Rn vs IJN

[EwenS]

But there was some oil production in Persia, and they had struck oil in Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain in the 1930s. ARAMCO was established in 1943.

Oil exploration in Persia / Iran dated back to 1901 and was discovered in 1908 leading to exploitation by the Anglo Persian Oil Company (later Anglo Iranian Oil Co later BP). By WW2 their refinery at Abadan was I believe the single largest in the world. It became the biggest source of oil for the Admiralty in WW1. Exploration from there then spread around the Gulf through a network of British companies. The US got involved in WW2 to help increase production and refining capacity in the region.

Iraq oil developed interwar following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and the acquisition of German oil concessions by British & French interests. Oil was piped across the desert from 1934 to refineries at Haifa in Palestine (then a British mandate) and Tripoli in Lebanon (then a French mandate).

There were also some small oilfields in Egypt along the Red Sea Coast by WW2. But exploration in the Western Desert had to wait until the 1970s to be discovered.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

How long would it take to expand whatever was going in Iraq and Egypt? I.e. trying to assess the Axis chances of conquest in the Middle East.

 

[EwenS]

How long would it take to expand whatever was going in Iraq and Egypt? I.e. trying to assess the Axis chances of conquest in the Middle East.

Much information here about Middle East oil production.

Middle East Oil Production in WW2 - Axis History Forum

Problem for the Axis is how to get to the major ME oilfields in the Gulf and Iraq before the allies destroy the facilities. Look at the distances involved. Egypt is small in comparison.

Cairo to Abadan - 1000 miles
Cairo to Kirkuk in Iraq - 850 miles

All this largely over desert, with all the supplies having to be shipped from Italy or Greece. Bit of a nightmare even if the Med Fleet and RAF have to withdraw.

Alternatives?
Tripoli in Lebanon to Kirkuk - 500 miles. But how to get there? By sea? Sailing past British bases in Cyprus & Egypt?

By comparison Tripoli in Libya to Cairo is 1100 miles as the crow flies, 1300 by road.

Other options:-
Via Turkey? Big logistics problems there getting troops and supplies through the Balkans and Turkey due to lack of railways. Done to death on the Axis History Forum a couple of years back ISTR.

Via the Caucasus? First the Germans have to get there (capturing Soviet oilfields along the way)

In 1941, prior to the outbreak of war with Japan Britain occupied Syria & Lebanon and ,along with the USSR , Persia /Iran. It intended to reinforce military assets in the region against the possibility of invasion via Turkey or the Caucasus, the latter in the event of a Soviet collapse. Itvwas these assets that were diverted to the Far East in Dec 1941. The ME region would not be given up without a fight.

 

[Peter Gunn]

I think it looks slightly silly that the rear turret is so high, but yes, the Littorios are very pretty.

I agree, but then again, I like a nice rear end...

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

Much information here about Middle East oil production.

Middle East Oil Production in WW2 - Axis History Forum

Problem for the Axis is how to get to the major ME oilfields in the Gulf and Iraq before the allies destroy the facilities. Look at the distances involved. Egypt is small in comparison.

Cairo to Abadan - 1000 miles
Cairo to Kirkuk in Iraq - 850 miles

All this largely over desert, with all the supplies having to be shipped from Italy or Greece. Bit of a nightmare even if the Med Fleet and RAF have to withdraw.

Alternatives?
Tripoli in Lebanon to Kirkuk - 500 miles. But how to get there? By sea? Sailing past British bases in Cyprus & Egypt?

By comparison Tripoli in Libya to Cairo is 1100 miles as the crow flies, 1300 by road.

Other options:-
Via Turkey? Big logistics problems there getting troops and supplies through the Balkans and Turkey due to lack of railways. Done to death on the Axis History Forum a couple of years back ISTR.

Via the Caucasus? First the Germans have to get there (capturing Soviet oilfields along the way)

In 1941, prior to the outbreak of war with Japan Britain occupied Syria & Lebanon and ,along with the USSR , Persia /Iran. It intended to reinforce military assets in the region against the possibility of invasion via Turkey or the Caucasus, the latter in the event of a Soviet collapse. Itvwas these assets that were diverted to the Far East in Dec 1941. The ME region would not be given up without a fight.

Ok but let me play devil's advocate here a bit.

First, there is some oil drilling going on near Cairo, right? So that is something right there. If there is already a refinery in Haifa that can be repaired too.

