One of then greatest questions discussed by historians for decades;
Could Britain have repelled a numerically superior and better trained
armed forces if Germany had invaded in 1940?
I have to answer yes, even though many people including my Father
(God bless him) would disagree. Why do I chose to disagree? There is
plenty of evidence to suggest that a German invasion, would have
failed.
One also has to assume that Germany had sufficient transport for its
infantry ( landing craft and JU-52 transport aircraft) as in 1940 it
had neither.
As is well documented, the British Expeditionary Force (together with
Belgian and French soldiers) were evacuated from France in May-June
1940, the majority of which were evacuated form the port of Dunkirk.
There was very little in the way of equipment taken back to Britain
as space was too valuable on board the boats and ships, indeed most
of the troops did not posses a rifle.
Ibid.
After
Dunkirk and other evacuations including Cherbourg Brest and St
Lo,what did Britain posses to repel German troops? Britain had
witnessed the much feared German blitzkrieg scythe through Europe.
France would capitulate by June 22nd.
With the
three main branches of the German armed forces working in cooperation
with each other and not competing Operation Sea Lion could have taken
place. Would an invasion have been successful? Fortunately we shall
never know. One thing is certain however, a German victory would not
have been easy or quick, unlike the relatively easy victories of the
Low Countries and Denmark.
Britain had learned a valuable lesson in the Battle of France- not to
rely on fixed defensive lines like those of the Maginot Line. France
and Britain were still using tactics from the First World War whereas
Germany had developed blitzkrieg (lightning war). Attacks with
strength and speed were used, dive bombing Stukas with deafening
sirens, closely followed by tanks and armoured personnel carriers and
infantry. Germany had learned from the mistakes of the 1914-1918 war,
whereas it's enemies had not. Fixed defences with all the guns
pointing in one direction proved to be a complete failure. Airborne
troops and glider troops proved this system of defence to be
obsolete. There were also gaps in the line, at the Belgian border and
the Ardennes. The Ardennes was said to be impenetrable, and then used
by the Germans for their main armoured thrust in 1940.
What
Defences Were Used By Britain For Home Defence?
Britain
used many methods of defence whilst awaiting an invasion. The problem
was forecasting where the invasion was going to arrive. It was
impossible to forecast this without good intelligence, so Britain had
to expect to be attacked on the southern and south eastern coasts as
this was the shortest route from occupied France. In fact most of the
coastline would be defended by some means, if only by barbed wire.
The most
obvious defence was the English Channel. As the Germans were not
prepared for an assault by the sea, they lacked landing craft and
their navy was much smaller than that of the Royal Navy. The German
plan was to transport men and horses across the English Channel using
towed barges. Unless the Royal Air Force was defeated, this would
mean some of the crossing would have to take place in darkness,
seriously affecting the ability of the Luftwaffe to defend an
invasion fleet. The darkness would work in the favour of the Royal
Navy however, it would only take one destroyer going at full speed
ahead to sink these barges by its wash alone, without firing it's
guns.
Barbed
wire, would be the next form of defence as previously stated, it
would be laid across the beaches in varying depths, this would ensure
the defenders would be able to easily pick off the Germans as they
landed, in 1940 there was no way through it other than wire cutters.
The wire and minefields would be covered by soldiers in trenches and
pillboxes. Unlike the Maginot Line, this was not designed to be the
only defence, there would be more lines of defence further inland.
Ironside had been put in charge of British defence on the 27th
May 1940 and realised that delaying the Germans would be the order of
the day. If they suffered enough delays to their objectives, it would
give the British forces enough time to re-group and re- organise for
a counter attack.
Fields were cluttered with obstacles to prevent glider landings.
Bridges were guarded., road signs removed to confuse the enemy. Parts
of East Anglia had been flooded including Romney marsh, more would be
flooded to slow down a German advance when the Germans invaded.
Tanks
traps,hedgehogs and dragons teeth would also have some effectiveness
in slowing down an armoured advance, assuming the Germans could
transport them across the Channel. It is doubtful that anti-tank
defence would have ever been needed if what Robinson wrote is to be
believed. He claims that the Germans were not planning to bring tanks
in any quantity, or vehicles. They were to rely on horses, 125,00 of
them.
Horses do not repel bullets, need feeding and are slow compared to
other vehicles. The German army high command did not want to
transport fuel, or rely on capturing British fuel dumps.
How many
troops did Britain have ready to fight in 1940? Over 300,000 were
evacuated from Dunkirk in 1940, more from other ports such as Brest
,St Lo and Cherbourg took the total to over 500,000.These
troops would need to be rested and re-equipped before being put on an
active role again. Local Defence Volunteers were formed on 14th
May 1940,
men who were too young or old could enrol and take part in defending
their local town or village. They were later renamed the Home Guard
and by the end of June 1940 they numbered more than 1,400,000.
