Hey Wiking, if your thinking is that FFO means an involuntary postponement of Barbarossa, does that rule out a DoW on the USA, who by 1941 will be a huge arsenal for British and French Empires? Carl Schwamberger offered the logic before that if not for Barbarossa, Hitler would have DoW'ed the US in retaliation for its aid to Britain and the US forward policy in the Atlantic.
I didn't see this, make sure next time to at the 'at' symbol.
That's actually a really interesting question I hadn't though of or necessarily have a good answer to.
I'm not sure that Hitler would have DoWed the US for it's policy, he was trying to keep them out of the war and if pursuing a Mediterranean strategy it would be counter productive to bring the US into the war in 1940-41 if the goal was to defeat the Allies.
Now we also need to look at the situation of US politics with the French fighting on, no LL due to French gold stocks being available, no invasion of the USSR meaning the US communists/left don't turn on Hitler and start beating the war drum (the USSR was doing a lot to fund the anti-war movement in the US in favor of Germany prior to Barbarossa), and so on. Of course if Hitler does get the Spanish into the war then things might get interesting in terms of US politics, especially if it means the Allies suffer badly as a result. There could well end up being more incidents in the Atlantic as a result of Hitler not turning East and focusing on defeating the Allies completely.
A lot depends on what plan Hitler does take and what the results in 1940 are. If the Allies are really on the ropes as of 1941, then Roosevelt might get more aggressive than IOTL in 1941, but aside from that I'm not sure what it would actually take to provoke Hitler to DoW the US early ITTL.
Sure, but not to the point that the Germans won't feel that they won't be able to defeat the USSR.
Based on?
Because your claim that the political/strategic situation is that different simply doesn't hold water. It's fundamentally still the same as OTL late-1940/early-1941 except less favorable to the Germans. Germany still lacks the means to prosecute a naval expeditionary war in the Med, except even more so with the French navy opposing them and the lack of French resources, and the German high command know it. Their comfort zone remains in massive land war. Hitler still has his ideological preference for achieving lebensraum. The French, like the British pose a long-term threat as they reorganize and get American aid and, from the German perspective, can be rendered an irrelevancy by a defeat and conquest of the USSR which, the Germans believe, should only take a couple of months maximum as opposed to the sort of multi-year long campaign the Mediterranean campaign calls for.
How isn't the situation completely different? Vichy was a game changer IOTL, as it neutralized the French fleet and forces abroad, set up a vassal system of economic tribute by French authorities, ceded to Germany huge amounts of equipment, and even got the British to attack the French.
The fact that things are so much less favorable means that Barbarossa remains a pipedream that was only possible IOTL by Britain being so alone and weak after France was effectively turned into a near German ally.
The strategic situation being what it was meant that Germany has to find a way to neutralize the French fleet and go after North Africa, which means the land route via Spain. From Spain they can fly to Morocco and use their captured fleet of merchant ships and whatever the Spanish have to essentially coastal ship across the Strait of Gibraltar, while the Allied fleets couldn't risk running the gauntlet to interdict. Beyond that the various landing/shipping vessels the Germans were working on IOTL for Sealion (like the MFPs), which IOTL were used for supply shipping runs in the Mediterranean, were more than useful for supply shipping from Spain to Morocco.
The land route is there and needed in fact. The French aren't a long term threat, they are an immediate and pressing one due to the threat of the fleet, which would in combination with the British threaten to knock Italy out of the war.
IOTL Hitler's Lebensraum fantasy fueled invasion of the USSR was only be possible given the existence of Vichy and the resources it provided, while neutralizing the threat of the French fleet and colonies. That's why the decision to invade the USSR was only made in December 1940 after all other options were looked and Vichy was firmly set up and in power. Given the massive butterflies unleashed by this POD there is no way you can say with any degree of certainty that Hitler would make exactly the same decisions as IOTL.
The resources spent propping up Italy in 1941-42 were a drop in the bucket compared to the Eastern Front and a increased, while a drag, isn't going to be much of a decisive finish. Meanwhile, a Med strategy is rendered more infeasible, not less, by the French still being in due to the naval balance of power being even more egregiously against the Germans.
