London Firestorm

[Deleted member 1487]

During the Blitz the Luftwaffe suffered from major problems of strategy, as their command (Goering and Hitler) ordered so many targets and constantly changed targets that effort was seriously dispersed. Concentration was never achieved to the levels that the RAF and USAAF ever achieved, not due to lack of airplanes (they they were smaller than their enemies' aircrafts), but due to dispersal of effort, i.e. trying to hit everything at once.

What if they concentrated their night bombing in October-December against London, putting into the bombing 1000+ aircraft (not just bombers, but also fighter-bombers (bf110, me109), dive bombers, sea planes, bomb carrying transports like the Ju52, etc.) over London, which was only 100 miles from Calais, which would allow for maximum bomb loads for most aircraft.
That means 2 tons for the He 111, 2.5 tons for the Ju88 in 1940, 1/2 ton for the Ju87, 1/2 ton for Me109, 1 ton for Bf110 and so on.

Its then conceivable and probable that over 1200 tons of bombs/incendiaries could be dropped on London.
The weather conditions in October-December were conducive to a firestorm like that visited on Hamburg.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firestorm
Sir Arthur Harris, the officer commanding RAF Bomber Command from 1942 through to the end of the war in Europe, pointed in his post war analysis, although many attempts were made to create deliberate man made firestorms during World War II few attempts succeed:

"The Germans again and again missed their chance, ... of setting our cities ablaze by a concentrated attack. Coventry was adequately concentrated in point of space, but all the same there was little concentration in point of time, and nothing like the fire tornadoes of Hamburg or Dresden ever occurred in this country. But they did do us enough damage to teach us the principle of concentration, the principle of starting so many fires at the same time that no fire fighting services, however efficiently and quickly they were reinforced by the fire brigades of other towns could get them under control."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coventry_Blitz

The raid that began on the evening of 14 November 1940 was the most severe to hit Coventry during the war. It was carried out by 515 German bombers, from Luftflotte 3 and from the pathfinders of Kampfgruppe 100. The attack, code-named Operation Mondscheinsonate (Moonlight Sonata), was intended to destroy Coventry's factories and industrial infrastructure, although it was clear that damage to the rest of the city, including monuments and residential areas, would be considerable.

The first wave of follow-up bombers dropped high explosive bombs, knocking out the utilities (the water supply, electricity network and gas mains) and cratering the roads, making it difficult for the fire engines to reach fires started by the follow-up waves of bombers. The follow-up waves dropped a combination of high explosive and incendiary bombs. There were two types of incendiary bomb: those made of magnesium and those made of petroleum. The high explosive bombs and the larger air-mines were not only designed to hamper the Coventry fire brigade, they were also intended to damage roofs, making it easier for the incendiary bombs to fall into buildings and ignite them

Coventry's air defences consisted of twenty four 3.7 inch AA guns and twelve 40mm Bofors. Over 6,700 rounds were fired. However only one German bomber was shot down.[20]
In one night, more than 4,000 homes in Coventry were destroyed and around two-thirds of the city's buildings were damaged. The raid was heavily concentrated on the city centre, most of which was destroyed. Two hospitals, two churches and a police station were also among the damaged buildings.[21].[22] Around one third of the city's factories were completely destroyed or severely damaged, another third were badly damaged, and the rest suffered slight damage.

The raid reached such a new level of destruction that Joseph Goebbels later used the term Coventriert ("Coventrated") when describing similar levels of destruction of other enemy towns. During the raid, the Germans dropped about 500 tonnes of high explosives, including 50 parachute air-mines, of which 20 were incendiary petroleum mines, and 36,000 incendiary bombs.[25]

The raid of 14 November combined several innovations which influenced all future strategic bomber raids during the war.[26] These were:

-The use of pathfinder aircraft with electronic aids to navigate, to mark the targets before the main bomber raid.

-The use of high explosive bombs and air-mines (blockbuster bombs) coupled with thousands of incendiary bombs intended to set the city ablaze in a firestorm.

