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Post by joeconnor53 on Aug 13, 2016 8:47:53 GMT 8
I'm confused.
Is the theory being discussed that there was a wink-and-nod understanding that Wainwright's troops would put up token resistance (enough to preserve American honor) and then surrender? If so, who were the parties to that understanding?
I'm not sure I understand what is being argued.
No, I am not suggesting any "wink and a nod" agreement between any parties, for they are all honorable men. I am pursuing an appreciation of what an impossible situation Wainwright knew he had been placed in. He was very much on his own. It is towards a better analysis of the vast weight of responsibility of high command, where national, military, political and humanitarian factors all intersect. - EXO
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Post by batteryboy on Aug 13, 2016 17:45:33 GMT 8
With regards to Manila Bay, all the conquerors of the Philippines (Spaniards, British, US and the Japanese) need to secure this bay area. Why? Its not because of Manila the capital per se, but Manila Bay is the ideal port that can handle both commercial and naval shipping and logistically it was easy to bring in materiel and you can practically supply most of Luzon with Manila Bay as your main embarkation and debarkation area.
Conrad's comment if the defenders had an inkling of how the Japanese would treat their captors is a good one.
more later...
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Post by joeconnor53 on Aug 13, 2016 20:30:41 GMT 8
Now I understand you point, EXO, and it is a good one. Yes, Wainwright was in an impossible position. However, Ned King was in an even worse position. At least Wainwright had been given a completely free hand with respect to surrender. King, on the other hand, was under impossible orders from MacArthur that he was not to surrender under any circumstances.
The intersection of factors is fascinating. Let's look at the different interests:
1. The U.S. government wanted a defense as spirited as possible to delay the Japanese, to tie up Japanese troops that might be used elsewhere and to protect American honor.
2. The Philippine government had an interest in not seeing its country and its Army destroyed by the war. It also had an interest in not seeing its country placed under harsh occupation by the Japanese.
3. The U.S. commanders had a duty to serve their national interests but also had a duty (moral or otherwise) to protect their troops from needless slaughter that would not accomplish any military goal.
In the end, these varying interests were irreconcilable. Curiously, when Quezon floated his neutralization proposal in 2/42, MacArthur radioed the War Dept. that, in his opinion, withdrawal of American and Japanese troops from a neutral Philippines would not damage America's war effort.
As to batteryboy's comments, of course Manila Bay was a valuable asset. My point was only that even without a direct attack on Corregidor, Corregidor would not have been able to hold out long once Bataan fell. The Japanese would have gotten Manila Bay, although a few months later than it did. The most immediate threat that the Philippines posed to the Japanese southward advance was the planes and ships that threatened Japan's lines of communication, and those threats were eliminated in the first week of the war.
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Post by batteryboy on Aug 13, 2016 21:13:26 GMT 8
Another factor to consider was that Homma was also under pressure from his own superiors. He was given 60 days to conquer the Philippines which did not happen. Now they really wanted to secure Manila Bay because it was also vital to their operations to the southern Philippines as it was hard to support the southern front if your supply train would come all the way from Lingayen. The Japanese had luck on their side as when Wainwright surrendered he did not only surrender the fortified island but also the entire Philippines as well. That saved the Japanese from launching major offensives in the southern parts and shortened their time period. Homma could not afford any delays so Manila Bay had to be taken at the soonest.
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Post by joeconnor53 on Aug 13, 2016 21:22:24 GMT 8
Batteryboy, how much of the pressure on Homma was based on military necessity and how much was based on saving face/national honor? Everywhere else, the Japanese had rolled over the Americans, British and Dutch on schedule or even ahead of schedule. In the Philippines, that didn't happen. It was the one place where the Japanese had been stopped in their tracks, and American propaganda made the most of it.
