How Nazi Germany could have Defeated Russia... (HITLER COULD HAVE WON!!)
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- Опубліковано 2 жов 2024
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CORRECTION:
I said in the video I said that Moscow was defended by Siberian divisions moving in from the east, and that that wouldn't have been possible if Japan attacked.
This is a very common narrative that you hear but may be incorrect
I recently saw this video
• The Counterfactual Sho...
at 28 minutes in, Stephen Kotkin claims that Stalin didn't actually move the Siberian divisions and that Moscow was defended by local soldiers
If anyone has any further information please do write a comment
Many people are making the point that Napoleon took Moscow and lost.
That is of course true, but it forgets the fact that Moscow wasn't the Russian capital when Napoleon took it.
Napoleon taking Moscow was like if the Nazis took Leningrad, far less of a big deal than taking the capital and seat of government
I'm not saying that Russia DEFINITELY would have fallen if the Nazis took Moscow, obviously that is impossible to know
However, to write the capture of Moscow off and assume that assume that it wouldn't have been a big deal is foolish
CORRECTION:
I said in the video I said that Moscow was defended by Siberian divisions moving in from the east, and that that wouldn't have been possible if Japan attacked.
This is a very common narrative that you hear but may be incorrect
I recently saw this video
• The Counterfactual Show: Reimagining ...
at 28 minutes in, Stephen Kotkin claims that Stalin didn't actually move the Siberian divisions and that Moscow was defended by local soldiers
If anyone has any further information please do write a comment
no of it matters with out oil the german army stops period , tanks and plans dont move and winter comes horses die ... horses dead no transport for food bullets shells and cannons dont move so German Army dies just like real history , No one has addressed this until you solve Germany's oil crisis in 41/42 forward they loose
*Germans
There were around 100,000 Women that helped defend Stalingrad. One was about the best Sniper the Russians had.
Moscow was like a de facto capital during Napoleon even though the real capital was St. Petersburg. A good comparison would be Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, where many people feel as though Jerusalem is the true capital.
The Germans should've reinforced Army Group South more and took the oil fields of Baku. Then they could've won
@@logangustavson the state of German logistics in 1941/42 meant that taking Moscow OR the Caucus oilfields was always going to be unlikely.
The original planning for Barbarrosa assumed that the Germans reached a line at Smolensk and then consolidated for the winter.
It was Guderian, blowing smoke 💨 up Hitler’s @ss and convincing him to keep going for Moscow that wrecked the German army. The Wehrmacht never really recovered. Certainly not in time for the 1942 Case Blue campaign.
I think his biggest loss was not realising that average Russian hated Stalin with a passion, if he capitalised on that and had them on his side the story would of been so much easier
Nonsense. Watch old video footage of how Russian people looked at Stalin. People don't look at a person they hate that way.
@@swe1733 Oh yes, look at literal communist propaganda. What's next, look at how North Koreans wept when Kim Il-sung died?
the Russian never hated stalin tf are you saying
@@Josef_Stalin1878- Oh yeah, you're sure are a reliable source.
They weren’t exactly a benevolent liberating army either though..
The Germans needed more oil and better logistics.
And more of everything else….
...If Hitler had decided to forego Barbarossa, in favor of a stronger Mediterranean strategy, the world might be a very different place today. Hitler's main weakness was oil, the Germans never had enough of it. Despite building scores of synthetic gas-from-coal plants in Germany they needed a foreign source for it too. Much of the reason Hitler launched Barbarossa was to secure the Romanian oil fields at Ploesti, which were highly vulnerable to a Russian attack. If Hitler had turned his forces south, reinforced Italy, taken the Suez canal and Gibralter, and knocked the British out of the region, the Germans could have over-run the oil fields in Iran and Iraq (and at lower cost than the catastrophe Barbarossa quickly became).
With the Mediterranean a German/Italian lake, Hitler's oil supply would have been assured indefinitely. Germans would have been strong enough to repel any Soviet attack (can anyone even doubt that now?). Germans could have stopped Overlord on the beaches, with German strength not being wasted on an eastern front, retaking the continent would have been very, very difficult for the British and Americans.
Like I said, the world might be an entirely different place today if any of that had happened.
Video says 4 million but I've heard 3 from every other account. I'd say double that amount and the same with tanks and equipment, the logistical problem was unavoidable considering the distance they traveled. The Russians felt that at the end of the war themselves. Also clearer objectives.
I think the American sooner just let Germany and the Soviet union fight it out because the Russians today talk about how they won World War II blah blah blah will Americans were fighting a war on two fronts in the Pacific, and in Europe, and IF NOT For operation, warp speed, and the lend lease program the Soviets in British did sign with a America. There’s no way in the world people would’ve had any food! First Americans off because the damn U-boats from Germany song 1600 ships, but at the time America was freaking rich. That’s when we were a true capitalist, country, and pay taxes but we didn’t have all the fridge and social welfare problems in our government did with the Americans wanted them to do because we would not get involved in foreign conflicts.
Wars cost a lot of money, and the people that pay for it are always the poor working class and middle class robes and the military industrial complex, and those invested in it get mega mega rich, and just like with inflation, it is an extra burdensome hardship tax on most Americans butt. Inflation is awesome person wealthy! Makes me.
If there were no lease program with the Soviet union, they would’ve started because 50% of their crops were burnt and destroyed between June and September and then another 15% were destroyed by late October, so nobody could pick any frogs and the Germans were killing a lot of the livestock!! Whatever they didn’t take for themselves they destroyed, and I think the Soviets would’ve been able to fight in 1941 in the summer 1942, but I don’t think that it would be going on that’s longer and I think the Germans would’ve still starved in Russia and frozen to death so there would’ve been 3 million deceased Germans and most of the Soviet Union and the people therein died. Hitler invaded a monster worse than himself and he was getting a lot of help from the United States after we got attacked by Japan in December 1941. because the Soviet union took the European countries, and they never ever gave their sovereign countries their freedom, back and force communism on them America never forgetting their war debt.
Sure America and the Scottish Canadians and the British would’ve took more casualties invading Western Europe but it wouldn’t have been nearly as bad as the eastern front at all because America lost 430,000 sailors and troops to death in the whole world war two even if we didn’t help The Russians we could’ve lost 1 million or a little over 1 million and the British the same but now the end of World War II we had 14 million army!! before America even thought about World War II. We had an army at 400,000 in a bigger navy in a small Marine Corps.
This is what modern historians are now saying. Oil and logistics work in tandem. Especially if you consider that more oil means their infantry could've quickly closed the encirclements, that cost them precious time in battles such as smolensk
No, as somebody who has studied the Eastern Front as a history student for decades, the German Wehrmacht had little chance of taking Moscow. A couple of points to ponder:
1. The Soviet Army was undergoing major reforms after their debacle in the 1939-40 Finnish war. Infantry divisions were drastically reduced in size. Many infantry brigades were made of about 3200 men with heavy guns stripped away. Heavy artillery was centralized into artillery divisions. Armored Corps were reduced in size with emphasis on armored brigades with about 48 tanks. Infantry brigades had many more mortars, antitank rifles, automatic weapons, and antitank guns. Training for officers and noncomms were improved with emphasis on antitank, antiaircraft and modern combat tasks. These smaller brigades were easier for inexperienced men to command. All of these Marshal Timoshenko military reforms were still on going up until the battle of Stalingrad. Stalin wanted another two years to accomplish these military reforms in the Soviet Army but Hitler invaded in 1941 rather than 1943.
2. The Soviets took heavy losses in summer 1941 battles but starting at the battle Smolensk from 10 July through 10 September 1941, things started going awry for the Wehrmacht. The Germans faced ferocious Soviet resistance. German manpower losses, while considerably lower than the Soviets, still were painful and substantial. Soviet soldiers in isolated pockets fought desperate brave battles charging German positions repeatedly to try and break out at night with bayonets, spades and grenades with any ammunition they had left. Many Soviet and German soldiers died in these isolated pocket battles often in bitter nightime hand-to-hand combat. Soviet soldiers brutally killed any Germans they captured. It took the Wehrmacht a long time of hard heavy infantry combat in these prolonged vicious pocket battles to reduce them against tenacious Soviet resistance. German casualties at Smolensk were around 115,000 men, also included are losses of hundreds of tanks, warplanes, guns and large tonnages of vital supplies consumed in combat operations. The timetable of Barbarossa became unraveled during the battle of Smolensk. The German chances of capturing Moscow literally ended in front of Smolensk. Many German logisticians predicted swift early offensive gains for the Wehrmacht but poor dirt roads turned into a sea of mud after rains, a lack of railway connections, lack of motorized truck transport guaranteed a breakdown of supply networks as soon as the Wehrmacht advanced about 500 miles from their raiheads. Weak German logistical networks guaranteed that future German Wehrmacht offensive operations would start in fits, starts and stops. The Soviets lost 22,000 BT series and T-26 series light tanks in 1941. However, the Germans were forced to deal with all these well armed 45mm gunned Soviet light tanks causing plenty Wehrmacht casualties all along the way. These light tanks were increasingly used in the later summer and autumn battles as dug in camouflaged pillboxes to make these older tanks more effective in combat.
3. As soon as the Germans invaded on June 22, 1941 Stalin ordered the call up of FIVE MILLION reservists and ordered industries moved to the Urals. The unsung heroes were Soviet railroad workers. The Soviet railway system performed a flawless miracle of transportation moving tens millions of workers, machine tools and tens of thousands of factories to the Urals. Soviet factories were soon churning out weapons, tanks, guns and warplanes for the front well out of Luftwaffe bombing range. The Soviet railway system with their brave tireless railway workers, many of them women, kept the Soviet Union in the fight for the long run. I wish western historians would give the Soviet railroad workers the credit they earned in defeating Nazi Germany.
4. The Soviets ruthlessly standardized their guns, tanks, infantry weapons and warplanes for mass production. Soviet engineers took a "no frills" approach to building streamlined weaponry. Once a weapons design was proven to work, the assembly lines were kept moving to churn out maximum quantities of standardized weapons with only modest improvements allowed that didn't hamper mass production. Soviet infantry brigades became armed with increasing numbers of mortars, antitank rifles, antitank guns, automatic weapons, 76mm field guns, and large numbers of submachine guns. Large numbers of light tanks, such as the T-60's and T-70's, were churned out in the first year of the war with T-34 medium tank and KV heavy tank production ramping up. Soviet artillery guns and mortars were regarded as the finest of the war both qualitatively and quantitatively. Soviet engineers quickly adopted the KV tank chassis with their 152mm guns into fearsome SU-152mm self propelled armored guns. The 100 lbs high explosive shell from the SU-152mm gun could blast a German Tiger tank or Panther tank into shredded scrap metal. This is exactly what happened in the last two years of the war with T-34-85mm tanks, SU-guns and new IS heavy tanks blasting the Wehrmacht from Stalingrad, Kursk, Operation Bagration all the way back to Berlin.
So the point here is once Germans got bogged down in the bitter summer and autumn battles of 1941, the war changed drastically for the Wehrmacht. The war in front of Smolensk, Leningrad, Odessa, Sebastopol, and later in front of Moscow changed from a war of maneuver to a giant thousand mile long battle of attrition. The Wehrmacht also endured endless Soviet cavalry raids and partisan warfare in their rear areas. Many hundreds of thousands of "alleged" Soviet prisoners of war actually escaped into the Russian forests and swamps to form partisan units. Moscow coordinated an efficient command/control system with regular supply airdrops and airlifting of specialist officers in and wounded out of partisan controlled areas. Soon German outposts, bridges, airfields, railway yards became targets that had to be guarded. The Germans were forced to conduct endless security sweeps, tying down large numbers of troops, made to hunt down elusive partisans. No place was safe for German soldiers with combat occurring hundreds of miles behind the front. Partisans just fought to the end because hanging was their fate if captured. Some of the fiercest battles on the Eastern Front were between German railway troops on armored trains and Soviets partisans along the railroad lines. No quarter was given or expected in these savage small to medium scale partisan raids, firefights and security sweeps along the railways of the Nazi occupied Soviet Union.Once Soviet Army political officers showed widespread newsreels and newspaper accounts of German atrocities hatred of all things German grew across Soviet society. The Soviet worker and soldier were united into a terrible resolve to kill the Germans. The Soviet citizenry resolved drive the Nazis off of sacred Russian soil no matter the sacrifice to be made. A person's life didn't matter but what mattered was national Soviet resistance against Nazism.
The German Wehrmacht lost an aggregate total of at least 1.2 MILLION casualties from the first summer battles until the end of the battle of Moscow by mid-February, 1942. Nearly every German infantry division was reduced from three regiments to less than two regiments of effective soldiers in 1942. Many German infantry divisions had to be pulled out of the lines to be rebuilt. German losses of guns, tanks, warplanes numbered in the thousands in EACH category. Losses of horse teams and trucks were especially severe in the winter fighting of 1941/42. The Germans had little chance of winning the battle of Moscow in December 5, 1941 when Zhukov's armies counterattacked. Once the battle of Moscow was lost, the tide of war turned against the Wehrmacht permanently.
Phenomenal information 👍
Man I love reading what fellow history buffs have to say and this was all well made and a good read
I also don't think the Russians would have capitulated with the fall of Moscow. Their entire strategy has always been space for time. Had the Nazis taken Moscow and made it to the Urals the Russians would have kept fighting.
How tf does this have only 11 likes?
Respect for the serious effort
"If the United States had not helped us, we would not have won the war," he wrote in his memoirs. "One-on-one against Hitler's Germany, we would not have withstood its onslaught and would have lost the war. No one talks about this officially, and Stalin never, I think, left any written traces of his opinion, but I can say that he expressed this view several times in conversations with me."
-Nikita Khrushchev
Alot of idiot dumbasses keep saying "WEURRR THE URALS BRO THE URALs!"
Khruschev was an anti-stalinist because Stalin shot his son. After that he did his best to downplay Stalin’s role in the ww2 victory.
The guy was a fraud and a traitor to his people, which eventually saw him ousted from power.
USA saved the USSR. 😢
6:20 Hitler never wanted to take over the whole Russia, the plan was to stablish the line Arkhangelsk/Astrakhan, what are you talking about ?
Just like putin
Which would probably let Hitler pop up thinking "Well, wouldn't it be nice if we owned Siberia as well?"
@@dottyspotty9835 yes lol, if somehow barbarossa was a success he would have wanted siberia as well for the resources and to enslave the remnants of the russian population
@@dottyspotty9835No that would have been idiotic. There's nothing in Siberia except frozen tundra, forests and Yakut peoples. It took the Russians literally CENTURIES to colonize Siberia. No way in hell could the Germans have colonized Siberia in just a couple of years
Not even the Soviet Union or Russain Empire cared for Siberia and just wanted Vladivostok. If Russians don't want to rule this land why would Germans?
The expression i remember is, "The English gave time, the Americans gave money, and the Russians gave blood."
