What was the reasoning for attacking Pearl Harbor? Did they honestly think they could beat the US?

They figured war with the US was inevitable, and a massive first strike was the only even tiny chance

I don't remember the US ever honoring a defence pact and barely having them to begin with. Maybe they would have declared war, but it probably would have been a phony war like when the allies declared war on germany

Just over looking the US sounds like a better plan than antagonizing them any way

>massive first strike
>a single sortie by 300 single-engine bombers
>massive

>or did he not make these decisions
this

The oil embargo would make their fleet useless anyway within the year so better just attack now and try to force a quick peace.

>I don't remember the US ever honoring a defence pact and barely having them to begin with.
How would you remember something you'd never learned in the first place?

>Maybe they would have declared war,
You'd think, considering they were heavily involved in planning for a war and in fact had pressured the Netherlands into embargoing Japan in the first place with the promise of a defensive agreement.

>but it probably would have been a phony war like when the allies declared war on germany
Do you even know what happened between 1939 and 1940? The "phony" war was anything but phony, and the entire time the Allies were planning for an offensive into Germany.

Its the military staff's job to make abunch of contingency plans, in fact they're supposed to have them ready before the wars. Saying they made plans means absolutely nothing, the most conclusive form of non action would be the chief executive giving his generals and field marshals a dead line to invade

>Its the military staff's job to make abunch of contingency plans, in fact they're supposed to have them ready before the wars. Saying they made plans means absolutely nothing,
You literally have zero historical knowledge, yet you keep posting. Why?

To put come context behind Imperial Japan, the military was in dire need of resources to keep the war machine fueled, especially against China, but the Japanese armed forces were actively competing against each other over what is the best way to secure the steel and oil needed to produce and fuel war material.

the Army favored a policy of Hokushin-ron, or northern expansion doctrine. where they would push into the oil rich lands of Siberia and Mongolia to secure their production needs. They attempted this but were decimated by the Red Army at the battle of Khalkhin Gol, so Northern expansion wasn't happening.

The Japanese navy then set for Nanshin-Ron, or Southern Expansion doctrine. where they would take the Pacific Islands and Dutch, British, and American colonial possessions to secure war material. But moving in on these territories meant war with the US, who was already embargoing oil and scrap iron to Japan.

Japan gambled that the only way to fulfill Nanshin-Ron was to wipe out the US's entire naval capacity in the Pacific in a single strike. Then pick up the Philippines, Guam, Wake Island and other allied islands with the US navy off the table for what they hoped would be for a good year or two.

The attack certainly hurt, but it did very little to cripple US strength in the Pacific as the most valuable targets, aircraft carriers, were not in Pearl Harbor for the attack, which Japan believed they would be there. So the US rebuilt their strength within 7 months as opposed to the year Japan hoped they would have to grab as much territory as possible.

>HUR DUR FRANCE WAS GOING TO INVADE GERMANY

This is what you sound like, literally had a whole year

...

>killed, wounded and sick
why is the common cold in the casualty statistics?

Why are you on a history board?

>The US never honors defense pacts

Tell that to South Korea and Kuwait.

If it went as planned the US would have lost their Pacific Fleet. That's a pretty massive strike against them.

>If it went as planned the US would have lost their Pacific Fleet
It did go as planned. And it resulted in minimal permanent damage because it was a small strike.

Didn't we have this thread like 8 times this week now?

Nobody knows. It could've possibly been just a ruse to abdicate him of any guilt after losing the war.

This.

Blitzkrieg the Pacific, dig in, win enough defensive land battles and check the USN in naval battles until the US sues for a peace favouring Japanese Pacific conquests.

They did the first 2 things successfully.

But how could they possibly
>check the USN in naval battles until the US sues for a peace
?

Everybody knew the US would vastly outperform Japan industrially and economically. The US knew that, and they would never sue for peace, but just keep going. Even public opinion of the war back home wasn't an issue back then.

New guinea had rubber plantations & australia had confirmed uranium in s.a.
Jap enrichment process still used today

Winning battles like Midway, the Coral Sea, etc

It'd drag the war out for a long time even if the US would recover the constant losses could turn public opinion against the war.

