The Japanese probaly had the strongest military during WWII.Their navy was also incredibly powerful.It was by far the largest during the whole war.The Japanese also had considerible air power.
Really?
Care to elaborate, such as by letting us know the number of Japanese divisions deployed against the Allies in the Pacific and Burma theatres with, say, the number of Russian and German divisions, and comparing the USN fleet with the IJN fleet?
And how the has Japanese broke the US/UK otherwise during first year of war?
The numbers of divisions is not everything yet.You yourself wrote that Japanes were outstanding warriors.
Soviet did have an impressive number of division in 1941 , but poorly managed , they were not capable to stop Germans ( but , at lest, the German have been critically dalayed till the most winter, thus haven’t finished barbarossa in time ).
If to look at the some yearly pacific balltes when Japanese were able to crush the superior forces ( kinda battle of Singapoo) , having twice less strenghts - the Japanes officer corp was acting like a professional one.( except whom have been “busy” , commited the crimes against civils and pows)
And as a nation they were outstandingly stupid in some respects, essentially revolving around a poor or virtually absent appreciation of the response of the US and Japan’s ability to resist it and to hold what it grabbed in its initial advance phase.
Maybe, but the Soviets gave the Japanese a flogging in 1939 which was sufficiently harsh to discourage the Japanese from (a) attacking the Soviets in 1941 in pursuit of their primary objective of expanding into China and Siberia, deciding instead to go south, and (b) not attacking the USSR during the whole of the war.
If, as the OP asserts, Japan probably had the strongest military in WWII, it was careful to avoid any conflict with the supposedly weaker Soviets. Which doesn’t suggest that Japan was stronger than the USSR.
This brings us back to the problem of determining whether numerically superior forces were incompetent by being defeated by numerically inferior forces just by comparing the numbers, which goes back to your point that the numbers aren’t everything, or whether one had to look at other factors.
In Malaya / Singapore Japan, on my analysis, actually had a numerical advantage where it mattered because the British and Commonwealth forces were dispersed in tactically bad positions to defend dispersed airfields and related areas. Japan, on the other hand, was able to concentrate its forces on an advance which largely ignored these areas which the defender had to defend, so that the defender’s forces often were where the war wasn’t.
It also needs to be recognised that Japan had huge air superiority; about 200 tanks against zero British tanks; generally battle hardened troops from China against green British troops; Japanese troops unified in their cause unlike elements of Britain’s Indian troops; and the huge advantage of being able to land unopposed in the initial phases because Britain wanted to avoid being seen as an aggressor by invading Thailand to reinforce the beachheads where Japan was expected to, and did, land. If the attacker can get ashore completely unopposed; establish his beachhead; and advance many miles inland and past the defensible choke points before he encounters his enemy, the 3:1 or thereabouts ratio which favours the defender is irrelevant.
Japan’s conquest of Malaya was a great piece of planning and soldiering, and put together very quickly by the relevant Japanese commanders, but if poor old General Percival had been given a free military hand to do what was necessary then Japan might not even have got past the Thai beachheads.
Do I smell a troll???
It is difficult to discriminate between the scent of a troll and a fool, for both spring from the same worthless womb.
That i was meaning. The ability to concentrate the forces proper and fast is a right sign of professionalism of the command and officer corps.
The Bitain still had have enough troops in Asia.But hasn’t concentrate it.
Honestly , their primitive “200 tanks” wasn’t match even for …dozen of Shermans, and might be destroyed with Molotov coctail,if to meet them proper.
Aslo the Singapore’s garrison did has a number of Artillery,that could be used with better effect.
The other hand is - did even Brits want to resist Japane harsh?I heard the Gen Percival did not plan to defend the city seriously:)
A lot of reasons, many of which involved a well executed, as well as a wasted opportunity, attack on Pearl Harbor which severally disrupted the US Navy’s “Plan Orange” coupled with the “Germany First” policy that was agreed upon prior with Britain. The US Navy quicly realized that there was no hope of relieving the Philippines after Pearl…
I’m not saying the Japanese were terrible or anything, as soldiers they were excellent. But they lacked the industry, mechanization, and modern doctrine to wage a strategic war against first class powers…
It doesn’t matter. You can have all the troops in the world, but if they get cut off and are isolated, they’re done for.
An interesting stat I recently read is the same amount of shipping that could sustain five (American) soldiers in the European Theatre could only sustain two in the Pacific because of the immense distances of the Pacific Ocean. One of the main reasons why the “Anglophobe” contingent, such as Admiral King, in the US Navy and Army were marginalized in strategic planning circles by 1942…
Honestly , their primitive “200 tanks” wasn’t match even for …dozen of Shermans, and might be destroyed with Molotov coctail,if to meet them proper.
