essay on the attack of pearl harbor

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Course: US history   >   Unit 7

• Beginning of World War II
• 1940 - Axis gains momentum in World War II
• 1941 Axis momentum accelerates in WW2

Pearl Harbor

• FDR and World War II
• Japanese internment
• American women and World War II
• 1942 Tide turning in World War II in Europe
• World War II in the Pacific in 1942
• 1943 Axis losing in Europe
• American progress in the Pacific in 1944
• 1944 - Allies advance further in Europe
• 1945 - End of World War II
• The Manhattan Project and the atomic bomb
• The United Nations
• The Second World War
• Shaping American national identity from 1890 to 1945

• On the morning of December 7, 1941, Japan attacked the US naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
• The surprise attack by some 350 Japanese aircraft sunk or badly damaged eighteen US naval vessels, including eight battleships, destroyed or damaged 300 US aircraft, and killed 2,403 men.
• Across the nation, Americans were stunned, shocked, and angered. The attack turned US public opinion in favor of entering the Second World War . The United States declared war on Japan on December 8, 1941.
• Japan’s allies, Germany and Italy, declared war on the United States on December 11. The United States responded in kind, and therefore entered World War II.

The Pearl Harbor attack

Motive for the attack, forewarnings about the attack, what do you think.

• On the attack at Pearl Harbor and the events surrounding it, see David M. Kennedy, Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929-1945 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 500-526; Gordon W. Prange, At Dawn We Slept: The Untold Story of Pearl Harbor (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1981), 499-504.
• Kennedy, Freedom from Fear , 521-522.
• Franklin D. Roosevelt, “ Address to Congress Requesting a Declaration of War with Japan December 8, 1941 ." Courtesy the American Presidency Project.
• Kennedy, Freedom from Fear , 512.
• See James L. McClain, Japan: A Modern History (New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2001), 470.
• Kennedy, Freedom from Fear , 519.
• Kennedy, Freedom from Fear , 517, 525.

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Pearl Harbor

Pearl Harbor was the site of the unprovoked aerial attack on the United States by Japan on December 7, 1941. Before the attack, many Americans were reluctant to become involved in the war in Europe. This all changed when the United States declared war on Japan, bringing the country into World War II.

Pearl Harbor was the most important American naval base in the Pacific and home to the US Pacific Fleet. In strategic terms, the Japanese attack failed. Most of the US fleet and aircraft carriers were not present at the time of the attack.

The Japanese rationalized the attack as retribution for the military and economic support from the US to the Chinese Republic, and for the economic sanctions against Japan that shortly followed. In summer-fall 1941, the United States froze Japanese assets and placed an embargo on oil exports to Japan.

The attack on Pearl Harbor had impacts far beyond the United States. Hitler applauded the attack and declared war on the United States—a maneuver historians believe was his greatest error in judgment.

• World War II
• Pacific theater
• United States
• military campaigns

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When did pearl harbor happen.

Pearl Harbor was, and still is, the most important American naval base in the Pacific and home to the US Pacific Fleet. It is located on the Hawaiian island of Oahu.

Background: Why did the Attack on Pearl Harbor Happen?

Japanese territorial   expansion in the 1930s.

Since the 1930s, the Japanese government had increasingly come under the influence of right-wing military leaders seeking to create a larger Japanese empire on the Pacific Rim. The United States, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and the Republic of China, represented significant obstacles to this expansion.

Japanese aggression began with the seizure of Manchuria from China in September 1931. The following year, this conquered territory was transformed into a Japanese puppet state, Manchukuo (1932–1945), under the nominal leadership of the last emperor of China, Pu Yi. The League of Nations carried out an investigation of the incident and concluded that Japan had, without a declaration of war, forcibly seized and occupied a large section of Chinese territory. It urged Japanese troops to withdraw from the occupied lands. In response, Japan withdrew from the League of Nations in March 1933. Neither the League of Nations nor the United States recognized the allegedly independent state.

Japan Builds up its Military and Joins the Axis Powers

In the mid-1930s, the Japanese military began to exert more authority in foreign and domestic policy. Japan withdrew from participation in international naval conferences that had limited the size of the country's fleet. Naval construction dramatically increased so that the Japanese possessed the third largest navy in the world by 1941. In the Pacific, the Japanese navy surpassed the combined power of the British and American fleets. The army rapidly expanded as well, doubling in size between 1936 and 1941.

During this time, Japan was also drawing closer to Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy . In November 1936, Japan signed the Anti-Comintern Pact. Then in September 1940, Germany, Italy, and Japan signed the Tripartite Pact. This pact formalized the alliance between the three countries. They were subsequently referred to as the Axis powers.

In July 1937 fighting erupted between Japanese and Chinese forces and escalated into a full-fledged war that lasted until 1945.

The United States Responds to Japanese Expansion

Japanese territorial aggression triggered widespread condemnation in the United States and elsewhere. On October 5, 1937, President Franklin D. Roosevelt warned that the “very foundations of civilization” were being “seriously threatened.” Although he did not single out any particular nations, the warning aimed to raise American concerns about Japanese actions in China and German and Italian intervention in the Spanish Civil War. A “quarantine” was necessary to halt the spread of the “epidemic of world lawlessness.” Roosevelt feared that Japanese expansionism would not end in China, but spread to Hong Kong, Indochina, and the Philippines, representing a threat to the United States.

Although the League of Nations condemned Japan's actions in China, diplomatic efforts aimed at halting the fighting failed. Roosevelt considered a joint Anglo-American naval blockade of Japan, particularly in December 1937 after Japanese aircraft attacked and sank several American vessels, including the patrol boat, the USS Panay , as well as some British ships in China. Isolationism at home and appeasement abroad put an end to such efforts.

Following the outbreak of war on the European continent, Japan took advantage of the situation to occupy territory in Asia. After France's defeat by Nazi Germany, the Imperial Japanese government pressured the Vichy regime into cutting off military supplies to China from Indochina and then permitting the Japanese military to house its troops there. In fall 1940, the US government offered to provide the embattled Chinese republic with aircraft and loans, which were then followed by economic sanctions against Japan that banned the export of aviation gasoline and scrap metals, including iron and steel. In summer-fall 1941, the United States froze Japanese assets and placed an embargo on oil exports to Japan.

Planning for the Attack on Pearl Harbor

As US policy and sanctions became more aggressive, Japanese planners determined to attack American positions in the Pacific: specifically, the Philippines, Guam and Wake Islands, and the Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor.

The dilemma faced by Japanese planners was how to counter the greater American naval power and economic potential.

The plan that emerged called for a surprise attack that would destroy the entire US Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor, while at the same time eliminating the other US forward positions. The strategic goal was to so cripple US naval power in the Pacific that the United States would be unable to interfere with Japanese conquests.

Japanese planners hoped that by the time the United States had recovered and rearmed it would face an imposing defensive perimeter that it would be unable or unwilling to defeat. A large naval strike force set sail from Japan operating under strict radio silence and avoiding shipping lanes to escape detection.

What Day and Time Did the Attack on Pearl Harbor Take Place?

[caption=e8f12946-a728-4138-bc67-53ebf4cd188a] - [credit=e8f12946-a728-4138-bc67-53ebf4cd188a]

At 7:55 am on December 7, 1941, the first of two waves of Japanese naval aircraft launched from six aircraft carriers attacked Pearl Harbor, catching US forces completely by surprise. Two thousand four hundred US sailors and soldiers were killed and 1,200 wounded. Well over half of the military aircraft were damaged or destroyed, almost all on the ground.

Of the US battleships present, all were hit and two, the Arizona and Oklahoma completely destroyed. Japanese air commanders requested a third strike, but Admiral Nagumo, in charge of the attacking force declined, preferring to avoid greater losses and presuming that the raid had been a success.

What were the Immediate Outcomes of the Attack on Pearl Harbor?

On its face, the attack on Pearl Harbor may indeed have seemed a brilliant strike. The US Pacific Fleet was effectively eliminated as an offensive force and would be unable to intervene in Japanese expansion for the foreseeable future. In addition, the attack had only cost 29 Japanese planes.

However, on closer inspection and in strategic terms, the assault was a failure for a number of reasons. First, the most important ships in the US fleet, the aircraft carriers, were away on maneuvers and not present during the attack. Second, US oil supplies, submarine fleet, and repair facilities remained undamaged. Third, while the all-important battleships had sustained heavy damage, all but two were eventually refloated, repaired, and returned to service. And finally, the attack galvanized a previously disinterested US public in support of the war.

Global Repercussions

The attack on Pearl Harbor had impacts far beyond Hawaii and the United States. Adolf Hitler applauded the attack and declared war on the United States even though the United States had only declared war against Japan. Before Pearl Harbor, many Americans maintained an isolationist stance and were reluctant to become involved in the war in Europe.

Hitler's declaration of war on the United States is seen by many historians as one of his greatest errors in judgment. In less than a year, American ground troops would be fighting German forces in North Africa. In addition, American materiel support of Nazi Germany's primary enemy, the Soviet Union, could proceed at full speed.

