Can the Philippines be saved 1941-42?

[Driftless]

1. Provide greater access to WWI-era reserve stocks to the Philippine Army, in the 1930s. The US provided 250,000 M1917 rifles and a mixture of heavy machineguns sufficient to the Philippine Army TO&E.

Some time back on this forum (not this thread), I had read that many of those rifles and other weapons were in bad need of repair. Was that true, or a bit of a myth?

I've also seen on this forum that there was too much of the ammunition where the powder had deteriorated with time and imperfect storage conditions. Was that true too?

IF true, that goes to your other points about having increased access to skilled ordnance personnel to start remedial work, and also for ordnance trainers for transitioning to Philippine staff

Also, the idea of a Philippine Sten make great sense. I was going to add a home-grown trench shotgun, but how well would paper cartridge shot shells hold up for extended periods in the high humidity?

*edit* What about recruiting more former US military NCO's to serve as technical advisors in various maintenance roles? Maybe more bang-for-the-peso in the short run than the lucre spent on Field Marshall Mac.

 

[buwaya]

The M1917 problem was with the tiny leaf spring on the ejector. It was not a notable problem when these were new in 1917-18, but seems to have gotten worse with time. Apparently it was exacerbated when the rifles were improperly cleaned of cosmoline preservative, leaving stiff goop under the spring. A good unit supply of spares should have gotten ahead of the problem, plus of course doing a proper job of preparing them for issue. This was another deficiency in Ordnance.

I suspect that having these things re-tempered may also have prevented so much spring breakage.

I havent heard that bad .30-06 ammo was an issue. The M1917s were in use till 1944-45 by guerillas, and were preferred by them over all others, like captured Japanese rufles. Their worst fault from the guerilla POV was the chronic lack of ammo.

Shotguns with cardboard cartridges are a very bad idea as a military weapon in the Philippines. There were a lot of extemporized/homemade single shot shotguns there, in the general category of "paltiks", homebrew guns. But that sort of thing is a last resort.

Any assistance in technical branches would have helped, as well, probably as combat experience from 1918. Those "bonus marchers" that MacArthur put down in 1932 probably had a good number of useful fellows among them.

An interesting item I saw in the Quezon museum (contains a lot of his personal effects) a couple of weeks ago was a presentation model of a Mexican Mendoza RM2 light machinegun. I suppose someone in Mexico was attempting to interest the president in a sale. Now, whether Productos Mendoza SA could have provided these in quantity pre-1942, who knows. It woukd have been expensive.

 

[buwaya]

I am certainly interested in any ideas about drawing out the campaign, which would fit in with the scenario I am developing ATM.

President Quezon had one of these among his personal effects. Its still there.

 

[Garrison]

This is all interesting and it could work itself into the bigger idea I'm working on.

 

[kent]

It all comes back to how messed up the Dept of the Army was, The big problem was leaving Mac in charge of anything. He had nothing but yes men advising him so anything he thought of was pushed by them. No flights over Formosa, leaving all the supplies behind no one ever asked any questions.

 

[buwaya]

It all comes back to how messed up the Dept of the Army was, The big problem was leaving Mac in charge of anything. He had nothing but yes men advising him so anything he thought of was pushed by them. No flights over Formosa, leaving all the supplies behind no one ever asked any questions.

Whatever his faults, MacArthurs problems, 1936-41, were nearly all caused by other people. He had a fine title but very little power. He was constantly asking for support, budget assistance, materiel, officers, etc from the US government. And from the Philippine government, which was trying to run a poor country with tiny tax revenues. He could not on his own, for instance, call for Philippine mobilization, as that was, a. A prerogative of the US, as the Philippines had very limited powers under its Commonwealth status, and b. The Philippines couldnt afford to do it on its own. He certainly couldn't transfer US officers to Philippine units, until the USAFFE was authorized, and he achieved true command authority in August 1941.

