A different "Manstein in Africa" scenario

Eurofed

Banned
The scenario I propose is a variant of BlairWitch 749's masterful "Manstein in Africa" TL (here, here, and here). The PoD (Manstein being sent to Africa to head the Africa Corps instead of Rommel) is the same, as well as the broad strategic consequences: gradual Axis military and economic total integration waging an effective coalition war, the military of Italy and later the other European Axis members raised to German efficiency levels, Hitler delaying Barbarossa to 1942 in order to focus Axis strength to crush Britain in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic, the Axis conquering North Africa, the Middle East, and East Africa, Spain, Turkey, and Vichy France joining the Axis which stages a collective naval and land massive build-up for uber-Barbarossa and naval supremacy in the Atlantic, British war coalition clinging to power with wild promises of American help, Stalin attacking first by a few weeks in late Spring or early Summer 1942, even if the Axis is fairly prepared for a defensive battle.

The main variant I wish to introduce is Japan: once the Axis conquers the Middle East, it bargains a Japanese cobelligerance against Soviet Russia in exchange for getting Middle Eastern oil, which defies the Allied embargo. The Japanese government accepts the deal, assumes a defensive stance in China and throws the bulk of its army against the Russian Far East once Stalin attacks. Thanks to Axis military integration, Japan receives a few hundred German tanks & planes and licences to build more (although of course logistical issues make Axis integration nowhere as efficient as it is for the European partners). Japan assumes a defensive stance in the Pacific and South East Asia, since it has little reason to attack South in this scenario.

In the Atlantic, the Axis sticks to a defensive stance against America and keeps trying to avoid Roosevelt's provocations. FDR keeps waging an undeclared naval war with the Axis in the Atlantic and sending as much Land-Lease to Britain as he can to the best of his constitutional peacetime powers, but an Axis declaration of war or armed attack against America is never coming. Since Stalin attacks first, the Congress bans L-L to the USSR at least until America and the Axis are at war, and may or may not keep it lower than OTL afterwards. It would have very serious problems reaching Russia in substantial amounts anyway.

Although it is wholly feasible and indeed quite likely that Axis-American naval build-up and undeclared war in the Atlantic may eventually give FDR a Lusitania-style casus belli at some point, it cannot be expected to be a sure or quick thing. Pro-British lobbies already pulled the trick in 1917 and the American public was quite wary of falling in the same trap during the 1930s, British weakness, Axis defensive attitude vs. the USA, and Soviet aggressiveness would strengthen the US isolationist public opinion, a casus belli arising from FDR's deliberate naval provocations would be much more controversial with the American public and Congress than OTL belligerance, and the Republican Party with its large isolationist wing was gradually recovering its strength during the 1940s.

An alternative possibility is Britain enlarging the war by seizing Japanese oil shipments of ME oil as contraband. This would easily and quickly escalate to war between Britain and Japan, but again assuming that Japan doesn't attack the Hawaii or the Philippines on its own initiative, an American intervention in a war against Japan that the UK started would be rather more controversial than OTL with the American public (although not so much as a deliberate intervention in the European war), and FDR cannot be assumed to get a declaration of war from Congress at once. It is of course all but sure that he would try and quite likely eventually succeed to get the USN into a provocative stance and some naval "incident" with the Japanese, and escalate it into war. But again these things take time, and American belligerance would be substantially delayed. Of course, if Japan enlarges its counterattack to the Philippines, this would bring an enraged America in the war at once.

For these reasons, it is wholly sensible to assume that American belligerance, if it ever happens, would be largely delayed, at the very least by 6-8 months if not quite possibly 12-16 months, even if America during 1942 would keep waging its huge military build-up (quite possibly enlarging it even further) and doing everything it could as a sympathetic neutral and already did in 1941 to assist Britain. Differently from BW's TL, however, America does not lose the vast majority of its warships to a double Pearl Harbor and would join the war with an intact Navy (but a rather less determined will to fight). It may also enjoy an extra year or so of military build-up, but so would the Axis and the Soviets.
 
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The scenario I propose is a variant of BlairWitch 749's masterful "Manstein in Africa" TL (here, here, and here). The PoD (Manstein being sent to Africa to head the Africa Corps instead of Rommel) is the same, as well as the broad strategic consequences: gradual Axis military and economic total integration waging an effective coalition war, the military of Italy and later the other European Axis members raised to German efficiency levels, Hitler delaying Barbarossa to 1942 in order to focus Axis strength to crush Britain in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic, the Axis conquers North Africa, the Middle East, and East Africa, Spain, Turkey, and Vichy France join the Axis which stages a collective naval and land massive build-up for uber-Barbarossa and naval supremacy in the Atlantic, British war coalition clings to power with wild promises of American help, Stalin attacks first in late Spring or early Summer 1942 by a few weeks, even if the Axis is fairly prepared for a defensive battle.

