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President Obama and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe made a historic appearance at Pearl Harbor on Tuesday. While Abe is not the first Japanese leader to visit the landmark, he's the first do so publicly and alongside a U.S. president.
Marco Garcia/AP
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President Obama and Japanese Minister Shinzo Abe made a historic appearance at Pearl Harbor, 75 years after the surprise attack that prompted U.S. entry into World War II, praising the reconciliation and partnership between their respective nations.
In a somber ceremony Tuesday, the two leaders touted the U.S.-Japan alliance that arose in the aftermath of the bitter conflict and became a "cornerstone of peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region," Obama said.
"The U.S. and Japan chose friendship and they chose peace," Obama said. "It has helped underwrite an international order that has prevented another World War."
Abe, for his part, offered his condolences, but stopped short of an apology for the Dec. 7, 1941, air raid that killed more than 2,300 service members.
"As the prime minister of Japan, I offer my sincere and everlasting condolences to the souls of those who lost their lives here, as well as to the spirits of all the brave men and women whose lives were taken by a war that commenced in this very place," Abe said through an interpreter.
But while both leaders spent significant time memorializing the dead, it was the current relationship between the two nations that took center stage. Abe said "the spirit of reconciliation" was at work in U.S. efforts to aid the war-wrecked Japan following its surrender. He also credited the U.S. for allowing Japan to transition from an imperial nation to a peaceful democratic one.
"On behalf of the Japanese people, I hereby wish to express once again my heartfelt gratitude to the U.S. and the world for the tolerance extended to Japan," the prime minister said.
