I have never really had a great intrest in the Pacfic war before now.But thanks to Wizard and Nick{and to Rising Suns objective comments} im going to read up a bit.
Ok, you never said it was a Japanese victory, except you just said it was, ‘tactically’, a Japanese one [victory].
To me, that is the same thing, whether or not you claim it was only “tactically” a Japanese victory is a minor detail. You can qualify it any way you want but we are going to have to agree to disagree on this issue.
As for for your view being “almost universally” accepted (an oxymoron BTW), no, it is not “almost universally” accepted. I posted two examples of historians (Bergerud and Willmott) who reject that notion.
Disingenuously??
Why? Because it shows you were lying when you claimed to have mentioned the intelligence factor first?
I would tend to agree with you, IF superior intelligence was a factor limited to the one battle of Midway, but this was not the case. I would recommend that you acquire John Prados’ “Combined Fleet Decoded”. Prados demonstrates convincingly that the gathering, analysis, and dissemination of intelligence by the Allies was a consistent, ongoing, and constantly improving skill practiced by the Allies, but neglected by their Japanese opponents. Therefore, it was not just Midway, but Coral Sea, Santa Cruz, Eastern Solomons, and a long string of other battles in which the Allies benefited from superior intelligence. Yes, it was a massive “force multiplier”, but was only available to the Allies through the expenditure of great resources, hard work, and development and application of specific skills.
BTW, it was not just an effort put forth by the US, but all of the Allies in the Pacific, including the Dutch.
Why not? Intelligence gathering and analysis was something that could have been available to the Japanese if they had practiced the same skills as assiduously as the Allies. It was no God-given “trump card” as you seem to think. The Allies (again, not just the US) were superior to the Japanese in intelligence precisely because their intelligence skills gave them the ability to accurately predict basic battle plans, and orders of battle. It was poor Japanese communications security that allowed the Allies to do this, not something magical that was unfairly denied to the Japanese.
Never mind, you’re so good at confusing issues, you’ve even managed to confuse yourself. Not an important point.
Actually, my point was that lots of obsolete planes, then or later, labeled as “Flying Coffins” were being used by lots of air services on both sides in WW II. So what? If you want a good basis in WW II air combat in the Pacific read Bergerud’s “Fire In The Sky” but be warned; it’s 723 pages long.
Well, the IJN was ahead by only a few months, it’s a moot point since the USN did not plan any peace-time surprise attacks against shallow water harbors.
As far as the IJN is concerned, that isn’t what you said, you said they had “developed” shallow running torpedoes in 1936, which most certainly was not the case. Maybe you could post the sources for your assertion of 1936 Japanese shallow running torpedoes. The Navweaps site I referred you to clearly shows that the torpedoes used at Pearl Harbor were a a 1940 design, delivered to the fleet only in April, 1941,
"[i][b]45 cm (17.7") Type 91 (1931) Mod 2
.
Ship Class Used On Aircraft
Date Of Design 1940
Date In Service 1941
Weight 1,841 lbs. (935 kg)
Overall Length 216 in (5.486 m)
Negative Buoyancy 271 lbs. (123 kg)
Explosive Charge 452 lbs. (205 kg) Type 97
Power / Range / Speed 140 HP / 2,200 yards (2,000 m) / 41-43 knots
Propulsion Kerosene-air wet-heater
Wander Left or Right (max) N/A
Notes: Compared to Mod 1, Mod 2 had a heavier explosive charge, a thinner air vessel and anti-roll stabilizers. It was first delivered in April 1941 and was carried into action by “Betty” (G4M) bombers against the Prince of Wales and Repulse. A version of this torpedo heavily modified for use in shallow waters was carried by “Kate” (B5N) attack planes at Pearl Harbor."[/b][/i]
Most people would think mistaking a correction of your misrepresentation of my comment, as a “backpedal”, would be a sign of a serious personality disorder. But, I would charitably dismiss it as just poor memory. Don’t try to put that “apology” in the bank.