In the Allied raids later in the war, 500 or more heavy four-engine bombers all delivered their 3,000–6,000 pound bomb loads in a concentrated wave lasting only a few minutes. But at Coventry, the German twin-engined bombers carried smaller bomb loads (2,000–4,000 lb), and attacked in smaller multiple waves. Each bomber flew several sorties over the target, returning to base in France to rearm. Thus the attack was spread over several hours, and there were lulls in the raid when fire fighters and rescuers could reorganise and evacuate civilians.[27] As Arthur Harris, commander of RAF Bomber Command, wrote after the war "Coventry was adequately concentrated in point of space [to start a firestorm], but all the same there was little concentration in point of time".[28]

The London raid of December shows what could have been achieved:
http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/impact_blitz_london.htm

On December 29th 1940 Hitler ordered a massive raid on London. The date chosen was deliberate. The River Thames was at its lowest. 100,000 incendiary bombs were dropped and fire fighters in the City area of London had to cope with temperatures in excess of 800 degrees Centigrade. A severed main water pipe did not help the fire fighters. What water the Thames could provide was used but it required fire fighters to crawl across mud banks to simply get to the water. Historian Juliet Gardner simply referred to December 29th as “a dreadful night”.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Great_Fire_of_London

The "Second Great Fire of London" is a name used at the time to refer to one of the most destructive air raids of the London Blitz, over the night of 29/30 December 1940. Between 6pm and 6am the next day, more than 24,000 high explosive bombs and 100,000 incendiary bombs were dropped.[1] The raid and the subsequent fire destroyed many Livery Halls and gutted the medieval Great Hall of the City's Guildhall.

The largest continuous area of Blitz destruction anywhere in Britain occurred on this night, stretching south from Islington to the very edge of St Paul's Churchyard. The area destroyed was greater than that of the Great Fire of London in 1666. The raid was timed to coincide with a particularly low tide on the River Thames, making water difficult to obtain for fire fighting. Over 1500 fires were started, with many joining up to form three major conflagrations which in turn caused a firestorm that spread the flames further, towards St Paul's Cathedral.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Blitz#Night_attacks

Probably the most devastating strike occurred on the evening of 29 December, when German aircraft attacked the City of London itself with incendiary and high explosive bombs, causing a firestorm that has been called the Second Great Fire of London.[102] The first group to use these incendiaries was Kampfgruppe 100 which despatched 10 "pathfinder" He 111s. At 18:17, it released the first of 10,000 fire bombs, eventually amounting to 300 dropped per minute.[103] Altogether, 130 German bombers destroyed the historical centre of London.

During the December 29th raid only 130 bombers achieved a mini-firestorm.

What if in the October-December timeframe the Luftwaffe manages to start a firestorm in London?
How much damage would/could be wrought? What are the political effects? Could London "take it" like Churchill thought?

 

[CalBear]

This is one of those remarkable times that you clearly see that Harris was a homicidal arsonist, even more than his NAZI opponents. Harris actually believed that burning down German Cities was the way to win the war. He went to his death believing that (quite mad actually).

Unlike the truly horrific sorts of attacks that the Americans managed in the Pacific, which at least managed to have serious impact on Japanese production (although not to the degree that was believed) the firebombing of European cities were always a dodgy proposition, with only two sets of strikes during the war actually being anything approaching a serious success.

Dresden, where three days of attacks, including two raids by USAAF aircraft on the marshaling yards on the city's borders managed to kill 25,000 people (this is the latest figures from German sources and cleaves closer to the original estimate than the ones put forward by Gobbels Propaganda Ministry) and Hamburg, where the firestorm was started on by the July 28/29 raid by 787 aircraft (the second major night raid on the city, following a 790 aircraft strike on July 24/25) caused some 30,000 deaths, with an additional 777 aircraft raid by Bomber Command on the residential portions of the city two days later. The 8th AF also had two strikes against the Hamburg sub pens (referred to as the Blohm & Voss complex in the USSBS) on July 25 (~100 aircraft) and July 26 (~70 aircraft) before Bomber Command tore into the City Center.

