Germany winning WW1 - best scenario for the 20th century?

Is Germany winning WW1 the most preferable outcome?

  • Yes. A German victory would have prevented the greatest horrors of the 20 century and saved millions

    Votes: 105 26.9%
  • No. A German victory would have made things as bad or worse than OTL

    Votes: 56 14.3%
  • Perhaps. Some things would have turned out better, some worse

    Votes: 245 62.7%

  • Total voters
    391

tenthring

Banned
A while back I remember being surprised at just how much land Germany acquired upon the Russian's agreeing to the Brest-Litovsk. Germany almost doubled its size and A-H did the same. This was also prime crop land and an enormous population gain to boot. Yes, those newly acquired subjects might well be a tad... restive... under the Kaiser's rule but they'd also be vastly better off than they were under the Tsar's tender mercies.

The scenario I envisioned was Germany's offering terms to the Entente in the Spring of 1918. They did so in OTL but the terms weren't smart enough and the offensives eventually petered out such that the Entente had no compelling reason to accept them. The POD here would be more generous terms and/or more success of those offensives which culminated in a peace that was too good to say no to for the Entente.

I don't think that would've taken much on Germany's part. The B-L treaty just got Germany a huge boon and largely obviated its need for overseas holdings or commerce to enrich itself. That land gained also "validated" the whole point of the Kaiser's taking the nation to war and would justly be seen as proof of victory. To make that peace offer more palatable - and much harder to resist - the Germans would offer up Alsace-Lorraine back to France. Gaining that territory was one of the key goals for the French in the war. And the offer of finally getting it back would knock the wind out of those in France who'd argue for continued fighting.

I think such a move - particularly if the proposal was made before the Spring Offensives had started and thus their threat couldn't be disproved by any battlefield failures - would be compelling indeed. With the sacred soil of Alsace-Lorraine once again part of France the rational to continue the war simply wouldn't be there for the French. With Germany offering to end the slaughter before it got any worse, there'd be less rationale for the UK to remain in the fight as well. Also, no reparations. So, no brutal peace with tribute being exacted from the downtrodden.

No, such an agreement would NOT be in the Entente's long term interest as it would leave Imperial Germany the dominant power on the Continent and that would surely make for hell to pay later on. But, that "later on" would be off in the far, far distance and hard to discern amongst the charnel house that was the battlefields of western Europe. Popular sentiment to "end the war now" would be pretty overwhelming within the Entente. And if that stuck, then Europe - and the world - would be a very different place.

With that peace agreed to, a truce more actually, there'd be no long term success of Communism in Russia. Germany's focus would be eastward. For one, it's newly acquired territory is to the east. For another, it would have no desire to risk renewing conflict with either France or Britain by trying to further encroach into their existing imperial holdings. Also, the militarists clearly recognized the pestilence they'd loosed in Russia in their efforts to knock it out of the war and they clearly intended to set that right. So, they'd be gunning to overthrow and destroy the Bolshevik regime in Russia once they'd secured the peace with the Entente in the west. Again, they'd likely either ally themselves with the Whites against the Red's threat or orchestrate their "being invited" to deal with those Communists. Either way, Communism in Russia would not be long for this Earth once World War I had ended. That alone is worth twenty to forty million lives spared directly. And counting the genocidal frenzy of the Communist regimes the Soviets spawned, that's at least 100,000,000 in total otherwise spared.

On the western end, there would be immediate hell to pay for the various powers that be in the Entente. Yes, they'd just achieved an end to the war and they'd even pried loose that sacred soil of Alsace-Lorraine. There's no way the peoples of the UK and France could view that as having been worth the six million or so who died in the war. And they'd take that out on the politicians and political parties that got them involved in it to start with. So there'd be huge changes within the body politic of the UK and France. And Italy too.

But, life would go on. At war's end both Britain and France would still have their respective empires. And in this ATL there'd be no revolutionary ideology in power in a sovereign nation state to spread its toxins against them. The imperialist and colonialist systems would have remained intact. Germany's colonial ambitions would've been blunted and its focus for the next decade - at the least - would be entirely eastward. First, to assimilate its new found territory and then to deal with the vermin it had loosed in Russia. So Germany could afford the luxury of ignoring the Great Game while it sorted all that out. Britain and France would be occupied with recovering from the war and tending to their empires. The US would most likely sour on any further foreign interventions and look quite dimly on trying to get rich again via war material sales to Britain or France.