This is why Pearl Harbor was so crucial, the Japanese had to land a crippling hit on the US early on. Remember that in the Russo-Japanese War in 1904/5, the Japanese landed a similar crippling early strike on the Russian navy that gave them a good advantage early on in the war, so they had that legacy as well.

Bit off topic, but would you Veeky Forumstorians mind explaining something? A friend of mine says that after WWI Japan and America signed a treaty which gave Japan exclusive rights to build naval bases on certain Polynesian islands, and that Americas violation of that treaty justified Japan doing Pearl Harbour. He says he can't remember the treaty though, and it stinks of bullshit to me. Any idea what he's talking about?

Apologies if spoon feeding or requests like this are frowned upon.

Think of it this way OP.

Some thug has been going around kicking ass. But he is only picking on guys smaller than him. Still, he is wiping the floor with these smaller guys. When he kicks their ass, he tells them the only way to keep from getting it kicked again is to hand over their money (resources).

He has kicked a bigger guys ass, but that guy is a borderline retard (China). So the thug is still doesn't really know his strength.

He has almost came to big blows with a bigger thug (russia) but always backs out at the last second because he is afraid he might not win the fight.

Now a rumored bad ass lives on the other side of town and his name America. He hears what is going on and makes some small threats to Japan. Basically puts the squeeze on this thug and puts a halt to his protection money scheme.

Now Japan is in a spot. You see, along the way; Japan has picked up some nasty addictions. He can no longer live on the money he is taking in his protection scheme. Because he needs money for his high (oil). What he was taking before just doesnt cut it anymore. Like any druggie, it takes more and more.

He's not confident enough to go north because he's liable to get his teeth kicked in. Plus Russia won't stop at kicking his ass. He will take everything he's got.

So he has to turn back to the Pacific which brings up America. A feared (but unproven) fighter.

He basically has a few options.
>1. Dont do anything. The withdrawals overpower him and he becomes a crumbling mess. He will eventually lose his grip on those he's squeezing.
>2. Find new weaklings to squeeze and abuse, until america comes for him and potentially devastates his ass.
>3. Walk up and sucker punch the fuck out of him and hope he goes down.

So really it was a calculated risk. Either way, the outcome for Japan probably wasn't gonna end well.

Your friend is dumb.

The Washington Naval Treaty in 1922 prohibited Japan, the US, and the UK from building naval bases or fortifications in the Pacific. Japan renounced it and didn't renew it in 1936.

Polynesian islands were all owned by France, Chile, UK, or the US.

Your friend is full of shit. Feel free to tell him that to his face.

This is the only actual response ITT. Other responses are for the most part made by Americans or idiots.

The Japanese were embargoed by the United States. Japan was in a sense forced into war. Many historians claim this was part of a strategy to maneuver the US into the World War without directly starting a war themselves, so as not to seem the perpetrators at the end of it.
Of course the US then created an image as having ended the World War, snowballing its influence through loans of good will to European nations, which was part of the whole Wilsonian scheme for a global empire oriented around soft power.

I have a master's degree in history.

I don't believe that Marshall Aid had imperialist motives, I think the USA just wanted to get Europe up and running so that they could trade with them.

>I have a master's degree in history.

I'll take 2 double cheeseburgers and a sprite

I don't actually I was just trying to pretend I had an edge over you guys, officially, to be funny

At least one of you is a NEET though judging by cartoon (animee) reaction image.

Not him, but you could be going to work and school with anime posters and never know. If you wanna find out, mention Eva.

Hirohito wasnt really in charge

the military basically rampaged around conducting foreign policy

>I have a master's degree in history.
Everybody back the fuck up, we got a badass in this thread.

The British cut off their oil supplies as soon as they formed an alliance with Germany. America, being a follower, did the same shortly after. The Japanese needed oil to continue their campaign in China and they were running out of it.

>The British cut off their oil supplies as soon as they formed an alliance with Germany. America, being a follower, did the same shortly after.
Britain did not embargo Japan until after the US embargo started. And Britain did this because the US pressured them into it.

>destroy the PAC fleet
>sweep the Pacific Colonies sans Hawaii while the US couldn't retaliate
>take on the new Naval fleet once it was rebuilt so they could bring the US to the negotiating table
Pretty much it

>It did go as planned
Not even close. The carrier fleet was on a logistics sortie and part of the BB fleet was in California for refit. If the Japs had attacked a week earlier you could maybe say that it went as planned.

