Invading Nazi-controlled Europe with Britain under Nazi rule

They couldn't just plow through the ice? It's not like environmental concerns would even registered.
No, for two reasons. First of all, icebreakers are expensive and very limited ships; they're good at exactly one thing, and have to compromise on their actual sailing ability to do that. Like I said, this would make for spending a large amount of money on ships that could only be used for one thing, which would make it terribly obvious to the Nazis what was going to happen. Second, the ice pack at that time was considerably thicker than it is now, so it would be correspondingly more difficult to break through it. The first surface vessel to reach the North Pole only got there in 1977, and that was a nuclear-powered icebreaker, obviously not something the United States is going to have in the 1940s.

Certainly, the United States and Nazis are going to be doing "stuff" around the North and South Poles, but it'll be more or less the kind of stuff that the United States and Soviets did IOTL, weather stations and propaganda exercises. No one is going to propose building a giant fleet of cargo-carrying icebreakers to ferry invasion forces across the Arctic Ocean.
 
USSR lost the war, no reason for Lend Lease, Iran doesn't matter in this scenario.

The strait of Hormuz is extremely important for shipping.

It is very possible that the U.S. adopts a "Monroe Doctrine" on Steroids, where America's umbrella extends to Australia and New Zealand, but it is also possible that the decision is closer to "New World is ours, stay on you side of the Atlantic and we're cool".

The US would at the very least want to take North Africa because if the Germans do not have that then there is absolutely no hope of invading South America. (In the event of war at least) They won't bottle themselves up with just a war waged in the western Atlantic. Not that that is exactly what you are saying, but we in the event of war the US wouldn't sit idly by.

There is simply no way to retain everything. Trying to hold all means losing everything. Unquestionably that effort would be made in India.

Maybe it has gone to Japan in this case.

The U.S. embargoes against Japan, especially oil, were only effective because the UK and Dutch Government in Exile went along with the U.S.

Even if Japan takes all the European colonies in Asia. Japanese foreign policy wanted the Philippines as early as July 2nd 1941 (and Australia). Don't see how that changes. November 5th was when they definitely decided on it, though.
 
Japanese foreign policy wanted the Philippines as early as July 2nd 1941 (and Australia). Don't see how that changes. November 5th was when they definitely decided on it, though.
That was because Japan did not want to have an empty flank that the US could use to cut things off if Japan starts military operations. If Japan has open access to oil from the UK and Dutch governments, there isn't much that the US can do without being the belligerent ones.
 

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They couldn't just plow through the ice? It's not like environmental concerns would even registered.
Literally can't be done with 1945 technology.

No surface ship reached the Pole until 1977. It was a nuclear power 24,000 ton Soviet icebreaker (the Arktika). In the mid-late 1950s the Canadians managed to force the Northwest Passage, but there was no way a non icebreaker would have been able to follow, much less thousands of them. An icebreaker doesn't make the ice disappear, it breaks it by pushing its heavily armored & reinforced hull up onto the ice, until the weight of the hull breaks the ice. Once the ice breaks it pushes forward to the end of the break, rinse, repeat. What it leaves in its wake is a mix of big chnks of broken, razor sharp mini icebergs, and something that resembles a slushie. The ships require very specific design feature that make the very costly to build and greatly reduce the general efficiency of the hull (a Liberty ship had five times the cargo capacity than the Arktika). It was 1985 before a icebreaker managed to circumnavigate North America.

Even if it was possible to get enough icebreaker/transport ships built they would have to land in a location that makes the middle of nowhere look like Manhattan South. The force would then need to build infrastructure, including several rail lines in addition to roads. air field, supply depots, barracks, etc., a MINIMUM of 1,400 miles to connect with the Trans-Siberian Railroad (which would also require massive upgrade, the U.S. military is not known for running lean) across some of the most hostile terrain on the planet. While the U.S.military worked miracles in WW II, this looks to be a bridge too far.
 
Basically there's not much the US can plausibly/feasibly do to invade Nazi Europe and actually succeed in a reasonable time frame.

How do you explain Downfall and the US mobilization plans involving over 60 armour divisions or the many of thousands of landing craft the US built by wars end? It is not a question of if the US invades North Africa or Europe only when and if it is successful.
 

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The strait of Hormuz is extremely important for shipping.



The US would at the very least want to take North Africa because if the Germans do not have that then there is absolutely no hope of invading South America. (In the event of war at least) They won't bottle themselves up with just a war waged in the western Atlantic. Not that that is exactly what you are saying, but we in the event of war the US wouldn't sit idly by.



