A civil discussion of alternate WWII history

Out of regard for poor Alsbron, who had his thread so totally hijacked, I'm starting an alternate Second World War history thread. They are always fun (as long as I keep my cool), and may be useful for those doing WWII scenarios.

Here's a few controversies to consider:

1. Germany could have won the war.
2. Germany could have developed the A-bomb.
3. Capture of Malta by Germany could have led to the capture of middle east oil.
4. The allies could have landed in France in 1943, or sooner.
5. The strategic air offensive was ineffective and a waste of resources.
6. Germany could have won the Battle of Britain and invaded England.
7. Germany could have won the Battle of the Atlantic and starved England.
8. The Soviets could have defeated Germany by themselves.

Yeah but half the fun out of that conversation was its spontaneity.
Now it all seems staged...

And you shouldn't worry about you keeping your cool. Since i was the target of your outrage, i can sincerely say that i was not offended. But i do find the label "Nazi apologizer" as misleading. In my way of thinking there was nothing wrong with their aggresivess so as there to be a need to apologize. I am curious though-Why people find Nazi foreign policy evil but not the bombing of Dresden or the A-bombs, essentially the mass killing of civilians to achieve war aims.

Here are two more ideas what could be happen in an alternate history:

- Hitler never became chancelor of Germany and the Weimar Republic didn´t collapse.
The Soviet Union launched an attack on Germany and Western Europe.

- Staufenbergs assassination on Hitler was succesfully and parts of the german military
staff joined Staufenberg. In the summer 1944 a civilwar broke out between the Nazis,
commaned by Goebbels and Göring and the revolutionaries, commanded by Staufenberg.

Dresden = Payback. And as we all know, payback is a MF! But honestly I can't offer any real justification for this event. Britain should not have stooped to the same level as the Nazi's by bombing civilians (I was going to say indiscriminately, but there was nothing indiscriminate about Dresden, it was wholesale murder!). All I can say is this event was not unprovoked. Was it evil? I would say yes it was!

A-Bomb on Hiroshima. Could be justified on the basis that it ended the war sooner and therefore there were less overall civilian casualties from the fire-bombing of Japanese cities and during the planned US invasion of the Japanese mainland. I think these justifications hold some water, but a massive motivation must have been to show the Soviet Union the power of the Bomb and for the US to gain control of Japan before the Soviets could. Nagasaki is harder to justify as the demonstration had already been made. Also, despite clearly being beaten the Japanese were showing no signs of being ready to surrender. Had they been on the brink a less lethal demonstration of the Bombs destructive power (say against a much less populated area) may have been enough. Was the US evil to drop the bomb? If they truly thought it was the lesser of two evils then no, it was not evil. If it was to gain an advantage over the Soviet Union in the cold war that they must have know was coming then yes it was evil.

German militarism was a major cause of the first world war and that is why the Allies felt the need to punish them. Clearly that was a short sighted move and was a major factor contributing the rise of the Nazi's and the second round of German militarism. However, once the worth of Versailles excesses had been overturned by Hitler and Germany was back in some sort of order economically there was no pressing need for expansion other than greed and racially motivated arrogance by the Nazi's. Britain and France did not want another war and Poland was in no state to wage an aggressive war against Germany. As said before, Austria and Bohemia had never been part of Germany and the relatively small number of ethnic Germans living outside of the Reich's borders were not being oppressed or persecuted. There were certainly no concentration camps in Poland or Czechoslovakia until the Nazi's built them there!

I accept your point that strong nations will find it tempting to wield their power for their own ends and will try and justify their actions. Americas invasion of Iraq is a classic example of a corrupt ruling elite manipulating a country's public opinion to wage a war of aggression. Its not in the same league as Barbarossa or the Holocaust but it is still clearly wrong (or evil if you like). I would never seek to justify any such war, but it does come across to me too that you are trying to say that what the Nazi's did was justified as its just a part of human nature for the strong to exploit the weak. This may be the reality but I don't believe it is ever justified and the civilized world should never accept it. The Nazi's were evil and I can see no argument that will make me think otherwise, though I'm happy to listen to any offered.

Palaiologos2 said:

I am curious though-Why people find Nazi foreign policy evil but not the bombing of Dresden or the A-bombs, essentially the mass killing of civilians to achieve war aims.

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Are you joking?
Of course people find the murder and enslavement of millions of people evil. Even if all the death and suffering was entirely against Hitlers wishes it it still just as evil.

Or, more likely, are you simply derailing the discussion because you have trouble defending your stance?

I have never seen anyone defend the Dresden bombings. I have seen people try to find explanations for them, but never actually say they were justified. I will eat my hat if anyone here even makes an attempt to condone the tragic results of the bombings.

On the other hand, while the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are terrible indeed, what makes them so very much worse than, say, the bombing of London?
Is the scale of destruction alone enough to single it out as something especially horrible? At what point did it become an act of evil different from all the other bombings?

