Axis in WWII

[213374U]

You can't really compare a desperate uprising, by starved and undernourished people, to a possible continental wide insurgency, by ex-soldiers/workers etc, with access to military weapons, who hasn't been living in diseased and horrible conditions..

That was meant to illustrate how Nazi repression worked. 50k+ dead or deported, most of them civilians. Military force brought to bear on the population of an already occupied city. These guys didn't operate like US troops on Iraq. If they had to burn down an entire neighborhood and kill everyone living there, they did. French resistance (not counting Free French troops) was pretty ineffectual, as well. In Vichy France, insurgency against the Germans was punished by internment in the Vichy equivalent of a concentration camp. There's always a local willing to become a tyrant-lackey and do the dirty work for you (see Tiso).

 

A scenario in which civil disobedience and pockets of insurgency would have been able to topple a possible Nazi European hegemony is wishful thinking, methinks.

[Meshugger]

Judging from most of the comments in this thread, many of you have read William L. Shirer's book "The rise and fall of the third Reich" (a very, very good book btw).

[Gorgon]

'RE Hitler's "brilliance": I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Dr. Schacht yet. He was the main architect of Germany's economic recovery during the 30's, clashing with the main man on several issues. He eventually got sick of raving lunatics and toadies (the two main constituents of the NSDAP), though.'

 

I dunno, Hitler told him to get Germany ready for war in two years, it's not that hard to get the economy moving if you spend like crazy and borrow everyone else's money only to invade them before the payments are due.

[213374U]

I dunno, Hitler told him to get Germany ready for war in two years, it's not that hard to get the economy moving if you spend like crazy and borrow everyone else's money only to invade them before the payments are due.

Schacht's defence on Nuremberg depended on the assumption that he didn't know Germany was going to war. So, arguably, Hitler didn't tell him to get Germany "ready for war". He was acquitted. He was also against an increase in military spending. Whose money was borrowed, that later got invaded, btw? Edited August 11, 2009 by 213374U

[Gorgon]

Figure of speech.

 

Although, he did create the foundation for Germany's rearmament using a system of Government bonds that ensured Germany could continue to run a deficit along with increased spending, like a second currency between industry and Government.

[Gorth]

Germans attacked in June.

My bad. I keep thinking of it as a fall offensive for some reason >_

 

I still think they would have been better off attacking in late February or early March.

[alanschu]

For sure.

 

They made it to the Moscow in that single offensive. It was truly impressive.

[Humodour]

I never really understood how the Russians got to keep K

[Walsingham]

Quick Answer: "I could have been a heavyweight boxer... if I'd been heavier and better at boxing"

Explanation: You'd have to be an insane dictator to have started ww2, but having done so there were systemic and practical reasons why Germany probably was going to lose all along.

 

~~

Some detailed reasons why Germany was going to lose

 

Political:

1. Churchill.

Cabinet papers and other evidence clearly indicate that without Winston Chruchill the British establishment would have agreed to peace after Dunkirk.

2. The Blitz

Anyone who didn't hate the Nazis in Britain soon did after they began the Blitz. It turns out that there was a flaw in teh theory that you bomb people to the point where they won't stand up to you, then expect them to stand up to their own government.

3. Hitler backed his mates

He may have been human excrement, but Hitler had a bewildering loyalty to other fascists. he followed Italy into North Africa. He followed Japan into war with the United States. he kept Hermann Goering as head of the luftwaffe (see below).

4. Nazism sucks

Nazi party officials at all levels consistently made mistakes. They made mistakes due to being lazy and stupid, which were subtle, and they made mistakes due to being racist ****ers which were less subtle. Principally, nazism managed to turn a Red Army that had little interest in fighting into a vengeful colossus through treating the Russians according to party doctrine.

 

 

Logistic:

1. Too many different bits of kit.

All the armed forces used a massive variety of different machines. This complicated supply of spare parts and training of mechanics. Also, lots of the adapted kit, like the self-propelled guns, was too heavy or underpowered, meaning it broke in new and exciting ways.

