I return!
Work picked up late last year, and didn't really slow appreciably since. It didn't help that the chapters I needed to write themselves were on areas that I didn't have particuarly strong instincts on, so inspiration required a mental wracking of the brain that it was just difficult to find the energy for after a full work-day. However, over the course of these (oh, wow, eight!?) months, I have managed now to produce two chapters. The ones immediately after these are on subjects where I had ideas anyway, so hopefully it won't take another eight to write them.
The world is definitely changing. After this war, no matter what, amercia will have reached the top of industrialised nations regarding production and infrastructure. They'll have fought across the world and been shown to be not just capable of being a great power but is already one of the greatest, without even really trying.
Amercian isolationism may well be the post war decision, but never again will the rest of the world be able to ignore Washington.
Saying that, the British have had a very good war so far, and been victorious pretty much on all their fronts except for the western front against Germany. That's really good going for a ww1 run.
Yes, the British are having a good war in terms of ultimately coming out on top on the fronts they are engaged in. However, under the surface, the bill (both financial and human) is mounting.
As much as it's nice that a ship surrendered, I doubt that any vessel would have done so. While it was in the vogue for sailing ships to strike their colors, there are precious few instances of ships larger than submarines having been captured. The closest we might come to that was the Hornet, which was sunk at close range by Japanese long lance torpedoes from their destroyers (I had heard an apocryphal story that the Japanese might have tried to take her under tow, but cannot find any source for that).
As noted, naval warfare is not my forte, but we also had an actual slugfest in the North Sea ITTL that proved the resilience of dreadnoughts in horrifying fashion, so perhaps the
Conte di Cavour was influenced by the knowledge that the hammering could indeed go on forever.
Good stuff!
I do find it curious that our author doesn't offer any commentary on whether they believe Paolini to be correct in his assessment.
Thanks!
In this case, it may be like commenting on the animal spirits of financial markets. It is simply impossible to know unless one gets to see the alternative, which the laws of space and time cannot provide to us.
We can put this naval battle in context if we look at comparable battles in our timeline.
The Battle of Lissa was a humiliating defeat for the Italian Navy. They had the better doctrine, the better guns, the better ships - and managed to lose due to command problems amounting to a collapse of leadership, while the Austrians won by the exercise of good leadership. Having the weaker force and expected to lose, Tegetthof decided to roll the dice and won big. Italian morale and leadership did not recover for decades. They were not effective in WW1 (see the Raid on Ancona), in part due to Austrian control of the Adriatic. So, yes - I think Paolini merely anticipates the sentiment of Admiral Cunningham, that it takes three years to build a ship and a century to build a tradition.
WW1 naval battles in our timeline show that capital ships could take a lt of pounding - see the reports of both fleets after Jutland - so Paolini might not have been gambling as much as we think. Good gunnery for that period achieved 3 to 5 percent hits for shells fired, and less at longer ranges. There would always be the option to launch a torpedo attack if the odds turned heavily against him or the Entente fleet pressed too close. Since the author does not say at what time of day the action took place it is also possible that Paolini was holding on until weather or twilight let him safely disengage.
Witness also the rot of the high Seas Fleet in the long years when it swung at anchor and the collapse of Russian civilian morale after Tsushima... Since he got away without serious losses, he made the right choice. Had he lost a significant part of his fleet - a bad choice.
Britain had abandoned the two-power standard for her navy long before WW1. The challenge from Germany had forced the RN to concentrate in the North Sea, and even then they were, at the start of WW1, hard-pressed to match German strength. The reason is that the Germans could pretty much pick their moment and have all ships ready to go, while the British, not knowing exactly when a sortie could come, had to keep a percentage of ships in dock for repair and maintenance.
So it is not at all inconceivable that Britain would be glad of American help. Politically, the more you get the Americans into action the less chance they'll go home before the war is over, and strategically the American ships have to be better than the Spanish and at least as good as the Italians. With TR as President, they'd better be.
Seaborne supply for Viareggio would still be essential. Not absolutely critical, but essential - railroads simply son't haul as much as ships, the rails and yards are more likely to be wrecked. It is at least as likely that Paolini had taken the measure of the situation on the ground and at sea and stopped when he realized he would not be making a difference.
Also, one reason for Italy joining the Entente in WW1 was her almost-total dependence on British coal... we have seen from WW2 what happens to navies short of fuel.
Getting the Americans more involved is, indeed, one of the lynchpins of British grand strategy as the war drags on. Pre-war, the US was a deterrent for Germany. Early war, they allowed for more aggressive prioritisation of Royal Navy resource by taking over in less important areas. Now, it is becoming clear that American resources and men may be necessary, not just for a clean victory, but for victory of any kind.
Therefore, each Anglo-American joint operation serves the grand strategy by actually getting Americans into Europe, and by increasing their buy-in (or, alternatively, engaging the sunk cost fallacy) with each contribution.