So what the citation was really saying is that the British thought the Japanese were physically better suited for jungle warfare. I’m assuming the comparison was being made to British, Australian, and Indian troops?
The citation also was saying that infiltration tactics were more adaptable than British tactics in Malaya or Burma; that has no reference to the American tactics used in New Guinea and Guadalcanal. Isn’t that correct?
There is nothing “silly” about it.
The definition of “better” in warfare is the side who wins their objective; of course, if the Japanese won an armored battle in the Philippines against an American tank unit, then by definition, on that day, in that place, under those circumstances, they were “better” at armored warfare. Which BTW, is a pretty succinct summation of my contentions.
But that skillful “fallback” on Okinawa cost them dearly, and in no way improved their overall position. In any case, they lost the battle for the island.
Call it what you want, the Japanese on Guadalcanal can’t be characterized as “expert Jungle fighters”, and they weren’t very skilled at fighting in the jungle; not once on Guadalcanal were the Japanese able to use the jungle to their advantage. As far as “difficult tactical maneuvers at night”, That was one of the “superior skills” the Japanese were supposed to possess, yet they screwed up such maneuvers on more than one occasion, on Guadalcanal.
Frankly, that’s bovine fecal matter.
If you could find an example of me “cherry-picking facts”, you’d have posted it by now, not just flung an unsupported accusation around. The very definition of “better”, as I’ve pointed out, is which side won their objective. So I guess it’s your contention that the Allies lost in New Guinea and Guadalcanal? That the inferior side won the war? That kill-ratios, casualty comparisons, loss ratios, and have no validity in deciding relative fighting power? I ask you this; if none of those quantitative measurements have no relevancy, what does?
My recollection was that it was most, being more than half, but on checking my source it appears it wasn’t quite. Only half.
On 9 August, the transports withdrew to Noumea. The unloading of supplies ended abruptly, and ships still half-full steamed away.
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USMC/USMC-C-Guadalcanal.html
Including the significant 2nd Marines’ HQ element.
… they also took the Marines still on board, including the 2d Marines’ headquarters element. Dropped off at the island of Espiritu Santo in the New Hebrides, the infantry Marines and their commander, Colonel Arthur, were most unhappy and remained so until they finally reached Guadalcanal on 29 October.
ibid.
Which included captured Japanese supplies.
The forces ashore had 17 days’ rations–after counting captured Japanese food …
ibid.
Not sure what a unit of fire is, but if it’s a day then that’s what they had. My source refers to it as “only four days’ supply” which suggests that it wasn’t sufficient for the intended purposes.
… and only four days’ supply of ammunition for all weapons.
ibid.
That sounds about right based on the accounts I have read. But it was not precisely “half” of every item category; some items were laded in their entirety, in other categories little or nothing was landed. For example, only 18 rolls of barbed wire was landed and no land mines, but almost all the artillery ammunition was landed.
I think your source is incorrect to refer to it as “four days supply”. A Unit of Fire is currently defined as a “basic load of ammunition”. This is an arbitrary amount of ammunition that each unit is authorized to have in it’s possession. Basically, it is calculated by figuring out how much ammunition each unit can carry and still reasonably perform it’s mission. I remember reading that a Unit of Fire for a division, or the equivalent unit, would be measured in “hundreds of tons.” Four units of fire would then be approximately four times what the First Marine Division normally could carry. But remember, for the Guadalcanal operation, most of the First Marine Division’s heavy transport vehicles had been left behind because they did not intend to move far, therefore a unit of fire for the First Marine Division would represent perhaps several times the ammunition it could carry.
Frank says, in Guadalcanal that it took four days of “concentrated labor” for the Marines, using captured Japanese Chevrolet trucks, to move their supplies off the beach to dispersal dumps. That suggests to me that they had more than enough ammo for all arms to fend off any possible Japanese counter attacks. I don’t recall reading any account where concern for the ammo supply was expressed. On 12 August, the first plane, Admiral McCain’s personal PBY amphibian, flew into Henderson Field and evacuated two wounded Marines, so, worst case, additional ammunition could have been flown in by DC-3’s.