I think for the 1920s that would mean a much "calmer" and more "introspective" time in Europe and that would continue into the 1930s. There'd be neither the mass murdering absolutist ideology of Communism threatening the world's order from the east nor would there be the mass murdering absolutist ideology of National Socialism being in power in Europe either. Sure, there'd be militants and extremists and fanatics in every country but in this ATL, I just can't see any of them coming to power sufficiently to implement their fanaticism to the same degree as they did in OTL.

If I'm the Entente all I need to do is drag on peace negotiations until the Americans arrive. That is a matter of months. I don't think there are enough trust on either side at that point for such a complex deal.
 

thorr97

Banned
tenthring,

True but.. Counting on the Americans being decisive enough versus dealing with all those "fresh & victorious" Germany is transferring from the eastern front would be quite the risk for the Entente. It would be months and months before the Americans are even combat ready. And in the meantime the Germans would be pressing hard. Here's a deal on the table that gives France its key pre-war goal AND also ends the bloodletting.

Strategically, no, it would not be the most farsighted thing for the Entente to accept.

For a public looking at the millions dead and many more millions maimed for naught but a few yards gain - and with no expectation of anything other than more slaughter? The public pressure in France and the UK to stop that slaughter would be enormous.

And thus very hard to resist...

If I'm the Entente all I need to do is drag on peace negotiations until the Americans arrive. That is a matter of months. I don't think there are enough trust on either side at that point for such a complex deal.
 
Yes, but Russia has a common border with Mitteleuropa. In a future war, a revanchist Russian regime could see about getting its backyard back while France tackles Germany at home. I foresee a rather horrible air war between the two...

Russia lacks the industry for an airforce worth mentioning without Ukraine and Stalins brutal industrialization. The it's former backyard outnumbers Russia and has more industry and rejects any Russian ideas of "getting it back".

The France/Russia alliance is outnumbered, outgunned, outindustrialized, outfinanced... they have literally nothing going for them.

I disagree. France OTL only suffered the defeat it did thanks to the incompetence of generals. ITTL, with a clean sweep of the generals who would have lost in the war, and with time to prepare and a revanchist inclination...they could hammer the bejeezus out of Germany.

France is far less industrialized and has half the population of Germany, on top of that it has less resources at home. In WW1 they had to ship in hundreds of thousands troops from the occupied colonies to fight and die for them. If the Germans annex the iron ore deposits at Briey (right across the border) the French wont be able to cobble together a shovel, let alone tanks and bombers.

Skating over the slightly worrisome sound of that...it also has manpower. A lot of manpower.

Manpower on its own is only good for one thing - dying. Without Ukraine Russia is severely lacking in war making potential. Without the Stalinist brutal industrialization it's simply unfit for war.

One of two things could happen:

1) Germany ponces Indochina from France post-WWI. To weaken Germany, Britain secretly gives Japan a blank cheque to go after German territory in Asia in the late 30s or early 40s - win-win for them, either Japan gets weakened or Germany does. In this case, I'd say that Japan would quickly beat Germany out of the gate - any Asian territory they hold would be too far from Europe for them to fight effectively without allies.

2) France still has Indochina. Japan sides with Germany and nabs it and French Polynesia.

A non Issue as i said. Besides leading the biggest economic block of the world gives Germany the means to influence Japan - the threat of an embargo.

...or, after being bled out by partisans in Eastern Europe (depending on how badly they treat the Slavs), Germany's forces in their satellites get steamrolled by Russian manpower while French bombers pound their cities.

Which partisan war? Eastern Europe was receiving German monarchs and were getting tied into the economic system of Germany at the end of the war receiving assistance from Germany against communist forces trying to retake the new nations. And why would they let the Russian "manpower" steamroll to Germany? Why is France even allowed to have bombers, what's the German airforce been doing all thsoe years, were the Germans sleeping? They'd be turning France afterwards into a pastorial state if that happened.

::Twitches::

Poland was the most heavily industrialized part of Imperial Russia, farmers+hunters/gatherers might be hyperbolic but it's far far closer to that than to an industrialized nation.
 

Insider

Banned
Like someone said before, grass is always greener on the other side. Its not a matter of optical illusion, nor preference. It is a matter of perspective. Simply the lower is your angle of view you see fewer gaps between the blades of grass. So to speak is our view of this reality.

Yes the French would probably develop "stab in a back" mentality. But will there be French blitzkrieg, French Hitler, French NSDAP? I doubt it. Even otl, these required a high degree of luck, which they may lack here.

