RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (Full Version)

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Curtis Lemay -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/12/2006 8:14:28 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: ColinWright
Launch a Seelowe doomed to failure? First off, I'd object to this on purely military grounds.


Probably a failure as a successful invasion. But perhaps not as attrition of the British defense forces, leading to ultimate success down the road. It can also shake out amphibious issues for subsequent invasions - like Dieppe did for the Allies. If so, not a failure at all.

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Germany is going to lose the bulk of the combat elements of nine of her best divisions. She'll also lose much of what's left of her surface navy and perhaps half her trained naval personnel. That's nothing to sneeze at.


The loss of the divisions could be sneezed at - from the perspective of 1945. And they need not be their best divisions, if they're just bait. The particulars of what the relative naval losses would be are unknown. I'm not sure the Germans should even risk many warships on the first attempt, considering the attritional strategy.

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Moreover, no decisive advantage will be gained as a result.

Since one can assume the invasion will be largely broken up in the Channel, it's going to rather rapidly become apparent that the British Army has the situation well in hand regarding those elements that do get ashore.

So -- say -- that the R.A.F. is going to feel obliged to be suicidally gallant over the Channel for about four days. Let's figure they lose four hundred fighters and four hundred bombers.

Now for the Royal Navy. Historically, the British planned to respond to the invasion with a force of (as I recall) eight cruisers and twenty destoyers -- perhaps 20% of their total assets. Now, since the failure of the invasion will rapidly become apparent, we can assume Britain's losses will be confined to these units. Going by Crete, we can figure even total German success against this force means a third will be sunk and the remainder forced to turn back with damage. In other words, the Royal Navy will permanently lose two-three cruisers and perhaps eight destroyers. Again, hardly fatal.


All of this is pure speculation. We don't know what the relative loss rates would have been between the RN and the transports, or what the pace of attrition would have been. It's possible that a large number of small ships are a more difficult target for aircraft than a smaller number of larger ones. Note the German lack of success against the Dunkirk evacuation. And the Crete example was surely against a much smaller Luftwaffe concentration, operating over longer ranges, and covering a larger area, than the Channel would face.

And this is before Taranto, Pearl Harbor, or Force Z. The world hasn't yet figured out just how vulnerable warships are to air attack. The RN might be in for a sucker punch. And in the end, the Germans will be trading mostly river barges for British warships. Meanwhile, German production could be shifted to building real transports. Throughout the invasion attempts, the Germans will be risking cheap transports while the British must risk expensive warships. It could be an equation that ultimately favors the Germans, once the ground forces are seen as expendable.

And there is no certainty that the invasion would be intercepted before it gets ashore, especially if it crosses at night. Or, if intercepted, what its losses would be. If it mostly gets ashore, the action in the channel may last weeks, requiring multiple costly RN sorties.

As to the RAF and Luftwaffe, we do know that the RAF came close to throwing in the towel in the historical battle, where the playing field was tilted in their favor. Under the more equal conditions of fighting over the Channel and charged with anti-shipping duties, they would certainly fare even worse.



ColinWright -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/12/2006 9:05:17 PM)

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ColinWright -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/12/2006 9:20:35 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay


quote:

ORIGINAL: ColinWright
Launch a Seelowe doomed to failure? First off, I'd object to this on purely military grounds.


Probably a failure as a successful invasion. But perhaps not as attrition of the British defense forces, leading to ultimate success down the road. It can also shake out amphibious issues for subsequent invasions - like Dieppe did for the Allies. If so, not a failure at all.


Dieppe was an abject failure itself -- and subsequent attempts to rationalize it as 'preparation' for D-Day aren't very convincing. One might as well congratulate the Americans for all they learned by cleverly letting the Japanese sink their fleet at Pearl Harbor.

However, to return to the point, I doubt if the Germans would inflict much attrition on the British defence forces in exchange for the loss of 50-100,000 assault troops. For one, men drowning in the middle of the Channel aren't in a position to inflict losses on anyone.
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quote:

Germany is going to lose the bulk of the combat elements of nine of her best divisions. She'll also lose much of what's left of her surface navy and perhaps half her trained naval personnel. That's nothing to sneeze at.


The loss of the divisions could be sneezed at - from the perspective of 1945. And they need not be their best divisions, if they're just bait. The particulars of what the relative naval losses would be are unknown. I'm not sure the Germans should even risk many warships on the first attempt, considering the attritional strategy.


There's a certain air of unreality about this proposal. Is it likely that we would lure out guerillas in Iraq by sending masses of semi-trained recruits up the road as 'bait?' Of course not -- the political fallout would be totally unacceptable.

Hitler and the Germans were subject to the same limitations. As I noted, Hitler veered away from the proposal for precisely this reason -- and the next year he was horrified by the losses (ca 6000 casualties or something) suffered in taking Crete. The Germans -- no more than any other modern society -- simply couldn't fling away troops on operations that were expected to fail. It would have destroyed that foundation of consensus and trust which the state requires to function. If nothing else, German troops are going to perform rather badly in the future if they start wondering if the missions they are being sent on are even intended to succeed.
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quote:

Moreover, no decisive advantage will be gained as a result.

Since one can assume the invasion will be largely broken up in the Channel, it's going to rather rapidly become apparent that the British Army has the situation well in hand regarding those elements that do get ashore.

So -- say -- that the R.A.F. is going to feel obliged to be suicidally gallant over the Channel for about four days. Let's figure they lose four hundred fighters and four hundred bombers.

Now for the Royal Navy. Historically, the British planned to respond to the invasion with a force of (as I recall) eight cruisers and twenty destoyers -- perhaps 20% of their total assets. Now, since the failure of the invasion will rapidly become apparent, we can assume Britain's losses will be confined to these units. Going by Crete, we can figure even total German success against this force means a third will be sunk and the remainder forced to turn back with damage. In other words, the Royal Navy will permanently lose two-three cruisers and perhaps eight destroyers. Again, hardly fatal.


