could hitler win the war?

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im not sure, but werent a few V1s shot down by RAF pilots?

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Yep, a big proportion of the V1's the first 'cruise missile' was shot down by Allied fighters and AA batteries, I've seen footage of RAF pilots actually getting their wing tips under the V1's wing and flipping them over causing them to crash.

And the V2, although it couldn't be intercepted, was extremely inaccurate, all the Germans could do was to aim it at London and hope it would hit it, plus it had a war head of under a ton, compared to Allied heavy bombers of over 6 tons.

Over 2000 V2's were fired at targets on the European continent, killing about 1,736 civilians, and over 1,400 were fired against England with about seven thousand civilians killed.

All in all, the immense effort in the V2 programme produced virtually no worth while results in the Nazi war effort.

 

The Germans failed to fit the V1 with a jinker devise which would had made the V1 swing from left to right making it a whole lot harder to shoot down. Going on from ANZAC point you needed nerves of steel to shoot down a ton of explosives that's for sure, as for flipping them over I think that came about when a pilot ran out of ammo and decided to get his plane's wing under the V1 wing and gently raise his wing which caused the V1 to flip over.

Our secret service or so played it part for example when the V1's landed on target they would inform Germany they under shot to the next wave was recalibrated resulting in the V1's to over shoot there target area.

 

Just to add there was a classic BBC series made back in the 1970's called The Secret War, sorry to say it's been withdrawn from DVD but it may return at a later date if it dose it's well worth buying. In the mean time the book based on the series is on sale here are the details.

The Secret War
By Brian Johnson
ISBN 1-84415-102-6

 

sorry guys i meant the v2s really couldnt be shot down, i always get them confused for some reason

 

In The Secret War programme ( Terror Weapons ) Raymond Baxter was talking about one of his missions over Holland, they were flying low when out of no where a V2 came up right through the gun sight of one of his wing men and he decided not to fire on the V2 just as well.

 

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/andrewbrooks1/art_MT_AV_SSD80.html

 

wow, thats a neat pic martin

 

yea thats pretty cool

 

T. A. Gardner mentioned.........

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'Hitler's best course of action was following the fall of France to simply quit. Just wait out England, keep the US out of the war, and sit on the spoils already obtained.'
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That would be the most sensible thing to do, and a far superior statesman like Bismarck would no doubt have tried to end the war at that point, or probably earlier, after annexing Checkoslovakia, and not risk bringing Britain into the war by attacking Poland.

But the Corporal was no Bismarck.

The war in the West was just a hindrance to Hitler, he'd been planning to attack East since 1923 as he quotes in Mien Kampf, and nothing would deter him from his longed for campaign of genocide against the so called 'sub human' Slavs and his woolly headed notions of lieberstrum in the East.

But the Nazi economy had not prepared for a long war, and although the Heer was the best army in the world, the Wehrmacht as a whole, had many fatal flaws.

[ 14. September 2006, 10:13 PM: Message edited by: ANZAC ]

 

Anzac

a lot of scholars also say that attacking Stalin was his altimate mistake europe might of been his if he hadnt done that. But its easy to say this now that we know that outcome of the war, back then Germany seemed invincible.

 

but eventually all that gets to your head, and you fall...

 

Well, I'll be blowed - just 24 hours after I posted the above link to the image of 'Operation Big Ben', it's been announced that Raymond Baxter died today at the age of 84.

 

Martin, what did you do?

 

wow thats pretty creapy

 

Well I be, even I mention Raymond Baxter in one of my threads.

Farewell Raymond Baxter

 

After having read the "Spitfire MK V in action" and a mention on anti Big Ben patrols anyone read:

Operation Big Ben: The Dive-bombing Spitfire Missions by Baxter et co

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Operation-Big-Ben-Dive-bombing-Missions/dp/1862272514

Recommend?

 

Could the Germans have defeated the British, Russians, and the USA?

Very possibly, if they were do thing little differently. They simply had to be more patient.

According to my old WWII History professor, there were a series of meetings aoung the German strategic planners during 1935-36. These meeting were to plan the various elements for the future war, such as industrial production planning. It was decided that production would be for the war to start in 1943.

This would have meant another four years of Naval production, especially U-boat production, and the lack of this production proved critical.

German started the war in 1939 with a funtional U-boat fleet of only some 30 boats. Oh, they had more, but Karl Donetz operated under the notion that at any one time, one third of thefleet would be on station, one third in transit to or from the areas of operation, and oe third would be resting and refitting. That effectively meant about 30 boats.

Had the war begun in 1943 the naval production of U-boats would have been accomplish, meaning the fleet would have complised of some 300-400 boats, maning 100+ operation boats.

The British were almost starved into surrender when the Germans had only 30 boats. had they had 100 operational boats... well it is only speculation

 

With regard to the German - Soviet war. I would speculate that if and this is a big if, the Germans managed to keep the US from giving lend-lease to the Soviets and could manage to largely blockade or intercept British aid that left on their own the Soviets would have had to negotiate a peace at some point with the Germans on unfavorable terms.
That is, the Germans would have gotten what Hitler wanted: A big chunk of land in former Soviet territory.
Keeping the US from doing this might be managed by concentrating U-boat efforts closer to England to prevent either German or US provocation of a war through sinkings of shipping outside what could be clearly defined as a war zone.
This is a somewhat slim chance, but it is possible that a repeat of the Russian collapse in 1917 is possible if the Soviets have no outside support.

 

T.A.

Respectfully I must disagree with you on this one.

When the war started Stalin was terrified. He could not imagine that Hitler had double crossed him. Germans biggest chance with on peace with Russia ( on German terms ) might only have been possible before the defeat at Moscow. After the Germans failed to take Moscow, surrender for Russians was OUT OF THE QUESTION.

I forgot who it was that said " at battle of Moscow the Russians knew thew could stop the Germans, Stalingrad proved that they could win a major battle, kursk meant that they would win the war " ( I think it was Kai )

Also, it is argued that Lend Lease amounted to only 10% of what Russia actually needed and most of the 10% came after 1943 by which time the fait of the Third Reich had already been sealed.

 

Regarding the war materials which reached the Soviet Union through Lend-Lease -- I read somplace a long time ago that the single most valuable item which was recieved in the USSR was the trucks for the movement of general items. And there were problems with many items shipped to Russia. One shipment of British Spitfires was shipped with the wrong component (generator?) which kept them gounded for additional months.