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German Military Attache and Plan Barbarossa


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I finally got around to finding my refs on the subject officer and his knowledge of the Red Army and the planning for the German attack on Russia in 1941. But for the life of me I cannot recall the thread in which I brought it up. In any case here it is. While not entirely ignored, he obviously had little to do with the planning of Barbarossa.

 

One of the earliest mentions I ever read was in the classic study published in 1970, The Russo-German War 1941-45 by Albert Seaton. He described that attache, Lt General Ernst A. Koestring, in 1941 as a 65 year old Russophile who had held his position in Moscow for ten years. He wrote reports of significant insight, despite the fact that the Russians kept the diplomatic corps very restricted in movements and activities. In October 1940, the German Army Foreign Armies East staff compiled some of this, concluding that "the Red Army was a factor to be reckoned with and would be a serious opponent in defense, but that it was not capable of mobile warfare on the grand scale."

 

He rated the Red Army as inferior to the German Army even if it mustered 3:1 or 2:1 in superior numbers, but he warned that the Red Army's "best allies were time and space, the lack of roads and the bad weather. These factors, according to Koestring, needed to be experienced in order to understand their importance in a war inside Russia." [p. 45]

 

This description is upheld by more recent historians, such as David Stahel, in his Operation Barbarossa and Germany's Defeat in the East (2009). He describes a September 1940 conversation between the chief of the General Staff, Halder, and Koestring, "in which the veteran Soviet observer noted improvements within the Red Army, but added that it would still require a further four years before it reached its former level [after the purges]. Koestring also warned of the demands the terrain and conditions would cause the Wehrmacht, to which Halder noted, ' Movement in the various parts of Russia will present significant problems for motorized units.' "[p. 47]

 

 

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49 minutes ago, Ken Estes said:

I finally got around to finding my refs on the subject officer and his knowledge of the Red Army and the planning for the German attack on Russia in 1941. But for the life of me I cannot recall the thread in which I brought it up. In any case here it is. While not entirely ignored, he obviously had little to do with the planning of Barbarossa.

 

One of the earliest mentions I ever read was in the classic study published in 1970, The Russo-German War 1941-45 by Albert Seaton. He described that attache, Lt General Ernst A. Koestring, in 1941 as a 65 year old Russophile who had held his position in Moscow for ten years. He wrote reports of significant insight, despite the fact that the Russians kept the diplomatic corps very restricted in movements and activities. In October 1940, the German Army Foreign Armies East staff compiled some of this, concluding that "the Red Army was a factor to be reckoned with and would be a serious opponent in defense, but that it was not capable of mobile warfare on the grand scale."

 

He rated the Red Army as inferior to the German Army even if it mustered 3:1 or 2:1 in superior numbers, but he warned that the Red Army's "best allies were time and space, the lack of roads and the bad weather. These factors, according to Koestring, needed to be experienced in order to understand their importance in a war inside Russia." [p. 45]

 

This description is upheld by more recent historians, such as David Stahel, in his Operation Barbarossa and Germany's Defeat in the East (2009). He describes a September 1940 conversation between the chief of the General Staff, Halder, and Koestring, "in which the veteran Soviet observer noted improvements within the Red Army, but added that it would still require a further four years before it reached its former level [after the purges]. Koestring also warned of the demands the terrain and conditions would cause the Wehrmacht, to which Halder noted, ' Movement in the various parts of Russia will present significant problems for motorized units.' "[p. 47]

 

 

He had been in Moscow since 1931? I guess that was like being in Mars from the Hitler point of view.

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IIRC, there was a major disconnect between what Koestring supplied to FHO, what FHO assessed and passed on to the planners at Gen. Stab des Heeres, and what was assumed for BARBAROSSA. A major problem was the Koestring and FHO more or less accurately assessed the Soviet capability, but their assessment got watered down to fit the expected outcome of the plan. Typical G-3 screwups. 😁

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31 minutes ago, RichTO90 said:

IIRC, there was a major disconnect between what Koestring supplied to FHO, what FHO assessed and passed on to the planners at Gen. Stab des Heeres, and what was assumed for BARBAROSSA. A major problem was the Koestring and FHO more or less accurately assessed the Soviet capability, but their assessment got watered down to fit the expected outcome of the plan. Typical G-3 screwups. 😁

Yep, a case of victory disease where the conquerors of France forgot how surprising that victory was and simply presumed the Landsern would as usual carry the day in the event of any friction in the planning.....

