RE: What were they thinking? (Full Version)

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highblooded -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 4:49:29 PM)

I feel the keys to Japan's thought processes at the time rest on their beliefs that America and Great Britian were politically weak and couldn't face large military losses. If high casualty rates could have been sustained with little to show for them, it was felt the allies would negotiate favorable terms.

A Great Many If's could have changed the war.

If the 'Barrier' had been setup as planned nells and betties would have made a formidable obstacle to the allies. The allies taking Guadalcanal was another turning point, if KB had been around it never could have been attempted without extreme loss. Delaying allied forces any offensives until 44 (due to the need to gather sufficient airpower) could lead to general disatisfaction of the home front.

If The Carriers had been sunk or damaged heavily at PH, KB could have done as it pleased, all of the Coral Sea would have been taken with slight losses, probably up to Noumea. The Tokyo raid is no longer possible. Any US CV raids would have risked the precious few leftover carriers, loss of these cv's delay offensives to '44. Also landings could have been made along the Indian Coast possibly pushing the british back to all the way to Iraq. Without A German-Soviet war in 1941 The Germans could have taken Malta, Syria, and most likely egypt. Giving the Axis powers the Middle East oil.

If Midway had been taken in the initial onslaught it would have created a formidable patrol and long range bomber base. Naturally KB would be spared its disaster.

If Japanese Codes had been better or changed more often, Midway could not have happened.

If the SRA invasions had been executed at a quicker pace many units could have been released for a burma or solomons campaign.

If forces had not been removed from the PI Bataan could have fallen much sooner releasing additional forces.

If the soviets had been attacked by japan in early '42 and the germans had not been diverted from moscow, ( or diverted in greece) it is likely Stalin would have gone under in mid to late '42.

If the Japanese-Soviet clashes had been learned from instead of ignored, many failings of Japanese Army units and Airpower could have been rectified much sooner(heavier firepower and armor for aircraft, better anti-tank guns, better tanks, better artillery, better C & C, etc.) The same is true to a lesser degree with the Chinese War.

If PH had occured a few hours after DOW, that would have helped a bit as well, focusing any blame on the US government, not on 'those sneaky @#$%@'s.

If the navy and army had cooperated 'for the good of the empire' a million positive changes could have been made.

If the Yamato Program had been scrapped, all of Japan could have been brought into the 20th century.

Naturally A million more 'what if's' exist. In all of these the allies do not automatcally win. The best economy in the world doesn't guarantee victory. Look at the Revolutionary War for example.

Japan's main obstacles to a possible victory are arrogance, stubborness, and a lack of realistic views on her capabilities.



SunDevil_MatrixForum -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 5:04:57 PM)

There is a book that all WWII interested people should read

Its called "A World at Arms - Global History of World War II" by Gerhard L. Weinberg

It is a huge book, over 900 pages, but it covers the whole world, before, during, and after WWII and all theaters. It talks a lot about the politics and how a lot of stuff was decided/happened. I learned a lot by reading this book.

If you ever wanted to know why things happened, and what some of these countries and their leadership were thinking and their relationships with each other (Axis and Allies), then this book is for you.

This is just my opinion, but if anyone is interested in this type of stuff, and is able to handle reading a book that is a total of 1100 pages (over 900 actual text, the rest are maps, footnotes, and the index) then I would recommend this book.



maddog0606 -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 5:11:38 PM)

From what I have read this is my understanding of why Japan went to war and thought they could get a quick peace:

Japan wanted China. It thought it had a right to getting part of China because the European colonial powers all had a piece of China. The US did not really get pissed off till the Japanese started to kill lots and lots of Chinese civilians. The US liked Japan and Japan liked the US. Heck, the US did not even get that pissed when the Japanese bombed some of our gunboats in China.

