WI William Gott not shot down

The point of divergence is this: a sandstorm sweeps over the airfield playing host to 5/JG27. The planes of Oberleutnant Emil Clade, Unteroffizer Bernd Schneider and several other pilots gets screwed to hell and beyond. As a result, no one shoots down William Gott while he is en route to Cairo.

Something tells me that the PoD is implausible. Feel free to suggest a more plausible PoD but the question is how will Gott's survival affect the course of the desert war and subsequently D-Day?
 
Well the question is whether or not Straffer Gott was half the general Montgomery was, whether Gott would be able to turn the 8th Army around as quickly as Monty did, whether he would cave into preasure from Churchill to attack before he was ready and whether or not he was cut out for Army level command. I dont know enough about Gott to say whether he was any of these things or could have done any of these things but personally I have an inkling that he wasn't as good as Monty and wouldn't have done as a good a job.
 
The point of divergence is this: a sandstorm sweeps over the airfield playing host to 5/JG27. The planes of Oberleutnant Emil Clade, Unteroffizer Bernd Schneider and several other pilots gets screwed to hell and beyond. As a result, no one shoots down William Gott while he is en route to Cairo.

Something tells me that the PoD is implausible. Feel free to suggest a more plausible PoD but the question is how will Gott's survival affect the course of the desert war and subsequently D-Day?

I intend to write an entire tl along this very subject line and even have a working title: British Blitzkrieg Gott Survives

Gott was a man much in the same mold as Rommel himself, a desert mechanized warrior. While Montgomery's conservatism and method of battle was well suited to the British army (ie they didn't have a big army and casualties were hard to replace especially as the war dragged on.) It is also argued by many here that his slowness and constant building of overwhelming strength made the war last much longer than it needed to

I see Gott as a far more imaginative and decisive figure and certainly one more likely to take risks than Montgomery ever thought about.
 

Redbeard

Banned
I intend to write an entire tl along this very subject line and even have a working title: British Blitzkrieg Gott Survives

Gott was a man much in the same mold as Rommel himself, a desert mechanized warrior. While Montgomery's conservatism and method of battle was well suited to the British army (ie they didn't have a big army and casualties were hard to replace especially as the war dragged on.) It is also argued by many here that his slowness and constant building of overwhelming strength made the war last much longer than it needed to

I see Gott as a far more imaginative and decisive figure and certainly one more likely to take risks than Montgomery ever thought about.

I don't know much about Gott, but if he really was a flashing Blitzkrieg type I'm afraid this could mean disaster for the British.

To utilise a blitzkrieg type of general you need a very swiftly operating army and one very much capable of individual creativity and action - at all levels. The British Army never was that, it rather was a fire spitting steam roller sticking to its plans no matter what the enemy intended, and it anyway did not need taking major risks - since late 41 time was working for the allies.

Monty is just perfect for such an army, but a blitzkrieg type most likely would end up bogged down, cut off and eliminated - and thus risk to politically shortcut the "unlooseable" strategy of just applying your ever growing strength.

Regards

Steffen Redbeard
 
I intend to write an entire tl along this very subject line and even have a working title: British Blitzkrieg Gott Survives

Gott was a man much in the same mold as Rommel himself, a desert mechanized warrior. While Montgomery's conservatism and method of battle was well suited to the British army (ie they didn't have a big army and casualties were hard to replace especially as the war dragged on.) It is also argued by many here that his slowness and constant building of overwhelming strength made the war last much longer than it needed to

I see Gott as a far more imaginative and decisive figure and certainly one more likely to take risks than Montgomery ever thought about.

I know that both the Auk and Alan Brooke had reservations about Gott's capacities for high command. The Auk's recomendation doesn't really carry much weight, given his track record on chosing good Army Commanders, but that Brooke had reservations speaks volumes. One of Brooke's reasons against Gott getting command was that he was tired out from the long fighting in the desert and needed a break. Brooke also felt Gott could offer nothing new, nothing that the Auk or his predecessors hadn't tried before and it would be better to bring in a commander from outside who had new ideas who culd do something different (and by that he meant Monty).
 
I intend to write an entire tl along this very subject line and even have a working title: British Blitzkrieg Gott Survives

I wanted to do that. But then again, since you are planning on doing it, I can suggest a title for you. The title being 'Die Wüste Gott (The Desert God)'. It's a pun on Gott's name being the word for 'God' in German.

In my rough sketch of the timeline, I envisioned him launching a blitzkrieg in El Alamein and capturing Rommel. This now sounds very implausible given Gott's weariness and the state of the 8th Army. Would he be able then to pass on his aggressive nature to the rest of the 8th Army?

By the way, was my PoD implausible?
 
I wanted to do that. But then again, since you are planning on doing it, I can suggest a title for you. The title being 'Die Wüste Gott (The Desert God)'. It's a pun on Gott's name being the word for 'God' in German.

In my rough sketch of the timeline, I envisioned him launching a blitzkrieg in El Alamein and capturing Rommel. This now sounds very implausible given Gott's weariness and the state of the 8th Army. Would he be able then to pass on his aggressive nature to the rest of the 8th Army?

By the way, was my PoD implausible?

I was planning to have the 8th army take two divisions and land them at tobruk around the battle of second alamein to trap panzer army africa front and back.

I personally thought a lot of brook's comments were unfair about Gott. Gott rose from command of a brigade to a corps in like 9 months and never had the necessary formal line command training associated with his new positions... he might have been tired but so was Rommel
 
I personally thought a lot of brook's comments were unfair about Gott. Gott rose from command of a brigade to a corps in like 9 months and never had the necessary formal line command training associated with his new positions... he might have been tired but so was Rommel

Perhaps, but Brooke was usually right about these things. His judgement was second to none so I have a hard time siding against him on these matters. Personally I think of Gott having the capacity to be an excellent Corps commander but I just dont think, from the little I know of him, that he could have done it at the Army level. He may have been more imaginative and of a Blitzkrieger than Monty but that didn't really play to the British Armies strengths.

This is to take nothing away from Gott's impressive rise to prominence in the British Army but I have to agree with Brooke in the end and say that I dont think Gott could have offered anything different to Auckinlech and his predessors. He probably would have been far better suited to commanding the British Armour corps than Herbert Lumsden was, and he may have done a good job as a one of the Corps commanders in stead of Horrocks or Lesse but I still dont think it would qualify him for Army command.
 
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