AHC: Make the Third Reich Survive

[Zaius]

Originally Posted by PoeFacedKilla

that said, if Hitler simply didn't invade poland and tricked stalin into doing it;
then he could take on the USSR alone, and could probably get at least a stalemate (though i think it would have to be someone other than hitler).

It’s a lot easier said then done, Stalin was too cautious to be ‘tricked’ in such a manner. He wouldn’t invade anybody without a major war in Europe.

Originally Posted by PoeFacedKilla

Its no where near impossible to beat the USSR; and without the western front Germany has a much better chance.

Without invading the west, Germany lacks quite a lot of industry needed for its war in the east. And without a war in Europe going on, the USSR is far less likely to be taken by surprise as IOTL. If Germany fights alongside Poland, the 30 or so Polish divisions ought to help, but if the goal is to defeat and overrun the USSR I can't see them making much of a difference. It seems to me that with no war with the west, Germany would be in a much worse position to attack the USSR then IOTL.

[Snake Featherston]

Originally Posted by PoeFacedKilla

why would anyone want the third reich to survive?
if the second reich survived, now thats something that would be cool and not a horrible disaster.

that said, if Hitler simply didn't invade poland and tricked stalin into doing it;
then he could take on the USSR alone, and could probably get at least a stalemate (though i think it would have to be someone other than hitler).

Its no where near impossible to beat the USSR; and without the western front Germany has a much better chance.

If he is the "liberator of communism" he could have a good chunk of the SSRs joining his side, and then he could attack the west (which we saw in OTL, didn't take much)

Then there's war with England, not sure how that would play out but if the germans play it smart they (along with the Italians) could impose Hegemony over the Mediterranean and thus Northern Africa.

but those are just my thoughts.

It is not impossible to defeat the USSR, yes. It is impossible for Nazi Germany, however, to be the one that defeats the USSR due to the reality of how "modern" the Wehrmacht actually was.

[George Carty]

Originally Posted by Zaius

Without invading the west, Germany lacks quite a lot of industry needed for its war in the east.

In OTL weren't the industries of Western Europe almost useless to the Germans though, because they didn't have enough raw materials to run them? For example, there was very little electricity production in France during the German occupation, because there was no British coal coming in to fuel the power stations.

(Perhaps seeing what happened when access to imported fossil fuels was lost was one of the reasons why France so eagerly embraced nuclear energy post-war...)

[dgharis]

Originally Posted by Snake Featherston

Given the inherent nature of Nazi ideology this is impossible. It's an ideology that *will* initiate a war it cannot win against the USSR come Hell or high water, and if it loses to the USSR the Nazis are doomed no matter what happens.

Agreed. No Nazis = No Third Reich; trying to keep the Third Reich alive with the Nazis in power is like trying to store dynamite in your cellar; sooner or later, BOOM! And the question is not if it loses to the USSR, but when it loses. The Third Reich, even at the height of its power, simply does not have the resources to defeat the Soviet Union.

[Snake Featherston]

Originally Posted by dgharis

Agreed. No Nazis = No Third Reich; trying to keep the Third Reich alive with the Nazis in power is like trying to store dynamite in your cellar; sooner or later, BOOM! And the question is not if it loses to the USSR, but when it loses. The Third Reich, even at the height of its power, simply does not have the resources to defeat the Soviet Union.

At the same time Soviet victory in these scenarios does not necessarily mean the Soviets reach the Pyrenees all by themselves. That scenario relies on just as much fundamental ignorance of actual logistics for the two sides.

[dgharis]

Originally Posted by Snake Featherston

At the same time Soviet victory in these scenarios does not necessarily mean the Soviets reach the Pyrenees all by themselves. That scenario relies on just as much fundamental ignorance of actual logistics for the two sides.

They don't need to advance further than Germany itself; military defeat followed by Soviet occupation will put an end to the Third Reich then and there, no matter what happens in the rest of Europe. Any remaining Nazis will have zero credibility and zero power; any remaining military forces will be looking for the nearest Soviet commander to surrender to. Finis.

