The A6M Naval Carrier Fighter - Homegrown or Copy?

Thanks to Audible for sponsoring today's episode. Choose 1 audiobook and 2 Audible Originals absolutely free. Visit audible.com/Dra... or text Drachinifel to 500-500
A follow-up to the episode on the A6M 'Zero' episode, was it a copy or was it designed in Japan? A case study on Japanese military technical capacity in the interwar period.
Sources:
Here is an album of additional material and a couple minor corrections to parts of the video (including primary source material related to Sempill's activities for the Japanese):
imgur.com/a/1C...
Here is Millman's blog post on the Gloster F.5/34.
www.aviationofj...
Here are QAZ's currently available articles on Japanese jet engine and aircraft development.
sensha-manual....
sensha-manual....
sensha-manual....
imgur.com/a/1C...
www.aviationofj...
Want to support the channel? - / drachinifel
Want a shirt/mug/hoodie - shop.spreadshi...
Want a medal? - www.etsy.com/u...
Want to talk about ships? / discord
Want to get some books? www.amazon.co.uk/shop/drachinifelDrydock
Episodes in podcast format - / user-21912004
Music - / ncmepicmusic

[@Drachinifel]

Pinned post for Q&A :) Also: "Hi Everyone, Justin here! It was once again an honour to appear on Drach's wonderful channel! I just wanted to provide some additional info that didn't make it into the final edit of the video (understandably, it was too much reading I think). List of sources in the video description." :)

[@DaFlyingStrawberry]

Where on earth do you find the time to make such good hour-long videos?

[@brainletmong6302]

I made a bet on which sponsor you would pick when you said you needed to pick one to fund your photo archiving project. I am now owed a few beers. As long as the sponsor choice is good and relevant (Raid Shadow Legends I'm looking at you), I'm more than happy for a content creator I support to have more income. That said, for the actual question: What could the US have done to prevent the naval invasion of the Philippines, and how could the locals have helped? (You can tell I'm filipino)

[@bwcdevices3028]

Surely all new aircraft of the 1914 - 1950 period were developments of everything that went before them at least in some part.... - any thoughts? - see that you covered that right at the end...

[@Volunteer-per-order_OSullivan]

If the RN had finished the two laid down lions, incorporating the same improvements as had been interpenetrated onto Vanguard, now what? Do they keep all 3 new Battleships (Vanguard, Lion, Temeraire)? How long do they last in RN service? What ships are lost in order to afford this?

[@charles18879]

I'm curious what do you think would of happened to the Lion class Battleships if they hadn't been cancelled. Would they be completed before the end of the war and if so what effect would they have on British operations and what do you see happening to them post war.

[@richardtaylor1652]

I like how Drach has done over 3 hours of videos on the Zero, but only a single 'five minute guide' on Japanese aircraft carriers (the Taihō).

[@richardtaylor1652]

@Warlord Titan Tiberius It is not how long you last but what kind of experience you leave behind.

[@murderouskitten2577]

airfield , even floting one ,is not as important as planes.

[@matsv201]

Well.. a Carrier is a platform for aircrafts.. it's the aircraft that is the important part. Also, of cause, being interview form take much longer time than a scripted walkthrough

[@philvanderlaan5942]

Well One the zero in very interesting. And Two aircraft are the whole point of a carrier, a carrier without aircraft is ....well German.

[@scottgiles7546]

@@philvanderlaan5942 "And Two aircraft are the whole point of a carrier" I believe a Carrier requires far more aircraft than a mere two..... (snark? ME??)

[@Ralph-yn3gr]

You two can't fool me! I've seen Tora Tora Tora, and I know for a fact that the Zero is actually a copy of the T-6 Texan!

[@justinpyke1756]

Now I want to watch Tora! Tora! Tora! again. It has been a few months. :D

[@Ralph-yn3gr]

@@justinpyke1756 Same here. It's a really good movie. Edit: also, that was a great video. You both should be proud.

[@Raiders1917]

Zeros were also T6s in The Final Countdown too. Imagine being in a Zero and fighting a F14 Tomcat yikes.

[@neilwilson5785]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/baC9g5JsmseVpLM A great video about this very airplane. I saw a meet of these many years ago and it was awesome. There is one based near me, but I can't afford a flight :(

[@williampaz2092]

😂🤪🤣

[@DahvPlays]

5 am, donuts and coffee calling, and an HOUR PLUS of Naval nerdery. Perfect morning

[@philvanderlaan5942]

So if the Japanese 'Copied ' everything western in aviation why/how come they didn't copy the machine tools? Forgive my ignorance, real question.

[@MrFreakofstarwars]

Hell yeah

[@hattrick8684]

Man I wish I had donuts... it’s 2049 but I’m usually watching at 0900 with my coffee. My sons sitting on my lap on his tablet so I thought to myself, what better to watch then history? Added bonus if my son gets tired of his tablet he can watch with me, he loves navy ships and military planes.

[@77thTrombone]

Hat Trick - there you go; that's how you do it, Poppy!

[@fuzer909]

@@hattrick8684 My dad's dad got me into history, especially WW2. He was in the USMC as a Corsair mechanic during WW2. Sadly we lost him in 2012.

[@bificommander]

American intelligence: "The Zero is just a copy." American early war pilots: "Cool, can we have the original then?"

[@VersusARCH]

I bet during the Korean War quite a few pilots who had to bail out of their Gloster Meteors shot up by Mig-15s had similar comments to the whole "Mig-15 uses a copy of the Rolls-Royce Nene engine" propaganda spin...

[@colobossable]

@@VersusARCH it did use almost a carbon copy of the Nene, the airframe was far advanced of the Meteor though. Remember the meteor was designed during the war and the mig15 after the war.

[@VersusARCH]

@@colobossable Fine. So why couldn't the Brits design a better plane in time? They had more time... Oh btw the US carrier fighter Grumman F9F Panther also used a copy of the Nene. And, in spite of scoring a first Jet-to jet shootdown in history against a Mig-15 it was still an inferior fighter to Mig-15 in terms of performance.

[@colobossable]

@@VersusARCH post war military spending was greatly scaled back, Britain was almost bankrupt. The Korean war was a wake-up call and the Hawker Hunter was introduced not long after which was probably the best fighter of the mid to late 1950's.

[@Raptor747]

@@VersusARCH Britain was broke after WW2. Of course, it wasn't done with 40 years of foreign policy catastrophes and basically handed the Soviets its best jet technology on a silver platter (despite warnings from the US) with nothing more than a promise to not use that technology for military purposes...which the Soviets had no intention of honoring whatsoever.

[@cannonfodder4376]

3:08 "Was the Zero actually a copy?" 5:35 "How the Japanese aviation industry came about" 20:00 "Examples of Western disbelief of Japanese indigenous designs and ability" 41:26 *The Three Big Claims* 42:47 Its a copy of the Gloster F5/34 51:00 Its a Vought V-143 copy 53:43 Its a copy of the Hughes H1 Racer 1:02:09 Conclusions

[@leesnyder9144]

+

[@Ralph-yn3gr]

Thank you. Here's engagement for better ranking.

[@quangduongang6230]

This comment is more conclusive than the claims themselves. Disappointing how some "historians" works sometimes

[@fuzer909]

Remember how crazy Hughes started to become.

[@mylanmiller9656]

I guess in some way it is a copy of all of them it had an Engine and wings just like the rest!

