Pearl Harbor...Why?

r3nu4l

Well I've never really had much interest in the Pacific side of WWII, I suppose that's natural given that I'm European. Anyway, can someone tell me exactly why Japan attacked Pearl Harbor?

Was there already bad blood between Japan and America? Was a war of words building and then Japan took the first (pre-emptive?) strike?

Also, did Japan ever have any official 'pact' with Germany or did they just take the opportunity to join in the bash?

I honestly don't know so help educate me here people

Morlar

America implemented a trade and Oil embargo - the japaneese saw that as an attempt to strangle their economy. There is more the it than that but I would say thats the gist of it from their perspective.

The Irish Times digital archive is free for the next couple of weeks so this might be worth checking out for a comtemporary view :

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/archive/1941/1208/Pg001.html

Latchy

By attacking the large fleet at Pearl Harbour ,which was then the largest fleet in the world , the japanese thought this would handicap the Americans enough to put their navy out of combat should they enter the war .This would also allow for an invasion of Hawai which would have being essential for japanese naval supremacy in the Pacific and possibly, it's assumed , the American mainland would also have being attacked . While they did inflict heavy casualtys and destroy a large part of the fleet at Pearl Harbour ,it wasn't enough to prevent the recovery of the American navy in the pacific ,who later went on to destroy the Japanese fleet .

cyrusdvirus

latchyco wrote: »

By attacking the large fleet at Pearl Harbour ,which was then the largest fleet in the world , the japanese thought this would handicap the Americans enough to put their navy out of combat should they enter the war .This would also allow for an invasion of Hawai which would have being essential for japanese naval supremacy in the Pacific and possibly, it's assumed , the American mainland would also have being attacked . While they did inflict heavy casualtys and destroy a large part of the fleet at Pearl Harbour ,it wasn't enough to prevent the recovery of the American navy in the pacific ,who later went on to destroy the Japanese fleet .

Nope, it wasn't. A lot of PACFLT ships had been transferred to the Atlantic fleet.

FrostyJack

r3nu4l wrote: »

Also, did Japan ever have any official 'pact' with Germany or did they just take the opportunity to join in the bash?

Yes Japan signed treaties with the axis powers. Out of this Germany's declaration of war on America in December 1941 basically sealed their fate as it gave the American campaign popular (joe 6 pack) support and brought them into the war.

While they did inflict heavy casualtys and destroy a large part of the fleet at Pearl Harbour ,it wasn't enough to prevent the recovery of the American navy in the pacific

It was basically a fail, because the carriers were not affected, which were one of the main targets and ultimately won the battle of the Pacific.

Or just read this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pearl_Harbor_(attack)

r3nu4l

Thanks for the replies lads, some interesting reading to be done

Latchy

gatecrash wrote: »

Nope, it wasn't. A lot of PACFLT ships had been transferred to the Atlantic fleet.

By saying it was the biggest fleet in the world I ment not only the Pacific but Atlantic fleet as well.

cyrusdvirus

latchyco wrote: »

By saying it was the biggest fleet in the world I ment not only the Pacific but Atlantic fleet as well.

Fair enough, but the R.N. was the largest fleet worldwide at that time.


http://www.ibiblio.org/pha/timeline/411207aoni.html

Manic Moran

latchyco wrote: »

By attacking the large fleet at Pearl Harbour ,which was then the largest fleet in the world , the japanese thought this would handicap the Americans enough to put their navy out of combat should they enter the war .This would also allow for an invasion of Hawai which would have being essential for japanese naval supremacy in the Pacific and possibly, it's assumed , the American mainland would also have being attacked . While they did inflict heavy casualtys and destroy a large part of the fleet at Pearl Harbour ,it wasn't enough to prevent the recovery of the American navy in the pacific ,who later went on to destroy the Japanese fleet .

They never expected to put the US Navy out of the war entirely. The intent was to weaken them enough to prevent them from interfering with their expansion in the Western Pacific, whereby they could negotiate a cease-fire from a position of strength which also happened to include all those natural resources. They always knew it was just a matter of time before the US forces would build up their strength courtesy of America's massive industrial capacity.

Certainly in 1941 there was never any thought in Japanese circles of invading Hawaii, and even today opinions are mixed as to whether or not the Japanese thought it a viable goal in the middle of 1942. They certainly looked at it, but the Army particularly was underenthusiastic.

It was basically a fail, because the carriers were not affected, which were one of the main targets

At the time, the lack of the carriers at Pearl was considered a disappointment, but not an outright fail. Bear in mind that even Yamamoto thought that the main deciding force in a large naval engagement would be the big guns of the battleships. Witness the plan for the Midway battle in which the aircraft carriers would only play the prelude for the main engagements.

NTM

cyrusdvirus

Manic Moran wrote: »

They never expected to put the US Navy out of the war entirely. The intent was to weaken them enough to prevent them from interfering with their expansion in the Western Pacific, whereby they could negotiate a cease-fire from a position of strength which also happened to include all those natural resources. They always knew it was just a matter of time before the US forces would build up their strength courtesy of America's massive industrial capacity.

Certainly in 1941 there was never any thought in Japanese circles of invading Hawaii, and even today opinions are mixed as to whether or not the Japanese thought it a viable goal in the middle of 1942. They certainly looked at it, but the Army particularly was underenthusiastic.



At the time, the lack of the carriers at Pearl was considered a disappointment, but not an outright fail. Bear in mind that even Yamamoto thought that the main deciding force in a large naval engagement would be the big guns of the battleships. Witness the plan for the Midway battle in which the aircraft carriers would only play the prelude for the main engagements.

NTM

Manic's right there. During the hunt for Bismarck, the Ark Royal's Swordfish were only tasked with slowing her down to allow the KGV and Rodney actually do the damage which led to her sinking/being scuttled.

The raid on Taranto in November 1940 showed what carriers are capable of, but only Yamamoto took full notice, and even he viewed carriers almost as a fleet auxiliary in that their aircraft would predominantly be used for locating enemy fleets