All of this is pure speculation. We don't know what the relative loss rates would have been between the RN and the transports, or what the pace of attrition would have been.


No, actually it's not pure speculation. The forces the British were planning to commit are a matter of record, as are the forces the Germans had available to oppose them. I guess I'm going out on a limb when I predict that a destroyer can win a fight with a river barge...
quote:




It's possible that a large number of small ships are a more difficult target for aircraft than a smaller number of larger ones. Note the German lack of success against the Dunkirk evacuation. And the Crete example was surely against a much smaller Luftwaffe concentration, operating over longer ranges, and covering a larger area, than the Channel would face.

And this is before Taranto, Pearl Harbor, or Force Z. The world hasn't yet figured out just how vulnerable warships are to air attack. The RN might be in for a sucker punch.


The world may not have figured it out, but the British had. The RN was quite aware of the threat posed by German aircraft. 5-10 British destroyers had been sunk by them by this point in the war, including several off Dunkirk. Moreover, the battleship Barham had taken bomb hits off Norway -- which was one reason the British had no intention of committing any capital ships to the Channel if they could avoid it. The R.N. isn't going to steam in mass formation into the Channel -- no fear.
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And in the end, the Germans will be trading mostly river barges for British warships. Meanwhile, German production could be shifted to building real transports. Throughout the invasion attempts, the Germans will be risking cheap transports while the British must risk expensive warships. It could be an equation that ultimately favors the Germans, once the ground forces are seen as expendable.


The river barges will be filled with troops that -- as I've pointed out -- are emphatically not expendable in this manner. Moreover, you've yet to demonstrate that a single British warship will be lost. In point of fact, the invasion flotillas were going to be out in the Channel for about sixty hours. How's the Luftwaffe at pinpoint bombing at night?
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And there is no certainty that the invasion would be intercepted before it gets ashore, especially if it crosses at night. Or, if intercepted, what its losses would be. If it mostly gets ashore, the action in the channel may last weeks, requiring multiple costly RN sorties.


No. Where're talking about thousands of craft packed into a limited area of sea. The British won't be able to avoid intercepting them.
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As to the RAF and Luftwaffe, we do know that the RAF came close to throwing in the towel in the historical battle, where the playing field was tilted in their favor. Under the more equal conditions of fighting over the Channel and charged with anti-shipping duties, they would certainly fare even worse.


How close the RAF came to 'throwing in the towel' is questionable. Historically, 11 Group was starting to suffer from the strain, and Fighter Command was contemplating going over to the 'ABCD' scheme, which would have concentrated the more experienced pilots in those squadrons doing the bulk of the fighting in the South. However, notions that Fighter Command was on the verge of collapse are more romanticism than anything else.

It is true that Fighter Command will do worse if it's forced to fight over the Channel. But for how long will it be forced to fight? You yourself intend to use substandard troops to fill those barges -- and you've yet to show how many of those barges reach Britain. In the intended invasion sector, the British had three and half divisions or so defending the beaches -- and four-six standing by around London as a counterattack force. So say twenty thousand-odd disorganized, demoralized, substandard infantry crawl out of the butchery in the Channel. It'll be Dieppe in reverse -- and with a vengeance. The 'invasion' will last about a day. At a guess, Fighter Command is going to feel decency requires its presence over the Channel for a couple of days. This isn't going to see its destruction.

Now, given some changes in Hitler's attitude and consequent German actions going back to about Dunkirk, a potentially successful German invasion of Britain in the summer of 1940 is possible to envisage. However, as the situation developed historically, it had no chance. Moreover, there's no reason to imagine an unsuccessful Seelowe would have inflicted fatal losses on the British -- indeed, the Germans probably accomplished more by not launching it and keeping so many destroyers tied up waiting for it and off convoy duty. On the other hand, the political and moral effects of such a defeat on the Germans would be extremely serious. A failed Seelowe is a good way for Germany to lose the war considerably earlier than when she did.



SMK-at-work -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/12/2006 9:46:59 PM)

the German plan for Sealion not only had a slow crossing time, but the major transports had to anchor off the English coast for 3 days to off-load - can you imagine what the RN could have done to them in that time?

The RN had over 20 cruisers and 80 destroyers available in home waters at the time - vs about 6 German cruisers and 20-25 destroyer-type vessels (incl torpedo boats) - I can't see any reason why the Brits would limit themselves to using only 1/4 of their available "small forces".  These ships could be based out of range of Me-109 escorts and still reach the channel areas with ease each and every night.

While the British had lost ships to a/c the LW was not set up to attack shipping - they had no regular torpedo-bomber units (only 1 experimental stafflen), and IIRC no armour piercing bombs for Stuka's at the time.  LW defence during daylight over the invasion fleet would ahve had the same problems that the RAF had had in France - ie no radar direction and needing to maintain fighter patrols in force - a tactic that is very wasteful.

OTOH the British had a torpedo-bomber force of Beauforts that was trained and experienced at night ops - I'm sure they would ahve loved the chance of getting at the German roadsteads!

The German divisions in 1940 were all front-line 1st class troops - there were no reserves or 2nd line troops.  the total losss of 100,000 of these on a "diversionary" attack would have been a political disaster - it would have broken the myth of German invulnerability.  The results on Russian and the Balkan "minors" diplomatically are a matter for speculation of course, but it is not inconceivable that Bulgaria and Romania might have stayed neutral a bit longer.

I cannot envisage a scenario that lets Seelowe succeed other than the British lining up their RN in the Channel Ports en masse for the LW to bomb to pieces - a ludicrous proposition not worthy of analysis.



ColinWright -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/12/2006 9:47:36 PM)

Anyway, let me try to cut this short. I take it we're discussing a Seelowe launched under the historical conditions obtaining by September 1940.