Yes, the Africans would be opressed. But would average quality of life in colonies be higher or lower then OTL?

Yes, without something as drastic as Holocaust, it is doubtful that majoriy would ever consider antisemitism as something inheritly bad. But there would be more Jews alive.
 
But there would be more Jews alive.

Germany was assimilating them at break neck speed, in the 30s many people who considered themselves to be as German as Wagner and Bismarck were shocked that they suddenly counted as "half jew" or "quarter jew" while judaism played no part in their lives for generations.
 
Germany was assimilating them at break neck speed, in the 30s many people who considered themselves to be as German as Wagner and Bismarck were shocked that they suddenly counted as "half jew" or "quarter jew" while judaism played no part in their lives for generations.

Yes, up until the decision to vote for the Nazis Germany's antisemitism was going away.
 
Russia lacks the industry for an airforce worth mentioning without Ukraine and Stalins brutal industrialization. The it's former backyard outnumbers Russia and has more industry and rejects any Russian ideas of "getting it back".

So Germany somehow gets a victory that gets them Brest-Litovsk, but we don't get Communist heavy industrialization? How?
 
If WW1 comes on schedule, the best scenario is Germany winning early: Paris falls and the war is over by end of 1914. Even better if the UK stays out for whatever reason. The peace treaties would be probably lenient (with the likely exception of Serbia, which gets the shit end of the stick). There are still three potential problems in the making (A-H, Russia and the Ottoman empire), but it would be a much better basis on which to build a long-term stability in Europe. A very quick victory of the Entente (say no later than the end of 1915) would also be good but it is very difficult to manage (Bulgaria enters the war early and the Dardanelles gambit works, and Russia performs somehow better. IMHO if Bulgaria enters the war, Greece would do the same)

By contrast the worst possible scenario is a peace-by-exhaustion in 1919, closely followed by a CP late win (unlikely but theoretically possible). OTL outcome is still better than a late CP victory, but not a lot better.
In the EDC that's broadly what I went with; the Great War fizzled out in 1915 with both sides reasonably happy to end it (and later a mix of "We could have won if not for XXX" and "We really avoided a disaster there" views). With Franz Josef dead Franz Ferdinand better managed the break up of Austria-Hungary (a controlled, slow motion, collapse), the Russians avoided communism and most of the violence of the revolutions, Germany went Social Democrat/Constitutional Monarchy and things were rather better generally.

Of course in the thirties the economies started to collapse, the Okie flu spread, the USA fell apart, and various countries started embracing fascism leading to the Eastern War, and nuclear and biological weapons use.
Zone Rouge has nothing on parts of eastern Europe.
 
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It's a very optimistic scenario...expecially if the war end late, the new territory in the east need to be pacified (Poland and Ukraine started to resent the new management), there is the question of the Ottoman Empire and A-H, nation that are basically on borrowed time without strong German support both in money and men, the people in general tired of war and the political repercussion of the veteran coming home and the following political fight (probably quite litteral).
Maybe they even liberalise, but this doesn't mean automatically happyness and sunshine, just that the political landscape it's greatly changed in a moment that the old guard had lost most of his legitimancy and this can litteraly open a can of worm of epic proportion, by this stage the fact that they have won it's just a step above being irrilevant as too much blood has been spilled.
Basically, sure Germany is a strong state...but she can't do everything or being everywhere and she had her own postwar internal problem

I don't think lowering the voting age to 21 or perhaps having the entire Bundesrat appoint the Chancellor is particularly optimistic unless you're comparing it to the proto-nazi bullshit that people seem to accept without question.

I don't forecast sunshine and happiness, only that the winner will liberalise a touch while the loser can do whatever he wants because he's not in a position to change anything because he lacks the national power. Maybe France will flip out like Germany did and want to kill Jews and other minorities, and maybe France would even get the ball rolling on that 'project', but unlike Germany in the 30s France isn't going to be able to browbeat most of Europe and invade the rest to make this happen. Lets not forget, when we start talking about how nasty the Kaiser Reich is, that everything is relative and it was a virtual saint compared to the likes of Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Tojo.
 
So Germany somehow gets a victory that gets them Brest-Litovsk, but we don't get Communist heavy industrialization? How?

Because the Germans did not intend to let the Communists stay around for long and had the means to make someone else win the civil war.
 
