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What Ifs? of SC


Liam

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Okay, well we have to look at the game as it is. A game though I think there are a couple aspects here or there that must be polished up! First of all, you could never station Allied troops in the USSR or aircraft. They wouldn't allow it, the Dolittle raid proved that when confiscated one of bombers it was a test.

Secondly you wouldn't be able to repair Russian ships in Allied ports, they'd probably put a ceil on the leaks but that's about it or grant the sailors asylum.

The Russian Navy is too powerful, in comparison with the Kriegsmarine that would have pounced it in 2 seconds.

Similarly much of what gave Hitler his initial power was the quick overrunning of small countries and the failure of bigger countries to intervene so the percentages for neutrals are perfect. Though if you ever invaded Holland/Belgium, you would pay Dearly! The British would stay to their Allies the French but the Russians would have become frightened to Hell with the Allies and possibly sided with Hitler in at least a Non-Aggression pact. For who knows how long.

You also have another huge thing to take into consideration, German subs weren't touched by the Royal Navy. Though in this game the Royal Navy is too powerful and the RAF is too weak. How about creating more subs<more realistic> like say 5 or 6 and making their attack upon surface ships weak as they were historically. Then tie up much of the Allied fleet with escort duty as it was historically.

Also Germany never gets bombed in this game, though by the time the US enters the war and in 1942 we were bombing them to hell and so were the British before then. Night time Lancaster and daytime b-17s but in this game you don't get to touch that aspect. Perhaps a income balance can be found in giving the Brits-Americans long distance Strato-bombers...

Also another GREAT thing before I go, if you land an army anywhere, amphibious it's not a marine unit. It can't attack right off. You should force that unit to have to wait unless it is an amphibious unit<or pay extra for outfitting it> Thus cutting down Italians washing up ashore in America all the sudden.

The Americans have to fight the Japanese, if the Axis player cannot by a certian point destroy the Allies she should get a bonus for forces be redeployed and that would be the perfect ending balance to make the game long. If you want that aspect included. As well as the United Kingdom, though a smaller detachment.

Please include all desires and good ideas I'd love to hear them!

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Liam

There are two earlier forums that delve into these very issues at very great legnth. Hubert -- The North Atlantic and North America . Modesty prevents me from mentioning the originator of both but I can tell you with great assurance that he agrees with you 100%. smile.gif

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Also Germany never gets bombed in this game, though by the time the US enters the war and in 1942 we were bombing them to hell and so were the British before then. Night time Lancaster and daytime b-17s but in this game you don't get to touch that aspect. Perhaps a income balance can be found in giving the Brits-Americans long distance Strato-bombers...
The bombing was really unimportant in WW2. It killed a lots of civilians but it did not decide the war. Either the V-2 or the British/American bombers decided the war. Germany reached it greatest production capacity and it greatest research progress near the end of the war! Do not forget a few months before end of the war Germany build the first manned rocket plane (Natter). The problem was the lack of soldiers especially skilled soldiers because too many were killed especially in Russia. So I think the game is well balanced and historcal in this point. You can kill some resources/people with strategic bombing in this game but it will far from deciding it with strategic bombing.

I personally think it was a terrible mistake to start civilian bombing in WW1. In WW2 so many millions died because of this bombing and it did not shortened the war! Germany was defended until Russian troops arrived at the "Reichskanzlei" of Adolf Hitler. The Reichskanzlei was defended by French, Danish and other foreign soldiers.

SO I think in this point the game is very historic and well balanced.

Sven

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Sven1969

I disagree. The Allied strategic bombing was effective in several ways. I mentioned it elsewhere in other posts but here it is:

1)it forced Germany to divert significant air assets from Russia to defend the Fatherland...basically from 1943 onwards, Russia had pretty much complete tactical air superiority over the entire battlefield. A point often overlooked by the Russians when they complain about Allied lack of help.

2)The Allied bombings of the Rumanian Ploesti oil fields and other vital oil targets in the Balkans forced Germany into hoarding their gas supplies and put a limit on their air and land operations.

