OT: question: US military size, prewar

[niceguy2005]

Mike above addressed the reason for that.  The plans were already in place on how to ramp up production.

Plus let's not forget all the men and women who worked, 10-12 hour days 6-7 days a week to keep stuff rolling off the assembly lines.

What amazes me is how fast all that stuff was decomisioned after the war was over.

[Terminus]

They just dumped it in the ocean... Quite literally...

[Mike Scholl]

ORIGINAL: Terminus

They just dumped it in the ocean... Quite literally...

More like "just left it" all over the world. People talk about the "Cargo Cult" of the Pacific Islanders..., but most of Western Europe was rebuilt using trucks and jeeps the US Army just abandoned in it's hurry to "get the boys home".

[niceguy2005]

The point of this thread as stated by the poster was...

There was no apparent assertion that the US WAS attacked because of its large military.

Thanks, all. The reason I'm asking is because, on a completely different forum-board, there is a thread where the OP postulates that the money the US currently spends on the military is better spent on domestic stuff.

In his/her mind, a large military leads to unnecessary wars. So, a small military leads to a peaceful (presumedly because your neighbors do not feel threatened) world, and no imperial ambitions.

I wished to counter with the data that, when the US was attacked in WW2, it's military was not large and threatening. (The USN and RN were in relative parity for the number one slot in size. But the US Army was relatively small.)

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

ORIGINAL: rtrapasso

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

The one factor this discussion fails to take into account is that the US Army KNEW that in peacetime they would be "sucking hint tit" for funds and support---but if war threatened the would be innundated with money and told to "get on with it!". They'd been through it before, which was why the US Army alone among the world's military maintained an "Industrial Mobilization School" with the sole job of preparing and updating piles of data on what industries could be rapidly co-opted for military production of what items.

When the tap was "turned on" , the military knew what it wanted, and who could produce it, and who would sub-contract the parts. And unlike most of the rest of the world, they knew that the quantities would be huge. One of the reasons for Japan's complacency in going to war was that the US had barely produced a single merchant ship during the decade of the '30's (the Depression). Based on that observation, the idea that it would produce over 50,000,000 tons of them in the next 4 years seemed remote. Only a few Japanese officers had listened to Sun Tsu's maxim to "Know your Enemy!"..., the majority clung to myths.

i think that proves the point of the original poster - this thread was all started to disprove the claim that the US having a huge army provoked the attack on the US... your post supports the claim that it was the weakness of the US that encouraged the attack (not the strength).

Not quite. It was the APPARENT weakness that they mis-read. Had they bothered to look at what was "in the pipeline" for 1919 when the First War ended, they would have been wiser. Or even at the figures for Aircraft production from 1939 to 1941, which had tripled and was exceeding that of all three Axis powers. Or the fact that of 3.5 million motor vehicles produced in the whole world in 1939, 2.5 million were produced in the US. Not realizing what such production could grow to in the event of being re-directed to military hardware was very short-sighted by the Axis.

The only "provoking" America provided (if you can call it that) was the "Two-Ocean Navy Bill" and it's supplements---which the Japanese realized meant that their 20-year Naval buildup was going to be swamped in 3 years by the US Fleet...., and their "Window of Opportunity" was closing fast.

[Terminus]

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

ORIGINAL: Terminus

They just dumped it in the ocean... Quite literally...

More like "just left it" all over the world. People talk about the "Cargo Cult" of the Pacific Islanders..., but most of Western Europe was rebuilt using trucks and jeeps the US Army just abandoned in it's hurry to "get the boys home".

True, but I know at least one example where a squadron's worth of aircraft were brought all the way back to Hawaii from the South Pacific and THEN dumped at sea.

[mlees]

I appreciate all the thought provoking posts in this thread. Thanks!
 
As I stated earlier, on another board, a poster there was griping about the money the US government spends on the military.
 
1) The poster postulated on how much "good" could be acheived by redirecting that money to other programs (education, infrastructure, health care, etc.).
 
and
 
2) They also argued that having a large military leads to the temptation to use it in imperialistic adventures, and a large military actually destabilises the world by the implied threat of such a force merely existing.
 
So, I wished to debate that last point (as my attempt to debate the economic point turned out to be futile), and get citable info I could use to bolster my position. That is to say, I disagreed with the second argument. I don't think a unilateral disarmament by a world power necessarily leads to peace. I had recalled that the size of the US Army, in 1939, was small by European standards, and this did not seem to make the US less likely to be drawn into any conflicts.
 
