MacArthur dies 1938

[Carl Schwamberger]

The US could have forced mobilization and training since they were the ones paying for it regardless of what the Philippine government wanted.

I concur that the US really was almost disinterested in the Philippines and what happened there even in 1940-41.

Unfortunately the US was disinterested in it own defense as well. The defense budgets through the 1936 bill funding 1937 & 1938 were declining in value. The 1938 bill looks good only in comparison to the previous eight years, but it failed to return to anything like the 1920s, and those military budgets were nothing to brag about. While hopeful the 1938 bill funded long range items. Officer training & NCO development/increase, technology development, and some naval construction to keep the Naval yards employed. Little in its appropriations led to a significant increase in combat power in the field in 1939-1940. Yes the US Congress could have allocated funds and mandated a rapid preparation of the PI military, but that ran directly contrary to the entire idea of divesting the PI. It also ran against that no one seriously thought there would be a war with Japan in the foreseeable future. Convincing Congress to mandate and fund a accelerated PI military build up 1938-1940 assumes a bit of prescience. Tensions did rise from 1937, but they had several times before as far back as the War Scare of 1907. It was not until the autumn of 1940 when people realized Japan really was serious about a military occupation of French Into China that a consideration of war moved from the abstract to the possible. Even then America Firsters and Isolationists argued Japans colonial activities were none of the business of the US. The Europe First doctrine was also emerging &n was another impediment to accelerating PI armament.

Bottomline is there was very little of Significance mac could do until very late in the game, in the autumn of 1941. Until then it was in the hands of the US Congress & Quezons group.

[Takao]

Hello All :

Mr. Takao posted:

The "commanding officer" undoubtedly was an American who could
neither read, write, or speak the local Philippine languages - Likely, he also
made no effort to learn either.
Not much of a "commanding officer", if he cannot communicate with the
men he is supposed to lead.

In the Philippines of the 1930s, there were over 120 different languages spoken, many by the inhabitants
of just one or two of the smaller islands. Of these, Tagalog was the most common.

Spanish and English were also commonly spoken.

Of course, MacArthur spoke English, and wrote it. Fluently, and eloquently.

At West Point, MacArthur studied Spanish, and in fact, in the Pancho Villa expedition, conducted
interrogations of Mexicans in their own language.

As for Tagalog, one of his first assignments was in Army Engineering Projects in the Philippines, where
he learned a small amount of Tagalog which, with his Spanish, allowed him to converse with the
Filipino workers he employed.


Interestingly enough, after being in VietNam for four years, William Westmoreland STILL couldn't
correctly pronounce the name of Nguyen Van Thieu.........


Respectfully ;

Paul R. Ward

That is all well and good, Paul. However, I was talking about the commanding officer of the 31st Philippine Infantry Division, Brigadier General Clifford Bluemel.

[LineDoggie]

reviving conscription was not popular but it was done without much fuss in 1940.

in 1941 there was much fuss

On August 12th, 1941 the draft was extended and passed with a single vote in the House of representatives (203-202) and that itself was some fairly underhanded tactics by Sam Rayburn. The Senate voted 45-30 to extend

[ljadw]

$ 32 million or $ 20 million are meaningless figures :$ 32 million does not result in more resources than $ 20 million, it could be the opposite .

Only in ljadw's Opposite World...However, this is not taking place in ljadw's Opposite World.

It took months to decide what and how much would be produced.
It took months and a lot of political intrigues to decide who would produce what .
It took months to produce what was decided .

Well, we do know these are all lies/figments of ljadw's imagination.

Why? Because ljadw told us so.

In November, 1100000 tons of equipment with as destination the Philippines,were still piled up in the US ports.

That's why.

Because 1,100,000 tons of equipment destined for the Philippines would not have been piled up in US Ports if his months, and months, and months, were true.

So, the question becomes...Why did ljadw contradict himself?

It took months to transport everything to the Philippines.

ljadw's only truthful statement.

It took months to learn illiterate soldiers, NCOs and officers how to use these weapons nobody had ever seen : most soldiers had never seen a functioning artillery piece .

Wonder why Dugout Doug thought he could hold the Philippines an defeat the Japanese then.

The commander of the 31st Philippine ID said the following :
The enlisted men are proficient in only 2 things
1 When an officer appears,to yell ''attention '' in a loud voice,jump up and salute
2 to demand three meals per day .

