The more accurate terminology is "sue for peace", not "surrender".

History revisionists keep pointing to the 'plan to surrender', as an argument for why the atomic bombs were unnecessary.  They ignore the fact that Japan's plan was to fight until they were in a favorable negotiating position during the peace talks that they planned to call for (not what most people think of, when the term "surrender" is used).

They ended up watching a god king fall, and Douglas wrote them a constitution.

Germans always underestimated us.

Read Shattered Sword.

The Japs were gonna lose.

You sure?

I think Mexico, Spain, Cuba, the Moro tribesmen in the Philippines, the Hawaiians, and the Plains Indians would dispute that notion.

To be clear, they didn't want to end up as China 2.0, Indochina or the various other European dominated parts of Asia. The only way for them to do this to capture lands with resources which they lacked and set up a buffer zone similar to the iron curtain.

They wanted to hit our ability to project power in the Pacific, secure the areas they needed, further strengthen their navy and negotiate peace with the US.

It was a different time back then and conquering, enslaving and working native populations to death was the norm. If you were given the choice of being the conqueror or the conquered we know what you'd choose. Japan chose accordingly, but they missed our carriers. Even if they sunk them I doubt they'd be able to solidify the Pacific without American manufacturing out arming them even if it took us another 5-6 years to get back at them.

No they weren't.

They knew that require the full-time commitment of 108 cargo ships that they just didn't have, much less the losses they would have replace if they tried.

They had calculated that superior ships and superior fighting spirit required a fleet size approximately 75% of the USN for victory.

The overall strategy involved seeking out a decisive engagement where the combined fleet would defeat the USN.  Carriers were still considered fragile but powerful striking forces, the combined fleet that would bring victory would include battleships, cruisers, and carriers.

The defeat would occur soon after or during a very bloody American attack on one fortified outer defensive islands.

The combined fleet would have the advantage of operating from within the fortified defensive perimeter while supported by land aircraft.  Submarine warfare was to play a role in reducing the USN's numbers and harassing the supply and communications before the decisive battle.

It makes more sense when you consider a isolationist and pacifist American public.  Also, I do not think Pearl Harbor was meant to be a sneak attack.  There were troubles decoding the declaration and it arrived late.  It was supposed to be a bold surprise attack immediately after a declaration of war while the Americans naturally looked towards the Philippians and outer islands.  A perceived military victory at Pearl would lowered enemy morale and not enrage them as much.

So it may have gone something like this.  Declare war and score an immediate victory at Pearl Harbor.  Secure resources, reduce the Philippians, and fortify the outer defensive ring.  Harass a regrouped USN as it attempts to move back into the combat area.  Bleed the Americans hard on some unknown island, while decisively defeating the USN again, and make them realize they really can't do this all the way to Japan.  Then reasonable peace terms would be offered that would secure continued access to needed resources for Japan. The Americans would probably have to live without the Philippines, but would they care?  The Aleutians, Guam, Wake, Midway, etc, probably would all have been returned as part of the peace treaty.

Total war hadn’t been practiced for hundreds of years at that point.

You are correct.

This is a really good post.

Those,no do not cunt.

Amazing that the fate of an entire war probably hinged on just one tiny snippet of OPSEC.

It's good to remember that tojo was one of the biggest murdering fucks of the twentieth century.  Right up there with hitler, stalin and mao.

They had already invaded and effectively annexed Manchuria. . . they felt they had a "manifest destiny" to rule over the other Asian peoples. .   Look up "East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere".  The Japanese considered themselves and their culture superior to all other Asian groups and cultures.  Not sure if they still do, but some people feel that they do. . .

They wanted to rule over China, Mongolia, Korea, "Indo-China" (Viet-nam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand), and maybe parts of eastern Russia (Soviet Union) what was then called "Malaya" (now Malaysia), as well as the Philippines, and the Dutch East Indies (Indonesia).

They felt that the US and Europe had and were colonizing Africa, Asia, etc, and that they had just as much a right to do so. . . They wanted and needed the resources of China, and other Asian areas (especially oil in Dutch East Indies) to expand their Empire.   The US had ties to China via missionary work, and at the time, US business interests which felt that China had great potential to be market for US goods (ironic no?). .  The US and other countries were concerned and upset at Japanese expansionist plans in China and reported atrocities there especially from reports about Japanese actions in Nanking.