There is a fascinating radiogram from Wainwright to the War Dept. in early April where Wainwright asked the War Dept. to tell the media to stop all the publicity taunting the Japanese for their failure to take Bataan and Corregidor:
(R)equest that radio broadcasting stations and the press in the United States be urged unobtrusively to avoid inviting further Japanese action against the Philippines by inflammatory remarks directed against failure of Japanese leaders to take the Islands. We are doing our utmost to hold our own and we feel we are not in a position to urge the enemy to put more power against us by such misdirected publicity.
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Post by okla on Aug 14, 2016 2:09:39 GMT 8
Hey All....Further complicating matters, in my humble, was the fact that the powers that be, back in D.C., had announced to the world that Skinny Wainwright, upon being named Commander, was Supreme Commander of all the Amer/Fil forces in the PI, down to the lowest ranking Private, pulling KP down on Mindanao. With this knowledge in mind the Japanese were, in effect, able to hold the Corregidor defenders hostage, while demanding the giving up of the whole Archipelago. Had he been named Commander of the Rock, only, he could have, truthfully, told Genl Houma that he had authority to surrender Corregidor ONLY. Of course, Houma could have had him shot on the spot, but I doubt that would have happened. The Japanese General could still have insisted that our guy run up the white flag for the whole PI Department. Who really knows??? Still, the decision of Washington to name Genl Wainright CO of the whole sheebang, certainly, was to the invaders' advantage.
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Post by wwalker on Aug 14, 2016 6:06:18 GMT 8
I'm enjoying the posts being made in this thread. I think that everyone makes some nice points and raises interesting questions. I've always thought more could have been done to defend Corregidor, and heaven knows, much more could have been done, but I think that the decisive blunders were made prior to the Japanese landings. I'll also readily admit that I'm no military tactician, just an interested history student. These are some of the decisive events: 1) The ratification of the Five-Power Treaty in Washington in 1923. After this treaty was signed with Japan, the United States halted its efforts of fortifying the islands of Manila and Subic Bay. Up to that point, millions of dollars were being spent to give the islands state-of-the-art (at the time) military capabilities. It wasn't until 1941 that the United States started trying to remedy the antiquated forts. As we all know, it was too late. Of course, Malinta Tunnel was built in the 1930s, which no doubt saved countless lives, but it wasn't enough. 2) The Ternate area was left undefended. Once Bataan fell, the Manila Bay forts were almost completely surrounded with artillery. The mistakes that took place at Bataan greatly hindered Corregidor and provided the Japanese a place from which to launch a landing force. 3) Japanese spying. I know this is a controversial topic, but the more first-hand accounts that I read the more I believe that Japanese spies, who'd been operating in the Philippines as early as 1913, knew all of the latest military developments in the islands. I don't think it was by any coincidence that the Japanese knew precisely where to bomb first i.e. Iba Airfield, Clark AF, Cavite, Nichols AF, etc. It took them less than a month to knock these sites out. However, as we all know, the Japanese did not know the Fil-American forces would retreat into Bataan. They didn't have any decent maps of the peninsula, as was witnessed with their failed attempts to land upon the west coast. Thus it was Bataan that upset their 50 day timetable. Furthermore, I believe that the Japanese had a decent idea of what kind of armament Corregidor had (in terms of artillery). Decades before World War II, they were trying to bribe US soldiers with vast sums of money to hand over blueprints and photographs of the fortified islands. 4) After having planned and orchestrated the beach defenses of Corregidor, there were no backup plans for if the landings were concentrated in one spot, which they were. Therefore when the time came, they had marines scattered in groups all over the island, most of whom were not at the tail. The fighting on the tail was more like a brawl than an organized defense. It is my understanding that one of the purposes for building the Malinta Tunnel was to give better access to the tail. Malinta Hill was a natural barrier that a tunnel could not fully remedy. That's my two cents for the afternoon.
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Post by batteryboy on Aug 14, 2016 7:43:28 GMT 8
The Japanese needed to secure the Philippines as it was vital to their operations to the other fronts. So if Homma could not do the job, he could be replaced by another commander in case he still failed.
