Yamamoto, genius?

Yes, and you will remember, that Nazi-Germany wasn't able to attack the United States seriously. The Kriegsmarine wished an unrestricted warfare against the US Navy and Hitler declared war.

After the victory in France and the near victory in the Soviet Union, he considered himself as the most powerful man in the world and the Wehrmacht as the most powerful army. And no one dares to declare war to him, so he declares war...

Hitler was very happy about the attack on Pearl Harbour and the japanese warfare against the Commonwealth. He heopes, that will keep the Brits busy for a long time.

 

It rather depends on how flexable one is in both timing and definiton of close. For instance the wiki page listed below contains the quote:
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Isoroku_Yamamoto

I think I've seen s a somewhat shorter version that is attributed to him in the immediate aftermath of PH.


Also relevant to this thread is:

Not sure that the interpretation is correct though. He could have been refering to torpedo attacks by light vessels as well especially given the time frame suggested.

 

Well some have used the term "similar". If you are talking horses a Shetland is hardly similar to a Percheron but compared to say a hippo or even a zebra they are. There were also a number of pre PH quotes or statements by him that were extremly pessimistic in regards to a Japanese victory in the event of a war with the US. But the "sleeping giant" quote is as one site stated "bogus".

 

Well first of all it's a translation as I doubt anyone really thinks he said that in English. We don't have the giant part but we do have the "sleeping" part. Futhermore "angered and outraged, he will soon launch a determined counterattack" could be IMO figurativly translated as "filled with a terrible resolve". So with a bit of poetic lisence we aren't too far off. Of course timing wise the above quote is in 42 I believe so it's hardly "right after" PH.

 

I've always presumed that people were rational about it and assumed it was a translation of something he said in Japanese. Certainly there was little reason for him to say anything like that in English. I guess I could be accused of both being rather presumptuous and giveing people too much credit. If charged with the above in all honesty I would have to plead guilty.

 

But was it influenced by a real quote (or translation there of) from Yamamoto. There is a queston of irrationality as well as I suspect some people do think he said that in English. From the English Japanese and Japanese English translations I've seen I would be surprised if there weren't at least some ambiguity. Indeed a lot of English statements are ambiguous even in English.

 

I certainly don't. There was a Japanese direcor as well wasn't there?

 

So a Japanese associate producer (I tend to mix up producers and directors). I certainly wouldn't be surprised if he was familiar with the quotes and if they were discussing dialog the general content would have a good chance of coming up even if the exact quote or translation there of didn't and if Fleisher was unfamiliar with them. Not something that would be easy to verify either way at this point.

 

Well he did seem to spend more time on making sure parts of it were historically accurate as opposed to certain recent films. My understanding was that the Japanese part was produced seperately from the American part and I assumed by the Japanese associtae producer so that would imply at least some coordination. I doubt there is enough information to draw conclusive conclusions one way or the other at this point and perhaps ever though.

 

It would be interesting to see how the unfilmed Kurosawa script treated the ending. IIRC, Kurosawa wrote some 27 drafts of the Tora Tora Tora script, which was never filmed, and eventually Kurosawa was fired from the film.