r/NonCredibleDefense • u/andreslucer0 Mexican Army Dragoon, the NonCredibleCavalry • 3d ago
Photoshop 101 📷 who would win between 1939 smugrope vs 2026 coaxrica
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u/vp917 3d ago
Don't forget the three million Hilux technicals running around with ATGMs, mortars, RPGs, and worst of all, radios.
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u/guyinthecap 2d ago
Rommel driving through the desert only to have his Tigers get blasted by a cavalry charge of SPG-9 wielding pickup trucks...
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u/Lolibotes Furthermore, Moscow should be destroyed 2d ago
Pz IIs. They didn't start rolling out Tigers until like 1943, and Tiger Is were famously dogass
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u/SlavCat09 Prinz Eugen megasimp 2d ago
Tiger 1 wasn't as bad as this sub is made out to be, but it could be destroyed by the guns they had back then. So even what we consider ancient now would mop the floor with everything they got.
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u/Attaxalotl Su-47 "Berkut" Enjoyer 2d ago
Solid tank consistently overhyped, and subsequently overbashed
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u/Youutternincompoop 2d ago
in 1939 the two most common tanks in Wehrmacht service were the PZI and the PZ35(t), PZII was the 3rd most common lol.
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u/Attaxalotl Su-47 "Berkut" Enjoyer 2d ago
Ehhh, the Tiger I had Typical German Reliability but if properly cared for that’s not a problem. In all other respects, it’s a damn good tank for the time. Good gun with a lot of ammo, internal radios, a fuckload of ergonomic features make it easy to operate and possible to fight in for long periods, it’s got very good frontal armor, and some good visibility from inside. All around, a solid tank especially for 1943; just follow the maintenance instructions in the owners manual or you will regret it.
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u/1010000_1100001_1110 2d ago
Well this is not true the panther and tiger II s were the unreliable ones
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u/guyinthecap 2d ago
Very fair, I just chose a heavy tank with armor on the thicker end of the spectrum.
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u/IdiosyncraticSarcasm 2d ago
cavalry charge of SPG-9 wielding pickup trucks
3000 SPG-9 of Hissène Habré
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u/ltobo123 2d ago
Someone was putting out the numbers (which were admittedly interesting) but seemed to vastly underestimate how many SPGs and RPGs Africa has access to. For any European force, it would be a genuinely baffling amount of organic firepower for '39
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u/MisogynysticFeminist 2d ago
Could ANY WWII tanks survive an RPG? Much less ‘39 tanks?
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u/Neitherman83 2d ago
The PG-7V Warhead, aka the basic bitch of shaped charge RPG-7s, can go through at least 260mm RHA.
The thickest tank that entered service was the Tiger 2, with 185mm RHA on the turret front.
MAYBE at an angle they'd have a shot of surviving it... but not very likely.
And then you add the later warheads. Which have "lol lmao, didn't realize you were armored" levels of RHA pen.
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 2d ago
Hmm, most shots in practice are going to be angled to some extent. You've got a bit of angle by the shooter probably being lower down than the turret, then there's likely some degree of sideways angle in practice as well, with these angles you can reach 260mm effective thickness somewhat quickly. Add in the possibility of hitting the mantlet and there's a decent chance.
Of course this is against the heaviest production tank and with the least potent armour-piercing warhead.
I also thought about the side skirts aka Schurzen. But I was reminded that such skirts, if effective against HEAT rounds, work by damaging the incoming round in some way to prevent optimal detonation rather than simply increasing standoff distance. In fact, a modest increase in standoff distance like you might see with a detonation against a Schurzen can actually increase penetration, for older munitions like the PG-7V which don't already have longer nose probes etc to take advantage of this phenomenon.
Source: https://imgur.com/a/shaped-charges-sANkucg
The likelihood of side skirts damaging the round is not very good I think because it's just a very thin sheet of simple steel. Add that to the thin (side) hull armour and penetration is pretty much guaranteed.
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u/Neitherman83 1d ago
Mind you, I pointed out the Tiger 2 as the extreme, but this is 1939 Europe...
The best thing around at that point I think is the Matilda? And that one has 78mm at its highest.
Even with an extreme angle, the odds are just not good
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 1d ago
Sorry yes, I have since been clarified that we're really talking about 1939 and not WWII or 1945 in general.
1939?! Absolutely nothing out there yeah. Matilda my beloved... godspeed, I hope the RPG misses you entirely. May you trundle along peacefully forever
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u/ltobo123 2d ago
WWII tanks survive? Probably, maybe? Depending on range/angle of impact, and assuming later models. Continue to be functional/with crew in tact? Significantly less likely.
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u/IlluminatedPickle 🇦🇺 3000 WW1 Catbois of Australia 🇦🇺 2d ago
Depending on range
The only thing range is going to change is the chance of missing. If the round hits and detonates, it doesn't matter what range it's at (discounting arming range, but if you're within 5m you're not going to survive anything anyway).
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u/ltobo123 2d ago
Ah I was thinking mostly angle of impact/arc and direction blast goes. That's a good point about it still being lethal at any range, more was "does it fuck the track or squishy bits"
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 2d ago
A very interesting question, please also see my follow-ups to other people's replies to your comment for my findings re Tiger II and re side skirts.
If you are counting prototypes, then yes probably. There were some ludicrously thickly armoured prototypes out there including the Maus (lol) and the American T28 which had a nominal frontal armour thickness of 305mm. That is greater than the PG-7V, the basic anti-armour RPG-7 round, listed armour penetration of RHA of 260mm.
But you probably shouldn't count prototypes because there was some really ridiculous shit made.
