Winston Churchill, Minister for Co-ordination of Defense

Japhy

Banned
How would the lead up to the Second World War be effected if Stanley Baldwin had decided to appoint Churchill as not-quite Defense Minister in 1936 with the creation of the Co-ordination of Defense Post, as many (not just Churchill in his memoirs) thought he would have? Could Churchill have dramatically changed any portion of the British footing going into the fall of 1939?
 
Interesting idea, the question is, how much can Churchill do in this post without running afoul of the appeasement lobby (of which Baldwin himself was a member)?

I think an obvious problem would the conflict between the RAF and the Fleet Air Arm, and problems with engines for cruiser tanks.

A lot of procurement policies weren't finalised until 1938, most notably the Enfield .303 Mark IV and the Bren Gun. The Semiautomatic Pedersen .276 was being considered as an alternative for the former, while the Vickers-Berthier was still being produced as a Light Machine Gun. IOTL this led to a drum fed derivative, the Vickers K, would a belt fed version of this gun be feasible or even desirable? From what I've read the Vickers K was lighter than the Browning .30 cal but too heavy to be a true GPMG. There is also the question of SMGs, Evo Owen's design was initially turned down by the Australian government in 1938 with the British obviously more serious about rearmament, might he try his luck in the mother country?
 
Perhaps KGV class would have been completed with 9 15-inch guns? IIRC Churchill favored those and lamented that 14 inch variant was chosen instead of 15 inch. Could he have influenced this decision as Minister of Co-ordination of Defense?

OTOH he might have pushed through his Cultivator no.6 scheme... That one would have been a net loss for the Allies.
 
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