Kratman and RN Capabilities

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Wow, the Nazi wanking Krautmann himself from Baen actually was briefly on HPCA, Stu?

[Mystikal]

Liberia? The country that had a brutal civil war? Additionally, the problem in Africa isn't just social institutions, but disease and poverty, which this won't fix. That and the territories around Liberia got claimed by other powers.

Come to think of it, former slaves dumped in Africa would make a much better Draka than the one we got. They would have a motive to be insanely militaristic and reject European values.

So a more powerful Imperial Germany at the on-set of the second World War, a America tht takes Manifest Destiny a bit further, as in the whole continent, and a united Africa that throws out all Europeans except allies and is basically Black Draka is possible!? Yay for the evil!

Oh and even though I edited out of the quote, let me explain more. That one smuggler gets shot to shit and while the American Government just goes "Well, no shit" over the deal in greater words, the American people start trying to smuggle in more food and war supplies to Germany in a hunt for profit. Britain and other allies keep killing them forcing Woodrow to ask to to stop the blockade and let free-trade resume or atleast stop shooting the smugglers. They refuse and America is at war with the Entente.

Maybe not as a direct ally of Germany. More like a particpant against the Entente and thus a helping hand.

I know this is a rahter inadequate explaination of my idea but a question. How would it affect the war if the US joined against the Entente and stopped supplying them or started supplying the Central powers as well? What ware the numbers and stuff and how would that affect the Battle of the Atlantic and the end of the war treaties?

[Stuart]

That sounds hilarious - is there any record of this, or was it swallowed by Yuku, never to be seen again? If there is I'd love to read that conversation.

It's a mix; the content had to be shaved down when we closed the thread. Kratman's contributions were mostly along the lines of something like "You. Are. Wrong. " without any further explanation. When we cleaned the thread up, they pretty much all got deleted. In fact, for some time I couldn't believe the person posting was Kratman since what he was saying was totally incompatible with the qualifications and experience he claimed to have. He was making very foolish mistakes and errors in fact that somebody who had achieved a reasonably high grade in the Army simply wouldn't make. Now, many moons later, I realize that he is so obsessed with Nazi supremacy that it's distorted everything else in his head. At a guess that's why his further services to the United States armed forces were declined.

The thread can be found HERE. It started off as quite a reasonable thread until one person came in with his crazy Sealion scheme. It went downhill from there.

Wow, the Nazi wanking Krautmann himself from Baen actually was briefly on HPCA, Stu?

Briefly, yes. He stomped off screaming that we were all too stupid to understand him. He got awarded the custom title of "Nazi Cocksucker" (I had to make a programming change to allow it) but he never reappeared and so it was never used. He came across as an extremely unpleasant person.

[Stuart]

But why wouldn't the US go for peace or Armistice? Is possible at all or is Carpet Nuking the only outcome?

Basically because accepting an armistice would have been accepting defeat and we're very, very bad losers. In fact, most people in the world have suddenly realized that the best way to win a war against the United States is to lose it. Then, the US gets all guilty, pulls out early and gives away billions in aid. Get close to winning a war and the US will hold a grudge for decades verging on centuries - and will act on that grudge at every opportunity.

On a more serious note, the United States was very well aware that Nazi Germany would remain a threat and any armistice would only delay the final reckoning. By 1943 we knew we had the atomic bomb coming and we assumed Germany would be the same (we didn't realize what a comic-opera bunch of clowns the Nazi research scientists were). This wasn't just a Democrat appreciation, it was completely bipartisan. Everybody on both sides of the political fence was well aware of the situation and were in more or less agreement on how things were due to go. (In TBO, I make this point by having Dewey win the 1944 election and the result is - no change. In OTL, the difference between a Dewey and a Roosevelt administration would have been that the post-war policy towards Russia would have been less tolerant but even that's ruled out in TBO due to the different political situation.

So, the fight between Nazi Germany and the United States was a fight to the finish and that was accepted across the political spectrum. Also, there was the sure and certain knowledge that we were massively outproducing Germany in everything, we had massively greater resources, we had the Russian Army killing off the male population of Germany at a delightful rate and scientifically we were pulling further and further ahead of the Germans in everything that mattered. We had the B-29, we had the B-36 coming down the pike, we had atomic bombs, we had jet engines that developed twice the thrust and had an order of magnitude longer service lives than their German equivalents - it goes on - and the gaps were increasing not decreasing. An Armistice would be of no advantage to us and would bring nothing but problems for us. Hence "unconditional surrender". Atomic carpet bombing was the "or else".

