Yamamoto's Plan in action

[ChezDaJez]

The arguement here is about LOGISTIC CAPABILITY - and IF Japan truly lacked the LOGISTIC ability to attempt the invasion - they would not have tired to do so. Since they did try - the first 100,000 men were actually sent out on more than 200 ships - there is no reasonable basis to say they could not

These 100,000 men... what units were they and when and where did they embark for a Hawaii operation? What ships were earmarked for escorts? And where did these troops end up?

Planning an operation is not the same as conducting it. Sure you write all the planning documents and point papers you want, you can even identify the units and the ships you would need, you can even wargame it but the fact remains everything was purely hypothetical because Japan NEVER attempted to actually invade Hawaii.

Amassing the forces necessary to invade Hawaii would require a far larger committment of men and material than they planned for Midway. Plus the Japanese would have had to delay or cancel either the Malaya or PI operation in order to gather the necessary shipping which in turn delays the taking of the SRA.

Chez

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: bradfordkay

ORIGINAL: Terminus

How the hell would the Japanese gather together enough transports to sail 5 divisions to Hawai'i at once, anyway? "Unlikely" would be a polite understatement...

Well, it's late July 1942 in our game, and Chez just landed 5-6 divisions, 3 infantry brigades, 2 infantry regiments plus supporting troops at Darwin (CHS v2.08, scen 159).

That's the size of the invasion of Sicily in early 1943. "There were 2,760 ships and major landing craft converging on their rendezvous near Malta." from Combined Arms Site. Did the Japanese have those sorts of amphibious assets in mid-1942?

[DuckofTindalos]

ORIGINAL: el cid again

and you are wholly ignoring that Japan DID invade Hawaii IRL - in 1942

The modified plan - coming in from the NE instead of the SE - was expanded to include invading the Aleutians and a carrier air strike on Kodiak, Alaska - hard proof of the logistic reach of Japan in 1942

You've finally gone insane, I see. Took you long enough...

You're obviously not talking about Wake, since that's not part of the Hawai'ian chain, and you can't be talking about Midway, since the Japanese didn't bring more than two battalions worth of troops, and none ever set foot on any part of the atoll.

Ergo, you must have finally lost it.

[DuckofTindalos]

ORIGINAL: ChezDaJez

The arguement here is about LOGISTIC CAPABILITY - and IF Japan truly lacked the LOGISTIC ability to attempt the invasion - they would not have tired to do so. Since they did try - the first 100,000 men were actually sent out on more than 200 ships - there is no reasonable basis to say they could not

These 100,000 men... what units were they and when and where did they embark for a Hawaii operation? What ships were earmarked for escorts? And where did these troops end up?

Planning an operation is not the same as conducting it. Sure you write all the planning documents and point papers you want, you can even identify the units and the ships you would need, you can even wargame it but the fact remains everything was purely hypothetical because Japan NEVER attempted to actually invade Hawaii.

Amassing the forces necessary to invade Hawaii would require a far larger commitment of men and material than they planned for Midway. Plus the Japanese would have had to delay or cancel either the Malaya or PI operation in order to gather the necessary shipping which in turn delays the taking of the SRA.

Chez

Furthermore, given the sort of facilities the Japanese provided on their troop ships (quite literally hammocks and a trough to sh*t in), their troops would have been in a sorry state if they'd ever gotten to Hawai'i in the first place.

[Mike Scholl]

ORIGINAL: el cid again
The idea the Japanese might come out of their mandate bases was hardly a surprise. The US forces were looking for precisely such a move - and that is a big part of why they didn't find the KB on Dec 7 (US time) IRL. The idea that such an invasion would be a surprise on that particular day is certainly possible. It is difficult to overstate the lack of readiness and the peacetime mind set in place on Dec 7, 1941 - worldwide and in Hawaii. There was no ready ammunition. There was no manning of AAA positions or CD positions. There was no combat air patrol. There was minimal air and inshore patrol. Wether or not that means that the forces would reach all the way to Hawaii undetected is another subject entirely - and not an assertion anyone has made - least of all I.

Cid. I believe the point that BRADFORDKEY was trying to make is that to guarantee Kido Butai's arrival was a suprise at PH, most of the supporting invasion convoys and their escorts really couldn't sail until maybe 12/5 or so. They would be too big to hide, and Japan had no other major targets to the East but the United States. That being the case, every garrison and position in the Hawaiian Chain would be on full War footing before they could possibly arrive to invade, and additional forces on the way from the West Coast.

