Re: What IF: ... Japan had more Oilers for Dec.7'41 ?

On Aug 28, 2:44=A0pm, Stephen Graham  wrote:

> I suspect that you don't know anything about the Philippine Insurrection
> or the Moro Rebellion.

Considering that I am proposing AH Pearl Harbor scenarios here, why
would I want to ?

> How much have you really looked at the political events running up to
> the outbreak of the Pacific War? The oil embargo only kicks in when the
> Japanese seize northern Indochina. There's a long period of operations
> in China before then with only grumbling from the United States.
>
> In any case, this really doesn't address the point I made that the
> entire mess wasn't in Japan's best interest.

I have no doubt that the Japanese fervently wished that they were not
in that mess and I have little interest at all in the political events
leading up to the outbreak of the Pacific War.

> When you're plotting a scenario, you should allow the actors some level
> of rationality, including planning for alternate outcomes.

True enough but your are "jumping the gun" here. At this stage I am
only researching limited "what if" scenarios with my, so far, 4
threads. I have yet to string any together to form a well thought out
ATL

> If it's tying down assets that could be used against BCE forces, what's
> to object to ?

In my particular case, I'd rather defend my own property/family that
rely on someone that I don't even know, and who likely cares more
about his own property and family than he does about mine, to do a
good job of it.

I'd imagine the Australians would take a similar view of the pre-war
(mostly untrained) Philipine Armed Forces under "Bugout Doug"
MacArthur. Not aht Commonwealth troops did any better at Hong Kong and
Singa****e, to be sure.

> I think we can usefully distinguish between the amount of fuel necessary
> to run a generator to recharge batteries and the amount of fuel required
> to supply a PT boat on "high speed search runs each and every night".

Possibly but how many fi****ng boats that can see about 2 miles off
either side at night, is it going to take you to provide the
coverage ? You are not talking about fi****ng boats here, you'll need
entire fi****ng fleets. Where do the radios and spare parts come from ?
Where do the trained operators come from ? Why do the Japanese RDF
units not notice a correlation between unexplained mid-ocean radio
messages and sinking tankers ? What happens to your fi****ng fleets
after a Japanese patrol boat finds the first radio on board one of
them ?

> > Since the kind of unremarkable fi****ng boat that I believe you
> > describe is only about 6' above the waves,
>
> They have masts that are taller than 6 feet.

And will no Japanese officer wonder why suddenly there are men perched
in the masts all day ling when there hadn't been for 100 years
previoiusly ?

> Until they're convinced they have a problem, the Japanese oilers will
> use predictable routes (because they did historically). That's what you
> have to cover, not every single square meter of ocean.

By definition the Japanese will know they have a manageable problem in
bypassing the PIs.

> And coverage doesn't have to be perfect. You just have to catch some of
> the ****pping.

How many is "some" ? 1 in 10, 1 in 100 or 1 in 1,000 ?

You are really "grasping at straws" with this one. Much better to just
establish a spy ring near the tanker loading ****ts. The radio signals
originating there will mask any other secret transmissions and Allied
submarines could be vectored in towards those ****ts to intercept
before the tankers had time to be hidden by the vastness of the ocean.