The main variant I wish to introduce is Japan: once the Axis conquers the Middle East, it bargains a Japanese cobelligerance against Soviet Russia in exchange for getting Middle Eastern oil, which defies the Allied embargo. The Japanese government accepts the deal, assumes a defensive stance in China and throws the bulk of its army against the Russian Far East once Stalin attacks. Thanks to Axis military integration, Japan receives a few hundred German tanks & planes and licences to build more (although of course logistical issues make the integration nowhere as efficient as it is for the European Axis). Japan assumes a defensive stance in the Pacific and South East Asia, since it has little reason to attack South in this scenario.

In the Atlantic, the Axis sticks to a defensive stance and keeps trying to avoid provocation against America. FDR keeps waging an undeclared naval war with the Axis in the Atlantic and sending as much Land-Lease to Britain as he can to the best of his constitutional peacetime powers, but an Axis declaration of war or armed attack against America is never coming. Since Stalin attacks first, the Congress bans L-L to the USSR at least until America and the Axis are at war, and may or may not keep it much lower than OTL afterwards. It would have very serious problems reaching Russia anyway.

Although it is wholly feasible and indeed quite possible that eventually American and Axis naval build-up and undeclared war in the Atlantic may give FDR a Lusitania-style casus belli at some point, it cannot be expected to be a sure or quick thing. Pro-British lobbies already pulled the trick in 1917 and the American public was quite wary of falling in the same trap during the 1930s, British weakness, Axis defensive attitude vs. the USA, and Soviet aggressiveness would strengthen the US isolationist public opinion, a casus belli arising from FDR's deliberate naval provocations would be much more controversial with the American public and Congress than OTL belligerance, and the Republican Party with its large isolationist wing was gradually recovering its strength during the 1940s.

An alternative possibility is Britain enlarging the war by seizing Japanese oil shipments of ME oil as contraband. This would easily escalate to war between Britain and Japan, but again assuming that Japan doesn't attack the Hawaii or the Philippines, an American intervention in a war against Japan that the UK started would be rather more controversial than OTL with the American public (not so much as deliberate intervention in the war in Europe, however), and FDR cannot be assumed to get a declaration of war from Congress at once. It is of course all but sure that he would try and quite possibly eventually succeed to get the USN into a provocative stance and some naval "incident" with the Japanese, and escalate it into war. But again these things take time, and American belligerance would be substantially delayed. Of course, if Japan enlarges its counterattack to the Philippines, this would bring an enraged America in the war at once.

For these reasons, it is wholly sensible to assume that American belligerance, if it ever happens, would be largely delayed, at the very least by 6-8 months if not quite possibly 12-16 months, even if America during 1942 would keep its huge military build-up (quite possibly further enlarging it) and doing everything it could as a sympathetic neutral and already did in 1941 to assist Britain. Differently from BW's TL, however, America does not lose the vast majority of its warships to a double Pearl Harbor and would join the war with an intact Navy (but a rather less determined will to fight).

Seconded. I like this idea alot. The double sneak attack on America was a foollish blunder even by Hitler's standard; I have to believe that someone in the German military would have talked him out of it.

If you write it, I will subscribe. :)
 
Seconded. I like this idea alot. The double sneak attack on America was a foollish blunder even by Hitler's standard; I have to believe that someone in the German military would have talked him out of it.

If you write it, I will subscribe. :)

There are a number of variants available within my story.

There are a couple of avenues to get Manstein into command of the DAK.

The first one with the most follow on possibilities (and the one I used) is to have him selected initially to command the unit. (Hitler considered him in otl and he was favored by elements of the general staff; especially Paulus as quartermaster general, but Hitler felt Rommel had more propaganda value and selected him)

The second one, Rommel during his first counterattack in March 1941 right after operation sunflower nearly landed right next to a British column and would have been taken prisoner. The 5th light had just succeeded in embarassing the British and taking all of Cyranacia except Tobruk. Manstein would have been on a short list to take over if Rommel was captured at that point

The third possibility is Rommel being relieved for how poorly his attacks on Tobruk went. Paulus who was the observer for the OKW/OKH was scathing and lobbied for him to be relieved. Again with Rommel eliminated from command Manstein would be on the top of a short list (plus his command was just training and not doing anything since he wasn't involved in the Yugo/Greece campaigns

