Were banzai charges any good in WW2? If you were to put bayonets on AR15's today would they be any good?

That seems to be the major issue. Between unmotivated Russians and Chinese, the US was the first enemy the Japanese fought that had enough training and discipline to fight back effectively.

Americans had the BAR and Thompson. And flamethrowers. And the M1 Garand. And...

Basically the American military, circa 1939-1945 was geared towards dealing with zerg rushes, almost by accident.

Not that I know of where it actually pushed the Americans back decisively. At most it would cause a break in a line and then the attack would be pushed back for the line to be reformed. The attacks were often done at night where they caused the most chaos but by morning they would be over and there would be a pile of Japanese bodies.
Against the Chinese and Soviets, the charges worked better because they didn't have as much support from machine guns, aircraft, ships, or weapons designed to deal with that stuff (shotguns, flamethrowers)

Those lessons also came in handy in Korea. Chinese infantry swarming onto tanks and trying to get inside, another American tank would just hose it down with their machine guns.

Well. If you think about it, the U.S. went into WW1 and had issues with being zerg rushed. We went in late and fell into levels of NON STOP WARFARE that we hadn't seen since the Civil War. So after that, it really does seem like American military doctrine shifted to defend against a bunch of dirty peasants with empty guns and swords charging U.S. lines. And with the exception of Germany...that actually is what tended to happen. From the Pacific in Dubya Dubya Two to fuckin' Afghanistan.

Depends on the war. Little Round Top was defended by a brilliant move by Chamberlain, in the absence of ammunition and having the high ground, the 20th Maine fixed bayonets and swept down the hill, essentially counter-charged the Confederates approaching them. The result was a complete route by the south.

For perspective, this was a risky and desperate move during the American civil war, 80 years later it's practically suicide for those japs.

The weapons that worked for clearing trenches also work for stopping charges. Because both ultimately become close combat where both sides are trying to take/hold a position.
With how the US military's procurement slowed after WW1, a lot of the weapons were kept and so for WW2 some were just as effective or were able to be used in a new way. The weapons that were newer, like the M1, maximized the firepower of an individual soldier.
Turns out slam-firing a shotgun down a trench of Hun and slam-firing it into a wave of charging Japs were both very effective.

The thinking with the Japanese was that since their soldiers were extensively trained in bayonet fighting, charging like that would allow them to bring that skill to decisive use. It would also break the morale of an enemy if a horde of screaming soldiers were rushing them and not stopping despite losses.
It works until the enemy can sustain enough fire to drop all those charging or they can fight while falling back and making the charging distance longer. Which is what happens when semi-automatic rifles and automatic weapons are standard as they were with the Americans.

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Cause Japs back in the day had an inferior intellect. I imagine they still do.

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Supposedly the one on Saipan caused enough chaos and casualties that the Americans had to throw cooks and other rear-echelon into the fray to keep that whole part of the line from collapsing into utter pandaemomium.

So while banzai charges never came close to accomplishing much of anything, American soldiers still took them very seriously. From their viewpoint one may not affect ever the overall outcome of the battle, but you just just as easily die in one as you could from anything else.

That one was probably the most effective banzai charge against American forces of the entire war, but it cost them their entire island garrison.

They actually fucked up the Russians and Chinese pretty well with banzai charges. But the US had a lot of machine guns, submachine guns, and standard issue semi auto rifles; the banzai charge is a lot less effective against that rate of fire.

But yeah, if i was some guy in a unit equipped with bolt action rifles with 5 round mag capacity, I would probably have a hard time repelling a charge of hundreds of katana and bayonet wielding japs. Let alone working the bolt smoothly, and imagine if your rifle jammed

Uh, they were literally suicidal. The Japanese banzai charged when they knew they were going to lose and couldn't escape but, as usual, refused to surrender. They're not supposed to "work".

I love remembering that the Americans mounted a banzai charge of their own against the Germans
>en.wikipedia.org/wiki/442nd_Infantry_Regiment_(United_States)#Lost_Battalion
>As the men of the 442nd went deeper and deeper they became more hesitant, until reaching the point where they would not move from behind a tree or come out of a foxhole. However, this all changed in an instant. The men of Companies I and K of 3rd Battalion had their backs against the wall, but as each one saw another rise to attack, then another also rose. Then every Nisei charged the Germans screaming, and many screaming "Banzai!"[26]:83 Through gunfire, artillery shells, and fragments from trees, and Nisei going down one after another, they charged.

