What one moment most led to Germany's Defeat?

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It is often said that the germans general would have run the war better ?!
the guys in charge were keitel , zeitzler ,jold and hadler ,
none of them big lights ,
the german military command was a bit of a dog's breakfast , consumed with bitch fight between the O.K.W nominaly in overall command and the O.K.H. practically running the eastern front

As for the hight general staff they definitely knew their stuff as far as staff work went but were a bit of gooses on occasion ,

couldn't see the soviet counter offensive of december 41 or
the stalingrad encirclement of november 42,
kurtsk was not hitler idea at all but zeitzler and manstein
deep defence in normandy would have been pretty stupid ,
the extermination of army group center in june 44 was completely unforseen ,
they were even moving armor out of the area a few days before it happenned

alltogether not a very encouraging picture


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Kursk was idd a plan of Von Manstein but Von Manstein wanted to attack a that area as soon as Charkov was liberated. At that time there were no large soviet anti-tank defences. It was Hitler that halted Von Manstein and wanted to wait until the panzerdivisions were reequiped. Thus give the Russians the time to reenforce the Kursk area.

 

According to Alan Clarke in ''Barbarossa'' it was Zietzler who drew up the plan for Kursk.

Manstein had shown Hitler his ''Backhand'' plan, which was more or less the Kharkov plan but on a much larger scale. Zietzler thought that Backhand was to risky and meant giving up ground [which Hitler hated to do] so he put forward pinching off the Kursk salient as less risky and not needing so many reserves.

Hitler was a worried man at this stage, not sure what to do next, he was never keen on 'Zitadelle' and after fixing early may to attack, postponed at urging from Model to explore further possibilities, then finally decided to wait until the wonder tanks were ready.

If it had gone ahead at the date Hitler first scheduled it, in early May, it might have succeeded.
Perhaps Model should have kept his mouth shut.

 

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I basically agree on the points made ,
it must be noted that as the date got pushed further and further back , manstein , then model , got cold feet .
At the end pretty much everybody thought it was not a good idea ,
Zietzler held up last , but then spoke of a limited , sharp action to destroy the soviets reserve , Keitel of political nescessity !!!???

The operation had taken a life of its own , unable to be stopped even by its creators ,
The fate of the panzers was thus sealed


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The higher-ups of German High Command included men like Jodl and Guderian, neither of which I would describe as anything but big lights on the logistic and strategical level they were supposed to operate in. I don't know where you got the impression that they were all just pen-pushers and Hitler's favourites, but I certainly did not find it so when I read about them in Ryan's "The Last Battle". According to Ryan, the German High Command lost its rational, calculating basis only when Hitler fired Guderian from OKH.

 

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So how do you account for the kursk fiasco ? or the inability to read soviet moves ? I am fond of guderian and jold proved his abilities during the norway campaign but the former had a grudge match running against von kluge in particular and the second refused to upset the nerve of his fuehrer even when he perfectly knew it was wrong .
blaming it all on hitler is true enought but it is sometimes a tad convenient


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Jodl almost had apoplexy on numerous occasions with Hitlers continued interference, and although not a ''boot licker'' like Keital, didn't have the fortitude to confront Hitler like Guderian.

Guderian, the Most talented German panzer General was a bit of a handful, his insubordination getting him sacked numerous times just when he was most needed.
Lasting just 6 months in Barbarossa, and just 8 months during his tenure as Chief of Staff. He had a long series of violent rows with Hitler over the way in which Germany should handle the war on both fronts. Hitler finally dismissed him in March 1945 after one last argument.

On 21st July 1944, when Guderian replaced Zeitzler as commander of the General Staff he demanded the resignation of any officer who did not fully support the ideals of the Nazi Party as a result of the July Plot. Over the next few months Guderian sat with von Rundstedt and Keitel on the Army Court of Honour that expelled hundreds of officers suspected of being opposed to the policies of Adolf Hitler. This removed them from court martial jurisdiction and turned them over to Roland Freisler and his People Court.

Wonder what happened to them?

