Losses in France for British 1940

[The Basket]

Bicycle is the answer!
It would be very interesting to see what kind of war the British thought they would be facing on home soil in 1940. Tanks would need a port and I doubt the German Navy had the resources to transport them in quantity so infantry? The more you look at a German invasion the more ridiculous the idea is.
The operation could make the Charge of the Light Brigade look like a sensible military exercise

 

[stona]

The Sealion planning allowed for tanks and other armoured vehicles to be landed, either from barges onto the beaches, 'swimming' (not unlike later Allied efforts), or submersible (driving ashore using a flexible snorkel type device).

Most early British planning was for an invasion across the North Sea,landings being made in East Anglia, not across the Channel with landings on the South Coast.

Cheers

Steve

 

[The Basket]

East Anglia?
North Sea.
I remember reading about an invasion from Norway and thinking er no.
If invasion by the channel was difficult then the North sea was impossible.
Loony toony.

 

[pbehn]

East Anglia?
North Sea.
I remember reading about an invasion from Norway and thinking er no.
If invasion by the channel was difficult then the North sea was impossible.
Loony toony.

You obviously didn't hear about the Vikings.

 

[stona]

Until the Fall of France an invasion somewhere on the East Coast was regarded as the only option for the Germans. Even after the Fall of France it remained favorite in many opinions.
The British worried about the prospect of invasion everywhere, even the Shetlands caused an Admiralty panic. If the Shetlands were seized by a German expedition from Norway it was feared that "it would be a difficult combined operation to turn them out". Furthermore, air bases might be established to threaten Scapa Flow and even the whole of Scotland, which at the time was defended only by one Division (9th Scottish). General Kirke was not impressed.
"The Admiralty is panicking about the Shetlands, which have been strongly reinforced, and preparations have been made to destroy the aerodrome."
It is impossible to overestimate the uncertainty in British circles when you read things like this in government documents.
"...an anonymous source has reported that the Germans contemplated extensive parachute operations in Eire, which would then become their base for land and sea operations against the united Kingdom."
No such plans ever existed, but the British decided to
"...at all costs avoid swinging Irish opinion against us by taking the initiative in the infringement of their neutrality, for example by the seizure of ports."
The British did attempt to do a deal with De Valera and the Irish government to establish some kind of cooperation but were rebuffed. De Valera
"...did not want any assistance whatsoever until Eire had actually been attacked. This would probably be too late."
The Admiralty even tried to put the wind up the politicians, writing to Attlee

Given that most of Germany's troops were still committed on the Western Front at this time,late May, this seems an unlikely prospect at the very least, but it does illustrate the panicky thinking going on, even at the highest levels in Britain.

Cheers

Steve

 

[stona]

East Anglia?
North Sea.
I remember reading about an invasion from Norway and thinking er no.
If invasion by the channel was difficult then the North sea was impossible.
Loony toony.

It was the occupation of Holland that reinforced this view.

As early as 10th May, the Chiefs of Staff had determined that the most
vulnerable stretch of coastline to a German landing was between The Wash
and Sussex, and the Home Defence Executive shared their view. The German
capture of the Netherlands redoubled the vulnerability of this area, since
the Dutch, and very soon the Belgian, ports and. estuaries could now be used
to assemble enemy shipping rapidly and secretly, being relatively free from
British aerial reconnaissance, while the previously long sea route was much
shortened. General Kirke warned, in a memoranda written on 15th May, that:

"in view of the German capture of Holland, a seaborne attack on the
East Anglian and north and east Kent coast carried out in a fleet of fast
shallow draught motor vessels appears to be a possibility. I have no
information as to whether Germany has any such boats or is in the process
of building them, and. request I may be kept informed of any developments of
this nature."

It was not lost on the British that whilst the East Anglian countryside might not exactly be a Russian steppe or North American prairie, it was flat and open land ideal for mobile warfare.