The US froze the Japanese assets in the US. The US stopped selling scrap metal and oil to Japan. Japan needed these to continue its war in China. Japan calculated when it would run out of these resources and started to plan a war to get these resources. It saw the US has weak due to the political leaders at the time and did not think that we would have the stomach for a long and bloody war. A lot of US politicians did not really care about the Philippines and more then likly would not have gone to war to protect em. The US certainly would not have gone to war to help the Dutch or British to get back their colonial posessions.

The Japanese made the mistake of hitting PH (considered American territory even though not a State). And they hit PH before officially declaring war (they did this same thing when they had the war with Russia in 1904-05). This pissed off the American government and thus the American people. Pissed off the American public enough in that they wanted to go after Japan first even before going after Germany. But the US government saw Germany has a bigger threat and only did a Stratigic Defense in the Pacific till 1944.

The Japanese other big boo boo was what is called Victory Desiese. They were wining so big that they started to grap things that they could not protect. They over extended.



MadmanRick -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 5:19:21 PM)

Let us not forget that after Yamamoto, the quality of Japanese naval officers fell off rapidly. Most were more concerned about not losing face, than they were about doing whatever it took to win. However, in the culture of Japan (or even Germany) at the time, losing face or favor was tantamount to death. Let us also not forget that Japan was not in this alone, they were also relying on the other Axis powers to put unbearable pressure upon the Allies. If Germany had been a bit "smarter" and less ego-driven, perhaps that pressure would have, along with the early Japanese victories forced the Allies to sue for peace. However, once Germany attacked Russia the handwriting was on the wall. If Britain HAD fallen and Japan had gone on its' 6-12 months rampage unabated, the U.S. may not have had any other choice than to sue for peace. Fortunately we shall never know!

Rick



SunDevil_MatrixForum -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 5:21:49 PM)

maddog0606,

Great post, great way to explain it.



hithere -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 5:22:42 PM)

well...i would have read it but i'm going to be playing WITP for the next 3 years!!! [:D]

highblooded, I respect you opinion but I think I disagree on almost every point. I'm not going to get a point by point debate because as Homer Simpson says "you can use fact to prove anything even remotely true" . What I will say is that most things happen for a reason and just don't "happen to happen" sure the one scout plane being late at midway is a good what if….but war is very un predictable. Sure any of those what if scenario's would have been bad for the allies, but to say that would have caused the allies to lost the war is a big step. It assumes that they would have acted historically and not reacted to the situation. For instance, if the US would have lost the battle of Midway and it was lost, the U.S. (I believe) would have shifted more of her tremendous industry power to build more carriers. Even winning, didn't the U.S. have 3 or 4 new carriers by the beginning of 43?
also I have to say that I disagree that economies don't win wars. The ability to produce has been important in every war. The colonies economy in the rev war was nothing to sneeze at. That war had a lot to do with taking 3 months to move back and forth…that that is another topic.

Anyway, that is my opinion. Someone may disagree with it but please respect it



moses -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 5:30:38 PM)

Another point. The strength of the US ecconomic/military expansion was not clear at the time. We were after all emerging from a great depression and while many were aware of the US potential, the eventual US production figures would probably have been regarded as absurd even by Yamamoto. It took about a year and a half to really get US weapons production into full gear in late 43/44. This really is an amazing short period of time. An expansion this complex could easily have been botched causing delays of a year or more. Anything can happen- A design flaw in a major weapon, a production bottleneck, an unexpected interoperability problem, or just plain incompetance at some level can delay things for years. If US production failed to ramp up until a year later you have a whole new war.

Plus you have to expect that the Japanese expected a little more from their economy.



hithere -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 5:37:38 PM)

that is a good point but the U.S. had alot of "slack" in our production from the depression...as for the weapons....it is really amazing how good most of the aircraft and such were thrown together and how well they worked...it really says something about the designers and such then...



Cap Mandrake -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 5:46:27 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: steveh11Matrix

There's another point: It's my understanding that Yamamoto was insistent on a proper declaration of war before the first raid at PH. Shock and Awe without the 'stab-in-the-back' reaction.