More than a drop considering 30% of the Luftwaffe was deployed to the Mediterranean and there was a large investment of forces to deal with Greece, which resulted in the 2nd Panzer division losing it's equipment and both it and the 5th Panzer being unavailable until Typhoon. That's on top of the divisions kept out of the East occupying Greece or rendered combat ineffective as a result of the fighting in Greece-Crete, plus of course the hundreds of aircraft lost/damaged in the operation. The Afrika Korps also consumed seriously disproportionate and increasing resources, including over 1000 tanks by the end of the commitment. The operations in the Balkans actually caused significant changes to Barbarossa, as major forces weren't available as a result. The double panzer pincer planned out of Romania and Galicia had to be cancelled for instance.
Add in the increased forced needed to hold down France plus all the additional forces that would be needed to help Italy either take Tunisia or hold it's own in the Central Mediterranean and Germany simply cannot afford Barbarossa.
The naval issue is mooted by Spain and air power. The Mediterranean option was always feasible and would be feasible ITTL too, it just required Hitler to realize that Barbarossa was not viable given all the extra problems/forces unavailable caused ITTL leaving the Mediterranean the only option on the table.
Yes it is. Leaving aside that the price of getting Spain in is liable to go up as Franco, on top of his historical reluctance to join, is now faced with the very real prospect of losing his overseas colonies to a Anglo-French counter-invasion without Vichy France and Italian colonies acting as a buffer, Anglo-French naval superiority means that French North Africa can be supplied through the Suez on the one hand and the Atlantic coast on the other even if Gibraltar falls.
You really should read up on the modern research on Franco, he wanted to enter it was actually Hitler who was reluctant given that Franco's demands would mean disrupting the deal with Vichy. That is not an obstacle ITTL.
Here is a link on another thread I posted:
https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...hts-on-from-1940.464004/page-12#post-18722818
Later, when in June 1940 Italy entered the war on the side of Germany, at the urging of Mussolini, Franco changed his declaration of neutrality to non-belligerency.
294 Taking advantage of the situation, on June 14, 1940, Spain occupied
Tangier .
295
Later, on the occasion of the fall of France, Franco congratulated Hitler:
296
At first Hitler dismissed Franco's offer, but the difficulties he encountered in his war against England made him think about the convenience of Spain's incorporation into the conflict. On August 8, 1940, Berlin produced a report on the costs and benefits of Spain's entry into the war. Spain, without the help of Germany, would hardly endure the war effort. With this forecast, the advantage centered on the suppression of Spanish exports of minerals to England, the access of Germany to English-owned iron and copper mines in Spain and the control of the
Strait of Gibraltar.. The drawbacks would be: a foreseeable British occupation of the Canary Islands and the Balearic Islands, the expansion of Gibraltar, the possible connection of the British forces with the French forces in Morocco and the need to supply Spain with essential products and fuel (since Spain these materials were supplied in third countries); also, the need to rearm it, adding the difficulties that the narrow roads and the different gauge would mean for the transport of war material.
298 A second detailed study of the assistance that Spain would need to enter the war discouraged the Germans. That summer there were numerous contacts between Spain and Germany.
On September 13, 1940, Serrano SuñerHe made a trip to Nazi Germany as Franco's special envoy. Serrano informed the Germans that Spain would enter the war on the German side in exchange for aid, arms and territories of North Africa, where Spain could re-establish an empire. 299
In this meeting Serrano would leave a message for Hitler and recorded on video by the Germans, in which he said:
299
According to Reinhard Spitzy, who was secretary and advisor to
Joachim von Ribbentrop (German Minister of Foreign Affairs), Minister Ribbentrop was not surprised by Serrano Suñer's offer to enter the war and suggested to the Spanish envoy that " After all, Spain was no more than a puppet of Germany "and that" Hitler was not very interested in what Spain needed to take part in the war. "
299 The enthusiasm shown by Franco before the entry of Spain into the war, which with the subsequent distribution of
Africa would fulfill his imperialist ambitions, contrasted with the skepticism shown by Germany.
300Franco's ambitions regarding his gains in the war were French Morocco, a part of
Algeria and the expansion of the
Spanish Sahara and the territory of
Equatorial Guinea .
301 There was also talk in Hendaya of handing over to Spain the
French Catalonia .
302There were also voices in the hard wing of the Falange asking for the annexation of
Portugal .
303 However, these ambitions clashed with the Germans, who, in exchange for their military aid, demanded the surrender of one of the
Canary Islands ,
Fernando Poo and
Annobón , in exchange for French Morocco.
304 Despite these disagreements, in a letter from Franco to Serrano Súñer in September 1940 he expressed that "he believed blindly in the victory of the Axis and was fully determined to enter the war." 305 On October 16, 1940, Franco appointed his third government, in which Serrano Súñer replaced Beigbeder in Foreign Affairs, considered an allyophile.
306
On October 23, 1940, Franco left, together with Serrano Suñer, from San Sebastián to France, where the
Hendaye Interview took place between Hitler and Franco. Although Franco left with a lot of time in advance, he arrived five minutes late to the appointment, which caused him great displeasure.
299 According to Preston, «Franco went to the historic meeting with Hitler in Hendaye in the hope of obtaining an adequate reward for his repeated offers to join the Axis. Later his propagandists would affirm that Franco brilliantly contained the Nazi hordes in Hendaya holding off a threatening Hitler. In fact, the examination of the meeting does not indicate an excessive pressure on the part of Hitler in favor of the Spanish belligerence ». 308According to Reinhard Spitzy, Hitler went to the meeting thinking that Franco had a duty to enter the war on the German side and for all the favors that Germany did to Franco during the Spanish Civil War.
299 This also affirmed that Hitler, during the conversation, succeeded in persuading Franco to enter the war as an ally of Germany.
299 Serrano Suñer would affirm that Franco accepted Hitler's proposal to enter the war and, in return, wanted some African territories and protectorates.
299 Serrano would also affirm that, for an hour and a half, Franco was explaining to Hitler his ambitions and that the German only yawned again and again during all that time.
299Serrano also commented that, given the expectations of being able to annex
Morocco , Franco was like "an excited child, fond of what had been his desire to always: the world that had formed as a great military leader."
309The meeting lasted for several hours. Franco's colonial demands, which clashed with Hitler's other interests, were not addressed by him; and Hitler did not get flexibility on the part of Franco in his pretensions. Both would comment on the meeting in a dismissive tone. Hitler would say "these guys there is nothing to do" and would prefer that you bring forth three or four wheels before returning to talk with Franco, whom he dubbed "Latin charlatan." Later he would comment to Mussolini that Franco "had arrived at Generalissimo and head of the Spanish State only by accident. He was not a man who was up to the problems of political and material development of his country.
310 Goebbelshe noted in his diary that "the Führer does not have a good opinion of Spain and Franco. [...] They are not at all ready for war, they are hidalgos of an empire that no longer exists ».
311 For his part, Franco would comment to Serrano Suñer that: "These people are intolerable; They want us to go to war in exchange for nothing. "
312Nevertheless, a protocol was established that "constituted a formal commitment on the part of Spain to enter the war on the side of the Axis."
313 According to Preston, in November 1940 Franco "took several dangerous and unnecessary initiatives, which can only be interpreted as indicating his willingness to enter the war on the side of the Axis." 311
The Atlantic coast means nothing as a port, because of the low capacity of the rail lines from Morocco to Algeria. The Suez route is too far to supply the French, as not only would it be 400% as far as going via Gibraltar, something the British could barely afford for just themselves IOTL in 1940-41, it would then have to double back across the Central Mediterranean through Italian sea-space and air, naval, and mine threats. Cutting Gibraltar strangles the supplies to France and renders them impotent.
Except they do still have the necessary material to win the huge border battles, which disintegrates your entire point.
Depending on what and how many forces are diverted ITTL away from Barbarossa. Then as you pointed out the Germans of the time did not know that and thought the border battles would be twice as hard as IOTL. Using your hindsight to try and think about what the people of the time without it thought is silly. Remove hundreds of thousands of additional men with their equipment and TTL's planners can't guarantee that they could pull off the border battles. Of course all that is mooted by the need to do something against the French in exile before they can rally and knock Italy out of the war. That and assuming with all the butterflies unleashed ITTL Hitler still thinks Barbarossa is the only option to knock Britain out of the war.
Which is wishful thinking. Libya will be secured before the Germans could possibly make their move and that leaves the supply routes open with or without Gibraltar.
Speaking in absolutes in terms of this what if while ignoring all the disruption the French faced? Don't be silly. The French couldn't move for months, perhaps as much as half a year given the vast disruptions they faced and how the evacuation wouldn't leave them with much in the way of supplies or organization to go on the offensive. North Africa was stripped of it's combat ready units to fight in Europe and wasn't left with much other than defense forces other than what could be evacuated to North Africa in late June to early July. Those forces wouldn't be combat ready for quite some time, especially with the equipment and supply losses; US material help would take time in materializing and then organizing once it showed up in enough quantity. France has a lot of rebuilding to do before it could do anything other than defend and even that only badly.
