Sorry if this has been wrung out dry. People routinely say "Operation Sealion was doomed from the start." I agree that it didn't have a tinker's chance of succeeding as planned, but what would you, as planner, have done to give it a better chance?
Opana, not to knock your thread right from the outset but "what ifs" are not something that is encouraged on the forum. Specifically as they generally evolve into raging arguments about subjects that arent based on facts. Ultimately as I always say in a what if scenario, "USA develops the Atom Bomb and Berlin gets blasted. War over" But to follow your point, what could have been done? France got defeated in June 1940, quicker than anyone had expected, including the Germans. They had a short window of opportunity before the channel weather went against them, they had to destroy the RAF and after that the Royal Navy. It took the Allies 4 years, massive amounts of equipment and a huge number of men who had been training for years to cross the channel. And the Germans had a number of weeks! How could sealion have worked?
But to follow your point, what could have been done? France got defeated in June 1940, quicker than anyone had expected, including the Germans. They had a short window of opportunity before the channel weather went against them, they had to destroy the RAF and after that the Royal Navy. It took the Allies 4 years, massive amounts of equipment and a huge number of men who had been training for years to cross the channel. And the Germans had a number of weeks! How could sealion have worked? Very well, if this gets out of hand we can kill it with fire. I think for Sealion to have any chance of working there would have had to have been at least one person in the Kreigsmarine who was interested in amphibious warfare. Say a person who had been an observer at the landing exercises the Marines and Navy conducted between wars and kept current (overtly and covertly) on the results of the annual fleet problems. If such a person was to get the ear of a ranking Nazi their landing craft program could have gotten off to a better start. Perhaps under the umbrella of "amphibious vehicles for crossing rivers"? This would be countered to an extent by the Germans' tendency to over-engineer. Basically, this is a question of logistics to me, something I like to analyze.
Very well, if this gets out of hand we can kill it with fire. I think for Sealion to have any chance of working there would have had to have been at least one person in the Kreigsmarine who was interested in amphibious warfare. Say a person who had been an observer at the landing exercises the Marines and Navy conducted between wars and kept current (overtly and covertly) on the results of the annual fleet problems. If such a person was to get the ear of a ranking Nazi their landing craft program could have gotten off to a better start. Perhaps under the umbrella of "amphibious vehicles for crossing rivers"? This would be countered to an extent by the Germans' tendency to over-engineer. Basically, this is a question of logistics to me, something I like to analyze. Logistics are fine but what need did the Germans have for amphibious operations in the 30's? England wasnt the enemy or at least, she wasnt supposed to be. Everything about the Nazi regime was short-term, nothing that needed development beyond 5 years or so. Even their method of warfare, blitzkrieg was designed for short campaigns. So even "if" (and I cant believe I'm doing this) the Kriegsmaring possessed someone who was an "expert" on these matters they would never have been listened to. The two major amphibious operations, Crete and Norway, were initiated at short notice, they didnt initially see the need for it. In Norway's case, Britain and France were never meant to go to war over Poland so why prepare for an amphibious invasion of norway????? Germany from a historical and geographical point of view is more concerned with land campaigns. Yes they realised that they needed a navy but again I ask, why was there a need for amphibious operations? Russia was going to be the enemy and they could be reached by land and air. So before we go down the road of discussing this you are assuming that: !. An "expert" witnessed the US exercises, decided that they might need this in the future 2. The Nazi leadership has suddenly acquired long-term planning ability and foresaw that at some point they would need to invade England 3. Again with the long-term planning we are "assuming" that the Nazi economy was gearing up for a long-term conflict Those assumptions are so far off the course of what actually happened that we are seriously in the realm of fiction and sure at this point anything is possible. From a logistics point of view look at the requirements needed to put 4 (I think it was 4) divisions into Normandy on 6th June. That will give you some indication.
The landing craft project would perhaps be something along the lines of the rocketry project, a "visionary" project. As I said, it's speculative.
To avoid any potential veering into pure what-iffery (we don't really do them here OP... for reason's I think you'll appreciate), is/are the core question/s really: 'Why were the German military so essentially flawed/uninterested/lacking in amphibious assault'? - Could their capability have been improved in any way, or was there something inherent (politically/militarily) that dampened their ability in the area? If that's essentially the case we had a thread a while back on German Marines (or the lack thereof) and successes/failures in Marine assault that's got some decent stuff on it: German Marines? (& Amphibious Assaults.) The German Marines relative obscurity still interests me. I occasionally wonder if it was all down to Adolf's blind-spot regarding Naval affairs, and that lack of the dictator's real interest also feeding into military woolliness where the land met the sea.
