[Closed] History -Revisionism- WW2

My favorite is the view that the Allied war effort was "a series of disasters, culminating in victory".

the fact that interesting and revisionist views of it are still being written is just endlessly fascinating

Apparently it was all Churchill's fault. He was bribed during the 1930s by "international bankers" to provoke Germany into war. There was a campaign to raise funds to out-bribe him, but that failed (apparently the "international bankers" were exceedingly cunning). The fake news media won't report it so most people don't know about it and just believe the conventional view that Hitler was a murderous genocidal monster.

Would the battles of Stalingrad and Kursk stand up to that analysis?

Surely the actual warfighting on the eastern front and the attritional wearing down of German resources and manpower as well as the destruction of German access to oil from the air bombardment had a huge part to play in the outcome of the war?

I'm not sure that is a particularly new view

I remember that series in the 1970s "The World at War". Most of the theme of that seemed to be that it was won by the side with the greatest industrial muscle and manpower, not by brilliant generals or masterful tactics.

just believe the conventional view that Hitler was a murderous genocidal monster

Was he not a murderous genocidal monster?

I'm just going by, say, the holocaust here.

Would the battles of Stalingrad and Kursk stand up to that analysis?

this is an interesting take on Kursk In essence saying the Germans didn't "lose" Hitler just lost his nerve. There is very little photograhic (none at all in fact) evidence from the Russian side to back up their claims of a victory at Prochorovka, and the ruskies loved photo's of knocked out tigers and considering they held the ground after the battle it does suggest a defeat.

I dunno. I sometimes think historical revisionism is a polite way of saying ‘academic trolling’

Would the battles of Stalingrad and Kursk stand up to that analysis?

Yes, Op Barbarossa is doomed to failure from the outset, The Germans simply aren't ever going to win.  Same as for the Battle of Britain for example (regardless of subsequent myth making) the Luftwaffe cannot ever hope to beat the RAF, and the Invasion of the UK is a hopeless non-starter.

I sometimes think historical revisionism is a polite way of saying ‘academic trolling’

haha, yes agreed, but when it's based on actual evidence and not just on (as in this case) an academic hard-on for military paraphernalia, it does make for an interesting argument.

Just finished reading a fascinating and brilliant book about a very dull American General (Lehey, bit that’s not important) What is important is that the author of that book argues thusly: (paraphrasing here)

That has to be Phillips O'Brien.

I was just listening to him the other day on a James Holland and Al Murray podcast.

https://play.acast.com/s/wehaveways/wherethewarwaswon-part1

A really good listen.

James Holland has written some good revisionist stuff as well.

There are now a lot of discussion about the reality of what happened at Kursk, compared to the Soviet propaganda after the war.

Same as for the Battle of Britain for example (regardless of subsequent myth making) the Luftwaffe cannot ever hope to beat the RAF, and the Invasion of the UK is a hopeless non-starter.

There's a nifty little precis of how impossible a German invasion was in Derek Robinson's excellent A Piece Of Cake, I always wondered how true it was.

Was he not a murderous genocidal monster?

I’m just going by, say, the holocaust here.

That is the conventional view, for sure. However, I'm told that revisionists believe that Churchill and Roosevelt were the real monsters and Hitler was framed. Pity nobody back in the 1940s had cameras and stuff to record it all.

However, I’m told that revisionists believe that Churchill and Roosevelt were the real monsters and Hitler was framed.

Which revisionists are these? The one's with the tattooed foreheads?

Same as for the Battle of Britain for example (regardless of subsequent myth making) the Luftwaffe cannot ever hope to beat the RAF, and the Invasion of the UK is a hopeless non-starter.

This one I will disagree with. Hitler moved the focus on to bombing london just at the point the air defenses in the south where being overwhelmed because the German bombing of the airfields was meaning fewer and fewer planes could get into the air. If Hitler had continued the attacks on the air bases another 3 weeks we would have lost the battle for air superiority over the UK

There is also the theory that Hitler considered the brits aryan and was hoping for accommodation with britain ( fascists in the royal family / moesley) so delayed invasion because of this

Lots of mistakes on both sides. History is written by the winners

Which revisionists are these? The one’s with the tattooed foreheads?

Hard to tell. They wear strange looking hats that cover their faces.

the Invasion of the UK is a hopeless non-starter.

Pretty much. The troops were to be transported by Rhine barges, something like only 25% were powered and they would be towing the others. It's doubtful that they would of got across, even if the Germans had air superiority. The Royal Navy would of risked their destroyers, of which they had about 150, to sink them.

The myth of plucky Britain standing alone in 1940 is nonsense. The UK was a Global Superpower, with Global reach and huge Global resources.

