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Saint Celestine posted:Shattered Sword has an interesting account of how even if the Japanese won the battle of Midway, the invasion force would have gotten absolutely wrecked if they actually tried an amphibious assault. gently caress I was just about to request this. Something to the tune of "the Japanese fleet would have been witness to a slaughter".
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Nov 19, 2013 06:29
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Frostwerks posted:gently caress I was just about to request this. Something to the tune of "the Japanese fleet would have been witness to a slaughter". I think the defenders of Midway actually outnumbered the attackers as well.
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Nov 19, 2013 06:51
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I think obsolete equipment was mentioned earlier in the thread? http://irisharchaeology.ie/2013/11/the-irish-rebel-and-the-ancient-sword/
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Nov 19, 2013 09:07
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I just remembered something about the Callot prints that might not have occurred to a non-specialist. Everyone in them is thin as hell, which is not the period's ideal of beauty. Look at Titian for what they think is sexy in women, respectable and dignified in men. In contrast, everyone in Callot looks like they're about to die, which they probably are. Yet even so the officers make the same jaunty dancing-master poses that they make in a hundred paintings--feet perpendicular, chest thrown out, one hand delicately on the hip. Even while their limbs are practically skeletal, even while they're supervising a firing squad. I think it's intended to be somewhat grotesque. Edit: In contrast, the men of "Bad War" are idealized beefcakes and probably modeled on Classical reliefs. HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 22:23 on Nov 19, 2013 |
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Nov 19, 2013 12:45
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Frostwerks posted:gently caress I was just about to request this. Something to the tune of "the Japanese fleet would have been witness to a slaughter". A total slaughter. It would've made Dieppe look like an extremely well planned and conducted landing. I posted about this on the other thread (I can't link to that post because I'm not on a computer now), but I essentially summarised the appendix from Shattered Sword. To summarise my summary: 1. The Japanese did not have good landing craft, this would've been extremely problematic in the face of even light resistance. 2. There were numerous US forces on the island, a great proportion of which were Marines, who, regardless of formal role, were all trained infantry. For opposing a landing (especially a poorly conducted on as the Japanese would've been able to offer) basic training as a rifleman is all you need. 3. There are extensive reefs around Midway, which would've meant that the Japanese would have had to disembark at substantial distances (hundreds of metres in some approaches) and essentially wade to the beaches with absolutely no cover. 4. The US forces were very well dug in, and had taken very few losses on the ground. Even if exposed to a constant bombardment it is unlikely that it would cause enough damage to make up for the other Japanese disadvantages. Especially as the bombardment of Midway had proven to be very ineffective. 5. The Midway garrison had a lot of support weaponry (AA guns, HMGs, light guns) that could be brought to bear on the Japanese marines (who, remember, approach with no cover). 6. The Marines had tanks. Yes they were plinky little Stuarts, but a small number of tanks, no matter how light, are incredibly useful when your enemy not only has no tanks but no anti-tank weaponry.
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Nov 19, 2013 15:55
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Ghost of Mussolini posted:A total slaughter. It would've made Dieppe look like an extremely well planned and conducted landing. I posted about this on the other thread (I can't link to that post because I'm not on a computer now), but I essentially summarised the appendix from Shattered Sword. To summarise my summary: Also: Japan didn't even have a doctrine for opposed amphibious landings and the army didn't train with the navy to practice. There was no training for the Cruisers on coastal bombardment in support of troops and no lines of communication to actually co-ordinate said naval support. Forget Dieppe, the Japanese plan was essentially a amphibious version of the Somme: 'bombs and shells will wipe out the defenders, you'll just have to wade through several hundred yards of reef to get to your objective'.
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Nov 19, 2013 16:07
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Was the goal to capture Midway? I thought they just wanted to force ”The Decisive Battle™” that would sink the US carrier fleet and force us to the negotiating table. After all, they were under the impression that they had sunk 2 or 3 carriers at Coral Sea, and that we had no more in reserve.
