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Did Hitler want to win the war?

Discussion in 'WWII Today' started by JuanMaddox, Jan 15, 2020.

  1. CAC

    CAC Ace of Spades

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    Germany declared war against the US (knowing the US would declare against them very soon anyway - Hitler got the jump for political points and because it amused him.)
    THIS is what sped the whole final solution plan up...
     
  2. harolds

    harolds Member

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    I agree b7! All one has to do is read Hitler's order(s) re. the conduct of the campaign to be waged in the USSR. On resources, as far as I'm concerned every train hauling people to the death camps was one train not hauling supplies to the troops. Once things like this get going, it's very hard to stop the machinery-even if they wanted to.
     
  3. von Poop

    von Poop Waspish

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    And, as you imply, they'd never want to.

    The fact it took them until '43-44 to begin officially committing to 'Total War' policies always sticks in my mind.
    Even then, the camp transports kept running, & the death totals kept building.
    Though (outside of Auschwitz) ISTR the rate did slow a little as slave labour was sometimes deemed more valuable than faster methods of extermination.
    Still extermination though.
    Still the inherent & inseperable belief in Untermensch & their eventual eradication.
     
  4. Jack B

    Jack B Active Member

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    In my mind, this is the answer to Juan's (OP) question.

    The war was the means to an end(s). It was not a question of winning a war or cleansing Europe of the Lebensunwertes Leben. Both goals were inexorably intertwined and had to be accomplished. I'm not sure one was a higher priority than the other, but if I had to guess, the removal of the Untermenschen and Jewish threat would have been priority #1. I don't think Hitler and the Nazis would have been satisfied to win a war of territorial acquisition without being able to 'evacuate' the enemy.

    I think there are parallels with the American Civil war, where the ideology prevented the use of African-American troops by the Confederacy (until the very end). Ideology overruled pragmatism. It had to.
     
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  5. Takao

    Takao Ace

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    In the ACW, ideology did not overrule pragmatism, it marched lock step with it. From a pragmatic viewpoint, the arming of slaves & using them as troops was a very bad idea - not only were they the most likely to desert and inform on Confederate positions and strength. But, arming a large contingent of slaves would encourage armed revolt, which the CSA would then be forced to put down.
     
  6. Jack B

    Jack B Active Member

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    That was the fear.

    At the very end of the American Civil war, the CSA did raise armed black troops. I'm not sure if they ever saw combat, but I don't think they revolted, either.

    I think the fear (based on ideology) did not prove out in that very limited trial. But we'll never know.
     
  7. Takao

    Takao Ace

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    2 companies were raised in Virginia before the end of the war - the law was only passed on March 13, 1865.

    They never saw combat nor revolted...Because they were never armed - rifles being in very short supply. Uniforms too.
     
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  8. KJ Jr

    KJ Jr Well-Known Member

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    I agree. The whole origin of National Socialism was based primarily on the "Jewish question." It was it's ideology of antisemitism and nationalism that soon became armed. The idea of conquering other countries was soon followed by rounding up and eradicating "undesirables." Its not a coincidence that once occupying in the east the killing squads were in full force.
     
  9. wm.

    wm. Well-Known Member

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    The reason he declared the war was the Tripartite Pact required it. He couldn't weasel out without losing face and without losing his Japanese ally.
     
  10. wm.

    wm. Well-Known Member

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    The Holocaust trains were local trains, they usually hauled people to work or food to cities. Tens of thousands such trains ran all around Germany every day. The SS asked for a train and they got it or not. It wasn't much different from German businessmen were doing every day.

    The trains that supplied the front were something entirely different. It was a different pool.
    "every train hauling people to the death camps was one train not hauling supplies to the troops" is not true.
     
  11. CAC

    CAC Ace of Spades

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    Because of the timing...this is wrong. It would gave happened but not when it did.
     
  12. Takao

    Takao Ace

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    I take it you have not read the Tripartite Pact...There was nothing to weasel out of. Germany was not required by the Pact to declare war on the US, as the US had not attacked Japan. You see, the Tripartite Pact was a defensive pact, and it was irrelevant if one of the partners decided to attack another nation. The pact was only relevant if one of the Pact members was attacked.

    If your nonsense was even remotely true, Japan should have declared war on the Soviet Union when Germany attacked it...Except, Japan didn't.
     
  13. wm.

    wm. Well-Known Member

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    If your nonsense was even remotely true my dear friend Takao you would know that the Japanese ambassador in Berlin spent days pressuring Hitler and his government to join the war.

    His argument was Japan was subjected to wanton, months-long economic and political aggression - that threatened the very existence of Japan.
    That Japan had to resort to war in self-defense.

    What you think about who attacked who is immaterial. Only opinions of the Japanese counted and the fact Hitler accepted them as true.

    And you would know that Hitler didn't act from the goodness of his heart but because he believed the new war would give him the much-needed breathing space to finish off the USSR - after his Barbarrosa failed so miserably. That it would delay the deadly American threat.
    That his gloom of defeat suddenly was replaced by euphoria, that they were jumping with joy (according to Ciano.)
     
    Last edited: Jan 18, 2020
  14. Jack B

    Jack B Active Member

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    If my edits are correct, I would agree with this statement.

    I think Germany anticipated the US officially entering the war soon, as CAC points out. Tensions had been escalating throughout 1941.

    It's also my understanding that the USA's 'neutrality' was a bit of a sham--for intents and purposes the battle of the Atlantic was going on; Lend-lease was active, British warships were being repaired in US ports, Axis ships had been seized and turned over to British shipping, etc...

