On December 8, 1941, President Franklin Roosevelt addressed Congress: "Yesterday, December 7, 1941–a date which will live in infamy–the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by the naval and air forces of the empire of Japan."
With that statement describing the attack on the U.S. Naval Base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, this nation was thrust into World War II. The first wave of Japanese aircraft attacked at 7:53 a.m. and by the end of the second wave at 9:45 a.m., the U.S. had suffered casualties of 2,335 servicemen and 68 civilians, while 1,178 were wounded.
Of the dead, 1,177 were men stationed on the USS Arizona, which was destroyed when a bomb hit the forward magazine, starting a series of explosions. Eight Arizona residents were listed among the dead on the battleship, which was moored near Ford Island on that dreadful morning 65 years ago.
Today the remains of the Arizona still lie in the same shallow water where she sat helpless during the attack. In 1962, the ship was declared a national shrine and a memorial was built across her remains. A room within the shrine lists the names of the dead crew members, and regular memorial services are performed to respect their memory. A new U.S. flag is raised each day above the site, and at the end of the day is folded and given to various dignitaries.
Time has taken its toll on the memorial and in September, 2005, Governor Janet Napolitano toured the site and pledged Arizona’s help in raising $34 million to build a new visitors’s center. ("Napolitano to help raise $34 million for USS Arizona," The Arizona Republic, Oct. 20, 2005).
"It’s Arizona’s battleship," she said in the article. "When it was commissioned (1916), they broke not just a bottle of champagne over its bow, but a bottle of water that had just come from the newly created Roosevelt Dam. We’ve always had a close connection with the USS Arizona."
Napolitano also declared 2006 as the "Year of the USS Arizona Memorial."
Many of the dead from the Arizona are still entombed within its hulk. Oil still seeps from the wreckage after 65 years and is sometimes referred to as "the tears of the Arizona." Each year the number of survivors decreases and many of them have made arrangements to be cremated with their ashes placed by their fallen shipmates at the site. Many of these men believe that the oil will continue to leak until the last survivor dies.
This column originally posted on December 7, 2011
(The New Pearl Harbor Museum Opened on 12-7-2010)
36 comments:
Hopefully future generations won't forget about this historical turning point for the US and the world. My dad and uncle fought in the Pacific during WW II and I am so proud of them and everyone else who did so.
Apparently, some people don't hold the same respect:
http://www.kpho.com/story/24143676/outrage-expressed-after-wwii-vet-allegedly-bumped-from-honolulu-bound-flight
We went to Hawaii in 1990 for a week and got to visit the Pearl Harbor Memorial. A very moving experience.
I see that Arizona has 2 replica 16 inch guns. 1 for the USS ARIZONA and the other of the USS MISSOURI.
One for the begining of the war and the other for the ending of the war.
A nice memorial for all those who fought the battles to free the world from tyranny.
Dave M
.."The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter"..
Winston Churchill
I have to tell ya I am getting a bit miffed myself at the level of aggressive ignorance and intentional apathy Americans have taken on subjects that should be axiomatic and instinctively understood by any thinking person.
I guess that particular "thinking person" juxtaposition answers itself eh?
The new normal has been at work on re writing history and making us pay to do it.
Ask the average twelve year old to fill you in on how WWII started and what ended it and the answer will probably shock you- liberalism is insidious and never takes the day off nor does it allow opportunity to go to waste.
The Public education system is a disgrace and nearly every thinking person admits it.
..But it's always been the same there are those who see,
those who don't see
and those who don't want to see; we all have to live with it.
..and here I told myself I wouldn't get the soapbox out today..
Every uncle I had served either in the Army in Europe, one spending time in a POW prison, the Navy and Marine Corps and the Army Air Force in the Pacific theater except one who was simply too old to join- my aunt worked in the airplane manufacturing industry during and after the war.
I watched a lot of WWII movies growing up, just like every other normal kid.
Thank God this really isn't an official holiday, the Walmartian/voter disrespects the memory of those better than they will ever be every chance they get and I don't see a happy ending to that attitude.
on the other hand here is an hour of uber cool star watching music.
http://chillography.net/media/EQlateral_at_Chillography201.mp3
safe as milk- if you like It's a Beautiful Day you probably will like EQlateral live.
