Alternate Defense of Guam 1941

Mid July 1942 The United States was now going to send a convoy to Luzon The Convoy would The XXXth Corp containing 3 Infantry divisions and the XXXI Corp containing the 5th Armored Division, Americal Division and the 1st Cavalry division. Lt General George S Patton was commanding. Guarding this convoy were the battleships: USS Nevada, USS Pennsylvania, USS Maryland and USS West Virginia. Three CVLs, 5 CVE, 3 CAs, 3 CLAAs, 3 CL 18 DD , 24 DE plus APA AKs LSTS etc.
 
General Patton's arrival changed the balance on the island of Luzon. The US now heavily outnumbered the Japanese and had control of the skies. By the Middle of August 1942 the Americans had regained Manila and had also retaken Clark Field. Patton was requesting another 3 US divisions. The US and Philippine forces were being rearmed and equipped.
 
August 1942 the Battle for Luzon continued to be a slow going battle.. General Patton now believed that it wouldn't be until the Spring of 1943 that the island would be secure and probably wouldn't be until the end of the year before the Japanese were out of the island chain.

Admiral Kimmel ordered the invasion of the Solomon Islands. It would be a USMC operation. Meanwhile USAAF and RAAF aircraft were busy bombing the island of Rabul and destroying every Japanese ship that they found in the Waters.

Admiral Nimitz had the Navy, Marines and Army forces clearing the way to Guam.
 
US Marines landed in September on Guadalcanal making another major thrust by the allies to drive the Japanese away from Australia.
Meanwhile the battle for the Philippines was heating up. General Patton's Sixth Army now had grown to 9 divisions. Supplies were now flowing into the Islands. General MacArthur had requested that the Presiedent allow him to return to the Philippines to help in its liberation. General Marshal was not in favor of it pointing out that MacArthur was a pain in the .... Still President Roosevelt thought that it might be a good idea.
 
The change here seems to be that holding Guam, Mindanao and a large part of the Dutch East Indies has enabled the U.S. to send adequate supplies and more troops to Luzon. It would be nice if you could supply some details on the logistics of this, and also on how convoys to the Philippines would be able to fend off Japanese air power on Luzon and the threat of still existing Japanese aircraft carriers.

Also, you say U.S. subs were delivering supplies to Bataan and then going hunting for Japanese ships. How are they able to deliver significant supplies while still having adequate torpedoes for their supplemental mission?

I have often wondered if subs could have been used effectively in a non stop shuttle of supplies to Bataan--how much could they have delivered by prioritizing the most important supplies (food, ammo, mortar shells). At the time of Pearl Harbor the U.S. had 73 subs in the Pacific, 38 elsewhere and 73 under construction. Say you had 50 subs doing nothing else during the siege....how much in the way of supplies could they have delivered? How much longer could the U.S. forces have held out? And as they held out, how many of the subs under construction or those from other theaters could have been brought into the shuttle service?

Also, could a system have been devised by some genius to pack the maximum number of supplies into a sub (including into the torpedo tubes)? Could the number of sailors have been cut back since the subs would not be on hunter-killer missions, so as to provide more space for supplies? Say Bataan holds out until early May and by this time the U.S. shuttle service includes 90 subs, each carrying one-third more supplies than the subs in OTL that visited Bataan?
 
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I have often wondered if subs could have been used effectively in a non stop shuttle of supplies to Bataan--how much could they have delivered by prioritizing the most important supplies (food, ammo, mortars?). Say you had 40 submarines doing nothing else during the siege....how much longer could the U.S. forces have held out?

I've wondered the same thing...bringing supplies in, taking people out...empty the stern torpedo room, put Nautilis, Argonaut, and Narwhal on full time duty making runs from Mindiniao to Battan...
 
