miletus12
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Post by miletus12 on May 21, 2023 4:09:35 GMT
This comment is just beyond hyperbole (your minimum speed) and straight into horseshit. Stalin in February 1943 and for the rest of the year, is preoccupied with with fighting off and beating up on the Germans in the western part of the Soviet Union, no matter what black magic is happening to the Americans and Japanese in the Pacific, and if its working out as a miracle for the Americans or a mix of a miracle and a curse. AND, he's not praying at the altar of Marx, Engels, and Lenin for it to be mostly a curse for the Americans as if they are his primary problem - the more of a miracle and easy time it is for them, the more supplies he gets and the easier his life is and the more Germans foreigners kill for him. 1. By February 1943, Stalin knows his neck is safe. He will be getting reports from his agents in the CCP and from his rear guard in Siberia, (He has troops there, despite the Russo-Japanese non-aggression pact.). It may take them a couple of weeks to figure things out, but opportunity awaits. 2. From traitors inside USG, Stalin has further agents who know just how weak the Americans still are and report it to his government. Up to now, most of the Lend Lease he has received (about 9 months worth) was British. The real American surge is arriving about now. It will take at least two months for that huge largesse to reach Kursk and for the infusion to kick in. There is no way to divert that LL, it has been pumped in, and it will go where it historically went. =============================================================================== Now you have an ISOT with a wrecked Japanese homeland under American administrative control. You have not been really clear about what happened to the IJN outside Japanese home waters. I presume that if Americans garrison the fleet anchorages described, that 1/2 the main body of Combined Fleet still remains between the Philippine Islands and Singapore *(Tawi Tawi and Linga) and that it is only the Chuuk and Japanese home island forces that are gone poof. In that case, you still have a force that can offer battle coomensurate with Sho-1. Explain to me how the Americans of February 1943 in the Pacific can reach MacArthur when the CTF of February 1943 risked at Tarawa was still outnuimbered? As for China, how will the Japanese forces in China ( Remember some of the psychopaths in command) really react to Americans in Tokyo? And in that chaos, sits Stalin, a monster the equal of any in the era, who has two diametrically opposite problems. He's gotten all the immediate supplies he is likely to get at the moment, because now FDR realizes there are Americans trapped behind the enemy front who need to be American rescued. There is a Japanese army inside Manchuria in immediate contact with those Americans located on the Korean Peninsula. Remember again that half of the American Lend lease en route is coming in through Siberia via Vladivostok a one week route march for the Japanese. Those LL supplies will be diverted immediately to succor MacArthur in Japan or they could be piled up at Vladisvostok, if the Russian competency is as it was. The Japanese in Manchuria realize that fact. They will attack that route, to interrupt and seize some of those supplies for themselves under the new paradigm. Stalin would not want that diversion. If nothing else, then the STAVKA will point out to Stalin that both necessity and opportunity compels some Russian actions against the Japanese in Manchuria to "rescue the Americans" in Korea as a move to save that LL supply line through and into the Siberian maritime provinces than for any other practical reason. Stalin can spare the half million men he has set there for a contingency purpose, to take advantage of any Japanese collapse or opportunity to attack after the German defeat in the future. It just happens that the military opportunity and necessity is "now". He has that "compelling selfish reason" to move to save that logistics bonanza and to still keep the Americans aimed at the Germans rather than swing away from them. And in so doing, he would follow his natural inclinations to rearrange the situation to suit himself. It will be a show of "goodwill" to the 1943 Americans, as well as another opportunity to create future chaos in China. Stalin always planned that way throughout his sitz-krieg with the 1939-1940 Germans with whom he was a conspirator and aggressor, and with the Japanese during the Non-Aggression pact with them and very much during all of WWII with the Anglo Americans, who he intended to betray at any first opportunity. If he has to postpone his war with the Germans for a couple of months to gain an advantage and slice off a piece of China, or install a puppet Beijing government; subservient to him; well remember the Russian army stall and sitdown outside Warsaw in 1944, when the wrong Polish patriotic people in Stalin's opinion were uprising against the Germans? As a last remark, that Georgian butcher, worshiped at the altar of Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili. He used Marxism, the way he wore shoes. Insofar as the ISOT is concerned, Stalin would be; "How can I twist this latest one strange thing to serve me?" Not one thing Jughasvilli ever did, from letting his son perish, to murdering his niece, to using men like Tupelov and Molotov (He Stockholm syndromed them.), to his constant betrayal after betrayal mixed with murders and butchery piled into the eight figures of human beings added as cherries, shows me anything but a calculating egoist and supreme narcissist. So he would be "licking his chops". That is not hyperbole. That is his observed behavior pattern. Now I refer you to this MAP.  