The British also gave intelligence (Bletchley Park)
England made their last payment for war loans to the United States in 2006 so it seems your quote is accurate.
@@kurtvonfricken6829 I do not think the USSR or Russia have repaid a single penny. In fact some of the lend lease material are in Moscow museums . They should have been returned
The Americans gave goods, machines, food and everything necessary to sustain the war.
americans for sure were 10x stronger Then soviet Union, americans were fighting at all fronts and were wining all of it, and soviets struggled fighting 5-7m Germans at one front and after War losing more, the thing was Hitlers Biggest mistake was declaring war on US
Regarding Japan invading Russia from the east, the problem with that is the Japanese were already overextended in China. They didn't have the ability to invade Russia in 1941, so that option is completely off the table.
They did. Russia is north of china. Look at the battle of khalkin gol. The japanese forces were completely decimated. The technological development of the soviets outclassed japan. Even if japan launched a full invasion. They would not hold up due to lack in military equipment and supplies. Japan stands no chance.
They would have been dead and out of supply’s before they got halfway through eastern Russia to effect Russia
the real reason hitler failed miserably besides raw materials was he was too ruthless and so where the japanese, if the japanese made friends with china and south east asia without commiting genocides then there wouldnt be many uprisings and civil wars in asia they could focus on soviet union or us easily and hitlers decision to attack france created enemies he didnt need since it is europes long dream to acquire russias resources since napoleon
Also what Japanese needed was not in Siberia but in Southeast Asia. The supplies to continue the war in China like oil rubber and ores were not easily accessible or even known to be Sibera but were known to be in the South.
@@adrianeckert6529 so there was only a losing scenario but what if Japan and nazis got nukes?
Napoleon took Moscow but as we saw it was meaningless.
Not only it was meaningless but it was his ultimate mousetrap.
Проблема Наполеона заключалась в том, что он хотел дать нашей армии одно единственное генеральное сражение, в котором он бы разгромил русскую армию. Однако Кутузов избегал этих самых сражений заманивая Наполеона в глубь моей страны, используя тактику выжженной земли. По итогу сражение состоялось у деревни Бородино (собственно от этого мы её называем Бородинская битва). В этом сражении наша армия конечно проиграла, но выиграла время для отвода войск, эвакуации Москвы. А потом у Наполеона попросту закончились снаряды, провизия и порох из-за чего его армия стала не способной вести боевые действия. В добавок ко всему этому приближалась Зима, страшные морозы, голод, холод и так далее. Бонусом он зашёл в глубь нашей страны из-за чего не мог нормально отступить и в конечном счёте из ≈680.000 наполеоновских воинов выжило всего ≈40.000. С гитлером немного другая история его поражения в войне, но по факту у него точно также не было ресурсов как и у Наполеона.
@@MrMirville, понимаешь, тогда это было совершено другое время и взятие городов не представляло такой важности. Типа это было конечно почётно, но бессмысленно, так как реальную опасность представляла наша армия. А во время Великой Отечественной Войны Москва была вадным промышленным центром СССР и имела очень важное стратегическое значение, так как через нашу столицу проходило большое количество железных дорог - путей снабжения.
Moscow wasn't the capital at the time either, so it's not going to be such a huge blow to morale. Will it hurt? Absolutely, but nowhere near as much as if it would've been if they took St.Petersburg which was the capital of Russia at the time
@@dmitripazlov491 I guess you are right but then why did't he take his army to St. Petersburg?
A few things:
1. Your main argument seems to boil down to Germany fighting a sort of "gentleman's war," like what was fought in North Africa (mostly, anyway). That was never going to happen, as Hitler an co. had totally transformed the mindset of the German people. There was a hate for the Bolsheviks that is almost indescribable today. The Germans looked at them as we look at roaches. There was never going to be any kind of "gentle occupation" akin to Denmark, Norway, or the Netherlands.
2. Roosevelt was hellbent on dragging the US into the war (against Germany), well before Pearl Harbor. The policy on ships bringing aid to Britain was a perfect example of this. He was looking for a "Lusitania moment," even though openly supplying arms and equipment to one side in a war would definitely warrant retaliation from the other.
3. Germany and Japan should not be looked at as allies. Yes, I know they signed various documents saying so, but they were more like co-belligerents (a title somehow bestowed upon Finland, despite the Finns and Germans actually being allies in every sense of the word). Japan and Germany had completely different war goals. It's also worth noting, Hitler was trying to curry favor with the Chinese, whom he saw as the rising power in the east, not Japan. This only ended after the Japanese invasion in 1937.
4. Japan had two strategies on how to acquire the resources they required. The first strategy, drawn up by the army, was to take Mongolia, a large swathe of Siberia, and the Soviet Far East. They were dissuaded from this plan due to the border skirmishes with the Soviets, most notably at Khalkhin Gol (the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact didn't help things, either). The second plan, drawn up by the navy, was obviously the plan they went with, getting resources from places like the Dutch East Indies.
"Germany and Japan...were more like co-belligerents". Indeed. HALF of US supplied Lend-Lease went through Vladivostock, the Soviet port directly across from Japan. The Soviets and Japan were officially neutral from after the Battle of Khalkin Gol until the Soviet Army stormed into Manchuria in August of 1945. IOW, half of the American-built stuff (trucks, planes, Spam, ammo, bandages, etc) Hitler faced on his Eastern Front (Soviet Western Front), sailed on Liberty ships right through Japanese-controlled waters. Japanese fishermen and the "neutral crews of the Soviet-flagged Liberty ships" - actually American merchant sailors would wave to each other in the winter months as these ships sailed through the Sea of Japan. This is known in the US history of Lend-Lease as "the Western Route". I believe all the warplanes flown across Alaska and the Bering Strait then across the USSR would be included.
Russians call their fellow slavs, the Ukrainians, "Kokols" or cockroaches as the war in Ukraine started. Bolsheviks murdered millions and one can't blame the Germans from being appalled of Bolshevik murder of millions. Meanwhile the Manchester Guardian and New York times was hiding the atrocities.
1. pre-Hitler the German Communist Party KPD was a growing force and by the common citizens regarded as a growing danger - the SA was just an answer to the communist RFB which built arms storages and used force in the public against capitalist (shop owners) - Hitlers legal rise to power was made by common people who feared these revolutionary troops in general (revolution) or in particular (for neighborhood terror)
another point is the "jewish" presence in the udssr - from the highest ranks of the KP (many reimported from the USA) down to the rural structures where they dominated in several regions by specific racial traits - as they dominated in intellectual traits in germany - so they did in the "east"
if you have to choose between a communist revolution - the holodomor (which was known in parts) - the red white civil war there is less brainwashing, but the exploitation of a realistic fear common germans had
if you sum up the deaths caused by the communists in russia and china hitler with his evil holocaust and all the deaths of ww2 put on his fault-account he is just ranking "far behind" place 3
2. and roosevelt suceeded by taking the world dominance of GB by his schemeing
3. probably this is a result from the japanese being unable to "win" the war against usa - as they could not win against russia (port arthur tsushima) - so they tried to win decisive batttles and secure their local gains
4. pearl harbour was a political = strategical mistake - probably a battle in the open sea (the us rainbow plans) - would be devastating enough for the usa to keep them out of war (if they attacked) or would have won enough time to establish a stiff defense zone (for the extended invasions)
@@Betz23K Pearl Harbor was basically a failure because the more important ships, the carriers weren't in the harbor.
There are so many IF’s in history.
If Hitler had been accepted into Art College on his 2nd attempt, would he have had such a tantrum? 😳
I've seen a few of Adolf 's art work and do you know what it's pretty darn Good - I'm not a expert but I've heard a Art Expert say how she was blown away herself - nobody can say the man was not a talent - it all makes me wonder ??? .
@@jamescorlett5272 ‘blown away’ was probably not the best phrase she could use? 😳
@sirloin8745 no no that was my ( interpretation ) of her reaction - said ( again by me ) with a little irony in mind
She thought they were Dynamite 👀✋️ .
@@sirloin8745 warning artistic licence in use in that erm last comment .
Imagine all of the "ifs" going on right now that we won't see the repercussions until decades from now. Like one of us here could be the next man with a funny mustache who commits genocide because someone called your furry art trash.
Counterpoint to your thesis:
1. Reaching Moscow earlier would have served nothing without the logistics to back it up. It was already breaking down at the end of the summer. For example, fuel was in short supplies in late august. Also, the « ill preparness » for the winter campaign is overblown. Since logistics was limited (you cannot add trains or horses), you have to choose: sending winter clothes means sending less fuel, or less amunition, or less food. Retaining those ressources would have slowed down the advance nonetheless. The quick advance made that the logistics couldn’t follow up. In smaller France, it’s not too bad, but in the huge USSR, it’s something else. Even with all the US equipment and its superiority in everything, the 1944-45 soviet army had to pause several times after a big advance for logistics to catch up.
2. Treating better the occupied eastern territories would have helped… but that’s forgetting that there was a lot of those populations (specially Belarusians and Ukrainians) were a big part of the Soviet army. There was no large scale mutiny in those units either. Independentists would not just trade a master for another. And the great majority of the population would not take action either way. An example is Vichy France, where the majority of the population would just try to survive.
3. The US, as an « ally » of the UK, was already sending materials to the USSR via their land lease policy. That’s also forgetting that the US help would seriously kick in at the end of 1943, when Germany was already defeated in the field. The US equipement was a massive contribution to the USSR counterattack, where they could perform some deep operational strategies with the mobility provided by the US vehicules. In that case, the US involvement probably shortened the war than won it alright. As for Japan attacking the USSR, they tried in 1939 and failed. They were also bogged down in China. This means that they only really had ressources for one front: either the northern plan (attacking China and the USSR) or the southern plan (attacking in the pacific and Indochina). Attacking the US meant that they could not attack the USSR. And since the US stopped their fuel exportation to Japan earlier, it meant that the southern offensive was chosen to procure those resources (specifically Indonesia).
Finally, was Hitler delusional for attacking the USSR at this point? His assument that it would crumble under sufficient force was also shared by the US and UK. And attacking early meant that the USSR had not completed its reorganization on it’s new frontier, which made it easier to encircle.
This is all speculation, because we won’t ever be able to know for sure what MIGHT have happened. We only know what happened and try to explain why it happened this way.
Dear Brien: you probably are a historicician, because your good knowledge.
I am a good reader, but not profesional. I think that if the Germans coukd work better in their supplie system, befire jube 22; puting more gasoline tons and gas trucks; more locomotives and the two spare panzer divisions in first line, advancind toward Mosciw, the victory was possible.
In the meantime the sourrunded Russian forces at Smolensk were fighting, nothing were between they and Moscow, the victory was very close!
At the end, these gasoline tons were in Europe or the conquered France, they existed!
The independentists were almost all willing to be allied with the Third Reich, but Hitler didn't support them hard enough. He gave aid to the Chechenyans independentists and he formed ukranian and russian collaboration armies. In total, over 1 million soviet citizens collaborated with Germany. But Germany could have emphazised more on them. He ""gave"" independence to the russian and ukranian collaborators only in 1945. We can speculate that if he had done it earlier, more people wo uld have joined these collaboration armies.
Yikes. This video is another one of those tired "if only hitler took moscow" arguments that are 50 years past their prime.
I would also point out that the USA lend lease program was approved for the USSR in November 1941. Before Japan attacked. If Hitler had not declared war on USA they could have freely traveled to Murmansk or even Leningrad itself and the Germans would have just sat and watched the aid go right by. No Roosevelt was well aware that his trade policy was a violation of USA neutrality, it was intended to force the Axis powers to attack the USA and thus bring them unit he fight without him having to drag congress into a vote for war while they’re at peace. Much easier to say let’s go to war when you’re already being attacked.
The outcome of major wars are determined by God. Superior forces have been defeated by much less. Look at ancient Israel. Once, when they had faith in God, their enemy was defeated by bees of all things! This is not to say your points are not valid, they are, but most important point of all is God is ultimately the master chess player.
The problem with starting earlier was the fact that eastern Europe had an unusually wet spring that delayed Barbarossa by a few months.
Barbarossa was also delayed because of italys failing attack on greece, the germans had to help them
same with africa
Germany needed more time to build - U boats - Tanks - and yeah - much better logistics and understanding of what issues there'd be in the East - winter - mud - they gambled which is very un German
@@reflex1453 Italy was a brake by using the German forces in the fight, and wearing their tanks and trucks. During the Yugo Greece campain it rained in USSR, the offensive would have been postponed anyways.
Delayed by weeks, not months.
You forgot to mention that Mussolini got jealous the German success that he decided to invade Greece, get humiliatingly defeated so the Germans had to step in and finish the campaign he started. Or that Japan attacked Pearl Harbour, which got the Allies involved and opened up the War on two fronts. If Japan stayed neutral or gave Germany any support, or if Mussolini could have had any competence then Germany would have been able to take the Soviet Union easily.
You forget to mention that the German invasion of Yugoslavia and Greece didnt't delay Barbarossa. This myth has been debunked for decades.
@@georgem589 Has it been debunked, though? The April 3, 1941 entry in the Naval War Staff War Diary says, "Balkanoperation verzögert "BARBAROSSA" zunächst um rund 5 Wochen. Alle Massnahmen, die auf offensives Vorgehen schliessen lassen, sind auf Führerbefehl zurückzustellen." Google translates that as "Balkan operation initially delays "BARBAROSSA" by around 5 weeks. All measures that suggest offensive action must be postponed by order of the Führer." You can Google the quoted German to find it being discussed in the Nuremberg transcripts.
agree. If they coordinated their efforts, the results would be different.
@@rexadriano4560 Japan invade Soviets in the East and cut off US supplies pouring into Russia via Alaska and now Stalin can not move a ton East when NS Germany invades - bad coordination for sure
Don't forget to mention the logistical challenge by Germany
Contains a lot of rubbish propaganda.
Europa the last battle should be must watch in schools
Hmmm… Nope. I think you put entirely too much emphasis on „taking Moscow“ - Napoleon did, and it didnt do him much good. Same thing with a hypothetical focus on trying to take Moscow in 41: The Soviets would very likely have defended it with the same ferocity as in Leningrad and Stalingrad. A protracted - and somewhat likely unsuccessful - siege / assault on Moscow could have done grievous, irreversible damage to the German army, along the lines of Stalingrad, but one year earlier.
Add piss poor German logistics and partisans into the mix, and „winning“ by obliterating the USSR as a functioning state becomes ever more unlikely. Best Germany could have achieved IMHO even without the US getting involved would have been a stalemate, a gigantic war of attrition that Germany neither had the industrial base nor manpower for.
Two totally different time periods. Moscow was much more important for communication, government, railway, and transportation hubs than it was during Napoleon's time. It wouldn't have won the war, but it would have made it a lot easier for the Germans.
Could they have even taken it? Its a big city, the fighting could have went on for months, and the russians did received reenforcements from the East. Instead of Stalingrad being the turning point, it could have been a failed attempt to take Moscow .
