IS Seelöwe The Only Way To German Victory?

Mostlyharmless has a thread in which he states - "Everyone loves a successful Sealion as it is the only military way to achieve German victory in WW2 after 3rd September 1939."

Rather than hijack his thread, I decided to start another to present the argument that this may not the case.

Herman Wouk has Armin von Roon make the case (in War And Remembrance) that a southern or Mediterranean strategy would have worked as well. "von Roon" argues that doing the hard dirty work of cutting off the Med and concentrating on taking Malta and Gibraltar can lead to victory in North Africa and the Middle East - cutting England off from India and from Middle Eastern oil.

The claim is made that Raeder made a case for taking Gibraltar in 1940.

Blockade

German ships and U-Boats attempt to blockade England. Some English ships run the blockade. Others are sunk by ships or U-boats.

cclittle said:

German ships and U-Boats attempt to blockade England. Some English ships run the blockade. Others are sunk by ships or U-boats.

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Unfortunately, a full-blown blockade of the UK probably requires more resources than Germany can afford after it attacks the USSR, and anway is likely to draw the US into the war even if Hitler manages to avoid declaring war as OTL.

Now, unilaterally surrender in the undeclared naval war with the US (probably requires Hitler to have a personality change or fall down a well) don't declare war on the US (possible) and do everything _exactly_ right in fighting the USSR (an interminably disputed topic) and maybe the Germany win the war of attrition at some point, the US fails to get directly involved in Europe (might need Roosevelt's wheelchair to fall down another well) and the UK negotiates a no-losses end to its own seeming unwinnable situation...only for the Germans to get fried in a nuclear confrontation with the UK and the US in, say, 1949.

The trouble is that the Nazis were such horrible, horrible people that they couldn't help but unite the world against them - and they almost invariably got nastier and more horrible when they were winning, too. (All that stuff about European unity against the Red Menace? Only when the Germans were clearly in trouble. Earlier on, 1941, it was all "Germans say frog - everyone else jumps!") If they beat the Soviets, they would be such threatening, boastful assholes that the US couldn't help but prepare for war with them - the usual "US stays neutral" scenario is rather unlikely to last long enough for Germany to develop the nuclear arsenal that it needs to survive long-term.

Bruce

Dave in St. Louis said:

Mostlyharmless has a thread in which he states - "Everyone loves a successful Sealion as it is the only military way to achieve German victory in WW2 after 3rd September 1939."

Rather than hijack his thread, I decided to start another to present the argument that this may not the case.

Herman Wouk has Armin von Roon make the case (in War And Remembrance) that a southern or Mediterranean strategy would have worked as well. "von Roon" argues that doing the hard dirty work of cutting off the Med and concentrating on taking Malta and Gibraltar can lead to victory in North Africa and the Middle East - cutting England off from India and from Middle Eastern oil.

The claim is made that Raeder made a case for taking Gibraltar in 1940.

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Hitler dies on September 4th of a drug overdose.

Goering agrees to Papal Mediation; Neville Chamberlain, offering an "Easy Peace", gets what he was looking for when Goering agrees to leave a rump Poland after an impressive display of German Military Efficiency.

Neville Chamberlain is a grossly humiliated man who is forced from office, while all eyes are on Goering, who has come to office and settled Danzig, the Corridor, and the war with the West in the span of two months.

Germany Wins.

Blue Max said:

Hitler dies on September 4th of a drug overdose.

Goering agrees to Papal Mediation; Neville Chamberlain, offering an "Easy Peace", gets what he was looking for when Goering agrees to leave a rump Poland after an impressive display of German Military Efficiency.

Neville Chamberlain is a grossly humiliated man who is forced from office, while all eyes are on Goering, who has come to office and settled Danzig, the Corridor, and the war with the West in the span of two months.

Germany Wins.

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Well, until Goering decides to distract the population from increasing economic woes by provoking a war with the USSR. I mean, the USSR is a house of cards, right?

Bruce

B_Munro said:

Well, until Goering decides to distract the population from increasing economic woes by provoking a war with the USSR. I mean, the USSR is a house of cards, right?

Bruce

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Going on a "Zero Point" ASB sort of rationale, it is fair to suggest that Hitler could die of a drug overdose and Goering dies of DUI shortly afterward.

But I think the idea of a German Victory that greatly expands the state and solves its major Post-WWI baggage is far from ASB. All we need to do for this scenario to pan out is for Germany to accept a victory that really isn't a WWII stakes level one.

Germany doesn't get to live out its insane Lebensraum fantasy, but it is far ahead of antebellum or even a Second Reich Germany. Such an outcome is entirely possible. But Germany winning all the marbles: No Way.

I guess it's a matter of how you want to define victory.

Certainly, a peace settlement in the west generally favourable to Germany (Alcase-Lorraine and much of Poland annexed, Denmark and possibly Norway reduced to puppets) is possible with a wide variety of PoDs (early demise of Hitler, crushed BEF, Churchill not becoming PM, etc.). Problem is really keeping the krauts from promptly blowing it in the East...