That is 1944 when the Chinese are in better shape and the Japanese are in worse shape than in China 1943. The IJA found a way when B-29s showed up. MacArthur in Tokyo is an order of magnitude worse. |
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stevep
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Post by stevep on May 21, 2023 10:32:16 GMT
If the US is willing then a lot more could be done in Italy in 43 now, although N Italy being so close to Germany could be tough as no easy location for landing. However definitely in a better position with the forces available and also UT knowledge to get far more of Italy liberated when the country surrenders. Which would also save a lot of destruction there from the prolonged fighting OTL Due to the Alps being in the way more a/c and bases in Italy may not have a big impact on Germany, especially as far north as Berlin but would make attacks on Polesti and also infrastructure targets in the Balkans and Hungary a lot easier. Sure - Not sure about liberating much of the Balkans as while a possibility the US was strong hostile to the idea and its still 1943 FDR in charge so I suspect the prime initial allocations of the new resources would be in Italy and also crushing the U boats earlier. Possibly some effort to clear Crete as a potential forward base to secure traffic through the eastern Med but wouldn't expect much else I'm afraid. Well the question is fundamentally what is the root of the American objection? Is it an emotional and irrational belief the region or its geography is poison? Or a more rational belief that expending units and shipping there per Churchill's 'good ideas' robs Peter to pay Paul and delays concentrations of shipping and aircraft and units to accomplish the vital Overlord landings in France and supporting landings in southern France? If it is the latter, not the former, by summer 1943, with the fade-down of the Pacific War, the US (and British Empire) may have an embarrassment of riches in in terms of available shipping, ground units and aircraft, and not all of them may *fit* into axes of attack against France or through Italy, so the Americans may have the choice of having units enter Europe via the Balkans by some point in '43 or '44 or sit idle away from any combat fronts. The two most efficient ways of getting forces a bridgehead in the Balkans involve doing so by getting forces onshore in places where they do not need to fight alerted Germans resisting on the beach or coastline. So Crete and Athens/Attica, always occupied directly by the Germans, make for an unattractive landing spot in that respect. Getting onshore of Italian held sectors of Greece (Peloponnese, Rhodes & Dodecanese, Albania) while they are surrendering and before they can be assaulted, disarmed, and often massacred by the Italians is more efficient early on than attacking German held coasts later. The second more efficient way to get bodies of ground forces into the Balkans without rough landings, Balkan D-Days, and storming sometimes mountainous shores, is to get a Turkish DoW coordinated with a massive secret airlift and sealift of Allied forces into Turkish Thrace for an assault on Bulgaria, liberation of additional Aegean and Black Sea ports, and pushing against minor Axis allied dominoes. This requires diplomacy and getting the Turks to play ball of course, but possibly could be done, using 'future knowledge' to augment American and British diplomacy, showing how Japan is done, Germany inevitably loses, how in the old history Germany evacuated weakly from Greece and the southern Balkans, how the Soviets occupied Bulgaria because Turkey was so late to join the war, how the Allies embargoed Turkey to make it get into the war, and how by the end of 1945 and early 1946, the Soviet Union was pressing Turkey for the straits and other territories and western support wasn't clear. The message is 'help us [Anglo-Americans] get into Bulgaria through your country sooner, or have a second Soviet-dominated border, now in Europe, and not just in Asia. The reason why I'm expecting some hold-outs is that the forces in eastern Asia haven't experienced the OTL success of allied forces in 43-45. As such some are likely to be unwilling to surrender even after a proclamation from the emperor. I get the theory behind this. The thing is the experience of the forces throughout East Asia in the early 1943 timeframe compared to the end of the war in 1945 would have varied. In China proper, ironically, Japanese