The 7 December 1941 Japanese raid on Pearl Harbor was one of the great defining moments in history. A single carefully-planned and well-executed stroke removed the United States Navy’s battleship force as a possible threat to the Japanese Empire’s southward expansion. America, unprepared and now considerably weakened, was abruptly brought into the Second World War as a full combatant.
The attack on Pearl Harbor was a pre-emptive military strike on the United States Pacific Fleet base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii by the Empire of Japan’s Imperial Japanese Navy, on the morning of Sunday, December 7, 1941 that made the United States enter World War II. Two aerial attack waves, totalling 350 aircraft, were launched from six aircraft carriers with the intent to destroy the United States Pacific Fleet.
The attack wrecked two U.S. Navy battleships, one minelayer, and two destroyers beyond repair, and destroyed 188 aircraft; personnel losses were 2,333 killed and 1,139 wounded. Damaged warships included three cruisers, a destroyer, and six battleships (one deliberately grounded, later refloated and repaired; two sunk at their berths, later raised, repaired, and restored to Fleet service late in the war). Vital fuel storage, shipyards, and submarine facilities were not hit. Japanese losses were minimal, at 29 aircraft and five midget submarines, with 65 servicemen killed or wounded.
On Sunday afternoon as he was eating lunch, President Roosevelt just got word that Pearl Harbor had been attacked. On the same day Winston Churchill called to tell him that Japan also attacked the British colonies in the southeast. Roosevelt told Churchill that he would go before Congress the following day to ask for a declaration for war on Japan.
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Sixty six years is a mere moment in time. This date should always be remembered.
My parents lived through this time and the time of WWII. For many years I’ve listened to their stories of the war and it’s consequences. I remember that my father joined the Army-Air Force just about the time my brother was born. My parents moved to an air base in Texas and then to another in Stockton so my father could be trained as a pilot. As it happened, the war ended before he was sent to serve and he was released from the military.
My father-in-law and his brothers were all involved in the war but in various areas of the world. I don’t think any of them actually served in Germany or in England when things got really bad. Just the other day my husband helped take some things down from my in-law’s attic and he found the helmets of his uncles. We’ll keep those forever and pass them down to our children in time.
A few years ago we visited Oahu, Hawaii and Pearl Harbor, the scene of the attacks by the Japanese. It was so strange to be there and know that there are still some servicemen entombed in one of the sunken ships still in the harbor.
