Youre looking at film shot 75 years ago on the morning of december 7th, 1941 when warplanes from fixed japanese Aircraft Carriers targeted the u. S. Pacific fleet at pearl harbor. Almost 4,400 killed, 1,200 wounded. The next two hours here on American History tv we will be joined by historians on fact on pearl bore. We have three ways to join the discussion. 2027408900. For those world war ii veterans 20274 202748902. Send us a tweet and we look forward to your comments on facebook. Com cspanhistory. Joining us from new york city on the first hour of our program is ian toll, the author of pacific crews bell, war at sea in the pacific, 1941 to 1942 which looks at the war in the pacific from pearl harbor to midway. Welcome to American History tv. And ill start by asking you how pearl harbor changed the course of history. Well, in many ways. I could probably go on the whole hour just answering that one question. It is is fair to say that pearl harbor is the central event in the history of the 20th century. Really not just for our country but for the world. Because it launched this country onto the global stage after a long period in which we had really been an isolationist country and by and large the American People were not interested in participating in the Second World War or in the affairs beyond our shores. Pearl harbor changed that virtually overnight. And led to this long period of american nationalist leadership, which continues today. In researching this book and your other writing on on world war ii, did your view on pearl harbor change at all . Well, certainly. You know, ive written about both the political impacts of the attack on pearl harbor and the military impacts. Of course theyre closely related. Form speaker of the house tweeted out the japanese attack had been technically brilliant and was criticized for that. But whatever else you want to say about Newt Gingrich he was right in this instance. Fdr essentially congratulated the japanese by saying that this was an extraordinarily brilliant attack. Tackily certainly it was. The japanese accomplished something that never had been accomplished before. Came twothirds of the way across the pacific ocean, launched a huge accord ated air strike in two waves from is six carrier flight decks. That was something that not only was it beyond american capabilities at that time, it was beyond the capabilities of any navy. It had never been done before. And really had never even been imagined that something that technically complicated could be achieved. Thats part of the reason pearl harbor came at such a huge shock. Why did japan ask the u. S. . That is a question japanese scholars and American Scholars have been debating now 75 years i think the best way to answer it is is to begin with the understanding that the japanese regime, prior to enduring the Second World War, was essentially disfunctional. Power was shared across many different elements of the military establishment. It was an armydominated government. Yet the navy also had a great deal of power. And there were libel factions within each services and also the two services were essentially at each others throats nonstop in a contest for control of the National Budget and military policy, foreign policy. Essentially the japanese needed oil. They had relied on texas crude essentially, imported about 90 of their oil, to run their economy and to run their war in china from the United States. And as our relations deteriorated in 1941, we put in place a number of trade sanctions, essentially cut off all exports. That created a crisis. The japanese needed to replace that source. And in order to do that, they were determined to take the Netherlands East Indies productive oil fields. In order to take those territories, they essentially decided that they needed to preemptively strike us at pearl harbor to clear the way for that invasion. This is American History tv on the special 75th Anniversary Program on the attack the on pearl harbor. Were talking about ian toll is and his back pacific crucible. 2027488901 for mountain and pacific. For world war ii vets, 2027488902. We look forward to your comments on twitter as wel well cspanhistory. Glen, welcome to the program. Caller hi. Thank you for having me. Would you ask the author to talk about the purple hearts that issued to the members of the honolulu fire department, which my understanding the only purple hearts ever issued to civilians outside the military specifically. Thanks, glen. Glen, i have heard about these purple hearts. You may know more about it than i do. Of course the attacks resulted in an enormous amount of antiaircraft fire coming up from the navy yard and the various air bases around oahu that were attacked by japanese planes that morning. Those anticipateaircraft shells, many of them fell into the residential districts of honolulu creating several fires, causing a number of casualties. And so all the first responders, is civilian and military, had to quickly get into the act to respond. And youre correct that that was unprecedented at the time. And its just a mark of what an extraordinary event this was, yet another way to measure what a remarkable and unprecedented event pearl harbor was. In your book you write by 8 10 a. M. , 15 minutes into the attack, the main battle fleet of the Pacific Fleet was tripled. What allowed that to happen so quickly . Well, the japanese achieved complete surprise. Their first wave came in essentially with little or no opposition either from american fighters or from antiaircraft batteries. And they were able to line up their attacks dive bombing torpedo attacks, on the American Battle ships which were moored in the east lock of pearl harbor in a double file. And were essentially sitting ducks. With no prior warning, the crews werent ready to react either by returning antiaircraft fire or by closing watertight hatches which might have prevented the ships from sinking. It was really the aerial torpedos that did most of the damage. And they were