10/11/2021

Historians Simms (Europe) and Laderman (Sharing the Burden) focus in this fine-grained if plodding chronicle on the four days between the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and Nazi Germany’s declaration of war against the U.S. They contend that America’s lend-lease program, which supplied allied countries with food, oil, and weaponry, brought the country to the edge of outright conflict, despite public sentiment in favor of isolationism, and helped provoke the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor. Following the attack, the public was eager to declare war on Japan, but President Roosevelt faced an uphill battle in convincing people to enter another European war. According to the authors, Hitler, who believed that the Japanese attack would put an end to the lend-lease supplies fueling the British and Russian war efforts and weaken the American military, made a grave strategic blunder in declaring war on the U.S. on Dec. 11, 1941. In so doing, he “turn two potentially separate conflicts into a truly world war.” Though Simms and Laderman take a fresh angle on the buildup to WWII, they overstuff the story with extraneous details and deep dives into diplomatic maneuverings. This one is best suited to completists. (Nov.)

[An] absorbing new book… The greatest strength of Simms and Laderman’s book is its success in accomplishing something supremely difficult: It reminds us how contingent even the most significant historical events can be, how many other possibilities lurked beyond the familiar ones that actually happened – and how even the greatest leaders often have only a shaky grasp of what is happening… Simms and Laderman give us a visceral sense of these events as they unfolded, in real time, with historical actors not always quite sure what was happening – a dimension of history that is both crucial and fiendishly difficult to recover.”
 —New York Times Book Review

“An engaging and insightful account of the forces that shaped Hitler’s fateful decision.”—Wall Street Journal

“[A] well-written and highly original study[.]”—The Times (UK)

"An extraordinary reconstruction of the fateful week following Pearl Harbor."—Adam Tooze, The Guardian

“[A] crisp and pacey analysis.” —David Reynolds, The New Statesman

“In a detailed reconstruction of the events of those few days, illuminating the importance of confusion, chance, and choice in the stream of history, Simms and Laderman explain that Hitler assumed that war with the United States was inevitable…”—Foreign Affairs

“In this fascinating book, which combines detailed analysis with a page turning account of the day by day shifts in Berlin, Washington, London and Tokyo, the story of that extraordinary and, as it turned out, fatal decision by Hitler – the ‘American gamble’ of the title – is laid out in detail. … [a] stimulating book.”—Rana Mitter, Literary Review

"A fast‑moving, even gripping story that informs as well as enlightens."—New York Journal of Books

"Unquestionably one of the most compelling and eye-opening monographs on World War II in recent memory.”—American History

"Brendan Simms and Charlie Laderman's collaborative work is as gripping as it is well researched.... Simms and Laderman have created a truly thought provoking book."—Aspects of History

“A thoughtful chronology… Hitler’s American Gamble offers fine, well-researched insights into the psyches of leaders who made decisions that changed the course of world history… For readers seeking a deeper understanding of the realpolitik that drove Germany to war against America, Hitler’s American Gamble offers an outstanding narrative.”  —World War II Magazine

"[A]n extraordinary reconstruction of the fateful week following Pearl Harbor."—Adam Tooze, The Guardian

“[A] fresh angle on the buildup to WWII.”—Publishers Weekly

“The authors effectively prove their thesis in a key volume for World War II history collections.”—Library Journal (Starred Review)

“A meticulous historical account of 'five momentous days' at the beginning of World War II…. An excellent argument that America’s WWII began on Dec. 11, 1941.”—Kirkus

"The pay off from Simms and Laderman’s meticulous blow by blow account is to sharpen our sense of how vertiginously contingent the escalation to global war seemed in the second week of December 1941, even as it was happening."
 —Adam Tooze, Chartbook

"Simms and Laderman...chart these historic developments with an amalgam of skill, knowledge and style."—Sheldon Kirshner, Times of Israel

“This is history at its scintillating best. The fate of the world tilted on the decisions made in those few days—hours even—in December 1941, and Simms and Laderman brilliantly strip away the many myths surrounding them in this hard-hitting, revelatory, and superbly researched work.”
 —Andrew Roberts, author of Churchill: Walking with Destiny

“Brendan Simms and Charlie Laderman show how Hitler’s mad decision to declare war on the United States on December 11, 1941 proved suicidal for the Axis, ensured a global catastrophe, and would radically redefine how World War II would end. And yet was Hitler really as unhinged and reckless as it has seemed? Warring with America was predictably consistent with the Nazi’s Final Solution ideology. It was consistent with Germany’s allegiance with Japan and the idea of Americans and British suddenly bogged down in a  new two-front war—and at the time seen as far more strategically advantageous than allowing a neutral America to continue to supply Germany’s enemies, the British Empire and Soviet Union. Hitler’s American Gamble is revisionist, but in the best sense of sound research, rare originality, singular analysis, and riveting prose.”
 —Victor Davis Hanson, the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, author of The Second World Wars

