What If: World War Two

[Mathalamus]

if the soviets expected an attack why were they ordered not to provoke the germans even if they are under fire?

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

if the soviets expected an attack why were they ordered not to provoke the germans even if they are under fire?

Because the USSR was not ready for war.

You kind of shot yourself in the foot with that one.

 

[Lord Baal]

There were a few squadrons of Gloster Meteors in service by mid-1944.

I did not know that. I was aware that they were under development, but not that they were actually in service.

His data comes from the total number of Meteors produced, which covered a ten-year time span to 1954.

That I did know from the moment I looked at it. Since I refuse to argue with someone who is so blatantly intellectually dishonest, I left the thread.

i still dont see how Germany can realistically survive. its well known that when Germany attacked the SU, Stalin was planning to attack attack Germany sometime in 1942.

The USSR was certainly preparing for war, but they were by no means ready to launch an invasion of German-held Europe. That being said, they were probably more ready for war than the Germans were, whence some of their surprise at Operation: Barbarossa.

 

[ParkCungHee]

I think you're on the wrong track with the Soviet Union Cheezy. While I think they didn't have a date planned or anything concrete, Stalin certainly could see which way the wind was blowing. I think As soon as Germany was sufficiently vulnerable, he certainly intended to make a landgrab.

 

[Lord Baal]

I think you're on the wrong track with the Soviet Union Cheezy. While I think they didn't have a date planned or anything concrete, Stalin certainly could see which way the wind was blowing. I think As soon as Germany was sufficiently vulnerable, he certainly intended to make a landgrab.

More of a pre-emptive strike. He wasn't stupid enough to think that Germany would leave him alone and survival mattered more to him than land. Then again, he was negotiating to join the Axis. While one can argue that was merely to buy time, the sheer attractiveness of his offer to Hitler makes me think he genuinely hoped to become a German ally and avoid war entirely.

 

[Mathalamus]

Hitler wouldn't allow the USSR to be allied with germany. he wanted living space for his people and he hates communists and slavs.

 

[Lord Baal]

Hitler wouldn't allow the USSR to be allied with germany. he wanted living space for his people and he hates communists and slavs.

Then why'd he ally with the USSR in 1939?

You are right that it was Hitler's intransigence that killed the Soviet offer of alliance in December 1940. But I'd like to see you explain what that has to do with Stalin's actions.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

I think you're on the wrong track with the Soviet Union Cheezy. While I think they didn't have a date planned or anything concrete, Stalin certainly could see which way the wind was blowing. I think As soon as Germany was sufficiently vulnerable, he certainly intended to make a landgrab.

Perhaps he did, but that is pure speculation. At any rate, there is no evidence that war plans had actually been drawn out, just knowledge that they anticipated a war at a future date. But then, war with the West had been anticipated in the USSR since 1925, hence the reason for the Five Year Plans in the first place.

Which brings me to the alliance with Nazi Germany being discussed parallel to this: it must be remembered that Stalin had been trying to create an anti-German defensive alliance with France, Britain, and Poland, since 1937. But Poland deliberately sabotaged these plans by absolutely refusing to sign any document which also had a Russian signature. Its options exhausted, the USSR was forced to do the only thing left to ensure its security for the near future: make friends with the enemy. Stalin knew that the USSR could and would outpace Germany industrially, so the longer war was put off, the better position it would be in. All this must be taken into account when discussing this issue, it wasn't simply "Soviet Russia shows its true nature by allying with NAZI GERMANY, the most evil people ever!" or "lol 2 dictators 1 cup," it was the absolute last option, which no one really wanted to do, but had to.

And finally, they were never actually allied, they signed a non-aggression pact. Not the same thing.

 

[Lord Baal]

Which brings me to the alliance with Nazi Germany being discussed parallel to this: it must be remembered that Stalin had been trying to create an anti-German defensive alliance with France, Britain, and Poland, since 1937. But Poland deliberately sabotaged these plans by absolutely refusing to sign any document which also had a Russian signature. Its options exhausted, the USSR was forced to do the only thing left to ensure its security for the near future: make friends with the enemy. Stalin knew that the USSR could and would outpace Germany industrially, so the longer war was put off, the better position it would be in. All this must be taken into account when discussing this issue, it wasn't simply "Soviet Russia shows its true nature by allying with NAZI GERMANY, the most evil people ever!" or "lol 2 dictators 1 cup," it was the absolute last option, which no one really wanted to do, but had to.