Could have been better, far better in fact. Could also have been a lot worse, with liberal usage of nukes and such. There's a very wide range of possible outcomes, and A TL author can basically take his story almost everywhere he wants.
 
If German wins , chances of it liberalizing are about nil. Victory has validated the authoritarian , conservative , militarist Prussian fraction. Wiley is not going to be handing more power to the masses , that's commie talk in his/his ministers eyes. Add in the apparently held view that the eastern lands are a cow to be milked and general anti-slavism , milk and honey is not round the corner.
Astro-Hungary and the Ottomans are in an even worse state. Victory make dampen the fires for a few years but they are going to be ripped apart from within without either 180's on positions re minorities or repression that Stalin would find harsh. Again add in the former foes wanting payback in some form and ww2 is coming.
 
A while back I remember being surprised at just how much land Germany acquired upon the Russian's agreeing to the Brest-Litovsk. Germany almost doubled its size and A-H did the same. This was also prime crop land and an enormous population gain to boot. Yes, those newly acquired subjects might well be a tad... restive... under the Kaiser's rule but they'd also be vastly better off than they were under the Tsar's tender mercies.

The scenario I envisioned was Germany's offering terms to the Entente in the Spring of 1918. They did so in OTL but the terms weren't smart enough and the offensives eventually petered out such that the Entente had no compelling reason to accept them. The POD here would be more generous terms and/or more success of those offensives which culminated in a peace that was too good to say no to for the Entente.

I don't think that would've taken much on Germany's part. The B-L treaty just got Germany a huge boon and largely obviated its need for overseas holdings or commerce to enrich itself. That land gained also "validated" the whole point of the Kaiser's taking the nation to war and would justly be seen as proof of victory. To make that peace offer more palatable - and much harder to resist - the Germans would offer up Alsace-Lorraine back to France. Gaining that territory was one of the key goals for the French in the war. And the offer of finally getting it back would knock the wind out of those in France who'd argue for continued fighting.

Actually, this reminds me of something that Bill Cameron once posted to me about this subject:

Plan 1919 aside, Germany wasn't going to last past the winter. Revolutions were breaking out everywhere, dozens soldier and sailor "soviets" had been formed, the A-H Empire was in the process of dissolving, and caloric intake was dropping.

(As discussed in a very recent thread, while the official 1,000 calorie daily ration wasn't too much of a hardship for relatively sedentary urban populations, industrial, mining, and agricultural workers among others need something around 2,500 calories per day.)

MP asks about food from the Ukraine and the answer to that will illustrate just how bad Germany's condition was getting. Germany's rail network couldn't distribute the food already in Germany let alone import more food into Germany. The system had seen very heavy incessant use due to war demands, vital maintenance had been put off or skimped on, and there was no longer enough coal to meet fuel requirements.

Like it's railway system, Germany was functioning in November of 1918, but just barely functioning with a godawful system-wide wreck looming in the near future.

Basically, the B-L treaty came too late for Germany. There was no way for them to properly exploit the newly conquered lands since the German rail network couldn't even properly distribute the food and other resources in Germany, let alone import more materials into Germany. And meanwhile, more and more supplies and US reinforcements are arriving in France every day...
 
I don't think lowering the voting age to 21 or perhaps having the entire Bundesrat appoint the Chancellor is particularly optimistic unless you're comparing it to the proto-nazi bullshit that people seem to accept without question.

I don't forecast sunshine and happiness, only that the winner will liberalise a touch while the loser can do whatever he wants because he's not in a position to change anything because he lacks the national power. Maybe France will flip out like Germany did and want to kill Jews and other minorities, and maybe France would even get the ball rolling on that 'project', but unlike Germany in the 30s France isn't going to be able to browbeat most of Europe and invade the rest to make this happen. Lets not forget, when we start talking about how nasty the Kaiser Reich is, that everything is relative and it was a virtual saint compared to the likes of Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Tojo.

The fascist in Italy had come to power also thanks to a pretty liberal electoral law and the lowering of the voting age; liberalisation can't be pretty counterproductive if happen both suddenly and during a time when the old political system it's totally in shatter as this it's usually a moment went pretty radical political ideas become very popular.
Sure France in the 30's can't browbeat most of Europe...unfortunely Germany if win late in the war can't really hope to keep everything, it will be too costly expecially for people too tired of war and having their political internal fight...and i mean litteraly, plus even in case of of an extremely succesfully SPring offensive she can't really dictat the harsh term that will cripple the other continental power.
 
