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Originally Posted by Torplexed
The striking thing about the IJN and the Japanese military in general when you look back on it was their slavish mania for the offensive at the expense of defense. Everything was geared for the attack. They had destroyers and cruisers trained to a razor's edge for night surface attack with torpedoes and then guns. But they had virtually no training for ASW and woefully insufficent AA arament. They had as their primary fighter the Zero and the Betty as their primary naval strike plane. Both traded durability and protection for range and striking distance. Even in the vital carrier task forces ships sailed too far apart to properly support each with AA fire and fighter pilots on escort missions often peeled off to chase after planes before their charges reached their targets leaving them defenseless. The submarine fleet was trained to see itself as an extension of the Battle Fleet and to go after capital ships and to regard merchants as less than honorable prey. Even though they had the finest torpedo in the world at the time. As in the one case noted in the post above you even had subs equipped with attack planes.
That epitome of last ditch weapons, the Kamikaze was offensive in nature. Their last remaining operational battleship, the Yamato was sent in on a hopeless "attack" run.
This extended even to the army with suicidal banzai charges when digging in and holding ground would have bought more time. However, the Japnese Army certainly showed in New Guinea, Iwo Jima, and Palau it could be quite tenacious in defense when it wanted too.
Just shows what a lack of balance can do.  |
Good summary. Somebody knows his Pacific war.