Who Could Have Won WWII?

[RN7]

And I'll say it again, too. There is nothing fantasist about it.

The Germans had no way of defeating the Commonwealth ... no, their U-Boat Campaign didn't ever manage it, either, and it is wishful thinking to believe it could have ... the Commonwealth could not easily have defeated the Germans, either, however, as I noted, on a historical basis, the UK has taken on powers as strong as she is/was and defeated them even if it took decades.

Germany wasn't at war with the Commonwealth, it was at war with Britain in Europe (also in the Atlantic and North Africa) and only fought Commonwealth forces who were deployed in these areas to support British forces. I doubt Germany even had any realistic plans for a war with the Commonwealth that was separate from plans directed against Britain.

And the UK had an Atomic Weapons program and the werewithal to, slowly, bring it to fruition ... the Germans had none, and even their pathetic nuclear power programs were working the wrong direction.

Britain had an atomic weapons programme but it wouldn't have independently produced an atomic bomb before 1950 without American involvement.

Would a Commonwealth/Russian victory have been quick No. Would it have been easy Hell no! But there is no evidence that the Germans could have won, and the Commonwealth have that historical track record of sticking to it!

How exactly would Britain have established air superiority over the English Channel and Northern France and Low Countries, and cleared German submarine forces from the North Sea, Western Approaches and North Atlantic, and then assemble an army the size of what was assembled during D-Day and then mount an invasion of Western Europe without the involvement of America

[RN7]

Note where it was tested. Certainly wasn't in the UK!!!
Middle of Australia, Woomera to be exact.

India was still in the fight as was Australia and New Zealand, not to mention South Africa as well as a number of other countries of somewhat lesser strategic importance (although able to supply troops and materials). Although at the time there was a great deal of fear that the Japanese would continue southward and roll over Australia and New Zealand, there was in reality little need for them to do that, nor did they really have the available forces anyway. Australia is HUGE. They'd need hundreds of thousands of troops to take it in the 1940s (more today with our greater population), troops they simply didn't have as it turned out.

With the constant threat of German aerial attack it's likely much of the UKs industrial production would be shifted to safer colonies (such as South Africa) with finished products shipped in via convoys. Eygpt and the suez canal would likely have become even more important with Commonwealth efforts against the Axis forces concentrated there while the UK itself carried out only holding actions to prevent invasion. Instead of D-Day landings being in France, the main thrust (when it finally came, likely several years later) may have been up through the middle east in an attempt to link up with the Soviets.

All in all though it's really impossible to say what might have happened, but it is foolish to say the UK would definitely have been defeated without the US.



It was possible. Even with the multiple fronts the Commonwealth were holding their own using substandard equipment (mainly god awful tanks with underpowered guns and dodgy tactics). It may have taken a few years but the Commonwealth may have been able to strangle Germany just enough to force a stalemate, and eventually, after another decade or two, maybe even take back some areas.

It would be a radically different world that which we live in today, one I imagine would somewhat resemble that shown in the George Orwell book, 1984 with war a constant background and the people generally living in poverty.

Although it is doubtful that Germany would have beaten Britain through military invasion, if America wasn't involved in the war and German progress in submarine warfare, jet aircraft and rocket technology had continued at the pace it did in reality there is also a strong possibility that Germany might have beaten Britain into submission.

Relocating British industry to other parts of the Commonwealth to fight on is however wishful thinking. Canada (mainly Ontario and Quebec) were the only part of the British Empire outside the UK that were heavily industrialised before the war, and that is the only place were any continuation of British military and industrial power would remain due to the fact that it is also protected by its proximity to the United States. It is possible to transplant factories and use blueprints to restart war production but only to a point. In WW2 arms and related industrial factories were only built on a limited scale in the British Empire outside of Canada, and that was when the British Empire was allied with and under the protection of the United States. With Britain defeated how long will India and the non-white colonies remain part of the British Empire, or in fact would Afrikaaner dominated South Africa remain British Also with no alliance with America and Britain knocked out, were will the technical expertise and the finance to support a Commonwealth led British Empire come from

[RN7]

My point exactly. And, to other posters, no, I am not trolling and the fact that Historians don't suggest that the Commonwealth could have won alone is unsurprising. Historians document what did happen, generally speaking, and shy away from explaining what could have happened except in the shortest of short terms, maybe medium term if they stretch it.

