You don't exactly hear much about british involvement other than they were pretty much getting their asses kicked until the united states entered the war. And I just realized that a large majority of you are from the UK so I apologize for any offense. in the above statement.
Seriously? That is how the British were winning over the US, as one of the reason the US didn't want to be involved was that they didn't want to join the losing side and find out their ally was defeated a month after joined. Whenever British Propaganda needed to win over Americans Churchill didn't want to spend money on an extensive campaign saying why America should join them but showed the Germans could be beaten after their inconceivable victory over modern armies (Poland and France). Although Poland wasn't as developed with its army as Britain, Germany and France they did have access to modern weapons such as Planes and Tanks.
True Britain did suffer heavily at first due to France and Britain thought that World War I was basically going to play out again so they dug in and to be honest the French Maginot line did hold out for some time and stopped German advance into that area but due to the new tactics (Blitzkrieg) used by the German commanders it took the allies by surprise as they didn't know that is how tanks could have been used as most thought they were only useful when support infantry and would be terrible if they went off by themselves.
Dunkirk which is seen as a miracle was a full British retreat from France which is seen as a victory for the British while many would see it as a defeat. Regardless if the Germans charged forward majority of the British army would have fallen and we would have surrendered. We would have actually been treated quite fairly by the Germans as we are the decent of Aryans according to Nazism due to the Saxons as they came from Tribus Saxony in Northern Germany.
Actually in Mein Kampf Hitler did want good relations with Britain as he saw Britain and Germany as similar and like minded people. Was a member of the Royal family of Britain who fought with the Kaiser in World War I because Queen Victoria sent him off to be trained in Germany then when he was reaching the age of enlisting World War I came. He was eventually banished from Britain and her Empire due to fighting with the Germans by Parliament as many were outraged someone turned their back on their homeland. He was allowed back when Hitler made him his Ambassador to Britain.
Britain didn't want to be involved at first the only air strikes they did on Germany was dropping leaflets giving out reason why the two shouldn't be at war and why German expansion was a bad thing. Did give flight crews experience flying over Germany but Britain didn't want another World War due to Chamberlain fighting in the First World War and attempted to appease Hitler and he thought any who'd seen the horrors that WWI had to offer wouldn't want to bring it back.
There were many fields of war in which Britain was involved. They helped make the Invasion of Sicily take like a week due to massive amounts of confusion given to the Germans with false plans for an Invasion of Greece. Although that was at the time when the US was involved but the British spying had broken German codes long before that and we knew Hitler's day of invasion of the USSR, we also had been spying on American communications to know what the Americans were talking about before they joined, once they joined in we ceased spying on them.
Britain expeditionary forces in India suffered some of the worst horrors in all of World War II due to fighting Japan but stopped Japan's spread into Asia Minor. To be honest if they were told they were be changed from fighting in Asia and going to the beaches of Normandy they'd probably be incredibly grateful...
To be honest Hitler allying with Mussolini was probably one of his worst moves as one of the only battles the Italians won was against tribals and they only really won because they used chemical weapons... When they faced a modern army they were thrashed like when they assisted in attacking France and need to have their arses saved by the Germans and when they invaded Greece and need to be saved by the Germans or when they invaded North Africa and were winning at first then the British Army arrived so the Germans needed to save the Italians again. To be honest if Rommel was given what he needed in North Africa then the Germans could have probably taken majority of the Middle East.
I did recently watch America's planned invasion of Japan's home island. Was going to dwarf the D-Day landings as it was expected a million of Americans would die in the taking of the home island. As the Atomic Bomb was just a theory and no one knew if it would work so they had plans on other things. Eventually Chemical Weapons were going to be used on Japan as America might have helped draft the Geneva Convention but never actually signed and this would have been in retaliation for the Japanese using chemical weapons on China in 1937. Whether or not that would stand up in a human rights case I doubt it but the war heroes who drew up plans which ended World War II similarly to the American commander in World War I who was outraged that the Allies allowed the Axis to surrender as he wanted the only to be over when he was in Berlin.
