OK, I just didn't know enough about WWII naval realities to know whether controlling one side of a nine-mile strait is enough to stop a navy like the RN from getting through it.
I'll take your word for it, but out of curiosity, would it be artillery based on Gibraltar that stops British warships from making through the gauntlet, landplanes bombing them, concentrations of U-boats, or what?
Of course before agreeing to join the Axis ITTL, Franco does also have bases on the other side, but I'd think the Western Allies would make short work of them--if Franco commits before the USA gets involved, the British have to do it alone but I don't doubt they could. At least until Hitler gets control of the Rock and refurbishes it. Then they might have a hard time holding it against a German-backed Spanish assault, if they weren't dug in enough.
The Italian navy is now much less vulnerable, more able to concentrate on the East as you say. But is it enough? The Germans can't add much to in, at least in quantity terms though perhaps they'd weigh more in quality, even if they completely control the Strait--they still have to get their ships down the Atlantic coast right past the RN's home bases and in the range of RAF Coastal Command after all. If by a miracle they could get their entire fleet of surface ships from the Baltic to the Med, how many hulls would that add to what Italy had? How many ships can the Germans complete in Mediterranean shipyards, even if they have Marseilles and every Italian yard as well?
British air access to North Africa would be all bollixed up if they not only can't stop at Gibraltar but need to swing wide around it.
Again--no question Hitler would want it, if only to deny it to Britain. The question is, would Franco be at all wise to let German forces into Spain on any great scale? What could he gain?
And by the way, has anyone done a timeline where Franco joins the Allies instead? If he had done that any time before D-Day it would surely have been much appreciated! Perhaps up until that day, it would not have been clear to him that the Western Allies could keep Spain safe from the furious invasion Hitler would have launched; even if done in the utmost secrecy, how much force could the Anglo-Americans have moved into places just south of the border with France before the Germans would surely get wise to it? I think it's safe to say that western forces could at least have contained the German strike and started to firmly push it back, considering that meanwhile the Soviets would still be pressing on from the east. Of course, joining the Allies would have meant accepting the Russians as one of them, which I guess Franco would dearly have liked to avoid--and did, OTL.
Given that the western allies too would have liked Spain to join their side, Franco was in a good position just sitting things out as he did OTL; if either side got impatient and moved in on their own he could call on the other for help.
If he could have hoped to hold Gibraltar himself, exclusively for Spain, that might have been a big temptation. But he simply faced a choice of which foreign superpower would hold it and that was not nearly so appealing.
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I used the search function
eek
and so far have come up with this discussion thread from just a couple months ago that at least considers the possibility of Spain joining the West--only to dismiss it as ASB, largely on the ideological grounds that Franco would never join a pro-Soviet side and that the Soviets and Western powers would not treat with Franco.
I agree with the consensus there that Franco's neutrality OTL was a better move than his joining either side would likely have been.
I am puzzled though, by the consensus that the benefits to the Allies would have been small! Basically the western powers would have enjoyed the advantage of being able to put land forces up against Hitler without running them through the meatgrinder of the Normandy invasion. Spain is worse off until the Allies can get enough force in place to stop the Germans and push them back--and that's Franco's leverage, if he could be convinced by say early 1944 the Allies would win eventually, to ask for large concessions and possibly get them.
I can't see the British handing Gibraltar over to him as a reward, but if they wouldn't consider it perhaps the Americans might urge them to at least try to see their way to doing it.
I am no fan of Franco but I can see him being forgiven a lot and given a lot, if he can help the Allies so substantially!
Oh wait, here's another one, this one all about an Allied Francoist Spain.
This one has Hitler getting impatient and invading Spain in 1940. Back then, the British would not have been able to do a lot for the Spanish; I'm talking about late '43 or early '44 when Britain had recovered and regrouped and huge American forces, including fleets of aircraft, had become available and the problem for them was to get a foothold on the Continent. If Hitler were to try anything so foolish at that late date, Franco would face a choice between capitulating to his demands--or inviting in really substantial Allied forces instead, some of which could move in quite fast by air to suddenly friendly bases. Considering that this thread had some arguing that even against weak Spanish forces with hardly any significant Allied help, the Germans would still take weeks or months to fight their way over the Pyrenees, Hitler would have been quite an idiot to drive a quasi-ally over to the other side at any much later date!
Obviously there might be a lot of these threads--still, none yet consider the advantage of Spain as the springboard of the Allied attack, they are all hung up on how many soldiers Spain might offer and how poorly equipped the army was and so forth.
