Most Americans can remember exactly where they were when the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks occurred and trace the profound effect it had on our lives. Today, only a small percentage are still alive to retell similar memories of the Dec. 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor. If you know one of those few remaining witnesses to history, it’s worth the time to listen to their stories and heed the lessons they’ve learned.
The world has transformed in the 75 years since Japanese pilots launched their relentless bombardment of the Pacific naval fleet in what the imperial Axis power hoped to be a knockout punch. Instead of forcing America into a wounded, protective crouch, the nation responded with an enthusiastic, multi-front war effort unmatched in modern history.
Any notion of isolationism or neutrality in World War II disappeared on that day. Americans recognized their duty to fight the evil behind the Axis powers’ quest for hemispheric domination and “master race” rule.
Pearl Harbor was America’s wake-up call, the inspirational moment from which the heroes of our Greatest Generation would emerge.
Extraordinary feats of engineering and defense mobilization resulted. Scientists, inventors and physicists huddled to solve the most difficult problems posed by the war, such as how to crack German codes, ramp up warplane design and production, or track and destroy the submarines wreaking havoc on global shipping lanes.
When millions of able-bodied men joined the war effort, a new world of factory production and management jobs opened for women at home. Thousands of new bombers and fighters rolled off the assembly line to be piloted by women to their combat staging points. Women logged more than 60 million miles as pilots but received minimal credit at the time for the crucial role they played in the war effort.
The massive wartime destruction — including the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki — required decades of reconstruction help after the war. The United States ultimately became the biggest benefactor, friend and defender of its former arch enemies.
A spirit of forgiveness ultimately overcame the enmity.
Therein lies one of the most profound lessons from the Pearl Harbor experience. Americans had every reason to let the Japanese rot in their rubble. Instead, we contributed massively to help them and the Germans rebuild.
While the United States devoted hundreds of billions of dollars in a postwar defense buildup, Japan and Germany took advantage of peacetime to reinvent themselves as global economic powerhouses. Some say their prosperity came at America’s expense. Perhaps.
Today, people are rethinking the current international alignment. Dangerous currents of isolationism and nationalism are resurgent.
The witnesses to history and their memories are gradually fading away. But the lessons of Pearl Harbor — standing prepared to fight but also to forgive — must not be allowed to die with them.
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©2016 the St. Louis Post-Dispatch
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