Matrix Games Forums

gus wrote:I hate to say it but it would be an improvement BTW WB probably has my vote for all time favorite character actor!




Nicely stated. I like to think that the Matrix boards are better than most but I have seen too many people drowned out as the signal to noise ratio drops even on this board. I tend to lurk rather than post but I do seek out posters such as mdiehl's, among others, as they are such a refreshing departure from the usual pulp that passes for opinion/argument here. Every one is entitled to their POV but whenever a debate devolves to name calling and personal attacks it is pretty obvious that person has lost. Unfortunately that is considered fair play here and is a common tactic to squash an unpopular view.

-g

Bendix was great. Are you old enough to remember The Life of Riley?

Character actors, eh? There were so many good ones it's hard for me to name a true all-time favorite. One of my favorites was C. Aubrey Smith, another Frank Morgan. Basil Rathbone and S. Z. "Cuddles" Sakall rank right up there. Of more recent vintage I think Richard Jaeckel deserves mention. And I haven't even touched women. So many, so much talent. Where has it gone, and why do they make movies the way they do today?

How about Aldo Ray? (spelling???)

Hi, I like Arthur Hunnycutt, Strother Martin, Ward Bond, Walter Brennen,
Peter Ustenov oh well I like a lot of these old guys. They made every movie they were in better and more then once stole the show. (wish I could spell their names right)

More to the point, here is a web link (web sites are not always the best resource it's true) that recaps some of the Gallup polls regarding WW2. Since it's from the Gallup Poll company web site, I think we can treat it authoritative in re such niceties as whether or not a poll was taken and what the results were.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/focus/polls_ ... events.asp

And here are some important text excerpts that I quote verbatim from the web site:

1940 Peacetime Draft Enactment of the first peacetime military draft in U.S. history enjoys overwhelming support, with 89% saying it is "a good thing."

1940 U.S. to Enter WWII Prior to entering World War II, 62% percent of the American public believes that defeating Germany is more important than staying out of the war.

It is simply factually incorrect to imply that most Americans were in favor of going to war in 1941. The polling data cited above (and in other posts) does not address the basic fact that people were still opposed to entering the war in 1941, and the opposition was so strong that no politician would dare go against it.

Percentage of Americans opposed to entering war (Gallup Poll):
1939: 96%
1941: 80%

How on earth can you contort this polling data into the conclusion that Americans were not opposed to war in 1941? Seldom in American history were the people as united in their views as they were about staying out of war in Europe.

Sure, if you ask them a question (like the one above) that forces them to choose between German hegemony and war, they would choose war, but that doesn't change the fact American anti-war sentiment was incredibly strong in 1941.

Public opinion did indeed correctly reflect the reality that war was inevitable. But that is entirely different from being in favor of a pre-emptive declaration of war on Germany - which most Americans clearly opposed.

Public opinion did indeed correctly reflect the reality that war was inevitable. But that is entirely different from being in favor of a pre-emptive declaration of war on Germany - which most Americans clearly opposed.

I think you are missing the point of the thread. The contention that started things was the assertion that the US public was so war averse that in the event of a formal Axis declaration of war the public would not have supported the successful termination that was historically pursued. The argument supposes that something about the WAY the war was initiated would have drastically affected the will to fight, and the claim is based on the wholly incorrect (perhaps "simplistic" or merely "simple minded") suggestion that the US public was "anti-war."

One thing, however, is very clear. Your claim --

It is simply factually incorrect to imply that most Americans were in favor of going to war in 1941. The polling data cited above (and in other posts) does not address the basic fact that people were still opposed to entering the war in 1941, and the opposition was so strong that no politician would dare go against it.

is nonsensical. You claim that "people" (whatever that means, it's a pretty ambiguous term in re quantification) "were still opposed" to going to war in 1941, despite evidence (from Gallup) to the contrary. I wonder what you think supports your position, since you seem to discount the evidenciary value of polling data? Do you claim, as your reply seems to indicate, that polls do not count except when they seem to support your ambiguous position? Or perhaps, like the A6M fanboys, you have a one-off anecdote written by a famous person, say, Henry Ford, that you feel overrides the statistical data. Gallup poll is very clear that in 1940, the majority of Americans favored going to war to halt German aggression. That's a real fact based on real poll using statistically appropriate sampling methods. Claiming something to the contrary at least requires that you match that substantive fact with something of comparable quality.