Pearl Harbor even had a small but identifiable impact on the Holocaust . The Wannsee Conference , whose goal was to coordinate the organizations responsible for the execution of the Final Solution, had originally been scheduled for 8 December. In light of the events of early December 1941, Reinhard Heydrich was forced to reschedule the meeting for 20 January 1942.

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Invasion of the soviet union, june 1941.

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The Eastern Front: The German War against the Soviet Union

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Critical thinking questions.

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• Did the course of the war in the Pacific affect the possibility of rescue of the endangered Jews by the Allies and other nations?
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Skip to Main Content of WWII

The path to pearl harbor.

On December 7, 1941, Japan staged a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, decimating the US Pacific Fleet. When Germany and Italy declared war on the United States days later, America found itself in a global war. 

Top Image: Propaganda poster developed by the Office of War Information following the attack on Pearl Harbor. (Image: Library of Congress, LC-USZC4-1663.)

The Roots of the Conflict

While Japan’s deadly assault on Pearl Harbor stunned Americans, its roots stretched back more than four decades. As Japan industrialized during the late 19th century, it sought to imitate Western countries such as the United States, which had established colonies in Asia and the Pacific to secure natural resources and markets for their goods. Japan’s process of imperial expansion, however, put it on a collision course with the United States, particularly in relation to China.   To a certain extent, the conflict between the United States and Japan stemmed from their competing interests in Chinese markets and Asian natural resources. While the United States and Japan jockeyed peaceably for influence in eastern Asia for many years, the situation changed in 1931. That year Japan took its first step toward building a Japanese empire in eastern Asia by invading Manchuria, a fertile, resource-rich province in northern China. Japan installed a puppet government in Manchuria, renaming it Manchukuo. But the United States refused to recognize the new regime or any other forced upon China under the Stimson Doctrine, named after Secretary of State and future Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson. 

The ineffectual Stimson Doctrine guided US policy in Asia for the next decade. On the one hand, the doctrine took a principled stand in support of Chinese sovereignty and against an increasingly militaristic Japanese regime. On the other hand, however, it failed to bolster that stand with either material consequences for Japan or meaningful support for China. In fact, US companies continued to supply Japan with the steel and petroleum it needed for its fight against China long after the conflict between the countries escalated into a full-scale war in 1937. But a powerful isolationist movement in the United States countered that the nation had no business at all in the international conflicts developing around the world. Even the Japanese military’s murder of between 100,000 and 200,000 helpless Chinese military prisoners and civilians and the rape of tens of thousands of Chinese women during the 1937 Rape of Nanking failed to immediately shift US policy.   The strong isolationist movement also influenced the initial US approach to the war in Europe, where by the end of 1940 Nazi Germany controlled most of France, Central Europe, Scandinavia, and North Africa, and severely threatened Great Britain. Prioritizing the war in Europe over Japan’s invasion of China, the United States allowed the sale of military supplies to Great Britain beginning in 1939. But neutrality laws and isolationist sentiment severely limited the extent of that aid prior to 1941. 

“Each [nation] stepped through a series of escalating moves that provoked but failed to restrain the other, all the while lifting the level of confrontation to ever-riskier heights.”

David M. Kennedy, PhD

The war in Europe had another significant impact on the war in the Pacific because Germany’s military successes unsettled the other European nations’ Asian colonies. As Japan seized the opportunity to become the dominant imperial power in Asia, United States-Japan relations soured. As historian David M. Kennedy, PhD, explained, “Each [nation] stepped through a series of escalating moves that provoked but failed to restrain the other, all the while lifting the level of confrontation to ever-riskier heights.”

The Impending Crisis

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt made one of those escalating moves in July 1940 when he cut off shipments of scrap iron, steel, and aviation fuel to Japan even as he allowed American oil to continue flowing to the empire. Japan responded by entering resource-rich French Indochina, with permission from the government of Nazi-occupied France, and by cementing its alliance with Germany and Italy as a member of the Axis. In July 1941, Japan then moved into southern Indochina in preparation for an attack against both British Malaya, a source for rice, rubber, and tin, and the oil-rich Dutch East Indies. This prompted Roosevelt to freeze all Japanese assets in the United States on July 26, 1941, which effectively cut off Japan’s access to US oil.

That move pushed Japan to secretly ready its “Southern Operation,” a massive military attack that would target Great Britain’s large naval facility in Singapore and American installations in the Philippines and at Pearl Harbor, thus clearing a path for the conquest of the Dutch East Indies. While diplomatic talks continued between the United States and Japan, neither side budged. Japan refused to cede any of its newly acquired territory, and the United States insisted that Japan immediately withdraw its troops from China and Indochina. 

On November 26, 1941, as US officials presented the Japanese with a 10-point statement reiterating their long-standing position, the Japanese Imperial Navy ordered an armada that included 414 planes aboard six aircraft carriers to set to sea. Following a plan devised by Admiral Yamamoto Isoroku, who had earlier studied at Harvard and served as Japan’s naval attaché in Washington, DC, the flotilla aimed to destroy the US Pacific Fleet base at Pearl Harbor. 

To catch the Americans by surprise, the ships maintained strict radio silence throughout their 3,500- mile trek from Hitokappu Bay to a predetermined launch sector 230 miles north of the Hawaiian island of Oahu. At 6:00 a.m. on Sunday, December 7, a first wave of Japanese planes lifted off from the carriers, followed by a second wave an hour later. Led by Captain Mitsuo Fuchida, the pilots spotted land and assumed their attack positions around 7:30 a.m. Twenty-three minutes later, with his bomber perched above the unsuspecting American ships moored in pairs along Pearl Harbor’s “Battleship Row,” Fuchida broke radio silence to shout, “Tora! Tora! Tora!” (Tiger! Tiger! Tiger!)—the coded message informing the Japanese fleet that they had caught the Americans by surprise.  

The USS Arizona in flames following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941. Image: Library of Congress: LC-USZ62-104778.

For nearly two hours, Japanese firepower rained down upon American ships and servicemen. While the attack inflicted significant destruction, the fact that Japan failed to destroy American repair shops and fuel-oil tanks mitigated the damage. Even more significantly, no American aircraft carriers were at Pearl Harbor that day. The Japanese, however, immediately followed their Pearl Harbor assault with attacks against US and British bases in the Philippines, Guam, Midway Island, Wake Island, Malaya, and Hong Kong. Within days, the Japanese were masters of the Pacific. 

In Washington, a decrypted message had alerted officials that an attack was imminent moments before Fuchida’s planes took to the skies. But a communications delay prevented a warning from reaching Pearl Harbor in time. The Americans missed another opportunity when an officer discounted a report from an Oahu-based radar operator that a large number of planes were headed their way. 

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At the White House, Roosevelt learned of the attack as he was finishing lunch and preparing to tend to his stamp collection. He spent the remainder of the afternoon receiving updates and writing the address he intended to deliver to Congress the following day asking for a declaration of war against Japan. As he drafted and redrafted the speech, Roosevelt focused on rallying the nation behind a war many had hoped to avoid.

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Pearl Harbor Attack Essay

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Japan had little chance of victory—so why did it attack Pearl Harbor?

Long-simmering tensions with the U.S. over expansion in Asia came to a head on December 7, 1941.

“Air raid on Pearl Harbor. This is no drill.” When that urgent message from Honolulu reached Washington, D.C., on December 7, 1941, even those who anticipated conflict with Japan were stunned by the attack on the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor, nearly 4,000 miles from Tokyo. “My God, this can’t be true!” said Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox.

Japan’s leaders had hatched a daring plan to let the United States know who was in control of the Pacific. The surprise attack had been in the works for months before the first bombs fell.

( 80 years after Pearl Harbor, here's how the attack changed history. )

Simmering tensions

Japan had begun an imperial expansion in the late 19th century, seeking out natural resources for the island nation as well as buffer states to protect it. It defeated China in the 1890s to gain control of Korea and triumphed over Russia in the 1900s to seize the Liaodong Peninsula and parts of Manchuria for itself.

In the early 20th century, Japan’s imperial efforts continued unabated as it took more and more territory from China, but by the mid-1930s relations between Japan and the United States had become strained. Through diplomacy and sanctions, the U.S. was trying to prevent Japan from becoming a great imperial power—a stance that seemed somewhat hypocritical. Why, Japan’s leaders asked, should their nation abandon expansion at the insistence of Americans who had colonized Hawaii and occupied the Philippines? If the price for peace was to grovel and pull back, then they would fight.

( See maps of nine key moments that defined WWII. )

First strike

Adm. Isoroku Yamamoto, the Japanese Marshal Admiral of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) and the commander-in-chief of the Combined Fleet during World War II , had lived in the United States when studying at Harvard University and during later tours of duty in the 1920s. Yamamoto understood that provoking the United States with a direct attack could have deadly consequences for he had seen the nation’s vast natural resources and industrial capacity. He warned that to “fight the United States is like fighting the whole world.”

