Does anyone have an opinion of Mansanobu Tsuji
I am reading two different things. One that he is a totally incompetant and the other that he is qoute a "notorious and sometimes brillant senior officer."
Both to a large degree, he was a firebrand, but being a staunch nationalist in that context doesn't detract from his capacities in being an officer. However I would not like to suggest anything more than that, since I am no massive expert on individual leaders within the Imperial Japanese armed forces, and for the most part singular commanders aren't all that important outside of a few key ones at the top.
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Myself said:
...if the Imperial Japanese Army was competent enough to have overrun China in this period, it would have had to have had the majority of political prestige, power and military budget.
That's exactly my problem with it: IJN would never have let it go that far before doing
something to keep its own share. And we're back at the Southern Option...
For the record there is more context to my point that just above.
I think you give the IJN commanders far more credit than they are due, for the most part the IJN took a back seat in the political affairs from 1928-1937. They were far more conservative, and not at all the firebands of the IJA.
A little historical context;
From 1928 the High Command in Japan and sort to push the Army in Manchuria to begin to extend its influence via covert means, which was what initially brought Chang into distrust of the Japanese, playing ball with Japan, then turning to Chiangs nationalist army for support, which led to his assassination, and eventually into Chiang Kai-sheik moving hte nationalist army into Manchuria. Hence Mukden become organised.
Meanwhile the IJN sits by with no real opinion on the matter.
Following the Manchurian affairs at the beginning of the decade the Army begins to separate into two schools of thought; the Kodo-ha and Tosei-ha, the first group being the firebrands who wanted to push the Manchurian affairs much further, as it only being the beginning of a new conflict. The latter group 'Control Clique' as it is sometimes referred to, was more geared to preserving the current state of affairs, preservation of the existing administration, but also removing fractious elements of party politics.
The Kodo-ha feeling 'used' by the Tosei-ha, thus turned to 'government by assassination' to try and further their goals, which as this was about to break into major scandal revolving around Colonel Aizaka, the Kodo-ha in Manchuria took the step of escalating matters in what would become known as the 2-2-6 Incident.
Part of the fallout of this shows how much control the Army had by 1936, when just the threat of General Terauchi was enough to dissolve the government cabinet, and so effectively began the military junta of Imperial Japan when the army eventually chose their desired prime minister and cabinet.
Since the Army effectively controlled the government at this time, and the spring 1937 meeting of the General Staff revolved entirely around the potent of a great war in Europe, and later in General Tojos wish to begin pre-emptive strikes. The Navy at this time is not even in the picture of events unfolding, hence they have 'no control' over events unfolding at this time!
What we see following Marco Polo Bridge is the beginnings of the...'estrangement' between the army and the navy. The navy quite rightly fearing that the Army in Manchuria would pull the Japan into a war with the Chinese and Soviets at the same time. This is where the IJN begins to develop the idea of 'Advance South', if they can pull national policy in their direction, then the Army would not have the resources or leverage to push Japan into a war against two adversaries.
However at this time the IJN does not quite have a formalised plan for how to go about this 'Advance South' rather there is just a nebulous idea of creating a navy/empire like Great Britain.
Yet for all the Navys vacillating, in 1938 the Army is still dominating the government, causing the cabinet to reform, to appoint army generals as ministers for education and similar.
This is where the IJN goes of 'half cocked' and begins their 'Advance South' with the taking of Hainan island, and Shanghai incident without any idea of how they are really going to progress. They conduct these actions unilaterally for the most part without prior consent from the Government, yet the government cannot denounce them or loose face, hence it becomes a very real case of generals acting as they wish.
After the Kwantung Army gets mauled at Nomonhan in 1939 is when the Army looses face, and the IJN get's the prestige since this is around the same time that the IJA has also stalled in Northern China. So it is only with the IJA waning power, that the IJN moves into the ascendant.
It is only with looking back, does it appear like the IJN had a plan, but really it was just all made up on the fly as a knee jerk reaction to finding out that the IJA had pulled the government out and instilled their own cabinet under the navy's very nose.
Coming back to my point, the IJN simply isn't a dominant force in Imperial Japan, during the vast majority of the period in which this scenario says that China should be overrun in. Hence the 'Advance South' would have never been able to get off the ground because the Japanese Army in China would have been successful, and there would have been no cause to change priorities.
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Whatever is said about the Japanese Airforce IOTL, it was totally underestimated by the Western powers of the age, this is precisely because in the period 1928-1935, the Japanese Airforces had been routinely flying combat, or recon, or patrol missions in their sphere of influence*. The fact that OTL Imperial Japan had such continuous series of opportunities to test men, equipment and ground crews under full operational conditions simply made their aero-complex staffed with 'veterans' even before the actions in China.
You take away those opportunities, you reduce the experience of the Japanese aero-complex.
It's not difficult to 'buy into' that reasoning.
*Vladivostok 1920, Tsinan 1928, Manchuria 1931-1933, Shanghai 1932, Jehol 1933.
Coming back to the underestimating by the western powers it is bullcrap that "Japan simply did not have the engineering capacity to match even the SU, let alone the U.S. or Britain." (at least in terms of aero-enginering in the early phase of OTL WWII)
The period 1933-1936 saw a complete revolution across the world in how air combat was to be conducted, as new technology replaced the highly manoeuvrable bi-plane designs, with newer faster aircraft that were initially bombers, but later fighters. For instance, by the time the Mitsubishi G3M was produced by 1936 or so (IIRC) it was right up there with similar capabilities to the Bristol Blenheim or Soviet SB-2.
It was only because of experience that had been gained in the last five years that these kinds of aircraft were up to flying missions out of Taiwan to strike at targets like Nanking. Indeed in this 'early war period' if we can call it that, Imperial Japanese aero-industries were at least equal to that of the western powers, and only later declined as they were spread thin, took losses, and home industry began to be redirected at other priorities.
So while the Japanese Airforces were completely outmatched by the allied aircraft towards the end of war period IOTL, in the period suggested by this threads premise, the Japanese Airforces are considerably 'top notch' because of their previous experiences and development focuses.
Anyhow, I care little for specification comparisons of military equipment, it's an argument that goes nowhere. I Instead as 'backing up evidence' point to the 'successes' of the Japanese in OTL border skirmishes, over China and the pacific, and what real life veterans thought about Japanese aircraft in their capabilities as an indicator of how effective their aero-complex was. By most accounts a lot of Japanese aircraft did get very good names for themselves like the 'Zero' fighters.
Blockade brings Japan's economy to a virtual stop in, say, 18mo to 2yr (not the extended "years" you seem to be implying). That includes near starvation, by the end of it, which is amplified by RN raids on transportation (as soon as the CVs become available after Germany is defeated).