Facts about attack on Pearl
Harbour by the Japanese
- The attack took place on December 7, 1941.
- Japansese force consisted of six carriers with 423 planes.
- At 6 a.m. the first Japanese attack wave of 83 planes took off.
- Three prime targets escaped damage, the U.S. Pacific Fleet aircraft
carriers, the Lexington, Enterprise and Saratoga. They were not in the
port when the attack took place.
- Another target, the base
fuel tanks also escaped damage.
- Casualties included 2,335
servicemen and 68 civilians.
- 1178 people were wounded.
- The attack was the climax of a decade of worsening relations
between the U.S. and militaristic Japan.
- The Japanese fleet had 30 ships.
- The attack was planned weeks in advance.
- The main reason for the attack was over economic issues.
- Of the eight battleships, all but the Arizona and Oklahoma were
eventually repaired and returned to service.
- A U.S. Army private who noticed the large flight of planes on his
radar screen was told to ignore them because a flight of B-17s from the
continental U.S. was expected at the time.
- Pearl Harbor was not in the state of high alert when the attack
started, Anti-Aircraft guns were left unmanned.
- The main targets for the
first wave was the airfield and battleships.
- The second wave targets
were other ships and shipyard facilities.
• By the summer
of 1940, the United States had cracked Japan's top-secret diplomatic code,
nicknamed "Purple [wiki]." This enabled U.S.
intelligence agencies to monitor messages to and from Tokyo.
• Although several U.S. command posts received machines for decoding
"Purple," Pearl Harbor was never given one.
• Messages intercepted in the autumn of 1941 suggested what the Japanese were
planning:
› On October
9, 1941, Tokyo told its consul in Honolulu to "divide the water around
Pearl Harbor into five sub-areas and report on the types and numbers of
American war craft."
› The Japanese foreign minister urged negotiators to resolve issues with the
U.S. by November 29, after which "things are automatically going to
happen."
› On December 1, after negotiations had failed, the navy intercepted a request
that the Japanese ambassador in Berlin informed Hitler of an extreme danger of
war ... coming "quicker than anyone dreams."
On the Other Hand
• Although the United States had cracked top-secret Japanese codes
several years earlier, "the fact is that code-breaking intelligence did
not prevent and could not have prevented Pearl Harbor, because Japan never sent
any messages to anybody saying anything like 'We shall attack Pearl
Harbor,'" writes military historian David Kahn in the autumn 1991 issue of Military History Quarterly.
• "The [Japanese] Ambassador in Washington was never told of the
plan," Kahn says, "Nor were other Japanese diplomats or consular
officials. The ship of the strike force were never radioed any message
mentioning Pearl Harbor. It was therefore impossible for cryptoanalysts to have
discovered the plan. Despite the American code breakers, Japan kept her
secret."
• Actually, Washington had issued a warning to commanders at
Pearl Harbor a few weeks earlier. On November 27, 1941, General George Marshall
sent the following message: "Hostile action possible at any moment. If
hostilities cannot, repeat CANNOT, be avoided, the United States desires that
Japan commit the first over act. This policy should not, repeat NOT, be
construed as restricting you to a course of action that might jeopardize your
defense."
• But the commanders at Pearl Harbor were apparently negligent. The base should
have at least been on alert, but the antiaircraft guns were unmanned and most
people on the base were asleep when the attack came.


USS Arizona burning at Pearl Harbor.
Rescuing survivor near USS West Virginia during the Pearl Harbor attack.
View of Pearl Harbor from a
nearby hill - the dots in the sky were anti-aircraft shells bursting.
Burning planes and hangars at the Wheeler Field.
References
Pearl Harbour Facts, Erik
Anderson, n,d, Website
Accessed on: 1st
October 2012
Pearl Harbour Bombing Pictures
Pearl Harbour Bombing 1, George, 19th July 2009, Image,
Accessed on: 1st October 2012
The Truth About Pearl Harbour, Alex, 28th May
2007, Website
Accessed on 1st October