More conservative German tank designs in WWII (RAR!)

[Zor]

Let us say that after going into Russia the higher ups in the German military decide that what the german army needs is quantity of vehicles, as such they decide to do two things...

1: Make as many Panzer-IVs as possible and modernize them on the same lines that they did OTL to better fight T-34s
2: Develop a Panzer-V, which is to be a low cost medium tank with comparable engine power and armor to the T-34 to supplement and eventually supersede the Panzer-IV.

The Tiger never gets beyond prototype, the Panther never goes beyond the drawing board.

Does this positively or negatively effect the German war machine?

Zor

[Borgholio]

Would only delay the inevitable. The Russians produced over 50,000 T-34s during the war. Even the US couldn't produce that same number of Shermans. Germany wouldn't have a chance to match the Soviets tank for tank.

[Thanas]

The thing is that the only way the Wehrmacht could win is by waging a defensive war, which most likely would not have happened at all as Stalin had no plans of attacking.

[Elheru Aran]

Starting a fight with Russia made the historic conclusion rather final after a certain point in time. Stalin might have been willing to let the Germans have Poland and some of the Ukraine as he seemed extremely passive in resisting their attack until the first winter, and the Western Allies had no reason to expect that they could defeat Germany entirely without Russia's intervention (although they would probably have defeated the Germans and Italians in Africa).

But once Russia started actively resisting Germany more than just falling back before the Nazi forces, it was only a matter of time. They simply had far more men and a much more powerful and active war-production industrial base to throw into the effort.

So the only thing this RAR would change is that the Germans might have a few more reasonably decent tanks. We might have a few more Kursks, but that's going to be about it.

[The Vortex Empire]

It would certainly improve their situation, but not enough to change the outcome. Germany simply lacked the industrial capacity to compete with the USSR, once the USSR recovered from the initial shock of the invasion.

[LaCroix]

If you change the op to "instead of attacking Russia", it might make a difference, as long as they also do the same for their airforce and keep focus on Britain. Against Russia, it's just more food for the grinder...

[Borgholio]

Had Germany defeated Britain before attacking Russia, that would have made a much bigger difference than simply building a new class of tank.

[Thanas]

Yeah but Germany could not defeat Britain due to that pesky water in between them.

[Borgholio]

I've always felt that had Germany kept up it's attacks against the RAF and support facilities and not resorted to bombing civilians, they could have eventually ground down British defenses to the point where they could have invaded.

[Flameblade]

I've always felt that had Germany kept up it's attacks against the RAF and support facilities and not resorted to bombing civilians, they could have eventually ground down British defenses to the point where they could have invaded.

They couldn't break the RN with that, because they simply couldn't reach all the naval bases that they could defend Britain out of, and without breaking the RN, Britain can't be invaded, which makes decisively knocking them out of the war impossible in the window of time that Germany had before its own war economy imploded.

[Darth Tanner]

I've always felt that had Germany kept up it's attacks against the RAF and support facilities and not resorted to bombing civilians, they could have eventually ground down British defenses to the point where they could have invaded.

They could have except that Britain could simply move its air resources further and further north to maximise the home turf advantage and decrease German air time. Then there is the problem of massive naval inferiority - which air dominance doesn't neutralise. To be honest if Germany had been convinced to try an invasion it might have ended the war significantly sooner as the invasion would have been the worst military disaster since Napoleon retreated from Russia... probably worse.

[Thanas]

I've always felt that had Germany kept up it's attacks against the RAF and support facilities and not resorted to bombing civilians, they could have eventually ground down British defenses to the point where they could have invaded.

No, that couldn't have happened.


1.) While the air fields were damaged and pilot losses high, the training arm and aircraft factories of the Royal Air Force remained intact and if necessary forces could simply have been based further north - sacrificing civilians for safer landing fields, but remember that even Allied terror bombing did not knock Germany out of the war - and German bombing never reached the level of the allied mass bombings anyway. So in any case the Royal Air Force would still have had a steady supply of planes.
2.) By early September (and possibly late August) British production of pilots and airplanes was above the loss rate. So there was no way the Royal Air Force would ever cease to exist as a fighting unit.

but even if the Royal Air Force totally ceases to exist, what then?

