All language subtitles for Attack.On.Pearl.Harbor.Minute.By.Minute.S01E02.WEBRip.x264-ION10

[narrator] Previously…

The Japanese launched
their secret plan to attack Pearl Harbor

and caught the American forces
by surprise.

[Jonathan] The Japanese have transited
across the northern Pacific

in the largest unified
carrier task force in history.

[Taylor] Not only were they planning
to attack the naval harbor

and to destroy the US Pacific fleet,

they were also going to attack
all the airfields on Oahu Island as well.

[plane engines whirring]

It was very ambitious,
but also very daring.

[Cass] I couldn't get it in my head
that they were attacking us,

and I don't know anybody else
that could in our area either.

[narrator] Pearl Harbor,
the surprise Japanese attack

that killed nearly 2,400 people
and led to America entering World War II.

[bombs whistling]

[Taylor] It’s one of those
crucial days in history,

like the attack on the Twin Towers
on September 11th.

You know the world won't be the same after
as it had been before.

[narrator] In this episode,
the attack on the harbor begins.

[Louis] Fire was burning
all around the deck

and the skin would come off in your hands.

[fire crackling]

[Cass] He tried to stand up

and when we walked over to him,
he was dead.

[dramatic music playing]

[in Japanese] Our chances
of returning from Pearl Harbor

were almost zero in our view.

[narrator, in English] In just 30 minutes,
183 Japanese bombers and fighters

will wipe out almost
all the Pacific’s Fleet's battleships.

About a million pounds of propellant
goes up… [clicks fingers] …in a flash.

Arizona is completely destroyed.

We lost 1,177 men in ten minutes.

[plane engines whirring]

[Louis] It was awful.

But we're just lucky that we were alive.

[dramatic music playing]

[typewriter clacking]

[Francis] The temperature's about 80.

There was a little light breeze
blowing down off the mountain there

and the… The air was still,

and you could--
You could smell the flowers in the air.

It was just a wonderful day.

They had dances on Saturday night,
parties on Saturday night,

and a lot of the military
are just sleeping in.

[indistinct chatter]

[Jonathan] They're beginning
to go to mess call.

There are some religious services ongoing.

It's just a normal,
calm Sunday morning routine

that is about to be shattered.

[clock ticking]

[narrator] One minute
before the attack on Pearl Harbor begins,

Frank Emond and the band
on the USS Pennsylvania

are preparing to play.

[Francis] The navy plays
"The Star-Spangled Banner"

at 8:00 every morning.

We were lined up to raise the flag.

[narrator] Closing in on Pearl Harbor

is an assault group
of 183 Japanese bombers and fighters

-from six aircraft carriers.
-[plane engines whirring]

The next half an hour
will see the crippling

of America's mighty Pacific Fleet with
the tragic loss of thousands of lives,

many aboard its eight battleships.

[clock ticking]

[Francis] At five minutes to eight,
they sound the bugle call

to let everybody know
that it's almost time for colors,

and at that time I'd heard a noise,
I looked up in the air

and there was a line of planes
coming in from the right-hand side.

The first one peeled off.

[plane engines whirring]

[narrator] Nine dive bombers
target the seaplane base on Ford Island.

[Timothy] The first wave involves
striking the search planes on the ground.

By knocking out those aircraft
in the first few minutes,

then it will be impossible
for the Americans to retaliate and damage

any of the Japanese carriers
that are at sea.

[Francis] Something come off the airplane.

I thought the tail assembly
had broken off or something,

so I watched it all the way to the ground,
hit the hanger on the air station there.

It exploded in flame and smoke
and a lot of noise, startled everybody.

[dramatic music playing]

The initial response
to the attack is disbelief.

Lieutenant Commander Ramsey
is on Ford Island,

and he thinks that it's just some
American pilot hot dogging it.

He wants to get the serial number
off of the plane

and report him to his commanding officer.

[narrator] It takes just a minute
for the dive bombers

to complete their bombing mission.

[fire crackling]

As they circle round
to fire at the sea plane base,

torpedo bombers swoop down.

