Today is V-E Day.

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=== Not every sector of the French coast has beaches suitable for amphibious landing. And an invasion near Brest or Bourdeaux would have been out-of-range of fighter cover (no P-51D Mustangs available yet) of bases from the UK. ===

Question: Assuming no war with Japan (the premise of the thread), could the US carriers have been used to provide air cover out of range of the British Isles? Or were planes that could be launched from and recovered by carriers unsuitable or insufficient to battle a land-based air force?

(not challenging... asking because I'm curious)

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Thank you

@averagejoe1 said
We in all the allied countries and the rest of the world should ‘Never Forget’ what happened in the early forties. Thank God almighty and brave men. Thank you.

Yes, FDR locked up innocent Japanese American citizens and tried the Court Packing Scheme.

May we never forget!

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Good stuff Duchess.

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There prob were none who objected. Why, you ask? Because Republicans are logical and rational and would not take a chance that those people could be evil and vicious , etc. Ahhh how simple. In other words, they would call a spade a spade, and not wet their beds agonizing.

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Assuming the Allies invade France rather than Sicily in June 1943, I question whether the Germans would have had sufficient forces there to prevent the establishment of a firm beachhead. From what I had read, there were only 25-30 German divisions there and few were panzer divisions. The great bulk of German armored forces were already committed to Operation Citadel (which had originally been scheduled for May) so I don't know where the mobile forces to repulse the invasion would have come from. I suppose Citadel could have been cancelled, but how long would it take to transfer divisions already in line for an offensive in Southern Russia to Western France AND have them prepared for the massive counterstroke necessary to defeat an already established beachhead?

It may very well be true that the Allies would have had a much more difficult time decisively breaking out then they had a year later. But I find it unlikely they could have been driven off; in November 1943 Rommel inspected the defenses in France and found them badly lacking:

The weaknesses that Rommel found along the coast appalled him — especially the lack of preparedness in the immediate coastal areas.

https://www.historynet.com/field-marshall-erwin-rommels-defense-of-normandy-during-world-war-ii.htm

The Italian front tied up more Allied forces than Germans, 189,000 to 100,000 by September 1943: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allied_invasion_of_Italy

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Funny, Erwin Rommel thought the beach defenses were pretty important but I'm sure he would have deferred to your military expertise.

I'm assuming an invasion in late June 1943 or perhaps July; Axis forces didn't surrender in Tunisia until May 13, 1943 and the Sicily invasion wasn't done until July 10, 1943. Assuming a similar delay, the Allies could be hitting the beaches days before or right in the middle of Operation Citadel which would severely limit any redeployment of German armor.

No one said anything about landing "several divisions". On the actual D-Day in 1944, the Allied landed 156,000 troops. https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/d-day
These were rapidly reinforced; by the end of June 850,000 troops were ashore. Perhaps the Allies had a bit less sea lift capability a year earlier, but they would have been able to put far more than "several divisions" in France and the idea they would have been trapped in a small salient as occurred at Gallipoli is far-fetched.

A funny thing about landing craft is that they aren't disposable; you can actually use them more than once. A bit more than two months after D-Day the Allies landed 151,000 troops in Southern France. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Dragoon Your idea that there couldn't be another front in the unlikely event the weak German forces in France could have sealed off the beachhead is contrary to historical reality; the Allies had plenty of troops and the means to transport them.

Again, a full scale breakout may or may not have been more difficult after the initial landings but I don't buy that there would have been any serious possibility of an Allied defeat.