Drain the Oceans (2018–…): Season 2, Episode 14 - Pacific Shockwave - full transcript

Pearl Harbor
is just the beginning.

In the terrifying weeks after
Japan's surprise attack,

more shocking blows
fall upon the Allies,

as a wave of terror
spreads across the Pacific,

leaving behind a tragic trail
of wreckage on the ocean floor.

Imagine if we could
empty the oceans,

letting the water drain away

to reveal the secrets
on the sea floor.

Now, we can.

Using accurate data and
astonishing technology

to bring light once
again to a lost world.



This time, what can a shattered wreck
in the South China Sea

reveal about the technical
brilliance of the Japanese navy?

The result was complete collapse of half
of the ship's systems from a single blow.

What secret weapon
sends this mighty warship down?

If you can't see it coming,
how do you avoid it?

Well, the answer is you don't.

And why does
this sleepy Australian port

become a second Pearl Harbor?

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December 1941, the empire
of Japan is on the march.

It already holds parts of China.

Now it targets the regions beyond,

sparking conflict with
America and her allies.

Including Great Britain.



From the fortress of Singapore,

the Royal Navy dominates
the South China Seas.

Can the ruins of a mighty
battleship reveal just how badly

the British misjudged the
power of their new enemy?

As the Japanese launch their
surprise attack on Pearl Harbor,

Winston Churchill worries
they might invade

the Dutch East Indies and British Malaya,

areas rich in the resources that Japan
badly needs, especially oil.

Seeing the imminent threat,
the Royal Navy mobilizes a battle group

of six powerful war ships,
and call it Force Zed.

Its mission is to head
north east from Singapore,

on the lookout for
Japanese invaders.

Leading the squadron is a brand new
battleship, HMS Prince of Wales.

Churchill believes that her mere presence
will be enough to deter the enemy.

The Prince of Wales was a state of the art
battleship, very heavily protected.

The ship with its armor was
pretty immune to attack.

The battleship was the supreme embodiment

of a nation's sea power and majesty.

If you saw Prince of Wales coming over the
horizon, you knew you were in big trouble.

Armed with
ten 14-inch main guns,

plus 16 secondary guns and
anti-aircraft capability,

the Prince of Wales is
lethal to targets at sea,

on land, and in the air.

She's also well protected.

Armor shields the deck,

and an additional 15 inch thick belt
surrounds her massive hull.

Force Zed is 50 miles
east of British Malaya,

when it's spotted by Japanese
reconnaissance aircraft.

But by early afternoon
the following day,

the Prince of Wales is at the
bottom of the South China Sea,

and Britannia's rule over
these waters is over.

Decades later, diver Rod MacDonald
is part of a military expedition

to research what happened here.

My role in this
expedition is basically

to try and work out
exactly why the wreck sank.

When this vessel was built, it was
a state of the art battleship.

Prince of Wales...

The location of
the wreck is well known.

But her condition has not been
revealed in such detail before.

Over 200 feet down, the
mighty Prince of Wales,

silent on the sea floor.

There are areas
of serious damage.

Over weeks, the divers scour
the wreck, gathering data.

And as the waters roll back,

light shines for the first
time in almost 80 years

on HMS Prince of Wales.

It's mostly intact,

but its starboard side is
punctures by three massive holes.

From their position below the water line,
they look like torpedo strikes.

Elsewhere on the wreck,
further details of her final battle.

The smaller 5.25 gun turrets on the
starboard side are all aimed downwards.

As the British sailors fight to defend
their ship, what are they shooting at?

The answer may lie
with another ship,

the USS North Carolina.

A battleship built to
similar specifications.

It survived its own deadly
encounters with the Japanese.

Naval historian Anthony Tully
believes this battleship holds clues

about the downfall of
its British cousin.

Behind us here are the North Carolina's
secondary battery,

a five-inch 38 caliber guns.

The Prince of Wales had eight
five-inch mounts of similar size.

These guns were trained
low on the horizontal.

They're not elevated like
this, but rather like this.

Guns trained low
couldn't hit distant ships.

And they aren't for
taking on submarines.

Tully believes it can mean
only one thing, air attack.

So they're trying to track the planes

'cause the Japanese
aircraft were attacking

at wave top level and they
had to lower them to this level

to even have a chance
of hitting them.

