WI Germany focused entirely on attacking Liverpool and other key ports after the Fall of France?

Deleted member 1487

I read your posts as generally supportive of the idea that destroying Liverpool was the Germans' best bet, I was indicating the problems with that.
I think it was a better path than the one they took IOTL.
 
Certainly was. Tho here is my disagreement with Liverpool port facility specifically.

... Basically the Germans didn't have the capacity to wipe out Liverpool and stop the British reacting to it successfully, all Luftwaffe vs UK scenarios are just whack.a.mole.

My point in my earlier post on this derives from the damage done to the cargo fleet. The submarines were doing increasing damage & attacking Liverpool & select other ports with the object of damaging/sinking ships supplements the ongoing submarine campaign. Thats why I included mines & air attacks on ships at sea, in coordination with the submarines and surface raiders. I understand its near ASB to expect a combined & coordinated air/naval campaign from the Germans of 1940, but as a hypothetical focusing on the cargo fleet first how and wherever you can reach them gets you closer than anything else practical to defeating Britain. This includes air attacks on select ports. Docked ships are vulnerable & the number of sorties per destroyed hull is far lower than for cargo ships at sea, even if bombing at night. Ancillary damage to the port facilities supplements this nicely.
 

Deleted member 1487

Though, if the night time bomber stream is focused on Liverpool, that should increase the odds of British nightfighters at least sighting German bombers. They're also in the path of AAA.
Prior to the Beaufighter British Nightfighters had a serious speed problem and often couldn't overtake German bombers. British AAA was pretty pathetic in 1940-41 namely due to the lack of a quality gunnery radar with enough accuracy to score blind fire hits at night.
 

Driftless

Donor
Prior to the Beaufighter British Nightfighters had a serious speed problem and often couldn't overtake German bombers.
Certainly not the significant weapon they would become as the war went on.

By Cunningham and Rawnsley's (Nightfighter) own experiences in the summer and fall of 1940, the Blenheim's were not well suited to the night interceptor role. And then the A.I. radar was new and finicky and the learning curve was very steep. The arrival of the Beaufighter's in late summer was a significant improvement and the Mosquito's a couple of years later a step up from there.
 

Ian_W

Banned
Certainly was. Tho here is my disagreement with Liverpool port facility specifically.



My point in my earlier post on this derives from the damage done to the cargo fleet. The submarines were doing increasing damage & attacking Liverpool & select other ports with the object of damaging/sinking ships supplements the ongoing submarine campaign. Thats why I included mines & air attacks on ships at sea, in coordination with the submarines and surface raiders. I understand its near ASB to expect a combined & coordinated air/naval campaign from the Germans of 1940, but as a hypothetical focusing on the cargo fleet first how and wherever you can reach them gets you closer than anything else practical to defeating Britain. This includes air attacks on select ports. Docked ships are vulnerable & the number of sorties per destroyed hull is far lower than for cargo ships at sea, even if bombing at night. Ancillary damage to the port facilities supplements this nicely.

One of the issues is that ships sunk in the Atlantic don't need to be unloaded at damaged ports, or have their cargo moved through damaged rail yards.

This campaign also doesn't have a path to victory in 1940 - it's a bet on winning a long war.
 

NoMommsen

Donor
One of the issues is that ships sunk in the Atlantic don't need to be unloaded at damaged ports, or have their cargo moved through damaged rail yards.
... ships together with their cargo sunk before reaching Britain ..., sounds like a "good" thing for the germans ...

May I ask, what your "issue" is with that ?

This campaign also doesn't have a path to victory in 1940 - it's a bet on winning a long war.
Did anybody ask here for a 1940 or even 1941 "victory" over Britain ?

IMO the decision for going more thoroughly after ther supply lines in that the subs are supplementetd by wrecking also harbour facilities as well as ships in harbour with a more on that task focused LW strategy or even combined naval-air strategy (IMO the Norway campaign shows, that such cooperation was possible) would show, that there is a long(er) time strategy/ "bet" behind : attrition and starvation.
 

looking at the huge numbers of ships laid up for repairs think an extensive use of Butterfly bombs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly_Bomb might have created a vicious cycle in which it would be more difficult to continue repairs even if thru extraordinary efforts arriving ships continue to be unloaded?

meaning you would have to draft everyone into clearing docklands first and repairs stalled? it might be possible to maintain dual track as much as possible, but all delays add up.
 
Night attacks on ports would certainly be a better strategy than the OTL BoB.

However, the best German strategy in 1940 is probably to declare victory and not attack Britain at all. Going to be a difficult one for Adolf and Herman to execute, though.
 
Did anybody ask here for a 1940 or even 1941 "victory" over Britain ?

IMO the decision for going more thoroughly after ther supply lines in that the subs are supplementetd by wrecking also harbour facilities as well as ships in harbour with a more on that task focused LW strategy or even combined naval-air strategy (IMO the Norway campaign shows, that such cooperation was possible) would show, that there is a long(er) time strategy/ "bet" behind : attrition and starvation.

