Are there any special episodes on China or asia planned ( not counting nukes) I loved your series but the Asian theater really lacked details and now you will even start a new series. While the war is still going on. Which is sure to divide resources?
I'm not sure how you're going to do it, but I'm sure it will be difficult to cover both timelines throughout the summer. Best of luck! I believe in you guys!
If I remember Churchill's World War II memoirs correctly, he couldn't believe Americans were wasting their time worrying about what was happening in China. He felt the Chinese would continue fighting each other forever and would never become a unified force worth dealing with.
@@scottlarson1548 Churchill was right. Mao great leap forward little red book and cultural revolution almost destroyed China. It was America's miscalculation in sending President Nixon to China that started the world down the path to China as a dangerous world power.
@@scottlarson1548 Churchill was an imperialist and was trying to undermine China so as to regain extraterritoriality and so that they would not come for Hong Kong. Churchill wanted to uphold the British Empire.
If you want story of civilians on Okinawa, read 'The Girl with the White Flag' by Tomiko Higa. She was 7 during the battle. I got to meet her in 1995 while stationed on Okinawa.
I feel like since the the end of the war in Europe, you've had more time in the episodes to really dive into the political machinations in the US, Chinese, and Japanese governments and armed forces. I'm all here for it, it's fascinating stuff!
You are very much correct. It’s also nice to only have to use 10-12 sources per episode instead of 25-30. My workload has not been cut in half but close. Of course, our Korean War coverage begins in ten days (June 25) so I’ve still been busy writing that. B
Yes. The political situation in China was pretty much not covered in US schools world history in the 1970s and 1980s. Everything was very Euro centric.
What people often forget is that both Mao and Chiang were brilliant scheming politicians during their own power struggles. However, some of Chiang's mistakes (and the poor optics, as Indy called out) absolutely tanked his odds of winning a continuation of the civil war.
It's a great advertisement for the power of language and a grave warning for all the western countries that are closing down the humanities faculties of their universities.
You can find images of them online quite easily if your curious to see them as well as some leaflets talking about the power of propaganda from that period.
An additional note about Chiang Kai-shek's survival against the Japanese this past 8 years: that's with China's industrial centres largely in shambles or occupied by Japan - this isn't like the Battle of Britain where a reasonably organized country is holding out while mostly seeing to the most critical needs of its citizens and has decent capacity to continue producing munitions....China was already a mess in 1937, that's kinda why Japan invaded - looked like too good of an opportunity to pass up. All their ports have been occupied for years by now, and the Japanese have continuously threatened the handful of supply routes left, like the Burma Road. Chaing Kai-shek isn't holding out with a well supplied army with fresh equipment and such, he's been clinging on for dear life with whatever equipment his forces can dig up. The fact that these guys are still in the fighting isn't just competence, it's a degree of brilliance that is very much no well recognized. Side note: while I think that with less competent leadership, Chinese forces would have eventually fallen to Japan, I think China itself would still be holding down plenty of troops. I feel like the Chinese people would be quite willing to throw themselves into the kind of insurgency that ties up all sorts of folks in security roles, and given the sheer size of China, I can easily see that taking the million soldiers Japan has in China to try to respond to it.
I do suspect that Chiang and the Nationalists surviving is also like with the USSR, due to China's size and Japan lacking the capability to conquer all of it. Especially after Pearl Harbour, when Japan's main focus shifted elsewhere.
You can see exactly what Japan had in mind for all of China with what they set up in Manchuria; it would just have been with Wang Jingwei instead of with Puyi. Another point to add: People tend to forget that Chiangs forces had to fight not only the Japanese, they also had to fight skirmishes with the chinese communists and the Soviets, who invaded Xinjang in 1944. Chiang had very limited forces, and had to do alot with those: resist the Japanese, resist the communists, supress the warlords and keep his own government intact.
@@ChaptermasterPedroKantor-kv5yw Oh for sure, defending a gigantic country and losing all the big cities that would traditionally be considered critical points to defend early gives you a lot of room to work maneuver and strategic retreat in your favour as the defending commander. But you still need to be competent enough a leader to recognize that and implement it while simultaneously keeping your forces motivated. Granted, memories of stuff like Nanking would be *extremely* motivating, but still...morale is a thing, and a war where you're constantly backpedaling to strategic ambush points and then abandoning that ground so the enemy never knows where you are is the kind of warfare we're talking about it, and it's really demoralizing for the front line forces to have to retreat all the time. China's size and Japan's activities in other theatres gave Chiang Kai-shek the opportunity to survive long term, along with the tenuous lifeline and general support of the Allies, etc. But Chiang Kai-shek didn't just have the chance, he realized how to go about seizing it; many commanders of history have failed easier challenges.
@@ChaptermasterPedroKantor-kv5ywwell Pearl Harbour happened because the Japanese were losing in China and the US made the token gesture of not supplying the Japanese fuel to continue the war in China. Pearl Harbour and the strike south could be seen as an expansion of the Japan China war by Japan , to keep to war in China going, that went very badly wrong.
Well, no, a comparison between the UK and China at this point is really bad. A 'reasonably organized' country; the UK is one of the old great powers and industrial powers of the world, and was able to go toe to toe with Germany in North Africa with an inferior, undersupplied force. China in 1937 was in the throes of its 25 year civil war, and was not a major power anymore. If China was even in the equivalent state it was in in 1989, then Japan wouldn't even dare invade the place.
A sidenote this week on June 15 1945 is that the *North American P-82 (later renamed F-82) Twin Mustang* will make its first flight in the skies. It is notable for being the last American piston-engined fighter ordered into production by the newly formed post-war United States Air Force and the war ended before the first production units could be operational. However, it would go on to serve in postwar conflicts such as the Korean War and beyond.
The research and presentation of this week in the war was tremendously well done. I mean, each of your episodes are excellent, but the nuanced coverage of the Chang vs Mao political and military maneuvering was particularly top-class. Well done Indy and the research team!
You know, I will actually toot my own horn here. So far, I have done all of the research and writing for every single one of the regular weekly episodes. All myself. So love it or or hate it it’s all me. Not the specials, but all 300+ regular episodes. So I will say thank you, and thank you again, since I spend 50 hours a week writing this stuff, but also this week that I enjoyed finally having time to cover China properly for a bit, now that Europe is over and Okinawa winding down. The next few weeks will be just plain weird.
@@Southsideindy Ah I see - in that case I'm all the more impressed! It's like finding out that one of your favorite singers writes their own songs - you appreciate them even more. Allow me then to properly thank you Indy for your Titanic efforts in putting this series together, and I greatly look forward to your coverage of the coming weirdness 😁
WW2 was Chiang Prime. However, the conflict with Stilwell and the IJA left him in a weakened state where he could only access 50% of his original power. Mao spent the war in the Hyperbolic China Chamber, so by the end he should likely be far more powerful.
Halsey may had survived the review, but his reputation was permanently damaged and it wasn't long until he retired. Probably his final mistake was publicly supporting MacArthur, but we'll get more of that with the Korean War series.
This week in French news. The 9th, General Doyen with the concurs of De Gaulle accepts to withdraw his troops from Italy. French occupation in Italy ends the 10th of July. The 15th, an ordinance ends censorship in France. The 16th, Air France (a plane company) is nationalized.
I read that line as "ordinance ends censorship in France" and immediately wondered who they dropped ordinance on to stop them from censoring things...... English is a weird language.
@@senderoverland Sorry fellow, English is a strange nonsensical mix of most everything. It is only important as the unfortunate default remnant of the Colonial Experts, the English, forcing it on 1/2 the world by the point of a gun ! (& the only language I happen to know)
@@MrStevossorry, but most languages are strange nonsensical mix of everything, as in every thing. English definitely became the lingua franca thanks to the Americans, and not the British (I think you meant this by using the word the English) who liberated the world by the point of a gun. I, French citizen, was not forced to learn it by the point of a gun, rather, my parents born in 1941 were saved by the aforementioned gun. The rest of your ranting sounds very much like propaganda made by countries who are far more imperialistic, colonialist and racist than England in this day and age.
And what really bugs me most is watching the Tigers beating the Astros 13-5 in the 9th inning. Thanks for the concern, for real too- I mean it, but I egotistically think I’ll survive.
You guys just continue do outdo yourselves. This episode describes every aspect of every reason why we have the Taiwan situation today. Amazing work TGA! ❤ And yes, Yalta has a lot to answer for (Korea split in half, Taiwan, Vietnam - all can be linked to a few decisions at Yalta)
Man I sure love these series. Best documentary style series I’ve seen. Seen WW1, and this so far. Between two wars is good too. Subbing now to next Korean War. So sad what humanity does to itself.
