AHC: Hitler and Nazi Russia

Today i came with this weird idea that Hitler in some way grew in Russia and founded a Nazi Russian power, came to power, estabilished his dictatorship and then launched WWII.

So , presuming as starting POV the whites won RCW (Because Hitler in the Reds, put away Stalin and imposed a sort of Nazicommunism maybe it's too much, but if someone wanted to try it's welcome) I invite everybody to develop possible ideas over the evolution of the TL.
 
Hitler was an example of narcissistic personality disorder. Some of these people can be extremely destructive if you give them the slightest bit of power (they become "malignant narcissists"). Fortunately, most of them (like L. Ron Hubbard) never have the opportunity to become dictators. Other narcissists are not so bad but their need to defend the ego at all costs causes them to make a lot of bad decisions. Like MacArthur in WW II and in Korea, although he functioned brilliantly as proconsul to Japan where everyone deferred to him properly.

In the Soviet Union, Hitler could not have founded his own movement with its own ideology. He'd have been off to the gulag in the twinkling of an eye. He'd have had the pragmatic sense to join the party and possibly have found his way to the top, although I'm not sure he had the particular skill sets for that. If he did become party chairman, he'd have found a way to skew the country's goals and ideology in the direction that fit with his extreme narcissism. Cult of personality, sure, but with lots of public appearances and speeches (like Trotsky). He'd have found a way to target the Jews through "revising" Marxism-Leninism, but he'd have also had to target class enemies rather than racial ones. And unlike Stalin, he'd have developed a very aggressive foreign policy and prepared for an offensive war to spread the revolution (as he understood it). This would have involved a version of Trotsky's permanent revolution but without crediting Trotsky. Hitler as a Marxist ideologue would have been a lot more apocalyptic in his revolutionary vision that Trotsky ever was.

As Soviet leader, I don't think he could have done as much damage as he did in Germany. First, the Soviet Union was too primitive economically in the 1920s and 30s and Hitler may have lacked Stalin's vision of rapid industrialization to prepare for invasion. Plus Hitler would have been preparing for an offensive war of world conquest, necessitating a dominance in the air and on the sea that was beyond Soviet capacity in those years (they could have developed a better air force than they did under Stalin, but nothing that the Western powers couldn't easily catch up with and exceed). A Soviet Union gearing for offensive war would scare the Western powers far more than Nazi Germany did in OTL, and they'd start rearming earlier. Also, a non-Nazi Germany (no Nazism without Hitler and probably not even an overthrow of Weimar) would be among the nations preparing to fend off an invasion, and they'd probably be helping the Poles. An obviously aggressive Soviet Union in the 1930s would have no allies; every nation in Europe would be against them. In the U.S., the Republicans would support Roosevelt in preparing for war a lot earlier.
 
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A problem with Nazism in Russia is that Russia's very strength is in being a multi-ethnic, multi-religious state. Nazism in Russia would cause it to disintegrate faster than the Flash after he drinks a gallon of Red Bull. Russia would become Italian-style fascism at the most, the political system and demographic reality make Nazism impossible in a Russian context. Russo-Nazism would burn out before it gets to its 1938 phase, let alone sparks a general European war.
 
A sort of Russian Nazism is possible, but it wouldn't be as insane. You might have increased pogroms, more anti-foreign sentiment, perhaps even something like the Gulag system, but not the "let's give them the final solution" kind of madness. It would probably last a couple decades at most, and certainly have died down a few years after WW2, if there still is one.

One facet of Russian Nazism would be perhaps the idea that all Slavs should be united, or that the Japanese need to be kicked off the Asian mainland. That would give plenty of fuel for an alternate WW2, made even more interesting if Germany is also Nazi in the OTL sense and Japan still bent on Asian expansion.
 

Wolfpaw

Banned
Nazism in Russia would cause it to disintegrate faster than the Flash after he drinks a gallon of Red Bull.
Brilliant.
Russia would become Italian-style fascism at the most, the political system and demographic reality make Nazism impossible in a Russian context. Russo-Nazism would burn out before it gets to its 1938 phase, let alone sparks a general European war.
Indeed. Though increasing radicalization could see the emergence of a Russian national socialism, especially as things begin to fall apart.

I see Russian fascism really glorifying the multiethnic unity of the Empire as it enjoys success. I could even see the word rossysky taking pride of place over russky in official language.

But when things start falling apart, things are going to start radicalizing and the first areas to fall away are the ones which are not majority-Great Russian. Fascism's internal logic of violent xenophobia is going to taint the increasingly radical atmosphere of a faltering regime, just as it did in Italy, Croatia, and Hungary.
Here we see Lenin's dreaded "Great Russian chauvinism" meld with the inherent toxicity of fascism. The results aren't going to be pretty.
 
Indeed. Though increasing radicalization could see the emergence of a Russian national socialism, especially as things begin to fall apart.

I see Russian fascism really glorifying the multiethnic unity of the Empire as it enjoys success. I could even see the word rossysky taking pride of place over russky in official language.

But when things start falling apart, things are going to start radicalizing and the first areas to fall away are the ones which are not majority-Great Russian. Fascism's internal logic of violent xenophobia is going to taint the increasingly radical atmosphere of a faltering regime, just as it did in Italy, Croatia, and Hungary. Here we see Lenin's dreaded "Great Russian chauvinism" meld with the inherent toxicity of fascism. The results aren't going to be pretty.

National Socialism won't work in any Russian Empire where Great Russians are a thin majority and the non-Russians are 45% or more of the population. If you want a means to reduce Russia to the OTL borders of the Russian Federation or arguably smaller still this is a damn good way to go about it. There is a reason Russian history sees relatively less emphasis on nationalism than elsewhere, and why the Tsars were relatively reticient about Russification: it was politically unfeasible and even the Soviets didn't try it on any too great a scale.
 
A sort of Russian Nazism is possible, but it wouldn't be as insane. You might have increased pogroms, more anti-foreign sentiment, perhaps even something like the Gulag system, but not the "let's give them the final solution" kind of madness. It would probably last a couple decades at most, and certainly have died down a few years after WW2, if there still is one.

One facet of Russian Nazism would be perhaps the idea that all Slavs should be united, or that the Japanese need to be kicked off the Asian mainland. That would give plenty of fuel for an alternate WW2, made even more interesting if Germany is also Nazi in the OTL sense and Japan still bent on Asian expansion.

What you're describing wouldn't be Nazism although it would be a variety of fascism.
 
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