How the Good Guys (or, at least Germany) could have won WW2

[broudweeb]

Old post of mine but I figured it would be good for discussion. These are not ordered by importance:

1. Not turning back to destroy the British Army at Dunkirk

2. Failing to secure enough oil both before and during the war (this was a MASSIVE problem, overall the single largest factor in their defeat)

3. Wasting resources on invasion of Norway

4. Dividing forces in 3 rather than in 2 while invading USSR, capturing Leningrad didn't serve much of a purpose, should have pushed towards the Volga valley as that contains majority of Russia's population & factories

5. Failing to build a strategic air force that could have taken out Soviet war material production in the Volga valley and towards the Urals

6. Wasting enormous resources trying to capture cities like Stalingrad. Should have just bypassed them but hit the factories from overhead.

7. By far the biggest problem was not having enough tanks, planes, truck etc to compete with USA/UK/USSR. They simply didn't have enough resources or factories to match up. But if they fixed the above flaws, they could win before this really started to hurt them.

8. Having a horse-drawn supply system rather than truck based like ALL of the allies did. This goes back to NO OIL. Worked ok in France but the USSR was just way too deep to get supplies that far.

9. Not providing adequate winterization for troops, tanks etc for the winter of 41-42. Dumb mistake, did they all just expect to go home the second Moscow fell?

10. Could have knocked out France by Nov 1939 in order to invade Russia earlier (the resources were available after Poland fell)

11. Delayed invasion of Russia until June 41, should have been April

12. Could have probably found a way to avoid occupying Yugoslavia and Greece to save resources. Partisans really wasted a lot of German time here. Maybe have Italy do more of the occupying (with German forces on the coasts, to protect from the British)

13. Basically giving up on the air campaign over Britain. Should have stuck with the night raids and focused on industrial areas (steel production, truck plants, etc). Admittedly air resources are going to be strained between Britain and USSR

14. Not changing up the Enigma system. Should have assumed their enemies would crack it eventually

15. Perhaps a hot take here, but avoid wasting resources on the holocaust. A waste of perfectly good slave labour!

16. You could make a case for allowing a breakout attempt for the 6th army at Stalingrad (resupplying by air was impossible for that tonnage) as well as avoiding Kursk (the USSR was already well aware of where they would attack, and had prepared extensively, making the battle a waste of desperately needed vehicles and oil). But I'd say the war was already unwinnable after Stalingrad, about all they could have done is lose more slowly.

17. Ramp up full military production vastly earlier (not in 1944). They could have been on a full wartime footing in 1939, perhaps earlier, depending on how much France and Britain complain about Versailles violations. This does depend on oil availability, which is historically part of why it didn't happen.

18. More resources to North Africa. Debatable since everything was needed to defeat USSR. But taking Suez would have really hurt British shipping. I'm not sure they'd ever have the resources to take the Arabian peninsula for the oil, though.

19. Overall be much "nicer" to the occupied populations in the East. Several were initially quite willing to work with Germany against the communists. Partisan activity made the supply problems even worse.

20. Convince the Japanese to take the "Northern" option and attack the USSR in late 1941. Ideally once they started moving their Siberian units towards Moscow, for maximum chaos. The Soviet forces would mog the Japanese Army, but it could have taken enough pressure off the west to win. I'm not sure the Japanese could be convinced to do this, though.

21. Delay declaring war on the US. While this would hurt the Atlantic campaign a bit, it would delay lend lease to the USSR, which was a problem (a lot of their trucks and high-quality fuels came from the US)

22. Avoid trusting Romanians (LOL) to guard your flanks at Stalingrad


Overall if I were Fuhrer this is what I would have done. Hindsight is 20/20. Would it all have been enough to overcome the overwhelming inferiority in resources? I don't know. It works in HOI4 at least, lol

 

[broudweeb]

Overall I think Japan was basically doomed. The US just could produce overwhelmingly more ships and whatnot (by a factor of like SIX!!!). So no matter how many tweaks you apply to military production, individual battles, etc Japan is screwed

 

[Rapistcel]

Overall I think Japan was basically doomed. The US just could produce overwhelmingly more ships and whatnot (by a factor of like SIX!!!). So no matter how many tweaks you apply to military production, individual battles, etc Japan is screwed

In my opinion the biggest mistake of Germany was supporting Japan.
They should have just abandon them or at least convince them to avoid direct conflict with US.
In my opinion the axis could have defeated USSR and UK as long the US didn't get involved.
War with US was the beginning of end for Hitler.

 

[broudweeb]

In my opinion the biggest mistake of Germany was supporting Japan.
They should have just abandon them or at least convince them to avoid direct conflict with US.
In my opinion the axis could have defeated USSR and UK as long the US didn't get involved.
War with US was the beginning of end for Hitler.

Fun fact: until about 1936 Germany actually worked closely with China rather than Japan. It's why you see many Chinese WW2 forces with Stahlhelm helmets.

