Avatar, asymmetric warfare, and US contribution to WW2

[Skybolt]

Agree. WereWolves where the type of die-hards, doing that for things like "let's make a stance", but I doubt anyone, bar the normal percentage of fanatics and "als ob", was REALLY convinced he could win or even make a dent. And, anyway, the more trained of them were quickly recruited as instructors in the various "Stay Behind" organizations. As always happen, after a big war there a lot of deracinèes, losers and winners, that are on hire... and after the WW2 there were an unusually lot of places they could find an employment.

 

[RyanC]

Since we have sort of drifted onto Iran and their economy.

Here is my view:

I think the problem is that all of Iran's money is going to the nuclear and missile programs, neither of which are cheap. I mean, just about anyone can buy a SCUD and mass produce it; and then stretch it by adding a meter or two of length to the missile...but making the jump from a SRBM program to a MRBM program alone is pretty daunting and expensive, much less a full scale ICBM program.

So while the Army and Navy have had some marginal improvements since 1991/1992, it's still a pretty decayed force. Sure, they've modernized as much stuff as possible with night sights, better radios etc but there really is no money for serious military modernization.

If they didn't want nukes that bad; they'd have the money to buy quite a pile of stuff. The bomb program is at least a billion bucks a year; and that'd buy quite a few modern SAM battalions and tank battalions; making them a threat conventionally.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

Speaking of Iraq, it makes me wonder if there ever was a realistic chance for the SS-led Werwolf guerillas to make a difference, after Germany's defeat. ???

The difference is those Germans who could have become an insurgent force after the surrender had already fought to their deaths in 1945 against the advancing allies. In Iraq they gave up the day the war started. Also the damage to the civilian infrastructure in Germany was far more intense than in Iraq. Most German cities had been burnt out, millions killed and tens of millions more were homeless. Then there were tens of millions of non Germans within Germany and not just the occupation Armies but also the former slave labourers. Finally the Nazis just didn’t prepare for a post war occupation. It was Hitler’s strategy that all Germans should fight to death and those civilians survive to die in a ditch if they lost the war. While it’s simple enough to write the word “were-wolf” it’s a lot harder to establish a cellular structure, train thousands of Germans in tactics for use after occupation and distribute hides of weapons. In Iraq however they planned extensively for a “Somalia” type occupation after the US invasion.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

Quite the lively topic, I was wondering what James Cameron was referring to
when he meant that the crew of the ISV Venture Star is protected by the following means; "protects the cargo and crew modules from the engines' heat and radiation using the simple rule of r-squared attenuation rather than heavy shielding"

R-Squared in statistics measures how well a regression or approximation matches actual data. In reference to the Avatar space ship is he trying to say that the ship reflects heat from the engine away from the payload rather than shielding it?

Anyway, thanks for the links:

But Cameron insisited that in the future, there will be super-efficient propellers.

This was the point in which I should have stopped reading…

But after reading those three articles a few things about Avatar’s vision of the future is clear:

1. On screen appearance was the driving force behind all Avatar design objectives.
2. Despite this James Cameron thinks he’s some kind of future technology visionary.
3. Even though James Cameron has little or no idea of technology, biology, economics and the future all his staff suck up to him immensely and they validate his opinion by 1.

 

[mz]

r squared refers to radius squared. A rather complicated way to say it's attenuated by distance. If you double the distance, the radiation dose per surface area drops to one quarter (because the surface area of the sphere where the radiation is distributed quadruples).

 

[quellish]

But after reading those three articles a few things about Avatar’s vision of the future is clear:

1. On screen appearance was the driving force behind all Avatar design objectives.
2. Despite this James Cameron thinks he’s some kind of future technology visionary.
3. Even though James Cameron has little or no idea of technology, biology, economics and the future all his staff suck up to him immensely and they validate his opinion by 1.

1. Well, it wasn't a documentary.
2. As far as I am aware, the only technology he has worked on has been related to creating entertainment. In that he has pushed the state of the art several times.
3. I know many people who have worked for/with him (his production company and former effects shop are near my home), and I can tell you this is not true.

But yay, on topic-ness!

 

[Abraham Gubler]

r squared refers to radius squared. A rather complicated way to say it's attenuated by distance. If you double the distance, the radiation dose per surface area drops to one quarter (because the surface area of the sphere where the radiation is distributed quadruples).

And therein lies the great whopping internal inconsistency in the Avatar story:

If the economy of earth is so big and efficient that it can build very large space ships (near light speeds, r2 attenuation, big rooms to float in, etc) then why do they need this “unobtanium” only found on another planet? Even without access to this raw material we can build the most expensive and difficult machines (the space ship) with earth legacy raw materials which are found abundantly everywhere else in the solar system if we happen to run out of them on earth. So where is the demand for “unobtanium” that drives the motivation of the story?

But of course trying to suspend disbelief for a story with such throw away premises as “naturally occurring carbon fibre arrow heads” and so in is probably more stupid than thinking all this crap up in the first place.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

1. Well, it wasn't a documentary.

Of course not. But fiction has tolerances for suspension of disbelief. Obviously here at a gathering place like secretprojects most people are interested in science and rationalism as opposed to myth and romanticism.

This is what makes Avatar so disappointing for this kind of audience because it’s a story predicated on themes of science yet realized at every point and detail through romanticism. It’s like going to a New Age Psychics Conference and hearing talk after talk about the scientific method and the observable nature of the universe.

But yay, on topic-ness!

War, economics, insurgency? That’s all on topic…

 

[mz]

r squared refers to radius squared. A rather complicated way to say it's attenuated by distance. If you double the distance, the radiation dose per surface area drops to one quarter (because the surface area of the sphere where the radiation is distributed quadruples).

And therein lies the great whopping internal inconsistency in the Avatar story:

If the economy of earth is so big and efficient that it can build very large space ships (near light speeds, r2 attenuation, big rooms to float in, etc) then why do they need this “unobtanium” only found on another planet? Even without access to this raw material we can build the most expensive and difficult machines (the space ship) with earth legacy raw materials which are found abundantly everywhere else in the solar system if we happen to run out of them on earth. So where is the demand for “unobtanium” that drives the motivation of the story?

But of course trying to suspend disbelief for a story with such throw away premises as “naturally occurring carbon fibre arrow heads” and so in is probably more stupid than thinking all this crap up in the first place.

