Herwig, Holger H.

Krug, Hans-Joachim

English

U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons

Naval War College ReviewVolume 55Number 4 Autumn Article 222002Reluctant Allies: German-Japanese Naval Relationsin World War IIHolger H. HerwigHans-Joachim KrugFollow this and additional works at: https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-reviewThis Book Review is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons. It has been accepted forinclusion in Naval War College Review by an authorized editor of U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons. For more information, please contactrepository.inquiries@usnwc.edu.Recommended CitationHerwig, Holger H. and Krug, Hans-Joachim (2002) "Reluctant Allies: German-Japanese Naval Relations in World War II," Naval WarCollege Review: Vol. 55 : No. 4 , Article 22.Available at: https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol55/iss4/22the national war effort.”  As a result, thecharacteristics of sound transmission be-neath the surface of the oceans, espe-cially the effects exerted by thermallayers, became the focus of scientific re-search sponsored by the Navy. By 1918the resulting underwater sound-sensingand transmission systems had “helpedkeep the U-boats at bay.”World War I ended less than two yearsafter the United States entered, and for afew years thereafter it seemed as if the war-time spirit of cooperation in the naval-scientific inquiry into oceanography’sutility to naval warfare would continue.However, the Republican era was a timeof American isolationism and naval re-trenchment, and by 1924 the budgetaryaxe had decapitated the fledgling naval-scientific hybrid. A revival of the joint ef-fort by scientists and the Navy did notcome until 1940, but not until the attackon Pearl Harbor did the fiscal floodgatesof defense spending on such topics trulyswing open.In the Second World War the final formof American naval oceanography beganto emerge. Just as the submarine is theweapons system around which Weirweaves his story, his concept of a cul-tural clash between naval officers andscientists constitutes his institutional orpolitical theme. Still, as Weir points out,“Effective submariners and ASW officerssoon realized that applied oceanographyimproved a ship’s chance of survival andincreased the likelihood that crew-members would again see their familiesafter a difficult North Atlantic convoy ora submarine patrol near the Japanesehome islands.” Besides patriotic motiva-tion, the scientists hoped that memoryof “the profitable wartime applicationof oceanography and the lives sparedin combat would induce the Navy tobecome the generous patron” of postwaroceanography.That was how it turned out, but onlybecause the unanticipated Soviet sub-marine threat provided an irresistibleimpetus for many shrewd oceanogra-phers and some astute naval officerswho served as the “translators” betweentheir respective cultures. The twogroups cooperated for mutual and na-tional benefit in the Cold War, but thecultures of the warrior and the scientistremained as separate as oil in water.Their testimonials were parallel, notunified—the invincibility of U.S. fast-attack and fleet ballistic missile subma-rines for the Navy, and the intellectualfecundity of the Woods Hole Oceano-graphic Institution and the Scripps In-stitution of Oceanography for science.This book is not light reading, but it isinvaluable to every serious student ofnaval strategy, weapons systems, and themarine environment that shapes andlimits modern warfare at sea.KENNETH J. HAGANNaval War CollegeMonterey ProgramKrug, Hans-Joachim, et al. Reluctant Allies: Ger-man-Japanese Naval Relations in World War II.Annapolis, Md.: Naval Institute Press, 2001.456pp. $38.95With the exception of Carl Boyd, JohnChapman, Gerhard Krebbs, and BerndMartin, historians have largely ignoredGerman-Japanese relations in generaland naval relations in particular. (Afurther exception would be WernerRahn; see his “Japan and Germany,1941–1943: No Common Objective, NoCommon Plans, No Basis of Trust,” inB O O K R E V I E W S 1 2 51Herwig and Krug: Reluctant Allies: German-Japanese Naval Relations in World War IIPublished by U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons, 2002the Summer 1993 issue of this journal.)That gap in the literature has now beenfilled by this collection of essays by foureminent German and Japanese naval of-ficers and historians: Hans-JoachimKrug, Yôichi Hirama, Berthold J.Sander-Nagashima, and Axel Niestlé.Each contributes from his research spe-cialty, and the product is a welcome re-examination of a “missed opportunity”based on sources in British, German,Japanese, and U.S. archives.Part I consists of a historical overviewand analysis of German-Japanese navalcooperation by Captain Krug, GermanNavy, and Admiral Hirama, Japan Mari-time Self-Defense Force. Their messageis straightforward—there never existedreal cooperation between Berlin andTokyo, as each side was intent merely touse the other to further its own power-political agenda. This is as true for theAnti-Comintern Pact of November 1936as it is for the follow-up Agreement forCultural Cooperation of November1939. Various technical, joint, and mili-tary affairs committees were eventuallyformed, mainly for “propaganda pur-poses”; they never met before Pearl Har-bor and thereafter only “for protocoland courtesy.” The result was a “reluc-tant” alliance. In August 1939 AdolphHitler did not tell the Japanese of Ger-many’s nonaggression pact with theSoviet Union until two days before itssigning. In April 1941 Hitler refused toinform the visiting Japanese foreignminister, Yosuke Matsuoka, of