Figure 1.-- The Pacific War was a naval war, but to fight it the Navy needed an infantry component. The U.S. Marine Corps was significantly expanded to fight it. The Navy's island hopping campaign needed infantry to secure each island as the Navy moved relentlessly across the Pacific toward Japan. America and Britain had many disagreements, but greed on one fundametal principle--Europe first. While Adm. King had toaccept this, he diverted resorces to the Pacific at a faster reate than was anticipated. Here American Marines are caring for Japanese civilians on Saipan. Japanese civilians were terrified at first because what they had been told, but soon learned the only way they were going to survive was to reach American lines. The caption read, "Jap women, children rounded up on Saipan--Japanese women and chidren whose husbands and fathers are opposing American troops on Saipan island in the Marianas are guarded after being rounded upfo removal to a compound where they are now more comfortably quaertered." The Japanese civilians do not look all thy concerned. It loks like they have figured out the Americans were not going to torture and kill them. The photograph was dated July 4, 1944. Source: U.S. Army ignal Corps gs31230nod-pl.

Wars since the first wars of mankind have been fought primarily on land. Over time as man developed maritime capabilities, wars expanded on to the seas. But while there were maritime engagements, most wars were fought on land, especially major wars of consequence. And especially the battle determining the outcomes of wars were fought on land. Naval actions were primarily to support land actions. World War II is a good example. The Pacific War was primarily a naval war. But naval and air forces were only conclusive when army and marine units were landed on and secured island outposts. It was why the U.S. Navy needed the Marine Corps. World War II began as a land war. The fighting and annexations that preceded the War (Manchuria (1931), Ethiopia (1935-36), Spain (1936-39), China (1937-45), Austria (1938), and Czechoslovakia (1938-39) were all land actions. And from the beginning of World War II the fighting in terms of manpower and occupation of defeated countries were primarily land actions, beginning with NAZI Germany and the Soviet Union invading Poland (September 1939). Beginning in Poland the new German Luftwaffe showcased itself as primarily a tactical force designed to support ground forces. This was a capability the Allies would not match until much later in the War. The fight for Norway was settled on land and occured despite overwhelming British naval power (April-May 1940). This was followed by the stunning German victory in the West, defeating and occupying Belgium, France, and the Netherlands (May-June 1940). The fall of France was especially important because it was believed to have the strongest army in the world. The French Army had been the Allied bulwark in World War I, resisting the German onslaught for for over 4 years. In World War II the French Army disintegrated in weeks. This did not occur because Germany had overwhelming land power and superior weaponry. It occurred primarily because of German tactics--Blitzkrieg. Now two decades of socialist inspired pacifist thought was also a factor--but Blitzkrieg tactics were the major factor. Now the idea of Blitzkrieg as not new. It was essentially a continuation of a major principle of warfare--mobility or rapid movement. It was succinctly expressed by Confederate cavalry officer--Natahan Bedford Forest who explained, perhaps erroneously phrased, that battles are won by gitting 'thar fustest with the mostist'. That basic principle is what turned Brandenberg, a small, poor German principality, into a world power. High mobility or Bewegungskrieg became the German way of war centuries before Hitler. 【Citino】 The German principle was to mass power at the point of spear. This did not change in World War II. What did change was that motorization and air power enabled the greatest concentration of land power at the point of the spear in the history of warfare. German victories, despite Goebells propaganda of racial and technological superiority, were achieved because the Germans realized this before their unfortunate victims. It would take some time before other countries understood this, but fortunately geography intervened. The English Channel, he vast stretches of the Soviet Union, and the Atlantic Ocean bought Britain with its Empire, the Soviet Union, and America the time they needed to marshal their far superior material and industrial resources to stop and defeat NAZI Germany. With Operation Brbarossa, the NAZI invasion of the Soviet Union, the Ostkrieg will dominate the land war and the war will be decided there. The War in the West will be a smaller scalle affair, but will draw the bulk of German industrial producion. Hitler by commiting the bulk of his manpower in the East, but concentrated his industrialoutput in the West meant that the Ostheer was not adequately supplied and supported--the fundamental war losing mistake of the War. The same dynamic played out in Asia. The huge size of China without basic infrastructure made it impossible for Japan to defeat the Chinese Nationalists who after losing major battles withdrew into the interior. The fight for China was a land war. Japan used its air force a terror weapon. And it did not have the industrial production needed to fight into the Chinese interior. Unable to defeat the Nationalists, the Japanese militarists decided victory cold be achieved by making war on America and Britain. The war with America would be a naval war. And if Japan did bot have the industrial base needed to defeat China, defeating the United States borders on insanity fueled by all the great victories in China. While the Pacific War was primarily a naval war, land forced were needed to secure bases as the U.S. Navy conducted its island leap frog campaign across the Pacific. The Japanese convinced themselves after reverses at Midway (June 1942) and Guadalcanal (August-December 1942) that heavily defended island outposts could repel amphibious invasion. This idea was proved wrong at Tarawa (November 1943). But Japan persisted in the delusion that fierce land resistance would prevent defeat. They continued to cling to he illusion that if they killed enough Americans, the United States would seek a negotiated peace. They may have been right bout this, if they had the industry needed to kill more Americans, but they did not. America had the industry to wreak unrivaled physical destruction, while the American homeland remained untouched. As in Europe, the most powerful and destructive strategic bombing campaign in history failed to force surrender. Land invasions were needed to end the War. In the case of Japan, only the use of the atomic bombs prevented a land invasion (August 1945).

Sources

Citino, Robert M. The German Way of War: From the Thirty Years' War to the Third Reich (2005), 428p. Citino prefers the Gerrman term 'Bewegungskrieg". Blitzkrieg was invented by the Western press.

Created: 12:14 PM 10/14/2025
Last updated: 12:14 PM 10/14/2025