Great article. Re. your last point - Napoleon was also defeated by Russia. Have we learned the lesson?

Re. Pearl Harbor - there was evidence that FDR wanted to get us into WWII and that he both knew the attack was coming (from intercepted Japanese radio communications) and may have actually provoked Japan, because close to 90% of Americans wanted to stay out of the war.

At the time, there were historians and writers who were making the case, but were blacklisted. Recently Stinnett has written The Day of Deceit.