Trump draws parallel between Pearl Harbor and US strikes on Iran in meeting with Japanese PM

Summary

• Trump likened US strikes on Iran to Japan's Pearl Harbor attack at a meeting with Japanese PM Takaichi in Washington.
• Trump questioned Japan's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor that killed 2,390 Americans and drew the US into World War II.
• Takaichi reacted with surprise as Trump evoked the "date which will live in infamy," referencing Roosevelt's poignant description.

WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump on March 19 drew a parallel between US strikes on Iran and Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor decades ago, as he defended the war against Tehran at a meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi in Washington.

“We wanted surprise. Who knows better about surprise than Japan? Why didn’t you tell me about Pearl Harbor?” Mr Trump said, when a journalist asked why he had not told allies about his war plans.

“You believe in surprise, I think much more so than us.”

Ms Takaichi’s eyes widened and she shifted in her chair as Mr Trump, seated beside her in the Oval Office, evoked the moment that drew the US into World War II.

The Japanese attack on the US naval base in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on Dec 7, 1941, killed 2,390 Americans, and the US declared war on Japan the next day.

US President Franklin D. Roosevelt called it “a date which will live in infamy.”

The US defeated Japan in August 1945, days after US atomic bomb attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki killed hundreds of thousands of civilians. REUTERS