Subject: WWII-L Digest - 18 Mar 1994 to 19 Mar 1994

From: Automatic digest processor <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 20 Mar 1994 00:00:42 -0500

There are 21 messages totalling 550 lines in this issue.

Topics of the day:

  1. Wehrmacht troops killing Waffen-SS troops? (3)
  2. When was WWII?
  3. Ultra in the Pacific (fwd) (2)
  4. TAC: IJN vs Army (WAS: Wehrmact v. Waffen-SS) (2)
  5. INF: Never trust technology! (2)
  6. INF: accessing historical archives
  7. German Nightfighters using AT cannons?
  8. Ultra in the Pacific
  9. Swapping American & Japanese civilians
 10. QUEST: FDR/Advance Knowledge of PH
 11. TAC: Cooperation of forces. (3)
 12. Japanese Army vs. Navy:  A self-destructive junta
 13. GEN: MODEL DECALS (2)

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Date:    Fri, 18 Mar 1994 23:58:28 PST
From:    Sidney Allinson <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Wehrmacht troops killing Waffen-SS troops?

Sorry to disillusion you, but the author "Sven Hassel", is in reality
the British writer, Charles Whiting.  Whiting writes a lot of fact
military history under his own name, is married to a German woman,
and lives in Germany
Whiting is very well informed about Nazi formations, and uses this
as background when writing his bang-bang war fiction under the
Sven Hassel name.

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 00:07:01 PST
From:    Sidney Allinson <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: When was WWII?

'Sorry to see you decided to quit the WW2 list.
We could have had some fun while you educated people about the valiant
combat record of South African forces in two world wars.
As you'll have gathered, there is -- shall we say -- a certain tunnel
vision around here.  :-)
Sarie Marais!
Best Regards from Victoria, British Columbia, on Canada's far
Pacific shore.

------------------------------

Date:    Fri, 18 Mar 1994 17:58:28 -0500
From:    Daniel Ford <[email-masked]>
Subject: Ultra in the Pacific (fwd)

The local machine has been bust all day, so I don't know if this went
out; if so, please excuse the re-posting --df

For those interested in Enigma, note the following new book from the
Naval Institute Press:

John Winton: ULTRA IN THE PACIFIC: HOW BREAKING JAPANESE CODES & CIPHERS
AFFECTED NAVAL OPERATIONS AGAINST JAPAN, 1941-1945.

Pub date 15 March. $22.95. ISBN 1-55750-856-9.

Toll-free ordering: 800=233-8764

Dan Ford      <e-mail: [email-masked]>

              <postal: 433 Bay Road, Durham NH 03824 USA>
              <voice or fax: +1-603-868-5850>

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 00:25:22 PST
From:    Sidney Allinson <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Ultra in the Pacific (fwd)

Thanks for the new Ultra book title.
Have you seen this one, also out recntly.....
        CODEBREAKERS: The Inside Story of Bletchley Park,
        edited by F.H. Hinsley and Alan Stripp,
        Oxford University Press

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 01:18:31 -0500
From:    Christopher Morton <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Wehrmacht troops killing Waffen-SS troops?

>         So. I ask this: Did some Heer troops ever kill Waffen-SS troops
> and if so where and when? Did the Waffen-SS "look down" on the Heer?

In a similar vein, I was told in college by a professor, that Japanese
Army and Navy intelligence operatives sometimes killed each other in
"turf" battles in China.

Given that they were involved in the drug trade (among other things), this
isn't that hard to believe.

Anyone heard anything similar?

