Effects of a Failed Operation Sealion in British Popular Culture

frozenpredator

About everyone saying that the Fallschirmjager would maul the homeguard:

considering the german paratrooper performance against the barely trained conscripts of the Dutch army in may 1940 (many of these conscripts never had any rifle training) the home guard would propably destroy them. In fact with the massive airplane losses over Holland in may 1940 the Fallschirmjager won't be able to land their entire formations at once (the germans still hadn't recovered from that blow when they invaded Crete)
 

MattII

Meadow said:
Dad's Army would not be the quiet joke it is today. The nickname itself would probably be quickly forgotten after the first few curbstomps by German troops.
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Firstly, 'Dad's Army' wasn't the only defence Britain had there was also the Territorials and the returnees from France, Secondly, the Germans weren't putting up much themselves (their 'invasion fleet' was going to be as much a slap-together as 'Dad's Army' was, even if the troops themselves were pretty good), Thirdly, the British were dug in, and finally, just because the RAF wasn't capable of keeping the Germans off the shores, There would still have been plenty of aircraft around for raiding purposes.

Meadow said:
I think they'd walk through the Home Guard. The late 1940 LDV/Home Guard was barely armed properly (remember the broom handles with knives on the end were not an invention of Jimmy Perry) and while they may have received their M1917s by that point, would get routed by a disciplined unit.
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Yeah, like grabbing weapons from the enemy was never going to happen. Also remember that the British had at least a few hundred armoured cars, and just one would probably have offed a squad of Germans. Also, what's this crap about "getting routed", if you remember, most of 'Dad's Army' were ex-soldiers themselves, from WW1, if there was anything they didn't know about discipline you could probably write it on one page of a note-book.

I'm no Axiswanker, you don't have to be unpatriotic to admit that the Home Guard, especially in its early stages, would have been little more than a nuisance to invading forces if encountered alone (of course, bolstering regular troops behind the lines, guarding fuel depots etc, it could well have had a valuable and worthy input).
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No, but you've obviously got little idea just how well-prepared Britain was. The Problem with an invasion means you're always fighting on unfamiliar terrain, and the enemy's always on familiar terrain. Also, a weapon doesn't necessarily mean a gun, so a guy wearing just cloth a crossbow bolt or musket ball is just as deadly as a bullet, and the fact that it has a shorter range and a much longer reload time is no comfort to the guy who just got shot with one.
 
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Michele

frozenpredator said:
About everyone saying that the Fallschirmjager would maul the homeguard:

considering the german paratrooper performance against the barely trained conscripts of the Dutch army in may 1940 (many of these conscripts never had any rifle training) the home guard would propably destroy them. In fact with the massive airplane losses over Holland in may 1940 the Fallschirmjager won't be able to land their entire formations at once (the germans still hadn't recovered from that blow when they invaded Crete)
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The Home Guard will not be able to prevent the Fallschirmjäger to achieve their objectives - eventually.
But that isn't the Home Guard's task. They are there to disrupt and delay the initial enemy operations, to gain time for the regular Army units to gather and deploy, and to collect intelligence as to the enemy's areas of deployment.

The Home Guard will do all of that, if at a cost to its members.

The first minutes will be when a German paratroop has a good chance of dying. Consider this: you are a super-soldier, exceptionally well trained, a veteran of Holland. Your opponent is an aging part-timer.
But he knew you were arriving, he knows the place like the back of his hand, he's a WWI veteran and he's got a rifle. Meanwhile you have a pistol and maybe a sprained ankle.
 

MattII

That old-timer's also sitting in a pillbox, be it the normal type, or a Bison, and you have to capture the airfield he's guarding. Good Luck Kraut.
 

Some Bloke

Pop culture? Well Dad's Army would probably be a grim military drama rather than a sitcom (would the don't tell him Pike line survive).

Once I've finished the war years for my current timeline I'm considering an unmentionable failure to present day scenario.
 
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Michele

MattII said:
That old-timer's also sitting in a pillbox, be it the normal type, or a Bison, and you have to capture the airfield he's guarding. Good Luck Kraut.
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Then we're no longer talking about the first minutes. The paratrooper, barring real unluckiness, will have retrieved his main weapon and will be part of a small unit (though by no means at full strength).
OTOH the volunteer will also be part of an organized defense (though by no means well-organized).
But, at this point, superior initiative, training and tactics will take their toll.

All in all, at this point chances are worse for the Guard. The paratroopers will have to pay in lives, ammunition and time, though, and they are short on all three.
 

Some Bloke

It's been established beyond all reasonable doubt that Sealion would have failed, the question is, how much damage could the under equipped, understrengh, under supported and seasick invasion forces have inflicted before the supply situation and impossibility of evacuation force them to surrender. The chaos caused by the airborne landings might buy enough time for sea landing forces to regain some semblence of cohesion.