 

[buwaya]

The fundamental primer on the defense of the Philippines, 1941-42, is the US Army "Green Book", "The Fall of the Philippines", Louis Morton. IMHO it is by far the best of the "Green Books" (The US Army official history series on WW2), in terms of literary quality. It is a US government publication and is easily available online. If anyobe has an interest in all this, read this one first. https://history.army.mil/books/wwii/5-2/5-2_Contents.htm

The second general history I would recommend (read Morton first), was an explicit attempt to fill in some blanks in Morton, "The Times When Men Must Die: The Story of the Destruction of the Philippine Army During the Early Months of World War II in the Pacific, December 1941-may 1942", Marconi Dioso. It is available on Amazon Kindle.

The third "starter" is "The Philippine Army, 1935-1942", Ricardo Trota Jose. This is the go-to source on Philippine defense policy of the era. It is unfortunately out of print. Professor Jose is still active at the University of the Philippines, and he has various Ateneo University and UP papers, though these are not readily available unless you have access to JSTOR or the like.

 

[Butchpfd]

Whatever his faults, MacArthurs problems, 1936-41, were nearly all caused by other people. He had a fine title but very little power. He was constantly asking for support, budget assistance, materiel, officers, etc from the US government. And from the Philippine government, which was trying to run a poor country with tiny tax revenues. He could not on his own, for instance, call for Philippine mobilization, as that was, a. A prerogative of the US, as the Philippines had very limited powers under its Commonwealth status, and b. The Philippines couldnt afford to do it on its own. He certainly couldn't transfer US officers to Philippine units, until the USAFFE was authorized, and he achieved true command authority in August 1941.

From the moment MacArthur became Commander of USFFE he screwed up. He threw out his predecessors plans for WPO , alienated the Navy, refused the Navy to patrol toward Formosa, ignored all intelligence and code breaking information that Japan planned war by December 1941. MacArthur believed ,until bombs fell on the Philippines on 8 December 1941, that the Japanese would not attack prior to March 1942. He decided on a forward defense plan ( with inadequately trained and equipped troops)rather then a prepared defensive with drawl to Bataan. He was forced to abandon Clark Field and Ft Stostenberg and did not destroy either base, leaving rolling stock, months of supplies, ammunition, His precipitious decision to declare Manila an open city ( less then 24 hours notice)forced huge stocks of supplies to be abandoned the navy tried burn thj e3,000,000 tons of POL in Manila but did not have enough time, Navy and Marine uniforms for 10,000 men for 6 months , 6 months of dry stores for the Asiatic Fleet an d16th Naval District, Over a million tons of civilian rice stores.

 

[buwaya]

The timeline of March 1942 was not MacArthurs alone. This was a Pentagon estimate, in part based on US shipping and availability issues - yes, basing things on what you CAN do is not a good way to predict what a potential enemy actually will do.

MacArthur, and everyone else, were begging for aid, and permission to begin mobilization, long before the Pentagon and the administration began to open the spigots.

As for the forward defense plan - you have to realize that there was another government involved. The Philippine government was not happy with WPO3. It meant abandoning the country to the invader on day 1. This may have been best from a US and Allied strategic POV, but the Filipinos (the government anyway) knew very well that under WPO3 they were to be sacrificed. They (the public) had been promised protection you know. We, in the far future, know this was unrealistic, but the US government and the Pentagon didnt admit it at the time. There were even several attempts by the Philippine government, before and during the war, to come to an accommodation with the Japanese, to spare the country an occupation by a hostile power. Nothing came of this.

I figure that MacArthur thought his Philippine reserve divisions would be more effective than they were. Or that they had to at least try (see above), to at least make an attempt to keep their promises. If you will recall, MacArthur was chief of staff and later commander of the ad-hoc National Guard "Rainbow" division in 1918. The Philippine divisions however were unable to turn in a similar performance.

 

[buwaya]

, alienated the Navy, refused the Navy to patrol toward Formosa,

The Navy did patrol towards Formosa, diffidently, at one point using a disguised civilian yacht. But that case may have been an attempt to create a casus belli. The prohibition on obvious provocations was an administration/Pentagon policy.

 

[buwaya]

As for holding Manila - politics again, or perhaps simple humanity. The implications of a street fight in a city with a million people (including refugees) was disgusting to all the leaders involved, Filipino and American. Consider what did happen in 1945.