That r2 attenuation just means the reactor and living quarters are separated by a large distance. I missed that early part of the movie so don't know exactly how the spaceship looks but I'd assume it's some kind of spinning tether thingy with the hab on one end and the reactor at the other. Or at least a boom-pod system or a tractor with long cables, or some other solution that enables a long distance separation of two parts. Most radioactive spaceships are designed in this style, as distance is cheap and light compared to shielding.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

That r2 attenuation just means the reactor and living quarters are separated by a large distance.

Yeah it is and there is a picture of it in one of those links ASMCI provided above. But building a big, long spaceship implies large scale orbital production and mass scale surface to orbit transfer. Now if humanity can acheive these things without "unobtanium" why do we need it?

 

[mz]

To reduce its resource intensity? It seems the plot device is that unobtainium (UK English spelling? It was translated as "smart metal" here which doesn't make much sense to me) makes storing antimatter easier.
Firstly, storing antimatter and then secondly also making its annihilation energy into a useful form are the biggest hurdles to interstellar travel now.

If you could store antimatter easily, a lot of assumptions would change. You could perhaps carry such large amounts of energy that higher speed trips would become possible. A bootsrapping process with Pandora - first send something conventional at great effort, then bring back a little unobtainium and produce faster ships and bring back it in increasing amounts.

I'm not saying the movie makes everything right or believable but it at least paid some attention to things. which is more than most scifi flicks.

The shuttle's angular shape, intakes, space shuttle colors (it felt as if they just copied some parts of the real STS orbiter at random?) and use as a low altitude snail pace bomb truck indeed was weird. Maybe they had such primitive explosives that they had to be dropped from low altitude and speed...

 

[Hammer Birchgrove]

Are you referring to RAF's planned "Tiger Force"? The atom bombs made it moot.

Pfff. The atom bombs came at the *end* of the war. Where were the RAF bombers and Royal Marines in all the battles leading up to that? Did they somehow get written out of the histories of Wake Island, Guadalcanal, Iwo Jima, Saipan and all the rest... or were they simply not there?

Fact is, they weren't there. And for good reason: it wasn't their war. Just as Europe was not America's war. And yet, America decided to fight first and foremost in Europe.

Good points; the "Germany First" strategy was agreed by both Churchill and Roosevelt.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

Pfff. The atom bombs came at the *end* of the war. Where were the RAF bombers and Royal Marines in all the battles leading up to that? Did they someho w get written out of the histories of Wake Island, Guadalcanal, Iwo Jima, Saipan and all the rest... or were they simply not there?

Fact is, they weren't there. And for good reason: it wasn't their war. Just as Europe was not America's war. And yet, America decided to fight first and foremost in Europe.

They were there and it was their war just as Europe was America’s war.

Firstly the British Pacific Fleet of around 10 capital ships (fleet carriers and battleships) was in action off Japan alongside the USN in 1945. Secondly the Pacific War wasn’t just the islands campaign. The British and Indians took on the Japanese Army in Burma and Western India which was vital for keeping China in the war as it was the rear of their lines of communication. This was the battlefield that engaged most of the Japanese Army. Without it all those US Marines would have had to face 2-3 times the numbers of defenders in each of those islands. By 1945 the British forces were driving the Japanese out of South East Asia. VietNam was occupied by the British Army before the French were let back in and the Americans got involved there.

Also at this time one can’t mention Australia and Britain as separate entities. Are you arguing that Australia – not to mention New Zealand, Fiji, etc – was not involved in the Pacific campaign? If the despicable Australian appeasers of Japan had gotten their way in 1940 and 41 and Australia sat out the Pacific War they would still be speaking Japanese across the west Pacific.

Now to this idea that America had no need to fight Germany. Even in the 1930s and 40s the world was an interconnected place. Without Europe America would have no market and united and aggressive it would be a terrible threat to America. The German’s entire grand strategy was predicated on making Germany equal to America by subjugating their European rivals and acquiring a ‘wild west’ of raw materials and farming surpluses over the top of central and eastern Europe. Apart from any moral desire to sustain the two great European democracies defeating Nazi Germany was very much in the self interest of America. Long term it was far more important than defeating Japan who never had the potential to be anything other than a short term threat.

All this stuff that happened in the past, it happened for good reason. It’s only by being ignorant of hugely important facts that we can shape the past into some incongruity that is used to support some contemporary position. Like the nonsense of the USA ‘saving’ Europe in WW2 therefore Europe should help the USA invade Iraq!

 

[Orionblamblam]

Pfff. The atom bombs came at the *end* of the war. Where were the RAF bombers and Royal Marines in all the battles leading up to that? Did they someho w get written out of the histories of Wake Island, Guadalcanal, Iwo Jima, Saipan and all the rest... or were they simply not there?

Fact is, they weren't there. And for good reason: it wasn't their war. Just as Europe was not America's war. And yet, America decided to fight first and foremost in Europe.

They were there ...

The were at Iwo Jima???

Firstly the British Pacific Fleet of around 10 capital ships (fleet carriers and battleships) was in action off Japan alongside the USN in 1945.

Was that before or after the defeat of Germany? I seem to recall the RN being somewhat bigger than ten capital ships...

Now to this idea that America had no need to fight Germany.

There was no *need.* The Russians would've kept the Germans tied in knots for years. A good strategy could have been devised to supply the Russians with arms and equipment at just the right rates to keep a stalemate going for *decades.* If the US government had somehow known that post-war would have led to a Soviet Union that would dominate much of Europe and Asia and threaten mankind with actual nuclear extinction, "American interests" would have been best served by letting the Europeans slaughter themselves back to the stone age.

Yes, yes, all very bloody-minded and "evil." yet this has been basic practice around the world ever since some pre-Sumerian tribal chief first thought of the idea of setting one enemy at another enemies throat. It's been going on quite recently as well (using Iraq to pound the hell out of Iran, frex), and people don't get too upset about it. But suggest that this be done to Europeans and suddenly people get the vapors. Don't kid yourself that if some major - or even not so major - world power today got the idea that they could set the US upon someone else, or upon itself, and that they'd be able to move into the vacuum and profit from it, that they wouldn't give it a shot.

Like the nonsense of the USA ‘saving’ Europe in WW2 therefore Europe should help the USA invade Iraq!

Oh, on that we're agreed. Europe should've helped the US invade Iraq not because of WWII, but because it was the right thing to do, for reasons not the least of which being pure self interest.

 

[SOC]

Abraham Gubler - I have read histories of WWII by D'Este, Churchill, Victor Davis Hanson, John Keegan, Eisenhower, Anthony Beevor, Andrew Roberts, Martin Gilbert and Fuller and have to say I have never read anything that even resembles your interpretation of events.

