1930's Japanese Navy - What would you have done differently?

[parsifal]

They are actually compiled from the British reports.

No, they are not. you might think they are, but I have the final report submitted to the Admiralty, and it reads nothing like the account you have posted

The following is a summary of the report submitted to his Lordships...

"At 08:20 on 31 December, OBDURATE, stationed south of the convoy, spotted three DKM DDs to the rear (west) of the convoy. Then, ONSLOW spotted DKM ADMIRAL HIPPER, also to the rear of the convoy, and steered to intercept with ORWELL, OBEDIENT and OBDURATE, while ACHATES was ordered to stay with the convoy and make smoke. After some firing, the British ships turned, apparently to make a torpedo attack. The Destroyers were heavily outgunned, and Sherbrooke knew that his torpedoes were his most formidable weapons; the attack was feigned as once the torpedoes had been launched their threat would be gone. The ruse worked: Hipper temporarily retired, since Kummetz had been ordered not to risk his ships. Admiral Hipper returned at around 0900 to make a second attack, opening fire on the ONSLOW and eventually hitting after about 30mins of continuous shelling causing heavy damage and many casualties including 17 killed. Although ONSLOW ultimately survived the action, Sherbrooke had been badly injured by a large steel splinter and command passed to OBEDIENT.......

HIPPER then pulled north of the convoy, stumbled across BRAMBLE, a Halcyon-class MSW, which opened fire; HIPPER returned fire with her much heavier guns. The DD ECKOLDT was ordered to finish BRAMBLE off, (she sank with all hands) while the HIPPER shifted target to OBEDIENT and ACHATES to the south. ACHATES was badly damaged after about 10 minutes of action, but she continued to lay down smoke until she eventually sank. (The trawler NORTHERN GEM rescued many of the crew of ACHATES.)...."

So, the inconsistencies between your version and the admiralty report are numerous. Hipper did not fire on the Achates initially...Achates was not even in the initial attacking group. hipper scored no hits in her opening salvo, in fact she was in action for more than thirty minutes before any hits were achieved against the Onslow and a further 10 minutes or so before hitting Achates.

 

[Wavelength]

So, the inconsistencies between your version and the admiralty report are numerous. Hipper did not fire on the Achates initially...Achates was not even in the initial attacking group. hipper scored no hits in her opening salvo, in fact she was in action for more than thirty minutes before any hits were achieved against the Onslow and a further 10 minutes or so before hitting Achates

Indeed, but that doesn't mean I'm wrong. The British summary is bare bones and with due respect I think your reading in your own conclusions on not enough information. The hit totals come from the British damage reports and they total at least nine direct hits. That's a hard fact.

By combining reports from several sources we get a better idea of what happened. We know from the Hipper KTB when it fired at what targets, how many rounds it fired, and from what ranges. There is no reason to doubt those facts. Other British reports confirm those facts. For example, Achates survivors report that Achates was indeed hit by Hipper's first salvo at 0940 hours:

"The enemy picked us out for his early fire. We must have been conspicuous. The German cruiser got us the first time."

(War at Sea pg 267)

The range was 14,900 meters which must have been correct because it yielded straddles and a hit. Hipper indeed retired after opening fire on Achates, but not because of feinted torpedo attacks, like how appeared to the British, but because the blast from Hipper's guns disabled its IFF equipment and its forward radar.

Hipper wasn't banging away for 30 minutes at the Onslow. If that was the case it would have expended most of its ammunition. "Between 1001 hours and 1016 hours Hipper fired only one salvo" Only at 1016 hours did it take the Onslow under fire. It expended only 48 rounds during this firing episode. Onslow was hit four times for those 48 rounds. That's a fact confirmed by British damage reports. The range was 114hm.

The Hipper expended 51 rounds on Bramble.

At 1115 hours Achates had just cleared her own smoke when Hipper reappeared to the northeast. The cruiser opened fire from 14,000 yards and hit with her first broadside

(O'Hara)

Hipper meanwhile closed the convoy and sighted its escorting destroyers once more, catching Achates unprotected by smoke screen. Hitting with her first salvo, the German Flagship quickly reduced the destroyer to a shambles killing or wounding many of her company, including her captain, and leaving her on fire with a serious list.

(Whitley)

Are O'Hara and Whitley both wrong?

The hits on Achates at that time were three: the first to the bridge, the second through a boiler room and a third through the forecastle. Those are facts from the British side.

