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Post by legionnaire on Feb 21, 2007 23:09:44 GMT -5
“The Battling Bastards of Bataan” by Richard Sassaman
America in WWII Magazine, April 2007 issue vol. II, # 6
....The 75,000 defenders of Bataan, while technically part of the US Army, were three-quarters Filipino. Unfortunately, with the exception of the highly skilled scouts of the Philippine Division,
the bulk of the soldiers were untrained, unequipped, and (as the fighting at the beaches had showed) uninterested in hanging around once a battle started. “These people, you could be with them and the next thing you’d be by yourself, “one private said. A corporal added, “The native infantry had a case of the runs. They had a million excuses” to leave the front lines. While retreating, he said, they would pass holding up two fingers in a V for Victory gesture. Americans referred to the gesture as “V for Vacate.” A division commander reported that the native troops did only two things well: “One, when an officer appeared, to yell attention in a loud voice, jump up and salute; the other, to demand three meals a day.”
Communication between the troops was difficult. “Over sixty-five dialects are spoken in the islands,” wrote Morton. “In many units there was a serious language barrier, not only between the American instructors and the Filipinos but also among the Filipinos. The enlisted men of one division spoke the Bicolanian dialect, then Philippine officers usually spoke Tagalog, and the Americans spoke neither.”
To make matters worse, the Filipinos’ weapons and munitions dated from World war I. Only one in three mortar shells would explode, and maybe one in five of the hand grenades. Many rifles had broken extractors, so after each bullet was fired, the shell case had to be pushed out of the gun with a piece of bamboo. The more modern M-1 rifles “became highly undependable” when dirty, said one private. “We got tired of pulling the trigger and having nothing happened.”
Page 31
My reply is WHO trained and supplied the weapons to the Philippine Army? The American Instructors they sent were not the most experience ones either!
- I invite eveyone to please send comments and reactions to;
editor@americainwwii.com
Philip
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Post by VeeVee on Feb 22, 2007 9:49:41 GMT -5
There's no sense getting riled up about this. It is the truth. It is what happened. The editor cannot change history. I don't think the theme of the article is to blame the Filipinos for the fall of the Philippines. Rather it is an illustration of how unprepared the USAFFE was when war started.
Notice that you will almost never read the same negative description about the Philippine Scouts, because they were well-trained. On the other hand, all you read are awe and praise for the Scouts. The bulk of the Philippine Army was mobilized a few weeks before the war started. That's not enough time to build the pride and the esprit that make men stand and fight.
I've read countless books about the campaign and that era, and in most of them mention how well the untrained Philippine Army soldiers fought (those who didn't run and desert). But the fact remains that a great many of them broke and ran in the face of the advancing Japanese. It's what happened. It's simply history, not the editor's opinion.
I will post some excerpts praising the untrained Filipino soldiers later.
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Post by VeeVee on Feb 22, 2007 12:31:34 GMT -5
From "Bataan, Our Last Ditch" by John W. Whitman
"Considering how bad the Philippine Army was when compared to the Scouts, it is amazing how remarkably well they actually did. For although they had shortcomings in all areas imaginable, they kept the more experienced and better-armed Japanese at bay for nearly one hundred days. The Philippine Army provided the vast majority of the soldiers on Bataan, occupied most of the fighting positions, were employed in the frontlines longer than the Americans or Scouts, and suffered the majority of combat and nonbattle casualties. Although performance during the first battles, especially before arriving in Bataan, was often disastrous, and although blind panic and refusal to obey orders were not uncommon, instances of entire battalions deserting their officers declined sharply as time passed. On Bataan the Filipinos were paragons of soldierly virtue when compared to their earlier performance. The Filipino soldier did stop the Japanese, did inflict staggering losses on him, and certainly delayed the complete and early conquest of Luzon. And considering the state of training, equipment, and unqualified, poorly trained native leaders, these facts are astounding. The Filipinos were good material, but they needed training and leadership. With training and effective officers, they performed well. This is the recurring theme, the oft-repeated "if only" of Bataan veterans. If only there had been more time, if only the Philippine Army could have been trained to the level of the Scouts. If only! Untrained recruits of all nationalities will break and run with depressing regularity, and the Filipinos were no exception."
