Chapter 87: In the Balance (1 to 15 August 1940)
Editor's Note: This first (longer) part will cover events related to the war and provide the operational backdrop for the first major War Cabinet review of strategic directions since the start of the Great Liberation War on 1 June 1940. The second part, to follow shortly, will provide reports to Cabinet on key unit production information, espionage considerations and the detailed agenda for the Cabinet meetings: to which ALL readAARs (regulars, occasional commenters, lurkers and new viewers) are welcome to send submissions and engage in the debate. For this, all you need to do is quickly review the current situation (which will all be laid out), consider the Cabinet Agenda (which will be out shortly) and have an opinion. The more the merrier. Remembering your comments (even if just every once in a while) are what gives us the added energy to write! 
1. Prologue – Ankara, 1 August 1940
Our two anonymous (for their own protection) sources from the Turkish Foreign Ministry once again ‘come up for air’, taking their fortnightly outing for lunch and coffee in downtown Ankara.
Says the first: “The record of conversation for the
‘demarche’ by the German Ambassador just before war was declared was certainly an interesting read!”
“It certainly was,” replies his colleague. “Even better if you were there … which I was! I don’t think that arrogant and self-important
Hans got the reception he expected.”
“Perhaps,” replies the first speaker. “But the
Kartoffel should have known he would not be welcome, given the low personal esteem in which he was held here and the tense circumstances at the time.”
“
Yes,” notes the second. “
I can see why he was so unpopular with our wise, brave and impeccably correct leaders.” This last sentence was said a little more loudly than usual and directed towards the pot plant near their table – just in case they were being listened to!
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The German Ambassador to Ankara in May 1940 was none other than Franz von Papen, the former Chancellor of Germany who had been succeeded by – and indeed facilitated the ascension of – Adolf Hitler. He was not well liked by Turkey. Papen had been the German government as Ambassador to Turkey since 1939. In April 1938, after the retirement of the previous ambassador, Frederich von Keller, Germany attempted to appoint Papen as ambassador in Ankara. But the appointment was vetoed by the Turkish president Mustafa Kemal Atatürk who remembered Papen well - with considerable distaste - from when he had served alongside him in Great War I. In February 1939, the new Turkish President İsmet İnönü again vetoed attempts to have Papen appointed as German ambassador to Turkey.
Franz von Papen (b. 29 October 1879) was a German nobleman, General Staff officer and politician. He served as Chancellor of Germany in 1932 and as Vice-Chancellor under Adolf Hitler in 1933–34. He belonged to the group of close advisers to President Paul von Hindenburg in the late Weimar Republic. It was largely Papen, believing that Hitler could be controlled once he was in the government, who persuaded Hindenburg to appoint Hitler as Chancellor in a cabinet not under Nazi Party domination. However, Papen and his allies were quickly marginalised by Hitler and he left the government after the Night of the Long Knives, during which the Nazis killed some of his confidantes.
In April 1939, the Turkish Foreign Minister Aras
[in this ATL] demanded that the Germans finally appoint a new ambassador to Turkey, saying he was tired of talking only to the First Counsellor. German Foreign Minister von Neurath
[Ribbentrop in OTL] took advantage of this, by saying he was more than happy to have Papen serve as the Reich's ambassador to Turkey. After having demanded that the Germans appoint an ambassador, the Turks now felt obliged to accept Papen, though both İnönü and Aras accepted Papen's appointment without enthusiasm. They would have preferred almost anybody
other than Papen.
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Record of Conversation
Meeting between President Inönü and German Ambassador von Papen,
Presidential Palace, Ankara, 31 May 1940
While the Ambassador was being summoned, President Inönü remarked to his cabinet colleagues Interior Minister Kaya, Foreign Minister Aras and Chief of Staff Örlungat: “Now are we well resolved and, God Willing, we will apply the glorious strength of our power against Germany. We'll bend them to our will, break them all to pieces, and see the Comintern ruling all its provinces and cities. If not, I will see my bones laid in an unworthy urn, tombless, with no remembrance of them. Either our history will be proclaimed with a loud voice, or else our grave, like a Turkish mute, will have a tongueless mouth, without any epitaph!”
At this point the German interlocutor, Ambassador von Papen, entered the President Inönü’s state reception room at the Presidential Palace.
“Now are we well prepared to know the pleasure of our fair colleague Deputy Führer Rudolf Hess,” states Inönü before Papen can begin his demarche. “For we hear your greeting is from him, not from Herr Hitler himself.”
By implication, it is a clear insult that an official message should come not from Inönü’s counterpart, but from his somewhat dubious Deputy.
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Rudolf Walter Richard Hess (b. 26 April 1894), was a prominent politician in Nazi Germany. Appointed Deputy Führer to Adolf Hitler in 1933. In 1940, he is the third most powerful man in Germany, behind only Hitler and Hermann Göring. [Wasn't yet considered the laughing stock he later became.]
