Where there any events in WW2 that could have led to an Axis victory?

[bz249]

Sat out? Why think so small? Il Duce would disapprove! He still wants his seat at peace conference, so obviously the masterstroke would be joining Allies around the time they broke out from Normandy and Germans prepare to abandon Paris. Allies would probably welcome Italians drawing German divisions away from Rhine, and Churchill would love to have Italians helping to counter-weight Soviet influence in Balkans. The Alps and air superiority should keep Italians safe from total military rout, and then Germany starts collapsing on all fronts the Italians should be able to make their own advances.

While all this probably wouldn't be enough to give Mussolini a seat among Big Three, standing on level of France and China should be achievable. So we are talking here about a well earned occupation zone in former 3rd Reich, like Austria for example, and obviously an Italian permanent seat in UNSC. If we add a generous assumption that Il Duce would gracefully leave office one way or another within next 10 years, before decolonization gets too nasty, then his legacy would be safe. He would be regarded as the most clever leader of Second World War, and the greatest Italian politician since Cavour.

Neutral Italy could mean two things:
- Germany still occupied Yugoslavia and Greece to secure the link with Romania and prevent a Britiish landing, in that case Italian Albania and Zara threatens the German occupation forces there... at some point Hitler have to declare war on Italy
- Yugoslavia and Greece are in the German camp willingly (Germany could protect them from the greedy Italian!) in that case Allied Italy is going to "liberate" the Nazi leaning Greece and Yugoslavia

So not only he get his seat in the security council, but he might add some territory to Italy

 

[Director]

Neutral Italy would have benefited everyone - most of the talk around Italy entering WW2 was centered on the idea that Italy would be more of a drain on resources than a help. Germany actually gains from not having an Italian ally... no North African distraction, no cleaning up the mess Italy made in the Balkans and possibly an Italian offer to mediate after Dunkirk. No oil and other resources diverted to Rome...

 

[Virupaksha]

Haven't read the whole thread but the obvious would have been USA joining on Germany's side. Many in the US were pro-Hitler and even more anti-Russia. Roosevelt, though he himself wanted to intervene against Hitler was completely unable to persuade his country to do so until the attack on Pearl Harbour.

Probably even had the Americans stayed neutral Russia would still have defeated Germany and it's hard to imagine roosevelt himself siding with Hitler. However had he died five years earlier or not been allowed to stand for a third term the situation could have been very different. One has to remember that the full horrors of the nazi regime were not generally known in 1941-42, indeed Belzec, the first extermination camp, did not become operational until march 1942, and Hitler's anti-bolshevik rhetoric had many supporters within the US establishment.

 

[Kovax]

From what I've read and heard from many of the elderly people who recall the era, there was a small but significant portion of the public who were in favor of supporting Germany, a larger minority in favor of supporting the UK, and the majority who didn't want to get involved after the mess that Europe made for itself in the aftermath of WWI. Roosevelt would have had a difficult time driving the country to get directly involved without Japan's complete miss-assessment and stupid move, or without some kind of concocted naval incident in the Atlantic, which the USN was clearly trying to provoke. The US stood to gain too much in arms sales to both parties, and the UK blockade of Germany (preventing the US from doing business with Germany by threat of force) irked a lot of people, almost as much as Hitler's rhetoric and blatantly aggressive actions. I see little chance that the US would ever join the Axis, but a distinct possibility that it could have remained effectively neutral for a few more years if Japan hadn't forced the issue, particularly if some political incident had reduced Roosevelt's political clout.

Then again, I'm in Berks County, which had a sizable German population. From what local sources claim, one German restaurant in the area had been claimed to be a hangout of pro-Nazis, so the US government had undercover "patrons" there practically from opening to closing throughout the war. There was also a US Coast Guard unit sent to investigate the nocturnal so-called "submarine races" at one popular "parking" location along the Schuylkill River.

 

[krieger11b]

Neutral Italy would have benefited everyone - most of the talk around Italy entering WW2 was centered on the idea that Italy would be more of a drain on resources than a help. Germany actually gains from not having an Italian ally... no North African distraction, no cleaning up the mess Italy made in the Balkans and possibly an Italian offer to mediate after Dunkirk. No oil and other resources diverted to Rome...

A neutral Italy also had enough of an Air Force (at least on paper) to force the allies to not be able to send their bombers through Italian Airspace. Giving a huge region the allies could not bomb Germany through, combine that with a neutral Yugoslavia/Greece and then the Ploesti Oil Fields would be relatively safe from bombing until the Soviet got too close and by the time that would happen then the writing would already be on the wall for Germany regardless. Greece would be the more important one though, the only real reason I know Germany went into was used to be a relatively friendly nation to them was to bail out the embarrassing invasion Italy initiated. Also with no Greek invasion you also have no invasion of Crete where Germany lost a large number of badly needed Ju-52s that could have been used to help supply their Armed Forces in the USSR, secondly Hitler completely lost the will to use airborne troops afterwards really how good they were under such adversity. Who knows if they would have been critical somewhere else but not used?

