OOOOOOO a reflection thread! Great idea!
 

Yes, the Japanese showdown mentality was their undoing. But the principle problem they had was ignorance. Their insular society had very few people who were familiar with America at all, aside from Yamamoto, who had the famous quote about awakening the sleeping giant.

But we had our own showdown strategy of getting all the capital ships of both nations together and duking it out to victory. Little did we know about the Japanese mastery of night battles (we didn't practice at night at all--might have a collision and give some ships boo-boos). We knew nothing about their advanced torpedoes or brilliance in execution thereof. See what the crew of the Houson has to say about all that!

If Japan had known us as well as they should, they would have known the phrase "Remember the Maine!" and another one similarly "Remember the Alamo!" Best not give those Yanks anything to remember. So Pearl Harbor is out. Let them attack Japan if they be so bold. Another bonus is that Pearl harbor put the means of significant American defeat safely on the bottom of the harbor with very little loss of life. Another aspect they did not understand was to power of the isolationist movement of the time, Americans completely willing to let the rest of the world go to hell, secure in the knowledge that if we left them alone, none of that mayhem would affect us. The Japanese could have used that, had they known it was available for their exploitation.

Just like the Japanese, we had a "big ship party" strategy. Had that happened, we would have taken casualties that made Pearl Harbor look like a USO dance. The Japanese would have chosen a night action, they would have unleashed several hundred Long Lance Type 93 torpedoes and we simply would have been anihilated with 10,000 dead at least. Now reflect on our attitude toward the comparitively few casualties in Iraq and imagine the reaction of the isolationist American public of the time to that! It was the symbolism of the Pearl Harbor attack, coupled with emulation of reactions to the Alamo and the Maine that galvanized American reaction. Without that rallying point and with a much more humiliation defeat for no particular purpose, there's a chance we would have pulled in our claws and called for our Mommy.

There is also a chance that the same thing would have happened. Once engaged, the Japanese had two good years of victory after victory and then it was the not so graceful swan dive for them.

I believe they were not capable of dealing with the Russians in a land battle. The Russians were methodical and covered all their bases while they just mopped the field with their enemies. The Japanese were impulsive and tactical, rather than strategic. Their strength played directly into Russian strategy. I suspect it would have been a repeat of Marshall Zhukov's earlier spanking.

Great thread here!

What-if scenarios are not just based on what the Japanese could have done - but also the state of things and the reaction.

What if the major carrier elements of the USN had been moored in Pearl during the attack? Had they been catastrophically crippled like our battleship force was, the war in the pacific would have been entirely different. The ONLY reason that we responded with carrier forces is because thats all the heavy firepower we had left. The navy brass at the time still felt that heavy warships (BB's and CA's) were the "backbone" of the fleet and would be the major combatants in the coming future conflict. Make no mistake, naval planners in the 30s were planning on having to face the Japanese.

The idea of Carrier warfare for the US was not borne of great inspiration, it was developed out of dire need. This is not to say that even the loss of our carriers as well as the rest of our surface navy would have insured a Japanese victory, but it would have extended the war tremendously.

Where the German blunders were either broadly tactical on a large scale (such as base location for the Luftwaffe) or strategic (such as the Western Invasion) - the Japanese made the mistake that the CSA in the Civil War made. They didn't really have any strategic vision - no long term goal other than to expand in whatever direction presented itself. Other than the attack on the Phillipines and the attempt to take Midway (which was folly - whether we had Ultra or not!), they really never focused on attacking the US after Pearl Harbor. Instead they looked for whatever target of opportunity could be exploited. This is what led to the creation of ABDA, which the Japanese promptly ran all over. ABDA was a polyglot collection of various naval vessels that was to defend certain areas. The only reason ABDA was smashed was it was in the way.

The Coral Sea battle is a perfect example - it was designed to defend against, and possibly eliminate Australia from the war. While I have nothing against my Aussie friends, its not like Australia was the big dog on the block in the Pacific. The Japanese saw an opening tactically they thought they could exploit. But expansion without a goal is reckless - and Coral Sea set the Japanese up for defeat at Midway.

The other thing that cost Japan was its "death before dishonor" and fanatical devotion to Hirohito. While I normally dont draw "modern" parallels - the rank and file military were told that upon their deaths they would immediately be in heaven due to their service to the Emperor. This was told to not just kamikaze pilots, but the army and navy as well - be it banzia charges or the human torpedo's that were created. This not only is a horribly ineffective waste of manpower, but it creates a "no retreat" policy that did not allow the Japanese to withdraw and consolidate along a truly defensible perimeter in the pacific. This is also told to the extremist who are encouraged to blow themselves up with as many civvies as they can so they can go to "heaven" and get a bunch of "pure girls" to enjoy eternity with.... Just something people should think about on occasion.

