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Common enemies. The Germans did share their code machine with the Japanese. One of the machines was stolen/captured/purloined by the British and shared with us. A major reason for the US victory at Midway. The Germans and Japanese sometimes seemed at cross purposes with each other: after Pearl Harbor Hitler obligingly declared war on the US but the Japanese refused to attack the USSR because they had a non-aggression treaty. Even Italy free-lanced, Greece being one example and didn't go into France in 1940 until almost the French surrender.
Were there any joint actions undertaken by German and Japanese forces during the Second World War? Maybe naval action in Russian waters.
I wondered if they were genuine allies or simply had common enemies.
Because of their geographical location, Germany and Japan had almost completely unrelated strategic designs. For quite a while, Japan did see Russia/Soviet Union as its primary threat, mainly because Russia was probably the only power that had interest and capabilities to compete with Japan in Northern China, especially Manchuria, coupled with the fear that Communism might instigate a revolution in a still rather poor and heavily hierarchical society. But overall, "strike north" faction was almost always minority and kinda mercurial, as we all know, renegade Japanese officers did attempt to fight Soviet Union after they tasted success against a divided and disorganized China, and as we also know, Imperial Japanese Army got its a$$ wiped so throughly by Soviet armored forces that Japan soon signed a non-aggression treaty with Soviet Union and never dared to provoke Soviet Union throughout the entire course of the war.
All in all, in hindsight, there was little chance that Japan would have any serious strategic cooperation with Germany no matter how many treaties they signed. It's determined by hard fact on the ground:
Capabilities wise, Japan knew that its poorly armed army guided by a rather backward doctrine was simply no match for the Red Army, if they weren't aware of that before, the decimation they suffered at the hands of Zhukov surely taught them the lesson, as evidenced by their refusal to join Germany against Soviet Union even when most people thought Soviet Union'd already lost the war, a rather out of character behavior for a quite often very opportunistic nation.
Intension wise, Japan's strategic objective could be summed in three words: China, China and China. Remember Japan wasn't a rich nation in any sense back then, its economy was still largely rural and the industrial sector it had was dominated by light industries, Japan could build some really advanced battleships, but overall, Japan was a poor backward power. Which presented a serious problem for Japan:
despite years of fighting, it still could not force the nationalistic government of China to negotiate, let alone surrender, even more remote was the suppression of Communist guerilla operating on Japanese occupied China. The war in China was draining Japan of resources and money. The push into South East Asia was not just about grabbing resources to feed its war in China, its also a desperate attempt to "resolve" the quagmire in China by escalation. There was no exploitable resources in Soviet Union reachable by Japan and the Red Army probably gave shudder to the spine of Japanese army officers. There was really not much for Japan to gain but a lot to lose in a hypothetical campaign to help Germany out, even if Japan decided to attack Soviet Union, the abysmal status of Japanese army and the sheer size and sparseness of Siberia meant that Soviet Union could just focus on repealing Germany and let Japan take whatever it could take, which wasn't much given the meager ability of Japanese army to supply an invading force stuck in a remote, inaccessible frozen hell.
Thank you,eatfastnoodle,almost all of that response was new to me. Being in Britain means that the German aims were more familiar to my generation; far eastern campaigns were really only considered when there was direct British involvement.
Thank you,eatfastnoodle,almost all of that response was new to me. Being in Britain means that the German aims were more familiar to my generation; far eastern campaigns were really only considered when there was direct British involvement.
Actually, I would say war in Europe and East Asia were of different origins. In Europe, it's a long established power (Germany and its predecessor, Prussia, had been recognized as great power ever since Napoleon was alive) going on a rampage as a result of perceived injustice and humiliation suffered at the hands of Western powers after the end of great war and being shut out of world market by old colonial powers which,despite their weakness, still controlled much of the world.
Global empire probably crossed Hitler's mind, but it wasn't the focus or the near or medium objectives of Germany. Emotionally speaking, the war was a burst-out against Britain and France, ideologically speaking, the war was against perceived shady racial group (Jews) that were working against Germany and inferior races that were lucky enough to occupy large swath of fertile land (Slavs). For Britain and France, war against Germany was more of a European power struggle fought by nation states than any global imperialistic conflicts, it's more in the line of what Napoleon did in Europe .
Japan, on the other hand, went to war for its perceived natural rights to acquire oversea empire. Indeed, if Japan were to open up and build up its power 100 years year earlier. its attempt to build up Asian empire belonging to itself wouldn't look so anachronistic as it did in the 40s, after all, old colonial empires, like Britain, France, Portugal, Spain and Netherlands weren't so innocent back when they were building their own respective empires. Entire civilizations were wiped out during the process, no wonder Japanese apologists, both in and outside Japan, cry foul when accused of being the aggressor: Japan was just doing what Britain had been doing for 300 years. How come did we become the boogyman when the land we went after, except China, wasn't in the hands of its rightful owner in the first place?
But the crucial difference was Japan tried to build its empire in the 20th century while Britain built its empire during 18th and 19th century. Time has changed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We lived in a era of nation state, no the time of crown belonging or tribal possessions any more. That's why Japan failed. The war in Asia and Pacific was by nature an old colonial war fought by a new colonial power who had problem understanding how different time was, it's more like war fought between Britain and France or Britain and Netherlands during colonial expanse era.
In sum:
Japan fought a war in a wrong time( in era of nation state and nationalism, colonial war was destined to fail).
Germany fought a war for something she could have attained without a drop of blood.(Economically, colonial Empires were crumbling with or without WWII, Germany's advanced industry was well positioned to propel it past France and Britain with or without WWII. Strategically, the growth of Soviet power meant sooner or later Britain and France would beg Germany to join them against the bear, and the rightful place of Germany being a great power could be restored without a shot fired)
Well, I do know that German supplied Japan with military goods and technology. Germany sent whole aircraft and at least 800 20mm cannons plus aircraft engines and the blueprints.
When Germany surrendered, a German submarine was in the Atlantic on its way to Japan with a load of refined Uranium. Two Japanese officers accompanied the load but they committed suicide when the German Captain told them that he was ordered to surrender. The Sub was later taken to Portsmouth, NH where the Uranium was offloaded.
There is a Submarine wreck off the coast of Norway that is leaking Mercury contaminating the seabed. It was a large shipment destined for Japan.
I don't know what the Japanese sent to Germany but it looks like they were busy working together on several military projects.
well, they probably had planned to do a joint operation, i mean if hitler had succeded in taking the USSR he probably would have moved on china with japans help
I read that German and Japanese Submarines worked together in the Indian Ocean during the war. The tried to catch allied merchant ships coming through the Suez Canal.
When Hitler attacked USSR, Germans were hoping Japanese to attack USSR simultaneously from the East. Japanese did hold their horse though for that they suffered defeat by the Russians during the war between the two in Mongolia right prior to the outbreak of WWII. The Japanese promised that as soon as the Germans took one major Russian city along Volga (especially during battle of stalingrad), they will join in.
The rest is well-known.
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