SUBSIM Radio Room Forums - War Topic: what would YOU have done re Pearl Harbor?

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Why do a remake? The original is as near perfect as it can get.

Hey, Pearl Harbour was a good film :D

*runs, hides*

:p

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Originally Posted by sonar732

With the IJN's familiar strategy of splitting their forces, I'm surprised that they didn't attack the west coast on the same day. How many carriers did the IJN have in late '41? Could've a carrier been placed at major shipbuilding/repair facilities at the same time? Besides the obvious fuel depots, they didn't touch the repair facilities that worked day in and day out during the war. Bremerton was utilized full throttle also.

My guess is that trying to send something that close to the mother ship (West Coast of the US) and keep it hidden would have been problematic, at best. The chances of being spotted are too great, and might have blown the cover off the impending Hawaii attack.

On the other hand, a simultanous attack on Midway might have helped.

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Originally Posted by Takeda Shingen

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Originally Posted by fatty

Blast Pearl and then keep going on to seize Panama.

Why? Pacific coast shipbuilding industries were more than sufficient to make up for the numbers lost in Pearl. Seizing Panama results in the taking of a relatively insignificant facility while dangerously overextending Japan's already overextended forces.

I think he was thinking that if you are able to blast the West coast ship yards, and keep them damaged, the East coast is the only other place to build without risk of damage at the yards, and then ship those carriers through Panama. If Panama was choked off, you'd still pin the US to their own borders, and carriers would have to go all the way south around South America (though again, this delays the inveitable, doesn't it?).

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Originally Posted by XabbaRus

but the time vortex doesn't allow them to change history.

And had they changed history, that atomic pile in their belly would cease to exist, since WW II was responsible for us entering the Atomic Age in the first place (Yes, it might have happened anyway, but we all know that war is the mother of invention).

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Originally Posted by mookiemookie

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Originally Posted by Zayphod

See, that was my thinking as well (the holding Hawaii as a base, not the poison gas thing), since whoever holds it has a huge base at the half-way point across the Pacific. Look at why Hawaii was so important to the US, and you'd understand why it would have been just as important to the Japanese. With no refuling base anywhere decent in the Pacific, the US would have had to base their ships in San Francisco / Los Angeles until much, much later in the war.

Using Hawaii as a refuling point for their ships, the IJN could have pinned the US Navy back to the west coast (at least, until the industrial might of the US managed to re-build the fleet).

Once pinned against the wall, rebuilding ships would have been much more difficult, and without carriers, we never could have re-taken Hawaii. Without Hawaii, no taking Midway, and without Midway, no other islands to the west. Sort of like chess, huh?

But in summary, there's no real way that the Japanese could have brought enough troops to take Hawaii, as it would have been defended by 75,000-100,000 US troops on the ground. Can you imagine trying to bring an invasion force all the way over from the home islands in numbers necessary to take the island? Don't forget that the Japanese still had their force in China to supply. They did not have an inexhausatble amount of troops to bring to bear on Hawaii. They just did not have the manpower to do it.

Part of Pearl Harbor's success is that it happened suddenly. A task force of carriers going 25-30 knots is a lot harder to find than a fleet of troop transports doing 10-15 knots. The surprise angle would have most likely been lost and the force would have come under attack before reaching Hawaii, and Pearl would have been ready.

Let's assume that they did take Hawaii. How would you keep it supplied? The Japanese couldn't even supply the garrison on Wake Island, how could they have kept men and materiel flowing to an occupying force the size needed to hold a major US possession like Hawaii? They were already working under a shipping shortage in trying to keep holdings in China, Malaysia and the Philippines supplied. Now you want to add Hawaii and its distance all the way across the Pacific into the mix? The transit time alone would exacerbate the situation. Empty ships travelling back from Hawaii are effectively out of service until they make their way back to the Home Islands.

As for the carrier aspect, Combined Fleet addresses it here: http://www.combinedfleet.com/economic.htm

In short, what it says is that the US could build carriers so quickly that they would have caught up with Japan in a relatively short amount of time. Midway and the Solomon Islands wouldn't have happened if we had lost the carriers at Pearl, but the pace at which we could have replaced those losses means that Japan would have bought themself time but that's it. They would have prolonged the war, but definately not have won it. Remember why we won the way we did: we outproduced the other side.

EDIT: Sorry...didn't realize joea had already posted this link. I still think it presents an excellent case though!

