After the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, they invaded Luzon, Philippines in January 1942. Despite insufficient supplies, American and Filipino troops were able to fight for three months. Eventually, they surrendered to Japanese troops and were forced into the Bataan Death March—where some of the most horrific war crimes were committed by the Japanese. 

The Office of Naval Intelligence and the Federal Bureau of Investigation conducted surveillance on Japanese Americans beginning in the 1930s. After the Pearl Harbor attack, these two agencies, plus the Army’s G-2 intelligence unit, arrested over 3,000 suspected subversives, half of whom were of Japanese descent.

The National WWII Museum commemorates the Day That Will Live in Infamy through articles, oral histories, artifacts, and more. 

In June 1942, US and Japanese naval forces engaged in a five-day battle in the middle of the Pacific Ocean that changed the course of the war in the Pacific. 

Pictured: Members of the Mexican Expeditionary Air Force on Luzon Island, Philippines, July 1945. The National WWII Museum, Gift of Dylan Utley, 2012.019.234.