Should the west have gone after Russia or Germany...

lljadw said:
NO : the capture of Malta would not help the Axis : the Italian merchant navy lost 15 % ( not all by Malta )of the goods they transported to NA .But, more goods would not have helped Rommel,because the problem was not the crossing of the Mediterranean ,but the transport of the goods from the ports to the front .
And for Japan : if it had captured India ( impossible ) ,where would its navy obtain the fuel to sail from Calcutta to the Canal ,a canal that would have been blocked by Britain ( it happened in 1967 and in 1973 )?
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While I dont agree that Malta was a priority, its capture early on would not have hindered the North African campaign and may have made their life a little easier, but certainly supplies arriving in Africa were less of an issue for the Axis than is commonly thought, I cant recall where I read it but essentially it was taking 1.5 tanker loads of fuel to get 1 tanker load to the front that was causing the most problems.

As for the Indian discussion I do not know why the IJN would have gone to India as they would have invaded (as they did) overland from Burma.
 
MontyB said:
While I dont agree that Malta was a priority, its capture early on would not have hindered the North African campaign and may have made their life a little easier, but certainly supplies arriving in Africa were less of an issue for the Axis than is commonly thought, I cant recall where I read it but essentially it was taking 1.5 tanker loads of fuel to get 1 tanker load to the front that was causing the most problems.

As for the Indian discussion I do not know why the IJN would have gone to India as they would have invaded (as they did) overland from Burma.
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If we look at the number of supplies that were sent and lost ( there is also the number of MV/war ships lost,but that is something different ),we have the following figures from Sadkovich '' The Italian Navy in WWII P 344 "

1941 : sent: 1,016,442 Arrived : 853,193
1942 : sent : 925,573 Arrived : 778,985
Only a minority was for the Germans and not all for the front .
About the transport of fuel from Tripoli to the front,it was not only that this transport consumed a lot of fuel, but that the number of goods was limited by the number of trucks and by the amount of time that was needed for the transport .
Would more trucks transport more goods in the same time ? This is questionable .
And, if there was more fuel arriving at Tripoli, how to transport more fuel ? By using more trucks, but for using more trucks, more trucks must be coming and more fuel is needed .
Losses suffered by transports are only ONE of the elements that are determining/limiting the amount of supplies that arrive at the front .And, it is not so that less losses during the transport means more supplies arriving at the front .
 
lljadw said:
If we look at the number of supplies that were sent and lost ( there is also the number of MV/war ships lost,but that is something different ),we have the following figures from Sadkovich '' The Italian Navy in WWII P 344 "

1941 : sent: 1,016,442 Arrived : 853,193
1942 : sent : 925,573 Arrived : 778,985
Only a minority was for the Germans and not all for the front .
About the transport of fuel from Tripoli to the front,it was not only that this transport consumed a lot of fuel, but that the number of goods was limited by the number of trucks and by the amount of time that was needed for the transport .
Would more trucks transport more goods in the same time ? This is questionable .
And, if there was more fuel arriving at Tripoli, how to transport more fuel ? By using more trucks, but for using more trucks, more trucks must be coming and more fuel is needed .
Losses suffered by transports are only ONE of the elements that are determining/limiting the amount of supplies that arrive at the front .And, it is not so that less losses during the transport means more supplies arriving at the front .
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The only way for both sides to have resolved the logistics issues would have been to have enlarged the North African ports between Cairo and Tripoli.

It is ironic that the Germans had similar issues in Russia with the need to prioritise what it shipped to the front, I remember listening to an interview where they spoke of having to decide wither to send ammunition, reinforcements/replacements or winter equipment, they could send one but not all three.
 
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MontyB said:
The only way for both sides to have resolved the logistics issues would have been to have enlarged the North African ports between Cairo and Tripoli.

It is ironic that the Germans had similar issues in Russia with the need to prioritise what it shipped to the front, I remember listening to an interview where they spoke of having to decide wither to send ammunition, reinforcements/replacements or winter equipment, they could send one but not all three.
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To enlarge the ports would help, but would still remain insufficient,because there would still remain the problem of the absence of railways in Libya, which hindered also the British advance in the winter of 1940/41 and 1942/43 .
 
lljadw said:
To enlarge the ports would help, but would still remain insufficient,because there would still remain the problem of the absence of railways in Libya, which hindered also the British advance in the winter of 1940/41 and 1942/43 .
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The Germans relied on a single railway line in Russia and by all accounts it was more of a problem than it was worth, there are numerous references to the logistics issues it caused.

