Director of the new Office of Civilian Defense Fiorello H. La Guardia publishes Administrative Order 9 creating the Civil Air Patrol for U.S Coastal Patrol and naming its national commander Major General John F. Curry.

American President Franklin D. Roosevelt cut short his vacation in Warm Springs, Georgia and returned to Washington due to the critical situation in the Pacific

Malta suffers its 1,000th bombing raid

Approximately 20,000 Stanisławów Jews were ordered into the Ghetto area, and non-Jews ordered out.

German SS officer Karl Jaegerleader of Einsatzkommando 3 (killing squad), reports "Lithuania clean of Jews" with some exceptions

Japanese Prime Minister Tojo rejects "peace feelers" from the USA

American President Roosevelt sent Japan a request for an explanation for the heavy Japanese troop concentrations in French Indochina, exceeding the 25,000 agreed upon between Tokyo and Vichy France.

German combat engineer patrol reaches the town of Khimki while scouting for a hole in the Russian defence perimeter around Moscow. It is the closest advance the Germans make to the Russian capital

The Soviet Red Army set up the Moscow Defence Zone.

Adolf Hitler issued Directive No. 38, ordering reinforcement of the Luftwaffe presence in the Mediterranean.

Japanese Rear Admiral Matome Ugaki received an order authorizing the Combined Fleet to attack any time after midnight on December 7, Japan time. Based on this order, Ugaki sent a wireless communication with the coded message "Climb Mount Niitaka", meaning the attacks were to go forward as planned

The temperature on the Moscow front falls to −31 °F (−37 °C), slowing the German offensive

Japanese invasion fleets departed from various locations for their destinations in British Malaya and Thailand.

Japanese aircraft scouted the American garrison on Wake Island undetected

Germans forces call off the attack on Moscow, now 11 miles away. The Soviet Red Army launches counter-attacks during a heavy blizzard

The United Kingdom declares war on Finland, Hungary & Romania

Japan declares war on the United States of America and the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand & South Africa.Australia, New Zealand and Panama declare war on Finland, Romania and Hungary

Adolf Hitler issued the Nacht und Nebel ("Night and Fog") decree, targeting political dissidents for disappearances.

Japan launched its invasion of British Malaya, at Kota Bharu, at 7:15 am Hawaiian Time (1:45 am 8 December Malaya time).

The Japanese launch surprise attack on Pearl Harbor began at 7:55 a.m. Hawaiian Time.

Japan invades Thailand and British Malaya and launches aerial attacks against Guam, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Shanghai, Singapore and Wake Island.

Football International: Germany 4-0 Slovakia, Sportpark Gräbschen, Breslau

United States of America, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Netherlands, Nicaragua and Philippines declare war on Japan. China declares war on Japan and Italy

American President Roosevelt made the Infamy Speech (with its famous opening line "Yesterday, December 7, 1941, a date which will live in infamy,") to a Joint Session of Congress. Within one hour the United States declared war on Japan. Lifelong pacifist Jeannette Rankin was the only member of Congress to vote against declaring war.

The British House of Commons convened on short notice in light of recent events. Winston Churchill made a speech concluding, "We have at least four-fifths of the population of the globe upon our side. We are responsible for their safety and their future. In the past we have had a light which flickered, in the present, we have a light which flames, and in the future, there will be a light which shines over all the land and sea.

Japanese forces take the Gilbert Islands (which include Tarawa). Clark Field in the Philippines is bombed, and many American aircraft are destroyed on the ground.

Japanese troops attack Hong Kong and British Malaya

Japanese aircraft Bomb of Singapore, killing 61.

Cuba and Guatemala declared war on Japan.

China formally declared war on Japan, Germany and Italy. The Second Sino-Japanese War had been undeclared up to this time despite being in its fifth year.

The Battle of Guam ended in Japanese victory.

Germany declared war on the United States. Hitler gave a speech to the Reichstag announcing the declaration of war.

Italy declared war on the United States. "The powers of the steel pact, Fascist Italy and Nationalist Socialist Germany, ever closely linked, participate from today on the side of heroic Japan against the United States of America," Benito Mussolini declared in a statement

Germany, Italy and Japan signed a new pact barring any of them from making a separate peace with the United States or Great Britain.

The Polish and Dutch government-in-exile declared war on Japan.

American forces repel a Japanese landing attempt at Wake Island.

The America First Committee held a special meeting and voted to dissolve itself. The organization expressed no regrets for its past activities and declared, "Our principles were right. Had they been followed, war could have been avoided.

Jews are rounded up in Lublin and interned in Majdanek concentration camp

Los Angeles had its first blackout of the war.

Romania and Bulgaria declares war on the United States of America and the United Kingdom.

Haiti, El Salvador and Panama declared war on Germany and Italy.