The 200 tanks were effective against infantry that had few antitank weapons, and I believe they were coming out of the jungle with swarms of infantry support…
Aslo the Singapore’s garrison did has a number of Artillery,that could be used with better effect.
The other hand is - did even Brits want to resist Japane harsh?I heard the Gen Percival did not plan to defend the city seriously:)
Not as much artillery as you might think, the British expected an amphibious landing and I believe the coastal guns were virtually useless against inland targets. I believe Percival also feared for the civilian population if he persisted vainly, as he had no hope of relief…
Nick , when they bombed Perl Harbour , they din’t even look like they felt shortage of modern doctrine and mechanization;)
Their doctrine was effective , ther fleet and aviation were modern.
Singapore had a big stocks of ammunition and food.Japanes had not.
The CHurchil was in fury when has learned that Percival surrendered the city.
Besides you forgetting, that Yamashita himself had a shortage of supplies and amunition.
His attack was a …pure bluff.But excellently organized bluff ( that again proves the hight professionalism of Japan corp).
BTW that what CHurchill wrote himself.
I think you ought to realise the way we view the situation in Singapore. It was reported to Cabinet by the C.I.G.S. [Chief of the Imperial General Staff, General Alan Brooke] that Percival has over 100,000 [sic] men, of whom 33,000 are British and 17,000 Australian. It is doubtful whether the Japanese have as many in the whole Malay Peninsula… In these circumstances the defenders must greatly outnumber Japanese forces who have crossed the straits, and in a well-contested battle they should destroy them. There must at this stage be no thought of saving the troops or sparing the population. The battle must be fought to the bitter end at all costs. The 18th Division has a chance to make its name in history. Commanders and senior officers should die with their troops. The honour of the British Empire and of the British Army is at stake. I rely on you to show no mercy to weakness in any form. With the Russians fighting as they are and the Americans so stubborn at Luzon, the whole reputation of our country and our race is involved. It is expected that every unit will be brought into close contact with the enemy and fight it out
Obviously Percival didn’t wish to die at all, neither with his troops nor in Japane camp alone:)
The Shame of Singapore just proves that at the moment, the British hight staff wasn’t able to manage the troops proper.
Even the SOviet officer corp ( usialy claimed as “purged out from professionals”) fought much more desperative in Kiev pocket to stop the GErmans advancing to East, that the British idiotic generals in Singapore.
An interesting stat I recently read is the same amount of shipping that could sustain five (American) soldiers in the European Theatre could only sustain two in the Pacific because of the immense distances of the Pacific Ocean. One of the main reasons why the “Anglophobe” contingent, such as Admiral King, in the US Navy and Army were marginalized in strategic planning circles by 1942…
But you are ignoring tha fact that Japanes also felt the same suppliing problems.
My attack on Singapore was a bluff - a bluff that worked. I had 30,000 men and was outnumbered more than three to one. I knew that if I had to fight for long for Singapore, I would be beaten. That is why the surrender had to be at once. I was very frightened all the time that the British would discover our numerical weakness and lack of supplies and force me into disastrous street fighting.
—- Tomoyuki Yamashita
You see, the Japanes themself was close to surrender indeed.
But they even can’t to hope that the destiny presents them such a great “profesional” like a Percival.
The 200 tanks were effective against infantry that had few antitank weapons, and I believe they were coming out of the jungle with swarms of infantry support…
Oh don’t make me to laugh …
Their stupid “tanks” might be easy destroyed even with the 20 mm AA gun with all their “swarms of infantry”( endeed just couple of soldiers in best case)
Not as much artillery as you might think, the British expected an amphibious landing and I believe the coastal guns were virtually useless against inland targets. I believe Percival also feared for the civilian population if he persisted vainly, as he had no hope of relief…
You believed in vain, Nick…
The Coastal big caliber artillery ( that act around 360 degrees) endeed migh be very effective against infantry troops.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/15/Coastal_defence_gun_at_Singapore.jpg/439px-Coastal_defence_gun_at_Singapore.jpg
In Sevastopol during the last assault of 1942 , the ONLY Coastal artillery whole 2 months hold the superior german forces, leading by Mainstain ( the probably best general of ww2). Germans had to use the monstrous Karl and Dora guns to destroys the Coastal bunkers.