I don't have all night to page back--does anyone know of a timeline that considers mainly the second-front advantage Spain could offer the Allies mid-war?
I'll take your word for it, but out of curiosity, would it be artillery based on Gibraltar that stops British warships from making through the gauntlet, landplanes bombing them, concentrations of U-boats, or what?
Of course before agreeing to join the Axis ITTL, Franco does also have bases on the other side, but I'd think the Western Allies would make short work of them--if Franco commits before the USA gets involved, the British have to do it alone but I don't doubt they could. At least until Hitler gets control of the Rock and refurbishes it. Then they might have a hard time holding it against a German-backed Spanish assault, if they weren't dug in enough.
The Italian navy is now much less vulnerable, more able to concentrate on the East as you say. But is it enough? The Germans can't add much to in, at least in quantity terms though perhaps they'd weigh more in quality, even if they completely control the Strait--they still have to get their ships down the Atlantic coast right past the RN's home bases and in the range of RAF Coastal Command after all. If by a miracle they could get their entire fleet of surface ships from the Baltic to the Med, how many hulls would that add to what Italy had? How many ships can the Germans complete in Mediterranean shipyards, even if they have Marseilles and every Italian yard as well?
British air access to North Africa would be all bollixed up if they not only can't stop at Gibraltar but need to swing wide around it.
Again--no question Hitler would want it, if only to deny it to Britain. The question is, would Franco be at all wise to let German forces into Spain on any great scale? What could he gain?
And by the way, has anyone done a timeline where Franco joins the Allies instead? If he had done that any time before D-Day it would surely have been much appreciated! Perhaps up until that day, it would not have been clear to him that the Western Allies could keep Spain safe from the furious invasion Hitler would have launched; even if done in the utmost secrecy, how much force could the Anglo-Americans have moved into places just south of the border with France before the Germans would surely get wise to it? I think it's safe to say that western forces could at least have contained the German strike and started to firmly push it back, considering that meanwhile the Soviets would still be pressing on from the east. Of course, joining the Allies would have meant accepting the Russians as one of them, which I guess Franco would dearly have liked to avoid--and did, OTL.
Given that the western allies too would have liked Spain to join their side, Franco was in a good position just sitting things out as he did OTL; if either side got impatient and moved in on their own he could call on the other for help.
If he could have hoped to hold Gibraltar himself, exclusively for Spain, that might have been a big temptation. But he simply faced a choice of which foreign superpower would hold it and that was not nearly so appealing.
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I used the search function
I agree with the consensus there that Franco's neutrality OTL was a better move than his joining either side would likely have been.
I am puzzled though, by the consensus that the benefits to the Allies would have been small! Basically the western powers would have enjoyed the advantage of being able to put land forces up against Hitler without running them through the meatgrinder of the Normandy invasion. Spain is worse off until the Allies can get enough force in place to stop the Germans and push them back--and that's Franco's leverage, if he could be convinced by say early 1944 the Allies would win eventually, to ask for large concessions and possibly get them.
I can't see the British handing Gibraltar over to him as a reward, but if they wouldn't consider it perhaps the Americans might urge them to at least try to see their way to doing it.
I am no fan of Franco but I can see him being forgiven a lot and given a lot, if he can help the Allies so substantially!
Oh wait, here's another one, this one all about an Allied Francoist Spain.
This one has Hitler getting impatient and invading Spain in 1940. Back then, the British would not have been able to do a lot for the Spanish; I'm talking about late '43 or early '44 when Britain had recovered and regrouped and huge American forces, including fleets of aircraft, had become available and the problem for them was to get a foothold on the Continent. If Hitler were to try anything so foolish at that late date, Franco would face a choice between capitulating to his demands--or inviting in really substantial Allied forces instead, some of which could move in quite fast by air to suddenly friendly bases. Considering that this thread had some arguing that even against weak Spanish forces with hardly any significant Allied help, the Germans would still take weeks or months to fight their way over the Pyrenees, Hitler would have been quite an idiot to drive a quasi-ally over to the other side at any much later date!
Obviously there might be a lot of these threads--still, none yet consider the advantage of Spain as the springboard of the Allied attack, they are all hung up on how many soldiers Spain might offer and how poorly equipped the army was and so forth.
I don't have all night to page back--does anyone know of a timeline that considers mainly the second-front advantage Spain could offer the Allies mid-war?