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I think that Germany could have won World War two (at least to the point of a Brokered peace) if they changed their tactics.
1) Delay Barbarossa until 1942
2) Use the forces that were used to invade the USSR to attack in North/East Africa
This would decimate the Allied forces (UK, Canada, Australia) and make a second front non-existent, as well as lead the conquest of the Middle east which as a two fold strategic importance
A. controls lots of formally Allied oil
B. Allows the Invasion of the USSR to have a Southern Front
3) With this strategy most likely Italy would not have surrendered in 1943, nor Romania in 1944 because the war would have been going better for them.
4) Invade The USSR in spring/summer 1942, including an attack through the Caucasus mountains, leading to a quick capture of Stalingrad.
With this the Allies would have been on the ropes, and I believe that it could have ended up being a different war with a brokered peace (see Treaty of Versailles with the loss of the Reich being the Kaiser's gov't)
of course hindsight is 20/20 and I'm sure the Allies would have reacted to German movements and offensives (say British army in India/Burma playing into this)
I think that Germany could have won World War two (at least to the point of a Brokered peace) if they changed their tactics.
1) Delay Barbarossa until 1942
2) Use the forces that were used to invade the USSR to attack in North/East Africa
This would decimate the Allied forces (UK, Canada, Australia) and make a second front non-existent, as well as lead the conquest of the Middle east which as a two fold strategic importance
A. controls lots of formally Allied oil
B. Allows the Invasion of the USSR to have a Southern Front
3) With this strategy most likely Italy would not have surrendered in 1943, nor Romania in 1944 because the war would have been going better for them.
4) Invade The USSR in spring/summer 1942, including an attack through the Caucasus mountains,leading to a quick capture of Stalingrad.
With this the Allies would have been on the ropes, and I believe that it could have ended up being a different war with a brokered peace (see Treaty of Versailles with the loss of the Reich being the Kaiser's gov't)
of course hindsight is 20/20 and I'm sure the Allies would have reacted to German movements and offensives (say British army in India/Burma playing into this)
You mean these mountains?
Yeah, I don't see how anything could possibly go wrong with this plan...
I think that Germany could have won World War two (at least to the point of a Brokered peace) if they changed their tactics.
1) Delay Barbarossa until 1942
2) Use the forces that were used to invade the USSR to attack in North/East Africa
This would decimate the Allied forces (UK, Canada, Australia) and make a second front non-existent, as well as lead the conquest of the Middle east which as a two fold strategic importance
A. controls lots of formally Allied oil
B. Allows the Invasion of the USSR to have a Southern Front
3) With this strategy most likely Italy would not have surrendered in 1943, nor Romania in 1944 because the war would have been going better for them.
4) Invade The USSR in spring/summer 1942, including an attack through the Caucasus mountains, leading to a quick capture of Stalingrad.
With this the Allies would have been on the ropes, and I believe that it could have ended up being a different war with a brokered peace (see Treaty of Versailles with the loss of the Reich being the Kaiser's gov't)
of course hindsight is 20/20 and I'm sure the Allies would have reacted to German movements and offensives (say British army in India/Burma playing into this)
Should have kept bombing England. They were in weeks of winning. The US had not entered the war at that time. Our involvement was more than a year away and we had not spooled our productions up that far. The continuation of bombing England would have brought Churchill to his knees. France had already thrown up there hands and Poland was soundly defeated in the second round of that playoff.
The mood in the US was anti war. WWI was still fresh in our minds. No one wanted any part of Ferdinand Fauche's mistakes and clean up 20 years hence.
Attacking the soviet union was lame. He had Stalin as an ally up until Barbarossa which was fought in 42. Going after a weak but plentiful ally was stupid.
Expand his presence in europes puppet states. Why stop at the Sudetenland? Chamberlain was a stooge. England may have rattled but they definitely would have rolled....over. If Hitler had kept up the blitzkrieg, he could have conquered half of Europe and while no ne would have been happy, no one would have stopped him.
Additionally, he should have let his generals fight the war. Desert storm proved how valuable that could be. Hitler should have kept to speeches. Dernitz should have stepped up the u-boats and the US and merchant fleet would have stayed home for the winter.