Also, I don't believe the idea of victory was that far-fetched. A mere 40 years later the USA was defeated by a much smaller Asian nation. It's not just about production quantities, it's much more about reducing the other fella's will to fight.

(Edit spelling...)
Steve.


Vietnam is not analogous. There was never a shocking aggression against American soil (Gulf of Tonkin was puffed up hype). There was no overarching Vietnamese goal of Imperialism. There were TENS of THOUSANDS of American POW's in the Pacific who were treated even worse than American POW's in Vietnam. The idea of an American adbication in the Pacific in the Pacific is simply not plausible.



moses -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 5:53:15 PM)

Yes it was amazing how well they did. Even today with computers, advanced management techniques and production/development programs that drag on for a decade we still produce the occasional dog. Imagine if our figher aircraft development program was as successful as our pre-war submarine torpedo program!!

The success of our economy was nothing short of a miracle. While most of the ingredients of that success were know pre-war, it could not be predicted to what extent those ingredients would come togrther.



hithere -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 6:12:11 PM)

.................................................................
The success of our economy was nothing short of a miracle. While most of the ingredients of that success were know pre-war, it could not be predicted to what extent those ingredients would come togrther.
..................................................................
i see your point...kinda like in baseball and waving a runner around 3rd....everything has to happen just right to gettem' at the plate

as for todays weapons design's....it is really crazy....company's coming in and saying that "we can build this widget for 20 million" and outbidding other companys...then like you say..10 years down the road...they are up to 500 million. granted that the tech is lot higher now but still.

that is why i think that there should be some criminal reprecussions if a company can not meet it's own price.....but that is off the point



carnifex -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 6:22:13 PM)

The Japanese leadership obviously failed to study the American Civil War. I believe that one conflict is more telling of the American character and will to fight than any other event.



steveh11Matrix -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 6:29:16 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake
Vietnam is not analogous. There was never a shocking aggression against American soil (Gulf of Tonkin was puffed up hype). There was no overarching Vietnamese goal of Imperialism. There were TENS of THOUSANDS of American POW's in the Pacific who were treated even worse than American POW's in Vietnam. The idea of an American adbication in the Pacific in the Pacific is simply not plausible.
The fact remains that Japan had no chance of defeating the USA in material terms, so they had to go for the psychological victory. This is why (IMHO) the foul-up over the declaration of war was so important.
A small chance of a psycological victory is better than no chance of material one. It's my belief that the Japanese government perceived itself as being forced into a corner in which the only way out with honour was to fight a war that they had little chance to win. Whether they were right or wrong is irrelevant, that's what they believed.

Steve.



hithere -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 6:35:29 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: carnifex

The Japanese leadership obviously failed to study the American Civil War. I believe that one conflict is more telling of the American character and will to fight than any other event.


you know i have never thought about that but it's true..albeit another generation. you would think that ol Tom Cruise would have done a better job [:)]



mdiehl -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 6:42:04 PM)

Another problem was that many in the Axis, Germans as well as Japanese, really did not believe people like Yamamoto when they pointed out the disparity between American and everyone else's industrial production. Your average Japanese could look at a map and see that the US was big, but production wise they thought the US was about the same as Japan. A good example is provided by the first Japanese combatant captured by the US... a crewman on one of the mini-subs. He was taken on a tour of the US and wrote afterwards of various 'holy sh1t' moments -- one of them was the observation of a US road crew in California, gravelling, compacting and paving more new road in a day with ten men and some machines than the Japanese could pave in a week with dozens of laborers. Most Japanese failed to understand that the US industrialized just about everything from alfalfa to zippers.

The Germans had a different sort of misconception -- That mass produced designs could not be both well-built and top performers. The P-51 was a complete shock when it was deployed with the Merlin engine.



CTB123 -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 6:47:27 PM)

The US public had a large isolationist streak, particuarly after WWI gave them a taste of modern war. The public had wanted to stay out of WWI, but relectantly came around to supporting the war effort. After the war by and large the public wanted to go back to ignoring the rest of the world. Roosevelt and others had to struggle to get enough support to begin building the military back up leading to WWII.