If Hitler had continued the attacks on the air bases another 3 weeks we would have lost the battle for air superiority over the UK

still wouldn't be able to mount an invasion, no armour piercing bomb that could penetrate the deck armour of british capital ships, no torpedo bombers. Home fleet would arrive in the channel at dawn and it would be all over within 3 hours

This one I will disagree with. Hitler moved the focus on to bombing london just at the point the air defenses in the south where being overwhelmed because the German bombing of the airfields was meaning fewer and fewer planes could get into the air. If Hitler had continued the attacks on the air bases another 3 weeks we would have lost the battle for air superiority over the UK

This is also a bit of a myth. Even before the bombing of London, the RAF were not being overwhelmed. They only put 1 airfield out of action and that was for 24 hours.

The Luftwaffe were taking unsupportable losses in the daylight raids on the airfields.

Their biggest mistake was not hitting the radar stations.

The least important aspect of the whole of WW2 is the actual war fighting; there is no battle in the whole war that doesn’t proceed exactly as the forces arranged beforehand predicts it would.

Its not really a controversial view. At the scale the battles were being fought, especially in the European theater, every battle played out the way you would expect given the "pieces on the board before the game"

War at the scale of WWII becomes more about moving men and producing material than about the battles themselves.

Zoom in small enough and tactics matter. Take the naval battles in Pacific: Japan gets a stunning victory at Pearl Harbour. Then the still crippled US Navy rolls the dice at Midway and defeats a far superior Japanese force. On those days tactics mattered. But zoom back out and look at the Pacific Theater as a whole. Japan is doomed from the start as it has nowhere near the industrial power of the US to sustain and win a war.

From what I understand, Germany and Japan didn't think they would have to conquer Britain and the U.S., they thought the Allies would decide it was better to sue for peace than accept the enormous casualties involved in continuing fighting (FFS, Japan had a plot to assassinate Charlie Chaplin, thinking that would demoralize the American public). What people always seem to misunderstand is that the enemy will usually fight to the death when they face an existential threat rather than just capitulate. In a way, their early successes contributed to their defeat because they overestimated their own strength and underestimated the Allies until it was too late. I think Germany and Japan didn't actually realize they were losing until 1944, by which time it was too late to do anything but postpone the inevitable.

@Kulunk cheers. Will have a read at that tonight.

If Hitler had continued the attacks on the air bases another 3 weeks we would have lost the battle for air superiority over the UK

Don't think that was the case- our production of aircraft was outpacing losses and german aircraft manufacturing couldn't keep up with their losses or our rate of production.

The radar defences could predict formations so a/c were in the air waiting. Typically once over the UK, a BF109 had only a few minutes of flight at full power before it had to head home and about 1 minute's worth of ammo. They often had to abandon the bombers they escorted.

Our a/c could land, re-fuel and get back in the air.

One area that does force a change of opinion is the role of Bletchley- when people were writing up WW2 history in the 50s-70s this wasn't common knowledge. I think the Kursk offence was known about hence the Russians could plan a defence. They wouldn't declare that would they?

My Grandad was in the Civil Defence in London. In the days after D-Day he was going to be sent over to France as a medic but him and all the other Civil Defence/ARP people were summoned back to their stations on Churchill's orders. Then the V1s & V2s fell. My Grandad thought Churchill was a genius for this "hunch" the Germans would retaliate, rather than the fact he had good intel.

Errrr, have to disagree on Midway...although not on the eventual outcome of the war. It could easily have gone the other way...

By utter and pure fluke the Yanks found and destroyed 3 of 4 Japanese carriers in the space of 15 minutes. Nobody expected that to happen beforehand. While it may not have changed the eventual outcome of the war it is accepted that those 15 minutes did considerably shorten it (apart from by academic trolls that is 😀)...

Having read both Churchill’s ww2 history and Alanbrookes diaries I’m not a huge fan of Churchill. However, it is interesting that he says after Pearl Harbour he never really had any doubts about ultimate victory, just how long it takes and how many lives. A bit of hyperbole maybe but I think his point is fair...

Very little revissionism stands up to closer examination, especially the sweeping statements. History is indeed written by the winners but the fact is they won. There's still something of an obsession with WWII in the UK as this thread demonstrates. Everyone sems to have an opinion and voice it without much fact checking. And there are plenty of facts from both sides as there are so many people passionately reasearching and documents keep coming to the surface.

Perhaps the most important thing about the whole sordid mess for us is to learn from it. And yet the extreme right isn't being fought against with the same intesity as other terrorists despite more victims in many countries. We need to do more to stop history repeating itself.

Some of the things that jumped off the page as obvious revisions:

Their biggest mistake was not hitting the radar stations.

That was an objective and they did hit some, but not the mobile ones which continued to provide enough cover.

