[Christian Lupine]

All the VJ news made me wonder, in an alternate history, i.e. the U.S. loses the naval battles in the Pacific and say Japan takes over Hawaii, how much further could they reallt have gone? Was it even possible for Japan to make any serious type of land invasion of the West Coast? Even if they did attempt a West Coast landing, wouldn't it have been nearly impossible for Japan to hold that ground given the industrial might of the US Northeast? What do you think?

[Anthony EJW]

Japan had no real chance of achieving their goals. Their entire war effort, unlike the German, was futile from the start. While the Germans, if better led or with more modest aims, *might* have had some chance of success, Japan was just too insignificant industrially to compete with the world’s global economies.

[cjr]

Some statistics:
-At the start of WWII, Japan's GDP was 7% of the US.
-During WWII, 85% of US war effort went to the European theater. 15% went to the Pacific.

[Hellfish6]

I think just taking Hawaii would have been beneficial to the Japanese and quite difficult for the US to kick them out, but they also had vast amounts of their military tied down in China and Manchuria. If it wasn't for that, the war would have lasted much longer. Remember - Japan was fighting a three-front war (Burma, China, Pacific islands).

If the Japanese took Hawaii and were able to free up some soldiers from China, I think they best they could have hoped for was the Panama Canal. I really don't think they'd ever have been capable of taking anything in the mainland US.

[Cromwell]

Jappan's big mistake was attacking the US. It was after all tangental to their real goals which was gaining the raw mwterials necessary to build an empire in Continenttal Asia. Therefor they attacked the British, Vichy French and Dutch posessions. The Phillipines did not really have the oil and rubber that they deperately needed. But given that they thought that the US would enter the war when they made their big push, Yamamoto insisted that the US Pac fleet be eliminated to provide breathing room (6 months was his estimate and 6 mnths was what they got). However he was only given the minimum number of carriers, the rest went south. This necessitated the invasion of the Phillipines and the Islands of the western pacific to provide airfields to protect and nourash their fleet.
Their only hope having miscalculated the need to attack the US and its possessions would be invaded Hawai at the same time or soon after the aerial attack. This would have bought them more time. Ulimately though it was folly they should have mved much more slowly. Obviosly the Atomic bomb could not have been part of the process. Lastly dictatorships rarely act in rational ways. Our democratic system ensures that the political leadership in times of crisis can turn to every one at the conferance table, a dictator must always calculate that everyone in his government is an enemy.

[FormerBlue]

Christian Lupine, on Tue 16 Aug 2005 1609, said:

All the VJ news made me wonder, in an alternate history, i.e. the U.S. loses the naval battles in the Pacific and say Japan takes over Hawaii, how much further could they reallt have gone?  Was it even possible for Japan to make any serious type of land invasion of the West Coast?  Even if they did attempt a West Coast landing, wouldn't it have been nearly impossible for Japan to hold that ground given the industrial might of the US Northeast?  What do you think?

They knew it wasn't a good long-term game. The hope was the sinking of CINCUSPAC (say it out loud...) and getting a settlement at the table.

"If you tell me that it is necessary that we fight, then in the first six months to a year I will run wild, and I will show you an uninterrupted succession of victories. Should the war be prolonged for two or three years....I have no confidence in our ultimate victory" - Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto

[Wyvern75]

Probably the dumbest thing the Japanese could have done would have been to attepmt to take the Hawaiian Islands. The logistics, the amount of land to take and the Japanese ability to invade against minor opposition was poor, let alone trying to do over the beach support. The Japanese were not prepared for a conquest of the Pacific. They had the ability to sieze a few ill defended Islands, but not something as large as the Hawaiian Islands. The Japanese may have had the ability to grab Midway in early January '42 but they didn't attempt taking Midway until it was way too late.


Vichy Indochina was pretty easy to take. Better and more imaginative British Commanders may have saved Singapore. Not having MacArthur or his staff may have saved the Philippines I am not sure what the Dutch could have done to have saved their possessions, too much of the natives were supporting the Japanese.

[nitflegal]

Japan taking Hawaii is pretty much a non-starter. They didn't have the landing and transport craft to do it, even if they shut down all of their other invasions. Too far away, quite well defended, and incredibly difficult to supply after the initial invasion.

Which is really the problem for them. If they call off the invasions of other islands to target Hawaii, then absolute best case they now hold an island with a large population far away from Japan without conquering the islands along their new, extended supply route. That's giving them a big hand wave and assuming that they could take Hawaii. It's that old problem, they were stretched as it was in the real world, so to do something beyond what they did they need to curtail something to provide sources.

