Today, Sunday, December 7th, 2025, marks the 84th anniversary of the attack on the United States by the Empire of Japan at Pearl Harbor. It is, as President Franklin Roosevelt so memorably thundered, a day that will live in infamy. It should be remembered as such, even though modern Japan is probably the best ally the United States has in the North Pacific.
Remembering that day, though, well, that’s the rub. There are now only 12 veterans of that day still alive as of this writing, all over 100 years old. None of them was able to make the trip to Pearl Harbor to mark the occasion this year.
Survivors of the 1941 Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor have long been the center of a remembrance ceremony held each year on the military base’s waterfront.
But today only 12 are still alive — all centenarians — and this year none is able to make the pilgrimage to Hawaii to mark the event, scheduled for Sunday.
That means no one attending will have firsthand memories of serving during the attack, which killed more than 2,300 troops and catapulted the U.S. into World War 2. The development is not a surprise and is an evolution of an ongoing trend. As survivors fade, their descendants and the public are increasingly turning to other ways of learning about the bombing.
My great-uncle was there, at Fort Shafter, an Army soldier. He once told my father and me how he stood outside, banging away at the Japanese aircraft with a Springfield rifle. He didn’t think he hit anything, but he fought back with what he had.
Read More: Essex Files: Honoring a Hero on Memorial Day
RIP, Vaughn P. Drake Jr – America’s Oldest Pearl Harbor Veteran
Pearl Harbor veteran Ken Schubring, now 103, had this memory to share:
“I went to eat breakfast after my duty and shortly before 8 a.m., an explosion shook our bunkers,” he said at a Veterans Day ceremony at the National WWII Museum this year, according to Spirit America. “Everyone rushed outside.”
“The sky was full of airplanes, dive bombers,” he continued. “I hit the deck, crawled to a ditch nearby… and stayed there until the first wave had finished.”
We should note that it’s not just the veterans themselves, but every year, there are fewer Americans who remember the attack personally. My mother was 13 on the day of the attack, and was reading a book while her father listened to the Sunday symphony on the radio when an announcer interrupted with the news. My father was 18 and was helping his mother with some shopping in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, when people started bursting out of storefronts shouting the news.
This is a day that we must remember. Yes, we should honor the few remaining, ancient veterans of that day; they earned it. But we have to remember the day itself, and we should understand the events that led up to that attack. While the United States and Japan were trading partners at one time, we ended up being enemies and fought a brutal, years-long war. And we should note that, while the future doesn’t always repeat itself, it often rhymes, and we can look at the Pacific theater now and see another nation that we are trading partners with now, and who is becoming increasingly bellicose – China.
We fail to learn from these things at our peril.
The attack on Pearl Harbor will inevitably slip into the mists of history, as the people who were involved do likewise. But we must nevertheless remember this day, and its lessons: To ensure peace, prepare for war, and nations have no permanent friends, only permanent interests.
Editor’s Note: Thanks to President Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s leadership, the warrior ethos is coming back to America’s military.
Help us report on Trump and Hegesth’s successes as they make our military great again. Join RedState VIP and use promo code FIGHT to get 60% off your membership.
