It’s still important to `Remember Pearl Harbor’

Seventy-five years ago, Dec. 7, 1941, the Japanese attack on U.S. military installations in Hawaii pulled the nation into a war in two theaters, Europe and the Pacific, that profoundly shaped today’s world. “Remember Pearl Harbor” was a well-known slogan during World War II, and today is Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day.

The attack effectively ended the isolationism that had kept the United States out of direct involvement in the war in Europe, although we were supporting the fight against fascist Germany and Italy. Those nations had an alliance with Japan, which was soon to control more territory than Japan’s Axis partners. The U.S. had placed an oil embargo on Japan, and that was one of the issues in talks between Secretary of State Cordell Hull and Japanese diplomats in Washington. The attack was under way as Hull and the Japanese met on Sunday. The Japanese had a record of surprise attacks.

President Franklin Roosevelt famously described Dec. 7, 1941, as “a day that will live in infamy.” The president, top military leaders, intelligence people and diplomats, felt that the Japanese might attack U.S. forces in the Pacific, but few thought Hawaii would be the target – and those who did were ignored. On that Sunday, about half the Pacific Fleet was in port, including eight battleships, eight cruisers, 29 destroyers and support ships such as tankers. No U.S. carriers were in port, however, reducing the impact of the attack. In 1941, battleships were the capital warships in the world’s navies; naval aviation was in its infancy. That changed with the carrier-based attack on Dec. 7.

The battleships included the USS Arizona, sunk at her moorings after a bomb exploded the forward magazine. The USS Arizona Memorial in Pearl Harbor is built over the sunken ship. The attack killed 1,177 Arizona crew members, almost half of the total U.S. casualties. Men were killed on other ships and others, including civilians, died at Wheeler Field, Schofield Barracks and Naval Air Station Kaneohe Bay. Not far from the memorial is the other bookend for WWII in the Pacific, the USS Missouri, on which the Japanese formally surrendered in 1945.

In his book, “Pearl Harbor: From Infamy to Greatness,” Craig Nelson writes: “The attack on Pearl Harbor, such a vital part of American history, was for Japan at that moment merely a preemptive strike, a minor sideshow to Operation Number One.” That was the overall Japanese plan – carried out with success – for taking the Philippines, Guam and East Indies. The attack on Dec. 7 was “to protect the flank of Operation Number One, keeping the Americans out of the Pacific until the resource-rich Asian colonial territories could be conquered, occupied, and integrated into the Japanese economy.”

Clearly, as Nelson notes, there was command failure on the part of Admiral Husband E. Kimmel and Army Gen. Walter Short. It’s an understatement that the U.S. Army and Navy did not work together or even communicate well. This was before the Department of Defense was created; the army and navy operated as rival forces. What is now the U.S. Air Force was then the Army Air Corps.

Today, we honor the sacrifice and service of those who died in the service of their country on Dec. 7, 1941, and we remember, too, the lasting impact of Pearl Harbor. “This would be the last war declared by Congress, and its unanimous sentiment was felt across the country ...”

This story was originally published December 7, 2016 at 6:30 AM with the headline "It’s still important to `Remember Pearl Harbor’."