forces probably would have more respect for Chinese Nationalist fighting power in February 1943 than they did by August 1945, because it was only after 1943, during 1944 and 1945, that the Japanese made sweeping, unprecedented territorial gains in southern China, shoving aside previously tenacious Nationalist resistance, during the Ichigo offensive. On the other hand, in line with your surmise, Japanese forces in mainland Southeast Asia, Malaya, and the Dutch East Indies in February 1943 had only known triumph so far, whereas by August 1945, forces had been driven from Burma, and survivors in Thailand and Indochina and Malaya had tasted defeat, as had some Japanese forces in sections of Borneo British forces reinvaded. Also, the Japanese forces in Manchukuo and northern Korea in February 1943 were undefeated [except for the Nomonhan check in 1939] and only just starting to get 'robbed' for replacement units, a great contrast to their smashed condition as the Soviets plowed through them in August 1945. As I noted earlier, the most volatile uptime/downtime point of contact will probably be the 38th parallel in Korea. The US occupation force in Korea only numbered 45,000. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Blacklist_Forty The Japanese in northern Korea from 1943, not having experienced the late war atmosphere of privation, Japanese defeats, and Allied bombings, could be all full of 'piss and vinegar' and on a hair trigger trying to assault and retake Seoul and Inchon. MacArthur will probably have to muster his AirPower resident in Japan, Okinawa, the PI and carriers nearby, and his most combat ready formations, to reinforce General John Hodge's occupation force in Korea and definitively crush the Japanese challenge in North Korea, and liberate it. That process should start to have salutary effects on Japanese attitudes in northern Korea, Manchuria, and China that have been in denial, fairly quickly. The Americans will have to arm up southern Koreans and liberated Koreans with captured Japanese arms to quickly augment infantry, and they won't be able to afford to be picky. This sudden reemergence of the Japanese threat to Korean Seoul won't solve everything, but should hopefully have some salutary effects on some of the nasty political divides that were roiling southern Korea by early 1946 and poisoning US-Korean relations. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Army_Military_Government_in_KoreaI think the renewed, even if only brief, Japanese threat to Seoul and the south, and the project of liberating northern Korea from *Japanese* would logically have the effect of papering over right-left Korean divides and improving US-Korean relations in the moment. The Korean leftists would obviously know they would be screwed with a Japanese comeback, but Korean rightists and landlords, even those who had previously been collaborators with the Japanese, would have to fear that Japanese returning to control would have no patience for their explanations for why they stepped in and took over government roles 'above their station' and would butcher them the same as anyone else. So all Koreans would have to fight a Japanese comeback, and even past collaborators could earn some redemption in that fight [though domestic enemies could be loath to admit it]. Meanwhile Americans and conservative Koreans won't be able to afford to mercilessly pick on leftist and Communist Koreans, and will have to let them enroll in the fight to drive the Japanese out of North Korea or get them to surrender there. And the Communists, whatever reforms and changes they would want, would know things aren't geopolitically favorable for them to bid for monopoly power considering the absence of a Communist North Korean zone and inability of the Soviet Union to act in the region. Not sure that the collapse of Japanese threat would had much of an initial impact on the Soviet war with Germany. Apart from Stalin's paranoia it would require shipping the forces along the Trans-Siberian which is already fairly heavily loaded with L-L so by the time some are shipped west and then attached to existing units its probably reaching the spring thaw and everything grinding to an halt. Possibly they might reach the front in time to help stop von Manstein's counter attack that retook Kharkov. - Better might be the UTers giving information on what happens and possibly hence avoiding some of the OTL mistakes but then would Stalin listen? You're right, I guess the effects won't be instant. Anything coming from the Far East only comes through the limited TSR, and it's a delicate balance how to apportion Lend-Lease versus combat units. Future info can be useful, if believed. I imagine Stalin would be skeptical but willing to test out tactical, operational, and technological information handed over. He may or may not understand butterfly effects and how after a bit, reactions change, so future history isn't true, without it being a lie. Whatever the net effect is, it should be helpful to the Soviet war effort, sooner or later, even if we are not talking about something as quick as a few weeks.
