German captured the entire French fleet by the end of 1940.

This could happen had German been more flexible on the armistice table. An offer of 'damage reparation'(with Reich mark of course) and release of POW..etc, Vichy would likely consider letting German/Italian help 'protecting' its fleet from falling into UK hands, and a subsequent capture becomes possible.
The French navy tonnage ranked 4th in the world, combined with kriegmarine and Regina Marina, and likely Graf Zepplins joining later, Axis navy would seriously challenge the royal navy; securing safer passage to Africa; much more deadly commerce raid by both surface and uboat fleet; isolation of Britain and perhaps even a successful operation Sealion...

any thoughts?

Unfortunately I think we have discussed this subject earlier.

Don´t be discouraged by this lebovski and if you can find things to discuss after reading the other thread you can come back with those.

Use the search system if not sure whether something has or has not been discussed.

A fully intact French navy for the Germans

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The problem with that is the Italian ships have short legs. Many of the smaller ones can't make it to the Atlantic coast of France without refueling. Even if you combine the Italian and French fleets the British at least in BB's still seriously out class them. There's also a good chance the British can intercept them on the way to the Atlantic French ports. Another factor is the Italian ships were to a large part not designed for Atlantic service.

Its worse than that. The Italian fleet was starved for fuel. The French fleet would be too in the hands of the Germans. Germany simply does not have access to sufficent fuel supplies to keep a large fleet of ships at sea. A single battleship can gulp down the equivalent in fuel to keep several squadrons of aircraft flying.
When the Italians are running tankers to North Africa half full or less as that is all the fuel available to support German / Italian operations there they have problems.
In addition, the French and Italian ships don't have radar and other up-to-date combat systems aboard.
The Graf Zeppelin as demonstrated elsewhere on this board was a true dog as an aircraft carrier. Its aircraft complement was limited in size, it used an unwieldy and likely unworkable trolly / catapult system to launch aircraft that was slow, prone to failures and accidents, and just really overly complex in design. Aside from that, a single carrier brings little to a fleet; particularly when the other fleet has several much better ones in service.

You have a choice with crude oil. It can be refined into a number of products including avgas and fuel for ships. It isn't quite one for one but the limitation is still there.
No not period. One reason for the losses was Ultra. Malta falling means they have to be a bit more circumspect but Axis losses will still be high. In any case this has little to do with the fuel problem the fleet would experiance.
So what use is a CV without AC? Oh you need to produce more AC for it and fuel for them as well.
I believe it was tested but not on the CV. However it if you check the other thread you will see a number of operational problems that exist because of it.
But CVs are fragile and it's going to have to run a gauntlet of RAF and RN planes and ships to even get close to the fighting. Then it's outnumbered by the RN CVs. It would be lucky to launch a single strike.

Scrapping isn't straight forward either. First you have to removed alot of various materials from the inside of the vessel: Insulation, wiring, machinery, flooring, etc. Once this is done you can begin to cut up the vessel. Now, you have to seperate bronze, brass, and copper from aluminum and from steel. Then the material must be shipped to a smelter and remade into new material. In the case of steel, it is actually just as cheap to mine new ore and smelt it as to use recycled material. Aluminum and copper could be economically done but these are a minor portion of the ships.

As already pointed out, even just the larger ships take alot of manpower and would require extensive refitting to make them ready for sea under German hands.

Then they could have produced the P 1000 Rattte, the 1,000 ton super tank !!!



Achtung Panzer! - P 1000/1500 / PzKpfw IX/X



The crummy subtitles are rather apropos, after all...

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Is that before or after Stalin gets his land battleships on the go?

I would add that if you added the new Richeleu(sp!) and Jean Bart (which was very almost completed and could be so if not sabotaged before it being captured and the Bearn (which was VERY obsolete but it has catapults and could be used as research) Germany already enhances its capability. But as you said it still lacks manpower, fuel and the rest to accommodate its newly acquired assets. Im sure the French Subs would help though.

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Time is only enemy you'll never get rid of.

that's a good target for the tallboys, am sure it would be just as easy to penetrate as a battleship deck not to mention no aa support. It is incapable of cross any bridge, and would damage any road it steps on...

i think the best German option for that fleet is to prevent it from falling into alllied hands, and maintain a friendly Vichy as long as possible.

I could see the Germans selectively scrapping French vessels for certain components and using them elsewhere. They did do this historically. For example, the Germans might strip off the guns and even many of the turrets to remount them ashore as coast defense batteries. The same could be done with the rangefinders and even the fire control computers etc.
Diesel generators might be stripped off for use elsewhere along with many specific engineering components. Some of the armor might be readily removed for use in shore defenses too.
But, wholesale scrapping? Probably not.

One of the major problems that German faced with Operation Sealion was a shortage of trained sailors to man the invasion barges. If they can't find enough men to man the barges, where are they going to find the men to man the French vessels ??????

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if in doubt....Panic!!!!