What if the Allies lost the Battle of D-Day? Serious answers only.?

Question

This is a question I've bounced around in my head once in a blue moon. In comics I've seen writers put their take on the question. Now I'm asking this of the history buffs of Y!A. Maybe like me you've thought of it or you've done your own research and found some conclusions. After all, with the factors of the weather and intelligence reports of the day a lot could have gone wrong. Or still go right. What are your thoughts?

Answer 1

A D-Day failure would've prolonged a war whose outcome was no longer in doubt. Not only did the allies have the nukes in the bullpen (BTW: the nukes were originally intended to be used against the Germans), but the drive up the boot of Italy would have been intensified, not to mention the strategic bombing of Germany's infrastructure.

A D-Day failure most likely would've resulted in a Soviet sphere of influence that stretched further west...but that's just my opinion.

Answer 2

Had D-Day gone badly as it very well could have (Ike carried around a letter he had prepared taking full responsibility for the failure that he fortunately didn't have to use), the end result of the war probably would have been the same. By 1944, the Germans were already being pushed back in the East and in Italy. The opening of the western front sped the end probably, but the allies would have won anyway, from overwhelming resrce advantages. The main difference is that the war might have ended in 46 maybe 47 instead, and that a few hundred thousand more may have died total.

Answer 3

Well if it was and absolute disaster with severe casualties and no hope of entering "Fortress Europe " across the Channel Then maybe the political enviroment might have changed at home.The European war was thought of in some circles as Mr.Roosevelt's war and we should have not been involved as it did not affect America's interest at the time there was a strong case of anti semitism with some industrialist notably Henry Ford , who received an award from Hitler, Thomas Edison , and Joe Kennedy who was sympathetic to the Nazi regime.
If political support crumbled and the United States came to an agreement with Germany then the British Empire would have been in the same situation as it was in 1940.With the industrial might of the US out of Europe the British would have to surrender in the Pacific leaving the US to continue fighting the Japanese to it conclusion leaving the US the sole power in the
Pacific Rim. So now we have a stalemate in the West with the British too weak to mount any kind of meaningful offensive in either Italy or across the channel leaving the Germans to us superior weapon technology to counter superior Soviet numbers just like NATO would use for the next 50 years after the conclusion of the second world war.Remember air power does not win wars it just makes it easier as current history will support.

Answer 4

Failure at Normandy would have been a setback, but not a defeat. At the time the Allied armies were already firmly lodged in Italy, and the Russians were rolling back across the Ukraine toward Berlin.

I suppose the biggest political consequence would be that the Soviets would have taken more of Europe behind the Iron Curtain than they did. Of course, Eisenhower would never have been President either.

That poses an interesting scenario. Given a Europe where the Iron Curtain hangs on the Rhine and a Republican Party that elects Robert Taft as President in 1952, we have a situation of extreme peril. Taft, who died in 1953, wanted Douglas MacArthur as his running mate, and MacArthur was determined to use nuclear weapons against the Communists.

Therefore, one possible result of a failure at Normandy would be nuclear war and the devastation of Europe.

My father, who was there, felt that the issue was never in doubt. The planning and preparation were immense, and simply could not fail. The Germans were outgunned, totally without air support and outnumbered. They did extremely well to hold as long as they did.

Further, had we been repulsed we would merely have gone elsewhere. We had mobility and the Germans were fixed in place.

Answer 5

Well in june 6 of 1944 germany had complete control in Europe, for this date only the allieds had found that germanies army standed back in Norht Africa and only the north african zones had been liberated, just in the Italy coast the allieds had found some victorys but they still had found the total control, and this D-Day represent to the allieds the opportunity for obtain one victory so important against the germanies cuz the allieds can to make a place in the french beach when they will can to enter much war material. So if the allieds had lost the fight in D-Day they would have to beguin again their work and maybe they will have his job in so much time maybe 2 years.

Answer 6

At the time, the Germans had too much trouble on their Eastern Front to start a new offensive in the West. So a D-Day defeat would have seen a return to the cross-channel stalemate of 1942/43.

Given that the A-bomb was only thirteen months away, I feel that if the war was still on-going in September 1945, then the US would have threatened the use of an A-bomb on Berlin.

Answer 7

Germany could not continue to fight a 2 front war. If D-Day had failed resources would have been rushed to the French coast to prevent another attempted landing. This would have strained the Germany army to the limit and allowed the Allies to push up from Italy into France. There probably would have been no Battle of the Bulge later because Germany would have had nothing left.

Answer 8

Yes - I have to agree with the others who have already stated that a failure of the D-Day landings would merely have prolonged the war rather than change the actual outcome.

Once the USA had joined the war, the Axis powers couldn't have hoped to keep pace with the sheer volume of munitions production and manpower that the US brought with them.

By D-Day, the Italians were all but finished and the Japanese were being pushed back.

If anything, perhaps the bombing of German cities would have become even more intensive and maybe we would have seen the use of the atomic bomb in Europe first rather than Japan.

Answer 9

It wouldn't really have mattered. By the time D Day had begun, Russia had practically won the war, pushing Germany all the way back home. While D Day ensured victory, for the British, Canadians and Americans against Germany, if we had lost Russia wouldve mopped it up, as they were facing 4 times as many Germans as were at D Day anyway.

Answer 10

Casualties” refers to all losses suffered by the armed forces: killed, wounded, missing in action (meaning that their bodies were not found) and prisoners of war. There is no "official" casualty figure for D-Day. Under the circumstances, accurate record keeping was very difficult. For example, some troops who were listed as missing may actually have landed in the wrong place, and have rejoined their parent unit only later.

In April and May 1944, the Allied air forces lost nearly 12,000 men and over 2,000 aircraft in operations which paved the way for D-Day.

Total Allied casualties on D-Day are estimated at 10,000, including 2500 dead. British casualties on D-Day have been estimated at approximately 2700. The Canadians lost 946 casualties. The US forces lost 6603 men. Note that the casualty figures for smaller units do not always add up to equal these overall figures exactly, however (this simply reflects the problems of obtaining accurate casualty statistics).

Casualties on the British beaches were roughly 1000 on Gold Beach and the same number on Sword Beach. The remainder of the British losses were amongst the airborne troops: some 600 were killed or wounded, and 600 more were missing; 100 glider pilots also became casualties. The losses of 3rd Canadian Division at Juno Beach have been given as 340 killed, 574 wounded and 47 taken prisoner.

The breakdown of US casualties was 1465 dead, 3184 wounded, 1928 missing and 26 captured. Of the total US figure, 2499 casualties were from the US airborne troops (238 of them being deaths). The casualties at Utah Beach were relatively light: 197, including 60 missing. However, the US 1st and 29th Divisions together suffered around 2000 casualties at Omaha Beach.