Japanese Blitzkrieg (1)
The Japanese-style blitzkrieg offensive continued to spread throughout the Pacific carefully designed to weaken the Anglo and US strength in the Asia-Pacific zones and give Tokyo the time to seize strategic bases and economic resources. The colonial outposts from Hong Kong to Manila and Malaya to Singapore were attacked while the US Naval Fleet lay crippled at Pearl Harbor.
Churchill, elated over the American attack, also saw the “terrible forfeits in the East” due to his misjudgment of Japan’s military power. There would be little in the Pacific remaining between Japan and the virtually undefended Australia and New Zealand.
Malaya and Thailand had been invaded by the Japanese 5th and 18th divisions, along with the Imperial Guards, with the missions to capture Singapore, her port and the British troops surrounding it. Let it be noted that the Malaya/Thailand and Singapore campaigns were designed as 2 separate strategies and were considered by the Japanese to be the most vital. Pearl Harbor was merely meant to render the US fleet incapable of interfering with these operations.
The Japanese 15th Army on the Kra Isthmus of Burma were to sever the supply routes of supplies to China and secure the Burmese oil. The British on mainland China were pushed back due to the assault by 3 enemy regiments opposite Hong Kong.
8 December, in the Philippines, the Japanese infantry units went in to occupy Bataan while other units landed at Vigan and Aparri in the north portion of Luzon. / Wake Island began to receive heavy naval and aerial enemy bombardment.
FDR gave his “a day that will live in infamy” speech to Congress and they immediately passed the resolution to declare war on Japan. (NOT Germany). Thirty-three minutes later, the president cabled Churchill_____
“…TODAY ALL OF US ARE IN THE SAME BOAT WITH YOU AND THE PEOPLE OF THE EMPIRE AND IT IS A SHIP WHICH WILL NOT AND CANNOT BE SUNK.”
Click on to images to enlarge.
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Humor – and the training shall begin…..
Postcards are courtesy of http://muscleheaded.wordpress.com/
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Farewell Salutes –
John Borowski – Port Allegany, PA; US Army, WWII, SSgt., Europe/Africa/Middle East Theater
Donald Chapman – Redding, CA; US Army, Korea, 64th FAR/25th Division
Alex Giblin – Richmond, NZ; RNZ Air Force # 436608, Flt. Sgt., WWII
Raymond Hatfield – Cythniana, KY; US Navy, WWII
Joseph McEntee – Washington DC; US Army, WWII & US Air Force, Korea, LtCol. (Ret.)
Kenneth Rankin – Ottawa, CAN; RAF/RCAF, WWII, (Ret.)
Floyd “Flip” Soden – WPalm Beach, FL; US Navy, USS Rowe 564
Robert Van Buren – WPalm Beach, FL; US Army, WWII
Adlophus “Ross” Wright Jr. (89) – Columbia, MO; US Air Force, POW
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Posted on September 8, 2014, in WWII and tagged Asia, family history, History, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaya, Military, nostalgia, Pacific, Philippines, veterans, WWII. Bookmark the permalink. 47 Comments.
Australia’s lack of defence was partly due to politics but more important was the general mindset. We had always sent troops abroad to fight, and those wars were far from home. Also, Singapore had this reputation as an ‘impregnable fortress’ and though that little island is quite a distance from this big island we somehow derived from it a sense of security.
We were complacent in another way too. As the descendants of the men who had sailed around the world, the men who made their name in discovery and colonisation and conquest, Australians couldn’t really believe in a military threat from Asia. We were afraid of the Yellow Peril, for sure – but that was envisaged as sly Orientals who enslaved our women with opium or took our jobs for lower pay. There were a few who weren’t blinkered this way; they were mostly ignored or mocked.
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Thank you for the Australian perspective, Greg. It is this kind of sharing that rounds out all the stories of the war. I appreciate you taking the time to explain the situation.
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Interesting. My Dad served in the Philippines.
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It would be interesting to hear about him. Do you have a post on him, Toni?
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I never thought of Pearl Harbour as a disabling of the potential opposition to the Thailand/Malayan campaign. There was a piece in our paper today (The Guardian) about Hirohito papers that have just been released. He was, apparently, worried that making enemies of the Americans might be a reckless strategy.
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Yes, not everyone was fanatical about hitting the US as some others in power [the Military]. The Emperor was actually powerless against them, due to tradition. He was an unassuming man, lacking vanity, unselfish and had no aspirations of ambition, but was born into royalty. He had merely wanted to be a marine biologist.
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Like the commenter above said, now there are more resources for learning than ever before. Makes you wonder why we are forced to fund textbooks each year for the schools, considering the publishers of said textbooks insist on practically ignoring or re-imagining the facts. Thanks to people like you, Gp, regular civilian folks like us can see exactly what our schooling seemed to lack or leave out.
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Thank you Morguie. Since computers are used so much for school work these days – textbooks ARE pretty much obsolete, so – in total agreement with you – why DO we need them?
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BTW, the second cartoon of the “all knowing” yet feeble depiction of a sergeant trying to tell what appears to be “real” soldiers how to war – it kinda reminds me of what the Administration has done to our experienced combat leadership. I shall end here. 🙂
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The breadth and coordination of these attacks by Japan is breathtaking! But I always read these accounts with a different perspective since your great blog on the warning signs leading up to these attacks. The politics behind turning a blind eye to enable a full attack as a way to bring the U.S in was so disturbing.
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That is exactly how I felt about it, and so, presented it in this fashion. Trying to discuss bits and pieces at different times gets confusing. Thanks for coming, Carol.
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The gathering of raw materials and efforts to secure their supply are the key to understanding so much about World War II.
