a Quora - In WW2, could the British Royal Navy have defeated the Japanese Navy

[a425couple]

In WW2, could the British Royal Navy have defeated the Japanese Navy
single-handedly without the US Navy?

James Wackenhut, Masters of Arts Military History and Wars & Political
Science, Western Illinois University (2004)
Updated Feb 17
The Japanese did a real number on the pre-War US Fleet. It is easy to
look at Leyte Gulf or the Philippines Sea and see a totally overmatched
Japanese Navy. But this imbalance of power was the result of a major
building program by the United States and the damage inflicted on the
Japanese Navy as they were fought to a draw by the pre-war US fleet.

The Imperial Japanese Navy had a glass jaw and little recuperative
power. It was Ill-equipped to win a drawn out war against the United
States. But the IJN was capable of going to toe to toe or even besting
the US Navy and Royal Navy as they existed in 1941.

After Pearl Harbor, the US Navy and Imperial Japanese carriers famously
went clashes at Coral Sea and Midway. There were two additional 1942
carrier battles, the Eastern Solomons and the Santa Cruz Islands and a
number of major surface engagements. The most famous of these were Savo
Island, Cape Esperance, Tassafaronga and the two mid-November battles
off of Guadalcanal.


Both sides suffered tremendously, as the forces were evenly matched. The
Japanese showcased their superior night fighting and torpedo technology.
The air forces based at Henderson field allowed the US to claim a
damaged battleship, the Hiei, and continually factored into this war of
attrition.

There was rough technological parity between the two sides as the US had
not mastered radar detection or targeting techniques. The Washington’s
walloping of the Kirishima may have been in the darkness but it was also
a battle fought at near point blank range- less than 6,000 meters.

By the end of 1942, the rump of the prewar US Navy has been whittled
down considerably. The issue for the Japanese was that the US could
afford to replace these losses and essentially built an even more modern
fleet several times over.

It didn’t matter if the Japanese got the best of a given engagement
because they could not make good their losses.


Great Britain had a much larger economy than Japan, which was more akin
to Italy in economic power, but many European obligations. They could
not have defeated the IJN if still engaged with Germany.

The IJN carriers may have had glass jaws and Japan may have lacked the
economic wherewithal for a long war, but the Royal Navy could not have
bounced back from this level of attrition.

Even if it were just England versus Japan, it would have been very
difficult to make good the losses listed below.

Kido Butai

The primary instrument of the Japanese navy was their collection of 6
fleet carriers: Kaga, Akagi, Hiryu, Soryu, Shokaku and Zuikaku.


This incredible asset was sorely mismanaged. The Japanese has a huge
head start as far as concentrating and operating their carrier together.
The concept was born from a picture of US carriers parading in unison
but Great Britain and the US were not conducting concentrated carrier
operations. This was a huge edge.

During the Easter Sunday Raid in 1942, the Royal Navy heavy cruisers
Dorsetshire and Cornwall were sent for the bottom of the Indian Ocean.
Japanese divebombers hit these capable warships with 90 percent
accuracy. This is the skill level and killing power Kido Butai brought
to the table in 1941–42


But there were issues beneath the surface. Damage control, doctrinal
issues, and an ability to replace ships and airman would plague the
Japanese.

One huge issue was how they viewed the carrier air groups. At the Coral
Sea, the Shokaku got hammered and the Zuikakus airwing was decimated.
The simple expedient of patching together a scratch force of the
remaining aircraft and attaching them to the Zuikaku would have given
the Japanese an additional carrier at Midway.

This could have been the winning margin, as when you include the
reinforced air groups on Midway and the slightly larger complement of
aircraft on the US carriers. the actual air assets deployed were quite
evenly matched.


Poor high level strategy which led to the premature demise of the Kido
Butai.

They should have operated under the premise that a target worthy of Kido
Butai’s attention merited the use of all 6 carriers.

Instead, they were peeled away pairs of ships for secondary missions.

