Russians in Manchuria? Looks like the Japanese are gonna march in after all.
"Our Struggle": What If Hitler Had Been a Communist?
- Thread starter The Red
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Indeed. Besides the Third Reich (hell, even with it depending on what you read), Imperial Japan was probably the most fanatically anti-communist power in the world during this time. Having the Soviets actively interfering in Manchuria and sponsoring a Communist state right there on the border of their colony in Korea (and threatening the rest of their interests in China) is going to laser-focus Japan's efforts northwards towards stopping them. I would bet that as a result, Japan would maintain its focus on the 'Northern Expansion Doctrine' into Manchuria and Siberia that it had OTL pre-Khalkin Gol, with the accompanying pre-eminence of the Army over the Navy, instead of the swing to the south and Pacific that brought it into conflict with the United States and the Western European colonial powers. I don't know if this would totally butterfly the Pacific War of OTL or prevent the breakdown of Japan's relations with the US and Europe (which weren't in great shape even pre-1937), but at the very least the Asia-Pacific theater is shaping up to play out very differently.
If the Japanese are eventually going to go head to head with the Soviets and Communist Koreans/Chinese then the Allies may turn a blind eye to whatever the Japanese do in Manchuria. The thing the Japanese need to be on an equal footing once war breaks out is some advancement in armor. Japanese tanks OTL were not very good and lightly armed and armored. It would be ironic if Japan received Lend-Lease from the U.S. to combat militant communism.
Great chapter, The Red!
Great chapter, The Red!
They were not because most of the time in fighting other Asians and European Colonial Powers outnumbered, they did not have to be that good. Also they were what the Japanese could most easily and efficient transport quickly, that was one of the reasons why the medium and heavy (in Japanese words) tanks remained on the main Home Island as well beside a fear of enemies invading there. They lacked the means to transport many of them offworld to some island base at all.
That makes sense, but if Japan is fighting USSR/CCP/Korean Communists then it will need some form of medium tank to at least help level the playing field. The Type 4 Chi-To looks promising but that won't be produced until 1943 if it follows OTL schedule, but with a need on tanks in northern China and with American/French/British advisors, it could be made ready by 1941 or '42.
Oh right, well I imagine each regime will try and stick to their European homelands rather than re-establishing themselves in Africa. That said the colonial policies of each were rather different, with the French trying to instill an image of Algeria as just another part of France divided by a particularly big river whilst the Italians were focusing on Libya as their 'Fourth Shore' with plans for even more aggressive colonisation which included the genocide and Italianisation of the Libyan peoples. The Portuguese in Angola were conversely moving towards apartheid at this juncture and although it was a settler colony the settlers were primarily male (The M:F ratio was just over 1.5/1 in 1940) and the bureaucracy was not only trained in Lisbon but almost entirely from Portugal as well. Creating an 'exile state' there would be a complete reversal of policy at a time when the local Angolan and mestiço populations were already facing severe economic and political disenfranchisement.
To be fair the OTL Morgenthau plan was seriously considered but there's a lot of reasons to be sceptical about its role in stiffening German resistance in the last months of 1944. Or at the very least it was one of many factors.
Yeah, here's a rough map detailing zones of influence in Manchuria by the end of 1932 with the Soviet-backed Down-with-Imperialism Union/Northeast Anti-Japanese United Army in red, the Kwantung Army in mustard and Zhang Xueliang's forces in blue. The Japanese have tried to react with there's a general bitterness about having missed the bus whilst the 'Young Marshal' has retreated to the west with his forces intact.
Thanks!
You're both right. Japanese tank development lost priority to the Navy shortly after Khalkhin Gol had revealed glaring issues which left the Japanese fielding largely light and outdated designs for much of the war. However the Pacific theatre also didn't call for large numbers of modern medium/heavy tanks whilst the Chinese had few tanks of their own to challenge what the Japanese already had. This wasn't to say development didn't continue but it was piecemeal and underfunded, managing to come up with some innovative designs by the end of the war which were earmarked for the defence of the Home Islands. Presumably the Japanese were going to fuel them with strawberry seed oil.
At any rate the Kwantung Army were left fighting off the Red Army in 1945 with largely the same tanks they had had in 1939 and this went as well as expected but if the Soviets have remained the primary enemy I could see the focus remaining on armoured development with Japan's industry backing that up but I'm sure they would happily accept some Shermans as well.
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Oh that's funny, so it's literally going to be a communist Manchukuo, a state bounded at Manchuria but not necessarily attached to the "broader revolution in China". Be interesting if they imported Stalin's nationality model, a Korean SSR may get assigned to the Korean independence/farmer protection militias. Wonder if there's still a contiguous population big enough for a Manchu SSR. The Khinggan could be home to a Mongol SSR depending on how things turn out there.
Speaking of the Khinggan, Zhang's in a rough spot. The KMT will take him back if only to prove their independence to the Japanese but he'll have to retreat soon, out among the Mongolian goatherds there's not much industry or anything for him to make use of.
Speaking of the Khinggan, Zhang's in a rough spot. The KMT will take him back if only to prove their independence to the Japanese but he'll have to retreat soon, out among the Mongolian goatherds there's not much industry or anything for him to make use of.
Since I'm new to the TL, I have to say, this situation would be absolutely wonderful for Stalin. He tried to reach the German communists in Poland in 1920, that failed. Never forget this passage from Stalin's works.