Indeed. I feel like the Italians navy made the best of a bad situation here. The amercians did good, the British got their lake back, and the Spanish got crushed.
It's an unusual situation where almost everyone from both sides in the battle got at least something's approaching good result. Naturally, that also means everyone got something approaching a bad result too.
Yes the Italian navy lives again, and has gone toe to toe with the allied fleet. It's also lost its ally, and it's country.
The British got rid of the Spanish, after their country bascially collapsed, but still have not dealt with the Italian navy despite their country's being bascially collapsed.
The Amercians have shot to the top of naval prestige by fighting a successful battle alongside the Royal Navy against a modern European navy...but they aren't going to get much from this. Having such an action nails their fleet to the British for the rest of the conflict, and there's no chance of their naval influence expanding further than it already has because they have no bases in Europe, let alone the Mediterranean. All well and good saying they are an ascending naval power, which they are. But their reach is still mostly confined to the pacific, without at least some British or French help or permission. And that will not be changing post war, because even if Roosevelt does make bank on his acting on the world stage approach, I don't think he'll be able to convince anyone at the peace conference or at home that America needs to have a base in Europe (and thus be constantly tied to what happens there).
Really, the winners are the British. They got American cooperation, Italian defeat and Spanish obliteration. They got the med back, a naval landing in Italy, Crete and reinforced the Balkans. The other interesting note is the lack of French ships anywhere. What are they up to, and how will their navy face having little to do with the opening of their own back yard?
Indeed. One of the issues the British will find post-war is that, having brought British influence to all these new frontiers with the help of the Americans, securing them in the peace will also require American support; support that may not be forthcoming.
With the situation on land being so dire for France (even before the war) and Brittany, the mayor French naval base in the north and the region with one of the strongest (military) naval traditions in France lost, I doubt France has a much larger navy than one needed to guard her coastline. Probably a grab-bunch of cruisers to protect her dotted out colonies, but not much more. (not to forget that Britain hold most of what "French West Africa" war IRL.
The seperate-ness was long confirmed by this point (the 1910's). Somewhere after the Treaty of London, either ex-king Willem I or his son Willem II held a celebration giving out honours, but it acted as a thanks and dismissal for the Belgian orangists for their efforts for the united kingdom. At this point the prevailing narrative was that Flanders and the Netherlands were seperated through a difference in national character, it's why Spain was able to reconquer Flanders but not the north. (It's present in both Belgicism and Calvinist-Dutch nationalism.) During the 20'ies Pieter Geyl would be the most prominent name I know of who criticized this academic narrative. I have no doubts that Belgium and the Netherlands would have warm relations post war (perhaps the Interbellum will see the construction of that Antwerp-Rhine connection decades earlier), but this is still Belgium in WWI with all her very unique issue's. Serving next to Dutch soldiers who speak Dutch to their officers instead of French would be galvanizing for the Front Movement
I don't know if I've said it explicitly enough before, but the mini-lessons your comments on the Belgian situation provide me are one of my favourite things about writing
FAWHA. Not only are they helpful in forming ideas for what teh history of post-war western Europe will look like, they're jsut fascinating in their own right.
I'm impressed by how well the Italians did, given the circumstances. It's a shame that the civil war ruined those efforts.
With Anglo-American domination of the seas, I expect that a blockade of Germany will be what forces them to surrender
The blockade is indeed doing damage, but, as we will see in the chapter after today's, its efficacy is being maintained at a cost.
I would point out that, important as the French naval bases of Brest and La Rochelle may be, Toulon was at least as important.
Under the circumstances - defeat on land, pressing German threat, uncertain support from Allies - I believe the remaining rump of France would devalue the navy and put all its resources into the army. Ergo, no Marine Nationale ships larger than, perhaps, a cruiser.
All the comments on the French naval situation are basically correct. Faced with an existential threat on land, France has deprioritised the navy to the point that it was basically ignored as a potential contributor to allied war plans for the sea.
Having reread the whole aar again, I'm struck by the absence of Lord Kitchener. Did he just not rise to acclaim in various African wars? I feel that he was one of the few OTL figures who grasped what was going on in 1914, and knew what was coming.
His absence as war leader is rather keenly noted, both in terms of propaganda and in terms of good and far-sighted logistical management planning.
Kitchener's absence is not an intentional thing, so I will be thinking about how to bring him into proceedings (there are many disasters and escalations yet to come where he can emerge as the man of the hour).
Finally caught up. Not to got much to add that hasn’t already been said, but looking forward to seeing how the last couple of years play out – and just exactly how the Germans fall to pieces.
Also keeping half on eye on Russia… Time to get that massive revolutionary wave rolling?
Thanks! Looking forward to writing it.
The clock is ticking, and Act Three draws ever closer.
