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Surprise Attack at ground zero
coordinates: 21°22′N 157°57′
Most every American soldier sailor tinker spy (and innocent civilians) moseying along the beautifully picturesque island of Oahu, the evening of December sixth never imagined, predicted, nor suspected, what annihilating blitzkrieg, catastrophizing debacle, emasculating fiend, Gorgonesque hellish imperial Japanese Kamikaze looming monstrosity neared Secret Operation Z, the unsuspecting civilian and military population, nonchalantly, insouciantly, and blithely went about their usual business, and upon late night hours of dark bedded down until awaking to an unbelievable, unforgettable, unnatural morrow.
When those first rays of sun shone forth on one typical pacific island, that unforgettable December seventh dawned with early risers basking in the warm sunlight initially oblivious to impending insanity, infamy, ignominy, et cetera.
Stock still, and as keen as a doe wide deer (there stood at least) one watchmen accidentally beholding conspiracy displayed flapping eyes insouciantly grimacing, evincing, convincingly approaching flashing red sun sinister terrorists unloading vicious wickedness.
Annihilation, eradication, incineration, punctuated earsplitting cacophony, when just a scant number of hours prior total mortal wrested tranquility, quality, piety, magnanimity, levity, jocularity, harmony became instantaneously obliterated pitching raw troops into the killing machine, where awaiting days, weeks, months...hence, a battle fatigue would be worn couture forcing the hand of Franklin Delano Roosevelt to issue additional conscripts as World War II torch hoard former neutrality, where statecraft instantaneously donned a take no prisoners posture.
This surprise aggressive attack launched a maelstrom of pandemonium before a handle could be
grasped to stave off subsequent rapacious quicksilver pounding obliterating national dire straits, sans moody blue.
Loathsomeness kickstarted joint intelligence hurriedly galvanizing fortified ensemble. Duty culled country brave-hearts answering belated call to arms, and farewell to family, which urgency to fight back wreaked havoc among family and fare thee well to friends.
No matter what price (paid with young and restless lives), an esprit de corps gung-ho, johnny minted platoons snapped, crackled, and popped into ready action.
Off to the Pacific fleet went stripling chaps barreling into harms way, charging full speed ahead, apply electric cool aid acid test (with no room to fail) assaying quickly assembled on the fly zippered dive bombarding claques, whose headlong risk sans carpet bombing sorties always carried a worse fate than death.
Plan net quickened scuttling damaged military armaments tugged back for possibly being repurposed for makeshift calisthenic, gymnastic, logically rustic yakkking gastric peptic zapper, or if scrapped hastily recycled for munitions.
After some degree of order instituted out of chaos, a well plotted strategy enlisted every spare, tiptop usable vet. This attack on Pearl Harbor delivered (as aforementioned), categorized as a surprise military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii Territory, on the morning of December 7, 1941.
The attack, also known as the Battle of Pearl Harbor, led to the United States' entry into World War II. The Japanese military leadership referred to the attack as the Hawaii Operation and Operation AI, and as Operation Z during its planning. Japan intended the attack as a preventive action to keep United States Pacific Fleet from interfering with military actions they planned in Southeast Asia against overseas territories of the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and United States.
Well synchronized, linkedin, and choreographed arced traceries over the next seven hours. Japanese coordinated, carried out simulated theatric, which witnessed attacks on the U.S. held Philippines, Guam and Wake Island and on the British Empire in Malaya, Singapore, and Hong Kong.
The attack commenced at 7:48 a.m. Hawaiian Time (18:18 UTC). The base was attacked by Imperial Japanese aircraft (including fighters, level and dive bombers, and torpedo bombers) in two waves, launched from six aircraft carriers.
All eight U.S. Navy battleships were damaged, with four sunk. All but the USS Arizona were later raised, and six were returned to service and went on to fight in the war. The Japanese also sank or damaged three cruisers, three destroyers, an anti-aircraft training ship, and one minelayer.
One hundred eighty-eight U.S. aircraft were destroyed; 2,403 Americans were killed and 1,178 others were wounded. Important base installations such as the power station, dry dock, shipyard, maintenance, and fuel and torpedo storage facilities, as well as the submarine piers and headquarters building (also home of the intelligence section), were not attacked.
Japanese losses were light: 29 aircraft and five midget submarines lost, and 64 servicemen killed. One Japanese sailor, Kazuo Sakamaki, was captured.
The surprise attack came as a profound shock to the American people and led directly to the American entry into World War II in both the Pacific and European theaters. The following day, December 8, the United States declared war on Japan, and several days later, on December 11, Germany and Italy declared war on the U.S. The U.S. responded with a declaration of war against Germany and Italy.
Domestic support for non-interventionism, which had been fading since the Fall of France in 1940, disappeared. There were numerous historical precedents for unannounced military action by Japan, but the lack of any formal warning, particularly while negotiations were still apparently ongoing, led President Franklin D. Roosevelt to proclaim December 7, 1941, "a date which will live in infamy".
Because the attack happened without a declaration of war and without explicit warning, the attack on Pearl Harbor was later judged in the Tokyo Trials to be a war crime.