Other than that, for production tanks there's just the Tiger II, which appears to have a small chance of survival with angled hits on the turret front. But these are ideal circumstances against the rare and heaviest tank. More modern anti-armour warheads can obviously achieve much more penetration.
If you count things that were never going to be lethal like hits against tracks, hits against the gun barrel, and so forth, obviously those can be counted as survival. Also if firing non anti-armour warheads which can happen sometimes due to mistake, obviously those aren't going to be nearly as potent.
We might see cope cages introduced after a while which can be done with old tech. They might be somewhat effective.
1939 tanks? I can't think of anything in that time period which had nearly enough thickness of any kind, slope, or spacing that could somehow amount to something that can overcome a nominal penetration of 260mm. If they survived, it would be by dint of how HEAT rounds can be somewhat finicky compared to a simple AP slug, like maybe if the detonator was damaged prior to firing etc. It would be no thanks to the characteristics of the tank itself.
This is all assuming the RPG-7, the most common RPG launcher and is what you're probably thinking of. But there are also smaller but not too uncommon numbers of the older RPG-2 out there, which is a lot less capable. (Though from anecdotal experience and a quick check on Wikipedia, it seems like modern sightings of them are often in the Middle East or SEA rather than Africa, I don't really know though.) Those would not be quite as deadly but still quite lethal against WWII tanks.
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u/TypowyLaman 2d ago
This whole thing ia very hard for me to decide cause like, are we assuming every one teleports to the front line or are still dispersed? Are the industries allowed to catch up or not? Is the rest of the world gone? Cause like yeah technical superiority on African side, but for how long? Africa is not nearly fully self sufficient, they'll run out of modern components pretty early on, meaning that replenishing any modern munitions and spare parts will be impossible early on. And what about manpower? Are we assuming that African countries can't introduce conscription or no?
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u/TyrialFrost Armchair strategist 2d ago
1939 Europe. 2026 Africa.
A wizard waves his wand and each opponent has a supreme allied commander who will be followed for military matters, they knows the other superstate must be defeated. All nationalist issues are paused until that is resolved. All State leaders are onboard and have delegated military leadership.
All other nations for all intents no longer exist. (But assume no new sea lanes open)
Only space assets that were made/bought by an African state still exist.
Any uptime foreign maintainers/peacekeepers/troops/doctors/mercenaries disappear overnight. Any uptime foreign owned/flagged bases/military/transport equipment similarly disappear.
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u/META_mahn 2d ago
2026 African tanks would absolutely demolish anything Europe has to field, purely because the APFSDS exists and is such a leap forward in materials and general weapons engineering that it would be treated with the same regard as a holy relic in 1939
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u/SolarianIntrigue 2d ago
Africa can't even feed itself without importing high calorie crops from Europe and America. It doesn't matter how hard WW2 europe gets clapped by F-16s, Africa would starve in this scenario
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u/Der_Stalhelm TÜRKİYE!!! 2d ago
If it is just 1v1 and nobody can trade the European resource market would blow up with only USSR having a diverse resource set to inject europe, considering africa cannot buy food they now dont have to sell food which would help with the starvation problem, over time the gaza level bombings against europe would destroy majority of the farming capabilities of europe leading to mass starvations in europe itself
its 2026 dawg you think starvations happen because people cannot grow food 😭
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u/SolarianIntrigue 2d ago edited 2d ago
Yes, actually. Africa imports something like 60% of its caloric intake from overseas because it physically can't grow them by itself and it's still only providing something like 2200 kcal per person per day. There's basically zero safety margin like there is in rich countries with tons of food waste, if you cut 60% of the supply then 60% of the continent will starve
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u/Der_Stalhelm TÜRKİYE!!! 2d ago
Could you give me a source for this
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u/SolarianIntrigue 2d ago
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u/Der_Stalhelm TÜRKİYE!!! 2d ago
I have to be honest man they seem to have bundled up the middle east with africa which fudges with the numbers alot
Alongside this if we remove the amount of exports coming out of africa we gain more food for africa, remember that africa grows luxury cash crops that do not feed africans, assuming that exports and imports are removed then these crops can be replaced with consumable crops
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u/does_my_name_suck 1d ago
Part of that reason is that it’s more effective for African countries to grow cash crops like cotton, tobacco, cocoa and coffee that they then sell on the international market for profit and buy back food. There isn’t a shortage of arable land in Africa to feed the continent’s population but it does counterintuitively make more economic sense to not grow food locally.
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u/andreslucer0 Mexican Army Dragoon, the NonCredibleCavalry 2d ago
It doesn't matter. Even assuming half of Africa's population starves to death (lol), they've got 800 million people to keep up the war. Europe's total population in 1939 was about 500 million.
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u/SolarianIntrigue 2d ago
Do you think the remaining 800 million will be in any condition to fight after barely avoiding starvation worse than Holodomor?
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 2d ago
Amazing diagrams and illustrations. This is actually a fascinating scenario and I'd totally be down to read an alternate history novel along these lines, something like Axis of Time except with a different group of people and stuff going back in time.
Fucking Panzer IIs lmao. Don't forget the horse-drawn supply chain to fuel them..
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u/DFMRCV 3d ago
Dude, this debate is so annoying. Zero nuance.
Either Ze Glorious Aryans will stomp or the cool dude African bros will stomp.
Point out that it's not that clear cut and that neither side here is fully equipped to handle the other for a while in large scale operations and you get jumped by both sides.
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u/EncabulatorTurbo 2d ago
Europe's invasion fleets get sunk by Egyptian air force
Africa has no lift capability or logistical ability to invade Europe.
