DBWI A Second 'Great War'

They had major budget cuts after the war to try and balance their budgets and huge debts. Spending on the military was cut way back even though it wasn't fully disarmed.

Only in the short run post 1918. That the Belgians Tripled the size of their army, the French had a larger number of trained men than in 1914, ect.. ect..

I mean in the early 1930s they had a world disarmament conference (probably motivated by the Great Depression and need to cut expenses further).

& the results existed only on paper. Unlike the 1920s Naval Treaty no one was sincere about the negotiations or compliance. The treaty had numerous loopholes, & some nations never signed it. The start of the Asian war in 1937 left the disarmament treaty a forgotten document.

Real disarment did not come to Europe until the 1960s or 70s when the growth of the European Union reached the point of erasing several key points of friction.
 
Uhm no. ROC units armed with german tanks had a 5:1 kill/loss ratio against japanese units equipped with british / french tanks. The Sturmgeschütz(OTL Hetzer) was a very effective tank killer and german fast tanks outmaneuvered their opponents.

It's a little historical revisionism but no modern army has "assault gun" type tanks save the Germans and then only in reserve units. It's obvious assault guns were just a plug until armor caught up. Which was rather fast after the Russians mass produced sloped armor tanks. Sturms are nice little small tanks easy to maintain and cheap to make but the Chars and Matildas and even Valentines were almost immune to the German peashooters. It's clear that 5 to 1 kill ratio is not due to lack of equipment but lack of doctrine plus careful use of anti-tank guns by the ROC units. And the Japanese were attacking, so those numbers are not surprising against a dug in and entrenched enemy. I stand by my point that if it had been French versus Germans, the kill ratio would be completely reversed. Again almost nobody uses assault guns now and the inherent weakness to them is obvious. You can defend well, not attack.

theg*ddam*hoi2fan said:
??? I think you mean between Russia, Japan and China. Since reunification in 1991, China's been becoming the dominant power in the alliance that Japan built up after the 60s. OK, Japan still had the largest navy and atomic Arsenal, but China's economy has grown rapidly after the brief 'unification dip' and their army's colossal... And bloody well-equipped. Because most of their leaders are former 'Coastal China' politicos, they've maintained their economic and military aid ties with Japan.

In such a war... I wonder who Britain would weigh in with. Either one could be a danger to their continued holdings in Asia (the Straits, Malaya etc) but Communism's far more pernicious...

No, I don't mean China. The reunification still has huge problems and is causing civil unrest everyday. There isn't a day that goes by that you don't hear of rebels or skirmishes or some religious minority uprising. If China was doing well we wouldn't even be talking about "rebels" and "proxy wars" or anything of the sort. But let's not argue if China is doing well and look at the deeper geopolitical picture.

Why is it that Japan and the USSR can still walk all over China? Because either they don't care or can't care, same result. The Russians have US advisors and equipment, the Japanese have British advisors and equipment meanwhile the Germans and the Europeans have largely pulled back from engagement with China. China is land, people and a huge money sink. This is what will happen. Russian-backed "rebels" will fight Japanese-backed "rebels" (actually regulars of both sides; CNN had a hilarious expose where soldiers from both sides were interviewed and admitted they barely bother to rip off their arm patches anymore these days) and China will play both sides. There is no reason for China caught in the middle to pick either side as you say they are far too smart for this. The Chinese-Japanese alliance has always been lukewarm, and fundamentally unnatural. Chinese armies will only move if their cities are threatened. What happens in the flat plains of Mongolia or the borders is of no concern to the Chinese. "Rebels" can fight "rebels" as much as they want neither the Chinese nationalist nor capitalists nor any other faction will want to interfere, at all. There's too much money from playing both sides. Maybe we will get another found footage of "rebel" banzai charges.

Carl Schwamberger said:
The emphasis on industrial development Was a major factor in consumer goods shortages, at least in the 1920s & 30s. & the Autarky program never worked. Foreign contractors and industrial imports were ramping up through the 1920s to restart industrial development. ie: Kochs involvement in the development of the Soviet oil industry in the 1920s. Machine tools from Germany & others were essential for this, as well as chemicals, alloy metals not present in the USSR.

