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Post by oldpop2000 on Nov 12, 2022 7:53:10 GMT -6
Japanese Naval Preparations for World War II.pdf (229.03 KB) Based upon my research with above article and my books, there were two problems for the IJN. There was no single strategic plan as to how to conduct the naval war. The Naval General Staff had their interception-attrition strategy. The above article will explain this strategy. However, the Combined Fleet and staff had their own plan, and it was based on offense. The Combined Fleet would take the offense to the US fleet to demoralize our navy and country. This strategy required the fleet fight together, as Mahan had said. However, it was not conducted in that manner. Either the carrier fleet should have been sent to conduct Operation MO and take Port Moresby, move down the Solomons and fight the decisive battle at Coral Sea, or wait, and attack Midway with all of their carriers to overwhelm our carriers. They did neither of these. They separated their carrier fleet and ultimately paid the price. Midway should never have taken place. Had they sunk at least two of our carriers, maybe more at Coral Sea, then they could have conducted the Interception-attrition strategy in Micronesia.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Nov 13, 2022 9:47:22 GMT -6
I've changed the name of the thread to reflect all naval warfare. Please feel free to put in your thoughts on any naval battle.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Nov 13, 2022 14:49:50 GMT -6
One of the terms used to represent the Japanese Navy operational failures was "victory disease". It simply means that they were so successful in the first five months of the war, that they did not feel they could lose. I don't subscribe to that idea. I believe their problem was deeper in the organization and planning of the Combined fleet and Naval General Staff. Japanese operational planning was ar too complex and detailed for naval warfare at this time. Communications between forces was not reliable and neither was signal intelligence. This overly complex operational planning laid the groundwork for the failures at Coral Sea and Midway. Here are my operational plans for the Japanese operations after April 1942 when the Southern operation was completed. The carrier force would consist of 7 fleet carriers (Junyo was the seventh fleet carrier" and one light carrier for every operation. Here they are:
Operation MO-Port Moresby Operation MI-Midway Operation NC - New Caledonia (This would include Tulagi, and Guadalcanal and possibly Vanuatu) Operation FI- Fiji
Note: I have left out Operation AL - bombers were not going to fly from the Aleutians to bomb Japan. The weather was far too icey for reliable attacks. Fighters could have been stationed in Hokkaido to defend the northern path. It is at least 2794 Miles from Adak to the main island of Japan.
This strategic plan would not separate the carrier force, all carriers would be available along with Musashi and Yamato battleships.
I believe this plan would have been much more successful.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Nov 13, 2022 15:28:15 GMT -6
Here is an alternate plan based on the concept of continuing with a Phase 2 aimed at blocking supplies and forces from going to Australia. I would leave at least three light carriers in Truk with some older battleships to cover the northern flank of the operations in the south.
Operation MO-Port Moresby Operation NC - New Caledonia (This would include Tulagi, and Guadalcanal and possibly Vanuatu) Operation FI- Fiji
Note: Here is one caveat about my suggested plans. The US will commission the Essex on July 1942. The Yorktown will be available on April 1943. This means that the Japanese will have to sink all of the Yorktown class carriers within one year of April 1942 to maintain an advantage over the US. Taiho will not be commissioned until 1944 for the IJN, the Unryu class will not be available until 1944. This means that all the plans have about one year to be completed successfully with few carrier losses.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Nov 19, 2022 20:25:21 GMT -6
When you analyze an event like the Attack on Pearl Harbor, you have to assess its effect on the strategic goals of the attacking nation. This is what both Alfred Thayer Mahan and Antoine-Heni Jomini stated. But in assessing Pearl Harbor, can we really say it furthered the Imperial Japanese Navy strategic goals? I don't think it did, here is why.
The two main goals of the Imperial Naval General Staff and the Combined Fleet were to move south, capture all of Southeast Asia to gain natural resources. A second goal was to force the US to quit because of the emotional effect, the destruction would have on their isolationist view. Now, did that happen, is the question?
Well, it was a tactical victory, they accomplished their tactical and operational goal; to destroy our Pacific Fleet to allow them time to complete the first phase of their southern Operation. But did it really further their strategic goal of forcing us to quit the war because of their assessment that we could not cope with the defeat. No, it actually worked the other way. Yamamoto, I believe actually knew it would not, and it did not. We replaced the aircraft destroyed in 15 days, and only two battleships were actually lost. The others were refloated, and repair. The key was the carriers, and they weren't there.
But the real important point was that all it did was to fill us with resolve to go after the Japanese and as one senior officer said, "Make the Japanese language only spoken in Hades". Pearl Harbor success did not further their strategic goal. The next operation to attack and occupy Port Moresby and the Solomon's failed. Many historians give the IJN a minor victory at Coral Sea, I don't agree but that is another story. The major, important strategic goal failed and from then on, almost every operation, failed.
