"What if Japan Never Attacked Pearl Harbor?" Topic

So…

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Amicalement
Armand

The miracle was that they did a surprise attack on US territory and united the country to fight the Axis….even if there was what must have been a very worrying few days before Hitler declared war on the US.

The Miracle was that the carriers were not there

That they did not go for the oil supplies and full tanker Neosho, which if hit…….

That they sank battleships in shallow water, that saved many lives and allowed salvage.

That the Nevada did not "sink" in the exit channel.

That they hit fighter planes on the ground rather than in the air. Trained pilots were more valuable than P40s.

Thank God they did attack Pearl Harbour the way that they did.

Glup!!…. (smile)

Amicalement
Armand

There was no miracle because the US knew there was an attack coming and got the carriers out of Dodge. This "conspiracy theory" (We knew it was coming) has been debated for years. I don't know why. If you want proof read The Big E chapter on Pearl Harbor and Google Search Halsey's Battle Order Number One … The Enterprise is now operating under War Conditions … written TEN DAYS before Pearl Harbor.

The Enterprise didn't just "happen" to be delivering planes to Wake. That was the Cover Story. It was out looking for the Jap Fleet and out so it wouldnt get trapped in Pearl like the Battleships did. We knew.

Cheers!

Good thing Enterprise didn't find the Japanese fleet then…

An interesting related counterfactual here is what would have happened if Japan had not waited for Shokaku and Zuikaku, the 5th Carrier Division, to join the Mobile Force before attacking PH. AIUI Stalin kept troops in Siberia in case Japan attacked Russia's eastern flank. Had Japan shown her hand by attacking PH earlier, in say September, presumably these forces would have been released to be deployed and lost against the German invaders sooner. As it was they stayed uncommitted, an intact reserve force, until after PH, at which point they moved west – or so I recall.

If that's correct then conceivably Moscow could have been taken, which while not necessarily a terminal military setback might very well have cost Stalin his throne.

Interesting indeed….

Amicalement
Armand

The Enterprise didn't just "happen" to be delivering planes to Wake. That was the Cover Story. It was out looking for the Jap Fleet and out so it wouldnt get trapped in Pearl like the Battleships did. We knew.

Really, Lee?

Under what reality would a US carrier deck-load Marine Corps aircraft (who's pilots were not carrier qualified) if it was "searching" for a Japanese strike force?

The fact that the carrier was given orders to operate under War conditions is EXACTLY what ANY responsible Admiral would have done. A War Warning had been issued. A US Navy task force was sailing upon waters within range of adversarial submarines and long-range patrol aircraft. How could those ships be ordered to do a ferry run to Wake (a completely rational step to re-enforce an outpost) without being ordered to take precautions?

If they were out there searching for a Japanese Fleet (without the ability to operate aircraft), why didn't they receive any orders to search for an enemy fleet?

Yeah, sure. If I expected a Japanese strike force with multiple carriers and battleships to come at Pearl, the first thing I would do was send out my two carriers is separate directions so they could not operate in support of each other, both in a condition that prevented them from operating their strike aircraft. Because it totally makes sense that the US Navy would protect it's carriers from a known threat by setting them up to be outnumbered, blind and unarmed in deep ocean waters.

I mean … really?

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

I was under the impression 4th Cuirassier that Soviet Intelligence in Tokyo found out that Japan was moving south, and the Soviets had already taken steps to send troops westward even before Pearl Harbor.

@ Bill

Yes, I wasn't sure exactly what the timing was. But my sense was that at the point Japanese intentions became clear it became possible to move troops out of the east.

If Japan had gone with an earlier smaller strike, that might have allowed those troops to move west (and get defeated) earlier.

A smaller strike could only have been more successful. It might have got lucky and sunk three or four modern carriers. It might have got unlucky, missed all the carriers and just sunk the same or fewer battleships, as the actual strike did. One of those outcomes is better….

US carrier damage control was very effective but I wonder how good it would have been in port?

