Would it have been better for Brittain to make peace after the fall of France?

5. Germany may not invade the USSR at all. In OTL, Germany was cut off from global markets due to the British blockade. That left the Soviet Union as the only major source of oil for Germany. This meant Hitler was at the mercy of Stalin. If he decides to turn off the taps, Germany is doomed. This thinking was part of what led to Operation Barbarossa. With no war in the west, it's by no means certain that he invades the USSR at all.

6. The Holocaust may never happen. OTL, the mass murder did not begin until 1941. But if the war ends in 1940, the Final Solution quite likely never happens. The Jews are still going to be persecuted and may be moved east or deported to Madagascar, or even sent to Palestine (all plans that were seriously considered).

Okay but the whole point of the war from Hitler's perspective is to eliminate France as a continental power, cow the British into giving him a free hand in Europe and then turning East to destroy Bolshevism and create living space for Greater Germany.

This necessitates exterminating the untermensch living in Poland and the USSR. Why would Hitler suddenly stop being Hitler if he gets the British to back off?
 
It derives indirectly from a YouTube video posted by TIK about WW2. Although he doesn't say that Hitler wouldn't have invaded the USSR if Britain made peace, he does point out Germany's reliance on imported oil, and the fact that oil played a decisive role in the war on the eastern front, especially in Fall Blau. He also points out Hitler's reliance on Soviet oil in the period leading up to Barbarossa.

Well worth a watch:


I looked at it. Interesting. He discounts the mindset of the lunatic.

This man(^^^) also forgets that the United States was the world's greatest COAL PRODUCER from ~ 1870 to WW II. This kind of makes me suspect that he does not know what he is talking about about with regard to oil, too. For example he omits Indonesia as an oil source and ignores the role that oil critically played for the Allied naval war effort east of Suez before Japan rolled south and took it away from them. It hobbled Allied operations in 1942-late 1944 in the West Pacific and forced Britain and America into an expensive oil tanker production program as well as speeded up exploitation of Venezuelan and Mexican oil fields, opened up Canada, the Western United States and even kick started the Saudi fields. All for the Pacific War and RUSSIA (Lend lease included refined oil.). The US could fuel the Atlantic war from her own fields.

He also notes in passing that Hitler did intend to destroy the Soviet Union for "reasons". Cref 7:00 to 7:10 your own video. Your own evidence refutes your thesis.
 
Okay but the whole point of the war from Hitler's perspective is to eliminate France as a continental power, cow the British into giving him a free hand in Europe and then turning East to destroy Bolshevism and create living space for Greater Germany.

This necessitates exterminating the untermensch living in Poland and the USSR. Why would Hitler suddenly stop being Hitler if he gets the British to back off?

Pressure of events. The context has shifted in such a way that Germany is under less pressure. It's no guarantee of course. Hitler once responded to someone who suggested he should make peace with Russia to the effect that even if he did, he couldn't bring himself to do it because he would only declare war again afterwards. So he might still invade - but we can never know for sure.

He also notes in passing that Hitler did intend to destroy the Soviet Union for "reasons". Cref 7:00 to 7:10 your own video. Your own evidence refutes your thesis.

Woah there. Let's tone down the intensity a bit, friend.

I'm not a history student submitting a doctoral thesis. I'm just a chump on the internet speculating wildly about what might have been. I wouldn't call my post a "thesis" (that does me too much honour which I don't deserve!).

OK so he says Hitler would've invaded anyway. I watched that video months ago so it wasn't freshest in my memory. But it doesn't really matter, because the point is Germany's oil situation described therein may have been a factor. Ribbentrop wanted to accept the USSR into the Axis, and recommended accepting a deal to that effect in November 1940 (although Hitler chose not to do so).

Ultimately Hitler's motives in invading the USSR come into play here. Would he have chosen to invade anyway? Perhaps. It seems plausible, likely even, considering what we know of his views. But even if there is only a 10% chance that he doesn't invade, I figured it is at least worth bringing up, since this is after all Alternate History.com.

Great points about the oil production in other regions BTW, thanks for posting. I learned something new. :)
 
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It derives indirectly from a YouTube video posted by TIK about WW2. Although he doesn't say that Hitler wouldn't have invaded the USSR if Britain made peace, he does point out Germany's reliance on imported oil, and the fact that oil played a decisive role in the war on the eastern front, especially in Fall Blau. He also points out Hitler's reliance on Soviet oil in the period leading up to Barbarossa.

