And an even larger logistical problem.
They demobilized almost a third of their force during barbarossa because logistics couldn't keep up.
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Plausible Alt-History is missing in this game
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They demobilized almost a third of their force during barbarossa because logistics couldn't keep up.
The biggest things to remember about whether Germany could have killed Russia in 1941:
1.) Germany lost a million troops in 6 months of fighting, and struggled to replace these (hence the large allied deployments of Hungarian, Romanian, and Italian troops to help cover the growing lines for Germany). Their tanks in particular were devastated, losing something like 2/3's of their combat effectiveness (combination of field losses and serious problems from the cold wrecking them).
2.) The battle of Rzhev following the failure to take Moscow was one of the bloodiest battles of WWII, and threatened to destroy the entire central German army (ultimately the Soviets tried to do too much too quickly, and Hitler's insistence on holding ground helped stabilize the front); successfully taking Moscow fails to address the massive reinforcements deployed nearby that are able to counterattack.
3.) Napoleon conquered Moscow and lost anyways; Germany's WWI victory was based on attritional warfare, not blitzing into the capital (rail hub or no, Russia can still ship enough troops into Europe without Moscow to pose a massive threat).
Realistically, Germany would have been better off not even trying to take Moscow in the first place in 1941, and just contenting themselves with consolidating their position.
1.) Germany lost a million troops in 6 months of fighting, and struggled to replace these (hence the large allied deployments of Hungarian, Romanian, and Italian troops to help cover the growing lines for Germany). Their tanks in particular were devastated, losing something like 2/3's of their combat effectiveness (combination of field losses and serious problems from the cold wrecking them).
2.) The battle of Rzhev following the failure to take Moscow was one of the bloodiest battles of WWII, and threatened to destroy the entire central German army (ultimately the Soviets tried to do too much too quickly, and Hitler's insistence on holding ground helped stabilize the front); successfully taking Moscow fails to address the massive reinforcements deployed nearby that are able to counterattack.
3.) Napoleon conquered Moscow and lost anyways; Germany's WWI victory was based on attritional warfare, not blitzing into the capital (rail hub or no, Russia can still ship enough troops into Europe without Moscow to pose a massive threat).
Realistically, Germany would have been better off not even trying to take Moscow in the first place in 1941, and just contenting themselves with consolidating their position.
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Eventually, America would -WANT- to go to war with Germany whether it be in 1941 or 1944. At some point, American's sleeping giant would awaken and bear upon the Germans.
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The problem with making any scenarios is that the game is HEAVILY scripted because the AI is not coded to think.
For example, in EU4, you only need to give the AI claims and they will try to declare war. EU4 AI will also check for strength ratios before declaring war IIRC. The AI in HOI4 doesnt even do that unless you add a specific ai_strategy to do it. The ai_strategy system is awful and requires heavy scripting to account for every possible scenario.
For example, in any scenario in which France does not remove the guarantee on Yugoslavia in time will result in Italy trying to fight France solo, and they will obviously lose. There is no sanity check for "hey, my alliance isnt stronger than France, this is a bad idea!". So not only do you have to make Italy check for France's guarantee, you also have to make Italy check for every possible guarantee AND faction allies.
The faction system also breaks down if its anything other than a 1vs1, and everyone fights to the death like an idiot except for a few rare scripted events, and the ones that are scripted are buggy. War support is virtually useless because everyone is sitting at 100% anyway. I just spent time testing and fixing China's white peace event with Japan becase it only creates a white peace with Japan, and doesnt include Japan's allies, so Germany and everyone else are still at war with China after the white peace fires, which is stupid.
Its also extremely frustrating when a faction member drags everyone along into a new war. I dunno about you, but if China decided to declare on Tibet, i seriously doubt the rest of the allies would have joined in.
There are plenty of alt scenarios but most of them are simply incompatible with each other. Most of the focus trees assume you are running with everything else on historical focus and will break if you are not. For example, India's focus tree flat out assumes that Germany is fascist and UK is democratic, and will break if they pick a different path. No attempt was made to make them compatible with each other. Newer focus trees are better in that regard, but are still extremely prone to breaking.
And the lack of sanity checks is extremely frustrating. Spain did the gilbraltar focus? OK lets suicide by declaring war on the UK. Portugal suicides into the UK because it wants the UK's african colonies too. France went Napoleon? Hey, lets fight UK AND Germany at the same time! UK at war with Germany? Time to declare on Communist India and bring the USSR into the war on Germany's side.
For example, in EU4, you only need to give the AI claims and they will try to declare war. EU4 AI will also check for strength ratios before declaring war IIRC. The AI in HOI4 doesnt even do that unless you add a specific ai_strategy to do it. The ai_strategy system is awful and requires heavy scripting to account for every possible scenario.
For example, in any scenario in which France does not remove the guarantee on Yugoslavia in time will result in Italy trying to fight France solo, and they will obviously lose. There is no sanity check for "hey, my alliance isnt stronger than France, this is a bad idea!". So not only do you have to make Italy check for France's guarantee, you also have to make Italy check for every possible guarantee AND faction allies.
The faction system also breaks down if its anything other than a 1vs1, and everyone fights to the death like an idiot except for a few rare scripted events, and the ones that are scripted are buggy. War support is virtually useless because everyone is sitting at 100% anyway. I just spent time testing and fixing China's white peace event with Japan becase it only creates a white peace with Japan, and doesnt include Japan's allies, so Germany and everyone else are still at war with China after the white peace fires, which is stupid.
Its also extremely frustrating when a faction member drags everyone along into a new war. I dunno about you, but if China decided to declare on Tibet, i seriously doubt the rest of the allies would have joined in.