If the Persival was charged to defend the Sevasopol , the city would be surrender befor the GErmans even arrived to Crimea:)
Percival couldn’t concentrate his forces because he was forced to defend airfields dotted around Malaya in tactically bad positions, to prevent the Japanese landing troops on them. It wasn’t his fault the airfields had been constructed in places virtually designed to create the maximum problem for a commander in disposing his forces.
200 tanks of any type is 200 tanks better than an enemy with none, which is what Percival had. Or, more accurately, didn’t have.
No, that’s an enduring myth.
The arcs of fire and ranges didn’t reach where they needed to be to be of any real value in resisting the final Japanese assault on Singapore and the types of ammunition available weren’t much help either as they were designed to resist naval ships attacking from the sea, not infantry attacking from the mainland.
Percival did the best he could with what he had, which was a shithouse hand carefully dealt to him by Churchill who refused to provide Malaya command with what the chiefs of staff, and a very accurate pre-war assessement by a staff officer being Percival, rightly said was needed to defend Malaya from accurately anticipated Japanese attacks.
Maybe somebody else could have done a bit better than Percival, but the end result was always going to be the same.
What buggered Percival, and what would have buggered any other commander, in the end was the loss of water supply to Singapore, without which the defenders could not continue to fight and without which the civilian population would be subjected to dehydration and disease.
I have yet to see anyone come up with a solution to the absence of water for a force and population under siege. Until someone does, Percival can’t be blamed for surrendering and, in my view, he made the right decision to minimise military and civilian suffering and death by surrendering instead of continuing a doomed defence.
Churchill deserves all the blame for losing Malaya, not poor bloody Percival who was hamstrung in his defence by Churchill from the outset by, chiefly, denying him the air forces he needed and preventing him initiating Matador until after the Japanese had attacked, which was at least 24 hours and probably 48 to 72 hours too late.
Churchill’s fury at the loss of Singapore and Malaya, which was almost entirely his fault through another of his spectacularly bad military tactical decisions (but not necessarily a bad strategic political decision by avoiding circumstances which would lose Malaya but avoid Britain being seen as the aggressor in isolationist America which might have influenced America to keep out of the war, ignoring Pearl Harbor which Churchill could not foresee - and I am not getting into the ‘Churchill let Pearl Harbor happen to drag America into the war’ conspiracy theory), does not demonstrate that Singapore had ample stocks of anything.
Churchill’s reactions, beliefs and comments are not always accurate guides to the true situation.
For example, Churchill blamed the Australians for losing Malaya, of which Singapore was the last part. The fact that he did this does not demonstrate that Australians, who were a relatively small proportion of Britain’s forces, actually managed to lose Malaya and Singapore all by themselves. They had some considerable assistance from the rather larger British and Indian forces who in most cases were also doing their best at the same time to resist the Japanese, also without any sign of continuing success.
Rational assessments of disasters brought about by his own actions or inaction were not Churchill’s strong point, not that that makes him any different from most of us.
He didn’t bother to tell Percival that before he unleashed a huge and sustained artillery attack to cover his amphibious assaults on Singapore.
The fact is that the Japanese very quickly brought up a lot of artillery ammunition for the assault, as they were very good in quickly bringing up ordnance and heavier weapons in their advance phase. Yamashita was a long way short of being down to his last artillery round when he attacked Singapore. He was actually adequately supplied for the assault he planned and succesfully executed, which is all a commander needs.
It was not a bluff.
It was a serious, sustained and successful amphibous assault supported by artillery and, most people seem to be unaware, air attacks including on the coastal guns which are the focus of so much myth and which suppressed or put some of them out of action.
It was the Japanese troops who got ashore in large numbers and who pressed the defenders back who delivered the final blows, including getting control of the water supplies.
It was a series of vicious battles, and nothing like a bluff. Many men died and were injured on both sides during them.
Big and empty words from an arrogant man who created the whole fucking problem and who had no solution to it other than to demand that the poor bastards he’d put into a hopeless position should fight to the death in an unwinnable situation, from the man who denied Malaya the air support that lost the Repulse, Prince of Wales, Malaya and Singapore.
Churchill is full of shit in these statements.
As is his post-war statement to the effect that he didn’t realise during the war how bad the situation was in Malaya before and during the campaign. Well, it was his fucking job to know, particularly when he had excellent advice from his military advisers and he was making the decisions about what Malaya command could and could not have and do. He was an arrogant fool at best and a woefully negligent and incompetent leader at worst, Or maybe the other way around.
Churchill chose to give priority to things closer to home, notably the Med (where as far as I am aware he didn’t, as apparently he did in Malaya, require several divisions to fight to the death to any purpose, let alone no good purpose). And so the poor bastards in Malaya were doomed from the outset and ended up in incredibly bad conditions as POWs of the Japanese.