Surely at the 'Canal they would have combat loaded the transports. That is, the most necessary equipment was loaded onboard last so it would be off loaded first.
And thus most of the vital equipment they needed was on the beach in the first days.
Deaf
Well, no, the transports carrying the First Marine Division were not combat loaded on leaving San Francisco; they were commercially loaded. They arrived at Wellington, New Zealand in two echelons, each of which had to be unloaded, and reloaded under the most difficult of circumstances. Wellington’s port facilities were severely limited to only five berths. The local longshoremen refused to work extra shifts, insisted on the traditional tea break in the afternoon, and since the shelter from the weather was limited, refused to work at all when a pelting rain storm developed just as the second echelon ships pulled into port. The Wellington police ended up ordering them off the docks, whereupon all dock labor became Marines.
The Marines, 300 per ship, worked around the clock, hampered by the heavy rains which destroyed the flimsy cardboard cartons much of the rations were packed in, dumping the contents into the puddles of rain, and turning the docks into dunes of soggy corn flakes, piles of cans without labels, intermingled with sodden paper pulp, clothing, decomposing candy bars and shredded cigarettes.
The Division supply officers realized that there were not be enough ships to combat load everything which had formerly fit into the same ships when commercially loaded, so much equipment, heavy transport vehicles for example, were left behind due to space restrictions. Also, the time element was lacking, so the landing was rescheduled from 1 August, to 7 August to allow enough time to finish reloading.
When the landings were commenced, much of the materials and equipment could not be unloaded because of the limited amount of labor available at Guadalcanal, and the severe shortage of heavy lighters, and large landing craft with ramps. Some supplies were left on the beach and lost to water damage for the same reason. Finally, unloading was delayed by Japanese air attack. Admiral Turner had estimated that complete unloading of the transports would take five days, but the US carriers under Fletcher, who had promised to stay for three days, withdrew after only 36 hours, and the Japanese thereafter had a free hand over the area of the landing beaches. Turner made a gutsy call after Fletcher had hot footed his carriers out of the combat zone, by continuing to unload without any air support or an adequate surface screen, but even he had to stop unloading when the Japanese bombers attacked and could only resume it after they left.
Richard Frank covers all this, and more, in his book, “Guadalcanal”, and explains why the logistical support effort was so difficult. The two big factors that emerge are poor planning by the US planning staff, and the fact that Europe and Operation Torch had priority over the Pacific, and received everything they needed; Operation Watchtower (Unofficially Operation Shoestring) got the leftovers.
I thought that Shaw, as an official historian for four decades of the USMC in WWII and later wars, was a fairly reliable source as the author of First Offensive from which I quoted.
FIRST OFFENSIVE: The Marine Campaign for Guadalcanal
by Henry I. Shaw, Jr.Sources
The basic source work for this booklet is the first volume in the series History of U.S. Marine Corps Operations in World War II, Pearl Harbor to Guadalcanal, written by LtCol Frank O. Hough, Maj Verle E. Ludwig, and Henry I. Shaw, Jr. (Washington: Historical Branch, G-3 Division, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1958). Other books used in writing this narrative were: BGen Samuel B. Griffith II, The Battle for Guadalcanal (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott, 1963); Gen Alexander A. Vandegrift as told to Robert B. Asprey, Once a Marine: The Memoirs of General A. A. Vandegrift, USMC (New York: W.W. Norton, 1964); Col Mitchell Paige, A Marine Named Mitch (New York: Vantage Press, 1975); Burke Davis, Marine: The Life of Chesty Puller (Boston: Little, Brown, 1962); George McMillan, The Old Breed: A History of the 1st Marine Division in World War II (Washington: Infantry Journal Press, 1949); and Richard W. Johnston, Follow Me! The Story of the Second Marine Division in World War II (New York: Random House, 1948).
The correspondence of General Vandegrift with General Holcomb and other senior Marines, held at the Marine Corps Historical Center, was helpful. Equally of value were conversations that the author had had with General Vandegrift after his retirement. In the course of his career as a Marine historian, the author has talked with other Guadalcanal veterans of all ranks; hopefully, this has resulted in a “feel” for the campaign, essential in writing such an overview.
