Great Pacific War: A History of the American-Japanese Campaign of 1931-33 (8 page)

Nor was it only in China that she had a vulnerable flank to guard. Early in the war serious disorders took place in Korea. The independence party raised the standard of revolt in April, 1931, achieving so much initial success that an army of three divisions had to be hastily dispatched from Japan. The revolt was quelled after severe fighting, but the temper of the Koreans was such that it was deemed unwise to withdraw a single regiment. Another source of danger lay in Formosa, where the inhabitants had always been restive under Japanese rule. Here, also, the garrison had to be heavily reinforced. Altogether therefore, not less than eleven divisions — or seventy per cent of the army’s peace establishment — were practically immobilised.

But even after these deductions the military power of Japan remained exceedingly formidable. With the calling-up of the first-line reserves, the strength of the army available for active operations was raised to 800,000 effectives. At the back of these were second-line reserves to the number of 1,400,000 men, the majority of whom had undergone training. Since the World War of 1914-18, the equipment of the army had been vastly improved. Its artillery, train, and special services were organised on up-to-date lines, and furnished with material of the latest pattern. The tank corps, inaugurated ten years before, had now reached a strength of 120 heavy and light battle tanks. The military aviation service had some 800 planes ready for service. Thus, if the course of the war compelled Japan to do any extensive fighting on land, she was in a position to give a good account of herself. It only remains to be added that no effort had been spared to make the coastline of Japan proper impregnable to assault from the sea. Strong forts armed with heavy ordnance guarded all the principal harbours and strategic channels. Besides these stationary defences there was a network of railroads which enabled large masses of troops to be rapidly concentrated at any point along the coast where attack threatened.

Having now examined as briefly as possible the armed forces at the disposal of Japan, together with the salient features of her strategic situation, it is time to glance at the corresponding factors on the side of the United States.

Until a few years previous to the war with Spain the United States Navy had been treated as though its sole function were coast defence. As late as 1890 it was proposed to expend most of the money available for shipbuilding on a number of new monitors, powerful enough as floating batteries, but quite unfitted to cruise and fight on the high seas. Eventually, however, these ships were abandoned in favour of sea-going ironclads, which formed the nucleus of the first American battle fleet. With the acquisition of Spain’s colonies in the Pacific, the naval commitments of the United States were largely increased. It was no longer simply a question of providing for the defence of the home coasts: protection had now to be extended to American territory situated thousands of miles away in the Pacific Ocean.

How to make the Philippines reasonably safe from foreign aggression was a strategical problem of the first magnitude, and one with which the American people, it must be confessed, showed no desire to grapple. To do so would have involved an expenditure on armaments out of proportion to the economic value of the new colonies. In any case, it would have meant not only a large increase in the navy, but the erection of costly local defences as well. Whether the taking of both these measures would have solved the problem is a debatable point. American naval officers always doubted the possibility of making the Philippines safe by means of ships and fortifications alone. In their judgment it could only be done by keeping permanently in the islands a military force equal to that which any prospective enemy could send to attack them, and this was a course that public opinion in the United States would never have countenanced. The alternative was to develop, either in the Philippines or some adjacent island, a well-equipped and strongly defended base which would enable a powerful American fleet to maintain itself in the Western Pacific; for the presence of such a fleet, or the certainty of its eventual arrival, would be likely to act as a deterrent to schemes of invasion.

For many years, therefore, the development of Cavite, in Manila Bay, or better still, of Guam — an island in the Mariana group, 1,500 miles east of Manila — had been urged as essential by American strategists, who from time to time put forward specific plans to this end. But all to no purpose. The nation either did not appreciate the facts of the case, or was indifferent to the fate of the remote possessions, which it had acquired more or less adventitiously. As a consequence Cavite remained a third-class base with no facilities for the care and replenishment of a modern battle fleet, while Guam continued to serve merely as a fuel station without means of protection. This negative policy prevailed till 1920, when Congress at length appropriated funds for strengthening the defences of Guam and otherwise improving the port of Apra as a fleet anchorage. There is every reason to believe that this represented only the initial stage of a plan which aimed ultimately at converting the island into a first-class naval base. But it was nipped in the bud by the Five-Power Treaty signed at Washington in 1922 which disallowed the establishment of new fortifications or naval bases in a specified area that included the Philippines and Guam, and forbade any increase in existing facilities for the repair and maintenance of naval forces and of the coast defences of those islands.

The effect of this restriction was practically to bar the American Fleet from the Western Pacific in time of war, for modern battleships can only operate in waters where there are secure bases within easy reach. Their range of action, governed by fuel endurance, is strictly limited, and especially in war time, when fast steaming is the rule and the consumption of oil or coal is abnormally heavy. Honolulu, situated 2,100 miles from San Francisco, was the only insular base in the Pacific having the necessary plant for dealing with the requirements of a large naval force. Pivoting on this base, the fleet could cruise to any point not above 1,500 or 2,000 miles distant. If it went further afield it would risk finding itself short of fuel for the homeward voyage, and under war conditions any reduction in speed for the purpose of economising fuel might be attended with fatal consequences, for ships steaming at low speed are easy targets for submarine attack. Obviously, therefore, a fleet working from Honolulu would be quite unable to extend protection either to Guam or the Philippines, since these places lay respectively 3,325 and 4,800 miles to the westward.