Thanks! You know, when I started the Great War I didn’t realize I was changing the whole path of my life, but ten years later it’s what I do, and no plans to stop.
@@extrahistory8956 in the process to absolve Chiang from allied criticisms, which are kinda shitty and too harsh on chiang especially from stillwel, they move too much to praise They chose to specifically mention the communists' opium trade to contrast against chiang's views on the trade, but that's the basically the general opinion. Morally opposed but was a good source of cash and even the governemnt and KMT aligned warlords engaged in it. The communists' politicking is cast as a shrewd manipulation of the situation while Chiang's is portrayed as an oppressed figure too stretched out to deal with the problems of the government.
I'm still catching up on a bunch of stuff I've missed in 1942 onwards. Major changes in the Pacific and Asian theatres from three years ago. I love this series. Thank you TimeGhost team.
Yet it was his government and his military that so alienated the people that they followed that prick Mao, plunging one of the oldest civilizations into the darkness of Maoism.
@@matthewmcmacken6716 I would post links to articles that cite other POWs that were there. However YT would kick the comments. Suffice to say one of the people that brought these accusations was fired from his position on a political actiom group and Fox news would no longer accept him as a guest because of the falsehoods he presented.
Hey Indy, I really like how your summary in many ways helps to 'redeem' Chiang compared to the public perception of him as a useless failure, as he really did have one of the most difficult balancing acts of the war. However, I think you went a little too far to claim that Chiang refused to partake in the opium trade. While it's hard to tell if Chiang is *personally* involved, there's plenty of evidence that people who worked closely with him, including various elements in the KMT high eschelons, his in-law families, and especially the Shanghai Green Gang whom were instrumental to his rise to power, all made large sums of profits from the opium trade. Meanwhile Chiang, at the very best, turned a blind eye towards them. His own son and later successor -- the soviet-educated Chiang Ching-kuo -- would write scathingly about this topic later. Also, one of the greatest ironies of WW2 is that Chiang's strategic policy -- which he stuck to the whole war as your summarized - was recommended to him by a German general (Falkenhausen), whom Chiang considered a personal friend even after the war.
Chiang tried to supress Opium in the "New Life Movement", but it was probably impossible to end the trade while the country was divided between warlords.
Americans on Okinawa: Holy shit, look at all these dudes! Our propaganda department must've finally gotten their act together! Bull Halsey: I'm never going to a naval academy reunioun ever again. Mao: Power is mine! All mine! Mine, mine, mine! *laughs like Igor*
This is fascinating. So much of what is going on with all the politics can be used to understand what is going on with politics in any era. I really appreciate that all sides point of view are being shared❤ ❤
True, and I am glad he "swung" after Nuremberg. However, fortunately for the allies he was incompetent as a diplomat. Had they had any true talented and Machiavellian diplomat, he could have probably been able to stall Entrance of the Allies (especially the U.S) into the European war. That is assuming Hitler would have listened to this persons advice.
He also signed the so called Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, assigning the Baltics and Finland under Soviet sphere of influence. The echoes of that deal can still be seen in the Russian point of view about world affairs.
I dont know, he was a diplomat, I dont think he deserved the death penalty, especially so knowing Albert Speer, a top nazi from 1942 onwards, survived.
@@eldarrissman4172 The funny thing about the German diplomatic corps at this period is that they're mostly composed of men who shouldn't even be made diplomats in the first place. We're talking about SA officers who earned their rank from direct street fights and uncompromising steadfastness to the Party line trying to navigate through the intricacies of foreign diplomacy. One of them, sent to Bulgaria, so displeases the Tsar there due to his boorishness that half the time he wasn't allowed inside the throne room until he looks and acts presentable...
I'm really enjoying the more detailed looks at what it was like on the ground, and the political aspects of the conflict now that the scope of the war has been paired down. This is making me look forward to the Korean series even more!
I'll love to see a band of brothers type of movie for the Australian 9th Infantry - Desert Warfare in North Africa for Siege of Tobruk, and Battle of El Alamein. Then a big pivot to Jungle warfare in PNG for Salamaua-Lae and Huon Peninsula. Now they are operating as marines.
Halsey said he didn’t get good info so couldn’t avoid the storm. Meanwhile one of Nelson’s last orders at Trafalgar was that he felt a storm would come soon and to prepare the fleet. A few days later nelson was proved correct. Seamanship is a hard skill.
this was a masterclass in clearly and concisely explaining a complicated political situation (in China) that in many ways was and is completely alien to the western way of thinking. Yet again this channel has shown itself to be one of the greatest things in the english language history scene today.
There is a book called I was the girl with the White Flag, which gives the civilian side of the battle. On the first day of the invasion, her father went to visit a Japanese radar station near their home and apparently was killed when it was bombed. Her mother had died of cancer the previous year. When they were forced out of their home by the fighting, she became separated from her older sisters, and roamed the battlefield mostly alone for a month. Aside from a close encounter with random shelling, the closest she came to death was being chased over a cliff by a Japanese officer who wanted to behead her to "save" her from the dire fate of falling into the hands of the Americans. She was saved by a bush which caught her clothes. She spent a week in a cave with an elderly couple, he immobile, she blind. She tended them, and they had an emergency food stock. When the loudspeakers announced that the caves would be sealed, they sent her out with a white flag. She was seven years old. (Her older brother had also been killed by a random shot, but she was reunited with her sisters)
My uncle was born this week 1945. He passed May 8, 2024 a few weeks short of his 79th birthday and 59th wedding anniversary. We are now losing the generation that came after this war.
22:02 My grandmother was one of Them. She was just 12 years old when they (she, her mother and her siblings) we're told to leave their house within the next few hours and to Join a trail heading towards Bavaria. She told me this Story Back when i was just a child. This illustrates that even after the end of the war the suffering continued.
Always wondered how Halsey could remain in command after so many screwups. At the very least, the navy managed to keep him away from the main fight and instead had more competent men like Kincaid and Spruance with the vital jobs.
Aggressiveness throughout the war counted for a lot. After Pearl Harbor, he was in the right place to fight back with what little we had to actually use. And he did, even with mistakes and losses. People remembered and responded to that.
I think that is a bit unfair to Halsey. His influence in the first US island invasion (Guadalcanal) should be beyond question, and pretty much bought him a pass for the rest of the war. He was genuinely popular amomngst all his staff, and morale would have been hard hit if he had been replaced.
@@davidcolin6519 It just seems to me that at this point, his faults where overwhelming compared to his strengths. And judging from Clark and Radford's assessments, his popularity has some serious limits.
To be honest, Halsey’s most infamous mistake (Leyte Gulf) wasn’t that much of a mistake. Yes, he took the Japanese bait, but way too many people ognore that providing direct support and cover for the landings WASN’T his responsibility; it was Kinkaid’s, as it was Seventh Fleet and not Third Fleet that was in large of the support role.
@@kenle2 Halsey seems to excell in places where 'hit em hard, hit em fast' aggressiveness and boldness are needed but falters greatly when calmness, cool headedness, and patience are required. Unfortunately for him, the latter became very common place scenarios near the end of the war. I honestly doubt someone like Spruance or Kincaid would've blundered into typhoons willy nily or left Taffy 3 in the lurch without a smidge of 'just in case Center Force comes out to play' preparation.
These closing stages of the war have really shown how seemingly naive the USA has been with geopolitics, first with Stalin and now with Mao. Of course hindsight is 2020 but it would have been interesting to see how it would have panned out if the USA had been as sceptical of the Soviets as Britain/Churchill was. For instance we saw US forces as the war was ending not advancing and securing areas as they deemed them to have no military purposes, leaving the Soviets to take control of them.
This episode really helped show the person who benefited from Ichi Go last year the most: Mao. The Japanese overextended themselves, Chiang suffered a bunch of defeats and nearly had his military power transferred to an American general. It will be interesting to see if Mao will make a grab for power once the war's over!
@@DavidMcdonald-df8tb U can't blame Mao for this, the Communists was nearly annihilated. And even after the Second Chinese Front was made and Chang was spared despite being sent to Communist Custody in the Xi An incident. Chang even raided the communists, try to undermine communist armaments, who were still recovering. You can't blame Mao or the communists to take a careful stance. It was just that Chiang's spite and Japan's buffonary was taken advantage for the sake of survival. Should Chang truly honoured the United Front, don't break any promises. He wouldn't have weaken so politically and Mao would be in amuch toughter state.
It would be really interesting to see Special made by you guys about Chiang Kai-shek. Here in Finland atleast we learn very little in history about Asian affairs of 1900-2000 and it has been very interesting to hear about all these stories other than just the usual Pearl Harbor and Nuke parts of Asian history.
