The Desperate War

[NapoleonXIV]

It is generally accepted that America could not have been invaded by the Axis in WWII.

However.

WI Germany had done even better in the war's early stages. They take the French Navy whole and then 300,000 prisoners at Dunkirk. They convince the British to exchange their Navy for the prisoners, keeping their colonies and no occupation. (I read somewhere the British debated doing this)

By July of 1940 the Axis has the British, French and Japanese Navies at it's disposal.

Given a much bigger surprise attack by both Japanese and German bomb ships planted in several US mainland harbors, and the Panama Canal; coordinated with huge conventional air and sea raids, could a sustainable invasion of the US begin sometime between August and December of 1940, and be successful at some point in the future?

Oh, and would Russia as another Axis nation invading Alaska be helpful?

To put it another way, if the whole world (Germany, Japan, Britain, Russia) attacks America in 1940, could we resist?

 

[Dave Howery]

it would depend on how long a warning the US had... I really doubt those enemies would be ready to invade the US in 1940, they'd need longer to build and train more armies (Germany is already stuck with occupying France, etc.)... and Russia, AFAIK, didn't have much of a navy at this time, and no real transport capacity. Germany might have those fleets, but no real experience in handling them, plus they'd have to draft more men to man those ships. It's hard to imagine all this happening without the US finding out about it ahead of time... and the US could easily accelerate it's naval building program (already in progress), and bulk up it's air forces and put massive air power on both coasts. Attacking the US mainland brings up the constant problem that the US will have air power in depth and is at it's home base, while the attackers are at the end of a long supply line. I doubt the invaders could even get their ships to the US shores.

However, if they did get ashore, they'd probably kick butt far and wide... the US was woefully undergunned and short on troops at this time... but again, if they had a long warning time, they could build up as well...

 

[CalBear]

It is generally accepted that America could not have been invaded by the Axis in WWII.

However.

WI Germany had done even better in the war's early stages. They take the French Navy whole and then 300,000 prisoners at Dunkirk. They convince the British to exchange their Navy for the prisoners, keeping their colonies and no occupation. (I read somewhere the British debated doing this)

By July of 1940 the Axis has the British, French and Japanese Navies at it's disposal.

Given a much bigger surprise attack by both Japanese and German bomb ships planted in several US mainland harbors, and the Panama Canal; coordinated with huge conventional air and sea raids, could a sustainable invasion of the US begin sometime between August and December of 1940, and be successful at some point in the future?

Oh, and would Russia as another Axis nation invading Alaska be helpful?

To put it another way, if the whole world (Germany, Japan, Britain, Russia) attacks America in 1940, could we resist?

Short Answer: No.

Longer Answer: Hell No!

Reason: Logistically impossible. The details have been explained time & again in other threads.

 

[BillHicksRules]

Nap,

"WI Germany had done even better in the war's early stages. They take the French Navy whole and then 300,000 prisoners at Dunkirk. They convince the British to exchange their Navy for the prisoners, keeping their colonies and no occupation. (I read somewhere the British debated doing this)"

Maybe you should have read a bit more about the "debate" about this.

The debate about the Habakkuk was more likely to get the go ahead than this was.

Cheers

BHR

 

[karl2025]

For this to happen, Hitler would have to have a much different world view than he did IOTL, seeing America as the greatest threat, and coming up with an aggressive, long range strategy designed to attack it. They would also run into problems keeping the USSR friendly.

But I don't like discounting something based on improbability. So with Hitler's focus on destroying the United States in this timeline, he'd probably be putting more resources into the navy, and would be in a better (but not good) position to man the new ships he acquired.

Canada would probably side with the US and would likely have snagged a few ships from the English to keep them out of German hands.

The expanded Axis Navy would be a big challenge to the USN, but America would be a force that couldn't be ignored, especially to a force at the end of their supply line. Any ground campaign would have to face constant supply interruptions from American convoy raiders.

And then the ground campaign itself would be brutal. The US army is small at the time, but partisans would raise the attrition rate considerably. At the time many individuals had access to weapons, even military grade small arms (BARs, Thompsons) and Molotov cocktails would put a hurting on panzers trying to move through any urban area. In the northeast, minorities, immigrants, and Jews would fight tooth and nail, while blacks in the south would do the same. They might win for a long time, but the campaign would bleed them dry.

 

[jkay]

I ran across the same problem

I tried to come up with an unlikely (2-POD) way the Axis could've won. But, in the end, I looked things up and saw it simply couldn't've been done. Your scenario has similar problems to mine - it can't address the fatal flaw mine also had.

By the earliest moment this could've happened, OTL, the gap in airpower was over 30,000 planes to Germany's 6,000. And it only grew worse from there. That'll happen when you try to kill alot of your workers and enslave most of the rest. He shoulda taken a page from Cyrus the Great, who got his conquered populations on his side and had alot more success. You could use PODs to change American politics, or have us waste alot of them, but then either it gets less and less likely, or you're giving up the POD to take London.