There are plenty of alt scenarios but most of them are simply incompatible with each other. Most of the focus trees assume you are running with everything else on historical focus and will break if you are not. For example, India's focus tree flat out assumes that Germany is fascist and UK is democratic, and will break if they pick a different path. No attempt was made to make them compatible with each other. Newer focus trees are better in that regard, but are still extremely prone to breaking.
And the lack of sanity checks is extremely frustrating. Spain did the gilbraltar focus? OK lets suicide by declaring war on the UK. Portugal suicides into the UK because it wants the UK's african colonies too. France went Napoleon? Hey, lets fight UK AND Germany at the same time! UK at war with Germany? Time to declare on Communist India and bring the USSR into the war on Germany's side.
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If by "America", you mean "Roosevelt", then yes, but the rest of congress didnt want to and he was stuck. Maybe another convenient excuse would have popped up, maybe not.
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I'm of the personal belief that Germany could not have defeated Russia in WW2 in the capitulation sense. I think they could have taken the resources they could require and then solidfied the front, before focusing on the Western but never actually defeat the Russians. If they did that then they could have put more troops onto Normandy and defended against the American invasion a bit better and maybe pushed it back. With the resources of Russia secured, they might have even started building a navy. maybe.
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Russia wasnt willing to surrender largely because of Stalin, because duh, a power hungry dictator doesnt care how many millions of his people die if he gets to stay in power. Throughout history, most countries were willing to negotiate for an armistice if it was clear they were going to lose, the ones who refused to usually had leaders that didnt care if their country was burnt to the ground along with them.
If Stalin died somehow and the politburo started the usual infighting, then whoever took power might have sued for peace so that he could focus on the political infighting and purging their political opponents.
If Stalin died somehow and the politburo started the usual infighting, then whoever took power might have sued for peace so that he could focus on the political infighting and purging their political opponents.
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Which is another alt-history we could explore, if it was a plausible outcome that he would be taken out. I mean Stalin Did fear it and took measures against it hence the purge.
But this would mean so much alt history had to take place in order for Germany to get this far. America not joining the war. Britain signing a peace deal and Stalin being dead. Theres so much that would have to go right there lmao.
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That "convenient excuse" was pearl harbour.
US Congress voted nearly unanimously in both house and senate to commit to going to war after December 7th, with the exception of a single house representative that was an ideological pacifist, and the step from there to expanding the already ongoing naval war against the axis in the Atlantic is tiny.
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I too am on the side of the arguement that thinks a US intervention wouldn't have happened that easily without a Reich declaration of war.
But here's the point, this argument itself is a "what if scenario", a possible and most importantly plausible Alt-History that could be represented in the game, just of the top of my head it could be a decision based on the majority minority mechanic that the US already has which makes that mini game more challenging and important if the player wants to go to war with Germany.
But here's the point, this argument itself is a "what if scenario", a possible and most importantly plausible Alt-History that could be represented in the game, just of the top of my head it could be a decision based on the majority minority mechanic that the US already has which makes that mini game more challenging and important if the player wants to go to war with Germany.
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The plausible branching point isn't "would the US have gotten involved without a German war declaration" but "would the US have gotten involved if Japan had limited their war to just China".
After that, the already ongoing informal war against the european Axis powers woule have continued to escalate.
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If i remember Hitler say "not return fire to american, and not sink USA ship, i not want USA angaist US"....
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UK didn't want war, Churchill did.
USA did not want war, Roosevelt did.
Russia did not want war, Stalin did.
Sensing a pattern here.
USA did not want war, Roosevelt did.
Russia did not want war, Stalin did.
Sensing a pattern here.
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While I don't strictly disagree (I don't see Germany actually conquering the USSR, UK, or US), Germany didn't really capitulate Russia in WWI either; Russia collapsed from its internal problems. That's how you take down earth-spanning hegemons, by wearing out their will to fight. Its not as if Stalin hadn't made a ton of enemies both politically and nationally. Of course, Nazi ideology and tactics rather precluded any effective use of these enemies (the Osttruppen are a far cry from nationalist armies like the WWI Polish or Czechs, and none of the defectors had any political influence in the USSR).
Its less of a case for how they could have won, and more for how they should have tried to win (since it wasn't really evident in 1939 that the USSR or USA were quite so dangerous or resilient).
Naval expansion ultimately would take over a decade to start matching British numbers (ignoring the very high production-capacity of Britain for new ships), and even with all of Russia the Germans really don't have a chance in their lifetime of matching US naval production capacity. Even focusing on submarines alone, subs proved incredibly-vulnerable to dedicated opposition from ASW escorts and aircraft (whether land- or carrier-based). Naval power is more of an industrial game than any other form of warfare.
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This isn't really true. Chamberlain declared war on Germany, not Churchill, and the British people were fairly-happy with Churchill's "never surrender" speech despite German offers for peace. Roosevelt's fighting was largely with the Senate, not the American people (compare House votes versus Senate votes, and compare the votes needed to filibuster versus the votes needed for new bills, and you'll see that even 40 senators can dictate policy so long as they don't need to propose new legislation). And in Stalin's case, he actively didn't want war (hence his work to avoid antagonizing Germany and his paralysis at the start of Barbarossa).
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Some of the alt-history are plausible (like Kodoha Japan or Mussolini staying in a distance from Hitler) while some are not (like Ottoman resurrection).
Ideally you could choose between historical play, semi-historical play (no political shifts but there's no restriction beyond that), soft ahistorical (only plausible political shifts), and hard ahistorical (anything goes). So this would be four game options instead of the current two.
Ideally you could choose between historical play, semi-historical play (no political shifts but there's no restriction beyond that), soft ahistorical (only plausible political shifts), and hard ahistorical (anything goes). So this would be four game options instead of the current two.
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But the thing is... who determines what is in these four categories?
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