When war broke out in Europe and Asia, the US public, though sympathetic to the nations being attacked, wanted to stay out of the fight. I believe the attack on Pearl Harbor, though a tactical victory, was a strategic error as it galvanized the public support for all out war as nothing else would have.

The US had major industrial potential, but the reality of what was accomplished exceeded everyone's expectations, even within the US. It took total public support. Even Germany's economy was not on a full war-time economy untill a good year after the invasion of Poland. It wasn't seen as necessary.

The Japanese plan was to deal a decisive blow to the US, destroy it's military abilty and will to fight back, and get the US to agree to peace before the US industrial capacity could be brought to to bear. This was all based on the US public's perceived lack of willingness to fight. I wonder if the same rage and support for the war would have been there if the Pearl Harlbor was not a suprise attack, but still had the same outcome.
Tony



mdiehl -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 6:51:04 PM)

That's not very accurate. At best a highly simplistic statement of the state of affairs in 1939. Various Gallup polls showed that by November 1941 90% of Americans favored an "all means short of war" level of support for the embattled non-Axis states, including China, even if it meant that there was a high likelihood that such support would lead to an "incident" that would spark direct US entry into the war. By November 1941, 60% of respondants indicated that the US should enter the war against Germany in order to support Britain.

Most Americans highly favored China at the time along with the UK. As a result, most Americans wanted to support the Chinese by all means available. Moreover, a direct attack on UK assets in the Pacific/Burma/Malaysia would have been viewed as a vile opportunistic backstabbing of the heroic Britons who were doing their best to curb the Nazis. IMO US public hostility towards Japan was quite high, and any of half a dozen plausible hair trigger events would have brought the US into the war against any of the Axis powers with no hesitation on the public's part.



ZOOMIE1980 -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 7:04:56 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: brisd

One reason Yamamoto was so eager to defeat the US Navy in a decisive battle (in this case, Midway), was he wanted a very strong negotiating position so that Japan could then try to negotiate, make concessions and try to end the war prior to US strength destroying Japan. One thing we must remember is that in Dec 41 Germany seemed on the verge of conquering the USSR and thus dominating Europe. Japan felt that if USA was faced with two major enemies, Japan could negotiate a peace where she got to keep most of her conquests. US and Japan relations were bad mostly due to her aggression in China and then her allying with the Axis. Both sides felt they couldn't back down and Japan struck back when the oil embargo took effect. Ask this question: if Germany had defeated USSR and made Britain sue for peace, Japan had conquered or made puppet states of India and Australia, would USA have insisted on unconditional surrender?
It was an insane move on Japan's part, dominated by an military-industrial interests that had taken over their government. Hmmm, sounds like current USA to me. I'd go on about that but that is another topic altogether.


He was encouraged becasue Japan was able to do this very thing with Stalin. Stalin, faced with disaster in Europe was more than willing to leave Japan alone. He probably figured America would be willing to do the same.



ZOOMIE1980 -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 7:10:41 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: moses

Yes it was amazing how well they did. Even today with computers, advanced management techniques and production/development programs that drag on for a decade we still produce the occasional dog. Imagine if our figher aircraft development program was as successful as our pre-war submarine torpedo program!!

The success of our economy was nothing short of a miracle. While most of the ingredients of that success were know pre-war, it could not be predicted to what extent those ingredients would come togrther.


Take the concept of the Liberty Ship. And then the revolutionary concepts of HOW to produce them! That was a REMARKABLE leap forward in manufacturing that happened at just the right time. Image the Pacific without such a robust merchant ship program.....



Arnir -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 7:13:53 PM)

An idea to ponder: The United States tends to fight wars to the bitter end (with some major exceptions) because the American people normally don't like to fight wars unless they are (thought to be) absolutely necessary. (Anti-war sentiment did not suddenly begin with Vietnam). Most wars, however, are not wars of national survival and are usually ended with some treaty and a land swap, etc.