Second, though those distances are indeed very long, and the Axis were limited in the amount of motor transport they had etc., they did manage to accomplish some extraordinary things in terms of projecting their armed forces quite long distances. Kursk is 1894 kilometers / 1180 miles from Dresden or Berlin, by road. Similar distance to Leningrad.

Budapest to Sevastopol is 2000 km / 1242 miles (again, by road).

Graz to Athens is 1670 km / 1037 miles

But they obviously managed to get a lot of men, weapons of war, materiel and supplies out to those distances.

Third, if there were already pipelines from Iran and Iraq, those could probably be repaired rather than built anew.

Fourth Abadan is 1000 + to Cairo over land. But if the Germans and Italians conquered Egypt, possibly the German or Italian navy could operate in the Persian Gulf and bring petrochemicals and oil through the Red Sea. Admittedly, that's a long and potentially perilous voyage, but might be easier to manage.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

I think the Axis powers in general may have really dropped the ball by not committing more assets to North Africa much earlier. Instead of - or at least before- say, conquering Yugoslavia and Greece.. (although those do go together with taking Egypt). Maybe a more focused and less wide invasion of Russia.

Maybe skip the Battle of Britain which was a massive drain of resources.

I don't know, but it seems like taking Egypt was closer to feasibility in 1941-42 than taking Stalingrad / Caucasus oil fields was, as we can see with the benefit of hindsight.

 

[EwenS]

Ok but let me play devil's advocate here a bit.

First, there is some oil drilling going on near Cairo, right? So that is something right there. If there is already a refinery in Haifa that can be repaired too.

Well everything depends on
1. How well these facilities can be destroyed.
2. How long it takes to get to Haifa and Tripoli (Lebanon)
3. Just how much of the Med fleet is withdrawn through the Suez Canal and how much moved to Haifa (ships were withdrawn to there in 1942 when Alexandria was threatened by the German advance.
4. Where is the equipment to rebuild the oilfields and refineries coming from? So long as the RN retains subs and destroyers at Haifa, they can threaten supply routes. And don't forget Cyprus as an air base, at least short term.

Second, though those distances are indeed very long, and the Axis were limited in the amount of motor transport they had etc., they did manage to accomplish some extraordinary things in terms of projecting their armed forces quite long distances. Kursk is 1894 kilometers / 1180 miles from Dresden or Berlin, by road. Similar distance to Leningrad.

Budapest to Sevastopol is 2000 km / 1242 miles (again, by road).

Graz to Athens is 1670 km / 1037 miles

But they obviously managed to get a lot of men, weapons of war, materiel and supplies out to those distances.

Third, if there were already pipelines from Iran and Iraq, those could probably be repaired rather than built anew.

The main pipeline was as from Kirkuk in Iraq to Haifa with a spur to Tripoli (Lebanon) which was turned off after the French Armistice. There was no pipeline linking that to oilfields and refineries in the Gulf itself in WW2. There were also a dozen or so pumping stations along the route. Those would be less easy to replace. And 500 miles of pipeline are impossible to protect 24/7. That leaves it vulnerable to attacks by Special Forces (LRDG/SAS/SBS/Popski's Private Army were all active in the Middle East).

Fourth Abadan is 1000 + to Cairo over land. But if the Germans and Italians conquered Egypt, possibly the German or Italian navy could operate in the Persian Gulf and bring petrochemicals and oil through the Red Sea. Admittedly, that's a long and potentially perilous voyage, but might be easier to manage.

Do you really think that the Suez Canal will be captured without Britain making efforts to block it and mine it and to continue minelaying efforts thereafter? And to wreck the ports on the Red Sea Coast. In Spring 1941 the Luftwaffe mined the Canal and ships were sunk. It delayed the passage of Illustrious for about a week on her way to the USA for repairs.

There were a fair number of RAF bases spread throughout Palestine, Iraq, East Africa, Aden and into the Persian Gulf area, for retreating RAF units to operate from.

During the 1956 Suez Crisis the Egyptians successfully closed it off by doing precisely that. It was closed for 5 months and took an international effort , including by RN salvage ships, divers etc to reopen it. How quickly can the Axis assemble the resources to achieve that?

But you need to capture a lot more than just Egypt to make naval operations in the Red Sea / Arabian Gulf Indian Ocean / Persian Gulf area viable. You need to take Sudan, Ethiopia and the various British, French & Italian colonies in the Horn of Africa to secure the Bab El-Mandeb Strait giving access from the Red Sea to the Arabian Gulf.

