WW2 USN Strategic Bombing Capability

[GrauGeist]

While Japan had domestic oil fields in Akita, Niigata and Nutsu, their production was minimal compared to American output. They looked to the oil fields in Korea, Manchuria, China, Burma and Formosa, then ultimately the Dutch East Indies, Sumatra, Borneo and Malayasia. They even purchased oil from neutral Sakhalin and Siberian sources.

They had sufficient refineries on the home islands to refine the inbound oil, they simply did not have the ability to properly protect the tankers that were vital to the process.

 

[Shortround6]

Thank you.
AS in many of the these cases the yield of the various oil fields is important. Going to war with Russian over small, low yield oil fields was probably not smart. May be different if they are high yield. I am questioning this as i have no idea as to how much was known about the resources in Northern Asia in the 1920s and 30s when this plan was being put forward.
A bit like nobody knew oil existed in Libya?
The Dutch East Indies crude was also pretty high grade stuff. It contained a lot of the "good stuff" to make high grade aviation fuel (at least high grade in the 1930s context.)

Not sure why the Japanese anti-sub effort was so poor. While attacking merchant ships was not a high priority for Japanese subs (direct involvement in the "decisive" battle was more their doctrine and may have carried over to the anti-sub effort). However the example of the Germans in both WW I and the first few years of WW II certainly showed the vulnerability of long sea supply lines.
Perhaps they were betting on taking out any bases the enemy subs could operate from?
Although they spent a lot of effort in building very long range subs themselves.

 

[gjs238]

I do have a question about "Hokushin-ron" as all I know is from Wiki:

"General Kenkichi Ueda was a strong believer in the Hokushin-ron policy, believing that Japan's main enemy was communism and that Japan's destiny lay in conquest of the natural resources of the sparely populated north Asian mainland."

Bolding by me. What were the "known" natural resources in the area/s in question?

The southern option had known sources of oil, rubber, tin and perhaps other materials?

Apparently, Manchuria has long been sought, and fought over, by Russia, the USSR, Japan and China.
I don't know if the Hokushin-ron policy took into account a potential petroleum embargo against Japan.

Japan's Economic Expansion into China in World War 2 | OnThisDay.com

Thank you.
AS in many of the these cases the yield of the various oil fields is important. Going to war with Russian over small, low yield oil fields was probably not smart. May be different if they are high yield. I am questioning this as i have no idea as to how much was known about the resources in Northern Asia in the 1920s and 30s when this plan was being put forward.
A bit like nobody knew oil existed in Libya?
The Dutch East Indies crude was also pretty high grade stuff. It contained a lot of the "good stuff" to make high grade aviation fuel (at least high grade in the 1930s context.)

Not sure why the Japanese anti-sub effort was so poor. While attacking merchant ships was not a high priority for Japanese subs (direct involvement in the "decisive" battle was more their doctrine and may have carried over to the anti-sub effort). However the example of the Germans in both WW I and the first few years of WW II certainly showed the vulnerability of long sea supply lines.
Perhaps they were betting on taking out any bases the enemy subs could operate from?
Although they spent a lot of effort in building very long range subs themselves.

Again from Wiki, but it seems the army preferred the Hokushin-ron northern route while the navy advocated for the Nanshin-ron southern route.
As we know, politics eventually favored the navy.

I wonder if the framers and/or advocates of the Hokushin-ron northern route considered the possible reactions, i.e., an oil embargo, from the west to such a course of action.

 

[Shortround6]

Thank you.

I am wondering if there were specific goals in mind or if they simply thought if they grabbed enough land there would be resources ( minerals/ores, lumber, food production, etc) somewhere in the area?

 

[gjs238]