Japan's history taught them that you can take on a big power (especially outside of their main area of interest), hit them hard, and then negotiate a peace and gain something. With the Philippines slated for independence in 194X? it might have been thought that the US might not want to pay too dear a price to keep it.

However, the US saw the war in a different light and Japan had no hope of winning barring incredibile disasters in Europe and the Pacific. (Even then it is doubtful).

The Japanese warplan wasn't as silly in 1941 as it might appear today. Fatally flawed, but not outright fantasy.



DrewMatrix -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 7:20:35 PM)

quote:

The Japanese warplan wasn't as silly in 1941 as it might appear today. Fatally flawed, but not outright fantasy.

My (limited, western) view of the Japanese Military's mindset in 1940 was: The US and Britain have us by the throat in the economic/resource area. The US and Britain (here the Japanese Military project on the US/Britain what they would do if the situation were reveresed) will soon have our industry starved and at that point they will crush us.

So this attack against the US is our last, desperate gamble before the US, maybe in 1944 when we are weakened and completely out of oil/resources, takes the intiative and attacks us.

Note I am not condoning the Japanese view, but that is what I think it was. They thought this was their last chance. They also thought the US weak/effete and willing to negotiate rather than fight, but that is another issue, not _why_ they started a war.



doktor1957 -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 7:32:00 PM)

My opinion (for what it's worth) is that the Japanese experience against the Russians in the Russo-Japanese war had convinced them that they could, indeed, defeat European/Western powers, if they chose the moment to strike. Russia, weakened by it's semi-feudal social structure and menaced by the rise of Germany, chose to accept a humiliating, negotiated peace, after a long, bloody, war.
Consider, then, the world situation in 1941. Germany, triumphant across the continent, the old powers crushed or at bay. German Panzers were racing toward Moscow. Britain had slashed it's forces in Asia in order to protect the homeland. America, emerging from the Great Depression, seemed to be torn between Isolationism and engagment. At any rate, her standing forces were not impressive.
As a Japanese commander, I would have to ask, "What better time to strike?"



dtravel -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 9:28:22 PM)

I think the only way the American public would have NOT seen Pearl as a "dastardly surprise attack" would be if there was about 24 hours between the declaration of war being delivered and the beginning of combat. It took the aircraft, what, 1 to 2 hours to fly from the carriers to Pearl Harbor? IIRC the plan was to give the diplomatic note (which I seem to recall wasn't actually a declaration of war, but a statement ending negiotations that were taking place) to the Secretary of State about 30 minutes before the attacks began.


(And the colonies didn't win the Revolutionary War. France took advantage of some colonial difficulties the British were having to re-start the Seven Years War, launching attacks on British colonies and interests all around the world. Granting the troublesome colonies independence was just what GB was willing to do to stop the fighting because they were losing money on it. [:'(])



SirRodneyOfGout -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 9:33:55 PM)

I always find it ironic that so much emphasis is placed on the cultural anthropological explanation for Japan's military planning. The cultural myopia theory seems somewhat akin to the pre-war notion that the Japanese would make poor flyers...

There are rational, historical reasons for the Japanese attack. doktor1957 cites the Russo-Japanese War, which indeed made a great impact on military planning.

But even more important was Japan's millenia long relationship with China. By comparison, the U.S. was a newcomer to Asia (even the Europeans were relative newcomers). Japan always viewed itself as the underdog in the wars with China, and that Japan's survival was always at stake in these wars. Japan had always fought against larger opponents. The long, complex history of Japan and China is usually glossed over, if mentioned at all, in any history of WW2.

The Japanese did not think the U.S. would be willing to lose significant amounts of ships and troops in battles over remote islands or even over China. The survival of the U.S. was not in any way dependent upon the outcome of a war across the globe. So they did not have an irrational viewpoint, by any means.

