When should Germany have surrendered?

[Sgt Barker]

Great thread here, by the way. :)

Even with the loss of 300,000 at Dunkirk Britain would have neither negotiated a peace nor been invaded. It wasn’t the balance of ground forces that determined whether or not Sea Lion took place, it was air and sea forces. (Even with the evacuation the balance was heavily German. WWII was a war of equipment, and the evacuees had none to speak of. The real hurt to the Germans from their failure at Dunkirk was in NA, and Italy, and France in 1944, when the trained men that they let go returned to battle.) Those would have been unaffected by a no Dunkirk scenario.

Even if the Battle of Britain had gone against them, the Brits still would not have been successfully invaded in 1940 or 41. The high command was willing and ready to literally sacrifice the entire RAF fighter force and Home Fleet to oppose an invasion. And the German’s ‘winning’ the Battle of Britain (defined as destroying the RAF fighter strength) was physically impossible. Had that been imminent the RAF would have evacuated considerable forces out of range of the Luftwaffe and only committed them when an invasion began. As well the Luftwaffe wasn’t the Japanese air force – their anti-shipping performance would not have been enough to keep the Royal Navy from reaching and pulverizing the shipping being used to support an invasion. At best the German units would have landed and then been completely isolated as their shipping was destroyed. At worst the RN would have actually engaged the landing forces, and the cream of the Wermacht would have died in the Channel.

If the war had dragged on, and Germany had an opportunity to rebuild it’s shattered sea assets then another invasion might have worked. But that begs the question of WWII not turning into WWII, but rather remaining Germany v. Britain for years. Not likely.