Other way around mate.

No, it was the other way around.

>Not even close. The carrier fleet was on a logistics sortie and part of the BB fleet was in California for refit.
It's a pretty stupid argument to say that the only way Pearl Harbor could have been successful was if it destroyed all the capital ships of PacFleet. Japs weren't so stupid. They had a list of priority targets, and contingency targets in case the top priority targets were not targetable. Luckily for them, *all but one* battleship of PacFleet was there.
Their plan was to sail to Pearl Harbor in secret and launch a concentrated strike in two waves. The fighters were to suppress the airfields and bombers were to target ships and hangars on a list of priorities. They carried everything out.
Pearl Harbor did not have strategic success because it was a flawed plan depending on way too few aircraft to achieve an objective miles beyond their capabilities. But as far as the plan itself, it was almost perfectly executed.

Pretty much just this.

However, there has been some recent allegations that Joseph Stalin's secret agents in both governments manipulated both sides into exacerbating tensions. He was terrified that Japan would attack him in the rear and wanted to give them a target to after other than him. In particular, Assistant Secretary of The Treasury Harry Dexter White drafted a memo arguing that the United States needed to draw a line in the sand and be hardasses in negotiations, just as tensions were starting to de-escalate. Pearl Harbor was the end result. This Psi-opp was called "Operation: Snow" .

The plan was that after destroying the American fleet (most of which was not actually at pearl harbor at the time of the attack) they would have the might to stomp on the Americans for a year or so before making a peace favourable to them. At this point America was the only thing capable of stemming their expanses, so to make a peace which removed their influence from the continent and removed the chance of military action against is all they wanted.

The reason there was always going to be war is because America forbade the English having anything to do with the Japanese which left them completely isolated and humiliated. This fear is very well founded, they saw everything that happened to China. This is what swung the balance of power against the moderates and into the hands of the jingoistic Chosu clan. Since it was clear at this point the American's were trying to wreck any chance they had of being friends with anyone other than America that chose Nazi Germany as an ally.

If the American's hadn't of used there post WWI clout to pressure the English (who were very cordial with Japan) to abandon ties with Japan they might have felt secure enough that the Chosu clan could be held in check.

>One of the most powerful countries in the world
>Not known as a military power
Wtf am I reading?

Japanese high command didn't think the Americans would except a long war of a attrition.

First of all, America was a democracy. So if Roosevelt fought a long war with Japan, and lots of troops got killed, then the American public would get angry and vote him out of office.

Second, the United States allowed rights to women, including the right to free speech and the right to vote. In the mind of the Japanese high command, women were weak and would never allow their sons and husbands to fight in a war. This would only hasten Roosevelt getting voted out of office, and the next president and congress suing for peace.

The Japanese high command felt if they could just hold out for a few years, sink a few ships, kill a few thousand marines in costly island invasions, then the American problem would just disappear.

It sounds like a really stupid idea, doesn't? Well yeah, they made a whole lot of incredibly stupid decisions.

Here was Japans line of logic

1. We will inevitably end up in a war with the USA if we want to create our Empire
2. So lets do a preemptive strike and try to take out their carriers
3. If this doesn't outright cripple them, we will then go into such a horrific war of attrition that they will surrender and let us keep our possessions, as we cannot actually beat them

>hey don't invade Dutch Indochina or else I'm cutting off your supply
>BAKA CHING CHONG BANNNZAAAAIIII
>ok

Dutch were not in Indochina. It was the French Indochina that Japan had occupied. Japan agreed to return it to France in exchange for normalizing relations with the US. US demanded that Japan give up Korea and Taiwan.

Yamamoto was hoping that a quick strike that would destroy or cripple the entire US Pacific fleet which was docked at Pearl Harbor would be so overwhelmingly shocking that the Americans would sue for peace rather then continue engaging in a bloody conflict in the Pacific the Empire of Japan.

The rational behind this was even if the US didn't surrender with the loss of HOPEFULLY the majority of their carriers and battleships, if the IJN could force several more quick major victories, the US would seek an end to the war and pull out of any contention with Japan.

