Pearl Harbor Day
[NOTE: This is a revised and expanded edition of a post first published in 2006.]
Eighty-two years ago today Pearl Harbor was attacked.
That’s long enough ago that only a vanishing few remember the day and its aftermath with any clarity. Many generations—including my own tiresome one, the baby boomers—have come up since then, and the world has indeed changed.
Prior to 9/11, the Pearl Harbor attack of December 7, 1941 was the closest thing America had to 9/11. The differences between the two are profound, however: at Pearl Harbor we knew the culprit. It was clearly and unequivocally an act of war by the nation of Japan, which was already at war in the Pacific.
But it was, like 9/11, a sneak attack that killed roughly the same number of Americans – in the case of Pearl Harbor mostly (although not exclusively) those in the armed forces. And the Pearl Harbor attack, in the reported (but disputed) words of Japanese Admiral Yamamoto, awakened the “sleeping giant” of the US and filled it with a “terrible resolve.”
In the case of Pearl Harbor, that resolve lasted the duration of the war, an all-out conflagration that required far more sacrifice of the US (and the world) in money, comfort, and the all-important cost of human lives. The scale of such a loss is not even remotely comparable to that of our present conflicts. In addition, the first years of World War II featured many losses and much peril. It was a different world, however, and failure was not considered an option.
Yes, mistakes were made in World War II and in the war that began on 9/11 and has not ended yet. Mistakes always will be made in war. The tactics and even the strategies of World War II don’t fit today’s wars. But tactics and strategies aren’t the issue – although they are extremely important. The overarching issue is will. Without that, a war cannot be won. And, in that respect as in many others, current generations don’t compare to the one known as “The Greatest Generation.”
For some contrast, go back to FDR’s “Day of Infamy” speech (a misquote, it turns out: he actually said “date which will live in infamy”). Following are some of the less famous quotes from the speech; I have selected them because they speak to the question of will. FDR was assisted in mustering that will by the relative clarity of the enemy and its intent in World War II. But it still seems to me, on reading these words, that such unequivocal determination could not be summoned today in the US, even if given the exact circumstances of the infamous attack of December 7, 1941. It may, however, be present in Israel at the moment, but I’m not completely sure:
…No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people in their righteous might will win through to absolute victory.
I believe that I interpret the will of the Congress and of the people when I assert that we will not only defend ourselves to the uttermost but will make it very certain that this form of treachery shall never again endanger us.
Hostilities exist. There is no blinking at the fact that our people, our territory and our interests are in grave danger.
With confidence in our armed forces – with the unbounding determination of our people – we will gain the inevitable triumph – so help us God.
It might be – and in the context of certain discussions which have taken place in the past I think it is – worth noting that the sneak attack on the United States by the government of Japan, and the death of some 2,400 Americans was not enought to get unanimous consent to a joint resolution declaring the recognition of an accomplished fact.
That fact was, that a state of war already existed between the government of Japan and the United States.
Jeanette Rankin, first woman elected to the House, original suffragette, and a Representative who more reasonably voted against entry into the First World War as well, did not find this killing of Americans on our own shores, by a foreign government launching a military strike on our armed forces and civilians, sufficient cause to recognize and to declare that a state of war already existed.
I suppose then we should not be surprised when we see parallel phenomena in current situations.
Some people simply will not defend themselves or others against violence. Which is fine by me as long as no one then assumes that there is an obligation to defend those who refuse to defend themselves.
College students in 1941. December 10th
https://www.loc.gov/item/afc1941004_sr04/
Nihon wa ore no dau ni furusato. There’s really only one way to spell it and it isn’t in English. Ii literally bled with them. By that I mean played Rugby actually made my Japanese friends cry when I made my speech, in Japanese, about how much after seven years i was going to miss them.
But my screen saver was USN drive bombers over the the Japanese carriers at Midway . I really don’t appreciate them screwing with my dad’s life. I hope I’m not banned.
I can’t for some reason correct my misspellings.
Wicked Pinto, is that you?
