stevep
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Post by stevep on Dec 12, 2021 20:57:56 GMT
Been thinking of this for a long time but recent discussions with miletus12 made me decide to post. What happens if in Sept 1939 we switch the UK and US, with the 48 states of the time exchanging places with the UK under the following mods. a) Since the US has about 3 times the population of the UK at the time the new US is about three times the area of the UK. It still has the OTL US's population and industry as well as coal and iron but is a net food importer and lacks oil. This is meant to replicate the issues that the UK faced. You would have to move Ireland some way to the west to fit this in without the US heading up into the arctic circle.
b) Similarly the US has its capital and largest city, i.e. Washington and New York, within escorted range of N France and its core industrial area within unescorted bomber range.
c) Britain is about 1/3 the size of the 48 states and occupies an area between Canada and Mexico, probably a markedly narrower body but covering both the great Lakes region and OTL Texas. As such its a big food exporter and has plenty of oil.
d) We can go either way but would suggest both nations also swap empires. This gives the US a lot of resources but also a need to defend them. In terms the British empire is limited to the Philippines,
Guam, Wake, Hawaii, Alaska, the Panama Canal Zone and Puerto Rico, possibly with connections to Liberia. The latter gives the UK an incentive to worry about Japan. Possibly Britain also inherits the China camp that played such a role in OTL's US while the US has Hong Kong and takes over Britain's role as the largest investor in China.
e) Here Britain has been an arch protectionist for the last decade and has little interest in the rest of the world while the US has been making, albeit relatively weak, attempts to supply some stability to the world and hence has an alliance with France and a guarantee to the borders of a number of countries including Poland. As a result of the German annexation of the rump Czech republic the US in the spring also introduced conscription.
f) Both nations have the industrial base and military, plus forces/units under construction/development as OTL. Britain lacking the imperial bases its units were designed to protect will have problems projecting power across either ocean without local bases. The US is now very close to an hostile Germany, especially assuming that the latter still conquers France and brings Italy into the war and lacks the air defence system that the UK had OTL. Leaders are as OTL at the start although assuming Chamberlain still dies of cancer as OTL, but with Britain at peace its unclear who will replace him as PM. Probably Halifax but could change.
Anyway, how do people think the two nations will adjust to their new positions and how does the war go?
Steve
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miletus12
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Post by miletus12 on Dec 12, 2021 23:38:42 GMT
Been thinking of this for a long time but recent discussions with miletus12 made me decide to post. What happens if in Sept 1939 we switch the UK and US, with the 48 states of the time exchanging places with the UK under the following mods. We need a map! We need a map! We need a map! We need a map! We need a map. Do we swap leaderships or keep the same teams in place? Internal politics? How is the isolationist movement? When is the start date, because if it is 1935, Holland, Belgium and the Czech republic will get a lot of business. Halifax is worse than Churchill. Yes I wrote that sentence. Halifax was a weakling. Is Attlee still in the mix? Can we replace Pound and Stark? Can we shuffle the deck and shove Chennault and Dowding into the air power niches occupied by Arnold and Portal? Does Kelly Johnson and Ed Heinenmann get cut loose and are they allowed to run wild? How about Gladeon Barnes, J.W. Christie, and John Carden? How about Ralph Christie (torpedoes). Does Claude Bloch get to push through his reforms and does Richardson stay at his post instead of being fired? Does Chatfeld get a clue and study the geography of the world ocean? Does someone cut Mitchell's cancer out in time and does someone whack Sydney Camm upside the head and show him the NACA airfoil and screw profiles book? Better yet, send him to tour GRUMMAN and see how airplanes are supposed to be built? |
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Dec 13, 2021 18:11:25 GMT
Been thinking of this for a long time but recent discussions with miletus12 made me decide to post. What happens if in Sept 1939 we switch the UK and US, with the 48 states of the time exchanging places with the UK under the following mods. We need a map! We need a map! We need a map! We need a map! We need a map. Do we swap leaderships or keep the same teams in place? Internal politics? How is the isolationist movement? When is the start date, because if it is 1935, Holland, Belgium and the Czech republic will get a lot of business. Halifax is worse than Churchill. Yes I wrote that sentence. Halifax was a weakling. Is Attlee still in the mix? Can we replace Pound and Stark? Can we shuffle the deck and shove Chennault and Dowding into the air power niches occupied by Arnold and Portal? Does Kelly Johnson and Ed Heinenmann get cut loose and are they allowed to run wild? How about Gladeon Barnes, J.W. Christie, and John Carden? How about Ralph Christie (torpedoes). Does Claude Bloch get to push through his reforms and does Richardson stay at his post instead of being fired? Does Chatfeld get a clue and study the geography of the world ocean? Does someone cut Mitchell's cancer out in time and does someone whack Sydney Camm upside the head and show him the NACA airfoil and screw profiles book? Better yet, send him to tour GRUMMAN and see how airplanes are supposed to be built?
Unfortunately my map making skills are minimal. I'm visualizing the new US as basically something with the same north-south reach as OTL but about three times the east-west dimensions. Its closest approach to the continent is similar to that of the UK i.e. about 18 miles from the French coast and its SE section is similar in character to OTL Channel but no great detail beyond that. There would be a backbone of mountains nearer the west coast - paralleling the uplands of western Britain and the Rockies in the US. There are a number of significant ports on the west coast but the bulk of the population is in the east and centre of the country - pretty much like the demographics of the US in this time period.
For the UK it would span the distance between Canada and Mexico to avoid too many climatic and other changes and its most developed areas would be parallels to the US NE and Great Lakes regions with agricultural areas in the south and inland. Again a less developed west coast although with some significant ports and land in the area of Texas which has a lot of oil production. Otherwise pretty vague as doubtful that much action would occur in this area
Both nations have the same leaders, military, political, economic and scientific as OTL. In terms of after Chamberlain's death I don't know anyone likely to successfully oppose Halifax as Tory leader although someone could emerge. Possibly even Churchill. Attlee is still Labour leader and there was an election due by Nov 1940 which is likely to occur here but the Tories had a substantial lead in seats. However possible that suitable foreign affairs or domestic issues, possibly such as the fall of France could change things drastically. Not to mention that by that about this time the Tories will be somewhat in disorder because of Chamberlain's death. Would expect Labour to close the gap over the Tories but whether they could win would be uncertain.
In terms of isolationism its stronger in Britain than the US which is realising the gathering storm in Europe, here now right on its doorstep. However there is some concern about the growth of totalitarianism, and its violent expansionism across Europe and Asia. The US has had a desire to avoid war - OTL British appeasement but with the occupation of the rump Czech state in March 1939 this is accepted as a dead end, hence the US agreeing with France on guaranteeing the borders of Poland among others. Basically its now Sept 39 and Germany has just invaded Poland. It has signed the agreement with the USSR although that won't become clear until Soviet forces invade eastern Poland.
The basic idea is how would the two nations deal with the issues they now face. Britain will have problems projecting power without the bases OTL Britain and empire had while the US, although being much larger than Britain, is now in the sort of exposed position that the UK was with the threat of subs and raiders attacking its trade lines and after the fall of France direct air attack and possibly even invasion. As well as defending its possessions elsewhere, especially in the ME. For instance: a) How would the USN fair in attempt to respond to the German invasion of France? b) In turn once France falls - with things somewhat different because of US rather than UK forces aiding them - does Roosevelt do the attack on the French fleet at Mers-el-Kebir? c) Does the US support a FF - lead probably by De Gaulle? d) How do they seek to protect trade routes and respond to the Italian dow? Even if they quickly switch to a convoy strategy will they have enough escorts once the fall of France removes the French fleet and presents Germany with sub bases in the Bay of Biscay.
e) Do they seek to defend Malta?