And one other thing, he should never have let Japan off that leash. Once we got off the bench, everything changed. Yamamoto was right, let sleeping dogs lie.
Hitler, Stalin, and Mussolini are textbook examples why you don't let supreme leaders, be supreme. They rarely know how to run a business let alone prosecute wars. They give good speech though...sound familiar? (as we currently stare down North Korea).
You worried about Korea? Don't. You should be more concerned about our leaders ability to launch a full retaliatory strike if necessary. Smart money says he wouldn't do it. He would rather negotiate and accept casualties without firing a shot. Just like Benghazi. It's a miracle anyone serves in our military anymore.
God bless them and protect them. I don't see our elected officials doing it.
Should have kept bombing England. They were in weeks of winning. The US had not entered the war at that time. Our involvement was more than a year away and we had not spooled our productions up that far. The continuation of bombing England would have brought Churchill to his knees. France had already thrown up there hands and Poland was soundly defeated in the second round of that playoff.
And one other thing, he should never have let Japan off that leash. Once we got off the bench, everything changed. Yamamoto was right, let sleeping dogs lie.
I want to respond to just two of your points, both of which I believe are off-base. First, the Battle of Britain (the air war): Germany gave up on the sustained bombing of England because of the horrendous losses they had suffered; they were not "within weeks of winning". (At least I assume you meant "within" rather than "in".) While it's true that the RAF had also sustained grievous losses, they had a superbly well organized defense system tied to their radar sites and this is what took such a toll on the Luftwaffe.
In the second paragraph which I quoted above, it is pretty clear "he" refers to Hitler. Well Hitler never had Japan "on a leash". The Japanese were very independent-minded and did not see themselves as owing any sort of obedience to Germany. In fact, although the two were allies on paper, there was nevr any meaningful cooperation between them.
1. Germany should also not have declared war on the U.S. right after Pearl Harbor.
2. It should also not have attacked USSR at all costs (since they signed the non-aggression pact and the Allies were suspicious of the Soviets). I would think the Soviets, like the U.S., wanted to avoid war at all cost.
3. Germany should have focused most of her attention on Western Europe (to maintain her territories), North Africa (to keep Italy in the war), and on bombarding Britain as someone else mentioned (since Britain's air defence then was still relatively weak).
In bombarding Britain, Germany should have launched a surprise air attack from Norway instead (much like what the Japanese did in their invasion of British Malaya).
I think that Germany could have won World War two (at least to the point of a Brokered peace) if they changed their tactics.
1) Delay Barbarossa until 1942
If you had actually studied the background to the planning of “Operation Barbarossa”, you would know that delaying it until 1942 was not a realistic option from the German’s perspective. It was known to the German High Command that the Soviets were in the midst of reorganizing and rebuilding their military in the wake of both their less than stellar performance against Finland during the Winter War of 1939-1940 and Stalin’s devastating purge of the Red Army leadership. German intelligence estimated that it would take until 1942 or, at the latest, 1943 for this to be accomplished. Their belief was that once this was done, any hope of attacking the Soviet Union successfully would have disappeared because the German Army would be simply outmatched. Thus, attacking in 1941 made the most sense because the perceived weakened state of the Red Army made the chances of victory higher, though by no means a guarantee.
Quote:
Originally Posted by btownboss4
2) Use the forces that were used to invade the USSR to attack in North/East Africa. This would decimate the Allied forces (UK, Canada, Australia) and make a second front non-existent, as well as lead the conquest of the Middle east which as a two fold strategic importance:
A. controls lots of formally Allied oil
B. Allows the Invasion of the USSR to have a Southern Front
After the Luftwaffe failed to establish air supremacy over Great Britain and the resulting cancellation of “Operation Sealion”, there were some within the German High Command that argued for pursuing a “war on the periphery” against the British. The key proponent of this strategy was Admiral Erich Raeder who proposed that Germany, in conjunction with Italy, should concentrate on attacking and eliminating the British positions in the Mediterranean, namely Gibraltar and the Suez Canal. This would remove any possibility of Britain, or the United States (should she enter the war) from ever gaining a foothold in the area to attack the Axis southern flank. After this was accomplished, the Axis could continue their drive through the Middle East, via Palestine and Syria, all the way to the borders of Turkey. This would also open the way for further Axis penetration into the oil rich countries of Iran and Iraq as well as placing the Axis at the Soviet Union’s southern doorstep. Raeder believed that such a move would intimidate both Greece and Turkey into joining the Axis and put the Soviets in check, likely removing any need for an invasion of Russia.