And remember, the germans were running out on everything with massile supply issues while the russians had very short supply lines.
The original Barbarossa plan was to stop a few hundred kilometers in, and dig in for the winter. After achieving that goal, the High Command agreed to continue forward, and succeeded in smashing many Soviet armies before their December counteroffensive. At any rate, the whole idea of attacking Moscow was to force the Soviets to commit the bulk of their forces and reserves into battle, much in the same way as Stalin ordered into Kiev. Much of the German difficulties in Case Blue came from Soviets retreating to avoid destruction. You can't defeat an enemy that keeps running away.
In the begining many russians viewed the germans as savoirs from Stalin. This could have been used to great advantage to overthrow Stalin but Hitler and the Nazis were too arogant and too ate up with their own propaganda to use this as an advantage. The persecution and roundup of the jews made this war a good versus evil war.
@@floycewhite6991the orginal plan was to reach the AA line. The Germans were very overconfident. Other wise I agree
He basically said "If nazis were not nazis, they would have won!". But then again, why even invade in a first place? Why not just trade?
Absolutely. What German in their right mind would want to live in the USSR? After all, Stalingrad was considered a resort city. Look at how much the Germans suffered there.
Germany wasnt getting enough oil through trade and because of the brittish blockade they couldnt import oil from other countries so the germans had to invade the ussr in a bid to get all that oil otherwise the reich would have collapsed.
@@xfhghe It was bad resort lol. They suffered because soviet put so much resistance that 6th army was already exhausted before even reaching this city. Real reason why they acted the way they acted was also because of racist views on "slavic subhuman" and such. Nazis lived in a fanstasy world of "racial hierarchies" and "racial purity".
Because the USSR was preparing an invasion while Europe was busy in the west with the UK.
Hitler was the architect of NATO, they just know how to hide this evil
Another youtuber (TIK) has a video about this, and points out why the Germans couldnt win.. oil! The Germans stopped short of Moskva because they had to! And even if the forward troops could have pushed a few kilometers further, it wouldnt have made a difference. There is no way for the Germans to get men and supplies to a Moskva assault, where as the Soviets has good supplies and and good rear lines. I think that if the Germans had tried, it would have been a huge Soviet victory, and I think Hitler understood this- and switched south to get the oilwells. Again see TIK video.
I totally agree and this is also the opinion of most of historians. Whichever path they would have taken would have led to a blind end.
According to the same youtuber, if Hitler was not so keen on flattening Stalingrad (for ideological reasons) they had enough men and supplies to actually make it to Moscow.
He diverted an entire army just to take Stalingrad and got bogged down
@@lorenzogumier7646 Not to a blind end, just very difficult circumstances. Hitler never had the affordability of making many mistakes, unlike the Allied forces with their vast reserves of raw materials and manpower.
@@KudzaishenyanhongoKudzie4ever Hitler went to the Caucasus for pragmatic reasons, for the oil that was there, and not to Stalingrad for ideological reasons. His basic reasoning was if Stalingrad couldn't be held (and dispatched), neither could the oil the Germans so desperately needed for the war effort.
Germans also had a depth limit of about 500-750Km into Russia, see TiK for details... I know its not "sexy", but its kinda important.
Without U.S. supplies, the Soviet war effort would have been futile. America supplied Stalin with 400,000 trucks, 2,000 locomotives, more than 10,000 rail rolling stock and billions of dollars' worth of warplanes, tanks, food and clothing. At the same time, the U.S. also supplied nearly a quarter of Britain’s munitions.
“We were lucky to have America as an ally,” Russian historian Anatoly Razumov told VOA recently. He said American technology and supplies formed the base of Russia’s war effort. “And we want to close our eyes to that. It’s shameful! Sometimes I talk to ordinary people who don’t want to understand. We were together during the war. Americans saved us from Hitlers push. How would it be if we hadn’t had this help? It was not a victory of just one country over Hitler. It was a victory of the whole world over him.”
The US were in a giving mood. They went on to give Russia printing plates ink and paper so the Soviets could print their currency. Estimated 2 billion dollars. This was AFTER the war this was occupation money.
The only source I have for this was an eye witness Major Racey Jordan. Have you read his diaries, He gives an impressive picture of the other things the Soviets got on lend lease. The diaries are available online.
By the same token, without Nazis being distracted on Hitler's eastern front, the overtaking of the Normandie beaches would have, likely, resulted in either failure or exceedingly higher allied casualties.
Most Of Which Came in 1944-45, Germany was not winning anything by then
That was big help, but it was not more then 20% of needs, rest USSR produce himself, espessialy when industry was moved to Ural and Siberia
The Nazis biggest flaw was of course its views of superiority and hatred for anyone not German. (Japan had a similar problem which led to their suicidal war with America). Hitler did have some diplomatic success in the treaty with Russia at the start, before he started winning in the west, but then it led to megalomania and a belief he could do no wrong. The population of Eastern Europe and Ukraine were there for the taking. This video does a great job showing this, which of course has been ignored intentionally and covered up since by Russia (or then Soviets), and really even the west who was always loathed to admit that anyone supported Hitler. Look no further for how little is said about Vichy France of the Scandanavian countries who really had no qualms about helping the nazis, or if not actively supporting, did not resist.
This is why Hitler lost. If he had any diplomatic skill whatsoever and could play his enemies or fool them, he probably would have won, but it was just a fatal flaw in their doctrine and how they were. Really, any competent leader, even as evil as Hitler, should have known there was no reason to declare war on America. It made no sense other than he thought it was inevitable. A shrewd evil leader might have even condemned Japan's attack on America and let America and Japan fight it out so they would not intervene in his European war. Asking why he made so many mistakes is futile as the answer was although he was very good at understanding and motivating Germany, he just was completely idiotic in strategic planning when it came to dealing with other powers.
Even attacking Russia when still fighting Britain was beyond stupid. Why intentionally start a two front war? He just could not help himself and the world thankfully was saved because of his weaknesses.
Germany should have insisted Japan invade eastern Russia before declaring war on the U.S.
Absolutely - that was a big mistake - no good coordination - and both Countries were at odd's with the League Nations through the 1930's - each underestimated the Mass of their opponents -Soviet Union and USA respectively
They didn't have leverage over Japan to force them to attack the Soviet Union. They were basically allies on paper.
Yes, but in April 1941 Russia had signed a non-agression pact with Japan. Moveover, Russia simply wasn't a priority for Japan.
The Japs tried and were rebuffed, ignominiously. We would hear more of Zhukov later in the war . . .
Japan had no interest in invading Russia. They were after resources to build up their military (Rubber-from the Dutch East Indies (Indonesia) Oil (DEI and Brunei) Rubber (Malaysia).
One aspect I see people tend to forget with taking Moscow instead of mopping up Ukraine is that Moscow was a major supply hub. Pretty much all supplies sent to Leningrad and the Russian forces on the northern front went through Moscow. By taking that critical junktion point, it would lead to the collapse of the Russian Leningrad front within weeks most likely, or one to two months. Some supply would get through the port of Murmansk, but not nearly enough to keep their northern forces going for long. For the Germans to be successful on their northern front, the fall of Moscow was of vital importance. It would have free'd up so many troops as well.
I've yet to see any analysis of the road and rail situation in Russia and how it helped or hindered defence. The wider track gauge was a problem for the invaders.
@@EllieMaes-GrandadYou are correct!
I'd really like to see an analysis what further implications it would cause the Soviet Union in terms of supply issue if the Moscow transportation hub fell into German hands in mid- to late autumn 1941.
And Germany as well for that matter. Would they be able to hold it for an considerable amount of time? If Germany went for Moscow after Smolensk instead of mopping up enemy forces in Ukraine, could they still do so afterwards or would Stalin have pulled those forces out of there?
These are some interesting questions.
Taking Moscow does not mean the end of the war, the russians remember losing their capital and still winning the war against Napoleon. Second the war in the northern front is a distraction because Germany needed the food from Ukraine and the oil from the Caucasus to fight the war. Victory or defeat would be decided in the southern front, the rest were sideshows.
Guderian was correct Moscow was the most important city to take. Luckily Germany thought they learned from napoleon mistake…
@@EllieMaes-Grandad I think you'd like TikHistory's analysis of Operation Barbarossa.
Be warned, its MIGHTY long
25:38 From a purely industrial production point of view, the World War II would have been a fair fight if it was Everyone VS USA, as the USA had roughly similar industrial production as the rest of the world combined.
War shouldn’t be a fair fight. That’s the point.
Something that Tojo and AH probably didn’t have a clue of comprehending. I also don’t think they had any comprehension how far away the mainland US was. AH had fantasies about setting NYC ablaze with his bombers but the odds of that happening were zero. The odds of his bombers making it to Detroit where they really needed to be (and Seattle for Japan) were less than zero.
@@kurtvonfricken6829 Yeah, it's not a football game!
@@tancreddehauteville764 Churchill was on a long-term contract, so they couldn't sign him
Wouldn't it be nice to still be able to say this about American manufacturing"
The "Northern plan" or Japan attacking the USSR is a meaningless argument that shows a total lack of understanding of the domestic situation in Japan. Japan was essentially at war with itself with the Army and Navy actively in opposition with each other. The Northern plan was an army plan while the Southern including Pearl Harbour was a Navy plan. The Navy would have never supported it as it would have made them second fiddle to their arch rivals. Also the Army was tied up in a long and unsuccessful war in China and had already had their nose bloodied in a conflict with the USSR in 1939. Japan also had a massive 5th column of Communist sympathisers who would have been mobilised if they attacked.
How ? Simple.
Just distort history so much to the point where all the events that caused and contributed to Germany's defeat no longer happen. This is the only way they could have won.
In our history as soon as USA entered the war and the big three joined efforts, Germany was doomed to loose no matter what they do.
But the US didn't have to join, the senate was very much against going to war, being busy with Japan, everyone would want to focus against the Japanese.
FDR wanted but if he gets blocked by the senate what good does it do?
@@Perrirodan1 Of course the US had to join, they were first attacked by an Axis member and Germany also declared war.
Plus it end up making the USA a global supwerpower.
@@Perrirodan1 The US DID have to join. Because Hitler declared war on the US first. Right after Pearl Harbor. Hitler wanted the Japanese to distract the USSR from the east and help him defeat Stalin, so he declared war on the US hoping to make Japan an ally. It was a stupid move. The US might have stayed out of the war in Europe if Hitler had remained neutral regarding the US/Japan war.
Obviously if you distort history anything can happen, there is no perfect scenario
United States was almost never needed to defeat Nazi Germany Soviet Union was more than enough to defeat the Germans... The war between them was like battle of 2 Evil brutal Dictators and the better one at it won the war....
Political farrytails
Sort of relevant if you see War's as Battles in a longer time line
Its called..... a l t e r n a t e h i s t o r y
@15:50 Hitler did plan to invade earlier but rescuing Mussolini's army in Greece caused him to delay the invasion.
They should have coordinated and invaded the Middle East for whatever Oil was there
It rained anyways during that period.
Also the Yugoslavian change of alliances infuriated Hitler so he decided to deal with them.
Proceed to ignore Yugoslavia joining Allies, you all ww2 meme historians bullying Italy are truly pathetic
Thinking about it now - The Soviet Union's back door was the United States back door also - Siberia Alaska - so the US could just pile stuff in with no stoppage and I think that is what happened - other'say not - I say so - also piling stuff into Britain and North Africa - and endless Oil for all the planes and tanks
Bailing the italians out was stupid
Apparently bailing them out in Greece delayed the start of operation Barberossa. If they didn't do that they may have beaten the Russian winter
They had to to prevent the British controlling Greece and Yugoslavia.
@@charlesmartellaactually, it didn’t. The late spring rains and resulting flooding had more to do with it.
No it wasn't, because if they hadn't the British would have landed troops, invaded and occupied Albania and then landed in Italy.
@@charlesmartella Made no difference. Barbarossa was delayed because of Spring rains, not the Balkan campaign.
He invaded the USSR because he learned the USSR was planning to invade Europe in July of 1941👀
Dude even quoted Antony Beevor LOL
As a Russian, I would like to leave a comment. In short, I disagree with you on all counts.
1. Even if the Germans had not stopped the advance of the Central Army on Moscow for a couple of months, they would still have encountered Soviet troops that were superior in numbers. Even before the war between Germany and the USSR, the latter had the largest fleet of various military equipment. The German command did not know about this and obviously, regardless of whether they continued the offensive or not, they would have encountered resistance from the Red Army.
2. At the start of the Soviet-German war, Japan had already abandoned plans to invade the USSR, having lost the battle for Khankil-Gol* (if I'm not mistaken, that's what it's called). Even during the civil war in Russia, the Japanese realized how poorly developed Russia's logistics were in the Far East, and this immediately deprived Japan of any pretext for attacking Russia.
3. Moscow is the undisputed center of Russia, it is not for nothing that it is called the "Third Rome", the capture of such a city could instantly collapse the defense of Russia. However, Moscow is the largest city in the USSR with a population of millions of people and around this city there were many more densely populated cities. The battle for this city would have cost the Germans too much, regardless of whether they had a numerical advantage or not. The Germans would have lost almost all of their combat potential in the hope of taking such a city and therefore in the event of the capture of Moscow, the Russians could quickly recapture it.
4. It can be said that one of Germany's leading advantages at the start of the war was the capture of all the western lands of the USSR where the majority of the USSR's population lived. That is, at the time of 1942, Germany outnumbered the USSR. Germany could have really attracted the peoples of Eastern Europe to its side for the war with the USSR, but then the Germans would have had to make concessions such as the creation of independent national states. So it is unlikely that the good attitude of the Germans towards the peoples of Eastern Europe could have changed anything, since they fundamentally could not allow the creation of sovereign states on the conquered territories. Germany could have used this population as a workforce, but not as support against the superior forces of the Red Army.
5. The US certainly helped the Soviet Union with Lend-Lease, but it was not entirely necessary. The USSR could have won the war without Lend-Lease, but with great losses. This is what Russian historians say. Moreover, the US would have entered the war against Germany in any case, since it was in the interests of the US to end the war in Europe and beyond.
In fact, Germany really did have a way to defeat the USSR, but to do this, Germany simply needed to block access to oil in the Caucasus, and then the entire Soviet industry would have lost its main resource of energy, transport and military equipment. In this case, the USSR would have been forced to wage war primarily with infantry without the support of tanks, trains and aircraft. However, the Germans did not have enough forces to carry out their plans, and Hitler himself, for some reason, decided to focus on capturing the city of Stalingrad, which had strategic importance as a logistical hub between the rest of Russia and the Caucasus.
There is much to think about on this topic, but I wrote everything as it is. I hope the translator translated my words correctly.
Well written; thanks. And what you say about the crucial strategic importance of the Caucasus oilfields is correct. The British perceived this early on, and in fact during the period between the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and the start of Barbarossa, when they mistakenly saw Germany and the USSR as allied against them, they had quite advanced plans for the mass bombing of the Baku oilfields from their bases in the Middle East.
