Attack on America: Dutch Harbor 60 years later: this may come as a surprise, but the nation was attacked twice during WWII. The second time was at the "Pearl Harbor of the North" in the Aleutian Islands. The National Park Service is making sure we all remember with a new visitor's center

VFW Magazine, June-July, 2002 by Shannon Hanson

Japan staged not one, but two audacious attacks on U.S. territory during World War II. On June 3-4, 1942--a full six months after Pearl Harbor--Japanese forces again hit American turf, shocking the nation.

Their carrier-based bombers and fighters struck Dutch Harbor Naval Base and Fort Meats in the eastern Aleutians, which stretch west from mainland Alaska. The front-page headline in the Anchorage Daily Times read simply: "Raid Dutch Harbor!"

The Aleutians were the perfect steppingstones for an invasion of North America. Japan's principal aim, however, was to prevent America from invading its home islands. Located just 100 miles off the Alaskan mainland, Unalaska Island (home to the U.S. naval base) was the prime target of enemy strategists.

But when the bombs fell, nearly 90% hit the close-by Army barracks at Fort Mears. Some 17 men of the 3rd Bn., 37th Inf. Regt., and eight of the 151st Engineer Combat Regiment were killed and 25 GIs were wounded in the first raid.

"I was on deck of the Fillmore when planes came over," Mack Mark of M Co., 71st Inf., recalled in Bert Webber's book Aleutian Headache. "I said to a guy that we had plenty of air cover. Then as we watched, little things started falling out of the planes.

"The things were bombs, and we were caught flat-footed. I came off the ship without even touching the gangplank, and we took off into the hills for cover. There was never an alarm until after the attack started."

On the following day, Japanese bombers took out an anti-aircraft artillery emplacement, killing four sailors manning the 20mm guns.

The Northwestern, a beached barracks ship, took two direct hits, killing eight laborers. "Waves of Zeroes strafed the 50-year-old liner until the rolling mass of smoke became so thick they could no longer find the target," wrote Brian Garfield in The Thousand-Mile War.

The final tally: 43 military personnel killed (33 Army, 8 Navy, 1 Marine and 1 civilian employee) and at least 10 civilians. (Though accounts mention a total of 78 deaths, no one seems to have accounted for the circumstances of other civilian casualties.) Some 64 servicemen were wounded. Eleven U.S. planes were lost. Japan lost 10 planes and 15 men in the raids.

Still, Garfield concluded, "The Americans had done far better at Dutch Harbor than they had at Pearl Harbor ... The Dutch Harbor diversion had cost Japan the major battle of 1942 [Midway]--perhaps the war."

NEW VISITOR CENTER TELLS STORY

Despite its fascinating place in history, only now--60 years later--is Dutch Harbor receiving proper and permanent recognition. The Aleutian WWII National Historic Area Visitor Center--a joint venture of the National Park Service and the Ounalashka Corporation (the Alaska Native village corporation that owns and operates the center)--has its grand opening June 16.

According to Linda Cook of the National Park Service, the purpose of the center is to "interpret the role of the Aleutians in the defense of the U.S. during World War II for the educational benefit and inspiration of present and future generations."

Center manager Janis Krukoff of the Ounalashka Corporation added, "The goal is to educate and preserve knowledge of the Aleutian Campaign and its effects on the Unangan [natives of the Aleutians] people."

The creation of the center was vitally important not only to Alaskan history, but to U.S. history as well. As news coverage of Sept. 11 has shown, very little is known about the role of the Aleutians in WWII: Pearl Harbor was listed as the only other time America had been attacked on its own soil since 1812.

Also, the campaign witnessed several significant events. A Japanese Zero was recovered intact, providing the U.S. the opportunity to redesign its own fighters; the Battle of Attu was the second deadliest battle (per capita) in the Pacific for Americans; and the Battle of the Kommandorskis was the most protracted purely naval battle of the war.

The center interprets WWII events and resources throughout the Aleutians, educating future generations about the history of this forgotten aspect of the war. It covers the Aleutian Campaign and the extension of the aerial raids over Japan's Kurile Islands.

Housed in a 1943 Naval Air Transport Service building at the island's airport, the center covers two floors. The first floor focuses on the history of the campaign. Exhibits include representations of the Battle of Attu, the bombing of Dutch Harbor and the blitz and invasion of Kiska. A large color mural, maps of the Aleutians and military installations, a gift shop and a theater round out the floor.

The theater shows several films, including Alaska at war, original footage from photographers at the time and History Channel productions.

Exhibits on the second floor relate back to the history of the building as a weather tracking station and control tower for the Dutch Harbor Naval Air Station in WWII. They focus on weather, the difficulties of waging the air war in the Aleutians and the life of the enlisted man. Future plans include multi-media kiosks with a flight simulator and digitized archives on different Aleutian bases.