Story Wednesday January 31, 2018

[The Old Hack 2,448]

3 hours ago, hkmaly said:

I just suspect that Luftwaffe flying above hostile soil was not result of that strategy.

Not either pursuing the Luftwaffe out of British airspace nor attempting to otherwise interfere with them in German airspace was. The decision to keep as much of the fighting as possible where Britain's own pilots could be recovered but the Germans could not recover theirs most certainly was. And a very wise one, at least until Britain went from air parity to air superiority or better yet air supremacy.

2 hours ago, Vorlonagent said:

I agree that it's hard to see the Luftwaffe being "lured" in the sense of getting German planes to go anywhere they weren't planning on going.  It's really more a ""roach motel" strategy, but that doesn't read as nice in history books. 

They could check out any time they wanted, they just couldn't ever leave.

[hkmaly 490]

5 minutes ago, The Old Hack said:

3 hours ago, hkmaly said:

I just suspect that Luftwaffe flying above hostile soil was not result of that strategy.

Not either pursuing the Luftwaffe out of British airspace nor attempting to otherwise interfere with them in German airspace was. The decision to keep as much of the fighting as possible where Britain's own pilots could be recovered but the Germans could not recover theirs most certainly was. And a very wise one, at least until Britain went from air parity to air superiority or better yet air supremacy.

Right. Possible but not done options needs to be considered part of strategy, despite that part mostly consisted of things NOT to do.

[The Old Hack 2,448]

Come to think of it, the Luftwaffe did get 'lured' during the Battle of Britain, albeit unintentionally. Luftwaffe had switched from bombing towns and factories to striking at the airfields of Fighter Command, which was in fact a winning strategy and was pushing the RAF to near desperation. That was when one of Luftwaffe's bombers accidentally dropped its bombs on an outlying area of London itself, something Hitler had expressly forbidden as he was worried about provoking the British into striking at Berlin. Fortunately for this strategy, Winston Churchill was a calm and very patient man who in no way believed in responding to force with ten times as much force or that disproportionate retribution was the best retribution.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! ...no, sorry, I couldn't write that with a straight face.

Anyway, the outraged Churchill ordered a long range night bombing raid on Berlin the very next night. A furious Hitler called Göring in front of him and yanked several of his medals off (err no, wait, that was The Great Dictator by Charlie Chaplin) and the humiliated Göring decided to display his antigenius by ordering the entire offensive to switch to bombing London. He did this just as the airfield strategy was beginning to succeed and the RAF breathed a huge sigh of relief as the pressure came off. Admittedly the bombing raids did some damage to London but at least the RAF managed to survive.

Göring was really an amazing man. He saved England at least twice by aborting highly effective strategies in favour of less effective ones (the first time was when he decided it wasn't 'worth the bother' to make concerted attacks on Dowding's radar stations) and he kept bleeding his Luftwaffe white in the skies above England long past the point where more sensible men might have called the whole thing off. I feel it is very unjust that he was never given the Victoria Cross for his efforts.

[hkmaly 490]

2 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

Fortunately for this strategy, Winston Churchill was a calm and very patient man who in no way believed in responding to force with ten times as much force or that disproportionate retribution was the best retribution.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! ...no, sorry, I couldn't write that with a straight face.

Anyway, the outraged Churchill ordered a long range night bombing raid on Berlin the very next night.

... that doesn't sound like Churchill did it deliberately to save RAF.

2 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

I feel it is very unjust that he was never given the Victoria Cross for his efforts.

Is it even possible to give it to someone not in British/Commonwealth forces? Sure, Charles Wooden got it, but while German-born, he WAS in the British Army at that point.

[The Old Hack 2,448]

3 hours ago, hkmaly said:

... that doesn't sound like Churchill did it deliberately to save RAF.

As I stated, it was unintentionally. It was more like a tragedy of errors than anything else. But the Luftwaffe did get derailed from a winning strategy to a losing one.

3 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Is it even possible to give it to someone not in British/Commonwealth forces?

I am actually not sure. Anyway, I was being snide more than anything else. Rather like how Grandpa Simpson during his time as a combat engineer in the US Army received the Cross of Iron for the number of casualties his incompetence caused his own side.

Still, you might have a point. Perhaps a special medal should be created just for him. Something like the Deleterious Flying Cross.

[Don Edwards 548]

18 hours ago, Vorlonagent said:

I agree that it's hard to see the Luftwaffe being "lured" in the sense of getting German planes to go anywhere they weren't planning on going.  It's really more a ""roach motel" strategy, but that doesn't read as nice in history books. 

"Luring" is possible, at least in the sense of deliberately trying to give the Luftwaffe the impression that Germany could win that battle with just a bit more effort.

Not saying that this was actually deliberately done, just that it's possible.

[The Old Hack 2,448]

2 hours ago, Don Edwards said:

"Luring" is possible, at least in the sense of deliberately trying to give the Luftwaffe the impression that Germany could win that battle with just a bit more effort.

Not saying that this was actually deliberately done, just that it's possible.

Well... kinda sorta. In a 'tell the boss what he wants to hear' way this was actually pretty close to what actually happened. Luftwaffe's own intelligence officers felt under pressure to deliver optimistic results to Göring so they continually reported that the RAF was buckling under the pressure and that with just a little more effort could be made to completely collapse. This resulted in Göring maintaining what was most of the time a fruitless effort and not noticing a brief window of time (when the Luftwaffe was hitting Fighter Command's airfields) where it was actually true. It ended up with Göring chasing a chimaera of victory that constantly moved just a little further away from him, much like that classic cartoon of a donkey induced to chase a carrot dangling from a stick.

[hkmaly 490]

32 minutes ago, The Old Hack said:

In a 'tell the boss what he wants to hear' way this was actually pretty close to what actually happened. Luftwaffe's own intelligence officers felt under pressure to deliver optimistic results to Göring so they continually reported that the RAF was buckling under the pressure and that with just a little more effort could be made to completely collapse. This resulted in Göring maintaining what was most of the time a fruitless effort and not noticing a brief window of time (when the Luftwaffe was hitting Fighter Command's airfields) where it was actually true.

On one hand, it can be argued that if Göring had correct intelligence, he might not be making so bad decisions. On the other, well, that pressure to deliver optimistic results didn't appeared out of nowhere, did it?

I'm sure that reacting to bad news in way which doesn't make your subordinates afraid to notify you of real problems is on evil overlord list ...

[The Old Hack 2,448]

18 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

On one hand, it can be argued that if Göring had correct intelligence, he might not be making so bad decisions. On the other, well, that pressure to deliver optimistic results didn't appeared out of nowhere, did it?

Precisely. To be fair to Göring, much as I hate to waste any effort on that, he was under similar pressure from Hitler.

19 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

I'm sure that reacting to bad news in way which doesn't make your subordinates afraid to notify you of real problems is on evil overlord list ...

Indeed. As it should be in any organisation which hopes to survive for any length of time.

[Don Edwards 548]

32 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

I'm sure that reacting to bad news in way which doesn't make your subordinates afraid to notify you of real problems is on evil overlord list ...

Yep, #32. I will not fly into a rage and kill a messenger who brings me bad news just to illustrate how evil I really am. Good messengers are hard to come by.

[Vorlonagent 442]

On 2/16/2018 at 7:57 PM, The Old Hack said:

They could check out any time they wanted, they just couldn't ever leave.

Somehow, I don't see captured German pilots getting "Mirrors on the ceiling and pink champagne on ice."  However they could."..call up the captain and say 'please bring me my wine.'"  They would have that spirit there because it's before 1969...