Why Were The Allies So Successful

[Bruno]

Neither we nor the British could, because of all that water between Us and Them. In the end I guess you try to diversify your efforts enough that you can deal with the most likely scenarios, one of which was that the Russians wouldn't be in the war (either because they were still allied with the Nazis or because they were defeated or made a separate peace). We needed the option, we planned for it, and it helped.

The English Channel isn't a lot of water... besides British pre-war policy was always to ally with France if war in Europe broke out. No one envisioned the fall of France and as such the British couldn't foresee the need for long range bombers as an 'only resort'. The Brits always viewed strategic bombing as means to an end.

America didn't have a viable design for a cross ocean bomber until late, they certainly didn't have any foresight into how the opening phases of the the war in Europe went. War planners there believed as the British did, that strategic bombing was a means to an end.

Soviet war planning and production was completely upset by the German invasion and had to be completely re-constructed while at the same time fighting with the tools at hand. It was evident to the Soviets that the immediate threat was those German forces at the front or re-enforcing the front and they didn't have the time to develop a strategy utilizing long range bombers. They did not pre-plan a tactical air force... They would strap bombs and rockets on anything that could fly.

All true, but also all hindsight. As it was it took the English nearly four years to get their strategic bombing to pay dividends, and it took us two, building on their experience. And these production decisions couldn't have been made overnight.

British experience lead them to believe daylight bombing of German would be costly and futile.

Speaking of hindsight! Right after the fact there was no doubt in the Germans' minds that the strategic bombing campaign had been decisive. I don't think I've seen a single post-war interview with any of their generals that didn't make that point.

You find that a lot of what those 'generals' said vary with who it is they are talking to. Not to mention many times the quotes are taken out of context. Even Speer tripped all over himself with contradicting claims about the effect of allied bombing. I can post quotes but I don't have time as I need to head out for dinner...

The USAF Strategic Bombing Survey made the same point.

Well the THE UNITED STATES STRATEGIC BOMBING SURVEY (Summary Report)

Allied air power was decisive in the war in Western Europe. Hindsight inevitably suggests

Page 16

that it might have been employed differently or better in some respects. Nevertheless, it was decisive. In the air, its victory was complete. At sea, its contribution, combined with naval power, brought an end to the enemy's greatest naval threat -- the U-boat; on land, it helped turn the tide overwhelmingly in favor of Allied ground forces. Its power and superiority made possible the success of the invasion. It brought the economy which sustained the enemy's armed forces to virtual collapse, although the full effects of this collapse had not reached the enemy's front lines when they were overrun by Allied forces. It brought home to the German people the full impact of modern war with all its horror and suffering. Its imprint on the German nation will be lasting.

I gotta run I will post a better reply later...

[Kev367th]

Originally posted by Bruno
The English Channel isn't a lot of water... besides British pre-war policy was always to ally with France if war in Europe broke out. No one envisioned the fall of France and as such the British couldn't foresee the need for long range bombers as an 'only resort'. The Brits always viewed strategic bombing as means to an end.

Come on...

No-one could have forseen the fall of France? Your joking. I hope.

French roll over faster than a 2 dollar hooker.

NATO startegy during the cold war was to consider it a foregone conclusion France would fall, yet again.

As the old joke goes -

Why does Paris have tree lined streets?

So the Germans can march in the shade .

[HoHun]

Hi Oldman,

>Right after the fact there was no doubt in the Germans' minds that the strategic bombing campaign had been decisive.  I don't think I've seen a single post-war interview with any of their generals that didn't make that point.  

Absolutely. And it weren't just generals - Speer shared that view, as did Milch. According to Speer, the Dambusters' Raid had very serious consequences due to the resultant loss of electrical power, and the Schweinfurt raids came very close to stopping the supply of the industry with ball bearings of certain important sizes. After the Schweinfurt raids, the  Germans soon recognized their petrol industry was critical to their war effort and highly vulnerable - and the USAAF attacks that followed had a heavy impact.

It would be interesting to see an analysis of the resources and the efforts that went into defense against the Allied bombing campaign, and the damage caused by the Allied bombers.

There is a tendency in the US literature to deny the effectiveness of their bombing strategy, though it really had a major impact on WW2 Germany. This does not seem to be in line with the historical dimensions of the USAAF and - to a lesser degree - RAF successes against the German industry.

