The Whale has Wings

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I've been wondering about it too, I might not have posed it as a direct question but I'd like to rectify that and third your motion.



You're clearly talking about OTL.

OTL, Portugal's behavior was really odd; as a neutral they gave an outrageous level of license to the Allies. Why didn't they ever just throw in with the UN openly? They were well shielded from any retaliation Hitler could throw at them and the Japanese had already done their worst, more than enough to justify a DOW against them.

I think. I assume that when the Japanese took Hong Kong they took Macao too, if so then they'd invaded not one but two Portugese Far Eastern possessions. I can barely conceive the possibility that they invested Hong Kong but left Macao alone, holding it hostage by the implied threat they'd invade and flatten the place if the Portuguese made a wrong move. That would explain their diplomatic restraint.

But I don't see the Japanese armies in China being that Machiavellian. I could look it up but my browser is being all wonky.

So, assuming the Japanese did invade Macao too, why wouldn't Portugal have DOWed just Japan, on the grounds that they did violate Portuguese territory, and having already done their worst against the Portuguese in their power, were in no position to do any further harm to them farther west and so Portugal would have nothing to lose.

Except of course the possibility Hitler would take offense and retaliate with his own DOW against them, which could hurt them--certainly by including Portuguese flagged shipping in the U-boat war, and conceivably if he ever managed to flip Franco over to active Axis membership, a crushing German/Spanish invasion might have been in the cards. But getting Franco onside like that would not be easy or likely; if nothing else Franco was well aware how dependent Spain was on seaborne trade that the British could cut off any time.

So I am mystified why, OTL, Portugal's Salazar didn't simply cite his country's long-time good relations with Britain and the offense Japan had committed against them to DOW Japan and see if Hitler were then stupid enough to use that, or Salazar's many one-sided deals with the Allies, as an excuse to retaliate in kind--which would put Portuguese assets at some greater risk but also bring them in as subsidized full partners in the winning Allied war effort. By 1943 or '44 at the latest it should have been clear the Anglo-Americans were going to win, or at any rate Iberia would be safe and the Germans would surely be swept from even under the seas, so he should have tipped over westward by then.

So who can explain why Portugal was not simply and openly an Ally in the OTL war, at least in its last years? Salazar's willingness to assist the west in the form of providing bases indicates to me either he was not deeply ideologically opposed--or he greatly feared that if he refused the RN and later USN permission, they'd just take the Azores and any other assets they wanted by force, he could squack and join the Axis and be damned with them if he did object (and Portugal would lose Timor, Macao, Angola and Mozambique forever) so he may have been an Axis sympathizer who felt strong-armed into submitting.

So which of those was it, or some third thing? It's very puzzling.

And for Astrodragon--are things any different with Portugal in this timeline? It looks to me like all the factors that would have pulled or pushed Salazar into openly joining the Allies are stronger here and any factors leading him to hesitate or even work for Axis victory are weaker. A German invasion or coup in Spain would be even stupider and less tenable or conceivable; the RN is stronger in general and particularly at hunting U-boats, Timor--I've lost track of whether the Japanese invasion there has been repelled or not, but if not yet its days are surely numbered, and the people driving the Japanese out would be W-Allies--Aussies, other Commonwealth, DEI, maybe by then some Americans, and for East Timor to remain a Portuguese possession it would behoove Salazar to have good relations with London. Berlin can't do him either harm or favors. But with Ally membership he gets protection of all the colonies Portugal now holds, including an East Timor actually back in Portuguese possession, plus a firm claim on getting Macao back. And probably lots of money in the form of military aid and donated weapons and training.

Maybe he still figures, as apparently OTL, he gets most of that and avoids having to commit any Portuguese soldiers or sailors to do their share of dying in Allied operations, if he's just an outrageously friendly neutral? That even a DOW on Japan, richly merited as that is, would entangle his weak country into shared burdens it shouldn't have to bear?

Is that pretty much his reasoning OTL and will it still hold here despite all the shifting of the odds in the Allies' favor?

