Question for the Japanese people here: In hindsight, was the attack on pearl harbor a mistake? Why or why not?

Question for the Japanese people here: In hindsight, was the attack on pearl harbor a mistake? Why or why not?

There are many things to consider.
Firstly, the attack itself was a bad idea.
It should have been postponed. Of course, United States had oil embargo, but we were conquering Asia just fine, and a war with America was dumb.

Secondly, it was not very well executed. What we were looking for were the carriers and we did not find any. We should have waited for the carriers and sank them as well.

Thirdly, we did not bomb your repair stations and fuel stations, which would be critical for your logistics. many historians agree that if admiral nagumo had authorized a third wave of bombers to attack the fuel and repair stations of pearl harbor, the damage inflicted by the attack would be 10x worse.

Fourthly, I would have ordered an attack and occupation order of Midway at the same time of the attack of pearl harbor. and some other islands. It was dumb not to orchestrate a simultaneous attack on midway and palmyra.

>but we were conquering Asia just fine
No, Japan was caught in a stalemate against China in a war that was going on for years.

>What we were looking for were the carriers and we did not find any.
No, the order given to the KB was to destroy warships in the following order of priority:
1. Carriers and battleships
2. cruisers
3. other small ships

>We should have waited for the carriers and sank them as well.
No that would have been extremely dumb, as the KB has now lost the element of surprise and is open to counterattack. It took only about 4 divebomber squadrons to sink 4 carriers at Midway. KB was less experienced and even shittier at this point.

>we did not bomb your repair stations and fuel stations, which would be critical for your logistics.
No, that was not in the order and there were not enough bombers to go around.

>many historians agree
No, it's mostly dirty uninformed mass of internet forum wankers and youtube commenters who believe in muh 3rd wave.

> would have ordered an attack and occupation order of Midway at the same time of the attack of pearl harbor. and some other islands. It was dumb not to orchestrate a simultaneous attack on midway and palmyra.
Japan had simultaneously ordered attacks all over the Pacific and NEI/ Malaya, there were not enough troops and boats to go around.
Note that Japs did launch a simultaneous attack of Philippines, Guam, and Wake, and failed hilariously at Wake the first time and had to wait for 2 fleet carriers to help them out.

You are a baka, English teacher-san.

Wasn't the problem mainly that Japan had a shortage of oil due to the embargo, and was afraid the Americans would retaliate if they conquered the Philippines?
As far as I understand, that was the idea by trying to destroy as much as possible of the fleet. I also understood that the US threatened to retaliate if the Japanese took the Philippines well enough, but had no good plans to defend it and would not have gotten much support within the country for causing a war to take them back.
In hindsight the attack definitely was a mistake, but with the intel the Japanese had it might very well have been one of the better choices they had.
It was certainly one the US did not expect.

>Wasn't the problem mainly that Japan had a shortage of oil due to the embargo, and was afraid the Americans would retaliate if they conquered the Philippines?
The Philippines were an American colony and the US had been heavily fortifying it with aircraft and subs, so yeah, there was good reason to think conquering it would've caused the US to react badly.

>I also understood that the US threatened to retaliate if the Japanese took the Philippines well enough, but had no good plans to defend it and would not have gotten much support within the country for causing a war to take them back.
You understand wrong. US plan was always to build up force and retaliate en masse, which I think is a good plan seeing as it worked just fine.
Muh isolationism is a meme. US would've gotten its war one way or another. Japs merely simplified the matter and hastened the process.

>, but with the intel the Japanese had it might very well have been one of the better choices they had.
It was certainly one the US did not expect.
The problem with the attack was rooted in the technology of the time, not in its execution. It was simply impossible to cause significant damage to ships at harbor, let alone infrastructure, with some 200 single-engine bombers. As it was, all but a couple of the battleships were raised and brought back into service. If the carriers were there, the results would've been the same.
Bombing facilities would've been less than worthless. Brits couldn't shut down German sub pens despite bombing them continuously with heavy 4-engine bombers. The KB was incapable of delivering a crippling attack because even six fleet carriers did not have that kind of firepower in 1941.

You seem to know a lot about the matter. Do you think there would have been a way for the Japanese to continue their conquest of China despite the embargo without ending up in a war with the US?

No, on top of oil, there was a sanction on them, their foreign funds were frozen, they couldn't buy scrap metal or rubber or other crucial war materials.
Meanwhile lend-lease to china started in early 1941 (although most of the first shipments got diverted to Britain once the nip chimpout began).
The china was also highly unpopular politically, on top of going nowhere and bleeding Japan dry.

So perhaps the best they could have gotten out of it would have been a one-sided but internationally just about acceptable peace accord with the KMT, and then lobbied to lift the sanctions.
They could probably still have had large parts of China.

No, Chinese wouldn't let them keep any part of China, why would they? They have the homefield and manpower advantage. Japanese hold on the areas it "conquered" was extremely weak. Japan's economy, which was already in shambles, would absolutely come crashing down from the sanctions. Meanwhile China was getting western international support for the first time after holding Japan off for 4 years. They were holding all the cards, and they have nothing to lose, and everyone knew it. Kind of hard to cut a deal at that point.

I guess that would depend on at which point the Japanese cut their deal.
The Chinese were in an internal conflict as well, and the KMT wasn't too motivated to fight the Japanese. Also looking how much of China the Japanese eventually managed to conquer and how long they held off the US, their situation couldn't have been quite as bleak as you describe it.