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“Mr President, may I speak freely” asks Papen, “or must I use the nicety of diplomatic language to convey the Deputy Führer’s message?”
“I am no tyrant, but a civilised Turk and President. Therefore with frank and uncurbed plainness tell us the Deputy Führer’s mind.”
“Mr President, Turkey has already made great claims in Europe and now threatens Germany with warlike words, claiming certain territories, invoking the name of your great predecessor, President Kemal Atatürk. In answer of which, the Deputy Führer says that you think too much of the former glories of the old Ottoman Empire, and advises you there will be nothing in Germany that can be won by your poor gambits and weak forces. He therefore sends you, to match the worth of your spirit and your nation’s armed forces, this treasure. Accept it and, in taking it, he desires to hear nothing more of your threats and to hear no more of you. This the Deputy Führer speaks.”
“What treasure does he present, Aras?”
Aras walks over and opens an ornate chest that von Papen’s aides have brought with them. He examines its contents.
“Bratwurst, my President,” reports Aras, with a raised eyebrow.
“We are glad the Deputy Führer is so pleasant with us,” replies Inönü with apparent cheerful calm. “For his present and your pains we thank you. When we have marched our cooks into Germany with these sausages we will, God willing, make a hearty meal. And we shall strike his Führer’s hat from his head. Tell him he has made an enemy of such a fighter, that all the beer halls of Germany will be shaken to their foundations. And we understand him well, how he insults us over our more humble and backward recent years, not measuring what use we made of them. Tell the Deputy Führer that Turkey will rise with so full a glory that it will dazzle all the eyes of Germany and strike the Deputy Führer blind to look on us.”
“And tell him this mockery of his has turned his bratwurst into bullets. His soul will be sorely charged with the wasteful vengeance that will fly with them: for this mockery of his, many a thousand widows shall see doom visited upon their dear husbands; he mocks mothers from their sons; mocks cities down. And some are yet unconceived and unborn, that shall have cause to curse the Deputy Führer’s scorn. But this lies all within the will of God, to whom I do appeal; and in whose name tell your Deputy Führer that Inönü is coming, to revenge himself upon your nation. So return to Germany now in peace and tell the Deputy Führer his jest will savour but of shallow wit, when thousands weep more than did laugh at it. Go with safe conduct. Farewell.”
After Papen’s uncomfortable and hasty departure, with the clumsy German attempt to insult and bully Turkey having failed so spectacularly, Aras turned to his President and remarked: “That was a merry message!”
“We hope to make the sender blush at it,” replied Inönü with steely determination. “Therefore, colleagues, make all haste to give effect to our declaration of war and the consummation of the Comintern agreement with our Soviet allies. For we have now no thought in us but of war against the Axis. Therefore let our preparations for this war be finalised with all speed. We'll chide this Deputy Führer at his leader’s door. Let every Turk now task his thought, that this Great Liberation War be fought!”
The declaration was made soon after, two months ago to the day of our diplomat’s lunch and recollection.
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Elsewhere in Ankara, after deep thought and earnest consideration of her duty, Persephonee has decided to stay the course in Ankara. She will apply for the job to succeed BJ Guildenstern as editor of the
Path to Glory. She has, after all, been doing much of the work herself for years, especially recently during BJ’s prolonged despond of past months. She returns to work as Acting Editor while the Propaganda Department considers her application.
And having consulted with some colleagues and countrymen, she even has a name to recommend as the ideal candidate for the new ‘Turkish Truth’ propaganda sheet they are planning to establish. Should she win the job, she will make the suggestion, which she hopes will cement her position – as a woman leading in a very masculine world, but a determined one with a clear sense of what she wants.
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2. General Events
1 Aug 40
News Report: Moscow, USSR. Foreign Minister Maksim Litvinov [Vyacheslav Molotov in OTL] makes a speech to the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union proudly recounting the recent annexation of the Baltic states and clearly signalling the USSR's wish to recover all the territories that had been "stolen" from it during the country's military weakness at the end of the First Great War.
News Report: Tokyo, Japan. Japanese Foreign Minister Hirota Koki [Matsuoka Yosuke in OTL] formally announces the concept of a Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.
2 Aug 40
As more discretionary IC becomes available to Turkey, a new artillery brigade is queued for production.
3 Aug 40
Another Turkish spy is caught in Paris – this time by Canada! It seems not even laying low is enough to evade the influx of Allied spy-catchers which must now thoroughly infest France (given Inspector Clouseau’s hopeless French counter-espionage operation is now reduced to
zero agents – presumably by separate Axis action)! This leaves only two remaining there: three agents are now in reserve back in Ankara, but Ögel sees no point in risking them in such a hostile environment: he still remembers the debacle of their past foray into Japan at the time of that country’s influence campaign on Turkey, when 10 agents were destroyed in short order. Given they are not even safe hiding now, Ögel orders the last two surviving agents to “do their patriotic duty for Turkey”, break cover and try to infiltrate France’s technical design archives one last time. They may as well go down fighting rather than waiting for the knock on the door.