There are uniformed people. So much nonsens, that it Impossible explain wath ist wrong😅. The only thing is fine: the Propaganda and the lies of most historians.
Very good comment, thank you for this
Germany had half the population of Russia and Russia had a larger industrial base. Germany had a lack of transport to carry a war much more than 500 miles into Russia. They could not win against so many people.
Yes, Stalingrad was their real Waterloo. The weather conditions were horrendous. But seriously, given their commitment elsewhere they simply did not have the manpower to overcome the Russians. Not forgetting that Stalin was as cunning as a fox.
the population ratio might be right but certainly not the might of the industry. Russia was no match for Germany economically or industrially. it isn't even today. it never was at any point in history. what a laughable notion. look at Russia. people live in sheds over three-quarters of the country.
Germany 86 million vs the USSR 168 million to 177 million, or including conquered territories 196 to 205 million.
Then you have other axis fighting so Italy 44 million, Romania 20 million, Hugary 10 million Bulgaria 8 million, Finland 3 million.
Then Germans other conquered territories of about 100 million or about excluding the soviets population they controlled.
The Germans also for most of the war had about 45% of the soviets population on there side of the conflict....
Germany wasn’t the only nation fighting, the Axis had a larger population than the USSR, not counting conquests, and then took a third of the USSR’s population and half its resources in Barbarossa.
Yes they could and they almost did. With the generals in charge, and not Hitler, Russia would have lost. 2/3 of the Russian population would have been behind enemy lines by the end of 1941.
What silliness.
As soon as Stalin successfully evacuated his factories and workers way east of Moscow, it was all over. The war was a war of annihilation which would be fought to the destruction of one state or the other. For it not to have been that, it would have required both Hitler and Stalin to not be who they were. Germany couldn't take Moscow in 1941, and even if they did , they couldn't have held it. Germany didn't have the production, nor the logistics (they lacked the trucks), nor the Air Force needed to take it. If they had prepared better and planned for a two year offensive, making sure to take Leningrad in year one, then they had a chance for a longer war. But they still lose. I'm still not sure Germany could have taken the Caucasus in two years. And that securing of oil is the 2nd key, after the factories. Against the UK, the US and even a weakened Russia, the best Germany could have hoped for was a longer war. The UK would not have dropped out, which means the US was going to join eventually. Japan was a non factor even if they were aggressive. Russia murdered them in 37-38.
The simple truth about the oil fields is this, the Russians had them all ready for destruction.
You are talking exact dream of Hitler, conquer the eropean part of Russia, unfortunately, the Furuer's dream failed. It first crackled in the winter of 1941, the German army was stopped at the gate of Mscow. Again in the winter of 1942, the German army broke its arm and leg at Starlingrade. From then on the Furuer started his journey to the Hell.
Even if they had taken Moscow it would have been a dead end trap. Moscow was equipped to welcome an invading army and wait in their tunnels to massacre them all. Hitler knew what was awaiting him in Moscow. He namely wanted to avoid Napoleon's biggest mistake.
Your biggest problem with this idea, is that Hitler had only 2 months' worth of fuel for his vehicles at the time of this invasion. Tanks do not do well without diesel.
How could Germany have won with Enigma broken?
What if they had realized Enigma was broken? They merely would have needed a secondary meaning for what their encoded words meant, and changed the meaning frequently. This would have completely thrown the Allies.
Stalin usually did not believe any warnings or intelligence recieved from the west
Don’t mean to be mean but the German could rebuild and use the Polish Navy😂😂😂😂.
Yes, but, Enigma information was sparsely used so that the Germans would not know it had been broken. Also, Stalin did not trust anything that Churchill would have said or shared. Once the Germans believed that the English were reading all their codes, they would have changed codes. Yes, major disruption of Command and Control would have hampered operations for a small period of time.
I agree - Enigma was a big problem - some say it just was not vital - bullshit - now how the Germans could have been so dumb to not change it in simple ways I don't know - I guess you have to give credit to the clever British how they did not reveal certain things to keep their secret secret - lot of good it did - look at Britain today - what a goblin hole of shit
The invasion of Yugoslavia and Greece cost valuable time and required sorting out those forces for later deployment for the attack on the Soviet Union. Also...invasion any time in April not possible because of very wet spring. As to U.S. aid, Krushschev, in his memoirs, said that the two greatest things that America sent to them was jeeps...and Spam... (The man was a peasant...) YP
Ya, I think too many fronts and plus by attacking Yugoslavia that would get Russia upset.
Not really, had the Germans attacked before the would just ended stuck in the mud. It was raining season....at least while waiting for the sun to show up, they secured the southern borders and got a handfull of battle hardened troops.
I read in a german soldiers published diary that the western Russian people hated Stalin and actually supported the germans with food and shelter. It was the later atrocoties against these people that stopped this support, I feel this was a key missed oportunity.
This is a fact, quick side note, a lot of those people weren't ethnically Russian and wanted self determination. Ukraine had recently suffered from Stalin's manufactured famine in the holodomor.
not a missed opportunity. the Nazis formed battalions from a lot of people liberated from the soviets, though liberated is a weird term when the ones doing the liberating dont really want you alive
10:40 this is only partially true. He did not decide to pause the invasion on a large scale but instead redirect armored divisions to the south (and north) because the goal of the invasion where ressources and food in the south and he would have a better position to attack moscow later on. at the time the soviets anticipated a german advance to moscow which is partly the reason they were so unprepared elsewhere. his decision resulted in the largest successes in the war including the biggest encirlcement in history next to kiev. most generals did support his decision with the exception of franz halder the chief of staff for the army high command. he redirected troops from the south to the center before and during the invasion despite hitlers commands. could the wehrmacht have taken moscow? maybe. would germany have won the war? maybe. As i see it the only way for germany to win the war which would probably have resulted in a long war either way was to secure the food supply and ressources for their own army while taking it from the soviets which they did partially do by taking ukraine.
If Germany had won the Battle of Britain the outcome against Russia would have been very different. With Britain (and the Commonwealth forces) out of the way, there would have been no need for all the troops to be on the Atlantic Wall, no need to send troops to North Africa and, more importantly, no need to delay his attack on Russia to send troops to Greece to fight the British. There would have been more troops to fight in Russia and the attack wouldn’t have been delayed by the weather.
Well the germans never wanted a war with France or England..
I've worked on 10 steps that might have let Germany win the war using minimal or no extra resources.
1 Secure their enigma cypher. That is regarded as giving the Germans 2 extra years before they are defeated. The Germans almost used a re-wirable keyboard for all 26 letters instead of just 10 they implemented in 1939 of the enigma machine and they almost manufactured enough of the rewirable UKWD Rotor in 1942 to make code breaking impossible. Had they have done that its said the war would have taken 2 years longer. Even Stalingrad of Kursk was assisted by British decrypts given to the Russians. Secure codes gives the Germans a lot of time and resources. Their supply routes to North Africa are much safer.
2 During the Battle of Britain neither the Me 109 nor Me 110 had the 66 Imperial Gallon drop tanks they latter had which would have increased range at max cruising speed from 400 miles to 700 miles dramatically increasing the time an Me 109 could spend over Britain, depth of escort and the number of Me 109. This is despite the fact that the Me 109 E1B could carry a 250kg bomb of the same weight and despite the fact that He 51 and He 112 used drop tank's in the Spanish civil war.
It's possible the RAF may have been defeated but certainly many more British factories would have been damaged.
3 Produced a long range fighter: The Fw 187 Falke twin engine fighter using the same DB601 engine as the Me 109 had much higher speed and climb rate than the Me 109 and Spitfire. DB601 engines been allocated to the program the Germans would have had an 800 miles range escort fighter equal to the P-38 or P-51 able to range even more with drop tanks. This would cover the entirely of Britain including Scotland not the 20% the Me 109 could do or the 35% it could do with drop tanks. It would also hand the Luftwaffe a high speed reconnaissance aircraft and fast bomber. The engines were not allocated and went instead to the Me 110 program which was a heavy cumbersome aircraft unable to dogfight.
-I believe points 2 and 3 might have turned the Battle of Britain had 33% of Me 110 production been sacrificed.
-I can not see operation sea lion succeeding or going ahead but Britain is neutralized for 6 months longer before it can start its bombing campaign.
4 Develop a 4 engine bomber to support Germany u-boat war, its surface raiders and attack Russia's Ural factories. By 1937 Germany had cancelled its 4 engine bomber development the Do 19 and Ju 89. The Ju 89 developed into the Ju 90 transport which became the successful Ju 290 which then became a bomber again but only in 1943. Although the He 177 program was started it was a failure until late 1943.
-Had Germany had a 4 engine bomber the u-boat campaign would have been far more successful as the aircraft would find targets. It would be far more survivable than the Fw 200 which would have been better served being a pure transport. The Fw 200 might have changed the battle of Stalingrad as it could reload and refuel out of the range of Russian fighters and would add much to the Luftwaffe's transport capability than the inefficient Ju 52. Likewise for supplying Rommel.
5 About 6000 tons of steel was put down of two the H-Class battleships to follow Bismark before they were scrapped. Had the decision been tanken earlier its possible that Germany could have had 6-12 more u-boats in service.
6 Battle of Stalingrad. Germany must withdraw and save the 6th Army. However secure cypher might have saved this battle as the British gave German plans to the Russians but said it was from an agent. The use of the Fw 200 as a transport might have improved German logistics.
7 North Africa: The allies used enigma to determine German air routes and sea routes. This culminated in the Massacre of 660+ Me 323 and Ju 52 transports in a perfect interception.
Again the Fw 200 is a much better transport had it been used as a transport instead of a maritime reconnaissance bomber.
9 Germany had a proximity fuse program in 1940 but suspended it in 1940 as resources was diverted into fielding weapons that could be available in 6-12 months. The program was only restarted in 1943 or late 1942 and lead to successful test firing in 1943 of about 1000 shells. It was essentially ready for production in late 1944/early 1945 but the factories were over run by the Soviets.
-The fuse was by Rhinemetal and its was code named kuhglochen. (little cow bell). It was electrostatic, had a back up nose contact fuse and cheap to produce. Had it not been suspended it might have started production in mid to late 1942 and be available to use against the RAF and USAAF 4 engine bombers in 1943. Proximity fuses increase kills by a factor of 4.5 or more and likely 50% more against a formation. This would increase loosses for the USAAF from 0.6% to 3% without losses to fighters taken into account. This would be a full year of heavy looses before the P-51 mustang came into use.
10 The following aircraft turned out to be a wasted effort: He 177, Me 210/Me 410, Ta 154. The He 177A could have been saved by converting it into the 4 engine He 177B and been in service by December 1941 if Ernst Heinkels advice had of been followed but with the Ju 89 and Do 19 in service it's perhaps best to make do with those. The Me 210/410 could have been saved had Willy Messerschmidt not personally intervened to shorten the tail which led to instability problems but it would likely be late anyway, just not as much. Best to cancel it and focus on Me 110 and Ju 88 production with new engines as the mass production system had to be built up and Me 210/410 was too late. Ta 154 was a total waste.
Instead Messerschmitt would improve their Me 109 by restoring the retractable tail wheel of the Me 109F in the Me 109G and producing the streamlined cowing. This would increase Me 109G6 speed from 387->399mph at 1.3 ata boost and Me 109G6 speed with 1.42A ATA boost from 399-> 411mph. The early Me 109-G6ASM would probably reach 430mph and be much more competitive with the P-51 Mustang.
11 Develop Microwave Radars. In May 1942 the Germans cancelled most of their microwave development program due to manpower shortages and decided to concentrate on their current 50cm radar. They had by then at Telefunken succeeded in developing a tunable split anode magnetron (4cm to 7cm) at 800W power and a disk triode which at 27cm could produced about 30kW and 9cm about 9kW. At Lorentz a 30cm FLAK radar was starting tests.
-These radars if developed would have had far more narrow beams and been much harder to jam. 8 months after the Germans abandoned their microwave program the allied CV64 Magnetron was discovered in a crashed Stirling bomber near Rotterdam. Thus not only did the Germans abandon their radars they were in no position to analyze the allied ones due to the dispersal of personnel often to the Army. The Germans had to start a crash program in 1943 as there radars started to be jammed and it too a while to recall experts.
-Essentially the Germans probably could have avoided serious jamming of their radars and this would have dramatically increased allied losses.
12 Develop a long range 6 engine America Bomber Starting in 1938 instead of the He 177. This would be a foresight full initiative but it would allow Germany to communicate to Japan, Find Convoys, Mine the East Coast of America and even bomb her cities at night. The fight must be taken to America since it is Germany's main agent of defeat.
The aircraft would be based around the Me 264/6m (a 6 engine Me 264) and use standard Jumo 211 engines so as not to delay matters and ensure sufficient power was available. It would have the wing span of the B-29 but have a narrower shorter fuselage. As more powerful high altitude engines become available such as the Jumo 213E become aviable missions of 13,000 miles for bombing and 15,500 for reconnaissance become possible.
13 Develop an Atmoci Bomb. In 1942 Germany was the first country to have a sub critical reactor that created more neutrons than it consumed, the Lepizig Sphere IV. In the same year Albert Speer asked Wener Heisnberg if a nuclear bomb could be made in time to alter the course of thr war. He had in mind 500 million reichs marks. Heisnberg repied it cound't be built in time. (I believe he had iun mind 1 year). Therefore Germany only invested 40 million Reichs marks instead of 500. Even so they were on the verge of starting a reactor at Haigerlocj and developed two uranium enrichment devices. They produced 600mg enriched to 6% despite being bombed to destruction 3 times.
So had they started the program they might have succeeded in time to counter the US lead nuclear bomb especially in consideration of the improvements caused by other proposals.
14 Tank and fuel production goes up organically by the blunting of the allied bombing campaign.
15 The G.41 semiautmaic rifle need not have been a failure. The StG44 could have been rolled out faster in 1943 and was synergistic with the Panzerfaust.
how does Germany win the battle of Britain exactly? Even with all airfields destroyed, what then? They didn't have any way to invade the UK and it wasn't like the empire planned to give up.
Germany winning the Battle of Britain, or at least the aerial battle that has that name now, would have changed little. Even with control of the sky they wouldn't have been able to invade the UK. It would basically require Germany to perfect a reverse D-Day.
The best hope for the Nazis when it came to the UK would have been making peace. If they had a ceasefire with the UK they could have dedicated more resources to the USSR.
