Pacific Theatre

[BeirutDude]

So I'm not interested in Warplan (sorry not refighting WWII in Europe according to the actual War's script with "Barbarossa" scheduled for May-June 1942 or Russia attacks)

Does Russia attack if Barbarossa isn't launched? What are the percentage chances of it happening?

[ncc1701e]

Chances are 100%

[malkarma]

Actually Japan and the URSS had a strict non agession agreement until 1945. And when I say strict taht means medical and cilvilian supplies were moved by Vladivostok.

Also Coral Sea battle started from Australia, but Midaway and the Guadalcanal invasion started from Pearl Harbour and Samoa.
Also even the disaster of Midway, the Japanese fleet managed to sink the Wasp (sub attack) and the Hornet (in Santa Cruz battle), so until december 1942, uS fleet only had one real CV operational...the MIGHTY CV6 ENTERPRISE (the Saratoga always managed to find herself under reapairs or travelling during that period).
The real turning point of the Pacific is the Guadalcanal campaing and the Biscamrk Islands capture, due to the experienced pilots loses for the Japanese Air Force and the fact that they were unable to replace their sunk ships.
After that, the Turkey shoot at the Mariana's was the unavoidable fate.

This said, there was more surface battles during the pacific campaing that in the Battle of the Atlantic and Mediterranean together (only Guadalcanal had like 10 surface encounters), so that need to be considered regarding the search chances for non CV fleets.

[kennonlightfoot]

Disagree on turning point. Midway was it. Japanese carrier fleet never was a serious threat after that loss. The Americans easily made up the losses. The Japanese lost four fleet carriers. While they had others lighter carriers they never put together a viable carrier threat after that.

But more importantly it set them up for what happened in the Guadalcanal campaign. Without air power that a carrier fleet would have provided they couldn't dominate the Island and cut off the marines from support. Midway became the first of an almost continuous string of defeats.

[battlevonwar]

Just finished the Book Shattered Sword about the Japanese CVs in the Pacific. I think everyone is right(it doesn't appear that the Japanese had a Pilot Training Program) when they lost their cream of the crop, they lost it for good. Plus it appears a lack in ability to replace their Carriers(naturally they had less than 1/20th the Industrial Capacity of the USA)

In Shattered Sword they break down precisely why the Japanese lost and they probably could not of helped it. Down to their Recon Planes and their orders. Their whole doctrine was set for them to lose. Could they of won a few more local victories and extended the war, yes... for certain could they of won the war, most assuredly NEVER unless the USA gave up.

[Platoonist]

ORIGINAL: battlevonwar

Just finished the Book Shattered Sword about the Japanese CVs in the Pacific. I think everyone is right(it doesn't appear that the Japanese had a Pilot Training Program) when they lost their cream of the crop, they lost it for good. Plus it appears a lack in ability to replace their Carriers(naturally they had less than 1/20th the Industrial Capacity of the USA)

In Shattered Sword they break down precisely why the Japanese lost and they probably could not of helped it. Down to their Recon Planes and their orders. Their whole doctrine was set for them to lose. Could they of won a few more local victories and extended the war, yes... for certain could they of won the war, most assuredly NEVER unless the USA gave up.

Shattered Sword is a fine work. They covered the impact of Midway on the battle for Guadalcanal beautifully in the chapter on assessing the battle's importance.

While the Japanese may have privately acknowledged the seriousness of their defeat at Midway, they did not feel that fact condemned them to to fighting on unequal terms around Guadalcanal. Indeed, in the short term, they were able to stay in game in the waters off Guadalcanal. At this point in the conflict, even after the losses she had suffered, Japan still possessed the means to equip the air groups of several more fleet carriers, had the ships themselves been available. Japan ultimately did commit a large scale of air resources to the Solomons contest, but most had to operate from primitive land air bases, some too far from the action.

Of the two major carrier battles fought off Guadalcanal, the Japanese lost at Eastern Solomons, but arguably won at Santa Cruz. But even when they achieved what appeared to be temporary victories in those waters, they lacked the strength anymore to capitalize on their triumphs. They could no longer seal the deal by inflicting a final crushing victory, driving off the US support vessels and exterminating US forces on the island. Had even just the Hiryu or Akagi survived Midway, the Japanese might have had the requisite strength to prevail four to six months more in those crucial waters.

However, once Japan concedes defeat at Guadalcanal, the tipping point finally arrives. By the end of 1942 the carrier fleets of both the US and Japan were in a shambles with both sides exhausted and spent. The US even borrowed a British carrier (the Victorious) early in 1943 to bolster their strength in the South Pacific. The opposing carrier fleets would not meet again until 1944. But by the middle of 1943 the Americans began committing Essex class carriers to the Pacific at the rate of one every other month in addition to the nine light Independence class carriers. A production rate the Japanese in their wildest dreams could never equal.

[Platoonist]

ORIGINAL: battlevonwar

Just finished the Book Shattered Sword about the Japanese CVs in the Pacific. I think everyone is right(it doesn't appear that the Japanese had a Pilot Training Program) when they lost their cream of the crop, they lost it for good. Plus it appears a lack in ability to replace their Carriers(naturally they had less than 1/20th the Industrial Capacity of the USA)

They had a pilot training program, but it focused too much on creating a tiny number of elite pilots instead a lot of just good ones like the US program did. It turned out that even elite pilots can have a disastrous attrition rate, especially when they are called upon to fight again and again with no relief to the point of sickness and exhaustion.

