As you know, no one controlled the North Sea, it was the domain of submarines and mines, but yes, the HSF is not going to engage with the RN in sight.glenn239 wrote: ↑24 Sep 2019, 19:00In fact, I think we can safely conclude that the German fleet would have no rational option but to decline to engage the French fleet under any circumstances where the Grand Fleet might be nearby. Functionally, this would mean that the French will control the North Sea. We also haven't dealt with the cases where German U-boats sink British warships by accident, thinking them French.
Uboats were used to attack warships, only directed at trade as a reprisal for the RN blockade, absent in this case.
Upon public Belgian request that puts the Germans publicly in the right, yes.Once France invades Belgium the German army has free reign to occupy Belgium in order to defeat France. All British requests to evacuate the territory would be stonewalled with the need to win the war first. But, once the war was won, the Germans are still in Belgium and can stonewall the British with the need to make peace, and enforce peace, with France. Since France invaded Belgium and the British did not DOW France, the treaty of 1839 was void and all the Benelux countries, (Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg) enter the Central Powers alliance.Swallow? Or simply align with the one that DID HONOR the treaty that protected them? There is a huge difference...
The Germans would be in Belgium for as long as the Belgians require it and allow it, aligning with the country that defended you is kind of a natural consequence. But why the Netherlands? They have never liked the Germans and were neutral...
I know and like his position, obviously, but really there was no upside for Germany allying with the UK, they would be first in line not if, but WHEN the UK colonial issues led to war.Ferguson makes the argument that Britain would have been better off allying with Germany and letting things go the way you picture them. That may be so, but that wasn't the way the British were seeing things at the time.And even so, how does that affect the UK in the 20th century?
Yeah, but what need would Germany have of France in that case? WOuld the French consent to the role of a junior partner to its vanquisher? And how? The Germans would make sure to cut France's legs, the bloodshed was such that we can certainly expect Versailles in reverse leaving France with little values as an ally...If the French are betrayed by the British, then to suppose, as you do, that they continue to be anti-German, we must credit the French with having the intelligence to only do so in the circumstance where such a policy might result in victory. After two beatings, (1871, 1914), what evidence would France have that they were due for a win? About the only one I can think of would be an alliance with the United States?No, the defeated tend to be resentful as history teaches us, they wont be siding with the Germans anytime soon... not after the Russians get Brest-Litovsked and the French stripped of colonies and crushed under reparations.
The UK would then be in the same situation they were prior to 1904 for several centuries, with the other side of the Channel on hostile hands, they will get used to it again...A temporary measure according to whom? The French are crushed. They have no say on whether the German navy leases French bases for the next 1 or 100 years. The British shall do what? Stamp their feet? Hold their breath? Scream blue bloody murder? Send their 6 divisions to France to fight 200 German divisions? No JAG, the British have remained neutral and the Germans now have the French ports to do as they wish for as long as they wish. In fact, the terms of the treaty might require the French navy to work in alliance with the Germans.Temporarily, until a definite peace treaty was signed, and just because the guy on the other side of the channel was still at war...
Only that here there would be no German war declaration or invasion of Belgium to look forward too, and why did he tell Nicholson that if it was just a show for the French? Of all possible outcomes the CPs trouncing Russia and making France MORE dependent on the entente was the best possible outcome for the Uk, isnt it?And again, Grey stated he would have gone had Britain remained neutral. He was not jettisoning the French on 1 August. He was stalling until events on the continent made his move to enter the war easier.And again, Grey was jettisoning the French on Aug 1st, it was their war, there was no alliance... in this case is worse, the French would have to declare war on Germany instead of being the attacked as IRL, so good luck selling a Russian war to the UK public...
So? Belgium had no value, the sole rationale for its existence was to spite the French and Dutch... Grey himself recognized that the UK would do nothing if France invaded Belgium, making the point of its value moot, it was a German invasion what would demand an action, but not because of Belgium itself.The independence of Belgium was not an "excuse", it was a core British national interest and policy. WRT France and Germany, it mattered not which invaded Belgium - Britain must go to war with Germany in either case or risk seeing Belgium swallowed by the victor, (ie, Germany) after the war.Belgium WAS an excuse, but it was used because it was NEEDED, here the French are not even being attacked, they are embarking willingly and on their own into a war over Serbia.