In article ,
Andrew Gray writes:
On 2004-05-14, Pat Flannery wrote:

I would think that, by forcing the Allies to slog through Italy from
1942-44, Germany and the Axis countries possibly delayed the eventual
invasion of Europe via France by as much as a year. (Granted, the
invasion might still have had to wait until June of '44 just to assemble
the mass of warmaking machinery and the vehicles to deliver it that was
required for a successful invasion.)


Italy gave us a base from which to operate B-17s and B-24s against the
Axis oil fields, like Ploesti- which would have been out of range from
Britain. My dad's B-24 squadron was in on some of the Ploesti strikes.

Ploesti was also raided from Egypt, mind you, and I believe in one
rather innovative attempt a large raid was staged from England, over a
major Eastern European taget (can't recall where) and then into the
USSR. Not the greatest of sucesses...

The shuttle raids (UK-USSR-UK) were, to decribe them politely, a
Colossal Mongolian Goat Screw. Poor COMSEC (Communication Security)
on the part of the Soviets let the Germans know that something was
coming. When the B-17s crossed into Poland, they were shadowed by
Luftwaffe Recce aircraft that followed them to the staging bases.
That night, the Germans raided the bases and detroyed a number of
B-17s. Having Soviet fighters jump the B-17's escorting P-38s as they
were entering the traffic pattern was just the icing on the cake.
We found that cooperating that actively with teh Soviets wasn't, shall
we say, productive. Shuttle raids continued, but now they staged from
the UK-Italy-UK. Much, much better, since the only flak they had to
deal with was German.

(As a side note, just before the fall of Greece, in 1941, there was
very nearly a British bombng raid on Ploesti and Baku (And yes, Baku
was in the Soviet Union - don't forget that the Soviets had jumped
into Poland with teh Germans, and were supporting the Germans, not
only with raw materiels but espionage and sabotage of the Allies
through the GRU, Amtorg, and the local Communist Parties, so they were
a Happy Paricipant, if not Member in Full of the Axis side from Sept
1939 until June, 1941 If the French were the obnly people who lost WW
2 twice once on each side, the Soviets are the only ones who won
twice.) that was canned at the last moment.

--
Pete Stickney
A strong conviction that something must be done is the parent of many
bad measures. -- Daniel Webster