Does Barbarossa succeed if there are no western allies?

[Catspoke]

I highly doubt Japan will attack the US, as they will have sufficient resources ITTL, even with the US embargo, to continue the war in China, which is what they wanted.

Most people seem to think that the government of the Netherlands would be forced to sell oil to the Japanese. But there are many butterflies. Perhaps the French government is unified and a final peace treaty signed by the time the Japanese want to occupy Indochina (Perhaps Germany has guaranteed French colonial boundaries in exchange for peace), OR maybe the Germans become indifferent to the Japanese if no longer at war with Britain OR want Netherlands oil for themselves.

Regardless if the Japanese attack the USA at some point, if Britain is neutral toward Germany at the moment and Germany can trade with the world I don't see a German DOW on the USA.

 

[toolbox11742]

Hmm ability to stomach a new war after a period of peace is something I didn't consider; I don't recall any special efforts done to justify Barbarossa other than the crusade against communism propaganda

With a week to mobilize they could disperse aircraft and ammo dumps; harden communication centers and issue standing and contingency orders. They could mobilize their tank brigades into better concentrated reserve formations (with as much AA and fighter protection as available) to engage or try to cut off German mobile spear points; they could also wire and mine every bridge within 150 miles of the border and staff them with fanatical NKVD troops

The Axis employed 3 1/3 million troops for Barbarossa. Another 25 divisions (German) without a western front is certainly possible. The Luftwaffe's manpower requirement's for home defense, defense of France, Africa, Italy and the Balkans where enormous, not just fighter planes but everything ground operated especially and including 10's of thousands of flak troops. The seemingly obvious places to install the additional German formations would be an additional field army and panzer corps to Army Group North, an additional panzer corps to panzer group 2 and a field army installed in between panzer group 2 and the 2nd army.

 

[victhemag]

Most people seem to think that the government of the Netherlands would be forced to sell oil to the Japanese. But there are many butterflies. Perhaps the French government is unified and a final peace treaty signed by the time the Japanese want to occupy Indochina (Perhaps Germany has guaranteed French colonial boundaries in exchange for peace), OR maybe the Germans become indifferent to the Japanese if no longer at war with Britain OR want Netherlands oil for themselves.

Regardless if the Japanese attack the USA at some point, if Britain is neutral toward Germany at the moment and Germany can trade with the world I don't see a German DOW on the USA.

Germany would still be favorable to Japan because Hitler would be hopeful of a Japanese invasion of Siberia

 

[Catspoke]

Going from peace to war without some sort of political build up I think would be impossible and Hitler himself lamented that after defeating the British he wouldn't be able to get the German people to go to war again. The Soviets assumed that there would be some sort of build up to war and border incidents first before invasion over the period of a week to allow for mobilization IOTL and might be right ITTL (it fit Hitler's pattern up to and through Poland). So perhaps the question is how much better could the Soviets do with a week's notice of war given all their horrible deficiencies IOTL?

Could Hitler be convinced NOT to invade the USSR in such a TL as this. OTL there was at least talk of an alliance in November 1940. Perhaps the Soviets are so nervous and in appeasement mode they aren't haggling over Bulgaria, maybe even willing to give up bits of territory like Galacian oil or Buknovia or Courland and economic assistance for free to buy time (i.e. the Soviets offer a new Non Aggression agreement based on new realities). Hitler just goes full hobby architect mode and starts rebuilding German cities instead, playing Lebansraum in Poland and Bohemia.

Otherwise Germany could just give up on the idea of surprise and build a coalition of the willing to help including Italy, Japan, Turkey and random world wide anti communist volunteers etc.. (in this time line Mussolini could have several of his best divisions ready from the get go). Having this great coalition might help the politics of selling it to the German people (he could probably sell it as a repeat of March 1918, that it would be easy).