Basically, the B-L treaty came too late for Germany. There was no way for them to properly exploit the newly conquered lands since the German rail network couldn't even properly distribute the food and other resources in Germany, let alone import more materials into Germany. And meanwhile, more and more supplies and US reinforcements are arriving in France every day...

I suppose you could knock Russia out earlier? But you aren't getting BL. A Russian socialist democracy that holds the Caucasus and Ukraine, spending the 1920s and 1930s fomenting unrest in the Austro-Hungarian Empire... well. I am going to bet on that over the Kaiser.
 
How does Germany win in your scenario?

By sending in war experienced soldiers with heavy artillery. The early Red Army was a mob lacking discipline, basic supplies like weapons or clothes and nearly no modern artillery, let alone heavy one, against a well supplied and well lead military they melt away. The Poles managed to beat them soundly in the field without anything resembling a modern military at that time.

And why is its intervention more successful than the Allied powers?

Because nobody cares about Vladivostok and random Siberian villages. The Germans would be intervening at St. Petersburg and Moscow, places which do matter, for the Germans it's just the decision to continue walking while the Allies had to land at random places with ships only to find out they're stuck unable to do anything worthwile.
 
I suppose you could knock Russia out earlier? But you aren't getting BL. A Russian socialist democracy that holds the Caucasus and Ukraine, spending the 1920s and 1930s fomenting unrest in the Austro-Hungarian Empire... well. I am going to bet on that over the Kaiser.


Given Russia's history, is there the slightest reason to expect her to become any kind of democracy - socialist or other?

Russia was and is one of those places that oscillates between anarchy and tyranny. Once the anarchy ends, the only real question is what kind of tyranny.
 

tenthring

Banned
If German wins , chances of it liberalizing are about nil. Victory has validated the authoritarian , conservative , militarist Prussian fraction. Wiley is not going to be handing more power to the masses , that's commie talk in his/his ministers eyes. Add in the apparently held view that the eastern lands are a cow to be milked and general anti-slavism , milk and honey is not round the corner.
Astro-Hungary and the Ottomans are in an even worse state. Victory make dampen the fires for a few years but they are going to be ripped apart from within without either 180's on positions re minorities or repression that Stalin would find harsh. Again add in the former foes wanting payback in some form and ww2 is coming.

Nothing validates monarchy like having blundered into a four year war that left millions dead and Germany starving.

Germany was already liberalizing before the war. The SPD was the biggest party. One of the big reasons Germany didn't expand the army more (which would have helped in 1914) is that people knew if you let the middle class into the officer corps the monarchy was going down. The war has already brought that about.

There would be some celebrations, and the Kaiser would pat himself on the back, but ultimately he would be quietly pushed aside like he was OTL even before 1918.
 

tenthring

Banned
tenthring,

True but.. Counting on the Americans being decisive enough versus dealing with all those "fresh & victorious" Germany is transferring from the eastern front would be quite the risk for the Entente. It would be months and months before the Americans are even combat ready. And in the meantime the Germans would be pressing hard. Here's a deal on the table that gives France its key pre-war goal AND also ends the bloodletting.

Strategically, no, it would not be the most farsighted thing for the Entente to accept.

For a public looking at the millions dead and many more millions maimed for naught but a few yards gain - and with no expectation of anything other than more slaughter? The public pressure in France and the UK to stop that slaughter would be enormous.

And thus very hard to resist...

There were strong reasons to peace deals before this. There was always a trust problem though. The Germans had territory, and the Entente had time. How do you trade territory for time? Doesn't the negotiation itself take time? How do you verify and hold the other person to their word? Why shouldn't the Entente just go back on its word once some time has passed?

OTL Versailles took a long time to work out. Germany can't afford to spend March 1918 negotiating, have it fall through, and then have given up their one card for nothing. Given this, the Entente would have to disarm immediately to get Germany to the table. However, once the Entente is disarmed why should Germany give them anything. Germany can act as if Operation Michael worked and drove the British into the sea, because they is the situation they found themselves in.

The logistics of this mess make it almost impossible. Once you get into the nitty gritty, 1918 wasn't a time for peace.

I think you're best shot for a negotiated peace comes in 1916. That was the year in which the two forces were most evenly matched. The CP have scored some great victories in the east but can't knock out Russia. The Dardanelles has failed. The Western and Italian fronts have stalled. By 1916 the reality of trench warfare should be obvious. 1916 is really the tragic year in my mind.
 
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