Early 1942 in the Southwest Pacific.

[AR]

I have always wondered why the US did not make a major attempt to stop the Japanese advance into the Indonesian oil fields.
The cariers were not sunk, and the cruiser and destroyer fleets essentailly so. Through code breaking the US knew that the Japanese were not going to invade Hawii. Have never really understood.
I believe that at one point in the spring of 1942, the Americans were about to give up on defending Australia.
I am sure that many will have some interesting responses.

[Laurence Batchelor]

The time period you speak of is very much the defensive and consolidation stage for the Allies.

The USN or the RN/RAN cannot jump in gung ho and plan such a major operation like that in such a short space of time.

Something like what your proposing would take a long time to plan, build, train and equip for.
It's that simple.

[ar]

I believe that the USN would know that the Japanese would at least have a plan to take the oil fields and therefore the US would have planned counter moves.
Apart from the battleships the US Fleet was more or less intact.

The time period you speak of is very much the defensive and consolidation stage for the Allies.

The USN or the RN/RAN cannot jump in gung ho and plan such a major operation like that in such a short space of time.

Something like what your proposing would take a long time to plan, build, train and equip for.
It's that simple.

[Laurence Batchelor]

Too much of a risk from land and carrier based airpower to expose your battleships.
There all you have got, why risk them unneccessarily?

It doesn't matter about intelligience, the USA is too busy recovering from Pearl, reploying warships from the Atlantic into the Pacific, gearing up on a full war footing and of course implementing her submarine campaign.

Examining USN actions throughout WW2 shows they rarely ever allowed their BB's to play ball, leaving their carrier aircraft to be their main stike weapon.

I can only ever seeing their activites at this time period as something like small commando raids on the oil fields themselves, nothing major from her surface combatants.

As an aside the USN's destroyer and cruiser forces also suffered at Pearl.
Off the top of my head 3 cruisers were damaged and 3 destroyers sunk.
This is often overlooked, but it adds to the fact that the USN was overstretched at this time.

[ar]

I have to dissagree with your position.
As I understand it, the Americans were going to let Australia fend for itself, and it was only because Admiral King vetoed this idea that New Guinea was saved. The Coral Sea battle.
The USN was designed to fight offensively. It did not go on the offensive until 1943.
The USN had many years to prepare for a number of things.
There is a hidden history here., one that nobody has written about. If I am wrong, and I may be, then somebody will tell me.
Guadalcanal was a defensive thing that was forced upon them, and not one of their chosing.
Without oil othing moves.

Too much of a risk from land and carrier based airpower to expose your battleships.
There all you have got, why risk them unneccessarily?

It doesn't matter about intelligience, the USA is too busy recovering from Pearl, reploying warships from the Atlantic into the Pacific, gearing up on a full war footing and of course implementing her submarine campaign.

Examining USN actions throughout WW2 shows they rarely ever allowed their BB's to play ball, leaving their carrier aircraft to be their main stike weapon.

I can only ever seeing their activites at this time period as something like small commando raids on the oil fields themselves, nothing major from her surface combatants.

As an aside the USN's destroyer and cruiser forces also suffered at Pearl.
Off the top of my head 3 cruisers were damaged and 3 destroyers sunk.
This is often overlooked, but it adds to the fact that the USN was overstretched at this time.

[Laurence Batchelor]

The Americans were not really in the position of a caring heart to heart with Australia, they were too concerned with their own pocessions.

Australia was relying on the British to safeguard her.
They repeatively asked for a combined RN & RAN fleet to based in Northern Australian waters, most likely Port Moreseby or Darwin which was ignored.

The USN may have been designed to operate offensively and may have had years to prepare for things, but Pearl seriously upset the apple cart.
The USN did not start war the manner she would have wished.
She had to take stock and let her industry replenish her first.
It went on the offensive when the opportunity presented itself in 1943.

Don't be obessed with oil all the time, a war cabinet or military planner has more on his mine than just the one resource.
I also disagree, men can move without oil just at a slower pace
Take the Japanese in the jungles of Malaya or the drive on Singapore on bicycles also, a moot point I know.

