Seventy years ago, on 7 December 1941, the Japanese declared war on the United States by launching devastating air attacks on Pearl Harbor, an American naval base in Hawaii.
All of the eight US battleships stationed at Pearl Harbor were damaged, and more than 3,500 Americans at the base were killed or wounded, including 1,177 crew of the battleship USS Arizona.
The map printed in the Guardian on 8 December shows the vulnerability of the Pacific naval bases.
Japan also declared war on Britain following the attacks. The Guardian's leader on 8 December 1941 warned the two countries to "prepare themselves for a stern war in Pacific waters", but was certain that America "will fight until the aggressor has been finally subdued."
A week after the attack, the Observer dubbed Pearl Harbor "Japan's Blitzkrieg". In an essay on the outlook for the now global war, the paper's editor, JL Garvin, declared that "the trumpets of the apocalypse have been sounded so that no soul remains asleep."
It was to be four long years before the war in the Pacific was won.