Lastly, the foolishness of not insuring a land corridor up the coast to where they could just sail raw materials across a small body of water instead of leaving their supply lines vulnerable to the enemy is insanity. Especially when our subs started really hurting them. They had the ability to secure a northern corridor, they just never thought of it. With them, it was Attack Attack Attack until they had wasted their strength. Once that was done, the war was over for them.

Actually the Japanese did have a strategic vision. They just didn't stick with it.;)

Japanese planners never envisaged a total defeat of the Western powers. Their intention was to strike a series of coordinated blows securing the resources of south Asia and establishing a defensive perimeter around them. This perimeter, extending well into the western Pacific Ocean, would be developed into a barrier of bases and fortified islands impregnable to amphibious assault. Behind that shield, the Imperial Navy would wait to launch javelin thrusts at counterattacks from any direction, making up for inferior numbers by use of interior lines and superior ships.

Japan, in short, proposed to fight the Pacific war as it had fought China and Russia. Limiting the conflict by escalating it's material and moral costs beyond what the Western powers, America in particular were willing to pay. The strategy was, oddly enough, based on American rationality. Americans were businessmen, not samurai. It was believed that they would calculate costs and benefits, and then come to terms with the harsh realities created by Japanese arms.

The problem came when the initial victories came much quicker and more cheaply then expected. The perimeter idea was expanded beyond the southern resource areas and the western Pacific to include the New Hebrides, the Aleutians, Midway, and then came the inevitable strategic overreach and disaster which ensued. :ping:

Excellent point torplexed - I missed seeing that!

So did the Japanese. :arrgh!:

Actually the defensive perimeter strategy even if it had been followed to the letter had fatal weaknesses. The island bases were usually too far apart to support each other, and the US was after 1943 able to bring such massively superior force to bear on each, that it ensured that any objective could be isolated and overwhelmed before Japanese naval forces could counterattack as planned. This vexing problem cropped up for the Japanese again and again during Nimitz's drive though the Gilberts and Marshall islands. The lessons the Americans learned at Tarawa set the pattern. Plus, with the exception of Truk and Rabaul the Japanese were never able to materially equip their bases to the degree needed to resist direct amphibious assault. Those few bases that were well fortified were just bypassed and left to wither on the vine.

Japan's naval bias
 

It also seems that the Japanese were too highly specialized in their navy. While their navy was argrably the finest in the world, their army wasn't up to the standard as evidenced by their battle with Marshall Zhukov in Manchuria. I believe they did not develop the land-based supply lines because it would have required use of a skill they did not have: an army which could control large areas in several countries in SE Asia with sufficient security to establish supply lines.

I don't recall any land battles where the Japanese were particularly imaginative, using feint, movement, misdirection, you know, actual military strategy to win a battle. My impression is that they were like a 1970's Big Ten College football team: three yards up the middle and a cloud of dust. Brawn vs brawn. When the other team throws a pass or runs a sweep it's all over.

I'll agree with that!

If anyone reads anything about the campaign in Burma, they'll see that, once it got over it's inferiority complex, the Anglo-Indian army ran rings around the Japanese.

May I quote the best British general of WW2?

Bill Slim certainly put that lesson into practice during the Meikteila campaign - the result? The total defeat of the Japanese in Burma and their largest land defeat of WW2.

My 2p

Mike.:cool:

For the most part I agree with the posible exception of Malaysia. :hmm: The Japanese Army did a pretty good job of bamboozling the British in the Malaysian/Singapore campaign. By continually turning the British flanks through the supposedly impentrable jungle they managed to bounce the road-bound Commonwealth forces from the Thai border back to Singapore in less than 70 days. Far less then even the Japanese General Staff had predicted. Then the Japanese won Singapore as much by bluff as strength. They were actually outnumbered by the British forces surrounded at Singapore. But short on supplies, out of room and with a civilian populace to worry about the British general chose to surrender. However, British miscalulations in that campaign is probably the element most responsible for their defeat there. (Such as 'fortress' Singapore having no guns that faced landward!)

Overall though the Japanese Army was lagging behind the times. Especially in equipment. A decade of fighting In China provided combat experience, but it also fostered a false illusion of military superiority. The Chinese were ill-equipped, poorly-led and divided. Their only real advantage was the sheer size of China and it's poor infrastructure which slowed the Japanese advance. However, China became the ruler by which the Japanese measured their martial success.

The clash with the Soviets in 1939 that Rockin Robbins mentioned should have been an eye-opener. The future Marshal Zhukov who was to make life so miserable for the Germans in the future gave the Japanese Army a bloody nose on the Manchurian border. They should have seen then that bayonets and banzai charges were not going to be a match for modern mechanized warfare. Instead the defeat was glossed over. Japan may have changed it's strategic direction from north to looking south. But the outdated infantry heavy tactics stayed the same.