Then there is the matter of "depth of sentiment" that you raise. Being "against the war" has no innate implication that one's will to fight is lessened when war comes. I suspect that if Gallup had polled the occupants of every major European power in Summer 1939, pretty much everybody in every country would have a majority "anti-war" sentiment. When it came to it, however, no one seems to have taken it less than seriously.

I am, however, interested in these polls. Maybe you can name your source. Gallup rarely gives one-sentence polls. Indeed, they may never have. Public sentiment "against war in 1941" might simply equate to a general supposition that the US would wait until preparations were further advanced than they were when the poll was taken. Or, perhaps, one may simply reconcile the 1940 poll with your alleged 1941 poll in this way: When war is to halt German aggression, most favor it. When there is a possibility of diplomatic effort to halt German (or, for that matter, Japanese), perhaps most Americans (rather rationally, I think) gave higher priority to diplomatic efforts to halt Axis aggression in lieu of war.

mdiehl wrote:. I wonder what you think supports your position, since you seem to discount the evidenciary value of polling data? Do you claim, as your reply seems to indicate, that polls do not count except when they seem to support your ambiguous position? .

I'm not trying to discount the poll. I'm a social psychologist and I study people's attitudes for a living, so I beleive in the value of polls. I just don't think the question you cite is the best measure of whether Americans were in favor of going to war. Here is some more polling data to illustrate my points (BTW, the source for these data is "The Gallup Poll: Public Opinion 1935-1975, Volume 1, 1935-1948", which is interesting reading).

Here are the specific questions and responses at several different times:

"Should we send our army and navy abroad to fight Germany?

Sept 18, 1939
Yes - 16%
No - 84%

December 9, 1939
Yes - 4%
No - 96% (!!!)


"If you were asked today on the question of the United States entering the war now against Germany and Italy, how would you vote - to go into the war now or to stay out of the war?"

April 28, 1941
Go In - 19%
Stay Out - 81%

June 29, 1941
Go In - 20%
Stay Out - 76%

July 20, 1941
Go In - 20%
Stay Out - 79%


After July of 1941 the above question was no longer asked (or at least is longer reported in this source). Not sure why this happened.

The above questions indicate that Americans were "anti-war" if you define "anti-war" as "being opposed to officially entering the war on the side of the allies and fighting Germany." But why is there a discrepancy between the above questions and the question you cite: "62% percent of the American public believes that defeating Germany is more important than staying out of the war"

The answer is quite simple: Most Americans thought Britian would win, even in 1941. So going to war was not neccessary in the mind of most Americans. Here are the relevant polling data that illustrate the point.

"Which side will win the war - England or Germany?"

Sept 1941
England - 69%
Germany - 6%
Undecided - 25%

So, rather than going to war with Germany, Americans supported Roosevelt's policy of aggressively aiding Britian, so that Britian would ultimately prevail. That sentiment is reflected in these data:

"Do you think President Roosevelt had gone too far in his policies of helping Britian or not far enough?"

June 15, 1941
Too far - 23%
About right - 55%
Not far enough - 22%

So with American help, Britian would win and the US would not have to choose between Germany hegemony and war - and the U.S. would come out the big winner. Germany is defeated and the U.S. avoids a repeat of WW1. That is why 80% of Americans did not want to go to war in 1941.

mdiehl wrote:In defense of Damien, I probably ****** him off by calling his supposition "B.S." My apologies, Damien.

