The sinking of the RMS Lusitania and the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor were both very notable tragedies that played a pivotal role in triggering the United States to enter and get involved in both World Wars. The Lusitania was a British luxury passenger ship that was being used by Britain to secretly store and transport ammunition and supplies. Although the Lusitania was nothing more than just a neutral defenseless passenger ship, German U-Boats were targeting all British ships in response to the British Navy creating a naval blockade against Germany which hindered their ability to trade . Germany also had information which revealed that some British passenger ships were transporting weapons and ammunition. Germany did not intend on getting the United States involved with their affairs, however, they were not going to stop the U-boat attacks either. The German government acted by renting out advertisements in American newspapers. The advertisements informed United States citizens that traveling to Britain by sea was dangerous and warned them that there is no guarantee of a safe voyage due to the U-boat attacks .
On May 7th, 1915, the Lusitania was targeted and torpedoed by a German U-Boat. The Lusitania sank shortly after its encounter with the U-boat. Roughly around 1200 citizens died from the attack, 100 of them being American citizens . Public opinion of Germany changed rapidly in a negative way and US-German relations declined substantially. The tragedy of the Lusitania along with the Zimmerman Telegraph left the United States no other choice but to declare war on Germany and enter World War 1 .
Before the Pearl Harbor attack, relations between the United States and the Japanese empire were tense. Negotiations between the two nations were failing because the United States was concerned about the alarming rate at which Japan was expanding its empire. Their dangerously fast expansion in east Asia as well as the war crimes they were committing made America less willing to trade with them. Eventually, trade stopped completely between the two nations and on December 7th, 1941, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor in order to immobilize and damage the United States Navy so that other American naval bases in the pacific would be defenseless . More than 3000 Americans died in the attack and six battleships were destroyed in total .
These two events are similar in the sense that they caused the United States to enter both World Wars unwillingly. During the time of both events, America was trying to maintain an isolationist policy and intended on maintaining peace with all nations, but the tragedy of the Lusitania and Pearl Harbor provoked the United States to declare war against other nations. Another similarity is that the destruction of the Lusitania and the Pearl Harbor attack were both deliberate and intentional attacks. The only difference between the Lusitania attack and the attack on Pearl Harbor was that Pearl harbor was a planned military strategical attack while the incident with the Lusitania occurred because the Germans wanted to stop the trade of ammunition and also wanted to antagonize the British for creating a naval blockade against them. There were more sailor casualties at Pearl Harbor as opposed to the Lusitania where almost all casualties were civilian.
The sinking of the Lusitania could have been prevented only if the United States government took the German warnings more seriously and if the British government sent naval escorts to protect ships like the Lusitania. The attack on Pearl Harbor however, could not have been prevented. The Japanese empire was very aggressive and sought to expand its territory. This, along with failing negotiations, guaranteed that the Japanese would launch an attack against the United States in order to gain more resources in the Pacific islands.
These two events altered American history in a very significant way. The Lusitania sinking changed public opinion on entering World War 1 drastically and the idea of isolationism became less popular as a result. Pearl Harbor is also a very significant event in American history. The Pearl Harbor attack caught many individuals by surprise and upset them greatly but this also was an event that unified the nation. It is also a very significant event because, unlike the Lusitania, Pearl Harbor was directly responsible for the United States declaring war on Japan. If these two events never occurred, our entire history would be undoubtedly different.