[BlairWitch749]

if we define "the third reich" as Germany as Hitler ran it; it's asb to the max

Nazism by it's very nature demands constant mobilization and military buildup (ignoring the need to invade, occupy and oppress neighbors as well).... constant mobilization and military buildup on a Nazi scale is unsustainable from an economic standpoint

basically if Hitler didn't move against the Czechs in some way or another by 1939 Germany's economy (despite the years of artful papering over by Dr. Schatt) would collapse into hyperinflation and renewed depression

Nazism is even more economically unsustainable than Communism or even Stalinism

[Daylight Savings]

I'm going to propose a scenario I can't recall seeing. Though I'll preface it with saying I have no idea who would fill this role. But how about a Polish leader who realizes that Poland cannot survive between Germany and Russia without being in one of their camps and who is dead set against communism. Stalin is a very cautious man, but is there any way he could be moved into attacking anything in eastern Europe in this scenario. The west may hate the Nazi's but they aren't a fan of the Reds either and if they are the aggressor the UK and France would have a hard time mobilizing their populations against Germany. This doesn't strike me as likely in the least. I'm just trying to think of other options.

Basically this boils down to Hitler's Germany is aggressive and Stalin's USSR is patient. A war is inevitable between them, but the one that starts it is going to lose at great cost to both parties. Putting it that way makes me wonder if MAD couldn't be developed as a political theory in 1939.

[Snake Featherston]

Originally Posted by Daylight Savings

I'm going to propose a scenario I can't recall seeing. Though I'll preface it with saying I have no idea who would fill this role. But how about a Polish leader who realizes that Poland cannot survive between Germany and Russia without being in one of their camps and who is dead set against communism. Stalin is a very cautious man, but is there any way he could be moved into attacking anything in eastern Europe in this scenario. The west may hate the Nazi's but they aren't a fan of the Reds either and if they are the aggressor the UK and France would have a hard time mobilizing their populations against Germany. This doesn't strike me as likely in the least. I'm just trying to think of other options.

Basically this boils down to Hitler's Germany is aggressive and Stalin's USSR is patient. A war is inevitable between them, but the one that starts it is going to lose at great cost to both parties. Putting it that way makes me wonder if MAD couldn't be developed as a political theory in 1939.

Again, no. First of all Stalin was massively paranoid, so you need to find a way to deceive a man who's looking for this kind of thing into believing it. This is not easy to do at all. Stalin would more likely seek to undermine and worm within systems of other states, not invade them, or if he does invade them he gets a plausible pretext that actually looks legitimate if not looked at too closely or too deeply (and even then the rest of Europe goes into a frenzy).

The Soviets were an aggressor IOTL and successfully struck three countries off the map, people still rallied to send the USSR the tools they needed to wage war against Germany IOTL.

[Daylight Savings]

Originally Posted by Snake Featherston

The Soviets were an aggressor IOTL and successfully struck three countries off the map, people still rallied to send the USSR the tools they needed to wage war against Germany IOTL.

The Soviets were mutual aggressors with the Germans there was plenty of talk of helping Finland against the Soviets alongside fighting the Germans. That ended when Germany invaded the west and the USSR. If the Soviets alone had invaded Poland and captured the Baltics you'd definitely see western Europe grudgingly mobilizing to fight them. Even if the invasion of Poland happens as OTL if the Germans sit on their thumbs for a year and then the Soviets invade Germany and look like they are threatening Europe expect lend lease materials going to the Nazis.

As you said though, Stalin was too paranoid and cautious to ever do that. Hitler was bound by Nazi ideology and his own psychoses to start a war. It all comes down to needing other men in power. And having other men in power likely guarantees we never get to the point where this war can happen anyway.

[The Knight]

Hitler will trash Germany with or without a war. If the nazis manage to avoid war (which is asb in itself) then some sort of revolution or military coup is going to finish them off, (See Moussolini.) The only way the Third Reich itself could survive is if there's a relatively smooth takeover by the wermacht which maintains some continuity. Either way Germany will be better off without it.

[Snake Featherston]

Originally Posted by Daylight Savings

The Soviets were mutual aggressors with the Germans there was plenty of talk of helping Finland against the Soviets alongside fighting the Germans. That ended when Germany invaded the west and the USSR. If the Soviets alone had invaded Poland and captured the Baltics you'd definitely see western Europe grudgingly mobilizing to fight them. Even if the invasion of Poland happens as OTL if the Germans sit on their thumbs for a year and then the Soviets invade Germany and look like they are threatening Europe expect lend lease materials going to the Nazis.