For Britain, how does the sudden fall of France make the imbalance in Europe clear prompt a move out of isolationism and what does the UK do about it. How and when does it remove restrictions on trade with combatants, establish a neutrality zone, make any destroyers for bases trade, sell surplus old equipment to the US - assuming the latter asked for those steps of course. The US had a considerably greater industrial capacity than OTL UK of course and a good proportion of this will be totally beyond the range of bombers based in N France but with a tactical air force controlled by the army - along with the naval air force rather than an independent air service it won't have the same sort of air defence system that Britain developed - which here is now pretty much redundant of course.  |
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miletus12
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Post by miletus12 on Dec 13, 2021 20:43:32 GMT
We have a map.  I used a semi-polar projection and tried to replicate the opening post conditions as closely as practical. Now we have to make some working assumptions about historical military evolution between the two transposed nations and their military histories. We know from the national histories that the British took the following lessons from WWI a. Air defense was very important. Zeppelin and Gotha raids taught this lesson. They were one of the first nations to develop an independent air force and this was the primary reason. b. Naval reforms in command and control was necessary because of the utter hash the Grand Fleet made of operational signaling during Jutland. The RN solution was to delegate authority down the chain of responsibility to improve tactical flexibility. The British reverted to area fleets and presence and adopted Julian Corbett's precepts about power projection and using the fleet as a force of national policy enforcement. This did not remove British battleship centric thinking or actually glom them onto the centric issue of trade protection as the primary naval mission for preserving the empire. c. The British army learned motorization and experimented some with armored formations, but they never absorbed the lessons at all. Their infantry centric drill emphasized patrolling and scouting as functions and positional defense as a preferred tactic. They allowed branch rivalries to utterly unlearn the lessons of combined arms that the French and they had so painfully acquired on the western front. The way they misused artillery and kept charging German defenses with tanks without infantry bodyguards in WWII shows this happened. d. Technologically the British were a shade better in aero engines and in infantry small arms than most of the planet. Their motor transport fleet was trash, their logistics at sea and on land second-rate and their outlook leading up to WW II definitely that of a "colonialist military" as regards the nuts and bolts of logistics. e. The line infantry was probably the best trained on Earth, but their armored force was equipped with rubbish, though the British had John Carden of all people who could have, if he lived, been a one man source for excellent kit in tanks, self propelled guns and cross country vehicles. f. The RAF had good aircraft but their air tactics and air staff work was horrible. True they had Dowding, but they flew the three plane vic long after the French, Germans and Russians flew the finger four. Their bomber doctrine was "questionable" as to both offense and defense and their RAF leadership aside from Dowding was utterly incompetent. Douglas Bader and Trefford Leigh Mallory were not fit to shovel out horse stables, much less lead an air campaign. Arthur "Bomber" Harris was a certifiable war criminal as to his incompetence in the strategic use of air power. g. But how about the Royal Navy? Mixed bag. They had a set of plans for the Battle of the Atlantic Round II, which did not work, because they neglected the air coverage component. The plan for Italy was a bit of an ad hockery with a "surprise air attack and then we will give them a go", element to it. Nothing effective was war-gamed about Malta or interrupting Italy's communications to Libya. British naval evolutions consisted of trying to improve "tactically", such as night fighting and torpedo work and the command and control problems previously mentioned. The RN and the Foreign Office did repeat their signals intelligence work against Germany, but unlike the MYTH, this work piggybacked and success was largely due to French and Polish original work against the Germans. When they pitted themselves against the Japanese and Italians, British crypto failed miserably. h. British naval leadership was "fair" once one gets below what passed for a naval staff in their admiralty. The fighting admirals: Tovey, Cunningham, Holland, the Ramseys, Vian, Lyster, Hunter (technically a commodore) etc. were quite good. But there were some fools in there. Boyd, Phillips, Pound, Harwood etc., were "execrable". Lord Mountbatten should have been sent to a fox hunting club and kept away from any responsible position. i. Churchill. Great flag-waver and inspirationalist. Too trusting of some of the so-called military professionals with whom he surrounded himself. (Charles Portal and Smuts come to mind.). he was the author of hare-brained schemes that prolonged the war and led to unnecessary defeats and disasters. ====================================================================== The Americans... WWI lessons learned. John Pershing. a. Army. Pershing, an idiot, poisoned US army infantry doctrine. He had observed machine guns work the Russians over along with Japanese field artillery, and yet he came to the startling conclusion that it was the Japanese infantry storming the Russian trenches with the rifle that alone won the Russo-Japanese war. He insisted on this approach for the US Army and he slaughtered tens of thousands of Americans against third rate German troops in poorly constructed trenches. But did the criticisms of Fox Conner and Hunter Liggett, or Douglas MacArthur (Yes, that guy.) change the "rifleman is the heart of the offense." mindset of the Pershing crowd? Kasserine Pass and Anzio ring a bell? How about the Battle of the Bulge? There were some people who paid attention. A colonel by the name of Adna Chaffee looked around and decided the horse needed to go away and be replaced by cargo trucks, motor gun carriages and people movers (armored personal carriers.). Another guy, Westertvelt, decided that artillery was the great WWI killer of men and recommended some things. Hunter Liggett and Billy Mitchell added air power to the killing mix, but all of these people strongly suggested that "combined arms" should be a thing. Unfortunately... no money. The experimental motorized brigade designed to test these concepts in imitation of J.F.C. Fuller inspired British experiment was dissolved to save money. Billy Mitchell. Bless his murderous almost treasonable heart, William Mitchell saw the airplane for what it was, the means to paralyze an enemy army and navy. He did add Douhet's strategic bombing follies to the mix, but people forget that in a time of scarce resources, he forced the American government to spend money on experiments to bomb battleships. Mitchell's first intent was never to replace the American navy: it was to give it air cover and to provide the Americans with air power to allow them to move on land and at sea. If enemy cities were flattened as part of the deal, that was part of the air power equation for him; striking at the enemy war economy. Spatz, Lemay, Chennault, and even Jimmy Doolittle learned at the feet of the master even after his court martial. They cooked up an air doctrine of attack and defense and developed a concept in imitation of Mahan, called the "air campaign". In the late 1920s these "air force" army officers began to catalog what they would need to bomb in Germany and Japan. William Moffett. The American navy did not fight much in WWI. They spent two years convoying troops to France and their Marine Corps was shot up at Belleau Woods which led to an energetic infantry lessons-learned for the Marines that sort of mirrored what the Russo-Japanese war taught the Japanese about infiltration and close assault after a massive artillery bombardment. The navy otherwise had an experience where they tried to attack German Zeppelin sheds and submarine pens in German occupied Belgium. They had mixed results, but Moffett still became excited about naval aviation. He developed some curious ideas about Zeppelins and flying aircraft carriers, but he more or less continued the USN fascination with taking airplanes to sea. After all, no less than Teddy Roosevelt funded the USN's first aircraft carrier.  It is a houseboat in the Potomac River. But... it is the world's first aircraft carrier. Anyhow, Moffett was somewhat instrumental in the floating variety, too. The battlecruiser made no sense in the era of the airplane, so there is the USS Langley, USS Lexington and USS Saratoga. 5 years after commissioning these bird farms and a year before he, Moffett, dies in a Zeppelin crash, the USN bombs Pearl Harbor. One might suggest that the USN had learned a LOT from its activities in WWI. And then there is Plan Orange. Plan Orange or how to peel Japan. The Marines got excited about this item. Pete Ellis was the father of amphibious warfare, British as well as American in WWII. If you did not do it his way, (Dedocanese Islands), you were slaughtered. Hiccups... a. National Defense Act of 1920. This idiocy prevented the formation of an independent air force, hobbled shore based naval aviation, split tanks between the cavalry and infantry, made Pershing's ideas about the army into law and cut the military budget to the level that only a fifth of the American navy had sailing time and the army was reduced to growing its own food to feed its troops. b. MacArthur. Something happened to him during the Bonus Army incident. But before he became an adulterer and a drunk and a press prima donna: as chief of the American army, he screwed up the following programs: --- the Christie tank ----first attempt at the squad machine gun (The ancestor of the T10/23E1) ----the M1 Garand Rifle (Rejected the 7 mm bullet for the 7.62 mm.) ----the Browning M1919A2 machine gun. (See Garand rifle for that mistake.) ----was caught with his mistress and forced to leave town one horse ahead of the posse and thus derailed the Conner reforms which he championed. And by the way, his was the deciding vote at Billy Mitchell's court martial. How does one think the USAF thinks of MacArthur? They hate him more than the USN does. But that is some of the background on the American army side. I should add that the bumblers (Bradley, Short, Fredendall, Wainwright, etc.) were not just MacArthur. Navy problems. When one traces the American torpedo crisis, one winds at the person of Harold Stark. When one traces the American naval command crisis, one winds up at the person of Harold Stark. (Kimmel was to Stark, what Phillips was to Pound.). When one traces who shafted Admiral Richardson, one winds up at the person of Harold Stark. (It was his advice, FDR followed.) When one traces who screwed up the Two Ocean Navy Bill and emphasized battleships over aircraft carriers and escorts; guess who? When one traces who agreed with that British "gentleman", Dudley Pound, upon the wrong allied naval strategy, well it was Stark. When one asks who told Roosevelt not to fire MacArthur, because it would damage the country's morale... When one asks who threw Kimmel under the tram in an attempt to save himself and LIED to the American congress about his own guilt... The list of Stark's crimes are many, but those will suffice for starters. Worst allied admiral of WWII and with Phillips as the low bar for incompetence that is really something awful. Air force problems? Brett, Bissell and Brereton. Then toss in Hap Arnold. If one wants any hopeful elements in the 1930s American military history? Chester Nimitz works on American submarines. Gladeon Barnes is a one man American army super-genius. He works through 1400 line items from mortars to trucks to tanks to artillery and he makes it all work. He can do nothing with the Hispano Suiza machine cannon and he NEVER gets the T23E1 machine gun or the T23 tank ready in time, but he manages to undo MacArthur's other major material mistakes. Eisenhower and Marshall and Patton. It would have been a quadrumvirate if Chaffee had not died from overwork. Nimitz for the Pacific, Ingersoll in the Atlantic and King for the global naval war. They reverted to Mahan and fixed what Pound and Stark screwed up. Next we will look at that map and using this background figure out what the transposition effects could be. ==================================================================================== By the way the British do have Slim, Montgomery and Cunningham. Too bad they canned Dowding or the RAF would have a hammer in the tool box, too. |
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Dec 14, 2021 13:07:16 GMT
Agree with a lot of what you say but disagree with others. Definitely not just in terms of where your criticising Britain as a lot of that was justified.
My main point with this thread is that I think a lot of criticism of Britain in WWII is unjustified because the fall of France/Italian dow meant that Britain was scrambling from crisis to crisis. There were definitely too many self-inflicted goals such as the intervention in Greece and the lack of commitment to coastal command because the RAF's bomber barons and Churchill's devotion to them. Then Japan proving drastically more dangerous than just about anyone expected and the additional crisis in the western Atlantic.
