I removed most of the post because I realized it was based on an assumption that may or may not be true. Better to let you make your case first, than for me to defend an assumption -- fair enough counselor?

BTW, this is starting to remind me of My Cousin Vinny, you being Vinnie telling me you won't kick my ass 'til I cough up the $200 ante.

But -- Bone didn't say Hitler, he didn't say Germany (or Italy), he didn't even say European theater. He said "before we got into WW2". Our entry into WWII, as far as I know, was against Japan in response to the attack on Pearl Harbor. His "japan" response then narrowed the parameters. I didn't respond because I felt that doing so would have led to a full-fledged hijacking of this thread rather than a diversion, and also because I'm no expert in regard to what liberals were saying/thinking pre-WWII regarding a response to Churchill's call for help. I will say that any comparison of our involvement in Europe during WWII and our unsolicited and essentially unilateral invasion of Iraq seems at least as ridiculous than the comparisons of Hilter to GW.

In the final analysis, it doesn't matter worth a hill of beans, because a few posts later, I was absolutely busted (and very nearly incarcerated).

Many, many people in the USA didn't want to get into another damned war in Europe. Most of our population at that time left Europe precisely because of these murderous tribal squabbles. What our nation learned from WWI was that Europeans were still insufferably self-righteous about killing each other by the tens of thosuands. We didn't want to get dragged down that damned road again. Nobody in the USA cared a fig about industrial eradication of the Jewish and other European minorities by the Nazis. That was their problem. We even turned away at least one boatload of Jewish refuges.

The people of the USA were much more alarmed by the Japanese militarists. They were directly threatening our Alaskan territory and also our colonies in the Pacific (Phillipines and others). The Japanese did not have a Goebbels soothing the American population with sweet words of brotherhood among whitey everywhere. Instead, we faced the, "yellow menace" from the east.

The Lend-Lease program was taking a beating in the press and Congress. Roosevelt barely go tthe draft extended over strong opposition. Naval expansion and general rearmament was predicated on the "yellow menace" not against the Nazis.

So when the Japanese attacked, without the European nicety of a formal declaration, the country was immediately mobilized without a second thought to kill the Japanese. All of them, everywhere.

Most of our Naval assets were in the Pacific with a few escort vessels and smaller combatant vessels in the Atlantic Fleet. The disaster at Pearl Harbor was mostly inflicted on WWI and older vessels. We did not have the fleet nor the public will to defend all of our Pacific assets. Our army in the Phillipines had been poorly trained, equiped and led before the war. The garrison duty among an unwelcoming population had been bad duty and Congress didn't help. So when the Japanese atacked the Phillipines, our army did not have the will or leadership or training or equipment for a protracted fight. Had they known of the brutality to come from the Japanese interrment, they probably would have resisted. So Roosevelt ordered Gen MacArthur out and gave the guy an undeserved Congressional Medal of Honor to make him shut-up.

Within two years, Adm Nimitz had the Japanese Navy fighting a totally defensive war. This, coupled with totally aggressive amphibious assaults by marines and incredible shipbuilding in the States, allowed Adm King to transfer assets to the Atlantic.