80+% of Africa's food is imported
Both Europe and Africa have economic collapse, Europe has mass food insecurity and Africa has mass starvation.
Both continents lose but I think Africa loses worse, even after they cobble together a nuke in the walled compound in South Africa holding back the starving masses with barbed wire and machineguns, and use it to glass berlin
Like for this to even count we need to define "Win"
Because people seem to think pan-africa can conquer Europe, and that aint happening any more than Europe is conquering fuckin... anything in Africa
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u/DFMRCV 2d ago
The question of "then what" really kind of just ruins either path to victory you look at.
For example, I'm not even sure Egypt and Algeria have the ammo to completely sink the entire Royal Navy combined with the entire French Navy combined with the entire Kriegsmarine of 1939, but let's grant it.
Then what?
Africa isn't going to suddenly be able to invade Europe. If South Africa manages to make a new nuke, or hell, let's grant that they secretly kept some of their nukes and they use them to glass every capital in Europe...
Then what?
You expect me to believe the Uber racists of Europe in 1939 the same Uber racists who didn't even see Slavs as people... Are going to let the Africans dictate terms? I could see them start stocking up on chemical shells and begin begging the African nations try to land troops or use the nuked cities as a rallying cry to resist for decades to come.
Even if Africa solves its food situation, and manages to get industry running so that they can sustain air operations, they're not going to be able to put boots on the ground in Europe for a while.
And if they do... Then what?
Same questiona for the dudes saying Europe would stomp have to answer for Europe somehow Lansing troops and retaking their colonies that remember the abuses of the Belgians in the Congo and the French in Algeria. You think Algeria is okay letting the French who nuked them 17 times back in control???
It's such a scenario where I don't think either side can definitevely "win" for a very very long time.
I do think Africa overall had the most tools to win, but Europe is not only not toothless here, but for Africa to win it'd take a very, very, VERY long time if the win condition is to conquer Europe or make it so Europe can't fight anymore.
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u/WirBrauchenRum 2d ago
I completely agree, so many or the fantasy scenarios that people run always have one side doing x, on the assumption that the other side will never counter with y.
Pretty much all Second World War speculation suffers from this as well, "What if Germany just produced x"
Then the Allies would be bombing the fuck out of that instead
"But what if..."
People would see it, and move to counter it!
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u/blamatron 3000 Essex Class Carriers of FDR 2d ago
Germany: hits a couple ships with the Fritz X
Allies: “Well, that’s enough of that.”
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u/EncabulatorTurbo 2d ago
It's a paradox that Reddit broadly agrees America can't engage in easy neoimperalism just by having more advanced tech and can fail at imperialism on the other side of the world, but somehow believes Africa will easily be able to conquer and hold Europe because they have more advanced technology in this scenario.
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u/BadassMcMuffin22 6h ago
Concur with pretty much everything here, but I do wonder about the racism angle.
European racism was based on the idea of racial superiority - we are smarter, stronger, more civilized, etc etc.
If one day Africa randomly started flying supersonic jet fighters, operated satellites in orbit, could vaccinate and treat tons of diseases, and each African carried a super-computer in their pocket (Africans are of course not the builders for most of this tech, but the Europeans wouldn't know that); In that case, I do think Europeans would start to question the basis of their racism.
We do have an anecdote of something like this - the Commonwealth army defending Malaysia and Singapore in 1941. When the Japanese invaded and started kicking their assess, you can see in reports of the time a kind of despair start to grip the troops and their leaders, partially from having to deal with the fact that they were being outfought by their supposed racial inferiors, and they started giving up in droves, ultimately surrendering despite outnumbering the attacking force 3 to 1. I don't think the racism-induced despair was the primary cause of course, but it was undoubtedly a factor.
Its just a single anecdote, and certainly wasn't universal or a constant, but its enough to make me wonder.
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u/IlluminatedPickle 🇦🇺 3000 WW1 Catbois of Australia 🇦🇺 2d ago
Dude, imagine the scenario where they send a convoy in to attack some African navy ships. They get within a few hundred kilometres, and their ships start getting schwacked.
How keen do you think the European navies are going to be to continue to commit their ships against an enemy with a weapon they don't fully understand and aren't even aware of what the magazine depths of the ships they're facing are?
You've gotta think of this from a 1939 viewpoint. The Kriegsmarine lost a couple of surface ships a few years later and decided to keep the rest in port for the remainder of the war.
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u/DFMRCV 2d ago
Of course, but the discussion is how they'd fight a combined war.
If Africa's combined ASM capabilities are expended very quickly, the Allies will notice and start building up their fleets to invade.
If Africa sticks to only defensive use of ASMs, they might actually face some losses as U Boats sneak into unprotected areas and use chemical weapons on coastal towns or even cities.
Remember, you can't easily get the Harpoon's from Egypt dwon to Sudan very quickly due without establishing the infrastructure for it.
That's why I say it's not that clear cut.
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u/IlluminatedPickle 🇦🇺 3000 WW1 Catbois of Australia 🇦🇺 2d ago edited 2d ago
Lmao, you think 1939 submarines are worth a fuck in 2026.
Modern fishing boats would pick them up at longer ranges than a WW2 destroyer. That is absolutely hilarious. You got any other good punchlines?
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u/DFMRCV 2d ago
No.
I think Africa combined doesn't currently have the ammo to deal with them, though. Not for a while.
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u/BadassMcMuffin22 6h ago
Worth considering is that Africa wouldn't necessarily have to kill the submarines to deal with them.