The Hipper opened fire the second time on Achates at 1117 hours from a range of 17,700 meters. That must be correct because it was the correct range in order to produce the hits recorded.

It was 1124 hours when Hipper took Obedient under fire. Obedient's wireless station was destroyed.

Fleshing out those bare bones tells how deadly accurate Hipper's shooting was that polar night.

Concerning the reliability of the German records, Krancke in 1958 questioned if Kummetz had manipulated the KTB concerning the reminder from Kluber to avoid risks, which Kummetz used to justify retiring from the battle whith a vastly superior force. But that is all it entails and it's irrelevant to how Hipper was fighting.

 

[parsifal]

I will deal with the Onslow issue a bit later in a separate post For now, I have open in front of me the after action report for HMS Achates

Are O'Hara and Whitley both wrong?

In the case of the Achates, unfortunately yes. See my comments below.

The hits on Achates at that time were three: the first to the bridge, the second through a boiler room and a third through the forecastle. Those are facts from the British side.

Nope. Relying on the best primary record that there is, being the official after action report that followed a board of enquiry , she began to take fire from the hipper at 0940, which in that initial encounter lasted until just before 1000. There were no hits, but there was one very near miss that caused casualties and peppering of the upper hull.

The Hipper opened fire the second time on Achates at 1117 hours from a range of 17,700 meters. That must be correct because it was the correct range in order to produce the hits recorded.

That's about right but there are some details that suggest it was not the first salvo that was the hit on Achates. The after action report states that she took fire again from just before 1115....say approximately 1114. after 3 mins she was hit....ie, not on the first salvo. Its common for crewmen to say things like 'we were hit from the first salvo". Frankly, they are not in a position to know....The CO and the bridge staff would have been the only people I would rely on for accurate reports....we don't have that in this case, since the entire bridge was killed with the first direct hit, but we do have the next best thing, being the Admiralties after action report and the board of enquiry's report, which are not quite the same, but which are near enough.

Article 15 of the board of enquiries findings statges:

"

This she proceeded to do, but just prior to 1115, again came under accurate enemy fire from the hipper and in spite of increasing speed and zig-zagging, received a direct hit on the fore end of the bridge at about 1118 which killed or seriously wounded all bridge and wheelhouse personnel, except the Yeoman and the Coxswain, and put B Gun and its crew out of action. A cordite fire was started on B Gun Deck but was soon put out by the seas, which came over the forecastle as the ship turned into the wind

".

So the first hit was at 1118, after three minutes of firing, on a ship that had had its speed reduced to 20 knots. Hipper's shooting is not looking so hot now.....

Article 19 of the report gives the details of the second hit. there is no time given, but judging by the events that transpired between the first and second hits, id say about 5 to 10 minutes. It appears that against a target now reduced to 12 knots the Hipper, after at least two more salvoes achieved one more hit. The report is silent on the total number of salvoes hipper fired

19 The ship was straddled on two more occasions before the firing ceased, and received direct hit in the Seamen's' Bath Room port side and a near miss abreast No.2 Boiler Room

So, at the end of this, after 30 minutes of firing there are 1 near miss and two hits, one hit whilst the ship was travelling at 20 knots, and another hit whilst travelling at 12 knots. That's nothing to crow about for Hipper

Fleshing out those bare bones tells how deadly accurate Hipper's shooting was that polar night

.

The board of enquiry's findings were, with respect to Hippers shooting accuracy...

Enemy fire appeared very accurate for line but spread for range averaged 400 yards. Near misses caused more extensive damage to the hull than actual hits. All shells were H.E. and burst on impact, but caused no serious fires.

Good shooting but not I wouldn't say outstanding given the vulnerability of the target.

 

[Wavelength]

Well at least you are seeing the close correlation between the British reports and the German reports and timeline now. The British reports support the German reports and the German reports support the British reports. Not exactly identical, but that is typical.

The report is silent on the total number of salvoes hipper fired

Right. We must get that from the German side. I have that right here. It fired five 4 gun salvos at three different targets between 0940 and 1016 hours. It fired six 8 gun salvos at Onslow between 1016 and 1018, scoring multiple hits two minutes. That is really excellent shooting there.

It fired about 12 four shot salvoes at Bramble scoring an unknown number of hits between 1036 and 1040 hours. That the Bramble was hit multiple times is known but we have no number for the hits scored.