The literature on the Guadalcanal operation is extensive. In addition to the books cited above, there are several which are personally recommended to the interested reader: Robert Leckie, Helmet for My Pillow (New York: Random House, 1957); Herbert Merillat, Guadalcanal Remembered (New York: Dodd, Mead, 1982); John Miller, Jr., The United States Army in World War II: The War in the Pacific; Guadalcanal, The First Offensive (Washington: Historical Division, Department of the Army, 1949); T. Grady Gallant, On Valor’s Side (New York: Doubleday, 1963); Robert Sherrod, History of Marine Corps Aviation in World War II (Washington: Combat Forces Press, 1952); Maj John L. Zimmerman, The Guadalcanal Campaign (Washington: Historical Division, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1949); RAdm Samuel E. Morison, The Struggle for Guadalcanal: History of United States Naval Operations in World War II, Vol V (Boston: Little, Brown, 1950); and a recent, comprehensive account, Richard B. Frank, Guadalcanal (New York: Random House, 1990).
Henry I. Shaw, Jr.About the Author
Henry I. Shaw, Jr., former chief historian of the History and Museums Division, was a Marine Corps historian from 1951-1990. He attended The Citadel, 1943-1944, and was graduated with a bachelor of arts cum laude in history from Hope College, Holland, Michigan. He received a master of arts degree from Columbia University. Mr. Shaw served as a Marine in both World War II and the Korean War. He is the co-author of four of the five volumes of the official history of Marine Corps operations in World War II and was the senior editor of most of the official histories of Marines in Vietnam. In addition, he has written a number of brief Marine Corps histories. He has written many articles on military history and has had more than 50 signed book reviews.
http://www.nps.gov/archive/wapa/indepth/extContent/usmc/pcn-190-003117-00/sec7.htm
… to refer to it as “four days supply”. A Unit of Fire is currently defined as a “basic load of ammunition”.
Was that the definition applied to the Marines in 1942 on Guadalcanal?
I don’t recall anyone referring to you as a “racist” here, and I think we share what I believe are your general attitudes towards the, say, present refusal of the Japanese gov’t admit–and indeed–to largely ignore, minimize, or rationalize its WWII war-crimes as a “advances” or “exaggerated instances” in China, against Allied POWs, and just about any place they occupied. I’m no fan of the IJA’s wartime conduct and their wanton brutality and the commands hoisting the pseudo-Code of Bushido onto the average (peasant) soldier, to whom such a code was never meant to apply too as codified by its Samurai adherents, many of whom would have found such policies offensive and alien IIRC. I think Bradley covers this pretty well in Flyboys, where he examines the complete shift in Imperial Japanese Army attitudes in the 1920s to the “third force,” spirit warrior mentality was fostered after the Russo-Japanese War, a conflict predating such notions and in which surrender was not necessarily considered dishonorable beyond any western exceptions regarding the “means to resist”. Furthermore, the Japanese captured thousands, even hundreds of thousands, of Russians servicemen and treated them relatively well along the lines of what would be the Geneva Convention, and accepted the repatriation of their POWs after the war with no stain of dishonor.
