BEF captured at Dunkirk...

Hitler does not stop Guderian outside of Dunkirk, and he moves forward to capture the city, along with almost the entire BEF.

Hitler, who had always considered Great Britain an Aryan country, offers generous peace terms. In return for a cessation of hostilities by Britain against Germany, France regains it's freedom providing it repays the reparations sent by Germany to them during the interwar years, and gets back Alsace and Lorraine. He guaratees the freedom of the Low Countries and Norway as well, and no further offensives against British interests in the West.

Since with the capture of the BEF, England has no army to speak of at the time, Parliment forces Churchill to accept the terms.

How does this alter the course of history?

Hitler is free to concentrate on the Soviet Union...but this time...

he no longer has to keep almost 400,000 troops in Norway.

He does not lose over 1000 aircraft and crews in the Battle of Britain

He does not need to send to Afrika Corps, and considerable air assets, to help Mussolini in North Africa.

He does not need to invade and occupy the Balkans to secure it against the British, thereby moving up the timetable for Barbarossa by about 2 weeks.

He does not need to garrison France with a several dozen divisions.

He does not have to build over 1000 u-boats to combat the allies in the Atlantic. These resources can be given over the panzer production.

He does not have to produce v-weapons, the atlantic wall, and huge numbers of fighters and anti-aircraft guns for the defense against air raids.

His industry can concentrate on aircraft, panzers, and other ground weapons, producing much greater numbers of both. Germany is already producing over twice as much steel as Russia, but now it can be concentrated along a much smaller variety of weapons.

Hitler would have at least twice the luftwaffe assets available for Russia, and at least 35 more divisions initially....with many more to follow in the future.

The Soviet Union receives virtually no lend-lease.

How does this alter the war in the East? Does Hitler win it? Under this set of circumstances I cannot see any plausible way (except Hitler's stupidity) that he either does win it, or it ends in a bloody stalemate well outside of German borders.

 

My question is this: would treating the BEF prisoners as hostages to be used as bargaining chips in negotiations with UK stiffen British resolve or not?
Our present mindset and outlook is different from those people in 1930-1940s era.
I tend to doubt that the Soviet Union would be a pushover even if the most of the parameters of this what if is fulfilled.
The German military is not as mechanized or motorized as portrayed in most forms of media today. The bulk of their forces are horse-drawn. In the vast spaces of the USSR where speed is a vital factor, the slow-moving infantry would be left behind by the armored spearheads.
One more point I would raise is the US Neutrality Act. It doesn't follow that if the UK and Germany sets peace terms then all economic trade would be immediately be restored between the US and any remaining belligerents. So where would Germany be getting the raw materials needed to ramp up their production? I grant it might be relatively easier for Germany to get the needed materials than it was historically but I doubt it could do so. Germany wouldn't have the hard currency needed for such transactions because its coffers were badly drained by the Versailles Treaty. And it would take time for France to "repay" Germany the payments Germany made under the parameters of this what-if.

Another question I would raise in this scenario would be the situation in Japan.
Going by the parameters of this what-if, it would seem to me that Japan would bear the brunt of the Western Allies weight. This would then lead me to believe that with Japan preoccuppied south, they wouldn't bother to look north. This would then free more of the USSR's Siberian units to move to meet the German thrusts earlier, if not faster.
For me this would be a slugging match of titanic proportions. The closest thing I can think of to describe this kind of war would be the Iran-Iraq War. Nobody really won that fight. It was meat grinder for several years. It would be the same for Germany and the USSR.

 

I think Falcon Jun's comments have a great deal of validity. Germany's finances were a shambles in 1939-40, and the only way it was able to keep the war going was by looting it's conquered territories. France certainly wouldn't be able to repay any significant reparations immediately, and in any case, Germany hadn't payed that much in reparations to France. The French actually occupied the Ruhr in January, 1923, because Germany wasn't paying the reparations demanded by France.

Besides that, Germany had defaulted on huge loans from the US that had ostensibly been made so Germany could pay reparations to Britain and France. If Germany suddenly demands a repayment of those reparations, the US is going to demand that Germany make good it's default on those loans. Roosevelt was not going to take no for an answer in that regard and had the ability to cripple German foreign trade, if denied.