I think it's also a good argument to say that if any of the allied commanders had spent even a week or two on the ground in China and seen the actual state of the front line Chinese army, there would not have been nearly as many complaints.
Most of them did. Stilwell was the American military attaché in China from 1938 to 1939 and he had been stationed there previously. He was terrible for China regardless. The issue was that they tended to miss the politics of the whole thing. The other thing was that they didn't like the Chinese theory of victory which was defeat the Japanese by outlasting them.
Some of the US Marine officers had, though they were not in the most senior levels of command and had special operations roles. Both Merrit Edson and Evans Carlson, commander officers of the 1st and 2nd Marine Raider Battalions respectively, had seen service in China prior to the U.S. entry into the war. Edson had served as a major and operations officer with the 4th Marine Regiment at Shanghai from 1937 - 1939, where also observed Japanese military operations against the Chinese nationalists. Carlson had also served with the 4th Marines in Shanghai, though prior to Edson. He later returned to China in 1937 to study the Chinese language and during this time also was posted as a military observer with Chinese nationalist forces battling the Japanese. Later he traveled thousands of miles on horseback across the interior of the country to link up with and observe Chinese communist guerillas in action against the Japanese. Interestingly Carlson was impressed by the guerillas and applied some of their principles to the 2nd Marine Raider battalion. Carlson adopted an egalitarian style of command inspired by the guerillas where officers had no priviliges due to their rank, lived alongside the men, and senior NCOs mentored officers. Using tactics that were also influenced by his observation of the guerillas, he led the famous Long Patrol on Guadalcanal, a nearly month long operation behind Japanese lines that harassed retreating Japanese forces and inflicted around 500 enemy KIA for only 16 of his own. Edson and the 1st Marine Raider battalion were employed in the defense of Lunga point, part of the overall defense of Henderson Field on Guadalcanal, against Japanese assaults. On Bloody Ridge (later named Edson's Ridge) the 800 or so men of the 1st Marine Raider battalion and 2 attached companies of the 2nd Parachute Battalion held out against ferocious assaults by approximately 3,000 Japanese, though at the cost of 256 casualties. They were heavily involved in the later actions along the Matinikau, both of which contributed heavily to the ultimate failure of the Japanese to take Henderson Field. Tl;dr: Two Marine special operations officers that played significant roles in the Allied victories on Guadalcanal had learned from pre-war experiences with both Chinese nationalist & communist forces.
@@ahorsewithnoname773 That's super interesting. Did they get involved with the post war Marines in China? There is a reason Eugene Sledge's second book is called China Marine.
It would be great to see a war against humanity episode about the civilians on Okinawa. The atrocities committed by both armies (especially the Japanese military since Okinawans weren't considered "true Japanese"). This is still an issue on the island to this day and flares up every time there is a new national history book introduced in the national school system.
The Japanese mechanics in Godzilla Minus One expressed the same sentiments. They knew they were losing, and didn't see any point in sacrificing their lives when there's a post-war world on the horizon
During the 1970s and 80s I got to talk with some Navy Veterans about Halsey and the Typhoons. The Typhoons are used as example of the difference of prewar/postwar bias. People forget how bad weather prediction was before WW2, in 1938 a completely unexpected catagory5 hurricane Hit Long Island and Rhode island without warning. The Japanese had the 4th Fleet Incident during the inter-war years. Great Strides were made with weather prediction during WW2, but older officers would often not trust Weather reports. Halsey's superiors had been at sea prewar when weather prediction at sea (especially with wartime communications blackouts and the enemy controlling areas where the Storm might be coming from) would be pretty bad.
I resisted watching this; having fought myself through the BarbaraTuchman book (stillwell & the American experience in China) what more could I learn? I am glad that i listened!
You need to read Forgotten Ally by Rana Mitter and Tower of Skulls by Richard Frank. Factually, tuchman is good. She does her citations right. The problem when she starts talking about personality and intention. The problem is she never questions whether Stilwell was actually good at his job. Why would he, a guy who last fought in WW1 as a colonel, know more about fighting Japan with Chinese troops than the actual Chinese commanders? Why would he have a "hunch" in March of 1942 that the Japanese were weak? They had just taken Malaya, Hong Kong, Rangoon, Jakarta, and had Corregidor under siege.... But he had a hunch. Tuchman just puts in the quote without exploring what that says about his judgement. His plan for Burma in 1942 was nuts. He wanted troops from China, under his American command, to work with Indian and Burmese troops under British command, to conduct a forward elastic defense and counterattack against Japanese forces who had not yet known defeat in southeast Asia. Oh, and they would have less than two weeks to prepare... That is obviously going to fail. It took the British and the French who have decades of working together, months to figure out their arrangements and they still had coordination problems. But somehow Tuchman echoes without comment Stilwell's insistence it's Chiang's fault that the Stilwell ad hoc multinational plan that relied on Chinese and British troops coordinating perfectly and being faster than Japan failed. Tuchman also shares Stilwell's indignation that Chiang didn't respect his obvious strategic brilliance after losing tens of thousands of China's troops in the Burmese jungle.
@@porksterbob Don't repress your feelings, let it all out. The Tuchman book was published in 1971, during the Viet Nam War. "Fire In the Lake" by Frances Fitzgerald, about Viet Nam, was published about the same time and Richard Nixon would go to China. The people who went into a bookstore in 1971 and paid full price, didn't want a book that insulted General Stilwell, and by extension, themselves. Many of these men would have been veterans of World War 2. Nearly any other American officer, trained at West Point, would have behaved in a similar fashion. He may have been wrong, but he was wrong in the best traditions of West Point. One thing the Tuchman book emphasized, was the ground war versus the air war, could an air base exist in a vacuum. General Chennault versus General Stilwell, not General Stilwell versus General Chiang, would have been important to US internal politics. Foreign politics doesn't win presidential elections in the US, but the battle for money between the ground grabbers and the fly boys would still go on. Something like 3/4ths of China's oil now passes Viet Nam, so that control over Viet Nam was important, if not successful. Suggested reading, "No Drums, No Bugles" by Charles Durden, "Close Quarters" by Larry Heinemann, "A Bright Shining Lie" by Neil Sheehan.
@@gordybing1727 I don't quite get the Vietnam segue... but let's continue. Stilwell vs. Chennault is an interesting case. Stilwell was right that the ground war more important than the air war, but he was very, very wrong in him not understanding his own position or his own role. He didn't see his Chinese counterparts as being his equals and felt he was always the smartest person in the room. Now, other "West Point" generals may not have done better. But, two points there. First, famously, Bill Slim was the only Western General to ask the Chinese how they had won their few victories, something Stilwell never did. He felt that he already knew what was wrong and how to fix it. Second, Stilwell was the 9th West Point educated officer in China. There were already 8 Chinese officers in the National Revolutionary Army who had also gone to West Point. Unlike Stilwell, who graduated in 1904, the other generals graduated between 1912 and 1937. The point is that China had generals who went to West Point. Stilwell's military education in America did not make him unique relative to some of his Chinese counterparts.
To sail into one typhoon is understandable. To do it twice might be considered carelessness. Might be a good idea to replace your weathermen. Did the Peter Principle apply?
Interestingly not the first conflict it happened, in 1274 and 1281 it wiped out a Mongolian invasion fleet that were attempting to take Japan. They called it the divine wind.
Really puts into focus how Nationalist China was only held together by the war against Japan. It was basically just a carryover of the warlord era but with Chiang was the chief warlord, many of the sub-warlords didn't like Chiang so he was under a precarious situation of keeping them in line so he could maintain his power, foreign powers appeared to have even less love for Chiang, the armies under the banner more or less acted independently and just as likely to loot and pillage as the Japanese were, the people had little love for them despite fighting the invaders for nearly a decade (and more in some areas), etc. It isn't hard to see why at the time people had warmer feelings toward the communists and is very hard to see how the Nationalist project wouldn't have imploded even if the civil war didn't restart after WW2.
The war with Japan caused the implosion. In the areas where the nationalists had firm control like the lower Yangtze, lots of things were moving in the right direction. The people were being educated. There was industry. The Central army was increasing in size and reducing the power of independent military forces. Once the war started, all of those core nationalist areas were taken. The industry was destroyed. The Central Army bore the brunt of the fighting and suddenly Chiang had to ask the warlords for additional forces.
Halsey was way over rated! Of the great naval battles of WW II, he was only in command at Leyte Gulf and almost caused a complete disaster there. Of the various fleet commanders in the Pacific, he was the least worthy of receiving a fifth star, yet he got it. Pure politics.