If the Japanese had let Yamamoto run the war according to his vision without constant restraint from senior "battleship admirals" and the Army (Tojo), I'm convinced his understanding of industrial capacity and the crucial importance of logistics would have led to the choking off of Hawaii and then Australia. He also understood the strategic importance of aircraft and submarines in a resource war in the Pacific. If Kido Butai had succeeded in destroying the American carriers at Pearl, and if it had been commanded by a bold, aggressive, aviator admiral, it could have stuck around Oahu a while longer and taken out the important oversights the first raid missed. Fueling and repair facilities, the submarine base, and long range patrol aircraft (besides the carriers of course) were what sustained the American war effort for the first few months of the war. Yamamoto understood this. A couple more waves of attacks could have eliminated these and left Hawaii essentially defenseless and difficult to supply. IJN doctrine wasted their extensive submarine fleet in a fruitless search for capital ships to sink, rather than the scouting and supply-line strangling which could have been their true value. Yamamoto understood this, but was powerless to change it. GG correctly points out that the majority of American shipbuilding and ordnance manufacturing was East Coast based. Aircraft manufacture, on the other hand (at least of the critical types) was concentrated In California and Washington. I know Bell, Chance Vought, Curtiss, Grumman, Martin, and Republic were East, but Boeing, Consolidated, Douglas, Lockheed, North American, and Northrop were all within easy air raid (or even battleship gun) range of the Pacific. With (as GG suggests) toe holds in Panama and the resource-rich American west coast a lot of the Japanese supply line dilemma would be eliminated, and (as the US later did) bypassed garrisons could be ignored and allowed to starve. With no safe haven Naval bases on the entire west coast, and Hawaii, the Philippines, and Australia gone, we would have been stymied in the Pacific and fighting a defensive war on the mainland. In December 41 and January 42 we would have been too shocked, demoralised, and disorganized to prevent the Japanese from making rapid territorial gains in the west and turning some of our own industrial might against us. They could have withdrawn most of the Kwantung Army from China and shipped them to California. Without foreign military aid neither Chiang nor Mao was any threat to Japan. The US would have had to concentrate its resources at home, leaving Britain and Russia vulnerable. If the Japanese forays into the Indian Ocean had been conducted with a conquest mentality rather than just raiding, India would have fallen, if treated properly, that huge suppressed population would have enthusiastically joined the "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere" and kicked the "white oppressors" out of Asia entirely. So there you have it; Japan sitting securely on top of a major chunk of the world's resources, with no significant opponents in position to threaten its resources, its logistics, or its industry.

Japan had been fighting the Second Sino-Japanese War since July 7, 1937, and were unable to defeat China.
How could Japan accomplish in North America what it had been unable to against its neighbor?

 

[GrauGeist]

The Japanese were well aware of strategic locations on the west coast.

When the Japanese submarine shelled the refineries at Ellwood (Santa Barbara), it was not by mistake.

 

[GrauGeist]

...Not sure why the Japanese anti-sub effort was so poor. While attacking merchant ships was not a high priority for Japanese subs (direct involvement in the "decisive" battle was more their doctrine and may have carried over to the anti-sub effort). However the example of the Germans in both WW I and the first few years of WW II certainly showed the vulnerability of long sea supply lines.
Perhaps they were betting on taking out any bases the enemy subs could operate from?
Although they spent a lot of effort in building very long range subs themselves.

One of the many blunders of the IJN, was the understatement of their submarine fleet.

When their submarines were deployed properly, they accounted for quite a few Allied warships, but their deployment was not in such a manner as to maximize their potential, like the Germans or Americans.

 

[Elmas]

Thank you.

AS in many of the these cases the yield of the various oil fields is important. Going to war with Russian over small, low yield oil fields was probably not smart. May be different if they are high yield. I am questioning this as i have no idea as to how much was known about the resources in Northern Asia in the 1920s and 30s when this plan was being put forward.

A bit like nobody knew oil existed in Libya?

The Dutch East Indies crude was also pretty high grade stuff. It contained a lot of the "good stuff" to make high grade aviation fuel (at least high grade in the 1930s context.)


Omissis

The presence of oil in Lybia was known from 1914, as small quantities were found excavating wells for drinking water and by a geological survey made in the '30s from an Italian geologist, Ardito Desio, more known for the K2 mountain climbing.

Lybia is a huge sincline

exactly the right place to find oil while, for example, Egypt is on an anticline, and in Egypt oil is lacking.

The problem is that in Lybia oil is very deep, from 5000 m to 7000 m and, in the '30s, there was no way to drill a hole, perfectly vertical and straight, to those depths. So the Lybian oil remained were it was until the late '50s, when the suitable technology was developed.

And, being so deep, the Lybian oil is of a very good quality.

 

[XBe02Drvr]

Even if the Japanese possessed a sizable number of ships capable of making the voyage the logistics are very against it. The voyage is many times longer than from the south island to the Philippines or Malaya so you need many more times the amount of rations for the troops and crew. You need to either carry water or install bigger desalination plants. Refueling the transports (and escorts) needs to be taken into account. The Japanese certainly cannot afford for the transports to make a one way trip and beach themselves on the California coast. .......The Japanese, assuming they can find fuel, have to send the ships back to Japan, reload and the sail back to the US. Replacement/reinforcements are weeks if not a couple of months away.

Implicit in any west coast invasion plan would necessarily be establishment of a staging area in Hawaii from which the invasion would be launched. This would be necessary anyway as a base for interdiction of the Australia pipeline.

 

[XBe02Drvr]

Not sure why the Japanese anti-sub effort was so poor. While attacking merchant ships was not a high priority for Japanese subs (direct involvement in the "decisive" battle was more their doctrine and may have carried over to the anti-sub effort). However the example of the Germans in both WW I and the first few years of WW II certainly showed the vulnerability of long sea supply lines.
Perhaps they were betting on taking out any bases the enemy subs could operate from?
Although they spent a lot of effort in building very long range subs themselves.

