So Bleeding Common: No Invasion into the U.S.S.R

CalBear

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They took Crete and did not have to walk there. In OTL, Malta almost starved under the air punishment in 1942. As I said, with OTL supplies and forces Rommel got to The Alamein. With not much more, he could have taken Alexandria and repaired its port. Or used Tunisian Vichy ports if needed.
Your knowledge is right, Franco was in charge. But the winner side of the Spanish Civil war was not a homogeneus one. There were monarchics and there were pro-nazis, like Serraño Suñer, Franco brother-in-law and Foreign Affairs minister. The Falange was a powerfull movement closer to fascism than to the old generals, and that's why Franco got rid of it later. It would be easier to find a Quisling in Spain than it was in France. But the germans do not need to conquer all of Spain and fight a guerrilla war. Their only interest is Gibraltar, and maybe some of the Balearic Islands, and they can get there and do their job without patrolling the whole peninsula.
The point of this thread is that there is no war in the east. The resources used in the Med, even with Spain in the basket, -agree Turkey would be a foolish thing- are only a fraction of those saved in the east.
The only thing that would keep the british in this war, while Stalin is watching, would be an american intervention before, say, 1943.

The Reich doesn't have the lift to increase the number of troops, trucks tanks, etc. needed to change the balance in Africa. They also lack the ability to alter that simple fact. Germany entered the war with very little merchant shipping, virtually all of the shipping that belonged to the occuppied countries that was at sea during the invasions ran to either the Commonwealth, the U.S., or a neutral port denying the Wehrmacht access to that resource, and availble shipyards were inadequete for the needs of just the Kreigsmarine, much less merchant vessels.

On the other hand, Great Britain had shipyards to burn (they were able to have five BATTLESHIPS and four AIRCRAFT CARRIERS under construction at the same time as they were cranking out merchant vessels), and has access to American yards, as well as the yards of the Commonwealth. All together, these yards were able to outbuild the U-boats ability to sink shipping, even at the peak of the Battle of the Atlantic. The British yards were virtually ALL outside of the range of the Luftwaffe, and the Wehrmacht clearly had no way to get at yards in North America. The British also could ship directly to North Africa from the Raj, and Australia, or even get shipping from the American Pacific coast shipyards (long trip, but doable) even if the Reich managed to close off the Western approaches to the Med, something that is considerably harder to achieve than some posters imagine.

You can build a million tanks, but if you can only move 25 a week and are losing 20 in combat while the enemy is getting 250 and losing 150, your ass is grass.

Germany, in this scenario, has an ocean of resources, unfortunately for the Reich, it only has a 5 kilometer long garden hose to distribute it while the UK, which has an even bigger ocean to draw from, can pump the resources from a dozen fireboats right next to the dock. Logistics are boring, the opposite of glamorous, and a general pain in the butt. Logistics, however, also wins wars.

The Reich's logistics were unequal to the task proposed.
 
I would say that you underestimate the germans logistical capacity. Of course it is true that they were not a naval power as UK, and could never be, but in OTL they managed to send and supply the AK, and later send a quarter million troops and their equipment to Tunisia, while fighting in the east and when the americans were already at war. That makes me think that, if they really wanted to, they could have send to Africa more men and supplies. Probably, only with avoiding the sinking of so many axis supply ships could have made Rommel to win at the first Alamein.
 
o_O What have I done?

Beside that little bit, Let's poke at the fact that the Germans by this time have seized all of the Dutch, French and such ports and likely, ships.
 

CalBear

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o_O What have I done?

Beside that little bit, Let's poke at the fact that the Germans by this time have seized all of the Dutch, French and such ports and likely, ships.

Ships can move. They did so in rather high percentages as the Germans moved in. Those ships all filled up with refugees and ran for Great Britain or Ireland or Sweden.

Even IF you manage to get merchant ships constructed in the North Sea ports, those ARE inside of RAF bomber range (nothing like actually having the proper tools for the job) and any vessels traveling from there are open for attack by RAF & RN units while the Kriegsmarine lacks sufficient forces to provide escorts for any convoy effort.
 

