Hitler invaded Ireland?

Err Matt, Sicily fell to the
Allies in 1943,and
A)the British paratroops were not wiped out.
B) while the German paratroops did slow the British advance they didn`t stop them

ps, what source did you get this from ?

 

Yeah... MP, you really should check your sources before posting something like that... The Allies took Sicily in 43... what are you talking about???

OK, so you are actually going to claim that in 1940 the germans could have dropped enough paratroops to invade England entirely from the air??
(Wonder why the Allies couldn't do that in 1944, with all the US manufacturing, complete air supremacy, and overwhelming numerical superiority???)
Sorry, MP, that is a ludicrous claim to make. Do you have any evidence AT ALL to suggest that would have been possible? Any sources?
It would have taken tens of thousands of troops to successfully conquer Enlgand- more than even the allies dropped in 44.
Such a campaign would have taken months- supplying that many troops for MONTHS from the air was downright impossible for the germans. They did not have anywhere near enough planes.

Uhhh, not sure if you have read your history books, but the germans never came close to achieving air supremacy over England. Guess that kind of shoots down the whole idea, eh?

Their first out of hundreds of British cities... what about the rest?

And here's my favorite part...

WHAT A LAUGH!!! The reality of it, eh? So you actually believe that the capture of ONE british city would have made the entire country surrender??? Yeah, that makes loads of sense
The germans captured MOST of France, including Paris, the capitol... and competely overwhelmed the French- mainly with tanks. This took the germans six weeks.
So you use this analogy to claim that the germans could have landed, taken one city, and won the battle?
You make NO account for-
German supply (you obviously do not undertand what would be involved in keeping an invasion force supplied. Again, look at Normandy...)
British resistance (still, some of us seem to assume that the British were spineless cowards who could not have put up a fight )
RAF attacks (again, no account of any evidence for HOW the germans could have gained air supremacy)

So essentially, your whole theory appears to be a bunch of vague generalizations backed up by NO evidence whatsoever.

I mean, geez, the german army attempted some ill-advised operations during the war... but even they could see the folly in invading England. If it would have been such an easy shot, like mp38 claims, you would think they might have tried it...

 

You guys need to study more about the battles.

Yes, I know Sicily fell to the allies. Any idiot knows that! Sicily was run by the Italians. The Germans dropped Luftwaffe paratroopers along with sending troops from the "Herman Goring" division.

The British dropped paratroopers near the town of Catania. They were dropped right in front of the German paratroopers! The British paratroopers were all but wiped out! Hundreds were captured!
During all the fighting for Sicily the German paratroopers never lost a single battle against the British! They only reason they were forced to retreat was because thier flanks (which were Italian units) were destroyed/surrendered. Also because they had no air support at all, and no navy either! And futher, the German leadership wanted to do a fighting retreat during the entire Italian campain, since they were so badly out numbered.

I have the book "Heaven and Hell" by Martin Poppel. This book is a war diary of Poppel who was a German paratrooper. He fought in every campain! From Poland 1939 to Belgium 1944-45.
I also have read several other books on German paratroopers. These guys were the toughest units in the German army, trust me!

I sugest that you both pick up a book and read it, before you make such statements!

Crazy,
I'm sorry, I didn't realize that you were such an experianced General.

Matt

[ 15. December 2002, 08:26 PM: Message edited by: mp38 ]

 

Just to get you an idea about logistics:

The shipping weight of an average German Infantry-Division was 31,500 tons, a Tank Division 48,600 tons.

The average daily supply needed to keep a Division operational was 45-140 tons plus fuel (dependend on motorization and action) and ammo (dependend on number of Arty and action).

The max. load of a Ju-52 was 3.8 tons. On May 1, 1940, the Luftwaffe had a total of 800 transport aircraft.

Cheers,

[ 16. December 2002, 02:47 AM: Message edited by: AndyW ]

 

Yes, they dropped them over friendly territory, not quite the same as dropping them over enemy held territory

The major drops by the British paratroops to protect the landing beaches were almost unapposed. In this one minor drop to capture the airfield near Catania the British paratroops landed there were indeed defeated, but to say the British Paratroops were wiped out, is pure nonsense, the majority landed without coming into contact with any enemy in the first day.

Excuses, excuses

and I'm sure its a very unbiased book

 

MP, how about instead of petty little insults, how about you actually respond to just one of the issues I raised?

