The Ypsilanti Daily Press

Already the Pearl Harbor Committee of the Congress has established:
1. That Japan was hopeful that a fight could be avoided;
2. That Japan was prepared to fight as well as she ever could be;
3. That the United States was not at all ready for a war in the Pacific;
4. That the United States had broken the Japanese code and knew every important move that Japan made as early as November 5;
5. That the Japanese had set November 25 as the last date for peaceful negotiations and that the United States knew that date prior to the issuance of an ultimatum to Japan by Mr. Hull; (There need be no quarrel over the word "ultimatum": from the standpoint of a war between the two countries, it was so considered by at least one of them and was acted upon accordingly).
6. That the Japanese fleet sailed to be ready to fight but with instructions to be prepared to return to Japan if the negotiations in Washington succeeded.
It is further clear:
That the naval and army witnesses are unwilling and reluctant and assume the subterfuge of lacking information that they should not lack because of the positions they hold now or held at the time;
That the minority members are apparently digging more deeply into the situation than counsel for the committee;
That while Admiral Kimmel and General Short are, in fact, being tried in the court of public opinion, they remain silenced and are not permitted in any manner really to protect themselves which they could only do if their counsel were permitted to cross-examine the witnesses;
That obviously Pearl Harbor represents a bureaucratic failure and a conspiracy of suppression that will not succeed because every day these hearings are evoking keener interest;
That the Democrats regard it all as a "smear Roosevelt" effort on the part of the Republicans and are treating it as such, while the Republicans are using it to gain whatever kudos come from thoroughness and frankness.
It is unfortunate that the Democrats and Republicans did not get together on Pearl Harbor with the understanding that it would be a clear-cut investigation, designed to smear no one but to get at the exact facts. It may be true that Mr. Roosevelt's "face," Mr. Hull's reputation, Admiral Kimmel's ability and General Short's integrity are involved.
But these are as nothing compared with the life of a single American soldier or sailor who may have been killed because someone blundered. That life-let us call him "The Unknown American Boy" might have been that of your son or mine. We gave our children, for life or death, to our country in this war but we have a right to know that whatever happened to them was not the result of stupidity, chicanery, or obstinate blundering. We also need to know how they are to be safeguarded in the future. Perhaps as a result of a thorough, scientific investigation of this nature, the State, Army and Navy Department may be reorganized. One of the major defects of the administration of our government is the concentration of power in the hands of the President which really makes all other officers of government irresponsible, except to him.
The Pearl Harbor investigation may lead to a consideration of ministerial responsibility.
That is the human problem in this Pearl Harbor investigation. Saving the skin of some individual who for an historical moment strutted the stage of human events means less than nothing. For ultimately the truth, the entire truth, will out. It had better be done in an orderly, unbiased Congressional Investigation than by controversial autobiographies and the delving into the records half a century hence by scholarly historians to whom the current great names may have less than transient significance.
The Democrats and Republicans ought to stop growling at each other-and let the chips fall where they may.