2. No logistic geniuses.

Certainly there were some logistic cretins on the Allied side (for example: Gen. JCH Lee). But there were also some absolute bloody marvels. OVERLORD being one example, and the 14th army counter-attack on Burma being another. Had Germany possessed a fraction of that ingenuity it might have been able to overcome logistic problems in the East which constantly hampered effectiveness. Although the aforementioned being a bunch of ****s and subsequent partisan activity couldn't have helped.

3. No oil.

You can't run an army on smoked pig products alone. You need fuel. As a central european power Germany simply didn't have access to enough fuel. Although this could have been solved by a concerted attempt to drive for the British-held middle east.

 

Intelligence:

1. Codebreaking & codekeeping

Even without the Royal Navy capturing an enigma machine (it wasn't the US Navy, no matter what the film says) Allied codebreaking was extensive and generally very effective. Signals traffic by the Germans and also the shockingly inept Japanese lead Allied commanders to have a superb picture of events, including German intentions. With this intelligence it became almost unthinkable for the Germans to achieve any meaningful surprise on the battlefield. And before you ask, the battle of the bluge happened because we forgot the germans might start using telephone lines rather than radios once they were back in germany.

2. The XXX committee

In addition to knowing what Jerry was thinking, the British set about capturing, turning, and generally foxing German intelligence agents. By a determined and well-coordinated effort, the Germans were actively mislead on just about anything we could think of. from the number and strength of allied forces, to the effects of air raids, and the general intentions of our troops.

 

Combat Effectiveness:

1. At sea

Being a bit of a mahdi wee man, Hitler refused to accept the blidingly obvious point that Germany was almost certainly never going to out-do the Royal Navy surface fleet. He tried to compete by building battle-cruisers and whatnot. Quite simply, the steel and other resources he wasted on these would have been far better used building U-boats, or tanks, or railway engines, or cutlery... because they just got sunk. They were always going to be sunk. The best he could hope for was that he would repeat the first world war, and he'd build a huge fleet which did sod all for fear of what would happen if it met in a big battle and lost.

2. In the air

The luftwafe made three principle blunders. The first was not building a heavy bomber like the Lancaster or Flying Fortress; if you insist on wasting resources on strategic bombing then you need heavy bombers to be efficient. The second blunder was not adopting drop tanks - which were well understood at the time - for use on fighters in the Battle for Britain. The third blunder was the confused mess that they made of research and development and production, meaning they had not enough sensible fighters to tackle Allied airpower later in the war.

3. On land

German land forces justifiably get a lot of chaps warm about the trousers. They fought extremely well because the wehrmacht had trained its command and control structures superbly, and the Nazi culture of encouraging violence with marching made for a good start with recruits. However, they did two things pretty badly. The first was they didn't really have any concept of operations beyond burst through and surround, with a general reckless enthusiasm. Compare this with the Russians who were world leaders in understanding an opponent's architecture and dismantling it. The second failing was that they stood their ground when they shouldn't, and they ran away when they shouldn't. A lot of this is down to Hitler, but not all of it. Again, you could argue this comes back to their lack of operational thinking.

[Llyranor]

Intelligence:

1. Codebreaking & codekeeping

Even without the Royal Navy capturing an enigma machine (it wasn't the US Navy, no matter what the film says) Allied codebreaking was extensive and generally very effective. Signals traffic by the Germans and also the shockingly inept Japanese lead Allied commanders to have a superb picture of events, including German intentions. With this intelligence it became almost unthinkable for the Germans to achieve any meaningful surprise on the battlefield. And before you ask, the battle of the bluge happened because we forgot the germans might start using telephone lines rather than radios once they were back in germany.

[

The early chapters of A Time of Trumpets are a pretty interesting read on how much information (or lack of information, which could be just as telling) was actually available to the Allies, through Ultra or otherwise, about an upcoming German offensive in the Ardennes. Of course, hindsight 20/20 etc.

[Walsingham]

I think it's important whenever considering that sort of thing to keep in mind how much bollocks floats around intelligence cells. It's part of the job. It's easy to confuse the truth with rumour.