Would France sit out the War?

[Rainbow Six]

Thats right - Italy was already at war long before the nukes started to fly

Unless I'm mistaken it's exactly one week from when the Italians entered the War to the first use of nuclear weapons

always thought the only way they would have joined the war would be with a takeover by Socialists. I cant see Christian Democrats ever joining a war on the US and Germany - not without being attacked first.

It appears that's exactly what GDW had happening - from the BYB (V2.2) page 11

In late February (1997) the socialist Governments of Italy and Greece conclude a mutual defence pact

[Olefin]

V2.2

On July 1 st, 1997 Greece declares war against the NATO nations, and Italy, in compliance with her treaty obligations, follows suit on the 2nd

First use of nukes in Europe against civilian targets doesnt happen till the end of September. They were used against military formations only earlier as you stated so that is correct.

However the strikes against the French, which is the ones we were referring to that might have knocked the French out of considering any joining in the war didnt happen until November.

[Rainbow Six]

V2.2

On July 1 st, 1997 Greece declares war against the NATO nations, and Italy, in compliance with her treaty obligations, follows suit on the 2nd

First use of nukes in Europe against civilian targets doesnt happen till the end of September. They were used against military formations only earlier as you stated so that is correct.

However the strikes against the French, which is the ones we were referring to that might have knocked the French out of considering any joining in the war didnt happen until November.

That's why I specifically stated the first use of nuclear weapons twice, but in any event I think we're agreed that the general nuclear exchanges from jul - nov 97 wouldn't have had an effect on Italy's participation as a belligerent on the warpac side.

[Webstral]

Im not at all sold on the idea that France does not go nuke-for-nuke with the USSR. Why in Gods name would they have a nuclear arsenal if not to go nuke-for-nuke with the Soviets As de Gaulle pointed out, it is not necessary to kill the enemy"only tear off an arm. The Soviets arent going to go nuclear with France in a separate show from the main East-West confrontation because hurting France wont do much to the NATO war effort (if France is neutral), but French retaliatory nukes will definitely affect the Soviet war effort. France wont get hit until the show starts winding down such that an intact France represents an intolerable salient of Western power. The idea that France would passively accept a mushroom cloud over any French city while the French nuclear arsenal remains unable stretches credibility pretty darned far.

[HorseSoldier]

Is there a published list of targets in France I am not recalling one.

The Soviets don't have to hit every large refinery and major port in France to achieve their objective, which would be denying French facilities to NATO. I can see a pretty logical progression of other ports and fuel production available to NATO being taken off the board when the tactical and then strategic nukes fly. NATO's desperation may have allowed France sufficient ability to name their price that France might have loosened, or made political rumblings about loosening, their neutrality -- say, only allowing materiel for humanitarian disaster relief to go through. That may have been enough to trigger limited Soviet strikes less to eradicate French refining and shipping as to nudge them back out of even marginal support for NATO.

Or Soviet paranoia that France might open its ports and fuel reserves to NATO is entirely enough to trigger some strikes to show resolve and force a resolution involving continued French neutrality.

Neither of which precludes French retaliatory strikes from the scenario. I'd personally think that if France did not answer back at all they'd have taken more hits than they did.

As things went, I think we're discussing an extremely limited number of strikes -- less than five, probably 2-3, taken and reciprocated. France is depicted as having enough fuel reserves and refining capacity to function in the manner of a pre-nuke military, so the thumping can't have been that bad.

There is a viable alternate argument that the US/UK made the strikes. Either overtly to try and force France to open its ports, refineries and other facilities to support the war effort or (as was suggested up thread) as a black flag operation to try and provoke French entry against the Soviets. The former seems unlikely to me, since by that point in the war NATO has a lot more to lose from France not standing up to bullying than the Soviets do. Of course at a certain point -- after France invaded West Germany and the Netherlands to put its border on the Rhine, nuking France might start making a lot more sense. It might honestly be seen as obligatory.

The black flag option -- once the strategic strikes start, what's one more random SLBM launch from somewhere north of the Iceland-UK part of the G-I-UK gap

(And, sitting here thinking about it, what about an atomic demolition charge I think there might be an interesting campaign there. During the peak nuclear phase of the exchange, a group of SF types -- maybe Dutch or German, once the dead zone is established, maybe other NATO nation(s) -- get sent on a mission behind Soviet lines to seize some nuke man packs. Mission accomplished, same guys get ordered to smuggle said weapons back through Central Europe as the nukes fly, conventional fighting continues, and refugees, deserters, and marauders wander. Maybe the target for the original mission is situated so the PCs have to thread the eye of the NATO vs Italy fighting in southern Germany and Austria. Anyway, PCs are then to infiltrate the French border and deliver strikes with Soviet man pack nukes on multiple targets. Pretty murky but possibly a good sort of T2K/espionage fusion campaign. One could make it easy on PCs by having most or all of them being fluent French speakers, or not -- obviously by that phase of the war even for a mission involving national asset level SF you use what you've got available rather than wait for a 100% solution that may never arrive.)

