Hitler was an escalating shit to the edge all the time asshole. After he saw what a mewling little bitch Chamberlain was with the Munich Agreement he made the call that England and France wouldn't do anything for invading Poland. Which proved out when Hitler annexed what remained of Czechoslovakia without any kind of response from them. The Nazis figured the West Europeans didn't give a shit about central/ eastern Europe. Which became apparent to them with the signing of the Munich Agreement and the lack of political action after invading Czechoslovakia.

Boy this thread really took a hard turn into German fantasy derpland.

All WW2 threads do. Americans seem predisposed toward a fetish for the Nazi German military.

Better question, after Pearl Harbor, why didn't Hitler swear on his mother's grave, he had no intention whatsoever to go to war with America. Better yet, why did not Hitler declare war on Japan?

Once Japan decided against tying down Soviet forces in the East when the Germans were fully committed against the Soviets, Japan then was no asset to Germany compared to keeping America out of the war against Germany.

This would have tied Roosevelt's hands. How could FDR have asked for a declaration of war against Germany when Germany had just declared war against the attackers of Pearl Harbor?

One would think the LAST thing Hitler wanted was for America with it's vast resources and industrial capacity, to enter the European war on Great Britain and the Soviet Union's side.

I blame the History Channel

After reading Blitzed:Drugs In The Reich I think I lost any real appreciation for what the German's did in the western front or how/why they did what they did anywhere really.

The same thing that made D-Day one of the hardest things any army ever had to pull off.

Germany could have never pulled together the resources to go across, fight and win, like the Allies did.

Amphibious operations are hard.

How was that book? I've read mixed reviews on the research and conclusions drawn.

I thought it was great. It was a pretty thorough overview of drugs in Germany before the Nazis came in and during. The first part is about sort of pre-nazi drug use, then goes into the German military, and the back section of the book is mostly about Hitler and Morrell. It has almost 50 pages of references in it so I feel like the guy did his research.

I wonder if a lot of it has to do with how bad so many in the media portray the American military. If someone wants  propaganda glorifying a military it's pretty much either USSR or Nazi propaganda to go with.

To the layman the things the Allies did to win the war are "boring" or "mundane". The Germans did lots of things that are "exciting" to the average person. But flashy shit doesn't win wars.

Cool, I'll add it to my amazon cart.

Yup inventing a standard shipping pallet doesnt make sexy what ifs, but it does ensure troops get the supplies they need.

You may disagree with it, but it is the truth.  The Germans had very little capability to actually invade - their "troop transports" were mostly river and coastal barges that would be towed across the channel at something less than 3 knots.  The British would have plenty of time to recognize an invasion fleet departing.  It would take over 24 hours to assemble, load, and cross the English Channel and the Royal Navy would be able to intercept it at night, when the Luftwaffe would be essentially ineffective.  Britain could put more than twice as many warships of any given type into the Channel on any given night than the German Navy (England had more CRUISERS assigned to defense against invasion than Germany had DESTROYERS afloat), and would have slaughtered the transports.  Anyone that made it ashore wouldn't have any hope of reinforcements, because those same transports would then have had to turn around and get towed back across for another run, at the same pace of over 24 hours each way.

The only people in the German military that thought Sea Lion stood a prayer were in the Army, and that was because they simply assumed that the Navy and Luftwaffe could get them across the Channel and keep them supplied.  Both the Navy and Luftwaffe knew that wax a pipe dream.

Sea Lion was a bluff, and its only real hope was to convince England to sue for peace.  Unfortunately for Germany, England knew it.

Mike

People don't think combined arms be like it is but it do.

People also seem to have a tendency to vastly overestimate the capability of airpower in the summer of 1940.  One of Germany’s biggest problems (amongst many) was that they simply didn’t have enough armour-piercing bombs to use against the RN’s cruisers and battleships.  Dropping HE from Stukas would be annoying, but it wouldn’t stop the heavier units from eviscerating a German invasion force.  The Germans had no counter for even something as simple as HMS Revenge steaming to Cherbourg at night and bombarding elements of the planned invasion force.  I think a lot of people too either simply don’t know or don’t realise the implication of the Germans planning the Sealion initial attack to happen at night.  If the RN sent any units in to cause problems, the Luftwaffe wouldn’t be doing anything of substance to counter them.  The only country with any significant ability to fight with aircraft at night in the summer and fall of 1940 was Britain.

The Heer thought it would be nothing much more complicated than a long river crossing and planned it as such, despite the Kriegsmarine telling them they were off their rocker the entire time.

A Tiger tank in it's natural environment...
Attached File

Here we see a Royal Tiger, abandoned because the allied tanks were advancing too fast to recover.
Attached File