IJN Fleet Mis-Management

[chuck]

He seems not always to have selected the right Admirals under him and he seems was not strong enough to stand up against the Army.
Though I suppose that was a good thing as if you stood up against Tojo et al. you normally got assassinated!

It was not his job as C-in-C combined fleet to stand up to the army. It was the job of the navy minister and navy chief of staff. In theory Yamamoto was subordinate to the navy chief of staff, and navy chief of staff subordinate to navy minister. Yamamoto was charged only with the actual implementation of the direct operational part of the naval strategy. The naval strategy was to be worked out by the naval staff under the supervision of the chief of naval staff, who reported to the navy minister. The navy minister in turn participated in formulating overall national strategy with the entire cabinet, chief amongst these were the war minister, prime minister and foreign minister. So as far as the navy is concerned the the balance of power between army and navy was ultimately the job of the navy minister.

However, Yamamoto was such a strong personality, and had such a loyal following in the fleet, that he effectively dictated the overall naval outlook from grand naval strategy to actual operational detail, reducing the chief of navy staff and the navy ministers to little more than his spokesmen.
The navy minister at the time was a classmate of Yamamoto's at navy academy and had been in awe of Yamamoto the superman ever since they've been in class together. So he certain was not the one to reign in Yamamoto. While Yamamoto got his way with chief of naval staff and navy minister every time he opened his mouth, he did not see fit to completely sideline the entire navy chain of command nominally above himself and also directly assume the mantle of going toe to toe with the army in the cabinet. That unpleasant job he left entirely to the navy minister and did not offer any direct support. The navy minister, somewhat lacking in capability and assertiveness, always in awe of Yamamoto, did not do well against the carnivorous representatives of the army.

If Yamamoto had actually been the navy minister, it is almost certain that he would not dodge the unpleasant part of his job and would have gone toe to toe with the army. He had been navy minister before assuming C-in-C combined fleet, which is technically a demotion but given Yamamoto's personality and god like status in the fleet a demotion that gave him much greater influence. While he was navy minister the army formulated a plot to assassinate him so troublesome had he became for the army. Part of the reason for his demotion from pinnacle of naval rank, to the pinnacle of naval power, was to get him out of the way of army assassins.

[Lesforan]

Chuck's summary of Yamamoto sounds pretty accurate. He was the best the Japanese could offer. He was considered important enough by the Americans that he became the victum of an assassination by the Americans.

Yamamoto's biggest failure was the Midway Operation. Perhaps he had to include an invasion of Midway as a sop to the Army in order to get the operation approved. This would account for his violation of a major principle: division of power.

Arguably, if he hadn't had to divide his forces up to provide cover for the Midway Invasion Force, he could have taken on the US Fleet with the overwhelming force he hoped to use.

[Laurence Batchelor]

Chuck what you say is certainly compelling, but I am only going on what an intelliengent front-line Commander saw in him regardless of his God like status.

Can you please analyse his actions in selecting his top Admiral's and the commands they were assigned?
Furthermore his reluctance to replace incompetent officers?
This may reveal some of my line of thinking about him perhaps?

[Guest]

Chuck what you say is certainly compelling, but I am only going on what an intelliengent front-line Commander saw in him regardless of his God like status.

Can you please analyse his actions in selecting his top Admiral's and the commands they were assigned?
Furthermore his reluctance to replace incompetent officers?
This may reveal some of my line of thinking about him perhaps?

Japanese naval hierarchy is merit based only up to captain. From rear admiral onwards not only promotion, but assignment as well, was based on seniority. It was assumed that by the time they reach captaincy, their leadership qualities and big picture mastery are so advanced they could omit such details as having the expertise relevant to their actual assignments. Any technically related issues would be resolved by the experts on their staffs. This is why there is such widespread mismatch between expertise and assignment in the senior ranks of Japanese navy.

[chuck]

I think Bakker has over 10,000 articles.

Hmmm, really? Are you sure he didn't just change the name and publish each article many times? If each article is original, Bakker would need to research, write, proof, submit and publish one article a day, every weekday excluding holidays, for 40 years to have published 10,000 articles.

[Dick J]

Baltimore's plant was the same one used from Atlanta on. Two plants made for the big ship, one plant for Wasp. Interestingly, BuShips complained that the manufacturers exceeded the design spec by 10-20% in output without documenting this feature, and future contracts ought to take that into account for even greater cost savings.

A slightly different plant powered all the Essex and Alaska ships.

Actually, Baltimore was the "different" one. Atlanta had a 2 shaft plant with 75,000 shp. Two sets of this plant powered both the Essex's and Alaska's, with 150,000 shp. Baltimore had 120,000 shp on her 4 shafts.