4 Aug 40
News Broadcast, US. American General John J. Pershing gives a nationwide radio broadcast urging that aid be sent to Britain [quote modified slightly in this ATL to reflect that France still fights on, though with increasing difficulty]. “It is not hysterical to insist that democracy and liberty are threatened,” Pershing said. “Democracy and liberty are under threat on the continent of Europe. The British and French are left to defend democracy and liberty in Europe. By sending help to them we can still hope with confidence to keep the war on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, where the enemies of liberty, if possible, should be defeated.” That same day, Charles Lindbergh appears at a pro-isolationism rally in Chicago and says that “if our own military forces are strong, no foreign nation can invade us and if we do not interfere with their affairs none will desire to.”
5 Aug 40
One of the two remaining spies in France is captured, again by the Canadians.
6 Aug 40
News Report: Brussels, Belgium. The American ambassador to Belgium John Cudahy says that the food situation in Belgium and German-occupied northern France is desperate and suggests that the Nazis seemed to be expecting outside aid to solve the food shortage for them. This comment would become controversial for touching on the issue of the British naval blockade.
8 Aug 40
With a little more IC freed up, a new militia brigade is ordered, while the second stage of the
Ankara-Adana Railway is commenced. The Cabinet is looking forward to future needs, whether for this Anti-Fascist War – or the next, to liberate the rest of the world from its capitalist chains!
9 Aug 40
News Report: Washington DC, US. US Under Secretary of State Sumner Welles reads a formal statement at a press conference calling Ambassador John Cudahy's recent remarks “in violation of standing instructions of the Department of State” and says they were “not to be construed as representing the views of this government.” The statement goes on to say that the incident “illustrates once again the importance which must be attributed by American representatives abroad to the Department's instructions to refrain at this critical time from making public statements other than those made in accordance with instructions of the Department of State.” [Ouch!]
10 Aug 40
Another advance is made to help keep the mainstay of the Turkish Army – the infantry – up to date. The next objective for Turkish researchers is to increase the attacking power of the artillery brigades, which will be important for future offensives.
News Report: Brussels, Belgium. John Cudahy is recalled from his post for “consultation”. The UK Daily Mail quotes him as saying, “I do not retract one word from what I said.”
13 Aug 40
The sad news is received that Turkey’s last spy in France has been captured – this time by the French! Clouseau must have been given some reinforcements for the purpose. But we are no longer able to see what strength their operation has, with the last of our agents gone.
At a special Cabinet meeting that evening, convened by Prime Minister Celal Bayar, Turkey’s war goals are added to. These are now becoming somewhat in the realm of “wild wish lists”, but the international system can throw up some strange results, so the claims are lodged with the Comintern Secretariat anyway. Germany and Japan would now be made puppet states, Hungary would be conquered and Trieste is added to the territories formally demanded of Italy.
15 Aug 40
Naval Report. In good news for Turkey, all the recorded naval losses during the first half of August were suffered by Italy. Two submarine flotillas were sunk, while they also lost one heavy and one light cruiser to the British Royal Navy.
The RM Zara was a heavy cruiser built for the Italian Regia Marina (Royal Navy), the lead ship of the Zara class. The ship was commissioned in October 1931, armed with a main battery of eight 8-inch (200 mm) guns and displacing 11,680 tons at standard load. The Zara was sunk in August 1940 by the British battle-cruiser HMS Renown.
The RM Armando Diaz was a light cruiser of the Condottieri class and the sister-ship of the Luigi Cadorna. The ship was commissioned on 29 April 1933, had a main armament of 8 x 152 mm (6 in) guns in four turrets and displaced 5,406 tons at standard load. Sunk by the Nelson class British battleship HMS Rodney (which had a main armament of nine 16 in guns!) in August 1940. A direct hit from the Rodney would have likely blown this light cruiser apart.
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3. France and the Mediterranean
After weeks at sea, at 0200 on
8 July, RADM Cebesoy’s ‘Mk1 Eyeball’ sub flotilla reported very low organisation – it was ordered back to
Athens to repair and refit.
Not three hours after being ordered back to port, Cebesoy was intercepted by an Italian cruiser and attacked. After three hours of inconclusive combat off the
Coast of Cape Matapan, Cebesoy was able to disengage and return to port.
11 July brought news that a convoy from one of only two Turkish sea routes still in operation was lost off the
Dodecanese. With plenty of spare convoys held back in Turkish ports, an occasional loss such as this can be sustained.