I'll quote from what I regard as the most authoritative work on Seelowe ever written: Walter Ansel's Hitler Confronts England. Rear Admiral Ansel himself had a background in World War Two amphibious operations, and in the early fifties he took the opportunity to interview many of the surviving German commanders involved in the preparations for Seelowe. In 1960, after further research, he published his book. Here is his assessment of what would have happened if the Germans had gone ahead:

"...If Dunkirk scene of 24-26 May 1940 had presented an amazing and lustful picture to German tankmen, Sea Lion underway on 26-27 September could have done no less for British destroyer sailors. The preliminary movements during the twenty-sixth, and before, could not have eluded evaluators in England's eager commands, ashore, afloat, and in the air. By nightfall that it was invasion had to be unmistakable: a direct but feeble crossing from Le Havre, and a main effort of three diffused prongs in the Narrows. There was no way of hiding these facts. The counteraction they might have called forth needs no development. To wreck invasion at sea must have been the fond hope of every destroyer. These light craft attacking in close-knit units would have held the rare advantage of open season, with every object sighted fair game and no limit on the bag. Think of of tangled tows by the dozen, sitting-duck steamers, and hundreds of confused small boats! The night promised a veritable destroyer sailor's dream. Fulfillment lay easily within their capability. Disaster portions could have been dealt Sea Lion in one grand orgy, his wretched bubble whipped into red froth on the sea.

To carry the sequence further in speculation about the actions of numerous anti-invasion patrol craft deployed closer along England's shores, or about the appearance of heavier ships in the dawn, to make sure that any landing elements who gained the shore were cut off, has small value. Sea Lion would already have been gutted, his vitals strewn upon the waters. Execution of operation Sea Lion on 27 September 1940 as set up held the sole prospect of major German disaster. He could have offered no serious challenge on the field of battle in England..."

Moreover, there is no significant compensation for this disaster. British land forces suffer almost no casualties. Perhaps some R.N. destroyers are caught and sunk as they retreat back to port at dawn. A dozen British fighter pilots who might otherwise have lived may drown in the drink as they try to protect the withdrawing destroyers. So what? It'll be one step up from looking at all the fuel we used to get the Enola Gay over Hiroshima. It would go down as one of the most massive and one-sided defeats in military history and would make the German people and army seriously question the leadership of Hitler and the wisdom of persevering with the war.



ColinWright -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/12/2006 10:10:35 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: SMK-at-work


...The German divisions in 1940 were all front-line 1st class troops - there were no reserves or 2nd line troops.....


That's really not true. See for example the Landwehr divisions used to invade Northern Holland in 1940.

However, the point is fairly irrelevant. The German people wouldn't have taken any better to seeing thirty-year old and father of two Franz drowned than twenty year old Heinz.

As to the prospects for Seelowe in general, I think such an operation had some chance of success if Hitler had immediately and ferociously pushed preparations for it when the possibility of it was first mentioned to him on 21 May 1940. The B.E.F. is smashed, the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau are held in port, the work of assembling and modifying barges gets underway much sooner, etc.

However, that's the other side of the argument, and if I try to argue both sides at once, this is going to get very confusing. Suffice it to say that Seelowe was a doomed proposition under the historical circumstances, and the idea that an unsuccessful Seelowe could have paid dividends worth the cost is an untenable one.



golden delicious -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/12/2006 11:18:51 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: nelmsm

Here's a hypothetical I'd like to see. Germany, by some miracle, achieves it's goals of Operation Wacht en Rhein and the Western Allies make separate peace.


As it was, Roosevelt said that if the Germans made it to the channel he'd raise 200 new divisions. If you want a separate peace in the west, have Hitler get killed in July 1944.



Curtis Lemay -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/13/2006 8:18:19 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: ColinWright
However, to return to the point, I doubt if the Germans would inflict much attrition on the British defence forces in exchange for the loss of 50-100,000 assault troops. For one, men drowning in the middle of the Channel aren't in a position to inflict losses on anyone.


I still don't see how they're going to be intercepted mid-channel, if they depart at night. The RN can't be sitting in the channel. The British have to detect the launch somehow, make sure it isn't a feign, and sail from outside Stuka range. It's probably not even going to be detected until daylight. Then the RN dare not sail, but will have to wait till the next night. Lots of stuff gets ashore, including all the combat troops. The amount of supplies that get unloaded may be far less than ideal, but most of the invasion fleet can be heading back before the RN arrives.

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Hitler and the Germans were subject to the same limitations. As I noted, Hitler veered away from the proposal for precisely this reason -- and the next year he was horrified by the losses (ca 6000 casualties or something) suffered in taking Crete. The Germans -- no more than any other modern society -- simply couldn't fling away troops on operations that were expected to fail. It would have destroyed that foundation of consensus and trust which the state requires to function. If nothing else, German troops are going to perform rather badly in the future if they start wondering if the missions they are being sent on are even intended to succeed.


The issue, from Manstein's memoirs (remember) was whether they should have, not whether they would have or politically could have. But I would point out that this was not the Hitler of 1937, this was the Hitler that had just won an unbroken string of victories, including just conquering France. He now has plenty of political capitol. If the people and military understand that the strategy is attritive, they'll go along. They went along for the vastly greater eastern front losses.

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No, actually it's not pure speculation. The forces the British were planning to commit are a matter of record, as are the forces the Germans had available to oppose them. I guess I'm going out on a limb when I predict that a destroyer can win a fight with a river barge...


You're speculating about all sort of things beyond that. That the invasion will be detected in advance, for one. Off hand, I can't think of a single historical one that was.

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The world may not have figured it out, but the British had.


No they hadn't. Force Z (Prince of Wales and Resolution) was British, and it merrily sailed out into Jap air superiority without air cover. Quickly sunk.

