Dumbest strategic decision that each country participating in WWII could have made, but didn't?

And you stop the panzers with what ? fairy dust ? that was the point of my post. The lack of attack planes was such, fighters were send against panzers to shot them with their 20 mm hispano guns.
Medium bombers were not particularly effective against tanks. CAS aircraft generally weren't either, as their terrible kill rates against tanks attests to when their numbers are -deflated from their own high claims, and when the French did try to use them they got horribly savaged by anti-aircraft and fighters. Which is the other point; what use is it if the French had a huge number of bombers, if they didn't have the aerial parity to deploy them in. Even LeO 45s couldn't survive in the face of German air superiority when unescorted, despite their fast speed; slower attack aircraft are mincemeat. Better to try to combat German air superiority and at least blunt their impact rather than to have German air force reign unchallenged and French counter-blows get ripped to shreds anyway.
 
Vegetarian would have won it, Pike would have lost it, Unthinkable would have been unthinkable.

The full story of the German viral and bacterial weapons program and how far they got is still under a fair bit of rapping paper so how much damage the German biological program could have done after Vegetarian and before civilization on the continent collapses is still not entirely known. I recall reading all the British documents are set to be declassified in 2045.
 

Deleted member 1487

The full story of the German viral and bacterial weapons program and how far they got is still under a fair bit of rapping paper so how much damage the German biological program could have done after Vegetarian and before civilization on the continent collapses is still not entirely known. I recall reading all the British documents are set to be declassified in 2045.
That would be interesting to read, same with the files on Hess. Got to make it that long, more reason to exercise and eat right.
The thing is by the time the Brits were ready to deploy the Germans lacked an effective means of deployment.
 
Not exactly, their tanks were better than the Germans in terms of armor and armament so could stop them on the defense and with frontal attacks.

When everything was going as the French expected them too, sure. When the French tried to turn them around and throw them into the actual key battles, though, the Fremch armor amounted to speed bumps at best for the Germans. The reasons for this had practically nothing to do with their tanks.

For example, the French 1e DCR arrived near Dinant on the night of 12 May. It then sat inactive all through 13 May while it's superiors tried to decide what to do with it before finally receiving its orders just before midnight. The staff of the 1e DCR then spent the next twelve hours on some rather poor staff work, trying to figure out a plan for their upcoming attack, before having to throw the whole thing out again when new orders arrived for the 15th. They were still trying to get themselves sorted out when Rommel rolled over them.

By comparison, consider Guderian's improvisation during the Sedan breakout. In response to the developing situation on 15 May, he dusted off a set of plans that had been drawn up during a staff exercise dealing with just this eventuality several months ago. His staff went over them, updated them, and issued them out. The whole process took them about two hours.

When things moved slower, and the French had time to build their response, and the Germans moved in a more predictable way, the French could put up a good fight, but once things moved off script and the Germans used their speed - of communications, planning and manuever - the French collapsed. It was a basic flaw in their glacial top-down system of command.

But remember to the French innovated the hedge-hog defense during the 1940 campaign to stop the Germans.

Weygand ad-hocced hedgehogs by necessity in June, and not out of true innovation, since he had to defend a front 1,000km long with only 65 divisions against a force of over 140 divisions and with vastly superior offensive potential. He had no way to maintain a continuous front and no way to prevent the Germans surrounding his units. While the hedgehogs gave the Germans some stiff fights, one thing needs to be made very clear: they were an admission of inevitable defeat. While tactically problematic as the hedghogs were they were wholly defensive and the Germans could just bypass and reduce them in time. Weygand's plan involved no chance of operational success, and he knew it. He was just giving the French Army one last hurrah before it called it quits.

Operationally they had issues with mobile warfare not adhering to a strict plan due to the lack of radios and having lost air superiority.

They had a lot more problems then that.
 
Medium bombers were not particularly effective against tanks. CAS aircraft generally weren't either, as their terrible kill rates against tanks attests to when their numbers are -deflated from their own high claims, and when the French did try to use them they got horribly savaged by anti-aircraft and fighters. Which is the other point; what use is it if the French had a huge number of bombers, if they didn't have the aerial parity to deploy them in. Even LeO 45s couldn't survive in the face of German air superiority when unescorted, despite their fast speed; slower attack aircraft are mincemeat. Better to try to combat German air superiority and at least blunt their impact rather than to have German air force reign unchallenged and French counter-blows get ripped to shreds anyway.
Well I bit agree here. I already rised few times question here what would happened if Czechoslovakia or Poland instead investing huge part of money into medium and light bombers decided to spend same amount on fighter planes. It would be deffinitely large increase in air defense. How much it would influence September 1939 campaign and how much it would influence Czechoslovak decission to deffend country in 1938?
 