Almost makes the Japanese look sage....well, no.

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Good topic.

Another German officer, Werner Baumbach, travelled around the USSR prior to Barbarossa. He also met with Koestring and other officers. In his book Life and Death of the Luftwaffe there is a cchapter on this visit. I have selected a few excerpts:

In the evening I sit with the Military Attaché, General Kostring, and my old friend the Air Attaché, Major-General Aschenbrenner, on the terrace of the very modern hotel Moskwa, not far from the Kremlin. The waiters are in evening dress and a jazz band plays swing. All the desires of a sophisticated human palate can be satisfied here if one has the necessary exchange.Many foreigners and diplomats are seen.

We have a long talk about the Russian Air Force and Russia's military strength. Both officers are greatly concerned. Their sober reports go into waste-paper baskets or e watered down before circulation when they reach Berlin. Aschenbrenner thinks that an understanding with Russia is possible for quite a long time. Russia's strength is in her system which is not going to collapse overnight. It is quite impossible to find out the size of the Russian army. If there are any tactical or strategic Air Force formations they are out of date. The Russian soldier obeys Stalin's order blindly. The armament industries concentrate primarily on modern equipment for the army and its auxiliaries. Russia cannot be conquered on land. As we walked home across the well-lighted Red Square, it clear to me that these officers were wasting their ti me.

While the West was tearing itself to pieces the Soviet was sitting here in the old fortress of the Tsars and biding its time as only Asiatics can. There was little sign of any feverish mobilization or open preparations for war, and yet Russia was armed, better armed than Berlin wanted to believe. The troops stationed in Moscow and the Siberian garrisons made a good impression. The discipline, food and equipment of the Red Army men I met was very different from what was said about them in the reports appearing in the German and Western press during the 1939-40 winter campaign in Finland.

The little I saw of the Russian Air Force gave me the impression that it was antiquated and could not be regarded as a military factor. Yet, despite all technical developments, Russia had remained a land power of the first order. Her inexhaustible reservoir of men and her vast distances are her weapons.

As we came closer to the Western frontier of Russia we saw more and more of the Russian army. The troops seemed to be in no hurry, as most of them were on foot. But the direction in which they were marching was indubitably west. The War had diverted the Soviets from their domestic ideological and colonizing tasks. Only the process of industrialization was intensified with might and main. Yet their efforts did not seem to be limited solely to Russia as their great final goal, world revolution, had come very near as the result of the "self-destruction of the capitalistic empires". They considered not Germany only but the whole Western world as their irreconcilable foe, as was explained to me by young cadets and students whose unblushing chauvinism, incidentally, was not in keeping with their doctrinaire Bolshevik education. Red Army officers who were travelling in the train with me, and whose knowledge of German and German literature was amazing, lost no opportunity of showing their glee over the English defeats.

After my return, the more I thought about the limited space and resources at my country's disposal, the greater seemed the danger of something much worse than an ideological controversy between swastika and hammer and sickle. But there was little time left for rumination as our Group had suffered heavy losses in the battle with England and could not permanently allow its young officers to range the world as philosophizing globe-trotters.

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On 11/23/2020 at 8:35 PM, Ken Estes said:

Yep, a case of victory disease where the conquerors of France forgot how surprising that victory was and simply presumed the Landsern would as usual carry the day in the event of any friction in the planning.....

Almost makes the Japanese look sage....well, no.

If only Germany's intent to betray Stalin had been conveyed more clearly to Tokyo, and in time for joint operational planning at the USSR's expense to be coordinated.

Edited to add: Thank you Alejandro, for the excerpts.

Edited by Nobu
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49 minutes ago, Nobu said:

If only Germany's intent to betray Stalin had been conveyed more clearly to Tokyo, and in time for joint operational planning at the USSR's expense to be coordinated.

Edited to add: Thank you Alejandro, for the excerpts.

Only if Japan wanted to participate in BARBAROSSA.  Given that they needed oil and rubber to continue the war in China, let alone fight in Siberia too, and this wouldn't get them any, they would probably have decided not to join in as they did in real life.

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The lack of cooperation between Germany and Japan is certainly noteworthy and imho hasn’t been covered enough. Only reason I can think of is that the leadership of both countries was basically crazy, plus geographical distance. It wasn’t due to animosity or anything — Hitler thought Japan was great (I don’t know much about what Japan thought of Hitler). One overlooked thing about Hitlers declaration of war on the US is that Hitler thought that Japan was more powerful than the US so having both countries enter the war was a positive for Germany. 