For Hungry Minds

The only hope, Yamamoto surmised, was to smash the Pacific Fleet in Pearl Harbor before the U.S. Navy had a chance to fully mobilize. If Japan did not rout the Pacific Fleet and prevent Americans from bringing their strength to bear, Japan would be in a world of trouble. Only a quick, powerful, pre-emptive strike could hobble the U.S. in the Pacific.

Japan authorized war preparations on July 2, 1941. Planning for the attack on Pearl Harbor began.

( The women codebreakers of World War II helped end the war. )

No turning back

On November 26, 1941, Yamamoto launched six big aircraft carriers with more than 400 warplanes of the First Air Fleet on their decks, escorted by battleships, cruisers, destroyers, and submarines. To avoid detection, the force followed a little-traveled, northerly route to Hawaii. Before daybreak on December 7, the Japanese carriers reached the assigned position a few hundred miles north of Honolulu.

( The Nisei soldiers who fought WWII enemies abroad—and were seen as enemies back home. )

War rituals

Up before daybreak on December 7, Japanese naval aviators aboard the aircraft carriers commanded by Vice Adm. Nagumo sat down to a ceremonial breakfast of rice and red beans and took sips of sake before setting out to attack the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. They did not have to wait until they achieved victory to honor their mission. These men believed that one who entered battle for his country and its exalted emperor was blessed, whether he prevailed or perished. Cmdr. Mitsuo Fuchida, cho­sen to lead the attack, spoke for many when he recalled his feelings that morning. “Who could be luckier than I?” he asked. In risking his life for what he cherished, he wrote, “I fulfilled my duty as a warrior.”

The rising sun

As dawn glimmered around 6 a.m., the carriers turned into the wind to launch the first wave of 183 fighters, bombers, and torpedo planes, even as heavy seas made conditions hazardous. “The carriers were rolling considerably, pitching and yaw­ing,” recalled a pilot who was waiting to take off with the second wave of attackers an hour later.

When planes left the flight deck, they sank out of sight before bobbing up above the clouds. Fuchida, who worried that cloud cover would obscure their target, was reassured when his radio picked up Honolulu’s weather forecast, promising clear skies. Residents there, waking to what looked like another placid Sunday in para­dise, had less than two hours of peace left.

( How the advent of nuclear weapons changed the course of history. )

Missed warnings

This is no drill!

At 8 a.m. sharp, as a band on the deck of the U.S.S. Nevada   began playing the national anthem for the raising of their flag, a squadron of 40 Japanese torpedo planes bore down on the har­bor. One hit the battleship U.S.S. Oklahoma , docked near the Nevada , whose band members scrambled for cover. Within moments, a torpedo struck the Nevada   explosively.

The damage done by torpedoes was compounded by bombs dropped at high levels that crashed through the decks of warships before detonating. Around 8:20 a.m., a bomb penetrated the forward magazine of the battleship U.S.S. Arizona   where gun­powder was stored, triggering a volcanic blast that killed hundreds of men instantaneously. Of the nearly 1,400 men aboard the Arizona   that morning, fewer than 300 survived.

Bloody Sunday

Around 9 a.m., the second wave of warplanes swooped in and wreaked further havoc. By the time the last attackers departed around 9:45 a.m., all eight bat­tleships and 11 other warships had gone down or been severely damaged. Most eventually would be repaired, but the Arizona   and Oklahoma   were ruined and those on board accounted for nearly three-fourths of the Navy’s casu­alties on this bloody Sunday.

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Waking the sleeping enemy

When Fuchida and his airmen returned to their carri­ers, the elation they felt at catching their foes off-guard drained away. For all the harm done at Pearl Harbor, the Pacific Fleet had not been incapacitated. The oil depots and repair yards on which it depended had suffered little damage.

Admiral Yamamoto, who later learned of the results, stated there was no glory in mauling a “sleeping enemy” who was now wide awake and capable of striking back. He knew the tide might turn against him if he did not complete the task his fleet left unfinished on December 7.

( The U.S. forced them into internment camps. Here’s how Japanese Americans started over. )

‘A date which will live in infamy’

Within hours of the Pearl Harbor attack, Japa­nese forces struck several other targets up to 6,000 miles away to clear the way for invasions that would follow. It was the broadest offensive ever launched at one time by a single nation. Japanese troops advanced on the British stronghold of Singapore. Among the American targets bombed on that same day were bases on Guam, Wake Island, and the Philippines, where dozens of fighters and B-17 bombers were destroyed on run­ways at Clark Field. As President Roosevelt stated when asking Congress to declare war on Japan, this day would “live in infamy.”

The Japanese show of force hurt the United States , and it would be many desparate days before American and Allied forces could begin to reclaim lost ground in the Pacific theater.

( In WWII, the Japanese invaded Guam. Now they’re welcomed as tourists. )

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Why Did Japan Attack Pearl Harbor?

By: Sarah Pruitt

Updated: May 13, 2020 | Original: April 10, 2018

When Japanese bombers appeared in the skies over Pearl Harbor  on the morning of December 7, 1941, the U.S. military was completely unprepared for the devastating surprise attack, which dramatically altered the course of World War II , especially in the Pacific theater. But there were several key reasons for the bombing that, in hindsight, make it seem almost inevitable.

Tensions Began During the Great Depression

Before the Pearl Harbor attack, tensions between Japan and the United States had been mounting for the better part of a decade.

The island nation of Japan, isolated from the rest of the world for much of its history, embarked on a period of aggressive expansion near the turn of the 20th century. Two successful wars, against China in 1894-95 and the Russo-Japanese War in 1904-05, fueled these ambitions, as did Japan’s successful participation in World War I  (1914-18) alongside the Allies.

During the Great Depression of the 1930s, Japan sought to solve its economic and demographic woes by forcing its way into China, starting in 1931 with an invasion of Manchuria. When a commission appointed by the League of Nations condemned the invasion, Japan withdrew from the international organization; it would occupy Manchuria until 1945.

In July 1937, a clash at Beijing’s Marco Polo Bridge began another Sino-Japanese war. That December, after Japanese forces captured Nanjing (Nanking), the capital of the Chinese Nationalist Party, or Guomindang (Kuomintang), they proceeded to carry out six weeks of mass killings and rapes now infamous as the Nanjing Massacre .

The U.S. Was Trying to Stop Japan’s Global Expansion

In light of such atrocities, the United States began passing economic sanctions against Japan, including trade embargoes on aircraft exports, oil and scrap metal, among other key goods, and gave economic support to Guomindang forces. In September 1940, Japan signed the Tripartite Pact with Germany and Italy, the two fascist regimes then at war with the Allies.

Tokyo and Washington negotiated for months leading up to the Pearl Harbor attack, without success. While the United States hoped embargoes on oil and other key goods would lead Japan to halt its expansionism, the sanctions and other penalties actually convinced Japan to stand its ground, and stirred up the anger of its people against continued Western interference in Asian affairs.

To Japan, war with the United States had become to seem inevitable, in order to defend its status as a major world power. Because the odds were stacked against them, their only chance was the element of surprise.

Destroying the Base at Pearl Harbor Would Mean Japan Controlled the Pacific

In May 1940, the United States had made Pearl Harbor the main base for its Pacific Fleet. As Americans didn’t expect the Japanese to attack first in Hawaii, some 4,000 miles away from the Japanese mainland, the base at Pearl Harbor was left relatively undefended, making it an easy target.

Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto spent months planning an attack that aimed to destroy the Pacific Fleet and destroy morale in the U.S. Navy, so that it would not be able to fight back as Japanese forces began to advance on targets across the South Pacific.

Japan’s surprise attack on Pearl Harbor would drive the United States out of isolation and into World War II, a conflict that would end with Japan’s surrender after the devastating atomic  bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945.

At first, however, the Pearl Harbor attack looked like a success for Japan. Its bombers hit all eight U.S. battleships, sinking four and damaging four others, destroyed or damaged more than 300 aircraft and killed some 2,400 Americans at Pearl Harbor.

Japanese forces went on to capture a string of current and former Western colonial possessions by early 1942—including Burma (now Myanmar), British Malaya (Malaysia and Singapore), the Dutch East Indies (Indonesia) and the Philippines—giving them access to these islands’ plentiful natural resources, including oil and rubber.

But the Pearl Harbor attack had failed in its objective to completely destroy the Pacific Fleet. The Japanese bombers missed oil tanks, ammunition sites and repair facilities, and not a single U.S. aircraft carrier was present during the attack. In June 1942, this failure came to haunt the Japanese, as U.S. forces scored a major victory in the Battle of Midway , decisively turning the tide of war in the Pacific.

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Attack on Pearl Harbor

Learn about this historic event that caused the United States to enter World War II.

Sunday, December 7, 1941, was supposed to be a day of rest for the military soldiers at Hawaii’s Pearl Harbor naval base on the island of Oahu. But at 7:55 a.m., Japanese fighter planes zoomed in without warning and attacked the United States Pacific fleet, or naval vessels, moored in the harbor. Thousands of lives would be lost that day.