It opened fire on Achates at 1117 (not 1114) and ceased fire at 1118, switching fire to Obedient at 1124 hours. Flashes were observed through the mist at the time of the fall of shot at 1118 hours. Considering the time of flight for almost 20,000 yards, that hit was probably from the first salvo. Now we see that Whitley and O'Hara were probably correct and what they are basing it on. These few salvos had to be only 4 shot salvos because Hipper was firing over her bow making 30+ knots.

Excuse me, but that is excellent shooting by any measure. Factor in the conditions of fog, snow, and the polar night, and it is SPECTACULAR shooting. It is rather unprecedented shooting for cruiser shooting during WWII.

 

[Wavelength]

So about 18-19k yards for a cruiser? I would think though the initial attempts and keeping the vessel under fire starting at longer ranges would help, as long as you are within rangefinder range (or if radar is effective)?

Yes, accurate ranging finding through rangefinders or radar doesn't change the ballistics, the danger space, or the salvo spread. Therefore radar ranging and spotting do not improve the probablity of hitting from a straddle at a given range.

 

[Garyt]

Not sure what you are saying here, Wavelength?

 

[Wavelength]

Only that radar or larger range finders ect.. won't help the probability scoring hits at longer range from a straddle. Having more salvos to spot and correct from would probably help to obtain more straddles more quickly though.

 

[Garyt]

Gotcha.

Having more salvos to spot and correct from would probably help to obtain more straddles more quickly though.

Problem is, the the rate of fire of 8" and smaller weapons, depending upon range, can't be met if getting corrections from every salvo, obviously the flight time is too long.

I found it interesting, the US Navy practice of when range gets too short of only spotting for one out of every X salvos, as spotting for every salvo becomes too confusing when you have multiple salvos in the air.

 

[parsifal]

Excuse me, but that is excellent shooting by any measure. Factor in the conditions of fog, snow, and the polar night, and it is SPECTACULAR shooting. It is rather unprecedented shooting for cruiser shooting during WWII.

Your version shows significant difference to the RN version, as is your claim that hipper turned away because of an equipment failure. That's something that would have resulted in a court martial in the RN if true. It smacks of extreme timidity and a lack of understanding about what needed to be done, but then the RN was not saddled with impossible terms of engagement. I still am not convinced the Hipper disengaged because of own equipment failures. Maybe that was something that happened, as an incidental event, but I will bet the farm she turned away because of a fear of torpedo attack. Somewhere there will be the German Admiralty after action report that details this. Annapolis have the german admiralty situation reports for most months, translated to English in 1948, and now available on line. Ill see if I can locate the report for Hippers action on that day.

There are obvious and serious differences between the RN account, and yours that makes the difference between miraculous shooting, that no-one, of any nationality, except hipper apparently, could ever achieve, either during the war, or after that Im aware of, and just good to average shooting. there are massive differences in the times for shooting as well. If Hipper was shooting so well, it make one wonder why she didn't despatch the RN cruisers rather than take three hits, fumble then drop the ball, then run like a girl as she did. No, as you can see, I am not impressed with hippers performance, and, as you can see, Im one of those sceptics that beg to differ about the quality of her shooting that day

 

[parsifal]

Found it.

Kummetz's log entry pertinent to this issue, states in plain language...(English translation).. "Only quick action can solve the problem of danger from torpedo attacks and this has to be considered in the light of my orders not to take any serious risks."

He did not withdraw because of equipment failure. He withdrew, in his own words and judgement because of the very real and justified, fear of a torpedo attack from the British destroyers......

 

[parsifal]

For all the bluster about exceptional gunnery by Hipper, the Germans had precious little to show for it. The convoy escaped unharmed, Sherbrookes command had been roughly handled, with two ships lost, both of which at the tie they were hit had top speed of below 20knots. To be fair, Hipper had completed its part of the mission.....the distraction of the RN Convoy escort,...very efficiently, though I would stop well short of describing anything the hipper (or any of the other german ships that day) as outstanding.

Captain Stange of DKM CS LUTZOW wrote in the ships Log as the German ships were running for port that day as
"

As we withdraw from the battle scene, it is hard to escape the feeling that, even though the situation appeared to be in our favour, we were unable to get at the convoy and scored no successes whatsoever

." He was on the money there, and wasn't trying to argue how well they had done. Most people understand Barents Sea as a defeat for the Germans that they should have won but didnt

 

[Wavelength]

Somewhere there will be the German Admiralty after action report that details this.