What kind of delusion is this? Besides the fact that the Germans couldn't ever win the battle of Britain, they were losing from the first engagement and the battle could only end in either a British victory or the complete annihaltion of the RAF and British industry, which the Germans certainly did not have the resources to do, nor the correct designs, german bombers were terrible for a strategic bombing campaign, every airforce in the world working together would still struggle to accomplish something like that because Britain was dug in with radar, great anti air defences, an incredible airforce and the best aircraft industry in the world Besides the USA. Even if the Germans do well in the battle of Britain, Britain cannot be knocked out of the war, a naval invasion would be hilarious and an air invasion would be too risky and again not have anywhere near enough resources. Also german logistics were terrible, even if your pipe dream scenario somehow happened, germany simply didn't have the logistical capabilities to send all the spare troops to the eastern front and supply them, they sent absolutely everything they could
"Unfortunately... I mean uhh thankfully, that didn't happen"
Wrong. Now a days communist world order doesnt bring happiness
"We only have to kick the door in and the whole thing will come crashing down" claimed Hitler. And that's what happened at first. Then the logistics of such a long supply line, Russia's winter and Russia's counter attacks all happened.
So basically shit is what happens when your battle plan does not follow your plan
Hitler gambled everything on "short war". That was how the Wehrmacht was designed to take advantage of Germany's strengths: superior innovation, and supreme powers of organization. So the Wehrmacht was very capable in breadth, but not in depth, the Germans knew their weaknesses and that they could hit an enemy hard, but they could not keep doing it forever the way the Russians could! And so when the wehrmacht did not defeat Russia in 1941, they never could do it.
@@healthguy79 Every battle plan falls apart upon first contact with the enemy.
@@healthguy79 The plan was shit. It could never have succeeded due to incompetent German logistics.
@@sulate1 The exceptional autumn rain and Lend Lease saved Russia
The problem with your Ukraine idea is that Hitler's program against slavs was a key part of his ideology. It was one of the things that made the Nazis who they were. To suppose they could change it is to suppose that Germary would be dominated by a different ideology, In that case I would suggest that WW2 would be much less likely to occur at all. This probably can be suggested with respect to your third point, the DOW by Hitler. Absolutley the greatest blunder of WW2. At the end of the war 1/3 of the trucks in the soviet army were USA msde, for example.
In summary if the Nazis hadn't been nazis, things would have been different. Yep, that is true.
Even without Nazis the Germans would have waged war. Their dream was to create an empire like the British did, or to settle big land masses like the spanish and british in America and the Russians in Siberia did. And this dream could not become reality without a world war.
Not true. Why didn't he do any program against the slavs of Slovakia and the Czech Republic? No progroms, no camps, no racially motivated killings there. And they were slavs, just as the ukranians or russians!
"Hitler's program against slavs was a key part of his ideology." No it wasn't? Most of the wartime propaganda focused on the ideological argument against 'Judeo-Bolsheviks', not against Slavs. " To suppose they could change it is to suppose that Germary would be dominated by a different ideology,", Yet they did change, and it was the most ideological faction of the whole army, the SS, that was the main proponent of this change, look up the Russian Liberation Army and the Galician SS division.
@@fenixman2 re: Lebensraum
There was no anti-Slav sentiment, that's made up nonsense.
Couldn't get past the 7 second mark when there was some cheap WWII film footage included as historical documentary film......
It was Hitler's love & admiration for the British that kept him from wanting to fight or harm their Empire. With 1 front to fight on, All divisions and resources can be focused on the East., German industry can be reshaped by Speer to give them the best weapons suited for the East, along with winter clothing
Hitler was counting on the English being so cowed by the examples of his successful "lightning war" against the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Norway, and most of all, France, that they would sue for peace. He didn't count on the leadership of Churchill, who, even before the war, was warning of the evils of Nazism, and was never going to surrender - even with the (bogus) threat of invasion (Operation Sea Lion).
England "stood alone" from June '40 (Fall of France) to June '41 (Invasion of Russia) against Germany. (Well, not really "alone" - there was the rest of the English Empire and Commonwealth - Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, South Africa, etc....)
Hitler's Africa campaign was bad strategy. From 1940 on, the Axis poured a lot of resources into it but it didn't lead to a worthwhile victory. The Axis failed to take the large Alexandria harbor or the Suez Canal, success in that direction would have turned the Eastern Mediterranean into an Axis sea.
In the winter of 1942/1943, when the German 6th army was surrounded in Stalingrad, fighting for its survival, hundreds of thousands of Axis troops with heavy equipment, were surrounded in Tunisia. 40% of the Luftwaffe was needed to guard the vulnerable overseas supply line past Allied Malta. Eventually, those hundreds of thousands of Axis troops had to surrender, having achieved nothing.
Regarding North Africa, either you put in enough force to get to victory, or you leave it alone. The worst decision was to go halfway, wasting force for no benefits, and fighting at a disadvantage given the problematic supply lines. And that is what the Axis did.
Had Hitler and Mussolini attacked Malta in 1940 instead of waging the air war on South England, followed by a push towards the Suez, the Axis would have been in a much better situation.
With the Suez under control, the Axis could have invaded Palestina/Lebanon, with overseas supply. Then Turkey, Iraq, and Iran might even have joined the Axis.
In fact, Hitler did have considerable face-to-face negotiations with Mussolini in 1940 but left the negotiations looking frustrated. Perhaps Hitler did want an Africa-first campaign but failed to convince Mussolini. Mussolini then attacked Greece and was defeated initially, forcing Hitler to postpone the attack on the Soviet Union to remedy the Italian defeat in Greece.
Peter, I agreevwith you. I will say more: in september for the Typhoon operatin, two panzer divisions went to reinfirce the Army group Center, imagone if the enture Afrikabkorps, with their 3.000 heavy trucks and gasoline, went to Mosciw offensive! They will make a diference! Regards!
You can still see the animosity in the Russian/Ukrainian war right now.
Yup exactly 👌🏽 the Russians massacred over 5+ million Ukrainian civilians and other government officials in the early 1920's. They mentioned that statistic in the (Nazi Death Squads) documentary a few years ago. You should watch it and see how it is continuing on since the current Russian/ Ukraine war invasion in March 2022 but I believe the Joe Biden Regime def has some HIGH INFLUENCE due to the invasion
It is a fomented animosity - outsiders with agenda's - Ukrainians and Russians were fine until 2014 - divide and conquer plain and simple
It is a NATO incursion.
I honestly think animosity would exist anywhere a neighbour invades another.
I have a Ukrainian grandmother & Russian grandfather who met during the war (came to the West after the War), & I think the culture differences of the Russo-Slavic peoples is something the West can't fully wrap their heads around.
@@adamjd7645practically all of the Ukrainians I know are intermarried with Russians and have family on both sides.
3:00 There's also the strategic situation Germany was in, not dissimilar to 1914 vis-à-vis Russia, in that Germany was on the clock. All Stalin had to do was sit back, eventually cut off the exports to Germany on which the German war effort was largely reliant upon and then invade Germany, perhaps in the summer of 1943. This always gets left out of these reasonings for why Hitler attacked Russia. You don't mention it either.
3:15 What evidence is there that the Nazis planned to genocide the Slavs? The Generalplan Ost (GPO) article on Wikipedia is based solely on what we know of the RSHA's draft for the GPO, which in turn comes from Dr. Erhard Wetzel's letter (27.4.1942) of high criticism towards the draft. That draft never went anywhere. The final GPO plan by Himmler's advisor Dr. Konrad Meyer, which survives to this day and I have read personally, has nothing about killing anyone. It doesn't even mention deportations, with the exception that when land is expropriated from the natives in the cities, then the natives must be relocated to former Kolkhozes and Sovhozes, where they will be compensated by giving them land there along with restoring their rights to own land (Generalplan Ost, p. 79). There's scarcely anything in the GPO on how to deal with the Russian population; the plan mainly concerns the settling of Ingria, Crimea, the Memel-Narew area (the "Bialystok District" annexed into Germany-proper in 1942) with German colonists and the economic requirements for that. We also know that the RSHA draft scarcely had anything about the Russians. On that note even the RSHA draft did not talk about mass killings, rather it talked about mass deportations, which were deemed completely unfeasible due to economic considerations and the psychological impact it would have on the German people. In short, the Wikipedia article on the GPO is propaganda drivel not worth the time of day of any self-respecting historian.
8:20 The Russian military archives in Moscow have the ID cards of over 15 million Soviet military dead from the 1941-45 period. Taking into account the possibility of duplicates, we're still talking likely in excess of 14 million military dead here.
14:30 Army Group Centre absolutely could have taken the Moscow-Tula-Kalinin area c. October 1941 had Hitler not diverted AGC's armour north and south. This would have been before the Russians could have fortified the region and raised a very sizeable amount of men from the region, including mechanised formations. I don't recall the figures off the top of my head, but I think we're talking close to a million men here. At any rate the region was of critical importance to the USSR's war effort and its loss would have had a huge impact on the country's capability to continue the war. Not to mention that the relatively primitive Russian railway network was largely dependent on Moscow as its central hub, connecting all the railways of the country. Losing Moscow would have had a crippling effect on Red Army logistics, while also providing the Germans with a supply hub and a protection from the elements, particularly in the upcoming winter. It's worth noting that e.g. Nigel Askey is of the opinion that AGS could have dealt with the "Kiev Pocket" on its own, without the diverted armour from AGC, due to the Soviet units in the pocket lacking the motorisation required to escape it.
15:20 Barbarossa couldn't really have began any earlier than it did, though not just because of the things you mentioned, but because of mud. The mud season of spring 1941 in Eastern Europe was particularly persistent. The week of June 22nd was pretty much the first mud-free week of the summer.
16:30 Right, I think without supplies coming from Moscow, Leningrad would almost certainly have fallen within a matter of weeks. There was still a railway connecting Murmansk and Archangel via Vologda and Tikhvin to a supply route to Leningrad over Lake Ladoga, but this would have meant that Western aid would have had to keep Leningrad alive. I think this is too much of an ask in late 1941 to early 1942. It is also possible that in a scenario where the Germans seize the Moscow-Tula-Kalinin area in late 1941, that the Russians also lose the route with which to supply Leningrad. Greater German successes in 1941 could also have meant the Finns would have pushed for Sorokka (Belomorsk) by the White Sea in the spring of 1942, cutting the Murmansk Railway off entirely. A large portion (the bulk?) of Western aid to the USSR at this stage came through Murmansk or Archangel, but the latter was not usable in mid-winter due to ice, at least not at proper capacity (I've read of ships unloading cargo on the ice off the coast, so it's possible some deliveries could have still been made in wintertime...).
17:00 The "if Hitler had had the creativity to ally the liberated peoples of Eastern Europe instead of subjugating them, he would have won!" is a popular trope going back to the early years of the Cold War. I don't really buy it. Plenty of locals from territory taken from the Russians still fought for the Germans, despite the Germans not setting up true puppet states in the sense that said states would have wielded their own militaries and so on (the Germans did install local regimes, many of which had quite substantial autonomy, e.g. in national-cultural matters; see the Baltic States under German occupation), and these locals rarely were effective or reliable, particularly those from the Russified territories. In WWI Germany did set up proper puppet regimes in Eastern Europe; they were weak, ineffective and their rule was enforced solely by a German military presence, even when Lenin's bloodstained hooligans came knocking in late 1918. Hitler setting up national states in the Ukraine, Belorussia, the Baltic States, Russia-proper, and so on, would have meant fewer partisans, but I don't think it would have had a huge impact on the German war effort, nevermind the outcome of the war.
24:30 Now we're getting to the meat of the matter, so to speak. Firstly, USA was well on her way to joining the war against Germany, with one foot already in the Battle of the Atlantic by mid-1941 (which is why Hitler chose to declare war on the US after the Japanese entry into the war). Obviously we can't know this, but I wouldn't be surprised if the US would have been in the war against Germany by mid-1942 regardless. There's no way the US was going to let Germany dominate Europe: if it looked like the Russians were about to crumble, more aid would have been sent to make up the loss of key industrial and logistical centres. It wouldn't surprise me if things got desperate enough, that Stalin would have allowed Anglo-American ground troops on the Eastern Front. The US is ultimately the weight that tipped the scale to the Allies' favour in both world wars, and the chief reason I seriously doubt Germany ever had a chance at winning WW2 in particular, even if she did things differently in 1941.
As for Japan, all I can say is good luck getting far with the infrastructure in the Far East and Siberia. And where's Japan going to get oil from without seizing the Dutch East Indies? They were already embargoed by the US after seizing French Indochina in 1940.
Hope you found this informative.
On the issue of what Germany intended to do with eastern Europe and the slavs, the answer lies in Mein Kampft. Everybody knew exactly what was going to happen and why.
@@RafaelSantos-pi8py This is conjecture; you could be right or you could be wrong. Ultimately Hitler's ideological "ramblings" in Mein Kampf and NSDAP party policy was one thing, and reality was another, and often the former was put to rest when it wasn't practical. Hitler had little issue working with big corporations, allying Slavic and other "untermensch" countries, and even allowing Jews or half-Jews to serve in his ranks (e.g. Generalfeldmarschall Erhard Milch) when it suited him. As Göring put it: "I will decide who is a Jew".
The key issue here is that the argument that the Nazis were planning to genocide 50 million Slavs and deport double-digit figures of millions of Slavs to Siberia etc. is based specifically on the GPO, and an incorrect read of an RSHA draft of the GPO, that was never accepted, at that. As far as I can tell it was to the contrary specifically r e j e c t e d (see Dr. Wetzel's letter and Dr. Meyer's GPO being the final form of the plan). It's the same kind of nonsense as the claims that the Nazis were making soap and lamp shades out of the Jews they were murdering. It's one thing to acknowledge horrible atrocities, but it's another to go on inventing baloney just for shock value. Historians have a duty towards the truth, and that truth must be based on facts that can be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. At the most we can say we don't know for certain what the Nazis would have done, but that there were no plans enacted to genocide the Slavs. To claim the contrary is quite simply the same as lying.
@@RafaelSantos-pi8py This is conjecture; you could be right or you could be wrong. Ultimately Hitler's ideological "ramblings" in Mein Kampf and NSDAP party policy was one thing, and reality was another, and often the former was put to rest when it wasn't practical. Hitler had little issue working with big corporations, allying Slavic and other "untermensch" countries, and even allowing Jews or half-Jews to serve in his ranks (e.g. Generalfeldmarschall Erhard Milch) when it suited him. As Göring put it: "I will decide who is a Jew".
The key issue here is that the argument that the Nazis were planning to genocide 50 million Slavs and deport double-digit figures of millions of Slavs to Siberia etc. is based specifically on the GPO, and an incorrect read of an RSHA draft of the GPO, that was never accepted, at that. As far as I can tell it was to the contrary specifically r e j e c t e d (see Dr. Wetzel's letter and Dr. Meyer's GPO being the final form of the plan). It's the same kind of nonsense as the claims that the Nazis were making soap and lamp shades out of the Jews they were murdering. It's one thing to acknowledge horrible atrocities, but it's another to go on inventing baloney just for shock value. Historians have a duty towards the truth, and that truth must be based on facts that can be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. At the most we can say we don't know for certain what the Nazis would have done, but that there were no plans enacted to genocide the Slavs. To claim the contrary is quite simply the same as lying.
