Three way World War Two

If this has been discussed already forgive me. But, I was wondering how can we get the Western Allies to fight the Soviets and the Axis at the same time, and who would win? This has been something on my mind for along time.
 
A truly three-cornered war has been discussed, as has the "USSR Axis" idea.

The obvious PoD would be either a Western Declaration of War on the USSR due to their invasion of Poland (after all, that was the official reason for the DoW on Germany), or due to their invasion of Finland later that year. There were actually Entente plans to intervene in the Winter War on the Finnish side.

The end result, IMO, would depend heavily on whether Hitler still invaded the USSR circa 1941. "What?" you ask "Who would be insane enough to declare war on one of his co-belligerents!?" and I answer: Hitler was that insane. Whether he'd act on that insanity is, of course, uncertain.

Do the Japanese still declare war on the US, UK, and Netherlands? Probably.

Does Hitler still declare war on the US? Who knows?

There are a lot of major changes that could happen, and I'm sure there is some avenue that hasn't been explored in the various threads yet.
 
A truly three-cornered war has been discussed, as has the "USSR Axis" idea.

The obvious PoD would be either a Western Declaration of War on the USSR due to their invasion of Poland (after all, that was the official reason for the DoW on Germany), or due to their invasion of Finland later that year. There were actually Entente plans to intervene in the Winter War on the Finnish side.

The end result, IMO, would depend heavily on whether Hitler still invaded the USSR circa 1941. "What?" you ask "Who would be insane enough to declare war on one of his co-belligerents!?" and I answer: Hitler was that insane. Whether he'd act on that insanity is, of course, uncertain.

Do the Japanese still declare war on the US, UK, and Netherlands? Probably.

Does Hitler still declare war on the US? Who knows?

There are a lot of major changes that could happen, and I'm sure there is some avenue that hasn't been explored in the various threads yet.
Thanks for the reply, so in the long run do you think the allies will win, even if the Second world war lasts one or two more years longer?
 
I'm not even sure if it will last that much longer. The Soviet union will be having it quite rough without US aid (or worse, US animosity). I also wouldn't want to be Chinese in such a TL.
 
I'm not even sure if it will last that much longer. The Soviet union will be having it quite rough without US aid (or worse, US animosity). I also wouldn't want to be Chinese in such a TL.
I agree with that about the Chinese, and the Soveits I think might end up like Mao I think and try to form a gurrilla force that would go against both sides.
 
You could have the allies declare war in order to support Finland during the Winter War. Had Norway and Sweden agreed to allow British and French troops access this would have likely happened in OTL.
 

Anaxagoras

Banned
IIRC, there was a proposal by France and the UK to bomb the oil fields at Baku in 1940, since these were supplying the Germans with the bulk of their fuel at the time. Obviously a pretty stupid idea.
 
Assuming Barbarossa still happens, the Allies would win World War II; whether no Lend-Lease and any other effects of Allied hostility is enough is enough to tip the balance in the Nazi-Soviet war is an open question, but whichever side wins is going to have been completely gutted in the process, and easy pickings for the Allies.
 
Thanks for the reply, so in the long run do you think the allies will win, even if the Second world war lasts one or two more years longer?

The odds are very strongly in favor of the western allies winning the war with a PoD close to the start of it. The combined technological, industrial, geographic, and leadership picture gave them a number of powerful advantages.

There are a lot of paths you can go down - if the five major power blocs (US, Entente, Axis, USSR, Japan) don't line up as they were at the end of 1941, a LOT is going to change.

Big questions to answer:

When does the US join the war? As long as FDR lives and the Entente don't do something massively stupid, the US is almost certain to wind up at war with Germany at some point.

Is it a three (or more) way war, with each power at war with all the others, or a two-and-a-half war, with the Entente (and later US) at war with both the Axis and the USSR, but the USSR and Germany at least neutral towards each other?

