Yet another reason to love and support FR: the ability to have informed, well reasoned, discussions such as this.
Thank you all.
About this invading Hawaii thing. Not possible for the reasons others have already mention. loose of the element of surprise, not enough man power and shipping. But just for grins lets say the Japanese did take Hawaii, they would still lose, but instead of the USA having a Europe first policy it would have had a Pacific first policy. Japan would be defeated before Hitler, the Amercan people would demand that. So the real effect of taking Hawaii would be to give Hitler a freer hand for a couple of years. Now that would be a game changer, yes Japan would be defeated but would Hitler. hmmmmm, maybe, maybe not.