Pearl Harbor Day
[NOTE: This is a revised and expanded edition of a post first published in 2006.]
Eighty-three years ago today Pearl Harbor was attacked.
That’s long enough ago that only a vanishing few remember the day and its aftermath with any clarity. Many generations—including my own tiresome one, the baby boomers—have come up since then, and the world has indeed changed.
Prior to 9/11, the Pearl Harbor attack of December 7, 1941 was the closest thing America had to 9/11. The differences between the two are profound, however: at Pearl Harbor we knew the culprit. It was clearly and unequivocally an act of war by the nation of Japan, which was already at war in the Pacific.
But it was, like 9/11, a sneak attack that killed roughly the same number of Americans – in the case of Pearl Harbor mostly (although not exclusively) those in the armed forces. And the Pearl Harbor attack, in the reported (but disputed) words of Japanese Admiral Yamamoto, awakened the “sleeping giant” of the US and filled it with a “terrible resolve.”
In the case of Pearl Harbor, that resolve lasted the duration of the war, an all-out conflagration that required far more sacrifice of the US (and the world) in money, comfort, and the all-important cost of human lives. The scale of such a loss is not even remotely comparable to that of our present conflicts. In addition, the first years of World War II featured many losses and much peril. It was a different world, however, and failure was not considered an option.
Yes, mistakes were made in World War II and in the war that began on 9/11 and has not ended yet. Mistakes always will be made in war. The tactics and even the strategies of World War II don’t fit today’s wars. But tactics and strategies aren’t the issue – although they are extremely important. The overarching issue is will. Without that, a war cannot be won. And, in that respect as in many others, current generations don’t compare to the one known as “The Greatest Generation.”
For some contrast, go back to FDR’s “Day of Infamy” speech (a misquote, it turns out: he actually said “date which will live in infamy”). Following are some of the less famous quotes from the speech; I have selected them because they speak to the question of will. FDR was assisted in mustering that will by the relative clarity of the enemy and its intent in World War II. But it still seems to me, on reading these words, that such unequivocal determination could not be summoned today in the US, even if given the exact circumstances of the infamous attack of December 7, 1941. It may, however, be present in Israel at the moment, but I’m not completely sure:
…No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people in their righteous might will win through to absolute victory.
I believe that I interpret the will of the Congress and of the people when I assert that we will not only defend ourselves to the uttermost but will make it very certain that this form of treachery shall never again endanger us.
Hostilities exist. There is no blinking at the fact that our people, our territory and our interests are in grave danger.
With confidence in our armed forces – with the unbounding determination of our people – we will gain the inevitable triumph – so help us God.
Neo: “an all-out conflagration that required far more sacrifice of the US (and the world) in money, comfort, and the all-important cost of human lives.”
As I’m sure you, Neo, and your readers are aware, it was common back during WWII to have a star in your front window or on your front door indicating that a son was in the armed forces; with a silver star meaning a son was injured in combat and a gold meant that a son was killed in the war.
I was born well after the war (late 50s); but I do remember my grandmother telling me that just about every neighborhood (my grandfather’s job was transferred several times during the war, so they lived in several cities during the war) had stars in the windows and in just about every neighborhood there was at least one silver or gold star on a front door. I dare say that today, unless you have family directly involved in a war, most wars overseas are not much more than news headlines – we are, in our daily lives, that far removed from foreign wars.
Also, the 9-11 attack was a coordinated attack on several locations; we tend to forget and really don’t teach the attack on Pearl Harbor as a similar coordinated attack on several locations.
But it was – within a few hours the Japanese attacked not just Pearl Harbor, but also the Philippines, Guam and Wake Island, all under US control. The Japanese also in the same time period attacked British-held Hong Kong, Singapore, and Malay. Thinking about the logistics of such a widespread, geographically speaking that is, attack must have been quite the under taking.
I cannot even begin to imagine what the horror such a global attacked must have felt like.
My dad was washing dishes in the kitchen of his fraternity house (Alpha Delta Phi) at Northwestern University when he first heard news of the attack on Pearl Harbor. He was listening to the Bears game on the radio when the announcer broke in to tell his audience what had happened. Dad was attending NU on a football scholarship, he was a starting single-wing quarterback, calling plays in the backfield next to the great Otto Graham, who was also his roommate and best friend. His college football career more or less ended in that moment. Not too long thereafter he was attending U.S. Navy midshipman’s school at Columbia University in New York City. In due course he was commissioned as an ensign and deployed to the Pacific. He came home in 1946.
He often told me that he, along with almost every American, never doubted that we would win the war.
He was right — as usual.
I still have his blue navy greatcoat, It is a marvelous garment, made of the finest wool, very heavy and as warm as any down coat from Eddie Bauer or LL Bean. It is slit in the left side to accommodate the wearing of a sword.
Rest in peace, sir. Mission accomplished, job well done.
Neptunus Lex (captain Carroll LeFon, USN) wrote about entering Pearl Harbor aboard the USS Constellation, in 1987:
https://thelexicans.wordpress.com/2017/12/07/pearl-harbor/
As I have previously commented on Decembers of the 7th day, my mother’s beau, a sailor on a ship based in Pearl Harbor. was killed in the Japanese attack. USS Oklahoma, IIRC, which was fitting, as he and my mother were Okies.