So, to rephrase my OP:
 
1) Did the small size of the US Army cause the aggressive Axis powers to underestimate the US's ability to fight and win a war?
 
1a) Would a much larger US military (Army, Air Force, and Navy) in 1939 have restrained the aggressiveness of Germany or Japan?
 
2) Did the large US Navy actually aggravate the situation vis a vis Japan?
 
3) Would a smaller military have worked, but only if the USA had remained completely isolationist from events in Asia and Europe? (Remember, the oil embargo and Lend Lease acts could be seen by the Axis powers as provocative.)
 
Thanks again for the interesting view points.
 
I had not considered that the large USN might have been seen by Japan, as a dagger aimed at her. I always viewed the move of the Pacific Fleet to Hawaii as a failed deterent, as Japan attacked anyway. I did not think much deeper than that. But then again, Japan had been training with the US in mind as the most likely enemy since the mid-20's... kind of a self fullfilling prophecy.

[Terminus]

I don't think the Axis powers underestimated the US because of the small size of her military, but because they thought she was decadent and isolationist and lacked the will to fight. Classic case of Oops![:D]

[ny59giants]

The poster postulated on how much "good" could be acheived by redirecting that money to other programs (education, infrastructure, health care, etc.).

I grew up during the 60's and thus became a big space advocate. Many people argued about how the race to the moon during that decade was a waste of money. However, without it there was no need to miniturize the electronics and thus there may not be a computer revolution like we have now. At the time, the production cost of a basic transitor circuit was less than $.05 while the same using a computer chip was over $2.00. [X(]

I would like to know how much more money the education system/department needs as the high price being paid has yet to show it is a wise investment. Without competion, like vouchers, the educational system in the USA will never improve with just more money. [:@]

[Andvari]

ORIGINAL: bjmorgan

An example:  We didn't have a clue about mobile, combined arms warfare until sometime after Kasserine.  Another? We ddn't figure out how to use airborne troops until sometime around Normandy.  (My uncle was a D-Day Screaming Eagle and said we never did figure it out.  But he was a little biased since his stick missed the drop zone by 13 miles.)  ANother?  Our knowledge of the use of airpower.  Another?  The use of carriers in naval operations.

Read Reynold's book, Admiral John H. Towers: The Struggle for Naval Air Supremecy. The brown shoe admirals (Towers, F. Sherman, Radford, Ragsdale, etc., and King himself, did know how to use carriers in naval operations, but their efforts were generally stifled by the Battleship (black shoe) boys. The Joint Naval Exercises throughout the '30s proved their (CVs) usefulness and strike capabilities.

[niceguy2005]

I know mlees, and probably no one else is asking my opinion, but since the forum is slow these days I'll give it anyway. [:'(]

1) Did the small size of the US Army cause the aggressive Axis powers to underestimate the US's ability to fight and win a war?

Almost certainly yes...but at least in the case of Japan it wasn't just the size of the military which led to the perceived weakness. Japan (the political military establishment) also considered Japanese people to be superior to pretty much everyone. It was the arrogance, as much as anything, that led to the war.

1a) Would a much larger US military (Army, Air Force, and Navy) in 1939 have restrained the aggressiveness of Germany or Japan?

NO. See the comment above. When ultra-national pride is the dominant thought process reason and judgment go out the window.

2) Did the large US Navy actually aggravate the situation vis a vis Japan?

No, the large Navy in and of itself did not aggravate the problem with Japan, if by aggravate you mean take aggressive action. However, the threat by the US and UK to blockade Japan, combined with the deployment of fleets to the Pacific did aggravate the situation. Had the US taken a more restrained posture it seems certain Japan would have been content to continue its war with China first.

3) Would a smaller military have worked, but only if the USA had remained completely isolationist from events in Asia and Europe? (Remember, the oil embargo and Lend Lease acts could be seen by the Axis powers as provocative.)

There was a small group advocating for maintaining a small military. They were isolationists. Would having a small military have discouraged FDR from threatening a blockade on Japan...possibly. Would this have prevented a preemptive strike by Japan, possibly. Would that ultimately have prevented a war? That's almost impossible to predict IMO, but personally I doubt it. Japan almost certainly would have attacked forces in the SRA.

Thanks again for the interesting view points.

I had not considered that the large USN might have been seen by Japan, as a dagger aimed at her. I always viewed the move of the Pacific Fleet to Hawaii as a failed deterent, as Japan attacked anyway. I did not think much deeper than that. But then again, Japan had been training with the US in mind as the most likely enemy since the mid-20's... kind of a self fullfilling prophecy.

