What if Soviets Invade Poland First?

Any way Stalin does the purge earlier?
The early 30s were the difficult years of industrialization and collectivization, when many critics of the USSR abroad were predicting failure. Carrying out the Great Purges at that point would have probably resulted in Stalin's removal.

The years 1936-38 were actually "ideal" because:

1. Hitler had come to power in 1933, thus many were able to justify the purges with "even if innocent people die, we need to ensure there's no treason whatsoever when Hitler attacks us."
2. The turmoil of the early 30s had been overcome.
3. There was actually an increased "openness" in parts of Soviet society after 1934, e.g. the new constitution, which gave the impression that the Soviet government was emphasizing the unity of the whole people for domestic construction and against foreign threats now that it argued socialism was built and exploiting classes abolished.
 
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If Poland and Germany formed alliance (not ruled out if, say Göring took power in Germany) cautious Stalin would be even less likely to invade.
 
The WAllies likely are forced into a confrontation with the Soviets. The Germans will definitely use the Soviet pressure to attempt an alliance allowing the Germans to strike through and attack the USSR. Strangely, we could see the Nazis and WAllies fighting the same enemy.
A cold war between the USA and The Reich.
 
if the soviets attacked with out insanely good reason, and then let's just say that Hitler plans it out, but goats the soviets to attack first into Poland. then hitler stands and complains and points fingers to the east, the west might be hard pressed to ignore with hitler trying to look like the guy of reason and protector of Poland as he sits and waits.

the Soviets are going to just stop and say .. eh.. oops? They want Poland just as much, so at that point its all in.

So do the French, British and Germans go in? or do the Brits and French green light the Germans?

lots of options, including up to lots of bluster but a defeated Poland making concessions to the soviets and others who pick off bits, including the Germans who take the corridor and possibly Posen
 
Still have the economy to deal with too.
Even if the Reich falls, they are in a really good position, look at Germany today, say the reich collapses in 1960, by 1980 we probably would have Germany be the second most powerful economy in the world.
 
Still have the economy to deal with too.

Well if Hitler is dead then its highly likely Goring will become Fuhrer as thus he can't continue being head of the economy. Hopefully he will give it back to Schacht. Unlikely, they didn't like eachother very much. But naoyne besides Goring is better.

But thats why Himmler needs to go too as he might become Fuhrer instead and Goring keeps doing what he was doing.
 
And Göring. And God knows who else.
It wasn't a one-man party, you know.
Being wealthly and powerful person is enough to satisfy Göring's anbitions. As dictator of Germany he'll just enjoy his wealth and position and would not risk losing it trying to conquer the world. It is why he is far less dangerous than Hitler.
 
Even if the Reich falls, they are in a really good position, look at Germany today, say the reich collapses in 1960, by 1980 we probably would have Germany be the second most powerful economy in the world.
After three decades of Nazi idiocy driving the country into the ground? Pull the other one.

One reason they were so reluctant to go to war against Hitler was precisely their fear of Bolshevism.

Yes, one reason. They also simply weren't ready for a war. The militaries of Britain and France were still being rebuilt by the late 1930s after the Depression, and they couldn't confront Germany even as late as Munich (or so they thought at least). The Soviets are more powerful than the Germany of 1938 was, and a lot harder to get to. And in this universe if something prevented early German aggression that rearmament is going to come later, not sooner, meaning the UK and France will be even less ready to fight the USSR if it invades Poland.
 
Being wealthly and powerful person is enough to satisfy Göring's anbitions. As dictator of Germany he'll just enjoy his wealth and position and would not risk losing it trying to conquer the world. It is why he is far less dangerous than Hitler.
Donitz and maybe Ribbentrop probably would have been decent leaders.
 
3 decades of bad economic policy arguably not as detrimental as the entire country being destroyed in the world war

The country was rebuilt following said World War as part of the Allied need for another ally against the Soviets in OTL. And saying the Nazis had bad economic policy is like saying the sun is warm. The economic policies followed by the Nazis were going to be disastrous in the long-term. More than any other ideology Nazism revolved around what the ideology says over reality. It was worse than any form of communism by far in this regard, and most others really. The entire economy by the time war broke out OTL revolved around looting conquered countries because they couldn't keep the economy going without that influx of money and resources, with what couldn't be stolen made up for by slave labor. Without the war do you think this instability is suddenly going to go away?

Hitler was not the be-all end-all of Nazi idiocy. Goering was not some masterful genius who was going to fix everything if he came into power (I also find the idea he would have avoided war to be laughable). The reality is that despite all these "well if this person had gotten into power things would have been fine" the Nazis were ALL a group of amoral psychopaths who lived in a delusional fantasyland with no relation to reality. Hitler was simply the most charismatic of the bunch, he was not magically worse than the rest.
 
Yes, one reason. They also simply weren't ready for a war. The militaries of Britain and France were still being rebuilt by the late 1930s after the Depression, and they couldn't confront Germany even as late as Munich (or so they thought at least). The Soviets are more powerful than the Germany of 1938 was, and a lot harder to get to. And in this universe if something prevented early German aggression that rearmament is going to come later, not sooner, meaning the UK and France will be even less ready to fight the USSR if it invades Poland.

The question isn't whether France and the UK by themselves could successfully fight Stalin over Poland but whether they could do so in cooperation with Hitler and the Poles. For Germany is going to be rearmed by this time, and it will be easy for Hitler to proclaim himself the savior of Poland (with which he got along fairly well in OTL before 1939) and of Europe against Bolshevism....
 
The country was rebuilt following said World War as part of the Allied need for another ally against the Soviets in OTL. And saying the Nazis had bad economic policy is like saying the sun is warm. The economic policies followed by the Nazis were going to be disastrous in the long-term. More than any other ideology Nazism revolved around what the ideology says over reality. It was worse than any form of communism by far in this regard, and most others really. The entire economy by the time war broke out OTL revolved around looting conquered countries because they couldn't keep the economy going without that influx of money and resources, with what couldn't be stolen made up for by slave labor. Without the war do you think this instability is suddenly going to go away?

Hitler was not the be-all end-all of Nazi idiocy. Goering was not some masterful genius who was going to fix everything if he came into power (I also find the idea he would have avoided war to be laughable). The reality is that despite all these "well if this person had gotten into power things would have been fine" the Nazis were ALL a group of amoral psychopaths who lived in a delusional fantasyland with no relation to reality. Hitler was simply the most charismatic of the bunch, he was not magically worse than the rest.
Well obviously the war would occur if they continued down the same path. An ideological shift caused by a different leader would be the only way war is avoided. There are many military leaders who could have accomplished this, and some of the Nazi party not in the inner circle, who were all essentially yes men to each other.
 
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