Modern commercial navigation RADARs have ranges of 60-80 nautical miles, so any modern commercial vessel would be capable of spotting submarines long before its crew even knows a ship is in the area - and keep in mind that in 1939, the vast majority of submarines aren't capable of remaining submerged for more than about 6-10 hours before having to resurface for air.
Once spotted, a merchant ship could easily plot a course to completely avoid the submarine, and if somehow surprised, would be more than fast enough to outrun even a surfaced submarine (modern cargo ships cruise at 16-24 knots, the max surfaced speed of a Type VII U-Boat was 18 knots, which it cause it to quickly run out of fuel).
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u/MrCockingFinally 2d ago
You're forgetting that Europe is going to get access to some of the tech Africa has and get to work.
Microchips wouldn't happen in any reasonable timeframe, but even just a basic ass transistor would revolutionize technology in 1939.
If they could get their hands on a single jet engines, say, a crashed jet over Europe from lack of spare parts, suddenly the first jet fighters come in only a couple of years not 1945.
Even getting their hands on assault rifles and RPG-7s would basically let European militaries get their infantry on par within a year or two.
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u/DFMRCV 2d ago
Ehhhhhhhhhhhh... Again, not as clear cut.
They'd need a fair bit of time and resources as well, which they may or may not have depending on how you count "Europe".
Does the UK gets access to its surviving colonies, but they just can't send troops?
Africa has a LOT of resources and losing it means Europe has to get those elsewhere. Some they might get in the continent, but... Not everything. So they'd be in an awkward position to start reverse engineering projects.
That said, they do have areas where they could if a jet crashes in the continent.
The Nordic countries are basically untouchable for African nations unless they develope ICBMs.
So they could try to start such reverse engineering programs to some results
I just don't think they'll get too far unless the war drags on for years and years and years. It might, depending on how the win conditions are given, but it also might not.
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u/MrCockingFinally 2d ago
Neither side has the capability in the beginning to mount an invasion. Europe has the logistical capability, but can't fight the African military until they have mostly run out of missiles and spare parts. Africa just doesn't have the logistical capability.
So it would drag on for years, which is why I rate Europe.
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u/BasedestEmperor 🇬🇧 patriots rule hong kong 🇬🇧 2d ago
Ehh you’re overestimating the reverse engineer capabilities a bit, but lower tech equipment like AKs, RPGs, rocket artillery and armored vehicles would definitely come quickly.
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u/lukeskylicker1 Type V ERA body armor 1d ago
Understanding how something works and having the resources to build something ≠ the capability to make it, especially in meaningful quantities. A ballpoint pen is an extremely simple item with ~5 parts including the shell, but if you wanted to get one two-hundred fifty years into the past and put your John Hancock right next to John Hancock's nobody would be capable of recreating one no matter how many examples and designs you provide.
Even an AK-47 designed basically immediately following the war has nearly a decade of advancement of institutional knowledge and manufacturing expertise over 1939 Europe.
That's not to say nothing can be copied, and assuming Europe and Africa unanimously and without any problems united against each other I lean towards Europe (because they're already on a war footing and have domestic manufacturing*) but really the answer is probably closer to "both sides stare across the Mediterranean very menacingly" or "one conquers the other but experiences an unholy insurgency to make the GWoT look like a series of skirmishes" but hey that's not satisfying is it?
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u/Imperium_Dragon 2d ago
Yeah both sides’ member states are more likely to fight each other than actually invade.
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u/iwumbo2 Canadian nuke program when? 2d ago
Typically when powerscalers post matchups like these, the default assumption is that everyone on each side teams up and works together. Somehow... magically...
But realistically, yeah. Neither 1939 Europe nor 2026 Africa are uniting and working together. Although I guess at least 2026 Africa isn't on the brink of starting a world war last I checked.
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u/Youutternincompoop 2d ago
Africa has no lift capability or logistical ability to invade Europe.
both Egypt and Algeria have amphibious landing ships, I haven't checked the other navies but you absolutely can scrap together a fleet of Amphibious landing ships and invade Europe, once you have a port you just use your fleet of seemingly infinite Liberian-flagged cargo ships to drop a million men in Europe.
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u/EncabulatorTurbo 2d ago edited 2d ago
A grand total of two amphibious assault ships, and one Italian transport dock.
Unless Africa is sending Astartes, sending 2000 guys to invade Europe without a logistical chain is sending 2000 corpses to Europe
They could do some Modern Warfare 2 plot and disgorge a bunch of cargo ships, but the problem is that they would end up with at best a few dozen unsupported tanks that nobody can stop in the field, but can still be mission killed by artillery, tank traps, mines, and lets be honest mud, and lots of light infantry - who will perform marginally superior to European light infantry of the time.
I'd rather have an Ak-47 than a kar-98, but that's a deciding factor in an engagement not a war
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u/Youutternincompoop 2d ago
lots of light infantry - who will perform marginally superior to European light infantry of the time.
marginally superior is laughable, oh sure night vision, scopes, automatic rifles, drones, body armour, etc, etc is just 'marginally superior'
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u/EncabulatorTurbo 2d ago edited 2d ago
in the scheme of things....yeah
really, marginally superior.
2000 guys with night vision anda rmor aren't taking a city, let alone a continent. A Kar98 is just as lethal
Also they have to be very conservative with ammunition because they dont have a logistical train and nobody uses the same cartridges as them
Tactically significant. Strategically not going to make a difference. It means more European riflemen die, thats it.
You're making a profoundly good case that the Egyptian military could raid anywhere within raiding distance in Europe at night and have that raid be very successful.
