Posts made by Lucifer

@KurtGodel7:

It is also worth noting that by 1944, the Germans had developed or were in the process of developing potentially war-changing technologies; including the following:

• Jets: obtained a 4:1 kill ratio against enemy aircraft.

• Wasserfall: a guided surface-to-air missile capable of helping defend Germany’s skies

• Type XXI U-boat (in development in '44): a very quiet, stealthy, highly advanced submarine difficult to track or kill. It had advanced electronics, allowing it to hunt and kill enemy ships without being detected. It used electrically powered torpedoes that did not leave telltale bubble trails.

• Panzerfaust: a shoulder-launched rocket used to destroy enemy tanks. Easily produced and effective.

• Panther tanks: significantly better than their Allied counterparts.

If in 1945 Germany had gone to war with a mostly jet air force, with a tank force consisting largely of Panthers, with infantry equipped with Panzerfausts and other advanced weapons, and with production capacity at or above the level it had historically obtained in '44, it would have been very difficult to stop.

Add that to the very unlikely, but not impossible prospect of Hitler persuading Japan to not attack US in 41, but instead building up, and sending lots of forces to Siberia, not necessarily to fight the Russians directly, but for tying up Russian resources which would be desperately needed on the eastern front.
There are many ways that the history could go in other directions instead of our known history. Imo, determinism is an illusion.

No barbarossa until England was forced to be either an ally or at least neutral. Also, taking UKs possessions in Africa would helped Germany against England, even if it would do more damage to UK than good to Germany, Germany had to get “rid” of England before the war against Russia, at least, England could not be an enemy.

It would also help if the Germans threated “non Germanic” people better than they did. Even if a few Norwegians was killed during the German occupation of Norway, they threated us fairly good, compared to what they did to the Slavic people of eastern Europe. This fact resulted in that only very few Norwegians opposed the occupation by use of arms, with good help of UK we did some minor sabotage and minor guerrilla warfare against the German occupation, and many Norwegians joined the Norwegian political party, “Nasjonal samling”, with Quisling as the well known infamous treacherous leader.

It’s a very big difference from Germany taking London, and Germany taking NY. Germany could actually pull off a successful sealion if the they went into total war modus from 1939, and every resources went against Britain.
They would not do it the time it was planned, b/c it would fail, but if the war against UK continued longer, and if they really went all in against the UK navy and military targets, they could very well pull it off. Then, imo, it is about 50% chance, or even higher, that the history we know would be very, very different….!

The Battle of Britain, although it is not very underrated, or unknown compared to many other big battles, but UK RAF leaders and pilots did a good job defending England. If England had fallen, Germany would have much better odds for succeeding with operation barbarossa.
Also the battle of the atlantic is somewhat underrated compared to D-Day and Stalingrad. It almost took too long before commanders decided to protect the convoys with small warships, ideal for hunting subs. UK and Russia was almost dependent on receiving resources from the US, at least early in the war.

And those who tricked German commanders think that Norway needed 300.000-400.000 soldiers for protecting Norway from allied assault. Never had so many soldiers done so little to help their country win the war  :-D

@Imperious:

If the axis held Europe, Africa, Middle East, and Asia for any duration of time it would only be a matter of time where the total resources and labor will out-build anything America can do.

They would have significant assets to give us a two front war. South America would not offer much resistance.

The axis powers and especially Germany would have most of Eurasia, and then would have good odds to win the cold war, but as the real cold war never escalated between Soviet and US directly b/c of nukes, I think the US would hold it’s ground, and probably South America, although Latin America would be guerrilla territory, as different fractions would be supported by the US and Germany. But even if the Sovietunion lost the cold war b/c it was dissolved, Russia is a major European big power, and Russia has not been overrun by NATO b/c Russia has nukes. Same goes for US if Germany controlled most of Eurasia, since both Germany and US would have nukes, there would be no direct confrontation. US could even occupy South America to secure the continent and themselves, during a cold war against Germany.
In the “second book” by Hitler, (Mein Kampf is the best known), Hitler thought that if Germany won the war, there would be a huge world war between US and Germany during 1980’s.

USA would not fall even if the axis won WW2. Germany would take most of Europe, and the neutral states during the war would be puppet states after the war. How far east Germany would stretch is hard to say, but probably not further than the Ural mountains. Japan would lose anyway, unless they did not go to war against the US.

@Dylan:

Okay say the German defense in Norway did go to fight Russia or something, do you think the Allies might then attack Norway?