Halsey was in control during the Guadalcanal campaign, and that was basically _the_ turning point in the Pacific. (of course, the US still suffered a ton of naval losses there, but that was due to local commanders being... disappointments) There's great channels that dive into the specifics: Drachinifel, and The Unauthorized History of the Pacific War Podcast. They both skewer Halsey where appropriate, but also give him a fair shake where he earned it :)
@@MrNicoJac Yeah, but Halsey really topped out as a Task Group commander. He was certainly too hungry for glory at Leyte, at that point just take the gains. Fletcher was screwed over by King and poor Naval Intelligence. He would have been better at Leyte.
I would be fascinated to learn more about the Ryukyu Shoho. To call it a newspaper suggests that it was more than a mere leaflet. How many pages was it, typically? Did it cover anything beyond the immediate military situation on Okinawa? How was it distributed to the Japanese troops? Is there anyplace, either online or as physical media, where I could read it in translation?
The "cult of personality" in politics is a old as human kind ! It unfortunately continues to this very day. And therefore we poor common folk seldom end up with leaders who have our best interests at the top of their agendas ...
19:59 that John McCain guy surely destroyed his family's future legacy with that blinder. I don't see how the future could ever look kindly on the name McCain
Written with tongue firmly in cheek, I trust. His grandson, bearing the patriarch's name, would run for president of the US although some would wonder whether his choice of a vice-presidential running mate in 2008 was wise.
This is quite a development indeed. I never thought that forcing the Japanese soldiers in surrendering by telling them that their military commanders are "corrupt and incompetent" have a strong effect that it was hopeless in continuing and prolonging a battle even though the word "surrendering" was avoided in using and still IS the main tool even though not mentioned in making the enemy face to face, mano e mano that it's over. Sidenote too, On June 10, 1945 Davao in the island of Mindanao,Philippines is finally free from Japanese control. Interestingly though, that place had the high number of Japanese Nationals and Civilians than any other places in the Philippines and SPOILER once the whole war is over, those Japanese are either repatriated or forcibly expelled back to their country due to the enmity of the Filipinos OR incorporated alongside the rest of the Filipino Population in the postwar.
@@extrahistory8956 Not necessarily. The homeland would be defended more bitterly, the cult of the emperor might be stronger, the people more completely indoctrinated and the resources for the Japanese army greater. I would think the resistance would still be immense.
I think Indy meant that it was a tractor battalion, as he said “American tractor and engineer battalion.” The unit would have been the 727th Amphibian Tractor Battalion.
I studied under Knight Biggerstaff, who had met Mao several times during the war as a member of a US diplomatic delegation,. He stressed that Mao and Stalin were NOT actual natural allies despite their lip service to communism.. During the thirties, Stalin supported Chiang Kai Shek, not Mao, in part because Stalin did not want a rival as head of the International side of the Communist movement. Stalin's support for Mao might likely be predicated on the acceptance of Soviet supremacy in the Communist movement. This did not mean that the US could trust Mao,, but that his actions could not be predicted based on simple assumption of a mutual interest in the success of communism.
The Soviets supported Chiang in the thirties because they knew he would be a far more capable anti Japanese fighter. Once the Japanese were dealt with, the soviets moved to supporting the CCP.
17:45 - my father told me a story of when he was on sentry duty at night in England. He was alone on a particularly dark night and he heard footsteps coming towards him. He called out 'Friend or Foe'. But no reply came. The steps came closer and again and again he called out 'Friend or Foe'. Nothing. The steps were right on top of him but he was terrified to kill a civilian - like a child. He was just about to fire his rifle when a giant tongue licked his face. It was a horse. ☮
One could hope the Borneo campaign in the coming weeks will have more coverage on local guerilla forces. That had been being prepared for months by Allied operatives who had been paradropped into the Kelabit highlands.
The Korean War gets closer every week, don't miss it on June 25th!
Don't forget to subscribe: www.youtube.com/@KoreanWarbyIndyNeidell
Are there any special episodes on China or asia planned ( not counting nukes)
I loved your series but the Asian theater really lacked details and now you will even start a new series. While the war is still going on. Which is sure to divide resources?
I'm not sure how you're going to do it, but I'm sure it will be difficult to cover both timelines throughout the summer. Best of luck! I believe in you guys!
I wish Chang kai-shek had Sherman Fireflies and P51D Mustangs at the start of the Chinese Civil War
thanks for the detailed description of Chiang's political position, and that it was not as easy as "fire this idiot, the rest won't mind"
Will you do a special on the Forest Brothers who continued fighting the Soviets after the war in Europe was officially over?
What a mess the whole Chinese situation has become. Still, really appreciate Indy picking apart the common myths of that front.
The Chinese situation has been a mess since the 1840's. They call it the century of humiliation for a good reason.
He really goes at the communists here. Great to see
If I remember Churchill's World War II memoirs correctly, he couldn't believe Americans were wasting their time worrying about what was happening in China. He felt the Chinese would continue fighting each other forever and would never become a unified force worth dealing with.
@@scottlarson1548 Churchill was right. Mao great leap forward little red book and cultural revolution almost destroyed China. It was America's miscalculation in sending President Nixon to China that started the world down the path to China as a dangerous world power.
@@scottlarson1548 Churchill was an imperialist and was trying to undermine China so as to regain extraterritoriality and so that they would not come for Hong Kong. Churchill wanted to uphold the British Empire.
"Forget it, Jake. It's China in 1945."
If you want story of civilians on Okinawa, read 'The Girl with the White Flag' by Tomiko Higa. She was 7 during the battle. I got to meet her in 1995 while stationed on Okinawa.
I feel like since the the end of the war in Europe, you've had more time in the episodes to really dive into the political machinations in the US, Chinese, and Japanese governments and armed forces. I'm all here for it, it's fascinating stuff!
Ihighly recommend the book by Tony Judt Postwar who covers all of that very well.
You are very much correct.
It’s also nice to only have to use 10-12 sources per episode instead of 25-30. My workload has not been cut in half but close.
Of course, our Korean War coverage begins in ten days (June 25) so I’ve still been busy writing that. B
Yes.
The political situation in China was pretty much not covered in US schools world history in the 1970s and 1980s.
Everything was very Euro centric.
Got a hunch: that Mao guy is going places !
Yep, he’s definitely going somewhere. Here’s a quote rumoured to be from him: “I wash myself in my woman”. I’m guessing showering is for weaklings.
He should write a book. 📕
@@jdrobertson42 ...by stealing a bunch of ideas from the Irish Republicans?
@@jdrobertson42 What color would such a book possibly be?
He also shouldn't fight birds. It's a phyrric victory
What people often forget is that both Mao and Chiang were brilliant scheming politicians during their own power struggles. However, some of Chiang's mistakes (and the poor optics, as Indy called out) absolutely tanked his odds of winning a continuation of the civil war.
It’s funny how the U.S. regretted not supporting Chiang after China fell to the communists. Smh.
Do you guys have any information on that newspaper? Seriously, those guys need to be given an award for saving a lot of people.
It's a great advertisement for the power of language and a grave warning for all the western countries that are closing down the humanities faculties of their universities.
You can find images of them online quite easily if your curious to see them as well as some leaflets talking about the power of propaganda from that period.
An additional note about Chiang Kai-shek's survival against the Japanese this past 8 years: that's with China's industrial centres largely in shambles or occupied by Japan - this isn't like the Battle of Britain where a reasonably organized country is holding out while mostly seeing to the most critical needs of its citizens and has decent capacity to continue producing munitions....China was already a mess in 1937, that's kinda why Japan invaded - looked like too good of an opportunity to pass up. All their ports have been occupied for years by now, and the Japanese have continuously threatened the handful of supply routes left, like the Burma Road. Chaing Kai-shek isn't holding out with a well supplied army with fresh equipment and such, he's been clinging on for dear life with whatever equipment his forces can dig up. The fact that these guys are still in the fighting isn't just competence, it's a degree of brilliance that is very much no well recognized.
Side note: while I think that with less competent leadership, Chinese forces would have eventually fallen to Japan, I think China itself would still be holding down plenty of troops. I feel like the Chinese people would be quite willing to throw themselves into the kind of insurgency that ties up all sorts of folks in security roles, and given the sheer size of China, I can easily see that taking the million soldiers Japan has in China to try to respond to it.
I do suspect that Chiang and the Nationalists surviving is also like with the USSR, due to China's size and Japan lacking the capability to conquer all of it. Especially after Pearl Harbour, when Japan's main focus shifted elsewhere.
