Japan in WW II - merchant marine and Pearl Harbour.

[unmerged(2833)]

See it worked that way. Assume we have two merchant ships, one in Shanghai and one in Fukuoka. Now we have some supplies for the Navy base in Shangai that need to get shiped there from Fukuoka and some soldiers in Shangai which return home.
Anyone with their right mind would have loaded the supplies on the ship in Fukuoka and then on the return trip the soldiers.
Not the Japanese.
The ship in Fukuoka will deliver the supplies and return empty. Why ? Because it is designated to the Navy and does not transport army stuff.
The ship in Shanghai will deliver the soldiers and if there is nothing for the army to load, return empty.
If the ship in Shangai is not needed it will wait in port instead of transporting resources for example.
Their ineficency is mindblowing.Stuff like that happened on anything, double research, double production double everything.
Another favorite of mine is that the Army was informed about Midway around one year later. Navy wanted to preserve face........

When searching for something i briefly looked at logs of merchant ships at the combined fleet site. Yes, the amount of shuffling around is impressive...

How does that relate to the amount of ships available, though? And how about my final question in the post previous to yours?

 

[Graf Zeppelin]

Yes I read alot about the pacific war, far more interesting for me then every other place in ww2. I cant name you a specific source on the merchant marine thing.
What I said is mostly and evaluation and reflection of the data I ingested from uhm everything.
If the Japanese had a shortage of ships the situation was made severe due to their ineficient approach.

 

[Ming]

See it worked that way. Assume we have two merchant ships, one in Shanghai and one in Fukuoka. Now we have some supplies for the Navy base in Shangai that need to get shiped there from Fukuoka and some soldiers in Shangai which return home.
Anyone with their right mind would have loaded the supplies on the ship in Fukuoka and then on the return trip the soldiers.
Not the Japanese.
The ship in Fukuoka will deliver the supplies and return empty. Why ? Because it is designated to the Navy and does not transport army stuff.
The ship in Shanghai will deliver the soldiers and if there is nothing for the army to load, return empty.
If the ship in Shangai is not needed it will wait in port instead of transporting resources for example.
Their ineficency is mindblowing.Stuff like that happened on anything, double research, double production double everything.
Another favorite of mine is that the Army was informed about Midway around one year later. Navy wanted to preserve face........

This can't be stressed enough. It occured all over the pacific too. Fuel drums in makassar needing to be shipped back to Kure? The army transport that just dropped off the soldiers to guard the refinery is going back to Japan empty handed. A naval transport will have to be dispatched later. . . and it won't carry the relief soldiers, food, or mail for the army that's already deployed either. (That will all get its own army transport dispatched later.)

It basically boiled down to expending twice as much shipping as was required, when you've already got a shortfall.

 

[unmerged(2833)]

With all due respect, we did, in detail, from a variety of angles.

There were only four fast battlecruisers in the Imperial Fleet capable of being assigned as escorts to the Striking Force, and they were armed for speed and stealth, not a bombardment role. If you bring heavier battleships, you slow the fleet waaaay down and increase the risk for detection.

Secondly, Pearl Harbor is one part of a multi-prong offensive whose true objective was to capture the Phillipines and the Malay penninsula fortress of Singapore. Strip the heavy battleships and their escorts from the primary objectives and you water down your true ojective.

Third and most importantly: it is totally impractical to bombard with the battlecruisers; in addition to the wide-awake coastal defenses and army artillery waiting for just such an event, if arcing fire from the Japanese guns could hit Pearl then the battleships in Pearl could fire back and hit the Japanese battlecruisers, and the Japanese carriers sailing alongside them.

CAN NOT BE DONE and still strike the true objectives. Does that answer your question?

No, most of what is written in this thread is not about the issues i mentioned in OP. You post is another example, i did not ask about what would be the effect on the other operations, i was not asking about that. You might think it is important in the general picture, and i agree it is, but it is nevertheless completely irrelevant to my question.

BCs 30 knots, the BBs i mentioned above 27knots. And i made a mistake, the time required to sail from the strike force location to Oahu is 7 hours, not 10, at 27.

There are no coastal defenses on the south west coast of Oahu. From my arguably limited understanding of naval gunnery, firing from harbour is decisive disadvantage (btw, the ships in the harbour were not in a shape allowing for firing back in first place). The CVs would be outside the range, of course, either in the original place or simply 20 kms more to the west.

