As mentioned in my post about the World War 1 centenary, there was a huge loss of life during that conflict.
Most people know that the British and the Americans fought the Germans and some know that the Russians fought the Germans. I guess that not many people know that the Russians lost almost as many soldiers as the Germans in that war and each country had almost twice the number of losses suffered by the British Army.
What very few people know, including myself until very recently is that the Japanese fought on the side of the Allies. The Japanese are believed to have had around 1200 casualties, principally fighting the Germans in the far east.
Japan had signed an alliance with Great Britain in 1902. When war broke out, the British asked Japan for help with the German naval squadron based in the far east. Their concern was that the German Navy would be able to disrupt trade and lever the war effort. At that time, Germany had various colonies in the Asian Pacific rim and Japan saw an opportunity.
Japan entered the war on August 23rd 1914 and a few months later, worked with the Royal Navy to seize the German naval base at Tsingtao in China. Japan was also able to seize the German controlled islands in the Pacific which gave them Japanese naval bases at Yap, Ponape and Jaluit and eventually allowed them to build their own base in Truk. In fact, the British agreed that the Japanese could take all the German colonies north of the equator.
Truk became the main Japanese naval base and for the first two years of World War 2 was considered an unassailable fortress. Yap became an island stronghold with around 6000 men and Jaluit had over 2000 men stationed there.
US naval forces eventually had to take Truk as part of their westward advance in a reverse Pearl Harbor attack and lost 25 aircraft in the process. The Japanese suffered huge losses and the media at the time referred to the attack as retribution for Pearl.
It just shows you governments need to be careful who they assist today because they might well be the enemy of tomorrow !!