Oh.. if you want to listen to that album you need to use the DuckDuckGo search engine, Google is a two faced censorqueen..
Yeah mike you might want to put off that Wolf Point vacation for a bit, up in the banana belt by Chester they are reporting -39 deg right now.. first time I have noticed Montana being colder than Edmonton.
Nice thing about Montana is the weather tends to keep everyone's hands in their own pockets.
I hadn't realized that when the Arizona was attacked it was twenty five years old at that time.
I knew that our military was pretty much a symbolic shell then and national popular opinion as formed by the New York Times was we had no business in European affairs, besides after nine years of Democrat leadership our nation was in a deep depression; the only question is why can't people add two and two and at least come up with a positive whole number?
And that leads to the darker question of will we ever be able again to respond to an actual national crisis as a unified nation?
I don't know- maybe after we get our civil problems settled.
..so which year in the thirties Germany does our present situation represent?
It doesn't always repeat but it usually rhymes..
.."did we give up when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?- (forget it- he's on a roll)..
.."But there’s a reason. There’s a reason. There’s a reason for this, there’s a reason education sucks, and it’s the same reason it will never, ever be fixed.
It’s never going to get any better, don’t look for it, be happy with what you’ve got.
Because the owners, the owners of this country don't want that.
I'm talking about the real owners now, the big owners! "The Wealthy"… the real owners!
The big wealthy business interests that control things and make all the important decisions.
Forget the politicians, They are irrelevant.
The politicians are put there to give you the idea that you have freedom of choice.
You don't. You have no choice!
You have owners!- they own you.
They own everything, they own all the important land, they own and control the corporations, they’ve long since bought and paid for the Senate, Congress, the state houses, the city halls, they got the judges in their back pockets and they own all the big media companies so they control just about all of the news and information you get to hear.
They got you by the balls.
They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying to get what they want.
Well, we know what they want, they want more for themselves and less for everybody else but I'll tell you what they don’t want...
They don’t want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking, they don’t want well informed, well educated people capable of critical thinking. They’re not interested in that, it doesn’t help them.
That's against their interests"..
(Carlin on a roll).
BTW in case anyone thinks I have gone crackers over agreeing with his view of the Wealthy, I don't consider anyone living in Scottsdale as "The Wealthy" when it comes to that level of controlling world events- anyone living in this state is well down the totem pole of actual wealth accumulation.
He went on...
.."Thats right, they don’t want people who are smart enough to sit around a kitchen table and think about how badly they’re getting screwed by a system that threw them overboard 30 years ago.
They don’t want that!
You know what they want? They want obedient workers.
Obedient workers, people who are just smart enough to run the machines and do the paperwork.
And just dumb enough to passively accept all these increasingly shitty jobs with the lower pay, the longer hours, the reduced benefits, the end of overtime and vanishing pension that disappears the minute you go to collect it.
Now they’re coming for your Social Security money, they want your retirement money, they want it back so they can give it to their criminal friends on Wall Street, and you know something? they’ll get it.
They’ll get it all from you sooner or later cause they own this place!
It's a big club, and you ain’t in it!
You, and I, are not in the big club.
By the way, it's the same big club they use to beat you over the head with all day long when they tell you what to believe.
All day long beating you over the head with their media telling you what to believe, what to think and what to buy.
The table has tilted folks.
The game is rigged and nobody seems to notice, nobody seems to care!
Good honest hard-working people; white collar, blue collar it doesn’t matter what color shirt you have on, good honest hard-working people continue -(these are people of modest means)- continue to elect these rich cock suckers who don’t give a damn about you.
They don’t care about you at all…
And nobody seems to notice, nobody seems to care.
Thats what the owners count on,the fact that Americans will probably remain willfully ignorant of the big red, white and blue dick thats being jammed up their assholes everyday, because the owners of this country know the truth.
It's called the American Dream.
..because you have to be asleep to believe it"..
Middy, 9 below in Wolf Point this morning. I rescheduled my trip until next July. The funny thing is the people up there don't mind the cold but in the summer if it gets to 90 they bitch and moan about the heat.
"A democracy is the worst form of government ever devised, except for all the others." Winston Churchill
Jim,
it is good to be reminded of the dreadful statistics of that infamous day and of Arizona's part in the Memorial in Hawaii. I am a DAR and in our meetings we always remember events in the history of our country. Unless our young people have veterans in their families, I am sure these historical events do not register.