 

[victhemag]

Could Hitler be convinced NOT to invade the USSR in such a TL as this. OTL there was at least talk of an alliance in November 1940. Perhaps the Soviets are so nervous and in appeasement mode they aren't haggling over Bulgaria, maybe even willing to give up bits of territory like Galacian oil or Buknovia or Courland and economic assistance for free to buy time (i.e. the Soviets offer a new Non Aggression agreement based on new realities). Hitler just goes full hobby architect mode and starts rebuilding German cities instead, playing Lebansraum in Poland and Bohemia.

Otherwise Germany could just give up on the idea of surprise and build a coalition of the willing to help including Italy, Japan, Turkey and random world wide anti communist volunteers etc.. (in this time line Mussolini could have several of his best divisions ready from the get go). Having this great coalition might help the politics of selling it to the German people (he could probably sell it as a repeat of March 1918, that it would be easy).

Nope. Hitler's war goals as outlined in Mein Kampf included the desettlement of Russia as Lebensraum for Germans, with a virtual extermination of all slavic peoples with the exception of certain slavs being kept alive for slave labor. Saying we could have a World War II without Hitler invading Russia is nonsense, it was one of Hitler's main goals.

 

[thaddeus]

Could Hitler be convinced NOT to invade the USSR in such a TL as this. OTL there was at least talk of an alliance in November 1940. Perhaps the Soviets are so nervous and in appeasement mode they aren't haggling over Bulgaria, maybe even willing to give up bits of territory like Galacian oil or Buknovia or Courland and economic assistance for free to buy time (i.e. the Soviets offer a new Non Aggression agreement based on new realities).

Nope. Hitler's war goals as outlined in Mein Kampf included the desettlement of Russia as Lebensraum for Germans, with a virtual extermination of all slavic peoples with the exception of certain slavs being kept alive for slave labor. Saying we could have a World War II without Hitler invading Russia is nonsense, it was one of Hitler's main goals.

my view historically they could have "postponed" the invasion to avoid two front war but felt cornered over unfavorable trade deal and Soviet encroachment in Balkans. here they would view the circumstances as perfect?

 

[Alex Zetsu]

I don't think your POD actually gets Britain out of the war but...

The OTL Axis 1941 offensive is unlikely to work even if there are no Western Allies. The Soviets have enough food and ammo for the time being.

This will lead to an attempt by the Axis to seize Stalingrad and establish an anchor at the Don River like they did OTL because there is no compelling reason for them do anything different (other than Army Group South being bigger than OTL since there is no North Africa Korps).

A few problems delayed Axis offensive in OTL. One, the Germans didn't expect the Russians would use unarmored vehicles to retreat after their failed offensive at Kharkov or retreat whole divisions on foot (apparently the idea of walking away never occurred to them) instead of waiting for mechanized support to cover their retreat or all wait in a bottleneck at the rail. This meant a lot of Soviet forces escaped in a disorganized fashion, but the Axis supply situation did not allow for them to take advantage of the disorganized state of the retreat.

Stalingrad was reached 30 days late due to... I don't remember.

In Stalingrad proper, the Germans lose the advantage in mobile warfare, going in street to street fighting which the Soviets were better at due to the more static nature and being on the defense.

These delays caused the German High Command to deploy the group assigned to Stalingrad and the Don river more offensively centered at the point of concentration, at Stalingrad. As a result, the bridgehead on the Don was left in Soviet Hands. Opposing them were the Romanian 3rd Army, which was not given any effective anti-tank weaponry.

The Romanians asked for help weeks before the Soviet Counterattack because they knew exactly where the attack was coming. they even predicted the exact routes most Soviet takes actually took. Palus said only Hitler had the authority to redeploy and Hitler wanted Stalingrad to be taken before the bridgeheads on the Don were secure. the Romanians predictably got scattered when the attack came, partially due to the lack of good anti-tank weapons. Actually there are reports of even the mighty T-34 being destroyed at point blank ranges by various means, so I don't see why they just didn't hide behind a snowdrift or something to do so. One report of a unit destroying 3 tanks on the front armor at 11 meters before the unit ran away complained the towed anti-tank guns were worthless in the same report that the tanks the penetrated.

