Pearl Harbor

PEARL HARBORMs. Katie’s 4th Grade Class

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gO1h_-

cqpc&feature=related

Timeline July 1937: Japan invades North China from

Manchuria. July 1940: U.S. imposes trade sanctions, followed by

an embargo, aimed at curbing Japan’s military aggression in Asia.

1941 January: Adm. Yamamoto begins communicating with other

Japanese officers about a possible attack on Pearl Harbor. January 27: Joseph C. Grew, the U.S. ambassador to Japan,

wires Washington that he has learned that Japan is planning a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor. No one in Washington believes the information. Most senior American military experts believe the Japanese would attack Manila in the Philippine Islands if war broke out.

Timeline February: Adm. Husband E. Kimmel assumes command of the

U.S. Pacific Fleet in Hawaii. Kimmel and Lt. Gen.Walter C. Short, commanding general of the Hawaiian Department, prepare for the defense of the islands. They ask their seniors in Washington for additional men and equipment to insure a proper defense of military instillations.

April: U.S. intelligence officers continue to monitor Japanese secret messages. In a program code-named Magic, U.S. intelligence uses a machine to decode Japan's diplomatic dispatches. Washington does not communicate all the available information to all commands, including Short and Kimmel in Hawaii.

May: Japanese Adm. Nomura informs his superiors that he has learned Americans were reading his message traffic. No one in Tokyo believes the code could have been broken. The code is not changed.

Timeline July: Throughout the summer, Adm. Yamamoto trains his forces

and finalizes the planning of the attack on Pearl Harbor. September 24: The "bomb plot" message from Japanese naval

intelligence to Japan's consul general in Honolulu requesting a grid of exact locations of ships in Pearl Harbor is deciphered. The information is not shared with the Hawaii's Adm. Kimmel and Gen. Short.

November: Tokyo sends an experienced diplomat to Washington as a special envoy to assist Ambassador Kichisaburo Nomura, who continues to seek a diplomatic solution. Japan wants the U.S. to agree to its southern expansion in Asia diplomatically but if those efforts were unsuccessful, Japan was prepared to go to war.

Timeline November 16: Submarines, the first units involved in the attack, depart Japan. November 26: The main body, aircraft carriers and escorts, begin the transit to

Hawaii. November 27: Kimmel and Short receive a so-called "war warning" from Washington

indicating a Japanese attack, possibly on an American target in the Pacific, is likely. Night of December 6; Morning of December 7: U.S. intelligence decodes a

message pointing to Sunday morning as a deadline for some kind of Japanese action. The message is delivered to the Washington high command before 9 a.m. Washington time, more than 4 hours before the attack on Pearl Harbor. But the message is not forwarded to the Pearl Harbor commanders and finally arrives only after the attack has begun.At 0755, Hawaiian time, the first wave of Japanese aircraft begin the attack. Along with the ships in Pearl Harbor, the air stations at Hickam, Wheeler, Ford Island, Kaneohe and Ewa Field are attacked. The Japanese attack continues for two hours and 20 minutes. When it's over, more than 2,400 Americans are dead and nearly 1,200 wounded. Eighteen ships have been sunk or damaged. More than 300 aircraft are damaged or destroyed. December 8: President Roosevelt addresses Congress and asks for a declaration of

war against Japan, which he receives. December 16: Adm. Kimmel and Gen. Short are relieved of their commands.

Leading up to the Event

Event Saturday, December 6 - Washington

D.C. - U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt makes a final appeal to the Emperor of Japan for peace. There is no reply. Late this same day, the U.S. code-breaking service begins intercepting a 14-part Japanese message and deciphers the first 13 parts, passing them on to the President and Secretary of State. The Americans believe a Japanese attack is imminent, most likely somewhere in Southeast Asia.

Event Sunday, December 7 - Washington D.C. - The last part of the Japanese

message, stating that diplomatic relations with the U.S. are to be broken off, reaches Washington in the morning and is decoded at approximately 9 a.m. About an hour later, another Japanese message is intercepted. It instructs the Japanese embassy to deliver the main message to the Americans at 1 p.m. The Americans realize this time corresponds with early morning time in Pearl Harbor, which is several hours behind. The U.S. War Department then sends out an alert but uses a commercial telegraph because radio contact with Hawaii is temporarily broken. Delays prevent the alert from arriving at headquarters in Oahu until noontime (Hawaii time) four hours after the attack has already begun.

Sunday, December 7 - Islands of Hawaii, near Oahu - The Japanese attack force under the command of Admiral Nagumo, consisting of six carriers with 423 planes, is about to attack. At 6 a.m., the first attack wave of 183 Japanese planes takes off from the carriers located 230 miles north of Oahu and heads for the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor.

Pearl Harbor - At 7:02 a.m., two Army operators at Oahu's northern shore radar station detect the Japanese air attack approaching and contact a junior officer who disregards their reports, thinking they are American B-17 planes which are expected in from the U.S. west coast.

Event Near Oahu - At 7:15 a.m., a second attack wave of 167 planes

takes off from the Japanese carriers and heads for Pearl Harbor. Pearl Harbor is not on a state on high alert. Senior commanders

have concluded, based on available intelligence, there is no reason to believe an attack is imminent. Aircraft are therefore left parked wingtip to wingtip on airfields, anti-aircraft guns are unmanned with many ammunition boxes kept locked in accordance with peacetime regulations. There are also no torpedo nets protecting the fleet anchorage. And since it is Sunday morning, many officers and crewmen are leisurely ashore.

