| 1. | a harbor near Honolulu, on S Oahu, in Hawaii: surprise attack by Japan on the U.S. naval base and other military installations December 7, 1941. |
| 2. | any significant or crippling defeat, betrayal, loss, etc., that comes unexpectedly. |
| Pearl Harbor An inlet of the Pacific Ocean on the southern coast of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. It became the site of a naval base after the United States annexed Hawaii in 1900. On Sunday, December 7, 1941, Japanese planes attacked the base, and the United States entered World War II the following day. |
A major United States naval base in Hawaii that was attacked without warning by the Japanese air force on December 7, 1941, with great loss of American lives and ships. In asking Congress to declare war on Japan the next day, President Franklin D. Roosevelt described the day of the attack as “a date which will live in infamy.”
