Japan invades Hawaii

CalBear

Moderator
Donor
Monthly Donor
:)
I started to write a rebuttal to this thread. Then I read this link and realized that this says it better than I ever could.


Guys Read The Link!

Short answer, No f'ckn way.

Thanks.

Saved me from posting the link AGAIN.
 
I'd think they could only do it if they had planned to do it years before, and started building up the necessary fleet and transports, and then didn't invade China so as to have the men available... frankly, it'd be a full resource application to that one goal. But then, if they did do that, they wouldn't be able to make a grab for the resources of SE Asia that they wanted so badly, and would run out of oil....
 
'Double back'? So Japan is going to take shipping that it does not have to move troops from the war-starting, cassus belli campaign against the Philippines, go well past its range, invade Hawaii, and then get up and go back to the Philippines, giving up the element of surprise and ignoring the entire reason of going to war in the first place, which was to nullify the Philippines?

Japan's plans focused so much on the Philippines that they wouldn't occupy the East Indies until they took care of the Philippines.

The US did lose the bulk of the Pacific Fleet on Day One. We call it... Pearl Harbor. :rolleyes:

To be honest dean I can't be arsed discussing it with you. You can take it as read though that I don't think you are as clever as you think you are.
 

Hashasheen

Banned
To be honest Dean I can't be arsed discussing it with you. You can take it as read though that I don't think you are as clever as you think you are.
Really? On a discussion forum, you can't be bothered discussing ideas? do you see the problem in that Shimbo? :rolleyes:

No lets take a look at what you said:

The only real possibility is if they invade right at the start of hostilities and and as there are not enough troops and logistics to invade Hawaii in addition to the other attacks, another major attack has to be canceled.
So they're not going to attack locations with needed supplies, but try to futily hold on to a distant outpost where they get raped as soon as possible?

What if the troops that in OTL attacked the Philippines attack Hawaii and then double back to attack the Philippines? That might be possible, but it's going to make the invasion of the Philippines much tougher.
Why invade Hawaii in the first place though? the logistics alone kills the attempt, and the Phillipines are more important to the Japanese.

Of course, the industrial disparity between the USA and Japan will inevitably tell eventually but irretrievably losing the bulk of the Pacific Fleet on Day One will be a heavy blow to the USA.
Two Words: Pearl Harbor.

From what I can see, Dean did nothing wrong or say anything wrong. he could have phrased it better, but you decided to get petulant and that lost you any arguing credibility.:cool:
 
Japan was economically and logistically at the end of her rope already.

Attempting an invasion of Hawaii in December of 1941 guarantees either a Japanese disaster by cancelling an entire series of vital operations at vulnerable targets(Philipines, Malaysia, Singapore, etc) which will be much less vulnerable given time to prepare or, in the worst case, a Japanese catastrophe as an entire series of operations on a shoe string are defeated.
 
So they're not going to attack locations with needed supplies, but try to futily hold on to a distant outpost where they get raped as soon as possible?

Why invade Hawaii in the first place though? the logistics alone kills the attempt, and the Phillipines are more important to the Japanese.

I think his point is that if the Japanese for some crazy reason obsessed with taking Hawaii at all costs this is the only way it could maybe work. The why isn't important as far as his point was just what was the best way if pulling it off if they wanted to at all costs. Even than it has problems as the US is probably going to notice what is going on sooner or later.
 

Hashasheen

Banned
I think his point is that if the Japanese for some crazy reason obsessed with taking Hawaii at all costs this is the only way it could maybe work. The why isn't important as far as his point was just what was the best way if pulling it off if they wanted to at all costs. Even than it has problems as the US is probably going to notice what is going on sooner or later.
True, I'm simply so used to Crazy Japanese things to be perverse and not military related.
 
If the Japanese had intended to takeover Hawaii they probably could have done it. Afterall, the US was supposedly taken by surprise. There are rumours that some higher ups in the US knew about an impeding attack but lets not go into that.

However, the Japanese would have probably met fierce oposition in some areas.

Attacking Hawaii could have given the Japanese time. The US would have been too busy trying to get the Hawaiian islands back that they would forget about Australia leaving Australia vulnerable to an attack.

Japanese would also probably have needed more troops and ships in order to attack the Philippines if they had sent a large force to Hawaii. Japanese had Taiwan to the North of the Philippines and Palau to the East to attack from.

And what someone said above is true. The Japanese economy was suffering because of the long war in China. Attacking China was a mistake.

In the end the US would have taken Hawaii back but after a large invasion.
In the end the Japanese would be routed but they probably would have taken part of Australia and more of the South pacific since the US was busy with liberating Hawaii.

And a person from the Philippines is a Filipino. :D
 
To be honest dean I can't be arsed discussing it with you. You can take it as read though that I don't think you are as clever as you think you are.
:confused:
What are you talking about? You made an incredibly absurd suggestion: that Japan is going to ignore all the reasons that they're going to war with the US in the first place (resources and the Philipines), are ignorring the minor inconvenient facts of, say, just how the Japanese are supposed to carry the men that far, and then you suggested that, immediately after going through the (impossible) trouble of doing it, that they would head right back.

That's not me being clever. That's you running headfirst into a concrete wall called reality.

