Subject: WWII-L Digest - 20 Feb 1995 to 21 Feb 1995

From: Automatic digest processor <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 22 Feb 1995 00:01:51 -0500

There are 13 messages totalling 801 lines in this issue.

Topics of the day:

  1. TACT: Firestorm
  2. INF: USN Chronology 02-21-95
  3. INF: 50 Years Ago - 22-FEB-1945
  4. MEDIA: War and Remembrance - Aussie style
  5. HIST: "Mein Kampf" and gassing of Jews
  6. (INF) Ques on Iwo Jima
  7. Japan-- loose ends and further thoughts
  8. Grampas Secrets
  9. Postscript on Japan-- war crimes trials
 10. Army Division Help!
 11. WWII - Order of Battle
 12. Westerly 4 of 5, Narciso
 13. Japanese war crimes trials (part 2)...& etc

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Date:    Tue, 21 Feb 1995 00:17:17 -0600
From:    Bill Smith <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: TACT: Firestorm

You make one telling statement, which for me has always stood as a major
support to my perspective on the atomic bomb.  The concept of the
firestorm and the napalm incidiary bomb were new and unique to warfare.
It is historically ignorant to retroactively condemn the use of a weapon
whose full power and effect were unknown.  I would place the horrors of
gas warfare during the First World War in this same category.  Certainly
physicians knew what mustard gas would do, but nobody fathomed the
scale.  The same should be said for the employment of napalm.

As I have posted notes on this in the past, I won't digress further,
except to say I find the thought of finishing the Second World War
without using the atomic bomb far more dangerous than its judicious use
to end that conflict.  The lessons learned, while painful for the
recipient, have redounded to the benefit of the world in general.

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

Date:    Tue, 21 Feb 1995 04:00:13 PST
From:    "Keller, Theron P." <[email-masked]>
Subject: INF: USN Chronology 02-21-95

UNITED STATES NAVY CHRONOLOGY
from:
//byrd.mu.wvnet.edu/pub/history/military/wwii/naval_chronology/chr4(4,5).txt

1945
02/21 Wed. Naval land-based and Army aircraft bomb and strafe enemy
           installations at Truk, Caroline Islands.
            United States naval vessel sunk:
             Escort carrier BISMARCK SEA (CVE-95), by suicide plane,
              Iwo Jima area,
              24 d. 36'N., 141 d. 48'E.
            United States naval vessels damaged:
             Carrier SARATOGA (CV-3), by suicide planes, Iwo Jima
              area,
              24 d. 56'N., 142 d. 01'E.
             Escort carrier LUNGA POINT (CVE-94), by suicide plane,
              Iwo Jima area,
              24 d. 40'N., 141 d. 44'E.
             Destroyer WILLIAMSON (DD-244), by collision,
              Iwo Jima area,
              24 d. 39'N., 142 d. 01'E.
             Destroyer RENSHAW (DD-499), by submarine torpedo,
              Luzon area, P. I.,
              24 d. 36'N., 141 d. 48'E.
             Attack cargo ship YANCEY (AKA-93), by collision,
              Iwo Jima area,
              24 d. 46'N., 141 d. 19'E.
             Net cargo ship KEOKUK (AKN-4), by suicide plane,
              Iwo Jima area,
              24 d. 36'N., 141 d. 48'E.
             LST 390, by collision, Iwo Jima area,
              24 d. 46'N., 141 d. 19'E.
             LST 477, by suicide plane, Iwo Jima area,
              24 d. 40'N., 141 d. 44'E.
             LST 809, by suicide plane, Iwo Jima area,
              24 d. 08'N., 142 d. 06'E.

Information compiled by U.S. Navy Historians.  For more information,
contact the Naval Historical Center at (202) 433-3940.
Archived by: "Larry W. Jewell" <[email-masked]>
Posted by:
Theron P. Keller
Logicon, Inc.
Dahlgren, VA  22448 USA
[email-masked]

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

Date:    Tue, 21 Feb 1995 07:22:48 EST
From:    John Davis <[email-masked]>
Subject: INF: 50 Years Ago - 22-FEB-1945

On 22-FEB-1945, the following occurred -

World War II - The Battlefronts
-------------------------------
Western Front - In the U.S. 3rd Army sector, German resistance in the VIII
Corps area disintegrates. The 90th Division takes Lichtenborn, Arzheld and
Holzchen. The 11th Armoured Division gains its final objectives taking
Eschfeld and Reiff. The 6th Armoured Division takes Irrhausen and
Olmscheid. The XII Corps consolidates its positions and begins regrouping.
In the XX Corps area, the 10th Armoured Division clears the rest of the
Saar-Moselle triangle and attempts to secure a bridgehead across the Saar
near Ockfen. In the 7th Army sector, elements of the 70th Division gain
control of two thirds of Forbach.

Italian Front - The Germans still cling to the crest of M. Torraccia, but
all 10th Mountain Division objectives to the left are now clear. The
Brazilian 1st Division consolidates positions on M. Castello.

Philippines - The XIV Corps continues preparations for the final assault on
Intramuros in Manila. East of Manila, the 6th Division and 1st Cavalry
Division attack across the Mariquina toward the line Taytay-Antipolo-
Montalban. The I Corps begins to push towards Balete Pass.