You can see exactly what Japan had in mind for all of China with what they set up in Manchuria; it would just have been with Wang Jingwei instead of with Puyi.
Another point to add: People tend to forget that Chiangs forces had to fight not only the Japanese, they also had to fight skirmishes with the chinese communists and the Soviets, who invaded Xinjang in 1944. Chiang had very limited forces, and had to do alot with those: resist the Japanese, resist the communists, supress the warlords and keep his own government intact.
@@ChaptermasterPedroKantor-kv5yw Oh for sure, defending a gigantic country and losing all the big cities that would traditionally be considered critical points to defend early gives you a lot of room to work maneuver and strategic retreat in your favour as the defending commander.
But you still need to be competent enough a leader to recognize that and implement it while simultaneously keeping your forces motivated. Granted, memories of stuff like Nanking would be *extremely* motivating, but still...morale is a thing, and a war where you're constantly backpedaling to strategic ambush points and then abandoning that ground so the enemy never knows where you are is the kind of warfare we're talking about it, and it's really demoralizing for the front line forces to have to retreat all the time.
China's size and Japan's activities in other theatres gave Chiang Kai-shek the opportunity to survive long term, along with the tenuous lifeline and general support of the Allies, etc. But Chiang Kai-shek didn't just have the chance, he realized how to go about seizing it; many commanders of history have failed easier challenges.
@@ChaptermasterPedroKantor-kv5ywwell Pearl Harbour happened because the Japanese were losing in China and the US made the token gesture of not supplying the Japanese fuel to continue the war in China. Pearl Harbour and the strike south could be seen as an expansion of the Japan China war by Japan , to keep to war in China going, that went very badly wrong.
Well, no, a comparison between the UK and China at this point is really bad. A 'reasonably organized' country; the UK is one of the old great powers and industrial powers of the world, and was able to go toe to toe with Germany in North Africa with an inferior, undersupplied force. China in 1937 was in the throes of its 25 year civil war, and was not a major power anymore. If China was even in the equivalent state it was in in 1989, then Japan wouldn't even dare invade the place.
This is one of your best episodes. A brilliant explanation of complex and little-known events. Well done!
Glad you enjoyed it!
A sidenote this week on June 15 1945 is that the *North American P-82 (later renamed F-82) Twin Mustang* will make its first flight in the skies. It is notable for being the last American piston-engined fighter ordered into production by the newly formed post-war United States Air Force and the war ended before the first production units could be operational. However, it would go on to serve in postwar conflicts such as the Korean War and beyond.
What about the Skyraider?
@@Pioneer_DEAttack plane not fighter plane
no splitting the planes in combat though :(
P-82 at this point. F-82 would mean a photo reconnaissance aircraft during the war.
@@davidpnewton Oh yes, I overlooked that. Updated it accordingly, thank you!
The research and presentation of this week in the war was tremendously well done.
I mean, each of your episodes are excellent, but the nuanced coverage of the Chang vs Mao political and military maneuvering was particularly top-class. Well done Indy and the research team!
You know, I will actually toot my own horn here. So far, I have done all of the research and writing for every single one of the regular weekly episodes. All myself.
So love it or or hate it it’s all me. Not the specials, but all 300+ regular episodes. So I will say thank you, and thank you again, since I spend 50 hours a week writing this stuff, but also this week that I enjoyed finally having time to cover China properly for a bit, now that Europe is over and Okinawa winding down.
The next few weeks will be just plain weird.
@@Southsideindy Ah I see - in that case I'm all the more impressed!
It's like finding out that one of your favorite singers writes their own songs - you appreciate them even more.
Allow me then to properly thank you Indy for your Titanic efforts in putting this series together, and I greatly look forward to your coverage of the coming weirdness 😁
"Mao's new powers"? How does Mao scale in the ww2 powerscaling universe? Can he 1v1 no diff Chiang?
WW2 was his training arc. I assume he could solo Chiang post it.
He has multiversal AP and immeasurable speed so he definitely one-shots Chiang.
WW2 was Chiang Prime. However, the conflict with Stilwell and the IJA left him in a weakened state where he could only access 50% of his original power. Mao spent the war in the Hyperbolic China Chamber, so by the end he should likely be far more powerful.
When you have so much clout you can sail a fleet into a Typhoon... Twice
Lol just like the mongols
Lol just like the mongol empire
and still build the largest naval empire during the war, probably in man's history
hello fellow eastern roman enjoyer btw
Halsey may had survived the review, but his reputation was permanently damaged and it wasn't long until he retired. Probably his final mistake was publicly supporting MacArthur, but we'll get more of that with the Korean War series.
Now we know why Marko Ramius called Halsey a "fool".
This week in French news.
The 9th, General Doyen with the concurs of De Gaulle accepts to withdraw his troops from Italy. French occupation in Italy ends the 10th of July.
The 15th, an ordinance ends censorship in France.
The 16th, Air France (a plane company) is nationalized.
Air France, a French airline.
I read that line as "ordinance ends censorship in France" and immediately wondered who they dropped ordinance on to stop them from censoring things...... English is a weird language.
@@Raskolnikov70english is the most important language
@@senderoverland Sorry fellow, English is a strange nonsensical mix of most everything.
It is only important as the unfortunate default remnant of the Colonial Experts, the English, forcing it on 1/2 the world by the point of a gun ! (& the only language I happen to know)
@@MrStevossorry, but most languages are strange nonsensical mix of everything, as in every thing. English definitely became the lingua franca thanks to the Americans, and not the British (I think you meant this by using the word the English) who liberated the world by the point of a gun. I, French citizen, was not forced to learn it by the point of a gun, rather, my parents born in 1941 were saved by the aforementioned gun.
The rest of your ranting sounds very much like propaganda made by countries who are far more imperialistic, colonialist and racist than England in this day and age.
I like that there are no paid promotions in the middle of these videos.
We have never- nor will we ever- had sponsors for the regular episodes or the regular sub series like war against humanity.
Never.
You are people of principle. It is recognised and admired.
Great episode again. And the way you pronounced Schiermonnikoog is really fabulous!
Thanks for the comment and thanks for watching!
Indy is going to lose some social credit for this one.
@Turnipstalk Well, not with that score he's not.
And what really bugs me most is watching the Tigers beating the Astros 13-5 in the 9th inning.
Thanks for the concern, for real too- I mean it, but I egotistically think I’ll survive.
Being an Astros fan is going to cause him to lose more popularity with the American audience, I think.
@@Southsideindy Hey, we will get them tomorrow.
@@marmotman151 you’re pretty right about that.
Man, Chiang played his cards unreasonably well, but he was dealt a terrible hand. I have issues with Chiang, but Mao was a devouring monster.
You guys just continue do outdo yourselves. This episode describes every aspect of every reason why we have the Taiwan situation today. Amazing work TGA! ❤
And yes, Yalta has a lot to answer for (Korea split in half, Taiwan, Vietnam - all can be linked to a few decisions at Yalta)
Thanks for watching!
Excellent, as always. This for me is dealing with events I am unfamiliar with. Good learning afoot.
Glad you are learning with us! Thanks for watching.
Tony Judt's magisterial book POSTWAR details the massive population relocations that followed WWII.
Man I sure love these series. Best documentary style series I’ve seen. Seen WW1, and this so far. Between two wars is good too. Subbing now to next Korean War. So sad what humanity does to itself.
Thanks!
You know, when I started the Great War I didn’t realize I was changing the whole path of my life, but ten years later it’s what I do, and no plans to stop.
There are several other video sets available.
Cuban missile crisis for one.
Thank you youtube for allowing this channel to bless us all with this content.
Finally, a great China episode. So good to put the contrast between the Western record against Japan vs. the Chinese one.
Huzzah, the profecy was true
The chinese part was pretty shitty but they have a chance to recitfy that if they do episodes during the chinesr civil war
@@rp-hr1qs How exactly?
@@extrahistory8956 in the process to absolve Chiang from allied criticisms, which are kinda shitty and too harsh on chiang especially from stillwel, they move too much to praise
They chose to specifically mention the communists' opium trade to contrast against chiang's views on the trade, but that's the basically the general opinion. Morally opposed but was a good source of cash and even the governemnt and KMT aligned warlords engaged in it.
The communists' politicking is cast as a shrewd manipulation of the situation while Chiang's is portrayed as an oppressed figure too stretched out to deal with the problems of the government.
@@rp-hr1qs That said, Mao did benefit from the fact that he had seldom participated in the war since 1940
I'm still catching up on a bunch of stuff I've missed in 1942 onwards. Major changes in the Pacific and Asian theatres from three years ago. I love this series. Thank you TimeGhost team.
Thank you for the lovely comment!
