Darwin was lightly defended relative to the size of the attack, and the Japanese inflicted heavy losses upon Allied forces at little cost to themselves.

By October 1941 plans were underway to position fuel and supplies with two ships, including USAT Don Esteban, being chartered and actively engaged in that purpose when war came.

[8][12] An improvised plan for support of the Philippines and the Dutch East Indies was completed in Washington on 20 December 1941 by the U.S. Army General Staff.

In order to protect these landings from Allied interference, the Japanese military command decided to conduct a major air raid on Darwin.

[19] Among the ships in harbour were those returned the morning before the attack from the convoy escorted by USS Houston involved in the failed effort to reinforce Timor.

[17] At the time of the event, there was no functional radar to provide early warning of air raids, and the town's civil defences were dysfunctional.

The warships included the United States Navy (USN) destroyer Peary and seaplane tender William B. Preston.

[32] In addition to the vessels in port, the American Army supply ships Don Isidro and Florence D., former Philippine vessels acquired as part of the South West Pacific Area command's permanent Army fleet earlier in February,[33] were near Bathurst Island bound for the Philippines with arms and supplies on the morning of the raid.

[15] On their way to Darwin, Zeros shot down a US Navy PBY Catalina and strafed a USAAF C-47 Skytrain on the ground, near Melville Island.

[37] No general alarm was given until about 10 am as the RAAF officers there wrongly judged that the aircraft which had been sighted were the ten USAAF P-40s, which were returning to Darwin at the time after reports of bad weather forced them to abort a flight to Java via Kupang, West Timor.

[43] Japanese aircraft bombed and strafed the base and civil airfield, as well as the town's army barracks and oil store.

[1] In 2013, a reference was discovered in Japanese records to a Nakajima torpedo bomber suffering wheel damage from a "gunshot" and both crew (names unknown) being rescued after ditching (by the destroyer Tanikaze).

Only one of the USAAF P-40 pilots remained airborne throughout the first attack, 1st Lieutenant Robert Oestreicher, who has also been credited by US and Japanese sources with one Aichi shot down and one damaged.

[39][50] Toyoshima's Zero is considered to have been brought down by small arms fire from Sappers Tom Lamb and Len O'Shea of the 19th Battalion.

[48] Most aviation historians believe Tsuru and Uchikado's Aichi was brought down by ground fire,[51] possibly from a major Australian Army camp at Winnellie.

Due to defective fuses, the Australian heavy anti-aircraft flak gunners were unable to shoot down or damage any of the high-flying Japanese aircraft.

The Japanese carrier force launched a small number of D3A dive bombers during the afternoon of 19 February to attack the Florence D. and Don Isidro.

[55] Among the survivors of Florence D. were the rescued crew of a U.S. Navy PBY piloted by then Lt Thomas H. Moorer (later to become Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff).

[56] Admiral Halstead, strafed and with plates damaged by near misses, was brought to the pier where U.S. Army volunteers along with survivors of the U.S. and Philippine vessels helped unload her 14,000 drums of aviation gasoline.

[58] The air raids caused chaos in Darwin, with most essential services including water and electricity being badly damaged or destroyed.

[61] In the words of journalist Douglas Lockwood, after the second Japanese air raid, the commander of RAAF Darwin, Wing Commander Stuart Griffith: summoned his senior administrative officer, Squadron Leader Swan, and gave a verbal order that all airmen were to move half a mile down the main road and then half a mile inland.

[63] The Australian Army also faced difficulty controlling some of its own troops from looting private property, including "furniture, refrigerators, stoves, pianos, clothes[,] [and] even children's toys" due to the breakdown of law and order after the bombing and the ensuing chaos.

[65] The bombing of Darwin resulted in the destruction of 7 of the 11 above ground storage tanks, located on Stokes Hill, in raids on 19 February 16 March and 16 June 1942.

On the day of the attack the prime minister is quoted on the front pages of most newspapers: "Damage to property was considerable", he said, "but reports so far to hand do not give precise particulars about the loss of life."

"[127] After the 19 February 1942 Japanese raid, the Northern Territory and parts of Western Australia's north were bombed approximately 100 times between 4 March 1942 and 12 November 1943.

[121] One of the heaviest attacks took place on 16 June 1942 when a Japanese force set fire to the oil fuel tanks around the harbour and inflicted severe damage to the vacant banks, stores and railway yards.

The Allied navies largely abandoned the naval base at Darwin after the initial 19 February attack, dispersing most of their forces to Brisbane, Fremantle, and other, smaller, seaports.

Conversely, Allied air commanders launched a build-up in the Darwin area, building more airfields and deploying many squadrons.

The four IJN aircraft carriers (Akagi, Kaga, Hiryū, and Sōryū) that participated in the Bombing of Darwin were later sunk during the Battle of Midway in June 1942.

On 19 February at the Cenotaph in Darwin, at 9:58 am, a World War II air-raid siren sounds to mark the precise time of the first attack.