jasonsnow
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Post by jasonsnow on Apr 7, 2018 22:14:52 GMT
]My point is, assuming Italy was in any way poor would be an unfair assumption. No matter how proportionate your growth is, it is raw proof Italian industry was accelerating, something that, well, can't happen if you're poor. But only accelerating slowly... Agriculture still employed 48% of the working population in 1936, and in 1921 24% of the working population were involved in industry, and by 1936 this had risen to the giddy height of 28% by 1936. Italy fared the Great Depression better than most others, something that is remarkable nevertheless. By 1939, Fascist Italy attained the highest rate of state–ownership of an economy in the world other than the Soviet Union where the Italian state controlled most Italy’s shipping and shipbuilding, just under half that of steel production. Italy made 44,000 cars in 1936. Opel in Germany alone made 150,000. It certainly wasn't the target for US investments the way Britain and Nazi Germany was - where was the Italian equivalent of Opel or AEG? Nobody makes cars like Germany. Even in Nazi Germany, those guys were the lords of car manufacturing. |
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Post by lukedalton on Apr 8, 2018 17:06:43 GMT
Ok, if we take as assumption that Benny and co. are aware that this will be a long fight and start immediately rationing and get on the aggressive strategy immediately concentrating all assets on one front, maybe even taking time between the start of the war and the Dow to increase the armed forces readiness even a little (and be sure to put the merchant fleet in port before of declaring war), what can happen?
The first objective is taking out Malta, it will hard due to the lack of experience and specific ship by the italians but if it's done quickly the probability are good for them due to the scarcity of defence of the place; if this succeed the logistic chain that support the invasion of Egypt will be much more safe.
If the preparation are just a little more serious, the shipment of material for the Italian east africa will be sent some days earlier...avoiding being intercepted, and while will not change the endgame it will permit more resistance
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jasonsnow
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Post by jasonsnow on Apr 8, 2018 19:22:58 GMT
Ok, if we take as assumption that Benny and co. are aware that this will be a long fight and start immediately rationing and get on the aggressive strategy immediately concentrating all assets on one front, maybe even taking time between the start of the war and the Dow to increase the armed forces readiness even a little (and be sure to put the merchant fleet in port before of declaring war), what can happen? The first objective is taking out Malta, it will hard due to the lack of experience and specific ship by the italians but if it's done quickly the probability are good for them due to the scarcity of defence of the place; if this succeed the logistic chain that support the invasion of Egypt will be much more safe. If the preparation are just a little more serious, the shipment of material for the Italian east africa will be sent some days earlier...avoiding being intercepted, and while will not change the endgame it will permit more resistance Yeah, nope. The Italians couldn't take out Malta OTL, and back then it was a defenseless town with scarce supplies filled with scared people. Countless months of bombing and raiding couldn't even do the job. The Italian Air Force lacked the logistical and tactical superiority to invade an island solely through air means, and putting troops on the ground would be impossible. The Italian navy was powerful, not not powerful enough to take on the full force of the British navy, since Malta was a strategic base for British ships. The British presence would make capturing Malta impossible. They're simply too strong and Malta too big of a target. |
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Apr 8, 2018 21:50:48 GMT
Here actually I would disagree. On the Italian dow the RN moved the Med fleet from Malta to Alexandria since it realised Malta itself was impractical as a fleet base in the event of Italian air attack. Coupled with the loss of France which meant the RN has to take over as the sole allied power in the Med, plus taking precautions against an invasion of Britain the RN was thinly stretched. Given the distance between Malta and Alexandria it was practically impossible to protect against an Italian invasion unless the RN got very lucky and with the Italian control of the air even a success could be very costly.
Given the limited defence of the island that existed at the time if the Italians had landed an invasion force within a month or two of their dow they would probably have won fairly quickly. It would have been like the invasion of British Somalia, with the exception that the defenders have no retreat.
I have heard that Malta's importance has been overrated. British subs could still have operated in the central Med, albeit with reduced efficiency. Possibly more important the argument goes that Tripoli was the only significant port in Libya. Benghazi and even more so Tobruk were a lot smaller and also closer to British bases in Egypt so were less useful. This meant that the bulk of supplies for Axis forces in N Africa that landed in Tripoli had to be transported to the front, by lorry as there was no railway which was a huge task, each mile of which consumed increasing amounts of petrol that also had to be brought across the Med.