The bombing of Dresden was a crime war. As far as I know many people in Britain condemned the British area bombardment of Dresden and other german cities during the war.

The A-bombing of Hieroshima and Nagasaki were very bad. But like McMonkey wrote, the Japanese Empire didn´t show any sign for a surrender. The alternative was an invading of the Japanese Islands with much more casualties.

On the other hand how would our world nowadays looking without the using of the two A-bombs? Without the knowing of this massive destruction and the following nuclear fallout? How would our world nowadays looking when these bombs were used first time during the Korean War or the Cuba Crisis?

Unfortunatelly thousands of civilians had to die but they saved lives. A nuclear war would have billions of casualties.

Hitler murdered millions of jews in concentration camps created by the Nazis in East Europe. This was an organized genocide and one of the worst things Hitler ever did.

In the UK, we used to regard the Dresden bombings as a payback for the horrors of the Blitz on the UK.
We now realise that such butchery on both sides was as relevant to military doctrine as eugenics was to science.

As a clever man once stated: "Cities are the basis of civilisation, not rubble heaps..."

.

WW2 was one of the very few just wars (from an Anglo-American perspective) in history. The United States and Britain have no obligation to apologize for conducting total war against Germany. Anything that could conceivably shorten the war by one hour was justified. It is conceivable that the strategic/terror bombing campaign conducted by the Allies shortened the war. Look at what it did to German air cover.

We would not be able to win a war like that today, because we are now entirely too concerned with what our enemies think of us.

Thank God our ancestors had more foresight.

Ingvar VII said:

Or, more likely, are you simply derailing the discussion because you have trouble defending your stance?

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Actually Ingvar my question was sincere. I was truly curious about the opinion of a westerner about the events. I mean people here in Greece hardly know that WW2 ever took place, let alone the Dresden bombings. I wanted to see how europeans actually look upon these actions. I personally and in all honesty do not consider either the Dresden bombing or the A-bombs as evil. I don't believe that there can be evil in times of war.

Christ. You are truly labelling people aren't you? "Nazi sympathizer" or whatever else you try to convince yourself that i am. Quite the intolerant type.

I have never seen anyone defend the Dresden bombings. I have seen people try to find explanations for them, but never actually say they were justified. I will eat my hat if anyone here even makes an attempt to condone the tragic results of the bombings.

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Well i can try. Part of the goal of the strategic bombing campaign was to demoralize the German population. Dresden having never been bombed before was considered safe by the Germans and many civilians flocked there. Destroying the city would prove to be twice beneficial for the Allies. Terrorizing the populace AND creating a horde of homeless to burden the German economy. Whats truly illogical about that?

On the other hand, while the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are terrible indeed, what makes them so very much worse than, say, the bombing of London?
Is the scale of destruction alone enough to single it out as something especially horrible? At what point did it become an act of evil different from all the other bombings?

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The terrifying scale caused by a mysterious weapon i suppose. In normal city bombings
people actually have a chance to live-shelters, lights out etc. In an atomic explosion there can be no escape. Although there was a single jap that survived both bombings!

JPetroski said:

WW2 was one of the very few just wars (from an Anglo-American perspective) in history. The United States and Britain have no obligation to apologize for conducting total war against Germany. Anything that could conceivably shorten the war by one hour was justified. It is conceivable that the strategic/terror bombing campaign conducted by the Allies shortened the war. Look at what it did to German air cover.

We would not be able to win a war like that today, because we are now entirely too concerned with what our enemies think of us.

Thank God our ancestors had more foresight.

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Exactly. Neither the Allies or Germans have to apologize for waging total war to each other. As i said in the post above, i don't believe there can be evil in times of war.

So were the Mongols evil as well? Genghis' campaigns caused 40 million deaths bested only by WW2.
Just read what they did to Persia.

You have stated your views clearly, so I have no reason to label you.
I don't see how it matter either, you have all the right to sympathize with whomever you choose.

Ingvar VII said:

You have stated your views clearly, so I have no reason to label you.
I don't see how it matter either, you have all the right to sympathize with whomever you choose.

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Problem is that if you truly believed that you wouldn't insinuate that i am a pro-Nazi.
And while labelling itself means nothing to me (or you) the specific characterization is a bad one in your mind. Frankly i have a problem with people thinking badly of me. In anycase just try to realize that things that i find understandable does not mean i necessarily like them.
I wouldn't like to be in Dresden; Nor i would like to have my country occupied by the Germans. While undesirable these eventualities are UNDERSTANDABLE because these people were trying to win a godamn war.

And just to clarify; I took the time and reread my posts in the other thread. While perfectly clear to me at the time of the writing it was not apparently to the readers. When i said that the German annexation of Sudetenland etc was justified i meant "justified from a German perspective".