Well, certainly that was true after the embargo and the threatened blockade. The failure at Hawaii, IMO, was a failure to adequately assess the threat of carriers. I never saw the Hawaii move foremost as a deterrent. I believe it was a real step toward an actual blockade....apparently so did Japan.

[Big B]

ORIGINAL:
I would like to know how much more money the education system/department needs as the high price being paid has yet to show it is a wise investment. Without competion, like vouchers, the educational system in the USA will never improve with just more money. [:@]

I would like to know why - if we actually got our 'peace dividend' and had a small military - why the government would have to spend OUR money on something else to begin with?
We seem to assume the money is the government's to spend on some other project if not the military...I would like to know why the government has a god-given right to spend money it never earns?

Ok, I'm getting too political, just my 2c.

[mdiehl]

1) Did the small size of the US Army cause the aggressive Axis powers to underestimate the US's ability to fight and win a war?

No. Many of the major players in the Axis powers knew well what the US *could* do. Axis powers' leadership however seem to have fully digested their own propaganda concerning their own racial or ethnic superiority, or their predestiny to rule supreme over the rest of the earth.

1a) Would a much larger US military (Army, Air Force, and Navy) in 1939 have restrained the aggressiveness of Germany or Japan?

No. The Allies (UK, France) of 1939 and USSR of 1941 were on paper far more powerful than Germany and its occupied satellites and client states. These imbalances did not deter Germany at all.

2) Did the large US Navy actually aggravate the situation vis a vis Japan?

No. The situtation that most aggravated Japan was the US unwillingess to acquiesce to the creation of a Japanese client state in Indochina, and the US unwillingness to allow the Phillippines to be occupied by Japan; vis the latter, one of Japan's demands in September 1941 was that *JAPAN* would "secure the neutrality of the Philippines" and that JAPAN would have carte blanche to expand facilities and troop levels in Formosa and Indochina and the west-central Pacific, but that the US must agree to NOT expand US troop levels or facilities in the Philippines. It was a more or less a naked demand that the US cede the Philippines to Japan.

3) Would a smaller military have worked, but only if the USA had remained completely isolationist from events in Asia and Europe? (Remember, the oil embargo and Lend Lease acts could be seen by the Axis powers as provocative.)

No. The size of the US military has no bearing on deterrence. At least it hasn't historically, mostly. The only two instances I can think of where the US was in a position of having substantial force that deterred aggression was during the Cold War and just after the end of the War of the Rebellion. In the latter case, Maximilian, uh, IV (IIRC) in Mexico was rattling sabres and implying that the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo might be open to executive renegotiation. At that time, Andrew Johnson casually observed that in 1865 with the war done, he had access to some 1.7 million US and former CSA veterans who might be looking to expand the Union southward. Maximilian wisely clammed up.

I *do* think that in the more general sense in which you intend this discussion, the need for a large US armed forces, now, is greatly overstated by conservatives. The USSR is gone. Russia is no threat. There are other wealthy highly developed allies who were in no position for self-defense in 1936-1941 that are now fully capable of shouldering their share of the burden. Yeah, it'd take some doing to get South Korea to stand up for itself, to get France to actually stand with democracies in general, and to get Japan to edit (or creatively interpret) their own constitution, and to get South Korea to step up in its own defense (given that they get so much from the US for free). But they COULD do it if pressed to do so.

At this time there are no organized military threats to the US, and our strategic nuclear retaliation capability gives us an overwhelming deterrance, and gives us the ability to eliminate any "rogue" nation that might "choose poorly" in imagining that an WMD released in the US would enhance their credibility on the world stage.

[niceguy2005]

ORIGINAL: Big B

ORIGINAL:
I would like to know how much more money the education system/department needs as the high price being paid has yet to show it is a wise investment. Without competion, like vouchers, the educational system in the USA will never improve with just more money. [:@]

I would like to know why - if we actually got our 'peace dividend' and had a small military - why the government would have to spend OUR money on something else to begin with?
We seem to assume the money is the government's to spend on some other project if not the military...I would like to know why the government has a god-given right to spend money it never earns?

Ok, I'm getting too political, just my 2c.

I really am bored today...way OT but...

I never want to see my tax dollars going to private organizations over which I have ZERO control. I'm all for competition, but if we really want it I say let the parents educate their own (however they see fit) and stop sending me the bill.

[Andvari]

ORIGINAL: mlees

2) Did the large US Navy actually aggravate the situation vis a vis Japan?

