Tracing a pattern in U.S. history

Robert Anton Wilson admired the revisionist historians of World War II who argued that Pearl Harbor was not simply an unprovoked, unexpected attack. (See the Lewis Shiner/Trajectories interview, Part Two.)

Related to that, I liked the posting Michael Johnson put up the other day. During a discussion on patterns and seeing patterns, he wrote:

I see 1898 and the US becoming an Imperial power starting with a
trumped-up bogus "attack." The Reichstag fire. Then, FDR or his people
knew about Pearl Harbor. Then, the Gulf of Tonkin. Then...9/11. Then:
Bush/Cheney lying and the press swallowing it: Iraq War.

But then: I know how EASY it is to see patterns.

I suspect I'm fooling myself somewhere along the line.

I SUSPECT. I don't "know."

Michael leaves out the Korean War; perhaps he hasn't researched it enough to offer an opinion. My only quibble with the events he does cite — not much of a quibble — is that I suspect the standard narrative that Al Qaeda carried out the attack as likely true but don't believe any of the attempts to tie it to Saddam Hussein.