able to hit these battleships, immobilize targets, large targets, and put all eight of the battle ships of the Pacific Fleet out of action. Now, six were returned to Service Later in the war. So it was a temporary loss. Yet at the time there were still a prevalent view that the battleships were really the hard of the navys fleet and were the queen of the seas. So thats why the japanese targeted the battle ships. And its also why the initial shock in washington and in the navy and around the country was so great. We had lost all of these ships, put out of action, essentially right at the outset of the war. Lets go to john in west palm beach, florida, on the air with ian toll. Good morning. Caller good morning. I grew up in the tv generation of the 60s. My father was a tanker in world war ii at the end of the war. He took me to the movie torah, torah, torah. I viewed it the other night again. After watching cspan, im amazed at how accurate the movie actually was. It really was like a first docudrama. I just wanted to the get your opinion on that. Elmo williams, the producer, made a great effort to keep the accuracy in his movie. I just wondered how you felt about that . I would agree with you. I think its the best movie thats been made about pearl harbor, including the more recent 2001 movie. As you say, that is a film that tried to use all the most up to date historical sources at the time it was made and to try to accurately depict what happened. And i also think its terrific that it was a joint effort between american and japanese filmmakers, directors, writers, and actors. The japanese sequences i think are a real highlight of that movie. And i would agree with you. And i wish there was more film making like that today. Film making track record about the pacific war in general i think is is very mixed. We could really use a new movie about the battle of midway. The movie in the 70s was quite good, i thought, but inaccurate in many respects. With film making technology today, theres a great move where to be made about the battle of midway. I would like to point out that the attacks on hiroshima and nagasaki are really the last mile in american film making. We havent had a big budget hollywood treatment of those events. Of course thats understandable in a sense why that hasnt happened. Yet somebody is going to make a great movie about the bombing of hiroshi hiroshima. I predict that will win an oscar for best picture. Our guest this hour is ian toll, author of pacific crucible looking at the war of 1941 and 1942. We have seen American News reels about that attack on pearl harbor. Lets look at the japanese news reels reporting on the attack that day. A great war against america and britain december 8th, 1941. The navy attacked pearl harboa which the United States boasts it is the strongest in the world. There are many miles on the pacific. Our carriers go toward hawaii. Strong wind blows. 17 meters per second. The sea is is rough and the waves are high, smashing against the side of the ship in a thunderous noise. All men are on deck. The imperial air squadron delivers an attack. The end of the war will be carried out in a few moments. War heroes respond to their countrys call in life and death. The eagle carrying the load of many bombs. The morning of sunday, december 8th, bombers speed toward hawaii. They go to the america air base. Next to the island. They go into action. Enemy aircraft. The fleet is the strongest fleet in the world. The greatest victory in hawaii. Carrying out operations over a wide area of the philippines. America and britain, east asia is imminent. A new tester in the history of asia against. Understandably bold news reel from japan in 1941 after the attack on pearl harbor. Back with ian toll, author of pacific crucible on the 75th anniversary of the attack on pearl harbor. They were asking what part of the attack on pearl harbor did not go as planned . Well, the attack went largely as planned fort japanese. There was one element of the attack, which was essentially not coordinated with the aerial attack, and that was a number of what were called midget submarines. These small twoman sub percent i believe so around with two small torpedoes attempted to penetrate pearl harbor, i believe two of them got into the harbor and fired on our ships and may have contributed to the sinking cap sizing of the battleship oklahoma although the crews didnt survive so there is some question and debate about exactly what those submarines achieved, but it was hoped that they might be able to recover the crews of those submarines, none of them were recovered, and but as for the main attack, the carrier air attack, largely went off as they had planned and was a tactically brilliant success. They lost only 29 planes and none of their ships was scratched, although they had expected a counterattack on their fleet and had even assumed that they might lose as many as two aircraft care whiers. We have plenty of calls waiting for ian toll so lets get to them. Here is norman. Welcome to the program. Hi. I would just like to ask mr. Who will in 1939 there was a battle between the soviet union and the japanese at cull kin goal in man chewer i cant and it was considered a decisive battle some say in history. I would like to know if that had a bearing on the japanese decision to strike at the americans in in pearl harbor. Okay. Thanks. We think weve got it there, norman. Thanks for the question. Ian toll. Yes, i think you can say that the experience of the Japanese Army fighting the soviet army in manchuria in 1939 did contribute to the decision to attack the United States and Great Britain in 1941. There had been essentially a debate between the Japanese Army and the Japanese Navy over whether they should concentrate their efforts on attacking russia or whether instead they should look at going south and taking territories in the South Pacific and these were two kind of fundamental Strategic Directions that japan could have taken. Now, the combat this was