This is conjecture; you could be right or you could be wrong. Ultimately Hitler's ideological "ramblings" in Mein Kampf and NSDAP party policy was one thing, and reality was another, and often the former was put to rest when it wasn't practical. Hitler had little issue working with big corporations, allying Slavic and other "untermensch" countries, and even allowing Jews or half-Jews to serve in his ranks (e.g. Generalfeldmarschall Erhard Milch) when it suited him. As Göring put it: "I will decide who is a Jew".
The key issue here is that the argument that the Nazis were planning to genocide 50 million Slavs and deport double-digit figures of millions of Slavs to Siberia etc. is based specifically on the GPO, and an incorrect read of an RSHA draft of the GPO, that was never accepted, at that. As far as I can tell it was to the contrary specifically r e j e c t e d (see Dr. Wetzel's letter and Dr. Meyer's GPO being the final form of the plan). It's the same kind of nonsense as the claims that the Nazis were making soap and lamp shades out of the Jews they were murdering. It's one thing to acknowledge horrible atrocities, but it's another to go on inventing baloney just for shock value. Historians have a duty towards the truth, and that truth must be based on facts that can be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. At the most we can say we don't know for certain what the Nazis would have done, but that there were no plans enacted to genocide the Slavs. To claim the contrary is quite simply the same as lying.
@RafaelSantos-pi8py This is conjecture; you could be right or you could be wrong. Ultimately Hitler's ideological "ramblings" in Mein Kampf and NSDAP party policy was one thing, and reality was another, and often the former was put to rest when it wasn't practical. Hitler had little issue working with big corporations, allying Slavic and other "untermensch" countries, and even allowing Jews or half-Jews to serve in his ranks (e.g. Generalfeldmarschall Erhard Milch) when it suited him. As Göring put it: "I will decide who is a Jew".
The key issue here is that the argument that the Nazis were planning to genocide 50 million Slavs and deport double-digit figures of millions of Slavs to Siberia etc. is based specifically on the GPO, and an incorrect read of an RSHA draft of the GPO, that was never accepted, at that. As far as I can tell it was to the contrary specifically r e j e c t e d (see Dr. Wetzel's letter and Dr. Meyer's GPO being the final form of the plan). It's the same kind of nonsense as the claims that the Nazis were making soap and lamp shades out of the Jews they were murdering. It's one thing to acknowledge horrible atrocities, but it's another to go on inventing baloney just for shock value. Historians have a duty towards the truth, and that truth must be based on facts that can be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. At the most we can say we don't know for certain what the Nazis would have done, but that there were no plans enacted to genocide the Slavs. To claim the contrary is quite simply the same as lying.
Germany couldn't have won without Britain or the USA on their side
He couldn't win, German lost the war when conquer France. Their local oil production was smaller that they consumption. Germans was facing an oil crisis time bomb. Not only need oil for german war machine, but to german population, and also all conquest territories need oil.
It all depends on where you define "The Start": Hitler basically lost the war when he attacked and partitioned Poland in conjunction with Stalin and the USSR...and started committing atrocities...
He should have revealed Stalin's plans to Poland and Finland, and helped them prepare!, and encouraged German Jews to emigrate to Poland, to join the Polish Army...
Thus, building on Stalin's record of atrocities, making the bad guy look even worse, while Hitler can work to rehabilitate the reputation of a greater Germany into being an important, and necessary component of a widespread international anti-communist movement...
If Hitler had been a bit more of a 'mild-mannered racist', and had properly blamed the Kaiser and the aristocracy for fighting and losing WW1, he could quite possibly have wound up destroying the USSR, incorporating half of it, and dominating Europe (less Spain), but unfortunately, he was another sick, twisted, meglomaniacal psychopath, like Stalin, and only one of them could survive!
(Of course, there WAS a possibility of NEITHER of them surviving, but, it would seem the US and Brits couldn't decide how/when/if to assassinate Stalin, because they couldn't imagine what would happen in a USSR without Stalin!
Apparantly, neither could the PolitBuro, which is why Stalin survived Operation Barbarossa! ) 😮
😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅😅
@@michellepeoplelikeyoumurde8373...I don't know what you mean.
I think some of your analysis and facts are mistaken, but nevertheless, here's my opinion. If German leadership had actually been planning a sneak attack on the USSR, they would have prepared much better. Romania was their main source of petroleum, and production had been declining since the early '20s. Germany could have invested a billion or more marks in the early '30s in Romanian oil fields, refineries, pipelines, and storage, to soon have the fuel for their modern war of mechanized mobility. Hitler's scientific advisors misinformed him about the ability to make synthetic diesel fuel from coal, so German tanks used gasoline engines which get far worse fuel economy under heavy load. Germany already had the proven Junkers Jumo 205 opposed-piston two-stroke diesel engine which was twice as efficient as their Maybach gasoline engines. Germany began the war against the Soviets without any medium, main battle tanks. Those were just beginning to be delivered. German tanks did not have the extremely wide tracks needed to drive in marshes and flood plains in the long wet seasons in spring and fall, and to drive atop deep snow. Germany lacked long-distance heavy bombers to repeatedly cripple railways deep in the Soviet rear (even if no foreign aid ever came). There was also no provision made for spare parts and forward repair shops. Germany didn't stockpile millions of rails, ties, and bed rock before the war, and organize engineer armies to build supply railroads. They were aware of the 50-mile gap between European-gauge rail and Russian-gauge rail in Poland yet through 1941 train cars had to be unloaded onto trucks, driven to the Russian-system rail head, and reloaded. The German leadership had set 1943 as the earliest time it could have been ready to go to war against the USSR, yet was forced to go earlier. Why? Vladimir Rezun gives it in his book The Chief Culprit. I believe you could also benefit from reading David Irving's excellent books.
Excelent post Floy!
@@juanporzio5990 Thanks
"Germany could have invested a billion or more marks in the early '30s in Romanian oil fields, refineries, pipelines, and storage, to soon have the fuel for their modern war of mechanized mobility. " Maybe, but then they wouldnt have had the army and air force to beat France.
0:07 These are fake Panzers for movies. Look at these cannons, they're amazing!
no shit sherlock
Reminds me of dialogue from dark knight rises "Victory has defeated you" ,after winning half europe germans were very overconfident especially Hitler that they underestimated their adversaries like Russia ,UK and US .The biggest clown was Japan who went and attacked pearl harbor when America was totally keeping its distance from WW2
These ideas aren't wrong, like the Germans being better off befriending Stalin's enemies, but still impossible. Germany couldn't have been "nice" to the Slavs, because it was part of their idealogy to oppress them, the same ideology behind the invasion of Russia. You would have to alter their ideology, and then would there even have been Barbarossa?
And Japan didn't have the resources to invade Russia and also attack Britain and the US. So...
And if you're getting into "what ifs", what if France dealt with Germany before it invaded France? What if Russia got it together during Barbarossa (or even before)? What if the US declared war on Germany anyway? If you want to play what if, you have to add the other what ifs to the mix.
Ukraine and the Baltics would have been valuable client states. They're all fair enough - lots of blonde/blue people - to be classified as Aryan, which would have drawn them into The Reich.
Also, the Italians created problems for Germany by entering the war. They added nothing and failed everywhere, needing Germany to bail them out. That took men and material away from Barbarossa and, in the Balkans, cost Germany nearly two months delay in the invasion.
go back to cab driving.
Lend lease saved Russia. Apart from the cold..
Lend-Lease was less than 20% of USSR production and mostly came in 1944-45
I lived in Russia for two plus years and speak and understand the language! the Russains lost 28 million people that they knew names of and another almost 10 million who disappeared and were never heard from again! the winter of 41-42 was relatively mild! the Nazi army was totally unprepared!
The fate of the GERMAN Army (there was only Nazi high command!) had nothing to do with preparedness; it had EVERYHTING to do with the size of the Russian country! As with Napoleon, the Russians simply retreated, burning cities & supplies... retreated, burning cities and supplies, etc. etc. eventually France/Germany was cut off from anything resembling a viable supply line... the end soon followed.
For winter and resupply as they moved forward. The German Soldier was also fighting two enemies, The Red Army and Hitlers Murderous Police Units and Security Troops who alienated potential allies.
German Officers stated as much.
KINDNESS.... MERE KINDNESS..... COULD HAVE TURNED THE WAR IN UKRAINE TO THE NAZIS. But Germany oppressed the population. I have witnessed horrifying videos of local citizen slaughter. Totally misguided enterprise. There was the price to be paid after the war. I have witnessed the hangings. Horrifying.
You could make the same argument you made in this video regarding the poor treatment of Eastern Europeans regarding the Jews themselves. If the Nazis didn't decide to exterminate them than they would have had a lot more resources to spend on their actual wars. Moreover all those Jewish scientists that escaped from Germany due to the atrocities would have still been there and loyal to the regime to the point where the race to the atomic bomb would have been completely different. But than again, doing so would have meant changing Nazi Germany itself rather than just Hitler's strategic and tactical decisions which is well beyond the scope of this video. Thus your arguments about Nazi Germany treating Eastern Europeans better and all that are simply moot.
Similarly avoiding war with the USA is also extremely sketchy to say the least considering, which to your credit you did mention it, the US was already heavily supporting the British and the rest of the Allies in their war against Nazi Germany. Do note that Soviet Russia was never actually part of the Allies but rather their own Comminterm faction thus they didn't receive American aid initially. So the US was already technically involved in the war, albeit strictly on the financial and industrial sides, which ultimately were the biggest factors in determining the outcome of the war so yeah...
While in hindsight it's obvious that the US joining the war was the determining factor in Germany's doom, in the moment it wasn't nearly as clear cut. Yes, the US had the mightiest industry in the world, yes they also had a very large military(albeit not the largest) to take advantage of this industrial might. Yes the US is far away and basically invincible from any invasion. The Nazis failed to invade Britain itself, so how would they even dream of attempting to invade the US which is literally an ocean away rather than the measly English Channel? With that said, the very same geography that made the US immune from any attacks against its own soil also greatly hampered the US' ability to wage an offensive war against Nazi Germany. The only reason it could do so was because their European allies still held enough territory from which the US could station its armies and invade the mainland(be it Sicily or Normandy).
Territory that in other circumstances wouldn't have been available if the Battle for Britain for example turned out differently and Operation Sea Lion wasn't nipped in the bud because of it. Or if Nazi Germany actually provoked the US earlier and begun their submarine campaign against the American and Allies' at large merchant fleets. Such a situation could very well have tipped the scales in the collapse of Great Britain, as there were points where it was literally hanging by a thread and 100% reliant on American support to sustain the civilian population. With Great Britain out of the war there would be no invasions of Sicily nor Normandy and the US would have been left on its own against an ever expanding Nazi Germany, as if Britain would have fell before Operation Barbarossa than that would have probably played out very differently too. In such a scenario neither side was able to conduct offensive operations against the other and the war would have ultimately ended in a stalemate.
How some of these soldiers you can see smiling as their marching into a most definite meat grinder is truly frightening.
The Soviet Union would have never won, if the US and Brit’s never surpported the soviets so heavily. They were so weak and stood no chance against the Germans.
No
Even though Western aid helped things a lot
It would be same thing as Napoleon's March on Moscow
Assuming Germany winning on Moscow
It is as if the Soviets won because of the US. What a narrative!
@@enzovernille3800
Kope, komrade
Back at ya, buckaro
@@enzovernille3800 I’m but the facts said said otherwise, even Stalin said that without US help the Soviet Union would have lost against Germany and krushev agreed to his assessment later.
Hitler had available to him, a weapon of mass destruction (rarely discussed on youtube) but refused to use it when his generals pressed him for his approval. Germans had developed nerve gas during the war and had many tonnes of Tabin nerve gas and a smaller quantity of Sarin gas. Allies had no idea that Germans had developed Nerve gas (for which no know antidote was developed til the 1960s - by Soviet scientists) With this gas, his armed forces may, with well placed and effective use, have been able convince the Bolshies to at least stop and suspend the invasion of Germany and negotiate a treaty. I guess Hitler said no to his generals, cos he knew from his WW1 experience that the gas could kill German troops as well, if the wind changed direction.
Bruh there was a reason the Germans elected not to use poison gas in WW2 - the Allies had poison gas too and would definitely have used it if the Germans did first. Also, why do you assume the Soviets would have surrendered at the use of poison gas by the Germans? The Entente had poison gas used on them in WW1 and they didn't surrender - they turned around and made their own poison gas.
@@Ian_Moon42 Nerve gas changes the dynamics entirely. Allies did not have this. It is still the gas for which modern armies train against, and nothing less than a full body suit with activated charcoal impregnated into the fabric has any hope of stopping penetration and a quick death.
Allies had no idea of the existence of nerve gas invented by the Germans, nor of the enormous stock pile held by the Germans, and the Allies had nothing to compare. Germans had stockpiled several thousand tonnes of Tabin Gas and about 500 tonnes of Sarin gas. Russians tended to attack in mass, making dealing with them by gas easier.
German soldiers always carried gas masks in their tin canister at their waist which could deal with allied gas. Nothing the Allies had in protective equipment could have prevented penetration and certain rapid death by nerve gas. In WW2, there was no known antidote to nerve gas. I have done NBC training in the Army, and even non lethal gas such as CS gas (tear gas) renders the soldier ineffective and incapable of carrying out his mission.
I was surprised to learn Hitler refused his General's requests to use gas on Allied armies as he is portrayed as totally evil. As I said in my previous comment, this weapon and its possible use is simply not discussed on UA-cam, nor is Hitler's refusal to allow it to be used even when it was clear, Germany had no hope of stopping the invading bolshevik hordes and the option of seeking a negotiated surrender was futile.
@@keithad6485 The type of gas is utterly irrelevant. The allies didn't need to have nerve gas to combat Germany using it. They had plenty of stockpiles of effective gas weapons and Hitler fully well understood that Germany using them would simply result in the allies also using them. Of more historical significance is that neither side had any qualms with using their weapons against the civilian populace so using it on the battlefield would have simply been a precursor to using it against cities.
@@LonesomeDove-dn8dk Irrelevant? your opinion is the opinion of one person. I disagree with your opinion. Allies had nothing like nerve gas and had no knowledge of what the Germans had developed. 'Neither side had qualms in using it?', I disagree, Hitler forbade his generals when they urged him to allow them to employ nerve gas when it was clear Germany was gonna lose. So again I disagree with your assessment.
@@keithad6485 The Germans had nerve gas and the allies didn't is correct, however the Germans believed they did since it was pretty simple to produce. In any case, it's still very much irrelevant since Germany using gas would simply result in the Allies responding in kind. The US alone literally produced 10 times more gas weapons than Germany did prior to 1945. Any gas warfare was going to be a net loss for Germany, regardless which gas was used. By the way, Germany and the US had developed chemical bombs for aerial delivery prior to WW2, so I repeat that any side using gas at any time would result in it being used against civilian targets where it would be exponentially more effective, regardless of type. The RAF had stockpiled mustard gas beginning in 1942 to be used against German cities, demonstrating their willingness to target civilians and Churchill had advocated doing so several times but the military command refused.
