WW1: Could the Germans have raced to Serbia, won, and gone home?

[thedarkendstar]

If Germany is not deploying its navy and not violating the sovereignty of other nations it is absolutely true that the British cannot be drawn into a war with Germany.

This is because Germany does not appear to actually be at war. There is nothing to be drawn in to.

How is it the UK can start a war and the "serfs" will do nothing but many say if Russia didn't declare war there would have been a coup......

Im not saying the British government could not declare war I'm saying if they went to war without public support the part would lose an election and be replaced by one that was will to negotiate for peace.

 

[Cavalry]

Only if you split hairs. The intent was the authorize offensive actions against the countries harboring Al Qaeda. While there was information at the time suggesting Afganistan the picture wasn't complete. So it was in fact an even more sweeping authorization then a war just against Afghanistan..

The legal status of that vote is nothing new. As I know there are no country officially admit they harbor Al Qaeda!? And with that vote the US President may go to war with any country he say there is terrorists in it, and choose not to war even he said so! Nothing new, war still happen without ordinary people have a say.

 

[BBBD316]

Would the Parliament have had the numbers to pass the motion to go to war however?

Also does the Empire get that surge of popular support and recruitment that can with defeating the vile Hun, if the Hun was sitting at its own borders?

Remember Irishmen enlisted and forgave British excesses in Ireland for the initial period of the war and this would probably not happen, same various Red areas were against the war and this may spike communist/socialist agitation against an unjust war. Especially if the number of casualties is like it was historically.

 

[JodelDiplom]

Would the Parliament have had the numbers to pass the motion to go to war however?

Also does the Empire get that surge of popular support and recruitment that can with defeating the vile Hun, if the Hun was sitting at its own borders?

Remember Irishmen enlisted and forgave British excesses in Ireland for the initial period of the war and this would probably not happen, same various Red areas were against the war and this may spike communist/socialist agitation against an unjust war. Especially if the number of casualties is like it was historically.

People didn't enlist to save Belgium. People enlisted because their country was at war, and it was considered their noble duty to "defend" it. (Note that Britain never was attacked in WW1 yet it was still a "defence" in people's minds.)

Nothing in this changes if Britain intervenes on the Franco-Russian side in November 1914 or April 1915 or what have you, to "defend" her national interests - freedom of navigation, freedom from German hegemony, whatever they cite.

BTW the idea of the German navy not sortieing at least its submarines and some commerce raiders is unrealistic. The Kriegsmarine was the most powerful military lobby pre-war, there would be irresistible pressure to use at least part of this hugely expensive fleet against France and Russia no matter the risks. Britain would have her casus belli.

 

[DoomBunny]

Would the Parliament have had the numbers to pass the motion to go to war however?

Also does the Empire get that surge of popular support and recruitment that can with defeating the vile Hun, if the Hun was sitting at its own borders?

Remember Irishmen enlisted and forgave British excesses in Ireland for the initial period of the war and this would probably not happen, same various Red areas were against the war and this may spike communist/socialist agitation against an unjust war. Especially if the number of casualties is like it was historically.

The Irish Question is a separate issue. It wasn't so much to do with Belgium as much as the two factions aiming to use the war as a platform for their political goals. Whether Belgium is invaded or not is fairly irrelevant to this by itself, as either way I'd suggest you'd get Irish nationalists and Ulstermen each going to war.

However, the big question a lack of Belgium brings up is a potential late entry to the war. Without going to war so soon, it's possible that the Irish powder keg touches off before Britain gets dragged in.

People didn't enlist to save Belgium.

Many probably did. That's not to say King and Country wasn't the bigger stake, but Belgium was a factor.

People enlisted because their country was at war, and it was considered their noble duty to "defend" it. (Note that Britain never was attacked in WW1 yet it was still a "defence" in people's minds.)

Britain was attacked on several occasions during the First World War. See for example the Hartlepool bombardment, the strategic bombing campaign, or the submarine campaign against British commerce.

 

[Kovax]

I note JodelDiplom's earlier admission to the effect that while the controlling party in UK COULD go to war (as I stated), it would need time to fabricate some kind of excuse or drum up enough support in Parliament first, in order to insure that they don't all get voted out of office in the next election. Whether that takes days, weeks, months, or even years is my question. My suspicion, as I pointed out, would be that they'd very likely find or manufacture some incident eventually, but whether that's in time to bail out Russia is subject to some uncertainty, and open for discussion. Whether other factors come into play, like Ireland revolting, French officers violating Belgian neutrality, or the Kriegsmarine decides to sortie and attack shipping (handing the UK it's excuse on a silver platter), is not knowable.

