What was the purpose of the of bombing Pearl harbor?
Post world war II, America and japan had a sketchy relationship.
Japan constantly needed resources from the USA in order to defeat china in their own war. Japan needed the USA's oil rubber and steel, the USA was a very valuable resource to japan. Even though china was our Ally in the League of nations, the main isolationists in the US government forced Themselves to trade with japan in order to not upset and cause another world war.
This caused a lot of tension inside of the nation itself, with Roosevelt trying his hardest to protect his allies and with the isolationists trying their hardest to not get involved in foreign affairs that would get them involved in any fighting or disputes.
After the Germans/ Nazis had attempted to blow up one of our ships, The USS Greer, USA closed off all trade with any one that wasn't an ally (mainly focused trade with Britain). Japan Clearly didn't like this.
In order to get the resources that they needed, Japan needed to look for another outlet. Japan found this outlet in the indies and the dutch. The only problem with needing the the indies resources, was that the only thing that blocked japan from getting them, was the Philippines. At the time, the Philippines belonged to the US, it was mainly used as a bridge to get to china in a more efficient way and to establish a better trade route with them.
Japan needed to invade the Philippines in order to get the resources that they required from the indies. The main reason for the bombing of pearl harbor, and the slaughter of 2,000 + Americans and Hawaiians, was that pearl harbor was one of the US's largest naval bases at the time.
the Japanese needed a surprise attack in order to get the jump on the US. if Japan didn't take out most of the US's fleet at that moment... they would be screwed throughout the rest of the war and they would surely lose. After the pearl harbor bombing, japan thought that they would easily take over the Philippines and sort of roll into another war with the US. (the US at this point was involved with the war against the Nazis)
https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/pearl-harbor
I found it interesting how you mentioned that the Japanese had an ambition for taking over the Philippines and that after successfully forcing the Americans in Hawaii out after Pearl Harbor. With some further research, I discovered that Roosevelt declared war on the Empire of Japan the following day, addressing a joint session of the 77th United States Congress. The use of propaganda in the US, like "Remember Pearl Harbor!" was quick to spread the word of the attack, and the effect it had on American morale. A poll was taken on December 12th through the 17th, in 1941, which revealed that 97% of Americans taking it supported the declaration of war against Japan. It led to many Americans seeking out Japanese Americans, or those with Japanese heritage, for investigations or interrogating.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.forbes.com/sites/geoffloftus/2016/12/07/pearl-harbor-leadership-lessons/#7bdeac425f27
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remember_Pearl_Harbor_(slogan)
I was surprised that there were so many people who died at Pearl Harbor; I thought it was mostly ships being destroyed. I wondered how it was possible for the US to be caught so unaware in the attack, so I did a bit more research on that. I learned that there was relatively little information regarding Japan’s military operations. Although there were some reports of the weakness of the base, it was not a huge concern. Some conspiracy theorists have theorized that FDR and other government officials knew about the attack in advance, and let it happen to incite the country to join the war.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.npr.org/2016/12/06/504449867/no-fdr-did-not-know-the-japanese-were-going-to-bomb-pearl-harbor
https://worldview.stratfor.com/article/pearl-harbor-intelligence-failure-lives-infamy