Remember, we were talking about England and Ireland, not Sicily. You claimed the germans could have invaded England easily... but of course, still nothing but vague, unsupported generalizations. Try using evidence...

And you need to study about the war.

Have you noticed that you are the only person who argues that germany could have easily invaded Britian? Wonder why?

[ 16. December 2002, 08:41 AM: Message edited by: CrazyD ]

 

Crazy,
I'm sorry, I didn't mean to insult you. I was just praising your knowledge.

I never said that Germany could have "easily"
invaded England. I also stated that before they could even attempt it, that they needed to gain total air supremacy (which they didn't, and would have been extremely difficult in the first place!)
So don't put words into my mouth.

By the way, what war did you serve in again?

Redcoat, the book is a diary. just everyday facts and occurances. I'm sure your not biased at all either!

Matt

[ 16. December 2002, 05:30 PM: Message edited by: mp38 ]

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,576793,00.html

A German agent, Herman Goertz, was parachuted into county Meath in May 1940 and may have made contact with several pro-German Irish army generals.

The activities of Dr Goertz, - alias Heinz Kruse, alias K - had been closely monitored by British intelligence. He had been arrested in England in 1936 and imprisoned for espionage before being deported to Germany.

In May 1940 he was dropped into Ireland to examine the feasibility of a plan proposed to German military intelligence by Stephen Caroll Held, an IRA officer. Held had suggested the Germans invade Northern Ireland "supported by 5,000 IRA men". The venture was known as Plan Kathleen

But shortly after arriving in Dublin, the house where Goertz was staying was raided. Held was arrested and a German airman's cap, a parachute and a wireless set were seized. Goertz escaped.

The memo contains many of the coded telegrams sent by the German legation in Dublin to Berlin following Goertz's movements."The cipher has been broken by the Irish and the results passed to us," it noted.

Goertz was arrested by Irish police in November 1941 and imprisoned.

-------------

In the history newspaper that I got his name from also claims he managed to keep regular radio contact with Germany all through 1940.

When Goertz landed in county Meath he lost his radio and almost all the other equipment, he had to walk over 100 kilometers to the meeting place and swim across the Boyne river during which his "invisible ink " was lost.

 

I dont think Hitler would even consider this unless Britain was captured, those transports would be sitting ducks, then Ireland would be "saved by Britain", and they would rally behind them after the Para's were gone, and there would be no way of supplying these troops.

 

An invasion of England was possible. Let's fact it, okay?

Let's suppose that Milch (or Galland) has command of the Luftwaffe instead of Goering. He takes the right decisions and in the middle of september they have cleared the skies.

Then the Navy can't sait out, because risk of being bombed by the Luftwaffe and attacks by the U-boats.

Invasion takes place around 21st September. After a fierce battel on the beaches the British have to surrender, mostly because the Lufwaffe attack their panzer divisions.

In November they sign a peace treaty (probably Halifax). At that moment an invasion istn't necessary.

It's not necessary because Ireland can get rid of the English rules in their land and they sign a neutrality pact with Germany.

In that contract the Germans can fix that they may use harbours and airfields in eastern and northern Ireland.

Greetz

 

Geez, we just love ignoring reality on this topic...

Ummm... how? So you are just making the assumption that the Luftwaffe could have knocked out the RAF that easily? The RAF had airfields in northern Enlgand and Ireland- airfields which were beyond the range of german fighter support. How would the luftwaffe have knocked these out?
Duh...

Again, ignoring reality. How would the germans have "invaded"? By swimming across the channel? Germany had no landing craft. And to produce enough landing craft would have taklen time and resources from other projects- likely the U-boats.
Not to mention that the german army had little or no training in amphibious assault. That would have taken months of time, plus it would have necessarily drawn a large number of troops into training, leaving the wehrmacht strained in other places.

Lol... the British "have to surrender"? Geez, this is one of the biggest fantasies people seem to have about this one.
The British held out for months during the blitz- but they would have surrendered after a battle on the beaches ??? That makes absolutley no sense at all. Nor is it backed up by anything at all. Did the British surrender at Dunkirk? Did they surrender after Rommel's victories in North Africa?

I find this idea incredibly amusing. Throughout WW2, the British showed some of the most resilience and courage of all the allies. Even during the height of the Blitz, there was NO talk in Britian about surrender.
And yet some of us seem to assume that the British were a bunch of wimps! "Oh no, a german- let's all surrender!"