Is that the same Keegan who ended up in the intelligence community and proved how not to do intelligence analysis? Not judging what he might have written back than (which I haven't read), just wondering since I saw the name. Anyway, if you want two more really interesting historical looks at some of the events of WWII, you should find Guderian's Panzer Leader (and no, that's not some weird English translation of Achtung! Panzer, which is also awesome) and The Rommell Papers. Both of them are really good reads.

[quote author=orionblamblam]While it's true that in the long run substnatially more should ahve been done WRT Saddam after Gulf War I, it's not clear that Bush *could* have done much more.[/quote]

There was also the issue of Saudi Arabia. Sunni Saudi could tolerate Sunni Saddam ruling majority Shia Iraq. They didn't want to risk Shia Iran exerting influence over Iraq were Saddam taken down back then.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

The were at Iwo Jima???

Was the US at Arakan, Kokoda? Come on this is a fools game mentioning different battles across the battlespace. The US had a minimal presence in the South-East Asian theatre (US lingo: CBI) and the British had a minimal presence in the North Pacific theatre. Anyway it was certainly US politics that kept the final islands campaigns to US only forces. Australia wanted to deploy three divisions to the invasions of Philippines and/or Okinawa but American refused wanting to keep it all American. So we invaded Borneo instead for whatever it was worth.

Was that before or after the defeat of Germany? I seem to recall the RN being somewhat bigger than ten capital ships...

The BPF was deployed in 1944 and was in battle before the German surrender. As to its size it was pretty much the entire first line RN battle fleet. They didn’t bother deploying clapped out battleships built in 1914 because they would have been more of a hindrance than an aide. Certainly all of the RN’s carriers were deployed with the European presence been made up of escort carriers and fleet carriers in their post delivery work ups.

There was no *need.* The Russians would've kept the Germans tied in knots for years. A good strategy could have been devised to supply the Russians with arms and equipment at just the right rates to keep a stalemate going for *decades.* If the US government had somehow known that post-war would have led to a Soviet Union that would dominate much of Europe and Asia and threaten mankind with actual nuclear extinction, "American interests" would have been best served by letting the Europeans slaughter themselves back to the stone age.

I don’t think that strategy would have worked nor would it have been in America’s best interest. Without a rapidly recovered Europe via the end of the war and the Marshall Plan there would be no export markets for American goods. There wouldn’t have been a 1950s boom in America with only a domestic market to feed. Rebuilding Europe and Japan in the 1950s and 60s is as good as business as building India and China is now.

But if the USA had decided not to get involved in the European WW2 then it probably wouldn’t have had too much of an effect on the final outcome except the USA would never have been a superpower. Without the US focusing so intently on destroying Nazi Germany as they did I doubt the Japanese would have taken the risk of attacking the US in ’41. They may have had a more localized attack against the Anglo-Dutch colonies or against the Soviet Union but neither would have been majorly significant to the outcome of the war in Europe and then it would have been their turn.

As to Europe as long as the USA maintained the cash and carry policy the UK would have kept up the orders to sustain themselves and the Soviet Union through to the final defeat of Germany. It would have indebted the UK but they would have been able to raise the money after their cash reserves ran out. This would have meant pretty much the same final outcome but due to the British limit in manpower the Invasion of France would have been on a smaller scale or in Norway. But the RAF still would have fire bombed the Germans to homlessness and the Red Army would have crushed their field army.

Post war the settlement would have been more Orwellian with all of Germany under the Soviets and a new Anglo-French alliance on the edge of western Europe. With a rampart Soviet Union in Germany, no cross Rhine coal-steel alliance and being totally reliant on the UK France would have been very much focused on a new Maginot mentality. With heavy debts and no access to German reparations and very unlikely the Soviets would have paid their share the UK probably would have held onto the empire and austerity measures for a generation or two or forever to pay them off. The USA would not have had the consumer revolution of the 1950s and certainly no global first world post war baby boom and 1960s cultural revolution.

Oh, on that we're agreed. Europe should've helped the US invade Iraq not because of WWII, but because it was the right thing to do, for reasons not the least of which being pure self interest.

LOL, that’s probably true. But alls well that ends well...

 

[Abraham Gubler]

Anyway, if you want two more really interesting historical looks at some of the events of WWII, you should find Guderian's Panzer Leader (and no, that's not some weird English translation of Achtung! Panzer, which is also awesome) and The Rommell Papers. Both of them are really good reads.

They are but also very misleading. Both men (or their former aides de camp defending their reputations) are very self serving in their attempt to justify why they lost the war. Probably not as bad as Speer’s self persevering propaganda nonsense (it did save his life) but pretty bad. The major problem with western post war understanding is it relied too much on the Germans self-serving perspective influenced by anti-Soviet propaganda. Then came the unstoppable bulldozer of Hollywood to re-write history via volume. It’s only in recent years that the real historians who troll through the archives and look at the things the players wanted to omit that we start to get a much better viewpoint of what actually happened appearing in print.

 

[Orionblamblam]

The US had a minimal presence in the South-East Asian theatre (US lingo: CBI) and the British had a minimal presence in the North Pacific theatre.

And thus accusing the US of not being involved in WWII is in serious error. "the Americans managed to avoid most of these crucial battles that decided the outcome of WW2" is a statement that displays the horrendous Euro-centric view of WWII that far too many people (including non-Europeans) have. I've seen quite a number of news articles in the past few days talking about VE-Day and how it was the "end of the Second World War," when in fact it was merely the end of one theater of it, just as the defeat of Iraq was merely more-or-less the end of one theater of WWIV.

I don’t think that strategy would have worked nor would it have been in America’s best interest. Without a rapidly recovered Europe via the end of the war and the Marshall Plan were would be the export markets for American goods?

The rest of the world.

But if the USA had decided not to get involved in the European WW2 then it probably wouldn’t have had too much of an effect on the final outcome except the USA would never have been a superpower. Without the US focusing so intently on destroying Nazi Germany as they did I doubt the Japanese would have taken the risk of attacking the US in ’41.

Errr... the US didn't "focus intently upon destroying Nazi Germany" until *after* the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

Post war the settlement would have been more Orwellian with all of Germany under the Soviets...

Had the western allies let the socialists battle it out amongst themselves, the post-war period would have seen a massively depleted Soviet Union. Their occupation of Germany would have been akin to Mexico occupying Iraq, at best.

The USA would not have had the consumer revolution of the 1950s and certainly no global first world post war baby boom and 1960s cultural revolution.

