Friday, December 07, 2018

"This is no drill!"

At The American Spectator, Geoffrey Norman writes about Pearl Harbor, where 2,403 soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, coast guardsmen and civilians were killed that day 77 years ago. Lest we ever forget...
The Japanese believed that they had won a splendid and complete victory at Pearl Harbor. They had achieved utter surprise and they had broken the backbone of the United States Navy which, without battleships, could not challenge the Japanese for control of the Pacific.

So, its leaders believed, that for many months, even years, Japan could consolidate the empire it had seized — or soon would, as in the case of the Philippines — and be secure against any challenge by sea.

However, in war, it sometimes seems there is nothing so uncertain as certainty.

...At one point in the months after Pearl Harbor and Midway, the U.S. Navy was down to one operational carrier in the Pacific. At the end of the war, less than four years later, it had over one hundred. We could build them faster than they would ever be able to sink them.

...Pearl Harbor is synonymous with surprise in war and, perhaps, the most successful — not to say audacious — surprise attack since that Greek stunt with the wooden horse. An example of overwhelming defeat, however temporary, as a result of surprise. Something to which America seems especially vulnerable.

The U.S. was surprised in Korea, first when North Koreans attacked, and then when the Chinese came in.

Surprised in the Cold War when the Berlin Wall went up

Surprised in Vietnam by the Tet Offensive.

Surprised when Iraq invaded Kuwait.

Surprised by the attacks of 9/11.

The attack of December 7th, however, is the sovereign surprise attack, catching the U.S. unprepared and even unbelieving. Which is summed up by the words that went out over the radio, once the bombs and torpedoes were exploding.

“Air raid, Pearl Harbor.”

And then.

“This is no drill.”

Complete surprise is when you can’t really believe it is happening.

And at Pearl Harbor, at first, they couldn’t.

It remains a day to remember.
Read more here.

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