Deleted member 1487

When everything was going as the French expected them too, sure. When the French tried to turn them around and throw them into the actual key battles, though, the Fremch armor amounted to speed bumps at best for the Germans. The reasons for this had practically nothing to do with their tanks.

For example, the French 1e DCR arrived near Dinant on the night of 12 May. It then sat inactive all through 13 May while it's superiors tried to decide what to do with it before finally receiving its orders just before midnight. The staff of the 1e DCR then spent the next twelve hours on some rather poor staff work, trying to figure out a plan for their upcoming attack, before having to throw the whole thing out again when new orders arrived for the 15th. They were still trying to get themselves sorted out when Rommel rolled over them.

By comparison, consider Guderian's improvisation during the Sedan breakout. In response to the developing situation on 15 May, he dusted off a set of plans that had been drawn up during a staff exercise dealing with just this eventuality several months ago. His staff went over them, updated them, and issued them out. The whole process took them about two hours.

When things moved slower, and the French had time to build their response, and the Germans moved in a more predictable way, the French could put up a good fight, but once things moved off script and the Germans used their speed - of communications, planning and manuever - the French collapsed. It was a basic flaw in their glacial top-down system of command.
The biggest part of the reason the French had problems on the attack was German air power. French air power was not ready to fight, something like 25% of it was operational at the start of the fight, plus then misused. Add in the lack of radios, something the Germans noticed in combat and would experience again against the Soviets in 1941, and the army couldn't fight nearly as coordinated as the Germans. You're right then that armor and guns mean less in that context, but when the Germans attacked them head on in Belgium they fought them a hard, costly nut to crack.

Pretty much the only army that was ready to fight in 1940 was the Germans and of the major powers they were the only ones with combat experience at that point (Poland and SCW). That had a very telling effect, as the French were still learning how to fight a modern war as the decisive campaign was being fought. Plus then trying to run things either on land lines that were being cut from the air or German penetrations or with couriers due to lack of radios. Guderian got pretty lucky that things were so according to plan that he could use training orders with different dates and times and was a function of the French doing exactly as the Germans needed them to for their strategic/operational plan to work. The thing was the French learned from their mistakes, but didn't get a chance to actually do much with the lessons learned because they were already effectively beaten by the time June rolled around.

Weygand ad-hocced hedgehogs by necessity in June, and not out of true innovation, since he had to defend a front 1,000km long with only 65 divisions against a force of over 140 divisions and with vastly superior offensive potential. He had no way to maintain a continuous front and no way to prevent the Germans surrounding his units. While the hedgehogs gave the Germans some stiff fights, one thing needs to be made very clear: they were an admission of inevitable defeat. While tactically problematic as the hedghogs were they were wholly defensive and the Germans could just bypass and reduce them in time. Weygand's plan involved no chance of operational success, and he knew it. He was just giving the French Army one last hurrah before it called it quits.
Necessity is the mother of innovation. What do you think is 'true innovation'? They learned and adapted, but due to a massive strategic/operational mistake they didn't have the time or space to adapt. Plus the Germans were already a combat experienced force, while the French were still rearming and were well behind. The Hedgehogs weren't simply reduced, they had to be fought through and cost the German more casualties per day to do so than they had suffered to that point; the French though lacked reserves and air cover, which meant once the defensive belt was broken there was nothing to plug the gap. That was the consequence of losing 2/3rds of their army and equipment in May.

They had a lot more problems then that.
I didn't say those were the only problems, just that they were the primary functional ones.
 
France: putting their entire army on the german border and not realizing there was a great bloody forest in their backyard, ready to be used as a 'highway for panzers'...... oh wait, that actually happened.
 
Say, since everyone is saying that the worst thing Finland could do would be fully committing forces to Leningrad... Why? I don't get it. Would helping the Germans out with the siege really weaken them that much in other areas?
 

Deleted member 1487

Say, since everyone is saying that the worst thing Finland could do would be fully committing forces to Leningrad... Why? I don't get it. Would helping the Germans out with the siege really weaken them that much in other areas?
I think it is the assumption that the Soviets would still win and take a bloody revenge for Leningrad. Of course if Leningrad falls things change quite a bit in the East, so it may be unfounded.
 