[Masamitsu speaking Japanese]
When we reached the coast,

I felt I had to get ready.

The release wire has a safety mechanism.

I disengaged it and got ready
to drop the torpedo at any time.

[Francis, in English] The sky seemed to be
full of airplanes.

Small prop airplanes and,
uh, you could see big red spots

on the fuselage and wings.

[suspenseful music playing]

So, immediately you knew
that they were not our airplanes.

The Japanese were there.

[alarm blaring]

[Jonathan] Now the full enormity
of what is about to happen

begins descending on those American crews.

[clock ticking]

[plane engines whirring]

[typewriter clacking]

[narrator] It's been just over a minute

since Japanese dive bombers
began their surprise raid on Pearl Harbor.

With the seaplane base
on Ford Island now ablaze,

40 Japanese torpedo bombers
take center stage.

[dramatic music playing]

One group is gonna go after Battleship Row
and the outward battleships there.

The other group coming in
against the other side of Ford Island

is still hoping to find
perhaps an American carrier.

[narrator] Twenty-three-year-old
Masamitsu Yoshioka is a navigator

in one of the planes in the leading group.

[Masamitsu speaking Japanese]
The east side of the island

was where the battleships were moored.

Our orders were to attack
the aircraft carriers on the west side.

[narrator, in English]
The US Pacific Fleet

has three carriers based at Pearl Harbor.

But today, their moorings are empty.

[in Japanese] I was disappointed,
but it couldn't be helped.

There was a battleship
so we decided to go for that one.

[Jonathan, in English]
From the Japanese perspective,

battleships are still
the coin of the realm.

If they can sink
four or five American battleships,

that will constitute success
for the operation.

[dramatic music playing]

[Timothy] All eight battleships
happened to be in port at the same time,

which was a rarity, had not been achieved
since, uh, the summer of 1941.

[narrator] Seven of them
are lined up in Battleship Row

on the East of Ford Island.

The eighth,
the flagship of the Pacific Fleet,

USS Pennsylvania,
is in dry dock undergoing repairs.

[dramatic music playing]

Months of intensive training
had gone into preventing their torpedoes

from nose-diving
into the shallow harbor floor.

Airspeed was cut back to about 150 knots

and the altitude of the aircraft
at 30 feet.

Optimally, what should happen
is the torpedo planes attack first,

because they are going
to have to attack low and slow,

they're going to be very vulnerable
to anti-aircraft fire.

[narrator] But already,
the Japanese plan is unravelling.

Miscommunication between aircrews
has seen the dive bombers jump the gun.

So, consequently, the first wave
goes in helter-skelter immediately

and you have simultaneous attacks
happening at once.

[narrator] As the first group
of torpedo bombers prepares to attack,

they are hit by pillars of black smoke

drifting upwards
from the earlier dive bomber hits.

[in Japanese] There was a lot of smoke,

so I couldn’t see the west side clearly.

[narrator, in English]
Adding to their problems

is the blinding sunrise.

With the sun in their eyes,

the crews had a very difficult time
seeing anything.

[in Japanese]
Looking at the shape of the mast,

it was a Colorado-class battleship.

We decided to aim for that,

and I think the lead aircraft
also thought the same.

[dramatic music playing]

[narrator, in English] The torpedo
unit's leader arrows in,

but as he nears his target,
he suddenly pulls out.

His wingman follows him.

The planes immediately
behind them thought that,

"Well, they must have launched
against the battleship,

so we're going to do that as well."

[narrator] Masamitsu Yoshioka
releases his torpedo,

but as he flies over the ship,
he is panicked.

[in Japanese]
I thought the battleship was smaller

than our Japanese warships.

[narrator, in English] The USS Utah
is the first victim of the torpedo attack.

This is an old ship
that's been largely demilitarized.

[suspenseful music playing]

[narrator] The moment is caught on camera.

And she is hit right, uh,
in the center of the ship.

[narrator] Within seconds,
another torpedo slams into Utah’s hull…

[explosion]

…but it's a target the Japanese crews
had been briefed to avoid.

[Masamitsu speaking Japanese]
I really think we messed up with the Utah.

