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The last battles in Europe? But we haven't even had a single Battle of the Isonzo yet! Just goes to show you the sequel is never as good as the original.
Yeah it's definitely not the bazooka. I know the usmc gets weapons later than the army but that wouldn't make it a new weapon in test firing so I agree wit you!
SPOILER Also one of the first weapons used by Americans in the Korean War, when a recoilless rifle was fired at oncoming North Korean T-34s on July 5, 1950 at Osan. It did not make any impression on them, but the back blast kicked up mud (it was sited on a forward slope, rather unwisely) and the mud jammed its mechanism.
It does seem like ancient history these days. But when I was groing up in the 70's and 80's most of my grandparents' generation were still relatively young and most served in the "big one", or in Korea. Seems like a much more recent event because of that.
Yup, V-2 No. 13 even got some video footage up to the peak altitude of 105 km. Previously the highest ever picture taken was from the manned balloon flight of Explorer II that hit 22 km in 1935, which was still high enough to directly document the curvature of the Earth.
Wild speculation. Is anyone with the technical knowledge to operate the infernal contraptions still alive? Even if they are, maybe the Russkies bagged them.
There has not been a moment of peace on the entire planet after WW2. It just devolved into a million smaller colonial brushwars, civil wars and wars of independence. And I am not surprised some fighting still went on. Where Allied forces could not disarm German forces right away an uneasy vacuum remained. And the many collaborators knew that upon surrendering and repatriation certain prison time, torture and DELETION would await them. So they really had nothing to lose.
My stepfather was a plank holder in the 6th Marine Tank Battalion in WWII. He took part in the battle of Sugerloaf. There was a platoon of Marine Infantry pinned on the open slope of the hill. My stepfather's platoon, 5 M4 E8 75 Ws, went behind the hill and took the bunkers that were pinning the Marines down. He then helped evacuate the wounded on the deck of the tank.
The 6th Marine Divisions's fight for Sugar Loaf, which was supported by interlocking fields of fire from the Half Moon and Horshoe hills that were all part of one interconnected defensive complex, has occasionally been described as the most savage fighting of the entire Okinawa campaign. Over the course of 8 days or so the division sustained around 3,000 casualties in bitter fighting at close range that occasionally went hand-to-hand. Several times Marines fought their way to their summit only for the few survivors that made it there to be pushed back in counterattacks, and the next day would be a bloody repeat. By the time it was finally cleared and held, the Japanese regiment manning the tunnels & fortifications on Sugar Loaf had been practically wiped out to a man. The writer Eugene Sledge, who served with the 1st Marine Division, passed through the area shortly after as his unit went into bloody action against Shuri. He described the entire region as a cratered moonscape with all the trees stripped bare from artillery. He also said the entire area reeked with the purtrefaction of death and decay, with bodies of both Marines and Japanese still left where they had fallen in craters half filled with rainwater, because the near constant Japanese artillery fire made removal of the bodies near impossible. Each corpse was also covered with maggots, which wished away in foul rivers from the torrential downpours. More from Sledge: "The stench of death was overpowering. The only way I could bear the monstrous horror of it all was to look upward away from the earthly reality surrounding us, watch the leaden gray clouds go skudding over, and repeat over and over to myself that the situation was unreal - just a nightmare - that I would soon awake and find myself somewhere else. I existed from moment to moment, sometimes thinking death would have been preferable. We were in the depths of the abyss, the ultimate horror of war. . . Men struggled and fought and bled in an environment so degrading I believed we had been flung into hell's own cesspool."
@@dominikbt7891 I'm not certain why that would be a cause for laughter. People lose a spouse either to death or divorce and remarry. What is so unusual about that? If the L was instead referring to his military service in some way, sounds like he a was a heroic man who played his part in saving lives and contributing to Allied victory on Sugar Loaf. That's a W.
@@ahorsewithnoname773 Sugarloaf hill is referenced in planning documents for Kyushu. Similar defensive areas were observed all over the invasion sites. Think how catastrophic the casualties would've been.
@@plisskin117 It is a Navy term from the days of wooden ships, which were made of "planks". A plank holder is one of the original members of a ship's company or in this case, a military unit.
In 1993 I was a reporter in the war in the former Yugoslavia. Near Makljen Ridge I met a Croat in a full-on WW2 Wehrmacht uniform. I commented and he replied "The man who wore this fought the communists until 1963." "And then they caught him?" I asked. "No, he went to Germany to work in the Mercedes factory."
Yay, Admiral Leahy got his mention in the series. For those who don't know, Leahy was really the person running the US during WW2 when it came to anything related to the war. As many know, FDR was not a military man, so FDR made Leahy his Chief of Staff and thus the highest-ranking member of the US military, above even George Marshall. Leahy was a master grand strategist. His specialty was logistics, production, and deep planning which FDR relied on as his right hand man during WW2. If you are not aware of what the job the US President's Chief of Staff does is essentially "The Hand of the King" from Game of Thrones if you watched the show or read the books. The President's Chief of Staff can do basically anything the President allows them to do and can order around the President's entire administration which gives the Chief of Staff an insane amount of power. Different US Presidents have given their Chief of Staff different levels of power, some Presidents are more hand on then others are. In FDR's terms he was a pretty hands on President prior to 1939 but after the start of WW2 Leahy was basically running the US as everything that mattered that was coming to the desk of the President was related to the LARGEST WAR IN HUMAN HISTORY which FDR had tapped Leahy to basically run for him.
The Chief of Staff is always the mastermind of the military. What good is the commander if the commander doesn’t have a good plan to execute? I think this is a very underrated reason why the Germans performed relatively well at the operational level against multiple major powers on multiple fronts in the world wars, especially the first. They had a more decentralized staff structure that could organically work with whoever was needed for the job to get a task done on the fly. The French in 1914 were bloated by military bureaucracy while the BEF was paralyzed as their commander had a nervous breakdown.
He became a bit of a persona non grata for American history writers since Leahy called the U.S. barbaric for dropping a he atomic bombs he saw no use or necessity for…
Random fun fact, my grandpa and great uncle were engineers who built airfields during the war. They called the Marston mats that covered the airfields "pierced planks"
@@longrider42 I stand corrected, I fired the 106 and 90 mm recoilless rifles in 1968 at Ft Polk, I was an 11H. The weapons, especially the 106 had a tremendous back blast.
@@WorldWarTwo The pacific episode could be based on the rain, mud and maggots quite by Indy. It's quite disgusting to watch but as it's set late in the month it depicts exactly what was described in this episode.
