On December 7, 1941, Japan launched an undeclared war against the United States and bombed Pearl Harbor, shocking the world. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor had a huge impact on the situation at that time, and some were happy and some were sad, and each had its own careful thoughts.
Why did Japan attack Pearl Harbor? What are the benefits of a successful sneak attack?
Japan is an island country, and everyone knows this. Then the island country naturally has the disadvantage of the island country, and the biggest disadvantage is the lack of resources, so this is one of the reasons for Japan's frequent foreign expansion.
Japan encountered the problem of lack of resources in World War II, especially strategic resources such as oil and other materials, which Japan was in urgent need. If it loses oil, then Japan will not be able to move forward, even if it has more steel and weapons, it is just a pile of scrap iron.
Therefore, Japan urgently needs to obtain strategic materials, and the plunder in China is obviously not enough. Then Japan had to look elsewhere. At the beginning of World War II, Japan formulated two strategic plans of "going north and going south", which was also done for two reasons. On the one hand, Japan's desire to expand its territory, on the other hand, is the actual demand.
But as they headed north, Japan was in trouble. The Soviet Union was not easy to provoke, and long ago the Soviet Union made preparations in the Far East in order to prevent two-front operations, and the Kwantung Army did not take advantage of several battles with the Soviet Army, but suffered a lot of losses.
Japan also did not dare to start an all-out war with the Soviet Union, otherwise it was unknown whether Japan would be able to hold the northeast, and at that time, the Soviet Union and China would inevitably unite, and I was afraid that Japan would encounter greater problems in China.
Then, since it is impossible to go north, there is only one way to go south, and for Japan, there is no third way. It just so happened that at that time, there was a huge advantage for Japan.
In modern times, most of Southeast Asia was a colony of Western powers, and at that time, these Western suzerainties were almost all defeated by Germany, many countries were destroyed, and countries such as Britain were also huddled in their own territories, bombed almost every day.
These countries could not take care of themselves, let alone the colonies.
However, Japan also has a problem, that is, the United States. The United States had not yet entered the war at that time, the Philippines was also a colony of the United States, and the invasion of Southeast Asia was bound to tear its face with the United States, so the threat of the Us Pacific Fleet made it difficult for Japan to sleep.
This is why Japan must sneak into Pearl Harbor in the United States, and the defeat of the Pacific Fleet will relieve a lot of pressure for Japan to invade Southeast Asia. This is also the only advantage of a successful sneak attack.
But the disadvantages are also obvious, especially for the overall war situation, there is no benefit. Just after the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor, Hitler in Germany was furious and scolded Japan very badly.
However, what Hitler did not expect was that Italy was already a second-class commodity, could not help anything, and had to let Germany put out fires everywhere, but the Japanese eight rods could not be hit, and it was also a fool, which offended the United States.
Churchill of England was begging the United States to join World War II and help Britain, but Roosevelt kept dragging on, so that the United States had no reason to delay, otherwise the Roosevelt government would lose the support of the American people.
The accession of the United States is fatal to the Axis powers and also injects new blood into the world's anti-fascism.