DBWI: What if the Russians had gotten to Berlin first?

We have all seen the classic photograph of U.S. troops raising the Stars and Stripes over the ruins of the Reichstag in Berlin on April 14th, 1945.

Something I was thinking about...what if the Soviets had gotten to Berlin first? The decision to go for Berlin was a hotly debated one in the Allied councils of war...what if they had decided to let the Soviets have the prize? How would our world have been different, if at all?
 

Saphroneth

Banned
I doubt you'd have had such large pockets surrendering, so the Battle of Berlin might have been even bloodier than OTL. We know that German troops seemed mainly relieved not to have been captured by the Soviets...
 

Deleted member 1487

Maybe they'd be less aggressive postwar because they would have less to prove. I think you'd need the Germans to behave differently though, because their 1944-45 behavior was pretty much all about stopping the Soviets short and giving the Wallies an easier go. Pulling out of Warsaw and letting the Soviets handle the Home Army was a big deal, because when the Soviets cracked down they found themselves facing an organized Polish force on their home turf and a Polish Army under their command that they could not longer trust and had to rotate out of the fight. Plus when the 1944-45 armored counteroffensive came with major fighter help* it did some damage to Soviet forces even though it sputtered out due to lack of fuel. So the Germans would really have to put that sort of resistance against the Wallies to stop them from getting as far for this POD.

*OOC: Battle of the Bulge and Bodenplatte happen in this East ITTL, delaying the Soviets for a month compared to OTL and leaving the Wallies open to move into Germany in January.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Bodenplatte
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_and_Allied_aircraft_losses_during_Operation_Bodenplatte
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wehrmacht_forces_for_the_Ardennes_Offensive
 

shiftygiant

Gone Fishin'
Hmm. Of course, this can be achieved by having Operation Market Garden end differently. An Allied failure on this part isn't too hard, the plan was, in hindsight, a mess, won only by sheer luck, but if Market Garden fails, then a straight shot to Berlin is lost and Eisenhower's slow approach would be favored, whilst the Soviets can just march straight to the Brandenburg gate.

But if they get there first? Not gonna be pretty. Think East Prussia times infinity. Russia will salt the earth with German Blood- if they get Hitler first, forget a trial, they're gonna tear him apart.
 
Fewer dead Americans for a prestige prize that was due to be given up anyways. Sure, getting to the city was easy enough even with those "accidental" attacks by the VVS and (towards the end of the battle) long-range artillery. But actually seizing it cost the US 50,000 casualties given all the fanatics Hitler had surrounded himself with (excluding those killed by the aforementioned "accidents"). And besides, what difference did it make? We just handed the place back as agreed upon at Yalta. Contrary to popular myth, market garden did not appreciably speed up the WAllied advance (it was a strategic culd-de-sac, no matter how much Monty claimed otherwise) and neither did the German Vistula offensive appreciably slow the Soviets down (honestly, even had the German's expected to do as well as they did at Kursk that would have been considered delusional). The key was all those extra German forces fighting defensively in the East. Even then the Soviets were conducting their assault crossings on the Oder about the time the US armed forces reched the outskirts of Berlin.
 
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Remember, the Russians were out for revenge against the invasion of their country, and as such took on any German defenders in the East with intense ferocity.

As such, the Nazi armies knew they would get far better treatment when surrendering to Americans or British. It did help that Adolf Hitler--inspecting a group of Volkssturm defenders in the open on March 23, 1945 in Berlin--got caught by surprise by a group of RAF Spitfire XVI ground attack planes and was killed when the group was hit with machine gun and rocket fire. After Hitler's death on that date, German resistance in the Western Front collapsed with amazing speed, so much so that American and British troops were literally at the Reichskanzlei buildings by April 7, 1945 and occupied the Reichstag building by the night of April 13, 1945. There are both black and white and color newsreel footage of the raising of the American flag (and the British Union Jack flag) just after dawn on April 14, 1945--though was a bittersweet occasion for the Americans with President Roosevelt dying just a few days earlier.

Of course, the Russians weren't exactly too happy about it, since they had planned a MASSIVE invasion of Berlin starting in mid-April, but most of Berlin fell to American and British troops before the planned invasion started.
 
Would the Soviets still declare war against Japan? Stalin pretty much waited until April 1945 to declare war in his effort to secure the Manchurian territory and the Korean Peninsula. One has to wonder if Stalin would have had the need or desire to capture those areas.
 