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On 12/4/2020 at 10:22 AM, R011 said:

Only if Japan wanted to participate in BARBAROSSA.  Given that they needed oil and rubber to continue the war in China, let alone fight in Siberia too, and this wouldn't get them any, they would probably have decided not to join in as they did in real life.

Well, when Barbarossa was launched, Japan was surprised by the move but was fairly quick in looking at it as an opportunity to "finally solve the Soviet problem". After all Russia/Soviet Union had been a major concern since before 1900 really. 1920s and 1930s Soviet communism was viewed a severe threat. In early July, there was already a large scale build up of Japanese forces in Manchuria. The thinking was evolving to if Soviet forces wered decreased due to shift to the western front vs Germany, they very well may make to go. In the mid 1930s, the Japanese army had carried out training and testing of their weapons in the northern part of Manchuria, in the winter, at night, and developed a good understanding of the effects of -20, -30, and -40 C does to equipment. The oil embargo at the end of July changed everything. The what-if with this is so massive and yet entirely unexplored because of the narrative. By mid 1941, the war in China was more of a big occupation than on going major maneuving of divisions going on attacks since it was a standstill. The Wang regime was on its way of getting established. The sitauation with the Nationalist Chinese was far worse than Japan. That even by 1945 with a totally beaten Japanese forces, there was no major counter attack by Nationalists against the Japanese. Instead when the war ended, the Nationalists and CKS needed the Japanese to remain in their occupied areas until even 1946 in some parts to just wait for Nationslists forces to arrive to accept the surrender because they were in no shape to move in quickly and take control and thus feared that if the Japanese withdrawn from all of China soon after Japan's surrender, that the Chinese communists would fill in before they (the Nationalists) would be able to. 

Edited by JasonJ
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On 12/5/2020 at 2:38 AM, Rick said:

Dude was dumber than I thought.

The complete failure to understand the nature of the US (“nation of shopkeepers”) was just an amazing blind spot for both Germany and Japan. By 1941 we were a really large country with a big, technologically sophisticated population that had been engaging in and winning pretty significant wars (not to mention the Civil War) since 1776. Most of the criticism about our conduct in WW1 revolved around us being too willing to take casualties. Anybody with access to a 1939 encyclopedia could have figured that out. 
edit to add: the more I read about the decisions to go to war against the US, Japan had basically (wrongly) convinced itself that they were screwed anyway so may as well pull the trigger, but Germany was completely delusional. 

Edited by Brian Kennedy
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3 minutes ago, Brian Kennedy said:

The complete failure to understand the nature of the US (“nation of shopkeepers”) was just an amazing blind spot for both Germany and Japan. By 1941 we were a really large country with a big, technologically sophisticated population that had been engaging in and winning pretty significant wars (not to mention the Civil War) since 1776. Most of the criticism about our conduct in WW1 revolved around us being too willing to take casualties. Anybody with access to a 1939 encyclopedia could have figured that out. 

The Japanese side well understood US strength. In a world with powerful countries in what was generally an international order of anarchy, it's not hard to see any country use power leverage to assert greater world power. The US coming out in the end as the country to achieve global hegemony is not a bad result in the very long global history of human activity and of their nation-states. 

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7 hours ago, Brian Kennedy said:

The complete failure to understand the nature of the US (“nation of shopkeepers”) was just an amazing blind spot for both Germany and Japan. By 1941 we were a really large country with a big, technologically sophisticated population that had been engaging in and winning pretty significant wars (not to mention the Civil War) since 1776. Most of the criticism about our conduct in WW1 revolved around us being too willing to take casualties. Anybody with access to a 1939 encyclopedia could have figured that out. 
edit to add: the more I read about the decisions to go to war against the US, Japan had basically (wrongly) convinced itself that they were screwed anyway so may as well pull the trigger, but Germany was completely delusional. 

Race theory. How could a mongrel nation made up of Jews, Hispanics, Negro's and Chinamen prove more powerful than the glorious Aryan Volk!

And the answer is, Henry Ford. A little Ironically perhaps in view of his own views on race, but its true.

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7 hours ago, JasonJ said:

The Japanese side well understood US strength. In a world with powerful countries in what was generally an international order of anarchy, it's not hard to see any country use power leverage to assert greater world power. The US coming out in the end as the country to achieve global hegemony is not a bad result in the very long global history of human activity and of their nation-states. 