I have it right here. It is the SKL analysis of the radar equipment performance. It says that the first salvo's blast tore the IFF device from its mountings and destroyed it. It says this forced Kummetz to revise his attack plan which was to send in the destroyers while supporting them with artillery fire from the Hipper at a distance-keeping the cruiser out of torpedo water. IFF was essential to this plan considering the conditions. Without IFF Kummetz was obliged to recall his destroyers and attempt to achieve his goal of diverting the close escort and turning the convoy into the Luetzow group with artillery fire alone. The Hipper as you correctly say performed this part of the overall battle plan. This was despite the difficulties of having its forward radar off line for almost an hour, and the aft radar operators needing to phone in the targeting data to the firecontrol computer room, instead of by data link, because the electronic connection in the computer room was faulty. That is all right in the report.

The plan failed because Stange dropped the ball, not the Hipper. Luetzow and its destroyers had the convoy in a perfect set up, with the convoy ships on radar at 1030 hours. But Stange did not attack because he could not identify them visually. He froze up, being afraid of a friendly fire accident. His IFF was switched on and working but he ignored it. He could have sent in his destroyers and kept track of them while supporting them with 11" gunfire because he had functional IFF, but he didn't. These are all pointed out the SKL analysis. Stange is strongly criticized for not using his electronic IFF and opening radar directed fire. It points out that Luetzow's radar performed exceptionally well in directing blind fire later on though, which made Stange's freeze up all the more disappointing and frustrating. It recommends that electronic IFF always be given priority over visual identification in the future.

You are entirely correct that Kummetz was concerned about not exposing his cruiser to possible torpedo attack in general. Kummetz was bound by the German fighting instructions which forbad exposing major warships to possible torpedo attack at night. As Kummetz himself wrote, since it was night 24 hours a day that time of year he was bound by these instructions. Kummetz handled his cruiser far better than American Admiral Wright did four weeks earlier at the night Battle of Tassafaronga. Kummetz never intended to send the Hipper in so to speak. But to always keep it at a distance in the presence of enemy destroyers. This he did.

I completely understand being skeptical about the gunnery performance. I was myself before I discovered the documentation. The evidence is strong. It is perhaps the strongest argument in favor of radar directed fire control from the WWII record.

 

[Wavelength]

Which brings up something the IJN should have developed, but didn't in time. Develop effective radar directed fire control for its warships.

 

[parsifal]

Agre completely with the last post. we will just have to agree to disagree on the hipper issue. Despite the heat, it was a very good discussion, enjoyed it thoroughly....Hope you enjoyed the exchange as well

 

[cherry blossom]

Possibly the most important change needed is to "sort out" the 4th Bureau of the Imperial Navy General Staffs. This is the section responsible for code breaking and communications. Almost everything in that section's area of responsibility was managed badly and to make matters worse, they helpfully advised the Foreign Ministry on their codes.

Let us start by looking at Japanese codes (although the radios were another serious problem). We might despair looking at OTL history but before we simply assert that Japan was not able to produce good codes, it is worth noting that the Imperial Army's codes were significantly better than the Navy's and resisted Allied efforts until late in 1943. Of course, the IJA was taking to the Poles and Finns in the 1930s about topics of mutual interest, such as the USSR, and seems to have picked up a few ideas.

Assuming that we do not have money to buy code machines for every IJN warship, let us imagine using standard 20-20 hindsight to teach us how to encode IJN communications starting from one day in about 1935. We start off with a new two part code book, which can be similar to that used in the code named by the USN as JN25 except that the codes are chosen randomly rather than being divisible by three. The code will be superenciphered using a separate book of random numbers but by 1940, such a code was vulnerable. Not only JN25 but also the Royal Navy's codes were broken by their enemies. The method of breaking the codes was called creating a "depth". That means aligning a series of code groups from several received signals so that code groups superencipered by the same random numbers are aligned. The basic approach was to look for the appearance of the same numbers in two signals. For example, we might find the same common code groups at positions 5 and 13 of two signals. We can feel more confident that we are not seeing an accident if a third signal can be aligned to give the same number at positions 11 and 15 with signal 1 and positions 7 and 12 with signal 2. Card sorting machines could be used to look for such matches. The use of divisibility by three was particularly disastrous in JN25 because it allowed an alternative approach as even with non-carrying addition, the differences between two correctly aligned set of code groups would be slightly more likely to be divisible by 3. Poorly trained cipher clerks using the same or predicable sets of "random numbers" weakened codes further.