We only found out about this from our aunt, after our mother died. My mother and Pearl Harbor have long reminded me of this song. KATE WOLF – In China or a Woman’s Heart.
I was eight on Pearl harbor Day. Our lives changed.
My father went away to work on building a naval base at Lake Pend Oreille, Idaho. Two years later my parents divorced.
All the young men in our small town left for the service or military construction projects. It became a town of men over forty, school age boys, and women of all ages.
The town organized scarp iron and paper/cardboard collection drives. We filled a vacant lot with old car frames, barrels, and anyother scrap metal we could scour from the countryside. It took several large trucks to haul it all away.
Our teachers had us read about the war in the Sunday newspaper and make reports about what we’d read. The other main source of war news was the Movietone News at the local movie theater. Admission was nickel as I recall.
There were gold and silver stars in windows where the families grieved but carried on because the war must be won.
People complained mildly about rationing, and maybe some cheated in applying for more gas or meat, but mostly it was seen as a patriotic thing to help the war effort by sticking to the rules.
Because there were no young men in town, boys were hired to do jobs that men had done. During summers I served as a gofer for my electrician grandfather, helped an older man deliver milk for the local dairy, and worked as a laborer at the lumber yard. Jobs I would not have gotten if the war wasn’t on.
It wasn’t a carefree time, but it was a time of unity. A distinct difference between those days and what we’ve become.
Neptunus Lex – I really miss his comments
I have mentioned that my Dad was there. The Dec after 9/11, my Wife and I flew to Hawaii, to surprise my Dad. We did.
We went to the ceremony held at Punch Bowl, US Cemetary. The featured speaker was Hugh O’Brien. He was the youngest Marine DI, training Men to go off to fight, and survive. On the way out we stopped at the grave of Ernie Pyle. If my memory serves me, he is buried flanked by Unkown Soldiers.
Side note, Dad was taught to fire 50 cal machine guns by Robert Stack.
I really miss my Dad
I was six years old, and don’t recall the day; although my wife says that she does.
I do recall total involvement. Nearly every family had young men in harm’s way. The one next door, and the one across the street from us, were both killed in the air war. An older cousin survived his tour with the 8th Air Force over Europe. His brother was a Marine; but in a support role.
My Dad was drafted into the Navy at age 36, with three children. How that came about is another story; one of local corruption and a vendetta by a person with power. Those types are always lurking.
By the way, he was in the amphibious force, assigned as a crewman on landing craft. He was at Okinawa, but I am thankful that he did not have to take part in an invasion of Japan proper.
At home women were doing jobs they could never have imagined; and scarcity of nearly every sort was the norm. School children bought ‘savings stamps’ with their dimes, and if we accumulated a sufficient number, traded them for war bonds. We diligently collected materials that were defined as war essential; e.g. kitchen grease, newspapers, and scrap metal. (We were not told why those items were desired.)
Radios were always tuned for the nightly war news, and families gathered anxiously. My Uncle, who was a farmer in an area without electricity, had a battery operated radio. So, he was the source of war news for others with loved ones at risk.
Letters were sporadic and cherished; but a telegram was to be dreaded.
I suppose that there were those who faulted the effort, or questioned the commitment. But they were not the ordinary people who bore whatever burden was required.
By the way, one of the burdens was the scarcity of grits. I asked why we could not get grits and Nannie, whose home we shared for the duration, replied that the fighting boys needed their grits to defeat the enemy. Like any Southern boy, I could see the logic.
Related, with information and a documentary of interest…
“Why Didn’t Someone Wake Up America On This Day 83 Years Ago?”—
https://blazingcatfur.ca/2024/12/08/why-didnt-someone-wake-up-america-on-this-day-83-years-ago/
Key graf:
‘…“Why,” asked a journalist with the AP, Harold “Hal” Boyle, in 1951, “didn’t someone blow a bugle at Pearl Harbor 10 years ago and wake up America?” It turns out that someone did, but that reveille was ignored by their immediate superior…’
It has always been contended by some that FDR deliberately got the U.S. into war with Japan.
Here is an article, complete with several very suggestive documents, arguing that FDR knew that the temper of the U.S. populace would never favor attacking Japan, so elements of his Administration goaded the Japanese, that FDR knew that the Japanese would attack the U.S., and had warnings that such an attack would most likely be targeting Pearl Harbor.*
* See https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2024/12/report-evidence-suggests-fdr-let-pearl-harbor-happen/
War has it’s own way, woe to those who start one thinking they can control it!
SoP, hasn’t that one been put to rest?
(Multiple times, in fact?)
Barry Meislin–
As I see it, the fact that we have discovered that all sorts of recent events, and things, our views of which, we have been told, are just “conspiracy theories,” have turned out to be, in fact, true, should also make us question and take another look at whether other events, in the past, were as we have been taught/told they were.
The Establishment and the MSM have been lying to us for a very long time.