3)basic air attrition by the US/UK strategic bombing runs gradually reduced Germany's pilot quality down to nothing by war's end. Sure they had pilots but like the Japanese...probably not very good quality. Germany was building planes made out of wood in 1945!!!

basically strategic bombing has to be made more effective in SC.

Right now as it is, the game doesn't make it so.

[ January 10, 2003, 06:07 AM: Message edited by: Genghis ]

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Originally posted by Liam:

First of all, you could never station Allied troops in the USSR or aircraft. They wouldn't allow it, the Dolittle raid proved that when confiscated one of bombers it was a test.

The Russian Navy is too powerful, in comparison with the Kriegsmarine that would have pounced it in 2 seconds.

Actually that is not entirely true. The USAAF/Soviets co-operated an air base at Poltava in the Ukraine. This allowed the USAAF bombers to make long runs into europe that they normally couldn't make. They'd fly from Britian hit something in East Prussia or Poland and fly to Poltava since they couldn't make the 2 way trip.

The germans bombed the base and it got ugly.

The soviets wouldn't let Doolittle land because they were neutral with the Japanese and didn't want to provoke them. The same excuse the soviets used for intering 3 TU-4's... Opps I mean B-29's. They were at war with germany and had no problem there.

Also do not discount the soviet navy. The three cruisers in the game are actually WWI vintage pre-dreadnaughts. The soviets had quiet a few cruisers and destroyers some of a very modern design. They also had a decent submarine force.

Anyone interested in reading some of the exploits of the Russian subs, and not just the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustlaff, a book called Russia's Heroes has some good sub stories in it.

I think the red navy is just fine. The german navy is a little small, but too many units clutter the seas.

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Here is some info on Poltava for those that are interested in this sort of info:

June 2nd, 1944: First shuttle raid, Operation Frantic, by 130 B-17s of the US 15th Air Force based at Tripoli that attack railyards at Debrecen< Hungary, and then fly on to Soviet airfields at Poltava in the Ukraine.

June 22nd, 1944: The Luftwaffe launches a surprise night raid, 60 aircraft, on the US 8th Air Force's shuttle base at Poltava in the Ukraine, destroying 44 B-17s and 500,000 gals. of fuel.

So it's not entirely out of the possibility to have USAAF units in Russia.

Ground troops, the soviets really had no use for them.

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Bites my tongue! Yeah, the Americans did to a small extent use Russian airfields.

And the Russian Navy I heard rumours but wouldn't they be sub hunting mostly? Protecting LendLease from American and Great Britian.

However Allied Strategic Bombing having no effect? 597 RAF bombers bomb German Rocket Launching Site Peenemünde:The production of the V1 Flying Bomb began in Germany in 1942, but the actual launch was delayed until 1944 because of successful Allied bombing of bomb sites.

<much more IMPORTANT>

Operation 'Double Strike': First U.S. daylight air raid, with 229 B17's (36 shot down), on Schweinfurt (and Regensburg) in Germany, 320 km; the Americans attempting a daylight raid without fighter escort.

Schweinfurt was the location of huge ball-bearing factories that supplied most of the ball-bearings for the entire German military. The second raid on 14 Octobre, 291 B17's now with 60 loses.

They had to goto the Swiss/Swedes for Ballbearings which we had to threaten them about. Now you could say that had no effect on the Germans? All the bombing raids combined did hellish damage. Hamburg was scorched and it took them awhile to rebuild bridges/industry/obtain resources, plan air defense<!>, rebuild production capacity. All that and in this game we cannot bomb ploesti or Hamburg or any of these targets because the bombers aren't truely strategic their more tactical bombers in this game. We never wasted much time pounding France, we didn't want to be too unpopular there. That's about the max of a bombing raid in this game. Germans strip out all the fighters that had to be dedicated to protecting their air space and without those if the difference was 10% or 20% on the Eastern front during at the beginning battle of Kursk:

Relative strength on the eve of the battle.

Germany Russia

Soldiers: 900.000 1.337.000

Tanks/mech.guns: 2.700 3.306

Planes: 2.500 2.650

Guns/mortar/rackets: 10.000 20.220

It's those percentages that often win & lose wars. How many more AC could've been brought in from German AirDefense, how many Anti-Aircraft guns could've been converted. As mentioned in this post and Hubert's...

