Greater impact -- Pearl Harbor or JFK assassination?

A late contender for post of the year for my money.

 

Thanks Columbo.

 

Highway, that was very well written. I think the greater impact, by far, is Pearl Harbor. Years ago, while talking to my grandfather (passed on, a shame, he was one of the greatest men I've ever known) about something very similar to this, he said Pearl Harbor was easily worse.

His reasons make sense when thinking about incidents that happened in my lifetime.

A) JFK's assassination was shocking and saddening, a tragic event that touched the nation and changed history.

B) Pearl Harbor was a gut-wrenching, terrifying event that struck fear into virtually every Amercan's life, and changed history.

A rough equation might be found in the Oklahoma City bombing and the 9/11 attacks. In watching the OKC coverage, I remember feeling revulsion, sickness and sadness over the bombing. Watching 9/11, I felt a much greater sense of fear, a sense of, "Dear God, what's going to come next? What happens now?"

Classifying those emotions, those incidents doesn't diminish them in their importance. JFK's death is easily one of the biggest turning points in U.S. history, but for the sheer shaking of the foundations, it was, by far, Pearl Harbor.

 

It can't be overstated how the visual to go with JFK ramps it up.

 

I also think the "lightning-bolt" effect Pearl Harbor had, like suddenly we'd been shocked from behind and don't know where to go for safety, equals or even outweighs JFK.