Iwo Jima - The VAC continues to attack northward toward a line extending
generally from Tachiiwi Pt. on the east coast to Motoyama village in the
center to the west coast south of Hiraiwa Bay. The Marines are virtually
pinned down by resistance from the main Japanese defences consisting of
mutually supporting pillboxes on high ground between Airfields 1 and 2. The
4th Marine Division continues to attack toward Airfield 2. The 5th Marine
Division continues slowly north on the left flank but is forced back when a
gap develops on the right flank. Elements of the 5th work slowly around the
base of Mt. Suribachi, encircling it except for 400 yards on the west
coast. The Japanese continue local counterattacks and infiltration attempts
under the cover of darkness.

The Homefront
-------------
Congress To Probe Army Communists - The House Military Affairs Committee
has named a subcommittee to investigate charges that Communists have
received Army commissions.

=============================================================================

Sources: "United States Army in World War II, Chronology 1941-1945" compiled
by Mary H. Williams, Office of the Chief of Military History, Department of
the Army, "2194 Days of War" by Cesare Salmaggi and Alfredo Pallavisimi,
"Facts On File Yearbook 1945, Person's Index Of World Events" edited by R.L.
Lapica.

Copyright 1995 by John B Davis, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Previous articles are archived at ftp.webcom.com in directory /pub/jbd/www
and can be accessed via the WWW by URL: http://www.webcom.com/~jbd/ww2.html.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
John Davis                           | [email-masked]
Cary, North Carolina                 | http://www.webcom.com/~jbd/
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

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

Date:    Tue, 21 Feb 1995 09:44:49 -0500
From:    Ron Babuka <[email-masked]>
Subject: MEDIA: War and Remembrance - Aussie style

Binghamton Press and Sun Bulletin - 2/21/95

Richard Reeves

Canverra, Australia - On Wednesday, the 53rd anniversary of the fall of
Singapore to invading Japanese, the Australian government honored the
31,088 Australians men and women taken as prisioners of war during World
War II.  As the survivors gathered at the war memorial overlooking the
city, police blocked buses carrying Japanese tourist.
        They were afraid of what might happen if the old "diggers" saw the
children and grandchildren of their Japanese guards.  Australian memory is
enshrined in these numbers: 8,712 Aussies were captured by Germans during
the war and 8,448 of them came home; 22,376 were captured by the Japanese
and 8,031 of them died in capativity - the greatest number of them from
starvation and exhaustion building the the jungle railroad in Burma and
Thailand that the Americans remember leading to the bridge over the River
Kwai.
        More than a third of Australians today, according to polls, believe
Japan is still a military threat to their freedom.  More than 40 percent
believe the Japanese have secret stores of nucear weapons.  War and
remembrance.
        But there are different kinds of statistics now.  Japan is
Australia's principle trading partner - one-quarter of its exports go to
Tokyo - and Australian companies have a $4.2 billion trade surplus ($3.1
billion U.S.) with their Japanese customers.  The principle exports are
coal, aluminum and grain.
        So there is an uncomfortable clash between the business of 1995 and
the brutality of 1942.  As in the United States, Australia does its
commercial best to sanitize the events of 50 years ago.  Wednesday's
ceremonies were the first official tribute to the World War II POW's, and
the Canberra Times' lead story reffered only to "the enemy," not mentioning
Japan.
        But the old men remembered: mainly they remembered their "mates,"
the Aussies who died in Japanese camps.  The ceremony went on despite
Japanese protest and complaints of the Japanese ambassador that he was not
invited.
        (A few years ago in Paris at the premier of The Last Emperor, a
very anti-Japanese film, I found myself seated next to the Japanese
ambassador to France.  We chatted, but he made no concessions that the
events depicted on the screen, the invasion of Manchuria, had anything to
do with him or his country.  They didn't acknowledge, they didn't apologize
- which is why so many Australians still hate them , trade or no trade.)
        Wednesday's ceremonies on a crystal late summer day (in the souther
hemisphere) were among the most impressive I have ever seen.  The Aussies,
I guess, learned from the British.  To begin with, Prime Minister Keating,
not particularyly popular these days, was presented as "speaking now on
behalf of the Australian people..." - an affection American presidents
might benefit from using.
        Keating was uncommonly eloguent, leaving men in tears, not all of
them Australian, saying:
        "Perhaps we should bring two messages to this commemeration.  One
is the message of faith and courage - the love of freedom and fairness,
pragmatism, resourcefullness and perseverance and, above all, the love of
this place.  The love of Australia...those indefinable bonds between them
we call 'mateship.'"
        "No man one the Burma line was allowed to die alone," said one of
the survivors, Arthur Wright.  "Always he had a mate by his side - you
never let a bloke just die."
        And Keating ended with his second message: "We should never forget
the evil that was done in these prision camps.  The outrage we feel what
was done on the Burma-Thailand railway ... should never fail.  Our children
must know these things. ... But, too, we must also heal.  We owe it to our
children that they are not obliged to live in a world poisoned by old
hatreds."
        It was another example to me of the power of experience and shared
history.  Will their children remember?  I don't know, and obviously the
Australians do not either.  The Ministry of Veterans Affairs offered
$20,000 to any playwright who could "help Generation Xers understand what
it was like in the Depression and war."