I've often thought that the best thing that they could do would have been impossible for them. Had they launched the invasion of China and done everything that they could to minimize atrocities, they might have been able to parlay that into less outrage over their invasion. If they'd played it correctly, they might have been able to survive the diplomatic consequences, especially as a nasty war was starting in Europe. As a wild card, have Japan drop the whole Axis bit (which didn't seem to do diddly for them) and offer whatever assistance needed to the UK in 39/40. probably not much of real value, but if the offer wasn't rejected out of hand they might be able to pull off being seen as a pseudo-ally, especially pre-Barbarossa when they could make the case of hindering Soviet expansion by providing a threat on their East coast.

It's a long shot, but as soon as they declared war on the US/UK, they were doomed. They need to avoid that at all costs.

Matt

[swerve]

cjr, on Tue 16 Aug 2005 1647, said:

Some statistics:
-At the start of WWII, Japan's GDP was 7% of the US.
-During WWII, 85% of US war effort went to the European theater. 15% went to the Pacific.

According to Angus Maddison (The World Economy: Historical Statistics, & The World Economy: A Millennial Perspective)

GDP (1990 billion USD)

1938 1940 1941
Japan 176 210 213
Korea 37.8 38.0 38.5
Taiwan 7.4 8.1 8.9
Total 221 256 260

USA 799 930 1099

UK 298 331 361
Germany 342 377 401
USSR 405 420 334
France 187 166 131
Italy 144 155 154

Maddisons & his collaborators estimates are as good as you'll get (that doesn't mean they're perfect). I make Japanese GDP at the start of WW2 somewhere between 19 & 28% of the USAs, depending on what you include (empire or not) & which year you choose as the start. However, it doesn't affect the fact that it wasn't enough, especially as a smaller proportion of it was potentially mobilisable for the war effort, & the gap widened rapidly as the war went on.

PS. The Commonwealth added quite a bit to the UK. Adding Canada, Australia & New Zealand made a combined total comfortably ahead of Germany.

This post has been edited by swerve: 16 August 2005 - 1524 PM

[FlyingCanOpener]

Anthony EJW, on Tue 16 Aug 2005 1624, said:

Japan had no real chance of achieving their goals. Their entire war effort, unlike the German, was futile from the start. While the Germans, if better led or with more modest aims, *might* have had some chance of success, Japan was just too insignificant industrially to compete with the world’s global economies.

Well, if the Japanese managed to knock out the Pacific fleet, including the carriers (CINCUSPAC is the Commander in Chief of the US Pacific Fleet, which is a man, not a fleet FormerBlue ;)), it would have been a lot closer to reality as it would have freed their hand to run amok in Western Pacific until the US could rebuild their strength. The Japanese still couldn't touch Hawai'i, as (1) they pretty much tapped their reserves out in the strike on Pearl Harbor, and (2) the US could still shift capital ships and carriers from the Atlantic Fleet to cover Hawai'i. The element of surprise would be gone, so no more ambushes. After this it gets real interesting...

This post has been edited by FlyingCanOpener: 16 August 2005 - 2009 PM

[FlyingCanOpener]

Murph, on Wed 17 Aug 2005 0134, said:

I think Japan would have been better served going south to Australia, and New Zealand.  Better basing, and a better shot at the Indian Ocean.

Australia would have been as ludicrous of an invasion as Hawai'i or the US, unfortunately. Considering the deployment of manpower as it was in December 1941, actually pulling off an invasion would have been doomed from the start. Considering you can take 2/3 of an entire continent and only then make contact of the enemy is a daunting enough challenge, much less for a severely overstretched enemy.

Even only taking say Darwin wouldn't work for the Japanese as despite have ing a foothold on Australia they would have to protect it from the Australian army attacking from Eastern Australia or even a counter-amphibious landing. It would have been much easier to keep a modest-sized bomber force on New Guinea to keep heads down in Darwin and shift the main naval force to say Singapore if they wanted to challenge in the Indian Ocean.

This review of a book outlining a flawed idea for continental defence gives a quite concise reason for the inability of Japan to try to invade Australia.

Here's the most relevant point:

Quote

The Japanese used the bombing of Darwin and other northern towns as a means of drawing off large military resources which could not be committed to the campaign in Papua and New Guinea. A Japanese invasion of Australia would not have been through a Perth or Darwin axis. These points could be essentially neutralised by minor attacks. The focus of invasion would have been the south-eastern boomerang. We can ask the counterfactual question what would have happened if Japan had won the battles for Papua and the Solomon islands? In the event of a delayed response from the United States the Japanese would almost certainly have attempted to invade Australia. This would have been only possible if they were able to withdraw troops from China and find sufficient shipping to land the troops on the east coast. A successful lodgement would have extended their supply lines further and only in the event of a rapid rout of Australian forces could the invasion have been sustained.

