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Historic Accuracy of the Film Tora Tora Tora

Historic Accuracy of the Film "Tora! Tora! Tora!"

In the movie Tora! Tora! Tora!, the American Naval Base at Pearl Harbor was attacked by the Japanese Air and Naval forces. The main question that is trying to be answered is; did the Americans know that the Japanese were going to attack Pearl Harbor? There is sufficient evidence to supply both sides with an argument. Nevertheless, I feel that the evidence supporting the statement that the Americans were previously unaware of the attack on Pearl Harbor outweigh the evidence supporting the statement that the Americans knew beforehand of the attack. I feel that the Americans could have discovered Japan’s plans, but through a series of unfortunate coincidences, were unable to know the location and time of the attack.


The American Government was definitely suspicious of the Japanese, and took precautionary measures resulting from the trade embargo between America and Japan that began when the Japanese occupied French Indo-China. To keep a close watch on Japan’s actions, the Navy intelligence set up a confidential task force to intercept all outgoing messages from Tokyo to every Japanese embassy in the world. When an alert was sent to look out for a possible Japanese attack, there were suggestions from the Navy that 180 planes were to keep a 360 degree patrol of Pearl Harbor. Since there were an insufficient number of planes to carry out this order, the navy set up a new radar system to monitor any planes coming onto the island. They were planning to put it on the highest point on the island, a mountain peak. Through an order from the national park system, they were unable to put it up on the high peak, but instead on a low beach shore with many objects blocking radar reception. Lieutenant General Walter C. Short also concluded that the Japanese would attack Pearl Harbor, but in a different way. He believed that the huge Japanese population on the Hawaiian Islands would up rise, and sabotage the airplanes on the Naval base. His solution was to round up all the planes together and keep them heavily guarded. This proved to be a fatal decision.


Many doubted that the Japanese would attack America at Pearl Harbor, and gave sufficient evidence for their reasoning. Admiral Husband E. Kimmel, the Commander of the US Pacific Fleet pointed out that torpedoes plunge to a depth of 75 feet, where...

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