At what point did German defeat in WW2 become inevitable?

[Ted Striker]

Originally posted by Alexander's Horse
While we're on the subject of Rommel, OKW did not resource him for offensive operations. That is the real reason he couldn't take Egypt, not supply problems. His mission was to stiffen up the Italians and help them hold Libya. He exceeded his orders by undertaking offensive operations and Halder considered disciplining him or even removing him from command. He was seen as a show pony by his fellow general staff officers but was enjoyed a meteoric career because of Hitler's patronage and the myth Goebbels built around him, the desert fox and all that BS. Churchill also had motive to build him up because he used it to show how well the British forces were doing holding him off.

There was a brief period in 1942 when the German army was advancing into the Caucasus when some sort of giant pincer movement from Russia and Africa was briefly dreamed of but Rommel never received the resources to carry it his end and the tide of war quickly turned against Germany in Russia and that was that.

Its fortunate really because even one decent German infantry corps could have shifted the balance in Rommel's favour. There was a rough parity of forces, about 7 divisions each, for most of the desert war so taking Egypt was always a bit of a pipedream in spite of all Rommel's fancy moves. As soon as the resources shifted against him, which was in the second half of 42, he was finished.

A sweep through Iraq that linked up with Army Group South in Odessa would have done the job and solidified the oil supply.

[Ted Striker]

Odessa is too far west, Rostov is the city I am thinking of, Army Group South would have already had Odessa under its control.

[Mr. Harley]

Dr.Strangelove and LOTM, nice posts on the supply problems for the Axis. Even though theoretically if the Nazis give Rommel both the added units and trucks necessary to supply them - which neatly dovetails into multiple comments about Axis problems with logistics - I had not even considered the port problems. I strongly suspect that the daily tonnage capacities at Benghazi and Tripoli, plus rail capacities between them, if any (I don't have a map handy) are not something we can find here. However, there seems to be pretty much agreement here that the Axis just isn't going to be able to shift it's mindset/scrouge the supplies to operate that much more effectively in North Africa.

Plus LOTM makes an excellent point, reinforced by our earlier posters and any benefit the Nazis gain from taking Egypt/the mideast. The Nazis and their favored industrialists tended to loot versus exploit countries. That's also shown in various occupation policies that have been written about, Himmler and the SS were very corrupt. However, the point about the mideast being critical to the existance of the British Emppire still stands.

If you have UBoats operating out of the Red Sea/Indian Ocean, the Brits are going to be totally out of range of their land-based air. the convoy system was actually much weaker in the south Atlantic, let alone the Indian Ocean. Forcing the British to try to protect all that shipping would have caused them major problems, and I suspect that it would have cost the Brits more assets to protect the Indian Ocean than it would have cost the Germans to operate some UBoats in it.

Reference Franco, that is an interesting meeting and the failure of it can be attributed to Hitler and the one other Nazi who had no redeeming features - Ribbentrop. He was the ultimate syncophant, and went with Hitler to the meeting that was with Franco and his foreign minister, a general from the Spanish nobility whose name excapes me.

Franco was lukewarm at the time, and had a set of military/resource/financial air Spain would require. Instead Hitler, with Ribbentrop supporting him totally, came in and demanded the Spanish do things his way, on his time tables, etc. and threw one of his legendary snits. Franco was not Mussolini, and the Spanish foreign minister was livid (both Hitler and Ribbentrop were NOT nobles). This short interlude may have been one of the most important screw-ups in WW2, because that would have been devestating for the British. Of course, as I mentioned previously, this is another shining example of the competency of the Hitler state/cult, and why they lost.

I forgot to post this earlier, reference delaying Barbarossa. The Red Army was building new defensive fortifications in Poland, and had abandoned the old ones. Stalin's greed in 1939 meant that the Red Army was caught betwixt the two, hoist on it's own petard so to speak. They were in the middle of reorganizing and in absolutely no shape to begin offensive operations and had none planned - deployments make that case pretty conclusively. Now if the reorganization had been permitted unhampered through 1943 - that could have been a very different situation, depending on what Stalin's periodic fits of paranoia did to the remaining leadership.

