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Pearl Harbor was US. The Philippines was US. We were literally invaded. They also bombed the West Coast.

by coryrc 4y ago

shepherdjerred 4y ago
Hawaii and the Philippines were only territories. The mainland US was not in any danger. What I mean by this is that the average US citizen was completely safe (well, until drafts)
kQq9oHeAz6wLLS 4y ago
> They also bombed the West Coast. Two bombs, and it was basically a non-event. The intent was to start massive forest fires, but they failed. They also shelled the West coast, and all they did was damage a baseball backstop at Fort Stevens and tear up the beach a bit.
jacobolus 4y ago
US Navy ships in the territory of Hawaii were bombed but the island was not “invaded”. You are right that the Philippines was invaded, and was at the time a US territory. But it was at that point under a government intended to transition it to independence. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hare–Hawes–Cutting_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hare–Hawes–Cutting_Act From what I can tell (this was decades before my birth and I have not extensively studied it, so I probably have an oversimplified impression) for mainland Americans, the Philippines was not really considered to be part of the country in the same way as, say, Illinois or Texas, and Filipinos were not considered to be Americans in the same way. (e.g. after WWII the Congress voted to strip benefits from Filipino veterans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rescission_Act_of_1946 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rescission_Act_of_1946) I’m sure the US wanted to maintain some navy and trade presence there though. The Japanese also occupied the Aleutian islands of Kiska and Attu (part of Alaska territory). But it’s hard to imagine that people 3000 miles away in, say, Oregon were worried that the Japanese would be imminently launching an amphibious assault from there.
- coryrc 4y ago
  People were literally killed by bombs in Oregon: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/1945-japanese-balloon-bomb-killed-six-americansfive-them-children-oregon-180972259/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/1945-japanese-balloon...
  - jacobolus 4y ago
    Remember, our discussion in this thread is the purported “legitimate and urgent fear of a foreign power invading [America’s] shores”. (a) This balloon bombing was covered up and essentially nobody about it at the time, so clearly not something people were urgently worried about. (b) This militarily irrelevant bombing of a handful of random civilians is hardly an “invasion”.

Pearl Harbor was US. The Philippines was US. We were literally invaded. They also bombed the West Coast.

by coryrc 4y ago

Pearl Harbor was US. The Philippines was US. We were literally invaded. They also bombed the West Coast.

Hawaii and the Philippines were only territories. The mainland US was not in any danger. What I mean by this is that the average US citizen was completely safe (well, until drafts)

kQq9oHeAz6wLLS 4y ago

> They also bombed the West Coast. Two bombs, and it was basically a non-event. The intent was to start massive forest fires, but they failed. They also shelled the West coast, and all they did was damage a baseball backstop at Fort Stevens and tear up the beach a bit.

jacobolus 4y ago

US Navy ships in the territory of Hawaii were bombed but the island was not “invaded”. You are right that the Philippines was invaded, and was at the time a US territory. But it was at that point under a government intended to transition it to independence. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hare–Hawes–Cutting_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hare–Hawes–Cutting_Act From what I can tell (this was decades before my birth and I have not extensively studied it, so I probably have an oversimplified impression) for mainland Americans, the Philippines was not really considered to be part of the country in the same way as, say, Illinois or Texas, and Filipinos were not considered to be Americans in the same way. (e.g. after WWII the Congress voted to strip benefits from Filipino veterans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rescission_Act_of_1946 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rescission_Act_of_1946) I’m sure the US wanted to maintain some navy and trade presence there though. The Japanese also occupied the Aleutian islands of Kiska and Attu (part of Alaska territory). But it’s hard to imagine that people 3000 miles away in, say, Oregon were worried that the Japanese would be imminently launching an amphibious assault from there.

coryrc 4y ago
People were literally killed by bombs in Oregon: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/1945-japanese-balloon-bomb-killed-six-americansfive-them-children-oregon-180972259/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/1945-japanese-balloon...
- jacobolus 4y ago
  Remember, our discussion in this thread is the purported “legitimate and urgent fear of a foreign power invading [America’s] shores”. (a) This balloon bombing was covered up and essentially nobody about it at the time, so clearly not something people were urgently worried about. (b) This militarily irrelevant bombing of a handful of random civilians is hardly an “invasion”.