The Whale has Wings

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Hyperion

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Actually there is an interesting point on will Hitler intervene?
In OTL, Germany had invested a lot of effort in NA, and obviously Hitler hated to be seen to lose.

In TTL, however, Germanies only contribution to the Med has been a small army unit (which promptly exited stage right), a specialises AS LW unit and some submarines.

Would he wash his hands of it until the allies were actually in Italy and heading north (at which point it obviously affects Germany)??

http://www.changingthetimes.net/samples/ww2/point_of_departure.htm

Ever read Point of Departure by Marc Jones over on ChangingTheTimes?

In it early on, due to the Italians and Germans being kicked out of North Africa sooner than OTL and loosing a major naval engagement, Italy actually went and declared neutrality, later joining the allies after German commandos accidentally shot dead Mussolini in a failed rescue attempt, and after the same commando leader accidentally shot the Pope in a failed airborne drop on Rome.

Given the weaker performance of Italy ITTL, if the British can do some more damage around the edges, what's to say Mussolini would not be forced out, and a new Italian government declares neutrality for both sides. No German troops in Italian territory, and all allied forces in Italian territory(not including Africa) leave.
 
http://www.changingthetimes.net/samples/ww2/point_of_departure.htm

Ever read Point of Departure by Marc Jones over on ChangingTheTimes?

In it early on, due to the Italians and Germans being kicked out of North Africa sooner than OTL and loosing a major naval engagement, Italy actually went and declared neutrality, later joining the allies after German commandos accidentally shot dead Mussolini in a failed rescue attempt, and after the same commando leader accidentally shot the Pope in a failed airborne drop on Rome.

Given the weaker performance of Italy ITTL, if the British can do some more damage around the edges, what's to say Mussolini would not be forced out, and a new Italian government declares neutrality for both sides. No German troops in Italian territory, and all allied forces in Italian territory(not including Africa) leave.

I never finished that bloody thing did I? :eek:

EDIT: Probably a good thing that I didn't, as I didn't have much of a clue at that time about logistics.

EDIT2: Dear god, that's embarrassing. It was the first AH thing I ever wrote.
 
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Ramp-Rat

Monthly Donor
Corsica, Sardinia or Sicily, which one to aim for, if you need to that is. Given just how badly Italy is doing ITTL, and how precarious Mussolini’s position is right now. The outcome of the secret negotiations might remove any need to invade, and replace it with a welcome mat. In regard to Italian divisions, one thing must always be remembered. Unlike those of her ally Germany, or those of the allied forces, Italian divisions had only two brigades, not the three normally found elsewhere.

So those seven divisions in Sardinia, with there fourteen brigades are in fact equal to four and two thirds, British divisions. Add to that they are not as well equipped as the British divisions, especially when it comes to motor transport. And an attack on Sardinia becomes far more doable, than it might seem at first to be. Up until now the butterflies ITTL have been small enough not to have had a major effect on TTL as we know it. Now however things are beginning to hot up, and from here on in, events are going to be very different, except in Russia. Where it will not be until mid to late 1943, that I would expect to see major changes in the fortunes of the Germans, and a very different campaign.
 
Except that with high-level bombing of their industries, will Germany be able to throw as much weight in in 1942 as they did?
 
Ramp-Rat
Hyperion
Garrison
Astrodragon


Regarding your most recent posts about British amphibious landing sites in the Central Med (Sicily v. Sardinia), and possible Hitlerian reactions to them.

Don't be beguiled by wishful thinking. As in "Oh, if only Hitler lets us do A, B, C, and D, we can turn Italy into a defensive bastion while setting up the OTL bomber bases in Foggia to turn Ploesti into a parking lot."

First, OIL was never far from Hitler's forebrain 24/7.

Second, and much more importantly, ATLs have a tendency to badly underestimate the "special relationship":rolleyes: between Adolph Hitler and Benito Mussolini. It's important to remember that at a time in his life when he was just a street agitator struggling to get ahold of power WITHIN the ranks of a tiny extremist political party in Munich; Mussolini was Il Duce of Italy, the High Pontiff of Fascism throughout the world.

Adolph Hitler, for much of his political life, truly admired Mussolini. And whatever faults Mussolini had, Hitler would just ascribe them to the weaknesses of his people, not to Il Duce himself. Adolph Hitler isn't going to let Mussolini go hang, politically or militarily! As far as Hitler is concerned, the Axis is like the Mafia. Once in, never out. Even OTL, when the Italians were only contemplating surrender, Hitler and Goebbels were convinced the Italians were about to switch sides en masse, populace, army, navy, air force, government, and all.

