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This is fascinating! Keep on! It will be a messy affair. Here is a curved ball: Will it scare people off from voting for Brexit?

From a military perspective it might have been a great idea to invade Saudi. However, Saddam was not looking at purely military objectives. It was all about politics. Invading Kuwait (with tacit approval by US ambassador - thank you!) could be explained away. It was not a major threat and...

Why would Germany want colonies in 1940? they might also be able to read the tea leaves and those said that colonies would be independent pretty soon (India as the leader of the pack). It is not 1900 anymore.

Sadam was already talking to a lot of the Arab League members. What was his objective? 1) Not to pay Kuwait 2) reverse the insult Apparently, nobody really liked Kuwait anyway. And Kiwait tended to be rather arrogant and demeaning to Sadam. He put his case forward t the other Arab countries...

It is of course possible to re-look the Chrysler TV-8 design. As a matter of fact, it has a lot of the suggestions above incorporated. OK, one thing: forget the nuclear-powered version. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrysler_TV-8 i quote from wiki: "Using an unconventional tank design, the...

What about the British carriers having armored flight decks? It limited the number of aircraft carried, but prevented loss, even from kamikazes, i believe.

Thanks Mattep, That really puts it across in few words.

Baku and surroundings provided some 80%+ of Soviet oil. Denying it to USSR will have a very serious impact. And Germany did get most of its oil from Rumania. Of course it is a bonus for Germany to get the Baku oil, but not a goal in itself. Operation Pike was formed to deny the oil to USSR...

... engineering aspects. It all comes down to one thing: what is cheapest combined with being reliable. All of that said, we should look forward to a real break-through. Whether it is Elon or NASA, we still sit with technology based on a chemical reaction. As even V2 was. The real quantum...

X-33 was a technology demonstrator. The real deal would have been the VentureStar. It was all about money. How to get 'things' into orbit and at what cost. Cost per kg and all done by something reliable (not blowing up on the pad etc). So Lockheed Martin looked at a continuation of the shuttle...

In the event that Dunkirk ( and the 2nd evacuation) fails, the top generals of later fame would also be going into the bag. If we imagine that the sea routes are closed and LW dominates the skies, Monty, Brooke, Alexander, .... will all be either dead or POW's That in itself will of course...

Well, yes - UK planned on offensives in 1946 (and I think even beyond that). Nobody knew about the bomb at that level. Apparently Japan actually tried to get the co-prosperity working (to some extent) in Burma. According to Allen there was more to it. It was not just the heavy-handed occupation...

It is a tricky one with China. I was under the impression that the bulk of support was stored for fighting Mao later on, after the US/UK forces had kicked Japan out of China. Admittedly, General Sun was in high esteem and so was his division. But the rest apparently was 'low-grade'. Ledo road...

Correct - that is the thing. It is hard to stop and consolidate, especially with a very long and difficult border. However, there are some natural defensive lines in Burma - According to "the longest war' by Louis Allen. Indian divisions were still very much officiered by British. Bose did...

The Burma Campaign consumed a fair amount of troops (British, Japanese and some US/China). But was it worth it? It is obvious that Japan needed to secure the flanks; hence Thailand (Siam in those days) had to be invested. It is also clear that a threat from Chinese forces had to be balanced...

the thing is: if there is a serious lull in the east, Overlord might ne re-looked especially if there is another concentration of troops available

February 1943: 1) Stalingrad is gone. 2) Africa is busy going 3) Italy is falling apart BUT: 1) Overlord is still not reality 2) Manstein is doing his art In essence: Germany was not defeated and with a bit of 'new management' might be able to fight to a draw in the East Would Stalin have...

It does get interesting: If we discard Himmler and the non-military SS AND Goering AND some more of the fanatic Nazi, we are sitting with two options: 1) An Army coup (forget Luftwaffe and navy) but who? 2) Waffen SS coup. After having killed off the Himmler tribe'. Who? The army generals...

Interesting indeed. The period shortly after Stalingrad was one of consolidation (thanks to Manstein). Stalin could not have felt that victory was a foregone conclusion. Even if he felt it was going the right way, the cost to USSR (ravaged countryside, people, etc) was just high. I also...

That is the thing. Any fighting will be conducted in Germany and Poland. Whichever way it is highly unlikely that the limited divisions of US/UK will be able to fight their way into USSR proper - and that was never the goal anyway. So, Stalin might fight a defensive war until ....? and that is...