[raketenjagdpanzer]

Does anyone know if France has a SIOP-like plan

A decapitation strike on Paris followed up by Le Harvre, Calais, and a few other key points would pretty much knock them on their asses if France didn't have a SIOP in place.

[Raellus]

Where is the published French target list The arguments that France got nuked hard and responded in kind don't hold much water considering what the published timeline stuff has to say about France's condition vis-a-vis the rest of western Europe c. 2000.

If one assumes every major French port facility and refinery is hit by a Soviet nuclear weapon, then yes, it does strain credulity to posit that France doesn't retaliate in kind. But where's the evidence that France got hit that hard If it did, why didn't it join NATO in its larger war against the USSR/WTO To suggest that France gets hit hard by the Soviets AND retaliates in kind BUT then sits on the sidelines, and still manages to avoid the destruction Germany and the UK experiences, doesn't make any more sense than the restraint argument.

On the other hand, if the Soviets hit only one or three such strategic French targets, combining that with the threat of much more to come unless the French deny the use of said ports to NATO, then I'm not sure it's such a stretch. We're not talking about Imperial Japan here, we're talking about France- the same country that sued for peace and set up the collaborationist Vichy government rather than continue fighting the Nazis when they still had the capacity (but not the willpower or strong leadership) to do so.

Just because one has the means to retaliate doesn't dictate that they will.

The published material is clear that France leaves NATO, sustains much less nuclear destruction than any other major NATO country, and opportunistically takes advantage of its eastern neighbors' weakened state. For this to occur, France can't have had a major nuclear exchange with the Soviet Union.

[Targan]

(And, sitting here thinking about it, what about an atomic demolition charge I think there might be an interesting campaign there. During the peak nuclear phase of the exchange, a group of SF types -- maybe Dutch or German, once the dead zone is established, maybe other NATO nation(s) -- get sent on a mission behind Soviet lines to seize some nuke man packs. Mission accomplished, same guys get ordered to smuggle said weapons back through Central Europe as the nukes fly, conventional fighting continues, and refugees, deserters, and marauders wander. Maybe the target for the original mission is situated so the PCs have to thread the eye of the NATO vs Italy fighting in southern Germany and Austria. Anyway, PCs are then to infiltrate the French border and deliver strikes with Soviet man pack nukes on multiple targets. Pretty murky but possibly a good sort of T2K/espionage fusion campaign. One could make it easy on PCs by having most or all of them being fluent French speakers, or not -- obviously by that phase of the war even for a mission involving national asset level SF you use what you've got available rather than wait for a 100% solution that may never arrive.)

In my last campaign, after the PC party successfully infiltrated and triggered a demolition nuke at the WarPac Reserve Front HQ in Lublin, the PCs were keen to attempt a similar operation against France. They didn't have a second backpack nuke but when they got back to Bremerhaven Major Po tried to sell the proposal to the US commanders there. US forces were in full-blown withdrawal mode by then and the idea fell on deaf ears but Po was still keen on the idea when he got back to CONUS. By then MilGov was keen to keep the French on good terms to continue the profitable Franco-US cooperation in the Middle East. The Joint Chiefs wouldn't have been willing to risk a nuke-equipped US team being caught inside France. In any case, as GM I never allowed Po's player to know how far up the chain his proposal had been heard.

[Graebarde]

Does France have ANY dometic oil production (wells/fields, not refineries)

Where do they import their oil from


If they have to import, and the production fields are closed, it doesn't matter if they can refine a billion barrels a day if they don't have the product to do it with.

[raketenjagdpanzer]

Does France have ANY dometic oil production (wells/fields, not refineries)

Where do they import their oil from


If they have to import, and the production fields are closed, it doesn't matter if they can refine a billion barrels a day if they don't have the product to do it with.

From here:

http://www.bonjourlafrance.com/france-facts/economy-of-france.htm

we see that:

With virtually no domestic oil production, France has relied heavily on the development of nuclear power, which now accounts for about 80% of the country's electricity production.

