Persuasive Speech After Pearl Harbor

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The attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike by the Japanese Navy Air Service against the U.S. Naval Base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii territory, in the morning of December 7th, 1941. The attack of Pearl Harbor was significant because it was a day that ultimately changed history by causing americans to join together in war effort. Just before eight in the morning, hundreds of Japanese fighter planes descended the base and managed to destroy nearly twenty American vessels, 8 enormous battleships, and over 300 airplanes (Zimm). This battle lead the United States entry into World War II. The U.S. was particularly unhappy with Japan’s belligerent attitude towards China. Japan’s government thought to believe that by taking over the neighbor’s …show more content…

The attack ensured America’s entrance into the war. Pearl Harbor made Americans passionate about the war and provoked a joint effort by all, at home and overseas. Pearl Harbor infuriated Americans and motivated an undivided decision to enter into World War II. On Dec. 8, 1941, the United States joined the Allied Powers (****). Only two weeks after Pearl Harbor, President Franklin Roosevelt, intent on bolstering America's battered morale, summoned his armed forces commanders to the White House to demand a bombing raid on Japan as soon as possible. President FDR made a last minute edit to his speech, changing “a day that will live on in world history” to “a day that will live in infamy” (****). Winston Churchill later recalled his reaction to the bombing of Pearl Harbor “In all the war I never received a more direct shock. As I turned over and twisted in bed the full horror of the news sank in upon me. There were no British or American capital ships in the Indian Ocean or the Pacific except the American survivors of Pearl Harbor who were hastening back to California. Over this vast expanse of waters Japan was supreme and we everywhere were weak and naked.” …show more content…

On April 18, 1942 Lieutenant Colonel James Doolittle led 16 bombers off the USS Hornet in a historic raid on Japan. But the Japanese had failed to cripple the Pacific Fleet. By the 1940s, battleships were no longer the most important naval vessel: Aircraft carriers were, and as it happened, all of the Pacific Fleet’s carriers were away from the base on December 7. Where some had returned to the mainland and others were delivering planes to troops on Midway and Wake Islands. Moreover, the Pearl Harbor assault had left the base’s most vital onshore facilities—oil storage depots, repair shops, shipyards and submarine docks—intact. As a result, the U.S. Navy was able to rebound relatively quickly from the

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