To avoid any potential veering into pure what-iffery (we don't really do them here OP... for reason's I think you'll appreciate), is/are the core question/s really: 'Why were the German military so essentially flawed/uninterested/lacking in amphibious assault'? - Could their capability have been improved in any way or was there something inherent (politically/militarily) that dampened their capabilities in the area? If that's essentially the case we had a thread a while back on German Marines (or the lack thereof) and successes/failures in Marine assault that's got some decent stuff on it: German Marines? (& Amphibious Assaults.) The German Marines relative obscurity still interests me. I occasionally wonder if it was all down to Adolf's blind-spot regarding Naval affairs. I understand, and you can kill this thread at any time. Adolf has been quoted as saying "I'm a hero on land and a coward at sea." (paraphrase). He exhibits a Eurocentric attitude, "conqueror Europe and the rest of the world will fall to you easily". Doesn't work that way, of course, but few people would say Hitler had a solid grasp of reality. Given the above the commitment to naval forces would be small. And the ancillary services (Sorry, jarheads) would be the least likely to get funding. "If the KM needs troops, the Heer will provide them." The battle over the need for Marines has been going on in the US for a long time. I have documents from the 1830s that urge the dissolution of the Fleet Marine Force. The statement "That flag means a Marine Corps for the next thousand years" was at least partly to bolster the Corps in the future. (And I'm not in any way devaluing the achievements on Suribachi, just pointing out that it can be a help on more than just the battlefield.)
The following were necessary(if ONE fell out,the whole thing was impossible) 1.Air superiority in south-east England 2.Ships to transport the troops 3.Ships to transport the material(tanks,guns,horses,trucks......) 4.Possession of a intact harbour to unload 3. 5.Astrong kriegsmarine to protect2 and 3 6.A long time of good weather(in september !)for the buil-up of point 2 and 3. NONE of these points were available ,thus ......
Well, the argument over Germany's "perceived" interwar (when the service would have had to be grown to be available in 1940) need for Marines has ONE very simple factor that a lot of people forget - Germany had VERY few potential enemies in the interwar period to NEED Marines! The Baltic was surrounded on several coastlines by members of the Neutral "Oslo Group"....and by the USSR, which an interwar Germany, even a 1930's resurgent one - could never hope to mount an amphibious op BIG enough to dent! So - a potential enemy against whom it was pointless to think of amphibious warfare, or a group of Neutrals who she would nver (!) be at war with... Remember, Germany really only had it's Baltic littoral to operate from in the 1920's and 1930's; exercising Marines on the little bit of North Germany facing the North Sea would have had the Versailles Treaty Powers being VERY rude to Berlin! Another point that's often forgotten, I myself wasn't aware of it in any detail until a few days ago - was that while WE in the UK are always pretty contmepuous of the "converted barge" idea for Sealion... The British did EXACTLY the same in 1942! During some of the early planning for SLEDGEHAMMER, apparently a number of Thames motor barges were drydocked, had concrete ballast pored to strengthen their bilges and keels, and importantly their hull sides inner-skinned and concrete powered between the two layers to create a bullet-and splinter-proof hull. There were even plans to equip a number with mortars and guns for "close support" a bit like the rocket-firing barges of OVERLORD. The ONE thing Germany REALLY needs is TIME; time to rebuild and if possible expand the KM after the horrific losses and damage they experienced in Norway - in August Raeder stated he only had FOUR vessels suitable for escorting the invasion fleet itself! ...time to expand the LW into a force that by sheer numbers can overwhelm Fighter Command, given the HUGE "force multiplier" that radar and ground vectoring gave to the RAF...and of course to PROPERLY reequip and replace casualties after all the losses of Poland and the West, bringing in the JU88 in proper numbers, for example... ...time to greatly expand the number of fields used in France and the Low Countries for the air assault; the LW was crowded into, what 15-18 airfields during the BoB?... Time acted against Germany; they tried in effect to "bounce" the Channel in less than three months since the last British serviceman left the Continent. Everything they knew or thought they knew indicated how weak the british would be after Dunkirk - which in many respects we WERE! - but they equally should have known that every day and week that passed served to replace all those manpower and materiel losses If they couldn't do it in three-four months - they shouldn't have tried at all, and cost all the lives and losses that the BoB cost them, and the nightly BC raids on barge concentrations etc. Even the Greater Reich's economy would have been stronger as all those barges wouldn't have been diverted away from their regular cargo carrying for so many months, as well as those that were totally lost. What the Germans needed therefore was for Hitler to keep his preoccupations with the Bolsheviks in check and make a REALLY good play for early 1941, when the hastily-begun "proper" bargebuilding plan would have come to fruition with all those mfps that were used in the Baltic, and the Aegean in 1943....or eventually relegated to flak barges - at least in the Channel!!! .... ...and to sit back and loose the strange German preoccupation with "quick victories" To make a 1941 invasion really successful needed them to be prepared to give up the apparent "advantage" of the shadow of Dunkirk upon the British armed forces. But until it was forced upon them in the Western Desert, or in the East - too late for Sealion or any altered version of it - the Wehrmacht seemed congentically unable to envisage a protracted campaign...:p
The nazis fostered a number of 'alternate sciences', some of which theories even if contradictory manage fo more or less thrive in company. I'm thinking of Hollow Earth - with us living inside, so a telescope in Copenhagen might read the news in Bristol although I never understood why this didn't really work, others proposed that yes, we lived on the outside and the inside was reserved for others superior peoples, etc. etc. One theory that wasn't given proper credit was that Britain being an island simply floated on the ocean (Ireland too!). Now, it would be a simple atter to just pull the plug on Britain and it would sink to a watery grave. Question is: Where in Great Britan can the plug be? Suggestions accepted.
