WI Isolationists US?

[Corbell Mark IV]

I'm sure this have been done, but I missed it, sooooo....


So, WI the US sits out WWII. No sanctions on Japan, no Lend Lease,

My first thoughts are a negotiated peace between the UK and Germany, and victory for Germany in the East.

Japan of course continues it's rampage in China.

If you agree, though, what happens next?

German nukes in the 50s? How much trouble holding it's Empire?

What does England do? What does the US do?

 

[1940LaSalle]

The first hurdle is a workable PoD. To be sure, the issue of isolationism vs. interventionism appeared to be coming to a head in the 1940 presidential election--that is, until Willkie prevailed (mercifully, IMO) and make interventionism essentially a given. So, the first order of business would be either a much stronger "no third term" coalition among Democrats or a much stronger "stop Willkie" coalition among Republicans, or both. I suspect the latter is more feasible (notice I didn't say "easier").

Let's assume that Willkie, who died in 1944, and was known to be something of a chain smoker, died in early 1940 before the convention. At that point the rest of the GOP field was decidedly more diffuse, with Taft, Vandenberg and Dewey as the front runners--and Hoover waiting in the wings ready to volunteer in case of a deadlock. All were isolationist to some degree.

OK, so somehow the personality-challenged Taft gets the nomination, and perhaps chooses a young (38 at the time) Dewey as his running mate. If somehow Franklin Roosevelt made his case for a third term to the Dems, he should have little difficulty in turning Taft inside out in three states where it really counted in those days (NY, PA, IL) given the hefty labor presence in all three states and major city machines (aside from Philadelphia). Add to that the eleven ex-Confederate states and Roosevelt has 236 electoral votes right there. I'll stipulate he'd likely lose OH, IN, MI (the Vandenberg influence) and the Plains and Mountain states (hotbeds of isolationism). But people were already getting nervous about the Japanese on the Pacific coast, so I'd suggest CA, OR, and WA will go for Roosevelt. That boosts him to 271, putting him over the top.

You'd need a couple of major gaffes (maybe Henry Wallace putting his foot in his mouth a few times?) to get Taft anywhere close--that, and a lot of luck. Willkie was charismatic and electrified people yet he still lost substantially; Taft was about as bland as they come. And I say all of this as a lifelong Republican.

 

[Dunning Kruger]

I think you need a different perception of Germany. The Nazi's would need to tone things down quite a bit. And there was in some courts a perception of Germany being a warmongering state. Between the two it's hard to avoid at least lend-lease aid to the allies.

 

[Vjacheslav Malyshev]

Have FDR bite the dust during his second term and then have John Nance Garner back the Ludlow Amendment.

 

[zoomar]

To make this plausible, you pretty much have to have a negotiated end to the European War in 1940 predicated either (1) on the "Phony War" becoming a permanent armistice in the west, or (2) Britain accepting a German armistice offer immediately after the Fall of France.

This would end the war with Germany appearing to be less of a global threat to the US...and also make US assistance to the USSR far less likely upon outbreak of the Nazi-Soviet war.

Regarding no US war with Japan, this is actually a harder one to make plausible. In many respects, the US in 1940 had far greater reason to become involved in countering Japan than in opposing Hitler. The Chinese "open door" was a linchpin of US foreign and economic policy in Asia, the US and Japan were natural naval rivals with overlapping spheres of interest, and any Japanese aggression aimed an the NEI and other European colonies in SE Asia was a direct threat to US territory and interests.

My own though is that this would lead ultimately to two completely unrelated wars in the later 1940's: A war between Germany (with some minor allies) against the USSR, and a war between the USA (together with China, possibly Britain, and the NEI) against Japan. The Russo-German war would be the longest and costliest of the two and I am not convinced German victory would be assured, depending on how resilient the Soviet government proved to be. The US-Japanese war would end fairly quickly in a decisive US victory.

I am also unconvinced that Germany would develop nuclear weapons, since they failed and lost interest OTL. The development of nuclear weapons by the US would also be delayed, both by the absence of British participation and by the fact that it would probably not be nearly as massive a program.

Assuming Germany defeats the USSR, Nazi attitudes would inevitably lead to greater expansionism leading to renewed hostilities between the UK and Germany probably with the US getting involved at some time, This final war might not occur until the early 1950's.