Feasibility of landings in Scotland?

[Terranix]

Any kind of invasion force launched across the North Sea would have faced obstacles that seem insurmountable--problems of resupply, an extremely rough crossing, aircover from Norway being limited at best. However, it would appear that the British government feared such an attack might be carried out, as evidenced by the erection of these defences:

http://www.aberdeenshire.gov.uk/archaeo ... efence.pdf

This passage is of particular note:

It had been noted that during 1938, that the Graf Zepplin photographed the northeast Scottish coast in great detail in preparation for a possible future invasion. Other German aircraft had also been seen photographing the coast around north east Scotland. Mitchell thought it highly likely that this area would be an ideal site for a beach landing invasion force by the German army, due to its sandy beaches and good communications.

I'm curious as to what is meant by "good communications". Nevertheless, however unworkable landings in Scotland might seem on the surface of things, they must have at least some, probably very limited merit, as it seems highly unlikely that General Mitchell and the military staff he had to convince would be so stupid as to erect the defences detailed in the PDF if such attacks were impossible.

I think Invasion 1940 mentions that early plans for an invasion of Britain all included landings on the east coast. Indeed, Grand Admiral Raeder reportedly drew up plans for a grand invasion across the North Sea. I imagine he more than anyone would appreciate the difficulties in carrying out such an operation (he was an opponent of Sealion, I think), presented to Hitler in May 1940, which he had not discussed with OKH.

In looking up information on the Free Polish forces I also came accross this tidbit on the 309 "Land of Czerwien" Army Cooperation Squadron:

The only Polish squadron formed in Scotland was created in late November 1940 at Renfrew, later moving after the Clydebank 'blitz' to Dunino in Fife where it co-operated with I Polish Corps whose units were defending the east coast of Scotland against an expected German invasion.

Expected?

Indeed, the accounts of a few war veterans seem to indicate that there were occasions when an assault on the east coast was thought to be imminent; I think there might even have been a false alarm or two. I can't think of anything off the top of my head, but I think one of the old gentlemen in the book Last Post mentions one. Could such false alarms have occured if the Germans had no capability to launch such an operation? Had they perhaps faked up an invasion fleet?

Personally I don't think landings in Scotland would have been at all advisable, but if they were given serious consideration by senior military figures I think they must at least be worth due consideration.

[Andreas]

There are coastal fortifications in Northumbria as well. The military planners covered their bases, and concrete/bricks was presumably cheap. The Germans had no capability or indeed intent to launch such an operation, as far as I know.

All the best

Andreas

[JamesL]

In the American dialect 'good communications' can be replaced with the phrases 'good commo' or 'lines of communication'. To us this means that there are adequate supply lines. A current example would be the transportation route between Kuwait and Baghdad. Armed truck convoys use it as well as military and commercial jet freighters.

Re: weather along the Scottish coast. A few days ago I flew transatlantic from Frankfurt. There was bad weather to the west of Great Britain and France so we took off and headed due north over the North Sea. The flying weather above the North Sea was excellent. Around Inverness we made an oblique left turn and headed for Iceland, passing just south of that island. What I am trying to point out is that the island of Great Britain formed a shield to the bad weather over the Atlantic. With good weather I do not see that an invasion of Scotland across the North Sea was out of the question.

[LWD]

As a parallel the US expended a fair amount of resources for invasion deffences of the West Coast. Given that the IJN was barely capable of making it to Hawaii this seams rather wasteful today but made sence at least to some at the time.

[phylo_roadking]

Actually, the North Sea has periods of long seasonal calm weather unlike the Channel - where you have extra periods of gales, high seas etc. because of the narrow channel. The North East Coast of Scotland north from the Ifrth of Forth has numerous long low beaches, and I've seen these mentioned in Alternative Histories before now, particularly around Dornoch. Landing on the low shores of the Firth itself wouldn't be out of the question, and would both immediately threaten Edinburgh, but also Britain's THEN only domestic oil, the shale oil fields there that were extended during the war. I'm not sure how much bunkerage HM government actually maintained for oil/petrol supplies during the war, and how much they depended on a continuous supply from the US, Mexico and Venezuela - but given how wartime and air ops - particularly in the even tof an invasion - fast drink up fuel stocks, with increased U-Boat activity in the Western and Northern Approaches its not out of bounds that the RAF and Army would soon be threatened with simply grinding to a halt...! Pretty good strategic reason for hitting Scotland then, if not by invasion then by bombing....strange they never thought of that at the height of the two "happy times" when sea-borne supplies were so much at risk....

[Andreas]

Quite apart from the feasibility, such a strategy would have required co-operation between the Luftwaffe and the KM. That was slightly less likely to happen than lions lying down with lambs for a siesta.