Just remember, Germany was the designated target for the first nuclear attacks right up to late 1944. Priority was only switched to Japan when it became apparent that Germany had lost the war and would be occupied before the devices were ready.

[Stuart]

Oh and even though I edited out of the quote, let me explain more. That one smuggler gets shot to shit and while the American Government just goes "Well, no shit" over the deal in greater words, the American people start trying to smuggle in more food and war supplies to Germany in a hunt for profit. Britain and other allies keep killing them forcing Woodrow to ask to to stop the blockade and let free-trade resume or atleast stop shooting the smugglers. They refuse and America is at war with the Entente. Maybe not as a direct ally of Germany. More like a particpant against the Entente and thus a helping hand.

That's utterly implausible. International law clearly states that a blockade is entirely legal. It's an extension of the old principle of beseiging a fortress. Basically, a deal was struck; privateering was made illegal and considered equivalent to piracy, in exchange for which blockade was made legal. This suited all the maritime powers down to the ground and, while they might piss and moan over specific applications, they never got to the point of actually repudiating that agreement. So, from a purely legal point of view, the United States, in the example to which you refer, hasn't got a leg to stand on. Wilson's position as described is inconceivable. It's worth noting that there was steadily-growing anti-German feeling in the US throughout this period. Sauerkraut got renamed liberty cabbage for example and people with German names had a hard time of it.

I know this is a rahter inadequate explaination of my idea but a question. How would it affect the war if the US joined against the Entente and stopped supplying them or started supplying the Central powers as well? What ware the numbers and stuff and how would that affect the Battle of the Atlantic and the end of the war treaties?

It would certainly give the Royal Navy something to do. I wouldn't like to live in a US coastal city during that period. The Brits would probably burn the White House down again. All in all though, its too far-out a situation to really worry about. The United States has to get across the Atlantic to do something and in the early 20th century, that capability only existed under benign circumstances. If, by some weird fluke, it did happen, I would guess a quiet deal would be struck "You don't invade Canada and we won't burn the East Coast to the ground." Then,a quiet phony war and an equally quiet peace deal after Germany goes down.

[Lonestar]

It would certainly give the Royal Navy something to do. I wouldn't like to live in a US coastal city during that period. The Brits would probably burn the White House down again. All in all though, its too far-out a situation to really worry about. The United States has to get across the Atlantic to do something and in the early 20th century, that capability only existed under benign circumstances. If, by some weird fluke, it did happen, I would guess a quiet deal would be struck "You don't invade Canada and we won't burn the East Coast to the ground." Then,a quiet phony war and an equally quiet peace deal after Germany goes down.

To continue the rapid divergence from the OP, would the RN really be able to do as you describe? I know that in absolute numbers the Grand Fleet had a comfortable margin over the HSF, but what about with the US Atlantic Fleet factored in? Or are you thinking in terms of "The RN can send BCs out to shell the hell out of East Coast cities and the USN can't do anything to stop it"?

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Does Canada have the docking capacity to even accomodate a good portion of the Royal Navy? The Royal Navy then was huge yes, but I doubt the USN would go down without a fight that would tear a chunk of ships.

[Simon_Jester]

On a more serious note, the United States was very well aware that Nazi Germany would remain a threat and any armistice would only delay the final reckoning. By 1943 we knew we had the atomic bomb coming and we assumed Germany would be the same (we didn't realize what a comic-opera bunch of clowns the Nazi research scientists were). This wasn't just a Democrat appreciation, it was completely bipartisan. Everybody on both sides of the political fence was well aware of the situation and were in more or less agreement on how things were due to go. (In TBO, I make this point by having Dewey win the 1944 election and the result is - no change. In OTL, the difference between a Dewey and a Roosevelt administration would have been that the post-war policy towards Russia would have been less tolerant but even that's ruled out in TBO due to the different political situation.

In your opinion, what would be the outcome of an earlier point of departure in US politics? Obviously changing things in 1944 isn't going to affect weapons that are already under development barring an act of hostile god, but what about changes made before those weapons are developed? Say, political chaos during the Depression leaving us in a very bad position to start a military buildup in 1940?