It was, as then President Franklin Delano Roosevelt would call it, "a date which will live in infamy."

The sudden attack in Hawaii —at the time a territory of the United States , not a state—might have taken many by surprise, but the Japanese had been planning the operation for months.

Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, commander in chief of the Japanese naval forces and architect of the Pearl Harbor attack, didn’t want a fight with America. But much of Europe and Asia, including Japan, were involved in World War II at the time. Yamamoto wanted to take over certain countries in southeastern Asia and use their oil to help fuel Japan’s military vehicles and naval fleet.

But because the U.S. base in Hawaii was relatively close to these countries, the Japanese worried that the United States would send soldiers from Pearl Harbor to defend the nations if they were attacked. By destroying the U.S. military presence in the region, the countries Japan wanted to target would be left vulnerable. So Yamamoto decided to move forward with a surprise attack on the U.S. fleet in Hawaii.

So on November 26, 1941, 31 warships carrying fighter planes and bombers slipped from Japan into the North Pacific. They moved silently until they closed in on the Hawaiian Islands. A small Japanese plane made a loop around the target and radioed back: “Pearl Harbor sleeps.”

At dawn on December 7, 350 planes launched in two waves from Japan’s ships. The bombers dropped bombs on American warships below, while the fighter planes targeted the U.S. aircraft on the ground so they couldn’t fight back.

Following both attacks, 19 U.S. naval vessels were sunk or damaged; 188 aircraft were destroyed. In all, 2,280 servicemen and women were killed, 1,109 were wounded. Sixty-eight civilians—people who are not in the military—also lost their lives. The attack lasted just under two hours.

THE AFTERMATH

Repair crews went to work on the ships. Except for the U.S.S. Arizona, Utah, and Oklahoma, every damaged ship returned to sea.

The day after the attack, the United States declared war on Japan, officially entering World War II. In the nearly four years that followed, the U.S. Navy sank all of the Japanese aircraft carriers, battleships, and cruisers that participated in the Pearl Harbor attack.

The United States and its allies— Britain , France , and Russia , among other countries—eventually won the war, defeating Japan and its allies, Germany and Italy .

Today visitors can tour the Pearl Harbor National Monument, built on the water above the wreckage of the U.S.S. Arizona,  one of the eight battleships attacked and damaged during the fight. From there you can still glimpse at the remains of the sunken ship 40 feet below the water, a memorial to the brave people who fought in this important battle.

TEXT ADAPTED FROM  PEARL HARBOR: A RETURN TO THE DAY OF INFAMY, OIL AND HONOR AT PEARL HARBOR , AND  NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC CONCISE HISTORY OF THE WORLD: AN ILLUSTRATED TIMELINE

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Deciphering the Enigma: Japan’s Calculated Strike at Pearl Harbor

This essay about Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor examines the intricate web of historical, political, and strategic factors that led to this pivotal moment in history. It discusses Japan’s emergence as a regional power, tensions with the United States, and the calculated decision to launch a surprise assault. The summary highlights the motives behind Japan’s actions, including the desire to neutralize America’s Pacific fleet and secure strategic advantages. It concludes by emphasizing the enduring legacy of the attack and its profound impact on the course of World War II.

How it works

The morning of December 7, 1941, is etched in the collective memory of history as a day that altered the course of nations. The attack on Pearl Harbor, a masterstroke of military audacity, continues to fascinate and perplex historians and strategists alike. Unraveling the motives behind Japan’s decision to launch such a brazen assault requires a nuanced understanding of historical context, geopolitical tensions, and strategic imperatives.

Japan’s emergence as a modern industrial power in the early 20th century marked a seismic shift in the balance of power in East Asia.

Fueled by a potent cocktail of nationalism, industrialization, and expansionist fervor, Japan embarked on a quest for regional dominance. However, this ascent collided with the interests of established Western powers, particularly the United States, whose economic and military presence in the Pacific posed a direct challenge to Japan’s ambitions.

The seeds of conflict were sown with Japan’s expansionist forays into China and Southeast Asia, which drew the ire of the international community. In response to Japan’s belligerence, the United States and its allies imposed a series of economic sanctions, including an oil embargo, aimed at curbing Japan’s aggressive expansionism. Faced with the prospect of economic strangulation and encirclement by hostile powers, Japan’s leaders found themselves at a crossroads, grappling with the question of how to safeguard their nation’s interests in the face of mounting pressure.

The decision to attack Pearl Harbor did not emerge in a vacuum but rather evolved out of a calculated assessment of Japan’s strategic imperatives and perceived vulnerabilities. By striking at the heart of America’s Pacific fleet, Japanese military planners sought to deliver a crippling blow that would neutralize America’s ability to project power in the region and buy time for Japan to consolidate its gains. Moreover, the element of surprise was seen as essential to maximize the impact of the attack and offset America’s numerical and technological superiority.

However, the road to Pearl Harbor was fraught with risks and uncertainties. Japanese leaders were acutely aware of the potential consequences of provoking the United States into entering the war, yet they deemed the gamble necessary to break free from the stranglehold of economic sanctions and secure Japan’s position as a dominant power in the Pacific. The meticulous planning and execution of the attack underscored Japan’s determination to achieve its objectives at any cost, even if it meant plunging the world into a global conflict.

The timing of the attack, meticulously planned to coincide with negotiations between Japan and the United States, further underscores the strategic calculus behind Japan’s actions. By launching a surprise assault on Pearl Harbor, Japan aimed to catch its adversaries off guard and preempt any potential diplomatic resolution that would undermine its strategic goals. Moreover, the attack served as a symbolic statement of Japan’s resolve to assert its dominance in the face of Western opposition.

In the aftermath of the attack, the world recoiled in shock at the audacity and ruthlessness of Japan’s actions. The loss of life and destruction wrought upon Pearl Harbor served as a wake-up call to the United States, galvanizing public opinion and propelling the nation into a state of total war. The subsequent entry of the United States into World War II spelled doom for Japan’s imperial ambitions, as the full might of America’s industrial and military machine was brought to bear on the Japanese empire.

In conclusion, the attack on Pearl Harbor remains a testament to the complexities of international relations and the perils of unchecked aggression. Japan’s decision to launch such a daring assault was driven by a combination of historical grievances, strategic imperatives, and a calculated assessment of risk. While it achieved initial tactical success, the attack ultimately proved to be a strategic blunder that sealed Japan’s fate and reshaped the course of history. As we reflect on this pivotal moment in time, it serves as a sobering reminder of the profound consequences of human folly and the enduring legacy of conflict.

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Introduction

The impacts of the pearl harbor attack, works cited.

Towards the end of the 1930s, Japan had managed to expand its military influence in the Pacific. This nation was also pessimistic that the United States’ entry into the ongoing global upheaval could affect its hegemonic position. In order to prevent this possible outcome, Japan designed a powerful plan to cripple the United States’ army and make it impossible for it to engage in war. This strategy led to the infamous Pearl Harbor attack that claimed the lives of over 2,400 people. This historical event would have long-term impacts that would eventually change the world forever.

Toland indicates that the Pearl Harbor attack compelled the U.S. government to investigate an attempt to understand the issues surrounding this event (31). The report led to the dismissal of different commanders who had failed to offer adequate protection. The short-term impact of this attack was that the government designed several camps on the country’s mainland. The purpose of such encampments was to confine all people who had Japanese descent. The same treatment was also used to punish Italians and Germans in the country.

Many historians have indicated that this attack informed the United States’ decision to declare war against Japan (Bode and Heo 135). Since this surprise assault led to the destruction of eight battleships and around 200 planes, the Japanese believed that America had a crippled navy that could not sustain the ongoing war. Fortunately, the country managed to join the Allies to deal with the challenges facing the world. Within a short duration, most of the battleships damaged after the attack were repaired and launched to engage in different battles.

The wave of militarism that had existed after the end of the 19 th century forced many countries to form and sign treaties. Such pacts were crucial due to the existing rivalry in Europe and beyond. The Tripartite Pact that had been signed by Germany, Japan, and Italy explained why the United States attracted new enemies. America’s declaration of war against the state of Japan forced the Axis to be against it (Nagata et al. 361). Consequently, America was forced to join the ongoing wars in Europe and Asia. With the country focusing on the reality of the Pearl Harbor attack, it was quite clear that there was a need to join the Allies (Russia, France, and Britain) and make the world safe again.

America’s entry into the war was critical since it sealed the fate of the Second World War and the future of the world. By the year 1940, the Allies were finding it hard to deal with the challenges and problems experienced in Europe. Toland indicates that the Germans were unstoppable and unpredictable during the time (73). They boasted of competent engineers and professionals who produced superior and sophisticated machines such as warplanes, submarines, and missiles. The infamous “enigma codes” used by the Germans were hard to monitor and crack (Bode and Heo 139). These aspects had made it impossible for the Allies to deal with the German problem in Europe.

