The Off Topic Topic

[Barrister]

Japan really have struck the Northern Resource Area instead. Communism would have collapsed like a house of cards.

No infrastructure to strike anything up there.  Once the Japs take Vladivostock, then what?

[Josquius]

Japan really have struck the Northern Resource Area instead. Communism would have collapsed like a house of cards.

No infrastructure to strike anything up there.  Once the Japs take Vladivostock, then what?

Bicycle ride to the urals!

[Lettow77]

 Depose the Mongolian puppet government with a Mongolian puppet gov't backed by Japan that seeks to bring all mongols under its borders and has a nationalist sentiment more palpable to Mongols than the red dictatorship they languish under;
menace the trans-siberian railroad, occupy the entirity of the primorsk region

The infrastructure to defend is pretty miserable too. If the soviets decide not to defend the frozen wastes, why, they are Japan's for the taking!

And needless to say the inevitable Axis victory in barbarossa will result in further Japanese territorial gains, probably extending at least to Irkutsk.

[Neil]

Japan really have struck the Northern Resource Area instead. Communism would have collapsed like a house of cards.

Hard to say.  It's not like the Japanese were really equipped for a slog across Siberia.  And then there's the political dimension.  The IJN was enormously powerful, and not really all that interested in being relegated to uselessness in a land war deep inside Asia.  In addition, the resources that Japan needed (rubber, oil, food, metals) weren't really available in Siberia at the time (if at all), and wouldn't be without massive investment.  Not many slaves in Siberia either.  And then there was the beating that their army took trying to fight the Soviets.

[Barrister]

Depose the Mongolian puppet government with a Mongolian puppet gov't backed by Japan that seeks to bring all mongols under its borders and has a nationalist sentiment more palpable to Mongols than the red dictatorship they languish under;
menace the trans-siberian railroad, occupy the entirity of the primorsk region

The infrastructure to defend is pretty miserable too. If the soviets decide not to defend the frozen wastes, why, they are Japan's for the taking!

And needless to say the inevitable Axis victory in barbarossa will result in further Japanese territorial gains, probably extending at least to Irkutsk.

Again - how do they do any of that?  How to they depose Mongolia?  How do they threaten the TSR?  And for what strategic purpose to Japan?

I once thought as you did (and as a kid I thought that was the optimal A&A strategy).  But A&A is a very poor simulator for the actual war.

[Lettow77]

 Not sure that I like what you are implying about advocates for the northern resource area.

But, alright.

Mongolia would not be hard to land- the mongols had little reason to be loyal to the soviets. They make a perfect cat's paw, sandwhiched between two larger ethnic groups. They could never hold real power but could hold over a restive population of russian and chinese within the outer limits of Mongolian territory with Japanese help. Deposing the Mongol communist regime would be as simple as expanding the support and influence of Mengjiang and giving the reds a push. The soviets didn't have much better infrastructure to defend it than the Japanese to attack it. Poor infrastructure would eventually be something that helped the IJA in Mongolia rather than hurt it.

With Mongolia under Japanese influence, and Primorsk occupied, the TSR is a long indefensible border for the Russians, and leads nowhere except a frontline anyway. (Primorsk would not be unduly hard to occupy with support by the navy- infrastructure and conditions there being comparatively advanced).

It is true the resources that Japan needed weren't as prevalent at all in Siberia, but Siberia was a prize Japan could actually land. The Southern Resource Area was way too much to expect to be able to get.

[Tonitrus]

Lettow should be clad that Imperial Japan lost...they would have never allowed anime to flourish to it's present form.

[Lettow77]

 A worthy sacrifice! I want anime with DASH and ELAN where the protagonist dies in defense of the empire suppressing Chinese revolts in the hinterland.

At least, if Imperial Japan wins cherry blossoms as a motif won't be any less stupidly overdone.

[CountDeMoney]

A worthy sacrifice! I want anime with DASH and ELAN where the protagonist dies in defense of the empire suppressing Chinese revolts in the hinterland.

Great--Big Eyes Small Mouth Bedford Forrest.  That's just fucking super.

[Ed Anger]

A worthy sacrifice! I want anime with DASH and ELAN where the protagonist dies in defense of the empire suppressing Chinese revolts in the hinterland.

Great--Big Eyes Small Mouth Bedford Forrest.  That's just fucking super.

Forrest gets tentacled raped. Might be worth a view.

[Tonitrus]

A worthy sacrifice! I want anime with DASH and ELAN where the protagonist dies in defense of the empire suppressing Chinese revolts in the hinterland.

At least, if Imperial Japan wins cherry blossoms as a motif won't be any less stupidly overdone.

I thought current anime often glorifies IJ, Nazis, totalitarian governments, and an obsession with blood-type.  So, alt-history-IJ-anime should be underground, and all about freedom and brotherhood, and an acute lack of schoolgirls and giant robots.

[CountDeMoney]

Forrest gets tentacled raped. Might be worth a view.

Meh, Lee got tentacle raped in the Wilderness.  Can't get bigger than that.

[Neil]

It is true the resources that Japan needed weren't as prevalent at all in Siberia, but Siberia was a prize Japan could actually land. The Southern Resource Area was way too much to expect to be able to get.

What's the point of winning a prize that is worthless though?

[Lettow77]

  I don't know. Why were the Japanese so intent on uniting Karafuto?
Portions of Siberia had value for timber & food, and it is another destination for Japanese colonists, which they anticipated to be a future problem at the time.

Also, with the Soviets out of the far east, they'd have a harder time providing any assistance to China- assuming they survived Barbarossa.

A world with the Soviets defeated is one with a much better strategic situation for the Japanese. 

The real fly in the ointment, as you pointed out earlier, is that the IJN has nothing to do and won't go for it.

[Neil]

  I don't know. Why were the Japanese so intent on uniting Karafuto?
Portions of Siberia had value for timber & food, and it is another destination for Japanese colonists, which they anticipated to be a future problem at the time.

Also, with the Soviets out of the far east, they'd have a harder time providing any assistance to China- assuming they survived Barbarossa.

A world with the Soviets defeated is one with a much better strategic situation for the Japanese. 

The real fly in the ointment, as you pointed out earlier, is that the IJN has nothing to do and won't go for it.

Timber wasn't really what the Japanese needed.  The resources that they needed simply weren't in Mongolia, or Siberia.

When are you talking about this attack?  They were soundly beaten in 1939, and you talk about Barbarossa as if the Japanese would have some effect on it.