Other Chances to Win World War II

That is the effect but not the intention

 

The only way you could possibly know for sure, is if you can read minds.

 

Let's face it, if you weren't there, any opinion you might form on an issue comes from reading about it (someone elses opinion). So, if you're pontificating about something of which you have no first-hand knowledge, you are simply regurgitating someone elses opinion. In that case, it's perfectly acceptable and understandable to be asked whose opinion you are spouting.

Anyone who gets upset under those circumstances is probably too ignorant to bother with, in any case.

 

Some of them are as transparent as Venice crystal.

 

Actually, I did not want the Axis to win, I wonder who in this modern world does. I merely thought that they were one of the most potent forces to attempt to conquer the world since the Mongols, and, relatively, they were pretty close.

 

I am sure this has been hit on a few billion times by now, but I have to pose this question in present company:

What if Germany stopped at France? If they didn't continue to advance/invade for at least a decade what might have become of it? The Vichy French seemed to be happy enough to fight on the Axis side (as shown throughout Torch, etc). Would the world have made an issue of it?

Particularly if the war with Japan had preoccupied the U.S. - what do you all think would have come of it?

 

Germany wasn't in quite as bad a bind economically as Japan was but it wasn't far behind. They were headed for a sever problem in the next year or two if the war hadn't started when it did. There economy, population, and technology were all going to start falling further and further behind if they didn't start the war when they did. Stopping at France only helps if they can make peace with the British.

 

Oh boy could I have some fun here! Since I am late to this little party, I'll let it go!
Well, maybe just this one shot!

My uncle was a chimp! So there!

OK, I'm done. If derPP wishes to delete my sophomoric attempt at humor, please feel free!

 

Over 40,000 Irish citizens fought in the British armed forces in WW2, the number of Irish citizens who fought in the German armed forces was around 3.

 

As per your hypotheses, for even a chance for Germany to win they'd had to have defeated Britain and preferably Russia BEFORE Pearl Harbor day and Hitler's declaration of war. Suppose this had actually happened: Britain overrun by the Germans and Russia beaten, all by December 1941. And suppose Hitler declares war on the USA just as it actually happened.

Where will the USA base its troops for an attempt to retake Britain, let alone the continent?

-In Britain? Of course not, it's occupied by the Germans...no US base going there!
-The Mediteranean? North Africa? Britain controls Gibralter and the Suez canal, but Germany controls Britain. So the entire mediterranean is Axis controlled unless the US violates Spain's neutrality (another country to fight), and retakes Gibralter or the Suez canal first.
-Spain? They were neutral, but Franco was Hitler's nominal ally and he would not have allowed Us troops. He'd have had to come in the war on the Axis side if the US tried to bring troops there. And with Britain and Russia beaten, hitler would not have had much trouble convincing Franco either.
-Iceland? Remotely possible but very unlikely...the weather and the distance are probably too much to overcome!
-The middle east? Most of it British/thus German controlled. Germany simply moves troops to cover Russia's southern borders.

All this even with the benefit of hindsight, was probably well beyond the capabilities of Germany and Italy. Even so if it had been done as described somehow, it would have been extremely difficult for the USA to liberate Europe and Britain.
anyone care to comment?

 

Would never happen, the Germans didn't have enough men or materials to take the entire of Europe or Russia, let alone Britain by herself. Now this has been discussed before maybe you should see those threads.

 

Difficult, perhaps, but far from impossible.

A base for a counter-invasion of Britain isn't all that difficult. The US already occupied Iceland by December, 1941, and an invasion of Britain would probably be impractical until mid-1943. New Foundland would be the obvious choice for the main staging area being only about 1,500 miles from Ireland, the likely first lodgment area. Iceland would also be used for long range air patrols and bombing. Carriers would be utilized for short range air cover until airfields could be captured. Since Germany had no significant navy, sea control would not be a problem beyond the usual ASW concerns.

It's axiomatic that Germany, faced with occupying significant parts of the Soviet Union, Norway, most of Western Europe, and large parts of North Africa, would find it's forces, particularly naval and air assets, spread extremely thin, and it's logistics capabilities stretched to the limit.

Fifteen hundred miles is indisputably a long distance for an amphibious operation, but certainly not unprecedented. Operation Torch in November, 1942, included the staging of three US divisions from the US East Coast to North Africa, a distance of over 2,000 miles. In the Pacific, major amphibious operations were sometimes stage over thousands of miles. The invasion of Okinawa, for example, included resupply and reinforcement elements staging over 8,000 miles from the West Coast of the US. Nothing in a hypothetical counter-invasion of Britain was beyond the historically demonstrated abilities of US the US military in WW II.

 

One very KEY element is almost never discussed that I believe WOULD HAVE led to a German victory in WWll, that being the huge populations of Eastern Europe whom would have joined with Germany in fighting the evil, horrible Soviet state that most of them had been virtual slaves in.

Actually, at the beginning of Operation Barbarossa, German soldiers were received as liberating heros in most of the eastern territories, including Russia herself.

Had Hitler played this opportunity differently than enslaving and slaughtering the people in the eastern territories, the numbers and thus the odds of victory would have changed dramatically. The Soviet Union probably would have crashed within a year.

But Hitler had far too much hatred for the peoples of the east, the slavs, etc., for him to ever think rationally regarding this. Thus, defeat was inevitable.

However, WHAT IF he could have put his hatred on hold and used the populations against what they already hated? WWll would have ended far differently IMHO.

 

Problem is, Hitler and the Nazi's would have had no reason to "liberate" the peoples of eastern Europe. The invasions of Poland and the Soviet Union were predicated on taking the lands thus gained and turning them over to ethnic German colonists. The concept was called "Lebensraum". Why would the Ukrainians, Lithuanians, Belarus, Georgians, etc. be inclined to fight against the Russians just to enable the Germans to take their lands for themselves? It doesn't matter how nice the Germans might have been to the "untermenschen" of Eastern Europe; the very fact that they were there was bad news for the inhabitants.

 

IIRC that subject has been discussed here LOL.

 

Hitler was certainly capable of duping the populations of the east into believing that they would share in the spoils of the wrecked Soviet Union, if only he had the patience to put up with their 'assistance' in helping destroy the monsterous Soviet state.

At the end of the war, entire populations could have been sent east over the Urals to territories that Hitler considered a wasteland. By then it would have been too late for any resistance that mattered. Hitler's patience did him in.

 

Even had Hitler been able to convince these people, what was he going to arm them with, pitchforks?

They already had ammunition troubles and shortages with good equipment, with it only reaching the better UNits and mainly the SS, so any left over would certainly not go to below second rate Eastruppen units. What about mobility? Well that would be walking or using horses just like the rest of the German army, sure they could have captured Rusisan trucks and what not, but then they were already facing shortages of oil and these extra vehicles woudl only make that need greater.

The war wouldn't end faster, the Russians still would have the numerical advantage, and they would still be able to recruit far more men then Germany, the war may have been prolonged but the result would be the same, especially with the The landings on Italy and France.

 

The only way the Germans could "win" ww2 was to not attack the Soviet Union and consolidate and integrate their newly acquired resources.

 

Most of the population could have been armed with the enormous amount of military equipment that the German army captured at the beginning of Operation Barbarossa.

Arming the hundreds of thousands, actually millions, of captured/freed Soviet soldiers, many, if not most whom at that stage of the war were ready to turn against their former enslaver would have accomplished the task. They were already trained and would be using their own equipment. This happens in history, check the side-switching Italian soldiers in WWll for the best example.

Additionally, the Allied landings in Italy and France were two and three years into the future, long after the war in the east would have been concluded with a Geman victory.