Had strategic bombing been better understood in WW2, the historical results could even have been surpassed, but there probably was no other way to understanding than to make mistakes and then to learn from them ...

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

[Kev367th]

Yeah IMO it played an important part in bringing the war to and end, but not by itself.

What would have happened if the war in Europe had dragged on?

Less resources for the Far east.
In fact makes you wonder - If the war against Germany was still going on would they have used one of the nukes against Berlin?

[Angus]

Ponder on this:
What would have become of the eastern front war if the British had decided to negotiate for peace in the summer of 1940?
(Hitler's appeal to reason)

I'd put my money on the Germans. Reasons:
1: Much more infantry (Less tied up all over the place)
2: Much more airpower (Same as above, and no late 1940 losses)
3: Much more resources (No embargo. Remember that the Germans could "legally" shop in the US!
4: Only one front (No other enemy to guard, no upcoming desert war)
5: Naval power (Would have helped in the black sea)
6: Time. The invasion would most likely have started earlier.

[hogenbor]

Originally posted by Kev367th
Come on...

No-one could have forseen the fall of France? Your joking. I hope.

French roll over faster than a 2 dollar hooker.

NATO startegy during the cold war was to consider it a foregone conclusion France would fall, yet again.

As the old joke goes -

Why does Paris have tree lined streets?

So the Germans can march in the shade .

Hope this is tongue in cheek  No I'm not French. Anyway, France had a considerable army, reasonably modern aircraft, tanks etc. So how did the Germans defeat France so easily? The only quick answer I can come up with is Blitzkrieg and going thorugh the Ardennes. But what about the quality of the French forces and their morale? Was their political infighting? Old fashioned military thinking? The French may have been beaten quickly but the British forces had to be rescued at Dunkirk if I'm not mistaken. If it weren't for the English Channel Hitler would have swept away the British as well as the French.

Anyone have a good insight in that? And those stale jokes about the French are really getting old btw.

[Oldman731]

Originally posted by Angus
I'd put my money on the Germans.

Well.  The thing is, in real life the Germans did way better than they had any reasonable expectation of doing.  The Soviets generally played straight man to the German routine, walking into just about every trap that was set for them.  It seems to me that any "what if" discussion ought to include the possibility that the Russians would actually do something brighter than what they did, rather than just continuing to play punching bag to Hitler.

Under those circumstances, with England out of the war or in it, what would have happened if Stalin had heeded his intelligence and pulled his armies back from the frontier?  What if he had begun relocating his industry in 1939?  Suppose he had eliminated the commissar system, encouraged initiative in his officers, and/or retired the old civil war cavalry generals and replaced them with tank men, like Hitler did?  Or pointed out that they had a lot of space to use, and let them use it, like Alexander I did in 1812 and as Stalin actually did in the summer of 1942?

When you allow the possibility for both sides to improve on their historical actions, there are two huge truths to the Eastern Front:  It was a really big place, as Europe goes; and the Soviets had a lot of resources.

- oldman

[Oldman731]

Originally posted by hogenbor
Anyone have a good insight in that?

If you have a chance, nab a copy of Shirer's "Collapse of the Third Republic," and a copy of Alistair Horne's "To Lose a Battle:  France 1940."  The former is more comprehensive than the latter, but both are good.  It's a pretty complicated topic.

- oldman

[Kev367th]

Originally posted by hogenbor
Hope this is tongue in cheek  No I'm not French. Anyway, France had a considerable army, reasonably modern aircraft, tanks etc. So how did the Germans defeat France so easily? The only quick answer I can come up with is Blitzkrieg and going thorugh the Ardennes. But what about the quality of the French forces and their morale? Was their political infighting? Old fashioned military thinking? The French may have been beaten quickly but the British forces had to be rescued at Dunkirk if I'm not mistaken. If it weren't for the English Channel Hitler would have swept away the British as well as the French.

Anyone have a good insight in that? And those stale jokes about the French are really getting old btw.

Yes it was tongue in cheek.

As for "swept away" - could of, would of, should of --- DIDN'T, COULDN'T.
In the words of the British attache in the movie B of B  - "The last little corporal who tried it came a cropper"

[Hap]

Originally posted by Kev367th
As the old joke goes -

I guess it depends on which "old joke," kev.  Nations seem to "have their 15 mins of fame" within the roll of the centuries.

