AHC: Japan goes to war with Britain and not America in 1940

[Wesley_Lewt]

Inspired by other WW2 threads.

This is what British planners described as their 'nightmare scenario'

My Suggestion was to have Hitler die during the fall of France, Goering take the reigns and mediate de-escalation of the Japanese-Soviet border, freeing up Japanese troops and reassuring the Soviets re German intentions. Maybe also making full Japanese posession of Indochina part of the peace with France in exchange for a secret agreement to join the war in a specified number of months.

But please ignore the above.

The Japanese had twitchy trigger fingers and a never-back-down mentality. Maybe there is a way to do this that doesn't require German diplomatic competence or anything different on the part of the Germans. What 'incidents' could there have been between Britain and Japan? Where the IJA or IJN start shooting and civilian politicians have to follow because... if they don't they get assassinated.

Government by assassination

Government by assassination has been used to describe the political situation in Japan in the 1930s. Most notably, it refers to the death of Inukai Tsuyoshi in the May 15 Incident of 1932, as well as the February 26 Incident of 1936, in which Saitō Makoto and Takahashi Korekiyo were killed. The...

military-history.fandom.com

A challenge with whatever and however many POD(s) you like.


Edit: here is a slightly modified clarifying reply I made down thread:

We are talking about 1940, not 1941. Before significant resources have been allocated to preparing Barbarossa. Earlier the better.

Second, I am not imagining that the Japanese Government or Senior Officers plan this. Oh no. We are talking about this happening in a manner similar to how Japan got into most of its wars with China. Junior officers acting on their own initiative and the top brass refusing to back down because... thats the type they were.

Also I am not interested in this as a 'here is how things could have gone better for Japan' rather on how this would affect Britain and events in Europe. I know Japan would fight America eventually and lose because America had like 10 times the economy they did.

 

[Wesley_Lewt]

@CalBear you are the WW2 specialist, right?

 

[Alanith]

Someone would have taken a shot at something flying the Stars and Stripes or landed a division in the PI to “demonstrate the cowardice of our leadership!” Or some insanity, and japan would have found itself at war anyways. This is only to be expected when you let your low ranking military officers get away with dictating foreign policy instead of making such an example of them that no one else is willing to pay the consequences.

 

[Gillan1220]

The Americans would try to reinforce the Philippines. Any Japanese movements in Malaya and Singapore is going to alarm the War Department.

 

[Admiral Bloonbeard]

The Japanese won’t do well, they lack the shipping in 1940 to invade any Western colonies. Perhaps the British keeps the T class submarines in the Pacific to use against Japan.

 

[The Tai-Pan]

There are any numbers of ways to get the UK and Imperial Japan at war, (it would be way harder to NOT have them fight) but the USA is going to be dragged in eventually. The region is just too important to Americas and the British too obvious of allies.

 

[DougM]

Eventually the US and Japan are going to start shooting at each other. My uncle was in the Navy when WW2 started and was in Austrailia when Japan attacked. So the US was running around in the area before the shooting stated so it will be hard to not get a war going but still be shooting at Australian and British units.

 

[TDM]

EDITrev2 I completely missed we're talking about moving the Japanese timetable up a year!


I may be misreading the title but Japan did go to war with Britain in Dec1940? (EDIT no Dec1941 not Dec1940!)

Do you mean specifically not going to war with the USA but everyone else?

The problem is the Japanese don't just attack the US at Pearl Harbour. They also attack the US in the Philippines a day later as well (and Midway). If they don't secure the Philippines or at the very least negate the chance of air attacks from the Philippines their other moves in the area are at risk.

Basically it's really hard for the Japanese not to attack the US while doing everything else they do in Dec41. It's even more unlikely for the US to do nothing even if they are not directly attacked since Japan is basically invading most of SEAsia under US noses, especially after the last year of US/Japaneses relationship

 

[Sargon]

I may be misreading the title but Japan did go to war with Britain in Dec1940?

Do you mean specifically not going to war with the USA but everyone else?

The problem is the Japanese don't just attack the US at Pearl Harbour. They also attack the US in the Philippines a day later as well (and Midway). If they don't secure the Philippines (or at the very least negate the chance of air attacks from the Philippines) their other moves in teh area are at risk.