All the best

Andreas

[phylo_roadking]

the whole question of when it could have happened would have depended on when/if Sealion was launched. It would have been the perfect spoiler for the Channel, drawing off RN units....OR being launched to pass behind them as they moved South through the North Sea IF preparations could have been carried out hidden from the British. The naval operations north of Crete show how badly the RN actually fared against air attack at sea - again! - as they were able to decimate ONE scratch invasion fleet but had to withdraw due to losses before doing significant damage to the second. Everyone seems to regard the RN as invincible at sea, without EVER taking on board the VERY major losses from air attack they took at Dunkirk, the Med, Crete...right up to losing entire battlecruisers to the Japanese!

[LWD]

The British certainly lost some major units in the war and had some serious losses but saying the RN had "VERY major losses" is a bit of an exaggeration and by the time they lost the POW and company to the Japanese there was no question of the Germans being able to launch any sort of successful invasion of Britain.

[phylo_roadking]

LWD - they lost 52 units at Dunkirk alone; to this add losses in the Med in 1941 and then the Far East. The total approaches 100 ocean-going vessels of all types in three years.

[LWD]

And how many ships did they bring on line in the same period? Then of course after the second week of Dec 41 the number of ships in the alliance more than doubled (I'd have to check the actual numbers could be off a bit here). Just chart the BB ratio and you'll see that the Germans never had a good chance of landing in Britain and it got steadily worse as the war progressed.

[redcoat]

I'm curious as to what is meant by "good communications". Nevertheless, however unworkable landings in Scotland might seem on the surface of things, they must have at least some, probably very limited merit, as it seems highly unlikely that General Mitchell and the military staff he had to convince would be so stupid as to erect the defences detailed in the PDF if such attacks were impossible.

I think Invasion 1940 mentions that early plans for an invasion of Britain all included landings on the east coast. Indeed, Grand Admiral Raeder reportedly drew up plans for a grand invasion across the North Sea. I imagine he more than anyone would appreciate the difficulties in carrying out such an operation (he was an opponent of Sealion, I think), presented to Hitler in May 1940, which he had not discussed with OKH.

In looking up information on the Free Polish forces I also came accross this tidbit on the 309 "Land of Czerwien" Army Cooperation Squadron:

The only Polish squadron formed in Scotland was created in late November 1940 at Renfrew, later moving after the Clydebank 'blitz' to Dunino in Fife where it co-operated with I Polish Corps whose units were defending the east coast of Scotland against an expected German invasion.

Expected?

Indeed, the accounts of a few war veterans seem to indicate that there were occasions when an assault on the east coast was thought to be imminent; I think there might even have been a false alarm or two. I can't think of anything off the top of my head, but I think one of the old gentlemen in the book Last Post mentions one. Could such false alarms have occured if the Germans had no capability to launch such an operation? Had they perhaps faked up an invasion fleet?

.

After the ease which Germany had defeated Poland, Norway and then France, the British tended to over-estimate the capabilities of the German forces, so they tended to take the view that the Germans could land anywhere suitable. So defenses were built everywhere, they even built some pill boxes in the town where I live in NW England, 60 miles from the sea, as protection from a paratroop attack !!!!!!

The trouble with a landing in Scotland is that its outside the range of both German single seat fighters and Ju 87's, so the RAF would have had little difficulty in giving effective air cover to the RN, and attacking the invasion force itself. The fact that its also quite close to the Home Fleet's base is another reason why the east coast of Scotland is not such a good idea

[Terranix]

It can't have been completely out of the Luftwaffe's range--a great uncle of mine was who lived in the Lothians was killed when Leith was bombed. The north-east coast was nearer to Norwegian bases than the Lothians.

[Andreas]

It can't have been completely out of the Luftwaffe's range--a great uncle of mine was who lived in the Lothians was killed when Leith was bombed. The north-east coast was nearer to Norwegian bases than the Lothians.

It was out of fighter range, which means that the LW would have been unable to give any support during the day. They could attack during the night, but that would not be enough to support an invasion force.

All the best

Andreas

[Tucobenedito]

A landing in Fife was anticipated and you can still find tank traps on the beach at Tentsmuir in North East Fife
Rich

[antwony]

From what I understand (sorry, but I can't remember where I read this), British Intelligence determined that the Germans didn't have the capability to mount a serious invasion over the channel. Therefore, they came to the conclusion that any "German Invasion Fleet" (which in actuality didn't exist) must be in the Baltic somewhere and would probably land on the east coast. Thought they were more concerned with Norfolk, but seems they hadn't ruled out Scotland.