Remembering: Pearl Harbor

Western Europe lay conquered, with only Britain left in the fight, as World War II raged in Africa and Eastern Europe.

In Asia, the empire of Japan was spreading through China, as the civil war there kept the two sides from presenting a united front. With the fall of France, Japan had begun marching into French Indo China.

The US was the lone major country not actively involved in the war. They already were involved as they were supplying the UK and her allies, they also had begun restricting trade with Japan.

Japan was feeling the pinch from embargoes, especially that of oil. The oil rich Dutch East Indies were just within their reach, but they knew that attacking there would draw in the British Empire and the US. Britain wasn't much of a threat, as she was busy fighting to defend the homeland and Africa. However, the US had a large Pacific fleet, and it had been moved from San Diego to Pearl Harbor.

In early 1941, the Japanese began plotting an attack on Pearl Harbor, to eliminate the US threat to their moves into the Dutch East Indies. For months they trained specifically to hit the shallow harbor. While the US knew war was basically inevitable, for those in charge an attack on Pearl was unthinkable. Despite warnings from various sources they continued to ignore threats to her, worrying about sabotage not an actual attack. Then one morning decoders read that Japan would attack within hours, but their message to Pearl was sent by regular telegram, and wouldn't be seen til too late.

On December 7, 1941 large blips of planes appeared on experimental radar screens, but their operators were told to ignore them, as they must be an expected flight of bombers, coming from the mainland. Then as the Stars and Stripes rose above the US Pacific fleet, 353 Japanese planes attacked.

By the end of the day of infamy 2,402 Americans and sixty-four Japanese had been killed and 1,247 Americans and one Japanese sailor were injured in the battle. For Japan it would be a monumental victory, that would cost them the war. After the attack, they failed to send another wave, to wipe out dry docks, oil storage, and other very important facilities that would've knocked Pearl out of the war for years. They also failed to hit the US carriers, as they had been sent out just days before.

But the most important thing was that the anger from the US was not something most of their leaders had expected, at least not to such an overwhelming degree. That anger would feed an American war effort that would not stop until both Germany and Japan were completely knocked out of the war.

Pearl Harbor would remain the worst attack, against Americans, for almost seventy years. Only the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2011 would be more deadly and more scarring to the American psyche.