This was a major reason why the conflict in N Africa saw such swings. Whenever either side defeated the other the resulting advance took them further from their own supply bases and the defeated enemy nearer to their own. Britain eventually won because the theatre was finally given sufficient priority and they also had a much larger base infrastructure in Egypt than the Axis had in Libya.
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jasonsnow
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Post by jasonsnow on Apr 8, 2018 22:55:29 GMT
Here actually I would disagree. On the Italian dow the RN moved the Med fleet from Malta to Alexandria since it realised Malta itself was impractical as a fleet base in the event of Italian air attack. Coupled with the loss of France which meant the RN has to take over as the sole allied power in the Med, plus taking precautions against an invasion of Britain the RN was thinly stretched. Given the distance between Malta and Alexandria it was practically impossible to protect against an Italian invasion unless the RN got very lucky and with the Italian control of the air even a success could be very costly. Given the limited defence of the island that existed at the time if the Italians had landed an invasion force within a month or two of their dow they would probably have won fairly quickly. It would have been like the invasion of British Somalia, with the exception that the defenders have no retreat. I have heard that Malta's importance has been overrated. British subs could still have operated in the central Med, albeit with reduced efficiency. Possibly more important the argument goes that Tripoli was the only significant port in Libya. Benghazi and even more so Tobruk were a lot smaller and also closer to British bases in Egypt so were less useful. This meant that the bulk of supplies for Axis forces in N Africa that landed in Tripoli had to be transported to the front, by lorry as there was no railway which was a huge task, each mile of which consumed increasing amounts of petrol that also had to be brought across the Med. This was a major reason why the conflict in N Africa saw such swings. Whenever either side defeated the other the resulting advance took them further from their own supply bases and the defeated enemy nearer to their own. Britain eventually won because the theatre was finally given sufficient priority and they also had a much larger base infrastructure in Egypt than the Axis had in Libya. I saw an article in AH.com which offered a similar explanation to whether Mussolini wasted his efforts attacking Malta. I agree, however, the UK wouldn't let Malta fall to Italian hands anyways. An island in the Med is an island in the Med no matter how many Italian bombers come your way. |
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steffen
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Post by steffen on Apr 9, 2018 9:42:35 GMT
Hi,
to make the italian army "competitive" and their armed forces in general much better you need to change seriously some things.
1.) the italian country was depending on ressources from outside. They lacked nearly everything. Coal, ore, but esp. oil. It wasn´t for nothing that the good warships lay in the ports 99% of their time, it was for the lack of fuel. Also the italian state build to many ships. Reduce these building program to 30%... say 2 Roma-class ships instead of 4, half the heavy cruisers, half the light cruisers... but many more light ships (cheap, diesel-driven asw-ships)...
2.) mussolini need to keep his ego down. He crippled basically the whole army by his "reforms".
3.) the support for franco was very expensive. Reduce it to a saner level, but build lots of "modern" weapons... if the italians also avoid some huge casulties (one time they lost a complete division)... they could come out this war better prepared.
4.) the italian weapon and ammo factories need to expand HUGE, they need to produce more
planes - esp. modern ones
engines - esp. modern ones
guns - the italian army had an excellent artillery, but they lacked mobility
trucks, lorries, railroad stuff
5.) in africa they lacked transports - it is easy to understand that italy could use a much better railroad along the coast from their eastern to their western borders
6.) they also need to enlargen their port facilities...
So, instead of building two 45.000ts-battleships they should have improve their infrastructure - use that money and steel and you should build a track to Bengahsi, then Darna, then Tobruk.
They also should double the loading capacities in all these ports.
For tanks - the italians lacked a usuable tank, they should have known this.
So either build Stugs and mobile artillery-launchers (they had excellent long-range 90mm-guns, perfectly deadly anti-tank guns, put em on outdated tanks and you have a deadly mobile tank-killer-unit... if you use the same 90mm-AA-guns against planes you kill two mosquitos... so even if you do not reach alexandria, you could slaughter the british tanks advancing through the desert.
If you double the output of fiat-trucks, by modernizing their production capabilities, maybe also build in licence german weapons (here the Me109 and later the FW190, but more so the efficent engines - and use em in your BETTER planes (as even the germans agreed to - the G55 was superior to anything the germans had... if you go for better nascelles and wings by using selfproduced german Daimler-engines you have a very competitive fighter plane, that helps to protect your army units...
The next project - a modern twin-engine bomber...
just think about this plot.
