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(VANITY) What if the USN had a terrible defeat at Midway?
5 June 2012 | me

Posted on 06/05/2012 1:21:45 PM PDT by moonshot925

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To: ArrogantBustard

The subject was covered in a book called ‘Refighting the Pacific War’ published by the Naval Institute Press. Those scholars interviewed were unanimous in their view of the Japanese capability to successfully invade Hawaii - they simply lacked the assets required. They might have made it ashore, but not in a million years could they have stayed ashore.


21 posted on 06/05/2012 1:47:34 PM PDT by skeeter
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To: moonshot925
Hmm. Well, I wrote a book called "Halsey's Bluff" about a US Navy defeat at Midway, with Bill Halsey in command. But that's only the beginning of the story. Halsey has to save what's left of the fleet---and find a way to turn the tables.

http://www.amazon.com/Halseys-Bluff-Larry-Schweikart/dp/1605301299/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1238619567&sr=1-1

BTW, I had the book vetted and endorsed by the "Battle of Midway Rountable" of Midway vets.

22 posted on 06/05/2012 1:53:28 PM PDT by LS ("Castles Made of Sand, Fall in the Sea . . . Eventually (Hendrix))
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To: moonshot925
I think a defeat at Midway would have had the effect of prioritizing the PTO and deemphasizing the ETO.

There would have been no American foray into Northern Africa, nor in Sicily/Italy. The war effort would have become understandably more self-absorbed if Hawaii had come under credible Japanese threat by mid-1942 in an unbroken string of setbacks/draws since Pearl Harbor.

However, nothing was going to long change the dynamic that inexorably turned the tide in the Pacific. The codes remained broken, The warships were coming. The Zero killers were coming. The B-29s were coming. The A-Bomb was coming.

The strategy would have changed too. I don't think we'd have seen an island hopping campaign after a US defeat at Midway. There would have been no Solomons campaign. There would have been a more concerted effort to hunt and kill Japanese shipping via submarine warfare to buy time for the completion of a large enough surface fleet to spread the Japanese too thin for any effective defense. Garrisons, such as at Tarawa, would have simply been cut off and starved to death rather than taken by amphibious warfare.

Though Midway was a pivotal battle, it could have only ever been determinative for the Japanese.
23 posted on 06/05/2012 1:54:05 PM PDT by Goldsborough
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To: moonshot925

From what I have read, both American and Japanese war games outcomes defined Japan’s defeat sooner rather than later.
Admiral Yamamoto did not believe Japan could defeat the U.S. and said he only believed he could mount effective offenses for six months—a prediction that proved accurate. And the Japanese Army command determined what has been stated elsewhere here, once they found out Americans owned guns—any Japanese offensive across the continent would have been a disaster because American civilians would have shot their army to pieces. Besides, not only would we have had a mounted American military presence of the Word War II army, Marines and Navy, we would have had the veteran survivors of WWI on the ground. The WWI guys were not all old men. Many or even most were middle age. In short, by the time the Japanese Imperial army got to Dallas, they would have been surrounded by hundreds of thousands of thoroughly urinated Americans. (Except I really think they would have been in real trouble by the time they got to Yuma.)


24 posted on 06/05/2012 1:55:04 PM PDT by righttackle44 (I may not be much, but I raised a United States Marine.)
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To: C19fan
. . . the author of one piece argued the US would of attacked Japan via Aleutians and Northern Pacific.

I've read extensively on the Aleutians war. That route would be problematic at best. Our commercial airlines who fly high over the Aleutians and ride the gulf stream from Tokyo to Seattle and back are uneventful because the fly far above the weather which is typical of that region: fog and constant storms.

Aviation had not advanced to that point in the 1940's. Even until the mid-1980's, direct flights were becoming common with the workhorse 747's, but refueling stops in Anchorage were even more common with lesser aircraft.

More sorties had to be canceled in the Aleutians theater of operations than were carried out. Japanese resupply of the two Aleutians which they occupied (Attu and Kiska) had to be done almost entirely by submarine. Even fast moving destroyer shuttles from the Japanese Kurile Island base at Parashimaro became too risky by the winter of 1942-43.

25 posted on 06/05/2012 1:55:51 PM PDT by Vigilanteman (Obama: Fake black man. Fake Messiah. Fake American. How many fakes can you fit in one Zer0?)
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To: skeeter

That just went on my “nook”. I read “Shattered Sword” last year ...


26 posted on 06/05/2012 1:56:19 PM PDT by ArrogantBustard (Western Civilization is Aborting, Buggering, and Contracepting itself out of existence.)
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To: ArrogantBustard
Shattered Sword was probably the best, most original work on Midway I've ever read, although I think the author was a little hard on Lt Cmdr Fuchida.

Jon Parshall is interviewed in 'Refighting' as well.

27 posted on 06/05/2012 1:59:50 PM PDT by skeeter
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To: moonshot925

Not much different. Just would have taken longer, that’s all.
Our submariners would have suffered through a longer, even more intensive unrestricted submarine warfare campaign while we replaced our carriers and trained up some new naval aviators. Might have lost New Guinea and had a land campaign in Australia.
But we would have swept them from sea, any darn way.


28 posted on 06/05/2012 2:00:22 PM PDT by Little Ray (FOR the best Conservative in the Primary; AGAINST Obama in the General.)
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To: moonshot925

We’d have started island-hopping in Hawaii, and we’d have started using nukes instead of Marines in any of the invasions after 1944.