The other guys had done okay.

[chuckles] So, even at my age,
the Utah still bothers me.

It's not one I can be proud of.

-[dramatic music playing]
-[plane engines whirring]

[narrator, in English] Four more torpedoes
are wasted on the Utah.

One torpedo is so off target
that it hits the cruiser,

USS Raleigh, moored behind.

[Michael] The pilots should have
exhausted all possibilities

before attacking these lesser ships.

And they really were taken to task

once they returned
to the carrier by their superiors

for making poor target selection.

[narrator] Just seconds
after he bypassed the Utah,

the unit's leader, Lt. Nagai, is convinced
he's got a battleship in his sights.

[Timothy] As he approaches 10-10 dock,

he thinks he sees the USS Pennsylvania
moored there and unleashes his torpedo.

In reality, what he is seeing
is the Helena and the Oglala

lashed side by side.

He thinks that it is a battleship
because the morning sun is--

has silhouetted
both of those ships together,

so it looks like
an extra-long type of ship.

[narrator] The torpedo goes underneath
an old minelayer, USS Oglala,

berthed next to the cruiser, USS Helena.

The explosion tears a hole
in the Helena's port side.

[alarm blaring]

The shockwave of that explosion
also damages the Oglala

and eventually it tumbles over
and capsizes on its side.

[suspenseful music playing]

The sailors who were at 10-10 dock

would joke in the days afterwards
that the Oglala died of fright.

[narrator] Watching on
from the deck of USS Pennsylvania,

Frank Emond is counting his blessings.

And that was the dock
that our ship usually were at.

We-- We had moved it to dry dock
two or three days before that.

[plane engine whirring]

[narrator] A Japanese photographer
captures the destructive moment.

[Michael] It shows the smoke
coming up out of Ford Island

and the simultaneous hits
on the Helena and the Utah.

[narrator] Four more bombers
waste their torpedoes

on the cruiser USS Helena.

They really could not see

what in the name of heaven
they were aiming at.

[Jonathan] That speaks
to the incredible pressure

that these pilots are under.

That they probably think too that,

"If I don’t attack now,
I may not get a second chance."

[narrator] Two minutes into the raid,

not a single torpedo has been released
against a battleship.

Across Ford Island,
ships' crews in Battleship Row

are wising up to the imminent threat.

[Dick] I was down in the office
wrapping presents

to be sent home for Christmas
when the speaker system hollered…

[alarm blaring]

"…Air attack, air attack.
All hands seek cover."

And almost immediately
they added another announcement,

"General Quarters,
man your battle stations."

The people who were there
used a great deal of profanity

and, uh, vulgar terms to describe…
[chuckles] …what was going on.

And it left no doubt
in anyone's mind who heard that

just what was unfolding outside.

When General Quarters goes off,
wherever you are on a ship,

the crew is trained,
it's just ingrained in them,

it's automatic,
to proceed to your battle station.

Everybody was in their battle stations
in three minutes

and doors are closed,
the hatches are closed,

our first guns were fired
within 30 seconds.

[cannons fire]

I was on the quarterdeck,
the vessel alongside of us,

they had to cut the lines off
the vessel first,

so we didn't last long enough
to even get the engine started up.

-[dramatic music playing]
-[plane engines whirring]

[narrator] Twenty-four torpedo bombers
descend into the Southeast Loch

in preparation for their attack
on Battleship Row.

[Michael] This body of water
was almost like a bowling alley

heading down toward the battleships.

The pilots could see that these two ships,

the West Virginia and Oklahoma,
were the golden targets.

These were skilled aerial technicians
that were going to deliver

an 18-foot torpedo that could blow a hole

in the side of the battleship
that a truck could drive through.

-[plane engines whirring]
-[Michael] They were coming in in pairs.

One plane on one side of the pair
was to take one battleship.

And then the plane on the opposite side
was to take the ship next to it.

[gunfire]

[narrator] But as the lead pair
get ready to drop their torpedoes,

planes from the earlier attacks
cross their path.

There were multiple aircraft crossing
against, uh, the grain, as it were.