Some Japanese certainly did. I know Admiral Yamamoto who had traveled widely in the UK and the US know they didnt stand a cat in hells chance of pulling off what they intended. What was that he said, I expect to run wild for 2 years, but after that ive no hopes of success? But, as always is the case, the one's blessed with knowledge, are usually not the ones invited to make the important decisions.

I dont honestly think Japan would have done what it did if it didnt believe it could win. And if they believed they could win, clearly the senior leadership had no idea what it was facing. Which seems interestingly enough to be exactly the same problem Nazi Germany was having, for the same reasons.

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Yamamoto seems to have thought that Japan was capable of delivering a first round knock-out blow to the IUS. If that first round however wouldn't deliver the KO... And whether by luck or other reasons, the absence of carriers in Pearl Harbor turned out to be the gum under his shoe, giving the US confidence that with them, Radar, and being able to decipher the Japanese radio messages they might be able to turn this around after all (spoiler alert: Which they did).

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1 minute ago, Ssnake said:

Yamamoto seems to have thought that Japan was capable of delivering a first round knock-out blow to the IUS. If that first round however wouldn't deliver the KO... And whether by luck or other reasons, the absence of carriers in Pearl Harbor turned out to be the gum under his shoe, giving the US confidence that with them, Radar, and being able to decipher the Japanese radio messages they might be able to turn this around after all (spoiler alert: Which they did).

And failure to destroy US carriers in PH became bit of obsession for Yamamoto (plus added insult of Doolittle raid) and did lead directly to Midway.

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1 hour ago, Ssnake said:

Yamamoto seems to have thought that Japan was capable of delivering a first round knock-out blow to the IUS. If that first round however wouldn't deliver the KO... And whether by luck or other reasons, the absence of carriers in Pearl Harbor turned out to be the gum under his shoe, giving the US confidence that with them, Radar, and being able to decipher the Japanese radio messages they might be able to turn this around after all (spoiler alert: Which they did).

Im not so sure he believed in the knockout blow to that degree. Admittedly I dont know much about Japanese Naval strategy, and ive never read a biography of Yamamoto (if anyone has any recommendations on either, im all ears). However, there was a very good book I read some years ago on a now obscure British Journalist called Hector Bywater (Who interested was friends with a man called Frederick T Jane, the man who set up Janes publishing). He wrote a book called The Great Pacific war which envisaged a naval war with Japan in the 1930's. There was a lot wrong with it, he didnt appreciate the importance of the aircraft carrier, and the battleship remained preeminent. But what it did do was write down for the Japanese the possibility of Island outposts that would have to be taken before the Japanese mainland could be taken. And of course the possibility of basing bomber and spotter aircraft on those islands.  I still keep looking for a copy, but it changes hands for silly prices now apparently

The reason why I mention all this. Yamamoto read it, and he didnt just read it, he actually went to England to meet Bywater in person and run through his ideas. So it cant be said the British invented Imperial Japans imperial naval strategy, but it certainly did give it a few important nudges in the right direction. My impression is, the defensive Island strategy wasnt so much a backup plan, it was always a core effort. Particularly when you look how well those islands were latterly prepared for defensive, which must have began in some cases as soon as they put boots on them. 

Against that, the Japanese Navy clearly built warships to compliment a  grand naval battle strategy. They envisaged something epic like Tsushima or Trafalgar, where they could take on the enemy navy and win in one giant confrontation. Yamato and the airplane carrying submarines were part of that strategy. I dont know if that is a conflict there, or two complimentary strategies like you suggest, one for a big battle, the other a just in case it doesnt work. Or perhaps It may even be that it shows how little control senior admirals had over the navy that was being procured for them. 

What I find fascinating is that Yamamoto seemingly believed he could win for up to 2 years, and then start losing if they couldn't find a winning position to negotiate from. Ok, so his timing was out by over a year (lets be fair, he didnt envisage Midway), but it seems he understood that as far as fighting ship for ship, they couldn't win. If that was his reasoning, he wasnt far wrong. He saw American industrial capacity and knew they couldn't compete against it.

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1 hour ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

Im not so sure he believed in the knockout blow to that degree.

...

What I find fascinating is that Yamamoto seemingly believed he could win for up to 2 years, and then start losing if they couldn't find a winning position to negotiate from. Ok, so his timing was out by over a year (lets be fair, he didnt envisage Midway), but it seems he understood that as far as fighting ship for ship, they couldn't win. If that was his reasoning, he wasnt far wrong. He saw American industrial capacity and knew they couldn't compete against it.

