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  • Originally posted by Toby View Post
    My money is on the Japanese, the Russians lack of winning anything against the Japanese thus far is hardly convincing and yeh I'm being polite.
    We examined this in another thread. The 1939 Battles of Khalkhin Gol showed just how inept the Japanese was, losing up to 80% of its invasion force to the Soviets. The Imperial Japanese Army was the best World War One Army in World War Two but that meant little to the men who wrote Deep Battle.

    Originally posted by Toby View Post
    China and India would consume the Russians and spit them out a bit like the German army attacking Russia in 41-43 We saw what happened in Afghanistan in 79-89
    This is Stalin we're talking about, on par with Alexander The Great and Genghis Khan, not even Hitler was up to his standards. Stalin built up his armies from Central Asian republics by grabbing their men and then threatening their families if they don't fight the Germans.
    Chimo

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    • Originally posted by WABs_OOE View Post
      We examined this in another thread. The 1939 Battles of Khalkhin Gol showed just how inept the Japanese was, losing up to 80% of its invasion force to the Soviets. The Imperial Japanese Army was the best World War One Army in World War Two but that meant little to the men who wrote Deep Battle.
      Are you Russian by any chance? ;-)

      This is Stalin we're talking about, on par with Alexander The Great and Genghis Khan, not even Hitler was up to his standards. Stalin built up his armies from Central Asian republics by grabbing their men and then threatening their families if they don't fight the Germans.
      Ah the old gangster stroke homicidal maniac routine...forgot to factor that one in ...Good point!

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      • Originally posted by Toby View Post
        Are you Russian by any chance? ;-)
        Worst. Canadian.
        Chimo

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        • Originally posted by WABs_OOE View Post
          Worst. Canadian.
          lol, Not been there, think I will though some day and see how the other part of N. America works...We'd have been knackered without the Canadians, Fact!

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          • OoE,

            Blitzkreig started to failed precisely because the Luftwaffe could not hit Soviet supply lines and with the numbers even more reduced,
            Luftwaffe wouldn't need to reach very far if the Russians are coming to them.

            What's stopping the British Indian Army from simply marching east?
            no way Churchill would risk India for North Africa. the only reason why anyone bothered to fight in North Africa at all was to protect the Suez and supply lines to India.

            besides, how would the supply situation work? and as far as i'm aware, the BIA was largely an infantry force anyways.
            There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

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            • Originally posted by astralis View Post
              well, the North Africa campaign for Germany would a walkover. No USSR fight means that Rommel actually gets resources worthy of a campaign, especially if Sea Lion goes to hell. Rommel could have double the men and material and it still wouldn't be even half of one wing of Barbarossa.
              If France stills falls in six weeks, would the UK still have most of it's equipment and men. No Poland no BEF fully established in Europe. All the same players. UK can still access and supply North Africa harder without Malta. Rommel is still going to be hampered by fuel and lift. No Poland no Romania no direct control of the fuel supply.

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              • Originally posted by Dazed View Post
                If France stills falls in six weeks, would the UK still have most of it's equipment and men. No Poland no BEF fully established in Europe. All the same players. UK can still access and supply North Africa harder without Malta. Rommel is still going to be hampered by fuel and lift. No Poland no Romania no direct control of the fuel supply.
                Yes. Rommel is still going to have problems getting his forces supplied. Port capacity, shipping & road/rail capacity in Nth Africa are still the same. And, as you say, Britain may well have more trained troops & especially more equipment. Plus it isn't sending large amounts to Russia via lend/lease. This likely means the faster demise of Italian East Africa too. which will free up resources & make it easier to supply forces in Egypt.