I continue to marvel at the absurd conspiracy theories that "FDR knew" and deliberately sacrificed the Pacific Fleet's battle line in order to get us into the war. Absolute nonsense. Any attack on US territories anywhere would have served to get us into the war, why lose all those ships for no reason at all?

Let me return to the miracle of PH

The US did not lose those ships, because they were sunk in 40ft of water, not the Ocean. Other than Arizona and I guess Oklahoma, all could be repaired and saw useful action, after massive refits.

Total losses were about 2000 I recall offhand, without checking, about half of those off the Arizona. bad enough but…imagine the loss of crew if five battleships (Arizona, Nevada, WV, Oklahoma, California) were sunk at sea

Those ships would not have stood a chance against the Jap surface fleet, let alone its naval air.

Good point my good friend!. (smile)

Amicalement
Armand

Nevertheless, Mark I ……. Wasn't it a most fortuitous happenstance that no carriers were at Pearl on the fateful day?

As the great Yogi Berra was fond of saying: "You don't know what you don't know."

Just sayin'

B

Prior to Pearl Harbor the "big gun" advocates still held sway in the Navy. I seriously doubt the carriers would be spared at expense of the battleships. The US Navy still held fast to Alfred Thayer Mahan's belief that concentrated groups of battleships were the decisive force. The number of battleships put out of commission led the Navy to rely more on the 3 remaining fleet carriers than planned.

Wasn't it a most fortuitous happenstance that no carriers were at Pearl on the fateful day?

Indeed it was!

And … purely a random stroke of luck that at least one CV wasn't there.

The intention was that the ferry missions to outlying posts would not leave the fleet in Pearl without a CV. So the missions were at scattered times. Lexington was not scheduled to depart for Midway until after Enterprise was scheduled to return from Wake, but Enterprise was delayed by 1 1/2 days by the same weather front that had hidden the Kido Butai on their approach. Lex departed on time (December 5), Enterprise's return to Pearl was delayed until December 7 in the afternoon.

Enterprise was actually within range of Pearl during the Japanese attack. Dauntlesses of Enterprise's scouting squadron were lost on that morning, though I've seen fair debate over whether they were shot down by the Japanese or the Americans when they got to Pearl.

That's another minor factoid often missed by the conspiracy buffs -- if you wanted to get your CVs out of harm's way for a known attack on Pearl, why would you position one of them within range of Pearl? Another stroke of luck (for the USN) that the Japanese attack plan did not put the ingress or egress of the strike OVER Enterprise! Given the great range advantage of Japanese naval aviation you would expect that Enterprise was at greater risk in the waters around Hawaii then if it was actually IN the harbor.

All of that said, I think luck swung both ways that day. The greatest luck of the US was that the Japanese didn't strike the oil storage and dry-dock facilities at Pearl. But those were low down on the Japanese priorities list, so odds were they would not be struck in any realistic scenario. Still a bit of luck.

The Japanese were lucky that the US was so deeply asleep that morning. If there was one price the IJN could not afford to pay, it was the loss of their precious pilots. If Pearl defenses had actually been alerted to the incoming strike, while I would still expect a "losing" engagement for the USN and USAAF, it would have been much less one-sided. With more than 100 fighters available around Pearl, and a whole lot of AA guns (without ammo until the second wave) that attack could have suffered much higher casualties than it did.

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

I agree with you Mark up until your point on the fuel reserves and dock facilities. There was a very real scenario where they would have been struck. Both Fuchida and Genda advocated a third wave who's primary targets would be those fuel storage facilities and repair and dock facilities. They were ultimately over-ruled by Admiral Nagumo. Nagumo had some very real concerns to back his decision but had he agreed with Fuchida and Genda it is very possible it would have ended much worse for the US. I believe it was Admiral Nimitz who said had they carried out that third wave and damaged those facilities it would have prolonged the war in the Pacific by up to two years.

@ marc

the 3 remaining fleet carriers

Six, no?

Saratoga, Lexington, Yorktown, Enterprise, Hornet, Wasp. There was Ranger too, but she wasn't of fleet standard by 1941.