Maybe it has gone to Japan in this case.



Even if Japan takes all the European colonies in Asia. Japanese foreign policy wanted the Philippines as early as July 2nd 1941 (and Australia). Don't see how that changes. November 5th was when they definitely decided on it, though.
The Strait of Hormuz is a critical shipping channel today solely because around half the world's oil is exported through it. In 1941 the world's, hand's down, largest oil exporter was the United States.

The U.S. only engaged the Reich when it did IOTL because Hitler was stupid enough to declare war on the U.S. Before Pearl Harbor there was very little sentiment to "fight in another European War". The basic belief among the American electorate was "F*** 'em all"; as late as December of 1940 the majority of Americans were not prepared to go to war, even to save Britain. Many Americans, rightly or wrongly, believed that the U.S. had been played for chumps in WW I. Isolationists were a major political force. The reason the U.S. Army was the 38th largest in the world, while the USN was, along with RN, the largest was because a majority of Americans throughout the intra-war years beleived that a big navy and big bomber force would keep the "European Wars" on the far side of the Atlantic. From our 21st Century perspective, with the vastly "smaller" world of today that seems crazy, in 1940 it really wasn't

The Japanese made that policy decision on July 2, 1941. The U.S., UK, and the Netherlands placed a total embargo on oil exports to Japan on June 26, 1941. If you are going to take the oil from the DEI, you have no choice but to neutralize the Philippines. The U.S. would probably have draw a big red line around Australia and New Zealand, and it is likely that the U.S. would occupy the various British possessions in the mid Pacific at the "request" of the Government in Exile, but it is difficult to see how the American electorate is motivated to support a war over Japan's replacing the British as the colonial masters of Malaya.
 
How do you explain Downfall and the US mobilization plans involving over 60 armour divisions or the many of thousands of landing craft the US built by wars end? It is not a question of if the US invades North Africa or Europe only when and if it is successful.
The enemy was Japan, who was starved and defenseless from the air. There is also the fact that the US had Okinawa as an absolute base.
 

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How do you explain Downfall and the US mobilization plans involving over 60 armour divisions or the many of thousands of landing craft the US built by wars end? It is not a question of if the US invades North Africa or Europe only when and if it is successful.
Because it was against Japan, which had about 3.5% of the total global industrial potential in 1940, compared to the U.S. at 41.7%. Even taking into consideration the damage done to the occupied European countries, the Reich controls, ATL, around 36% of the glbal 1940 industrial production

Because Japan had, even in September of 1945, more than 1.8 million troops, and the vast majority of its heavy equipment, on the Asian mainland, and several hundred thousand other troops trapped in the PI, on Truk, and on other islands that had been isolated and left to wither on the vine.

Because Japan's industry, such as it was, had been stared for fuel, raw materials, and electrical power by the hugely successful U.S. submarine and naval mining campaign. This same campaign had greatly reduced the daily caloric intake of the average Japanese subject.

Because the U.S. had a massive logistical jumping off point 350 miles from Kyushu across waters that were effectively an American lake, and a second, equally huge logistical base 1,000 miles from Kyushu.

You will note that, unlike Japan, the Reich has sufficient oil, an embarrassment of raw material riches, sufficient food, and the ability to move forces, by rail, across interior lines of communication. In Planning any landing Europe the U.S. has one logistical base within 1,000 miles of the continent (the aptly named Iceland) until the Faroes and Shetlands are captured (both of these targets are well inside land based air out of Scotland and Norway).

It is also worth noting that, unlike IOTL, any engagement against the Reich is purely voluntary on the part of the United States. There is no plucky London standing firm in the face of the Luftwaffe, no Churchill making his "Never Surrender" speeches (clearly ATL, the British DID surrender). What is there? The sort of invasion that boggles the mind. American planners (except MacArthur, who refused to even look at the intel if it didn't agree with him) expected to take more KIA in the first week on, and in the waters surrounding, Kyushu than the U.S. had absorbed during the ENTIRE PACIFIC WAR. Compared to the proposed invasion in this ATL, Downfall would have been an administrative landing.
 
Compared to the proposed invasion in this ATL, Downfall would have been an administrative landing.
It's insane how any potential war between the US and Nazi Germany ITTL would make the worst hypothetical bloodbath of all time (Downfall) look tame in comparison.