5.2 inch guns are
formidable against attacking aircraft,

but the armor belted hull is the Prince
of Wales ultimate defense,

impervious to most gun
fire and torpedoes.

If any ship would be able to shrug off
an air attack, it was Prince of Wales.

No battleship had been sunk
in action in the open sea.

The big guns of battleship
were the only things that

could take out
another battleship.

Despite all this protection,

somehow the Japanese
managed to break through.

The drained wreck
exposes more clues.

The holes reveal whatever hit this
hull created massive damage,

much bigger than damage caused
by a typical torpedo of the day.

It points to one thing, a
new Japanese wonder weapon.

The type 91 torpedo.

The standard torpedo can
break the surface and run

in an erratic direction,
that you don't intend it to go.

But the Japanese had pretty much
worked the bugs out of their torpedoes.

The Japanese military
used the 91 with devastating effect

for the first time, just days
earlier at Pearl Harbor.

It came as a nasty
surprise to the Allies.

The war head was quite powerful compared
to other contemporary torpedoes.

It could be released
at a higher altitude,

at a longer distance from
the target, at higher speed.

These innovations made it a revolutionary
version of an aerial torpedo.

The type 91 torpedo
is indeed revolutionary.

At its nose is a warhead carrying
a payload of 450 pounds of explosive.

Wooden stabilizers on its tail
fins guide it into the water.

On entering, the
fins snap off.

Then an internal depth meter keeps
the missile from rolling off target,

and at a steady 20
feet below the surface.

But if the torpedo was at this depth,

it should have hit the ship
right in the armor belt.

If any of these torpedoes
had hit the armor belt,

Prince of Wales would have
survived unscathed.

But the damage on
the wreck is way below the armor...

On the ship's soft underbelly.

How did the Japanese
91s strike so low?

The battleship HMS Prince of Wales

is sunk whilst patrolling
the South China Sea.

Japanese aerial torpedoes,

designed to strike at precisely
20 feet below the water line,

have pierced the battleship.

But her hull is supposed
to be impenetrable.

Looking at what remains
of the battered wreck,

the hull damage shows torpedoes strike
three times on the starboard side,

outside the protective armor belt

and below the normal operating
depth of the type 91.

And there's another hole on the port side,
close to the stern.

Can this torpedo strike
explain the ship's fate?

The damage at the stern
attracts the attention

of naval historian Anthony Tully.

He's on board the
USS North Carolina,

a ship with similar design features
to the Prince of Wales.

This is the
propeller shaft we're seeing.

If you were standing right here, it would
be spinning like crazy.

Because of the torpedo hit, you had a bent
shaft rotating out of, out of alignment.

The bent shaft
causes a dangerous chain reaction.

A ship's hull is divided into
partitions known as bulkheads.

These add strength and can be sealed off
to contain water if flooding occurs.

They are what allow a warship
to take a hit but stay afloat.

Running through these bulkheads
are the ship's four propeller shafts.

A damaged but still rotating
shaft would rupture the

bulkhead seals all along its length.

This would allow water to flood the engine
room, deep in the center of the ship.

This entire space,
this entire vast claustrophobic space,

would be filled with water.

It doesn't take much water inside
a ship to alter the trim of the ship.

If flooding makes
the ship list to one side,

it would raise the armor
belt out of the water,

exposing the ship's vulnerable
hull to further torpedo strikes.

If the ship had
been on an even keel,

that torpedo would have
hit the armored belt,

which would have
dealt with it quite easily.

Using all the evidence,
we can now recreate what likely happened.

It's late morning.

Force Zed are spotted by enemy aircraft
and turned back, heading to Singapore.

But the hunter
becomes the hunted.

Japanese bombers arriving from
nearby bases spot the British fleet.

The Prince of Wales
lowers her anti-aircraft guns

and opens fire on the enemy.

A bomber now at wave top
level on her attack run

launches her deadly
type 91 torpedo.

It strikes the
Prince of Wales.

Right by the port propeller.

It is impossible
to protect the propellers

and steering gear of a battleship.

The flooding
ship starts to list.

The armored section rises up,
bringing the unprotected hull

into the firing
line of the torpedo.

It's a sitting duck.

Three more torpedoes
strike the Prince of Wales,

on the starboard side,
beneath the armor plating.

A state of the art battleship is brought
down by a handful of torpedoes.

In about 100 minutes,
less than two hours,

one of the most modern
battleships in the world

had been sunk
by torpedo bombers.

