in article , E. Barry Bruyea at
wrote on 6/13/04 3:26 AM:



Prior to Hitler's invasion of Poland, there wasn't a Western Country
that wasn't dealing with Germany. As to the Americans 'funding' the
Nazis, many American firms were dealing with Germany prior to
Germany's declaration of War on the U.S. What's your point?

talking about revising history.
Germany declared war on a lot of countries; the US wasn't one of them. In
fact the German Embassy in the US was bent on sabotaging the US campaign
aimed at getting the citizens to rally beside their Allies.
They had a great deal of popular support and shamelessly used their greatest
tool- Charles Lindhberg.
If you are referring to Roosevelt's speech when a warship was sunk by the
Germans, there is an interesting passage in 'the Rise and Fall of the Third
Reich', William Schirer who claims that the German Fleet were under orders
to attack Allied Shipping to disrupt war materials; Roosevelt ordered a ship
to follow a U-Boat and attempt to sink it. In defence the U-Boat opened
fire.
Up to that point no US ship was sunk, even though the Germans lost 6 of
their fleet- but it didn't stop Roosevelt from calling 'Now we see who fired
the first shot.'