Equal peace with France

Now I know this isnt very plausible, but suppose Germany had concluded a "just" peace with France after defeating her in 1941. Perhaps only taking Alsace-Lorraine, not demanding monetary "tribute," not occupying a good deal of the country. I think Britain might have had a harder time continuing the war. Perhaps the United States might have begun to prefer neutrality instead of wishing to aid the Allies. Maybe Lend-Lease is affected? Any thoughts?

 

Good one, dasriech.
I think the war would have slowed drastically. The conquest of Poland demonstrated the caution of the allies. Britian And I think it would have been significant that France really proved unable to defend herself. Until russia, people had an impression of the german army as some unbeatable force. If it looked to the allies like Germany was really not going ot attack any further, I think the allies would have been in a tough spot- it would be a lot harder to justify sending British and American troops to war only to rescue the Poles (nothing against anyone polish!)...

 

Not very plausible but here it goes. The US would not have been as involved. Great Britain would have had to made peace even if reluctantly. But only if Norway and the low countries were not invaded. Had the Germans invaded Russia anyway, I am sure that Churchill would have loved to watch the two bullies beat themselves up. It would have been hard to support the Russians when it would have looked like Germany was only expanded eastwards instead of Westwards. The Brits would have probably sided on the German side since they would have thought that they had nothing to fear from Germany. There was a large anti Bolshevic sentiment in Britain at that time.

 

Perhaps I didn't understand quite well this thread but:

France was defeated in 1940, not 1941 and the peace threaty was a fair one. Géneral Maxime Weygand said: "It is a hard one, but not an humilliating one". France was occupied, our territories came back home and we formed a relatively independent France. If you remember well, Poland and Checoslovaquia had stopped existing as nations. France didn't. Their fleet was more respected by us than their British "allies"... Beside, wars between France and Germany are not conventional ones (Thank God, my mother isn't here, reading...) because we are too different peoples, always enemies and always pride. So, the idea of humilliating your greatest enemy is great for both nations and France humilliated Germany in 1918 as we did in 1871 and we did again in Compiègne forest in 1940. This time were not so much economic compensations or so. We were quite fair, and compared to the East we behaved properly most of the time.

The problem would have been that without France defeated, the war against Great Britain would have been very, very difficult. You must remember the tremendous advantages of having so many ports in the Atlantic: Lorient, La Rochelle, Cherbourg, Dinkirk, Le Havre, Boulogne, etc. Whaty would Dönitz have done without them? Or what would Göring have done without the air fields in France, just 30 kilometres away from the British Isles?

 

Well said PzJgr--my thoughts exactly.

 

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