                Nth Africa will likely stalemate.
                sigpic

                Win nervously lose tragically - Reds C C

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                • Originally posted by WABs_OOE View Post
                  Blitzkreig started to failed precisely because the Luftwaffe could not hit Soviet supply lines and with the numbers even more reduced, German reccee would tentatively give the advantage to the Soviets which precisely is what Soviet doctrine, even pre-war calls for.
                  You can thank the RAF for that. In June 1940 the Luftwaffe had over 5000 aircraft fit for service. Even after the ehavy material losses on mainland Europe there was still a lot of meat on the bone. During the BoB the Luftwaffe dedicated 3 luftflottes totaling over 2500 aircraft. By June 1941 the Luftwaffe was only able to muster half that for the invasion of the USSR thanks in part to near 2000 losses in the BoB and another 3500 lost subduing the rest Western Europe. German industry could make good the material losses (barely) but not the pilots and aircrews. Without the BoB the Luftwaffe would have around 1500 more aircraft to use.

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                  • Originally posted by Toby View Post
                    My money is on the Japanese, the Russians lack of winning anything against the Japanese thus far is hardly convincing and yeh I'm being polite.
                    The Russians made a very serious mess of the Japanese at Khalkin Gol. That was a situation where the Japanese had considerably better fighters than the Russians and the heaviest Russian tanks were the T-26 & BT series. Even then the Japanese struggled to stop Russian tanks.

                    Flash forward to 1941 or 1942. Russia has a new generation of aircraft and tanks, better artillery and extensive combat experience in Finland. Japanese aircraft will have improved, but their tanks are still inferior to what Russia had in 1939, let alone T-34s & KV-1s. And Japanese strength is spread all over Asia & the Pacific. Russia will be able to hold its own in the air at the very least, and on the ground it will cut through the Japanese like a hot knife through butter.

                    Worse, Russia will be taking some of the areas Japan relies on to supply the war - important industrialized areas in Manchuria. Japan will lose an entire army trying to hold Manchuria & eventually sue for peace before Russia takes the Korean peninsular & tears out the rest of the heart of its empire.
                    sigpic

                    Win nervously lose tragically - Reds C C

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                    • Originally posted by astralis View Post
                      Luftwaffe wouldn't need to reach very far if the Russians are coming to them.
                      My point being that air supremacy is not assured and battlefield interdiction is a pipe dream.

                      Originally posted by astralis View Post
                      no way Churchill would risk India for North Africa. the only reason why anyone bothered to fight in North Africa at all was to protect the Suez and supply lines to India.
                      Why is India at risk? With the Soviets fully engaged, the Chinese would more than step up their portion of the war, especially under Soviet Advice (read Command). We're no longer talking about adding conquest, we're talking about the IJA trying to save its own ass.

                      Originally posted by astralis View Post
                      besides, how would the supply situation work? and as far as i'm aware, the BIA was largely an infantry force anyways.
                      Well, there's the 1941 Anglo-Soviet Invasion of Iran.
                      Last edited by Officer of Engineers; 02 Jan 18,, 01:58.
                      Chimo

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                      • Originally posted by Toby View Post
                        Rommel getting more kit would obviously help him. It would have to physically get there though and there is that thing called the med in between....and hey more planes for the luftwaffe to fly and more for the SAS to blow up!

                        Actually the med is not in the way. You could literally take 2 short ferry rides from Italy to North Africa. The Axis used this route to rapidly build up in Tunisia. The problem is Malta, which means you can't ship directly south from Sicily through the Gulf of Sirta. Instead you have to take a longer way around and that meant you use up most of your fuel, moving your fuel. Rommel's success depended on 1. taking out Malta to shorten the shipping lanes for fuel. Axis shipping able to sail due south instead of southwest to Tripoli and then east along the coast increases usable shipping capacity as the turn around gets more than halved. 2. A working port west of Benghazi. 3. Sufficient shipping capacity in both space and weight. 4. Italian rail capacity able to get material and men to shipping ports. Libya could handle 6000 tons a day on good days but distance from Benghazi (1000-1700 tons a day) to Tobruck is 433km. A truck carrying 2 tons getting 4 km/l will need 220 liters of fuel to make the round trip. That means a truck needs to devote 1/6 of its cargo capacity for its own fuel. Too make it to Alexandria that truck will need to carry almost a third of its cargo weight in its own fuel. A truck going from Tripoli (5000tons a day) to Alexandria and back will need fuel for a 3700km round trip, over half its cargo weight.