Cheers

Steve

 

[The Basket]

Your quote saying that Germany may land troops using shallow draught boats which Germany may or may not have is surprising.
Viking was mentioned but the Vikings didn't invade at first. They would raid and the nature of the British Isles was perfect for Viking raiders. Plus the Vikings were a sea power and good sailors in bad weather.
An invasion needs tanks and a port and shallow draught boats offer neither. And the North Sea is rough. So shallow boats may not offer good stability. Germany lost a good portion of her navy in Norway so an invasion by Germany is looking less and less likely.
Another factor is that the Germans only had weeks to plan and had no real idea how to do it. Landing the necessary forces to invade UK successfully would have been difficult even in peace time in ideal conditions.

 

[stona]

Kirke was worried about the possibility of an invasion of this type. It seems obvious that to land heavier equipment they would have needed to capture a port or ports. This was not, and never was, a German plan. It was just conjecture on the part of the British who were sensibly weighing up all the options vailable to the enemy.
This was the essence of the two defensive arguments, whether to concentrate a static defence on the ports and lamding grounds or establish a mobile defence which could react to any landing and repel it before it could establish a bridgehead, and certainly before it could capture a facility like a port.
Initially the British were looking to defend the hundreds of miles of coast stretching from north of the Wash to the Thames estuary (Lincolnshire, Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, into North Kent) which was impossible to do with the resources available which gave impetus to the idea of a mobile defence. The biggest problem, apart from a lack of materiel, was that the British army was simply not trained in this form of warfare.
It puts the later German plans into perspective, where the British would only need to defend the south Channel coast form Folkestone to Brighton (essentially Kent and Sussex.)
Cheers
Steve

 

[pbehn]

Basket, I mentioned the Vikings as a joke, however their boats were probably quicker than a towed barge which I read were capable of 2 knots. In 1940 the worry of the British government was that any landing that wasn't immediately repulsed would have the population suing for peace. Lord Halifax seems to have been for surrender at any cost.

 

[Shortround6]

large numbers of tanks need ports, small numbers might not.

Germans were fooling around with small numbers of MK II and MK III tanks that could "deep wade". How successful they would have been is another story. A few were used in Russia for initial river crossings.

30-45 ton tanks need more specialized port facilities or landing craft than 6-20 ton tanks.

German success in Poland and the French campaign gave a rather overblown impression of their capabilities to the British, The Western allies having perhaps underrated them before that.

Ports were needed for supplies. Even an infantry division could go through several hundred tons of "supplies" per day in hard fighting. Bringing hundreds of tons of supplies per day over beaches is a very difficult job.

 

[stona]

It's all about timing.
By the time of Sealion, say late September 1940, the Germans had barges adapted with ramps which could land Panzer IIs, IIIs and IVs directly onto the beach. In tests it took approximately 20 minutes to construct/emplace the ramp and start unloading the tanks, which might not have been ideal in an opposed landing.
Panzer IIIs and IVs were modified as submersibles. They would be driven down a ramp into water. These were unloaded from a modified type A barge. The tanks could negotiate a ramp at a maximum angle of 30 degrees, so for a 4m water depth an 11 m ramp was required. The front of the ramp was kept afloat by a float and as the tank drove onto the ramp this would sink allowing the tank to set off along the sea bed, before floating again to allow he next tank to exit.
The lighter Panzer IIs were modified as swimming tanks. The floats attached to each side made the ensemble too wide for the Type A barges and a special vessel based on the larger Type C ('Kampinen') barge, 6.6 metres wide, was developed. A modified barge could carry four swimming Panzer IIs.

The Panzer IIs and IVs were considered most suitable for submersible modifications and Kapitan zur See Paul Zieb, who was Director of Equipment at Wilhelmshaven certainly rated the experiments a success and operational use possible. His report concluded

"The maximum underwater duration of a tank during the trials was an hour. In general, the experiments showed that the tanks were able to travel underwater in sand up to a depth of 7m; the tank commander did not feel it was necessary to test its performance in silt. A demonstration was given on 26th June to a high ranking audience, including Dr Todt, the armaments minister*."

*He was by this time "Reichsminister für Bewaffnung und Munition".

The Germans certainly planned to land tanks on the beaches.

Cheers

Steve

 

[The Basket]

Timing.
The Germans were going to be on a very sticky wicket if they planned an invasion of the British isles in Autumn and Winter.
Tanks also need vast quantities of fuel and ammo. I hope the fuel trucks were also amphibious

 

[Glider]

The possibility of a successfull invasion as we now know was close to zero if only because of the state ot the German Navy which was down to appox 10 - 12 destroyers and no one is going to cover an invasion with such limited resources.