The "unlikely" thing in the first place would be for Germany to sit idle in the west, since that would be extremely contrary to their "normal" doctrine. I still believe it could have offered slightly better ( or "less terrible") odds of success than the plan that was chosen.

 

[Avernite]

I note JodelDiplom's earlier admission to the effect that while the controlling party in UK COULD go to war (as I stated), it would need time to fabricate some kind of excuse or drum up enough support in Parliament first, in order to insure that they don't all get voted out of office in the next election. Whether that takes days, weeks, months, or even years is my question. My suspicion, as I pointed out, would be that they'd very likely find or manufacture some incident eventually, but whether that's in time to bail out Russia is subject to some uncertainty, and open for discussion. Whether other factors come into play, like Ireland revolting, French officers violating Belgian neutrality, or the Kriegsmarine decides to sortie and attack shipping (handing the UK it's excuse on a silver platter), is not knowable.

The "unlikely" thing in the first place would be for Germany to sit idle in the west, since that would be extremely contrary to their "normal" doctrine. I still believe it could have offered slightly better ( or "less terrible") odds of success than the plan that was chosen.

Personally, I'd give it a few months. Britain immediately enforces a sort of embargo, whereby Germany (and other people bordering the North Sea, i.e. Germany) can't import weapons and war materials, but food and the like is okay. Eventually Britain enforces more and more goods as embargoed, and some German captain fails to dodge it. Subsequently the German Navy (feeling very keenly that Britain is basically an enemy anyway, even if they don't know yet how much worse it can be - and feeling even more clearly that the army is doing ALL the fighting) begins escorting German merchants in the North Sea. Eventually it comes to incidents between German vessels and British ones, someone starts shooting, and before you know it there's a handful of incidents and a war.

By the time Britain joins the war, Austria-Hungary and Russia are starting to feel the pain, while France (without the losses of Schlieffen) and Germany are still in good shape.

The tricky question is exactly how good those shapes are; France and Germany will have ground armies to dust in the Alsatian hills, and Austria Hungary and Russia will have squandered armies at surprisingly low cost to their enemies, but there's a large amount of leeway between 'France attacks and attacks despite better judgement' and 'France improves tactics to make, if not good, then equally-bad-for-Germany offensives', 'Germany throws the defending armies recklessly into a counter-offensive when the first French attacks are repulsed' and 'Germany launches succesful localized counteroffensives on overextended French armies and manages to grind slowly forward', 'Austria-Hungary blunders into getting its armies in Galicia encircled while those in Serbia wither on the vine' and 'the Austro-Hungarians fail to make any headway against Serbia and have to fall back to the Galician mountains when Russia attacks', 'Russia gets its best armies encircled in Poland/Prussia followed by German armies smashing the Austrian offensive' and 'Russian armies are thrown back to their fortifications in Eastern Poland while taking Austrian Galicia'.

And, to be fair, I think the biggest change in delayed UK entry is that the Germans start out with a reasonable chance to sway the USA in a propaganda war. They'll start losing once the UK joins the war outright, but that may delay the overall propaganda defeat long enough that the USA never enters.

 

[JodelDiplom]

Sway the USA? How would that work? USA and France were much closer then than USA and Germany. Democracy, revolution, statue of liberty and all that.

 

[keynes2.0]

whether that's in time to bail out Russia

I dont really see how Germany is going to force a Russian surrender quickly.

 

[thedarkendstar]

I dont really see how Germany is going to force a Russian surrender quickly.

Well the Smaller border with France and the Fact Germany is playing defensivly could free another army group to face the Russians

 

[yerm]

I dont really see how Germany is going to force a Russian surrender quickly.

If Germany moves easy quickly and prevents Russia from any overly large successes early on, and the pressure is great, I think having Nick out up to maybe a year early is pretty reasonable. I also think the provisional replacement government might be far more receptive to ceding the Baltics and a rump Poland if things have gone bad quicker than OTL.

It's all speculative though. The Russian collapse required hardship strain, so there's no feasible argument I can see for victory in a year. Not only that, but if the German attack is TOO good then perhaps instead of anger at the Czar and industrialists over the war, it's just a straight oh hot damn we're losing ordeal.

 

[keynes2.0]

Well the Smaller border with France and the Fact Germany is playing defensivly could free another army group to face the Russians

I dont see how another army group makes the Russian populace want to revolt much faster or makes the Czar want to surrender.

 

[thedarkendstar]

I dont see how another army group makes the Russian populace want to revolt much faster or makes the Czar want to surrender.

More Germans on the Front means a stronger offensive meaning Russian land being lost fast and higher Russian Casualties.

