Jasen777
Donor
I say again, just like Viet Nam was a US rollover. NVN had no chance of winning in Viet Nam.
Because those wars are exactly the same.
What If Japan Wins WW2?
- Thread starter Errnge
- Start date
Because those wars are exactly the same.
You'd have to have the Nazis do a lot better. Maybe replace Goering with somebody who didn't try to take everything that had ANYTHING to do with flying from everybody else.
Have a strong naval air arm that manages to do a lot more damage at dunkirk, a significantly smaller French-British army survives.
Also send somebody else to Africa other than Rommel, let's just stick with Blairwitches Manstein and have him do better against a significantly weakened British Army.
Do something about Italy...though I have no idea how.
Have Japan force the Americans into a fait accompli where the Americans declare war, being the aggressors. Japan takes the Phillipines with their carrier fleet while only 2 or 3 carriers sail out with the Battleships for the "decisive battle" The Americans do the same and finangle a pyrrhic victory for the Japanese qhere they and the Americans pretty much lose everything. The lessons each force takes away are different. The Japanese just lost most of their big gun battleships which were stupid expensive. They saw the strength the limited number of carrier planes they had on the American flotilla although this goes largely unnoticed by the Americans who decide that they should just invest in more big-gun battleships.
Each nation now has to rebuild their capital ships, by round 2 about 2 years later (During this 2 year period you have the war largely fought by escort carriers, cruisers, and submarines). The American Atlantic fleet gets moved to the Pacific and plays it safe with occasional raids into Japanese homewaters. The Japanese largely counter with submarines and use their carriers to conquer new territory. At the end of two years time. The Japanese have greatly improved their anti-submarine warfare activities and have dumped everything into carriers with nominal building of Battleships. The Americans have done the reverse, building an impressive amount of Battleships and concentrating their carriers for air and anti-submarine warfare defense.
The last decisive battle ends with (likely) another Pyrrhic victory where Japan loses all its pilots in a glorious air battle over the American fleet and bombs and torpedoes them into oblivion 200 km from where the Japanese fleet is.
The Americans lose many lives, they no longer want to participate and figure victory in Europe was good enough and bang out a treaty which tries to preserve each nations pride.
However Japan loses everything in mainland China and Korea as well as Sakhalin as the Russians take it all.
A three-way cold war sets in but with Japan as the "junior" world power. Now it gets to figure out how to dominate Islands with 100's of different spoken languages and who hate the Japanese with gusto. Japans empire will probably crumble after fighting 30 different Vietnams probably including one IN Vietnam.
P.S: Oh right, and do SOMETHING about signal security...Jesus. You can also help out by some bright Japanese engineer designing tricycle carriages for airplanes. Also vastly stepping up training after it becomes apparent that carriers are useless without fckin pilots.
Have a strong naval air arm that manages to do a lot more damage at dunkirk, a significantly smaller French-British army survives.
Also send somebody else to Africa other than Rommel, let's just stick with Blairwitches Manstein and have him do better against a significantly weakened British Army.
Do something about Italy...though I have no idea how.
Have Japan force the Americans into a fait accompli where the Americans declare war, being the aggressors. Japan takes the Phillipines with their carrier fleet while only 2 or 3 carriers sail out with the Battleships for the "decisive battle" The Americans do the same and finangle a pyrrhic victory for the Japanese qhere they and the Americans pretty much lose everything. The lessons each force takes away are different. The Japanese just lost most of their big gun battleships which were stupid expensive. They saw the strength the limited number of carrier planes they had on the American flotilla although this goes largely unnoticed by the Americans who decide that they should just invest in more big-gun battleships.
Each nation now has to rebuild their capital ships, by round 2 about 2 years later (During this 2 year period you have the war largely fought by escort carriers, cruisers, and submarines). The American Atlantic fleet gets moved to the Pacific and plays it safe with occasional raids into Japanese homewaters. The Japanese largely counter with submarines and use their carriers to conquer new territory. At the end of two years time. The Japanese have greatly improved their anti-submarine warfare activities and have dumped everything into carriers with nominal building of Battleships. The Americans have done the reverse, building an impressive amount of Battleships and concentrating their carriers for air and anti-submarine warfare defense.