Germany was never gong to win that war. The Russians had 350 Divisions.. the army was massive. Stalin knew a war was coming, and he prepared for it starting in 1936..
When the Germans got to Ukraine they found a weapons plant so huge it was shocking to Hitler. It employeed something like twenty thousand people. Goebbels even told the German public, during a speech in 42, that the Russian army was underestimated..
I'm a historian. I've studied this conflict for thirty years... By the time the Germans had reached Estonia, they were down to twenty working panzers in the leading division.
By the end of 41 - 42 most of the good front line junior commanders were dead.
Hitler lost that war in the first twelve weeks of the conflict... he just wouldn't believe it!
Axis should have gone straight for the Caucasian oil fields after they managed to push the USSR military command out of Stalingrad to the Asian bank of the Volga. Instead, they allowed themselves to get lured into an ugly prestigious urban warfare in order to get full control over Stalingrad. The Axis war machine was far from its best in a close range urban combat scenary. Many military experts have doubts that control over Stalingrad was essential to secure the oil. In their opinion Stalingrad just had to be captured because Hitler wanted to humiliate Stalin. After the complete 6th army had fallen in Stalingrad, control over the oil was no longer possible and mechanized Axis warfare slowly came to a stop because it ran out of oil.
A few things , the Nazis could not utilize eastern Europeans for anything other than slaves. Their ideology’s central tenets prevents them using other races in a constructive way. Remember they only allowed SS units of collaborators en-masse when things were way too late. From a nazi perspective the presence of “alien races” would degrade the unit cohesion and effectiveness of the army. They also probably did not approach Japan for assistance because Japan had fought a border conflict with the USSR at khalkin gol and the technologically and numerically superior soviet weapons defeated the japanese
Great job mentioning how crucial lend lease was. You are correct at pointing out The germans needed to intercept/destroy lend lease convoys to have a chance at victory. Correct me if I am wrong but one of the main reasons Raeder was replaced because the kriegsmarine failed to intercept a convoy that contained hundreds of fighters, these fighters were immediately flown to Moscow to bolster the resistance to operation typhoon.
Also despite stalin swearing to never leave Moscow, even if it was taken by hitler , stalin prepared Stavka to continue the war if Moscow was lost and stalin was captured. Even if this happened the soviets still possessed their main armaments factories in the Ural mountains and the soviets still had massive reserves of solders to continue resistance. Hitler did not continue attacking Moscow for a reason. He was truly a military genius and he knew from the beginning that capturing moscow would deal a great blow, but it would not win the war. hitler knew destroying the red army was the only way to win the war. He decided that stalingrad would be the decisive battle to exhaust the red army. His genius failed him in that decision. The germans could not win a battle of attrition like stalingrad. They needed to outmanuever the red army. The city was destroyed. They should have withdrew , conserved forces and prepared extensive defeneses miles behind the front line - somenthing like the panther wotan line but far more robust , and be prepared to slowly withdraw to those strongpoints while conserving and building up replacement armies. Even then they dont have the manpower to resist the massive soviet population potential and would have been eventually overwhelmed.
There is also something you did not mention that could have won the nazis the war - the Ural bomber project. Some of the senior luftwaffe officers recognized the soviet armaments industry was out of reach and were developing a 4 engine bomber with the range to directly attack these factories. The head of the project died in an accident and the project was cancelled.
Germany had adequate manpower. Its losses were made up until some time in 1944, and I've gone over the census numbers. Out of the eight-million-strong military, only about 280,000 German soldiers were physically on the Eastern Front lines at any one time. Such was their conviction that fighting on the front lines was a death sentence.
@@floycewhite6991 if they had adequate manpower , berlin would not have been defended by old men and children.
i think you meant a shade under 3 million soliders at all times , this is correct but the composition of those 3 million were increasingly made of of hastily (poorly) trained troops old men and children
3 million is not enough to overcome the 7 million combat troops the red army was fielding in 1944-45
@@bsaintnyc Just as pretty much every losing war ever goes, casualties were first concentrated among the men of ordinary military age. As they were removed, they were progressively replaced by men both older and younger, until only old men and boys remained. This process should have been deliberately avoided. Germany could have drafted older men and trained them, in groups of years of birth, beginning in 1933. A third were unemployed anyway, in the cities in particular. Call it "Civilian Conservation Corps" and use them to do planting and harvesting to get around the restrictions of Versailles. 10 million and more could have been well trained and released back into the workforce, ready for mobilization in 1939. Then of course another 4 million or so ethnic German men of military age became available from Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Poland. I'm not even counting teenagers. They'll be better soldiers later on as seasoned men.
Germany should have gone into a total war economy in 1933, with the mindset that a confrontation with the USSR was inevitable. By the start of the invasion in 1939, Germany could have fielded a larger, better-equipped, and better-trained military than the Soviets had at that moment. Piercing and bypassing the Stalin Line, motorized German forces could have rapidly pinched off and captured the manpower-and-resource-rich Ukraine and western USSR. In this I agree with Henry Stewart History.
Germany had a 10-to-1 kill ratio in 1941. That ratio could have been kept high, for longer, had German forces advanced more rapidly or began earlier in the year. That ratio would have been lower had Germany been ready to invade the USSR in 1939 (because the Soviets weren't as mobilized), but, German advance would have been much quicker.
The weimar republic was already practing your training scheme. The would draft the maxium amount of combat troops like 500k , train them for one year , then draft another 500k
hitler wanted to avoid a total war sceneario at all costs because of his experience with the home front collapsing before the actual front.
When Barbarossa commenced the german forces were larger in terms of manpower , not machines though.
There are only 3 scenearios where germany wins over the ussr
1 do not begin the genocide plan until the soviets are beaten (impossible, these are nazis)
2 intercept all lend lease to russia (impossible , kriegsmarine sucked)
3 Japan attacks russia from the east right before the assault on moscow
(impossible , japan was tied down in china and felt the soviet union was a peer opponent)
@@floycewhite6991 They had that ratio becouse they were on the offensive and the USSR was completely unprepared.
It wasn't something that could be sustained. This isn't hoi4 this is real life.
Moscow was huge in the scheme of things. All communication AND rail lines went through Moscow. Take it and you cut off the army from communicating and resupply of material. Guderian knew this, which is why he kept pushing for Moscow to be the main target
You don't see a problem with this logic? 😅 The biggest hub has the biggest resources to defend itself obviously.
Going straight for Moscow would have left 1 million Soviet troops on Germany's right flank. Not to mention all the resources were in the South. Hitler correctly called it. My Generals do not understand the logistics of war.
Moscow had the same number of Soviet soldiers, and it was a much more important logistics and production hub. The 5 Soviet armies south of Army Group Centre were not going anywhere. They were fully engaged against Army Group South.
Hitler did not say 'logistics' either. He said 'economics'.
Does Somebody know why and when Hitler had order Barbarossa?
Ist one knowing Hitlers Plan?
Why it had forbiden in Nürnberg the German General to explain why they had to Strike?
Wath had had discussed in November 40 in Berlin?
Why Stalin did not join the victory Parade 9. May 45,?
The four political ways unknown?
Almost the entire German army was horse drawn infantry and artillery, wagons, real 19th century stuff! they needed millions of horses to move everything. Logistics were a nightmare. The horses could not survive the Russian winter in 1942/43 any more than they could in 1812.
I was having a conversation the other day, and by no means, am I a historian or a scholar. But I was watching some world war two footage, and I thought to myself what if Japan had attacked Russia at its weakest point when Hitler and the Nazis were knocking on the doors of Stalingrad and Moscow instead of pushing the US. Would love to hear other peoples comments on the subject that are more educated.
All great conquers had one thing in common: they were not just great military commanders, but also great politicians. The best example is Hernan Cortes and his small army of Spanish soldiers who were able to defeat the Aztec Empire with the help of the local tribes oppressed by the Aztecs. In 1941 Russia was only 20 years out the bloody civil war, also cruel forced collectivization of farmers between 1928 and 1940, the great political terror and mass executions made certain that that millions of people in Russia hated Stalin and his regime. Hitler missed this opportunity to attract these people to his side because he was Hitler (General Vlasov and his soldiers were too late, too little and never a real military force). Even the Mongols, the cruelest conquers in history had a very simple option to offer: surrender, pay taxes and we’ll leave you more or less alone.
You do not get to the point. Stalin had many mistakes, but all that mistakes were nothing in comparison with german attack, cruel agressor behaviour, einsatz kommando units, simply terror that made all the people united in the anti-german front. That was priority and not Stalin`s gulags. How can you be so narrow-minded?!
You can do more damage with words than guns and tanks
The USA should have demanded Stalin open a Second Front against the Japanese in China in the start of 1944. This would have greatly helped the Allies efforts in the Pacific and saved tens of thousands of lives of civilians in China , Pacific area, plus American troops. Stalin cut deals with the Germans and Japanese prior to WW2, supported Germany with weapons, ships and raw materials and let the Japanese do whatever it wanted in China. They gave the Allies zero support in the Pacific. They did help defeat the Germans but they brought on the German invasion by cutting a deal with Germany. Also, they destroyed part of Poland, killed tens of thousands of Polish people and held it hostage for the next 40 years. FDR gave Stalin too much material support despite knowing Stalin and the Communists were worse than the Nazi's.
Insane idea
@@thomassenbart Why? It would have taken some of the pressure off the Allies in the Pacific War. The Japanese division that fought to the bitter end in Okinawa was brother to Okinawa from China.
worse then the nazis? so what if the cold war was staffed by us on one side and nazis on the other... and what about nukes?
russians? evil! germans nazis? acceptable?! this timeline is weird that we live in the new cold war has soured your brain.. needs pickling
@@thomassenbart obviously russians are worse then nazis.. because russians dont have racial theories that prioritize us english people and hate everyone else, while the russians commies have some form of acceptance of all.. we like people who worship our genetics
Hitler could have defeated Stalin. We forget the Kaiser defeated the Czar of Russia during World War I.
Not sure that I agree with you. Tsar abdicated and the new govt continued the war, including Kerensky who took over as Prime Minister and continued the war, then his govt was replaced by communist govt under Lenin whose political policy was to cease war against Germany. Kaiser did not defeat the Russians. Russians ceased fighting.
Different war. The czar couldn't even supply hís own soldiers with small arms, let alone many tens of thousands of tanks, guns, and planes.
Hitler and the German Generals Operation Barbarossa plan was Finland, Germany, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, Italy 150 divisions against 200 Russian divisions, invade May/June, defeat the Red Army west of the Dnieper R. and Dvina River, capture Moscow and defeat Russia in 4 months before the winter 1941/42. The German Army got near Moscow but never close to capturing the heavily defended city and didn't have the strength to switch to defense and man a 1,800 miles front and had nothing for fighting a winter war in Russia. Only the Iron discipline of the German Army got it thru the winter other armies like the French and Napoleon would have collapsed and been routed. The October muddy season and how cold it could get was not a surprise to German Generals many had been there before in 1914-18. Russia had over 300 divisions, the best tank of the war T-34 among other things and the German massive miscalculation. Germany and the German army only had the strength for short wars quick victories. Hitler gambled in Poland and France and won he gambled one more time in Russia and lost the war.
"Greater Germanic Reich of the German Nation" (Großgermanisches Reich Deutscher Nation) , a "Thousand-Year Reich" (Tausendjähriges Reich). "Living Space" (Lebensraum 1880-1941), "US Manifest Destiny" (1780-1880), "Drive towards the East" (Drang nach Osten), "Master Plan for the East" (Generalplan Ost), "Hunger Plan" (der Hungerplan), Nazi racial ideology "Superior man/ Subhuman" (Ubermensch/Untermensch), "The Final Solution/ the Final Solution to the Jewish Question" (die Endlösung/ Endlösung der Judenfrage) , "My Struggle" (Mein Kampf), "Second Book" (The Zweites Buch)
I think it was General Omar Bradley who said , 'amateurs talk tactics, professionals talk logistics '. In addition to the ferocity of the Soviet resistance, the Germans were woefully under preared logisticslly. From the different gauge of the rail systems, their ongoing reliance on horse drawn transport, even their reliance on captured French trucks, the shortages of fuel, all had dire consequences. They had a brief window in 1941, that was it. 80,% of German casualties in WW2 were inflicted by the Red Army , something we should remember when celebrating D Day as the turning point of WW2 in Europe.
"Vichy Russia" 😂
My 3 changes that could have theoretically given the Germans a victory: 1) Japan decides to attack Soviet Far East rather than US Hawaii. This alone would have practically guaranteed a fascist win over the USSR. The soldiers from the Far East were the critical reserve that stopped the Germans and if the they were tied down fighting the Japanese, their transfer to Moscow would have been impossible. 2) Pushing for Moscow at all costs at the beginning (as HSH is saying). This would have handed the Germans the vital logistics hub of the USSR, denying it to the Soviets and solving the German logistics problem that handicapped them the rest of the fight in the East. 3) Bypassing Stalingrad and taking Astrakhan, cutting off the Baku fields, again denying the resource to the Soviets and solving the German oil problem that was their single biggest military problem.
What if. is really without meaning.
@@Nina-l2l1e Isn’t that the whole point of this video: what ifs of history?
@@charlesiragui2473 No way, all the "conditional thinking" means nothing, changes nothing, it is really waste of time.
@@Nina-l2l1e So why do you bother?
first one wouldn't work as Stalin would gladly sacrifice Siberia for Moscow, and the Japanese already signed a non aggression pact because they knew they wouldn't win any land war with the soviets, they had several border skirmishes and the soviets and the soviets generally won every major engagement which is one of the reasons they signed the non aggression pact, and the resources the Japanese needed were in the east indies and western European colonies not Siberia which was underdeveloped
secondly the Germans stopped because they needed to and this wouldn't have solved all their problems and they would have been pushed back, the Ussr was a massive nation and simply taking Moscow wouldn't have stopped them, they'd likely relocate their capital more east wards and continue fighting as a huge amount of industry was moved past the urals and they would have pushed the Germans back, German defeat was inevitable
thirdly, the soviets would have destroyed the oil fields if they knew they couldn't secure them they did that every time Germany captured land and had a scorched earth policy so its likely they would do the same here, and it would take several years for the Germans to rebuild them and bypassing Stalingrad would have given the soviets an opportunity to cut off the Germans and encircle them, and Stalingrad was a major supply line and a big industrial hub so ignoring it would allow the soviets to rebuild their army faster
When a Corporal with a talent for speech and a belly full of hate thinks he’s smarter then everyone else in the room.
except that his plan with France worked wonders.
except for the talent for speech, we have Trump...
0:04 - am pausing here to throw in my $.02. If the Germans surrounded and bypassed Moscow and Leningrad and went for the oil fields in Azerbaijan, they could have held fast in the East.