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 09:16:47 EST
From:    Larry & Kim Jewell <[email-masked]>
Subject: TAC: IJN vs Army (WAS: Wehrmact v. Waffen-SS)

>
> >         So. I ask this: Did some Heer troops ever kill Waffen-SS troops
> > and if so where and when? Did the Waffen-SS "look down" on the Heer?
>
> In a similar vein, I was told in college by a professor, that Japanese
> Army and Navy intelligence operatives sometimes killed each other in
> "turf" battles in China.
>
> Given that they were involved in the drug trade (among other things), this
> isn't that hard to believe.
>
> Anyone heard anything similar?
>
I have always been amazed at the lack of cooperation between the IJN and
the Japanese Army at any level. I've been working on a collection of
stragtegic plans for 42-43 in the Pacific (both Allied and Japanese). When
you read Allied plans (such as ELKTON) you see the "Army will do this and
the Navy will do that and each will support the other" but the Japanese
order read something like "the Army intends to do this, the Navy intends to
do that, and try to get along, OK?" If such orders were written by a plebe
at Annapolis or the Point they would catch hell from their instructors. These
plans, however, were signed by the top brass in each branch. If this level
of distrust and uncooperativeness is found at the highest level, the
conduct of the lower ranks can only be imagined!

The nearest example I can think of on the Allied side would be Monty and
Patton with no Eisenhower to mediate. Under that scenario I think we would
have had the Russians in Buckingham (now renamed "Hall of the Glorious Peoples'
Struggle") by 1945 ;-).

Larry J

[email-masked]; Co-Moderator: BYRD.MU.WVNET.EDU (Historical docs)
"Sunday's horoscope is note worthy because of its strange, sudden and wholly
unpredictable and inexplicable occurrences, affecting all phases of life."
Your Horoscope" L.A. Evening Herald Express, Sat, 12/06/41

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 09:24:34 -0500
From:    GERHARD REMPEL <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: INF: Never trust technology!

Hello,
just thought I would mention that there are other books on the SS........

        Robert L. Koehl, The Black Corps (University of Wisconsin Pr., 1983)

        Wegner, Bernd. The Waffen-SS: Ideology, Organization and Function. Trans
   lated by Ronald Webster. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1989.

The Wegner book is generally regarded as the most thorough sociological
analysis to date.

Gerhard Rempel
GRempel@WNEC/Western New England College, Springfield, Ma 01119. USA

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 09:38:53 EST
From:    Larry & Kim Jewell <[email-masked]>
Subject: INF: accessing historical archives

Lynn does a better job than I've done in explaining how to get access to the
major historical archives (or atleast many of them) on the net, so I'm for-
warding this from milhist-l.

Larry J

Date:    Fri, 18 Mar 1994 04:30:36 +0000
From:    "Lynn H. Nelson" <[email-masked]>

In response to the request for information on the History Index, the
address is:

telnet ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu

and respond to the request for username with either

history (lower case letters only)

or

www (again lower case letters only)

If you have a gopher and wish to set a pointer to the History Index, the
address is: http://kuhttp.cc.ukans.edu/history/WWW_history_main.html

An information server is a facility that offers the user automatic
connections to various sites. The History Index is an advanced information
server that uses hypertext screens and embedded commands, but that's
getting into jargon.

What happens is that you log into history, and you find yourself looking
at a screen that tells you that this is The Central Information Server for
Historians. There are a series of titles below that. The top one is
highlighted and reads "how to use this system" If you look at the bottom
of the screen you'll see instructions about what the various keys do. You
can run the whole thing with the four cursor keys, the space bar and the P
and C keys.

If you press the down cursor key, the next title will be highlighted. When
you want to see what's behind that title, you press the right cursor key
and are transferred to another screen. If you try that on the title
"General Index," you will find a long list of various sites: ftp, gopher,
infoserver, etc. you press the down cursor until you highlight something
that looks interesting. Then you press the right cursor key, and history
will connect you with that site automatically. (You might try BYRD; They
have a lot of military material, including a large collection of bibrefs
from Carlisle. Or there's ADFA -- Australian Defense Force Academy -- and
it's military history files. Or hytelnet, with connections to a couple of
hundred electronic library catalogues around the world; or MARVEL, the
Library of Congress gopher; or IHR-INFO, the Institute of Historical
Research in London, with connections to a lot of sites in the UK. Or ..)