[Seasick]

Imperial Japanese Navy in WW2

Nijon Kiagun, the IJN, had deteriorated intelectually in the space of time between the victory at Tushima and the 1930s. The Milertarist had weeded out the non-militarist from the service academies. The officer corps changed from a British style officer corps into a warped extreemist Bushido mutation of its former self. The result is a rigid inflexable mess.

1. Naval avation had its champions in the IJN but even after Pearl Harbor they were still a fringe. Surface forces were still seen as the path to victory.

2. Japanese construction methods had much to desire. Many IJN ships succomed to dammage much to easily.

3. The IJN defense of the Phillipines was insane.
-- The only part of the attack that worked was the diversionary force under Admiral Ozawa to the north.
-- The surface forces were divided in the southern attack through the Sugario Strait. Two forces went through independantly rather than a coordinated attack as a single force. It would not have helped too much but it would have been the right move. The northern force didn't arrive untill most of the transports had already left for American bases. There were still many ships mostly empty. The USN's Taffy 3 managed a tremendous defense which blunted the attack. When the force withdrew back to the San Bernidito strait they were being attacked by aircraft from Taffy-2 and Taffy-1, also strike aircraft from Admiral McCain's detached carrier group from TF38 were arriving with torpedos and AP bombs.

The IJN had neglected ASW chronically and paid for it. The tankers of the Japanese Merchant Marine were not adequetly until losses from USN submarines had crippled it.

[Werner]

Actually, Baltimore was the "different" one. Atlanta had a 2 shaft plant with 75,000 shp. Two sets of this plant powered both the Essex's and Alaska's, with 150,000 shp. Baltimore had 120,000 shp on her 4 shafts.

What I meant was (I must be stroking) Baltimore, Wichita, Brooklyn, Cleveland are essentially the same plant, tweaked with temperature and pressure here and there. Atlanta & Ranger have the identical plant. Essex and Alaska have the identical plant. These last two types are also related closely (Essex & Atlanta, but are evolutionary in affinity).

[chuck]

He was the best the Japanese could offer. He was considered important enough by the Americans that he became the victum of an assassination by the Americans..

I am not sure if I agree with that. Let's distinguish what Yamamoto had from what evidence there is that he was the best Japan had.

Yamamoto had the ability to engender tremendous loyalty in the IJN. Surviving Japanese officers and men spoke of him with great reverence:
That shows he couldn't have been too bad. But it does not show he was the best. Many are the relatively unpopular commanders who brough greater success on the battlefield than their more popular counterparts.

Yamamoto's ability and intelligence was well know to Americans. Americans knew no one in the IJN more dangerous as C-in-C than Yamamoto:
Yamamoto was well known to the American navy because he was a former naval attache and a highly sociable person with a large repatoir of stories and party tricks who had graced many a dinner table at the homes of future American naval leaders. Through these personal interactions the Americans knew him to be extremely smart and capable. But American knowledge of the much of the rest of the Japanese naval officer corp was far more limited, and there is no basis for comparing Yamamoto with some more obscure officers with whom the US had little or no previous contact.

I think Yamamoto was indeed the most original strategist Japan had. But he was not the total military genius who could bring adaquate operational finess to bear to carry his strategy through. I think the two officers who succeeded Yamamoto were each at least equal to Yamamoto in overall effectiveness of leadership. Yamamoto should have thought strategy and let more experienced people implement the tactics.

[Laurence Batchelor]

The reason why I raised the point of Yamamoto is this.

The general pattern of naval strategy implemented by the IJN upto Yamamoto's death seemed to be formulaic.
This seemed to be that when a naval tactic suceeded it was likely to be used repeatedly and without change and this often proved disastrous.

Using some examples, lets start with Admiral Kurita's October 1942 incendiary bombardment of Guadalcanal from battleships Kongo and Haruna which proved successful.
One month later Admiral Abe was sent with battleships Hiei and Kirishima to carry out the very same bombardment.
This second time not only did the Imperial Navy fail to hit the island with a single shell, but they lost one of their precious battleships in the process.

In November and December 1942 Admiral Tanaka had carried out a series of brillant transport operations to Guadalcanal.
When other destroyer groups and officers of lesser ability had been instructed to do the same it frequently led to blunders such as the one on March 5th 1943 in the Kula Gulf.

In the following year of 1943 at the Battle of the Bismarck Sea Admiral Kimura and the IJN met with castrophic losses of 12 of their 16 ships.
This was an attempt to ferry troops to Lae and Salamaua and there was high Japanese troop casualties also.
He (Kimura) was merely carrying out orders which had been successful 6 months earlier when troops were ferried to reinforce Buna.
But in that 6 month gap the US air strength had grown and this had not been taken into consideration by the IJN high command in their operational planning.

