FDR gets a declaration of war from congress on Germany and Italy in Nov of 41

[Kubis Gabcik]

My historical understanding is that FDR was staunchly pro allied and did everything to support the allied cause for example supplying the other allied powers with weapons and other equipment and had sent volunteer fighter aircraft squadrons to Britain and China. However what prevented him from becoming fully involved was the inability of congress to budge and vote in favor of a declaration of war.

By Nov of 41 German Kriegsmarine U-boats had torpedoed some U.S. Navy destroyers. Suppose this had been enough to sway congress in favor of declaring war. How soon would the Americans deploy to the European war? Also, would the Americans join the Chinese in the second Sino Japanese war?

 

[Kubis Gabcik]

I know this might seem like a silly question but does anyone know where the standards are for what kind of speculative history scenarios can be posted? I want to make good speculative history threads and create some good discussion

 

[Chlodio]

Basically take the historical rate of mobilization and advance it one month because the US began mobilizing one month earlier. The only way to really speed up American mobilization is if the Pacific stays peaceful. Then the US could concentrate troops, planes, and ships (especially merchant ships) in the Atlantic and not have to split resources between two fronts. There is, however, no guarantee that an early American entry against Germany will neutralize Japan. If the US started redeploying strength from the Pacific to the Atlantic, it might actually encourage Japan to attack Pearl Harbor even more than historically. In fact, historically, the US did deploy the USS Yorktown and some cruisers and destroyers from the Pacific to the Atlantic in the fall of 1941 only to switch them back to the Pacific after Pearl Harbor. I don't know if this redeployment encouraged Japan or not, but it may have.

 

[Futurist]

I know this might seem like a silly question but does anyone know where the standards are for what kind of speculative history scenarios can be posted? I want to make good speculative history threads and create some good discussion

AFAIK, we can create any alternate history threads we like as long as we:

1. Don't involve any magic in this. So, no Alien Space Bats (to borrow a theme from alternatehistory.com).
2. Don't talk about genetics. We forbid talking about genetics on this forum.

 

[Futurist]

Basically take the historical rate of mobilization and advance it one month because the US began mobilizing one month earlier. The only way to really speed up American mobilization is if the Pacific stays peaceful. Then the US could concentrate troops, planes, and ships (especially merchant ships) in the Atlantic and not have to split resources between two fronts. There is, however, no guarantee that an early American entry against Germany will neutralize Japan. If the US started redeploying strength from the Pacific to the Atlantic, it might actually encourage Japan to attack Pearl Harbor even more than historically. In fact, historically, the US did deploy the USS Yorktown and some cruisers and destroyers from the Pacific to the Atlantic in the fall of 1941 only to switch them back to the Pacific after Pearl Harbor. I don't know if this redeployment encouraged Japan or not, but it may have.

Your response here sounds reasonable. Thus, I am tempted to agree with all of it.

 

[Chlodio]

I know this might seem like a silly question but does anyone know where the standards are for what kind of speculative history scenarios can be posted? I want to make good speculative history threads and create some good discussion

The problem you ran into with that other thread sprang from some complaints a few months ago that there were too many unrealistic threads in the speculative forum. A lot of members were more annoyed than entertained by the nature of the threads. You could tweak your other subject into something more acceptable like:

Did Ronald Reagan have the talent, personality, and leadership style to be a good wartime leader like FDR or Lincoln?
or
What traits made FDR a good wartime leader? Did any peacetime US presidents have these traits but did not have the opportunity to display them?

Since these questions are more fact-based, you might want to put them in other forums besides speculative.

If you really want to stick to Speculative history, a good rule of thumb is that your speculation must be possible and not complete fantasy. I did a speculative thread some ways back about the Japanese not attacking Pearl Harbor but they did invade the Philippines so that the US fleet sailed to the Western Pacific and fought the Japanese fleet in an open sea battle. What would this battle look like and who would win?

 

[Futurist]

Yeah, we can't have any magic in our speculative history threads. It's a huge shame because @Niobe really liked Alien Space Bats!

 

[Kubis Gabcik]

Thank you for the replies Chlodio and Futurist. I have a number of speculative military history scenarios in mind that I might make threads on. I agree that the situation in Asia and the Pacific would be uncertain. In Nov of 41 the Chinese and the Japanese were locked in a stalemate and it had been roughly over a year since the Tripartite Pact had been signed. It would be interesting to see if the Americans or the Japanese struck first. There is a chance that the Japanese seeing there allies in the European war have a new foe join the fight against them declare war on the Americans (which wasn't mandatory for them to do so) and strike first at the Philippines/Pearl/Malaya/Hong Kong/Singapore/Indonesia just like Germany declared war on the Americans in reality.

 

[Kubis Gabcik]

The Japanese leadership probably would be like oh we're having difficulty conquering all of China and then we foolishly declared war on the American when it wasn't mandatory for us to do so.

 

[Kubis Gabcik]

Some speculation here.

The second happy time would begin a month earlier as In Dec of 41 U-boats began attacking cargo ships and maybe warships along the east coast of the states.

The U.S. Navy sinks its first u-boat in Feb of 42 maybe off the east coast of NC.

USAAF Bombers make their first mission in July or June of 42 or maybe earlier.

The Americans join Britain and the commonwealth in the North Africa campaign in Nov of 42 as in reality or earlier?

Would the U.S. Navy have committed any carriers to the Atlantic to fight the U-boats or sent any warships such as cruisers or battleships to fight the Kriegsmarine surface ships (Tirpitz, Scharnhorst, Gneisenau, Admiral Scheer, Prinz Eugen Admiral Hipper) ?