Another thing about Italy could be like with Franco sending the Blue Division to fight in the USSR. So Germany could get some small amount of what would likely be some of the best Italian Divisions without all pain Italy caused them in WW2.

 

[Director]

@Kovax - I'm in York County, myself. I'd recommend, "Those Angry Days" by Lynne Olson. Maybe not the most in-depth book, but I thought it a good overview of the last Presidential election before the war. One of the themes is the rise and then gradual falling off of isolationist sentiment - Congress may have been more isolationist than the public at large. Another theme is Roosevelt's disinclination to directly challenge the isolationists, working 'around the margins' instead and making sure public opinion was firmly behind any steps he took.

Yes, Japan broke itself by declaring war. But since the US, Britain and the Netherlands had totally embargoed resources like oil, that Japan did not have and absolutely must have, their options were all bad. To withdraw from China? Unthinkable to the generals in charge. And so, war - which the more worldly of the governing class doubted they could win... but the generals could be refused only at the cost of assassination or a coup.

@krieger11b - Mussolini would have been much smarter to play both sides against each other, as did Franco, and stay out as long as he could. The Italian airforce certainly had a great prewar reputation, but as with the army, the Italians bought too much equipment in the 30s that was obsolete by the 40s but which they could not afford to replace.

 

[Semper Victor]

You juxtapose Barbarossa by saying it's a rational move but also a desperate gamble. The two are not compatible. Resource-wise, there was no need whatsoever for Barbarossa. By the end of 1940, when Hitler first initiated planning for invasion of the USSR, the Italian army was crumbling against Metaxas' troops and Mussolini was about to request assistance from Germany. Once they invaded, assimilating Yugoslavia in the process, they would have uninterrupted control over most of Europe and the resources that came with it. While there is an argument to be made that the breadbasket areas of Russia and their rich oil deposits in the south would've been helpful in any future German expansion, they were not absolutely necessary.of.

Oil was absolutely necessary if Germany wanted to win an aeronaval war against Britain and against the USA that under Roosevelt became ever more and more hostile to the Reich. During the war, more than 50% of the oil spent by the Wehrmacht was consumed by the Luftwaffe alone, even with a lack of airplanes and cutting traning hours to the bare minimum by 1944.

It was not only the British embargo; the Reich lacked strong currency or gold reserves with which to purchase large quantities of oil, and all the main international oil producing wells were owned by British, American and Dutch companies. The only independent source was the USSR, which already was selling oil to Germany, in quantities that the Germans considered totally insufficient.

Oil had to be obtained somewhere, and as in 1940/41 the oil wells in Algeria, Lybia and the North Sea were not known or technically viable, that left only two options: either the USSR or the Middle East. The USSR was nearer, had better comunications with Germany, offered many other necessary resources and removed the last great dangerous land enemy that Germany had left in the Eurasian landmass.

And then there were of course the Nazi ideological long-term objectives in the East, and the political obsession of the Nazi hierarchy with the memories of the hunger of the IWW; one of the main impulses behind the decision to launch Barbarossa were the very pessimistic asessments of European agrarian production under British blockade made by the Reich's Secretary of State for Food Production Herbert Backe. In their eyes, the only "salvation" was to explote the Ukrainian "breadbasket" exclusvely for the German and western European populatins, to substitute the food imports that before the war had come from America and Australia.

 

[noobermenschen]

Neutral Italy could mean two things:
- Germany still occupied Yugoslavia and Greece to secure the link with Romania and prevent a Britiish landing, in that case Italian Albania and Zara threatens the German occupation forces there... at some point Hitler have to declare war on Italy
- Yugoslavia and Greece are in the German camp willingly (Germany could protect them from the greedy Italian!) in that case Allied Italy is going to "liberate" the Nazi leaning Greece and Yugoslavia

So not only he get his seat in the security council, but he might add some territory to Italy

Have to disagree with this as Hitler wanted peace in the Balkans above all else. If Mussolini had died atop his mistress in 1939 and his Son in-Law Ciano were il Duce and prepared to maintain a profiteering neutrality, Hitler would not have sent a single grenadier to the region unless Britain established a military presence there first.

 

[Ming]

While staying out is the best course for Il Duce, I'm doubtful that the British would go the whole war allowing neutral Italy to participate fully in the world market and thus act as proxy for Germany.

Mussolini doesn't seem to be the type to keep a cool head over such provocations.