Would the Soviets still declare war against Japan? Stalin pretty much waited until April 1945 to declare war in his effort to secure the Manchurian territory and the Korean Peninsula. One has to wonder if Stalin would have had the need or desire to capture those areas.

Probably. Stalin likes communism to be everywhere.
 

shiftygiant

Gone Fishin'
Might General Zhukov have lived longer? It really wasn't his fault...

Definitely. he was leading the Eastern Front, so if he got to Berlin first, he's gonna get prestige faster than you can say 'Barbarossa'. Heck, he might even have ended up he next leader of the SU.
 

Deleted member 1487

Definitely. he was leading the Eastern Front, so if he got to Berlin first, he's gonna get prestige faster than you can say 'Barbarossa'. Heck, he might even have ended up he next leader of the SU.
Whatever happens to him, it would be better than his 'reward' IOTL.
 
Might General Zhukov have lived longer? It really wasn't his fault...

Doubtful. Stalin was notoriously paranoid. Capturing Berlin would give him far too much prestige. OTL Stalin used his failure as an excuse because of the successes on that front anyway. He'd have found some other reason to line the general up against a wall after a two minute trial.

There might be more resistance in the Red Army itself though if Zhukov hadn't failed.

Probably. Stalin likes communism to be everywhere.

Actually that's a misconception. Stalin was far more interested in achieving communism in the USSR first, and then spreading it. He only took Manchuria because of a perceived Western betrayal.
 
If the Red Army arrives fast enough & the Allies stop on the Oder River or some similar point then maybe we'd not have to listen for the past 65 years to all those anti Communists complain about abandoning Berlin or eastern Germany?

Actually this situation is on my wish list for gaming out on the hexagon overlaid maps :) Executing Operation Eclipse with the Red Army still somewhere east of the Vistula River... One of the less understood aspects of the US/British advance into Germany is their logistics were falling apart the same as the previous year when racing across France. The German railroads were inoperable, and automotive transport was wholly inadaquate for sustianing the full strength of Ikes forces across Germany.
 

Deleted member 1487

If the Red Army arrives fast enough & the Allies stop on the Oder River or some similar point then maybe we'd not have to listen for the past 65 years to all those anti Communists complain about abandoning Berlin or eastern Germany?
Or not advancing on Poland.

Actually this situation is on my wish list for gaming out on the hexagon overlaid maps :) Executing Operation Eclipse with the Red Army still somewhere east of the Vistula River... One of the less understood aspects of the US/British advance into Germany is their logistics were falling apart the same as the previous year when racing across France. The German railroads were inoperable, and automotive transport was wholly inadaquate for sustianing the full strength of Ikes forces across Germany.
Maybe if Antwerp isn't sabotaged/interdicted for so long and there is less effort in 1945 to wreck German infrastructure via the air to keep it available for the Allied advance, especially if there is no Battle of the Bulge might help. In this DBWI maybe Dresden isn't bombed to enable the Germans to resist the Soviets better if they are moving forces East?
 
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... and there is less effort in 1945 to wreck German infrastructure via the air to keep it available for the Allied advance, especially if there is no Battle of the Bulge might help. In this DBWI maybe Dresden isn't bombed to enable the Germans to resist the Soviets better if they are moving forces East?

If it is understood the Wehrmacht will not resist much then canceling the 1945 anti transportation campaign might work. OTL German resistance fell apart along the Rhine because they were no longer receiving ammunition, replacement equipment, remaining fuel, or much else. To find the supplies they had to fall back to where th material was, scattered wherever it had been diverted to, stalled, or still sat at the factory. Even if the Alies have to bring their own rolling stock, communications, electrical service, and operating personnel capurting the tracks and bridges intact would help. just have make sure its not going to assist the defense as well.

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Maybe if Antwerp isn't sabotaged/interdicted for so long ...

Interdicted, by the German resistance on Walchern & Beveland along the north shore of the Scheldt Estuary. The artillery in those areas prevented mine sweeping of the ship channel and block removal. Only one of the 40+ cranes in the Antwerp harbor had been damaged, the power stations, phone/radio system for the harbor, navigation aids, & other port service infrastructure was intact. The Belgian resistance did a great job of taking advantage of the German confusion and ran off the units assigned to demolish the port.
 
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