Aircraft-industries
the italians understand with their lessons out of spain that they need much better and more modern planes:
so they
a.) buy the JU88, but the non-divebomber-version (early versions)... with them in 1938 you could build a modern fast twinengine bomber with the capability to lift heavy bombs or torpedos in 1940. If you build em in licence you can start in early 40 and - till mid 40 you could start to build 150 a month.
b.) buy the DO217-bomber... a true heavy bomber (for its time) with adequate defence...
c.) as a naval bomber, build the He111 - licence it, build it. It is cheaper and better as the own bombers, the biggest advantage - if you need german help, the same crews that could maintanance the german bombers could also maintanence the italian planes.
d.) for long range cover - buy (cheapish) the licence to build the FW189 Falke... develop the plane and - in 1940/41 you have a world beating long range bomber YOU could sell back to the germans (making money or reduce the licence costs)
e.) build a modern transport plane - or produce the german Ju52... if you can get them, buy the DC3 and produce this. Much better plane...
If you need money, sell early a working air torpedo to the germans, also sell italian naval torpedos... they worked, fiume was long time the heart of torpedo-development. Use this to reduce licencing costs.
Ground base-weapons:
a.) buy the mark-iv-tank, build in a diesel engine, also the use either a 47mm-Anti-Tank-gun or the long 75mm-anti-tank-gun. Maybe also a Stug with the 90mm-AA-gun....
b.) buy some Sdkfz-251 and Sdfz-222-designs, improve em, use them for your desert war. Again, licences, not the weapons itself.
Start in 1937 with the first lessons of the spanish war... deliver stuff the germans need, esp. money.
c.) move your older stuff in significant numbers to east-africa... so you have more spare parts, also some armored units could be handsome here.
naval units:
as mentioned, reduce the expensive ships, maybe even stop the last upgrades of the useless older battleships. These were very expensive and - lack of fuel - the ships itself were useless at all in combat. For artillery support they are usefull enough as they are - maybe remove only the central turret, reducing them to 10x 30,5cm guns, but raise em...
Buy german, american technology, 40mm-bofors for medium AA guns, maybe your own 100mm-AA-guns... but esp. produce more of them. Italy lacked numbers because its weaponary industry was not up to a real war.
Train your crews, esp. for night fighting. Try to get a working radar device either from the british (if you can get em) or the germans... again, licence em and produce em yourself.
Most important, modernize your army infrastructure, but not by doubling the numbers. This reform gutted the quality of the italian army.
Coming 1940 and the german succsess, don´t declare war hasty. So you not loose 50% of your merchant fleet, say they wait and only loose 10%, but the other 40% reach italian or german ports. With these ships you don´t suffer by lack of transport capacity.
Italian subs still will be unsuitable for the atlantic, they will still not be as significant as numbers could mean.
Italian officer corps still will have tons of dead wood...
But if you start your war with a surprise assault on malta - as everybody could know that you need that island to control your lifeline to africa, they could benefit. Say the italians declare war in october 1940, after they prepared for it. They launch a full scale naval/airborne assault on malta and take it - after a bloody but succsessfull campagain, loosing their airdropable capacity for 1 year, 20% of their transport planes (old style), 3 cruisers and 10 destroyers, 20 merchants and 10 subs... that is heavy casulties, but they own malta.
With a working railroad to tobruk (doable), they could cheapish supply their forces till here... in the same time they could have their first two armored divisions working.
with licence build german mark-IV, 1/2 as a infantry tank - with a 75mm short-gun, 1/2 as a tank-killer with either a 50mm-german gun (L50) or a Böhler 47mm-gun and lots of STUGs (italian produced) and Tank-killer - basically mounted 90mm-AA-guns, as armored cars (german ones, but diesels) and 20% more trucks as otl, they could supply their run to alexandria... that could happen in times the british are on their lows - nov/dec 1940, in some costly tank battles at the borders they get stopped, but they also kill the british tanks in the deserts... basically "el-alemain-style", just 2 years earlier.
With a better army they could start their greece-fiasko, it will be slightly better -because their airforce could bomb more efficent...
So comming january 1941 they have
3 comming armored divisions with mark-4-tanks, more supplies, each division with a german style-Sdkfz251 regiment, mobile artillery...
with Malta in italian hands i think we could agree about a massive reduction of ship losses...
i can´t see the italians break through the british defence, but overall the italians do not suffer the huge casulties in africa, in the same time the absessinian forces could significantly hurt the british in this area.
If the italians finally win against greece, it will be propably still with german help , but again less casulties.
Overall morale in italy would be better, their production capacity would be higher.
