WI: France liberates itself in WW2

Deleted member 94680

A lot depends on just how bad off the Germans are in the east. If they are near collapse when attacked in the west the Red Army can hope to gain a lot. If they are close to stalemate in the east then there is the possibility of dragging things out through 1943, maybe into 1944.

If it looks like the Germans will collapse in 43 the Manhatten project would be reduced in priority. The dual program for both Uranium & Plutonium bombs might be reduced to a single track program for only Plutonium bombs. Or it might be scaled down to a research project, and actual production postponed at considerable savings. A number of other US longer term development programs would be cut down to lower cost research with no development budgeted.

So Nazi Europe was the driver for Manhattan as opposed to Imperial Japan? Does this mean Operation Downfall is back to being the most likely endgame for the Pacific?
 
So Nazi Europe was the driver for Manhattan as opposed to Imperial Japan? Does this mean Operation Downfall is back to being the most likely endgame for the Pacific?
Yes and not sure that Japan will not fold beforehand anyway?
 
WI (spring 1944) De Gaulle helps WALLIES plan an invasion of the Cotentin Penninsula?
As usual, De Gaulle's staff leak the top-secret plans to friends back home. Germans hear of invasion plans a week later. Like OTL Patton and his phantom army create a ruse aimed at Cotentin.

French resistance fighters quietly stock-pile weapons in the Massif Central.
D-Day lands on the Belgian Coast and advances to liberate Antwerp a couple months earlier than OTL. WALLIED glider troops clear Walcheren Island before Germans have time to reinforce it. The usual White Brigades, Belgian SAS, etc. secure major bridges, dis-arm demolitions, etc.
With Antwerp secured and most of the Ardennes under attack, WALLIES rattle Sabres towards Paris. Meanwhile Vichy police switch sides and hinder German soldiers within Occupied France. Germans trying to retreat from Marseilles are delayed at every railway switch. Vichy colonies quickly turn their coats to assist WALLIES. Most French colonies fall into WALLIED hands with barely a shot fired.
Once he sees that the tide has turned against Hitler, Franco allows WALLIED troops to slip through Pyrennes passes to occupy Southern France, specifically the Port of Bordeaux.
With southern and northern pinches threatening to trap them in Paris, Germans retreat towards the Rhine.
De Gaule is kept busy planning the 'decisive' invasion of Cotentin.
Meanwhile Vichy Colonial troops are busy seizing control along the Northern and Southern Borders of France.
 
I'd think that were the Red Army doing this well then the Brits would be on board for a invasion of NW Europe in 1942. Dill who was CIGS then was all for such a thing. A Brit staff was busy working on invasion plans in the summer of 1942, the most developed of which was aimed at the Cotientin beaches & the port of Cherbourg. Dills replacement by Alan-Brooke ended serious attention to this, but a badly damaged Wehrmacht in 1942 is a game changer.

How many troops are we talking about?
 
Why would you think Japan will fold beforehand? Being the only opponent left on the field?
With Berlin falling in late 43 the Japanese will be very isolated. Come 44 they have to face off against the massive USN with the entire RN to help and fight the land war against China now with tons of spare equipment coming from Europe as well as a free none distracted Soviet looking at Manchuria and thinking if it's worth it? Can they really keep thinking its worth it for all of 44 and 45?
 

Deleted member 94680

With Berlin falling in late 43 the Japanese will be very isolated. Come 44 they have to face off against the massive USN with the entire RN to help and fight the land war against China now with tons of spare equipment coming from Europe as well as a free none distracted Soviet looking at Manchuria and thinking if it's worth it? Can they really keep thinking its worth it for all of 44 and 45?

Fair enough, but there was no real ‘surrender party’ in the Japanese hierarchy OTL with a situation not much better than that you’ve described. Wouldn’t they plan to keep fighting all the way back to the Home islands and resist the WAllies to the last, as OTL, even in this scenario? Their best hope, post mid-43, was probably for the WAllies to exhaust themselves into stalemate anyway.

The WAllies being forced into Downfall due to a lack of a Nuclear option is the Japanese’s best chance of a favourable outcome.
 
The WAllies being forced into Downfall due to a lack of a Nuclear option is the Japanese’s best chance of a favourable outcome.
Without the war in Europe I don't think the Japanese can fool themselves that the US/GB will get exhausted even without help from China, France, Dutch and potentially USSR.
With Berlin falling in 43 just calculate how many more aircraft are free, how many ships are freed by not convoying the Atlantic, how much equipment they can give to the Chinese army...etc.
 

Deleted member 94680

Without the war in Europe I don't think the Japanese can fool themselves that the US/GB will get exhausted even without help from China, France, Dutch and potentially USSR.
With Berlin falling in 43 just calculate how many more aircraft are free, how many ships are freed by not convoying the Atlantic, how much equipment they can give to the Chinese army...etc.

I don’t think the Japanese position post-43 relied on reality too much
 
WI (spring 1944) De Gaulle helps WALLIES plan an invasion of the Cotentin Penninsula?
As usual, De Gaulle's staff leak the top-secret plans to friends back home. Germans hear of invasion plans a week later. Like OTL Patton and his phantom army create a ruse aimed at Cotentin.
...

Good point. Allied deception ops were effective in 1942. Holts 'The Deceivers' is a 800+ page reference for the Allied deception operations. 90% of them ops folks never heard of. i.e.: When the ships for the Eastern Task Force of Operation TORCH assembled in the UK ports a series of ops were triggered to make the Germans think a invasion of Brittiany France was starting. The Germans reacted by sending their reserves in France to the NW region & their anti invasion assembly areas. Once the Western TF was at sea a second story was fed. That the convoys were headed for Egypt. When the Brits monitored reports from German observers near Gibraltar the fleet was passing into the Mediterranean a third story was launched that Sardinia was the target. Hitler ordered up preparations to reinforce that area. When the Allies started landing in the French north African colonies it was a complete surprise at the top.
 
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