alternatehistory.com

Island Hopping was a military strategy employed by the Allies in the Pacific against Japan during World War Two. The idea was to bypass heavily fortified Japanese positions and instead concentrate the limited Allied resources on strategically important islands that were not well defended but capable of supporting the drive to the main islands of Japan. The main reason why this was able to work later in the war was because of Allied naval dominance.

The Japanese however, had naval dominance in the early stages of the war. In otl, the Japanese pretty much just advanced in a regular fashion, starting in Japan and China and slowly expanding in each direction, not skipping over any territory in the process. I would make the argument that this strategy slowed them down and prevented them from capturing certain islands and strategic points such as Port Moresby, Midway, Guadalcanal, and other locations.

What if instead of this, the Japanese adopt the Island Hopping strategy, skip the Dutch East Indies and the Philippines and focus on securing the objectives furthest away first (Solomon Islands, New Guinea, Midway, Malaysia, Burma, etc). After securing these objectives, then the Japanese can invade the Dutch East Indies and Philippines. This option would INITIALLY free up almost two hundred thousand Japanese soldiers (according to Wikipedia) as well as countless ships and airplanes. Obviously the Japanese would need to keep some ships and planes in the rear to deal with the Philippines and DEI garrisons but I'd assume that they wouldn't cause that much trouble to the Japanese war effort (I could be wrong).

Is this idea bat shit crazy (alien bat shit more specifically) or is it possible this would help the Japanese tremendously. Please note, I am fully aware the Japanese really couldn't win in the long run, I am just curious if this strategy could have helped prolong the war.
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