Most decisive battle of ww2?

[Dave85]

I know this has been done to death, but I was checking it out on other sites and the one I would pick often does not even feature in the top 10.

The most common answer is Stalingrad (of course the war in the west was just a sideshow and had no real effect on the outcome)

I dont agree, I think by the end of '42 the war was, one way or another, lost by the germans. Had the russians lost stalingrad they would, by no means have been anywhere near out of the war. With the combined industrial and military might of the British empire and the United states there was no way germany would be able to force a defeat on the western allies without nuclear weapons, regardless of what happened in russia.

My choice would be the battle of Britian. It was a close call and it was Britains last chance to stay in the war. Britain (and empire) being the only country that actually wanted war with Germany by this point, once knocked out, Germany would have been able to leave western europe virtually undefended and put her whole effort against the unsupported soviet union.

What do you guys think?

[Chainsaw]

I would say Pearl Harbour. Sure even before PH the US supplied UK with plenty of support, but without the US armys GIs the Normandy landing could never have taken place anyhow considering UKs extrem lack of personel by that stage of the war.

[sburke]

My choice would be the battle of Britian. It was a close call and it was Britains last chance to stay in the war. Britain (and empire) being the only country that actually wanted war with Germany by this point, once knocked out, Germany would have been able to leave western europe virtually undefended and put her whole effort against the unsupported soviet union.

What do you guys think?

While the Battle of Britain had a huge morale impact and hashed a bit of the luftwaffe, I am not sure it's loss would have meant Sealion necessarily being a success. Considering what it took to launch Normandy, I can't see Germany in 1940 pulling it off.

[Rokko]

I sometimes wonder what would've happend had the British not pulled out of Dunkirk and had the BEF went into captivity. Could Britain have fought on after such a loss?

[YankeeDog]

Are you looking for the most decisive or the most important? Two very different questions...

At any rate, regardless I would definitely rate the Battle of the Atlantic over the Battle of Britain (though the two are inevitably related, somewhat). Another one of Hitler's colossal strategic failures was his failure to understand that actually invading and subjugating Britain was completely unnecessary to his geopolitical objectives -- cutting her off from her colonies and starving her into submission would have been easier and would have accomplished everything he needed to do. In fact, a blockade leading to peace on Germany's terms would have in many ways been better for Germany than outright invasion and subjugation of the British Isles, as it would have been a very difficult territory to occupy and control.

At least initially, Hitler was slow to recognize the importance of the battle for the control of the North Atlantic, and as a result the Germans didn't put enough resources into this fight early on. Even so, they nearly succeeded in strangling Britain into submission anyway. IMHO, from a strategic wargaming viewpoint, if the Germans had skipped the whole invasion idea except perhaps as a misdirection to keep the British guessing, and put the resources that went into planning and preparing an invasion into building U-Boats and enforcing a blockade, Britain would have been in a difficult position indeed.

[Erwin]

Re Sealion, Britain didn't have anything like the Atlantic Wall defenses that the Germans built over 4 years.

In the west, my vote would be BOB (or Atlantic battle - that's a good point). Pearl Harbor was more of a political reason for the US to immediately enter the war rather than a decisive battle.

Of course Normandy itself was decisive in keeping Europe free. Had it failed, it would have been at least a year before forces were again built up to try again. (And in that time the Soviets would have taken a lot more territory than they did by the end of WW2.)

But, in the east either Battle for Moscow where the Germans were first defeated on a large scale and the invincibility myth shattered, or Stalingrad are contenders. Did the Germans ever win anything big ever again after Stalingrad?

[SteveP]

Kursk for the Germans. After that, the Germans no longer had any practical ability to return to the strategic offensive, even though they had finally mobilized the entire economy for the war effort. That made it decisive.

Pearl Harbor for the Japanese. They had no chance to win a war against the economic might of the U.S. Having attacked Pearl Harbor they were going to lose.