I guess my limited command of the English language may make the use of the phrase "knock-out blow" contentious. It was used by me with the presumed Japanese intention to negotiate peace from a position of strength. For that the Pacific fleet had to be struck preemptively where all major battleships and carriers had to be damaged in such a way that reconstruction would take a long time and would leave the rest of the US fleet (cruisers, destroyers, submarines mostly) vulnerable to any task force that the IJN could assemble.

Both the USN and the IJN did not fully appreciate the impact of the aircraft carrier on naval strategy.

I'm not sure if the carriers were pulled out of Pearl Harbor before the attack because some genius thought he'd protect the most valuable asset, "just in case". I mean, "war was in the air". People knew it was coming. They didn't know when and where exactly. Those who pointed out how vulnerable Pearl Harbor was were largely overheard. The prediction of an attack on December 1st was highly accurate, if off by one week, and I don't think they vacated the base; just put everybody on alert (and then had the men stand down when nothing happened). To me that suggests that the carriers were spared was more of dumb luck than a 4D chess move. But the USN made the most of it, at least. That said, I see the Battle of Midway mostly as an exercise in throwing a lot of very brave air crews piecemeal into the maw of the IJN fleet until, eventually, they got lucky at last with the one tactic that actually worked (unlike the torpedos).

Midway was genius on the USN part as far as preparing the trap was concerned. The Japanese plan for the operation was highly vulnerable to prediction error. All that combined with another stroke of luck for the USN that the one Japanese spotter plane that could have revealed the presence of US Carriers in time to launch the full offensive against the US carriers didn't report in, and the first reports that did come in were inconclusive.

At the end of the day however, Midway hinged on the carriers, and the carriers were absent in Pear Harbor when Japan needed them there. Yamamoto and Japan bet the whole farm on the Pearl Harbor attack, and effectively lost the war right in the opening move because what they needed to find there they couldn't.

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19 minutes ago, Ssnake said:

I guess my limited command of the English language may make the use of the phrase "knock-out blow" contentious. It was used by me with the presumed Japanese intention to negotiate peace from a position of strength. For that the Pacific fleet had to be struck preemptively where all major battleships and carriers had to be damaged in such a way that reconstruction would take a long time and would leave the rest of the US fleet (cruisers, destroyers, submarines mostly) vulnerable to any task force that the IJN could assemble.

Both the USN and the IJN did not fully appreciate the impact of the aircraft carrier on naval strategy.

I'm not sure if the carriers were pulled out of Pearl Harbor before the attack because some genius thought he'd protect the most valuable asset, "just in case". I mean, "war was in the air". People knew it was coming. They didn't know when and where exactly. Those who pointed out how vulnerable Pearl Harbor was were largely overheard. The prediction of an attack on December 1st was highly accurate, if off by one week, and I don't think they vacated the base; just put everybody on alert (and then had the men stand down when nothing happened). To me that suggests that the carriers were spared was more of dumb luck than a 4D chess move. But the USN made the most of it, at least. That said, I see the Battle of Midway mostly as an exercise in throwing a lot of very brave air crews piecemeal into the maw of the IJN fleet until, eventually, they got lucky at last with the one tactic that actually worked (unlike the torpedos).

Midway was genius on the USN part as far as preparing the trap was concerned. The Japanese plan for the operation was highly vulnerable to prediction error. All that combined with another stroke of luck for the USN that the one Japanese spotter plane that could have revealed the presence of US Carriers in time to launch the full offensive against the US carriers didn't report in, and the first reports that did come in were inconclusive.

At the end of the day however, Midway hinged on the carriers, and the carriers were absent in Pear Harbor when Japan needed them there. Yamamoto and Japan bet the whole farm on the Pearl Harbor attack, and effectively lost the war right in the opening move because what they needed to find there they couldn't.

Forgive me Nils, im not suggesting it was contentious. Im suggesting that Yamamoto himself seems to have realized it was impossible to achieve, even if the rest of the Japanese General Staff did not. Hence the strange disparity between the desire for a massive naval victory, and the apparently more pedestrian effort of an island hopping campaign which they could then subsequently defend from.

Perhaps to an extent they are complimentary, you use the islands to soak up enemy reinforcements and ships and then you counterattack with surface ships and carriers. The Japanese did try that, it was the lack of any significant carrier forces that made it unachievable. Even if it worked, you are still left with the problem the Americans are going to have more ships and aircraft to throw at the problems than Japan. It cant do much other than postpone the inevitable.