The last decisive battle ends with (likely) another Pyrrhic victory where Japan loses all its pilots in a glorious air battle over the American fleet and bombs and torpedoes them into oblivion 200 km from where the Japanese fleet is.
The Americans lose many lives, they no longer want to participate and figure victory in Europe was good enough and bang out a treaty which tries to preserve each nations pride.
However Japan loses everything in mainland China and Korea as well as Sakhalin as the Russians take it all.
A three-way cold war sets in but with Japan as the "junior" world power. Now it gets to figure out how to dominate Islands with 100's of different spoken languages and who hate the Japanese with gusto. Japans empire will probably crumble after fighting 30 different Vietnams probably including one IN Vietnam.
P.S: Oh right, and do SOMETHING about signal security...Jesus. You can also help out by some bright Japanese engineer designing tricycle carriages for airplanes. Also vastly stepping up training after it becomes apparent that carriers are useless without fckin pilots.
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BlondieBC
Banned
I think you have fixed the Italy issue with your first two POD. A stronger naval air arm inflicts noticeably more casualties at Dunkirk and they will get some other RN ships in other engagements such as the battle for Norway. You have to pick a few numbers, but say 2 capital ships, 4 cruisers and 10 destroyers are sunk or under long term repairs for the RN. These actions will likely lower pressure on the Italian navy and may well butterfly major Italian losses from OTL. With much of the BEF out of action, and the German Navy doing better we likely have a good bit less forces less in North Africa, and if Germany still reinforces as you suggest, then the Egyptian front for the Germans is secure. If you make the progress great enough to cancel Torch, Italy can make it until the end of the war. It is a matter of getting the German performance "enough" better.
The pilot issue was known, but was ignored. The staff officers had estimated that 15K pilots per year need to be trained each year for a war. It was ignored. So was the issue of not coming out with enough newer planes after the war started. Neither was an accident. The Japanese Navy really believed they would win a 6 months war 100% of time, and lose any war over 24 months 100% of time. It was not just a slogan. So they adjusted their strategy to live with this reality. There is not reason for newer model planes since they can't come into service before the 6 month window. Maximize current model production runs, bring out new models after the war. It is only a 6-12 month pause in R&D anyway. Also, have marvelously trained pilots with lavish resources into training. Don't waste resources on training programs that really matter after the 6 month window of victory. The navy had a fairly accurate understanding of how the war would played out.
The failing was more at the Army and national government level, where there was no realistic plan on how to make a peace offer the USA would accept. If someone has the details on what the offer was to be and why they though the USA would accept, i would love to see them. For the USA to accept before 6 months is over, the offer for peace need to be made no latter than the end of February 1942 to allow time of acceptance. The terms have to be reasonable, and not changing so as the USA keeps losing battles, the terms become more reasonable. And you can't mistreat POW. So many issues with the diplomacy. IMO, the Japanese had an unsolvable diplomatic problem, so they just assumed the USA would 'magically' accept terms.
BlondieBC
Banned
The racism is impossible to fix without butterflying away OTL. The USA was angry with Japan by 1916 and furious over Yap by 1919. Even with a democratic Japan with a government structure identical to the USA, the USA and Japan are hostile over competing interests. It comes down to both sides want to call the shots in China, and obviously both can't. The USA strong China policy conflicts with Japan conquered China policy. And the dispute predates the military actions as a trade dispute.
Asking "What if Japan won WW2" is about as relevant as asking "What if the French had tanks at Agincourt", and the two scenarios are equally likely.
Hyperion
Banned
The vast majority of German forces during the war where tied up fighting the Russians, and had been going back and forth with the British in North Africa since December 1940.
As for the US involvement in Europe, B-17 bomber missions where going on during the summer of 1942 onwards, and the first major US landing was Operation Torch, in November of 1942.
After that you had Operation Husky, the Allied invasion of Sicily, which actually had a larger invasion force tha D-Day in and of itself.