Well worth a watch:


Looks like I'm echoing what others have said,

thing is yes Oil was a problem for Germany, but it's a practical issue to overcome in order to achieve their goals. The problem is defeating Bolshevism, gaining an east german empire, and getting rid of the jews (and others) are goals in their own right
 
Looks like I'm echoing what others have said,

thing is yes Oil was a problem for Germany, but it's a practical issue to overcome in order to achieve their goals. The problem is defeating Bolshevism, gaining an east german empire, and getting rid of the jews (and others) are goals in their own right

Could the USSR have successfully resisted a German invasion, if Germany had been able to import oil from the global market via sea trade?
 
Could the USSR have successfully resisted a German invasion, if Germany had been able to import oil from the global market via sea trade?

Emphatically, yes. There was a while when I did not believe it, based on Russian incompetence pre-Barbarosa, but they learned fast and well in 41-42, and by March 1943, nothing was going to stop the Red Army short of the Rhine, even if the Anglo-Americans had sidelined on Russia as long as the madman, Stalin, allowed his STAVKA and Lend Lease to do its work as he shrewdly did. In fact I believe Stalin, being paranoid and politically cautious, might have slowed them down a bit to digest the Eastern and old Russian territories regained, sort of setting his political house in order before the Russians moved on to Berlin. And as I noted, the idea of Germany having a free hand at sea was effectively ZERO. The United States would not allow it. Hell, the Americans did not even let the British have a free hand in the Pacific, and they were an ALLY.
 
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Pressure of events. The context has shifted in such a way that Germany is under less pressure. It's no guarantee of course. Hitler once responded to someone who suggested he should make peace with Russia to the effect that even if he did, he couldn't bring himself to do it because he would only declare war again afterwards. So he might still invade - but we can never know for sure.



...

Thing is, if peace is made with Britain the pressure is reduced compared to the OTL, so wouldn't that mean Hitler is more likely to go for it in regards to USSR and so on.

in RL, he invades the USSR while still fighting in SE Europe and N.Africa, later he continues and increases resources on the final solution while fighting a three front war against, the US, USSR, UK, Canada, and so on

What ever else can be said about the man lack of commitment to goals isn't an issue!
 
Could the USSR have successfully resisted a German invasion, if Germany had been able to import oil from the global market via sea trade?

Well that's kind of a different question than the claim they wouldn't invade the USSR at all?

However to answer it, yeah access to more oil helps, but I don't think it's enough there are other issues

Also while it kind of depends on the nature of the peace with Britain, just ending the military blockade doesn't mean Germany can freely buy Oil from everyone. They may well face trade embargoes.
 

CalBear

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My goal would be a Brittain in a better shape after WWII not a nazi victory.

I dont propose to trust Hitler for a minute. However if he offers a quasy white peace which requires nothing from Brittain beside stop activly fighting and offers the same in exchange as an alternate of the battle of Brittain and the bombings I think that might be a good idea for the british to accept - of course only as long as the nazis still loose the war in the end. The british of course would know that this is more a temporary armistice than real peace. Thats why I said that they would supply war material to the soviets and reenter the war a bit later.

Im aware that if a victory is still possible this way it would put the extra strain that Brittain avoided on the soviets and the body count in the end might be higher than the OTL alternate.
Britain fighting off a Reich invasion attempt in 1944, after a defeat of the USSR, alone?

It is difficult to see how a Britain with most of its coastal cities have been subjected to YEARS of battlefield preparation by a Luftwaffe reinforced by the materials of the entire European Peninsula, including slave laborers and factories from ALL of European Russia at their disposal, comes out batter off than IOTL. The age of Empires was ending, no matter how much Churchill and the other traditionalists wanted to pretend it wasn't. The Raj was gone by 1950, no matter what the British tried to do (assuming they don't transmute from the British to the Nazis in their administration of the region), the same, perhaps a few years later, is going to happen across Africa and the Malay region.
 
Really? But what about Fall Blau? The Luftwaffe? Lack of fuel seems to have affected the war a lot - at the very least I imagine more oil would make Germany more dangerous...