The (belated) invasion of France for the Italians. After that, the Italians could only lose a war they had no good reason to join.

[Erwin]

While it is still the largest tank battle in "history" (dating back a whole 60 years) Kursk, like Wacht am Rhein simply depleted German resources and shortened the war. If they had won at Kursk (or Ardennes), they would only have bought some time. Wars are economic, and Germany had lost that one years before.

[Sergei]

I'd say the battle in which William Blazkowicz killed the Führer.

[Dave85]

YankeeDog you make a very good point and Im rather inclined to agree with you.

Regards Pearl harbour, as a battle, the only thing decisive about it was the failure to sink the US carriers which could have had a huge impact on the pacific war.

The japanese decision to bring America into the war was indeed hugely decisive, but that alone does not make pearl habour a decisive battle, as in, a different outcome to that battle would not neccesarily lead to a different outcome of the war.

[YankeeDog]

Re Sealion, Britain didn't have anything like the Atlantic Wall defenses that the Germans built over 4 years.

True, but the Germans didn't have anything like LCVPs, LSTs, DUKWs, a large fleet of battleships and cruisers to pound shore installations into submission, and a whole host of other gizmos the Allies developed to make the landings work. And Germany had never even attempted a large, opposed amphibious operation before. By 1944, the Allies had all of the above, and had learned many lessons running multiple large Amphibious operations in North Africa, Italy, and the Pacific.

Germany didn't even have enough smaller surface ships (destroyers, etc.) to properly screen the landing forces from small surface ship and submarine attack. U-Boats aren't so great for defending against enemy submarines and MTBs... If you posit that the RAF is completely eliminated by the time the invasion takes place (an unlikely proposition, I think -- I think the RAF would probably still be able to put up at least some resistance), then perhaps the Luftwaffe can help keep British naval forces at bay, but there's only so much the German planes can do at once. Given the general lack of German heavy naval guns, the German bombers are going to have to be the primary heavy support against shore installations in the first few days of the landings. And in any event air power isn't very useful at all against small, fast surface ships and submarines at night and/or during low cloud cover.

Heck, the Germans were planning on shipping a large number of their panzers across the English Channel in requisitioned unpowered civilian river barges pulled by tugboats. How well do you think that would have gone? Honestly, given the water transport they were planning to use, I think they would have been lucky to just get most of their heavy equipment across the channel the face of just the currents and weather, let alone what would have happened if a few MTBs broke through the screening forces and actually started shooting at the tugboats...

Any way you look at it, I think Sea Lion was a pipe dream. The more level heads in the German High Command knew it, too.

EDIT to add: And don't forget the French Resistance. In Normandy, the Germans were unpopular occupiers in a foreign land, and the Allies got all sorts of help from the French Resistance. You can be sure the Germans would have gotten no such help in Southern Britain...

[Yeknodathon]

They'd have no chance against chavs and hoodies.

[Karabekian]

The most common answer is Stalingrad (of course the war in the west was just a sideshow and had no real effect on the outcome)

What do you guys think?

I would never ever disregard the importance of Stalingrad. The sheer magnitude of its psychological impact on the Germans, as well as the Soviets, was immensive, and lasted long after the war.

While its stategic importance was the control of the Caucasus, as the battle went on it became one of the culminations of WW2 - A total war of ideology.

Without the war in the east, and the defeat at Stalingad - Overlord would not have existed. You could argue that Overlord aided in the victory at Stalingrad - the threat of the western Allies tied Germany to a two front war, even without an invasion. However, Overlord was hardly decisive on its own.

Someone mentioned the Kursk and Ardennes offensives as a waste of resources. It is easy to say today. For the Germans it was an opportunity, even if a small and unlikely one, to make a change in the situation. Not to mention the mentality of the German officer of the time - Attack is the best defence, no matter the risk.