Things got very confused

and then those aircraft
had to abort and circle around again.

[narrator] Its valuable time wasted,

the Japanese are rapidly losing
the advantage of surprise.

[Jonathan] The locks were broken,

uh, so that ammunition could be
brought to the guns.

The volume and intensity
of the American anti-aircraft fire

swells very, very quickly.

[gunfire]

[Michael] The Japanese were
absolutely astonished, if not dismayed,

at how quickly the Americans
came online with anti-aircraft fire.

They were not expecting it.

[narrator] The bombers
drop their torpedoes

scoring direct hits on the
USS West Virginia and the USS Oklahoma.

Incredibly, the first two torpedo
hits on a battleship at Pearl Harbor

are caught by a Japanese camera.

-[explosion]
-[suspenseful music playing]

[Daniel] These dramatic pictures
are being taken by the aircraft in the air

and you see the water geysers,
which my grandfather witnessed,

that were going
90 to 100 feet or more into the air.

Very, very quickly,
the first six aircraft came in,

bam, bam, bam,
within seconds of each other,

and all these torpedoes
were running at the same time.

[Daniel] You can see streaks of torpedoes
now striking the West Virginia,

and then you can also see torpedo streaks
and some disturbance in the water

of, uh, torpedoes coming
towards the Oklahoma.

[narrator] Both battleships
are unprepared for war

with their watertight doors
left unsecured.

As America was at peace,
these doors were open.

Their underwater integrity
was severely compromised,

because, of course, in the levels
of the decks below the waterline,

the water would just surge
through the ship.

I felt the ship take on a bit of a list.

And I thought,
"My God, they're flooding the blisters."

One of the ways in which you can
prevent a ship from capsizing

is to flood other sections of the ship
to balance it out.

But on the Oklahoma,
the first torpedo hits knock out

a lot of lights below decks,
such that the repair crews

cannot get to the stations
they need to be to counter flood.

[Daniel] There's a case made
that one torpedo followed

right through the hole
of the torpedo before it.

She is in a very bad way.

The flooding is so bad on the port side
of the vessel that it starts to keel over.

[indistinct clamor]

[Dick] When the ship listed
about 15 degrees,

you couldn't walk the deck.

We hand-walked the overhead pipes

walking on top
of the bolted down machinery.

[narrator] Commander of the Pacific Fleet,
Admiral Kimmel,

is at home when he receives a message.

"Air Raid Pearl Harbor, this is no drill."

[Taylor] He's due to play golf
with the army commander, General Short.

He cancels the golf,
he gets into his uniform

and prepares to leave
for his headquarters.

[Michael] Admiral Kimmel
could very clearly see the harbor

and see the battleships
lined up against Ford Island.

And so, he was watching
the torpedo explosions

one after another
on the ships under his command.

And it must have been an absolutely
devastating experience for him.

[narrator] Despite receiving a warning
that an attack was imminent,

Kimmel had not put the base
on a war footing.

[Steve] This was a man who had
never failed in his professional career.

And so, here he was witnessing
catastrophic failure on his part

and the wife of the neighbor

recalled that Kimmel looked
as white as the uniform he was wearing.

[narrator] But things are about
to get even worse.

-[intense music playing]
-[clock ticking]

[plane engines whirring]

[gunfire]

[Laura] The crews who are working
in the California's guns

start firing back at the Japanese planes
pretty much immediately,

but they very quickly
expend their ammunition,

and the rest of their ammunition
is locked in the magazines

and they are not able
to access it right away.

[narrator] The ship is defenseless
as a torpedo bomber drops its payload

with devastating effect.

USS California is the battleship
least able to survive the attack.

[Michael] She had a number
of the manhole covers

that led down into her double bottom
loosened to-- for inspection.

When the water came
into the lower portions of the ship,

it just surged all back and forth.

It starts to flood very, very quickly.

So, the crew has to focus
on countermeasures,

has to focus on getting
these watertight doors closed

just to keep the ship afloat,

because they are not prepared
for this at all.