When we analyze an event like a victory in a tactical battle, we have to analyze, it in an operational but more importantly, a strategic sense. Does the victory further the operation, and does it contribute to the strategic goals of the nation. If it doesn't, it is a failure.
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Post by zederfflinger on Nov 19, 2022 22:05:09 GMT -6
When you analyze an event like the Attack on Pearl Harbor, you have to assess its effect on the strategic goals of the attacking nation. This is what both Alfred Thayer Mahan and Antoine-Heni Jomini stated. But in assessing Pearl Harbor, can we really say it furthered the Imperial Japanese Navy strategic goals? I don't think it did, here is why. The two main goals of the Imperial Naval General Staff and the Combined Fleet were to move south, capture all of Southeast Asia to gain natural resources. A second goal was to force the US to quit because of the emotional effect, the destruction would have on their isolationist view. Now, did that happen, is the question? Well, it was a tactical victory, they accomplished their tactical and operational goal; to destroy our Pacific Fleet to allow them time to complete the first phase of their southern Operation. But did it really further their strategic goal of forcing us to quit the war because of their assessment that we could not cope with the defeat. No, it actually worked the other way. Yamamoto, I believe actually knew it would not, and it did not. We replaced the aircraft destroyed in 15 days, and only two battleships were actually lost. The others were refloated, and repair. The key was the carriers, and they weren't there. But the real important point was that all it did was to fill us with resolve to go after the Japanese and as one senior officer said, "Make the Japanese language only spoken in Hades". Pearl Harbor success did not further their strategic goal. The next operation to attack and occupy Port Moresby and the Solomon's failed. Many historians give the IJN a minor victory at Coral Sea, I don't agree but that is another story. The major, important strategic goal failed and from then on, almost every operation, failed. When we analyze an event like a victory in a tactical battle, we have to analyze, it in an operational but more importantly, a strategic sense. Does the victory further the operation, and does it contribute to the strategic goals of the nation. If it doesn't, it is a failure. Do you think that the loss of those battleships, even if it was only temporary, caused the Americans to change the way they conducted the war?
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Post by vonfriedman on Nov 20, 2022 2:04:55 GMT -6
I would add another question: if the Japanese strategic goals were still realistic after the US congress had passed the Two Ocean Bill for a total of 18 CVs, 6 BBs, 6 BCs, 27 CAs and CLs, about one hundred DDs and 15000 aircraft. In that critical autumn and winter 1941, an alternative, perhaps more sensible, strategy was to help Germany defeat Russia and take the Dutch Indies with their oil. This still meant a war with the US and the UK, but with an ally, Germany, which, free of its commitments on the eastern front, would have been far more effective.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Nov 20, 2022 7:17:19 GMT -6
When you analyze an event like the Attack on Pearl Harbor, you have to assess its effect on the strategic goals of the attacking nation. This is what both Alfred Thayer Mahan and Antoine-Heni Jomini stated. But in assessing Pearl Harbor, can we really say it furthered the Imperial Japanese Navy strategic goals? I don't think it did, here is why. The two main goals of the Imperial Naval General Staff and the Combined Fleet were to move south, capture all of Southeast Asia to gain natural resources. A second goal was to force the US to quit because of the emotional effect, the destruction would have on their isolationist view. Now, did that happen, is the question? Well, it was a tactical victory, they accomplished their tactical and operational goal; to destroy our Pacific Fleet to allow them time to complete the first phase of their southern Operation. But did it really further their strategic goal of forcing us to quit the war because of their assessment that we could not cope with the defeat. No, it actually worked the other way. Yamamoto, I believe actually knew it would not, and it did not. We replaced the aircraft destroyed in 15 days, and only two battleships were actually lost. The others were refloated, and repair. The key was the carriers, and they weren't there. But the real important point was that all it did was to fill us with resolve to go after the Japanese and as one senior officer said, "Make the Japanese language only spoken in Hades". Pearl Harbor success did not further their strategic goal. The next operation to attack and occupy Port Moresby and the Solomon's failed. Many historians give the IJN a minor victory at Coral Sea, I don't agree but that is another story. The major, important strategic goal failed and from then on, almost every operation, failed. When we analyze an event like a victory in a tactical battle, we have to analyze, it in an operational but more importantly, a strategic sense. Does the victory further the operation, and does it contribute to the strategic goals of the nation. If it doesn't, it is a failure. Do you think that the loss of those battleships, even if it was only temporary, caused the Americans to change the way they conducted the war? No, because when Halsey was ordered to deliver aircraft to Wake Island, he was asked if he wanted to take the battleships. He answered "No, they will just slow me down if I have to run". This is an indication that the senior admirals knew that these ships were no longer the primary fleet warships anymore. I am certain that some admirals were still battleship admirals, but that attitude was quickly falling by the wayside. The Essex's were already under construction. Those battleships were only there because Roosevelt wanted to threaten the Japanese. Everyone probably knew that they should have been on the West Coast. War Plan Orange had been disestablished in 1940, we focused on Europe with the Rainbow plans. It wasn't until after the end of the Guadalcanal operation in 1943, that a plan like WPO was used to march across the Central Pacific.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Nov 20, 2022 11:31:42 GMT -6
