PC: United States on losing side in WWI

Without any POD changing the OTL alliances of European countries in WWI (except Britain), is it possible having the US be on the losing side?
 
Spring to Sommer 1917 had Germany a unique chance but had not chance to realize it

March USA declare War to Empire of Germany

in April the Russian czar was removed from Power and provisional government take place
here Russia had chance for Peace Treaty with Germany, but provisional government wanted to reconquer the area occupied by German Army.

In Mean time the British Command were in dispute with new head of French Military, General Neville
The General eager to Win the War, start the Neville offensive, a failure. Hundred thousand soldiers died for win of strip 6 km wide from Enemy.
The brutality Neville use against his own troops in offensive let to mutiny in 68 french division atlong frontline.
also rebelled the Russian expedition corps on West front

in May General Neville was removed from post and general Petain his successor.
He manage to get revolt under control and reorganzied the Frontline to mobil defense and play on time until US troops arrive on West front.

So What If
The Russian provisional government make a truce with German Empire in April of 1917 ?
The German Army could move troops from east front to West front and use them to brake true at frontline of mutinies divisions.

or Petain is not taken but General Foch as new head of French Military in may ?
his "Napoleon tactic" approach would have be effective against Germans Sturmtruppen?
 
The window for this is after 4/17 when the USA declares war, and spring 18 when the US buildup in Europe is well underway. Basically a combination of a more widespread French mutiny where the troops actually desert/leave the trenches (OTL they merely refused any offensive but stayed on the defensive), and then the Germans manage to move lots of troops west after the Russian collapse. This combines with a German offensive that splits the seam between the French and British, and results in a French collapse. The British can fort up along the channel as no WWII level airpower or tanks, so being thrown in to the sea not happening.

Here the USA has some significant casualties as not quite ready units are rushed forward to try and plug holes. When the French throw in the sponge, its all over. I doubt there is much the Germans could expect to get from the USA. By 1918 the German fleet has been reduced, and in any case is not designed to operate long distance unlike the USN (and RN). The scenario of the Germans using Mexico (or similar) as a base to attack the USA is possible, but that would take time to get the Mexicans on board and get men and equipment over there. Seeing the French having to give Caribbean islands or French Guiana as part of a war reparation as possible.

IMHO Germany even after "winning" has been bled white, been through "starvation winter", and financially strained. The last thing they need is to get in to a hassle with the USA about peace terms. I would expect that the Germans and the USA will come to terms quickly, the Germans demanding return of assets seized (companies, patents, etc) and little if anything else. Postwar I think US isolationism and disillusion with European involvement will be even more than OTL. The USA spent treasure, loans never to be repaid, dead and wounded to bail out the Europeans - who folded anyways. As part of this however, you might see more support for a strong navy, and a somewhat larger peacetime army and proper reserve/national guard system (mobilization for the Mexican affair in 1916 was a mess) for continental defense - especially if Germany makes inroads in Central/South America.

Basically once the USA has large numbers of adequately trained troops and equipment in France, the Germans are toast, even with Russia out of the war. OTL the MICHAEL offensive was a manifestation of this but was too little and too late.
 
The window for this is after 4/17 when the USA declares war, and spring 18 when the US buildup in Europe is well underway. Basically a combination of a more widespread French mutiny where the troops actually desert/leave the trenches (OTL they merely refused any offensive but stayed on the defensive), and then the Germans manage to move lots of troops west after the Russian collapse. This combines with a German offensive that splits the seam between the French and British, and results in a French collapse. The British can fort up along the channel as no WWII level airpower or tanks, so being thrown in to the sea not happening.

Here the USA has some significant casualties as not quite ready units are rushed forward to try and plug holes. When the French throw in the sponge, its all over. I doubt there is much the Germans could expect to get from the USA. By 1918 the German fleet has been reduced, and in any case is not designed to operate long distance unlike the USN (and RN). The scenario of the Germans using Mexico (or similar) as a base to attack the USA is possible, but that would take time to get the Mexicans on board and get men and equipment over there. Seeing the French having to give Caribbean islands or French Guiana as part of a war reparation as possible.

IMHO Germany even after "winning" has been bled white, been through "starvation winter", and financially strained. The last thing they need is to get in to a hassle with the USA about peace terms. I would expect that the Germans and the USA will come to terms quickly, the Germans demanding return of assets seized (companies, patents, etc) and little if anything else. Postwar I think US isolationism and disillusion with European involvement will be even more than OTL. The USA spent treasure, loans never to be repaid, dead and wounded to bail out the Europeans - who folded anyways. As part of this however, you might see more support for a strong navy, and a somewhat larger peacetime army and proper reserve/national guard system (mobilization for the Mexican affair in 1916 was a mess) for continental defense - especially if Germany makes inroads in Central/South America.

This would make a good TL. Sounds a bit like Sakura F TL 'Peace Without Victors.'
 
Won't lose too badly

The Central Powers can defeat the Entente, perhaps. They can NOT defeat the USA; they can only make the USA decide that it's not worth pursuing matters any further. I think that the best terms Germany can get from the USA is an armistice, followed by a peace treaty that basically leaves the USA holding anything that it feels the desire to keep holding.

What could the Central Powers threaten, in military terms, to get the USA to give back the spoils of war? Best to give it up as a bad job...
 
The Central Powers can defeat the Entente, perhaps. They can NOT defeat the USA; they can only make the USA decide that it's not worth pursuing matters any further. I think that the best terms Germany can get from the USA is an armistice, followed by a peace treaty that basically leaves the USA holding anything that it feels the desire to keep holding.

