Axis Best Case - WW2

[Fulton 44]

The disparity in resources was so great in WW2, that it is hard to make a case that the Axis could have won.
This thread will try to give the Axis - 1. lucky breaks, 2. better production choices, 3. more intelligent geopolitical strategy, and 4. more lucky breaks.
So......
1. The Germans capture the British Army in 1940 - no Dunkirk
2. Italy stays out of the war until its merchant fleet has returned to home waters,
3. Italy and Germany cooperate from day 1 in the Med,
4. No one breaks German or Japanese codes,
5. Germany puts more resources into developing jet fighters and conventional long range bombers - no attempt to develop rockets or jet bombers,
6. Spain enters the war on the Axis side,
7. Italy, with German assistance, takes Malta as soon as it enters the war,
8. There is no attack on USSR until the Med is cleared,
9. In 1940, FDR gets ill, Farley gets the Democratic nomination and Taft is elected President,
10. In the UK Halifax is selected over Churchill in 1940,
11. By mid- 1941 the Axis takes Gibraltar, the Suez Canal and pushes into the Middle East where it develops a new source of oil,
12. Japan attacks British and Dutch colonies in the Far East but not the USA. Japan takes Ceylon in early 1942 and offers India independence. Japan's theme is anti-colonialism offering Malaya and Indonesia independence after a 10 year transition period.
13. Japan does not build super battleships but builds more and better planes and carriers. It uses its veteran pilots to train new pilots.
14. In Spring 1942, Halifax negotiates a treaty with the Axis under which the UK keeps the colonies it still holds and under certain terms may reclaim Singapore, Hong Kong, etc. after a period of 5 years.
15. In Spring 1942, all 3 Axis powers attack the USSR. The US and UK stay neutral and do not supply the USSR.
16. A Russian government in exile is formed and national groups representing the Ukraine, the Baltic states, etc. are created as governments in exile. Upon occupation, these groups assist in controlling the territory and exploiting resources.
An interesting exercise would be to evaluate how important each of these changes would be to the end result.

 

[Cubert]

6. Spain enters the war on the Axis side

Honestly I think Spain outright joining the Axis is extremely unlikely unless the Spanish Civil War goes differently.

10. In the UK Halifax is selected over Churchill in 1940,

"On Chamberlain's resignation early in May 1940, Halifax effectively declined the position of Prime Minister as he felt that Churchill would be a more suitable war leader (his membership in the House of Lords was given as the official reason)."
Wikipedia

11. By mid- 1941 the Axis takes Gibraltar, the Suez Canal and pushes into the Middle East where it develops a new source of oil,

In what universe do they suddenly have the ability to do this?

12. Japan attacks British and Dutch colonies in the Far East but not the USA. Japan takes Ceylon in early 1942 and offers India independence. Japan's theme is anti-colonialism offering Malaya and Indonesia independence after a 10 year transition period.

Notperials.

14. In Spring 1942, Halifax negotiates a treaty with the Axis under which the UK keeps the colonies it still holds and under certain terms may reclaim Singapore, Hong Kong, etc. after a period of 5 years.

And Japan would agree to this because?

15. In Spring 1942, all 3 Axis powers attack the USSR. The US and UK stay neutral and do not supply the USSR.

And in Spring 1942 a decent number of the organizational defects within the Soviet military that caused such a disastrous result during Barbarossa will have been corrected.
Japan heading north has been discussed several times - I believe the general consensus is that at best they manage to take Khabarovsk and slowly siege down Vladivostok.

16. A Russian government in exile is formed and national groups representing the Ukraine, the Baltic states, etc. are created as governments in exile. Upon occupation, these groups assist in controlling the territory and exploiting resources.

Notzis.

 

[History Learner]

Collapse the USSR in 1941 or 1942, and from there the Reich can exhaust the Anglo-Americans into a peace agreement.

 

[BlackDragon98]

Possible way to achieve each one
1. No Halt Order. Panzers drive to the sea while Luftwaffe focuses on killing as many BEF as possible.

2. Transfer the Italian Red Sea Fleet back to Italy as well. OTL those ships were cut off by British Egypt

3. German Italian cooperation during the 1930s? Join German Italian training exercises? Italians get license for German radar, tanks and planes ASAP?

4. Germans ditch Enigma or improve it or better security practices. Abwehr exposed as traitors and Heydrich and RSHA take over. japan's purple cipher was a completely lost cause

5. HeS 30 jet engines. Cheaper, easier to build and better preform than both Jumo 004 and BMW 003. Better Me 262 that comes earlier. He 177 ditched ASAP and focus on He 274 instead.

