1919-ww1 restarted

NoMommsen

Donor
...
The handing-over of the material demanded in the armistice (planes, heavy artillery)has in parts just started, was in parts still going on.
...
Have to correct (most likely) myself.

The annex No. 1 to the armistice, signed (officially) 5 o'clock, french time on the 11th November 1918, specified :
"This war material must be delivered under the following conditions:
The first half having the 10th day;
The second half before the 20th day."

This war materieals consisted of :
- 5000 cannons (2500 "heavy" [what calibres count as heavy ?] and 2500 Fieldcannons [short of an quarter of all 7.7 cm guns produced])
- 25 000 machineguns (at least 225 000 are known to be produced of type 08/15 by the "major" producers, that kept reasonable proper records)
- 3000 minethrowers (numbers produced : unknown)
- 1700 airplanes (of approximatly 5-6000 built ... only single-seater fightercrafts from spring 1917 onwards)​

However, I never came across a notion, when these deliveries actually started, if and when they were completed.
The mentioned annex also states, that the peculiarities of delivery shall be fixed/arranged by the Armistice Commission (which in many cases was a typical bureaucratic delaying-instrument ;-))
 
Hmmm, ... quite the same in Vietnam, the russians in Afghanistan, ...

Vietnam wasn’t fielding an army of over a million men and sitting in trenches in Cambodia.

The streets of Berlin, the Streets of Duisburg, Dortmund, Cologne, Maiz, Hamburg, Munich, Stuttgart, Leipzig, Halle, Farnkfurt, Frankfurt/Oder, Rostock, Stettin, Danzig, ....
... see how "well" the occupation of Afghanistan by the US or the Iraque or the occupation of southern Lebanon by the Israelis went ... as some ... modern examples, of what might/would/will happen to the Entente-forces in Germany.
Not to forget the brandenburgian pine-forrests, the forrests and swamps of East and West-Prussia, the Black-forrest, the thuringian mountains, the mountains of the "Harz" region, ...

Just like what happened at the end of the Second War. The WAllies had to go room by room in every major city fighting against determined partisans wh-

Oh wait hang on no they didn’t.

And in this scenario, what you’re suggesting makes no difference to the allies. If German society completely collapses into just Afghan style warlords fighting the invader in guerilla battles the Wallies will declare victory and sit in the Ruhr extracting anything of value while Germany has a six way civil war.

From a militarian(ists) point of view : actually they were. The homefront collapsed and not only didn't support the soldiers but activly called for mutiny (what, btw, in the front units happened only very rarely).

What many often forget :
the empires army was by autumn 1918 beaten on several battles but far from being completly beaten. They still stood on foreign country and left for home after armistice only for tiredness of war.

As said earlier, the german army in summer 1919 was far from being dismantled, as the Reichswehr later looked alike.

Ding ding ding. A genuine Dolchstoßlegender! You’re a rare breed these days my friend. All the talking points are the same as they were 99 years ago too! “No enemy has vanquished you!”, “returned undefeated from the battlefield!”, “the November criminals called for mutiny!”.

And as you say above, all the Germans needed was a bit more backbone and a will to fight to the end, and the allies would surely lose the stomach for the fight.

Well, you’re welcome to your view my friend but you’re in a very small minority and we’re debating an area of history which isn’t very controversial.
 

NoMommsen

Donor
Hmmm, ... quite the same in Vietnam, the russians in Afghanistan, ...
Vietnam wasn’t fielding an army of over a million men and sitting in trenches in Cambodia.
So ... then you think the chances of the germans in 1919 were better than the chances of the vietnamese in lets say 1961 ?

Just like what happened at the end of the Second War. The WAllies had to go room by room in every major city fighting against determined partisans wh-

Oh wait hang on no they didn’t.
End of WW2 and WW1 are two completly different kettles of fish regarding available forces, available weaponry, stance of civilian population, pressure on civilian population ... well on everything.

And in this scenario, what you’re suggesting makes no difference to the allies. If German society completely collapses into just Afghan style warlords fighting the invader in guerilla battles the Wallies will declare victory and sit in the Ruhr extracting anything of value while Germany has a six way civil war.
At least one very big difference : no central authority to extract reparations from, only refraining to "simple" robbery and exploitation of slave labour in the Ruhr region ( ... or will you simply "depopulate" the region and "colonize" it with some frenchmen ?) won't pay the already open bills.


