Hawai'i's historic day of "infamy" began just before 8 a.m. Dec. 7, 1941, as a clear Sunday sky was penetrated by 183 Japanese planes.
The first wave of the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor saw Japanese bombers targeting American aircraft carriers and battleships at Pearl Harbor while dive-bombers struck Hickam Field and other U.S. air bases on O'ahu. A second wave of 170 planes followed, attacking Bellows Field and Ford Island.
The assault lasted approximately 90 minutes, and when it was over, 2,388 men, women and children had been killed, including 1,177 sailors from the USS Arizona. Among the dead were 49 civilians, many killed by friendly fire as U.S. forces tried desperately to mount a defense.
Nearly half of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, including all but one of its battleships, had been anchored at Pearl Harbor that morning. The attack left a total of 21 vessels sunken or damaged, and 323 military aircraft around the island damaged or destroyed.
Historians note that the ongoing war with China had placed Japan in need of oil and other resources — resources that could be acquired through military action in the East Indies and Southeast Asia.
U.S. intelligence officials had anticipated an act of Japanese aggression — a presumption that prompted President Franklin D. Roosevelt to transfer the U.S. fleet to Pearl Harbor 18 months earlier as a deterrent — but were nonetheless surprised by the attack on Pearl Harbor.
By that evening, after consulting his military advisers, Roosevelt had composed his famous address to Congress asking for a declaration of war against Japan.
The nature of the attack galvanized American opinion in favor of entering World War II, a defining moment that would set the stage for the country's emergence as an eventual superpower.
In Hawai'i, patriotic fervor was no less intense, but it was complicated by the suspicion cast upon Japanese immigrants and Americans of Japanese ancestry. This in turn led to a historic rallying of local nisei eager to prove their loyalty.
