Operation: Downfall

[Michael Daumen]

I chopped down the big WW2 Pacific map a while ago for just such a project.

[McMonkey]

I'm not exactly sure what Patine has in mind but IMHO the map above is way too small. An invasion of Japan would have been, to borrow the phrase, the mother of all battles. The Americans were projecting casualties in the hundreds of thousands in a protracted campaign against a desperate and stubborn opponent.

If Patine used this map the game could be over in a few turns. What I would recommend is something on a far larger, more focused scale. Most of SE Asia was irrelevant to this final campaign of WWII.

As I said before there is an excellent map by Darth Veda of Japan at a really good scale and Korea could be added on using MapEdit!

Just my view! I wonder what ideas Boco had as it was obviously on his mind too!

[Patine]

Werd100, go ahead and make a map. This one has a good chance of being done when EotRS and KW are finished, so I'd appreciate if you'd do this for me. Thanks greatly!

[McMonkey]

Cool. I will start on this at a slightly more subdued pace then so it should be ready or thereabouts by the time you finish Korea etc...

I think this map would also have potential for any remake of the Japanese Sengoku-Jidai period as well as the Mongol Invasion and Japanese invasion of Korea or all three combined? Anyway that is a project for the future.

I have found an excellent map of the area you need in my huge A2 Times Atlas. It has been photocopied and the landmass highlighted in snazzy green florescent pen. A fetching red grid is ready to be laid over the top. When this is done I can do the map editor grid to correspond and then work on it when I want a rest from the Nam!

What I need to find out is how to generate a 32,000 square map that is longer in its vertical measurement than its horizontal. I am sure it is fairly easy but I am too lazy to work it out myself. If anyone could explain in layman's terms how this is done I would be grateful.

[McMonkey]

Here is part of the photocopied template. I could only fit some of it into my A4 scanner. I could try and use the giant work ones but I may get the sack! I think this gives an idea about scale anyway

[Patine]

Looking good, Werd! I'll be delighted to see the final result. But first, EotRS and Korea...

[Michael Daumen]

Originally posted by Werd100
What I would recommend is something on a far larger, more focused scale. Most of SE Asia was irrelevant to this final campaign of WWII.

Chinese Civil War? Soviet invasion of Manchuria and Japan? Potential start of WW3? Why restrict it to a two-nation game?

[McMonkey]

True. I still think a bigger map would be an advantage though. Also by adding the Chinese civil war I think you are creating a huge amount of extra work and another level of complexity. It would be possible to represent WWIII between USA-USSR just in Japan, Korea, SE Manchuria and SE Siberia as a theatre game, much as WWII games set only in Europe are! Anyway, Techumseh has already covered the Chinese civil war!

[techumseh]

No, the warlord period preceded the Sino-Japanese War. The Civil War came after it. Neither are relevant to this project.

The problem with the whole concept of "Operation Downfall", is that must assumes the absence of the atomic bomb, but does not take into account "Operation August Storm", the invasion of Manchuria by the Red Army. It was one of the most successful blitzkreig campaigns of the entire war, cut short by the Japanese surrender.

One of the reasons for the deployment of the atomic bomb was to forstall the Soviet attack, which started the same day as the Nagasaki bombing. If the bomb was unavailable to the US, the Soviets would have been able to occupy Manchuria, Korea and north China before the US could hit the beaches in Kyushu.

The outcome feared by US ruling circles was a Japanese surrender to the USSR, which left the Soviets in control of much of north-east Asia. Hence the decision to deploy the A-bomb.

All of which is a way of saying the premise here is shaky, at best. A better alternative would be to include the Soviets in Manchuria, and assume the US invasion took place at the same time.

[McMonkey]

@Techumseh

Sorry about the inaccuracy. I have not played Warlords all the way through yet and just assumed that it carried on until the bitter end! My mistake

Re: Downfall
This is one of the major flaws of alternative history. I totally agree the Soviets have been forgotten about in this discussion.

