Leningrad

DrakonFin:

As you said Finland was a Co-beligerent - its main priority was to regain the lost territory of Karrelia. In OTL it didn't co-operate as much as it could've to tie the noose around Leningrad - from the North of Leningrad.

But I don't see any problem with them allowing the Germans to stage from Hamburg through Helsinki to the Baltic state's ports, and assisting with transporting the Finmark troops to join them if that was required. Whether, Fininish troops would fight in Latvia & Lithuania is debatable - though maybe they could help train Baltic nationalists!

Incidentally, we only know Hitler's attitude to Leningrad when he couldn't have it - it's much more debatable what he what to do with it if it was captured!!
 
I don't want to sound rude, but is it really necessary to use all these german words thrown in? They overflow with grammatical and spelling mistakes.
 
But I don't see any problem with them allowing the Germans to stage from Hamburg through Helsinki to the Baltic state's ports, and assisting with transporting the Finmark troops to join them if that was required. Whether, Fininish troops would fight in Latvia & Lithuania is debatable - though maybe they could help train Baltic nationalists!!

Logistically, I don't think using Helsinki as a staging port would be impossible. Politically allowing several divisions of German troops in the nation's capital, far outnumbering Finnish troops in the area, would be problematic.

And let us remember that IOTL the transfers of larger German formations into Lapland were at least somewhat hidden from the Soviets, as they arrived through Norway and the western Baltic ports such as Oulu. If the projected number of troops arrives in the capital area in early June, Stalin will know about it in days. There really is no plausible reason to have that many German troops around Helsinki besides an imminent invasion.

I am also a bit sceptical about the idea that transporting those troops to Tallinn and Riga would be as easy as the plan outlines. The approaches to Tallinn and the Gulf of Riga would be mined by the Soviets and significant Soviet naval forces would be operating in those areas.

Using Finnish expeditionary forces in the Baltic area would be pretty much impossible - especially politically. For one thing, Finland can't spare any troops if it wants to make headway in Karelia when the attack phase starts. And even if some troops would be somehow available still it would be very unlikely Mannerheim et al. would allow shipping them out to take directly part in Barbarossa. Deploying them in areas outside Finland and Karelia would run counter of the separate war theory that was the linchpin of "co-belligerence".
 
Credibility issues

If that LtCOL is brieffing the "German High Command" I don't think his patronising tone is going to be allowed for long. That kind of arguments would be presented in "brainstorming" meetings within G3, and once someone had convinced the DCOS/OPS, would have been presented by the COS to the relevant force commanders.
Sorry about the NATO speak, but its the fastest way to get the message across...

You just don't reminesce about your past boss favourite sayings when you're a LTCOL brieffing a roomfull of Field Marshalls and Generals...

Set this up as a wargame within Operations Branch while OKW is planning Barbarossa and anything goes...

On another note, seasoned veteran Generals don't really care what decorations you wear, since they're the ones who awarded them...
And telling them you got your commision on the field, even if it was by von Lettow Vorbeck (not really a popular name in Nazi circles) and not at a graduation cerimony after a proper academy course is not going to impress a bunch of career officers either.

I don't usally comment on style, specificaly since English is a second or third language for a lot of us, but since you seem to worry about your's I though a few sugestions would come handy...
 
There really is no plausible reason to have that many German troops around Helsinki besides an imminent invasion.
IOTL Germany moved its entire army up to the border & deployed into what could only be offensive positions, but Stalin's big worry was not to piss 'em off. He was absolutely convinced that Hitler would never invade, wouldn't believe it even when it happened, & went into depression for over a week when it was proven to him.

Furthermore, IOTL Germany has 1 div. in Finland as early as Oct. 1940. When Molotov was in Berlin in Nov. negotiating for the USSR to join the Axis he demanded an explanation, & Stalin made their withdrawal one of his conditions. Everyone knew those German troops were there to guarantee Finland's borders

The approaches to Tallinn and the Gulf of Riga would be mined by the Soviets and significant Soviet naval forces would be operating in those areas.
IOTL the approaches to Tallinn & Riga were never mined, except by the Germans. The USSR was caught entirely off-guard, was unable for months to take the initiative, & the offensive proceeded so fast that by the time the Soviets thought of doing it, it was too late.

As for Soviet naval forces, IOTL they were penned in Kronstadt, Leningrad, & Tallinn by minefields that were laid by German minelayers that had been concealed in Helsinki. Something like a quarter of the Soviet ships were sunk, mostly by German & Finnish mines, in the largest loss of life to a minefield in history. So, other than submarines, the Red Banner Baltic Fleet had no capability to interfere with German-Finnish naval ops in the Baltic. Our convoys will be escorted by a large number of destroyers to protect vs Soviet submarines.

