The Invasion of 1950

Chapter Twenty-Four

Berlin, Germany

The Fuhrer was in a good mood. When the Fuhrer was happy, so was everyone else in his cabinet, sharing the faith that the Fuhrer wouldn’t have one of his fits or start ordering impossible military operations. Adolph Hitler might be growing older and weaker in front of them, but he still maintained a presence. He was still the absolute leader of Germany. Himmler caught the eyes of Speer for a moment and wondered what treatments were being used on the Fuhrer; he looked almost normal, save for the unkempt hair. Hitler’s survival was a concern of all three of the main power-brokers; none of them knew what would happen when the Fuhrer finally shuffled off his mortal coil.

“We have finally broken the power of the British Empire,” Hitler proclaimed as he waved one hand at the massive map of the occupied region of the British homeland. It had been blown up enough that Himmler, in a rare moment of whimsy, had wondered if the scale was actually one-to-one. The landing forces might have managed to prevent the British from trapping and crushing the lodgement, but they were far from having completely defeated the British. “This nation of shopkeepers and imperialists will be broken for all time!”

His voice rose higher. “I offered the British a fair and just peace, and they threw it back into my face,” he thundered. “I offered them peace and freedom within the New Order, and they rejected it. I offered them their crumbling empire, even the lands that rightfully belong to Germany, and yet… they refused me! The arch-imperialist Churchill has returned to power… and why was he not killed when Otto attacked London?”

His gaze swept around to focus on Himmler. “Why was Churchill allowed to remain alive?”

Himmler forced himself to think, ignoring the cold sweat that was forming on the back of his neck. Hitler loved Skorzeny; he thrilled to his antics as much as any young boy, reading SS Commando or one of the other glossy publications churned out by Goebbels, and any aspersions that Himmler might cast on Skorzeny’s character might not go unpunished. If he said the wrong thing, his career and his ascent to the post of Fuhrer might fall into doubt…

He couldn’t tolerate that. “Churchill wasn’t in Ten Downing Street at the time of the assault,” he said, silently cursing Hitler’s monomaniacal belief that Churchill had inhabited the centre of British power even after losing office. Atlee hadn’t impressed Hitler at all, and so it was easy for the Fuhrer to believe that Churchill had always been the secret power behind the throne, whatever was said in public. “He avoided the first assault for that reason, but the second assault will not fail.”

Hitler leaned forwards, his eyes glowing with a chilling degree of interest. “A second assault against the war criminal?”

Himmler nodded. “I have managed to discover, though my sources, that Otto remains alive in London and has gone to ground, in accordance with my plan,” he said. It was irritating, in a way, as Philby now knew the truth about who he’d been working for ever since Moscow had fallen. It allowed the SS to ask him more direct questions, but at the same time, it introduced a new and dangerous equation into play. Philby had followed communism with the dedication of a religious convert; what would he do now that he knew that he hadn’t been working for Moscow after all? “In fact, six men survived and possess the weapons to take out any target within London.”

Hitler looked as if Christmas had come early. “And you will order them to take out Churchill and the remainder of his corrupt body of men?”

“I will order him to remain under cover until we are in a position to take London, at which point they will strike and throw the British defences into confusion,” Himmler said, hoping that Hitler would agree with his plan. If the Fuhrer ordered him to send Skorzeny into action at once, Philby might not pass on the order, or maybe the English traitor would break and confess everything to Churchill. If that happened, even Otto Skorzeny wouldn’t be able to escape. “It is the best use of the asset he represents.”

“Excellent,” Hitler said, almost rubbing his hands with glee. “Now, where do we stand in the campaign?”

There was a brief exchange of looks among the military personnel, and then Generaladmiral Erich Raeder emerged as the first speaker. Hitler regarded him carefully. He had once been known to say that on land he was a lion, but at sea he was a coward. Raeder’s survival had surprised many, after the loss of several fine ships, but maybe Hitler was just comfortable with him.

“Mein Fuhrer, overall, the invasion has been a success,” he said. “We have lost five warships and three freighters so far to enemy attacks, but we haven’t suffered any major loss in our projected shipping rates as we were able to press into service British ships we captured in port, as well as French, Dutch and Danish shipping that we captured during the first war. Overall, we are exceeding our supply projections for the first week, with the main bottleneck being limited port space on the other side of the Channel.”

He hesitated. “The British have launched several attacks against our freighters at night and have inflicted some damage to them as well as to their escorts,” he admitted. “Although it may seem like defeat, I have decided to abandon shipping efforts after nightfall, therefore preserving the freighters for shipping during the day. As we have enough additional freighters to expand our shipping and diversify the resupply effort, we do not anticipate falling behind our supply projections.”