Another problem for Germany in 1939-40, is that nobody trusts Hitler; he has already broken way too many solemn treaties and promises, so nobody will take his word on "guarantees" of freedom for Norway, the Low Countries, or France. In addition, there is Poland and Czechoslovakia, they are still under Hitler's yoke and I doubt even Britain would be so perfidious as to abandon them. In order to make peace with the West, Hitler has to reverse all of his aggressions.

Finally, the BEF is not the only force that can defend Britain. If I'm not mistaken, there was already at that time, a fully equipped Canadian Division in Britain and more on the way. Britain is certainly NOT defenseless; it still controls the Channel with a navy which is far beyond the ability of Germany to challenge, and It has an Air Force on par with Germany's.

The destruction of the BEF and Hitler's "generous" terms simply would not be enough to convince the British government that it should submit to Germany. The likely result of such an event would be increased US aid, coupled with an emergency sea-lift of Commonwealth manpower. That would take a couple of months, but with the RAF and RN stalemating Germany in the air and at sea, Britain has the time. The US would definitely pressure Britain to stay in the war and might even make a deal (secret, or otherwise) to enter the European war early to insure that.

The capture or destruction of the BEF definitely would be a set back to the Western Allies, but not a decisive one. Britain still has defenses and would almost certainly opt to stay in the war since Hitler would not be willing to grant the terms demanded, and, in any case, no one would trust him to live by those terms. Britain, and later, the Soviet Union, would still get lend-lease aid, and the US would absolutely remain openly hostile to the Nazi regime, and might even accelerate it's entry into the war.

 

There are actually several PODs here.
1) The Germans don't stop
2) That they take the city (while a significant number of British are still there)
3) That "almost the entire BEF" is captured

It's not at all clear that 2 and 3 follow from 1.

These terms might acutally have worked post Dunkirk historically.

This is incorrect. Britain had a substantial army besides what was at Dunkirk.

Make that no LL. Cash and carry perhaps. Germany could well get the same and access to more external resourcers.

Germany is certainly in a stronger position but the logistics problems actually experianced are still in place. Most likely is some sort of bloody stalemate IMO.

 

'Almost the entire Bef' was not present at Dunkirk :'only' 195000 men of a total of some 400000
Al the rest is unprooved,speculation :Hitler did NOT stop Guderian (old myths will never die )
Last point :a German landing was IMPOSSIBLE (the troops at Dunkirk taken prisonnor or not )

 

Lets so for complete arguments the BEF is very decisively captured at Dunkirk. This alone does not guarantee a victory for the Germans over the British, many more troops from other ports also escaped for example. Collins; Atlas of WW2, John Keegan state's that

300000 troops from Dunkirk, 110000 French.
30,000 from Cherbourg
32,000 from Brest
190,000 French and Poles from the Bayonne area.
as well as smaller evacuations from St Malo 21,000 troops, Le, Havre, St-Valery-en-Caus and Marseille.

So even had the BEF been captured all these other troops would have rallied in Britain, being the last refuge for any Allied soldiers other then French Morocco. So the British were far from defenseless.

 

When the Dunkirk evacuation started and the British were only expecting to save around 50,000 of their troops, Churchill had already won the discussion within the war cabinet about whether to seek peace terms or fight on.

 

Even with extra forces, Germany was not in a possition to wage a long war in Russia either. Most of the German army was still being moved by horses. He could not move fast enough to secure the territories needed before the terrible winter set in.

 

Well said, even without the BEF at Dunkirk the British were far from defenseless. They had the Canadians who hadn't yet been deployed, the Home Guard was being replenished with arms shippments from the US arsenals, and they still had a number of tanks on the home shores as well.

And of course this ignores the half-million French troops who were still in France after Dunkirk, and the French reserves who had been called up but not deployed before the French armistice was signed.

 

From the game board... In one case the German player achived such a situation against me. The subsequent battle wore down both the German armored corps, and the infantry following up. By the time the Allied groups trapped along the coast were mopped up two extra weeks were wasted, the French army to the south had two more weeks to entrench and and reorganize. This the surviving Allied forces, including over 100,000 British, in central France are noticeablly stronger and the German armored corps noticeablly weaker. This did not save France from ultimate defeat, but the German took considerablly more casualties, and did not finish off the French until August.