As I understand it the prime US idea was to attack the centre of German power and hence draw in and defeat their main military forces. Basic Napoleonic strategy. They were very, very strongly committed to landing in France ASAP once they entered the war and it was only practical limitations, including such ideas as landing in France in late 42 being simply impossible that prompted them to accept Operation Torch and then operations in Italy at all.
Hence I can't see them being willing to bother at all about Italian held parts of the Balkans as a way of getting footholds in that region and being able to threaten key resources such as Polesti, the Danube and knocking out some of the Axis allies. They definitely didn't seem to have any concern about getting to such areas before the Soviets and hence preventing the spread of communism and Soviet control. Feb 46 - for some reason I had thought it was Aug 46?? - is really too early for cold war tensions to affect this and any warnings from MacArthur is likely to be viewed, probably correctly, as his own personal bias. I got the impression, possibly it was the bit "And they can try to handle the surrender of Italy better, so less territory, people, fall into Nazi hands." which I thought included areas under Italian control in the Balkans. But generally agree the US will be eager for all forces to France ASAP.
I don't know enough on the war in China that while there was a fair level of stalemate on the front lines from ~1941-44 how much the Japanese successes in the final stages compared to this were a) They were so busy with operations elsewhere, especially attacks on the western powers that they didn't try or b) Chinese forces declined significantly in ability during this period, possibly due to the lull in activity allowing more infighting, coupled with the increasing isolation of them with the Burma route being cut. or c) A mix of both.
As such while their time is limited being cut off from their primary sources of supplies and equipment as well as manpower if the Japanese forces in China did decide to fight on in large numbers then I wouldn't be doing any more than guessing as to how well they would do against the Chinese in the short term. I do suspect that any such continued fighting would be limited in scope as many would accept an order from the emperor to surrender, or possibly withdrawal to coastal regions/Manchuria to surrender to allied forces there for repatriation. [Given what the Japanese had done in China I would think many would be reluctant to surrender to Chinese forces.
As you sat the most likely source of problems for the western powers would probably be Manchuria/Korea as there you have a sizeable garrison and a markedly longer period of control along with some Japanese settlement. This could cause problems for S Korea. I suspect Stalin, so heavily involved in fighting Germany and with the latter still occupying so much rich territory would be very reluctant to engage his forces against any such Japanese resistance at this point. His forces are sweeping across a good chunk of eastern Ukraine at this stage but there's still a long way to go and if he gets any information about how much fight Germany still has in it adding a resistant China to his list of opponents seems highly unlikely.