That doesn't mean the Japs would encounter major opposition in the Western Hawaiian Area when siezing advanced bases (like the Brits grabbed South Georgia during the Falklands Affair)..., but it does mean that resistance would be ready and aimed at all the militarily developed and useful bases (almost all of which were on or near Oahu).

[DuckofTindalos]

ORIGINAL: el cid again

It is impossible to prove a negative assertion - but it takes only a single fact to show a negative assertion must be false. This is that fact.

No, you must prove this "fact". The burden of proof is on you when you come up with these so-called "facts", and you've NEVER been able to prove anything you've presented as "facts".

[Mike Scholl]

ORIGINAL: el cid again
Sorry Cid..., but that's one big barrel of baloney. The Japanese "planned" to conquer China---and look how well that was turning out! "Wishfull Thinking" was a major ingredient in many Japanese Plans and Estimates.

Lets be perfectly clear here:

You claimed Japan lacked the logistic ability to invade Hawaii -

and you are wholly ignoring that Japan DID invade Hawaii IRL - in 1942

NO ..., they didn't. They made a "raid" on Midway (and the Aleutians) in hopes of drawing the US Navy into "the Decisive Battle". And they got their wish at Midway. The only things that got "invaded" were a couple of almost uninhabited islands at the far end of the Aleutians. And there is a good case to be made that even the "Midway Landing Force" was totally inadequate to the job allotted it, and would have been butchered had it tried to land.

An "invasion" of Hawaii would require the siezure of the area around and including Oahu (1200 miles farther from Japan) with at minimum and "Army-sized force" (in Japanese terms..., 3-5 Divisions). A long and drawn out process requiring the IJN to stay in position to support and protect lots of convoys and oilers and aircraft ferries and such...., and requiring many times the logistical support of the historical Midway Operation.

[Mike Scholl]

ORIGINAL: Terminus
Furthermore, given the sort of facilities the Japanese provided on their troop ships (quite literally hammocks and a trough to sh*t in), their troops would have been in a sorry state if they'd ever gotten to Hawai'i in the first place.

A valid point when the length of the voyage to the landing site grows from days to weeks... The Japanese soldier was a fairly hardy fellow, but his medical support was a joke, and his care and feeding aboard ship almost a "war crime" in itself (and by his own side to boot).

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

ORIGINAL: el cid again
The idea the Japanese might come out of their mandate bases was hardly a surprise. The US forces were looking for precisely such a move - and that is a big part of why they didn't find the KB on Dec 7 (US time) IRL. The idea that such an invasion would be a surprise on that particular day is certainly possible. It is difficult to overstate the lack of readiness and the peacetime mind set in place on Dec 7, 1941 - worldwide and in Hawaii. There was no ready ammunition. There was no manning of AAA positions or CD positions. There was no combat air patrol. There was minimal air and inshore patrol. Wether or not that means that the forces would reach all the way to Hawaii undetected is another subject entirely - and not an assertion anyone has made - least of all I.

Cid. I believe the point that BRADFORDKEY was trying to make is that to guarantee Kido Butai's arrival was a suprise at PH, most of the supporting invasion convoys and their escorts really couldn't sail until maybe 12/5 or so. They would be too big to hide, and Japan had no other major targets to the East but the United States. That being the case, every garrison and position in the Hawaiian Chain would be on full War footing before they could possibly arrive to invade, and additional forces on the way from the West Coast.

That doesn't mean the Japs would encounter major opposition in the Western Hawaiian Area when siezing advanced bases (like the Brits grabbed South Georgia during the Falklands Affair)..., but it does mean that resistance would be ready and aimed at all the militarily developed and useful bases (almost all of which were on or near Oahu).

Comparable operations for America in the Pacific were the invasions of Leyte, Guam, Mindinao, Iwo Jima, and Saipan. The invasions of Luzon and Okinawa were about twice as big.

[DuckofTindalos]

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

ORIGINAL: Terminus
Furthermore, given the sort of facilities the Japanese provided on their troop ships (quite literally hammocks and a trough to sh*t in), their troops would have been in a sorry state if they'd ever gotten to Hawai'i in the first place.

A valid point when the length of the voyage to the landing site grows from days to weeks... The Japanese soldier was a fairly hardy fellow, but his medical support was a joke, and his care and feeding aboard ship almost a "war crime" in itself (and by his own side to boot).