Of course waiting until 1942 - assuming instead the Nazis consolidate the Mediterranean - causes a major technology problem. The Soviets are upgrading their air force significantly. Even worse, the KV-1 and T-34 will have seen a full year of production. The Wehrmacht may have a viciously tough time battering through that, and since they will not have had the surprises of the 1941 campaign they will not have any new AFV chassis. PZ111's and IV's are going to take some pretty ugly losses.

[Ted Striker]

Shawn you should write a WW2 book.

Cover all the common "did that really happen?" strategic and tactical topics of the war.

[Mr. Harley]

It's been done - rather poorly, I have the book at home. I'll have to post it. I was the person responsible for everything except vendors at Origins 1980, when it still was the national wargaming convention. If it wasn't for my vision, I probably would have joined the airforce. Kismet. What is interesting is that I started as a hardware/tech junkie, and from there have branched into the social/political and finally into the personalities aspect of military history. They all interconnnect, sort of like some of our posts on Iraq. I've learned something here, I had always assumed/read/been assured that the appeasers were no longer a force in GB by 1942. I would love to see some good documentation, i.e. newspapers, private journals, correspondence, etc. The problem is that the British government is VERY good at keeping secrets/glossing over certain things, and has done an excellent job in helping make sure favorable histories are written, though there are exceptions on the latter.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by shawnmmcc

It's been done - rather poorly, I have the book at home. I'll have to post it.

Have you read 'The Moscow Option' ?

" Synopsis

This provocative alternate history looks at the Second World War from a new angle - what might have happened had the Germans taken Moscow in 1941. Based on authentic history and real possibilities, this unique speculative narrative plays out the dramatic consequences of opportunities taken and examines the grotesque possibilities of a Third Reich triumphant. On 30 September 1941, the Germans fight their way into the ruins of Moscow and the Soviet Union collapses. Although Russian resistance continues, German ambition multiplies after this signal victory and offensives are launched in Africa, the Mediterranean and the Middle East. Hitler's armies, assured of victory, make their leader's dreams reality and Allied hopes of victory seem to be almost hopelessly doomed. David Downing's writing is fluid and eminently believable as he blends actual history with the stimulating world of alternate events. The Moscow Option is a chilling reminder that history might easily have been very different."

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/185367463X

There are also a few suggestive counterfactuals in the first volume of 'What If' edited by Robert Cowley. The most persuasive 'Nazi Mediterranean' one is based upon a strike at Vichy Lebanon/Syria from either the Italian occupied Dodecanese/Rhodes, through Turkey, or British Cyprus, in lieu of Operation Barbarossa.

Rashid Ali revolted in Iraq, and it took several weeks of fighting to subdue Vicy Lebanon/Syria. The Russians were hardly enamoured of the Turks (and neither were Arab nationalists) and a German blitzkrieg through the Eastern Mediterranean could have secured the Iraqi-Kuwaiti oilfields, and even the British Iranian oilfields.


Of course, had the Germans but known, there was also oil aplenty underneath Libya's desert strand.

[Mr. Harley]

(cross-post with Molly - I had to leave this up between breaks)

An example of weird, esoteric and critical technical info, much more so than what I posted on the Stuka, is the Japanase naval anti-aircraft weapons. They had no effective long range AA gun like the US 5" Dual-purpose gun (the one you see in all those single and double turrets). Their 25mm gun essentially could not hit the US divebombers until AFTER they released their bombs. This meant that without any air cover (as at Midway, when it's all down at the deck killing torpedo bombers) the the US divebombers essentially got to make bombing runs in close to ideal conditions. There are some interesting accounts by the Dauntless pilots to that effect.

The poor Japanese pilots have to deal with long-range flak - the 5" DP guns - 40mm short range flak (smaller guns were being phased out as ineffective) which meant they were under continuous heavy fire from well before the start of their attack runs. Combined with radios in all the fighers and radar directed CAP - neither of which the Japanese had - and it is amazing those poor pilots did as well as they did. The phenomenal training of the Japanese pilots is one of the reasons, and also the reason Midway was so devastating. The carriers could be replaced, sort of. The pilots, if memory serves me, took roughly five years to train, never would be replaced. Add in the earlier comments about the lack of self-sealing tanks, and the Japanese bushido code that meant that they didn't try to rescue pilots who ditched due to fuel loss (those pesky non-sealing tanks) - no submarines out there to recover them. The end result was the fairly early in the war elimination of Japanese naval air as a significant factor.