[gunfire]

[narrator] Through the driving rain
of machine gun fire,

four more bombers torpedoed the
USS Oklahoma and the USS West Virginia.

[Jonathan] The two center line ships,
West Virginia and Oklahoma,

are just absolutely gutted.

And the result is that their port sides
are just ripped open like a tin can.

[clock ticking]

[plane engine whirring]

[narrator] A stray bomber
from the earlier attacks swoops in

to get another hit on the California.

[Daniel] You can see
the battleship California,

uh, in this picture
struggling from her attacks.

[plane engine whirring]

[narrator] The torpedo bombers
continue their assault,

but now in extended intervals.

With anti-aircraft fire
growing in intensity,

aircrews take the easiest option.

With the West Virginia and the Oklahoma
again taking the brunt.

[Jonathan] It's overkill against them.

The amount of damage that they took
would have sunk them twice over.

[narrator] A photo taken by
a Japanese raider

perfectly captures the scene.

[Daniel] You can see
that the torpedo attack

has been devastating
and you can look at the black groupings,

that's oil just pouring out
of the sides of the ships.

[narrator] But nothing can prepare
the crews for what happens next.

[plane engine whirring]

As the Japanese attack
on Pearl Harbor rages,

Commander of the Pacific Fleet,
Husband Kimmell,

watches in shock
from his neighbor’s lawn.

-[explosions]
-[gunfire]

[narrator] Hundreds of his crewmen
are now fighting for their lives.

The coup de grâce of the first wave

is the high-level bomber attack
led by Commander Fuchida himself.

-[intense music playing]
-[plane engines whirring]

The high-level bombing units
circled around the western side of Oahu

and lined up for an attack run
on the battleships.

[narrator] The level bombers' ultimate aim
is to destroy the battleships

that have survived
the torpedo raids unscathed,

the inboard giants at Battleship Row,

USS Maryland, USS Tennessee,
and USS Arizona.

[Timothy] They will approach
Battleship Row from the south

and their mission is to go in
and strike the battleships one at a time

with the first five plane divisions
that is supposed to strike the Nevada,

the next one, the Arizona,
and on down the line.

[narrator] For the mission,

the Japanese have designed
a unique weapon.

They take a heavy,
armor-piercing battleship shell,

and turn it into an aerial bomb.

So it's got to be dropped
from a very great height,

at least 10,000 feet,
so that gravity can accelerate that bomb

to the point that when it hits the deck,
it's got sufficient kinetic energy

to get through the deck armor
about four inches,

and into the innards of the ship
before it detonates.

[narrator] The 800-kilogram bomb
is so heavy,

the bombers can only carry one each.

Again, there's no second chance on this,
I’ve got to drop at exactly the right time

and if I don’t get a hit result
on this first attack,

it's over
and I've wasted my entire effort.

[narrator] To maximize their chances
of hitting their targets,

the planes divide
into ten V formations each of five planes.

As they approach Pearl Harbor,
a photographer aboard one of the bombers

captures the devastation below.

[Jonathan] You can see that Oklahoma
is already in the process of rolling over

while some of these planes are coming in.

[dramatic music playing]

[narrator] It soon becomes clear
to Mitsuo Fuchida, the attack leader,

that hitting a battleship
from two miles up is no mean feat.

Fuchida said that the anti-aircraft fire
at that point in time was pretty severe.

♪ Ring-a-ring-a-rosies… ♪

[Timothy] In fact, his wing man is hit
and the battle damage causes

the armor-piercing bomb
to fall away from the undercarriage.

Then right at the last minute,
they fly through a cloud,

and they are unable to see their target,
the USS Nevada.

They have to go around two
or even three times

before the elements collaborate enough
that they can get a fix on their target.

[clock ticking]

[plane engine whirring]

[narrator] USS West Virginia,
already struck by six torpedoes,

is listing badly
when more bombers arrive overhead.

The specially adapted bombs
hit West Virginia

and USS Tennessee moored alongside.

The fuses on those weapons mean
that the bombs don't detonate cleanly.

Had the fusing
on these 800-kilogram bombs

been more effective and more reliable,

they quite possibly could have blown up
the Tennessee and the West Virginia,

both of which suffered direct hits
on their rear turrets.