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ron Babuka
Cornell University
CIT - Information Resources
Ithaca, New York 14850
(607) 254-6492

Fax: 607-254-6404
http://ir-www.cit.cornell.edu/IR_staff/ron_babuka.html

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

Date:    Tue, 21 Feb 1995 09:11:34 -0500
From:    [email-masked]
Subject: HIST: "Mein Kampf" and gassing of Jews

For what it's worth, per THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF THE HOLOCAUST under the entry for
MEIN KAMPF, Eberhard Jaeckel says,

        "Hitler complains that at the beginning of World War I the German
        government had missed the opportunity of 'mercilessly exterminating'
        the Jews, and that Germany would not have lost the war if it had 'used
        poison gas' on twelve thousand to fifteen thousand Jews (chapters 14
        and 15 [of MEIN KAMPF] of vol.2)."

-- Warren Thompson

[email-masked]

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

Date:    Tue, 21 Feb 1995 08:35:55 EST
From:    "SGM Robert S. Rush" <[email-masked]>
Subject: (INF) Ques on Iwo Jima

Ben Frank,

Actually to anyone with information.  With the 50th Commemoration
of the Battle on Iwo Jima ongoing, thought I might ask some questions
concerning the Marines their organization and casualties during the
battle.

I know quite a lot about Army regimental organization during WWII,
but little to nothing about Marine regiments.

Perhaps you could tell us how a Marine regiment was organized, to include
personnel strengths.
.
I understand that Iwo was the bloodiest battle in the Pacific.  Do
you have the casualty figures for any of the regiments?

I would like to understand the fighting on Iwo Jima, much as you once
wrote about putting the Hurtgen into context with what you experienced.

Thanks
Rob Rush
[email-masked]

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

Date:    Tue, 21 Feb 1995 13:58:22 -0400
From:    Mike Yaklich <[email-masked]>
Subject: Japan-- loose ends and further thoughts