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The river barges will be filled with troops that -- as I've pointed out -- are emphatically not expendable in this manner. Moreover, you've yet to demonstrate that a single British warship will be lost. In point of fact, the invasion flotillas were going to be out in the Channel for about sixty hours. How's the Luftwaffe at pinpoint bombing at night?


They will only be filled with troops if intercepted mid-channel on the way over. That's unlikely. And, from a 1945 perspective, they are expendable if they are expended as part of a plan that leads to ultimate victory. Most of that 60 hours would be sitting on the beach unloading supplies - that could be cut short, or some of the barges just grounded. And if the RN intends to get in, and get out, entirely under cover of night they will have a very short and very predictable combat window (if any - I'm not sure they could even pull that off at all).

The Luftwaffe was probably not too good at anti-shipping against ships that were simply under sail in darkness. However, if those ships are engaged with the beaches, there are such things as star-shells, and spotlights. That changes the equation. It could get very deadly for the RN. The Germans can calculate just about exactly when and where they're going to arrive, and have the lights and stukas waiting. Might even be better for the stukas at night, since the RAF would be far less effective.

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No. Where're talking about thousands of craft packed into a limited area of sea. The British won't be able to avoid intercepting them.


Only if they're literally continuously sitting in the channel. If they choose that strategy, the Germans don't even have to launch to get their naval targets.

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You yourself intend to use substandard troops to fill those barges


No. I said they didn't have to be the best. Just average will do.

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-- and you've yet to show how many of those barges reach Britain.


If the invasion isn't detected in advance of arrival, I don't see why all of them wouldn't reach it. And the losses they suffer will depend on the British strategy. If they're not going to risk the RN in daylight, losses may not be much at all. If they are, then the Luftwaffe will get to inflict lots of RN attrition.

Of course, another strategy would be to launch the invasion just shortly before daylight. That would force the RN to intercept in daylight or watch all the troops get ashore. That allows less time before the next night, though.



ColinWright -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/13/2006 8:45:06 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay


quote:

ORIGINAL: ColinWright
However, to return to the point, I doubt if the Germans would inflict much attrition on the British defence forces in exchange for the loss of 50-100,000 assault troops. For one, men drowning in the middle of the Channel aren't in a position to inflict losses on anyone.


I still don't see how they're going to be intercepted mid-channel, if they depart at night. The RN can't be sitting in the channel. The British have to detect the launch somehow, make sure it isn't a feign, and sail from outside Stuka range...


Historically, the British were forced to withdraw their destroyers from Dover, but were able to continue to base them at Southampton and Sheerness. These two points are each about two-three hours steaming time from the intended invasion sites.

Now, it is estimated that the Germans would have spent a good two days loading troops and equipment into barges under daily surveillance from the RAF, then assembling and marshalling their tows outside the ports. A vast beehive of activity, invoving literally thousands of vessels.

Then it is estimated that between the need to form form up, the vicissitudes of Channel tides, the low (five knot) speed of the tows, the vast numbers of craft involved, and the poor state of training of the crews, that the whole operation would be exposed at sea for a good twenty hours...this with columns of shipping as much as ten miles in length. In other words, sprawled across half the Channel.

You work out the odds of detection and the likelihood of interception. Huge, slow-moving columns of towed river barges stretched across half the channel. Twenty high-speed destroyers. All night to look. Hmmm...



ColinWright -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/13/2006 9:01:53 PM)

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...If the invasion isn't detected in advance of arrival, I don't see why all of them wouldn't reach it.


You might as well propose that they reach Windsor Castle undetected. Why not have them land unseen?



ColinWright -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/13/2006 9:15:12 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

No they hadn't. Force Z (Prince of Wales and Resolution) was British, and it merrily sailed out into Jap air superiority without air cover. Quickly sunk.


We have the historically expressed concerns about the effects of German air power...but never mind that.

We have the forces that had been set aside to intercept the invasion consisting solely of destroyers and light cruisers...but never mind that.

We have the explicit refusal of the Admiralty to risk its capital ships unless the German capital ships appeared (which, being damaged, they weren't going to do)...but never mind that.

Bob says the entire Royal Navy will sortie in broad daylight, sail down to within Stuka range, and let itself be sunk.



golden delicious -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/13/2006 9:18:11 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

You're speculating about all sort of things beyond that. That the invasion will be detected in advance, for one. Off hand, I can't think of a single historical one that was.


How about Seelowe? We were photographing the ports regularly.

You have to realise the Channel is not the Atlantic Ocean- and we have always been paranoid about people wanting to invade us. That the Germans time and again failed to predict the target of invasions which they knew would happen speaks volumes, not about the difficulty of predicting invasions, but of the lack of German experience with naval matters, and above all amphibious matters.



ColinWright -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/13/2006 9:20:20 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

...Most of that 60 hours would be sitting on the beach unloading supplies - that could be cut short, or some of the barges just grounded. And if the RN intends to get in, and get out, entirely under cover of night they will have a very short and very predictable combat window (if any - I'm not sure they could even pull that off at all)....


No. The sixty hour figure is from when the troops begin boarding in Continental ports until when they arrive off the British beaches. Far from 'most of that sixty hours' being for unloading, the figure doesn't include unloading time at all.

The British have a wide and generous span of time to intercept the convoys -- and by late September, plenty of hours of darkness to do it in.



golden delicious -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/13/2006 9:25:02 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: ColinWright
No. The sixty hour figure is from when the troops begin boarding in Continental ports until when they arrive off the British beaches. Far from 'most of that sixty hours' being for unloading, the figure doesn't include unloading time at all.


