I'll throw in my 2 cents here.

Agreed that a successful invasion in 40 was impossible (read extremely unlikely). Maybe, though, Hitler did have it correct in his strategy, that Britain could be bombed into surrendering. I find that most of you are only discussing the military aspects of the entire BoBritain, and not the political. The question is, how long would Britain want to stand alone again Germany? The Nazi leadership made it quite clear repeatedly that they did not wish to conquer Britain, either because they couldn't or didn't want to.

What if, what if, what if, Germany decides in May 41 NOT to invade Russia, but to continue the Blitz against British cities (nightbombing only), vigorously pursue the Middle East campaign, capture Malta, and invest their naval resources into their U-Boat fleet as opposed to surface fleet? I actually see a war-weary and fed-up citizenry after, let's say, 3 years of weak or no successes, wanting to simply negotiate an end to the war. Maybe a new gov't in a different timeline would have preferred peace instead. By late 1942, with no Barba, Germany, with Italy, could have accomplished these limited objectives. I do agree there is a possibility of Russia invading Germany in 42, but I don't know if a communist Europe would be more or less desirable than a Nazi-economically dominated one. Would UK have 'helped' Russia communize continental europe by actively aiding them? Maybe, just maybe, they would have opted to make peace with Hitler, and let the 2 land titans fight it out.

Germany could have beaten the UK, just not by direct invasion. Raeder knew this, as well as possibily Hitler. Raeder, however, thought that a Med strategy would be the best plan for beating Britain, while Hitler thought that a Barba victory would do the same.


Also, to respond to these 'Germany didn't have the naval tradition, it would take 3-4 decades to build up'. That's so ridiculous. 3-4 decades? maybe 3-5 years ok, but not 3 decades. IMO the Germans did a good job using the limited naval resources/technique they started the war with, and they could have improved upon that with more experience. Invading Norway gave them experience, so did Crete, so would a theoretical Malta, etc. I do agree however, that it would take, of course, 3-5 years to build said landing craft for a MAJOR amphibious invasion (ie UK). But again, this would have been still risky and there were better alternatives to bringing Britain to the negotiating table.

Cheers from Canada.