I should have specified in the Pacific. Yorktown, Wasp and Ranger were assigned to the Atlantic Fleet. Hornet had not carried out its shakedown cruise yet. This left Enterprise, Lexington and Saratoga as the only 3 fully operational fleet carriers in the Pacific.

Mark 1 wrote – "And … purely a random stroke of luck that at least one CV wasn't there."

Feel free to call me a cynic, Mark. But a great deal concerning the USA's entry into a war against Japan just smells a bit too funny to me. Going back to the late '30s, when GB approached the USA about providing military support to defend key British interests in the Asia Pacific region (Singapore in particular). The US demurred on military involvement, but assured GB that it had it within its power to collapse the Japanese economy in very rapid fashion if necessary. Reference to to this exchange can be found in the USJCoS history of the Pacific War.

> US intelligence was reading the highest level Japanese diplomatic codes, but totally missed the Pearl Harbor operation?

> US coast defense radar totally muffed reporting incoming aircraft?

> The sudden and rapid build-up of Midway Island?

> Top secret last minute long range photo recon missions ordered for Truk and Jaluit?

> Pearl Harbor left at low level of defense readiness despite acute diplomatic tension between US and Japanese negotiators?

> No carriers at Pearl Harbor?

Maybe all of these strange circumstances were indeed all unrelated and just happened to all arise in very close time proximity to the Pearl Harbor raid. But there are an awful lot of them. Roosevelt was facing a very neutrality-minded isolationist American public at the time and the Pearl Harbor raid, billed with great moral outrage as a "sneak attack" and "A day that will live in infamy" served dramatically well to arouse the public to war.

I do not trust my government to tell the truth, sad to say.

B

Blut-

You do not trust the government to tell the truth, but you expect it can keep a conspiracy that must have involved several thousands of people in multiple internally feuding departments secret for 75 years, because there is SO much evidence that every employee of the US Government works together forever and no one ever breaks ranks, right?

- US Intelligence was reading the diplomatic codes. I've read Japanese correspondence for 35 years. I've been to Japan 30 times. I still can't make sense out of half of what I might read, even when it's in English. Japanese culture does not encourage direct, clear and concise correspondence. Never has. Did you know in Japan it can be considered rude to say "thank you" when someone does an unexpected favor for you? Saying "thank you" might infer that you believe that person was supposed to do that for you, which is the height of presumption. If your boss buys you lunch some day, you are expected to apologize!

Now you expect Americans to understand what "Climb Mount Suribachi" means, even IF they can translate it?

The US didn't even have an "intelligence" agency in 1941. That was one of the remedial actions taken after Pearl Harbor had been analyzed and the lessons extracted. Army and Navy were two separate parts of the government. Each had it's own intelligence service, as did the State Department. All had their own ideas of what was going on, based on their own information. It would be terribly mis-informed to suggest there was any ongoing coordination between them, much less any conspiracy.

- US coast defense radar did not totally muff reporting incoming aircraft. They reported it. The duty officer, who knew to expect incoming aircraft (B-17s from the mainland) took the report, and went on with his day.

Even today, when we actually have 75 years of experience with such tools, it is EASY to mus-interpret data when it looks like the data we were already expecting.

Years ago (college days) I went house-boating with some friends. It took hours to get everything set – rent the houseboat, get all our stuff aboard and stowed, go through the safety lectures, check out the maps for where we were going and how we planned to get there. All in the hot summer sun.

Finally, we were motoring out from the marina into open waters. I think there were at least two six-packs opened and passed around. Dave, driving the boat, opened up the throttle to full speed (a blinding 8 or 10 knots I'm sure). A minute or two later one of the guys at the back of the boat yelled "Dave, we're on fire". A big grin came across his face as, beer in one hand, steering wheel in the other, Dave yelled back "Yeah, about time, but we are really cooking now!"

So shall we make the case that Dave was participating in a some grand conspiracy to destroy a houseboat full of all his vacation resources? I mean, who could possibly misunderstand such a clear and urgent warning? Well, Dave could, and did.

