December 7,1941
- Thread starter Nitt1300
- Start date
What is astounding is how fast the US Navy rebounded from what could have been a fatal blow to its fleets and within six months, they gave a sound thrashing to the Imperial Japanese Navy by sinking four of their carriers and numerous irreplaceable air fighter pilots at Midway.
"With confidence in our armed forces, with the unbounding determination of our people, we will gain the inevitable triumph—so help us God."
FDR Dec 8, 1941 just before asking Congress to declare war on Japan.
FDR Dec 8, 1941 just before asking Congress to declare war on Japan.
Thanks for posting. An anecdote if I may.
The company I worked for has an office on Pearl Harbor Navy Base. The building it occupies still has bullet holes on its facia from the attack. In fact, the Navy didn't repair some of the battle damage to serve as a reminder. The same building served as a morgue after the attack. Employees claim it's haunted.
The company I worked for has an office on Pearl Harbor Navy Base. The building it occupies still has bullet holes on its facia from the attack. In fact, the Navy didn't repair some of the battle damage to serve as a reminder. The same building served as a morgue after the attack. Employees claim it's haunted.
So true. Talk about your 'fog of war'. Fortuitous our carriers were out-to-sea and Japan didn't launch that third strike. Had Adm. Nagumo done so then the Battle of Midway would not have happened. In all probability our carriers would've been retrograded in defense of the west coast.
The four Japanese carriers sunk at Midway (Hiryu, Soryu, Akagi and Kaga) constituted 40% of their carrier strike force. Crippling because Japan didn't have our industrial potential. Japan lost 250 aircraft and 3,000 sailors in return for the Yorktown and 300 U.S. sailors. The turning point in the Pacific War.
'A date which will live in infamy' — Scott woman, 101, remembers Pearl Harbor attack in vivid detail
Days before the deadly attacks on Pearl Harbor, Virginia Flickinger was hula dancing, taking photos, and enjoying life as a nurse’s assistant on...
www.post-gazette.com
Japanese failed to destroy the dry docks or the fuel depots...and they hit the ships when 80%+ of sailors were on shore leave (Sunday morning) resulting in very low causality rate. Had they hit the dry docks the U.S. Navy would have had to drag the boats back to mainland for repair. Had they hit the fuel depots there would be little/no fuel for aircraft for months. I believe just about every ship expect the Arizona was back in service in 12-18 months.
Mostly correct, but not entirely. The USS Arizona remains in the water at Pearl Harbor. The USS Oklahoma was sunk on Dec. 7. It was not righted until 1943, at which point it was determined that it was too damaged to be repaired. They salvaged as much as they could from the Oklahoma, then sold it for scrap in 1946, and it sunk in 1947 while being towed from Hawaii to San Francisco.
The USS Cassin and the USS Downes are kind of asterisks in the discussion. They were in dry dock on Dec. 7, and a bomb landed between them. and ignited the fuel tanks on the Downes. The Cassin slipped from her keel blocks and rested against the Downes. In the aftermath of the attack, it was determined that both ships were too damaged to be repaired. However, the machinery and equipment on both were salvaged, and sent to Mare Island Navy Yard. At that facility, new ships were constructed around the salvaged material and equipment, and given the ships' names and full numbers. So while a USS Cassin and a USS Downes were in service later in WW II, it's kind of a stretch to say that the aforementioned ships that were damaged at Pearl were fixed and back in service.
Also, the USS Oglala was out of operation a little longer than your timeframe. She wasn't seaworthy until Dec. 1942, and had been so badly damaged that she could no longer serve as a mine sweeper. She was converted to an internal combustion engine repair ship, and was not fully operational until March 30, 1944.
i knew there were some ships that effectively didn't make it... but i really think the point that the dry docks survived and fuel depots untouched was hugely significant but rarely discussed.
your larger point was very relevant, and critical for the USA in terms of their ability to bounce back from the surprise attack at Pearl.
History nuts (myself included) have this nagging tendency to want to get all the details correct. I did not mean (or attempt) to diminish your larger point -- I simply was trying to give exact info on the ships that were unable to be salvaged, or had major issues with their being salvaged.
It's ok @Tom McAndrew. As usual, you are throwin' down some serious US history for all on this site -- a value add imho.
My Dad was 14... He's now 94... He's a veteran of WWII and Korea. He served on the USS Roosevelt. Throughout my entire life my dad has quoted Yamamoto saying, "We may have awaken a sleeping giant." Yamamoto was prophetic... Our nation came together as one and we were unstoppable.
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