 

[keynes2.0]

More Germans on the Front means a stronger offensive meaning Russian land being lost fast and higher Russian Casualties.

Every other major belligerent had worse casualties as a percentage of their population. The number of deaths was not the primary factor.

 

[JodelDiplom]

More Germans on the Front means a stronger offensive meaning Russian land being lost fast and higher Russian Casualties.

If faced with German superior forces, the Russians would have changed their strategy and ceded ground in Poland and Lithuania without giving battle. That was how they fought napoleon already, and not a novel strategic concept. There was nothing critical in those areas that they would be forced to defend against unfavorable odds, so why would they suffer now casualties than in OTL? Ceding ground would have given them around half a year to fully prepare their armies and then fought the Germans for serious in spring 1915, at a point in time when the Germans would be far from their home bases and their armies trudging through Belorussian swamps and marshes. Russian morale would not suffer from having to withdraw from Poland or Lithuania throughout 1914, so they would be at their peak fighting efficiency. The only thing that could mess with their morale would be economic hardship. But then again with Britain not entering the war in August 1914 odds are Turkey might also stay out a while longer, which in turn means the Bosporus remains open longer which means the Russians won't suffer as much from blockade.

 

[Avernite]

Sway the USA? How would that work? USA and France were much closer then than USA and Germany. Democracy, revolution, statue of liberty and all that.

Luckily my followup makes clear it's not 'sway to its side in the war' but 'sway away from helping the Entente for at elast some time more' which seems quite reasonable in a scenario where the UK isn't yet stopping German propaganda reaching the USA and there is no Belgian argument and there is no UK propaganda flooding the USA in quite as large numbers as there would be when the UK joins the war.

If faced with German superior forces, the Russians would have changed their strategy and ceded ground in Poland and Lithuania without giving battle. That was how they fought napoleon already, and not a novel strategic concept. There was nothing critical in those areas that they would be forced to defend against unfavorable odds, so why would they suffer now casualties than in OTL? Ceding ground would have given them around half a year to fully prepare their armies and then fought the Germans for serious in spring 1915, at a point in time when the Germans would be far from their home bases and their armies trudging through Belorussian swamps and marshes. Russian morale would not suffer from having to withdraw from Poland or Lithuania throughout 1914, so they would be at their peak fighting efficiency. The only thing that could mess with their morale would be economic hardship. But then again with Britain not entering the war in August 1914 odds are Turkey might also stay out a while longer, which in turn means the Bosporus remains open longer which means the Russians won't suffer as much from blockade.

Austria-Hungary is also not all-but-dead yet given the Russians had to fall back before they got to crush Galicia or next year smash the Austrians in the Brusilov offensive.

 

[keynes2.0]

Economic "aid" to France and England was the US selling items freely at market rates. German propoganda isn't going to put a stop to that...

There is a bizarre tendency with WWI where people speculate "what if Germany tried such and such argument" as if the entire world might suddenly decide to accept the German diplomatic position and then call it a day.

 

[thedarkendstar]

If faced with German superior forces, the Russians would have changed their strategy and ceded ground in Poland and Lithuania without giving battle. That was how they fought napoleon already, and not a novel strategic concept. There was nothing critical in those areas that they would be forced to defend against unfavorable odds, so why would they suffer now casualties than in OTL? Ceding ground would have given them around half a year to fully prepare their armies and then fought the Germans for serious in spring 1915, at a point in time when the Germans would be far from their home bases and their armies trudging through Belorussian swamps and marshes. Russian morale would not suffer from having to withdraw from Poland or Lithuania throughout 1914, so they would be at their peak fighting efficiency. The only thing that could mess with their morale would be economic hardship. But then again with Britain not entering the war in August 1914 odds are Turkey might also stay out a while longer, which in turn means the Bosporus remains open longer which means the Russians won't suffer as much from blockade.

Wouldn't the loss of those territory hurt the Russian economy I mean I'm not super knowledgeable about the economic capacity but Poland had a good population base which the Russians no longer have and without Russian troops to deal with wouldn't that give the Germans plenty opportunity to set up supply bases in the Russian land.

 

[Avernite]

Economic "aid" to France and England was the US selling items freely at market rates. German propoganda isn't going to put a stop to that...

'sway away from helping the Entente for some time more' does rather clearly say they were not helping the Entente for some time before starting to actually help, unless my English is worse than I thought.

 

[Graf Zeppelin]

'sway away from helping the Entente for some time more' does rather clearly say they were not helping the Entente for some time before starting to actually help, unless my English is worse than I thought.

Nonsense, You said the US will enter the war for the central powers and then afte years of pointlesswar defeated by the Dutch. You are nothing but a Landaboo.