Ding ding ding. A genuine Dolchstoßlegender! You’re a rare breed these days my friend. All the talking points are the same as they were 99 years ago too! “No enemy has vanquished you!”, “returned undefeated from the battlefield!”, “the November criminals called for mutiny!”.
From a militarists point of view - as I stated above, not from an overall view of the overall situation in autumn 1918 - these arguements still stands.
Prove them from such a point of view wrong (beside engaging something like "common opinion" ).

Some of the "november criminals" or revolutionaries (whatever "legality" revolutionaries have) actually called for mutinies of soldiers ... but were followed only very rarely by front soldiers. In a "mirror" to the russian revolutiion, soldiers at home followed these calls much easier in their fear of being sent to the front.

At least the "East Army ("Ost-Heer") actually WAS undefeated, instead was returning from victorious occupation deep into the Ukraine.

The losses on the west ... could have been pictured as a retreat as in 1914 or in 1917 to the Hindenburg-line. The frontline at the armistice was still deep into Belgium and France (beside the almost immobile front beside some yards in the upper Alsac).

And as you say above, all the Germans needed was a bit more backbone and a will to fight to the end, and the allies would surely lose the stomach for the fight.
It's two very different things to fight on foreign soil or on your own soil.

Well, you’re welcome to your view my friend but you’re in a very small minority and we’re debating an area of history which isn’t very controversial.
Says who ?
Conventional historical teaching, formed (and in many parts worldwide distorted) to meet "political correctness".

Don't get me wrong, I would absoluty agree, that there was in autumn 1918 or in summer 1919 no way, that Germany would have been able to "win" (in the sense of "dictating" terms of (kind of a ) peace).

If it would have fought on in autumn 1918 or even in from summer 1919 it might have reached a more "equal" armistice and peace due to general exhaustion of everybody.
If the Entente would have acted as you (and some others here are obviously for whatever reasons very fond of : BEAT THE GERMANS AS HARD AS POSSIBLE) it would have ended in a LOOSE-LOOSE-LOOSE situation for everybody.
 
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Several nations fought on their own land during ww1 and did not turn into invincible heroes as result. We know what already happen during ww1 in towns where occupying forces had to deal with real or imagined resistance. It is what happened in Kalisz and Belgian cities which were destroyed not as result of previously planned action but due to panic and incompetence. For example in Kalisz two German patrols accidentaly shoot at each other at night. This friendly fire was interpreted as attack of enemy's sharp shooters by German commander Hermann Preusker. Soldiers were afraid that the city is full of hidden sharp shooters who will shoot at their backs, it should not be surprise that they would rather risk lives of civilians on enemy's territory than their own. As result Kalisz was leveled with the ground with artillery fire. Even houses of local Germans were destroyed.
 

CalBear

Moderator
Donor
Monthly Donor
So ... then you think the chances of the germans in 1919 were better than the chances of the vietnamese in lets say 1961 ?

End of WW2 and WW1 are two completly different kettles of fish regarding available forces, available weaponry, stance of civilian population, pressure on civilian population ... well on everything.

At least one very big difference : no central authority to extract reparations from, only refraining to "simple" robbery and exploitation of slave labour in the Ruhr region ( ... or will you simply "depopulate" the region and "colonize" it with some frenchmen ?) won't pay the already open bills.


From a militarists point of view - as I stated above, not from an overall view of the overall situation in autumn 1918 - these arguements still stands.
Prove them from such a point of view wrong (beside engaging something like "common opinion" ).

Some of the "november criminals" or revolutionaries (whatever "legality" revolutionaries have) actually called for mutinies of soldiers ... but were followed only very rarely by front soldiers. In a "mirror" to the russian revolutiion, soldiers at home followed these calls much easier in their fear of being sent to the front.

At least the "East Army ("Ost-Heer") actually WAS undefeated, instead was returning from victorious occupation deep into the Ukraine.

The losses on the west ... could have been pictured as a retreat as in 1914 or in 1917 to the Hindenburg-line. The frontline at the armistice was still deep into Belgium and France (beside the almost immobile front beside some yards in the upper Alsac).

It's two very different things to fight on foreign soil or on your own soil.