See my edit. Add to this case. Russian geography, weather, American LOGISTICS training and help, and Allied manufacturing cycles. Machines wear out, training is perishable, and the enemy is there. If he can outdie you, he wins (WW I; western front, Germans run out of soldiers by 1918.). Guess what is not in the 1943-44-45 German draft cohorts for Russia? Sons of WW I KIAs as casualty replacements for current WW II KIAs. Their fathers were killed in France 1916-1918. And... if he, the enemy, gets smarter and fights better than you, (*Red Army 1944), your goose is definitely cooked if you are German. Add this... The Russians are motivated by two most basic and strong human imperatives... survival and REVENGE.

EDIT: Slave labor is not as efficient as motivated factory workers, and what good does oil do one if the products produced are junk in battle? Take a look at the ACTUAL exchange ratios in one category, Allied vs. German tanks in the year 1944. From American records the US Army lost about ~1,300 Shermans ir-repairable due to battle damage in France. In theater (France) in the same campaign, the Germans lost roughly the same number of Panthers to US action. Tank vs tank. Not too good. I think the exchange ratios against the T-34 were a bit more lopsided, something like 1.3 T-34s for every Panther, but the Russians were more tank aggressive and dependent in their combined arms drill. The point is, what good was oil to a defender who did not have to move much in comparison to his attacker? Not much. Germans in the attack were not all that efficient past 1943 either. They had the oil stocks for Kursk and initially for the Bulge. Results? The defenders used hasty defense obstacles, terrain, and better combined arms to snuff the two offensives before they could really get started and went on to bulldozerkrieg their ways forward.

Not buying into oil as a magic cure all. One has to know what one is doing. Did you know that the IJN had the best organized oil supply system in the world for its fleet in 1942? They had enough oil to mount operations and they mounted them. BUT, they were incompetent strategists and inept in the operational art. Their opponents only had to last through the initial rush and the ceaseless pressure of numbers, time, distance, manufacturing cycle and kill-off of trained personnel would leave the IJN vulnerable and helpless to a stronger enemy, who by late 1943 was much better at warfare than the IJN was. Oil was the American handicap in the first two years of the Pacific war. TANKER SHORTAGE. And yet... Does it kind of sound familiar?

15% of American power ~ Japan's total war effort. 1=1 from 1942 until 1944.

Oil as a factor? By March 1943, yes for the IJN on offense, but the Americans were sucking on empty, too. You don't see Task Force 58 until late 43, and then not at full power until mid 1944 when America has enough fleet trains built to sustain it. Of course by then, the Japanese were dead empire walking. Much like the Germans for the same reason. They were on the wrong end of the applied force equations. When the crunches came in June 1944 at approximately the same times for the militarists in Berlin and Tokyo, it was not oil that was the doomer. They had simply run out of trained men and materials to mount a successful defense. Defense does not have to move much, but it has to be effective. It was not for the Germans or the Japanese. System of systems it is called, and oil is a "small" part of it.
 
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if Germany had been able to import oil from the global market via sea trade?

The oil may arrive in the form of reparations - conditional for the release of British POWs.

Ribbentrop wanted to accept the USSR into the Axis, and recommended accepting a deal to that effect in November 1940 (although Hitler chose not to do so).

Germans tried to persuade the Soviets to join the Axis - to wage war against the British Empire, the Soviets were not impressed by the fact that as they were talking they were in the midst of a RAF air raid! German wanted Russia to go South, but Russia wanted access to the Med. by securing the Straits, and wanted Rumania to be in their sphere of influence.
It was such territorial ambitions that made Hitler's mind up.
 
Britain fighting off a Reich invasion attempt in 1944, after a defeat of the USSR, alone?

It is difficult to see how a Britain with most of its coastal cities have been subjected to YEARS of battlefield preparation by a Luftwaffe reinforced by the materials of the entire European Peninsula, including slave laborers and factories from ALL of European Russia at their disposal, comes out batter off than IOTL. The age of Empires was ending, no matter how much Churchill and the other traditionalists wanted to pretend it wasn't. The Raj was gone by 1950, no matter what the British tried to do (assuming they don't transmute from the British to the Nazis in their administration of the region), the same, perhaps a few years later, is going to happen across Africa and the Malay region.

Im not an expert of this era. But as far as I see the question boils down to if the nazis would have beaten the soviets in this ATL where they have the extra material from not fighting the BoB, the Africa Corps and have some trade restored while the soviets still receive land lease.
IMO:
1. If the nazi's win Brittain is off worse.
2. If the nazi's still loose Brittain is off better.