Politically allowing several divisions of German troops in the nation's capital...
After a careful consideration of your criticisms & a more thorough review of Finnish war objectives & their limited willingness to cooperate with Barbarossa, I have (regretfully) concluded that you are most likely correct, & they would probably not have allowed the Germans to stage from Helsinki.

We will therefore assemble our ships at Danzig. After the invasion forces move out from Memel (Klaipeda) & their assembly areas SE. of Memel, we'll move the 1st echelon of ships & sealifted divisions into Memel for departure. It is 236 miles from Memel to Riga, so by using 12-kt. ships our forces can be there in 20 hours. It is 316 miles from Memel to Tallinn, so by using 15-kt. ships our forces can be there in 21 hours.

The most important loss in this revised plan is the 4-hour transit time from Helsinki to Tallinn, but upon reflection that shouldn't be critical because the Soviet Fleet will be completely taken by surprise anyway & is unlikely to be able to intervene. (Of course, the Germans wouldn't know that in advance, which is why they would have preferred to use Helsinki.)

My apologies to Catspoke if my defense of my earlier position sounded a little too insistent. Your criticisms also contributed to this re-evaluation.

...and AdA, your point about the patronizing tone is well-taken. Initially I had him speak with much greater reserve, but my own frustration with the limitations of the Barbarossa plan kept coming thru. Finally I decided to give up & just let him say what he wanted & let the chips fall where they may. On occasions when I've felt very strongly about something, following weeks of trying to get my point across in staff conferences, I've gotten carried away with myself in a similar fashion in front of general officers. Both times this happened I expected to get slapped down pretty hard, but I didn't. One general even said afterward that it was refreshing to hear a "spirited" presentation instead of the dry, monotone briefings they get exposed to all the time.

Go figure.

As for the Lettow-Vorbeck thing, you're right. He wasn't popular in Nazi circles, but he was a lot more popular among the General Staff than Hitler was. He was the only bona fide military hero from WW1.
Thegn.
 
...and AdA, your point about the patronizing tone is well-taken. Initially I had him speak with much greater reserve, but my own frustration with the limitations of the Barbarossa plan kept coming thru. Finally I decided to give up & just let him say what he wanted & let the chips fall where they may. On occasions when I've felt very strongly about something, following weeks of trying to get my point across in staff conferences, I've gotten carried away with myself in a similar fashion in front of general officers. Both times this happened I expected to get slapped down pretty hard, but I didn't. One general even said afterward that it was refreshing to hear a "spirited" presentation instead of the dry, monotone briefings they get exposed to all the time.

Go figure.

As for the Lettow-Vorbeck thing, you're right. He wasn't popular in Nazi circles, but he was a lot more popular among the General Staff than Hitler was. He was the only bona fide military hero from WW1.
Thegn.[/QUOTE]

I did get the feeling you were strongly identifying with your main character. Being blunt often works in the military, even to Generals, if you're pretty sure you're gonna be proven right, but your guy talks with a smugness like he's Hitler Bridge partner. He keeps saying "I think that", when "Our studies show that.." would be more conventional. And if he's talking to Von Rundstedt and friends you'de better tone him down a notch.


Are you talking to me?

3962715032_6e4e00a57a.jpg
 
It's a 1st draft, AdA. Cut me a little slack.
Thegn.

Done. Strictly operational issues from now on. And remember, there are no negative post, only bumps. Every time I am a snob about your LTCOL, you go to the top of the list:cool:
 
IOTL Germany moved its entire army up to the border & deployed into what could only be offensive positions, but Stalin's big worry was not to piss 'em off. He was absolutely convinced that Hitler would never invade, wouldn't believe it even when it happened, & went into depression for over a week when it was proven to him.

Furthermore, IOTL Germany has 1 div. in Finland as early as Oct. 1940. When Molotov was in Berlin in Nov. negotiating for the USSR to join the Axis he demanded an explanation, & Stalin made their withdrawal one of his conditions. Everyone knew those German troops were there to guarantee Finland's borders.

Yes. What I was talking about was a sudden, visible and disproportionate increase of troops that the arrival of 4-8 divisions into Helsinki would represent. In comparison, the troops that arrived into Lapland earlier could be partly explained as "troops in transit" or "troops on leave", etc., and also different maskirovka measures were being used such as clothing the German soldiers in Finnish uniforms and so on. The Helsinki option would have been very different.


IOTL the approaches to Tallinn & Riga were never mined, except by the Germans. The USSR was caught entirely off-guard, was unable for months to take the initiative, & the offensive proceeded so fast that by the time the Soviets thought of doing it, it was too late.