Then the still crippled US Navy rolls the dice at Midway and defeats a far superior Japanese force

Superior how? Sitting ducks given the imbalance in air power (mainly range).

Klunk forgets that the German rail guns and coastal batteries with the fire power of destroyers were in place by September 40 and that the channel was out of bounds to Capital ships both German and Allied for most of the war.

Edit to add:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Midway

Because a one liner that includes "sitting ducks" is an example of a misleading one-liner. Fact is the Japanese had a couple of aircraft carriers out of action and the Americans had the range to make a first strike.

Everyone sems to have an opinion and voice it without much fact checking.

That was an objective and they did hit some, but not the mobile ones which continued to provide enough cover.

Love this. Not a lot of fact checking going on there. there were no mobile radar units in 1940. There were very few attacks on the radar stations and only minor damage. They were critical to the RAF. The Luftwaffe simply did not understand how critical they were. If they had, they would of put a lot of effort in to destroy them.

Errrr, have to disagree on Midway…although not on the eventual outcome of the war. It could easily have gone the other way…

By utter and pure fluke the Yanks found and destroyed 3 of 4 Japanese carriers in the space of 15 minutes. Nobody expected that to happen beforehand. While it may not have changed the eventual outcome of the war it is accepted that those 15 minutes did considerably shorten it (apart from by academic trolls that is 😀)…

That's exactly the point I made, so no need to disagree 😉

Klunk forgets that the German rail guns and coastal batteries with the fire power of destroyers were in place by September 40 and that the channel was out of bounds to Capital ships both German and Allied for most of the war.

Apart from when 7 of them took part in D Day without loss, when the Atlantic Wall as at it's strongest.

They had no significant coastal batteries in 1940 that would of been capable of defeating the RN. Even later on, they would of struggled to hit a warship moving at 30 kts. Capital ships would not of been used in the Dover Strait due to the lack of searoom, however, in the Channel they would of happily torn any invasion barges to shreds, although I doubt they would of been needed to do that, as the destroyers would be a more effective means of doing so.

Love this. Not a lot of fact checking going on there. there were no mobile radar units in 1940. There were very few attacks on the radar stations and only minor damage.

FFS read a bit. The mobile station on the Isle of Wight was critical after Ventnor was destroyed:

Ventnor Chain Home Destroyed

Ventnor Chain Home had, during the opening stages of the war, given effective warning of large raids from July 11th. This included detecting the large force of German bombers flown on August 8th4, and the even larger force sent across the channel on August 11th5. However, on the 12th August, for the first time, the Isle of Wight was a prime target. The Chain Home station at Ventnor was one of four radar stations6 as well as Portsmouth docks and several airfields targeted for attack by the force of 100 Junkers Ju88s, 120 Messerschmitt BF110s and 25 Messerschmitt BF109s. A detachment of 20 Junkers Ju88s broke from the main formation and turned to attack the Chain Home Radar station at Ventnor. As they began their dive, spitfires from 152 Squadron intercepted, destroying some of the Ju88s before they could release their bombs. Fifteen, however, got through.
Each of the bombers were armed with four high-explosive bombs and many added to the confusion by strafing the area with machine-guns.

Despite the efforts of local firemen, who were hampered by the lack of available water on the site, most of the service buildings had been destroyed.

Several delayed action and unexploded bombs were located in the site of the radar pylons, forcing the whole site to be evacuated and delaying the start of repairs. Luckily, only one soldier was injured in the attack. The radar station was put out of action, the only one in the country in the entire war to have been destroyed.

Something that is often overlooked- our munitions and weapons were made by employed people "doing their bit" (despite the strikes that took place in the war) vs German slave labour. Who had the bigger incentive to do a good job? There is evidence that where possible they sabotaged production- of course not many lived to tell the tale.

delaying the start of repairs.

The radar station was put out of action,

It wasn't "destroyed". It was badly damaged and "quickly repaired".

Where is the spec of this mobile chain home station? If they could use a mobile unit instead of huge pylons and wooden huts why wouldn't there of been a lot of them?

Very early in the battle, the Luftwaffe made a series of small but effective raids on several stations, including Ventnor, but they were repaired quickly. In the meantime, the operators broadcast radar-like signals from neighbouring stations in order to fool the Germans that coverage continued. The Germans' attacks were sporadic and short-lived. The German High Command apparently never understood the importance of radar to the RAF's efforts, or they would have assigned these stations a much higher priority. Greater disruption was caused by destroying the teletype and landline links of the vulnerable above-ground control huts and the power cables to the masts than by attacking the towers themselves.

@richmtb that’s a fair point which only occurred to me after I’d posted 😀. I think my point was more that Midway itself was not a foregone conclusion. Dan Carlin’s Supernova in the East podcast is great on this...