Yeah. These aren't modern, purpose-built landing craft- they're ad-hoc constructions and elderly river barges. Nor are they just nipping across the 22 miles from Calais to Dover- they're going via a series of circuitous routes from a dozen or so ports (bearing in mind that most of the major ports in the Pas-de-Calais had been given a good seeing to by one air force or another over the Summer). There is tremendous congestion, there is the bad Channel weather (this is NOT the Mediterranean) and there is a chronic shortage of experience German naval personnel to conduct the operation. Even if the Royal Navy declined to interfere at all, you wouldn't get everyone over.



ColinWright -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/13/2006 9:29:08 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: golden delicious

quote:

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

You're speculating about all sort of things beyond that. That the invasion will be detected in advance, for one. Off hand, I can't think of a single historical one that was.


How about Seelowe? We were photographing the ports regularly.

You have to realise the Channel is not the Atlantic Ocean- and we have always been paranoid about people wanting to invade us. That the Germans time and again failed to predict the target of invasions which they knew would happen speaks volumes, not about the difficulty of predicting invasions, but of the lack of German experience with naval matters, and above all amphibious matters.


Yeah. The British were monitoring the collection and assembly of barges in considerable detail, and given their naval superiority in the Channel at night, it's virtually inconceivable the German invasion flotillas could have left port undetected. If the Germans had launched Seelowe, at a minimum the British would have collected photographs suggesting a great deal of troops were being loaded on S-2, and would have seen a lot of craft leaving port on S-1. Then on the night preceding S-Day itself, destroyers would have swept into the Channel and encountered the invasion flotillas themselves. (Bob doesn't seem to grasp just how long these columns were going to be and how narrow the Channel is. Not spotting them would be like not being able to find the cars at an auto dealership).

By about 10:00 pm on S-1 the presence of large numbers of towed barges in the Channel would have been confirmed. By 2:00 am at the latest, these would have been engaged by close to thirty British destroyers and cruisers.

Dawn might have caught some of these destroyers and cruisers fatally close to the German airfields. However, that wouldn't have done Seelowe much good. It would have suffered massive losses, complete disruption, and would long since have ceased to be an organized military expedition. One can assume many of the troops would have made it back to France. One can even assume a few might have pressed on to England. However, nothing resembling a serious invasion would have occurred -- the planned initial assault wave of sixty thousand or so troops would have been reduced to ten-twenty thousand men in disorganized parties scattered virtually at random along the Sussex and Kentish coasts. Mopping them up would be a fine training exercise for the British Army and the Germans would immediately cancel all sailings that hadn't yet left port.

Net results.

British losses. Say five destroyers and one cruiser sunk. Twice that number damaged. Perhaps a hundred aircraft lost in the fighting along the coast on S-Day. Maybe five thosuand casualties among the ground troops. I think these are generous figures.

German losses. Probably two-three destroyers sunk and as many damaged. Perhaps a hundred aircraft lost as well. Total losses of about thirty thousand men, including a great deal of Germany's available trained naval personnel.

Political fall-out. A thumping British victory. No doubt about her being able to stay the course now. Germans question the war. Russia turns more aggressive. France gets restive.



ColinWright -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/13/2006 9:52:23 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: golden delicious


...You have to realise the Channel is not the Atlantic Ocean- and we have always been paranoid about people wanting to invade us. That the Germans time and again failed to predict the target of invasions which they knew would happen speaks volumes, not about the difficulty of predicting invasions, but of the lack of German experience with naval matters, and above all amphibious matters.


Well, it also speaks volumes about the inability of the Germans to conduct aerial reconnaissance in the face of Allied air supremacy, and the advantages conferred by Allied naval supremacy and amphibious capability. The Allies could indeed go where they pleased and strike where they pleased. The Germans of 1940 couldn't.



ColinWright -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/13/2006 10:02:00 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: golden delicious


quote:

ORIGINAL: ColinWright
No. The sixty hour figure is from when the troops begin boarding in Continental ports until when they arrive off the British beaches. Far from 'most of that sixty hours' being for unloading, the figure doesn't include unloading time at all.


Yeah. These aren't modern, purpose-built landing craft- they're ad-hoc constructions and elderly river barges. Nor are they just nipping across the 22 miles from Calais to Dover- they're going via a series of circuitous routes from a dozen or so ports (bearing in mind that most of the major ports in the Pas-de-Calais had been given a good seeing to by one air force or another over the Summer). There is tremendous congestion, there is the bad Channel weather (this is NOT the Mediterranean) and there is a chronic shortage of experience German naval personnel to conduct the operation. Even if the Royal Navy declined to interfere at all, you wouldn't get everyone over.


That was more or less the picture. The Germans were bidding fair to possibly be able to manage to be able to mount a respectable landing -- if there was no British opposition at all. What with damaged mounting ports, untrained civilian crews, unseaworthy river craft, long, unwieldy tows, strong tides, and large numbers of craft at sea all at once, it was going to be quite a challenge as it was. The thought of the results if the British interfered isn't pleasant.

In the words of one participant, 'we should try this just to see if it works.' He was referring to just doing it as an exercise in peacetime -- that was going to be problematical enough.



ColinWright -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/13/2006 10:34:59 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

You're speculating about all sort of things beyond that. That the invasion will be detected in advance, for one. Off hand, I can't think of a single historical one that was.


Actually, when I think about that, I realize the above statement doesn't hold much water.

We knew the Japanese were planning to invade somewhere in December 1941. We even knew where the convoys were. The Germans had spotted the convoys for [I]Torch. The Japanese fully expected American landings in 1944.

Etc. What generally wasn't known was exactly where the enemy would strike -- because the same naval supremacy that made the landings possible at all also conferred a wide range of possible targets.

Now let's look at invasions carried out absent naval supremacy. Funnily enough, these are few and far between. Generally -- the Armada and Napoleon's invasion come to mind -- they're cancelled. When they're tried anyway, they've generally been anticipated and destroyed. See Germany's attempted seaborne invasion of Crete and whatever the Japanese were up to when they were caught and destroyed in the Battle of the Bismarck Sea. Contrary to Bob, invasions are generally anticipated, and if the tools are at hand, foiled.