As Indy talks about Svalbard at about 21:34 you can see it in red on the map just over his head.
The background map has been very cute
Background map is inaccurate as hell @@1nsaniel
@@leaveme3559With all those inland rivers and lakes having been moved a few degrees westwards😅
Good eye!
Mao tightens his grip: Quick hide the western sheet music and instruments!
Especially the Red Violin.
Hiding it is useless!
You children or other family members (or cat) will report you to the Party!
Best episode you guys have ever done. Really great stuff.
Much appreciated!
Chang was one of the most underrated leaders of the war, he played the political game like a pro.
Yet it was his government and his military that so alienated the people that they followed that prick Mao, plunging one of the oldest civilizations into the darkness of Maoism.
And lost the civil war after destroying the Chinese economy.
I just figured it out: The Admiral Maccain was the grandfather of the late senator John Maccain.
AKA, 'Songbird'.
McCain.
@@matthewmcmacken6716
That accusation has been debunked.
@@shawnr771 - Nah, but thanks for playing.
@@matthewmcmacken6716
I would post links to articles that cite other POWs that were there. However YT would kick the comments.
Suffice to say one of the people that brought these accusations was fired from his position on a political actiom group and Fox news would no longer accept him as a guest because of the falsehoods he presented.
Hey Indy, I really like how your summary in many ways helps to 'redeem' Chiang compared to the public perception of him as a useless failure, as he really did have one of the most difficult balancing acts of the war. However, I think you went a little too far to claim that Chiang refused to partake in the opium trade.
While it's hard to tell if Chiang is *personally* involved, there's plenty of evidence that people who worked closely with him, including various elements in the KMT high eschelons, his in-law families, and especially the Shanghai Green Gang whom were instrumental to his rise to power, all made large sums of profits from the opium trade. Meanwhile Chiang, at the very best, turned a blind eye towards them. His own son and later successor -- the soviet-educated Chiang Ching-kuo -- would write scathingly about this topic later.
Also, one of the greatest ironies of WW2 is that Chiang's strategic policy -- which he stuck to the whole war as your summarized - was recommended to him by a German general (Falkenhausen), whom Chiang considered a personal friend even after the war.
Chiang tried to supress Opium in the "New Life Movement", but it was probably impossible to end the trade while the country was divided between warlords.
Americans on Okinawa: Holy shit, look at all these dudes! Our propaganda department must've finally gotten their act together!
Bull Halsey: I'm never going to a naval academy reunioun ever again.
Mao: Power is mine! All mine! Mine, mine, mine! *laughs like Igor*
thanks indy and crew
Thank you for watching!
This is fascinating. So much of what is going on with all the politics can be used to understand what is going on with politics in any era. I really appreciate that all sides point of view are being shared❤ ❤
Oh no! I've caught up with real time!!! Now I can't binge anymore and have to wait a few days for the next video.
Time is moving slowly, that pocket watch has not moved in a while,lol...I am glad to be a time ghost member...
Thanks for being a member!
Kind of surprised we still had action in Europe...Great stuff like always Indy!
Thanks for watching!
Also glad they caught Ribbentrop. He played a big role in the Holocaust.
True, and I am glad he "swung" after Nuremberg. However, fortunately for the allies he was incompetent as a diplomat. Had they had any true talented and Machiavellian diplomat, he could have probably been able to stall Entrance of the Allies (especially the U.S) into the European war. That is assuming Hitler would have listened to this persons advice.
He also signed the so called Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, assigning the Baltics and Finland under Soviet sphere of influence. The echoes of that deal can still be seen in the Russian point of view about world affairs.
@@mhyotynithat too!
I dont know, he was a diplomat, I dont think he deserved the death penalty, especially so knowing Albert Speer, a top nazi from 1942 onwards, survived.
@@eldarrissman4172 The funny thing about the German diplomatic corps at this period is that they're mostly composed of men who shouldn't even be made diplomats in the first place. We're talking about SA officers who earned their rank from direct street fights and uncompromising steadfastness to the Party line trying to navigate through the intricacies of foreign diplomacy. One of them, sent to Bulgaria, so displeases the Tsar there due to his boorishness that half the time he wasn't allowed inside the throne room until he looks and acts presentable...
I'm really enjoying the more detailed looks at what it was like on the ground, and the political aspects of the conflict now that the scope of the war has been paired down. This is making me look forward to the Korean series even more!
I'll love to see a band of brothers type of movie for the Australian 9th Infantry - Desert Warfare in North Africa for Siege of Tobruk, and Battle of El Alamein. Then a big pivot to Jungle warfare in PNG for Salamaua-Lae and Huon Peninsula. Now they are operating as marines.
Halsey said he didn’t get good info so couldn’t avoid the storm. Meanwhile one of Nelson’s last orders at Trafalgar was that he felt a storm would come soon and to prepare the fleet. A few days later nelson was proved correct.
Seamanship is a hard skill.
To be fair, wooden ships are far more susceptible to storms than metal ones.
@@randomguy-tg7ok*Looks at all the aircraft parked on US carrier decks*
The ship may be less susceptible, the weaponry isn’t.
this was a masterclass in clearly and concisely explaining a complicated political situation (in China) that in many ways was and is completely alien to the western way of thinking. Yet again this channel has shown itself to be one of the greatest things in the english language history scene today.
Great deals to be had this week on Bohemian farmland and optical shops.
There is a book called I was the girl with the White Flag, which gives the civilian side of the battle. On the first day of the invasion, her father went to visit a Japanese radar station near their home and apparently was killed when it was bombed. Her mother had died of cancer the previous year. When they were forced out of their home by the fighting, she became separated from her older sisters, and roamed the battlefield mostly alone for a month. Aside from a close encounter with random shelling, the closest she came to death was being chased over a cliff by a Japanese officer who wanted to behead her to "save" her from the dire fate of falling into the hands of the Americans. She was saved by a bush which caught her clothes. She spent a week in a cave with an elderly couple, he immobile, she blind. She tended them, and they had an emergency food stock. When the loudspeakers announced that the caves would be sealed, they sent her out with a white flag. She was seven years old.
(Her older brother had also been killed by a random shot, but she was reunited with her sisters)
This Moa guy seems like he's ready to take a "big jump"
Or perhaps a "great leap"
Possibly a "large bound"
My uncle was born this week 1945. He passed May 8, 2024 a few weeks short of his 79th birthday and 59th wedding anniversary. We are now losing the generation that came after this war.
I genuinely enjoy how this episode plays as you arguing with yourself about the Chinese factions
As a Dutch I can't help but laugh at your attempt at Schiermonnikoog, lol. Good effort though!
22:02
My grandmother was one of Them.
She was just 12 years old when they (she, her mother and her siblings) we're told to leave their house within the next few hours and to Join a trail heading towards Bavaria. She told me this Story Back when i was just a child.
This illustrates that even after the end of the war the suffering continued.
It sounds like Halsy had a great PR team that went into overdrive to make him out to be a hero when he was in hot water.
Halsey: the US Navy's MacArthur.
Always wondered how Halsey could remain in command after so many screwups. At the very least, the navy managed to keep him away from the main fight and instead had more competent men like Kincaid and Spruance with the vital jobs.
Aggressiveness throughout the war counted for a lot.
After Pearl Harbor, he was in the right place to fight back with what little we had to actually use.
And he did, even with mistakes and losses.
People remembered and responded to that.
I think that is a bit unfair to Halsey. His influence in the first US island invasion (Guadalcanal) should be beyond question, and pretty much bought him a pass for the rest of the war. He was genuinely popular amomngst all his staff, and morale would have been hard hit if he had been replaced.
@@davidcolin6519 It just seems to me that at this point, his faults where overwhelming compared to his strengths. And judging from Clark and Radford's assessments, his popularity has some serious limits.
To be honest, Halsey’s most infamous mistake (Leyte Gulf) wasn’t that much of a mistake. Yes, he took the Japanese bait, but way too many people ognore that providing direct support and cover for the landings WASN’T his responsibility; it was Kinkaid’s, as it was Seventh Fleet and not Third Fleet that was in large of the support role.
@@kenle2 Halsey seems to excell in places where 'hit em hard, hit em fast' aggressiveness and boldness are needed but falters greatly when calmness, cool headedness, and patience are required. Unfortunately for him, the latter became very common place scenarios near the end of the war.
I honestly doubt someone like Spruance or Kincaid would've blundered into typhoons willy nily or left Taffy 3 in the lurch without a smidge of 'just in case Center Force comes out to play' preparation.
It appears that using Submarines to monitor weather in gaps where they did not hold an island might have been a good idea.
