The FReeper Foxhole Presents the Saturday Symposium July, 1940 A Different Option? August 6,2005

Airpower Magazine: September 2002 | alfa6's vivid imagination

[snippy_about_it]

Maybe "they" should give us all stars on our shoulders, eh?!!!!!!!!!!! Hah.

I agree. Good job folks, great topic alfa6. I've learned a lot today.

[PhilDragoo]

Audio: Winston Churchill's "This Was Their Finest Hour" Speech

In August 1940 he confidently threw himself into the great offensive against Great Britain, Operation Eagle, convinced that he would drive the RAF from the skies and secure the surrender of the British by means of the Luftwaffe alone. Goering, however, lost control of the Battle of Britain and made a fatal, tactical error when he switched to massive night bombings of London on 7 September 1940 just when British fighter defences were reeling from losses in the air and on the ground. This move saved the RAF sector control stations from destruction and gave the British fighter defences precious time to recover. The failure of the Luftwaffe (which Hitler never forgave) caused the abandonment of Operation Sea Lion, the planned invasion of England, and began the political eclipse of Goering. Further failures of the Luftwaffe on the Russian front and its inability to defend Germany itself from Allied bombing attacks underlined Goering's incompetence as its supreme commander . Technical research was run down completely, not surprisingly with a Commander-in-Chief who prized personal heroism above scientific know- how and whose idea of dignified combat was ramming enemy aircraft.

~~~

Stalin's Blindness
He deceived himself about Hitler, and it cost millions of Russian lives.
by Andrew Nagorski

The problem was that Hitler, who had all along believed that subjugating Russia was a key part of his life's mission, quickly became frustrated with his inability to bomb Britain into submission or mount Operation Sea Lion, the invasion of that island nation. Instead, he convinced himself that if he knocked Russia out first, this would leave Britain more isolated and vulnerable than ever. The fact that history (to wit, Napoleon's disaster in 1812) and common sense flew in the face of that reasoning meant little to Hitler. But Stalin refused to believe it--as he refused to believe the steady stream of reports flowing from Soviet agents abroad.

Murphy provides details that prove "beyond any reasonable doubt," as he puts it, that the Soviet services filed alarming reports about German intentions early and often. From Berlin, a source code-named Ariets reported on September 29, 1940, that Hitler intended to "resolve problems in the east in the spring of next year." Maj. Gen. Vasily Tupikov, the Soviet military attaché in Berlin, backed up his source and later confirmed the redeployment of large numbers of German troops from the western to the eastern front. From Bucharest, the Soviet military mission reported on March 26, 1941: "The Romanian general staff has precise information that in two or three months Germany will attack the Ukraine. The Germans will attack the Baltic states at the same time . . . "

Stalin reacted by ridding himself of Ivan Proskurov, the head of military intelligence who had consistently refused to buckle to his pressure to deliver better news. His replacement, Filipp Golikov, began relying on reports from his officers who picked up German disinformation, which dismissed all talk of an invasion of Russia as "English propaganda." When Golikov felt obliged to pass along a report from his Prague station that the Germans would attack in the second half of June, it landed back on his desk with Stalin's note in red ink: "English provocation! Investigate!"

~~~

Hitler's megalomania [a delusional mental disorder that is marked by infantile feelings of personal omnipotence and grandeur], fueled by amphetamine-rich vitamultin, coupled with Goering's abuse of cocaine [viz. his own grandiosity, five daily changes of operatic costume] made coherent strategic decision-making an impossibility.

There is more military chessplaying horsepower on this thread to date than evinced by the supreme command of the Third Reich in toto.

Had its actions been governed by Albert Speer and Karl Doenitz instead of Moe and Larry Howard with epaulets, we'd be victims of the full catastrophic consequences of our interbellum inertia.

Thank God for the collossal blunders of madmen.

Hitler overreached, fueled by the unfulfillable boasts of Goering. Stalin remained in monomaniacal denial of Hitler's intentions.

My Latin teacher sketched out the ferocity faced by Caesar's legions in attempting to subjugate that isle, and apparently Hitler ignored that as well as Napolean's defeat.

