What is the purpose of wasting allied lives taking the Solomons, New Guinea, and the Philippines when you can just take pooly defended Marshall, Marianas and Iwo Jima islands and then maybe Okinawa, to straightaway launch bombing campaigns and invasion into Japan.
Can some strategy expert explain to me the idea behind this? Like, if you threaten Japan, wouldn't they pull their navy back to defend? Without the IJN, the SEA holdings of Japan would disintegrate on its own or are just out of the picture.

Maybe you should go back in time and tell them your ideas

>monday morning quarterbacking the pacific theatre

>>64069998 (OP)
Better yet. Why didn't the US land 2 million men on Hokkaido and use it as a base to bomb the fuck out of Japan?

>>64069998 (OP)
>>64070010
Homo

>>64070005
But they were doing this already. Problem is... why do both?

what if the himalyas didn't exist would india be chinese?

>>64070021
Whats that gotta do with the pacific war?

new guinea was literally australian territory at this time

>>64070028
Then let the aussies handle it and do a flanking move on Jap forces in Malaya, Dutch East Indies, and Philippines by taking smaller islands and using them as air and naval bases to destroy the IJN.

>>64070034
how are you this ignorant
this isn't hoi4 you fucking retard

>>64070054
Instead of calling me ignorant, why dont you educate me. Retard. lemme guess, you cant.

Maybe they'll be harassed from the south if they just let the japs chill there? Put a little thought into it man. Why do you think they did what they did?

>>64069998 (OP)
>wasting allied lives
>Philippines
Yeah, leave the 2+ million American citizens behind...

>>64070055
Correct, it's s hard to educate a retard like you.

>>64070064
But they can only do that with the IJN and after Midway, it was effectively destroyed. It finally met its end at Leyte Gulf but you could avoid that and just gun straight for Japan no? I don't think the IJA had the means to harass the USN.

>>64070067
>0 argument
OK.

>retard does not even know that the Philippines was a US territory and the Nips had millions of US civilians and POWs there
>Oh and they're white too, the brown local Filos weren't considered part of America

>>64070073
If Japan surrenders, they get released. Just because they have a few hostages doesn't mean its wise to engage in bloody island warfare in the Philippines.

>>64070068
>But they can only do that with the IJN and after Midway, it was effectively destroyed.
Sure were a lot of naval engagements including carrier battles in the Solomons campaign despite the IJN being destroyed. Fucking mong.

>>64070055
the things you are saying are multiple layers of idiocy deep man, to the point that it'd require more effort than you are worth.

you seem to think that, if the southern resource area wasn't attacked, the japs would just sit on their hands down there or that the same outcome could have been achieved. do i really have to tell you that the allies were not the only people with brains in this war? not the only ones strategizing? that this would have left them quite vulnerable?

this is only one reason. then there's the fact that a naval fight closer to japan benefits the japanese far more, and others.

>>64070067
not me but it is true

>>64069998 (OP)
The Philippines were American clay, and besides it would be more difficult to support an invasion of iwo jima if the nearest friendly port was fuckin Darwin.

>>64070077
>Sure were a lot of naval engagements including carrier battles in the Solomons campaign despite the IJN being destroyed. Fucking mong.
The IJN ceased to be a threat after suffering catastrophic defeat after defeat. This is a fact. A few disparate kamikaze attacks by surviving carriers were more delaying and desperate actions than a real threat.
>>64070079
>>64070079
>this is only one reason. then there's the fact that a naval fight closer to japan benefits the japanese far more, and others.
Then how come the USN was able to land marines in Okinawa and Iwo Jima and win both islands? You don't need to take the Philippine islands to do this.
>>64070086
Hawaii.

>>64070089
jesus fucking christ.
>You don't need to take the Philippine islands to do this.
i want you to substantiate this bullshit. listen to yourself.

>>64069998 (OP)
Because we needed to protect Australia

>>64070089
>dude just invade directly from hawaii!!!111
hawaii is 4000 fucking miles from japan. convoys steaming across the pacific for WEEKS, vulnerable to all manner of attack, costing all manner of fuel.
you do not exist in reality. you are an infant.