Of course, Stalin screwed up royally with this, as the USSR was far stronger than Germany in 1939 when he signed the Pact. While the USSR certainly outpaced Germany industrially it was actually in its best position in regards to starting a war with Germany in 1939, even without the Western Allies.

And finally, they were never actually allied, they signed a non-aggression pact. Not the same thing.

A non-aggression pact that involved joint parades and direct assistance in the invasion of Poland, not to mention the massive concurrent economic deal. They were as close to allies as one could get without a formal alliance, espeically considering their mutually differing philosophies. Ideologically they should have hated each other, not traded together on a huge scale.

 

[sabo]

Well if Hitler hadn't been stupid enough to meddle with military matters and just let his Generals run the show instead, it very well might have gone similar to that. For instance, Hitler put off operation Citadel for 2 months so he could get more Panthers and Tigers involved in the campaign, giving Russia time to put up concentric defenses 7 deep. Had he just let his Generals command in the East, Citadel might never have happened, or at the very least, the German high command would have struck in April instead of June before the Russians had time to build up their defensive line. They could have very well taken the Kursk salient with mostly Pz 4's and a smattering of Panthers and Tigers. Look what the Germans did in 1941, they only had Pz 4's and they cut off, surrounded and destroyed some 300,000 Russian troops around Kiev. Which by the way I think was another of Hitlers blunders, he should have kept his Panzers pointed and rolling towards Moscow. Hitlers arrogance had no limits.

 

[ParkCungHee]

A non-aggression pact that involved joint parades and direct assistance in the invasion of Poland, not to mention the massive concurrent economic deal. They were as close to allies as one could get without a formal alliance, espeically considering their mutually differing philosophies. Ideologically they should have hated each other, not traded together on a huge scale.

Not to mention direct military assistance offered to strengthen Nazi Germany even in 1940, such as naval aid in the invasion of Norway.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

Of course, Stalin screwed up royally with this, as the USSR was far stronger than Germany in 1939 when he signed the Pact.

Yes, but how likely was it that the Western Allies would support the USSR in a war against Germany before they were getting raped themselves? The USSR was their ally of convenience, because they both happened to be fighting the same countries. It was no secret in the 1930s that Britain, France et al wanted to unleash Germany against the Soviet Union, because Fascists were tolerable, but Communists they were dead scared of.

While the USSR certainly outpaced Germany industrially it was actually in its best position in regards to starting a war with Germany in 1939, even without the Western Allies.

I don't think that's so. There are other factors apart from industrial output that you must take into account. Besides, neither side had accurate information about the others' actual wartime capacity. Remember that France and Britain were just as skiddish about attacking Germany, and for similar reasons.

A non-aggression pact that involved joint parades

Never heard of putting on a show?

and direct assistance in the invasion of Poland,

This deserves its own topic, suffice to say I don't care to explain why this is false.

[EDIT] Never mind, I can do it here.

The two countries both realized that if either controlled Poland entirely, it would antagonize the other too much (proximity and all that), so they proposed that if either of them wound up going to war with Poland, then they would only advance so far, and the buffer state would remain, albeit as a tool, but then, most buffer states are. Well the Polish government had the ingenious idea of fleeing the country without surrendering to the Germans, and getting arrested by the neutral Romanians and sent to Britain. When that happened, Poland effectively had no government and ceased to legally be a national entity. So what was to stop Germany from driving all the way to Belorussia? Well, the Red Army being in that part of Poland was decided to be a good measure, so they sent their forces in to protect themselves and the rest of Poland. There's a reason the Poles didn't oppose the Russian intervention: because it was just that, not an invasion. The international community didn't recognize it as such, nor did Romania, with whom Poland had a defensive alliance specifically against Russia.
[/EDIT]

not to mention the massive concurrent economic deal.

Which had been going on since 1922.

They were as close to allies as one could get without a formal alliance, espeically considering their mutually differing philosophies. Ideologically they should have hated each other, not traded together on a huge scale.

As with all diplomacy, and I cannot reiterate this enough, there are bigger things than ideology that drive peoples' and countries' actions. For all your lecturing of zhaoshuais, I would have thought you'd learned that by now.