I think that this was part of the problem that the leaders in Japan hadn't thought of before. Hawaii needed to be taken. The fact that it wasn't gives us the history lesson of not killing your enemy, but allowing him to live - he'll come back to haunt you. So many evil overlords have learned this the hard way (see every James Bond movie where the bad guy just misses the opportunity to kill the hero, and instead gives him an escape route, instead of just putting a bullet through the head).

Basically, you're saying that Japan was not prepared to take Hawaii, and I understand that. The question was "What would you have done differently if you were in charge of Japan's war resources?" i.e, take the necessary troups and make the invasion possible, take Midway at the same time, draw on other resources to make it happen.

I guess it comes down to Japan not really being ready for the fight they started. I agree about the manpower issue. I think they should have used a Ferengi method to buy time: "Every now and then, make peace with your enemies - it confuses the hell out of them."

Granted, they weren't at war with us YET, but they could have pretended to concede some things, while in the background, secretly prepare what was needed to make things happen.

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Originally Posted by Zayphod

lets not forget the japanese bombardement of the Ellwood oil fields

http://www.militarymuseum.org/Ellwood.html

altough by somthing a wee bit smaller than a carrier:roll:

In hindsight it was probably a counter productive move by the Japanese :hmm:

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Originally Posted by jimbuna

In hindsight it was probably a counter productive move by the Japanese :hmm:

...and Hitler, now that I think about it. Had he set his scientists into production building those V2 rockets long before the 1944 timeframe, i.e., prior to invading Poland, things might have worked out differently as well.

But that's conjecture for another thread.

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Originally Posted by Zayphod

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Originally Posted by Takeda Shingen

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Originally Posted by fatty

Blast Pearl and then keep going on to seize Panama.

Yep. It'll do ya no good. Stay away from Panama.

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Originally Posted by Zayphod

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Originally Posted by jimbuna

In hindsight it was probably a counter productive move by the Japanese :hmm:

Or, utilized his resources and learned from the Japanese regarding aircraft carriers. Imagine if Hitler didn't bide into the bickering between the submarine and air forces stall tactics and would've had the Graf Zeppelin in the Atlantic? Even though it was a small carrier, combined with the U-boats, the Battle of the Atlantic would've been completely different strategically. The U.S. would've had to worry about the G.F. coming close to shore and bombing key cities on the East Coast and the Atlantic Fleet would've been hunting her down instead of escorting transports.

Here's a bigger and more important question . . . the US Strategy would have been for the Battle Fleet to sail across the pacific to relieve the US and Allied Forces in the Dutch East Indies and the Philippine Islands. Now say that Japanese forces invade Dutch East Indies, without attacking US posessions . . . would Japane be able to hold those territories without other western powers declaring a state of war against it. For instance they posessed French Indochina under the auspice that they were doing so on behalf of the Vichy French. Could they not argue that they were holding the Dutch East Indies under an agreement with the government under German occupation?
This would have provided the raw material and resources needed to continue their war on the mainland . . . and countinue building up their naval forces for the inevitable move by western powers.
For if they were able to strengthen their forces in Truk and other central pacific locations, I beleive the US Battle fleet would not hold up against the airpower on those far flung outpost . . . given the fact that their route to relieve Guam and the Philippine Islands are easily predictable.

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Originally Posted by JALU3

Yes it wouldn't have made much of a diffrence. Japan would have had the same advantages it had after PH the US would only have had a few additional BBs to slow its forces down. However I think the US could have at least got a few carriers within range of the Phillipines to resupply them with badly needed aircraft which it didn't try.

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Originally Posted by TLAM Strike

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Originally Posted by JALU3

Furthermore, the US Battle Fleet would have needed more oil to steam across to Guam and PI . . . meaning more slower tankers to follow . . . meaning an easier target for Truk based Aircraft and Carrier Based Aircraft. We'd be reading about the disaster at Truk today if there was no pearl harbor.
But that is if Japan attempted to engage the US, which we have shown that they did not have to do in order to secure the resources in the Dutch East Indies.

I am real late to the party on this. No matter what, Japan would have been defeated, even if they took Hawai, the oil, sunk our carriers, etc. No nation in the world could have competed with the USA's industrial capacity once geared up which was greater than every other leading nation during WW2 combined. We had the resources, the labor (due to the depression which was made worse by FDRs New Deal), and the will to become the most powerful nation on the planet. Unfortunately we are a mere shadow of this today.