How does Japan fit in? WWII can't really go well for them, but they're a bit of a wild card. A more internationally minded government might plausibly come to power and seek alignment with any of the other four blocs to fight one or more of the others; some of those alliances may be hard to swallow (especially Japan aligned with the USSR), but remember they sided with the Entente in WWI. Realpolitik can make for strange alliances. Who they side with (or against) and when will certainly have an impact on the entire shape of the war.

Is the atomic bomb developed roughly on OTLs schedule? While the practical effects of the 1st generation bombs weren't all that impressive from a purely military standpoint, their political and psychological effect was huge. Any PoD before August 2, 1939 might have as a butterfly preventing the "Einstein letter" from reaching FDR, and even PoDs after that could easily result in a slower (or faster) Manhattan Project for a variety of reasons. Just as one example: it is pretty clear today that the KGB had the Manhattan project thoroughly penetrated. If they were hostile to the US instead of semi-allied, might they sabotage it? One small bomb blowing up the right room of scientists and engineers might delay the project by years.
 
I'm thinking, a cruise for a new US carrier, French/English worry sink it, causing a German-American-Italian-(Japan?) Alliance.
 

Laurentia

Banned
I'm thinking, a cruise for a new US carrier, French/English worry sink it, causing a German-American-Italian-(Japan?) Alliance.

No. The Allies are not going to sink an American Carrier. They know America is not going to side with tyrannical, genocidal maniacs, so there's no reason to worry.
 
No. The Allies are not going to sink an American Carrier. They know America is not going to side with tyrannical, genocidal maniacs, so there's no reason to worry.

Exactly this; you would need a much bigger PoD to make the Allies even consider something as insane as launching an unprovoked attack on the US.
 
The odds are very strongly in favor of the western allies winning the war with a PoD close to the start of it. The combined technological, industrial, geographic, and leadership picture gave them a number of powerful advantages.

There are a lot of paths you can go down - if the five major power blocs (US, Entente, Axis, USSR, Japan) don't line up as they were at the end of 1941, a LOT is going to change.

Big questions to answer:

When does the US join the war? As long as FDR lives and the Entente don't do something massively stupid, the US is almost certain to wind up at war with Germany at some point.

Is it a three (or more) way war, with each power at war with all the others, or a two-and-a-half war, with the Entente (and later US) at war with both the Axis and the USSR, but the USSR and Germany at least neutral towards each other?

How does Japan fit in? WWII can't really go well for them, but they're a bit of a wild card. A more internationally minded government might plausibly come to power and seek alignment with any of the other four blocs to fight one or more of the others; some of those alliances may be hard to swallow (especially Japan aligned with the USSR), but remember they sided with the Entente in WWI. Realpolitik can make for strange alliances. Who they side with (or against) and when will certainly have an impact on the entire shape of the war.

Is the atomic bomb developed roughly on OTLs schedule? While the practical effects of the 1st generation bombs weren't all that impressive from a purely military standpoint, their political and psychological effect was huge. Any PoD before August 2, 1939 might have as a butterfly preventing the "Einstein letter" from reaching FDR, and even PoDs after that could easily result in a slower (or faster) Manhattan Project for a variety of reasons. Just as one example: it is pretty clear today that the KGB had the Manhattan project thoroughly penetrated. If they were hostile to the US instead of semi-allied, might they sabotage it? One small bomb blowing up the right room of scientists and engineers might delay the project by years.

Thanks for answering, I suppose a two and half way war as Japan and the USSR would remain netrual and I was thinking that the U.S. sides with the Brits and the French against both of the Axis and the USSR and Japan. The U.S. still joins as old timeline and the U.S. still gets the bomb eventually. What I was thinking with this is the destruction of both Communism and Fascist/Nazism at the same time and the Allies liberating not only comentration camps but Soviet gulags as they invade Kamchaka and Siberia and push East and eventually having the Nazis and the Soviets fighting one another and slowly being bombed and bleed to death as the Allies close in on their capitals. Japan can also be invaded as well from the North.
 
Top