If you're readig something and would like a copy of it, you press P and
write in your electronic address. When you finish your session, history
will send you a copy of the file.

And when you get tired of one site and want to try another, you back out
by pressing the left cursor key.

I won't bother trying to describe it any more; you just have to try it.

Oh, there _is_ one more thing. If you are equipped with MOSAIC, history
can access color graphics, video clips, animations, sound, and other
things for you.

Lynn

[email-masked]; Co-Moderator: BYRD.MU.WVNET.EDU (Historical docs)
"Sunday's horoscope is note worthy because of its strange, sudden and wholly
unpredictable and inexplicable occurrences, affecting all phases of life."
Your Horoscope" L.A. Evening Herald Express, Sat, 12/06/41

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 09:35:24 EST
From:    Crane Conrad LTC <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: German Nightfighters using AT cannons?

>        Hey all
>
>I have been wondering (and not finding this in my sources) if the German
>nightfighter force used anti-tank big caliber (50mm or so) cannons on
>RAF night bomber formations? It would seem that one or two rounds of
>that heavy ammo would take care of any bomber if well places, after all
>if such a round kills a T-34/85 then a lightly armoured Lancaster should
>suffer heavily.
>The Henshel Hs-219 multipurpusa plane (nightfighter/ground attack
>fighter) was very succesful in wiping out USSR tanks. 4 Staffeln of them
>(12 in each staffeln) nearly wiped out an entire Soviet tank division
>flanking II. SS-Das Reich at Kursk in 43. So these planes DID have these
>very heavy cannons and using them in nightfighter role with that
>ordinance should have caused little trouble, unless they were too heavy
>for that altitutes?
>
>Thanks in advance
>
>
>
>Gudmundur J. Helgason
>
>E-mail:    [email-masked]
Gudmundur,
     There may have been some experiments, but the standard machine guns and 20
mm cannon especially tore up the bombers well enough.
mm cannon especially tore up the bombers well enough. And you could carry more
ammo for the smaller weapons. - LTC Con Crane, USMA

------------------------------

Date:    Fri, 18 Mar 1994 13:38:53 -0500
From:    Daniel Ford <[email-masked]>
Subject: Ultra in the Pacific

For those interested in Enigma, note the following new book from the
Naval Institute Press:

John Winton: ULTRA IN THE PACIFIC: HOW BREAKING JAPANESE CODES & CIPHERS
AFFECTED NAVAL OPERATIONS AGAINST JAPAN, 1941-1945.

Pub date 15 March. $22.95. ISBN 1-55750-856-9.

Toll-free ordering: 800=233-8764

Dan Ford      <e-mail: [email-masked]>

              <postal: 433 Bay Road, Durham NH 03824 USA>
              <voice or fax: +1-603-868-5850>

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 11:52:54 PST
From:    Sidney Allinson <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Wehrmacht troops killing Waffen-SS troops?

The best *factual* account I've read of German troops fighting the SS
is:
        LAST ACTION AT FLENSBURG, by Charles Whiting.
Happened within a week or or so before V-J Day.

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 12:03:23 PST
From:    Sidney Allinson <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: INF: Never trust technology!

An excellent and revealing study is:
        LICENCED MASS MURDER: A Socio-Psychological Study of SS Killers,
                by Dr. Henry V. Dicks,
                Basic Books NY 1972.
Hannibal Lecter had nothing on the SS.

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 06:56:11 -0500
From:    Daniel Ford <[email-masked]>
Subject: Swapping American & Japanese civilians

In answer to the posting on this subject, two anecdotes:

* There was a transport leaving Japan in November 1941 which most
American civilians recognized was their last chance to get home. (Few
people in the know, either in Tokyo or DC, failed to see that war was
imminent.) The ship sailed on schedule, then proceeded to travel in
circles until December 8, whereupon it returned to Japan. How's that for
a hopeless feeling?