They knew they wouldn't win a war of attrition with America. They just wanted to go for their best shot at debilitating and blooding the US Navy that American resolve to continue the war would end.

They legitimately stood a chance if they just rushed Midway instead of making the most retarded plan and cutting their navy in half to invade the Aleutian islands as a ruse when we had broken their code like before the fucking war started

I have never heard a more retarded metaphor for World War II before in my life

Great job

What if Japan didn't invade the United States but instead invaded the USSR alongside Germany?

Japan could have outlasted the USA if nagumo had launched his third wave against the drydocks, oil facilities and submarine pens at Pearl.

The USN would have been crippled in operational capabilities for at least a year if not more, while ceding pretty much the entire central, western and southern pacific to the IJN. Japan would have been able to destroy Australia in the east Indies and possibly invade.

As it was, those drydocks were hard at work repairing ships which would otherwise have been lost like Yorktown and others. The submarines are THE weapon which beat Japan, their economy was totally crippled by subs and they had pretty much no effective response to it. Their massive resources from their newly conquered empire could not reach Japan, troop movements were hindered, etc.

Tldr Japan had a chance and kinda blew it.

Japan gets btfo like they did last time.

But Ruskies would have to fight on two fronts

All their troops were already in Siberia so Japan could force them to stay there while the Nazis steamroll Western Russia

Alternatively the Japanese wait for Russian troops to move and then steam roll Eastern Russia

>The USN would have been crippled in operational capabilities for at least a year if not more,

Name a single port strike ANYWHERE in the war that knocked out a port for a year or more. Hell, name a port strike that knocked out the facilities for a month.

Explain how the CBs could turn an atoll into an airstrip in a week or a port in 3 but wouldn't be able to fix Pearl Harbor in less than a year.

> Japan would have been able to destroy Australia in the east Indies and possibly invade.

With the half a million troops they have lying about for an operation?

>The submarines are THE weapon which beat Japan, their economy was totally crippled by subs

In 1944, when they were already losing for other reasons; for instance, the oil being cut off after losing the Philippines and the carrier and land based area.

tldr You have no fucking clue what you're talking about.

Its a lot more complex than that, man. Japan lost Midway because of poor tactical decisions on the day of battle and poor overall doctrine like a reduced emphasis on recon planes. Their surface fleet was isolated from the carriers, leaving them vulnerable, and also once again nagumo blew it by being too cautious and not reacting quickly enough to events unfolding.

Seriously fuck Nagumo

YOU NO GIVE OIL?

FAK YOU HAHAHAHA

It was attacking a military installation which was rapidly building up in the Pacific. The US had shown animosity before by cutting off oil, and the militarization of the island was what provoked the war. The island inhabitants were mostly Japanese. The attack was an operational success.

The Soviets mobilized 824 divisions in the first 8 months of their war with Germany. Khalkin Gol had something like 5-6 divisions, one of which was Mongolian.

You are overestimating the ability of the Japanese to seriously inconvience the USSR to such an extent it's laughable.

And no, the bulk of their forces weren't in Siberia. The bulk of their forces were in Poland, which is why they ran into such trouble when they got plastered by the surprise attack.

It's hard to believe that Japan was able to draw out a war with the United States for about 4 years and not think they'd be able to fight the USSR at all

Japan lost Midway because their codes had been broken, and the U.S. got lucky.

No, it really isn't.

Remember, pre-war, the USN has a 5:3 tonnage advantage with the IJN, courtesy of the Washington and London Naval treaties. But of course, the U.S. is splitting their forces roughly 50-50 to the Atlantic and Pacific, which means the Japanese have a slight superiority at outset, which gets exacerbated with their initial wins.

It takes about 2 years to build a capital ship. Even with the enormous resources at America's command, they can't really speed that up much. What they can do, however, is build a lot of vessels at once, but still, you won't be seeing too many of those before late 1943.

Now add in that if you want to island hop, you need to have such an overwhelming carrier advantage that you can overwhelm land based air defenses from that island and any other islands that are within range that can send help. And that LBA is often comprised of planes that are larger and thus better than CVP. And that America had to develop landing craft, as well as an amphibious doctrine almost from scratch.

