mdiehl
Posts: 5998
Joined: 10/21/2000 Status: offline
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quote:
You have a hard time looking past your own nose here my friend. I will agree that the overall strategic considerations of the operations was the defense of PM and Australia. But the operation at it's heart was a "meeting engagement" with carrier forces. Purely defensive operations are not meeting engagements. I'll skip over your multiple, obvious ad hominems. The existence of a meeting engagement does not obviate the importance of the basic circumstance that the US CVs were deployed in the Coral Sea. They were there as a blocking (defensive) move against an anticipated Japanese move against Port Moresby. Your use of the phrase "meeting engagement" strikes me as a gross misuse of language. In the stretegic sense (since we're talking about motivations here we are, primarily, talking about strategic decisions), one would only say it was a "meeting engagement" if both forces were attempting to seize the same objective at the same time. They weren't. Only Japan was sending troop transports in the engagement and the ONLY reason why the USN was there was to block the move. It was, therefore, by any reasonable standard, a defensive engagement not an offensive one. Moreover, there were not even any follow-up assets available on a contingency basis to exploit any lopsided Allied victory, should one occur. The Coral Sea campaign, from the US raids in February 1942 down through the CV battles, was from the Allied POV a suite of strategic defensive actions whose primary purpose was to maintain a forward base from which Allied offnsive operations could be launched in 1943 and to prevent the establishment of a Japanese forward base. If your point is that military engagements have political fallout that was often the source of much haymaking in the press, then we agree. But there is absolutely no basis for arguing that political decisions were a driving motivating factor in the Coral Sea campaign. quote:
And the Allied landings at Guadalcanal were not "defensive" and certainly took place well before 1943. Again forced upon JCS by Japanese offensive operations. My grasp of Coral Sea is no less tenuous than your own. It was never part of the Allies original strategic plan to take the offensive in the SoPac in 1942. Op Watctower is often also called "Op Shoestring" because it was opportunistically cobbled together and initiated in about 8 weeks. It was the most jury-rigged operation of the Allied war effort. It was executed primarily to deny the Japanese a forward air base. Going into Watchtower, there were no plans for follow up operations in the Solomons in 1942. It was solely intended to be a one-shot invasion whose strategic purpose was defensive in nature. Moreover, it never would have happened unless the USN had been victorious at Midway. quote:
Not to mention Doolittle or the Rabaul raid.... It was for exact moral/political reasons that you offhandedly dismiss as "garbage". It depends. Attacking Japanese morale and, more importantly, their mindshare was the objective. I think of the Doolittle Raid as a "spoiling attack" executed on a strategic level. And it worked. Of the cases that you mention the Doolittle Raid comes the closest to being a "politically motivated" raid, but it was not primarily the US public who was expected to be the recipient of the message. Even so, in the general thrust of this discussion, don't you think it's pretty strange to assert that the Allied player should be required to take such risks when the Doolittle Raid itself demonstrates that the USN was, in 1942, pretty risk averse? After all, they DID launch those B-25s from a range that most understood would result in their running out of fuel. quote:
Doolittle's raid was not meant to boost US public morale and was purely intended to mess with the mind of Nippon? Primarily, yes. And it worked. Look at where the Japanese thrust was -- SE Asia and the Indian Ocean. The Doolittle Raid focused the IJNs attention back on the Central Pacific (a quiet theater after December 1941), and resulted in the restriction of a significant amount of Japanese aircraft to the defense of Japan. It also forced the IJN to react, causing them to divide their forces for their planned attempt at Port Moresby (reduced the plan from 6 CVs to 2 CVs + 1 very light CV), in order to save 4 CV for their hastily conceived, cobbled-together attempt at Midway. So, I'd say that the US op planners were pretty darned good at predicting Japanese mindset. quote:
Why would Roosevelt play it up so highly, so shortly after it's completion. You have mistaken effect for cause. The raid occurred. It was executed for some fairly compelling military reasons. Having executed the raid, it was then played up for far more than it was worth in terms of physical damage. Why would you expect such an event NOT to be played up, regardless of the original military purposes that set the raid in motion? quote:
Politics have EVERYTHING to do with war, even the Rabaul raid. I think the claim is trivial and overblown. It has to be made on a case-by-case basis if your wish to assign "political reasons" rather than "military reasons" as the primary driving force in the planning and execution of an operation or a campaign. quote:
