Part of the Pacific Theater of World War II

America Attacked!

Pearl Harbor and the World Trade Center Bombing

Pearl Harbor

On the morning of December 7, 1941 Japanese fighter planes bombed the United States fleet anchored at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The base at Pearl Harbor was attacked by 353 Japanese aircraft in two waves, launched from six aircraft carriers. Four Navy battleships were sunk (two of which were raised and returned to service later in the war) and the four other battleships present were damaged. The battleship Arizona sunk with 1,102 sailor’s inside. The Japanese also sank or damaged three cruisers, three destroyers, an anti-aircraft training ship, and one minelayer. 188 U.S. aircraft were destroyed; 2,402 men were killed and 1,282 wounded. The power station, shipyard, maintenance, and fuel and torpedo storage facilities, as well as the submarine piers and headquarters building were not attacked. Japanese losses were light, with 29 aircraft and five midget submarines lost, and 65 servicemen killed or wounded. One Japanese sailor was captured. The attack took less than two hours.

The attack came as a profound shock to the American people and led directly to the United States entry into World War II in both the Pacific and European theaters. The following day (December 8) the United States declared war on Japan. Domestic support for isolationism, which had been strong, disappeared. Silent support of Britain was replaced by active alliance and full participation in the European Theater. Subsequent operations by the U.S., as well as the Axis alliance, prompted Germany and Italy to declare war on the U.S. on December 11, which was reciprocated by the U.S. the same day. As a result the American industry began to make a switch to a war time machine creating new airplanes and ships in record time.

Source: PearlHarbor.org

The World Trade Center Bombing

The September 11 attacks were a series of coordinated suicide attacks by al-Qaeda upon the United States on September 11, 2001. On that morning, 19 al-Qaeda terrorists hijacked four commercial passenger airliners. The hijackers intentionally crashed two of the airliners into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, killing everyone on board and many others working in the buildings. Both buildings collapsed within two hours, destroying nearby buildings and damaging others. The hijackers crashed a third airliner into the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C. The fourth plane crashed into a field in rural Pennsylvania after some of its passengers and flight crew attempted to retake control of the plane, which the hijackers had redirected toward Washington, D.C. There were no survivors from any of the flights.

Nearly 3,000 victims and the 19 hijackers died in the attacks. Among the 2,752 victims who died in the attacks on the World Trade Center were 343 firefighters and 60 police officers from New York City and the Port Authority. 184 people were killed in the attacks on the Pentagon. The overwhelming majority of casualties were civilians, including nationals of over 70 countries.

The United States responded to the attacks by launching the war on terror, invading Afghanistan to depose the Taliban, who had harbored al-Qaeda terrorists, and enacting the USA Patriot Act. Many other countries also strengthened their anti-terrorism legislation and expanded law enforcement powers. Some American stock exchanges stayed closed for the rest of the week following the attack, and posted enormous losses upon reopening, especially in the airline and insurance industries. The destruction of billions of dollars' worth of office space caused serious damage to the economy of lower Manhattan.

Source: Wikipedia