No Hitler: How long will Weimar last?

This actually makes absolutly no sense. You somehow assume that without WWII, there would have been a made race towards the development of nuclear weapons. I would think, without WWII, the development of nuclear weapons could be significantly delayed. Consider the massive amount of resources the US did allocate towards the Manhattan project, what European nation would deliberately do that?

Actually this (a European nuke race in the late 1940s/early 1950s) makes a great deal of sense. Notice the time frame: Late 1940s/early 1950s. That's roughly 5-10 years after the historic bomb. Historically, the first British nuke weapons test was in 1952. This was the product of a financially ruined country that was losing its empire. There are factors you can cite that might move the date back or forth a few years, but the reality is that European powers were quite capable of building nukes eventually and would have done so. Exactly when? I don't know. Maybe around 1952 when the British historically did. Maybe a little earlier given an intact and financially stronger British empire. Maybe a little later because the bomb hadn't been proven feasible by the US.

If you think early 1950s is too soon, plug in the late 1950s. It doesn't change the problem. In the absence of a World War II equivalent, Europe would still be full of unresolved border disputes, nationalism and suspicions. It would still be full of cities and industries that in an era of nukes, jets and ballistic missiles (even ones with a range in the hundreds rather than the thousands of miles) would be seconds away from devastation a quantum leap more thorough than anything conventional explosives can do.

Do you really think the French would risk letting the Germans have that kind of power over them? Of course the French would try for nukes. Do you really think the Germans, no matter who is in charge, would risk letting the French and/or the Soviets have that kind of power over them? Of course the Germans would try for nukes. Every country with the scientific/industrial ability would be forced to go for nukes, even if they really didn't want to, and even if they publicly tried to stop development, because the risk of letting potential enemies get a multi-year head start was too high.

If you don't buy this scenario, try playing it through. There is this huge potential for power, both for peaceful purposes and for war. The science gradually gets more and more clear and solid. As the leader of a European Great Power, you (a) Trust your neighbors not to research it, or (b) You finance research--low key stuff at first, kind of an insurance policy so you don't get blind-sided. You find out, or suspect that a potential enemy has a nuke program of unknown size and sophistication. Your intelligence community exaggerates the probable size of the other side's effort (inevitable, that's how intelligence budgets grow). At that point you can figure that the intelligence people are wrong and avoid escalating the race, but that's dangerous. If you're in charge of France and Germany gets nukes before you do, what are they going to demand? They can have anything they want because your cities are held hostage. Can you risk being in that situation? I've tried various scenarios, and I can't find a realistic one where the old Europe with the competing Great Powers can go into a nuclear age without an arms race, and a very significant risk of a nuke war.

Also, I think the idea that Germany would inevitably have been a warmonger that attacked it's neighbours - even without Hitler - is fairly implausible. Even if there is an authoritarian (perhaps monarchist?) regime that takes over Germany in the 1930s, they'd probably have been content with Austria and the Sudetenland. Don't forget, what really made WWII start was - in the end - Hitler himself.

You're kind of putting words in my mouth here if you're responding to me here. The dynamics of a nuke race in Europe doesn't require a warmonger. It just requires deep mutual distrust, which there was plenty of after all of the centuries of European warfare.

That being said, the Germans at some point would probably want changes to their border with Poland. Silesia was just too economically valuable and had too many Germans to allow it to stay in Polish hands.
 
In the absence of a World War II equivalent, Europe would still be full of unresolved border disputes, nationalism and suspicions.

Mmmm. You know, I have to wonder. OTL's Europe managed to get through the 1920s without poison gas raining down upon cities; Germany managed to get along with its neighbors pretty well during this period (and by 1929 there were prominent Germans who thought the Eastern Border might be permanent). Yugoslavia didn't collapse; Hungary didn't annex its neighbors.

And yet Locarno was signed; poison gas was banned in warfare; The Washington Naval Treaty took place; etc.


I've tried various scenarios, and I can't find a realistic one where the old Europe with the competing Great Powers can go into a nuclear age without an arms race, and a very significant risk of a nuke war.

It's simple, really.

Look for the Union label...
 
I strongly agree with Faelin. For different kinds of reasons, a European war different from our WW2 is possible and imaginable, but simply as a result of a nuclear arms snail-race?

Now please can anyone give me an example for a war breaking out simply because a new weapon had been developed in the meanwhile? Now, additionally, if this new weapon is of unheard potential?

So the rationale would go "He, we have lived in peace in europe for more than 30 years now and resolved most differences without war during that time....now that we have a weapon which can wipe out all major cities on the continent, let's go and use it directly to destroy civilization once and for all."

Not even North Korea does this.

Of course, the Nazis would be perfectly able to have a first strike policy as soon as they have their hands on the thing, but we postulate a different political development in Germany here.
 
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