Lil OT Indochina fights on?

[DOCUP]

So a question or a few of them?

Indochina does not give into Japan. They decide to stand up and fight. I know they would of lost, but at what cost to Japan? How long could the French hold out, with little to no support? What would be the butterfly effect also?

[bartrat]

The French sort of did fight, some resistance to Japanese troops did occur for a short while.

Your idea is that they fight on; HIGHLY unlikely due to France under German occupation, lack of supplies, and isolation.

A possible outcome is that the USA uses the fighting as an excuse to get involved. This again is HIGHLY unlikely given the still isolationist US Congress mood in Mid 1941. So war begins a few months earlier and the USA is even more unprepared.

Another is that Japan starts another land invasion that does not end quickly and drains resources that she does not have. Again unlikely for any period of time given the problems of resupply IndoChina would have.

[DOCUP]

Bartrat: IRL I know it was unlikely due to the German occupation. I think the French foreign Legion was the unit that stood up to the Japanese. But what if they had fought on. I know very little supplies would come from France. Britain didn't have to come to Frances aid in this fight either. I would expect some supplies to come from USA.

I would think that the IJA 5th Division would be recovering from battle when Dec 7th came along. This would count for other IJA units that participated in the capture of Indochina. I would expect some French troops to evacuate into China. I wonder if the British would try and help evacuate some French forces. Maybe a couple of months of fighting. Maybe a week or so for peace talks?

[Dobey455]

This might be an interesting thread for you DOCUP:

http://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/t ... na.390261/

In Particular this post:

Yeah, France refusing to surrender is a big, big POD here, with effects beyond just Indochina.

In any case, with a legal French government continuing the war, the Japanese will be unable to bully the French into giving them basing rights as they will be unable to strike at the European empires until they've finished constructing their last two aircraft carriers. Of course, no Japanese incursion into Indochina also means that the US doesn't halt their shipments of airplanes, parts, machine tools and aviation gasoline to Japan, at least for the time being.

Exactly. No Vichy probably means no japanese occupation of Indochina which probably means no US embargoes which means no Pearl Harbor which means no War in the Pacific.

[DOCUP]

Dobey: Nice read.

Correct me if I'm wrong. Hadn't Japan been on war footing for awhile and was low on resources? Also, I seem to remember that Japan wouldn't of gave up anything in China. I think war was coming to the Pacific, now where was Japan going to attack first, I don't know.

[Dobey455]

ORIGINAL: DOCUP

Dobey: Nice read.

Correct me if I'm wrong. Hadn't Japan been on war footing for awhile and was low on resources? Also, I seem to remember that Japan wouldn't of gave up anything in China. I think war was coming to the Pacific, now where was Japan going to attack first, I don't know.

The US embargo was put in place after (and because of) Japan's occupation of Indochina.
At the time that Japan invaded they were not under embargo and I don't believe they had any serious short term resource concerns.


To respond to your original question, even if the French wanted to fight for Indochina, what did they have to fight with?
Aside from about 1 brigade of the Foreign Legion the rest of the forces available were mostly local conscripts, of questionable loyalty. Against this Japan could deploy virtually any and all forces that were not committed in China.

[crsutton]

You need to take into consideration the political situation in Indo-China. The French were very harsh colonial masters and widely despised by the native populations. There was very little local enthusiasm or sympathy for the French and it is unlikely that any scenario other than the one that played out would have developed. It was very much like the situation in Burma where the British were a lot more oppressive than they were in India. Considering the poor equipment, low morale and poor leadership of the bulk of French forces in Indo-China, any thought of prolonged resistance is pure fantasy.

[Macclan5]

ORIGINAL: crsutton

You need to take into consideration the political situation in Indo-China. The French were very harsh colonial masters and widely despised by the native populations. There was very little local enthusiasm or sympathy for the French and it is unlikely that any scenario other than the one that played out would have developed. It was very much like the situation in Burma where the British were a lot more oppressive than they were in India. Considering the poor equipment, low morale and poor leadership of the bulk of French forces in Indo-China, any thought of prolonged resistance is pure fantasy.

+1

1) Understand that the Japanese Empire easily over ran Dutch Forces which at least equally prepared as the French ~ some Dutch forces bolstered with Australian support making them more so prepared ~ and they had access to more supplies than the French...

2) Understand that the Japanese Empire easily over ran Singapore and British Colonial territories; that the British were on a war footing at the time. True you can make arguments about the British vis a vis effective leadership, political considerations, strategy, under estimation of the opposition et al, but none the less the Japanese Forces quickly dispatched most opposition.

The French would not have / could not have held out no matter what. Japan viewed the territory as a critical component of what would eventually be called the "Co-prosperity sphere of influence'.

--

The 'cause effect' of the American Freezing of assets and imposing steel and oil embargo's due to Indochina is a speculative argument under potentially faulty logic. This point I somewhat dispute.

It was a 'part of the reason'.

There is at least prima face evidence that:

i) America viewed Japan as a threat since the start of Chinese hostilities,
ii) that the economic embargo would have been the FDR administrations response 'eventually' no matter what happened in Indo China
iii) that the Japanese 'warrior' culture / government / policies were inevitably geared to a confrontation with the United States at some point in the 1940's.

It is easy to attribute the embargo as precipitating the Pearl Harbor attack because A follows B.

However there were many more factors involved including Japan's "Naval shadow cabinet" Pacific empire focus competing with Japan's "Army cabinet focus" on the eventual confrontation with Russia (for example).

[MakeeLearn]

The OSS went in toward the end of war 1945 to train the anti-Japanese resistance groups, including Ho Chi Minh's group. I believe resistance fighters were both were French and native Vietnamese . In game a French Indochina that did not surrender could be reflected by a earlier OSS and increase in partisans activity/attacks. Ive not been playing or know enough to know if this is a game possibility.

[Mike Dubost]

One thing to keep in mind is that although I agree that absent a major change, the oil embargo was an eventual certainty, the timing was not fixed. The Japanese takeover was what triggered the embargo at this particular time instead of "soon".

I read a book called "Japan 1941" written from (primarily) Japanese sources that attempted to explain why Japan and the US went to war. It mentioned that there was an offer being discussed that would have effectively made Indochina neutral.
It was taken off the table as a result of the invasion of Indochina. The quid pro quo for this was that Japan would stop the war in China, and only maintain enough troops there to "keep order". In other words, effectively a cease fire and
limited force drawdown. Note that this was evidently a proposal from Washington, since FDR's main enemy was Germany. I'm somewhat skeptical of such an arrangement lasting for very long, but it is not entirely crazy.

Interestingly enough, one of the men who privately expressed the most reservations and regret about the invasion of Indochina in the immediate aftermath of that invasion was General Tojo.