The IJA's method was to replace the process of non-carrying addition by the use of a "conversion square" Allied and Axis Signals Intelligence in World War II - Google Books or THE BREAKING OF THE JAPANESE ARMY ADMINISTRATIVE CODE and New evidence on breaking the Japanese army codes for the lucky few with access. They weren't perfect because they didn't encode which square was used for the message but the effect was that a codebreaker could only easily align messages superenciphered using the same conversion square.

In 1943, the Royal Navy had the same problem because it realised from its own Enigma intercepts that the Germans were reading its codes. They replaced their Number 3 cipher by their Number 5 cipher. The biggest change was that they introduced an adjustable grille invented by John Tiltman https://www.nsa.gov/about/_files/cryptologic_heritage/publications/misc/tiltman.pdf (page 45) so that only a subset of the random numbers on a page are used. Again the result is that only messages using the same grille setting can be aligned.

Now as those are independent improvements, my new IJN system uses both an IJA style conversion square and a Tiltman grille, which should keep any enemy codebreakers busy until 1945.

Apparently, I have just changed the details of the Pacific War without making any fundamental change. However, the diplomacy of 1941 was conditioned by American confidence. The fact that Japanese codes were known to be fairly weak must have led to the idea that "those monkeys aren't too bright". If Japanese codes had been completely unbreakable since Yardley's revelations had been published, might American policy have been more cautious?

 

[cherry blossom]

For my next move as Japanese Navy Minister or perhaps Chief of the Imperial Navy's Staffs, I intend to invite the Austrian actress Hedy Lamarr to visit me, naturally with all expenses paid from IJN funds. Oddly enough, I am not primarily motivated by her controversial performance in Ekstase (1933) Ecstasy (1933) - Synopsis with its nudity and simulated sex (try Bing image search for details) but by my feelings for her mind. I feel confident that the 4th Bureau of the General Staffs will be deeply impressed by the ideas of a young foreign woman on how they might improve their radio communications. To see what they might learn, you can listen to NPR Media Player.

I am not sure if the IJN would have been able to get frequency hopping to work in the 1930s. However, the spread spectrum idea is simpler. If you send the same energy on four different wavelengths instead of one, the noise on the four channels is independent and therefore the noise is only increased by the square root of four which is two. Thus the signal to noise ratio is doubled. Of course, we really want to use 64 wavelengths to give us a factor of eight in the signal to noise ratio.

Tanaka Raizo's article "The Struggle for Guadalcanal" in "The Japanese Navy in World War II in the words of former Japanese Naval Officers" edited and translated by David C. Evans has on page 210:
"Communication failures. Our communication system was seldom good, and during the fall and winter of 1942 it was almost consistently terrible. In wide theatres of operations and under difficult battle conditions it is indispensable for a tactical commander to have perfect communication with his headquarters and with his subordinate units. The consequence of poor communications is failure"

We can add other examples such as the mangled message sending Carrier Division 5's aircraft against the Neosho rather than against the American carriers at Coral Sea to reinforce Tanaka's message.

 

[cherry blossom]

Although my comments on the 4th Section of the General Staffs work haven't exactly sparked massive interest, I feel that I should discuss their most catastrophic failure. This was their helpful advice for the Japanese Foreign Ministry on codes. During the Thirties two cipher machines were designed by the IJN and then used for Japanese diplomatic codes. These were the Type 91 Alphabetic Typewriter, which was called Red by the Americans, and the Type 97 Alphabetic Typewriter, which the Americans called Purple.

There is a description of Red at Development of the First Japanese Cipher Machine: RED, which concludes "Now, the RED cipher machine is remembered as a classic example of a weak machine cipher broken by codebreakers. There is even a view that the weak RED cipher provided a tutoring period for codebreakers to prepare themselves for more complicated ones such as PURPLE."

The mechanics of the related machines called Purple, Coral and Jade are described at PURPLE, CORAL, and JADE. Whilst Purple was certainly stronger than Red, it was still not a strong cipher and it had fewer possible permutations than contemporary rotor machines as it was not possible to carry out an operation equivalent to swapping the rotors. However, the real errors that doomed Purple's security were the totally unnecessary choice of keeping the division of the alphabet into groups of twenty and six as with Red and the sending of the same messages using both the broken Red machine and the new Purple machine during the period when Purple was replacing Red.

