Current beliefs

Pearl Harbor is often linked to the term “conspiracy theory.” At this time, many Americans feel that the United States government allowed Pearl Harbor to be attacked by the Japanese in order to escalate our entrance into World War II. In the early years after the attack in 1941, the American people thought that the Japanese totally surprised the United States and that Pearl Harbor was hit without warning so there was no way to prepare for the assault on us. However, there is tangible proof that has been made public that the US government had been warned of the coming assault long before it occurred and even several times on the morning of the attack
Reports about the Japanese plan came from the American Ambassador to Japan, the German Ambassador to the United States, a British secret agent, Korean intelligence, and a famous spy from the Soviet Union (Willey 2005). Our president also heard from the governments of the Netherlands, Australia, Peru and others. American military intelligence had decoded the Japanese secret code called JN-25, and were reading the Japanese secret messages 24 hours a day, one message spelled out the exact date and time of the assault on Pearl Harbor (Willey 2005). On the morning of the attack, a strange submarine was spotted in the entrance to Pearl Harbor and it was torpedoed and sunk. When Admiral Kimmel, the Commander of the Pacific Navy was told of this, he ignored the message (Lord 1957).
Once all these facts became known to Americans, most now believe that our nation’s leaders chose not to prepare for the Japanese bombing in order to have a reason to enter WWII. Also, 9/11 is often compared to Pearl Harbor since the news came out that the United States was warned about this event as well.
In Japan, they feel that the war “brought them suffering, not that war made them do reprehensible things” (Chira 1991). The Japanese government is allowing textbooks to be “sanitized” on how they portray their actions in WWII (Chira 191). The authors revising the textbooks are ‘justifying Japan’s conduct during the war and stating that their actions were exaggerated ‘ (Chira 1991). The Japanese people were very worried when the 50th anniversary of Pearl Harbor was approaching, they were afraid that the US might re-start the anti-Japanese feelings that were so prevalent after Pearl Harbor.
WWII and Pearl Harbor had a huge affect on the Japanese people. They are very opposed to any sort of war and they will not assist in any military needs that the United Nations requests of them, nor will they help with any peacekeeping efforts needed by their Western allies (Chira 1991).

Sources Used:
Chira, Susan. “The Nation; Pearl Harbor’s Smoke, Hiroshima’s Fallout.” The New York
Times. 8 December 1991.
Willey, Mark. Pearl Harbor Mother of All Conspiracies. Jan. 2005.
http://www.geocities.com/Pentagon/6315/pearl.html.