I can only guess that you took one of my comments regarding Allied prewar attitudes, specifically those of the British on the Malayan peninsula, regarding the Japanese as racial inferiors who–because of their sloping eyes–couldn’t accurately fire rifles, fly aircraft, nor match western tactics. Such notions were falsely comforting for the average Tommie. I believe this was somewhat mirrored in the US commands (sink-us CINCUS :lol: ) and contributed to the shock of the initial Japanese successes. I wasn’t attacking you personally, I was merely stating the obvious, that one must “know thy enemy” as Sun Tzu stated, and that hubris (false conceptions) is one of the factors that loses battles. And of course, the Japanese false belief, or hope, that the Allies would never be able to fight it out in brutal infantry engagements, or the spirit warrior could overcome the superiority of enemy organic (weapons carried by infantry) firepower, was a xenophobic farce on the other end of the spectrum–as was their treatment of western POWs as “cowards,” Japanese POWs were not regarded at cowards necessarily only a generation earlier as the IJA had originally been organized along the lines western militaries, as had their codes of conduct…
I think my point was also that some in the west began to have a trepidation and a, I false notion that the ‘animalistic’ Japanese could not be defeated by western troops raised under democracy and enlightened humanism. This notion, and I’ve never said anything different, was equally false and I believe even in the Malayan campaign, the Australians holding their ground and surprising the Japanese, cycling to victory after victory on their bicycles, and massacred several hundred IJA in a series of tactical engagements and showed the IJA certainly would panic and run when their expectations were confounded, and that they were certainly no ‘supermen’…
I agree with pretty much everything else you said, with perhaps one exception. The infiltration tactics that the Japanese favored (when they were fortuitous enough to be on the offensive) were largely adopted by the Chinese Peoples Liberation Army and again used to good effect against US soldiers in Korea. The marines performed much better there, but the US Army apparently forgot how to tie in their flanks, conduct defense in-depth, and organize mutually supporting positions until Gen. Ridgeway virtually retrained, and rewired the brains of the US Army in 1951. But that is a digression to another thread…
You’re probably thinking of the large scale Gemas ambush, although the Australians didn’t hold their ground after the ambush for reasons largely beyond their control but that was typical of the Malayan disaster where a cascading series of defeats and disasters saw the Commonwealth forces fall back in some disarray towards Singapore:
On the ground, British and Indian troops were also pushed back during December and early January. Some Australian transport and ambulance drivers saw early action alongside Indian troops, but the first major Australian battle was not until 14-15 January 1942. A company of the 2/30th Battalion, commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Frederick Galleghan, mounted an ambush which cut down hundreds of Japanese soldiers riding bicycles through a cutting and over a bridge on the Sungei Gemencheh river. Their plan was to withdraw and let the main battalion group at Gemas fight the main battle. As the ambush party withdrew, they found themselves encircled by Japanese patrols but most managed to get through. The battle for Gemas raged that night and next day and on the afternoon of 15 January the Japanese called in aircraft and tanks and the Australians withdrew.
http://www.ww2australia.gov.au/japadvance/malaya.html
The Japanese didn’t panic in these circumstances but rallied and regrouped and pushed on hard against the Commonwealth forces until the Commonwealth forces duly surrendered in Singapore.
Well, it appears Shaw should be a reliable source, but based on the various military manuals and articles I have read, I still think he is wrong to equate a “unit of fire” to a “day’s worth of ammunition”.
First of all, a “day’s worth of ammunition”, quantitatively, is a very imprecise measure, especially for a large unit like a regiment or a division. The Marines on Guadalcanal were seldom all in action at the same time; a routine day might see minor patrols, and maybe some small firefights to suppress sniper activity on the perimeter. There might be a few artillery fire missions to harass suspected Japanese activities within a few miles of the Marine’s positions, but in perspective, these would involve a very small fraction of the entire Marine force. And the ammunition expended certainly wouldn’t amount to a “unit of fire”, so how would that be a “day’s worth of fire”?
On the other hand, there were times when practically every Marine on Guadalcanal was on the highest alert because a major Japanese attack was expected. If it developed, a major proportion, or even all, of the Division’s “basic load of ammunition” might might be expended in a few hours, so it seems difficult, and rather pointless, to define a unit of measure of ammunition in terms of a specific time period like a day.
Over a long term, in a similar environment, and against the same enemy using the same tactics, it might be possible to develop average expenditures of ammunition, but early in the war, with no recent experience in large scale combat operations, that seems like a rather dangerous way to approach the issue.