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Post by raharris1973 on May 21, 2023 16:08:36 GMT
Now you have an ISOT with a wrecked Japanese homeland under American administrative control. You have not been really clear about what happened to the IJN outside Japanese home waters. I presume that if Americans garrison the fleet anchorages described, that 1/2 the main body of Combined Fleet still remains between the Philippine Islands and Singapore *(Tawi Tawi and Linga) and that it is only the Chuuk and Japanese home island forces that are gone poof. In that case, you still have a force that can offer battle coomensurate with Sho-1. |
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lordroel
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Post by lordroel on May 21, 2023 16:12:10 GMT
Now you have an ISOT with a wrecked Japanese homeland under American administrative control. You have not been really clear about what happened to the IJN outside Japanese home waters. I presume that if Americans garrison the fleet anchorages described, that 1/2 the main body of Combined Fleet still remains between the Philippine Islands and Singapore *(Tawi Tawi and Linga) and that it is only the Chuuk and Japanese home island forces that are gone poof. In that case, you still have a force that can offer battle coomensurate with Sho-1. You know you can post the image here if it if from imgur. |
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Post by raharris1973 on May 21, 2023 16:14:51 GMT
You know you can post the image here if it if from imgur. What are the keystrokes? - the 'upload file' button on the bottom I originally saw [don't see it now] didn't respond in any way by browsing my image files, it would just jerk me to the top of the page]. The insert image file forced me to put in an http: URL. |
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lordroel
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Post by lordroel on May 21, 2023 16:22:08 GMT
You know you can post the image here if it if from imgur. What are the keystrokes? - the 'upload file' button on the bottom I originally saw [don't see it now] didn't respond in any way by browsing my image files, it would just jerk me to the top of the page]. The insert image file forced me to put in an http: URL. Looks like this, then  post the image URL and get this:  |
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Post by raharris1973 on May 21, 2023 17:48:07 GMT
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lordroel
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Post by lordroel on May 21, 2023 18:04:52 GMT
No problem. 1943 Japan is cur off from what remains of its empire, minus Japan, South Korea which are gone, it still has Formosa which mind end up being the de facto home for the 1943 remains of Japan. Governor General of Taiwan, admiral Kiyoshi Hasegawa might place himself under General Shunroku Hata, Supreme Commander of Japan's military forces in China ore might act alone, especially if 1946 MacArthur has the emperor broadcast a second surrender message, this time for the 1943 Japanese forces. |
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miletus12
Squadron vice admiral
To get yourself lost, just follow the signs.
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Post by miletus12 on May 21, 2023 19:37:27 GMT
What are the keystrokes? - the 'upload file' button on the bottom I originally saw [don't see it now] didn't respond in any way by browsing my image files, it would just jerk me to the top of the page]. The insert image file forced me to put in an http: URL. Looks like this, then post the image URL and get this: Referring to that image, the refugee IJN ships that fled west to be near the Indonesian oil supplies they would need are located here:  That is Linga. Here is Tawi Tawi.  The situation to the south is NOT TOO GOOD if you are 1946 7th Fleet. Governor General of Taiwan, admiral Kiyoshi Hasegawa might place himself under General Shunroku Hata, Supreme Commander of Japan's military forces in China ore might act alone, especially if 1946 MacArthur has the emperor broadcast a second surrender message, this time for the 1943 Japanese forces. Hosagaya was the Japanese admiral who screwed up Operation AI and failed to rendezvous as ordered with Yamamoto's main body after Nagumo got himself sunk off Midway Islands Atoll. Like Inouye who botched up Coral Sea, who Yamamoto also fired and beached into a ceremonial job, Hosagaya was considered a peace-nik and somewhat "timid" by Japanese standards. He was not the sort of go-it-alone rugged individualist who would act on his own book. Shunroku Hata was a "politically reliable" officer for the Modernist Faction in the Japanese Army. Though he was not the brains behind Ichi-Go, he was most quick to take credit for it. Based on his record as a war criminal, the Americans were "lenient". He was just as guilty as the other Japanese generals like Homma and Yamashita, when their troops ran amok, and for much the same reasons. The man in charge who gave the order is responsible for the results of the order. He gave the orders that resulted in 250,000 Chinese civilian mass murders and deaths during Ichi-Go. |
