Alternatives to Raeder

[RF]

I don't disagree with any of the last post, but it should be pointed out that the Schlieffen Plan had no provision for fighting a war with Britain.

So if the attack on France succeeded the Germans would be left in a 1940 type position - the war in the West continues, with a surface fleet unable to challenge for control of the North Sea.
Germany would be unable to invade Britain, as no substantive airpower would be available, so would have to concentrate on Russia. In fact it would show close parallel to the position of Napoleon Bonaparte in 1812....

[tommy303]

Hi RF,

If you go back to my original premise:

The main problem, prior to WW1 was the failure of German diplomacy. Bismarck had advised Wilhelm II to keep Austria-Hungary friendly, but not to sign a formal alliance; Austria had its fingers in just about every Balkan pie on the table and any conflict starting there would almost surely bring the Russian empire into conflict as the Czar considered himself the advocate of all slavic peoples. Bismarck also cautioned against building up a large fleet which might alienate Germany's traditional friend and ally, the British. Keep the British friendly and don't threaten their interests or give them cause to fear for their survival.

The building of a large high seas fleet was, unfortunately, a catalyst for confilict with Britain. Without that monkey wrench, what would have been the chances of war with Britain in the first place. It is somehow ironic that the greatest warship of Hitler's era was named after the chancellor who would have been least likely to have wanted it built.

[RF]

You are absolutely right.

I have already argued in an earlier thread that if Bismarck's policy had been continued by Wilhelm II it was quite likely that Britain would have gone into alliance with Germany in 1902 rather than with (or possibly as well) Japan to counterbalance the colonial rivalry with France and Russia.

In which case WW1 could have happened ten years earlier than it did - the Russo-Japanese War could have triggered a German attack on Russia,
and when France attacked Germany in support of Russia, Britain followed by Italy go to war with France.

Germany would have been on the winning side - and there would have been no Hitler.....

[Alatriste]

If Germany is victorious in WW1 what would have happened to France?

[Laurenz]

I would propose to watch the European scenario more political not the dependant from military side.
If we watch the results, the story goes a little bit different.
The Flottenbauprogramm of Wilhelm II provoked the British, that is true.
The British feared their sea superiority.
But the result 25 Years later is, that the United States and later on the Sovjet Union became the main seaforces.
No doubt, on the long run, the British took the wrong partners, if they wanted to keep their position.
Hitler had seen this. But he was not able to convince the British.
If we watch the communist International Corp. (in german -Komintern-) and their plans for worldrevolution, the picture becomes more clear.
For a revolution economic catastrophies are needed. The main target of the communists was Gemany, but Russia was easier to get.
The contract of Versailles was a nice instrument to put Germany into an economic catastrophy. The repair payments only to France were higher than the whole value of France. But the good plan did not worked, caused by Hitler.
(In 1932 were only in Berlin around 8500 murders, more than the half done by communists, a highly eplosive scenery.)
Meanwhile Stalin replaced the Trotzky-lobby in the SU, but he kept their plans.
Stalins military plan was to conquer Europe, while the Germans sent 70 divisions to England during Seelöwe.
Hitler cleared for Stalin Europe. When Hitler would move to England, Europe would be free of any soldiers, easy game for Stalin.
When Hitler checked this, it was already too late, Barbarossa was a desperate action.
And the British did not beleived that.
But in fact the SU was the only country which wons territory after WWII.
These are the circumstances, the Eurpeans could not imagine.
So its equal Raeder oder another guys became OKM chief.
Kind regards,
L.

[RF]

If Germany is victorious in WW1 what would have happened to France?

This depends very much which scenario you take, ie. is Germany on the same side as Britain?

If we take the 1904 scenario in my previous post above, then first of all Germany's pre-occupation would be with Russia. The Bolsheviks almost certainly would have swept the Czar from power. The German Army would then have smashed the Bolsheviks so no communist system or USSR would have existed.

The British in the meantime would be dealing with a defeated France. We could expect the British to annex a large proportion of the French colonial empire, principally I would suspect the islands in the Caribbean and south west Pacific, along with Indo-China. The Italians would probably seize the territories that Mussolini was after in 1940, namely Corsica, Tunisia, Nice and Savoy.

What Germany would take from France is more difficult to define, particulary as their main focus is on Russia. Perhaps some of the French colonies in West Africa, such as Morocco and Gambia? As Alsace-Lorraine is already German there is little scope to extend Germany westward into completely French speaking France, possibly taking a bit more of Lorraine, say Nancy.

If Germany was victorious in the actual WW1 conflict then basically you can expect a mirror image reversal of the Versailles treaty, with the difference that Germany would enforce it throughout the 1920's, 1930's and 1940's so there would be no twenty year armistice that Foch so accurately predicted. No Hitler, no genocide, today you would probably have a very similar situation to what we currently have , except that instead of calling it the European Union we would call it Deutschland or Deutsch Reich.

[RF]

But in fact the SU was the only country which wons territory after WWII.

L.

Not quite.

Poland took most of East Prussia, Silesia and Pomerania from Germany.

Yugoslavia took Istria from Italy.

Ethiopia took Eritrea from Italy.