Interestingly, neither of these campaigns (that can't be properly called a raid, since they were a series of strikes) really did anything materially to the war fighting potential of the Reich. The 8th AF had to make a number of raids against the oil refineries surrounding the Hamburg in an ongoing effort to destroy them. Bomber Command didn't make a major raid against Habburg again until March of 1945, when strikes were made against U-boat facilities and then oil targets. Dresden was also not put out of commission, requiring a follow-up strike on the Marshaling Yards twice in the following seven weeks. Even the far more successful (in terms of acres burned and civilians killed) of the two campaigns, namely Dresden, fails to equal the March 9/10 night bombing of Tokyo, where a single raid destroyed more acres of structures and exacted the largest death toll of any air raid in history with 100,000 estimated casualties (here's hoping that record is never broken, even though the estimate is now generally acknowledged as being remarkably low, with actually loss being much closer to 400K than 100K)

Overall Harris vastly over-estimated the impact the heroic efforts that his men gave him, both in lethality and in effectiveness. He also equally over-estimated the ability of the Luftwaffe to produce the sort of results he clearly lusted after.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

The RAF and USAAF efforts also had the problem of dispersion of effort until mid-1944.

London differed from both Hamburg and Dresden in that it was the largest city in the world in terms of size and had critical war industries in the city itself. Not to mention the entire country's rail network converged on London, which meant bombing of it disrupted the entire system.
Neither Hamburg nor Dresden had critical war industries, though both were legitimate military targets, which London did.

I should mention that both its rail yards and docks had lots of coal stockpiled because of London's huge demand for coal for power stations, which would be 'wonderful' fuel for fire.

Assuming the raid killed even 10,000 people, which would increase the number killed in the Blitz so far by 50%, it would be a pretty nasty blow and like Operation Gemorrah (Hamburg firestorm) panic would spread into the countryside as refugees fled the city, lowering morale just like after Hamburg.

Note I'm not saying this would be a morally good thing, but I'm trying just to figure out what the reaction would be to a successful firestorm in 1940 around Christmas.

How would the US react (historically it reacted to the OTL bombing by announcing Lend-Lease)? How would the British public react? What would be the effects on the British war effort/economy? What about Churchill's military response? And most importantly is this enough to topple Churchill via vote of no confidence and bring in a Prime Minister willing to negotiate with Hitler?

edit:
http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/hamburg_bombing_1943.htm

The first attack came in the early hours of Sunday 24th. In one hour, between 01.00 and 02.00, 2,300 tons of bombs were dropped which included 350,000 incendiary bombs. 15,000 people were killed and many more wounded. In previous bombing raids, the RAF had sent in pathfinder planes to illuminate the target by dropping incendiary bombs. The main bulk of the attack followed on to what was now a burning target. For the attack on Hamburg, the RAF combined the use of high explosive bombs and incendiary bombs, which were dropped together. The result made all but useless any form of fire fighting.

The Americans attacked on Monday 26th July and sustained heavy losses as a result of Luftwaffe attacks. An American attack on the Tuesday was called off due to poor weather.

The raid was resumed on the Wednesday. The 722 bombers were loaded with an extra 240 tons of incendiary bombs and dropped a total of 2,313 tons of bombs in just 50 minutes. The impact of this attack led to a firestorm with temperatures estimated to have reached 1000oC. Bomber crews reported smoke reaching 20,000 feet. Winds on the ground reached 120 mph. While not exclusively a wooden city, Hamburg did have many old wooden houses and after a dry summer they easily burned.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Dresden_in_World_War_II

In four raids between 13 February and 15 February 1945, 1,300 heavy bombers of the British Royal Air Force (RAF) and the United States Army Air Force (USAAF) dropped more than 3,900 tons of high-explosive bombs and incendiary devices on the city. The resulting firestorm destroyed 15 square miles (39 square kilometres) of the city centre and caused thousands of civilian casualties.[1]

Both of these raids were awful. To achieve what they did the RAF and USAAF require much more tonnage over days than the Luftwaffe had for one raid, but multiple raids over days could have had just such a devastating effect.

