9781422277188

BACKGROUND 1. MISSION REPORT : E arly on the morning of December 7, 1941, more than 350 Japanese planes attacked the US naval base at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. It was a devastating strike that killed 2,403 Americans and wounded more than 1,000 others. The attack damaged all eight navy battleships stationed there, as well as several other cruisers and destroyers, plus dozens of aircraft. December 7 at Pearl Harbor was, as President Franklin Delano Roosevelt told the nation in a speech to Congress the next day, “a date which will live in infamy.” A World at War Before Pearl Harbor, the United States had remained on the sidelines dur- ing World War II. America had built up its military and had given indirect aid to its overseas friends, but the country was deeply divided over entering another conflict in Europe less than 25 years removed from deadly World War I—the “war to end all wars,” as it was called at the time. Many Ameri- cans believed the country should fight alongside Great Britain, France, Rus-

Words To Understand bayonet a long knife attached to the muzzle end of a rifle detention in this case, being held against one’s will isolationist a person who believes countries should stand on their own and not get involved in foreign conflicts

10