Portugal in WWII is a fascinating subject and books have been written about it a good one is Lisbon: war in the shadows of the city of light by Neill Lochery
Basically Portugal took the position of neutrality and allowed both sides more or less freedom of operation within Portugal as long as they kept a low profile. For example Portugal expelled diplomats and spies from both the Allies and Axis throughout the war. Also consider that Portugal possessed deposits of wolfram(tungsten) without which Germany's war machine would grind to a halt. This meant that Germany HAD to act to seize those resources if Portugal sided with the Allies. As a side note Portugal made quite a lot of money selling tungsten to the Germans and I believe they are the only country which was allowed to keep the gold it got from Nazi Germany after the war.

Regarding colonies Salazar's top priority was to maintain Portugal's colonial empire at all costs. It took all the leverage the Allies had to get access to the Azores and that was even with the condition that it be used only by British soldiers( in practice the allies fudged this by placing all the American troops on the Azores on a technical loan to the British). The alliance with Britain was the only way Portugal could justify the use of the Azores to Hitler.

Regarding why Salazar didn't just throw in with the Allies in '43/'44 well Salazar thought that the best possible outcome of WWII would be a negotiated surrender that would prevent one country from dominating Europe in the aftermath.

Sorry this post was a bit messy but I'll look through my copy of Lisbon and give you a more detailed answer when I get a chance.
 
You mean something designed to provoke Astro into rushing out an update.

Something unmentioned because of general unmentionableness. A food consumed late at night and in no sense in a sober condition.

something like this.

PieFloater.jpg
 
Interesting way of ending the war against Japan, ties into operation starvation.

Instead of the Americans dropping the bomb, the British force the Japanese surrender by blockading all shipping except for neutral ships carrying the foodstuffs mentioned thus far in the thread.

Even to this day Japanese people of a certain age curl up into a foetal ball gibbering to themselves at the mention of pork scratchings, meatpie floaters and surstroemming.

Maybe Dag Hammarskjold faces a warcrimes tribunal when it's revealed that he was on board a Swedish merchantman delivering relief supplies consisting chiefly of the latter.
 
If you people don't behave yourselves I'm going to have to get out the pictures of a British Rail Pork Pie...:p:eek:

Banned under the Geneva Convention.

There's always a Lufthansa "Cheese" Rooftile, sorry, Sandwich. Also available in the mysterious "Meat not Pork" variety.
 
Pshaw! I laugh at something so ordinary! What about a British Rail beefburger? They always gave off the lovely aroma of hot brake fluid.... :(

Yeah, but the prionburgers were fairly fresh. The pork pies use-by dates referred to when they were "created" pre-Grouping.
 
Also consider that Portugal possessed deposits of wolfram(tungsten) without which Germany's war machine would grind to a halt. This meant that Germany HAD to act to seize those resources if Portugal sided with the Allies. As a side note Portugal made quite a lot of money selling tungsten to the Germans and I believe they are the only country which was allowed to keep the gold it got from Nazi Germany after the war.

It was my understanding that Portugal only agreed to sell tungsten to Germany after a couple of incidents where Portugese flagged vessels were "accidentaly" sunk by UBoats. Tungsten sales to Germany were strictly cash and carry whereas sales to the Brits had very generous credit terms.

I'm thinking Portugal was wary of which way the Spanish were going to jump and just wanted to stay out of the line of fire.
 
Interesting way of ending the war against Japan, ties into operation starvation.

Even to this day Japanese people of a certain age curl up into a foetal ball gibbering to themselves at the mention of pork scratchings, meatpie floaters and surstroemming.

so instead of operation manna in europe, the japanese get operation canna, where they get bombed with cans of surströmming :p
 
well in fairness surstromming does contained banned chemicals and can spontaneously explode, it probably would count as a chemical weapon in a fair trial.

And the Swedes being technically neutral, but as everyone should know by now totally under the control of the US in everything they do it may even be feasible.