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Post by legionnaire on Mar 15, 2007 1:12:51 GMT -5
Oral History Transcript Edward Price RamseyLieutenant Colonel (Retired), 26th Cavalry Regiment (Philippine Scouts) : Now when you were heading back south towards Manila, and everybody was retreating, the Japanese are coming in, tell me about the preparations for and the training of the Philippine forces and how many American forces were there. In other words, at that time both the American and Filipino's were not very well trained, nor well equipped. Can you kind of describe that going against thousands of Japanese who were highly trained, highly fortified, and highly equipped? How would you point out to someone that didn't know, how we needed more time and money and equipment, things like that?S: I understand what you are saying and what you are getting at. First off, the number of American's that were in the Philippines was relatively few, in terms of the combat personnel. The only ones that we had that were line combat people was your Air Force obviously, which were wiped out within the first few days and most of those were sent back to the rear areas into Bataan. I think maybe half a dozen airplanes left or maybe a dozen originally, then they at least several of those were shot down. You had the coast artillery where you had American officers and Philippine, they were Philippine scouts. You had the three regiments that were combat regiments Philippine scouts; the 45th, and 57th infantry Philippine scouts, the 26th Cavalry Regiment, Philippine scouts. You had one regiment of Americans that had been brought back from Shanghai that was the 31st American Infantry who were in my opinion very poorly trained. Mainly because they had been doing nothing but duty over in China and not had…I probably shouldn't say that because, I did not have that much contact with them at the time. But in the final battles, I did not get the impression that they were very effective. I: How would you describe the quantity and quality of the Japanese forces versus Filipino and American forces?S: Well the ones that came in, they were hardened, well-trained troops as opposed to our Filipino Army troops. Many of them didn't even have shoes, some of them didn't even have guns, and they had not yet had time to get them equipped or trained for that matter only superficial training. The ones that were really well trained was the scouts, Filipino Scouts, like the 26th Cavalry and actually the only one that was in combat in that area at that time was the 26th. That is why we took quite a beating, in the thing and I said we had lost about half of our officers and men in the very beginning action. The Philippine Army division that was up there had been pretty much routed, I think it was the 71st. I: Why were they routed? If they were equal in numbers and all that, equal equipment how is it?S: They weren't equally equipped at all. Our Philippine Scouts had good equipment, the Filipino Army had very poor or no equipment. The Japanese that came in were well equipped with the equipment they are used to. The rifles they had I didn't think much of, but still they had been fighting with them for a long time, they were well equipped, seasoned troops, that came in there. As opposed to the fact that the only ones that were well trained that we had, was our regiment. That's the reason that we got massacred, because General Wainwright, who was an old cavalry officer incidentally, and he was the umpire at the polo games the day before war broke out, that day that war broke out. He threw our regiment in there to try to stem the tide of the Japanese invasion into Lingayen Gulf that is why we lost so many men at the time. I: Now, your retreating actions, the Japanese have really been getting you guys. Now let me ask you about that issue of the retreat. I asked this question before, how could a bunch of Americans who were not hardened battle, as the Japanese were, not fully equipped, not fully trained, many of the guys in the tanks had never fired them - never trained in them. And the Filipinos you said didn't have many of them, didn't have weapons, and many of them had never been trained or fully trained. How could that amalgamation of people hold out against the Japanese for six months?S: That's true and it was because, well, let me back up a little bit. First off, you have to understand the number of Americans that were there was a handful. The 31st American Infantry never got into action until the final days they were back in Bataan well to the rear. So they were not even committed to it. The two tank battalions, one was from Arizona and one was from New Mexico, Arizona, or New Mexico, and one I think was Texas. I think it was 192nd and 194th Tank Battalions, light tanks. They were not trained together with us and actually, they didn't do us an awful lot of good. They were constantly being pulled back, because they had never been training together with the tanks. Which was a disaster and shouldn't have happened, but that is what I said, the beginning of a war is always chaotic. Once we got into Bataan, and we were dug in there, and we did have time, 'cause while we were withdrawing and holding in the north and there was actually four lines of resistance before