@DNW
It’s only really “more reasonable” by the slimmest of margins, and made all the more galling by the fact that the Japanese had the dignity to at least declare war on us (admittedly after the fact). But the German Government had killed more Americans (significantly more) than those that perished at Pearl Harbor in the leadup to 1917, had tried to goad Mexico into war with us (unsuccessfully) and sponsored a bunch of terrorists against us (both domestically with things like the Black Tom explosion and externally by giving basically any Hispanic American tinpot willing to shoot at us arms), and by repudiating the Sussex Pledge had dropped any pretensions that it was sorry or was going to do better, while fully expecting us to declare war on them for it (and understandably so). And that’s before we get into the fact that by midwar they were under the control of nutjob proto-Fascists who bear a more than passing resemblance to the “Control Clique” that took over Japanese politics.
Of course this tended to get glossed over by an oddly bipartisan conspiracy of silence, spearheaded most logically by the War Responsibility office of the German Foreign Ministry, who largely peddled the “We dindo nothing wrong” narrative which has gotten quite pervasive (I still see references to the Rape of Belgium being a “fraud” or “propaganda” when it most assuredly was not), but which was picked up by people over here like the Beards, Rankin, and the odious in my opinion Senator Nye (whose committee went out of the way to ignore German crimes against the US to try and blame US entry into the war on Arms Manufacturers) and even Smedley Butler (and one of these days I am going to have to dissect and fisk “War is a Racket” which I find to be very overquoted and more than a bit disgraceful, since Butler lied quite blatantly about the reasons for a number of interventions, most jarringly WWI, and understood that the evidence disproving his claims could not or would not be declassified).
Some of these people understandably changed their tunes after the Japanese tried to spell things out in blood red characters, but many others didn’t.
This is the first time I’ve seen anyone namedrop Smedley Butler without it being to reference JP Morgan purportedly feeling him out for a coup d’etat with Butler as the intended post-coup President.
I was eight on December 7th, 1941. I’ve told this story here before, but it merits the retelling because I see how much of the population has morphed from freedom loving citizens to people who dislike almost everything about this country.
I saw the adults in my life put on their game faces and accept the facts that life was going to be harder, less abundant, and filled with the possibility of loss and grief.
In 1942 when we were getting beat up pretty bad in the South Pacific, I asked my grandfather if we were going to lose. His answer was a resounding, “NO.” Then he explained that our boys still didn’t have the guns, tanks, ammo, ships, airplanes, and more that they needed to take the fight to Japan and Germany.
He told me that our factories were running at top speed to produce the weapons our boys needed.
He also told me that our boys would win because they knew what they were fighting for, and they knew how to think for themselves. When the Lieutenant goes down, the Sergeant will step up, and when the Sergeant goes down the Corporal will step up. He assured me that when our boys had the weapons they needed, we would win.
I’ve always remembered that. But I’ve seen such changes over the years. We’ve lost a lot of our manufacturing capacity. What he said about boys” may still be true of the volunteer military, but if we ever need lots of draftees, I’m not so sure we can find enough to do
the job. We’re just not the country we were in 1941.
Anyway, remember Pearl Harbor. I sure do.
I am sure that there was a measure of ‘anti-war’ sentiment among elements of the country after Pearl Harbor. I suspect it was more prevalent among the Sophisticates.
But as memory serves–I was 6 years old when PH was attacked–the decidedly unsophisticated people around me were of one mind. World War II was a massive effort; so much so that I doubt the average American today can imagine the scope. It also involved massive sacrifice. Again, from the limited perspective of one child; Dad left Mom and three children for three years. Happily he returned. The young man next door, and the one across the street, both fighter pilots, did not. Nearly every family lived with constant worry and dread for loved ones in harm’s way. Rationing of almost every basic need was rigorously enforced–except for some privileged souls, of course.
On the other hand, the dynamic of the U.S. entry into World War I is a bit murky. The whole mess was a massive mistake, of course. It is not clear to me that either side was more or less villainous than the other at the outset; although it seems many historians blame ‘Kaiser Willie’s’ jealousy of the British and French Empires for creating tensions and an arms race. Certainly, the existence of hard alliances that bound competing Empires to enter regional conflicts was exacerbating.