[narrator] One casualty
is West Virginia’s Captain Mervin Bennion,

hit by flying shrapnel
from the Tennessee blast.

[explosion]

[Daniel] They needed
to get the captain off the bridge,

because the fires were starting to envelop
the lower portion of the ship.

[narrator] Enter a Pearl Harbor hero,
mess attendant, Doris Miller.

[Regina] As Dorie Miller is proceeding
to his assigned battle station,

an officer flags him down
and asks him to help him move…

[alarm blaring]

…the commanding officer
of West Virginia to a safer location.

The status of African Americans
in the United States Navy in 1941

was to segregate the races,
whites from Blacks.

And the Navy did that
by limiting the ratings

for which African Americans could qualify.

[narrator] Despite no training,
mess attendant Miller

immediately joins in the ship's defense.

[Regina] He sees an unmanned
anti-aircraft gun

and according to his own account,
Miller says, "I just shot it."

"I-- I wasn't sure what to do."

[Laura] Dorie Miller
was the first African American

to receive the Navy Cross.

The Navy Cross
is the US Navy's highest military honor.

But all Dorie Miller wanted to do
was be in the fight.

Fighting the enemy
was not laying out another man's clothes,

cooking and serving his meals.

[clock ticking]

[narrator] From the deck
of a nearby hospital ship,

navy doctor, Eric Haakenson,
starts filming the horror in the harbor.

He panned up from
the stern of the hospital ship, Solace,

on about the third higher deck
and aimed his camera

at a V pattern of Japanese bombers.

He caught two groups flying at altitude.

[narrator] All five bombers
in the first formation

-drop their payloads simultaneously.
-[bombs whistling]

[explosion]

[narrator] A Japanese photo
shows the moment of impact

on Arizona's stern.

[Daniel] One of the shells
is bounced off the faceplate

of gun turret number three
and exploded into the water aside of it.

[John] A bomb dropped
between us and the Vestal

and it blew me inside the hatch,
knocked me silly.

And I, uh… [clears throat]
…of course, that set off a wildfire.

[Michael] The, uh, repair ship Vestal
sustained two hits

and almost sank right then and there,

not from the explosions,
but from the flooding,

because the bombs
went clear through the ship.

[narrator] On the USS Arizona,
Bosun’s Mate John Anderson

goes to help his twin brother Delbert

on one of the ship's
anti-aircraft batteries.

Unaware that a second group of bombers
has the Arizona in their sights.

[John] I started up that ladder
to the boat deck

where all the anti-aircraft guns were.

When I got to the top of the ladder
and the enormous explosion occurred

and people were just blown
all over the place.

There's all kinds of body parts,
different, uh…

There was nothing I could do--
To do, if anything,

and a tremendous fire broke out.

[explosion]

That bomb lands
just slightly behind turret number two,

it goes through the deck armor
and into the powder rooms

for Arizona’s main guns
and detonates there.

The result is that about a million pounds
of propellant go up instantaneously.

[explosion]

The forward end of the ship
and her mast go up

by as much as 40 feet
before settling back down again.

So, she's literally been
blown out of the water.

[narrator] The bow of
the 32,500-ton ship is split

from the rest
of the Arizona's superstructure.

[Michael] The explosion
of the Arizona's forward magazines

incinerated instantly almost everything
that was in the forward half of the ship.

[Jonathan] Half or more of Arizona's crew
is killed outright by that conflagration

and many others are, uh,
very badly injured by flash burns.

[Louis] You're on fire
from the mainmast forward.

The flames were floating up
hundreds of feet in the air,

and, uh, it was awful.

But we're just lucky that we were alive.

The ones coming out of fire there,
we got 12, 14 of them in there,

they were still alive.
A lot of them didn't live long.

[John] I grabbed a guy,
but the hand was on fire,

and I held on to him.
And he was from Greenfield, Ohio.

I've never forgot that.

And I saved him. I got him out of there.

[narrator] Watching the horror unfold

is the Commander of the Pacific Fleet,
Admiral Kimmell.