[@JevansUK]

I suppose in terms of the history of time, 5 minutes and an hour and 10 are not significantly different.

[@ReptilianLepton]

Practically a rounding error.

[@AquaSprout]

Time is relative anyways

[@reaperking2121]

TIme is relative. its not our fault you can't slow or speed up time as we can.

[@MartinCHorowitz]

Drach needs to list the time dilation factor on these episodes....

[@justinpyke1756]

The last Zero five minute guide was 2.5 hours, so we are slowly moving toward "truth in advertising" for a five minute guide. :D

[@deaks25]

"To consider this whole 'Zero was a copy idea' you have to ignore the trajectory of the entire Japanese aviation industry over a span of decades..." Justin, you underestimate the level of blindness that Keyboard Warriors possess. They can make those hilariously ridiculous leaps no problem. I must admit, I'd never once heard of the idea that the Zero might have been a copy. Plenty on the "was it good, was it bad" debate, which as the previous video on the Zero delved into, the answer is pretty nuanced.

[@jimmyseaver3647]

This makes me think of a video I saw using _Ace Attorney_ to represent an internet argument over whether or not the Russians could use _cruise ships_ to invade Britain. The obvious answer is to laugh at anyone who thinks that's something plausable (nevermind a tactically and strategically sound idea), but there are plenty of idiots out there who think a few articles from Wikipedia or Defense News suddenly make them experts on military affairs and foreign policy.

[@Markle2k]

I have several books on the Zero and not a single one has suggested that it is a copy. The history part where he has dug up primary sources from the 1930s suggesting (wrongly) that everything is a copy is new to me.

[@jakublulek3261]

I also never heard about Zero being a copy of other aircraft. It was surely influenced by Western designs but I think Soviets were than much more guilty than Japanese in this field.

[@jamesfelstead4096]

I'm pretty sure Leo Di Caprio as Howard Hughes in 'The Aviator' makes that claim.

[@JamesSmith-op7yc]

It's true.

[@highlypolishedturd7947]

"Twisting themselves into logic pretzels..." Brilliant line! I wish I'd thought of it. I'll have to settle for stealing it.

[@highjumpstudios2384]

M-much like the Japanese with all their military equipment clearly.

[@ConorD1990]

Me :"Ooo another video on the Zero, I wonder if Drak got Justin back for this one" Looks at length of video.... O_o "Yep he did..."

[@VersusARCH]

All planes borrow ideas from others more or less. Zero was certainly not a direct copy of any plane in the world, and was a design compromise VASTLY different than anyone else decided to make (um - 1500+km range!!!). It only borrowed some concepts pioneered on other planes (some of them Japanese, notably A5M). It was a monoplane with NACA cowling, monocoque design, retractable landing gear, arrestor hook, enclosed cockpit, directed exhaust, radial engine, cannon armament, radio, light aluminium alloys, drop tanks, could carry bombs... Other planes featured some of those earlier, but Zero was a unique combination of it.

[@justinpyke1756]

Exactly! Hirokoshi himself explained this in various interviews. Aviation is a global, shared industry almost right from its earliest days. One nation would come up with something good (e.g. Germany with Duralumin alloy), and other nations would eventually follow suit. Sometimes developments happened in parallel, other times lineage is very clear. Nations would make use of license produced components from others. Etc.

[@Edax_Royeaux]

They clearly ripped off the Wright Brothers concept of a plane.

[@coachhannah2403]

Edax - Wing warping and all... 😎

[@kilianortmann9979]

The best way to learn is always from someone else's mistakes. If it's a good idea. like the main gear retraction, or the NACA cowling, it will probably find its way into a lot of designs. Additionally, you don't design something as exceptional as the Zero, especially for a 1939 carrier aircraft, by copying someone else.

[@Zyme86]

But mah ethnocentrism!

[@grumpycat_1]

The F-22 is a "copy" of the Wright Flyer. Source: Wikipedia

[@highjumpstudios2384]

Bro ain’t it tho

[@mathewkelly9968]

@@highjumpstudios2384 I think he's mocking the idea of using Wikipedia as a source

[@rockyblacksmith]

@@mathewkelly9968 It's a pretty good reference to GET sources though.

[@highjumpstudios2384]

Were you dropped as a child?

[@APVZ-fi8mt]

@@rockyblacksmith Wikipedia doesn't always use great sources. While most of it is cited, the cited material is often secondary sources. Although, I will say, if everyone would just read wikipedia instead of opinionated forum posts, the average knowledgeably level would be much higher.

[@andrewcox4386]

Obviously the Zero is a copy of the Lysander - just look at the tail wheel!!!

[@philvanderlaan5942]

The kananishi h8k Emily is obviously a copy of the FW 200 kondor , they are both 4 engine maritime patrol/bombers employed by Axis countries.

[@kieranh2005]

Andrew Cox, I disagree. Obviously, it's the not the A6M but the A5M that's the copy... I mean look at those faired wheels!

[@spacecadet35]

Obviously the A6M Zero is a copy of the Hawker Sea Fury. Mitsubishi were so good at copying aircraft that they managed to copy the Sea Fury five years before the Sea Fury even took flight.

[@米空軍パイロット]

Nonsense. Its heavily framed canopy indicates that it's derived from the Isokaze-class Space Destroyer.

[@erasmusguy8289]

@ i bet youre fun at parties

[@messmeister92]

This whole episode demonstrates what it’s like to be an actual, degree-holding historian in the age of the internet. I appreciate people have an interest in history, but the amount of self-appointed “historians” who graduated from “The Wikipedia School of Military History” and proceed to make false claims all over the internet are making our jobs more difficult than it should be. The struggle is real.

[@captianmorgan7627]

Be nice if they could spare some time making wikipedia a bit more accurate. (Being completely sincere.)

[@DCFusor]

While I tend to agree...keyboard warriors are the worst; Academics make mistakes too - and the "appeal to authority" argument is laughable and widely discredited. In my own field, physics, there are plenty of stories of academic self-delusion and omission, from the charge/mass ratio of electrons - anyone measuring a different number fudged back to the original academic number - to Castle Bravo making assumptions about cross sections of Li7...and a very long list in between as well as before and after. I've listened to most of this already - no mention of a very primary source - NACA - which all the parties shared data with before hostilities began. Which included extensive shared work on, for example, the very airfoil designs here in some dispute about being copied. Hint. And we've all seen that Jeep in "academically approved" documentaries with a near miss mortar hit and its tail on fire - which apparently fought in every theater of world war two, from the islands to a couple battles in Europe. So I don't think you can make the blanket argument - even if it's right most of the time. It's obvious that if someone spends years studying a specialized sub-field, they probably know more than the average keyboardist here. But they've also been repeatedly exposed to the fashionable errors of their field, which aren't negligible. I commiserate to a degree - it's hard to work some things out when you were born after your primary sources died. But just to copy what they wrote without going further in critical thinking is far too common - and academics are, if anything, more prone to it than many others. Oh, and edited to add - in my own judgment and analysis - and I'm not an academic on this topic, not hardly - the Zero was not a copy of anything else. No one else used the design concepts of "no armor, make it faster than anything and better handling so we don't need any, and pilot lives be damned" before the Japanese did it. You could argue the Mossie later,, but I kinda doubt time travel worked yet.

[@taotoo2]

I always assume the ones that don't do live Q&As don't do them cos they couldn't.

