Why did Japan attack the US (at Pearl Harbor) to bring them into WW2?
Strategic motives: the purpose of the attack on Pearl Harbor was to neutralize American naval power in the Pacific, if only temporarily, so Japan could have it’s way in southeast Asia. The Japanese move into southern Indo-China, beginning in mid-1941, provoked the major Powers in the area into action, more than the diplomatic protest notes which had been the usual for nearly a decade: the United States, with Britain and the Dutch colonial government, imposed an embargo on strategic materials, in particular oil and steel, to Japan in July. This threat to the Japanese economy (and to the military’s supplies) was intended to force a reconsideration of the move into Indo-China and perhaps even to the negotiating table. Roosevelt’s decision to leave the Fleet in Pearl (closer to Japan than the US West coast, and so an increase in threat) is said to have been part of this response. Roosevelt regarded it as sufficiently important to relieve Admiral Kimmel’s predecessor, Admiral Richardson, wh