[Guest]

I have always wondered why the US did not make a major attempt to stop the Japanese advance into the Indonesian oil fields.
The cariers were not sunk, and the cruiser and destroyer fleets essentailly so. Through code breaking the US knew that the Japanese were not going to invade Hawii. Have never really understood.
I believe that at one point in the spring of 1942, the Americans were about to give up on defending Australia.
I am sure that many will have some interesting responses.

If you are saying why the Americans didn't try to pull off a midway in Indonesia, then the easiest answer would be where as the Midway operation gave Americans the advantages of friendly land based air cover, interior lines of communication, and proximity to one's own base of operation to offset Japanese quantitative and qualitative advantage in naval forces, an attempt to do something similar in Indonesia would have yielded all three of those advantages to the Japanese, while the US forces would still suffer from great disadvantage in quantity and significant disadvantages in quality.

[ar]

I am not talking about a Midway type battle being sought. But the almost complete complete lack of US ships in the East Indies. It was only when Admiral King decided that Australia was to be defended, that Coral Sea took place, a defensive battle. Without King's decision, then all of New guinea would have gone. Australia would have effectively been cut off.

Two carriers were moved to the Pacific from the Atlantic. Apart from the battleships, the Fleet was more or less intact, and yet, no offensive actions until 1943.
Something is wrong here, at least as I see it. However I am open to be convinced otherwise.

I have always wondered why the US did not make a major attempt to stop the Japanese advance into the Indonesian oil fields.
The cariers were not sunk, and the cruiser and destroyer fleets essentailly so. Through code breaking the US knew that the Japanese were not going to invade Hawii. Have never really understood.
I believe that at one point in the spring of 1942, the Americans were about to give up on defending Australia.
I am sure that many will have some interesting responses.

If you are saying why the Americans didn't try to pull off a midway in Indonesia, then the easiest answer would be where as the Midway operation gave Americans the advantages of friendly land based air cover, interior lines of communication, and proximity to one's own base of operation to offset Japanese quantitative and qualitative advantage in naval forces, an attempt to do something similar in Indonesia would have yielded all three of those advantages to the Japanese, while the US forces would still suffer from great disadvantage in quantity and significant disadvantages in quality.

[Werner]

You're missing an obvious answer. The USN did not yet have enough tankers and oilers to sustain operations west of Manila. A carrier group would have to loiter West of Australia for some weeks to even arrange an engagement.

[Laurence Batchelor]

I am not talking about a Midway type battle being sought. But the almost complete complete lack of US ships in the East Indies. It was only when Admiral King decided that Australia was to be defended, that Coral Sea took place, a defensive battle. Without King's decision, then all of New guinea would have gone. Australia would have effectively been cut off.

Two carriers were moved to the Pacific from the Atlantic. Apart from the battleships, the Fleet was more or less intact, and yet, no offensive actions until 1943.
Something is wrong here, at least as I see it. However I am open to be convinced otherwise.

Them lacking a great offensive Admiral in the early war phase who was willing to take undue risk to achieve his goals.
Regardless of what the men in chairs say back home.

[Werner]

It's good that Midway happened when and where it did. I'd hate to think of those airgroups going out in Buffaloes, Vindicators and Devastators.

[ar]

You may have a point, but as a counter, why cannot one use Australia as a fuel base for tankers? It should not take too many, and no tankers were lost until April. Also worth bearing in mind that a number of tankers were freed from battleship refuelling duties, at least I would think so. How many would have been freed up? What say you to this point? Also , as I understand, the remaining undamaged battleships went to, and operated off the Weat Coast and would not have the need for a tanker force.
Question; At Coral Sea, where did the tankers operate from. If they did not, could they have been based at Sydney? This port would have substantial stocks. Not as much as Pearl of course but too shabby either. There is also Melbourne and Brisbane and Auckland. A total of four ports. Perhaps one of the Australian people would know.

You're missing an obvious answer. The USN did not yet have enough tankers and oilers to sustain operations west of Manila. A carrier group would have to loiter West of Australia for some weeks to even arrange an engagement.

[Laurence Batchelor]

Freemantle also was major port and would have had large stocks, but of course she's a bit far out on the West Coast.

This may be of some use and show the distances involved:-



Also you may wish to pour yourself a and get reading, this details probably what you wish to know:-

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USA/USA ... index.html

[ar]

After a quick count I have come up with about 36 to 37 tankers available by March of 1942. THis does not include gasoline tankers.
I also noted that two had been sunk by this date.

