How Hitler could have won

Flip through this link & you'll see Baku changed hands a few times. Brits, Turks, ( almost ), & Russians. Not exactly an unconquerable locale.

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/usazerb/246.htm

as well as the agreement on the Baku-Batumi pipeline on the usage of
Azerbaijani and Transcaucasian railroads created a legal basis for Turkey to get the use of Baku oil.

Transcaucasian railroads, did we get that? & that was WW1.


& here is map of Georgia. Germans may send northern pincer through there. Terrrain not too rough. & below is the status of roads/rails circa 1926-1940.
http://www.thewineman.com/geo_map.htm

In 1926 Georgia had reached its prewar level of industrial production; transportation was restored; area under cultivation exceeded its pre-war level and cultural construction expanded as well. As a result of socialist construction and the successful completion of the first five year plans, Georgia had transformed itself into an industrial-agrarian country with a diversified, collectivized agricultural system. In 1937, industry's share in Georgian economy was 75.2% and 800 new industrial installations were constructed. The industrial enterprises built or totally reconstructed under Soviet power reportedly accounted for more than 80% of Georgia's industrial productivity. More than 8,000 km of highways and 250 km of raillines were built. By 1940, Georgia's Gross Industrial Product had increased by a factor of 10,2 over its 1913 level.

8000 km of highways, & 250 km of railines. A bit different than Libya eh?

 

Sounds like some kinda Barbarossa to me..?! Which you were meant NOT to do, right?

And considering the road conditions in Russia/Georgia. The Germans found out that the roads were , eh, not really roads as we call them. Besides the Soviets made false maps of roads, cities etc until the end of cold war so that the enemy would not know how to move in their country in case they were attacked.

Also like the article I put earlier says the Baku oil was moved by tankers not by trains or trucks. I guess they had a very good reason to that? I must suppose the conditions would not make it possible??!

And if the Soviets wanted to move spies/partisans they did have the Black sea navy to do that. No need to swim.

 

The article I put mentions Turkey getting oil by train.
& not even close to Barbarossa. The distances are not even in the same league. A small front through Georgia is not even close to attacking all along Polish border & Romanian border simultaneously. Not even close. & Russian maps mean very little, German photo recon planes would tell the tale with aireal photos.

http://www.worldatlas.com/webimage/countrys/europe/europea.htm

A look at the map shows just how much further it is from Romania to Baku that it is from Georgia to Baku.

 

I see the discussion seems to have cooled down however I can't help but get involved here.

We all know that Turkey was neutral until the end of the war. Keeping Turkey out of the war was a great achivement accomplished by Ismet Inonu, who was the second president of Republic of Turkey after Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. He was also the second man in the Independence War of Turkey against British supported Greek. After the victory, again Ismet Inonu was sent to Switzerland to sign Loussane Treaty which is the basis of recognition of Turkey in the international community today. Yet he has left all 3000 aegean islands to greek in Lousanne. We cursed after him while we were driving on the Aegean coast and listening to the greek radio broadcasting from a greek island 2 miles away .

Got a little bit off topic there sorry, so lets get back to our question "what if Turkey got involved?".

It is really hard to tell whose side would Turkey be in case war was inevitable. It is known that Turkey used to supply Reich with chromium, and Hitler gave money to Turkey to build some air defense. I think Inonu double played. Both axis and allied were afraid that Turkey would get in the war on the opposide side. If turkey had joined axis Baku would be just a step away from Kars which is Germans interest, meanwhile Turkish army would not hesitate a second to attack Mosul and Kirkuk by having the support of Wehrmacht behind. Mosul and Kirkuk are being considered as Turkish soil and those cities are the only ones which Turkey tried to get back and could not. still today Turkish government is stirring up the area in order to avoid an independent Kurdish state to be established. So Germans would not have to worry about the Brits in Iraq. But they would probably have trouble in the northeast. Caucasian geography is a harsh one. Turkish army lost over supposedly 50.000 men in WW1 not because of Russians but due to winter. It is called Sarikamis Operation, which later to be called Sarikamis disaster. Well it was mostly due to lack of command and winter equipment but it might give you an idea about the conditions over there. The topic is being discussed in wikipedia ;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Battle_of_Sarikamis

What would happen in the caucasians is up to your imaginations.

