With USN subs around? A tanker full of gasoline and another full of aviation fuel going up before going down will certainly negatively affect the fuel supply available to the occupation forces. Remember Oscar and Charlie doing their windsurfing trip around Oahu? They came across a convoy just before it was attacked by a sub, and one of the ships hit was likely a tanker, though Turtledove describes it as a Maru (wartime slang for freighter), and one was a freighter.
Days of Infamy: Invasion, Occupation, and Liberation of Hawaii (1941-1943)
- Thread starter Alterwright
- Start date
Really? I can imagine the IJA did that out of spite because how much they hated their IJN rivals. Still Genda had to bike when his fleet were annihilated and fuel were prepared for the counter-invasion.
I’m trying to remember if rickshaws were used in the books.
Deleted member 2186
Having the two books on my kindle i made a search, they are mentioned two times, thus i think they might still be in use even if fuel is rationed.
I agree it would be very likely as they were widely use in Asia and Japan during the war and it wouldn’t be any different in Hawaii.
What are some aspects of the occupation of Hawaii that weren't expanded on in the books, but you would have liked to see more of or explained more.
Talking about Hawaii specifically.
Talking about Hawaii specifically.
Compared to Oahu, control of the other islands by the Japanese was likely to be much looser. Some of the other islands, other than the Big Island, would have a brigade or a regiment as the garrison-and very spread out. The Big Island of Hawaii would have a division-and it, too, would be very spread out. It's the one island that one could wage a guerilla war, and get away with it.
I'm guess at around this time, the other hawaiian island were very sparsely populated with only a few inhabitants on them. So its makes sense that only a light garrison would be needed to keep an eye on a small population.
What about the concern over American "holdouts" on these islands? That's another question for me. Surely there would be at least some kind of scattered yet determined underground cells on these islands if possible.
There certainly would be: especially on the Big Island. Plenty of room (and one can live off the land if need be) there for guerillas or OSS teams to hide.
I'm unsure about the intensity of the resistance and the level of organization of it though. Enough to keep the Japanese busy and worried I'd hope.
It might not be much, but it'd be enough to keep the occupiers busy, and the island is plenty big enough that a sub could easily find many a spot to land supplies, retrieve personnel, and drop off either OSS or Marine Raiders to inflict some mayhem on the enemy.
Deleted member 2186
Turtledove, Harry. End of the Beginning (Pearl Harbor) (p. 101).
From what Les had heard, the Japs had four or five divisions in Hawaii. Defenders needed fewer men than invaders.
Turtledove has his characters write off that possibility, on the basis that the Hawaiian jungle couldn’t sustain them well. Aside from feral hogs, pineapple, and sugar cane, there wasn’t much in the way of food to scrounge—they’d probably starve before the first rice harvest comes in.
On Oahu and the other islands other than the Big Island, certainly. On Hawaii proper, that's a different matter. Lots of room, there's plenty of jungle, and the island is too big for the Japanese to control with the limited garrison they likely have. Oahu's the more important one.
Conversely, how many US troops were actually stationed on the Big Island? If there’s no US garrison, there won’t be any guerilla operation. The Japanese forces would be more concerned with squeezing the locals for rice to load onto sailboats to Honolulu than with suppressing holdouts. A few second-string troops flashing bayonets should suffice for that.
There were some: Army and Navy (there was an AAF satellite field at Hilo), and some Navy personnel. They will likely head to the hills before the occupation force arrives.
I was under the impression the other islands did not get garrisoned much if at all. At one point there was a massive raid by B-17s and B-24s on Pearl Harbor and they went on to land at an airfield on one of the other islands the US had managed to build in secret. Somebody commented that how the US managed to build an airfield under the noses of the Japanese was something people would write books about after the war.
Deleted member 2186
Yep it was on Kauai those American bombers landed, but i do wonder if they have the range to fly from the West Coast all the way to Hawaii, even if it is a one way trip for them.
With lightened bomb loads and auxiliary fuel tanks they can probably stretch although some probably don't make it. San Francisco to Honolulu to Kauai is a 2500 mile trip.
Deleted member 2186
Is that a Kongo-class ore am I wrong.Japanese warships in Pearl Harbor are attacked by US carrier aircraft prior to the American invasion to re-take Oahu:
