Our two films were Windtalkers (2002) and Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970). Each of these two movies were about the Americans and World War II. In Windtalkers, the main character Sergeant Joe Enders is tasked with protecting a Navaho code talker, Ben Yahzee. He is then sent into combat by the Marines to Saipan, a heavily defended Japanese island. On the other hand, Tora! Tora! Tora! focuses on the Japanese and American sides of the events during and leading up to the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. It mostly depicts the behind-the-scene events, including the American breaking of the Purple Code, the ignorance of command at Pearl Harbor, and the intents and motives of the Japanese.
While watching Tora!, we found it interesting that the Japanese were not entirely eager for war. At the beginning, when Admiral Yamamoto takes over the command of the Japanese fleet from Yoshida, they discuss the possibility of entering a war with the United States. However, instead of supporting it, they both say that winning is impossible, and Yamamoto urges Yoshida to fight against the Army and the politicians, who are pushing for war. Yamamoto also says later that the only way to win a war with the US is to not only destroy the navy or conquer Hawaii, but to invade the country and take the White House, which he says cannot be done. Despite the commander of the Japanese fleet objecting to the use of aggression, the government clearly had its own agenda – the war was mainly started by a small group of radicals who held enormous power.
It was also interesting that the Americans weren’t portrayed in a very good light. Captain John Earle at Pearl Harbor, after receiving news that a Japanese submarine was sunk close to the entrance to the harbor, demanded co...
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...hrower tank is ignited by a bullet and he bursts into flames. Enders kills him to put him out of his pain. Another instance was when Whitehorse’s protector, Sergeant Anderson, is decapitated while attempting to save Whitehouse despite his previous orders to kill the code talker in order to save the code.
In all, the two movies, released thirty-two years apart, had huge differences. Tora! Tora! Tora! was based on the facts that were known as of 1970, and tried to follow them as closely as possible. However, Windtalkers was more of a Hollywood film, trying to be exciting while sacrificing historical accuracy. Regardless, they were both interesting to watch, especially when compared to what actually occurred in history.
Works Cited
“Tora! Tora! Tora!” Wikipedia.org. Wikimedia, n.d. Web. 8 Jun 2010.
“Windtalkers.” Wikipedia.org. Wikimedia, n.d. Web. 8 Jun. 2010.
Zimm, Alan D. Attack on Pearl Harbor: Strategy, Combat, Myths, Deceptions / Alan D. Zimm ; Graphics by Matt Baughman. Philadelphia, [Pa.: Casemate, 2011. Print.
The Japanese government believed that the only way to solve its economic and demographic problems was to expand into its neighbor’s territory and take over its import market, mostly pointed at China. To put an end on that the United States put economic sanctions and trade embargoes. We believed that if we cut off their resources and their source of federal income than they would have no choice but to pull back and surrender. But the
The author of this essay is Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He was the president of the United States at the time of the Pearl Harbor attack. The purpose of this speech was to inform the entire United States about what had happened the day before at Pearl Harbor. The nation was to be warned that the United States was going to declare war against Japan. The intended audience is everyone in the United States. President Roosevelt ef...
One reason Japan assaulted U.S.A. Navy was because the "New World Order.” “The ideals of Japan... are represented by the principle that the benevolent rule of the Emperor may be extended so as to embrace the whole world."(Doc. A) The beliefs Japanese grew up with were that the Emperor was sublime and his empire should be followed everywhere nerveless by everyone. They were trained to be dedicated; willing to do anything to please their superior. “An old order... (European and American)... is now crumbling.”(Doc. A) Great Britain,
“Now It’s the Japanese Who Will ‘Remember Pearl Harbor’.” Daily Boston Globe 7 June 1942: D1 ProQuest. Web. 13 March 2014.
While Japan was greedy for more land and industrial materials, no one believed that the Japanese would start war with America by planning an attack on American soil. Another reason that the United States thought that the attack wouldn’t happen so close was because they were confident that Japan would try and take over the the Dutch East Indies, or French
Gailey, Harry. The War in the Pacific: From Pearl Harbor to Tokyo Bay. Novato: Presidio, 1995.
When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, America was at last forced to officially enter World War II. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt officially declared war on the Japanese and in his famous radio address to the American people, he professed that December 7 was a day that would live in infamy. Americans and Japanese alike, still remember Pearl Harbor Day, but how many remember the gallant, fighting Marines who served on a tiny atoll in the Pacific by the name of Wake Island?
Prange, Gordon W., Donald M. Goldstein, and Katherine V. Dillon. At Dawn We Slept: The Untold Story of Pearl Harbor. New York: Penguin Books, 1981. Print.
Blair Jr., Clay, (1975). Silent Victory: The U.S. Submarine War Against Japan. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, p. 78. p. 1072. Buell, Thomas B. -. (1987)
In the first story i read the sound of thunder the technology was more advanced than the others i have read. Also in the second one i read the foghorn the location was in the present and on earth not located in the past. Lastly the story all in a summer day was different because the characters were not dealing with a beast they were each just dealing with time. This proves that each of the stories had many differences.
On December 7,1941 Japan raided the airbases across the islands of Pearl Harbour. The “sneak attack” targeted the United States Navy. It left 2400 army personnel dead and over a thousand Americans wounded. U.S. Navy termed it as “one of the great defining moments in history”1 President Roosevelt called it as “A Day of Infamy”. 2 As this attack shook the nation and the Japanese Americans became the immediate ‘focal point’. At that moment approximately 112,000 Persons of Japanese descent resided in coastal areas of Oregon, Washington and also in California and Arizona.3
Allen, Thomas B. Remember Pearl Harbor: American and Japanese Survivors Tell Their Stories. Washington, D.C.: National Geographic Society, 2001. Print.
They both show that the United States was exceedingly confident and narrow-minded that the Japanese could pull off such a task. Much of the film is focused on Japan before the attack. Prange's book and the directors of Tora! Tora! Tora!
Japan wanted many things, world expansion was one of them and the only way to get that was to destroy America. “Japan declared its policy to establish a ‘New Order in east Asia,’” according to Iriye (1999). A year later the US stopped all trade or aircraft and aircraft parts with Japan, this led to one of the many reasons Japan bombed Pearl Harbor. Before the Japanese could even think about world domination they would have had to take out the American naval fleet to accomplish building the empire sized naval fleet that they wanted.