And, of course, many Historians, even respected ones, don't actually do a lot of (and, in some cases, any at all) original research ... they simply rehash what is available in secondary sources and seldom check to see whether those secondary sources are based on reliable primary sources.

This is one of the reasons why our understanding of the war in the East has so radically changed in the last quarter century ... decades of Soviet lies and misinformation is gradually being chipped away at by people like Glantz (good researcher, terrible writer btw). But even before that by people such as Barber and Harrison in books such as "The Soviet Home Front, 1941-5: a Social and Economic History of the USSR in World War II" and in others of their extensive writings on the Soviet economy.

Unfortunately, this material has yet to make its way into the wider historical context, especially in generalist histories and histories aimed at a non-specialist audience.

So are you implying that the Soviets (and the Germans) lied about the Eastern Front in the Second World War, and that we should discount the forces listed as being present in the campaigns and battles on the Eastern Front and the casualty rates incurred during them

Similar material is increasingly available in specialist economic and historical circles that debunks many of the more ludicrous claims about such things as the U Boat campaign bringing the UK to its knees or that it could have defeated her single handedly.

And what should we make of the naval losses statistics during the battle of the Atlantic

As for the Japanese - well, as I noted elsewhere, the US and Japanese were on a path to conflict without the UK anywhere. If the Japs decided to steal all the resources they needed because of the US embargoes, they will, indeed, almost certainly go to war with the UK etc. Unfortunately, military reality, and their own unique and not entirely crazy (but always consistent within its own crazy logic) take on reality meant that, to take and secure the resources of Malaya, Borneo, the DEI and elsewhere they needed to take out the US forces in the PI. Which meant war with the US.

Although Japan's actions may have been guided by the fact that Germany had taken control over most of Europe, pinned Britain against the wall and declared war on the Soviet Union.

Now, if the US decides to ignore Europe and simply fight the Japs, the Japs are not a major problem for the Commonwealth for more than a year, maybe a year and a bit ... after all, as we all know, the US put 80% of its war effort into Europe and only 20% into the Pacific. If they had put 100% into the Pacific they would have swamped the Japs at least a year, and more likely 1.5-2 years, earlier ... though without the A-Bomb, of course.

Well the US would have had to have beaten the Imperial Japanese Navy and also mobilise its manpower and industry to create military forces capable of clearing the Japanese from the Pacific which would have taken longer than a year or two.

And the A-Bomb. Tubealloys provided a lot of the theoretical and engineering underpinning for the US program on the, mistaken, understanding that the US would share the fruits of such ... so the UK didn't expend resources on it. If the US was not involved, then the program would have continued ... granted, much less quickly than the Manhattan Engineering District did, but I never suggested it would.

Well if the UK and US didn't cooperate in Atomic research and Britain went ahead alone I don't think we would have seen Atomic bomb's until the 1950's

And, of course, I note you completely ignore the historical stick-to-it-ivity of the British Empire at war over the last several centuries and her ability to fund and pay off such wars within extremely short periods of time.

I just get annoyed at people trotting out 'facts' that are now known to not be such in specialist circles and pooh-poohing anyone who disagrees with those disproven assertions.

Not trolling at all.

Phil

Although the relevance of history is important to us all I think the logistics, tactics, technology and cost of mechanised warfare of the mid-20th Century would differ somewhat to warfare and realities fought by the British Empire during the Seven years War and Napoleonic wars, when armies used gunpowder and muskets and navies were dependent on sail and wind.

[RN7]

Probably not. The UK had large underground factory complexes for all sorts of things and, indeed, much of their industry was actually completely beyond the range of German bombers and more was beyond the range of unescorted German bombers (aka 'sitting ducks').