I posit the above posting Foxholians could plot a more successful strategy than Hitler and Goering using a few Sharpies and the backs of a couple of placemats at Fridays.

Regarding the aging process, I put a jacouzzi in for a couple in their eighties, he the owner of several Oklahoma lumberyards who leaning on his cane advised, "Take my advice: don't ever grow old--it's not worth the aggravation."

Regarding unhappy discoveries, my younger wiser brother at forty found and defeated the most virulent of testicular cancers.

So, PE, the Galaxy Quest injunction, never surrender, never give up.

Astrobabentruppen

The cells are here. Their training manual is available from our DOJ. I read it all today.

Apparently Turban Durbin is a fellow traveller, useful idiot, and islamsymp rolled into one:

[from the manual]

IF AN INDICTMENT IS ISSUED AND THE TRIAL, BEGINS, THE BROTHER HAS TO PAY ATTENTION TO THE FOLLOWING:

1. At the beginning of the trial, once more the brothers must insist on proving that torture was inflicted on them by State Security [investigators] before the judge.

2. Complain [to the court] of mistreatment while in prison.

[PAR35]

Technical research was run down completely,

I'll have to strongly disagree with this one. Jet fighters, jet bombers, rocket fighters, using electric eyes to automatically fire cannon, television guided smart bombs, radar - just some of the technological breakthroughs under Goering. Some of the failures in the Luftwaffe properly should be credited to Hitler, not Goering (the 262 as a bomber, for example.)

While Goering was no Speer, this description of him reeks of British propaganda.

And the Luftwaffe headquarters in Berlin are among the few offices still being used (although by a different agency) by the German Federal government today.

[steveegg]

Sorry about jumping in late. At first glance, this looks a lot like the earlier discussion on Gibraltar. Unlike that, however, the Luftwaffe would have had forward basing rights.

With the forces you outline, the immediate outcome wouldn't be in doubt; another quick, successful Blitzkrieg where medium- and long-term logistics don't come into play. Moving on, if Japan had moved up their timetable, they simply would have drawn the US in that much earlier (whether Hitler would have repeated the mistake that set the Arsenal of Democracy against him is yet another variable; had he done so, the only significant difference in Europe would have been the Romanian oil fields not being destroyed).

However, I can't see Hitler sparing much more than he did in the form of the Afrika Korps. Further, the Brits were already reading much of the German codes; with the change of emphasis from the Isles to the Middle East, they likely would have cut loose a large chunk of the Hurricanes (there's no way they would have let the Spitfires off of home island defense), which would have evened out the air battle significantly.

More-realistically, the question would have been, if the Germans sent the Afrika Korps along with the Italians in Sept. 1940, would they have been able to break through to the Nile? On paper, it sure looks like it, but remember that the Italians were stopped with logistics problems even though they had a better than 7-1 advantage over the British. It sure would be an interesting fight.

In the end, if I were in the German High Command, I would have been satisfied with the way things were after France fell, trusted the English Channel to keep the British out, and rolled east in May 1941 (oh, and I wouldn't have declared war on the US).

[PhilDragoo]

Apparently not British propaganda, but Zionist propaganda: Hermann Goering (1893-1946)

[PAR35]

, real road building capability (they had none, as far as I can tell, except some "in name only" units)

I actually can add just a little bit of light on that subject. German labor battalions (at least some) (the equivalent to the CCC) who worked on the autobahns pre-war were incorporated into the Luftwaffe more or less intact, put to work building runways. So early in the war, the units were available and more or less intact (if under Goering rather than the army). As things progressed, of course, they moved to other duties, and then as the final collapse neared, they were handed rifles and sent to the front.

[PAR35]

It is a pretty well done piece. Most of it is straightforward, which gives more appearance of credibility to the few parts which seem to reflect an agenda.

[PhilDragoo]

We may be thankful that Hitler thought the war would be over before the new technologies would be needed.

We may be particularly thankful that he dismissed the atomic bomb as a Zionist gimmick.

[E.G.C.]

BTTT!!!!!!

[Iris7]

[Professional Engineer]

Astrobabentruppen

It's a one way trip to, oh who the hell cares, sign me up!