The "commanding officer" undoubtedly was an American who could neither read, write, or speak the local Philippine languages - Likely, he also made no effort to learn either.
Not much of a "commanding officer", if he cannot communicate with the men he is supposed to lead.

MacArthur commanded 16643 American soldiers and some 120000 Philippine soldiers .
But of course,for the Mac Arthur haters,everything that went wrong,was the fault of MacArthur. And when he left the Philippines on the order of FDR, he was a coward :Dugout Doug .
No other general would have done better than MacArthur in the Philippines .

Everything that went wrong? No, just those things that went wrong that MacArthur had control over.

No general could have done worse than MacArthur, some certainly would have done better.

The number of supplies that could arrive/was arriving in the Philippines was decided by several factors
distance was one of them : distance Port of LA to port of Manilla is 18182 miles,at a speed of 10 NM,it would take a MV 75,8 days to arrive at Manilla ( and this without the time needed to load and unload the supplies ).And to return, the same ship would also need a lot of weeks .Source : Ports.com
FYI :75,8 days is more than 1 month, even more than 2 months
an other factor was the number of available supplies :if 10000 tons of supplies are produced,this does not mean that 10000 tons of supplies were ready to be shipped.
also important are the numbers of available merchant vessels
and let's not forget the stockage and load capacity of the US western ports and that of the ports of the Philippines .
And last but not least :supplies that arrived at the port of Manilla were useless: they had to leave Manilla for other destinations .
And about the commander of the 31st division : there were dozens of languages in the Philippines : what language should learn the general ?
About the money : you can't use a raw figure to indicate the number of supplies that would be produced .
An order of $ 200000 would result in cheaper supplies than an order of 500000,because the supplies of the first order could be available in stock,while the supplies of the second order had to be produced .
And, everyone with some intelligence,knows that when the government orders to make things,it is not a question of free market :it was congress who would decide who got the order .Walter George (senator of Georgia ) and chairman of the Finance Committee of the Senate ) would take the necessary measures to give Georgia more than its fair part of the money .After all ,the farmers of Georgia suffered from the depression ,and were his (potential ) voters .No one would care if the order for the farmers of Georgia could be done cheaper by the GOP farmers of Kansas ,who also suffered from the depression,for the WH GOP farmers deserved to suffer from the depression .

[Carl Schwamberger]

reviving conscription was not popular but it was done without much fuss in 1940.

in 1941 there was much fuss

On August 12th, 1941 the draft was extended and passed with a single vote in the House of representatives (203-202) and that itself was some fairly underhanded tactics by Sam Rayburn. The Senate voted 45-30 to extend

More to it than just extending the draft. A faction in Congress was threatening to defund the Army, proposing a budget that would cut it from 1,600,000+ in active service to 400,000, releasing all the former National Guards and Army reservists from active service. The Navy faced a similar budget cut. The War Department took the defunding threat so seriously that Staff officers were preparing two plans, one for the reduction, and a ongoing plan to double active service strength in 1942.

Motivations went beyond a simple Isolationist/Warhawk divide. There was a almost anarchical free for all within Congress over who got War & Navy Dept contracts. Directly related to that was the effort of Stimson and Marshal to wrestle control of procurement away from from the Congressmen who had run the Qaurtermasters Corps as a defacto independent entity for a century. Leftists wanted funds diverted to increase Lend Lease to the USSR, Anglophiles wanted the same for LL to Britain, fiscal conservatives were fighting a last stand against wasteful government spending. America Firsters supported reducing Lend Lease and diverting the money to the US military. Adding to the ferment were the former Isolationists and anti Roosevelters who were that autumn shifting to the Warhawk side. They were accepting the inevitability of the US at war, but they wanted to run it. All that created a incomprehensible path to the compromise the is the standard legislation process.

Its not difficult to imagine how things would have gone in the autumn of 1941 & early 1942 had the US mobilization crashed with Congress gridlocked. Its even conceivable the State Department would have had to acted to at least some Japanese demands for rolling back the embargoes. That would at least postpone a Pacific war if not waive it away entirely. How Hitler or Mussolini might have reacted is difficult to say, but it could alter the Battle of the Atlantic if the US Navy has to cut back its participation.