ALSO the bigggggest thing, anyone who says terror bombing doesn't work? What about Nagasaki and Hiroshima? That was all they were really, and no worse than the other raids done by thousands of bombs rather than a couple. My own GrandMother who worked in a shoe factory in East Anglia Norwich recounted seeing the eyes of a German pilot as he came down to strafe the workers comming from rubber boot factory. If you're going to have strategic bombing, it was at least effective as subs were vs England! If not more so for I don't think the Russians were shooting down as many German pilots as American and British were early on in the war!

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Liam

First, Thanks for coming up with this forum, it's fantastic; I didn't realize how much at first, but it's really turned into something.

The whole argument of whether the strategic bombing of Europe was a success has been going on for a long time and will probably go on for ages to come without everyone being convinced one way or the other.

I agree pretty much with Genghis earlier remarks about it being a success.

When a country has to scatter it's industry and constantly repair it's transportation network, falling further and further behind as it does so, then the cause of all that mayhem has to be considered a success.

Weighed against that claim is the huge number of men consumed in crews and support personnel, the majority of whom needing to be extensively trained, along with the seemingly disproportionate amount of resources and industry tied up in producing planes and bombs and everything else.

Against that I'd pit the huge number of Germans and subject people tied up in the anti-aircraft defense of numerous cities (Albert Speer's figure was 1,000,000!) and nonproductive repair and rebuilding work (no estimate that I know of but it had to be huge) plus the fact that those very potent bombs are falling on your enemy's facilities instead of his being dropped on yours, then, again, my nod would have to be to the bombing side.

As for strategic bombing in the game it's difficult to judge as there's probably nobody who does it to the extent it was done historically. I don't but I often wonder if it isn't a good tactic despite it's unpopularity.

Also, it keeps bringing me back to a decades old memory of a sunny summer day and looking around to see B-52s parked in every direction, literally hundreds of them (some firstline, others for back-up and the oldest ones being canablized for parts) and it made me wonder how it must have felt being in Berlin or London or Hamburg and looking up to see a similar horde of those planes ancestors droning ever closer.

I would imagine it's a reasonably demoralizing process despite what the propagandists claim. Not much joy standing in a pile of burnt out rubble that used to be your home and saying, "Well, they didn't get my daughter's bicycle!"

Of course we've made much more progress now and you probably no longer have the chance to look up and actually see the bomber (only one, no more impressive looking squadrons overhead) that's about to kill you and everyone else so much more efficiently. smile.gif

The Russian/American material being tossed around by you and Konstantin about U. S. bombers and Russian bases is particularly great stuff.

I remember when the Russians suddenly released some American airmen who'd made emergency landings in the USSR during the war. What made it so odd was the war was over something like forty years and everyone thought those men were long dead! Life is full of pleasant surprises.

[ January 11, 2003, 06:41 AM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

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I definitely trust Speer on figures though I think he reinvented himself at the Nuremburg Trials!

Manpower etc .... Exactly, plus the toll paid by the Luftwaffe in irreplacable pilots lost against swarms of bombers and later against the long range escorts that Adolph Galland called the best fighters he'd ever seen.

[ January 11, 2003, 05:56 PM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

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Yes,l I really think that even if the serious damage of German industry was not as bad as our propoganda made it out to be. We tried strategic bombing it was a huge goal of pre-war military thinkers. So naturally we would have developed very quickly and by WW2. USA would possess a B-17 flying fortress during her entry into the war with a norden bombsight that was at the time cutting edge!

The Germans used a radar type device that had intersecting lines from Norway and France to find their bombing locations. During the Battle of Britian had the Germans bombed extensively. They didn't have worthwhile escorts in the BF 109 so that hurt them. The Brits instilled fear in the Luftwaffe bomber pilots and divebomber pilots. Even for the Germans, they had a fairly extensive bomber command by the B.O.B. which is represented in this game. The people of London had suffered greatly! Both in lives and loss of homes. My GrandFather will tell you a story of running in to get his wallet out a bombed building in Norfolk a minor Industrial city. <recently deceased>

Bombing industry and killing thousands and even perhaps millions of citizens was thought to be capable of bringing the War home, past the front lines. It was thought it would instill fear in the civilian populace and they would lose their will to fight. It didn't work, apparently. Although many countermeasures, of great expense were used to stop the bombing, rockets... Whole strategies were changed on the battlefield. If the Germans would have had none air defense whatsoever, what would have been the outcome of the many air raids?

