No Pearl Harbor

Very impressive friend, such a collection can only be admired.

Perhaps someday I may be as fortunate

 

The way they were doing it prior to PH. A concerted propaganda campaign. It was working by the way. If you look at poles for the late 30's you will find that the US population favored a very strict interpretation of the neutrality act. By 41 the majority favored anything short of war in support of Britain and her allies. A significant number were in favor of going to war with Germany by late 41. Indeed there is some thought that Roosevelt could have gotten a declaration of war without PH in December. However he didn't want overwhelming support for the war. The way things were going he would probably have had it in the first half of 42.

 

You don't answer the question how does the President bypass the Neutrality Act to declare war on either Japan or Germany when they in turn have yet to attack any interests of the United States, so Japan and Germany make damn sure to keep America out of the war, so where is the justification. And can you provide details on those polls that were conducted in the 30's and 40's.

Onto T.A Gardner, i again ask you how many T-34/75 were serving in the East, also you are very good on statistics, so another question, what was the break-up of the Soviet Red Air Force such as make and models and quantity of said models and were any comparible to the Mitsubishi Zero and could they counter the combined Imperial Japanese Naval and Army Air Forces, including those carrier based units. Plus if the United State was able to be kept out of the war, when would Britain be ready to launch both Operation Torch and Operation Overlord. My guess it would have to be at least 1947 at the earliest (Operation Torch, and hopefully that North Africa hasn't fallen by then) and 1949 (Operation Overlord).

 

T34s. In the Far East, as of 1941 less than 100. Yes, there were a few distributed among the tank divisions there but the exact number is not clear. However, this makes absolutely no difference in the scenario given. The BT 7 and T 26 are more than sufficent to deal with anything the Japanese have. There is also one regiment of heavier T 28 tanks that are largely invulnerable to Japanese weapons as well.
You have to remember, in tank on tank combat the Japanese are absolutely pathetic. Their tankers generally moved to a firing position then halted and fired until destroyed. No attempt to maneuver, none to exploit mobility. The Japanese treated tanks as mobile pillboxes. This was true in 1939, in 1941 and, in 1944.

The first line Soviet fighters in the Far East in 1941 were typically the same ones as in the West: The I 16 bis, LaGG 1 and 3, some MiG 1 or 3 interceptors, along with older I 153 and such types. Typical Soviet tactics were to have the better fighters make a diving run on escorts in a slashing pass. The older fighers followed to attack the bombers. Soviet pilots were on the whole pretty bad especially compared to the Japanese. However, their numbers give them a significant advantage in the long run.
But, even Stalin had his limits on tolerance. After the Nomohan incident where the Red Air Force took far heavier casualties (even though they pretty much trashed the Japanese 2nd Air Army simply through attrition) Stalin called Polikarpov his premier fighter designer on the carpet and "fired" him (it could have been worse....he could have been shot).
Anyway, that is why you don't see this designer putting any aircraft forward during WW 2. His bureau was distinctly out of favor and got little or no resources. LaGG and Yak became the lead designers in the vacuum.

 

As I said pretty much as he was doing. Any act congress passes can be changed or modified. Indeed if you look at:
Neutrality Acts - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
You'll see that the neutrality acts were modified and changed as time went on. Indeed the modifications of Nov 41 pretty much nullified any penalties as they would apply to supporting Britain and China.

Part depends on what Germany in particular does to keep the US out. Do they not invade Poland or not start submarine warfare in the Atlantic or avoid the BOB? What are you proposing?

I'll see what I can find. It was part of a thread in another forum and I didn't mark it or search out too many of the details.

I did find this chart. Only the first data points appear pre WWII and things have aleady gone way down hill of Germany. Note the bottom line is those willing to make peace with Hitler.
The TPM DOCUMENT COLLECTION - Graph Showing Public Opinion During World War II
I haven't had a chance to really look at this document in detail as I just found it but look at the chart on page 181.
http://web.mit.edu/berinsky/www/aaw.pdf

 

Theres several fundamental flaws here. First the direct participation of the US is not required to cut off Japans oil. This had primarily come from the Dutch East Indies (Indonesia) and those oil fields and refinerys were controled by the Dutch. The Dutch governemnt in 1941 sat in London the capitol of its most important ally. Whatever arraigment Japan makes with the US the Dutch dont have to release a single liter to Japan. If Japan want the oil it still has to fight for it.

Second the Japanese economy had become throughly intertwined with the conquored territory in China, as well as Manchuria and Korea. Withdrawl from China was totally unacceptable to the Zaibatsu (sp?), the business conglomerates, because such a thing would destroy their businesses and wreck Japans economy. With the economy in a free fall sustained military operations anywhere become impossible. Japans military leaders understood this hence any withdrawl from China was unacceptable to them as well.

Finally there was a Japanese idea for taking over Siberia. Refered to as the "Northern Resource Area" it had ben set aside as the last major Asian area to be conquored. Even by the end of 1939 it was clear to Japans economic planners that controlling the oil, rubber, and rice of South Asia and Indonesia was critical to Japans economy and military power. The coal from Manchuria or China, and Chinas tiny oil industry could not supply Japans industrial energy needs. Siberia was to come later when the resources for properly exploiting it were in place.

 

Rod was this leading to Stalingrad with no Siberian Reserves?

I think the fundamental flaw in this what if, was the competition for resources and territory between the US and Japan and I know you tried to eliminate that issue with your what if guidelines.

I think that the Japanese could maintain a minor coastal presence in Russia and that would perhaps tie down forces destined to fight Germany but that effort would have left the Japanese very vulnerable to the American and British forces in their backyard.

It would give all the advantages to the Germans but great risk and little gain for the Japanese.

