Bizarre but my interest is piqued.

[Franco Darioli]

Thank you Tom for clarifying the situation. My mirror this morning looked a bit peculiar but now that I know that it was you I don't feel so bad. I hope you get better soon.

Denis, we appreciate your efforts but blue-vein flavored fruit leather has a limited appeal. Nevertheless niche market products attract higher margins…
Franco

[Dean F.]

Sorry, but I have to clear something up…

Isoroku Yamamoto knew that Japan would lose a war with the United States. He said so on several occasions before the war, and lost his cabinet position because of it. He studied at Harvard, and was a military attache to Washington D.C., and was very familiar with our industrial potential.

Yamamoto is often described as a "dove." He opposed the 1931 invasion of Manchuria, the war with China in 1937, and the Tripartite Pact with Germany and Italy. There was once even a plot on the part of Japanese militants to assassinate him.

He opposed war with the United States but once his country was committed (by Tojo and his flunkies) he felt that he had to fight to the best of his ability. And he fought very well.

That's why WE assassinated him.

He WAS the architect of the Pearl Harbor attack. (And we can debate the morality of that somewhere else…) But, the impression of him as a warmonger was wholly a product of allied propaganda. Tojo was the warmonger.

But, yes, Tojo did underestimate the American "public." One of his arguments for war was that Americans lacked any warrior spirit, and would decline to make war on Japan beyond a token effort. (Which is ridiculous, considering the warlike history of the United States to that point.)

[JAMES CALL]

Franco,
While out for a walk today it suddenly hit me. One of the main tenets of our techniques is multifunctionality. If one were to carry compressed O2 and compressed H2 in light weight fiberglass bottles, then given an ignition source, a backpacker would have both fuel and water. Now just to contain that pesky explosion.

[Franco Darioli]

Thank you James for turning your mind to that. Here some talk about saving 1 oz and I had to carry 1 gallon of water at times.
I have to congratulate you too on your personal multitasking, walking and thinking at the same time. Must try that one of these days.
If I get lost doing it I will blame you.
Franco

[Anonymous]

Franco,
Hope I didn't ruin your day. All I can say is that I'm working on it 24/7; Obviously with marginal results, so far, but hope springs eternal….

[Anonymous]

James,
I seem to recall someone getting the Darwin Award for their cutting edge work on that one in recent years.

[Anonymous]

"Sorry, but I have to clear something up…"
Wasn't that already pointed out in a previous post?

[Denis Hazlewood]

Franco,
I live in the San Francisco Area, and they'll buy anything that has a "green" label. And we're working with the OPsak folks to develop a skin that may be peeled off before chowing down. The used cover may then be used as a rain hat, to hit the multi-use crowd.

We're also experimenting with a Vegemite flavor to appeal to the Aussies and Pad Thai for the far east market. I particularly like the Curry flavor when peckish on the trail.

[Dean F.]

"Wasn't that already pointed out in a previous post?"

Sort of…

I think that I read your post too quickly. I thought that you were implying tht Yamamoto thought he could win with a "sucker punch". My understanding was that he did not. That is, he didn't think it could win, but it was the only possible course of action with ANY chance of success, once Japan was commited.

I dimly recall a quote of his to the effect that he claimed that he would control the Pacific for 6 months after Pearl Harbor, but that after that the tide would turn against Japan, and if peace was not made quickly Japan would be crushed.

Hmm.

So, maybe we did say the same thing, but with different emphasis. I was mainly trying to point out that Yamamoto wasn't the idiot who started a war with the United States. (That was Tojo.) After my too-quick read of your post, I had concluded that you thought Yamamoto believed he could win.

My bad.

Well, enough persnickety history lessons. I'm off.

[Anonymous]

Dean,
We are pretty much on the same page, methinks. From everything I have read, he was against starting a war with America for reasons you have stated but, being a professional soldier he was duty bound to come up with a strategy that offered the best possible chance of success, however remote. I could see him hoping that, once the fighting started, the "fog of war", might provide an exploitable opportunity against a vastly superior opponent.
What has always puzzled me was why they didn't send a second wave to invade the Hawaiian Islands, thereby effectively pushing us back to the mainland and buying time/battlespace to consolidate control of the South Pacific and possibly go after Australia. Perhaps then a negotiated end to hostilities that largely achieved Japan's objectives would
have been possible?
Well, enough hindsight/armchair quarterbacking that is probably wildly off the mark anyway.

[Author]

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