Though Japanese attack on American naval base in Pearl Harbor was surprise, there was a set of factors, which could potentially lead to a war between the United States and Japan earlier or later. Both sides had a clear understanding of the processes, therefore each of the nations was preparing to the possible escalation.
Propensity towards armed conflict increased significantly after Japanese overrun to Manchuria (a part of Chinese territory) in 1931. During the following years Japan kept on with expansion to China, which led to start of full-scale war between Japan and China (also referred to as Second Sino-Japanese War) in 1937.
The Japanese officials were sure that the one and only way to solve their economic problems, such as lack of natural resources (oil, rubber etc.), is to invade to China in order to get control over their resources and their import market in general. For this reason, Japan exerted maximum force to China isolation and gaining maximum possible economic resources independence. The pivotal moment in ruining positive attitude to Japan from Western countries was a Nanking massacre, an episode during the Second Sino-Japanese War of mass civilian population murder. According to the estimation by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East made in 1948, over 200,000 people were killed.
The USA responded to this aggressive behavior with numerous economic sanctions and trade embargoes. They supposed that having no access to essential resources (money, oil etc.), Japan would be more liable and would limit its expansionist policy. But this American actions had a little effect: due to them Japan became even more confident in the necessity of reaching its goals.
At the beginning of 1941 Roosevelt ordered to move the US Pacific Fleet from California to Hawaii and to send contingent of troops to Philippines, hoping that these efforts would stop military activity of Japan in the Far East. At the same time Japanese army commanders were sure that their attack on any of the colonies in the South East Asia belonging to the United Kingdom, would involve the USA into war. Therefore, preventive attack on the US troops seemed to them as the most effective method of resisting the United States.
Preplanning of the Pearl Harbor attack directed by Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto started at the beginning of 1941. Large-scale planning was underway in spring 1941. During next months all the necessary data concerning Pearl Harbor was being collected, pilots and other staff were trained, essential equipment was being prepared. From the United States side, nobody believed, that Japanese could attack the US territory, because technically it was a very difficult task: distance between Hawaii and Japan is about 4,000 miles and the water depth in Pearl Harbor is too small for effective bombing. As Americans didn’t expect Pearl Harbor attack, the infrastructure was poorly defended. Almost all ships of the Pacific Fleet were placed with close spacing around one of the islands in the harbor. The same principle of placing referred to planes on nearby airfields. For all the reasons mentioned above, the fleet and aircrafts in Pearl Harbor were optimal targets for Japanese attack in case it is thoroughly prepared.
The level of Japanese preparation to the attack was outstanding. Almost two weeks before strike, on November 26, 1941, six Japanese aircraft carriers departed from Japan towards Hawaii. By the early morning of December 7 they have reached their destination point. The attack started at 7:48 local time without any warning and had lasted for about two hours. 353 Japanese aircrafts took part in the strike.
During the attack 2,335 people were killed and 1,143 were wounded. Casualties among civilians consisted of 68 killed and 35 wounded. Eight US Navy battleships, which were present at the base at the moment of attack, were damaged. Four of them were run down. A total number of 18 ships were damaged or sunk. As a result of airfields bombing, 188 American aircrafts were destroyed.
Losses from Japanese side were 65 servicemen killed, one captured. 29 Japanese aircrafts were destroyed with return fire from Americans.
The major result of Pearl Harbor attack on the World War II development is full-scale entry of the United States in war on December 8, the next day after attack. This day President Roosevelt addressed Congress with his speech, after which Congress declared war on Japan.
Three days later Japanese allies Germany and Italy proclaimed war on the United States, according to Tripartite Act, the agreement, which acknowledged declaring the war to any of the parties of the agreement as declaring the war to the whole alliance. Congress responded with declaring the war to Germany and Italy later the same day. The United Kingdom also declared the war to Japan on December 8 according to its previous obligation to the USA to declare the war on Japan in case it attacks the United States.
There were two the most notable military responses to Japanese aggression: Doolittle Raid and atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
In just two weeks after Pearl Harbor attack, President Roosevelt suggested bombing Japan as soon as possible. The aim was to bolster morale of the US army and citizen after severe defeat on December 7 rather than making significant material damage to Japan. In order to do this, American specialists had to solve a difficult task of performing carrier-based attack. The problem was that all existing bombers had take-off paths, which were longer than needed to take off from aircraft carriers. Therefore, B-25 bombers were selected for upgrade intended on airplane weight reduction. The air raid was planned and led by James Doolittle. And the operation itself took place in April 1942, when a group of sixteen US aircrafts bombed military and industrial targets in Japanese capital Tokyo as well as Osaka, Yokosuka, Nagoya and Kobe.
According to initial plan, there was a prepared flight field in China, which would host American aircrafts and allow crew members safely get back to the United States. But the raid was detected before its intended start, therefore aircrafts had to take off earlier than expected and consequently experienced lack of fuel to get to China after planned military activities. As a result, all sixteen aircrafts were lost due to emergency landings.
This fact as well as material damage, which was less than expected, made Doolittle suppose that attack was failed and expect a court-martial on his return to the United States. However, Doolittle raid boosted the American morale and the people’s confidence in winning the war to such a high extent, that Roosevelt personally awarded Doolittle with Medal of Honor.
The final military act in confrontation between the United States was atomic bombing of Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945. The decision to use atomic bombs was made by American authorities in order to get the war to quick end. The problem was that even after defeating Nazi Germany in May 1945 Japanese government refused to accept the US and its allies’ demands for the unconditional surrender. All operation plans concerning invasion of Japan beared a very high risk of high number of casualties. Studies predicted that the United States would suffer 130-220 thousand of casualties including 25-46 thousand killed. Such risks seemed unacceptable.
Therefore, instead of earlier plans the atomic bombing was performed. The result was controversial, because a lot of civilian Japanese people were killed. But from the other side anticipated casualties from both American and Japanese sides in case of not using atomic bomb would be significantly higher.
Abovementioned actions led to quick surrender of Japan announced by Emperor Hirohito on August 15, 1945. This was actually the last day of US – Japan war and the World War II as a whole. But there was also a formal surrender ceremony held onSeptember 2, 1945. And this day is considered to be the official ending day of the World War II.
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