As an additional trivia: the Japanese Army Air Force Heavy bomber, the Mitsubishi Ki-20, an adaptation Junkers G. 38 civilian transport (K.51 military version) was intended to be used by Japanese to bomb the Harbor Defenses of Manila Bay and for deep penetration flights to Siberia. This right after 1936, a few years even before the outbreak of war.
I will not dwell much on the Japanese spy efforts before but will share to this group of Japanese recon flights over the Philippines. Not much has been written about it but the Japanese made intensive recce flights over military and "special" targets over the Philippines. Now I wonder why the US Army Air Force (USAAC prior to renaming) where not able to detect these intrusion flights but this is the reason why the Japanese knew what to hit. Even when the air force in the P.I. was reinforced, the Japanese Army and Navy air forcer recce units continued to hold observation flights even up to the day before the attacks on Clark and Iba. One flight consisted of an unmarked Mitsubishi IJN C5M (Ki-15 "Babs" equivalent to the IJA) with the crews carrying cyanide pills or capsules with the intention to take their lives in case they would be intercepted and crash in Philippine soil.
In the book December 8, MacArthur's Pearl Harbor, Mac mentions that the location and distance of the Philippines is one of its "best defense". He was proven wrong on that day. You can sum it up that he (and his command staff) underestimated the Japanese to launch a capable offensive in both air and ground.
As for Malinta tunnel, it was constructed under the "DISGUISE" of a road work project to connect the tail of the island. Why?, because any military build-up or additional fortification was prohibited by the Washington Treaty of 1922. That was how to circumnavigate the treaty but the real purpose was military in nature and they built the laterals to house a command center, medical facilities and storage for materiel.
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Post by cbuehler on Aug 14, 2016 9:03:19 GMT 8
Batteryboy, how much of the pressure on Homma was based on military necessity and how much was based on saving face/national honor? Everywhere else, the Japanese had rolled over the Americans, British and Dutch on schedule or even ahead of schedule. In the Philippines, that didn't happen. It was the one place where the Japanese had been stopped in their tracks, and American propaganda made the most of it. There is a fascinating radiogram from Wainwright to the War Dept. in early April where Wainwright asked the War Dept. to tell the media to stop all the publicity taunting the Japanese for their failure to take Bataan and Corregidor: (R)equest that radio broadcasting stations and the press in the United States be urged unobtrusively to avoid inviting further Japanese action against the Philippines by inflammatory remarks directed against failure of Japanese leaders to take the Islands. We are doing our utmost to hold our own and we feel we are not in a position to urge the enemy to put more power against us by such misdirected publicity.Actually the Japanese did rather roll over the USAAFE forces in the beginning. Most of their primary combat units were transferred once the the Bataan peninsula was occupied by the defenders. Was this a political or military decision, I dont know. Gen. Homma was left with a force that could at best hold the situation only, and was even potentially open to defeat. Perhaps Gen. Homma himself was left with a hopeless situation by the higher ups much like Wainwright, however, he was eventually reinforced with enough to accomplish the job, unlike Wainwright. As Tony mentioned, Homma was tasked with a decisive defeat and nothing less, as MacArthur was in Manila in 1945. No army or nation tends to let the enemy rot at their place, which could have been done on Tarawa and other islands and possibly even Manila itself. CB PS, this discussion is a particularly good and hot one and I thank all for their contributions!
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Post by joeconnor53 on Aug 14, 2016 11:11:46 GMT 8
Cbuehler, I like your comparison of Wainwright and Homma. I had never thought of that, but it makes a lot of sense.
I do think Wainwright was a more competent soldier than Homma. Homma completely misread the withdrawal into Bataan. If he had figured it out, a couple of timely bombs on the Calumpit bridge might have ended the Bataan campaign before it even began.
No army or nation tends to let the enemy rot at their place.
I have to disagree on that one. Isn't that what the U.S. did with Truk and Rabaul? The cost of taking those two bases was not considered worth the cost, so they were bypassed and left to rot on the vine.
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