Pearl Harbor

• Pearl Harbour

Calque of Hawaiian Wai Momi (“pearl water”). The extended senses allude to the surprise attack executed by the Imperial Japanese Navy on the harbor on December 7, 1941.

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˌpɝ˞l ˈhɑɹbɚ/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˌpɜːl ˈhɑːbə/

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

Pearl Harbor

1. A placename
   1. A deep water harbor in Oahu, Hawaii, United States in the Pacific.
   2. (military) A naval base in Pearl Harbor, Oahu, Hawaii, United States: a US Navy base
      • 1978, Harold Ramis, Douglas Kenney, Chris Miller, Animal House (motion picture), spoken by Bluto (John Belushi), Universal Pictures:

        Bluto: What? Over? Did you say "over"? Nothing is over until we decide it is! Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell no!
        Otter: [to Boon] Germans?
        Boon: Forget it, he's rolling.

   3. Alternative form of Pearl Harbour.
2. (historical) The attack on Pearl Harbor.

   Pearl Harbor happened in 1941 and was the direct cause of the United States' entry into World War II.

   • 2012 March 19, David Denby, “Everybody Comes to Rick’s: “Casablanca” on the Big Screen”, in The New Yorker‎^[1]:

     “Casablanca” was completed in 1942, but it’s set in December, 1941, the time of Pearl Harbor.

Pearl Harbor (plural Pearl Harbors)

1. A sneak attack, often using underhanded measures.
   • 2002, Richard F. Hill, Hitler Attacks Pearl Harbor: Why the United States Declared War on Germany, page 85:

     Most Americans wanted no more Pearl Harbors, but they now expected Germany to attempt one.

2. A seminal dramatic event that unites a community and arouses it into action against an enemy.
   • 1991, Winn Schwartau, Terminal Compromise‎^[2]:

     For all practical purposes, the United States is undergoing an electronic Pearl Harbor, and the target is one of the most crucial segments of our way of life: Information.

   • 2007 June 24, John Schwartz, quoting Danny McPherson, “Preparing for a digital Pearl Harbor”, in The New York Times‎^[3], →ISSN:

     Still, instead of thinking in terms of the industry's repeated warnings of a "digital Pearl Harbor," McPherson said, "I think cyberwarfare will be far more subtle," in that "certain parts of the system won't work, or it will be that we can't trust information we're looking at."

   • 2012 July 6, Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai, quoting Milton Clary, “Drone Hijacking? That’s Just the Start of GPS Troubles”, in Wired‎^[4]:

     We certainly don’t want a GPS Pearl Harbor, but probably it’s gonna take a GPS Mogadishu to get people’s attention.

   • 2023 October 9, Ben Doherty, “Israel military says situation ‘dire’ in south as 260 bodies retrieved from festival”, in The Guardian‎^[5], →ISSN:

     IDF says fighting is ongoing in south, saying it ‘could be a 9/11 and a Pearl Harbour wrapped into one’ as Supernova festival-goers describe attack[.]

Pearl Harbor (third-person singular simple present Pearl Harbors, present participle Pearl Harboring, simple past and past participle Pearl Harbored)

1. (often passive voice, slang) To attack by surprise; to subject to a sneak attack.
   • 2000, James P. Sterba, Earth Ethics: Introductory Readings on Animal Rights, page 345:

     The first and second ships had been successfully Pearl Harbored. The third was not to be surprised. As we approached, she dropped her net and fled. We pursued.

   • 2013, Heiner Timmermann, The Future a Memory: The Cold War and Intelligence, page 127:

     Pearl Harbor had seared itself into the American consciousness, but even at the times of greatest tension American Presidents never believed that they were about to be Pearl Harbored again.

2. (often passive, slang, rare) To take rudely by surprise.
   • 2001, Arthur C. Clarke, quoted in Stylistics: A Resource Book for Students (2004, →ISBN, page 143:

     Of course, with the Soviets' launch of Sputnik, the Americans had been Pearl Harbored in space.

   • 2015, Halloween Shrieks, →ISBN, page 107:

     If I had quit two houses sooner than I did all would have been well but since I didn't, I got Pearl Harbored by some big kid dressed up in a Ben Cooper Howdy Doody plastic outfit and a goofily grinning mask […]

Unadapted borrowing from English Pearl Harbor, from Hawaiian Wai Momi.

• IPA^(key): /ˈpɛrl ˈxar.bɔr/
• Syllabification: [please specify syllabification manually]

Pearl Harbor m inan (indeclinable)

1. Pearl Harbor (a harbour and naval base in Hawaii, United States)
2. (historical, rare) the attack on Pearl Harbor

• Pearl Harbor in Polish dictionaries at PWN
• Pearl Harbor in PWN's encyclopedia

Unadapted borrowing from English Pearl Harbor, calqued from Hawaiian Wai Momi.

Pearl Harbor f

1. Pearl Harbor (a harbour and naval base in Hawaii, United States)

• Perl Harbor

Unadapted borrowing from English Pearl Harbor, calqued from Hawaiian Wai Momi.

• IPA^(key): /pêrl̩ xǎrbor/

Pearl Harbor m

1. (Bosnia, Croatia) Pearl Harbor (a harbour and naval base in Hawaii, United States)

• “Pearl Harbor”, in Hrvatski jezični portal [Croatian language portal] (in Serbo-Croatian), 2006–2025

English Pearl Harbor, calqued from Hawaiian Wai Momi.

• IPA^(key): /pɛ́ːrl xáːrbɔr/

Pȇarl Hȃrbor m inan

1. Pearl Harbor (a harbour and naval base in Hawaii, United States)