Unlikely imo, although if Germany left Norway totally empty, I think Norway would be secured by some british forces (along with our very few Norwegian soldiers), but if we look at the map, choosing Norway instead of France would mean that the allied forces had to be shipped onboard the ships again and then sail to Denmark, or Northern Germany, or France for an invasion.
Stalin said no foreign soldiers on Russian soil, so the hypothetical invasion force (for Norway) could not move from northern Norway to Northern Russia, south to balticum, and then to Germany. It was definitely most practical to invade France and then move east to Germany.
It would even be better to just send all allied troops to Italy and moving upwards towards Germany instead of invading Norway.
And the Germans treated us “fairly” good, taking the war situation into consideration, I think less than 3000 Norwegians were killed during the war, and that is not so bad if you look at some other countries which were not so lucky, so there was no immediate need to liberate Norway for the intention of saving our civilian population.

@Herr:

@Subotai:

Yes, if they had been sent to the eastern front in 42-43, it would probably be less than 20.000 left of them by the end of the war, same goes if they had been sent to the western front in 44…  :-)

Out of 400,000, that would imply a 95% casualty rate, which seems very unlikely even with the German death toll rapidly rising towards the end of the war.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties#Casualties_by_branch_of_service

Well, yes, my suggestion of probable German losses is probably too high, but most German soldiers did not chose where to be sent, and the Germans soldiers in Norway were damn lucky, it could easily be 50%-80% casualties for those who fought on the eastern or western front during the last years of WW2.
Germany didn’t need more than 100.000 to have close to total control in Norway anyway, and if Norway was invaded by allies instead of France, 400.000 would not be nearly enough to stop US+UK et.al.

@Scalenex:

I recently had to get a new computer.  I re-downloaded Triplea and Axis and Allies Revised isn’t on it.  Is it still available?

http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=18278.0

@balungaloaf:

@Subotai:

Norway was not liberated, the 400.000 Germans went home when Berlin had fallen.

those guys lucked out to the highest degree known to mankind.

Yes, if they had been sent to the eastern front in 42-43, it would probably be less than 20.000 left of them by the end of the war, same goes if they had been sent to the western front in 44…  :-)

The KGF strat is not about ignoring Japan, no countries can be ignored, it’s just that allies cant do much against Japan for the first 2 rnds, and Japan can be partially ignored early in the game. The KGF strat involves slowing Japan down as much as possible, but most resources goes against Germany.
The reason why KGF is most popular among the best players is because a good axis player will make a too strong Germany if only Russia and UK tries to stop them.

And there is no such thing as KGF fanmania, it’s about the-most-effective-strat-fanmania :)

Norway was not liberated, the 400.000 Germans went home when Berlin had fallen.

@Imperious:

Right… just like in Poland and Paris.

Russia was more powerful than France and Poland combined, and the Russian territories + winter was much easier to defend than Poland and France. Not saying that Germany couldn’t take Moscow if Germany went 100% against it, but it is very unsure how long the Germans could hold Moscow, even if they succeeded, and chances for Germany taking Moscow in 41-42 was less than 50%.

TripleA is the better one, since it is a game, and not just a map.

But the TripleA AIs are nowhere near good enough to be playable against humans, and it won’t be until someone spends a few millions of $ in AI development, and even if that happens, I doubt very much that someone will be able to make a decent A&A AI before the year 5010…

@ABWorsham:

I think a qood question in response to the 70th anniversary of the German invasion of Norway is, was it worth the cost in ships and occuping troop strength for the Germans?

Imo, definitely not, and some historians would also agree to that.

I think Germany had around 400.000 soldiers in Norway in 1944 or 1945… :-)

Germany + US worked “fairly” good in Revised/Classic, so it is possible it will “kinda” work also in AA42. I haven’t tried it though.

Total Norwegian losses during the war was about 9500. Pretty good compared to the eastern front…  :-) 8-)

What I still can’t forgive, is that there was no serious attempts at killing Quisling during the WW2.  :evil:  :|  :cry:

Better later than never, some say, and I agree. But I am still a little bit shameful about this, even I was born long after the war was ended.

And those totally retarded Norwegian politicians who didn’t chose (the right) side when Germany attacked us, is also disturbing. We were “neutral” during the WW1, and that worked out pretty good, but there is no excuse to not see what happened in Europe in from 1939 until 1940.

For TripleA there is the minimap which is good for people who have never played A&A or TripleA, but for F2F play I don’t think TripleA is good for absolute beginners, b/c TripleA handles all the rules, but for strategical lessons, the Revised, AA42 and AA50 maps, TripleA is excellent for both beginners and reasonable decent players to learn more about strategy.

@i:

i dont see the need for an axis bid it seems the axis always win to me.

Maybe that is because your age is XXII  :roll:

The “common” bid for axis is 8-9 ipc.

With no bids it’s all out against Russia, take Moscow within 4-5 rnds usually, but with an allied bid Germany should be aggressive at first, then turtle, and wait for Japan to take Moscow and Africa and the rest of the world.