The US had overwhelming industrial capacity on a whole 'nother continent. It was always going to be extremely difficult for the Axis to deal with that.

 

[PLS HALP ME]

What would have happened if Germany had won the war?

 

[Rapistcel]

Fun fact: until about 1936 Germany actually worked closely with China rather than Japan. It's why you see many Chinese WW2 forces with Stahlhelm helmets.

The US had overwhelming industrial capacity on a whole 'nother continent. It was always going to be extremely difficult for the Axis to deal with that.

I know it, in retrospective, probably keep supporting chinks wound have been much better for Germany interest.
I dare to say that Japan itself was the main factor for the result of war.
Without US involved Normandy and Torch Operation (and invasion of Italy after that) wouldn't have happened, Germany could have sent much more resources to east and commies wouldn't be getting a lot of resources from US that they got in our real timelime.
I'm not saying Moscow would have fell necessarily (they didn't take it in 1941) but I think Germany would have ended forcing both USSR and UK to make a peace treatment.
There is also a big change that Germany could have dominated mediterranean, specially if Spain (without the US threat that made it impossible) would have joined in 1942 to and take Gibraltar and to secure the mediterranean rute.
Probably atlantic battle could have damaged UK much more.

 

[broudweeb]

What would have happened if Germany had won the war?

Debatable. Some would say a 1000 year Reich, some would say the Nazi system wasn't stable and would eventually fall apart. They'd probably have at least some sort of cold war with the US. Occupying all of that land would take a lot of German resources since there would be insurgencies everywhere.

Personally, I don't think the Nazi political system was that bad. It survived the strains of an extremely destructive war. But so did the Soviet system, until the pressure was off and people started to give up on it by the 60s.

 

[Rapistcel]

What would have happened if Germany had won the war?

US and Germany: 2 most powerful countries.

 

[Rapistcel]

Debatable. Some would say a 1000 year Reich, some would say the Nazi system wasn't stable and would eventually fall apart. They'd probably have at least some sort of cold war with the US. Occupying all of that land would take a lot of German resources since there would be insurgencies everywhere.

Personally, I don't think the Nazi political system was that bad. It survived the strains of an extremely destructive war. But so did the Soviet system, until the pressure was off and people started to give up on it by the 60s.

There would have probably been a transition to a different system after the death of Hitlers successor , I think it would have lasted maybe 30/40 years after the war.

 

[broudweeb]

I know it, in retrospective, probably keep supporting chinks wound have been much better for Germany interest.
I dare to say that Japan itself was the main factor for the result of war.
Without US involved Normandy and Torch Operation (and invasion of Italy after that) wouldn't have happened, Germany could have sent much more resources to east and commies wouldn't be getting a lot of resources from US that they got in our real timelime.
I'm not saying Moscow would have fell necessarily (they didn't take it in 1941) but I think Germany would have ended forcing both USSR and UK to make a peace treatment.
There is also a big change that Germany could have dominated mediterranean, specially if Spain (without the US threat that made it impossible) would have joined in 1942 to and take Gibraltar and to secure the mediterranean rute.
Probably atlantic battle could have damaged UK much more.

I'm not sure US would have truly stayed out forever, they were already extensively supporting Britain before Pearl Harbor. PH just gave the government the public support it needed to go to war. I suppose their support / entry could be delayed or toned down a bit

Once the Allies had secured a toehold at Normany, the war was basically going to be over. Germany had no way to win at all. They could at least delay the Allied moves up Italy since the mountainous terrain gave defenders a huge advantage.

Keeping Britain out of the Mediterranean would help a bit, esp for getting troops to North Africa. It makes British shipping much more inefficient, since they'd have to go around all of Africa.

 

[broudweeb]

There would have probably been a transition to a different system after the death of Hitlers successor , I think it would have lasted maybe 30/40 years after the war.

It's also interesting to imagine how France and Italy would evolve under those scenarios. By necessity, I'd bet France would become more independent with time. A big part of the "cold war" might be Fascist France and Italy vs. Britain (with USA support) fighting over African colonies

 

[Rapistcel]

I'm not sure US would have truly stayed out forever, they were already extensively supporting Britain before Pearl Harbor. PH just gave the government the public support it needed to go to war. I suppose their support / entry could be delayed or toned down a bit

Once the Allies had secured a toehold at Normany, the war was basically going to be over. Germany had no way to win at all. They could at least delay the Allied moves up Italy since the mountainous terrain gave defenders a huge advantage.

Keeping Britain out of the Mediterranean would help a bit, esp for getting troops to North Africa. It makes British shipping much more inefficient, since they'd have to go around all of Africa.

US involved: safe allied victory.
But I'm not that sure that US would have got involved if war with Japan never happened, the public opinion of US population during those years was favorable to not getting involved.
They could have joined in 1939 if war was a big priority to them, and they didn't.
Though, if there was a more isolationist president than Roosevelt: much better for Germany.