Apology accepted and please accept my apology for saying you shovel lots of it.

I guess the reason I feel so strongly (besides the ones I've already stated) is that I want this game to be "fair and Balanced" to quote a certain news station.
I saw another game I loved "Star Fleet Battles" ruined by the addition of units that were clearly inspired by the surge in Nationalism in the 80's. Granted, that's a great thing in real life but it sure ruined a great space board game. If you know the game, you know what I'm talking about ('cough', Fed fighters 'cough').
Also, I think that saying that the war was a forgone conclusion (not that that has been said on this thread, but it is implied elsewhere) and that the US would automatically win because of production takes away from the courage and valor displayed by the Allied servicemen who had to fight hard for every inch of ground they took.
Overall, I fall into the group of people that think having a balanced game, even in 1944 and 1945 is more important that historical accuracy. Other than skewing the units' values (something I'm opposed to), I think the best way to do it would be to alter the combatant's will to fight and reset the victory conditions. Otherwise I think people will have a hard time finding someone who will want to play into 1944 and 1945.

Most Americans thought Britian would win, even in 1941. So going to war was not neccessary in the mind of most Americans. Here are the relevant polling data that illustrate the point.

Right. I think the point is that simply asserting that Americans were "Anti war" does not tell one much in re Americans' resolve to fight, once a war started, for whatever reason. One implication of interpreting the "status quo acceptable because the UK will win" theory from these polls is that a substantial downturn in the UK's fortunes might change Americans' opinions about more direct questions like "Should the US go to war with Germany NOW?"

Tristanjohn wrote:Bendix was great. Are you old enough to remember The Life of Riley??

Unfortunaley yes , funny show tho!

Tristanjohn wrote:Character actors, eh? There were so many good ones it's hard for me to name a true all-time favorite. One of my favorites was C. Aubrey Smith, another Frank Morgan. Basil Rathbone and S. Z. "Cuddles" Sakall rank right up there. Of more recent vintage I think Richard Jaeckel deserves mention.

Good call on S. Z. "Cuddles" Sakall, had some of the funniest one liners ever!

Tristanjohn wrote:And I haven't even touched women. ?

You should really give it a try

Tristanjohn wrote:So many, so much talent. Where has it gone, and why do they make movies the way they do today?

Certainly the 1940's were a/the golden era of film.

-g

This has been a pretty good debate to read, and kudo's to guys who have the knowledge and are prepared to spare it. I think it would be helpful if Damiens question of how to get a Japanese player to keep on playing in 44, 45 needs addressing. Im getting thrashed by wobbly ( if you read the AAR he's playing me for a patsy), its only 1942 still. Now in WITP at the same stage I might have some hope of fighting through 43 as new carriers come online, but later?
I really enjoy the thought process of the slow withdrawing fight, but if Im just getting crushed ( ie I lose 100a/c to his 5 every time I fly, or sailing a ship means instant death), there isnt really much of that as well.

How to solve the problem, I dont know, I do see the idea behind weakened national will ( If I just hang on long enough here or inflict enough casualties those peace protests just might help me), but I also know Historically that wasnt going to happen(maybe!)
As historically accurate as some guys want this to be, somewhere , somehow I as the Japanese player needs a way to win the Game(not, repeat not the war), a way to show that head to head Ive beaten my opponent, or that my opponent has beaten me. Thats what gaming is about.
finally I think finding Japanese players willing to play to the bitter end using totally Historical everything will be difficult, Im sure the game will cater for them no problem, but for us guys who want to move historical units in the context of a close contest, that will be more difficult.

Isnt that what we should be debating? Any Ideas, thoughts.
I hand over to the experts. Mhediel I think youve got the historical accuracy side pretty correct, but playing your game wouldnt be much fun( no offence, Im sure some of the scenerios fully historical will be), and for the others , the long game, how do you keep myself playing as Japan to the bitter end?