How about this... instead of us "fact"ing it, how about you come up with some way the germans could have overcome all the obstacles a cross-channel invasion presented. Instead of making wild, vague assumptions, how about some kind of theory?

Although it seems that those who are fans of the cross-channel invasion idea can come up with nothing other than wild, vague assumptions.

 

Actually you have to add a lot of fictional what-ifs to construct something like a sucessfull invasion of the Britsh homeland in 1940 or 1941.

To be honest, I don't see any reason in discussing a "what-if" loaded with that amount of alternative prerequisites, speculations, simplifications, should have, would have, didn't have etc. beeing that far away from the actual historical event.

I'm sure if the Germans (or the Martians) would have had everything they need to invade GB, in adequate numbers, in adequate quality, in time, at place, and had felt need to do it - then Hitler (or Goering, or Milch or any other "alternative") might have done it...or not.

Just my 2c on the validity of this kind of discussion.

Cheers,

[ 25. January 2003, 05:56 AM: Message edited by: AndyW ]

 

[Ummm... how? So you are just making the assumption that the Luftwaffe could have knocked out the RAF that easily? The RAF had airfields in northern Enlgand and Ireland- airfields which were beyond the range of german fighter support. How would the luftwaffe have knocked these out?
Duh...]
It's very easy to explain this one. If the Germans would have all the airpower, than they could have used paratroops to capture them in Ireland or you can just ignore them.

Maybe the British would have tried to throw everthing they had against the Germans and then the problem would haven been solved immediately.

[Again, ignoring reality. How would the germans have "invaded"? By swimming across the channel? Germany had no landing craft. And to produce enough landing craft would have taklen time and resources from other projects- likely the U-boats.
Not to mention that the german army had little or no training in amphibious assault. That would have taken months of time, plus it would have necessarily drawn a large number of troops into training, leaving the wehrmacht strained in other places.]
The Germans would have used paratroopers as the first invasion force. Afterwards the slower troops could carry the other troops, tanks and the heavy equipment to the coast. And with no RAF the Luftwaffe could attack any ship of the Navy that would try to attack the convoys.

No, the Germand did train for an invasion in England. And with the defeat of France there were a lot of troops in France. So it wouldn't be necessary to move them from e.g. Poland to France. No, they were already there.

Was the Wehrmacht figting in other places in 1940? I don't think so. Maybe you can name me the place where they were.


[Lol... the British "have to surrender"? Geez, this is one of the biggest fantasies people seem to have about this one.
The British held out for months during the blitz- but they would have surrendered after a battle on the beaches ??? That makes absolutley no sense at all. Nor is it backed up by anything at all. Did the British surrender at Dunkirk? Did they surrender after Rommel's victories in North Africa?

I find this idea incredibly amusing. Throughout WW2, the British showed some of the most resilience and courage of all the allies. Even during the height of the Blitz, there was NO talk in Britian about surrender.
And yet some of us seem to assume that the British were a bunch of wimps! "Oh no, a german- let's all surrender!"]

Indeed the British didn't surrender at Dunkirk. But was it due to the British or more due to the Germans. If they wouldn't have stopped, then they would have surrendered.

After Rommel's victories in Northern Africa the British still had a lot of troops in Egypt. So there would indeed be no way to surrender at e.g. Tobruk. But assume they(the Germans)win at El Alamein, then they might have surrendered.

Maybe the British had courage, but I think that the people living in occupied countries had a lot more courage. It’s very easy to stand against an enemy who is across a channel and almost cannot harm you.

If Belgium would have just been attacked by bombers, then we also wouldn’t have surrendered. But if you are being attacked by a superior army then you cannot then surrender. That’s why I think that Finland has for more right to speak about fierce resistance. They were bombed and attacked by the Russian army.


[How about this... instead of us "fact"ing it, how about you come up with some way the Germans could have overcome all the obstacles a cross-channel invasion presented. Instead of making wild, vague assumptions, how about some kind of theory?

Although it seems that those who are fans of the cross-channel invasion idea can come up
with nothing other than wild, vague assumptions.]
Okay, it’s “facing”, but that’s not the point here. I’ll tell you the theory in a minute. But CrazyD and especially AndyW this is the What if… topic.

My theory:
Augustus
The Luftwaffe fight against the RAF above the skies of England. In the beginning the Lufwaffe have big losses. But while the Luftwaffe have a lot of planes, the RAF hasn’t. Also bombers bomb airplanefactories and airfields. Also troops train on the coast of Germany how to land on the beaches of England.

