David,
Years ago I read Samurai by Saburo Sakai. Also the matter is covered in Toll
and some others. Japanese pilot training methods were exhaustive and time
consuming. Only a relatively small percentage of those who tried out were able
to complete the training. The Japanese pilots we encountered at the beginning
were the best in the world. But as they were killed off, the Japanese had to
change their methods. There wasn’t time to train new pilots as thoroughly as
they trained them in the past. I can’t recall whether it was Sakai or one of
the other Japanese aces who survived the war that said all of the pilots who
washed out during his training were better than the pilots being turned out
with abbreviated training toward the end of the war.
As to planes being destroyed on carriers versus being shot down in combat –
this occurred on both sides. Launching planes from a carrier was time
consuming, and if the enemy’s planes showed up before you got yours into the
air then you had to stop launching and concentrate on saving your boat. Lots
of planes were destroyed on decks or down below if enemy planes were
successful. But at some point, almost all Japanese pilots being produced were
inferior to American pilots. Also, American planes at some point were superior
to the Japanese. The Japanese hadn’t time to produce a new design. They
tinkered with the Zero, but couldn’t make it as good as the later American
planes.
Lawrence
-----Original Message-----
From: lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On ;
Behalf Of david ritchie
Sent: Thursday, February 20, 2020 11:06 PM
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: On underestimating America
On Feb 20, 2020, at 7:52 PM, Lawrence Helm <lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
David,
I read your note a second time and see that I did not address your (Keegan's)
emphasis on chance. Maybe Parshall & Tully's dealing as much from the
Japanese leadership diminishes the idea of chance playing a very important
roll. The hubris of Japanese leadership, the fact that they at the Battle of
Midway had gone "all in" whereas the Americans were back home churning out
another battle fleet much better than the one facing the Japanese at Midway
(something the Americans could and did do many times over, but the Japanese
fleet at Midway was all there was. They never again had a battle fleet that
could match the ones the Americans were turning out in abundance. They never
even tried to match them again.).
If all the listings of chance had gone for the Japanese instead of the
Americans they may have delayed the final defeat of the Japanese, but not by
much.
When a Japanese carrier was taken back to Japan for repair, it was most
likely out for the entire war. When an American carrier was taken back to
Pearl Harbor for repair, that repair would take place so quickly it could
sometimes be sent back to the same battle it had limped away from.
Carriers were no good without planes, and the Americans shot almost all the
Japanese planes down. If I remember correctly, one last attempt by the
Japanese to damage an American carrier at Midway occurred when all they could
put in the air were 13 planes.
I have been reading someplace that the mindset of the Japanese and Germans
was similar. Neither had an adequate battle plan. The idea of the Germans
imagining they could conquer the Red Army by chasing it over the Urals in
winter on horseback can seem Quixotic if we don't focus on all the people
dying. We excuse the Japanese from folly because Yamamoto understood that
American industrial resources would eventually wear the Japanese down, but he
nevertheless underestimated the Americans to a fatal degree.
Yamamoto made his name because of his "success" at pearl harbor, but he
didn't manage to damage a single carrier, and his plan was to sink them all.
That isn't success. Also, this attack at Pearl Harbor that had the Japanese
cheering back home, had the effect of pissing the Americans off so that they
transformed themselves on that day from a nation that was predominately
isolationist to nation that was in a brief period to become the most powerful
in the world. If Yamamoto had left Pearl Harbor alone, it is unlikely that
America would have gone to war against Japan. America was counting on its
embargoes, and it is true they were hampering Japans ability to conquer the
Chinese. So instead of finding another way, or even giving the idea of
conquering China, Yamamoto took the Japanese into a war he, we are told, he
knew the Japanese couldn't win.
Yamamoto's poor battle plan at Midway virtually condemned the Japanese to
defeat.
Yes, I recall reading in the past that if in both the Japanese and German
portions of World War II things gone just a little more their way, that they
could have won that war, but in the stuff I've been reading recently, that
was never going to happen. Neither the Japanese nor the Germans had the
manpower nor the resources to win.