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Post by raharris1973 on May 21, 2023 20:50:45 GMT
No problem. 1943 Japan is cur off from what remains of its empire, minus Japan, South Korea which are gone, it still has Formosa which mind end up being the de facto home for the 1943 remains of Japan. Governor General of Taiwan, admiral Kiyoshi Hasegawa might place himself under General Shunroku Hata, Supreme Commander of Japan's military forces in China ore might act alone, especially if 1946 MacArthur has the emperor broadcast a second surrender message, this time for the 1943 Japanese forces. For cross-referencing with the other map, here's a Pacific control map, although be warned it is from July 1, 1943, not Feb 1, 1943  Referring to that image, the refugee IJN ships that fled west to be near the Indonesian oil supplies they would need are located here: That is Linga. Here is Tawi Tawi. The situation to the south is NOT TOO GOOD if you are 1946 7th Fleet. Hosagaya was the Japanese admiral who screwed up Operation AI and failed to rendezvous as ordered with Yamamoto's main body after Nagumo got himself sunk off Midway Islands Atoll. Like Inouye who botched up Coral Sea, who Yamamoto also fired and beached into a ceremonial job, Hosagaya was considered a peace-nik and somewhat "timid" by Japanese standards. He was not the sort of go-it-alone rugged individualist who would act on his own book. Shunroku Hata was a "politically reliable" officer for the Modernist Faction in the Japanese Army. Though he was not the brains behind Ichi-Go, he was most quick to take credit for it. Based on his record as a war criminal, the Americans were "lenient". He was just as guilty as the other Japanese generals like Homma and Yamashita, when their troops ran amok, and for much the same reasons. The man in charge who gave the order is responsible for the results of the order. He gave the orders that resulted in 250,000 Chinese civilian mass murders and deaths during Ichi-Go. Good information from both - So miletus12 basically indeed, whatever IJN forces were in the South China, outside Filipino EEZ waters, and in Indonesia/DEI archipelagic waters, a substantial amount of Japan's early 1943 IJN, would remain existent and available with its on board commanders and commanders on proximate shores in this scenarios. This constituted what? Approximately 1/2 of IJN fleet strength in early 1943. I do not know the placement of various Japanese Admirals at that time - Yamamoto, Nagumo, Nagano, others. Although any 1943 ships right at Tawi Tawi and the island it was on would not be there, (since it is Filipino), and Sitangkai and Sibutu (also Filipino), and the Turtle islands (also Filipino) would not be there since its ISOT'ed 1946, anything close offshore to Sempora, Sandakan, and the island or Borneo and state of Sarawak in general remains in its 1943 condition, so that is indeed, something like 98% of all the sea space between Tawi-Tawi and Linga. Other 1943 IJN fleet units left available would be those in North Korean ports/anchorages, in the Kuriles at infamous Hitokappu Bay, in the China Sea, the Bismarcks or Solomons or Gilberts, and in transit through the Philippine Sea, seas north of Micronesia, or the other orange sea patches near Japan not part of any EEZ. |
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Post by raharris1973 on May 21, 2023 21:09:36 GMT
 insert code here ![]() Cross-referencing the temporal and adversarial zones of control - (admittedly, source material above is somewhat off, representing July 1, 1943, instead of Feb 1, 1943) <blockquote class="imgur-embed-pub" lang="en" data-id="8ASSa2B"><a href="https://imgur.com/8ASSa2B">View post on imgur.com</a></blockquote><script async src="//s.imgur.com/min/embed.js" charset="utf-8"></script> imgur.com/8ASSa2B[still beyond my technical competence to get a linked image to display, attachment would be way simpler] |
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miletus12
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To get yourself lost, just follow the signs.
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Post by miletus12 on May 21, 2023 23:49:04 GMT
 From the above, we can postulate that Kurita is at Linga, along with Nishimura. Shima, it depends. I think he went poof. Ozawa went with Shima. So we can figure out what's left. |
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gillan1220
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I've been depressed recently. Slow replies coming in the next few days.
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Post by gillan1220 on May 22, 2023 1:17:04 GMT
Now I'm curious how will those downtimers realize that they many of them will be KIA at some point in the future? Could they avoid their deaths?