"If there is one place where a start can be made to arouse Europe to revolution, that place is Germany . . . and victory of the revolution in Germany will guarantee the victory of world revolution."
Hitler will be Stalin's ambitious lieutenant, that much is certain, but there is no doubt in my mind that Stalin will have Hitler firmly under his thumb. In a war between Germany and the Soviet Union, Germany has a snowball's chance in hell. So he's not going to fight him. He is going to be the Icebreaker of the Revolution. They will break the barrier states between them, and once the revolutionary states have been joined, nothing will be able to stop them from conquering all Europe.
"If there is one place where a start can be made to arouse Europe to revolution, that place is Germany . . . and victory of the revolution in Germany will guarantee the victory of world revolution."
Hitler will be Stalin's ambitious lieutenant, that much is certain, but there is no doubt in my mind that Stalin will have Hitler firmly under his thumb. In a war between Germany and the Soviet Union, Germany has a snowball's chance in hell. So he's not going to fight him. He is going to be the Icebreaker of the Revolution. They will break the barrier states between them, and once the revolutionary states have been joined, nothing will be able to stop them from conquering all Europe.
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Pretty much. There's not going to be a march on Nanking from Manchuria anytime soon but it is another headache for Chiang and something for CCP morale even if they're not getting much of a material benefit from it.
I could see that being more trouble than it's worth. A Manchurian People's Republic can be emphasised on its geographical location to a certain extent but to then have a separate Korean republic could end up causing a rift with the CCP on the Soviet's intentions actually are. Party for this reason I also couldn't see the territory being incorporated into the Soviet Union directly but also because the aims of the Soviet involvement are better served with having it as a buffer state. An alternative Korean government-in-exile backed by Moscow with forward bases on the Korean border could end up having a lot more clout than one based in Shanghai however.
Yeah, it's partly a matter of prestige but Zhang's army can't live off the land and it's going to hard for Chiang to maintain his army when he has more pressing concerns. They'll likely end up retreating further soon, perhaps leaving a small KMT-affiliated force behind.
Whilst there was some talk about marching through Poland to link up with the German Communists it's hard to say how seriously it was really entertained. Stalin certainly wasn't a fan of the idea, he was wary of advancing on Warsaw as it was:
Situation on the South-Western Front; June 24 said:
Would you happen to know which of Stalin's works this is from? I tried to have a look myself but couldn't seem to find it.
The relationship isn't that one-sided but they do ultimately need one another. Although Hitler may well see himself as the "icebreaker" of the global revolution it might not be a role that Stalin is keen for him to embrace.
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I'm not familiar with @Praetor98 's exact chain of citations but a brief search yields this:
If there is one place where a start can be made to arouse Europe to revolution, that place is Germany… and victory of the revolution in Germany will guarantee the victory of world revolution.
STALIN (Sochineniya, Vol. 6, p. 267)
There are two places I've found which make the claim that Stalin said these words: one, in a book by Viktor Suvorov (who presumably needs no introduction—in case he does, he's a famous Nazi apologist); the other, on a charming website called Jew-wise, whose self-description is "Educating people about the Global Lying Jew Mafia". Given these impeccably trustworthy sources, one might just start to doubt the truth of this quotation.
(I don't mean to be nasty to Praetor98, by the way. Nazi apologists are good at inventing complete lies and pretending they're from real sources. It's an easy mistake to make. And of course, if anyone finds this quotation in the actual work of Stalin, I'm happy to be corrected. )
With the aid of the reference to Volume 6 I think I might have found the original quote:
Speech to the Communist Party of Poland said:
Given his reputation for taking quotes out of context and outright fabrications I wouldn't be surprised if Suvorov was the one to change the quote and that's where his fellow travellers got it from. Granted he has managed to pass himself off as a credible historian in the past so it's possible a more benign source has used his misquotation without thinking anything of it.
I see no Nazi apologia in Suvorov's works. In fact he said in his book Icebreaker that the work of chasing the nazi criminals must be continued and stepped up. He also makes no bones about the fact that Hitler was a mass murderer.
And yes, I know he is a propagandist. Ex-GRU or not, he is still a spook and must be treated as such. But even a propagandist can be right sometimes.
Claiming Barbarossa was a pre-emptive strike is about as Nazi apologist as you can get, there's a reason that he keeps getting brought up on far-right websites.
Oh no, he hates the nazis from what I could see when I read the book. He openly calls the SS a bunch of murdering thugs. He also said Germany started the war.
But perhaps we ought to take this to Chat?
He uses anecdotes, assumptions and fabricated evidence to claim that the Nazi war of conquest and genocide against the Soviet Union was actually defensive in nature.
Really? From what I can see, he says Hitler intended to do that anyway, but that Stalin made him attack before he was ready. He does reference Mein Kampf after all.
His thesis relies on ignoring the evidence that the Nazis were planning to attack the Soviets in 1941 and had no belief that the Soviets were going to attack them. He establishes this partly by citing those such as Keitel who publicly claimed the war against the Soviets was defensive but then ignores Keitel's own private material stating the attack against the Soviet Union was planned with conquest in mind and was not pre-emptive. In doing so he cites the view that head Nazis were trying to peddle and goes as far as to say that Keitel was executed at Nuremburg to help cover this up. He can dance around it however he likes but he used Nazi lies as a basis for his thesis which paints the Nazis in a more favourable light. It's hardly the most subtle dogwhistling I've ever seen.
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