Germany -- No Battleships No Mediterranean (1 Viewer)

[WARSPITER]

wrong button.

 

[don4331]

lots.

Tungsten - France had a couple of tungsten mines which were operated ( perhaps clandestinely ) by the French who then smuggled the tungsten
out - through Spain I think. The mines were known of by German officials but nothing was done to exploit them.

Tungsten is also very convoluted. There were efforts by Allies to buy up all the production by paying significantly over cost. And they were successful in cornering all the Portugal production. But the mines in Spain were actually owned by German interests...so, they just used the extra $$$ to expand the mine to meet both Allies and German demands.

 

[Shortround6]

I don't think the Germans ever got any raw materials/resources out of North Africa, could be wrong.
This a different than the Germans being interested/influencing things in the Mediterranean.
Like trying to get or keep Spain supplying materials or getting Turkey to supply materials. The better the Germans were doing in the Med the more likely the bordering countries are to deal with Germany. The worse the Germans are doing the more likely these countries are to side with the British/allies. Slow or stop shipments to Germany.
In any case a few German battleships or heavy units are going to make very little difference to any Mediterranean raw material shipments. Just getting them into the med without serious damage if not outright sinking is going to be quite a trick. Maybe a few cargo ships can sneak by while the RN focuses on sinking the German interlopers?

Germans didn't want to deal with the Med at all, except to safeguard Romania. But the Italians failure to deal with the Greeks and British put the Romanian oil fields in jeopardy and Forced the Germans to push back the British before they built up enough bombers to attack the oil fields from Greek or Egyptian bases.

 

[Geoffrey Sinclair]

The two volume set The Economic Blockade by W N Medlicott goes into the allied efforts to set up an economic blockade of Germany, no consolidated table of German imports, the book uses British estimates as well as German figures for imports and stocks. Germany had no domestic production of bauxite, molybdenum, chrome, manganese, titanium and tungsten (wolfram).

Most of the import tables given on the book are for wartime trade, Sweden maintained iron ore exports, Turkey ceased exporting chrome until 1943, Spanish trade went largely backwards but Portuguese exports of Wolfram went from 638 tons in 1939 to 1,641 tons in 1942 and 1,696 tons in 1943.

The books also note the leaks in the blockade to June 1941 via the USSR and to late 1942 from Africa into Southern France.

In 1940 Germany received 3,032,830 metric tons of imports from the USSR, plus 166,242 tons from Japan, 71,902 tons from Iran and 327 tons from Afghanistan, all via the USSR. In 1941 the figures were USSR 1,362,269 metric tons, Japan 212,366 tons, Iran 27,177 tons, Afghanistan 2,103 tons. Around 1/3 of this were food and 1/4 fuel in 1940, and over 1/2 of the 1941 imports were food, 1/5 fuel.

In 1941 imports from Africa were 3,811,732 metric tons, in January to August 1942 3,194,766 tons. About 40 to 50% of these were food and a third fertilisers. Mostly carried in French ships.

 

[Shortround6]

In 1941 imports from Africa were 3,811,732 metric tons, in January to August 1942 3,194,766 tons. About 40 to 50% of these were food and a third fertilisers. Mostly carried in French ships.

I am assuming that this was from Algeria and Morrocco?
Non-French ships would have been fair game or at least at higher risk of search and seizure?

 

[yulzari]

I am assuming that this was from Algeria and Morrocco?
Non-French ships would have been fair game or at least at higher risk of search and seizure?

My mother experienced significant food shortages as a refugee in Morocco. With so much food being required by the Italy-German Armistice Commission to be shipped to France for use by the Axis.

 

[Admiral Beez]

If Hitler does not bother with battleships or with the Mediterranean, what can he do with these resources?

Trucks, trucks and more trucks. There should have been a hard and fast rule: if it doesn't support victory in the east, it doesn't get built. Skip the Bismarcks and Scharnhorsts, and take those >120k tons of steel and copper and build several thousand Mercedes-Benz L3000, Opel Blitz 4x4, and MAN ML4500 all terrain trucks plus Krauss-Maffei and Maultier halftrack trucks (shown below) in time for Barbarossa, along with the six thousand battleship men (and all that fuel) to drive them.

Approximately 600,000 to 750,000 horses were used by the German Army during the launch of Operation Barbarossa in June 1941, which is insane. 35 months later when the Allies land at Normandy, there are zero horses landed, with the US, British and Canadian Armies being fully mechanized, relying on trucks, halftracks and jeeps rather than horse-drawn transport.

So, skip the battleships, build more army transports and logistics capabilities. The Deutschlands, Hippers and CLs and DDs can support the invasion of Norway as historical, but the focus for the navy should be uboats, and their slowing down the Wallies until victory in the east is achieved (however unlikely).

