What if Germany magically had Plan Z?

1939:

Germany invades Poland, overrunning it within weeks, followed by a declaration of war by France and Britain.

Despite the pleas of Donitz, however, instead of building U-boats, Hitler orders Raeder to continue on his massive surface fleet. Hitler decides the O-class battlecruisers will be continued.

All other surface ships (besides extra Panzerschiffle) of Plan Z will continue to be built:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plan_Z

How will the Western Allies adapt to a different Kreigsmarine? Will the Lion class battleships continue to be built? How will naval warfare in the Pacific fare, particularly with less development of anti submarine warfare? How many ships of Plan Z could have been built? Will the war have ended sooner? Could the Western Allies landed earlier, therefore allowing them to take over more of Europe?

What do you think?

Definitely not for me. I’d almost give them a buck though just because I sympathize with their desire to make a cool game. Im working on a game of my own and just gathering the courage to do it is a feat in and of itself.

@Gargantua:

Whats a plan orange battle?

Plan Orange was a U.S plan to defeat the Japanese in a large Jutland type battle in between the war years.

@CWO:

@Hobbes:

@RedArmySoldier:

So it’s either ‘join together vs Russkieland’, or ‘fall together’.

Isn’t this what happened in real life?

Not really. In the last days of the war in Europe, the Nazis entertained all kinds of fantasies that the Anglo-Americans would come to their senses and would team up with them to fight the barbarous Soviet hordes, but it never happened.  The Soviet/Anglo-American alliance held together until the surrender of Germany, and indeed until the surrender of Japan: Stalin fulfilled his prior commitment to go to war against Japan three months after Germany surrendered (the time which had been allocated for him to shift some of his forces from Europe to the Far East).  Germany surrendered on May 7, and the USSR invaded Manchuria almost exactly on schedule on August 9.  In Europe, the Soviet, American and British armies all settled into the occupation zones which had been defined ahead of time for each power.  The predefined occupation zones were even respected where the fighting had taken the Americans into areas assigned to the Russians (such as Leipzig) and the Russians into areas assigned to the Anglo-Americans (such as parts of Austria, and of course the western half of Berlin).

Yeah, but afterwards the West set up the ‘denazification’ because they needed the former Nazis to run West Germany, while taking a blind eye to both the fascist regimes of Portugal and Spain since they were anti-communist as well, and had no problems in supporting dictatorships everywhere to prevent the communists from taking power.

@morrel:

russia didn’t border Czechoslovakia so direct support would have been through air power or invasion of someone else most likely         This was prior to the winter war with finland    I wonder how effective russian help would have been?

Russia didn’t border Spain either, but that didn’t stop them from sending a lot of tanks and planes to support the Republicans. But as in Finland, the russian help was not very effective. The russian “political officers” spent more time in purging western commies that had joined the International Brigade, than to fight the fascists. And unlike the Germans, the russian officers never learned any lesson in Spain.

The problem now adays is that people just don’t have the stomach for war like they used to.

The rule used to be, pre-1800, that either a city under attack surrendered and chose to raise the flag of the aggressor,  thereby not being seiged, raped, and pilliaged.

Or,

The city resisted, and you seiged it, raped, pilliaged, occupied, and raised your flag thier.

Lastly, whilst most empires expanded the rule aslo was if you wanted the land for yourself, you came in, killed everyone who had a claim to the territory, and took it as your own.

In modern terms however, we invade countires, briefly change their governments, piss everyone off who lives there, pay to rebuild their infrastructure, and then given the country back to the people we’ve made angry - after we’ve trained them to defend themselves.

And it is a big difference if those German ships are new (build in 1939, or something), because a lot of British ships were older then that.

OK now that someone is not grapping my attention thanks for the kind thank yous. Me doing this kind thing from time to time keeps my ex alive.  :wink: Sir Basil was 22 when Plan 1919 was concieved. He wasn’t yet the military theorist he would become. Though as brilliant as Hart was he was well on his way. Too bad the Brits didn’t work more with him when they put him in charge of mechanizing their Army in 1937.

Another thing most people don’t know about the development of blitzkrieg is the impact Napoleon had. He didn’t have tanks so his concentration of force can in the form of artillery. Instead of shooting at the entire line like everyone else did Bonaparte massed his barrage on one point. When the men there crumbled an attack aimed at that point would begin. Punch through, roll up the lines, head to the tent for a stiff drink. This basic tactic was studied by the men who made blitzkrieg a household word around the world.