SeaLion - the poll

[Wozza]

1. Speer 2.0 (Kriegsleiter)manages to organise the german industry, the new ressources beeing focused in a torpedo-bomber project
2. Luftwaffe had the ability to achieve total air superiority, enabeling safe air-transport and support
3. Spain, Vichy France and Italy could be brought in, possibly as a result of a big axis naval victory in the Med or a Oran-like incident
4. German troops where superior in numbers, training, tactics, weapons and leadership to those of the british
5. The germans could risk in the battle of Norway, where they would simply bleed the R.N. dry by U-Boat and airpower
6.Germany had beaten everyone up to that point, including the once mighty french
7. Germany had a strong paratrooper force, wich could have been even stronger
8. DUNKIRK COULD HAVE BEEN A MUCH BIGGER DISASTER

1. A lot of ideas get floated for different German economic planning in the 30s. Nine out of ten of them are, to be frank, complete bollocks. The really good one would be not to build the West Wall. But, really, to decide in 1938 to go for barges/landing equipment instead of fortications, because " when one attacks Poland France will do nothing, France will then fall in six weeks but the British will hold out" would just get laughed at.

2. Curiously enough the Germans could have massively improved their chances in the Battle of Britain by putting long-range fuel tanks on Me 109s. I have never read an explanation of why this was not done.

3. Spain, France and Italy? The contradictions of doing so are legion.


The other option of course is that the Germans do ... NOTHING. No bombs, no threats, they just act as if the war is over. It would be interesting to see what the British would or could do in those circumstances.

In practice of course Churchill could easily have provoked Hitler, who lacked the temperament for such an approach.

 

[Max Sinister]

And if Germany didn't build the westwall, the Allies shouldn't be that hesitating with an attack on the Rhineland. The westwall wasn't even as strong as the Maginot line (and we know that this doesn't have to mean much), it only was in nazi propaganda.

 

[Earling]

How do you come to the premise that the RAF cannot be destroyed? The RN, maybe. With proper focus on destroying the sectors airfields and radar stations its forseable that the Luftwaffe can gain airsupremacy.

Air Supremacy over southern England doesn't equal a destroyed RAF. It has been demonstrated that had losses grown too high the RAF would retreat to northern bases where it could be patched up in order to re-challenge the skies across the channel and landing grounds come any invasion attempt.

Then you have to consider the British have greater production so the Luftwaffe will really have to be hammering the British (which given the numerous factors already mentioned in the thread is unlikely) to get sustained air superiority.

Since its generally taken that with a surviving RAF and RN the invasion is impossible and since the British could keep those forces alive by moving them out of German reach before any invasion attempt is detected coming to a conclusion is not difficult.

Sealion is the plan that was intended to be used in the war of OTL in 1940-41. Sealion is not some improved plan where Germany is equipped with hundreds of torpedo bombers, has captured the British army at Dunkirk or Germany has some how gained divine intervention to bring about a successful invasion. The plan of OTL was doomed to failure.

 

[oberdada]

I chose the 4th possibility, because it normally is the option to Blaime Thande, and that's hat I really wanted to do!

 

[stevep]

2. Curiously enough the Germans could have massively improved their chances in the Battle of Britain by putting long-range fuel tanks on Me 109s. I have never read an explanation of why this was not done.

Wozza

Think I remember reading that the Me109 was too thin winged to support drop tanks. Germany had used them in the Spanish civil war I believe but that was with a different a/c.

Steve

 

[vpsoccer]

Bomber Command in 1940

I think a lot of this talk of the LW taking command of the air is a bit over blown.

Even *if* the RAF had to withdraw from south-east England, the small number of bf109 fighters would have to maintain their dominance over the Spits and Hurries, and cover their own invasion fleets from air attack by the RAF.

My books are in another room, but IIRC the RAF had about 1,000 bombers from light Battles up to Wellingtons and Whitleys. They were already attacking invasion ports (destroying more than 10% of the collected shipping in September) and were ready to make an all-out assault on an invasion fleet.