Mhediel I think youve got the historical accuracy side pretty correct, but playing your game wouldnt be much fun( no offence, Im sure some of the scenerios fully historical will be), and for the others , the long game, how do you keep myself playing as Japan to the bitter end?

Well, I guess you have to ask yourself why you are playing the game. If "fun" equates with "winning" and winning equates with "decisively defeating the US" I see no hope for making a WW2 game that is both a good simulation and also fun. For me the attraction has always been "doing better than the historical counterparts did" as one goal and "winning the GAME" as the other attraction. I think the latter means setting victory conditions that are attainable.

In GGPW, the Japanese casualty scores increased through time courtesy of a casualty-VP multiplier, always advancing out of reach of the US player, giving the Japanese player the hope that he could "run out the clock." The game made no presumption, really, about "will to fight." It just made "victory points sufficient to declare a victory" very difficult to come by. I think that is a decent model.

I'd try to do the same, but reward players bonus permanent control victory points (rather than temporary ones as in GGPW) for conquests. Thus, objectives like Wake have more value for the US and less value for the Japanese in the early part of the game when taking it away from the US is easy and defending it against the Japanese is difficult. Late in the game, when wresting Wake away from Japan is comparatively easy and keeping the US out of Wake is hard, it should have more value per turn to the Japanese player than to the US. Each game turn beyond the historical date upon which the asset changed hands should result in the permanent accrual of VP somewhere.

herbieh wrote: As historically accurate as some guys want this to be, somewhere , somehow I as the Japanese player needs a way to win the Game (not, repeat not the war), a way to show that head to head Ive beaten my opponent, or that my opponent has beaten me. Thats what gaming is about.

IMO the Japanese player has won the game (not the war) if his situation at a certain date is substantialy better than it was historically, i.e. if the player controls more bases, has larger supply, resource and oil stockpiles and has more ships, planes, production capacity etc. still operational at VJ day than Japan had IRL.
The crux is that it should be possible to calculate the amount of victory points the real-life situation at VJ-day would have yielded in WitP. You would have to take all the assets that WitP does contain and check which of them were available to Japan at VJ day. Locations, ships, planes, LCU already have victory values and I see no problem to add resources and oil into the calculation - so it's simply a matter of calculating victory points the old fashioned way.
This amount of WitP-VPs Japan controlled IRL would be the benchmark for the assessment of the game victory - if the Jap player achieves the same amount of points +/- say 5%, the game (not the war) is a draw, below the sum the Jap player lost, above he won the game. (marginal/decisive depending on point difference to benchmark). So, as Jap player you can't beat the Allies, but you can try to beat history...
The only (and not small) problem I see with this approach is to allocate the 'correct' number of victory points to the individual assets in respect to their relative worth (I think there is a current discussion somewhere about VPs for CVs being too high in relation to VPs for land bases).

Perhaps not thought out well enough, but - well, I'm at the office trying to look busy while waiting for the weekend... ten minutes till closing time and I really don't need another project NOW...

Hi, I know there are players who will only enjoy a game where they have the power to crush the enemy. And in reverse situations resign or vanish without a trace. For myself I do not mind playing when the enemy "thinks" he has overwhelming strength. I study the situation and attempt to spring a boomerang on him. Since I have nothing to lose my I don't worry about the string of defeats that occur where I have no ability to stop them. I take care not to add to the problem by sending good after bad. You have to be able to see where the enemy will over reach and then be ready to time your response to exploit over extended enemy forces. If the enemy is one of those Halleck like players that never (knowingly) takes risk you have to persude them the next step is safe or wait for the time the enemy advance becomes disorganized or splits into weaker efforts. What do you have to lose? If you can't butt heads look to kick him in the pants.

Hi, I just made a post. It shows up as being posted but I can't see it.
Ok that fixed it

I hope I'm not too late to throw my $3.50 AUD into the heap....