An outright German victory in the west (France crushed, Britian reduced to impotence or conqured, etc.) may be possible without Seelowe (or later invasion of Britain) but alternate routes -blockade, Med stratergy- really require almost everything to go the krauts' way (in the Med case it's really less a matter of Africa falling than of the RN getting crippled in the process...).

As for the Naziwankers' victory -3rd Reich from the Atlantic to the Urals- it's pretty much bonkers.

Cockroach said:

As for the Naziwankers' victory -3rd Reich from the Atlantic to the Urals- it's pretty much bonkers.

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The trouble is that Hitler _wanted_ that, so you really need to kill him off: and by 1941 his subordinates probably thought it was possible as well, so you need to kill _them_ off as well...really, the solution is in the title of this thread, which says "German Victory" rather than "Nazi Victory." Anything like OTLs Nazi Germany is essentially a machine for conquest, which must keep growing: the Nazi economic pyramid scheme would collapse if Goering did not radically cut military spending immediately after achieving peace as in Max's scenario above. But if he does that, he knows Germany is unlikely to ever get any further than it currently stands, and indeed might find itself in very deep crap if the Soviets decide to ally with the French the next round...

Bruce

I started on a L I never got to finishing in which the RAF fought in a traditional manner, on top of the T-34 was the first model. So you had British planes flying over into Europe, facing the same problem the Germans had, and thus throwing away various planes until they figure out something that works. If you avoid bombing the UK the peoplle can still see the war as "over there." The intense need for revenge, and to fight on is limited.

I always felt the best way to make the UK get out of the war is to somehow create conditions which damaged its military, but saved its people.

Lots of talk about blockade, but the fact is that the Germans did their damnedest to blockade us with U-boats and did not succeed. Any further resources put towards U-boat construction affects the land war. And as for blockading withs urface units, that's an invitation to the RN to sink them.

B_Munro said:

do everything _exactly_ right in fighting the USSR (an interminably disputed topic) and maybe the Germany win the war of attrition at some point,

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A damn fine summary here, succinct and accurate, so I just thought that as a reliable defender of Soviet prospects I'd offer my thoughts here:

Physically speaking,I do think it is possible for the German army to end the Red army as as effective modern, mobile fighting force. To do so, however, does indeed require the German was machine to be literally perfect, and that is disregard everything Klausewitz ever wrote, while at the same time making the Soviets blunder into trap after trap. For hypothetical purposes (like in Calbear's timeline) it's justifiable; but in reality the uncertainty of war means the the German will fall short of their aims eventually.

And of course, this causes Russia to become a second China. China lost both capitals, had no appreciable modern army, and had no realistic chance of evicting the enemy without foreign assistance, and yet they fought on in the face of gigantic casualties and were going to fight so long as they could equip infantry divisions. Russia will do the same. "Bitter peace" is pure bahookie when it's a question of national extermination.

B_Munro said:

The trouble is that Hitler _wanted_ that, so you really need to kill him off: and by 1941 his subordinates probably thought it was possible as well, so you need to kill _them_ off as well...really, the solution is in the title of this thread, which says "German Victory" rather than "Nazi Victory." Anything like OTLs Nazi Germany is essentially a machine for conquest, which must keep growing

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That just says it all. Germany could have won some worldwar in the 40s, although winning here does merely imply a far larger Germany dominating large parts of the continent in constant threat by the still existing Soviets/Russian, US and Britain.

Nazi-Germany can't win their war.

They could take the Soviets down with one simple decision... use nerve gas at Kirsk. The Soviets had no counter, they would have lost virtually everyone and handed the Germans about 5,000 tanks and 20,000 pieces of artillery. Perfectly usable after decontamination, and with ammo pre-supplied by the Soviet depots they would have captured. Keep using the stuff after that and the Red Army is finished. I'm pretty sure, however, that Canaris would have or did learn that the UK had weaponized anthrax, which means the only way to win in the west is to redeploy forces from the USSR to meet any invasion. Make that look sufficiently costly, be willing to release most of France for peace, and be willing to sell Italy down the river, and you get a German total victory in the East and at least a demilitarized and much shrunken France in the West. The USSR was years away, if not a decade away, from effective nerve agents, and would never have come up with a meaningful countermeasure in time.

Let me be more explicit...

Does anyone think that closing the Med (along with the continuing U-boat offensive) can bring down the UK?

If the UK does opt out of the game, how does Lend-Lease get to the USSR in quantities sufficient to help the Red Army? We all know that American trucks, airplanes, uniforms and so much more were essential to the Soviet war effort.

loughery111 said:

They could take the Soviets down with one simple decision... use nerve gas at Kirsk.

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I think I've read that Hitler was opposed to using Chemical Weapons after his experience in World War I.