6. UK has to be pretty much neutralized first, otherwise Spanish coast is destroyed by RN. Gibraltar will fall pretty quick.

7. Possible. Med Fleet needs to be neutralized first. Maybe a really successful Decima Flottaglia MAS attack on Alexandria?

8. Hard. Lebensraum is pretty important for Hitler and the Nazis.

9. His Polio gets worse or he gets meningitis or pneumonia.

10. Churchill is badly injured in 1939 when HMS Nelson is torpedoed and sunk. He slips during the evac and hits his head on the steel deck. Dies months later from complications. Halifax is not likely. More likely it would be Eden.

11. new Nazi plan is to "liberate Middle East", get their oil and then invade USSR thru Iran? It would be closer to the Caucasus oilfields that way. Afrika Korp needs more forces and Italians need to be way better than OTL.

12. USA would declare war first or something like that. Japan is pretty much screwed once that happens. Philippines, DEI, and Malaya can be overrun, but China will be constantly bleeding Japan.

13. It would cause more US losses but ultimately US outnumbers Japan 100 to 1. It's a matter of time.

14. Nope. UK fights till the end. Once USA get involved the Axis will lose sooner or later.

15. Japan doesn't have the strength to take on China and USSR. Italy is too far away. USSR would be too strong in 1942. Barbarossa is less successful.

16. Unless Hitler got a concussion, it's not happening. See Hunger Plan or GP Ost. Initial cooperation is possible but the Nazis will kill them sooner or later. Ostlegionens were pretty ineffective except for the Cossacks. A Cossack homeland may be granted only because Cossacks are actually effective at counter-insurgency and the Nazis are cool with them. The rest will be exterminated, starting with the urban pop. because they don't produce food.

 

[BlackDragon98]

Collapse the USSR in 1941 or 1942, and from there the Reich can exhaust the Anglo-Americans into a peace agreement.

Not possible.
USA will get A-bomb soon.
Only way for Nazis to survive is not fight the US at all and get A-bomb ASAP, put it on V-rocket.
Otherwise the US will nuke the Reich at some point.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

Well, the best case scenario for them is Hitler falls down some stairs and dies in at least August 1939.

 

[BlackDragon98]

Well, the best case scenario for them is Hitler falls down some stairs and dies in at least August 1939.

Hitler is not necessarily the problem. A series of events between the wars can make him smarter, choose better subordinates, and make better decisions while staying a Nazi.
Absolutely shameless plug: https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/der-rote-kampfflieger-an-axis-victory-tl.482347/

 

[Phoenix_jz]

No way to appreciably change things without changing the course of events before the war. There are simply too many systemic issues within the Axis - the just-short-of-open-war between the IJN and IJA in Japan, the RM and RA's near total lack of cooperation in Italy, and the Luftwaffe... where do we even start? Cooperation with anything, but the KM and RM would be a start.

Likewise, nothing fixes the lack of raw material to feed the Axis war industries, all very import-dependent from Allied countries, infrastructure shortcomings, the lack of fuel sources within reach - even if they could get the Middle East, it was far from the oil-producing power-house it is twenty or thirty years in the future - by which point Libya is already pumping a huge volume of it. Setting that aside - you likewise have the issue of not having the infrastructure or means to transport the amount of oil you need from the Middle East back west. This was already an issue the Axis was facing even if they were able to capture the fields in the Caucuses intact.

And, of course, material preparation is an issue. Ex, in June of 1940, Italy did not have a strong enough fleet to attempt a landing on Malta - there were only two active battleships, and they could not have stood up to a combined intervention of the Mediterranean Fleet and Force H. You'd have to wait until at least September 1941 for the pair of Littorio's to become fully operational, along with the rebuilt Caio Duilio, for such an operation to become tenable. Likewise, a successful intervention into Egypt would require a mobile force, something Italy simply did not have in 1940. Your first true armored division isn't going to be fielded until early 1941, and you'll need a proper armored division like 132ª Ariete or 131ª Centauro to be deployed, so for a successful attack you'd wind up using a force much smaller than 10th army, but probably far more successful. However, you'd need to wait another year to pull it off, because said divisions simply won't be available with tanks worth a damn (M13's, M14's) until mid-1941. Which only gives the Allies more time to prepare.

The war was lost for the Axis long before it started.