As it was historically, the overwhelming bulk of the French Navy survived the fall of France quite well intact and in order. The British too were able to maintain a force equal to the Italians in the Med IOTL 1940-41, add the French to that and it becomes overwhelmingly against the Italians such that they can't really operate surface forces south of Malta.
Surviving intact doesn't mean that they were organized for combat operations or that the necessary bases were prepared to support them. Oran and Bizerte didn't handle the majority of the French fleet ever and now have to handle something like 80% of the pre-war force, plus maintain it in fighting trim all without the facilities or supplies for it. Plus there is a bunch of planning that needs to go into whatever they decide to do next once they actually reorder themselves. In the long run they would be able to outgun the Italians, but likely for most of the rest of 1940 they're stuck trying to unfuck themselves after their massive defeat and evacuation to a province not set up to handle them and an order schedule with the US that does not match their new reality.
Also the British Mediterranean fleet did not match the Italians in power, they were outgunned and it was only the Taranto Raid and lack of fuel for the Italians that evened the odds...at the end of 1940. Of course that was before the successful Italian raid on Alexandria.
The claim that the British have more trouble supplying themselves with greater naval dominance of the Med and Libya secured is so ludicrous as to not be worth addressing.
I get it, you don't a cogent response. The material superiority the Allies have doesn't really happen until the French actually get reorganized and resupplied to fight, which would probably take through most of 1940 and perhaps into 1941. That gives the Axis a ton of breathing room to move, especially if the BoB is not launched ITTL. Securing Libya certainly is not going to happen until 1941 and assumes the Axis does absolutely nothing in 1940-41 to counter them.
So basically the only difference I'm hearing is that the Anglo-French get 31 billion in L-L instead of 34 billion, with the 3 billion dollar difference being made out of French gold. Again, Lend-Lease is only the point that the US started taking stuff on credit instead of on payment. It isn't even the point when the US began provisioning military aid for the WAllies, that pre-dates L-L by quite a bit.
You have a habit of only hearing what you want it seems. LL is delayed and in the critical 1941 and perhaps 1942 period means the Allies only get a fraction of what they got via LL in the same time frame. LL only kicks in once they are proveably broke, but they didn't know that IOTL, they just hoped the US would pass a law to help them. So while the flood would be there eventually, it is delayed until the Allies get the nerve to buy themselves broke and then hope for the best. Which leaves them in a tight spot until probably 1942 given the money the French had and the spending rate they were going through it IOTL.
Pretty quickly. As it is, the French Navy survived and withdrew to the colonies in a quite organized fashion even before the armistice and was quite capable of operations from a very early stage, which is what prompted the British to attack them at Mers-El-Kebir after their surrender. The late bugout would mainly affect land forces available: air and naval withdrawals happened independently of the armistice decision as a precaution. The claim that the Italians are prepared IATL flies in the face of the historical evidence where the Italians showed themselves quite unprepared for what was coming OTL despite it being a much more favorable situation for the Italians to prepare.
The Mers el Kebir situation wasn't really about capabilities at the time, but potential threat they would be down the road if the Germans got the ships. Do you have a source about their combat readiness as of June 1940 after the evacuation?
The Italians of the 5th Army were prepared to fight the French, but IOTL were stripped out and sent to the other side of Libya under a different command and sent to fight before the 10th Army could finish preparations. OTL's situation in Egypt was quite different than moving on Tunisia; 5th Army was larger than the 10th Army in the East by a large margin and then all that was disrupted to rapidly switch to an invasion of Egypt on the fly. Of course things turned out badly, because Mussolini wasn't expecting a fight, rather just wanted a finger in the pie so that the British gave them a slice when the peace deal happened, which he thought was right around the corner. Understanding that will make his move on Greece make sense as well, same with his decisions to move before preparations were complete. This of course is quite different than TTL when there is no reason to assume the Allies would quit any time soon.
The Germans had the resources to win at the border and still will IATL. They don't have the resources for prosecuting the war deep into the USSR, but then they ultimately didn't have that OTL and didn't care since their assumption was entirely that the border battles would decide the war. Given that they'll have that same assumption, Barbarossa is liable to still go forward.
