A Few Questions For My TL on the Battle Of France

History_Pintobean

I've a few questions on my TL version of WWII, chiefly:

-In the TL, the German Red Army utilizes a modified Sclieffen Plan w/ a stronger right wing and a weaker left wing for its entry into Belgium which ITTL resembles a direct thrust into Belgium rather then the OTL movements through the Ardennes forest and such.

I'm not pretending to be an expert, and in fact I'm curious as to what others on this board think. Much of the OTL German leadership joined the Red Army during and after the German Civil War echoing the Russian Civil War's influx of Czarist military officers to the Reds; does this still allow for a Blitzkrieg or is the Blitzkrieg out of the question in the absence of the Nazis.

The setup thus allows (in theory) for Guderian, Manstein, Rommel, etc. to be present at the height of TTL WWII.

Is this workable?

-Assuming there is no Blitzkrieg, and while the Ruhr is occupied by French forces and thus requires Red Army intervention to take back the border territories, how long could France hold out militarily against a Soviet Union which includes OTL Soviet Russia + SSR's and Germany?

What was France's defenses/military like by the late 30's-early 40's? ITTL would it be fully capable of winning victories and potentially triumphing in the war assuming that its facing a greater Soviet Union?

Any advice and/or help would be greatly appreciated from those who know a ton about the Western Theater of operations during the outbreak of WWII/the OTL Battle Of France.
 

History_Pintobean

The Great Purges don't happen, and so the Red Army in Soviet Russia-proper is stronger.

I'm toying with the idea of having a different federal structure of the Soviet Union owing to Germany's inclusion into the USSR, so ITTL Germany has its own limited Red Army.
 

Julian

History_Pintobean said:
The Great Purges don't happen, and so the Red Army in Soviet Russia-proper is stronger.

I'm toying with the idea of having a different federal structure of the Soviet Union owing to Germany's inclusion into the USSR, so ITTL Germany has its own limited Red Army.
Click to expand...

Right.

The Red Army IOTL utilized two major theories on the conduct of a war; one, first developed in the late 1920s by Svechin, focused on attrition as the path to victory, making use of the Soviet Union's resources, manpower, an d organization. The second, developed by Tuhachevsky and co, focused on the use of maneuver to decisively destroy an enemy.

The latter proved to be much more popular and was adopted. However, in the end the Soviet Union was never able to truly assemble the kind of force Tuhachevsky envisioned. Post-war studies show that in terms of truck production, artillery tractors, etc the Red Army was deficient and would remain deficient for years. Even American lens lease only motorized a portion of the Red Army's logistics and mobile forces.

The result is that the Red Army during the war, and if a proper study had been conducted would have before the war, was attrition through maneuver. The Red Army gradually destroyed the German army in a series of mobile and semi-mobile operations which at the same time reduced Germany's strategic depths in accordance with Svechin's theories.

I have not read your timeline and can't perfectly judge how things are, but it is certain to me that the Soviet Union's military theories and practices will have equal effect on the German Red Army as the German's own war experiences.

Thus while tactically it will differ substantially, with the German focus on mission based operations as opposed to the more direct control favored in the Soviet Union, operationally the Germans will also employ attrition through maneuver in accordance with the principles of deep battle.

Thus the Invasion of France will not be a massive knockout blow. Instead there will be a coherent operational-strategic concept. In this case it will be the destruction or rout of large portions of the French army in Belgium, and from there the reduction of the French industrial regions in the north. The final goal will be the capture of Paris.

The principles of deception were also greatly developed in deep operations and used decisively throughout the war. Thus it is unlikely that the French will know the German's true strength, where it is concentrated, and what it's final objectives will be.

Without Soviet support the Germans can achieve victory, but only at great cost. With immediate Soviet support France will collapse within 3 months.
 
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