Now, does that mean they have no oil-bearing strata or lack the willpower to dig for it in their own backyard Either way after the missiles fly they're going to be importing: setting up a refinery from zero requires nontrivial technology use that would likely require expertise and equipment that like everything in every other country calls for a degree of trade and import, two things that are not going to be happening much at all from 1997 to 20.

With that said the authors wanted a forever crippled/subservient US, so at some juncture France gets its shit together and seizes control of just about everything, so clearly they do get POL up and running.

[HorseSoldier]

Oil is why they're parked in Kuwait in the RDF Sourcebook, isn't it

[raketenjagdpanzer]

Oil is why they're parked in Kuwait in the RDF Sourcebook, isn't it

Yep.

[Rainbow Six]

Where do they import their oil from

In addition to the Middle East, North and West Africa are also both possibilities dependent on how badly they've been hit. North Africa is touched on in Med Cruise but I'm not sure about the state of affairs in West Africa - I think consensus has generally been that Nigeria would get hit, but there are a lot more oil producing areas in Africa - if the Middle East didn't get flattened it's reasonable to assume that Africa didn't either. I'm going from memory here, but the V2 NATO guide has French troops based in Libreville in Gabon as well as somewhere else in West Africa (Ivory Coast maybe)

[Olefin]

this line from V2.2 suggests that Nigeria, Libya and other areas producing oil got hit in Africa (we know that Libya is out of business from Med Cruise)

"Except for petroleum-producing areas, the bulk of the continent escaped the war, but prewar events combined with global chaos have taken their toll."

There is no way they didnt hit Nigeria - they alone produce more than enough to keep NATO, or whats left of it, awash in oil if their oil producing areas were still intact and functional.

And the line about no sizeable refinery closer than Romania also suggests every major refinery over the magic 100,000 bbl/day number got taken out as well - which would explain why Mombasa's refinery is still there (its only at 78,000) per Frank Frey and the ones in Egypt, Algeria, Libya, Senegal, Nigeria and other areas are gone.

V2.2 also has this - "France: Although ostensibly neutral in the war, France was still subjected to nuclear attacks to deny its port and oil refining facilities to NATO. Damage was largely confined to the coasts, but the resulting casualties were severe."

As per the list I submitted if they hit every oil refining target at or over 100,000 bbl/day then you are talking about 10 refineries going up in nuclear smoke. And if its ports you have to start putting a bunch more targets up as well - possibly as many as 15-16 nukes hitting France.

Places like Calais, St. Nazaire and the ports in Brittany are probably just smoking ruins by late 1997.

Thats a lot of nukes.

And they arent awash in oil or able to act like a pre-war military oil wise - Going Home makes that pretty clear

"Units in the dead zone are in constant radio communication
with their base. If they get into more trouble than they can handle
alone, they can call for and receive support in the form of
airstrikes or airmobile reinforcements (unlike their opponents,
the French Army still has a small quantity of functional aircraft
and the fuel to run them). Avgas does not grow on trees,
however, and the platoon who calls for aviation help had better
have a good reason for doing so."

A small quantity of functional aircraft and enough avgas to run a small quantity of aircraft is not a pre-war Army.

That could imply also that their aircraft industry got hit as well to some extent and aircraft spare parts are in short supply.

And while France is getting oil from the Middle East (per the RDF it mentions that most is consumed locally, but a trickle is exported
by the various nations who control the oilfields. This trade in
oil is slowing, as attrition reduces the number of ships available.
What remains is now mostly with nations of the Franco-Belgian
Union) with most of their refineries and ports knocked out they wont have much in the way of production.

Again - if they took at least 15 nukes if not more (ports plus those ten refineries most likely) then they had to hit back and hit back hard. Or face, at the least, a de Gaullist coup to overthrown the government.

Its the one thing that is really missing from all the versions - I cant believe there is no French sourcebook.

[Olefin]

keep in mind guys that the strikes on the refineries may have been pin point strikes with small nukes - you only need about .25 megatons at most to really screw up a port or refinery

they arent using city busters - i.e. they arent taking out Paris - but a lot of French ports are very congested as to civilian housing areas being right on top of the port area itself - you would have a lot of deaths

and in Europe the workers tend to live right next to the plants they are working at - the Renault plant in Lyon for instance was right in the middle of a ton of houses and apts - you hit that with any kind of nuke and you kill 20-30K civilians no matter how pinpoint you are

2-3 nukes wouldnt do the job mentioned in V2.2 - you are taking over a dozen minimum considering how many ports that NATO could conceiveably use on the Atlantic and Med coasts along with taking out refinining capacity