I realize I'm starting to sound like Arthur Harris here. It would be an awful, heinous thing for my scenario to play out, especially reading about the effects of the Hamburg and Dresden raids and having spoken to a survivor of the Dresden raids personally (that was a horrible story!), but I'm wondering if the British experienced it in the capital whether they might have decided enough was enough and tried to end the war via negotitation.

 

[BlondieBC]

What if in the October-December timeframe the Luftwaffe manages to start a firestorm in London?
How much damage would/could be wrought? What are the political effects? Could London "take it" like Churchill thought?

Yes, London can "take it". The UK stays in the war. The rail hubs are rebuilt. I can't give you the likely bomb damage assessment, but you seen to have a handle on it. You list the number dead, but I think the number of houses/building destroyed maybe the more important number to assess how much it actually hurts the war effort of the UK. Do you have a ballpark figure on the number of houses lost?

The political is more interesting. It will hurt the popularity of Churchill, and make it more difficult for him to govern if the were to be other major setbacks. I don't see this being a major issue in OTL, but with additional POD's, it could be a major amplifier of the additional POD. I don't see the UK using biological or chemical weapons in retaliation, but I can't totally rule this out.

As to the war impact, the UK will keep a lot more fighters and anti-aircraft around London than OTL, so other theaters will suffer. Like a lot of Germany does better against the UK in 1940/41, the major beneficiary will likely be Japan as the UK strips the far east of even more resources than OTL. It might also help Rommel in the desert if he faces less air power. If I had to place a bet, i would say the UK would keep at least 3 more squadrons of fighters in Southern England than OTL, with at least two coming from Asia or Australia.

I see you keep coming up with a lot of these very technical POD for WW2. Are you planning on writing at TL, or just reading books about WW2?

 

[hairysamarian]

...I'm wondering if the British experienced it in the capital whether they might have decided enough was enough and tried to end the war via negotitation.

More likely they would have decided enough was enough and that they should up the ante even further. Anything the Germans could have dished out, the Wallies could return multiply. There was a comment, I forget by whom, to the effect that "after the war, Japanese will be spoken only in hell." Such an attack on London would probably bring the same attitude to bear upon Germany.

 

[BlondieBC]

How would the US react (historically it reacted to the OTL bombing by announcing Lend-Lease)? How would the British public react? What would be the effects on the British war effort/economy? What about Churchill's military response? And most importantly is this enough to topple Churchill via vote of no confidence and bring in a Prime Minister willing to negotiate with Hitler?

It would be very, very unlikely that the UK would seek peace. It also seems a too early to even think about voting out Churchill. Now I can see someone resigning (scapegoating), but it would be more likely some RAF General. It is also hard to see the USA doing more because of domestic political constraints and hard to see the USA doing less because of the will of FDR. Did you have something that you think FDR was likely to do?

I have done a lot of work thinking on how to model lesser supplies for WW1. It appears to me that, generally speaking, Generals will consume all available supplies to support the current campaign. I can't model the bottlenecks in London in 1940/41 for you, but if you see a major delay, the lost supplies will be made up by cancelling enough military operations. For example, lets say London made 90% of the spare parts for tanks. Then any commander using tanks, would immediately go on the defensive due to lack of spare parts. So I would say the counter attack against the Italians in North Africa is cancel and the UK just digs in to defend the Suez.

It would take weeks of research to give you something approaching the correct answer, but based on what I know, I don't see any bottlenecks that can't be fixed. It will be less supplies for the USSR, a lot less supplies for Asia, and more timid land commanders for a period of a few weeks to a few months. The war would last a few weeks longer than OTL, with much the same result. There could be a major butterfly somewhere, but I just don't see it. The most likely butterfly is Japan in 1941, and they were stopped as much by Japanese logistical issues as Allied land forces. North Africa has some potential for a butterfly, but again, Axis logistics makes it difficult to capitalize.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

Yes, London can "take it". The UK stays in the war. The rail hubs are rebuilt. I can't give you the likely bomb damage assessment, but you seen to have a handle on it. You list the number dead, but I think the number of houses/building destroyed maybe the more important number to assess how much it actually hurts the war effort of the UK. Do you have a ballpark figure on the number of houses lost?