However, in the days before the Dieppe raid proving that a direct seabourne assault would be futile (butterfly number one), the invasion force would probably invole a direct assault on a southeast port, aiming to capture it, (Enemy at the Gates about a Home Guard unit anyone) so Stalingrad as a reference to Urban Combat would not enter popular culture.

First and foremost the effects of this event on popular culture can't really be speculated upon without considering the affect on the history as a whole.

Although this would be an interesting exercise, A.H films and books etc with their cast lists with some context provided in the description and footnotes etc.
 
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Meadow

Meadow

MattII said:
Firstly, 'Dad's Army' wasn't the only defence Britain had there was also the Territorials and the returnees from France, Secondly, the Germans weren't putting up much themselves (their 'invasion fleet' was going to be as much a slap-together as 'Dad's Army' was, even if the troops themselves were pretty good), Thirdly, the British were dug in, and finally, just because the RAF wasn't capable of keeping the Germans off the shores, There would still have been plenty of aircraft around for raiding purposes.

Yeah, like grabbing weapons from the enemy was never going to happen. Also remember that the British had at least a few hundred armoured cars, and just one would probably have offed a squad of Germans. Also, what's this crap about "getting routed", if you remember, most of 'Dad's Army' were ex-soldiers themselves, from WW1, if there was anything they didn't know about discipline you could probably write it on one page of a note-book.

No, but you've obviously got little idea just how well-prepared Britain was. The Problem with an invasion means you're always fighting on unfamiliar terrain, and the enemy's always on familiar terrain. Also, a weapon doesn't necessarily mean a gun, so a guy wearing just cloth a crossbow bolt or musket ball is just as deadly as a bullet, and the fact that it has a shorter range and a much longer reload time is no comfort to the guy who just got shot with one.
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Well, no, what you've done there is make the mistaken assumption that I only know about the Home Guard. I'm well aware of the state of the British defences against Sealion - I am in fact writing a paper on it as we speak - and therefore entirely conscious that the Home Guard was not the only defence we had. There was also, as you evidently also know, the British Army. Quite what gave you the impression that I believed that the LDV/Home Guard were Britain's only defences in 1940/1941 is beyond me.

Your rude tone makes me disinclined to respond in much further detail, but I would point out that, despite video games and Hollywood's impressions, taking weapons from the enemy was very rare in WWII, because of supply reasons. Notable exceptions include MP40 magazines being stockpiled by Sten gunners, and battles such as Stalingrad or Leningrad (forgive the populist examples) where the supply situation was so terrible anyway that there was little reason not to pick up a PPSh if there was one going.
 

Wanderlust

After the war, there was a bizarre public-relations battle between the 'forces, which in the ensuing rounds of defence-spending cuts, never went away. The RAF was probably the only force that emerged from the war with an intact reputation, marketing itself on the Battle of Britain. The Army got second-place credits for D-Day and the march to Berlin (and a distant last, the 'Forgotten' 14th Army's reconquest of Burma). The poor old Navy, which soldiered on in every theatre with the thankless tasks of safeguarding the vital transatlantic supply lines against the U-boats, the tumultuous med, and the desperate rear-guard fights against the Japanese, had little to claim as an outright victory in the minds of the public (The Americans also did everything they could to keep the 1945 British Pacific Fleet out of the action for this purpose). This despite having many Fleet Air Arm pilots also servng valiantly in the battle of Britain.

In this timeline, perhaps the Navy gets the credit where the RAF has failed, and the Senior Service becomes the golden boy of the services once again. So maybe: Goodbye V-Bomber force, hello Royal Navy supercarriers post-1980? More British investment in shipbuilding? Longer British presence in the middle-east and far east?
 

Dilvish

Post war, children play Homeguard versus the Nazis and similar games. Some hide and seek games have the hiders being German paratroopers.

A dog that bravely protected its English family from Germans becomes a movie star.
 
Thande

Thande

Donor
The "Keep Calm and Carry On" poster is actually deployed at the time (it was held in reserve for if the Germans invaded) and thus is not a modern pop culture phenomenon. It might be forgotten or it might be a bit of nostalgia along the lines of "Dig for Victory".

The RN gets a better WW2 reputation, more on the lines of the RAF.

Hitler compared more to Philip II and the Spanish Armada than to Napoleon in propaganda.

Britain could be viewed as either more or less impregnable depending on exactly how the invasion went (whether the barges were all sank in the Channel or whether the Germans managed to land and were then defeated) which has consequences for British self-image.
 

oberdada

"Ten German Bombers" would be replaced by something like "By the everlasting Hills of Dover" for England Fans on England-German football games...


just my 2 bits...
 

Grimm Reaper

Don't forget the inevitable case where a local archery club confronts a detachment of German invaders.:D


WELCOME TO SHERWOOD!!!​
 

Flayer

Hitler would get associated with Trafalgar in terms of poor planning the way he is with the Grand Armee now.
 
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