One of the myths of the Midway battle is that the Japanese suffered catastrophic losses in their naval air arm. The casualty figures show that their losses were only slightly greater than those of the Americans, and represented less than a quarter of the aircrew assigned to 1st Air Fleet. The really crippling losses were among the carrier plane maintenance crews and mechanics and the carriers themselves. Their loss forced most of the Japanese Navy's pilots to operate off of rough land bases with poorly maintained aircraft during the decisive South Pacific campaign, in which the Japanese Navy's air power would be ground down by attrition.

[BrutalReaper]

I love the idea of adding the Pacific! Will the game be separate than the original, or could we fight the entire war in a single game?

[MorningDew]

I believe the current plan for the first release is just Pacific.

[AlvaroSousa]

ORIGINAL: Platoonist

One of the myths of the Midway battle is that the Japanese suffered catastrophic losses in their naval air arm. The casualty figures show that their losses were only slightly greater than those of the Americans, and represented less than a quarter of the aircrew assigned to 1st Air Fleet. The really crippling losses were among the carrier plane maintenance crews and mechanics and the carriers themselves. Their loss forced most of the Japanese Navy's pilots to operate off of rough land bases with poorly maintained aircraft during the decisive South Pacific campaign, in which the Japanese Navy's air power would be ground down by attrition.

I learned something new. None of the books I read on the Pacific even mentioned this.
Eagle Against the Sun
Japan's War
and others.

[ago1000]

ORIGINAL: AlvaroSousa

I learned something new. None of the books I read on the Pacific even mentioned this.
Eagle Against the Sun
Japan's War
and others.

I'm trying to do the same, since the game is based on tactics used in real life. I didn't know that UK had broken the sub code in the Battle of the Atlantic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cexTcnTHdc8

[AlvaroSousa]

Germany lost the battle of the atlantic in 1942. 2nd happy time was only due to the USA being so stupid.

[Platoonist]

ORIGINAL: AlvaroSousa

I learned something new. None of the books I read on the Pacific even mentioned this.
Eagle Against the Sun
Japan's War
and others.

Those are good titles. Spector's Eagle Against the Sun is hands-down the best one volume book on the subject.

However, if you get a chance (God knows you are a busy as it is) I heartily recommend Shattered Sword. It does demolish a lot of the myths of Battle of Midway without detracting from the table-turning and pivotal nature of the battle. Perhaps, the most important thing the book does is reveal the self-serving fabrications put forward by Japanese Navy captain and pilot, Mitsuo Fuchida in his 1955 book Midway: The Battle That Doomed Japan.

Fuchida’s book was quickly translated into English, while the operational records that belied it were in handwritten Japanese stored on microfilms. For this reason, American historians (perhaps not surprisingly) simply swallowed Fuchida’s account of events verbatim and declined to look further. It did not help matters that Fuchida had become great friends with Gordon Prange, whose best-selling Miracle at Midway (1983) became, hands down, the most important English-language account of the battle, one whose details were subsequently incorporated into many other Western histories.

Intriguingly, Fuchida’s reputation as a reliable witness was being demolished in Japan even as these Western histories were coming out. For example, Minoru Genda, the First Air Fleet’s staff air officer, acknowledged in his own memoirs that he was aware of the scene in the movie Tora! Tora! Tora! were Fuchida passionately argues for a third strike on the Pearl Harbor oil tank farms, but explicitly denies that such an incident ever took place or that any such proposal was put forward at the time by Fuchida.

[canuckgamer]

In my opinion the books to read on the Pacific theatre is the pacific war trilogy by Ian Toll. I have read the first two, Pacific Crucible and The Conquering Tide. The Twilight of the Gods was just released and is already on the best seller list.

[kennonlightfoot]

Thanks for the recommendation, I had forgotten about Toll. I read his book Six Frigates some time ago. Downloaded Pacific Crucible from Amazon.

[ago1000]

ORIGINAL: kennonlightfoot

Thanks for the recommendation, I had forgotten about Toll. I read his book Six Frigates some time ago. Downloaded Pacific Crucible from Amazon.

I just bought the audio book from amazon. Should be an interesting listen. Thank you too for the recommendation.

[malkarma]

From the navy point of view, I can also recommend Luis de la Sierra books. As long as you are fine knowing that he is is a writer of his time (Spain during the Franco's directorate), and you understand that he have a "poetic" vein in his chapters openings, you can get a point of view form a "neutral country" sailor. Actually he likes to makes comments about the leadership in the naval battles. In fact, Ireally think that his thoughts about the Prince of Wales+Repulse sinkining plus his opinion about Yamaguchi´s sacrifice are interesting.


ps: Off topic here, but I need to recommend "War between generals" from David Irving. After reading it (i have did it 4 times) you will end wondering how the allies managed to win the war. Really amusing and with some caustic quotes by the protagonists.

[magic87966]

Definitely agree on Ian Toll. Six Frigates and the Trilogy are outstanding. Although not on the entire war in the Pacific, I definitely recommend James D. Hornfischer’s books. “The Last Stand of the Tincan Sailors” (Leyte Gulf), “The Fleet at Flood Tide” (44-45), and my favorite “Neptune’s Inferno”. This one is about the Solomons campaign and is fantastic. I love WP and anxiously looking forward to WP Pacific but I always wanted to play a good game centered on the Solomons campaign. This was the only time the Japanese and the US were on something close to an equal footing and a theater based game on that campaign would be fun to play for both sides..

[Fred98]

Do we know the scale of warplan pacific v the scale of warplan?

[AlvaroSousa]

The Pacific is 4x the size of Europe. So the scale of WarPlan Pacific is 80km per hex vs Europe's 40km per hex.

The map is the same physical size as Europe.

It is still Corps/Div level but Has a bit of a different mix to where there will be more divisions.