[@米空軍パイロット]

@@DCFusor Aero engineer here. The lack of armor predates the use of it. Why? Because it's easier.

[@DCFusor]

@@米空軍パイロット Not being a pro, of course I oversimplified. (and of course, prewar...was a different environment) In fact on this very channel, there is an example of obsolete British aircraft managing to sink a German warship because the "string bags" were not only hard to hit (the fire control systems assumed faster planes) but because bullets went through without real damage. Resilience might have been a better word choice for me. Things like air vs water cooling (which is also Navy vs land forces) - self sealing gas tanks and so on - all of which add weight, are, as you say, easier, and ... do pilots really fly better - or more importantly, fight better, if they know they're more likely to catch the golden BB? This guy covers the armor issue: kzbin.info/www/bejne/Y6eYkoCXrquliKc And Greg's Airplanes and Automobiles is FAR more thorough on sources, details and so on - at least for all but the Japanese aircraft - he only has a couple minutes on the Zero. kzbin.info/door/ynGrIaI5vsJQgHJAIp9oSg I pray for a collab if Drach is going to get into aircraft - Greg is to planes what he is to warships...

[@jagh1410]

Thats a sponsor i can live with, 10/10 for choice.

[@seanmac1793]

@Richard Joyce way better than other service's selection. Beats the snot out of the library

[@danielstickney2400]

Finally someone acknowledges the significance of the US machine tool industry to the overall war effort. The US had the tools to make more tools while everyone else was running their industries into the ground struggling to keep up with current requirements. British and Soviet war production would have collapsed without constant shipments of US machine tools to replace the tools that they were using up. The Axis powers had no similar "tool daddy' supporting them. Resources spent on a lathe or a mill have a far greater return than those same resources spent on a ship, aircraft, or tank.

[@neurofiedyamato8763]

"Resources spent on a lathe or a mill have a far greater return than those same resources spent on a ship, aircraft, or tank." The problem with the axis nations was that they needed the tank and ship NOW. Or else they won' have a tomorrow to make a lathe.

[@MultiZirkon]

@@neurofiedyamato8763 ...and also surely the reason that production German WW2 jet engines had turbines with such short life span: They HAD to use available nickel and chromium for machine tools.

[@MultiZirkon]

If only someone could make engaging videoes on some of these tools...

[@ringowunderlich2241]

Japanese aircraft designer: I also reference my work to Leonardo da Vinci, the brothers Mongolfier, Otto Lilienthal, the Wright brothers, Louis Bleriot, Edmund Rumpler and Charles Lindbergh. U.S. intelligence officer: See, it's a copy, cause they were all Americans, except Charles Lindbergh. He sounds British.

[@JoshuaC923]

April fool's suggestion Five minutes guide to HMS Tog

[@murderouskitten2577]

Tog is a class. First of the class was HMS Pointless

[@theleva7]

@@murderouskitten2577 The revised version, HMS Useless, can be seen at the Tank Museum in Bovington.

[@spacecadet35]

The TOG II is such a superior piece of machinery that of course it is fully amphibious and was feared by navies all around the globe.

[@VMFCorsair214]

Yeah do a five minute guide and have the Mighty Jingles voice it

[@MrDirigible]

TOG II >>> Yamato Change my mind...

[@phsyco123]

I have nothing to watch.. A wild Drach vid appears YAYYYYYYYYYYY :D

[@WielkaKasza]

My delight is immeasurable and my day is saved.

[@lordhoth4443]

Ok this one confused me a lot. How can the zero be anything but Japanese? It was designed to fill a uniquely Japanese role and doctrine. There was no other aircraft like it and no one was building aircraft to fill the requirements the zero filled.

[@neurofiedyamato8763]

Never underestimate the ignorance of people with national/racial bias thrown in the mix.

[@CaptChang]

It's the only thing that makes sense if you are a member of Western supremacy. They can't possibly be this good by themselves, so it must be a copy of something of ours.

[@icewaterslim7260]

Well stated

[@MichaelSmith-nd4rr]

look at it, stolen from Seversky

[@leechowning2712]

The same way we basically ignored threats to the Philippines and Singapore, because the "little yellow b******rds" could not actually think they can fight USA/UK.

[@takogonikanetniukogo]

I regret that I could only like it once. Justin is a wonderful narrator and I wish I could listen to him for hours.

[@mattwoodard2535]

Honestly, I can never recall hearing the Zero was a copy of a western aircraft. I guess I either forgot it or I read the better sources that had already discounted it. sm

[@VersusARCH]

I heard a few times some people in early 1940s USA, who first saw a photo of the Zero, jumped to conclusion that it was a copy of Seversky P-35 because of superficial resemblence from some angles of view and also the fact that the Japanese purchased 20 of them before the war for evaluation and study. Once the war began the poor Alexander de Seversky (who later designed the P-47) decided to change the name of his company from Seversky to Republic Aviation due to all the bad press he received that included opinions that the Zero was based on P-35. But that's it.

[@Edax_Royeaux]

I do remember Leonardo diCaprio complaining about his design being stolen in the movie Aviator.

@Nonya Business Yeah the only indigenous thing about the zero was the inhumane savage who flew it :/

[@justinpyke1756]

It is a peculiar thing that rarely if ever comes up in published works, but gets trotted out on the internet any time the Zero is mentioned and it gets enough attention. Bizarrely enough, as I mention in the video, US intelligence didn't identify it as a copy from what I have seen. There wasn't much reporting on the Zero pre-war (though there was some), but what little did exist wasn't terrible. The one example I showed in the video is technically about the "Zero" I guess, but it was a complete outlier (which I stress). Only interesting in the sense that they somehow found a Fokker design that it was a "copy" of for a plane that didn't exist. The Sakae engine was often referred to as a copy or something of a similar sort, but this broader trend seemed to occur outside classified circles. A couple big names, like Howard Hughes, made the claim the Zero was a copy and it has kinda simmered on the internet up to the present.

[@73Trident]

I'd also heard that it was an indirect copy of the Hughes racer but discounted that very quickly.

[@polygondwanaland8390]

I've never heard the accusation that Japan "copied" the Zero outright, so this will be interesting to watch. Before watching, I can't imagine the Zero is any more a copy than the Fw 190 is a copy of American planes just because it used a radial.

[@timonsolus]

When the RAF first encountered the Fw 190, their staff officers thought the Germans were using Hawk 75's (aka export P-36A's) captured from the French.

[@satagaming9144]

@@timonsolus And then after that, they promptly made a new plane that "incorporated several design elements" of a Fw 190 that accidentally landed in Wales.

[@satagaming9144]

@bojo perez A lot of American propaganda and public spirit (did one cause the other, did the other cause one, idk) was very racist at the time. It was the 1940's. It's crazy to think that was how people thought eighty short years ago, but it was. WWII was full of racism-clouded judgement (see: operation barbarossa, literally everything else the Nazis ever did, the Japanese sure we would lie down and let them win, etc.). It's crazy how big of a role it played, because society has (kinda) moved on from that.

[@polygondwanaland8390]

@bojo perez yeah, I don't like the modern "everything is racist" insanity but this does seem like they just straight up thought the Japanese couldn't do anything on their own

[@polygondwanaland8390]

@bojo perez I'm concerned whether modern intelligence reports are making the same mistake and underestimating the threat from China.