Naturally it is very easy to suggest with hindsight how to do much better. For example, either the American ECM II The ECM Mark II, also known as SIGABA, M-134-C, and CSP-889 or the later Russian Fialka http://www.xat.nl/fialka/files/man001.pdf would have kept Japanese diplomatic messages completely secure up to 1945. However, a more realist question is whether there were options that Japan might have plausibly taken. One possibility might have been to buy an early Enigma A or B The Enigma A and Enigma B and make the rotor motion less predictable by making the cams adjustable.

Unlike most of the improvements suggested in this thread, keeping Japanese diplomatic codes secure might have very significantly altered history. There are possibly three mechanisms which all might have made a Pacific War less likely.

Firstly, as mentioned earlier, secure Japanese codes might have caused America to take Japan more seriously as a potential adversary, which might have made American policy more cautious over 1941.

Secondly and much more obviously, America would have listened more carefully to the Japanese Ambassador Nomura. Nomura, as a retired full admiral felt that he was in Washington to represent the IJN and to make policy and he was determined to avoid a war (see Peter Mauch's Sailor Diplomat http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=34971). Unfortunately, when he diverged from his instructions from the Foreign Ministry, the Americans reading the often poorly translated instructions, believed that he was trying to deceive them. "Misunderstanding and Mistranslation in the Origins of the Pacific War of 1941-1945: The Importance of "Magic" by Keiichiro Komatsu http://theburmacampaignsociety.org/library/Lecture-by-Dr-Keiichiro-Komatsu-24-March-2002.pdf goes into more detail on the malign effects of poor translations.

Finally and most importantly, American leaders would have had to ask Ambassador Grew's opinion rather more often as he would be left as their best source on what Japan was likely to do. OTL, Grew's views were assumed to be wrong because he was naturally not informed of the results of code breaking and he was mostly ignored. Here is an extract from "My Year with Ambassador Joseph C. Grew 1941-1942 — A Personal Account" by Robert A. Fearey www.connectedcommunities.net/robertfearey/year_with_grew.doc :
"Fully set out in those volumes are the arguments supporting Washington's handling of the negotiations, on the one hand, and on the other, Ambassador Grew's firmly held views that Washington's stance was unimaginative and inflexible; that the Embassy's carefully considered reports, analyses and recommendations, centering on Prime Minister Konoye's proposal that he and President Roosevelt meet face-to-face in Honolulu in a direct effort to achieve a settlement of all outstanding issues, were given short shrift; and that if the meeting had been allowed to take place the Pacific War might have been avoided."

 

[Garyt]

Sorry about the no response, Cherry Blossum. That's what happens when you try to bring a thread back on track

I think we had sidetracked into "The accuracy of WW2 Naval Guns"

But I'd fully agree that the code was a huge factor. Without a broken code for instance, the Japanese are not ambushed at Midway.

The one area it's not going to fix however is the industrial inequity of the 2 sides, as well the fuel inequity.

But I'm sire you are aware of that, and very few of these solutions do anything to address these issues.

I wonder if not making the attack on Pearl in hindsight would be better for the Japanese.

If the US took the bait to defend the Phillipines, maybe the Japanese get their defining battle. THe US anti aircraft was not that much to write home about at this early stage, and the US battleships did not offer a ton of AA help before refitting. The Japanese would have 6 fleet carriers against 3-4 american carriers, and the Japanese Cruisers, Destroyers and even the Yamato would have a chance to do what they were best designed to do - a surface action against another fleet.

And perhaps with enough US losses, and no Pearl Harbor suprise attack as a rallying call, the US might be quicker to come to the bargaining table with the Japanese.

 

[Wavelength]

The USN was also strapped for fuel during the first year or so. It took awhile to build up the fuel supply. The Japanese failed to go after the stock piles at Pearl when they had the chance.

 

[Garyt]

The Japanese failed to go after the stock piles at Pearl when they had the chance.

The old second wave debate. I'm not sure how I feel about that one, how many losses would a second wave at Pearl Harbor taken, balanced vs. the additional damage that could be done.

Heck, going after the fuel reserves might have been more important than Battleship Row. If you can render the US Pacific fleet inoperable for a few more months, it might be worth it.

I guess one big question, did the Japanese have accurate intelligence of where the reserves were in late 1941?

Overall, I'd say a second wave makes sense, other than the problem with Japanese being able to replentish trained pilots. Trained pilots might have been Japan's least expendable asset, ranking right up there with fuel.