Here the American empire is going to face those problems with of course some differences. Imperial overstretch is going to be less as the home base is going to be a lot stronger although attitudes towards non-whites could cause issues in many areas about using especially African but also other forces. There will be some calls for scrapping much of the empire but that's not going to be that practical in the midst of a world war - although I think we would need to assume that the existence of the empire would make the US leadership political and military a good bit more aware of details about much of the undeveloped world.
However with their less interest in trade protection how are they going to handle the Atlantic battle, especially since as well they have no fast capital ships until the N Carolina's are commissioned in spring/summer 41? [Which might be delayed a little in TTL depending on the 'Battle of America'. Longer ranged a/c and the fact they don't have an independent airforce means they can use air power more, along with greater production capacity but the N Atlantic is often rough and storm, restricting both visibility and the ability of CVs to operate a/c so its not a golden bullet. Especially not until they get airbourne radar and there's less incentive for a Tizard Mission - at least going the same way here - so that could be later for the US.
As I say I don't think a separate air service is necessarily a good thing. For Britain the RAF meant that because it quickly sought to find a role - strategic bombing - to give it clear independence from the army and navy co-operation with the other services suffered. This was especially bad for the RN as they lost all the expertise established in WWI and maritime air developments overall were at the least badly hamstrung. True even while part of the US army the USAAF put a lot of effort into strategic bombing although its argued that, at least until the carpet bombing of Japan this was more effective in winning air superiority by drawing out the Luftwaffe fighters for the escorts to destroy than the actual results of the bombing for most of the European war. The US definitely had better equipment and doctrine for ground support that the UK, a lesson that it took a long time for us to relearn. Ditto with carrier capability although there will be questions about carrier use in closed waters - such as the Med and North Sea facing large numbers of advanced enemy land based a/c and with a lot more hostile subs.
In terms of how Britain will respond to the different challenges here that's more difficult to tell. In part some of them will be different from what the US faces because, assuming the US continues to fight on and is able to protect its supply lines, its greater population and industrial capacity might dissuade even Hitler from Barbarossa while its still fighting. [Although we might assume that still occurs for simplicity sake]. Without the network of bases its war programme was designed for its going to have more issues projecting power and even with more material resources and security its obviously not going to be the economic and military colossus that the US was OTL, especially since here its the US with the empire and its resources. There is the danger that the bomber barons will gain even more power here as they can argue their the 'easiest' way to win the war although the clear need to send air, sea and land forces long distances to the primary points of contact will argue otherwise.
Similarly getting the army away from the tally-ho charges of the cavalry regiments that formed the bulk of the initial tank forces is going to be a problem. There were combined armed support units but they tended to get ignored by the armoured commanders too often. With more time to prepare and not being dependent on US imports we could however avoid one of the problems that crippled the arm OTL in not using the Liberty engine which left our tanks under-powered. This seems to have been a personal move by Lord Nuffield, who according to some sources made a lot of money by pushing the use of the design.
All nations have pretty much the same people in the same locations as OTL.
Steve
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miletus12
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Post by miletus12 on Dec 14, 2021 19:31:43 GMT
Agree with a lot of what you say but disagree with others. Definitely not just in terms of where your criticising Britain as a lot of that was justified. My main point with this thread is that I think a lot of criticism of Britain in WWII is unjustified because the fall of France/Italian dow meant that Britain was scrambling from crisis to crisis. There were definitely too many self-inflicted goals such as the intervention in Greece and the lack of commitment to coastal command because the RAF's bomber barons and Churchill's devotion to them. Then Japan proving drastically more dangerous than just about anyone expected and the additional crisis in the western Atlantic. The criticisms, I level, come from a post-mortem autopsy bias. I see human factors and lessons learned as applicable in a lot of the observations post facto, but then again, I have read documentation about what was known then, too. 1. I agree the collapse of France could not be foreseen. On the other hand, the failure of allied tactical aviation, especially based on the French lessons learned in the skies over Verdun, when the French were only able to stabilize the land campaign when they finally were able to overfly the German side of the front and perform reconnaissance and close air support to neutralize German assaults, should have taught both the French and the British that air superiority was the most important aspect of the air ground campaign. 2. Coastal Command is inexcusable. I mentioned USN and Marine experience in trying to neutralize German submarine pens and Zeppelin sheds? The other bunch bombing was the Royal Navy. 3. The Greek campaign was inexcusable. Wavell told Churchill... that he had the Italians on the ropes and just needed one more push. But Churchill, the romantic, did not see that italian Libya in British hands would mean Malta was sustainable at far less cost than it would eventually require and the Mediterranean would be closed to the Axis. The British would be at a loss until they could bring along an ally to exploit the victory, but then that is the point. They would have had the resources to secure the Indian Ocean and the added resources to ramp up an air campaign. They might have even been able to mount Sicily on their own? 4. The Japanese were underestimated by Pound, Phillips, and Churchill. On the other side, Kimmel and Stark and Short because of their racism were similarly myopic. The ones who were not; were Percival, Brooke Popham, Slim (No-one listened.), Richardson, King, Claude Bloch, MacArthur (He said the Japanese were the most efficient users of incompetent or poorly trained infantry he had ever seen.), and especially Claire Chennault who was reading the reports that American volunteer aviators from 1938 onward wrote him about the kinds of air warriors and type of air warfare the Japanese threw at the ROCAF. Here the American empire is going to face those problems with of course some differences. Imperial overstretch is going to be less as the home base is going to be a lot stronger although attitudes towards non-whites could cause issues in many areas about using especially African but also other forces. There will be some calls for scrapping much of the empire but that's not going to be that practical in the midst of a world war - although I think we would need to assume that the existence of the empire would make the US leadership political and military a good bit more aware of details about much of the undeveloped world. 5. Ultimately, when it comes to cultural arrogance and racism, the British were just as hobbled as the Americans. The Americans did not invent the term "wog" which is just as despicable and indicative as the utterly unacceptable American equivalent, "gook". The British treated the Malays abominably. India was ... well, part of the misrule was that the British thought the Indians were "inferior". Sure the British used Indian army formations as cannon fodder, but that is the other criticism. Spending your troops as file fillers is not good human resources practice in the military sense. The Americans, at least, put African American troops to work making roads and handling logistics and aboard USN ships, while the mess stewards were mistreated, they were still part of the fire fighting and damage control parties and they had their assigned gun stations when the bugles blared "general quarters". And as the USAAF demonstrated, fighter pilots know no skin color. 6. The Americans knew their empire. Filipinos were expected to fight hard and they did. The racism in the FEAA did not extend to the Philippine Scouts as it did to the colonial Malay Settlement "territorials" as exhibited by the British army. . However with their less interest in trade protection how are they going to handle the Atlantic battle, especially since as well they have no fast capital ships until the N Carolina's are commissioned in spring/summer 41? [Which might be delayed a little in TTL depending on the 'Battle of America'. Longer ranged a/c and the fact they don't have an independent air-force means they can use air power more, along with greater production capacity but the N Atlantic is often rough and storm, restricting both visibility and the ability of CVs to operate a/c so it's not a golden bullet. Especially not until they get airbourne radar and there's less incentive for a Tizard Mission - at least going the same way here - so that could be later for the US.
