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PaperclipPerfector  14hr ago (text post)   742 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for October 16, 2026

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The new nerd-sniping question is circulating on Twitter. Who would win in a war: 1939 Europe or 2026 Africa? As usual, both camps are 100% their side would win.

My bet is on 1939 Europe. As the Russo-Ukrainian and the US-Iran wars show, ammunition stockpiles run out in a couple of weeks. Africans won't have missiles for their fighter jets and shells for their MBTs, while Europeans will be cranking out bombs and strategic bombers to turn Cairo into Dresden. When German subs destroy whatever boats Africans have, French and British navies will perform naval landings, their troops armed with reverse-engineered AKs.

What's the goal state for the war exactly? I have a hard time believing that the Africans get their shit together to a sufficient degree so as to cross the Mediterranean, dominate the air and systematically decimate the cities through bombing campaigns, let alone land and conquer in Europe. But at the same time, the insanely lopsided area and population size differences, together with often extremely difficult terrain, make it hard to believe that Europe stands a chance at conquering the whole of Africa in a meaningful way. Even if such a war somehow came to begin, and one side tried to conquer the other, my guess would be a quick stall somewhere early. Maybe the Europeans conquer parts of North Africa, but then struggle to advance past the Sahara. But most likely not even that.

Edit: Also, what's the international help situation supposed to be like? Africa is utterly dependent on outside help to survive, and large parts of that come from (modern) Europe.

The sheer size of Africa also means it can be modeled as a relatively small set of logistical chokepoints that control the entire continent, and capturing or knocking out one generally means that area is taken out of the war, since the logistics are not joined up between different regions. Team Africa would need to spread their limited and irreplaceable modern weapons around the continent for coastal defense (e.g. South Africa currently has just two Gripens and 3/4 Hawks available, with the entire helicopter fleet grounded for lack of fuel), with a rapid reaction force of infantry flying around in commercial planes to respond to any landings.

It sort of depends on what you think is "irreplaceable." Africa manufactures their own RPGs, small arms ammunition, and bombs. Dumb bombs in particular aren't hard to manufacture at all, but plenty sufficient to sink European ships with ~impunity if you have jet aircraft. But I don't know how long the African air force could be maintained without technical expertise and spare parts from Russia and the United States.

But I don't know how long the African air force could be maintained without technical expertise and spare parts from Russia and the United States.

On a war footing, not very long, and the parts won't be replaced domestically (the idea of an African war economy just doesn't work. North African countries maintain the militaries they do by putting much their best human capital into it, sustained by resource sales to fund foreign imports and expertise, so IMO their best shot is to carefully husband modern weapons to support the conscript zerg rush at key points). Egypt has a wild hodgepodge of aircraft that are all incompatible. Algeria a bit more robust because of their Russian connection, but not great either. Morocco, pretty good. South Africa, well. Given their relatively short range and limited number of fires, they can't do sufficient strategic bombing to knock out industry, and they'll lack the ground attack capabilities which were so important in WWII. They'll be fine on small arms ammunition but get a pretty negligible advantage from that - the first African casualties/prisoners mean that European industry will switch over entirely to the AK-47, it's not exactly rocket science to make.

On a war footing, not very long,

Right, but if "not very long" is, say, a month, that's long enough to clobber every European navy (at least the ones within reach).

They'll be fine on small arms ammunition but get a pretty negligible advantage from that

I tend to agree here, although stuff like the RPG and modern towed arty is genuinely a big step up from what's being thrown around in 1939. The main advantage Africa would have would be modern NVGs and (more) modern tanks/AFVs, but I am not sure that's enough to actually be decisive.

I consider tanks and similar vehicles basically irrelevant, because, with African standards of maintenance, they break down even faster trying to cover meaningful stretches of ground. I doubt Team Africa's tanks even make it to the Pyrenees.

"Within reach" is the critical thing with respect to air/naval stuff. The Italian navy is just as fucked as they were in OTL 1939, but everyone else is fine.

In-flight refueling (particularly combined with lighter weapons loads and drop tanks - although I don't know if Algeria bought any of those) would let them hit the French and likely British navy as well, if they thought to prioritize it.

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