AND, if the invasion was to follow right on top of any Pearl Harbor attack (12/7), the invasion force would have been exposed to the severe weather of the North Pacific that the Kido Butai had to sail through. Another nail in the coffin.

Consider how many Allied soldiers were violently seasick in the Channel on the way to Normandy (which, in amphibious assault terms, is basically stepping off a curb and into a street), and then consider how far the Japs would have had to travel.

Seishin only goes so far...

[Andrew Brown]

ORIGINAL: el cid again
As WITP mechanics are cast in stone, no scenario designer can give the Allies control over their production. Nor - probably - should we tinker with different allocations between theaters.

I don't see why not? Modders are allowed to change things. I haven't seen any comments from the game designers that modders should not change the allocation of forces in "what-if" scenarios.

I don't think we can make good estimates of the impacts of that.

If the allocation of greater forces by the USA to the Pacific is considered the likely response to a Japanese invasion of Hawaii, and I certainly believe that to be the case, then adding additional US reinforcements, even if we do not exactly know what form those forces would take, would be more accurate than not adding them.

Tinkering with this is a big can of worms -and WITP design was soundly based on the assumption "when things entered PTO is the time they enter in the game" - period.

You have placed that comment in quotes. Who are you quoting? Also, were they talking about "what-if" scenarios? I also don't understand this objection to changing the Allied reinforcements. After all, they arrived when they did partly due to the situation at the time. If the war takes a different course, then the situation is different, and that influence on the arrival of reinforcements changes as well.

first of all - many nations that joined the Allies won't join (so for example we don't get the use of the Azores, maybe);

Why do you believe that many nations would not Join the Allies? Which nations? On what basis?

...morale in many places is likely to have some political impacts. It is on the record that Gen Marshall and FDR worried about the impacts of casualties on US domestic politics. Lacking the ability to calculate when, if, and with what impact these sorts of changes might occur, I think it is much safer to stay with things more or less as they were

Given the outrage in the USA after the PH attack, I would expect that there would be even more outrage if PH was invaded in December 1941. That translates to a greater, rather than lesser, resolve to fight the war on the part of the USA.

I tend to side with Andrew's view that "Germany still loses, but it takes longer." If "it takes longer" - what is the impact on UNITS that transferred ETO to PTO - in months? How much longer does it Germany tie up those units that did change theaters?

As I stated earlier, I gave a very brief answer to this question in my first post. To repeat it - I think it likely that there would be fewer Commonwealth reinforcements from the ETO, and the land and air units transferred from the ETO after the Surrender of Germany would not arrive (since Germany hasn't surrendered yet). But those are more than offset by the much greater allocation of resources to the PTO, throughout the scenario, by the USA in any case.

So my opinion remains the same - I see no reason not to include the addition of significantly larger US air and ground reinforcements to such a "what-if" scenario. I believe that adding them is more likely to provide a reasonable answer to the central "what-if" question of the scenario, and leaving them out is a major innacuracy.

Edit - I thought I'd better add a post-script: I don't have a problem with the existence of such a scenario - the more WitP scenarios the better as far as I am concerned. Nor do I want to buy into the arguments about whether such a plan was feasible.

[VSWG]

ORIGINAL: ChezDaJez

The arguement here is about LOGISTIC CAPABILITY - and IF Japan truly lacked the LOGISTIC ability to attempt the invasion - they would not have tired to do so. Since they did try - the first 100,000 men were actually sent out on more than 200 ships - there is no reasonable basis to say they could not

These 100,000 men... what units were they and when and where did they embark for a Hawaii operation? What ships were earmarked for escorts? And where did these troops end up?

As an ignorant bystander, I'd really like to know more about this invasion interruptus, too. Do you have an OoB?

Thanks in advance.

[witpqs]

ORIGINAL: el cid again

ORIGINAL: witpqs

ORIGINAL: el cid again

Lets be perfectly clear here:

You claimed Japan lacked the logistic ability to invade Hawaii -

and you are wholly ignoring that Japan DID invade Hawaii IRL - in 1942

Sid,

This is false. Period. I understand what you mean because you explained it. Still, the statement is false. Planning a thing is not doing it. Even doing other things that were part of the plan is not doing it. They might have planned to invade Hawaii, they certainly did invade two Islands in Alaska (and I think intended to invade a third but were dissuaded by bad weather), and they certainly attacked Midway in an attempt to invade it (which failed), but they never did invade Hawaii.

