Most decisive European battle of WWII??

Wasn't there an entire Arab unit, or am I just making that up?

 

I presume that the Muslims came from the Balkans?

 

I just answered this in the other thread. This thread was going in another direction away from the battle talk haha.

 

Funny how it helps for the objective information you can assemble if you don't live in the country you are talking about. In school we were taught that about 25,000 Dutch volunteered for German service in the SS. The numbers you are quite certain of seem a bit higher... So we have black pages in history too! Ah, finally we belong to the big guys.

 

All nations on the Earth have black pages in their histories, Roel, be they big or small. Belgium managed to exterminate at least five million native Africans in the Congo in the late 19th century, just as an example.

 

i would say battle of britain. Why BoB? Cause I believe is that if the germans managed to gain air suprioty, they would invade britain with air cover and destruction of the royal navy which is the only thing that stood in their way in invading britian. Since russia did not join the allied side only after germany invades russia, it would meant the end for allies also considering the fact that USA are still neutral.

As long the USA and soviets are not in the allied side, the allied( which is only france and britian at the start of the war) will be wiped out. However , there is still possobilities of another world war if the USA and Russia declared war on the axis powers .

 

Air superiority wasn't only thing germany lacked, they lacked landing crafts and ships too.

 

...Like I said all along. Also, invading Britain isn't just a thing of getting the airforce out of the way, and the Normandy invasion is the best example of this. The German air force played no role whatsoever in this operation, yet it took the Allies two months to break the stalemate. In the time after the withdrawal from Dunkirk the British army got an average of 200,000 volunteers each month. They would have made up quite an army by the time the Germans invaded, and nothing would be over very soon.

 

Except they lacked a fair bit of equipment.
The most common AT gun was the 2pdr, Defences were organised on a system of 'stop lines' utilising pillboxes (in theory anyway - most pillboxes were not even built until 1942!) tanks were in extremely short supply...
Even rifles, machineguns, etc were not over-plentiful.

It does not really compare to Normandy, where the German army was well equipped, and fighting in inherantly defensible terrain and using defensive positions built over the last 2-3 years. Guess what beach defences existed in Britain...

Having said that, the RN would have been capable of stopping an invasion attempt. The Germans planned to use barges to take troops across - even the wash from a destroyer at high speed would capsize these. So, if the RN gets into the invasion fleet, it is scuppered. could the combined Luftwaffe & Kriegsmarine destroy the RN? Unlikely, especially as the RAF would put up a huge effort (even if it lost the BoB, it would only have evacuated the SE corner of the UK, so could still cover the Channel), bombers & fighters.

 

In is 1940 the Germans really weren't in a position to launch a successful invasion of Britain even if they won air superiority over the English south east. However in many respects making preparations to invade would still be useful. What the Germans really need is for Britain to come to terms, almost any terms. The whole threat of invasion is a useful phyological club to beat the British with but really not much more than that.

Take Britain out of the picture in 1940 and America will never become involved in the west even if it wants to. There will not desert war probably a reduced Balkians war and on the whole the situation for Russian looks a hell of a lot grimmer

Bottom line BoB is one of the most influencial battles of the war since by failling to land a knock out blow Germany opens the door for the enemy to gather strength around it.

 

Yes the inital storming the beaches is basically the easy bit and in 1940 I think it was probably within the Germans capabilities. After that you have to bring in food, fuel and ammo. None of this is optional and if any of it runs out your up the creek.

The German surface fleet isn't a factor. They have nothing bigger than a heavy cruiser serviceable at that stage and the RN has more battleships than they have destroyers. Even a defeated fighter command is going to put up whatever it has left to screen the Home Fleet as it moves to block the chanel. The main danger would be U Boats but its hard to them them being able to defeat the Home Fleet on their own.

 

So basically if the Germans can somehow secure the Channel, they can win.
But that involves destroying the RN (well, the Home Fleet, at least) and the RAF...

 

One think to bear in mind is the U boats, with them I packs in the channel we would not stand a chance.

The dive bombers would keep the British troops from the landing Germans and the u boats would keep the RN out. I magine fifty u boats in the Channel, my money would be on the Germans.

One the port of dover is taken then they can bring in what they like.

Most of their fighters wold have been saved from the BoB. Sorry to disagree but that is how I see it.

 

Basically yes. I've come across sites where ornate plans show Germany succeeding without a bother are laid out but they all rely on everything going the Germans way. In practice you can rarely rely on the enemy reading the script.

The best hope of victory for Germany would be Britain losing the BoB and the RAF being forced to concede the airspace over the english south east. There is a good chance this could force a vote of no confidence in Churchill's government resulting in a change of adminstration to perhaps Lord Halifax who might open negocations with Germany.

 

The best hope of victory but by far not the only one.

 

I don't doubt that the Germans could get a shore since any invader will generally have local superiority for the landing and yes army support is the role the Luftwaffe was very good at.


Let bare in might the big issue if you land troops you have to be able to control 24/7 a corridor of water atlast 20 miles wide until the campaign. If it is interupted for even a short time you've lost.


At sea however I think the Germans are going to have major problems. As I've said they have no big suface units at this stage.

On the subject of the U Boats I think their torpedos are still a bit on the buggy side at this stage. To the best of my knowledge the english chanel is relatively shallow making it less than perfect for sub operations. So subs might spend a lot of time trying not to be depth charged out of exstance rather than sinking ships.

I have no doubt that the German are going to hurt the RN but I don't believe they will hurt them enough.

Now Luftwaffe. I'm ruling out the level flight bombers because frankly I don't think they will be able to land a decent number of hits against moving and manuvering targets. I my opinion the only planes that will count are the JU87 and JU88 both of which can divebomb. However whatever strength fighter command has will be concentrating on protecting the fleet and of course bombers trying to sink ships are bombers not supporting the army.

As far as I can see in 1940 the odds just didn't look good for a successful invasion.

 

They wouldn't need a big surface fleet, the dive bombers bombing the RN making them dodge them and the subs killing. the German paras landing in Dover first, would secure a beachhead. Thinking also the RN had a big job in convoy guarding, depleating more precious resources. If the BOB had been lost by the British then the RAF would not be a strong as it was and the luftwaffe would have been stronger.

Now I am not saying it would be easy but the Germans would have taken Britain or peace sued for at best. The British of the day had planned for the invasion and with the resources they had they assumed they would lose, the military historians assume they would have lost, everything points to a German victory.

 

With enough air superiority I think it would have been possible despite the Royal Navy. Air superiority would have provided the mobile artillery needed to secure the beaches and move on a major port, and then (along with the U-boats), beat back the RN. I guess the RN could have embarked on near Kamikaze missions and gotten through (not an impossible thought when you're defending your homes). A lot of "what ifs", but it could have made for a heck of a battle!

 

Well I'll tell ya, the Isle Of Wight would NEVER have caved in!

We would have made Stalingrad seem like a vicar's cake party! :bang:

 

Remember, RN had quite alot submarines too. They would have been valuable in countering that invasion.
Also, how many aircrafts Luftwaffe had operational per day during BoB? How many of them were bombers? How many of them can carry a torpedo? Did germans had armor piercing bombs in their inventory? How many bombers does it take to sunk a battleship? Did Brits mine their coast and made obstacles against landings like Germans had in Normandy? How long does it take to get those RN big boys from Scapa or where ever they were? How many cruisers and destroyers did Home Fleet have available during BoB? And smaller fighting units, torpedo boats, gun boats etc?
And so on.