>>64070070
The explanations are easily available in the historiography, however hard that is for a spastic like you to decipher.
>Needed to safeguard Australia and it's vital sea lines of communication
>needed a modest starting point for a Pacific offensive with its own airfield to provide land based air cover
>Could not yet rely upon the USN entirely to do this. Carriers too precious after Coral Sea/Midway
>The Big Blue Fleet that can rampage over the Pacific providing it's own air cover does not exist yet
>IJN and Rabaul are still lethally dangerous and need to be reduced.

>>64070099
I never said that. I said go with Nimitz's plan of Island hopping and stick to it. Why are you samefagging this hard and putting words in my mouth just to discredit me? This is schizo behavior.

>>64070089
I dont want to join in on the chorus of people calling you a retard but youre making it pretty hard.
>Midway
Did not establish USN supremacy, it merely resulted in roughly carrier parity.
>beelineing straight to Japan
Was the exact thing Japan was praying we would do, as that would play entirely into their prewar planning - the US would be on the end of a long ass and clunky logistics train and the IJN would be able to bring us to a planned decisive engagement where the merits of their ship designs would outweigh their flaws
>Solomons campaign
An unmitigated catastrophe for Japan, the exact kind of fight they desperately wanted to avoid. At the end of a long supply chain, Japan was stuck in a slugfest and couldn't maintain the quality of their units. Their pilot corps ground themselves to dust in the meat grinder over Guadalcanal

>>64070107
>Needed to safeguard Australia and it's vital sea lines of communication
If so, why not go all the way then and take Indonesia and Malaya? Clearly this was not the goal. Hell, one can argue taking Solomons was sufficient>>64070107
>needed a modest starting point for a Pacific offensive with its own airfield to provide land based air cover
Island hopping achieved this without the need for Philippines
>>64070107
>The Big Blue Fleet that can rampage over the Pacific providing it's own air cover does not exist yet
The USN had many forward bases and was already working its way to Japan
>>64070107
>IJN and Rabaul are still lethally dangerous and need to be reduced.
IJN was crippled in Midway and Rabaul, fine, you can take the Solomon islands. But why go all the way to Philippines?

The Philippines was a US territory during this time, skipping them is fucking retarded especially when there are Americans living there and tens of thousands of US troops who surrendered 4-5 years prior.

The island of Luzon is a shorter jump off point than Guam or any Pacific island.

>>64070115
>>beelineing straight to Japan
Again, stop putting words in my mouth. See pic>>64070018

>>64070115
>An unmitigated catastrophe for Japan, the exact kind of fight they desperately wanted to avoid. At the end of a long supply chain, Japan was stuck in a slugfest and couldn't maintain the quality of their units. Their pilot corps ground themselves to dust in the meat grinder over Guadalcanal
This does not negate the fact that it may have been unnecessary. I can submit to the idea that you needed to defend Australia but there was 0 need to go all the way to Philippines. Even Nimitz was arguing against going to the Philippines.

>>64070089
>The IJN ceased to be a threat after suffering catastrophic defeat after defeat.
Then why did the USN suffer losses to the point where they had only one active fleet carrier in the entire theater then during the Solomons campaign? Plus repeated shitkickings from Japanese surface action forces in the Solomons? Mong.

>>64070117
>The Philippines was a US territory during this time, skipping them is fucking retarded especially when there are Americans living there and tens of thousands of US troops who surrendered 4-5 years prior.
This isn't a game of RISK. This is war. You don't need to recapture every single territory to win a war. Once Japan surrenders, you win Philippines back without blowing up Manila.
>>64070117
>>The island of Luzon is a shorter jump off point than Guam or any Pacific island.
I dunno man, seems pretty far from Japan compared to Okinawa.

>>64070127
>Then why did the USN suffer losses to the point where they had only one active fleet carrier in the entire theater then during the Solomons campaign? Plus repeated shitkickings from Japanese surface action forces in the Solomons? Mong.
Uhhh read the thread? Midway is before Solomons.