Axis cooperation
 

One thing that has always surprised me is the lack of cooperation between Germany and Japan during the war. Although Germany was always bailing out the Italians when they couldn't get the job done, their attitude to Japan seems to have been "you have your little war over there and we have our big war over here and let's just not attack each other." Yes, they sent a couple of U-Boats that way, but the Japanese never seem to have realized how to use any kind of submarine.

It seems like timing of different actions in both spheres could have helped, such as having the Japanese tie up Russian armor in Manchuria or Siberia whilst Germany takes advantage of the diversion. Japanese weren't Aryans. I'll bet that colored their entire strategy process.

Add to that the fact that the Japanese resisted/ignored Nazi pressure to conduct anti-semitic, anti-jewish actions in the Far East....They did create the Shanghai 'ghetto' with admittedly very difficult living conditions, but the Jews there were not interred in concentration camps nor, as demanded by the Nazi's, sent off for extermination. Some think that it was a dislike of the Nazi Aryan superiority philosophy, because as you correctly and logically point out, the Japanese would not be included in the Aryan Uber-Race elite. Couple that with the fact that the Japanese, themselves, 'knew' that it was the Japanese race which was superior to all others. Odd bedfellows, to say the least.

With regard to Japanese potential for military success against Russia in the Far East had they inititated same in 1941, as I suggested in my initial "What-IF" scenario, I agree that the Japanese were not prepared for large-scale mechanized operations on a wide front; however, as we all know, it took everything the Russians had to just barely avoid defeat by resisting and slowing down that first German assault in June-December '41, and later to defend in '42 and ultimately counterattack (Stalingrad, for example, as the turning point). Many of the Soviet forces were comprised of Eastern Divisions/conscripts...none of which would have been available had they been already engaged against the Japanese in the Far East (even if they were occupied in 'successful' tactical or strategic actions in that region...I won't digress much here, but in Soviet military doctrine, they have a level of "Operational" warfare/art between "Tactical" and "Strategic").

In a nutshell, the weakening/lessening of available Soviet Forces facing the Germans resulting from a Japanese 1941 offensive agaisnt Russia, I think, would have easily tipped the scales in Germany's favor and enabled a German victory not later than summer '42.

Just my humble 'what-if' guess, of course.... which is the name of the game in this thread, after all...:)

A most interesting thread
 

I'm coming in late but have to agree with RR, CaptainHaplo and torplexed that

1. The Japanese were carried away with their early victories (just like the Germans) and expanded way beyond what they could defend.

2. Both countries threw away their original battle plans and decided they could beat the US just like they were doing with other lesser countries. They failed to see that the US had the resources to send 1000 plane bomber raids into both Germany and Japan. Neither side could imagine the shipbuilding capability of the US once it got started. The last US Task Force in 1945 covered over 90 square miles of ocean and the D-Day invasion had some 5,000 ships.

3. Neither of the Axis had the capability to change direction with new technology while the Allies constantly evolved with new weapons and tactics. The Germans were too late with the Type XXI, V1 and V2, and the Japanese's major superior weapons were the Zero and the Long Lance.

4. The Japanese samurai influence was not a good one for fighting a long term war. If you visit Guadacanal, Lei, Port Moresby, etc. their tactics were wrong, and threw away thousands of lives, as did Iwo Jima, Saipan, Okinawa.

There are two "what-if's" for Germany. These are what-if they had 300 U-Boats at the start of the war and , and what-if they had built the Type XXI, V1 and V2 in 1943. There are no offsetting what-if's for the Japanese other than what-if they hadn't bombed Pearl Harbor. Once they did that, their fate was sealed, just like Germany's was virtually sealed when they crossed the border into Russia.

I'm old enough to recall the troops coming home from both Europe and the Pacific and can remember them saying "We made fewer mistakes than they did. That's why we won." It suggests that our leadership at the higher levels made better decisions. Whether that is because we are democracies is a topic for future debate.

There really isn't much debate: We made better decisions than both Germany and Japan because for a large portion of the war, we were reading their mail.

This is most especially true from 1943 onward. It effected both tactical and strategic plans, both theater and conflict-wide, and it was what guided Roosevelt and Churchill in their prosecution of the war. There is even evidence that they invented a Soviet spy network specifically to feed ULTRA intelligence to Stalin in a way that it would be believed.

I guess I've never thought very highly of this idea that a dual German-Japanese assault would have neccessarily toppled the Soviet Union.