Rumor has it.....................EEEEEEEEEERRRR *BEEEEEEEEP* WRONG! THEY DON'T DO JACK SHIEEEEEEEEET

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>Were banzai charges any good in WW2?
Mah "The Pacific".
Why am I - Russian know more about Japanese tactics than you? But you are not a simple anonymous author, you write on /K.
The main method of conducting offensive actions in the Japanese regulations and manuals was not at all a frontal bayonet attack, but a flank bypass and environment. The battle plan at the Ilu River (from Japanese sources) resembles the illustration of the last reception from the tactics textbook.
Two companies with the support of artillery, machine guns and mortars mark the attack across the river, in fact, not even trying to force it. They distract attention and do not allow the enemy to maneuver reserves. And the third company at this time is trying to reach the flank along the sandy spit in the mouth of the Ilu. Another company and support units are in reserve.
The problem with Colonel Ichitki was that the Americans had already had as many as 11,000 people on Guadalcanal, and they found out about the arrival of the Japanese landing force on the day of its landing. The Americans seriously concentrated on the perimeter, four battalions were concentrated on the Ilu River, plus one in reserve, that is, about five thousand Marines - and they used two days to entrench positions.
As a result, the Japanese company that was breaking through on this spit got into the classic "ognevoi meshok" (I do not know how in English - does the term "fire bag" exist?). Despite the heavy losses, the Japanese managed to break through to the cut-off position and capture some of the trenches and machine-gun points in hand-to-hand combat.
Colonel Ichiki still had no idea of the forces opposing him. The only thing he knew was that the first attack was almost a success.

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Therefore, he ordered to transfer the fire of mortars and 70-mm cannons to the identified position and repeat the attack, already using his reserve. At this time, the Japanese tried to circumvent the cut-off position on the water, hiding behind the oblique. But this attack was repulsed.
The commander began to gather his men for retreat. In the meantime, morning came and the Americans launched a counterattack. Using the best knowledge of the terrain, they cut off the retreat paths for the Japanese, and then, with the support of artillery, tanks and aircraft, pressed them to the coast and destroyed them.
Only three dozen Japanese escaped from the encirclement, and about 780 people, including the commander, were left lying on the shore. Overwhelmingly, they died during the liquidation of the mini-boiler, and not at all during the “suicide attacks”.

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>If you were to put bayonets on AR15's today would they be any good?
Only if you have overwhelming numbers, but expect it to be a pyrrhic victory.

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Yes. The Japanese would routinely overrun our lines and massacre everyone within the sector. This was most notable in the Banzai charge at Saipan. The Japanese would eventually all get killed but it did work to an extent, especially with massive numbers such as at Saipan

>Japanese-Americans banzai charging the Krauts
Holy shit, how have I never heard of this?

Not really. Turns out a sword/bayonet charge against a well supplied enemy with automatic/semiautomatic weapons and flamethrowers and shit isn’t a good idea, but typically they did that because they had literally nothing else to throw but themselves. They really only had effectiveness against starving peasants in Manchuria and barely equipped Soviet forces in the region, but that only helped the Soviets hate them more when they decided to move eastward.
That was really the only actually effective charge and even then the garrison got completely slaughtered in the end.
There’s a ton of WW1/2 shit that never saw the light of day despite being completely awesome and/or bizarre.

Bazai charges only work if the enemy doesn't have self-loading weapons AND is inferior in numbers AND is being attacked at close range from cover and with the element of surprise. Human wave attack past 1850 is impossible against a competent enemy armed with modern weapons. There are accounts of a single machine gun killing literally thousands of melee attackers.

>There are accounts of a single machine gun killing literally thousands of melee attackers.
Isn't this exactly what Daniel Daly did?

We picked the term up from you, and translated it as "fire sack", close enough.

Bayonet charges were the decisive action of thousands of battles from the invention of the primitive plug bayonet up through at least the US Civil War. Musket volleys were meant to soften the other side up so that the enemy would break in the face of a charge, allowing it to carry into the enemy's lines and cause a rout.

Banzai charges were no different. What was different was the ranged firepower available to the defender. While Crimea demonstrated this to an extent, the US Civil War should have demonstrated the obsolescence of Napoleonic tactics, and the Franco-Prussian War should have made clear what was going to replace them. However, even into WWI, a lot of generals still worshiped the bayonet, and the Japanese likewise thought that they could rout an enemy with semi-automatic rifles and machine guns with steel and courage. They thought wrong.

The Chinese did something similar in Korea, except with a lot more firepower in support of the charge. It worked--sometimes--at great cost. It also led to further developments in weapons designed to break up charges, like the Mk. 19 and the Claymore.