[@StrikeWyvern]

"The Japanese are four limbed creatures who have planes!"

[@whiskeytangosierra6]

A very worthwhile internet chat. That Hughs Copy story in particular was one worthy of a "smack my head".

[@JohnRodriguesPhotographer]

There was one good source, a voice in the wilderness, largely ignored by the US Military and intelligence organs. General Claire Chennault .

[@jlvfr]

Chennault had the "problem" of being disliked by the US miltary, because he wasn't "one of them". He was seen as a maverick and a mercenary, and was hated by the US commander in China, Stilwell. And Chennault also had the audacity of sending reports that contradicted US inteligence and anyalists, something the US did not tolerate.

[@JohnRodriguesPhotographer]

@@jlvfr Stilwell hated everyone. The [eo[le that went to China to fight were encouraged to go by the US Government. Unofficially of course.

[@zeitgeistx5239]

@@jlvfr Chennault was an aviation guy which made him unpopular with the officer corp. In the 30s the USAAF saw aviation as a supporting role to ground maneuvers and Chennault qas advocating unofficially for a USAAF that was basically a separate branch like the RAF. Launching air offensives unrelated to ground movements was still a revolutionary thought during the Great Depression.

[@bernardedwards8461]

Chennault sent back a report on the Zero's performance, a copy of which reached the RAF, but no one took any notice of it, so they had to find out the hard way. However, the Zero had its shortcomings and there were several allied fighters which could hold their own with it provided the right tactics were used. The formation of the AVG was one of the many provocations which goaded the Japanese into the attacks on Malaya and Hawaii.

[@seanmac1793]

@@zeitgeistx5239 no not really there were a lot of air power hardliners in the USAAF. People like Hap Arnold didn't materialize out of no where. It's my understanding that Chenault was more disliked by the group because he wasn't a member of the bomber mafia

[@whyus2000]

Just as I thought I’d go to sleep, drach comes at us with another hour vid about the zero. Who needs sleep anyway ?

[@scottdrone-silvers5179]

It is clear that there were many instances of Western powers underestimating the technological capabilities of Japan. While they were accurate enough in assessing Japan’s production limitations due to the lack of precision tooling and the number of resource limitations they faced, it is clear that there was an overall assumption in many quarters that the Japanese just weren’t capable of producing their own designs, which is obviously NOT the case.

[@MonkeyJedi99]

There was a lot of deeply ingrained racism in the estimation of the capabilities of the Japanese during WW2. Even Bugs Bunny got in on the act of being racist against the Japanese.

[@ZurLuften]

I have to say that all the content Drach has, I have really enjoyed the videos about the Zero. I would like Drach and Justin to do an episode about Japanese naval aviation and maybe something about land-based torpedo bombers or how allied naval inteligence worked, what they found and how they contributed to victory on pacific theatre.

[@strydyrhellzrydyr1345]

I wish He would have Justin come back on as well... They work well together

[@MrArtbv]

Great video. Truly. The ONLY thing it under emphasizes is the paucity of Japanese natural resources as a constraint on overall design vs capability of construction. As an example would be that the BF-109 wasn't so much "expensive" in terms of cost per unit; but in terms of sunk costs in terms of material assets and assets in terms of production requirements. here the video does a good job of describing the shortage of vital die and stamping/machine tools available to the Japanese industrial infrastructure. The Japanese aviation industry needed designs it could actually produce in significant numbers. Not to get to far into the trees but Adam Tooze has an excellent series of books that describe how the Versailles Treaty actually worked when it came to Germany's ultimate ability to produce armaments during WW2. Capitol constraints of the 20s prevented Germany's industrial infrastructure from producing large/sufficient amounts of the machines needed to make large numbers of critical components for larger weapons systems. The money for basic development/re-investment simply wasn't there as reparations sucked it out of the economy. What happened in both Japan and Germany was a single machine in a factory being constantly reconfigured to produce different parts whereas in America and Britain there was a machine dedicated to do that one singular thing. I'd say overall the Japanese were probably FAR more efficient than the Germans when it came to utilizing or recognizing resource vs design vs production ability... BUT to utterly fail to recognize that absent an American immediate surrender... Their cause was completely hopeless from the outset. The Zero represented the BEST aircraft they could actually produce.. The fact they were never able to successfully replace it with a next generation advancement during the war wasn't due to lack of vision as it was physical ability on a realistic scale...

[@Demonriceball]

I was taught Japanese modern history by Professor Melzer during my university exchange in Japan. He's an absolute treasure trove of information and an excellent scholar

[@ttaibe]

I thought the miscosception of the A6M being a copy was laid to rest decades ago... edit:| I am interested in more of these episodes about japanese planes!!

[@seanmac1793]

There are still people who think it was made out of paper

[@serban031]

There's a book by Simon Winchester that talks about Sony's early start and the development of their portable radio and there are some interesting parallels, especially with that desire to make the best. He was talking about how they had to overcome their own worry about making an inferior version of the transistor and they had to take quite a bit of time to overcome that until they developed an identical at first and then a superior version which lead to that radio design. It's interesting to see this even in aircraft design where they closely pay attention to specific elements to learn how it works and how it's built before they make their own version based on their own very specific needs and desires.

[@CH3TN1K313]

For reference, the Ki-100 used the Fw 190 "protruding A-frame" engine mount design, but also cleaned up the planes aerodynamics by not using the traditional "almost 360 degree cooling flaps" which extended almost completely around the engine cowling, such as in the Zero's, leaving only room for the spots where the fuselage mounted machine guns' rounds could pass thru. This allowed them to adopt the recessed cooling flaps on the Ki-100, just like is seen on the radial (BMW 801) powered Fw 190's, which allowed it to have the closest drag coefficient to an inline fighter, than any radial could ever achieve before hand.

[@CH3TN1K313]

btw, we need more videos / channels dedicated to the topic of the WW2's aircraft design & implementation. The stuff going on in Germany & Japan from around 1937 to the last days of WW2, is the most fascinating moment of "military equipment engineering". I am glad the guest brought up the Kikka, and the desperate need for an in depth look at its design process. The plane is 1/3 the size of an Me 262, and their engines were built from just one single line drawing of a BMW 003 (used on th Heinkel He 162), leading to the Ne-20. Germany sent a full working Jumo 004 (along with a Henschel Tiger tank) in a submarine from Germany to Japan, which sadly sank somewhere in the Indian Ocean on it's way back to Japan, luckily the line drawing of the BMW 003 was on the accompanying sub which managed to slip passed the Allies.

[@justinpyke1756]

Thanks for the explanation! Always wondered about the specifics behind why the Japanese were so interested in seeing how the engine was mounted on the Fw-190.

[@nogi2167]

Drach! Dunno if you’ll see this but someone actually cited this video in the current Wikipedia article for the Hughes H-1 to prove the aircraft wasn’t copied by the Japanese. Literally the only “evidence” I favor of copying was the Howard Hughes said so after the war.

