I was not alive when Pearl Harbor happened.  Heck, my mom was only 4 years old at the time.   Much like anyone born years after 1941, I knew the details about the attack on Pearl Harbor, but I could hardly fathom the feelings of the profound significance of that terrible day on December 7th.

That all changed for me in 1980, and even more so in 2001. 

Pearl Harbor
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I was 16 and sitting in my  history class in Lockhart, Texas.   I heard the sound of tapping on the in-class intercom speaker, which was nothing to get alarmed about...probably the front office calling for a student to come visit the principal, or maybe a parent was here to pick up their kid.

Instead, we heard a very somber voice that we recognized as our principal.  He came on the intercom and told us the details of a Japanese attack that had just taken place in Hawaii...casualties were high, damage was enormous; 39 years after Pearl Harbor, the Japanese were brazen enough to hit us again.

There was stunned silence in the classroom, my heart sank...soon tears starting flowing from many,  and then our Junior Class President stood up and in uncontained anger said 'Them damn Japs done did it to us again!!'

That was the end of the experiment and lesson.  Our history teacher came clean and told us she had arranged for the principal to make that announcement only to our class in order to give us an idea of what the feelings must've been like in 1941.

It was a good lesson, albeit giving rise to terrible feelings of anger, betrayal, and loss of innocence.  Thank goodness we live in a world where something like that won't happen again...or so I thought.

Here we are, 10 years later and it still hurts...it still makes me cry tears of anger, sorrow, and frustration.  What's really scary is that there are tens of thousands of zealots who would gladly fly more planes into our buildings.  No amount of US or NATO led wars will ever change that.

Which begs the question...how do you eliminate an enemy that is nothing more than an arm of Satan?

I don't know if this is the answer, but I do know that in every battle that takes place in the Bible, the side that did God's will always turned out victorious.   I think it's time that the people of America and our leaders do some serious introspection....we need to re-find our Righteous might again that Franklin Roosevelt spoke of after Pearl Harbor.

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