The United States’ decision to retaliate after the Pearl Harbor attack sealed the Allies’ victory in Europe. This was the case because the war was not being fought on American soil (Bode and Heo 141). Consequently, the country’s citizens and professionals offered adequate materials and resources that turned the tables in Europe. Domestic workers in American produced different foodstuffs and commodities that met the needs of many soldiers in Europe and Asia. The country’s army was also equipped with superior resources and weapons. This means that the Americans provided essential assistance that made it easier for the Allies to emerge victoriously.

Toland goes further to acknowledge that the Pearl Harbor attack should be outlined as the most important event that made the United States a global superpower (64). The country’s engagement in Second World War proved to the world that a new order had emerged. The Japanese and Germans eventually realized that they had engaged a superior nation that possessed adequate resources and expertise.

Another consequence of this attack that cannot be taken lightly is the invention of the atomic bomb. In 1945, Japan surrendered after the Americans dropped two weapons in Japan’s Nagasaki and Hiroshima cities With these bombs claiming the lives of over one hundred thousand people and others perishing after several months, the world acknowledged that the nuclear age had come (Nagata et al. 362). These explosive devices marked the end of the Second World War. However, America realized that it had attracted a new enemy (Russia) after 1945. This rivalry would result in the infamous Cold War that transformed the nature of international relations.

Although Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor can be described as a small event, historians have admitted that it forced the United States to join the war in Europe. This decision would result in the defeat of Japan and Germany in 1945. The country would also emerge victoriously and develop the world’s first nuclear weapon. These subsequent events led to the Cold War, thereby changing global relations forever.

Bode, Ingvild, and Seunghoon E. Heo. “World War II Narratives in Contemporary Germany and Japan: How University Students Understand their Past.” International Studies Perspectives, vol. 18, no. 2, 2017, pp. 131-154.

Nagata, Donna K., et al. “Processing Cultural Trauma: Intergenerational Effects of the Japanese American Incarceration.” Journal of Social Issues: A Journal of the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Studies, vol. 71, no. 2, 2015, pp. 356-370.

Toland, John. Infamy: Pearl Harbor and Its Aftermath. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2014.

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IvyPanda. (2021, May 28). The Impact of the Attack on Pearl Harbor. https://ivypanda.com/essays/the-impact-of-the-attack-on-pearl-harbor/

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Remembering Pearl Harbor 80 years later: The story Paducah man, James Vessels | Opinion

James Allard Vessels of Paducah was enjoying a friendly Sunday morning card game with a shipmate on the battleship Arizona in the middle of Pearl Harbor.

More than 4,200 miles away in Fancy Farm, it was Sunday afternoon. His fiancée and childhood sweetheart, Frances Anita Hodge, couldn’t wait to model the new engagement ring her betrothed had sent from Hawaii.

The date was Dec. 7, 1941, when Japan’s surprise attack on Pearl Harbor plunged America into World War II. Vessels, 21, lived. His ship died. So did 1,177 of his fellow crewmen, including Vessels’ card partner, a sailor named Lightfoot. 

Vessels was the first of about a dozen Pearl Harbor survivors I interviewed during my tenure at the Paducah Sun-Democrat and Paducah Sun. Their stories formed the nucleus of my book, " Kentuckians and Pearl Harbor: Stories from the Day of Infamy ," which the University Press of Kentucky published last year.

More: 80-year mystery laid to rest on Memorial Day: A Pearl Harbor casualty comes home

His warship is the most iconic of the all the vessels lost on the date President Franklin D. Roosevelt said would “live in infamy.” A gleaming white memorial straddles what is left of the Arizona’s rusty, bomb-blasted, fire-blackened and submerged hull.

The air raid began shortly before 8 a.m. “Lightfoot and I jumped up to see what was going [on] as we couldn’t figure [out] what was happening,” Vessels said.

The crew raced for battle stations. Vessels' was “the birdbath,” an anti-aircraft machine gun position atop the mainmast. A dizzying 90-feet above the waterline, it was the loftiest spot on the ship.

Vessels and his fellow machine gunners made it to the top. But bomb fragments and strafing fire killed or wounded several other sailors and marines as they scrambled up the mast’s steel legs to their battle stations elsewhere on the mainmast. “Guys were droppin’ off the ladders like flies,” a survivor remembered.

Because it was peacetime, the machine gun ammunition was stowed below. So Vessels and his mates watched helplessly as enemy horizontal- and dive-bombers worked over the Pacific Fleet.

About 15 minutes into the attack, an armor-piercing bomb crashed through the Arizona’s forward deck into a powder magazine, triggering a fiery explosion that heaved the 32,600-ton capital ship’s bow section nearly 50 feet into the air.

The concussion “tore most of our clothes off,” Vessels said. “But if we hadn’t been up in the mainmast, we wouldn’t have made it.”

After the fires subsided, Vessels and his shipmates began the long climb down. On the anti-aircraft deck, he saw just one man standing. He was badly burned, but Vessels recognized him as Lightfoot, whose injuries were fatal. 

A machine-gun bullet from an enemy plane had hit Vessels in his right leg. He cut it out with his pocket knife. 

James Allard and Frances Anita returned to Pearl Harbor for the 30th anniversary of the attack, and they visited the Arizona memorial. Beneath their feet were the remains of more than 900 crewmen still entombed in the battleship, as well as Vessels’ shipboard belongings. He was thankful he didn’t lose her engagement ring and wedding band, which he bought in Honolulu. The sailor mailed them to his parents in Paducah with instructions to pass them on to Frances Anita and her parents.

More: Officials identify remains of Kentucky sailor killed in Pearl Harbor attack

The future in-laws agreed on a delivery date: Dec. 7. They would worship together at St. Jerome Catholic Church, then have Sunday lunch at the Hodge house.     

It was a little before noon in western Kentucky when the Pearl Harbor attack started. Mass was probably over at St. Jerome, and James Allard and Frances Anita’s folks had likely started the midday meal. 

Afterwards, Frances Anita tried on her diamond ring, and everybody gathered around the radio. “They were listening to music, and all of a sudden it came over the radio that Pearl had been bombed,” said Margaret Vessels Shoulta, one of James Allard and Frances Anita’s two daughters. “It was just devastating.”

News bulletins reported that the Arizona was sunk. But there was no word about casualties. For about two weeks, the families prayed that their loved one was alive but feared he was dead. 

Shortly before Christmas, Walter and Annie Mae Vessels were overjoyed to receive a short letter from James Allard promising he was okay. He earned a brief leave to come home in February 1942; wasting no time, he and Frances Anita got married on the 25th. The couple also reared five sons, four of whom, including Mike Vessels, were sailors.

When Mike arrived at Pearl Harbor in 1968, he was astonished to see “these Japanese torpedo planes…flying over, dropping torpedoes, and they were setting off explosions in the water. So I'm here watching what Dad really went through." 

Hollywood had come to Honolulu. Crews were filming the movie "Tora! Tora! Tora!" which came out in 1970.

Tom Brokaw hoped "The Greatest Generation," his book about the World War II generation, which included my sailor father and soldier father-in-law, would “in some small way pay tribute to those men and women who have given us the lives we have today.” That was also my hope for my book, which I dedicated to Motor Machinist’s Mate First Class Berry F. Craig Jr. and Master Sergeant Robert P. Hocker Jr., both of whom volunteered after Pearl Harbor and were combat veterans of the Pacific war.

McCracken countian Jim Hamlin, who survived the sinking of the battleship California, was the subject of my second Sun-Democrat Pearl Harbor story. The day after the story ran, he found me in the newsroom. 

“Thank you,” he said, handing me a small Christmas fruitcake and shaking my hand.

“No, sir,” I replied. “Thank you.”  

Berry Craig is a professor emeritus of history at West Kentucky Community College in Paducah and an author of seven books and co-author of two more, all on Kentucky history.

The Infamous Attack on Pearl Harbor: A Tragic Event in US History

The attack on Pearl Harbor, which occurred on December 7, 1941, stands as one of the most devastating and significant events in American history. This treacherous act, carried out by the Imperial Japanese Navy, plunged the United States into World War II and forever altered the course of global politics.

In this comprehensive blog post, we will delve into the various aspects surrounding the attack on Pearl Harbor, shedding light on the key players involved, the reasons behind the attack, and the profound consequences that followed. By exploring these crucial elements, we aim to deepen our understanding of this pivotal moment and its lasting impact on the United States and the world.

The Attack Unfolds: A Day of Infamy

On the fateful morning of December 7, 1941, Japanese aircraft launched a surprise attack on the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, located in Honolulu, Hawaii. The assault, meticulously planned and executed, involved two waves of air strikes that targeted battleships, airfields, and other military installations.

The attack commenced at approximately 7:48 a.m. local time, catching the American forces off guard. Over the course of two hours, Japanese bombers and torpedo planes wreaked havoc on the unsuspecting base, inflicting severe damage and causing widespread casualties.

Key Players: Japan and the United States

To fully comprehend the attack on Pearl Harbor, it is essential to understand the geopolitical context and the motivations of the key players involved.