September
First 2 weeks of September fierce battles above the skies of England. But the Luftwaffe wins and they can use - in case of an eventually attack- paratroops (JU52). Landing ships are being brought together in Le Havre, Antwerp, Rotterdam, … . (mostly Belgian and Dutch ports)

By 18 September the final battle above the skies has begun. The Luftwaffe defeats the remains of the RAF. On 20 September the JU52 leave from airfields in Belgium and Holland. When passing the English channel fighters from French airfields join them to protect them.

In the early morning on the 21st September the first German soldiers land near Deal and Dover. By the end of the day they have secured a few airfields and beaches. In the next days a lot of reinforcements will land on the airfields.

In the meanwhile the ships – which left the ports the 20th – are reaching the coast. The Navy tries to come between, but the Luftwaffe attacks them and they suffer losses. They arrive the 22th and they carry a lot of 88mm, tanks and regular soldiers.

The British fight for their lives – there are 100.000 troops in the neighbourhood – but they have no chance against the better equipped and experienced Germans. Also the beaches haven’t been prepared well.

By 25th the Germans have enough troops to attack the eastern coast (Ramsgate, …) and also to secure the southern coast (Eastbourne, Brighton, …). In the meanwhile a lot of Englishmen and –women have fled and are going towards to the north, because they think that the Germans can’t reach them there.

But due to the refugees the English army cannot counterattack the panzer divisions of the
Germans. On 30th the Wehrmacht reach the outskirts of London. By this time ± 150.000 troops have been captured and will be brought to the continent to work in the German war factories.

The British people want peace and Churchill, the Royal Family and a few thousands troops leave with the remains of the Navy towards Canada. Halifax signs the cease-fire and Sir Oswald Mosley becomes PM of Britain.

This peace treaty is being signed on 20th November after the London surrendered to the German tanks and special troops (Brandenburg division).

Greetz

 

Then the Navy can't sait out, because risk of being bombed by the Luftwaffe and attacks by the U-boats....

At that time, the idea of the navy not sailing out because of risk of bombing and U boats misses one salient factor.

This would have been a fight for national survival. U boats, Luftwaffe, whatever the threat, if the invasion was signalled the nave would have done their damnest to move into the invasion areas and invasion fleet no matter the cost, its that simple, the navy would have sailed towards destruction if that is what it took, but to dismiss their sailing because of the dangers is not taking into account the that this was a do or die battle and no matter what historians may have written since of the possibilites or whatever...the navy would be ordered into the ivasion forces and would it would have been all or bust. Its a false hope to think the navy would not have sailed into the maelstrom.

 

Okay, and then they would probably have been slaughtered.

 

Here we go again

I don't think you quite got what Crazy D was saying.
What Crazy D was saying was the Germans could never have all the airpower, because the British could keep a large part of their airforce out of reach of the Luftwaffe until needed to fight the invasion.

If we look at the track record of the Luftwaffe against the RN, we notice one thing.
They never stopped the RN from doing what the RN was determined to do.
With both Dunkirk and Crete the Germans caused heavy casualties on the RN, but they did not stop them from completing their mission, and these were missions which lasted weeks. In an invasion of England the Luftwaffe would only have hours to stop the RN from sinking the invasion fleet.

In the plan for Sealion, the Germans planned to attack with ten Infantry divisions. very few tanks and no heavy support

The British had 29 divisions in Britain at this time, these didn`t have a lot of heavy weapons, but this didn't matter because the German invasion force wouldn't have had any
As for armour the British had a couple of armoured brigades, containing some Matilda MKII's

As for the beaches not being prepared well
The British built defensive positions all over Britain in the summer of 1940, even today there are still a number that can be seen on the quieter coastal area's.

Sorry, but as far as the Germans were concerned, Britain in 1940, was just far too well-defended to invade, and any amount of wishful thinking will not change this basic fact

[ 25. January 2003, 07:30 PM: Message edited by: redcoat ]

 

Redcoat, apparently you see the points I was trying to make!