[@ninetalis]

Thank you for addressing this issue. It's sad that these long discredited myths keep enduring even as late as 2020 and will probably remain for decades to come. I think that one claim on the G3M about its engines being German made Pratt & Whitney engines based on just seeing them fly over, several kilometers above, speaks for itself how far some went (or in some cases, will still go) to discredit Japanese designs. Some of these claims are outright ridiculous at times against the most basic evidence. One example is how some people still state the Ki-27 is a copy from the Italian Re.2000, despite the fact that the Ki-27 was already in service (1937) long before design work on the Re.2000 began (1938) or even made its first prototype flight (1939), or that it was derived from the P-36/Hawk 75 which hadn't even flown (May 1936) when design work began on the Ki-27 (April 1936) and had nothing in common except the overall layout (which would be as ludicrous as stating the P-36 was a copy from the I-16). Not only is it a side-effect of all the things you said, but also this seemingly inability of 'Western nations' to objectively assess 'Eastern designs' and admitting them being of equal or even superior quality, and having to inherently stamp them as inferior. Some of these problems actually still persist to this day with modern day aircraft. On a side note, I really LOVE these videos with Justin! I don't know how far his expertise goes beyond the A6M, but I think the unsung G3M and G4M could also make for very interesting videos given: - Their extreme range and high performance adding to the confidence of the Japanese Navy (just like the A6M did) - Their involvement in the sinking of HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse - The G4M's later involvement with the Yokosuka MXY7 Ohka 'baka' bombs - Yamamoto being shot down aboard a G4M leading to the Japanese becoming even more secretive amongst their own ranks. All of these actions led to notable consequence s or changes in the Naval part of the Pacific war.

[@johnbeauvais3159]

I’ve read into the design of the Zeke extensively and there are so many little tricks and details that went into the development of that aircraft that there is no way to in good conscience call it anything other than a Japanese design. Things like the design of the aileron balancing system are so brilliant and appear nowhere else that shows the plane is 100% domestically designed.

[@dasmuta8211]

I love how this channel is my clean the house background noise, and kinda becoming a hobby of sorts. So thanks all for making cleaning more fun...

[@tomsemmens6275]

A glance at the other designs for specification F.5/34 - the Vickers Type 279 Venom, Bristol Type 146, and Martin-Baker MB 2 - indicate that three of the four designs had the same general arrangement of a lightweight all metal monocoque airframe with a "bubble(ish) canopy built around a radial engine. Significantly, all the powerplants except the MB-2 were sub-1000HP radials, as was the Zero prototype. These designs were all transitional in terms of powerplant - the Zero did not have a power plant that exceeded 1000HP until the A6M3 Type 0 Model 32, and that came with the severe penalty of a 1000km range reduction. The Mitsubishi, Gloster, Vickers and Bristol designs all indicate that when given the same problem and engineering constraints, competent designers will come up with similar solutions. The British chose to not follow up on the design problem, because the RAF couldn't (in 1937-38) think of where they might want to use a lightweight, radial engine long range fighter and they certainly weren't going to ask the Royal Navy for feedback . However, they COULD see the need for the 1000HP+ Merlin engine mated to a short range, ground (radar) controlled interceptor so they went with the Hurricane and Spitfire. Over in the Pacific the Japanese thought a a lightweight, radial engine long range fighter was just what they were after so they developed the A6M1 further.

[@justinpyke1756]

Thanks for the comment!

[@jakehopkinson2031]

The two of you are my favourite collaborators on KZbin, please work together more often in future!

[@johnmcmickle5685]

My thoughts are that there are only so many ways to build a radial aircraft engine. So they will all be close to being a copy of something else. The wing shapes are the same, you can do a lot but they will all look alike in a photo. You could have to literally take the wing apart and measure with a micrometer to get the exact difference.

[@mineplow1000]

I could listen to these sorts of things forever. Thanks!

[@kingquackie7284]

US person incharge of making the report on Japanese planes: Its an American rip-off! Someone: Well then what did they rip-off? Reports person: it has wings, it can fly and it makes the prprprprprp woulds whe the spiny spiny thingy goes brrr.

[@xgford94]

And Someone else....then find what they copied...and build us 10000

[@jlvfr]

It was western racism, pure and simple.

[@ThePTBRULES]

@@jlvfr No, it was just Racism and Nationalism.

[@FLJBeliever1776]

@@ThePTBRULES - As I always say, "Racism is the bane to everyone. Because it allows the Stupids to INFECT everything."

[@its1110]

.. and the guns go Pew Pew Pew!

[@notbobrosss3670]

When I started in the aerospace industry as a mechanic. A old timer told me this is how u tell the difference between a military or civilian design. The civilian basis the design on the number of rivets holding the plane to gather. The military basis it’s design on the thickness of the material the parts of the plane is made from. This was and still is western aviation thinking. The Japanese aren’t a western country. So they thought about it very different. They wanted a plane that was light. Heavy planes are harder to land on carriers. They wanted a fast plane. This means a powerful and usually means a heavy engine. That’s a problem they want a light airplane. They wanted a very agile plane. That means light so that works. But they wanted the longest possible range fuel means weight. So what does the west do to solve this problem. They build a heavy plane put lots of firepower on it. Then they say all they guns make up for lost agility. Never mind needing agility to aim those guns at a target. Japanese take basically the concept of a civilian aerobatics aircraft. Very light but has strong airframe with a power plant that has high power to weight ratio. But isn’t a huge high max and squeeze out as much power as u can engine. Then they put weapons on it and give it a good size fuel capacity. What did they get, they got a fast agile long range aircraft. Surprise everybody! Did u see that coming. The only problem was they forgot about battle damage is inevitable for war machine in a conflict regardless of any designs performance or characteristics. That ultra light airframe then becomes a liability.

[@boobah5643]

Well, there's also the not-insignificant detail that the Japanese didn't have any bigger airplane engines to power their design at the time; the light weight design was, in part, a concession to the limitations of the engines they had available. Even with that limitation they still designed and built one of the best fighters of the war's opening years. And that engine's limitations were ones that the A6M's contemporaries discovered and exploited.

[@j.f.fisher5318]

the most reliable way to wipe out an enemy's airforce in a prolonged attritional war like WW2 is heavily armed and armored fighters with the most powerful engines possible, and the most powerful guns that are practical. Dogfighting gives your enemy a chance, while boom and zoom does not.

[@juvandy]

I just finished the previous zero video yesterday. Imagine my delight at ANOTHER HOUR of zero-talk. Arigato

[@freefall0483]

Was the Zero based on American technology? Yes. It was a plane. America invented the plane. Conspiracy confirmed... Awesome video. Love this channel.

[@kyleheins]

Love the simplicity.

[@rabidmidgeecosse1336]

They had the first successful FLIGHT. I would like to know who came up with the idea of the powered aircraft first, i suspect that predates the Wright brothers by a fair amount

[@globial5329]

@@rabidmidgeecosse1336 davinci probably or maybe he just developed the helicopter, so I am not sure

[@freefall0483]

@@rabidmidgeecosse1336 It's amusing that this is all aircraft related. My joke flew right over your head. Click the read more bit next time...

[@freefall0483]

@@kyleheins Thank you kindly, sir. Hope it entertained you.

[@timcarpenter2441]

This demonstrates (yet again) that Japanese engineers are not burdened with the curse of hubris. They consume, learn, adapt. Copying the best is sensible, as long as one retains the ability to innovate independently. Post war, their vehicles did the same, and today Japan can produce among the best in the world, and the best in terms of consistent reliability (Toyota/Lexus and Honda).

[@FallenPhoenix86]

What could possibly have been missed from the last 3+ hour Zero marathon 😂 Coffee ready, time to find out...