Sealion: a very large swimming party for the Wehrmacht.

 

[vpsoccer]

Bf109 had no problem carrying a belly tank, if fitted for it. Late stages of the BoB quite a number were fitted for a 250kg bomb.

Spit was similar, and in addition could have taken a fuselage tank behind the seat (similar to Mustang) if the Air Ministry had approved. Would have given quite intersting range.

 

[CDurham]

the question was not the royal marine but air supremacy. if the luftwaffe had gained air supremacy over south england during the battle for britain the invasion would have been a success because the invasion fleet would be protected by a mass number of planes -> no danger from royal navy.

i think it was churchhill who said in private that three or four more days of dogfights above south-englands RAF-bases and britain would have had to ask for an armistice or risk an invasion......that was on that day when göring stopped the battle for britain and went over to moral bombings (the blitz)

No, they would have withdrawn to the Midlands out of range of any German fighter or Bomber (they only had mid-range bombers) and then when the invasion sets sail they send about a thousand fighters to knock them out of the sky. A ME-109 only had about 20 minutes of "combat fuel" after crossing the channel, the hurricanes and spitfires could spend far more time over the beaches.

Oh, and the Stuka was a good plane for hitting a static ground posistion, but utterly worthless at hitting a moving ship (as the Germans own practice runs showed), they had no torpedo planes. Oh and the Stuka was called the Flying Coffin for a reason, if an enemy fighter spotted it it was only slightly more likely to survive the contact than the Red Baron running into a Hawker Hurricane.

As for the ME-109's, the Luftwaffe would be providing artillery for the invasion as their non-submersible navy was laughably small. You could have them bomb the beaches but they'd have to fly right back or you could have them with fuel tanks trying to protect the Stukas from the 1,000+ Spitfires and Hurricanes flying towards you while trying not to get shot down yourself. Sure, you and your 600 BF and ME flying friends will distract a large number of them but that still leaves the now unguarded Stukas trying to reach their targets with 500 or more enemy fighters around looking for something to shoot.

The river barges they were going to send across the channel had a Sea State rating of 2. As you can see here, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_State this means they could were designed for waters whose waves are no more than 0.5 meters high, or about 20 inches. Provided mild seas didn't swamp the damm things during the night as they neared the beaches a destroyer could sink an entire formation of them just by passing through at high speed (and in some cases, maybe literally passing through, if I was that destroyer captain and one of them happend to be right in my path... oh well, a heavily armoured warship at high speed running into a low lying river barge, hell, I might TRY and do it just to see if I could feel the collision)

 

[Max Sinister]

OK, so they could've done it if the wind wouldn't blow much faster than 3 on the Beaufort Scale, or 20 km/h. Good luck with that.

 

[committed hero]

Much as it would make for an interesting scenario, I don't think it was ever a realistic one.

 

[Saladin]

As far as the British aircraft of 12 and 13 groups coming to the rescue if 10 and 11 groups were overwhelmed ... well, After ww2, Bader and other proponents of the 'big wing' philosophy refought the BoB using their 'improved' tactics. They lost. Badly.

That doesn't, however, deny the ability of 12 and 13 groups to massively assist in disrupting an *invasion* due to the slower rates of movement of ships and barges etc. The Big Wings could get organised and sweep down, pushing the Luftwaffe away long enough to do dreadful damage to any invasion fleet, and then have the RN follow up to finish the rest.

In short, we need to remember that we must not see the BoB as equivalent to a successful Sealion

 

[Akiyama]

I voted yes, although it's a qualified yes. I think it's possible for an invasion of Britain in 1940 to succeed with a POD later than 1st January 1940, provided the Germans have a string of lucky breaks, make use of ships from foreign navies (for example from the French or the Dutch navies), and invade Britain in May or June. However, if the POD is after 16th July 1940 (when the Operation Sealion directive was issued) then I think, while not impossible, it is highly improbable (odds greater than 1000-1 against).

EDIT: I just noticed that Magnum's definition of "a realistic chance" is a greater than 15% chance. In that case I want to change my "yes" to a "no".