Their plan was to do, and which they did quite well,  what is now called a pre-emptive strike at our base in Pearl Harbor, which would cripple our ability to take action against them.  Immediately after the attack at Pearl Harbor, the attacked the Philippines, Singapore, French Indo-China (where they got the Vichy French regime to turn over the rubber exports there that were needed), and Korea. . . and they were winning.  The fall of Singapore was a HUGE shock to the UK.

It is now not really spoken of, but during 1942, the Allies were genuinely worried about defeat at the hands of the Axis---remember France had fallen, England was hangning by a thread, the Low Countries, Norway occupied.  The US Army was tiny.   The Army numbered about 270K, with the Navy about 160K in 1940.   Think we ranked about 16th in the world.  We had very little in the way of advanced aviation, and Naval Aviation was still trying to establish itself against the "battleship mafia". . .Mechanized and Armor was not well developed---at all.  The Air Corp was not equipped with what would be considered advanced or even adequate types and qtys  of fighters and bombers.    America was not in the mood for war.  Approx. 80% of the US did not want us involved in the war that had already started in Europe in 1939.  America was still feeling the effects of the Depression with regards to industrial output.  It would take the war to get that revved up.  With two large oceans and peaceful neighbors north and south, the USA did not see the need for a large military, nor the wish to get involved in foreign wars.   Also, the Western people felt the Japanese unable to wage a modern war effectively.   They thought of them as backwards and inferior.

Taking all this into account, the Japanese figured if they could hit us hard at Pearl Harbor, and then make good enough gains in Asia, we would negotiate a peace with good terms for them,. . . they wanted to rule the East.

But we were still occupying Japan or at least strongly present during the run up to the Korean War.  Was it the 8th Army in Japan still?

We actually kept Russia out of Japan or at least kept them to spectator levels of occupation.

How would it have effected the result of the war if Japan had developed Accords, Camrys and Tacomas by 1940?

As things turned out, that was correct.

.
Hitler was a big fan of the USA.
He even named his trains California and America.
His dog was named Blondi, after the title character in Hank Ketchum's comic strip.

Not to derail this thread, but I don't think Hitler wanted to go to war with the UK or France even. . . I believe he didn't think they would go to war over Poland. . . they hadn't done so over the Sudetenland, and he was allied at the time with the USSR, (who also occupied half of Poland with Germany), so he figured they'd have to declare war on both him and Russia---so he figured they'd let it go. . .   He wanted Russia ---to colonize it and extract it's resources. . .and then he wouldn't have to wage war in the West---he wouldn't need to. . . he'd be the superpower and have the gun to their head. . .

We had 28 fleet carriers by 1945.   If they had sunk our whole navy in 1942, we still would have still built a navy 5 times bigger and then nuked the shit out of them.

There’s no way the Japs could have won, even if they sank every Carrier on day one.    We had unlimited resources and the will to win at any cost.

At most, it could have extended WWII by a few years.

I am no expert.   I have always been fascinated with the Jap I class sub
It held 3 aircraft. And could launch and recover them
I think they scheduled to build quite a few

Think those could have made a difference. They did have worldwide reach also

It was essentially a 'stealth carrier', but it was a carrier that carried only three light bombers and took a bit of time to launch each one (even longer to recover them).

That would have made things interesting though- 2 front war for the Commies and most importantly, no USA to arm & equip the Allies. Japs coulda gone for Australia or India if not fighting us?

This.  Yamamoto figured he could "run wild" for the first 6 months to a year after Pearl Harbor.  But they didn't catch the carriers in port, nor did they destroy them at Midway.

The war was essentially over at that point.

Attached File

Thanks to panic created by the fall of France in 1940, we were already on our way to building a two-ocean navy by the time the Japanese hit Pearl Harbor.

When your best strategy depends not on you defeating your enemy, but hoping he gets tired and goes home, then you don't have much chance of winning.

I think he meant "isolationist"

No.
3 planes can’t make a decent strike, esp 3 slow, unmanuverable float planes.

It would take 20 of those subs to equal one carrier. Plus you need escorts because holy shit were those subs going to be vulnerable during launch and recovery.

Japan never had a chance. We could replace losses, Japan could not.

I know what you're saying - their industrial base was totally out-classed by the US, but the fuckers still managed to chop up a lot of Marines and GI's from Guadalcanal to Okinawa.

