Postwar Germany after Hitler assasination

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Deleted member 1487

All these thread about a July 20th plot continue to return to the allied demand for unconditional surrender. So what happens post-war? Lets assume that Germany fights a bit longer and more effectively, the western allies get resisted a bit less, meaning no battle of the bulge. The Soviets get chewed up worse, but the end result is the same. The holocaust gets stopped in 1944 after the July 20th plot (or July 15th if that makes things easier ;)) and Germany is led by a military dictatorship until the end of the war. Perhaps they surrender sooner, sparing Berlin the worst of the Russian invasion (this also means a Volkssturm under military command not under Goebbels).

But what does this all mean post-war? Does Germany accept the blame if the Holocaust is not experienced by the western allies personally (meaning the camps are not around for them to liberate-all the surviving inmates are shipped east. All are liberated by the Russians, so the Americans have no direct knowledge of anything to do with it. The camps, including Auschwitz, have been razed and forests planted on top)? Do the allies indoctrinate the German people with the crimes of Nazism? What kind of power dynamic are we looking at? How are hitler and the nazis remembered?
 
Stab in the Back; Hitler would've pulled the same miracles he had in 1938 and 1940, and man, wasn't Nazism a great idea?
 
Do the allies indoctrinate the German people with the crimes of Nazism?
Well, they did so in OTL, but I'd say that there would be less anti-'Prussian' agitation, which was pretty heavy in OTL, especially from the Americans.
 

Eurofed

Banned
Stab in the Back; Hitler would've pulled the same miracles he had in 1938 and 1940, and man, wasn't Nazism a great idea?

Quite unlikely, the prestige of Hitler as a military leader had plummeted among the German people after Stalingrad.

Nazism would not be regarded as a good idea by the vast majority of people, In Germany and abroad, although you can expect the neo-Nazi fringe to be a bit larger and less ostracized. Rather, Nazism and Hitler would be regarded as a somewhat more vicious version of Italian fascism, evil and megalomaniacal but not the ultimate evil, without any good evidence of the Holocaust, and the body count substantially lower.

German society would show an attitude about the war guilt that would mirror the Japanese one, half genuinely remorseful, half in ambigous but resentful denial.
 
Ineresting point Eurofed. I'd say more but the last time I started discussing the actual German's reactions to the coup I was ignored because it ignored everyone's efforts to wank the Prussian asshats.
 

Eurofed

Banned
Lets assume that Germany fights a bit longer and more effectively, the western allies get resisted a bit less, meaning no battle of the bulge. The Soviets get chewed up worse, but the end result is the same. The holocaust gets stopped in 1944 after the July 20th plot (or July 15th if that makes things easier ;)) and Germany is led by a military dictatorship until the end of the war. Perhaps they surrender sooner, sparing Berlin the worst of the Russian invasion (this also means a Volkssturm under military command not under Goebbels).

Personally I keep regarding the idea that without Hitler the post-Nazi government would still fight to the bitter end with Stauffenberg in the bunker as pure anti-German wishful thinking. At some point, the Germans leverage the political bargaining chips created by the coup and the perspective of an early end to the war into a conditional surrender in all but name, just like the Japanese got.

As I said in the other thread, the most likely outcome is a effective conditional surrender with guarantees about qualified territorial integrity that ensures the loss of Prussia and Sudetenland to mass expulsion ethnic cleansing, but a West Germany that includes Austria (possibly after a referendum) and an East Germany that includes Pomerania and Silesia.

Does Germany accept the blame if the Holocaust is not experienced by the western allies personally (meaning the camps are not around for them to liberate-all the surviving inmates are shipped east. All are liberated by the Russians, so the Americans have no direct knowledge of anything to do with it. The camps, including Auschwitz, have been razed and forests planted on top)? Do the allies indoctrinate the German people with the crimes of Nazism?