we got into Bataan. They had time to dig in and get at some revetments and get into a position to do a fair defense action. My regiment by that time was cut at least by half, and we were pulled back, reorganized like the troop I led into Moron was combined. (Troops) E and F, instead of two different troops, it had been lumped together under troop E and it was actually E/F. So, by that time things were organized and the Philippine Army equipment had been gotten to them so by that time they were quite effective. In the beginning when they were way off, they were quite ineffective, because of the lack of equipment and actually the lack of training, lack of time to train them. Artillery, incidentally, the Philippine Army artillery by that time had learned to do well. The 31st Philippine Army Division, Infantry Division, was quite good and their artillery was very effective in helping to slow things down. So by that time our lines of defense were dug in and the 11th Infantry Division, which were Ingerots from the north mountain province. They were tough little characters and the Japanese were scared of them because they found out some of them were headhunters and they had a good meal if the Japanese tried to raid their place. I don't know if that should be talked about or not. This I know, later on all of those troops of the 11th, that they could find were executed by the Japanese, because they had a reputation that scared the Japanese. www.militarymuseum.org/Ramsey.html
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noy
New Member
Posts: 38
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Post by noy on Nov 4, 2007 3:44:23 GMT -5
hey what do you know?..........The Philippine Military is still ill equipped and ill trained. Oh boy.........
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Post by legionnaire on Nov 4, 2007 13:23:47 GMT -5
If you know more on why the American forces in the Philippine were "superior" to the japanese on the outbreak of WWII please let us know.
You can't compare how it was in 1930 to today's conditions. Back then the USAFFE supposedly had the full support of the US military. "Oh Boy!" But the US was very worried of supplying the latest weapons and the best troops and instructors to defend the Philippines, their COLONY. Yet America was more interested in supplying her distant cousin in England were there we no US ground forces at ALL at that time anywhere in Europe, and that was a European war, than making sure 30,000 plus American soldiers and commonwealth forces in the Philippines be prepared to the big threat from Japan, who by the way did attack the US and the Philippine Islands as warned by Billy Mitchell long ago.
So the US had the Money, equipment, trained manpower, and political power to aid the Commonwealth Government of the Philippines. The USAFFE troops could have driven back the Japanese invasion force with the latest equipment and professional training from the US but it was in vain considering the US administered the Comonwealth of the Philippine for more than 50 years and had all this time to prepare the country for invasion?
The Philippine Armed forces today has very little money to train and equipment to supply it's troops, all these are still the result of decades of corruption in past administrations starting all the back to Marcos. Who by the way underminded the professionalism of the AFP.
Philip
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victoree
History Buff
V for Vacate, Joe
Posts: 119
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Post by victoree on Nov 4, 2007 14:06:56 GMT -5
I think that they just messed up on thier time table. They were gearing for a war that was suppose to start in the spring of 42. The Japanese didn't get the timing right. I commend the PS as they did a heck of a job with what they had. Martin
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Post by legionnaire on Nov 4, 2007 14:25:06 GMT -5
Sadly it was in Washington DC and the US chief of Staffs that had already written the Philippines off as a liability, to far to defend and not worth pouring defense spending on, way before the Attack on Pearl Harbor. This was the betrayal of the US Government and did sacrifice the 30,000 US personnel in the Islands as "Expendable!" . By the time war loomed in the horizon everything being sent to the Philippines were all in vain. And of course who is the most convinient scape goat on the fall of the Philippines? Gen. MAC! "ODE to the Battling Bastards of Bataan" How an American POW drawings in the "grand scheme of things" and probably thousands of them viewed their country's betrayal. Philip
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Post by VeeVee on Nov 4, 2007 15:45:28 GMT -5
I don't think it would have made a difference anyway even if the PI had more of the US's military strength. It could have prolonged the campaign but the medium term outcome would have been the same. The US almost lost the Guadalcanal campaign even with US navy carrier support and initially well fed and well equipped and trained Marine division. The supply link to Australia was pretty short. Imagine the Philippines... the Japanese would just have brought in more men and hundreds more bombers and fighters. It would have been the same story.