You are partly right, the Soviets did drag their feet in starting mining those areas as they were caught off guard. But the approaches to Tallinn for example were mined, just as were entrances to the Gulf of Riga though only beginning in late June. Other fields, such as 3000 mine strong one across the mouth of the Gulf of Finland was completed in late June. According to my sources, when the war begun the Soviets were quite capable of starting mining those areas right away, as the minelayers were already loaded. If they get advance warning, by suspicious troop transfers into southern Finland and heavy German naval activity towards Helsinki (and/or Turku), they might well start their mining activity earlier

I agree that the Finns and the Germans were certainly more prolific in building minefields even before the start of Barbarossa. But then they knew exactly what was coming.


As for Soviet naval forces, IOTL they were penned in Kronstadt, Leningrad, & Tallinn by minefields that were laid by German minelayers that had been concealed in Helsinki. Something like a quarter of the Soviet ships were sunk, mostly by German & Finnish mines, in the largest loss of life to a minefield in history. So, other than submarines, the Red Banner Baltic Fleet had no capability to interfere with German-Finnish naval ops in the Baltic. Our convoys will be escorted by a large number of destroyers to protect vs Soviet submarines.

That would be true later, but not yet in June or even very early July. In June the bulk of the Baltic Fleet was still in the western Gulf of Finland and Soviet forces in the Gulf of Riga still included at least the cruisers Kirov and Maxim Gorky and six to eight destroyers, as well as submarines and torpedo boats etc. The bulk of the Baltic Fleet forces defending the Gulf of Riga was transferred to Tallinn only at the end of June-early July IOTL. In other words, the Soviets had reasonably strong naval forces outside Riga right up to the point the Germans captured Libau and Riga itself.

A very big part of the Finnish and German minelaying took place after the start of the war as well (including building the entire notorious Juminda minefield). On July 1st the waters outside Tallinn, for example, were still open enough to move the battleship Oktyabrskaya Revolutsiya, submarines, minelayers and large support vessels from Tallinn to Kronstadt. The Juminda disaster during the eventual evacuation of Tallinn happened only on August 28th - over two months from the beginning of the hostilities. At that point the Finns and Germans had been beavering away building their minefields which were much more formidable than in June.


After a careful consideration of your criticisms & a more thorough review of Finnish war objectives & their limited willingness to cooperate with Barbarossa, I have (regretfully) concluded that you are most likely correct, & they would probably not have allowed the Germans to stage from Helsinki.

[snip]

The most important loss in this revised plan is the 4-hour transit time from Helsinki to Tallinn, but upon reflection that shouldn't be critical because the Soviet Fleet will be completely taken by surprise anyway & is unlikely to be able to intervene. (Of course, the Germans wouldn't know that in advance, which is why they would have preferred to use Helsinki.)

Thank you for taking my views into account. I am though not entirely in agreement with you that the Soviet Baltic Fleet was entirely taken by surprise by the attack - my sources indicate that it was surprisingly ready for war, at least in comparison to the army. In fact the Baltic Fleet had been put to "full battle readiness" on June 11th and then again on June 21st. The downfall of the Baltic Fleet was more the fact that the front on land collapsed much faster than was anticipated and that more than the events on the Baltic Sea itself let to it being evacuated to Tallinn and Kronstadt and then penned up there for the most of the war.

According to my sources the OTL German naval forces actually in use on the Baltic at the start of Barbarossa definitely were not very strong in comparison: 28 MTBs, 5 submarines, 6 big minelayers, and several flotillas of small minelayers, minesweepers and support vessels. I would not call that an existential threat to the Soviet Baltic Fleet as its forces stood in mid-June. So for your plan you will need the Kriegsmarine to use a lot more of its precious vessels and a lot more aggressively than it was ready to do IOTL, perhaps forming something like the OTL Baltenflotte several months early.
 
What I was talking about was a sudden, visible and disproportionate increase of troops that the arrival of 4-8 divisions into Helsinki would represent.
Point taken. Since we've moved the op to Memel this should no longer be a problem.

...the troops that arrived into Lapland earlier could be partly explained as "troops in transit" or "troops on leave", etc...
...which is basically what Hitler told Molotov when Molotov called him on it.

In June the bulk of the Baltic Fleet was still in the western Gulf of Finland and Soviet forces in the Gulf of Riga still included at least the cruisers Kirov and Maxim Gorky and six to eight destroyers...
Where did you come by that information? My information on Soviet fleet deployments prior to Barbarossa is rather scant.

According to my sources the OTL German naval forces actually in use on the Baltic at the start of Barbarossa definitely were not very strong in comparison: 28 MTBs, 5 submarines, 6 big minelayers, and several flotillas of small minelayers...
Would you have the names of those "6 big minelayers"? The only ones I've been able to ID by name are the 'Tannenburg', the 'Brummer' (ex-Nor. 'Olaf Tryggvason'), the 'Kamerun' (ex-Nor. 'Rauma'), & the 'Togo' (ex-Nor. 'Otra'). There was also the 'Drache' (ex-Yugo. 'Zmaj'), but she was in the Med.

