Defending the Realm

Chapter Twelve: Establishing the Plan
The year of 1942 had seen major gains for the Allies – the liberation of French Africa being the main gain of the year, yet the capture of the Dodecanese and the establishment of aerial superiority over the Balkans were also key Allied achievements. Yet, as the year dawned to a close and 1943 began, the leaders of the Allies began to wonder a key question – what would be the next move? There were numerous options open to Britain and her allies, yet a common idea espoused by generals and politicians alike was staging a landing somewhere in Europe, so as to ‘bring the fight to the Germans’. Of course, there were difficulties in staging landings anywhere along the Continent – Churchill was amongst the sceptics to organising a campaign in Europe, due to the potentially high casualty list such a campaign would result in. However, Churchill was eventually convinced by Brooke, who insisted that, if such a campaign were to take place in 1943, then the British Army would ensure that no life would be wasted and great care would be taken in planning and preparations. In addition to this, as Brooke’s argument went, landing in Europe would also result in many neutral nations who were previously wary of Nazi Germany following the invasion of Switzerland to finally tip over the edge and declare war on the Axis Powers.

And so, the planning began for a British and Commonwealth landing in Europe – yet this opened up a crucial question: Where to land? Of course, many Governments-in-exile who learnt of British preparations immediately made their own case for their respective nations – de Gaulle and the Free French argued vehemently for landings in France, as the most logical stepping stone towards Germany itself, while Orlando and the Free Italians argued for Sicily and then the Italian mainland, due to its vulnerable position. However, both of these options posed serious flaws for a landing – Northern France was essentially impenetrable due to a series of Nazi-built fortifications known as the ‘Atlantic Wall’, which would lead to a bloodbath for any British, Commonwealth, or Free French troops which attempted to land on the beaches. Meanwhile, Italy, while lacking any series of major coastal fortifications, had only recently been invaded by the Germans, and would therefore be host to numerous divisions still stationed there – which would make a landing incredibly difficult. There was, however, one site which offered potential for an Allied landing – Greece.

For a variety of reasons, Greece was an ideal location for a landing by British and Commonwealth troops – one was that, with Crete and the Dodecanese under Allied control, there was an easy route to land in Greece. Another was that, unlike Italy and France, there was not a significant number of German troops located in Greece – indeed, the large majority of the country was occupied by the Italian Social Republic (although, as time passed, more German divisions were performing garrison duties in Italian-occupied Greece, due to the proven instability of the Social Republic’s forces). In addition to this, since the capture of the Dodecanese, the RAF held air superiority over the Balkans, and so there would be little worry about the Luftwaffe (still in the process of re-building) potentially attacking Allied troops as the stormed the beaches. With these advantages, it was agreed by the British Joint Chiefs of Staff and Churchill’s Government that, in either mid-to-late 1943 or early 1944, landings would take place in Greece – the first strike by the Allies on the Continent.

And so, preparations began, starting in December 1943, for a British and Commonwealth landing in Greece, codenamed Operation Overlord. It was agreed that there would be seven landing sites on the Peloponnese Peninsula, which by far the most strategically sound location to land, due to its isolation from the rest of Greece, with the only land route connecting the peninsula to the rest of Greece being the narrow Isthmus of Corinth. The seven landing sites were planned to be as follows – Site A was near a remote village of Fokiano, located close to another, more populous village, called Poulithra. Site B was located near another village, Limin Ierka. Site C was close to the Cape of Maleas, although, in order to avoid the mountains which surrounded the cape, the landing would take place a few miles west of the cape, near the Agia Marina Paralia Petrified Forest – this would enable the soldiers landing to land on a flat beach, rather than a dangerous mountain, and instead advance between the mountains to reach flatter land to advance from. Site D would be the only landing not to take place on the Peloponnese, and would instead take place on the island of Kythira, an island south of the Peloponnese – this was due to the fact that, if all the landings took place on the peninsula, any Axis troops on the island would prove to be a thorn in the Allies’ side. The next landing site was Site E, which was located on beaches near the two villages of Leimonas and Elos. Site F was located near the Cape of Matapan, where, like Site C, there was the issue of mountainous terrain, which the landing troops were planned to navigate through by landing west of the cape, and advancing along the coast, thereby avoiding the mountainous areas. The final landing site was Site G, and was located near the village of Agios Nikolaos.

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Above: A map displaying the Allies’ planed landing sites. Dark blue indicates how far each landing force was planned to advance by the end of the first day of Overlord.