One interesting line of thought, presuming the A-Bomb was not available and the Japanese refused to surrender, is the possibility of a Soviet amphibious invasion of Japan at the same time as the Americans and the whole thing turning into WWIII.

I think it would have taken the Soviets some time to organize such an invasion. They did not have any strategic bomber force at the time, their navy was in a poor state, especially in the far east and they did not have a history of amphibious warfare to refer to. Just because their tanks reached Pusan there is no guarantee they would have been able to launch an immediate invasion of Japan.

I propose that in the time it would have taken for the Soviets to organize an invasion the US (with their vast navy, marine corps and air force) could have launched their invasion, they were more than capable of pulling off such a large and complex operation!

This is where the 'What if' part could really get interesting. Would the Soviets have continued their northern push and invaded Hokkaido and then move onto Honshu. Would they also launch an attack from Korea. What would have happened if the US and Soviets had both invaded Kyushu at once and how would they divide up Japan. Could the third world war actually be a continuation of the second?

I think it is a fascinating subject as long as the player is willing to suspend his disbelief over the Atomic bomb.

[Boco]

When I was considering this, I thought of the advice offered, and envisioned a scenario centered on Kyushu and Honshu. Soviets would become a threat, diplomatic or otherwise, by invading Honshu from Hokkaidu later in the scenario.

Initially the human would have to weather a blistering Kamikaze campaign. Unit costs would have to be tweaked to make transports a magnet. The challenge as I saw it was to make the scenario fun once the landings were made. If you, as the designer, could predict where the player would land, you could program a terrific battle near the beach. If you were wrong, then the player could have an easy boring time of it.

Btw, no one knew of the effects of radiation. AFAIK, at least some planners considered using tactical nukes, with Allied troops marching in and mopping up in a nuclear landscape. The other nasty being considered was gas. Apparently, winds were predictable and favorable at times. By this point, the Japanese couldn't manufacture masks, and for that reason were loathe to introduce gas on the US troops. IIRC, they had already used gas in China, and that could have been used as a 'justification' to use gas as part of 'Downfall'.

One concern that I have about incorporating the Chinese Civil War and the blitz into Manchuria is the amount of event space that it would require. This would come at the expense of events in Japan itself.

[AGRICOLA]

techumseh is right that the scen rests on very shaky underpinnings. It seems to me that, as soon as the Soviets are brought into play, the basic premises of the scen cease to make sense. The best solution may be to eliminate the Chinese, the Soviets, China, Manchuria and Korea from the scen and make it a one-on-one between the Japanese and the Americans. This way one would at least not need to dream up explanations for some most unlikely alternate history.

One would still have to assume that food was being shipped from China, raw materials were arriving from Manchuria and Korea and that an oil was flowing from some newly discovered oilfields. Realty would be more like seaweed for breakfast, lunch and dinner, untold numbers of fanatics with sharpened bamboo sticks and explosive belts for weapons, and gasoline distilled from pine roots.

[Patine]

This all makes sense. Though I'd neglected to post it, I did plan on including the Soviets as a player, but in what role and to what extent I hadn't decided yet. I will have to carefully consider how the scen would function with each of these parameters, and pick my poison for event writing, etc. But indeed, all of these ideas and concerns are quite valid and do need to be taken into account. My biggest concern is the scope of the map and the size of the events file, as well as extensive alternate history extrapolation. I will have to carefully consider this.

[Boco]

If you work from the premise that the a-bomb was not a viable weapon, the scenario could make sense. Then it could either focus on Japan's Götterdämerung or make that a prelude to a Bear vs Eagle showdown in the Far East.

[curtsibling]

If we are searching for alternate reality foils...

With the lack of a nuke, and a full-scale invasion ordered...
Perhaps some calamity happens to the US forces as they land?

*Typhoon strikes as the US forces try to land?
*Kamikazes get lucky and sink the headquarters ship?
*Invasion lands premature and must carry out an improvised operation?

PS
I too agree that it should be kept to a duel between Japan and the USA.

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