Is this a relevant possibility? Or do I just not know enough about Depression era history to be confident that it couldn't have been worse?

EDIT: Wow. The HPCA thread is great reading and I'm just starting. I mean, the guy's plan for Giant Mutant Sealion just makes me want to yell at my screen: "HELLO! British troops shelling the airstrips you captured! HELLO! Metropolitan Spitfires!..."

EDIT Mk. 2: The stuff in the replies is even better; that's just what I came up with reading through Giant Mutant Sealion myself.

[Thanas]

Split from here, because unlike the rest of that thread, this discussion is worth having.

Also, I loathe Kratman so I wanted this to be preserved for posterity.

[Stuart]

To continue the rapid divergence from the OP, would the RN really be able to do as you describe? I know that in absolute numbers the Grand Fleet had a comfortable margin over the HSF, but what about with the US Atlantic Fleet factored in? Or are you thinking in terms of "The RN can send BCs out to shell the hell out of East Coast cities and the USN can't do anything to stop it"?

A lot of this is going to depend on when the United States enters WW1. Let's assume 1917 for consistency. This adds the battleships Pennsylvania, Arizona, Oklahoma, Nevada, New York, Texas, Arkansas, Wyoming, Utah, Florida, Delaware, North Dakota South Carolina and Michigan to the CP total. Total of 14 battleships. These are twenty-knot ships by the way. At that time, the Royal Navy deployed 31 battleships and 9 battlecruisers. The German Navy deployed 19 battleships and 6 battlecruisers. So even with the American contribution and assuming it works in full, the balance is 33 battleships to 31 (two in favor of the CP) and 9 battle cruisers to six (three in favor of the RN). If we assume that under these circumstances, the French Navy joins in with the UK, then we can add seven more battleships to the British total. This is just battleships; the cruiser and destroyer supremacy of the RN is overwhelming.

So, faced with this situation, it is predictable that the RN will see its primary objective as keeping the two halves of teh CP fleet apart and eliminating them in detail. Detaching a battle cruiser force (say the Repulse, Renown and the three Courageous class ships that are not included above) to raid the US coast is a good start. They have a ten to twelve knot superiority over the American battle line in an era where a three-knot superiority was considered decisive. They can more or less come and go as they please. They can turn up more or less where they wish, shell the living daylights out of a coastal town and vanish again. There's plenty of bases they can use. Halifax is big enough to hold the entire Grand Fleet, Bermuda is available and there are a few more. The UK also has a lot of pretty neat submarines that could be deployed off American ports to pick off warships coming and going. This is where the American weakness in destroyers and cruisers will really bite them in the ass.

The almost inevitable American response would be to keep the fleet at home, taksed with defending American coastal cities. The Brits would help that concept along by studiously not pounding on cities that had a battleship or two stationed in their ports. This strategy has another by-product. It will give plenty of warning of the US battleline starting to assemble and move across the Atlantic. This is a great early warning signal of an attempt to join the two halves of the CP fleet.

Despite all this talk of numbers of battleships and so on, I suspect that geography is the really great problem here. With the two halves of the CP fleet seperated by so much, the chances of assembling them are limited in the extreme. factor in the need to defend the US East coast (of course if the Japanese decide to join in the fun, the equation changes dramatically. That throws at least four excellent battlecruisers and four battleships into the Entente pot. It also leaves the entire US west coast open (in theory at least).

That's why I think that, in the extremely unlikely event of the US joining the CP, the action would be nominal at best and there would be a quiet "let sleeping dogs lay" agreement.

[Stuart]

Also, I loathe Kratman so I wanted this to be preserved for posterity.

His "contributions" to the thread in question varied from the pathetic to the absurd. Even now, a long time later, I still can't decide whether he really is that stupid (in which case, his promotion level is inexplicable) or whether he was just taking the piss. At that time, I wasn't aware of just how much of a Nazi cocksucker he really was so my feeling today is that he's let his Nazi worship distort everything inside his head - and that probably explains why Uncle Sam declined his future services.