I did NOT miss Dday 24 Hours as I was right with you for 18 of those hours!! BUT , I did just rewatch it again-all 24 hours. I will probably make it annual watching around Memorial Day weekend because there is just so much information that can NOT be retained in one viewing.
21:53 funny you mention that, I am currently watching it now to prepare for my trip to Normandy next week, I plan to be at the American Cemetery on the 6th
9:28 i think you were talking about the M20 recoilless rifle. This was not shoulder fired but instead fired from either a machine gun tripod or vehicle mount. The bazooka is a shoulder fired rocket launcher and was in use since 1942. The picture seems to show an M9 bazooka. a midwar upgrade to the earlier m1-m1a1 bazookas.
About the battle of Odžak... that one was never allowed to be mentioned officially in post-WW2 Yugoslavia, no history textbooks or discussions about it, the official stance was that WW2 ended on May 8th but there were some "skirmishes" until May 15th in north Slovenia / south Austria (Carinthia), but Odžak was kept under the rug...
@@dawnpalmby5100 I'm sure they'll cover it broadly since it forms such an important part of the Korean conflict, but probably outside the scope of that series to go into in detail.
0:27 NGL you had me going with the "Midnight Train to Georgia" joke. You had me thinking maybe Gladys Knight & the Pips had ripped off a song from the 1940s. 😆
13 episodes (give or take left)! It's been a paradoxically enthralling and draining series- not in a bad way. The pathos with which the time ghost team is able convey information about events from the last century is a testament to not only their talents as content creators, but as custodians to history. Absolutely love the work from you guys.
Georgians on Texel faught Germans with the hope to surrender western allies, Dutch helped them a lot risking their lives. I’m glad that Indy and team included this battle in the episode. Big thanks guys from Georgian 🇬🇪. Best ww2 show ever 🫡✊
3 Georgians took a small boat to England at the beginning at the revolt to discuss surrender with the British, who weren't interested for whatever reason. Those 3 were sent to a POW camp and I think escaped repatriation to the USSR.
It’s still insane to me how the pacific front was always a brutal fight to the last man against the Japanese. That’s so rare in warfare it boggles the mine that that was the norm here
The Japanese were slightly more willing to surrender in proportional terms in 1944 and 1945 (prior to the overall capitulation) than earlier in the war, but Slim's comment is appropriate. He said generals everywhere talk about their troops fighting to the death. "The Japanese actually did."
If anything they could keep the channel going with no breaks as there would still be a war going on somewhere in the world. When Japan surrendered the Chinese civil war would reignite and the wars of independence in Indo China and the Dutch East Indies would ignite. Civil war in Greece soon after, the Jewish insurgency in Palestine, the 1st war between Israel and its Arab neighbors anti-cession revolt in Sarawak, Berlin Blockade, the Malayan Emergency, the partition of India and the 1st Kashmir war. And that's just mostly stuff that involves the British, all before Korea.
It might get some reference during the Korean War series. During the battle of the Chosin Reservoir a lot of the men who were thrown against the Marines in human wave attacks, like cannon fodder, had been former nationalist soldiers in WW2 and the civil war.
@@ahorsewithnoname773 Large parts of the Chinese forces in the Korean War generally had once been in the Nationalist army. Defeated soldiers in the Civil War often changed sides, and the disintegration of the Nationalist cause was partly caused by that. As the best way of keeping an eye on them, the Communists enrolled them in their army but also appointed commissars to supervise them, and a large number were sent to Korea. On the whole they do not seem to have fought worse than the troops who had never been Nationalist, though if taken prisoner they quite often opted for Taiwan when offered the choice at the end of the Korean War.
@@ahorsewithnoname773 I am not so sure about that. The Chinese expeditionary army in Korea was not that large to waste massive numbers of soldiers in human wave attacks. Just like German generals in WW2 American generals refused to admit that they got outgeneraled and beaten by the Chinese, which they saw as inferior, and blamed it on massive human wave attacks instead. Despite lacking American firepower, air and armor support the Chinese infantry was very skillful in small unit tactics and used infiltration and concentration at decisive points to devastating attacks.
So November 1 is when the next big WW2 minute by minute coverage special will drop? This one will no doubt be the biggest, most explosive, special series ever.
I feel like most people here have probably seen it but The Pacific does an incredible job at displaying the horrors of the battle of Okinawa. I highly recommend it to anyone interested that hasn't seen it. Be forewarned there are some rough scenes.
I'm surprised you haven't announced a 24 hour live special for the beginning of Operation Olympic. Surely an invasion of this scale will dwarf Overlord by a huge magnitude, right?
@@ChaptermasterPedroKantor-kv5yw More depressing than anything else. Documents show the Japanese were very well prepared for that invasion, and would have taken a horrific toll on the invading forces (note all the Purple Hearts that were minted because of that plan).
@@johnf7683 It's probably for the best that it did not happen. I still think it would make for an interesting alt.history series. And no more depressing then the first 3 years of this channel when the Germans were winning.
Can’t believe we are already at Week 300 of the war. Soon we may get to see the invasion of the Japanese home islands once Okinawa will inevitably be secured. I wonder if Malaya and Singapore will soon be liberated too, given the ongoing Borneo Campaign nearby? I heard rumours that Operation Zipper is in the making…
And Zipper could have happened a lot sooner too, but got postponed twice. First by London allowing British soldiers with the most service time to be discharged back home, which put back the timetable for Zipper as SEA Command lost its most experienced soldiers that had to be replaced. And later when Japan surrendered and that gloryhound McArthur demanded that no local surrenders could be taken until said gloryhound had his moment to shine in Tokyo Bay. The British could have landed in Malaya and Singapore weeks earlier, while Allied POW's kept DELETING from Japanese maltreatment and local Japanese commanders even prepared plans to DELETE all those POW's out of revenge for the surrender.
That's why I'm glad they're continuing to cover it and not just stop everything on V-E day. The immediate post-war recovery period is fascinating, but even in college courses it gets glossed over and they skip right to the Berlin Blockade.
Hi Indy Another wonderful episode. 300 weeks passed. Seems like it was yesterday I saw your first episode. Time flew so fast also Iearned about this war. Hats off to your resilience in completing this series.
i actually have known one of the Georgians talked about in this episode personally... he worked for the water authority in Petten, where we have the highest and strongest seadike of the Netherlands, the "Hondsbossche en Pettemer zeewering". it is situated in the provence of Noord-Holland in the gap between the dunes there.
