AHC: USA goes to war against Nazi Germany without France falling?

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
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I'm looking for PoDs after March 1940 only please.

In OTL the fall of France, unexpected, and unexpectedly rapid, spooked the US into accelerated rearmament and conscription.

If France resists Nazi Germany on the European mainland in perpetuity, how could circumstances conspired to eventually bring in the US as a belligerent against the Nazis before the war is over?
 
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If France resists Nazi Germany on the European mainland in perpetuity, how could circumstances conspired to eventually bring in the US as a belligerent against the Nazis before the war is over?

One possibility has parallels to the Great War. Bad diplomacy of the German leaders, the submarine/raider war, and US ties to France and the smaller nations occupied by Germany pulls the US into it. For the US ending the war & restoring something like the pre 1914 Europe was economically important to the US. nazi management of Europe promised nothing good for US trade & exports, about 60% of the US economy in the previous two decades.

France surviving probably waives away the Japanese occupation of French Indochina, the Embargos, and a Pacific war as we know it. While the Two Ocean Navy Act is still included in the 1940-42 budget the Europe First policy will be a given. Hardly discussed. That means more attention to enforcing the western Atlantic Exclusion or Neutrality Zone & greater tensions between the US and Germany.

France still in the war may reduce pro German/Facist sentiment in latin America, so more successful Allied/US diplomacy there.

If, as the French calculated Germany peaks out & its economy/military are sagging in late 1941, when the French expected to start offensive actions. Then the US may not actually get into the war. A early German collapse in the winter of 1941-42, or later in 1942 leaves the US military out of it, other than observers. If the USSR takes advantage of the situation in 1942 & attacks Germany its game over. Ike, Patton, Clark, & the rest retire in obscurity.
 
If the US does get into it its air force and naval forces would be more important that its half built army. As in 1918 the US Army sole might be just as cannon fodder to help break the German ground defense in a 1942 offensive.
 

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
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I think this challenge is actually quite hard. A Germany that does not occupy the Atlantic ports of France is unlikely to be able to support u boat operations of the scale, range and frequency to provoke the US into declaring war, rather than just more measures to underwrite allied victory.
 
If Japan still attacks south (i.e. into Indochina to start with) the US is likely to impose sanctions, which may lead to Japan thinking it needs to go to war against the US. Not certain, of course, but possible.

And if Japan goes to war, Hitler might well declare war and the US would be in.
OTOH, having to conquer Indochina would sop up even more of Japan's scarce resources, and brings in the Brits and the French. It would make an attack on the US even more insane than OTL, enough that it might even make the Japanese think twice.

In THIS scenario, perhaps Japan assumes the US will stay out (Japan must win. Japan can't win against the US. Therefore the US will stay out.)
If Japan leaves the US alone, the US builds up the Philippines like MacArthur wanted to. FDR then orders aggressive 'convoy' and 'commerce protection' patrols in mid '42, when there's at least a chance the PI can hold out. This leads to escalating confrontations with Japan, and war starts late '42, about a year late.

Japan is in desperate trouble, and appeals to Germany for help, and they declare war on the US, bringing the US in.
 
Or you could just have aggressive patrolling in the Atlantic, shepherding convoys to Iceland, sinking the odd Uboot, and losing a few destroyers and cruisers.

Eventually, one did or the other declares war.
 

Geon

Donor
First thing we have to assume. The fateful plane crash that allowed the German war plans to fall into Allied hands doesn't occur. Hitler proceeds with the all-too obvious variant of the Schlieffen Plan. And the UK and French forces are able to fight the forces on the Western Front to a standstill.

The next POD depends on how far the Germans are able to go on their original plan. Assume here they manage to take the Netherlands, Belgium capitulates, and Luxembourg is captured. The Allies are forced back but not cut off. Eventually they manage as in World War I to set up a defensive line just short of Paris. The war then becomes a war of attrition. Which I believe still favors the Germans.

To provide manpower for the factories producing war material Hitler needs workers. Whole villages' manpower behind the lines is conscripted as well as any French and British POWs to work in the Nazi armament factories. Reports start coming back of the brutal conditions many of these slave laborers are forced to work in. Despite the isolationists in the U.S, insisting this is not America's war newsreels of homeless bombed out refugees and smuggled photos showing the conditions for the slave laborers start stirring the public against Germany.

As the war drags on a resistance springs up behind the lines. That resistance faces the full might of the SS. Towns are leveled similar to what happened to Lidice and Oradur sur Glane in reprisal for attacks on German columns. All of this is fertile fuel for the press in the U.S. Churchill makes certain that lots of photos and films are smuggled out of the occupied regions and find their way into newsreels in American theaters.

It might take a year or two, but I believe public sentiment would rather quickly shift from isolationism to anger as Americans witness the utter brutality of the Nazis. Within two years I believe FDR would have enough of a consensus to declare war on Germany.
 
Skimming back through my notes; In the spring of 1940 French purchasing agents had a interest in a prototype under construction of a four engine bomber. They'd already been told the 1936 vintage Boeing 299 or B17 was off limits as the USAC wanted all that production. But, this design Consolidated Aircraft was completing looked exciting. In this scenario we could see the French flying a version of the B24 Liberator over Germany circa 1942.
 
Skimming back through my notes; In the spring of 1940 French purchasing agents had a interest in a prototype under construction of a four engine bomber. They'd already been told the 1936 vintage Boeing 299 or B17 was off limits as the USAC wanted all that production. But, this design Consolidated Aircraft was completing looked exciting. In this scenario we could see the French flying a version of the B24 Liberator over Germany circa 1942.
France Ordered 120 off the drawing board
Here is the XB-24,flying in December 1939. The French were going with the YB-24, some slight changes.
B24-Liberator-Agony-Wagon-03.jpg

Things of note: Shorter nose, Six handheld 7.5mm MGs, no turbochargers, LE Slots

Brits took over those Order when France Fell, and used them as LB-30A Transports.
One still exists, #18 off the assembly line
4754050348_d753602e6c_b.jpg
 
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