The Original September 11: President Franklin Roosevelt Announces the Pearl Harbor Unpleasantness, Updated Edition

By Barry Rubin

What if President Roosevelt announced what happened at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, by the standards of today’s official view of September 11? Imagine, if you will, you’re sitting in a rocking chair, listening through the static of a 1941 radio. It might have sounded like this:

My fellow Americans, this morning forces of the Imperial Army of a foreign country that I better not mention lest it stir up chauvinism and racism visited American facilities at Pearl Harbor in the Hawaiian Islands. They dropped by without warning.

On the other hand, however, we can understand their motives. OK, I’ll say the “J” word! After all, we have discriminated against Japanese people for decades. We can understand why the Japanese people feel a grievance against America.