 

[Cryhavoc101]

Low hanging fruit in this period would be a far more aggressive USN Submarine Doctrine with regards to their OTL abysmal performance during this campaign

The USN Submarine doctrine of the day was to stay submerged during the day and only surface at night.

Also to conduct attacks submerged - not at periscope depth for fear of enemy ASW efforts which were not nearly as good as was feared.

There was 23 modern submarines in Adm Harts force of 29 Subs made 15 attacks and sank just 4 ships in Dec (of which only 1 was confirmed post war).

We know that there was an issue with the infamous MK 14 but this was made worse by the fact that so few attacks were made and allowed BuOrd to dismiss reports of the issues

Also we have several things that could be done

More Aggressive training of the boat commanders and crews - this would show up unaggressive commanders etc

Aggressive orders - OTL they were very passive in nature - basically they should have been ordered to attack whenever possible

Only 2 boats were at sea patrolling on Dec 7th out of 29 boats - have more boats at sea

No plan to aggressively attack an invasion force - lets have one!

 

[Butchpfd]

As for holding Manila - politics again, or perhaps simple humanity. The implications of a street fight in a city with a million people (including refugees) was disgusting to all the leaders involved, Filipino and American. Consider what did happen in 1945.

The issue was not holding Manila, it was Mac Arthur's decision on 23 December ti Declare Manila an Open City as of noon on the 25th. That was a totally inadequate for the Army and Navy to evacuate stores from Manila. Two examples; over 1,000 barrels of 100 octane gasoline for the PT Boats (55,000) gallons were abandoned and only partial.y destroyed, as well as 3,000,000 tons of Marine fuel with about 1/3 rd destroyed.

 

[Butchpfd]

Low hanging fruit in this period would be a far more aggressive USN Submarine Doctrine with regards to their OTL abysmal performance during this campaign

The USN Submarine doctrine of the day was to stay submerged during the day and only surface at night.

Also to conduct attacks submerged - not at periscope depth for fear of enemy ASW efforts which were not nearly as good as was feared.

There was 23 modern submarines in Adm Harts force of 29 Subs made 15 attacks and sank just 4 ships in Dec (of which only 1 was confirmed post war).

We know that there was an issue with the infamous MK 14 but this was made worse by the fact that so few attacks were made and allowed BuOrd to dismiss reports of the issues

Also we have several things that could be done

More Aggressive training of the boat commanders and crews - this would show up unaggressive commanders etc

Aggressive orders - OTL they were very passive in nature - basically they should have been ordered to attack whenever possible

Only 2 boats were at sea patrolling on Dec 7th out of 29 boats - have more boats at sea

No plan to aggressively attack an invasion force - lets have one!

Describe the aggressive attack on the Invasion forces at Lingayen Gulf, remember the mean depth of water is 22 fathoms in clear water, it is a 2 day run for PT boats which would have required refueling twice, the only naval aviation available are a mix of PBY-3 and 4s and a handful of SOC-3s.

 

[Butchpfd]

The Navy did patrol towards Formosa, diffidently, at one point using a disguised civilian yacht. But that case may have been an attempt to create a casus belli. The prohibition on obvious provocations was an administration/Pentagon policy.

The disguised yacht was the USS Lanaki, which had just cleared Manila Bay enroute enroute to Cam Rahn Bay Indochina on 8 December. She never Patrolled North. Only Army aviation patrolled North of Iba, the USNs 28 PBYS patrolled an arc from Olapango West 800miles to NE of Davo 800 miles. Hart had 1/3rd thePBY s Hawaii had to cover 5 times the area.
The prohibition was pushed by Mac Arthur, over Hart's objection.

 

[Garrison]

So I am reading some of these responses as suggesting if there was a clearer picture of Japanese intentions in Washington, enough for them to send out very clear orders on patrolling and taking proactive measures then the battle could be extended but not won?

 

[Cryhavoc101]

Describe the aggressive attack on the Invasion forces at Lingayen Gulf, remember the mean depth of water is 22 fathoms in clear water, it is a 2 day run for PT boats which would have required refueling twice, the only naval aviation available are a mix of PBY-3 and 4s and a handful of SOC-3s.

