Honor December 7th today.

On Sunday, December 7 at approximately 6am, the Japanese attack force of six carriers with 423 planes, is about to attack. The first attack wave of 183 Japanese planes takes off from the carriers located 230 miles north of Oahu and heads for the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor.

At 7:02 a.m., two Army radio operators detect the Japanese air attack approaching and contact a junior officer who disregards their reports, thinking they are American B-17 planes which are expected in from the U.S. west coast.

At 7:15 a.m., a second attack wave of 167 planes takes off from the Japanese carriers and heads for Pearl Harbor. The planes arrive at Pearl Harbor at 7:53am and commit a savage attack against an unprepared and, at the time, undeclared, enemy. The air raid lasts until 9:45 a.m. Eight battleships are damaged, and five sunk. Three light cruisers, three destroyers and three smaller vessels are lost along with 188 aircraft. The Japanese lose only 27 planes and five midget submarines.

2,335 servicemen and 68 civilians killed, and another 1,178 wounded. Those 1,104 men stationed on the USS Arizona were killed after a 1,760-pound air bomb penetrated the forward magazine. 

Today, the Arizona is at the bottom of the harbor, but she is spanned by a memorial that draws over a million visitors every year. And once a year, on December 7th, those who survived that horrible day return to pay their respects to their fallen friends. 

Every year that gathering gets smaller and smaller. According to the Veteran's Administration, we are loosing our World War II Veterans at 740 per day. There will come a time in the very near future when there will be no survivors left to speak out, to stand on the memorial, and to teach the next generation. 

The events of this day, 70 years ago, still affect us today. Hate and genocide are still with us. Consider this day carefully and talk to those you meet about it. Explain the significance of this day to your children. Lite a candle. Buy a wreath for your door. By claiming these remembrance days and celebrating them with solemn tradition, we affirm that we will indeed be watchful of our fellow man and that we will not stand by and let hate and insanity rule the world again. 

And to our veterans. . . I say a very grateful  and heartfelt thank you and God bless you.

70th Anniversary of Pearl Harbor

 At 6:05am on Dec 7, 1941, the Japanese Navy attacked the U.S. Pacific Fllet stationed at Pearl Harbor located just west of Honolulu on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. The Japanese used aircraft and midget submarines. Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto launched the first assault at 7:51am, with a volley of 183 airplanes from 6 Japanese carriers striking the outlying ships, military installations, and airfields controlled by the military on Ford Island.

We lost lost 9 ships, and had 21 severely damaged ships. The obscinity of the attack is revealed in the death toll which reached 2,350, including 68 civilians. In addition, 1,178 non-casualties were injured. Out of the military personnel lost at Pearl Harbor, 1,177 were crew of the USS Arizona.

We've all heard the words spoken by President Roosevelt on December 8.

"Yesterday, December 7, 1941—a date which will live in infamy—the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan... No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people will through their righteous might win through to absolute victory... With confidence in our armed forces-with the unbounded determination of our people-we will gain the inevitable triumph-so help us God. I, therefore, ask that the Congress declare that since the dastardly and unprovoked attack by Japan on Sunday, December seventh, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire."

Consider how Hitler felt. Some people feel he should have been angry that the Japanese brought the United States into the war, but his speech to the Reichstag on December 11 gives us a clear picture of his thoughts.

"A threatening [political] opposition was gathering over the head of this man [Roosevelt]. He guessed that the only salvation for him lay in diverting public attention from home to foreign policy... He was strengthened in this by the Jews around him... The full diabolical meanness of Jewry rallied around this man and he stretched out his hands. Thus began the increasing efforts of the American President to create conflicts... For years this man harbored one desire -- that a conflict should break out somewhere in the world... The fact that the Japanese Government, which has been negotiating for years with this man, has at last become tired of being mocked by him in such an unworthy way, fills us all, the German people, and all other decent people in the world, with deep satisfaction... As a consequence of the further extension of President Roosevelt's policy, which is aimed at unrestricted world domination and dictatorship, the U.S.A. together with England have not hesitated from using any means to dispute the rights of the German, Italian and Japanese nations to the basis of their natural existence ... in these historic times, the existence or non-existence of the nations, is being decided perhaps forever."

Wednesday, December 7, is the date that will live in infamy. This is a day that not only changed America, but the world as well. Our navy rallied and became a force to be reckoned with. American soldiers brought hope to war-weary soldiers from other nations who had been fighting for so long. 

As the war caved in around Hitler, U.S. forces liberated the Buchenwald concentration camp near Weimar, Germany, on April 11, 1945, a few days after the Nazis began evacuating the camp. On the day of liberation, an underground prisoner resistance organization seized control of Buchenwald to prevent atrocities by the retreating camp guards. American forces liberated more than 20,000 prisoners at Buchenwald. They also liberated Dora-Mittelbau, Flossenbürg, Dachau, and Mauthausen.

Remember December 7th and those brave souls who fight and died for our freedom and the lives of strangers.