        After I posted my "appendix" of six examples of the Zero's early
dominance in Pacific skies, Steve New replied with a suggestion for another
entry in that category, namely Saburo Sakai's amazing flying feat on June 24,
1944.  On that date four US carriers raided Iwo Jima, where Sakai was
stationed.  Sakai, though blind in one eye as a result of wounds suffered over
Guadalcanal in Aug '42, was one of some 80 Zero pilots who came up to
intercept.  Early on Sakai managed to get out of the way of six Hellcats that
dove in on him for a quick pass, then  eluded a single Hellcat that tried to
get on his tail.  Escaping this threat, he unwittingly blundered into another,
as he found his lone Zero attracting the attention of 15 Hellcats, who circled
him, taking turns coming at him in groups of four at a time (Sakai, with his
one eye, had mistaken the US fighters for Zeros and tried to join their
formation!).  Somehow Sakai managed to evade these repeated attacks, until the
Americans began to run low on fuel and ammo and headed for home.  Perhaps the
most amazing thing about the whole episode is that on landing Sakai discovered
that, despite having been attacked by 22 Hellcats in the course of his flight,
his Zero had not been hit by a single bullet!  If this happened as Sakai
described it in his memoir "Samurai," it should certainly go down as one of the
greatest pieces of combat flying on record, and also not a bad testimony to the
Zero's awesome maneuverability.  However, I didn't include it in my earlier
post because that post was concerned with events that demonstrated the mastery
the Zero and its pilots often exercized in the first year and a half of the
war.  And (aside from the fact that wars are not won by great escapes), June
24, 1944 was hardly a banner day for the Zero overall.  One other Japanese
pilot, the young newcomer Kinsuke Muto, shot down four Hellcats on the day, but
few other Japanese pilots experienced much success in this encounter.  On the
day the Japanese lost at least 40 Zeros-- half the force based on Iwo's two
fighter airfields (that is Sakai's figure-- US pilots claimed 66).   And so,
the more I think about it, this day's events are not an example of the Zero's
excellence, but rather the exact  opposite-- a perfect demonstration of the
extent to which the Japanese by 1944 had dramatically and irrevocably lost the
upper hand in air combat.
        Consider, first of all, that the Japanese put up 80 Zeros, the entire
strength of the island's air complement, yet got their butts kicked (remember
in some of my early posts how groups of 20-30-odd Zeros could handle anything
the Allies threw at them).  Consider, further, that the Japanese were in such
bad shape that a pilot like Sakai was allowed to fly even though blind in one
eye.  Most of the other pilots on Iwo were relative rookies like Muto-- and set
against the performance of this one talented newcomer (he shot down 35 US
planes before being killed in the summer of '45) were perhaps 40 other new
pilots who didn't live to fly their second combat mission.  If that was the
ratio of success to total failure for new fighter pilots the Japanese were in a
lot of trouble (and its not beyond reason-- I remember reading somewhere of a
German fighter Geschwader on the Russian front complaining as the war went on
that four out of five new pilots died before shooting down even one Soviet
plane).  Finally, just the fact that Sakai continually found himself alone and
outnumbered over his own base was a sign of big problems.  Once the Allies
could literally darken the sky with planes from CARRIERS the situation looked
pretty bleak for the Japanese (consider what we could do when we had land
bases within range of our targets-- like the previously cited raid of 821
B-29's against Tokyo 8/14/45.  In the first March '45 fire raid 333 B-29's had
levelled 16 square miles of Tokyo, and killed over 100,000 people!!).  The
scariest part about carriers was that they could go anywhere, especially when
they carried with them air support on that scale.  And go anywhere they did, as
in 1945 the China coast, Formosa, and, repeatedly, Japan itself became targets
for the carrier air raids (meanwhile, British carriers which had been
transferred to the Far East struck at Indonesia).   And the US forces could
indeed darken the sky with planes.  During the actions covering the American
capture of Kwajalein and Eniwetok in Jan-Feb '44, carrier aircraft flew some
6,000 sorties!  The heaviest blow was a pre-emptive strike at the Japanese
fleet's central Pacific base at Truk.  Five fleet carriers and four light
carriers flew 1,250 sorties in two days, shooting down 250 Japanese aircraft
for the loss of 25  planes.  Although Admiral Koga, commander of the Japanese
Combined Fleet, had already withdrawn most of his ships from Truk, air attacks
sank a cruiser and two destroyers while devastating the shipping in the
anchorage.  When the gunnery action of the new battleships IOWA and NEW JERSEY
and related operations of US subs are added in, the Japanese lost two cruisers,
four destroyers, and 26 cargo vessels at Truk-- losses serious enough they were
hushed up even within the Japanese military (keeping the ugly truth from their
own people, even other military staffs, was a common practice with the
Japanese.  For example, only in 1966 was the figure of 18,000 men killed
fighting the Russians in 1939 made public.  Many Japanese did not suspect how
badly they were losing the war until the regular bombing of the homeland in
1945 made the truth impossible to conceal).
        Admiral Mineichi Koga, BTW, was another of those Navy moderates.  He
replaced Yamamoto as commander-in-chief of the combined fleet when Yamamoto's
plane was shot down by P-38's (acting on a decoded radio message) while the
Admiral was flying in for a tour of Bougainville in April 1943.  Koga, a quiet
and efficient officer, differed dramatically in style of command from the
charismatic and inspirational Yamamoto.  Like his predecessor, Koga was
critical of the Army for dragging Japan into the war (he felt that if the Army
was confronted, as it said it was, with choosing between the risks of a foreign
war or an internal coup, that they erred by choosing war, as Koga felt risking