The Soviet counterattack worked.

When Operation Uranus Succeeded in 1942, the Soviets no longer need Western help, although supplies were certainty welcome.

If TTL Uranus succeeds, the Soviets alone can win.

If they run out of stuff to shoot or eat and can't cut off the 1942 Axis offensive, then Axis probably win.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

When Operation Uranus Succeeded in 1942, the Soviets no longer need Western help, although supplies were certainty welcome.

If TTL Uranus succeeds, the Soviets alone can win.

Yeah...no. LL was vital to Soviet survival, people were dropping dead in Soviet factories of malnutrition in 1944 and there were famines in the USSR after the war ended.
Allied help was vital tying down German strategic reserves throughout the rest of the war, not to mention drawing off and killing the majority of the Luftwaffe from late 1942 on. 40% of the Luftwaffe was destroyed in 6 months from mid November 1942- mid May 1943 as just one example. By Spring 1943 75% of German single engine fighters were fighting the Wallies, over 90% of twin engine fighters were too.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

Could Hitler be convinced NOT to invade the USSR in such a TL as this. OTL there was at least talk of an alliance in November 1940. Perhaps the Soviets are so nervous and in appeasement mode they aren't haggling over Bulgaria, maybe even willing to give up bits of territory like Galacian oil or Buknovia or Courland and economic assistance for free to buy time (i.e. the Soviets offer a new Non Aggression agreement based on new realities). Hitler just goes full hobby architect mode and starts rebuilding German cities instead, playing Lebansraum in Poland and Bohemia.

Otherwise Germany could just give up on the idea of surprise and build a coalition of the willing to help including Italy, Japan, Turkey and random world wide anti communist volunteers etc.. (in this time line Mussolini could have several of his best divisions ready from the get go). Having this great coalition might help the politics of selling it to the German people (he could probably sell it as a repeat of March 1918, that it would be easy).

IMHO yes. Germany not at war in 1940-41 is going to be very terrifying for the Soviets and Hitler isn't going to let them get away with anything. I don't think Hitler goes full architect, but likely might focus less on starting another war and trying to consider regime stability and establishing a new order in Europe.

 

[Emperor Casey]

I do recall an interesting detail from another piece of AH I read once. While the scenario is different I think it could work. In the scenario the airborne operations in Crete go much better than OTL and therefore doesn't convince Hitler to just stop further drops and thus helps in the invasion of Russia. In this scenario where Britain is out of the war, best case scenario is before Crete, perhaps we could see the Germans utilizing paratroopers more extensively in Russia to secure more objectives and flank Soviet forces.

 

[Alex Zetsu]

Yeah...no. LL was vital to Soviet survival, people were dropping dead in Soviet factories of malnutrition in 1944 and there were famines in the USSR after the war ended.
Allied help was vital tying down German strategic reserves throughout the rest of the war, not to mention drawing off and killing the majority of the Luftwaffe from late 1942 on. 40% of the Luftwaffe was destroyed in 6 months from mid November 1942- mid May 1943 as just one example. By Spring 1943 75% of German single engine fighters were fighting the Wallies, over 90% of twin engine fighters were too.

The Axis lost enough personnel that the even total Luftwaffe dominance wouldn't make a difference. So unless you have a reason besides "oh the air war"...

Once (if) Uranus succeeds, maybe they can just cannibalize their POWs?

 

[Alex Zetsu]

I know the food situation the Soviet Union was pretty bad, but you can always reduce headcount by a banzai charge.

I'm pretty sure that's not what the Japanese had in mind at Saipan, but that was the result.

To be honest, I'm not really sure what the Soviets could do after 1944 with no LL. But at this time they are in Romanian and Polish territory, so maybe the army can just "requisition" supplies. As for the civilians back home... more cannibalism?

 

[Alex Zetsu]

I didn't do the math on the food thing. And I don't know where to look up the data, so I might be wrong about their ability to solve it by eating every enemy (and friendly) corpse. But once Uranus succeeds, the Soviets can win, air war or not.