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Nov 19, 2013 19:45
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sullat posted:Was the goal to capture Midway? I thought they just wanted to force ”The Decisive Battle™” that would sink the US carrier fleet and force us to the negotiating table. After all, they were under the impression that they had sunk 2 or 3 carriers at Coral Sea, and that we had no more in reserve. They didn't know the American carriers were there. That was sort of the point of Midway.
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Nov 19, 2013 19:54
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the JJ posted:They didn't know the American carriers were there. That was sort of the point of Midway. No, the point totally was that they were going to lure the US fleet out of Pearl and force ~~Decisive Battle~~, they just expected to have captured Midway by then. The US move was supposed to be in reaction to the invasion, not a preemption.
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Nov 19, 2013 20:01
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What kind of wooden sailing vessels were ideal for combat during the 16 and 17th centuries? Like, construction material, guns, crews, sail material, etc?
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Nov 19, 2013 20:31
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VaultAggie posted:What kind of wooden sailing vessels were ideal for combat during the 16 and 17th centuries? Like, construction material, guns, crews, sail material, etc? Galleons.
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Nov 19, 2013 20:49
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VaultAggie posted:What kind of wooden sailing vessels were ideal for combat during the 16 and 17th centuries? Like, construction material, guns, crews, sail material, etc? Try to find a copy of this book that won't completely bankrupt you (my edition is from the 70s, not the new one) and read it.
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Nov 19, 2013 20:49
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a travelling HEGEL posted:War galleys. Maneuverable, you don't have to gently caress around with wind direction or any of that bullshit; stick a bunch of soldiers on that poo poo; guns go on the front, parallel to the line of motion, load them with stone/iron shot for long range shipkilling and with small shot/iron dice for antipersonnel use. And you can do amphibious assaults with them, or haul them onshore, turn their bows toward the sea, and use their guns to supplement your shore defenses. Every Mediterranean power had a fuckload. Ship-killing is not something galleys do terribly well, especially when facing galleons. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Cape_Celidonia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Narrow_Seas Galleys were excellent for amphibious landings because of their shallow-draft and speed in addition to the reasons you mentioned, but galleons were inordinately better in ship-to-ship battles and could operate in the Atlantic.
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Nov 19, 2013 21:17
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Rodrigo Diaz posted:Ship-killing is not something galleys do terribly well, especially when facing galleons. I'm not disputing the general point, but reading the top link it seems there were 6 galleys being ambushed by 9 ships with much better intel. Even then the Spainish flagship, separated and on its own, manages to elude 10 Dutch ships and get to port.
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Nov 19, 2013 21:28
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the JJ posted:I'm not disputing the general point, but reading the top link it seems there were 6 galleys being ambushed by 9 ships with much better intel. Even then the Spainish flagship, separated and on its own, manages to elude 10 Dutch ships and get to port. You mean the bottom link. I mostly included that one so people would see the painting, which is loving mental but also emphasises the size and firepower difference between the two types of ship.
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Nov 19, 2013 21:50
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Is the degree of tumblehome represented on that Dutch frigate accurate for the time, or is it just kinda amateurish perspective?
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Nov 19, 2013 21:55
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a travelling HEGEL posted:Well, it didn't help that Frederick the Great didn't just take one for the team, get really drunk, and screw a goddamned woman. Instead, his nephew succeeded him, and that dude was real dumb. To be fair, at least he was nice and sociable. He didn't end up as a reclusive mysanthrope like his uncle. Friedrich Wilhelm II. had lots of women and lots of children. Also he was a Rosicrucian, therefore automatically better than Frederick the Great, who was a dirty Freemason.
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Nov 19, 2013 23:01
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DerLeo posted:No, the point totally was that they were going to lure the US fleet out of Pearl and force ~~Decisive Battle~~, they just expected to have captured Midway by then. The US move was supposed to be in reaction to the invasion, not a preemption. There was a set of wargame-simulations before the battle. The guy in charge of the simulated US forces decided for one run "what happens if I show up early, let's find out" and managed to kill two carriers. This was ruled "never gonna happen when we do it for real" but Yamamoto ordered two carriers kept in reserve to strike the US forces at all times. Messing about with the armament of those two reserve carriers was a problem on the actual day of Midway, but not to the extent that some suggest.
