Quote:
Originally Posted by WarriorDiplomat
Every one of those soldiers would be willing to sacrifice to rescue POW's, commanders are responsible for the lives of those men who would willingly do the mission as well as the POW's if given the mission. The commander weighs the risk vs the gain of mission success and in this case success is defined as rescue of all POW's returned to U.S. alive if possible, his decision includes risking the lives of 2000 men for a mission with a low chance of success ending in the deaths of the men he would send in and in effect doubling the loss of life. U.S. military policy today is a 3-1 fire superiority in other words if their are 2000 known enemy in the area he wants to be successful meaning he would send in U.S. 3- to 1 enemy ratio to reduce the threat...not sure if they had that luxury during WW2
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Fair enough.
I don't think they had a 3-1 ratio in the Philippines but they could have, and I say this in absolute hindsight 70 years later, could have secured the POW camp and potentially the badly damaged airfield and harbour with 2000-3000 men BUT....I can think of the logistical nightmare if transport planes started to get shot down en-masse en-route with supplies (and men) to the drop zone....
The american's did carry out a successful parachute drop in the Philippines in early 1945 but it was done I believe with naval fire power as support and a large contingent of men to rescue POW's...I need to read up on that more to understand how complex that mission was
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Thanks!