The last major possibility was after the first battle of Alemein where Rommel went home on sick leave and was replaced with Stumme. Rommel initially lobbied for Guderian to be taken out of retirement and sent to Africa (he was still in Hitler's doghouse AND recovering from serious heart surgery so he was rejected, Rommel's next request was for Erich Von Manstein who at that moment was being shuttled north with his victorious 11th army to try to capture Leningrad, he was rejected on the grounds that the Russian front couldn't spare his talents, he would be given Army Group Don just a few weeks later, perhaps one of Hitler's insites to keep him there) so Stumme was next on the totem poll

Feel free to borrow any creative license you want in construction:)
 

Eurofed

Banned
Seconded. I like this idea alot. The double sneak attack on America was a foollish blunder even by Hitler's standard; I have to believe that someone in the German military would have talked him out of it.

If you write it, I will subscribe. :)


There are a number of variants available within my story.

There are a couple of avenues to get Manstein into command of the DAK.

The first one with the most follow on possibilities (and the one I used) is to have him selected initially to command the unit. (Hitler considered him in otl and he was favored by elements of the general staff; especially Paulus as quartermaster general, but Hitler felt Rommel had more propaganda value and selected him)

The second one, Rommel during his first counterattack in March 1941 right after operation sunflower nearly landed right next to a British column and would have been taken prisoner. The 5th light had just succeeded in embarassing the British and taking all of Cyranacia except Tobruk. Manstein would have been on a short list to take over if Rommel was captured at that point

The third possibility is Rommel being relieved for how poorly his attacks on Tobruk went. Paulus who was the observer for the OKW/OKH was scathing and lobbied for him to be relieved. Again with Rommel eliminated from command Manstein would be on the top of a short list (plus his command was just training and not doing anything since he wasn't involved in the Yugo/Greece campaigns

The last major possibility was after the first battle of Alemein where Rommel went home on sick leave and was replaced with Stumme. Rommel initially lobbied for Guderian to be taken out of retirement and sent to Africa (he was still in Hitler's doghouse AND recovering from serious heart surgery so he was rejected, Rommel's next request was for Erich Von Manstein who at that moment was being shuttled north with his victorious 11th army to try to capture Leningrad, he was rejected on the grounds that the Russian front couldn't spare his talents, he would be given Army Group Don just a few weeks later, perhaps one of Hitler's insites to keep him there) so Stumme was next on the totem poll

Feel free to borrow any creative license you want in construction:)

Thank you for the kind support to my idea, even if I only meant this one to be a discussion thread and talking shop. I would not really tackle the task of doing a variant TL to MiA until and unless it is fully written, for various reasons. And I would try to stick as close as possible to the original early PoD used in MiA, to minimize butterflies.

Now, on further reflection, even if we assume that in this new TL, Hitler, Mussolini, and Tojo are talked out of the huge blunder of giving FDR excatly what he wanted, there might be another theoretical possiblity to bring Japan at war with Britain, and thus eventually America in the conflict.

Theoretically the Axis leaders might decide to agree on a combined attack on the British Empire in Asia, in addition to the one on Soviet Russia. But I'm rather skeptical that it wuld be feasible. A Japanese invasion of British Malaya and Birmania would bring the European Axis trivial strategic benefits, and an Axis invasion of India would distract too many forces from the offensive against Soviet Russia, for the European Axis and Japan alike, so I expect the idea would be shot down.

No, relatively speaking, the quickest and surest way to bring America in the fray would be Britain picking a fight with Japan,. Although with North Africa and the Middle East gone, and Britain sorely hard-pressed in the Atlantic, I have some serious reservations that in this situation, the British Parliament and public is going to accept adding to their troubles by picking another fight with Japan, even if the government sells it for what it is, a desperate gamble to force America in the war.

As for the *Lusitania scenario repeating itself, I have very serious doubts that it would bring America in the fight soon after PH anyway. Sure it may easily happen eventually, but it is going to take at least the better part of a year, perhaos more. WWI had left a very sour aftertaste in the American public about pro-British lobbies manipulating naval incidents to pull America into European wars to fight for the Entente's sake. Avoiding a repeat was everything the Neutrality Acts were about, and it would not be nowhere simple for FDR to let the public fall for the same trick all over again. Isolationists were quite wary of the possibility, and even if Roosevel eventually manages to pull it, it is going to take a long time of increasing tensions and repeated naval incidents and skirmishes in the Atlantic, and FDR's dogged pursuit of an undeclared naval war may backfire politically if he tries too hard and fails.
 
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