an undeclared there was no war declar declared, but there was largescale combat as the caller mentioned in manchuria, and the soviet army really got the better of the Japanese Army in that action and that was came as a a kind of a wakeup call for the Japanese Army realizing that going up against an efficient modern Mechanized Army was going to be much more difficult than they thought. So from that point forward japanese policy making really rested on the idea that they were going to avoid war with the soviet union, and that continued right through the end of the war. There were hopes in 1944, 1945 that the japanese government might be able to execute a kind of diplomatic maneuver where they would bring stalin in as a mediator to try to have a truce and a negotiated end to the pacific war. Of course, that never amounted to anything and, in fact, there was really no chance that that could have succeeded. Weve set aside a line for world war ii vets 2027489802. We welcome ray from fayetteville, arkansas. Good morning. Yes. I wonder why its never been mentioned that the top secret invasion of the mainland of japan has not been mentioned to the public where they we would have lost more than we would have lost more americans killed plus japanese killed and the bomb dropped at hiroshima and its never been mentioned. Its been taken out of top secret now and ive got ive got copies of the invasion order, but its unbelievable that its not been put in our history books. Its very important that this be known by the feel just what was to happen in november of 1945 that did not happen. We were on our way to japan. I was in that after mad da, to a attack japan when the war ended and we passed the uss missouri the day we arrived there the day the peace treaty was signed. Brady, do you know how big that force would have been . That what . Do you know how big that force would have been . Do you have any idea . It would have been ever they had every army unit and every naval unit and every marine unit gathered together to attack japan mainland and there would have been over a million men lost on the beach if they would have hit it. Lets hear from ian toll. I appreciate your comments this morning. Sorry. Before we cut the line id like to know what hes hes gone. There you go. Okay. I was just curious to know exactly what unit he had been in. But thats fine. Yes, we had planned an invasion of the japanese islands, it was in two stages, first in november as ray said correctly and then the main island of honchu following some months after that, that was going to be an enormous invasion, it would have been larger than the normandy invasion, there were more than ten divisions army and marine slated to take part in that information and it would have been an immensely cloudy and really very terrible operation not only for our own forces but as ray said for the japanese people and this has been the traditional justification for the decision to drop the bomb, atomic bomb on hiroshima. I think that it is in the history books, ray. Certainly anybody who pays attention to the history of the pacific war is aware that we had these plans, they were well advanced, ive spent a lot of time talking to veterans who would have gone in and certainly it was necessary to avoid that operation. Now, the question which he didnt directly bring up, you know, did we need to use the bombs in the way that we did. I think that that is something that were going to continue to debate. Of course, the attack on hiroshima was in the first week of august, 1945. The d day, the date for the invasion of kushu was november 1st so thats a long period of time and there was not an immediate invasion that was about to occur. My own view and i have expressed this recently in may when president obama went to hiroshima is that i think it would have been a good idea for our own sake to provide an explicit warning to the japanese. I think that that would have been easier to defend in the long light of history, but certainly and this is important when youre talking to a veteran who would have gone in and might not have survived, i think it was clear that we needed to avoid ending the war with an invasion of japan one way or another. We should point out, too, pacific crucible is part of a trilogy of ian toll, 1941 to 1942, the conquering tide from 1942 from midway until 1944 and i assume this information youre talking about now in the book youre working on currently. Yes, i will get deep into the plans for the invasion of japan in the third book which is going to be entitled twilight of the gods. And when will we see that published, ian toll . Well, thats a very personal question, bill. We wont hold you to it. I would like to say the fall of 2018. All right. Lets hear from dave in rensselaer, new york. Good morning. Go ahead, dave. Caller good morning, gentlemen. My basic question, mr. Toll, you referred on this before, is when exactly did the United States realize that the day of the battleship was over and when the day of the carrier arrived . When them et cetera was looking at his fleet after he took over from kimmel did he believe relieved that the battle ships were hit and he still had call of his carriers and that the most part of his fleet was intact or was he in a state of panic in that we lost all our battle ships what am i going to do with all these carriers that have never been tested in battle and i have no idea how to use them . I particularly ask when the americans passed the two ocean navy act in july of 1940 they included six iowa battle ships and a Montana Class of battleship but by the end of 42 the six iowa battle ships were down to four and the montanas were canceled. Id ask for him to go in more detail, please. Sure. First of all, i would say that nim mitts certainly wasnt panicked. He was a battleship admiral, he had been the captain of the arizona, he had been an admiral heading up a Battleship Division and so, you know, certainly the loss of the battle ships at pearl harbor gave as a real gut punch