Spain Invaded by WAllies World War II

Just like it says. Have the western allies invade Spain to topple Franco either before, simultaneously with, or after Mussolini in Italy is toppled. Operations Torch AND Husky must be completed by this point. Bonus points if you invade Sardinia and the Balearic Islands just because.
 
If they really wanted to topple off Franco, the best moment is during operation dragoon, when German resistance has fallen. They could act together with the republican government to call for an uprising, slip in, arm the rebel and with WAllies divisions, conquer Spain and put back democracy. The only problem is that OTL rebel that could had rised where communist, anarchist and socialist. Not really the kind of guys that the US or Britain would want to help.

The problem with your POD is, as Zeppelinair pointed, WAllies position isn't strong enough to quickly ''open'' a front in Spain. Franco will ally with Germany and boost their war effort.
 
Spain allies with Germany.
done.

Yea. If Franco's position was stronger or if the British weaker Spain's entrance is a possibility. The British never activated their alliance with Portugal because they feared that would bring Spain in on the Axis side.

The difficulty is that in OTL Franco really never had any intention of joining the Axis unless they were already certain to win and despite declaring he was "ready under certain conditions to enter the war on the side of Germany and Italy" those conditions basically consisted of the Allies invading Spain or Germany marching into London.

I think the easiest way to get Spain to enter the war is to remove Franco and replace him with someone less competent and more willing to blindly grab for the British territories promised by Germany. Franco, whatever his flaws, was remarkably skilled at playing both sides.
 
Yea. If Franco's position was stronger or if the British weaker Spain's entrance is a possibility. The British never activated their alliance with Portugal because they feared that would bring Spain in on the Axis side.

Actually the Salazar regime in Portugal was decidedly pro- German.
An invasion of Spain by the Allies might have backfired.
 
Actually the Salazar regime in Portugal was decidedly pro- German.
An invasion of Spain by the Allies might have backfired.

He was so progerman he let the British use bases in the Azores.

While Salazar's regime had plenty of ideological affinity with Germany and Italy, he found fascism too progressive and revolutionary. His first priority was to keep Portugal independent and its empire intact, and british friendship was his best option.
 
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Just like it says. Have the western allies invade Spain to topple Franco either before, simultaneously with, or after Mussolini in Italy is toppled. Operations Torch AND Husky must be completed by this point. Bonus points if you invade Sardinia and the Balearic Islands just because.
Probably can't be done as you propose. If Spain is hostile it blocks access to the Mediterranean from the Atlantic, making some of the original timeline Torch landings impossible.

Edit:
And if Spain isn't hostile (allowing the execution of Torch and Husky as in the original timeline), it doesn't make much sense for the Western Allies to go and start anything in Spain, when 'Germany first' is a priority. Starting anything in Spain, unnecessarily, detracts from the main thrust of taking down Germany.
 
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Probably can't be done as you propose. If Spain is hostile it blocks access to the Mediterranean from the Atlantic, making some of the original timeline Torch landings impossible.

Edit:
And if Spain isn't hostile (allowing the execution of Torch and Husky as in the original timeline), it doesn't make much sense for the Western Allies to go and start anything in Spain, when 'Germany first' is a priority. Starting anything in Spain, unnecessarily, detracts from the main thrust of taking down Germany.

:confused: but, Gibraltar is controlled by brittain...
 
:confused: but, Gibraltar is controlled by brittain...

And the opposite coast is controlled by Spain. The Spanish would be able to tale Gibraltar, but I'm not sure at what cost as the Rock is really not something you want to attack. But even if the Straits are contested, it means theyre no longer open to shipping until they're secured again.

Any situation where the Allies are invading Spain would have to be instead of Italy simply because there's no point to the invasion of both while Germany is still in France.
 
And?

:confused: but, Gibraltar is controlled by brittain...
Even assuming the British could hold Gibraltar in the face of a hostile Spain, between Spanish Morocco and mainland Spain (and the guns and aircraft which could be put in both, plus the naval minefields which could be laid from them) nothing is going through the Straits of Gibraltar without a good deal of trouble if the Spanish don't want it to do so.
 
WALLIES did not need to conquer all of Spain during WW2, they just needed to secure 3 corners: Gibraltar, Basque and Catalonia.
The Royal Navy already had the port of Gibraltar to control ships sailing from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean.

