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UK was on the verge of defeat after the battle of Britain. Although it was a tactical win for them . If Hitler never invaded Russia. He would have mopped up the UK . Except Hitler looked at the Brits as being closely related to Germans. He never really wanted war with them...... He even had Rudolf Hess fly there to barter peace.....
UK was on the verge of defeat after the battle of Britain. Although it was a tactical win for them . If Hitler never invaded Russia. He would have mopped up the UK .
Germany would have had to spend years building up an invasion force that could take the UK. An opposed landing across the Channel took quite a bit of doing in 1944, and that was without the equivalent of the Royal Navy ready to spoil everyone's day.
Anyway, it's (almost) pointless to speculate about Hitler not moving East - his entire political philosophy was based on expanding Germany eastwards, so that the master race could rule over the Slavs.
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He even had Rudolf Hess fly there to barter peace.....
I am not sure Hitler's involvement in that quixotic plot is an established fact.
UK was on the verge of defeat after the battle of Britain. Although it was a tactical win for them . If Hitler never invaded Russia. He would have mopped up the UK . Except Hitler looked at the Brits as being closely related to Germans. He never really wanted war with them...... He even had Rudolf Hess fly there to barter peace.....
They actually played out the scenarios in relation to a possible German Invasion in 1974 at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst.
The German navy's relative weakness, combined with the Luftwaffe's lack of air supremacy, meant it was not able to prevent the Royal Navy from interfering with the planned Channel crossings. The Navy's destruction of the second invasion wave prevented resupply and reinforcement of the landed troops, as well the arrival of more artillery and tanks. This made the position of the initially successful invasion force untenable; it suffered further casualties during the attempted evacuation. Of the 90,000 German troops who landed only 15,400 returned to France. 33,000 were taken prisoner, 26,000 were killed in the fighting and 15,000 drowned in the English Channel. All six umpires deemed the invasion a resounding failure.
Germany would have had to spend years building up an invasion force that could take the UK. An opposed landing across the Channel took quite a bit of doing in 1944, and that was without the equivalent of the Royal Navy ready to spoil everyone's day.
Anyway, it's (almost) pointless to speculate about Hitler not moving East - his entire political philosophy was based on expanding Germany eastwards, so that the master race could rule over the Slavs.
The Royal Navy was over stretched. Hitlers U-Boat campaign was starting to pay off in choking off supplies to UK , however his lack of a Navy besides the Bismark was the major blowback. Hitler had the most modern air force in Europe. As I said before, he never wanted war with England. After Poland, england was forced to enter the war.
As for the east... Lebensraum was the ultimate goal, and even though the slavs were considered inferior to the German race, they still loved hitler over stalin.
My wife is Lithuanian, born and raised there until her teens.. When we visited a year ago or so. Her grandparents told us the Gemran army walked right through their farm when Kaunas was invaded. They said that they actually cheered the German forces on and gave them food because they were so happy that hitler drove out communism and Stalin from their lands......
Chamberlain only agreed to Munich because his military told him that Britain could not withstand a Nazi air assault at that time. A year later, after Poland, he was told that after a rapid military buildup, that Britain could withstand a Nazi air attack. So he kept his promise to Poland, and declared war on Germany. The German occupation of Poland was brutal, and the British government knew this.
The US military buildup started in 1939, the US had very little to offer at that time. After Japan invaded the Philippines, US soldiers were using WWI ammunition, that more often than not, did not even fire. It took time to build new factories.
Hitler had lost the war by late 1941, when he had failed to take Moscow or Leningrad. The Soviets produced more war material throughout the war than Germany did, even after the German invasion. Soviet mass production of the T34 tank gave the Russians tank dominance, starting with two tank armies committed to Stalingrad.
Allied air power killed a lot of civilians, but the armies on the ground won the war. Including the Canadian Army that landed on D-day.
I haven't seen any survey on the subject, but it wouldn't be at all surprising if well over half of Americans aren't at all aware that Russia played the major role in defeating Germany.
Something like 70% of German casualties were on the Eastern Front.
And the Russians paid a horrible price for that; 25+ million deaths.
I'd say that's debatable. Obviously, no naval commander is going to say he has more ships than needed, but if Home Fleet had been given Do-or-Die orders, I would not have cherished the idea of being on a German invasion barge.
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Hitler had the most modern air force in Europe.
Modern is good, but it didn't have the right capabilities. In the prewar years it had been conceived as a tactical air force, designed to support the Wehrmacht from improvised or occupied strips, moving with the advancing forces. Even during the Battle of Britain, the short operational range of German fighters was a problem. And the Ju87, the best anti-shipping weapon in the German arsenal, was proven to be simply unsuited if there were enemy fighters present.
German paratroopers were extremely well-trained as individual soldiers, but their tactics were, well - not up to the job. Imagine Crete on a greater scale. (I know Crete fell, but the airborne operations was such a mess, Hitler stopped using his paratroopers as paratroopers.)
Gaining a foothold is one thing. Sustaining the breakout is the hard bit.
As Brave New World points out, no one has professionally wargamed a successful German invasion of England under 1940 - 1941 conditions.
I'd say that's debatable. Obviously, no naval commander is going to say he has more ships than needed, but if Home Fleet had been given Do-or-Die orders, I would not have cherished the idea of being on a German invasion barge.
Modern is good, but it didn't have the right capabilities. In the prewar years it had been conceived as a tactical air force, designed to support the Wehrmacht from improvised or occupied strips, moving with the advancing forces. Even during the Battle of Britain, the short operational range of German fighters was a problem. And the Ju87, the best anti-shipping weapon in the German arsenal, was proven to be simply unsuited if there were enemy fighters present.
German paratroopers were extremely well-trained as individual soldiers, but their tactics were, well - not up to the job. Imagine Crete on a greater scale. (I know Crete fell, but the airborne operations was such a mess, Hitler stopped using his paratroopers as paratroopers.)
Gaining a foothold is one thing. Sustaining the breakout is the hard bit.
As Brave New World points out, no one has professionally wargamed a successful German invasion of England under 1940 - 1941 conditions.
Well when your entire strategy is to gain air superiority to suppress naval forces so you can launch an amphibious assault over 26 miles of sea in wooden boats and without any real armor support. You may want to rethink your strategy.
As others have pointed out, the discipline of Soviet troops as they entered central Europe was abysmal, but not as heinous as Hitler's troops in the USSR.
The Royal Navy was over stretched. Hitlers U-Boat campaign was starting to pay off in choking off supplies to UK , however his lack of a Navy besides the Bismark was the major blowback. Hitler had the most modern air force in Europe. As I said before, he never wanted war with England. After Poland, england was forced to enter the war.
As for the east... Lebensraum was the ultimate goal, and even though the slavs were considered inferior to the German race, they still loved hitler over stalin.
My wife is Lithuanian, born and raised there until her teens.. When we visited a year ago or so. Her grandparents told us the Gemran army walked right through their farm when Kaunas was invaded. They said that they actually cheered the German forces on and gave them food because they were so happy that hitler drove out communism and Stalin from their lands......
You can't be serious.
Lithuanians are not Slavic, they are Baltic.
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