1941 - Britain and Japan vs USA - How long until the USA wins?

Canada wasn’t truly independent until the Statute of Westminster in 1931. So given the OP, there is a window where the Canadians are subjects of a Dominion and technically under Britain’s rule.
But NOT in 1941. They are a separate country.
 

Deleted member 94680

But NOT in 1941. They are a separate country.

No need for the capitalisation fella, I wrote 1931 so I can see 1941 comes after that. I assume the OP’s reference to Pearl means you take the PoD to be in ‘41?

But the OP wrote “just before WWII begins” that gives us a PoD of 1937-38 or so. He also mentions “Britain and Japan kept their alliance from WWI” so one would assume this affects the British Empire during the whole of the pre-WWII period. This in turn will surely affect Anglo-Canadian relations.
 
Thanks. It could use some more work; I'll hopefully post a potential revision soon.

At which point, WW2 itself is almost entirely butterflied away. Germany's Anchluss of Austria was only possible because the Italians were content to do nothing. Prior to that, Mussolini and Hitler were at the loggerheads over who controls Austria, something they nearly had a fight over had the two not joined forces in the Berlin-Rome Axis. With Germany forced to stand down, its standing would be harmed and it would need a more careful approach to expansion. It would be unlikely Hitler would have gotten as far as he did without Italian support, not unless Italy pulled a massive "head in the sand" political stance.

Actually, that's not going to be at all easy. While the Italian Army was the laughingstock of WW2, that was mostly due to lack of sufficient training and competent officers due to the massive bloating Mussolini had subjected it to in the interwar period, Italian terrain is going to be a nightmare for armor. Germany must cross the Alps, defended by some of the most surprisingly competent mountain troops in the world, the Italian Alpini. While the rich Po river valley isn't too far off from Austria, you have to cross some truly brutal rough terrain to get there, and unlike Northern France, a blitzkrieg would be counterproductive, if not a complete failure.

Admittedly, there are other ways; Germany managed to wrest control of Albania and Greece from Greek forces rather swiftly and brutally, despite them being some pretty rough mountain terrain that would favor defenders. Once they manage to get through, they can take the Po river valley, then work their way down the Appenine mountains - but it would not be easy, not by a long shot, unless Italy surrenders once they get through the northern mountains.

More good points.

Consider perhaps then Mussolini's death prior to the signing of the pact of steel in May 1939. This is to late for the Nazis to stop rolling but the turmoil in Italy succession results in an anti German position (they disagree with Germany over Balkans and alps).

The phony war causes them to believe Germany has bitten off more than they can chew and they join France in the entente, perhaps on the promise of some border readjustments in Africa.

The quick fall of France leads to a fall of Italy as Germany pressed in from all parts of the alps. Italy's slow retreat lets the USSR and the UK keep the otl idea that Germany is too distracted to attack.

Once Italy falls Germany turns on the USSR. While the UK seizes Ethiopia and East Africa for safe keeping. Securing the entire Indian ocean.

Spain after the fall of Italy and France seeing Japan and the UK trying to sneakily seize abandoned colonies join the axis, and look at expanding in North Africa and perhaps in the med and along border with France.

Portugal may also join Spain or sit out. Maybe Spain gets greedy and goes after Portugese African cities.

The USA struggles to supply the USSR via the bering strait and arctic. Finland probably is in the axis too. While the other Scandinavian countries lean towards Germany. Turkey? No idea.

If Japan and the UK ignore the USA demands to leave China will the USA declare war on them? If not the two can focus on that. Perhaps the British might be able to dull some of the Japanese horrors.

If they plan a war does Britain strategically abandon Canada or plan to bleed America dry with a gruelling defensive campaign or go for a quick strike for quick peace.

The alternative is that the USA stays isolationist and Nazis and commies bleed each other dry while the imperialists seize land with small amounts of blood shed. Eventually Japan might decide to strike at the USSR or Britain angers one of German allies like Spain or Portugal or Denmark (Britain surely seized Iceland and Greenland as otl) and they end up against both axis and comintern.