Taking and holding territory is different than that
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u/As_no_one2510 2d ago
Africa win this because the amount of pathogen within a modern day person would wreak havoc Europe and make Spanish Flu look like an epidemic
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u/Twinkperium_of_man 2d ago
Smallpox doesn't exist today, but it did in the 30s. Most people after a certain year aren't vaccinated against it because it is eradicated.
So if africa gets covid, then europe gets smallpox.
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u/As_no_one2510 2d ago
Is smallpox less contagious than Covid? And unlike Smallpox, Covid doesn't show symptoms early, which is hard to identify without modern medic
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u/Twinkperium_of_man 2d ago
Smallpox was a scourge so bad everyone agreed it should be eradicated. It is quite contagious and does more damage than covid does. The normal variant has a 30% lethality rate, and two of the four variants have a near 100%
Also covid affects the immunocompromised the most whilst young people can shrug it off. It was bad, but not as bad as other plagues.
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u/As_no_one2510 2d ago
Smallpox was eradicated because it's one of the most lethal disease on human body that can spread from person to person. But the mortality rate is the reason why is it never cause any major global pandemic as the host will die before it infect enough host to cause issue. Smallpox are contagious, buy it spread low and the symptoms are obvious enough for quarantine immediately. Disease like that of influenza are infact more dangerous as they can spread from animal to human and low mortality rate mean the disease can stay domain and spreading. There is a reason AIDS is a global disease and not Ebola
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u/Twinkperium_of_man 2d ago
Smallpox was infectious enough to spread everywhere and needed a universal vaccination campaign something we barely did with polio before people started refusing the vaccine.
So the few strains of h1n1(spanish flu) would be a greater counter argument. It is believed that it existed here and there until h2n2 came along in the 50s. There we have a flu with higher infecttous rate and mortality rate focusing on healthy people.
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u/cybernet377 2d ago
Covid alone would annihilate those twinkish malnourished factory workers with the efficiency of a turkish wrestler on a lethal dosage of viagra
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u/123yes1 2d ago
Here's a question, can infrared seeker missiles even track WW2 prop planes? I know that of course they can, but I want to know if they are able to do so without reprograming. Their signature would both be much lower and very different than the modern planes they are supposed to track.
For example, Russia had a really hard time shooting down certain Ukrainian drones until they were able to roll out a software patch that helped them track them.
Another question is would these missiles reliably kill the aircraft in one shot? I know more about the later American Heavy bombers, but heavy bombers in general were incredibly redundant and absurdly airworthy. Eating 88 mm flak rounds for dozens of minutes at a time.
Obviously modern missiles are always going to explode the right distance away and not miss, a sidewinder has 8 pounds of explosive compared to 2 pounds from German flak, so I imagine probably but don't actually know for sure.
Once again, I imagine you could calibrate the missiles to explode closer to the target
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u/SpiralUnicorn 3000 Doom badgers of Allah 2d ago
Yes, but the range is sub-1km and the lock is questionable at best. You would also only be able to lock certain angles depending on the plane
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u/AuroraHalsey 🇬🇧 BAE give Tempest 2d ago
Depends on the type of IR missile.
Imaging Infrared would have no problem tracking, more basic homing infrared might have trouble.
An AIM-9X, IRIS-T, or ASRAAM would work perfectly fine, even at range.
An older, but still all-aspect IR homing missile like an AIM-9L, R-27, or R-73 might still work.
I doubt an older tail-aspect only missile would work at all.
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u/TypowyLaman 2d ago
They can, tho it is slightly harder. It's just like you can track helicopters as well.
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 1d ago
A great question and I have no answer except to point out that, again, the variety of WWII planes is insane. We have lil biplane Swordfish/Gladiator bois and we have mega super heavy Superfortresses. Oh God, I just looked at the numbers, the Gladiator is about 1,500 kg empty and the Superfortress is about 34,000 kg.
Perhaps if we consider the Axis air forces only, we can narrow it down a bit because they never fielded stuff quite as heavy as the Superfortress. But yeah, still a wide range.
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u/iwumbo2 Canadian nuke program when? 2d ago
tbh it's probably a stalemate. There's no way 1939 Europe is gonna be able to successfully land an invasion force on 2026 Africa. And 2026 Africa is not going to be able to sustain an occupation across 1939 Europe.
I think the only chance 2026 Africa has is if they can get nukes put together. South Africa had nukes and still has enriched uranium. If two nukes was enough to scare 1945 Japan into surrender, I feel like one or two would also be enough to scare 1939 Europe into surrender. Especially since 2026 Africa is also going to have a bunch of technology besides nukes like supersonic jets that would basically be alien to 1939 Europe.
This is of course assuming that both sides have all constituent nations working together somehow. Which I would assume is the default when people put together matchups like this.
Then again, there's also the fact that 1939 Europe is probably economically fucked since I assume there aren't going to be two Africas in this hypothetical world, so that means they lose all the resources from their colonies. But in a similar vein, 2026 Africa is going to lose all its modern global trade connections and also be economically fucked.
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 1d ago
These silly threads are the only exposure I've had to this whole debate, has everyone settled on considering the year 1939 in particular or are people just considering "WWII" which could be a wide range? Not this thread specifically which has 1939 in the title, but just generally.
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u/iwumbo2 Canadian nuke program when? 1d ago
Lowkey, I first saw these threads pop up a few days ago. It was originally specifically a united 1939 Europe vs a united 2026 Africa.
Except... I think a lot of people are either bad at reading, bad at history, or both. Because people kept bringing up things that were developed later in World War 2, and which did not exist in 1939. I'm not a tank nerd, but I am pretty sure the gap between 1939 tanks and 1945 tanks is pretty huge for example. Even had people bringing up how jet engines existed in that time period. Except... not in any kind of capacity that would be useful in a war. And obviously they weren't even close to supersonic jets like the F-16. Of which 2026 Egypt alone has over 200 of, which probably dwarfs the number of jets in the entirety of 1939.
