Re: Midway

Brad Meyer wrote:

On Wed, 20 Jun 2007 05:44:25 -0400, Bill Shatzer
<bshatzerNO@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

-snip-

The end might have been a few months delayed but the eventual outcome would have been identical. Manila is, after all, closer to Nagasaki than is Tinian. Taiwan is closer to everything.

Add another 50,000 US casualties for Taiwan. That is why they did not
attempt it during the war. Too costly.

That seems unduly pessimistic. Total US ground forces casualties for the entire Philippine campaign were under 50,000 - apprx. 10,300 fatalities and apprx. 35,500 wounded/injured.

And Japan had over 380,000 troops in the Philippines. Japan had less than half that number in Formosa (about 170,000) in 1945; it seems unlikely that a Taiwan/Formosa operation would have suffered casualties equal the entire Philippine campaign with less than half the total number of Japanese defenders.

On the other hand, the course historically adopted was far from cost free either.

The US suffered over 26,000 ground force casualties in the Saipan/Tinian/Guam invasions while the Okinawa campaign (ultimately decided on in lieu of the proposed Formosa invasion) incurred 40,000 US Army and Marine casualties (and nearly 9,000 additional US Navy casualties).

Weighing a hypothetical Formosa invasion against the actual capture of the Marianas and Okinawa, it would seem Fomosa would have been decidedly -less- costly in terms of US casualties.

Though admittedly, logistics for the Mariana and Okinawa operations were more easily handled than they would have been for a Formosa invasion.

Cheers,

.