 

[History Learner]

Not possible.
USA will get A-bomb soon.
Only way for Nazis to survive is not fight the US at all and get A-bomb ASAP, put it on V-rocket.
Otherwise the US will nuke the Reich at some point.

Leslie Groves was actually interviewed on the subject of atomic weapons on Germany:

REPORTER: General Groves, could we go back for a minute. You mentioned in your book [Now it Can Be Told] that just before the Yalta Conference that President Roosevelt said if we had bombs before the European war was over he would like to drop them on Germany. Would you discuss this?

GROVES: At the conference that Secretary Stimson and myself had with President Roosevelt shortly before his departure, I believe it was December 30th or 31st of 1944, President Roosevelt was quite disturbed over the Battle of the Bulge and he asked me at that time whether I could bomb Germany as well as Japan. The plan had always been to bomb Japan because we thought the war in Germany was pretty apt to be over in the first place and in the second place the Japanese building construction was much more easily damaged by a bomb of this character than that in Germany. I urged President Roosevelt that it would be very difficult for various reasons.

The main one was that the Germans had quite strong aerial defense. They made a practice, as every nation does, that when a new plane came into the combat area, that they would run any risk that they could to bring such a plane down so that they could examine it and see what new ideas had come in so that they could make improvements and also would know the characteristics of the plane so that they could prepare a better defense against it. We had no B-29’s in Europe. If we had sent over a small squadron or group as we did against Japan of this type, everyone of them would have been brought down on the first trip to Germany. If they hadn’t been, it would have been through no lack of effort on the part of the Germans.

The alternative would be to bring a large number of B-29’s over to to England and that would have been a major logistical task and the other possibility would have been to have used a British plane which would not have been a bit pleasing to General Arnold and also would have created a great many difficulties for our general operation because then it would be an Allied operation with the United States furnishing the bombs and everything connected with it but using a British plane and a British crew to actually drop the bomb and it would have raised a tremendous number of difficulties.

And difficulties like that — while you say you should be able to handle that — you can but in a project of this character there are so many little things, each one of them key, that you can’t afford to throw any more sand into the wheels that you can help.

The bombing of Germany with atomic bombs was, I would say, never seriously considered to the extent of making definite plans but on this occasion I told the President, Mr. Roosevelt, why it would be very unfortunate from my standpoint, I added that of course if the President — if the war demanded it and the President so desired, we would bomb Germany and I was so certain personally that the war in Europe would be over before we would be ready that you might say I didn’t give it too much consideration.

Outside of that, presuming the Project is still finished on time, the atomic card only becomes viable in late 1945; that's years of vicious casualties in the interim and even with it, the Reich likely could not be grinded down until 1946 or 1947.

 

[Ramontxo]

I think that a pretty good case could be made to argue that we live in a Axis Best Case TL

 

[BlackDragon98]

Leslie Groves was actually interviewed on the subject of atomic weapons on Germany:



Outside of that, presuming the Project is still finished on time, the atomic card only becomes viable in late 1945; that's years of vicious casualties in the interim and even with it, the Reich likely could not be grinded down until 1946 or 1947.

Luftwaffe had no fuel by the end of the war.
Can't intercept bombers with no fuel.
Only things that can touch the B-29s are the Flak 40s and there's only so many of them.
Luftwaffe wunderwaffe like the Do 335, Ta 152, and Me 262 were too few in numbers.
Only a quarter of Me 262s produced actually saw service because of the fuel shortage at the end of the war.
USAAF can just put the nuke plane with other B-29s carrying regular bombs and add overwhelming fighter escort.
Berlin, Munich, or Hamberg can still be hit.
It was the lack of political will to nuke Germany that saved them.
And there were few fanatics among Germans by 1945, minus the SS.
US experiences fighting the Japanese had shown that they were absolute fanatics and wouldn't surrender under normal situations, especially as the war went on.
But if the US had to, they would. nuke Germany.

 

[BlackDragon98]

No way to appreciably change things without changing the course of events before the war. There are simply too many systemic issues within the Axis - the just-short-of-open-war between the IJN and IJA in Japan, the RM and RA's near total lack of cooperation in Italy, and the Luftwaffe... where do we even start? Cooperation with anything, but the KM and RM would be a start.

Likewise, nothing fixes the lack of raw material to feed the Axis war industries, all very import-dependent from Allied countries, infrastructure shortcomings, the lack of fuel sources within reach - even if they could get the Middle East, it was far from the oil-producing power-house it is twenty or thirty years in the future - by which point Libya is already pumping a huge volume of it. Setting that aside - you likewise have the issue of not having the infrastructure or means to transport the amount of oil you need from the Middle East back west. This was already an issue the Axis was facing even if they were able to capture the fields in the Caucuses intact.