In fact, the only invasion I can think of that was both unanticipated and launched absent naval supremacy was Weserubung -- the German descent on Norway. Of course, that also relied on no significant opposition ashore -- hardly something the Germans contemplating invading Britain in 1940 could have counted on.

In 1940, the British had spotted the German landing craft. They had pretty definite ideas about where and in what force the Germans could land. They had ample naval force standing by, ready to interfere. This was not a recipe for success from the German point of view.



TOCarroll -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (11/26/2006 7:47:50 AM)

Lots of nice chat about Sealion......

I wonder if Matrix could do an upgrade of SSI's Panzer Commander. Failing that, since I have the original program, does any one know how to run it on Windows XP?



jtownsend2k -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (1/20/2007 7:11:30 PM)

Someone may already have dealt with this one - but I'd love to see a "revisionist" France 1940 - that is to say, one along the lines of the Don Alexander, Julian Jackson, Ernest May, Jeffrey Gunsburg school of thought, that basically just interprets the debacle in terms of operational dislocation more than moral and material deficiency.

If the current France 40 scenario(s) already have accurate OOBs and TO&Es, then it might just be a matter of modifying readiness values etc; or of redeploying units that were very badly located historically, like Giraud's Seventh Army or the excessive Maginot interval troops.

EDIT: Depending, of course, on what one wanted. If one accepts that it was dislocation of the good French armies rather than an overall question of quality, than would one attempt to replicate the defeat, using shock events? Or to simulate counterfactuals? Or make it a question of either/or, with theatre events?

I might someday putter at this myself, as the topic interests me greatly, but depending on how historically accurate the OOB/TO&Es are it could be a monstrous task.



Graymane -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (1/22/2007 4:33:43 PM)

I want to see a better France '40. I would like to see at least 2 of them actually. One a sort of "what if" that we could have some time to move forces around on both sides. Something on the scale of DNO for example. I would also like to see a more historical one a few days after the start of hostilities at a shorter hex scale.

I would like to see a fantasy scenario (or maybe "what if" I guess) where the allies take a stand at Munich and there is war with the Czechs.



golden delicious -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (1/22/2007 4:58:44 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: jtownsend2k

Someone may already have dealt with this one - but I'd love to see a "revisionist" France 1940 - that is to say, one along the lines of the Don Alexander, Julian Jackson, Ernest May, Jeffrey Gunsburg school of thought, that basically just interprets the debacle in terms of operational dislocation more than moral and material deficiency.

If the current France 40 scenario(s) already have accurate OOBs and TO&Es, then it might just be a matter of modifying readiness values etc; or of redeploying units that were very badly located historically, like Giraud's Seventh Army or the excessive Maginot interval troops.

EDIT: Depending, of course, on what one wanted. If one accepts that it was dislocation of the good French armies rather than an overall question of quality, than would one attempt to replicate the defeat, using shock events? Or to simulate counterfactuals? Or make it a question of either/or, with theatre events?

I might someday putter at this myself, as the topic interests me greatly, but depending on how historically accurate the OOB/TO&Es are it could be a monstrous task.


I'd suggest starting from scratch, but I don't think building the OOB will be very difficult because there are a lot of good sources for this. One could do the vast majority of the work using just Niehorster's site and the French and Dutch pages he links to.

The problem is in getting the scenario to play right. I discussed exactly this problem in my BA dissertation, which you can read here;
http://www.tdg.nu/articles/historical%20articles/simulating_fall_of_france.htm

The trouble is that the French army couldn't act off-the-cuff in the manner that a TOAW army can. This presents huge problems. There are a number of tools available to the discerning designer which can encourage fairly realistic behaviour from the French player, but it's an uphill struggle.



jtownsend2k -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (1/22/2007 7:00:22 PM)

Another nagging detail for me is France '40 being division units; I've always had the gut feeling TOAW was a better game with the scale kept to regiments tops. I wonder if perhaps a new map just representing the rectangle Abbeville-Marne-North end of Maginot line-Antwerp or something to that effect might take the scale down low enough to make that possible? It could be that even if the hex scale is right the unit density would hurt gameplay.

I agree that the TOAW ability - and the ability in lots of other wargames - to just have whole army corps spin round and maneuver in any of 360-degrees at the drop of a hat is a realism problem, but that's true of more scenarios than this and more armies than just the French. But what can one do? Consider Ugoigo, for that matter. Fun, but awfully 'abstracted.'

EDIT: Interesting dissertation. Expands amply on what May wrote about simulations of '40. I'm writing an MA term paper on the defeat and its historiography, or rather, I'm instead posting on gaming messageboards because I'm an idiot. Back to work ;)




Graymane -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (1/22/2007 9:25:59 PM)


quote:

ORIGINAL: golden delicious

The problem is in getting the scenario to play right. I discussed exactly this problem in my BA dissertation, which you can read here;
http://www.tdg.nu/articles/historical%20articles/simulating_fall_of_france.htm

The trouble is that the French army couldn't act off-the-cuff in the manner that a TOAW army can. This presents huge problems. There are a number of tools available to the discerning designer which can encourage fairly realistic behaviour from the French player, but it's an uphill struggle.


Very good and I would agree with just about everything you discuss there, especially as applies to war gaming in general. The frustration that I feel with wargames in general with respect to the lack of good C3 highlights why all the France '40 scenarios never get it right without special rules. That is also why I wanted a second, more historical scenario starting a bit later as I mentioned above, because I want to make sure that the northern section of the campaign is already committed to the low countries.



jtownsend2k -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (1/22/2007 9:53:27 PM)

My problem with that notion is that to simulate the actual campaign you have to padlock the French, which isn't a great deal of fun for the French player. That's why it seems to me you could have theatre options to undo, above all, the deployment errors.

