Operation Otsu, 1941

Apparently, Japan had war plans for the Soviet Union.

I wass just wondering. Waht if they invaded with Germany at the same time?
 
Such a decision would have to be made several years beforehand. IOTL in 1941 the Japanese were not up to the task of invading the Soviet invasion. Most of their tanks were inferior to their Soviet counterparts as the battle for lake Khasan and the Nomonhan Incident had proven. If they really wanted to they could do it. They should start tech exchange with Germany to get a decent panzer design. They should also build trucks and a fleet of transport planes. They will need those as supply is difficult in Siberia. The area, at the time, lacked roads and railroads except for the Trans-Siberian railroad. In this case I could see the Soviet Union going down since reinforcements from the east won't come. Moscow might fall.

If it's on a whim, they're screwed since their logistical capabilities weren't that great. In an area like Siberia that'll kill you. It just so big and has a bad infrastructure. And even T-28s. T-26s and BT-7s managed to beat the Japanese at Nomonhan. Imagine what T-34s, T-34/85s and KV-1s can do. In the event of a surprise attack they won't get much further than Vladivostok which will only fall after a lenghty and costly siege which will make the siege of Sebastopol look like a walk in the park. After that the Japanese can only try to keep on to what they took before they grinded to a halt thanks to the Soviets and the unfavourable terrain and weather.
 

LittleSpeer

Monthly Donor
yes they would take the important cities in eastern Russia and the Germans might have taken more land and just maybe Moscow but the fact still remains. By this point Hitler has already fucked himself over and will lose anyway. The USSR will most likely take all of Korea and some of China so no Korean war in 1950. This would affect post war more then the war.
 
What if any raw materials would Japan get from a relatively successful attack on the USSR. As I understand it Japan was desperately short of lots of stuff because of the US sanctions.

This still forces Japan to either accept US terms (stop its outragous behaviour in China) or go to war.

If a Soviet front is added to the rest of Japan's actions in a context when there is still Pearl Harbor overextended will be the understatement of the Milenium.
 

The Sandman

Banned
More realistic would be an attempt to grab the rest of Sakhalin and see if they can get away with it while the Soviets are preoccupied. That, they might be able to do without getting torn to shreds by superior Soviet equipment and manpower.

Although I'm honestly rather surprised they didn't do that during the RCW.
 
More realistic would be an attempt to grab the rest of Sakhalin and see if they can get away with it while the Soviets are preoccupied. That, they might be able to do without getting torn to shreds by superior Soviet equipment and manpower.

Although I'm honestly rather surprised they didn't do that during the RCW.

Don't worry, they did. The West just forced Japan to give it all back.

And the Soviets MIGHT tolerate the loss of Sakhalin with hasty negotiations if the Germans are driving on Moscow. They would probably be willing to throw out more if Germany has grabbed Moscow due to Japan tying up all kinds of forces in the East.

Either case would be a boon to Japan, which can probably get Sakhalin oil to support its war machine, at least partially and possibly last long enough to wait out the allied Embargo.
 

The Sandman

Banned
Don't worry, they did. The West just forced Japan to give it all back.

And the Soviets MIGHT tolerate the loss of Sakhalin with hasty negotiations if the Germans are driving on Moscow. They would probably be willing to throw out more if Germany has grabbed Moscow due to Japan tying up all kinds of forces in the East.

Either case would be a boon to Japan, which can probably get Sakhalin oil to support its war machine, at least partially and possibly last long enough to wait out the allied Embargo.

Here's an idea: the Japanese move the army to the border not so much for an actual invasion as to provide a stick to use in negotiating the Non-Aggression Treaty with the Soviets. In TTL, let's say that Sorge gets caught before he can tell the Russians that they have nothing to fear from Japan, and the Japanese squeeze North Sakhalin out of Stalin in exchange for the Non-Aggression Treaty.

If the Japanese can somehow manage to keep all of Sakhalin and the Kurils post-war, does that change anything important?
 
That's huge, Sakhalin was exporting millions of tons of oil even back then.

It raises questions of there not being a Pearl Harbor.

Certainly, it eases Japan's pressure on making a hasty move towards war, even if all this does is gives it another year to make arrangments.

WW2 as we know it gets butterflied, though its hard to say how. Suffice it to say bombing the Sakhalin Oil Fields is going to be critical to the Allied War Effort if Japan decides to attack Pearl Harbor (which they probably will not do on schedule, and might pass on entirely)
 

The Sandman

Banned
That's huge, Sakhalin was exporting millions of tons of oil even back then.

It raises questions of there not being a Pearl Harbor.

Certainly, it eases Japan's pressure on making a hasty move towards war, even if all this does is gives it another year to make arrangments.

WW2 as we know it gets butterflied, though its hard to say how. Suffice it to say bombing the Sakhalin Oil Fields is going to be critical to the Allied War Effort if Japan decides to attack Pearl Harbor (which they probably will not do on schedule, and might pass on entirely)

I suppose one possibility, though admittedly remote, is that the Japanese wait for the Americans to finally get pulled into the European war (which I think is likely to happen, given Hitler's brilliance for finding ways to make his strategic situation worse) and then make a grab for the DEI under the pretext that they're protecting it for the Dutch government-in-exile, which obviously no longer has the capacity to adequately control the area after the loss of their homeland to the Germans. They would carefully be avoiding the British and American possessions, though, gambling on the idea that the Americans wouldn't be willing to start a war with Japan over European colonial possessions while they were already fighting another war.

They of course might have guessed totally wrong on this, but frankly Japanese foreign policy from about 1930 on seems to have been based mainly on opportunism. And with the added breathing room from Sakhalin, trying to grab the DEI would be more in line with taking Indochina from the Vichy French than with the OTL desperate "we need these resources within 6 months to a year or our economy collapses" offensive.
 
Here's an idea: the Japanese move the army to the border not so much for an actual invasion as to provide a stick to use in negotiating the Non-Aggression Treaty with the Soviets. In TTL, let's say that Sorge gets caught before he can tell the Russians that they have nothing to fear from Japan, and the Japanese squeeze North Sakhalin out of Stalin in exchange for the Non-Aggression Treaty.

Is this in 1941? I mean, Richard Sorge's info could come in a bit earlier ITTL (with the Japanese struggling in Khalkin Gol and China) - especially if Stalin had a lucky moment and concluded that the Germans were going to attack him sometime soon (which is not all that unlikely), and asked Sorge if he was going to be attacked from the back.

In 1940, Japanese-Soviet relations weren't at their highest, and the Soviets put a lot of troops on 'garrison duty' anyway.
 
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