Why did japan bomb pearl harbor (in a 5th graders point of view)?
It is hard for anybody to understand exactly, but for years, starting with China, Japan had been taking over areas in East Asia and the Pacific. They had virtually no natural resources and a huge population in a small group of islands. I have heard something like 90 million, but don’t quote me on that on less land than California. They needed somewhere to go and things like oil, rubber, and other resources. China was their first stop in about 1937 or even earlier, then French Indochina, now called Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos; then the Dutch East Indies, now called Indonesia (This was after France and the Netherlands had been invaded by Germany and could not fight Japan) They knew America would try to stop them sooner or later, especially when they wanted to go after the Philippine Islands, then US territory, like Hawaii was. They knew the only way was to attack the American fleet at Pearl Harbor and destroy it before we could enter the war and to after them. It almost worked. But as man