The number of dead could well be higher if a self-fueling fire tornado like what was achieved in Hamburg is started in London (Hamburg took 4 days and 3900 tons to achieve), which could potentially happen if the LW is able to drop over 3000 tons over 3-4 days on London, which if they could muster 1000 bombers for the initial raid, they could easily do in 4 days.

Judging by what happened in Hamburg its possible to lose 40-50% of the city in a firestorm. With about 2 million people left in London by December 1940 (the bulk of the prewar population had been relocated) this could potentially mean that homes for 500k+ remaining people are lost. London was about 30 squared miles in WW2 and the bulk of the housing was outside the city center near the Thames, which meant that the bulk of the housing required transport to reach the factories and other war industries in London. The docks, near the center of the city, had tons of flammable materials, like coal to power the power plants which ran the tram system in London, and the rail yards, also lots of coal, would both provide fuel for the fires and deprive the city of electricity to bring the outer housing residents to whatever is left of the city proper.

So not all housing is created equal. Lots of it would provide shelter that escaped from the fire, but then won't allow the inhabitants to travel the city once the power stations and their fuel are incinerated. The docks would have to be rebuilt to start receiving coal again, as would the rail yards to start unloading the coal and bringing it into the city to the destroyed power stations. Basically this would shut down London totally for months.

Add to this that the critical rail yard and its signaling gear would be destroyed and the British national rail system would be crippled for months until it was restored to full service. OTL even without bombing really striking it, the British rail infrastructure was heavily overburdened by the closing down of coastal shipping, which took nearly half of the burden off of the limited rail service in Britain, all of which converged on London.

Oh and London had ordnance factories in it, which has lots of explosive fuel for fires...

The political is more interesting. It will hurt the popularity of Churchill, and make it more difficult for him to govern if the were to be other major setbacks. I don't see this being a major issue in OTL, but with additional POD's, it could be a major amplifier of the additional POD. I don't see the UK using biological or chemical weapons in retaliation, but I can't totally rule this out.

Indeed, just as IOTL it hurt Goering's and Hitler's when Hamburg was burned to the ground.

No, the British would be very poorly served if it went biological/chemical, as the Germans just demonstrated they could saturate British cities with bombs at will and Bomber Command had only 400 bombers in their arsenal in 1940.

If you check my chemical weapons on the Eastern Front thread, Blairwitch makes a point about the super persistant Mustard gas the Germans could spray all over cities rendering them uninhabitable.

As to the war impact, the UK will keep a lot more fighters and anti-aircraft around London than OTL, so other theaters will suffer. Like a lot of Germany does better against the UK in 1940/41, the major beneficiary will likely be Japan as the UK strips the far east of even more resources than OTL. It might also help Rommel in the desert if he faces less air power. If I had to place a bet, i would say the UK would keep at least 3 more squadrons of fighters in Southern England than OTL, with at least two coming from Asia or Australia.

Yes, but it would also help drive Britain to bankruptcy quicker. IOTL it was already insolvent in December 1940 and by March 1941, which LL kicked in but still required payments, the Belgians had to sell of their gold to pay for war materials for Britain, because Britain was literally insolvent. That could play a major factor in Churchill's downfall if made public or it pisses off the war cabinet enough.

I see you keep coming up with a lot of these very technical POD for WW2. Are you planning on writing at TL, or just reading books about WW2?

Both

 

[DD951]

More likely they would have decided enough was enough and that they should up the ante even further. Anything the Germans could have dished out, the Wallies could return multiply. There was a comment, I forget by whom, to the effect that "after the war, Japanese will be spoken only in hell." Such an attack on London would probably bring the same attitude to bear upon Germany.

The quote is attributed to Adm. William F. Halsey, who made that remark to his staff while observing the damage caused by the Pearl Harbor raid from the flag bridge of his flagship, the carrier Enterprise, while entering port late on Dec. 7, 1941.

