States. Pearl Harbor is an inlet of the island of Oahu, Hawaii, about 6 miles

west of Honolulu, and the site of one of the principal naval bases of the United

States. The government first obtained exclusive use of the inlet and the right to

maintain a repair and coaling station for ships here in 1887. The harbor was

surveyed then and later, but improvements were not begun until after the United

States annexed the Hawaiian Islands in 1898. In 1911 the work of digging a wide

channel form the sea across the sandbar and coral reef at the mouth of the

harbor was completed. The channel is about 35 feet deep and the harbor has a

maximum depth of about 60 ft, making the harbor available to the largest naval

vessels. (Encarta Encyclopedia, 1994, software)

The Japanese air attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 was the

climax of a decade of rising tension between Japan and the United States.

Throughout the 1930s, Japan had been steadily encroaching on China, and the

United States had been trying to contain Japan's expansion. This period of

growth is known as imperialism. Since America supplied more than half of

were two explosions on the Arizona "The bridge shielded us from flames...

change the course of history. Japanese submarines and carrier-based planes

II on the side of Germany and Italy and of the United States on the Allied side.

with Italy and Germany (communist countries) and began to expand into

were given the command to strike by Commander Mitsuo. Shortly after there

Eight American battleships and ten other naval vessels were sunk or

Roosevelt closed the Panama Canal to Japanese shipping and added oil to the

Cory) The ship went down shortly after the bombings. The air raids by the

Some common words found in the essay are:
Hideki Tojo, Pearl Harbor, Roosevelt Roosevelt, China United, Hawaiian Islands, Oahu Hawaii, Kimmel Short, Eight American, Roosevelt's December, Mitsuo Shortly, pearl harbor, franklin roosevelt, president franklin roosevelt, president franklin, attack pearl harbor, attack pearl, world war, december 7 1941, northern indochina, japanese attack, admiral kimmel, dereliction duty, entered world war, encartaonlinecom 2002, world war ii,
Approximate Word count = 1112
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)