If the imperials get nukes first will the USA surrender?
 

Lusitania

Donor
Interesting, but I keep wondering a few items.

1) Why would Japan attack US in this scenario? IOTL it attacked US because it was being cut off from resources. In the scenario the occupation of Netherlands would of led to a British and Australia occupying Dutch East Indies. It then can sell oil to the Japanese.
2) Please Note that in 1932 the Dominion Act provided Canada, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand with greater independence, In WW1 the entry of Britain in war meant that Canada and other Dominions also joined the war. IN WW2 they each had to declare war on Germany and Subsequently on Japan. So we would need 4 Dominions to be on board and have "fascist" governments seems to difficult.
3) For your scenario to have any chance of working you need few things to go your way.
a) Part of Dutch East Indies would be demanded by Australians along with French Pacific Colonies.
b) The British would want all of Borneo not give it to the Japanese and that was where the oil was.
c) Best the Japanese could hope for is Philippines and French Indochina the rest the British and commonwealth would want to keep for security and just plain greed.
d) Australia and British along with Japanese navy would want to both destroy American bases in Hawaii and capture it so they have a clear path between Canada and Australia. New Zealand and British invade Panama Canal from Pacific while Forces in the Carribean would of attacked both Puerto Rico, Cuba and Panama Canal from Caribbean Sea.
e) Get Mexico onside from 1940-1941 promising to give it back part of land it lost in Mexico-USA war.
f) Follow-up the capture of Hawaii with actual invasion of California with assistance of Mexico.
g) The Japanese should concentrate on China, which it would have a free hand and since no Burma road no assistance.
h) Japan signs non-aggression treaty with Soviet Union following invasion by Germany allowing the Soviets to send majority if not all troops west. Then in 1942 when Soviet Union on verge of collapsing invade and capture most of Siberia.

Note: Portuguese Timor would not be attacked since it was not part of Dutch East Indies and Portugal was aligned with Britain, Which bring us to the fact that the British could of used Azores, Bermuda and Bahamas to launch their own blitz against American forces and industry in south.

What I not understand is what is FDR and American government doing through all this? No the only logical explanation is that he never comes to power and that a more isolationist and advocating greater state freedom President reduces Federal powers and US military go more to the state militia after WWI. You need to limit US ability to have any chance of the scenario to work.
 
No need for the capitalisation fella, I wrote 1931 so I can see 1941 comes after that. I assume the OP’s reference to Pearl means you take the PoD to be in ‘41?

But the OP wrote “just before WWII begins” that gives us a PoD of 1937-38 or so. He also mentions “Britain and Japan kept their alliance from WWI” so one would assume this affects the British Empire during the whole of the pre-WWII period. This in turn will surely affect Anglo-Canadian relations.
WWII began for the US in 1941. WWII arguably began in the early 1930s with Japan's invasion of Manchuria.
Follwoing that logic, that Canada is a still UK territory, means that the US gains a dozen new states after a short military campaign. Thanks!:openedeyewink:
 
British carrier aircraft where are inferior to those the Americans flew especially early in the war.
Although it might be humorous to see a spitfire or a hurricane try to shoot down a B-17 using only eight 30 caliber machine guns.

The OP question is ...well

But only 155 B17s of all variants to date were produced by Pearl Harbor OTL and by then the Vb Spit is toting 20mm cannon so the laughter would not last long

As for carrier aircraft

When?

The Wildcat only really matured in late 1941 and the folding wing F4F-4 in Mid 42 (in time for Midway) - before that it was the F2F all 55 of them and the F3F all 147 of them

The Dauntless was a fine aircraft

The Devastator…..well I'd rather be in a Swordfish although the Avenger its replacement was superb but was not available in numbers until late 42
 

FBKampfer

Banned
American industrial heartland is within range of RAF heavies from British holding in N America. The Royal Navy can hit American shipping and bases from Newfoundland etc, and the Americans have no equivalent capability.

The focus of American operations would be to try and evict the British from N America....the Phillipines, Gaum and even possibly Hawaii are write offs.

