What does it take for Greece (with Allied help) to successfully repel a German invasion in Spring 1941?
Alas only ASB's could save Greece.
The reality is only massive reinforcements could have saved Greece Pre-Barbarossa. The kind of reinforcements that Britain didn't have and couldn't send through an unfriendly central Mediterranean.
Conversely less British help to Greece from Britain than OTL, may have helped the Greeks more as they may have held the Italians alone into the summer of 1941. It was only the very limited British intervention that focused the minds of Germans on Greece.
If the Germans don't strike south in the spring of 1941 it creates many interesting butterflies, including; The Brits could use the troupes and resources used OTL in Greece to batter Romel and/or Brits send larger reinforcements to Greece after the Germans invade Russia leaving the Germans in a bit of a sticky wicket needing to divert their reserves to deal with this new threat. Of course the Germans have more resources not expended in Greece for the start of the Russian campaign.
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I don't think the British sending nothing would stop the Germans targeting Greece.
Germany cannot allow Greece to remain at war with Italy and the situation in the Balkans unresolved. So even if Greece declares no British troops/aid will be accepted, Germany can't accept that. It's a constant danger that at any point, Greece may change it's mind and then suddenly their is a major theatre on mainland Europe with British (and American?) troops on the ground. Romania is threatened and the oilfields and if the Germans are fighting the Soviets this makes for a very dangerous situation in the Balkans.
The only way to save Greece would be to make it pointless for the British to WANT to be there, but I can't see how this is possible unless Yugoslavia and (at least) Bulgaria are also neutral. And Greece then holding (and defeating) Italy in Albania could lead to an early overthrow of Mussolini.
Germany has to help Italy once Italy has attacked.
And once it does so, it has to win. If necessary, throwing everything at it. And the British and Greeks alone can't stop this.
Wow........
What does it take for Greece (with Allied help) to successfully repel a German invasion in Spring 1941?
The Greeks weren't going to give up part of their country voluntarily. IIRC they refused to pull their forces back and give up northern Greece and Thessalonica, their second city, even when they didn't have the troop numbers needed so their defensive line ended up being outflanked and troops cut off. The Greek and Commonwealth forces could probably have done better if they had fallen back to the Aliakmon Line and set out another defensive line to link the northern end of it to the territory they held in Albania to defend against an invasion from Yugoslavia. The Axis forces are still going to win since the Germans can bring their heavier weight of manpower and easier overland logistics to bear but the Allies would likely be able to hold out longer, slowly withdraw down the peninsula to new lines as they go and the geography favours them, and generally increase the costs that the Germans have to pay to win. In an ideal world this translates to a better evacuation that see more troops and their equipment moved to Crete so that any airborne invasion sees the whole paratrooper force defeated and captured, but that's another matter.Do you need to hold all of Greece or just part?
Best scenario seems to me to be that the Greeks lose the mainland, but hold onto Crete.What does it take for Greece (with Allied help) to successfully repel a German invasion in Spring 1941?