[@kaymish6178]

Fantastic episode, i liked the Espionage by cheque book line

[@williamforbes6919]

The Packard Merlin is a re-engineered Rolls-Royce intended for mass production with minimal manual fitment. But yes, by a country mile it fits the description of a copy far better than anything the Japanese ever did.

[@allangibson8494]

The Packard Merlin also has American screw threads in place of the original Whitworth fasteners. Basically it was modified to suit American production equipment. The early American jets were very similarly.

[@martijn9568]

@@allangibson8494 The story of America literally copying the British work on jet engines is also not exactly correct. The Americans knew that the British had some reliability issues with their jet engines due to heat and such. Something the Americans easily solved due to their experiences with gas turbines and turbo superchargers (turbos). This resulted in them being able to built a much larger more powerful engine (J-33) far sooner than the Brits or Germans. Which enables them to built a normal sized fighter aircraft with a single engine, were the others had to use 2 engines. Note that the De Havilland Vampire is more of a light weight fighter.

[@allangibson8494]

Martijn The first generation American engines were far worse than the British ones - because GE left out an oil gallery when they copied the W1-X / W2-B (which is also why the W1-X is in the Smithsonian collection). Fixing this omission led to the J-31. The Rolls Royce Welland / W2 had exactly the same ratings as the J-31 and was used in the Gloster Meteor (where it performed somewhat better than the P-59A).

[@Markle2k]

The Packard Merlin was license-built like the license-built Hamilton-Standard propellers that the Japanese used. It does not fit the definition of copy that was meant to be applied to anything the Japanese built that was as or more competent than the West. The Canadians have not copied the M-D F/A-18 to produce the CF-18

[@smittywjmj]

@@Markle2k The CF-188s aren't made by any Canadian company anyway, they were produced by McDonnell Douglas (now Boeing) in the US and exported, just like the previous McDonnell CF-101 Voodoo. Canada has produced licensed aircraft before, such as the Canadair CL-13 Sabres, a licensed version of the North American F-86, but some of which were given more powerful (and domestic) Canadian Orenda engines. Canadair also licensed the Lockheed F-104 to produce the CF-104.

[@KC-yq1jt]

FW190's narrow fuselage mating with thw radial BMW801 was a good solution. the longer than usual truss has its attachment point at engine were wide but truss tapered off to meet the fuselage mounting points at rear. both stiffness and profile (drag) requirements were satisfied. previously the mounting for radials were wide and short. necessitating a wider fuselage. actually both Lavochkin La-5 (derived from LaGG-3 ) and Grumman Bearcat took inspiration from this engine-fuselage mating.

[@Ensign_Cthulhu]

Wait, WTF? I've had it in my strongly Anglophile head for forty-three years that the Zero was a piece of Japanese brilliance that just didn't have the stretch needed to keep up with the best of the West as the war dragged on. It beggars imagination that we even have to bring this up in the current context.

[@ihatecabbage7270]

stupid sarcasm, no technology is purely designed by one nation. Pure stupidity.

[@smittywjmj]

You could certainly argue that the Zero would've kept up with other designs as well, and it was more the collapsing Japanese industry that held it back. The A6M5 is certainly a quite capable mid-war aircraft and often considered comparable to the US Navy's now-famous F6F Hellcat. The A6M8 promised further improvements in its testing. It's certainly similar in that regard to planes like Bf 109s and Spitfires (and P-38s and quite a few others), which were both early- or pre-war fighters that would be radically changed over the course of the war to stay updated, but which were nevertheless showing their age by the mid-'40s in comparison to newer designs (Fw 190 D/Ta 152, Hawker Tempest/Supermarine Spiteful).

[@emilyn6725]

I somehow stumbled across your videos. I love history, not necessarily naval specifically but I do find it interesting, HOWEVER, I came here to say your videos put me to sleep like a baby, I've been listening to these every night. Thank youuu 😁🙏

[@firestorm165]

They are indeed very relaxing to listen to

[@SiegeTurtle]

I use drydock and episodes like this as my free audiobooks 😂

[@neurofiedyamato8763]

lmao same. I listen while grind in some game.

[@FirstDagger]

Had an argument with somebody who said that the MiG-29 and Su-27 were a copy of the F-14, some people just don't know better.

[@davidturner7577]

Seriously with some people! "It has two jet engines and a wing, it must be a copy!". Never mind the obvious differences in size, range, engine placement, exact role, and of course variable fucking geometry wings, not to mention more nuanced differences in aerodynamics, wing loading, etc.

[@bluemarlin8138]

The Soviets did some copying of western planes, but that definitely wasn’t it!

[@TheGhost-xj8fu]

No need to make up aircraft that the Soviets copied when the Tu-4 is right there.

[@rabidmidgeecosse1336]

@@TheGhost-xj8fu they didn't just copy the plane, they copied the entire industry base as well, thats serious dedication to copying.

[@seanmac1793]

@@rabidmidgeecosse1336 well if you are going to copy someone you might as well choose the best

[@WildBillCox13]

The Japanese "copy ninja" designs, the J8 and Kikka, were essentially German looking airframes filled with Japanese guts. My understanding is that the submarines carrying German technology exchange hardcopy were sunk in transit. One (I-29) dropped off some paperwork in Saipan before heading toward the Home Islands . . . and was sunk en route. So the concepts of things like the Tiger tank, the Me-163 and 262, arrived in Japan as textual fragments and no hardcopy examples were delivered. The turbojet and rocket motors used for J8 and Kikka were Japanese. They (IJN designers) knew about the German designs, and, knowing they existed, reverse engineered the CONCEPTS, not the hardware. I very much appreciate the nod to Von Braun. After all, if you're accusing the Japanese kettle of being black, your American pot had better be rostfrei.

[@sinisterisrandom8537]

Japan studied the Tiger tank. Realized a more powerful gun would be useful but it was too late. For Japanese jet fighters, had plans to reverse engineer the Me-262 Sturmvogel. But due to one of the submarines sinking. The Kikka was born.

[@nonvalidOT]

Just to let you know how far your influence reaches, I referred to a shift manager at my company as "the Kamchatka of the company" during a pretty important meeting. The Health and safety manager had to leave the room. The person in question thanked me for my kind words. This is all your doing.

[@JevansUK]

He see's torpedo boats ... Everywhere?

[@zednotzee7]

German WW2 intelligence... " The Vought F4U Corsair is obviously a copy of the Ju 87 Stuka. Just look at the wings ! It stands to reason it's a copy ! " Lol.

[@HaloFTW55]

German WW2 military intelligence was for all intents and purposes; a laughably inept service plagued by the lack of competence (and later riddled with Soviet Moles).

[@zednotzee7]

@@HaloFTW55 Ah... my comment was a joke actually :) They didn't really think that.

[@donaldgrant9067]

This goes back to the old saying: "Never underestimate you enemies." Like we underestimate the Chinese and Russians.

[@tomhath8413]

ISIS is Junior Varsity

[@donaldgrant9067]

@@tomhath8413 Who said anything about ISIS?

[@richarddouglas688]

did you read the latest military assessment of Chinese military power?

[@donaldgrant9067]

@@richarddouglas688 No just take my "Q" from comments sections saying everything that China and Russia makes is crap.

[@handlebarfox2366]

I'm reminded of some US official who declared, "we don't know of a single thing that the USSR has successfully concealed from us."