I had heard something about the Georgians in Texel. I encountered an elderly Georgian who was begging in Antwerp, Belgium, in the 1990s. I spoke to him in Russian. I did not ask if he had any involvement in the Texel events but he looked the right age though that does not necessarily mean he was there.
another rather "fun" fact, the water authority there had 2 DUKW's, left after ww2... they were used for many years after the war to bring out "zinkstukken" (big mats to keep the sandy bottom in place, there is a strong current along the coast of the North sea that depletes the sand that makes up the beaches in a high rate) which are kept in place by dumping tons of rock on them. these loads of rocks were also brought out to sea by the DUKW's. i don't know if they are still in use now, but it would not surprise me, i'll look it up or give the water authority a call about this topic...
If you enjoyed Dr Felton’s lengthy musings on Heinrich’s last days, you’ll simply LOVE David Irving’s accusations / conclusions, etc., much of which were ( are ? ) available on RUclips…
awesome history, i will have to replay it since there are so many units and names involved, thanks! One name I recognized was Admiral Leahy. I served on a Navy ship named after him. First time I heard about Leahy was when I came on board in the 1980s, lol.
further to highlighting the Pacific theatre: 2 ideas. soft box the light(s) on the flags to your left (camera right) or shift those flags farther left all in aid of losing the shadow line on the map...
Ironically in contrast to the war being all motorized and maneuver based in Europe, the last battle had trench warfare and the Yugoslav partisan's couldn't break the lines until they brought in air power.
9:25 The bazooka is new? I seem to recall it making appearances in Band of Brothers - outside Carentan, in Hagenau, and in front of the roadblocks around Berchtesgaden. Were they some other similar kind of weapon, or is Stephen Ambrose sprinkling bazookas in places they don't belong?
@@Arashmickey You're welcome. This little thing highlights what is probably the biggest difference between TimeGhost and virtually all other WW2 histories/historians, even more than this marathon week-by-week format: They focus on what the war did to the people rather than the panoply of world-changing geopolitics, tactics, weapons, and technology. Those are in there, but they are supporting actors.
There were 2 bazookas, a 2.36 inch and a 3.5 inch, both rocket propelled. I think there were also recoilless rifles used, the first being 57 mm. Later there would be 75 mm and 105 mm. The difference is not much, actually. The bazookas have a straight tube, the propellant is in the missile. A recoilless rifle has a shell casing just like a normal cartridge, with a bunch of holes in it and similar holes in the gun. This allows the "backblast" to balance the recoil. Either way you have a lot of hot gas coming out of the back, very fast.
@@gordybing1727 Thank you so much! I'm such a nerd sometimes. Decided to check out the etymology and the first thing I see in the in the wiki is this cool quote: "I shouldn't 'arf wonder, from the look of him, if he wasn't the 'aughty kind of a feller who'd cleave you to the bazooka for tuppence with his bloomin' falchion."
19:53 You forgot Troy. That siege also failed; the Achaeans had to use a giant, wooden horse. Maybe the Allies will use the same trick against Japan. Maybe with an aircraft carrier made of ice and sawdust.
You do have to admire the Japanese bravery and dedication to the Emperor,landing on an enemy airfield,then blowing up stuff,under the enemy noses..I bet Skorzeny himself would never have attempted such a thing!
Otto performed jaw-dropping feats & fought in battles that none of the Japanese ‘officer class’, none,.came remotely close to approaching in ambition, gumption, & skill.
Sugarloaf hill was referenced in planning for the invasion of Kyushu. It was/will be noted that hundreds of such defensive points dot the invasion area. It's no wonder they imagined potential casualties of one million men.
My dad was a U.S. Army Master Seargent in the 288th Field Artillery Observation Battalion in Europe. At the conclusion of European hostilities, the Army offered him a choice to either return directly home to the States or go to the Pacific with an Officer's commission. Perhaps fortunately for me and my siblings, he said "no, thank you" to becoming an Officer and made his way home from Europe.
I have a similar story, my grandfather was offered a Squad leader job for his performance in the Battle of the Bulge. Turns out every officer is his platoon was KIA a week later (officers lead the way). He was lucky to be wounded early in the fighting and evacuated to a field hospital.
Seriously. I was watching a documentary about the atomic bombings, and it got to the part after the bombings where the Japanese leaders were discussing whether to surrender or not. You can really tell that they barely cared about what would happen to their own civilian population.
Nice! I kinda want to binge it with energy drinks and pizza. I listened to it over a week while at work off and on the first time and a few select episodes again since then. -TimeGhost Ambassador
@@WorldWarTwo Took some planning... getting that day and the next off from work to make the timing line up. Still barely made it. Was an amazing experience.
9:26 I think you guys made a mistake, you said the Basil’s but that has been in US service since 1942. I think you guys were actually talking about the new Recoilless rifles which came into service around this time.
Quite possibly. I couldn't find ready sources, and Indy was travelling and couldn't check his notes when I asked for clarification. -TimeGhost Ambassador
@@Raskolnikov70 Yeah where is that anglophonic Aussie turd that comes on here spouting his rubbish? bet he keeps quite if you mention the Emu War to him. 😂😂
the fact that even with censorship at home, Marshall does not believe that US Public opinion would support the war for that long speaks about the kind of casualties they expect in the invasion of Japan, they are indeed already being forced to declare early victory in Iwo Jima despite fighting still raging on because of degrading public opinion on the battle, at the same time sieging would actually be far more lengthy and give the Japanese government far more power to demand any kind of negotiation, the more information are known about the invasion of Japan, the more clear it is that the atomic bomb is very much necessary also this is the first time i heard about the raid on Yontan air fields, it is crazy what damage 12 trained fanatics can do, and they are only 1 out of 5 aircraft that are suppose to raid the airfield.
The war was never popular in the US, that's one of the enduring myths of this era. The reason it persists is because the news and media of the day is so full of pro-war sentiment and dissenting voices were largely silenced after Pearl Harbor. But if you look at the feelings of the US population prior to the war, it was overwhelmingly isolationist and anti-war, and a large proportion of people were openly pro-German. It's important to mention because that forced the US government's hand in many ways that make a lot more sense when you look at them through that lens; the use of atomic weapons is only the latest and most famous example of it. Marshall, along with everyone at the top, understood they had to win a fast victory because they were up against that ticking clock of public opinion and support.
@@Raskolnikov70 I also suspect they would not have been up for a war with the USSR either, despite some enthusiasts today thinking Patton would have been able to storm to Moscow if he had been allowed to...