Would this estimate remain as bad even if Britain was unconquered and still in the war while the Reich had still reached the A-A Line?
 
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I would assume that the Pacific Theater still takes place on time? All of the United States resources would be spent taking out Japan, perhaps with more Soviet involvement if there is a truce between the Germans and the rump-Soviet state in Asia. If this does happen, we might see the United States for the duration of 1941 to 1945 in the Pacific concentrating there, albeit with side battles, including securing British holdings across the New World, as well as seizing Vichy/German/Italian Africa. Then they would wage an island campaign. Taking Crete, Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, the Baelerics, a few Aegean islands including Rhodes, etc... Cut at Germany's frontier, and then prepare for the liberation of Britain around 1946 or '47.
 

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That's insane how any potential war between the US and Nazi Germany ITTL would make the worst hypothetical bloodbath of all time (Downfall) look tame in comparison.

Would this casualty estimate remain as bad even if Britain was unconquered and still in the war while the Reich had still reached the A-A Line?
No.

The presence of the UK allows the same sort of campaign as occurred IOTL, albeit against a much stronger Reich. Even if one accepts that the Heer would need to conduct on going counter-insurgency operations, needs to increase garrison troops, and will have to release a number of the older reservists to return to their civilian positions, the WAllies would be facing at least double, more likely triple, the forces in Occupied Western Europe as IOTL on the day of any landings, with that number swelling as reserves are returned to duty.One major difference would nthat the Reich would have much more in the way of fuel and troop reserves compared to OTL (where the Red Army faced around 80% of the Heer). I wrote a rather extensive T/L that describes one possible version of the resulting war (although that wasn't really my initial intention), although there are many other visions of the results.

Still, I would expect U.S. KIA to beat least five, more likely ten times that experienced IOTL during the initial landings, that would make ALT D-Day the bloodiest day in American History.
 
If Wiki's estimate of 2,499 US deaths on OTLs D-Day is correct, that would be between 12,500 and 25,000 deaths in ATL, not including British deaths.

My question is what makes you think the losses would be between 5x and 10x worse than IOTL as opposed to 3x or 4x?
 
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The U.S. only engaged the Reich when it did IOTL because Hitler was stupid enough to declare war on the U.S. Before Pearl Harbor there was very little sentiment to "fight in another European War". The basic belief among the American electorate was "F*** 'em all"; as late as December of 1940 the majority of Americans were not prepared to go to war, even to save Britain. Many Americans, rightly or wrongly, believed that the U.S. had been played for chumps in WW I. Isolationists were a major political force. The reason the U.S. Army was the 38th largest in the world, while the USN was, along with RN, the largest was because a majority of Americans throughout the intra-war years beleived that a big navy and big bomber force would keep the "European Wars" on the far side of the Atlantic. From our 21st Century perspective, with the vastly "smaller" world of today that seems crazy, in 1940 it really wasn't

Gallup polls regarding risking war to save the U.K. as was done OTL showed that a majority of the public felt it was ok.

The Strait of Hormuz is a critical shipping channel today solely because around half the world's oil is exported through it. In 1941 the world's, hand's down, largest oil exporter was the United States.

It can also be used by Axis aircraft on the peripheries of the Axis territories making it a big target.

Sudan and Aden wouldn't be ignored either for the air bases. Gibraltar.

It could be a part of the groundwork for taking back the Red sea ports and North Africa in general in 1944.

I won't go so far as to say that the US can defeat Germany without a great deal more elaboration, but were they to do it this is how. The Germans could afford a lot of men in North Africa but it is a big coastline. Casablanca is in easy reach of Allied forces. Gibraltar is as well assuming Spain doesn't join the axis.

The Japanese made that policy decision on July 2, 1941. The U.S., UK, and the Netherlands placed a total embargo on oil exports to Japan on June 26, 1941. If you are going to take the oil from the DEI, you have no choice but to neutralize the Philippines. The U.S. would probably have draw a big red line around Australia and New Zealand, and it is likely that the U.S. would occupy the various British possessions in the mid Pacific at the "request" of the Government in Exile, but it is difficult to see how the American electorate is motivated to support a war over Japan's replacing the British as the colonial masters of Malaya.

The conference was convened because of Barbarossa, though.

Japan has control of the DEI wouldn't they?

Because it was against Japan, which had about 3.5% of the total global industrial potential in 1940, compared to the U.S. at 41.7%. Even taking into consideration the damage done to the occupied European countries, the Reich controls, ATL, around 36% of the glbal 1940 industrial production

Germany cannot exploit the U.K. and USSR and automatically become a superpower.

