Pearl Harbor

noun

1. a harbor near Honolulu, on S Oahu, in Hawaii: surprise attack by Japan on the U.S. naval base and other military installations December 7, 1941.
2. any significant or crippling defeat, betrayal, loss, etc., that comes unexpectedly.

Pearl Harbor

noun

1. an almost landlocked inlet of the Pacific on the S coast of the island of Oahu, Hawaii: site of a US naval base attacked by the Japanese in 1941, resulting in the US entry into World War II

Pearl Harbor

1. A major United States naval base in Hawaii that was attacked without warning by the Japanese air force on December 7, 1941, with great loss of American lives and ships. In asking Congress to declare war on Japan the next day, President Franklin D. Roosevelt described the day of the attack as “ a date which will live in infamy .”

Example Sentences

After the Japanese navy launched its attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, a tsunami of racist propaganda washed across the United States.

From Los Angeles Times

The law has been used three times in American history: during the War of 1812 and World War I and after the attack on Pearl Harbor during World War II.

From Los Angeles Times

A month or so until Election Day, I feel this is Pearl Harbor again but only worse.

From Salon

After training 30 miles north of Chicago on Lake Michigan, he was eventually posted in March 1940 to the Oklahoma, based in Pearl Harbor as part of the Pacific Fleet.

From Los Angeles Times

In the period when Lindbergh made those statements, Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto and his staff were assiduously planning an aerial attack on Pearl Harbor.

From Salon