@@stevekaczynski3793 There's no way Roosevelt or Truman would have been able to take any action towards the USSR no matter how justified it might have been. Most people would have been totally confused - "wait, aren't they our ally???" - in addition to the war weariness. Churchill's government was the one coming up with all kinds of ambitious plans for the post-war world and trying to drag the US into supporting them; that lack of popular support in the US is what prevented the very pro-British Roosevelt from taking part. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, this is something that gets buried and forgotten in because of the events post-1945, with most histories jumping straight into the Cold War. Which the isolationist US public also had to be dragged kicking and screaming into supporting through a whole lot of fear, among other methods.
US public wanted the war done, the fact that the "siege" might drag on for years was massively unappealing to anyone except the navy guys (plus consider that the war in china would drag on endlessly). Overall, the invasion was very much a "last push" kind of thing.
Japan: wow our logistics in China is already in a dire condition Also Japan, "You know what let's go on the offensive which will stretch our supply even further"
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A series on the Chinese civil war after ww2 would be interesting. But then again you would probably get calls for then CCP try to control content
Going by the title, I was expecting more Spartans...
The last battles in Europe? But we haven't even had a single Battle of the Isonzo yet! Just goes to show you the sequel is never as good as the original.
The First war had 11 of them and this one had 0?!
Hahaha, touché! Despite no battle of the Isonzo, still an impressive masterpiece Timeghost did!
Right?? And they even had a battle of Thermopylae too....weird throwback 😂
Tito, come on, the people of Trieste and beyond are demanding an expansion of the Revolution!
Well, the average amount of battles of Isonzo per world war is 6.5, so things are still looking up
I think the new weapon introduced on Okinawa may have been the recoilless rifle because the Bazooka had been in use since North Africa.
Apparently this is around the time the M18 57mm recoilless rifle was deployed, so that checks out
Yeah it's definitely not the bazooka. I know the usmc gets weapons later than the army but that wouldn't make it a new weapon in test firing so I agree wit you!
SPOILER
Also one of the first weapons used by Americans in the Korean War, when a recoilless rifle was fired at oncoming North Korean T-34s on July 5, 1950 at Osan. It did not make any impression on them, but the back blast kicked up mud (it was sited on a forward slope, rather unwisely) and the mud jammed its mechanism.
@@stevekaczynski3793 Now there's an inauspicious beginning to an ugly war.
@@HairTrigger223 And I remember Little John using it in "Combat". Does anyone remember who carried the BAR?
WW2 in Europe ends
Churchill:I'm thinking about something unthinkable...
SPOILER
Losing the 1945 election...
Stalin: So am I ...
Quite the "Operation" 😁
If Siblin' wouldn't have left the Major,
let's not think...
How does he cut out?
Exactly, he was a warmonger.
Rather off topic, but I first learned about WW2 in school in 1980. Those early lessons were actually closer to WW2, than to today.
It’s a strange feeling, is it not?
When I was in first grade, WW-II was just 15 years in the rearview mirror. I had boatloads of surplus stuff to play with. It was all over the place.
Uh... Yes. Time is linear.
@@zack875 Well, to our primitive brains, it is.
It does seem like ancient history these days. But when I was groing up in the 70's and 80's most of my grandparents' generation were still relatively young and most served in the "big one", or in Korea. Seems like a much more recent event because of that.
One of those German V2 rockets will be launched from New Mexico next year with a 35mm camera mounted and would take the first photograph in space
Interesting
Yup, V-2 No. 13 even got some video footage up to the peak altitude of 105 km. Previously the highest ever picture taken was from the manned balloon flight of Explorer II that hit 22 km in 1935, which was still high enough to directly document the curvature of the Earth.
Whatever happened to Robert Goddard and his ideas, the man who directly influenced Werner Von Braun.
Wild speculation. Is anyone with the technical knowledge to operate the infernal contraptions still alive? Even if they are, maybe the Russkies bagged them.
Thank you for the opening showing the P-47 Thunderbolts. One of my high school friends father flew them in WW2. RIP Mr Phillips
Thank you for sharing that with us, and thank you for watching.
The Midnight Train to Georgia joke was great, thanks for the chuckle this morning.
The "Midnight Train to Georgian SSR" is a much lesser-known song, since everyone who took it starved in the gulag.
I don't know if gulag was worse than kz.
@@Raskolnikov70 You mean they were successfully purged of bourgeois tendencies.
I didn’t quite get it. Would you mind explaining the joke?
@@Icicle_Racing ruclips.net/video/NP0bot4-qmM/видео.html
Insane to think that there is still fighting even this far after the “official” surrender of the Axis in Europe.
There has not been a moment of peace on the entire planet after WW2. It just devolved into a million smaller colonial brushwars, civil wars and wars of independence. And I am not surprised some fighting still went on. Where Allied forces could not disarm German forces right away an uneasy vacuum remained. And the many collaborators knew that upon surrendering and repatriation certain prison time, torture and DELETION would await them. So they really had nothing to lose.
My stepfather was a plank holder in the 6th Marine Tank Battalion in WWII. He took part in the battle of Sugerloaf. There was a platoon of Marine Infantry pinned on the open slope of the hill. My stepfather's platoon, 5 M4 E8 75 Ws, went behind the hill and took the bunkers that were pinning the Marines down. He then helped evacuate the wounded on the deck of the tank.
The 6th Marine Divisions's fight for Sugar Loaf, which was supported by interlocking fields of fire from the Half Moon and Horshoe hills that were all part of one interconnected defensive complex, has occasionally been described as the most savage fighting of the entire Okinawa campaign. Over the course of 8 days or so the division sustained around 3,000 casualties in bitter fighting at close range that occasionally went hand-to-hand. Several times Marines fought their way to their summit only for the few survivors that made it there to be pushed back in counterattacks, and the next day would be a bloody repeat. By the time it was finally cleared and held, the Japanese regiment manning the tunnels & fortifications on Sugar Loaf had been practically wiped out to a man.
The writer Eugene Sledge, who served with the 1st Marine Division, passed through the area shortly after as his unit went into bloody action against Shuri. He described the entire region as a cratered moonscape with all the trees stripped bare from artillery. He also said the entire area reeked with the purtrefaction of death and decay, with bodies of both Marines and Japanese still left where they had fallen in craters half filled with rainwater, because the near constant Japanese artillery fire made removal of the bodies near impossible. Each corpse was also covered with maggots, which wished away in foul rivers from the torrential downpours.
More from Sledge: "The stench of death was overpowering. The only way I could bear the monstrous horror of it all
was to look upward away from the earthly reality surrounding us, watch the leaden gray clouds go
skudding over, and repeat over and over to myself that the situation was unreal - just a nightmare -
that I would soon awake and find myself somewhere else.