Then the second question is - if you undo the deployment errors, shouldn't you obviate the need to simulate command paralysis at the Army/Army Group commander level? If you put Giraud's forces into a reserve corps - which I think was originally supposed to be partly fixed on Reims - suddenly you don't have to necessarily start wondering how the hell you disentangle the French First Army and the BEF, because it'd be strategic reserve forces that would immediately be going for the Meuse spearhead.

And of course, if you have the Seventh Army mostly back in reserve, that presumably means the Dyle-Breda plan is out the window, and your line is going either up the Escaut or along the French frontier, which is quite a different ball-game; the French frontier would also be better fortified (not well, but better) than the defensive fronts the Seventh, BEF and First armies fell back from in May. Which means further yet that the Meuse line itself could be different; I mean, if you want to get way into monday morning quarterbacking, if they had decided to screw over the Belgians, they could have systematically blocked French roads in the Ardennes sector, something that was eshewed so that the Ardennes cavalry screen could maneuver forward.

I guess at the end of the day, I'm interested in having at least the option of sitting on a frontier defensive position with the Seventh Army and part of the Ardennes interval troops in reserve, and seeing if I can't have myself a nice bataille conduite. But that may because I'm a bit peculiar. If you made a lot of theatre options you could have the same scenario be able to do both that, AND an historical outcome. Ideally.

Different challenges here:

1. PBEM historical outcome - seems like a painful experience for the poor bastard playing France
2. PBEM hypothetical outcomes of various levels of hypotheticality
3. French player vs. German PO historical - I dunno why you'd want to do this. Maybe play while drunk?
4. German player vs. French PO historical - I can see how people would find this amusing.
5. French player vs. German PO hypothetical - not quite as fun as 2, but hey
6. German player vs. French PO hypothetical - could be interesting.

ramble ramble ramble. Back to paper.



golden delicious -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (1/23/2007 12:56:07 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: jtownsend2k

Another nagging detail for me is France '40 being division units; I've always had the gut feeling TOAW was a better game with the scale kept to regiments tops.


I'd say it works OK at division. But for France I would work at regiment scale, 5km/hex.

quote:

I wonder if perhaps a new map just representing the rectangle Abbeville-Marne-North end of Maginot line-Antwerp or something to that effect might take the scale down low enough to make that possible?


I'd be inclined to incorporate the map down to the Swiss frontier. As it was, once the French had completed stripped the Maginot Line, the Germans were able to pierce it. This needs to be an option.

quote:

EDIT: Interesting dissertation. Expands amply on what May wrote about simulations of '40. I'm writing an MA term paper on the defeat and its historiography, or rather, I'm instead posting on gaming messageboards because I'm an idiot. Back to work ;)


Nonsense. Reading this thread is important research.



golden delicious -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (1/23/2007 1:03:59 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Graymane

Very good and I would agree with just about everything you discuss there, especially as applies to war gaming in general. The frustration that I feel with wargames in general with respect to the lack of good C3 highlights why all the France '40 scenarios never get it right without special rules. That is also why I wanted a second, more historical scenario starting a bit later as I mentioned above, because I want to make sure that the northern section of the campaign is already committed to the low countries.


That's one way to approach it. However it's difficult to go far enough so that the French can't play in an unrealistic way without going so far that the campaign is a foregone conclusion.

It might be that there isn't much of a game at all in the wider campaign. In the early going the French were paralysed by their command system and caught by surprise, whilst already by late May there is an air of trying to salvage French honour without losing too many lives. Perhaps a vs. PO campaign for a German player, or some of the battles (in particular the evacuation of the BEF) might make for better gaming.

Thanks to both of you for your kind words on my dissertation, btw.



golden delicious -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (1/23/2007 1:45:53 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: jtownsend2k

If you put Giraud's forces into a reserve corps - which I think was originally supposed to be partly fixed on Reims - suddenly you don't have to necessarily start wondering how the hell you disentangle the French First Army and the BEF, because it'd be strategic reserve forces that would immediately be going for the Meuse spearhead.


I'm not convinced the French could react quickly enough. As it is, Gamelin decided it would be best to let matters "develop". There was considerable infantry in GHQ reserve and masses of stuff behind the Maginot line yet this was not thrown into the path of the German offensive; it was merely deployed to form a new line behind the Somme. The French did not want for troops. They wanted for the wit to use them.

quote:

And of course, if you have the Seventh Army mostly back in reserve, that presumably means the Dyle-Breda plan is out the window,


Again, I'm not convinced. The thrust into Holland was a last minute addition. The Allies will still move to the Dyle.

quote:

if they had decided to screw over the Belgians,


You need to look into why they didn't do so, though. In addition to political concerns, abandoning Belgium gives the Germans, besides Belgium's own industry, a clear shot at Lille and the Pas de Calais- and with it the majority of French coal and a good deal of other raw materials and heavy industry. This is what the Dyle Plan was all about; providing enough depth to secure precisely those areas which were lost to France's detriment in the last war. Since the Allies knew they had to outbuild Germany to win, this was an essential objective

Really one wants to set up a scenario where the threshold for French victory is set very high; they need to hold on to their frontiers without taking severe losses. Moreover the scenario lasts until the Autumn of 1940. This forces them to face the same considerations as their historical counterparts. This may lead them to overstretching and being crushed. Not exactly balanced but there it is.



jtownsend2k -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (1/24/2007 4:21:28 AM)

Well, Don W. Alexander, Mr. Breda Variant himself (You know, I'm pretty sure he never got a job in academia, kind of funny since he's the go-to guy on an historiographical revolution) supported the Dyle plan of November 1939; that's saying something. And yeah, it's a shorter line, better defence, gets Antwerp, protects Britain, welds alliance together, has the chance of getting the (3x BEF) Belgian Army into line - it's definately got its bright spots.

