Navy 'stopped invasion by Nazis'

[steviejay]

Navy 'stopped invasion by Nazis'

The Royal Navy, and not the Royal Air Force, saved Britain from Nazi invasion, according to a study.
Writing in the latest issue of History Today, Brian James argued too much importance was given to the Battle of Britain in fighting the German threat.

He said it was Adolf Hitler's fear of British naval strength that prevented a Second World War invasion.

However, other historians argued this trivialised the role of RAF fighters in repelling the Germans.

Traditionally, a small band of RAF fighter pilots have been acknowledged with keeping Hitler's forces at bay.

It was their heroic actions that stirred Sir Winston Churchill to say: "Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few."

Mr James interviewed military historians from the Joint Services Command Staff College, who said the standard version of events was "hogwash".

The college's Dr Andrew Gordon said: "Like everyone I cheered like crazy at the film of the Battle of Britain, but it really is time to put away this enduring myth.

"To claim that Germany failed to invade in 1940 because of what was done by phenomenally brave and skilled young men of Fighter Command is hogwash.

"The Germans stayed away because while the Royal Navy existed they had not a hope in hell of capturing these islands."

Importance of air power

However, Tony Hirons, marketing director at the RAF Association, argued that control over the British skies would have been key to a German victory.

He said: "Facts don't lie, the heroics of the RAF, through the pilots of the Spitfire and Hurricane squadrons, took on and defeated the Luftwaffe invasion.

"If we had not managed to overcome the Luftwaffe, it would have cleared the skies, which would have led to a naval invasion and a land invasion.

"Whether the Army and navy would have been able to suppress that is open to conjecture.

"As far as history stands, it was the Battle of Britain that prevented subsequent invasions taking place."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/5281238.stm

What is your opinions on that? Yes? No? I'd have to agree with the guy, the Navy, despite the sub war, was still the Pimp Daddy in the North Sea/Channel area and any sea invasion would have resulted in a HUGE naval encounter, and it would have been old school as well, battleships and destroyers.

Can anyone fill me in on the naval capabilities of the German Luftwaffe? How well were they when it came to Torpedo bombers? Taking supreme arial superiority in mind, would they have been able to completely supress the might of the British Home Fleet? or should that be the whole British Navy because I'm under the belief that if an invasion was coming, everything would have been recalled to tackle it?

Who'd win? Assuming the Luftwaffe won the Battle of Britain, the worlds largest navy against the worlds largest airforce using WW2 tactics? Now a days it'd go without saying, but would the Luftwaffe have the ability to sink a large fleet given the oportunity? or would Britannia always rule the waves?

edit: just to say - My belief that the Navy was a main reason in why the Germans couldn't have invaded Britain does not mean I feel no less pride in the fly boys who defended Britain in the air war. I have the upmost respect for them all and they deserve all the honour attributed to them

 

[bathsheba666]

OK, they couldn't invade because of the navy.

But this would no longer be a problem if the RAF were taken out of the equation.

Remember Repulse and Prince of Wales in the Far East? This was what woke people up to air superiority and the demise of the battleships.

 

[steviejay]

yeah but those were JAPANESE torpedo bombers, my question was whether the Germans had the technology (or skill) to repeat such a performance. In all honest WE didn't even have that sort of skill, simply by looking at Swordfish, we got lucky with the Bismark, against a full blown fleet it might have been different

 

[pawpaw]

yeah but those were JAPANESE torpedo bombers, my question was whether the Germans had the technology (or skill) to repeat such a performance.

I believe the Royal navy got beat up good from German dive bombers during Crete?

 

[AdrianE]

"I believe the Royal navy got beat up good from German dive bombers during Crete?"

After slaughtering the naval invasion component.

 

[Verbose]

yeah but those were JAPANESE torpedo bombers, my question was whether the Germans had the technology (or skill) to repeat such a performance. In all honest WE didn't even have that sort of skill, simply by looking at Swordfish, we got lucky with the Bismark, against a full blown fleet it might have been different

I seem to remember one of these books coming out in comemoration of the BoB some years ago, which reprinted very interesting assesments of the Japanese military attaché to London (iirc, senior Japanese diplomat at least).