What if Turkey joined Allies? The answer is I probably would not have been born because my grandfather would be dead before he got married. I have no doubt that we would fight back with everything we had. But that would not make much difference. However Germans had to deal with local resistance forces supported by the allies. That the same resistance spirit repelled French from south of Turkey, Russians from the east of Turkey in WW1. After that, Germans had Brits in the south and Russian in the east to deal with. In the case Turkey's joining the allies if I was in Hitler's shoes I would ride the way over the black sea.

There is a proverb in Turkish slang, "If my aunt had balls, than she would be my uncle." So I think it is better to keep the things as they happened.

Well that's all for my history knowledge. Excuse the grammar and spelling mistakes please.

Regards.

 

Karem,

Turkey was in two military campaigs against Russia of which neither one was successful,in fact they were both desasters. Do you think that Turkey would want go to war with Russia again?

Im not to familiar with Turkey's military and economic might but after WW1 the Ottoman Empire was no more. If im not mistaken wasnt there an economic collapse and the country in a disastrous state?? Please inform me I might be mistaken.

Thanks

 

Nope , Turkey wouldn't even think of going to war Russia. That must be one of the reasons why we were neutral at that time. But I repeat, if Turkey joined axis we would definetly take it on the Brits in Iraq. You see, in 1925 Mustafa Kemal Ataturk was preparing for an operation to take back Mosul, but just in that time a revolt in southeast of Turkey kept Turkish army busy. That revolt was provoked by the Brits, obviously. But politics is a game you have to play.

After WW1 Turkish state collapsed that is true, however the new founded secular republic showed great success rebuilding the country and the economy. About after a decade from the decleration of independence great investments were made, these including the railroads that you people were talking about. However with Mustafa Kemal taking his hands off the politics -due to cirrhosis- the spirit was lost and today here is the IMF depended middle eastern country which is trying to join the E.U.

However all these progress that have been made was not enough to get into a full scale war against Russia or Germany.

You see they had planned to take back Mosul but a riot kept them away from doing it. This should give you an idea about the situation of the miltary and the economy.

 

That I agree with!!!

 

And don't forget that even if the Wehrmacht had taken Moscow and driven the Red army behind the Urals they still had no chance whats so ever of winning the war.

British and American air power would do to Germany what the U.S. 20th air force did in Japan, and if that wasn't enough before August '45.....Armageddon.

 

Damn! And Lawrence of Arabia was dead already!

 

The angry thread is back better put on my oven gloves.

 

Fret not Richard

I've dug a foxhole with reeinforced roof and dry straw to sleep on. Get a brew on and we're good to go.

 

Hey Miguel where did you get that smiley face with a peace sign??

 

www.freesmileys.org

 

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Overall I would have to say that probably the best chance that Hitler had off winning the war was not attacking Soviet Union.

 

And Stalin almost did everything he could to make the Germans win...

 

Yes, Stalin was a good 'ally' of the Germans for the first couple of years until some lessons were rubbed in, while Adolf was becoming a better 'ally' of everyone else as time went on

 

Does that include his demand of: military bases on the outlets to the North Sea, Constantinople, Romania (Germany's key supplier), Bulgaria, and Finland?

 

i think if Germany's goal at the start of Barbarossa was the quick destruction of Baku by mid-range bombing, not the takeover of Baku, the loss of oil at that time would have been devastating enough to have weakened the Russians to much to adequately defend themselves.

The German's didn't need to completely take over Turkey or Baku, just take the 75% of Russian oil out of production in mid-1941 at the start of the war with them. They needed to gain about 250 miles East along the Black Sea into Turkey for German Bombers (range 1500 miles), with about (900 mid-range bombers) at Germany's disposal at the start of Barbarossa) to make the round trip to Baku (Istanbul being 2000 miles round trip)

There reserves may have lasted Russia till winter if they could get them to the front line and the rest of the country could live without any oil in 6 months but then what? Taking most of the Ukraine already caused famine. Russia would not have been able to replace enough oil within 6 months to have continued without unbearable oil and gas shortages leading to more famine and a mechless army.

People are saying Germany would not be able to make much deeper push into Russia without more oil, but they could have their way if Russia's ability to feed their people and gas their engines was severely curtailed inside of 6 months.

Most What if threads by their very nature is going to be about what the losing side could have done different and how the winning side would have reacted. There is little need to What if the winning side. They won, why should they change much?

Its a debate about the strategy, not a debate that people actually wanted to see the Germans win and just can't accept it. I think a lot of people feel the need to knock every possible What If with dismissive drivel because they feel they are debating against if Germany should have won the war.