Hitler banged the table. “The British will struggle to cut the supply lines in daytime as well,” he thundered. “Can you meet your obligations or will the commanding officers have to be replaced?”

Raeder looked as if he would have sooner charged an enemy machine gun nest naked. “My Fuhrer, there are practical problems involved with defending a convoy in darkness that do not apply in the daytime,” he said. “The British can attack from the air, the surface, or underwater, with a different threat angle every time. Their larger ships have been destroyed or rendered isolated and therefore useless, so they must rely on smaller ships to launch their attacks and impeded our resupply efforts. At night, they can get very close to their targets without being seen. In the day, those smaller ships will be seen and engaged well before they get anywhere near a vulnerable target.

“The only remaining danger is submarines, but the British submarine technology is behind ours by several years,” he concluded. Himmler recognised the note of a man stalling for time and made a mental note to check out the exact situation for himself. He’d packed many spies and informers into the Kriegsmarine. “Therefore, we are able to keep British submarines away from the convoys and prevent any major disasters.”

Admiral Canaris coughed into the silence. “I have been informed that the other two main British fleets are heading towards a rendezvous,” he said. “If they can be defeated, our ultimate victory is certain, but we must work to weaken them before they engage our surface fleet. I have it on good authority that President Taft, while officially maintaining the neutrality of the United States, has privately agreed to allow the British fleet transit through the Panama Canal and has, furthermore, agreed to supply them with some essential supplies. We may also see them escorted by units of the American Navy, at least while they’re in the Caribbean, although I don’t believe we will see a resumption of the Phoney War.”

Hitler’s face contorted into a snarl. “Then should we not aim a strike at the canal and prevent them from passing through?”

“I would advise against it,” Canaris said, softly. Hitler eyed him maliciously. “There is no target within the United States more certain to draw a violent response from the United States than the Canal. We could bomb Washington and it wouldn’t provoke the Americans as much.”

“And what does that matter?” Hitler demanded. “Where do the Americans stand on the scale of pure power?”

“The Americans built up their fleet during 1940 and continued the program until 1944, when Roosevelt left office,” Canaris said. “They may not have quite our level of naval technology, but added to the remains of the British Navy, they would have a major advantage over our navy and would win the battle. In a year, we wouldn’t even have the technological advantage; Mein Fuhrer, it is not the time to poke the Americans.”

Hitler subsided slightly. “Once we have finished the British, we will turn our attention to the Americans,” he said, flatly. Himmler nodded in private relief. “What is happening on the ground?”

It was Manstein who spoke. “We have defeated the early British counter-attacks and captured enough strong-points to be fairly certain of holding the lodgement for the moment, and we are currently reinforcing in strength,” he said. “The British fought to hold Ipswich, but we punched through their defence lines and shattered them, taking several thousand British servicemen as prisoners in the process. Those prisoners have been well-treated and have been moved to a new detention camp near Felixstowe, although I suggest shipping them back to the continent as soon as possible.

“The British themselves appear to be establishing two defensive lines,” he continued. “One of them is being established in the direction of London, the other in the direction of Birmingham and the mid-lands We believe that the British intend to block us from any further advance and then evict us from their country; naturally, we do not intend to allow them to do that.”

“Of course,” Hitler agreed, dryly. “How do you plan to stop them?”

Manstein’s hand traced a line on the map. “We are currently expanding our lodgements and intend to make contact with their main defence line within a week, as much to ensure that we wipe out isolated Home Guard forces as to make our territory very clear,” he said. “Resistance, since we beat them at Ipswich, has been mixed; some of their units have been alert and not to be trifled with, others were disorganised and became easy prey. Once we come into contact with their main defensive line, we will mass our forces and engage as soon as possible, punching through the line and rolling it up before moving on London.”

He looked down at Hitler for a moment. “It has been suggested that we attempt to seize their industrial areas, rather than London, but as long as the British Army remains in being, our ability to guarantee the security of our conquests is limited,” he admitted. “Therefore, I suggest that we continue with the original plan and engage them on the way to London, smashing their army and convincing them that further resistance is useless.”

“But not all of them seem to have learned that,” Himmler purred, taking advantage of a brief pause to needle Manstein. “How else would you account for the incidents of resistance across the country?”

Manstein kept his face blank. “There have indeed been some attempts to resist us,” he conceded. “There have been a handful of incidents of young British men taking shots at our people, mostly missing, and they have been dealt with severely. The only incident that was not easy to deal with was someone who was actually a Home Guardsman who’d been ill and therefore wasn’t in uniform. The commander on the ground decided to believe him and sent him to a camp.”