A couple of reasons why: ONE, US sub capabilities, largely stagnant at a WWI level through the lean budget years of the 20s and 30s, took a quantum leap forward just before WWll with the new classes of fleet boats. The IJN was slow to take this into account. They were still thinking in terms of S-boats. TWO, they lagged behind the western world in electronics in general and particularly sonar. This didn't bother them, as they didn't consider our subs much of a threat, and proudly thought theirs were state of the art. Besides, they didn't have much concept of the strategic value of subs as commerce raiders. It was all about the decisive battle.

 

[Shortround6]

The topic of invading Hawaii came up in a thread about two years ago. It didn't seem feasible then.
Significance of the Battle of Midway
Pretty much from page 18 to page 23

 

[michaelmaltby]

Shin, earlier in this thread you wrote:
"... Japanese army in China did not have to go back to Japan as they were deployed there to build up new Chinese Empire.
It was a simple story."

I am curious to understand this more fully ... are you saying that the Japanese army in China were "settlers" who were going to remain in China and reform the society, make it more productive, more harmonious with the economic needs to the Homeland, etc.?

Please write a little more about this.

 

[Shinpachi]

Your curiosity seems endless, MM.
I sometimes forget your age

Building up a new Chinese Empire was a major premise for Japanese to invade like Mongolians and Manchurians did in their old times.
Japanese settlers in Manchukuo were already happy to speak Chinese and accept the local culture.
If everything had gone well, the country of Japan would have been disappeared to be a part of China in the 21st century.
The term "China" originally means "The center of the world" to be adored by Asians.
So, it was a simple story.

 

[michaelmaltby]

Thanks for the insights, Shin

"... I sometimes forget your age ". Wish I could ..

 

[Shinpachi]

You are welcome sir

 

[Thorlifter]

Wow, I did not know that. Thank you Shinpachi.

 

[Shortround6]

From a Post in the above mentioned Midway Thread.

The Japanese were dependent on the US for about 80% of their oil and when the US started the Oil embargo in Aug 1941 and the British and Dutch joined Japan was in big trouble. Without those three Japan could not come up with 10% of the oil it needed so every month that they waited to grab the Dutch east indies oil fields (which could produce as 90% as much as Russia and Columbia combined in late 1930s) meant that their reserves shrank. The Japanese were also about 88% reliant on imported iron, 50% on zinc, 80% on tin, 100% on cotton, 99% on wool and 100% on rubber. Securing their own supply lines in addition to securing the sources was the main objective. Taking the oil fields with almost 30 submarines between the oil fields and Japanese home islands wasn't a good solution.

Now perhaps these numbers are in error, after two years I have forgotten were I got them but they point out that the main goal of the Japanese attacks HAD to be the Dutch East Indies oil fields AND a secure line of communication between the oil fields and the home Islands.

 

[Peter Gunn]

Not to be a dick or anything, but Japan coming anywhere near conquering the U.S. really wasn't in the cards. Even if the Lex, Sara and the Big E had been taken out at Pearl Harbor the Yorktown, Hornet, Wasp and if needs be Ranger would come from the Atlantic post haste.

Also remember the Essex was commissioned in December of '42, with 28 sisters to follow, plus six super dreadnaughts with four more on the way as the surface escort. The best Japan could hope for would have been a quick negotiated peace to stop the oncoming American juggernaut, and because of the nature of the opening of hostilities (i.e. Sneak Attack) that wasn't going to happen.

So in the end, taking that and the raw material situation into account, what the Japanese accomplished was, in reality, just about what they were going to accomplish, there isn't much wiggle room for "what if" scenarios.

*EDIT* Actually, upon reflection, I doubt the Ranger would have been brought to the Pacific considering her short comings.

 

[Shortround6]

The Ranger might depend on how desperate things were and/or other duties (aircraft ferry?) it could perform in keeping the other ships at the pointy end of things, at least until other carrier conversions showed up. Either escort carriers or the converted Clevelands.

The Massive US ship building program was not a secret, having been debated in congress and published in some newspapers. A 1938 spending bill called for a 20% increase in the US navy and other bills/authorizations had followed. Launchings were popular newsreel footage. Even the first two Iowa Class battleships had been laid down before Pearl Harbor.
Anything the Japanese were going to do had to be done quickly or not at all.

 

[XBe02Drvr]

Shinpachi, this is a mind-blowing concept! Japan to merge into China? And I suppose, to create a new dynasty based on Bushido and the Imperial lineage of Japan? Wouldn't that have poked Mao in the eye!
"Hey Liz, move over; the US is coming back to the fold! We're gonna merge into the UK and save you from your Brexit disaster, but you're gonna have to yield your throne to the Trump Dynasty!"