mhaze may well know some of them
It was quick, drove up in 6 hours yesterday towing box trailer
Early morning to day drove to Nimbin, pickup and paid for my 4x4, trady sold it to me at a good price
Found time, not much, to meet a few of that mob, hearing I was coming they met me at my brothers place
Two fishing mates will be down mid spring, both have never eaten eels, will smoke a couple for them
Back on thread next post

In the book ‘1984’ there is an iconic passage that encapsulates what happened in regards to the Soviet propaganda after the new treaty….
At the start of the book, Oceania is at war with Eurasia. They have always been at war with Eurasia. That's the political consensus, and all historic documents agree. However, Winston Smith (the protagonist) remembers a time five years ago when Oceania was instead at war with Eastasia.
Then Ocean's allegiance switched back again. On the sixth day of Hate Week, as crowds gathered to denounce Eurasia, the Party switched enemies to Eastasia. In a particularly rousing speech against their enemy, the speaker was handed a slip of paper, and in mid-sentence, without pause, without change in content or tone, he changed the name of the enemy he was speaking against to Eastasia. Eurasia was now their dearest friends. Those holding banners denouncing their enemy were suddenly embarrassed to discover they had unaccountably written the wrong name, and quickly trampled and destroyed them.

This change meant work for Winston in the Ministry of Truth:

“Oceania was at war with Eastasia: Oceania had always been at war with Eastasia. A large part of the political literature of five years was now completely obsolete. Reports and records of all kinds, newspapers, books, pamphlets, films, sound-tracks, photographs--all had to be rectified at lightning speed. Although no directive was ever issued, it was known that the chiefs of the Department intended that within one week no reference to the war with Eurasia, or the alliance with Eastasia, should remain in existence anywhere.”

And so it was with regards to the Soviet propaganda and the ‘beliefs’ of all good communists around the western world who changed in an insistence from demanding that Hitler be confronted to demanding that Hitler be supported and his enemies confronted

"do you think America knew about Pearl Harbor"

It depends. They knew or guessed that Japan would launch a surprise attack somewhere. But they suspected it'd be in S-E Asia, probably the Philippines. They didn't expect (let alone know) it to occur in Hawaii.

mhaze such is my distrust of ww2 America I think it may have known
And let it happen so they could get the nation behind them, as it became increasingly understood they must take part
Yes [and the middle aged and young should under stand it] for a while communists, here too, did not support the war
Until Russia was attacked
America made big money out of that war
Few however can ignore the huge part Russia played in winning the war in Europe

There's really no evidence, merely innuendo, that the US was even remotely aware of the Japanese attack. Its always struck me a more than a little racist in that it assumes that those yellow men were incapable of outsmarting our guys.

We're really smart and were able to organise the Dolittle raids without them knowing but the reverse is unthinkable.

If Roosevelt wanted or needed to allow Pearl Harbor to occur to get into the war he did it in a strange way. He wanted to fight Hitler but Pearl Harbor didn't offer that path. Its was only Hitler declaring war on the USA that solved his problems.

Yes the USA come out the other side of the war having become the richest place on earth. But if that was the goal, they would have been so much better-off staying neutral and selling to all comers.

"or a while communists, here too, did not support the war
Until Russia was attacked"

It was more than not support. For example the communist waterside workers actively sabotaged the war effort and put lives of servicemen at risk right up to June 1941.

Dear mhaze,

I'm really at a loss as to what you are trying to achieve with this topic. At first I thought you were trying to present yourself as an historian but from the way you write about the past it is very obvious that you are definitely no historian. I find you creation science types to be all a bit odd! I think we need to put you with Cardinal Pell in the old confessional box (or the sin bin as the boys in the Vatican probably call it - nudge, nudge, wink, wink, know what I mean). Just make sure you dress for the occasion.