3.) The main danger to an invasion fleet are not planes, but the Royal Navy. The German Air Force would be unable to bring enough force to bear against the Royal Navy and especially not against the quick destroyer attacks at night. The German Navy would be unable to stop any such attack, especially after the losses to the destroyer fleet at Narvik.
4.) Actually, what invasion fleet? There never was enough transport capacity to support any kind of large operation. Most of the invasion fleet collected were river barges to boot, which means that any kind of chanel storm (totally unheard of, right?) would prevent shipping. Worst case scenario is a storm actually happening when the troops are embarked, in which case the Brits could just pop the champagne already and watch the Germans drown en masse.

And even if a landing had been made against those odds:

5.) Congrats. You just landed 50k troops. Resupply is impossible. The British army is coming for you. Have fun.
6.) Even worse, due to the limited Navy, you would have landed on a very short front, thereby robbing the German Army of its main advantage, its mobility and speed.
7.) All those big massed troops are just begging for a shelling from the British battleships and other artillery.

So you can see why this would never ever have worked.

[Borgholio]

What could Germany have hoped to accomplish then? Were they hoping to bomb Britain into submission so they would surrender without an invasion? They couldn't possibly just keep fighting them forever.

[Thanas]

What could Germany have hoped to accomplish then? Were they hoping to bomb Britain into submission so they would surrender without an invasion? They couldn't possibly just keep fighting them forever.

Pick your reasons among the following, it all depends on whose story you believe:

1. Luftwaffe brass wanted a spoling attack to knock the Royal Air Force out of the picture. This worked, the German Luftwaffe remained operational and capable of supporting major offences within half a year whereas the Brits took over a year to recover.
2. Hitler had no clue and committed a major strategical blunder by first halting the German attack on Dunkirchen. He believed the Brits were the natural allies of Germany and would come to see the light. This of course was not the case.
3. Hitler put a lot of stock into the "fighting morale of the common people" and believe British morale would be broken by terror bombing. It achieved the opposite, as the terror bombing was nowhere close the level of the allied bombing later on (which initially also only hardened the resolve of those affected by it)
4. "We can't just sit here and let the uboots have all the fun. We have to do something. This is something within our capabilities. Thus, we do it".
5. Terror bombing had worked earlier in the case of Rotterdam and Antwerpen as well as Warsaw. But in both cases the army was also destroyed, unlike as in Britain (see above).

And while Germany could not win, neither could Britain. It was a stalemate. The Germans tried to break it by invading Greece, North Africa and the middle East. Who knows how long the war would have gone on for and who would have won had Pearl Harbor and Barbarossa not happened.

[Elheru Aran]

What could Germany have hoped to accomplish then? Were they hoping to bomb Britain into submission so they would surrender without an invasion? They couldn't possibly just keep fighting them forever.

I re-read Shirer's Rise and Fall a month or two ago. IIRC it was mostly bluster by Hitler, backed up by a little lackadaisical preparation by his generals, but the focus was always upon simply neutralizing Britain and invading Russia. Hitler's mentality in particular was that Russia and the East were the greater menace. They were quite aware that invading Britain was a practical impossibility, so apart from some efforts here and there such as assembling a number of barges for the invasion, there was no serious effort to put it into practice. Although being German, they drew up detailed plans, of course...

[Borgholio]

I wonder if (barring an invasion of Russia), Germany might have been able to complete their Atom Bomb and use that to force the British to surrender?

[Elheru Aran]

I wonder if (barring an invasion of Russia), Germany might have been able to complete their Atom Bomb and use that to force the British to surrender?

Very slightly possible, but from what I understand, they simply didn't have the scientists or equipment for it. They had a broad grasp of the concept, hence their tenuous attempts at collecting the necessary materials, but it would have taken them much longer than it did the Americans (who, it must be granted, had the advantage of all those lovely German scientists who got the hell out of Dodge in time).