Its a great strategy if German can resist the urge to invade the Soviet Union and the USA doesn't get sucked in, or until British night air defense improves (better radars etc.) , all of which probably happen eventually, so there is sort of a timeliness about the whole thing.

I could see Hitler if he really thinks he has Britain on its heels, delaying a Soviet invasion until 1942. The advantages of Britain being completely out outweigh the Soviets being stronger.
Japan is sort of on its path to war after September 40 so USA is probably in as OTL.
Perhaps with USA in then Hitler delays the Soviet invasion again.

So I can see a scenario where the starvation campaign continues into 1942, but with USA entry, improved radars etc., it starts having decreased effectiveness.

A USA/Britain vs Germany/Italy/Japan (focused on shipping, with a friendly neutral USSR for strategic supplies) would be an epic struggle.
 

Deleted member 1487

Night attacks on ports would certainly be a better strategy than the OTL BoB.

However, the best German strategy in 1940 is probably to declare victory and not attack Britain at all. Going to be a difficult one for Adolf and Herman to execute, though.
Doesn't really work with Churchill in charge. Probably would need to go the Wallies 1944-45 route and turn the fighters on to strafe everything that moves in the civilian transport area to shut down the economy:
http://worldwarwings.com/intense-industrial-strafing-1945-restored-color-footage/


 
Its a great strategy if German can resist the urge to invade the Soviet Union and the USA doesn't get sucked in, or until British night air defense improves (better radars etc.) , all of which probably happen eventually, so there is sort of a timeliness about the whole thing.

I could see Hitler if he really thinks he has Britain on its heels, delaying a Soviet invasion until 1942. The advantages of Britain being completely out outweigh the Soviets being stronger.
Japan is sort of on its path to war after September 40 so USA is probably in as OTL.
Perhaps with USA in then Hitler delays the Soviet invasion again.

So I can see a scenario where the starvation campaign continues into 1942, but with USA entry, improved radars etc., it starts having decreased effectiveness.

A USA/Britain vs Germany/Italy/Japan (focused on shipping, with a friendly neutral USSR for strategic supplies) would be an epic struggle.

It is very unlikely that Hitler goes full retard and declares war on the USA because of Pearl Harbor. OTL he only did so on the hopes that Japan would reciprocate and declare war in the USSR to help in the middle Barbarossa for a quick victory like he wanted. Here he isn't fighting the Soviets and thus has nothing to gain by declaring war on the USA.

The American public is not going to support going to war just to help Britain when the Japanese flatout attacked them, so if anything, a Pearl Harbor absent Hitler's declaration of war will ensure that the USA is occupied with Japan.

There is even the possibility that Hitler might condemn the attack, maybe even (borderline ASB, but possible) declare war on Japan to try shifting the USA support of Britain, which in this timeline is Germany's main enemy.
 
Prior to the Beaufighter British Nightfighters had a serious speed problem and often couldn't overtake German bombers. British AAA was pretty pathetic in 1940-41 namely due to the lack of a quality gunnery radar with enough accuracy to score blind fire hits at night.

Conversely how good was German Night bombing during this period - especially as they are having to travel further increasing the potential for navigation errors

As part of my History course at school we visited Queens road in Portsmouth

It was a 'main road' that runs several miles through Portsmouth and was used as an aiming point / navigation aid by the Luftwaffe as it ran directly to the Naval harbour/dockyard.

Even then they did relatively little damage to the dockyard and as far as I am aware never put it out of action - but not one building was left undamaged along that road for a distance of several miles and you have to go 50+ meters down each of the side road's before you start to find pre war buildings - so it appears that an awful lot of bombs dropped on the Portsmouth dockyard missed.

Also if the focus shifted from London to Liverpool then so does the additional counter measures and decoys used to distract bombers - for efforts were made to build a fake locations - that at night might be misidentified as the actual dockyards - further diluting their efforts by drawing bombers into bombing them in error

See Starfish sight for more information
 

Deleted member 1487

Conversely how good was German Night bombing during this period - especially as they are having to travel further increasing the potential for navigation errors

As part of my History course at school we visited Queens road in Portsmouth

It was a 'main road' that runs several miles through Portsmouth and was used as an aiming point / navigation aid by the Luftwaffe as it ran directly to the Naval harbour/dockyard.

Even then they did relatively little damage to the dockyard and as far as I am aware never put it out of action - but not one building was left undamaged along that road for a distance of several miles and you have to go 50+ meters down each of the side road's before you start to find pre war buildings - so it appears that an awful lot of bombs dropped on the Portsmouth dockyard missed.

Also if the focus shifted from London to Liverpool then so does the additional counter measures and decoys used to distract bombers - for efforts were made to build a fake locations - that at night might be misidentified as the actual dockyards - further diluting their efforts by drawing bombers into bombing them in error

See Starfish sight for more information
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liverpool_Blitz#May_blitz
The raids put 69 out of 144 cargo berths out of action and inflicted 2,895 casualties[nb 1] and left many more homeless.