Then there was of course the Italian campaign. You had US troops fighting on the European mainland close to a year before D-Day actually occured.
Japan can't win world war 2 just based on the sheer economics of. The reason Japan held out so long was because the US and Britain were largely fighting from 1941-mid 1945 with one hand tied behind their backs with the Germany-first policy. If Japan had been doing well enough to justift a shift in resources, Japan suddenly stops having success. This article is probably the most cited article on the board-I think it should be sticked personally, but that's me.
http://www.combinedfleet.com/economic.htm
http://www.combinedfleet.com/economic.htm
Bumping OneUp and Blondie's points
Japan "winning" WW2 was based on the 6 month strategy.
When you think about it- it ALMOST worked exactly as planned, but the British and US weren't sufficiently vulnerable for the six-months campaign to accomplish its mission of stunning them into surrender.
Yamamoto himself made the point that the IJN would have a happy time through 1942 and then the USA and UK would crush them with overwhelming forces.
Being a military professional- he understood the calculus of manufacturing capacity and logsitics that meant doom for the Japanese, no matter how good they fought.
Them being ten times better than your opponent at the beginning ceases to matter when twenty or thirty come over the hill capably led, better equipped and ready to kick ass as happened OTL.
There was no way in heck that Japan could industrialize itself, Korea, or Manchukuo or get enough online in DEI and various other bits conquered to effectively exploit their resources to change that calculus enough to matter.
You'd need to have thirty years of really detailed planning and development pre-war, plus Japanese willingness to develop everyone in their Empire to make that possible. I say ASB.
IMO the Nazis had a number of problems that doomed them we've discussed until they're no longer even carbon atoms, but clouds of quarks that USED to be horses.
In essence, the Nazis themselves had no fucking idea how to play the long game. They hoped blitzkrieg would conquer Europe, air attack and U-boats convince the UK to quit, and the USA wouldn't bother getting involved before the Germans went on their crusade to crush Bolshevism in the USSR.
There's been numerous WI's about whether Nazi Germany could have fully mobilized for war from 1939 on and actively developed Europe's human and natural resources to confront the USSR on something of an even match.
Tweaking the KM naval aviation arm (the Osterkamp variation I call it) has some tasty possibilities I'll sum up quickly.
Barring major POD's in industrial policy going back to 1930- upscaling shipbuilding, standardizing aircraft engines, and giving the German KMFK
thousands of planes and pilots to work with for roughly a decade so they're skilled in carrier and counter-naval ops to be a credible, game-changing threat
you get some worse losses for the RN and MN in France and Norway, but not
strategic game-changing defeats IMO.
Navies are massive resource sinks that take a very long time to establish and train that Germany had neither the industrial plant or budget to establish or maintain.
Germany avoided going full-bore on matching the RN or USN in surface forces, CV's etc b/c they could either have a second-class fleet and NO army or air force
OR they could build an army and air force semi-secretly that could quickly punk continental neighbors. U-boats were cheap snipers and good at commerce raiding.
A bit better coordination with Condors or FL X medium bombers @ AWACS giving wolf packs better C3I could have increased Allied MM tonnage lost, but the Condors were vulnerable themselves.
I"ve played Axis and Allies a lot and taken Germany to win, but by NOT being the Nazis.
Japan "winning" WW2 was based on the 6 month strategy.
When you think about it- it ALMOST worked exactly as planned, but the British and US weren't sufficiently vulnerable for the six-months campaign to accomplish its mission of stunning them into surrender.
Yamamoto himself made the point that the IJN would have a happy time through 1942 and then the USA and UK would crush them with overwhelming forces.
Being a military professional- he understood the calculus of manufacturing capacity and logsitics that meant doom for the Japanese, no matter how good they fought.
Them being ten times better than your opponent at the beginning ceases to matter when twenty or thirty come over the hill capably led, better equipped and ready to kick ass as happened OTL.
There was no way in heck that Japan could industrialize itself, Korea, or Manchukuo or get enough online in DEI and various other bits conquered to effectively exploit their resources to change that calculus enough to matter.