Have you ever met a Lieutenant? Let's ask our assembled veterans -- who here has NEVER seen a Lieutenant who needed an extra clue?

- The sudden and rapid build-up of Midway Island was a well documented and clear long-term plan. So was Wake. These were outposts of American power. The Department of the Navy issued a War Warning to the Pacific Fleet (who owned the defense of both) in late November. So both outposts were to be reinforced. There is no surprise, no inconsistency there. It was a well documented undertaking, nothing hidden about it.

- Long range recon of Japanese outposts in the South Pacific is ENTIRELY consistent with what the Navy expected. They expected the Japanese to strike south. That's what all the diplomatic traffic indicated. That's what all the political appreciations indicated. That's the only Japanese military response to the US economic policy that made any sense to US ways of thinking. Every piece of data that reinforced that view went into the intelligence appreciations.

The US embargo, particularly the oil embargo, was expected to cripple Japanese military capabilities within a few short months. Diplomatic discussions were going no where. The Dutch were no longer in a position to protect their East Indies oil fields, and the French were no longer in a position to defend Indochina. Suddenly the Japanese fleet was missing. What the h3ll would you expect the USN to do? Of COURSE they ordered additional recon over IJN South Pacific bases and harbors. Of COURSE they reinforced outlying outposts. They even sailed under war warnings when they made their ferry runs to those outposts. And all the aircraft were taken out of their hangers and placed under big bright lights to protect them from sabotage.

Pearl Harbor was not left at low level readiness. It was as ready as it knew how to be, given the expectation that the Japanese might be making a play for the South Pacific, and the fact that the Navy was placed under the Army's defense when they were in port.

To somehow suggest that the Admiral Halsey, commander of TF8 aboard Enterprise, knew exactly where and when the Japanese would strike, early enough to adjust his speed 30 hours before the strike to enter the harbor just hours after the Japanese were done, when the US Pacific Fleet HQ didn't even know what the Army's coastal defense and harbor defense patrol plans were … like, huh?

There were 100+ "circumstances". It's easy to pick 6, ignore 94+, and announce a pattern. But when Dave turned his head and saw smoke pouring out of the engine compartment, at least he didn't shut his eyes and announce he already knew everything was "cooking" and wouldn't trust any contrary evidence…

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

Fascinating discussion guys

The other reason the conspiracy theory falters is that if it was a conspiracy intended to get the USA into WW2, it was looking the wrong way. The major Axis threat was Germany and PH did nothing to embroil Germany in a war with the USA. It was actually 4 days after PH that Germany declared war on the USA.

Actually that's another interesting counterfactual: Germany does not obligingly declare war on the USA after PH. What then? Would the USA have declared war on Germany, and if so, on what grounds? If not, how does the land campaign proceed against Germany?

+1 Mark1!

Good analysis. The US ability to read the Japanese diplomatic codes was useful, but since the Japanese military rarely ever told the diplomats about their operations, there wouldn't be any detailed information about them in any of those messages. And as Mark said, correctly interpreting information isn't easy. Just look at the failure prior to the Battle of the Bulge as an example.

A great discussion though. Thanks all.

I remain unconvinced that the US fighters largely staying grounded was anything but a good thing. Interception would indeed have meant many an IJN crew lost, but I suspect far more US Army and Navy fliers. That radar alarm did not give much time to arm and fuel, then get to any altitude.

A battlefleet, then far less damaged, would surely have sailed to meet the Japanese fleet in an artillery engagement, actually dominated by Long Lance torpedoes and aircraft attack, on the high seas.

The major weak link in the Japanese Naval Air Force was their lack of trained pilots. Even as late as 1943 the IJN was only training One HUNDRED new pilots a year! The cumulative losses in the first two years of the war left them with a severe shortage of good pilots. The Americans, on the other hand, cranked pilots out factory-style so fast that by 1945 they were turning pilots into infantrymen (my dad was one of them). So any additional losses at Pearl Harbor would have hurt the Japanese far more then the Americans.