One incident on 3 May involved the SS Malakand, a ship carrying munitions which was berthed in the Huskisson Dock. Although its eventual explosion is often attributed to a burning barrage balloon, this fire was put out. However flames from dock sheds that had been bombed spread to the Malakand, and this fire could not be contained. Despite valiant efforts by the fire brigade to extinguish the flames, they spread to the ship's cargo of 1,000 tons of bombs, which exploded a few hours after the raid had ended. The entire Huskisson No. 2 dock and the surrounding quays were destroyed and four people were killed. The explosion was so violent that some pieces of the ship's hull plating were blasted into a park over 1 mile (1.6 km) away. It took seventy-four hours for the fire to burn out.[8]

The Times on 5 May 1941, carried the following report:" The Germans stated that Saturday night's attack on Liverpool was one of the heaviest ever made by their air force on Britain. Several hundred bombers had been used, visibility was good and docks and industrial works, storehouses and business centres, had been hit. In addition to many smaller fires, one conflagration, it was claimed, was greater than any hitherto observed during a night attack."
Despite it being the 2nd most important target during the Blitz, the Brits never really stopped or deflected damage from the city...as late as May 1941, the month the Blitz basically ended, the heaviest damage was done.
There is also the help from reflecting moonlight off of the water, which also made Hamburg a relatively easy to find target for the RAF once they gained experience.
 
... ships together with their cargo sunk before reaching Britain ..., sounds like a "good" thing for the germans ...

May I ask, what your "issue" is with that ?
I haven't really been following the discussion, but...
Perhaps that if you sink the ships there's not much need to destroy the ports as the ships won't be reaching them anyway.
Extra effort and risk for little additional gain.
 

Ian_W

Banned
... ships together with their cargo sunk before reaching Britain ..., sounds like a "good" thing for the germans ...

May I ask, what your "issue" is with that ?

Did anybody ask here for a 1940 or even 1941 "victory" over Britain ?

IMO the decision for going more thoroughly after ther supply lines in that the subs are supplementetd by wrecking also harbour facilities as well as ships in harbour with a more on that task focused LW strategy or even combined naval-air strategy (IMO the Norway campaign shows, that such cooperation was possible) would show, that there is a long(er) time strategy/ "bet" behind : attrition and starvation.

Lets keep the numbers simple - the UK has 1000 ton/weeks of shipping coming in, and has ports capable of dealing with 1000 ton/weeks of ships.

If you double the number of ships, but keep the port capacity the same, you get 1000 tons a week leaving the ports and is a big queue of ships outside the ports amounting to 1000 tons of shipping per week.

If you keep the number of ships the same, but halve the port capacity, you get 500 tons of shipping a week leaving the ports and a smaller queue of ships outside the ports amounting to 500 tons of shipping per week.

If you halve the number of ships arriving and halve the port capacity, you get 500 tons of shipping a week leaving the ports and no queue.

Sinking some ships and damaging ports at the same time has less effect than either sinking more ships or more severely damaging ports.

In reality, it's not that quite that simple, as not every ship can be unloaded at every port (ie tankers). But the British can and did re-route ships to the less damaged ports that could unload them.

Victory in 1940 or 1941 is important, because a long war will eventually see the USA entering on the UK's side, and WW1 experience shows this means Germany losing the war.
 
It is very unlikely that Hitler goes full retard and declares war on the USA because of Pearl Harbor. OTL he only did so on the hopes that Japan would reciprocate and declare war in the USSR to help in the middle Barbarossa for a quick victory like he wanted. Here he isn't fighting the Soviets and thus has nothing to gain by declaring war on the USA.

The American public is not going to support going to war just to help Britain when the Japanese flatout attacked them, so if anything, a Pearl Harbor absent Hitler's declaration of war will ensure that the USA is occupied with Japan.

There is even the possibility that Hitler might condemn the attack, maybe even (borderline ASB, but possible) declare war on Japan to try shifting the USA support of Britain, which in this timeline is Germany's main enemy.

Sigh.... Man, you do know the US was actively supporting Britain with measures that are very very dubious for any "neutral power"? By 1941 the USN was fighting an undeclared naaval war with the Kriegsmarine h=that would see American servicemen killed in action protecting British convoys plus they are a couple of Gallup polls done around this period that contradict your statement that the public wouldn't support a war plus when Japan attacks the US they will also attack Britian Britainn is now a ally and stationoing US troops and US planes in the home isles is only a assisting a ally in thing like "training or joint operations" and it would be a dman shame if US pilots would killed in LW raids RAF bases wouldn''t it
 

looking at the huge numbers of ships laid up for repairs think an extensive use of Butterfly bombs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly_Bomb might have created a vicious cycle in which it would be more difficult to continue repairs even if thru extraordinary efforts arriving ships continue to be unloaded?

Sinking some ships and damaging ports at the same time has less effect than either sinking more ships or more severely damaging ports.

understand your calculation but since there are ships in ports and since ports are only point of their journey within range of large percentage of LW bombers?

any damage to western ports forces use of east coast routes and ports in better range of KM and LW?
 
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