So more and better italian planes defend their forces in africa, an italian army in russia could be better supplied, better trained and better armed.
In fact if the italians have their "long range-mark-4" tanks, they are suddenly the only ones who have tanks that are able to fight the russian t34...
in the end it doesn´t matter - but the casulties of the allies could raise, the italian army will not be so weak and italian morale would be much higher.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 9, 2018 10:55:51 GMT
Aircraft-industries the italians understand with their lessons out of Spain that they need much better and more modern planes Unfortunately the Regia Aeronautica will no lessons from Spanish Civil War - there was no coordinated air defence over Spain, so aircraft as slow and vulnerable as the Ju52 were viable bombers. The SM.79 was the fastest bomber in its era (it held 26 world records) and a aircraft of great national prestige. Mussolini isn't going to give them up lightly, the SM.81 and CANT Z.1007 maybe. The fact is there was little spare industrial capacity to absorb production of any tanks or aircraft on any scale. As an industrial economy, Italy is only marginally less backward than pre-civil war Spain. Its empire was a space-filling one, occupying territories the French and British had no strategic interest in. |
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steffen
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Post by steffen on Apr 9, 2018 11:23:50 GMT
Aircraft-industries the italians understand with their lessons out of Spain that they need much better and more modern planes Unfortunately the Regia Aeronautica will no lessons from Spanish Civil War - there was no coordinated air defence over Spain, so aircraft as slow and vulnerable as the Ju52 were viable bombers. The SM.79 was the fastest bomber in its era (it held 26 world records) and a aircraft of great national prestige. Mussolini isn't going to give them up lightly, the SM.81 and CANT Z.1007 maybe. The fact is there was little spare industrial capacity to absorb production of any tanks or aircraft on any scale. As an industrial economy, Italy is only marginally less backward than pre-civil war Spain. Its empire was a space-filling one, occupying territories the French and British had no strategic interest in. Hi, i agree - i just tried to answer the question what they SHOULD do... The SM.79 was a dead end, to expensive, to vulnerable and its maintanance was terrible bad. With buying german engines (for fighters), german designs (for simplified replacements with more numbers per month) they could improve their situation. So Do217 as heavy bomber, Ju88 without divebombing capabilities for fast medium bombers, He111 as torpedo-bombers, but also versatile bombers... mass produced and with the possibility to use spare parts from the allied germany. Tanks i went with the mark4, because it is the tank with more evolution space. Italy needs, if it plan a war in africa, a tank that has a long range antitank gun. OTL they suffered badly because the light tanks were basically useless targets. Here they produce themself a tank, with either an uniform 75mm-gun, say L30 (basically a Mark-4-sherman), but with a diesel-engine (i read once that italy went for diesels in tanks) or with the 47mm-Böhler-gun for Antitank-use and a 75mm gun for HE-use (stummel). Airplanes, if they look for a model with interesting performance they could go for the FW-187, it is fast and heavy armed, also it has a good range. So basically the ideal long range superior fighter (that could - with the correct modern engines) destroy most 1941-42-fighters and so protect the bombers... in opposition to the Me110, that is to slow for that. As an italian design it could later be build by the germans... It is no wonderweapon, but it could influence significant the war in the med, a fast (700km/h) long ranged, heavily armed dayfighter, that could shoot down mosquitos, even spitfires (with boom-and-zoom)... compared to biplane-fighters the italians used in that time that is a significant improvement. About the lessons learned from the spanish civil war - i mentioned that the italians would learn the right things out of this...  |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 9, 2018 12:47:21 GMT
i agree - i just tried to answer the question what they SHOULD do... The SM.79 was a dead end, too expensive, too vulnerable and its maintanance was terrible bad. You would need a self-insert into Mussolini, and a willing Italian industry, and a massive industrial expansion in period of economic depression post-1930. Otherwise you will just get "Why do we need the FW187 when we have the Breda Ba.88? Why do we need the Panzer IV when we have the Fiat M13/40?" As far as the fascists are concerned, Italy has industrialised - enough to fight the wars Mussolini envisages fighting. |
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jasonsnow
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Post by jasonsnow on Apr 9, 2018 13:48:28 GMT
Okay okay. Let's say Mussolini's military isn't a bloody disaster and is actually capable of doing things properly. If the Italians conquer Egypt and most importantly, the Suez Canal, that would not only jeopardize Allied positions in Africa and the Mediterranean, but also give Germany access to the oil-rich Middle East and Caucasus region. Wouldn't this alter the course of the war in the Axis' favor?
