Japan in WW I

The only major thing they did was take Tsingtao. Germany tried to get it to help Mexico attack the US, but this was impossible. What could Japan attack? Even with a huge navy, without a good army(something they lacked even in WW2-they didn’t have the logistics to take China or India), they can just take small costal territories.

@ABWorsham:

@calvinhobbesliker:

The only major thing they did was take Tsingtao. Germany tried to get it to help Mexico attack the US, but this was impossible. What could Japan attack? Even with a huge navy, without a good army(something they lacked even in WW2-they didn’t have the logistics to take China or India), they can just take small costal territories.

How would the threat of Japan in the Pacific effect the North Sea showdown?

Not at all? The best the Japs ever did in putting navy far away was subs in the Med

China could take care of Japan if they did decide to do that.

Dylan, do you just randomly say things?  China could take care of Japan during the period of WWI?  First of all, Japan was on the side of the allies in WW I.  Japan mopped the oceans with the russian fleet in 1905, russian cried uncle and Japan became a serious player in world affairs.  Japan played it smart and got the modest german possessions in the east for taken sides with ‘the good guys’.

China had NO navy so I am not sure how you think China was going to project power.  The best China could hope for is that Japan would invade them and get tired of killing Chinese perhaps running out of bullets and would eventually give up and leave.

@calvinhobbesliker:

The only major thing they did was take Tsingtao. Germany tried to get it to help Mexico attack the US, but this was impossible. What could Japan attack? Even with a huge navy, without a good army(something they lacked even in WW2-they didn’t have the logistics to take China or India), they can just take small costal territories.

Seriously?
Japan was call the Prussia of the east during the Great War era, and their armed forces were top knotch. Better yet, all that bushido-mongering hadnt taken place and Japanese troops were actually well behaved.
Wether or not their involvment would have caused the European alliance to shift enough forces to change the deadlock on the western front is doubtful, espically as Japan would have been faced with fighting Britian, France and Russia simultaniously, they may have been overwhelmed. No commander at that time understood what a modern war would entail and how their new weapons of war would effect battles.
Japan, did have some experiance in this field, having fought with Russia about a decade before hand, but how well, or what if any, lessons were learned by Japanese commanders of the day has been lost to history. You cannot discount what impact Japan may have had because of having a poor army. If anything, the skill of their army may be the best thing going for them

@Clyde85:

@calvinhobbesliker:

The only major thing they did was take Tsingtao. Germany tried to get it to help Mexico attack the US, but this was impossible. What could Japan attack? Even with a huge navy, without a good army(something they lacked even in WW2-they didn’t have the logistics to take China or India), they can just take small costal territories.

Seriously?
Japan was call the Prussia of the east during the Great War era, and their armed forces were top knotch. Better yet, all that bushido-mongering hadnt taken place and Japanese troops were actually well behaved.
Wether or not their involvment would have caused the European alliance to shift enough forces to change the deadlock on the western front is doubtful, espically as Japan would have been faced with fighting Britian, France and Russia simultaniously, they may have been overwhelmed. No commander at that time understood what a modern war would entail and how their new weapons of war would effect battles.
Japan, did have some experiance in this field, having fought with Russia about a decade before hand, but how well, or what if any, lessons were learned by Japanese commanders of the day has been lost to history. You cannot discount what impact Japan may have had because of having a poor army. If anything, the skill of their army may be the best thing going for them

I agree that they had a strong NAVY, but I’m not sure of it’s army, since 20 years later, they were unable to take more than one third of China

Now although Japan did crush the Russian navy one needs to look at context.  The russian navy equipment wise was no Great Britain though the brit battlecruisers had a glass jaw and tended to blow up quite nicely, a lesson not learned with the Hood.  In any event, the russians had poor training, low morale and motivation and had just sailed around the world to get to the pacific coast where the Japs were waiting.  With the presense no surpise the Japs could pick and choose the timing of the engagement.

Nothing in the Pacific really affected the trench warfare situation in Europe.  Japan was not going to be able to blockade Britain in the Atlantic nor could they break the blockade on the Germans which ultimately is what took Germany down.  Remember, when the Germans signed the armistace, no Germany territory was held by the allies and russia had sued for peace giving up lots to the Germans.

I am sure if the Germans had not been starving they would have eventually lost to the greater numbers, by the end of the war the US was adding 10,000 men per day to the combat rolls.  But it would have been perhaps by 1920 and the French army had nearly revolted a few times even by 19166, who knows what would have happened had the French gotten tired of the war.  They really had born the brunt of the damage and losses and could not be expected to keep doing it indefinately.

I did read on wikipedia that the Japs helped crush a mutiny by Indians in Malaya and bolstered the defense of the Royal Navy in the Pacific.

Anyway, Japan was not likely to join the central powers, since it had an alliance with Britain

@MrMalachiCrunch:

Dylan, do you just randomly say things?  China could take care of Japan during the period of WWI?  First of all, Japan was on the side of the allies in WW I.  Japan mopped the oceans with the russian fleet in 1905, russian cried uncle and Japan became a serious player in world affairs.  Japan played it smart and got the modest german possessions in the east for taken sides with ‘the good guys’.

China had NO navy so I am not sure how you think China was going to project power.  The best China could hope for is that Japan would invade them and get tired of killing Chinese perhaps running out of bullets and would eventually give up and leave.

Well first of all were talking about if Japan wasn’t an ally, and boats don’t matter if you don’t have any land. The US would also fight them in the pacific and they were weaker then in WW2, so really thats what would happen if Japan was a Central Power.