What could the Central Powers threaten, in military terms, to get the USA to give back the spoils of war? Best to give it up as a bad job...
How feasible is it for a weakened United States to be defeated in regular fashion? Could this be accomplished by wanking British North America?
 
How feasible is it for a weakened United States to be defeated in regular fashion? Could this be accomplished by wanking British North America?
How would wanking a US ally make it easier for the US to lose?

And if the British are not part of the Entente, then WWI does not last long enough to join
 
In 1917/18 there is no way Germany can attack the USA in any significant way. Assuming France folds, which means the UK exits the war in Europe is over. After the DOW in April, 1917 various German patents, properties, and some ships in US ports, were confiscated. I don't know for sure but I'm sure similar US properties, patents, etc in Germany were likewise taken over. At this point in time under the scenario I put forward, the US holds few if any German POWs, the Germans have more US POWs but not lots. Neither the USA nor Germany has taken any overseas possession of the other so other than returning such assets are returnable, perhaps some compensation for things like patents that are now out of the box, and of course POW exchange its easy.

Dealing with overseas possessions between France, Germany, Britain/Empire, and Japan (who took German Pacific Islands) will be more contentious. Germany will want all of its colonies back, and probably some French spots and perhaps the Belgian Congo. I don't think Germany can do much to force the UK to give anything up, a staus quo antebellum is what they will see. Germany will want its Pacific Islands back, and it would be interesting to see Japan's response...
 

jahenders

Banned
Easily. 1917 and 1918 were near-run things for the Entente.

You might want to read this for details

http://www.worldwar1.com/dbc/doughty2.htm

I'd agree. It's not too hard to achieve a stalemate-ish loss even with the historical alliances. You simply need the Wallies to have more issues and come so near collapse that they negotiate a peace before the US can really get heavily involved. But, that might not be too much of a "loss", more of a stalemate.
 
Putting the US on the losing side is easy, as noted above. Shatter the French armies during the mutinies, drive the French out of the war, and cut a peace deal with Britain and the United States. Germany wins, France loses, Russia really loses, Ottomans lose, Britain comes out about even (picking up gains from the Ottomans, for example), and the US never really lost or gained anything.

Making the US itself actually lose, without a PoD so far back you end up with an unrecognizable WW1, is probably outside the range of even spacebats. Too much population and too much industry over too large an ocean; it's literally impossible for the Central Powers to take the war to the United States without Britain first falling, and if that happened the United States would just ask for a white peace. There's nothing that Germany (or Austria-Hungary, if they can avoid the autumn collapse) could hope to gain that'd be worth the expense of attempting an invasion - and how are they going to manage it, anyway?
 
A US loss in this situation would be like the historical loss in Vietnam.

Its not like the Vietnamese took over parts of the United States. What the US "lost" was any chance of shaping the government of the Republic of Vietnam to American liking.

What the US would lose in Europe after World War I was a chance to shape things in Europe more to Wilson's way of thinking.
 

Deleted member 1487

Well you could go with the David Zabecki thesis and having things really come up 7's Germany:
http://www.amazon.com/German-1918-O...=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1219499286&sr=1-2

Basically they structure the March 1918 offensive better and net Amiens, which puts the British in a very bad logistics situation and leaves German resources less depleted than IOTL, while they then have Operation Georgette in April also be better planned and geared toward taking Hazebrouk, a major rail center. Have that fall and avoid the Ypres fighting. So once again the Germans suffer fewer losses in this offensive than IOTL AND it is effective in capturing a critical rail juncture. Based on the solid research of Zabecki the British supply system collapses and they have to pull back to the coast to restore supply, but in doing so they abandon their defenses, all their supplies at the front, and a huge part of their heavy equipment. They cease to be a significant factor in the war in 1918.

The US is not yet a significant factor and only has a few divisions holding the line in a quiet sector. The French panic as per OTL and pull back to defend Paris as the British retreat to the coast (unlike OTL) and German forces launch their offensives against the French to break them and get a separate peace; as France is the major supplies of weapons to the US, the loss of their major production centers in Paris is effectively fatal to the US too. Now though with the loss of northern French coal fields Paris cannot really operate its factories to full capacity.

At this point the Germans can focus their remaining reserves on the French and probably crack them, getting them to fall back and probably lose Paris in the process; their morale was pretty bad in 1918 as it was and the British effectively admitting defeat and falling back on the coast would have the French morale close to collapse. They'd probably be begging for terms, though I think Ludendorff wanted full victory rather than a negotiated peace, so unless they're willing to agree to a separate armistice in the meantime and demand the other Allied powers leave France or face war, the Germans will attack and take Paris. Once Paris falls its game over. The French government can successfully evacuate to Bordeaux as was the plan, but without the Paris factories and with the British army abandoning huge amounts of heavy weapons and supplies the Allies are done with being able to mount a major resistance in 1918 and effectively have to ask for terms or hold out and fight the war on the periphery by taking down the Ottomans and attacking on the Italian and Balkans fronts, but that doesn't win them the war. With France down and out, the BEF probably having to evacuate once Paris falls or face the entire German offensive power on their own, the war against Germany is effectively lost. They will have plenty of captured resources and have collapsed the French army, while the Brits are having to start from zero in terms of equipment and now be solely responsible for equipping the Americans now too and the US will not really be in a position to form itself in France as that country unravels.

At that point the Allies could come to terms with the Germans and it be clearly a loss for them, even if the are able to get good terms outside of Europe.
 
Top