 

[Shortround6]

See earlier posts in this thread and look at some other threads along the same lines.
German doesn't build Battleships?
England does other things to counter the U-Boats earlier. Like several dozen more escorts months earlier. Several thousand ex BB sailors manning escorts.
England has less to fear from German invasion after Dunkirk. Sends more "stuff" to North Africa. Kicks the Italians out in 1941?
Not sure what that does to Japan.

Lots and lots of ripples.
England has 30,000 to 50,000 tons more fuel oil for escort ships.
The list goes on and on.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

Trucks, trucks and more trucks. There should have been a hard and fast rule: if it doesn't support victory in the east, it doesn't get built. Skip the Bismarcks and Scharnhorsts, and take those >120k tons of steel and copper and build several thousand Mercedes-Benz L3000, Opel Blitz 4x4, and MAN ML4500 all terrain trucks in time for Barbarossa, along with the six thousand battleship men (and all that fuel) to drive them.

View attachment 872021

Approximately 600,000 to 750,000 horses were used by the German Army during the launch of Operation Barbarossa in June 1941, which is insane. 35 months later when the Allies land at Normandy, there are zero horses landed, with the US, British and Canadian Armies being fully mechanized, relying on trucks, halftracks and jeeps rather than horse-drawn transport.

So, skip the battleships, build more army transports and logistics capabilities. The Deutschlands, Hippers and CLs and DDs can support the invasion of Norway as historical, but the focus for the navy should be uboats, and their slowing down the Wallies until victory in the east is achieved (however unlikely).

That's a lot of gasoline, which is harder to refine than bunker oil.

 

[WARSPITER]

That's a lot of gasoline, which is harder to refine than bunker oil.

That is a very important point. Fuel for the German army and Luftwaffe was crucial in all respects. Reserves were chewed up badly
in the initial campaigns to the point where even with replacement fuel being produced, the Luftwaffe was restricted to mostly close
tactical support for the rest of the war in the East.

 

[z42]

Approximately 600,000 to 750,000 horses were used by the German Army during the launch of Operation Barbarossa in June 1941, which is insane. 35 months later when the Allies land at Normandy, there are zero horses landed, with the US, British and Canadian Armies being fully mechanized, relying on trucks, halftracks and jeeps rather than horse-drawn transport

There's some anecdote floating around saying the Germans were shocked when sifting through the wreckage left after the Dunkirk evacuation and they found no horses, dead or alive. The British army was already mechanized then. (Of course, the British army was also much smaller than the German, so it was a relatively smaller investment for them. )

Anyway, back to ships. So the Germans spent around 200ktons on capital ships and unfinished large ships like the carrier etc. Maybe slightly less. Meanwhile, the synthetic fuel program sucked up millions and millions of tons of steel. One figure I saw thrown about somewhere said 10 million tons. Compared to that, the capital ships are a rounding error.

Building 50-100k trucks to replace the horses is maybe doable. But what is the corresponding increase in synthetic fuel production capacity in order to be able to use those trucks?

 

[EwenS]

Well it is not true that the BEF in France in 1939-40 had NO equine transport at all. 2,700 horses and mules initially were imported to France from India for use by four Royal Indian Army Service Corps and two Cypriot transport companies in 1939. That rose to over 4,000 according to some sources.

The Royal Indian Army Service Corps » Dunkirk 1940 - The Before, The Reality, The Aftermath

dunkirk1940.org

World War Two: The forgotten Indian soldiers of Dunkirk

Some 300 Indian soldiers were evacuated from the coast of France during a pivotal moment in World War Two.

www.bbc.co.uk

Indian & Cypriot Muleteers with the BEF

I've found these photos in a book called The First Year Of War In Pictures. Thought I'd share them. I know they were mentioned in another thread last...

ww2talk.com

In 1939 the British Army formed the horse mounted 1st Cavalry Division from various Yeomanry Units around the country. While of no use in Europe it was sent across France in Jan 1940 and on to Palestine where it carried out policing duties before becoming involved in Syria, Iraq & Iran. It became the 10th Armoured Div on 1st Aug 1941 and becoming mechanized at that point.

The British Army and Commonwealth units continued to use mules for transportation in both Italy and India / Burma throughout WW2 as conditions dictated.

 

[Geoffrey Sinclair]

I am assuming that this was from Algeria and Morrocco?
Non-French ships would have been fair game or at least at higher risk of search and seizure?