As an example (these are taken from pmails he sent screaming insults at the administration), he denied claiming that two divisions of paratroopers would be used and that his planned descent would employ only a single division. Asked how a single division would hold a 26-mile front he resorted to his standard response to any indication of a factual error. "You. Are. Wrong." He also claimed that only 60 tons of supplies per day would be required ignoring the fact that the Ju-52 force couldn't even deliver that. However, his piece de resistance was to claim that even if the invasion barges were sunk in mid-channel, the German troops would just swim ashore and proceed to establish their beachhead anyway.

[Thanas]

However, his piece de resistance was to claim that even if the invasion barges were sunk in mid-channel, the German troops would just swim ashore and proceed to establish their beachhead anyway.

I guess he has never taken any kind of swim fully clothed.

But hey, I guess this is par the course for somebody who believed the SS were the best troops Germany ever fielded. Oh, and we need them to fight a modern war because the western militaries have gone all soft.

[CaptHawkeye]

If he thinks that why even build the fucking barges then? They might as well just have the Wehrmacht try to swim to shore right from France. Nevermind that GIs and Marines couldn't even swim a few feet during invasions like D-Day or Peleliu when the heaviest equipment they had was a rifle and basic gear. God help anybody carrying a machine gun or mortar.

But hey, he'd probably just chalk them up to being sub-human non-Aryans or something. Guys like this are too funny for words.

[Samuel]

Swimming across the Channel to invade England... can't you just mow the idiots down with destroyers anyway if the Wehrmacht demonstrates superhuman endurance?

[CaptHawkeye]

He probably thinks his big bad Luftwaffe will stop the RN from doing that, even though it would be exhausted fighting the RAF no matter how well the BoB went. Also the Luftwaffe lacked any kind of really effective anti-ship weapons for the early course of the war.

I should also mention the Royal Navy happily and safely controlled the waters of the channel at night when the Luftwaffe couldn't even sortie against them. They even bombarded French harbors a bunch of times during the peak of the LW's strength.

But none of this matters because SUPER ARYANS OF DOOM are comin to get ya!

[Stuart]

If he thinks that why even build the fucking barges then? They might as well just have the Wehrmacht try to swim to shore right from France. Nevermind that GIs and Marines couldn't even swim a few feet during invasions like D-Day or Peleliu when the heaviest equipment they had was a rifle and basic gear. God help anybody carrying a machine gun or mortar. But hey, he'd probably just chalk them up to being sub-human non-Aryans or something. Guys like this are too funny for words.

I think Kratman believes the German infantry would simply have walked across the English Channel. Some of his beliefs were very definately weird for somebody who is alleged to have his background (it would be interesting to see what his military records actually say). For example, he was quite convinced that German paratroopers would land in perfect tactical formation and in perfect defense terrain because they were "elite". Pointing out that paratroop operations always had a high degree of dispersal was met with the usual "You. Are. Wrong." (by the way, has anybody any idea where the ludicrous idea of punctuating sentences with a period after every word comes from? From observation I've noted that it appears to be much favored by raving nutcases).

There's an interesting sideline to the idea of the Kent airdrop by the way. One of the minor points that got overlooked in the promulgation of the basic plan was that at the dates intended, the nearest German airfields weren't in the Pas de Calais, they were along the Rhine. Now, that means that the Bf-109s were literally at the extreme edge of their tactical radius (as were the Ju-52 transports). Assuming they were intercepted by Metropolitan Spitfires. they would have to turn back before reaching the British coast. NOw, here's a funny thing. The British had quite a lot of Bolton-Paul Defiants in the Metropolitan Air Force. The Defiant is greatly derided in history primarily because it fared extremely badly in air-to-air combat with fighters. But, it wasn't a fighter, it was a bomber destroyer. It was intended to hold formation with the target and spray it with concentrated blast of fire from the four .303s in its turret. In short, it was almost specifically designed for the sort of target it would be facing - a whole stream of poorly armed Ju-52s lumbering along without any form of escort.

Could it be that, had this strange abortion of a plan ever been tried, today the Bolton Paul Defiant would be lauded as the savior of England with heroic tales being told of how it scythed the Nazi horde out of the sky? (By the way, it was a pretty effective early night fighter as well).