With an entirely exhausted Europe, the risk of Soviet nuclear annihilation would have been averted. Making some cash is generally not held in as high esteem as avoiding extinction. Additionally, with the Soviets tied up with Germany and the US *not* tied up in Europe, Mao could have been turned into yet another minor footnote in history. With the European colonies freed from the Europeans, India, the Middle East, China and the rest could well have served the same cash-cow function for the US that Europe did.

Additionally, a Europe where the war didn't end until the 1950's would have been thoroughly exhausted in willpower and manpower. Perfect for the combined American/Australian/Canadian/Chinese/Indian forces to move in, take over and turn the joint into a colony. It'd be interesting to see the Indians take over Buckingham Palace and turn it into a shrine to Vishnu; the Aussies invade Italy and overturn the local cuisine and enforce Vegemite; the Chinese set up shop in Paris; and probably set up a Canadian military governor over Germany and the former Soviet Union, to enforce Canuck civility norms on 'em.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

And thus accusing the US of not being involved in WWII is in serious error. "the Americans managed to avoid most of these crucial battles that decided the outcome of WW2" is a statement that displays the horrendous Euro-centric view of WWII that far too many people (including non-Europeans) have.

It’s not Euro centric but rather chronological and economic centric. In case you haven’t noticed the war had been going on for a good two and a bit years (or more) before the Japs attacked in SE Asia and Hawaii. It went on for another year or two in Europe before American forces started to play a role. During that time the Germans were defeated.

Also the importance of the Pacific campaign to the economic inputs to the war were minimal. Did Japan’s attack disrupt the American, British and Soviet war economies in any noticeable way? Did it provide a major boost to the war economies of the Axis nations? Nope to both. At the best it provided the Japanese with more fuel reserves to sail their navy a bit more before eventual obliteration.

The rest of the world.

LOL, what were they going to pay the USA with? The rest of the world in 1945 was central and south America. While Africa and Asia may have looked separate on a map they were all controlled from Europe. And even the colonies and client states lacked economies of much note. A peasant farmer is not going to be able to buy a truck or a TV from you even if you are willing to take payment in kind.

Errr... the US didn't "focus intently upon destroying Nazi Germany" until *after* the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

Ahh sorry all those orders for weapons that the US military was facilitating for the UK and SU. All those anti U-boat combat patrols of the Navy. All those Americans serving in British uniforms after nudge and wink transfers… in 41 (well before Pearl Harbour) they even started serving openly in US uniforms. The Bismarck was found by an American built plane, flown by a serving US Naval officer despite it having British insignia painted on the side. Why did the USN redeploy the best elements of its Pacific Fleet into the Atlantic in 1940/41? Why was the USG so heavily focused on events in Europe… Roosevelet said all that stuff about “arsenals of democracy” and so on well before the Japanese were a threat. Even the US militaries huge build up was focused on weapons to fight in Europe.

Had the western allies let the socialists battle it out amongst themselves, the post-war period would have seen a massively depleted Soviet Union. Their occupation of Germany would have been akin to Mexico occupying Iraq, at best.

LOL, the Nazis were as un-Socialist as the Soviets! But in case you didn’t notice the UK and France were already in the war before the Soviets were forced into it. But the Soviets did occupy Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Romania, etc. If they had to do it all again but with western Germany added to it things wouldn’t have changed too much for their post war recovery. Probably a lot better with more Germans to exploit.

With an entirely exhausted Europe, the risk of Soviet nuclear annihilation would have been averted. Making some cash is generally not held in as high esteem as avoiding extinction. Additionally, with the Soviets tied up with Germany and the US *not* tied up in Europe, Mao could have been turned into yet another minor footnote in history.

What nuclear annihilation? There would be no Manhattan Project without a US desire to be involved in the war so nuclear bomb development would be at a much lower priority and tentative commitment. Maybe nuclear bombs would be developed in the 1950s or 60s and most likely by the UK. Britannia rules the Atoms!

As to US being free to do their will with the rest of the world? What with? Without a desire to be involved in the war in Europe there is no build up of the US military. The USN can’t dictate policy in China.

With the European colonies freed from the Europeans, India, the Middle East, China and the rest could well have served the same cash-cow function for the US that Europe did.

They wouldn’t be freed because the Europeans are not going away. And they can’t be a cash-cow if they have no cash.

Additionally, a Europe where the war didn't end until the 1950's would have been thoroughly exhausted in willpower and manpower.

Ha, ha. Now you’re beginning to sound like James Cameron.

 

[Orionblamblam]

conquering a depopulated Germany? Had the war dragged on till the 50's, there'd be a lot fewer of each population. The best and brightest of both would either be dead, or done their damnedest to hightail the hell out of there.

With an entirely exhausted Europe, the risk of Soviet nuclear annihilation would have been averted. Making some cash is generally not held in as high esteem as avoiding extinction. Additionally, with the Soviets tied up with Germany and the US *not* tied up in Europe, Mao could have been turned into yet another minor footnote in history.

What nuclear annihilation? There would be no Manhattan Project without a US desire to be involved in the war so nuclear bomb development would be at a much lower priority and tentative commitment.[/quote]


I suspect if you re-read the exchange, you'll realize that you're making my point for me here.

As to US being free to do their will with the rest of the world? What with? Without a desire to be involved in the war in Europe there is no build up of the US military.

The US military was already building up prior to Pearl Harbor. Had we stayed out of Europe, we'd still have tangled with the Japanese, since they brought the war to us. We would have focussed on the Japanese, defeating them somewhat earlier. We probably would have gotten to the shores of Japan earlier, and the Manhattan Project (which would ahve gone ahead regardless of whether we moved on Germany) might have taken a little longer, with the result that there'd be a massive bloodbath of an invasion of Japan. If it turned into a disaster, once nukes were available we probably would ahve pulled back a bit and pasted the joint till it glowed in the dark.

The USN can’t dictate policy in China.

Had the bulk of the US military been in the Pacific, and America's interest directed at Asia rather than Europe, and especilly if we'd gotten to Operation Downfall a year or so earlier, there'd almost certainly be US troops in China fighting the Japanese. So hopefully Mao and his merry band of genocidal murderers would have either been rendered moot, or at least strung up.

They wouldn’t be freed because the Europeans are not going away. And they can’t be a cash-cow if they have no cash.

And what would be the condition of the European colonial powers if the Germans remain a militarily dominant force through the 1940's? And the colonies *were* cahs cows. otherwise they wouldn't have been colonies. They just replaced "cash" with stuff like "oil."