I have not delved deeply into the circumstances leading to the U.S. involvement. I know the pretext was Germany’s alleged use of unrestricted submarine warfare. I know that up to a point, Germany hoped that the U.S. would side with them, or at least remain neutral: so I am a bit surprised at what I read above, if the implication is that Germany was encouraging Latin American attacks on the U.S. before our entry into the war. At any rate there was a serious miscalculation about the scope of warfare in the 20th century by virtually all concerned. The inability of nations to step back, and negotiate a resolution once the cost to each side escalated so dramatically is a condemnation of government by personality.
I think America still has Will. What it has, though is an enormous “Fifth Column” in the merdia and the PostModern Left which will act to undermine that will at every turn.
Consider the endless daily repetition of the Death Count in Iraq — which, even at the very end, wouldn’t have totaled as much as a major battle in the US Civil War, WWI, or WWII. If you split Iraq and Afghanistan apart, the totals lost in each nation from entry to exit was less than many single DAYS in those three wars. But the merdia provided no context, and they bloviated endlessly on it while harping on it.
It says a lot that Bush actually met with the families of something like 1/3rd of those lost while in office. No other PotUS comes close, even in much smaller examples such as Korea or Vietnam.
And, of course, when Teh One took over, suddenly there was silence on the count, such that when Afghanistan crossed 10k, no one even noticed for days.
None of them gave a shit. They just wanted to make America — and the GOP — look bad. Oh, and fuck any Iraqi or Afghani who actually trusted us and sided with us, expecting us to help them in the end… NAHHHH.
The #$^#^#^$ merdia sought to reclaim their glory days, and to recreate Vietnam — which they did, by constantly harping on anything that wasn’t perfect, and avoiding any kind of recollection of what went right any longer than a couple days.
So they succeeded, and essentially delivered a defeat even thought the war was largely won, in both cases.
I repeat what I have said before:
PostModern Liberalism is a social cancer. Literally, not figuratively.
They will be the death of this nation, and many others.
Again a great Dec. 7 post. Germany and Japan were, and now Hamas is, full of will. Not enough. Maybe Ukraine will is also not enough. Armenia will in Nagorno-Karabakh was not enough.
Will is necessary, but not sufficient – military might is also required, which comes from economic might. Which is most efficiently produced in market capitalistic countries with private property, and a fairly large Mil. Ind. Complex. Big not-quite capitalist countries like China might also have winning military.
Hamas will is combined with martyrs/ victims of Hamas and Islam delusions, those who Hamas leaders are willing to have die in order to weaken support for Israel in the world. This might work.
Israel has declared war on Hamas, which it mostly hasn’t done in the past. They have the military might to win, but none can win a war without civilian deaths. It seems they are working effectively to minimize the civilian deaths while gaining more control.
Yet Israel also need a post-Hamas plan for Gaza, much like the US needed a post-Saddam plan for Iraq. But the US plan wasn’t great. Israel’s job is even harder. Inside Likud there is already talk of an alternate leader – not sure what that means for the war effort, but it’s clear that Jews continue to be willing to dissent against leaders they disagree with.
American freedom is worth fighting for, dying for, killing for. While there is a “Just War” theory to support violent self defense that might result in killing an attacker, Christianity and especially most Christian priests, have serious doubts about the morality of killing even in self-defense. Many saints were martyrs, as was Jesus himself.
I’m far more a believer in the need for Just Wars to stop aggression of those who start unjust wars. Recognizing that War is Hell, and some non-guilty civilians always get killed.
In war, victory hinges upon two factors; Mark Twain spoke of one, “It’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the dog.” and WWll Gen. Omar Bradley spoke of the other, “Amateurs study tactics; professionals study logistics.”
J.J.,
I’m sure you know this, but regarding manufacturing capacity, I’m not sure we were in any better shape in 1941 than we are now. The U.S. did an outstanding job of ramping up capacity and wartime industry, but it took time.
With your aviation and military background I’m sure you’re familiar with these stats: in 1939 U.S. aircraft production was about 3,000/year. In 1945 we were making close to 4,000 a month! Nearly 1,000 planes a week! I have read that stat many times and am astounded every time I try to imagine it.