I'd imagine that there might be a few more people suggesting that the British go ahead with something as extreme in this scenario, though not really convinced if those calls would go as far as advocating Operation Vegetarian eek or whether it'd gain much traction if it was just a 1-time thing

 

[BlondieBC]

Judging by what happened in Hamburg its possible to lose 40-50% of the city in a firestorm. With about 2 million people left in London by December 1940 (the bulk of the prewar population had been relocated) this could potentially mean that homes for 500k+ remaining people are lost. London was about 30 squared miles in WW2 and the bulk of the housing was outside the city center near the Thames, which meant that the bulk of the housing required transport to reach the factories and other war industries in London. The docks, near the center of the city, had tons of flammable materials, like coal to power the power plants which ran the tram system in London, and the rail yards, also lots of coal, would both provide fuel for the fires and deprive the city of electricity to bring the outer housing residents to whatever is left of the city proper.

So not all housing is created equal. Lots of it would provide shelter that escaped from the fire, but then won't allow the inhabitants to travel the city once the power stations and their fuel are incinerated. The docks would have to be rebuilt to start receiving coal again, as would the rail yards to start unloading the coal and bringing it into the city to the destroyed power stations. Basically this would shut down London totally for months.

Add to this that the critical rail yard and its signaling gear would be destroyed and the British national rail system would be crippled for months until it was restored to full service. OTL even without bombing really striking it, the British rail infrastructure was heavily overburdened by the closing down of coastal shipping, which took nearly half of the burden off of the limited rail service in Britain, all of which converged on London.

Oh and London had ordnance factories in it, which has lots of explosive fuel for fires...

I remember an old saying from the military. "Artillery does the killing, Infantry does the dying." When I tried to model in my ATL, I used the WW1 rule of thumb that 75% of the casualties were from artillery, so if there is a 40% reduction in ammunition, there is a 30% reduction in enemy casualties.

So, with the effects of burning half of London, there will be an immediate ammo crisis. You will have to pick a date, but lets say it is Dec 1. If I was writing a TL, I would cancel the British counter attack into London, and have the British army dig in near El Alamein. You then have to deal with the butterflies of Rommel not going to North Africa and the German troops not going. So with a massive London success, i see some interest butterflies in the the campaign to the east. I would also think about if Malta falls through butterflies. And Crete and the UK in Greece goes away. It is interesting how the butterflies can pop up.

London will be substantially abandoned. The factories not destroyed will be restored, but the workers in the factories lost will be moved to more secure locations where the the factories will be reestablished. With so much damage, I am not sure you rebuild the docks to any major degree.

No, the British would be very poorly served if it went biological/chemical, as the Germans just demonstrated they could saturate British cities with bombs at will and Bomber Command had only 400 bombers in their arsenal in 1940.

If you check my chemical weapons on the Eastern Front thread, Blairwitch makes a point about the super persistant Mustard gas the Germans could spray all over cities rendering them uninhabitable.

Churchill could be emotional and he was a big risk taker. Think carefully for the TL on the conditions that would trigger him to use the Anthrax. There is not right answer, but just because it does not work well, did not always stop Churchill.

Yes, but it would also help drive Britain to bankruptcy quicker. IOTL it was already insolvent in December 1940 and by March 1941, which LL kicked in but still required payments, the Belgians had to sell of their gold to pay for war materials for Britain, because Britain was literally insolvent. That could play a major factor in Churchill's downfall if made public or it pisses off the war cabinet enough.

I don't see how this happens. Why does destruction in London mean more imports? Wasn't the limiting factor the number of merchant ships, so the $$ per day should stay much the same? The impact will be lost supplies, not more expenses.

And for you TL, you seem to have some major improvement in German military IQ. Using SeaLion as a diversion to bring the Royal Navy into range for the Luftwaffe to engage could be an interesting story. For example, what if the Germans stockpiled magnetic mines, and they made their debut as a blocking mine field at both ends of the channel? Trading a few regiments of soldiers for several capital ships and favorable fighting conditions for Goering could be interesting. Also, Hitler was a risk seeker, and I can see him taking one more big gamble, not that it has to work out well.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

Churchill could be emotional and he was a big risk taker. Think carefully for the TL on the conditions that would trigger him to use the Anthrax. There is not right answer, but just because it does not work well, did not always stop Churchill.