This was covered up by America's government as generals like that got a large amount of people killed needlessly as fighting didn't stop until the last minute. I think that a few were killed afterwards like a German officer who was shot when he was moving over to surrender his forces but due to the wonderful miscommunication that was so common in World War I was shot by Americans who fought he was attacking them. Can't really blame them though as they thought they were still fighting and the usual way to do that shoot first ask questions later.
Still annoys me when people think all of the Wehrmacht were members of the Nationalist Socialist Party. The Wehrmacht is the German Army it would be like saying all the American army follows the Democratic party because they are in power...
Majority of the Wehrmacht was highly supportive of Hitler since he brought them from the brink of falling to Communism and economic destruction to become one of the world super powers. If someone went up a soldier of the Wehrmacht and send Hitler is killing millions of Jews they would have probably beaten for saying something ridiculous. No doubt German was racists against the Jewish population but that comes from years of propaganda which had been fed to people all over the world for years. If the Waffen SS turned up then they were Hitler's personal bodyguard and were "Elite" compared to the normal German soldiers.
Near the end though there were several regiments of Waffen SS quickly drafted from nearby occupied lands which the Germans took over much earlier.
I still think the most underrated German unit has to be the Fallschirmjager as they were one of the first Paratrooper regiments in the World and basically showed France, Britain and US that Paratroopers could be very useful.
The last unit fighting in World War II in the European Theater between Germany and Russia was actually a French SS division that if they surrendered would have been called traitors and executed or they'd have been shot by Russians. Wenck's 9th army retreated taking as many civilians as they could have to the West to be treated better (Not shot on sight) unlike if they surrendered to the Russians.
That is why Germany kept on fighting because they really poked the bear when Russia came charge into Germany as the Russians saw the horrors of the Waffen SS (Mass killings of inferior people and leaving them in unmarked graves) which naturally pissed off the Russians so when they came into German territory they didn't give a fuck about the Germans. Wenck was actually killed I think for being in the Nazi high command but regardless his last actions makes him a hero to me as he helped save thousands of civilians and he is own troops who were mainly made up of young boys and old men (Volkssturm) who can't really fight but the Hitler Youth was the most fanatical force within World War II as they'd charge T-34s with Panzerfausts and not care about their safety at all. Majority of the German army laughed at them at first because they were still boys but the Hitler Youth was basically covered up as say scouts but actually was massive amounts of indoctrination and basic training for the army which most boys liked to do because they were out and about, learnt how to shoot, use camouflage, campcraft and all the other stuff like that by the time they joined they had more training than some veteran germans as they'd be taught since 1936 or before.
Also German marches are much more energetic and enjoyable than other countries for some reason...
We all needed each other to beat Germany, if Britain had fallen America would have had a horrible time making a foothold into Europe as crossing the channel was bad enough for the D-Day landing now imagine crossing an ocean... If America hadn't gotten involved we wouldn't have had the increased amount of equipment and if Russia had fallen then we'd have had the actual German army return to the West rather than the recruits from occupied territories. To be honest the Russians had it worst. There was actually a Finnish SS group of volunteers who went into battles against the Russians as the Russians had fought against the Fins earlier and Mannerheim treated a thin line between collaboration with the Nazis instead of just cooperating with them to ensure Finland's safety. Germany wanted to move through Finland but Finland was supported with munitions to push back the Russians to the original Finnish line.
There you go a random jumble of World War II trivia basically explaining in the beginning how Britain wasn't "getting their asses kicked" but actually putting up stern resistance to a massively outnumbering force from the Luftwaffe. Thank fuck for radar and the Polish... To be honest we did have the RAF beaten a couple of times to the point wouldn't have been able to recover but then Goring changed his mind and started attacking a new target just as Britain was at breaking point.