If you look at the pre war maps French West Africa and French Equatorial Africa comprised about half of the northern half of Africa. Algeria and Morocco were small parts of an area. that stretched to the modern Congo/Gabon region. No doubt most of the imports came from Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia but convoys were run through the straits and there was some shooting between the French and British warships as a result, remember Dakar is in Senegal.. The British no doubt would try and enforce blockade rules on any neutrals entering the Mediterranean remembering the Swiss were doing some trading via the French ports. Throw in Spanish coastal shipping. It became complicated really quickly in June 1940.

Amongst other things, main pre war industries,
Tunisia, food, cork, minerals.
Algeria, food, phosphate, lead, zinc
Morocco, food, phosphate, manganese, not sure what the international zone around Tangier went through in WWII, it was under 200 miles NE of Casablanca

 

[Shortround6]

Thank you.
I was thinking that most goods from NA would be from areas around the coast. I am not familiar with the French colonial railways and could be greatly surprised. But moving many types of goods hundreds of miles overland before getting to a port might have been very difficult.

It appears this subject doesn't come up much. Would cutting off the French supply/trade from Africa to France in 1941/42 hurt the Germans significantly?

 

[Geoffrey Sinclair]

I was thinking that most goods from NA would be from areas around the coast. I am not familiar with the French colonial railways and could be greatly surprised. But moving many types of goods hundreds of miles overland before getting to a port might have been very difficult.

It appears this subject doesn't come up much. Would cutting off the French supply/trade from Africa to France in 1941/42 hurt the Germans significantly?

Cutting the links would have hurt, not necessarily the Germans.

I have no good idea what the French colonial internal transport links were like, how big the rail and river transport systems were. I do know places like the Congo had pressure put on them for rubber at least, resulting in more people being killed by leopards as they went deeper into the jungle. Add uranium. You would expect pre war export levels to be maintained.

1,500,000 tonnes of food, assuming 1 kg of this is enough for one person for a day is enough to feed around 4 million people for a year, adjust the weight as you think appropriate. No idea how much phosphate is required for a given increase in yields and for what crops.

Pre war France imported around 10% of its food needs. During the war some 3,000,000 acres had gone out of cultivation. With industry largely not working, most of the new machine tools had been looted, only 20% of the necessary spare parts for agricultural machinery were available, then add fuel shortages. German requisitions had seen the horse population reduced from 2.2 million to 1.5 million. French industry was back to pre war levels of production in 1947.

The population of France sank by over 1 million people between 1936 and 1946, to 40.5 million, the average 14 year old in 1945 was 7 to 9 kg lighter and 7 to 11 cm shorter than their 1935 counterparts. Germany had requisitioned a lot of French food production. When the US army tried to recruit local labour in France in 1944 it found the potential workers were hampered by malnutrition.

See the message from the Japanese embassy in Vichy,

"FROM: Vichy DATE: September 11, 1941
TO: Tokyo MESSAGE: # 503.

Re my # 502.

Please arrange to send 100 cases (60 cans each) immediately. It is impossible to obtain fish and meat here and so we are forced to be vegetarians. Several of the staff have lost a lot of weight. Please by all means send the items requested in my telegram."

The allies sent food relief supplies via Türkiye to alleviate the Greek famine, which killed about 5% of the population.

 

[Shortround6]

Thank you.

A complex subject indeed.

 

[Shortround6]

There's some anecdote floating around saying the Germans were shocked when sifting through the wreckage left after the Dunkirk evacuation and they found no horses, dead or alive. The British army was already mechanized then.

The definitions of mechanized and motorized have changed over the years.
The British army (with the exceptions noted by others) was motorized in the BEF. No horses and using unarmored trucks for transport. The troops were still expected to walk/march.
Mechanized generally means tracks and/or more armored transport.

Type of armored car used by the BEF. Motorized or mechanized recon?

 

[Admiral Beez]

German doesn't build Battleships? England does other things to counter the U-Boats earlier.

Indeed. But unless Germany can defeat the USSR by mid 1942 the war is lost anyway. Maybe skip the U-Boats as well, and that silly DoW on the US. Then, using your new logistics fleet, race for Moscow.

 

[SaparotRob]

Or, the people of that country could rely on its legal system to remove an unstable, degenerate despot before he caused more destruction.
Good thing we have these protections in place here.

 

[z42]

Indeed. But unless Germany can defeat the USSR by mid 1942 the war is lost anyway. Maybe skip the U-Boats as well, and that silly DoW on the US. Then, using your new logistics fleet, race for Moscow.

Hard to say. The U-boats were an excellent investment in terms of resources spent vs. Allied resources sunk or otherwise tied up chasing them. To a somewhat lesser extent the same can be said of the surface fleet as well. But indeed, even if they had worked as well as the Germans hoped, they were a tool for winning a drawn out war of attrition, the kind of war Germany had very little chance of winning in the first place.