More than they did OTL - a lot was expected of them OTL and they did not deliver even an 'nth' of what was expected.

Yes attacking in shallow water was dangerous and any such attempts are risky but if they are not going to do it why have them there - they could have made a material difference to the land campaign through loss of supplies, equipment and available shipping - but did not.

A contrast is Sub Flotilla 10 operating out of Malta - it lost 50% of its boats operating very aggressively in the restricted waters of the central Med but also sunk a great deal of shipping that directly impacted events in the North African campaign - its reason for existing.

There was an issue with USN Submarine Doctrine in the early stages of the war (late war it and the USN Submarine force was amazing) - one of its greatest successes during this period for example was at Midway when the Mikuma and Mogami collided after spotting the USS Tambor during the night after the main carrier battle and taking evasive action assuming that if they had spotted the smaller submarine it must have spotted them and already fired a spread.

Tambor's captain was utterly unaware that 4 Heavy cruisers were nearby and made no attempt to attack the crippled Mogami much to the disgust of his crew instead remaining submerged during the following day.

He would later be beached for this!

So just a tad more aggression!

There was only a handful of PT boats (6?) and they are as far as I am concerned Auxiliary craft for littoral combat (excellent for actions such as the anti SLOC campaign in the Slot') and not to be confused with Destroyers, Crusiers and Submarines in terms of striking power or indeed staying power.

 

[Driftless]

So I am reading some of these responses as suggesting if there was a clearer picture of Japanese intentions in Washington, enough for them to send out very clear orders on patrolling and taking proactive measures then the battle could be extended but not won?

To my limited knowledge, the USN saw little possibilty of successfully defending the archipelago against a determined Japanese assault. Their all-along plan was to temporarily retreat and await the arrival of the bulk of the Pacific fleet+, with the hopes the US and Philippine Armies could hold on till then.

Pearl Harbor by itself derailed that sketchy notion, combined with the day-one multiple failures on the US ground and air forces in the PI

 

[Cryhavoc101]

So I am reading some of these responses as suggesting if there was a clearer picture of Japanese intentions in Washington, enough for them to send out very clear orders on patrolling and taking proactive measures then the battle could be extended but not won?

Certainly makes for a longer more costly campaign and given that many of the forces would go on to conduct other operations (same with those forces used in Malaya) it is perhaps those follow on operations that cannot happen in early mid 42 (or are weaker) that is the real prize here.

It would take a tall if tree to change the fortunes of the Philippines campaign and certainly not within the timeline given (full occupation of FIC)

 

[Blue cat]

Ok then.

1. This is often mentioned. The biggest supply deficiency on Bataan was the dire shortage of rice. The general debility of all personnel was in the main caused by a lack
of calories, which manifested in all sorts of other problems. USAFFE, in Jan to April, went to great lengths to obtain rice. There was a system of blockade runners, using smaller interisland vessels, set up to run rice to Bataan, and this alone probably kept them going for a month. That is an untold story, of Filipino sailors and Spanish skippers (as most were at the time), taking sacrificial risks. Anyway, in the confusion of the December retreat, USAFFE passed right by the warehouses of the National Rice and Corn Administration in San Fernando, Pampanga. This was the nationalized purchaser of the Central Valley rice crop. There was a vast quantity of rice held there. USAFFE could, possibly, have diverted transport assets (assuming clear roads, and other logistical issues) to have taken enough rice from there to Bataan to provide normal rations for six months.

It’s interesting that USAFFE managed to organize the evacuation of all ordnance stores from Fort McKinley, near Manila, most of which ended up by being blown up upon the surrender of Bataan. But no rice.

I have a vague recollection of reading something along the lines of the Philippine Government had rules regarding the movement of rice which complicated efforts to move rice around during the initial retreats. That may or may not have been true but I seem to recall reading that. There may also have been well founded concerns about leaving rice for the civilians to eat ?

I presume the U.S. had the authority to move its own military supplies around.