7. An independent air force allows for an independent air mission. The USAAC was already committed to bombing Germany. There is solid planning in their air warfare planning documents from 1937 onward. The B-17 was partially intended to carry out this campaign and the chosen flyoff platform was the Eastern UK.. Now the Regular Army was more battlefield interdiction mission oriented. They assumed they would be fighting in France at some moment and they wanted to bomb the Ruhr bridges. Hence all those B-25s, A-20s, B-26s, A-26s and other 2 engined specials that the Germans will come to hate. 8. The Battle of the Atlantic is going to have to be fought with an air eye on the National Defense Act of 1920. I presume that the Americans get to play in France in WWI for 4 years in this timeline and that Washington and New York have been Zeppelinned and Gothaed and that the Battle of the Atlantic Round 1 has happened. I also assume it is the USN that has to fight in the North Sea, so we can expect that the post war USN is going to have a vastly different Mahanic experience to the RN and exercise a more air-minded attitude toward reconnaissance. Add the fleet problems to the interwar years and I expect a lot of activity in the Mediterranean Sea, the North Sea, and the South China Sea as Green, Black and Orange are simulated as the Op-foes. Admiral Henry Yarnell (Not Lumley Lyster) will bomb New London or maybe Norfolk as a step exercise and proof of concept to wipe out the Regia Marina at Taranto. 9. I cannot begin to imagine how Georgie Patton or Adna Chaffee will manage army maneuvers in Egypt or what Wedemeyer is doing in Burma, but I think the Americans will be doing their "oil wars" in lieu of the Banana Wars and tac-air and accompanying motorized formations may be seen in Iraq and possibly the Saudi Peninsula. If Matador is drawn up, it will be implemented and I think a Thai war is in the offing much as Bolivia, Columbia, Guatemala, Ecuador, and Panama and Nicaragua happened. 10. Fast battleships were not used in the North Atlantic to escort convoys. Not even the RN did that silly thing. As for the Bismarck and the pocket battleships, remember USS San Francisco? It kind of wrecked the Hiei. That was what it was designed to do. If one needed to kil the Germans hiding their battleships out at Norwegian fjords, then one does not send the USS Washington in. One sends Liberators and 2,500 kg bombs to carpet bomb an anchorage. 11. Ah... make the air service part of the USN. See video. 12. I think I will leave that headache for you. But as for the bomber barons, they were not exactly wrong, the technology was not ready yet. 13. The British army, like the American army, has to subordinate its artillery to the commander of the maneuver formation. The clique who declared themselves to be the only practitioners of indirect fire will need to be taken to the wood shed to be taught "We are all one army.", and everyone from Henry Private to General Obnoxious will need to learn the tape and grid system for calling fires off a map via the radio. The tank crews will need to be taught that they are as much artillerymen as they are tankers. The infantry have to learn that the tanks are not there to guard them. It is the other way around. 14. The British need to clarify their armored doctrine. The infantry tank or the cruiser. Pick one and build combined arms around it. If it is the cruiser, it is RADIO, guns, mobility, endurance, maintenance and protection. If it is infantry, then t is RADIO, guns, protection, endurance, maintenance and mobility. I had to modify that one a bit. For example, MacArthur will be in Singapore and Percival will screw up the Philippine Islands. Tom Phillips screws up in the South China Sea and Thomas Hart does better in the Gulf of Siam. Next we will speculate on differences in this ATL kit? |
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stevep
Fleet admiral
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Post by stevep on Dec 15, 2021 20:35:50 GMT
Agree with a lot of what you say but disagree with others. Definitely not just in terms of where your criticising Britain as a lot of that was justified. My main point with this thread is that I think a lot of criticism of Britain in WWII is unjustified because the fall of France/Italian dow meant that Britain was scrambling from crisis to crisis. There were definitely too many self-inflicted goals such as the intervention in Greece and the lack of commitment to coastal command because the RAF's bomber barons and Churchill's devotion to them. Then Japan proving drastically more dangerous than just about anyone expected and the additional crisis in the western Atlantic. The criticisms, I level, come from a post-mortem autopsy bias. I see human factors and lessons learned as applicable in a lot of the observations post facto, but then again, I have read documentation about what was known then, too. 1. I agree the collapse of France could not be foreseen. On the other hand, the failure of allied tactical aviation, especially based on the French lessons learned in the skies over Verdun, when the French were only able to stabilize the land campaign when they finally were able to overfly the German side of the front and perform reconnaissance and close air support to neutralize German assaults, should have taught both the French and the British that air superiority was the most important aspect of the air ground campaign. 2. Coastal Command is inexcusable. I mentioned USN and Marine experience in trying to neutralize German submarine pens and Zeppelin sheds? The other bunch bombing was the Royal Navy. 3. The Greek campaign was inexcusable. Wavell told Churchill... that he had the Italians on the ropes and just needed one more push. But Churchill, the romantic, did not see that italian Libya in British hands would mean Malta was sustainable at far less cost than it would eventually require and the Mediterranean would be closed to the Axis. The British would be at a loss until they could bring along an ally to exploit the victory, but then that is the point. They would have had the resources to secure the Indian Ocean and the added resources to ramp up an air campaign. They might have even been able to mount Sicily on their own? 4. The Japanese were underestimated by Pound, Phillips, and Churchill. On the other side, Kimmel and Stark and Short because of their racism were similarly myopic. The ones who were not; were Percival, Brooke Popham, Slim (No-one listened.), Richardson, King, Claude Bloch, MacArthur (He said the Japanese were the most efficient users of incompetent or poorly trained infantry he had ever seen.), and especially Claire Chennault who was reading the reports that American volunteer aviators from 1938 onward wrote him about the kinds of air warriors and type of air warfare the Japanese threw at the ROCAF. Here the American empire is going to face those problems with of course some differences. Imperial overstretch is going to be less as the home base is going to be a lot stronger although attitudes towards non-whites could cause issues in many areas about using especially African but also other forces. There will be some calls for scrapping much of the empire but that's not going to be that practical in the midst of a world war - although I think we would need to assume that the existence of the empire would make the US leadership political and military a good bit more aware of details about much of the undeveloped world. 5. Ultimately, when it comes to cultural arrogance and racism, the British were just as hobbled as the Americans. The Americans did not invent the term "wog" which is just as despicable and indicative as the utterly unacceptable American equivalent, "gook". The British treated the Malays abominably. India was ... well, part of the misrule was that the British thought the Indians were "inferior". Sure the British used Indian army formations as cannon fodder, but that is the other criticism. Spending your troops as file fillers is not good human resources practice in the military sense. The Americans, at least, put African American troops to work making roads and handling logistics and aboard USN ships, while the mess stewards were mistreated, they were still part of the fire fighting and damage control parties and they had their assigned gun stations when the bugles blared "general quarters". And as the USAAF demonstrated, fighter pilots know no skin color. 6. The Americans knew their empire. Filipinos were expected to fight hard and they did. The racism in the FEAA did not extend to the Philippine Scouts as it did to the colonial Malay Settlement "territorials" as exhibited by the British army. . However with their less interest in trade protection how are they going to handle the Atlantic battle, especially since as well they have no fast capital ships until the N Carolina's are commissioned in spring/summer 41? [Which might be delayed a little in TTL depending on the 'Battle of America'. Longer ranged a/c and the fact they don't have an independent air-force means they can use air power more, along with greater production capacity but the N Atlantic is often rough and storm, restricting both visibility and the ability of CVs to operate a/c so it's not a golden bullet. Especially not until they get airbourne radar and there's less incentive for a Tizard Mission - at least going the same way here - so that could be later for the US.
7. An independent air force allows for an independent air mission. The USAAC was already committed to bombing Germany. There is solid planning in their air warfare planning documents from 1937 onward. The B-17 was partially intended to carry out this campaign and the chosen flyoff platform was the Eastern UK.. Now the Regular Army was more battlefield interdiction mission oriented. They assumed they would be fighting in France at some moment and they wanted to bomb the Ruhr bridges. Hence all those B-25s, A-20s, B-26s, A-26s and other 2 engined specials that the Germans will come to hate. 8. The Battle of the Atlantic is going to have to be fought with an air eye on the National Defense Act of 1920. I presume that the Americans get to play in France in WWI for 4 years in this timeline and that Washington and New York have been Zeppelinned and Gothaed and that the Battle of the Atlantic Round 1 has happened. I also assume it is the USN that has to fight in the North Sea, so we can expect that the post war USN is going to have a vastly different Mahanic experience to the RN and exercise a more air-minded attitude toward reconnaissance. Add the fleet problems to the interwar years and I expect a lot of activity in the Mediterranean Sea, the North Sea, and the South China Sea as Green, Black and Orange are simulated as the Op-foes. Admiral Henry Yarnell (Not Lumley Lyster) will bomb New London or maybe Norfolk as a step exercise and proof of concept to wipe out the Regia Marina at Taranto. 9. I cannot begin to imagine how Georgie Patton or Adna Chaffee will manage army maneuvers in Egypt or what Wedemeyer is doing in Burma, but I think the Americans will be doing their "oil wars" in lieu of the Banana Wars and tac-air and accompanying motorized formations may be seen in Iraq and possibly the Saudi Peninsula. If Matador is drawn up, it will be implemented and I think a Thai war is in the offing much as Bolivia, Columbia, Guatemala, Ecuador, and Panama and Nicaragua happened. 10. Fast battleships were not used in the North Atlantic to escort convoys. Not even the RN did that silly thing. As for the Bismarck and the pocket battleships, remember USS San Francisco? It kind of wrecked the Hiei. That was what it was designed to do. If one needed to kil the Germans hiding their battleships out at Norwegian fjords, then one does not send the USS Washington in. One sends Liberators and 2,500 kg bombs to carpet bomb an anchorage. 11. Ah... make the air service part of the USN. See video. 12. I think I will leave that headache for you. But as for the bomber barons, they were not exactly wrong, the technology was not ready yet. 13. The British army, like the American army, has to subordinate its artillery to the commander of the maneuver formation. The clique who declared themselves to be the only practitioners of indirect fire will need to be taken to the wood shed to be taught "We are all one army.", and everyone from Henry Private to General Obnoxious will need to learn the tape and grid system for calling fires off a map via the radio. The tank crews will need to be taught that they are as much artillerymen as they are tankers. The infantry have to learn that the tanks are not there to guard them. It is the other way around. 14. The British need to clarify their armored doctrine. The infantry tank or the cruiser. Pick one and build combined arms around it. If it is the cruiser, it is RADIO, guns, mobility, endurance, maintenance and protection. If it is infantry, then t is RADIO, guns, protection, endurance, maintenance and mobility. I had to modify that one a bit. For example, MacArthur will be in Singapore and Percival will screw up the Philippine Islands. Tom Phillips screws up in the South China Sea and Thomas Hart does better in the Gulf of Siam. Next we will speculate on differences in this ATL kit?
Brief reply to your points. 1) Would the USAAF be in any better position in 1939/40 with their OTL forces and equipment?
2) Are you talking about WWI or WWII?? I would have assumed the latter but for the mention of Zeppelin? If so yes armies on both sides tried to bomb sub based but with no real effect. As I said the problem for Coastal Command was the strength of the bomber barons and their support by Churchill especially. There were people calling for the use of LRPA but they were ignored and many Liberators wasted over Germany.