I existed from moment to moment, sometimes thinking death would have been preferable. We
were in the depths of the abyss, the ultimate horror of war. . . Men struggled and fought and bled
in an environment so degrading I believed we had been flung into hell's own cesspool."
@@dominikbt7891 I'm not certain why that would be a cause for laughter. People lose a spouse either to death or divorce and remarry. What is so unusual about that?
If the L was instead referring to his military service in some way, sounds like he a was a heroic man who played his part in saving lives and contributing to Allied victory on Sugar Loaf. That's a W.
@@ahorsewithnoname773 Sugarloaf hill is referenced in planning documents for Kyushu. Similar defensive areas were observed all over the invasion sites.
Think how catastrophic the casualties would've been.
What's a plank holder?
@@plisskin117 It is a Navy term from the days of wooden ships, which were made of "planks". A plank holder is one of the original members of a ship's company or in this case, a military unit.
World War I began in the Balkans when Franz Ferdinand was shot in Sarajevo. World War II ended in the Balkans with the Battle of Odžak…
Bravo Vince!
And even today, the Balkans are somewhat unsettled politically.
We have gone full circle
In 1993 I was a reporter in the war in the former Yugoslavia. Near Makljen Ridge I met a Croat in a full-on WW2 Wehrmacht uniform. I commented and he replied "The man who wore this fought the communists until 1963." "And then they caught him?" I asked. "No, he went to Germany to work in the Mercedes factory."
31 years apart, millions of lives lost, and these cities/towns are 200km apart! That is some symmetry.
'This war is not about winning anymore; it's about who gets what.' Ron Speirs, May 1945
I watched their D-Day 24-hour series, and i was great! I can't wait for their minute-by-minute coverage of the invasion of Japan in November.
Yay, Admiral Leahy got his mention in the series. For those who don't know, Leahy was really the person running the US during WW2 when it came to anything related to the war. As many know, FDR was not a military man, so FDR made Leahy his Chief of Staff and thus the highest-ranking member of the US military, above even George Marshall.
Leahy was a master grand strategist. His specialty was logistics, production, and deep planning which FDR relied on as his right hand man during WW2. If you are not aware of what the job the US President's Chief of Staff does is essentially "The Hand of the King" from Game of Thrones if you watched the show or read the books. The President's Chief of Staff can do basically anything the President allows them to do and can order around the President's entire administration which gives the Chief of Staff an insane amount of power. Different US Presidents have given their Chief of Staff different levels of power, some Presidents are more hand on then others are. In FDR's terms he was a pretty hands on President prior to 1939 but after the start of WW2 Leahy was basically running the US as everything that mattered that was coming to the desk of the President was related to the LARGEST WAR IN HUMAN HISTORY which FDR had tapped Leahy to basically run for him.
Amateurs study tactics.
Is it really his first mention in this series!? That is pretty crazy to think about now
@@Cityinlead I think he was mentioned before when Indy was pointing out the 5 star US generals and admirals.
The Chief of Staff is always the mastermind of the military. What good is the commander if the commander doesn’t have a good plan to execute?
I think this is a very underrated reason why the Germans performed relatively well at the operational level against multiple major powers on multiple fronts in the world wars, especially the first. They had a more decentralized staff structure that could organically work with whoever was needed for the job to get a task done on the fly. The French in 1914 were bloated by military bureaucracy while the BEF was paralyzed as their commander had a nervous breakdown.
He became a bit of a persona non grata for American history writers since Leahy called the U.S. barbaric for dropping a he atomic bombs he saw no use or necessity for…
Random fun fact, my grandpa and great uncle were engineers who built airfields during the war. They called the Marston mats that covered the airfields "pierced planks"
The bazooka had been in use since 1943, the 106 mm recoilless rifle was used and was new.
Actually, it was the M18, 57mm Recoilless Rifle. But the 106 came by the Korean War. The 75mm was the next step after the 57mm
@@longrider42 I stand corrected, I fired the 106 and 90 mm recoilless rifles in 1968 at Ft Polk, I was an 11H. The weapons, especially the 106 had a tremendous back blast.
Thanks!
Thank you so much!
This would be a good time to watch the film Hacksaw ridge, and the 9th episode of the Pacific, both set in Okinawa during May.
Supposed to be great, thanks for the recommendation.
@@WorldWarTwo The pacific episode could be based on the rain, mud and maggots quite by Indy. It's quite disgusting to watch but as it's set late in the month it depicts exactly what was described in this episode.
Assistance From The Resistance would be a good band name.
I thought the same exact thing lol
300! Plus some 200 more extra and W.A.H. specials. This will be for a long time the most epic WW II video documentary ever
Thanks for watching!
I did NOT miss Dday 24 Hours as I was right with you for 18 of those hours!! BUT , I did just rewatch it again-all 24 hours. I will probably make it annual watching around Memorial Day weekend because there is just so much information that can NOT be retained in one viewing.
Great to hear!
21:53 funny you mention that, I am currently watching it now to prepare for my trip to Normandy next week, I plan to be at the American Cemetery on the 6th
9:28 i think you were talking about the M20 recoilless rifle. This was not shoulder fired but instead fired from either a machine gun tripod or vehicle mount. The bazooka is a shoulder fired rocket launcher and was in use since 1942. The picture seems to show an M9 bazooka. a midwar upgrade to the earlier m1-m1a1 bazookas.
The M18, a 57mm Recoilless Rifle could be shoulder fired, and was used in WW2.
About the battle of Odžak... that one was never allowed to be mentioned officially in post-WW2 Yugoslavia, no history textbooks or discussions about it, the official stance was that WW2 ended on May 8th but there were some "skirmishes" until May 15th in north Slovenia / south Austria (Carinthia), but Odžak was kept under the rug...
Case in point, the wikipedia entry is very very short.
@@nickhtk6285 Wikipedia is run by marxists, so.....
@@dominikbt7891 cope
@@dominikbt7891 je l' ukusna zemlja blajburška?
300? THIS IS TIMEGHOST!
Edit: Will you do episodes on the civil war between the Nationalists and the Communists?
They released "what's coming next" and it sounds like they'll be covering the lead up to the war so hopefully that will be included as well
@@dawnpalmby5100 I'm sure they'll cover it broadly since it forms such an important part of the Korean conflict, but probably outside the scope of that series to go into in detail.
Lol
0:27 NGL you had me going with the "Midnight Train to Georgia" joke.