We built 1 aircraft carrier in 1941 and 15 in 1943! While also building 128 destroyers! 1943 also saw the U.S. producing just shy of 30,000 tanks from a total of only 300, 3 years earlier. So, your grandfather was right. Our soldiers, airmen and sailors could get the job done if they had the necessary equipment, and our nation could produce the necessary equipment, but it took time.
I may be ridiculously naive, but I believe Americans could do that again if under threat. However, I cannot imagine a situation where such a huge amount of military material would be necessary. In 2023 a war brutal enough to require 1945 levels of men, bullets and machines would almost certainly escalate to nuclear weapons long before it reached the scale of WWII on land, air and sea.
Regarding my prior comment, I should add that I have sons who are of draft age and it has been interesting how much they and their friends are sharing texts and memes about a draft being inevitable due to current world events. I tell my sons I don’t think it is likely, but the positive thing I have seen is they and their male friends aren’t necessarily mad about it. They are seeing struggles in the world and the U.S. and understand they may be called upon to help. In other words, the attitudes of a lot of young people may not be as different from young Americans on December 6th, 1941.
Social media and corporate media greatly amplify the voices of young people who are mired in chaos and confusion, but maybe there is a larger silent majority among the young than we perceive?
Rufus, I don’t believe we could do it again. Not because of lack of brainpower or ability to ramp up production. But making sacrifices and rationing, the way Oldflyer describes is very dependent on having a “high-trust” society. In a low-trust society, people cheat and look out for themselves, figuring that everyone else is doing so too. I doubt we still have enough team spirit, with today’s elites and deplorables. The left doesn’t respect the US, in favor of globalism, and the right is losing respect for the US largely directed by the left.
Got any more good news on this front to cheer up Eeyore, Tigger?
Rufus T., your point about how we ramped up manufacturing is very true. It was done by putting a few men who knew how to do big things in charge and letting them lead the way.
I doubt that could happen today. We have deep layers of bureaucrats whose job it is to devise regulations to make building anything more difficult. (It’s one of the reasons housing is so expensive today. The Growth Management Act in Washington State was passed in 1994. It ‘s primary effect has been to drive real estate prices into the stratosphere.)
To quickly bypass those layers of bureaucrats would be met with great resistance. Note that much of the resistance to Trump is that he wants to increase our manufacturing and make it easier to build things. Oh, the horror!
We can’t even decide whether we should really support Israel in their time of need. Biden and company are talking out of both sides of their mouths.
Heck, we still haven’t recognized that we are at war with that sect of Islam which animates Hamas, Hezbollah, Isis, al Qaeda, and many other jihadi terror organizations. They’ve been at war with us for these many years, but we keep hoping they will change their minds. To what effect?
On the left we have non-decisive leadership. Unlike FDR and our leaders in 1941. We hope that a GOP POTUS would be more decisive but look at what the left did to Trump during his term. I am not at all confident that we could rise to another Pearl Harbor. I pray that I’m wrong.
“
You were six, my father was 14, and by the time another three years had elapsed, he had enlisted; although his induction was deferred until after Christmas. Thus he was only 17 while actually serving for a relatively short while.
His older brother was in France.
The thing that strikes me of the men of that generation and background was their settledness, their lack of histrionics, their seemingly simple determination to “deal with it” whatever it was, and get on with the business of life and building families.
The reasons for that mindset may be multiple, and include heritage, meaning familial and other culture, and the more general worldview which that inheritance represented.
But in addition, I would not rule out the experience of getting a taste of the bad, sufficient to appreciate in terms of profound psychological comittment, the good.
We today live in a society in which about half of the population are in effect and quite possibly consciously, moral nihilists. And I hardly need quote the current figures concerning the levels of diagnosed psychological disturbance among the populace.
These people always existed, and the literary and arts communities of the prewar era seem to have been populated almost exclusively with them.
But it seemed that at least the average postwar citizen had faith that after all was said and done, life was worth living, and that a regime of constitutional liberty, self-government, and economic freedom was the best venue in which to work that out.
But of course, the sinecured institution dwelling classes have never overwhelmingly believed that; and as their shame at being cowards and center-of-the-herd-seeking types decreases when existential threats fade, their will to power grows concomitantly and their internally generated nihilism spreads through objectively comfortable societies like a contagious psychopathy. Which, to some degree, it is.