On the outbreak of war the United States Navy possessed eighteen battleships, varying from 21,825 to 32,600 tons; twenty-two light cruisers, more than 300 destroyers, and 125 submarines, with five large airplane carriers. Its
personnel
numbered approximately 115,000 of all grades, including Marines. The short-service system had always been the bane of the American Navy. To turn out a thoroughly efficient man-of-war’s man in less than six years is admittedly impossible, yet the majority of American blue jackets served only for four years, and re-enlistment, for a second term was exceptional. This involved a heavy turnover in recruits and discharges each year, with a low average of training and efficiency as the unavoidable consequence. Repeated attempts were made to have the minimum period of service fixed as six years, but not until 1929 was this reform sanctioned by Congress. Its beneficial effect had therefore not begun to be felt previous to the coming of war. When the crisis arose, about forty per cent of the enlisted
personnel
had served less than three years.

In these circumstances it would be demonstrably false to assert that the standard of training and discipline was as high in the American Navy as in the Japanese, where the great majority of seamen, being volunteers, had served at least six years. While it may be true that, the American recruit was more mentally alert, and showed a greater aptitude for the mechanical details of his work, this advantage could not compensate for the extreme brevity of his training. Knowledge may be acquired rapidly in the hard school of war, but there is no denying the fact, that, at the outset, the American Navy was severely handicapped by the inadequate training of its enlisted
personnel
.

In 1931 the authorised peace strength of the United States Army was slightly under 150,000. Experience gained during the world war had been turned to good account, and in organisation, training, and equipment the Army could bear comparison with any in the world. The National Guard, or Militia, had an authorised strength of 425,000, but this total was far from complete, and in 1931 failed to reach 200,000. Potentially the military power of the United States was enormous. In November, 1918, at the close of the World War. 3,600,000 mem were under arms, and many classes still remained to be called up. The total number of men registered at that period as liable to serve exceeded 24,000,000. Given the requisite time the United States could create, organise and equip entirely from its own resources the largest army in the world. Compulsory military service was restored immediately after the outbreak of war with Japan, but since at that time the impending campaign seemed to offer little scope for the employment of land forces, apart from garrison duty, the maximum strength of the Army was provisionally laid down as a million men, although the actual number recruited did not reach this total until several months later.

As for the strategic problem now confronting the United States, it may be very simply stated. That Japan would attempt any serious military attack on the American Continent was out of the question. The distance was far too great, and her fleet, outside its own waters, was not sufficiently strong to risk an encounter with the combined naval forces of her enemy. A Japanese invasion of the Pacific Slope was therefore physically impossible, and, despite sensational forecasts to the contrary by certain writers who chose to ignore the rudiments of strategy, it had always been regarded as such by informed naval and military opinion in the United States. Nor were fears entertained for the safety of Hawaii, for it was unbelievable that Japan would send a military expedition across 3,400 miles of ocean to attack territory which served as the main Pacific base of the American fleet.

Both the United States coastline and Hawaii could thus be regarded as immune from serious military attack. But simply to stand on the defensive would not win the war. A decision could be brought about only by defeating the armed forces of the enemy and, then if necessary, by applying the pressure of blockade. To achieve either of these ends it was necessary to have bases in the immediate war zone, namely the Western Pacific. But how were these to be obtained? Therein lay the kernel of the problem. With the loss of the Philippines and Guam there remained no American possession west of Hawaii which was capable of serving as a war base. Midway Island, 1,126 miles to the north-west of Hawaii, was too remote from Japanese waters; while Wake Island, 2,000 miles to the west, was a mere coral atoll without anchorage facilities for large ships.

It speedily became evident, therefore, that if a base were to be found at all, it must be sought in Japanese territory. Even here the choice of sites was strictly limited. The Marshall Islands seemed to be disqualified by their distance from the war zone, as also by the fact that ships operating therefrom would have to run the gantlet of submarines from neighbouring Japanese islands. To Ponape, in the Carolines, which was also considered, much the same objections were held to apply, nor were the hydrographic conditions at that port favourable to its development as a base for big ships. Angaur, in the Pelew group, though well situated as to distance, was at this time rejected on account of its proximity to other Japanese islands, which flanked every direct line of approach thereto. Guam was assumed to be a hostile base, and no other harbour in the Mariana islands had a sufficiently good anchorage. And so, as we shall see in a later chapter, the Bonins came to be selected as the only practicable site for a war base, from which the American fleet could wage a campaign in enemy waters.

Meanwhile; to deal with events in their chronological sequence, we must now turn our attention to Guam. As explained above, this island, the largest of the Mariana group, had never been developed as an important naval base, though its unique advantages from the strategical point of view were obvious. Captured by the American cruiser
Charleston
in 1898, during the war with Spain, it had served thereafter merely as a coaling station for naval vessels and Government transports. Very little had been done to improve the antiquated fortifications left by the Spaniards.

Extending about thirty miles from N.N.E. to S.S.W., the island averages six and a half miles in width and has an area of 208 square miles. The northern part is a plateau from 300 to 600 feet above sea level, attaining its highest elevation along the east and west coasts, where steep headlands jut out into the sea. Viewed at a distance, the island appears rather flat, its even outline broken towards the north by the hills of Santa Rosa (870 feet high), Machinao (610 feet), the extreme northerly point, and the site of the radio station which had been destroyed in the first bomb attack, and Mataguac (630 feet). To the southward, however, the country is mountainous, and here there are several lofty peaks, such as Alutum (Mount Reconnaissance), Chachao, and Tinko, all of which are over 1,000 feet. The highest point on the island is Jamullong Manglo, nearly 1,300 feet above the sea. An abundant supply of fresh water is obtained from a spring near Agaña. There is a belt of open, undulating country between the hills and the sea on the western side; but on the east the coast is steep and rugged, with only one harbour (Port Tarofofo) where vessels can find shelter. This port takes its name from the river Tarofofo, which flows into the harbour. Both sides of the bay are flanked by steep hills. The largest ships can enter here with safety, as there are from eight to six fathoms of water inside.