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Post by legionnaire on Nov 4, 2007 17:53:15 GMT -5
But Vic, you are underestimating the Filipinos. This was the Filipinos home land they were fighting for. As the USAFFE retreated to Bataan it became more and more difficult for the Japanese to win.
It came to a point that Homma felt his Army was getting bog down with the campaign and had no choice but to embarrasingly ask from Imperial high command for more veteran troops stationed in China. If the USAFFE had been better equiped and trained, the commonwealth forces would have had a real fighting chance on turning the tide and driven back the japanese to the sea. Isn't it the initial landings were a disaster on the Japanese?
The fact that they planned to win in 50 days and ended up taking Gen Homma's Army 150 days to win the campaign, If the Japanese were already taking HUGE LOSSES all the way to Bataan compared to their victories in the rest of Asia. THE longest in seige of any of the Allied forces history in Asia. What more with a modernly equipped and professionally trained 150,000 man Army would have had much more different result?
Then the Japanese would have been force to change their strategy about continuing their campaign in their conquest of the philippines and a find a new alternative choice to minimize the huge lost of men and material.
The reason why the Japanese continued was that the Defenders of Bataan were running out of food, no medicine, no tanks, no planes and no Artllery pieces to continue the fight.
So there was a possible victorious outcome that would have happened. The Japanese at this point had never experience defeat until their frustrating setback in capturing the Philippines.
Philip
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Post by VeeVee on Nov 4, 2007 18:41:04 GMT -5
Don't get me wrong, the Japanese would have been in one heck of a fight and for a longer period of time... maybe (9-12 months?). I'm just being realistic. Eventually the USAFFE would have run out of food and ammo too since resupply wouldn't have been possible, not for another 3 years. The Japanese could have been beaten back several times but they would have come back with 10 times more troops, ships, and planes and bring in even more reinforcements from other theaters.
What I'm saying is it took almost 3 years for the US to fight its way back... the 150k strong USAFFE which were dispersed among the major islands would not have been able to hold for 3 years. Maybe one year at most, then it would be the same story, only on a bigger scale.
The Far Eastern air force would have dished out some hurt even if they were not bombed on the ground but Clark would have been the only field big bombers could have operated on and that would have been bombed useless after a while. The Japanese had at times 50 to 100 zero fighters escorting their bombers. None of the P40's could even get near the bombers because of the swarming fighter escort.
It took the US several carrier battle groups, 20+ fleet and escort carriers, many highly trained marine and army divisions, the gigantic logistics, supply trains, etc.. Even if all of the US strength in Hawaii were transferred to the Philippines, it wouldn't have had enough critical mass to survive for 3 years. Fighting qualities aside, the USAFFE wouldn't have had enough resources both in men and materiele. The US just didn't have that much even if they sent all the aid they gave the UK to the Philippines instead.
