Browsing: Pearl Harbor

That old saying about a picture being worth 1,000 words? There’s a reason everybody says it: A few words, anyway: As the striking photo above — part landscape, part history lesson — shows, the crew of the aircraft carrier Nimitz made its way to Pearl Harbor on Tuesday, en route to a pre-Christmas homecoming in Everett, Wash. As the ship passed by the USS Arizona Memorial, sailors and Marines paid tribute to fellow service members lost during the Dec. 7, 1941, attack. “Every time I stand up there, I feel goosebumps when we pass the Arizona,” Interior Communications 2nd Class…

Joe Sanes served his country during wartime for six years and survived a torpedo sinking his ship — all before he graduated boot camp. Sanes, a World War II veteran, officially graduated from boot camp on June 14, more than 70 years after he enlisted in the Navy, a Navy release said. The young sailor had only been in boot camp for four weeks in 1941 when Pearl Harbor was bombed; he was immediately assigned to the destroyer Hammann, never graduating. “After 72 years, I am proud and happy to be a part of this graduation,” the 91-year-old said in…

It was a sunny, Sunday morning when bombs started raining down on Pearl Harbor 71 years ago today. In the chaos, more than 2,000 service members died, 21 boats sunk to the bottom of the harbor and most of the 394 planes on the island were either damaged or destroyed. Today, the community of those who remember the attack is shrinking. There are fewer than 3,000 survivors of the attack nationwide, and the national Pearl Harbor Survivors Association disbanded Jan. 1, since there were not enough members to keep it together. Most of the population today was not alive for…

I remember a 1990-ish visit to a Japanese submarine base and being dumbfounded to see the subs flying the rising sun flag off their stern masts. Dumbfounded, because being, ahem, of a certain age, I associated the flag — a red disc with red and white “beams” extending outward — with the aggressive World War II-era regime that launched a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor in an effort to exercise total dominance over the Pacific. Its use was banned in 1945 following the surrender to the United States and its allies, but many Americans don’t realize that it was re-adopted…

Today marks the 69th anniversary of “a date which will live in infamy” — the devastating Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that prompted the U.S. entry into World War II. The Navy regrouped, fought back and, four years later, enjoyed the ultimate payback, hosting the formal Japanese surrender ceremony aboard the battleship Missouri. The anniversary is being marked at commemorations around the world, chief among them ceremonies at the new Pearl Harbor Visitor Center at the World War II Valor in the Pacific National Monument and on Ford Island, where a memorial commemoration will be held in honor of those…

css.php