1000 bomber raids againt the North Eastern population centers? Instead of Hamburg, Colonge, Essen and Dresdan, we get Detroit, New York, Chicago and Philadelphia?


You know, betting againt the Royal Navy is usually a very bad idea.
The USA out built the entire tonnage totals of the RN and IJN almost twice over.


Assuming that even 3/4 of the British battle fleet survives to penetrate the US air screen and wins a phyrric victory over the USN, theres no way she could stand against the 10 battleships, 14 fleet carriers, 9 light carriers, and 25 escort carriers the US would build from 1941 onwards.
 
If the shipyards on the East Coast are being hit they aren't going to have OTL production. The four major yards, ie Quincy, Brookyln, Philadephia and Newport News are all within 500 miles of Canadian airspace and on the coast.
 

FBKampfer

Banned
If the shipyards on the East Coast are being hit they aren't going to have OTL production. The four major yards, ie Quincy, Brookyln, Philadephia and Newport News are all within 500 miles of Canadian airspace and on the coast.


Presuming Canada is dumb enough to try to attack the USA, knowing they'll end up little better than indentured servants to the land, providing natural resources to fuel the US economy in the long run.


Again, even if the UK can win a nominal victory against the US, they're still in no position to begin raiding the US coast.


Hell, the sheer industrial output of the US means they could swamp the RN with land based aircraft even if the entirety of the UK fleet were assembled unharmed offshore.


And that's ignoring the still respectable US Atlantic fleet, assuming the Japanese calculate the same way with the RN on the ledger, and decide they need to Pearl Harbor PACFLEET.

Which assuming it goes OTL still leaves the carrier force untouched (which as we all know became the decisive force).


Best case is the UK loses the KGV's and a few of the Elisabeths and R's off the Eastern coast, and the battlecruisers stay untouched, while the entirety of the Atlantic battleship fleet is sunk. This at least let's them do hit and run raids with somewhat reasonable chance of escaping.

Worst (and more probable) case, they lose all capital ships committed to their idiotic offensive into range of US land-based airpower, and effectively knock themselves out of the war.


The 1000 bomber raids proved pretty ineffective, and the USA has a lot more capacity to absorb some serious blows, even assuming operating out of Canada somehow solves all the problems.


By 1940, it's gonna take at least Germany, UK, Japan, and France all at once forcibly beat the US into submission.
 
If the shipyards on the East Coast are being hit they aren't going to have OTL production. The four major yards, ie Quincy, Brookyln, Philadephia and Newport News are all within 500 miles of Canadian airspace and on the coast.
Where are the forces in Canada , Bermuda and the Bahamas (I assume that is where the RAF is going to be based for this bombing campaign) going to get petrol? It won't be coming by tanker from Texas (the primary source in WWII) and I doubt it will come from Curacao (The secondary source in WWII) The U.S. had plenty of R & S class submarines in reserve to use against GB. They didn't have the range for a transpacific campaign (We will leave that to fleet boats to the traditional campaign against Japan) but have plenty of range for use in the Atlantic. And the older design torpedos used by the S class did not have anywhere near the problems of the newer torpedos used by the fleet boats.

Also remember that many of the Lancasters that formed the backbone of Bomber Command were B.III aircraft with Packard merlin engines. The reason there were packard merlins for mustangs was that Packard was already building them for Lancasters. I would have to look up numbers but memory tells me between 1/3 and 1/2 of the Lancasters used by B omber command were B.IIIs.

Then there are the radar units for ASW and H2S radar. Yes the British invented the cavity magnatron. but they were not able to produce it in enough volume.. The great majority of the radar units used by RAF and RN used American produced cavity magnatrons at their core.

And where are the British going to get the ships it needs to feed itself? Even if they are able to produce the plans that became known as the Liberty Ship, where do they produce the volume they need to make up losses to the submarine campaign? And the United Kingdom is much more dependent on ocean trade than the U.S. is. The U.S can feed itself and produce most basic materials strictly using internal commerce.