This needs to be taken a serious look at or perhaps we need to remove those subs in the N.Sea and replace them with a cruiser cause they are unimportant to the outcome of the game though semi-historical just being there.

Now bombs are so effective in ending wars, it's rare we even use ground power if we don't have to.

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Liam

Fine post, agreed all around and sorry about your grandfather's recent death. Bombing of civilians doesn't seem to break a nation's will to fight, but I don't think it does much to help things either.

I don't know if any of this can or should be adjusted involving game pieces. The German navy in terms of capital ships generally consisted of a handfull of units during the course of the war:

three pre-war "pocket battleships" of which the Graf Spee was sunk in '39, two undergunned battlecruisers of which Scharnhorst was sunk in 43, two large battleships -- Bismarck sunk in May of '41 and Tirpitz sunk in late 44, and four heavy cruisers (8" guns) one of which was severely damaged in the Norway operation and never fully repaired. Add to that the U-boats, various light cruisers, destroyers, torpedo boats, a few hopelessly obsolete BBs and the unfinished hulls of two aircraft carriers. All in all not much compared to either the British or U. S. navies.

As I suggest in one of the other forums, I've tried a scenario of replacing the 3 starting U-boats with either two carriers (Peter Strasser and Graf Zeppelin) or two Battleships (Bismark and Tirpitz) or one of each -- like having dinner in a Chinese Restauant and using the group combination option. The whole German Fleet, including the two added capital ships, starts in the Baltic. It's still too weak to chanllenge the Brits but I find the two capital ships much more useful than the three subs. Against a human the two Atlantic subs only play a brief game of tag then go under the waves for ever, so taking this unit exchange option against a human would pretty much be a no brainer. At least they're safe at home and available for later use.

[ January 11, 2003, 06:22 PM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

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Please comment on the following ditty I found in the book "Hitler's War Machine" by Dr. William Carr:

"Thus the Czech crisis of 1938 gave the impetus to his decision to permit the Navy's famous Plan 'Z'........ No one could doubt that, with a future fleet of 13 battleships, 4 aircraft carriers, 33 cruisers, and 250 U-Boats, all of modern design, Germany would be in a position by 1944 to challenge Britain, and possibly the United States, for mastery of the seas."

If my math is correct (1944-1938=6 years) then had the German's initiated Plan Z in say 1934, then the above force could have been available by 1940. That would be an interesting variant!

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Jim

Interesting. And those battleships would have been of the unbuilt Hindenburg Class, 50,000 tons with 16" main guns.

The problem was in building that fleet and an army and a navy to match. Each Battleship required resources comparable to forming a new panzer division!

What I think was going through Hitler's damaged brain in late 1939 was this; grab Poland, Denmark and Norway, accept the inevitable British and French peace propossal, then decide where to direct the newly expanded Reich industry afterwards.

Britain and France screwed him up by not offering peace and after crushing France and conquering the Low Countries he was caught up in his own meglomania and having England continue to refuse a peace treaty he was caught up in his own half resolved schemes.

Even had he retuned France and kept the other conquests I think the stage would have been set for the building of a modified Z-Plan navy. With France occupied and England at peace with him he probably could have gone full tilt into his naval expansion program. Except there was still Russia which he thought would cave in and he wouldn't have been able to help himself from invading it. In which case the navy would have taken a back seat.

There are excellent postings by dgaad about Hitler's planned Blue Ocean Navy in the old fourm North America originated a few months back by, let me see, I forget the guy's name. smile.gif

[ January 11, 2003, 08:12 PM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

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Germany was a land based power. She didn't need a navy, unless she was in a war with Britian and France. Navies take a long time to produce. The WW1 navies which were far more evenly matched never really decisively decided the War. So in my opinion as air power had taken over, it would be more cost effective to put the money in Submarines, jets, and more advanced land weapondry as Stalin was Hitler's greatest Enemy. Noone killed as many Germans as Russia did or offered them as many defeats...