29 posted on 06/05/2012 2:01:47 PM PDT by MuttTheHoople (Democrats- Forgetting 9/11 since 9/12/01)
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To: skeeter

Their Army was stretched mighty thin, too.


30 posted on 06/05/2012 2:04:21 PM PDT by PzLdr ("The Emperor is not as forgiving as I am" - Darth Vader)
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To: ArrogantBustard

“... Japan gets nuked more than twice in 1948 ... “

.
And where would those bombers have taken off from?

You are assuming that we would have gone island hopping like we did in the early forties so as to make a slow approach to the Japanese islands in order to secure Pacific bases.

And what about Europe? No way that we could’ve maintained the lend-lease program, all of Europe would have fallen to the nazis, no shipping to Murmansk to help the Russkies, nazis riding roughshod all the way to the Urals and beyond, Britain defeated, mid-east oil in nazi hands, etc. etc., no D-Day.

In His mercy the Good Lord gave us Admiral Fletcher (The American Lord Nelson) and good and lucky decision making at Midway.


31 posted on 06/05/2012 2:06:06 PM PDT by 353FMG
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To: PzLdr

Yes, the vast bulk of it was tied down in China & Manchuria for the entire war.


32 posted on 06/05/2012 2:06:36 PM PDT by skeeter
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To: moonshot925

What if your aunt had a p***s?

She’d be your uncle, I suppose, but in the end the question is pointless along with all possible answers.

Unless you’re Harry Turtledove, in which case you write another book and give your wife the kitchen makeover she’s been pestering you for.


33 posted on 06/05/2012 2:07:22 PM PDT by ExGeeEye (Romney Sucks. Mutiny Now, or something.)
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To: DesertRhino
The Japanese had no chance to ultimately prevail. Yamamoto himself knew that.

Probably would have kept Yamamoto alive for at least a little while longer. Don't thinks that the Japanese would have tried to take Hawaii.

34 posted on 06/05/2012 2:08:27 PM PDT by Mike Darancette (Ineptocracy; the Obama way.)
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To: skeeter

Take a look at “Midway Inquest”. Great book.


35 posted on 06/05/2012 2:09:03 PM PDT by PzLdr ("The Emperor is not as forgiving as I am" - Darth Vader)
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To: Mr Ramsbotham

The loss of the four carriers was devastating to Japan. They could neither replace the ships or their flight crews.

However, what exactly was Japan’s plan to win the war?

Initially, they thought to knock the U.S. out, negotiate a peace, and continue undeterred by us with their crazy idea of creating a Japan-dominated East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. In other words, at some point, instead of continually sinking resources into their extended empire, they were to be enriched by it.

This is like thinking socialism, central planning, high taxes, and slavery works.

The key to us winning WWII was the Supreme Court declaring the National Recovery Act unconstitutional, delaying the socialization of the U.S. economy until Obama’s second term.

Because we still had a basically capitalist economy, we were able to not only supply our military, but Russia’s as well. Almost all their trucks were U.S.-built 2 1/2 tons, and more of their tanks were Shermans than T-34s. Ditto their warplanes.


36 posted on 06/05/2012 2:10:36 PM PDT by Redmen4ever
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To: moonshot925
What if the USN had a terrible defeat at Midway?

But they didn't. And, if they had, the US would have doubled down and defeated the Japanese somewhere else in the Pacific. The Japanese supply lines were stretched too far by the time they got to Midway and Navy successes against their shipping were having a significant impact on the Japanese ability to re-supply their troops at the farthest points.

However, in light of current events upon which the very future of America as the beacon of freedom in an increasing oppressive world depends, discussing "what-if" questions about events that ocurred ~70 years ago is pretty pointless. Why not pose the question "What would the world be like today had Napoleon NOT have been defeated at Waterloo??" It's the same pointless exercise.

37 posted on 06/05/2012 2:10:43 PM PDT by DustyMoment
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To: moonshot925

Japan was working on the Atom bomb as well and was very close, if not already successful in 1945. What would a delay of six more months have brought? Could you imagine first Pearl Harbor being nuked, then San Francisco, Seatle, and LA? Japan had already developed a sub that carried a plane. They had no shortage of suicide pilots and submariners either. If they couldn’t fly a bomb in, they could submarine one in. Japan was working on a lot of nasty stuff besides the Atom bomb too. I say it was close.


38 posted on 06/05/2012 2:11:21 PM PDT by Dogbert41 ("...The people of Jerusalem are strong, because the Lord Almighty is their God" Zech. 12:5)
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To: moonshot925

If we could come back from Pearl Harbor, we could come back from a loss at Midway. Japan could possibly have invaded Hawaii, but I don’t think they were capable of indefinitely holding it. They were capable of causing massive damage to the mainland, but not capable of holding it. American productive capacity and the overstretch straddling the Pacific would ultimately be too much.


39 posted on 06/05/2012 2:13:33 PM PDT by Tublecane
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To: ArrogantBustard
Japan would have had to defeat the land based air forces based on Hawaii. They would have the use of a base at Midway and carrier aircraft. Good luck with that.

US submarines and land based aircraft could have probably isolated and starved a garrison on Midway.

40 posted on 06/05/2012 2:14:11 PM PDT by Former Proud Canadian (Obamanomics-We don't need your stinking tar sands oil, we'll just grow algae.)
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