Royal Navy Aircraft

the Royal Navy was illequipped to deal with the Japanese carriers in 1941.


And in a scenario where they fight the Japanese alone, they would not
have access to the Wildcat (which was competitive with the Zero and
later world beating Hellcat and Corsair fighters). They also would not
have the redoubtable Dauntless SBD.

It was certainly within Great Britain’s power to produce a ton of high
quality carrier aircraft of a high quality. But they would be going in
with Swordfish Biplanes and Blackburn Skuas.

This line of discussion probably requires additional elaboration beyond
the scope of this answer. Suffice it say, the Royal Navy carriers were
fine. The planes left something to be desire for a Pacific conflict
against the Japanese Navy.


Destruction of Pre-War US Navy

At the end of the war, the US Navy still had naval assets remaining from
1941 but the losses listed below are testimony to how difficult it would
have been for England to defeat the Japanese in a one on one naval war.

The IJN was taking telling blows as well. There is a reason that the
Friday the 13th battle off of Guadalcanal wasn’t another carrier clash
and the Solomon campaign was heavy in surface engagements.

After the two major carrier clashes near Guadalcanal, the flattops
wouldn’t throw down again for almost 2 years. The US rebuilt their
battered fleet carrier strike forces but the Japanese never recovered.

These two overlooked Guadalcanal carrier battles are The Battle of the
Eastern Solomons (late August 1942) and the Santa Cruz Islands (late
October 1942).

The Japanese lost nearly 150 aircrew at Santa Cruz, including two dive
bomber leaders, a serious erosion in their talent pool from which they
never recovered. This is a testimony to how flawed their naval pilot
personnel and training programs were.

The Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands was a Pyrrhic victory for the
Japanese, leaving the US nearly denuded of Carriers (only the Enterprise
was left in South Pacific) and the Japanese were not in much better shape.

Much like the Yorktown’s amazing recovery in time for Midway, the
Enterprise took a tremendous beating At the Eastern Solomon’s- 3 direct
bomb hits and 4 near misses, yet was able to steam back to port under
her own power and repaired in less than a month.

The Enterprises amazing resilience notwithstanding, she was hit twice
more at The Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands. The stage was now set for
surface forces.

When the carriers met again in June 1944 near the Marianas Islands, the
outcome would be more clear cut.


Naval losses in Pacific 1941 to 1943

US losses in the Pacific through the end of 1943 are staggering,
although much of the damage was inflicted before the end of 1942 as both
the USN and IJN had to recuperate for the anticipated Mahanian showdown.

The Royal Navy lost a fair number of naval assets in the Pacific during
same this time frame. The Prince of Wales and Repulse being the two most
famous. They also lost at least 3 heavy cruisers and carrier Hermès. The
Dutch were battered about in early 1942 as well, fighting a heroic but
ultimately futile struggle to slow the Japanese advance.

List of ships sunk by the Imperial Japanese Navy - Wikipedia

Destruction of Prewar Fleet

As far as US losses, the Arizona and Oklahoma were sunk. The Nevada,
California and West Virginia were heavily damaged. That is 5
battleships. The North Carolina was torpedoed and damaged in September
1942. The South Dakota was damaged off of Guadalcanal.

Aircraft carriers did not emerge unscathed with the Lexington, Hornet,
Yorktown and Wasp all being sent to the bottom. The escort carrier
Linscombe Bay was sunk in late 1943.

Heavy Cruiser losses were brutal as well. The Houston got knocked out in
first months. The Astoria, Vincennes and Quincy went down in a single
evening

The Chicago, New Orleans and North Hampton were also sunk before 1944.

The light cruiser Juneau famously sank with the Sullivans on board in
1942. The Atlanta was scuttled after the same battle off of Guadalcanal
and the Helena was sunk a year later.

I am not positive how many destroyers were lost between 1941 and the end
of 1943 in Pacific but the number is close to 30.