This is true, but I would even though in a "but...". The British had very few conventional heavy wepaons, but I believe they had enough to make do. (Of course, again, this would be "making do" against an invasion that even Hitler was not foolish enough to attempt!) First off, look at allied experiences on D-Day- some of the heaviest casualties were caused by mortars and tradional artillery- not heavy tanks or rockets or anything unusual. And I would imagine that the British also could have come up with a decent amount of artillery. PLus there are some of those improvised weapons the Home Guard used. ADmittedly, if actually used many of these could have been as dangerous to the user as the target. But such weapons would nonetheless contribute in a urban situaion.

Look at the cross channel invasion the allies pulled off. The allies were facing a german army being pushed back on three fronts. And the vast majority of this army was in the east- the Normandy beaches were defended by units of widely varying quality.
And the Allies had overwhelming superiority in nearly every statistical category you can look at- manpower, equipment, support, manufacturing.
Even in light of all these advantages, the allied armies still took months to fight inland.
Even if we make the drastic assumption that the RAF was pushed very far back, and even if me make the further drastic assumption that the germans could have come up with the materials and troops just to attmept an invasion, how in any reasonable way could we assume that the german army, with far less of any of the advantages the allies had in 44, could do any better?

A VERY good point on the whole idea of "what if" scenarios. More or less what I was talking about above. Just because we are discussing a fictional or potential scenario does not mean we should just ignore reality!
But I do think the Martians could have pulled it off. Come on, Andy, you can't just dismiss those phasers. Photon torpedos could have been used against the Royal Navy...

Now that's just plain ignorant...

 

Hmm……Of course the British were braver, they had to be. You had us for allies, all we had was you

No.9

 

D – I appreciate there’s a lot of levity attached to the Local Defence Volunteers aka Home Guard, but I think there’s a few points worth noting. Churchill rushed them into existence in May 1940 because of the invasion threat. No uniforms or guns to start with and everyone arm themselves as best could. However, all the men were ‘volunteers’, there was no conscription or quota system. Everyone knew what they may be up against and their function was to delay the Germans long enough for the regulars to deploy. Churchill hoped for 150’000. In the first month they had 750’000. By June they had 1’500’000. Britain bought ½ million W.W.I American 30.06 rifles and Canadian Ross’s for them. A lot of the volunteers were ex-W.W.I soldiers. What do you think the 19 year old Jerry could have taught them about warfare? Their legs probably wouldn’t speed march any more, but neither do I think they would have marched backwards!

Also, between September and October, most of Britain’s special forces, the Independent Companies and the Commandos – around 8500 men, were temporally placed under command of the Home Forces instead of Adm. Roger Keyes and Combined Operations. This was specifically to act as a rapid reaction force to deal with paratroops

And, the departments of Military Intelligence had in place the ‘Lost Boys’. These were an extremely secret force of around 3000 operatives, (when I say extremely secret I mean even their spouses didn’t know!). These operatives were trained in sabotage and assassination. They were spread all down the eastern British coast and had their own secret supply dumps. Their brief was to go about their normal lives until the event of invasion when they were to put their craft into practice as they saw fit with no further orders. Anything they chose to do was permissible, everyone including themselves were expendable, and when their supplies ran out they were to improvise

Should Hitler have collected enough barges to pack his troops into, as they were towed at what…2 mph…4 mph over to England, the men would have had to eat, drink and toilet in those floating coffins, and eventually fight their way ashore - assuming they were landing somewhere the prepared fuel pipes had not dispensed fuel oil on the sea which was set alight as planned

As for attacking fortified ports, I believe we saw the results of trying that 2 years later at Dieppe

Not all coastal sections planned their heaviest defences for the beaches. There was a plan for the SE to more or less let the enemy ashore and fight them immediately after. The architect and officer commanding that sector was Bernard Law Montgomery

As for the Brandenburg's capturing London, they wouldn’t even have captured Millwall

All in all, if Hitler tried to invade Britain it would have been their thrush’s anvil, or, summed up by Churchill’s maxim still chanted on British football terraces today: ”Come over here if you think you’re hard enough?”

No.9

 

Good stuff, No. 9. I really do find the idea comical that the discussion of either Sealion or this "Ireland Invasion", some tend to entirely focus on the shortcomings of the germans. People go on and on about how if the germans had managed this, if the germans had planned that... as if the British would not have been involved!!! Oh, they just would have surrendered... Give me a break

That's some interesting stuff on the forces England had. It dosen't really suprise me though- as far as I know, the English were conscious (maybe even paranoid?) of the idea of a german invasion as soon as France fell. For everything the germans could do to prepare for an operation against England, England could in turn prepare defences.

Lol!!!