Plus, after the reorganization finishes in Italy, the allies should be able to soon enter Austria from the South. I can see them entering in force before winter starts to hit.
Keynes' Cruisers Volume 2
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There is still a fully supplied German field army in the eastern Italian Alps
So no 2ème Division Blindée and Leclerc dash here. This will change (slightly) the power dynamics in France and with the Allies. De Gaulle doesn't have the PR boost of OTL. But, since "La France Combattante" is more powerfull ITTL and the Allies didn't try to put AMGOT in power in France, inter-Allies relations are probably better.
Note : I suspect that Eisenhower decision OTL to free the 2ème Division Blindée to race to Paris was a way to mend the AMGOT incident.
And it's not the best of terrain to mount a big offensive. The Allies will probably be better inspired if they swing through Slovenia toward the Danube, and then North.
Story 2523
East Bank of the Prut River, USSR July 7, 1944
The nineteen year old conscript had just a moment to stretch his legs. The company of BA-64 armored cars had been on the move for six hours. It was time for food, repairs and refueling. He knew the drill by now. He jogged over to the pair of GAZ trucks that had been with the company ever since the corps had been released into the fascist deep rear. The truck driver was looking at a squeaky belt while the half dozen riflemen who were riding in the truck bed were busy passing out two fuel cans per scout car. It would not be enough to fill the tank, but the jugs were more than enough to replace the petrol burned during the morning's advance.
Half an hour later, the seventeen vehicles started up again as they probed north looking for either a ford or a bridge that a trio of tank brigades could exploit. If they found nothing, then the engineers would be busy in a few days.
The nineteen year old conscript had just a moment to stretch his legs. The company of BA-64 armored cars had been on the move for six hours. It was time for food, repairs and refueling. He knew the drill by now. He jogged over to the pair of GAZ trucks that had been with the company ever since the corps had been released into the fascist deep rear. The truck driver was looking at a squeaky belt while the half dozen riflemen who were riding in the truck bed were busy passing out two fuel cans per scout car. It would not be enough to fill the tank, but the jugs were more than enough to replace the petrol burned during the morning's advance.
Half an hour later, the seventeen vehicles started up again as they probed north looking for either a ford or a bridge that a trio of tank brigades could exploit. If they found nothing, then the engineers would be busy in a few days.
USN Carrier thinking (July 1944)
The US Navy is, like the RN, looking at both war time needs and future peace time needs. At this point, the building bolus of both the 2 Ocean Navy and then the war time supplements of 1941 and 1942 are either with the fleet or will likely be commissioned by the start of 1946 (with a few exceptions). Laying down new ships over the rest of 1944 and 1945 will likely mean that those ships will not be ready for combat operations while there is still a war going on. Therefore, the USN is doing a significant rethink of what the war time fleet needs and then what the peace time fleet should look like.
Ships expected to be completed by mid-1946
6 Wake Island CV-B (TTL Midway)
24 Essex class CV
3 Yorktown class CV
1 Lexington CV
1 Wasp CV
1 Ranger CVL
8 Independence CVL
Way too many CVE
The plan is for the entire fleet to be available for up to a year after the end of hostilities for return of forces to the US. However, by 1947, the Ranger, Wasp and Lexington will be disposed of. Lexington is beaten up and old and uses odd equipment for the propulsion train. She is big enough to be useful, but expensive as hell to maintain. Wasp and Ranger are too damn small and slow for current propeller driven aircraft much less jets. The 8 Independence class ships are war time expedients that are too small to be useful with jets. They are likely to go into reserve quickly and also sold/transferred to allies as needed. There will be some talk about converting them into trade protection carriers as they have a smaller crew than the Essexes, but way less endurance and capability. Several of the purpose built CVEs will be kept as interim ASW ships and several more will continue as aircraft transports (these may eventually be converted into LPHs). The rest of the CVEs, esp. the merchant conversions will be quickly disposed of in the most profitable way available.
Now onto the first line fleet carriers --- the core of the post-war fleet will be the half dozen Wake Islands. They will be supplemented by 8 Essex class ships, likely the long hulls with the least amount of war time wear and tear. One Essex will be in the active fleet as a test and technology demonstration carrier but will not be part of the deployable force. The rest of the Essex class will go into reserve/deep refits as technology evolves and rotate out of reserve to replace the active duty ships as they get deep refits. The USN is likely to keep the 3 Yorktowns in reserve for a few years, but the combination of very hard wartime use, damage and smaller size means that they will be razor blades by the early 50s.
As far as building plans, something like the USS United States class is highly likely to be in the shipbuilding plans for the late 40s. The USN won't have a reliable nuclear delivery system on its current carrier force for a while until the bombs shrink in size, so a big carrier is needed from internal interservice politics perspective. There will be talk about another light-ish carrier class (still might be 40,000 tons) as an economy carrier to perform CAP and ASW roles for the battle and nuclear strike carriers, but at this time, not a penny has been allocated to those design studies.
