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The Great Pacific War: A History of the American-Japanese Campaign of 1931-1933

di Hector C. Bywater

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This blow-by-blow fictional account of a war between the United States and Japan was a forerunner of actual events, written 16 years before the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. Bywater, the world's leading naval authority in the period between the two world wars, prophesied the following: A Japanese surprise attack attacks U. S. naval forces in the Pacific. Japanese troops simultaneously invade the Phillippines and Guam. Recognizing their limits, Japanese commanders hold off from any attempt to capture Hawaii.… (altro)
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    It Can't Happen Here di Sinclair Lewis (Lammers)
    Lammers: Though it reads like Alternative History today, the book shows very nicely what people in the 1920s and 1930s could happen in the very near future.
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Originally published in 1925 and recently reprinted in paperback, The Great Pacific War is an “alternate history”, describing a war between the USA and Japan in 1931-1933.


Author Hector Bywater was no Tom Clancy; the characters and events are pretty colorless. Bywater chose not to use any actual people in his narrative, which further detracts from any life the story might have had.


Although hailed after the fact as prophetic, Bywater’s scenario is not much more than a fictionalization of War Plan Orange, which had been around for some time and was presumably not very secret. There has to be a reason for the war, and Bywater hypothesizes a competent Chinese government coming to power, with US commercial interests competing with Japan for Chinese resources. Japan is undergoing a labor and political crisis at home, with the government turning to a foreign war as a way to rekindle patriotism. Although the identification of China as the source of conflict is interesting, it’s difficult to imagine any Japanese government going to war with a United States undistracted by other conflicts. Further, Bywater’s Japanese never express a coherent plan for the war – what exactly are they going to do after starting it?


The war starts with the suicide explosion of a Japanese freighter in the Culebra Cut, blocking the Panama Canal. The IJN annihilates the US Asiatic Fleet and seizes the Philippines and Guam (although Guam holds out for a while). Interestingly, especially for the times, the Japanese are portrayed as clever and innovative while the US response is ponderous. Japan bombs the US Pacific Coast and Dutch Harbor (by assembling seaplanes carried to the area on ships); Japanese submarines ambush the US Atlantic Fleet passing through the Straits of Magellan; Japan arms a number of merchant cruisers to attack US shipping in the Atlantic, and Nisei in Hawaii revolt with weapons snuck into the islands. Eventually, however, the USN gets its act together, seizes an advanced base at Truk, and defeats the IJN in a grand big-gun battle off Yap.


Bywater’s predictions for naval strategy and tactics are a little dubious in hindsight, but do accord with some of the military fears and hopes of the time. The US was always worried about an attack on the Panama Canal. It’s pretty unlikely that anybody would be able to assembly a force of flying boats on the high seas (especially the Bering Sea), but it seems that was an actual fear; at one point the was apparently a real concern that the Nazis would sail a fleet of freighters into Hudson Bay, haul seaplane parts out of the holds, put them together, and fly off to bomb Duluth. The Japanese actually did stage an attack on Pearl Harbor with flying boats based out of French Frigate Shoals, and there was supposedly a plan to refuel flying boats from submarines off Mexico, fly them to Texas, bomb oil fields, continue to the Caribbean, refuel from U-boats, and head for Germany. I suppose the armchair theorists of the time didn’t understand exactly how difficult it is to operate seaplanes from the open ocean, as opposed to sheltered anchorages.


The capabilities of aircraft and submarines are both over- and underestimated. According to the doctrines of the time, both operate as fleet auxiliaries (with a few exceptions like the Straits of Magellan ambush). Submarines scout ahead of the fleet; aircraft carriers travel with the battleships and naval aircraft primarily serve to spot gunfire or as scouts. However, on the few occasions when aircraft operate directly against vessels or land installations, they are very effective (admittedly, Bywater’s airplanes make extensive use of gas bombs). In anime/manga style, the Japanese construct immense “battleship-submarines”, heavily armored (to the extent that they are impervious to destroyer gunfire) and with twin 8” guns. The US builds an entire fleet of “dummy battleships” on merchant vessel hulls, which cruise around to deceive Japanese scouting aircraft (on reflection, that might not be as far-fetched as it sounds; while putting a dummy battleship topside on a merchant vessel while still keeping it seaworthy seems unlikely, air observers from both sides were notoriously bad at correctly identifying naval vessels). The Japanese are chivalrous in their treatment of POWs (again, not too far-fetched; the Japanese had been quite correct with Russian, German, and Austrian prisoners during the Russo-Japanese war and WWI; the attitude was just starting to harden in the 1920s when Bywater was writing). And, in a final unlikely event, the Japanese convert their Washington Treaty aircraft carriers Kaga and Akagi back to a battleship and battlecruiser in the middle of the war.


If this was re-written by Harry Turtledove, it would probably be pretty interesting. Bywater did do his research; I checked my 1924 Jane’s Fighting Ships and all the vessels mentioned in the book are either real or reasonable extrapolations. However, the dull writing style makes The Great Pacific War only of historical interest. ( )
  setnahkt | Dec 1, 2017 |
A work of Alternate History, by its date of publication, it's designed to be an illustration of what might have happened if the Washington Treaties hadn't cooled down the USA-Japan naval race. The scenario centres on the defence of Guam against the Japanese, a locale not often visited, and full of interest, as it indicates a Pacific War not distorted by the need to free the Philippines. There is little idea of the actual mechanics of naval war in the age of the Dreadnought, but its innocence is charming. The battleship freaks among naval buffs will find this book intriguing, and the naval wargamers will find very interesting indeed. ( )
  DinadansFriend | May 3, 2015 |
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This blow-by-blow fictional account of a war between the United States and Japan was a forerunner of actual events, written 16 years before the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. Bywater, the world's leading naval authority in the period between the two world wars, prophesied the following: A Japanese surprise attack attacks U. S. naval forces in the Pacific. Japanese troops simultaneously invade the Phillippines and Guam. Recognizing their limits, Japanese commanders hold off from any attempt to capture Hawaii.

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