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 1d ago
Oh damn whoops. I've been talking about a lot of 1945 stuff thinking it was up in the air. Okay thanks for the clarification. Appreciate it!
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u/iwumbo2 Canadian nuke program when? 1d ago
I mean, some people are claiming that 1939 Europe would eventually also develop 1945 stuff. Which would be plausible. Except 2026 Africa would probably be able to slow down or stop those efforts. Also assuming that the 1945 stuff would even make a difference because I'm pretty sure conventional Cold War hardware from the 60s or 70s still trounces anything from 1945.
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 1d ago
I see, and I agree. Depends a lot on the '45 tech in question and how much is the product of many minor improvements difficult to all speed up, and how much is literally the "ohhh right" two guys looking at laptop meme.
I mean it certainly helps to know which direction to focus on and which are dead ends, eg the wars of the future were not in fact fought with 100-tonne Maus-like tanks and even regular heavy tanks were quickly dropped.
But yeah a lot of the 1945 tech would not really help any more than 1939 tech.
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u/Low-Explanation-4761 2d ago
I mean there is no doubt at all that Europe cannot possibly win unless the conflict drags on for like 25+ years. It’s either Africa wins or neither side wins.
Africa will win every single battle, it’s just a question of whether they can build the capability to do a long range invasion.
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u/andreslucer0 Mexican Army Dragoon, the NonCredibleCavalry 2d ago
there is no universe in which europe wins either in a war of attrition or a high-intensity campaign
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u/d5789567 2d ago
You can also say there is no way for Africa to win as they can't sustain an aerial or amphibious campaign to stop europe from outproduce Africa in the long run while Africa's capability diminish due to lack of capability to produce critical parts
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u/MrCockingFinally 2d ago
Africa doesn't have microchip fabs, or any domestic capability to manufacture diesel engines, let alone jet engines. Any missile or drone program is fully reliant on improved components.
How the fuck exactly is Africa planning to win a war of attrition?
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u/gobbothegreen 2d ago
By developing them overtime as they have the now how and even 60s version of metallurgy if we are being the least generous possible is decades ahead of what the europeans have the manufacturing capacity off and natural resources to create.
Like even touting the manufacturing capacity of europe they dont have the resources to feed it without their colonies, while africa has the resoruces and know how to create a manufactoring capacity way beyond europes capacity to even reverse engineer. It doesnt matter if they try to reverse engineer a modern jet engine if they cant produce the metal capable to actually make it.
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u/MrCockingFinally 2d ago
You are forgetting that "1939 Europe" includes the USSR.
Africa has barely any capacity to even make regular ass mild steel from scratch. South Africa used to have plants that made steel, but those have been closing. Most recently, ArcelorMittal closed one of the biggest plants in the country in 2025.
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u/DFMRCV 2d ago
Europe might actually win a war of attrition.
Africa's nations need to deal with three major problems:
Ammunition production.
Airframe maintenance
Logistic network
They can solve these, but it'd take them a while. The guidance chips for PGMs are probably not in the cards, either given all nations in the continent mainly buy them from overseas nations.
If Africa solves all these issues and invades Europe... Well, now they added a hell of a lot of strains to this recently brought about system and they're facing a very hostile population.
Sure, they could use South Africa's nukes, assuming they secretly kept some, but they only have so many, and they'd be facing multiple armies with chemical weapons, so add a need for PPE to the logistics lists as no African nations is currently known to use chemical weapons or equipment.
If the win condition is for Africa to conquer Europe in a decade, I don't think they can do it.
If the win condition is for either side to conquer one another, I don't think either can do it.
I think Africa can definitely win if the win condition is to force peace talks.
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u/isademigod 2d ago
That all depends on the scenario.
Is africa going back to 1939 or is europe coming to 2026? Everyone is assuming africa going back but that wasn’t specified in the question
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u/Hohenheim_of_Shadow globohomo catgirl 2d ago
Africa doesn't need to maintain fifth gen fighter jets slinging spamraams and yeeting PRISM cruise missiles. They just need something that can clap early WW2 fighters .
Cessna technicals slinging RPG-7/drone based a2a/a2g guided missiles will go hard.
No need for AESA, steal some commercial radars off of small boats. FPV or ML terminal guidance. Sure it'll be a trashy missile by today's standards, but tf a BF109 going to do against a guided missile with an ungodly range of over a mile?
Or maybe just use a Stinger if you are boring.
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u/AuroraHalsey 🇬🇧 BAE give Tempest 2d ago
Cessna technicals slinging RPG-7/drone based a2a/a2g guided missiles will go hard.
No way.
A Cessna isn't capable of keeping up with WW2 combat aircraft in speed, altitude, or agility.
An RPG-7 round doesn't have thrust to be modified into an A2A weapon either.
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u/Hohenheim_of_Shadow globohomo catgirl 2d ago
I'll admit Cessna technical is a meme, but I beg you give it another thought. Africa has access to CNC machines, CAD programs and aerodynamics simulators. Sure their domestic airplane production would initially be very Cessna level performance, but how long until they can make a credible 1950 era fighter?
RPG-7 A2A missiles is also a meme, but consider the next evolutionary step. Making modern A2A missiles is hard because they need incredibly high performance in small packages. It's why solid rocket boosters are often a critical supply chain factor. But you can make SRB's out of a steel pipe, sugar and fertilizer. Chip production is hard, but they got millions of smartphones on hand. Modern smartphones are a goated combo of IMU, wireless comms, processing power and cameras. Give Africans a bit of time to cook and they could make TV guided a2a missiles controlled over local 4G networks.