That is not how it was with France and it won't be the way with these others.

Not to mention the possibility the occupation costs of the USSR might make the money made from it totally irrelevant.

Because Japan had, even in September of 1945, more than 1.8 million troops, and the vast majority of its heavy equipment, on the Asian mainland, and several hundred thousand other troops trapped in the PI, on Truk, and on other islands that had been isolated and left to wither on the vine.

And millions more on the Japanese home islands. They weren't completely unworthy of battle if they don't just surrender outright like Army Group B at the Ruhr.

Because Japan's industry, such as it was, had been stared for fuel, raw materials, and electrical power by the hugely successful U.S. submarine and naval mining campaign. This same campaign had greatly reduced the daily caloric intake of the average Japanese subject.

That means the invasion assets can be used for an invasion of Europe instead. The Us in this scenario will need the full mobilzation. 10 million. Probably for North Africa. Certainly for Europe.

Because the U.S. had a massive logistical jumping off point 350 miles from Kyushu across waters that were effectively an American lake, and a second, equally huge logistical base 1,000 miles from Kyushu.

Why is say New York to Casablanca not a good logistical jumping off point?

It is also unclear what the fate of the British navy is and if Germany captured it, and especially important where Spain stands .

You will note that, unlike Japan, the Reich has sufficient oil, an embarrassment of raw material riches, sufficient food, and the ability to move forces, by rail, across interior lines of communication. In Planning any landing Europe the U.S. has one logistical base within 1,000 miles of the continent (the aptly named Iceland) until the Faroes and Shetlands are captured (both of these targets are well inside land based air out of Scotland and Norway).

And yet they have less territories to defend whereas the German Army is spread across several continents! it is even worse than OTL. I am curious if they have enough divisions to even properly garrison all this coastline.

It is also worth noting that, unlike IOTL, any engagement against the Reich is purely voluntary on the part of the United States. There is no plucky London standing firm in the face of the Luftwaffe, no Churchill making his "Never Surrender" speeches (clearly ATL, the British DID surrender). What is there? The sort of invasion that boggles the mind. American planners (except MacArthur, who refused to even look at the intel if it didn't agree with him) expected to take more KIA in the first week on, and in the waters surrounding, Kyushu than the U.S. had absorbed during the ENTIRE PACIFIC WAR. Compared to the proposed invasion in this ATL, Downfall would have been an administrative landing.

Downfall was estimated between 250 thousand to 1 million casualties for the US so there is little reason to believe invasion of Nazi Europe is going to be anything less than millions.

The German economy is going to go massively into debt as per OTL.

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That was because Japan did not want to have an empty flank that the US could use to cut things off if Japan starts military operations. If Japan has open access to oil from the UK and Dutch governments, there isn't much that the US can do without being the belligerent ones.

I am not sure those governments exist anymore. If Japan has them now the US can cut those territories off if hostilities were to break out.

The enemy was Japan, who was starved and defenseless from the air. There is also the fact that the US had Okinawa as an absolute base.

This mainly applies to the liberation of the U.K. in a transatlantic invasion, which I did have doubts about.

North Africa is much more viable. Gibraltar, Sudan, Aden, Iran are on the list of what is taken first. Then, an invasion of North Africa, then Italy, and finally France. Assuming either North Africa or Europe don't become failures
 

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Gallup polls regarding risking war to save the U.K. as was done OTL showed that a majority of the public felt it was ok.



It can also be used by Axis aircraft on the peripheries of the Axis territories making it a big target.

Sudan and Aden wouldn't be ignored either for the air bases. Gibraltar.

It could be a part of the groundwork for taking back the Red sea ports and North Africa in general in 1944.

I won't go so far as to say that the US can defeat Germany without a great deal more elaboration, but were they to do it this is how. The Germans could afford a lot of men in North Africa but it is a big coastline. Casablanca is in easy reach of Allied forces. Gibraltar is as well assuming Spain doesn't join the axis.



The conference was convened because of Barbarossa, though.

Japan has control of the DEI wouldn't they?



Germany cannot exploit the U.K. and USSR and automatically become a superpower.

That is not how it was with France and it won't be the way with these others.

Not to mention the possibility the occupation costs of the USSR might make the money made from it totally irrelevant.