One of the major differences between this time line and OTL was the fact that in this time line just about all of the supplies that were in Manila were transported to Bataan, That meant that the US forces in Bataan had far more supplies -ie food, medicine and munitions than they did in OTL> At the beginning of the war US Submarines had the problem with torpedoes. The result was that some of the submarines that had been stationed in the Philippines were only carrying 4 torpedoes leaving more room for supplies. The Department of the Navy was also recalling that Imperial Germany had twice had Merchant Submarines visit the US during the war before the US entered it. A decision was made to use at least 5 submarines as transport submarines. This would allow critic supplies to come in and allow the evacuation of wounded and nonessential personnel.
 
Japan was in serious trouble. As the year 1942 was drawn to a close the balance of power was shifting more and more toward the US. The Major Japanese base on Rabul was being pounded by the US and Australian Air Forces. The US had been advancing up the Solomon Islands. The Imperial Japanese Navy was taking a pounding from the US Navy and the US Submarine fleet was starting to sink Japanese shipping faster than it could be replaced.
 
The Americans had slowly been retaking the Philippines. Clark Field was once again in US hands. Leyte had also been retaken and things were looking up. 1943 could well see the allies push the japanese out of the islands that they had taken as well as the WWI trust.

General Stillwell was in command of a US-Chinese force that was aiding the British in opening the Burma Road and liberationg Burma.. There were 12 US equipped Nationalist Chinese Divisions and to that had been added 2 US Army RCT (Regimential Combat Teams). Stillwell had been requesting more forces and General Marshal had agreed to send another RCT and that was to be followed by theXVII Corp of Four divisons, one of which as the 11th Airborne Division.
 
Japan was finding pressure being exerted on a lot of fronts. British- Commonwealth forces had pushed the Japanese away from Singapore and were trying to push them out of Malaya. In Burma General Stillwell combined US-Chinese forces had cleared a route through Burma allowing the Construction of a new Burma Road. It would probably take most of 1943 to complete. British General Slim was also battling his way into Burma. He knew that he would not be receiving British troops from Europe as the war had been going on there.
 
The United States now had forces that were fighting in the Pacific taking islands back from Japan. This included the Marshall Islands, Gilbert Islands. Solomon and the Philippines. On the Asian Mainland General Stillwell commanded an American Army that consisted of 4 divisions plus 2 Regimental Combat Teams.
The Commander in Chief of the Imperial Japanese Navy stated quite clearly that the war appeared to be lost. The Navy would continue to resist but it was only a matter of time before the industrial might of the US crushed Japan.
 
Japan now decided to see if it might be possible to seek an end of the war. It sought help from the Swiss and the Germans in ending the war. The death of Hitler in 1941 in a plane explosion had not managed to end the war, But it had kept Germany from declaring War of the US and making other stupid decisions. It wasn't until 1942 that the German Military government had ousted the last traces of the Nazis. The war continued as both sides sought a peace that would benefit them. Thus Germany had little barging power and little will to pull Japan's chips out of the fire.
Every day the Tojo Government got news of another set back . There
were recommendations to pull out of Malaya and Borneo and the Celebes so as to save manpower for the final struggle. US Submarines had sunk another carrier as well as more supply ships.
 
The British and US Government were informed by the Swiss government that Japan was seeking prospects for the possibility of a peace agreement between Japan and the nations it was at was with.
Japan was offering that upon a cease fire it would remove all of its troops from Burma, Malaya, Netherlands East Indies, Philippines. It would also pull all forces out of Indochina and all of Australia's trust territories..
The US was demanding more including evacuation from all of the trust territories and a withdrawal from the Republic of China.
 
General Stillwell American Army was joined by two Chinese Armies in launching an all out offensive to drive the Japanese out of Burma. The Japanese had withdraw to northern Malaya Troops had been evacuated from the Celebes. It was clear that the Japanese were trying to conserve resources.
Admiral Nimitz was having the US Marines clear more of the Marianas
Islands of Japanese forces. This had meant that pressure on Guam was now relieved. Construction on Guam was now going all out so that the new long ranged bombers could be based there. In addition construction was underway to allow the US Navy to base more submarine to the island thus increasing pressure on Japan.
 
The US Navy had supported the capturing of additional islands in the Marianas Island group. The US thus by 1944 had changed the situation so much that the Guam base was becoming the US forward base for the fleet.
 
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