No Stalin

I was wondering what would have happen if the Bolshevik uprising had failed and all them were shot. Right now to the point, What kind of Russia would be facing Germany in June 1941?

 

This is one of the most complicated and involved speculations I ever saw in this forum, in fact it is quite impossible to carry forward.

You say the October Revolution failed, in 1917? So all the Red leaders were all shot and who won was the incumbent Provisional Government led by Kerensky. Here things began to get a bit complicated as all the forces that were in action or exacerbated by the Revolution were already on the march.

The Kzar was totally discredited and had abdicated in March.The Prov. Government were not exactly in the finest condition as WW1 was raging and the Russians were losing badly, with major upheavals and desertion rife. Gen. Kornilov was preparing a military coup in St. Petersburg.

I cannot see the Provisional Government lasting much, perhaps reaching a peace agreement with the Central Powers in exchange for large swathes of Ukraine (that's what the Reds did). Now what would come after the Prov. Gov. I have no idea, most likely there would be a civil war in the early 20's, Reds or no Reds. From then on I'm left completely blank as it could go one way or another, but in any case no outcome would be a happy one. And I'm still in the 20s, let alone 1941. Totally unpredictable.

From the above please do not infer that the Reds (especially Lenin and Stalin) were the best thing ever to happen to Mother Russia. The Reds were what we know did happen, all the rest we simply do not know.

 

Great What If.


If the revolution failed, the Communists around the world would likely keep their profile low, German's capacity to fight in WW1 would be greater, and Russia would still be knocked out for good. As a result, the terms in the Treaty of Versailles would not be as disgraceful, Germany might be more stable, and Hitler's rise to power would be A LOT harder. Let's not forget that Hitler’s rise to power had a lot to do with the fear of Communism.

 

Not too sure that Hitlers rise would have been affected in that way, I always feel the scales in the 20's and 30's were very finely balanced for Germany. She was open to extremism but it could just have easily been extreme left or right for a period. Perhaps a failed revolution would have led to more Communist agitators and exiles from whatever regime Russia produced with more ideological impetus to succeed after their failure to establish the SU.
In what way do you think "German's capacity to fight in WW1 would be greater"? I'd have thought the effects would be minimal and quite possibly to her detriment if a Russian regime survived that was still interested in the fight?
Cheers,
Adam.

 

Ironcross, you have to remember that the Reds were the ones who started peace negotiations with Germany, the Provisional Government was still launching offensives. Failed offensives but offensives. And as for the rest of the world communist movements at the time were negligible.

One thing that is not entirely clear is whether Lenin was actually a German agent or not. Just before the October Revolution he was exiled in Switzerland and the German High Command managed to send him off across Germany on a sealed train from Zürich to Helsinki, from where he moved on to St. Petersburg. It is not yet clear how much the October Revolution was a German ploy to end the war in the East front. This has been discussed in this forum a couple years ago.

 

If the communist revolution had failed, either initially or during the subsequent civil war, it is likely that Russia would have ended up with a government closer to a Western European socialist monarchy or social democrat government. The problem with this would be such a government would have found it impossible to move the nation forward industrially as quickly as the communists did. There would simply be no way to force such a change in anything but a dictatorship.
The result would be that if Hitler still came to power (still a possibility) and invaded such a Russian state it would be likely that the Germans would now win outright. The Russian army would have been far less capable of stopping an invasion simply through the lack of industrial power.

 

Or if the Soviet Union never came to be, then the overall communist movement would have been much weaker, therefore causing no provocation to the Nazis. Maybe Mein Kampf would identify it's lebensraum elsewhere, say in the former German colonies lost with WW1, like Togo, Namibia, Tsingtao, the Marshall islands, etc.

Who knows, we're in the

 

Hitler could have still come to power as the Communists were only one of many causes leading to his rise. The Versaillies Treaty and its oppressive conditions, racism, economic collapse, a resurgent militarism were just some of the other issues that allowed him into power. So, the lack of a communist government in Russia alone does not preclude the rise of the Nazis in Germany nor Facisim in Italy or Spain.

 

I agree, TAG, no reason for Fascism not to develop.

However with no significant country with Communism in power the world communist movement would be much much weaker. The strongest left wing movements would be socialists and social democrats, with only a small fringe of spartakists, Rosa Luxemburgs, etc.

Therefore no big danger looming on the left, so no need for great reactionary movements, no Freikorps, etc. As such there wouldn't be much on the left to inflame Hitler's wrath, so Mein Kampf would have no big target on the left, no need for a fixation on hatred of a thing that would not exist. Where else Hitler would apply his energies I do not know.

Russia in the twenties with no communism would be just a big Romania or a big Bulgaria.

 

So if the Bolshevik uprising had failed, Russia would have civil war on and off along with other factor's which would have played very nicely into Hitler's hands. The result would be a Russia that could not or would not stand up to Barbarossa.

 

Even without a Soviet Russia if Hilter did come to power Germany would still look east for expansion. Germany historicaly always looked east since the tuetonic knights.

 

Without the fear of communism = no support from the bourgeoisie = no money = no SA = no Hitler

 

Still a massive fear of the potential of the Bolsheviks among the middle classes regardless of revolutionary success, the fear of it happening elsewhere could even be stronger as the Communist Literati were still scattered across the globe before Uncle Jo 'sorted them out'... In that period the anti-semitism alone (disregarding other factors such as militarism) would still be fertile ground for money and support.
Cheers,
Adam.

 

Even without the mainstream communists there were other far left movements enough to scare the Right into motion. The German 1918 uprisings certainly were not directed from the Kremlin.

 

As a first long term consequence of this what-if, I think Stalin would no longer be Za Rodinu's forum avatar.

 

What Stalin? It's a poster based on the Soviet memorial at Treptower park

But you're right, I'd have to choose another autocrat: your Louis XIV instead ("L'État c'est moi" - The State, that's me) :spar:

http://www.geocities.com/isanders_2000/treptower.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_War_Memorial_(Treptower_Park)

 

Good choice ! And Louis XIV had so much more class than Stalin !