Says who ?
Conventional historical teaching, formed (and in many parts worldwide distorted) to meet "political correctness".
[Then I assume you also eat shit. ... Billiards of flys can't be wrong eyh?]


Don't get me wrong, I would absoluty agree, that there was in autumn 1918 or in summer 1919 no way, that Germany would have been able to "win" (in the sense of "dictating" terms of (kind of a ) peace).

If it would have fought on in autumn 1918 or even in from summer 1919 it might have reached a more "equal" armistice and peace due to general exhaustion of everybody.
If the Entente would have acted as you (and some others here are obviously for whatever reasons very fond of : BEAT THE GERMANS AS HARD AS POSSIBLE) it would have ended in a LOOSE-LOOSE-LOOSE situation for everybody.
Such a solid set of arguments to make than then you throw it all away. The minute you insulted the other person in the debate you lost.

Play the ball.
 

CalBear

Moderator
Donor
Monthly Donor
Vietnam wasn’t fielding an army of over a million men and sitting in trenches in Cambodia.



Just like what happened at the end of the Second War. The WAllies had to go room by room in every major city fighting against determined partisans wh-

Oh wait hang on no they didn’t.

And in this scenario, what you’re suggesting makes no difference to the allies. If German society completely collapses into just Afghan style warlords fighting the invader in guerilla battles the Wallies will declare victory and sit in the Ruhr extracting anything of value while Germany has a six way civil war.



Ding ding ding. A genuine Dolchstoßlegender! You’re a rare breed these days my friend. All the talking points are the same as they were 99 years ago too! “No enemy has vanquished you!”, “returned undefeated from the battlefield!”, “the November criminals called for mutiny!”.

And as you say above, all the Germans needed was a bit more backbone and a will to fight to the end, and the allies would surely lose the stomach for the fight.

Well, you’re welcome to your view my friend but you’re in a very small minority and we’re debating an area of history which isn’t very controversial.
Dancing sort of close to the edge here.

Play the ball.
 

NoMommsen

Donor
@CalBear
... emotion might has taken me too far.
It's sometimes hard not to fall and follow into a spiral of worded escalation.

Edited the post and deleted the personally insulting part
 
The level of war exhaustion in Germany makes this decision titanically unpopular. The German government is overthrown in the subsequent Communist revolution and the leaders who authorized a restarting of the war are all executed.
 
Too many people are conflating too much here. The initial OP is that sometime in the spring 1919 the Germans decide to basically kick Versailles to the curb and restart fighting to grab some land in the east/prevent some territorial concessions. Unless I am missing something, this means from November 1918, until the spring/summer 1919 everything has gone as OTL. This means the squirreling away of armaments is at the same level as OTL, the production of ammunition of all sorts has basically been halted, and production lines shut down, crews of ships not sent to Scapa or elsewhere reduced to minimal levels, pilot training ceased and the mechanics who maintained the aircraft back in civilian life. As I have posted before, those other members of the alliance are bust collapsing and have internal problems that make German problems look like nothing. Don't forget that, by spring 1919, most of the remaining armed forces under central control (Freikorps don't count) are units that have been put together out of other units so cohesion, even with trained veterans, is not what you'd like it to be and often officers and NCOs who have not worked or trained as a unit very much - which impacts unit effectiveness even with veteran troops.

If you accept that "war-weariness" and collapse of the home front was the most important factor in the German surrender in 1918, you are then arguing strongly against guerilla war. If you don't have strong support amongst the civilian population for an insurgency, it will collapse pretty quickly. Even with civilian support, the sea for the fish of the insurgency to swim in, this wear is not always won by the insurgents. I ave no doubt that had there been some sort of uprising in German cities the allies would have certainly cut off food supplies, and if the urban fighting was significant simply unleashing the artillery on a city - after all outside of the Rhineland (which they already occupied), and parts of the Ruhr, which they might wish to exploit, it matters little to them if Heidelberg or Berlin is reduced to a sea of rubble.