Klunk forgets that the German rail guns and coastal batteries with the fire power of destroyers were in place by September 40 and that the channel was out of bounds to Capital ships both German and Allied for most of the war.

LOL how the **** does a rail gun hit a moving target? good for shelling a static fort or bombarding a city not good at hitting a destroyer doing upwards of 40mph.

Naval engagements are interesting because there are always fewer pieces in play than a pitched land battle. So tactics definitely matter.

Coral Sea, Midway and Guadalcanal could all have played out differently and shortened or lengthened the war in the Pacific pretty significantly, but very little could have changed the eventual outcome of the war.

This is a great book about the naval battles off Guadalcanal

Neptune's Inferno

Apart from when 7 of them took part in D Day without loss, when the Atlantic Wall as at it’s stronges

I've visited la pointe du Hoc, it's a sea of craters, what with that and the commandos. By D-day the RAF, paratroppers, resistants, commandos had knocked out the heavy guns but shipping losses were still high, mainly down to torpedos. At least one gun had been moved back to a safer place and was taken by a handful of parras.

Check the guns the Germans had available by Septemeber 1940. A few seconds with Google confirms what I've stated, railways guns and batterys with destroyer guns. The two sides spent the war occasionally shelling across the channel but the wear rate discouraged over-using the guns which were needed in case capital ships turned up.

the fire power of destroyers

Missed that as well. What could the "firepower of a destroyer" do to a capital ship?

On the battle of britain - yes we could build more warplanes and most importantly when our planes were shot down the pilot usually parachuted to ground and thus could fly again unlike the Germans who ended up as POWS

The key point was the destruction of the runways allowing British planes to take off. 3 more weeks attacks on the airfields would have seriously reduced the British ability to get the planes and pilots in the air

I see Klunk has changed tactics and realising that the Germans did indeed have considerable firepower now claims the Germans were too incompetant to do the sums necessary to use them. They didn't even need to be able to hit anything with them. Both the admiralty and the Germans had taken the decision not to send capital ships down the channel as it would have been too high a risk.

Admit that this:

Home fleet would arrive in the channel at dawn and it would be all over within 3 hours

is revissionism of the highest order.

german coastal battery performance 😀

The guns started shelling the Dover area during the second week of August 1940 and continued firing until September 1944. Over a thousand rounds were fired but the German coast batteries only sank:

Sambut,[5] 7,219 BRT, 6 June 1944
Empire Lough, 2,824 BRT, 24 June 1944[6]

it's amusing to think that the the admiralty would consider the channel a no go area during an invasion.

I agree with much of what you are saying, TJ. The Germans could possibly have won the air war if they had continued it to the bitter end and accepted the almost toal loss of their own air force but they took to bombing other things. However, the airfields themselves weren't critical. Any big field was enough and they had plenty lined up. The ciritcal factors were pilots (and you are right, allied loses were lower), aircraft ( despite the lower losses the RAF stood to run out first), aircraft production (and the Germans failed to put the factories within range out of action which was a significant failing).

I’ve visited la pointe du Hoc, it’s a sea of craters, what with that and the commandos. By D-day the RAF, paratroppers, resistants, commandos had knocked out the heavy guns but shipping losses were still high, mainly down to torpedos. At least one gun had been moved back to a safer place and was taken by a handful of parras.

i don't know where to start.

The French Resistance was very ineffectual during WW2. They certainly didn't do significant damage to the Atlantic Wall.

Which shipping losses are you talking about? There were relatively very few Allied losses on D Day, when compared to the size of the fleet. More destroyers were lost to mines than anything else. None of the Battleships, Heavy Cruisers or Cruisers were lost.

What do you think created the craters at Pointe du Hoc? The gun emplacements were never finished before D-Day anyway. Besides, they were 155mm guns, not "railway guns" and their sole purpose was to shell the landing beaches, not to try and attack Capital Ships.

Check the guns the Germans had available by Septemeber 1940. A few seconds with Google confirms what I’ve stated, railways guns and batterys with destroyer guns.

What are these 1940 coastal defenses? I can find nothing on Google. All I know about is the Atlantic Wall, which wasn't started until 1942.

Please post a link I would love to hear about them.

The two sides spent the war occasionally shelling across the channel but the wear rate discouraged over-using the guns which were needed in case capital ships turned up.

Explain again how they were going to hit a moving target? They didn't have the complex fire control systems that were used by the Battleships.

Some good points absolutely ruined by the use of “would of”. Would have. It’s would have.
😅😱

aircraft ( despite the lower losses the RAF stood to run out first),

No they didn't. They were building more aircraft than Germany in 1940 and taking fewer losses.

