The Pacific Theater - WW2 (What won the war?)

Fine.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_War#Tensions_between_Japan_and_the_West

Come back when you are finished.

Which made US a target.....

The thing is..."eventually" might be in decades.
They perfectly well were aware that there is no chances of winning a war of attrition against US industrial might.

 

Japan didn't have nearly enough skilled people to exploit the fields they seized, so even if the Philippines were being exploited in the 1930's they couldn't do anything about working them anyway.

And the entire Asian oil production combined was tiny, and what wells and refineries there were to grab were effectively sabotaged by the British and Dutch, nor did they have nearly the tanker capacity to fully exploit what they could salvage. And, to cap it off, the Japanese sent their entire available pool of experts on one tanker, Taiyo Maru or something like that, and that was sunk by a U.S. submarine, killing about 800 or so of the 1,000 experts they could spare. I'll find the production numbers here in a minute or so. The claim they could gain oil by declaring war on the U.S. is ridiculous.

 

have to disagree here. Japan had no natural resoures. to keep their war machines running they were forced to conquer countries that did. the embargo shut down a lot of these supplies. the US had to go

 

The entire oil production of the Asian oil fields was only 86 million barrels in 1939, and that fell off dramatically in the years that followed. Japan was importing over 50 million from the U.S. alone. Launching their offensive that provoked the embargo in the first place drastically increased their consumption and reduced their possible reserves from a max of three years to 1 and maybe two at the outside.

the right wing fanatics in Japan simply fell for Hitler's BS that the U.S. couldn't fight a two front war. As it was, we ended the Pacific Wat ahead of schedule, even though the main effort was the European theater.

 

they weren't forced to invade anybody, they just had a distorted sense of their own superiority, basically. They didn't have to do anything but consolidate what they already had.

 

This is often the problem with people who have (or were taught by) people who have only a superficial concept of what history really was.

I bet if you poll most Americans, they will honestly believe that the USS entered World War I because the Germans sunk the RMS Lusitania. Or that the 13 colonies revolted from England because of taxes. Or that the US Civil War was about freeing the slaves.

Each of these is "common knowledge", and each of these is also wrong. But it is commonly accepted, just like "Japan was about to surrender so the atom bombs were not needed" and "Japan attacked the US because of the embargo". These are actually what a great many people believe are true, but really are not. They are just simplistic reasons that were normally taught to children.

 

Yes. It's unfortunate, but then the main purpose of education is the develop the skills necessary to educate yourself; few people choose to do so; they assume they've learned it all in school.

 

And only few chosen ones are able to see the TRUTH!!11one behind each event in the world with their superior minds. Unfortunatelly, reading comprehension and basic logic is a horrible price for this skill.
eheheheh

 

Not quite.

Remember, we are looking at the economy of Japan.

Japan actually had (and has) a lot of natural resources. Iron, coal, oil, copper, silver, mercury, and a lot more raw resources were available in Japan.

The problem was that Japan had still not geared itself up to exploiting these resources by itself.

We are talking about a nation that had only pulled itself out of a medieval feudal level society a generation prior. Within less then 70 years they had gone through the equivalent of the rise in Europe between 1300-1930. They were importing most of their raw resources not because they did not have them, but they were unable to effectively exploit what they already had.

Plus most of those imports were cheap.

Japan had been attempting to modernize since Emperor Meiji threw out the Tokugawa Shogunate. But it was a tall order, transforming an isolated nation of farmers into an educated and modern nation. Most agriculture was still done by hand, and hand crafting was favored over mass production. And why spend all of the money to mine a resource, set up the infrastructure to refine and smelt it, when you can simply get it on the open market?

Japan lacked the form of industrialization that Europe and the US had developed over the course of centuries to fully exploit these resources, so it relied upon imports. They missed the gradual shifts of the Industrial Revolution which caused the rest of the world to evolve extractors of the raw resources, then others to refine them into a form that could be easily used, then the final workers to make them into finished products. They had the final stages in place (and designed and built some outstanding equipment), but lacked the stages to get the final raw materials in preparation to make the products.

This is why they could build the Zero or Musashi, but could not make the steel and aluminum from scratch (even though they had both) in sufficient quantity. Plus they had developed a fiercely expansionist policy, which they thought would give them the entire Western Pacific region to control as their own Empire. After all, as conquerers they should not be expected to dig in the dirt to gain natural resources, it should be rightfully delivered to them as the warriors that they were.

This can really be seen in Korea. Japan had some outstanding engineers and scientists working in Korea to build their war machine, but the Koreans to them were nothing more then laborers to dig tunnels in mountains and pleasure their soldiers. Chosin, Manchuko, Mengjiang, Kampuchea, Azad Hind, Okinawa, the region was to be filled with puppet-kingdoms who all paid homage to Japan as the rightful rulers of East Asia. And as such, they did not need to be hewers of wood, that was not their destiny.

