Could Germany and the Axis powers have Won the Second World War?

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fall out would the US be... 10/12/2004 3:55:55 AM

more willing to get involved in WW2 had Germany invaded sucessfully (hypothetical), or less willing?

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ozigrunt RE:Not only NO but heck NO 10/12/2004 7:00:28 AM

"i realise that op sealion was a long shot, but the odds shortened greatly had the luftwaffe actually gained complete air superiority over the south east part of England,.." No this just wasn't the equation. Even with air supremacy and naval supremacy they didn?t have the shipping to land and support an invasion force. ?had only about 500 anti-tank guns in it's ENTIRE inventory? Hardly an issue, the Germans weren?t able to land one tank ? not without capturing a working port. At best this would have taken weeks. Op Sealion was going to be an air/ naval slugfest with the armies playing a minor role. Once the invasion army had landed and established it's self it was all over bar the shouting. Shades of Normandy '44 eh?! ?their army was in no way ready to defeat the world's most powerful army.? I agreed but they didn?t have to. 30 miles of salt water did it for them. ?also, Hitler actually gave operational orders for Op Sealion to go ahead in 2 weeks but due to the continued presence of the RAF fighter command, it was called off,?? Hitler procrastinated for many months. It was only after he was convinced by the Army Staff that the logs were insurmountable in the short term that he gave up and allowed himself to be distracted by his first interest, lebensraum in the East. He was also seduced by the promise of Gerring to bomb Britain in to submission. And it was the British Navy that really threatened success. Air supremacy was only a means to neutralizing the Navy. In 1940 the best the Germans air force and navy could promise was periods of 24 hours of supremacy. The Brit navy tactic would have been to withdraw from bombing range and to sally into the channel with specific targets like invasion fleets and/or supply convoys, shell beachheads, rake havoc and withdraw. Repeat. ?however, the Germans would still have (and always did for the entire war) the best army capable of combined arms with a new tactic.? I conceded that in my first post when I said ?General for General?? etc But the whole point is that the best doesn?t win. The most with the most logistics will win ? i.e. pop and industrial capacity. ?The biggest battalions with the biggest guns? Napoleon. ?and combined with taking Ukraine, the Russians would be starving; of both oil and food.? The Ukraine WAS taken and Russia lost its oil supply and still fought successful. So what would be different? And as I?ve contended, the Russian army probably would not have fallen back so far, so easily or with such loses if he wasn?t taken by surprise and had 12 months further to prepare. "the Germans could've gone thru the Mid East to take out the Caucases early " they could have??? really? I doubt it. There may be a land bridge there but there was no transport infrastructure. And how defendable are the Caucasus and the terrain of the whole southern approaches into Russia - its multiple mountain ranges without established crossings (for armies). And the length of the lines of comms? I'm not saying they couldn't but it would be no assumption that it would be a walk over - the logs alone would be daunting. Maybe with an alliance with Turkey there would be a better hope ? but that?s agin the rules of this ?what if?. The soft underbelly of Russia nee, the soft underbelly of Europe. ?But, as you said, it's no given, the Germans needed a bit of luck,?? Which is the whole point; I?m talking mil science not luck. Military power is pop x industrial capacity. Germany?s early success was due to ?stealing a march? and blatant military incompetence by the French rather than any innate military advantage. Luck can win battles and maybe wars (but I doubt it) but I wouldn't want to be the mil advisor telling a nation "Yeah, give it a go...."

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raptor RE:would the US be... 10/12/2004 11:51:52 AM

IT is more probable that the US would then be drawn into the war because i have little doubt that the british government would flee to Canada at least at first where they would probably then be very big news to the Americans

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bsl RE:Historical review-American politics 10/12/2004 9:59:24 PM