Force Zed loses the
Prince of Wales and one other warship

in the battle
group, HMS Repulse.

840 British sailors are dead and naval
warfare has been changed forever.

No battleship had been
sunk by air attack at sea.

This is a major landmark
in naval history.

This catastrophic defeat
marks the beginning of the end

for the British Empire in the east,

and the Japanese
have only just begun.

What can we learn of the scale
of Japan's ambition from a vessel

lost over 3,000 miles
from Japan itself?

Expedition diver Mac McCarthy
has been investigating wrecks

in the Pacific Ocean for decades.

War records reveal a
Japanese submarine, I-124,

was sunk off the coast of
Australia in January 1942.

And he wants to find it.

His mission takes him to
waters north of Australia;

to an area declared
a war grave

and off limits to
diving since 1976.

I had a personal desire to see it because
it had so much mystery around it.

In 1988, Mac and his team
gained permission to explore the wreckage.

The problem was that the position fixing
in those early days wasn't very good,

so it was very difficult
to locate the wreck.

The crew
deploys a side scan sonar.

You clearly start to see
this pointy shape, which is a bow,

of course it's a
glorious moment.

Oh heckety deck, look at this.

You see the conning tower?

Aha.

Mac's team has pinpointed
what looks like their sunken sub.

Next, they lower an ROV.

There we all
were around the screen.

And then down it goes.

We're watching the compass
and we're watching what's in front

and then there
comes the submarine.

The submarine
has suffered damage.

But is this the sub
he's looking for?

To find out, we're now able to
drain the waters of the Timor Sea.

The submarine appears.

A five and a half inch deck
gun is clearly visible.

The conning tower shows signs
of damage from enemy attack.

It must have been hit
hard and repeatedly.

And there's more.

Markings visible on the tower.

Japanese submarine, I-124.

Submarines are the ultimate
maritime stealth weapon.

Nearly undetectable when submerged,
but something must have found this one.

Australian naval historian
Tom Lewis is trying to work out

what the submarine
was doing here.

He's found blueprints that match
the sunken sub's features.

If you look at this, you've got
torpedo tubes, ballast tanks,

you've got diesel engines, you've got
electric batteries, you've got periscopes.

You sort of say okay, German
U-boat from World War I.

So, Japan took the plans of one of the
German U-boats and they copied it.

But this isn't a
straight copy of a German sub.

The Japanese take the design
and develop it further,

to give the submarine a new role.

This is a mine laying submarine.

It's designed in a different way from
other submarines of World War I and II.

The mines are bigger than
the average sort of mine.

You make a big mine
and you dispense it

and it's got more fire
power, it's got more punch.

The I-124 is one of four

underwater mine layers in the
Imperial Japanese Navy.

280 feet long, it carries
a crew of over 75 men.

It's armed with torpedoes, deck gun,

and it carries 42
powerful sea mines.

This book here is the wreck inspection
journal, which we have to keep.

So what was
this minelayer doing here?

Mac McCarthy finds a map
detailing the war movements

of all four Japanese mine layers.

These are the Japanese
records and they show

the movements of these Japanese
submarines in the north Australian coast,

and their proximity to the coast.

The Japanese subs
are targeting this critical supply route

between northern Australia
and the Dutch East Indies.

A mine layer should
be undetectable.

So how did it somehow
make itself a target?

Off the coast of northern
Australia, diver Mac McCarthy

has found a Japanese
World War II submarine.

A closer look at the drained wreck
reveals something unusual.

Hatches in the hull
have been blown open.

Elsewhere on the sea
bed, something curious.

Objects that look
like oil barrels.

These are submarine killers.

Depth charges.

Depth charges are deployed
when a submarine is spotted.

As a charge sinks to a
pre-selected depth...

...it detonates.

The shockwave can
send a sub down.

This sub must have been
spotted then hit hard.

But how did the enemy
know where I-124 was?

January 19th, 1942, the submarine
sends a routine message

that is picked up by
Allied intelligence.

The following day, a
torpedo attack on a US ship

alerts them to Japanese
submarine activity.

The Australian sub-killer, Deloraine,
armed to the teeth with depth charges,

heads off to search for it.

Whilst Japanese and German subs are
similar, their tactics are very different.

The Germans target merchant shipping,
whilst Japanese subs

shadow and attack
Allied task-forces.

