Disasters

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Disasters
Disaster can occur naturally or get instigated by human actions. Either way, its consequences are adverse and fatal. This paper seeks to compare and contrast the Pearl Harbor attack of 1941 and Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings of 1945.
On December 7, 1941, Japan attacked the US naval base at Pearl Harbor and wreaked havoc. Notably, more than 2000 Americans lost their lives and the U.S arsenal was also destroyed (ICAN n.p). The attack got the U.S army unawares. Again, it also prompted the US to fully join the Second World War (Northrup 488).
On 6 August 1945, the US retaliated and detonated an atomic bomb over the Japanese city of Hiroshima. The explosion brought down much of the Hiroshima city and led to the death of about 80,000 people leaving scores of others injured (ICAN n.p). Another bomb of the same nature was dropped again three days later in the city of Nagasaki killing about forty thousand people instantly. These bombings led to the end of World War II on August 15, 1945.
The two attacks are similar in several ways. One, the attacks on both Pearl Harbor and Hiroshima/Nagasaki got both parties as a surprise. Both countries had not put in place measures to thwart the disaster. Besides, in both attacks, hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians bore the brunt and died. Property and other valuables got destroyed for lack of preparedness. Ryan and Schlup argue that postwar reconstruction was not easy for both the US and Japan (p. 16).

It took some time for both nations to recover from the attacks.
The difference between the two attacks is that whereas the Hiroshima/Nagasaki bombings were provoked, the Pearl Harbor attack was unprovoked and got the US unaware. Japan expected the US to retaliate and was capable of thwarting the impending disaster. Moreover, the Pearl Harbor attack was worse than the Japan bombings and its effects are still felt today.
Works Cited
ICAN. “Hiroshima and Nagasaki Bombings”.n.d. Retrieved from http://www.icanw.org/the-facts/catastrophic-harm/hiroshima-and-nagasaki-bombings/. Accessed 8 Oct 2018.
Northrup, C. Cynthia C. The American Economy: A Historical Encyclopedia. Santa Barbara, Calif: ABC-CLIO, 2011. Internet resource.
Ryan, James & Leonard, Schlup. Historical Dictionary of the 1940s. Routledge, 2015.