 

They still would have had victories, just not as fast as they would have been if Hitler decided to go over the ardennes with tanks. I think a big moment was when Hitler diverted his forces from the drive on Moscow to get resources in the Ukraine. Not to mention the ruthlessness he had when taking cities (stalingrad, outskirts of moscow, leningrad, etc)

 

If we imagina that Hitler did not attack USSR and that non attacking packt woth,so USSR dont attack Germany,UK will be on serius problems,coz Germany will redirect funds and resources in naval/air instead in ground forces.If Germany isolate UK with navy ,UK will be crushed in 2-3 years by lack of resources.

 

Cripes, doubt that Germany could ever have a war winning decisive edge over the R.N. or R.A.F. Brits could always depend on the U.S. for vital supplies because it was in their interests to see Britain survive.

 

sinissa - unless the USA gets on-side then the UK might not even have lasted 2 years.

With American help:

we would survive. The Battle of the Atlantic would be longer & harder-fought (more resources available to the German navy & air force), and any invasion of Europe would be a much more chancy affair.

Mind you, given Hitler's attitude, I wouldn't be surprised if he disbanded 80% of the Wehrmacht after France falls and Russia is not invaded because 'the war is over now'.

Certainly the development of army weaponry (esp. tanks) would be much reduced without the nasty shocks that the Russians gave them. Imagine an army of M4A1 Shermans against Pz.III and early-type Pz.IV. With only 37mm AT guns.

 

Or Pak 50. They would have put extra armour plating on their tanks and upgunned them, and I think the superior german tactics would have been a strong point. They would have to invade through France first, and while they were bottled up there the germans would have time to realize a threat and produce, oh, I dunno, a few hundred tanks to deal with the threat. Also, the allies would not have air superiority, so thats save a bunch of tanks from being wrecked. I think the germans could ahave recognized the threat of the allied tanks and adapted to it in good time, allthough not to say a lot of Panzers would be lost before replacements came.

Ricky, remember the tanks the germans had facing the allies in the Spring of 1940, and we all know how that ended.

 

i think the battle of britain was germany's downfall. they left britain able to fight and later on the US had a staging base to lauch it's forces. also in the battle of britain germany lost alot of it's pilots that trained before the war and did not have that quailty of pilots again.

 

Think France was just an unwanted entree.

His twisted ambitions were always a vast German Empire in the East, destruction of the Bolsheviks and slaughter of all European Jews.

He was just getting started.

 

I wonder, though; what would have been the effect of a Kasserine without a fallback position? If the Americans gained that bloody nose during their invasion of Europe, the entire campaign may have failed.

 

If Normandy failed? Suppose plan B would be to bomb Germany to it's knees and the Soviets over run all of the Reich.
Might have switched full weight of attack to Italy.

 

The debacle at Kasserine, while interesting military history, was actually a minor thing in the overall picture, and not unexpected when green troops get their first taste of battle, especially agaionst battle hardened veterans. The US had suffered numerous setbacks in the Pacific (as had the Brits and Commonwealth nations) against the Japanese and it only strengthened their resolve.

 

I think Roel meant what if such an event had happened to troops that have nowhere to retreat to, such as troops trying to secure a beachead.

However, Kesserine has two major contributing factors - green troops (the first batches of US servicemen in Africa were referred to as 'Britain's Italians' - however they shaped up remarkably quickly) and poor equipment facing good equipment.

Replace that German equipment with their 1940-level, and the US equipment with their 1942-level...

 

war with the ussr was inevitable..so for tht reason alone barbarossa can be ruled out.

im in agreement with the fact that germanys failure to eliminate britain either militarily or politically...was the ultimate reason for their certain defeat.

with britian out of the picture i think germany could have secured victory over the ussr...still whatever the outcome had been.. germany would never be able to hold its conquest for an extended period of time under nazi rule.

 

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Can I think there is some kind of consensus forming ,
Britain alone with no Barbarossa would have been in deep sh***
an intervention by the U.S. would have made a draw possible
the north African interlude provided the U.S. army with plenty of food for though ,
a European landing in 43 would have been a disaster
the Germans would not have pushed their armament research as far ,
though some weapons systems were already in the pipeline such as the tiger
so no Barbarossa... I see Germany in control of the continent by the fall of 45

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