The Attack on Pearl Harbor

Pearl Harbor is a naval base located in Hawaii near Honolulu. The attack on Pearl Harbor happened on December 7, 1941 at eight in the morning. Without declaring war, Japanese Commander Mitsuo Fuchida attacked Pearl Harbor with 353 aircrafts and 60 ships. There were two waves that hit Pearl Harbor. The first one took off from Japan at 6 A.M., 183 planes. The second wave had 167 planes and they took off from Japan at 7 A.M. While some of the soldiers were out for religious services, two waves of Japanese fighters and bombers came and bombed pearl harbor.

The attack on pearl harbor in 1941 lead America to get involved in WWII and greatly helping the alliance in winning the war. Japan attacked Pearl Harbor because they didn’t like the idea of Americans placing an embargo on the country’s trade. It was a cautionary operation to attempt and destroy the practicality of the US Navy in the Pacific. There were 2403 deaths and 1143 injured Americans. The Japanese sunk eighteen ships, which included five battleships.

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The word of attack was sent to President Roosevelt by the Secretary of War, Harry Stimson. Japan wanted to destroy and cripple the US Navy, but that plan didn’t work because the American fleet came into World War II full force.

There were multiple consequences of Pearl Harbor. The United States set in motion a investigation into the attack on Pearl Harbor to figure out how a surprise attack was possible. Two people took responsibility for not making sure the base had a proper defense.

Their names were Rear Admiral Husband E. Kimmel and Lieutenant General Walter Short and they were both stripped away from their commands. The most important consequence of Pearl Harbor is the United States declaring war on Japan. After the attack, the US had no choice but to be involved in WWII because of the Tripartite Pact. The Tripartite Pact includes Germany, Italy, and Japan so when the US declared war on Japan, Italy and Germany also declared war on the US and that is how the United States got involved in WWII. The attack on Pearl Harbor is assumed to have secured the Allied victory as it allowed the other partners with needed help.

The consequences didn’t stop there. The mainland was against anything that was Japanese related after the Japanese attacked, they mistreated the Germans and Italians but mostly the Japanese. After the attack, President Roosevelt ordered the Japanese who weren’t American soldiers to be put in internment camps. The planner of the program, Colonel Karl Bendetsen, said, “One drop of Japanese blood is qualified.” Americans put Japanese people in camps (mainly on the west coast) because the U.S. couldn’t trust them. Japanese American soldiers would come back from the war only to see their family incarcerated. There were about 110,00 to 120,000 prisoners in the camps. Sixty-two percent of those prisoners were American citizens and 80,000 of those prisoners were second generation. Not every Japanese were put in internment camps. A little more than 112,00 Japanese Americans that were living on the West were forced into camps. Though, in Hawaii, there were 150,000 Japanese Americans living there but only 1,200 to 1,800 were imprisoned.

Another thing that happened as a result of the attack, was more women working in factories. Women began working during World War I but it became more so in World War II. The ladies in that generation stepped up to help the society while most of the men went off to fight in WWII. They took over more important jobs in factories. The women worked jobs where they aren’t normally working at. They worked as nurses, drove trucks, fixed airplanes, and clerical positions. The rebuilding of Pearl Harbor took a while. The shipyard was restored immediately after the attack, as the rest of the military prepared to go to war. A boy named, Erdworth Ventula, had been working at the Pearl Harbor shipyard for only a month when it was attacked. Men like Ventula worked for most of the day to help rebuild and repair the damaged vessels. Despite the amount of damage that was done to the naval base and the fleet, within a few months, the first battleships were returned to service.

In conclusion, the Japanese has killed and wounded numerous Americans at Pearl Harbor, in Hawaii. They attacked Pearl Harbor hoping to severely damage the US Navy but failed. They damaged the US Navy, but it wasn’t long term. The US recovered fast enough to defeat Japan with the rest of the Allies. Mostly all of the battleships that were damaged from the Japanese were rebuilt and refloated to join in on WWII and participate in battles across the pacific. The consequences after the attack were entering World War II, Rear Admiral Husband E. Kimmel and Lieutenant General Walter Short were fired from their jobs because they were blamed for not preparing a secure base, Japanese American internment camps, and women working in the work force increased tremendously.