And, as we know from German experiences with the Bombing Campaign, factory buildings are easy(ish) to destroy, but the machine tools in them ... not so much. It was common for 'destroyed' factories to be back in production in days or weeks with, at best, only temporary shelter above the workers heads (if any at all) ... the Russians found much the same with the factories they relocated east of the Urals, they were back in production as soon as the machines were on firm footings, even in winter, and way before anything more than temporary shelter was erected over them.

If the Germans and Russians could manage it, no reason why the Brits couldn't.

Phil

No part of Britain was outside the range of German bombers. The Soviet Union had the vast expanses of Siberia to relocate its factories to, and Germany was geographically larger than Britain and even more so when you add the territory it conquered and annexed in Eastern Europe during the war.

[StainlessSteelCynic]

Britain had an atomic weapons programme but it wouldn't have independently produced an atomic bomb before 1950 without American involvement.

That's not the interpretation I gained from reading about Britain's nuclear weapons research. In fact it appears completely opposite what you state here. Britain was conducting atomic weapons research in 1940. It sent it's data and it's researchers to the US to encourage and assist the US in building atomic weapons.
The US was supposed to share all its findings with the UK but didn't due to security concerns. Britain essentially rebuilt its atomic weapons programme from scratch without any outside assistance so that approximately five years after wars end, they had working technology.

Edit: for more, refer to my post here http://forum.juhlin.com/showpost.php...5&postcount=97

[RN7]

If the British had continued their own programme instead of halting it to give their information and their researchers to the US, they likely would have had a bomb available to them around the same time as the Manhattan Project delivered its first weapon and possibly before.

Not a chance.

When America and Britain started to cooperate in 1940 they compared their work, and it was discovered that British research was more advanced and that Britain was spending more on research.

Once America put its full resources into the project the roles soon reversed heavily in favour of America. By 1942 Britain was spending about $2 million on R&D compare with America who was spending about $30 million on R&D, plus another $100 million on construction projects related to atomic research. This unequal balance remained if not increased until 1945. After the completion of the Manhattan Project the US conceded that early British research and scientists were helpful but not vital to the project, and that the US would have built an atomic bomb without British assistance. Although the US also conceded that without ongoing active British assistance they would not have had an atomic device by 1945.

For Britain to have built an atomic bomb without US cooperation it was estimated that it would have cost $12 million in R&D, and a nuclear reactor would have had to have been built (probably in Canada) costing $20 million and taking 5 years to construct, while industrial facilities, heavy water and uranium metal would have cost another $40 million. The project would involve over 20,000 highly skilled workers, half a million tons of steel and 500,000 kw of electricity, and all this during WW2 without any disruption. British participation in the Manhattan Project gave it a lot of data and expertise that it would have taken a lot longer to compile without its cooperation with the US, and even the success of Hurricane in 1952 was not without gaps in technology.

[Legbreaker]

GODZILLA WON!

Can we now lock this thread

Why censor debate Happens all too often already without yet another thread being shut down just because somebody's ego is bruised.
As long as the insults are kept out of it, where's the problem

[RN7]

It's also worth noting the British had an aircraft more than capable to carrying an atomic bomb several years before the US - the Avro Lancaster.
With a payload of 22,000lbs, it was also capable of carrying nearly a ton more than the US B-29.

True British bombers had larger payloads compared with US bombers, but the B-29 was faster and had a longer range than the Lancaster and also had a greatly superior service ceiling height.

[RN7]

I also feel that you are cherry picking your objections ... indeed, creating them where they simply cannot stand, as in the matter of Japan in the Far East, ignoring the reality that if they attacked the Commonwealth and her allies they had to attack the US. I am not aware of any mainstream historian who supports that line of thought ... unless they're conspiracy theorists.

They attacked the Commonwealth in Asia/Pacific because they could see that Britain was unlikely to be able to significantly oppose Japanese forces or significantly reinforce the Commonwealth due to being heavily engaged against Germany and Italy in Europe, North Africa and the Med. They were in retrospect very accurate with that assessment, and their major blunder was to seriously underestimate American resolve and resources.

As far as a non-US WW2 goes, could the Commonwealth have won Obviously, based on economics, the answer is yes. As I have repeatedly pointed out, and which you still don't seem to have fully understood, such a victory would have been neither fast nor cheap. Would it have caused economic stresses that could have had similar consequences to the American Revolution ... hell yes. Would that change the fact that the Commonwealth could/would have defeated Germany (aka 'won the war') ... IMO, no.