Basically it's really hard for the Japanese not to attack teh US while doing everything else they do in Dec40. It's even more unlikely for the US to do nothing even if they are not directly attacked since Japan is basically invading most of SEAsia under US noses, especially after the last year of US/Japaneses relationship

It was December in 1941 rather than 1940 that the UK and Japan were at war with each other.

Your points are reasonable to think about though. Having various lines exposed and vulnerable to the US is probably a situation which can't last for Japan. Sooner or later the US will be fighting the Japanese.

One question is whether without the outrage Pearl Harbor caused should that not happen, if there's the possibility of a negotiated peace later on due to the grinding nature of the conflict.

The British will be reinforcing using the Main Fleet to Singapore strategy, especially if they are very freed up in Europe.


Sargon

 

[TDM]

It was December in 1941 rather than 1940 that the UK and Japan were at war with each other.

Your points are reasonable to think about though. Having various lines exposed and vulnerable to the US is probably a situation which can't last for Japan. Sooner or later the US will be fighting the Japanese.

One question is whether without the outrage Pearl Harbor caused if that doesn't happen, if there's the possibility of a negotiated peace later on due to the grinding nature of the conflict.

The British will be reinforcing using the Main Fleet to Singapore strategy, especially if they are very freed up in Europe.


Sargon

Whoops yes Dec41!

 

[Aphrodite]

Can they do any worse than they did our time?

Strike at the British and Dutch while hoping the Americans stay neutral is a vast improvement over Pearl Harbor and the abomb on your head.

Maybe you get lucky, maybe not. The worse that will happen is what happens

 

[David T]

In another forum, I once posed this as follows:

"December 1941: Japan attacks Thailand and the British and Dutch colonies in southeast Asia but leaves Pearl Harbor and the Philippines alone, gambling that without an attack on US territory, FDR, whatever he may have promised Halifax, can't get Congressional support for US military action. "

I just have a hard time seeing the Japanese leaders thinking this way. Coming from a country where the parliament was impotent--and seeing how Congress had, though sometimes reluctantly, gone along with FDR's "short of war" measures--I just don't see them gambling on Congress standing in the way of FDR going to war under such circumstances. Assuming that an attack on the British and Dutch colonies, etc., would probably bring the US into the war anyway, they felt they had to do everything in their power to (at least temporarily) cripple US military power in the Pacific, even though this made war with the US not merely probable but absolutely certain.

 

[Post]

I maybe wrong, but I think the Japanese didn't have the Zero yet in december 1940, but their carriers operated the Claude. Which probably puts the British more on par.
Also the Zuikaku and Shokaku weren't available yet, they were commisioned in 1941. I think august and september.

So the Japanese probably don't do as well as in 1941, and then there's a big risk that somewhere along the line they provoke a casus belli and give the US an excuse to join the war.

 

[CalBear]

@CalBear you are the WW2 specialist, right?

THE specialist? Not really. More than a couple folks here are at least at, if not ahead, of my knowledge level. I am, however a well read and fairly focused hobbyist.

As to the question, and it is one that comes up fairly often, the Japanese had no real choice in the matter thanks to geographic and economic realities with a strong dollop of misunderstanding how the U.S. political system worked.

Assuming we are actually talking about 1941, not 1940, which was well before things came to a head -

Second issue first - The Japanese assumed that FDR could do literally anything he wanted, regardless of any opposition. This was, largely, because that was how Japan worked. The PM and his Cabinet were the first, last, and only word regarding policy, with the Emperor largely acting as a rubber stqmp for whatever course they chose (this was tradition, not actual law, and extended back for at least 700 years, if not longer). This led them to believe that the U.S. would go to war as soon as FDR who they believed was (erroneously) simply itching to go to war with Japan. This meant, in their minds, that the U.S. would jump in the instant the Empire made a move for the Southern Resource Area. This being the case the need to take the U.S. off the table at the outset of hostilities was obvious.