That said, here is a happy thought. By my rough reckoning there are just as many good or salvageable people in the United States with whom it is worthwhile to have political fellowship and to regard as worthy moral and social peers, as there were back in 1941.
And that would be somewhere in excess of 100 million …
Hey Neo, if you are reading this: You know your readership. You might assess if the old timers would respond to an open thread on the following …
I know you’re not necessarily a car guy, but you seem to have a lot of people posting here who are of an age and sufficient mental acuity at present to comment on the specifics and experience of driving in cars during the transition age; back when semi and automatic transmissions were intoduced , V-8s and power steering and brakes became common, timing chains were still in use and the population of manufacturers was whittled down and consolidated to the Big Three and The Two. [Excluding Checker and International specialty vehicles]
It would be interesting to hear from someone who had driven [in] a late model Packard, a Hudson, or whose family bought Studebakers and could recount any tech or accomodation details they recall. I’m talking ’47 to ’65 or so.
Also, regarding the B36 and B47 ….
The thing that strikes me of the men of that generation and background was their settledness, their lack of histrionics, their seemingly simple determination to “deal with it” whatever it was, and get on with the business of life and building families.
DNW:
My father and uncle enlisted in late WW2 to become paratroopers. They would have been part of Operation Downfall, the invasion of Japan, had the atomic bombs not convinced Japan to surrender.
My father and uncle weren’t particularly settled. They went on to become beatniks. My uncle, later, even became a full-fledged hippie living in the Haight-Ashbury in 1967.
Which is to say, generalities are generalities. Those who went left and countercultural weren’t necessarily people who hated America and weren’t interested in building families.
It seems to me that Hamas may have provided the required level of bestial savagery needed to wake up the West.
Now we need a political leadership capable of using that truth to motivate Americans to defend themselves, and to lead others by example. It is pretty clear that Democrats have no interest in that undertaking, or they would have been straining at their woke tethers to do it already, wouldn’t they?
The answer is obvious: Trump. He has his flaws, but he has fewer and more benign than most, and he loves our country with unabashed clarity. Deal closed.
My dad was a coastie in WWII. Then through the Korean war, and Vietnam. Yes I’m old. I never went through a period when I disliked my father. I always loved and respected him. I knew what he had done.
I miss him.
Many years ago, when I was in the insurance business, I got a letter from a health insurance company that one of my individual contract clients had reached sixty-five and his contract would expire. They’d be happy to switch him to the Medicare Supplement, form enclosed. He was in the office on other business, so I asked him what he wanted to do.
“Oh, I’m actually sixty-four, but I lied about my age after Pearl Harbor.”
I went back to my desk and looked out the window for a bit and then called the company.
“Oh, we’re getting a lot of that. Just send us a letter.”
“…a lot of that…”
“Oh, I’m actually sixty-four, but I lied about my age after Pearl Harbor.”
Richard Aubrey:
My best friend from high school’s father did that. He was 16. He became one of the most highly decorated sailors in the Pacific Theater.
Then, because he was young enough, he got called for the Korean War and became one of the Frozen Chosin.
https://homeofheroes.com/heroes-stories/korean-war/frozen-chosin/
Rufus T. Firefly on December 7, 2023 at 5:38 pm
“…but maybe there is a larger silent majority among the young than we perceive?”
Could this really be a confirmation of the 4th Turning as proposed by Neil Howe?
Companion to DNW’s comment: “The thing that strikes me of the men of that generation and background was their settledness, their lack of histrionics, their seemingly simple determination to “deal with it” whatever it was, and get on with the business of life and building families.”
Is it fair to say the same thing about the generation of 1776? [Except maybe Patrick Henry? 🙂 ]
Can we really say that also about the generation currently rising? I am too far away in age, geography, and cyber skills from that generation to even make a real guess.
Another absolutely glorious anniversary day. Classic Hawaiian winter day, just like in ’41. Cool, crisp and clear enough to see Kauai from the North Shore. It’s always like this on 12/7. Some kinda message there, I think.