* There was at least one major swap of civilian internees. Japanese
diplomats in the U.S. were gathered and interned at the Hot Springs VA
resort; there may have been businessmen and journalists among them, I
don't know. They were taken to a swap point off the South African coast
sometime in 1942 in the Swedish (i.e. neutral liner) GRIPSHOLM along with
Red Cross parcels and there exchanged for a shipload of American
civilians including Joseph Grew, the US ambassador to Japan, and Joseph
Alsop, the newspaper correspondent and secretary to Claire Chennault of
the American Volunteer Group, who'd been caught on Hong Kong island on
Christmas Day when it fell to the Japanese.

Alsop was interned first in a brothel and then in Fort Stanley under
exceptionally grim conditions. He'd swapped his money for small gems
which he sewed into his coat and sold as necessary for food and Chinese
lessons. This yarn may be in his autobiography published about 1991.

Cheers -

Dan Ford      <e-mail: [email-masked]>

              <postal: 433 Bay Road, Durham NH 03824 USA>
              <voice or fax: +1-603-868-5850>

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 11:57:19 -0600
From:    "Robert J. Granvin" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: QUEST: FDR/Advance Knowledge of PH

> I realize that this is an unwelcome topic, but seeing it reminds me of a
> book I read in high school called The Paladin.
>
> It was about a young boy that happened to grow up in a country cottage
> that was close to the country home of Winston Churchill.  Appearently,
> during the war, this boy did a lot of behind the lines work for
> Churchill.  One of these jobs was to be flown half way around the world
> and dropped into the Pacific to rendezvous with a Brittish sub.  His

This falls into one of those areas normally referred to as "fiction,"
"utter fantasy," "someone's agenda" or "a really bad memory."

--
Robert J. Granvin                                    Southern Minnesota Wing
[email-masked]                                       Confederate Air Force

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 11:17:33 -0500
From:    Daniel Ford <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: TAC: IJN vs Army (WAS: Wehrmact v. Waffen-SS)

The competition between army and navy likely arose from the constitution
that required a serving army and navy officer as head of their respective
departments. This gave the high command of each service a veto over all
government deliberations, since if the service was unhappy it could
retire that officer or post him to Manchuria and the government would
fall. This assured equal split of funds for army and navy but probably
also assured their eternal enmity.

The JAAF and JNAF radios operated on different frequencies, their guns
took different ammo even when nominally of the same caliber, and even
their throttles moved in opposite directions (the army's, toward the
pilot for full throttle; the navy's, toward the firewall).

Dan Ford      <e-mail: [email-masked]>

              <postal: 433 Bay Road, Durham NH 03824 USA>
              <voice or fax: +1-603-868-5850>

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 16:58:32 EST
From:    Larry & Kim Jewell <[email-masked]>
Subject: TAC: Cooperation of forces.

Concerning the thread on the Japanese Navy and Army cooperating so poorly:
Is it safe to say that on the whole the Allied forces cooperated much
better than their Axis counterparts?

If so, was this key to winning the war, very important, or reasonably
important?

Were there Allied commands which acted just as badly (back up your conjecture)
and if so were they better or worse than Axis equivalents?

Larry J

[email-masked]; Co-Moderator: BYRD.MU.WVNET.EDU (Historical docs)
"Sunday's horoscope is note worthy because of its strange, sudden and wholly
unpredictable and inexplicable occurrences, affecting all phases of life."
Your Horoscope" L.A. Evening Herald Express, Sat, 12/06/41

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 16:05:02 -0600
From:    [email-masked]
Subject: Japanese Army vs. Navy:  A self-destructive junta

Larry et al,

     Imperial Japan seems to have been a military junta by 1941,
with the Emperor little more than a figurehead.

     Both the Army and Navy had political power, jealously
preserved and protected.  Interservice rivalry was bad enough in
this country, with the Department of the Army and the Navy
Department, but a civilian President could still make or break
anyone sufficiently uncooperative or incompetent -- Admiral
Ernest King apparently excepted.

     Integration of the services -- as has happened, at least
in name, in Canada -- is one solution.