20:03 I am pretty sure you mistakenly said that King did not give serious consideration to relieving Halsey, however the text said he did.
One of them was in error, anyway ... !
Wow!
Indy actually said 'Bye'.
It has happened.
But it's very rare.
☮
I've been encouraging him to work on his phone manners since the very beginning - maybe it's finally sinking in!
@@McRocket Ah! Maybe I've done some good in this world after all!
@@hilariousname6826 Looks like it is working.
He did it again the following week.
☮
@@hilariousname6826 😊
☮
These closing stages of the war have really shown how seemingly naive the USA has been with geopolitics, first with Stalin and now with Mao. Of course hindsight is 2020 but it would have been interesting to see how it would have panned out if the USA had been as sceptical of the Soviets as Britain/Churchill was. For instance we saw US forces as the war was ending not advancing and securing areas as they deemed them to have no military purposes, leaving the Soviets to take control of them.
It would have been interesting for someone to see how it would have panned out but it would not have been you because you never would have been born.
@tekinfomedi FDR had the American media refer to Stalin as Uncle Joe and he gave them most of Europe.
This episode really helped show the person who benefited from Ichi Go last year the most: Mao.
The Japanese overextended themselves, Chiang suffered a bunch of defeats and nearly had his military power transferred to an American general. It will be interesting to see if Mao will make a grab for power once the war's over!
Seems like some kind of war between China and China is brewing
I'm starting to think that this Mao guy is a real jerk.
@@DavidMcdonald-df8tb U can't blame Mao for this, the Communists was nearly annihilated.
And even after the Second Chinese Front was made and Chang was spared despite being sent to Communist Custody in the Xi An incident.
Chang even raided the communists, try to undermine communist armaments, who were still recovering. You can't blame Mao or the communists to take a careful stance. It was just that Chiang's spite and Japan's buffonary was taken advantage for the sake of survival.
Should Chang truly honoured the United Front, don't break any promises. He wouldn't have weaken so politically and Mao would be in amuch toughter state.
@@bosunbill9059 he still sounds like he was a real jerk.
It would be really interesting to see Special made by you guys about Chiang Kai-shek. Here in Finland atleast we learn very little in history about Asian affairs of 1900-2000 and it has been very interesting to hear about all these stories other than just the usual Pearl Harbor and Nuke parts of Asian history.
I very much enjoyed your video and I gave it a Thumbs Up
Hi Indy
Another interesting week.
Thanks.
Thank you for the lesson.
I think it's also a good argument to say that if any of the allied commanders had spent even a week or two on the ground in China and seen the actual state of the front line Chinese army, there would not have been nearly as many complaints.
Most of them did. Stilwell was the American military attaché in China from 1938 to 1939 and he had been stationed there previously.
He was terrible for China regardless.
The issue was that they tended to miss the politics of the whole thing. The other thing was that they didn't like the Chinese theory of victory which was defeat the Japanese by outlasting them.
Some of the US Marine officers had, though they were not in the most senior levels of command and had special operations roles. Both Merrit Edson and Evans Carlson, commander officers of the 1st and 2nd Marine Raider Battalions respectively, had seen service in China prior to the U.S. entry into the war.
Edson had served as a major and operations officer with the 4th Marine Regiment at Shanghai from 1937 - 1939, where also observed Japanese military operations against the Chinese nationalists. Carlson had also served with the 4th Marines in Shanghai, though prior to Edson. He later returned to China in 1937 to study the Chinese language and during this time also was posted as a military observer with Chinese nationalist forces battling the Japanese. Later he traveled thousands of miles on horseback across the interior of the country to link up with and observe Chinese communist guerillas in action against the Japanese.
Interestingly Carlson was impressed by the guerillas and applied some of their principles to the 2nd Marine Raider battalion. Carlson adopted an egalitarian style of command inspired by the guerillas where officers had no priviliges due to their rank, lived alongside the men, and senior NCOs mentored officers. Using tactics that were also influenced by his observation of the guerillas, he led the famous Long Patrol on Guadalcanal, a nearly month long operation behind Japanese lines that harassed retreating Japanese forces and inflicted around 500 enemy KIA for only 16 of his own.
Edson and the 1st Marine Raider battalion were employed in the defense of Lunga point, part of the overall defense of Henderson Field on Guadalcanal, against Japanese assaults. On Bloody Ridge (later named Edson's Ridge) the 800 or so men of the 1st Marine Raider battalion and 2 attached companies of the 2nd Parachute Battalion held out against ferocious assaults by approximately 3,000 Japanese, though at the cost of 256 casualties. They were heavily involved in the later actions along the Matinikau, both of which contributed heavily to the ultimate failure of the Japanese to take Henderson Field.
Tl;dr: Two Marine special operations officers that played significant roles in the Allied victories on Guadalcanal had learned from pre-war experiences with both Chinese nationalist & communist forces.
@@ahorsewithnoname773 That's super interesting. Did they get involved with the post war Marines in China? There is a reason Eugene Sledge's second book is called China Marine.
It would be great to see a war against humanity episode about the civilians on Okinawa. The atrocities committed by both armies (especially the Japanese military since Okinawans weren't considered "true Japanese"). This is still an issue on the island to this day and flares up every time there is a new national history book introduced in the national school system.
The Japanese mechanics in Godzilla Minus One expressed the same sentiments. They knew they were losing, and didn't see any point in sacrificing their lives when there's a post-war world on the horizon
I hope you do more on the DP crisis in Europe.
I highly recommend the book by Tony Judt Postwar that goes into detail about DPs population and border shifts and the aftermath of WWII.
Wonder if we’ll ever hear from that Mao guy again 🤔
Fascinating Episode!!!
Thanks for watching!
During the 1970s and 80s I got to talk with some Navy Veterans about Halsey and the Typhoons. The Typhoons are used as example of the difference of prewar/postwar bias.
People forget how bad weather prediction was before WW2, in 1938 a completely unexpected catagory5 hurricane Hit Long Island and Rhode island without warning.
The Japanese had the 4th Fleet Incident during the inter-war years.
Great Strides were made with weather prediction during WW2, but older officers would often not trust Weather reports. Halsey's superiors had been at sea prewar when weather prediction at sea (especially with wartime communications blackouts and the enemy controlling areas where the Storm might be coming from) would be pretty bad.
I resisted watching this; having fought myself through the BarbaraTuchman book (stillwell & the American experience in China) what more could I learn? I am glad that i listened!
You need to read Forgotten Ally by Rana Mitter and Tower of Skulls by Richard Frank.
Factually, tuchman is good. She does her citations right. The problem when she starts talking about personality and intention.
The problem is she never questions whether Stilwell was actually good at his job. Why would he, a guy who last fought in WW1 as a colonel, know more about fighting Japan with Chinese troops than the actual Chinese commanders?
Why would he have a "hunch" in March of 1942 that the Japanese were weak? They had just taken Malaya, Hong Kong, Rangoon, Jakarta, and had Corregidor under siege.... But he had a hunch. Tuchman just puts in the quote without exploring what that says about his judgement.
His plan for Burma in 1942 was nuts. He wanted troops from China, under his American command, to work with Indian and Burmese troops under British command, to conduct a forward elastic defense and counterattack against Japanese forces who had not yet known defeat in southeast Asia. Oh, and they would have less than two weeks to prepare...
That is obviously going to fail. It took the British and the French who have decades of working together, months to figure out their arrangements and they still had coordination problems. But somehow Tuchman echoes without comment Stilwell's insistence it's Chiang's fault that the Stilwell ad hoc multinational plan that relied on Chinese and British troops coordinating perfectly and being faster than Japan failed. Tuchman also shares Stilwell's indignation that Chiang didn't respect his obvious strategic brilliance after losing tens of thousands of China's troops in the Burmese jungle.
@@porksterbob Don't repress your feelings, let it all out.
The Tuchman book was published in 1971, during the Viet Nam War. "Fire In the Lake" by Frances Fitzgerald, about Viet Nam, was published about the same time and Richard Nixon would go to China.
The people who went into a bookstore in 1971 and paid full price, didn't want a book that insulted General Stilwell, and by extension, themselves. Many of these men would have been veterans of World War 2. Nearly any other American officer, trained at West Point, would have behaved in a similar fashion.
He may have been wrong, but he was wrong in the best traditions of West Point.
One thing the Tuchman book emphasized, was the ground war versus the air war, could an air base exist in a vacuum. General Chennault versus General Stilwell, not General Stilwell versus General Chiang, would have been important to US internal politics.
Foreign politics doesn't win presidential elections in the US, but the battle for money between the ground grabbers and the fly boys would still go on.