As for the battle fleet, I'm not sure the Americans could have sent it west even if it had been available because of a lack of fuel tankers. The battleships burned a huge amount of fuel and the Pacific Fleet was severely short of oilers. By the time of Midway the US had 8 operational battleships on the west coast and they didn't even try to use them.

The IJN was not in any way set up for a prolonged conflict and was constructively a regional force only. The constraints were not only in pilot output but also in ship and aircraft construction as well. It took Japan 20 years to amass a force of six fleet carriers. Only the last four were actually purpose-built as such, and they weren't commissioned until 1937, 1939, and 1941 (x2). After the Shokakus they didn't deploy another fleet carrier until Taiho commissioned in 1944. Other carriers were added to their strength meanwhile, but all were conversions of other vessels, and inferior, usually in air group size (Chitose, Chiyoda) but often in speed as well (the Junyo liner conversions, Ryuho).

Worse, the converted carriers struggled with newer, heavier aircraft types. Kaga (a 1920s battleship conversion) was so slow that her torpedo bomber complement had to be reduced because, if she carried too many, those spotted furthest forward wouldn't have enough deck left in which to take off. Similar issues plus hangar lift capacity limited other converted carriers' ability to operate modern aircraft.

There wasn't even the option to use older aircraft on these ships because the Val production line had been shut down and had to be restarted (Germany had the same problem getting replacement Stukas).

All in all, training only 100 pilots as Scott mentions (and only having about 1,500 carrier qualified pilots in 1941) was inadequate but arguably rational given the lack of flight decks and aircraft.

Any why would a navy that was still dominated by BB admirals have left 8 of them sitting in Pearl if they knew an attack was coming?

+1thomalley. And why would a president who loved the navy do that either?

Its as I said in my first post. Doctrine still held to the supremacy of the battleship. A combination of necessity (few battleships to deploy after Pearl Harbor) and a fundamental change in doctrine brought the carriers to the fore front. Until Pearl Harbor US carriers were seen to augment the battleship groups. Only after do they become the primary weapon of decision.

Fascinating ideed!… thanks!.

Amicalement
Armand

The other reason the conspiracy theory falters is that if it was a conspiracy intended to get the USA into WW2, it was looking the wrong way. The major Axis threat was Germany and PH did nothing to embroil Germany in a war with the USA.

A critical point. Roosevelt had no desire for a war against Japan. What he wanted was to shut Japan down, to prevent or eliminate the threat of Japanese aggression in light of the declining deterrence of European power projection into Asia.

But he saw Germany as an existential threat to the US.

The conspiracy models all assume that Roosevelt somehow KNEW that an America united for war against Japan would somewhow morph into an America united for war against Germany.

But there is never any rationale suggested for this, other than 20/20 hindsight from the actual historical events.

Because everyone in 1941 KNEW exactly what Hitler would do in any and all political circumstances, because he had been SO predictable SO MANY times.

And why would a president who loved the navy do that either?

Another faltering of the conspiracy models. Even IF you can get past the twisted logic of "goad Japan into attacking so we can get the public behind a war with Germany", you are still left with the question of why a crushing USN defeat of unparalleled historic proportions was necessary, or even desirable.

I mean, if you want to get things started with Japan only as a means of fighting Germany, why conspire to put yourself at a disadvantage against the Japanese? Why not conspire to swat the Japanese with one fell swoop?

If you can manage a conspiracy that can be hidden from the diplomatic corps of the US government, the soldiers and sailors of the US Army and Navy, and that can manipulate the Japanese diplomacy and military in the process, why not lay a trap for the Japanese to sail into? Why not conspire to have them launch their dastardly sneak attack, only to be crushed by the righteous American response? After all, the American public loves winners, not losers.

Or better yet, why not conspire to manipulate the GERMANS into launching a sneak attack? Or the Italians?

I mean, if you want to throw away your precious battleships to get into the war, why not sail just 3 of the old BBs (why 8?) as an updated "great white fleet" to Baltic or Mediterranean waters on "neutrality" patrols, and get the Tirpitz and sisters to blast them or the Regia Aeronautica to torpedo them? Then all the fury of the American public would be directed at the guys Roosevelt actually wanted to fight.