That's irrelevant, what matters is the belief of the planners that they have the resources to do so, which isn't necessarily there ITTL, nor is it guaranteed that with all the butterflies unleashed that Hitler would still pursue the planning for an invasion of the USSR given all the strategic options/problems opened up by TTL. And contrary to what you may think, you still haven't proved that the strategic considerations exist ITTL to get the same course of action as ITTL.
Because British and French merchant ships are free to sail across the southern med and port in Tunis whereas OTL, the British couldn't enter. The Atlantic coast would also still be open to resupply, although how well the French could move those supplies across Morocco and into Algieria is still a open question. Nonetheless, it would be adequate to support a swift occupation of Spanish Morocco, which is very small, poorly defended, and very nearby. And the addition of French destroyers to the Battle of the Atlantic would also be helpful for the British.
I don't think you understand what 'freely allowed to' means in a scenario where they'd have to cross the Italian held central Mediterranean.
What ground forces does France have ready to occupy Spanish Morocco ITTL? They will need months to unfuck their surviving ground forces evacuated from France, while what was left behind in North Africa was not combat material, as what could be used in Europe was. They were there to make sure the natives stayed in line, train reservists, and put up enough of a front to potentially deter and Italian surprise invasion.
He was pretty much the tipping factor.
If Weygand was dead and there was another general in charge, you think he wouldn't be asking for an armistice? The military guys were, it was the politicians in the cabinet who considered fighting on.
Your own quote shows that Petain was supportive of Reynaud's idea.
He made positive noises in one meeting, while in previous meetings he was pushing for an armistice. For all we know he was buttering up Reynaud to get him to listen to reason.
Darlan only came out after Weynaud talked Petain into opposing a retreat, so the casual link there is pretty obvious.
Petain was pro-surrender before Weygand talked to him. Weygand didn't convince him of anything on the 15th. You're purposely ignoring all the other parts about Petain's position to focus on two lines that you think backs your point. Darlan turned as a result of the promise not to surrender the fleet and Churchill's bloviations, with the vote to ask for terms before making a decision and the worsening war situation as of the 15th changing his mind.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/François_Darlan#Armistice
Even on 15 June he was still talking of a potential armistice with indignation.
[7] Darlan appears to have retreated from his position on 15 June, when the Cabinet voted 13–6 for
Camille Chautemps' compromise proposal to inquire about possible terms. He was willing to accept an armistice provided the French fleet was kept out of German hands.
[8]
On 16 June Churchill's telegram arrived agreeing to an armistice (France and Britain were bound by treaty not to seek a separate peace) provided the French fleet was moved to British ports. This was not acceptable to Darlan, who argued that it would leave France defenceless.
[9] That day, according to
Jules Moch, he declared that Britain was finished so there was no point in continuing to fight, and he was concerned that if there was no armistice Hitler would invade French North Africa via
Franco's Spain.
[5] That evening
Paul Reynaud, feeling he lacked sufficient cabinet support for continuing the war, resigned as
Prime Minister, and
Philippe Pétain formed a new government with a view to seeking an armistice with
Germany.
[9]
Darlan's flip convinced Reynaud enough was enough as was the worsening war situation. Interestingly Darlan was explicitly afraid of exactly the course of action I'm arguing the Germans pretty much had to take to deal with the French. If the French admiral was terrified into armistice from that potential course of action, there wasn't really a way for the French to stop that move.
And they were demoralized because Weygand had been talking about how hopeless fighting on would be since he was appointed Supreme Commander's position in late-May. He demoralized the cabinet.
I think the fact that Paris fell and they evacuated convinced them of that more than Weygand. Everyone knew that France was going to be occupied at the rate things were going in June, they just didn't think it was worth fighting on after that.
Petain was brought around to a anti-evacuation stance by Weygand.
Petain was already set to quit before Paris fell.
And yet, as your earlier quote showed, he supported Reynaud's June 12th proposal to fight on until Weygand talked him out of it.
Weygand didn't talk Petain out of anything on the 12th. Petain urged the cabinet to listen to Weygand:
On 12 June, after a second session of the conference, the cabinet met and Weygand again called for an armistice. He referred to the danger of military and civil disorder and the possibility of a Communist uprising in Paris. Pétain and Minister of Information Prouvost urged the cabinet to hear Weygand out because "he was the only one really to know what was happening".
Before that Petain was giving every signal that the fight was hopeless when talking to de Gaulle and Churchill. That was before Paris fell.