His view was that British and German pilots were all sub-par to their Japanese counterpart, but with the edge for the British over the Germans.

And iirc one reason the Repulse and Prince of Wales were sent to the Far East with no air cover was that the RN hadn't really been impressed with what the German torpedo bombers could do. It wasn't considered a major risk.
Surely the Japanese, Asians for God's sake!, wouldn't be able to do better than Germans now, would they?

These were the days when Singapore got bombed at night with all streetlights burning. Someone had decided a black-out was unnecessary as the Japanese slanty eyes meant that they didn't have night vision.

And Douglas MacArthur evacuated the Philipines convinced that the Japanese planes had all been flown by European mercenaries, for surely mere Asians couldn't be THAT good?

 

[Suppersalmon]

I once read a book about this and it turned out that the navey would not have been able to stop an invassion due to traveling distances and stuff but it would have arrived in time to be able to cut off the Germans Supplies therefore leaveing the Germans Trapped in the SE of England were the Army would be able to sort out the rest of the German Forces

 

[steviejay]

These were the days when Singapore got bombed at night with all streetlights burning. Someone had decided a black-out was unnecessary as the Japanese slanty eyes meant that they didn't have night vision.

That was actually taught at American air force training schools. Don't worry about the Japanese pilots, they can't see very well :shakeshead: I agree with the statement that the Japenese had the best pilots, they just didn't have enough....

 

[privatehudson]

I once read a book about this and it turned out that the navey would not have been able to stop an invassion due to traveling distances and stuff but it would have arrived in time to be able to cut off the Germans Supplies therefore leaveing the Germans Trapped in the SE of England were the Army would be able to sort out the rest of the German Forces

Related to this there was a wargame done sometime in the 1960s where they gathered many of the surviving generals who would have been involved in Sealion and tested out how such an invasion would have worked. Basically the Germans got ashore and pushed inland some distance before hitting a few defensive lines in Southern England. By the time they'd cleared their way past these the RN turned up and combining with the weather basically decimated the supply attempts, albeit at a heavy cost. The Germans were pushed back and then eventually forced to attempt a withdrawl but most of them were simply captured. I believe the RAF in this scenario had been pulled back into northern England. Overall I find that to be about a fair representation of what would have happened.

Personally I don't actually think Hitler took Sealion that seriously to begin with anyway so a discussion about who prevented sealion is a bit of a moot point to me. I'd say however that both arms had their role to play. Without air cover provided by the RAF the Germans may well have tried their luck. The RN and Army probably would have made the invasion fail but not stop it. Without the Navy though the RAF alone were not enough of a deterrent. To try and diminish the role of either in providing a deterrent is childish if you ask me.

 

[simonnomis]

Personally I don't actually think Hitler took Sealion that seriously to begin with anyway so a discussion about who prevented sealion is a bit of a moot point to me.

You raise the most important point of all. The Germans had never really considered invading the UK as a realistic option. Bear in mind that very few generals actually believed the invasion of France would be as successful as it was, so planning that far ahead would simply never have occured in any detail.

For Sealion to have ever been successful, it would have needed much more preparation and military equipment than was available. And control of the skies would still have been a vital part of that equation, certainly much more realistic than trying to catch up to the RN.

The fundamental problem with this scenario though is that German military production was already inadequate and they were being outproduced in many key areas by 1940 as the Brits geared up for total war. The best they could realistically have hoped for was a peace agreement, which would have seemed likely until Churchill scuppered it.

 

[brachy-pride]

Who had a better navy in ww2, japan or the UK?