I mean, who would suggest that the Gulf of Tonkin incident was a conspiracy to get into the Arab Israeli wars? It doesn't make any sense!

So how can one suggest, with a straight face, that an impossibly grand and pointlessly expensive conspiracy to get the Japanese to attack and cripple the US Pacific Fleet was all a secret plan to get the US into the war against Germany?

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

A wargamer with OCD would chart out the presence of CV's in Pearl Harbor over the last 5 years, calculate the odds of there being no carriers and have the player roll a die to determine if they are in port or not. If the odds were one in six and the player rolled a 1, everyone would call the player lucky. A historian with OCD would map out the presence of CV's in the last 5 years, calculate the odds of there being no carriers, write a doctoral thesis stating the odds were 1 in 6 and conspiracy theorists would argue that the slim odds are proof that FDR knew about the attack.
BTW, I did a six month Mediterranean cruise in the Navy on a DDG during the 80's and we steamed under wartime conditions from the time we left port to the time we pulled back in.

BTW, I did a six month Mediterranean cruise in the Navy on a DDG … and we steamed under wartime conditions from the time we left port to the time we pulled back in.

Ah HA! So you admit it! And did you carry an umbrella with you as you strolled upon the grassy knoll? Hmmmm?

Confess!

Cardinal Fang -- poke him with … the soft cushions!

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

It would have seriously discomfited the Allies if Germany had not declared war on the USA. But there was no treaty obligation to do so, as Japan had launched the attack. Germany could have remained an unfriendly non-belligerent, like Japan was vis-a-vis the USSR.

If you were trying to think through what Germany's reaction to letting your fleet get sunk at PH might be, a declaration of war would not be a major scenario.

The only reasons one ever hears for why Hitler did this make no sense. One is that he was excited by the idea of an intercontinental war. Another is that he saw an opportunity for the U-boats who would now be able to attack convoys with US escorts in US waters. Another was that he believed America's economy was only fit to produce razor blades.

These are all such grotesque fantasies that one would hesitate to accept any of them as the grounds for declaring war, were it not that there aren't any better grounds apparent.

A critical point. Roosevelt had no desire for a war against Japan.

Odd that. I always thought Roosevelt was pretty savvy, but if he really thought Japan was just going to roll over after he embargoed the oil and seized all their assets, he and the state department must have been a bunch of dumb asses!

The German motivation to declare war was that the US was the Arsenal of Democracy. Lease Lend was making a major difference to Britain's resistance to invasion and would probably help the USSR eventually, where conquest was becoming a bit less likely.

Think Hitler's way. The US has no interest in any war with Germany, beyond an economic resurgence that massively boosted the US economy in manufacturing. Add in his anti Semitic views of who ran that economy and just wanted to profit. If I strike now my U boats can work wonders on their Eastern Seaboard (and they did). Up to now any USN intervention has been solely self interest ASW, to protect their own enormously lucrative trade routes. They actually did ruin the British Empire, economically, in practice…totally.

Even now, esp now after PH, they will massively concentrate on Japan and I can run riot. No more Atlantic lifeline, but only if I get in now.

Here is the final miracle of Pearl Harbour, that few appreciate. However "mad" (I mean jolly cross in UK speak) the US public now was, the US military somehow recognised that the greatest threat was from Europe, not Asia.

Germany First was the greatest miracle of 7/12…or 12/7 to US folk…..

Other than that we are counting on those chaps at Los Alamos to come up with another post PH miracle weapon. Become the Destroyer of Worlds? Well Berlin might have been a good start and saved far more lives

I didn't expect that.

I didn't expect that.

Nobody expects the history-buff inquisition!

Our chief weapon is surprise. Fear and surprise…

Our TWO chief weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency…

Our THREE chief weapons are fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, and an almost fanatical devotion to TMP.

AMONG our chief weapons are such diverse elements as fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, an almo

Nevermind. I'll post again.

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)