What was the ultimate tripwire for all this? For the German takeover of Italy? Mussolini's fall. Once he was removed, Hitler gave his orders for the takeover to commence once all forces were in place to do so. The only thing more important to Hitler than crushing Bagdolio's Royalist government was securing Mussolini's rescue. When they were reunited, the emotion between the two was quite genuine (exhaustion and gratitude from Mussolini, shock at Mussolini's appearance from Hitler).

Adolf Hitler will NOT under any circumstance allow Mussolini's Italy to be lost, whatever goes on in Russia. Besides, compared to the size of the Russian Front, just a dozen or so divisions would be enough to stop the British cold at this point (at least in Sicily and the Italian mainland). As to the demands of the Luftwaffe? The Red Air Force is pretty much no more than of a nuisance at this point. The Germans can get air superiority, even air supremacy, anywhere in Russia they want, within logistical limits. So the Luftwaffe really isn't prevented from a heavy investment into the Med once Hitler gives the orders.

If the British go on the offensive in a region where he can get at them, he will. Frex, Sicily, Italy, or the Greek mainland. He sees himself as someone with a lot of debts to collect from the British for the humiliations his army, navy, and air force have suffered (especially NA and Crete).

Terrain advantage to the Axis, the danger of the Axis gaining local air superiority (certainly air parity, and all that that entails), and German Army troops that will give a much better accounting of themselves than Italians trapped out in Sardinia and perhaps later Corsica.

Hitler intervened in NA right from the middle of O'Connor's first offensive. The Heer was IN Sicily in time for Husky. In the invasion of Italy, hitting the beaches right at Salerno (as far as Hitler could go south without being cutoff).

I don't see Adolph Hitler "cutting his losses" when it comes to allowing the Allies to get strategic bomber bases close to Ploesti, or abandoning Il Duce and his country to the enemy, whatever his people might think about it.:rolleyes:

How often did Adolph Hitler ever "cut his losses", except for the purpose of creating a reserve to crush a "betrayal" in his own rear? Like Italy's "betrayal"?


I'm not saying that the strategy for Italy was bad. Just the idea of fighting all the way up the peninsula, when at the end of it all you are facing is the Alps.:( And handwaving away inevitable early German intervention is precisely that. Handwaving. The Germans will always be able to RAIL IN forces and supplies far far faster than the Allies can SHIP them in. Logistics are just so damned inconvenient sometimes. Most times. Every time.:(
 

Ramp-Rat

Monthly Donor
MattII, yes the high level bombing will have an affect, though its going to take time for the affect to fully kick in. there is a certain inertia in the T/L, change will always be slow at first, speeding up later. At the moment the RAF have a few High Level Bombers, and a multitude of targets to aim at. There is no one target that is going to end the war tomorrow, nor are the bombs available, anywhere as event changing as an A-Bomb. This isn’t like the destruction of ether the German or Italian surface fleet, which had an immediate effect. This will be far more a slow but quickening grind, as the Germans have to deploy more effort into dealing with this new weapon.

As for the changes in the availability of shipping, due to the lower level of losses, of both ships and men, and the increase in ship numbers resulting from new builds. People often forget just how many merchant seamen lost their lives, so less sinking’s mean more seamen to man the ships. This will along with a number of factors, as with the HL bombers see a slow but accelerating change. Older ships that were kept on the North Atlantic run, will be moved, and replaced by faster, more reliable new builds. These older ships, will be directed to areas where they can sail independently, and used on inter empire trade.

It looks as if the Indian Ocean is to be a British lake, and shipping free to sail without escort. Not only does this release, escorts for use elsewhere, it also improves efficiency. One of the major disadvantages with convoys is the additional time added to turnarounds. As ship wait in the roads for there turn to enter the port and unload/load. Convoys from Britain can once they have cleared the Suez Canal, split and sail on to their final destination, at each ships best speed. In the same way shipping for Britain, will only form its convoy once it reaches Gibraltar, as up until then it will have been part of local convoys in the Mediterranean, ether delivering cargos to units there, and or collecting cargos from North Africa. Only those ships fully laden, and just transiting the Med will be convoyed from Suez to Gib, the rest depending on where they are headed will ether sail independently of in local convoys.