Back to the game....if the Allied player wants to not risk a thing prior to '43, then I say fine that's his perogative. We'll all employ different strategies with this beast of a game. That's just one of them. I agree. quote:
What are you talking about? The overall strategic goal for the Japanese was to go over to the defensive after making thier economic gains that would enable them to be self sufficient in natural resources. They over extended themselves. Ever hear the reference "victory disease"? So, your argument is that the Japanese should not suffer from any game-introduced inherent pressure to sustain their offensives because it went against their original strategic plan? Yet at the same time you maintain that the Allies should suffer from game-introduced inherent pressure to take the offensive, even though it went against their strategic plan? Hey, as long as logical consistency doesn't matter, you can have your cake and eat it too. quote:
The Japanese advance forced the hand of the Allies, who by winning (Midway), or coming to a draw with the IJN (Coral Sea), took the initiative in '42 and gained valuble experience and confidence that carried over to huge gains of '43. The Japanese advance probably forced the Allies to take risks in the Coral Sea action. The Midway invasion did not "force" the Allies' hand in any way. It was purely a wonderously vulnerable target of opportunity for the USN. The Japanese were TAKEN at Midway, the USN planned from the outset for the result that happened, and had every reason to be confident that such a result would likely happen. Indeed, one could with better reason argue that the USN "forced the Japanese hand" into a thrust at Midway because of the Doolittle Raid. This gets back to my earlier allusion to a "strategic spoling attack" and "attacking your opponent's mind share." quote:
Again, I'm talking history here and your answering with a game context. Immaterial to the original discussion and quite shrill. No, you've quite clearly taken Op. Watchtower out of its historical context and, frankly, the Doolittle Raid as well. If that's "talking history" then I need no part of it. I think you have to put these actions in their contingent circumstances to understand why they happened and to assign importance to motivating factors commensurate with their real importance. Watchtower happened in order to deny the Japanese a forward air base. It was made doable in a rather hastily cobbled together way primarily because the USN had sunk 4 IJN CVs and thought that they'd sunk two more big CVs at Coral Sea. quote:
So you are contending that the meager damage caused by a few Army bombers striking the mainland of Japan was the main thrust of the Doolittle raid and therefore worth the risk of precious carriers? Sorry, 60 years of documented works disagree with you here. Nope. Sixty years of writing don't disagree. Most of the writings include a discussion of the strategic goals of the mission, and subsequent operations that the mission was supposed to kick off. If you are, err, narrowly focussed enough on the simple question "what did the Doolittle Raiders' bombs blow up?" then you will only conclude that the raid had no effect. You might then put the logical cart before the horse -- 'the raid had no effect, therefore it was anticipated that it would have no effect, therefore the motivating purpose of the raid was for US domestic political consumption.' But, as you ought to know: 1. The raid was aimed first and foremost at the minds of Japanese operational planners. 2. The raid was secondarily aimed at the military targets that were to be bombed. 3. The raid was supposed to result in the birth of a tactical air force in China, comprised of the raiding B-25s after they arrived in China. 4. The least important consideration was US public consumption. That is why the USN CVs fled when detected. It was far, far more important that the CVs make a clean getaway than any measure of success for the mission. In short, there was no willingness to take a real risk for the sake of political gain back home. And that, fella, cuts to the heart of yours (and others') suggestions that there ought to be some sort of inherent game mechanic that forces the Allies to take risks in 1942. quote:
The main point of engaging in combat is to inflict greater damage on the enemy, period. Midway, notwithstanding. That's a really odd statement. Lots of combat has objectives other than "inflicting greater damage." Why did the Axis invade Crete? For that matter, why did the UK resist? If you have a really plum strategic objective that you think will allow you to substantially enhance your overall war effort, it is often acceptable to risk greater damage to yourself than you are likely to inflict on your enemy. On another note, why "Midway notwithstanding?" Your statement is almost verbatim the orders given to Ray Spruance.
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Show me a fellow who rejects statistical analysis a priori and I'll show you a fellow who has no knowledge of statistics. Didn't we have this conversation already?
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