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US Naval (ground) Division

Discussion in 'War in the Pacific' started by A-58, Apr 30, 2020.

  1. A-58

    A-58 Cool Dude

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    Dudes, or Rogues if you will....

    I've been wondering for some time now about the aborted Operation Olympic, and the following campaign if it would've continued deep into 1947 or so if not for the introduction of the A-Bombs. Yes, this is a "what if" scenario, but not a real off of center one as far as I've encountered before.

    Here's the scenario;

    Ground combat in Honshu ground on and no end was in sight. Conventional combat continues and behind the lines partisan activity is next to never ending. The Emperor must be defended. Imagine Okinawa at a much huger scale in size and barbarity. After some time, transferring of complete units and individuals from Europe as combat replacements would stretch manpower needs considerably. Another source of fighting men would be the Bluejackets of the USN. It's been done before, the Brits formed a Naval Division in WW1 and put them in the trenches. The USN formed a "Naval Battalion" on Bataan in 1942. I'm sure other examples are out there, but that's all that I can think of right off the top of my head right now. The USN discontinued programs such as the Montana Battleship class later in the war as they were not needed as much as the Essex and subsequent classes of carriers were. Once the Japanese home islands were contained, there were lots of naval units available for whatever needs arose. So, back home in the US, manpower needs had to shift. Ground units needs replacements for combat losses. If the war continued into 1946 or beyond, many replacements would be needed. Manpower could have been drawn from the USN or the USAAF for all that matters since their reduced role (not many IJN units were left late in the war or targets to bomb) would waste much needed manpower.

    I'm not saying that units should be formed as the Luftwaffe Field Divisions were and thrown to the wolves, but possible they could've been formed and employed with USMC units. Excess USAAF personnel would belong the the Army.

    So, what say y'all?
     
  2. R Leonard

    R Leonard Member

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    Probably easier to snatch young cannon fodder, err, umm, draftees, yeah, draftees, directly from their draft boards before ever having the chance of donning bell bottoms and dragoon them straight into the army. That way there's no un-teaching of potentially bad habits.
     
  3. belasar

    belasar Court Jester

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    I could see them taking over non-combat roles (supply, medical, MP, engineer) freeing up army/marine support units to be converted into replacements.
     
  4. A-58

    A-58 Cool Dude

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    Wasn't much of the available manpower pools at home taxed heavily by late 1945? Sure there were the 18 year olds coming of age and were available but a very large amount of trained manpower was already available in the USN and USAAF. Infantry training would be an additional 6-8 weeks at most for these men, same as for the US Army at the time. I never said that they should be turned over to the Army as the LWFD were in the Wehrmacht.
     
  5. firstf1abn

    firstf1abn Member

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    Why not read Giangreco's Hell to Pay? Excellent details on the manpower question. Prob set you back $8-10 or so used. Then you could build all the scenarios you wanted - but from a factual basis.

    IIRC, the USN badly wanted to blockade Japan instead of merely supporting an invasion - even going to the extent of leaking casualty estimates to sour the public on an invasion. A blockade would put the navy in charge (which is what it really wanted).

    So, your heavy losses on the ground scenario might very well have resulted in scrubbing the Honshu prong, backing off on Kyushu and letting the navy starve out the enemy.

    (Normally I reserve my idle speculating for an alternate outcome for the '69 Florida-Georgia game - eliminating a bad snap on a chipshot field goal mid-4Q, but this book deserves a plug)
     
    A-58 and LRusso216 like this.
  6. OpanaPointer

    OpanaPointer I Point at Opana Staff Member WW2|ORG Editor

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    Concur with firstf1abn on the Giangreco book.
     
  7. bronk7

    bronk7 Well-Known Member

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    Okinawa ended....we won that battle....Iwo also...tough, but won .......no end in sight? how long did it take the Russians to go from the border to Berlin?
    ..so we make no advancement in ground combat? this seems unrealistic
     
  8. Class of '42

    Class of '42 Active Member

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    Without Marines to lead them..the Navy guys would get lost.
     
  9. LRusso216

    LRusso216 Graybeard Staff Member

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    I also read the Giangreco book. An excellent anslysis of the situation, with plenty of backup in the Appendices. He covers a load of scenarios with lots of supporting material. Look it over to see whether your premise holds water.
     
  10. A-58

    A-58 Cool Dude

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    Sounds like a good read. I’ll Amazon it. Thanks for all the input guys.
     

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