And I don't see Canada being a willing partner in this. They are already tightly tied economically with the U.S. and if France is on the other side Quebec would be nothing but trouble.
 
If the imperials get nukes first will the USA surrender?
That first would be in the 1950s, with a Neutral USA.
The UK, like the USA, really underestimated the infrastructure needed to make many atomic bombs. Would go faster with access to Canadian hydropower, but not much faster.

The difference was, that even with WWII raging, the USA had a lit of slack. Like to deal with UF6, needed for gaseous diffusion, US had Teflon as a by-product of chlorofluorocarbon research, and able to plate miles of stainless steel tubing with Nickel, thanks to Dodge having a spare factory that chromed bumpers, and could be scaled up.
 
If the shipyards on the East Coast are being hit they aren't going to have OTL production. The four major yards, ie Quincy, Brookyln, Philadephia and Newport News are all within 500 miles of Canadian airspace and on the coast.

Thats not going to work. If the US sees the British building up forces in Canada they will respond appropriately.

While pre WWI US has no substantial army, neither does Canada, and it can arm up its guard formations more quickly to occupy Eastern Canada.

Lets also remember, in this scenario, the US is not fighting Germany, correct? That means all that production is going to be hammering Britain. An occupied Canada means Britain is playing the U Boat campaign all alone, against someone who can make 20x as many submarines.

In worse case scenario London is radioactive in 1945.
 
Thats not going to work. If the US sees the British building up forces in Canada they will respond appropriately.

While pre WWI US has no substantial army, neither does Canada, and it can arm up its guard formations more quickly to occupy Eastern Canada.

Lets also remember, in this scenario, the US is not fighting Germany, correct? That means all that production is going to be hammering Britain. An occupied Canada means Britain is playing the U Boat campaign all alone, against someone who can make 20x as many submarines.

In worse case scenario London is radioactive in 1945.

Erm....you know in this scenario Britain can import from Europe? Europe can import from the world. The US needs world trade to function as a society so really cannot do the kind of USW they did against Japan without the very real risk of hitting their own ships and neutrals carrying US cargoes?

You should be able to demonstrate that the US has effective responses short of these kinds of wild flights of fancy. Why not read some of the commentary above?
 
Interesting, but I keep wondering a few items.

1) Why would Japan attack US in this scenario? IOTL it attacked US because it was being cut off from resources. In the scenario the occupation of Netherlands would of led to a British and Australia occupying Dutch East Indies. It then can sell oil to the Japanese.
2) Please Note that in 1932 the Dominion Act provided Canada, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand with greater independence, In WW1 the entry of Britain in war meant that Canada and other Dominions also joined the war. IN WW2 they each had to declare war on Germany and Subsequently on Japan. So we would need 4 Dominions to be on board and have "fascist" governments seems to difficult.
3) For your scenario to have any chance of working you need few things to go your way.
a) Part of Dutch East Indies would be demanded by Australians along with French Pacific Colonies.
b) The British would want all of Borneo not give it to the Japanese and that was where the oil was.
c) Best the Japanese could hope for is Philippines and French Indochina the rest the British and commonwealth would want to keep for security and just plain greed.
d) Australia and British along with Japanese navy would want to both destroy American bases in Hawaii and capture it so they have a clear path between Canada and Australia. New Zealand and British invade Panama Canal from Pacific while Forces in the Carribean would of attacked both Puerto Rico, Cuba and Panama Canal from Caribbean Sea.
e) Get Mexico onside from 1940-1941 promising to give it back part of land it lost in Mexico-USA war.
f) Follow-up the capture of Hawaii with actual invasion of California with assistance of Mexico.
g) The Japanese should concentrate on China, which it would have a free hand and since no Burma road no assistance.
h) Japan signs non-aggression treaty with Soviet Union following invasion by Germany allowing the Soviets to send majority if not all troops west. Then in 1942 when Soviet Union on verge of collapsing invade and capture most of Siberia.

Note: Portuguese Timor would not be attacked since it was not part of Dutch East Indies and Portugal was aligned with Britain, Which bring us to the fact that the British could of used Azores, Bermuda and Bahamas to launch their own blitz against American forces and industry in south.

