No Barbabarossa, no PH?

[elkarlo]

OOC if the Germans didn't launch Barbarossa in 41, would the Japanese not have gone to war with the WAlliees?

I know that the Japanese had realized that they were running out of oil, and that by Dec 41, they were at a die or die point. But did the calculations take into consideration the Germans tying up the Soviets? Or were the Japanese so irrational at this point that they had already marched into the Abyss, and there was no turning back now?

just curious if anyone has any actual specifics here.

Thanks

 

[TimPhillips]

OOC if the Germans didn't launch Barbarossa in 41, would the Japanese not have gone to war with the WAlliees?

just curious if anyone has any actual specifics here.

Thanks

Amusingly, I've been reading John Toland's The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire, 1936–1945 over breakfast the last few weeks.

Japan's course of action was independent of what Germany was doing. If Germany's action distracted potential opponents in the Pacific Theater...fine...if not...the overwhelming majority were convinced that superior Japanese spirit would assure them of the win anyways. When I read books about the Japanese government, I get a profound sense of a leadership that was insulated from reality and prone to repeating the same emotional facts about their inherent superiority and the enemy's weaknesses. Very few leaders were like Yamamoto, who had lived outside Japan for an extended period of time and had an honest - if unpopular - assessment of Japan's enemies.

I think that even if at the 11th hour Roosevelt had blinked and lifted the embargos that were crippling Japan...they would have still attacked. It might have taken a couple of years to happen, but the internal pressure caused by senior leaders who found any restriction on Japan's will infuriating and sought freedom via military force would have pushed things over the brink. If Roosevelt had backed down, it would have seen as proof that the US was weak and that Japan could simply take what it wanted.

Tim

 

[lycan]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fleet_Faction

 

[Dan]

Purely Opinion:

Japan was already comitted to Pearl Harbour. It was an attack against America, not in support of Germany or it's other allies.

I suspect that even if the European war had been avoided or postponed, there is a strong chance that the course of the South East Asian war would have remained more or less the same.