It's July 1, 1940 . . .

[Horatio Parker]

Churchill's bold readiness to run such double risks, in the endeavor to gain success in Africa and preserve the British position in Egypt, was in striking contrast to the attitude of Hitler and Halder, who were agreed in trying to curtail the German commitment in the Mediterranean there. In October, when Gen. von Thoma had been sent on an exploratory visit to Cyrenaica, he had reported that a force of four panzer divisions would be needed, and should suffice, to ensure success in the invasion of Egypt...

Liddell-Hart History of the Second World War

In a June 30, 1940 memorandum, Jodl wrote that if the strike across the Channel did not come off, the Mediterranean offered the best arena to defeat Britain…

No one realized this truth better than Winston Churchill. In a message to President Roosevelt a few months later, he asserted that if Egypt and the Middle East were lost, continuation for the war "would be a hard, long, and bleak proposition," even if the US entered.

How Hitler Could Have Won World War II: The Fatal Errors That Led to Nazi Defeat
By Bevin Alexander

Moreover, by early June,
the military situation seemed much better. To everyone’s relief and amazement,
335,000 Allied troops had been evacuated from Dunkirk, and it also became
clear that Hitler intended to finish off the French before he turned his attention
to Britain. With the immediate crisis averted, a consensus now formed in the
Cabinet around the Churchillian position that no question of peace terms could
be raised until the Battle of Britain had been won. However, the hope was still
that, by continuing the struggle, Britain would eventually secure not total victory
but acceptable terms. Halifax and Butler were particularly emphatic on this
point, fearing that Churchill would be carried away by emotion and bravado into
prolonging the war unnecessarily.

Where did Churchill stand on this issue? On 13 May he had told the
Commons that his policy was ‘Victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror,
however long and hard the road may be, for without victory there is no survival.’
Privately on 18 May and 1 June he spoke of his conviction that Britain would
beat Germany and he rejected the idea of preparing contingency plans to
evacuate the royal family and government abroad.
But in Cabinet during the
Dunkirk crisis he was much less adamant that total victory was the only
acceptable result. When asked by Halifax on 26 May ‘whether, if he was satisfied
that matters vital to the independence of this country were unaffected, he would
be prepared to discuss terms’, Churchill replied ‘that he would be thankful to get
out of our present difficulties on such terms, provided we retained the essentials
and the elements of our vital strength, even at the cost of some territory’.
In
Chamberlain’s more colourful account of the exchange, Churchill is recorded as
saying that ‘if we could get out of this jam by giving up Malta and Gibraltar and
some African colonies he would jump at it’, although he did not see any such
prospect.
The following day he took a similar line. According to the War
Cabinet minutes he commented that ‘if Herr Hitler was prepared to make peace
on the terms of the restoration of German colonies and the overlordship of
Central Europe, that was one thing’, but he felt that such an offer was ‘most
unlikely’.
Summing up his position on 28 May, Churchill stressed that in the
present crisis they could not get acceptable terms from Italy and Germany:
Signor Mussolini, if he came in as mediator, would take his whack out of us. It was
impossible to imagine that Herr Hitler would be so foolish as to let us continue our
rearmament. In effect, his terms would put us completely at his mercy. We should get no
worse terms if we went on fighting, even if we were beaten, than were open to us now. If,
however, we continued the war and Germany attacked us, no doubt we should suffer
some damage, but they would also suffer severe losses. Their oil supplies might be
reduced. A time might come when we felt that we had to put an end to the struggle, but
the terms would not then be more mortal than those offered to us now.

FROM WORLD WAR TO COLD WAR

David Reynolds

 

[SLD]

How about just keep the focus on the British RAF fields? Wearing them down and actually invading instead of shifting the focus to bombing London? Perhaps starting the battle earlier than mid august - if that were logistically possible. Would that strategy eventually opened the way for a successful invasion or not?

SLD

 

[Horatio Parker]

How about just keep the focus on the British RAF fields? Wearing them down and actually invading instead of shifting the focus to bombing London? Perhaps starting the battle earlier than mid august - if that were logistically possible. Would that strategy eventually opened the way for a successful invasion or not?

SLD

I don't remember the author, but one book claimed that if Germany could've gotten a single brigade across immediately after Dunkirk, Britain would've fallen. That's how disorganized things were. No idea how realistic that is, but it serves to underline Britain's vulnerability, of which the British were all too keenly aware.

And yes, it appears the air campaign was mismanaged, with the Germans changing strategies just as they started getting results.

But in retrospect, the key to a successful invasion was speed.

 

[Sarpedon]

Look, the fact that people agree with you that the British Empire could be defeated by focussing on the Mediterrranean is beside the point. My main point has always been that Germany didn't have enough troops to do everything. Occupy Spain, occupy France, occupy Yugoslavia, Occupy North Africa and the middle east, and then invade the Soviet Union just wouldn't work. They went in with 4 million and lost. Now you say they can win by going in with 3 million.

 

[LordKiran]

Look, the fact that people agree with you that the British Empire could be defeated by focussing on the Mediterrranean is beside the point. My main point has always been that Germany didn't have enough troops to do everything. Occupy Spain, occupy France, occupy Yugoslavia, Occupy North Africa and the middle east, and then invade the Soviet Union just wouldn't work. They went in with 4 million and lost. Now you say they can win by going in with 3 million.

By making better decisions. Hitler overextended and there's simply no way of getting around that. Taking Danzig was probably his worst decision. He should have stopped before that and took his time consolidating his holdings and continuing to build up. Then maybe in ten years, after completion of the Wunderwaffe you can leverage your newfound military might to take everything else, leaving DC and Moscow in ruin. Just imagine if Hitler could have defeated the soviets without ever having to actually invade past the territory he intended to take.

 

[Horatio Parker]

Look, the fact that people agree with you that the British Empire could be defeated by focussing on the Mediterrranean is beside the point. My main point has always been that Germany didn't have enough troops to do everything. Occupy Spain, occupy France, occupy Yugoslavia, Occupy North Africa and the middle east, and then invade the Soviet Union just wouldn't work. They went in with 4 million and lost. Now you say they can win by going in with 3 million.

Who agrees with you? Anybody?

With Britain out of the war, there would be no need to occupy the Balkans. It was a British supported coup in Yugoslavia that prompted the Germans action, along with the memory of Allied intervention in southern Europe ie Salonika. No allies, no intervention, no Nazi occupation. You seem to lose sight of the fact that victorious outcomes free up resources. Your list adds only one country to what happened, yet, even with reserves left for the west, they had 4M. Add one country and they lose 1M? Your math is suspect.

Yet with my argument, not only would the original force be intact, there would be more available, since fewer units would have to be left in the west or in southern Europe. Not to mention the Soviets would not be receiving Allied aid.

Also, with no western enemies, who is going to be supplying the partisans your argument depends so heavily on?

Besides, some the reading I've done suggests that Egypt and the Suez would be enough. It isn't clear; I had read that Raeder considered Gibraltar critical, but recently Ive read that he was more interested in NW Africa. So maybe Spain could be left alone, or perhaps there was a way to take Gibraltar without invading Spain.

 

[bilby]

Look, the fact that people agree with you that the British Empire could be defeated by focussing on the Mediterrranean is beside the point. My main point has always been that Germany didn't have enough troops to do everything. Occupy Spain, occupy France, occupy Yugoslavia, Occupy North Africa and the middle east, and then invade the Soviet Union just wouldn't work. They went in with 4 million and lost. Now you say they can win by going in with 3 million.

By making better decisions. Hitler overextended and there's simply no way of getting around that. Taking Danzig was probably his worst decision. He should have stopped before that and took his time consolidating his holdings and continuing to build up. Then maybe in ten years, after completion of the Wunderwaffe you can leverage your newfound military might to take everything else, leaving DC and Moscow in ruin. Just imagine if Hitler could have defeated the soviets without ever having to actually invade past the territory he intended to take.

Ten years would be about five too many; Berlin would be radioactive glass by then, if the war was still going.

The big problem with waiting for better technology is that the allies were getting better faster. So the technological advantage was steadily moving away from Germany and towards the British at the time of Dunkirk; and would only accelerate if as and when the Americans joined the war.

It's arguable that the Germans still had a technological edge as late as 1941; but Hitler had shut down basic research in 1939, thinking that it was a waste of resources; and by the time he realised that that was an error, it was too late. And even than, he put his resources in the wrong place, looking for drama and flash, such as the V-weapons, where the allies were simply trying to make everything they already had bigger and better - and when they had a new idea, they kept it a secret.

The British seemed to be FAR better at keeping secrets than any of the other major players on either side.

 

[LordKiran]

By making better decisions. Hitler overextended and there's simply no way of getting around that. Taking Danzig was probably his worst decision. He should have stopped before that and took his time consolidating his holdings and continuing to build up. Then maybe in ten years, after completion of the Wunderwaffe you can leverage your newfound military might to take everything else, leaving DC and Moscow in ruin. Just imagine if Hitler could have defeated the soviets without ever having to actually invade past the territory he intended to take.

Ten years would be about five too many; Berlin would be radioactive glass by then, if the war was still going.

The big problem with waiting for better technology is that the allies were getting better faster. So the technological advantage was steadily moving away from Germany and towards the British at the time of Dunkirk; and would only accelerate if as and when the Americans joined the war.

It's arguable that the Germans still had a technological edge as late as 1941; but Hitler had shut down basic research in 1939, thinking that it was a waste of resources; and by the time he realised that that was an error, it was too late. And even than, he put his resources in the wrong place, looking for drama and flash, such as the V-weapons, where the allies were simply trying to make everything they already had bigger and better - and when they had a new idea, they kept it a secret.

The British seemed to be FAR better at keeping secrets than any of the other major players on either side.

Well this is all assuming that Hitler didn't kick off WW2 by invading poland but rather stopped short, allowed Poland to continue existing as a border territory between them and the soviets. While I don't deny your point I have to wonder how much it'd have mattered. Would the allies have jet engines and nukes without captured German scientists? If not, and with the benefit of hindsight, making both of those top priority developments could conceivably end the war in German victory. Stalin literally wouldn't know what hit him.

I wonder if simply by invading Poland Hitler doomed himself to failure by biting off more than he could reasonably chew, but then we don't expect reason from mad men.

 

[bilby]

Ten years would be about five too many; Berlin would be radioactive glass by then, if the war was still going.

The big problem with waiting for better technology is that the allies were getting better faster. So the technological advantage was steadily moving away from Germany and towards the British at the time of Dunkirk; and would only accelerate if as and when the Americans joined the war.

It's arguable that the Germans still had a technological edge as late as 1941; but Hitler had shut down basic research in 1939, thinking that it was a waste of resources; and by the time he realised that that was an error, it was too late. And even than, he put his resources in the wrong place, looking for drama and flash, such as the V-weapons, where the allies were simply trying to make everything they already had bigger and better - and when they had a new idea, they kept it a secret.

The British seemed to be FAR better at keeping secrets than any of the other major players on either side.

Well this is all assuming that Hitler didn't kick off WW2 by invading poland but rather stopped short, allowed Poland to continue existing as a border territory between them and the soviets. While I don't deny your point I have to wonder how much it'd have mattered. Would the allies have jet engines and nukes without captured German scientists? If not, and with the benefit of hindsight, making both of those top priority developments could conceivably end the war in German victory. Stalin literally wouldn't know what hit him.

I wonder if simply by invading Poland Hitler doomed himself to failure by biting off more than he could reasonably chew, but then we don't expect reason from mad men.

Captured German scientists had nothing to do with either invention; The jet engine was developed and patented before the war by Frank Whittle of the RAF between 1928 and 1930, and (probably independently) by Hans von Ohain in Germany in 1935. Axial flow engines were likewise developed independently in both nations, and no 'captured Germans' were involved in allied jet engine development during the war; Jet engines on both sides went into production too late to affect the outcome, but in any hypothetical where their use became important, it is unreasonable to assume that there would have been any significant period when one side but not the other was able to use them.

Nuclear weapons were developed in the US Manhattan Project with the assistance of a number of refugees from Germany and occupied countries (particularly Poland - so had Poland not been invaded, perhaps their absence could have slowed the Manhattan project; But then again, probably not), and also with the benefit of having the British bomb project (code-named Tube Alloys, the British project was the world's first attempt to develop an atomic bomb) merged with the US effort to move Tube Alloys safely away from German bombing.

The refugees were not 'captured German scientists' - many of them were Jews who were ineligible for Reich citizenship after the Nuremberg Laws of 1935.

The German bomb project was headed by Heisenberg, who had declared the fission bomb to be impossible to develop in practice, and who after the war claimed to have deliberately retarded German fission research, although many believe that he was simply not able to assemble a competent team. Competent or not, none of his team were captured by the allies during the war. The funding of the German project was lack-luster, partly because Heisenberg repeatedly expressed doubts as to whether it could succeed, and partly because much of the basic research on which it was founded was done by Jews, and "Jewish Science" was considered by the Nazis to be unreliable and worthless.

Captured German scientists did provide a huge boost to the US and Soviet rocketry and ballistic missile development programs after the war; Operation Paperclip allowed a number of Nazis and suspected Nazis (notably Wernher von Braun's team) to avoid trial for war crimes, in return for working for the United States on rocket development - perhaps it is this that you are thinking of?

[YOUTUBE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjDEsGZLbio[/YOUTUBE]

 

[LordKiran]

Well this is all assuming that Hitler didn't kick off WW2 by invading poland but rather stopped short, allowed Poland to continue existing as a border territory between them and the soviets. While I don't deny your point I have to wonder how much it'd have mattered. Would the allies have jet engines and nukes without captured German scientists? If not, and with the benefit of hindsight, making both of those top priority developments could conceivably end the war in German victory. Stalin literally wouldn't know what hit him.

I wonder if simply by invading Poland Hitler doomed himself to failure by biting off more than he could reasonably chew, but then we don't expect reason from mad men.

Captured German scientists had nothing to do with either invention; The jet engine was developed and patented before the war by Frank Whittle of the RAF between 1928 and 1930, and (probably independently) by Hans von Ohain in Germany in 1935. Axial flow engines were likewise developed independently in both nations, and no 'captured Germans' were involved in allied jet engine development during the war; Jet engines on both sides went into production too late to affect the outcome, but in any hypothetical where their use became important, it is unreasonable to assume that there would have been any significant period when one side but not the other was able to use them.

Nuclear weapons were developed in the US Manhattan Project with the assistance of a number of refugees from Germany and occupied countries (particularly Poland - so had Poland not been invaded, perhaps their absence could have slowed the Manhattan project; But then again, probably not), and also with the benefit of having the British bomb project (code-named Tube Alloys, the British project was the world's first attempt to develop an atomic bomb) merged with the US effort to move Tube Alloys safely away from German bombing.

The refugees were not 'captured German scientists' - many of them were Jews who were ineligible for Reich citizenship after the Nuremberg Laws of 1935.

The German bomb project was headed by Heisenberg, who had declared the fission bomb to be impossible to develop in practice, and who after the war claimed to have deliberately retarded German fission research, although many believe that he was simply not able to assemble a competent team. Competent or not, none of his team were captured by the allies during the war. The funding of the German project was lack-luster, partly because Heisenberg repeatedly expressed doubts as to whether it could succeed, and partly because much of the basic research on which it was founded was done by Jews, and "Jewish Science" was considered by the Nazis to be unreliable and worthless.

Captured German scientists did provide a huge boost to the US and Soviet rocketry and ballistic missile development programs after the war; Operation Paperclip allowed a number of Nazis and suspected Nazis (notably Wernher von Braun's team) to avoid trial for war crimes, in return for working for the United States on rocket development - perhaps it is this that you are thinking of?

[YOUTUBE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjDEsGZLbio[/YOUTUBE]

Mhm, I never heard of Jet propulsion being developed simultaneously by the allies and axis. Likewise, I was under the seemingly false notion that German scientists/captured research were integral to the development of atomic weapons first used by the US, but thinking about it now the timing of those events don't really line up do they?