Molly Brown:
You’re killing me. I take it you live in Hawaii … and on the North Shore?
We are not worthy!
“
Yes, well, as you say, generalities. My remarks were based on the common and perhaps dubious, if one wishes to make an issue of it, “all things being equal” predicate.
I cannot tell from, and it is really none of my business, exactly what “late in the war” meant. That might mean enlisting in October ’44 or entering basic in July of 1945.
When going through some VA material, it appears WWII theater service was even attributed to some occupation troops into 1946.
The men I am basically referring to – though settling down as he did – were all slightly older contemporaries of my father but our neighbors and friends.
– John D’Ang#lo, rifleman, Italy, who returned with a Neopolitan wife, went to work for the electric company and reared 6 kids.
– Hank Ho##a, US Marine, Pacific island campaigns who described being on the receiving end of banzai charges and listening to calls of “HeyJoe! throughout the night. Wife, 3 kids , career as a tool and die man at Chrysler.
– Jack M, from Tennessee, actually younger than my Dad by some months, but joined the marines at 16 and wound up invading Okinawa.and possibly Iwo. I cannot remember which one it was where he was sent to the beach to collect a case of peaches, when a shell landed in the sand right next to him. Wife, 5 kids, ran a TV shop and was a 33rd degree Mason.
– Jimmy Luc##o, who took a samurai sword off what you might expect, and came back home with it. Two daughters, one with thalassemia and all that that entailed, and an uncomplaining work life spent at Parke Davis.
These were men typical of their experiences and condition.
If I recall correctly, you have in the past shared information which indicated that although your family had a very interesting and in some measure economically privileged background, they were anything but typical.
Or perhaps I misremember.
DNW:
I don’t know the exact dates. Instead of invading Japan, my father and uncle were both in the Occupation.
They were definitely All-American, when it came to WW2. They were both affected by their tours in Japan.
My father was a poor, half-breed New Mexican. My uncle was from a nouveau-riche Oklahoma family.
I’m not typical either.
R2L,
‘…but maybe there is a larger silent majority among the young than we perceive?
FWIW, my ‘doubting Thomas’ son is now a conservative Christian. He is in tech and claims it was living in the ‘demon infested Bay Area’ that did it.
Also, the son of one of my good friends and his buddies are fully conservative (in a late 20’s something way) and aren’t buying anything the MSM is peddling. They’ve even realized electric cars are environmentally disastrous. Frankly, these boys can only be described as ‘surf bums’! They don’t have ‘careers’, are not in college or the military, but they are voting Republican!
I don’t understand it, but it gives me hope.
Unfortunately, the girls I know of that age are another matter. I’m afraid most of them have fallen victim to what Jordan Peterson refers to as ‘Toxic Compassion’.
Huxley,
Yes, a hillside above Waimea Bay on the North Shore of Oahu – went to college here and never left – been here 44 years. It’s better than paradise – it’s heaven on earth.
The only thing that can get me out of here is grandchildren.
Wore myself out weeding in the yard today, and gave thanks to God every time I stood up and took in the view.
It’s better than paradise – it’s heaven on earth.
Molly Brown:
Waimea… We are not worthy!
@Boobah
The “Business Plot” was probably real (I am happy to call Butler out for his lies but this stuff probably wasn’t one of them) but pretty much all of the “evidence” that JP Morgan was involved is hearsay blown up by Stalinist propaganda in the same breath as claiming Jewish financiers were for it. The plot was probably real but nowhere near as well connected as MacGuire and Clark wanted to act it was. In any case Morgan was leery of Fascism in general and probably was not interested in it or working with Butler.
@Rufus T. Firefly
No, we probably were in a much better position then than we are now. In particular in terms of industrial capacity and overall share of the pie. I am fairly active as a history nerd and gamer and one thing that keeps coming up with WWII and to a lesser extent WWI, Victorian, and early WW3 (ie 1950s ish) scenarios is how the developers tend to have to put their fingers on the scales to make things “balanced” rather than historical because otherwise the US would have about 35% of the world’s industrial capacity around the start of World War… One, and more than 40% around the height of the Great Depression.
