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They bombed Pearl Harbor knowing that no carriers were docked there at the time. American carriers were not the main objective of the attack. You have to reali
by Evil_Saint 7y ago
They bombed Pearl Harbor knowing that no carriers were docked there at the time. American carriers were not the main objective of the attack. You have to realize carriers were relatively new and not a known commodity like they are today.
- DuskStar 7y agoAnd at the same time, carriers were counted as powerful enough to make the opening moves of the war. I don't think Japan was happy to discover that they'd missed all of the US's carriers. I think I've read that Yamato was furious, in fact.
- jcranmer 7y agoThe strike Pearl Harbor did achieve all of Japan's objectives: it prevented the US Navy from rushing to the Philippines' defense or otherwise thwarting their 1941-1942 conquests in Australasia. The IJN was still planning on having their decisive battle strategy, in which the US Navy would be decisively defeated in a pitched battleship battle, where carriers would not matter because carriers are not effective ships of the line, instead being good for scouting missions or harassing of incoming forces. Ironically, they still held to this strategy in 1944, and attacked the US Navy in the Battle of Leyte Gulf to force their missing decisive battle, using their carrier fleet entirely as a decoy force. Even after there had been only one battleship action in the entirety of the Pacific war to this point, with all other major naval battles involving only the carriers on one or both sides.