Deleted member 97083

Pike would have lost it
Well Operation Pike despite being very flawed in its own right, might have inadvertently caused the Soviets to have a more mobilized army in time for Barbarossa, or have caused Barbarossa to be delayed until 1942 when the Soviets had the advantage, either case leading to the Soviets pushing west earlier. This would have "won" WW2 in 1944 or earlier than May in 1945. However, the war between Britain and the Soviet Union would have made an Allies vs. Soviet Union World War 3 almost inevitable.
 

Deleted member 1487

Well Operation Pike despite being very flawed in its own right, might have inadvertently caused the Soviets to have a more mobilized army in time for Barbarossa, or have caused Barbarossa to be delayed until 1942 when the Soviets had the advantage, either case leading to the Soviets pushing west earlier. This would have "won" WW2 in 1944 or earlier than May in 1945. However, the war between Britain and the Soviet Union would have made a 1946 WW3 a foregone conclusion.
I probably would have prevented Barbarossa, because as I do more reading about the reasons Hitler went to war (I found a good article on the German ambassador to the USSR and they get into details on how he tried to prevent war) a major sticking point was Hitler and Molotov not agreeing on basic principles for an alliance when the Axis talks happened in Berlin; Hitler wanted the Soviets to focus on Iran and Turkey, not Central Europe and Balkans; Molotov had no interest in the Middle East. With Pike the Soviets will have to attack the Brits and French in the region via...Iran and Turkey. So Hitler gets exactly what he wanted out of the Soviets and deflects them from Romania before they overplay their hand there, taking part of Bukovina against the Border Agreement. Pike brings the Soviets into the war against the Allies and may well cause the Axis to form early, specifically on a German-Soviet alliance, instead of a Japanese-Italian-German deal in September. With a deal forced by circumstance it makes things even easier on Germany against Britain and France, while fully securing the Eastern border. That probably means the Allies bow out in 1940 after France falls because their global position is collapsing.
 

Deleted member 97083

I probably would have prevented Barbarossa, because as I do more reading about the reasons Hitler went to war (I found a good article on the German ambassador to the USSR and they get into details on how he tried to prevent war) a major sticking point was Hitler and Molotov not agreeing on basic principles for an alliance when the Axis talks happened in Berlin; Hitler wanted the Soviets to focus on Iran and Turkey, not Central Europe and Balkans; Molotov had no interest in the Middle East. With Pike the Soviets will have to attack the Brits and French in the region via...Iran and Turkey. So Hitler gets exactly what he wanted out of the Soviets and deflects them from Romania before they overplay their hand there, taking part of Bukovina against the Border Agreement. Pike brings the Soviets into the war against the Allies and may well cause the Axis to form early, specifically on a German-Soviet alliance, instead of a Japanese-Italian-German deal in September. With a deal forced by circumstance it makes things even easier on Germany against Britain and France, while fully securing the Eastern border. That probably means the Allies bow out in 1940 after France falls because their global position is collapsing.
Hitler's ultimate goal was to conquer the Soviet Union though. Barbarossa wouldn't be delayed indefinitely unless Hitler and Himmler are both taken out.
 
Hitler's ultimate goal was to conquer the Soviet Union though. Barbarossa wouldn't be delayed indefinitely unless Hitler and Himmler are both taken out.

If it was delayed long enough to knock Britain out of the war, and by extension keep the US out, then that's still a major net win.
 

Deleted member 97083

If it was delayed long enough to knock Britain out of the war, and by extension keep the US out, then that's still a major net win.
That doesn't stop Lend-Lease though.
 
That doesn't stop Lend-Lease though.

Doesn't it? There's no question of the USSR getting any while it's at war with Britain, and if the British sue for peace then the program would probably end. The odds of FDR getting it reinstated for Stalin's benefit later don't seem that great, and without British help, shipping anywhere besides Siberia seems hard.
 

Deleted member 1487

Hitler's ultimate goal was to conquer the Soviet Union though. Barbarossa wouldn't be delayed indefinitely unless Hitler and Himmler are both taken out.
Hitler wasn't dead set on one goal; he certainly wanted to, but didn't make the decision that he needed to until some time around December 1940. Perhaps THE key event was the Molotov negotiations in Berlin that convinced Hitler that he couldn't work something out with the Soviets in the long run and they needed to be destroyed. Prior he wasn't set on war in the East.
 
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