The Japanese armies inability to take China had much more to do with their occupation policy and the fierce resistence this fostered and their logistical limitations/difficulties. Tacticaly, the Japanese army was far superior to most, in not all, Chinese forces, and were seldomly defeated in battle by them.
During the Great War ear, this was even more pronounced, and was a time where a few victories scored in a major campagin, could have won a war in China for Japan, espicaly with a better behaved army.
What impact this would have had against the European Alliance is unclear, but given the way in which the Imperial Armed Forces of Japan had preformed earlier, during this time period, it could have been major

Dylan, if you don’t have any land, you don’t have a country nor an army so……    I kinda think boats matter if your nation expects to go anywhere other than on the defensive.  If you figure letting the enemy sail up and down your coast raiding ports and coastal towns is a great way to win wars, then don’t have boats to fight enemy boats.

The US alone good defeat Japan quite easily, their navy was stronger, their air force was stronger, their army was stronger.  It would change WW2 quite a bit if they did that. China could hold off on any Asian assault (maybe with Russian assistant.)

@Dylan:

The US alone good defeat Japan quite easily, their navy was stronger, their air force was stronger, their army was stronger.  It would change WW2 quite a bit if they did that. China could hold off on any Asian assault (maybe with Russian assistant.)

I dont think China stood much of a chance aginst a Japanese invasion during the Great War era. The Chinese we’re too dis-unified, and the Japanese of the day were much more flexiable diplomatically in those days, and could have manouvered better. Also their amry was far better behaved and their occupation would have been nothing like what they did in WW2. I think Japan could have conqured China during that time period.
What im unsure of is how Japan would have impacted the fighting in Europe or against the Eorpean Powers in the far east.

@Clyde85:

@Dylan:

The US alone good defeat Japan quite easily, their navy was stronger, their air force was stronger, their army was stronger.  It would change WW2 quite a bit if they did that. China could hold off on any Asian assault (maybe with Russian assistant.)

I dont think China stood much of a chance aginst a Japanese invasion during the Great War era. The Chinese we’re too dis-unified, and the Japanese of the day were much more flexiable diplomatically in those days, and could have manouvered better. Also their amry was far better behaved and their occupation would have been nothing like what they did in WW2. I think Japan could have conqured China during that time period.
What im unsure of is how Japan would have impacted the fighting in Europe or against the Eorpean Powers in the far east.

farmers could wack them on the head, like they have more people then Japan, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_in_1907

Numbers are great, But China didnt have the arms, and more importantly, given how the chinese people reacted the the warlords running around, the will, to resist. The Great War era was a different time, and you cant apply WW2 thinking and examples to a WW1 setting

@ABWorsham:

@calvinhobbesliker:

@ABWorsham:

@calvinhobbesliker:

The only major thing they did was take Tsingtao. Germany tried to get it to help Mexico attack the US, but this was impossible. What could Japan attack? Even with a huge navy, without a good army(something they lacked even in WW2-they didn’t have the logistics to take China or India), they can just take small costal territories.

How would the threat of Japan in the Pacific effect the North Sea showdown?

Not at all? The best the Japs ever did in putting navy far away was subs in the Med

I’m not suggesting the Japan would have ships in the North Sea. How would England react to a serious Pacific threat.

Spee’s cruisers caused considerable problems to the Allies in 1914.; enough of a problem to justify the stationing of battlecruiser in the Port Stanley.

Japan involving itself on the side of the Central powers may of very well won the central powers the war. Although this greatly depends on whether or not the Americans would end up getting involved or not. If in 1914 Japan went to war with the Triple Entete the possibility of a central powers victory would greatly improve.

After the humiliation of the Ruso-Japanese war of 1905 I dont think that Russia would of been in any position to challenge Japans navy in the pacific or make any meaningful commitment of their ground forces there either. Also the Russians were defeated WW1 so I dont think they would of entered the equation too much.

The real death blow to the central powers was the blockade by the Royal Navy that caused the starvation of 750,000 Germans, with all the German and Austro-Hungarian troops fighting on the Western front as well enough food for all the soldiers and civilians a central powers victory goes from being a possibility to a likelyhood.

With the combined power of the battle hardened IJN and the German high seas fleet an engagement like Jutland would likely be a victory for the Central powers especially considering the British having to commit dozens of ships to the protection of their possesions in Asia. With control of the seas the central powers could of invaded Egypt with the help of their Ottoman allies they could cut Britain off from the Suez canal and their Asian empire.

To those of you who say China would fight the Japanese i’m not so sure. At that time in history relations between Japan and China were amicable and the Chinese had no love for the British or French empires in Asia, the Chinese may very well of joined the central powers if the wind was blowing that way and the price was right.

So in my opinion I think Japanese involvement in world war 1 may of very well got the central powers across the line.

Japan wouldn’t sacrifice their ever so precious Anglo-Japanese Alliance that they strived for in 1902. But if Japan did, an alliance with Germany and the other Central Powers wouldn’t have helped, and in terms of Japanese national security, it would’ve been an utter disaster.  Not much to be gained in battle concessions (that could be feasibly taken), and the price of defeat would’ve been quite high

Honestly, Japan tried to stay neutral in the Great War, but the aforementioned alliance drew them in. If the alliance had not been signed, perhaps Japan’s ultimatum on the Republic of China, the Twenty-One Demands, could’ve gone smoother. Of course, that is an entirely different topic.