China took Formosa and the Pescadore Islands from Japan.

The USA took several Pacific island groups from Japan, which had been German prior to WW1.

[Laurenz]

Correct, but in the case of Poland its not really true.
Poland got the eastgerman provinces and gave up the own eastern
provinces to SU. So win and loss is flat for them, excluding the economic
differences of the exchange.
Italy itself is only (around) 150 years old. Historically seen, a difficult matter
to decide what is italian or not.
China lost Formosa already again :-)
And todays Germany is only a sovereign on the paper. In reality its a second
class member of the U.S.. The U.S. Americans can do here in Germany what they want to do.
So in a way you are right. Many countries became independant from Great Britain. So they won territory.
But i think you understood very well, what i wanted to point out in my a.m. comment
:-)
Kind regards,
L.

[RF]

Laurenz, I think you will find that Germany is more constrained by the European Union than it is by the USA.

Correct me if I am wrong, but Germany is free to leave NATO at any time and to ask the US to remove its military forces from German soil. The Bush Administration wouldn't like it but they would have to comply with German wishes?

[Laurenz]

Dear RF :-)

If U.S. President ask the Germans:" It is my bombers allowed to pass the german airspace to attack Iraq?"
He is doing that officially. Every time in the past a german government said:"Yes, do it".
What would happen if a german government would say:"No!"
Amercan planes would pass the german airspace, no doubt.
Jimmy Carter forbade the germans to sell a nuclear plant to Argentina.
The Americans sold a american one.
The main job of the CIA after cold war is espionage to exploit the german industry.
The dispute of General Motors with Volkswagen, caused by the jobchange of Mr. Lopez was such a thing. One week after the telephone calls between Lopez and Piech, General Motor got the records of these calls.
Later on, redundand in Northspain, Mr. Lopez had unfortunately a terrible accident with a truck.
CIA could use the MAD- and Verfassungschutz databases but the Germans could not use these of the U.S. intelligence services.
U.S. army trucks in Germany do not need an identification number.
Every Bundeswehr vehicle has one.
When Joschka Fischer (Greens) as a fresh minister for foreign affairs visited the first time Madelaine Albright he proposed with a big mouth to discuss the NATO first nuclear hit proclamation (i dont know the correct english description), Madelaine gave him two clipclaps on his mouth and said, "shut up, then you are allowed to sit beside me".
Your never heard anything from his former proposals.
All postwar legislations of the allies after the german surrender are still intact.
To give you an good example. Every U.S. army/navy/airforce officer is allowed to hunt in the forests of the former amercan zone in the southwest of Germany.
So, dear RF, i can tell you some hundreds further stories about that theme, but i think, this is enough
Kind regards,
L.

[Karl Heidenreich]

Hey, Laurenz, you´re going a bit to far in this thing. I believe it´s a Naval History forum and sometimes, I reckon, it´s hard to swim against the common wisdom of some guys here but in general terms RF displays a good knowledge of things and it´s quite interesting to read his posts as those of iankw, bgile, tiornu etc.
But you are going thru a path that´s not that good.
I don´t know if there is the posibility to have a chapter inside this forum where we can put political issues at stake because every time we go in something historical or technical we finished figthing over politics...

[Bgile]

Laurenz,

All US military vehicles have identification numbers painted on their hulls.

A number of countries have denied use of their airspace during US military operations, and the US has honored them. Recent historical examples are Spain and France during Reagan's operations against Libya and Turkey's refusal during the invasion of Iraq. Your assertion that German airspace would be violated against the will of the German govenment is just stupid.

I am not proud of some of the things my country's govenment has done, but we defended Germany for many years against Soviet agression and that might have something to do with current arrangements there. Our presence in Germany gets smaller every year. It's expensive for us to keep troops there.

I have violate my own rule against politics in this forum, and I apologize. Laurenz made me angry and I shouldn't let that happen. I don't expect to continue.

[Karl Heidenreich]

In the 60ies, 70ies and 80ies NATO was threatened by the Soviets, who have not regiments or divisions along their border but whole shock armies. Europe could have lasted 15 seconds if the Soviets decided to have vacations in Calais or in the Mediterranean because, let´s be honest, the contemporary european armies are a laugh compared with the WW2 ones. As some say: they are just tired. So the bulk of the defense of Europe was at the hands of the US VII Corps and other main US units. When the figthing starts it would be US Army the one that must withstand the impact.
Let´s no go that hypothetical: Kosovo. It was a reluctant US the one that solved the problem. Or Irak: granted that Bush is as good strategist as Krusty the Clown but the US is the only one doing something about terrorism. What´s Germany doing? Just criticizing. It is not what we talk about but what we do that define us. Well: US is doing.

Kind regards.

[johnmk]

Laurenz made me angry and I shouldn't let that happen.

You are clearly a better man than he to express such sentiment; I don't think any such apology is necessary, however. Laurenz's comments thus far in this forum have been a mixture of factually questionable, irrationally defensive, and disrespectful. His personality type frequently cannot be trusted to comprehend information objectively, certainly not to portray it or share it either. As such I would advise significantly discounting all of his posts and should his child-like behavior persist an outright ban might be considered as an economical measure.