"Don't Worry About It"

Those were his precise words, and they afterwards haunted his life. After that history-ranking event, he did, often, worry about it, but the die was cast, the deed done, and there was nothing whatever he could do to turn back the tide of history and somehow manage to raise the alert he hadn't felt compelled to commit to, in 1941. December 7, 1941, to be precise; even more precise, 7:00 a.m. on that historical date.

On the other hand, had the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor never taken place, the Americans would likely have remained isolationist. And the Second World War which imperilled much of the world would have concluded in a far different way then it eventually did. Britain, for one, might have been occupied by Nazi Germany. And the killing machine that exemplified what racist hatred could accomplish in the Holocaust, might have been even more successful.

So who knows? After all, it's said that there are some theories that hold the slightest of changes, even the effect of a butterfly's wings riffling the air, could have consequences through an ongoing chain of events influenced by that butterfly that simply could not be visualized, that could have the effect of altering - everything conceivable in historical and natural events.

In any event, all seemed still at a Fort Shafter U.S. base on Oahu, Hawaii as 28-year-old Kermit Tyler, a U.S. fighter pilot stationed at a radar unit and tasked with the 4:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. shift at the information centre made a decision that would take history on a trajectory that no one might have imagined.

On being informed that a blip on the radar screen had presented itself, he shrugged it off and responded: "Don't worry about it".

As the first wave of Japanese fighters and bombers closed in on their mission to destroy the America naval base at Pearl Harbor. A later navy court of enquiry in 1941 exonerated the man who fought with distinction for his country, earning the Legion of Merit. He had been assigned temporary charge of the radar information centre as his commanding officer wanted the pilots under his command to gain radar experience.

They'd had no previous training, knew nothing about how they should react in case of a troubling report, and this was his second day on duty with no one present to advise him. He did know that there were six B17s due to return to base. And when he was informed of the blip on the screen, without being informed also that the blip was sufficiently large to represent about 50 planes, he assumed it was the B17s returning.

Logically, nothing to worry about. So he didn't. He was an untrained officer, taking responsibility because he was tasked with that responsibility without being sufficiently aware of the full impact of what a lack of awareness leading to the right alarm being raised at the critical time would result in. What it resulted in was 2,402 U.S. military dead, 1,282 wounded, 188 aircraft destroyed and 12 naval vessels sunk.

There were, in total, 353 Japanese aircraft that flew in on waves determined to wreak as much damage as possible. And they succeeded in their duty. And the Government of the United States of America understood they had no other option but to enter the war they had thus far studiously avoided. Had they not, the results would have been far more devastating for the entire world, under the heel of the 1000-year Third Reich.

It may well be that the man who fought so well for his country and who received accolades of praise and achieved a senior post with Air Defence Command, retiring with the rank of lieutenant-colonel, failed in his first vital role. While he remained haunted throughout his life by the fall-out of his lack of astute awareness, there are those who aree, and believe gut instinct had failed.