What I not understand is what is FDR and American government doing through all this? No the only logical explanation is that he never comes to power and that a more isolationist and advocating greater state freedom President reduces Federal powers and US military go more to the state militia after WWI. You need to limit US ability to have any chance of the scenario to work.

Great comment

1) it seems like the USA was going to keep escalating if Japan didn't leave China. If the US won't ever declare war on Japan then you're right the preventative attack is not needed. It wasn't needed otl either Philippines didn't have any oil.

2) not necessarily fascist but more nationalist and similar to the Japanese a sense of superiority. Perhaps the island mentality spreads. There were otl a lot of advocates for anglo Japanese relations. Fiction books become better etc. Perhaps the change is during the imperial conferences and the empire gets reimagined..

3)a I mentioned they'd take Papua what else would they want? Timor?

B that's reasonable

C otl the Japanese were willing to leave everywhere but China just to lift the embargo so I believe with British alliance they would have a smaller sphere. Something more in line with https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Asian_cultural_sphere

D sounds good

E I didn't even think about Mexico and South America.

H I like. The burma road will have British troops invading now

If there's a more isolationist do they never go to war? Or do they wait for the USA to declare war on the hope that the Americans will lose faith in their government. Target the population by saying how pointless the war is. Fund isolationists

Would Portugal join Britain here or join the axis or stay neutral?

Would they sell timor leste if Australia wants all of timor? I can't imagine the colony does much
 
Rather than trying to force britain to commit suicide perhaps flip it around and have the US go communist or fascist?

With a hostile US possibly allied to the Soviets Britain tolerates Japanese shenanigans out of raw terror. The US being the aggressor alters the calculus somewhat and IMHO is far more likely.
 
Rather than trying to force britain to commit suicide perhaps flip it around and have the US go communist or fascist?

With a hostile US possibly allied to the Soviets Britain tolerates Japanese shenanigans out of raw terror. The US being the aggressor alters the calculus somewhat and IMHO is far more likely.

Sure that works well, France easily falls to communism, so the Entente can be the cominterm. The USA lend leases the USSR as OTL. If the USA decides to declare war on them then they lose the surprise attack. And the commie US will just roll over the Americas.
 
American industrial heartland is within range of RAF heavies from British holding in N America. The Royal Navy can hit American shipping and bases from Newfoundland etc, and the Americans have no equivalent capability.

The focus of American operations would be to try and evict the British from N America....the Phillipines, Gaum and even possibly Hawaii are write offs.

1000 bomber raids againt the North Eastern population centers? Instead of Hamburg, Colonge, Essen and Dresdan, we get Detroit, New York, Chicago and Philadelphia?

You know, betting againt the Royal Navy is usually a very bad idea.

1. US has homefield in North America. Bombing against the USAAF in 1940? Viable. 1941 it is a very bad option. The RAF dies.
2. To knock Canada out, (Get past the McNaughton Line.) from New England and Michigan is a murderous affair. Canadians, contrary to popular opinion, are no pushovers, nor are they amateurs. This is the hard part. Takes 2 years, followed by guerilla warfare, but doable. Canada will be a long time taming but it is doable. Once the St Lawrence River Valley is in US hands, it is over for the UK forever. The bomber war starts looking very grim for the UK. (Iceland).

British possessions in the New World become forfeit.

Now about writing off the Philippines, Hawaii and Indonesia. Nope. Based on RTL performance in battle, I would be far more afraid of the IJN than the RN. The Japanese were the gold standard. Bet against them at your peril. The RN were "manageable" and beatable for they were badly beaten by the Japanese. Therefore; go with the navy that beat them.
 
The US needs world trade to function as a society so really cannot do the kind of USW they did against Japan without the very real risk of hitting their own ships and neutrals carrying US cargoes?
Not in 1940 they didn’t. Oh it’ll sting sure, but not as much as it would in peacetime, and it’ll hurt others a lot more. And even if Europe is cut off South America is not, and can’t be.
 
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