 

[CDurham]

As far as the British aircraft of 12 and 13 groups coming to the rescue if 10 and 11 groups were overwhelmed ... well, After ww2, Bader and other proponents of the 'big wing' philosophy refought the BoB using their 'improved' tactics. They lost. Badly.

That doesn't, however, deny the ability of 12 and 13 groups to massively assist in disrupting an *invasion* due to the slower rates of movement of ships and barges etc. The Big Wings could get organised and sweep down, pushing the Luftwaffe away long enough to do dreadful damage to any invasion fleet, and then have the RN follow up to finish the rest.

In short, we need to remember that we must not see the BoB as equivalent to a successful Sealion

Like I put down, sure, almost every damm Luftwaffe fighter they could spare would be there. During their only (that I know about) thousand bomber raid they had about 600 fighters. Well thats all well and good but when they're gathered around the Channel almost every fighter based in Scotland and Northern Ireland flies down to the Midlands and as dawn breaks over 1,000 RAF fighters fly in. Along with the bombers

Hell, the Luftwaffe would suffer Moral drop from that alone. Can you imagine, you're part of a group of 600 fighters and suddenly you see a fighter force outnumbering yours 2 to 1? Hell, I could see the fighters taking care of each other and then, after they drop their bombs, the He-111's and Avro 679 Manchesters engaged in their OWN dogfight.

1800 fighters in a dogfight would be an amazing sight on its own. 2500 medium bombers in a dogfight a short ways away would simply be awsome to see

 

[Saladin]

Like I put down, sure, almost every damm Luftwaffe fighter they could spare would be there. During their only (that I know about) thousand bomber raid they had about 600 fighters. Well thats all well and good but when they're gathered around the Channel almost every fighter based in Scotland and Northern Ireland flies down to the Midlands and as dawn breaks over 1,000 RAF fighters fly in. Along with the bombers

Hell, the Luftwaffe would suffer Moral drop from that alone. Can you imagine, you're part of a group of 600 fighters and suddenly you see a fighter force outnumbering yours 2 to 1? Hell, I could see the fighters taking care of each other and then, after they drop their bombs, the He-111's and Avro 679 Manchesters engaged in their OWN dogfight.

1800 fighters in a dogfight would be an amazing sight on its own. 2500 medium bombers in a dogfight a short ways away would simply be awsome to see

To cover the invasion fleet though, the Luftwaffe would need to have at least three shifts of fighters -- meaning that no more than, say 300 German fighters on patrol at any time. The British raid would sweep those aircraft aside in minutes and massacre the barges and light vessels while the RN comes in to clean up whats left

 

[marapets]

well i'm thinking yes but the luftwaffe blew it! basically. As large as the RN was it could nt have sustained the huge pressure it would have been put under by the luftwaffe its only 20 miles between the hapless home guard and the most explosive and effective army since napoleon!!

 

[Cockroach]

well i'm thinking yes but the luftwaffe blew it! basically. As large as the RN was it could nt have sustained the huge pressure it would have been put under by the luftwaffe its only 20 miles between the hapless home guard and the most explosive and effective army since napoleon!!

Okay first off the Brits only need to turn some Destroyers loose on the Rhein river barges to cause a massacure... and it happens the RN had a number of Destroyers in the Channel ready for such an opertunity.
Secondly there are a number of problems with the Luftwaffe:
1. Lack of Torpedo bombers, quite simply level bombers are as good as useless against manouvering warships. Dive bombers are effective but at this stage don't carry sufficient bomb loads to be a threat to anything larger than a Light Cruiser... that leaves Torpedo Bombers as the only effective Anti-Ship weapon... and the Luftwaffe was seriously lacking in Torpedo bombers.
2. Lack of Dive Bomber... Don't get me wrong the Germans were not short of Dive Bombers... but those couple of hundred Ju-87s are somehow meant to be battering the RN, acting as flying artillary (no guns with the first wave of troops) and knocking about British industry and supply centers all at the same time.