 

[PLS HALP ME]

US and Germany: 2 most powerful countries.

China, North Korea, and Russia are major military powers.

 

[Rapistcel]

It's also interesting to imagine how France and Italy would evolve under those scenarios. By necessity, I'd bet France would become more independent with time. A big part of the "cold war" might be Fascist France and Italy vs. Britain (with USA support) fighting over African colonies

I made a thread explaining why I think Germany can't be blamed by the starting of war, if you are interested.

WW2 wasn't Hitler fault

If you analyze this deeply it's very obvious that WW2 wasn't the NS Germany fault and I will explain in in this thread. As you know after WW1 Germany was considered the responsible of all what happened in the war without being it. The Versalles imposition let Germany completely disabled and...

incels.is

 

[Excalibur]

Failing to secure enough oil both before and during the war (this was a MASSIVE problem, overall the single largest factor in their defeat)

I don’t think there was any realistic way they could have solved the oil crisis. Even they took the Caucasus, the oil fields all would’ve been blown up by the retreating Soviets and would have taken an eternity to restore. Manufacturing synthetic oil was too expensive and even if they did invest copious amounts of resources into it, it still wouldn’t have been enough.

Dividing forces in 3 rather than in 2 while invading USSR, capturing Leningrad didn't serve much of a purpose, should have pushed towards the Volga valley as that contains majority of Russia's population & factories

That would have been an even larger mistake than irl Barbarossa. Leaving the north untouched would’ve left Army Group center’s northern flanks espoused and allowed the Soviets to counterattack and fuck up their supply lines.

Wasting resources on invasion of Norway

The British were about to invade Norway to prevent critical Swedish iron shipments to Germany. The German invasion was necessary to secure Swedish shipments that were keeping the German war economy alive.

Failing to build a strategic air force that could have taken out Soviet war material production in the Volga valley and towards the Urals

Building a strategic bomber fleet from almost from scratch isn’t a walk in a park. Germany had very limited resources and did the best it could under the circumstances. Also, even if they did build more strategic bombers, most of them would have been grounded anyways due to lack of oil.

 

[Rapistcel]

I don’t think there was any realistic way they could have solved the oil crisis. Even they took the Caucasus, the oil fields all would’ve been blown up by the retreating Soviets and would have taken an eternity to restore. Manufacturing synthetic oil was too expensive and even if they did invest copious amounts of resources into it, it still wouldn’t have been enough.

That would have been an even larger mistake than irl Barbarossa. Leaving the north untouched would’ve left Army Group center’s northern flanks espoused and allowed the Soviets to counterattack and fuck up their supply lines.

The British were about to invade Norway to prevent critical Swedish iron shipments to Germany. The German invasion was necessary to secure Swedish shipments that were keeping the German war economy alive.

Building a strategic bomber fleet from almost from scratch isn’t a walk in a park. Germany had very limited resources and did the best it could under the circumstances. Also, even if they did build more strategic bombers, most of them would have been grounded anyways due to lack of oil.

The bad thing about caucus campaign is that even if it was successful, soviets would have removed oil plantations so Germany probably couldn't have take advantage from it.

 

[Rapistcel]

China, North Korea, and Russia are major military powers.

I'm talking about the scenario of an axis victory.

 

[Excalibur]

The bad thing about caucus campaign is that even if it was successful, soviets would have removed oil plantations so Germany probably couldn't have take advantage from it.

Yeah, Hitler was very correct in focusing the 1942 offensive on Caucasia for its oil fields, but it would have been in vain had it succeeded. Perhaps it might’ve equalized the war more depriving the Soviets of the majority of their oil, but Germany would still be a huge disadvantage.

 

[Rapistcel]

Yeah, Hitler was very correct in focusing the 1942 offensive on Caucasia, but it would have been in vain had it succeeded. Perhaps it might’ve equalized the war more depriving the Soviets of the majority of their oil, but Germany would still be a huge disadvantage.

Personal opinion: Germany wasn't dead yet even after they didn't manage to take Moscow in Barbarossa, it was when americans got involved when the war was decided.

 

[broudweeb]

The bad thing about caucus campaign is that even if it was successful, soviets would have removed oil plantations so Germany probably couldn't have take advantage from it.

That would have at least taken a lot of the oil away from Soviets

 

[Excalibur]

Personal opinion: Germany wasn't dead yet even after they didn't manage to take Moscow in Barbarossa, it was when americans got involved when the war was decided.

Maybe. I think the Soviets would eventually have been to drive the Germans to the Dneiper and probably beyond, but I doubt they would be able to conquer Germany without a Western Front distracting Germany. When the Soviets took Berlin, they were utterly exhausted and working beyond their limits. With the West secure and more German field armies in the East, I doubt the Soviets would have been able to successfully invade Germany or even German occupied Poland without succumbing to attrition. Perhaps Stalin and Hitler would sign a negotiated peace, but I’m not sure.