Himmler snorted. “The security of the rear area, however, is in the hands of the SS,” Manstein concluded. “Perhaps the Reichsfuhrer would like to detail that?”

Hitler looked at Himmler, who nodded. “We have nearly two thousand trained and experienced SS security forces on the ground now, and that number is increasing all the time,” Himmler said. There are also several elements of the Waffen-SS Das Reich unit, but they are soldiers, rather than security forces. “We have been quick to secure our control over the occupied territories, but we have been unable to prevent a handful of incidents, most of them minor. One particularly odd set of minor incidents involved British police officers; three of them have been murdered within a day of our arrival.”

Hitler looked unconcerned. “Was that the result of one of our activities?”

“I don’t know,” Himmler admitted. “They didn’t kill themselves, but our forces have strict orders not to interfere with the local police unless they get in the way. It’s more likely that it could be someone settling a few old scores under the chaos caused by the invasion.”

He paused. “Apart from a handful of attempts to impede us, all dealt with swiftly and decisively, the British civilian population has been keeping its head down and trying to ignore us as much as possible,” he said. “Overall, we have some thousands of British working for us on the docks, and they’re being paid very high rates for their work, but I don’t think that they can really be considered enthusiastic supporters of the Reich. In the long term, they may end up with no option but to support us, but that depends on the course of the war.”

Hitler nodded. In Occupied Europe, the Reich had worked hard to cultivate groups that would have little choice but to support the Reich. The Vichy French Government was only popular compared to the Occupation Authorities in Occupied France; the French knew that Admiral Darlen was much kinder to them than any German would be. Hitler’s England might end up with a British puppet government running most of the country and only a few areas directly controlled from Berlin. That would, however, depend on the outcome of the fighting… and how much the British had left to bargain with when they finally conceded their defeat.

“In the air, we have air superiority over most of the important areas of Britain,” General Adolf Galland said, his voice confident and very controlled. He was aware that Hitler was watching the Luftwaffe like a hawk, looking for signs of the same failures that had forced the postponement, and then cancellation, of Operation Sealion. “The British RAF has taken a beating, and its efforts to interfere with the landing operations and the expansion of the beachheads have, so far, proven to be failures. Their main efforts have concentrated on breaking up our bomber formations and attempting to bomb the invasion ports in France, but I suspect that they are actually conserving their strength as much as possible for the main event.”

He smiled grimly. “They have to know that we will want to break out as soon as possible,” he said. “When that happens, they will throw everything they have into the air over the battle and try to keep the Luftwaffe off the backs of their soldiers. We are working to impede that in two ways, focusing our attention on their airfields and forcing them to react to our moves, rather than giving them time to catch their breath and launch their own attacks.”

“Good,” Hitler said after a long heart-stopping pause. “I expect you to focus your efforts on keeping them off balance. Albert, what about the deception plan?”

“In France, we have ten divisions, four infantry, six panzer with signal traffic warning the British of an attempted landing in the south of England,” Kesselring said. “I don’t know for sure if the British are taking the threat of a landing seriously, but under the circumstances, they have little choice but to move units north to confront us in the invasion lodgement. Churchill will have to decide what he wants to do quickly, under threat of us opening a second front.”

Hitler studied the map. “Why can’t your forces jump across the Channel?”

Kesselring and Speer shared a look. “The issue at hand, Mein Fuhrer, is that we do not have the ability to get them all over that part of the Channel without the British being able to tear them to ribbons from fixed positions,” he said. “It would be like the death ride of the 3rd Shock Army in Russia, without even the advantage of tanks like the Russians had; the British would be able to beat us, maybe even before we landed. At the moment, it remains better as a threat than as a real military operation.”

“Very well,” Hitler said. “I may add my own refinements to your future plans, but on the whole, I agree with them in principle.” Himmler smiled as the military men let out a collective sigh of relief. “I expect to see the British lines broken as soon as possible and the remains of the British Army shattered, do you understand?”

Kesselring nodded. “Yes, Mein Fuhrer,” he said.

Hitler looked over at Goebbels. “You will broadcast, tonight, an appeal to reason. You will inform the British public of their losses and make them an offer, a peace deal that I will design. If they choose to accept it and remove the arch-criminal from office, then we will have the grounds for a honourable peace with Britain, and then…”

Himmler listened with half an ear. Thanks to Philby and the others, he had a far greater insight into the strange world of British politics than anyone else, even Canaris and the Abwher. He doubted, somehow, that the British would accept Hitler’s offer, not after the Germans had launched their surprise attack. They hadn’t yet been convinced that they were actually beaten… and, as Himmler knew full well, without that internal surrender and submission, Britain would never give up the fight.