[Jonathan] And in his words,

he could see the Arizona sink down,
way down.

And it's then
that the real weight of this attack

falls fully on him
and he begins to understand

just what a catastrophe,
uh, he is witnessing.

[narrator] A Japanese photograph
documents the devastation in the harbor.

[Daniel] Oil was coming from the Nevada,

the West Virginia,
the Oklahoma, the California.

Along Battleship Row,
the Arizona's explosion ignited that oil.

And now you had oil fires
enveloping all of those ships.

Even the inboard ships
now have oil around them and on fire.

[narrator] USS Arizona's
senior surviving officer,

Lt. Commander Sam Fuqua,
takes charge of the operation

to fight the blaze
and evacuate the wounded.

[Daniel] He was seeing men
falling dead on the deck

and others just walking, uh, all afire.

It was something so horrifying
he could hardly recall it without weeping.

[Louis] In Honolulu,
their uniform were shorts and T-shirts,

so their arms were burned,
their face was burned,

their legs were burned.

And you'd pick them up,
the skin would come off in your hands.

They were burned pretty bad. Lot of them.

[clock ticking]

[Timothy] So, it is a confusing,

eerie and nightmarish situation
on the Oklahoma

as nothing can stop this ship
from going over.

It's as if a monster took its claws

and tore out
the outside skin of the Oklahoma

and allowed the water to flood through.

[Timothy] If they are on
the quarter deck, they are lucky.

The roll of the ship is so slow
that a great many of them

can simply walk over the railing
on the starboard side

and then walk onto the keel of the ship.

Unfortunately, those are the minority
of the sailors on the Oklahoma.

The majority have taken shelter
below decks,

which is where they are required to be
during an aerial attack.

[narrator] More than 400 men
are trapped in the bowels of the ship.

[Daniel] Now that the ship
had totally capsized,

what has been the deck
is now the ceiling…

and you're in this compartment,
that is your coffin.

[narrator] Desperate measures are required

aboard West Virginia
to prevent a similar fate.

[Timothy] There is a lieutenant
commander who is taking charge

and he orders all of the watertight
hatches sealed.

And at one point, uh,
one of his junior officers hears men

on the other side of
the water-tight door pounding away,

asking to be let in,
'cause if they open those doors again,

the whole damage control center floods

and the effort to save
the West Virginia will perish.

The lieutenant commander says,
"No, the door stays shut."

[dramatic music playing]

[Michael] There were heroic efforts
to try to move through gasoline fires.

It was just a scene from hell.

[narrator] Twenty minutes
into Japan's raid

on the US Naval bastion of Pearl Harbor,

their ambition to cripple
the Pacific Fleet

by destroying its battleships
is well on the way.

[Michael] Uh, there were
immense columns of smoke

coming up from multiple ships,

uh, primarily the West Virginia
and the Arizona,

which cast a pall over everything.

[narrator] The USS Arizona
is blown in half,

the USS West Virginia is sinking fast,
and the USS Oklahoma nearby has capsized.

[Jonathan] She's turned turtle,

the Americans are facing up
to having to figure out

how to chop holes in her bottom
to actually get some of the crewmen out

that they suspect may be trapped inside.

[clock ticking]

[narrator] The California is still afloat,
but slowly sinking.

Another quintet of level bombers
looms over her,

but the salvo is off target.

The harmless explosions
signal the end of the bombing raid.

[intense music playing]

The Americans are trying to figure out
how to rescue as many men as they can.

There's a lot of sailors
coming out in small boats

trying to pick up the survivors
and take them back to land,

take them back to medical stations.

[narrator] Enveloped by flames,
Arizona is in the direst need.

Officer in charge, Sam Fuqua,
knows the crew is fighting

a losing battle with the raging inferno.

[Daniel] He immediately took action,

boats from the USS Solace,
the hospital ship, were coming alongside.

Fuqua was yelling at me
to get in one of those boats.

"We want to save
as many men as we can, get in there."

We-- I said, "I cannot leave.
My brother is there in someplace."

"I got to find him, I got to find him."