It was agreed that by British and Commonwealth commanders that the landings would be split between them. Site A would be undertaken by Montgomery’s XIV Corps, Site B would be undertaken by Auchinleck’s XVII Corps, Site C would be undertaken by Harry Crerar’s I Canadian Corps, Site D would be undertaken by Brian Horrock’s XVIII Corps, Site E would be undertaken by Thomas Blamey’s I Corps, Site F would be undertaken by Bernard Freyberg’s II New Zealand Corps, and Site G would be undertaken the sole corps of the Greek Government-in-exile, headed by Alexander Papagos. Combined, the landing force in Greece was planned to number roughly 350,000 soldiers in total.

Detailed plans were laid out for how the Allied forces would advance upon landing on the Greek coast – after establishing beacheads, it was agreed that the corps from Sites A, B and C would advance towards the first target of Overlord – Sparta – from the west, crossing the Parnonas mountains from the west to reach the city. Meanwhile, the corps from Sites F would approach Sparta from the south before linking up with the corps advancing from the west before reaching the city, while the corps from Sites F and G would advance towards Sparta from the east by crossing the Taygetos mountains. After all corps reached Sparta, the city would be besieged (if not already abandoned by the Germans and Italians), and, once captured, the Allied corps would split, with half going west, once again crossing the Taygetos, to capture Kalamata, and then proceeding north to capture Pyrgos. Meanwhile, the other corps would immediately advance north, with the intention of capturing Tripoli and then moving northeast to capture Corinth, thereby blocking the remaining Axis troops in Greece from accessing the Peloponnese, and leading to either the abandonment or the surrender of the remaining areas which the Allies had not yet liberated. During this period of advanced by ground forces, it was also planned for RAF planes to bomb Axis targets in the region, utilising aerial superiority, while it was also agreed that British parachute regiments would, in conjunction with the Royal Navy, land in and capture the Cyclades, in a fashion similar to the capture of the Dodecanese. This would conclude Overlord, and at that point the British and Commonwealth Governments would determine whether or not to launch a further offensive to push beyond the Peloponnese and capture Athens.

The plans for Overlord were concluded in July 1943, and thus only two actions needed to be taken by Britain before the landings would take place – first, set a date for the landings, and, second, utilise intelligence and spies inside Continental Europe to ensure that the Nazi Government was under the impression that landings would take place elsewhere. These two actions would take place during mid-1943, and shall be discussed in the next chapter.
 
Not a very good idea, imho. I guess it's the natural logical progression of the UK's Med strategy, but this means that will have to reach Germany going through the north of Greece and the Balcans, all of which is hard mountain terrain, ideal for defense... the result will be what happened in Italy in 43, only worse...
 
Not a very good idea, imho. I guess it's the natural logical progression of the UK's Med strategy, but this means that will have to reach Germany going through the north of Greece and the Balcans, all of which is hard mountain terrain, ideal for defense... the result will be what happened in Italy in 43, only worse...
Wasn't original timeline Italy slowed by troops being used or held back for other operations elsewhere, and a lack of landing craft (again, in some cases because they were being held back for elsewhere) for attempting flanking operations?

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Granted the logistics for operations away from the coast in some parts of the Balkans may get pretty rubbish.
If the locals are on the Allied side it might work in their favour. Some parts of the Balkans in the original timeline had some fairly ferocious partisan groups.
 
Wasn't original timeline Italy slowed by troops being used or held back for other operations elsewhere, and a lack of landing craft (again, in some cases because they were being held back for elsewhere) for attempting flanking operations?

I was refering, not to the original assaults, but to the latter progression up Italy, specially the center & north, which is mostly mountains.
 
I'm pretty sure, you could just use Operation Mincemeat and the Double-Cross system to fool the Germans. And what about the Greeks partisans and their in-fighting between the Royalists and Communists.
 
And what about the Greeks partisans and their in-fighting between the Royalists and Communists.
The Greek troops which shall be serving in Overlord are those serving the Greek Government based in Crete, while in-fighting is occurring between resistance groups in occupied Greece (as in our timeline). This shall be covered soon enough.
 
Chapter Thirteen: Operation Mincemeat and Final Preparations
As previously mentioned, as the Allies prepared to bring Overlord into effect, a priority for Britain was to ensure that as few German and Italian troops would be defending the Peloponnese as possible. In order to achieve this aim, British intelligence officers aimed to deceive Germany through a plan code-named Operation Mincemeat [1] – under this plan, the body of a homeless man named Glyndwr Michael who had recently died was obtained by Ewen Montagu and Charles Cholmondeley, two members of British intelligence, who duly dressed up the body as a member of the Royal Marines. In addition to this, allegedly ‘top secret documents’ were placed inside the body’s uniform, revealing that the Allies intended to land in Normandy and Brittany in late 1943. With the approval of Churchill and the British Government, the body was then transported to the Mediterranean in April 1943, where it was dropped into the sea near the Spanish coast. As the officers intended, the body was retrieved by Spanish fishermen, who duly sent it to the Spanish Government. When the documents were uncovered inside the body, Franco ordered that copies be sent to Berlin, so as to give warning to Hitler, before the body was sent back to Britain. Mincemeat proved to be a success, as, when the documents reached Hitler, he immediately ordered that significant reinforcements be sent to defend Northern France, at the expense of the Balkans, in particular Greece.

