HH104 AMERICAN NAVAL HISTORY

ACTS OF WAR

CREATING THE AXIS (more on previous notes); Tripartite Alliance.

EARLY JAP OFFENSIVES

12 Dec ’37 – Japs sink US gunboat and damage British boats; later apologize

1937 – “Rape of Nanking” by Japs – soldiers and officers gun down thousands of Chinese, rape women, loot, etc.

GERMANY’S MOTIVATION

GERMANY’S ACTIONS

1938 – Annexed Austria. Czechoslovakia

1939 – Poland invaded (Britain, France declare war) (followed by Norway, Luxembourg, and France)

U.S. ACTIONS

Banned loans, ships, passengers to belligerents (Germans, British)

$46B to Brits, $11B to Soviets

RAINBOW PLANS

Mix of Plan Orange and Black. Plan 2 & 3 assume no war in the Atlantic. Plan 5 puts fleet ¾ size of Jap fleet in Pacific to play a defensive role, acknowledging probable loss of Guam and Philippines, with the rest of the US fleet in the Atlantic.

NEUTRALITY PATROL

Organized by Roosevelt; originally went from western Atlantic and up 300mi from the coast between Canada and Guianas in South America. Reported in plain English belligerent German vessels’ locations

NAVAL ESTIMATES

Office of Naval Intelligence placed Britain with 1.3M tons, US with 1.1M, Jap with 860k tons, and Germany with 204k tons. Brit had another million tons in construction, the US 500k tons, Germans 250k, Japs 40k. Japs secret shipbuilding gave them about 10 unknown battleships plus two superbattleships (by 1941 for sbships).

NAVAL ACTS

Paris fell this day as well. 11% increase in the Navy.

17 June Adm Stark asked Congress for 70% further increase at $4B; approved

NATIONAL STATE OF EMERGENCY

27 June 1940. By 2 Jul Congress gave Roosevelt ability to prohibit export of war materials (embargo of war materials placed on Japs). 30 Jul RAdm. Ghormley left to be a “Special Naval Observer” in Britain.

U.S. DESTROYERS

Roosevelt trades 50 overage DDs from WWI to British in exchange for 99 year leases on bases in Bermuda, West Indies, Newfoundland

ROOSEVELT

Called for US to support “Four Freedoms” nations (speech, religion, from want, from fear)

“Lend-Lease” program of arms credits to nations in war with aggressors

ABC-1 – American British Conversations; stated if US came into war, Hitler would be defeated first, then Japs

JAPAN’S ACTIONS

Moving inland through China, French-Indochina, Manchuria with its Army regardless of US / British assets

Tried to offer limited Jap withdrawal for comprehensive Sino-Jap settlement or cease military ops for 1M gal fuel

Adm Nagumo sailed 20 warships inc. 6 of Jap’s 10 carriers to Pearl Harbor

US ACTIONS

USS Neeblack (sp) depth charges German submarine; first shots by US prior to WWII

1941 – USS Ruben James sunk by U-boat (first US warship lost)