But still poor old Percival gets blamed for being a poor commander and for losing Malaya.
If MacArthur had been hobbled with the same constraints as Percival, he would have lost in Papua New Guinea and would never have returned to the Philippines. And so on for other commanders.
Percival mightn’t have been the best commander in WWII, but he was competent with what he had in a shithouse situation designed to deprive him of every element for a successful defence of Malaya, some of which came from Churchill and some of which came from other factors.
Percival doesn’t deserve the ridicule and contempt which has been heaped upon him since he surrendered.
I’d like to see an armchair, or any other, general who could fight the Malayan campaign better and win when operating under all the constraints placed upon Percival.
So what should Percival have done when he was on the verge of military defeat and having his troops and civilians in Singapore die from dehydration and disease?
Follow Churchill’s idiotic demands about fighting to the last man so that the loss of Malaya, as well as being Britain’s greatest military defeat, could also go down as losing every man in several divisions? And what would people then say of Percival? Call him The Butcher of Singapore, and so on, and revile him for ever more as the general who lost thousands of British soldiers to absolutely no point?
I think that Percival is one of the most unfortunate commanders in WWII, as are the troops under his command, as they are still subjected to unfair criticisms based on simplistic assessments of the Malayan campaign by people who have not studied it in even slight detail and who cling to untenable assertions and myths about Singapore, such as the various myths surrounding the coastal guns.
Well, here’s a fact which never appears in all the uninformed comment about the coastal guns pointing the wrong way, which guns in fact in various emplacements could be and were brought to bear on the enemy attacking from the mainland: Percival, the supposedly stupid commander of the island with the guns supposedly pointing the wrong way, requested HE shells for the coastal guns before the war, to overcome the lack of effect of naval AP on infantry and counter-battery fire etc, but it was never supplied.
There is nothing unusual in military history in commanders at the limit of their resources gambling everything on one final assault. Sometimes it works and they are heroes, sometimes it doesn’t and they are fools. Both assessments ignore the realities of the difficulties facing commanders in these situations. Rommel was perhaps the greatest gambler of WWII but most people think he was a genius when often he was just lucky, and they ignore his failures and poor planning.
I think you omitted a smiley there. 
And the evidence for that statement is…what?
That they defeated a poorly trained and ineptly led army in the Philippines?
That they defeated a poorly trained and ineptly led Army in Malaya/Singapore?
That it took the USN five months to stop them cold in the Southwest Pacific?
That it took the USN six months and only one major battle to seize the initiative from them in the Pacific?
That the Japanese were not once able to defeat an amphibious assault?
The Japanese Navy never ranked as more than the third largest during the war and by the end didn’t exist at all.
I would submit that the Japanese military and naval forces, though fanatically courageous as individuals, were collectively hopeless amateurs at the art of modern warfare.
How often I hear people saying, it took USA only 3 mths to do this to the Japanese and it took the USA only 2 weeks to do this and that to the Germans……What you are forgetting is that while Germany and Japan were actively engaged at war for years prior to the introduction of USA into the war, they had spread their troops and lost a lot of troops and gear during the years Japan invaded China etc, and Germany advanced into Russia etc… the USA did nothing before the axis countries were actively engaged in war. THE USA entered the war after the axis had already been heavily involved for years already with various other countries. I am sure if the war last 10 years that a country like Lichtenstein could have easily joined the war and claim to win battle after battle over the axis countries, and people would boast that Japan and Germany were amateurs cause Lichtenstein beat them in battle so easily.I wonder if USA never entered the war, who would have won!
Well, let’s see. I’m not sure of your argument here; are you disputing the facts, or merely looking for reasons to rationalize the poor performance of the Japanese military in the Pacific in mid-1942?
First, let’s specify that I was only addressing the relative performance of the Japanese and Americans in the Pacific Theater, and that the German situation in Europe is irrelevant to this discussion.
With that as a starting point, it seems that your main point is that the Japanese military suffered crippling losses in their war with China, which they weren’t able to make good before their attack on Pearl Harbor. I must admit I wasn’t aware of this aspect of the Second Sino-Japanese war. After many years of studying the Japanese, both before and during the Pacific War, I was under the impression, that they, while not being able to subdue China, more or less had things their own way militarily. But as you assert otherwise, perhaps you could enlighten me as to how many Japanese divisions were destroyed in China prior to December, 1941? And since the US was mainly fighting the Japanese Navy in the Pacific, perhaps you could also tell me how many major Fleet units the Japanese Navy lost in China before Pearl Harbor? Also it would be instructive to know how many Japanese air units were rendered nonoperational by the Chinese.