I would add another question: if the Japanese strategic goals were still realistic after the US congress had passed the Two Ocean Bill for a total of 18 CVs, 6 BBs, 6 BCs, 27 CAs and CLs, about one hundred DDs and 15000 aircraft. In that critical autumn and winter 1941, an alternative, perhaps more sensible, strategy was to help Germany defeat Russia and take the Dutch Indies with their oil. This still meant a war with the US and the UK, but with an ally, Germany, which, free of its commitments on the eastern front, would have been far more effective. Your concept of operations(conops) is ok, but Japan had her eyes on the Asian continent before the 20th century. It felt that the Asian mainland should be subjected to Japanese rule by taking Korea, Manchuria then China. Contact and invasion of Siberia really wasn't on their planning list. The operations in Manchuria, China and Indochina allowed them to have bases near Southeast Asia. This allowed the Southern Operation to be more effective and finished quicker. So, I believe that the direction they went was correct. But how they implemented it was not consistent. The conops has to satisfy the strategic objectives. Your idea would not accomplish this because of a lack of forces in the Imperial Japanese Army.
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Post by vonfriedman on Nov 21, 2022 2:58:19 GMT -6
The counterfactual history does not lend itself to verification. We do not know if a different Japanese strategy could have resulted in the non-arrival of those Siberian divisions that drove the Germans back 150 miles from Moscow. And we don't know if this could have led to the collapse of the USSR.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Nov 21, 2022 7:21:58 GMT -6
The counterfactual history does not lend itself to verification. We do not know if a different Japanese strategy could have resulted in the non-arrival of those Siberian divisions that drove the Germans back 150 miles from Moscow. And we don't know if this could have led to the collapse of the USSR. That is entirely correct, without gaming it like war colleges with strict rules and guidelines, there is almost no way to actually verify whether it would have happened. However, would the Russian's have sacrificed European Russia for Asian Russia? I have doubts. Most historical accounts choose the Washington Naval Treaties as the beginning of the process that led to war. I do not subscribe to that idea; I believe it was the depression which wrecked the Japanese economy and the concept of democracy. I believe this was the starting point for the invasion of Manchuria, inner Mongolia and Northern China by the Kwantung Army. This led to conflict with Russia which ended at Nomonhan and the beginning of embargoes by Western Nations. All this led to the Japanese to begin to look south for natural resources. It gets complex in the study of this. thediplomat.com/2012/08/the-forgotten-soviet-japanese-war-of-1939
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Post by vonfriedman on Nov 22, 2022 8:38:25 GMT -6
In Italy there have been endless reflections on why the fascist regime ran headlong towards the adventure of WW2. Many have tried to find only an economic justification. For those who did not live that era (myself, if the bombs hadn't rained and there hadn't been a general flight to the countryside, I would have become another "figlio della lupa") it is difficult to understand the importance of emotional factors.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Nov 22, 2022 9:31:58 GMT -6
In Italy there have been endless reflections on why the fascist regime ran headlong towards the adventure of WW2. Many have tried to find only an economic justification. For those who did not live that era (myself, if the bombs hadn't rained and there hadn't been a general flight to the countryside, I would have become another "figlio della lupa") it is difficult to understand the importance of emotional factors. It wasn't just emotional adventure. Mussolini was an imperialist dictator and wanted North Africa, Southern France and other areas in Eastern Europe. He felt that he was equal to Hitler and develop another Roman Empire. They had had a failure in Ethiopia so why not make up for it. It was economic, geopolitical and maybe a little emotional.
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Post by vonfriedman on Nov 22, 2022 10:52:12 GMT -6
The failure was not in Ethiopia but, partially, in Spain. How much rational and how much emotional there is in certain "historical" decisions (eg the 2003 war against Saddam) is difficult to evaluate.
It is very probable that Mussolini, in June 1940, thought the war had already been won.
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Post by vonfriedman on Nov 22, 2022 11:13:43 GMT -6
Mussolini had also proclaimed "If I advance follow me, if I retreat kill me, if they kill me avenge me" and he felt on his neck the breath of those crowds he had militarized, regimented and stuffed with propaganda.
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