You had me thinking maybe Gladys Knight & the Pips had ripped off a song from the 1940s. 😆
13 episodes (give or take left)! It's been a paradoxically enthralling and draining series- not in a bad way. The pathos with which the time ghost team is able convey information about events from the last century is a testament to not only their talents as content creators, but as custodians to history. Absolutely love the work from you guys.
Georgians on Texel faught Germans with the hope to surrender western allies, Dutch helped them a lot risking their lives. I’m glad that Indy and team included this battle in the episode. Big thanks guys from Georgian 🇬🇪. Best ww2 show ever 🫡✊
I am impressed that you'd cover Texel.
3 Georgians took a small boat to England at the beginning at the revolt to discuss surrender with the British, who weren't interested for whatever reason. Those 3 were sent to a POW camp and I think escaped repatriation to the USSR.
It’s still insane to me how the pacific front was always a brutal fight to the last man against the Japanese. That’s so rare in warfare it boggles the mine that that was the norm here
The Japanese were slightly more willing to surrender in proportional terms in 1944 and 1945 (prior to the overall capitulation) than earlier in the war, but Slim's comment is appropriate. He said generals everywhere talk about their troops fighting to the death. "The Japanese actually did."
I would like to know more about the civil war in China after this war. That's a war that doesn't usually get enough coverage.
If anything they could keep the channel going with no breaks as there would still be a war going on somewhere in the world. When Japan surrendered the Chinese civil war would reignite and the wars of independence in Indo China and the Dutch East Indies would ignite. Civil war in Greece soon after, the Jewish insurgency in Palestine, the 1st war between Israel and its Arab neighbors anti-cession revolt in Sarawak, Berlin Blockade, the Malayan Emergency, the partition of India and the 1st Kashmir war. And that's just mostly stuff that involves the British, all before Korea.
It might get some reference during the Korean War series. During the battle of the Chosin Reservoir a lot of the men who were thrown against the Marines in human wave attacks, like cannon fodder, had been former nationalist soldiers in WW2 and the civil war.
@@ahorsewithnoname773 Large parts of the Chinese forces in the Korean War generally had once been in the Nationalist army. Defeated soldiers in the Civil War often changed sides, and the disintegration of the Nationalist cause was partly caused by that. As the best way of keeping an eye on them, the Communists enrolled them in their army but also appointed commissars to supervise them, and a large number were sent to Korea. On the whole they do not seem to have fought worse than the troops who had never been Nationalist, though if taken prisoner they quite often opted for Taiwan when offered the choice at the end of the Korean War.
@@ahorsewithnoname773 I am not so sure about that. The Chinese expeditionary army in Korea was not that large to waste massive numbers of soldiers in human wave attacks. Just like German generals in WW2 American generals refused to admit that they got outgeneraled and beaten by the Chinese, which they saw as inferior, and blamed it on massive human wave attacks instead. Despite lacking American firepower, air and armor support the Chinese infantry was very skillful in small unit tactics and used infiltration and concentration at decisive points to devastating attacks.
@@ChaptermasterPedroKantor-kv5yw The science fiction novel "The Mercenary" by Jerry Pournelle uses a factual battle for the climactic scene.
So November 1 is when the next big WW2 minute by minute coverage special will drop? This one will no doubt be the biggest, most explosive, special series ever.
I feel like most people here have probably seen it but The Pacific does an incredible job at displaying the horrors of the battle of Okinawa. I highly recommend it to anyone interested that hasn't seen it. Be forewarned there are some rough scenes.
I'm surprised you haven't announced a 24 hour live special for the beginning of Operation Olympic. Surely an invasion of this scale will dwarf Overlord by a huge magnitude, right?
I see what you did there.
Hmm You know, that might make for an interesting alt.history channel series.
@@ChaptermasterPedroKantor-kv5yw More depressing than anything else. Documents show the Japanese were very well prepared for that invasion, and would have taken a horrific toll on the invading forces (note all the Purple Hearts that were minted because of that plan).
I fully expect it and will be disappointed if we don't see it. 🙂
@@johnf7683 It's probably for the best that it did not happen. I still think it would make for an interesting alt.history series. And no more depressing then the first 3 years of this channel when the Germans were winning.
Can’t believe we are already at Week 300 of the war. Soon we may get to see the invasion of the Japanese home islands once Okinawa will inevitably be secured. I wonder if Malaya and Singapore will soon be liberated too, given the ongoing Borneo Campaign nearby? I heard rumours that Operation Zipper is in the making…
And Zipper could have happened a lot sooner too, but got postponed twice. First by London allowing British soldiers with the most service time to be discharged back home, which put back the timetable for Zipper as SEA Command lost its most experienced soldiers that had to be replaced. And later when Japan surrendered and that gloryhound McArthur demanded that no local surrenders could be taken until said gloryhound had his moment to shine in Tokyo Bay. The British could have landed in Malaya and Singapore weeks earlier, while Allied POW's kept DELETING from Japanese maltreatment and local Japanese commanders even prepared plans to DELETE all those POW's out of revenge for the surrender.
Good stuff Indy! History books don't really cover post German surrender fighting in Europe.
That's why I'm glad they're continuing to cover it and not just stop everything on V-E day. The immediate post-war recovery period is fascinating, but even in college courses it gets glossed over and they skip right to the Berlin Blockade.
Hi Indy
Another wonderful episode.
300 weeks passed. Seems like it was yesterday I saw your first episode. Time flew so fast also Iearned about this war. Hats off to your resilience in completing this series.
Like always, a great episode, thanks.
Thanks for watching!
Congrats on 300 great episodes! And Thank You!!!
Thank you so much!
i actually have known one of the Georgians talked about in this episode personally...
he worked for the water authority in Petten, where we have the highest and strongest seadike of the Netherlands, the "Hondsbossche en Pettemer zeewering". it is situated in the provence of Noord-Holland in the gap between the dunes there.
I had heard something about the Georgians in Texel. I encountered an elderly Georgian who was begging in Antwerp, Belgium, in the 1990s. I spoke to him in Russian. I did not ask if he had any involvement in the Texel events but he looked the right age though that does not necessarily mean he was there.
another rather "fun" fact, the water authority there had 2 DUKW's, left after ww2...
they were used for many years after the war to bring out "zinkstukken" (big mats to keep the sandy bottom in place, there is a strong current along the coast of the North sea that depletes the sand that makes up the beaches in a high rate) which are kept in place by dumping tons of rock on them. these loads of rocks were also brought out to sea by the DUKW's. i don't know if they are still in use now, but it would not surprise me, i'll look it up or give the water authority a call about this topic...