Would your assessment of France hold up in the 19th century?  Would Cornwallis have anything to say on the matter in the 18th century?

France's 1.3 million lost in ww2 might ask for a more judicious assessment.  No?

And I for one, am stymied at their collapse.  "Underprepared/not-prepared probably goes a long way.  Though explaning it by the general notion that they can't fight their way out of a paper bag runs into the 1700's and 1800's.  1800's most conspicuously.  Untill Wellington, of course.

That was then, and this is now.  And our "now" is changing.

hap

p.s.  ah crud the man cannot read.  "Tongue in cheek."  Yes.

[indy007]

The French aren't the rollovers people think. Read about the Old Guard's last stand at Waterloo, Paris Taxi's in ww1, pockets in the maginot line, the underground resistance in ww2, or Diem Ben Phu. Their fatal mistake was just upgrading their equipment, and not their tactics. No country is immune to that. They simply didn't have the space (assuming space = time) to recover like the Soviets did in the East, the English in North Africa, or the US in the Pacific. Bad strategy does not equal cowardice, just defeat.

[Angus]

Errrr....Oldman:
"When you allow the possibility for both sides to improve on their historical actions, there are two huge truths to the Eastern Front: It was a really big place, as Europe goes; and the Soviets had a lot of resources"

I was referring to the difference it would have made to the warif the British had decided to stop fighting after Dunkirk.
At that time, they were basically on enemy terms with the USSR BTW.

So, what-if, given the same setup to both Germany and USSR, the UK being out.

[Oldman731]

Originally posted by Angus
Errrr....Oldman:
"When you allow the possibility for both sides to improve on their historical actions, there are two huge truths to the Eastern Front: It was a really big place, as Europe goes; and the Soviets had a lot of resources"

I was referring to the difference it would have made to the warif the British had decided to stop fighting after Dunkirk.
At that time, they were basically on enemy terms with the USSR BTW.

So, what-if, given the same setup to both Germany and USSR, the UK being out.

You mean, an all-other-things-stay-the-same notion?  My guess is, probably the same result.  Germans left very little in Western Europe to guard against the English in 1941, and they'd still have had to garrison all of the occupied countries.  In 1941 Rommel had, what, two German divisions?  Pocket change on the Eastern Front.  Same with the Luftwaffe forces left in the West, and lack of air power isn't usually considered to have been one of the reasons the Germans fell short in 1941 (inasmuch as there was really no Russian air force to oppose them after Day 3).  Russians lost their Baltic Fleet trying to run from Riga as it was, and naval ops in either the Baltic or the Black Sea were never more than a small footnote to the Russian campaign.  I don't think the Germans wanted to buy anything in the US in 1940 or 41.  Most of the writers in the past 25 years or so seem to agree that starting Barbarossa in May wouldn't have made much difference, mainly because the spring thaws weren't over yet in Leeb's area.

What might have changed with Britain out of it would be Stalin's perception of the threat.  Wouldn't have been any further question of who the Germans were after.  That might have been enough to make him stop deluding himself, so that he'd have pulled his troops 50 miles back from the border and alerted his air force that the attack was imminent.

Just a guess, but these things can be fun.

- oldman

[Angus]

Fun is the right word. Sort of, for speculators like us...now.
Some points :

The Kriegsmarine could have proved very effective on the southern side of the Ukraine, as much as unhampered transport. Sevastopol was quite a fight right?
Unlimited transport and trade always makes a bit.

The troops tied up guarding the occupied countries could yet have been haired down quite a bit. A few divisions at least. (The resistance does not have an ally without the UK)
Anyway, just two divisions (with all the fuss it takes to sent them to Africa) would have meant more than pocket change in the outskirts of Moscow.

The Time, yes. Well, although the Germans couldn't have moved before the spring thaws, - they were still a month or more behind the optimal moment.
A month only would have made quite a bit.

The airpower. Ok, the Germans lost 1200+ aircraft just in the BoB. 4 months. Experienced crew. And then again they had to keep an airforce from Norway, through Denmark, France and down south.

The Italians. Imagine that the Eyeties had aided much more on Barbarossa with Aircraft and naval power instead of  jostling with the Brits.

And...the sense of realism. If the Brits had withdrawn, would Stalin have come more to his senses? Tough one

[E25280]

see rule #5