The war cabinet had the ability to block him. They were far more rational than just Churchill, especially collectively. And many of them were talking privately of negotiation OTL.

I don't see how this happens. Why does destruction in London mean more imports? Wasn't the limiting factor the number of merchant ships, so the $$ per day should stay much the same? The impact will be lost supplies, not more expenses.

They need to replace machine tools and finished goods, not to mention various raw materials lost. Plus shipping and trains.
All of this needs to be imported, and most of that was coming from the US, not the Empire.

 

[BlondieBC]

They need to replace machine tools and finished goods, not to mention various raw materials lost. Plus shipping and trains.
All of this needs to be imported, and most of that was coming from the US, not the Empire.

True, but if the bottleneck in OTL was shipping not money, then every extra machine tool imported will replace an imported tank. Imported railroad ties will replace imported armor plates for warships, etc. This is my understanding of the UK issue in 1940.

However if the bottleneck is money not shipping, the UK will simply spend its gold reserves faster, and the date the UK will be able to import nothing from outside the empire is moved up.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

True, but if the bottleneck in OTL was shipping not money, then every extra machine tool imported will replace an imported tank. Imported railroad ties will replace imported armor plates for warships, etc. This is my understanding of the UK issue in 1940.

However if the bottleneck is money not shipping, the UK will simply spend its gold reserves faster, and the date the UK will be able to import nothing from outside the empire is moved up.

It wasn't money because there were still money available until March. Then it was gone and the US made it up via loans. Run out of money by earlier spending and there is a gap between the time periods and a fall in imports.

Perhaps the limited shipping will just result in delayed purchases for other items, but perhaps it will result in more purchasing of US ship building while production is unacceptably delayed. Also, with most of the imports coming in via Liverpool, most of it cannot be properly distributed while London was still recovering and rail transport cannot move through the city to factories in other parts of the country and food to the now dispersed Londoners.

 

[BlondieBC]

It wasn't money because there were still money available until March. Then it was gone and the US made it up via loans. Run out of money by earlier spending and there is a gap between the time periods and a fall in imports.

Perhaps the limited shipping will just result in delayed purchases for other items, but perhaps it will result in more purchasing of US ship building while production is unacceptably delayed. Also, with most of the imports coming in via Liverpool, most of it cannot be properly distributed while London was still recovering and rail transport cannot move through the city to factories in other parts of the country and food to the now dispersed Londoners.

If the ports are jammed up, the UK finances actually improve. Lets say the UK was receiving 3.5 million tons of shipping before the raid, but can only unload 3.0 million tons after the raid. Instead of running out of money on February 28 (call it 100 days from the raid), it will run out of money in 117 days or March 17. ( 3.5/3.0*100). I point this out because I found this quite surprising when I did my TL. Italy not entering the war and the UK losing a lot more merchant ships meant the UK was actually better financially.

Unless the UK has lots of idle merchant shipping sitting around, the firebombing raid will either have no impact or improve how long the UK can import with hard currency. The impact of your raid will be felt in fewer consumables by civilians and less ammo/supplies for combat units. If the UK importing policy in 1940 is anything like 1915, then the main impact will be a colder and hungrier civilian. There will be a secondary impact of military commanders cancelling offensive operations.

 

[Dathi THorfinnsson]

European cities have lots of brick and stone, and are much harder to set ablaze tan japanese ones. Note that in all of wwii, only two cities were set ablzze, hamburg and dresden. Hamburg was very dry, and it took 9000 tons of bombs do do it. Dresden was much later, and they had a far better idea of how to go about doing it, so they only needed 3900 tons.

Getting that tonnage of bombs onto london would be very, very difficult. Losses would mean the luftwaffe is destroyed as an offensive weapon.

Also, hitler and goering haave never seen a firestorm, dont know how effective it would be, and have no reasson to destroy the luftwaffe for a goal they dont know exists.

 

[Simreeve]

European cities have lots of brick and stone, and are much harder to set ablaze tan japanese ones. Note that in all of wwii, only two cities were set ablzze, hamburg and dresden. Hamburg was very dry, and it took 9000 tons of bombs do do it. Dresden was much later, and they had a far better idea of how to go about doing it, so they only needed 3900 tons.

