Isoroku Yamamoto's sleeping giant quotation is a film quote by the Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto regarding the 1941

attack on Pearl Harbor The attack on Pearl HarborAlso known as the Battle of Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service upon the United States against the naval base at Pearl Harbor in Honolulu, Territory of Hawaii, j ...

by forces of Imperial Japan. The quotation is portrayed at the very end of the 1970 film ''

Tora! Tora! Tora! ''Tora! Tora! Tora!'' ( ja, トラ・トラ・トラ！) is a 1970 epic film, epic war film that dramatizes the Empire of Japan, Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. The film was produced by Elmo Williams and directed by Richard Fleischer, T ...

'' as:

Vermont Royster Vermont Connecticut Royster (April 30, 1914 – July 22, 1996) was the editor of the editorial page of ''The Wall Street Journal'' from 1958 to 1971. He was honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He won two Pulitzer Prizes for his writing, ...

offers a possible origin to the phrase attributed to

Napoleon Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader who ...

, "China is a sickly, sleeping giant. But when she awakes the world will tremble". An abridged version of the quotation is also featured in the 2001 film ''

Pearl Harbor Pearl Harbor is an American lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. It was often visited by the Naval fleet of the United States, before it was acquired from the Hawaiian Kingdom by the U.S. with the signing of the Re ...

''. The 2019 film '' Midway'' also features Admiral Yamamoto speaking aloud the sleeping giant quote.

Overview

The director of ''Tora! Tora! Tora!'',

Richard Fleischer Richard O. Fleischer (; December 8, 1916 – March 25, 2006) was an American film director whose career spanned more than four decades, beginning at the height of the Golden Age of Hollywood and lasting through the American New Wave. Though he ...

, stated that while Yamamoto may never have said those words, the film's producer, Elmo Williams, had found the line written in Yamamoto's diary. Williams, in turn, has stated that Larry Forrester, the screenwriter, found a 1943 letter from Yamamoto to the Admiralty in Tokyo containing the quotation. However, Forrester cannot produce the letter, nor can anyone else, American or Japanese, recall it or find it. Randall Wallace, the screenwriter of the 2001 film ''Pearl Harbor'', readily admitted that he copied the line from ''Tora! Tora! Tora!'' Yamamoto did believe that Japan could not win a protracted war with the United States. Moreover, he seemed later to have believed that the Pearl Harbor attack had been a blunder strategically, morally, and politically, even though he was the person who originated the idea of a surprise attack on the military installation. It is recorded that while all his staff members were celebrating, "Yamamoto alone" spent the day after Pearl Harbor "sunk in apparent depression". Although almost 2,500 Americans lost their lives at Pearl Harbor and surrounding areas in Honolulu, he was only upset by the bungling of the Foreign Ministry which led to the attack happening while the countries were still at peace, thus, along with other factors, making the incident an unprovoked surprise attack that enraged American public opinion.

Similar sayings

On December 8, 1941, the day after the attack at Pearl Harbor, an inspirational statement was made by Don McNeill during the NBC radio broadcast of Don McNeill’s Breakfast Club. His statement ended: A portion of the broadcast was replayed on the Pearl Harbor attack-themed episode of Smithsonian Channel program documentary, The Lost Tapes (S1:E1). In ''The Reluctant Admiral'', Hiroyuki Agawa gives a quotation from a reply by Admiral Yamamoto to Ogata Taketora on January 9, 1942, which is similar to the famous version: "A military man can scarcely pride himself on having 'smitten a sleeping enemy'; it is more a matter of shame, simply, for the one smitten. I would rather you made your appraisal after seeing what the enemy does, since it is certain that, angered and outraged, he will soon launch a determined counterattack." The other common quotation attributed to Yamamoto predicting the future outcome of a naval war against the United States is, "I can run wild for six months ... after that, I have no expectation of success". As it happened, the

Battle of Midway The Battle of Midway was a major naval battle in the Pacific Theater of World War II that took place on 4–7 June 1942, six months after Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor and one month after the Battle of the Coral Sea. The U.S. Navy under Adm ...

, the critical naval battle considered to be the turning point of the

war in the Pacific The Pacific War, sometimes called the Asia–Pacific War, was the Theater (warfare), theater of World War II that was fought in Asia, the Pacific Ocean, the Indian Ocean, and Oceania. It was geographically the largest theater of the war, ...

, concluded exactly 6 months later on June 7. Similar to the above quotation was another quotation: Yamamoto, when once asked his opinion on the war, pessimistically said that the only way for Japan to win the war was to dictate terms in the

White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in 1800. ...

. Yamamoto's meaning was that military victory, in a protracted war against an opponent with as much of a population and industrial advantage as the United States possessed, was completely impossible, a rebuff to the Kantai Kessen Decisive Battle Doctrine of those who thought that winning a single major battle against the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

would end the war, just as the Japanese victory in the

Battle of Tsushima The Battle of Tsushima (Japanese:対馬沖海戦, Tsushimaoki''-Kaisen'', russian: Цусимское сражение, ''Tsusimskoye srazheniye''), also known as the Battle of Tsushima Strait and the Naval Battle of Sea of Japan (Japanese: 日 ...

had ended the

Russo-Japanese War The Russo-Japanese War ( ja, 日露戦争, Nichiro sensō, Japanese-Russian War; russian: Ру́сско-япóнская войнá, Rússko-yapónskaya voyná) was fought between the Empire of Japan and the Russian Empire during 1904 and 1 ...

in 1905. Yamamoto's quote about peace terms in the White House was abridged by Japanese propaganda to make it seem like an optimistic prediction; this version was promptly picked up by American propaganda to look even more boastful (see illustration).

Notes

References

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Yamamoto, Isoroku, Sleeping giant quote English phrases Historiography of World War II Attack on Pearl Harbor Sleeping giant quote Historiography of Japan