I think had they (allied or axis) been able to get Tobruk harbour fully operational it would have made a significant difference.
 
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The Italians were desperate to get fuel to Tripoli because of Malta's interdiction. They even loaded large amount of fuel in barrels on the decks of 2 Cruisers. They became torches when detected by RN ships.
 
From June to September (included ) 1942,112,304 tons of oil were dispatched to NA (of which 52,164 for the Germans ). 83,030 tons arrived ( 73,9 % ) .
If more oil had arrived to NA ( = in Tripoli ) this would not have
benefited to the Axis, as oil in Tripoli is not oil on the front and as there was no way to transport more oil from Tripoli to the front .
Besides : it is more than questionable that,without Malta, the Italians could have sent more oil to NA,as they had no oil from their own and as their oil had to come from Germany (by rail ) and Romania ( by ship ? )and as the Italian forces in the Balkans ( superior to those in NA ) also had to be supplied..by ship .
The whole supply system was a chain ,where what was decisive was what arrived, not what was lost .And, any problem in the chain had negative results elsewhere .
As one could expect, he problems started not in the ''convoys '' ,but at the beginning of the chain : the Ruhr ( for the Germans ) and Milan ( for the Italians ) .
It was the same for the Atlantic convoys, but the opposite for Antwerp in 1945 .
 
lljadw said:
From June to September (included ) 1942,112,304 tons of oil were dispatched to NA (of which 52,164 for the Germans ). 83,030 tons arrived ( 73,9 % ) .
If more oil had arrived to NA ( = in Tripoli ) this would not have
benefited to the Axis, as oil in Tripoli is not oil on the front and as there was no way to transport more oil from Tripoli to the front .
Besides : it is more than questionable that,without Malta, the Italians could have sent more oil to NA,as they had no oil from their own and as their oil had to come from Germany (by rail ) and Romania ( by ship ? )and as the Italian forces in the Balkans ( superior to those in NA ) also had to be supplied..by ship .
The whole supply system was a chain ,where what was decisive was what arrived, not what was lost .And, any problem in the chain had negative results elsewhere .
As one could expect, he problems started not in the ''convoys '' ,but at the beginning of the chain : the Ruhr ( for the Germans ) and Milan ( for the Italians ) .
It was the same for the Atlantic convoys, but the opposite for Antwerp in 1945 .
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This I agree with, looking at the distances involved in North Africa the problem of supply become apparent.
Dusseldorf to Taranto is 1800km
Taranto to Tripoli is 1000km
Tripoli to El Alamein is another 1800km
All up roughly 4600km (2800 miles)

Dusseldorf to Stalingrad is roughly 3000km or 1900 mile.

Most people look at North Africa as a sideshow but in logistical terms it dwarfed the Russian campaign, the cost of shipping material in support of both of these campaigns was phenomenal.

One point to the capture of Malta is that it would have forced the Royal Navy back to Cairo thus eroding it's effectiveness in Mediterranean and possibly making the Axis use of smaller ports like Tobruk safer.
 
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Some more information ( from the historian Richard Hammond )

Axis Convoy routes in the Mediterranean
Naples -Tripoli : length (in miles ) 502
:: transit time (at 8 kts ) :2 days, 15 hours
Messina-Tripoli :339 miles, 1 day,19 hours
Tripoli- Benghazi :352 miles, 1 day ,20 hours
Brindisi-Benghazi : 532 miles,2 days, 19 hours
Athens-Benghazi :400 miles, 2 days,2 hours
Taranto-Tobruk :608 miles, 3 days,4 hours
Athens-Tobruk :389 miles, 2 days
Benghazi-Tobruk :255 miles, 1 day, 8 hours
Palermo-Bizerte : 181 miles, 1 day
Palermo-Tunis :179 miles , 1 day
Brindisi-Athens : 473 ,2 days,8 hours
This means that the transit time for a convoy sailing from Tripoli to Tobruk was 3 days and 4 hours , to be multiplied by 2 ,and without the time needed to load in Tripoli and unload in Tobruk .
 
lljadw said:
Some more information ( from the historian Richard Hammond )

