preview

Pearl Harbor Dbq Essay

Decent Essays

Japan as the Asia’s industrial and economic leader, resented any threats to its authority

in the region. America’s presence in Guam and the Philippines and its support of China posed

such a threat. On December 7th, 1941, Pearl Harbor was attacked by the Japanese air force

relentlessly. Although Japan and the United States had been allies in World War I, and the United

States had been stayed in neutral, the attack on Pearl Harbor led to America’s entry to the World

War II and broke the Allied relationship between Japan and America. The reasons why Japan

attacked Pearl Harbor are extremely nationalistic mentality, the embargo of resources that the

U.S. had put into place against Japan, and the fear of America becoming too powerful. …show more content…

Also, they considered Europe and America were crumbling countries (Document

A).With that being said, Japan tried to gain power so that it could achieve the apex of the world.

Japanese plan of expanding and gaining power stimulated them to hurt America first before they

were attacked. America’s embargo of resources to Japan caused Japan lack of resources to supply its

army. In order to stop Japanese Empire continued to grow in China, in July of 1940, President

Roosevelt placed an embargo on important naval and aviation supplies to Japan, such as oil, iron

ore, fuel, steel, and rubber. These materials were vital to Japan since it is an island, it lacked

these materials. As well, America was its largest trading country. Without it, Japan’s economy

was definitely influenced. A shown in Document D,about 80% of Oil of Japan received in 1937

was from the United States. That gradually changes, as the graph shows that in 1941, about 60%

of oil Japan received was from the United States. This added fuel to the fire, which eventually

would be one of the reasons Pearl Harbor attack

Get Access