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I think it would have succeeded under a bold and intelligent commander, only the Germans didn't have one.

I woud bring in Guderian, von Rundstett, von Manstein.
And this are the first 3 names which come into my mind

Regards
Ede

RF wrote:I think it would have succeeded under a bold and intelligent commander, only the Germans didn't have one.

..... Really? No bold and intelligent commanders? How interesting.

B

Byron,

RF is refering to THE commander (i.e. the bohemian corporal), not the rest of commanders that were superior to all the rest of commanders of WWII put together... and I am thinking in Manstein alone...

Karl Heidenreich wrote:... not the rest of commanders that were superior to all the rest of commanders of WWII put together... and I am thinking in Manstein alone...

???? Talk about broken logic and opinion leading to faulty conclusions. Care to make a case for that?

Take into accounts that Hitler trusted his General's until the first winter in Russia. and be shure he wouldn't have ordered a war against Russia w/o the advice of his commanders. All were well aware of Brest-litowsk
Regards
Ede

lwd:

Care to make a case for that?

Not to you... ever!

ede144 wrote:I woud bring in Guderian, von Rundstett, von Manstein.
And this are the first 3 names which come into my mind

All of them brilliant commanders in terms of land warfare. But with respect their expertise in combined land, air and naval operations was not given much opportunity for operations like Sea Lion. Hitler never appointed an equivalent of Eisenhower for Sea Lion, beyond himself performing the role.....

Byron Angel wrote:

RF wrote:I think it would have succeeded under a bold and intelligent commander, only the Germans didn't have one.

..... Really? No bold and intelligent commanders? How interesting.B

It doesn't help to quote out of the context in which my post was made. I was referring to a bold intelligent commander in combined land, sea and air operations. The Germans had bold and intelligent commanders in specialist roles in each of the three combat services, but not any capable of performing equally brilliantly in all three. The nearest they had were Kesselring and perhaps Marcks.
The invasion of Norway springs to mind - but even here there was separate army and naval planning, not a joint inter-service military command. And the demands on military planning were not too onerous for what was a surprise operation against a neutral and largely unarmed open country.

RF wrote:

Byron Angel wrote:

RF wrote:I think it would have succeeded under a bold and intelligent commander, only the Germans didn't have one.

..... Really? No bold and intelligent commanders? How interesting.B

It doesn't help to quote out of the context in which my post was made. I was referring to a bold intelligent commander in combined land, sea and air operations. The Germans had bold and intelligent commanders in specialist roles in each of the three combat services, but not any capable of performing equally brilliantly in all three. The nearest they had were Kesselring and perhaps Marcks.
The invasion of Norway springs to mind - but even here there was separate army and naval planning, not a joint inter-service military command. And the demands on military planning were not too onerous for what was a surprise operation against a neutral and largely unarmed open country.

..... You make it sound like the Allies were simply teeming with commanders sporting combined operations experience and training. What prior experience and training in major combined arms operations did senior Allied comanders bring to the table in 1941? Gallipoli?

There were many reasons why Sea Lion would quite likely have failed, but the Germans were no better or worse off than their Allied opponents in terms of combined arms command skill sets. In fact, an arguable case can be made that, in terms of air/ground combined operations (as in tactical air support) the German started the war well ahead.

B

Byron Angel wrote: ... There were many reasons why Sea Lion would quite likely have failed, but the Germans were no better or worse off than their Allied opponents in terms of combined arms command skill sets. In fact, an arguable case can be made that, in terms of air/ground combined operations (as in tactical air support) the German started the war well ahead.

Over some allied forces perhaps but the USMC for instance had done a lot of work on air/ground combined operations in the interwar years and also done considerable theoretical work on opposed invasions.

lwd wrote:

Byron Angel wrote: ... There were many reasons why Sea Lion would quite likely have failed, but the Germans were no better or worse off than their Allied opponents in terms of combined arms command skill sets. In fact, an arguable case can be made that, in terms of air/ground combined operations (as in tactical air support) the German started the war well ahead.

Over some allied forces perhaps but the USMC for instance had done a lot of work on air/ground combined operations in the interwar years and also done considerable theoretical work on opposed invasions.

..... Fair comment. sir. I have nothing but the highest esteem for the USMC - the finest of the American armed services IMHO. But the strength of the USMC was < 20,000 men in Jun 1939 and, even with its expansion immediately prior to US entry into WW2, only stood at about 65,000 men in toto by Nov 1941. The USMC's pre-war work on combined arms amphibious operations was largely theoretical - undoubtedly valuable, but still theoretical - and was progressively evolved on an OJT basis from 1943 Tarawa) onward to Okinawa Add to that the fact that the USMC was very much an orphan service rather disdained by US Army (I consider it a small bureaucratice miracle that any USMC planning assistance was accepted for Overlord - although so far as I have been able to ascertain, that assistance was provided to the British combined operations planners as opposed to the US side of the staff).

B

My understanding was there was at least one USMC adviser on the American side as well but that most of his advice was ignored. On the other hand the prewar theoretical work resulted in practical equipment such as the various landing craft and a navy that knew how to work with shore based observers so some of it carried over. Furthermore the US and I suspect the British seamed to have had a much greater respect for the logistical problems involved in such operations. As you say the British did have some Spencerian in WWI and had had considerable experience conducting campaigns and wars over huge distances. The only place I can think of where the western allies had anything like the logistics problems that plagued the Germans were in SEA and China where the realities of the terrain precluded pretty much anything else.

Byron Angel wrote: ..... You make it sound like the Allies were simply teeming with commanders sporting combined operations experience and training. What prior experience and training in major combined arms operations did senior Allied comanders bring to the table in 1941? Gallipoli?

I never said any such thing about the Allies, or implied it. My comments concerned the Germans and not anybody else. Your question hence of the Allies experience of amphibious operations 1941 is irrelevant.

There were many reasons why Sea Lion would quite likely have failed

Agreed.

, but the Germans were no better or worse off than their Allied opponents in terms of combined arms command skill sets. In fact, an arguable case can be made that, in terms of air/ground combined operations (as in tactical air support) the German started the war well ahead.

In terms of blitzkrieg they certainly were. However blitzkrieg was only two dimensional, focussed on land campaigns and not focussed on waging war against a seapower. Hence the Germans had no means of tackiling the USA effectively once they had declared war on the US - except perhaps hope that the Japanese could do it for them....