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Nov 19, 2013 23:02
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David Fromkin asserts in A Peace to End All Peace that the primary reason for the Ottoman alliance with Germany during WW1 was due to the fact that Enver and Talaat made a secret offer to hand over the Sultan Osman in the event of war, since the Ottomans (according to Fromkin) could not really offer anything else of value to Germany to justify an alliance. (Of course, Churchill seized the Osman anyways.) Is this a view that is accepted by most other historians? I'm just curious about the political calculus of it all.
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Nov 19, 2013 23:39
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What other options were available to RE Lee on the third day of Gettysburg besides Pickett's Charge? Could he have flanked farther to the east? Attacked somewhere else entirely? I really enjoyed Gettysburg: The Last Invasion but it was on audiobook so I'm not entirely clear on the dispositions besides the fact that Pickett's Charge was a really bad idea.
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Nov 20, 2013 00:01
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Cumshot in the Dark posted:David Fromkin asserts in A Peace to End All Peace that the primary reason for the Ottoman alliance with Germany during WW1 was due to the fact that Enver and Talaat made a secret offer to hand over the Sultan Osman in the event of war, since the Ottomans (according to Fromkin) could not really offer anything else of value to Germany to justify an alliance. (Of course, Churchill seized the Osman anyways.) Is this a view that is accepted by most other historians? I'm just curious about the political calculus of it all. That's pretty uncommon and a bizarre view too. How do the Ottomans have nothing to offer Germany besides a dreadnought? Not only does it open up the second Caucasus front it cuts off the Black Sea and locks Russia away from the allies for half the year due to ice, and it threatens the Suez canal.
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Nov 20, 2013 00:06
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DerLeo posted:That's pretty uncommon and a bizarre view too. How do the Ottomans have nothing to offer Germany besides a dreadnought? Not only does it open up the second Caucasus front it cuts off the Black Sea and locks Russia away from the allies for half the year due to ice, and it threatens the Suez canal.
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Nov 20, 2013 00:20
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gradenko_2000 posted:What other options were available to RE Lee on the third day of Gettysburg besides Pickett's Charge? Could he have flanked farther to the east? Attacked somewhere else entirely? I really enjoyed Gettysburg: The Last Invasion but it was on audiobook so I'm not entirely clear on the dispositions besides the fact that Pickett's Charge was a really bad idea. Retreating was by far his best choice. GTFO and get back to Virginia; maybe, if your pride absolutely demands it, take up a strong position somewhere southwest of Gettysburg and hope (assume?) Meade has to attack you. He was in a pretty bad spot there on the 3rd day, his best corps was not in great shape, he was facing a much larger army with a huge advantage in terrain, etc etc. Longstreet's idea of rolling around behind the federals and getting between them and Washington was a brilliant one, but it was not possible by the third day.
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Nov 20, 2013 00:49
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Cumshot in the Dark posted:David Fromkin asserts in A Peace to End All Peace that the primary reason for the Ottoman alliance with Germany during WW1 was due to the fact that Enver and Talaat made a secret offer to hand over the Sultan Osman in the event of war, since the Ottomans (according to Fromkin) could not really offer anything else of value to Germany to justify an alliance. (Of course, Churchill seized the Osman anyways.) Is this a view that is accepted by most other historians? I'm just curious about the political calculus of it all. I have never heard of this before. Everything else I've read shows the British treating the ottomans with complete disdain while Germany begins pumping money into them to make the Berlin to Baghdad railway. In the beginning you see Enver trying to stay out of the war but as both sides pressure him, german economic aid and the "gift" of Goeben and Breslau weighs better than British threats. Add in turning the Caucasus and Middle East into new fronts and its a match made in heaven for the central powers.
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Nov 20, 2013 00:57
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Hovermoose posted:It's hardly big scale, but I've always been a fan of the German submarine U-1206 sinking of the coast of Scotland due to a toilet malfunction. Long story short: the sub was equipped with a new, high-tech deep water toilet. This toilet was so advanced and complicated it required a technician to flush it. Someone on board mucked up the flushing procedure which led to large amounts of water rushing into the sub which was at 200 feet beneath the surface. A few pages ago, but this is my favorite u-boat sinking as well. Also, the "someone on board" who flushed improperly was the boat's commander KL Karl-Adolf Schlitt. To continue subchat, does anyone have any idea why the IJN was obsessed with constructing subs that could carry a seaplane? IIRC the I-400 class boats were Yamamoto's brainchild, but they never made any strategic or tactical sense to me.