                        My money is on the Japanese, the Russians lack of winning anything against the Japanese thus far is hardly convincing and yeh I'm being polite.
                        China and India would consume the Russians and spit them out a bit like the German army attacking Russia in 41-43 We saw what happened in Afghanistan in 79-89
                        Losing bet, as OOE has stated before, the IJA was a WWI army and not capable of fighting a prolonged war of movement.
                        Last edited by zraver; 02 Jan 18,, 02:36.

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                        • Originally posted by WABs_OOE View Post
                          My point being that air supremacy is not assured and battlefield interdiction is a pipe dream.
                          Allied Jabos In France and Germany managed to cut German hours of movement in half by restricting them to night time/ bad weather moves of large formations. Plus when the escort fighters were turned loose to shoot up the rail net bulk movement of material ground to a halt.

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                          • The IJN would be massacred in any kind of match up with the Russian Red Army. IMHO, the quality of Japanese tanks and anti-tank guns are irrelevant. The Japanese did not have the reaction time, materiel, logistics or vision to understand mobile ground warfare waged by mechanized armies. The IJN did give the Americans a bloody fight in the Pacific... but those were light infantry battles in small jungle islands. And even then, their overland logistics sucked.

                            On that note, Stephen Kotkin's new book, Stalin: Waiting for Hitler, 1929-1941, explicitly deals with Stalin and Hitler's geostrategy game.
                            Last edited by Triple C; 02 Jan 18,, 10:31.
                            All those who are merciful with the cruel will come to be cruel to the merciful.
                            -Talmud Kohelet Rabbah, 7:16.

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                            • Originally posted by Triple C View Post
                              The IJN would be massacred in any kind of match up with the Russian Red Army. IMHO, the quality of Japanese tanks and anti-tank guns are irrelevant. The Japanese did not have the reaction time, materiel, logistics or vision to understand mobile ground warfare waged by mechanized armies. The IJN did give the Americans a bloody fight in the Pacific... but those were light infantry battles in small jungle islands. And even then, their overland logistics sucked.

                              On that note, Stephen Kotkin's new book, Stalin: Waiting for Hitler, 1929-1941, explicitly deals with Stalin and Hitler's geostrategy game.
                              I think you mean IJA, but yes to everything else :-). Not only did they lack the equipment on land (better in the air), but practically everything else required to fight Russia. Look at how badly France & Britain did against Germany in 1940 - and they were in a much better relative position than Japan to Russia. The sort of personal bravery and excellent infantry tactics the Japanese sometimes used to effect wouldn't help them much.

                              The Russians would stop when they had what they wanted, and then beef up the KMT & Communists with equipment & advisors to make sure the Japanese were kept nice and busy.
                              sigpic

                              Win nervously lose tragically - Reds C C

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                              • Originally posted by Bigfella View Post
                                I think you mean IJA, but yes to everything else :-). Not only did they lack the equipment on land (better in the air), but practically everything else required to fight Russia. Look at how badly France & Britain did against Germany in 1940 - and they were in a much better relative position than Japan to Russia. The sort of personal bravery and excellent infantry tactics the Japanese sometimes used to effect wouldn't help them much.

                                The Russians would stop when they had what they wanted, and then beef up the KMT & Communists with equipment & advisors to make sure the Japanese were kept nice and busy.
                                Assuming a Soviet invasion before the IJA pulls half its total troop strength and most of its bes tunits out and still has a sizable airforce in the region. The Soviet Advance will be more expensive. Japanese AT weapons are OK against T-26's and BT series tanks. But more expensive doesn't mean stopped. The biggest Soviet hurdles will be logistics, it takes them a ew years to get it right and they still do set piece offensives of limited duration in 1945. The Soviets will be able to do the sort of dashes with breakthroughs of 60-100 miles every 30-60 days on a broad front. So it will be a series of body blows rather than a brutal body slam we saw in 45. The late war Red Army could do deep battle much more effectively. In part because the tanks had bigger ranges with on board fuel and a much better supply of LL trucks that were 4x4 drive.

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