Thank you for your remembrance.
Joy Wiseman
Randy Rogers
6:42 PM (19 hours ago)
I posted on Facebook the Bing page with a notation, a buddy in DC replied the Washington Post had nothing, zero, nada acknowledging the event, the sacrifice and loss, and the contribution of the Greatest Generation, God Bless America!
Stay warm, hope your Saturday was peaceful.
Randy
Lawrence Rupp
3:47 PM (22 hours ago)
You see, the other driving force in my life is that, like Barak Obama, I'm always right and have never made a mistake. So I'm forced by conscience to always correct those who are doing or saying something erroneously!
It's a terrible curse, but a cross that I must bear.
Leonard J. Marcisz
4:08 PM (22 hours ago)
Jim,
Thanks for sharing the column. I remember reading it in 2011 and consider it worth rereading now.
Spent three weeks this summer on Kailua Beach near the Marine base at Kaneohe which, on December 7th, 1941 was a Navy installation and the first military target hit that morning as the Japanese planes swept south along the coast and peeled off at that point to sweep down the valley into Honolulu. Also took the time to visit the Arizona. You are correct; the oil is still seeping to the surface creating a small but discernible slick. It's a sobering sight.
The effect of December 7th upon my family, and I suppose many others, was akin to 9/11 for current generations. I recall a Sunday dinner at my maternal grandmother's house back in the early 1960s. The extended family was present, probably a score of people. We were clearing away the dishes and cleaning up when one of my uncles turned on the TV which was tuned to a channel featuring a Walter Cronkite documentary. The scene being shown was FDR's "Infamy" speech to Congress. Everything went silent in the house. Aunts and uncles suspended their chores and drifted into the living room listening to the speech until the scene shifted. But for the fact that it was a television broadcast rather than a radio, one would have thought it was December 7th, 1941.
I wonder if the lessons of December 7th are still taught in our schools. Hope so.
Lawrence Rupp Dec 7 (1 day ago)
I've been there - old memorial - watched the oil come up and remember the day...
Merry Christmas.
Cleaned the kitchen on my day off and made blackberry cobbler. I've got half a dozen videos to get out and I keep getting behind.
The late Jim Wallis, a Pearl Harbor survivor, was like a father to me, even the final words thing at the bedside. He was a Navy officer and taught me to trust my instincts. He verified through Naval Intelligence what I needed to know. Jim was a good man and he is missed. He'd approve of what I'm doing.
About the Memorial in Arizona(6:48PM), You Tube had a movie about it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dFIZX_RXuU&feature=youtu.be
Hope this comes up alright, got it from an old friend from High School.
Dave M
You're welcome, Joy. I'm glad you enjoyed the piece.
A few years ago, I decided to ask some younger people I saw what happened on December 7, 1941. The answers and the looks rivaled the nonsense Jay Leno gets from his on campus interviews. It's sad that this country has deteriorated so much in the knowledge of our history.
Thanks, Randy.
JM
He“wandered into the White House on a White House tour and discovered himself in the Oval Office as president.”......Charles Krauthamer commenting on Obama's handling of the failure of obamacare.
Glo,
That's the society that we live in today where those who were heroes of the past (and still should be having hero status) are shunned and forgotten with a total lack of respect.
Today we have a "smartass" society that only dwells over their "Is it good for me?" attitude and takes something like Pearl Harbor for granted while they await the arrival of the next edition of iPhone.
Mike,
I've never been to Hawaii but hope to make it eventually.
Arizona and Missouri: I'm glad those ships represented two of my favorite states. I still miss the Ozarks in summer.
"White Bird" by It's a Beautiful Day and David LaFlame.
You got me pumped with that so I dialed up YouTube and am playing it now. 1968: Wow, can it be that long ago? 45 years? I was 27 and listening to that on "Yours truly WHB" in KC.
I still love the WWII movies. There are a bunch of good ones. "A Walk in the Sun", "Objective, Burma!"
I was surprised that the USS Arizona was built in 1916 when I first read it. Great photo online of it in the Panama Canal.
Arkansas has a nuclear power plant down this morning due to an electrical fire and possible explosion- probably a transformer..
nothing to see, keep moving.