 

[ParkCungHee]

A lot of "well duh" concepts in the article. No one doubts the importance of the Royal Navy, because it was the largest fleet in the world at the time and because of that, the British Royal Navy was never directly challenged by the Wehrmacht.
The other half of the article seems to be attacking a straw man. The problem is that if the RAF was defeated and the Luftwaffe had clear sky's the Royal Navy could do nothing but sit with their thumbs up their arse's while London burned, and invasion would not have been neccesary.

 

[Adler17]

IF the Germans had won the BoB, which was possible until Göring's order to change the targets, The Luftwaffe had clear skies over Britain. They would have attacked every British ship coming near to the invasion area. Mostly Dive bombers would have been used, as torpedo bomber were mostly used sea planes like the He 59 or the He 115. Only later in the war with the KG 26 and KG 77 equipped with torpedo carrying He 111 or Ju 88 land planes got a more important role in that kind of warfare. The Germans mostly slept in the first two years to use aerial torpedos. Only the planned Fi 159 and the Ju 87 T were considered in that role, but only because of being carrier planes.
However: IF the Luftwaffe controlled the skies an invasion would have happened. And considering the lack of heavy equipment in the UK, as most of it was left in France at Dunquerque, an invasion was difficult to repell. However the invasion would have been successful at least in the beginning as there would be no fighter to defend the British ships. Crete is a good example for what would happen.
So in the end, no, it wasn't the Royal Navy, but the Royal Air Force do prevent an invasion.

Adler

 

[steviejay]

I don't think anyone can argue with that Adler. Thanks to all for the input, especially to Hudson for the 'wargame' I never knew they did that

 

[Case]

It's silly to claim that any one of Britain's three services 'won' the Battle of Britain. It was a joint effort. The German goal was to defeat the RAF so that the Luftwaffe could make up for the weakness of the German Navy and the Army invasion force's lack of firepower during the initial phases of Operation Sealion. As a result, the Royal Navy's role was critical as the presence of this powerful force effectively check-mated German plans. The British Army's role was also important as the presence of a large field force in the UK (which wasn't equipped as badly as is often argued) meant that the German invasion force had to be so large that an invasion couldn't possibly be launched with any hope of success until the RAF and RN had been neutralised.

 

[Kan' Sharuminar]

Adler and Private Hudson have effectively summed it up very well.

Also, I'm not sure if this is the same wargame Hudson refered to, or a different one, but the results are the same: Invasion of Britain

 

[simonnomis]

Who had a better navy in ww2, japan or the UK?

The UK navy was considerably larger. However the Japanese did at least benefit from concentration of resources; unlike the UK whose navy was spread across the globe and US that had the Atlantic as well as Pacific theatre to contend with.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

The UK navy was considerably larger. However the Japanese did at least benefit from concentration of resources; unlike the UK whose navy was spread across the globe and US that had the Atlantic as well as Pacific theatre to contend with.

The Japs had rather large guns on their battleships, too, something on the order of nine 46 cm guns, and armor that could guard against equal-sizd shells. AFAIK, the Japs had much more naval air capability than the RN, too.

 

[pawpaw]

Japanese Fleet 1941..................British Fleet 1939
10 Battleships..........................15 Battleships
8 Carriers................................7 Carriers
38 Cruisers..............................66 Cruisers
108 Destroyers........................184 Destroyers
118 Submarines.......................60 Submarines

Majority of Japanese ships in 1941 were in service in 1939 so this is close to correct.

 

[privatehudson]

Crete is a good example for what would happen.

It certainly is on the one hand, the German seaborne invasion was either wiped out or driven back before the RN withdrew with heavy losses. You can bet that if the British isles were the target they'd be more inclined to hang around.

On the other hand Crete was a small island with a relatively isolated and small garrison making it possible to take without major German/Italian naval intervention. Britain would be nothing like that at all, a failure of the Luftwaffe or Kreigsmarine to protect the convoys there would result in severe problems for the Heer. You couldn't rescue Sealion by flying troops into airports captured by paratroopers.

And I believe that was the wargame, sorry for my innacurate report of it, I was going from memory of a TV programme I saw last year.