And millions more on the Japanese home islands. They weren't completely unworthy of battle if they don't just surrender outright like Army Group B at the Ruhr.



That means the invasion assets can be used for an invasion of Europe instead. The Us in this scenario will need the full mobilzation. 10 million. Probably for North Africa. Certainly for Europe.



Why is say New York to Casablanca not a good logistical jumping off point?

It is also unclear what the fate of the British navy is and if Germany captured it, and especially important where Spain stands .



And yet they have less territories to defend whereas the German Army is spread across several continents! it is even worse than OTL. I am curious if they have enough divisions to even properly garrison all this coastline.



Downfall was estimated between 250 thousand to 1 million casualties for the US so there is little reason to believe invasion of Nazi Europe is going to be anything less than millions.

The German economy is going to go massively into debt as per OTL.

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The sentiment to aid the UK did indeed increase during 1941. In this scenario that no long matters. The UK is GONE. The only way the U.S gets into a war with the Reich now is if it flat out starts it on its own.

Torch worked IOTL because the British controlled a number of critical locations, most importantly Gibraltar. The U.S. doesn't have enough decks to even attempt an invasion without access to land based air before mid-1944. This assumes that the Japanese somehow get rolled far earlier ATL than IOTL (or there is no war with Japan, although that would also reduce the number of available decks, since the Emergency Conversion program would no longer provide the Independence class CVL).

The base question is WHY? Why would the U.S. choose to invade and directly confront the Reich? Invading North Africa is the first step, even if it can be done with losses that are no worse than the Marianas campaign, how does the Administration (which is unlikely to be led by FDR, since the conditions that allowed his unprecedented 4th Term are no longer fully applicable) justify it? Assuming that FDR IS reelected, how does FDR's successor, be it Truman or anyone else, justify at least 500,000 casualties, with at least 125,000 KIA, to the electorate (especially considering the estimates will probably be at least a million casualties, as you note invading and subduing Europe is going to be a much tougher proposition than Downfall)?

The Reich squeezed France dry IOTL. The Reich doesn't need happy workers, it needs slaves. Slaves it now has in abundance. People in the Occupied Countries still need to eat, still need shelter. Some will flat out refuse to work in any capacity, they, and their families, will rapidly become object lessons (this is the NAZIS we are talking about here). Entire communities will become hostage to ensure that workers show up (there is no need to speculate about this, OTL proves it). Courage and resistance is a great concept until it is your neighbor's wife and 8 year old daughter wind up in Dachau with your family next up on the deportation list. The overwhelming percentage of the population will, to use a term that was popular in Paris in 1941, "prefer Coal to ashes".
 
OTL when TORCH happened while there was Vichy French opposition it was spotty at best and almost always ended pretty quickly. ITTL there is no reason to suspect this would be the case, and the longer the occupation of France, and the collaborationist government of Vichy is in power, the LESS willing any French forces in North Africa will be willing to throw in the sponge. In the Caribbean, South/Central America, Pacific, sub-Saharan Africa French colonies will mostly come under American control +/- a "Free French" administration - obviously those in the western hemisphere and "close" to the US and +/- valuable resources would be those taken up first. In the Pacific I can see French Polynesia and other islands under ANZAC control as well as US or joint.

Gibraltar is GONE. Spain WILL let Germany have basing rights there even if it is now "Spanish", likewise being able to use Spanish ports and airfields. I expect the canaries will end up with German bases, and the US will follow through on plans to occupy the Azores. So in the Atlantic you have the US in control of Greenland, Iceland, the Azores and Germany the UK, all of the European coastline directly or indirectly, Gibraltar, Canary Islands, and Africa north of the Sahara. Somewhere south of the Sahara you get US control of former European colonies, where exactly hard to say. South Africa and the Portuguese colonies are a wild card. All of the South Atlantic islands down to the Antarctic are controlled by the US.

IMHO a US-Japan war is iffy. British and French islands go to US/ANZAC, so does Borneo. The DEI, French Indochina, Malaya interesting question.

With Gibraltar controlled by the Nazis, with the Canaries controlled by the Nazis, with North Africa controlled by the Nazis TORCH is ASB. You might see US assaults on the Canaries, or any French colonies in Africa controlled by Vichy. North Africa (Morocco/Atlantic coast) would be a disaster. Don't forget also that now the Nazis are capable of basing aircraft patrol and attack anywhere in the UK and Northern Ireland, and likewise naval forces. This makes the Eastern Atlantic extremely dicey for the USA.
 
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