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steffen
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Post by steffen on Apr 9, 2018 19:52:33 GMT
i agree - i just tried to answer the question what they SHOULD do... The SM.79 was a dead end, too expensive, too vulnerable and its maintanance was terrible bad. You would need a self-insert into Mussolini, and a willing Italian industry, and a massive industrial expansion in period of economic depression post-1930. Otherwise you will just get "Why do we need the FW187 when we have the Breda Ba.88? Why do we need the Panzer IV when we have the Fiat M13/40?" As far as the fascists are concerned, Italy has industrialised - enough to fight the wars Mussolini envisages fighting. I agree 100%. I just try to make the thread starter "happy", without beeing asb. For that the italian industry need superior airplanes, better (much) better engines, usable tanks and a reduced navy (because you need something to sacrifice for such things happening). So i looked in OTL engines, tanks and other stuff the italians could use. The Fw187 was a superior plane with a DB601-engine... its the anwer to many questions. With the nazis not going this way, the italians could ask for them, without much lost faces... The Ju88 with non-divebombing capacity was a plane that could have been started in production in 1938... so it is early enough for the italians to retool their factories.. .it was the superior fast bomber, esp. if the italians reduce AA defence for more speed. Range is okay, but it is faster as the actual italian fighters! Again my idea here is "well, the germans want the "superior" divebombing superplane", the "idiotic italians" only a fast level bomber... so they got the licence for building them, slightly modified (so the Ju88 (it) is maybe a Breda 88nova or what ever. The He111 is a working house, the italians knows the bomber allready from spain. So i thought "well, that is a better plane and cheaper. Lets licence it. Yes, it is stretching reallity quite thin, esp. in dictatorships, but also the democratic states used inferior stuff out of pride. Think about the americans trying to paint the MG42 a bad MG, because it is german. With the Mark4, the same idea. Italy had nil competitive tanks. Period. They should have known this. Why not take the "superior" german mark4, build in an italian gun, italian MG, an italian engine (diesel)... so the mark4 is a modified one... again not build in germany but italy. Otherwise you need even more "hindsight", the italians need to remove all turrets from their light and medium tanks and put a heavy AA gun (90mm) on it. Use em as long distant super-killing antitank gun or AA gun. That is - at last for me - violating the realism even more. OTL the germans compared (in 1943) the G55/G56 with their own planes and accepted that it was SUPERIOR. They critisized the huge manpower per plane, but the plane itself was better as the german products. Here i have a similar idea - use german engines, german guns, partly german fighters (the twin-engine FW187, a plane the germans dropped for the Me110)... so it is another plane the italians could sell itself as "their" plane. No Me109 or FW190, still their good/average monoplane planes, propably with a heavier gun (20mm instead of 12,7mm) or 4 of them instead of 3, such things) The main problems could be solved with a "plan"... take out malta with everything you have in a surprise attack, declare war later. For africa to have a (small) chance to be a win, you need the railroad and enlarged port capabilities, from 1935 on. Otherwise you lack supplies near the frontline. The italians basically copy the german army system in parts (1-2 tank corps with each 2 tank divisions, 2 motorised divisions and mobile artillery) for ONE tank corps in 1941, another one in 1942. To achive this and to make the whole army more mobile, they build more fiat-trucks... they do not loose 50% of the merchant fleet by a hasty declaration of war, they use them more reasonable. there is a window of opportunity, from june 1940 to october 1940, in that italy - with no declaration of war could buy lots of strategic ressources, preparing their invasion. Sure, that is post Fall-Gelb, but if they do the same failures as otl the results are like OTL. The soldiers were brave, but bad equipped, the italian army lacked everything in numbers... their AA guns, their AT-guns were good, the artillery was very good. The officer corps is bad, lots of dead wood you need to remove. But - with some changes, so they produce more stuff and not outdated stuff (so switch to mark4, start the development of an own tank), buy an armored halftrack (SdkfZ 251) to protect the infantry that go with the tanks, later develop an own one (even if there is no "later)) but most important, increase the production capacity pre-war, so you could start building a lot more stuff later... finance it with selling stuff to germany (from september 39 - october 40 you could use the neutral-card). You need a good long range fighter (so the Fw187), a heavy bomber that could be produced in numbers (so the Do217 - with own engines this is no problem) and a decent torpedo-bomber (i think the He111 could be used because it is cheaper) Think about my idea to buy the DC3/Licence it... it is the needed transport plane - the Ju52 need more ressources and has less performance. Overall the scenario is very implausible, but i just try to make it "happen" |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 10, 2018 10:41:11 GMT