[Rickshaw]

I've always felt that the Japanese started the war incorrectly. Instead of mounting a air raid which was intended purely to destroy/disable ships, they would have been far better off combining that with a seaborne raiding party who's intention was to occupy the harbour installations at Pearl Harbor and destroy them. Without the drydock, the US Navy's recovering would have been set back far more significantly than what it was. The war would have been lengthened by at least one to two years, while the US was forced to rebuild first the infrastructure and then the naval forces destroyed at Pear Harbor, rather than just the ships.

The occupation would have been short, only a week or so, the US forces on the islands would have been inadequate to prevent it from achieving its objectives and the US Navy ineffectual to prevent either the initial landing or its subsequent withdrawal.

If it could have been done simulteanously with a strike on the Panama Canal locks, it would have resulted in the US being pretty hard pressed to mount an effective response for quite a long time.

Ultimately, however it has to be recognised that these would only delay, they wouldn't stop a US response from appearing. Perhaps the Japanese should have gone NE, instead, into the USSR?

[FormerBlue]

FlyingCanOpener, on Wed 17 Aug 2005 0107, said:

Well, if the Japanese managed to knock out the Pacific fleet, including the carriers (CINCUSPAC is the Commander in Chief of the US Pacific Fleet, which is a man, not a fleet FormerBlue ;)), it would have been a lot closer to reality as it would have freed their hand to run amok in Western Pacific until the US could rebuild their strength. The Japanese still couldn't touch Hawai'i, as (1) they pretty much tapped their reserves out in the strike on Pearl Harbor, and (2) the US could still shift capital ships and carriers from the Atlantic Fleet to cover Hawai'i. The element of surprise would be gone, so no more ambushes. After this it gets real interesting...

Tis been mentioned a number of times that the designation was rather unfortunate. USPacFleet doesn't sound as odd as CINCUSPAC (Sink US Pac). They Japanese were just following the suggestion...

[UN-Interested Observer]

It seems that had the Japanese paid slightly more attention to electronics before the war, and more attention to communications during the war, and made even rudimentary plans for convoys to exploit their new watery empire, they might have had more success. Come to think of it they could simply have communicated with their German colleagues at the outbreak of hostilites & performed some technology exchange programs. Worst comes to worse, just don't communicate over the airwaves. Give battle fleets autonomy, let them communicate internally with visual signals.

And if every torpedo had had a human pilot... Well it seems to me that a submarine would be capable of sinking destroyers before the latter could close the range, and Japan had a formidable array of submarines.

[KingSargent]

We did a thread on a possible Hawaiian op in 1941. I postulated using the 25th Army under Yamashita (which took Malaya) and delaying ops in the NEI - SE Asia. The NEI/SEA weren't going anywhere and they weren't going to be massively reinforced either.

The plan collapsed when I checked the oilers. Virtually every one of Japan's oilers were used just to support the PH raid. There was nothing to fuel an invasion force crossing the Pacific. They would have had problems with food and fresh water for the troops on a trans-Pacific voyage as well.

IMHO, the best alternative approach for Japan in 1941 was to not attack the US at all. All Pearl Harbor did was really piss the US off. The US Fleet wasn't going to SE Asia, especially without a declaration of war (no certain thing if the Japs had confined themselves to British and Dutch colonies). We didn't have enough oilers to move the Fleet that far either....

The Philippines could have been bypassed and the invasion forces could have gone directly to the oil fields in NEI. The US forces in the PI were pretty impotent (although the B-17s were a lot scarier for the Japanese than they turned out to be) and aren't going to be attacking Japanese invasion convoys, especially if the 1st Air Fleet is supporting the SE Asian ops instead of beating up Hawaii.

It would at least have given FDR more headaches trying to convince Congress to get into the war when the Japanese were scrupulously avoiding striking American people or possessions.

[swerve]

KingSargent, on Wed 17 Aug 2005 0447, said:

IMHO, the best alternative approach for Japan in 1941 was to not attack the US at all. All Pearl Harbor did was really piss the US off. The US Fleet wasn't going to SE Asia, especially without a declaration of war (no certain thing if the Japs had confined themselves to British and Dutch  colonies). We didn't have enough oilers to move the Fleet that far either....

The Philippines could have been bypassed and the invasion forces could have gone directly to the oil fields in NEI. The US forces in the PI were pretty impotent (although the B-17s were a lot scarier for the Japanese than they turned out to be) and aren't going to be attacking Japanese invasion convoys, especially if the 1st Air Fleet is supporting the SE Asian ops instead of beating up Hawaii.

That is a very scary suggestion.

The carriers used for PH could have screened the Philippines, in case the USA did decide to join in, with strict orders not to provoke anything. Put Yamamoto in charge & those orders would have been scrupulously obeyed.