 

[Rapistcel]

Maybe. I think the Soviets would eventually have been to drive the Germans to the Dneiper and probably beyond, but I doubt they would be able to conquer Germany without a Western Front distracting Germany. When the Soviets took Berlin, they were utterly exhausted and working beyond their limits. With the West secure and more German field armies in the East, I doubt the Soviets would have been able to successfully invade Germany or even German occupied Poland without succumbing to attrition. Perhaps Stalin and Hitler would sign a negotiated peace, but I’m not sure.

Do you think a coexistence with USSR without starting war with them was possible or nah?
I think there is a huge chance of Stalin attacking first if Hitler didn't.

 

[broudweeb]

I don’t think there was any realistic way they could have solved the oil crisis. Even they took the Caucasus, the oil fields all would’ve been blown up by the retreating Soviets and would have taken an eternity to restore. Manufacturing synthetic oil was too expensive and even if they did invest copious amounts of resources into it, it still wouldn’t have been enough.

Not solved perhaps, but every additional drop of oil they could get would have helped a little

That would have been an even larger mistake than irl Barbarossa. Leaving the north untouched would’ve left Army Group center’s northern flanks espoused and allowed the Soviets to counterattack and fuck up their supply lines.

I'm not saying they should just leave the Northern flank open, they'd need to expand somewhat in that direction (and this would allow them to pick up the mostly anti-Soviet Baltic states) but I don't think Leningrad should have been a strategic objective. It did have some military production, but the resources spent up North would have made more sense if used in the South or Center

The British were about to invade Norway to prevent critical Swedish iron shipments to Germany. The German invasion was necessary to secure Swedish shipments that were keeping the German war economy alive.

This is probably true but there may have been other ways around this. For example if France had fallen a bit earlier, the British may not have bothered. Germany lost a lot of good naval resources on the Norway operation. Plus, Britain would look bad (to the Americans) if they invaded a neutral country

Building a strategic bomber fleet from almost from scratch isn’t a walk in a park. Germany had very limited resources and did the best it could under the circumstances. Also, even if they did build more strategic bombers, most of them would have been grounded anyways due to lack of oil.

It's not easy, certainly, but they did have the ability to build the planes. They had several very long-range prototypes ready. The point would be to spend the resources on the planes so as to limit the enemy's ability to build its own planes, tanks etc. Thus needing fewer German tanks and whatnot in the field. Whether the math would work out, idk

 

[Excalibur]

Do you think a coexistence with USSR without starting war with them was possible or nah?

No, Stalin was terrified of Germany and considered it to be an existential threat. The pact with Berlin was to simply buy time for the Red Army to grow larger and reform. If Hitler hadn’t attacked first, Stalin would have launched an invasion sometime after 1942. Maybe 43 or 44.

 

[Let It Burn]

They could never won there is no way

 

[broudweeb]

No, Stalin was terrified of Germany and considered it to be an existential threat. The pact with Berlin was to simply buy time for their Red Army to grow larger and reform. If Hitler hadn’t attacked first, Stalin would have launched an invasion sometime after 1942. Maybe 43.

I agree, war between them was inevitable. It was just a question of when, and who would attack first.

Hitler's plans for the East were obvious going back to Mein Kampf.

 

[Excalibur]

Not solved perhaps, but every additional drop of oil they could get would have helped a little


I'm not saying they should just leave the Northern flank open, they'd need to expand somewhat in that direction (and this would allow them to pick up the mostly anti-Soviet Baltic states) but I don't think Leningrad should have been a strategic objective. It did have some military production, but the resources spent up North would have made more sense if used in the South or Center


This is probably true but there may have been other ways around this. For example if France had fallen a bit earlier, the British may not have bothered. Germany lost a lot of good naval resources on the Norway operation. Plus, Britain would look bad (to the Americans) if they invaded a neutral country


It's not easy, certainly, but they did have the ability to build the planes. They had several very long-range prototypes ready. The point would be to spend the resources on the planes so as to limit the enemy's ability to build its own planes, tanks etc. Thus needing fewer German tanks and whatnot in the field. Whether the math would work out, idk

I see your points, but I still think none of these strategic decisions would have led to a decisive German victory. Maybe they could have prolonged the war which just maybe could have led the survival of the Third Reich as a state through a negotiated settlement, but total German victory ie. Lebensraum secured is impossible unless other factors beyond Hitler’s control were changed, such as Britain making peace in 1940, Japan attacking the Far East, or the Great Purge being much worse with multiple decisive generals like Zhukov getting purged by Stalin.