Japan’s Imperial Ambitions

In the early 20th century, Japan was rapidly expanding its military power and pursuing an aggressive policy of territorial expansion in the Asia-Pacific region. The country’s leaders sought to establish a Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, aiming to dominate and control vast territories in the region.

Japan’s expansionist ambitions brought it into direct conflict with the United States, which had significant economic and political interests in the Asia-Pacific region. Tensions between the two nations had been escalating in the years leading up to the attack on Pearl Harbor.

The United States’ Role

The United States, under the leadership of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, had adopted a policy of containment to counter Japan’s growing influence in the region. This policy involved economic sanctions and diplomatic pressure to deter Japanese aggression.

However, despite these measures, tensions continued to rise, culminating in the attack on Pearl Harbor, which marked a turning point in the relationship between the two nations.

Why Pearl Harbor?

The choice of Pearl Harbor as the target of the attack was strategically significant for several reasons:

• Neutralizing the US Pacific Fleet: Pearl Harbor was the headquarters of the United States Pacific Fleet, the primary naval force responsible for maintaining American dominance in the Pacific Ocean. By destroying or severely damaging the fleet, Japan aimed to cripple the US naval power and gain a strategic advantage in the region.
• Psychological Impact: The attack on Pearl Harbor was intended to deliver a devastating psychological blow to the United States. Japan hoped that the sudden and overwhelming assault would demoralize the American public and weaken their resolve to resist Japanese expansion.

The Aftermath: Consequences and Legacy

The attack on Pearl Harbor had profound and far-reaching consequences that reverberated across the globe:

• US Entry into World War II: The attack directly led to the United States’ entry into World War II. President Roosevelt declared war on Japan the day after the attack, marking a significant turning point in the global conflict.
• Global Conflict: The attack on Pearl Harbor triggered a chain reaction, drawing other nations into the war. The United States joined forces with its allies, including Great Britain and the Soviet Union, to form the Allied Powers, while Japan aligned with Germany and Italy, forming the Axis Powers. World War II escalated into a global conflict that engulfed nations across the world.
• Loss of Life and Devastation: The attack resulted in the loss of thousands of American lives and caused extensive damage to the Pearl Harbor naval base. The human toll and material destruction left a lasting scar on the United States.
• Technological Advancements: The war spurred significant technological advancements, particularly in the fields of aviation, shipbuilding, and weaponry. These advancements would shape the future of warfare and have lasting impacts on society.

Conclusion: Remembering Pearl Harbor

The attack on Pearl Harbor remains a pivotal event in American history, serving as a somber reminder of the devastating consequences of war and the importance of international diplomacy. As we reflect on this tragic chapter, we honor the sacrifices made by those who served and remember the lessons learned from this dark day in history.

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"Pearl Harbor" is a two-hour movie squeezed into three hours, about how on Dec. 7, 1941, the Japanese staged a surprise attack on an American love triangle. Its centerpiece is 40 minutes of redundant special effects, surrounded by a love story of stunning banality. The film has been directed without grace, vision, or originality, and although you may walk out quoting lines of dialog, it will not be because you admire them.

The filmmakers seem to have aimed the film at an audience that may not have heard of Pearl Harbor, or perhaps even of World War Two. This is the Our Weekly Reader version. If you have the slightest knowledge of the events in the film, you will know more than it can tell you. There is no sense of history, strategy or context; according to this movie, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor because America cut off its oil supply, and they were down to an 18 month reserve. Would going to war restore the fuel sources? Did they perhaps also have imperialist designs? Movie doesn't say.

So shaky is the film's history that at the end, when Jimmy Doolittle's Tokyo raiders crash-land in China, they're shot at by Japanese patrols with only a murky throwaway explanation about the Sino-Japanese war already underway. I predict some viewers will leave the theater sincerely confused about why there were Japanese in China.

As for the movie's portrait of the Japanese themselves, it is so oblique that Japanese audiences will find little to complain about apart from the fact that they play such a small role in their own raid. There are several scenes where the Japanese high command debates military tactics, but all of their dialog is strictly expository; they state facts but do not emerge with personalities or passions. Only Admiral Yamamoto (Mako) is seen as an individual, and his dialog seems to have been singled out with the hindsight of history. Congratulated on a brilliant raid, he demurs, "A brilliant man would find a way not to fight a war." And later, "I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant." Do you imagine at any point the Japanese high command engaged in the 1941 Japanese equivalent of exchanging high-fives and shouting "Yes!" while pumping their fists in the air? Not in this movie, where the Japanese seem to have been melancholy even at the time about the regrettable need to play such a negative role in such a positive Hollywood film.

The American side of the story centers on two childhood friends from Tennessee with the standard-issue screenplay names Rafe McCawley ( Ben Affleck ) and Danny Walker ( Josh Hartnett ). They enter the Army Air Corps and both fall in love with the same nurse, Evelyn Johnson ( Kate Beckinsale )--first Rafe falls for her, and then, after he is reported dead, Danny. Their first date is subtitled "Three Months Later" and ends with Danny, having apparently read the subtitle, telling Evelyn, "Don't let it be three months before I see you again, okay?" That gets almost as big a laugh as her line to Rafe, "I'm gonna give Danny my whole heart, but I don't think I'll ever look at another sunset without thinking of you." That kind of bad laugh would have been sidestepped in a more literate screenplay, but our hopes are not high after an early newsreel report that the Germans are bombing "downtown London"--a difficult target, since although there is such a place as "central London," at no time in 2,000 years has London ever had anything described by anybody as a "downtown." There is not a shred of conviction or chemistry in the love triangle, which results after Rafe returns alive to Hawaii shortly before the raid on Pearl Harbor and is angry at Evelyn for falling in love with Danny, inspiring her timeless line, "I didn't even know until the day you turned up alive--and then all this happened." Evelyn is a hero in the aftermath of the raid, performing triage by using her lipstick to separate the wounded who should be treated from those left to die. In a pointless stylistic choice, director Michael Bay and cinematographer John Schwartzman shoot some of the hospital scenes in soft focus, some in sharp focus, some blurred. Why? I understand it's to obscure details deemed too gory for the PG-13 rating. (Why should the carnage at Pearl Harbor be toned down to PG-13 in the first place?) In the newsreel sequences, the movie fades in and out of black and white with almost amusing haste, while the newsreel announcer sounds not like a period voice but like a Top-40 deejay in an echo chamber.

The most involving material in the film comes at the end, when Jimmy Doolittle ( Alec Baldwin ) leads his famous raid on Tokyo, flying Army bombers off the decks of Navy carriers and hoping to crash-land in China.

He and his men were heroes, and their story would make a good movie (and indeed has: "Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo"). Another hero in the movie is the African-American cook Dorie Miller (Cuba Gooding Jr.), who because of his race was not allowed to touch a gun in the racist pre-war Navy, but opens fire during the raid, shoots down two planes, and saves the life of his captain. He's shown getting a medal. Nice to see an African-American in the movie, but the almost total absence of Asians in 1941 Hawaii is inexplicable.

As for the raid itself, a little goes a long way. What is the point, really, of more than half an hour of planes bombing ships, of explosions and fireballs, of roars on the soundtrack and bodies flying through the air and people running away from fighters that are strafing them? How can it be entertaining or moving when it's simply about the most appalling slaughter? Why do the filmmakers think we want to see this, unrelieved by intelligence, viewpoint or insight? It was a terrible, terrible day. Three thousand died in all. This is not a movie about them.

It is an unremarkable action movie; Pearl Harbor supplies the subject, but not the inspiration.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism.

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Film credits.

Pearl Harbor (2001)

Rated PG-13 For Sustained Intense War Sequences, Images Of Wounded, Brief Sensuality and Some Language

183 minutes

Ben Affleck as Rafe McCawley

Josh Hartnett as Danny Walker

Kate Beckinsale as Evelyn

Alec Baldwin as Doolittle

Cuba Gooding Jr. as Dorie Miller

Jon Voigt as President Roosevelt

• Randall Wallace

Directed by

• Michael Bay

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War History Online

The Terrifying Story of Three Sailors Trapped Inside a Battleship After the Attack on Pearl Harbor

Posted: May 28, 2024 | Last updated: May 29, 2024

On December 7, 1941, the Japanese initiated a devastating assault on US naval forces stationed at Pearl Harbor. Roughly 2,400 sailors and Marines perished that day, including three whose stories remain relatively unknown.

The USS West Virginia was on fire for 30 minutes before sinking

When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor , the USS West Virginia was positioned outboard of the USS Tennessee as part of Battleship Row, along with the USS Arizona , California , Pennsylvania , Nevada , Maryland and Oklahoma . A repair vessel, the USS Vestal , was also moored beside the Arizona .

The USS West Virginia was hit by two overhead bombs and at least six torpedoes during the attack. Immediately after, officers aboard the ship called a "setting condition Zed," a naval technique wherein all hatch compartments are closed and a portion of the ship flooded to keep it from capsizing.