Looking at the recently produced map OTTL, I too was struck by the incongruity of French Guiana, on the map. And looking at it was reminded of the bit in the book Papillion, were he states that during WWII, the inmates were informed that in the event of an invasion by the Allies, they the inmates were to be given weapons and would be expected to fight for Vichy. What other than the normal Gauoises the authorities were smoking I do not know, but somehow I do not see this as being a good idea. :eek:
 
Ramp-Rat said:
Looking at the recently produced map OTTL, I too was struck by the incongruity of French Guiana, on the map. And looking at it was reminded of the bit in the book Papillion, were he states that during WWII, the inmates were informed that in the event of an invasion by the Allies, they the inmates were to be given weapons and would be expected to fight for Vichy. What other than the normal Gauoises the authorities were smoking I do not know, but somehow I do not see this as being a good idea. :eek:

Apparently the government was Vichy but the populace was mostly Free French in sentiment. The territory wasn't occupied by the Free French until August of 1944, which speaks volumes of the territory's utter lack of strategic importance.

OTL, the "Papillon" story has some holes in it, as apparently the guards (representing the only "military force" in the territory), went unpaid by a bankrupted (and looted) Vichy, and desertions occured en masse, making escape relatively easy. It seems records for the colony post-surrender and pre-liberation are quite sparse. Not surprising, since even the civil servants weren't being paid.:p

There is a story, it may be urban legend, of what happened to the prisoners who volunteered to fight in the Free French Forces in exchange for their freedom. That they fought very hard. So hard most of them died. And those who did not die, were sent BACK!:mad: x infinity If this tale is true, it may explain why the Fourth Republic died. It deserved to.:mad:
 
Looking at the recently produced map OTTL, I too was struck by the incongruity of French Guiana, on the map. And looking at it was reminded of the bit in the book Papillion, were he states that during WWII, the inmates were informed that in the event of an invasion by the Allies, they the inmates were to be given weapons and would be expected to fight for Vichy. What other than the normal Gauoises the authorities were smoking I do not know, but somehow I do not see this as being a good idea. :eek:

Could someone point out where this is, i must have missed it/or be blind as a highly intelligent psychic alien space bat.
 
Some people seem to have a skewed idea of German strength.

Actual Luftwaffe OOB for July 42 gives 3,500 a/c of which 249 are dive bombers and 1115 twin engine bombers. Yes Hitler could launch a smashing attack with a thousand stukas on an invasion fleet - but only if he used the entire Luftwaffe dive capable strength.

The Luftwaffe could attain air superiority whenever/wherever it wanted to in the east but only by stripping the rest of the front. And it could do that only until the red air force redeployed. And that I suspect was only possible if the attack was in the south - soviet defence scheme focused on Moscow for air force as much as ground forces. All but 500 a/c on the eastern front were committed to Luftflotte 4 in support of Blue.

The Luftwaffe not by means or equipment or training or numbers was in a position to seriously dispute control of the air over a battlefield with the RAF for any period of time by 1942- unless the Luftwaffe is flying off concrete and the RAF off mud - Tunisa; or temporary fields - Gazala. Much less actually defeat it. And before anyone shouts FW190 - there are 300 in service. (1200 spits in Fighter Command alone in the same period) and the Brits alone are outproducing.

The RAF frontline strength in Dec 41 is 4287 a/c rising to 5257 a year later so probably around 4500-4750 at this time deployed in 271 squadrons to which add 16 RAAF and 60 RCAF squadrons between 10 and 16 SAAF squadrons so a total frontline strength of around 6000 a/c plus the 500 or so USAF aircraft in Europe in the first quarter of 1942. This is going to be compounded by higher RAF etc sortie rates.

Astro says the components of Pz armee Afrika are in the east which leaves (July 42)6,7,10 Pz div and possibly 100 Pz Brigade and Herman Goering rgt as German mobile forces not in the east. 100 pz brigade is equipped with really scary French tanks the others OTL had just (April/May) been withdrawn from the east for ‘rehabilitation’ basically at cadre strength.

In order to get the forces for Blue up to strength the rest of the eastern front was at ~50% strength. There no spare ‘elite panzer and panzer grenadier divisions’ to throw into Italy at a moments notice.

The problem with Sardinia (apart from Astro having other plans) is:

Its outside fighter cover but in range of significant Italian airfields. There is lift for maybe 2 divs which might give a lodgement but cant conquer the island without a port. Montgomery, Eisenhower, Bradley, Alexander, Patton etc etc reckoned they needed 10.5 div to take Sicily from 12 Italian with 7 Italian on Sardina the same calculation would be 5 + . Cagliari would do, probably but the geography means a direct attack on the port and taking it more or less intact. That is very high risk by anyone‘s standards - and you will have to put in an entire dock workforce to man it. Even if you take it every supply resupply convoy would then come in range of Italian A/C from either Italy or Sicily or both.

And its pointless. Once Sicily is taken the air threat to Mediterranean convoys is massively reduced and Italian forces would be sucked back onto the mainland. You could probably take Cagliari with a commando brigade 6 months after Sicily fell.