You'd need to have thirty years of really detailed planning and development pre-war, plus Japanese willingness to develop everyone in their Empire to make that possible. I say ASB.
IMO the Nazis had a number of problems that doomed them we've discussed until they're no longer even carbon atoms, but clouds of quarks that USED to be horses.
In essence, the Nazis themselves had no fucking idea how to play the long game. They hoped blitzkrieg would conquer Europe, air attack and U-boats convince the UK to quit, and the USA wouldn't bother getting involved before the Germans went on their crusade to crush Bolshevism in the USSR.
There's been numerous WI's about whether Nazi Germany could have fully mobilized for war from 1939 on and actively developed Europe's human and natural resources to confront the USSR on something of an even match.
Tweaking the KM naval aviation arm (the Osterkamp variation I call it) has some tasty possibilities I'll sum up quickly.
Barring major POD's in industrial policy going back to 1930- upscaling shipbuilding, standardizing aircraft engines, and giving the German KMFK
thousands of planes and pilots to work with for roughly a decade so they're skilled in carrier and counter-naval ops to be a credible, game-changing threat
you get some worse losses for the RN and MN in France and Norway, but not
strategic game-changing defeats IMO.
Navies are massive resource sinks that take a very long time to establish and train that Germany had neither the industrial plant or budget to establish or maintain.
Germany avoided going full-bore on matching the RN or USN in surface forces, CV's etc b/c they could either have a second-class fleet and NO army or air force
OR they could build an army and air force semi-secretly that could quickly punk continental neighbors. U-boats were cheap snipers and good at commerce raiding.
A bit better coordination with Condors or FL X medium bombers @ AWACS giving wolf packs better C3I could have increased Allied MM tonnage lost, but the Condors were vulnerable themselves.
I"ve played Axis and Allies a lot and taken Germany to win, but by NOT being the Nazis.
I think the hope was to neutralize the navy and force a settlement in Japan's favor, and in a hurry. Yamamoto knew he'd have about a year to run amuk, before American industry started pumping out weapons faster than they could be destroyed.
You need a little bit of a POD here, but if you could keep Japan a little less hardcore in the 30s you might be able to swing a Japanese diplomatic victory in WW2.
If Britain and Japan are a little more cozy, and Japanese hasn't done anything TOO atrocious is China, maybe Japan can offer up support for Britain against Germany in exchange for Japanese permission to occupy Indo-China and recognition of Manchukuo.
I'm just not sure how you get the POD is all. With Germany defeated in WW1, Japan becomes the number 1 threat in the Pacific to the UK, so you need a lot of political wrangling to deal with that.
If Britain and Japan are a little more cozy, and Japanese hasn't done anything TOO atrocious is China, maybe Japan can offer up support for Britain against Germany in exchange for Japanese permission to occupy Indo-China and recognition of Manchukuo.
I'm just not sure how you get the POD is all. With Germany defeated in WW1, Japan becomes the number 1 threat in the Pacific to the UK, so you need a lot of political wrangling to deal with that.
BlondieBC
Banned
It is not really doable. If you go back and read the newspapers from 1914 to 1920, the vicious and racist anti-Japan bashing starts very soon after Tsingtao falls. While the Rape of Nanking was horrible, the relationships had fallen apart long before then. And while it is easy to see a reasonable division of spheres of influence in hindsight, the racism makes it impossible. This is the era of KKK marches in Washington DC, treating the Yellow man as vaguely equal is a non-starter. It would have certainly made since to allow Japan the Yellow River valley sphere, UK allow Pearl, and for all to share Yangtze with giving the USA Yap island and maybe some other ones such as Marshall Islands. But is more likely for Sweden to conquer the world than for this type of deal to happen.
Japan wanted an empire like the others had. Japan wanted to be treated as a Great Power, not with racism.
I think the big problem with a Japan supports UK against the Nazis in exchange for a blind eye in Asia is that the US will then be less likely to support the UK (pro-China), and at the end of the day the US support is more valuable. Maybe if Japan sits tight on Korea and Manchuria and avoids pushing into China proper in the 30s? But in that scenario I'm not sure exactly what they could be offered which would convince them to join the Allies.