Btw, about the other operations part, even if it is not relevant, the Kongo and Haruna were part of the force that was screening the Malaya invasions. Guess what happens if IJN takes huge risk and they are not here - PoW and Repulse still get sunk by LBA. The other two BBs i proposed are a bit strange, they seem to be part of the Pearl operation, but they idled around home islands, apparently, in the december.

What 'dudes' are you talking about? Stop speculating and understand that Japan still operated on the Samurai code of Bushido. Supply, logistics, merchant marine, sub-hunting: these were not 'Warrior-pursuits'. Maximum effort was put into preparing the Imperial Fleet for the Final Engagement as describe by Alfred Mahon, proven by Tsushima and Jutland in the last war; our massed fleet vs. your massed fleet to the death. Period.

The dude that was Senpaku Uneikai director at that time. Arguably not a samurai

 

[unmerged(2833)]

Yes I read alot about the pacific war, far more interesting for me then every other place in ww2. I cant name you a specific source on the merchant marine thing.
What I said is mostly and evaluation and reflection of the data I ingested from uhm everything.
If the Japanese had a shortage of ships the situation was made severe due to their ineficient approach.

Thanks. I expected this, its quite normal imo , i asked because you might have had remembered some specific book or numbers about this issue.

 

[Graf Zeppelin]

Thanks. I expected this, its quite normal imo , i asked because you might have had remembered some specific book or numbers about this issue.

Numbers ? Me ? Since I discovered that actually no 1000 bomber raid had exactly 1000 bombers I am totally lost

 

[gagenater]

When searching for something i briefly looked at logs of merchant ships at the combined fleet site. Yes, the amount of shuffling around is impressive...

How does that relate to the amount of ships available, though? And how about my final question in the post previous to yours?

It relates to the number of ships available directly. If you figure that you need 100 ships to perform some task, and you have 25 ships, then you know it will take 4 trips. Unless you were the Japanese in WWII. They organized their ships so poorly than instead of having 25 ships make 4 trips they had 16 ships make 6 trips while 9 crews were on shore leave. This meant that conventional methods of calculating what the Japanese could do with the ships available to them aren't terribly useful.

 

[gagenater]

SNIP

BCs 30 knots, the BBs i mentioned above 27knots. And i made a mistake, the time required to sail from the strike force location to Oahu is 7 hours, not 10, at 27.

There are no coastal defenses on the south west coast of Oahu. From my arguably limited understanding of naval gunnery, firing from harbour is decisive disadvantage (btw, the ships in the harbour were not in a shape allowing for firing back in first place). The CVs would be outside the range, of course, either in the original place or simply 20 kms more to the west.

Nobody is answering your original question for two reasons: There's no way to know - a major 'battleship bombardment raid' on an enemy naval base has never been tried in the era since the end of sailing ships, so it's hard to say how successful it would be. Secondly there is no way in he (double hockey sticks) the IJN would be dumb enough to put their BB's that close to a major enemy installation. You say 'of course the Pearl Harbor fleet can't hit back' but they had no way of knowing that. It took hours and in some cases days before the ships hit hard at Pearl Harbor finished sinking or immediate salvage operations were given up on. By the time the battleship bombardment is ready to start the Japanese have no way of being able to figure out if it's 'safe' or not for them to try and pull off such a risky maneuver. The U.S. had B-17's operating as long range scouts around Hawaii. No threat to an armada of carrier borne fighter bombers, but very deadly for a few battleships. The Japanese knew this.

Also you are grossly underestimating how quickly the surviving ships of the USN responded after the attack. It took less than 3 hours (in some cases less than an hour) before squadrons of destroyers and other undamaged (or lightly damaged) ships were underway and out at sea. In fact this is the reason the mini submarine portion of the surprise attack failed so miserably - they were a couple of hours off on their timing in coordinating with the air attack. By the time they arrived close to shore swarms of destroyers rammed, depth charged and forced them to ground literally as soon as they showed up. There is no reason to believe that the USN would inexplicably respond more slowly to a surface threat - indeed they would probably respond even faster because they are easier to spot.

There is no disadvantage for firing naval guns at port. Of course you are easier to hit since you aren't moving much, but your shooting will be as good as at sea - maybe better since you aren't moving.

