That Pearl Harbor was revenge for the destruction of the Peking Man fossils , probablyOkay , so back during WWII , before the Americans got involved in it , Japan was invading the HELL out of China in a nasty land war . But of course , just ' cause there ' s a war on doesn ' t mean all civilian and research activity stops , and the Chinese dug a bunch of Hominid Ancient human fossils out of the ground near Beijing and named it Peking man . Big scientific discovery . Now , the Chinese were worried for these fossils , and wanted to protect them . They were worried the Japanese would damage them in their bombings , and since America was out of the war . They decided to send the fossils to America , where they ' d be safe . The thing is , a few days later was the Pearl Harbor attack , and the fossils Vanished on route , often believed to have been lost in the Pearl Harbor attack , since that was part of their route . The above is 100 % fact Minus the thing about them being lost in Pearl Harbor which is just common belief . The conspiracy part is this A common theory on the fossils dissapearance was that they were aboard the MV Awa Maru , a Japanese cargo ship which left Japaneseoccupied Singapore at the same time as the fossils would , and which was reportedly loaded with mysterious contraband on the way And which had no Red Cross supplies aboard it despite being supposedly a Red Cross ship . The ship was sunk by an American one , even though they were at peace at the time , as the ship was Mistaken for a Destroyer . So why would the Japanese by so pissed off by this ? The Japanese at the time were big into Shinto , a religious with a huge emphasis on ancestor worship . Hominid fossils are human ancestors , so these fossils would have been of immense religious significance to the Japanese . The sinking of the Awa Maru , which they would ' ve seen as deliberate Since they stole the fossils from an American convoy then lost them to more Americans would have been an act of war , hence requiring retaliation . I dunno if i believe the whole thing , but every now and again i google around a bit and find out a little bit more about the whole affair . It ' s definitelyinteresting stuff in my opinion .