Historical pearl harbor

[Flying Tiger]

How would you feel about America having to place a BB in Hawaii for the setup. Also America would not be allowed to move this ship until at war. It could represent Americas unpreparedness for war. It would give Japan a juicy target and a reason to pull off PH move. I am not thrilled about the lack of this battle in the game.

[Spendo02]

The only reason Pearl isn’t attacked is because it isn’t worth that much for Japan in the bigger picture.

In history it never really was either.  The goal was just to cripple US naval influence in the Pacific - which ended up backfiring on them anyways.

Why make that mistake again as Japan?

[Flying Tiger]

Japan attacked PH with the hopes of sinking as many aircraft carriers as possible. This was a brilliant strategy. It did not work out because none were at port. In the game it is not worth it like you say. The setup seems to have all the historical ships on the west coast.

[knp7765]

Well, since the game starts in Spring 1940, a good year and a half before the historical Pearl Harbor attack. Perhaps the bulk of the US Navy was on the west coast at that time and moved to Pearl at a later date. Also, this game is just supposed to have a historical “feel” to it. If it was too historical, the Axis would never win.

There is a couple of reasons for Japan to attack Hawaii in the game. 1 = Honolulu is one of the 8 victory cities plus a $5 NO for Japan. 2 = It deprives the US of a $5 NO for controlling Alaska, Aleutian Islands, Hawaii, Johnston Island and Line Island.
Although, to get these Japan has to actually invade Hawaii, which is also ahistorical.

I do agree though that for game purposes it doesn’t make a lot of sense for Japan to hit Hawaii, at least not until later in the game when other objectives are secured first (DEI, Calcutta)

[Larrie]

@Flying:

Japan attacked PH with the hopes of sinking as many aircraft carriers as possible. This was a brilliant strategy. It did not work out because none were at port. In the game it is not worth it like you say. The setup seems to have all the historical ships on the west coast.

Of course they start on the West Coast, it is 1940 not 1941 after all.

[Flying Tiger]

Suppose nothing can be done. Usa knows it will get hit if it leaves medium size navy in PH. A bit disappointing. No surprise attack is like knowing to buy gold in 2008 or this weeks lotto numbers.

[CWO Marc]

@knp7765:

Well, since the game starts in Spring 1940, a good year and a half before the historical Pearl Harbor attack. Perhaps the bulk of the US Navy was on the west coast at that time and moved to Pearl at a later date.

Correct.  The US Pacific Fleet was traditionally based at San Diego.  In the summer of 1940, it was ordered to take a forward position at Pearl Harbor.  Its commander, Admiral James Richardson, objected to the redeployment, “believing that a forward defense was neither practical or useful, and that the Pacific Fleet would be the logical first target in the event of war with Japan.”  Roosevelt relived him of command in February 1941 and replaced him with Admiral Husband E. Kimmel.

[Spendo02]

A nice house rule includes all US ships roll at 1 the first and only the first zone Japan attacks them in.  This only applies to J1, J2 or J3.  No aircraft can scramble from islands for the first round of combat, but enter combat normally on the second round.

It isn’t exactly Hawaii, but it does give the Japanese the choice to sink a good portion of a US fleet within range before the US can declare war.

[knp7765]

@CWO:

@knp7765:

Well, since the game starts in Spring 1940, a good year and a half before the historical Pearl Harbor attack. Perhaps the bulk of the US Navy was on the west coast at that time and moved to Pearl at a later date.

Correct.  The US Pacific Fleet was traditionally based at San Diego.  In the summer of 1940, it was ordered to take a forward position at Pearl Harbor.  Its commander, Admiral James Richardson, objected to the redeployment, “believing that a forward defense was neither practical or useful, and that the Pacific Fleet would be the logical first target in the event of war with Japan.”  Roosevelt relived him of command in February 1941 and replaced him with Admiral Husband E. Kimmel.

Yeah, Admiral Kimmel really got screwed I think. He basically got saddled with the blame for the Pearl Harbor attack on account of our forces not being prepared enough for an attack. At least for the naval part of it. There was another guy, an Army General (can’t remember his name) who got stuck with the blame for our airfields that got pasted. It was a horrible tragedy for the US Armed Services and those two guys ended up taking the fall for all of it.
I watched this interesting DVD set all about Pearl Harbor from the History Channel. The way I understand it is there were a number of requests that were denied, information that was misunderstood or even plain ignored that may have altered the outcome to our favor. Also, I don’t think Admiral Kimmel was a “combat” Admiral so he really shouldn’t have been expected to react correctly to such an attack, the way perhaps a more seasoned officer might have.  From what I saw in those videos, I just think these guys got a raw deal.