his deci-sion to invade the Soviet Union.Matsuoka, in turn, did not inform theGermans that on his way home he wouldsign a neutrality pact with the Soviets.The Japanese attack on Pearl Harborcame as a complete surprise to the Ger-mans. Hastily arranged joint warfareagreements among the three Axis powerson 11 December 1941 and 18 January1942 brought few concrete measures.Much of the book rests on the detailedradio transmissions of the German navalattachés in Tokyo, Admiral PaulWenneker and Captain JoachimLietzmann. These show that even in thearea of possible joint operations in theIndian and Pacific Oceans, there wasmutual mistrust and jealousy. Thisstemmed from lack of prior cooperation,racial arrogance (by both sides), linguis-tic difficulties, and especially the factthat German auxiliary merchant cruisersand submarines had to diesel more thanthirteen thousand miles across a hun-dred degrees of longitude en route to theFar East. Admiral Karl Dönitz reducedthe cargo capacity of U-boats by insist-ing that they carry full loads of torpe-does; he refused to share Germanweapons and equipment technologywith the Japanese until August 1944, andthen only at Hitler’s insistence. In theIndian Ocean, the one place where Ger-man and Japanese naval forces mighthave been able to coordinate operations,nothing of the sort eventuated.Part II, by Sander-Nagashima, a Germannaval officer and historian, fleshes outmuch of the above. Sander-Nagashimafirst analyzes the command structure ofboth navies and then examines technicaland personnel matters (“Cooperationwith Caution”). He is especially criticalof German duplicity in continuing tosupply Chiang Kai-shek with militarymaterial in large quantities and in build-ing submarines for China, stating thatthey were for Germany—in the process“purposefully fooling the befriendedJapanese.” Perhaps in return, the Japa-nese refused to give direct help to Ger-man warships in the Far East; supplies,1 2 6 N A V A L W A R C O L L E G E R E V I E W2Naval War College Review, Vol. 55 [2002], No. 4, Art. 22https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol55/iss4/22until 22 June 1941, had to be shipped viathe Trans-Siberian Railroad. In the finalanalysis, Sander-Nagashima concludes,naval cooperation between the two allieswas restricted to “the limitation of theoperational zones through 70 degreeseast longitude.”Part III, written by Niestlé, a business-man and author of numerous works onGerman U-boats, details the meager lo-gistical exchanges between Berlin andTokyo. In terms of passengers travelingby transport ship, a mere twenty-onepeople went from Europe to Japan, andnot quite nine hundred from the FarEast to Europe; by submarine, the totalsare ninety-six and eighty-nine, respec-tively. In terms of material exchanges, in1941–42 Japan shipped 104,233 tons toGermany, of which 19,200 were lost; in1942–43 half the 104,700 tons shippedwas lost. Of the goods shipped in bothdirections by submarines, only between20 and 40 percent ever arrived. Whilethe Germans were anxious for deliveriesof rubber and precious metals, the Japa-nese requested industrial products, tech-nical equipment, and chemical goods.Part IV consists of a conclusion bySander-Nagashima.My criticisms of this superb work arebut two. First, the fact that it has fourauthors writing separate sections has re-sulted in a good deal of overlap, retellingvarious aspects of the story. Second, thetitle does not do the book justice; it washardly a “reluctant” alliance but rather ahollow, empty, or wasted one.HOLGER H. HERWIGUniversity of CalgaryHerwig, Holger H., and David J. Bercuson. TheDestruction of the Bismarck. Overlook, N.Y.: Over-look Press, 2001. 314pp. $35Rhys-Jones, Graham. The Loss of the Bismarck: AnAvoidable Disaster. Annapolis, Md.: Naval Insti-tute Press, 2000. 272pp. $32.95During the early evening hours of 22May 1941, the German battleship Bis-marck departed Bergen, Norway, to facethe might of the Royal Navy with onlythe heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen in com-pany. It was to be the battleship’s firstand only operational deployment. Fivedays later, the ship went down with overa thousand of its crew.Considered then to be the world’s mostpowerful battleship, Bismarck enteredthe Atlantic when Britain was stretchedalmost to the breaking point. With thecritical Battle of the Atlantic hanging inthe balance, the pursuit and sinking ofBismarck was one of the war’s most dra-matic episodes; many books and a moviewere dedicated to it. Those early works,written mostly within twenty years afterthe war, focused almost entirely on theoperation itself. None devoted attentionto the strategies, political aspects, oroperational and politico-strategic back-grounds that shaped the battleship’s de-ployment and the Allied responses to it.That void has now been filled by thetwo books under review, The Destruc-tion of the Bismarck, by Holger Herwigand David Bercuson, and The Loss of theBismarck: An Avoidable Disaster, by Gra-ham Rhys-Jones. Both books bring newinformation and fresh perspectives tothe tale, putting Bismarck’s operation inits strategic context. In doing so, the au-thors highlight the strategic impact ofthe potential outcomes of OperationRHINE, the code name for Bismarck’sB O O K R E V I E W S 1 2 73Herwig and Krug: Reluctant Allies: German-Japanese Naval Relations in World War IIPublished by U.S. Naval War College Digital Commons, 2002

Reluctant Allies: German-Japanese Naval Relations in World War II

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Reluctant Allies: German-Japanese Naval Relations in World War II

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