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Executive Order No.9066
On December 7th,1941 Japan, allied with Germany and Italy, started a series of surprise attacks on US military bases in Hawaii and in the Western Pacific, particularly at Pearl Habour. The problem was that they had not declared war first. So the USA was not prepared and had no chance to strike back. Then, on February 19th,1942 Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Executive Order No.9066, although the FBI and the counsellor of the president told him not to sign it.
The Executive Order No.9066 allowed all military commanders to designate areas for relocation. The aim was to remove all Japanese and all Americans of Japanese ancestry from the western coastal regions to the interior. These were the so called relocation camps like for example Manzanar. Many of the interned were children under 15 years of age. It is interesting to note that also 11,000 Germans and Italians were removed to the same relocation camps.
