Pearl Harbor

The attack on Pearl harbor was the single most deadly attack on American soil in Americas history. This attack is what helped make the decicion to involve America into World War Two. Also the attack damaged hundreds of millions of dollars worth of American Battle equipment.

In May of 1940 the key piece of the United States navy was moved to pearl harbor from the west side of the island. Pearl harbor had long been under expansion as a important marine base. The navy yard had a dock able of containing the biggest warships, the marine railway was for the less significant ones and an engineering place for repairing these ships. There were a large amount of fastening and docking locations for ships, including a succeeding area by the east side of Ford Island it was usually called Battleship Row. Ford Island, controls the center of Pearl Harbor, which held a naval air posting for combating landplanes and watch seaplanes. Across Southeast Loch from the navy yard was a submarine base and nearby was a large farm of fuel oil tanks. The base also included a naval hospital and other facilities.

Even with all of this it was still not enough to support the entire fleet. Pearl Harbor had a very small space to work preventing the dispersal of its battleships, and in

order to get into the sea, the ships had to go through a single narrow channel.Both of the flauses in construction was a risk from a safety point of view . The base's supply and industrial capacity was also too small in order to fulfill the needs of the fleet of ships

moving from the west coast was slow as well and lacked carrying space. There were not enough tow boats and other maintenance services to keep the Fleet ready and prepared for fighting practice. Living and amusement facilities for the Fleet's many of Marines and Sailors were extremely unsatisfactory for the men who were going be separated for a long time from their families. Nearby Honolulu was also filled with Army and Navy staff, and its populace, were not too happy about the flood , and did not welcome the new arrivals properly. Therefore, Fleet readiness was disabled, its security was below as good as the safety levls should be, and its spirit was impared.

During 1940 1941, construction of the new buildings was engaged to deal with some of these problems. The supply stock up, on a neck of land across the channel from Battleship Row, was very significantly expanded other locations were developed for basing aircraft, new everlasting dry docks were begun, a floating dock was brought over from the mainland, and many other upgrades were started. The Army and Army Air Corporations, were accountable for the defense of Hawaii and the Pearl Harbor base, also built new amenities and brought in more armed forces. However, other deficiency were either natural to the physical location or could not be corrected within the short amount of time allowed, competing requirements and available resources. These had to be stood as best they could.

On December seventh 1941a Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor began which was one of the most surprising moments in US history. A solitary well done attack removed the United States Navy's battleship force as a possible risk to the Japanese empires

southward growth. America, not prepared and now a great deal weakened, was unexpectedly brought into the Second World War . the Fleet was more vulnerable because Eighteen months earlier, President Franklin D. Roosevelt had transferred the United States Fleet to Pearl Harbor as a presumed prevention to Japanese hostility. The Japanese military deeply busy in the seemingly endless war it had started against China in the mid 1930's , badly needed oil and other raw resources. Commercial access to these was little by little shortened as the conquests continued. In July 1941 the Western powers successfully stopped trade with Japan. From then on, as the desperate Japanese plan to take hold of the oil and minerals in the East Indies and Southeast Asia, a war in the pacific was virtually unavoidable.

By late November 1941, the peace negotiations clearly approaching an end, educated U.S. officials and they were well informed they believed through an ability to read Japan's discreet codes fully expected a Japanese attack into the Indies, Malaya and possibly in the Philippines (history).But what was completely unforeseen was the prospect that Japan would attack the U.S also.

The U.S. Fleet's Pearl Harbor base was accessible only by an aircraft carrier force, and the Japanese Navy in secret sent one across the Pacific with greater airborne striking power than had ever been seen in the worlds oceans (History). Its planes hit just before early morning on the seventh of December. Within a short time five of eight battleships at Pearl Harbor were sunk or sinking, with the rest damaged. Several other ships and most Hawaii based combat planes were also knock out of commission and over 2400

Americans were dead (history). Soon after, Japanese planes eliminated much of the American air force in the Philippines, and then theJapanese Army was onto dry land in Malaya. This great Japanese triumph, achieved without prior political paperwork, shocked and infuriated the previously divided American people into a level of determined unity scarcely seen before. For the next five months, until the battle of coral sea in the early Spring , Japan's far reaching offensives continued undisturbed by productive opposition. American and Allied confidence suffered accordingly. Under normal political circumstances, a place might have been considered. However, the memory of the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor fueled a determination to fight . Once the battle of midway in June 1942 had abolished much of Japan's striking power, that same memory stoked a relentless war to undo the take-over and eliminate Japan , and its Italian and German allies,as they threaten future World peace (history).

Both the Japanese and the United States Navies were a potential target for hostile carrier air power recognized the Pearl Harbor naval base. The U.S. Navy had even looked at the issue during some of its interwar Fleet troubles. However, its detachment from Japan and shallow harbor, the certainty that Japan's navy would have many other pressing needs for its aircraft carriers in the event of war, and a belief that intelligence would provide warning convinced superior US officers that the vision of an attack on Pearl Harbor could be carefully predicted unlikely (history). During the interwar period, the Japanesehad reached a like conclusion. However, their burning need for secure flanks during the

planned offensive into Southeast Asia and the East Indies urged the forceful chief of the Japanese Combined Fleet, Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto to revert to the