As you said though, Stalin was too paranoid and cautious to ever do that. Hitler was bound by Nazi ideology and his own psychoses to start a war. It all comes down to needing other men in power. And having other men in power likely guarantees we never get to the point where this war can happen anyway.

Hitler was perfectly happy to do things like assigning to the USSR a bigger sphere than that allotted by the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (Lithuania was originally to be a Nazi satellite but it fell out with the Nazis over the post-Operation White partition of Poland so Hitler just gave it to the USSR in exchange for pushing his boundary in Poland with them to the Bug, as opposed to the Vistula) and only decided to make Finland his ally when they started slapping around the Soviet invasion.

The USSR's horrors suffered at the hands of the Nazis do not in actual fact alter the reality that the USSR spent the first phase of WWII working hand in glove with the Axis. It if anything makes them worse as it's the most egregious example outside the German occupation of Italy of how vicious and incapable of accepting a meaningful alliance the Nazi regime actually was.

[Urban fox]

Originally Posted by scholar

If there isn't a war with the west, such as appeasement continues, then it is not without the realm of possibility that the Axis would go to war with the Soviets without a second and third front. It is not impossible for them to win against the USSR, though it is impossible to conquer them. Part of the reason for the failure of the Soviet campaign was a lack of Japanese support and the sharp division of resources, many of which were in Norway, France, and the Balkans instead of being used against the Soviets. If one tones down the aggressive hostility of Nazism towards the west, lessens its racial nonsense, and simply focuses on the "evils" of communism, this is not impossible.

That said, this is the wrong subforum.

Of course that means the Red Army wont be caught with it's pants-around it's ankles when Nazi Germany attacks.

The best way for the Thrid Reich to survive longer, is for Hitler to die before war breaks out and have Goring take over.

Then it can rot & fall apart in it's own good time.

[mrmandias]

Originally Posted by Snake Featherston

Given the inherent nature of Nazi ideology this is impossible. It's an ideology that *will* initiate a war it cannot win against the USSR come Hell or high water, and if it loses to the USSR the Nazis are doomed no matter what happens.

Ideologies don't have inherent natures. They're human constructs, they can change, they can contain contradictory elements, they can be ramshackle compromises forced by circumstances and events.

There are no such things as platonic ideologies to which humans dance.

[Rubicon]

Originally Posted by Snake Featherston

The Axis doesn't have what it takes to destroy the USSR. By itself the USSR is plenty sufficient to crush and grind up the offensive power of the Axis and preserve its existence.

I know of at least three different PoDs, none earlier then October 1940, that would have the Germans in Moscow by December 1941 without ASB intervention.

1) Italians do better in North Africa. No Rommel and no DAK. Two more Panzer divisions, enough trucks to supply a Panzergruppe and an entire Fliegerkorps. Attach these to Heeresgruppe Nord, and Leningrad falls in July/August 1941 freeing up enough troops and logistical support that a real attack is feasible on Moscow.

2) Italians do worse in North Africa. No Rommel and no DAK. Two more Panzer divisions, enough trucks to supply a Panzergruppe and an entire Fliegerkorps. Attach these to Heeresgruppe Nord, and Leningrad falls in July/August 1941 freeing up enough troops and logistical support that a real attack is feasable on Moscow.

3) Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm von Leeb is not appointed commander of Heeresgruppe Nord, but either Generaloberst Günther von Kluge or Generaloberst Ewald von Kleist is. Both had a much better understanding of armoured warfare and it's role in deep penetrations, they were also quite a bit more aggressive. Leningrad falls in July/August 1941 freeing up enough troops and logistical support that a real attack is feasable on Moscow.

Moscow falls and the Red Army lacks sufficient logistical support that a massive counterattack is impossible, meaning much less German casualties and loss of material. This makes Fall Blau in the summer of -42 much, much stronger and will more then likely mean that the Volga artery is severed and that the Soviet industry will be unable to utilize the Caucasus oil. Either the Soviet leadership sues for peace at that point, or Germany will reach the AA line sometime during 1943 and begin fortifying.