As for the force needed to at least partially realize this goal, it would not have been necessary to use a force equal to that employed to invade the Soviet Union. At the time Raeder first raised the idea of this “Mediterranean Strategy”, the British position in Egypt was tenuous at best. The Italians had approximately 250,000 troops across the border in Libya while the British had only about 36,000 men and a half strength armored brigade to defend Egypt and the Suez Canal. With the addition of between 2 and 4 panzer divisions to what the Italians already had in place, the British wouldn’t have stood a chance. They would have been forced to retreat from the eastern Mediterranean either all the way back to Gibraltar or into the Red Sea. This would have cleared the way for the Axis to advance into Palestine and Vichy controlled Syria if they chose to. If Germany was then able to make a deal with Spain to allow access through Spanish territory to attack Gibraltar, and provided that operation was a success, the Mediterranean would have been completely closed to the British.
Now, while all of this seems to indicate a colossal mistake on the part of Hitler for not embracing Raeder’s alternate strategy, there was certainly no guarantee that it would play out exactly how it was drawn up on paper. And to be fair, Hitler didn’t just dismiss Raeder’s idea out of hand, he did actually give it some consideration. To that end, he had meetings with Marshal Petain of Vichy France, Franco in Spain, and even Mussolini, to examine the possibility of some sort of concerted Axis effort in the Mediterranean. But these talks proved to be pointless. Petain pledged to cooperate with Germany but refused to commit Vichy France to entering the conflict against Britain militarily. Franco was eager to join the fight but wanted Germany to bankroll the whole thing. Mussolini saw merit in the overall idea. But he reminded Hitler of both his earlier agreement that the Mediterranean was in the Italian sphere of influence and of the territorial concessions Italy expected to receive in North Africa once the war was over; territory which was either currently in Vichy or Spanish hands, or to which Vichy and Spain had an interest in acquiring as well. Upon seeing all that would need to be done to satisfy all involved, not to mention the cost, Hitler saw no upside to pursuing the strategy further, and his interest in the matter fizzled out.
But it should not be forgotten that Hitler was obsessed with the destruction of the Soviet Union for reasons that were both ideological and strategic. The idea that Germany’s destiny lay in expanding into the East, that Germany’s survival depended on the elimination of the Russian menace and the exploitation of Russia’s natural resources, were so ingrained in his mind that nothing could turn him away from the pursuit of that goal, regardless of how promising an alternative the Mediterranean may have seemed to others. Consequently, we will never know if this was a lost opportunity for Germany to win the war or not.
Quote:
Originally Posted by btownboss4
3) With this strategy most likely Italy would not have surrendered in 1943, nor Romania in 1944 because the war would have been going better for them.
Well, obviously, had Raeder’s alternate strategy been adopted with the end result being an Axis victory, Italy would have become the dominate power in the Mediterranean and that would have been that. As for Romania, absent a war between the Germans and the Russians, Romania would have simply been a German satellite/buffer state in Eastern Europe and nothing more.
With respect to why those countries ended up surrendering during World War II, in both instances it came down to the same basic factors; poor training, timid and or inept field commanders, and lack of the modern weaponry needed to prevail against their adversaries. The Italians, Romanians, and even Hungarians fought the best they could under the circumstances, but the truth is it would have taken years and untold expenditure of funds for them to reach the point where they were at the same level of combat effectiveness as the Germans or even the Soviets for that matter.
regarding Russia..................I was doing some reading and Hitler always held Russia in great awe( militarily)
It wasn't until Russia battled the the Finns at Finland ( and the Finns gave Russia a good battle ) that Hitler was quoted-----------" I have over estimated Russia. They are a paper tiger "
Evidently Hitler concluded if the small army of Finland could give Russia that much trouble, the Hitler's army could defeat them .
I think once everyone was in, op's points would have resulted in much longer war, but unlikely Germany would prevail.
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