 

[SewerPolarKoala]

Old post of mine but I figured it would be good for discussion. These are not ordered by importance:

1. Not turning back to destroy the British Army at Dunkirk

2. Failing to secure enough oil both before and during the war (this was a MASSIVE problem, overall the single largest factor in their defeat)

3. Wasting resources on invasion of Norway

4. Dividing forces in 3 rather than in 2 while invading USSR, capturing Leningrad didn't serve much of a purpose, should have pushed towards the Volga valley as that contains majority of Russia's population & factories

5. Failing to build a strategic air force that could have taken out Soviet war material production in the Volga valley and towards the Urals

6. Wasting enormous resources trying to capture cities like Stalingrad. Should have just bypassed them but hit the factories from overhead.

7. By far the biggest problem was not having enough tanks, planes, truck etc to compete with USA/UK/USSR. They simply didn't have enough resources or factories to match up. But if they fixed the above flaws, they could win before this really started to hurt them.

8. Having a horse-drawn supply system rather than truck based like ALL of the allies did. This goes back to NO OIL. Worked ok in France but the USSR was just way too deep to get supplies that far.

9. Not providing adequate winterization for troops, tanks etc for the winter of 41-42. Dumb mistake, did they all just expect to go home the second Moscow fell?

10. Could have knocked out France by Nov 1939 in order to invade Russia earlier (the resources were available after Poland fell)

11. Delayed invasion of Russia until June 41, should have been April

12. Could have probably found a way to avoid occupying Yugoslavia and Greece to save resources. Partisans really wasted a lot of German time here. Maybe have Italy do more of the occupying (with German forces on the coasts, to protect from the British)

13. Basically giving up on the air campaign over Britain. Should have stuck with the night raids and focused on industrial areas (steel production, truck plants, etc). Admittedly air resources are going to be strained between Britain and USSR

14. Not changing up the Enigma system. Should have assumed their enemies would crack it eventually

15. Perhaps a hot take here, but avoid wasting resources on the holocaust. A waste of perfectly good slave labour!

16. You could make a case for allowing a breakout attempt for the 6th army at Stalingrad (resupplying by air was impossible for that tonnage) as well as avoiding Kursk (the USSR was already well aware of where they would attack, and had prepared extensively, making the battle a waste of desperately needed vehicles and oil). But I'd say the war was already unwinnable after Stalingrad, about all they could have done is lose more slowly.

17. Ramp up full military production vastly earlier (not in 1944). They could have been on a full wartime footing in 1939, perhaps earlier, depending on how much France and Britain complain about Versailles violations. This does depend on oil availability, which is historically part of why it didn't happen.

18. More resources to North Africa. Debatable since everything was needed to defeat USSR. But taking Suez would have really hurt British shipping. I'm not sure they'd ever have the resources to take the Arabian peninsula for the oil, though.

19. Overall be much "nicer" to the occupied populations in the East. Several were initially quite willing to work with Germany against the communists. Partisan activity made the supply problems even worse.

20. Convince the Japanese to take the "Northern" option and attack the USSR in late 1941. Ideally once they started moving their Siberian units towards Moscow, for maximum chaos. The Soviet forces would mog the Japanese Army, but it could have taken enough pressure off the west to win. I'm not sure the Japanese could be convinced to do this, though.

21. Delay declaring war on the US. While this would hurt the Atlantic campaign a bit, it would delay lend lease to the USSR, which was a problem (a lot of their trucks and high-quality fuels came from the US)

22. Avoid trusting Romanians (LOL) to guard your flanks at Stalingrad


Overall if I were Fuhrer this is what I would have done. Hindsight is 20/20. Would it all have been enough to overcome the overwhelming inferiority in resources? I don't know. It works in HOI4 at least, lol

The problem was too rapid territorial expansion, hitler should have captured Poland, Czechia and Austria and wait 5 or 10 years then attack USSR and western allies

 

[SewerPolarKoala]

I see your points, but I still think none of these strategic decisions would have led to a decisive German victory. Maybe they could have prolonged the war which just maybe could have led the survival of the Third Reich as a state through a negotiated settlement, but total German victory ie. Lebensraum secured is impossible unless other factors beyond Hitler’s control were changed, such as Britain making peace in 1940, Japan attacking the Far East, or the Great Purge being much worse with multiple decisive generals like Zhukov getting purged by Stalin.

Nah I think the problem was instability in peripheries of the Reich caused by too rapid expansion

 

[Excalibur]

The problem was too rapid territorial expansion, hitler should have captured Poland, Czechia and Austria and wait 5 or 10 years then attack USSR and western allies

Nah I think the problem was instability in peripheries of the Reich caused by too rapid expansion

Germany needed to go to war in 1939, otherwise its economy would have collapsed and Hitler would have been overthrown. Germany’s economy was dangerously overheating thanks to years of massive military spending and was running out resources such as oil, coal, and steel. The only reason it was able to even get as far as it did before declaring war was thanks to foreign loans, hiding debt with Mefo bills, and exhausting Germany’s foreign currency reserves. Absorbing the economies of conquered countries was the only real way of keeping Germany’s war economy going.