From this point onwards, Hitler, whose mental health was deteriorating as the war progressed, became convinced that landings would take place in Northern France, and rejected any request for reinforcements by generals outside of France. Indeed, the Führer went so far as to order the delaying of Barbarossa once again, to May 1944, in order to combat what he deemed the ‘imminent threat’ of Allied landings in France. The German belief that landings would take place in Normandy and Brittany was reinforced in June 1943, when a general election took place in Ireland which resulted in the toppling of Eamon de Valera’s Fianna Fail Government and its replacement with a Fine Gael-Labour Coalition, led by Richard Mulcahy [2] as Taoiseach – Mulcahy, a long advocate for Ireland joining the war, duly passed through the Dáil Éireann a motion declaring war on Germany. After this, Mulcahy’s Government signed a treaty with Britain enabling the Royal Navy to use the former treaty ports of Spike Island and Berehaven for the duration of the war. This turn of events led to the Nazi Government believing that Irish ports would be used to assist Allied landings in France, and so it appeared that their decision to move extra divisions to Northern France was vindicated.

Meanwhile, the British Government was delighted that their deception strategy had proved to be an effective one, and so a date was set for Overlord’s launch – October the 3rd 1943. This provided time, from July when Overlord’s planning was concluded, to send the necessary soldiers to the Eastern Mediterranean to prepare for the operation’s launch. As the numerous divisions arrived in Crete, several coastal villages on the island were evacuated for the time being, so as to allow British, Commonwealth and Greek troops to conduct mock landings, due to the physical similarity of Crete and the Peloponnese Peninsula – this granted the Allied forces a general idea of how the landings would be carried out. It is important to note that, during this time, the exact location of the Overlord landings was kept strictly secret from the Allied forces who would be undertaking the operation, so as to prevent any Nazi spies in Crete ruining the carefully orchestrated British deception tactics. Instead, soldiers were simply not told the location of the landing sites – or, if necessary, they were informed that the landings would take place in Central Greece, with the intention of capturing Athens immediately.

Eventually, the launch date for Overlord drew closer and closer to the Allied corps on Crete and, on the evening of the 2nd, the commanders present informed their soldiers of their true destination. And so, shortly afterwards, the soldiers present retired to bed for the night and woke up long before sunrise, ready to carry out their task.

Operation Overlord was about to commence.

***
[1] This was a plan from our timeline to deceive Germany on the Allies’ landings in Sicily – in this timeline it is used to deceive the Germans on the Allies’ landing in Greece.

[2] In this timeline, W.T. Cosgrave resigns earlier, and consequently Richard Mulcahy leads Fine Gael into the 1943 general election.
 
Who's to say that the Soviets aren't dealing with internal problems at this point?

Doubtfull, tbh. This war will only fuel Stalin's power, specially since he has (as far as the soviets know) allied himself, at least for now, with the man that gave him part of Poland. By 1942/43 the army's reorganization will be well on it's way to completetion, the officers given rank after the purges will have calmed down, and the NKVD will have a firm hand on the country.
 
Doubtfull, tbh. This war will only fuel Stalin's power, specially since he has (as far as the soviets know) allied himself, at least for now, with the man that gave him part of Poland. By 1942/43 the army's reorganization will be well on it's way to completetion, the officers given rank after the purges will have calmed down, and the NKVD will have a firm hand on the country.
All I shall say is - wait and see.
 
The invasion of Greece at this time may not be a good idea. To get up into the Balkans would require armies the size of those that were shuttled over to Normandy after D-Day. You couldn't move troops on the required scale thousands of miles into the eastern Med and keep them supplied. The Germans could send troops, tanks, etc. on a MUCH larger scale since they would move them over land, and just for a few hundred miles. The only practical way to invade Europe was in or around Normandy and in the scenario here it would be unlikely the Germans would have built up the shores of France to be impregnable; even in 1944 they weren't. However, the earlier move in the eastern Med, taking the Dodecanese islands, makes sense within the framework of the overall scenario, because it has a demoralizing effect on the Axis, provides airfields for some useful bombing, doesn't require huge numbers of troops, and doesn't become a political and diplomatic football.
 
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