What If Australia and New Zealand had been lost?

Ok lads, cut the sheep jokes...

Carl, didn't you read the contract for me joining

 

BBBbbbbaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!

 

Ok Kiwi, when are you coming to Texas? I'll take you to the Texas Roadhouse for THE BIGGEST steak you will ever eat.

 

Carl, why don't you just come down here, see our 45 million sheep (Or how ever many there are)

We do have steak here too ya know

 

I guess I could eat some veal parmesian (Sp?)or veal cutlet--I havent had either in years.

 

MMMmmmmmmmmmmm.......sheep steak. Yum.

 

Now, you have made me hungry!!!

 

well to my knoledge the Japanese forces had done there reasearch and had no intention in invading the countries of Australia and New Zeland due to their expanding supply lines. Their intention was to continue with their naval assult of port moresby and "hopefully" have their navy still intack. but as we know they were beaten in the battle of the Coral Sea. Thus stopping this alternative. but anyway............then applying pressure to the two countries and forcing them to discontinue there efforts seeing though there supplies from the us were not continuing to come from the US. But the hard attitude of the ANZAC countries would have held strong and they would have had no alternative but to invade us which would have had extremely similiar succes to that of operation barborassa. they would have had quick and large amounts of success, due to the Brisbane line which was drawn across the whole of Asutralia stating where the Australian Forces would b able to defend from with their Headquarters situated in Gowan Brae, now part of Kings.

i have no idea what the New Zealanders had in mind for their defence but it would be as feirce and as patriotic as Asutralia. Because we are both bloody good countries. Land down under

Sorry if i have just wasted a bit of your time with my crap

 

you cant forget that the Pacific theatre of the war was only a side show to that of the "main" threat of germany in europe. in other words the Australian and New Zeland forces would have been up against the Japanese with only a few pome's and some yanks.

As much as i agree that the Australians are very good fighters the japanese wernt exactly the worst fighters. But it would be just like the invasion of america as Yammamato stated "there would be a rifle behind every blade of grass" and i feel that this would also mean very patriotic men holding those guns aswell, in both countries.

 

I agree with most that Australia and NZ would be a tough nut to crack, especially as extended as the Japanese were.

But I tend to think the Pacific war would have been over sooner if Japan had tried, it would have seen a large occupation force to keep those ANZAC partisans from having their way, and they would have most likely whithered away while the Americans marched through the Pacific. Or consider this, a large all or nothing mobile battle over Australia, that I think the American with Australia/commonwealth help would easily win, instead of the long island hopping campaign. Japan's Stalingrad if I may.

 

As Otto has stated there was to be a line drawn from Sydney to Adelaide and the majority of the population was to fall back behind this line.As some one else said us aussie's were good at jungle fighting on the kakoda track out numbered we beat em back.
Also bombing darwin is alot diffrent to invading Sydney is some 2000km away though.

i nice link one of the only surving fully australian built tank (no much match for a panther) though i doubt a panther downunder
http://www.armytankmuseum.com.au/sentinel.htm

 

So hypothetically, if an invasion plan had been created, how would the invasion of Australia taken place, given what resources were in the area. What do you think the plan would have been?

 

This is interesting because British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill and American President Franklyn D Roosevelt did discuss this i think at the Yatla Conferrence. And they made the decision that Australia and New Zealand were expendable, this was the consequences of the "Germany First" policy.

The plan was to evacuate all US forces out of the South Pacific (Excluding Hawaii) and divert all of the American millitary to Europe and once Germany was defeated then concentrate in recapturing the Pacific.

But the one fly in the ointment was General Douglas MacArthur, he use his considerable political and military influence, to overturn this, Australia cold not be allowed to fall into Japanese hands, because once established Australia and New Zealand would remain Japanese territories.

Plus it worked out that without Australia and New Zealand the historical island hopping campaigns would and could not have begun.

 

Most of those were drawn up from men & materials taken from the US West Coast ports and channeled through Oahu. The USN plans prewar or during had little use for Australia or New Zeland. The line of attack Adm King proposed, pushed for, and executed ran from Oahu through the Central Pacific and thence to Japan. Island groups like the Carolines, Marshalls, or Ryukus (Okinawa) we the key land masses in the operations Adm King authorized.

MacAurther was obssesd with retaking the Phillpines. He used the forces sent to defend Australian & the South Pacifc region as a basis for his own offensive strategy. Then he used his prestige to gain additional forces for a continued attack towards Manila. This offensive from the South Pacific/Australian region was very nearly a seperate war from that based in Oahu. While ships, air units, and ground forces were switched back and forth between the two areas the Central Pacific offensive was in no way dependant on Australia/New Zealand as a base for operations. Two different theatres, commanders, supply lines.

For a good analysis of the Pacific war I'd recomend the closing chapters of Ellis's 'Brute Force'. (Tho I disagree with his conclusion on strategy). A broader and more detailed analysis of the Pacific war would be John Costellos 'The Great Pacific War of 1939-1945. Both make it clear the difference between the two theatres of operations in the Pacific.

 

Ok, fair enough assesment of what actually happened, and the strategy that took place historically, but if you were the person in charge of the Imperial Japanese Forces, and "IF" you attacked Australia, based on historical ideology, and changeable historical fact, aka the battle of the coral sea never took place or the third wave of aircraft was launched at pearl harbour destroying everything completely, or Hitler didn't declare war on America (how far back do you want to go?)...what chain of events could you have forseen that resulted in the Japanese sphere of Co-prosperity being extended to Australia. Obviously resources available and advantage gained from invasion would have to be taken into account, but what plausible plan could have taken place if all factors went the way of the Japanese hypothetically?

I'll try to come up with one myself, but not having access to many historical resources, the one I come up with could be pure fantasy, will post soon however. Cheers guys, as an Aussie I'm very curious about all this

 

I was wrong on the Yatla Conference thingy but i was correct on the agreement by Messers Churchill and Roosevelt that they considered Australia and New Zealand expendable. Churchill had a profound hatered of Australia and Australians he considered us convict sleaze.

I can say that if Japan had taken Australia and New Zealand then there is no way America even with her industrial resources could launch an offensive to retake the South-East Asian and South Pacific Theatres, Japan would become to powerful. Japan would have all the oil, rubber, iron ore, agriculture to feed her growing empire. And to finish off 8 miilion extra slaves to do her dirty work.

 

What exactly would the Japanese plan and TO&E be for such an operation? If we are going to discuss this at least provide some reasonable means for the Japanese to carry this out