Sure, Hitler could have reformed the economy by cutting military spending, raising taxes, reducing the speed rearmament, and integrating Germany into global trade, but that would have gone against Hitler’s belief in creating a German autarky.

 

[4sez]

They wouldn't be able to win, even with all those odds in their hands.

It was a battle they should had never faced.

 

[SewerPolarKoala]

Germany needed to go to war in 1939, otherwise its economy would have collapsed and Hitler would have been overthrown. Germany’s economy was dangerously overheating thanks to years of massive military spending and was running out resources such as oil, coal, and steel. The only reason it was able to even get as far as it did before declaring war was thanks to foreign loans, hiding debt with Mefo bills, and exhausting Germany’s foreign currency reserves. Absorbing the economies of conquered countries was the only real way of keeping Germany’s war economy going.

Sure, Hitler could have reformed the economy by cutting military spending, raising taxes, reducing the speed rearmament, and integrating Germany into global trade, but that would have gone against Hitler’s belief in creating a German autarky.

I mean Poland, Austria and Czechia then wait few years then next countries

 

[ESL]

This and many miracles would have had to happen for Germany to secure the East and establish peace talks with the Allies.

 

[broudweeb]

I see your points, but I still think none of these strategic decisions would have led to a decisive German victory. Maybe they could have prolonged the war which just maybe could have led the survival of the Third Reich as a state through a negotiated settlement, but total German victory ie. Lebensraum secured is impossible unless other factors beyond Hitler’s control were changed, such as Britain making peace in 1940, Japan attacking the Far East, or the Great Purge being much worse with multiple decisive generals like Zhukov getting purged by Stalin.

This and many miracles would have had to happen for Germany to secure the East and establish peace talks with the Allies.

I feel like their best chance would have been to stockpile oil / planes / tanks / trucks in the 30s, then maximize the efficiency of Operation Barbarossa. If they could have taken cities like Samara, Kazan etc it would have greatly diminished the Soviet capacity to fight back. At the latest, they would have needed to win by summer / fall 1942

 

[broudweeb]

Germany needed to go to war in 1939, otherwise its economy would have collapsed and Hitler would have been overthrown. Germany’s economy was dangerously overheating thanks to years of massive military spending and was running out resources such as oil, coal, and steel. The only reason it was able to even get as far as it did before declaring war was thanks to foreign loans, hiding debt with Mefo bills, and exhausting Germany’s foreign currency reserves. Absorbing the economies of conquered countries was the only real way of keeping Germany’s war economy going.

Sure, Hitler could have reformed the economy by cutting military spending, raising taxes, reducing the speed rearmament, and integrating Germany into global trade, but that would have gone against Hitler’s belief in creating a German autarky.

I'm familiar with the MEFO bills, but I don't think it would have been a showstopper. Germany had survived far worse economic conditions in 1917-1918 as well as 1923. That Germany as a nation functioned until it was basically completely destroyed in 1945 showed how resilient it was. I don't think another bout of inflation would have been intolerable.

If you think that's bad you should see the financial bullshit the Brits and Americans have pulled for a century lol

 

[broudweeb]

I should do a similar thread for WW1

heck, I could break that into separate Germany and Austria-Hungary threads

 

[cathuluelitist]

These would all probably work but idk how realistic they would be without some sort of divine intervention or the Yichud society forewarning them with their oh so grand premonition, the Nazis had typical Marxist issues which caused the typical Marxist disasters, which struck at the worst possible time. Just like the rest of the Marxist, they ran out of stuff, and just as they were invading Russia, they ran out of other people's belongings and there was no escaping the Marxist cocytus of contrition and homogeneity can really only bring you so far, I mean, the only difference between communist third positionism and the Nazi alteration is that instead of eradicating the merchant class, they were going to coopt or rather subjugate them in a way but that doesn't change much since all third positionists wish to eliminate the commercial class and transfer their wealth to the priestly class and the priestly class is supremely effeminate so it just obviously doesn't work. The third positionist movement has always been in the pay of the left, they are always selling a socialism even more radical than that of Hitler, which was itself more radical than the socialism of Franco and Mussolini, it always fails in the end. I imagine Churchill's veiw of Hitler is like how Trump sees seething liberals, obviously these people are political losers. Well, Franco is an outlier and one of the Great Man types but my point stands.

 

[deadcells]

One interesting idea I always had is if they had diverted more attention to North Africa, sending a way bigger dedicated force early on to help out the Duce and improve the logistics of Libya (which was a heavy crux both for the Germans and Italians fighting there), to ultimately take the Suez Canal, securing one entrance into the Mediterranean, starving supply to any Allied fleets stationed there, and cutting oil and rubber convoys coming from the Middle east and Malaysia going to mainland Britain, as it would have to go around the Cape, and from my point of view, thats much more easier to intercept.