See post above. Without good direct evidence of the Holocaust, and a substantially lower body count, the blame is only about starting a vicious imperialist war (awareness of atrocities against Slavs goes substantially down to a footnote in popular culture even more than OTL), so the outcome is substantially comparable to OTL Japan: the Allies make an half-hearted indoctrination effort, but soon give up, mindful of Cold War realities, so war guilt only makes an ambigous and incomplete imprint in German mass consciousness, like in Japan. But again, the anti-German stigma in Western mass consciousness is radically lower, at the same time.

What kind of power dynamic are we looking at?

In Germany, the society is less burdened by crippling guilt, it comes to identify Stauffenberg & co. and the German Resistance as substitute role models much like France did with DeGaulle and its own Resistance. As a result, Germany is somewhat less pacifistic (but still leans that way), and a conservative antifascist center-of-right mainstream mass party exists to the right of the CDU and FDP, butterflying away the CSU (and quite possibly the FDP as well) and splitting the right-wing electorate in 2-3 halves, like in post-war France.

Outside Europe, less negative public image of Germany may easily accelerate European integration, so the European Defense/Political Community effort may be accepted by France, so European integration shall be much more federal and supranational from the start, having a full-fledged European Army around since the early-mid 1950s to mirror the economic integration.

Complete EU defense integration shall have some interesting effects on some parts of the Cold War: a) for the Soviets, it means they face a rather more efficient European arm of the NATO, so they are forced to an even more burdensome arms race, which quite likely spells a slightly earlier collapse of the Soviet bloc b) the Suez campaign and the Algerian War may be fought rather more effectively by an European Army, even if other nations within the EU could still leverage France into giving up the Canal and Algeria all the same at the end. Still, this could cause all kinds of political butterflies for Egypt, Algeria, and France.

A West Germany and EU that include Austria shall be even more economically successful; likewise, a larger East Germany with Pomerania and Silesia may be slightly more successful for the Communist bloc (since East Germany was a bit more effiicent than Communist Poland). After the reunification, this could mean an even larger economic burden for West Germany and the EU (more people and land to receive subsidies) or slighlty lesser (a slightly better East Germany).

How are hitler and the nazis remembered?

Not substantially different from the crossbreed of a more efficient and vicious Mussolini and Italian fascism, and an explicilty fascist version of Japanese militarism. Evil and megalomanical, but not the ultimate evil, an largely forgotten by popular culture after a few decades. The latter stereotype gets in large part to be gradually but only partially incarnated by Stalin and Communism, as evidence and awareness of its own atrocities grows over the decades, but for the rest, there is lingering pop-culture archetype of ultimate evil, the clichè is more spread around and sees various short-lived incarnations in the "villain of the decade". That is, until Bin Laden and Al Quaeda show up, then pop culture shall have their enduring face of ultimate evil even more so than Stalin, without (mass awareness of) the Holocaust, the Islamist atrocities shall stand up even more shocking.
 

Deleted member 1487

Not only that, but what about the East Prussia refugees? Hitler left them in place as a motivational tool for the troops, defending the civilians schtick. But the new government would make an effort to evacuate, or at least let the people leave on their own accord instead of persued by the Russians in the dead of winter with their posessions in wagons. Maybe it means more survivors and a more innundated refugee situation. Perhaps a stronger call for East Prussia's reclaimation post-war? Not only that, but perhaps the Americans make more of an effort to feed the Germans in the immediate aftermath of the war without the holocaust.

I'm not one of those that believes in the "Other Losses" thesis, but there was a large shortage of food in the immediate years after the war, causing a large number of children to die. This had less to do with the destruction of infrastructure, though massive, than a policy of punishment by the Allies. So perhaps there are even more Germans in the 50's.

But that being said, I doubt the German people would ever be pro-war after the experiences with bombings and Russian invasion. Even without the brutaler aspects of the Goetterdaemmerung, the end game period in '45, the trauma of the war and subsequent occupation really took that spirit out of the people. Not only that, but Band of Brothers losses it's most poignant episode "Why We Fight". Perhaps a stronger US-German relationship post-war?

