Operation Pedestal

I voted for the RN fighting for Malta whatever. Understand that Malta was a vital part of the UK’s efforts to interrupt supplies to N Africa and so defend the Suez canal and thus the UK’s whole middle east position. I am presuming this was understood at the time - but that’s an assumption others may challenge.

I think they’d have managed to hold on for some time, but eventually the Germans would have overwhelmed the invasion and forced another Dunkirk or captured the entire invasion force. The allies simply didn’t have the resources they needed at this point in the war to try something like this and have a chance of victory.

All those allied infantry in such an invasion would’ve needed to hit 2s for several rounds running to have a chance.  :-D

@CWO:

Apparently one of only two Lancs in the world that still fly.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/news/hamilton-s-lancaster-bomber-marks-25-years-back-in-the-sky-1.1866309

Excellent article Marc. Only just go to read it. The expense is ridiculous, but worth it, I believe. The many accidents and that hangar fire are horrid to read about.
It will be sad indeed when planes like this no longer grace our skies.

LOL, guess I should check to see if somebody else had posted this!  Nice work, going to have to get up a bit earlier me thinks!

I’d never heard of this operation, but it sounds typically Churchillian.  He had great fondness – in both World Wars – for schemes that aimed blows at the outer fringes of enemy territory rather than hitting the enemy head-on (in the Ulysses S. Grant style favoured by the Americans).  In WWI, Churchill dreamed up the Gallipoli operation for this reason; it was poorly planned and badly botched, and his reputation took a hit as a result.  In WWII, Churchill pushed hard for the invasion of Italy; the fallacy of his argument that Italy was the “soft underbelly of Europe” should have been obvious to anyone able to spot mountain ranges on a topographical map.  Churchill’s Baltic operation also has a few echoes of Jacky Fisher’s WWI plan to invade Germany via the Baltic, for which Fisher conceived the misguided Courageous-class battlecruisers – severely unbalanced ships with the armament of a battleship but the armour protection of a light cruiser.

My bad, either way, still a pretty cool find. The plans on the show had both the airborne and amphibious landings. Just thought you might find it interesting.

so for every 4-5 brigades create 1 vichy infantry unit

I understand, Life happens every single second…