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  1. AH Challenge: Different Navy Composition

    There is still a place for the battleship. The problem is that the WW II versions are now 60+ years old with all the problems that brings AND are manpower intensive while building new ones is too expensive for anyone but the USN. The USN would MUCH rather have an additional carrier deck than a...
  2. Mistakes during WWII

    I remarked on the Eagle Squadron & Flying Tigers as an example of why the RAF would never run out of TRAINERS. The American RAF volunteers were never more than a morale booster as far as combat strength.
  3. Japan vs. Russia: Round 3

    While the OIL embargo did not begin until after June, the U.S. had already begun to strangle the Japanese economy with embargos on Iron & Steel by the summer of '41. FDR was hesitant to cut off the oil tap as he believed (quite correctly) that it would mean war. There was no question, on either...
  4. Japan vs. Russia: Round 3

    The USSR forces get knocked back about 15 miles in the Far East before getting the feet under them and crushing the Kwantung Army like bugs. Deception, with some early gains, followed by masses of light infantry charging tanks and heavy artillery and being annihilated in number worthy of the...
  5. Nagumo surprised during his IO raid

    Coral Sea would have become a mini-Midway if the IJN had concentrated their carriers there. The Americans hit the Shoho with two full decks resulting in 13 bomb hits and 7 torpedo strikes (they sank her a lot). HAd she been in company with Carrier Division 5, the Americans would have found both...
  6. What if the Japanese won Midway?

    This is a textbook example of the weakness of computer games in modeling real world conditions. Since Dean already quoted Combined Fleet.com (a wonderful site, BTW), he spared me from listing all the reasons that Hawaii was effectively impossible to hold, even if, by some miracle (and it would...
  7. Mistakes during WWII

    Breathtakingly unlikely. Enigma II? In 1945 the Germans didn't believe that the Allies had penetrated the original system. The addition of an additional rotor to the original machine, done after the Germans believed that the older system might have been exposed effectively DID create a new...
  8. Nagumo surprised during his IO raid

    The Japanese DID change a number of proceedures after the Indian Ocean near disaster; these were not enough (as evidenced by both Coral Sea & Midway) to avert surprises. The Japanese needed radar, something they lacked at the time (there had been some speculation that Akagi we equipped with...
  9. Nagumo surprised during his IO raid

    A single 1000lb bomb SANK the AKAGI. While some sources indicate a second bomb it the far aft of the Akagi's flight deck, recent scholarship leans toward a single hit, from Lt. Best's SBD. dealing the killing blow. A single bomb, if it hit the right (wrong?) part of the ship, was capable of...
  10. What if the Japanese won Midway?

    As we've discussed before, the IJN was obsessed, from cadet to command, with the doctrine of Decisive Battle. The strike at Midway, and to a lesser extent, the Aleutians, was designed to bring the USN into this battle and destroy it. The actual capture of the islands (as noted already in the...
  11. What if the Japanese won Midway?

    1) Interestingly, the IJN didn't suffer that great a loss of trained aircrews at Midway (planes, were a different matter, those were shot to pieces, with many being chucked over the side upon return to the carriers). The big attritor of IJN pilot resources was the Solomons bloodbath where the...
  12. N/A

    Sure they do. The Red Army of June 1941 bore little resemblance to the 1944 version, in skill, mobility and equipment. It would have walked into the Heer, supported by aircraft that made Finnish pilots aces while flying Brewster Buffalos:eek: It's easy to kill invaders who lack rifles...
  13. What if the Japanese won Midway?

    Not really. By the time the IJN had finished it's attack Midway & against the U.S. Task Groups they were down to roughly a dozen servicable aircraft. They hadn't lost anywhere near that number of planes, but most of those that returned were shot to pieces. The IJN had no fire support doctrine...
  14. WI the Americans won the Battle of Kasserine Pass?

    In the greater scheme of things? No difference at all. At some point the Americans were going to be manhandled by the far more experieced Heer, that was a given. As far as the war itself, however, the end result is unchanged. The Reich lost the war on the Russian steppes, with the Western...
  15. West Takes Tougher Stand at Yalta

    A few points - Because a following regime is a legitimate successor does not make those who fled them property of the successor state. If this was the case then refugees from any state would be subject to return to, in many cases, their deaths or life long mistreatment at the whim of the new...
  16. West Takes Tougher Stand at Yalta

    Very slanted view of the realities of a complex situation. You had, among others, the Cossak army, who more or less fought both the Heer & Red Army with equal vigor. They were handed over by the British and the NKVD stated executing the commanders before the troops they had led were even in the...
  17. A small world war two?

    If it's just a regional war, wouldn't that sort of eliminate that whole "World War" moniker?:confused: What made WW I & WW II "world wars" was that they occurred all over the world (yes, I know it's obvious, but..) A 1939 war as you describe would be the "European War", or the "Hitler War"...
  18. Eisenhower a Communist?

    I'll second that nomination! :D Although the initial poster has several other lulu's floating about that may deserve consideration.
  19. "World War III"

    It is an interesting idea, unfortunately, it simply wouldn't hold together, for a couple of reasons. There isn't an terrorist or mass of terrorists (hell damned few nation states) that could survive an ALL OUT effort by the United States military, as it currently exists, for six months & the...
  20. Other nations operating supercarriers

    You ever notice that it's always the two of us that take these kinds of naval warfare questions and turn them in "angels on the head of a pin" exchanges?:D
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