As said, Id be interested to see what ken makes of it.

 

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6 hours ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

Some Japanese certainly did. I know Admiral Yamamoto who had traveled widely in the UK and the US know they didnt stand a cat in hells chance of pulling off what they intended. What was that he said, I expect to run wild for 2 years, but after that ive no hopes of success? But, as always is the case, the one's blessed with knowledge, are usually not the ones invited to make the important decisions.

I dont honestly think Japan would have done what it did if it didnt believe it could win. And if they believed they could win, clearly the senior leadership had no idea what it was facing. Which seems interestingly enough to be exactly the same problem Nazi Germany was having, for the same reasons.

 

These forums lack the quote and quote feature that the old forums had. That's not really a necessary feature and produced rather ridiculous long post because of the build up of nested quotes within quotes as exchanges go long.

 

But in this case, having the quote that your above quote is pretty important because the rest of your subsequent posts reflect the incomplete picture. So here it is again with what else should have been made bold if there was any interest to capture the full picture rather than just making it a capabilities comparison exchange that with the obvious disparity, uninformed readers would be conditioned to conclude for themselves that the Japanese in charge were blind from power reality and thus excessively foolish, which in turn reduces that credibility which in turns increases the credibility for the other side. The desired result, no?

The Japanese side well understood US strength. In a world with powerful countries in what was generally an international order of anarchy, it's not hard to see any country use power leverage to assert greater world power. The US coming out in the end as the country to achieve global hegemony is not a bad result in the very long global history of human activity and of their nation-states. 

There's a lot in that second bold part. The non-bold part serves that even though there is the bold, final conclusion is still just meh to the whole thing, life goes on. Life does go on right? Points that should be accepted are accepted right? so that life can go on right? Yeah, right..

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As the origin of this thread attests, it's not just "did the knowledge exist", it's also "who had/believed the knowledge."

I ran across something about when Honda decided to come to America in the 1950s; they sent a two or three man team over to travel the US to understand the motorcycle business.  The team came back with a lot of insights about selling motorcycles but also with the impression "We fought a war with these guys?  What the hell were we thinking?"

It's one thing to even intellectually know that the US is big and has a lot of capacity, but it's different to see it and feel it.

All nations make assumptions, frequently half assed, about potential opponents.  One difference is that when you're rich and powerful (like the US), you can get away with a lot of mistakes, but if you're small and strategically (if not tactically) weak, a mistake is a catastrophe.

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32 minutes ago, CaptLuke said:

As the origin of this thread attests, it's not just "did the knowledge exist", it's also "who had/believed the knowledge."

I ran across something about when Honda decided to come to America in the 1950s; they sent a two or three man team over to travel the US to understand the motorcycle business.  The team came back with a lot of insights about selling motorcycles but also with the impression "We fought a war with these guys?  What the hell were we thinking?"

It's one thing to even intellectually know that the US is big and has a lot of capacity, but it's different to see it and feel it.

All nations make assumptions, frequently half assed, about potential opponents.  One difference is that when you're rich and powerful (like the US), you can get away with a lot of mistakes, but if you're small and strategically (if not tactically) weak, a mistake is a catastrophe.

The US demand for Japan to leave all of China which would have included Manchuria since the US did not recognize that (but gave recognition to the SU as a response to Manchukuo being established) coupled with the oil embargo was to 1) get the US in a war that the FDR administration wanted to get the US into and 2) to satisfy the requests/demands from the Nationalists Chinese for lines of credit and to get in the fight vs Japan since the Nationalists Chinese were on their last legs after having been thrusted at Japan by the commies via the Xi'an incident all the while Japan had just established the Wang regime which seriously threatened to capture the greater portion of legitimacy over China.. If the US administration reflected the US population about isolation, then the US administration would not have tried making demands on Japan to get out of all of China. The Konoye administration tried to get a meeting with FDR soon after the oil embargo was put in place but unsurprisingly to Japanese hard liners like Tojo, the FDR side expressed no interest to set up a meeting. So in others words..."want us out of China, make us". So as expected, as the by far more powerful country, they US did it. And the commies got China as a result. But it put an end to Unit 731 at least. But Korea got cut in half and the north half is still worse off than when it was part of the Japanese empire. Taiwan got cursed with the China identity issue lasting decades. That's the other side of the "see it and feel it" coin that post-war GHQ and all the way down down to this year's Espers VJ Day speech attempt to erase.

Edited by JasonJ
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