As we have already mentioned one clear pattern here is the inflexability of the IJN. It seems the IJN and this has to include Yamamoto consistantly felt that the USN was gullible and just as inflexible and unwilling to doctrinal change like they were.
They felt the enemy would always play their game on their terms and how and when they wished.

Furthermore to address the ability of mis-management of picking the right Commanders to carry out the right assignments.
I find it a terrible mistake by the IJN High Command (Is Yamamoto blameless in this?) that Tanaka was sent packing to Singapore, sorry 'reassigned' after the battle of Tassafaronga.
He may not have pursued the the remaining American cruisers and destroyers with the few remaining torpedoes he had, but its almost that the IJN saw him as a coward for this.
In the words of Morison 'It is a painful truth that the Battle of Tassafaronga was a sharp defeat inflicted on an alert and superior cruiser force by a partially surprised and inferior destroyer force.'
This has to go down as one of the IJN's greatest victories of the Pacific Campaign, and any right minded naval command should have promoted him.
At the very least his skill and ability should have been recognised and at at the very least remained in command of a destroyer division for the continuation of the Guadacanal campaign.
This seems to me just one of many poor judgements by the IJN high command which they mad eover and over again before Yamamoto's death.
I ask again can we honestly sit here with the benefit of hindsight and say Yamamoto had no part in any of these decisions or operational plans?

[Werner]

Shattered Sword is not charitable toward Yamamoto. They imply (at least in the run-up to Midway) that he was moody, detached and only slightly involved with the staff.

[chuck]

Yamamoto was not known to be a micro manager on an operational level. There were many occasions when he disagreed with the decisions of his subordinates, knew about the decision in time to countermand it, but didn't do it. He would express in real time his disappointment in his subordinate's decision and then let it go. There were also occasions when he anticipated the decision that his subordinates would take based on his understanding of the character of the subordinate, He would tells his staff ahead of time in explicit terms that he fully expect this particular commander to make that particular suboptimal decision in such and such circumstances, but does not do anything to prevent it when the circumstances described materializes. In most of the cases where this behavior was described, it was in the context of Yamamoto being more right. A particular example was Yamamoto's anticipation that Nagumo would get in and get out quick during the Pearl Harbor, and would not linger to thoroughly demolish important shore installations. As the Pearl Harbor attack drew to a close, Yamamoto expressed disappoint in that he knew Nagumo would not linger to smash the oil farms. This was before Nagumo had actually called off the third attack. Yet Yamamoto did not instruct Nagumo to attack a third time.

This is not because he was a usually reserved man. It is well known that he does micromanage on planning sessions. He was also not shy about being very open and blunt when he wanted. He was particularly liked by junior officers because he would give forthright criticisms. It is said that unlike most senior officers in the IJN, with Yamamoto you knew exactly where he stood. I am not certain how to resolve this difference.

One possibility is he was a firm believer in the notion that letting subordinate in operational commands have full freedom to exercise their command has a certain value that is greater than what can be gained by second guessing them on this decision or that. Perhaps he thought that even if a subordinate is likely to make a wrong decision in a certain circumstances, when the real time comes the decision may in fact be right because the circumstances are not exactly as Yamamoto had anticipated and the limits of communication makes it impossible for Yamamoto to fully appreciate the difference.

In any case as the war progressed it is known that his tendency to refrain from tactical interference diminished. It can be seen that he countermanded the orders of his subordinates more and more often.

One thing to notice is during WWII, relative few Japanese senior officers, either army or navy, was fired for poor performance. This was particularly noticeable compared to German and allied forces. Apparently Japanese officers were more insulated from blame when things go wrong. Also there appears to be less systematic postmortem when things do go wrong. Each officer drew his own lessons from past defeats, there being much less thorough dissemination of the lessons to be drawn.

[Werner]

A particular example was Yamamoto's anticipation that Nagumo would get in and get out quick during the Pearl Harbor, and would not linger to thoroughly demolish important shore installations. As the Pearl Harbor attack drew to a close, Yamamoto expressed disappoint in that he knew Nagumo would not linger to smash the oil farms. This was before Nagumo had actually called off the third attack. Yet Yamamoto did not instruct Nagumo to attack a third time.

If true, could this be a cultural thing, respect for Nagumo's position?

Otherwise he sounds like he may have had a bipolar condition or bouts of chronic depression.

One thing that bothers me about the complaint about Nagumo is the situation at Wake. Only one of his four carriers (Hiryu) had enough fuel to linger there long enough for an air strike. The rest of Nagumo's force was desperately short and had to separate to fuel. If this is not an exaggeration, then perhaps Nagumo was not so dumb.