an uprising was by far the least dangerous path).  Like Yamamoto, Koga's
strategy for prosecuting the war consisted of groping for the "decisive battle"
which had eluded the Japanese Navy since Midway.  His staff prepared plans
along those lines, which led to the two final attempts to destroy the US fleet
at sea, the Battle of the Phillipine Sea and Leyte Gulf.  Koga himself did not
see either of those battles, however.  His plane was lost in a storm and
disappeared without a trace in March '44.
        The Phillipine Sea battle, which arose when the Japanese attempted to
counterattack the forces covering the US landings on Saipan in the Marianas in
June '44, was probably the most graphic illustration of how seriously Japanese
air power had declined since the glory days of early '42.  The first day of the
battle, in what was called "The Great Marianas Turkey Shoot," US carrier pilots
shot down 218 Japanese aircraft for the loss of 29 American planes.  Meanwhile,
US subs sank the SHOKAKU and a smaller carrier.  In subsequent action, when the
Americans launched 216 of their own planes to find and destroy the Japanese
fleet, the enemy's air power was so depleted by the losses that only 35 Zeros
were left to face them.   Another of Japan's new small carriers was sunk by air
attack, and the combined loss of planes, pilots, and carriers made this for all
intents and purposes the end of Japanese naval aviation as a force to be
reckoned with in the war.  For the fleet's next big sortie at Leyte in October,
the carrier force under Ozawa was used merely as a decoy, because the few
remaining carriers were too short of planes and aircrews to fight effectively.
        In mentioning the effectiveness of US air tactics I used two Army
pilots, Dick Bong and Tom Lynch, as an example of the way two wingmen could
fight as a balanced team.  The Navy certainly had examples as well, and one
which springs to mind was that of "Valencia's Flying Circus," also
affectionately known as "the mowing machine."  Commander Eugene Valencia led a
"division" of four pilots flying Hellcats off the second-generation
(ESSEX-class) YORKTOWN.  Valencia himself shot down 23 planes, the
second-highest scoring US Navy pilot of the war.  His wingman, Harris Mitchell,
was himself an ace of repute with 10 victories.  The second pair of the
division wasn't too shabby either, with leader Jim French accounting for 11
"kills" and his wingman Clinton Smith reaching ace status with six victories.
        While I'm on the subject of US pilots, I should mention that I guess I
did spell Maj. Thomas MacGuire's name correctly, at least at first, though I
think I identified him as a captain.  Another trivia point, one of the Marine
pilots who survived the debacle over Midway that I posted in "Six Reasons the
Zero Had A Reputation" was Marion Carl.  Carl later evened up the score
considerably flying a Wildcat over Guadalcanal, where he was one of the leading
aces on the island during the first two months of the campaign, with 18.5
confirmed "kills."  BTW, the top US ace on the island, and the top-scoring
Marine fighter pilot of the war, was Joe Foss, who arrived in October '42.  He
shot down 26 Japanese planes over Guadalcanal (Boyington, also a Marine, had 28
"kills" for the war, but six of these were with the AVG, not the USMC).  Even
an ace of Foss' calibre almost failed to survive his first aerial combat.  He
shot down a Zero on his first combat mission, but was so intent on his prey
that he ignored a flight of three more Zeros that latched onto his plane and put
250 bullet and shell holes in his Wildcat.  Foss was barely able to coax his
shot-up F4F in for a landing.  On a later mission, Foss downed three Japanese
planes, but then took a hit in the engine which forced his plane down over the
water.  The Wildcat's canopy jammed shut, and Foss was barely able to force it
open before his plane went under.  Foss flew a second tour of duty in 1944 but
failed to add to his score.  He survived the war and was later elected governor
of South Dakota.
        One last word on fighter pilots.  I mentioned almost all the top
Japanese Navy pilots except one, the remarkable Teimei Akamatsu.  Credited with
50 victories, Akamatsu was, along with Sakai, the only top naval ace to survive
the entire war.  Akamatsu had a casual approach to discipline that seems
incredible in the Japanese armed forces.  Toward the end of the war he even
skipped briefings, preferring to party at his favorite geisha house until the
air raid alert sounded.  Then he would be notified by phone according to a
previously arranged system, arriving at the airfield in his beat-up jalopy,
often still chugging at a bottle as he drove (one custom in the Japanese Navy
air units was that it was absolutely forbidden to drink even the night before a
pilot was scheduled to fly-- in Sakai's fighter school class one trainee was
bounced out of the program the day before graduation because he had been caught
in a bar, and the class was to make a fly-by as part of the ceremony).
Akamatsu's attitude was responsible for the fact that, although he graduated
from officers' training school before the war, he was still the equivalent of a
lieutenant j.g. in 1945, so many times had he been disciplined, busted in rank,
or held back for promotion due to his antics.  In 1945 Akamatsu was one of a
handfull of Japanese pilots to have success flying the Mitsubishi Raiden, a
fast, well-armed, well-armored aircraft that was also very difficult to fly (I
wonder if the same phenomenom described by Emmanuel Gustin in re: the Army's
Ki-44 was at  work here-- namely, that older pilots used to highly-maneuverable
fighters which characterized most Army and Navy designs had more accidents than
new trainees who learned from scratch how to handle a plane that couldn't make
tight turns without loss of control, but excelled at climbing and diving?  At
any rate, Akamatsu managed to adapt to the Raiden despite having fought through
most of the war in a Zero).  Akamatsu shot down ten P-51 and Hellcat fighters
in the Raiden, and survived although on at least two occasions he was the only
pilot from his flight to return from his mission alive.