At best we’re near the lower thresholds of that now and probably well lower due to deindustrialization and above all foreign industrialization, somewhat offset by information dominance but still an issue. Even if we believe the PRC is fudging its numbers – because it is – and the likes of India or Southeast Asia or Mexico or Nigeria have relatively inefficient industries they are still leaps beyond what they had then. The good news is outside of Red China and Pakistan the most likely countries that industrialized between then and now are likely to be on our side, while the enemy has had much of their countries ruined (Venezuela is far less competitive now than it was in the 1940s).
Indeed. The issue I see is that the added complexity of war material means it is a lot more intensive to make, more dependent on foreign inputs and the supply lines there, and more difficult to ship.
Indeed and rightfully so. The issue is that we aren’t going to be able to have quite those numbers now. Modern planes and tanks are exponentially more costly and more complex than they were then which is also why you see things like airframe and vehicle bull numbers drop like a rock very quickly after the war. Made worse because of the heavy reliance on advanced computers and circuitry not just in the machines but in their disposable weapons like missiles (which basically dominate air combat).
Agreed. The big issue I see is the lead time for the necessary equipment. Which has become much longer, more costly to obtain, more costly to produce and sustain, and more vulnerable to say nukes. In many ways the complexity of churning out tanks and airplanes today is comparable to that of doing so for naval warships back in the ages of Steam and Oil.
And ironically while more complex those were actually shorter to deal with than age of sail where you worked in literally generational time spans due to the trees needed for production.
For most of the US’s existence this has actually worked to our favor, especially after the British and French stopped being our major strategic threats. The single largest and most intensive military capability to make – and the one that needs the most forward planning – is the Navy. And it says something that Japan is the enemy that had the most capable navy, and it was still a pipsqueak.
Hitler in one of his more astute moments saw this as a problem and his unpublished Second Book goes into a fair amount of detail about the need to bring Eurasia to order and three build up a navy to defeat the US and destroy American Capitalism. But of course that’s be working at a disadvantage.
Nukes and other strategic bombing and rocket capabilities I fear make that a lot less of an advantage than it once was, because while also very costly and demanding they are relatively cheaper than running a functioning high performance navy (something the USN struggled with more) and also can be whipped out on a dime once developed. So now Hitler/Wilhelm/Stalin/Tojo/Lenin/Mao/etc no longer have to fume as they fight to control their own neighborhoods and try to build up a navy to go out and strike us at home.
I might be too and I do think we can do it again, but it will be hard
I would not be so sure at that. Moreover even if it did escalate to nuclear weapons that wouldn’t mean they would escalate all the way. This is one part of strategic planning I think the Russian school of war has an advantage on for us because we seem to generally blank out when the concept of them actually being used in war comes up. Understandable, but unfortunate because that blinds us (if you will pardon the pun) to how things will escalate, the different ways they might, and that nukes are and ultimately remain tools for war and Moscow and Beijing have thought A LOT about how to use them as such in “limited” deployments, like the French have.
DNW : Okinawa and Iwo Jima involved different units, so it’s unlikely that anyone would serve in both campaigns. OTOH, either one would be pretty tough.
Rufus T. Firefly : There’s a story which is probably apocryphal and which I may be misremembering –
Reporter ; Who are the best jungle fighters ?
Australian Soldier : We are, the Japs are the second best.
Reporter : What about the Americans ?
AS : The yanks aren’t jungle fighters – the first thing they do is knock the jungle down, THEN they fight.
I have never really been a gamer but have in the past, collect wargames to use as simulation study aids. One of the first simulations that I can remember, was on Pearl Harbor Day when I was about 12. My bed was in alcove in the wall like a ship berth. This left the floor clear for my activities. On this particular PH day, I pretended to be sick as I knew my mother was going to be out all day. As soon as she left, I laid out a recreation of PH with LEGO ships and using Walter Lord’s “Day of Infamy” timeline, recreated the attack minute by minute time adjusted to the Central Time Zone (where I lived).
My first attempt at computer-based simulation I described previously as follows:
“When I was about 16, I had permission to use another WWMCCS [World Wide Military Command and Control System] computer that was in Virginia. I learned Basic by reading the manual and writing a Star Trek game (naturally). I charged my computer runtime to the Information Directorate of the Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.”