3) Its debatable whether reaching Tripoli was logistically possible in 1940 but it would have been better that the attempt to support Greece. Part of the problem was the even earlier diversion of the 4th Indian Div to E Africa. However the US was also prone to its follies - such as the idea of landings in N France in 1942!! Or its double track approach in the Pacific - 3 track if you include operations in the Aleutians. Agree that as well as ending the drain in N Africa and greatly reducing the naval burden there clearing Libya early offers the opportunity to at least grab an island or two to possibly open up the Med for traffic and weaken the enemy.
4) There was widespread under-estimation of the Japanese in 1940-41 but the big problem for Britain was it was limited on what it could do given its commitments elsewhere. The US with a much greater resource base - having both its larger home one and a large empire - should do better but may be so fixated on an early return to the continent it could also foul up here. It also shouldn't be under the same economic pressure that Britain was.
5 & 6) Both nations were prone to bad racism at this period but at least Britain was willing - and hand long experience - to have imperial forces fight alongside their own troops. Not just as cannon fodder either as your suggesting. Its just that OTL UK had far more experience of using non-white forces whereas the US didn't so this could be an issue for the US. - On the 2nd point its a pity that between MacArthur and Washington the Filippino forces were so poorly equipped and trained. Didn't help that MacArthur didn't have enough confidence in his men that he lead them into an hopeless position - basically an early prison camp in Bataan.
7) Allows for an independent air mission but shouldn't blind it to other duties. As you mention the need of combined arms, which in this case extends across the services.
8) No we're not assuming that the US fought in France for 4 years in 1914-18. That would have resulted in a vastly different US and also of course far heavier losses. The idea of this scenario is how the UK and US of 1939 would fare facing the other's problems.
9) Its quite probable that TTL US would be more aggressive in areas such as the ME than Britain was OTL with a strong eye towards commercial gain but that would mean we have to assume uncertain changes prior to the start of the scenario.
10) Who said anything about using them as convoy escorts! I was thinking about how slow ships would have issues in terms of situations like Denmark Straits or trying to hunt down German forces off Norway, or generally after raiders at sea. If nothing else two 'pocket battleships' are already at sea when the war starts.
11) Will try and have a look at the video in the next few days.
12) I would argue the bomber barons were wrong because the technology wasn't there and because there were clearly higher priority issues - such as defence of Britain's supply lines which could have been secured far quicker with a fraction of the forces that were wasted over Germany.
13 & 14) Agree that Britain has a lot to learn, especially with changes in technology and resources. Think that the US will also have a fair amount to learn and here they will have to learn faster while Britain has the time to think about matters more before they have to commit. - One point with a stronger power fighting the Nazis from the start is that this could also be later than OTL.
Yes, assuming the attacks go in as OTL and defences aren't largely different both MacArthur and Percival will screw up. Percival will fight longer outside of the Bataan trap but may last less time within it - unless as OTL its a lower priority to the Japanese. Tom Phillips may screw up or, if facing overwhelming odds as Hart was he might decide to withdraw what he can to fight elsewhere. What kind of force Z will the US be able and willing to send to Malaya in Dec 41. Which in large part will depend on how things go between Sep 39 and then.
15) As I said above I'm assuming the kits are as OTL for the two nations up to 1-9-39 and the start of the war. Of course kits, doctrines etc will change in response to events and how the assorted figures react to them.
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miletus12
Squadron vice admiral
To get yourself lost, just follow the signs.
Posts: 7,470
Likes: 4,295
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Post by miletus12 on Dec 15, 2021 21:56:00 GMT
The criticisms, I level, come from a post-mortem autopsy bias. I see human factors and lessons learned as applicable in a lot of the observations post facto, but then again, I have read documentation about what was known then, too. 1. I agree the collapse of France could not be foreseen. On the other hand, the failure of allied tactical aviation, especially based on the French lessons learned in the skies over Verdun, when the French were only able to stabilize the land campaign when they finally were able to overfly the German side of the front and perform reconnaissance and close air support to neutralize German assaults, should have taught both the French and the British that air superiority was the most important aspect of the air ground campaign. 2. Coastal Command is inexcusable. I mentioned USN and Marine experience in trying to neutralize German submarine pens and Zeppelin sheds? The other bunch bombing was the Royal Navy. 3. The Greek campaign was inexcusable. Wavell told Churchill... that he had the Italians on the ropes and just needed one more push. But Churchill, the romantic, did not see that italian Libya in British hands would mean Malta was sustainable at far less cost than it would eventually require and the Mediterranean would be closed to the Axis. The British would be at a loss until they could bring along an ally to exploit the victory, but then that is the point. They would have had the resources to secure the Indian Ocean and the added resources to ramp up an air campaign. They might have even been able to mount Sicily on their own? 4. The Japanese were underestimated by Pound, Phillips, and Churchill. On the other side, Kimmel and Stark and Short because of their racism were similarly myopic. The ones who were not; were Percival, Brooke Popham, Slim (No-one listened.), Richardson, King, Claude Bloch, MacArthur (He said the Japanese were the most efficient users of incompetent or poorly trained infantry he had ever seen.), and especially Claire Chennault who was reading the reports that American volunteer aviators from 1938 onward wrote him about the kinds of air warriors and type of air warfare the Japanese threw at the ROCAF. 5. Ultimately, when it comes to cultural arrogance and racism, the British were just as hobbled as the Americans. The Americans did not invent the term "wog" which is just as despicable and indicative as the utterly unacceptable American equivalent, "gook". The British treated the Malays abominably. India was ... well, part of the misrule was that the British thought the Indians were "inferior". Sure the British used Indian army formations as cannon fodder, but that is the other criticism. Spending your troops as file fillers is not good human resources practice in the military sense. The Americans, at least, put African American troops to work making roads and handling logistics and aboard USN ships, while the mess stewards were mistreated, they were still part of the fire fighting and damage control parties and they had their assigned gun stations when the bugles blared "general quarters". And as the USAAF demonstrated, fighter pilots know no skin color. 6. The Americans knew their empire. Filipinos were expected to fight hard and they did. The racism in the FEAA did not extend to the Philippine Scouts as it did to the colonial Malay Settlement "territorials" as exhibited by the British army. . 7. An independent air force allows for an independent air mission. The USAAC was already committed to bombing Germany. There is solid planning in their air warfare planning documents from 1937 onward. The B-17 was partially intended to carry out this campaign and the chosen flyoff platform was the Eastern UK.. Now the Regular Army was more battlefield interdiction mission oriented. They assumed they would be fighting in France at some moment and they wanted to bomb the Ruhr bridges. Hence all those B-25s, A-20s, B-26s, A-26s and other 2 engined specials that the Germans will come to hate. 8. The Battle of the Atlantic is going to have to be fought with an air eye on the National Defense Act of 1920. I presume that the Americans get to play in France in WWI for 4 years in this timeline and that Washington and New York have been Zeppelinned and Gothaed and that the Battle of the Atlantic Round 1 has happened. I also assume it is the USN that has to fight in the North Sea, so we can expect that the post war USN is going to have a vastly different Mahanic experience to the RN and exercise a more air-minded attitude toward reconnaissance. Add the fleet problems to the interwar years and I expect a lot of activity in the Mediterranean Sea, the North Sea, and the South China Sea as Green, Black and Orange are simulated as the Op-foes. Admiral Henry Yarnell (Not Lumley Lyster) will bomb New London or maybe Norfolk as a step exercise and proof of concept to wipe out the Regia Marina at Taranto. 9. I cannot begin to imagine how Georgie Patton or Adna Chaffee will manage army maneuvers in Egypt or what Wedemeyer is doing in Burma, but I think the Americans will be doing their "oil wars" in lieu of the Banana Wars and tac-air and accompanying motorized formations may be seen in Iraq and possibly the Saudi Peninsula. If Matador is drawn up, it will be implemented and I think a Thai war is in the offing much as Bolivia, Columbia, Guatemala, Ecuador, and Panama and Nicaragua happened. 10. Fast battleships were not used in the North Atlantic to escort convoys. Not even the RN did that silly thing. As for the Bismarck and the pocket battleships, remember USS San Francisco? It kind of wrecked the Hiei. That was what it was designed to do. If one needed to kil the Germans hiding their battleships out at Norwegian fjords, then one does not send the USS Washington in. One sends Liberators and 2,500 kg bombs to carpet bomb an anchorage. 11. Ah... make the air service part of the USN. See video. 12. I think I will leave that headache for you. But as for the bomber barons, they were not exactly wrong, the technology was not ready yet. 13. The British army, like the American army, has to subordinate its artillery to the commander of the maneuver formation. The clique who declared themselves to be the only practitioners of indirect fire will need to be taken to the wood shed to be taught "We are all one army.", and everyone from Henry Private to General Obnoxious will need to learn the tape and grid system for calling fires off a map via the radio. The tank crews will need to be taught that they are as much artillerymen as they are tankers. The infantry have to learn that the tanks are not there to guard them. It is the other way around. 14. The British need to clarify their armored doctrine. The infantry tank or the cruiser. Pick one and build combined arms around it. If it is the cruiser, it is RADIO, guns, mobility, endurance, maintenance and protection. If it is infantry, then t is RADIO, guns, protection, endurance, maintenance and mobility. I had to modify that one a bit. For example, MacArthur will be in Singapore and Percival will screw up the Philippine Islands. Tom Phillips screws up in the South China Sea and Thomas Hart does better in the Gulf of Siam. Next we will speculate on differences in this ATL kit?