The Japanese strategy in World War II,
how they use their submarines, is floored.

They attack warships.

A sort of odd concept.

When the Deloraine
spots a torpedo fired at it,

it's the clue the crew need.

For once, the Japanese navy
is too ambitious for its own good.

It allows the Deloraine to
pinpoint the sub, then attack.

Now using evidence from historical
records and our drained shipwreck,

we can illustrate
I-124's final hours.

The I-124 is laying mines
in the Allied shipping lane.

Allied intelligence alerts HMAS
Deloraine to the presence of a sub.

She fails to find it.

The I-124 spots the Australian
warship first and attacks.

A torpedo narrowly misses,

and the Deloraine is alerted
to the sub's position.

Unfortunately, they
took on a modern warship,

specifically designed to kill submarines.

The minesweeper
immediately charges the sub.

Where do you go?

Once they've got a lock on him and
they can see where it's come from,

they know where you are.

It's a suicidal position.

I-124 is pummeled by
round after round of depth charges.

Seconds later the hatches blow
and she plunges to the depths.

The first Japanese submarine to be sunk
by the Australian Navy in World War II.

There are no survivors.

Despite their advanced technology,
the Japanese strategy of using subs for

pre-emptive attacks
costs them dearly here.

But the wreck of I-124 is
evidence that the Japanese do

quickly bring the war
to northern Australia.

They will be back,
and in shocking force.

Maritime archaeologists David
Steinberg and Silvano Young

are leading an expedition dive
in Darwin Harbor Northern Australia.

They've come to investigate the
largest ever attack on Australian soil.

The only warning is the
drone of an air armada.

Nearly 200 Japanese planes descend
on Darwin, strafing the harbor.

Next, they target the town itself.

Nine Naval vessels are sunk.

And hundreds are
dead and wounded.

It's a massive attack,
and it was devastating and overwhelming

and lived in people's memories.

Those that experienced
it will never forget it.

I think Darwin is
Australia's Pearl Harbor.

David and Silvano are
searching for evidence to understand

just why the raid was so
successful and so deadly.

There it is.

One of the main things we're gonna be
looking for is any damage that's been done

from the attack on the
9th February 1942.

Heading down.

Roger, left surface, 0918.

On the wreck.

Yeah,
Roger, just have a swim round

and just work
out where you are.

This looks
like a structure here.

But the dive
can only reveal so much.

Using data from David
and Silvano's survey,

we can lay the floor of
Darwin Harbor bare.

To reveal not a ship...

but a plane.

Camouflaged paintwork suggests
it's military, not civilian.

Features on the plane
help David identify it.

It's a Catalina.

The Catalina is an
Allied flying boat.

It was used for vital intelligence
gathering and surveillance.

The Catalinas were essential
for the Allied war effort because

the only way you were,

you were gonna find the enemy
at sea was with your own eyes.

Here you've got
some torn sheeting and I'm just...

Oh look at that.
Does that look burnt to you?

Certainly does.

It's definitely burnt.

There's
clear evidence of fire.

That's most definitely burn damage

from the fire that caused
the loss of the aircraft.

So what caused this fire
and ultimately sent this Catalina down?

Can you see this clearly?

We've got more
examples of damage.

So you've got machine gun damage.

Returning to the drained
wreckage, there's more evidence.

More signs of gunfire.

Under the pilot's
window, something else.

Larger holes.

Tell-tale signs.

Yeah, that looks like 20
millimeter cannon damage there.

Which points to
one particular fighter plane.

A brilliantly designed killer that is a
vital cog in Japan's military machine,

the Zero.

No, it's
very exciting, yeah.

It was really a
process of elimination.

There were Zeroes that came
down, strafing on them.

The Mitsubishi A6M,
or Zero, is a fighter plane

capable of launching
from aircraft carriers.

It carries a pair of
7.7 millimeter machine guns

and 20 millimeter cannon in each wing.

It has an unparalleled
range of over 1,500 miles.

The Zero is an iconic Japanese fighter.

It is to the Japanese what the
Spitfire is to the British.

Japan attacks
Darwin with her best,

and fresh evidence beneath
the waters of the harbor

reveals a secret tactic that
almost guarantees success.

David Steinberg
and Silvano Young have found

one plane in Darwin harbor.

Now they extend their search.

And discover two more
downed Catalinas.

Mapping the position of all three planes
reveals they lie in a line.

