One of the most deeply disturbing things about Ms Malkin’s perpetration of a revisionist fraud is the way in which so many TV and radio hosts were unable to penetrate the fog of her flimsy case to see that it was based on an absurdity. Ms Malkin has inadvertantly done the nation a good service in revealing the astonishing level of military, historical and even geographical ignorance on the part of the national and local media.
I didn’t bother writing about Malkin’s book at first because it was so obviously ridiculous that I assumed the first person to ask her questions about it would explode her case like one of Terry Pratchett’s swamp dragons. But I realized that people were actually taking her case seriously when I appeared on the Northern Alliance Radio Show – yo Midwest – a week before her and one of the guys halfheartedly defended her case for invasion vis-a-vis Overlord because of the length of the California coast. (The problem is that the French coast is 2.4 times longer than the entire American West Coast, and all of it is a LOT closer.)
The Matthews-Malkin episode on Hardball was bizarre, because had Matthews not been so rude and focused on unfairly attacking her over something she didn’t say, he could have politely destroyed her over what she did write. But when you’re busy carrying water for John Kerry, I suppose it’s hard to pay attention to other, lesser matters.
I have nothing against Michelle Malkin, except for the fact that she has no freaking clue what she’s talking about. Well, I also regard her defense of internment as treason against the human race, and her claims of innocence in answer to charges of advocating the internment of Arab-Americans to be more than a little disingenuous. (Yes, I know she said she wasn’t advocating it, but then what’s the point of the book? And the cover? Sometimes, Virginia, people say things that aren’t true.)
So, on to the Internet sources which you can access yourself. Imperial Japanese Navy. Yamamoto’s invasion OOB. US naval production. Anzio. Anzio map that gives a pretty clear picture of the situation. Anzio ships. Overlord logistics – very useful. On the air umbrella issue. WWII armaments production. The economic data is compiled from a variety of sources and calculated independently.
If you’d like to check out a very different attack on Malkin’s case for internment, Eric Muller was the first to start picking it apart.
As for the mini-interview with the former member of the Joint Chiefs that concluded the column, well, I happen to know a few of them. And naturally, I rang up my favorite one, just as the Vox Popolisti assumed.
UPDATE: As there appear to be some recalcitrant “hindsight” theorists who don’t appear to be able to either reason their way out of a paper bag or bother to look at the links provided here, this should help spell things out. “In April [1942], the British accepted an American plan for a buildup of U.S. forces in the United Kingdom in preparation for a future return to the Continent. This plan, Operation BOLERO, included construction of airfields from which to launch the bombing offensive, a small contingent of ground troops, and a force of 750,000 to participate in a cross-Channel attack in early 1943. SOS, ETOUSA would participate in the BOLERO planning process and be the U.S. agent to carry out the plans for the reception and accommodation of U.S. forces. By early May, detailed planning was underway.”
So, the hindsight theory rests on the incredible notion that in the time between February 19, 142 and sometime prior to April 1942, US military strategists discovered the concept of logistics and found that 750,000 men would be required for a continental invasion. It also relies on the false premise that US planners did not know Japan’s transport capability, as a glance at the 1941 edition of Janes Fighting Ships should suffice to disprove. Ms Malkin can even buy a copy of the 1942 edition here for £30.