The definition of “unit of fire” in terms of what could be transported by a given unit of troops seems to make much more sense, at least for the purpose of planning operations. Moreover, everything I have read points to the conclusion that a “unit of fire” was meant to represent a logistical concept linked to moving and storing ammunition and ordnance from factory (or depot) to an operational zone, and finally down to the individual Marine or soldier. Since, they were combat troops, support troops, and specialists all mixed into large units like divisions, who would have differing needs, in terms of ammunition supply on a daily basis, defining a unit’s, say a platoon’s, needs in terms of time doesn’t really make much sense.
I believe it was, but I can’t yet confirm that, all the sources I have found, save one, are post war. Obviously, the concept behind the term was in use in 1942. The one source that discusses a “unit of fire” strictly in WW II context is a US Army publication, and the Marines, of course, were US Navy. The term “unit of fire” was a logistical measurement, but I do not know if it was used the same way in Navy logistics jargon, as it was in Army logistics speak.
Wizard,
Pity they didn’t beach the ships like the Japanese later did and accept the lost of a few ships for the benefit of the supplies on the beach. Those Marines sorely need everything they could get!
As for the longshoremen, I understand even in Germany many of them didn’t work extended hours till near the end of the war! Funny how people will declare war and try to kill the other guy but won’t be so serious as to generate as much material as they can till they are neck deep in trouble.
Deaf
Well, I guess Turner wasn’t quite that desperate. He needed those ships for continued resupply, and he had Japanese air attacks to worry about. Remember, when the Japanese beached their ships on Guadalcanal to facilitate unloading, they still lost more than 50% of their cargoes to air attack, either on the beach before the material could be dispersed, or on the ships themselves when they were set afire.
I didn’t know about the German Longshoremen, but it doesn’t surprise me. Civilian labor problems were a feature of logistics in the Pacific. I understand there were sometimes similar problems encountered in Australian and other ports. Also American civilian seaman, who were mostly unionized, sometimes refused the orders of military authorities when they did not accord with union work rules.
Wizard,
It wasn’t just longshoreman in Germany. The German government didn’t even push for two and three shifts in the factories till late in the war! And women didn’t work in those factories till near the end.
Some of this undoubtedly is because they had slave labor, but still their population didn’t get serious about it till it was too late.
I think the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey while indicating the bombing did slow down the manufacture, the Germans still upped the production because they had slack (that is, the factories were idle at night and by making a third shift they increased production to make up the difference.)
But I guess you are right, at Guadalcanal we didn’t have all that many transports. But we sure did need those supplies!
I often wonder how the Marines would have faired if the Army had given them Garands to take to the 'canal. I bet more dead Japanese!
Deaf
That’s interesting. I have heard others on various forums saying the same things. However, since my interests lie mainly in the Pacific war, I haven’t studied Germany or Europe all that extensively. I have read Adam Tooze’s book, “The Wages of Destruction”. Tooze claims that Germany’s economy was one of the most highly mobilized of all the belligerents during WW II. If that is the case, I don’t know why most factories weren’t running at least two shifts, and a third, if possible. Perhaps it was a shortage of manpower?
As for women, Tooze says (pages 513-515), “One obvious solution was a further mobilization of German women. It has become a commonplace to compare the mobilization of Germany’s female labor force in World War II unfavorably to that of Britain. This, however, ignores the obvious. As we have seen, German women in 1939 were already more actively engaged in the labor force than Britain’s women were to be even at the end of the war. When the chief statistician of the Reich Labor Ministry investigated the issue in the autumn of 1943, using data that were very unfavorable to Germany, he arrived at the conclusion that the share of women in war work was 25.4 per cent in the United States, 33.1 per cent in Britain and 34 per cent in Germany. Another comparative study in the spring of 1944 arrived at the same conclusion.”
But Tooze also states, “These are not the kind of figures which could have made much difference. Germany needed not hundreds of thousands but millions of additional workers.”
As I speculated, it would seem that Germany’s problem wasn’t underutilized manufacturing capacity (which did exist), but lack of manpower to utilize it. But I am just guessing.
Yes, but as it turned out that wasn’t the critical issue. What allowed the Marines to hold out, was denying supplies to the Japanese on the island, and that was accomplished by quickly putting Henderson Field into operation, and keeping it operating
An interesting question. Having seen practical demonstrations of what a few ex-Marines can do with an '03, I wouldn’t give the Japanese good odds in either case.