At 7:53 a.m., the first Japanese assault wave, with 51 'Val' dive bombers, 40 'Kate' torpedo bombers, 50 high level bombers and 43 'Zero' fighters, commences the attack with flight commander, Mitsuo Fuchida, sounding the battle cry: "Tora! Tora! Tora!" (Tiger! Tiger! Tiger!).

Event The Americans are taken completely by surprise. The

first attack wave targets airfields and battleships. The second wave targets other ships and shipyard facilities. The air raid lasts until 9:45 a.m. Eight battleships are damaged, with five sunk. Three light cruisers, three destroyers and three smaller vessels are lost along with 188 aircraft. The Japanese lose 27 planes and five midget submarines which attempted to penetrate the inner harbor and launch torpedoes.

Escaping damage from the attack are the prime targets, the three U.S. Pacific Fleet aircraft carriers, Lexington, Enterprise and Saratoga, which were not in the port. Also escaping damage are the base fuel tanks.

Event The casualty list includes 2,335 servicemen

and 68 civilians killed, with 1,178 wounded. Included are 1,104 men aboard the Battleship USS Arizona killed after a 1,760-pound air bomb penetrated into the forward magazine causing catastrophic explosions.

In Washington, various delays prevent the Japanese diplomats from presenting their war message to Secretary of State, Cordell Hull, until 2:30 p.m. (Washington time) just as the first reports of the air raid at Pearl Harbor are being read by Hull.

Event News of the "sneak attack" is broadcast to the American

public via radio bulletins, with many popular Sunday afternoon entertainment programs being interrupted. The news sends a shockwave across the nation and results in a tremendous influx of young volunteers into the U.S. armed forces. The attack also unites the nation behind the President and effectively ends isolationist sentiment in the country.

Monday, December 8 - The United States and Britain declare war on Japan with President Roosevelt calling December 7, "a date which will live in infamy..."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VqQAf74fsE http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xEWvIn-

YNc&feature=related

Event

Aftermath No sooner had the raid ended than U.S. forces

attempted to locate the Japanese carrier fleet, with a view to delivering some kind of counter-blow. Many cruisers and destroyers left Pearl Harbor, joining the aircraft carrier Enterprise and other surface ships that were already at sea. The few surviving flight-worthy aircraft were also sent out. Much of the search was directed southwards, rather than to the north where Japanese ships were already steaming away after recovering their planes. Fortunately for the outnumbered Americans, no contact was made.

Aftermath On 8 December, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt addressed the Congress to

ask for a declaration of war against Japan. Referring to December Seventh, 1941, as a "day that shall live in infamy", he gave the Pearl Harbor attack its most famous and enduring title. Within a few days, Germany and Italy had declared war on the United States. Even before the President's speech, Americans were flooding recruiting offices to try to join the Armed Forces. For those already in the Service, the formality of war was now present, though for most, the grim reality of the experience was still well in the future.

Also on 8 December, Vice Admiral William F. Halsey brought his Enterprise task force into Pearl Harbor, where the enormity of the destruction shocked all hands. Halsey's comment, "Before we're through with 'em, the Japanese language will be spoken only in hell!", probably represented a universal feeling, not just in the Fleet, but in virtually the entire Nation.

Four days after the raid, on 11 December, Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox arrived at Pearl Harbor for a personal inspection. On his return to Washington, he recommended the relief of the Pacific Fleet's commander. Admiral Husband E. Kimmel was temporarily replaced by the Battle Force commander, Vice Admiral William S. Pye. Kimmel's permanent replacement, Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, who had been Chief of the Bureau of Navigation, arrived on Christmas Day and took command at year's end.

Aftermath Knox's brief visit to Pearl Harbor was but the first of a long

series of official investigations into the causes of such a successful enemy surprise attack. However, the most important element of the aftermath of the Pearl Harbor attack, the fighting of World War II, could not await the outcome of such proceedings. For six months, Japan would encounter few reverses to its energetic offensives. Then, in May and June 1942, it would be twice checked, in the carrier battles of the Coral Sea and Midway. With its offensive power greatly diminished, Japan was soon engaged in a brutal attrition campaign over Guadalcanal, and, beginning in 1943, was on the receiving end of a relentless American drive west across the Pacific and north from Australia that brought vengeance for Pearl Harbor forcefully into the Japanese Home Islands.

Implications Of the 22 Japanese ships that took part in the

attack, only one survived. The attack on Pearl Harbor was a strategic

blunder for Japan. In terms of military history, the attack on Pearl

Harbor marked the emergence of aircraft carrier as the center of naval power, replacing the battleship as the keystone of the fleet.

This event is also an important part of the reason for the bombings of Nagasaki and Hiroshima.

Videos http://

www.youtube.com/watch?v=VnlLRmy3BI0&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxFv8xFU1Ng&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyjicU83-Zs&feature=related

Standards Webpage will not display standards.

Requires login.

Sources http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VnlLR

my3BI0&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxFv8

xFU1Ng&feature=related http://

www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyjicU83-Zs&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VqQAf74fsE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gO1h_-cqpc&feature=related

Sources http://

www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4206060

http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/pearl.htm

http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/events/wwii-pac/pearlhbr/ph-aftr.htm

http://www.dark-stories.com/eng/pearl_harbor.htm