Ha, ha. Now you’re beginning to sound like James Cameron.

Now you're just getting nasty.

 

[amsci99]

Anyway, thanks for the links

Abraham,

You are most welcome and thanks for the explanantion which cleared up a lot of things. Btw, what do you and fellow forum members think of the coaxial rotors employed on the Scorpion/RDA gunships. What advantages would it offer within a ducted fan set up? Again I have a feeling that it might be sci-fi wishful thinking again.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

conquering a depopulated Germany? Had the war dragged on till the 50's, there'd be a lot fewer of each population. The best and brightest of both would either be dead, or done their damnedest to hightail the hell out of there.

Well I don’t think the war would have gone on until the 1950s. Germany just didn’t have it in them with or without a USA military involvement. The Red Army would have still advanced into Germany by 1945 and the RAF would have still firebombed all their cities in 43, 44, 45. Without the diversion of RAF bomber command away from Germany in mid 44 to support Overlord they would have done even more damage. Strategically the USAAF bomber force was not doing much damage to Germany until they started to support RAF fire bombing. And all those American trucks that provided the Soviets with logistic mobility would still be there just their receipts would have been lodged in the City of London for payment due.

In the greater scheme of things the German divisions destroyed in France were pretty minor compared to what was going on in the Eastern Front. The best thing the western allies did apart from strategic air against the Germans in 44 and 45 is unleash their fighters onto German skies. But all those Mustangs would still be there over Germany destroying Me 109s and strafing everyone that moved in 44 and 45 without the USAAF because they would be built for the RAF and flown by the many spare pilots the EATS was producing at this time.

I would imagine the difference would be no Overlord in 44 but something similar without the heavy resistance in mid 45 (the Germans would have no fuel) as the Red Army takes Berlin. The British and Soviet Armies meet on the Rhine and the Brenner Pass with the Germans left to the fate that the Russians determine for them. The British forces liberate France, the low countries and Norway. Denmark I’m afraid would join the Baltics and Central European nations behind the Iron Curtain.

I suspect if you re-read the exchange, you'll realize that you're making my point for me here.

But Europe does not end the war much different to that it did in real life. The primary difference, apart form the stop line of the various allied armies, is like the end of WW1 the UK owes the USA a lot of money. A fair bit of this debt would be passed onto France and those countries that are liberated by the UK. Italy would also be flogged with lots of reparations but would consider itself lucky it didn’t end up under Soviet control. But the UK would then have to pay it off. But they did so after WW1 and could do so again if they had to. It would just mean a lot less economic growth and comfort for British subjects. I also argue that it would probably mean no independence for the colonies as they are flogged to provide more low cost resources to generate goods to pay off the American lenders.

The US military was already building up prior to Pearl Harbor. Had we stayed out of Europe, we'd still have tangled with the Japanese, since they brought the war to us.

But this is a case of having your cake and eating it to. The USA only builds up its forces because the President wants to fight the Germans. The Navy was already on establishment (in peace time) to counter the Japanese and it was only when the USA started to get heavily enmeshed in the European conflict that the Japanese started to think they could get away with a way against the USA. So if the USA is unwilling to be involved in the European War there would be no major program to build up the Army, Air Forces and Navy. The later was called the “Two Ocean Navy Act” so the USN could counter the Japanese while still fighting Germany and was passed as a response to the fall of France in 1940.

Now without the US being willing to fight in Europe then there would still be huge armaments expansion in the US but it would be in the main for the UK and France and then later the Soviet Union (on the UK’s account). The capacity would not be as great as if the US was planning on being an active belligerent but it would still be huge enough to give an undistracted USA the potential to easily defeat Japan so they wouldn’t have gambled that way. The Japanese were quite conservative in their pre war decision making (they just appointed radicals to run the war) and without a belligerent USA placing oil blockades and the like they wouldn’t need to fight.

Had the bulk of the US military been in the Pacific, and America's interest directed at Asia rather than Europe, and especilly if we'd gotten to Operation Downfall a year or so earlier, there'd almost certainly be US troops in China fighting the Japanese. So hopefully Mao and his merry band of genocidal murderers would have either been rendered moot, or at least strung up.

That war and those forces just wouldn’t exist. With an isolationist USA Japan doesn’t have to attack the Philippines and Hawaii to attack the Dutch East Indes which had the oil they were looking for (if they even needed it). They could just sail past the Philippines with no doubt the USN incensed but powerless to intervene without USG approval.

And what would be the condition of the European colonial powers if the Germans remain a militarily dominant force through the 1940's? And the colonies *were* cahs cows. otherwise they wouldn't have been colonies. They just replaced "cash" with stuff like "oil."

The colonies were only cash cows if you were resource poor Europe. They had little to offer the USA with its own domestic sources of abundant resources. What’s the USA going to do with Africa and Asian cotton, grain and ore? Put its own people out of work?

Ha, ha. Now you’re beginning to sound like James Cameron.

Now you're just getting nasty.

Yep definitely a below the belt hit, I withdraw it and apologise. Besides he must’n believe in cause and effect because of the Terminator franchise… You blow the evil computer up in the past before it can be developed and still comes back to nuke you ten years later.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

You are most welcome and thanks for the explanantion which cleared up a lot of things. Btw, what do you and fellow forum members think of the coaxial rotors employed on the Scorpion/RDA gunships. What advantages would it offer within a ducted fan set up? Again I have a feeling that it might be sci-fi wishful thinking again.

Ducted fans tend to be about 20% more efficient in producing thrust from torque than conventional propellers/rotors thanks to the effect of the duct. But the Avatar design doesn’t look like it is an actual duct as opposed to a cosmetic rim around the rotors. A duct would have to be deeper for the size of the rotor disc.

The Avatar ‘duct’ design sort of looks like it would be tip powered? That is the rotors in the ducts don’t spin by provision of torque to their hub but they spin by force applied at their tips in contact with the duct. I say this because the thing that joins the hub to the duct looks flat and not round like a shaft and because the ducted fans tilt any gear box arrangement from the fuselage mounted engines would be very complex.

What am I saying! They just designed the thing to look cool with no concern for the engineering. It’s just bogus eye candy. And some of the tilting of the rotors in flight: It’s pretty extreme stuff and yet the aircraft keeps on moving forward with only a slight adjustment in attitude.

 

[Orionblamblam]

Well I don’t think the war would have gone on until the 1950s.

It can if the US in this alternate timeline plays its cards right... supply the Russians here, drop a dime on the Russians to the Germans there. Play both sides against each other.

But this is a case of having your cake and eating it to. The USA only builds up its forces because the President wants to fight the Germans.

Despite what Obama may think, the President is not the King. FDR can want to fight the Germans all he wants. But the fact of the matter is, the US did not declare war on Germany untill after they declared war on us first. Had they not done so... it would've been hard to justify a US declaration of war against Germany when the US populace didn;t really care that much about Europe, but did care about Japan. Plus, as already mentioned this is an alternate reality where the US knows what a nuclear monster the USSR will become, and thus is quite interested in *not* speeding up the defeat of Germany.

The Navy was already on establishment (in peace time) to counter the Japanese and it was only when the USA started to get heavily enmeshed in the European conflict that the Japanese started to think they could get away with a way against the USA.

As has been pointed out to you, the US did not get "heavily enmeshed" in Europe until well after Pearl Harbor. Selling stuff? That's what we *do* (or *did*, at any rate).

Now without the US being willing to fight in Europe then there would still be huge armaments expansion in the US but it would be in the main for the UK and France and then later the Soviet Union (on the UK’s account).

No, it would be for kicking Japan's ass.

The colonies were only cash cows if you were resource poor Europe. They had little to offer the USA with its own domestic sources of abundant resources. What’s the USA going to do with Africa and Asian cotton, grain and ore?

How about African gold, oil and uranium? How about Indian and Chinese intellect? Sure, their countires were backwards and low-tech... but then, so essentially was Europe. And we spent a lot of money to build *them* up. Who's to say that in this other world where Europe has fought itself stupid, with the US doing it's part to make sure that the USSR loses as much as it possibly can, that a "Marshall Plan" for India, say, couldn't have jumped them ahead a few decades? The Chinese have managed to jump themselves far ahead of where they once were, and they used socialism and the point of a gun (but I repeat myself) to do it... had free enterprise and market forces been used instead, they'd've been decades ahead decades earlier.

And so by now, the US and the Chinese would have abandoned the Earth That Was to the savages in feral Europe, and taken a joint colonization mission to the stars.

Yeah...

 

[Abraham Gubler]

As has been pointed out to you, the US did not get "heavily enmeshed" in Europe until well after Pearl Harbor. Selling stuff? That's what we *do* (or *did*, at any rate).

Repeating a statement does not give it anymore credence. The US was doing a lot more than just selling stuff to the Allies before Pearl Harbour. I would consider escorting British convoys from Canada to the UK and in the process attacking and being attacked by U Boats months before Pearl Harbour to be a little bit more than standing on the side of the conflict. I mentioned before the US personnel on secondment who also flew on active service all before Pearl Harbour. They wore their own insignia sewn onto RAF uniforms.

And this is just the direct participation. The US provided immense military aide to the Allies including personnel to operate ferry command, recruitment in the USA and of course the support to armaments purchases. Then the USA also prohibited sales to the Axis and froze their assets in America, long before declerations of war. And Lend-Lease started in March 1941, months before Pearl Harbour. This isn’t America selling stuff to whomever wants to buy it.

 

[bobbymike]

Abraham Grubler - You are making statements based on pure speculation and you state them as if they are fact. If the US wasn't in Europe then the Soviet's still would have been in Berlin in 1945, Overlord would still happen but smaller or in Norway and there are too many other examples to list. Did not Britain and her ally Canada try Normandy - Dieppe - and it did not go very well.

Operation Torch was in November 1942 so US involvement really began then (yes that's North Africa but the purpose was the Med and Southern Europe. Besides how many German divisions ended up stuck in Southern France and Italy. Britain did not have the man power to threaten the "soft underbelly" and do anything in Normandy or elsewhere. That means divisions could have been shifted elsewhere.

I have read a few alternate histories that say on page after page "if this happened, then that would happen or this and then that" it is all informed speculation nothing else. One history had Hitler sending Rommel 10 more divisions in which he conquered the entire Middle East and eventually up through Turkey into the USSR all nicely laid out by a professor of military history from Sandhurst (I am going from memory because I can't find the book)

The problem with your methodology is that it is completely unprovable and therefore trying to refute it is a waste of time. I'm not being critical it may very well be informed speculation, but it is speculation.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

but it is speculation.

 

[bobbymike]

AG - Maybe I missed it in your run-on posts but please quote me where you say "I may just be speculating". So if by your "DUH" comment to me are you then saying you were purely speculating and therefore everything you have posted is no better than, as Norman Schwartzkopf said, bovine scatology?

 

[Abraham Gubler]

You are making statements based on pure speculation and you state them as if they are fact.

I’m sorry that the bleedingly obvious isn’t good enough for you and I shall endeavour to insert allegedly or speculatively at the beginning of every sentence from now on… (Not!)

Did not Britain and her ally Canada try Normandy - Dieppe - and it did not go very well.

You clearly have a low level of understanding of these battles so probably should not be trying to engage in this attempt at frustration. Dieppe was a raid to practice amphibious assault techniques. That it ended in disaster ensured that Overlord did not.

Operation Torch was in November 1942 so US involvement really began then (yes that's North Africa but the purpose was the Med and Southern Europe.

You know Australia occupied a few French Vichy countries during WW2 (Lebanon, Syria, South Paficic) but we don’t make a big deal out of it. Because it wasn’t a big deal. Americans should do the same for Operation Torch – which BTW was a joint UK-US operation. The main thrust of the North African campaign was in the east between the Germans and the British lead forces. Not in the west between the French police and US Army.

Besides how many German divisions ended up stuck in Southern France and Italy. Britain did not have the man power to threaten the "soft underbelly" and do anything in Normandy or elsewhere. That means divisions could have been shifted elsewhere.

Of course divisions were diverted but if they have 200 in one place and 40 in the others which is more significant? [A hint 200 is a bigger number than 40.] Not to mention that the divisions in one place were engaged in continuous combat and all the demands for munitions, casualty replacements and so on compared to low impact occupation duties for which the occupied country was forced to pay hugely inflated costs.

Now the British could have sustained the Italian offensive at the tempo it was fought on their own if they were not dividing their effort between Italy and France. Without the US divisions available then it is unlikely they would have planned for a major French offensive and focused on Italy to secure the Mediterranean lines of communication.