As far as I see opinion are divided on this question.

Also when I suggested that Brittain reenters the war I didnt say it would be after the soviets are defeated. After a build up I thought about '43-'44.
I also dont believe that the Empire would last much longer than OTL.
 
Im not an expert of this era. But as far as I see the question boils down to if the nazis would have beaten the soviets in this ATL where they have the extra material from not fighting the BoB, the Africa Corps and have some trade restored while the soviets still receive land lease.
IMO:
1. If the nazi's win Brittain is off worse.
2. If the nazi's still loose Brittain is off better.

As far as I see opinion are divided on this question.

Also when I suggested that Brittain reenters the war I didnt say it would be after the soviets are defeated. After a build up I thought about '43-'44.
I also dont believe that the Empire would last much longer than OTL.

OK, maybe the Soviets receive some Lend-lease from the US (maybe 10 or 20% of OTL).
Option 2 - Britain still worse off - with the Soviet Union in control of Western Europe.
I sometimes read about people thinking the Britain will re-enter the War, as if its almost a certainty.
On the contrary I see the 'Peace' as having some conditions - no Churchill in the Government, is a certainty; Duke of Windsor on the throne is quite possible!
Britain's status will take a tumble - South Africa will move to the right, KM will make goodwill visits there, while Canada (perhaps with King George) and Australia will grow closer to the US. With Australia withdrawing its forces to protect it from Japan.
 
There seems to be a theme here that Britain would be looking to maintain the Empire as it was at the time and that this would be a good thing. Britain was already seeking a change in the Empire which would allow it to retain it's world trade characteristics and culture but work as individual nations. The planning for Indian independence was already an accepted fact with the Indian forces for example, increasing the leadership and technical input becoming increasingly Indian in personnel. Britain not becoming bankrupt would allow a more evolutionary approach but decolonisation was already an eventual given.
 

manav95

Banned
I feel this would have been a disaster. The Soviets would likely get wrecked dealing with the future might of the German war machine, and the Germans came close to seizing Moscow in 1941 even on a two front war. Not to mention, the Germans would have free reign in North Africa and could seize the oil there, giving them a chance to deny the Allies a base from which to land and other stuff. Even if by some miracle, the British and Americans later came back and helped the Soviets cream the Germans, they would still be weakened and facing decolonization.
 
...But if they made peace what then? Britain would be the island that bowed. And bowed without a fight, unlike the rest of the Nazi's enemies. France fell when it was overrun. But in this Britain gave up before a single enemy soldier stepped onto their soil. That really isn't a good thing...
wcv215:
The UK had no problem signing the Treaty of Amiens in 1802, despite enemy soldiers not having landed on their soil (unless you count Fishguard in 1797, which was hardly an outstanding triumph for the French.)

Edit:
And in 1940, the UK had fought against Germany (there was a British Expeditionary Force of several divisions in France) but had just been kicked off the continent anyway.

Further Edit:
And there was the fighting in Norway in 1940, too.
 
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There seems to be a theme here that Britain would be looking to maintain the Empire as it was at the time and that this would be a good thing. Britain was already seeking a change in the Empire which would allow it to retain it's world trade characteristics and culture but work as individual nations. The planning for Indian independence was already an accepted fact with the Indian forces for example, increasing the leadership and technical input becoming increasingly Indian in personnel. Britain not becoming bankrupt would allow a more evolutionary approach but decolonisation was already an eventual given.

Replace Stalin in 41 after the Winter War and Grigory Kulik with him and that does not happen. Stalin was worth 10-15 Panzer divisions to the Germans until he figured out that he should let his competent generals run the battlefield and just let the NKVD watch them for defeatism. Any competent Oligarchy (Zhukov, Scherbakov, and Malenkov: remove the others: especially Beria.) that replaces Stalin can do better than he actually did in OTL. As for the senior no-goods like Kulik, who continue to plague the Red Army, they should have been removed immediately, too. This was not a case of reassigning a Fredendall after Kasserine, to be sent to the rear to manage and count paperclips, which he could do well. Those types of Russian generals, like Kulik, actually were detrimental as military assets being disasters as administrators as well as tacticians and trainers to and for the Red Army. They introduced disorder and defeatism just by the presence of their sheer incompetence and personal corruption.
 
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