That would have left them with time & resources to tidy up the SW Pacific & neutralise Australia & New Zealand (no need to invade) fairly easily, & either build up forces in Burma for a better supplied invasion of India, or work along the coast (feasible, once the Pacific is no longer occupying most of the IJN), or even invade Ceylon (a much shorter move from Singapore than Hawaii is from anywhere) & deprive the UK of the use of Trincomalee - or use it as a base themselves. We'd have been in deep doo-doo with the IJN loose in the Indian Ocean in force, able to raid our oil supply route from Persia. IJN subs lurking off the mouth of the Red Sea & Persian Gulf - shudder!

[Miner]

FlyingCanOpener, on Wed 17 Aug 2005 1157, said:

Even only taking say Darwin wouldn't work for the Japanese as despite have ing a foothold on Australia they would have to protect it from the Australian army attacking from Eastern Australia or even a counter-amphibious landing. It would have been much easier to keep a modest-sized bomber force on New Guinea to keep heads down in Darwin

In 1942 Darwin was essentially an island with 800 miles of dirt track (to call it a road would be misleading) to a railway line. It is also 1000 miles from Port Moresby. The bombers came from places like Timor - only 400 miles.

[Ken Estes]

KingSargent, on Wed 17 Aug 2005 0447, said:

We did a thread on a possible Hawaiian op in 1941. I postulated using the 25th Army under Yamashita (which took Malaya) and delaying ops in the NEI - SE Asia. The NEI/SEA weren't going anywhere and they weren't going to be massively reinforced either.

The plan collapsed when I checked the oilers. Virtually every one of Japan's oilers were used just to support the PH raid. There was nothing to fuel an invasion force crossing the Pacific. They would have had problems with food and fresh water for the troops on a trans-Pacific voyage as well.

IMHO, the best alternative approach for Japan in 1941 was to not attack the US at all. All Pearl Harbor did was really piss the US off. The US Fleet wasn't going to SE Asia, especially without a declaration of war (no certain thing if the Japs had confined themselves to British and Dutch  colonies). We didn't have enough oilers to move the Fleet that far either....

The Philippines could have been bypassed and the invasion forces could have gone directly to the oil fields in NEI. The US forces in the PI were pretty impotent (although the B-17s were a lot scarier for the Japanese than they turned out to be) and aren't going to be attacking Japanese invasion convoys, especially if the 1st Air Fleet is supporting the SE Asian ops instead of beating up Hawaii.

It would at least have given FDR more headaches trying to convince Congress to get into the war when the Japanese were scrupulously avoiding striking American people or possessions.

The oil and the oiler are the Achilles heels for both sides, King, your point is well taken. Few of us remember that the JA/IJN have the most advanced and capable amphibious forces in the world through 1942. The Canton landings of 1939 were corps sized. The little USMC/Army could maybe land a regiment at the time.

The decision to attack PH assured the US entry and the Japanese demise. A gambler would have done the Philippines bypass, and that is much less a gamble than a direct attack on US forces.

The decision for the IJN to make in March 1942, best put by H.P. Wilmott, is among the following:

(1) E to Hawaii
(2) So to Australia
(3) W to Persian Gulf, linking with the rest of the Axis

The distances to 1 are horrendous, the army would not cooperate for 2 and there was no alliance with the Germans to effect 3, but Wilmott still maintains it (3) was their best shot, certainly a strategic blow unlike any accomplished by the Axis anywhere.

Yamamoto, frustrated, opts for a modified 1, hoping he can trick the USN into a decisive Midway battle, which they would lose, leaving Hawaii ripe for the taking once Midway became a staging base. But first losing the services of 2 CVs for no gain at Coral Sea [Pt. Moresby being a modified 2] places the whole strategy in jeopardy. The Japanese, it would seem, could never wean themselves of the divided approach of separate forces, and dividing in face of an enemy was something only a genius like l'Empereur could try.

[RETAC21]

KingSargent, on Wed 17 Aug 2005 0447, said:

We did a thread on a possible Hawaiian op in 1941. I postulated using the 25th Army under Yamashita (which took Malaya) and delaying ops in the NEI - SE Asia. The NEI/SEA weren't going anywhere and they weren't going to be massively reinforced either.

The plan collapsed when I checked the oilers. Virtually every one of Japan's oilers were used just to support the PH raid. There was nothing to fuel an invasion force crossing the Pacific. They would have had problems with food and fresh water for the troops on a trans-Pacific voyage as well.

tsk, tsk, the Japanese didn't use naval oilers for Pearl Harbor, but fast commercial tankers adapted, so while there was little else to refuel the fast carriers, there were still tankers and oilers to keep the invasion force going, albeit sincronisation with the attack may be a problem, due to the different speeds.
On the other hand, a lot of troops are going to be needed to overcome the 2 divisions and the coast defences, plus beaches were not suitable for a landing.