In 1945 things start to change even without an invasion of France because two years of fire bombing and the advances of the Red Army have attrited much of Germany’s ability to conduct an active, mobile defence. So as long as you stay away from their entrenched formations you can pretty much drive through the countryside around them. So an invasion of France would require far less resources. While the Germans would still be highly lethal much like the Allied offences into western Germany in 1945 as long as you don’t stumble onto the Bengal Tiger training facility and stay away from the cities you can have freedom of movement.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

AG - Maybe I missed it in your run-on posts but please quote me where you say "I may just be speculating". So if by your "DUH" comment to me are you then saying you were purely speculating and therefore everything you have posted is no better than, as Norman Schwartzkopf said, bovine scatology?

The question was asked ‘what would WW2 be like without the active participation of American’. I have been trying to provide a rational, cause and effect answer to that question. Since the question was clearly speculative and counter factual to past events any answer would obviously be based on speculation. Since I have been linking the various conclusions I have made to actual known capabilities and cause-effects I would hope that even someone who disagrees with the question and/or the answer would at least acknowledge that it is made in good faith based on rational principals.

 

[bobbymike]

I just find your assertions much too broad based on the "without America" premise. Unless you can construct a full European order of battle sans anything US your generalizations on alternative outcomes are meaningless.

It would be necessary to "wargame" everything - i.e. someone would have to be moving the chess pieces on the other side. You have a set result in your mind "Britain victorious" and then fitting the facts to that result.

Now I fully understand your "ceteris paribus" assumption and compliment your reasoned arguments. But based on what factors you choose to change and which you hold unchanged I do not find your conclusions compelling.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

I just find your assertions much too broad based on the "without America" premise. Unless you can construct a full European order of battle sans anything US your generalizations on alternative outcomes are meaningless.

It would be necessary to "wargame" everything - i.e. someone would have to be moving the chess pieces on the other side.

You place too much emphasis on chance in battlefield outcome. The Germans lost all their battles from 42 onwards by decisive margins and a few extra divisions here and there would not save them. They lost despite being generally considered superior tacticians and combatants.

Even with only access to American wartime extra capacity the Allies produce three times the steel as Germany. With access to full American capacity that’s six times the steel. You can’t build HE ammunition without steel. And you can’t win battles without HE.

You have a set result in your mind "Britain victorious" and then fitting the facts to that result.

Not at all. In reality I’m saying the Red Army would still win despite Operation Overlord or wether their aide from the USA was paid for by Lend-Lease or Soviet and British gold and credit. The involvement of Britain in this is more a case of trying to see where those pieces would land without the direct American involvement. And it can be a quite illuminating process:

Without competition from the needs of the USAAF American production of four engine bombers would go in the main to the RAF for improving their night incendiary bombing capability and ASW patrol. They might even go to the Soviet Union to provide an eastern arm of the strategic bomber offensive. All solutions that are far more effective than the ineffective use of American heavy bombers by USAAF until 1944.

Without competition from the USN the RN is going to be able to order a few American carriers and reequip with superior American carrier aircraft. What are 12 fleet carriers going to be able to achieve in the North Sea in 44?

Without a Pacific Theatre the British and allied armies would have an additional 20 first rate divisions they could place into battle in Europe in 43-44. They would more than compensate for the 10 or so American divisions that were in the Mediterranean. Combined with the 20 divisions kept out of line for use in Overlord they provide additional capacity to launch spoiling invasions against Norway and France in a limited way (Brittany, Biscay, etc). Not enough for an additional French front as in real history but enough to make things very difficult on the German flanks to support the Soviet offensive.

 

[Hammer Birchgrove]

I think that if USA didn't get involved in Europe, the British Army and RAF would probably team up with the Red Army in the Eastern Front after the Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran. (This is not my idea - I read it first in the Wikipedia article about Philip K. Dick's novel The Man in the High Castle and the story-within-the-story "The Grasshopper Lies Heavy". I don't remember this from the book; but there are few years since I read it. I do remember British tanks moving into Berlin.)

If UK, its Commonwealth and Empire, Free French etc had invaded Italy, there would probably be no invasion of France; though perhaps there would still be an Operation Market Garden (maybe with better logistics), most certainly no Operation Dragoon.

Operation Foxley, the assassination of Hitler by SOE, could have been carried out; it would have been more appealing to an UK without help from US Army.

There would be no Morgenthau Plan; meaning less motivation for German resistance at the Western Front.

If USA concentrated on Japan, what would stop India, Australia and New Zeeland from sending more troops to Europe? Edit: I see Abraham Gubler mentioned this.

 

[Skybolt]

MMMMMMM, going back to Avatar for a moment, if you agree. Has anyone noticed that the "unobtanium" idea and the fact that having it justifies a great use of power and resources to go to Pandora comes directly and straight from two other Poul Anderson's novels, where the race to possession of the source of "unobtanium"-like elements triggers wars, even civil wars ? "Lodestar" and "Mirkheim" and its supermetals. So the count of "inspirations" is now at two... BTW, the physics and economics in Anderson's novels are MUCH better than in Avatar...

 

[shockonlip]

Shockonlip wrote:
>OK, remove ALL US involvement from Europe in WW2. Including air war, North Africa,
>Italy, D-day, Battle of the Bulge, technology development, manufacturing and convoys
>for the allies

Abraham Gubler wrote:
>By the time the American forces were directly involved in the war the Germans had
>already been defeated. American economic power helped (just helped)
>When I say the US didn’t have the guts to fight across Germany to capture

Ok Gubler, let's take some of this apart.

Let's see what Adam Tooze (your boy) says about these items
in: “Wages of Destruction: the making and breaking of the Nazi economy”

Abraham Gubler wrote:
>think about if for a second. Those battles you mentioned… were they as important as
>the Battle of Britain 1940
OK let's check if the US was involved in the "Battle of Britian, 1940"
Adam Tooze, pg 394:
"In the hope of American backing, London by the end of May 1940 had already decided
to reject any offer of a negotiated peace. Britian would continue to resist
German domination of Europe and act as a rallying point for anti-Nazi
forces across the Continent. And the signs from Washington, certainly as seen
through German eyes, were ominous. Roosevelt had launched America on its own
all-out rearmament programme and on 19 July, in announcing his candidacy for a
third term, he re-emphasized his unrelenting hostility to Germany. ... Faced with
this obstacle, Hitler chose once more to resume the offensive. On 12 July he
ordered the wholesale redirection of the German armaments effort towards the
navy and Luftwaffe, the weapons required to subdue Britian. ... By August, this
was reinforced by instruction to the Wermacht to prepare itself for an attack
on the Soviet Union."
(so the US was a factor in the Battle of Britian 1940)