Yes, but it wasn’t by any means a straightforward issue involving a consistent oppostion to the Allied effort or even just plain bloody-mindedness and selfishness, although there were certainly some deplorable instances of wharfies (stevedores / longshoremen) refusing to work ships when we were in our greatest peril and later when our servicemen were putting their lives on the line overseas as we rolled Japan back.
The wharfies’ union had significant communist elements and alignments which resulted in strong opposition to Japan before the war because of its actions in China, partly as opposition to fascism and partly in support for the communists in China. These attitudes were to some extent compounded by White Australia (i.e. exclude Asian migrants) policies and attitudes which were hostile to the perceived ‘Yellow Peril’ on labour and cheap import grounds of concern to workers.
This resulted in refusals to work some Japanese ships and ships taking war materials to Japan and in a major confrontation between the wharfies and the Federal Government in 1938 over exports of potential war materials to Japan, which the wharfies more or less won.
The Moscow aligned elements in the wharfies’ union saw the European war 1939-41 as essentially a conflict between imperialists which they opposed. But when the USSR was attacked they did an about face and generally supported the Allied effort as it represented a defence of the USSR and communism.
The foregoing is a vast oversimplification of complex issues and events, but it’ll do to sketch the bare bones of it.
After the war the wharfies were opposed to the Dutch attempts to suppress Indonesian independence and carried this through to bans on working on Dutch ships and on handling arms etc destined for the Dutch in Indonesia.
History has shown that those radical and determined wharfies, although condemned by the establishment and other political (notably the social - or socialist depending upon your point of view -democratic Labor Party which governed Australia for most of the war) and social elements at the time, were generally ahead of their time in their opposition to and support for such things. It’s ironic that they did it very much in support of communism as represented by the USSR, where they would not have been allowed the same liberty to protest against government policies and actions, not that that’s the only time that particular irony has been played out in a democratic nation.
The Germans upped production in 1944 despite massive bombing because Albert Speer was a genius (one of the few truly capable ‘golden eagles’ in the Nazi leadership caste). Part of this is because the Germans only went to a full War economy very late, not until 1942 IIRC. Hitler also had some bizarre fetish for still trying to provide the illusion that he could give the German people both guns AND butter by still manufacturing consumer goods until late. The other reason is that they simply dispersed factories away from urban centers that were so convenient for bombing. We can also argue the overall effectiveness of strategic bombing in terms of cost vs. benefit, and in the humanitarian concerns of incinerating and suffocating civilians whose morale never really broke. Remember too, the Germans had an acute labor manpower shortage that had to be partially rectified by using unreliable slave labor.
As a side note, for instance, I’ve been told NEVER to fire a Browning High Power 9mm manufactured under the period of German occupation in Belgium --as you might get a meal of steel. 
…
I often wonder how the Marines would have faired if the Army had given them Garands to take to the 'canal. I bet more dead Japanese!
Deaf
Well, they always could have clubbed an Army National Guardsman over the head and taken his. I imagine a few were able pick up weapons and exchange their Springfields for M-1s from casualties…
Interesting. I don’t know much about it, but there are strong rumors that the US Naval Intelligence were sort of forced to bed the devil and make deals with La Cosa Nostra in order to fully secure the Port of New York and to prevent ‘accidents’ from happening…
I imagine it went something like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PXJk72St01Q
I wouldn’t have been shocked if they did now and then…
John George, in his book, “Shots Fired in Anger”, spoke of how an American rifle squad with Garands could and did take on a whole platoon of Japanese, and win.
He was on the 'Canal near the end after the Army took over alot of the responsiblities. He was very impressed when a large number of Japanese did a banzai charge and three GIs in a fox hole in front of him chopped them to bits (with his help as he had a '03 with scope, but he had only 3 rounds in the gun.)
I feel at Edson’s ridge they would have stopped them much quicker with less casualties. Same goes for at Alligator Creek (Battle of the Tenaru.)