And in fact Dresden, for historical reasons, still included a lot of wooden buidlings...

 

[Deleted member 1487]

European cities have lots of brick and stone, and are much harder to set ablaze tan japanese ones. Note that in all of wwii, only two cities were set ablzze, hamburg and dresden. Hamburg was very dry, and it took 9000 tons of bombs do do it. Dresden was much later, and they had a far better idea of how to go about doing it, so they only needed 3900 tons.

Getting that tonnage of bombs onto london would be very, very difficult. Losses would mean the luftwaffe is destroyed as an offensive weapon.

Also, hitler and goering haave never seen a firestorm, dont know how effective it would be, and have no reasson to destroy the luftwaffe for a goal they dont know exists.

The night bombing campaign during the Blitz was very low casualty for the Luftwaffe, something like 1% per mission. British AA was very weak and inaccurate, for example at Conventry, a heavy raid by LW standards, of 550 bombers, only one was lost to enemy action.
The RAF night fighters were only just coming online and weren't really effective until about March-April 1941 and even then effectiveness meant they inflicted around 45 losses in May despite several thousand sortees being launched.

The firestorm concept was 'proven' over Conventry. Though not a firestorm by the standard of Hamburg or Dresden, it was a massive conflagration that no one had yet experienced. The much smaller raid that historically hit London on December 29th, with 130 bombers, was purposely launched when weather conditions would cause worse fires. Had the LW launched 800-1000 bombers then instead of just 130 they could have turned the 3 giant conflagrations they created IOTL into a firestorm by Dresden standards, especially if they made follow up raids for days, just like over Dresden and Hamburg.

With a historical loss rate of 1% that means 10 bombers for that 1k bomber force. Over 8 missions that's ~80 bombers out of 1000. I highly doubt that would cripple the LW.

 

[Snake Featherston]

It took the Allies repeated efforts to get firebombings to work in Europe and even in Japan. In neither case did any individual firebombing break the will of the enemy to resist (Japan's will broke in 1945, long after the firebombings had reduced its cities to rubble). The Allies had a heavy bomber force and the kind of maniacs willing to invest in it even when sources at that time were noting what a load of bullshit the CBO was selling. All this does as with the later German firebombing is make people grit their teeth more and harden their attitudes to prosecuting the war. The Axis have neither the weaponry nor the materiel to bring such a campaign about.

 

[Clandango]

Was there at any point an unusually large amount of petroleum stored around the city either in trunks, barrels, or ships? Having them leak over the Thames might stop efforts to fight fires.

 

[wietze]

Churchill could be emotional and he was a big risk taker. Think carefully for the TL on the conditions that would trigger him to use the Anthrax. There is not right answer, but just because it does not work well, did not always stop Churchill.

The war cabinet had the ability to block him. They were far more rational than just Churchill, especially collectively. And many of them were talking privately of negotiation OTL.

And don't forget the generals, i recall something about churchill suggesting to spray the normandy beaches with mustardgas and the general going berserk over it. one of the reasons they were so reluctant is because they (rightly for chem weapons) thought the germans could retaliate in kind, and this thought will hold vegetarian of chem weapons off until something unlikely like sealion would happen. As said, the chances of trying a negotiated peace are higher than bioweapen use.

 

[BlondieBC]

And don't forget the generals, i recall something about churchill suggesting to spray the normandy beaches with mustardgas and the general going berserk over it. one of the reasons they were so reluctant is because they (rightly for chem weapons) thought the germans could retaliate in kind, and this thought will hold vegetarian of chem weapons off until something unlikely like sealion would happen. As said, the chances of trying a negotiated peace are higher than bioweapen use.

You are most likely correct.

But IMO, the most powerful force in the Universe is Human stupidity. If we use the logic that dumb things don't happen, then Zimmerman Telegram never is sent, the USA does not have a minor war with Mexico over a 21 gun salute, Hitler does not invade Russia. Napoleon quits while he is a head. And the most relevant example, no Gallipoli.