Of course for more direct (and tasty) results the US should have introduced their own culinary magic pre war

http://eater.com/archives/2010/11/24/seven-best-deep-fried-turkey-disasters.php
 
If Churchill and his general staff had been put off fighting in Greece why reinforce the Greek mainland? Gallipoli wasn't the only campaign of WW1 in the area. Salonika was also attempted with a bit more success.
http://www.1914-1918.net/salonika.htm

I think you're playing Churchill...
The British moved to reinforce Greece for 3 reasons; to fulfil a declaration made in 1939 "to lend the Greek Government all the support in their power" supporting Greek independence in the event of a threat; to protect the Mediterranean shipping lanes ; and to use Greece as a barrier to protect Turkey, the only (neutral) country standing between the Axis Balkans and the oil-rich Middle East.
In WW1, Salonika, or the Macedonian Front, was an attempt to support the Serbians with a limited (2 large brigades/2 Divisions) Balkan landing; it arrived too late but led to part of the Serbian Army being saved. The front was re-established in Macedonia despite the objections of the neutral Greeks (with significant pro-German factions), where it remained largely static until July-September 1918. I don't really see (nor would the IGS) where it was a success unless you count the forces remaining intact & dug in until the final offensive - which started around the same time as the German Spring Offensive ground to a halt.

I must re-emphasise that the wisdom of this approach only has to win over the CW high command, not us in hindsight. Like the amphibious landings in south eastern Bulgaria in support from the Caucuses. Russia has shed loads of marines and would request air support over the Black Sea.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_S...naval_strength

Ship Type Number Note/class
Battleship 1 Parizhskaya Kommuna
Cruisers 5 Molotov, Voroshilov, Chervona Ukraina, Krasnyi Krym and Krasny Kavkaz
Destroyer Leaders 3 Leningrad-class destroyer and Tashkent-class destroyer
Destroyers (Modern) 11 6 Type 7, 5 Type 7U,
Destroyers (old) 4 Novik type
Submarines 44
Escort Vessels/Gunboats 2
Mine warfare vessels 18
Motor Torpedo Boats 84

In December (1941), there was an amphibious operation against Kerch which resulted in the recapture of the Kerch Peninsula.

Air bases and a land bridge into the Black sea are very much in Russian interests and they will support in any way they can. Sevastopol is under siege at this point.

True about IGS.
The strategic aim is understood very well - the Balkans are supposed to be the "soft underbelly", so invading & securing Greece is followed by occupying Bulgaria (possibly securing or eliminating the Romania Oil fields). After that, there are two possible routes; 1) attack up the Danube valley through N Serbia, Hungary, Austria/Czechoslovakia into S Germany or 2) from Romania, cross into the Ukraine into Poland & attack E Germany.
The problem is that it's not that straight-forward; the Axis can reinforce the area faster than the Allies can. Axis forces & logistics can cross the mountains by rail or road; Allied manpower & supplies have to travel by ship along the entire length of the Med, into a Greek port for transfer to lorry & then driven to the lines for use. That's a few hundred miles against around a thousand miles.
Western Allied forces are unable to get passage through into the Black Sea without Turkish permission, which is unlikely.. so no British amphibious landings in Bulgaria & no military supply chain to Bulgarian ports.
Russia has NO marines although it has several brigades of Naval Infantry (think sailors fighting on land), but they're pretty much committed to defending Sevastopol at this point along with all the other manpower the Soviets can muster. They're unlikely to lend significant troops to a landing in Bulgaria if they'll be under Western command, and air support in the Black Sea from the Western Allies would depend on seizing or constructing airstrips in Eastern Greece, then in Bulgaria & possibly Romania.

Anyone got data on the Bulgarian navy? Is there one at all?

I was referring to merchant shipping; although you could use naval vessels to transport supplies IF the WA capture Black Sea ports and IF the Russians can crew them, although I suspect they've already stripped most ships of their crews for use on land. It's also likely that the Allied Balkan force would need those supplies themselves.