        Regards

        Mike Yaklich

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

Date:    Tue, 21 Feb 1995 15:09:32 GMT-6
From:    "Robert T. Moore" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Grampas Secrets

Hello, Cassady!

The problem with responding to your request are the abbreviations
used, as far as I am concerned. It is difficult to follow, and
unclear as to what is desired. I have some info on Bletchley Park
activities, but I will need more info.

All the best.

Terry
> I appreciate all help that has been given to me on various topic so far.
> Thanks for everything.
>
> Cassady Craft
> e-mail [email-masked]
> or
> [email-masked]
>

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

Date:    Tue, 21 Feb 1995 17:42:38 -0400
From:    Mike Yaklich <[email-masked]>
Subject: Postscript on Japan-- war crimes trials

        Many of the tribunals convened after the war to try those accused of
war crimes focused not on specific atrocities (of which readers of my previous
posts will be aware there was no shortage) but on attempting to punish those
considered politically and philosophically responsible for Japan's war of
conquest.  In other words, the entire Japanese war effort from 1931 on was in
itself considered a crime-- a concious waging of a war of aggression.
        I mentioned in an earlier post a few of the big names of Japan's 1941
government who were tried and condemned, principally Tojo and Prince Konoye
(who had also done a previous stint as Prime Minister in 1937, and was at the
helm when the full-scale war on China was launched in July of that year).
Another who was brought before the war crimes court was Kuniaki Koiso, the man
who replaced Tojo as Prime Minister when the latter resigned in July 1944 as a
consequence of the imminent loss of Saipan.  Koiso was a reserve general in the
Army whose active service had consisted almost entirely of intelligence and
administrative postings.  He was completely ineffective as head of government,
due to his inability to gain support from either the military leadership or the
moderate peace faction.  Koiso himself was open to the possibility of peace,
but did not believe the Allies would offer Japan acceptable terms-- the formula
of "unconditional surrender" not meeting the criteria. However, he was forced
to accept in his cabinet  the Navy moderate Admiral Mitsumasa Yonai, not only
as Navy Minister, but as "Assistant Prime Minister."  Yonai was pushed on Koiso
by the true peace faction which already existed, centered around the Emporer
himself, and also including the Keeper of the Privy Seal Marquis Kido and
Prince Konoye (a note: Konoye might not seem the prototype moderate, and found
himself tried by the war crimes board.  But in October 1941, at the cabinet
meeting when Tojo made a violently emotional speech, saying the Army would
never back down on China, because that would only embolden the Americans and
the Japanese would eventually be forced out of Manchuria and Korea as well,
Konoye replied that he thought it "manifestly unwise for Japan to plunge into
an unpredictable war at a time when the China incident is unresolved.")  At any
rate, while Koiso was unable to win the support and trust of the true peace
faction, he was also distrusted by the military, who completely excluded him
from the decision-making process in regard to prosecuting the war.  Thus
isolated, Koiso accomplished little, and succeeded in losing considerable face
when he broadcast a radio speech to the nation on November 8th, 1944,
guaranteeing a Japanese victory on Leyte (after the disastrous naval battle of
Leyte Gulf, and in spite of the fact that the Japanese commander in the
Phillipines, General Yamashita, didn't want to fight on Leyte at all).  When
the Allies landed on Okinawa in April 1945, Koiso demanded to be given a voice
in running the war effort. When the military chiefs still refused, he resigned
as Prime Minister, opening the way for the Suzuki government which eventually
agreed to the Allied peace terms.  Koiso was found guilty of war crimes and
sentenced to life imprisonment.  He died in prison in 1950, barely two years
after his conviction.  Koiso may seem an odd choice for the tribunal to go
after, but he had been more of a hawk in his days as an active Army officer.
Specifically, at the time of the Manchurian occupation in 1931, when he was
serving as chief of the War Ministry's Military Bureau, he gave his opinion of
the contemplated action of the Kwantung Army as follows; "The Japanese like
war.  If the guns start firing they'll all jump in for a good fight."
        Another prominent member of the Tojo cabinet who was sentenced to life
imprisonment was Admiral Shigetaro Shimada, Tojo's Navy Minister.  Shimada was
one of the less moderate Navy admirals.  When asked about his opinion on how
Japan should proceed in the face of American demands regarding China, Shimada
said, "On the basis of what I learned as commander of the China squadron,* if
our forces are removed our businessmen will have great difficulty in continuing
their operations.  Their personal safety might be endangered.**  Furthermore,
no matter what happens on the mainland I will oppose the removal of our forces
from Hainan island." (off the south coast of China)  Japanese naval forces
occupied the island in 1939).
        *Shimada commanded the  China Fleet from May '40 to Sept '41.
        **One aspect of the stiffening of Chinese resistance to the Japanese
following the kidnapping of Chiang Kai-Shek in the "Sian Incident" of 1936 was
a nationwide boycott of Japanese businesses, accompanied in some places by
rioting which destroyed Japanese enterprises.
        Shimada was also criticized for being too easily overawed by Tojo,
particularly after Tojo assumed the position of Army Chief-of-Staff in addition
to Prime Minister.  The war crimes tribunal charged him with 55 counts and
sentenced him to life imprisonment.
        More tomorrow, my e-mail system is getting too slow to work with.

        Regards

        Mike Yaklich

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

Date:    Tue, 21 Feb 1995 17:14:28 CST
From:    Derek L Decross <[email-masked]>
Subject: Army Division Help!

One more time...

Does anyone know where I could get yearbooks or rosters of the following
divisions:

3rd, 4th, 13th Armored Divisions
18th Field Artillery Brigade

Also, can someone tell me what other smaller units might have been
based at Camp Bowie, Texas during 1942-1944?

Thanks for your help,

Derek

------------------------------------------------------------------------
                         Derek L. Decross
------------------------------------------------------------------------
6408 Wildwood Circle S.                       [email-masked]
Apt. 924                                       [email-masked]
Fort Worth, TX  76132
------------------------------------------------------------------------

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

Date:    Tue, 21 Feb 1995 17:28:00 CST
From:    Alex Bielakowski <[email-masked]>
Subject: WWII - Order of Battle

On 20 Feb 1995, Terry Lindell wrote:

Regarding your query about assignment of regiments to divisions, I would
suggest you look at Shelby L. Stanton, _World War II Order of Battle_
(New York:  Galahad Books, 1984).  I have found this to be an invaluable
reference tool.  I even saw a few copies for sale at a B. Dalton or
Waldenbook store over the weekend, for about $25.  It will not cover the
post-WWII era.  Nor will it offer explanations as to why some regiments
were moved around.  It will offer brief organizational histories of
divisions, including typical tables of organization for 1941 and 1944/45,
and brief histories of regiments during the war.

Stanton has also written the excellent Vietnam War Order of Battle which
includes Air Force, Navy, and Marine ground formations, as well as the
ground formations of Australia, New Zealand, Thailand, South Korea, and
the Phillipines.  My hope is that he will eventually write another volum
about the Korea War.  Sorry to deviate from the subject of WWII, but I
thought some people might like to know about Stanton's other volume.

Alex Bielakowski

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

Date:    Fri, 17 Feb 1995 22:48:34 -0500
From:    Cheryl Abdullah <[email-masked]>
Subject: Westerly 4 of 5, Narciso

Dear WWII-L, I'm attempting an alternate e-mail method that should let me mail
an entire summary in one fell swoop.  Did anyone else out there not see
Part I of the Roy Howard summary?  Please e-mail me privately on that
question.  Again I thank you good folks for any and all corrections to this
Narciso summary.