Sure they'd likely be subsonic, the size of a telephone pole and laughable range, but that's good enough.
And until African engineers can make those amazing breakthroughs, they'll just have to hold the line with MANPADS, F-16s, ATGMs, and Abrams.
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 1d ago
Has anyone talked about what happens to the (original timeline) Allies? They have a serious amount of land, manpower, and WWII-tech industry at their disposal. What happens, is there an alliance between the time travellers and the Allies? Are the time travellers a third force at war with the Axis but not allied to the Allies? Do the time travellers just replace the original Allies?
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u/Big-Station-2283 2d ago edited 2d ago
The war starts with a brilliant 2 week bombing campaign by Europe. They then run out of ammo. Using their limited expeditionary capabilities they send SF teams in various African countries. They quicky realize those countries are a mess, barely holding together with prayer, duct tape, and chicken wire. And that nearly every country has some conflict zone with 10 or more factions fighting for ethnic/land/historical reasons. In the chaos, the African states haven't noticed the SF presence. The European coalition is dumbfounded and spends the next 8years debating on a course of action, budget runs out and the SOF are pulled out. The member states then have to content with debt and blame each other for this misadventure. A great victory for both sides!
Results:
* The African states are barely holding on to power after the bombing further damaged their collpasing infrastructure. The fighting between government and rebel factions hasn't stopped.
* Europe has accumulated more debt.
* 10million refugees have crossed into the continent.
* 10 SOF got dysentry and 5 others got some new tropical disease.Edit: I'm assuming the war is between Western Europe and Sub-saharan Africa (ie. colonialism 2.0 Boogaloo Edition).
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u/SlavCat09 Prinz Eugen megasimp 2d ago
This isn't deep fried enough I can still make some things out.
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 1d ago
Real trvth nvke: this was never a shitpost, this was actually a high effort post made with love and was never intended to be deep fried at all, despite the subject material. The pasted in images are shitty but the drawing is done with care.
The PNG format is the biggest tell. (I saved it so I can gaze upon it in 20 years and reminisce.)
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u/luddgy 2d ago
Modern IFV would chew a panzer division instantly
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u/Attaxalotl Su-47 "Berkut" Enjoyer 2d ago
It can only do that once though, Africa buys most of their stuff, and if they don’t, they buy the components for their stuff. Morocco, Algeria, &c will wreak havoc against anyone who approaches at first, but then they’ll run out of missile. It’s all a question as to whether or not they can get their own production up and running.
South Africa has a well-established independent MIC, and Kenya is kinda starting to make their own chips on a small scale. They could do it, but could they do it in time is the question.
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u/ZenPyx 2d ago
Kenya make chips on a small scale, but are totally reliant on the US for the pure silicon imports needed to make those chips
Manufacturing is too global to really be capable of domestic full-scale end-to-end manufacture of anything in the modern age (except maybe in the US and China)
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u/MrCockingFinally 2d ago
Then European factories churn out a second division, while the single IFV breaks down from lack of parts.
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u/lavafish80 2d ago
it's hilarious when people are like "Germany had jets!"
1939
ME262 entered service in 1944
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 1d ago
This thread is talking about 1939, but in terms of the discussion in general, have people settled on 1939 as well or is there a variety of dates under discussion?
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u/lavafish80 1d ago
the original question asked was 1939 Europe vs 2026 Africa, people in the original comments section were talking about how ME262s got shot down and therefore jets aren't invulnerable to piston engine fighters
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 1d ago
Oh damn whoops. I've been talking about a lot of 1945 stuff thinking it was up in the air. Okay thanks for the clarification. Appreciate it!
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u/YamroZ 2d ago
I appreciate production value of this post immensely. That being said - what the actual fuck is happening here my good friend?
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u/andreslucer0 Mexican Army Dragoon, the NonCredibleCavalry 2d ago
3000 black toyota hiluxes of afrika
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u/The_Happy_ 2d ago
Even if they can reverse engineer, the real question is if they can make it. And the answer is no, because ASML doesn’t exist.
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u/ZenPyx 2d ago
I mean... ASML also doesn't exist for Africa in this scenario. It's a question of whether Africa have enough shit stockpiled to win, before they run out and have to rely on the stuff they can make entirely domestic
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u/does_my_name_suck 1d ago
There’d be mandatory microwave hand ins in every capital in Africa the next day to harvest chips in this scenario. Simple enough flight paths can be run on the simplest of chips.
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u/BasedestEmperor 🇬🇧 patriots rule hong kong 🇬🇧 2d ago
People are looking at the wrong targets to reverse engineer anyways. What the European military would be aiming for is copying modern infantry equipment, so AKs, RPGs, rocket artillery and armored vehicles, to put them on as close of an equal fighting field with African infantry as much as possible.
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u/MianMDude 2d ago
People seem to be forgetting that most of the people who go onto lead or invent the modern weapons that Africa would be using are alive during 1939. I feel fairly confident that if you showed a Ak-47/74 to Kalashnikov he would figure it out very quickly.
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u/The_Happy_ 2d ago
There’s a good number of things they could reverse engineer and make, the AK-47 is pretty reasonable. But truly war winning inventions like guided weapons, advanced radars, and powerful computers would take decades to figure out.
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u/metcalphnz 2d ago
I think the most likely scenario is a repeat of the Libyan invasion of Chad in which a tank army got kerbstomped by hilux technicals.
