Items related to Day Of Infamy
Walter Lord traces the human drama of the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor: the spies behind it; the Japanese pilots; the crews on the stricken warships; the men at the airfields and bases; the generals, the sailors, the housewives and the children. In piecing together the saga, Mr. Lord spoke or corresponded with over five hundred individuals who were there, including members of the Japanese attacking force. He visited each of the Hawaiian bases attacked, and pored over maps, charts, letters, diaries, official files, newspapers, and thousands of pages of testimony, discovering a wealth of information that had never before been revealed.
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Review:
There may not be a better book on what happened at Pearl Harbor than Day of Infamy--and it's not as if the Pearl Harbor story has lacked chroniclers. Walter Lord is best known for A Night to Remember, his book on the voyage of the Titanic. Day of Infamy deserves to stand beside that classic as a gripping narrative, and the subject matter, of course, is infinitely more important.
About the Author:
Lord begins by showing how Japanese admirals, three months before their notorious sneak attack, "tested the idea on the game board at the Naval War College." (It didn't go nearly as well there as it did in real life.) Then he proceeds briskly through the preparations for the assault and delivers a minute-by-minute account about those fateful hours in Oahu. The detail is incredible. The Japanese scan Hawaiian radio stations to see if their moves have been detected; a U.S. naval officer on "his first night on his first patrol on his first command" spots a Japanese submarine just hours before the strike; when the surprise attack finally does arrive, an excited Japanese commander shouts "Tora! Tora! Tora!" ("Victory!") before even the first bombs have fallen. The whole assault lasted about two hours. Thousands of Americans were killed or wounded. The Navy lost the U.S.S. Arizona, which blew up about 15 minutes into the raid, and 17 other ships were either sunk or crippled. Hundreds of planes were destroyed or damaged. The Japanese, by contrast, lost only 29 planes. It must be considered one of the most lopsided battles in all history--and "battle" probably isn't the best word to describe it. Pearl Harbor was closer to a massacre. Whatever the label, Pearl Harbor was a turning-point moment in American history, and it gave rise, the very next day, to some of the most famous words ever spoken by an American president: "Yesterday, December 7, 1941, a date which will live in infamy, the United States was suddenly and deliberately attacked...." If you intend to read only a single book on Pearl Harbor, this is the one for you. --John J. Miller
Walter Lord (1917-2002), American author of numerous nonfiction books, was a graduate of Princeton University and Yale Law School, served in the OSS during World War II, and became an editor and advertising copywriter. He is known for his book A Night to Remember, about the sinking of the Titanic, and he served as consultant in the making of the movie Titanic.
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- PublisherNiagara
- Publication date1997
- ISBN 10 0708958818
- ISBN 13 9780708958810
- BindingHardcover
- Number of pages336
- Rating
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