>>64070130
Yes...after which the US suffered defeats.

op just wants to dunk on mcarthur and this is unacceptable

>>64070108
>>64070116
>>64070124
>samefagging
not what that means

>just island hop past the IJN bro
>just give the japanese unfettered access to resources bro
>just rely on a ridiculously weak supply line bro

>stop putting words in my mouth, see pic:
>pic depicts beeline straight to taiwan past thousands of miles of territory

you can't even reply right. how new are you? lurk 100 years before posting.

>>64070134
Oh so the US lost the war? Implessive.

>>64070130
And I'm referring to the carrier and surface actions that occurred post-Midway in the Solomons, retard.

>>64070136
>>>just island hop past the IJN bro
This was done. Read up on the pacific war.
>>just give the japanese unfettered access to resources bro
Their merchant shipping was blown up by subs. Read up on the pacific war
>>just rely on a ridiculously weak supply line bro
Japan had no ability to stop resupplies. read up on the pacific war
>
>>stop putting words in my mouth, see pic:
>>pic depicts beeline straight to taiwan past thousands of miles of territory
Look at it again. Try harder.

>>64070140
Ah so you're saying USN was getting BTFO left and right by the IJN? Right.
>>64070135
McArthur was a dumb son of a bitch who lost the Philippines and then Korea afterwards. He should have been shot. His pride got in the way of grand strategy and America wasted lives in Philippines.

>>64070142
hahahahahahaha
mindbroken

>>64070147
0 argument. again. youre just a dumb fucking spastic schizo mcarthur's cock sucking shill

>>64070144
>seethe over people misrepresenting your ideas
>blatantly misrepresent thier own

>>64070148
>youre just a dumb fucking spastic schizo mcarthur's cock sucking shill

>>64070151
Tell me where. They are saying its absolute necessary to take Philippines. You don't need to take Philippines to defend Australia. You don't need to take Philippines to invade Japan. You don't need to use the Philippines as a forward base when you have taken Marshall Islands and later the Mariana, Iwo and Okinawa. The invasion of Philippines in the October of 1944 was completely unnecessary to achieve the primary objective of bombing and invading the Japanese home islands for a swift and decisive victory over Japan.

>>64070165
Also from this pic here, if defending Australia was a real objective McArthur would have invaded Indonesia instead of fucking Philippines

>>64070167
SEETHING

>>64070169
Youre fucking arguing in bad faith the whole time. Go fuck yourself.

>>64070165
>The invasion of Philippines in the October of 1944 was completely unnecessary to achieve the primary objective of bombing and invading the Japanese home islands for a swift and decisive victory over Japan.
>They just did it for funsies

>>64070192
>>They just did it for funsies
The did it because McArthur's pride was hurt when he got defeated and kicked out of the Philippines and he spent years building political support for the retaking of the Philippines. Nimitz's strategy was successful and did not hinge on taking the Philippines.

>>64070165
>>64070167
The capture of the Phillipines did alot more than just turn a part of the map a friendly color, it also effectively cut Japan's empire in two, while also maintaining a solid base from which to continue the advance. Indonesia would have just tucked in an edge, by the time invading large Japanese occupied areas was on the table the risk to Australia was largely gone now that the Allies were on the offensive.

The idea of just cutting straight to Japan was hugely risky, you call it "swift and decisive" but it had every opportunity to reverse and become a disaster. The Allies couldn't assume they'd just win the war, and to extend their lines of supply out to the heart of Japan without the years of grinding actions that preceded 1944/45 would be putting the very real chance of a catastrophic defeat on the table.

Throughout this thread you've made alot of statements and claims about the circumstances of the Pacific war, but often fail to appreciate that those circumstances came about as the result of the way the war was fought, not as an inherent quality of it.

>>64069998 (OP)

Cutting off Japan from its newly conquered territories in Southeast Asia that were a crucial source for materials such as raw rubber and oil. One of the driving factors behind the Japanese decision to build the infamous Thai-Burma Railway was their rapid loss of control over the sea lanes after Midway. Japanese troops in Burma needed to be supplied and looted wealth from Burma needed to be transported to Japan, and a 200 mile journey by railway presented less risk of immediate destruction than a 2,000 mile journey by sea around Malaya.