Abraham Gubler writes:
>American economic power helped (just helped)
Adam Tooze, pg 402:
"For, as long as Britian remained in the war, the United States had a
means through which to project its awesome industrial power
against Nazi Germany. In the summer of 1940 this migh seem a distant prospect.
The spotlight was on the German armies parading down the Champs-Elysees.
However, viewed from the perspective of the early twenty-first
century, the German triumphs of 1940 seem less significant that the decisions
they precipitated in Washington. Alarmed by Germany's bid to overturn the
balance of power in Europe, the Roosevelt administration, backed
by a bi-partisan majority in Congress, took urgent steps to transform
the United States into a pre-eminent military superpower that it remains today.
The sequene of events was rapid. On 16 May 1940, three days after Kleist's Panzer
Groupe A had broken through on the river Maas, President Roosevelt put
before Congress the proposal to construct the world's largest military-industrial
complex, a manufaturing base capable of supplying the United States with
no less than 50,000 aircraft per year. Roosevelt picked this number out
of the air and it was unclear how it would be put into practice. But he
made his point. The Luftwaffe and the RAF, even in their wildest moments,
had never conceived of aircraft production on this scale. ... Only a few weeks
later, Congress approved the Two Oceans Navy Expansion Act, which laid the
foundations for the vast carrier fleets ... What was ominous from the German
point of view was that this enormous accumulation of force was ultimately
directed across the Atlantic, in support of Britian and its war against Hitler.
Britians willingness to go on resisting Germany depended critically on the
assumption that the United States would provide it with massive material aid."
(this doesn't sound like the US was just helping to me - in fact as
Tooze states just above, it was the reason they hung in there).



Abraham Gubler writes:
>When I say the US didn’t have the guts to fight across Germany to capture Berlin
>in 1945 it’s not because this is some “feeling” I have or other. It’s because the
>records of decision making at that time record this!

Shockonlip responds:
>Mr. Gubler, you are full of shit !!

Abraham Gubler responds:
>Go have a big sook Shockonlip. If you can’t put
>aside your immense personal stake in WW2 because you went on a holiday to Belgium
>and try and objectively analyse the major turning points of the war and its actual
>events beyond those that generate the most number of movies and tourist destinations
>then all you are doing is proving my point. The war was decided not by the loudest
>and most emotional voices after it but by the strategic, tactical and economic
>inputs and decisions.

Abraham Gubler, it is not worth arguing with you if you don't read my rebuttals.
It makes no sense for you to write that the "US didn't have the guts to fight across
Germany" (and I'm amazed that my fellow Americans will let such a statement
stand as well) when the US and Belgian citizens defeated overwhelming numerical
and firepower odds in Bastogne. It doesn't matter if you think that is important
or not. It happened ! It alone refutes what you claim. bobbymike also claims that
he has not read such things in his readings (correct me if I'm wrong bobbymike)
of the key commanders of WWII, who you don't accept as historians, but everyone
does as they MADE HISTORY and WERE THERE!! And given how much I found against your
own points while reading Tooze, I'll bet if I check your claims, I'll find
you misrepresenting them as well. So Mr. Gubler. Given me the chapter and
verse on "the US didn’t have the guts to fight across Germany to capture Berlin
in 1945". It is the word "guts" that is important here. I'm out to challenge
your use of that word. That is the point. No sooking dude.

 

[Hammer Birchgrove]

MMMMMMM, going back to Avatar for a moment, if you agree. Has anyone noticed that the "unobtanium" idea and the fact that having it justifies a great use of power and resources to go to Pandora comes directly and straight from two other Poul Anderson's novels, where the race to possession of the source of "unobtanium"-like elements triggers wars, even civil wars ? "Lodestar" and "Mirkheim" and its supermetals. So the count of "inspirations" is now at two... BTW, the physics and economics in Anderson's novels are MUCH better than in Avatar...

Just like Star Wars and Matrix, Avatar seems to be based/inspired by several SF stories and themes. (At least The Empire Strikes Back was written by Leigh Brackett, who had earlier written science fantasy similar to Star Wars.) IIRC James Cameron has confirmed he was inspired by Edgar Rice Burroughs' A Princess of Mars.

Makes me think of Frederick Pohl and his meeting with a producer of sci-fi films (during the 1950's or 60's IIRC), who told Pohl that the no longer hires (professional) script writers, because he can find all the inspiration/stories/plots he need from SF magazines and books. : Pohl wasn't pleased, but at the moment felt he couldn't react without being uncivil or breaking the law.

 

[Skybolt]

IIRC James Cameron has confirmed he was inspired by Edgar Rice Burroughs' A Princess of Mars.

Conveniently expired copyright.... :

 

[Orionblamblam]

As has been pointed out to you, the US did not get "heavily enmeshed" in Europe until well after Pearl Harbor. Selling stuff? That's what we *do* (or *did*, at any rate).

Repeating a statement does not give it anymore credence.

Ahem. Pot, meet kettle.

And this is just the direct participation. The US provided immense military aide to the Allies...

The problem you've got here is the language you choose to use. "Heavily enmeshed," "immense aid," "focus intently upon destroying Nazi Germany," and so on. These are your description of the American war effort *before* American entered the war. The diffence between 1940 and 1944 in terms of American interest and involvement are so vast that if the pre-war efforts were as vast as you describe them, then the actual wartime efforts were so powerful and energetic that they would create multiuple linear singularities and actually crack the fabric of space-time along the north Atlantic shipping lanes.

So are you now arguing that America's involvement in WWII caused massive gravitational disruptions, with tidal forces enough to damage the upper mantle and crust of the Earth, and that, in the end, it's America's fault that Eyjafjallajokull has erupted and dumped ash into the skies over Europe? Jeez, I can blame FDR for a lot of bad stuff, but even *I* don't credit him with such long-range SPECTRE-ish plans for mass physical destruction. Sure, Social Security is sort of a financial black hole that will suck the American economy into a pit of financial despair so deep that not even light can escape, but compared to your nutty, tinfoil-hattish view that the American military became the most powerful force in the known universe, greatly outshining the largest known gamma ray burster on record, it's perfectly bland.

Or, perhaps, someone here tends to engage in hyperbole.

 

[Hammer Birchgrove]

IIRC James Cameron has confirmed he was inspired by Edgar Rice Burroughs' "A Princess of Mars".

Conveniently expired copyright.... :

Too true.

 

[Colonial-Marine]

Only just read some of these pages now, but the idea that the Soviets could have driven back an Allied advance and taken all of continental Europe if Patton had actually started something is absurd.