Also how does DT Japanese realize that two of their cities will be razed in atomic fire?
What will happen if the uptime version of a person sees their downtime version?
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Post by raharris1973 on May 22, 2023 1:31:33 GMT
What will happen if the uptime version of a person sees their downtime version? Congratulations - they now have a younger twin. Another brother who can help them through life. Of course this can also be a source of much awkwardness about such matters as 'which one gets the wife', 'who is really father to the kids?', who has the claim to any land, saved bank accounts, or inheritance? |
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Post by raharris1973 on May 22, 2023 2:23:22 GMT
He's gotten all the immediate supplies he is likely to get at the moment, because now FDR realizes there are Americans trapped behind the enemy front who need to be American rescued. There is a Japanese army inside Manchuria in immediate contact with those Americans located on the Korean Peninsula. Remember again that half of the American Lend lease en route is coming in through Siberia via Vladivostok a one week route march for the Japanese. Those LL supplies will be diverted immediately to succor MacArthur in Japan or they could be piled up at Vladisvostok, if the Russian competency is as it was. The Japanese in Manchuria realize that fact. They will attack that route, to interrupt and seize some of those supplies for themselves under the new paradigm. Stalin would not want that diversion. If nothing else, then the STAVKA will point out to Stalin that both necessity and opportunity compels some Russian actions against the Japanese in Manchuria to "rescue the Americans" in Korea as a move to save that LL supply line through and into the Siberian maritime provinces than for any other practical reason. Stalin can spare the half million men he has set there for a contingency purpose, to take advantage of any Japanese collapse or opportunity to attack after the German defeat in the future. It just happens that the military opportunity and necessity is "now". He has that "compelling selfish reason" to move to save that logistics bonanza and to still keep the Americans aimed at the Germans rather than swing away from them. And in so doing, he would follow his natural inclinations to rearrange the situation to suit himself. It will be a show of "goodwill" to the 1943 Americans, as well as another opportunity to create future chaos in China. Stalin always planned that way throughout his sitz-krieg with the 1939-1940 Germans with whom he was a conspirator and aggressor, and with the Japanese during the Non-Aggression pact with them and very much during all of WWII with the Anglo Americans, who he intended to betray at any first opportunity. If he has to postpone his war with the Germans for a couple of months to gain an advantage and slice off a piece of China, or install a puppet Beijing government; subservient to him; well remember the Russian army stall and sitdown outside Warsaw in 1944, when the wrong Polish patriotic people in Stalin's opinion were uprising against the Germans? Now that you explain it, there could be a bit more to this idea than I was giving you credit for. I'll itemize: Those LL supplies will be diverted immediately to succor MacArthur in Japan or they could be piled up at Vladisvostok They may be diverted if en route, or not. I believe the shipping for Pacific Lend-Lease was Soviet-flagged, if not actually Soviet-crewed for the passage through Japanese waters to Vladivostok, to keep a neutral flag and avoid being assaulted by the Japanese. If they were Soviet false-flagged but actually American-crewed, they would be responsive to orders from Washington or MacArthur to divert food and other supplies to Japan. But if Soviet skippered and crewed they will keep going to the USSR. Last time I inquired about the actual crews, I was told they were Soviet and Soviet controlled. The Japanese in Manchuria realize that fact. They will attack that route, to interrupt and seize some of those supplies for themselves under the new paradigm. That is a big decision for local commanders to make. It is a temptation, and the country is in desperate situation so it can be an argument to act, but it is also a great argument to not initiate a new war with an additional enemy. I wonder who the commanders of the Kwangtung Army in Manchuria and the Korea Army's were. For the Korea army it would have to be any units with command structure based out of the north, not Seoul. If nothing else, then the STAVKA will point out to Stalin that both necessity and opportunity compels some Russian actions against the Japanese in Manchuria to "rescue the Americans" in Korea as a move to save that LL supply line through and into the Siberian maritime provinces than for