Now to the primary reasons - The U.S. was a MASSIVE threat to the Japanese plans, it is an axiom of military planning that one MUST honor a threat while planning an operation. That was what the Japanese did. Japan had a goal to to create an unbreakable defensive perimeter to protect their new resources. American bases made that a complete impossibility. Wake provided a perfect basing location to interdict/attack the Marshall Islands portion of the South Seas Mandate. Guam was literally 120 miles (i.e. inside fighter range) from Saipan, the absolute Jewel of the South Seas Mandate, and was perfectly place to serve as the third leg of the flight path from the West Coast (SF > Oahu > Guam > Clark Field) to Luzon. The Philippines were in the ideal location to interdict any ocean traffic from the Southern Resource Area any moment the U.S. chose to do so. Luzon also provides an ideal location to conduct bombing attacks on Japanese bases on Formosa (Taiwan), while bases on Mindinao can strike The Paulas chain as well as Northern Borneo. That is about a serious a threat to any sort of military operational plan as once can create.

The capper was, as has been discussed here frequently, the truly stunning building program that the U.S. had undertaken following the passage of the "Two Oceans Naval Act". That building program, which was the source of the majority of the USN that dominated the World's oceans by early 1944 put an absolute hard cap on Japan's opportunities, something that was reaching an absolute peak in early December of 1941 when Zuikaku was commissioned. Every day after that, the balance of forces moved unstoppably against Japan (the USS Hornet was almost ready to join the Pacific Fleet, between April of 1941 and August of 1942 the U.S. commissioned SIX fast battleships, all of the North Carolina and South Dakota classes, with plans in hand to build 10 more by 1944; Japan manage to commission two new battleships between 1935 and September of 1945, to give just a couple of examples). Japan had to strike when it did or it would lose any chance to secure the Southern Resource Area forever.

In the end the Japanese faced a math problem with no good solution, but one that grew worse almost by the day (Literally. Grumman held the grand opening of its brand new plant to build the Avenger on December 7th, 1941)

 

[Myth]

"Eventually" may be a convenient amount of time. Delaying US entry allows more breathing room than not delaying US entry.

 

[CalBear]

I maybe wrong, but I think the Japanese didn't have the Zero yet in december 1940, but their carriers operated the Claude. Which probably puts the British more on par.
Also the Zuikaku and Shokaku weren't available yet, they were commisioned in 1941. I think august and september.

So the Japanese probably don't do as well as in 1941, and then there's a big risk that somewhere along the line they provoke a casus belli and give the US an excuse to join the war.

Correct. The Gladiator would have been a strong opponent to A5M.

 

[Deleted member 2186]

Wait if Japan attacks Britain, then they also would go after the Netherlands, if they do that they will have to bypass the American hold Philippines which is not a wise thing to do.

 

[The Tai-Pan]

Every day after that, the balance of forces moved unstoppably against Japan (the USS Hornet was almost ready to join the Pacific Fleet, between April of 1941 and August of 1942 the U.S. commissioned SIX fast battleships, all of the North Carolina and South Dakota classes, with plans in hand to build 10 more by 1944; Japan manage to commission two new battleships between 1935 and September of 1945, to give just a couple of examples).

'For imagining war he has let loose war, believing that he has no time to waste; for he that strikes the first blow, if he strikes it hard enough, may need to strike no more.'

 

[Post]

For those who want to visualise @CalBear 's comment about Japan's math problem this is a nice video:

Basically the US goes poppoppoppoppoppoppoppoppoppoppoppoppoppoppoppop when Japan goes pop. Especially with escorts carriers, destroyers and destroyer escorts it's not even funny anymore by already the end of 1943 (if you're Japanese) and the US probably could have won if they had only produced those.

 

[Carl Schwamberger]

I maybe wrong, but I think the Japanese didn't have the Zero yet in december 1940, but their carriers operated the Claude. Which probably puts the British more on par.
Also the Zuikaku and Shokaku weren't available yet, they were commisioned in 1941. I think august and september.

So the Japanese probably don't do as well as in 1941, and then there's a big risk that somewhere along the line they provoke a casus belli and give the US an excuse to join the war.

Correct. Also as Cal Bear states they were short two carriers from the 1941 count. Neither had their admirals caught on to the combination of several carriers into a single group. As with the US and Britain doctrine was for the carriers to be parceled out to the Battleship groups. No one was practicing in any fashion two or more carriers operating as a tightly synchronized single tactical entity. The Brits attempted it for the attack on Taranto late 1940, but were thwarted by mechanical problems & the legacy doctrine.