I had not considered that the large USN might have been seen by Japan, as a dagger aimed at her. I always viewed the move of the Pacific Fleet to Hawaii as a failed deterent, as Japan attacked anyway. I did not think much deeper than that. But then again, Japan had been training with the US in mind as the most likely enemy since the mid-20's... kind of a self fullfilling prophecy.

The Naval Treaties after WWI made Japan a junior partner in the Pacific. The greater restrictions on Japan were seen as a slight by them. The Japanese were just as incensed at Britain, if not more so because of their Imperial possesions in the Pacific as well as their overall condescending attitude toward Japan.

The ring of bases from Singapore through the Philippines, Wake, Midway probably only aggravated the situation. During the '30s, I think we were generally sensitive to the Japanese situation and restricted our naval exercises to the Hawaiian Islands and the Panama Canal area.

The Japanese essentially put us on the road to WWII with their adventures in Manchuria and China proper. They couldn't/wouldn't leave China without losing face. They sealed their own fate....

[Big B]

...
I *do* think that in the more general sense in which you intend this discussion, the need for a large US armed forces, now, is greatly overstated by conservatives. The USSR is gone. Russia is no threat. There are other wealthy highly developed allies who were in no position for self-defense in 1936-1941 that are now fully capable of shouldering their share of the burden. Yeah, it'd take some doing to get South Korea to stand up for itself, to get France to actually stand with democracies in general, and to get Japan to edit (or creatively interpret) their own constitution, and to get South Korea to step up in its own defense (given that they get so much from the US for free). But they COULD do it if pressed to do so.

At this time there are no organized military threats to the US, and our strategic nuclear retaliation capability gives us an overwhelming deterrance, and gives us the ability to eliminate any "rogue" nation that might "choose poorly" in imagining that an WMD released in the US would enhance their credibility on the world stage.

Another example of the tax payer being bilked is the US defense of S Korea, look at the two countries:

North Korea
Population - 2007 estimate 23,301,725
GDP 2006 estimate - Total $22.85 billion - Per capita $1,007
South Korea
Population - 2007 estimate 49,044,790
GDP 2007 estimate - Total $1.250 trillion[1] (12th) - Per capita $25,840 (2007)

If North Korea, so much an outnumbered, poor, underdog - can kick South Korea's butt...then South korea deserves to live under North Korean rule - we shouldn't have to defend them anymore.
This is like protecting Italy from Malta....and paying a lot of money for the honor.

[Andvari]

ORIGINAL: mlees

I thought I read somewhere that the size of the US Army in 1939 was smaller than Greece (or was it Portugal?). Can someone point me towards an online reference as to the numbers of folks in uniform (USA) pre-WW2?

Thanks!

Is should have posted this hours ago, but....

Geoffrey Perrett's, There's a War to Be Won is a nice source for the prewar numbers of troops, tanks, men, etc. and the growing pains of the U.S. military.

There's a nice little section on the development of the M-1 Garand.

[Erik Rutins]

Gentlemen,

Please keep this discussion on the subject of history rather than veering into the present and current/political issues. Discussing the US military and mobilization in WWII is great, but I see too much of this heading in a modern political direction. Thanks.

Regards,

- Erik

[John Lansford]

The move of the Pacific Fleet to Hawaii was certainly considered by Japan as an implied threat aimed at them; prior to that the fleet was based on the West Coast.  The buildup of forces (especially the B-17's) in the Philippines was taken by them as a threat too.  The Fleet at Hawaii, however, provided them an opportunity to neutralize it with the Pearl Harbor attack.

It would be interesting to game out what would have happened had the Pacific Fleet remained based at San Francisco in 1941 and never moved their HQ to Hawaii...

[niceguy2005]

ORIGINAL: John Lansford

The move of the Pacific Fleet to Hawaii was certainly considered by Japan as an implied threat aimed at them; prior to that the fleet was based on the West Coast. The buildup of forces (especially the B-17's) in the Philippines was taken by them as a threat too. The Fleet at Hawaii, however, provided them an opportunity to neutralize it with the Pearl Harbor attack.

It would be interesting to game out what would have happened had the Pacific Fleet remained based at San Francisco in 1941 and never moved their HQ to Hawaii...

The loss of battleships (the hardware) probably had the least effect on events. The loss of AC at PH was probably of actual greater consequence. The loss of life however, at PH was probably the nail that ensured the US would never consider a negotiated peace

[panzers]

ORIGINAL: anarchyintheuk

Greece and Poland were bordered by countries a little more dangerous to them than Canada and Mexico were to the US.

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USA/COS ... ial-1.html

lol