BlondieBC
Banned
You have the wrong decade. The 1910's. The USA/Japan were hostile by 1920 over Yap and the demands on China by Japan BEFORE the USA entered WW1. Sure you can do a POD to change this hostility, such as the USA does not fight Spain in 1898, but any of these POD mean we don't have WW2 like we know it. The closest possible POD is keeping Japan out of WW1, but this would require major changes to the OTL. And likely has a very noticeable impact on WW1 because the UK lacked the forces to take Tsingtao without pulling from other theaters, and the merchant raiding out of this open port would have cause fits for the UK until neutralized. So you likely see the ANZAC first go to China with some support for RN, and lacking siege artillery it will go much slower. And it will take longer to start, since the ANZAC are not as ready. And this will lead to a change of butterflies that have large impacts.
Well, in a scenario where an invasion of the islands occur, the Vietnam thing does make a lot more sense.
Wow, having the ANZAC day celebrations in China instead of Turkey (Gallipoli), that would be weird.
trollhole, it really doesn't.
Japan has no potential arms supplier nor are the American people likely to get tired of the war and there certainly won't be any restraint displayed by the US against Japan.
Japan has no potential arms supplier nor are the American people likely to get tired of the war and there certainly won't be any restraint displayed by the US against Japan.
Japan has a chance to "win" WW2 if:
- It keeps the war limited. This applies to the three major powers- China, the USSR, and USA that it faced.
- Its military does not go all psycho in China, or if the Chinese put up a better fight, thus not allowing this to happen.
- The USA is goaded into attacking Japan and not vice versa.
- This war is not popular with the US public and is seen as a lost cause when Yamamoto does his thing and fights the US fleet successfully in 1941 or 42.
- With this move, Japan is "given" the Southeast Asian nations and whatever it could hold onto in China, including Manchuria and some coastal regions. Peace with KMT.
Problems:
- Japan not suffering a proper defeat will give their military no reason to do their best to subjugate and rape China and whatever else they run into, making chances harder if not impossible of actually ending the war.
- If WW2 in Europe happens as normal most likely the US will be on a war footing and thus there won't be so much the issue of morale. (Perhaps they could be isolationist?)
- It keeps the war limited. This applies to the three major powers- China, the USSR, and USA that it faced.
- Its military does not go all psycho in China, or if the Chinese put up a better fight, thus not allowing this to happen.
- The USA is goaded into attacking Japan and not vice versa.
- This war is not popular with the US public and is seen as a lost cause when Yamamoto does his thing and fights the US fleet successfully in 1941 or 42.
- With this move, Japan is "given" the Southeast Asian nations and whatever it could hold onto in China, including Manchuria and some coastal regions. Peace with KMT.
Problems:
- Japan not suffering a proper defeat will give their military no reason to do their best to subjugate and rape China and whatever else they run into, making chances harder if not impossible of actually ending the war.
- If WW2 in Europe happens as normal most likely the US will be on a war footing and thus there won't be so much the issue of morale. (Perhaps they could be isolationist?)
Just remember though that the Germans had been gutted by the Soviets, the Japanese were fighting fresh aside from their forces tied up in China.
To survive, Japan has to keep the US and USSR from attacking, at any costs.
Contradictory points, if the US is already at war Japan isn't likely to get the chance to pull it off due to Pearl Harbour having proper defences.
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sharlin
Banned
- It keeps the war limited. This applies to the three major powers- China, the USSR, and USA that it faced. -
How can you keep a war limited in such a massive region of the world? The Japanese were possessed of a cult of the offensive that made the French Officer Corps at the start of world war 1 look like guitar strumming peace activists.
