Panama canal is blocked

[Hammerbolt]

Hi folks

This is not so much a "What if", but a request for information. I started thinking about this after reading a new article on the I-400 (LOS magazine #25), and the 2nd plan for them, which was to block the Panama Canal by blowing up gates.

I'm not here to debate the feasibility of the plan, but it's efects. I also know that the I-400-based plan would be be implementable before 1945, so I think it's too late for any substantial efects. But what if something did happen (sabotage, kamikaze with a charter plane, meteor, whatever) that destroyed the Gatun locks in 1944 or even 1943, puting the Canal out for severall months? I have no idea on how high was the percentage of naval construction based in the west of the US, so I do not know what the overall efect on deployments and resuply would be, for the Pacific operations.

Now that the US would have to sail around the Horn or the Cape (fun things to do in winter...), and considering the need to refuel along the way would probably require building/improving facilities somewhere in South America and/or Africa, how long would this delay the end of the war? A year? More?

 

[Hrvatskiwi]

Hi folks

This is not so much a "What if", but a request for information. I started thinking about this after reading a new article on the I-400 (LOS magazine #25), and the 2nd plan for them, which was to block the Panama Canal by blowing up gates.

I'm not here to debate the feasibility of the plan, but it's efects. I also know that the I-400-based plan would be be implementable before 1945, so I think it's too late for any substantial efects. But what if something did happen (sabotage, kamikaze with a charter plane, meteor, whatever) that destroyed the Gatun locks in 1944 or even 1943, puting the Canal out for severall months? I have no idea on how high was the percentage of naval construction based in the west of the US, so I do not know what the overall efect on deployments and resuply would be, for the Pacific operations.

Now that the US would have to sail around the Horn or the Cape (fun things to do in winter...), and considering the need to refuel along the way would probably require building/improving facilities somewhere in South America and/or Africa, how long would this delay the end of the war? A year? More?

I'm no expert on it, but I'm pretty sure that the vast majority of naval construction was on the East Coast, at the Norfolk shipyards and the like. The West Coast cities were relatively small at this time, which basically consisted solely of San Francisco and Los Angeles, both of which were much smaller than today. They were pretty lacking as far as heavy industry, AFAIK.

 

[shiftygiant]

Ships now have to go around Cape Horn until the Canal is opened, which puts them at risk of attack in the South Atlantic. Ports of call along the South American East Coast will suddenly be getting a lot more revenue, and there will be a greater investment into West Coast heavy industries. The Pacific War will see a delay until the Canal is opened again (a few months or so), and there will be more paranoia over Japanese attacks in the Americas.

 

[BlueTrousers]

Crazy notion of the day: they could go eastabout and use the existing RN string of bases in Africa and the Indian Ocean. The Cape of Good Hope is significantly further north than Cape Horn, and convoys had been going that way since 1940.

Of course, you'd need to retake Singapore and push east through the East Indies, rather than start in the Solomons and work West....

 

[Hammerbolt]

Crazy notion of the day: they could go eastabout and use the existing RN string of bases in Africa and the Indian Ocean. The Cape of Good Hope is significantly further north than Cape Horn, and convoys had been going that way since 1940.

But would those bases be able to handle such a hugh extra influx of ships and men?...

Of course, you'd need to retake Singapore and push east through the East Indies, rather than start in the Solomons and work West....

OoOoo... now there's a notion... that would flip everything...

 

[BlueTrousers]

But would those bases be able to handle such a hugh extra influx of ships and men?...

Pour in the kind of resources that the US used in the Pacific, and they could be made to handle the extra ships and men. Mostly they'd just be bunkering stations, so the demands would be minimal. Massive expansion of facilities at Trincomalee and Gan, though.

 

[docfl]

By then underway replenishment is perfected, if not it is quickly. Mare Island and Pugent sound both had large naval facility's.

 

[NHBL]

Repair vs rebuild

The Pacific Coast could, apparently, repair anything that came their way-even USS West Virginia. The delays come from new construction being a few months later, and worse, the sheer number of extra ships to carry cargo from the east coast to the Pacific.