 

[thaddeus]

Could Hitler be convinced NOT to invade the USSR in such a TL as this. OTL there was at least talk of an alliance in November 1940. Perhaps the Soviets are so nervous and in appeasement mode they aren't haggling ... maybe even willing to give up bits of territory .. and economic assistance for free to buy time (i.e. the Soviets offer a new Non Aggression agreement based on new realities).

Otherwise Germany could just give up on the idea of surprise and build a coalition of the willing to help including Italy, Japan, Turkey and random world wide anti communist volunteers etc..

my view historically they could have "postponed" the invasion to avoid two front war but felt cornered over unfavorable trade deal and Soviet encroachment in Balkans. here they would view the circumstances as perfect?

IMHO yes. Germany not at war in 1940-41 is going to be very terrifying for the Soviets and Hitler isn't going to let them get away with anything... but likely might focus less on starting another war and trying to consider regime stability and establishing a new order in Europe.

can envision a scenario in which they drain the Soviets of resources for a year, far above the historical amounts, and attack them to reduce their military rather than establish Reichskommisariats or drive them behind the Urals? under the probably realistic view they never have such an advantage?

 

[sloreck]

The problem is you can't have the USSR fighting the Axis by itself and without LL/significant aid from the UK and expect the later Soviet offensives to happen. Just one example, with the Luftwaffe not having to direct a huge number of assets "elsewhere" and also not losing experienced pilots and other aircrew Soviet forces are going to be exposed as all get out on all those flat open places. Stukas and other aircraft will have a field day train busting, and in the USSR if you mess up rail traffic you hose logistics big time. The USA sent a lot of locomotives and rolling stock, as well as rails to the USSR under LL - if they don't get it it means that every day they have to decide "do we build tanks or locomotives?" (locomotive works in all countries involved got involved in building tanks or at least major tank components). If the Germans and Finns take Leningrad the Axis logistics get better, and any chance the Soviets have of getting supplies via Murmansk go away due to rail interdiction. If Moscow goes, rail transport is seriously disrupted which has some major issues not only in moving troops around but also moving factories around.

Both Moscow and Leningrad were centers of manufacturing. Leningrad did have production to some extent even during the siege, and picked up afterwards. The Moscow factories remained in service throughout the war, in this scenario there will be more disruption at a minimum. All sorts of raw materials from leather to aluminum came from LL as well as finished goods. Trucks, jeeps, radios were all vital for Soviet counteroffensives. As far as Stalingrad goes, if some of the resources that will be available (25+ divisions and more stuff) ITTL are used to shore up the flanks, even if the Germans go in to the meatgrinder as opposed to simply encircling it, things go differently.

Jokes about cannibalism aside, malnourished workers are not producing efficiently and make more mistakes, no matter how the NKVD makes threats (look at the "efficiency" of the slave labor factories in Germany and elsewhere). Malnourished soldiers simply don't have stamina and get ground down quickly, if they are missing vitamins you can see things like night vision going to pot pretty quickly (not a good thing). Whatever LL did, whatever argument you make about "the Soviets could have made that stuff", one of the things they absolutely positively could not make was more food. Also, AVGAS.

Simply saying once this or that Soviet offensive dropped in from OTL happens the Germans are screwed won't work. Even if we assume ITTL that EVERY factory either moved east, or continuing to work in place in spots the Germans never overran OTL like Moscow produces just as efficiently as OTL the Soviets are going to come up very short in many key areas. You have to explain how the Soviets are going to make up for food, AVGAS, leather, aluminum, trucks, jeeps, radios that they got from LL that they did not have or could not produce. The production facilities they had were running full steam OTL, so no matter if all workers were Stakhanovites the only way they have "more" is more factories which they don't have or foreign aid, which they won't have. Oh, forgot MACHINE TOOLS!!!

 

[trajen777]

Just one single item from ll that keep untold thousands or millions in Russia fed.