And he says, "He can't made it.
He couldn't have made it."

[narrator] The Andersons are
one of 38 sets of brothers aboard Arizona.

Only one set survived.

"Just get in there."
He said, "This place is going to blow."

[narrator] The blaze threatens
to ignite another ammunition store.

[John] I said, "Well, I'm not going."

He says, "Yes, you are."
And he shoved me in.

With a wounded man in my hand.

So, I got in the boat
whether I wanted to or not.

[clock ticking]

[Daniel] The USS Monaghan crew
was just passing Pearl City Peninsula

when they were notified
that there was a submarine in that area.

[suspenseful music playing]

[narrator]
But this is no ordinary submarine.

It's part of a fleet of midget subs
never before used in combat.

The Americans didn't have
mini submarines in their naval arsenal,

they weren't expecting
this sort of attack.

At first, the skipper
of the Monahan is incredulous.

He thinks there can't possibly be
an enemy submarine in the harbor,

but just as he is saying these words,

one of his crewmen
who is on the bridge says,

"Well, I understand that, Skipper,
but what the hell is that?"

And he points and you can see
the conning tower

of a Japanese miniature submarine
dead ahead.

[intense music playing]

[alarm blaring]

[Daniel] The submarine itself
fired a torpedo at the Monaghan,

which brushed along the side of the ship.

The engineers rang up full power
and, uh, fired at the, uh, submarine.

[Timothy] The first shot
goes right through the conning tower,

and as the crew explained,

decapitated the pilot
of the Japanese submarine,

and then the Monaghan
proceeded straight ahead,

rammed the enemy submarine,
and for good measure,

rolled depth charges
off the back of the ship.

Well, against, you know,
such a tiny target as that,

the result is complete destruction.

[narrator] It's a small price to pay
for the Japanese successes.

The first wave attack on Pearl Harbor
has hit most of the prize targets.

[narrator] But the fleet's flagship,

the USS Pennsylvania,
in dry dock, remains unscathed,

the USS Maryland and USS Tennessee
have so far escaped serious damage.

Had the plan been better executed,
things could have been much worse.

[Jonathan] If things had gone
absolutely according to plan,

it's not unreasonable to think
that the Japanese might have sunk

every single battleship in Battleship Row.

[plane engine whirring]

[narrator] Twenty-four
out of the available 40 torpedoes

are launched against the Oklahoma,
the West Virginia and the California.

There was definitely target fixation
on the Oklahoma and the West Virginia,

and it prevented further damage
to the battleships Nevada and California,

which by all rights could have been sunk.

[Jonathan] Of the 50
heavy-armor-piercing bombs

that the Japanese dropped,
they got only ten hits.

That's a 20% hit rate,

that's lower than they wanted to see
as a result of their work-up exercises.

And of those ten hits,
a number of them were duds.

[Timothy] The Japanese
lose only nine planes

shot down in the first wave.

It's a very minimal amount,

considering all the risks
that went into this mission.

[clock ticking]

[soft patriotic music playing]

[narrator] A lull settles over the harbor.

The gates of hell had been opened up,
uh, by the end of the first attack wave.

The scene and the anchorage
is absolutely cataclysmic.

[narrator] Instead of relief,
there is chaos and fear.

The, uh, men in the harbor were
just firing at anything and everything.

They would hear a strange noise
and they'd start firing the machine guns.

American, uh, planes,
if they got near the harbor,

were thought to be Japanese planes.

[Francis] We didn't know
whether the Japanese had troop ships

and they were gonna land
troops on the island or not.

[intense music playing]

[narrator] Next time,

with the US Pacific Fleet on its knees,
a second wave of Japanese planes arrives.

Their mission, to finish off the fleet.

[Louis] All the fighters
and bombers in the air.

The Nevada got attacked by everybody.

[dramatic music playing]

[Michael] By this time,
the Americans were fully alerted,

and they were blind fighting mad.

[Cass] He got a machine gun

and was shooting back
at the Japanese planes.

It showed a lot of courage to me.

-[gunfire]
-[explosions]

[dramatic music playing]