WI: Op. Weserübung includes Faroes and Iceland

If we assume an attempted surface-borne assault, this could have an interesting effect on the Norwegian Campaign. IOTL, thanks to poor ship recognition skills in Coastal Command, and a certain amount of bad luck, Admiral Forbes became convinced that the Germans were attempting to break raiders out into the North Atlantic, and pulled his forces into positions from which they could less effectively respond to the German invasion of Norway as a result. ITTL, if these intelligence failures continue (and there's no reason they shouldn't) then, since there are actually ships heading into the North Atlantic, Forbes will give chase to a greater extent. The forces heading to the Faroes/Iceland will be sunk, but the British response in Norway will be delayed; perhaps Narvik is less of a crushing victory for the RN than IOTL, and the Lofoten Action will be avoided.
 

GarethC

Donor
If we assume an attempted surface-borne assault, this could have an interesting effect on the Norwegian Campaign. IOTL, thanks to poor ship recognition skills in Coastal Command, and a certain amount of bad luck, Admiral Forbes became convinced that the Germans were attempting to break raiders out into the North Atlantic, and pulled his forces into positions from which they could less effectively respond to the German invasion of Norway as a result. ITTL, if these intelligence failures continue (and there's no reason they shouldn't) then, since there are actually ships heading into the North Atlantic, Forbes will give chase to a greater extent. The forces heading to the Faroes/Iceland will be sunk, but the British response in Norway will be delayed; perhaps Narvik is less of a crushing victory for the RN than IOTL, and the Lofoten Action will be avoided.
What surface forces could be used for these operations? I thought the whole ocean-going KM was committed to Norway already?
 
What surface forces could be used for these operations? I thought the whole ocean-going KM was committed to Norway already?

With that I was assuming a few smaller ships such as trawlers, or a merchant or two, which would then be confused with actual warships by Coastal Command and Naval Intelligence. An intelligence organisation that's already expecting a German breakout is going to be easy to convince that a few nebulously described ships form one, especially since an invasion of the Faroes and Iceland is such a far-out, ridiculous idea that would be far from contemplation.
 
Loss of aircraft in this April operation cuts into the size of the air assault on Holland in May. Perhaps enough the Dutch surrender is delayed ?
 
my (very speculative) scenario is to operate on and around Greenland, a grandiose version of their OTL weather stations there. just IMO Iceland and Faroes are in too close proximity to Great Britain.
YepI dont Personally understand why they couldnt refuel floatplanes from Greenland fjords using submarines
 
The Japanese did some sub based refueling of floatplanes. However you need to have special arrangements for fuel storage, highly volatile aviation gasoline is NOT something any submarine commander is going to be happy about having on his boat. For a one off deal, refueling aircraft from a sub is doable, but enough to provide a ,lot of missions, not really. If you fly to a rendezvous and the sub is not there for any reason you're screwed. If the weather/sea state when you arrive is unsuitable (and around Greenland likely) you're screwed. If you need to signal back and forth to confirm the sub is on station and the weather/sea state OK you open yourself up to detection.
 

Driftless

Donor
Loss of aircraft in this April operation cuts into the size of the air assault on Holland in May. Perhaps enough the Dutch surrender is delayed ?

Ju-52's? Any survivor planes used for the Faroes-Iceland invasion probably couldn't get back to Germany. That would probably have been a one-way trip. Could the Germans retrieve the crews in time though? Or might they have used other aircraft?
 
The Japanese did some sub based refueling of floatplanes. However you need to have special arrangements for fuel storage, highly volatile aviation gasoline is NOT something any submarine commander is going to be happy about having on his boat. For a one off deal, refueling aircraft from a sub is doable, but enough to provide a ,lot of missions, not really. If you fly to a rendezvous and the sub is not there for any reason you're screwed. If the weather/sea state when you arrive is unsuitable (and around Greenland likely) you're screwed. If you need to signal back and forth to confirm the sub is on station and the weather/sea state OK you open yourself up to detection.
The Sea states is the point about the fjords, I would recommend Do-26 diesels and if you intercept these fixed point refuelling stations to often any statistician would quickly expose ULTRA.
 
Even in the fjords its questionable, and much of the year you worry about floating ice which will trash seaplanes easily. There are ways to conceal the ULTRA data, and don't forget HF-DF.
 
The Sea states is the point about the fjords, I would recommend Do-26 diesels and if you intercept these fixed point refuelling stations to often any statistician would quickly expose ULTRA.

OTL the Germans had all that statistical evidence & more & failed to do more than add rotors to the Enigma machines. They could have grossly reduced the effectiveness of the ULTRA system had they altered their use of radio and cleaned up sloppy procedures and habits. Instead they ignored proper analysis of the problem and expended a lot of labor-hours looking for spies in the French ports and telephone switch stations.

The Brits understood the threat from proper analysis and used several methods to reduce it. One was the effort to send reconissance planes in advance of ULTRA inspired attacks. A second was not to respond to every bit of ULTRA information. Response was selective and situational. A third was attacks initiated by regular reconissance, directional finding (HufDuf system) & other signal analysis helped obscure the presence of the ULTRA system.
 
OTL the Germans had all that statistical evidence & more & failed to do more than add rotors to the Enigma machines. They could have grossly reduced the effectiveness of the ULTRA system had they altered their use of radio and cleaned up sloppy procedures and habits. Instead they ignored proper analysis of the problem and expended a lot of labor-hours looking for spies in the French ports and telephone switch stations.

The Brits understood the threat from proper analysis and used several methods to reduce it. One was the effort to send reconissance planes in advance of ULTRA inspired attacks. A second was not to respond to every bit of ULTRA information. Response was selective and situational. A third was attacks initiated by regular reconissance, directional finding (HufDuf system) & other signal analysis helped obscure the presence of the ULTRA system.
I do agree in this, its just hard to explain this kind of situation with Spies in French ports
 
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