With the signing of Lend-Lease in March 1941, shipments of Spam were included in the aid transported to Great Britain and the Soviet Union. It was gratefully accepted by both the military and civilian populations. Future British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, then a teenager working in her parents’ grocery store, called it “a war-time delicacy.” On Boxing Day (the day after Christmas) 1943, she recalled, “We had friends in and … we opened a tin of Spam luncheon meat. We had some lettuce and tomatoes and peaches, so it was Spam and salad.” And Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev wrote in his autobiography, “Without Spam, we wouldn’t have been able to feed our army.”


Key food items shipped ll ..tones

Wheat,flour and other cereals : 901,220

Canned meat and meat products : 822,510

Sugar : 703,079

Vegetable oils : 520,800

Animal fats and oils : 446,433

Smoked and prepared meats : 319,341

Dried peas and beans : 270,514

Dried eggs : 121,144

 

[Mr.J]

Why wouldn't the UK send Lend-lease though? They've got a war industry built up and no war to use it in, a massive grudge against the Germans, and a centuries-old desire to not let one country (especially not an evil dictatorship) control all mainland Europe. It's not like the UK particularly liked the Austrian or Russian regimes much in the Napoleonic Wars, but the UK subsidized them because they fought Napoleon. The situation here is similar.

And what are the Germans going to do about it, restart the war in the West? They've just moved almost everything they have to go fight in Russia.

 

[Mr.J]

Nope. Hitler's war goals as outlined in Mein Kampf included the desettlement of Russia as Lebensraum for Germans, with a virtual extermination of all slavic peoples with the exception of certain slavs being kept alive for slave labor. Saying we could have a World War II without Hitler invading Russia is nonsense, it was one of Hitler's main goals.

Though if Hitler dies (some assassination attempt works, or his plane crashes or whatever) and someone like Goering takes over, maybe he decides that half of Poland, Austria, Czechoslovakia and whatever is bitten off of the Low Countries and France is plenty of lebensraum and this whole agrarian thing's a bit silly anyway. Probably some sort of next war is started by the Nazis though, it is a militarist ideology with an economy based on looting the neighbors.

 

[merlin]

Why wouldn't the UK send Lend-lease though? They've got a war industry built up and no war to use it in, a massive grudge against the Germans, and a centuries-old desire to not let one country (especially not an evil dictatorship) control all mainland Europe. It's not like the UK particularly liked the Austrian or Russian regimes much in the Napoleonic Wars, but the UK subsidized them because they fought Napoleon. The situation here is similar.

And what are the Germans going to do about it, restart the war in the West? They've just moved almost everything they have to go fight in Russia.

Because they have a more pro-German government in place, no Churchill, and King Edward - just as likely that the press etc. are vilifying the soviets rather than the Germans. Quite possible that war production has been cut, part of the 'deal' being a much lower % spent on Defence.

 

[thaddeus]

Why wouldn't the UK send Lend-lease though? They've got a war industry built up and no war to use it in, a massive grudge against the Germans, and a centuries-old desire to not let one country (especially not an evil dictatorship) control all mainland Europe. It's not like the UK particularly liked the Austrian or Russian regimes much in the Napoleonic Wars, but the UK subsidized them because they fought Napoleon. The situation here is similar.

And what are the Germans going to do about it, restart the war in the West? They've just moved almost everything they have to go fight in Russia.

Because they have a more pro-German government in place, no Churchill, and King Edward - just as likely that the press etc. are vilifying the soviets rather than the Germans. Quite possible that war production has been cut, part of the 'deal' being a much lower % spent on Defence.

common sense. UK driven out of the war in 1940, due to ...?? working torpedoes costing them a handful of capital ships, disaster at Dunkirk, etc.

they would need time to regroup, rebuild, even if politicians of every stripe wanted to supply (and side) with the Soviets?

coupled with stronger German effort that captures Leningrad, Arctic route would be moot point. what are the British going to do, invade Iran to provide an avenue to supply the Soviets? (who would at least appear to be losing)