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Old 04-02-07, 06:08 PM   #6
AntEater
Grey Wolf
 
Join Date: Apr 2005
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Nope.
Manchuko is partly right, it was the chinese territory of Manchuria, where the Japanese put up a puppet state headed by the last emperor of China, Pu Yi. How independent this nation really was, I cannot say, but I suppose not very independent.
But they did have their own flag and their own merchant marine and navy and should be present at least as coastal traffic in the yellow sea.
Also Manchuko would be a nice place to banish the stupid river gunboats to, to keep them from showing up in the roaring fourties...

Thailand was Thailand. Burma is the country west of Thailand which was a british colony (dominion/commonwealth/whatever) until after WW2.
Thailand is also known as Siam, but was actually called Thailand even back then by the Thais or Siamese. But in the contemporary US navy, Siam would have been the name.
Thailand was not really at war with the allies but also not really a neutral, it gave Japan basing rights, there were allied POWs in Thailand (bridge on the Kwai!), but apart from a few incidents (including the only victorious naval battle of the french navy in WW2:rotfl, Thai forces never engaged allied forces.
Thats why Thailand got away the cheapest of all the countries on the wrong side, they just delivered a few million tons of rice to india, renamed themselves Siam again (for around 4 years) and changed their government and everything was forgiven and forgotten....
But Thailand had a "real" navy:
Two 1930s build coast defence vessels with 4 x 8" guns (one sunk by the french in 1941)
One british WW1 destroyer (R Class) named Pra Ruang (ex HMS Radiant).
In some older sources, Pra Ruang is credited with sinking the USS Harder commanded by the "destroyer killer" Sam Dealey. According to combinedfleet.com, Harder was sunk by Patrol Boat 102, the former USS Steward, a captured 4-Stacker.
Eight italian build torpedo boats, around 600 tons. (two sunk by the french)
Four submarines (couldnt find anything on these)
Serveral Sloops or Gunboats, some of them quite modern japanese build vessels similar to the Ukuru class. One of them, the Phuket, still exists as a museum ship and is most likely the only japanese build WW2 era warship still existing.

Further submarines and two light cruisers were being build in Italy, but never completed due to the war.
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