I do admit i am biased in favor of the German national cause in post WW1 Germany, if only it reminds me of my own nation's tragedy. I don't particulary care about German politics so in my eyes Hitler would be as good as the next guy as long as he promoted the national cause of reunion.
As for the Nazi concetration camps and the German policy in occupied countries, i have deliberately left them out of my posts since they didn't affect the political actions of either embattled party during WW2. Unless someone believes the Germans were invading countries in search of Jews.

Okay, I will be as clear as I possibly can.

One of the main points in your posts is that your opinion is that anything is fair game in war. You did not say that you only thought anything that the Axis powers of the second world war did was okay, you said that anything that was done in any war was okay.

How am I insinuating that you are a Nazi sympathizer? By saying you can sympathize with whomever you like?

Well you did acccuse me of trying to derail the discussion by bringing up Allied "war crimes".

Ingvar VII said:

One of the main points in your posts is that your opinion is that anything is fair game in war. You did not say that you only thought anything that the Axis powers of the second world war did was okay, you said that anything that was done in any war was okay.

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But...of course. How could it not be? Within a certain rationale of course. Nuking Syria because they are supposedly harboring terrorists is not okay, but torturing Syrians to extract information on enemy hideouts is.

The strategic air offensive of day time is useful and important. It not only greatly disrupted German industry/logistic, but also lured out and crushed German fighter forces. And it is achieved with relatively low civilian damage.
However the night time bombing...is at least not so effective, let alone justifiable or not. "Terro bombing" is not effective against well organised targets. Please be noted that the word "effective" here is in terms of to reduce German war potential, not in terms of kill civilians. "Terro bombing" does not a bad job for the later.

@McMonkey :
The second A-bomb on Nagasaki can be justified as it is to show Japanese that US not only have A-Bomb, but can mass produce it.
BTW, a great many innocent Asian people and Bataan prisoner would like to see the two A-Bombs as justice Payback as well.

Regards to Palaiologos2's opinion, don't want to talk much about it but there is one argument: There are more people (including many Germans) benifited from Nazi's failure than the people would benifit from Nazi's victory. So yes Mongol empire is evil. That's why it didn't last long. People against it. Same for Nazi.
If people have to choose a smaller one from two evils and define it as justice, it makes sense.

In fact, I do find the fire-bombing of German and Japanese cities "evil". The use of the A-bomb, even moreso. I think they were driven primarily by political, rather than military, objectives.

The area bombing of cities by the RAF at night was not effective in weakening the German war effort. (Neither was the "precision" daylight bombing of industrial targets by the USAAF, btw) It was enormously expensive in planes and crew, and despite it, German production increased steadily throughout the war. It was promoted by Air Marshal "Bomber" Harris, using appeals to the public's thirst for revenge for the far more limited "Blitz" of London, Coventry and other British cities. It was promoted by politicians like Winston Churchill to satisfy public opinion that not enough was being done to defeat Germany, when the heroic Russians were fighting and dying on a massive scale.

The fire-bombing of Dresden and the A-bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were all influenced by the emerging contest between the western allies and the Soviet Union in the post-war world. In the case of Dresden, as a city with little industry or military value, it was attacked only on the verge of it's capture by the Red Army. Arguably, it's destruction hindered the western movement of the Soviets in the last few days of the war, as they attempted to capture as much of Germany as possible.

The nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki also came after Japan's defeat was a foregone conclusion. The Japanese had already signaled their willingness to surrender; the only condition was the retention of the Emperor. With a massive Soviet offensive against Japan imminent, the US was anxious to forstall the capture of Mancuhuria, Korea and North China by the Red Army. The immediate unconditional surrender of Japan after the A-bombs were dropped allowed US forces to land in southern Korea and northern China to forstall the Soviet occupation of those areas.

It was also a forceful demonstration to Stalin of the power of the west in the post-war world, something that set off a desperate arms race that has not abated to this day.

techumseh said:

Neither was the "precision" daylight bombing of industrial targets by the USAAF, btw

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There are several reasons of the low effecient of daylight bombing:
1, USAAF chosed wrong targets, not key factorys and fuel plants as in the later stage, which is quite effective.
2, Nazi only began total mobilization after 1942, so it seems that daylight bombing didn't sotpped its production from growing. But if there is no daylight bombing, Nazi production would grow faster and larger.
3, Daylight bombing may not only target on Nazi production number but on its overall capability. For example the best heavy tanks on paper, Tiger IIs, are often found being build with poor quality armor, much weaker than Tiger I's. It is because USAAF take out Nazi's Molybdenum supply.
Bisedes it also effected a lot on transport and air superiority.

Yet, daylight bombing is astonishing costy, and not as effecient or decisive as ground battle(again, salute to the Red Army). It is debatable that if all these manpower and resource may be made a better use. However, it is very effective nonetheless.

And the fire-bombing on Japanese cities has a somewhat "decent" reason(at least US say so): Japanese industry then was different from Europe style, it was scatered among the city in many small workshops. So concentrated bombing may not be that effective.