"American participation in WW2 Was NEVER "inevitable"...although it was HIGHLY probable. America had already shown its preference and was strongly aligned with Britain before Pearl Harbour." True as far as it goes. Here's the problem: the observation confuses the preferences of the Roosevelt administration with the feelings of the country, as a whole. I think it's deplorable, but there's vast amount of data on the subject, showing, quite clearly, that a substantial majority of the American people were opposed to war with either Japan or Germany until the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor changed the question from "Should we oppose what Japan is doing across the Pacific" to "We've been attacked. Should we fight back or surrender?" Hitler's declaration of war, in this context, came on a people who were fighting mad, and quite willing to add any number of new enemies onto the little list we were drawing up. But, before the attack, whose effect on the American psyche of the time is almost impossible to overstate, those favoring taking on either Japan or Germany were in a clear minority. Now, opinion *had* changed, a lot, over the decade or so before Pearl Harbor. At the beginning of that time, it would be fair to characterize the bulk of the American public as isolationist and totally uninterested in almost any military larger than necessary to fight central America. Over the years in which the Japanese and Germans expanded their militaries and began beating the drums for war, the American consensus gradually accepted that rearmament on a major scale was necessary. HOWEVER, pre-Pearl Harbor, the idea of most of the country was *still* that the rearmament was intended to be defensive. Either to deter attack, or to defend the Western Hemisphere (and some Pacific territories). Even while rearmament had started, in earnest, a clear majority continued to oppose even the idea that America had a role in Europe, or, East Asia. It's often overlooked that FDR campaigned in 1940 to keep America **out** of war. (Rather as Wilson had, similarly, promised to keep America out of WW1.) Yes, FDR favored involement. But, no, he did not have the power or influence to bring America into the war on his own. It was the Tojo and Hitler who managed to get that done.

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bsl RE:Historical review--Japan - ozigrunt 10/12/2004 10:07:23 PM

Oh, I agree with you that it was a bad decision. But, it was neither stupid nor irrational. Basically, it all comes down to what Japan was about. Their bottom line national goal was conquering China. Everything else flowed from this basic definition of Japanese vital national interests. As far as Pearl Harbor was concerned, after FDR organized the international boycott on exports of certain resources necessary to support the Japanese military, Japan decided that to continue the Chinese War, they needed to gain control of sources of resources needed to support their military. This is what led them to attack the European colonies of SE Asia and Oceania. It was a war for resources. Having made the decision that they needed to seize SE Asia, the Dutch East Indies, etc., Japan had to look, closely, at the American presence in the Phillipines. Essentially, with control of the Phillipines, American forces sat astride the lines of communications between Japan, in the north, and the proposed conquests, in the south(west). The debate was vigorous, as I understand, but, in the end, they decided that it was just too dangerous to leave America with the potential to cut the Japanese lines. And, so, they concluded, that in order to protect the resources they needed to conquer China, America must be thrown out of the Phillipines. Having decided to remove America from the Phillipines implied a general war. That being so, the Japanese had to decide whether they'd be better off just taking the Phillipines and waiting for the American response, or going further, and trying to hit America, harder, in the first moments. And, of all possible targets Japan could reach, the naval facilities at Pearl Harbor offered the greatest potential military impact while still being reasonably feasible. But, it all traces back to the Chinese war. Everything else flows from that.

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bsl RE:Canada and Germany- raptor 10/12/2004 10:15:16 PM

Interesting question, and one which has had some discussion, among historians. Apparently, at the last resort, had German troops landed in force and won, Churchill was prepared to try to evacuate the government and royal family and the Fleet to Canada, to establish a government in exile. (There was, at the lowest ebb soon after Dunkirk, really very little question that had the Germans been able to land substantial forces, they would have overwhelmed the defenders. For some months after Dunkirk, the UK had only about one fully trained and equipped division on the island of Britain ready to fight. The rest would have been regulars without tanks, heavy artillery, etc., and a lot of untrained and barely armed recently recruited militia. Actually, some militia trained, at this time, WITH SPEARS, for lack of enough firearms.) But, while no one doubts that Winston meant it, what everyone else might have done is another matter. There was a lot of support for a deal with Germany in both the public and Parliament. There was a lot of sympathy for Germany among elites. The Duke of Windsor was exiled to be Governor of Bermuda for...let's be polite and just say concern for a lack of dedication to the war. Had the Germans won, it's been speculated that the King would have been deposed in favor of Windsor, who, after all, had some experience on the throne.

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bsl RE:would the US be... 10/12/2004 10:25:48 PM

"would the US be more willing to get involved in WW2 had Germany invaded sucessfully " You mean, invaded Britain? Good question. AFTER Pearl Harbor? More willing. By that point, a huge majority of Americans were strongly in favor of fighting. Before Pearl Harbor? More speculative. It took a real shock to knock American opinion out of the anti-war rut. Pearl Harbor accomplished that. Britain was not so well loved, in 1940, as it was by the end of 1941. Not nearly so well. Conquest would certainly have registered in America and certainly have caused concern. I'm not certain it would have led to war with Germany. It would certainly have led to even greater rearmament than was already underway. America would almost certainly have taken control of European colonies/departments in the Western Hemisphere, rather than allow them to fall under the influence of Germany. The appearance of German forces in the Western Hemisphere would have been causus belli. That much I think is fairly clear. That would have pushed the public over the edge. Had Canada attempted to align with a Vichy Britain (as it were), I think Canada would have been occupied by American troops. At the very least, America would have worked, quickly, to sponsor a coup by antiGerman elements. If the Anglo elements were especially proGerman, we might have seen the country splintered, Quebec given independence, and many of the other provinces apart from Ontario possibly absorbed into the US. Any move by Latin American governments to align with the Axis would have been seen by Americans as a direct threat. So, yes, there was a lot of emotion in the air, in America, by 1940, and a lot of concern, but it was still mostly turned inward, and thinking in terms of keeping the threats outside the hemisphere, rather than moving out to fight in Europe and Asia.

