# Outrageous claim about WW2: please verify
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outrageous-claim-about-ww2-please-verify/530743
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [February 28, 2010, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outrageous-claim-about-ww2-please-verify/530743 "2010-02-28T13:15:55Z")
**Posts on this page:** 10
**Page:** 3
### Author:  [@MarcusF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MarcusF)
#### Post date: [March 1, 2010, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outrageous-claim-about-ww2-please-verify/530743/41 "2010-03-01T19:50:07Z")
> [@aruvqan](#):
>
> Actually we did have ships stationed along the coasts, and it was to do sentry duty [more or less] protecting american and canadian coastal waters against Germans on the east coast and Japanese on the west coast.
>
> We did actually have german vessels and japanese vessels get quite close to the US. There are online sites where you can look for the locations of sunken miltary vessels from WW2 off the US coast. There is a german sub off Orient Point NY. It sunk an american collier. It was not a waste of time posting american war vessels along the coast.
Possibly not a waste of time posting \*\*American \*\*war vessels along the coast but certainly a waste of scarce battleships for the Royal Navy.
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### Author:  [@mlees](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mlees)
#### Post date: [March 1, 2010, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outrageous-claim-about-ww2-please-verify/530743/42 "2010-03-01T20:56:54Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#):
>
> I knew about the Pacific shellings, but I couldn’t think of any uses against cities. Thanks to you and Pushkin for the cites.
>
> But OTOH, the Japanese survived the bombardments all too well and the rest … well, they don’t show much faith in the concept if that’s all that can be dredged up for an entire war.
The US Navy also shelled industrial targets on Honshu in '45:
> **[USS Iowa (BB-61) | Bombardment of Japan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Iowa_(BB-61)#Bombardment_of_Japan)**
>
> Iowa sailed on 19 March 1945 for Okinawa, arriving on 15 April to relieve her sister ship New Jersey. From 24 April, Iowa supported carrier operations which aimed to establish and maintain air superiority for ground forces during their struggle for the island. She then supported air strikes off southern Kyūshū from 25 May to 13 June. Afterward, she sailed toward northern Honshū and Hokkaido, and participated in strikes on the Japanese home islands on 14–15 July by bombarding Muroran, Hokkaido, de...
It’s probably more efficient to use air power to flatten those targets, but using the BB’s sends a clear message to the enemy populace as to who own’s those seas.
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### Author:  [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)
#### Post date: [March 2, 2010, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outrageous-claim-about-ww2-please-verify/530743/43 "2010-03-02T01:16:48Z")
> [@](#):
>
> I say BS on the claim of the OP’s wife’s sister’s husband about his grandfather. I’m also guessing that a sailor on a WWII battleships didn’t really know why he was anywhere unless he happened to be the Captain.
A sailor might know the location of his ship but this raises another point. If there were any British plans in 1940 that involved shelling American cities, I would guess they were classified “burn before reading” - they would have been top secret sealed orders for the Captain’s eyes only and only for him if he received orders to open them. No way would this have been the kind of scuttlebutt that the men in the crew would be talking about. Can you imagine what would have happened if rumors of this supposed plan had gotten back to the American isolationist press?
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### Author:  [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)
#### Post date: [March 2, 2010, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outrageous-claim-about-ww2-please-verify/530743/44 "2010-03-02T01:35:51Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#):
>
> “burn before reading”
Now _that’s_ secrecy!
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### Author:  [@MarcusF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MarcusF)
#### Post date: [March 2, 2010, 10:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outrageous-claim-about-ww2-please-verify/530743/45 "2010-03-02T10:25:51Z")
> [@Koxinga](#):
>
> Now _that’s_ secrecy!
There is a higher level, “Drop dead before reading” 😃
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### Author:  [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)
#### Post date: [March 2, 2010, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outrageous-claim-about-ww2-please-verify/530743/46 "2010-03-02T13:24:42Z")
No, the higher level is “burn before writing”.
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### Author:  [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)
#### Post date: [March 2, 2010, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outrageous-claim-about-ww2-please-verify/530743/47 "2010-03-02T14:13:11Z")
Is that higher or lower than **Inconceivable**?
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### Author:  [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2010, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outrageous-claim-about-ww2-please-verify/530743/48 "2010-03-03T19:31:14Z")
Canadians would not have automatically surrendered to the Germans if Britain fell, and I seriously doubt the Americans even thought that. They weren’t colonies like the French possessions in north Africa.
Plus - a ship going up and down the coast is a sitting duck for a sub attack. Subs were even spotted in the ST. Lawrence. Even convoys weren’t immune. I suspect ships not engaged in a specific action did not linger anywhere where they could be predictably found. I agree that the ships stationed over here were a waste of resources.
Plus, very true, such “secret orders” would not be known to any common sailor, nor likely to anyone young enough to still be alive today. As mentioned, very likely only the captain and first mate would actually read such orders.
So odds are this was idle speculation and rumor by the bored seamen during a convoy run.
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### Author:  [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)
#### Post date: [March 3, 2010, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outrageous-claim-about-ww2-please-verify/530743/49 "2010-03-03T22:58:55Z")
> [@Koxinga](#):
>
> However, I could see it just barely within the realm of possibility that the UK kept in mind the chance that the US government could switch sides and begin supporting the Nazis. Like an asteroid strike, it would be unlikely _almost_ to the degree of impossibility – but if it _did_ happen, the result would be sufficiently catastrophic that some sort of contingency plans were warranted.
Perhaps they still remembered WWI where America switched seemingly overnight from neutral (remember the 1916 election? Wilson won on “He kept us out of war”) with some Anglo and some German sympathy to war. It’s a stretch but possible.
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### Author:  [@flyboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flyboy)
#### Post date: [March 4, 2010, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/outrageous-claim-about-ww2-please-verify/530743/50 "2010-03-04T02:28:04Z")
> [@Markxxx](#):
>
> The USA has plans to invade Canada right now. But so what? It has plans to invade every country on Earth. This is just how it’s done.
> [@spifflog](#):
>
> It’s not critical to the discussion at hand, but I’d strongly disagree with that statement. We don’t have plans to invade all that many countries actually. I’ve spent some time in an operations, plans and strategy office. It’s very intensive and costly to develop these plans. And with requirements, objectives capabilities and forces (yours and their’s) changing all the time, the plans that you drew up four years ago aren’t all that currently anymore. So is there some invasion plan for Canada that was drafted 75 years ago that wasn’t cancelled? I suppose. but to say that we have an actual plan for Canada, or “every country on Earth” is nonsense.
Agreed, and I’ve also spent time in a planning cell. I’m surprised no one else has called bs on this. **Markxxx** , do you have anything to back up this wild claim?
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