The British Empire was simply too big for the Germans to have any realistic prospect of defeating it entirely. If they had tried to attack England more directly, the government would have simply moved; perhaps to Northern Ireland, perhaps to Canada, and the Navy would have relocated as well. For all that the Germans tried, they never quite had the resources and manpower. Sooner or later, especially if Japan pulled off Pearl Harbor, the United States would've gotten into the war, and they were the other steamroller of the war. Piss off them or Russia, and you lose.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

If a coup had removed Hitler after long enough of a stalemate it's quite possible that the British would have recognized the Polish partition in exchange for peace, since that still leaves the Germans and the Soviets to play off each other to support the alliance of western Europe, but it would have required a withdrawl from the western countries to achieve. The British made real concessions at the Peace of Amiens under somewhat similiar circumstances in 1802. Neither side observed the result, but that was because Napoleon was alive and kicking and planning for war.

[Elheru Aran]

If a coup had removed Hitler after long enough of a stalemate it's quite possible that the British would have recognized the Polish partition in exchange for peace, since that still leaves the Germans and the Soviets to play off each other to support the alliance of western Europe, but it would have required a withdrawl from the western countries to achieve. The British made real concessions at the Peace of Amiens under somewhat similiar circumstances in 1802. Neither side observed the result, but that was because Napoleon was alive and kicking and planning for war.

You think they would have let Germany hold on to France and the Low Countries? I suspect that would have been a sticking point...

[Thanas]

They don't have much choice without the Luftwaffe and the Heer exhausting itself in Russia. Neither side can do much to hurt the other, for the same thing that saved Britain (the channel) is the same thing preventing them from attacking the continent.

[Elheru Aran]

How does the fight in Africa and the Med affect this hypothetical? Or is that more 'neither side can do much to hurt the other'?

[Borgholio]

If Germany has control over continental Europe and isn't busy fighting the Soviets, that would free up a good number of troops to take control of Northern Africa.

[Thanas]

How does the fight in Africa and the Med affect this hypothetical? Or is that more 'neither side can do much to hurt the other'?

If Germany has control over continental Europe and isn't busy fighting the Soviets, that would free up a good number of troops to take control of Northern Africa.

No. Logistics make a German push into Egypt impossible (Water and fuel is impossible to transport in much greater capacity than OTL), but Britain would face challenges pushing harder into cyrenaica as well. As long as Turkey stays neutral (and provided Germany would not open that can of worms) nobody will touch the British rule in Persia and India.

OTOH, England does not gain much from it either. It keeps the supply lines open, but beyond that...nothing. I guess it is always possible that Italy fails spectacularly and the Brits take Sicily due to their naval superiority, but that is a much lower possibility with the Germans being able to commit much more to the fight. In OTL sicily and lower Italy was a near catastrophe to the alllies in terms of casualties and expended resources anyway.

[Simon_Jester]

On the subject of the nuclear program, I don't think the German nuclear program could have realistically succeeded before the American program. American involvement in the war was inevitable given the stalemate between Germany and the UK. Even if Japan hadn't jumped in, it would have been something in the Atlantic. Given American involvement, the US will pursue the atomic bomb. They'll have the bomb and means to deliver it before the Germans are ready.
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Now, it IS worth putting a little effort into figuring out what might happen if ALL the Germans did was rationalize tank production. The Panzer IV is a good chassis for improvement but a bit lightweight, so it has limitations- and the Soviets are busily developing vehicles that can overmatch it rather badly. They will if nothing else need to pursue heavy tank destroyers on the Panzer IV chassis.

[Elheru Aran]

As I understand it, the Americans were stretching their neutrality pretty strongly by Lend-Lease and various agreements with the British anyway. The Germans torpedoed a American ship in mid-1941, and had Pearl Harbor not happened, it's quite possible that more American ships may have been sunk by U-boats, giving incitement to the States to get committed. And if they got committed, odds are they would have to join the British in fighting the Japanese, so yeah, you've got WWII as it pretty much went there.