>>64070068
>destroyed at midway
>wait no... nvm it was destroyed later at leyte gulf
Get it together

>>64070259
Problem is, the USN was already cutting the empire in two by taking islands between South East Asia and Japan. Im talking about The Mariana Islands. Formosa at the time was also less defended than the Philippines but it was avoided because Okinawa was a better spot and was also less defended.
For context, Japan had 500k troops on Philippines.Okinawa had 70k IJA troops and 50k Okinawan conscripts.
I simply take issue with attacking such a well defended archipelago when you can instead take the Okinawan islands and still achieve the strategic objective of cutting the Empire into two by using it as a forward base with which to conduct either attacks against the Japanese homeland or to sink merchant shipping that carries valuable resources from the South East Asian holdings.
>>64070276
ok

>>64070282
Also, Midway during June of 42 saw the sinking of 4 Japanese fleet carriers which were simply irreplaceable. In comparison, the US industrial capacity was still ramping up and more and more ships were being built. It was clear by then to both the IJN and the USN who held the upper hand as time went on. This was also why the IJN resorted to massive attacks later on as well as even using Kamikaze to try to rescue the situation. All in the hopes of a decisive victory which, even if achieved, does not change the fact that the US can pump out more carriers and trained pilots than the Japanese can destroy, if they managed to destroy any in the first place.
So my argument is that the invasion of the Philippines is therefore, not appropriate as it does not achieve with the least amount of friction the main strategic objective of cutting off Japan and its newly acquired territories.

>>64070144
>Ah so you're saying USN was getting BTFO left and right by the IJN? Right.
But I didn't say that, did I? Both were ground down in the Solomons, the IJN irrecoverably so. To the point where they could do very little to act against the island hopping campaign, as was the intention. Please end your fuckwit bloodline.

>>64070301
ok

>>64070305
Thank you. One less spaz polluting the gene pool.

>>64070296
Furthermore, when it comes to the defense of Australia, military planners then knew as well as today that the best defense is a good offense. The IJN was in no position to conduct anymore offensive attacks or expansion after the Solomon islands. Rather than engaging 500k IJA troops in the Philippines, its much more economical to cut them off via USN dominance in the Pacific which by 1944, was already achieved.
>>64070312
ok

>>64070315
Which of course, would cause a reaction. The IJN would then focus on the defense of the home islands and the political pressure the IJA could exert would be minimal when it comes to strategy.
Basically, bypass the SEA as Nimitz intended. But of course reality was different, the US army had significant political pressure and was able to convince the president that taking the Philippines was necessary. There has been many critics since then that say that it was in fact, completely and utterly unnecessary. It slowed the progression of the war. 1.2 million US army troops could be put to good use to pressure the Japanese home islands further with landings on the rest of the Ryukyu islands. Maybe even take the Kuril Islands to pincer Japan from North and South.

>>64069998 (OP)
It wasn't strategy, it was MacArthur being a clinically diagnosable narcissist, who wanted to rectify his pathetic performance when the Philippines fell.
It's the same kind of reason why he wanted to nuke North Korea after he once again fucked everything up.

>>64070337
Ah finally someone sees it. McArthur is our Luigi Cadorna in terms of competence.

>>64070337
>>64070344
Samefagging retard

The Japanese Army rejected the plan to invade Australia, regarding it as a full-scale operation, but if they had occupied Darwin alone, it would have caused considerable confusion in the Allied operational plans.

>>64070361
They had 0 capacity to do such a thing. They can send 1 million divisions into Darwin and 1 million divisions would have been repulsed.

>>64070137
>Implessive.
You are aware that Japanese can speak "r" just fine, aren't you?

>>64070373
>and 1 million divisions would have been repulsed.
By the emus?

>>64070395
Veterans of the middle east, AIF.

>>64069998 (OP)
Yeah...

Much better to have enemies on three sides ready to attack while you're invading their homeland.
They surely won't get behind you and destroy your supply lines.

>>64070392
La-li-lu-le-lo

>>64070437
I wasn't aware that you could rapidly spawn ships in indonesia