This is obviously where our main point of difference is.

Phil

The British Commonwealth could not have beaten Germany on its own.

[Legbreaker]

True British bombers had larger payloads compared with US bombers, but the B-29 was faster and had a longer range than the Lancaster and also had a greatly superior service ceiling height.

True, but the point is the British had the capability, perhaps moreso than the US and certainly earlier. The range difference wouldn't have been much of a factor in Europe although speed may have.

[Legbreaker]

Lets look at this from another angle.

Could the US have won without the Commonwealth. My money is firmly on "not a chance in hell".

Also, could Germany have won if a) they didn't have to bail out Italy in Africa, and/or b) they left the USSR alone for another year

What if Spain had joined in on the side of the Axis

What if Japan had coordinated their submarine war with Germany

[dragoon500ly]

Lets look at this from another angle.

Could the US have won without the Commonwealth. My money is firmly on "not a chance in hell".

Also, could Germany have won if a) they didn't have to bail out Italy in Africa, and/or b) they left the USSR alone for another year

What if Spain had joined in on the side of the Axis

What if Japan had coordinated their submarine war with Germany

I don't believe that the U.S. or the Commonwealth could have the war without each other's support.

Could Germany have won the war if they hadn't had to intervene in Africa Tough to call, since Africa would later prove to be essential for air and sea bases as well as a logistical base for later operations in Italy and Southern Europe. Without invading Russia, the Germans should have been to send in additional troops and support making the British operations much more difficult...hmmm how would Eighth Army performed against one of the first line field marshals

I doubt that Spain would have able to enter the war as Franco was still rebuilding after the civil war, if he did enter the war, Gibraltar would have been besieged and almost certainly taken, sealing the Mediterranean at one end and making it far more likely that Malta would have been invaded.

Japan's submarine offensive would be harder to pull off, IJN doctrine had its subs primary mission as anti-warship, would they have modified their doctrine

[RN7]

True, but the point is the British had the capability, perhaps moreso than the US and certainly earlier. The range difference wouldn't have been much of a factor in Europe although speed may have.

But they had to have an atomic bomb to load on a Lancaster.

[RN7]

Lets look at this from another angle.

Could the US have won without the Commonwealth. My money is firmly on "not a chance in hell".

It would have been difficult for them to do so in the early part of the war without Australia in the Pacific, and near impossible in Europe without Britain.

Also, could Germany have won if a) they didn't have to bail out Italy in Africa, and/or b) they left the USSR alone for another year"

It would have been easier for them to do so but the more likely outcome would have been that the Germans reached an armistice with Britain in Europe and the Med.

What if Spain had joined in on the side of the Axis"

It would have created problems for the Allies in North Africa and the Med, but more to do with enabling German forces to use Spanish ports and airbases than any great threat from Spanish forces. The Canary Islands and Spanish North Africa wouldn't last too long from Allied invasion and they would have been useful as bases against the Axis. Gibraltar probably would have been invaded but Spain would also have been wide open to attack and invasion from the Med and may have been an easier route to an Allied invade Europe than Italy and the South of France.

What if Japan had coordinated their submarine war with Germany

It would have undoubtedly caused some problems but anti-submarine tactics used in the Atlantic could have countered it. Japanese submarines in the Atlantic and German U-boats in the Pacific might have been interesting.

[aspqrz]

No part of Britain was outside the range of German bombers. The Soviet Union had the vast expanses of Siberia to relocate its factories to, and Germany was geographically larger than Britain and even more so when you add the territory it conquered and annexed in Eastern Europe during the war.

Really.

Possibly true, depending on where said German Bombers were based.

Utterly misleading, however.

As I noted in a previous post, IIRC, unescorted German Bombers could reach most of the UK.

Unescorted German Bombers = dead meat.

55% of the RAF was north of the maximum range line for escorted German Bombers ... which is, also, one reason why the Germans were never going to be able to win the Battle of Britain with the resources they had available.

Phil