The Pyrenees Mountain provides a solid border between Spain and France, with few passes. Andorran smugglers assisted WALLY POWS and aircrew to cross from France into Spain, then Portugal and eventually back to the UK. Smugglers are always easily "rented" to help WALLIES secure the few mountain passes.

The only practical places to bypass the Pyrenees are along the Atlantic or Mediterranean coasts.
Secondly, the Basque port of Bilbao would have been handy for unloading supplies immediately after D-Day. This would have helped solve the WALLY of having no decent port until
Approaches to Antwerp were cleared in November 1944. A second D-Day column advancing up the Coast of the Bay of Biscay would have thoroughly confused Hitler! Basques were still smarting from their Spanish Civil War casualties and would have cheerfully foiled Franco's official policies.

Finally, the north-east region of Catalonia includes the even bigger port of Barcelona. Catalans also suffered under General Franco's rule, so would have been easy converts to WALLY. As long as some WALLY cargo "fell off the truck" Catalans would have been happy to allow WaLLY cargo passage around the eastern end of the Pyrenees Mountains.
 
Gibraltar on its own can only interdict...

WALLIES did not need to conquer all of Spain during WW2, they just needed to secure 3 corners: Gibraltar, Basque and Catalonia.
The Royal Navy already had the port of Gibraltar to control ships sailing from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean...
Gibraltar on its own can only interdict the passage of enemy vessels through the straits in WW2, not guarantee the safe-passage of friendly ones. Spanish neutrality and/or both Spanish Morocco and southern Andalusia being in friendly hands are otherwise required to ensure the safe passage through the straits of friendly shipping.
For a situation from the original timeline which it seems to me would be comparable to that of a friendly Gibraltar but a hostile Andalusia/Spanish Morocco, look at what happened off North Africa from mid-1940 to at least late 1942 in the original timeline. The Allies controlled Malta, but the Axis had Sicily and were able to use aircraft and ships operating from Sicily (and southern Italy) to try to shoot up any Allied shipping attempting to pass through that part of the Mediterranean (and likewise the Allies could attempt to sink Axis shipping in those waters). The end result was that both sides lost a lot of shipping tonnage (and cargoes and men:() in those waters, and the Allies (except in emergencies or to attempt to deliver supplies to Malta) preferred to avoid those waters altogether, moving men/equipment 'the long way round' to/from Egypt via the Cape of Good Hope and Suez.
 
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Ah contraire!
Franco would need a longer and bloodier Spanish Civil War plus far more support from Italy and Germany before he would be willing to commit Spain to the fascist axis during WW2.
 
Gibraltar on its own can only interdict the passage of enemy vessels through the straits in WW2, not guarantee the safe-passage of friendly ones. Spanish neutrality and/or both Spanish Morocco and southern Andalusia being in friendly hands are otherwise required to ensure the safe passage through the straits of friendly shipping.
For a situation from the original timeline which it seems to me would be comparable to that of a friendly Gibraltar but a hostile Andalusia/Spanish Morocco, look at what happened off North Africa from mid-1940 to at least late 1942 in the original timeline. The Allies controlled Malta, but the Axis had Sicily and were able to use aircraft and ships operating from Sicily (and southern Italy) to try to shoot up any Allied shipping attempting to pass through that part of the Mediterranean (and likewise the Allies could attempt to sink Axis shipping in those waters). The end result was that both sides lost a lot of shipping tonnage (and cargoes and men:() in those waters, and the Allies (except in emergencies or to attempt to deliver supplies to Malta) preferred to avoid those waters altogether, moving men/equipment 'the long way round' to/from Egypt via the Cape of Good Hope and Suez.

Pray tell us oh wise and dear one what is the order of battle of the Spanish Navy and Air Force from 1942-44? I know you feel we should count every jolly boat as five cruisers, every bomber as a squadron because the crews have pure Phlangist hearts but the rest of us have cause to suspect that Spain's military weakness might have been a contributory factor in Franco's choice to stay out of the war.

Even should you disagree with our weak democratic way of counting one ageing dreadnought era battleship as one ageing dreadnought era battleship I think the exercise might do you good.
 
...

Pray tell us oh wise and dear one what is the order of battle of the Spanish Navy and Air Force from 1942-44? I know you feel we should count every jolly boat as five cruisers, every bomber as a squadron because the crews have pure Phlangist hearts but the rest of us have cause to suspect that Spain's military weakness might have been a contributory factor in Franco's choice to stay out of the war.