Wouldn't this alter the course of the war in the Axis' favour? Yes it would. If the Italians conquer Egypt and most importantly, the Suez Canal But this is alien space battery - a military barely capable of defending Cyrenaica OTL is never going to achieve this. |
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steffen
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Post by steffen on Apr 10, 2018 13:43:37 GMT
Wouldn't this alter the course of the war in the Axis' favour? Yes it would. If the Italians conquer Egypt and most importantly, the Suez Canal But this is alien space battery - a military barely capable of defending Cyrenaica OTL is never going to achieve this. Depends... replace the OTL italian forces and their lacking supply-lines with this - starting in mid 1930. a.) a railroad to tobruk, maybe even to the border (doable... cost money and steel, but if you drop one Roma-class-battleship you have enough money and material). This alone helps the italians because suddenly they only need to move 150km without supplies to reach their goal b.) build a "modern" mechanized corps - as i wrote, replace the bad italian tanks by better ones - here i suggested the Mark4 in two roles (anti-tank with eiter a 50mm-german L60-gun or with the Böhler 47mm-Anti-Tank gun and as infantry-support-tank with 75mm Standard gun (the stummel). c.) modernize the air force, so the standard fighter is a modern monowing plane with adequate weaponary, range and capability. Doing this is easy - just buy german engines that you build on your own. Modern inline engines like DB600er series... if you start early with this, you can produce 150-300 such engines a months in early 1940, rising to 300-500 engines a month in late 1940. Nothing special... to achive b. and c., drop another Roma-class battleship. If you also don´t mess with the structure of italian divisions (as mussolini did) and produce much more guns and ammo - just the actual AA-guns, Antitank-guns, that is enough - you could field a mech corps that is worth its name. So, with enough supplies at the border, with a mech corps you crush the weak british forces in africa (*) and you could reach the channel. (*) with the italians improving their infrastructure in africa, i see more money spent by UK for defence and war materials in egypt. But what do they sacrifice for that? Do they reduce the numbers of pilots trained for fighters? Drop expensive 4-mot-bombers? I doubt that you could defeat the british in egypt, but it isn´t impossible for italy, if they act smart. No wonderweapons needed. |
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jasonsnow
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Post by jasonsnow on Apr 11, 2018 21:13:43 GMT
Yes it would. But this is alien space battery - a military barely capable of defending Cyrenaica OTL is never going to achieve this. Depends... replace the OTL italian forces and their lacking supply-lines with this - starting in mid 1930. a.) a railroad to tobruk, maybe even to the border (doable... cost money and steel, but if you drop one Roma-class-battleship you have enough money and material). This alone helps the italians because suddenly they only need to move 150km without supplies to reach their goal b.) build a "modern" mechanized corps - as i wrote, replace the bad italian tanks by better ones - here i suggested the Mark4 in two roles (anti-tank with eiter a 50mm-german L60-gun or with the Böhler 47mm-Anti-Tank gun and as infantry-support-tank with 75mm Standard gun (the stummel). c.) modernize the air force, so the standard fighter is a modern monowing plane with adequate weaponary, range and capability. Doing this is easy - just buy german engines that you build on your own. Modern inline engines like DB600er series... if you start early with this, you can produce 150-300 such engines a months in early 1940, rising to 300-500 engines a month in late 1940. Nothing special... to achive b. and c., drop another Roma-class battleship. If you also don´t mess with the structure of italian divisions (as mussolini did) and produce much more guns and ammo - just the actual AA-guns, Antitank-guns, that is enough - you could field a mech corps that is worth its name. So, with enough supplies at the border, with a mech corps you crush the weak british forces in africa (*) and you could reach the channel. (*) with the italians improving their infrastructure in africa, i see more money spent by UK for defence and war materials in egypt. But what do they sacrifice for that? Do they reduce the numbers of pilots trained for fighters? Drop expensive 4-mot-bombers? I doubt that you could defeat the british in egypt, but it isn´t impossible for italy, if they act smart. No wonderweapons needed. Egypt was lacking troops by the time Italy attacked. They crappy selves failed, and completely ruined the little things they had going in their favor: number superiority and the lack of trained, straight-from-Britain British troops. Of course it's not impossible, just get yourself a better Italy. However, that's easier said than done. |
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