Axis Convoy routes in the Mediterranean
Naples -Tripoli : length (in miles ) 502
:: transit time (at 8 kts ) :2 days, 15 hours
Messina-Tripoli :339 miles, 1 day,19 hours
Tripoli- Benghazi :352 miles, 1 day ,20 hours
Brindisi-Benghazi : 532 miles,2 days, 19 hours
Athens-Benghazi :400 miles, 2 days,2 hours
Taranto-Tobruk :608 miles, 3 days,4 hours
Athens-Tobruk :389 miles, 2 days
Benghazi-Tobruk :255 miles, 1 day, 8 hours
Palermo-Bizerte : 181 miles, 1 day
Palermo-Tunis :179 miles , 1 day
Brindisi-Athens : 473 ,2 days,8 hours
This means that the transit time for a convoy sailing from Tripoli to Tobruk was 3 days and 4 hours , to be multiplied by 2 ,and without the time needed to load in Tripoli and unload in Tobruk .
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The other consideration here is the size and capacity of these ports, I doubt they would have had the capacity to deal with the requirements of Rommel's 3 divisions let alone an expanded army.
 
There were only 2 serious ports : Alexandria ( of which nothing is known ) and Tripoli ( much smaller than Alexandria ) . The other ones were irrelevant . The Axis used even Tunis as port .
The unload capacity of Tripoli was mostly some 1500 tons a day, that of Benghazi mostly less than 1000.Nothing is known about their storing capacity .
Source : the Crusader Project .
 
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lljadw said:
There were only 2 serious ports : Alexandria ( of which nothing is known ) and Tripoli ( much smaller than Alexandria ) . The other ones were irrelevant . The Axis used even Tunis as port .
The unload capacity of Tripoli was mostly some 1500 tons a day, that of Benghazi mostly less than 1000.Nothing is known about their storing capacity .
Source : the Crusader Project .
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I found this rather interesting.

https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/2018/12/29/north-african-campaign-wwiis-ultimate-war-of-logistics/
 
I have serious reservations about the content of the article
1 It is not serious to say that anti-fascist Italian naval officers sabotaged the transport of supplies to NA
2 It is not so that the NA campaign could be decisive for the outcome of the war .
3 To say that logistics were decisive is a big exaggeration : Britain also had logistic problems, but still won .
4 Rommel did not lose because of the Italians,whatever the Rommel lobby may tell .
5 The article is hiding the role of the British forces,it is as if they not existed . For the campaign in Normandy there are a lot of sources about the logistic problems and possibilities of both sides . For the campaign in NA nothing is known about British logistics .
 
lljadw said:
I have serious reservations about the content of the article
1 It is not serious to say that anti-fascist Italian naval officers sabotaged the transport of supplies to NA
2 It is not so that the NA campaign could be decisive for the outcome of the war .
3 To say that logistics were decisive is a big exaggeration : Britain also had logistic problems, but still won .
4 Rommel did not lose because of the Italians,whatever the Rommel lobby may tell .
5 The article is hiding the role of the British forces,it is as if they not existed . For the campaign in Normandy there are a lot of sources about the logistic problems and possibilities of both sides . For the campaign in NA nothing is known about British logistics .
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I probably should have been clearer, I found the statistics in the article interesting as many people talk about an expanded Afrika Korps going all the way through the middle east to link up with Operation Barbarossa in the Caucasus, the reality is that the Axis could barely support the seven German and Italian divisions they had there.
 
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I agree .
The geography of Libya prevented a stronger Axis force than there was in the HTL even if more supplies were available, even if more supplies could be transported to Naples, even if more supplies could be transported to NA .
Between 1940-1943 981000 men were transported to the Balkans and the Aegean and 262000 to NA .From these 981000 900 were lost during their transport, from the 262000 23000 were lost .
The reasons are
1 It was easier to transport men and material to the Balkans
2 Stronger forces could operate in the Balkans than in NA .
3 The Balkans were more important .
4 More men were needed in the Balkans .
For the supplies : the Balkans got 1,965,000 tons of which 7000 were lost . NA got 2,235,000 tons of which 440,000 were lost .
 
I expect the British campaign of 1942 would have also suffered supply problems had it not been for the Torch landings.
 
It took Monty 2 months to go to Tripoli,notwithstanding Torch .
Reasons were : logistics ad the Axis resistance .
 
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