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YanKEE RE:Not only NO but heck NO 10/13/2004 4:28:09 PM

Imagine if you well that germany and Italy had taken and held europe. imagine that they had defeated russia. Now assume that all these people under their rule don't like them. The US just uses the African continent for a forward base. South Africa was an ally remember. It would have taken longer to defeat them but remember we were activelly developing nukes. The Germans were still 4-5 years from a operationaal nuke in 45. That alone would have given us an edge in leveling key centers of commerce of weapons manufacturer. Irregardless of Germany's conquest. The biggest threat to their holding all that territory is a partisan activity that would have developed and been quite active by 44-45. Imagine how many germans would have been kept busy trying to capture and stop all theses resistance fighters throughout europe. If the US had to resort to nukes to stop germany only one lucky strike was needed to cripple Germany. Imagine the primary target of Berlin untouched by the war because Britian was knocked out and not used as a base. A lone B-29 flies to Berlin on a one way mission and drops a nuke. End of Berlin and maybe the war considering that most likely senior leadership would have been wiped out. You can conquer all the territory you want but keeping it is another matter!

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french stratege YanKEE 10/13/2004 4:46:01 PM

I have studied the subject and it is very difficult to say that Germany was 5 years away from nuke in 45. Some said that from proceeding of Farm Hall but it seems that there was an other team working on nukes and more advanced. By the way US have only few nukes until 47 and it would have let German time to adapt. The nuclear program was slowed down because it seems that a weapon would not be available before the war end and they were right on that. But if Germany have succeded to invade Britain or Russia more ressources would have been available and the weapon would have been on track. You have to suppose that Hitler would have declared war on US first which would have been maybe different in an other situation so US involvement could have been different. Also it is doutfull that using atomic bomb of germany would have stopped their weapon program: they have produced their V2 in underground factories and they were doing their nuclear research in underground bunkers. It is estimated that Germany have received equivalent of 400 hiroshima bomb in WW2 so effect of few nukes is highly disputable. In reprisal they would have use nerve gazs they had contrary to US.

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bsl RE:nukes 10/13/2004 7:43:48 PM

-Historians have argued over the German program and what Heisenberg was about since, virtually, the smoke was still in the air. I suspect he was just not up to administering a practical program, as opposed to his theoretical work. But, for whatever reason, Germany was not very close to a practical weapon when it surrendered. The American program hit a production bottleneck in 1945. There were only three weapons produced and no more could be made available quickly. (3, meaning the Alamagordo test bomb, plus the Hiroshima and Nagasaki devices.) The bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki had a certain element of bluff in them, because despite the idea we wanted to plant, that failure to surrender would lead to the destruction of the rest of Japan's cities, it would have been many months till the US had more bombs to use. However, this was a temporary issue (and not really unusual where moving from prototype to production of complex systems is concerned). Had there been reason, production would certainly have ramped up in 1946, and afterwards. As it was, America actually produced only a very limited number of devices, first fission bombs, later fusion bombs, until the Kennedy years. The numbers thrown about in the 1970s and afterwards came only in the second phase of the Cold War. Pre-JFK, the US was content with a few hundred strategic nuclear warheads. OTOH, I strongly doubt it would have been possible under any circumstances to have rushed the Manhattan Project any more than it was. America was not getting bombs before 1945, whatever the need. I do agree, however, that in an alternate history, had America *not* joined the war in 1941, but in which Germany conquered Russia and either conquered Britain or forced Britain to accept a peace on German terms, the Manhattan Project WOULD have still happened. Einstein's famous letter to FDR, recommending research into the possibility of a nuclear weapon, was actually written in August of ***1939***. The first steps towards the Manahattan Project began *before* Pearl Harbor. Although official interest had actually waned, somewhat, in the intervening period, the subject was already on the burner before the Japanese attacked. A victorious Germany, astride Europe, combined with a Japan expanding towards them, in Asia, would have served as a stimulus towards development of the Bomb similar to that provided by Pearl Harbor.

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