This, combined with much more focus on naval expansion and fully surrounding the British isles to intercept any convoys heading in or out from the Cape or the Atlantic from the USA, could starve the British industry and maybe reduce the effectiveness of their home fleet, opening up a chance to launch a potential Operation Sealion.

The RAF would also be heavily hit its effectiveness, as rubber is an important resource in the production of planes, and obviously fuel is necessary to even use them, so the air war over Britain could also have been tipped to favour the Luftwaffe plausibly AND Allied bombings over German industrial centers would be reduced if not stopped completely, which would allow more effectiveness in military production. Also with the control of the Suez, trade is possible to supply the German war machine with oil from the Middle east and Persia, which I think both of these regions were inclined to align with the Axis.

However obviously, I think in this scenario you'd be diverting attention from the east, so late Operation Barbarossa. and just in general, a late WW2, as Grand Admiral Erich Raeder said the Kriegsmarine wouldnt be operationally ready until 1942 under his Plan Z expansion plan, however Hitler assumed war with Britain wouldnt happen until 1943ish so he told him it was fine, but since Britain declared war when Germany invaded Poland in 1939, he scrapped the plan as he needed the resources elsewhere. So probably a late invasion of Poland aswell, somehow. Goes against the blitzkrieg doctrine kind of, but oh well.

 

[Based_Catcel]

There was no "good guys" in world war 2, both sides did terrible things

 

[broudweeb]

There was no "good guys" in world war 2, both sides did terrible things

This is largely true

I like to call them the "good guys" so as to 1. piss off sensitive redditards and 2. as a counterpoint to the anglo-american westoid attitude of "we wuz the good guyz saving the wurld!111!!!"

 

[broudweeb]

One interesting idea I always had is if they had diverted more attention to North Africa, sending a way bigger dedicated force early on to help out the Duce and improve the logistics of Libya (which was a heavy crux both for the Germans and Italians fighting there), to ultimately take the Suez Canal, securing one entrance into the Mediterranean, starving supply to any Allied fleets stationed there, and cutting oil and rubber convoys coming from the Middle east and Malaysia going to mainland Britain, as it would have to go around the Cape, and from my point of view, thats much more easier to intercept.

This, combined with much more focus on naval expansion and fully surrounding the British isles to intercept any convoys heading in or out from the Cape or the Atlantic from the USA, could starve the British industry and maybe reduce the effectiveness of their home fleet, opening up a chance to launch a potential Operation Sealion.

The RAF would also be heavily hit its effectiveness, as rubber is an important resource in the production of planes, and obviously fuel is necessary to even use them, so the air war over Britain could also have been tipped to favour the Luftwaffe plausibly AND Allied bombings over German industrial centers would be reduced if not stopped completely, which would allow more effectiveness in military production. Also with the control of the Suez, trade is possible to supply the German war machine with oil from the Middle east and Persia, which I think both of these regions were inclined to align with the Axis.

However obviously, I think in this scenario you'd be diverting attention from the east, so late Operation Barbarossa. and just in general, a late WW2, as Grand Admiral Erich Raeder said the Kriegsmarine wouldnt be operationally ready until 1942 under his Plan Z expansion plan, however Hitler assumed war with Britain wouldnt happen until 1943ish so he told him it was fine, but since Britain declared war when Germany invaded Poland in 1939, he scrapped the plan as he needed the resources elsewhere. So probably a late invasion of Poland aswell, somehow. Goes against the blitzkrieg doctrine kind of, but oh well.

This is a very interesting scenario

My only concern is that it might take a lot of resources to occupy Egypt, Arabia, etc and ensure the safe travel of petroleum

Another scenario I like is the idea of Britain (a la Oswald Mosley) going Fascist and allying with Germany. Ironically this would have been far better for the Brits overall. They could have saved all the money and resources they wasted on fighting Germany. They would have avoided bankruptcy and becoming financially enslaved to the Americans. Plus, they would have maintained the resources to retain much of their Empire. I wonder if they would have worked out a deal with the Japanese or wound up fighting with them - and if they did fight, would Japan ally with someone else or go it alone?

 

[Caichan]

Proudweeb is…

problematic medias?

 

[deadcells]

Another scenario I like is the idea of Britain (a la Oswald Mosley) going Fascist and allying with Germany. Ironically this would have been far better for the Brits overall. They could have saved all the money and resources they wasted on fighting Germany. They would have avoided bankruptcy and becoming financially enslaved to the Americans. Plus, they would have maintained the resources to retain much of their Empire. I wonder if they would have worked out a deal with the Japanese or wound up fighting with them - and if they did fight, would Japan ally with someone else or go it alone?

The empire was already pointing to decline during the 20th century, and decentralization of the colonies into dominions to ease governence in exchange for giving autonomy and local governments to them, with some of them exploiting that autonomy to push for full independence, like in India. Mosley I believe if he took power, with his want to recentralize the empire, and establishment of racial hierachy with the English man on top in the colonies, would dissolve the empire pretty quickly.