American forces seize French liner Normandie in New York City

Japanese landings on the southern Philippine Islands—Samar, Jolo, Mindanao

At a meeting of high ranking officials of the Nazi Party, at the Reich Chancellery in Berlin, Adolf Hitler declares the 'destruction of the Jewish race in Europe. Ordering the Holocaust, the genocide of all European Jews.

German Jews were forbidden to use public telephones.

Hungary declared war on the United States of America

Great Britain, New Zealand and South Africa declared war on Bulgaria.

Honduras declared war on Germany and Italy.

The Independent State of Croatia declared war on the United States and Britain.

The largest of the Liepāja massacres began in Latvia. From this date through December 17 a total of 2,731 Jews and 23 communists were massacred by the Nazis.

The Czechoslovak government-in-exile declared war on all countries at war with the United States of America, the United Kingdom & the Soviet Union

Erwin Rommel orders a withdrawal of German & Italian forces to El Agheila, where he had begun in March. He awaits reinforcements of men and tanks. Axis forces began to fall back to El Agheila, moving too quickly for the British 4th Armoured Brigade to outflank their retreat.

Japan forces invade Borneo.

Albania declared war on the United States.

The Siege of Sevastopol by German forces begins

Japanese forces invaded Penang Island, British Malaya

Blenheim aircraft conducted the first-night intruder attack, successfully striking Soesterberg airfield in the Netherlands with bombs and attacking two German bombers in the air with guns

Japanese forces land on Hong Kong Island.

The S-1 Committee, a forerunner of the Manhattan Project, formally met in Washington DC, for the first time and recommended that $400,000 be assigned to Ernest Lawrence's work in electromagnetic isotope separation.

Adolf Hitler relieved Walther von Brauchitsch as Commander-in-Chief of the German Army and took personal command himself. A proclamation announcing the move was published two days later.

World Lightweight Boxing Title Sammy Angott (USA) beat Lew Jenkins (USA) Pts 15, Madison Square Garden, New York City.

The Belgian government in exile declared war on Japan.

The battle for Wake Island continued with several Japanese ships sunk or damaged.

Stanisławów Ghetto officially closed from the outside and sealed with walls

Vilna Ghetto 400 Jews were killed by Lithuanian militias inside the ghetto.

The Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda Joseph Goebbels announces a winter clothing collection drive for troops on the Eastern Front. Rather than admitting to a supply shortage, he presented it as an expression of solidarity between the soldiers and the homeland.

Japanese forces invade Lingayen Gulf and Lamon Bay.

During the siege of Leningrad; it is estimated that about 3,000 are dying each day of starvation and various diseases.

The inmates at Bogdanovka concentration camp are massacred to quell an outbreak of typhus. Roughly 40,000 die.

Romanian and German units began murdering the inmates of the Bogdanovka concentration camp. By the end of the year, 30,000 Jews would be killed.

The Japanese forces land at Lingayen Gulf, on the northern part of Luzon in the Philippines

British Prime Minister Winston Churchill arrives in Washington, D.C. aboard the Duke of York after a secret ten-day journey across the Atlantic. Start of the Arcadia Conference in Washington, D.C., the first official meeting of British and American political and military leaders

General MacArthur declares Manila an "Open City".

Japanese forces land on Sarawak.

A second Japanese landing attempt on Wake Island is successful, and the American garrison surrenders after hours of fighting.

Haiti declared war on Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania.

American forces retreat into the Bataan Peninsula.

Japanese aircraft bomb Rangoon.

All Jewish ghettos in Nazi-occupied Europe are required to gather all fur coats or other furs from the Jews

Free French liberate Saint Pierre and Miquelon from Vichy France.

British forces surrender Hong Kong to Japanese forces

British Empire forces retake Benghazi.

British Prime Minister Winston Churchill addressed a joint meeting of the American Congress. He predicted that at least 18 months would be required to turn the tide of the war and warned that "many disappointments and unpleasant surprises await us.

German Flyweight Boxing Title Hans Schiffers (Germany) beat Hubert Offermanns (Germany) Rsf 2, Stadthalle, Stuttgart.

British and Norwegian Commandos raid the Norwegian port of Vågsøy, causing Hitler to reinforce the garrison and defences.

Japanese forces land on Dutch Sumatra.

Football International: Spain 3-2 Switzerland, Mestalla Stadium, Valencia

Eddie Rickenbacker President of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway announced that the 1942 Indianapolis 500 was cancelled and that the race would not be held again until after the war.

Winston Churchill made the "Chicken Speech" to the Canadian Parliament. About a comment made by Philippe Pétain that Britain would be invaded and "have its neck wrung like a chicken" by the Germans in three weeks, Churchill exclaimed, "Some chicken! Some neck!"

The end of Operation Crusader, a victory for Allied forces in North Africa.

European Lightweight Boxing Title Bruno Bistezo (Italy) beat Ascenzo Botta (Italy) Pts 12, Brancaccio Theatre, Rome.