 

[zhaoshuais]

Grishnash made a mistake:when there were 3 superpowers in the world,cold war was not a good idea for any of them!
But he also realized something:triangle world is stable.
Sending atomic bombs to ally was not a good idea,either,especially when you were not in the war at all.Under such condition,most of leaders would declare war on you,as they also have atomic bombs.
USSR might declare war on Japan even earlier as they had at least one hand free after 1942.Under such condition,Japan had no chance to survive.
Your timeline includes China,but you did not provide the winner of civil war.Communist or Nationalist?

 

[zhaoshuais]

In fact,if I am the leader,and there are 3 superpowers,I would not consider any of them as potential enemy.A cold war against all 2 sides would isolate myself,not my opponents.

And CIV tell us that with more superpowers in the world,the tech speed can be faster,as they can research different lines and exchange with each other.Grishnash realized that.

At last,corruption of Stalinism can not be cured without change of idology.In fact,Stalin made a fatal mistake:without supervision of democracy,state property and planned economy would gradually fall into officials' hands,and lose all their advantage at last.Without cold war and isolation from outside,USSR could survive longer,but could not overcome the real weak point inside without revolution.

Of course,if state property and democracy come together in a superpower,it would be the end of capitalism.I know that's still far away from reality,but that may happen in future.

 

[zhaoshuais]

For the end of Nazi,I can tell everyone that when an aggressive country become rich,and everyone can live abundantly,the country would gradually change idology and become more and more peaceful.
Take Qing dynasty in China as an example,when they entered China,they were aggressive barbarians,but after over 200 years,they became extremely coward and attempted to buy peace with money robbed by their ancestors.That's the real end of Facistism.I found the same story on Sparta,as they also lost their tradition when they became rich.

 

[red_elk]

A non-aggression pact that involved joint parades and direct assistance in the invasion of Poland, not to mention the massive concurrent economic deal. They were as close to allies as one could get without a formal alliance, espeically considering their mutually differing philosophies. Ideologically they should have hated each other, not traded together on a huge scale.

What is interesting is that nobody calls Poland ally of Nazi Germany for joint invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1938, and USA, for economic deals.

 

[Mathalamus]

What is interesting is that nobody calls Poland ally of Nazi Germany for joint invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1938, and USA, for economic deals.

because poland and the USA obviously distanced themselves from Nazis?

 

[red_elk]

because poland and the USA obviously distanced themselves from Nazis?

I don't know what you meant by "distanced", but USSR and Germany were actively preparing for war against each other, starting from 1938. I wouldn't call such relations allied

 

[Lord Baal]

Yes, but how likely was it that the Western Allies would support the USSR in a war against Germany before they were getting raped themselves? The USSR was their ally of convenience, because they both happened to be fighting the same countries. It was no secret in the 1930s that Britain, France et al wanted to unleash Germany against the Soviet Union, because Fascists were tolerable, but Communists they were dead scared of.

The USSR could have defeated Germany without the assistance of the Western Allies. You should know that better than I do. Granted, purging half his command staff had put Stalin in a worse position than he should have been, but he still had them at his disposal if he needed them - most were in gulags, not killed.

I don't think that's so. There are other factors apart from industrial output that you must take into account. Besides, neither side had accurate information about the others' actual wartime capacity. Remember that France and Britain were just as skiddish about attacking Germany, and for similar reasons.

I'm aware of the intelligence failures on both sides, along with other Soviet problems, such as the aforementioned purges, fear of a Japanese invasion in the East, etc.. Stalin didn't know how weak Germany really was, hence his desperation. If he knew how precarious Hitler's position truly was he may well have gone to war in 1939, Polish permission and Western Allies be damned

Never heard of putting on a show?

They usually involve more than just the troops and a few generals. A show that big usually has some heads-of-state.

This deserves its own topic, suffice to say I don't care to explain why this is false.

[EDIT] Never mind, I can do it here.

