FREE ESSAY ON PEARL HARBOR

PEARL HARBOR

Pearl Harbor: We didn't know, yet it was our fault In 1941, one of the largest American
military defeats occurred. An entire naval fleet was destroyed, hundreds were killed, all
before nine A.M. on a Sunday morning. The US did not have any knowledge of this attack,
mostly because of their own ignorance, partially because of the military strategies of
their Japanese opponents. The Japanese attack on the US naval base of Pearl Harbor on
December 7, 1941, was a classic case of It will not happen to me! Although the US
suspected the Japanese actions, they were not ready because they believed an attack would
never happen on American grounds. Through an examination of military history, tactics and
eye witness descriptions, it will be proven that the US had no knowledge of the attack on
Pearl Harbor in 1941, but had sufficient warnings from the Japanese and others that an
attack was imminent. In the years before 1941, the war saw little American military
action. After the collapse of France, American President Franklin Delano Roosevelt
promised his county that no American troops would be sent to Europe to aid in the battle
against Hitler and his powerful army. These promises caused Roosevelt to be criticized by
his closest advisors for his doubt about declaring war . 
The President's defense to these accusations was he did not want to be looked down upon
by the public. As well, he believed American intervention would cause a 'mortal blow' to
the Allies cause. In reality, the advisors, as well as Roosevelt, knew that Britain could
not win the war without American armed intervention. Two oceans to the East, Japan was
deep into a war of its own. Japanese forces were concentrated on the Chinese front to
conquer and obtain. As a result of its unpopular declaration of war on China, Japan's
fuel supply from the US was eliminated. Consequently, the Japanese turned to Indonesia to
continue the supply of fuel for its war efforts. Fuel talks broke down as the Dutch, who
were in control of the Indonesian fuel supply and, under heavy influence from the US,
would not supply Japan with fuel. Desperately needing fuel to continue the war, Japan
first thought of attacking Indonesia, but feared US intervention. After some thought,
Japanese leaders decided that an attack directly on the US would be more appropriate to
bring the US to the fuel supplies negotiating table . 
The first acknowledgment that Japan was a war threat came on November 27, 1941 when
Washington ordered a 'War Warning'. The US feared a Japanese attack, not on America, but
on the Philippines. American military leaders took little or no precautions upon the
issue of warning. Admiral Husband E. Kimmel and Lt. General Walter C. Short of Pearl
Harbor had done nothing to make the fleet or its defenses ready for Japanese attack . The
commanding officers believed the warning to be no more than a possible threat of sabotage
from the Japanese living on the island of Oahu. As a result, the officers ordered that
all aircraft in the base be lined up at wing tip to be easily guarded. Defenses were on
limited alert, with no long distance reconnaissance and no improvements on the limited
anti-aircraft defenses. On board ships, only half of the anti-aircraft positions were
stood at with the ammunition locked away . In every reference I've seen and every Pearl
Harbor survivor I've ever talked to, each referred to the attack as a surprise, said PH1
Goodwin of Pearl Harbor in an Electronic-mail letter dated December 15, 1997. Mr.
Goodwin's comment is embarrassing at best, subsequently the American defense stance has
been referred to as a 'shameful blunder' . The lack of preparation for an attack
demonstrated by the officers at Pearl Harbor portrayed the general attitude of ignorance
in the American government. The United States of America is the strongest, most powerful
country in the world. A country such as Japan, which does not even have the resources to
survive a lengthy war, could not possibly attack them . 
The result of the attack would have been much less serious had the American officers
fought stronger. The ignorance was so great that, on the day of the bombing of Pearl
Harbor, several major and peculiar instances were noted and ignored by officers on duty.
At 03.50 an unidentified periscope was seen and ignored at the entrance of the harbor.
Also, the destroyer Ward depth-charged and sank an unidentified submarine at 06.37. The
contact report was taken up much later and with no degree of urgency. Finally, two radar
sightings of a large mass of aircraft 64 kilometers north of the island were dismissed by
the commanding officer at 07.02 as a 'probable' flight of B-17s from the US west coast .
These events, left utterly unacknowledged, led up to one of the great military defeats in
US history. At 06.00, the 2 500 foot anti-torpedo gate that guarded the entrance to Pearl
Harbor was opened in a customary morning maneuver unknowingly welcoming the attack.
Three-hundred and sixty Japanese planes broke through the clouds above Pearl Harbor at
07.55. The planes attacked in rows of two or three, dropping torpedoes at 100 knots from
70 feet. The first wave of planes destroyed US hangers and the planes in the neat,
anti-sabotage rows. Other attacks in the first wave were on 'Battleship Row', cruisers
and other auxiliary ships. Most ships had numerous torpedo hits. To complete the
destruction of the war ships, six submarines aided in the sinking and destroying of what
was not already certain. When torpedoing planes left the vicinity, bombers carrying 1 600
pound bombs were sent to destroy any remaining ships. Overlapping the first wave of
attack at 08.40 was a second one. They concentrated on the not yet fully destroyed
airfields. By 09.45 any ship of the US Pacific! Naval Fleet that was not on the Ocean
floor was drifting helplessly. It [the Arizona] sank like an earthquake had struck it, a
survivor remarked, 1 200 of his crew mates died. US troops returned from church or brunch
to defend as best they could. Fighting until they drowned or were crushed by exploding
debris, sailors, fliers and anti-aircraft gunners fought heroically to save their doomed
naval base. By reason of the attack occurring in what Americans thought was peace time,
much of the ammunition was locked away, leaving the defending US troops with little
defense. In the end, the US had eight battleships, three cruisers and a large number of
smaller vessels sink or rendered out of use. The Japanese lost 30 planes and five
submarines. Although the destruction was not total, Japanese foremost naval strategist,
Yamamoto, found the result better than he had anticipated . Military records state that
the attack sank or destroyed 6 ships, all of which were raised and rebuilt , except for
the Arizona, Oklahoma and Utah . US casualties included 2 500 as well as over 1 000
wounded. The Japanese lost less than 30 aircraft and about 55 men. Unharmed or
salvageable from the attack were land installation, power stations, all submarines and
stores of gasoline. The gasoline enabled shipyards to repair all the salvageable ships.
Primary targets for the Japanese were the US carriers Saratoga, Lexington and Enterprise.
They weighed 33 000, 33 000 and 19 000 tones respectively. The carriers were out of port
at the time of the bombing, performing deep sea maneuvers, thereby eluding the attack.
The USS Enterpise was later present at the battle of Midway Island on June 4-6, 1942 The
bombing of Pearl Harbor can be seen as a turning point in the war. Essentially, the war
had been of mainly European involvement, now it took a global turn. The bombing prompted
a US declaration of war on the following day, as well as great American shock and outrage
tempered by anger. The attack was dubbed 'a day of infamy' by President Roosevelt, as no
American could forgive or forget the actions of the Japanese nation. The Japanese could
not have devised a better way to rally the American citizens into full support for
Roosevelt and his government's plan of US involvement in the war. A previous promise
between British Prime Minister, Winstin Churchill and President Roosevelt was honored
when Britain declared war upon Japan two hours after the US declaration. The events
surrounding the bombing of Pearl Harbor prove the US handled the situation very poorly.
Many opposing tactics were noted and ignored. Warnings were thought of as routine. Even
survivors, who were fully aware of the Japanese tendencies of war on China, the
government war warnings and their country's unprepared state, still describe the attack
as a surprise. The Japanese military strategies were intelligent and well executed;
although, the Japanese attack would not have been nearly as effective had the Americans
not have been so blatantly ignorant.