But the Japanese certainly were aware that the U.S. would fight a war. Both sides had been planning for one since the 1920s, and there were several incidents in the 1930s that might have triggered an American declaration of war against Japan. So the Japanese took advantage of what they saw as a window of opportunity. The Japanese saw it as an ultimate struggle, perhaps the main reason why they were determined to fight to the bitter end.

In hindsight the PH + mass production + atomic bomb equation seems so substantive that it is hard to believe events could have unfolded in any other fashion.



Cap Mandrake -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 10:59:09 PM)

Sir Rodney;

The "cultural myopia" theory seems quite plausible to me. In fact, just as the USN underestimated the ability of the Japanese to design an aerial torpedo for the shallow waters of PH, the Japanese military underestimated the resiliance and alacrity of the US. They clearly underestimated our code-breakng ability for eg. They mistook the European tradition of formal surrender when a defeated force was in a hopeless situation to be a sign of weakness. This was essentially a racist idea on the part of the Japanese. Even their treatment of the Koreans and Chinese was based on racist ideas.

If they thought the war was going to be a replay of the Battle of Tsushima, then they weren't doing their homework very well. As to historical enmity vs. the Chinese, that may well be true, but FDR wasn't asking them to give a couple of the home islands to the Chinese. The oil embargo might well have been lifted had the Japanese simple ceased agrression. If that did not allow the preservation of "face", then we are back to the cultural myopia problem again.

I agree that their goose was cooked as soon as they took on the US.



maddog0606 -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 11:26:09 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: SunDevil

There is a book that all WWII interested people should read

Its called "A World at Arms - Global History of World War II" by Gerhard L. Weinberg


Thanks for the heads up on the book.

Went and ordered this book on half.com for $12 (includes shipping). Takes about 3 weeks to get. Which gives me more then enough time to finish reading the last 200 pages of a 800 page book about the land/sea/air battle for Guadalcanal. The name of the book is Guadalcanal: The Definitive Account of the Landmark Battle by Richard B. Frank



SunDevil_MatrixForum -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/5/2004 11:28:47 PM)

No problem maddog,

Thanks for returning the favor, might just give that book a look.



neuromancer -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/6/2004 1:57:25 AM)

My quick nickle, which mirrors what a lot of other people said.

I don't think even the biggest hot heads in Japan ever seriously beleived they could conquer the US, and so I don't think that was ever the plan.

I always beleived the goal was - as stated - to 'shock and awe' the US out of the war. Hit the US hard and fast, cripple their ability to effectively fight in the Pacific, and then negotiate a peace.

I think it actually might have worked, if two things hadn't happened.

1. Pearl Harbour was supposed to be a surprise attack while at war. Not a sneak attack while at peace. The military difference would have been negligable, maybe the US forces might have been a little more prepared with an hour or two notice, but not enough to make any significant difference.
The key difference is that a surprise attack at war is "Blast, we got caught with our pants down!"
It happens, its part of war.
But a sneak attack while at peace? 63 years later it still gets the blood of some Americans boiling. It was seen as a horribly cowardly and underhanded act.

I understand that not only did Yamamoto understand that the attack 'woke the sleeping giant', but he also understood that the US could never forgive such an insult. PH alone probably guarenteed that the US would not back down.

2. Even if PH had gone as planned, and the US had come away with a bloody nose, but it had been a proper wartime action and thus the US had not been filled with righteous anger, they still had to destroy the US ability to fight in the Pacific. Thus Midway had to go in favour of Japan, not as the crushing defeat for Japan that it was.

So if Pearl Harbour had gone as planned, or more accurately, if some dim bulb clerk in Washington hadn't delayed delivery of the DoW for two hours, and then everything else had fone more or less the way it had historically, except instead of Japan losing at Midway, they had won and the US instead had lost 2 or 3 carriers.

If - and really, it was mostly poor luck (and the abject stupidity of two Japanese people at wo key points in history) that caused the sneak attack at Pearl, and the Japanese defeat at Midway, their planning had been reasonably sound - those had gone as hey should. Then the Japanese might have been able to negotiate a peace with the US.