With the following post I will not try to make any points towards game improvements in WITP. The sole reason for my posting is an intellectual one. However, before I go on I feel that I have to justify this post which argueably has very little to do with WITP.

So here we go:

I have to say that the people posting to this forum must be the most educated and well behaved lot out of the all the Internet forums that I'm involved with. Consequently, some of the threads I have read here have given me a tremendous insight to a great many things, out of which, historical knowledge about WW2 is only a small part. One of the greatest pleasure I have gained from reading these threads has been to follow the battle of minds and arguments -regardless if they *really* have anything to do with the game or not. I think that these forums (UV&WITP) give me a great opportunity to learn from people that I would not meet in my day-to-day life and, furthermore, to test my skills in areas of history and debate with them.

Hence, I feel justified to ask the following:

In this thread you have debated about whether a declared attack would have resulted in a lowered will to fight for the Americans.

So far this debate has mainly been about Gallup polls on the public perception about the war between 1937 and 1941.

I fully understand that when looking back on history, recorded polls are probably one of the most reliable source that one can hope to offer as an evidence, in spite of polls being almost as prone to slants as statistics are.

I will not go on and ask questions about how the poll was conducted, how many people participated, did the participants give an honest answer, were they being led to answer in certain way because of the initial setting of the question, etc, etc, so you can set your mind at ease in that regard.

What I really want to ask is that do the polls have any relevance to U.S war efforts?

Before you get worked up, let me explain:

A poll measures public opinion (sometimes accurately, sometimes not). However, in democracy as we have it at the moment (40's included), the public opinion and the policies adopted do not always go hand in hand: Whatever the public's “will to fight is” hardly translates to the actual measures taken by the government. The “will” might influence the policies, but it will not *decide* them -at least if the next election is further 3 years away.

Therefore, I ask (not argue) what relevance would any poll have had with U.S getting involved in WW2 if Japanese had indeed violated U.S territory in any way (war declared or not)?

Is it viable to think that U.S government would have abstained of entering the war just because a poll would have been against it, or entering one just because a poll would have been in favor of it; or the point in question, altering its strategic goals because of public perception?

I would be inclined to think that any decisions about war, and how it should be fought, has very little to do with the “national will to fight” that can (or cannot) be measured by polls. In reality, the nation (individuals might have varying opinion) does pretty much what its elected leaders say, whether they have “will to fight” or not. Of course there are exceptions, such as Vietnam, but how long it took before the troops were withdrawn because of 'public' pressure?

When talking about democracy in 40's, how much *real* impact any poll would have had to U.S war efforts? To illustrate: was it the poll which you have discussed to great lenghts the key factor that decided the direction of war efforts or is some other factor much more important?

In the end, U.S entered the war because it was attacked. It fought the war the way it did, ending it by dropping two WMDs A great many things might have been different if factors x,y,z had been different, however, what I seriously question is if a public opinion poll qualifies as a conclusive evidence to one direction or the other in regards to (possible)historical outcomes?

A poll might give us a glimpse on what was the sentiment back then, but I ask if it has any relevance to U.S war effort? Therefore, does that poll has any relevance with development of WITP?

I know that my post doesn't, but it was fun posting anyways.

Well that kicked of a few intelligent ideas, Me, a crushing victory, better chance of going to the moon.......

Piiska, the polls are relevant if you believe, as do some, that a "right and proper declaration of war" by Japan would so drastically alter the situation that public support for the war on Japan would wither in the face of a three-to-five year campaign. This perception is based on the mistaken idea that the public unpopularity of Viet Nam might be a proper analog for unpopularity for war in, say, 1945. I say the analog is "mistaken" because for the first 8 years more or less of the US involvement in Viet Nam, the public did not give a hoot.