[Stuart]

He probably thinks his big bad Luftwaffe will stop the RN from doing that, even though it would be exhausted fighting the RAF no matter how well the BoB went. Also the Luftwaffe lacked any kind of really effective anti-ship weapons for the early course of the war. I should also mention the Royal Navy happily and safely controlled the waters of the channel at night when the Luftwaffe couldn't even sortie against them. They even bombarded French harbors a bunch of times during the peak of the LW's strength. But none of this matters because SUPER ARYANS OF DOOM are comin to get ya!

Hitting a fast-moving destroyer even in broad daylight was a pretty neat trick. The US Navy finally cracked it by using salvoes of air-to-ship rockets but even then it wasn't easy. Dunkirk was an interesting example; the RN destroyers were under intense air attack for several days yet only a handful were sunk and they were caught stationary, inside a small port, loading men. As you say, at night, the Royal Navy reigned supreme, the channel was their own private pond and nobody else was allowed to play in it.

[CaptHawkeye]

The Royal Navy had something like 3 Destroyer Flotillas right in the intended area of the Sea Lion landings. Yet few if any ships were lost by these Flotillas even during the day when they were at port. The reality was that even when it exposed itself openly, their wasn't a thing in the fucking world the Luftwaffe could do against the Royal Navy.

[Scottish Ninja]

Also, I loathe Kratman so I wanted this to be preserved for posterity.

His "contributions" to the thread in question varied from the pathetic to the absurd. Even now, a long time later, I still can't decide whether he really is that stupid (in which case, his promotion level is inexplicable) or whether he was just taking the piss. At that time, I wasn't aware of just how much of a Nazi cocksucker he really was so my feeling today is that he's let his Nazi worship distort everything inside his head - and that probably explains why Uncle Sam declined his future services.

I wonder, Stuart, are there any other prominent sci-fi/alt-hist authors that you've managed to send off in a fit of screaming rage? Seeing as how you've done Stirling and Kratman already, I thought it might be worthwhile to ask.

[K. A. Pital]

However, his piece de resistance was to claim that even if the invasion barges were sunk in mid-channel, the German troops would just swim ashore and proceed to establish their beachhead anyway.

A dose of sheer insanity for a good mood. We've already discussed Kratman's many failures, I believe (in Sci-Fi, though, not in History). But this is just borderline brainless.

[Simon_Jester]

A lot of this is going to depend on when the United States enters WW1. Let's assume 1917 for consistency. This adds the battleships Pennsylvania, Arizona, Oklahoma, Nevada, New York, Texas, Arkansas, Wyoming, Utah, Florida, Delaware, North Dakota South Carolina and Michigan to the CP total. Total of 14 battleships. These are twenty-knot ships by the way. At that time, the Royal Navy deployed 31 battleships and 9 battlecruisers. The German Navy deployed 19 battleships and 6 battlecruisers. So even with the American contribution and assuming it works in full, the balance is 33 battleships to 31 (two in favor of the CP) and 9 battle cruisers to six (three in favor of the RN). If we assume that under these circumstances, the French Navy joins in with the UK, then we can add seven more battleships to the British total. This is just battleships; the cruiser and destroyer supremacy of the RN is overwhelming.

Though I could swear the French battle fleet was mostly kept in the Mediterranean to stop the Austro-Hungarians from getting mischievous. And with the Americans entering on the Central Powers' side, around the time the Russians fall apart entirely, the Austro-Hungarians may not collapse the way they did historically... or am I missing something again?

So, faced with this situation, it is predictable that the RN will see its primary objective as keeping the two halves of teh CP fleet apart and eliminating them in detail. Detaching a battle cruiser force (say the Repulse, Renown and the three Courageous class ships that are not included above) to raid the US coast is a good start. They have a ten to twelve knot superiority over the American battle line in an era where a three-knot superiority was considered decisive. They can more or less come and go as they please. They can turn up more or less where they wish, shell the living daylights out of a coastal town and vanish again. There's plenty of bases they can use. Halifax is big enough to hold the entire Grand Fleet, Bermuda is available and there are a few more. The UK also has a lot of pretty neat submarines that could be deployed off American ports to pick off warships coming and going. This is where the American weakness in destroyers and cruisers will really bite them in the ass.

A question: what was the overall state of US coast defense artillery in this period? My impression is that the last major upgrade program had been long enough ago that it wouldn't be very helpful against 15-inch armed British capital ships.

