I just started the article. I know a few things about the lead up to the attack, but I somehow wasn't aware that civilians were worried about an attack on Hawaii. I guess somehow "surprise attack" became complete surprise in my head.

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I somehow wasn't aware that civilians were worried about an attack on Hawaii.

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Way back in the thread about college football during WWII, I posted this image I found in a newspaper while reading about the last games played before we entered the war.

From the November 14, 1941 Corsicana Light:



The timing and means were a surprise, of course, but fear of an attack from the Pacific had been building.

yea I think most had realized the attack was coming, just nobody thought that the Japs could make it to Pearl unseen. I think most had figured Guam and PI was going to be where it all started. Which still baffles me how PI was so unprepared and how they had most of their air fleet wiped out on the ground

They attack took place about 10 hours after the Pearl Harbor raid. Still, no real excuse for the lack of preparation with what forces McA had at his disposal. Probably wouldn't have made much difference given they were too few for the AOR, too piecemeal in makeup and in general too poorly trained and equipped.

The result of the "false economy of peacetime" or as it is called now the "peace dividend".

Brereton gets blamed for having his planes destroyed mostly on the ground, but that was mostly bad luck and unfortunate timing. The Japanese had already been making raids around the PI. He wanted to bomb Formosa, but was ordered not to bomb up his planes and only conduct a recce mission instead. So he launched the recce mission (3 bombers) and all the serviceable fighters and most the remaining bombers (stayed local). By the time the recce bombers had returned to refuel, the fighters where already on the ground refueling and the bombers had landed to finally bomb up for a raid. That's when they got caught by the Japanese. While there was a squadron of fighters up, they were low on fuel, outclassed and out numbered.

The unfortunate part of it was is that Bereton had launched them at the right time to avoid getting caught on the ground....had the Japanese raid taken off on time. They had been delayed by weather.

Obviously, this is a simplified overview.