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Post by johnbryan on Nov 18, 2008 20:18:23 GMT -5
Don't get me wrong, the Japanese would have been in one heck of a fight and for a longer period of time... maybe (9-12 months?). I'm just being realistic. Eventually the USAFFE would have run out of food and ammo too since resupply wouldn't have been possible, not for another 3 years. The Japanese could have been beaten back several times but they would have come back with 10 times more troops, ships, and planes and bring in even more reinforcements from other theaters. What I'm saying is it took almost 3 years for the US to fight its way back... the 150k strong USAFFE which were dispersed among the major islands would not have been able to hold for 3 years. Maybe one year at most, then it would be the same story, only on a bigger scale. The Far Eastern air force would have dished out some hurt even if they were not bombed on the ground but Clark would have been the only field big bombers could have operated on and that would have been bombed useless after a while. The Japanese had at times 50 to 100 zero fighters escorting their bombers. None of the P40's could even get near the bombers because of the swarming fighter escort. It took the US several carrier battle groups, 20+ fleet and escort carriers, many highly trained marine and army divisions, the gigantic logistics, supply trains, etc.. Even if all of the US strength in Hawaii were transferred to the Philippines, it wouldn't have had enough critical mass to survive for 3 years. Fighting qualities aside, the USAFFE wouldn't have had enough resources both in men and materiele. The US just didn't have that much even if they sent all the aid they gave the UK to the Philippines instead. Imagine if all this had been delivered before 7 December, 1941: "In a letter prepared on 5 December 1941 but never sent, General Marshall outlined for General MacArthur what had been and was being done to strengthen USAFFE. "Reinforcements and equipment already approved," he said, "require over 1,000,000 ship tons." Fifty-five ships had already been obtained and approximately 100,000 ship tons of supplies were en route, with twice this amount ready for immediate shipment to ports of embarkation. Requests for equipment for the Philippine Army, except those for the M1 rifle, had been approved, and uncontrolled items of supply were being shipped as rapidly as they could be assembled and loaded on ships. "Not only will you receive soon all your supporting light artillery (130 75-mm. guns]," Marshall told MacArthur, "but 48 155-mm. howitzers and 24 155-mm. guns for corps and army artillery." Except for certain types of ammunition, the defense reserve for the U.S. Army by July of that year. Three semimobile antiaircraft artillery regiments were scheduled to leave the United States soon, but the 90--mm. antiaircraft gun could not be sent since it had not yet been fully tested. A sum of $269,000,000 had been requested from Congress for the support of the Philippine Army, and early passage of such legislation was expected. "I assure you," Marshall closed, "of my purpose to meet to the fullest extent possible your recommendations for personnel and equipment necessary to defend the Philippines."[65] The last vessels carrying supplies to the Philippines were assembled in convoy in Hawaii and on 7 December were still on the high seas. In the convoy were the 52 dive bombers of the 27th Bombardment Group, 18 P-40s, 340 motor vehicles, 48 75-mm. guns, 3,500,00 rounds of .30- and .50-caliber ammunition, 600 tons of bombs, 9,000 drums of aviation fuel, and other heavy equipment and supplies. Also aboard were the two light field artillery battalions and the ground echelon of the 7th Bombardment Group (H)." HyperWar: US Army in WWII: Fall of the Philippines Even the cargo carried aboard the Pensacola Convoy, mentioned in the last paragraph would have been warmly welcomed, eagerly received and would have made a difference during the campaign.
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Post by johnbryan on Nov 18, 2008 20:24:32 GMT -5
There was also a full battalion of M-3 Grant/Lee Medium Tanks in New Orleans awaiting shipment to the PI along with their crews and supporting material that never made it aboard ship before Pearl Harbor.
