War Diaries - Advance to Moscow October 1941

I started by checking my own Global 1940 map analysis document…

https://www.axisandallies.org/forums/topic/26161/global-1940-2nd-edition-map-analysis/33?page=2&lang=en-GB

…and the entry for Chile says “Chile, a country with close trading ties with Germany, initially chose to remain neutral (in contrast with many South American countries which, although technically neutral, tilted slightly towards the Allied side early in the war). Chile only started to distance itself from the Axis powers in 1943, when it broke diplomatic relations with them.”

According to this page…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allies_of_World_War_II

the “Declaration by United Nations”, originally signed by 26 nations in January 1942, was signed by Chile in early 1945. Chile was also one of the original 51 signatories of the 1945 Charter of the United Nations, and Chile also apparently declared war on Japan in April 1945. This page…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declarations_of_war_during_World_War_II

…similarly notes the same declaration of war against Japan and similarly mentions none against Germany.

All in all, it sounds as if Chile was one of the countries (there were several, notably in Latin America) which spent much of WWII playing their cards close to their vest, and which only committeed themselves to the Allied bandwagon once it was clear that a) the war was nearly over and b) the Allies were going to win. Based on the other entries in my map analysis document, it looks as if, basically, the Latin American countries whose real inclination was to be pro-Axis spent the war pretending they were neutral; the Latin American countries whose real inclination was to be neutral spent the war pretending they were pro-Allied; and the Latin American / Caribbean countries whose inclination was to be pro-Allied jumped onto the Allied bandwagon right after Pearl Harbor. The reason for all of these positions (nuanced or overt) isn’t hard to guess: they were all in the western hemisphere, i.e. in the backyard of the United States, so they had to be careful about the public stance they took, even in those countries with right-wing governements and/or significantly large numbers of residents of German ancestry.

Leaving the Philippines wasn’t a “strategy” by MacArthur; he was ordered to leave by Roosevelt.  It should also be noted that MacArthur’s handling of the opening phases of the Philippines campaign was sloppy; as I recall, he was caught unprepared by the Japanese invasion, even though by the time it started he had already heard about the raid on Pearl Harbor.

The Siege of Tobruk lasted for 241 days in 1941, after Axis forces advanced through Cyrenaica from El Agheila in Operation Sonnenblume against the British Western Desert Force (WDF) in Libya, during the Western Desert Campaign (1940–1943) of the Second World War. In late 1940, the British had defeated the Italian 10th Army during Operation Compass (9 December 1940 – 9 February 1941) and trapped the remnants at Beda Fomm. German troops and Italian reinforcements reached Libya, while much of the WDF was sent to Greece and replaced by a skeleton force, short of equipment and supplies.

Operation Sonnenblume (6 February – 25 May 1941), forced the British into a retreat to the Egyptian border. A garrison was left behind at Tobruk, to deny the port to the Axis, while the WDF reorganised and prepared a counter-offensive. The Axis siege of Tobruk began on 10 April, when the port was attacked by a force under Generalleutnant Erwin Rommel and continued during three relief attempts, Operation Brevity (15–16 May), Operation Battleaxe (15–17 June) and Operation Crusader (18 November – 30 December). The occupation of Tobruk deprived the Axis of a supply port closer to the Egypt-Libya border than Benghazi, 900 miles (1,400 km) west of the Egyptian frontier, which was within the range of RAF bombers; Tripoli was 1,500 kilometres (930 mi) to the west in Tripolitania.

The siege diverted Axis troops from the frontier and the Tobruk garrison repulsed several attacks. The port was frequently bombarded by artillery, dive-bombers and medium bombers, as the RAF flew defensive sorties from airfields far away in Egypt. British Mediterranean Fleet and Inshore Squadron ships ran the blockade, to carry reinforcements and supplies in and wounded and prisoners out. On 27 November, Tobruk was relieved by the 8th Army (the name of British, Commonwealth, Imperial and Allied forces in the Western Desert since September 1941), during Operation Crusader.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Tobruk

I have decided to no longer post polls, but instead post questions for discussion instead.
Might make your answers to my questions easier to give an opinion on.

The Siege of Tobruk began in April 75 years ago.
Rommel was tenacious, and the British certainly did not want to give up this important port to the Axis powers.
History says that this was one of Rommel’s greatest victories when Tobruk finally fell.
History also says that this one of Britain’s finest hours, holding out as long as they did.
Tell me your impressions as we now enter the heart of the Western Desert Campaign in North Africa.

How to win it in late 41…  good one.

To begin with I would kill corp. Hitler.  That dumb ass got Germany in the predicament it was in in the first palce.

That being said you keep pushing on Moscow because the logistics of moving troops is what killed Germany.  Is the Caucus a better objective - yes.  But Corp. Hitler didn’t figure that out until it was too late.  Germany may not have gotten the same fruits of capturing the oilfields (which should have been their major objective in 41), but they would have taken Moscow which was the locomotive hub of the USSR (not to mention, the capital.

The logistics of transferring the troops was a stupid play at that point.  He should have kept the focus on Moscow and broke them there, than take his Moscow forces and move them where they needed to go.  At all 3 Russian fronts Corp. Hitler never won… because when he had overwhelming force he never finished the fight.

WW2 history is kind of funny in that you think “thank god Hitler was so crazy that he lost the war”, but at the same time it is also “how did this crazy person get in charge in the first place?”

I think they had enough men, but was short of trannies, so I voted for more shipping

Haile Selassie’s words were to ring true. Four more years the Western Powers allowed Hitler, Mussolini and Japan  to take what parts of the world they wished.
It was only arrogant errors by those same leaders that saw them reversed after some years and millions of deaths.

Lol yes Gar. “So the Germans can march in the shade”