ABSTRACT
The United States (US) army's viewpoint concerning strategies in Europe and in the Pacific and the assessments and recommendations formulated by the War Plans Division during 1940 and 1941. The assessments made by US army planners following the defeat of France in June 1940 remained basically unchanged until the Pearl Harbor attack. Once a number of army officers had concluded that the threat of a German victory over Britain would far outweigh any danger to the US resulting from Japanese expansion, and that the defense of the Western Hemisphere was vital to the US national interest, the implications for the Pacific were clear. The army projected a picture of Japan's relations with her Axis allies that was much more dynamic, complex, and open to change than the one drawn by Henry, Jr Morgenthau and Henry L. Stimson, who perceived Japan as an inseparable part of the Axis coalition.