It was ablaze for 30 hours before sinking and settling along the bottom of the harbor, 40 feet below the water. According to the National Park Service , 106 crew members were killed.

A banging sound was heard inside the ship

The following day, those who'd survived the attack began cleanup efforts, during which they heard a banging noise coming from the USS West Virginia . At first, they thought it was a piece of loose rigging hitting the hull. However, they soon realized they were hearing the sounds of those trapped inside the wreckage.

"When it was quiet you could hear it... bang, bang, then stop. Then bang, bang, pause. At first, I thought it was a loose piece of rigging slapping against the hull. Then I realized men were making that sound - taking turns making noise," said bugler Dick Fiske.

It was impossible to rescue the men

Sailors recounted how they dreaded guard duty close to the USS West Virginia , as they could hear the trapped men. Unfortunately, there was nothing anyone could do to rescue them. The risk was too high: cutting a hole in the hull would cause it to fill with water, while using a torch brought about the risk of explosion.

The USS West Virginia was raised six months later. Within it, salvage crews found the bodies of three men huddled together in storeroom A-111: 18-year-old Ronald Endicott of Washington; 21-year-old Louis "Buddy" Costin of Indiana; and 20-year old Clifford Olds of North Dakota .

The Navy never told their families what happened

Also found were flashlight batteries, a manhole to supply fresh water and the remnants of emergency rations. There was also a calendar, with sixteen days crossed off in red pencil: December 7 to December 23. It turned out the three had been stuck in the wreckage, alive, for over two weeks, without the ability to escape.

Word of the discovery spread quickly through Pearl Harbor. However, the Navy never told their families how long they'd been alive. It wasn't until decades later, in 1995, that their loved ones learned the truth when Honolulu Advertiser 's Eric Gregory wrote a piece about the attack.

All three headstones say they died on the day of the attack

Following its discovery, the calendar was sent to the chief of naval personnel in Washington, D.C. , and its current location is unknown. Following their recovery, Endicott and Costin were buried at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific - known as the "Punchbowl" - in Honolulu. Olds' remains were returned to his hometown and buried in the local cemetery.

All three of their headstones say they died on December 7, 1941, the day of the attack.

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Following it being raised, the USS West Virginia was repaired. When it was returned to service in April 1944, it played a key role in the US forces' efforts against Japan, and was present at Tokyo Bay during the Japanese surrender. It was decommissioned in 1957 and sold for scrapping two years later.

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Special Edition: Sailor killed in Pearl Harbor attack to be buried with honors

Plus: wwii photos uncovered, state senate approves $53.1 billion budget plan and more..

Seaman 2nd Class Michael Malek was among the service members killed when the USS Oklahoma was struck in the Pearl Harbor attack Dec. 7, 1941.

US Navy History and Heritage Command

Good morning, Chicago. ✶

And Happy Memorial Day.

In today’s special edition newsletter, we’ve got the story of Chicago sailor Michael Malek.

Listed as missing for decades, Malek will be buried with honors after his remains were found recently. We speak with his family, who plan to attend the service.

Plus, we’ve got reporting on the state Senate approving a $53.1 billion budget plan, weather cutting short the Sueños Music Festival and more community news you need to know.👇

📝 Keeping score : The Cubs fell to the Cardinals , 4-3; the White Sox lost to the Orioles , 4-1.

⏱️: A 7-minute read

— Matt Moore, newsletter reporter ( @MattKenMoore )

TODAY’S WEATHER 🌥️

Mostly cloudy with a chance of thunderstorms and a high near 72.

TODAY’S TOP STORIES

Navy sailor from chicago killed in pearl harbor attack will be buried with honors, reporting by violet miller.

Lost and found : Two Illinois men were killed at Pearl Harbor and deemed “non-recoverable” four years after World War II ended. More than 80 years later, their remains have been identified and they’re being given a final resting place.

One sailor’s story : Seaman 2nd Class Michael Malek wasn’t accounted for until February 2021, according to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, a U.S. Department of Defense division that works to identify missing soldiers. Malek was 17 when he was killed aboard the USS Oklahoma during the Pearl Harbor attack Dec. 7, 1941.

‘Sense of closure’ : Malek’s niece Sandra Hannan and her husband plan to attend Malek’s June 6 service at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu. They’ll be joined by her youngest son and Malek’s namesake, Michael. “To have the story completed for our family, there’s a good sense of closure,” Hannan said.

Fred Brems with his father, Frederick C. Brems, who served in the 2nd Armored Division, also known as “Hell on Wheels.”

Courtesy of Fred Brems

‘Looking through my dad’s eyes': Son publishes Chicago vet’s photos from World War II front lines

Reporting by jessica ma.

Preserving the past : Fred Brems grew up captivated by the tales his father told about his days serving in World War II. Now, Brems hopes to share those stories with others as a way of honoring his father, who died in 2014. He spent 18 years compiling his father’s photos and stories from the war into a book titled “Knights of Freedom.”

Chicago kid with a lens : Lt. Col. Frederick C. Brems, from Belmont Cragin, loved photography “from the get-go” and helped sell cameras at a Chicago department store. He took his Rolleiflex camera to war, documenting burning vehicles and snapping portraits of his comrades. “The camera was part of him,” his son said.

Connecting generations : Karen Dellinger’s father, Ray Stewart, served alongside Brems’ father. Though Stewart died this year, his daughter said she learned about him from reading Brems’ book. “A lot of these guys go through experiences they don’t repeat,” Dellinger said. “If we don’t reach out to younger people and let them know the stories, they will be forgotten.”

State senators voted Sunday night on bills banning delta-8 products and reforming the Illinois Prisoner Review Board.

Rich Hein/Sun-Times file

Illinois Senate approves $53.1 billion budget plan

Reporting by tina sfondeles, nader issa and sarah karp | wbez.

Budget approved : The state Senate on Sunday night approved a $53.1 billion budget that largely mirrored Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s budget proposal and priorities — a point of contention for state Republicans.

Breaking it down : Just before 10 p.m., the Democrat-led Senate voted 38-21 to approve the spending plan. A revenue measure — which will raise $865 million — passed 37-22 and a budget implementation measure was approved 41-18. It also includes cost-of-living pay raises for lawmakers — and no action on pension reform.

Other moves : Budget aside, senators in rapid succession voted on bills with large implications, including a measure that effectively bans delta-8 products and another that reforms the Illinois Prisoner Review Board, requiring it to livestream some of its meetings.

Mayor intervenes : Mayor Brandon Johnson intervened to get his way in Springfield, to kill a bill that would have extended a ban on Chicago school closings and limited the Board of Education’s authority to make budgetary and admissions changes affecting selective enrollment schools. Johnson sent a letter to Illinois Senate President Don Harmon on Thursday asking him to hold House Bill 303, which had already passed the Illinois House and needed a final vote in the Senate.

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Ashley López (left) and Lizeth Valle arrive at Grant Park on Sunday for the Sueños Music Festival, which was cut short due to weather.

Andrea Flores/For the Sun-Times

• Weather shortens Sueños : Organizers of the sold-out music festival evacuated Grant Park by about 8 p.m. due to the threat of severe weather. Superstar Peso Pluma was among the artists not able to perform . Despite cancellations, a few shows did go on . Find our full festival coverage here .
• UChicago encampment fallout : A student is alleging the University of Chicago is withholding his degree — and those for three other students involved in the pro-Palestinian encampment on the Hyde Park campus — until the resolution of a school disciplinary process.
• RTA board nominee withdraws : The Rev. Ira Acree withdrew Friday as Mayor Johnson’s nominee to the Regional Transportation Authority board, branding those who called him unqualified as “opponents of African American empowerment.”
• Push for electric power : City and state leaders as well as officials from the U.S. Department of Energy gathered Friday at the Chicago Housing Authority’s Dearborn Homes to flip the switch on the Bronzeville Community Microgrid, part of a larger push to create ComEd’s “smart communities.”
• Cicada buzzing begins : After 17 years underground, the periodical cicadas have emerged, and their telltale chorus of buzzing has begun in some parts of the Chicago area. Peak emergence, when the noise will be at its loudest, isn’t expected for at least another week.
• Beaches officially open : As of Friday, the city’s 22 beaches are open 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. every day through Labor Day, Sept. 2.
• 3 stars for ‘The Big Cigar’ : André Holland does a brilliant job of capturing the complicated and charismatic Black Panthers co-founder Huey P. Newton in this well-made series, writes Sun-Times critic Richard Roeper.

PICTURE CHICAGO 📸

Maria Medina takes a selfie with her mother, Virginia Cruz, and son Juan Bahena on Saturday with the sculpture “Of Migratory Paths and Milkweed” by Alice Hargrave. It’s part of the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum’s “Flight of Butterflies” new exhibit along the Magnificent Mile .