[@guyjones4936]

Claire Chennault repeatedly warned the U.S. Govt. about Japanese planes and capabilities and he was ignored most of the time. Until U.S. fighter pilots really experienced Japanese fighter traits and the excellent fighter pilots Japan had, they didn't believe it could be true.

[@Daemascus]

I like to consider myself to have a decent knowledge of aviation and I never even knew of the claim until today. Of course my first question was what the Zero was supposedly a copy of? Nothing springs to mind for me.

[@spacecadet35]

The conspiracy theory I have been fed is that it was based on the Curtiss P36 Hawk. But it was such a good copy that it was superior to the original in every way. :)

[@richardhughes8885]

Keep them coming Drachinifel Glad to have Justin Pyke back! thanks for both your hard work it's much appreciated

[@95keat]

In defense of the observers thinking everything is a copy, japan did industrialize so quickly that it may have seemed like they wouldn't have had the time to design their own aircrafts. I mean going from the middle ages to a nation designing it's own aircraft in under a century is mind boggling

[@OtakuLoki]

Thank you for this entertaining and informative video. One of the things that I can't help thinking about while listening to Justin talking about confirmation biases is just how often during the war, and shortly post-war, the USN and figures writing memoirs at that time were attributing various torpedo strikes to undetected Japanese submarines, while vast segments of the USN remained willfully in denial about the range of the Long Lance.

[@jimmyseaver3647]

Y'know, this makes me wonder what designs would come out had the Japanese aircraft industry not been completely and literally shot to pieces as a result of the War? What _would_ a completely-indigenous Japanese counterpart to things such as the F-86, or the MiG-29, or current stealth fighters such as the F-35 even _look like?_ The world may never know.

[@mxaxai9266]

Japan rebuilt their aircraft industry post-war. Much like any non-superpower they realized that it's cheaper to buy fighters from allied superpowers, though. They did develop numerous transport aircraft and also have assembly lines for the F-16-derived F-2, the F-15J variant and the F-35. For indigenous stealth fighters, you could look at the X-2 or the proposed F-X / F-3.

[@hailexiao2770]

I think it would have depended on the state of the Empire at the time. By the Cold War, designing and building your own fighters and bombers was simply too expensive unless your armed forces were very large (USSR, USA, China) or you had loads of export sales (UK, France).

[@BlackHawkBallistic]

The Japanese did design and produce the F-1, and the trainer T-2 version. I've only read the Wikipedia article but it seemed like it was decent and did its job, I think they still use the T-2 for training.

[@jimlatosful]

Congrats on the sponsorship! I already use audible to listen to almost exclusively military history books lol

[@todo9633]

I've never heard any claims that the Zero was a copy, so this is quite interesting!

[@USSEnterpriseA1701]

Kind of reminds me of IJN Battleship/Battlecruiser evolution. The clear progression from buying British built ships (say, Kongo for example), to building British designs at home (Hiei, Haruna and Kirishima, not to mention Fuso and Yamashiro), to modifying and improving on said British designs (Ise and Hyuga), eventually breaking away and working up an indigenous design (Nagato and Mutsu, the treaty victim designs, on up through Yamato and Musashi). Even at the end stages, you see traces of the origins, but traces do not make a copy of a design any more than inherited genetic traits make someone a clone of an ancestor.

[@aluminumfence]

"Greetings! This is Greg. Just Kidding" -Part 2 :P

[@uhavedied12334557]

That would be an ambitious crossover

[@Hetstaine]

Maybe one day :)

[@nathanbrown8680]

Surely the Yamato is just a scaled up copy of a South Carolina with one of the rear turrets removed, which in turn is just a copy of HMS Dreadnought with half the wing turrets stuck on top and the others discarded, which in turn is basically just HMS Royal Sovereign (as refit in 1864), but with more turrets and less wooden, which in turn is basically USS Monitor, but more wooden and with multiple turrets, which in turn is just a cheese box on a raft.

[@caringancoystopitum4224]

Imagine being a japanese aircraft designer. You're proud of you design and rightfully so. Yet the whole western world takes a short glance at it and goes "Eeeh, it somewhat looks like a german/american/british plane, so it is a copy. No need to look at it any further." I have to say, I'd be a bit pissed about that...

[@TheRAFlemingsMr]

Drach, this was an excellent essay on one of the major challenges for the allies in WW2. The Zero was thought to be a copy, inferior, not to be worried about right up to the point that Allied planes had to tangle w it and then, "oh s""t". Great episode! As a follow-on and also about the sort of background story to the wars; it would be fascinating to have insight into the big gun design and manufacture of the major fleet players. And I'll include Italy because you've said they had great guns but lousy shells. So how did the different naval armorers design their guns differently, what did they see as advantages/disadvantages to what they were designing and how could gun design become so disassociated from shell production. Why were there duds? Dear god you're designing a device the weight of a Volkswagen that all it has to do is go boom when it hits something hard. Thanks as always and I can't say how much I look forward to every release you do. Bob

[@vespelian5769]

Knowing something of Japanese culture and history, I can understand Western preconceptions at the time. Japan had traditionally been inthraled to Chinese, and to some extent Korean culture for overt inspiration, an example being the over complicated naval tactics of WWII being heavily influenced by medieval Chinese militarily treatises. The fact the West was wrong is a cautionary axiom against such assumptions.

[@cannonfodder4376]

Oh another hour plus Zero video with Justin. A surprise to be sure but a welcome one.

[@anatolib.suvarov6621]

Back in the late 1980s while attending college at the behest of the U.S. Army, one of the history courses I took made reference to this subject in broad general terms, and the conclusion of the author of the textbooks we used was that the Western military, and especially intelligence branches had myopia based on anti-Asian racism. I think that there may be more than a little racism involved in the dismissive attitude toward Japanese technology.

[@ogaugeclockwork4407]

I’ve had the opportunity to inspect wrecks of A6M’s in Palau and Yap. Pretty clear that it’s an indigenous design when you can look at fine details of the airframe and its construction.

[@loganholmberg2295]

I work manufacturing and Engineering and I can tell you everyone copies each other and/or gets insperation from other peoples work. Just go to an industry trade show and you'll find engineers and designers climbing over other competitors boths or people's work to see how somebody did something and what they can learn from it. Sure there are new ideas out there but more often than not people are either improving on a preexisting design or "apreciating" someone elses better idea and incorporating it into their machine or system.

[@danielstickney2400]

I once toured the R&D lab of a major diesel engine manufacturer. They had a "Reference Room" that held disassembled examples of their competitors' engines, including some from market segments where they did not compete. All had been thoroughly tested before disassembly.

[@Halinspark]

The thing people don't ever contemplate with Japanese technological development is that it was only 60 or 70 years earlier that Japan was running around with samurai shooting muskets at each other. They had to cram in as much knowledge about why everything was the way it was, how it worked, how to make it, how it was evolving, and how to use it most effectively, what they could actually make with the resources available to them, and what they could get from trade on a global scale. All while having to work around a lower budget and population than most of the major powers of the time.

[@Halinspark]

And then on top of THAT, they had to work around internal issues, such as samurai revolts, political unrest, revolution and restoration, and people just not wanting to do any of this in the first place arguing the whole time with both the people who saw what the world did to China and are desperate to avoid it, and the people who want to get in on the action and have their own empire.

[@calvingreene90]

Once the Zero was a "copy" of a western plane you could get people to believe how good it was. People are stupid.

