This is an important book that does justice to parts of WWII that have been largely forgotten. The Royal Navy in Eastern Waters played a critical role in the steps to eventual victory over the Axis countries. – Very Highly Recommended.
NAME: The Royal Navy in Eastern Waters, Linchpin of Victory 1935-1942 FILE: R2527 AUTHOR: Andrew Boyd PUBLISHER: Pen & Sword, Seaforth BINDING: hard back PAGES: 538 PRICE: £30.00 GENRE: Non Fiction SUBJECT: WWII, World War II, World War 2, Second World War, 1935-1942, Indian Ocean, Indo-China, Burma, Malaya, Australia, Japan, war at sea
ISBN: 978-1-4738-9248-4
IMAGE: B2527.jpg6 BUYNOW: http://tinyurl.com/m3anasv LINKS: DESCRIPTION: This is an important book that does justice to parts of WWII that have been largely forgotten. The Royal Navy in Eastern Waters played a critical role in the steps to eventual victory over the Axis countries. – Very Highly Recommended. The Royal Navy has failed to receive the recognition it deserves for its role in Eastern Waters. In the period to 1942, the British focus was on Europe and North Africa, with Eastern operations taking a priority well behind the other two theatres. That was understandable because resources were stretched, the first stage had to be a greatly expanded bombing campaign in Europe and the ejection of Axis forces from North Africa. The latter also had implications for Eastern Waters because victory in North Africa would frustrate any attempts for Germany and Japan to link up on land and for German naval operations to have friendly ports in the Mediterranean and Red Sea. The result was that the Royal Navy was always seriously under resourced in Eastern Waters, but that never stopped them following orders to operate in those areas with obsolete equipment and insufficient numbers of ships and aircraft. The RAF in the area tried hard to support naval operations with some of the oldest aircraft still flying. The Fleet Air Arm fared little better. It was hardly surprising that HMS Repulse and HMS Prince of Wales should be sunk by Japanese aircraft before they could make a positive contribution. In the Indian Ocean, U-Boats operated against British convoys, using covert resupply facilities in neutral ports. This was to prompt the use of the Calcutta Light Horse to carry out a commando attack on German vessels in port in Goa. Founded as much as a polo club as a reserve cavalry force, the ageing members of the CLH performed with great courage and successfully denied U-Boats their secret supply base. Incidents such as these have coloured the popular view of the conduct of war East of Suez as far too little and without credible plans, where only individuals, small groups and isolated warships performed with immense courage on what were near suicide missions. This is an unfair picture and the author has produced a well- researched and comprehensive study of what was in fact a grand strategy that embraced all of the areas and made the most of the available resources to achieve some notable successes. This work is long overdue and provides a very detailed picture of the realities. Many readers will be surprised by the real story of what happened and why, leading to a new appreciation of how the Royal Navy rose to meet impossible challenges and won most of the battles. There is excellent illustration and a very well executed index and bibliography.