Those subs were the equivalent of suicide bombers.  Their purpose was to terrorize and cause chaos on the west coast.

But in military terms they were useless.

How would the war have fared if our carriers were sunk at Pearl Harbor.  I think we still would've entered the war and won it.

We would've fixed the carriers but it would've taken an extra  year before the fleet was ready.  The Japanese would have expanded their reach and taken over the Phillipines and Midway.  And maybe the aleutian islands.

More of our carriers sunk and more American deaths.  I think we still would've won, but it would be a few years longer.

I don't think it would have even been six more months. Most of our production, men and aircraft were going to fight Hitler. Japan was put on the back burner until after Hitler was defeated by plan. If Japan had made more of a nuisance of themselves that would probably would have changed.

Lots of people are unaware that the Japanese were establishing bases in the Aleutian Islands and we fought battles there. The shortest great circle distance to DC was through largely uninhabited Canada. Had they gained a foothold we would’ve had a front in Alaska and an enemy making their way to DC from the North.

These subs did do a 'limited' bomb run in Oregon!  They dropped incendiary bombs, but the forest was too wet for them to do any damage.

The first of the Essex carriers weren't combat ready until mid-1943.  If we had sped it up they could have been ready by the end of 1942.

During those extra six months the Japanese would have isolated Australia and expanded out further in the South Pacific.  Not to mention that without our carriers to oppose them they would have taken Port Moresby and Midway Island.

It would have been much more difficult to fight our way to Japan at that point.

LoL. .    Awesome premise for a video game, but no.   On the off chance you’re being serious; It’s a ridiculous theory, but an amusing one.

They were going nowhere through Alaska even if the attack hadn't been mostly diversionary.

Japan was absolutely dwarfed by the USA in terms of resources and GDP right from the get go.

They were completely retarded to pick that fight.  You have to remember that we absolutely steamrolled them which is not exactly a common result in the history of warfare.  For a country to wage across an entire ocean, take territory, and obliterate entire cities of the opponent on their home turf suggests a vast advantage in terms of men, machines, and resources NOT some stroke of luck or genius of leadership.

I understand their theory of causing enough pain to negotiate a favorable peace but that sure did require some pretty ignorant assumptions.

No.

Japanese submarine doctrine was crap, and most ended up being pressed into cargo service to try and supply cut-off Garrison's.

One Problem: When WWII started, the Soviet Union had been in existence for 23 years.

Japan simply didn't have the logistical capabilities to support a major invasion anywhere farther than a few hundred miles from the home islands.

Almost all of their merchant fleet was required to keep their supply lines from South East Asia and the Philippines running.  A major invasion into the eastern Pacific or Indian Ocean would have required hundreds of more ships than they had.

They wanted to keep us OUT of the war.  They'd hoped that the attack on Pearl Harbor would have been adequate warning for us to stay out and mind our own business or there's more of THAT waiting for us!

They didn't know us very well, did they?

Defeat US Navy hard enough, through multiple engagements, to get us to give them better trade deals, to allow them to continue their hostile takeover of an Empire, because the Japanese were all about prestige.

They emulated the European empires, as being an 'empire' was what seemed to make a country powerful and rich.

They wanted to gain all the European holdings in the Pacific for their own, for the resources, for their wars in Asia.

That included US territories, because of what fell into our lap from beating the Spanish.

They had long worked up their people against the US, to the point that the news they had 'crushed the American navy at Pearl Harbor' was celebrated, even by school children.

They got the war they wanted, and let pure racism fuel their confidence in themselves and led them to extremely underestimate the US.

Actually, biggest part of plan was to lure remaining American fleet into a 'decisive battle' where they were confident they would win.

Which is unlikely with how poorly they performed almost all the time.

European-imitators with dreams of prestige leading a blind, fanatically maliable people.

There biggest problem was trying to use subs against warships. That ends poorly for diesel subs.
We used subs primarily against merchant ships, and completely crippled Japan.

Without merchant ships to resupply garrisons, Japan had to use there warships. It tied up a significant portion of there ships, and was largely ineffective anyway. Destroyers make poor cargo ships.

It was a failure cascade on there part.

One thing that doomed the Japanese at Guadalcanal and elsewhere was the lousy cooperation and communication between their navy and army.

They could never get on the same page.