One wonders what would have happened if Western investment and backing hadn't turned Russia into dollarama and clothing central. There's literally nowhere else in the world safe enough to produce cheap consumer goods, electronics, clothing etc., and the huge Russian middle class is growing every year. They should just give up the pretense of being communist at all.
 

tenthring

Banned
I know this is a bit wonky, but one scenario would be if France had been pig headed enough to force Creditanstalt, the major Austrian bank, into default in 1931. Imagine if there was a bank run in Germany/Austria and the Great Recession got even worse, its pretty obvious that far right parties electoral success was correlated with economic conditions.
 
Everyone is talking about Germany ditching Kaiser in favour of fascists. What about the nationalist leader who already in OTL decided not to pay the Germans his war debts, broke the Treaty of Versailles by remilitarization, established a personality cult around himself, held revanchist speeches and annexed Free State of Walloon, a member of Mitteleuropa? Yes, Charles de Gaulle, the controversial French hero. Who also had good relations with Mussolini and supported Franco and the British revanchist politician Churchill. Yes, Gaulle's France wasn't exactly fascist, but it could easily have been. OTL Gaulle and Franz restored or at least partially fixed the Franco-German relations in late 1930s, but there could have been a war in early 1930s or an escalation of the Balkan Wars. Had Gaulle not backed off in Greece 1949, who knows what could have happened. The other members of Novaroma pact supported full scale invasion, even Britain that wasn't even an official member. Soviets could have declared war on Ottomans too, to reclaim Russian Caucasus and on Mitteleuropa to reclaim everything lost in Brest-Litovsk and the Civil War interventions.
 
Everyone is talking about Germany ditching Kaiser in favour of fascists. What about the nationalist leader who already in OTL decided not to pay the Germans his war debts, broke the Treaty of Versailles by remilitarization, established a personality cult around himself, held revanchist speeches and annexed Free State of Walloon, a member of Mitteleuropa? Yes, Charles de Gaulle, the controversial French hero. Who also had good relations with Mussolini and supported Franco and the British revanchist politician Churchill. Yes, Gaulle's France wasn't exactly fascist, but it could easily have been. OTL Gaulle and Franz restored or at least partially fixed the Franco-German relations in late 1930s, but there could have been a war in early 1930s or an escalation of the Balkan Wars. Had Gaulle not backed off in Greece 1949, who knows what could have happened. The other members of Novaroma pact supported full scale invasion, even Britain that wasn't even an official member. Soviets could have declared war on Ottomans too, to reclaim Russian Caucasus and on Mitteleuropa to reclaim everything lost in Brest-Litovsk and the Civil War interventions.

1. Churchill was not a fascist. His "1000-year Empire" speech and his "asian mongrels" quip is often used as proof he was a fascist, but he was not. Just another hyper-nationalist in a sea of hyper-nationalists (and hyper-militarist). If you look at the rest of his career he was tame.

2. Le sigh another "fascists > monarchists" / "monarchists > fascists" troll bait. Had du Gaulle actually come to blows with the Kaiser it would have been resolved by the countless bureaucrats and diplomats underneath, namely the German General Staff and the French Civil Service. Some say this alliance of military and civil servants is unholy, but it's what kept the two sides at peace for decades. What you see at the top is just the tip of the mountain and the two sides have deep connections and a special relationship, one of the reasons there's been no war in Europe no matter what nutjob is at the top.*

3. "Revolution in Nation" Leninism would have stopped any sort of military adventures including grabbing pieces of Ottoman as tempting as that was you have to show they actually have inclination not just ability. Asian wars is a totally different beast than hacking away at parts of Europe.

* That and the Americans <-- yes, Americans have kept the peace everywhere... deal with it everyone :D
 
It's a little historical revisionism but no modern army has "assault gun" type tanks save the Germans and then only in reserve units. It's obvious assault guns were just a plug until armor caught up. Which was rather fast after the Russians mass produced sloped armor tanks. Sturms are nice little small tanks easy to maintain and cheap to make but the Chars and Matildas and even Valentines were almost immune to the German peashooters. It's clear that 5 to 1 kill ratio is not due to lack of equipment but lack of doctrine plus careful use of anti-tank guns by the ROC units.

