Remembering Pearl Harbor
I fully agree with Honan when he writes that we should put Pearl Harbor behind us. It serves no purpose, socially, politically or economically. More than ever, we as nations are all in this world together. These are different times.
But, when he writes that we were not just “angelic bystanders” when the Japanese airmen “mugged” us, is an insult and simplistic beyond belief!
Perhaps he is not old enough to remember the unprovoked attack on our gunboat, the Panay, in China in 1937. The unprovoked invasion of Manchuria in 1931. The bombing of the defenseless population of Shanghai, the rape of Nanking, all in 1937. All the while the Roosevelt Administration tried in vain to have Japan withdraw from China.
As for the sneak attack, unless he was there, he could never know the insult, the ignominy of that attack without a warning that left over 2,000 dead and many wounded. Surprised, you bet! To quote one of the seamen aboard my ship during the attack: “I didn’t even know they were mad at us!”
Finally, Mr. Honan, for those of us that were there, “dastardly” is a very descriptive word in reference to that attack, but we have other words equally descriptive but they are unprintable.
PETER T. LIMON
San Clemente
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