While recognise the worth of a western med island hopping campaign, this is a Churchill led CW not an AH.com puppet. TTL has to recognise the drivers in place and the desires of those in a position to direct the course of action.
It might be useful to look at plans kept on file at this time should opportunities arise.
Crete and Sicily shield much of the route, but Sardinia still offers a pinch point for axis bombers to exploit. The driver for Corsica is less obvious. That might be a combination of consolidating Sardinia and the French wanting the lowest hanging fruit of European France. Next? Well around the point marked (4) is a weak point of sorts that the Greeks might use to justify taking airbases in the Ionian Islands. That would be more egg on the face of Il Duce and more coastline under immediate threat. Stretching the soft belly before the surprise poke. The axis can see it coming, but where? Italy (north or south), France (north or south) or Greece (east or west)? All the while Norway must be watched. Maybe islands off Norway might make things harder for transiting U-boats and easier for North Atlantic and Arctic convoys?
All the while I wonder how far the Dodecanese Campaign intended to go if it had been more successful? Gen Sir Henry Maitland Wilson seems likely to be in overall charge if Alexander is busy in the Far East.
Just spit-balling here, but might the Empire see finding a route to Russia as a great excuse to annex Persia? With the Med route opened up a lot more could funnel through there than OTL if the local infrastructure could be improved. Which is easier, Persia or Bulgaria?
It might be useful to look at plans kept on file at this time should opportunities arise.
Dieppe might not be the most tempting approach now that North Africa has been consolidated and Sicily looks achievable. Island hopping doesn't answer Stalin's call for a second continental front, but Churchill was happy that North Africa was enough to be getting on with IOTL, so why should this one be any different? Freeing up the sea lanes of the Med would be the Empire's top priority (especially with far flung fronts like Malaya to support). This goes beyond taking Sicily. Keeping axis air power out of the Med requires airbases off the coast of the mainland capable of intercepting naval bombers before they can reach allied shipping. The same bases can help patrol for U-boats.http://worldwar2database.com/html/planning.htm
Early in the war Soviet Premier Josef Stalin, faced with grievous losses in the great encirclements of 1941, was agitating for a second front in continental Europe. The war in North Africa was not enough.
Churchill calmly received his scorn when they first met in 1942. The year Britain stood alone still weighed on his mind, and Stalin seemed to take no note of it. Almost immediately upon greeting Churchill Stalin demanded a landing in France before the end of the year. He could point to over 4,000,000 casualties in the last half 1941 alone.
What he got was the Dieppe Raid. Thousands of Canadians were killed, and it was clear that combined operations had a lot of learning to do if a landing was going to work.
Crete and Sicily shield much of the route, but Sardinia still offers a pinch point for axis bombers to exploit. The driver for Corsica is less obvious. That might be a combination of consolidating Sardinia and the French wanting the lowest hanging fruit of European France. Next? Well around the point marked (4) is a weak point of sorts that the Greeks might use to justify taking airbases in the Ionian Islands. That would be more egg on the face of Il Duce and more coastline under immediate threat. Stretching the soft belly before the surprise poke. The axis can see it coming, but where? Italy (north or south), France (north or south) or Greece (east or west)? All the while Norway must be watched. Maybe islands off Norway might make things harder for transiting U-boats and easier for North Atlantic and Arctic convoys?
All the while I wonder how far the Dodecanese Campaign intended to go if it had been more successful? Gen Sir Henry Maitland Wilson seems likely to be in overall charge if Alexander is busy in the Far East.
Some indication that a route through to Russia via the Aegean was targeted.http://www.iprom.co.uk/archives/caithness/Dodecanese.html
In January 1943 plans were drawn up about the future of the Long Range Desert Group (LRDG). The Middle East Command were not about to let such a specialist unit go to waste, they were looking for an area in which they could operate. This area turned out to be the Aegean Sea. The Aegean is surrounded by Greece to the North and West, which was occupied by the Italians and Germans. To the East was Turkey, which was neutral. To the South lay Crete, which was captured by the Germans. In the middle was the Dodecanese Islands also occupied by the Italians and Germans. The idea was to open another, smaller front, on in the Aegean. This was to capture the Dodecanese Islands and then open the way for a new resupply rout to Russia through the Dardanelles. Also this could be used to infiltrate agents, equipment and Special Forces into Greece
and Yugoslavia for the Partisans. Another worry was with Greece, who were formed into three main Resistance Armies, communist; royalist & independent. All were virtually fighting amongst themselves. Britain was keen to have troops in Greece as soon as possible to replace the King on the throne.
While the Balkans included Yugoslavia, Albania and Greece, much like today there was much fighting among the ethnic people. This was going to be a more dangerous warfare than the desert. Hitler had already implied that all Commandos should be shot or handed over to the Gestapo, to be tortured and then shot. In the desert these things were unheaded and generally if a member of the SAS or LRDG were captured or wounded, they could expect to be treated fairly. In the Aegean and Balkans, like today, war crimes were being committed on a daily basis. People were being taken out and shot as examples by the Gestapo and SS. This was defiantly a different kind of warfare, the best they could hope for was to be captured by the Germans or Italians. If caught by the partisans or civilians, could mean being tortured and then mutilated, depending on who caught them.
Just spit-balling here, but might the Empire see finding a route to Russia as a great excuse to annex Persia? With the Med route opened up a lot more could funnel through there than OTL if the local infrastructure could be improved. Which is easier, Persia or Bulgaria?
http://www.patriotfiles.com/archive/navalhistory/WW2RN10-194106.htm
EUROPE - JUNE 1941
Atomic Bomb - The report on nuclear research by the Maud Committee led to the setting up of a development programme by Imperial Chemical Industries. Code named 'Tube Alloys', it oversaw both atomic bomb and reactor work.
Last edited: