World War II Discussion Thread

I disagree AT60.

I think the Japanese would have forced a seperate peace on America, but they could not have sucessfully invaded, especially with their army tied up in Burma, China, and possibly Australia.

 

It was just a way of saying you would have lost the war. Sorry. Not meant to be taken literally.

 

Ah, well definately.

All our pacific claims would have been taken including Hawaii. The ships that were raise from Pearl Harbor would, of course not have been. All the shipping made along the West coast(including the two Kasier shipyards which produced mostly liberty ships> would have been in trouble. No Guadacanal means Autralia would have been on it's own. An Actual Invasion may have happened but I'm not sure. I don't know if they could have sucessfully invaded India but Chins might have been swallowed. I doubt Russia would have started a two front war.
America could have made the ships in the Gulf or East coast and then gone via the cannel of the horn but that would have taken forever and would have cut down on convoys to GB.

I think the Japanese would have bombed the Cannel and taken it out. They really had no chance of actually taking over North or South America so it would not hurt them and really screwed over the US.
All in all we'd have been up sith creek.

 

Now, the Japanese DID NOT intend to actually invade the United States. Admiral Yamamoto and virtually the entire Japanese High Command knew that it was impossibe. Their reasoning for the Pearl Harbor strike is that it would give them 7 months where they could reign supreme in the Pacific, at which time, they wanted to seek out a cease fire. They intended by then to have sacked the Phillipines, New Zealand, Australlia, Indonesia and the rest of the South Pacific.

The big things that counted against them were A) the American anger over Pearl Harbor, B) The Japanese compounding that anger when they beheaded all captured US Officers and NCO's and sending the pictures of them back to the US; and C) the Battle Of Midway breaking the best of the Japanese fleet.

 

It would have been wise for them to have at least invade Hawaii.

 

There is no doubt Hawaii was and is a springboard for American Navel movement in the Pacific. If the Japanese had the uperhand they would have been fools not to capture it or demand control of it in a peace treaty.

 

It was not necessary to invade Hawaii. I;ve seen reports that indicate that had the Japanese bombed the oil reserves at Pearl Harbour, the American fleet would have been forced to retreat to San Diego. Say bye bye to forward operating base if that had happened.

 

One of the things that detered teh Japanese from Invading Hawaii is the probablity of going up against armed civillians. One of the things that made it so difficult for the Chinese and Koreans to withstand the Japanese invaders is that most of their civillians were unarmed. To the Japanese, invading US soil and facing the possiblity that ever civillian was armed was a deterent to them.

 

Hawaii protects Americas coast. if they hadn't demanded it they'd have faced another war in the future. Even if they did demand it they;d probably face another war, but with a far better chance at winning.

 

No, TripleB.
1. It was not a time when the citizenry were particularly well-armed. The combination of the closing of the frontiers in the late 1800s, and the urbanization and industrialization of the country between 1880 and 1920, made for conditions unfavorable to widespread ownership of guns. Add to that the Depression, and the relative uselessness of a firearm in an urban area for winning one's food and livelihood (unless one turns to cannibalism). Also the amount of immigration before 1920 (most immigrants would come from countries that did not take so readily to guns as Amerikans are said to do). The gun rights and Patriot movements of today still had another thirty and fifty years, respectively, to go until they sprang up and filled the gap.
2. Given how little we understood of their culture, I doubt that Amerikan readiness with firearms entered into the heads of the Japanese High Command as a strategic factor. More likely, they would have seen an invasion of the Amerikan West Coast as huge supply and security problems waiting to happen, in a similar manner the German invasion of Russia.'
3. More tomorrow.

 

To change focus a little bit, I believe the most important theater of the war could have been the North African campaign. If the Germans had been able to defeat the British in North Africa, it is very possible that the Churchill government would have fallen and the UK would have sued for a peace treaty. When Rommel first attacked the 8th army, had he had a a full army group, the entire middle east would have fallen. This would have been devastating to the UK, cut off from India, without hope of defeating Germany in the "soft underbelly of Europe", Britain woulf have dropped out of the war, leaving the Soviet Union exposed to the full might of the Wehrmacht, and thus left to total defeat, leaving Germany the masters of Europe.

 

1. Interesting point. After the fall of France, there were basically three strategies Hitler could have gone for- Sealion, Barbarossa, or the Southern strategy. He first considered Sealion, the opted for the invasion of the Soviet Union. It is my belief that the proper strategy for the Germans (I almost said German player out of habit) would have been to concentrate forces as you say, combined with an increase in Mediterranean air and naval power, especially submarines and the bombers sent to the East. Eventually Malta would be cut off and invaded, and then an invasion of Gibraltar would become a possibility. Striking into the Middle East, the Germans could do either or both of the following: invade India from behind in conjunction with the Japanese, or invade the Soviet Union from both West and South in 1942.

2. On the subject of Rudolf Hess, to correct some slight errors and uncertainties: Hess flew to the UK on May 10, 1941, in a Messerschmitt Me-110 twin-engined fighter. Pursued by British Defiant night fighters, he parachuted near Dungavel Castle, and gave himself up to a Scottish farmer, asking later to speak to the Duke of Hamilton. He claimed to be on a mission to secure peace between Britain and Germany, and was publicly disavowed by Hitler.
However, from the treatment received by his family, and other indications, many believe that Hess' mission, whatever it really was, was secretly approved by Hitler.
One plausible scenario constructed by author Greg Iles in his interesting novel Spandau Phoenix is the possibility that Hess' mission was to negotiate with a secret group of British Nazis and sympathizers to somehow gain control of the government and make peace with the Reich. Also, several authors have played with the possibility that Hess' two-seat Messerschmitt was in fact carrying two men. Iles goes further, suggesting that the second man was Hess' wartime double, and in fact, that it was this man who was imprisoned in Spandau until 1987. In Spandau Phoenix, the real Hess survives, with the knowledge and collusion of the British, after failing in his plot, which involved the assassination of both the King and PM by avowed communists, followed by their replacement by Edward VIII and some other fascist.
While only a book, it's a very good and interesting read, and also very disturbing; he had me really believing that that could have happened. We'll probably never know all the ins and outs of the Hess story.

3. On Roosevelt's knowledge (or lack of it) of the coming Japanese attack- there are strong points both for and against.
There were many indications prior to December 7th, 1941, that the Japanese planned to attack the United States, if not necessarily Pearl Harbor. The US had broken the Purple diplomatic cipher, and was reading the diplomatic codes. The Japanese had taken most other steps preliminary to war. And there were other things I have forgotten about.
On the other hand, one must remember that the Amerikans and British had racist attitudes towards the Japanese, and considered them necessarily stupid, weak, and inferior. When the Zero appeared, it was at first assumed to be a German design, possibly even piloted by Germans, because the Japanese were not believed capable of designing such an aircraft. Therefore, they had a tendency to underestimate them, which could have led Roosevelt's advisers to downplay any indication of a possible Japanese strike.

Many other interesting points have been raised, and now I will raise a new and difficult one- How much did the Allies know and when, of the Holocaust and other Nazi atrocities? What should they have done? What could they have done? How much responsibility do the UK and US bear for allowing these terrible things to happen?

 

I'll have to disagree with that one Lord_Tantuphilos, the North African campaign was nowhere near as important as the Eastern front or the pacific war. I mean in a worst case scenario Rommel would've defeated the British in Egypt and Libya taking the suez canal, and the rest of the middle east including the oilfields in Iraq and Saudi Arabia, then maybe even persuading Turkey to join in the war on the axis side. Britain wouldn't be cut off from India with the loss of suez they would just have to convoy all the way around Africa, this would limit the resources brought in but they wouldn't be cut off.

 

Malta was at times defended by as little as an anti-submarine pale and whatever ground forces. Germany should have taken it after Creete.

Anyways the Allies would have fallen back if Cairo fell, to the Cannel then probably to Jerusalam. Whatever happened taking Alexandria would have meant the German supply lines got shortened and the Allies were stretched.

The campaign wasn't essential but it would have definately helped Germany.

 

yeah, cairo was a sideshow.........however if they had pushed through there into the Gulf, now that would have been interesting.............

.......what is more interesting i think is the South African situation......there was a strong pro german movement there, what if they successfully had a coup? that would have cut of the Cape supply route, which was more important than the Med. route at the time, plus it was an important source of strategic minerals for the Allies

 

The extermination camps and the concentration camps were two seperate, yet similar things. The extermination camps came long after the commencement of hostilities, and even after America entered the war. Meanwhile, there was very little undeniable proof that the concentration camps existed as far as the world was aware.

As for the most important theatre of the war? That, in my opinion was the Mediterranean theatre. Everything had the potential to be decided there. Had Malta been occupied, Rommel's Afrika Korps would have succeeded, and potentially moved through to open a second front on Russia's southern flank. A suppression of Gibraltar was reliant on Spain entering the war beyond the contributions made by the Blue Legion.

So much of what happened in WW2 was reliant on simple mistakes and grand strategic blunders. The occupation of Britain never happened due to a single German bomber overshooting its target and hitting a civilian district of London. Malta was not occupied due to Hitler fearing the loss of more elite troops in a repeat of Crete. The list is endless.

 

I'm trying to be nice but my comments will hurt.

The US joined the war--only after it's own shore was hit, they did not want to, nor gave any intention of wishing to, fight for rights, freedom etc they in fact turned away Jewish people trying to escape what history rightly calls the Holocaust but to be fair so did others, while Countries were in the heat of war America watched.

It's great that the US finally did join but smaller countries had made the hard road and took the hard stance not because of attack but because it was the right thing to do.

War comes with great cost and the US entered WW2 at a time when most resources had been fully used, allies around the world simple had given all they could give, after all the fight had been going on a few years before the US entry. Germany did not invade the UK because of USA action. Germany did not invade because the few where better than the many-and when it's your last line of defence you give everything you have.

Please understand I'm not bashing the US, you guys showed up when most needed-but sometimes you make it sound as if you are the be all and end all of WW2 and a bucket load(thousands died)of people defending everything prior to your arrival.

Flame suit on--fire away.

 

No flaming.

 

Mutley is very correct. America failed to enter the war after several of her warships were attacked and sunk by German U-boats. In my book, that's an act of war, and should be responded to as such, yet America did next to nothing.

Germany had every possible chance to win the war yet threw each and every one of them away. Any history book will tell you how close a call the convoy battles in the Atlantic were.

A year prior to the commencement of war, Hitler promised Grand Admiral Erich Raeder that war would not break out for five years. Raeder based the Kreigsmarine's entire shipbuilding plans around a start date of mid 1943, and increased naval shipbuilding, including the U-boat fleet. There were plans for battleships to rival the Japanese super-battlecruisers for both size and firepower. The aircraft carrier Graf Zeppelin was left half finished due to changing priorities after the invasion of Poland.

Admiral Doenitz estimated that a minimum of 300 or more U-boats would be needed before war broke out to win - 100 on station, 100 in transit, and 100 in overhaul, with more being built to replace losses and increase the strength of the fleet. The Kriegsmarine began the war with less than a 1/3rd of Doenitz's estimated requirements, and as such, by 1941, all of the top scoring aces were burnt out and started making mistakes that got them killed or captured. In three straight patrols, the best of the best U-boat skippers were either killed or captured - Gunther Prien, Otto Kretchsmer and Joachim Schepke. These men were literally the best in their trade, between them having sunk or damaged 114 ships over the course of 24 cruises.

The misuse of Tirpitz and Bismarck severely affected the Battle of the Atlantic. Both of these ships had the capability to wipe entire convoys at a time, and avoid confrontation with the RAN. Original plans called for both Bismarck and Tirpitz to break out and roam the Atlantic with a decent escort, however, Tirpitz was not yet ready for her maiden war-cruise. Therefore, Bismarck was sent out with Prinz Eugen. After the sinking of HMS Hood, the mission outlaid for the battlegroup was blown, and Bismarck headed south east to dock in Brest for emergency repairs, and was sunk enroute. who can say what could have happened had Bismarck waited in port for Tirpitz to join her?

 

It wasn't just that the U-boat captains were worn out. The Brits broke the code and were able to find the u-boats, even when they added the fourth wheel on the Enigma machine the Allies were able to get the info from captured subs and weather trawlers in the North Sea.

If they'd had more subs or less faith in Enigma they'd have mopped the floor with the Brits.

 

But you forget that Admiral Doenitz never fully trusted Enigma anyway, and was the force behind switching to the four rotor Enigma device. However, other code books were not changed - cyphers which had already been broken and were being intercepted with nearly every transmission. And besides, the first naval Enigma machines were not captured until after mid-1941, well after the top three aces had been taken otu of play.

 

The first enigma machien was capture May 9th 1941, and they ahd been raiding ships for codes before that. By mid 1941 the first "happy time" was over.

Pure exhaustion did have something to do with it but so did the fact the brits were reading the radio transmits.

 

whats the story about hte single german bomber stopping the invasion of britain?

 

Those three were taken out in march of the same year. The brits had stolen the codes for several months from Weather trawlers in the North Sea.

And Doenitz didn't entirely trust it. but then again it was his onyl way of communicating with the subs and he used it a lot. The fourth rotor wasn't added until 1942