Recap
The British would have to be geared towards a total naval war if they
hoped to defeat the Japanese. Even without the advantage of a sneak
attack, the IJN sank a modern and well protected battleship and an agile
battlecruiser.

The total butchers bill for the US Navy during the first half of the war was
2 BB (5 others damaged and out of commission at various points)
4 CV (fleet carrier)
1 CVE (Escort carrier)
4 CA (Heavy Cruiser)
3 CL (Light Cruiser)
28(est) DD (Destroyers)

The Royal Navy
1 BB
1 BC (Battlecruiser)
3 CA
6 DD

And these staggering losses are not even the total picture. The Dutch
lost a significant surface fleet as well.
2 CL
4 DD

Could the Royal Navy have made good this level attrition and defeated
the Japanese on their own? I tend to think it would have been such a
difficult lengthy campaign that it is unlikely.

It certainly would have taken much longer than the 3 long years it took
for the US to finally finish off the Japanese Navy, which occurred at
Leyte Gulf in the fall of 1944.
15.3k viewsView UpvotersView Sharers
12 comments from Reno Hyde, Matt Gaspar, Chris Crawley and more

[Peter Skelton]

It depends almost completely on what else Britain is up to. The RN is inferior by day but has overwhelming superiority by night or in bad visibility. In 1941, their first team leadership (Ramsay, Tovey, Cunningham et al) were first rate. If they're available with the first team ships, and the RAF comes to the party with its first team the British might put on a decent show.

Japan had surprising weaknesses. Three examples: They had a cavity magnetron around '37, couldn't use it because they couldn't produce tuning circuits in volume. Only their flight leaders had radio in their aircraft, in case you wondered why their defensive fighters showed so horribly at Midway. Their merchant marine was insufficient for their peacetime needs,

[Scott Kozel]

On Thursday, March 5, 2020 at 4:34:02 PM UTC-5, a425couple wrote:
>
> Kido Butai
>
> The primary instrument of the Japanese navy was their collection of 6
> fleet carriers: Kaga, Akagi, Hiryu, Soryu, Shokaku and Zuikaku.
>
> This incredible asset was sorely mismanaged. The Japanese has a huge
> head start as far as concentrating and operating their carrier together.
> The concept was born from a picture of US carriers parading in unison
> but Great Britain and the US were not conducting concentrated carrier
> operations. This was a huge edge.

Interestingly, in all the books and articles about Midway, I have seen very few
that underscore the fact that for all the experience the IJN had in carrier
operations compared to the USN in early 1942, actually their carriers at Midway
had -less- in carrier-to-carrier battles, actually -none-. At Pearl Harbor the
USN ships were at anchor. In the Indian Ocean the IJN did not battle RN
carriers. None of the Midway IJN carriers were at Coral Sea. Yorktown was at
Coral Sea, most of its commanders were onboard at Midway.

Finding enemy carriers at sea, successfully attacking them, and successfully
defending from attacks from that enemy, are very different from raids on land
targets and harbor targets.
. . . . . .

From Roundtable Forum, June 2017, comment by editor --
In fact the only carrier group that found the Japanese carriers relatively easy
was Yorktown's group. For the most part you can forgive how the US operated in
the battle. None of the carrier squadrons, except VS5 (which was really VB5 but
renamed for the battle) had any experience in carrier battles. After all there
was only one carrier that had been in a carrier battle, and that was Yorktown.
Even the 4 Japanese carriers had never been in a carrier battle before and as it
turns out it showed. Compare Japanese performance between Midway to the Battle
of Santa Cruz. Big difference.
http://www.midway42.org/Backissues/2017/20170601.aspx

[Dean Markley]

On Thursday, March 5, 2020 at 4:34:02 PM UTC-5, a425couple wrote:

There are two items I think you've overlooked. 1. The Royal Navy had no Pacific bases after the initial Japanese onslaught. They would have had to operate out of India or perhaps Australia. 2. You've overlooked submarines. I suspect the RN subs could have been devastating to the Japanese navy assuming they could operate in theater.