Monitor the news sources of today for mention of natural gas, oil, pipelines, food production, coal, rare earths, fishing rights, capital resources, etc. and consider if our world is all that much different . . . more subtle, perhaps? Maybe not. Does an ever increasing global population coupled with nation state fragmentation push us back into a global war over natural resources? Are we already in such a war?
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I believe it is as you said, more subtle. Look at the fight over who has the rights for the North Pole and/or South? The population is out of control, we have nearly tripled since I was in high school and everybody needs something. Thanks for bringing up that point.
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I have a story that you may find interesting. If you would like to receive it, you can email me at mustang45usmc at gmail.com.
Semper Fi
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I appreciate you wanting to share your story, but I do not do private emails. Either here in the comments or let me know if you have a post with the story for me to read and/or reblog. Thank you for the offer.
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That was one devastating war that killed many people around the world.
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So very true.
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My grandfather was actually in the war.
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Something to be very proud of. Do you have any stories you’d like to share about him that he might have told you? Do you have info? name? unit?, etc?
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The cartoons and the map really add to the post. My dad had a brother killed at Midway , another ( later ) with the Amer. Army on Biak ( near New Guinea ) , and Dad was on a transport bringing troops to the Solomons and Australia and bringing casualties back home . ( another brother of his flew a B-17 in Europe ) . So , I’m paying attention to your well-presented information . Again , thanks .
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It certainly takes an entire family to win a war and yours did more than their fair share!!! My only fear is – am I doing the men the justice? I am doing my best to get data about every spot they went to and I just know I’ll miss somebody, some unit or some island, especially with so much going on in so many places at once. That’s why I’m always asking the readers to share their stories and add the details (unit? name? branch? country?, etc). Thanks for loyal reading, Dan and your family’s contributions.
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I love how you worked the postcards in — I think they’re a perfect fit !
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Thanks, Chris. You know yourself, after Pearl – the men started lining up at the recruitment centers – what could be better? I hope the link brought you some new readers.
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I especially appreciate getting to be a part of your blog. 🙂
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You are on the site every time you comment – and many readers DO see the comments. But thanks for the compliment.
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Now I know. Thank heavens that contradictions are impossible …
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Pierre raises interesting points … ‘hidden agendas’? Naaaaa, surely not … I’m off now to refresh myself with the definition of ‘colony’. As I understand it, ‘colonies bad—freedom good’.
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Hey, nothing wrong with colonies if they’re treated properly and back then – they weren’t!! Pierre always makes good points – he’s quite sharp that one – he keeps me on my toes. Thank you for reading, Argus.
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Great read, thank you for sharing.
I have put the “poetry blog” to bed! Please check out my new site where I will begin a new journey into “fiction” based on sometimes “fact” and continue to follow your visits are important to me. ajm
“Libretto”
http://writerannjohnsonmurphree.wordpress.com/
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Thank you for giving me the link. I see I’m already 4 months behind schedule – it will take some time to catch up, please bear with me. Thanks for visiting here, Ann.
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As you know, the IJA was more powerful than the IJN at that time. The IJA conquests you reported on set the stage, so to speak, for their complex plan to take Port Moresby with their underling IJN as support. It was thwarted at Coral Sea which signaled the gradual attrition of their soldiers as they were condemned to a debilitating overland strategy. I love the cartoons from the muscleheaded blog!
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Glad you liked it, Koji. Oh, we’ll get to Australia, after all she was attacked over 90 times before the enemy gave up on the idea. I’m glad you made the point about the Imperial Japanese Army and Navy; I just want to get in what IJN & IJA stand for for people who aren’t familiar. Thank you.
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Another fine post. A key argument for the side that thinks dropping the two atomic bombs was necessary to end the war is the fact U.S. had targeted 67 Japanese cities in our own Blitzkrieg from April to August. Still, the Japanese had not surrendered.
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You bring up a very good point, Cindy. I enjoy hearing everyone’s take on the data.
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The map gave a sobering start to my day. I was thinking of how my father, who had never been outside of Western Pennsylvania must have felt ending up on New Guinea.
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I know my father was excited to see parts of the world he wouldn’t otherwise get to visit, but I know what you mean. Not only going so far away, but to such a backward country (at the time) and in wartime!! Good to see you here, Dan.
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There was a commission set up in Canada during the war to shed light on Canada’s decision to send troops in Hong Kong. I will look it up and comment further.
When we see how leaders had hidden agendas before Pearl Harbor, I am curious to read more about this.
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There you go…
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/UN/Canada/CA/163-HongKong/
I knew I had read this in 2010.
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Thank you, a ton of data to go thru here!!
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I don’t have to read it all.
I know why these men were sent there,
Canada had to follow Britain’s demands.
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I just shake my head when people refuse to believe it; I have too much data to bring out and prove things to them. This site is just skimming the surface. I would greatly appreciate you joining in with info!!
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Of course I have found it GP…
People now have the chance to learn more about history than before with the Internet.
They can make up their own mind about what really went on.
There was a lot of hidden agendas out there like how Australia being left alone to defend herself.
This is how the British Empire considered its colonies back then. It was the normal thing to do. France had the same attitude towards its colonies.
Colonies…
Italy, Japan, and Germany wanted a piece of that pie also. They could not get in the same way so they used war to conquer their enemies’ colonies.
Pur and simple logic.
For them it was a question of survival and the end justified the means, and the means were mean indeed.
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Exactly!!
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Reading your recent posts reminded of the film “Empire of the Sun”. Have you seen it?
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I believe so; I’ve watched so many…It certainly does sound familiar
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I can’t say I enjoyed it but it all makes more sense in the light of my reading of your posts.
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I do my best, Ann, Thanks!
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