Even should you disagree with our weak democratic way of counting one ageing dreadnought era battleship as one ageing dreadnought era battleship I think the exercise might do you good.
The Spanish air force may well have been quite impressive. The opening post on this thread on another website mentions five squadrons (presumably of 'volunteers') having served on the Eastern Front, and post #11 refers to Spain (at least at the end of the Spanish civil war) having '...one of the most powerful and modern air forces in the world...'

Edit:
Found another site (link) which is slightly more conservative and actually gives some numbers. Seem to have been a couple of hundred fighter planes in Spain in the first few years of the war, and upwards of a hundred bombers.
Which is still somewhat more aircraft, than the Allies seem to have ever crammed into Gibraltar though (wikipedia lists eight RAF squadrons and one meteorological flight operating at Gibraltar in 1943 in the original timeline, at the apparent peak of use of Gibraltar as an airbase; as far as I can determine 'at most' at the time an RAF squadron seems to have consisted of 16 planes, but more usually of 15, 14, 13, or 12 (link) ).

All of which seems to me to support a definite threat of air-attack to Allied ships attempting the straits in at least daylight, if Gibraltar is friendly but Andalusia and Spanish Morocco are hostile.

Further Edit:
And should I be flattered or concerned that you refer to me as 'wise and dear one'? :D
 
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The Spanish air force may well have been quite impressive. The opening post on this thread on another website mentions five squadrons (presumably of 'volunteers') having served on the Eastern Front, and post #11 refers to Spain (at least at the end of the Spanish civil war) having '...one of the most powerful and modern air forces in the world...'

Edit:
Found another site (link) which is slightly more conservative and actually gives some numbers. Seem to have been a couple of hundred fighter planes in Spain in the first few years of the war, and upwards of a hundred bombers.
Which is still somewhat more aircraft, than the Allies seem to have ever crammed into Gibraltar though (wikipedia lists nine RAF squadrons operating at Gibraltar in 1943 in the original timeline, at the apparent peak of use of Gibraltar as an airbase; as far as I can determine 'at most' at the time an RAF squadron seems to have consisted of 16 planes, but more usually of 15, 14, 13, or 12 (link) ).

All of which seems to me to support a definite threat of air-attack to Allied ships attempting the straits in at least daylight, if Gibraltar is friendly but Andalusia and Spanish Morocco are hostile.

Further Edit:
And should I be flattered or concerned that you refer to me as 'wise and dear one'? :D

Oh always concerned...you've seen 1984? Us rodents are dodgy...and that is just the rats, the gerbils are plainly up to something and as for the squirrels :eek:

Now as to the numbers one of the things you need to think about is that the numbers need to be sufficient to fly operations day in day out...not simply to suppress Gibraltar which is already a tall order but in order to counter the increasing numbers of carrier aircraft that can be deployed by the RN and the USN.

I look at the same numbers you do and conclude that Spain cannot close the Straits in the face of British let alone British and some American opposition.

If you look at the deployments of the squadrons you will see that concentrating them to interdict the Straits opens up places like the Basque country to attack. Now I would assume that you assume that the Germans might transfer some of their assets to Spain and this is possible but by the time of Torch they are are stretched and their primary concern is the Balkans and its supplies of oil and copper among other strategic raw materials.

For Spain the option of closing the Straits only serves to make them the next most inviting point of attack.

That said the Spanish really do have to do something to tick the Allies off because attacking Spain is one thing. Settling matters in that ghastly country (I mean the terrain in military terms, the natives are quite lovely) is another matter entirely. Next to no one to my knowledge has ever conquered Spain in a short campaign, Nappy tried and we all know how that ended and it was not just the British, the Spanish themselves were able to maintain areas outside of French control...even the new inventions like tanks and aircraft did not entirely change the fundamentals of geography as the campaign in Italy was to prove.

Spain does not want to risk Allied invasion, even Allied blockade as you and I have discussed before would be disadvantageous. The Allies have little interest in offering Spain anything for its allegiance and by the end of 1942 the Axis cannot, in fact Franco appears to have foreseen their inability to come up with the goods as early as 1940.

Spain need a quite dramatic POD provocation from the allies before it will advance beyond protest notes.
 
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