Pearl Harbor Essay

Even though the U.S. didn’t join WWII until 1941, it still had a massive impact. The U.S. supplied the allies in hopes of them winning the war. The only problem with this is that it made the U.S. a Target for opposing countries in the war, Japan was one of these countries. During the war tensions between Japan and the U.S. had grown high. On December 7, 1941, Japan carried out a mass attack on the Pearl Harbor naval base taking many lives and destroying many ships and planes. If the U.S. would have paid attention to some simple details, the attack could have been stopped. A great example of one of those details was on the morning of December 7, 1941, when a radar operator reported seeing a group of planes flying in, he was told by his superior to not worry about them (National WWII Museum). This was one of the biggest details that could have allowed the U.S. to stop the attack, but it was ignored. If this bit of information was taken seriously, many people and military supplies could have been saved. Another crucial mistake that was made is that there was no long-distance patrol conducted and that is Pearl Harbor’s number one defense (Richardson 76). If a long-distance patrol would have been conducted they would have seen the

had made. During the war, the U.S. was aiding China to try and undercut Japanese aggression. The U.S. also stopped vital resources to Japan(Hart). The U.S. should have realized that the tensions with Japan were rising and that Japan would most likely do something to try and stop U.S. actions. The U.S. had also intercepted and decoded a note from Japan that referenced the idea of an attack coming up on the U.S. and this attack would occur in the Pacific Ocean(Hart). This was another major piece of evidence that the U.S. had and didn’t take full advantage of it. The U.S. could have upped their precautions for all their bases in the Pacific and been able to counter any attack coming their