Steve,
Unfortunately, you are probably right. We are turning into a pussy country under Obama with his bullshit about income disparity and bowing to the heads of Muslim countries. Countries don't tax their way to prosperity but he still thinks so.
If we don't get the country back in 2016 I fear for the future.
Thanks, Len.
Thanks, Len,
I doubt if December 7 or much else historical is taught in our public schools anymore. It's sad to think that is so but at least Jay Leno gets to show the stupidity of the American public with his "Jay Walking" tours. I'll be those people could tell Jay when the next iPhone will make its debut though.
Always good to hear from you.
Jim
I wonder if anyone from that era could still recognize our country; I was out amongst them today and society has certainly changed, these stores aren't even making an effort to decorate or get into any kind of Christmas spirit if there ever was any, but I seem to remember it and it wasn't all that long ago.
..a trip to Khols is looking more and more like a trip to the state GUM store in 1955 Kiev.
It's just a gun in the ribs and a hard sell now, I wished one nice sales lady at Target a Merry Christmas because she deserved it- she sure wasn't getting her great attitude from the company that's for sure.
I remember stores respecting their employees enough to honor a holiday and at least let them take a day breather after putting up with non stop push for a full month, but that is a quaint, illogical assumption to make any more.
..The McEmployee..(see that line kid, they want your job)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k89Ot38QfEk
I mean really... am I seeing a Lexus commercial with some .01 percenter of a Royal family dressy bird in a castle hard at work making huge red bows on an antique sewing machine and then doing the slut walk down the hall to put them on three cars all the while dressed for late night cocktails?
I nearly got up off my chair and went straight to the Lexus dealer just to meet her missing the entire third period.
My point is.. today's focus is on the visuals whether it be a smart phone or the boob tube, people don't interact much like they used to and the subtle message of that commercial is the future is going to be either upper or lower classes, the middle class dream is pretty much gone, the future is either living at the castle or working at the castle.
I have heard nothing of a nuclear power plant problem. I've noticed that when I go out at night, the plant life glows like in that movie, "Avatar." The government said it's just swamp gas and nothing to worry about.
As tho the government would ever lie to us, just give me one example..
http://nukeprofessional.blogspot.com/2013/12/fukushima-was-nuclear-explosion-here-is.html
Here's an interesting slant and accompanying govt. video on how nuclear generators can indeed blow up and do a whole lot more damage than people realize..
..just something to tuck away in your anxiety closet when you realize that they just found some debris around Fukashima that is emitting enough radiation that twenty minutes of it would be a death sentence.
Season's Greetings.
http://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2013/dec/09/fire-entergy-nuclear-power-site-russellville/?news-arkansas
..well I guess that was rude not to include the link to the incident.. nothing to worry about continue shopping..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgbBP9Em00A#t=17
This folks is an example of one of your Representatives speaking in the halls of Congress.
I actually wonder if she can, not just if she did read the bill before voting on it..
Florida is a blight on the nation right along with about thirty others- so no I don't believe that we would respond like we did on Dec 8, 1941- the fact is we are under a much worse threat to our nation today and no one seems to want to do anything about the core problem.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cesSRfXqS1Q
..here's another one illustrating once again the irrefutable fact that some people have no use to society whatsoever.
The only thing that might explain this level of bizarre behavior that ravages the Black Caucus is rampant drug use which by common knowledge can be recognized as the same disease their constituencies suffer.
Maybe we need to piss test our Representatives once a week to weed them out- then hang the rest.
I hafta agree with 'Midnight staff'> My research has concluded that Winston Churchill KNEW about the 'surprise attack for the 7th'. The 'Bletchley Park crowd' had cracked JN25. Now, either Churchill didn't tell Roosevelt, or they were in collusion?? The sticky point is that all 3 AIRCRAFT CARRIERS were out to sea delivering airplanes to wake Island [as the story goes]
I hafta agree with 'Midnight staff'> My research has concluded that Winston Churchill KNEW about the 'surprise attack for the 7th'. The 'Bletchley Park crowd' had cracked JN25. Now, either Churchill didn't tell Roosevelt, or they were in collusion?? The sticky point is that all 3 AIRCRAFT CARRIERS were out to sea delivering airplanes to wake Island [as the story goes]
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