No....but you have to be able to get there. Swimming from one island to another is really not practical.

(September 14, 2012 at 3:10 pm)Minimalist Wrote: No....but you have to be able to get there. Swimming from one island to another is really not practical.

How many prisoners? What happened in Shanghai could be repeated all across Southen Asia.

But it wasn't and the Japs were hanging by their balls for months prior to the atomic bomb.

Sure, you may have had individual acts of nuttiness, but hell...we get that here in the 21st century.

(September 14, 2012 at 8:15 pm)Minimalist Wrote: But it wasn't and the Japs were hanging by their balls for months prior to the atomic bomb.

Sure, you may have had individual acts of nuttiness, but hell...we get that here in the 21st century.

How come Shell B gave kudos to this post and she doesn't take objection to your use of "Japs" but I just used it once (even when I didn't know it was derogatory) and she excoriated me?

Well, Shell B, to make amends, you can give me a reputation and I'll be pleased as pie.

15,000+ posts gives some street cred. Shel and I go way back.

Keep posting and someday you may get into the club.

( I also use the phrase "towel-heads" when pissed at muslims. )

(September 15, 2012 at 2:21 am)Minimalist Wrote: 15,000+ posts gives some street cred. Shel and I go way back.

Keep posting and someday you may get into the club.

( I also use the phrase "towel-heads" when pissed at muslims. )

Oh, I'm sure if I called Muslims that, Shell B would give me a frightful shelling. But I don't. I call Muslims "virtuous followers of Muhammad (pbuh)" and so, not only Shell B should give me a rep but Rayaan too.

Just kidding.

Rayaan already has a rep from me, as does Min. I respect, like and know Min. I also know he is well aware of what kind of language he uses. Furthermore, his intellect speaks for itself. He could use text speak and he would still get kudos.

Also, you used Japs far more than once and I barely gave you a tongue-lashing. I merely pointed out that it made you sound stupid.

Superiority achieved by brutal and surprisingly effective dive bombing from the Douglas SBD ‘Dauntless’, largely. A fun fact, air superiority was not conferred to the allies in the Pacific through technology or training. The A6M was hands down the best fighter (and it was the worlds first long range escort, no less- very important in the pacific) flown by the best pilots until the introduction of the F4U Corsair and P-38 Lightning (the top two American aces in the Pacific flew the P-38 btw). The P-40 and the Hellcat were incapable of dogfighting with the Zero (technically..pilot skill notwithstanding) but there was a long list of concessions that were made in it's design to achieve it's legendary speed, climb, range and agility. Namely, low wing loading(limited the amount of ords it could carry), poor pilot protection, lack of self sealing fuel tanks, and extremely light construction. What ended up happening with this fighter was that the allies produced aircraft that were the polar opposite of it's flight envelope. High altitude, heavily armored, heavily armed -dive bombers. Some variants of the Corsairs, for example, had 8 50cals plus a couple thousand lbs of ords. Had the war drug on at a stalemate (or with Japan slowly inching us out) they would have eventually been incapable of defeating our aircraft in any case. It was always going to end by bombing, one way or another. I'd wager that sustained carpet bombing would have cost more lives, personally. There was really nothing that the Japanese could have done in retaliation by the end of the war. They had the KI-84 which might have put up a fight but we had so many P-38's by that time it would have been a swift war of attrition.

(I'm surprised - or maybe I just missed it- that no one has compared the detonations over Japan to the fire-bombing of Dresden yet)

(September 14, 2012 at 8:15 pm)Minimalist Wrote: Sure, you may have had individual acts of nuttiness,

Come on

Rhythm: Aye, the Kates and Zekes were meant to be quick-hitters but being quick means nothing when you it takes you 30 minutes to cut your enemy apart and it only takes them tapping you on the shoulder to tear you asunder. All that weight meant that the heavier American aircraft could dive far better, too; if a Jap plane (Yeah I'mma call 'em Japs; about as insulting as someone calling me a white-boy) got on their six, they could simply outdive their pursuer while another American plane would dive after the pursuer and take him out. Or, hell, they oftentimes just used it to get away, pure and simple.

Plus there was the whole matter of quality of materials available. You saw something similar with the infantry weapons the Japs had available to them. Recovered Type-99 Arisaka rifles and Nambu Type-100 submachine guns prior to and during the earlier stages of the war were of very fine craftsmanship and of high quality. Towards the last two years, however, recovered models were clearly made of inferior materials and of markedly poorer manufacture. Reasons for this are obvious, of course. Their tanks and aircraft weren't fairing any better [in some cases, much worse in fact], and with poorer materials and construction comes a cost in efficiency and performance. Not to mention the loss of so many of their pilots meant their experienced veterans were mostly dead, lost in conflicts where they were more pivotal and needed and ultimately lost, whereas the higher survivability of American aircraft meant we retained and gained better, more experienced pilots throughout the war.

I love WWII aviation.