An Attack that Changed the World December 7.1941: Pearl Harbor
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B y Jennifer S. Blandford Fifty years ago, December 7, a quiet Sunday morning, America suffered a surprise attack that cannot be forgotten by her people. Shortly before 8 a.m. a squadron of 350 Japanese fighters, dive bombers, and torpedo planes swept in from the north and destroyed six American battleships, 163 aircraft and 2,403 soldiers while wounding 1,178. Most of this d a m a g e occurred within the first 20 minutes of a two-hour attack. The event w a s the attack on Pearl Harbor, and it brought America into World W a r II. This day has been called by m a n y , "the day of infamy" or "bloody Sunday." Following Pearl Harbor, the war carried on for several years with heavy fighting throughout m u c h of Southeast Asia and thousands of casualities on both sides. America finally ended it after dropping two surprise atomic bombs on the Japanese cities, Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Unfortunately, America's surprise attacks wiped out thousands of innocent Japanese civilians. From the m o m e n t after the first explosion and through the past 50 years, m a n y patriots have debated over h o w a nation as great as America could have allowed herself to be caught so off-guard by a lesser foe, such as Japan. The fact is that America w a s too preoccupied with Europe's bold fascists to pay any attention to Tokyo's imperialists. Over the years, the surprise attack has been turned into a kind-of heroic defeat for America. Stories have been told of scalded m e n s w i m m i n g through burning oil to rescue their bleeding comrades as they drowned in the harbor and of gallant soldiers firing round after round of ammunition into the sky with the hopes of downing a soaring Japanese plane. The results of the attack on Pearl Harbor and World But the fact remains that for America, the attack on W a r II have been positive for America. It brought her out Pearl Harbor w a s a devastating and humiliating event. of isolation and helped her to restore Britain's power, People seldom forget, nor do they want to forget, such free Japan from military rule and give democracy back to calamities. Western Europe, and it established amazing n e w ties The Pearl Harbor event w a s the first time w h e n the betweeen America and Japan. entire world stood still. It w a s a time w h e n people In a w a y unprecedented in history, the conquering around the country were experiencing the same emo- nation began immediately to help the conquered nation tions brought about by horror, fear, and disbelief. Most rebuild. U.S. occupational forces replaced a totalitarian Americans living at the time can pinpoint exactly where monarchy with a democratic, representative governthey were and what they were doing w h e n they first ment, which still exists today. heard the news of the attack. The U.S. government poured in economic aid to help Today m a n y Japanese are not ashamed of the Pearl the conquered nation build a free enterprise business Harbor incident, but m a n y feel that what is past is past and financial operation, which still thrives today. and should be forgotten. In fact, most Japanese history U.S. missionaries also helped to lift the people from text books do not include the facts of World W a r II for just spiritual devastation. America put Japan back on its feet, and today that tiny this reason. Of course, a country as great as America had no prob- Asian nation has developed into one of the leading lem recovering once the initial shock wore off, but such nations of the world. destruction is not easily forgotten.