    "Since the United States had decided that its own security demanded British survival, and since Britain could be saved only by maintaining a reasonably secure life line across the North Atlantic, the logic of the situation seemed to demand that the American Navy enter the Battle of the Atlantic.

    [USA] Army and Navy leaders had reached this conclusion on 16 December 1940, and Navy planners drafted their first escort-of-convoy plans during the same month. President Roosevelt sanctioned this planning in his oral directive to Admiral Stark of 16 January 1941. On the following day, the Navy War Plans Division informed Admiral Stark that the Navy could be ready to begin escort duties across the Atlantic to Great Britain by 1 April. Effective 1 February, the Navy reorganized its forces and soon thereafter began to train them for convoy work in the Atlantic." -- THE FRAMEWORK OF HEMISPHERE DEFENSE, UNITED STATES ARMY IN WORLD WAR II

    Now, I don't think Hitler gave a toss about the Japanese. (I could well be wrong about that, I just haven't seen anything to lead me to think he cared. Germany and Japan seemed to be 'allies' in name only.) However, he did see a nice opportunity: while the Japanese would be occupying the militarily weak USA, why not drop the pretense of neutrality and tighten the strangle hold on Britain? There was little to lose (if the idea that the USA would take years to build it's military strength up proved accurate.), and the potential to weaken the British further.

    His decision--base on what proved to be a flawed assessment--makes strategic sense. And, oh, yeah, sure, he could appear to support his Japanese 'allies'.

    Dat's my take.
     
  15. wm.

    wm. Well-Known Member

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    Hitler believed the resources of the USSR would allow him to defend Europe from an invasion.
    That the British would sue for peace anyway, the slogan plastered all over Germany was Britain will be defeated in Russia.
    That the US would give up. If not he had a (far fetched) plan to attack American cities with heavy bombers - to deter the Americans.

    Maybe he was mistaken, but the plans were his.

    He knew the US had been waging an undeclared war against him already, so for him the declaration of war was a formality.
     
  16. harolds

    harolds Member

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    I disagree! The trains that hauled jewish people to the camps in Poland or eastern Germany from western Europe couldn't have been "local trains". Even if they were then the trains that that were to haul food or people had to be replaced. I'll admit that Germany had a very sophisticated rail net and had very brainy fellows coordinating all this traffic. Their contribution to the German cause has not been fully appreciated. They kept the trains going even during the Allied attacks on the rail net. However, when an engine or boxcar is being used to transport people to the concentration or death camps, they couldn't be used for anything else.
     
  17. Takao

    Takao Ace

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    Yes, and that's what makes this nonsense...The Germans had been pressuring the Japanese for many months-since at least December, 1940-To attack British territory in the Pacific, specifically Singapore. However, the Japanese continually kept coming up with excuses for not going to war.

    Quite odd then, that it was somehow the Japanese pressuring Hitler for only a few days...Very odd.


    Again, quite odd...as these would be the same months that Germany was pressuring Japan to enter the war and Japan refused to do so. Very odd indeed.


    Well...your presuming that the opinions of the Japanese mattered to Hitler. Unfortunately, they didn't matter a whit. Hitler already proved that when he shredded the German-Japanese Anti-Comintern Pact.

    Your also presuming that Hitler somehow accepted them as true to the exclusion of everything else.

    You might want to read a copy of the December 4th, 1941, Chicago Tribune...you know...The one with the big bold FDR'S WAR PLANS headline.


    Delaying the deadly American threat?

    You mean that deadly American threat that refused to join the war? And continued to refuse to enter the war right up until it was forced upon them? If anything, it hastened American entry into the European war.

    By 1943, the US expected to enter the war without Pearl Harbor...With Pearl Harbor, they had already knocked Italy out of the war.
     
  18. Jack B

    Jack B Active Member

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    Thanks for the pointer, Takao. I was curious, so I looked up the article you referenced:

    [​IMG]
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    [​IMG]


    I hadn't seen that before. Interesting to see that there was a fair bit of scandal that followed. From the front page of the Trib the following day:

    [​IMG]
     
  19. Jack B

    Jack B Active Member

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    The USA or Roosevelt?
     
  20. wm.

    wm. Well-Known Member

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    Pressured with what: empty words, no treaty obligations? This pressure?

    The question of Hitler's relationship to Japan certainly culminated in a conversation with General Oshima on July 14, 1941 On that occasion, Hitler offered the Japanese ambassador a comprehensive alliance for the purpose of jointly destroying the Soviet Union, the United States, and Great Britain. ...
    There are arguments indicating that Hitler's offer to the Japanese was simply bait, similar to the offer he made to Soviet foreign minister Molotov in 1940, to jointly enrich themselves from the "massive world bankruptcy" of the British Empire.

    Hitler aimed at persuading the Japanese into rash activity in East Asia to demonstrate to Great Britain how necessary and inevitable it would be for her to change sides "in its own interest."
    At the same time, he was also aiming to keep the Americans out of Europe. An overly nervous "Fuhrer," who already had powerlessly stood by and watched as Iceland was occupied, gave up any reservations he had with the Japanese. He was lacking the military means to hit the Americans in their own hemisphere.
    To disguise the situation, he took refuge in a completely exaggerated account of what was happening in the East: in six weeks at the latest, he maintained, it would be all over. Hitler's offer of an alliance to Japan was therefore more a gambler's last stake than a calculated decision.

    from: Hitler's Plans for Global Domination: Nazi Architecture and Ultimate War Aims by Jochen Thies.

    The same happened at the end of 1941, an overly nervous Fuhrer and his gambler's last stake.
    Read some real works, lay off the History Channel.
     

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