Just because our official history was written in ignorance - decades before we had the Japanese official history - does not change the facts of real life: Japan decided to invade Hawaii - it launched the first phase operations leading to that end - and was forced to abort because of being decisively defeated in the Southern portion of that operation (the Northern phase was successful). This discussion is about LOGISTIC CAPABILITY - and the decision to IMPLEMENT the invasion strategy is history - not some fantasy. The ships existed, they sailed, and the additional ships and units involved were also standing up to sail on time tables for the next several months. The LOGISTIC CAPABILITY existed - and had it not - the battle would not have occurred. Now we can try this in some other language if you wish - but by dictionary definition - it is wholly false to deny they had a capability they actually had and used. Launching the op to invade Hawaii - never mind the outcome of it - shows the logistics to do it existed. Yes - at least three islands were in the invasion plan - just as the earlier plans also had at least three islands. The only change was that the islands changed from Midway, Johnston and Molokai to Midway, Attu and Kiska. Logistically speaking, supporting an invasion of the latter three out of Japan is far more difficult than supporting the earlier op out of Kwajalein - to which add the logistical burdon of the carrier raid on Kodiak. The actual op shows that the original concept was feasible - in a logistical sense. You are now reduced to quibbling about details - they had the ships, the fuel, the divisions and other units, and they decided to do the mission: it is not rational to say they could not have had - because we know they did.

Sid,

You are totally missing the forest for the trees. Japan did not invade Hawaii. Attu is not Hawaii. Kiska is not Hawaii. They did not even invade Midway - they attacked it. They wanted to invade Midway, but they failed to even begin landings. You are attempting to apply your own definition of the word 'invaded'. Whatever was feasible, whatever was supportable, whatever was possible, whatever was probable, whatever their decisions, whatever their plans, whatever their attempts - they did not get there. I am not "quibbling over details" - they did not get a single soldier within even hundreds of miles of landing on Hawaii as part of an invasion. (If you come back and tell me that they landed some special ops people for intel - no, that still is not an invasion.)

Wanting to do something is not the same as doing it. Only doing it is doing it. They did not even land and fail - they never even got close.

The word 'invade' can have a broad definition depending upon the context. One could land even a handful of troops as part of an invasion attempt and get wiped out, one could land in force and seize a place, or anything in between. Those could all be called invasions in the appropriate context. But you cannot redefine the word to mean 'they took steps in that direction, therefore they invaded'. That would be like saying 'the USSR landed men on the moon because they took many steps in that direction'.


EDIT

PS: Even George Carlin has to use the same words as everybody else! If you use words with your own meaning that no one else agrees on, you fail to communicate because it becomes your own language that no one else understands.

[DuckofTindalos]

ORIGINAL: witpqs

(If you come back and tell me that they landed some special ops people for intel - no, that still is not an invasion.)

And they didn't.

[Skyros]

Here is a site where they discuss a possible operation. I do not know how valid the info is.

http://www.users.bigpond.com/pacificwar ... wayOp.html

[Skyros]

ANd another perspective.

http://www.combinedfleet.com/pearlops.htm

[Mike Scholl]

ORIGINAL: Skyros

Here is a site where they discuss a possible operation. I do not know how valid the info is.

http://www.users.bigpond.com/pacificwar ... wayOp.html

"Dr Stephan claims in his book that on 9 December 1941 Admiral Yamamoto ordered his chief of staff, Rear Admiral Matome Ugaki, to draw up a plan for an invasion of Hawaii (p.92)." I find it interesting that even in this most "rose-colored" assessment, the notion of actually invading Hawaii doesn't show up until AFTER Pearl Harbor.

[DuckofTindalos]

ORIGINAL: Skyros

ANd another perspective.

http://www.combinedfleet.com/pearlops.htm

I just re-read this one. Good assessment.

[Mike Scholl]

ORIGINAL: Skyros

ANd another perspective.

http://www.combinedfleet.com/pearlops.htm

This assessment of the situation seems to have a lot more concrete in it's foundations...

[aztez]

This thread is quite an spectacle or turning into one.
 
Japanese did not have the transport shipping available to conduct such an massive operation at CenPac nor did they have adequate means and strenght to provide aircover for it. That pretty much sums up any Pearl Harbour invasion fantasy in WW2.