Uhm the Sturmgeschuetz has sloped armor and a 75mm AT Gun. It killed a japanese Matilda I at a distance of 1800 meters. The germans guns could be used against infantry and tanks. Slow, underarmed piece of junk is an adequate description for Chars, Matildas and Valentines.
 
There is a mispercetion in the pop hitories about everything to do with tanks in Chinese and Japanese service. From European records its clear less than 500 tracked/armored vehicles were exported to either nation before 1937. Hunnicutts research from the 1950s & 60s has withstood checks and revisionist challenges. Of the two Japan imported the least, most being some Carden-Llyod tankettes in the 1920s. Contrary to popular belief the Matidias & Char B were Japanese built copies. 32 in the case of the Matilda vs ten imported & 11 Char B built against four imported. In the later case the French built vehicles were the original CharB & not the later Char Bbis or Bter models. For the Japanese built models there are valid questions of quality control. ie: There were the armor samples collected from the wreck of a Japanese Ha95 by a US intel officer. LtCol Stillwell of the US 15th Inf Regiment returned a crate of bits, with photos of collection that have consistently tested as cast iron. A tank examined by Soviet metaurgists proved to be of a low grade and very brittle steel, only slightly better than cast iron. Japanese secrecy has prevented a examination of this question from their records. However when you take a close look at photos of destroyed Japanese tanks you cant help but get a impression of something being not right.

Its been much easier to collect data on the German deigned tanks used in Asia. The Chinese officials are easily bribed. Most seem to reflect German rep for workmanship & engineering. Tho there is the well known incident where Krupp shipped a half dozen heavy tanks made from mild steel. Those were probably a test batch never intended for combat.
 
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No, I don't mean China. The reunification still has huge problems and is causing civil unrest everyday. There isn't a day that goes by that you don't hear of rebels or skirmishes or some religious minority uprising. If China was doing well we wouldn't even be talking about "rebels" and "proxy wars" or anything of the sort. But let's not argue if China is doing well and look at the deeper geopolitical picture.

China has been in the ditch since the Taiping Rebellion of the 19th Century, or arguablly since the Emperors favorite HoShen (or Sen) introduced hyper corruption a century earlier. Eliminating the Manchu dynasty & the Mandarins changed nothing. Efforts at reform are either crushed or hijacked by the wealthy.
 
The bigger issue would be if the fascists and authoritarians we did have like Mussolini, Metaxas, Antonescu etc had actually started attacking other nations (okay, important nations, sorry Albania). That could have easily dominoed into, if not a Second Great War, certainly a stampede of smaller ones.

As is, we got lucky - as Richter says - that Italy and Greece went to blows. Italian fascism was discredited, the Hellenic forces were weakened enough for Turkey to try it on, and the resultant war between them led to the Royal Navy and RAF "discouraging" the Turks. The system of goverment was discredited. (And that still got almost two million people killed, half of them Greeks, and meant the Asian War had a chance to start, so thank Christ we didn't get anything bigger)

for another, the Maginot line could have stopped any German attack.

There's a bunch of takes - Turtledove did one in "The Man With The Iron Heart" - where the Fascists go through Belgium again. That relies on Britain being either weak or unwillingly to get involved due to concerns over Japan though. And to do that, Turtledove had to have George Lansbury running Labour in the 30s rather than Uncle Arthur and then Clynes.

having the French and British be foolishly enabling of that regime to say balance out the USSR's influence on Eastern Europe

Ah, you've read the Turtledove? ;)

To be fair, he had Stalin running the USSR at the time and that would've certainly been a threat, a plausible one too. Stretching a bit to say a clearly expansionist fascistic government would be the weapon of choice for restraining Stalin though, you don't literally fight fire with fire.


There is a really nice Kim Newman one on fascist Germany though. Joh Fredersen of Metropolis - so it's not a hard AU, sue me - brings horror and blood to Europe to see his grand dream come true but just a generation after, nobody in the 'free world' cares as long as the Deutchtropolis continues to sell us shiny things. Take the sci-fi and meta out, that still feels like a thing that would happen.
 