Nothing back then would beat 30 or 40 GIs firing aimed rapid fire with Garands.
Deaf
We can argue all day and all night about the quality of the Japanese troops and their equipment, but the more interesting argument, it seems to me, is about the the people who directed their forces and determined their strategy. I think the attack Pearl Harbor was a death wish on the part of the Japanese, a kamikaze operation guaranteed to result in their defeat. The Japanese tactics in this attack were pretty brilliant, but they had no follow through worthy of the name, and “brilliance” has to be taken with a grain of salt too because the failure to either 1) occupy Hawaii or 2) destroy its vast oil storage facilities didn’t help the Japanese either.
The worst mistake of all was the most basic - they didn’t need to attack to US at all because of the neutrality act the US would not have been able to declare war on Japan, period. This fact is poorly understood in this forum, it seems, and it shows just how incredibly stupid the Japanese really were.
As for equipment. the Japanese aircraft were well up to the task and their torpedoes were second to none; the latter were never surpassed by anyone during the war, but the former were quickly surpassed and had some pretty bad Achilles’ heels. The use of aircraft carriers showed that, tactically, the Japanese for the most part, were well ahead of the US and Great Britain in naval doctrine, but that superiority didn’t last very long - Coral Sea and Midway settled that issue.
Most of the world’s navies and armies didn’t get along all that well, but the Japanese made a virtue out of interservice hatred that set a whole new standard for no one to emulate.
I agree with just about everything you write except for your reading of the US Neutrality Act of 1939. The Japanese did not need to attack Pearl Harbor, but certainly not because of the Neutrality Act. The reasoning Admiral Yamamoto advanced for the very risky air attack on PH was that the IJN needed to be able to operate in the western Pacific free of any interference from the US Pacific Fleet stationed at PH. Neither he, nor the Japanese High Command, realized that the US war plan for the Pacific was to stand on the defensive in the Pacific, until the defeat of Nazi Germany had been assured. The US plan was to initially defend only a strategic line from Alaska to Hawaii to the Panama Canal, and the sea lanes of communication to Australia. Admiral Kimmel, the commander of the US Pacific Fleet, apparently had some plan for an early war excursion to the Marshall islands, part of the Japanese Mandate, with hopes that the Japanese fleet would respond and open itself to an ambush. But with the reality of a 2 to 1 Japanese superiority in carriers, such a plan probably would have resulted in a US defeat had it been implemented. Admiral Kimmel, absent the attack on PH, almost certainly would have found that the Pacific Fleet, already short of the required supporting ships that any sortie into the western Pacific would have necessitated, would have found his forces further eroded by transfers to the Atlantic theater. The response that Admiral Yamamoto imagined the US Pacific Fleet would automatically launch against Japan just wasn’t in the cards, thus the Japanese attack on PH was absolutely unnecessary.
The Neutrality Act of 1939 would not have prevented a declaration of war against Japan had that country attacked only British and Dutch possessions in the western Pacific. It certainly had not prevented an undeclared war at sea against Germany in the Atlantic in the Fall of 1941. The Neutrality Act provisionsw dealt primarily with trading arms and war materials to belligerent nations by US citizens, with US merchant ships being armed and carrying war materials to belligerents, and with US citizens taking passage on the ships of belligerent nations. (see http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/WorldWar2/neutrality.htm)
The question that does arise, is would Roosevelt have been able to command enough votes in Congress had Japan not attacked PH, or any other US possessions? In my opinion, it would have been almost certain that the US Congress would have eventually declared war against Japan if they had attack only Malaya, Borneo and the NEI, although probably not immediately. Attacks on these possessions would have been tantamount to Japan joining the European war on Germany’s side, and the US was already fully committed to ensuring that Britain was not defeated in that war. As it was, Japan originally planned on attacking the Philippines concurrent with the attacks on the British and Dutch, without an attack on PH. The plan to attack PH was only added, at Yamamoto’s insistence, to the Japanese strategic plan after much opposition and debate within Japanese military circles.