| jezze_jamez said: The Japanese went wayyyy out of their way to attack Pearl Harbour. It was totally warrented. |
It was a strategic military move that they knew they needed to get naval superiority for a while. It would have worked better if they got the aircraft carriers but they were gone at the time. The death of 1,000 military and some blown up ships is not anything like killing 300,000 civilians and wiping out entire cities.
Imperialism was something the Japanese learned from the Europeans, they became the country they were by emulating them. At the time the French, Britain and Germany had colonies all over the world, and Japan with its lack of natural resources knew it couldn't be powerful without expanding. All around the world even in the US racial superiority was something people believed in or wanted to. It spread all around the world in the first half of the century. None of this was stuff that originated in Japan, they simply copied others which is what they had been doing ever since the US came and forced them to open up for trade.
If the US never opened up Japan or Japan didn't westernize and industrialize then they probably would have ended up as a colony for one of the western powers instead.
That doesn't excuse anything they did but it should give you an idea of how things became the way they did and why they thought they had to do what they did at the time.
currently playing: Skyward Sword, Mario Sunshine, Xenoblade Chronicles X