CalBear

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I would say that you underestimate the germans logistical capacity. Of course it is true that they were not a naval power as UK, and could never be, but in OTL they managed to send and supply the AK, and later send a quarter million troops and their equipment to Tunisia, while fighting in the east and when the americans were already at war. That makes me think that, if they really wanted to, they could have send to Africa more men and supplies. Probably, only with avoiding the sinking of so many axis supply ships could have made Rommel to win at the first Alamein.

Not at all. The Germans did manage to move troops and their personal weapons, along with a trickle of tanks and other armor, as well as minimal supplies, although the supply situation was generally touch and go. They moved all they could with resources available to them. They HAD no other resources sitting at the quay empty and waiting. What was sent was what could be sent with the lift available. Germany was a land power. Their naval presence, both military and merchant, was tiny.
 
Not at all. The Germans did manage to move troops and their personal weapons, along with a trickle of tanks and other armor, as well as minimal supplies, although the supply situation was generally touch and go. They moved all they could with resources available to them. They HAD no other resources sitting at the quay empty and waiting. What was sent was what could be sent with the lift available. Germany was a land power. Their naval presence, both military and merchant, was tiny.

Ala Pre-1st Punic War Rome I'd like to think.
 
I would say that you underestimate the germans logistical capacity. Of course it is true that they were not a naval power as UK, and could never be, but in OTL they managed to send and supply the AK, and later send a quarter million troops and their equipment to Tunisia, while fighting in the east and when the americans were already at war. That makes me think that, if they really wanted to, they could have send to Africa more men and supplies. Probably, only with avoiding the sinking of so many axis supply ships could have made Rommel to win at the first Alamein.

The issue is the capacity of the Libyan supply routes. There is no railway, so everything has to be moved by road, which means you are constantly up against the law of diminishing returns as you need to ship in more water and fuel into docks with limited capacity.

Staying on the defensive in Tunisia is a whole different kettle of fish to taking Egypt, which would have been almost impossible without constructing a railway. Which would have taken time, necessitated a halt in combat operations and so on.

Also it is all irrelevant. The Middle East falls, so what. It was not the crucial source of oil it is today. The British can stay in the fight. Unless The Americans and Russians are going to acquiesce to German rule in Europe until the end of time, and why would that. It will simply delay the inevitable.

There are only two places that matter in the struggle to control Europe - London and Moscow. If the Germans control one or both of these they can win. But only then.
 
Also it is all irrelevant. The Middle East falls, so what. It was not the crucial source of oil it is today. The British can stay in the fight. Unless The Americans and Russians are going to acquiesce to German rule in Europe until the end of time, and why would that. It will simply delay the inevitable.

There are only two places that matter in the struggle to control Europe - London and Moscow. If the Germans control one or both of these they can win. But only then.

I do agree with you. But in early 1941 neither the americans nor the Russians were in the war. Would any of them decide to attack unilateraly? Surovov believes the soviets would have. Others think FDR would get a Dow against Germany eventually. But we will never know for sure. If another year goes by with britain loosing land and no partners, IMHO the british could very well have made peace. Not saying that we would not see another war in a ten years time frame.

Back to Afrika, IMO Rommel, in the crucial moments, had much less that he needed not because of port capacity, limited as it was, but for losses at sea. For example, during June 1942 he received 5,000 tons of supplies compared with 34,000 in May and 400 vehicles compared with 2,000 in May. The ports were the same, it was british activity from Malta and Gibraltar that made the difference. And with Malta in Axis hands and more planes and subs in the Med, that would have changed.
 
I think you're all forgetting Hitler had been breeding Sea Lions he could use to transport his troops across the Straits, where he'd blow up that big white thing in Dover and use it to erect a huge statue of himself. The RAF would give up cause who would've thought Sea Lions and then Hitler gets the whole British Empire cuz Britain is too weak to fight back.

Then Hitler takes over the world and we all überdeutschesallies now woo.

That's what we want to hear ja?
 
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