And, of course, material preparation is an issue. Ex, in June of 1940, Italy did not have a strong enough fleet to attempt a landing on Malta - there were only two active battleships, and they could not have stood up to a combined intervention of the Mediterranean Fleet and Force H. You'd have to wait until at least September 1941 for the pair of Littorio's to become fully operational, along with the rebuilt Caio Duilio, for such an operation to become tenable. Likewise, a successful intervention into Egypt would require a mobile force, something Italy simply did not have in 1940. Your first true armored division isn't going to be fielded until early 1941, and you'll need a proper armored division like 132ª Ariete or 131ª Centauro to be deployed, so for a successful attack you'd wind up using a force much smaller than 10th army, but probably far more successful. However, you'd need to wait another year to pull it off, because said divisions simply won't be available with tanks worth a damn (M13's, M14's) until mid-1941. Which only gives the Allies more time to prepare.

The war was lost for the Axis long before it started.

The Middle East was producing a sizeable amount of oil by the 1940s and there was a pipeline running from the Iraqi oilfields thru Syria to a Syrian port city.
If the Axis had control over the Med, then that oil would become available.

In terms of raw materials:

Euromines

www.euromines.org

Italy needs some serious help though.
Just license produce German tanks.

 

[TheDarkSun]

1. The Germans capture the British Army in 1940 - no Dunkirk

So assuming this one, and assuming that the operation is successful from the German point of view, as in it is not a Pyrrhic victory due to a desperate British fight back, how horrific a defeat is this?

 

[Garrison]

Hitler is not necessarily the problem. A series of events between the wars can make him smarter, choose better subordinates, and make better decisions while staying a Nazi.
Absolutely shameless plug: https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/der-rote-kampfflieger-an-axis-victory-tl.482347/

No nothing can make him smarter and making better decisions means no war because there was exactly zero rational basis for Germany to go to war in 1939. The war started because of Hitler's fantasies about Aryans, a world Jewish conspiracy, and a struggle for 'racial survival'.

 

[Garrison]

Well, the best case scenario for them is Hitler falls down some stairs and dies in at least August 1939.

Odd how its the one that some posters won't accept, instead their 'better' seems to mean 'Nazi's get to kill more Jews and get their chance to execute Generalplan Ost'.

 

[Admiral Spaun]

4. The U.S had broken Japan's naval codes by the 1920s.
6. Spain had already been devestated by 4 years of war. If you think Italy was utterly dependent on German help, you haven't seen anything yet.
9. If Roosevelt doesn't run in 1940 the Democrats still would have won. FDR was extremely popular and the Dem nominee would have cruised to victory with his support.

 

[Gudestein]

Hitler is not necessarily the problem. A series of events between the wars can make him smarter, choose better subordinates, and make better decisions while staying a Nazi.
Absolutely shameless plug: https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/der-rote-kampfflieger-an-axis-victory-tl.482347/

A favorite theme of mine as well. Doesn’t solve all the German problems though and it’s hard to make it solve the Italian and Japanese problems as well.

 

[TheDarkSun]

Odd how its the one that some posters won't accept, instead their 'better' seems to mean 'Nazi's get to kill more Jews and get their chance to execute Generalplan Ost'.

I think the issue is that by killing or improving Hitler/Nazi's we are cheating. And generally 'we' are trying to create timelines that are more interesting because they are dark and more dystopian.

 

[Anarcho-Occultist]

Even in a best-case scenario you aren’t likely to see a long-lasting Nazi-dominates Europe or Co-Prosperity Sphere. I suspect both spheres would end up collapsing sometime in the 1950’s even with both of them rolling Nat 20’s.

 

[Garrison]

I think the issue is that by killing or improving Hitler/Nazi's we are cheating. And generally 'we' are trying to create timelines that are more interesting because they are dark and more dystopian.

Except its been so done to death that its far from interesting, its flogging the same tired old ideas time and again(counting down to the next pointless thread rehashing Sealion) and buying into every myth put about by the likes of Albert Speer to buff their reputations. 'Nazi's victorious' is probably the most cliché ridden, hackneyed ATL idea around, besides 'what if the South wins the American Civil War?'. Also the notion that something has to be dark and dystopian to be interesting is nonsense, chucking 'grimdark' over a story does not magically make it interesting, or more plausible for that matter.