Thread: Hallowed Waters Dec. 7, 1941, Never Forget!

Very good video on Pearl Harbor in Oahu, Hawaii When we visited this place a few years ago it was awesome and so solemn you could hear a pin drop and it was filled with people..




Hallowed Waters
By Floyd K. Takeuchi - December 1, 2011
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Just after 8 a.m., our Navy launch comes alongside the small jetty at the eastern edge of a simple white sway-top building. Above us, the Stars and Stripes is stirred by gentle tropical trade winds.

Perhaps this is what it was like 70 years ago, on the morning of Dec. 7, 1941, at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii: white clouds etched on a deep blue sky, launches crisscrossing the calm waters of the U.S. naval base, and gray warships berthed at shoreside docks.

What happened next changed the United States and the world. Just before 8 a.m. local time, the first wave of Japanese carrier-based fighters and bombers swooped down on an unsuspecting U.S. Pacific Fleet at anchor in Pearl Harbor, on the southern shore of the island of Oahu. At 8:06 a.m. – almost the exact time I step off the Navy launch at the USS Arizona Memorial this particular morning – an armor-piercing bomb penetrated the deck of the proud battleship and exploded, setting off the forward ammunition magazine and triggering U.S. entry into World War II.

The resulting explosions proved fatal to the warship and 1,177 of its crew. The shattered hulk of Arizona quickly settled keel-first into the muddy bottom of Pearl Harbor, still alongside its mooring platforms just off Ford Island. To the north and south, other battleships would be crippled or destroyed: Nevada, California, Oklahoma, West Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Tennessee. Battleship Row, the pride of the Pacific Fleet, had suddenly become a tangle of twisted steel, covered by thick oily smoke and fire. All around, the screams of wounded and dying men filled the air.

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that morning killed 2,341 Navy, Marine and Army personnel. It also resulted in 49 civilian deaths, a few of which were caused by U.S. anti-aircraft shells falling on Honolulu. The attack led to the United States’ direct involvement in World War II, which had been under way in Europe for two years. And although it wasn’t obvious yet, with the burning hulks of U.S. warships scattered across Pearl Harbor, Japan’s sneak attack also marked the beginning of the end of its military ambitions in the vast Asia-Pacific region.

Seventy years later, with U.S. military forces fighting wars sparked by another sneak attack, Pearl Harbor remains both an active naval base and a monument to a titanic struggle fought across millions of square miles of ocean. For the dwindling number of veterans who served in World War II – particularly those who proudly call themselves Pearl Harbor Survivors – and for many generations that followed, “Pearl Harbor,â€

Did FDR Provoke Pearl Harbor?
By Patrick J. Buchanan
December 6, 2011
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On Dec. 8, 1941, Franklin Roosevelt took the rostrum before a joint session of Congress to ask for a declaration of war on Japan.

A day earlier, at dawn, carrier-based Japanese aircraft had launched a sneak attack devastating the U.S. battle fleet at Pearl Harbor.

Said ex-President Herbert Hoover, Republican statesman of the day, “We have only one job to do now, and that is to defeat Japan.â€

Obama visits Pearl Harbor for first time since entering office
By Amie Parnes - 12/30/11 05:56 AM ET

President Obama on Thursday evening made his first trip to Pearl Harbor since becoming commander-in-chief.

The president and first lady Michelle Obama visited the USS Arizona Memorial, where they observed a moment of silence in a room where the names of crew members who died 70 years ago this month are inscribed.

Obama, who visited the memorial before he was president in 2008, did not make any remarks at the memorial, according to a pool report. But he and the first lady dropped white and purple orchids into the sunken battleship.

Since the memorial opened, every president has visited the site during their time in office.

Earlier in the day, Obama -- who is visiting his native Hawaii over a holiday vacation--stopped for shave ice and spent time at a local beach with his family.

President Obama on Thursday evening made his first trip to Pearl Harbor since becoming commander-in-chief.

Are we impressed yet????