     However, it is important to note that a military/naval
political takeover can undermine military/naval performance,
if there is no clear leader to meld the political factions.

Lou Coatney

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 12:18:59 LCL
From:    [email-masked]
Subject: GEN: MODEL DECALS

To: [email-masked]
 Ww> From: [email-masked]
 Ww> Subject:      Re: GEN: model decals

 Ww> Joe, Sidney,

 >       This has got to be the most absurd thing I have heard in a while!
 >What I find more disgusting than the PC mentality is someone who knuckles
 >under to the PC mentality.

 >Interesting, if absurd, that Revell and most other mfrs. prefer not to
 >supply decals with Nazi insignia.

 Ww> As a modeller myself, I can only agree with you. It's totally
 Ww> rediculous! For example, my Type XXI U-Boat was supplied with a German
 Ww> flag with a big empty white circle in the middle! This is carrying
 Ww> "Political Correctness" too far when it tries to alter the historical
 Ww> accuracy.

 Ww> Wilber.

I agree with your opinion, but point out that one possibility for the
manufacturer's decision could be economics and not "political correctness."
It is illegal to ship into Germany printed materials, software and other
representations of Nazi symbols, including the Aryan cross. It may be that
Revell, Monogram etc. do not want to produce a separate stock. Or perhaps
they worry about inventory control, i.e., getting penalized for accidental
shipment into Germany of banned materials.

Anybody out there know? Sounds like a good question for someone who is
into modeling to put forth to one of these companies.

 -- Jim Brady
___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 19:00:32 -0500
From:    GEORGE BAUER <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: GEN: MODEL DECALS

Sounds to me like a good question for the MODELING-L.

Not WWII...

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 20:10:03 -0500
From:    Joe Barone <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: TAC: Cooperation of forces.

Larry Jewell <[email-masked]> writes:
> Concerning the thread on the Japanese Navy and Army cooperating so poorly:
> Is it safe to say that on the whole the Allied forces cooperated much
> better than their Axis counterparts?
>
> If so, was this key to winning the war, very important, or reasonably
> important?
>
> Were there Allied commands which acted just as badly (back up your conjecture)
> and if so were they better or worse than Axis equivalents?

        I am currently reading "Fatal Decision: Anzio and the Battle of Rome".
The book goes into some detail of Clark's Anglophobia and resulting disaster
at the Liri River.  At Anzio, the book details how American armor refused
to support the British 1st Division during the German counterattacks.  In
particular, a lone Pzkw IV had a field day against the British while some M-10s
would not engage it for fear of the resulting artillery attack that they would
bring down on themselves.  I think the Italian campaign is a good example of
the Allies not getting along that well and this uncooperation had to play
some part in the resulting stalemate.
--
Joe Barone
[email-masked]
We have our own ammunition -- it's filled with paint.  When we
fire it, it makes pretty pictures -- scares the hell out of people!

------------------------------

Date:    Sat, 19 Mar 1994 20:13:54 CST
From:    Steve Alvin <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: TAC: Cooperation of forces.

One example I can think of is the relationship between McArthur
and the Commander of the 5th Air Force, George Brett.  McArthur,
was well, McArthur and he did not consider Brett to be one of
"the Loyal Ones."  He further believed that the Air Corps would
contribute little to the war effort.  Brett also had his faults
(beyond the fact that his command in the Spring of 1942 was little
more than a few worn-out P-40's, P-400's, P-39's, A-24's & B-17's).
His personality was described as a mingling of hauter and ego.
He didn't like the Australians, especially govt. representatives
from the Labour Party--he considered them radical and left wing.
McArthur and Brett were estranged completly.  MacArthur's Chief of
Staff, Richard Sutherland did little to ease the situation and
may have made the situation worse.

By August, 1942, Brett was relieved by George Kenney and the
situation was very much improved.

--
Steve Alvin
[email-masked]

------------------------------

End of WWII-L Digest - 18 Mar 1994 to 19 Mar 1994
*************************************************