As for tanks going underwater for a beach landng not a chance, there is sand and then there is sand. The english channel isn't a river, at Southend where I lived for approx 30 years the tide goes out approximately a mile and there was soft in its consistancy where tanks will almost certainly get stuck. Note- the RNLI station at Southend has a hovercraft as nothing else will get across the sand.
A number of my friends worked at the Shoebury Firing range and they were always coming in with stories of tanks and other equipment that got stuck in the sand.
Other beaches are pebble beaches and remember what happened to the Churchill tanks that hit Dieppe.

 

[stona]

Well, there was a lot of optimism, probably misplaced, in the German planning.

Here's a picture of a 'Schwimmpanzer II' in a flat calm. Not, I would suggest, a lot of freeboard!

How that would fair in an even moderate sea must be open to question. I know I wouldn't fancy my chances.

Cheers

Steve

 

[stona]

Trials on 10th August 1940 showed that submersible tanks could be launched, in this case from the modified Peniche Hans Herbert.

Cheers

Steve

 

[The Basket]

I did know the Viking thing was a joke.
However...the Vikings were far better equipped for amphibious warfare than the Kriegsmarine.
It would be interesting... hypothetically speaking of a big push from Germany into the UK would have given the Soviets pause...road to Berlin would be very empty.

 

[pbehn]

I did know the Viking thing was a joke.
However...the Vikings were far better equipped for amphibious warfare than the Kriegsmarine.
It would be interesting... hypothetically speaking of a big push from Germany into the UK would have given the Soviets pause...road to Berlin would be very empty.

The old English were very cooperative in the start with the Vikings, they stuffed Lindisfarne full of riches, it is surrounded by water twice a day at high tide and is one of closest sites to Norway in the UK. The Vikings actually entered by rivers. What is now the Louvre museum in Paris was originally a fortification to stop them

 

[stona]

The old English were very cooperative in the start with the Vikings,

The landings were also unopposed and there was no mobile reserve

When Harold (Godwinson) did get an army up north to oppose Harald Hardrada and Tostig Godwinson's army things didn't go so well for the invaders. This was the kind of defence envisaged 900 odd years later, not stopping them on the beaches, or rather the banks of the Ouse (as you correctly note they tended to come up rivers rather than land on sea coasts) but inland.

Cheers

Steve

 

[The Basket]

Defending the isle the size of Britain against amphibious invasion is a monstrous undertaking and impossible to guard every inch.
You need to know main invasion point as the enemy will probably have dummy invasion landings to keep you guessing.
Once the main invasion route is known you then have to throw everything at them to push them into the sea. The Germans for thier part have to go inland as quickly as possible and need a major port and either occupy or build an airbase.
I would hope any invasion would have been fought tooth and nail. Making a separate peace with Hitler is one thing... surrendering is quite different. It is surprising that the British Army seemed that we were under threat of invasion when it was logical that we were not. Although over estimating the enemy does have its perks.

 

[stona]

Defending the isle the size of Britain against amphibious invasion is a monstrous undertaking and impossible to guard every inch.
You need to know main invasion point as the enemy will probably have dummy invasion landings to keep you guessing.

Fortunately, living on an island inspired the English (later British) to establish a first line of defence in the Royal Navy, which could seriously mess up an invader's plans before he even reached the coast. This option has worked three times (including 1940) since 1588.
In the context of 'Sealion' that same navy could prevent re-supply of any forces that did manage a landing, cutting them off and allowing them to be mopped up as and when a sufficient concentration of defending forces (those mobile forces so beloved of Kirke and others) could be established against them. This is the invariable outcome of 'Sealion' when played out, as it is from time to time, at various military institutions, staff colleges etc., even when weighted in favour of the initial invasion. The weighting is to allow the Germans to get ashore in sufficient strength to make a game of it.

The feints for 'Sealion', attempts to divert the heavy units of the Home Fleet into the North Sea were laughable, not even the Germans thought they would really work. There was no resemblance to the much more complicated and sophisticated operation(s) mounted to confuse the Germans by the Allies in 1944.

Cheers

Steve