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Although the alliance was phoney from the start (Hitler planned to betray Stalin), do you think if Hitler had kept up the alliance with the USSR, and focused on consolidating his hold on Europe and totally crippling Britain, the Axis could have won the war? I'm thinking Japan could have dominated Asia and strengthened it's position, but a combined German-Soviet-Japanese (and other Axis, including Italians) strike force, not even perhaps 1/2 or 1/3 of their entire force, could have invaded the United States and eventually defeated them. Of course, what happened after is anyone's guess, but how plausible do you think such a scenario could be?
I don't think it's very plausible. Stalin was extremely paranoid and as far as I know his plans didn't involve peace. In fact many sources claim he was preparing for an attack against the Nazis and was only slightly beaten to it (Mark Solonin comes to mind as a source of such a claim, I've read several of his books and even though they didn't strike me as too objective, it was an interesting point of view.).
I'm not convinced Hitler beat Stalin by a margin as small as some claim, but after reading a ton of books on both tyrants I don't see how they could have remained at peace for long.
Yac.
Although the alliance was phoney from the start (Hitler planned to betray Stalin), do you think if Hitler had kept up the alliance with the USSR, and focused on consolidating his hold on Europe and totally crippling Britain, the Axis could have won the war? I'm thinking Japan could have dominated Asia and strengthened it's position, but a combined German-Soviet-Japanese (and other Axis, including Italians) strike force, not even perhaps 1/2 or 1/3 of their entire force, could have invaded the United States and eventually defeated them. Of course, what happened after is anyone's guess, but how plausible do you think such a scenario could be?
If Adolf Hitler had remained permanently allied with the USSR, he would not have been Adolf Hitler.
Adolf Hitler had spent two decades prior to 1941 promoting the necessity of lebensraum to the east - and this involved much more than half of Poland. The agricultural potential of the Ukraine was in particular sought. That man, the driving force behind the war in Europe, was not going to suddenly decide this life's mission was defeating the UK and the U.S. in cooperations with the USSR.
Further, the West was essentially just a side-show. The entire point of the war in the west, from a German perspective, was to knock France and Britain out of the war so that all the attention could be turned towards the Soviets. You can't "win a war" where the entire point of said war is to defeat the Soviets by deciding to be permanently allied with the Soviets in order to defeat powers that you only went to war with in order to eventually turn on the power you've now decided is your permanent friend.
Beyond all that - even given the reality of a permanent German-Soviet alliance (completely illogical as that may be) - how do those powers launch trans-oceanic invasions of the United States? By 1941 the British had made it clear that they were not going to fall to the Germans. I fail to see how the USSR could meaningfully contribute to defeating the UK. And the Soviets certainly had nothing much to offer the Japanese in stopping the U.S. from eventually doing what it did.
I don't think it's very plausible. Stalin was extremely paranoid and as far as I know his plans didn't involve peace. In fact many sources claim he was preparing for an attack against the Nazis and was only slightly beaten to it (Mark Solonin comes to mind as a source of such a claim, I've read several of his books and even though they didn't strike me as too objective, it was an interesting point of view.).
I'm not convinced Hitler beat Stalin by a margin as small as some claim, but after reading a ton of books on both tyrants I don't see how they could have remained at peace for long.
Yac.
That's true. I suppose even the possibility of working together to defeat the western Allies might not have been enough for them to ally long enough. Yeah even at the end of the war the Red Army was well ahead of the Germans, simply had far more manpower and industrial capacity.
If Adolf Hitler had remained permanently allied with the USSR, he would not have been Adolf Hitler.
Adolf Hitler had spent two decades prior to 1941 promoting the necessity of lebensraum to the east - and this involved much more than half of Poland. The agricultural potential of the Ukraine was in particular sought. That man, the driving force behind the war in Europe, was not going to suddenly decide this life's mission was defeating the UK and the U.S. in cooperations with the USSR.
Further, the West was essentially just a side-show. The entire point of the war in the west, from a German perspective, was to knock France and Britain out of the war so that all the attention could be turned towards the Soviets. You can't "win a war" where the entire point of said war is to defeat the Soviets by deciding to be permanently allied with the Soviets in order to defeat powers that you only went to war with in order to eventually turn on the power you've now decided is your permanent friend.
Beyond all that - even given the reality of a permanent German-Soviet alliance (completely illogical as that may be) - how do those powers launch trans-oceanic invasions of the United States? By 1941 the British had made it clear that they were not going to fall to the Germans. I fail to see how the USSR could meaningfully contribute to defeating the UK. And the Soviets certainly had nothing much to offer the Japanese in stopping the U.S. from eventually doing what it did.