“All too often, historians narrate the past as if the end were preordained at the beginning. But history is not a novel or a play; it is more like a big game, in which the difference between victory and defeat depends on split'second decisions and hair’s breadths. In Hitler’s American Gamble, Brendan Simms and Charlie Laderman grippingly retell the story of five days that not only shook but also shaped the world—the days between the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor (December 7, 1941) and Hitler’s declaration of war on the United States (December 11). All students of both World War II and the Holocaust will learn, as I did, from their careful use of neglected documents and their attention to ‘counterfactuals’ that, for contemporaries, were at least as likely as what actually happened.”
 —Niall Ferguson, Milbank Family Senior Fellow, the Hoover Institution, and author of The War of the World

“The greatest grand strategic blunder of all time may well have been Nazi Germany’s declarations of war, within six months in 1941, on both the Soviet Union and the United States. ‘Don’t try this at home,’ I’ve always told my students, but I’ve never been able to explain to them why Hitler chose to. Brendan Simms and Charlie Laderman have now come to the rescue with a rare achievement: a microhistory that’s global in scope. Filled with fresh insights, excitingly written, and meticulously documented, Hitler’s American Gamble is sure to become an instant classic.”
 —John Lewis Gaddis, Yale University

“Hitler’s American Gamble is a thrilling and authoritative study of five crucial days in the Second World War: December 7–11, 1941. Using a wide array of hitherto-neglected sources and their own deep understanding of the period, Laderman and Simms provide an altogether outstanding account of what transpired between the Pearl Harbor attack and Hitler’s declaration of war against the United States. A gripping tale, expertly told.”
 —Fredrik Logevall, author of Embers of War

“This outstanding book by two of the best historians around revolutionized what I thought I knew about strategy by the Axis powers and how it shaped post-war order. Written like a thriller, it pulls you along breathlessly as Hitler makes his fateful decision.”
 —Dr. Kori Schake, senior fellow and director of foreign and defense policy studies, American Enterprise Institute

★ 11/01/2021

Conventional wisdom holds that once the Japanese Empire bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941, American entry into World War II was inevitable. However, in the five days between the Pearl Harbor attack and Hitler's declaration of war on the U.S., there was much uncertainty. Simms (history of international relations, Univ. of Cambridge; Europe and Hitler) and Laderman (international history, King's Coll., London; Sharing the Burden) argue that the United States might not have entered the war in the immediate aftermath of Pearl Harbor, had Hitler not declared war on the nation on December 11, 1941 (thus keeping Germany's promise to Japan). Simms and Laderman reason that the nation was still in shock at the attack; American isolationist sentiment was still strong, at least as regarded Europe; and, with congressional backing uncertain, FDR had been unwilling to ask Congress for a declaration of war against Italy and Germany. The authors provide an hour-by-hour account of December 7 to December 12, 1941, including the events of the war in Europe, and delve into American public sentiment and the sentiment of the press to illustrate the uncertainty that still existed between December 7 and 12. VERDICT The authors effectively prove their thesis in a key volume for World War II history collections.—Michael Farrell, Reformed Theological Seminary, Orlando, FL

2021-08-26
A meticulous historical account of “five momentous days” at the beginning of World War II.

Congress declared war on Japan the day after the Dec. 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor, but it didn’t declare war on Germany. That was Hitler’s idea, and he declared war on the U.S. on Dec. 11. Most historians argue that this was a terrible decision, but Hitler showed no doubt. Simms and Laderman deliver an insightful account of those five days. As the authors note, few considered Japan a serious military threat, and most experts believed that it had bombed Pearl Harbor at Hitler’s behest. Franklin Roosevelt and Allied leaders continued to consider Germany the major threat. Yet when Roosevelt’s Cabinet met and Secretary of War Henry Stimson urged a declaration of war against Germany, no one supported him, and Roosevelt did not mention Germany in his famous “day of infamy” speech. Always attuned to public opinion, he deferred to powerful opposition to another European war, as embodied by the America First Committee, which had grumpily agreed to fight only Japan. Many histories report that Churchill “slept the sleep of the saved and thankful” after hearing the news of Pearl Harbor. That’s hindsight, write Simms and Laderman, noting how he documented that sentiment later. At the time in Britain, “opinion was split on whether the new Pacific war was good or bad news.” Many, Churchill included, worried that the U.S. would focus on Japan and leave Britain to face Hitler alone—a realistic concern given that the U.S. had immediately suspended its massive lend-lease program. Hitler’s declaration of war solved the problem, and the authors conclude that he did not declare war in ignorance of America’s immense power but because of it. “In late 1941,” they write, “the Führer saw a narrow window of opportunity not to defeat the United States outright but to create a self-sufficient Axis bloc strong enough to withstand it. Otherwise he risked gradual strangulation.”

An excellent argument that America’s WWII began on Dec. 11, 1941.