A Lot of the Battle of Britain stuff completely misses the point and history that for fighter command it was fully integrated air defence system with data collection analysis and dissemination of the first order.

That's why the BoB was a draw for the RAF and not a defeat. (Slips in sneaky revision...)

IIRC the bloke behind (Dowding) it was a bit unpopular with other RAF bigwigs so eventually got booted/moved and replaced by a less effective cabal (YMMV). British management, right there.

This seems like a reasonable summary of the German coastal guns

The first such guns began to be installed around the end of July 1940. First came Siegfried Battery at Audinghen, south of Cap Gris-Nez, with one 38 cm SK C/34 naval gun (15-inch) gun (later increased to 4 and renamed Todt Battery), shortly followed by:

Three 30.5 cm (12.0 in) guns at Friedrich August Battery, to the north of Boulogne-sur-Mer
Four 28 cm (11 in) guns at Grosser Kurfürst Battery at Cap Gris-Nez
Two 21 cm (8.3 in) guns at Prinz Heinrich Battery just outside Calais
Two 21 cm (8.3 in) guns at Oldenburg Battery in Calais
Three 40.6 cm SK C/34 (16-inch) guns (from among the so-called Adolf Guns) at Lindemann Battery between Calais and Cap Blanc-Nez. The battery was named Lindemann after the fallen captain of the battleship Bismarck.
By early August, Siegfried Battery and Grosser Kurfürst Battery were fully operational as were all of the Army’s railway guns. Seven of the railway guns, six 28 cm (11 in) K5 guns and a single 21 cm (8.3 in) K12 gun with a range of 115 km (71 mi), could only be used against land targets. The remainder, thirteen 28 cm (11 in) guns and five 24 cm (9.4 in) guns, plus additional motorised batteries comprising twelve 24 cm (9.4 in) guns and ten 21 cm (8.3 in) guns, could be fired at shipping but were of limited effectiveness due to their slow traverse speed, long loading time and ammunition types. Land-based guns have always been feared by navies because they are on a stationary platform and are thus more accurate (and can be larger, with more ammunition stowage) than those on board ship. Super-heavy railway guns can only be traversed by moving the entire gun and its carriage along a curved track, or by building a special cross track or turntable. This, combined with their slow rate of fire (measured in rounds per hour or even rounds per day), makes it difficult for them to hit moving targets. Another problem with super-heavy guns is that their barrels (which are difficult to make and expensive to replace) wear out relatively quickly, so they could not be fired often.

Better suited for use against naval targets were the four heavy naval batteries installed by mid-September: Friedrich August, Prinz Heinrich, Oldenburg and Siegfried (later renamed Todt) – a total of eleven guns, with the firepower of a battlecruiser. Fire control for these guns was provided by both spotter aircraft and by DeTeGerät radar sets installed at Blanc-Nez and Cap d’Alprech. These units were capable of detecting targets out to a range of 40 km (25 mi), including small British patrol craft near the English coast. Two additional radar sites were added by mid-September: a DeTeGerät at Cap de la Hague and a FernDeTeGerät long-range radar at Cap d’Antifer near Le Havre.[4]

Perhaps the most remarkable gun was the 21 cm (8.3 in) Kanone 12 in Eisenbahnlafette, manned by the German Army. The gun had an effective range of 45 km (28 mi). Designed as a successor to the World War I Paris gun, it is claimed to have had a maximum range of 115 km (71 mi). Shell fragments from the gun were found near Chatham, Kent, 88 km (55 mi) from the nearest point on the French coast. There were two of these guns, operated by Artillerie-Batterie 701 (E) and they remained on the Channel Coast for the rest of the war.

The guns started shelling the Dover area during the second week of August 1940 and continued firing until September 1944. Over a thousand rounds were fired but the German coast batteries only sank:

Sambut,[5] 7,219 BRT, 6 June 1944
Empire Lough, 2,824 BRT, 24 June 1944[6]

Empire Lough was one of 21 coastal vessels in the convoy ETC-17, escorted by the frigate HMS Dakins and corvette HMS Sunflower. On 24 June 1944, the convoy left Southend en route to the Seine Bay when the ships were engaged by German long-range coastal artillery guns off Dover. Empire Lough was set on fire and declared a total loss after she was beached near Folkestone. The master Robert Robinson and one crew member were lost. The freighter Gurden Gates (1,791 grt, built 1943) was damaged in the same action.

So the Germans definitely had the firepower to take out a capital ship, whether they could have hit it is an entirely different question.

For Klunk and gobulchul.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dover_Strait_coastal_guns

it’s amusing to think that the the admiralty would consider the channel a no go area during an invasion.

And yet that's what happened to the German navy on D-day apart from the U-boats and small craft.