Yes. The WWI experience with being city bombed would have impelled an earlier and more energetic commitment to the B-17 and to radar. In addition, there is a decent chance that the P-39 might not have been hobbled as a target defense interceptor, or the P-38 not starved of funding to develop as an area interceptor. The P-35 => P-47 development would have seen more emphasis. I am not convinced that Curtiss would still not played USAAC politics and screwed up US aircraft procurement in a nascent USAF, but that should not affect Douglas, Grumman, Boeing, Vought, Martin or Consolidated who are either building bombers or navy fighters and seaplanes. My real concern here is aero-engines. There were two big players, Wright (worthless) and Pratt and Whitney, but they were radial makers. There was GM (Allisons) with a botched supercharger and aspiration. If the hyper-program is funded more robustly then Lycoming comes in as a player earlier and US turkeys, like the P-36 or the P-37 might have done better earlier. London was bombed in WWI. Presumably Washington and New York take London's place. As for the sub pens and Zepp hangers... 50% effective by WWI standards is rather good. I am not sure Marshall was wrong "if" the Americans had the 40 divisions and sea lift necessary. It was King, not the British, who nixed the idea. "We can support Torch. We cannot support Sledgehammer".
As for the Pacific War. We will have to disagree here. I am of the opinion that the British in the Pacific demonstrated in early operations that they misused the far greater assets and forces they did have in place; much worse than the much weaker Americans in the Western Pacific; they collapsed much faster and therefore the criticisms of how the Americans conducted the Pacific War recovery, at least from post-war British military scholarship is filled with envy and downright lies invented to save several reputations including Mountbattan, Layton and especially Somerville and the UTTERLY incompetent FECB.
The US could have done more in 1940, should have done more in 1940. But then one has to remember that the things that needed doing were long lead programs that should have started in 1935. It would take considerable arm twisting in Congress to arrange base training and material improvements and a 20% increase in military funding to match what the British historically did.
War plan ORANGE (1938) and Army-Op 38 annex actually envisioned a Bataan garrison defense. The reason was simple. The Bataan peninsula denies Manila Bay as an anchorage. It allows a limited garrison of 40,000 troops to use the mountainous and jungle terrain in a series of delay lines against an enemy field army of equal or superior size, but with the enemy advantage of SLOCs to resupply, to pin that enemy army in place for up to 6 months as long as the ammunition and food holds out in a prolonged bloody and expensive siege that would delay and discombobulate enemy moves elsewhere. It worked exactly as intended. MacArthur did not draw up that plan. Eisenhower did. What MacArthur did was ignore the supply stockpile part of the plan. He scattered the food and ammunition forward on the Lingayen plain and let the Japanese under Homma take it. Hence the drunkard, Wainwright, was short of the wherewithal to fight the campaign as intended. Yamashita and his Malay campaign veterans, and an entire train of siege artillery had to be shipped in about February 1942 to defeat the Filipinos and the Americans. That diverted 300,000 tonnes of shipping and threw off Japanese timetables for New Guinea by those six months. Note that word "Filipinos". Those were the majority of troops who fought on Bataan. They bought the Australians and the Americans time for Kokoda Track and Coral Sea. How did the British Indian units do in Burma at the same time?
That is the RAF. Take a look at the USAF in Korea. How-so? If the Americans change positions with the British, then that means the geography drives the history.
See previous comment and how the Americans have behaved in the Middle East. Lots of wars.
How did the Americans handle the Denmark Strait? They blocked it with Standards backed by shore based air. 1941 onward. It apparently worked. The Germans did not try. I recommend the 8 Bells series, particularly the ones that cover Dogger Bank and the Falkland Islands War. It gives a more balanced objective view to naval history.
By 1945, it was.
Immediate issues have to be handled, but one needs to maintain synergistic or additive effects. Attacks on oil facilities and a transportation plan (1944) showed solid results. Tying down the enemy air force in homeland defense, which night bombing did not do, keeps the Germans off the Red Army's neck in 1943-1944. Also that air campaign allowed Neptune / Overlord.
The Americans tried to learn and Kasserine still happened. I think Marshall was correct. One has to fight and interact with the enemy and learn from one's own and their mistakes in battle. Parts of the operational art cannot be simulated. Since the British, despite Montgomery's best efforts, repeated their North Africa mistakes in France 1944 (Goodwood and Market Garden) and the Americans did not, one has to ask why?
29 submarines. Hopefully with working torpedoes this time. It is what Hart did off Lingayen Gulf.
I predict Percival will panic and not adopt the war-plan required. Beaten in 30 days, especially as he will misuse the bulk of his indigenous troops. The Filipinos will not fight for a coward or a racist bastard. MacArthur? He was neither. And Matador is exactly the kind of nuttery in his whackjob playbook (Inchon). It actually could work with that publicity hog and clown in charge. He would bowl Washington over and force the issue.
Better in the Atlantic, and maybe worse in the Pacific. Wedemeyer, however, in Burma means the Burma Road holds and the Japanese are SCREWED.
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stevep
Fleet admiral
Posts: 24,835
Likes: 13,224
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Post by stevep on Dec 16, 2021 15:37:32 GMT
Yes. The WWI experience with being city bombed would have impelled an earlier and more energetic commitment to the B-17 and to radar. In addition, there is a decent chance that the P-39 might not have been hobbled as a target defense interceptor, or the P-38 not starved of funding to develop as an area interceptor. The P-35 => P-47 development would have seen more emphasis. I am not convinced that Curtiss would still not played USAAC politics and screwed up US aircraft procurement in a nascent USAF, but that should not affect Douglas, Grumman, Boeing, Vought, Martin or Consolidated who are either building bombers or navy fighters and seaplanes. My real concern here is aero-engines. There were two big players, Wright (worthless) and Pratt and Whitney, but they were radial makers. There was GM (Allisons) with a botched supercharger and aspiration. If the hyper-program is funded more robustly then Lycoming comes in as a player earlier and US turkeys, like the P-36 or the P-37 might have done better earlier. London was bombed in WWI. Presumably Washington and New York take London's place. As for the sub pens and Zepp hangers... 50% effective by WWI standards is rather good. I am not sure Marshall was wrong "if" the Americans had the 40 divisions and sea lift necessary. It was King, not the British, who nixed the idea. "We can support Torch. We cannot support Sledgehammer".
As for the Pacific War. We will have to disagree here. I am of the opinion that the British in the Pacific demonstrated in early operations that they misused the far greater assets and forces they did have in place; much worse than the much weaker Americans in the Western Pacific; they collapsed much faster and therefore the criticisms of how the Americans conducted the Pacific War recovery, at least from post-war British military scholarship is filled with envy and downright lies invented to save several reputations including Mountbattan, Layton and especially Somerville and the UTTERLY incompetent FECB.
The US could have done more in 1940, should have done more in 1940. But then one has to remember that the things that needed doing were long lead programs that should have started in 1935. It would take considerable arm twisting in Congress to arrange base training and material improvements and a 20% increase in military funding to match what the British historically did.
War plan ORANGE (1938) and Army-Op 38 annex actually envisioned a Bataan garrison defense. The reason was simple. The Bataan peninsula denies Manila Bay as an anchorage. It allows a limited garrison of 40,000 troops to use the mountainous and jungle terrain in a series of delay lines against an enemy field army of equal or superior size, but with the enemy advantage of SLOCs to resupply, to pin that enemy army in place for up to 6 months as long as the ammunition and food holds out in a prolonged bloody and expensive siege that would delay and discombobulate enemy moves elsewhere. It worked exactly as intended. MacArthur did not draw up that plan. Eisenhower did. What MacArthur did was ignore the supply stockpile part of the plan. He scattered the food and ammunition forward on the Lingayen plain and let the Japanese under Homma take it. Hence the drunkard, Wainwright, was short of the wherewithal to fight the campaign as intended. Yamashita and his Malay campaign veterans, and an entire train of siege artillery had to be shipped in about February 1942 to defeat the Filipinos and the Americans. That diverted 300,000 tonnes of shipping and threw off Japanese timetables for New Guinea by those six months. Note that word "Filipinos". Those were the majority of troops who fought on Bataan. They bought the Australians and the Americans time for Kokoda Track and Coral Sea. How did the British Indian units do in Burma at the same time?
That is the RAF. Take a look at the USAF in Korea. How-so? If the Americans change positions with the British, then that means the geography drives the history.
See previous comment and how the Americans have behaved in the Middle East. Lots of wars.
How did the Americans handle the Denmark Strait? They blocked it with Standards backed by shore based air. 1941 onward. It apparently worked. The Germans did not try. I recommend the 8 Bells series, particularly the ones that cover Dogger Bank and the Falkland Islands War. It gives a more balanced objective view to naval history.
By 1945, it was.
Immediate issues have to be handled, but one needs to maintain synergistic or additive effects. Attacks on oil facilities and a transportation plan (1944) showed solid results. Tying down the enemy air force in homeland defense, which night bombing did not do, keeps the Germans off the Red Army's neck in 1943-1944. Also that air campaign allowed Neptune / Overlord.
The Americans tried to learn and Kasserine still happened. I think Marshall was correct. One has to fight and interact with the enemy and learn from one's own and their mistakes in battle. Parts of the operational art cannot be simulated. Since the British, despite Montgomery's best efforts, repeated their North Africa mistakes in France 1944 (Goodwood and Market Garden) and the Americans did not, one has to ask why?