I think his point is that if the Japanese for some crazy reason obsessed with taking Hawaii at all costs this is the only way it could maybe work. The why isn't important as far as his point was just what was the best way if pulling it off if they wanted to at all costs. Even than it has problems as the US is probably going to notice what is going on sooner or later.
But the Japanese navy didn't have any reason to have a crazy obsession with Hawaii. Japanese naval doctrine since the turn of the century had been that the US-Japanese naval showdown would be near Japan, after Japan harassed the American fleet during the draw-up. The Japanese knew, even they knew, that they couldn't keep Midway in supply once they seized it: Hawaii is even farther, and many times larger.

Why would Japan seize Hawaii?

A) It does not further their entrenched naval doctrine for a decisive battle in the Western Pacific.
B) It does not prevent the US from sailing beyond Hawaii. The US Navy can still sail through the South Pacific, by the other numerous US islands.
C) It is not a guaranteed destruction of the Pacific Fleet, which in worst case can sail from Hawaii back to the mainland intact.
D) Hawaii can not be supplied.
E) Hawaii can not be kept.
F) Throwing the men and shipping at Hawaii means diverting distinctly finite resources from the vital actions of the Philippines, the East Indies, and the British Pacific strongholds.
G) Even if the Navy won the impossible and convinced the Army to pony up more men, managed to sail to Hawaii, and attack, there's no guarantee they even could invade and beat the American garrison.

Raiding Hawaii serves only the goal of temporarily weakening the US navy. Conquering Hawaii does only the same thing, but at extreme costs.

Attacking Hawaii could have given the Japanese time. The US would have been too busy trying to get the Hawaiian islands back that they would forget about Australia leaving Australia vulnerable to an attack.
Australia was never in danger of a serious invasion for the same reason Hawaii wasn't: it's too far. More importantly, Australia is too big, and the defenders would have the interior lines of movement and communication.
 
:confused:
What are you talking about? You made an incredibly absurd suggestion: Why would Japan seize Hawaii?

A) It does not further their entrenched naval doctrine for a decisive battle in the Western Pacific.
B) It does not prevent the US from sailing beyond Hawaii. The US Navy can still sail through the South Pacific, by the other numerous US islands.
C) It is not a guaranteed destruction of the Pacific Fleet, which in worst case can sail from Hawaii back to the mainland intact.
D) Hawaii can not be supplied.
E) Hawaii can not be kept.
F) Throwing the men and shipping at Hawaii means diverting distinctly finite resources from the vital actions of the Philippines, the East Indies, and the British Pacific strongholds.
G) Even if the Navy won the impossible and convinced the Army to pony up more men, managed to sail to Hawaii, and attack, there's no guarantee they even could invade and beat the American garrison.

Raiding Hawaii serves only the goal of temporarily weakening the US navy. Conquering Hawaii does only the same thing, but at extreme costs.

Agreed, but that isn't the arguement. Take the "Japan wants Hawaii at all costs" as granted. The arguement isn't SHOULD Japan take Hawaii but how best they could pull it off if they wanted to. It would take years and it would still be damn hard to pull off.
 
Agreed, but that isn't the arguement. Take the "Japan wants Hawaii at all costs" as granted. The arguement isn't SHOULD Japan take Hawaii but how best they could pull it off if they wanted to. It would take years and it would still be damn hard to pull off.
The question of if Japan could take Hawaii has already been addressed: they couldn't, even if they did want to. That's a fact. All the reasons they would want to take Hawaii come from why they would want Hawaii in the first place: to deter the American navy from distrubing trade routes from a southern Pacific empire. Which is why the Philippines, British garrisons, and Dutch East Indies were more important. Which is why Hawaii is effectively undermined.
 
Metro, it would have destroyed Japan sooner.

An invasion combined with the strike at Pearl Harbor requires that they either abandon most of their other planned attacks for several months or launch an entire series of attacks even weaker than OTL and the attacks on Singapore and the Philipines both nearly came to grief as it is.

Give the British another month to prepare and Japan will be more concerned about Singapore as a bloody wound in their empire and 50,000 dead soldiers in southern Malaysia. Give the Americans another WEEK to pull supplies into Bataan and Japan is going to be wasting months longer on that siege.

And every battle reduces Japan's merchant marine. Instead of Australia it may be the Coral Sea and Guadalcanal which never sees Japanese forces.


Also this upsets the entire Japanese plan. The astounding fact about the IJN in the first several months was that they won an entire series of battles which required limited forces to literally stampede all over the map from one location to another. A landing in Hawaii ties down Nagumo's strike force for a month or longer so which Japanese victories are now erased and which invasions(Singapore? Philipines? Dutch East Indies?) were cancelled because the ships were around Hawaii and many of them never came home?

From Japan's perspective a major naval or bombing force in Singapore or the Philipines(or both!) right in the middle of their sphere is far worse than distant Hawaii.
 

Hashasheen

Banned
And what someone said above is true. The Japanese economy was suffering because of the long war in China. Attacking China was a mistake.
Not really, continuing the war after they took Manchuria was what was a mistake. They had basically decapitated the Chinese Industry, and got themselves all the land they needed. Had they stayed on a Defensive platform in Manchuria, things might have gone better on the Chinese front.
 
I don't think that an invasion of Hawaii would have been feasible, mainly for logistics reasons.
On the other hand, shelling Pearl Harbor is a completely different story...
:)
 
Having seen this discussion several times now ------
I think this is slightly less probable , that that un mentionable Sea Mammal.
 
Top