There have been a few bayonet charges in modern times, several of them by British squads and platoons that were low on ammunition and successfully routed an enemy that they really should have lost to (Falklands, Afghanistan). The circumstances have to be just right for it to work, though; which, really, isn't that much different from Little Round top, where conditions were similar.

>Were banzai charges any good in WW2?
Short term, they made fantastic territorial gains. Long term, everybody was dead so said gains didn't matter.

>If you were to put bayonets on AR15's today would they be any good?
Eh....sort of. The AR-15 is enough to storm a position kind of like if you were using smgs but you'll need some kind of cover. Smoke, supressive fire, anything that'll protect you that last 20 yards with no cover.

Depends on what you call "Working". I mean, they killed lots of US soldiers but they didn't hold the island.

>YWN live in a timeline where the confederates won the civil war and then fought the japanese charge for charge
why even live

Lol fuckin weebs.

got any stories about the awesome shit?

Meanwhile the british army has carried out at least one bayonet charge in possibly every war they've fought in since wwii
Sometimes it has to be done

Cause then you no see and stick bayonet inside friendly guy instead of Chinese 14 year old pussy... sry I mean American piggu.

>banzai
To die for some lying narcissist prick who destroys a nation drives it to a status of war criminal exporter and getting it bombed by nukes because he claims he is God? No.

Difference between a bayonet charge to decisively conclude and action and what the Japanese did (which were effectively mass suicides). Also. They don't like it up 'em

LONG LIVE JAPAN
NIPPON BANZAI !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

Nakagawa shaped up the Japanese defence strategies in Peleliu in things like no banzai charges, and no attacking at the beach. This resulted in holding the Americans back for two months longer than expected (initially expected to be four days) and got him a posthumous promotion.

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Oh my God are you serious? If the wanton death and gore weren't so offputting, the image of that would be hilarious.

>1930s China and Russia
>Experiencing Banzai Charges
t. historylets

The "Charges" in China and Russia were pretty much bog standard WWI style infantry rushes on weakened positions or infiltration and shock tactics. Not the desperation-induced insanity of the 1940s Banzai charges.

In fact the Chinese were doing the same thing to the Japanese considering they have similar infantry playbooks straight out of WWI.

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>Were banzai charges any good in WW2? If you were to put bayonets on AR15'

It didn't work for the japs against americans, why did it work better for the iranians against the iraqi army?

True, fair point.

Because this is the timeline where we won?

towards the end of 44 the japanese had all but stopped banzai charges, opting to instead fortify on ridges to great affect. By this time they mostly sent in small raiding parties at night, usually under 5 men to harass and try and kill marines under the cover of darkness.

> The Japanese would routinely overrun our lines and massacre everyone within the sector.
That's not true at all, banzai charges against US forces were extremely ineffective and almost never worked, which is why they were eventually banned. Saipan was actually a classic example of how extremely ineffectual banzai charges were: The japanese attacked with a 3:1 numerical advantage and not only failed to break the US lines, but suffered a 6:1 casualty rate doing it. With any other counterattack strategy a 3:1 advantage would almost assure victory.
The only time that bazai charges were ever effective is against the Chinese, who were a hopelessly inferior adversary that lacked the firepower, organization or willpower to go toe to toe against the japanese regardless of the tactics used and were also at a size and strength disadvantage against the larger japanese troops in hand to hand combat.
US troops were essentially the opposite of chinese troops and slaughtered the japanese both during the charge and in the close combat phase, hence the consistently massive losses and consistent failure of the attacks against American forces.

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天皇陛下万歳!!!
日本が一番だ!!!

What da fuck did you just fucking say about me, you rittre baka? I have you know I graduated top of my crass in kamikaze warfare, and I’ve been invorved in numerous raids on pearr harbor, wake isrand and da Phirripines and I have over 300 confirmed kirrs. I am trained in goriya warfare and I’m da top bonzai charger in da entire IJA. You are noting to me but just anoder target. I wirr wipe you da fuck out with precishion the rikes of which hayve never been seen before on dis Earth, mark my fucking words. You tink you can get away with saying dat shit to me over da radio? Tink again, fucker. As we speak I am contacting my secret network of kampeitai across Nihon and your radio signal is being traced right now so you beder prepare for da storm, gaijin. The storm tat wipes out tda pathetic rittre thing you cah your rife. You’re fucking dead, baka. I can be anywhere, anytime, and I can kire you in over seven hundred ways, and dat’s just with my katana. Not only am I extensivery trained in most honorabru sword combat, but I have access to the entire arsenar of the Imperiar Japanese navar infantry and I wirr use it to its furr extent to wipe your miserabu assh off da face of da continent, you rittre shit. If only you could have known what dishonobru retribution your rittre “crever” comment was about to bring down upon you, maybe you would have herd your fucking tongue. But you coodn’t, you didn’t, and now you’re paying the price, you buddadamn baka. I will shid fury arr over you and you wirr drown in id. You’re fucking dead, baka.