It seems to me that the Japanese military did well against the American and Filipino troops in the Philippines, and certainly experienced little trouble against the British forces in Malaya/Singapore. Furthermore, in the tomes I have read on these campaigns, the historians, rather than dwelling on the debilitating Japanese experiences in China, credit their activities with hardening the Japanese troops and endowing them with an overwhelming advantage due to priceless combat experience in China; an experience, BTW, which was sadly lacking in American troops in the Pacific.
Moreover, it must be pointed out that not only did Japanese forces gain excellent combat experience in China, but that by striking first, and unexpectedly, they gained the initiative over American forces in the Pacific, allowing them to concentrate their forces and strike at places and times of their choosing.
Finally, I think it proper to remember that the Americans were fighting a two-front war, and that less than 20% of American war material and equipment was allocated to the Pacific Theater during the first year of the war. Figuratively, the Americans in the PTO in the early stages of the war were fighting with one hand tied behind their back.
Seriously, unless you are prepared to argue that the Japanese experienced crippling losses to their Army, Navy and air forces in China between July, 1937, and December, 1941, I just don’t think your statements have much merit. In any event, the facts speak for themselves; the Japanese military was stopped cold in the Pacific during the months of May/June, 1942, by American military forces of superior quality. This fact certainly does not support the idea that the Japanese fielded the “best” military during WW II.
The Japanese weren’t necessarily stopped by “superior quality” in 1942, they were stopped by (increasingly) superior tactics and firepower as by Guadalcanal, the myth of IJA superiority on land died a hard death as they were unable to cope with US infantry organic firepower and artillery. The Japanese were no longer able to launch offensive operations on land against dug in US Marine and Army infantry after 1942. However, it should be noted that when the high command, under the likes of Gen. Kuribayashi, finally realized their best option was to not launch suicidal and idiotic “Banzai charges,” it was to draw down US ground forces via a bitter battle of attrition where intricate fortifications volcanic and mountainous terrain largely negated the massive US advantage in mobility and firepower. The Imperial Japanese Army and Naval Fleet Landing forces proved they were able to not only fight as mindlessly fanatics–but to fight fanatically AND smarter. There was a very real concern that the fierce resistance posted against the Americans could lead to a protracted and bloody ground campaign to conquer Japan that could possibly lead to the American population demanding something short of an unconditional surrender, and a negotiated settlement.
I agree overall with the premise of the Japanese soldiers’ duality. One side being the courageous fanatic that truly “fought to the last bullet, to the last man”; and I alternately agree to him as the “dangerous amateur” adhering to a fraudulent Code of Bushido and one who was more successful at getting himself impaled on a bullet or a piece of shrapnel than actually defeating a modern mechanized force in combat. But this doesn’t mean that protracted in bloody infantry fights–where US technology, numbers, and mobility could be marginalized–the Japanese soldier couldn’t inflict appalling casualties and successfully attrit US ground forces, and perhaps even the Navy, if the War had gone onto Honshu. This could have possibly led to political consequences, and a slightly more ignominious end to the War in the eyes of some US planners of “Downfall.” Fortunately, we’ll never know…
In Eastern Europe, who knows? Without America to contend with, Japan might well have pursued its preferred plan of pushing into Siberia at the end of 1941 instead of going south. This may have improved Germany’s chances against the Soviets in the west, although the Soviets may have had adequate forces already deployed against Japan. But given the circumstances which impelled Japan to war, it had to be the war which actually happened as attacking Siberia would not have done anything to relieve Japan of the embargoes or give it access to the NEI oil and other resources it needed southwards to overcome the Allied embargoes.
In Western Europe, probably Germany, and certainly Germany if the Soviets were defeated.
In the Pacific, if Japan went the route it actually did, Japan would have won hands down without America coming in. Britain, France, the Netherlands, and Portugal had no hope of regaining their colonial possessions from the Japanese. Australia probably could not have resisted an invasion without American support, although that depends on where the Japanese landed and how many troops they used.
It was primarily America which won the Pacific war, as distinct from the war against Japan as that involved other Allies in China, Burma and the Indian Ocean, with useful help from Australia, the Netherlands, and Britain, in that order.
The non-US Allies did not have the military, naval, air, merchant naval capacity and industrial capacity to undertake the offensive phase of the war against Japan beyond New Guinea from 1944 onwards.
Without that offensive phase, Japan would still be in the NEI.