Ad: This forum contains affiliate links to products on Amazon and eBay. More information in Terms and rules
The Japanese pipeline was certainly not as scalable to the degree that the Empire Air Scheme or US rotational training in terms of providing capable rookies who stood a chance in, say, their first five combats.
It was a training program in the sprit of the Samurai - it turned out superb pilots who were Bothe mentally and physically at the peak. No weakness was tolerated.
Par exams;e, many otherwise excellent trainees were washed out by the eyesight test. No, not for poor eyesight, but because the IJN also tested its pilot trainees for night vision and set very high standards. You could score maximum points in every physical attribute, but be discarded for not meeting that requirement.
By the time they realised they needed to churn out pilots in quantity, it was too late. the Cadre of trained pilots were most dead, and a training regime that spent years honing a pilot trainee to the very highest peak of perfection - pre war, a pilot could spend 5 years learning his trade before let loose in the fleet, simply wasn't able to expand to produce large numbers of good enough pilots in quick time.
Japanese modern industrial society was a generation behind the US. Japan didn't have nearly the ratio of engineers, scientists, mechanics, hobby and commercial pilots or even daily automobile tinkerers and users of the US or UK. There's no foundation upon which to scale up.The Japanese pipeline was certainly not as scalable to the degree that the Empire Air Scheme or US rotational training in terms of providing capable rookies who stood a chance in, say, their first five combats.
Japanese modern industrial society was a generation behind the US. Japan didn't have nearly the ratio of engineers, scientists, mechanics, hobby and commercial pilots or even daily automobile tinkerers and users of the US or UK. There's no foundation upon which to scale up.
Gotcha. What I meant to say is that it's easier to scale up flight training if you have a culture of engineering, mechanics, driving, flying clubs, tinkering, etc. When the Empire flying scheme was set up in Canada, the Air Force wasn't faced with recruiting airmen and mechanics from a population alien to such things.We were talking about the scaling-up of Japanese flight training, not Japanese industry or civic education. Japanese industry, until the last year of the war, could produce more planes than the military could pilots.
Gotcha. What I meant to say is that it's easier to scale up flight training if you have a culture of engineering, mechanics, driving, flying clubs, tinkering, etc. When the Empire flying scheme was set up in Canada, the Air Force wasn't faced with recruiting airmen and mechanics from a population alien to such things.
Similar to the Soviet problem with tanks. Plenty being built but unlike other countries vehicles in the
general population were few and far between. Drivers had to be given crash courses with crash gearboxes.
Availability of tinkerers / mechanics was an add on problem.
The first step Id take as Emperor Hirohito's Minister of Get Our Crap Together would be to create a bureau of design and manufacture which would be responsible for determining what needs are unique to or can be shared by the IJN and IJA. No longer will each service have their own mousetrap design, product id#s, and other egocentric inefficiencies. Having stated that, I'll go even further and state the new bureau would have departments addressing all the friction points between the IJN and IJA such as planning and strategy, also.Let's say that Japanese take a good and hard look at what Europeans (and especially Germans) were doing with regard to not just aircraft-related technology, but also with regard to mass production of military hardware. Japanese start their 'investigation' once the Tripartite pact is signed, 27th September 1940, and start employing the knowledge gained by some time Spring of 1941 where possible.
To get the ball rolling, I'd propose a ruthless reduction of aircraft types slated for series production, ASAP, along with requirement for protection for crew and fuel tanks for any new A/C design.
edit: time of interest is now from 1937 on; thread is about IJA and IJN military aircraft and whatever is related to that
The first step Id take as Emperor Hirohito's Minister of Get Our Crap Together would be to create a bureau of design and manufacture which would be responsible for determining what needs are unique to or can be shared by the IJN and IJA. No longer will each service have their own mousetrap design, product id#s, and other egocentric inefficiencies. Having stated that, I'll go even further and state the new bureau would have departments addressing all the friction points between the IJN and IJA such as planning and strategy, also.
In my eyes, eliminating the in-fighting between services would have allowed Japan to stretch her minimal resources into the later years of the war, but only prolonging the inevitable. The only Pacific War, Japan had a chance at winning would have been a minimal war, along the lines of "Asia for Asians" and not reaching out past the Philippines. Minimizing American losses and loss of face would still allow Japan to take the crown's asset's, with England too busy with Europe and the US not fully committed to war in Europe, the chances of pulling off an Asia for Asian war would be good.
Oh boy, I need to stop because the pre-war "what if's" bring out the motor mouth in me.
It depends on what we're counting. Britain have had 2 major and several minor engine companies, with Napier and A-S in-between? Italy 2+2; granted, volume of Italian engines produced was small, bar the indifferent A.74. Japan has 2 companies making their own engines, plus Kawasaki and Aichi making the DB 601As and Nakajima radials under licence, with Hitachi as producer of small engines. Kawasaki was making radials during the whole war, Aichi switched to the meager production of V12s some time in 1941, while phasing out radial engines production.Britain had 3 companies, France had two, Germany had 3 and Italy had 2/3. Japan had 3 ? the two major radial engine makers and few minors and the two companies with licensed DB 601s. That may have been duplication.
Now the problem with combining companies in the "interest" of standardization is you are putting all or most of your eggs in one basket. Engine "A" may have been world class but when they tried to scale it up or change the number of cylinders if it doesn't go like they plan you have nowhere else to go. You also can't do competitive bids. The engine company tells the government what the engines will cost.
The Homare fell on it's face. In the US the R-2600 made a good bomber engine but it never made it as a fighter engine. But we had the R-2800 so Wright skated.
Maybe the Japanese had a few too many duplicates but you need at least two companies and each company needs more than one model.
The Japanese did screw up weapons/ammo production. Standardize on the ammo, have more than one company make each caliber, make more than one gun in each caliber if you want but have them use the same ammo.
Japanese modern industrial society was a generation behind the US. Japan didn't have nearly the ratio of engineers, scientists, mechanics, hobby and commercial pilots or even daily automobile tinkerers and users of the US or UK. There's no foundation upon which to scale up.
A good demonstration is the ease of a transmission swap on a M4 Sherman.A bit off thread, but some US Army General in Ordnance stipulated that US army equipment should be 'able to be fixed by a farm boy with a basic toolkit' - - he really 'got it' - a war winning strategy.
A good demonstration is the ease of a transmission swap on a M4 Sherman.
View attachment 697324
Meanwhile on a German Panther the entire front hull has to be torn out, with the transmission being pulled up through the hull where the driver sat.
View attachment 697325