Pearl: December 7, 1941

"The account that Butler lays out is very clear and easy to follow. It provides a series of dramatic moments and hits all the key elements of the story of Pearl Harbor that have appeared in the existing literature."―The Northern Mariner

What happened at Pearl Harbor?
What really happened?

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor is one of those rare moments where, in the space of a few hours, the "hinge of Fate" turned and the course of history was utterly changed. Nearly eight decades later, it has become one of those events which almost everyone knows of, but hardly anyone seems to know about. How—and why—did the Empire of Japan and the United States of America collide on blood and flames that Sunday morning when the sun rose and the bombs fell?

Pearl: December 7, 1941 is the story of how America and Japan, two nations with seemingly little over which to quarrel, let peace slip away, so that on that "day which will live in infamy," more than 350 dive bombers, high-level bombers, torpedo planes, and fighters of the Imperial Japanese Navy did their best to cripple the United States Navy's Pacific Fleet, killing 2,403 American servicemen and civilians, and wounding another 1,178.

It's a story of emperors and presidents, diplomats and politicians, admirals and generals—and it's also the tale of ordinary sailors, soldiers, and airmen, all of whom were overtaken by a rush of events that ultimately overwhelmed them. Pearl shows the real reasons why the America's political and military leaders underestimated Japan's threat against America's security, and why their Japanese counterparts ultimately felt compelled to launch the Pearl Harbor attack.

Pearl offers more than superficial answers, showing how both sides blundered their way through arrogance, overconfidence, racism, bigotry, and old-fashioned human error to arrive at the moment when the Japanese were convinced that there was no alternative to war. Once the battle is joined, Pearl then takes the reader into the heart of the attack, where the fighting men of both nations showed that neither side had a monopoly on heroism, courage, cowardice, or luck, as they fought to protect their nations.

Table of Contents

Introduction
Prologue Dawn at Pearl
Chapter 1 The Rising Sun
Chapter 2 The Sleeping Giant
Chapter 3 Men, Ships, Plans, and Planes
Chapter 4 MAGIC and the Color Purple
Chapter 5 “Climb Mount Niitaka”
Chapter 6 “To-ra! To-ra! To-ra!”
Chapter 7 “THIS IS NOT DRILL!”
Chapter 8 “A Devastating Sight...”
Chapter 9 Inferno
Chapter 10 Shock and Awe
Chapter 11 Retribution...
Chapter 12 ... and Reckoning
Epilogue The Ship that Weeps for her Dead
Appendix I Imperial Japanese Navy “Hawaii Operation" Order of Battle, December 7, 1941
Appendix II United States Armed Forces Order of Battle Pearl Harbor and Oahu, December 7, 1941
Notes
Bibliography and Sources

Daniel Allen Butler, a maritime and military historian, is the bestselling author of “Unsinkable”: The Full Story of RMS Titanic, Distant Victory: The Battle of Jutland and the Allied Triumph in the First World War, and The First Jihad: The Battle for Khartoum and the Dawn of Militant Islam. He is an internationally recognized authority on maritime subjects. Butler lives and works in Los Angeles, California. Daniel Allen Butler was educated at Hope College, Grand Valley State University, and the University of Erlangen.