World War II: Who Fought Where

[Mike Irwin]

I forget who wrote the book, but it came out about 8 to 10 years ago. It made a VERY persuasive case for it being impossible for the Japanese to invade Hawaii with any hope of using it effectively as a base of operations.

They simply were stretched too thin.

Had they invaded, yes, the Japanese would have gained a nice protective position for Japan, but I think it's pretty evident that the Americans wouldn't have been as foolish as the Japanese were... Those tank farms, unless taken by surprise by paratroopers, never would have been taken complete.

The Japanese would have had to have performed massive infrastructure repairs before Hawaii became fully operational. The channel to Pearl Harbor would have been thoroughly blocked with sunken ships and mined, the Naval facilities would have been heavily damaged or destroyed...

It's doubtful that Hawaii would have been of much military use at all for quite some time.

 

[Nightcrawler]

Hitler and the Imperial Japanese Government made the same mistake; they both spread their wars much further than their fairly small countries' resources would allow.

I know that hindsight is always 20/20, but someone in these respective militaries must've seen the foolishness of this?

 

[James Bondrock]

I know that hindsight is always 20/20, but someone in these respective militaries must've seen the foolishness of this?

No doubt they did. But if they did not obey, they and their families would have been killed. In fact, many were.

 

[Bruce626]

My father and my two uncles (his two brothers) personally won WWII and I have proof...

Although living in different parts of the country, they would occasionally convene a war history conference, cleverly disguised as a family reunion. They would then, and only then, proceed to tell a few war stories.

The youngest of the three brothers enlisted in the Marines by lieing about his age and was, according to his stories told to his older brothers, personally responsible for winning the Pacific theatre by taking Guadalcanal (sp?) via hand-to-hand combat, and going on from there... Well, he was there and got a medal, but how much credit can one guy take? Best of the bunch, however.

The oldest brother was an Army Paratrooper who actually jumped out of perfectly good airplanes more than once and was the key guy in the liberation of France. Or, at least that's what he told his brothers that all of the french girls would report. Well, he did jump, land, and fight... but we may never know about the girls.

The middle brother, my Dad, was Army Corps of Engineers. He always said he had the easy job compared to his brothers, he only had to build the bridges in front of Patton's liesurely advance into bad-guy territory. In FRONT of Patton? Sheesh! But it was true.

You guys have way more details than I remember and all of my uncles and Dad are gone, so I'll always regret not getting a real oral history from three guys who were in the thick of it and lived to tell at least a bit about it.

 

[IRONFIST]

I pretty much agree with your thinking Mike, but even the temporary takeover of such an important base would be catastrophic to the United States armed forces in the region. I seriously doubt that the Nippon army could have KEPT Hawaii after seizing it, but they would have burrowed into every hidden crevice and hiding spot on those islands and blown everything up behind them. The monkeywrenching, espionage, covert attacks and outright assasinations would happen day and night. The resources that we would have had to send to contain the problem would have been very large and the port facilities would probably be out of commission for months. Of course, we would eventually kill every single Japanese soldier that had been left behind, but the cost in war material, lives and time to do it would be dreadful. You keep your enemies base for as long as it is humanly possible, and when you must give the base back you scorch the earth in doing so. After reading about how hard it was to dig the fanatical Japanese soldiers out of Guadalcanal, Iwo Jima and other combat areas, can you imagine the chaos of trying to do it in Hawaii and the smaller islands? It would be nuts. You also know that there is no way that we could have put together a large enough strike force in such a small amount of time, to oust the Japanese before they could have rebuilt the island defenses enough to give them a toehold. If they could get the airfields up to speed, they could have put a defensive perimeter out to sea that we would have had to fight thru to get back onto the island. We certainly would have kicked them off, eventually, but it would be very, very painful.


Michael in Sandy, Oregon/Owner of IronWolf Industries

 

[Mike Irwin]

"I pretty much agree with your thinking Mike, but even the temporary takeover of such an important base would be catastrophic to the United States armed forces in the region."

About as catastrophic as the loss of the bases in the Philippines and the deep water harbor in Subic Bay.

In other words yeah, a pain in the ???, but not critical to the overall waging of the war.

With the loss of the Philippines, the Navy simply moved its staging areas back to Pearl.

Had Pearl been lost, they would have, as the contingency plan called for, moved back to California.

"After reading about how hard it was to dig the fanatical Japanese soldiers out of Guadalcanal, Iwo Jima and other combat areas, can you imagine the chaos of trying to do it in Hawaii and the smaller islands?"

Uh, yeah, about as difficult, time consuming, and costly as it was in the Philippines, the Marshall Islands, the Gilberts, etc. Not sure what your ultimate point is... Let the Japanese keep the islands?

Starting around 1943, if the United States needed a forward base, they simply built it, often in unbelievably rapid time.

Ulithi Atoll was won from the Japanese in 1944, and within I believe 3 months was the major US supply, rondevous, and refit yard in the Pacific, handling more traffic than Pearl Harbor.

About the only thing that couldn't be done at Ulithi were major refits and complex battle damage repairs, as there were no drydocking facilities.

Here's a great picture of just a few of the ships that could be serviced at the same time at Ulithi in the protected waters of the lagoon...

That's the Ticonderoga. Not sure what the Essex is behind her.

 

[IRONFIST]

Okay, okay... After being beaten about the head and shoulders by someone who obviously has far more knowledge about the war in the Pacific than myself, I kneel in submission... Crap, I hate doing that! :banghead:


Michael in Sandy, Oregon/Owner of IronWolf Industries

 

[Billy Sparks]

Not to beat a dead horse.....

Remember Pearl was not the Navies primary base. Prior to FDR moving the US Pacific fleet there Pearl was home to some destroyers, crusisers and 1 aircraft carrier. FDR wanted to project more power so he moved the Pacific Fleet there. Little know fact Adm. Richardson was the admiral of the US Pacific fleet but was sacked by FDR for opposing the move. That is why Adm. Kimmel got the job, after Nimitz respectively turned it down.

the loss of Pearl would have forced the Navy back to there secure base in San Diego, where they wanted to be to start with.

 

[bukijin]

This has been an interesting thread. I for one had no idea about the Japanese attacks on Alaska. I was prompted to do a little more research and found an interesting website about Australian (and New Zealand) military history (including WW2)here

To keep this gun-related there is also a section on weapons used by Australian forces up til now. The .303 (SMLE) is the legendary rifle in Australia !