WI after allied defeat after the battle of the bulge Germany is nuked

So if the allies by some manner manage to lose at the battle of the bulge how likely do you think it is that the allies will use a nuclear weapon on Germany?
 
Maybe the Russians do less well?

sure, you can throw that at it, make the war last longer. But then the question will be how badly beaten are the Germans(meaning how close are the allies to berlin) for them to drp the bomb on germany anyway, instead of a more obvious, stubborn target like Japan?
 

Redbeard

Banned
If Germany still has control over its territory and access to strategic materials as first half of OTL 1944 then I doubt you could nuke Germany into submission and certainly not with the nukes available in 1945. But if the Bulge fails for the Wallies I guess the most likely outcome is the Russians reaching much further west.

I say "first half of 1944" because German production peaked in 1944 and thereafter fell mainly because the Germans lost control over/access to territory with not only factories and labour but also strategic materials. The bombings of course diverted resources and disturbed everything, but late war the important production was quite well dispersed and/or protected. The German railroad network worked well enough in late 1944 to place 25 Divisions for the Bulge - unseen for the allies. Of course you had more dark hours to utilise in November/December than in March/April but the Wallies tried to destroy the railroads from the start of the bombing campaign - without much success - there always was another line to use. Only when airbases were close enough to literally have fighterbombers hanging over each line and waiting for the next train to shoot up did the network start to dissolve.

In other words nuking a railway hub, a factory or (an already flattened) city will not make the difference - boots on the ground will. Later, when enough nukes are available to have all of Germany glow (late 40s/early 50s) you could of course claim to have defeated Germany, but it wouldn't be much of a victory.
 
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