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You have long generations,
Two generations early the Japanese were more like this,
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See Sino-Japanese war of 1894. Also the battle of Yalu which was the first battle between armoured warships since the Battle of Lisa in 1866 ( a few isolated incidents aside like the HMS Shah vs the Huascar).
The Russo-Japanese war (1904) should have been enough to dissuade people from thinking the Japanese military was like your picture.
From what I've read anyway I agree but isn't the next layer to this that the reason that the western nations cut off the oil is the invasion of China and the abuses there.Hi guys,
There are a lot of interesting ideas posted in this thread (and no that is not my way of saying some or all of you are all nuts or anything like that).
I would again like to suggest that anyone interested in the war in the PTO read the following book:
"War Plan Orange: The U.S. Strategy to Defeat Japan, 1897-1945" by Edward S. Miller, published by the United States Naval Institute, and by Shinchosa Ltd. in Japanese
Although it is primarily concerned with the US perspective, it also necessarily includes some of the aspects of Japanese thinking on the subject of taking control of various areas in the PTO.
One aspect closely relating to this thread's subject is that the Japanese high command never considered it feasible to invade Hawaii in any early operation, and impractical at a later date unless they could defeat the USN in a decisive final manner, in which case there would have been no need to invade.
Another aspect is that the US also considered it impractical to invade a similar Japanese target at a similar distance in any early operation. At the beginning of the war in the PTO , the US planners knew the US did not have enough force projection ability to have a reasonable chance of holding distant areas already under US control (such as the Philippines) let alone invade and hold other objectives at similar distance.
Contrary to popular myth (at least in the US) the Japanese government had no interest in going to war with the US, and their war planners never thought it likely (possible? yes, but not likely) that they would win a short war with the US. The Japanese war planners considered it a certainty that they would not win a sustained war with the US (barring devine intervention, pure luck, extreme US incompetence, etc.). The reason for Japan's willingness to start a war with the US, UK, and Dutch (at least at that point in time) rested solely on the fact that these countries had all ceased to supply oil to Japan. Even if the US alone had continued to supply oil to Japan, the Japanese high command would not have started a war at that point in time. The Japanese government knew that without oil the Japanese nation would have returned to its late-1800s to early-1900s status. They would most likely have lost Manchuko, Korea, and have had to stop their invasion of China. This would have destroyed their economy and their ability to defend themselves, putting them at the mercy (once again) of the European nations and the US, and possibly the Soviet Union.
I have met a fair amount of resistance to this idea, all I can say is that if tomorrow the US (or any other modern high standard of living industrial nation) was suddenly cut off from oil: what would they do? I think that it is safe to say that the US and various European nations would go to war to regain access to oil.
So if there was no embargo then Japan wouldn't be forced to go to war with the western powers.
So no embargo no Pearl Harbour.
While I don't know if the details are correct in this article it does seem to align with what I have read elsewhere about the difficulties with logistics on both sides. It gives a peek at what trying to set up an airfield on an atoll actually involved.
History Net article
But without the embargo, Japan would have far greater freedom to operate in China, which would make any nation supplying oil to Japan complicit in the atrocities committed.
Also consider how badly the Japanese airgroups got mauled at Coral Sea and Midway. At Coral sea they faced what, 18 Wildcats per carrier, 36 total give or take. First strike on Midway caused the Japanese strike force 20% of their aircraft. They were opposed by 21 Buffaloes and 6 Wildcats flown by inexperienced marine pilots. Imagine if it had been 50 or 75 Wildcats with well trained navy pilots?
The total casualties to the Midway strike force ( 121 aircraft ) was eleven aircraft lost, with another fourteen heavily damaged, and twenty-nine more shot up to some degree. Fully half the aircraft involved had been hit. Counting missing aircraft and those rendered out of commission, the mission had lost 23 percent of its strength in about thirty minutes of combat. Twenty aviators were dead or missing, and several more had been wounded.
(Shattered Sword)
What battles / regions does First Team cover exactly?
No, but the latter two volumes dealing with carrier to carrier battles are not yet published, AFAIK.South Pacific Air War
Made sense at the time. Britain needed to recall its fleet to counter the Germans in Europe and was worried about growing Russian naval power in the Pacific. And of course Britain's shipbuilders were private companies seeking export business and foreign currency.Japan. We want to invade other countries.
Britain. Wanna buy Battleships?
Japan. Sweet.