[@20chocsaday]

Japan had been at war since 1935. They had experience to draw from and make up the requirements for their aircraft. In the same way, once the allies were confronted with what the German forces could do they revised what they wanted.

[@calvingreene90]

@@20chocsaday You missed the point. The anti Japanese racism kept people from believing how good the Zero was. But once it was declared a copy of a western design the stupid bastards would believe the stories of how good it was.

[@highjumpstudios2384]

Like how to e engine in the Mig-17 is a “copy” of the Roles Royce Nene, Pilots in Korea probably said something along the lines of “well then why don’t we have that?” In the 50s

[@calvingreene90]

@@highjumpstudios2384 Not at all. The engine in the Mig 15 was a copy of the Nene the Traitors of the Labor government provided the engines that were copied to Russia. The Russian did make improvements but that is expected because Russia would have been fielding jet fighters before WWII if Stalin had not been afraid of flying as well as paranoid.

[@highjumpstudios2384]

@@calvingreene90 it be that way sometimes

[@joeyp38]

these collaborations are awesome

[@michaelblaszkiewicz7283]

I have listened to this entire conversation, and have come to the conclusion, that the Zero is a 100% copy of aircraft Howard Hughes imagined.

[@mihaiserafim]

Very interesting! I wasn't aware of this " theory". I am impressed by the professional level displayed by Justin with context and sources. It has been a pleasure to listen to!

[@rare_kumiko]

Your channel is such high quality obviously has so much work put into it I wouldn't mind you putting sponsors on your longer videos (Drydocks and Wednesday specials). Hell I don't even mind if they're shitty sponsors. You've earned the chance to earn some more money with the channel!

[@VintageCarHistory]

If this is the kind of sponsorship you'll be pursuing, please go right ahead. Well chosen!

[@Tundra-ec3ii]

I see absolutely no parallels to the modern world. Absolutely none! Never!

[@rabidmidgeecosse1336]

yeah that thought had occurred as well, No way that's going to end badly.

[@neurofiedyamato8763]

J20 is just a copy of the F35, definitely! It's no threat! What do you mean it is still a modern 5th generation fighter? It's just a copy. The Chinese totally never invented anything.

[@attilarischt2851]

These videos are amazing, I really hope you guys can make more of these collabs.

[@EliteF22]

Lesson to learn from the Zero and pre-war intelligence in general: actually create conclusions from your evidence and not from your preconceived notions. So much of this history is being repeated almost step for step with China right now. Difference is China has the industrial capacity to match the USA should things head that way.

[@andyroy7376]

That was a lot to unpack but it was splendidly presented. Well done.

[@Colt45hatchback]

Legend!!! more Japanese aircraft content!

[@scottcoffman8306]

A real pleasure to hear someone who knows what there are talking about. The first few years of the war no allied aircraft could stay in the air with the zero sooooooooooo what could they have copied it after?

[@davem2369]

Elsewhere on the internet a video on the X31 technology demonstrator went up and a poster or two immediately claimed it was copied by China to be the J10. When challeneged they then claimed it was a straight copy of the Lavi, when challenged again about the Eurocanards and other delta canard designs that werent American and preceeded it and J10 redesign for differing engines and avionics development they ceased responding as they had nothing more than their internet knowledge that the Chinese only do straight copies. Dont know how they would have coped with being introduced to the J9

[@nickdanger3802]

DC3/C47 The Shōwa L2D and Nakajima L2D, given the designations Shōwa Navy Type 0 Transport and Nakajima Navy Type 0 Transport, were license-built versions of the Douglas DC-3. The L2D series, numerically, was the most important Japanese transport in World War II. The L2D was given the Allied code name Tabby.

[@robertx8020]

Well the Zero was 'clearly' a copy of either the Fokker III or the F-16 (Yes the Japanese could travel in time :) ) I haven't decided yet LMAO Actually the Zero was a copy of most planes ...as it had wings, a motor, wheels, a rudder ect ...and all western planes had these too soo...no doubt..a copy !! :P

[@RCAvhstape]

Funny, because Mitsubishi makes a modified licensed version of the F-16 called the F2.

[@maus92]

Actually the Americans could time travel: See "Final Countdown."

[@robertx8020]

@@maus92 Not a great example as in TFC they had no control over it :) they were just send back and couldn't stop it

[@robertx8020]

@@RCAvhstape True but not during the time the zero was made. If they would have then they would have had absolute airsuperiority :)

[@mr.gunzaku437]

I love that picture of Emperor Meiji leanin' back in his chair, with that look of "Yeah, you hatin' cause I make this look good," on his face.😆😆😆

[@BHuang92]

"Asian country makes plane" West: *Wait, that's illegal*

[@rabidmidgeecosse1336]

What is not said in the video, but probably should have been. This had a lot to do with racism. The idea that those Japanese can only copy. was a known racist trope. Its often pointed out that too many is the US did not believe the Japanese could attack the US because they were (basically) not white.

[@BHuang92]

@@rabidmidgeecosse1336 And there was a stigma that is associated with non-white, non-european or American countries that are technologically and culturally inferior.

[@Edax_Royeaux]

Well, it's a trope that has a lot of truth with it in China. I can still remember the Top Gear episode with Richard Clarkson standing outside of a knockoff Starbucks wearing a bunch of Chinese knockoffs while he was in China.

[@timonsolus]

@@rabidmidgeecosse1336 : Absolutely. That's why US soldiers and sailors, right after Pearl Harbor, were trying to find pieces of aircraft wreckage with swastikas and German text on them, and were surprised when they didn't find any. "It must have been the Nazis wot dunnit..."

[@aceofswords1725]

@@rabidmidgeecosse1336 ... and the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor for the same reasons that i am not allowed to mention but you are, dunno why.... it goes both ways you know (i'd like to go into more detail but for some reason Big Momma Susan censors me like a b...)

[@damonbullock1489]

You have one of my favorite channels! Please keep up the good work Sir. Thank you very much!

[@guidor.4161]

The propaganda of the Japanese planes and soldiers being inferior must have cost a lot of lives in the fighting ranks (US and UK), if they underestimated their opponents...

[@CSSVirginia]

There is a scene in The Pacific min series where Jon Basalone chastises recruits for similar thinking. Not certain how true it is but it would not surprise me if it was true.

[@bkjeong4302]

To be fair, the Zero eventually DID become inferior once the Hellcat came out. Emphasis on the "eventually", as it was still a match for the Wildcat (provided both sides have good pilots).

[@tomhath8413]

I've hear interviews of Marines who said they were told the Japanese soldiers were supermen. They found out after the fighting started that fanatic is not the same as good.

[@Paciat]

British prime minister Loyd George said that giving coal rich terrains of Silesia to Poles (instead of Germans) is like giving a gold watch to a monkey. If GB didnt treat their allies worst than their European enemy, Hitler would be stopped before he rebuilded his army.

[@benjaminmiddaugh2729]

There's a fine line (that rarely is gotten right), especially at the beginning of a major war, between having effective propaganda (for morale and recruiting purposes) which minimizes the effectiveness of your enemy and having an accurate assessment of your own capabilities in relation to those of your enemy.

[@vipondiu]

54:04 noooow we are going to need an in-depth video on all of those cross-out misconceptions done with the same level of research proficiency as this one.

[@dcbadger2]

Question for Justin, but how did you end up in your specialty? I've always wondered how an historian picks their one very specific aspect and build off of it to the point they are the expert.