[Keith Willshaw]

>
> There are two items I think you've overlooked. 1. The Royal Navy had no Pacific bases after the initial Japanese onslaught. They would have had to operate out of India or perhaps Australia. 2. You've overlooked submarines. I suspect the RN subs could have been devastating to the Japanese navy assuming they could operate in theater.
>

The RN had no real Pacific bases before the Japanese attack. The nearest
was Singapore which was important because it controlled the Malacca
Straits. None of the small pacific colonies was suitable for use as a
naval base. After Singapore was lost the nearest bases were Port
Moresby, Australia, New Zealand and Ceylon but anything other than
replenishment at sea meant a long voyage to Australia and it was 1945
before the RN had enough vessels to support a fleet train or frankly had
sufficiently developed the techniques. The British Pacific Fleet used
Ulithi Atoll as its forward base when it showed up for the Okinawa campaign.

The RN submarine force was tied up for most of the war in the Med and
North Sea and Kattegat stalking Italian and German shipping. Most of the
boats didnt really have the range to undertake long pacific patrols anyway.

The O, P and R classes were built as long range patrol submarines but
most of them were lost in the Mediterranean as they were very large and
easily spotted from the air. Of the 15 built 11 had been lost by the
start of the Pacific war.

The T Class was the mainstay in the European theatre but while it was
very heavily armed with 10 21" torpedo tubes it carried few reloads and
had a patrol range of only 5000 nautical miles which was not really
enough until the USA had established forward pacific bases, they also
had limited diving depth. The original design had been better suited to
long range patrols but the displacement was limited to comply with naval
treaties.

The A Class was to have been the answer but simply arrived too late,
only 2 had been completed by the end of the war, As far as I recall the
only RN boats to operate in the PTO were 2 of the Grampus class
submarine minelayers HMS Rorqual and HMS Porpoise. There main role was
laying mines in sea lanes used by Japanese shipping, especially the
tankers carrying oil from the Dutch East Indies and they aslo laid mines
in the waters around Singapore.

What naval force was available was before 1945 mainly used to support
the operations in the Arrakan by 14th Army mainly in the form of
minesweepers and small coastal craft and landing craft supplemented from
1944 onwards by Carriers based in Ceylon.

[a425couple]

On 3/5/2020 4:50 PM, Peter Skelton wrote:
> On Thursday, 5 March 2020 16:34:02 UTC-5, a425couple wrote:
>> In WW2, could the British Royal Navy have defeated the Japanese Navy
>> single-handedly without the US Navy?
>>
>> James Wackenhut, Masters of Arts Military History and Wars & Political
>> Science, Western Illinois University (2004)
>> Updated Feb 17
>> The Japanese did a real number on the pre-War US Fleet. It is easy to
>> look at Leyte Gulf or the Philippines Sea and see a totally overmatched
>> Japanese Navy. But this imbalance of power was the result of a major
>> building program by the United States and the damage inflicted on the
>> Japanese Navy as they were fought to a draw by the pre-war US fleet.
>

> It depends almost completely on what else Britain is up to.

Yes.

One thing I think is very important and was not very well addressed
is the building capacity of UK and Japan.

Try going to Google, books,
Try plonking in
https://books.google.com/books?id=2nN-AwAAQBAJ&pg=PT49&dq=%22The+major+Fleets+were+not+destined+to+remain+so+small+for+very+long.%22&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjzqdetjJHoAhUEqp4KHY15D3kQ6AEwAHoECAEQAg#v=onepage&q=%22The%20major%20Fleets%20were%20not%20destined%20to%20remain%20so%20small%20for%20very%20long.%22&f=false

or, if that does not work, try Google, books, and enter
"The major Fleets were not destined to remain so small for very long."

But still, how to count all the production of USA in
the consideration of this question.
Recalling the 43 escort carriers for the UK.