Btw, about the other operations part, even if it is not relevant, the Kongo and Haruna were part of the force that was screening the Malaya invasions. Guess what happens if IJN takes huge risk and they are not here - PoW and Repulse still get sunk by LBA. The other two BBs i proposed are a bit strange, they seem to be part of the Pearl operation, but they idled around home islands, apparently, in the december. SNIP

The Japanese were not foolish enough to plan a massive invasion assuming that when the British battleships sortied that they would all efficiently be sunk in short order by naval air forces. They didn't have a crystal ball that told them this would take place. And unless I miss my guess those battleships were probably engaged in shore bombardment and other duties that were critical to the success of the invasion.

 

[Andre Bolkonsky]

No, most of what is written in this thread is not about the issues i mentioned in OP. You post is another example, i did not ask about what would be the effect on the other operations, i was not asking about that. You might think it is important in the general picture, and i agree it is, but it is nevertheless completely irrelevant to my question.

What are you, about 16, 18 years old and beginning to learn all you can about WWII? I applaud your desire for knowledge. The issue as I see it is you want to put everything in a silo and deal with it on an individual basis, and you can't do that. Everything affects everything.

A general rule of scholarship states if you aren't getting the answer you want to the question you have asked; don't criticize the individuals who take time out of their day to answer your question, revisit the manner in which the questions are asked. Politely rephrase the question, and specify exactly what you want addressed. it is the polite way to do it, and will get you much further in future research projects. Trust me, i speak from first hand experience.

Take this suggestion for what it is worth. Good luck, I wish you the best.

 

[Andre Bolkonsky]

Yes I read alot about the pacific war, far more interesting for me then every other place in ww2.

Gage, you may find this interesting as well

I read a lot as well over the years, and have written more academic papers for classes than I can remember. Probably because my Dad was drafted out of college and journeyed with the Army Air Corps as a radio operator. He started in Australia and journeyed with the army's island hopping campaigning up through the Phillipines and ended up the war in Korea of all places. I studied WWII in general, and the Pacific in particular, because he didn't want to talk about it. (But I still find the maniac in Germany seducing a noble people into an evil crusade far more interesting; probably because it is the less personal of the two conflicts. Or possibly because I see much honor in the people that was lacking in the Leader and his black-clad cabal of occult murderers.)

Speaking of which, did I ever told you this story about dinner at the Ranneft's. If not, I think you'll find this rather fascinating.

My wife is a teacher who at the time of this story ran the foreign language department at an Episcopalian High School in Houston. Under her was a Latin teacher who taught at three separate church schools, all part time because the demand for Latin, not surprisingly, wasn't too high.

My wife and the Latin teacher, D. Ranneft, became friends. She invited us over for dinner a few times, and I met her father. Her father, now deceased, was a Dutchman named Johan Ranneft; his daughter and grandson lived with him. Super nice fellow. As we talked, WWII came up, as it does when I'm having a drink with a European who would have been alive during the war. I found out he spent the war on the Canberra as a crewman. After a few cocktails, he told me about his father, Captain Johan Ranneft, Dutch Naval Attache to ONI prior to America's entrance into the war. Ranneft, whom I had never heard of before but have run into many times since, is rather famous.

One of the pieces of evidence that the US knew far more than it admits about the Japanese plans were disclosed by John Toland. Toland states a 'Dutch Official' told him of an ONI message detecting the presence of Japanese Carriers 270 miles southeast of Dutch Harbor at around 1:00 in the morning on December 6th. The Dutch official excitedly tried to inform someone since ONI was actively disinterested in sharing that intel at the time. Toland has since denied the source was Ranneft. But, according to Ranneft's son, who told me he was in the hospital room as Toland interviewed his father, Ranneft explicitly told Toland this bit of information in tremendous detail on what was essentially his deathbed. ONI knew the carriers were inbound for Pearl, and they did not want this information disclosed to anyone, at any time. Ranneft damages his own reputation with ONI trying to alert people outside the agency.

The anger and the passion in the son's voice told me a great deal, and the anger was at Toland for not revealing his father as the source. I was unaware of the details of this story at the time but listened intently as he was passionate about telling me, and like all historical puzzles that strike my mind I have studied the matter rather carefully since then. Ever since, it is rather impossible for me to believe the US did not know Japan's intentions, though I understand the government's steadfast need to maintain a veil of plausible deniability over the whole matter.