The late completion of the South France campaign had the following reprecussions. The subsequent air attack on England came later and was slightly weaker. Britain had more weeks to prepare its defenses, and most important the French government became more sympathetic to Reynauds proposal to not surrender and move the government to Africa.

 

Well there are still many possible factors that would help the Soviets in this case:
1. If the Siberian army was transferred West to combat the German threat early that would give the Soviets an extra 46 divisions.
2. If Hitler's ridiculous strategic decisions ensued and he relieved some of his prime strategists then the Soviets would get a slight advantage tactically.
3. If the Soviets did not have border disputes with the Japanese they would have an extra 80,000 soldiers, approx 300 armored vehicles, approx 800 artillery pieces to combat the Germans.

All of this would would have a positive boost for the Soviets but who knows if it would be enough.

 

Ok, but what does that have to do with dunkirk in 1940?

 

I was following someone elses hypothetical situation.....(Dagnie) scroll up....Red Coat quoted him.

 

Very well, however perhaps next time use the appropriate quotation so we know who everyone is talking to.

 

yeah i realized that after i posted it. lol

 

One option underestimated by Hitler regardless if Britain refused to come to terms would be to reinforce the inept Italians before moving into Egypt.
Most of Hitler's military general staff all knew well that the Italians were poorly equipped and under-trained in the art of warfare to make any use of for them. But, Hitler never the less put his trust the Italians which we all know how that turned out to be when he started complaining about them in 1945 lol.

 

It was hardly a matter of him putting his trust in the Italians. The Med was an Italian show until they got in trouble and asked Germany to help bail them out. Hitler had little say in the initial moves in North Africa.

 

Assuming that here was some kind of armictice/agreement with the UK, the British Empire has VAST resources available, the agreement would certainly entail the Axis leaving the British Empire intact in exchange for being able to purchase resources.
The UK & Allies had huge oil production in the Dutch east Indies, Borneo, Persia & the Caribbean.
The UK & Commonwealth were the world's largest aircraft producers in 1941 (Germany - 12,400, USSR 15,700, USA 19,400, UK 22,000+)

No, there would be nothing of the sort. Without the Anglo-Dutch embargo on oil, Japan does not attack them in 1941. Without Anglo-Dutch shipping the USA has basically zero capability of a major offensive against Japan before 1943, so the Soviets would be forced to leave the bulk of the veteran Siberian Army in the East.

 

Eh, sort of. The troops rescued from Dunkirk were sans equipment, in the fall of 1940 the UK had lots of troops but were very short of artillery, antitank, AA etc - everything that they had left behind in France.
However, the critical factor was that the Germans didn't know what the situation of the British army was, while on the other hand the UK had an almost complete copy of the German order-of -battle, after Monty's division had captured it in France. (Oops! )

Not impossible, but difficult in the extreme, mainly due to the German loss of about 2/3 of it's DD & DE forces in Norway. This meant that they didn't have enough ASW capability to protect invasion shipping from being torpedoed by British subs as they cross the channel.

Wrong. The Germans were able to advance in 2.5 months to isolate St. Petersburg (by 8 Sept) and destroyed the Soviet forces at the battle of Smolensk by ~10 Sept, which is 500 miles from the starting point and only ~250 miles from Moscow. They then stopped for about a month to consolidate.

If they had started 2 months earlier, had 30+ divisions extra, and were not short of supplies (using Commonwealth resource as part of armistice), they could be attacking Moscow in August instead of late October - big difference.

Uh, actually they would likely NOT have these siberian forces - ie no Winter counter-attack

 

Before the beginning of the battle of Britain, many of Hitler's OKH managers and generals were well aware of the Italians intentions and how easy the war can be won by taking the Suez canal and liberating the middle east(where islamic collaborators were already present: Syria, Iraq and Iran). At the advice of some members of his general staff, Hitler became involved in securing the Mediterranean from British with a plan to strike gib at the inconsiderate expense of bringing Spain into the war. He knew all along about the Suez canal and mistakenly put confidence on the Italians reassuring that their units outnumbered the British 3 to 1.