The two countries both realized that if either controlled Poland entirely, it would antagonize the other too much (proximity and all that), so they proposed that if either of them wound up going to war with Poland, then they would only advance so far, and the buffer state would remain, albeit as a tool, but then, most buffer states are. Well the Polish government had the ingenious idea of fleeing the country without surrendering to the Germans, and getting arrested by the neutral Romanians and sent to Britain. When that happened, Poland effectively had no government and ceased to legally be a national entity. So what was to stop Germany from driving all the way to Belorussia? Well, the Red Army being in that part of Poland was decided to be a good measure, so they sent their forces in to protect themselves and the rest of Poland. There's a reason the Poles didn't oppose the Russian intervention: because it was just that, not an invasion. The international community didn't recognize it as such, nor did Romania, with whom Poland had a defensive alliance specifically against Russia.
[/EDIT]

Too bad that Russia made the agreement to divide Poland with Germany before the war started, let alone before the Polish government fled. That was what guaranteed that Germany wouldn't march all the way to Belorussia. As it was, the Germans were quite pissed when the Soviets bullied Romania out of territory that had not been included in its sphere in the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.

And having no government doesn't cause on to cease being a legal national entity anyway. Somalia is still a recognised nation, it just doesn't have a recognised government. And considering both Soviet and Nazi atrocities in Poland - the Katyn Massacre is the best-known Soviet example - how can you honestly believe that the Polish government wouldn't have been summarily shot? After a show trial on the German side, probablyjust marched into the woods on the Russian since they were pumping out propaganda about how it was to help the Poles. It wasn't recognised as an invasion at the time solely because the West - including, famously, Winston Churchill - bought the Soviet lies about marching into Poland to protect Russian and Polish citizens from Germany.

As for the Romanians not recognising the invasion and arresting the Polish government, it's no different from Finnish attempts to play off Germany and Russia while keeping both happy. When you're sandwiched between superpowers you tend to bend over backwards for them whenever necessary, so as to avoid being bent over forwards by them, to use a crude analogy.

Also, did not Russia and Germany already share a border along East Prussia? Or did Poland and Lithuania separate them at that point? I don't remember and I already have too many pages loaded to go looking at maps.

All told, you didn't really explain why any of it was false Cheezy. I believe we had this discussion once before. The secret provisions of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact are incontrovertible fact. Russia wasn't protecting Poland, they were cutting themselves off a slice to protect themselves.

Which had been going on since 1922.

Which had nothing to do with the needs of a wartime economy, which Russia was meeting for Germany. That deal was also with the Weimar Republic, not Nazi Germany (yes, I'm aware there were also deals with the Nazis prior to 1939, but they were chump-change in comparison to what was to come). Do you argue that the economic assistance provided to Germany by Russia increased dramatically in the period after the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact?

As with all diplomacy, and I cannot reiterate this enough, there are bigger things than ideology that drive peoples' and countries' actions. For all your lecturing of zhaoshuais, I would have thought you'd learned that by now.

What are you on about? I'm well-aware of this, probably more than you are. I did study international relations at university, after all. If you're enquiring about my final sentence, I'm merely pointing out that their mutally hostile ideologies limited them from more public examples of their alliance. There's a reason the secret provisions were secret, after all, and one major reason was because both nations had spent years vilifying the other to their own people.

What is interesting is that nobody calls Poland ally of Nazi Germany for joint invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1938, and USA, for economic deals.

That wasn't a joint invasion, they simply both carved off a slice for themselves. To my knowledge there was nothing even close to the sort of direct military assistance provided Germany by the USSR between Poland and Germany during the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia. As for economic deals, the US didn't act as the financier and supplier for Germany's wartime industry. In fact, it did the direct opposite, by doing so for Germany's enemies; Britain, France (for a short time) and later the Soviets.

 

[red_elk]

That wasn't a joint invasion, they simply both carved off a slice for themselves. To my knowledge there was nothing even close to the sort of direct military assistance provided Germany by the USSR between Poland and Germany during the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia. As for economic deals, the US didn't act as the financier and supplier for Germany's wartime industry. In fact, it did the direct opposite, by doing so for Germany's enemies; Britain, France (for a short time) and later the Soviets.

Soviet direct military assistance only included coordination of German aviation, using signals from radio station in Minsk. And "joint" assault on Lvov, with clash between 24-th Soviet armoured brigade and 2-nd mountain division of Wehrmacht. Which ended up with agreement between "allies" to keep minimal distance of 25 km. between their troops. There are no principal differences between German-Soviet cooperation in partition of Poland and German-Polish cooperation in partition of Czechoslovakia.

To call two nations allies, it's necessary for them to trust each other and to have common long-term interests. Germany and USSR in 1939, as I already said, were preparing for war against each other.

Analogy from modern time, Russia and China had joint military parades and even maneuvers, have very intensive economic deals, including weapons trade. Are they allies?