us living inside, so a telescope in Copenhagen might read the news in Bristol although I never understood why this didn't really work, Britain's forgotten war winner.... Council paving slabs!
Phylo, Za, good points! The lack of perceived need for Marines goes back to the Eurocentric view. The invasion of Norway was seaborne, but hardly an amphibious assault in the manner that phrase is most often use, IMHO. Za, the drain in Great Britain is obviously under Parliament. Where else would all the money be going?
What would it take for Sealion to work? I think it would have taken far more resources from Germany to successfully invade the UK. Resources incidentally, that at the time were severely depleted after the France Campaign. When you realise just how long the planning for "Overlord" took the Allies and the resources put into it, Sealion never seemed to stand a chance of succeeding. Regards Tom
The invasion of Norway was seaborne, but hardly an amphibious assault in the manner that phrase is most often use, IMHO. Definitely not. The ONLY element that even ressembled that was the landing at Narvik....which was relatively small in size and scope, a battalion-sized tactical rather than strategic operation, using a tiny number of PRE-war scoped and constructed landing craft...and ships' boats IIRC. The French had four larger tank landing craft in construction at the time in Metropolitan France - but guess who ended up with those...
Definitely not. The ONLY element that even ressembled that was the landing at Narvik....which was relatively small in size and scope, a battalion-sized tactical rather than strategic operation, using a tiny number of PRE-war scoped and constructed landing craft...and ships' boats IIRC. The French had four larger tank landing craft in construction at the time in Metropolitan France - but guess who ended up with those... Any sources on the French LCTs, please?
One theory that wasn't given proper credit was that Britain being an island simply floated on the ocean (Ireland too!). Now, it would be a simple atter to just pull the plug on Britain and it would sink to a watery grave. Question is: Where in Great Britan can the plug be? Suggestions accepted. Well, they could have pulled the cork out of Ireland !
The nazis fostered a number of 'alternate sciences', some of which theories even if contradictory manage fo more or less thrive in company. I'm thinking of Hollow Earth - with us living inside, so a telescope in Copenhagen might read the news in Bristol although I never understood why this didn't really work, others proposed that yes, we lived on the outside and the inside was reserved for others superior peoples, etc. etc. One theory that wasn't given proper credit was that Britain being an island simply floated on the ocean (Ireland too!). Now, it would be a simple atter to just pull the plug on Britain and it would sink to a watery grave. Question is: Where in Great Britan can the plug be? Suggestions accepted. Downing Street 10
Phylo, Za, good points! The lack of perceived need for Marines goes back to the Eurocentric view. The invasion of Norway was seaborne, but hardly an amphibious assault in the manner that phrase is most often use, IMHO. Za, the drain in Great Britain is obviously under Parliament. Where else would all the money be going? I'm curious Opana, why did Germany need Marines, given that the war with Britain was an accident?
Why does any country keep specialist forces at hand? 'Just In case', surely? (Do you really think the Anglo/German element of the war can be described as a pure accident Ger?) Definitely not. The ONLY element that even ressembled that was the landing at Narvik....which was relatively small in size and scope, a battalion-sized tactical rather than strategic operation, using a tiny number of PRE-war scoped and constructed landing craft...and ships' boats IIRC. And Leros maybe? As mentioned in that other thread.
Any sources on the French LCTs, please? Dave "PT Dockyard" on AHF (who's interest is small coastal vessles), turned up a literary reference to it in an inventory about six months ago, and asked for more detail at the time. I'll try to find the thread again. Historically, the French Renaults at Narvik had to debark fron BRITISH lighters...