Couldn't have started in March or April as the Spring mud would have prevented it. Couldn't have started in May or June as the weather was poor then as well. Meaningless argument.
"you need only kick in the door..."
*...pauses at the front door*
The commander of the Wehrmacht's logistics wrote a study in which he predicted that it would be umpossible to supply German troops once they were 700 or 800 km inside the USSR. This was because the retreating Red Army would destroy as many tracks and trains as it could. Then there was to problem of the partizans. The Reich III did not have enough men to guard the tracks.
Russian track has 5 foot gauge, German trains won't fit.
Youve spoken about scenarios ive often thought about as well. 1)-Germany treating people in Belarous and the Ukraine well. 2)-Japan not attacking America, or at least not until russia was defeated. 3)-Although the capture of Moscow wouldent have ended the war, it would have been a major strategic victory, by way of taking out a major logistics hub.
1. National Socialism made that impossible.
2. Japan had to attack the US, or all future invasions would have been impossible.
3. Capture Moscow. Stalin dies. Zhukov is now the new leader of the USSR. That's not a very ideal situation for the Germans.
nazis treating people well 😂😂
The first part is the most obvious one, treating the people of eastern Europe well. In other words, if the nazis didn't acted like nazis they might have won the war. Wich meant they were doomed to lose from the start.
@@davidrozemberg9295 communists treated russians badly so when germans came they took them as liberators
There is an interview with Marshal Zhukov from 1969 where he claimed that the road to Moscow was completely open to the Germans and that it was only pure coincidence that they did not take the city. Stalin and Beria were also prepared several times to give up large parts of the western Soviet Union, and he had to persuade them several times to give him a chance to strike back against the Germans, so of course the germans could have won the war in the East. Much was decided by chance and coincidence in this war.
and awful weather suffered by the Germans halting their tanks in October and November
Well if Japan didn't provoke the USA and get them involved; that would have made the fronts at stalemate then Germany could focus on Russia and get it over with. Also German tanks/mech steel didn't offer much leway, tolerances were too tight for thermal expansion, leading to equipment failure during battle. The terrain stopped Napoleon and Hitler; those Russia winters weakened them considerably. I don't agree with you about the Jewish population, since they would dissent and not go along with this war with Russia. Or Hitler could have concentrated on Western Europe and the USA; beat them then go for the Soviets later on given time to prepare. Too quick and many fronts for conquest without giving time to rebuild further; but I guess Hitler thought about blitzkrieg quick as lightening war to get over ASAP. Thank you for considering other theories regarding WW2, I wonder myself when I was younger studying ww2.
They can win it, look at their early success during Operation Barbarosa, although they fail to achieve total victory, but they acquire vast territories. Firstly they should have prepare more time for military resources instead they wasted it on the Battle of Britain and helping their allies in North Afirca thus losing its momentum. Secondly, vast distance resulted of lack of logistical supplies. Thirdly, terrain and weather condition halted Germans advances. Finally, they underestimated the huge chunk of Red Army, they just assumed they will fall after a huge casualties take by the Soviet Union.
If Hitler had 'liberated' Ukraine, the additional manpower and resources might havce changed things. Instead, the policy of oppression was used. Foolish when you think of the poor logistics that Germany had. The UK had been the masters of logistics due to their global empire. Germany, not so much.
The english army at Dunkirk was the key. Hitler let them go but with the army in his hands Churchill needed to sign the peace treaty. The free divisions would had smashed the russians at Moscow and Stalin would had been defeated. That is also what every Wehrmacht soldier at that time said: "Den Sack zumachen" - close the bag, finish the job. And there was no need for the battle of Britain. And after WW2 the US and britain had also the chance to defeat russia. Remember that Poland was the cause of WW2 but the allies didnt cared about Poland after 1945.
24:48 - of course, the saying is a patriotic oversimplification, with an element of truth. One could add many elements to the saying, such as regarding the contributions of partisan and spy networks, the particular patriotism of the Poles (animosity towards the Russians and Germans), and the influence and surreptitious activities of the British, particularly in North Aftica . . . etc.
Germany could never have beaten the USSR. What's the point of ruminating on it? The German forces, whilst immense didn't have enough machines to move them, an answer to the T-34 or anyone in charge that was of sound mind and intellect. P.S. Love the clips from the movie Downfall with Bruno Ganz's chilling portrait of AH.
The main cause for Germany's, or I should actually say; National Socialism, failed to subdue and defeat the USSR, lies in what led up to the entire conflict.
In short, Germany already lost the conflict before the first shot was fired. even before France and the Lowlands fell in the initial onslaught.
More in detail; Throughout the 1930s Germany lacked in oil and was nearly constantly teetering on the verge of being able economically afloat and/or feed its own population. This bad situation was made worse by the fractured approach to logistics and its ludicrous development and production approach in its industry. Within the German armed forces, there was no real cohesion and the mechanised elements Prima-Donna general like Guderian and Model were allowed to outpace the main body of the army and be ground down due to lack of true combined operations in the form of infantry close-in protection.
Germany lost the Russia campaign in 1940 due to lack of preparation. There is oil in Poland on the German held side. But German policy towards conquered land was always about looting not development. There was enough Bauxite in France to build all the airframes Germany and Italy would ever need. Not enough effort was made to Recruit anti communists in France and other countries. If easter Europe was going to be treated better then you gotta grow more food in France and Poland. The arms industry in Checkelzslova was considerable,was never exploited like it should have been. More rolling stock should have been built. French truck factories expanded more. Rail network expanded to Warsaw as much as possible under the guise of a greater Germany to fake out Stalin. Reform in air development. German engines in superior Italian airframes for instance. A program for "Germanization" of Allied forces to get them up to German standards in terms of equipment, doctrine, training. So Italy will be more dangerous in Africa and on the Eastern front as well as others. This will require licensure of German weapons like AT and AA guns to allies to standardize parts and ammo requirements at the front. (NATO does this) I suspect so much went to waste at the Eastern Front when the wrong ammo wound up at the wrong gun at the wrong time and now there is nothing to shoot at the enemy. So now you are forced to abandon your position possibly leave your gear behind and blow up the ammo. Enormous amounts of captured gear could be used to equip friendly Ukrainians some might have training on its use. That would stem German losses.
Hitler never committed to total war production Early on. He needed to do that before 1939 ended.
lol the weakness of Nazism is nazism. They could not treat the people better whom they viewed as subhuman. They viewed the Russians as subhuman. Their tactics could not change as well. Even in the face of increased Soviet bravery and growing competency in war . The guy in the video is basically saying the nazis could have won…if the didn’t behave like nazis 😂😂😂😂😂
I think they could have met all their objectives, I just don't think they could have held them very long..
Silly. Like most of alternative histories. Shoulda, woulda, coulda. Once at war there is no way to control everything, things just happen.
This is bs. Usually, your work is good...but you need more research. I suggest MHV. He has primary German sources.
The pause was probably because also he knew he was already overstretched in direction of Moscow. And, as you said, they couldn't start earlier because logistics and the military industrial weren't ready yet.
As we know from the French invasion earlier, these undefeated pockets attacked their supply lines, another reason to pause for that clean up. He went for stalingrad because he was in a need for oil.
Hitler like Napoleon suffered with the same thing and it was not winter, they overstretched supplies a mobile army cannot move without fuel and feed for its animals and it must be remembered the German army relied a lot on horse power. I would say there was no way the outcome could have been changed.
Agree 100%...Ive long said much of this myself almost verbatum.
Germany absolutely could’ve conquered Russia, if they just did everything differently.
The decision to invade Russia was correct, at the time it was made in 1940.
But doing it near the end of June, on exactly the same day that Napoleon launched his attack, was pure madness.
That’s a clear sign of Hitler’s narcissism and wanting to be like and then surpass Napoleon. It was the image he wanted to portray of himself. Being like Napoleon, the rogue general who humbled all the monarchs of Europe.
He was thinking with his heart, his self infatuation, dreams of grandeur and not purely with a logical strategic mind.
That was the foundation stone that e built his entire war machine upon and that was ultimately its fundamental flaw.
Had he made the decision to betray his ally the USSR and then handed the operation’s decisions to his generals, Germany would’ve won the war and we’d all be speaking and typing in Deutsche.
The Germans were drawn into helping Italy invading Greece that distracted a lot of forces and supplies.
Also in North Africa, a massive waste for Germany. They should’ve focused on conquering the Middle East to get the oil. But even if they did, they couldn’t ship it to Germany, but they could’ve supplied an expeditionary army and helped the Japs to conquer India.
Then in 1943 Italy couldn’t defend itself, so Germany had to waste their military keeping the Allies at bay.
Some historians have said that if Italy wasn’t allied with Germany, Germany would’ve conquered the whole world.
Having 300,000 troops bogged down in Norway was a waste of Germany’s force potency against Russia as well. They could’ve used them to capture Leningrad and then onto Moscow.
That’s personally how I would’ve changed Germany’s overall strategic approach with invading the USSR.
But there were several alternate possibilities.
Ultimately it was the Caucasus oil fields that determined the outcome of the war, when it did end. Germany probably would’ve lost eventually anyway, or possibly a truce made. Bc Germany lost their campaign in Africa.
Had they successfully conquered the Middle East, the Caucasus wasn’t quite as critical.
The author of this video is right that mistreating their own potential workforce and recruiting pool, was a critical factor for the outcome of the war.
The Germans tied up tens of thousands of their best troops attacking civilians and guarding prisoners that could’ve been utilised more effectively.
He also made the point correctly that declaring war against the USA was one of the biggest mistakes, if not the single biggest.
Again showing Hitler’s insanity, as he hadn’t finished the campaign against Russia, or Britain.
Hitler was relying on over inflating the morale and national pride of the people, primarily to secure himself, to suppress criticism of his flagging campaigns and public disgruntlement. The people needed justification for all their personal sacrifices and shortages.
But he was already fighting a losing strategy by the point that he declared war against the USA.
Ultimately, Hitler was a gambler and like all gamblers they fall into the trap of thinking that their past successes, guarantees them future success.
At the point in the war that he declared war against the USA, he was gambling that his V rockets, jet planes and acquiring nuclear weapons first, would tip the balance in Germany’s favour.
The important thing to recognise here is the distinction between calculations and gambles. Gambles are a form of calculating, when there’s a preponderance of unknown factors. All his gambles up to this point, had more knowable aspects to them. I.e. Breaching the treaty of Versailles. Invading Poland, the Low Countries, Scandinavia and the greatest of all invading France. And up until Stalingrad and Al Alamein, everything was going his way, he was winning the war. So at the time, another gamble didn’t seem such a bad idea. But the unknowable factors with such large advances in technology, were a bridge too far and that was the straw that broke his camel’s back and the drop of water that bust his dam.
He’d lost all respect for his enemies, grossly underestimated them and over inflated his opinion of Germany. This goes back to his ideological foundation, the fatal flaw of his military superstructure and grand strategy. He was too trapped inside his own prison cell that he’d mentally constructed for himself, that he couldn’t see the bigger picture and that’s why dictatorships always fail. One person alone, no matter how brilliant or intelligent, cannot possibly see all the aspects and angles needed to make successful multiple decisions consistently, over large amounts of time.
Hitler had done amazingly to even get to the seat of power, let alone all his successes up until 1942. He just needed to deflect all the criticism from the failures that he knew were on the cards and pray for some miracles. After all, miracles do happen for the divinely appointed don’t they? And he really thought that he was the Messiah, so God would bail him out at the point he needed the most.
He didn’t even expect to be in that position, so far ahead of all expectations. He thought he would be stuck in a trench war like the First World War that he had personally fought and suffered in.
In his mind he was reliving WW1 all over again. So he needed to be locked in a desperate struggle somewhere and that was against Communism and the USSR. Two great juggernauts locked in a fight to the death, the biggest and greatest war of all history, for the greatest winner and then world leader. He was proving himself as the Messiah. Suffering in his youth, Struggling, overcoming and Winning. That’s what he was driven by, all that tosh and propaganda that fuelled him in WW1, now coming from him, to fuel his country and people.
In his mind, he’d already won WW1 by defeating France and Russia would probably go the same way it did in WW1. There would be a rebellion another revolution and he would be master of Europe, with the world at his beck and call.
WW1 has been so close in his mind at least. That another close contest would inevitably sway differently. That’s the law of averages, but reality doesn’t abide by human theories, Reality is its own master and blows wherever it will.
Anyway, another alternate strategy and my personal favourite, would’ve been to put all his elite units into Ukraine and his Kriegsmarine in the Black Sea in 1941. Then launch them all at conquering the Caucasus. He could use the Kriegsmarine, Luftwaffe, Paratruppen and SS panzer divisions, to leapfrog each other along the coast. With the rest of the main army, following up inland. Blitzkrieging their way to the oil fields.
Then they could create a hard front to the north, roughly from Stalingrad to Smolensk, and extract all the oil they needed, to pursue further conquests.
Ignore Africa, Ignore Greece, Ignore Leningrad and Moscow, until the Caucasus was firmly secured.
Then the Allies would be begging for a truce.
He also should’ve built more submarines, to keep the western allies at bay, while he finished Barbarossa. Built more trucks and trains, to solve his logistics problems. The root problem was he needed oil to implement a winning strategy. Without a successful strategy to secure oil, he couldn’t fuel the subs, trucks, planes tanks, in the numbers needed for victory. So it was a catch 22 vicious cycle. But he did have the means to break it permanently and that was ultimately, the most vital component of a winning strategy.
After successfully acquiring the oil supply, the options would’ve opened far wider for Germany. So that they could keep the Allies guessing what they would do and so prolong the war indefinitely and acquire the technologies to a higher standard, that could threaten London and America.
At the very least they could reverse the supply situation against Britain with submarines. Effectively knocking them out as a significant threat and stopping the USA launching attacks from there.
Then slowly but surely, defeated the key cities of the USSR, essentially knocking them out of the war.
This strategy may have taken longer, probably until 1948-1950. But it had a much higher chance of succeeding and bought the few crucial years that Germany needed to perfect the wonder weapons and mass produce them.
Only nukes, or BioChem weapons would’ve stopped Germany. But once the balance was in Germany’s favour, the pendulum of victory would’ve swung firmly that way. Once the momentum is firmly on one side, it snowballs exponentially. As it did in the Allies favour, bc of productivity and logistics. The only way for Germany to overturn this race against time, was to buy more time, and the only way to do that was with oil. Everything else follows on like the dominos.
Resolving the most crucial weakness in a chain, makes the whole chain stronger and correcting the biggest mistake, makes all other possible mistakes, far less detrimental. But not resolving the biggest weakness, magnified all the other strategic and tactical mistakes. Until everyone starts arguing and blaming each other and everything becomes a mess.
That was the difference between success or failure for Germany in WW2.
I hope I’ve sufficiently laboured this matter? Tyvm.