Understanding World War II-Japan & Synthetic Rubber

[dalecoz]

This is a reprint of something I originally wrote for Gather.

When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, they won a tactical victory, but at the cost of starting a war with a country with enormously more resources at almost every level-more people, more industry, more access to raw materials. The US had enough ships in the pipeline that whatever

Comments

[chris_gerrib]

Rubber was part of it, but the real bottom line was that Japan was expecting a quick war. Their plan was to do unto us what they did to Russia in 1905 - win a big victory and sue for peace.

[paulliver]

Sort of like our experience in the Iraqi Wars. The first went so well...

[paulliver]

I think that's an interesting take on Japanese expectations. Probably both your suggestion and the traditional one have merit, depending on which Japanese military planners. It's easy to imagine an round table discussion about all these pros and cons of attacking Pearl Harbor before they finally decided to just "go for it."