The main Italian Red Sea base pre-war was at Massawa in Eritrea. It fell to the British East African Campaign on 8 April 1941, just 3 months after Rommel turns up at Tripoli (Libya). The East African campaign rumbled on until Nov 1941 when the Italians in Ethiopia and other Italian colonies were swept up. Those British forces will need to be pushed south to open the bottom of the Red Sea.

Red Sea Flotilla - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

East African campaign (World War II) - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

So long as a reinforced Eastern Fleet exists (with at least some assets coming from the Med) then the RN will seek to close off the bottom of the Red Sea to prevent Axis warships breaking out into the Arabian Gulf. The RN Eastern Fleet withdrew from Ceylon to Kilindini / Mombasa (Kenya) in April 1942. After the Japanese went to war the main job of the Eastern Fleet was to protect the western part of the IO. Axis movements like you suggest, represents the kind of threat it was there to counter.

And there you also have to secure both sides of the Persian Gulf to secure the choke point at the Straits of Hormuz.

You need to a map out to study. Again it demonstrates how WW2 was a true world war. The various theatres interact with one another. What happens in one does affect what happens elsewhere.

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

Second, though those distances are indeed very long, and the Axis were limited in the amount of motor transport they had etc., they did manage to accomplish some extraordinary things in terms of projecting their armed forces quite long distances. Kursk is 1894 kilometers / 1180 miles from Dresden or Berlin, by road. Similar distance to Leningrad.

Budapest to Sevastopol is 2000 km / 1242 miles (again, by road).

Graz to Athens is 1670 km / 1037 miles

But they obviously managed to get a lot of men, weapons of war, materiel and supplies out to those distances.

None of those routes are vulnerable to the RAF or RN -- unlike an army transiting the Levant and Near East.

Third, if there were already pipelines from Iran and Iraq, those could probably be repaired rather than built anew.

These are also pretty difficult to guard and pretty easy to sabotage. I think it's clear that Iraqis resent any foreign domination (they evicted the British twice and Amerika once).

Fourth Abadan is 1000 + to Cairo over land. But if the Germans and Italians conquered Egypt, possibly the German or Italian navy could operate in the Persian Gulf and bring petrochemicals and oil through the Red Sea. Admittedly, that's a long and potentially perilous voyage, but might be easier to manage.

They're going to have to get past the straits at the heel of the Saudi boot -- and then past the nearby major RN base at Aden, and if the manage all that and get into the Persian Gulf, they could easily be bottled up in it by RN patrols (both surface and submarine) in the Gulf of Oman.

We've had a similar discussion before, I think.

 

[don4331]

I think the Axis powers in general may have really dropped the ball by not committing more assets to North Africa much earlier. Instead of - or at least before- say, conquering Yugoslavia and Greece.. (although those do go together with taking Egypt). Maybe a more focused and less wide invasion of Russia.

Maybe skip the Battle of Britain which was a massive drain of resources.

I don't know, but it seems like taking Egypt was closer to feasibility in 1941-42 than taking Stalingrad / Caucasus oil fields was, as we can see with the benefit of hindsight.

I think Hitler's biggest incorrect assumption was that Stalin would fold like the Czar did in WWI - threaten Moscow/St. Petersburg and he would sue for peace. Then Germany gets both food and oil production from Ukraine/Caucasus.

Stalin wasn't a Czar's whose family had lived in Moscow/St. Petersburg for generations, so threatening those cities didn't faze him.

A less destructive march through Belarus/arming Ukraine against Russia might have got Germans to Caucasus without 1/2 the effort. But that would require SS looking after the local populations from the Heer. Which is about 180* from what was happening...​

 

[WARSPITER]

Hitler made the same mistake with Britain.

Japan made the same mistake with the United States.

Napoleon mad the same mistake with Russia in 1812.

None of these lot realised that life is something that gets in the way of our plans.

 

[Peter Gunn]

Stalin wasn't a Czar's whose family had lived in Moscow/St. Petersburg for generations, so threatening those cities didn't faze him.

Whilst I agree wholeheartedly Stalin also wasn't fazed by casualty lists, military or civilian, human life meant nothing to him, maybe less than nothing if that's possible.

 

[Frog]

Napoléon :
'' I went to Russia to put an end to the colossus of the northern barbarians. The sword is drawn. They must be kept in the mirror so that they will no longer meddle in the affairs of civilized Europe. Even under the Great Catherine, the Russians were little or nothing in Europe's political affairs. It was the sharing of Poland that brought them into contact with civilization. Now Poland in turn must push them home. ''