Thought you, and Gage, might like to hear this story. On my word of honor, word for word every bit of it is true.

 

[Graf Zeppelin]

Thought you, and Gage, might like to hear this story. On my word of honor, word for word every bit of it is true.

Absolutely, thank you This the US knew something stuff is very intriguing. I lean somewhat to the they knew nothing side but mostly out of sceptism. Very interesting post you made there.

 

[gagenater]

Interesting indeed. It leaves a lot of unanswered questions though? Who decided not to send the info along? What was their reasoning? Or was the data sent along but not believed? There are a LOT of unanswered things about how the U.S. got into WWII and this is certainly one of them.

 

[unmerged(2833)]

Nobody is answering your original question for two reasons: There's no way to know - a major 'battleship bombardment raid' on an enemy naval base has never been tried in the era since the end of sailing ships, so it's hard to say how successful it would be.

Yeah, its a terribly specific question, thats true. More about naval gunnery and accuracy and prospective damage to Pearl facilities than anything. (on a interesting note, US BBs shelled factories in Japan in july 1945. Apparently the damage to factory by 14inch shell is less than of 1000pound bomb.)

Though i do not completely agree with that there are no examples at all, Mers-el-Kebir is rather famous if not completely comparable instance, and for coastal guns-battleship duels we have, for example, the instance when Kirk answered Bradley request to shell Cherbourg.

The Japanese were not foolish enough to plan a massive invasion assuming that when the British battleships sortied that they would all efficiently be sunk in short order by naval air forces. They didn't have a crystal ball that told them this would take place. And unless I miss my guess those battleships were probably engaged in shore bombardment and other duties that were critical to the success of the invasion.

Yeah, i know. I am more surprised that the two BBs just mulled around home islands, while the less armoured BCs were supposed to take on British battleships.

Though Khota Baru landing didnt involve resistance from Allied troops, so i would guess their duties was to shield the ships from British interdiction.

You say 'of course the Pearl Harbor fleet can't hit back' but they had no way of knowing that. It took hours and in some cases days before the ships hit hard at Pearl Harbor finished sinking or immediate salvage operations were given up on. By the time the battleship bombardment is ready to start the Japanese have no way of being able to figure out if it's 'safe' or not for them to try and pull off such a risky maneuver. The U.S. had B-17's operating as long range scouts around Hawaii. No threat to an armada of carrier borne fighter bombers, but very deadly for a few battleships. The Japanese knew this.

Also you are grossly underestimating how quickly the surviving ships of the USN responded after the attack. It took less than 3 hours (in some cases less than an hour) before squadrons of destroyers and other undamaged (or lightly damaged) ships were underway and out at sea. In fact this is the reason the mini submarine portion of the surprise attack failed so miserably - they were a couple of hours off on their timing in coordinating with the air attack. By the time they arrived close to shore swarms of destroyers rammed, depth charged and forced them to ground literally as soon as they showed up. There is no reason to believe that the USN would inexplicably respond more slowly to a surface threat - indeed they would probably respond even faster because they are easier to spot.

There is no disadvantage for firing naval guns at port. Of course you are easier to hit since you aren't moving much, but your shooting will be as good as at sea - maybe better since you aren't moving.

Actually, i think they knew they hit PH hard, that was part of the reasoning for Nagumo withdrawal. B-17 are not very dangerous for ships, they have trouble hitting a city much less even a huge ship, and neither is two dozen destroyers for a proper fleet. Hm, the Japanese for all their talk of decisive battle were terribly cautios bordering on avoiding it altogether.

There is a problem with shooting back in this situation (well, apart from the fact that US BBs were mostly burning and sinking at that point), it would require aerial spotting because of the terrain, something that would be hard with Japanese control of the air. Or shore observers, but that takes time to set up. In any case, i think it is a problem based on my understanding of French situation in Mers-el-Kebir, i dont know why it would be harder.

What are you, about 16, 18 years old and beginning to learn all you can about WWII? I applaud your desire for knowledge. The issue as I see it is you want to put everything in a silo and deal with it on an individual basis, and you can't do that. Everything affects everything.