[Werner]

You may have a point, but as a counter, why cannot one use Australia as a fuel base for tankers? It should not take too many, and no tankers were lost until April. Also worth bearing in mind that a number of tankers were freed from battleship refuelling duties, at least I would think so. How many would have been freed up? What say you to this point? Also , as I understand, the remaining undamaged battleships went to, and operated off the Weat Coast and would not have the need for a tanker force.

You're confusing tanker and oiler in my argument. We did use Australia as a base, but it took months of build-up before there was sufficient tankage and a train of tankers from Los Angeles to support more than modest operations in this region without destroying the Australian civil economy.

Fleet oiler operations were tied to the tank farms at San Pedro and Honolulu until the tankage was available in Australia.

Question; At Coral Sea, where did the tankers operate from. If they did not, could they have been based at Sydney? This port would have substantial stocks. Not as much as Pearl of course but too shabby either. There is also Melbourne and Brisbane and Auckland. A total of four ports. Perhaps one of the Australian people would know.

I only know they operated from Sydney and (I believe) Auckland. A fleet oiler filling up with 10,000 tons of oil and some quantity of aviation fuel will make quite a dent in either country's strategic reserve in 1941/2. It might be that only at a place like Sydney was sufficient tankage available close to one dock.

[Lesforan]

I have to take issue with the statement that the Japanese could have
put on a sustained offensive without oil. The main reason for their southern thrust into what is now Indonesia and Southeast Asia was to secure oil resources. Indeed, the main justification for Japan initiating hostilites was its need for oil to sustain operations against China.

The little Dutch-Austrailian-USN force in the area, just a cruiser flotilla, was no match for the Japanese fleet, as events soon showed. The Japanese were going for the Java oil. I'm sure that much was obvious from the beginning.

Looking with hindsight, I don't understand why the cruiser force wasn't used to destroy the oil facilities to deny them to the Japanese. We didn't have the force to counter the Japanese, but we did have the capability to destroy the Japanese objective.

All of Japan's means of power projection was dependent on oil. This is why they started the war against the West. The Americans offered to sell Japan the oil and other strategic materials she needed, contingent on a Japanese withdrawl from China. Japan viewed this as an ultimatum she could not accept for political reasons.

Given time, the Japanese Navy could maybe have converted back to coal.
She still would have needed oil for her aircraft.

[ar]

Come now dear Warner, I am not confusing the two.
Had the USN decided to mount operations there would possibly/likely have been extra supplies from Persia. ot easy, but something could have been done. I think that Churchill would have demanded. It's a guess of course.
Anyway, your position is that there were NO operations to defend the East Indies because of the lack of tankers and or oilers.
I am not sure that I buy it. Would need to read the reports of the meetings. HOwever you may be correct.
I forget to add Darwin and Freemantle and Wellinton to the list of ports.
PS Sydney and Melbourne has quite large stocks because of the large amount of liner traffic. I had forgotten about the liners. And many of these were of the large type.
Your turn.

[Werner]

After a quick count I have come up with about 36 to 37 tankers available by March of 1942. THis does not include gasoline tankers.
I also noted that two had been sunk by this date.

What is this number? Civil tankers or fleet oilers? American or Allied?

We talked about this before. You'd have to dispatch 7 tankers a week on the 60 day round trip to Australia in order to keep one carrier task force operating.

By your count, we only have half as many as we need, and this number may have to supply other theatres as well.

[Lesforan]

Japan was able to take over French Indochina in a walk-over.

Why wouldn't they simply obtain the oil in VietNam from the French Colonial Governmant there? After all, France was already occupied by the Germans and Vichy France was in no position to object. I understand this was the reason Indochina wasn't defended against the Japanese.

This concieveably would have delayed the start of the war.

[Guest]

Japan was able to take over French Indochina in a walk-over.

Why wouldn't they simply obtain the oil in VietNam from the French Colonial Governmant there? After all, France was already occupied by the Germans and Vichy France was in no position to object. I understand this was the reason Indochina wasn't defended against the Japanese.

This concieveably would have delayed the start of the war.

How much oil does Vietnam have, and were the oil fields developed so the Japanese can immediately begin extraction.

The Japanese were looking for producing oil fields, not oil reserves that takes years to develop.