Something like 3/4ths of China's oil now passes Viet Nam, so that control over Viet Nam was important, if not successful.
Suggested reading, "No Drums, No Bugles" by Charles Durden, "Close Quarters" by Larry Heinemann, "A Bright Shining Lie" by Neil Sheehan.
@@gordybing1727 I don't quite get the Vietnam segue... but let's continue.
Stilwell vs. Chennault is an interesting case. Stilwell was right that the ground war more important than the air war, but he was very, very wrong in him not understanding his own position or his own role. He didn't see his Chinese counterparts as being his equals and felt he was always the smartest person in the room.
Now, other "West Point" generals may not have done better.
But, two points there. First, famously, Bill Slim was the only Western General to ask the Chinese how they had won their few victories, something Stilwell never did. He felt that he already knew what was wrong and how to fix it.
Second, Stilwell was the 9th West Point educated officer in China. There were already 8 Chinese officers in the National Revolutionary Army who had also gone to West Point. Unlike Stilwell, who graduated in 1904, the other generals graduated between 1912 and 1937. The point is that China had generals who went to West Point. Stilwell's military education in America did not make him unique relative to some of his Chinese counterparts.
Thank you!
Caught a premiere & made this engagement comment. Good night.
Thank you!
The title feels eerie for some event in the future
A very good point about Chiang fighting the Japanese.
Little Red Book worthy.
We all know what we want after the WWII series come to end:
The 100 years war - week by week!
Give it a rest
@@caryblack5985 why?
@@parsifal6094 It is getting monotonous and it won't happen.
@@caryblack5985 I have an advise for you:
deal with it!
To sail into one typhoon is understandable. To do it twice might be considered carelessness. Might be a good idea to replace your weathermen. Did the Peter Principle apply?
Interestingly not the first conflict it happened, in 1274 and 1281 it wiped out a Mongolian invasion fleet that were attempting to take Japan. They called it the divine wind.
The monster Mao raises its head.
Would it be possible to do a series on the defense of China against the Japanese before the official start of WWII?
Really puts into focus how Nationalist China was only held together by the war against Japan. It was basically just a carryover of the warlord era but with Chiang was the chief warlord, many of the sub-warlords didn't like Chiang so he was under a precarious situation of keeping them in line so he could maintain his power, foreign powers appeared to have even less love for Chiang, the armies under the banner more or less acted independently and just as likely to loot and pillage as the Japanese were, the people had little love for them despite fighting the invaders for nearly a decade (and more in some areas), etc.
It isn't hard to see why at the time people had warmer feelings toward the communists and is very hard to see how the Nationalist project wouldn't have imploded even if the civil war didn't restart after WW2.
The war with Japan caused the implosion.
In the areas where the nationalists had firm control like the lower Yangtze, lots of things were moving in the right direction. The people were being educated. There was industry. The Central army was increasing in size and reducing the power of independent military forces.
Once the war started, all of those core nationalist areas were taken. The industry was destroyed. The Central Army bore the brunt of the fighting and suddenly Chiang had to ask the warlords for additional forces.
Spot the ccp bot
Halsey was way over rated! Of the great naval battles of WW II, he was only in command at Leyte Gulf and almost caused a complete disaster there. Of the various fleet commanders in the Pacific, he was the least worthy of receiving a fifth star, yet he got it. Pure politics.
Shows the power of a good nickname. Tommy Lasorda understood that when he nicknamed his young pitching feenom Oral Hershiser "BULLDOG"!
Halsey was in control during the Guadalcanal campaign, and that was basically _the_ turning point in the Pacific.
(of course, the US still suffered a ton of naval losses there, but that was due to local commanders being... disappointments)
There's great channels that dive into the specifics: Drachinifel, and The Unauthorized History of the Pacific War Podcast.
They both skewer Halsey where appropriate, but also give him a fair shake where he earned it :)
@@MrNicoJac Yeah, but Halsey really topped out as a Task Group commander. He was certainly too hungry for glory at Leyte, at that point just take the gains.
Fletcher was screwed over by King and poor Naval Intelligence. He would have been better at Leyte.
@@recoil53
Yeah, I agree with all that
I would be fascinated to learn more about the Ryukyu Shoho. To call it a newspaper suggests that it was more than a mere leaflet. How many pages was it, typically? Did it cover anything beyond the immediate military situation on Okinawa? How was it distributed to the Japanese troops? Is there anyplace, either online or as physical media, where I could read it in translation?
Hi gang thanks for another thrilling week!
One thing though,part of Crete is still under German control AND actualy guards shoot on allied forces....
The "cult of personality" in politics is a old as human kind ! It unfortunately continues to this very day. And therefore we poor common folk seldom end up with leaders who have our best interests at the top of their agendas ...
Thank you.
19:59 that John McCain guy surely destroyed his family's future legacy with that blinder. I don't see how the future could ever look kindly on the name McCain
Written with tongue firmly in cheek, I trust. His grandson, bearing the patriarch's name, would run for president of the US although some would wonder whether his choice of a vice-presidential running mate in 2008 was wise.
I think Timeghost could do an amazing job on the rise and fall and rise again of Mao.
Interesting idea but we don't have any plans to do biographies right now! Thanks for the suggestion.
I'm sure we won't hear about this Mao fella in some obscure up and coming coverage of an event from 1950-53..
"June 15th 1945" Man, We have come a long way.
Honestly one of your best episode ! Love it ! Thanks for disentangling this whole affairs with the Soviet and CCP by referencing past events
Glad you enjoyed it!
This is quite a development indeed. I never thought that forcing the Japanese soldiers in surrendering by telling them that their military commanders are "corrupt and incompetent" have a strong effect that it was hopeless in continuing and prolonging a battle even though the word "surrendering" was avoided in using and still IS the main tool even though not mentioned in making the enemy face to face, mano e mano that it's over.
Sidenote too, On June 10, 1945 Davao in the island of Mindanao,Philippines is finally free from Japanese control. Interestingly though, that place had the high number of Japanese Nationals and Civilians than any other places in the Philippines and SPOILER once the whole war is over, those Japanese are either repatriated or forcibly expelled back to their country due to the enmity of the Filipinos OR incorporated alongside the rest of the Filipino Population in the postwar.
So, if the Americans play their cards right, perhaps the Japanese population might not give nearly as much resistance to them as initially expected
@@extrahistory8956 Not necessarily. The homeland would be defended more bitterly, the cult of the emperor might be stronger, the people more completely indoctrinated and the resources for the Japanese army greater. I would think the resistance would still be immense.
Swalbard held out until December, likely since no one considered it worth any lives to force a surrender on that garrison
Everybody figured they just had to wait until it got really cold and supplies ran out.
11:39 I wonder how that tractor went into the battle.
I think Indy meant that it was a tractor battalion, as he said “American tractor and engineer battalion.” The unit would have been the 727th Amphibian Tractor Battalion.
I studied under Knight Biggerstaff, who had met Mao several times during the war as a member of a US diplomatic delegation,. He stressed that Mao and Stalin were NOT actual natural allies despite their lip service to communism.. During the thirties, Stalin supported Chiang Kai Shek, not Mao, in part because Stalin did not want a rival as head of the International side of the Communist movement. Stalin's support for Mao might likely be predicated on the acceptance of Soviet supremacy in the Communist movement.
This did not mean that the US could trust Mao,, but that his actions could not be predicted based on simple assumption of a mutual interest in the success of communism.
The Soviets supported Chiang in the thirties because they knew he would be a far more capable anti Japanese fighter. Once the Japanese were dealt with, the soviets moved to supporting the CCP.
During the great purges of 1937 and 1938, most of "Comintern" was destroyed, only Ho Chi Minh and a handful of others would survive.
On the 16th of june 1945 the last german troops surrendered in my home village on the dutch island Schiermonnikoog.
17:45 - my father told me a story of when he was on sentry duty at night in England.
He was alone on a particularly dark night and he heard footsteps coming towards him.
He called out 'Friend or Foe'.
But no reply came.
The steps came closer and again and again he called out 'Friend or Foe'.
Nothing.
The steps were right on top of him but he was terrified to kill a civilian - like a child.
He was just about to fire his rifle when a giant tongue licked his face.
It was a horse.
☮
This guy is pretty good. He brings a “you are there” type of vibe to his program.
Very interesting to learn about the China stuff, and I had no idea so many Japanese soldiers surrendered on Okinawa!
One could hope the Borneo campaign in the coming weeks will have more coverage on local guerilla forces. That had been being prepared for months by Allied operatives who had been paradropped into the Kelabit highlands.
17:06 why am I thinking of chickens righ-never mind, wrong war