Originally Posted by strangecircus
for another, the Maginot line could have stopped any German attack.


Back when the US military used to care about such things we ran wargames on theoretical European wars. A variety of European war scenarios were scripted out, including Germany as the rogue aggressor state. Nothing special about that one. Plan Blue, Green, Red, Crimson, or whatever was just as common. One of the scenarios looked at was that of Germany using a higly concentrated mobile force to bypass the French CORF fortification system through gaps or weak points between the French, Belgian, Dutch, Swiss defense systems. Absent a strong alliance system & the French lacked that in the 1940s & 50s, plus certain weaknesses in French command and control of the era it was possible for the Black or German team to create a considerable stratigic gain.

The Euro exercises pretty well faded out in the 1970s. I participated in one of the last circa 1975 as a very low ranking coffee fetcher. In the 1980s and 90s the focus settled on Asia. In 1986 I was involved in the joint Japanese/US Cherry Mountain (Yama Sekura) exercise. That ongoing exercise revolved around the expulsion of a Soviet force from Hokkido & Sakhalin region after a Soviet coup de main seized Hokkido island.

Late and post service I poked about among the records of those exercises archived at Ft Levenworth and other Army or Navy Schools. While very fragmented and incomplete the stacks of papers or modern computer media can be very interesting to the miltiary historian. As a Marine I was intrigued by the Army exercises studying a invasion of a hostile Europe. Those mostly postulated securing a base in the UK first. The scale of the the proposed operations were usually a couple orders of magnitude larger than any amphibous operation in the 19th or 20th Centuries. The technical features of a simultaneous three or four corps assault, with 2-3 armies in the following thirty day build up are facinating. The Japanese never attempted anything larger than a reinforced corps in the Asian war. The Brits had either Gallipoli in the Great War or the Formosa operation at the end of the Asian War. Neither of those could be counted as more than two corps in the assault, & the build up amounted to only a normal size army.
 
Political background in these exercises is thin, since the point is to study the military problem. However there was at least one Levenworth assesment of reentering Europe with the UK in hostile hands. It had several 'sub plans' One titled "Dropshot" proposed making diversionary attacks around the west and Mediterranean edges of Europe while the main effort would be in the far east via Persia & the Caspaian region the NW through the Urkraine & thence west wards via Poland. At some point the diversionary attacks would turn into supporting attacks for the armies advancing westwards.

Before you drop you jaw on your key board over this one, keep in mind it was a class room exercises for students, tho a very elaborate one lasting for weeks. Not a serious proposal like the old Orange plans.
 
Will this work?

Americans, since the Civil War, are very risk adverse. The US population was horrified at the death toll and injuries in WW1. If you have Web cams, 24/7 news uncensored I doubt WW2 would have happened. I see the US declaring "if any countries go to War we will not sell to any of the parties ''! Even FDR would have problems.
 
.... I see the US declaring "if any countries go to War we will not sell to any of the parties ''! Even FDR would have problems.

That had been US policy interwar. The Nuetrality Acts were originally very strong. OTL they were twice reduced as the tensions in Europe rose. They were finally repealed in 1939 in after the German invasion of Poland. Cash & Carry to any nation became the new official US policy.


... If you have Web cams, 24/7 news uncensored I doubt WW2 would have happened. ...

Most of us are too old to remember morning and afternoon dailys and frequent 'extra' edition newspapers, news reels before each feature screenning in the cinema, and 24 hour news networks like Mutual. IIRC the Austiran Anschluss saw the first integrated multi location live news reports (Berlin, Paris, London, Vienna with a anchor reporter in New York). Railway telegraph operatiors ran a informal news disimination akin to the modern internet. The news cycle was slower, but there is nothing new about 24/7, it ran that & more so when radio became common.

The photos and print descriptions of the bombing of Guernica, the Rape of Nanking & a half dozen other other bloodlettings were widely disimminated and obsessd over or ignored as the individual was inclined.
 
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