IIRC, the Bulgarians had a small navy, a handful of pre-WW1 torpedo boats. Romania had a somewhat larger navy- 4 destroyers (2 WW1 Italian ships in poor condition & 2 of the British A-I destroyer leader knockoffs that were so popular in the interwar era), a couple WW1 vintage ex-French sloops (equivalent to the various 'Flower' types built by the RN at the same time) a handful of patrol boats &, 1 old submarine in poor condition, & a couple more that were commissioned too late to be of much use.

Your maps are great for troop strengths, locations, current occupation borders. They're missing something vital; try these & see what you think.

Greece_etc_phy.jpg


Hungary_etc_phy.jpg


The missing feature was TERRAIN. It's quite important when you're fighting over it. Mountainous terrain = less armoured/motorised forces, more infantry. Also more difficult transport of supplies, reinforcements etc even when you have sufficient ports available.

Like barbed wire, the German zones of occupation mark out the vulnerable points. The Dodecanese (marked here in Italian green) are already in allied hands. How dynamic do they expect the German and Italian forces to their north to be? Who holds Samos and Ikaria in TTL, the Italians still? Fair game. Allied occupation in the south would endanger fewer Bulgars than the bombing. Soviet landings south of Burgas suffer from the lack of a war between Bulgaria and the Soviet Union. Soon remedied I suppose. It would be nice if the SOE got going with an underground movement before (instead of) the communists. Isolate the German occupation zone on the Turkish border, then invade. Britain had at least three parachute brigades to support this by 1943. Perhaps one, dropping as three battalions, in 1942? Battalion size drops can be quite well co-ordinated and successful. Given all the cross roads and bridges to cover, company size forces is more likely (if any of this is).

The Germans here are geared up to defend against Turkish aggression (and to offer some of their own), so a landing on the coast and to their north west should effectively flank or even encircle them. Any similarity to Market Garden is purely for satire.

<cut>
On the Balkans while a Salonika might be sort of feasible and might be attractive to Churchill and Attlee and is certainly a threat that the Germans can't ignore (as is a Bulgarian defection if Italy goes) I can't see it except as an endrun in the event of German collapse. It brings the British up against the the main German armies and neither the US or France would support it. Or Brooke and the CoS.

Like Gannt said, if Britain wants to stage into the Balkans, it's going alone; the French will want to liberate La Belle France, so they won't want to spend their troop strength in a Balkan campaign. We've already heard the American answer - not while Marshall is COS, stated VERY forcefully.
To support a Balkans campaign, you're going to need troop strengths similar to or greater than those the Germans used; so 80,000 troops with integral armour & artillery formations, well-integrated tactical air support (which needs at least local air superiority) & attached engineer support & logistics troops. Does Britain at this point HAVE those troops, tanks, artillery, aircraft, ships & motor transportation available for use? Even if it did, you're going to need to land on a broad front from Thessaloniki to Alexandruopolis; you need all the ports you can get, and the attacks through the mountains need to be based on the 4 road routes through the mountains - 3 fairly close together (>90 miles apart) into Western Bulgaria (the westernmost is into Macedonia), and 1 past the Turkish border & along the coast into E Bulgaria. If the mountain routes get blocked...

In April 1942, 1st Parachute Brigade has 3-4 Battalions still in training, although it forms the core of 1st Parachute Division under "Boy" Browning. Only 1st Btn is ready to use (did Operation Colossus take place ATL?) - it was No. 11 Special Air Service Battalion until Sept 1941 OTL, & the German Parachute Corps didn't perform this time... The British Airborne formations might have not gone any further. SBS & SAS are available though, as is SOE - it will probably be cheaper in manpower to sponsor the Balkan partisans.

The better plan would be to occupy Sicily (further securing Med shipping routes), then Sardinia & Corsica then Italy or France. If you want bold, how about an invasion of NORTHERN Italy from both coasts instead - say Trieste in the east & Genoa in the west? If the two forces link quickly, then that cuts off Italy altogether... & encourages an "arrangement" with "interested" Italian parties that we've heard hints of.
Hmm, that might be a little too risky even with American & French support. *shrugs*
 
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