Cheryl                                    [email-masked]

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

Date:    Tue, 21 Feb 1995 22:26:00 -0400
From:    Mike Yaklich <[email-masked]>
Subject: Japanese war crimes trials (part 2)...& etc

        Former Prime Minister Koiso and former Navy Minister Shimada got off
with life sentences in the post-war trials.  Sadao Araki, a member of the
"Imperial Way" faction that eventually lost the struggle for dominance within
the Army, was also sentenced to life imprisonment.  He was considered one of
the chief culprits in the creation of a militaristic educational system (one of
his posts was Minister of Education in the 1937 Konoye cabinet). Major-General
Oshima, who served as first military attache, then (from 1940) as Japanese
ambassador in Berlin, and was a very vocal advocate and facilitator of Japan's
adherence to the Axis Anti-Comintern Pact and Tripartite Pact, also got life.
Both, however, were released in 1955, Araki for reasons of health.  Field
Marshal Hata was tried by the Chinese and sentenced to life imprisonment for
the acts committed under his command (perhaps a light sentence considering that
much of the notorious "Three All Policy" happened on his watch).  Some of the
Emporer's councilors also drew lengthy prison terms, and another of those
sentenced to life in prison was Col. Kingoro Hashimoto.  Hashimoto was a
founder and prominent member of radical secret societies, and he had been one
of the two colonels who led the planning of the abortive coup of October 1931.
Hashimoto had also gained attention for his inflammatory behavior at the time
of the "Panay Incident" (1937), when Japanese aircraft sank a US gunboat in
China, the Japanese eventually issuing a formal apology (note the western
powers also retained the right to freely navigate China's internal waterways
with military vessels, to protect the activities of their own businessmen and
missionaries--it wasn't only Japan that sought to keep China in the status of a
virtual colony.  Shanghai, for instance, was virtually a foreign colony, with a
whole area of the city run by whites for whites, and the hired British police
force, who among other things pioneered the use of electric shocks for torture,
as a few local Communists found out the hard way.  Note also that the above
Hashimoto should not be confused with Lt-Gen Mure Hashimoto, who was referred
to earlier as informing Prince Takeda about the Japanese Army's use of poison
gas in China, nor with General Gen Hashimoto.  Gen Hashimoto was the Japanese
commander in the Peking area in July 1937, when night training maneuvers led to
an exchange of fire between Japanese and Chinese troops near the Marco Polo
bridge about 12 miles outside the city.  Hashimoto had managed to patch things
up and work out a truce with the local warlord Sung, who was after all taking
Japanese money.  However, Chiang Kai-Shek rejected the agreement, due to
Chinese internal politics.  Signing the Hashimoto-Sung accord would be
implicity recognizing Sung, an independent local warlord, having the right to
negotiate on China's behalf, and Chiang as theoretical supreme commander [but
in fact always wary that one of the warlords or generals through which he still
had to exercize any real military or political power might grow too strong and
break away or overthrow him] could not tolerate that.  War ensued instead.)
        To return to the main subject, there were others guilty less of
specific atrocities than of acts instigating the war who, like Tojo, paid the
supreme price.  Generals Homma and Yamashita were at least in theory executed
for their parts in the Bataan Death March and the destruction of Manila,
respectively, even though it was clearly arguable that neither man was in fact
truly responsible for the acts that got them condemned.  Yamashita's
chief-of-staff, General Muto, was also executed.  A couple of other Japanese
officers were however condemned to death for their roles in propagating the
philosophy and deeds of Japanese expansion in China.  In this category were
Generals Seishiro Itagaki and Kenji Dohihara.  Itagaki, still a colonel, played
a leading role in planning and executing the Kwantung Army's seizure of
Manchuria in 1931.  From 1941-45 he was Japanese commander-in-chief in Korea.
Dohihara, a specialist in political activity, helped set up the Manchurian
puppet government under long-deposed Chinese emporer Henry Pu-Yi (also with the
help of Itagaki).  The new government of "Manchukuo," coached through the
negotiations by Dohihara, allowed the Japanese to take control of the nascent
country's national defense and foreign policy, "at the request of the new
administration."  The Japanese were also kind enough to remove from their
Manchurian brethren the burden of running the province's communications and
transportation networks.   Dohihara also negotiated the agreement with the
Chinese leadership of Chahar province, adjacent to Hopei, into which the
Japanese from 1933 were steadily expanding, which among other things allowed
the Japanese to transfer the army of a warlord they had in their pay from
Chahar into Hopei, thereby increasing their influence in that province even
more.  The Japanese, BTW, were using their position in Hopei-Chahar not only as
a potential staging area/jumping off point for future military expansion, but
also as a convenient center for the attempted economic subversion of China
proper.  One aspect of this latter plan was the flooding of China with
counterfeit currency, aimed at undermining the entire monetary system.  This
was launched from Hopei-Chahar with the full support of the military, including
their transport.  Drug smuggling of opium and heroin into China from
Japanese-controlled territories was also widespread and under direct military
supervision (as were the profits from the trade).  Both Dohihara and Itagaki
were executed.
        I should mention, in connection with the events in China in the early
and mid 'thirties, the activities of one far-sighted officer, General Kenji
Ishiwara.  Ishiwara, as a colonel, was a fierce and eloquent advocate of
expansion, and one of the philosophical leaders of the Manchurian takeover.  By
1937 he was chief of operations for the Army general staff.  Ishiwara had
however become more pacifist as the years progressed.  He, too, believed that
with Manchuria Japan had acquired enough territory and resources to survive and
prosper, at least for the immediate future.  In July 1937 he was fiercely
opposed to expansion of the war in China, rightly predicting that China was too
vast to be easily conquered, that despite Japanese racial propaganda the
Chinese were not bad soldiers, and that the attitude of the western powers was
too uncertain and could be a source of trouble later.  Ishiwara even went so
far as to, on his own initiative, cancel Prime Minister Konoye's initial
mobilization orders when it appeared an agreement could be reached.  It is only
fitting that the actions of a man willing to risk his career to oppose a war he
thought foolhardy should also be mentioned in the text.  Ishiwara's career was
in fact ruined.  He was transferred to the backwater job of commanding Kyoto
military district in 1939, then given command of 16th Division in 1940, and
finally retired in 1941.
        I also wanted to add one more prominent assassination to my earlier
list of acts of gekokujo.  I didn't mention anything on the home front between
the May 1932 incident and the 2/26 Incident of 1936, but, among other things,
in August 1935 an Army lt-colonel shot and killed Major-General Nagata, chief
of the War Ministry's Military Bureau, allegedly because Nagata, whose bureau
dealt with many budgetary affairs, was "putting the Army in the paws of high
finance."
        I also wanted to mention that despite my confusion, I was correct in
saying that Lin Piao commanded for a time the Communist Chinese 8th Route Army.
Lin, who was officially described as "Mao's closest comrade-in-arms," was the
Chinese Communist version of the ideal soldier.  He had held various training
and administrative positions under Chiang Kai-Shek during the early period of
Communist co-operation with the Kuomintang.  After the Shanghai massacres of
1927, he eventually joined Mao's guerilla forces, and by 1937 was commanding
the various elements in northern China that would eventually be coalesced into
the famous 8th Route Army-- Lin was in fact one of that army's founders.  His
division inflicted the first bona fide defeat on the Japanese in China a few
months after the war began.  In 1939 Lin was severely wounded, and spent most
of the next two years recuperating.  After the end of WW2, he commanded the
Chinese Communist forces in Manchuria in what turned out to be the decisive
campaign of the civil war against Chiang.  Then he commanded the Chinese armies
which attacked MacArthur across the Yalu river in Korea, and turned that war
into a stalemate (where his mass attack tactics proved costly but somewhat
effective-- the Chinese were one of the few armies that had enough manpower for
"bamboo spear tactics" to work).
        Speaking of bamboo spear tactics, I wanted to say one last thing about
the 1944 Japanese offensive in Burma.  Liddel Hart, in his "History of the
Second World War," has this to say, in summation of that campaign; that the
Japanese "forfeited their advantage in tactical skill by blind conformity to an
unrealistic military tradition."  Couldn't have said it better myself (which
is, I guess, why I'm trailing old Basil a bit in the book sales department).  I
suppose it only remains for me to draw the parallels with Guadalcanal, of which
there were many, not least of which were the overconfidence of certain
commanders, conspicuously poor staff work, horribly insufficient logistical
preparation for the demands of the campaign, and a general abandonment of
tactical principles which had been proven to work in favor of an all-out
commitment to the offensive.  In Burma the results were as bad as at
Guadalcanal, only on an even greater scale.  The Japanese lost 50,000 of the
84,000 troops who participated.  Of these, some 20,000 died of disease or
starvation in fighting through some of the worst malarial jungle in the world.
Preparations for this offensive were so lacking that some of the attack units
were counting on capturing enemy stores for their food resupply once their
original issue of rations ran out.  Failing that, they were supposed to kill
and butcher their pack animals and forage for edible plants!  Some detailed
planning.  The three divisions and one tank regiment which formed the spearhead
of this venture and did most of the fighting-- some of it on Indian soil in the
mountainous frontier region-- were virtually wiped out.  Many junior officers
bitterly complained of the obviously deficient staff arrangements for offensive
action.  Much of the blame can be apportioned to the Japanese commander in
northwestern Burma, General Renya Mutaguchi.  Mutaguchi as a colonel had
commanded the regiment involved in the Marco Polo Bridge incident which started
the Chinese war in 1937, and used to boast he had fired the first shot.  He had
commanded the spearhead 18th Division in the conquest of Malaya and Singapore,
and during earlier fighting in Burma before being appointed commander of 15th
Army.  Mutaguchi insisted on an offensive, allegedly for "preventive" reasons
(although the Japanese with their better small-unit tactics and the defender's
advantage in difficult terrain had done a pretty good job of "preventing" every
British offensive for the past two years).
        While discussing casualties, I wanted to mention that on Guadalcanal
the Japanese lost about 25,000 men killed.  Of these, about 9,000 died of
disease or starvation.  The significance of that battle was not in sheer
numbers, but in the fact that the combined strength of the Japanese naval and
air units was no longer sufficient to guarantee victory, and that the Army when
fighting at something like equal odds (actually, they were progressively
outnumbered as the Allies came to win the aero-naval supply war) proved
woefully inadequate to its task.  In the battle of Bloody Ridge (Sept '42) the
Japanese lost about 1,200 killed, half of Kawaguchi's force, and for the
October offensive estimates range from 2,000-3,500 dead (while the Marines at
the main point of attack suffered less than 200 casualties).

        Now, honestly, I'm going to shut up about Japan for a long while.

        Regards

        Mike Yaklich

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

End of WWII-L Digest - 20 Feb 1995 to 21 Feb 1995
*************************************************