Without the Allied victory in keeping shipping lanes open during the Battle of the Atlantic, Britain could not have fed her people or withstood Axis offensives in Europe and North Africa.
[2] Without Britain's survival and without Allied shipments of food and industrial equipment to the Soviet Union,[a] her military and economic power would likely not have rebounded in time for Russian soldiers to prevail at Stalingrad and Kursk.
[3][4][5] Without victories at sea in the Pacific theater, the Allies could not have mounted amphibious assaults on or maintained land forces on Guadalcanal, New Guinea, Saipan, The Philippines, Iwo Jima, or Okinawa.
Allied operations in the Atlantic and Pacific theaters were interconnected because they frequently competed for scarce naval resources for everything from aircraft carriers to transports and landing craft.
[b][9] For much of the war, Britain and America fought mainly on the seas,[10][clarification needed] where successful Allied naval operations permitted effective support and reinforcement of troops in North Africa, the Soviet Union, western Europe and the Pacific.
Historian Craig Symonds lists three key factors enabling the Allies to win the war: British "grit", Russian manpower, and American industrial strength.
America and Russia mobilized men and industrial capacity to rebound from significant military setbacks more quickly than anticipated by the attacking Axis powers.
[27][28] Significant strategic offensive decisions by Axis leaders proved unsound, creating opportunities that the Allies exploited to great effect.
[29][30] Many of these factors played important parts in enabling the Allies to dominate the seas, a central reason, according to historian Evan Mawdsley, for their emerging victorious in the war.
Successful Allied initiatives at El Alamein, Stalingrad, French North Africa, and Guadalcanal in November 1942 marked strategic shifts for World War II.
Beginning in 1943, the extensive mobilization of American production capability for war resulted in dramatic increases in the number of carriers available for even more strategic initiatives.
[u] In the Pacific Theater, a force of six Japanese fleet carriers with their combined aircraft striking power, the Kidō Butai, acted as a unit and roamed virtually at will for the first six months of the war.
At the end of October 1942, after battle attrition from sinkings and damages, Japan had only three such carriers operational in the Pacific Theater and America, for a two-week period, had none.
For example, at the end of October 1942 following the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands, only seven (47%) of the fifteen fleet and light carriers the combatants had afloat worldwide were operational.
The impact of the relative number of operational, combat-ready carriers available was particularly felt during 1942, when the strategic initiative in the Pacific Theater passed from Japan to America.
Dissatisfied with these limitations, Japan discontinued participation in naval treaty negotiations in 1936 and invested in a construction program that within five years doubled the number of her fleet and light carriers.
Construction of HMS Victorious began in 1937 but she did not become combat operational until mid-1941 when rushed into the hunt for the German battleship Bismarck with only a quarter of her aircraft onboard .
Within seven weeks of commissioning, her aircraft were bombing airfields, spotting for warship's guns, patrolling for enemy cruisers and submarines, and refueling other ships in support of the invasion of North Africa.
In January 1945, still without aircrew aboard, she sailed for the Indian Ocean, where she took on an air squadron and participated in reconnaissance flights in February about 18 months after initial commissioning.
Britain made major changes to many American-made escort carriers due to concerns over fuel handling facilities after the unexplained explosion and sinking of HMS Dasher (D37) in March 1943.
However, there were at least 229 incidents for which damage was sustained by carriers from enemy weapon systems or causes such as extreme weather (storms, typhoons), collisions, aircraft landing accidents, etc.
It reflects how Japan more than doubled the number of her carriers between leaving the Washington/London naval treaties in 1936 and the time she attacked Pearl Harbor in December 1941.
Without the Allied victory in keeping shipping lanes open during the Battle of the Atlantic, Britain could not have fed her people or withstood Axis offensives in Europe and North Africa.
[57] Without Britain's survival and without Allied shipments of food and industrial equipment to the Soviet Union,[a] her military and economic power would likely not have rebounded in time for Russian soldiers to prevail at Stalingrad and Kursk.
[58][59][60][61][62] Without victories at sea in the Pacific theater, the Allies could not have mounted amphibious assaults on or maintained land forces on Guadalcanal, New Guinea, Saipan, The Philippines, Iwo Jima, or Okinawa.
Allied operations in the Atlantic and Pacific war theaters were interconnected because they frequently competed for scarce naval resources for everything from aircraft carriers to transports and landing craft.
Without the Allied victory in keeping shipping lanes open during the Battle of the Atlantic, Britain could not have fed her people or withstood Axis offensives in Europe and North Africa.
[69] Without Britain's survival and without Allied shipments of materiel, food and industrial equipment to the Soviet Union,[a] her military and economic power would likely not have rebounded in time for the Red Army to prevail at Stalingrad and Kursk.
[70][71][72][73][74] Without victories at sea in the Pacific theater, the Allies could not have mounted amphibious assaults on or maintained land forces on Guadalcanal, New Guinea, Saipan, The Philippines, Iwo Jima, or Okinawa.
Allied operations in the Atlantic and Pacific war theaters were interconnected because they frequently competed for scarce naval resources for everything from aircraft carriers to transports and landing craft.