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Post by johnbryan on Nov 18, 2008 20:35:12 GMT -5
Oral History Transcript Edward Price RamseyLieutenant Colonel (Retired), 26th Cavalry Regiment (Philippine Scouts) : Now when you were heading back south towards Manila, and everybody was retreating, the Japanese are coming in, tell me about the preparations for and the training of the Philippine forces and how many American forces were there. In other words, at that time both the American and Filipino's were not very well trained, nor well equipped. Can you kind of describe that going against thousands of Japanese who were highly trained, highly fortified, and highly equipped? How would you point out to someone that didn't know, how we needed more time and money and equipment, things like that?S: I understand what you are saying and what you are getting at. First off, the number of American's that were in the Philippines was relatively few, in terms of the combat personnel. The only ones that we had that were line combat people was your Air Force obviously, which were wiped out within the first few days and most of those were sent back to the rear areas into Bataan. I think maybe half a dozen airplanes left or maybe a dozen originally, then they at least several of those were shot down. You had the coast artillery where you had American officers and Philippine, they were Philippine scouts. You had the three regiments that were combat regiments Philippine scouts; the 45th, and 57th infantry Philippine scouts, the 26th Cavalry Regiment, Philippine scouts. You had one regiment of Americans that had been brought back from Shanghai that was the 31st American Infantry who were in my opinion very poorly trained. Mainly because they had been doing nothing but duty over in China and not had…I probably shouldn't say that because, I did not have that much contact with them at the time. But in the final battles, I did not get the impression that they were very effective. I: How would you describe the quantity and quality of the Japanese forces versus Filipino and American forces?S: Well the ones that came in, they were hardened, well-trained troops as opposed to our Filipino Army troops. Many of them didn't even have shoes, some of them didn't even have guns, and they had not yet had time to get them equipped or trained for that matter only superficial training. The ones that were really well trained was the scouts, Filipino Scouts, like the 26th Cavalry and actually the only one that was in combat in that area at that time was the 26th. That is why we took quite a beating, in the thing and I said we had lost about half of our officers and men in the very beginning action. The Philippine Army division that was up there had been pretty much routed, I think it was the 71st. I: Why were they routed? If they were equal in numbers and all that, equal equipment how is it?S: They weren't equally equipped at all. Our Philippine Scouts had good equipment, the Filipino Army had very poor or no equipment. The Japanese that came in were well equipped with the equipment they are used to. The rifles they had I didn't think much of, but still they had been fighting with them for a long time, they were well equipped, seasoned troops, that came in there. As opposed to the fact that the only ones that were well trained that we had, was our regiment. That's the reason that we got massacred, because General Wainwright, who was an old cavalry officer incidentally, and he was the umpire at the polo games the day before war broke out, that day that war broke out. He threw our regiment in there to try to stem the tide of the Japanese invasion into Lingayen Gulf that is why we lost so many men at the time. I: Now, your retreating actions, the Japanese have really been getting you guys. Now let me ask you about that issue of the retreat. I asked this question before, how could a bunch of Americans who were not hardened battle, as the Japanese were, not fully equipped, not fully trained, many of the guys in the tanks had never fired them - never trained in them. And the Filipinos you said didn't have many of them, didn't have weapons, and many of them had never been trained or fully trained. How could that amalgamation of people hold out against the Japanese for six months?S: That's true and it was because, well, let me back up a little bit. First off, you have to understand the number of Americans that were there was a handful. The 31st American Infantry never got into action until the final days they were back in Bataan well to the rear. So they were not even committed to it. The two tank battalions, one was from Arizona and one was from New Mexico, Arizona, or New Mexico, and one I think was Texas. I think it was 192nd and 194th Tank Battalions, light tanks. They were not trained together with us and actually, they didn't do us an awful lot of good. They were constantly being pulled back, because they had never been training together with the tanks. Which was a disaster and shouldn't have happened, but that is what I said, the beginning of a war is always chaotic. Once we got into Bataan, and we were dug in there, and we did have time, 'cause while we were withdrawing and holding in the north and there was actually four lines of resistance before we got into Bataan. They had time to dig in and get at some revetments and get into a position to do a fair defense action. My regiment by that time was cut at least by half, and we were pulled back, reorganized like the troop I led into Moron was combined. (Troops) E and F, instead of two different troops, it had been lumped together under troop E and it was actually E/F. So, by that time things were organized and the Philippine Army equipment had been gotten to them so by that time they were quite effective. In the beginning when they were way off, they were quite ineffective, because of the lack of equipment and actually the lack of training, lack of time to train them. Artillery, incidentally, the Philippine Army artillery by that time had learned to do well. The 31st Philippine Army Division, Infantry Division, was quite good and their artillery was very effective in helping to slow things down. So by that time our lines of defense were dug in and the 11th Infantry Division, which were Ingerots from the north mountain province. They were tough little characters and the Japanese were scared of them because they found out some of them were headhunters and they had a good meal if the Japanese tried to raid their place. I don't know if that should be talked about or not. This I know, later on all of those troops of the 11th, that they could find were executed by the Japanese, because they had a reputation that scared the Japanese www.militarymuseum.org/Ramsey.htmlI think the regiment that you are thinking of that was evacuated from China, was the 4th Marine Regiment. Even then, only part of them managed to escape. The remaining Legation Guard and North China Horse Marines were captured before they could board ship on 7 December, 1941. IIRC, the USA 31st Regiment was always part of the Philippine Scouts.