Pat Nabong/Sun-Times

FROM THE OPINION PAGE 🗣️

• Support for veterans : Suicide risk is high among veterans and active-duty military. We need ways to lower that, writes April Smith, associate professor of psychological sciences at Auburn University.
• Vet recalls D-Day : As one of the few living World War II veterans, Gene Kleindl reflects on his experience and upcoming trip to Normandy for the 80th anniversary of D-Day. “When you are one of the few who are left, it’s up to you to remember those who did so much,” Kleindl says.
• Reasons for remembrance : This Memorial Day comes amid a difficult time: Americans trying to come to grips with a hot button presidential election, our country’s role in overseas conflict and war being questioned, writes columnist Michael Sneed.
• Laughter through challenges : In his latest Someone in Chicago advice column, Ismael Pérez talks with Chicago comedian Anthony Corrado, who has brought fans laughter on TikTok — even through his cancer treatment.

FROM THE PRESS BOX 🏈🏀⚽

• The Caleb Effect : You can feel the energy Caleb Williams’ potential and personality have brought to the Bears, but it’s not a dominant theme at Halas Hall, writes Mark Potash.
• Craig Counsell and Dansby Swanson : Counsell and Swanson may not be Bill Belichick and Tom Brady, but their relationship reveals how the Cubs manager approaches his job, writes Maddie Lee.
• Sky’s ticket sales skyrocket : Angel Reese and Kamilla Cardoso are among this year’s rookies who brought a new level of excitement to the Sky’s season — and boosted ticket sales for the home opener Saturday.
• Caitlin Clark has transformed WNBA : Rather than applaud the Clark Phenomenon, some are questioning it, writes Rick Morrissey.
• Cari Roccaro champions mental health : When the NWSL Players Association was negotiating with the league to establish its first collective bargaining agreement, the Red Stars midfielder made clear the need to pay attention to mental health.

YOUR DAILY QUESTION ☕️

What’s one way you plan to enjoy summer in Chicago this year?

Email us (please include your first and last name). To see the answers to this question, check our Morning Edition newsletter . Not subscribed to Morning Edition? Sign up here so you won’t miss a thing!

In Friday’s Afternoon Edition , we asked you: What’s your defining Maxwell Street Market memory?

Here’s some of what you said…

“Walking through the streets with dad. He was always looking for work tools, but I remember the blues music blaring out through the streets."— Patricia Rangel Guerrero

“My mom taking me there to purchase a dress for my junior prom. I was in awe of all the shops and vendors. This was in the mid-1950s. I did get my dress and it was beautiful."— Harriet Meaders

“Grew up as a flea market kid setting up shop with my pop to sell beauty products. It was a community; we knew each other and looked out for each other. I loved getting there early ... then splitting a steak and egg breakfast from White Palace Grill. The sounds, the foods, the comradery — it was great growing up here!"— Nathalie Magallanes

“I was a young nun on the West Side. To raise money for the school, we sold snow cones on weekend nights. Around 10 p.m. [one night], we were running out of syrup. Without telling anyone, I grabbed the keys to the convent car, took off my veil so I wouldn’t stand out, headed to Maxwell Street and bought more syrup. When I got back to the convent the pastor was waiting for me — he was not pleased!"— Jerry Snider Delaney

“In the early 1970s, with my new husband, I went to Maxwell Street’s Sunday market to find furnishings for our first apartment. The delicious, heady aroma of grilled Polish sausage permeated the air, and we always hoped we had enough money left over from our household purchases — dishes, tableware, a table for our stereo, etc. — to afford a sausage to split!"— Paula Risk

Thanks for reading the Sun-Times Morning Edition! Got a story you think we missed? Email us here.

Written by : Matt Moore Copy editor : Eydie Cubarrubia

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Guest Essay

America’s Military Is Not Prepared for War — or Peace

By Roger Wicker

Mr. Wicker, a Republican, is the ranking member of the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee.

“To be prepared for war,” George Washington said, “is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.” President Ronald Reagan agreed with his forebear’s words, and peace through strength became a theme of his administration. In the past four decades, the American arsenal helped secure that peace, but political neglect has led to its atrophy as other nations’ war machines have kicked into high gear. Most Americans do not realize the specter of great power conflict has risen again.

It is far past time to rebuild America’s military. We can avoid war by preparing for it.

When America’s senior military leaders testify before my colleagues and me on the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee behind closed doors, they have said that we face some of the most dangerous global threat environments since World War II. Then, they darken that already unsettling picture by explaining that our armed forces are at risk of being underequipped and outgunned. We struggle to build and maintain ships, our fighter jet fleet is dangerously small, and our military infrastructure is outdated. Meanwhile, America’s adversaries are growing their militaries and getting more aggressive.

In China, the country’s leader, Xi Jinping, has orchestrated a historic military modernization intended to exploit the U.S. military’s weaknesses. He has overtaken the U.S. Navy in fleet size, built one of the world’s largest missile stockpiles and made big advances in space. President Vladimir Putin of Russia has thrown Europe into war and mobilized his society for long-term conflict. Iran and its proxy groups have escalated their shadow war against Israel and increased attacks on U.S. ships and soldiers. And North Korea has disregarded efforts toward arms control negotiations and moved toward wartime readiness.

Worse yet, these governments are materially helping one another, cooperating in new ways to prevent an American-led 21st century. Iran has provided Russia with battlefield drones, and China is sending technical and logistical help to aid Mr. Putin’s war. They are also helping one another prepare for future fights by increasing weapons transfers and to evade sanctions. Their unprecedented coordination makes new global conflict increasingly possible.

That theoretical future could come faster than most Americans think. We may find ourselves in a state of extreme vulnerability in a matter of a few years, according to a growing consensus of experts. Our military readiness could be at its lowest point in decades just as China’s military in particular hits its stride. The U.S. Indo-Pacific commander released what I believe to be the largest list of unfunded items ever for services and combatant commands for next year’s budget, amounting to $11 billion. It requested funding for a raft of infrastructure, missile defense and targeting programs that would prove vital in a Pacific fight. China, on the other hand, has no such problems, as it accumulates the world’s leading hypersonic arsenal with a mix of other lethal cruise and attack missiles.

Our military leaders are being forced to make impossible choices. The Navy is struggling to adequately fund new ships, routine maintenance and munition procurement; it is unable to effectively address all three. We recently signed a deal to sell submarines to Australia, but we’ve failed to sufficiently fund our own submarine industrial base, leaving an aging fleet unprepared to respond to threats. Two of the three most important nuclear modernization programs are underfunded and are at risk of delays. The military faces a backlog of at least $180 billion for basic maintenance, from barracks to training ranges. This projects weakness to our adversaries as we send service members abroad with diminished ability to respond to crises.

Fortunately, we can change course. We can avoid that extreme vulnerability and resurrect American military might.

On Wednesday I am publishing a plan that includes a series of detailed proposals to address this reality head-on. We have been living off the Reagan military buildup for too long; it is time for updates and upgrades. My plan outlines why and how the United States should aim to spend an additional $55 billion on the military in the 2025 fiscal year and grow military spending from a projected 2.9 percent of our national gross domestic product this year to 5 percent over the next five to seven years.

It would be a significant investment that would start a reckoning over our nation’s spending priorities. There will be conversations ahead about all manner of budget questions. We do not need to spend this much indefinitely — but we do need a short-term generational investment to help us prevent another world war.

My blueprint would grow the Navy to 357 ships by 2035 and halt our shrinking Air Force fleet by producing at least 340 additional fighters in five years. This will help patch near-term holes and put each fleet on a sustainable trajectory. The plan would also replenish the Air Force tanker and training fleets, accelerate the modernization of the Army and Marine Corps, and invest in joint capabilities that are all too often forgotten, including logistics and munitions.

The proposal would build on the $3.3 billion in submarine industrial base funding included in the national security supplemental passed in April, so we can bolster our defense and that of our allies. It would also rapidly equip service members all over the world with innovative technologies at scale, from the seabed to the stars.

We should pair increased investment with wiser spending. Combining this crucial investment with fiscal responsibility would funnel resources to the most strategic ends. Emerging technology must play an essential role, and we can build and deploy much of it in less than five years. My road map would also help make improvements to the military procurement system and increase accountability for bureaucrats and companies that fail to perform on vital national security projects.

This whole endeavor would shake our status quo but be far less disruptive and expensive than the alternative. Should China decide to wage war with the United States, the global economy could immediately fall into a depression. Americans have grown far too comfortable under the decades-old presumption of overwhelming military superiority. And that false sense of security has led us to ignore necessary maintenance and made us vulnerable.

Our ability to deter our adversaries can be regained because we have done it before. At the 50th anniversary of Pearl Harbor, in the twilight of the Soviet Union, George H.W. Bush reflected on the lessons of Pearl Harbor. Though the conflict was long gone, it taught him an enduring lesson: “When it comes to national defense,” he said, “finishing second means finishing last.”

Regaining American strength will be expensive. But fighting a war — and worse, losing one — is far more costly. We need to begin a national conversation today on how we achieve a peaceful, prosperous and American-led 21st century. The first step is a generational investment in the U.S. military.

Roger Wicker is the senior U.S. senator from Mississippi and the ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

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