Edit: Maybe the Western Allies are stronger in their demand for the return of German POW's in Russia. Many weren't returned until the 50's and several hundreds of thousands died in captivity. Not to mention what the French did with the Germans and mine clearing and mistreatment after the war, so maybe that doesn't happen as widely either.
 
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But what does this all mean post-war? Does Germany accept the blame if the Holocaust is not experienced by the western allies personally (meaning the camps are not around for them to liberate-all the surviving inmates are shipped east. All are liberated by the Russians, so the Americans have no direct knowledge of anything to do with it.
Qwll, there will be people in those camps from western areas, who will report on the situation in the camps, eventually. I don't think it will be as diminished as the other guys think; though yes, it would be somewhat. It will still at least thoroughly discredit anti-semitism as in OTL.

I do wonder what kind of impact this would have on the formation of Israel.
 

Eurofed

Banned
Ineresting point Eurofed. I'd say more but the last time I started discussing the actual German's reactions to the coup I was ignored because it ignored everyone's efforts to wank the Prussian asshats.

As an Europhile and Germanophile, this is the part that I can't really suffer about Valkyrie discussions, the wishful expectation that the coup must fail or be without any real effect, so that Germany (and Central-Eastern Europe) may be screwed as thoroughly as they were OTL and the guilt for Nazi crimes purified in a barbaric orgy of fire and blood, notwithstanding the lasting damage to Europe (roast in Hell for that, FDR).

I tend to chalk it to a nasty combination of Allied (essentially Soviet) wankage, anti-fascist/Prussian Germanophobia, and vengeful Slav nationalism (see the efforts of the Polish Wikipedia Conspiracy to paint Stauffenberg as a crypto-Nazi. Sorry guys, a desire for the 1914 borders does not a Nazi make).
 
It's really ironic how often I get called a Germanophobe in these threads.

I freely admit I think that the German slide into barbarism was inevitable, with its people only purified by the righteous bombings of the B-24. There were no wise German statesmen who could have averted Hitlerism. Nope. None. Predetermined from Tannenberg, or, being charitable, 1919.

I suppose the love of the generals who had no problem looting and raping their way across the steppes can be chalked up to the fact that the SPD is less sexy.
 
Faeelin,

You're not the only Valkyrie-critic though.

CanadianGoose fits Eurofed's derision well, although his nationalism is specifically Russian and is VERY anti-Eastern European.

(In the most recent eruption--this one pertaining to Stalin's terror-famine--he claims the higher-end figures were invented by SS men retained by the Nazis and acts as though it was wrong for Eastern Europeans to resist Soviet conquest)
 

Typo

Banned
Yeah, it would actually be interesting to know exact what cause the strong feeling of Germanophile on those boards.
 

Eurofed

Banned
I do wonder what kind of impact this would have on the formation of Israel.

At present, I'm not precisely aware of how many extra European Jews would survive if the Holocaust is cut short in July 1944. As a very rough guess, I'd say at least an half. The vast majority of them shall find themselves in Soviet occupied territory, so it basically goes down to what Stalin wants to do with them. Since Soviet policy was strongly pro-Sionist in 1945-49 (before Stalin's paranoia grew to include antisemitism), I would exce that he leaves them free to reach Israel. All those extra Jewish refugees most likely counterbalance the effects of less Western pro-Sionist goodwill due to lack of direct evidence of the Holocaust, so Israel still happens, but maybe becomes a non-Communist Soviet statellite in the first decade of its existence (afterwards, I expect it to swing to its OTL pro-Western stance). With all those extra potential soldiers, I do expect Israel to win a total victory in the War of Independence, conquering the West Bank as well.
 
Yeah, it would actually be interesting to know exact what cause the strong feeling of Germanophile on those boards.

Wunderwaffen! And my guess is a fair amount of imbibing propaganda about how the millions of victims of he regime, especially Eastern Europeans, weren't quite equal to Anglo-Saxons.