[Takao]

The number of supplies that could arrive/was arriving in the Philippines was decided by several factors
distance was one of them : distance Port of LA to port of Manilla is 18182 miles,at a speed of 10 NM,it would take a MV 75,8 days to arrive at Manilla ( and this without the time needed to load and unload the supplies ).And to return, the same ship would also need a lot of weeks .Source : Ports.com
FYI :75,8 days is more than 1 month, even more than 2 months

You are preaching to the choir. No one is arguing this.

an other factor was the number of available supplies :if 10000 tons of supplies are produced,this does not mean that 10000 tons of supplies were ready to be shipped.

Irrelevant.

You said 1,100,000 tons was waiting to be shipped.

also important are the numbers of available merchant vessels
and let's not forget the stockage and load capacity of the US western ports and that of the ports of the Philippines .

Redundant, pertains to first response concerning shipping.

And last but not least :supplies that arrived at the port of Manilla were useless: they had to leave Manilla for other destinations .

If supplies that arrive at Manila are useless, then there is no need to send supplies to the Philippines.

And about the commander of the 31st division : there were dozens of languages in the Philippines : what language should learn the general ?

One of the more common ones would have been a start. But, the General could not talk to the troops he was expected to command.

You rail against the Filipino troops because they did not know english....But, not word one against the American officers who could not communicate with the troops they commanded.
Double standard much?

About the money : you can't use a raw figure to indicate the number of supplies that would be produced .
An order of $ 200000 would result in cheaper supplies than an order of 500000,because the supplies of the first order could be available in stock,while the supplies of the second order had to be produced .

Irrelevant, considering your stated "fact" of 1,100,000 tons of equipment that had already been produced, and was awaiting shipment to the Philippines.

And, everyone with some intelligence,knows that when the government orders to make things,it is not a question of free market :it was congress who would decide who got the order .Walter George (senator of Georgia ) and chairman of the Finance Committee of the Senate ) would take the necessary measures to give Georgia more than its fair part of the money .After all ,the farmers of Georgia suffered from the depression ,and were his (potential ) voters .No one would care if the order for the farmers of Georgia could be done cheaper by the GOP farmers of Kansas ,who also suffered from the depression,for the WH GOP farmers deserved to suffer from the depression .

Also irrelevant, considering no state's farmers produce artillery, guns, tanks, aircraft, ammunition, etc.

But, I do have a question for you...How long does it take a Georgia or Kansas farmer to produce a 75mm howitzer?

[ljadw]

Thus, you deny that the US military and their families in the Philippines needed food from the US .
A big part of the 1,1 million tons of supplies waiting in the ports of the West Coast to be transported to the Philippines in December 1941 ( which was excluded ) were not ammunition,artillery, guns, aircraft.tanks ,but food .
And,why would the commander of the 31st ID learn one of the common languages (which one and how common was this language ),if the majority of his men did not speak,not understand such a common language ?
It is not so that if a common language (what is the qualification of common ?) was spoken by 10 % of the Filipinos, that 10 % of the men of the 31st division would speak that language .
There are today ! some 180 languages in the Philippines .
And you attacked the commander of the 31st ID because he could not speak these 180 languages ,but you ''forget '' that no one in the Philippines could speak and can speak these 180 languages .
About the supplies for the Philippines :
it would take months to transport even 5000 tons to Manilla and the increase of the money from $34 million to 54 million would not make the distance shorter .
As it happened in the Atlantic and in the Mediterranean ,there were several factors which determined the amount of supplies that would arrive and the moment they would arrive .
One example : if every day 10000 tons of supplies could arrive in Manilla ,but the unloading and stocking capacity was only 9000 , it would be stupid to sent daily 10000 tons.
And if everyday only 8000 tons could leave the port, it would be stupid to sent daily 9000 tons and if MacArthur needed only 7000 tons daily,it would be stupid to send every day 8000 tons .
And this is only about the quantities, there were also problems about the composition of what was needed .If MacArthur needed 2 X of ammunition and 1 X of rifles,but only 50 % of the ammunition could be sent ,but the double of the rifles ,what should be done ?
To send 50 % of what he needed,or to send more than he asked of something else ?
If he asked 1000 rifles and 500 tons of cornedbeef, but only 500 rifles and 1000 tons of cornedbeef were available , what should be sent ?
500 rifles and 500 tons of corned beef?
500 rifles and 1000 tons of cornedbeef ?
no rifles (waiting til 1000 were available ) and 500 or 1000 tons of corned beef ?
or no rifles and no cornedbeef, but 100 machine guns which Mac Arthur did not ask ?
More money does not mean more supplies and more supplies do not mean more supplies that are asked for .
Who would initially decide what would be transported ? Manilla or Washington ?