Now onto battleships --- the Big-5 standards going to reserve, pretty much everything else is getting razorbladed or becoming a test ship.
2 North Carolinas -- reserve
3 South Dakota -- deep reserve
3 Iowas -- active service
2 Alaskas --- deep reserve
The USN is still thinking if they need a big carrier body guard cruiser/light battleship and they've allocated half a dozen FTEs to do a design/requirement scoping study.
Ships expected to be completed by mid-1946
6 Wake Island CV-B (TTL Midway)
24 Essex class CV
3 Yorktown class CV
1 Lexington CV
1 Wasp CV
1 Ranger CVL
8 Independence CVL
Way too many CVE
The plan is for the entire fleet to be available for up to a year after the end of hostilities for return of forces to the US. However, by 1947, the Ranger, Wasp and Lexington will be disposed of. Lexington is beaten up and old and uses odd equipment for the propulsion train. She is big enough to be useful, but expensive as hell to maintain. Wasp and Ranger are too damn small and slow for current propeller driven aircraft much less jets. The 8 Independence class ships are war time expedients that are too small to be useful with jets. They are likely to go into reserve quickly and also sold/transferred to allies as needed. There will be some talk about converting them into trade protection carriers as they have a smaller crew than the Essexes, but way less endurance and capability. Several of the purpose built CVEs will be kept as interim ASW ships and several more will continue as aircraft transports (these may eventually be converted into LPHs). The rest of the CVEs, esp. the merchant conversions will be quickly disposed of in the most profitable way available.
Now onto the first line fleet carriers --- the core of the post-war fleet will be the half dozen Wake Islands. They will be supplemented by 8 Essex class ships, likely the long hulls with the least amount of war time wear and tear. One Essex will be in the active fleet as a test and technology demonstration carrier but will not be part of the deployable force. The rest of the Essex class will go into reserve/deep refits as technology evolves and rotate out of reserve to replace the active duty ships as they get deep refits. The USN is likely to keep the 3 Yorktowns in reserve for a few years, but the combination of very hard wartime use, damage and smaller size means that they will be razor blades by the early 50s.
As far as building plans, something like the USS United States class is highly likely to be in the shipbuilding plans for the late 40s. The USN won't have a reliable nuclear delivery system on its current carrier force for a while until the bombs shrink in size, so a big carrier is needed from internal interservice politics perspective. There will be talk about another light-ish carrier class (still might be 40,000 tons) as an economy carrier to perform CAP and ASW roles for the battle and nuclear strike carriers, but at this time, not a penny has been allocated to those design studies.
Now onto battleships --- the Big-5 standards going to reserve, pretty much everything else is getting razorbladed or becoming a test ship.
2 North Carolinas -- reserve
3 South Dakota -- deep reserve
3 Iowas -- active service
2 Alaskas --- deep reserve
The USN is still thinking if they need a big carrier body guard cruiser/light battleship and they've allocated half a dozen FTEs to do a design/requirement scoping study.
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Story 2524
Turkish Thrace, July 8, 1944
The cavalrymen turned around. The patrol along the border was part of the routine that the Turkish Army had adapted ever since the Western Allies had landed in Greece. The horses knew the path and they stepped around the branches that would have swatted them in their face. The riders, by now, knew where to duck and lean as well.
Six hours later, the patrol had returned to their camp. Hot food and strong coffee was ready for them. The men would have a day off and then they would patrol again to insure their nation's neutrality even as two Allied corps were attempting to work east to break into the Bulgarian coastal plain.
The cavalrymen turned around. The patrol along the border was part of the routine that the Turkish Army had adapted ever since the Western Allies had landed in Greece. The horses knew the path and they stepped around the branches that would have swatted them in their face. The riders, by now, knew where to duck and lean as well.
Six hours later, the patrol had returned to their camp. Hot food and strong coffee was ready for them. The men would have a day off and then they would patrol again to insure their nation's neutrality even as two Allied corps were attempting to work east to break into the Bulgarian coastal plain.
Still no declaration of war from Turkey to the Axis. In OTL Turkey declared war to the Axis in February 1945, when the nearest German forces were some isolated guards in some Aegean islands and any major German forces were located as far as Hungary... Has Turkey broken off relations with the Axis yet?
That is an interesting cruiser design. It sounds like a Des Moines, with heavier armor and twin 9.2" instead of the three triple, automatic 8" turrets. I expect it is heavy on the armor, since six 9.2" seems light for a 21,000-ton ship. For a different example, a pocket battleship mounted six 11" on less than two-thirds the tonnage.
It may or may not get built; the class may have anywhere from 0 to 8 completed ships... there is a lot in the air. The fundamental idea of the ship is to get a night and bad weather bodyguard that can shoot-up anything at the edge of the radar horizon that is less than a battleship --- this justifies the relatively heavy guns as they need to get to the horizon and don't need the steel rain of the Des Moines.