Dave in St. Louis said:

Does anyone think that closing the Med (along with the continuing U-boat offensive) can bring down the UK?

If the UK does opt out of the game, how does Lend-Lease get to the USSR in quantities sufficient to help the Red Army? We all know that American trucks, airplanes, uniforms and so much more were essential to the Soviet war effort.

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I do! It is indeed possible to knock Great Britain out of the war.

Dave in St. Louis said:

I think I've read that Hitler was opposed to using Chemical Weapons after his experience in World War I.

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I didn't say he would do it, just that it could have been done and in all likelihood would have won the war in the East at a stroke. Losing Kursk in that fashion would have cost the Red Army 10% of its manpower and over 25% of its armor and artillery (almost all captured, at that)! Continuing to use nerve gas afterwards would have done two things; one, kicked the crap out of the Soviets in the short run, and; two, forced them into strategic dispersal in the long run, thus enabling the decisive sweep-up of enemy units and allowing Germany to take at least Leningrad, Stalingrad, and Moscow.

I figure the Red Army loses any status as a conventional, modern, and mechanized fighting force sometime in late '44. It would have been reduced to impotence earlier, allowing the Germans to transfer forces to the Atlantic Wall in droves. Thus rendering the Allied deception plans irrelevant because the Germans can fully defend the whole French coast...

Dave in St. Louis said:

Does anyone think that closing the Med (along with the continuing U-boat offensive) can bring down the UK?

If the UK does opt out of the game, how does Lend-Lease get to the USSR in quantities sufficient to help the Red Army? We all know that American trucks, airplanes, uniforms and so much more were essential to the Soviet war effort.

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I feel you are making a oft repeated fallacy in your lend lease assumption.
Yes, the American supplies greatly helped the USSR, by allowing them to focus on other hardware. But if they hadn't received it, surely they could have made most themselves. It just meant building less tanks, artillery pieces and aircraft. Which would have had an impact on strategy and maybe, just maybe, STAVKA would have been forced to fight smartly instead of just fighting hard and winning by burrying Germans with their dead.

Closing down the Med in itself is not going to achieve that much. England can still move supplies along Africa. It just takes longer. What it will achieve is more or less secure Axis supply lines for a major push in (North) Africa, if the Axis decide to make it a major front. And considering how much trouble the British had with 3 run down German divisions, a major force with a decent supply line would have kicked them out of Egypt and the Levant. If that leads to sufficient oil, the picture changes again. It might not have led to Britain throwing in the towel but it would have strengthened the Axis by a significant degree. It also would have meant a defensive posture on the Ostfront (or perhaps even a postponement).

Considering the difficulty England had with just a handful of U-boats, a much larger U-boat fleet earlier in the war could have blockaded England (assuming the British didn't undertake pre-emptive measures when the Germans were building this larger U-boat fleet). But again, it is unlikely it would have led to a collapse. Rationing of food and military materials would have enabled England to last a couple of years. Germany did the same in WWI. And at the same time, England would be doing everything it could to break the blockade....Odds are they would have succeeded before enough people starved to force the government to surrender.

There's no way the Axis is winning in North Africa. The ports of Libya couldn't support a larger army than it did OTL and the narrow front at El Alamein, gaurded by the med sea to the north and qattara depression to the south, negates Rommel's mobility and flanking maneouvers. Like OTL the British dig in and simply await reinforcements.

Dave in St. Louis said:

Does anyone think that closing the Med (along with the continuing U-boat offensive) can bring down the UK?

.

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In a word? No.

The Med was closed for 2 years, and the U-boat offensive failed in OTL.
In any case, the Med is a luxury for Britain, they simply keep the convoys going via the cape (good luck at gettinga force far enough south to interfere with that route...!!

loughery111 said:

I didn't say he would do it, just that it could have been done and in all likelihood would have won the war in the East at a stroke. Losing Kursk in that fashion would have cost the Red Army 10% of its manpower and over 25% of its armor and artillery (almost all captured, at that)! Continuing to use nerve gas afterwards would have done two things; one, kicked the crap out of the Soviets in the short run, and; two, forced them into strategic dispersal in the long run, thus enabling the decisive sweep-up of enemy units and allowing Germany to take at least Leningrad, Stalingrad, and Moscow.

I figure the Red Army loses any status as a conventional, modern, and mechanized fighting force sometime in late '44. It would have been reduced to impotence earlier, allowing the Germans to transfer forces to the Atlantic Wall in droves. Thus rendering the Allied deception plans irrelevant because the Germans can fully defend the whole French coast...

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I think you have very unrealistic expectations of the effect of WW2-era dispersants and dispersal mechanisms (for non-persistant chemicals yet!)over an area the size of the Kursk battlefield, while ignoring Soviet chemical retaliation (which granted wont be as effective, but will hurt).
Remember, chemical weapons favour the defence, not the attacker