WI Bomber command and the 8th air force were divereted to support the Warsaw uprising

WI Churchill and Roosevelt had been angry enough at the lack of Soviet support to take the bomber force from terror bombing to dropping supplies to the Poles?

Could this have changed things?
 
OTL

The Allies ( Churchill) asked the USSR for permission for the aircraft to be refuelled in Soviet bases in order to be able to make the journey back. It was refused. It is often asked wether Roosevelt pushing Stalin along with Churchill would have forced Stalin's hand. But supplies alone would not have prevented the uprising from being crushed, they would have needed to be reached by the Soviets. Rossokovsky forces had been checked by a German counter attack and were unable press forward. The only thing that could have saved the city would have been a large air supply operation, with soviet cooperation, andthe Red Army shifting it's next offensive from Romania and Hungary to a renew effort towards Warsaw. We can't, however, be sure wether that manoeuvre was logistically possible, and if it would be scceful. What we can be sure off is that the USSR choose not to allow any help to reach the free poles, therefore both making that battle easier for the Germans and allowing the people better placed to resist the Sovietisation of Poland to die.
As a side comment, we know now that during the cold war the Soviets fully expected the poles to turn against them in the event of a major war, making a red offensive against NATO extremely problematic.
 
Did a B-17 or Lancaster have the range to reach Warsaw from England or Italy?

From what I see, Warsaw would be within the range of B17s based near, say, London. A lot depends on the bomb load. They wouldn't be able to carry the same loads as they did against German targets. Still, that means a long unescorted flight straight through the most heavily defended airspace of the war. And back again. A lot of losses to do what? To support the uprising in Warsaw by bombing it flat?
 
Did a B-17 or Lancaster have the range to reach Warsaw from England or Italy?

OTL some planes did make it to Warsaw with supplies towards the end of the uprising, so yes they could have done it. However, without Soviet co operation little could be achieved.
 
Weren't those bombers flying in from Italy, though? That would mean that the 8th air force, stationed in the UK, wouldn't be the actual force delivering the supplies.

If Roosevelt and Churchill could get Sweden to allow their aircraft to refuel in Swedish territory on the grounds of 'humanitarian assistance' it might be doable. After all the Swedes gave token resistance against the Nazis and at that stage in the war it's not as if the Nazis could retaliate against them with any kind of concerted military effort - Hitler might be losing it, but he wouldn't open a third (or should that be fourth, counting Italy?) front!
 
Without Stalin actively supporting militarily an uprising which he knows is not in his interest to support air supply will make no difference.
 
No. The Warsaw Uprising was intended to see a Poland with its 1939 borders surviving, and if the Soviets do more, the Home Army in Warsaw will start bushwhacking them. The Home Army is the classic example of nationalism in a small state wanting freedom for that small state, but unable to get what it wanted. The WAllies at this point in time have more pressing immediate tactical concerns, and the Soviets are focused on the Jhassy-Kishinev Offensive, which serves the nice advantage for them of having firm strategic logic behind it *and* enabling them to screw over the Home Army in the process.
 
The Allies ( Churchill) asked the USSR for permission for the aircraft to be refuelled in Soviet bases in order to be able to make the journey back. It was refused. It is often asked wether Roosevelt pushing Stalin along with Churchill would have forced Stalin's hand. But supplies alone would not have prevented the uprising from being crushed, they would have needed to be reached by the Soviets. Rossokovsky forces had been checked by a German counter attack and were unable press forward. The only thing that could have saved the city would have been a large air supply operation, with soviet cooperation, andthe Red Army shifting it's next offensive from Romania and Hungary to a renew effort towards Warsaw. We can't, however, be sure wether that manoeuvre was logistically possible, and if it would be scceful. What we can be sure off is that the USSR choose not to allow any help to reach the free poles, therefore both making that battle easier for the Germans and allowing the people better placed to resist the Sovietisation of Poland to die.
As a side comment, we know now that during the cold war the Soviets fully expected the poles to turn against them in the event of a major war, making a red offensive against NATO extremely problematic.

The Soviet advance into the Balkans through Romania did have some powerful strategic arguments in its favor, such as capturing the major Axis oil fields the Nazi regime shamelessly looted and exploited, and that it enabled the USSR to allow the Nazis to crush the Uprising in an advance that got turned into Stalingrad on the Danube was a side benefit.

The Red Army would have gained nothing from a Siege of Budapest-style urban nightmare months earlier and in Warsaw. The Soviets were focused on what they gained from, naturally, and not intent on undermining their empire when they were just beginning to establish it.
 
Suppose Stalin looses it and actually orders his troops to cross the river? Well, then the Germans send in more troops to crush that crossing. End result is more dead Poles and Warsaw razed to the ground even more than OTL
 
Hello Snake,

The Warsaw Uprising was intended to see a Poland with its 1939 borders surviving, and if the Soviets do more, the Home Army in Warsaw will start bushwhacking them.

The borders hardly mattered to the Soviets, if the government that would have eventuated from any successful uprising (the London government or otherwise) was not under Moscow's control.
 
I'm not 100% sure about this but I don't Bomber Command bombed Poland once during WW2 - hopefully someone will correct me if I'm wrong

RAF did fly resupply missions to Warsaw in using Liberators, Halifaxes and Dakotas from bases in Italy

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warsaw_Uprising#Airdrops

but they were about as successful as the air supply bridge to Stalingrad and Tunisia - ie not very

any mission to Warsaw by the 8th AF would probably have to be a Shuttle Mission - so no go there...
 
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