In Egypt, the British report that by midnight on
15 July they have made more significant advances in the last couple of weeks. The key locations of
Sidi Barrani and then
Bardia have been taken, with Allied forces now having reoccupied all the previously conquered provinces in Egypt. They have now advanced over the border into Libya, and are pressing on the key strategic fortified outpost of
Tobruch.
But in France, the news is grimmer. In the first half of August, the Germans have made slow but steady progress along various sectors on the Western Front. They inch ever closer to
Paris with the occupation of
Chateau Thierry, the scene of heavy fighting back in GW1. Of equal concern is the bridgehead over the River Marne they have seized at
Mailly le Camp, now directly threatening the major French air base at
Troyes. And further east, the Germans have advanced on a wide front between
Neufchateau and
St. Die, taking the fortifications of
Epinal and threatening what remains of the
Maginot Line still being held by the French, especially its northern-most point at
Selestat.
No further surrender progress has been yielded (still estimated by the Turkish Foreign Ministry as 29.1%), but the strategic situation in France continues to deteriorate. Even with Germany seriously distracted in the east, the French can’t seem to halt their advance, even where the ground should be favourable. There has been no movement in southern France, on Sardinia or French North Africa since 31 July.
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4. The East
Starting in the
Far East, by the end of
15 August, the Japanese have picked up the pace and made rapid advances along the coast of the Sea of Japan. They have displaced the Soviet Far East submarine base at
Innokentevsky way to the north, where they will find it even more difficult to operate against Japanese merchant shipping. The Soviet 25th Army remains in full retreat but is still largely intact. There is still no indication of when the Japanese assault may run out of steam (perhaps because of supply difficulties) or the Soviets might be able to consolidate a defensive line with properly supplied, rested and dug-in troops.
The great trek east for the Romanian relief force continues, with them now tracking past to the north of the Aral Sea.
Let’s hope their fate will not be the same as for the Russian Fleet at the
Battle of Tsushima Strait in 1905!
The above map shows the route taken by the main body of the Russian ‘Second Pacific Squadron’ (in blue) from the Baltic. It set out on 15 October 1904, only to meet its almost complete destruction in the Sea of Japan on 27 May 1905, at the hands of the Japanese in the Battle of Tsushima Strait. In poor condition after a long approach to the theatre, then thrown in against a better equipped, more experienced and better led force … oh dear, this could end in tears for our gallant Romanian brothers-in-arms!
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Turning to the
Eastern Front, midnight on
15 August sees the
Soviet Sector not much changed in net terms during the first half of the month. To-and-fro exchanges of territory continue. In the north, the Red Army retook
Rietavas, once again cleansing the Lithuanian SSR of Nazi pollution. They pushed on to
Memel and seized it, holding it for some time before being ejected again by a German counter-attack. Germany held the much-contested
Gumbinnen throughout the period and managed to once again expand into
Sowalki, to its south-east. On the Polish Front and the Soviet bridgehead over the Bug River, the Germans narrowed it by retaking
Wlodawa, but the Soviets deepened it by reoccupying
Bilgoraj. On this sector at least, Soviet numerical advantage and the lack of German mechanised units seems to be counteracting the Nazi’s
‘Destiny Putsch’. Honours are again even.
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In the
Romanian Sector, on the evening of
4 August the Soviets report they have yet again occupied
Debrecen, throwing out the defending German 35th Inf Div. The Soviets now have forces in action all along the front, from Eastern Hungary and along most of the Romanian-Hungarian border.
However, by
15 August, while the Soviets have maintained their early gains in the north and still hold
Debrecen, the Axis have regained some ground in the centre, around
Karcag and
Bekes. A net positive for the Comintern, but not decisively so. The question remains: if Turkey was able to muster some ‘spare’ troops, could their injection into the
Battle for Hungary prove decisive? Or could it weaken the
Yeniçeri Line sufficiently to allow an Axis breakthrough, with not enough reserves in place to plus any gap or reinforce a hard-pressed defence? As 1st Army Commander and President, Ismet Inönü will be putting these questions and more to his Cabinet for consideration shortly.
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The
Turkish Sector sees no more Axis ground attacks in the first half of August. Indeed, all is quiet until the early morning of
15 August, when the air raid alarms are again heard in
Ada at 0100. Ju-86 (TAC) bombers of the quaintly named
I and II Bombázóosztály of the Hungarian Air Force commence a series of raids that continue throughout the day. Whether this is just random harassment of the ‘softening up’ for another attack is unknown. Casualty reports come in during the day, with the first night raid killing 45 troops, 131 in the mid-morning and another 129 by 1700. There are no more raids that night, and by midnight no ground attack had materialised.
Coming Up: The second part of this two-weekly update will set up for the important War Cabinet Meeting of 16 August 1940. It will cover the Secret War; the unit production pipeline and what unit will be coming on line in the next few months; and the agenda for the meeting, decisions to be made and advice sought on them. Out soon.