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It was cultivated as a tactic against Chinese militias with one rifle for every third person, and was quite successful. Then they tried to use it against Americans - every one of whom either had an M1 or some sort of machine gun, and as we all know it never worked.

US troops actually kind of hoped for Banzai attacks. Fucking scary sure, but it sures beats poking around the jungle for them.

based

Kek.

The level to which banzai charges were ineffective seems to have been inflated a bit by US media. Not unlike the fuddlore of mounted polacks charging german armor in ww2. Don't get me wrong. Banzai charges didn't work very well (how could such a tactic with semi modern weaponry?), but they were effective in certain situations. Consider who the japs were fighting for much of the war. Often untrained and improperly supplied militias. Even in some battles in which the US was involved such as the invasion of the Philippines. They didn't have to break the entire line, just overwhelm a few points where ammo was short or the only opposition was poorly prepared natives.

Use "motti" for some rustled jimmies.

Literally my thoughts, just imagining a load of bugmen swarming around a tank, hollering, banging and prying their way in all in vain, as they all collapse in a handful of seconds. Having never stood a chance, all that remains is red pulp.

From wikipedia
>"Banzai charges were always of dubious effectiveness. In the early stages of the Pacific War, a sudden banzai charge might overwhelm small groups of enemy soldiers unprepared for such an attack. However, by the end of the war, a banzai charge's participants suffered horrendous losses while inflicting little damage in return, particularly if launched against an organized defense with strong firepower, such as automatic weapons, machine guns and semi-automatic rifles."
>"Some Japanese commanders, such as General Tadamichi Kuribayashi, recognized the futility and waste of such attacks and expressly forbade their men from carrying them out. Indeed, the Americans were surprised that the Japanese did not employ banzai charges at the Battle of Iwo Jima."
>On 19 February 1945, the United States Marine Corps landed its first men on the southern shore of the island. In a radically different approach, American officers and men were first allowed to land unmolested and then shelled and machine gunned from underground bunkers. As night fell, Marine Corps General Holland Smith studied reports aboard the command ship Eldorado. He was especially stunned that Kuribayashi's men had never attempted a banzai charge. Addressing a group of war correspondents, he quipped,
>"I don't know who he is, but the Japanese General running this show is one smart bastard."

So not really, the Battle of Saipan had an "effective" banzai charge that gravely weakened some infantry divisions but the losses were ~4500 on the japanese side and ~650 for the U.S. side.

I'd dont think he was on a machine gun that night in the Boxer Rebellion he earned one of his Medals of Honor, wanna say he killed 30-something ching-chongs who attacked in pairs with his rifle and bayonet.

youtube.com/watch?v=qDDU0ZDYic8&t=1639s
26-28 minutes in the video, one of the M26 tankers interviewed talks about it. It was North Koreans doing it but still infantry physically swarming tanks.

Actually talked to a tanker from Korea who had this happen to him. Think his tank bogged down outside of friendly lines and by the time they got unbogged it was nighttime and weren't allowed back in friendly lines because they were afraid that the Chinese would follow their tank inside the perimeter, so they would periodically radio to get housed down with MG fire from friendly tanks until a chinse guy lopped off the antenna

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Jesus, thank you for sauce user

Because Iraqi's are incompetent backwards goat fuckers.

the jap lost the war, so no.

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Lol

Dude stop saying Zerg rush you look like a huge faggot s o i guzzling reddit no guns kid. Have you even played StarCraft? Shut the fuck up and just call it a charge or a frontal assault or just a rush with no added video game faggotry.

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Better is kind of subjective, if you mean losing entire regiment + sized forces for killing a couple of tanks, knocking out the odd mobile artillery and scaring the shit out of Iraqi conscripts. I guess, if you're willing to soak up extreme casualties for minimal objectives.
Course like most middle eastern slap fights, there's not a huge amount of thought throwing mostly worthless troops at other nearly worthless troops. Its your last throw of the dice when there's simply no tactical advantage elsewhere you've managed to come up with, plus that can happen. All it really takes is grunts that aren't worth jack shit anyway combined with an officer corps that doesn't give a fuck and bingo, manlet bonsai charge it is!

Just watched all of it. MacArthur is a fag god bless all the veterans of the USA

Yup. Good at killing japs.

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more than half of the time they didn't work

good at making dead japs, the only good jap

Ran out of artillery. Most of the time they Japs had their arty blasted by 16" rifles.