How had Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor changed Americans' attitudes towards war?

Answer 1

isolationism

The United States had been practicing isolationism officially. They were staying out of it. They were sending weapons and men to help fight. When the attack occured America realized that this was indeed a world war and a nation as powerful as America would have to choose a side. Naturally they wanted to attack Japan in retaliation, but decided that Germany and Europe was more important. They sent the bulk of the armed forces their, but kept enought to take back the Pacific and destroy Japan. The United States was basically shocked into action.

The attack on Pearl Harbor brought the USA into war. The attack also caused a permanent end to isolationism in US Foreign policy.

The Japanese Attacked Pearl Harbor December 7, 1941

December 7, 2009

Last week we had President Obama's less-than-rousing Afghanistan war speech, trying to have it both ways by dispatching more troops while promising a scheduled departure. And not once using the word "victory."

Today, coincidentally, is the 68th anniversary of the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, where shortly the 44th president will fly with his family and White House entourage for a holiday vacation. Few Ticket readers will remember the shock that swept the country that quiet Sunday, not unlike 9/11 would do 60 years later. And the millions of lives affected by those events.

So here as a political refresher are two historic videos -- one about the actual attack itself by 350 planes from Imperial Japanese aircraft carriers more than 200 miles away.

The other video includes President Franklin D. Roosevelt's famous war speech the very next day, the one saying that Dec. 7, 1941, would live in infamy. And here we are 24,837 days later remembering.

It was 68 years ago that a news bulletin bringing sweeping changes to the American way of life crackled over the AM radio in Malcolm T. Smith's car as he drove to work at the new Reynold's Aluminum plant in Sheffield.

The bulletin announced Japan had attacked the United States with a surprise raid on Pearl Harbor in Hawaii.

"I think everybody was surprised to hear we had been attacked," said Smith, 93.

"When I got to work that morning, everybody was talking about Pearl Harbor and what they were going to do about it."

Many of his co-workers volunteered for military duty. Within a year, Smith, who now lives in Tuscumbia, was in the U.S. Navy.

His wife, Grace, followed him to California, where he was sent for training, and she went to work in a tailor shop in San Diego, altering uniforms for sailors.

"All of the sailors wanted their uniforms to fit tight. They wanted their shirts so tight they could barely get it over their head to put it on," she said.

"I would take up their uniforms to make them fit the way they wanted them to. That was my way of doing something for the war."

Ronald Pettus, of Athens, an expert on Shoals history and a former history teacher at Brooks High School in Killen, said the attack on Pearl Harbor changed America in a way never seen before or since.

Four days after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Germany declared war on the United States and America was suddenly helping fight World War II in both the Pacific and Europe.

Pettus said the United States' response to suddenly being thrust into the war was amazing.

"The Japanese caught America completely unprepared for war," he said. "But the country came together and almost overnight we put together a military like no other in the world. By 1942, we were up and rolling.

"Everybody helped out with the war effort. The kids here at home would go around their neighborhoods collecting scrap metal and paper for the war. Women saved grease from their kitchen that was used to make gunpowder. Women all over the country went to work in defense plants building tanks, airplanes, bombs and other military equipment. Everybody wanted to do their part to help win the war."

The Sunday morning attack caused extensive damage to the Navy's fleet based at Pearl Harbor. There were 21 ships sunk or damaged, 188 airplanes were destroyed and 159 were damaged. There were 2,403 American casualties, including 68 civilians. The first Colbert County resident killed in World War II, Thomas Stegar Sanford, died onboard the USS Arizona.

Grace Smith said she was at home getting ready for church when she learned of the attack.

"I was shocked and scared when I heard on the radio what had happened at Pearl Harbor," she said.

Pettus said Americans were so angered by the attack that many flooded military recruiting offices when they opened the following morning, wanting to volunteer for duty. Congress declared war on Japan that day.

"There has never been anything that unified America as much as the attack on Pearl Harbor," Pettus said. "The 9/11 attacks came close, but that unification began to wane after just a few weeks."

Pettus said it would have been difficult for anyone living in America during World War II to not become involved in the war effort. He said every family in the Shoals and almost every community in the nation either had someone who was in the military during World War II or knew someone who was in the armed forces. The United States had 16 million men and women serve in the armed forces during the war.

Richard Sheridan, of Sheffield, who was 12 when Pearl Harbor was attacked, recalls the strong sense of patriotism that swept the western Kentucky community where he grew up.

"Everybody took ownership of the war effort and we all wanted to do all we could to help," Sheridan said. "We were proud of our country and our military."

Malcolm Smith, who spent his Navy career as a ship's barber, recalls the support for the war effort continuing after the fighting had ended. On his way home from the war, Smith recalled how he and a group of sailors he was traveling with received a hero's welcome in North Platte, Neb.

"The people there welcomed us to their city like you wouldn't believe," he said. "They had all the food and goodies you could think of spread out for us. I will never forget that."

Although President Franklin D. Roosevelt predicted in his address to the nation on the day following the Pearl Harbor attack that Dec. 7, 1941, would be a day that would "live in infamy," Pettus fears than younger Americans are forgetting the significance of the date.

"Some of our schools are not putting as much emphasis on teaching the history of World War II as they used to," he said. "That concerns me because I'm not sure if there was another incident like Pearl Harbor that we would be able to rise to the occasion like we did then. The attack on Pearl Harbor is an important part of our history and we must make sure it is never forgotten."

With more than 1,000 World War II veterans dying every day in the United States, Pettus said many of the stories about the war are fading fast.

Horace B. Carpenter, of Sheffield, who served on the USS Goshen in World War II, said only 10 of his shipmates, three widows of shipmates and the son of a shipmate attended a reunion of the ship's crew that was staged in the Shoals in October. The veterans traveled from as far away as Oregon, New Mexico and New York. Family members and friends of the veterans, about 50 people, attended the two-day reunion. When the reunions began about 30 years ago, more than 100 veterans would attend the annual gatherings that have been held throughout the country.

Carpenter said fewer than 20 members of the original crew of 500 crew members of the Goshen survive. "There's not many of us left. We're dying out fast," he said.

Pettus said he would like to see younger Americans make a point of thanking veterans who survived the attack on Pearl Harbor and all of those who were in World War II.

"We owe those men and women a huge debt of gratitude," Pettus said. "They saved our country and the world."

Answer 2

Pearl harbor changed America by forcing the u.s. to work together and defeat Japan during world war two.

Answer 3

On December 7, 1941, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. Immediately after this happened, the USA declared war on Japan, bringing the USA into World War 2.

Answer 4

it made them mad