 

No, Not Stalingrad specifically but the entire Soviet Western Front.

 

I would entertain that possibility since they gave the Japanese such a thrashing at the end of the war.

 

The way i was thinking was that if the Japanese could at the very least tie down the Soviets with skirmishes or even an outright invasion, the Soviets might not be able to transfer their troops in the east, westward to fight the Germans, not specifically in Stalingrad but along the entire front. Now i am not saying that the Soviet Union can't raise those additional men, i believe they can, but not from the east.

The Japanese got absolutely smashed 1945, but here is my point, the difference of the Japanese Army in 1941 (In this thread no longer at war with China and distributed thoughout South-East Asia and the Pacific) is vastly stronger that the Japanese Army of 1945. If you were to use my timeline in this thread the Japanese would deploy about 40 divisions in 1941 eventually by 1945 they have deployed 107 divisions against the Soviets, also the Japanese would have land based units of the combined Imperial Japanese Naval and Army Air Forces.

Japan as i have stated does not have to occupy the entire Siberian area, just go after stategic targets like the trans-siberian railway, coastal ports, Sakhalin, Kurile Islands the destruction of the Soviet Pacific Fleet.

Some have mentioned China, if my senario is historically correct then China is a no show concerning Japan, as Nationalist China signs an Anti-Commintern Pact with Japan, Germany and Italy, Chinese Nationalist are now at war with Communist Chinese.

Now ont Britain itself, as discussed, if America does not join the frey, then Britain is in no shape to launch Operation Torch Eventually right up to the invasion of Italy, Greece and the Balkans, Operation Overlord and carry on both Daylight and Night bombing offensive on Germany, it also does not have the forces to evict the Germans out of Norway. Britain could not hope to fend off the Axis in North Africa and the Mediterannean, without a second North African Front, Axis forces would eventuall overrun Egypt.

 

Well I'm following your logic, but I think there would be a serious constraint on Japanese effective operational area concerning the Russians. It all comes down to available weapons systems at the time. With the basic small arms comparisons PPsH 41, Svt40 versus the Arisaka. The Japanese type 96 was similar to the Bren and based on the Czech ZB26 used by the Waffen SS. but other than the Nambu type 11, Hotchkiss copy the Japanese lacked SAWs. As far as Armor the Japanese were no match for the Russians tank for tank as well as AT weps. The Navy conflict easily goes to Japan but then there's operational distance in play which could be compensated somewhat by Japanese Air Power but that's if they secured land bases to further the operational effectiveness. That operational distance would be key and how much territory would Russia give up undefended if Germany was a greater threat? Thought the Nationalist anti communist treaty made sense especially since Germany had provided equipment to China under license.

 

Which is my point as well, i can concede that with mobility (Mechanised units) the Soviets have it all over the Japanese, but here is the twist, if is almost impossible for the Japanese to Use mechanisation due to topography then the Soviets would be hampered by that same constraint, so mechanised transports can't maneuver then they cant deploy their big artillery pieces, so light and medium artillery pieces could only be horse drawn. If mechanisation is impossible then tanks are useless on both sides, it comes down to a footslogger war.

 

Well I'm not an expert with the terrain of the area but are you sure that mechanized units couldn't operate in that coastal reagion? That is just outside of Naval big gun range.

 

The T-34 proves this theory incorrect, as it was capable of going in many places where the German Panzers were unable.

While I understand that there were only a few available, even a handfull would be more then a match.

 

What was the capability of the T-34/76 as per coverage in gradient degree, plus what was the coverage of paved roads in the east and those roads that could take heavy tracked traffic.

 

The T-34 was designed specifically to overcome these problems and is why the tracks were wider to begin with. While the German Panzer sunk in the mudd, the T-34 would be able to go over it with more ease.

Im sure Von Poop, might elaborate on this one as he is the tank expert.

 

Well I'm still unclear about the terrain issue in the area discussed, if the armor was subject to choke points in the terrain, then airpower could interdict effectively if not then armor could be brought to bear on a broad front and the japanese would have a difficult time dealing with it without carrier and big deck gun support.

 

Glantz' August Storm: Soviet Tactical and Operational Combat in Manchuria, 1945 has some excellent military topographical maps of much of the region in question. In fact, Glantz notes that the Japanese were suprised on more than one occasion by Soviet armor crossing swampy / marshy regions they deemed impassable that exploited the weak local defenses based on these assumptions of impassability.

 

Topogaphical maps do show that throughout the Northern China/Manchuria/Korean/Soviet border and into the Intreior and along the Eastern Soviet Union.

1, Yablonovy, Standonov, Bureiskiy, Dzugdzhur, Cherski, Kolyma, Koryak, Sredinnyy Ranges and the Sikhote Mountains

Her Oberst, please read my post as i state that the Japanese do infact use both Carrier based aircraft and naval bombardment in their assault on the Soviet Pacific Fleet and to support infantry troops inland, i'm sorry to pull you up on that. But you raise an interesring mention and that is bottlenecks, if my assumption that the Japanese almost exclusive used Infantry and horse drawn artillery and the Soviets use their Mechanisation, the Soviets would eventually be stymied by vast bottlenecks within the lack of road system, Japanese aircraft would simply hammer the hell out of the trapped Soviet Mechanisation.

Slonisp, i fully realise that the T-34/76 was good at mobility in mud, so was the Panther, Tiger and King Tiger with their wide tracks, but that is on the Russian Western Front where in some places the Russian Steppes went on almost forever and was as flat as a pancake, but i defy anyone to tell me that the T-34/76 was as effective and mobile in very steep mountainous terrain in the Soviet Eastern Front.