Perl Harbor Essay, Research Paper
In 1941, one of the largest American military
defeats occurred. An entire naval fleet was destroyed, hundreds were killed,
all before 09.00 on a Sunday. The US did not have any knowledge of this
attack, partially because of 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 Japanese actions, they did
not take a defensive stance as they believed an attack would never touch
their soil. 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. In the years before 1941, the war saw
little American military action. After the collapse of France, American
President 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 indecisiveness about declaring war.
The President’s defense to these accusations
was he did not want to out step public opinion. 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 or her own. Japanese forces were concentrated on the
Chinese front to conquer and obtain. As a result of her 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 her
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 exercised more vigilance. 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. The US had no knowledge of the attack on Pearl
Harbor in 1941, and it was their fault.