Interesting. I know one of the principle motivations was to create more 'living space' in the East, but it seemed Hitler was intent on conquering all of Europe. Obviously, France and Britain were it's main obstacles. Hitler judged right that the US would not get involved after the invasion of Czechoslovakia and Poland and the declaration of war in September 1939 (Roosevelt etc stuck to their isolationist policy). I wouldn't say that was the sole point of the war, but I don't know much about that aspect of the war. Hitler of course was intent on removing the Jews, many of whom lived in Eastern Europe and Russia.
Air-craft carriers, long-range aircraft and of course, feverishly working on long range rockets/intercontinental ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons. Could the Soviets or Nazis have developed the A-bomb before the Americans? It's not implausible. A simultaneously two pronged invasion of the continental US - the Soviets and Japanese from the Pacific and the Germans and Soviets from the Atlantic, could probably have defeated the US. In that unthinkable situation the world could be carved between the three powers. The Nazis would have plenty of 'lebensraum' in Europe, perhaps Africa, while Russia already had a lot of territory, and Japan would have it's Asian Empire. Plus they could have flooded American and pillaged her resources.
Interesting. I know one of the principle motivations was to create more 'living space' in the East, but it seemed Hitler was intent on conquering all of Europe. Obviously, France and Britain were it's main obstacles. Hitler judged right that the US would not get involved after the invasion of Czechoslovakia and Poland and the declaration of war in September 1939 (Roosevelt etc stuck to their isolationist policy). I wouldn't say that was the sole point of the war, but I don't know much about that aspect of the war. Hitler of course was intent on removing the Jews, many of whom lived in Eastern Europe and Russia.
Hitler believed that France and the UK were bluffing in their threats of war over a German invasion of Poland. While Hitler prior to 1939 had certainly entertained notions of defeating the western powers, these plans were always as a means of eliminating a potential second front so that he could then focus on the east. However, by August of 1939 he was hoping the western powers would simply decline to intervene, as they had done at Munich.
Only when the situation failed to play out as he wished did Hitler decide to attempt to neutralize the French and British so that he could undertake his long-term expansion to the east. This is not to say that once he did take action in the west, he didn't use his gains to further his agenda (looting, persecution of Jews and communists, etc.). It just wasn't part of his grand agenda. More to the point, destroying what he saw as the implaccable foe of all things German - Bolshvism - was his agenda. Hard to imagine Hitler one day decided he wants to work with Stalin for lebensraum in, where, Bordeaux?
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Air-craft carriers, long-range aircraft and of course, feverishly working on long range rockets/intercontinental ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons. Could the Soviets or Nazis have developed the A-bomb before the Americans? It's not implausible. A simultaneously two pronged invasion of the continental US - the Soviets and Japanese from the Pacific and the Germans and Soviets from the Atlantic, could probably have defeated the US. In that unthinkable situation the world could be carved between the three powers. The Nazis would have plenty of 'lebensraum' in Europe, perhaps Africa, while Russia already had a lot of territory, and Japan would have it's Asian Empire. Plus they could have flooded American and pillaged her resources.
It is implausible. You're going to have to make major revisions to history in order to give the Germans nuclear weapons before the United States. And it's one thing to make a ballistic missie that can hit London - it is quite another to make an ICBM, a nuclear weapon, and then miniaturize those weapons to fit on an ICBM.
A trans-oceanic invasion is completely unworkable. A flotilla that completely crosses the Atlantic? What is the United States (and Canada) doing during this time span? First, you've got to have a Kriegsmarine that can overwhelm the U.S. Navy. And the Canadian Navy. And what part of the Royal Navy has retreated across the Atlantic to regroup and fight on after Britain was successfully invaded and conquered (a development that is left mysteriosly unexplained). Even assuming all that, carrier-based German aircraft are going to provide air superiority against American air defense projected out from the coasts? And then, once they miraculously get a beachhead, they're going to successfully defend it at the end of a trans-Atlantic supply line against the entire American Army?
And there's still that fact that adding the USSR to the list of allies of Japan does next to nothing to improve Japan's strategic position in the Pacific, except maybe free up some forces along the border (I suppose in this scenario, Imperial Japan is not only allied with Stalin, but is so trusting of him that they decide not to defend the Japan-Soviet frontier?). In your scenario, the United States has no "Europe First" policy, and is thus better able to deal with Japan than they actually were - and yet Japan manages to not lose one island campaign after another but, presumably, takes Hawaii and then invades the west coast?
You've got to do more than say "No Barbarossa = Germany/USSR/Italy/Japan defeating UK/U.S.". You need to explain 'how', precisely. And looting occupied territories really doesn't cut it. The untouched U.S. industrial base is going to be cranking out much more useful war machinery and materiel than bombed-and-occupied Europe and China with factories manned by sullen occupied natives.
