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I accept your detailed info, EwenS, but Darwin couldn't have been too inconsequential—the Imperial Japanese Navy chose that place as the target for their one and only mass carrier strike on the Australian mainland, on 19 February 1942. A force in Darwin could deter invasion and its harbor seems well positioned to support the eventual New Guinea Campaign. Darwin is 700 nautical miles from the airbase the Japanese established in Kendari on Sulawesi and hence was within range of the Mitsubishi twin-engine bombers there, which did strike Darwin repeatedly from February 1942 to mid-1943. The US Navy established Naval Base Darwin for its subs fleeing the Philippines, but the air strikes prompted a retreat to Exmouth Submarine Base (which in turn was bombed), and then to the Perth/Fremantle region. If Darwin was considered too exposed for a few subs and their diesel fuel supply, then capital ships would probably not be thought safe there.On the other hand: the Royal Navy's 'far-flung' base at Scapa Flow is only 500 nautical miles from Germany. Luftwaffe planes bombed Scapa Flow starting 17 October 1939, three days after U-47 torpedoed and sank a battleship at anchor there. In his Osprey book Scapa Flow: Defences of Britain's Great Fleet Anchorage 1914-45, historian Angus Konstam (who lives in the area) points out that after the German conquest of Norway in 1940 brought Luftwaffe bases even closer to Scapa Flow, "no such raids ever materialized, although reconnaissance and minelaying sorties continued throughout the war" [p26]. Konstam believes that a mass air strike from Norway against the vulnerable capital ships and fuel oil storage tanks at Scapa was deterred by the hurried buildup of antiaircraft guns and fighter cover around the base. In our alternate history, a similar buildup of defenses around Darwin, Australia could be within the bounds of possibility, allowing warships to be stationed there and thus be conveniently near the 1941-43 fighting front. EwenS points out that Darwin had terrible rail and road connections with the rest of Australia (although I've heard this was a general problem for the whole continent back then). Maybe if Darwin had been chosen instead of Singapore as the UK's principal Far East base, then better connections would have been among the economic benefits that British investment would have brought in the 1920s and 30s.
I accept your detailed info, EwenS, but Darwin couldn't have been too inconsequential—the Imperial Japanese Navy chose that place as the target for their one and only mass carrier strike on the Australian mainland, on 19 February 1942. A force in Darwin could deter invasion and its harbor seems well positioned to support the eventual New Guinea Campaign. Darwin is 700 nautical miles from the airbase the Japanese established in Kendari on Sulawesi and hence was within range of the Mitsubishi twin-engine bombers there, which did strike Darwin repeatedly from February 1942 to mid-1943. The US Navy established Naval Base Darwin for its subs fleeing the Philippines, but the air strikes prompted a retreat to Exmouth Submarine Base (which in turn was bombed), and then to the Perth/Fremantle region. If Darwin was considered too exposed for a few subs and their diesel fuel supply, then capital ships would probably not be thought safe there.
On the other hand: the Royal Navy's 'far-flung' base at Scapa Flow is only 500 nautical miles from Germany. Luftwaffe planes bombed Scapa Flow starting 17 October 1939, three days after U-47 torpedoed and sank a battleship at anchor there. In his Osprey book Scapa Flow: Defences of Britain's Great Fleet Anchorage 1914-45, historian Angus Konstam (who lives in the area) points out that after the German conquest of Norway in 1940 brought Luftwaffe bases even closer to Scapa Flow, "no such raids ever materialized, although reconnaissance and minelaying sorties continued throughout the war" [p26]. Konstam believes that a mass air strike from Norway against the vulnerable capital ships and fuel oil storage tanks at Scapa was deterred by the hurried buildup of antiaircraft guns and fighter cover around the base. In our alternate history, a similar buildup of defenses around Darwin, Australia could be within the bounds of possibility, allowing warships to be stationed there and thus be conveniently near the 1941-43 fighting front. EwenS points out that Darwin had terrible rail and road connections with the rest of Australia (although I've heard this was a general problem for the whole continent back then). Maybe if Darwin had been chosen instead of Singapore as the UK's principal Far East base, then better connections would have been among the economic benefits that British investment would have brought in the 1920s and 30s.