At the short end of the economic stick the Japanese NEED to attack and grab the resources in the DEI, Burma, etc to do that they NEED to neutralise Singapore because the Dutch are an English allied nation and are not going to go 'oh carry on!' whilst the Japanese seize the DEI. With this in mind you've then got the Phillipines and its fairly impressive (but poorly lead) forces now sitting RIGHT ON YOUR SUPPLY LINES. This can't be ignored. So you've got to get the Phillipines and engage the US/Local forces there. As part of that you MUST seize Guam as its a major US regional base.
And whilst all this is going on, you're still embrioled in China with a foe who is as stubborn as you are, so any plan of a limited war has just been flung out of the window kicking and screaming.
Its military does not go all psycho in China, or if the Chinese put up a better fight, thus not allowing this to happen.
Hah! Sorry not going to happen, the IJA had a history of brutality going back to 1905 in the Russo/Japanese war. Its Officer corps was out of control, with junior officers acting and forcing the government to react and not rein them in because they KNEW the Govermnent would do nothing because it would mean loosing face. Also asking any Imperial power (UK, Japan, America etc) to treat China with any midoctum of pleasentness in this time period is like asking the tide to stop coming in.
- The USA is goaded into attacking Japan and not vice versa.
How? The US had already done a full blown and fully encompasing trade embargo and that was effective enough, the US didn't need to attack. They had plans to react to offensive Japanese moves and the US was expecting an attack and would react accordingly. Already outnumbered and with a history of successful supprise attacks the IJN did the best thing it could to give them as much time as possible in attacking Pearl.
- This war is not popular with the US public and is seen as a lost cause when Yamamoto does his thing and fights the US fleet successfully in 1941 or 42.
Err...no. The US public was utterly incensed at the attack and was fully behind the war when it was declared. The fact that it was a supprise attack and the whole kerfuffle with the declaration of war coming a bit late just made matters worse. Even when it was its darkest in the Pacific the US public NEVER wavered their support for the war. By 1945 like everyone else they were tired of the bloodshed but this is 1942 and their blood is up.
How can you keep a war limited in such a massive region of the world? The Japanese were possessed of a cult of the offensive that made the French Officer Corps at the start of world war 1 look like guitar strumming peace activists.
At the short end of the economic stick the Japanese NEED to attack and grab the resources in the DEI, Burma, etc to do that they NEED to neutralise Singapore because the Dutch are an English allied nation and are not going to go 'oh carry on!' whilst the Japanese seize the DEI. With this in mind you've then got the Phillipines and its fairly impressive (but poorly lead) forces now sitting RIGHT ON YOUR SUPPLY LINES. This can't be ignored. So you've got to get the Phillipines and engage the US/Local forces there. As part of that you MUST seize Guam as its a major US regional base.
And whilst all this is going on, you're still embrioled in China with a foe who is as stubborn as you are, so any plan of a limited war has just been flung out of the window kicking and screaming.
Its military does not go all psycho in China, or if the Chinese put up a better fight, thus not allowing this to happen.
Hah! Sorry not going to happen, the IJA had a history of brutality going back to 1905 in the Russo/Japanese war. Its Officer corps was out of control, with junior officers acting and forcing the government to react and not rein them in because they KNEW the Govermnent would do nothing because it would mean loosing face. Also asking any Imperial power (UK, Japan, America etc) to treat China with any midoctum of pleasentness in this time period is like asking the tide to stop coming in.
- The USA is goaded into attacking Japan and not vice versa.
How? The US had already done a full blown and fully encompasing trade embargo and that was effective enough, the US didn't need to attack. They had plans to react to offensive Japanese moves and the US was expecting an attack and would react accordingly. Already outnumbered and with a history of successful supprise attacks the IJN did the best thing it could to give them as much time as possible in attacking Pearl.
- This war is not popular with the US public and is seen as a lost cause when Yamamoto does his thing and fights the US fleet successfully in 1941 or 42.
Err...no. The US public was utterly incensed at the attack and was fully behind the war when it was declared. The fact that it was a supprise attack and the whole kerfuffle with the declaration of war coming a bit late just made matters worse. Even when it was its darkest in the Pacific the US public NEVER wavered their support for the war. By 1945 like everyone else they were tired of the bloodshed but this is 1942 and their blood is up.