A general rule of scholarship states if you aren't getting the answer you want to the question you have asked; don't criticize the individuals who take time out of their day to answer your question, revisit the manner in which the questions are asked. Politely rephrase the question, and specify exactly what you want addressed. it is the polite way to do it, and will get you much further in future research projects. Trust me, i speak from first hand experience.

Take this suggestion for what it is worth. Good luck, I wish you the best.

Oh yes, tell me more about your concept of politeness, it should be interesting Also, yes, i am 16 years old and i registered on this forum when i was 3 years old.

 

[gagenater]

Yeah, its a terribly specific question, thats true. More about naval gunnery and accuracy and prospective damage to Pearl facilities than anything. (on a interesting note, US BBs shelled factories in Japan in july 1945. Apparently the damage to factory by 14inch shell is less than of 1000pound bomb.)

Factories aren't armored - you want burst radius for that. Battleship shells are wonderful against hardened/armored targets but not so useful against unarmored ones because they don't carry much explosive for their weight. Even High Explosive large ship shells don't have the sort of burst radius that bombs do.

Though i do not completely agree with that there are no examples at all, Mers-el-Kebir is rather famous if not completely comparable instance, and for coastal guns-battleship duels we have, for example, the instance when Kirk answered Bradley request to shell Cherbourg.

Those aren't comparable at all. Those are examples of a vastly superior fleet engaging a few ships in a temporary harbor, and a fleet engaging a shore installation.

Yeah, i know. I am more surprised that the two BBs just mulled around home islands, while the less armoured BCs were supposed to take on British battleships.

You are vastly discounting the need for speed in modern warfare - WWII style. Anything less than 30 knots speed was a 2nd line unit regardless of what sort of firepower or protection it might have. Also the Japanese 'Battlecruisers' had been extensively reconstructed with better armor and internal protection between WWI and WWII and were regarded by both the allies and the Japanese as their best battleships bar the Yamato's.

SNIP

Actually, i think they knew they hit PH hard, that was part of the reasoning for Nagumo withdrawal. B-17 are not very dangerous for ships, they have trouble hitting a city much less even a huge ship, and neither is two dozen destroyers for a proper fleet. Hm, the Japanese for all their talk of decisive battle were terribly cautios bordering on avoiding it altogether.

We know NOW that B-17's aren't very good at hitting ships. At the time it was thought that they would be quite useful at that sort of task by all parties (US, Japan and others) and they took it seriously. The Japanese didn't have hindsight.

As for a few dozen destroyers not being a proper fleet - no it's not. But again - to stress the point over and over - the Japanese didn't have any way of knowing exactly what had survived the carrier strike and what hadn't. They knew they had done very well and didn't want to press their luck. The Japanese were seeking to win without any decisive battle at all. If there was going to be one though, it was going to be a decisive battle they could win and they were seeking it AFTER they had conquered all of SE asia, which they were doing literally simultaneously with the Pearl Harbor attack. They didn't have their entire fleet at Pearl Harbor - most of it was spread out involved in the invasions of the Phillipines, the Dutch East Indies, and Malaysia. Ideally the 'decisive battle' would be when the U.S. battle fleet sallied forth into areas under firm Japanese control, and the Japanese fleet could concentrate. This would allow their fleet the advantages of better speed and range (from having better access to fuel supplies) land based air support and other things like short ranged submarines and destroyers that couldn't be at Pearl Harbor.

There is a problem with shooting back in this situation (well, apart from the fact that US BBs were mostly burning and sinking at that point), it would require aerial spotting because of the terrain, something that would be hard with Japanese control of the air. Or shore observers, but that takes time to set up. In any case, i think it is a problem based on my understanding of French situation in Mers-el-Kebir, i dont know why it would be harder.

SNIP

Again, to beat you over the head with it - the Japanese did NOT know for sure that all the U.S. battleships were out of commission and wouldn't for some time. And how on earth would they do aerial spotting? All it would take would be for two or three U.S. fighters to have escaped the destruction of their airfields to shoot down all the battleship spotting planes. Unless the Japanese carrier fleet sticks around to provide air support, but then if they were going to do that, why bother with the battleships at all? Why not just launch a 3rd wave of air attacks?

 

[Graf Zeppelin]

Gagenater is spot on here Papa Darth