And no, it is not necessarily the case that public sentiment determines the actions that an administration takes. Morale, however, may suffer if a very unpopular war is started or drags on for a while, and bad morale usually results in a change of administration.

mdiehl wrote:. This perception is based on the mistaken idea that the public unpopularity of Viet Nam might be a proper analog for unpopularity for war in, say, 1945. I say the analog is "mistaken" because for the first 8 years more or less of the US involvement in Viet Nam, the public did not give a hoot.

I think the anology is mistaken for more than that. For one Viet Nam never declared war on the US or the US declare war on it. Second Viet Nam never attacked the US directly ( Tonkin Gulf notwithstanding ). It is entirely incorrect anology.

The position that if only Japan had formely and nicely declared war before attacking, that somehow that would magically sap US will to fight, makes absolutely no sense to me. You might get a minority expousing the view that FDR's warmongering forced Japan's hand, but I think that would quickly dissapate once American blood began to be spilled.

That being said though, I do think it was possibility disunity and unpopularity at home existed. If say, Japan neither attacked or declared war on the US, and instead it was the US government that was compelled to arbitrally ( in some minds ) to declare war on Japan for the sake of the Brits and Dutch. In this case you might very well get people in middle America, America firsters, pacifist ect... asking what the hell are we fighting for?

TIMJOT.

I think I agree. That is why I posited a while back that if Japan attacks SE Asia (not Britain or Australia -- I think if Japan attacks any primarily English speaking primarily caucasian nation, American sympathy is always greater and the race card [anti-Japanese] comes into play, especially with the otherwise strong pro-UK-Commonwealth sympathy that prevailed in the US in 1940-1941), FDR would have found a way to instigate a war.

Basically, my "channeling" of FDR (I say in jest) leads me to believe that FDR would engineer a lend-lease arrangement with crucial oil installations in the Netherlands East Indies. Moreover, the US would heavily dog (using a/c, submarines, and light surface vessels) any and every Japanese TF moving in the area. The precdent for these is established by the historical complainst (by the Japanese in OCT-early Dec 1941) of US overflights of Japanese Formosa and ship-shadowing. There are some entertaining and hypocritical Japanese complaints registered about this (hypocritical because the Japanese were routinely overflying US assets during the same period). Also, there was the Isabella (IIRC).

With all that, FDR would highly irritaate all manner of Japanese military personnel from Admiral rank on down to individual a/c 1st pilots. Given Japanese historical racism and bellicosity, and their truly poor discipline in command and control of the lower ranks, it is inconceivable to me that some ticked off Japanese skipper or pilot would not utter the Japanese equivalent of "F@ck this sh1t!" and make an attack on their own initiative. This would in effect be a "Panay" incident redux, except that it would result in a perfectly "legitimate" war marketable to most Americans.

Your reading of FDR is plausible, but I think the historical record argues against it. FDR actually wanted to get involved in the war against Nazi Germany, and he did so as soon as Hitler foolishly declared war. Never mind that the U-boats didn't kill as many people or seize as many US assets as the Japanese expansion. FDR saw Germany as the greater danger and his wartime priorities showed it very clearly. (Note that nearly all the B-17's were transferred from the Pacific theatre when it was found how useful they were over Europe.)

Engineering a Lend-Lease agreement would have been tricky, because Holland was at that time being run by the Germans, who had an alliance with Japan. But FDR might have managed something with the Free Dutch Government.

As for the argument that American blood being spilled would have inflamed pro-war sentiment, I believe that is true only for the short run. One-time disasters such as the Alamo, the Maine, Pearl Harbor, and Sept. 11 do have the effect of rousing the American public. But bloodshed over a long period of time has the opposite effect. Consider the Civil War, the only other war fought as long, and with as many casualties on the Yankee side. The South nearly won its independence even after it had been reduced to a militarily hopeless situation in 1864. The massive casualties in the Wilderness Campaign would have caused Lincoln to lose the election (and McClellan to be elected on a pro-peace platform) had Sherman not taken Atlanta and Sheridan not conquered the Shenandoah Valley just in time.