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u/Attaxalotl Su-47 "Berkut" Enjoyer 2d ago
Who are also spotting for the Ace Combat-ass Air Force our Pan-African Coalition is rocking.
Picture it, Hawker Hurricanes, Fw-190s, whatever the French cooked up while drunk this week, all getting blown to smithereens in the largest turkey shoot ever seen, before they run out of missiles.
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 1d ago
Probably my favourite war... ever. Man I love technicals.
not just tanks, but plenty of fixed and rotary wing aircraft and artillery too. You can drive away from tanks if you need at least, most of the time, but not from aircraft or from the rocket storm of a multiple launch rocket system - those could, if a solid strike was landed, completely devastate a formation of light vehicles of course. The equipment there was completely up to the task of devastating the Chadians. Other things... were not lol
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u/Txtspeak Tapestryposter extraordinaire 2d ago
Africa wins because Africans are virtuous and Europe loses because they're evil.
I'm not stupid.
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u/XAlphaWarriorX 3000 artisan battleships of Mare Nostrum 2d ago
Both are food importers so everyone dies of starvation.
The end.
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u/MrCockingFinally 2d ago
Bro, have you seen the recent state of South Africa?
The South African military got it's ass handed to it in Bangui in 2013, because it has absolutely zero logistical capability. The politicians changed absolutely nothing, and ended up doing the exact same thing last year in Congo. Any sort of nuclear development has pretty much halted, with the last time a serious nuclear project was considered, RosAtom would be building the reactors in a project designed to steal as much money as humanly possible. The South African air force has one (1) operational Gripen because they can't afford maintenance on a fighter that is famously cheap and easy to maintain.
AAMs are nice, but what is the totality of the African stockpile? Couple thousand at best? Congratulations, that is like 1 month of production in the UK in 1939.
And Panamax cargo ships are famously completely immune to 8" naval gun shells. The Royal Navy alone had 28 Heavy cruisers in 1939 btw, with the British, French, Italians, and Germans all at least somewhat able to build more.
Meanwhile every single large ship lost by Africa is irrecoverable.
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u/Tiss_E_Lur 2d ago
Is it just a bug for me or something new? The comment section of" 1939 vs 2026 " and the" African Toyota tech tree " is swapped.
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u/Peekachooed would marry a technical 1d ago
At this point idk who's even commenting on what, not sure it matters
It's the same picture
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u/Wolfy_Packy Arsenal of Democrussy 2d ago
assuming everyone on both sides are entirely united together, Africa still stomps. the conventional army is one thing, but there are also forces in Africa who are capable of operating without traditional supply lines or logistics, and have vastly more motorization and transport ability. the French Army in 1939 can't even operate like that
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u/andreslucer0 Mexican Army Dragoon, the NonCredibleCavalry 2d ago
3 billion toyota hilux militiamen from the sahara who need negative supply (they plunder the enemy's and send back surplus)
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u/Chipsy_21 4h ago
How are getting their damn food first before we get into any military adventures?
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u/what_do_eye_know 2d ago
ChatGPT thinks you’re wrong.
Try it.
Chat believes Europe gets the bomb first and that Europe can survive a war of complete conquest.
Set some fair baselines and ask the AI for yourself.
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u/panteradelnorte 2d ago
Nah I’ll ask a homeless man in fatigues. He’ll tell me the truth. Not what I want to hear.
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u/Wolfy_Packy Arsenal of Democrussy 2d ago
what is a nuke gonna do? blow up Cairo or Alexandria or Algiers or something? if there can only be one winner, even if the Europeans produce one bomb, there's still more than one city in Africa, and Africa has survived a hundred or so years of conquest in the past.
beyond that, Europe would also lack the means to airdrop a nuke because of African air superiority, unless they strap it to an early missile. but again, there is more than one city in Africa, and the population is veeeeery spread out
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u/luizbiel 3000 T-14's of Schrodinger 2d ago
I reckon both sides would be in a massive civil war and also at war with eachother, a shitshow of continental proportions.
I do wonder what happens to former european colonies and alliances in africa in 1939 in this scenario
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u/an_agreeing_dothraki Scramjets when 2d ago
due to tedium, I refuse to entertain this scenario further without killer art of an Ethiopian girlboss riding into battle holding a pistol like the time Italy thought they could just roll in.
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u/horribleone 2d ago
It doesn't matter if you have a billion nuclear weapons if your leaders are worthless
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u/andreslucer0 Mexican Army Dragoon, the NonCredibleCavalry 2d ago
the famously worthwhile and strategically sound adolf hitler:
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u/horribleone 2d ago
Now imagine an entire continent full of leaders like that, minus the capability
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u/Ok_Macaroon_4784 2d ago
It would just be the family guy Amish meme where Europe would rebuild whatever the Africans destroy until they run out of long range weaponry
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u/MisogynysticFeminist 2d ago
My favorite argument is that Africa would be helpless because no more imports while conveniently ignoring how much shit 1939 Europe imported.
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u/BoppityBop2 2d ago
More likely a repeat of the European colonization of North Africa, except Africans are the colonizing powers and the European are the Natives allying with African powers to fight over which African power gets to rule Europe.
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u/KJ_is_a_doomer Russophobic? I'm not scared 2d ago
Can't wait for the french tank forces to desperately express their horror at the sight of a BMP with their flags (no radios)
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u/heavy_metal_soldier 2d ago
"Panzer II (lmao)"
I legit saw someone be like "Europe will have tigers" and I'm like no chief, in 1939 European tanks were just shit. Panzer II, Cruiser Mark I and II, Bt-7's and t26 tanks
Ass on a stick