Royal Navy vs. IJN, 1940

sharlin

Banned
Without looking at the lists of ships in comission at the time i'd say its a bit more even than folks might realise. The INJ could not afford to trade losses with the RN though because each ship lost is nigh priceless, especially when it comes to big ships.

If france collapses as per OTL, and the RN suddenly looses support of the MN then the med will get a LOT more dicey unless the ASB's that caused this decide that the french want to fight on and the fleet remains loyal to the government rather than the Vichy regime.
 
If the scenario for Europe is as the OTL, then Italy and Germany would both soak up all British millitarry attention, as Britain simply lacked the needed materiel and men to do this and also fight the Japanese, no matter how much you want it. Europe simply came first, the Far East was partly expendable, iff necessary (except India). The British would have known that the Japanese might take controll of the Dutch East Indies, as that was their prime target, while stopping in Birma, as the Japanese could not find enough military resources to do two landwars (India) at once (China War also continued as OTL, I suppose.)

In Naval things, the OTL line of Europe would also include the OTL losses of some ships in that theater then, including the French Fleet for the Allied Cause. HMS Glorious still gets sunk in the Norwegean Campaign and Courageous still was sunk by the U-Boot in 1939, as was HMS Royal Oak.
 
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