[BlondieBC]

Originally Posted by Rubicon

I know of at least three different PoDs, none earlier then October 1940, that would have the Germans in Moscow by December 1941 without ASB intervention.

Better than OTL? Yes

Moscow - Don't think so if you mean take and hold. Now the advance units had a line of sight on the Kremlin, so in the broadest sense, the Nazi made it into Moscow IOTL.

Now I think isolating Leningrad is possible with OTL forces, and it would help free up Nazi forces for 1942. But Leningrad will not fall due to siege until well after the Battle for Moscow has been decided.

Now lets say Rommel takes the Suez. He now has to garrison Egypt and the Canal from the South. The British are likely sitting in Palestine, actually the far eastern Sinai at an easily defended Wadi. I don't see how this helps Moscow falls. Helps the Axis, sure, Moscow falls no. The most likely beneficiary is the Japanese, as the UK pulls at least 2 more of the elite divisions out of Asia. Imagine how the Burma/Singapore campaign goes if you remove the best division from the Malaya campaign, and the best division from Burma. Also, look at the railroad map. To totally cutoff the British supply in Palestine, you have to drive deep into Jordan, and this assumes the UK does not build a railroad from Iraq. On two occasion in WW1, the UK built a railroad at a sustained pace of 1.5 miles per day into light resistance. Look up how many miles it is from Mosul to the rail in northern Syria.

Now Rommel's forces in Russia. It helps a lot if it does not mean the loss of surprise. But even assuming Rommel is in Army Group Center, I think the Nazi just take a bit more of the Moscow suburbs before being pushed out. Now it is possible Moscow falls, but where is the petrol and ammunition coming from. The German pauses were basically about supplies, not an inability to drive the tanks 50 more miles.

And the big issue for the Germans, the USA still enters the war, and we will use nuclear weapons. And maybe the war does last til late 1946, but the Nazi don't survive. You have to keep either the USSR or USA neutral to the Nazi until about 1950 to have a chance of writing a Nazi win TL.

[Revolutionary Todyo]

Hitler gets killed, Goering takes over and turns everything anti-Semetic, neo-Whilhelmite and for all intents and purposes Capitalist.

Ta-da, Third Reich survives.

[Snake Featherston]

Originally Posted by mrmandias

Ideologies don't have inherent natures. They're human constructs, they can change, they can contain contradictory elements, they can be ramshackle compromises forced by circumstances and events.

There are no such things as platonic ideologies to which humans dance.

On the contrary, ideologies do have inherent natures shaped by the institutional and cultural frameworks they interact with. Ideologies have the abilities to make societies and armies sustain casualties that would otherwise lead a single battle to see the two sides both decide that it's time to negotiate.

Originally Posted by Rubicon

I know of at least three different PoDs, none earlier then October 1940, that would have the Germans in Moscow by December 1941 without ASB intervention.

1) Italians do better in North Africa. No Rommel and no DAK. Two more Panzer divisions, enough trucks to supply a Panzergruppe and an entire Fliegerkorps. Attach these to Heeresgruppe Nord, and Leningrad falls in July/August 1941 freeing up enough troops and logistical support that a real attack is feasible on Moscow.

2) Italians do worse in North Africa. No Rommel and no DAK. Two more Panzer divisions, enough trucks to supply a Panzergruppe and an entire Fliegerkorps. Attach these to Heeresgruppe Nord, and Leningrad falls in July/August 1941 freeing up enough troops and logistical support that a real attack is feasable on Moscow.

3) Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm von Leeb is not appointed commander of Heeresgruppe Nord, but either Generaloberst Günther von Kluge or Generaloberst Ewald von Kleist is. Both had a much better understanding of armoured warfare and it's role in deep penetrations, they were also quite a bit more aggressive. Leningrad falls in July/August 1941 freeing up enough troops and logistical support that a real attack is feasable on Moscow.