any other practical reason. Stalin can spare the half million men he has set there for a contingency purpose, to take advantage of any Japanese collapse or opportunity to attack after the German defeat in the future. It just happens that the military opportunity and necessity is "now". He has that "compelling selfish reason" to move to save that logistics bonanza and to still keep the Americans aimed at the Germans rather than swing away from them. And in so doing, he would follow his natural inclinations to rearrange the situation to suit himself. It will be a show of "goodwill" to the 1943 Americans, as well as another opportunity to create future chaos in China. This could happen. If surrenders happens smoothly, the Russians and Americans won't have to deal with it, but it may not, and there could be a decent rationale for Soviet intervention of one degree or another. An ambitious interventionist program throwing all of the Far East and Mongolia half million men into attacking Manchuria, Northern Korea (and southern Sakhalin and Kuriles) would serve multiple purposes - securing Vladivostok and LL supplies in case Japanese 1943 forces in Korea and Manchuria get any 'ideas', 'rescuing' the Americans in southern Korea and northern Japan, laying claims to lands that 1946 Soviet diplomats will tell the 1943 Soviet Union the west and Chinese agreed its was entitled to (Kuriles, Sakhalin, a zone of northern Korea, the Manchurian railways, Port Arthur), looting Manchuria for industrial booty and natural resources, freely using Japanese PoWs as a forced labor pool, establishing their share of influence in northeast Asia. A Soviet intervention of this scope, combined with 'news from the future' and uptime Japanese and American attempts to communicate the surrender to downtime Japanese, would probably within a relatively short period replicate that double effect of the OTL atomic bombing and Soviet entry into the war that helped end the war and cause Japanese general surrender. The psychological impacts of any large Soviet attack would be larger than their physical effects, even though the Soviet forces would not have the physical capability to achieve gains of the same speed and scale as in August Storm 1945, being smaller and less lavishly supported. Soviet forces campaigning far south of Harbin and the Chinese Eastern railway, to the Great Wall, and down into Korea as far as Pyongyang - as opposed to the northeast corner, may be a bit deeper than Stalin would want to engage at this point. So even more likely than trying to make all the gains of the August 1945 campaign would be a limited campaign to seize smaller targets like the Kurils and Sakhalin to directly expand Soviet territory, the northeastern province of Korea to buffer Vladivostok and relieve the Americans, and northern Manchuria, the whole length of the Chinese Eastern Railway and all of Manchuria north of it, but not extending forces south to the Yellow Sea and Port Arthur and Beijing. That gives the Russians a second line through the CER for the Trans-Siberian. To save on labor and cannon fodder, the Soviets would probably demand major Chinese Communist support to any of their offensives, big or little, and a Chinese Communist re-focusing and regrouping toward Soviet zones of operation in the northeast. Of course, for the 1946 Japanese government under occupation, not wanting to see land lost to the Soviet Union and hundreds of thousands of PoWs and civilians going missing into Soviet captivity, they will be working hard to forestall Soviet entry into the fight by trying to persuade the downtime Japanese to believe the Emperor's surrender announcement and get them to be responsive to MacArthur's orders. If he has to postpone his war with the Germans for a couple of months to gain an advantage and slice off a piece of China, or install a puppet Beijing government; subservient to him; I think he'll still see anything that comes at the cost of postponing European operations substantially...like a couple months, as an excessive price to pay. He was and will be a Europe-firster, as he was in the Russian Civil War, the Great Patriotic War, and the Cold War. I think he would also see going down to Beijing to set up a puppet government there in the middle of the war against the Germans as overcommitting to the Far East beyond what it is worth. Getting involved in Manchuria for buffer space and loot, sure, trying to play for dominating power stakes in China - not how he'd use his chips. Stalin really wants to get back the Donbass and Ukraine and Belarus and reintegrate them and start conscripting their men, and not let separatist partisans fester under German protection. He really wants to show the flag again in the Baltics. He's not going to put Korea and North China ahead of those targets. |
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