They couldn't have
all crashed this way,

the wrecked flying boats
must have been moored

at the time of the attack.

Evidence on the drained Catalina

sheds light on Japanese tactics
that February morning.

The position of the damage,
all on one side, is revealing.

The bullet-holes
all lie on its south side,

suggesting the direction of the attack

comes not from the sea,
but from inland.

An approach from the south,
over the Australian mainland,

would surprise the Allies.

And Tom Lewis thinks the Japanese
tactic of attacking in the morning

gave them another advantage.

There's a number of reasons
for attacking from the south.

The first is you're
attacking out of the sun.

You've still got the sun
behind you, which is good

because it blinds
your defenders.

So it gives you that
element of surprise.

At the time of the attack,
Darwin is a small town of 2,000 civilians.

But Darwin's size
belies its importance.

Its location isn't just the perfect place

for launching surveillance aircraft,
like the Catalinas,

as David and Silvano discover,
as they continue to scour the sea bed.

They find another wreck.

A large ship.

Much of it is gone, salvaged
in the decades since it sank.

But enough remains to
reveal what it was.

A cargo ship.

We can see there is trucks
and motorbikes and ammunition

and also recorded on this side

is gas masks and mortars,
military equipment.

And the importance
of Darwin becomes clear.

It's a crucial link in
the Allies' supply chain.

A base for vessels

and the hub for shipping ammunitions
and other vital supplies.

Now, it's possible to understand exactly
what happened in Darwin Harbor.

188 planes are launched from
four Japanese aircraft carriers,

nearly 200 miles to the north.

But rather than heading
directly to Darwin,

the planes fly east,
circling around the town.

They want to attack Darwin
harbor from the south.

You would have seen the aircraft
coming towards you this way,

crossing the beach down there.

The Australians are unprepared.

The town is poorly defended
for an attack from the air.

The Catalinas are sitting ducks
as the Zeroes circle round to attack,

protected by the full
glare of the sun.

The pilots swoop down, unleashing
the full force of their weapons.

Machine gunning
the moored planes.

A second wave of
planes arrives.

High altitude bombers.

The place was in
absolute pandemonium.

The fighters and bombers
destroy 30 military aircraft

and nine ships
anchored in the harbor.

Behind is left chaos,
ships on fire, ships sinking,

people underwater who are dead.

Darwin remained ineffective,

as a harbor that could support the war.

The Japanese have used advanced
technology and smart tactics

against an unsuspecting and
unprepared enemy.

The Allied supply chain into
the Pacific is crippled.

And still, the shockwave spreads.

In Washington DC and London,
Allied leaders are astonished

at the scale and speed
of Japan's victories.

Just days before the Darwin bombing,
the Japanese also capture

the famous British
stronghold of Singapore.

Now Japan has its eye on Java,
in the Dutch East Indies,

today known as Indonesia.

The Imperial Navy mobilizes a landing
fleet to seize its precious oil fields.

The Allies scramble to stop them.

Pulling together a force that includes one
of Australia's most famous warships,

HMAS Perth.

At 550 feet long,
the light cruiser HMAS Perth

is almost twice the length
of the Statue of Liberty.

Achieving 32 knots,
she is built for speed.

Armed with almost 40 guns, the
Perth is a fearsome opponent.

But the Allied fleet she is sailing in
is unprepared for what is to come.

There was an ad hoc
force of cruisers and destroyers

from four different countries,

Australia, Britain,
the United States, and the Netherlands.

So you have this almost Rag,
Tag, and Bobtail force of ships

against the very highly trained
and motivated Japanese Navy.

The two fleets meet
in the Battle of the Java Sea,

and the Allies don't
stand a chance.

They lose five vessels.

Along with 2,300 lives.

There was no common doctrine.

No common signaling system.

The whole thing degenerated
into complete chaos.

Two Allied cruisers escape,

seeking refuge on the
southern coast of Java.

An American heavy cruiser,
USS Houston, and HMAS Perth.

They had been told that there were
no Japanese forces in the vicinity

so therefore they could
have a safe passage.

But 48 hours after
escaping the Japanese in the Java Sea,

the Perth disappears.

An expedition to unravel the fate of the
allied warships, including the Perth,

is led by veteran wreck
hunter Vidar Skoglie.

Her last known position is in the
Sunda Strait, a narrow passage of water

between the islands
of Java and Sumatra.