It would have angered both the ethnic majority colonies, and the already autonomous white man colonies like Australia or Canada, as they already had the taste of how their self-goverence is, and the Statute of Westminister already protected their independence. Most of the colonies, if not all, were garrisoned majorily by men from the Dominions, with only the officer NCOs came from isles. Plus with all the concessions the British made to the local elites like tribal chiefs in Africa or princes in India, suddenly cutting all of that would reverse any peace they had before.

I doubt Mosley would want to concede to Japan, as any concessions would threaten losing the remaining grip they'd have in the Pacific. Which again, would help promote the collapse of the empire sooner.

Plus the stability of the isles would have been threatened aswell. Scottish and Welsh question of independence was in full rage in the 1930s. Centralization and English supremacy would have caused major riots, if not civil war.

The only chance for survival then would be aligning with the Germans heavily, becoming reliant and slowly losing independence in the process.

 

[ANAWG9]

Old post of mine but I figured it would be good for discussion. These are not ordered by importance:

1. Not turning back to destroy the British Army at Dunkirk

2. Failing to secure enough oil both before and during the war (this was a MASSIVE problem, overall the single largest factor in their defeat)

3. Wasting resources on invasion of Norway

4. Dividing forces in 3 rather than in 2 while invading USSR, capturing Leningrad didn't serve much of a purpose, should have pushed towards the Volga valley as that contains majority of Russia's population & factories

5. Failing to build a strategic air force that could have taken out Soviet war material production in the Volga valley and towards the Urals

6. Wasting enormous resources trying to capture cities like Stalingrad. Should have just bypassed them but hit the factories from overhead.

7. By far the biggest problem was not having enough tanks, planes, truck etc to compete with USA/UK/USSR. They simply didn't have enough resources or factories to match up. But if they fixed the above flaws, they could win before this really started to hurt them.

8. Having a horse-drawn supply system rather than truck based like ALL of the allies did. This goes back to NO OIL. Worked ok in France but the USSR was just way too deep to get supplies that far.

9. Not providing adequate winterization for troops, tanks etc for the winter of 41-42. Dumb mistake, did they all just expect to go home the second Moscow fell?

10. Could have knocked out France by Nov 1939 in order to invade Russia earlier (the resources were available after Poland fell)

11. Delayed invasion of Russia until June 41, should have been April

12. Could have probably found a way to avoid occupying Yugoslavia and Greece to save resources. Partisans really wasted a lot of German time here. Maybe have Italy do more of the occupying (with German forces on the coasts, to protect from the British)

13. Basically giving up on the air campaign over Britain. Should have stuck with the night raids and focused on industrial areas (steel production, truck plants, etc). Admittedly air resources are going to be strained between Britain and USSR

14. Not changing up the Enigma system. Should have assumed their enemies would crack it eventually

15. Perhaps a hot take here, but avoid wasting resources on the holocaust. A waste of perfectly good slave labour!

16. You could make a case for allowing a breakout attempt for the 6th army at Stalingrad (resupplying by air was impossible for that tonnage) as well as avoiding Kursk (the USSR was already well aware of where they would attack, and had prepared extensively, making the battle a waste of desperately needed vehicles and oil). But I'd say the war was already unwinnable after Stalingrad, about all they could have done is lose more slowly.

17. Ramp up full military production vastly earlier (not in 1944). They could have been on a full wartime footing in 1939, perhaps earlier, depending on how much France and Britain complain about Versailles violations. This does depend on oil availability, which is historically part of why it didn't happen.

18. More resources to North Africa. Debatable since everything was needed to defeat USSR. But taking Suez would have really hurt British shipping. I'm not sure they'd ever have the resources to take the Arabian peninsula for the oil, though.

19. Overall be much "nicer" to the occupied populations in the East. Several were initially quite willing to work with Germany against the communists. Partisan activity made the supply problems even worse.

20. Convince the Japanese to take the "Northern" option and attack the USSR in late 1941. Ideally once they started moving their Siberian units towards Moscow, for maximum chaos. The Soviet forces would mog the Japanese Army, but it could have taken enough pressure off the west to win. I'm not sure the Japanese could be convinced to do this, though.

21. Delay declaring war on the US. While this would hurt the Atlantic campaign a bit, it would delay lend lease to the USSR, which was a problem (a lot of their trucks and high-quality fuels came from the US)

22. Avoid trusting Romanians (LOL) to guard your flanks at Stalingrad


Overall if I were Fuhrer this is what I would have done. Hindsight is 20/20. Would it all have been enough to overcome the overwhelming inferiority in resources? I don't know. It works in HOI4 at least, lol

I would like to add that if Germany pulled off Operation Sea Lion it would have been a major bonus. Personally, I would try to knock out the UK before even thinking about attacking the USSR