The people Guderian had killed so he could confiscate their estate? Untermenschen, after all. The people Von Stauffenberg joyfully wrote about putting to work as serfs? Eh. Lice, at best.
 

Eurofed

Banned
It's really ironic how often I get called a Germanophobe in these threads.

But as others have pointed out, the object of my scorn isn't you. ;)

I freely admit I think that the German slide into barbarism was inevitable, with its people only purified by the righteous bombings of the B-24. There were no wise German statesmen who could have averted Hitlerism. Nope. None. Predetermined from Tannenberg, or, being charitable, 1919.

I think this stance is too radical. What was perhaps inevitable (unless Versailles is made much less harsh) was the takeover by an authoritarian German right-wing revanchist regime, but genocidal Nazism itself was fully avoidable. With the right butterflies, you can still have a sane regime that shall still claim Austria, Sudetenland, and wage a limited war or wrestle a Munich II settlement against Poland to recover the Corridor, than squats content on its gain without piking a fight with Stalin, until inevitable return to democracy happens in the next generation.

I suppose the love of the generals who had no problem looting and raping their way across the steppes can be chalked up to the fact that the SPD is less sexy.

I claim the Gorbachev and Mandela argument. About the first, I fully agree that the fall of the Nazi by means of a grassroots revolution lead by the SPD-CDU underground would be more morally uplifting, but that would be ASB, the Army was the only agent able to bring down the Nazis. Therefore, I am more than willing to write a pardon for the flaws of the generals if they oust the Nazis and make an early end to the WWII carnage and contain the lasting damage to Europe, just like I accept the same deal for the reformist Communists that brought down the Soviet monster.

About the second, when a vicious dictatorship has a change to go down, one must cheer for the solution that allows to contain the damage from the regime and its collapse the most, not the one that allows most radical justice, no matter the collateral damage. History shows that tyrannies that are ousted by radicals that brook no compromise for the past for the sake of pacification and go for savage "purifications" always build tyrannies, injustices and body counts as bad as or worse than the tyrants they ousted. See: Robespierre, Lenin, Mao, Castro, Pol Pot, Khomeini.

Just saving all those extra Holocaust victims is well worth writing a blank-check pardon for the crimes of the Heer in Eastern Europe. After all, nobody ever paid for the crimes of Stalinism.
 

Eurofed

Banned
Wunderwaffen! And my guess is a fair amount of imbibing propaganda about how the millions of victims of he regime, especially Eastern Europeans, weren't quite equal to Anglo-Saxons.

Better to have some extra millions of Holocaust victims and civilian victims of the war to die, not to mention bringing the joys of Stalinism to the Elbe, so the crimes of Germany in Eastern Europe can be properly avenged and purified in an orgy of blood and fire amid the ruins of Berlin, eh ? Now, that's an "interesting" double standard. No matter how you wrap it, "fiat justitia, pereat mundus" is an an asshat philosophy.
 
I think this stance is too radical. What was perhaps inevitable (unless Versailles is made much less harsh) was the takeover by an authoritarian German right-wing revanchist regime, but genocidal Nazism itself was fully avoidable. With the right butterflies, you can still have a sane regime that shall still claim Austria, Sudetenland, and wage a limited war or wrestle a Munich II settlement against Poland to recover the Corridor, than squats content on its gain without piking a fight with Stalin, until inevitable return to democracy happens in the next generation.

I think he was being sarcastic. That's why he mentioned the SPD.
 
The German generals, who have given the study of the war a huge Germanophillic slant until relavtively recently, but also early cold war propaganda, which disquietingly easily adopted some of Nazism's themes about the USSR.

'Tis possible.

However, the propaganda sword cuts both ways. Look at CanadianGoose, who was brought up in the Soviet Union.

He claims that enables him to spot BS better, but I get a distinct USSR/Russia uber alles vibe (he regularly denounces the Baltic States, for example).
 
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