The team surveys the area,
looking for wrecks.

Why don't you try
just a little here.

Eventually,
the sonar detects something promising.

The biggest thrill of
all is to find a new wreck.

You never know what you're
gonna find down there.

The team dive.

They encounter a massive wreck.

And as the waters roll back...

we can see for the first time,

a huge vessel lying on her port side.

With four large gun turrets visible,

and several gaping holes in the hull.

It's definitely the Perth.

The guns on one of the turrets are
pointing straight down into the sand

and the sighting ports on the
two half turrets are both open.

These guns were operational
and firing to the end.

She did not go down without a fight.

A dive team, led by Vidar Skoglie,

is investigating the
wreck of HMAS Perth.

The exposed starboard side of the
Perth hull shows several gaping holes,

and underneath they find something else.

It had some very serious torpedo
damage right behind the bow,

where you could actually swim
through the hull from side to the other.

Using the data, we
can look beneath the wreck,

to reveal something impossible
to see from diving alone.

Two bigger holes on
the opposite port side.

The Perth was under attack
from both directions.

And one attacker hit the ship with
something unusually powerful.

A typical torpedo wouldn't
cause such massive damage.

Wartime records suggest one possible
cause was something that

wreaked havoc in the
Java Sea days before,

a Japanese wonder weapon.

The long lance torpedo.

The long lance was by far the
most effective torpedo in the world,

and the western navies had virtually
no idea of its existence.

Reaching faster speeds
than anything else afloat at the time,

the long lance has
a huge warhead,

packing around twice the
payload of an average torpedo.

It has an astonishing
range of 23 miles.

Inside, it uses a revolutionary
system of propulsion

which leaves no trail of bubbles.

The standard surface
torpedo ran on compressed air,

which means that
you get bubbles.

It leaves a wake in the water which
you can see from quite a distance.

You can see it coming.

If you can't see the torpedo
coming, how do you avoid it?

Well the answer it you don't. You can't.

Its ability to target
ships at distances unheard of

means the Japanese
can attack the Allies

whilst keeping their
own ships out of range.

Tragically for the Perth,
she escapes one Japanese fleet,

then sails unwittingly into
the path of a second.

What they didn't realize
was that they were running into

a major Japanese invasion force.

Piecing together the evidence,
a picture emerges of the final hours

of HMAS Perth and her crew.

In the Java Sea, the Allies
take on the Japanese.

Over the course of the battle,
the Allied ships are hit hard.

The Perth escapes.

Told that the Sunda Strait is safe,

the captain heads for
this narrow stretch of water

off the Java coast.

But she's spotted by
a Japanese destroyer.

Minutes later, three entire
destroyer divisions close in.

Salvos of torpedoes
come from all sides.

The Japanese go in for the kill.

Now they could concentrate
a superior force of destroyers.

Two torpedoes hit the port side.

Massive explosions
suggesting long lances.

It was very difficult to counter a long
lance because you couldn't see it coming.

After over an hour of
desperate fighting, the Perth goes down,

along with 375 sailors.

Another emphatic victory
for the Japanese navy.

The following day,
the Japanese landing fleets

begin their invasion of Java island.

Just one day after
originally planned.

With the delay of the invasion
of Java by a mere 24 hours,

and the heavy losses suffered,
this must go down as

one of the greatest
disasters in naval history.

Thousands of Allied lives were
lost across the region in just three days.

But today, surveys reveal that
little remains of the Perth,

or many other ships
sunk by the Japanese.

These and other vessels face
another more recent enemy...

Salvagers,

with the wrecks being illegally
ripped apart for their metal.

The grab itself would go down on top of
the wreck and it would stab into it,

that would close up and then
just tear chunks of metal off.

So piece by piece,
they would rip it off.

There's just no wreck at all.

As if it's just been lifted.

What remains of these
wrecks is a continuing reminder

of the first shocking
months of the Pacific war.

And the price of
Allied overconfidence.

There was a tendency at this time
to underestimate the Japanese.

The Japanese actively
encouraged that kind of misperception

on the part of the western countries

because they didn't want them to know
how advanced they really were.

Less than three
months after Pearl Harbor,

the empire of Japan is
at the apex of its power.

With superior technology and strategy,

it now controls
the entire region and its oil.

It will take the Allies three deadly years

to defeat an enemy they so
shockingly underestimated.