It would be intresting to estimate the most decisive battle for its impact until after the war. Like you mentioned, the involvment of the Western Allies led to a divided Europe, rather than a Soviet Europe.

[Sailor Malan2]

Slightly off the wall, but I think the most decisive 'battle' of the war was that of the code makers vs the code breakers, and other spying. The Allies won that one decisively. Dont believe me? Correlate shipping losses in the North Atlantic with the delay Bletchley Park had on the Naval Enigma. Apart from the occasional oddity like the 1942 happy time off the US East Coast, the Uboat way only went Germany's way when the Naval codes were intact. Conversely, look at Russian vs German intel on the Eastern front. The Russians masked Bagration completely, leaving the Germans expecting the 1944 summer offensive on a similar axis to 1943. They read Kursk completely (admittedly Russian intel was rather more human based than code, but close enough!)

The move of the Siberian divisions west in late 1941 based on Stalin's man in Tokyo was fairly key. Conversely the XX committee, and the complete failure of German spying in UK was pretty pronounced, enabling the fake US 1AG in Kent deception. The few failures (e.g. Bulge) were not huge. You could argue that breaking the RN code No3 (convoys and escorts) for much of the early war was good, but didnt last and was not enough to undo the Enigma successes, and the wider teleprinter code successes.

I think if you want to highlight a single 'battle' as having the largest likelihood to reverse the result, this is it...

[Kronolog]

Did the Germans ever win anything big ever again after Stalingrad?

The third battle of Kharkov.

[SteveP]

YankeeDog you make a very good point and Im rather inclined to agree with you.

Regards Pearl harbour, as a battle, the only thing decisive about it was the failure to sink the US carriers which could have had a huge impact on the pacific war.

The japanese decision to bring America into the war was indeed hugely decisive, but that alone does not make pearl habour a decisive battle, as in, a different outcome to that battle would not neccesarily lead to a different outcome of the war.

My choices were based on the assumption that the decision to engage in a battle at all is part of what could make a battle decisive to a war. The Japanese might very well have accomplished their war aims (access to raw materials and dominance of East Asia) without attacking Pearl Harbor. The decision to do that made the specific results at Pearl Harbor immaterial. The US could have lost the carriers. Could have lost Hawaii. Could have been fighting the Japanese on the coast of California. It wouldn't have mattered in the long run. IMHO, there simply isn't any other battle that occurred in the war with Japan that could be considered decisive in that way.

Kursk occurred at about the same time that Germany finally mobilized their economy for war (in reaction to Stalingrad). Had the Germans somehow broken the Kursk salient and driven the Russians into retreat, it is difficult to predict how the rest of the war in Europe might have played out. By losing that battle so badly, they made the final result certain, though not the time it would take.

[dan/california]

Einstein leaving for the U.S. turned out to matter quite a bit.

But with seventy years of hindsight almost everything about the war in Western Europe mattered more for how it shaped the post war peace than anything else. Nothing short of dozens of atomic bombs was going to turn it for Hitler after he decided to attack Russia. A German success as Kursk would have slowed the Soviet entry into Eastern Europe, maybe enough to spare the Czechs, but probably not the Poles from Russian occupation. If D Day had failed badly the Russians might have rolled all the way to the Rhine, or even Paris, that would have MATTERED.

If both had happened then the even more complete exhaustion of Europe by the time the Nazis went down in say 1947 could have left the post war world considerably poorer for a generation or more. As it was the Russians never REALLY recovered from the first half of the twentieth century.

[GhostRider3/3]

I sometimes wonder what would've happend had the British not pulled out of Dunkirk and had the BEF went into captivity. Could Britain have fought on after such a loss?

I agree with this. Had the BEF and othere forces been captured, and dunkirk failed I dont beleive the Commonwealth forces in Egypt would have withstood any axis attacks. the UK would have maintained a strong home defense with its Navy and Royal Airforce, but it would have made Italy possibly dominant in the south with possibly little help from Germany.