[Takao]

Thus, you deny that the US military and their families in the Philippines needed food from the US .

You said the supplies going to Manila were "useless", did you not? If they were "useless", than they were not needed.

A big part of the 1,1 million tons of supplies waiting in the ports of the West Coast to be transported to the Philippines in December 1941 ( which was excluded ) were not ammunition,artillery, guns, aircraft.tanks ,but food .

A breakdown of these supplies is required as proof.

And,why would the commander of the 31st ID learn one of the common languages (which one and how common was this language ),if the majority of his men did not speak,not understand such a common language ?
It is not so that if a common language (what is the qualification of common ?) was spoken by 10 % of the Filipinos, that 10 % of the men of the 31st division would speak that language .

If the majority of his men do not understand the language, it is not "common", is it?

There are today ! some 180 languages in the Philippines .
And you attacked the commander of the 31st ID because he could not speak these 180 languages ,but you ''forget '' that no one in the Philippines could speak and can speak these 180 languages .

Meaningless, as 80%-90% of Filipinos today speak Tagalog.

About the supplies for the Philippines :
it would take months to transport even 5000 tons to Manilla and the increase of the money from $34 million to 54 million would not make the distance shorter .

Again, preaching to the choir...

As it happened in the Atlantic and in the Mediterranean ,there were several factors which determined the amount of supplies that would arrive and the moment they would arrive .
One example : if every day 10000 tons of supplies could arrive in Manilla ,but the unloading and stocking capacity was only 9000 , it would be stupid to sent daily 10000 tons.
And if everyday only 8000 tons could leave the port, it would be stupid to sent daily 9000 tons and if MacArthur needed only 7000 tons daily,it would be stupid to send every day 8000 tons .

Irrelevant, since there is more than Manila as a port of call in the Philippines.

What is the unloading capacity of all ports in the Philippines?

And this is only about the quantities, there were also problems about the composition of what was needed .If MacArthur needed 2 X of ammunition and 1 X of rifles,but only 50 % of the ammunition could be sent ,but the double of the rifles ,what should be done ?
To send 50 % of what he needed,or to send more than he asked of something else ?
If he asked 1000 rifles and 500 tons of cornedbeef, but only 500 rifles and 1000 tons of cornedbeef were available , what should be sent ?
500 rifles and 500 tons of corned beef?
500 rifles and 1000 tons of cornedbeef ?
no rifles (waiting til 1000 were available ) and 500 or 1000 tons of corned beef ?
or no rifles and no cornedbeef, but 100 machine guns which Mac Arthur did not ask ?
More money does not mean more supplies and more supplies do not mean more supplies that are asked for .
Who would initially decide what would be transported ? Manilla or Washington ?

Your grasping at straws here...Creating illogical situations and then trying to shoehorn them into your argument.

What if all the supplies sent were not what MacArthur had asked for?

What if all of them were?

What if 1000 rifles were sent, but without firing pins?

What if 500 rifles were sent without triggers?

What if 10,000 cartridges were sent, but without bullets?

On and on, ad nauseum

[ljadw]

Thus, you deny that the US military and their families in the Philippines needed food from the US .

You said the supplies going to Manila were "useless", did you not? If they were "useless", than they were not needed.

A big part of the 1,1 million tons of supplies waiting in the ports of the West Coast to be transported to the Philippines in December 1941 ( which was excluded ) were not ammunition,artillery, guns, aircraft.tanks ,but food .

A breakdown of these supplies is required as proof.

And,why would the commander of the 31st ID learn one of the common languages (which one and how common was this language ),if the majority of his men did not speak,not understand such a common language ?
It is not so that if a common language (what is the qualification of common ?) was spoken by 10 % of the Filipinos, that 10 % of the men of the 31st division would speak that language .

If the majority of his men do not understand the language, it is not "common", is it?

There are today ! some 180 languages in the Philippines .
And you attacked the commander of the 31st ID because he could not speak these 180 languages ,but you ''forget '' that no one in the Philippines could speak and can speak these 180 languages .