The Home Guard was at first very badly equipped, having to use
personal firearms, Molotov cocktails, pickaxe handles and even
improvising pikes. They had no uniform at first, just an LDV armband,
and these were home-made. Putting these inadequacies to one side,
they would serve two purposes: They would attract men who could
otherwise get in the way of the regular forces, should an invasion
come. Being part of the armed forces would mean they could not be
like partisans. Also. they would significantly contribute to the
delay needed for the armed forces to regroup, and then counter
attack.
Auxiliary Units were to be used after the invasion had passed through their area. They were ordinary people who would operate in civilian clothes. When the invasion happened they would hide out in specially made bunkers, often camouflaged in woods and perform various tasks. These included sabotaging any German vehicles, reporting German movements by radio to the military and relaying messages. The saboteurs among them were to fight with guns and explosives until their ammunition ran out, then if they were still alive, disband and go back to their own homes.
As a last resort, gas was to be used on the Germans. Churchill had authorised this in 1940, gas was to be sprayed on German troops by Fairey Battle aircraft. This may seem drastic nowadays, but what choice did Churchill have? There was nowhere left to evacuate to and he knew the Germans had to be stopped.
The
Germans were planning to land at least 160,000 troops off the English
coast. It is necessary to use one's imagination at this point.
Germany had troops, tanks and horses but no way of transporting them
quickly over the English Channel. The Germans planned to use steamers
and tugs towing barges, Robinson states that there would be nearly
1000 barges towed across the Channel.
Obviously such transport was completely inadequate and unsuitable for
such a task. An armed escort would consist of a total of 8 destroyers
and numerous E-boats.
Opposing this invasion fleet would be at least 44 destroyers and
cruisers,
(this does not take into account the British submarine fleet or
U-boats). Even the most biased of opinions cannot be swayed by these
facts. The German invasion fleet would have at least suffered a
severe mauling.
Airborne
troops had been used by the Germans in Holland to capture bridges and
airfields. They also knocked out the Belgian fort at Eben Emael. They
proved useful in surprise attacks behind the front line, but were far
from invincible. The problem for Sea Lion would be shortage of
transport aircraft (Ju-52), and the lack of heavy weapons. Airborne
troops could carry only light weapons and mortars, which would make
them unable to resist a determined counter-attack. JU-52's were
generally unarmed, and would prove easy meat for fighter aircraft.
Assuming
the Germans got ashore, they would be outnumbered, unable to land in
strength due to the transportation problems and under attack from
both land and air as the Royal Air Force proved impossible to defeat.
The landing barges could only be unloaded from the stern, they were
slow and would ride very low in the water. This would involve some
manoeuvring, which would take time and make these makeshift landing
craft easy targets for the coastal defences, the RAF and the Royal
Navy. The RAF had provided air cover at the evacuation of France. It
was not perfect, ships and troops were often under attack on the
beaches, but the fact remains that because of the RAF nearly half a
million troops escaped to Britain to fight again.
The
longer Hitler and his forces delayed meant that more defences would
be built, more men trained and more equipment would be made in
British factories. Large quantities of supplies began to arrive from
the United States and Canada. On 9th July 200,000 rifles
from the U.S.A.
75,000 Ross rifles were on their way from Canada.
Britain had also bought the entire production of the Thompson Machine
Co of Chicago – 5,000 machine guns a month.
This would replace weapons lost in France, and ensure the Home guard
was armed properly. Eventually ,Britain received re-conditioned
American destroyers ( at least 50)in exchange for bases in British
Colonies such as Trinidad, Bermuda and St Lucia.
The
Germans concentrated on aerial domination , there is no need to go
into great detail about the Battle of Britain. It is widely known
that the Germans could not defeat the RAF, and were unwilling to
cross the Channel until the RAF had been defeated by the Luftwaffe.
By the time the Battle of Britain had ended it was September, which
meant a rougher Channel crossing for an improvised invasion fleet,
and shorter daylight hours, which could mean no air cover for an
invasion fleet. This would leave it exposed to the Royal Navy
destroyers.
Assuming
half the troops and horses landed safely what would happen then? They
would be under constant fore from beach defences. They would have to
advance through barbed wire and minefields. Those that survived all
this would have to wipe out the soldiers in the trenches and
pillboxes and then fight reinforcements that would inevitably arrive.
They would have to advance inland to meet up with airborne troops
that would have been dropped before the invasion fleet landed. How
effective these troops would have been remains doubtful. Transports
would be shot down before and after dropping their paratroops. They
were only lightly armed and may soon need rescuing themselves. Unlike
the attacks on Denmark Holland and Belgium the British troops were on a
high state of alert. Home Guard and Auxiliary troops would have slowed the German advance further while the main British forces retreated and regrouped. The Royal Navy would be attacking the German
fleet, alongside the RAF. What was the chance of German success, even
if they had got ashore? None. Even if they had made progress, there
is no doubt the British military would have used gas on the invader. The results of
this could be catastrophic but Churchill would have used every weapon
available to defeat a German invasion force.
Bibliography
Gilbert, M, The Second World War.
Robinson, D, (2005), Invasion 1940 London.
DVD
The World At War, (1973), Thames television. The episode Alone is particularly relevant to this essay.
Footnotes
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