The ‘Brief Statement of Reasons for Cancellation of Invasion of England’, prepared by the German Naval Historical Staff in 1944,[7] states:

As the preliminary work and preparations proceeded, the exceptional difficulties became more and more obvious. The more forcibly the risks were brought home, the dimmer grew faith in success… just as in Napoleon’s invasion plans in 1805, the fundamental requirement for success was lacking, that is, command of the sea. This lack of superiority at sea was to be compensated for by air superiority. But it was never even possible to destroy enemy sea superiority by use of our own air superiority… The sea area in which we were to operate was dominated by a well prepared opponent who was determined to fight to the utmost of his ability. The greatest difficulty was bound to be that of maintaining the flow of supplies and food. The enemy’s fleet and other means of naval defence had to be considered as a decisive factor. Owing to the weakness of our naval forces there could be no effective guarantee against the enemy breaking into our area of transports, despite our mine barrages on the flanks and despite our air superiority.

3 more weeks attacks on the airfields would have seriously reduced the British ability to get the planes and pilots in the air

Nope, the RAF had dispersal airfields* that were largely ignored by the Luftwaffe, and as has been pointed out, they were losing too many bombers on daylight raids to drop bombs on what were mostly grassy fields, that were quickly and easily repaired and back in service. the Luftwaffe quickly realised that it was unsustainable, there were just too many airfields, and not enough bombers

*remember also that the planes at the time Spitfires and Hurricanes essentially needed about 250 yards of grass to get airborne, Southern England is literally littered with ready made airbases.

is revissionism of the highest order.

Nope, the RN were gagging for the Germans to invade as they knew full well, it probably wouldn't have got out of whichever French port they'd chosen before being blown to bits. There are telegrams from Fleet Nor (at Scapa Flow) arguing this this point to the Home Fleet

And yet that’s what happened to the German navy on D-day apart from the U-boats and small craft.

exactly can't deploy what you don't have.

Grand Admiral Raeder (head of the Kriegsmarine in 1940) said much the same, in almost the same words, after the war; and had tried to dodge out of the invasion as early as July 11th.[8] The last sentence quoted above appears to mean that, even if the Luftwaffe had won the air battle of Britain, the Kriegsmarine would still not have wanted to attempt SEALION.

No they didn’t. They were building more aircraft than Germany in 1940 and taking fewer losses.

That is correct, but had less in stock. I agree with TJ and Baron, it was poor tactics and decisions that meant the Germans missed a window of opportunity to knock out the RAF, and backing off in late August gave the RAF and the factories the chance to turn it around. How things would have turned out had the RAF and Luftwaffe continued at teh same rate of attrition as the "hardest day" we thankfully don't know and can only speculate.

And yet that’s what happened to the German navy on D-day apart from the U-boats and small craft.

Where was no German Navy in June 1944. Tirpitz was a prisoner in Norway. Their remaining cruisers were in the Baltic providing NGS. If they had left the Baltic they would of been wiped out by the Home Fleet.

The main activity was by the E Boats, by 1944 the U boats were very vulnerable to the new technology of the Allies.

it was poor tactics and decisions that meant the Germans missed a window of opportunity to knock out the RAF

Not really, the Luftwaffe have to destroy the RAF, bombing airfields isn't going to work, they don't understand the significance of Chain Home so don't target it in any meaningful way, and they don't ever have air superiority of fighters* at any point of the battle, it's literally hopeless, they cannot; regardless of whatever they do, win...

* regardless of actual numbers of airplanes, one has to consider "time over the battle-space". The 109 can spend maybe 10 minutes over a teeny bit of southern UK, each spitfire can last 4-5 longer in the air as each 109, so has each 109 turns to fly home, the same spitfire is then free to go look for another target. The Luftwaffe simply don't have the numbers, it's a forgone conclusion.

They didn't even deploy what they did have, Klunk. And your quote about the Kriegsmarine backs up what I said about the Channel being out of bounds to the navies from both sides for most of the war.

3 more weeks attacks on the airfields would have seriously reduced the British ability to get the planes and pilots in the air

Came to dispute this but nickc beat me to it.

In most cases the craters in the fields were re-filled overnight. I don't think any airfield was out of action for over 24 hours.

I worked at Biggin Hill for an air charter company flying Learjets. Next door was the Heritage hangar with Spitfires- the only aircraft that people would leave their desks to see take off (no-one gave a toss about the bizjets) It didn't go to the main runway to take off- it would do so from the taxi-way.

In the summer of 1940 we were making c1000 aircraft a month- more than enough to cover the losses and I think aircrew losses for the Germans were c5x as great as the RAF.

How things would have turned out had the RAF and Luftwaffe continued at teh same rate of attrition as the “hardest day” we thankfully don’t know and can only speculate.