 

[Easy-Kill]

Haven't read the whole thread but the obvious would have been USA joining on Germany's side. Many in the US were pro-Hitler and even more anti-Russia. Roosevelt, though he himself wanted to intervene against Hitler was completely unable to persuade his country to do so until the attack on Pearl Harbour.

Probably even had the Americans stayed neutral Russia would still have defeated Germany and it's hard to imagine roosevelt himself siding with Hitler. However had he died five years earlier or not been allowed to stand for a third term the situation could have been very different. One has to remember that the full horrors of the nazi regime were not generally known in 1941-42, indeed Belzec, the first extermination camp, did not become operational until march 1942, and Hitler's anti-bolshevik rhetoric had many supporters within the US establishment.

By 1940, the Judo-Bolshevik enemy of the Mein Kampf days had been supplanted by the Anglo-American, world Jewish conspiracy (led by Roosevelt) as the main enemy of Nazism. This started after Roosevelt's actions to isolate Germany following the increasing anti-Jewish agression in Germany in the late 1930s. The invasion of the Soviet Union was meant to address Germany's material deficiencies and provide them the empire necessary to build an economy to rival that of the Anglo-Americans and to ultimately defeat them.

In short, with Hitler, there is no chance of the USA allying to Germany, let alone not supporting the UK.

 

[trybald]

I believe that the pivotal moment that could have changed the outcome of the war was Stalin's nervous breakdown which happened in the very first weeks of Barbarossa. Stalin's might had not recovered. He could also been deposed at that time, as he himself apparently expected.

Chaos that would have erupted in the event of ineffectual leadership or even power struggles at the top Soviet echelons could have dramatic influence on the eventual outcome of the war.

 

[DoomBunny]

I believe that the pivotal moment that could have changed the outcome of the war was Stalin's nervous breakdown which happened in the very first weeks of Barbarossa. Stalin's might had not recovered. He could also been deposed at that time, as he himself apparently expected.

Chaos that would have erupted in the event of ineffectual leadership or even power struggles at the top Soviet echelons could have dramatic influence on the eventual outcome of the war.

*Awaits inevitable barrage of "That's a post-Stalin myth" from literally every Russian poster*

 

[pithorr]

*Awaits inevitable barrage of "That's a post-Stalin myth" from literally every Russian poster*

Of course, why Stalin would have been afraid, when Barbarossa was doomed from the very beginning?

 

[DoomBunny]

Of course, why Stalin would have been afraid, when Barbarossa was doomed from the very beginning?

But I think the real question here is why did Hitler not just drop a division of paratroopers onto Moscow and have done with it in a day?

 

[krieger11b]

But I think the real question here is why did Hitler not just drop a division of paratroopers onto Moscow and have done with it in a day?

Victory is very doubtable there. In any case that was post Crete when Hitler decided to never again use paratroops on a large scale despite the Fallschirmjagers incredible victory over such a difficult task, though at a very high cost. They lost so many Ju-52s at Crete their ability to send large numbers of troops in each wave was severely reduced, not to mention what transport planes did have were tasked with an impossibly large amount of troops out of supply already.

 

[pithorr]

Victory is very doubtable there. In any case that was post Crete when Hitler decided to never again use paratroops on a large scale despite the Fallschirmjagers incredible victory over such a difficult task, though at a very high cost. They lost so many Ju-52s at Crete their ability to send large numbers of troops in each wave was severely reduced, not to mention what transport planes did have were tasked with an impossibly large amount of troops out of supply already.

Have you taken him being serious?

 

[Pyoro]

Well, once they Nazis did that, everyone would catch up on the trick, and a month later Brits would jump onto Berlin, and Americans on Tokyo, and who knows what else. Shortly after, all capitals of everyone would be occupied by foreign forces.

And some years later Hitler would sit in his Führerbunker in Teheran, commanding his Revolutionary Guard, and wonder how the f... that happened.

 

[krieger11b]

Have you taken him being serious?

It's hard to tell with Doombunny most of the time.

 

[Kovax]

But I think the real question here is why did Hitler not just drop a division of paratroopers onto Moscow and have done with it in a day?

Anyone who's played HOI3 knows that Stalin would never leave troops behind to defend the capital, when they could be sitting in a pocket near Minsk.

Then again, in HOI4, those same troops would be long dead by then, after making senselessly repeated suicide attacks across a river against greater numbers of entrenched German troops.

 

[krieger11b]

Anyone who's played HOI3 knows that Stalin would never leave troops behind to defend the capital, when they could be sitting in a pocket near Minsk.

Then again, in HOI4, those same troops would be long dead by then, after making senselessly repeated suicide attacks across a river against greater numbers of entrenched German troops.

Also the British Isles would be almost devoid of troops after their repeated catastrophic 1940 D-Day invasions of Northwest Germany.