29 submarines. Hopefully with working torpedoes this time. It is what Hart did off Lingayen Gulf.
I predict Percival will panic and not adopt the war-plan required. Beaten in 30 days, especially as he will misuse the bulk of his indigenous troops. The Filipinos will not fight for a coward or a racist bastard. MacArthur? He was neither. And Matador is exactly the kind of nuttery in his whackjob playbook (Inchon). It actually could work with that publicity hog and clown in charge. He would bowl Washington over and force the issue.
Better in the Atlantic, and maybe worse in the Pacific. Wedemeyer, however, in Burma means the Burma Road holds and the Japanese are SCREWED.
Damn it. Seems to be something wrong with the quoting as its only showing your last statements and also allocating them to me! ?? You keep avoiding what I'm saying however. The question of the thread is what the US in Britain's position would have done different - for better or worse - and vice versa, not what they might have done better with a totally different set up. Responding to some of your points below.
Ah you are talking about WWI. Thanks for qualifying.
The problem being of course that he didn't have those units and the necessary sea lift. Opposing this was one of the decisions of Churchill I agree with. Mind you I suspect he would have had mass resignations from the British military if he had agreed to such a plan.
Given that Britain in Malaya had, with last minute reinforcements - which apparently was insisted on by Canberra not Churchill - had a similar number of forces as the US in the Philippines and that the US/Filipino lasted longer simply because they avoided fighting, gibing the Japanese everything they wanted. Both powers and their leaders cocked up majorly in those early months.
The problem was that the Japanese weren't interested in Manila harbour. They wanted to deny the US use of the Philippines harbours and airfields, which could have been used to strangle their own supply lines. Plus gain those assets themselves. With the exception of Manila harbour the US plan gave them that largely without fighting. The Japanese, having secured their initial aims did move units back from elsewhere to finish off the isolated garrison, although arguably they could simply have continued starving them out and they would have been forced to surrender little if any latter than OTL.
In answer to your last point the Indian forces, which were actually fighting the Japanese, were doing pretty well in Burma despite being outnumbered and facing massive air inferiority until a cock-up isolated a sizeable force of the defenders on the wrong side of a river. 
Not from 41 onward. From 42 onward they played a part. Britain probably made an error giving up Iceland to the US as it denied them assets there and as I pointed out the bomber barons delayed the deployment of air power in the gap. Germany didn't try again after Bismarck was sunk and withdrew the twins from Brittany but that was more because of BC's campaign against them there made the situation untenable. Which was the sort of use heavy bombers should have been used for until the necessary technology and resources were there for more successful strategic operations. Tirpitz could have gone out before the US was dragged into the war but it didn't.
By 45 it was way too late. More importantly the resources committed to the strategic bombing campaign not only suffered heavy losses in themselves but denied assets for far more important tasks. If a fraction of those resources had been committed to the N Atlantic then that battle could have been won a lot earlier and with much less costs. Especially since each merchant saved not only saved its cargo and crew but also the cargoes those ships could have carried on later missions.
Did they learn? They were taken by surprise again in the Ardennes and also made a mess of things in the Black forest, at least until the German commander in a fit of stupidity decided to counter attack, largely sacrificing his forces for further defence. Also their performance on Omaha Beach and at Anzio were somewhat lacking.
Do you mean the plan to withdraw the entire force into Bataan? Assuming that is the British plan in this scenario since this is after the POD so to speak. They might make the same assumption about Japanese intentions and as such be unable to put up any more fight than MacArthur did. The Filipinos were willing to fight for MacArthur so a braver man like Percival should have no problem. He was widely respected for his decision to go into captivity with his men and his work to support them as much possibly during and after the war. MacArthur apparently had no more bitter critics than the men - and their families - he left in Bataan.
MacArthur might ignore his superiors and trigger a war with Thailand, which would give the Japanese an excuse for their own intervention but would he also lose the bulk of his airforce almost immediately, especially if its a markedly more powerful force than the largely obsolete forces in Malaya OTL?
That depends on whether the OTL error was made, what forces the US had committed to Burma and whether they can avoid alienating the locals, including the Indians who made up the bulk of the defenders. This might be difficult given their general lack of experience of commanding non-white forces. If Burma is held, although assuming that pearl and force Z events still occur Japanese control of the air and sea would make it difficult to hold for long once Malaya and the DEI fall.
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miletus12
Squadron vice admiral
To get yourself lost, just follow the signs.
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Post by miletus12 on Dec 17, 2021 8:09:43 GMT
Damn it. Seems to be something wrong with the quoting as its only showing your last statements and also allocating them to me! ?? You keep avoiding what I'm saying however. The question of the thread is what the US in Britain's position would have done different - for better or worse - and vice versa, not what they might have done better with a totally different set up. Responding to some of your points below. Rats.... Formatting error? I have been interspersing commentary on examples of what the US did historically, in response to problems it encountered that were parallel to the types of problems that the British encountered. One thing I pointed out, was that the Americans war-gamed a lot more than the British did at the operational art level. One example is the annual fleet problem. The British Royal Navy held gunnery exercises and tactical evolutions but they did not simulate naval war as the Americans did against Orange and Black. Some twenty joint armky-navy wargames were held between 1922 and 1939 that played out mock full scale wars that simulated Japanese attacks on the US "empire" in the Pacific or an unnamed European country seeking presence in US areas of interest in the Caribbean, central America or South America. the unnamed European country was usually Germany afte3r it supported a fascist coup. The target countries regarded as vulnerable were Venezuela, or Argentina. Ah you are talking about WWI. Thanks for qualifying.
I was unclear? My apologies. I thought the reference to Zeppelins and Gothas would have been plain. It was not. But as a further clarification, the final American offensives in the overall 100 days campaign were combined arms efforts, with Mitchell directing army air service light bombers and fighters in air actions to bomb and machine gun German trenches, and harass the Germans behind their front lines to hinder their reinforcements and efforts at reconnaissance. The American air power was supposed to close air support and battlefield interdict German troop concentrations and supply efforts behind the trenches, while the tanks (FT-17s supplied by the French.), advanced and passed the infantry through the German wire and past the German outpost line and through their artillery and machine gun beaten zone to allow the doughboys to work the Germans over with aimed rifle fire and the bayonet. Still could not get away from the Pershing idiocies despite George Marshall, George Patton and Fox Connor planning to use combined arms to get through the no man's land. Presumably, if the war goes into 1919, Pershing will be fired and Hunter Liggett and the two Georges and Billy will figure out what the French have been trying to tell them. Send bullets, shells and air dropped explosives and not men. The problem being of course that he didn't have those units and the necessary sea lift. Opposing this was one of the decisions of Churchill I agree with. Mind you I suspect he would have had mass resignations from the British military if he had agreed to such a plan. I have read Sledgehammer. The "allied army" envisioned was about 20-25 divisions (10 American and the rest British), which were to land on the Cotentin peninsula, work its way south and fort up between the Loire and Seine rivers in Normandy and Brittany. As I understand the lunacy proposed, the allies would build a fortified enclave and try to draw off 20 to 30 German divisions and defends that lodgement until US reinforcements could be trained and equipped to come into the liberated enclave, breakout and liberate France and then drive east to take Berlin. It was supposed to last a year in the static phase and then the mobile phase would take anywhere from 1 to years to fight across France. It would have still been 1944 before the allied armies were at the Rhine. Now I ask me, what was Army Warplans smoking, when they drew that nonsense up? My guess is that the hashish must have been a spoiled batch. Given that Britain in Malaya had, with last minute reinforcements - which apparently was insisted on by Canberra not Churchill - had a similar number of forces as the US in the Philippines and that the US/Filipino lasted longer simply because they avoided fighting, gibing the Japanese everything they wanted. Both powers and their leaders cocked up majorly in those early months. US forces in the Philippine Islands, ground, air, and naval amounted to 155,000 men of which 85,000 of the troops were Filipinos. Percival had 100,000 troops when he packed it in. Some 40,000 more had been lost in the rout when his command ran for the supposed safety of Singapore. The Japanese never had more than 70,000 men in that campaign. The British forces surrendered; does not include air and naval personnel. Percival's command collapsed in less than 70 days. At sea the British lost an entire surface action group. The Japanese wiped the RAF out and took their airfields intact, including the air defense network system. Worse, the British gave up a first-class naval base with capital ship repair and maintenance facilities. The Japanese also captured British sonar and radar technology which the Americans will encounter during WATCHTOWER (Guadalcanal Japanese radar and the warning center was the system the Marines used to alert five at Henderson Field before they brought in their own gear.) and especially at the Battle of the Santa Cruz. Where did the Americans screw up in the Philippine Islands like that? The answer is... they did not give up in a rout. They wrecked their facilities as they retreated and when they finally surrendered, it was because they were out of ammunition and sustenance, they were out-numbered on the ground and in the air and they were besieged to the point of starvation. The Japanese had to bring in their best general and most of their heavy artillery to beat Wainwright. And he did not have a walkover, did Yamashita. Not from 41 onward. From 42 onward they played a part. Britain probably made an error giving up Iceland to the US as it denied them assets there and as I pointed out the bomber barons delayed the deployment of air power in the gap. Germany didn't try again after Bismarck was sunk and withdrew the twins from Brittany but that was more because of BC's campaign against them there made the situation untenable. Which was the sort of use heavy bombers should have been used for until the necessary technology and resources were there for more successful strategic operations. Tirpitz could have gone out before the US was dragged into the war but it didn't. The deployment of Task Force 1 of Atlantic Fleet was well before December 7, 1941. The Marines landed in Iceland in March 1941. Long before that happened, it was not the British who garrisoned the island. It was the Canadians. Tirpitz was commissioned February 1941. It had only 30 days free run? It takes at least six months to work a commissioned warship up into a ready to fight unit (HMS Prince of Wales example.). How is that the Royal Navy preventing Tirpitz from trying the Denmark Strait before the Americans slammed it shut? Yet again, after the Twins made it back to Germany and then Scharnhorst sortied to Norway (Channel Dash February 1942 and then August.), how does that look to the USN as to the capacity of the Royal Navy? Not too good. Hence USS Washington and USS Massachusetts show up as Anti-Tirpitz patrollers... in the North Sea. Until the sea lanes could be sanitized by cover groups and better ASW methods, the U-boats would persist to take an unacceptable % of allied shipping. See chart.  (Note the British admiralty comments on when US coastal defenses become "effective"? July 1942. Also notice the slaughter of allied shipping near Capetown South Africa? Drumbeat kind of pales into lesser significance?) and map.  Note the gaps the US CVE ASW groups have to close, which they will close by 1944. By 45 it was way too late. More importantly the resources committed to the strategic bombing campaign not only suffered heavy losses in themselves but denied assets for far more important tasks. If a fraction of those resources had been committed to the N Atlantic then that battle could have been won a lot earlier and with much less costs. Especially since each merchant saved not only saved its cargo and crew but also the cargoes those ships could have carried on later missions. By '44 the Luftwaffe had been attritted to the point where it was not able to contest the air. No effective bombing was possible until then. Once the Germans committed their night fighters to combat the USAAF, it finally became possible for the RAF to actually do something useful besides dehousing. Did they? According to the USSBS, the damage to German transportation and to their oil industry was a USAAF achievement in 1945. Better late than never. Did they learn? They were taken by surprise again in the Ardennes and also made a mess of things in the Black forest, at least until the German commander in a fit of stupidity decided to counter attack, largely sacrificing his forces for further defence. Also their performance on Omaha Beach and at Anzio were somewhat lacking. Of course they learned. The Americans held the Eisenborn Ridge, fought a delay at St. Vith and blew bridges and blocked roads before and behind the Germans (Peiper) in the Ardennes. They fought in a weather so cold that German veterans of Moscow '41 claimed it was the worst winter they experienced. I blame Bradley for not paying attention to his juniors and credit Patton and Montgomery for the successful results. As for the Hurtgen Forest, it was the worst terrain in the western front and the Germans still lost. Have you walked on Omaha Beach? Reminds me a lot of Salerno. The Americans cleared the bluffs in 24 hours against the best German troops and defenses present on the best defensive terrain. They did all right. Anzio was a mess, it was a Churchill inspired mess, and yet once again, the Germans lost when they should have pushed the ANGLO Americans into the sea. The British screwed up their half of the landing worse than the Americans did. Do you mean the plan to withdraw the entire force into Bataan? Assuming that is the British plan in this scenario since this is after the POD so to speak. They might make the same assumption about Japanese intentions and as such be unable to put up any more fight than MacArthur did. The Filipinos were willing to fight for MacArthur so a braver man like Percival should have no problem. He was widely respected for his decision to go into captivity with his men and his work to support them as much possibly during and after the war. MacArthur apparently had no more bitter critics than the men - and their families - he left in Bataan. The British under Slim would do better. The Americans under Courtney Hodges or Walter Krueger would do better. The assumption was MacArthur and Percival would switch places. Percival was a rotten racist and a moral coward. I know about his WWI physical heroics, but so what? MacArthur was just as physically brave. He was unusual in that he was without a degree of prejudice as to how he treated people. He treated his Chinese Filipino mistress, FDR, Eisenhower, the Australians *(Curtin and Blamey), the entire US Navy, Nimitz, the press, the British, (especially Mountbatten), and his own troops like they were his servants or extras in his grand stage production. The only ones who managed to put MacArthur on the back foot, were Kenney, his air force general and Truman (Korea). The Filipinos loved him, because he treated them like dirt, but then they saw he treated everybody that same way. No prejudices. MacArthur might ignore his superiors and trigger a war with Thailand, which would give the Japanese an excuse for their own intervention but would he also lose the bulk of his airforce almost immediately, especially if its a markedly more powerful force than the largely obsolete forces in Malaya OTL? B-17s can reach the Mekong Delta from the Kra Peninsula. The Japanese special attack force dies on their runways and USS Colorado and USS New Mexico get to go to work on the Japanese invasion convoys with air cover overhead that is friendly. That of course rests on the assumption that Louis Brereton does not screw up the air op for Matador, as he did at Clark Field and like he did everything else he touched in WWII. (Market Garden, he was the air commander.) That depends on whether the OTL error was made, what forces the US had committed to Burma and whether they can avoid alienating the locals, including the Indians who made up the bulk of the defenders. This might be difficult given their general lack of experience of commanding non-white forces. If Burma is held, although assuming that pearl and force Z events still occur Japanese control of the air and sea would make it difficult to hold for long once Malaya and the DEI fall.
The history in the CBI shows the Burmese fought for the Americans and tolerated the British. I am no fan of Stillwell, but his operations were sounder than the British until Slim took over that fluster cluck and sorted the 14th Army out. Might also remind one that Slim had to rely on the USAAF for his air logistics in region since the RAF in Burma was worthless. Nonwhite forces... 10th and 11th US Cavalry in the First Nations Wars. United States Colored Troops in the American Civil War. Spanish American War "Immunes" of the 7th Corps and of course the Filipino Scouts in the Filipino American War and the Moro Wars. The Americans had experience of 80 years commanding non-white ELITE combat troops. Navajo units for example in the Apache Wars, and again in WWII against the Japanese. It was Woodrow Wilson's administration that interrupted that practice and makes the myth of Americans not having experience with non-white troops a thing. Ever hear of the 442 Combat Regimwent or the Red Tails? That would be Mark Clark's Japanese troops, and the Tuskegee airmen. Those fighter pilots I mentioned who were non-white flew with the 15th Air Force. But that still does not answer what Americans would have done using this map.  1. Got to fight the Germans somewhere. 2. Got to fight the Italians somewhere. 3. Oil fuels everything. 4. Sea lines of communication need a major foreign base. (Aden) 5. Burma is the gateway to India. 6. If Aden is the western base in the Indian Ocean, then Singapore is the eastern base in the Indian ocean 7. There is an extinct volcanic harbor and anchorage and air complex called Rabaul. That is the guard station to the east coast of Australia and more important than one realizes. The nation that holds the Bismarcks and New Ireland and New Britain holds the Australasian gate. 8. Halifax is the gate to Canada. 9. The corner turn for the most secure route to India and the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea is the Cape of Good Hope. Might as well make it a major naval base. Geography drives military necessity. The ATL Americans have the Atlantic, Mediterranean and Indian Oceans to cover and a North Sea to defend. They need to slam the GIUK shut, and protect trade routes to Canada, South America, and India / Australia / New Zealand. Most of that problem is a seaplane and land based long ranged patrol bomber problem. Shore based anti-ship strike forces are necessary. The fleets at sea have to be balanced between trade protection and combat. In the North Sea, the forces can be supplemented by shore-based airpower. One sees those purple lines? Air coverage, assuming B-17s designed for anti-ship work. Fleets against the Germans: 4BB, 1BC, 2 CVs, 3CAs, 4CLs, 64 DDs, 12SS, 15 naval air wings. 2CV based. Fleets against the Italians: 4BB, 1BC, 2 CVs, 3CAs, 4CLs, 64 DDs, 12SS, 15 naval air wings. 2CV based. Fleets against the Japanese: 8BB, 2BC, 6 Cvs, 6CAs, 12CLs, 64 DDs, 100SS, 30 naval air wings, 6 CV based. Army units for France (500,000 men) 10 infantry and 3 armored divisions plus 10 tacair wings. Army units for Egypt. (100,000 men) 3 infantry and 1 armored division plus 5 tacair wings. Army units for Burma (100,000 men) 4 infantry divisions plus 10 tacair wings. Metro air force 10 bomber wings (240-300 heavy bombers) Metro air force 30 fighter wings (1800 fighters) Includes SCR 260 mobile radar defense network. That is prewar establishment. Note that 70% of these air-land forces are national guard units? |
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Dec 17, 2021 12:51:35 GMT
So in Sept 39 the US military had??
I'm not aware of any time the USN had BCs unless you count the Alaska's who arrived very late in the war. They definitely didn't have that many BBs or CV at that data and I wonder if they could get the National Guard in such numbers to deploy aboard or what their equipment levels were. Did the US actually have a radar system for detecting air attack in 1939 at all, let alone mobile units?
I think we might as well end it here.
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miletus12
Squadron vice admiral
To get yourself lost, just follow the signs.
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Post by miletus12 on Dec 17, 2021 19:22:33 GMT
Agree that the topic is played out.
One last note; the "battlecruisers" would be the Plan A cruiser "destroyers" proposed in 1935. The 1939 start strength is based on what would presumably be the American response to the French and Italian pull-out from the LNT talks. It is what the General Board wanted.
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