Plus in their early attempts to industrialize to quickly, they did a lot of damage to Japan. The Ashio Copper Mine at the turn of the century was pulling over 4,000 tons of copper out of the ground a year at the turn of the century, at the expense of the environment. Pollution from these mines destroyed the ecosystem in 2 major rivers, and killed thousands of people due to the contamination and starvation due to the killing of fisheries up to 15 miles from the mouth of the rivers.



Even a century later Japan is still cleaning up the damage caused by this one mine to the environment. Removing and decontaminating slag piles and trying to restore the environment to a state that it was prior to the mine opening.

Being a small island nation, they simply could not industrialize to the scale that the US and Europe did. So they were dependent upon imports. Not that they did not have their own resources, they simply lacked the ability to effectively extract and refine them.

 

China, Manchuria, Korea were already under attack before the embargo. it was the IJA's idea for conquest. they ran the show. and the US had to go.

 

Actually, they were consolidating everybody's territory.

After the Boxer Rebellion, the main protectionary zones were given to Germany, UK, US, and Russia. Japan, France and other countries had smaller ones.

First you had the Russo-Japanese War, which ended with Japan gaining the majority of the Russian zone. Then after World War I, Japan (an Allied power in that war) gained most of the German zone. And after the collapse of France in WWII, Japan took over their zone as well.

However, the US and UK zones were under almost constant attack and pressure from Japan to leave their areas. US and UK convoys were frequently the target of Japanese supported "bandits", and there were even military attacks upon them (USS Pinay Incident). By early 1941 the conditions had deteriorated so much that the US ordered all excess personnel and families to leave China, and by November removed all government personnel (including embassy staff and Marines) and sent them to the Philippines.

The UK was in the process of pulling everything back to the enclaves in Hong Kong and Singapore when on 8 December Japan declared war on both the US and UK.

Japan was not consolidating anything, other then they felt that all of China should belong to them, and all other foreigners had to be removed.

 

I know. I was referring to their southern conquests they already had in hand. I'm rusty and its been a long time Since I read anything on it but I don't recall that Japan had conquered all of China, and was still having problems in the North and the South as well. They could have waited and took care of some other problems without provoking a U.S. reaction and the embargo and having to declare war on the U.S.

 

Actually, they had most of of Eastern China (especially the North-East) in the bag, their problems were mostly in the West. And that was because of logistics and manpower available. There were simply not enough Japanese forces available to push in any further, nor enough transportation to do so even if they had the manpower. So they mostly just took the major cities and used patrols to try and keep control.

 

Who won the war for the allies? First and foremost, I'd say the Axis. They made so many blunders, victory could have easily been achieved with handful of different maneuvers.

First, blame the Italians. I'll be honest, I don't know exactly what it was about the Italians - training, leadership, equipment, morale - but they did not pull their weight. Had the Italians not blundered so immensely so repeatedly, our victory in Africa, if it still came, would have taken far longer. Italy's Navy never pulled its weight either, and that was probably what should have been a key objective for Italt , to maintain a strong Navy. Africa should have been secondary. If they kept a naval edge they would have been able to choke offost of Africa and keep it from being well reinforced. But even beyond strategic errors, they were never able to make a real tactical success.

Other minor allies, like Bulgaria and Hungary, didn't pull their weight either. They had forces attached to the German army on the eastern front, but never really did anything.

Japan was always over-rated as a threat. It had its initial naval success because it was able to stun the Americans, but it wasn't long thereafter that Japan lost its edge. The American fleet was actually spread out, so a lot of it was untouched from Pearl Harbor. Also, when Japan attacked Pedal Harbor, it failed to hit our fuel storage there (without which our counters would have been impossible). But, Japan just didn't have the industrial might to match its ambitions. America's west coast alone could outproduce the Japanese naval fabrication facilities. Japan's planes were maneuverable, but they were pathetically weak, and not very fast, and had weaker weaponry. Look at the mainland, and they actually got bogged down real badly, like Austriadid in world war one. The Chinese really didn't have the equipment to match, but they held out long and well. And you have to consider the sheer weight of it. Even then, China and India were the two most populous countries in the world, and Japan had to deal with them - and many other countries and British territories, on the maknla d. Further, you had the Aussies and Kiwis. Japan just never had the real capacity to meet its goals. It was dependent on German success in Operation Sea Lion or Barbarossa, both of which were utter failures.

Then you have the Germans themselves. With a few things done differently, they could have won the war. First, Operation Barbarossa came too soon. It distracted the Germans before they could finish off London. Second, their forces were misdirected. The Germans nearly won the battle of Britain, devestating military targets, but when Churchill started bombing German cities Hitler lost sight of his goal and got personal, attacking British cities. This allowed the RAF to recuperate, and had an effect on civilian commitment to the war effort opposite of the intended effect. Germany should have kept on attacking military targets, and should have made a more effective naval blockade of Britain and started to starve them out before landing troops. The point wouldn't have been to conquer Britain, but to get them to signs peace treaty. W/o the British Empire, the Axis forces would have stood a fsr greater chance at victory.