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Nov 20, 2013 02:47
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If the Japanese military was so obsessed with the idea of forcing a ~Decisive Battle~™® with the American navy, why build carriers in the first place? Isn't that doctrine orientated towards battleships?
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Nov 20, 2013 02:52
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count_von_count posted:A few pages ago, but this is my favorite u-boat sinking as well. Also, the "someone on board" who flushed improperly was the boat's commander KL Karl-Adolf Schlitt. In the WWI to Mid WWII years they were probably meant to be really long range and nigh undetectable scouts.
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Nov 20, 2013 02:57
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Farecoal posted:If the Japanese military was so obsessed with the idea of forcing a ~Decisive Battle~™® with the American navy, why build carriers in the first place? Isn't that doctrine orientated towards battleships? For one thing the Washington Naval Treaty had a separate allotment of tonnage for Aircraft Carriers. Japan could only have 315k tons of battleship displacement but they could have an additional 81k tons of aircraft carriers.
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Nov 20, 2013 02:58
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count_von_count posted:A few pages ago, but this is my favorite u-boat sinking as well. Also, the "someone on board" who flushed improperly was the boat's commander KL Karl-Adolf Schlitt. The original purpose of the -400 class was attacking west coast targets in the US, which the Japanese were understandably obsessed with. They then got it into their heads that they should bomb the locks of the Panama Canal but by the time that plan was together it was deemed irrelevant and they were retasked.
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Nov 20, 2013 03:00
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DerLeo posted:No, the point totally was that they were going to lure the US fleet out of Pearl and force ~~Decisive Battle~~, they just expected to have captured Midway by then. The US move was supposed to be in reaction to the invasion, not a preemption. They also did not expect Yorktown to be repaired so fast after the Battle of Coral Sea. The Japanese calculations were basically a 2/3th strength Mobile Force made of 4 fleet carriers: Kaga, Akagi, Hiryū and Sōryū first suppressing Midway Island's airbase, then turning against TF 17 made of 2 fleet carriers: Hornet and Enterprise, when they showed up 24-48 hours after. What screwed the Japanese was that they left out the 2 fleet carriers of Carrier Division 5 Shokaku and Zuikaku, and the fact that the Americans showed up with THREE fleet carriers and a fully operational battle station. So basically instead of 4 flight decks vs. 1 airbase, then 4 carriers vs. 2 carriers, it became an even 4 vs. 4 slug-fest, with the element of surprise and one giant unsinkable airbase on the American side. What might be interesting to arm-chair war game is what if the Japanese had brought a full strength Mobile Force of 6 fast fleet carriers, operating as a coordinated unit (something the American's hadn't figured out how to do in 1942).
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Nov 20, 2013 03:18
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Farecoal posted:If the Japanese military was so obsessed with the idea of forcing a ~Decisive Battle~™® with the American navy, why build carriers in the first place? Isn't that doctrine orientated towards battleships? The idea was that naval aviation and submarines would whittle down the USN as they sailed across the Pacific towards the site of the Decisive Battle so that the IJN Battlefleet would have parity or superiority by the time they got there. IIRC the Japanese were counting on a 20% reduction in order to ensure victory given the relative sizes of their battle lines (itself defined by the Washington Naval Treaty)
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Nov 20, 2013 03:18
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gohuskies posted:Freddie Spencer Chapman spent two years behind Japanese lines in Malaysia, fighting alongside the resistance. The Jungle Is Neutral is one of the best war memoirs I've ever read. Dammit, I was gonna post this but I'm over 24 hours late. The Jungle Is Neutral owns owns owns and you should read the hell out of it. It's leeches, malaria, submarine extractions, Japanese patrols, train sabotage, fanatical but incompetent Chinese communist guerrillas, bribes, parachute jumps, bad food, no food, improvised weapons, treacherous corrupt locals, fiercely loyal locals, indifferent locals, communications breakdowns, James Bond escapes, and flimsy ruses that somehow work, all steeped in enough  understatement to... do a thing that requires a lot of understatement.It's the most   you will ever find in one book.