In any case the German Army was retreating to defensive lines further back in 1918, even with the stoppage of fighting in the east and the troops moving west, not because it was winning or even staying even. It was losing, period. This is not an evaluation of whether or not the German Army was better than the Allied armies, it is the reality that it was exhausted, outnumbered and out produced in military materiel. These are factors that, even if you say the Germans were qualitatively better, could not be overcome. IMHO if you think Versailles was vindictive, if the Germans had fought in to 1919, which would have meant a huge increase in US casualties, any moderating influence Wilson might have had would have been unsupportable domestically. In 1919 Germany had been a united country for 49 years and there is no reason that this could not and would not have been undone by an allied coalition that fought their way in to Germany, even to Berlin.

I believe it was a GERMAN military theorist from the 19th centuries who talked about centers of gravity and the national will to fight - the military might of a nation was a continium with no real front or back so if there is no back there is no Dolchstoß.
 
Even gunfire? What a dreadful prospect! It would make the Kaiserschlacht look like a walk in the park - I think not.

The irony here is that this was being cited by military officials at time and later these very same tactics would get the French to abandon their attempt to occupy the Rhineland in 1923.

Germany was beaten; the army was demobilized, the fleet was in Scapa Flow. The Allies had occupied the west bank of the Rhine, and also several large bridgeheads on the east bank. There were leftist uprisings, strikes, mutinies, and other unrest. Nearly all of this was in opposition to the government, and had begun in opposition to the war.

By the Summer of 1919 the uprisings had been crushed and, as was demonstrated earlier in the thread, the Army retained at the very least the same level of mobilization as the Entente had by the time of the Treaty; presuming each of those divisions had 15,000 men that comes out to around 585,000 as compared to what we know for sure was 400,000 in 1920, further into German demobilization. It should also be noted the French and American navies lacked the ability to project power into the Baltic while the Royal Navy was having entire ships mutiny over operations in Russia while service in the blockade was increasingly unpopular to the point the Admiralty doubted their ability to retain it in the event of hostilities resuming.

Suppose the German government tried to order re-mobilization. I doubt if a quarter of the men would respond, and not quickly. Meanwhile the Allies know immediately. Many of the Allied troops were war-weary and wanted to go home. But hardly all. The Allies had many divisions still in the field, fully equipped and supplied. Many were regulars or long-service colonial troops who weren't "going home" anyway.

We know they had at least 400,000 still under arms and probably that again in paramilitary forces such as the Freikorps and I've seen estimates as high as million for both sources. As for the Entente, they had a grand total of 39 Divisions of varying quality; mass mutiny was occurring in British units throughout the year and the French, as I've repeatedly noted, had no less an authority than Foch himself stating further offensive actions by his troops could no longer be sustained. The Americans were indeed fresh, but by the Summer of 1919 they'd obviously massively drawn down their strength and then later rejected the Treaty itself anyway, so I wouldn't count on them paying a blood toll for Europe in this situation.

If there was "guerrilla" resistance: the Allies could bypass cities and town, or just shell them into submission. Since the Treaty of Versailles included the cession of Danophone Schleswig to Denmark, the Allies would have the cooperation of Denmark in enforcing it. So there would be no difficulty in bringing Allied naval forces into the Baltic Sea, or in making amphibious attacks on Germany's Baltic coast.

As I've already pointed out, this wouldn't happen.

Nor, of course, in providing arms and supplies to Poland.

They lost every operation they conducted against the Germans, with their territorial gains only occurring due to Entente diplomatic intervention.

If Allied military leaders expressed doubts about further military operations inside Germany - I suggest that this was a desire to avoid breaking the Compiégne armistice if it could be avoided. But if Germany breaks the armistice by armed resistance, that objection is moot. (Just as in the US after Pearl Harbor, isolationist opposition to war with Germany evaporated.)

As IOTL showed, this simply wasn't the case. As I stated in my opening post, I'm not arguing Germany could suddenly reclaim victory from the jaws of defeat, but it did have the military ability to reject the Treaty and the Entente lacked the means of enforcing their acceptance. Most likely, the treaty terms the Germans proposed in May, which all of the Entente leaders thought was fair (Keynes himself thought it was one of the best treaties ever composed) would then get accepted; borders would probably end up following something like this:

alternate_treaty_of_versailles_by_lehnaru-d830z46.png
 
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The level of war exhaustion in Germany makes this decision titanically unpopular. The German government is overthrown in the subsequent Communist revolution and the leaders who authorized a restarting of the war are all executed.

And thats where the real fun starts. Communist/bolshevik government and forces not just in Russia, but in Germany too.
 
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