The first beach that the Americans actually stormed was at Tarawa, at the end of 1943. A year later, they'd have overrun the entirety of the Marshalls, the Marianas, the Philippines, almost all of the Solomons, and be relentlessly bombing Japanese positions in Formosa, southern China, and bombing the home islands themselves.

tldr: What kept the Japanese going for 4 years was almost entirely the space of time it took for the U.S. to construct new warships for this war. Once they were online, Japanese resistance was smothered in extremely short order.

The soviets did keep troops in Siberia.

ah another proud piece of french military history

This attitude is how most empires fall. Its not the foreign invaders, its the failure to respect them and arrogance that leads to the downfall.

this is actually pretty good - you're just missing the part where Japan had multi-personality disorder.

This is a massively incorrect generalization. The IJN for its part in the higher ranks of the Admiralty were filled with various individuals like Ozawa and Yamamoto to name a few that were wary of getting into a war with Russia, the US, or the UK in the first place.

The crazies were mainly in the IJA.

>Name a single port strike ANYWHERE in the war that knocked out a port for a year or more.
This. The Brits bombed Wilhelmshaven with 4 engine bombers for years and couldn't knock it out, yet people still think the KB could've done it with 100 Kates.

In Nagumo's defense Yamamoto handcuffed him with his retarded orders and prevented any kind of initiative.

Weebs, by definition, are delusional tards.

Battles like these, Verdun, etc. Convince me that the French aren't cowards, just really bad at war

Not the guy you were replying to but how is this an argument?

>Yamamoto
>not one of the crazies

Yamamoto was the one who insisted on Pearl Harbor. He believed, like the others, that the U.S. would just give up. Hit them hard first, and they'd just give up all the sooner.

St. Nazaire.

Oh and it was largely the submarines that cut off all that oil.

I think their flag caused seizures, which was a CB for hawaii bro.

Yamamoto was the one who insisted on Pearl Harbor, after voicing opposition to attacking the Americans in the first place.

Literally the most successful nation in history when it comes to warfare with 724 victories recorded.

Why didn't they just go "oh we're out of oil and steel I guess we'll just call it a day"

>St. Nazaire.

An amphibious attack, not an aerial one, and the port facilities at St Nazaire were no longer useful to the Germans, what with the Bismarck having been sunk, the Tirpitz assigned to Norway, and the dock being unneeded for u-boats.

They could have easily repaired it had there been strategic reason to do so after Chariot.

>Oh and it was largely the submarines that cut off all that oil.

Funny, because guys like Soemu Toyoda said quite otherwise. I mean, just because he was the commander of the Combined fleet when it happened means that you should just ignore what he says, right?

Those are some nice moving goal posts. I'd point out the remaining flaws, but I'm sure you'd just move them again.

You accuse me of goalpost shifting?

St Nazaire still functioned as a port, the only thing that was knocked out for the entirety of the war was the drydock. It still, for instance, was the base for submarines for most of the war.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint-Nazaire_submarine_base

So why don't you take your best shot, retard?

>, just really bad at war

Yeah, that must be that

>Verdun
??? the french had won at verdun

I mean in modern war, have the French won a war on their own the past 150 years?

What I meant at Verdun is that even though the French were suffering very badly at Verdun, they kept soldiering on for 9 months until the Germans left.

Adding to things posted, Japs went full retard after Tsushima. They actually though they could replicate same conditions as Baltic fleet travelling across Africa and Eurasia because Brits were assholes.
That is US fleet would unite, then move across all the Pacific, constantly harassed by Jap subs and raiders, then arrive having suffered severe attrition close to Home Islands to be destroyed by Japanese mega battleships the like of Musashi and Yamato with help from surface aviation. Just like Russians did 35 years before.

So practically they had prepared for Russo-Japanese war re-enaction, grossly underestimating enemy strategy and role of carriers. The everlasting tradition of any general staff is preparing for the past war instead of a present one. Pearl Harbor would not only cut American forces, but also deny them of valuable installation half-way to Japan, and give Japs 1-2 years more to grab more resources and build more ships for incoming battle royal than never happened.

Political pressure from the left-wing pacifist SFIO government forced them to retreat. They didn't want to look like the aggressor.

good post