I wonder if anyone of them survived going back to soviet union and eventually returned to their families in Georgia 🙁
@@mclurr3197 Kinds surprised this wasn't addressed.
21:51 I can't believe D-Day was nearly a year ago. What an insane month that was, for me personally.
It was insane for us here too!
300 weeks. What a journey!
Indeed it was! Still plenty more to go though.
@@WorldWarTwo And I will follow you till there and beyond.
Solid Gladys Knight reference.
As a native of Georgia (US state, not country), I approve of this musical reference. You guys do awesome work.
Right there with ya, Jamey….
Great. Thanks Indy. Now I've got Georgia on my mind.
A great series!! Should be required viewing in high schools and college. Thanks.
Thank you very much!
Mark feltons video on himmlers death explains alot more of what goes on and the shady stuff
If you enjoyed Dr Felton’s lengthy musings on Heinrich’s last days, you’ll simply LOVE David Irving’s accusations / conclusions, etc., much of which were ( are ? ) available on RUclips…
awesome history, i will have to replay it since there are so many units and names involved, thanks! One name I recognized was Admiral Leahy. I served on a Navy ship named after him. First time I heard about Leahy was when I came on board in the 1980s, lol.
further to highlighting the Pacific theatre:
2 ideas.
soft box the light(s) on the flags to your left (camera right)
or
shift those flags farther left
all in aid of losing the shadow line on the map...
(3:30) Wow... The surviving Georgian rebels were handed over by the Canadians to the Soviets?... Wouldn't that basically be a death-sentence?
If you don't already know about this, look into Operation Keelhaul. It's much worse than you think.
Apparently it was a mix of gulag and rehabilitation. Got off pretty lucky
Yep. Not the only group of "two-uniforms" from the East Front that happened to.
@@TheOtherOne122 No crap? Stalin must have had a soft spot for his old tribe.
@@MM22966 The rehabilitation IIRC largely happened post-Destalinization, so there’s that.
I think Cole Phelps should be somewhere there around Sugar Loaf at this time.
Ironically in contrast to the war being all motorized and maneuver based in Europe, the last battle had trench warfare and the Yugoslav partisan's couldn't break the lines until they brought in air power.
9:25 The bazooka is new? I seem to recall it making appearances in Band of Brothers - outside Carentan, in Hagenau, and in front of the roadblocks around Berchtesgaden. Were they some other similar kind of weapon, or is Stephen Ambrose sprinkling bazookas in places they don't belong?
He's getting it confused with Recoilless Rifles, which were new. TimeGhost isn't really a "weapons" channel like a lot of WW2 docs/series.
@@MM22966 Aha, thanks for that. I guess that's why they often bring someone from outside the channel to talk about weapons.
@@Arashmickey You're welcome. This little thing highlights what is probably the biggest difference between TimeGhost and virtually all other WW2 histories/historians, even more than this marathon week-by-week format: They focus on what the war did to the people rather than the panoply of world-changing geopolitics, tactics, weapons, and technology. Those are in there, but they are supporting actors.
There were 2 bazookas, a 2.36 inch and a 3.5 inch, both rocket propelled. I think there were also recoilless rifles used, the first being 57 mm. Later there would be 75 mm and 105 mm.
The difference is not much, actually. The bazookas have a straight tube, the propellant is in the missile. A recoilless rifle has a shell casing just like a normal cartridge, with a bunch of holes in it and similar holes in the gun. This allows the "backblast" to balance the recoil. Either way you have a lot of hot gas coming out of the back, very fast.
@@gordybing1727 Thank you so much! I'm such a nerd sometimes. Decided to check out the etymology and the first thing I see in the in the wiki is this cool quote: "I shouldn't 'arf wonder, from the look of him, if he wasn't the 'aughty kind of a feller who'd cleave you to the bazooka for tuppence with his bloomin' falchion."
I checkout the music reference by Indy. Nice '70's song.
I very much enjoyed your video and I gave it a Thumbs Up
19:53 You forgot Troy. That siege also failed; the Achaeans had to use a giant, wooden horse.
Maybe the Allies will use the same trick against Japan. Maybe with an aircraft carrier made of ice and sawdust.
Great nod to a great song.
Fell asleep last night! But I'm here now.
Thanks for watching!
You do have to admire the Japanese bravery and dedication to the Emperor,landing on an enemy airfield,then blowing up stuff,under the enemy noses..I bet Skorzeny himself would never have attempted such a thing!
Otto performed jaw-dropping feats & fought in battles that none of the Japanese ‘officer class’, none,.came remotely close to approaching in ambition, gumption, & skill.
Sugarloaf hill was referenced in planning for the invasion of Kyushu. It was/will be noted that hundreds of such defensive points dot the invasion area. It's no wonder they imagined potential casualties of one million men.
My dad was a U.S. Army Master Seargent in the 288th Field Artillery Observation Battalion in Europe. At the conclusion of European hostilities, the Army offered him a choice to either return directly home to the States or go to the Pacific with an Officer's commission. Perhaps fortunately for me and my siblings, he said "no, thank you" to becoming an Officer and made his way home from Europe.
I have a similar story, my grandfather was offered a Squad leader job for his performance in the Battle of the Bulge. Turns out every officer is his platoon was KIA a week later (officers lead the way). He was lucky to be wounded early in the fighting and evacuated to a field hospital.
@@Lonovavir Thanks for relating your grandfather's story.
19:58 Unfortunately not enough people inside Japan were concerned with all those Japanese lives being lost either
Seriously. I was watching a documentary about the atomic bombings, and it got to the part after the bombings where the Japanese leaders were discussing whether to surrender or not. You can really tell that they barely cared about what would happen to their own civilian population.
@@Mr110074 Before the atomic bombings they were talking about how many million people they were willing to have die to avoid surrendering.
Indy: Bet they got there on the Midnight Train
My Brain: Going aaaaaanywheeeeeeere!
Don't stop believing!
Holy shit! 12:00 how have I never heard of this xD that sounds epic..
Man this invasion of Japan stuff sounds like the channel will be going on for at least another year
Love the Gladys Knight and the Pips reverence!
That D-Day 24 Hours was completely amazing.
Thanks for watching! It really was an amazing project.
-TimeGhost Ambassador
@@WorldWarTwo I think there were three of us that made it through the whole thing in one go that night. A great time all around.
Nice! I kinda want to binge it with energy drinks and pizza. I listened to it over a week while at work off and on the first time and a few select episodes again since then.