As both sides suffered very similar losses and the UK was producing more aircraft than Germany, then it would follow that the Luftwaffe still would of failed. Even at that time, the RAF had a system of rotation for it's crews. They would be rotated to quieter sectors to give them a chance to recover. The Nazi's didn't really care about that, or any way of effectively doing it and their pilots flew day after day. battle fatigue was another major factor.

They basically threw themselves against the first modern air defense system and were gradually destroyed. Another myth of the BoB, is that of "The Few", they were the tip of the spear of a massive and complex organisation.

Channel being out of bounds to the navies from both sides for most of the war.

so where then did all the merchant shipping that used London ports go exactly? If not directly into the Channel?

They didn’t even deploy what they did have, Klunk. And your quote about the Kriegsmarine backs up what I said about the Channel being out of bounds to the navies from both sides for most of the war.

So how did the Allies launch the biggest fleet in history in the English Channel?

What do you think kept the Kriegsmarine out of the Channel during D Day?

The Royal Navy didn't deploy Capital ships to the English Channel as it made no sense whatsoever. Why would you risk them to U boats if they were no needed there?

I'm not trying to revise the outcome, Nick or dispute any of that. I got into this correcting errors about radar.

Fact is the Germans lost the Battle of Britain, I'm looking at explanations of that which include poor German choices and backing off at a critical point because it wasn't a foregone conclusion.

In most cases the craters in the fields were re-filled overnight. I don’t think any airfield was out of action for over 24 hours.

Manston was abandoned for a period of time and the RAF were vastly relieved when the attack turned to London, at the behest of Hitler for political reasons, after tit for tat bombing of cities following an initial targeting mistake by the Germans.

because it wasn’t a foregone conclusion.

Interestingly that the point this historian is making, The BoB (like every other battle in the war bar the Battle of France) was a forgone conclusion, given the forces deployed at the start of the battle, it went the only way that it could've, i.e. the UK won, there was literally no other conclusion, what the German military did was largely irrelevant.

And your quote about the Kriegsmarine backs up what I said about the Channel being out of bounds to the navies from both sides for most of the war.

LOL it says we can't win because there's a navy there that's prepare to do what ever it takes to stop us. It doesn't say we can't win because the the rn thinks the channel is a out of bounds.

As both sides suffered very similar losses and the UK

Sorry, no, the Germans lost about 5x as many aircrew (a large proportion being bomber aircrew so more than 1 person per plane) and had c700 captured and more wounded than the RAF.

I think the battle fatigue is worthy to note- after storming Poland & France, it was a shock to be suffering such defeats. I've seen a history channel doc that had a Luftwaffe ace's diary. It starts in 1939 in high spirits but come the summer of 1940 it got darker as the loss of friends took its toll.

I got into this correcting errors about radar.

Which errors were these?

I am still waiting for the spec of the mobile radar system that the UK had in 1940?

So how did the Allies launch the biggest fleet in history in the English Channel?

If you're refering to D-day then by knocking out all the German heavy guns with air raids, commando, paratroop and resistant action. Having air control. Having already eliminated most of the German navy with ehexception of U-boats and light craft.

What do you think kept the Kriegsmarine out of the Channel during D Day?

Heavy guns, battle ships, the RAF, submarines... .

The Royal Navy didn’t deploy Capital ships to the English Channel as it made no sense whatsoever. Why would you risk them to U boats if they were no needed there?

Absolutely, and yet you were claming the Navy could have romped through the Channel with impunity in 1940 had the Germans won the air war (which they didn't) and embarked on Sealion (which they didn't) because the Luftwaffe couldn't touch capital ships and the Germans didn't have heavy guns (which they did). Some of that was Gobulchul.

You're now taking the facts I'm providing to rubbish your own earlier contributions, klunk. You're learning. It must be all this revision.

Fascinating thread. People are still more passionate about events of 70 odd years ago than screwing their own economy with Brexit. With a common theme.

I think the battle fatigue is worthy to note- after storming Poland & France, it was a shock to be suffering such defeats. I’ve seen a history channel doc that had a Luftwaffe ace’s diary. It starts in 1939 in high spirits but come the summer of 1940 it got darker as the loss of friends took its toll.

Completely agree. It was the same for the British though and what doesn't seem to have been addressed earlier in this thread (I might have missed it) is that while Britain was able to keep up with hardware losses, toward the end of the BoB there was immense pilot fatigue but also pilot losses were only being replaced by inexperienced aircrew - sub 20 hours on Type in some cases. That was another reason there was huge relief when London was targeted.

Manston was abandoned for a period of time and the RAF were vastly relieved when the attack turned to London

Typical the one I drive past on the way to work! Yes relieved, but its not as if they had a number of airfields out of action and they could then repair them. A lot of them were back in operation over night. The respite just gave the repair crews a bit of a breather. Given the greater losses the Luftwaffe had, we were still getting aircraft in the air so couldn't have been that disadvantaged.