A trans-oceanic invasion is completely unworkable.
I think that we sometimes view the idea of Nazi world domination solely through a very limited and militaristic lens. In isn't necessary to physically conquer the world in order to dominate it.
I agree that it is seemingly beyond the possibility that then or now any nation outside of some hypothetical supercharged Mexico or Canada being able to invade the U.S. (illegal immigration folks please this isn't the time or the place) but it isn't implausible that a Europe ruled by the Nazi Party, wouldn't have served as a rallying point for fascist across the globe to take control of their own governments. It isn't like there weren't fascist and fascist leaning movements in the Americas, many of which were quite successful in coming to power. And in one particular nation - which will go unnamed - the idea of a master race bent on ending Jewish "domination", committing genocide or at least s bit of ethic cleansing of inferior races wouldn't have fallen on deaf ears. In short it isn't totally inconceivable in an alternate universe that a Nazi Europe could become the head of a league of fascist nations.
As Goebbles put it in 1943:
"The Führer gave expression to his unshakable conviction that the Reich will be the master of all Europe. We shall yet have to engage in many fights, but these will undoubtedly lead to most wonderful victories. From there on the way to world domination is practically certain. Whoever dominates Europe will thereby assume the leadership of the world."
I believe that this was precisely what was in the mind of western leaders when they spoke about Nazi world conquest and it is precisely what Roosevelt referred to in his December 29, 1940 "Arsenal of Democracy Speech" when he said,"The Nazi masters of Germany have made it clear that they intend not only to dominate all life and thought in their own country, but also to enslave the whole of Europe, and then to use the resources of Europe to dominate the rest of the world."
So perhaps we should all be more precise in your wording, rather than writing about Nazi world conquest let's keep to the idea of world domination.
I think that we sometimes view the idea of Nazi world domination solely through a very limited and militaristic lens. In isn't necessary to physically conquer the world in order to dominate it.
I agree that it is seemingly beyond the possibility that then or now any nation outside of some hypothetical supercharged Mexico or Canada being able to invade the U.S. (illegal immigration folks please this isn't the time or the place) but it isn't implausible that a Europe ruled by the Nazi Party, wouldn't have served as a rallying point for fascist across the globe to take control of their own governments. It isn't like there weren't fascist and fascist leaning movements in the Americas, many of which were quite successful in coming to power. And in one particular nation - which will go unnamed - the idea of a master race bent on ending Jewish "domination", committing genocide or at least s bit of ethic cleansing of inferior races wouldn't have fallen on deaf ears. In short it isn't totally inconceivable in an alternate universe that a Nazi Europe could become the head of a league of fascist nations.
As Goebbles put it in 1943:
"The Führer gave expression to his unshakable conviction that the Reich will be the master of all Europe. We shall yet have to engage in many fights, but these will undoubtedly lead to most wonderful victories. From there on the way to world domination is practically certain. Whoever dominates Europe will thereby assume the leadership of the world."
I believe that this was precisely what was in the mind of western leaders when they spoke about Nazi world conquest and it is precisely what Roosevelt referred to in his December 29, 1940 "Arsenal of Democracy Speech" when he said,"The Nazi masters of Germany have made it clear that they intend not only to dominate all life and thought in their own country, but also to enslave the whole of Europe, and then to use the resources of Europe to dominate the rest of the world."
So perhaps we should all be more precise in your wording, rather than writing about Nazi world conquest let's keep to the idea of world domination.
Personally, I was responding to the specifically stated notion of simultaneous invasions of CONUS by Germany (presumably with Soviet and Italian assistance) and Japan on both Atlantic and Pacific shores.
But even regarding domination, you still have a United States that was leaps and bounds ahead of the Germans in developing a nuclear device. You also have the postulated notion of Hitler deciding that he really was kidding about all the lebensraum stuff, and along with Stalin decided that they can not only co-exist long-term, then can be functional allies on a long-term basis. And if they are, then the Soviets are able to reorganize and rearm and are a dominant European power along with Germany.
That's the scenario provided by the OP. It really is very different than the scenario of Josef Goebbels fondest fantasies (which, frankly, has its own myriad problematic issues).
But even regarding domination, you still have a United States that was leaps and bounds ahead of the Germans in developing a nuclear device.
What good is a nuclear device when one of the leading parties in the U.S. is one that is fascist in orientation? Had Japan not attacked Pearl Harbor and had Germany not declared war on the U.S. American fascist might have become today's equivalent of the Tea Party (no I'm not accusing the Tea Party of being nazi style fascist...yet).
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You also have the postulated notion of Hitler deciding that he really was kidding about all the lebensraum stuff,
YOU have to be kidding if you think that I ever "postulated" such a think or I made some egregious typographical error.
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