Also I think the biggest mistake was the encirclement around I beleive Kiev in 1941. Germany should have pressed on to Moscow without delay. this would have cut off Leningrad, the major rail Moscow hub station, and industrial works.

Having taken Moscow, I beleive Finland would have been more aggressive and supportive, and quit possibly the Turks may have gotten involvled seeing the Russian Capital taken... thats alot of what if's, but I do believe Britian and France would have sued for peace had the BEF been completely anhialated or taken as POW's, France fell I think a week later, after Dunkirk...

The US seeing the capitulation of UK and France would have done what???? not sure, they were still isolationists sorta until the actual Pear harbor attack, but new they would be drawn into conflict sooner then later, most likely with Japan.

[c3k]

June, 1944...on the Eastern Front. Bagration, 22nd of June, nice anniversary surprise for the Germans, tore apart any pretensions the Germans may've had about "winning" a defensive war. That battle signified "Game Over".

[Vark]

I think Kursks importance was just as much psychological as well as operational. For the first time the "summer Germans" had been stopped, then rolled back decisively, without any backhand blows. After 43 the Russians knew they would beat the Germans, not just hoped they could, and they never let up the operational momentum. Whereas victory in the Winter of 42 led to a massive German offensive in summer 43, Kursk led to a massive offensive in 44, but this time it was a Soviet one.

Although such topics are interesting to grogulate on I really do not think any battle can be taken in isolation and then proclaimed the most decisive. If I had to choose it would be one of the early border battles in 41, for example Bialystok-Minsk, why decisive? Because it meant by invading Russia, Hitler had just doomed Germany to eventual defeat

[black_prince]

Interesting thread. Apparently, the Russians asked von Runstedt the same question after the war. They were expecting him to answer 'Stalingrad'. When he answered with 'the Battle of Britain' the Russians went off in a huff.

[chas_in_mlb]

The Battle Of The Atlantic. Had the Allies lost that one, there wouldn't be an Overlord. Even Churchill admitted in his memoirs that it was the only thing that frightened him during the entire war (the U Boats). The USN succeeded where the KM failed and see what happened to the Japanese war effort.

It's also highly debatable the Battle Of Britain was decisive- it clearly was not. It's importance is almost purely political/symbolic. Sealion was a joke of a plan and there was profound relief on the part of the German high command when it was called off. If the Germans had tried crossing the channel in Rhine river barges in late Sept early Oct. they would have had their a$$es handed to them in a high hat. The BoB wasn't a cliche "near run thing" as you may have read in the many, many heroic narratives (that comprise quite a cottage industry in the UK) and a Luftwaffe victory would have been a Phyrric victory at best.

'Nuff said.

Interesting thread. Apparently, the Russians asked von Runstedt the same question after the war. They were expecting him to answer 'Stalingrad'. When he answered with 'the Battle of Britain' the Russians went off in a huff.

Gerd probably hated the Russians like all the German generals did and gave that answer to piss them off. It's exactly what I would have said to them, too if I was in his shoes.

[black_prince]

Gerd probably hated the Russians like all the German generals did and gave that answer to piss them off

Yep, agreed.

[Sergei]

Altogether this is a somewhat pointless exercise. Germans had no means to win the battle for Britain, for example. Cancelling the attack on Pearl Harbor would not have stopped USA from entering the war, either, nor would it have prevented the eventual Japanese decline.

Why is battle for France any less decisive, considering that an Allied victory there in 1940 would have shortened the war by years? Or if Red Army had not gotten through the Mannerheim line within the historical timetable, there is a chance of the Allies sending an expeditionary force against Soviet Union in March 1940 through Norway and Sweden. That would have completely changed the diplomatic situation. How does one compare the decisiveness of these battles, considering all of their potential fallout?

In the end, the most decisive battle was fought at the home front, and the Allied factory workers won that one.

[c3k]

Enigma...(padded)