The first professional simulation was for a USAF research project. I simulated the Soviet breakout in the Tom Clancy novel “Red Storm Rising”.
The area I am working now Is the Fall of the Philippines. I never knew until recently for example, that we sent mustard gas to Philippines in 1941.
DNW : Okinawa and Iwo Jima involved different units, so it’s unlikely that anyone would serve in both campaigns. OTOH, either one would be pretty tough.
Yeah, I’m sure you are right. I probably should have written “and/or” since I could not bring to mind the name of the island.
Must have had a deep samdy beach that would envelop an artillery shell or mortar round without it exploding.
And Jack may have indicated that it was his idea to liberate the box, possibly having been sent down for another reason.
There was also somthing about his unit when he finally got back, but I cannot recall what it was.
I dont know what Jack looked like at 16 or 17, but at 45 and with a full head of prematurely grey hair, he looked like a square jawed semi-twin brother of the singer Charlie Rich.
I recall D’Angelo sitting on the floor of the living room – actually they may have moved in on our immediate post Christmas toy race car set up – and reminiscing with my dad; overhearing him mention the incident when the head of the lieutenant he had been talking to, just “disappeared”
These are not unique wartime incidents, and I have even seen these types of events portrayed in movies. A canonball takes some guy’s head off, Japanese charging through the night with swords waving, dud shells landing on the beach a few feet away.
But these were things I either overheard as the men solemnly and reflectively conversed, or were briefly recounted to me at the tail and late evening end of a holiday get together. Dont know why much of it seemed connected to holiday event wind-downs, rather than other gatherings.
I’m regretful now that I was not more attentive in a systematic way.
Steve57 says
Wheter he was initially Great Lakes, or Manhattan Beach, St Augustine, or Cape May …
Here’s something for you. https://www.si.edu/object/engine-room-coast-guard-buoy-tender-oak%3Anmah_842767
https://thetidesofhistory.com/2019/12/29/treasury-class-cutters/
Turtler,
I cede the argument to you based solely on military and historical knowledge. Not only are you strong in those areas, I am fairly uneducated in military history after about AD 450.
Your points about the current state of manufacturing are correct, as are your points about the complexity of a nuclear sub or F-18, but I was writing in generalities.
Just as you and others wrote; in 1941 really talented people were given great resources to lead huge numbers of dedicated, talented people in a war effort that bore amazing fruit.
That is what I am naively optimistic about. Could we build 40,000 F-18s in a year? Almost certainly not, but would we make clever use of drone technology, find faster ways to synthesize carbon fiber, use cyber warfare to minimize our enemie(s)’ effectiveness.
I’m thinking of Elon Musk types.
And their challenge would not be; recreate WWII production levels of WWII materials. It would be; figure out iterative methodologies to use current production capacity to make effective weapons and equipment while simultaneously ramping up production on innovative, new tools for effective warfare.
We’ve seen resourceful Ukrainians using limited resources and brilliant technical innovation to great effect.
Years ago I read about the Army’s initial attempts to make an effective, small, unmanned fighter. They gave sacks of money to one or more of the usual suspects; Lockheed, McDonnel Douglas, Raytheon… Who then proceeded to try to shrink an F-15. After several years of pouring money into a gaping maw of non-success they abandoned the program and rethought their approach.
And they noticed two scientists in Israel’s armed forces who had a very capable and effective unmanned remote plane that cost about 1/gajillionth of the Army’s budget. So our Army hired them to teach us. How did those two scientists achieve what our best defense contractors could not? The Israeli scientists had a tiny budget so they started with existing, hobbyist, RC aircraft and found economical and effective ways to upscale that hardware to military demands.
This is the reason for my optimism. I think America still does a great job of developing such people and there are many alive today. Many under 40. Under 30. In a life or death struggle against an existential foe I think we could still out create most any other nation.
As a rule, it takes longer to train fighter pilots than it takes to build fighter planes and inadequately trained pilots wreck a lot of planes. The US built a truly massive aircrew training system during WW2.
The US Navy’s all-woman Poseidon crew put their plane into Kaneohe Bay a couple of weeks ago.