So for your plan you will need the Kriegsmarine to use a lot more of its precious vessels and a lot more aggressively than it was ready to do IOTL, perhaps forming something like the OTL Baltenflotte several months early.
1st of all, the invasion of Norway involved the full committment of the KM. I can't see OKM putting up a big resistance to a similar committment in the Baltic for Barbarossa.

2d, the basic proposal quotes the actual figures & conditions of LW success during the Dunkirk evacuation (as opposed to the propaganda figures generally found on this board). In light of those numbers, I think that any sortie by the Soviet Baltic Fleet will suffer severe losses. (And BTW, I expected those figures to elicit some objection-- but not a peep. I have references, if anyone's interested.)

...& 3d, the plan for this campaign involves a much more rapid advance than IOTL, with a 50% increase in panzer formations alone, & all the artillery concentrated in support of them. IOTL HGN captured all of Latvia by 10 July. Quite honestly, with these changes I see the Soviets losing Riga definitely by the end of June, even without the sealifted infantry. From Memel to Riga is only 190 road miles. That's a rate of advance of only 20 miles per day.

If I were commanding Pzgp. 4, then after taking Riga I'd leave my reserve pzkorps to hold it, send my left-flank korps straight up the coast to Tallinn, & send my right-flank pzkorps up the axis Daugavpils-Ostrov-Pskov. (I know-- the plan for sealift was specifically to avoid having to use the motorized troops to hold objectives, but what happens in a map room & what happens on the ground are usually 2 different things.)

Since Riga (I believe) would have fallen before the sealifted troops even got there, those troops would end up getting diverted to Tallinn & in reality the foot infantry marching up the coast might reach Riga before the 2d echelon of sealifted troops did. If aerial recon showed the Soviet Baltic Fleet concentrated at Tallinn, as happened IOTL, then we'd offload the transports in the Gulf of Riga-- somewhere like Parnu. It's 79 road miles from Parnu to Tallinn, so dismounted infantry can be there in 4 days.

...so more KM vessels & more aggressive use of them? Almost certainly. But is that an argument against the op? I don't think so, because the speed at which the situation develops on the ground is even more disastrous & disorienting for the Baltic Fleet than IOTL.
Thegn.
 
Where did you come by that information? My information on Soviet fleet deployments prior to Barbarossa is rather scant.

That is from my trusty old Suomen laivasto 1918-1968, a semi-official history of the Finnish Navy. At the very end of Vol. I is a look at the German and Soviet naval forces on the Baltic in just before the war in June 1941, and the first part of Vol. II deals with the years 1941-45 and includes reasonably detailed information about German and Soviet actions in the northern Baltic.


Would you have the names of those "6 big minelayers"? The only ones I've been able to ID by name are the 'Tannenburg', the 'Brummer' (ex-Nor. 'Olaf Tryggvason'), the 'Kamerun' (ex-Nor. 'Rauma'), & the 'Togo' (ex-Nor. 'Otra'). There was also the 'Drache' (ex-Yugo. 'Zmaj'), but she was in the Med.

These ships, apparently converted fast passenger ships, are given in the book as Cobra, Kaiser and Königin Luise (of the "minelayer group Cobra") and Tannenberg, Hansestadt Danzig and Brummer (of the "minelayer group Nord"). Both "Cobra" and "Nord" included also 5 minesweepers, 6 MTBs and a support vessel. It seems they arrived to the Finnish coast between June 12th and June 19th and were hiding among the archipelago until the 21st when they started laying minefields at the mouth of the Gulf of Finland between Hanko and Hiidenmaa and outside Paldiski.


...so more KM vessels & more aggressive use of them? Almost certainly. But is that an argument against the op? I don't think so, because the speed at which the situation develops on the ground is even more disastrous & disorienting for the Baltic Fleet than IOTL.

I didn't mean it as an argument against the OP, as such, more as something that needs to be addressed, as the ships that would be used would likely have to be detached from other duties (I assume) and doing that would mean further changes to the timeline, in regards to the situation in other sea areas.
 
Thank you for taking my views into account. I am though not entirely in agreement with you that the Soviet Baltic Fleet was entirely taken by surprise by the attack - my sources indicate that it was surprisingly ready for war, at least in comparison to the army.

Two factors: longer service times - more experienced sailors - and the germans were failed to distrupt/sabotage the fleets communications (yes, they did that, but usually you can read about their failures).
 
You know, while there is a lot of criticism going around here, virtually none of it has to do with the early part of the plan. Have you considered the implications of "only" following the above maneuvers as far as Riga? How much would that have accelerated the German advance?
 
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