Meaningless, as 80%-90% of Filipinos today speak Tagalog.

About the supplies for the Philippines :
it would take months to transport even 5000 tons to Manilla and the increase of the money from $34 million to 54 million would not make the distance shorter .

Again, preaching to the choir...

As it happened in the Atlantic and in the Mediterranean ,there were several factors which determined the amount of supplies that would arrive and the moment they would arrive .
One example : if every day 10000 tons of supplies could arrive in Manilla ,but the unloading and stocking capacity was only 9000 , it would be stupid to sent daily 10000 tons.
And if everyday only 8000 tons could leave the port, it would be stupid to sent daily 9000 tons and if MacArthur needed only 7000 tons daily,it would be stupid to send every day 8000 tons .

Irrelevant, since there is more than Manila as a port of call in the Philippines.

What is the unloading capacity of all ports in the Philippines?

And this is only about the quantities, there were also problems about the composition of what was needed .If MacArthur needed 2 X of ammunition and 1 X of rifles,but only 50 % of the ammunition could be sent ,but the double of the rifles ,what should be done ?
To send 50 % of what he needed,or to send more than he asked of something else ?
If he asked 1000 rifles and 500 tons of cornedbeef, but only 500 rifles and 1000 tons of cornedbeef were available , what should be sent ?
500 rifles and 500 tons of corned beef?
500 rifles and 1000 tons of cornedbeef ?
no rifles (waiting til 1000 were available ) and 500 or 1000 tons of corned beef ?
or no rifles and no cornedbeef, but 100 machine guns which Mac Arthur did not ask ?
More money does not mean more supplies and more supplies do not mean more supplies that are asked for .
Who would initially decide what would be transported ? Manilla or Washington ?

Your grasping at straws here...Creating illogical situations and then trying to shoehorn them into your argument.

What if all the supplies sent were not what MacArthur had asked for?

What if all of them were?

What if 1000 rifles were sent, but without firing pins?

What if 500 rifles were sent without triggers?

What if 10,000 cartridges were sent, but without bullets?

On and on, ad nauseum

I did not say that supplies going to Manilla were useless : I said that supplies that arrived at Manilla were useless .It was the same for supplies in Liverpool,Tripoli, NYC,LA,......
If you can't understand the difference, that is not my business .

[Takao]

I did not say that supplies going to Manilla were useless : I said that supplies that arrived at Manilla were useless .It was the same for supplies in Liverpool,Tripoli, NYC,LA,......
If you can't understand the difference, that is not my business .

Doesn't change anything....Useless is useless. Food is useless. Starve Americans! Ammo, don't need that either.

[ljadw]

Supplies that piled up in LA could not be used in Manilla, thus were useless . Supplies that piled up in Manilla could not be used in Mindanao , thus were useless for the forces in Mindanao .
Supplies that piled up in Liverpool could not be used by the forces in Kent, thus were useless for the forces in Kent .
It is as simple as that .

[Takao]

Yes, yes, ljadw, supplies are useless.

Makes you wonder...If supplies are useless, than why does every nation produce them.

Oh, yeah...Supplies are only useless in ljadw World.

[ljadw]

About the unloading capacity of the ports of the Philippines
Between June 1939 and June 1940 1724 vessels entered the port of Manilla with 6,268,000 tons of supplies.
410 Japanese with 1,502, 000 tons
335 British with 1,270,000 tons
227 from Norway with 686,000 tons
and only 195 US vessels with 829000 tons .
Source :Port of Manila and other Philippine ports yearbook 1940 P 63
Thus,it is very unlikely that the port of Manila could handle an additional 1,1 million tons of supplies .
It is also very unlikely that US could have the equivalent of an additional 200 merchant vessels .And the less MV available,the longer it would take to transport the 1,1 million tons of supplies and to return to the west coast.ONE MV would need 150 days to go to Manila and to return .
And there are at least two more important problems, as important as the unload capacity .
1 the storage capacity :for how many tons was there place in the depots ?
2 the capacity to transport the supplies out of the depots : if this was only 17000 tons a day , this would limit the imports to 17000 tons a day . And 17000 a day was what entered the ports between June 1939 and June 1940 . Thus there would be no place for the 1,1 million tons who piled up on the west coast.