From: island!fester@uunet.uu.net (Mike Fester)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: WWII: Why Japan didn't invade Hawaii
Date: 15 Oct 92 16:32:30 GMT
Organization: /usr/local/rn/organization


From Mike Fester <island!fester@uunet.uu.net>

In article <Bw0oGK.L9I@law7.DaytonOH.NCR.COM> jaskew@spam.maths.adelaide.edu.au (Joseph Askew) writes:
>
>From jaskew@spam.maths.adelaide.edu.au (Joseph Askew)
>
>In article <Bvq4qF.DLw@law7.DaytonOH.NCR.COM> DEICHMAN@cisco.nosc.mil writes:
>
>>From DEICHMAN@cisco.nosc.mil
>
>>In reply to rdh@sli.com (Robert D. Houk):
>
>With all due respect to the writer of this, the *only* reason Japan entered
>the Second World War was because the Americans forced them to. The US had
>placed an oil embargo on the Japanese and would not lift it until Japan
>withdrew from *all* of its conquests since 1904. The Japanese economy and

To put it mildy, this assertion is absolutely not true. The US NEVER
demanded that Japan withdraw from all territories (though why this would be
considered a BAD thing is beyond me), rather that they pull back from there
most recent "incursions" into Chinese territory (even Toland agrees on 
this point). Further, Japan was not "forced into the war" by the US: they had
already annexed Korea, were "settling" China, had attacked Soviet positions
along the Manchurian border, and attacked other nations in souteast Asia. In
short, Japan was doing to Asia what Germany was doing to Europe, and neither 
of them were doing this with ANY impetus from the US. Finally, the attack on
the US was to prevent the US from reacting effectively when Japan FURTHER
EXPANDED the war to the Indochina region, in order to grab the oil fields.

To put it bluntly, Japan started WWII: Germany didn't enter until 1939.

>military power were rapidly grinding down and they felt the only responce
>they had left was to grab the oil reserves of the Dutch East Indies ie
>Indonesia. The real question is why the US wanted to force the Japanese
>into fighting. According the US government memos the Roosevelt adminstration

Again, this is not a question: the Japanese WERE fighting, several nations,
for a very long time.

>wanted to enter the War but could not get Congress to agree. Thus they placed
>an embargo on Japan with the intention of getting Japan to attack the US and
>so put the US in the War. Unfortunately it appears that the US underestimated

Actually, I believe Roosevelt wanted into the European war.

>the Japanese thinking they could only attack the Philipines and so were
>suprised. The Japanese always knew they could not win, their only goal was to
>grab as much as they could and then grind the US down in a war of attrition.
>Citations and sources available on request.

I would dearly love to see those citations: almost all military historians
AND Adm. Yamamoto agree that Japan felt she could NOT win a long war of 
attrition with the US, and her only hope was that a quick blow would put the
US in a position where it was forced to negotiate.

>>  With the destruction of their most forward Naval port, the
>>U.S. would have been delayed long enough for Japan to secure
>>their conquests in Southeast Asia and vanquish their other
>>foes before the U.S. could get involved.
>
>The Japanese won all their battles so fast the US couldn't have intervened
>from Hawaii no matter what. We are talking a couple of weeks here! Besides
>which the most forward Naval port was in the Philipines not Pearl Harbour.

The Japanese were on the offensive a total of 6 months against US forces.
After Midway, Japan got ground down (and if the Japanese couldn't take Midway,
how can you imagine they'd take Hawaii?) Hardly any evidence anywhere that
an attempted invasion of Hawaii would have been sheerest folly.

Mike
-- 
Disclaimer - I'm only doing what the little voices tell me to do.