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On the seventh of December, 1941, the Imperial Japanese Navy launched a pre-emptive strike against the United State's Pacific fleet, stationed in Pearl Harbour, Hawaii.

Two waves of attack craft, totaling 350 aircraft, were launched from six aircraft carriers with the intent to destroy the United States Pacific Fleet.

The attack wrecked two U.S. Navy battleships, one minelayer, and two destroyers beyond repair, and destroyed 188 aircraft; personnel losses were 2,333 killed and 1,139 wounded. Damaged warships included three cruisers, a destroyer, and six battleships. Vital fuel storage, shipyards, and submarine facilities were not hit. Japanese losses were minimal, at 29 aircraft and five midget submarines, with 65 servicemen killed or wounded.

This attack would draw the United States into the Second World War, and end with the destruction of two cities, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, with the use of atomic weapons.

May all who died rest in peace.

*Moment of silence*

...

Which was, I might add, the exact same way the Japanese started their war with Russia a generation earlier.

I was wondering if anyone else remembered today, the first day of infamy.

On this day in history, Imperial Japan made its dumbest move ever...

Rochey wrote:May all who died rest in peace.

So say we all.

Rochey wrote:On the seventh of December, 1941, the Imperial Japanese Navy launched a pre-emptive strike against the United State's Pacific fleet, stationed in Pearl Harbour, Hawaii.

Two waves of attack craft, totaling 350 aircraft, were launched from six aircraft carriers with the intent to destroy the United States Pacific Fleet.

The attack wrecked two U.S. Navy battleships, one minelayer, and two destroyers beyond repair, and destroyed 188 aircraft; personnel losses were 2,333 killed and 1,139 wounded. Damaged warships included three cruisers, a destroyer, and six battleships. Vital fuel storage, shipyards, and submarine facilities were not hit. Japanese losses were minimal, at 29 aircraft and five midget submarines, with 65 servicemen killed or wounded.

This attack would draw the United States into the Second World War, and end with the destruction of two cities, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, with the use of atomic weapons.

May all who died rest in peace.

May they never be forgotten.

Hear, hear. I generally try to avoid posting things like this, as an American, in the name of humility; but thank you for your thoughts, Rochey.

I had the opportunity to vist Pearl Harbor, which visit included a trip to the memorial constructed over the remains of the USS Arizona. I was chilled and humbled by the fact that the Arizona is essentially a tomb for many of her crew and by the fact that many survivors of her crew, as they pass, are cremated and buried via divers with their shipmates.

I am not a terribly sentimental man, but that trip certainly brought me to tears.

I too visited the USS Arizona and like you Mikey I could feel the tears boil within. I have also seen Gettysburg, Antietam, Harpers Farry, Manassas & Bull Run bridge. Before I die I want to see Normandy beach. My father is a harsh man, like his father before him and as I hope to be... But even my father admitted that seeing the place in which our family landed made him kneel, pray and cry. I hope that I will feel the same as my father did when I reach that place and see what both my father saw from above and my grandfather saw from his higgins.

Gettysburg was moving for the sheer scale of it, and for the reminder that after all was said and done, it was men killing their own countrymen. I haven't yet seen any other Civil War sites - especially in the Deep South where the Civil War is referred to as the "recent unpleasantness" - but I too would like to see some of the WWII sites in Europe, along with places where some blood of mine was spilt, like Dachau, Auschwitz, and Babi Yar.

I'd seriously advise taking a look at the war cemetaries in France the next time you're around there. The first time I saw one, I was completely speachless, and that was after I'd been to Auschwitz, so death was hardly unknown to me.

I can only imagine, after having seen both Arlington and the Cemetary of the Pacific in the Punchbowl. However, I mentioned those sites because of personal, familial interest.

Of the cemeteries I've visited Tyne Cot, at Paschendael, left the greatest impression. The scale of the place is incredible - from a distance it looks like a huge solid block of white on the hillside.

I too have been to Dachau and Auschwitz. Very moving, I remember sitting quietly in the Jewish memorial in Dachau on an extremely hot summers day and feeling very cold. The picture in the museum of the pill of shoes was very daunting.

The shear scale of Auschwitz is what gets you most. A particularly mood inspiring note while we were at the crematoria a huge thunder storm rolled in over the site. As I put my foot on the bottom step of the coach the heavens opened and the heaviest rain fall I've ever seen started to fall. It all added to the creepiness of the experience.

I, unfortunately, have never visited any of these sites you mention. I have only been to a small war memorial in a tiny Italian village named Anguillara Sabazia just outside Rome back when i lived there. Although i hope to visit one of the Cemetaries in France and , one day, the Wreck of the USS Arizona.
I would also like to put in a mention for 8th December 1941, the first mass execution of a the Jewish ethnicity in Belarus.

Thank you to those who died in D-Day, Aboard the Arizona and elsewhere in the war for the freedom of all those who lived.