Despite all this talk of numbers of battleships and so on, I suspect that geography is the really great problem here. With the two halves of the CP fleet seperated by so much, the chances of assembling them are limited in the extreme. factor in the need to defend the US East coast (of course if the Japanese decide to join in the fun, the equation changes dramatically. That throws at least four excellent battlecruisers and four battleships into the Entente pot. It also leaves the entire US west coast open (in theory at least).

The difficulty I see for the Allies in this situation is that the British no longer have the same dramatic local superiority over the High Seas Fleet; to put heavy units off the US coast, they have to take them away from the Grand Fleet, and they need to use their relatively limited supply of modern units (the ones that have a speed advantage, like the battlecruisers and the Queen Elizabeth class). Suddenly the possibility of a German sally from Wilhelmshaven becomes a bit more plausible, though it may have been practically impossible for other reasons. Politics, maybe?

Swimming across the Channel to invade England... can't you just mow the idiots down with destroyers anyway if the Wehrmacht demonstrates superhuman endurance?

"The Germans are trying to swim ashore!" has only one response:
"Praise the Lord and pass the depth charges!"

Wow. I didn't realize Kratman was that foolish...

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Though I could swear the French battle fleet was mostly kept in the Mediterranean to stop the Austro-Hungarians from getting mischievous. And with the Americans entering on the Central Powers' side, around the time the Russians fall apart entirely, the Austro-Hungarians may not collapse the way they did historically... or am I missing something again?

Italy had five dreadnoughts in 1917, discounting the Leonardo da Vinci (whose salvage may be the greatest feat ever performed with an Italian capital ship, which tells you a lot about the Italians employed their battle line). The Austrians had four and in any other situation four enemy dreadnoughts versus five Italian ones means that the enemy bombards the Italian coast with impunity and dominates the Mediterranean, but the Austrian warships lacked such features as turret ventilation, and one of them was a floating piece of crap (the worst warship builders in the world were unquestionably the Hungarians, and the entire world breathed a sigh of relief when Hungary lost its coastline and could no longer build battleships), which had been built in the sole shipyard in the entire Kingdom of Hungary, which before had never built anything larger than a torpedo boat. She as a turbine-powered dreadnought could be easily overhauled by the Wobbly Eight, let alone an Italian battleship.

The only time that the situation in the Mediterranean starts to get hairy is when the Soviet Union surrenders and the Germans, occupying Sevastobol and with the stalemate on the Western Front continuing, have reason to refit and repair the Black Sea Fleet--by 1919 they could have three 12 x 12in/52cal armed dreadnoughts operational + Goeben if they really went at it. But that requires the Germans to hold out to 1919, which... Well, it's possible with the USA not supplying the entente any longer. Will be a long, long winter for German civilians, though; by then they could probably finish Wurttemburg, Sachsen, and Mackensen and Graf Spee, too.... ...maybe. It's a race against time, since far more important than the HSF (and needing French dreadnoughts to block the German Black Sea Fleet, as we'll call it), is the fact that the US has an utterly huge building programme going on which here would not be delayed, but accelerated, and easily could be. If Germany can hold out long enough for the the Maryland-class to finish then the Royal Navy is running into problems since they had largely halted new battleship construction and would have to restart it in a hurry in 1917 with all new hulls which will take 2 - 3 years to finish.

[atg]

is the fact that the US has an utterly huge building programme going on which here would not be delayed, but accelerated, and easily could be.

I might just be imagining things, but I seem to recall a thread on this subject on here before (as in US joining the Central Powers during the WWI timeframe). The suggestion was that if the US tried to outbuild the UK in capital ships it would be trivial for the Royal Navy to bombard the ports and destroy the under-construction ships/construciton facilites due to the US Navy not having the ships to defend said facilities.

Of course, I am not personally sure how viable that would be.

[Simon_Jester]

Italy had five dreadnoughts in 1917, discounting the Leonardo da Vinci (whose salvage may be the greatest feat ever performed with an Italian capital ship, which tells you a lot about the Italians employed their battle line). The Austrians had four and in any other situation four enemy dreadnoughts versus five Italian ones means that the enemy bombards the Italian coast with impunity and dominates the Mediterranean, but the Austrian warships lacked such features as turret ventilation, and one of them was a floating piece of crap (the worst warship builders in the world were unquestionably the Hungarians, and the entire world breathed a sigh of relief when Hungary lost its coastline and could no longer build battleships), which had been built in the sole shipyard in the entire Kingdom of Hungary, which before had never built anything larger than a torpedo boat. She as a turbine-powered dreadnought could be easily overhauled by the Wobbly Eight, let alone an Italian battleship.