Moscow falls and the Red Army lacks sufficient logistical support that a massive counterattack is impossible, meaning much less German casualties and loss of material. This makes Fall Blau in the summer of -42 much, much stronger and will more then likely mean that the Volga artery is severed and that the Soviet industry will be unable to utilize the Caucasus oil. Either the Soviet leadership sues for peace at that point, or Germany will reach the AA line sometime during 1943 and begin fortifying.

1) This is nonsense. Leningrad's fall will not be shaped one way or another by a mere two divisions, given the Nazis reinforced Army Group North in the lead-in to the Tikhvin fighting by about this amount. The Nazis had a 3:1 advantage over Kuznetsov and an absence of Soviet fortifications in front of them, their major limitations in 1941 were the nature of terrain, where more soldiers means a greater logistical bottleneck for the Axis means ultimately a bigger disaster near Tikhvin means shorter siege.

2) See above. The woods around Leningrad are the best protection the city has, more troops just clog up the logistical situation here worse. It's like how the answer to Monte Cassino was *not* more Dakka.

3) Again, Leningrad's fall is impossible for the Nazis due to the terrain making it such. It was not a quality Soviet resistance, it was the problem of conducting a major mechanized assault in densely wooded terrain that chopped off Germany's logistical network.

[Snake Featherston]

Originally Posted by BlondieBC

Better than OTL? Yes

Moscow - Don't think so if you mean take and hold. Now the advance units had a line of sight on the Kremlin, so in the broadest sense, the Nazi made it into Moscow IOTL.

Now I think isolating Leningrad is possible with OTL forces, and it would help free up Nazi forces for 1942. But Leningrad will not fall due to siege until well after the Battle for Moscow has been decided.

Now lets say Rommel takes the Suez. He now has to garrison Egypt and the Canal from the South. The British are likely sitting in Palestine, actually the far eastern Sinai at an easily defended Wadi. I don't see how this helps Moscow falls. Helps the Axis, sure, Moscow falls no. The most likely beneficiary is the Japanese, as the UK pulls at least 2 more of the elite divisions out of Asia. Imagine how the Burma/Singapore campaign goes if you remove the best division from the Malaya campaign, and the best division from Burma. Also, look at the railroad map. To totally cutoff the British supply in Palestine, you have to drive deep into Jordan, and this assumes the UK does not build a railroad from Iraq. On two occasion in WW1, the UK built a railroad at a sustained pace of 1.5 miles per day into light resistance. Look up how many miles it is from Mosul to the rail in northern Syria.

Now Rommel's forces in Russia. It helps a lot if it does not mean the loss of surprise. But even assuming Rommel is in Army Group Center, I think the Nazi just take a bit more of the Moscow suburbs before being pushed out. Now it is possible Moscow falls, but where is the petrol and ammunition coming from. The German pauses were basically about supplies, not an inability to drive the tanks 50 more miles.

And the big issue for the Germans, the USA still enters the war, and we will use nuclear weapons. And maybe the war does last til late 1946, but the Nazi don't survive. You have to keep either the USSR or USA neutral to the Nazi until about 1950 to have a chance of writing a Nazi win TL.

Leningrad does not fall in 1941 no matter what number of forces the Germans allocate, for reasons primarily to do with the problems both Nazis and Soviets experienced in a terrain entirely unsuitable for the mechanized operations both armies had spent their most mental effort developing. That the Soviets took vastly disproportionate casualties here is because the fighting emphasized small-unit actions, a major German strength. That the Germans in repeated attempts in 1941 and 1942 utterly and completely failed to force the city to fall is a product of logistics restricting the opportunity for them to rely on the heavy firepower that was their stock in trade beforehand.

You might as well try to have Monte Cassino fall in 1943 in a single drive, it's theoretically possible but will always and forever be theoretically possible.

[DCC]

Members of an ideology are not a hive mind. Not even Nazis.

Yes, some Nazis were more radical than others. Some emphasised anti-Semitism more than others. Some were more warmongering than others. (Hitler was a relatively extreme Nazi).

So--yes, it is possible another Nazi leader would have had less extreme policies than Hitler did OTL.

Think of it this way--there's plenty of examples of bad Communist leaders. Does that mean *every* Communist is as bad as Stalin? It does not--even the later leaders of the USSR weren't nearly as bad as Stalin. Not even in the same league.