Hitler also made an lot of errors, where the German military leadership was opposed, and actually cost the Germans densely in doing so many times. The focus on Stalingrad was one such error. Stalin, like Hitler, saw it personally, but the real goal for the Germans should have been the oil fields to the South. Meanwhile the Germans could have encircled the city (while not entering in force) and shelled it with artillery and carpet bombed it. In real life, the Russian commander had his men move so close to the Germans that artillery and air support became ineffective, neutralizing the greatest German advantage. Now, back to op Sea Lion - if the Germans got UK out of the war, that would have freed up the Italians (the bulk of the Axis forces in Africa) to help fight the Soviet Union.

Hitler also failed to provide Rommel support he needed. When the Germans developed jet power the commanders wanted jet interceptors, but Hitler insisted on jet bombers. Also, Hitler made too many national enemies in the East. He should have been less cruel on peoples like the Poles. Had he allowed their government to persist under friendly terms (free passage of troops etc.) the Germans would not have needed to station so many troops there, deal with uprisings, AND potentially would have had a buffer zone (which wouldn't have been needed I'd they didn't make so many errors). Hitler also failed to offer sufficient support to the Irish or Finns, and could have easily stirred up Irish national sentiment. He also could have given more support to Spanish Nationalists and potentially had another, albeit weak ally. And had the Germans done a better job with their blocladea - which could easily have been done - Russia would have been without a lot of US support. Germany's fleet, combine d with air superiority, could have done a better job destroying the British fleet and then closed the North Sea. Also, in retrospect, Pearl Harbor may have been too early. Its unlikely the US would have stayed out indefinitely, but the Axis powers could have kept them out longer and focused their efforts on the UK and USSR.

So, I submit to you, the greatest contributor to allied victory ws the blunders of the Axis powers. Looking at the Allies though, the UK deserves the most credit. The Russians mostly for lucky. The Brits had brilliant and daring moves that saved them in the Battle of Britain, defeated the Italian and German fleers almost single handedly, won Africa mostly on their own, developed key technologies, were probably the biggest thorn in Japan's side until the latter.part of the war. If an ally deserves the most credit, its the Brits.

 

I might add that the Soviets suffered the most, but that's just because they were idiots.

 

I might add that the Germans were idiots for invading Russia in the dead of winter. The soviets suffered the most because they were the only European power that could stand up against them.

 

I might add that the Germans were idiots for invading Russia in the dead of winter. The soviets suffered the most because the Red army was the only army in Europe that only could stand up against them.

 

What won World War II? The legalization of marijuana.

In 1937, industrial hemp was outlawed as the dangerous narcotic, "Marihuana". In 1942 after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the US Department of Agriculture released a 14-minute instructional film for American farmers on how to grow and process Cannabis Sativa for the war effort to replace foreign imports of raw materials that were cut off by Japan. The video is titled Hemp For Victory. According to the film, industrial hemp made essential ropes for the Navy, parachute rigging for paratroopers, and bootlaces and uniforms for millions of US soldiers.

Three minutes into the video is shown the Special Tax Stamp issued to American farmers which clearly reads, Producer of Marihuana.

Hemp For Victory, 1942:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ngc0_mQ5tjE

Without the legalization of "Marihuana" in 1942, the US Navy would not have been able to engage the Axis, D-Day wouldn't have occurred, Hawaii would probably have become a Japanese territory, England would have been overrun, and Israel most likely would not exist. Despite these facts, the US Federal government continues to arrest and incarcerate thousands of Americans every year for possession of "Marihuana".

 

They invaded June 22, 1941.

- - - Updated - - -

Interesting tidbit I didn't know about, putting aside the hyperbolic conclusion.

 

Hey thats winter in Australia

 

heh heh I'm sure that's what he meant.

 

Starting that late in the year meant a winter war in the drive on Moscow, is what he means. He should have waited until the next year for the northern offensive drive, or a limited one against the Baltic ports, if at all, and concentrated on the center and the southern offensive.

 

It may be a common myth, but there is nothing mystical or supernatural about winter in Russia. Its cold, but we're talking about the Ukraine and the Caucasus, not Siberia. The Germans starved because they're lines were broken, their supply lines cut, and their air support nullified. Their losses in the assault of Stalingrad were severe. Had they operated as I previously mentioned they would have avoided their greatest issues, winter or not.

The Soviet strategies and tactics were supremely idiotic. From 1930-1950, the Soviets killed more of their own than the US, UK, and France lost in the whole of the war.

 

What if Hitler had not delayed the invasion of Russia chasing rabbits in the Balkans? The plan was to invade as soon as the ground firmed up - around May 1, 1941. He delayed the invasion for eleven weeks, stomping Yugoslavia (for no particular reason)and pulling Mussolini's fat out of the fire in Greece. A couple of non-motorized infantry divisions would have done nicely to keep Mussolini from losing in the Balkans.

How much further east would the Wehrmacht have moved with eleven more weeks of good weather?

If he insisted on firming up his southern flank in May-July 1941, Hitler would have been wiser postponing Barbarossa til 1942 and spend all of 1941 concentrating on punching Britain out of the war. Ignore the US, and face only one active enemy in 1942.

 

PB4Y Liberator.