They were plotted approaching the Isle of Wight soon after 2 p.m., and ... because back-up semi-mobile radar had been installed on the Isle of Wight and soon ...

the numbers

People are still more passionate about events of 70 odd years ago than screwing their own economy with Brexit. With a common theme.

That's quite a leap, this IS a thread about historical revisionism so guess what...folk are talking about history The point I was trying to make was that still, after the heaps of material written about this monumental and well recorded event, historians are still finding new ways of looking at the facts and coming to different conclusions.

It has **** all to do with Brexit.

You’re now taking the facts I’m providing to rubbish your own earlier contributions, klunk. You’re learning. It must be all this revision.

lol

People are still more passionate about events of 70 odd years ago than screwing their own economy with Brexit.

It's 'cos we know what happened. With the latter we don't know WTF it's going to end up like and don't like to envisage it!

If you’re refering to D-day then by knocking out all the German heavy guns with air raids, commando, paratroop and resistant action.

So why did they launch the Merville and the Point du Hoc Raids if these guns had been knocked out? Bombing them had been largely ineffective and the French resistance never took out any hard targets like that.

The "heavy guns" you keep referring to, were not a major threat to the ships but were intended to shell the troops on the beaches. They did not deny the sea to the Allies.

Absolutely, and yet you were claming the Navy could have romped through the Channel with impunity in 1940 had the Germans won the air war (which they didn’t) and embarked on Sealion (which they didn’t) because the Luftwaffe couldn’t touch capital ships and the Germans didn’t have heavy guns (which they did). Some of that was Gobulchul.

Nobody said the RN would of been impervious to losses. The fact is, that if invasion had become a reality the RN would of excepted losses to sink the invasion fleet. They accepted the loss of a significant number of destroyers at Dunkirk, so imagine what they would of acceptted had Sealion gone ahead.

These "heavy guns" you seem to think would of dominated the sea, have been described above and been shown to be mostly useless against shipping.

Still waiting for this mobile radar station information.

It has everything to do with Brexit. Or should I say Brexit has everything to do with anti-European propaganda and a lot of that is rooted in anti-German attitudes that go back to WW2.

Zoom in small enough and tactics matter. Take the naval battles in Pacific: Japan gets a stunning victory at Pearl Harbour. Then the still crippled US Navy rolls the dice at Midway and defeats a far superior Japanese force. On those days tactics mattered. But zoom back out and look at the Pacific Theater as a whole.

Japan struck Pearl Harbour before even declaring war. Naturally ,this pissed off the Yanks but the latter had their carriers at sea and did a helluva repair job on the ships that did get hit.

I don't entirely agree that the US rolled the dice at Midway. I believe they cracked some Japanse codes, intercepted them and then kicked their arses due to the latter making a catalogue of errors and having just about everything go wrong, eg they had a load of planes doing a turnaround on one of the carriers when the Americans attacked = carnage that they couldn't recover from. All in all, Midway was over pretty damn quick.

Japan is doomed from the start as it has nowhere near the industrial power of the US to sustain and win a war.

Yep. Their fleet was chugging through an insane amount of oil alone. It didn't matter how advanced their carriers and aircraft were, they couldn't get anywhere near the production levels of the US. The whole Pacific War was very unlikely going to turn out differently.

yeah because say a German railway gun couldn't hit a destroyer doing 36knots is somehow anti German propaganda! 😀 Call me a traitor but I'd hazard a guess a british one would do no better.

They accepted the loss of a significant number of destroyers at Dunkirk

And, perhaps more importantly the losses of destroyers at Dunkirk is significant for two reasons, 1. the losses given the overall destroyer fleet were actually pretty small (6 out of a fleet of over 160) and 2. The RN didn't feel the need to deploy any capital ships at all to the evacuation, knowing full well, they didn't need to...

The RN didn’t feel the need to deploy any capital ships at all to the evacuation, knowing full well, they didn’t need to…

Absolutely. They wouldn't of needed to deploy any capital ships to sink an invasion fleet either.

It has everything to do with Brexit.

That sort of populist nonsense is entirely antithetical to what were talking about. It may play well on the Sun's FB page, but it relies of myth making, what were doing here is trying to bust myths. The propaganda (of the Brexiteer) relies on a stories of "Britain standing alone" (which evidence has shown that it didn't) and the BoB myth of the "few against the many" which it sort of was, only the other way around, the few was the Luftwaffe, not the RAF...and that you, ironically are arguing for...

The revisionism I'm talking about takes away the propaganda of the war from the Brexiteers...