Glossary of Sealion Threads

RMcD94

RMcD94

We need glossary's for all threads and timelines, it's a nightmare to find something you're looking for.

Some sort of tagging system, ie, British, French, Britwank, Nelson, Napoleon, Waterloo, would lend itself well to this and if every timeline started off with the title and the PoD or a short description of what the timeline would be about
 
Resurgam

Resurgam

I propose this as our meme for newbie posters asking about Sealion:
dt950529dhc0.gif
 

DerWonderWaffles

DerGiLLster said:
Anyone mention a glossary of Barbarossa threads? Or is that more likely to succeed than SeaLion?
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I take this post back. Barbarossa has a a chance to succeed, a somewhat narrow one, but allows for many great discussions as to how the Germans could have won against Russia(More hindsight, gearing up war production after it starts). Everytime I read the plans for Sealion, they make me cringe.
 
sitalkes

sitalkes

There's a new Sealion book coming out next month (maybe 20 October) https://ospreypublishing.com/we-march-against-england It is written by a US author and claims not to be the usual re-hash of British sources;

"Robert Forcyzk, author of Where the Iron Crosses Grow, looks beyond the traditional British account of Operation Sea Lion, complete with plucky Home Guards and courageous Spitfire pilots, at the real scale of German ambition, plans and capabilities. He examines, in depth, how Operation Sea Lion fitted in with German air-sea actions around the British Isles as he shows exactly what stopped Hitler from invading Britain."

Another recent publication worthy of mention is Ian Lofting's "We Shall Fight Them", which is the first to list the location of all the British forces down to company level (or even lower in some cases).

Edit: maybe Forcyzk's book is not worth buying, according to the Daily Mail http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3806587/Adolf-Hitler-talked-plot-occupy-Isle-Wight.html he advocates landing on the Isle of Wight first, which is a silly plan as explained in several threads on this board
 
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pipisme

There is an article about Forczyk's book in the November 2016 issue of BBC History Magazine. He states that "Many of these were armed with 20 mm flak guns and bowitzers......And while the German navy had few destroyers to deploy in the Channel, it did have large numbers of light warships to protect the barges from attack."

He also states that tbe "Royal Navy would have been lucky to intercept and destroy even 10 per cent of the invasion force." The RAF would have been "unable to deploy in strength until the morning of the landing."

Leo McKinstry, author of the book Operation Sealion, told BBC History Magazine that "I think the author underestimates the severe difficulties in the Reich's path, including the lack of co-ordination between their services and the huge inferiority of the Kreigsmarine compared to the Royal Navy."
 
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Resurgam

Resurgam

pipisme said:
There is an article about Forczyk's book in the November 2016 issue of BBC History Magazine. He states that "Many of these were armed with 20 mm flak guns and bowitzers......And wbile the German navy had few deztroyers to deploy in the Channel, it did have large numbers of light warships to protect the barges from attack."

He also states that tbe "Royal Navy would have been lucky to intercept and destroy even 10 per cent of the invasion force." The RAF would have been "unable to deploy in strength until the morning of the landing."

Leo McKinstry, autbor of the book Operation Sealion, told BBC History Magazine that "I think the author underestimates the severe difficulties in the Reich's path, including the lack of co-ordination between their services and the huge inferiority of the Kreigsmarine compared to the Royal Navy."
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Does he give reasons for his claims? Because that seems wildly, wildly optimistic for Germany.
 

Cockroach

pipisme said:
There is an article about Forczyk's book in the November 2016 issue of BBC History Magazine. He states that "Many of these were armed with 20 mm flak guns and bowitzers......And wbile the German navy had few deztroyers to deploy in the Channel, it did have large numbers of light warships to protect the barges from attack."
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It's one of those technically true but somewhat misleading statements (see sitalkes numbers above). I suspect he's also ignored British vessels equivalent to the German escorts (motor torpedo boats, armed trawlers, purpose built minesweepers, the first Flower class Corvettes and various sloops) to make the numbers look better for the Jerries. And of cause, there's a certain qualitative difference (12 knot trawlers cannot easily concentrate to intercept a determined attack by two or three 35 knot destroyers)...
pipisme said:
He also states that tbe "Royal Navy would have been lucky to intercept and destroy even 10 per cent of the invasion force." The RAF would have been "unable to deploy in strength until the morning of the landing."
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Given the time it'd take for a 4 knot convoy of barges to get from Antwerp to the landing beaches, there should be plenty of warning for the RN to intercept, the RAF is limited mainly to daylight ops so morning of the landing is probably right for effective intervention by the RAF.

Of cause 'only' 10% irreversibly sunk mid-Channel may not sound like much (and given shear numbers on the German side doesn't seem that implausible), but that's units at least decimated (in the pedantic sense, probably worse losses, not necessarily in terms of dead but more in terms of failed to make it ashore, once you factor in the badly shot up and turned back; got lost and turned back and badly shot up but made it across counts) before they make landfall. Worse than that, it's convoys disrupted, scattered and likely heading for the wrong beaches; command structures disrupted (Colonel X dead, Major Y on the wrong beach etc.); vital equipment lost or landed in the wrong place... 'only' 10% losses in the crossing still makes things horribly difficult for the Germans. I'm not sure Foczyk realizes that (or alternatively conveniently ignores it...).

Edit: There's also going to be losses during the landing (maybe not that many sunk, but barges grounded or overturned... salvageable once the area's secure but still out for at least the next few days) and the RN gets more bites at the cherry. 10% of the German vessels sunk on their way over plus, say, 5% sunk on their way back, repeat for the next wave... it's not that long before you're talking cumulative naval losses north of 30%...
 
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pipisme

USSManhattan said:
Does he give reasons for his claims? Because that seems wildly, wildly optimistic for Germany.
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From the article about Forczyk's book in the BBC History Magazine:
Many British warships previously assumed to be operational in the area were in fact under repair, he says, and "not a single British destroyer near the Channel was equipped with either radar or rapid-firing guns."
Click to expand...

As regards the RAF being unable to be deployed in strength until the morning of the landing, Forczyk claims that:
Invasion forces would have had plenty of flak guns and Luftwaffe cover, so RAF losses would have been crippling.
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Cockroach

pipisme said:
From the article about Forczyk's book in the BBC History Magazine:
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And there he is getting into rather blatant bullshyte. Ship histories have been available for ages, so the number of ships operational vs damaged should have been obvious to most interested authors for the last decade or four. On the radar front he's correct, but on the rapid fire guns... could be a question of definition, if he's only counting fully automatic 50+ RPM guns like 40mm Bofors and 2 pounder AAs it's an exaggeration to say no British DDs carried any but it is true that the serious ones (i.e. cannon rather than MG class) were relatively rare in 1940, if he's using rapid fire in a more general sense then he's clearly an idiot... most British DDs carried either 4in guns capable of 15-20 rounds per minute or 4.5s and 4.7s capable of 12-16 rounds per minute, while minesweepers, corvettes and armed trawlers typically had either a 4in or 3in/12 pounder AA (12-18 round per minute depending on which of the three common models you look at) and other light forces (HDMLS, MTBs) would have WW1 vintage 6 pounder and 3 pounder light guns (20-25 rounds per minute).
 
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