Heh. The problem I remember isn't a danger of the Dual Monarchy going on a monstrous rampage with their powerful ships, since they didn't really have any. It's that you can't let the enemy have battleships operating unopposed. Even crappy battleships. And "opposed only by Italian warships" is alarmingly close to "unopposed." So I'm not sure the French could confidently dispatch their dreadnoughts from the Mediterranean to reinforce the British against the Germans or Americans.

So you have the French dreadnoughts largely tied down by the need to cover the Med. They might shake loose a few ships, but not all seven. Meanwhile, the British are either holding local parity in capital ships against both the US and Germany or maintaining local capital ship superiority against Germany and sending only raiding forces (up to and including battlecruisers) against the US.

And, as you say, it gets messy in 1919 if the Germans can hold out that long. One interesting question to me is whether the French could outlast the Germans on land in this scenario, because if both Russia and France fall and the US is with the Central Powers, the logical outcome is for Britain to negotiate peace. They may have plenty of surface units, but I doubt they'll be able to maintain long term control of the world oceans against a combined US-German effort, not if the Germans aren't distracted by waging a major land war.

But that requires the Germans to hold out to 1919, which... Well, it's possible with the USA not supplying the entente any longer. Will be a long, long winter for German civilians, though...

In what ways would it be worse than what happened historically for them? Not saying it wouldn't; I'm asking how.

I might just be imagining things, but I seem to recall a thread on this subject on here before (as in US joining the Central Powers during the WWI timeframe). The suggestion was that if the US tried to outbuild the UK in capital ships it would be trivial for the Royal Navy to bombard the ports and destroy the under-construction ships/construciton facilites due to the US Navy not having the ships to defend said facilities.

Of course, I am not personally sure how viable that would be.

The RN would need enough superiority to overcome US coastal defenses to make this work. The US coastal artillery wasn't exactly stellar as far as I can tell, but it wasn't completely useless, either. And there's some nasty short ranged stuff like the US submarine force to consider, too.

Doing that much damage to the US naval bases in the Atlantic might force the British to deploy more units than they could safely send across the Atlantic without inviting attacks by the German fleet closer to home. That's the real problem I see the British having here, in general: they're faced with two widely separated opponents, and they can probably keep them separated, but they can't concentrate to destroy the weaker one (the US) without leaving themselves open to the stronger one (Germany). Which makes it difficult for them to win a long term construction race.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

is the fact that the US has an utterly huge building programme going on which here would not be delayed, but accelerated, and easily could be.

I might just be imagining things, but I seem to recall a thread on this subject on here before (as in US joining the Central Powers during the WWI timeframe). The suggestion was that if the US tried to outbuild the UK in capital ships it would be trivial for the Royal Navy to bombard the ports and destroy the under-construction ships/construciton facilites due to the US Navy not having the ships to defend said facilities.

Of course, I am not personally sure how viable that would be.

We did instead, however, have very extensive fortifications everywhere, which were far better than the fortifications which halted the British at the Hellespont in 1915, and while the guns of the ships doing the bombardments here would be longer-ranged (well, not than the QE's) than the old pre-dreads at the Hellespont.... Who cares? The Endicott forts will hold up well enough since ships bombarding shore fortresses has always been problematic, and if the 1880s vintage guns of the Ottomans could stop a fleet, the 1890s - 1990s vintage Endicott forts will keep the Entente's squadrons at long enough ranges that the occasional 12in or 13.5in shell crashing down will be easily repaired; Leningrad hardly stopped manufacturing things in WW2 under far more heavy inaccurate long range bombardment. I think Stuart is being somewhat optimistic about how the Royal Navy could bombard the US coast, but, conversely, the United States Navy is about 4 years away from having the advantage in 1917, and Germany does not have 4 years of life left. Not under the British hunger blockade. They'd either have to actually start getting grain from the Ukraine in great quantities or win the war in a single decisive blow.

The problem being that winning the war in a single decisive blow was already tried in OTL and failed: The Spring Offensive.