Anti-Western Germany?

I was just wondering, would it be possible to get a German leader in the 1933 election who hated Britain and France (and the US), rather than the way Hitler hated the Eastern Europeans? Would a Germany more focussed on beating Britain last any longer than OTL Hitler's Germany did?

MattII said:

I was just wondering, would it be possible to get a German leader in the 1933 election who hated Britain and France (and the US), rather than the way Hitler hated the Eastern Europeans? Would a Germany more focussed on beating Britain last any longer than OTL Hitler's Germany did?

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I doubt anyone one the right would do that, because the threat of Communism was felt by all...

Perhaps a communist elected to the post?

Given Thalmann's pacifist position during the elections, I doubt an elected communist Germany would be warlike, but there are many ways to make things bad once the KPD won.

We can have a western intervention in Germany, or a more aggressive KPD after a power struggle which killed off the pacifist elements within the party.

You can have a rather pacifist communist government at first, strongly allied with the Soviet Union; then UK/France launch something like the Operation Pike, Germany is prompted by SU to join the war on their side, hesitantly at first, and then the things escalate.

MattII said:

I was just wondering, would it be possible to get a German leader in the 1933 election who hated Britain and France (and the US), rather than the way Hitler hated the Eastern Europeans? Would a Germany more focussed on beating Britain last any longer than OTL Hitler's Germany did?

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Von Schleicher:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_von_Schleicher

He didn't hate the west per se, but he was friendly with the Soviets and wanted to pick apart the Little Entente, break the iron ring around Germany that France had formed, and redress the border with Poland. But he didn't want to wipe out Poland, as it had its uses as a buffer state between the USSR and Germany.

I take it he didn't want war with the West, but would fight it if necessary, especially if he could be backed up by the Soviets to a degree. So he is your best bet if you want to get similar border revisions and a non-hostile German leader to the USSR and didn't want to wipe out Poland for colonization purposes.

Operation Pike? Sorry to digress, but by this, the Allies could have helped Hitler. As WP says, the French airfields in Syria were supposed to be ready on May 15th. On May 10th, Germany attacked in the west. But what if Hitler had postponed the attack for some time? In June '40, Stalin annexed Bessarabia and the Baltic states. Shouldn't that be enough to make the WAllies take action? (Of course, that is just in case Stalin would dare to annex the lands when France is still standing.) And once they have devastated Baku and Batum, which produced 90% of the oil, Hitler could attack in the west first and take on the weakened SU one year later. While laughing how the WAllies took out his most dangerous opponent in Europe.

A leader follower of eurasiatic ideology is entirely possible. Whats difficult is him to take power whitout the ideological fuel of anticommunism.

Not even on a base of getting people into jobs and bringing the economy back to something like good order?

Max Sinister said:

June '40, Stalin annexed Bessarabia and the Baltic states. Shouldn't that be enough to make the WAllies take action? (Of course, that is just in case Stalin would dare to annex the lands when France is still standing.)

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Do we know if the actions were tied together?

I really don't know. Of course they don't have to be, just because they happen at about the same time, but it's easy to interpret events. Did Stalin annex them because he felt threatened by Hitler? In other words: If France wasn't down, would he hesitate to annex the areas, to not provoke Hitler? And if it doesn't matter: Why didn't he annex them earlier, since the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact allowed him to? Did he know that the WAllies had such a plan? If not, did he suspect it?