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Nov 20, 2013 03:24
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INTJ Mastermind posted:They also did not expect Yorktown to be repaired so fast after the Battle of Coral Sea. The thing about Midway is that the forces involved mattered a lot less than blind luck, in that both sides had made a quick air strike on a poorly known target at Coral Sea and whiffed, sometimes badly(including a massive air attack on a single US fleet oiler), so I imagine Nagumo was hesitant to just drop everything and launch all his aircraft at a vaguely scouted target early in the morning, and once he didn't do that events basically overtook him and everything spiraled out of control.
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Nov 20, 2013 03:36
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Aside from the initial spotting of the Kido Butai by a Midway-based PBY, how important was midway-based aircraft to the outcome of the battle? The B-17s scored zero hits. The B-26s scored zero hits. The Buffaloes got shot down in droves defending the island. The TBFs of VT-6 scored zero hits and had only one surviving aircraft. From my understanding, it was the carrier-based aviation that brought home the bacon.
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Nov 20, 2013 03:51
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INTJ Mastermind posted:They also did not expect Yorktown to be repaired so fast after the Battle of Coral Sea. I thought the two Japanese reserve carriers were under repair during Midway; one had been damged by a sub and the other had hit a reef. So they didn't have the option of bringing them.
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Nov 20, 2013 03:52
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sullat posted:I thought the two Japanese reserve carriers were under repair during Midway; one had been damged by a sub and the other had hit a reef. So they didn't have the option of bringing them. One of them was under repair and the other had a depleted air wing. The Japanese might have been able to bring 5 carriers if they merged the Shokaku and Zuikaku air wings together to fill up one deck, but both wasn't in the cards AFAIK
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Nov 20, 2013 03:55
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Bacarruda posted:Aside from the initial spotting of the Kido Butai by a Midway-based PBY, how important was midway-based aircraft to the outcome of the battle? The simpler route is probably for you to pick up a copy of Shattered Sword, since it's a great book and in this thread we're mostly going to recite from it, but said book asserts that the constant attack during the morning prevented the Japanese from making clear decisions or having deck space to rearm since they were busy running CAP.
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Nov 20, 2013 03:57
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DerLeo posted:The simpler route is probably for you to pick up a copy of Shattered Sword, since it's a great book and in this thread we're mostly going to recite from it, but said book asserts that the constant attack during the morning prevented the Japanese from making clear decisions or having deck space to rearm since they were busy running CAP. I should really get a copy of that, I only have Craig Symonds' Battle of Midway. What did it say about the Hornet's Flight to Nowhere?
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Nov 20, 2013 04:03
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What did the Indian army look like just prior to the British takeover? I suppose it's part of a larger question about the early gunpowder era. Which armies didn't adopt the technology and why?
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Nov 20, 2013 06:22
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Remember that warfare is universally pretty horrible? well, it is time to depress you with what I call 'The  Of War!'The fate of the French ship of the line Achille from the recollections of John Pollard from possibly British/French Sailors who were also there: quote:The Achille, in which was a detachment of the 67th regiment, was set on fire during the action, The English who were fighting it cleared off; and of eight hundred men, who formed the crew, not more than twenty found an opportunity of escaping. When all hopes of stopping the progress of the flames were gone, and death seemed inevitable, to avoid waiting for it several officers blew out their brains; others threw themselves into the flames that were consuming the forepart of the ship, several sailors went to the store-room, gorged themselves with brandy, and with most complete drunkenness endeavored to throw a veil over the disaster that was about to terminate their existence. Towards six o'clock in the evening the fire reached the gun room, the vessel blew up, and everything disappeared. EDIT: Fixed slightly. John Pollard you dead git! SeanBeansShako fucked around with this message at 06:46 on Nov 20, 2013 |
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Nov 20, 2013 06:26
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