This brings back memories of “The Haunted Tank”.

Whenever that Stuart got into trouble, the ghost of J. E. B. would appear and get them out of it.

Life of the Mind: Absolutely sir! Preventing a Japanese-German link-up in the Indian Ocean was THE critical element of 1942
if not of the whole war. The Canal, Midway, the Chindits, The Marauders and on and on. It was one close-run thing.

Not only were there the material advantages to the Axis of such a link-up, IMO it would have meant that Tojo and Hitler were no longer running their show. Yammamoto and Rommel would have been. Wouldn’t want those two in charge, they were a lot more astute than the others.

Paul Johnson has said that had the link-up been successful, the war would have gone on into the 1950s and been settled with widespread use of nukes—–not all of which would have been ours.

“Close-run” may be an understatement.