[knp7765]

@Spendo02:

A nice house rule includes all US ships roll at 1 the first and only the first zone Japan attacks them in.  This only applies to J1, J2 or J3.  No aircraft can scramble from islands for the first round of combat, but enter combat normally on the second round.

It isn’t exactly Hawaii, but it does give the Japanese the choice to sink a good portion of a US fleet within range before the US can declare war.

In the original A&A Pacific, they have a rule where on Japan’s 1st turn, all Allied forces defend at a 1. The only exception is Chinese units fighting on Chinese territories. They defend like normal. This is done to simulate the surprise and swiftness of the Japanese attacks, not only on Pearl Harbor but throughout Southeast Asia and the Southwestern Pacific.
Of course, in that game, the starting setup has 2 US battleships, a destroyer and a transport stationed around Hawaii and 3 Japanese carriers, each with 2 fighters, and a Japanese submarine stationed off of Midway. So you can kind of simulate Pearl Harbor there.

[CWO Marc]

@knp7765:

Yeah, Admiral Kimmel really got screwed I think. He basically got saddled with the blame for the Pearl Harbor attack on account of our forces not being prepared enough for an attack. At least for the naval part of it. There was another guy, an Army General (can’t remember his name) who got stuck with the blame for our airfields that got pasted. It was a horrible tragedy for the US Armed Services and those two guys ended up taking the fall for all of it.

The view expressed by Gordon Prange on this subject in his book At Dawn We Slept is that the blame for the Pearl Harbor debacle runs all the way through the U.S. chain of command – and thus that, while it’s not correct to saddle Admiral Kimmel and his Army counterpart, General Walter C. Short, with the responsibility for the whole thing, it is correct to hold them responsible for the mistakes they personally contributed.

To give just one example from many, there’s the issue of how Kimmel and Short handled aerial reconnaissance (or lack thereof) around the Hawaiian Islands.  A couple of their officers presented them with a reconnaissance plan which would have provided comprehensive coverage of the sea areas from which potentially hostile Japanese ships might approach.  The plan required far more planes than the U.S. had in Hawaii, so Kimmel and Short rejected it.  Prange argues that even though Kimmel and Short didn’t have the resources to provide comprehensive reconnaissance, they did have the resources (including planes which, while not ideal, could have been put to use) to provide at least some reconnaissance.  By not using them at all, they reduced to zero the chances that an incoming Japanese fleet might be spotted, and thus failed to do their manifest duty.

Another fundamental mistake – which could have been corrected by allocating just a few men and a few telephones to the task – was failing to institute a system to keep proper tabs on the military air traffic over Hawaii.  The incoming Japanese planes were spotted on radar, but the report was disregarded by the lieutenent to whom the radar contact was reported because he assumed that the operators had spotted an expected flight of B-17s coming in from the mainland.  The fact that there were hundreds of incoming planes – which would have been a huge danger signal, since only about ten B-17s were expected – wasn’t reported.  Had proper protocols been in place to positively identify incoming air traffic, this critical mistake would never have happened.

[almashir]

The link below mostly deals with the effectiveness of Japanese torpedoes.  But the opening paragraphs have a description of the pre-war Japanese strategy, before they decided to do Pearl Harbor.  It’s interesting reading.

http://www.navweaps.com/index_tech/tech-067.htm

Edit:  Sorry.  Looking at that article again, it doesn’t give as much detail about the big picture strategy as I remembered.  I was confusing it with another article.  But the gist of their original strategy was to grab the Philippines and wait for the inevitable American counter-attack.  Subs and aircraft carriers were seen as harassment units to whittle down the US as much as possible before the surface units engaged.  From there, the article in the link above covers how the surface engagement was supposed to go.

The background on the torpedoes was that the Japanese had the best on the planet.  Every other navy’s torpedoes had a range of 3-8 miles, depending on the speed setting.  The Japanese Type-93 had a range of about 22 miles on slow setting (which was as fast as the fast setting on most other torpedoes), and a range of about 11 miles on fast setting (which was REALLY fast – like 52 knots or so).  Using compressed oxygen instead of compressed air as an oxidizer for the fuel also caused them to have a less visible wake.  To top it all off, they also had a heavier warhead than other torpedoes.  The Japanese successfully kept the existence of this weapon secret until several months into the war, and built a lot of their naval strategy around it.