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Post by johnbryan on Nov 18, 2008 20:47:16 GMT -5
Don't get me wrong, the Japanese would have been in one heck of a fight and for a longer period of time... maybe (9-12 months?). I'm just being realistic. Eventually the USAFFE would have run out of food and ammo too since resupply wouldn't have been possible, not for another 3 years. The Japanese could have been beaten back several times but they would have come back with 10 times more troops, ships, and planes and bring in even more reinforcements from other theaters. What I'm saying is it took almost 3 years for the US to fight its way back... the 150k strong USAFFE which were dispersed among the major islands would not have been able to hold for 3 years. Maybe one year at most, then it would be the same story, only on a bigger scale. The Far Eastern air force would have dished out some hurt even if they were not bombed on the ground but Clark would have been the only field big bombers could have operated on and that would have been bombed useless after a while. The Japanese had at times 50 to 100 zero fighters escorting their bombers. None of the P40's could even get near the bombers because of the swarming fighter escort. It took the US several carrier battle groups, 20+ fleet and escort carriers, many highly trained marine and army divisions, the gigantic logistics, supply trains, etc.. Even if all of the US strength in Hawaii were transferred to the Philippines, it wouldn't have had enough critical mass to survive for 3 years. Fighting qualities aside, the USAFFE wouldn't have had enough resources both in men and materiele. The US just didn't have that much even if they sent all the aid they gave the UK to the Philippines instead. IIRC, some of the airfields on Bataan were quite large and were quite well protected with aircraft revetments. The only problem was, there were more revetments than there were aircraft. Imagine what might have happened if all of the Quartermaster Stores sitting in depots north of Clark Field and Fort Stotsenburg had been fully transported into Bataan, as called-for, had War Plan Orange III been enacted earlier, not to mention hundreds of thousands of tons of rice that was sitting in the Central Luzon Rice Depot and prohibitted by Philippine law from being transported from one province to another? Makes for an interesting "what-it?"
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Post by oklahoma on Nov 19, 2008 12:04:45 GMT -5
the cold, brutal fact remains that after dec 7, 1941 the japanese ruled the pacific ocean. our pacific fleet was in a shambles except for the carriers and they were outnumbered. by the time we fought our way back to the PI our forces there would have been overrun and most taken prisoner and the remainder fighting in the hills as guerillas. things played out eventually probably about as they would have if we had moved sooner. it just took longer. as for the quality of the philippine troops (not the excellent scouts), the native troops who made it down to bataan after the retreat from lingayan had to be a tough lot. the sheep had been separated from the goats. the filipinos who stood on the abucay line in january 1942 were people who could be depended on. they could have bailed out up on the luzon central plain, but stayed to fight on bataan. i cant see how anyone could question their performance from january 1942 onward. no need to go into the performance of the scouts. best soldiers, possibly, in the entire pacific, certainly the best, by far, in the philippines.
