Re: Could Stalin Have Prevented Hitler from Coming to Power?

"Louis C" <louisc00@xxxxxxxxx> ha scritto nel messaggio
news:1189870483.657986.290330@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
"Michele" wrote:
Hitler was aware of the size involved, but he seems not to have been
aware
of the difficulty.

For some of the points you raised, I replied to Jussi, please see that
message too.


As Rich Rostrom noted, prior to the fall of France the agenda seems to
have been 1/ settle accounts with France and secure things in the
German rear (i.e. agreement with, or neutralization of, Britain) 2/
gain Lebensraum, 3/ rid German-controlled territory of those
considered racially undesirable.


We disagree on the prioritization of that list.


Accomodation was never sought with France, which was considered
unalterably hostile. Maybe Hitler would have gone for Russia first,
but then maybe not.

Then maybe not, of course. We're talking hypotheticals here, so nobody has
the answer.

Further note that the historical Barbarossa was
accelerated by a huge influx of resources to the German economy from
conquered western Europe (which requires beating France, as there's no
way that Britain & France are going to let Germany get away with
invading the Low Countries or Scandinavia) and by the sense of urgency
generated by British hostility coupled with increasing US involvement.

In other words, Hitler knew in 1940-41 that the clock was ticking
though the "good news" such as he perceived it to be was that he now
had the means to successfully take the Soviet Union out in a quick
campaign. It's far from clear that he would have perceived that as
being within the realm of the possible before.


All true, but he was aware of his biological clock ticking already in 1939,
and he had a way of taking into accounts facts that went well with what he
wanted to do anyway, while disregarding others. Had he not gained the
noticeable Western booty, he might very well have considered that while in
1940 he was receiving plenty of Soviet supplies, and not yet paying for most
of them, later on the Soviets would have asked for that payment, or closed
the tap. For instance.

Therefore, your reasoning would work - in the sense that once the French
have proven to be once again, the spineless cowards Hitler thought they'd
be, by not coming to the help of their Polish ally, there _would_ be an
isolated target: the USSR.

Note that it's not just about the French. The French knew that they
were going to have to fight Germany sooner or later, Britain was the
alliance leader in that case so if the British chose to let Poland go,
then probably so would France. On the other hand, after Czechoslovakia
(March '39) there would be no doubt that the western powers were
hostile.

French appeasers believed that the war was unwinnable for their
country. That didn't equate to being favorable to the German cause and
they might well be replaced by a more energetic government,
particularly after rearmament had gone farther. The same holds true of
Britain. Now what if Germany controls Moscow, with an army that has
been weakened by serious campaigning, and Britain and France are now
fully rearmed and decide to take a firm line? That prospect was a
likely possibility in Hitler's social darwinian outlook, and one that
he would want to guard against.


Of course the British behavior would be a further major variable. I did not
take that into account because it would further complicate the scenario;
things change if they have gone to war for Poland without the French, or if
they behaved like the French.


Remember: blitzkrieg in the sense of a quick, relatively painless
victory against a major power, was not deemed possible before June
1940. Crushing Poland was one thing, crushing a major power painlessly
was considered a different matter. Even the Nazis thought that the
Soviets would be harder than the Poles.


Point taken.
Then again, it's a point that would apply to both an attack on the USSR and
an attack on France.

Note that apart from a move that while aggressive can be considered as
pre-emptively defensive (retaking and remilitarizing good defensive
country
along the Rhine) _every_ other move by Hitler was to the East

Depends on what you call a "move", but I would argue that the Z Plan
and involvement in the Spanish Civil War were not to the East.


In this context, I call a move something that is really fully implemented in
useful time, therefore not the Z Plan; and something that has significance
at the strategic level, therefore not the involvement in the SCW. Note that
the latter does go to the East in a certain sense, because the valuable
intel reaped there as to foreign tanks or fighters wasn't about French tanks
or British fighters.
Now if Hitler had waited to have the Z Plan achieved, at least in great
part, to make war on the continent, that would count as a strategically
significant move; but then he would not have attacked Poland until 1942.


Because historically, he launched Barbarossa without a lot of
divisions that were scattered over Norway, Denmark, Holland, Northern
France, Yugoslavia, Greece and Africa.

This is entirely from memory, as I have no time to look up my notes or
the group archives, but my understanding is that at the time of
Barbarossa there were something like 20 divisions in western Europe
plus less than 10 in the Balkans and Scandinavia, against 42 in the
West + OKH reserves in September '39. Further note that the total
German division count was higher in June '41 than in September '39.
Both of these point to the same thing: Hitler rated French aggression
a higher threat in 1939 than he rated British amphibious attacks in
mid-'41. Not unreasonably.

So I don't think that the Germans could have spared that many units
for the alternative Barbarossa that you refer to.


Well, I count 7 divisions in the Balkans, 38 in the West, 13 between Norway
and Denmark, for a total of 58. That doesn't count the 2 in Africa.
Additionally there were 28 divisions in the OKH reserves, which is a
category you count together with the French-facing divisions in 1939, but
which I'd count as facing the Soviets in 1941, since they were rather
quickly committed there. Of course the total number of available divisions
had grown, and the numbers I give above include 15. Welle infantry units.

.

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