The carrier air wing is the primary ASuW asset. The rest of the tonnage is devoted to range, sustainability and improved AA.
Driftless
Donor
I could imagine under the current conditions of the war, that there would be a ton of post-war jockeying between Allied military planners and civilian expenditure authorities over both the nature of future naval combat and money available for shipbuilding, maintenance, and fleet operations. Even if no one believes this conflagration was another "war to end all wars". The amount of national treasure has limits.
One of the key strategic elements to be seen is how the availability and use of the Atomic Bomb has on both military planners and civilian authority. Wasn't there an overriding estimation that the "Bomb" made everything else obsolete, or at least only marginally effective? At least until that notion was disproved time and again.
One of the key strategic elements to be seen is how the availability and use of the Atomic Bomb has on both military planners and civilian authority. Wasn't there an overriding estimation that the "Bomb" made everything else obsolete, or at least only marginally effective? At least until that notion was disproved time and again.
To be fair at the rate things are going the bomb might not actually be done before Japan has to throw in the towel due to a lack of food
IIRC the big impact of the bomb on naval warfare is countries stopped using heavy armor except on the biggest ships like super carriers. Another issue with armor is that as ships transitioned from guns to missiles, they became hard to armor effectively. Radars are hard to armor and the topsides have lots of antennas and waveguides.
For example, when USS Worden was accidentally attacked by a Shrike ARM in the Vietnam war, the missile exploded a hundred yards away and mission killed the ship due to fragmentation damage, without any damage to the ship's capability to float and move.
Story 2525
Near Boulogne, France July 9, 1944
The Belgian infantry brigade's advanced had stopped. Mortars and machine gun fire slashed the scouting element. Half a dozen unarmored cars were damaged or destroyed in under three minutes and a few dozen men were hit as well. Even as the lead element was responding to the contact, two batteries of German guns began to fire. The first few rounds were short and to the right, but soon, they had found the range.
Several flights of RAF controlled fighter bombers were near enough to be on call. Their cannons, machine guns, and rockets hit very few Germans. However, the threat of attack was more than enough to allow the mangled Belgian spearpoint to pull back several hundred meters behind a slight rise in the ground. By early afternoon, the rest of the brigade had pulled up. Half a dozen platoon sized patrols were out in the field to find the German lines and give enough information to the artillery that both the brigade and the 1st Canadian Army controlled for a deliberate attack that was now being planned for the next morning.
The Belgian infantry brigade's advanced had stopped. Mortars and machine gun fire slashed the scouting element. Half a dozen unarmored cars were damaged or destroyed in under three minutes and a few dozen men were hit as well. Even as the lead element was responding to the contact, two batteries of German guns began to fire. The first few rounds were short and to the right, but soon, they had found the range.
Several flights of RAF controlled fighter bombers were near enough to be on call. Their cannons, machine guns, and rockets hit very few Germans. However, the threat of attack was more than enough to allow the mangled Belgian spearpoint to pull back several hundred meters behind a slight rise in the ground. By early afternoon, the rest of the brigade had pulled up. Half a dozen platoon sized patrols were out in the field to find the German lines and give enough information to the artillery that both the brigade and the 1st Canadian Army controlled for a deliberate attack that was now being planned for the next morning.
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Story 2526
Los Alamos, New Mexico July 10, 1944
The physicists, managers, generals, and engineers were engulfed in smoke. Pungent cigar smoke dominated the cigarette smokers and the pipe puffers. The glasses were filled with ice cubes and Coca-Cola or water. Whiskey would be consumed after the meeting. The last presentation had been completed an hour ago. Thin Man was an elegant but currently unfeasible pathway forward. Little Boy would receive all of the resources that had previously been allocated to Thin Man.
The physicists, managers, generals, and engineers were engulfed in smoke. Pungent cigar smoke dominated the cigarette smokers and the pipe puffers. The glasses were filled with ice cubes and Coca-Cola or water. Whiskey would be consumed after the meeting. The last presentation had been completed an hour ago. Thin Man was an elegant but currently unfeasible pathway forward. Little Boy would receive all of the resources that had previously been allocated to Thin Man.
Very effective rearguard action. Would be surprised if there was any German presence there in the morning, they’ll be busy setting up the next delaying action just out of artillery range.
I suppose you mean Boulogne.
I would be rather surprized if the Belgian count in yards.
Well, Boulogne and almost all the ports are "Festungs". OTL, some ports resisted until May 45.
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About a week early, while the war is running much earlier than that. Hmmm.
The US nuclear program dissonance between TTL and OTL are plus or minus a few weeks as I have never seen much of a driver to change that much of the timing all that much.
That makes sense to me, the issue is what it implies about where the war front is and the bomb's readiness is.
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