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dailyhistory.org]
Interesting that the movie was panned and not well received. Nevertheless, it is one of the most accurate portrayals of the actual attack. However, the movie according to the attached research article lacks credibility in two principal areas: 1) The movie portrays an actual declaration of war by the Japanese that was not delivered on time-Nothing could be further from the truth in that the Japanese wanted the surprise and intentionally provided a vague "ultimatum" memo. A declaration of war would have provided the US with time to man its defenses. The movie was a joint American Japanese production and the Japanese insisted on this detail to show that there was no "illegal" surprise attack. The Japanese needed the surprise element. 2) The role of Hirohito is also not accurately portrayed. He was not some soft premier who left everything up to the military. Indeed he knew of the details of the surprise and was on board with everything.
The actual battle was very well done and explains the beginnings of why we eventually won the Pacific-namely the fact that the aircraft carriers were not at bay but were on maneuvers at the time. This was a devastating blow to the attackers.
