Could Germany have ever won WWII?

[Venusian Broon]

Nice article here about the role of the Hurricane

Battle of Britain: without the hurricane the battle would have been lost

(another point about the cheap materials used by the Hurricane was that it was much easier to patch up when getting repaired.)

 

[BAYLOR]

The 110 compared really, really badly to the rival Henschel Hs 124 prototype twin-engined fighter but Messerschmidt got the contract because (a) it was their turn - Goerings bizarre approach to sourcing - and (b) they said it would be fine once equipped with the new Junker engines (which powered the Ju 88). Unfortunately Junkers refused to play ball and the 110 remained a dog, despite successive redesigns. It only came into its own as a specialized night-fighter.

It seems that Herman Goering's decision making process did much to contribute to failure of the Luftwaffe.

 

[BAYLOR]

My point concerning the drop tanks was merely to illustrate that the Germans did themselvess no favors when taking on such a difficult task. In essence the Luftwaffe had fallen victim to 'victory disease', a consequence of which was that they considered the Battle of Britain a reverse, rather than defeat with far-reaching consequences.

The Battle of Britain cost the Germans alot of their best pilots and aircrews. It weakened the Luftwaffe .

 

[BAYLOR]

not stopping outside Dunkerque would have been quite a help too!! Had they managed to take the French fleet before Churchill ordered it sunk may well have made a difference as would Spain joining the conflict

That combined with what they already had would have given them larger surface fleet and if you combined that with Italy's navy. That would have effectively closed off the Mediterranean to the allies. There is also the possibility that end up controlling Gibraltar. Egypt, The Suez Canal and the whole of North Africa would have fallen under their control. It would have given them a stepping stone to middle eastern oil.

 

[BAYLOR]

I remember watching a program about the Battle of Britain a few years ago, and IIRC, the design success of both planes was down to total flukes. The original hurricane (again, IIRC) was made of wooden frame covered with canvas, simply because Britain was so strapped for resources (unlike the German's, who could cast their early Me's with metal frames - the preferred option). In theory, the German planes should have been superior - but the lighter materials in the British planes gave them superior manoeuvrability and therefore an extra advantage in dogfights.

Not sure how true it is, but I remember being surprised at the claims.

I don't know if this was true of the Hawker Hurricane but, the Spitfires fuel tank under the pits seat, about 86 gallons worth of aviation fuel. Not a happy thought if your the pilot.

 

[paranoid marvin]

Germany had effectively won WWII. Mainland Western Europe had been conquered, and there was no significant threat to Germany. But then they declared war on Russia.

Could Germany have defeated Britain? There are two arguments, one being that (provided she was supplied from her Empire and the US) Britain could go on indefintely as the Royal Navy was by far the Superior to Germany in terms of manpower, ships and (probably most important) experience. Britain had effectively dominated the waves for most of the last half a millenium, and there was no way that Germany could catch up that quickly.

The other argument is that when you consider just how much manpower and equipment was thrown against Russia, you have to suppose that if Germany had thrown everything against Britain with mass drops of parachutists combined with a seaborne assault along the Eastern and Southern coast of England and Scotland that a crack would have appeared. It would only take one or two succesful beachheads to have signalled the beginning of the end. It would no doubt have costs the lives of tens/hundreds of thousands of German lives lost, but when you consider the losses at Stalingrad alone you see just how vast were the manpower resources at Hitler's command.

The danger with Hitler carrying out an all-out assault against Britain would be leaving him (relatively) defenceless in the East against Russia, so he probably (and possibly rightly) considered a land-based attack against Russia to be more likely to succeed than an aerial/naval attack against Britain. Once either of these two foes were eliminated, the other would face the full force of Germany and almost certainly fall.

 

[BAYLOR]

Germany had effectively won WWII. Mainland Western Europe had been conquered, and there was no significant threat to Germany. But then they declared war on Russia.

Could Germany have defeated Britain? There are two arguments, one being that (provided she was supplied from her Empire and the US) Britain could go on indefintely as the Royal Navy was by far the Superior to Germany in terms of manpower, ships and (probably most important) experience. Britain had effectively dominated the waves for most of the last half a millenium, and there was no way that Germany could catch up that quickly.

The other argument is that when you consider just how much manpower and equipment was thrown against Russia, you have to suppose that if Germany had thrown everything against Britain with mass drops of parachutists combined with a seaborne assault along the Eastern and Southern coast of England and Scotland that a crack would have appeared. It would only take one or two succesful beachheads to have signalled the beginning of the end. It would no doubt have costs the lives of tens/hundreds of thousands of German lives lost, but when you consider the losses at Stalingrad alone you see just how vast were the manpower resources at Hitler's command.

The danger with Hitler carrying out an all-out assault against Britain would be leaving him (relatively) defenceless in the East against Russia, so he probably (and possibly rightly) considered a land-based attack against Russia to be more likely to succeed than an aerial/naval attack against Britain. Once either of these two foes were eliminated, the other would face the full force of Germany and almost certainly fall.

In the short term Stalin had no immediate plans to move against Germany from the east. The treaty he signed was to buy himself time to rebuild his military. I think it like that had Hitler moved on Britain to conquer it , Stalin would have done nothing to all to Germany . Stalin would have let Hitler knock out Britain because that would have remove one more obstacle to him eventually taking all of Europe for himself. Eventually Stalin at a time of his one choosing would have gone after Hitler, that I believe.

Could Hitler have knocked out Britain ? Standing in his way was the Royal Navy which at that time was the most powerful navy in the world, way more powerful and larger than the German navy and more the sufficient to block and destroy cross channel invasion. The only possible way they might have been able to counter that in any way is had the gotten control of the French battleships that that were destroyed by the Royal Navy. Also if they could borrowed a few of Italys battleships. But even then thye still had no aircraft career and I believe that Britain did at that time ?

Their air campaign over Britain was never going to work because the German strategy was badly flawed. And as the battle progressed the moral of Germany airfare plummeted dramatically. At the begin the battle Germay had the world most powerful airfare , but the end ,that was no longer the case. And even had they gotten troops on the gourd in Britain , they would had no armor an likely not controlled the skies. The Germans would have failed miserably in their invasion.