Now, the next question is, would the US have backed down? Well, that is another matter. It can be argued back and forth whether the US heart would have been in the fight or not, and cannot be proven one way or another (don't quote polls to me, I've studied poli-sci, polls will usually produce the answer you wanted to get when you designed them).

But whether the US would have actually backed down or not is not the question. The question is what did the Japanese think the US would do.

Just as the US had contempt for the Japanese, and didn't think the 'little yellow <bleep>s' could fight (and were proved very wrong, that they could fight quite well), the Japanese had contempt for the US. They felt that the US would be inclined to be isolationist, that they would not have the stomach for a protracted fight, and more importantly would probably be more concerned about fighting for their fellow white allies in Europe than for China and the Phillipines (although a successful invasion of Australia might have been a bad idea then).

Don't forget, this was WW2, and racism was alive and well, on both sides of the Pacific.

And quite frankly, most people will only fight for what actually matters to them. This is simply human nature. Japan probably didn't think the US really cared that much about China and the Phillipenes.

So yes, I think the Japanese did think they could negotiate a peace after a years war if they could bloody the nose of the US enough to get them out of the fight. They could surrender enough territory (uselss chunks of rock like Wake and Midway) to make the US feel there was a comfortable buffer between the US and Japan.

Yamamoto on the other hand, as was pointed out, studied in the US. He knew that they could never win a protracted war, and may have even suspected that the US had more of a stomach for it than his comrades in Japan would ever believe.

So was Japan deluded? Maybe, maybe not. I would say that they wore more likely mis-informed. Or had under-estimated their opponents. As has been pointed out, that is a very common mistake.

To a certain extent the US also under-estimated Japan. Britain under-estimated Germany. Germany under-estimated the Soviet Union. The west under-estimated Korea, the US under-estimated the Vietnamese, pretty much everyone has always under-estimated the Afganis. The US under-estimated the Canadian colonies in 1812. And there were the Zulu, the Indians (East), various African groups (Rwanda, and Somali come to mind), etc., etc., etc.

Under-estimating your opponent is almost human nature.

We are American/ Japanese/ Russian// etc.! We have God/ Bushido/ the Dialectic/ etc. on our side! They are stupid/ weak/ decadent/ etc. and will be destroyed by our rightous might! Yea for us!

Sure, with hind sight we can look back and say "boy were they out to lunch!" but at the time, no one knew that for sure. Even the US wasn't absolutely convinced of victory until maybe sometime in '43 or '44, untl then there were a lot of people chewing their nails.



This was supposed to be quick. Sorry about that.



DrewMatrix -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/6/2004 1:59:22 AM)

quote:

Pearl Harbour was supposed to be a surprise attack while at war. Not a sneak attack while at peace.


The Japanese began the Russo-Japanese war with a sneak attack (Torpedo Boats vs Russian ships in harbor) as I recall. Was that attack before or after any declaration of war (I don't know, myself)



neuromancer -> RE: What were they thinking? (8/6/2004 2:08:03 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Beezle
The Japanese began the Russo-Japanese war with a sneak attack (Torpedo Boats vs Russian ships in harbor) as I recall. Was that attack before or after any declaration of war (I don't know, myself)


Don't know either. Doesn't really matter.

For Pearl Harbour, the Emperor had commanded that the DoW to the US was to be delivered an hour before the attack on PH was scheduled to occur. The Emperor had not suggested or recommended the action, commanded. It was important to him, he might have suspected what would happen, or at the very least it would be a stain on the honour of Bushido to perform a sneak attack instead of a surprise attack.

So as I said, it wasn't supposed to be a sneak attack. A clerk in the Japanese embassy had so much trouble decoding, translating, and typing out the message that - to avoid dishonour - he decided to redo it, and thus the DoW arrived an hour after the attack.

I don't know for sure, but I bet that clerk probably ended up performing ritual suicide over the larger dishonour of failing his Emperor than whether his typing skills sucked.



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