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Post by johnbryan on Nov 19, 2008 12:38:08 GMT -5
the cold, brutal fact remains that after dec 7, 1941 the japanese ruled the pacific ocean. our pacific fleet was in a shambles except for the carriers and they were outnumbered. by the time we fought our way back to the PI our forces there would have been overrun and most taken prisoner and the remainder fighting in the hills as guerillas. things played out eventually probably about as they would have if we had moved sooner. it just took longer. as for the quality of the philippine troops (not the excellent scouts), the native troops who made it down to bataan after the retreat from lingayan had to be a tough lot. the sheep had been separated from the goats. the filipinos who stood on the abucay line in january 1942 were people who could be depended on. they could have bailed out up on the luzon central plain, but stayed to fight on bataan. i cant see how anyone could question their performance from january 1942 onward. no need to go into the performance of the scouts. best soldiers, possibly, in the entire pacific, certainly the best, by far, in the philippines. I agree with you to a point. Where we differ is that I contend that had Bataan held out until after the Battles of Coral Sea and Midway in mid 1942, FDR would have had an extremely hard time maintaining his "Europe First " policy in the face of public opinion and would have had to substantially increase the numbers of ships, men and material sent into the Pacific Theatre of Operations. The ugly truth is that the Japanese didn't beat the USAFFE Forces on Luzon, starvation and disease did. The Japanese were always outnumbered throughout the campaign and remained so right up to the end.
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Post by oklahoma on Nov 19, 2008 14:46:35 GMT -5
and i agree with you up to a point, but even had we turned all our resources toward relief of the PI soon after midway, i still dont believe we could have arrived in time for a rescue. it was a hard enough slugfest the way it was. with the europe first strategy we made it back to manila soon after new years 1945. maybe with a PI first strategy we make it back by spring 1944. thats still too late. the whole early 1942 period, to me, was l ike a greek tradegy. our guys and filipino allies half way around the world, fighting with inferior weapons, not enough of the good ones that we did have, short on meds and food. even though we may, on paper been equal or even at times outnumbered the enemy, when it came to counting "effectives" we come up short. i will never believe enough light has been shed on how and why our air forces were decimated on the first day and why, prior to pearl harbor and soon after, that more food stuffs/meds/ammo wasnt moved into bataan while we had the chance, the rice sitting in cabanatuan warehouses for the taking by the japs/etc. those kinds of things certainly hastened the amer/filipino downfall, but in the final anaylysis, methinks our forces were just too far from the U.S. for any real chance of rescue. the time line was just too narrow.
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Post by legionnaire on Nov 19, 2008 15:17:44 GMT -5
What is so tragic and one could mention criminal is the fact that Washington and the US high Command even before there was Pearl harbor had already knew/ realized and decided that the Philippines was not worth defending due to its vast distance from the US to rescue and resupply. It was a liability for Washington. Considering there were 30,000 plus "expendable" US combat and service personnel, not counting US civilians stationed in the P.I. since Dewey sailed into Manila Bay.
How many US combat troops were in England compare to the Philippines? Yet for the USAFFE Soldier's sacrifices and buying time for America to rearm and prepare to win the war, these expendables were not considered worthy enough to be rescued again by the US high command, when the US forces were starting to win back the pacific war. Even Japan considered the Philippine Islands a major strategic territory that must not be lost and be held at all cost, as a result of the biggest Naval battle of WWII, Leyte Gulf.
Only MacArthur argued that it was America's responsibility and duty to rescued their commonwealth brothers, based on documented facts that the Japanese Army in WWII's were THE most barbaric and mankind's most cruel treatment of Filipino and American POW's.
Philip
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Post by oklahoma on Nov 20, 2008 14:09:59 GMT -5
genl mac was 100 percent correct when he persuaded FDR that it was our moral duty to liberate the PI instead of following the "formosa" strategic plan being promoted by some in the pentagon. if it delayed our immediate advance on japan proper it was still worth it to run the japanese our of the Philippines before we did anything else. as i said, it was our absolute moral duty to settle that score post haste. thank God the USA did it to our everlasting credit. we owed it to the filipinos and we owed it to the japanese and we owed it to ourselves.
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