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Liam

Agreed. Germany's emphasis would have needed to become global before she began building that sort of fleet. The figures Jim posted are correct; Hitler did bandy them about with Admiral Raeder just before war's start, but building such a fleet would have required resources and manpower far beyond Germany's 1939 capabilities.

I think it's safe to say Germany would have needed to win the war in Europe first, keeping occupied France and owning all of European Russia before beginning construction of such an enormous fleet.

There were also drawing board plans for 85,000 ton battle ships with 20" main guns. The largest BBs ever built, Japan's Yamato and Musashi were 65,000 tons with nine 18" guns main armament, so warships of that size were possible. Whether they'd ever actually have been built is open to debate.

Photo of Japanese Super Battleship Yamato

[ January 11, 2003, 08:31 PM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

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Liam

I think the point you bring up about Germany not needing a navy unless they were going to war with Britain and France is absolutely correct. Hitler stated early on in his infamous blueprint mein kampf (not worthy of either capitals or quotation marks) that his ambitions lay to the East for Lebenstraum and his hatred of the Bolsheviks was intense. Therefore a possible variant could be a different German Government with policies more conciliatory to the west. I truly believe Hitler would have avoided war initially with the west if he could get his hands on Poland and a common border with the Soviets.

[ January 11, 2003, 08:41 PM: Message edited by: Jim Boggs ]

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Yes! A Navy is expensive and a huge battleship can be cumbersome if you hit it with a few well placed divebombers. WW2 was the transition from big gun boats to Aerial Sea control. I.E. Midway

I would have built a huge # of subs. I would have sunk anything and everything that tried to come in and out of Britian. Remeber what Admiral Derntiz said, paraphrazing,"with enough subs I could've ended the war with britian in 1940." I would have so utterly decimated their airforce and economy before I turned East that she would be no threat any longer. Either that or Roll East like a Golden Horde...

She should've waited for War, the Allies weren't mobilizing at all... 1941 probably would've been a better year. With full promise of jet technology within the next year or two to completely decimate all Allied Airpower...

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Liam & Jim

Interesting material. I think Hitler wanted to conquer Western Europe too but he was more interested in sprawling eastwards first.

About the time of the Munich Conference Britain and France were conducting numerous secret meetings with Germany exploring the possibility of returning her former African colonies in exchange for an end to all German claims on European territory. In effect, Hitler wanted both. It's difficult to say what he would have been satisfied with.

Much of the thoughts expressed in [excuse me for using capitals, I do so out of respect for the language and not his horrible book] Mein Kampf are not Hitler's own thoughts but those of Rudolf Hess, who in turn got them a Professor Houshoffer (I think that's his name, I hesitate to say Housefinder as it sounds like a Real Estate brokerage). The good professor espoused a psuedo-science known as Geo-Politics that was very popular at the turn of the 19th/20th centuries. Houshoffer was the great evangelist of Germany's eastern destiny. He also like South America, especially Brazil. Eventually he fell from grace with the nazis and was imprisoned. He survived the war though his equally famous son was executed by the SS in 1945 as the Russians were taking Berlin.

[ January 11, 2003, 08:57 PM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

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John:

I was sitting in a Doctor's Office recently reading a book about German Nationalism. They tried to Wars and failed. Then watched how France & Britian had beaten them with economics and followed suite. They're very economically powerful now. Far more than her former enemies save the USA... So did she lose ultimately or is she just decided that the only way to win is join?

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Jim

Good point about the defeated nations becoming so much more powerful economically after the war. Only proves that wars really settle nothing.

Liam

Exactly. The upper Nazis sure looked Nordic -- Hitler, Himmler, Goebels, Goering, Borman. The only one with Aarian features was Reinhard

Heydrich!

Photo of SS Butcher and author of the Final Solution (Wansee Conference 1942, Reinhard Heydrich.

[ January 11, 2003, 09:05 PM: Message edited by: JerseyJohn ]

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