But it definitely -could- have been an encounter battle; if the Germans had gone to Gembloux as expected the initial clash would have favoured the Germans, who could always safely concentrate their corps d'elite of air and armour more because they knew they were the only ones out to win the war in a few months. That is, I think the battle the Dyle plan expected - a one on one clash of the hard-edges of the opposing armies - might have led to a decisive battle the Allies would have lost. A more conservative deployment would have allowed for the safest possible reaction to the expected Gembloux onslaught, while also being somewhat better than the Dyle plan (or much better than Dyle Breda) at reacting to disasters between Namur and the Maginot line.

Unquestionably, the Escaut plan is a longer, worse line, closer to (or driven into) Northern France, it endangers French industry - but it is also possible to build fieldworks there, and most importantly of all, the motorized forces don't have to be put in a 'liason' role to save anyone ass; that is, if you imagine the Breda Variant being the ultimate in throwing your best forces after dubious aims, I think that actually any extra-frontier manuever may be a subset of the same thing.

So, if I'm Gamelin in November 1939, I'd either go with the Escaut or the Franco-Belgian Frontier, and suck up all of the (considerable) disadvantages; because at no time would I be obliged to throw any of my reserves into anything, and the entire bulk of the low countries would screen any incoming German advance in such a way as to make it easy to relocate reserves as needed.

Regarding the actual reserves used in the real May 10 - I do think the Breda Variant made a huge difference there. There's a quote I have here from Alexander - unfortunately I trimmed it for use in my paper so it's a bit truncated, but if you have JSTOR access it's on page 485 of Alexander's FHS paper on Breda:

"Had the Dyle plan of October 1939 been executed and Giraud’s forces not directed to Breda, his army – one DLM, two motorized divisions, and four infantry divisions – would have formed ample reserves for the Lowlands . . . with the Seventh Army detached to Holland Georges replaced this reserve with most of the remaining French reserve units . . . had Giraud’s forces not been directed to Breda, Georges could have retained his concentration of 3 DCRs around Chalons-sur-Marne intact, as well as the two infantry divisions . . . and other available units, including the Third Motorized Division."

In other words, it wasn't so much that Giraud could have saved the day if he'd been in reserve, but that there had been a domino effect; when Giraud was retasked to Breda in the 1940 version of the plan, the whole system of reserves moved north, with the best units going behind the Belgian plains where Giraud's original role was. Between having those units closer to hand, Giraud closer to hand, plus the units originally sent, I think there's the possibility that Army Group A's offensive might have been plausibly blunted.

Then there's the Maginot troops; I wish there was an article like Alexanders JUST on the subject of why the hell there was no existing staff work done to examine how they would redeploy North if necessary; a mindboggling oversight on the part of all responsible Allied authorities.

My own sense - dunno how you feel about this - is that the war was basically lost in the disposition; literally, so that on May 10, there was never going to be any force big enough or close enough to interpose itself effectively against Army Group A.



golden delicious -> RE: What WW2 Scenario Would We Like? (1/24/2007 2:00:04 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: jtownsend2k

But it definitely -could- have been an encounter battle; if the Germans had gone to Gembloux as expected the initial clash would have favoured the Germans, who could always safely concentrate their corps d'elite of air and armour more because they knew they were the only ones out to win the war in a few months.


!!! Maybe Manstein and Hitler. OKH had no such expectations.

quote:

That is, I think the battle the Dyle plan expected - a one on one clash of the hard-edges of the opposing armies - might have led to a decisive battle the Allies would have lost.


Presuming this is the Germans going with their original plan- their Schlieffen mark II- I'd say one gets a very bloody melee from which the Germans emerge victorious. Victory, however, means driving the Allies back to either the French border or to the Somme, in the space of six or eight weeks, with the main strength of the Allied armies intact and German losses much more severe than they were historically.

German tactical and operational superiority were going to be enough to win whatever. However for a decisive battle they really need a large encirclement as the Allies are going to be able to put more men onto the field, and large encirclements are hard to come by in such a densely populated battlefield. Without such a decisive battle winning will take all year and half a million casualties.

This actually makes a decent scenario, but it's one which is going to disappoint any German player who is hoping to reach the Spanish frontier in six weeks. It also opens up all kinds of questions about what will happen in the course of several months, particularly with regard to popular feeling in France and Germany.

quote:

"Had the Dyle plan of October 1939 been executed and Giraud’s forces not directed to Breda, his army – one DLM, two motorized divisions, and four infantry divisions – would have formed ample reserves for the Lowlands . . . with the Seventh Army detached to Holland Georges replaced this reserve with most of the remaining French reserve units . . . had Giraud’s forces not been directed to Breda, Georges could have retained his concentration of 3 DCRs around Chalons-sur-Marne intact, as well as the two infantry divisions . . . and other available units, including the Third Motorized Division."


This is all very well, but the question of whether the French would or could put this reserve in the right place remains unanswered. They did not perceive the real threat until several days into the campaign, due to a very convincing German decoy offensive in the Low Countries

quote:

Then there's the Maginot troops; I wish there was an article like Alexanders JUST on the subject of why the hell there was no existing staff work done to examine how they would redeploy North if necessary; a mindboggling oversight on the part of all responsible Allied authorities.


Yeah. It is startling just how much of a reserve was placed behing the Maginot line. The whole rationale behind building the line was to save manpower for the more mobile battle on the plain of Flanders, and yet two whole Army Groups were deployed behind it.

quote:

My own sense - dunno how you feel about this - is that the war was basically lost in the disposition; literally, so that on May 10, there was never going to be any force big enough or close enough to interpose itself effectively against Army Group A.


I'd say the war was lost in the early and mid-30s with the French taking their army in the wrong direction, and the uncertain commitment of the nation to facing another First World War-style holocaust. The campaign- that was lost in the dispositions.



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