It would not have helped Germany that much if the Japanese had invaded the Soviet Far East because besides the port city of Vladivostok the Japanese had no where to go and would have had no resources with which to drive further west. The mostly horse drawn Japanese Army, was not equipped or trained in Arctic warfare and would have perished in the Siberian Lowlands in the winter when it gets 70-120 degrees below zero! The Russians could have easily limited their advance with minimal forces in such an environment even with all of the Siberian divisions called away to defend Moscow. (As it was they didn't send all of them west!) And in the summer it's a hellish hive of bugs.

Eastern Siberia back then was a mostly trackless wilderness supplied by one slender rail line with no large cities or sources of supply, it is not suited for modern war in 1941, and even now would be a logistical nightmare to keep an army supplied in. Japan was ill-equipped to fight in the sub-Arctic as their reckless invasion of the Aleutians demonstrated. Plus, Japan badly needed oil and it wasn't until well after the war that a booming oil and gas industry was developed in Siberia. Those factories that Stalin shipped east during Operation Barbarossa were mostly resettled near the Urals. That's about 2,000 miles of endless swamps, forests and rivers from the Manchurian border.

I have to agree that a third raid on Pearl Harbor would have been beneficial to the Japanese effort. However, though able to do a fair amount of damage, the carrier aircraft lacked the ability to permantently destroy the facilities IMHO. A carrier Air wing carried a far less bomb load than a few B-17's. Yes, blowing up the drydocks and oil facilities would have been good but they would have been repaired in short order. Japan did not have the resources, even if they took Midway, to conduct exetended opperations off Pearl Harbor. One also has to remember that the much of fleet that destroyed the Japanese in 1943-1944 was already ordered or being built by the time of Pearl Harbor. Had the Japanese destroyed the carriers that should have been in Pearl, won Coral Sea and Midway AND not lost a single Carrier, they still would have been blown away by the Armada that sallied forth in 1943-44.

Kevin

But the Japanese would have had more time to strengthen their positions. A retake by the Americans would have been a long lasting bloody nightmare, even with their superior naval forces.

One thing that you aren't considering is that the Japanese failed to destroy 140 million gallons of fuel sitting out in the open in tank farms.

That fuel would have been easy to destroy, and *VERY* hard to replace. It fueled the war in the Pacific on the American side for several months. If you take that out of the equation, then you have to bring tankers full of fuel to support the Navy at Pearl, or withdraw your fleet to the West Coast. Either way, you are going to have some major logistical nightmares.

It's actually kind of suprising that they Japanese didn't think to take that out in the first wave.

True, taking out the fuel would have been a good move. It would seem the Japanese only tended to focus on direct military targets, objectives and this worked to be VERY shortsigted. In reality the fuel was of probably more importance than the Battleships that they sank. An example of this mindset was in the engineering troops that the Japanese fielded as opposed to the US. In the Japanese army/navy the engineering troops were essentially slave labor troops that were deemed unfit for "real" military service. In the US, the Engineering corps were made up of professional engineers, overseeing trained construction troops. If I'm not wrong, the engineering units got one of the top picks on draftees. The difference this made was that the Japanese were barely able build a crude fighter strip after Months of work as opposed to the Army / Navy being able to get a fighter strip up in about a week and then expand that to a field able to handle bombers.

This aside, my point was that after Pearl Harbor, all the Japanese could do is prolong the inevitable. After Pearl, the US would have settled for nothing short of unconditional surrender. It would definately been a tougher go but the end would have been the same. Yes the Japanese would have had more time to prepare but you then have to remember that they had 2-3 years to prepare defences in the Islands near the home Islands as it was. Here is what I'm talking about, the US and Japan started roughly equal in carrier strength. By 1944 the Japanese had built and launched the following (and I'll include the Shinano)

1 Fleet Carrier (shinano)
5 Medium Carriers (Junyo, Hiyo, Taiho, Unryu, Amagi (1945), Katsuragi (1945))
5 Escort Carriers

The US on the other hand had built and launched:

12 Essex class Fleet Carriers
9 Independence Class Light Carriers
40+ Various Class Escort Carriers

So, even assuming that we lost all our carriers and they none in 1942 (REAL unlikely...) by 1944, the USN is still able to way outnumber the IJN.

Realistically the Japanese could not have expanded their perimeter much larger than they did. The lacked the manpower or logistical support to capture Pearl Harbor or Australia. Now they could have possibly capured Samoa and cut Australia off.

thanks,

Kevin

You know, it would have made for a much more interesting game if this "what-if" scenario had actually been made into a mod for SH4. Drag the thing out into a "you might win, you might lose" set-up instead of a "we know the USA wins, we just want to know if you'll survive to the end of it" situation.

Did I just come up with an idea for a mod? Possibly SH6? :p