On the other hand I agree that a an Italian defection/surrender will provoke a reaction from Hitler with or without Mussolini being in charge. His problem is that reaction has to come from the already inadequate forces for Blue while they are half way to the Don.

Italian geography cuts two ways. Not only does it slow the allies (less so than OTL as the german’s do have to get there and cant spend day 1, start disarming the Italian army). And they are not popular. But it also creates a nice constrained theatre where the Allies can limit their commitment. Proportionally the Germans used more resources than the allies and would have been better off leaving it and defending the Alps.
 
Gannt is pretty accurate.
The RAF/RAAF/RCAF actually have more planes as they havnt been building as many heavy bombers, but then they have sent more east, so the strength in Europe is similar.

The Allies are keeping an eye on the Eastern front. As soon as it looks like the summer offensive is starting, they intend to do something evil to the Italians. At which point, its going to take time for Hitler to redeploy forces to Italy if he wants to. This wait also allows them to produce more landing craft, so when they do go in its in higher numbers (hopefully enough to overwehelm the defenders). They will also have 4 fleet carriers and some CVL available to cover until they capture or build an airstrip.

They haven't actually realised yet how important Ploesti is - BC is currently aiming at a spring campaign to flatten the Ruhr - something they almost pulled off in OTL, and which would significantly reduce German production. With the new bombing aids, HL bombers and pathfinding techniques they'd been practicing with over the last time, TTL the Ruhr will not be a happy fun place this summer. Pressure is being put on the USA to move B-17's over; the Ruhr campaign will damage BC - they cant keep it going forever, but they'd love the USAAF to keep up the pressure when they are forced to take a break. May not happen, the USAAF isnt the fastest at getting heavy bombers into action. But there are a couple of tricks they can play to speed things up.
 
I'm not quite sure what the figures were for the RNZAF in late 1941-early 1942, but it appears that while the number of personnel and aircraft was reasonably high, most of that was still focused on training.
 

abc123

Banned
I wonder, do British bomb Bulgaria and railroad from Istanbul to Sofia? Since that's the road where important raw materials from Turkey are goeing to Germany.
 
The 400 - 499 block of squadron numbers was set aside for commonwealth originated units but there were also other numbers with mainly or only NZ for example 75 sqdn and aircrew in 'normal' RAF units. wiki has an entry detailing 7 squadrons this with equipment type. the numbers are in the 480's. No date of formation or location so they could be training and stay in the far east. 488 at least has a squadron website so you could track things through.
 
The 400 - 499 block of squadron numbers was set aside for commonwealth originated units but there were also other numbers with mainly or only NZ for example 75 sqdn and aircrew in 'normal' RAF units. wiki has an entry detailing 7 squadrons this with equipment type. the numbers are in the 480's. No date of formation or location so they could be training and stay in the far east. 488 at least has a squadron website so you could track things through.

That is interesting, thanks. It seems like they may have had half a dozen frontline squadrons and then many hundreds of training aircraft and such back home. Then as the war progressed and front line aircraft became more available, the sharp end improved. In this TL, with the boost to Imperial production and perhaps less demand on the US production, it is possible that the RNZAF gets frontline equipment far faster, as per their OTL requests
 

perfectgeneral

Donor
Monthly Donor
About "soft underbelly" I would rather go for Sardinia as first target, not against Sicily.
I agree, Sicily may be more important because of shipping trough Mediterranean, but Sardinia is harder to support and supply for Italians and also gives Britain more options for future attacks ( Germans and Italians don't know whether next target is Corsica or Sicily ).
The difficulty being the air cover from Corsica, Sicily and mainland would overwhelm you.
Well, maybe they could do something about the Dodecanese before that...
Much better idea.

Axis expecting something near Italy because of softening up bombing.
 
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abc123

Banned
The difficulty being the air cover from Corsica, Sicily and mainland would overwhelm you.


From southern tip of Corsica to Cagliari there is 240 km, from closest point of Italian mainland to Cagliari there is 380 km, while from westernmost point of Sicily to Cagliari there's about 330 km.

OTOH, from Biserte to Cagliari there's about 220 km.
So, Germans and Italians will have the same problems as Britons in projecting their airpower to southern Sardinia. So Italians can count only on their existing aircrafts in Sardinia, and sincerely I dont think that they have too much assets there. Nothing that few aircraft carriers and aircrafts from Biserte couldn't handle long enough until Cagliari is taken and aircrafts from Biserte sent in bases around cagliari.

Btw. airplanes in Sicily would have other priorities, to protect Sicily from attacks from Malta and Tunisia.
 
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