-TimeGhost Ambassador
@@WorldWarTwo Took some planning... getting that day and the next off from work to make the timing line up. Still barely made it. Was an amazing experience.
06:50 I cannot forget his phrase in Downfall : - Robert Ritter von Greim "My Führer I didn't know we have SUCH (REALLY inexisting) RESERVES"
UK having a surprising general election is so damn well-timed
I don't think i've ever quite looked forward to the fourth of july as much as I do for this year.
Looking like a Labour victory in both timelines as well.
You had me at "Midnight Train".
2:52 Fun fact queen Tamar was a member of the Bagration dynasty, and one of her relatives was the namesake of Operation Bagration
Week 300... astounding.
If only this would be Europe's last battle ever. Ah well, to dream...
Thank you for watching!
If I recall correctly Episode 1 specifically said at that point it was "only" the German-Polish war. (Indy even did a "gotcha".)
I like how "great song" got translated into "best song ever" in the subtitles
9:26 I think you guys made a mistake, you said the Basil’s but that has been in US service since 1942. I think you guys were actually talking about the new Recoilless rifles which came into service around this time.
This was the 3.5 inch "Super Bazooka", as compared to the original 2.36 inch.
Excellent thanks
Taking Tarakan was important as an oil producing center with a refinery and depot.
Thank you for the lesson.
And thank you for watching.
Will you be doing a special hour by hour coverage of the invasion of Japan? :)
Hold on, wasnt the bazooka in use from 42? Or is this just new for the marines?
2nd generation, 3.5 inch vs. 2.36 inch.
It's a largely new thing in this theater, including the use of smoke and frag rockets which mostly were used in the Pacific.
-TimeGhost Ambassador
@@WorldWarTwo The original warhead was a "shaped charge", designed to cut thru armor. Having alternate warheads would have been a game changer.
Im confused, the Bazooka was im service since 1942 i thought?
thats what i thought, maybe the newer "super bazooka"
Someone commented that it could be the m18 57mm recoilless rifle
9:29 ? That’s an M9 bazooka? I believe they have been used for a year by this point. The prior model saw service with Americans for most of this war.
This seems to be the first widespread use in the Pacific. They of course had already been widely used elsewhere.
-TimeGhost Ambassador
@@WorldWarTwo I think the M9s were used the prior year in the Marianas if I recall correctly in large numbers.
Quite possibly. I couldn't find ready sources, and Indy was travelling and couldn't check his notes when I asked for clarification.
-TimeGhost Ambassador
Hello from Odzak❤
Georgia, Georgia
The whole day through (the whole day through)
Just an old sweet song
Keeps Georgia on my mind (Georgia on my mind)
With that opening, we know what’s on Indy’s mind.
At the beginning of this episode, Indy, I felt you had turned, as my father would say, demob happy!
"I'm gonna be with him on that midnight train to Georgia 🎶
I'd rather live in his world, than be without him in mine
Week 300! Yippie. I wonder if we’ll get to 400, or at least 350.
I'm confused
The bazooka came out in 1942
My grandfather used one in north Africa
Am I missing something?
Two generations, 2.36 inch and 3.5 inch.
We all know what we want after the WWII series come to end:The 100 years war - week by week!
Will be interesting to see indies great-grandchildren covering that...
Nope, Emu War special series needs to come first. Priorities, man......
@@Raskolnikov70 Yeah where is that anglophonic Aussie turd that comes on here spouting his rubbish? bet he keeps quite if you mention the Emu War to him. 😂😂
Anyone else think this guy should partner with a history centric band?
Perhaps one in the heavy metal genre?
-TimeGhost Ambassador
@@WorldWarTwo ooo, that could be really good, I hear the Swedes have some really good metal bands
With that voice he could do "Country Roads" by John Denver.
In which video does Spartacus talk about the battle of Odzak?
Haha, midnight train pure gold
Thanks all
I’m trying to plug these episodes into the events of the HBO show the pacific.
And can’t
the fact that even with censorship at home, Marshall does not believe that US Public opinion would support the war for that long speaks about the kind of casualties they expect in the invasion of Japan, they are indeed already being forced to declare early victory in Iwo Jima despite fighting still raging on because of degrading public opinion on the battle, at the same time sieging would actually be far more lengthy and give the Japanese government far more power to demand any kind of negotiation, the more information are known about the invasion of Japan, the more clear it is that the atomic bomb is very much necessary
also this is the first time i heard about the raid on Yontan air fields, it is crazy what damage 12 trained fanatics can do, and they are only 1 out of 5 aircraft that are suppose to raid the airfield.
The war was never popular in the US, that's one of the enduring myths of this era. The reason it persists is because the news and media of the day is so full of pro-war sentiment and dissenting voices were largely silenced after Pearl Harbor. But if you look at the feelings of the US population prior to the war, it was overwhelmingly isolationist and anti-war, and a large proportion of people were openly pro-German. It's important to mention because that forced the US government's hand in many ways that make a lot more sense when you look at them through that lens; the use of atomic weapons is only the latest and most famous example of it. Marshall, along with everyone at the top, understood they had to win a fast victory because they were up against that ticking clock of public opinion and support.
@@Raskolnikov70 I also suspect they would not have been up for a war with the USSR either, despite some enthusiasts today thinking Patton would have been able to storm to Moscow if he had been allowed to...
@@stevekaczynski3793 There's no way Roosevelt or Truman would have been able to take any action towards the USSR no matter how justified it might have been. Most people would have been totally confused - "wait, aren't they our ally???" - in addition to the war weariness. Churchill's government was the one coming up with all kinds of ambitious plans for the post-war world and trying to drag the US into supporting them; that lack of popular support in the US is what prevented the very pro-British Roosevelt from taking part.
At the risk of sounding like a broken record, this is something that gets buried and forgotten in because of the events post-1945, with most histories jumping straight into the Cold War. Which the isolationist US public also had to be dragged kicking and screaming into supporting through a whole lot of fear, among other methods.
US public wanted the war done, the fact that the "siege" might drag on for years was massively unappealing to anyone except the navy guys (plus consider that the war in china would drag on endlessly).
Overall, the invasion was very much a "last push" kind of thing.
Thanks for another great episode, dear TimeGhost team! 🙏
Great opening!
A small thing for Indy: Texel is pronounced the same as Tessel, and thus not Teschel.
Japan: wow our logistics in China is already in a dire condition
Also Japan,
"You know what let's go on the offensive which will stretch our supply even further"
I'm now expecting Indy to have a channel sponsored by VH-1.