 

[wietze]

falklands naval base?

 

[riggerrob]

With more USN ships passing Cape Horn, would the USA shift it's focus to liberating the Indian Ocean islands (e.g. Indonesia) first and the mid-Pacific islands last?

 

[TFSmith121]

The Canal was too far from the Axis and too well-defended

This is not so much a "What if", but a request for information. I started thinking about this after reading a new article on the I-400 (LOS magazine #25), and the 2nd plan for them, which was to block the Panama Canal by blowing up gates.

I'm not here to debate the feasibility of the plan, but it's efects. I also know that the I-400-based plan would be be implementable before 1945, so I think it's too late for any substantial efects. But what if something did happen (sabotage, kamikaze with a charter plane, meteor, whatever) that destroyed the Gatun locks in 1944 or even 1943, puting the Canal out for severall months? I have no idea on how high was the percentage of naval construction based in the west of the US, so I do not know what the overall efect on deployments and resuply would be, for the Pacific operations. Now that the US would have to sail around the Horn or the Cape (fun things to do in winter...), and considering the need to refuel along the way would probably require building/improving facilities somewhere in South America and/or Africa, how long would this delay the end of the war? A year? More?

The Canal was too far from the Axis and too well-defended; although not invulnerable, it was pretty close to it.

The US had very sucessful procedures to avoid accidents as well, and there were signficant amounts of equipment and material stockpiled in the CZ for repairs.

Beyond all that, even if the Canal was closed for some period of time to shipping, the Panama railroad existed, and there were substantial commercial ports on both coasts of the CZ; so at worst, cargo has to be transhipped. This is also the era of break-bulk cargo, so it's not going to cause huge problems.

POL was shipped overland in the US, or simply produced and refined in California, so that's not an issue; as far as shipping contruction goes, the Puget Sound and Mare Island navy yards, and the vertically integrated shipbuilding industries in California, Oregon, and Washington were capable of not just rebuilding ships, but actually building battleships, cruisers, destroyers, auxiliaries, etc. from the keel up.

The US had basing rights in Brazil, Uruguay, and Peru by 1942, and even as a belligerent could make port calls in Argentina and Chile for limited periods. The USN had been making steam transits around the Horn since the 1840s, after all.

So the bottom line is there really isn't any significant impact.

Best.

 

[zert]

Interesting possibilities. Granted that the attack succeeds somehow, I only see this delaying things a few months at best. It may lead to harsher punishment towards Japan at the end and after.

 

[Riain]

It would be an inconvenience more than anything else, only for shipping that HAS to go from the east and carribean coasts. Once those ships have redeployed to the west carga and the like can simply be shipped from west coast ports. The only real problem would be bigger windows of vulnerability for strategically importtant ships like BBs and CVs that might need to transit from Atlantic to Pacific. But given such redeployments would take weeks anyway I doubt adding another fortnight or whatever to steam around the horn would have been too much of a problem.

 

[Zheng He]

One of the more interesting butterflies of a successful attack of this sort would be the diversion of resources to defending the canal and other crucial targets. How much would be wasted on such efforts?

 

[MorningDew]

Hi folks

This is not so much a "What if", but a request for information. I started thinking about this after reading a new article on the I-400 (LOS magazine #25), and the 2nd plan for them, which was to block the Panama Canal by blowing up gates.

I'm not here to debate the feasibility of the plan, but it's efects. I also know that the I-400-based plan would be be implementable before 1945, so I think it's too late for any substantial efects. But what if something did happen (sabotage, kamikaze with a charter plane, meteor, whatever) that destroyed the Gatun locks in 1944 or even 1943, puting the Canal out for severall months? I have no idea on how high was the percentage of naval construction based in the west of the US, so I do not know what the overall efect on deployments and resuply would be, for the Pacific operations.

Now that the US would have to sail around the Horn or the Cape (fun things to do in winter...), and considering the need to refuel along the way would probably require building/improving facilities somewhere in South America and/or Africa, how long would this delay the end of the war? A year? More?

Next time you do a question thread, can you post a "WI:" before the title?