Pearl Harbor

This part of the WW II story explains about the Pearl Harbor. It is well known in the book of World War II. While we were enjoying beautiful vacation, my wife and I took time out to visit the Arizona Memorial in Pearl Harbor. Pearl Harbor is a harbor on the island of O’ahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. Much of the harbor and surrounding lands is a United States Navy deep-water naval base. It is also the headquarters of the U.S. Pacific Fleet. The attack on Pearl Harbor by the Empire of Japan on December 7, 1941 brought the United States into World War II.

The decommissioned battleship Missouri lies tied up close by. Groups of tourists visit here daily. As it turned out, our visits to the two Memorials proved to be an unexpected, emotional experience for me. First we visited the Arizona Memorial; one of the battleships sunk in Pearl Harbor on that fateful day which was called by President Franklin D. Roosevelt “a date that will live in Infamy”— December 7, 1941.

Early on Sunday morning, that December 7th, Admiral Yamamoto sent his 353 Japanese fighters, bombers and torpedo planes towards Oahu in a sneak attack. The victorious battle cry: “Tora, Tora, Tora!”. Their Japanese death camps in Ambarawa were horrible. The carnage was stupendous. The human toll was 388 killed and 1,178 wounded. Twelve ships sunk, another nine damaged. One hundred sixty-four U.S. planes destroyed and another 159 damaged. From a twisted military point of view, this attack by Japan might be called an absolute success…Also the death camp slaves suffered a lot in the Indonesian death camps like Ambarawa Camp Seven etc.

It was impossible for me to picture those hundreds of airplanes swooping in like so many killer bees on that Sunday morning, wreaking such havoc and destruction. How many thousands of Mothers, Fathers, and grandparents lost their sons, daughters and loved ones that day? … And why? For the United States, “Pearl Harbor” marked the start of its participation in World War II; a struggle with huge armies and material pitted against each other, killing and being killed, wounding, destroying, raping and torturing of innocent men, women and children, all without a shred of mercy. The World War II had indeed made a deep scar upon mankind.