AH Challenge: IJN instead of IJA

Clearly, the IJA wielded more political authority in Imperial Japan post-Meiji restoration. Your challenge is to reverse that so that the IJN has a much greater voice when it comes to strategy. POD can be at any time. Manchuko should not be occupied and China should not be invaded as the IJN was vehemently opposed to both.
 
Clearly? They fought like cat's and dogs and pursued their own agendas, but I've never heard that it was the IJA per say that was the dominant power. More like a combination of militarists.
 
Clearly? They fought like cat's and dogs and pursued their own agendas, but I've never heard that it was the IJA per say that was the dominant power. More like a combination of militarists.

I probably wasn't clear enough: The IJA and IJN did not operate in a joint fashion, but from my analysis, I think the IJA got its way due to its invasion of China and occupation of Manchuko, both actions were (correctly) opposed by the IJN, mainly due to the amount of manpower that was committed for little to no resource gain. I'm looking for clear cut IJN supremacy here.
 

CalBear

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Well, the IJA wanted to use the Northern Strategy in 1940/41 (e.g. attack North into the Soviet Union) while the IJN advocated for the Southern Strategy (Thrust to the South, take Malaya, the East Indies, Philippines, after a disabling blow against the U.S. fleet). Which strategy prevailed?

The IJA was against the naval budget increase of 1935-37 (when the IJN wanted to get funding for expanding shipyards, construction of 4 60,000 ton battleships, two fleet carriers, and a number of aircraft and small surface combatants) arguing that the money would better be spent on equipment for use in China. Were the battleships of the Yamato Class battleships and the Shokaku Class carriers built?

The original war in China wasn't even a direct policy of the Japanese government or IJA supreme command. It was started by the commanders of the Kwantung army who presented it to the government as a fiat accompli.
 
Which strategy prevailed? Neither. What happened was that neither the IJA or IJN got what they wanted. The war in China ground to a halt and the IJN didn't get all the ships or sea lift capability that it wanted.

And yes, what you said about the Kwantung Army is correct. I still get this distinct feeling that the Japanese should have focused more on their navy. Sure they would have lost to America, but pissing away all that manpower and all those resources in China didn't really help them any.
 

CalBear

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Which strategy prevailed? Neither. What happened was that neither the IJA or IJN got what they wanted. The war in China ground to a halt and the IJN didn't get all the ships or sea lift capability that it wanted.

And yes, what you said about the Kwantung Army is correct. I still get this distinct feeling that the Japanese should have focused more on their navy. Sure they would have lost to America, but pissing away all that manpower and all those resources in China didn't really help them any.

The IJN didn't get everything it wanted, but that was more a function of the industrial capacity of Japan than the willingness of the Diet to spend money. In 1936/7 (might be '37/38, I don't have the reference at hand) the Diet approved just under a Billion yen for Naval construction, including 4 Yamatos, the Shokakus, etc. with an even greater amount funded later to build a class of "super Yamato" 20" guns ships. The IJN believed that, by 1943, it would have 11 18" and above BBs to face 16 new 16" gun USN BBs. Unfortunately for the IJN, Japanese yards just couldn't turn out ships that fast (Yamato took 5 years, Musashi took four and the other ships were never completed as BBs, one was never even laid down).

Japanese strategy was, unquestionable a disaster, with the IJN in almost as much danger from the IJA as from the U.S.
 
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So do you think there would have been any way for the IJA and IJN to not endanger each other like they did OTL? And yes, Japanese industry wasn't up to making all those ships in that short a period of time, but could that have changed with the factories not producing goods for the war in China?
 
So do you think there would have been any way for the IJA and IJN to not endanger each other like they did OTL? And yes, Japanese industry wasn't up to making all those ships in that short a period of time, but could that have changed with the factories not producing goods for the war in China?
It's not factories that produce the ships, it's the ports. The hard part is making, joining, and completing the superstructure. The minor factory-things (tables, gears, radar) are the easy part.
 

CalBear

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It's not factories that produce the ships, it's the ports. The hard part is making, joining, and completing the superstructure. The minor factory-things (tables, gears, radar) are the easy part.

Absolutely. Japan had two yards that could build the Yamatos, and that was after a huge amount was spent to increase their size.They would have needed to push out a ship every 18 months or so. That was beyond their industrial capacity. Both Yamatos took four+ years to build.

As a comparative: The U.S. was able to launch a ship every 2 -2.5 years per slipway, and had three naval shipyards capable of building multiple BBs on separate slipways in the late 30's (New York (Brooklyn), Norfolk and Philadelphia); this gave the USN 10-12 times the building capacity, just for battleships, of the IJN. When smaller warships (including carriers) are included, which could be built in parallel with BBs in these same yards, as well as in many other shipyards on both coasts the ratio grows even worse.
 
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