GERMANS DESTROY ALL DEEP WATER PORTS IN FRANCE IN 1943

oronos2

Banned
I HAVE always been confused why the Germans din't destroy the French deep ports in 1943 as a means to deny the allies any means to supply their armies when they invaded France in a 1 or 2.


please give your views.
 

archaeogeek

Banned
Dönitz has the moron who suggested the idea shot, his name stricken from records and his body burned and the ashes spread to the winds.
The Uboat fleets are paralized as their only available harbours are now in Germany and partially bottled up.
 
the Third Reich was in totally distressed need for Deep Water Ports
for Germand Warfleet and U-boat Fleet

to destory the france one is pointless
 
Its interesting to look at the Allies and Germans view of Antwerp in this scenario, the Germans certainly tried to destroy that

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 
I HAVE always been confused why the Germans din't destroy the French deep ports in 1943 as a means to deny the allies any means to supply their armies when they invaded France in a 1 or 2.


please give your views.

Destroying the ports in 1943 would be odd, as Germany is using them, and the failed Dieppe debarkment comforts the idea that the ports cannot be taken directly.

Making provisions to render the ports useless in case of a successful Allied invasion would be more logical - and it was actually done, even though the officers in charge of the demolition had qualms about implementing it (blowing up ports often meaning heavy civilian casualties in the nearby city).
 

oronos2

Banned
Dönitz may not like the idea but he has failed to starve the british into defeat thus lossing face in the eyes of Hitler

plus with the deep water ports gone the invasion of france will have to be cancelled by the allies because it matters not how many divisions you have if you can't feed them


and with invasion of France cancelled the Germans are free to ship troops to the eastern front.
 
Oh, you mean doing it BEFORE they land? I thought you meant blowing them up as they evacuated them, which seemed feasible

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 

archaeogeek

Banned
Dönitz may not like the idea but he has failed to starve the british into defeat thus lossing face in the eyes of Hitler

plus with the deep water ports gone the invasion of france will have to be cancelled by the allies because it matters not how many divisions you have if you can't feed them


and with invasion of France cancelled the Germans are free to ship troops to the eastern front.

The WAllies can now go through the Med instead with Italy on their side; it just takes longer - the Americans didn't want Normandy anyway.
In 1943, even 20% more soldiers on the eastern front won't save Germany, it will just strain their supplies even more and the Soviets are still outproducing and outmanning them. Stalingrad is long over, Kursk will be ongoing by the time troops are moved. If the germans move out too many troops from France, it's perfect time to support a french uprising. Basically it mostly slows the war, somewhat.
 

Susano

Banned
The WAllies can now go through the Med instead with Italy on their side; it just takes longer - the Americans didn't want Normandy anyway.
In 1943, even 20% more soldiers on the eastern front won't save Germany, it will just strain their supplies even more and the Soviets are still outproducing and outmanning them.

Well, thats the case anyways. Even having some pitful remnaints of the submarine fleet wont change that, either. Though Im a bit doubtful about the ability of destroying all harbours so thoroughly that no supplies could be brought to France. I mean, there are natural harbours, there is air transport and if everything else fails one doesnt even need harbours to unload stuff - it just helps very much, heh.
 
- How do you destroy a deep water port? You can blow up the equipment, mine it, sink freighters in the bassin, ... but thats nothing that a competent engineer unit, with the americans ample access to resources couldnt fix within, lets say a year at the most.
The ports we talk about are mostly very old more or less natural ports, that can't be destroyed permanently.
And the Allies allready had their artificial Mullberry harbours to keep them supplyed until the could capture enough deep water ports. They would just have had to make a few more of those.
 
Dönitz may not like the idea but he has failed to starve the british into defeat thus lossing face in the eyes of Hitler

Wrong, Dönitz became the Hitler successor in May 1945. So many others had lost more credits in Hitler eyes than Dönitz : Goering from the Battle of Britain, Himmler from 1944 on the eastern front...

plus with the deep water ports gone the invasion of france will have to be cancelled by the allies because it matters not how many divisions you have if you can't feed them

The Allies didn't need deep waters ports in june 1944 to land severals divisions on Normandy beaches and feed them with artificial ports or landing on beaches.

Most deep water ports in France were in Germans hands until May 1945 or completely destroyed by the fights or germans sabotages...

and with invasion of France cancelled the Germans are free to ship troops to the eastern front.

You have an invasion of southern France in august 1945 and they used the great international port and megapolis of Saint Tropez everybody remember the "Gendarmes" film with Louis de Funes" to land troops.

You have too much small and middle-size ports in France to destroy them all.
 
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The Germans managed to hold or severely damage every single port that they had control over.. some ports where held until the end of the war, others required weeks of repair or subsidary operations to clear. Really, the Germans could not have done much better. However, the Allies, specifically the Americans, had a massive engineering capability and the ability to essentially rebuild a port from scratch if need be.
 
GB is correct

Look at Brest and Cherbourg... the Germans where damn successful wrecking them anyway, there wasn't much to be gained destroying them when they where using them supply U-boat ops

not to mention the allies bombed and assaulted the crap out of the ones they did take for the most part which aided german destruction anyway
 
It would certainly have been thoughtful of the Germans to utterly discredit Vichy France, stimulate the French resistance with staggering levels of unemployment in such areas and, of course, cripple the efforts of the U-boats now forced to operate further from the Atlantic.
 
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