Could the Western allies have won it alone?

Lets say the Soviets have been defeated. Britain is still independent of Nazi rule, but the Western desert is now under intense German pressure as the Axis forces concentrate their efforts on the Suez and the Middle East. The Wehrmacht has all the oil it would ever need, as well as an industry as good as or better than that of the entire Western Allies combined now that Russia is Nazi territory.

Do you think the Western Allies would be able to win?

 

Pfft, no.

 

Yes. By August 1945 the Allies will have one crucial advantage over the Germans, the Atomic Bomb.

 

My gut reaction - no!

With the USSR defeated, Germany had 2 options:

1) link up with the Japanese by clearing out the Western Desert and attacking through Iran.

2) turn its attention back on Britain, and finally lauch Seelow. Remember at this point the Fw190 was just about making its presence felt, and the Lutwaffe had a temporary fighter superiority.

Either course would have been possible, given that at least 40% of the Whermacht would be freed up from the USSR. Knowing the Germans., they would have tried both at once, but hey.

Without the Middle East & its oil, we'd have been very hard pressed.
If the Germans and Japanese had linked in India/Burma, I reckon Australia may even have been invaded

If Britain fell, how could America ever have got into Europe, unless it either invaded from the Atlantic, or went through Africa?

Either way, this emoticon sums up our chances well-
:kill:

 

Germany could never have defeated and successfully occupied the USSR.

Had Germany defeated them (doubtful at best), a negotiated peace would have been the best they could have ever hoped for.

The question is, would Germany have deployed the atomic bomb before the Allies. To whomever went the honors, so did the future course. Even if Germany had developed it, in time they would still have been overextended and ultimately defeated.

My two cents worth...

:smok:

 

It was never the intention of the Germans to completely defeat the Russians, just push them back over the Urals, so linking up with the Japanese would not be an option.

I would expect that the Germans would have to maintain a large military presence in the Occupied East, not least of which to counter the Partisan resistance movements, and to guard against Red Army raids and skirmishes. So by necessity if nothing else they would have to content themself to a naval blockade of Britain more or less as was (The Battle of the Atlantic).

I would anticipate in this case that the war would be a long haul, much longer than was actually the case.

The US may be forced to adopt a Japan first policy to free up the Pacific for Lend-Lease aid to arrive in what was left of the Soviet Union via Manchuria and Siberia. Whilst maintaining enough of a presence in Britain and the Western Desert to if not defeat the Germans at least keep them in check.

I would expect the US to be in a position to begin using Atomic bombs against major German cities like Berlin in reasonable numbers by summer 1946, afterwhich I would expect that in the chaos that ensued a Red Army counterattack would begin to recapture sections of Russia, starting with a symbolic victory at Moscow (Which I would guess would happen along the lines of Stalingrad), followed by Operation Overlord in late Spring 1947, with a steady grind to the defeat of Nazi Germany by 1950.

The infighting and bickering endemic of the Nazi regime would also contribute to their eventual defeat.

Fanciful perhaps, but this is roughly what I would expect to happen.

 

Had Russia been defeated, Germany would have been able to concentrate her ressources on planes and U-Boats, and I think Britain's position would have become very critical.
The capture of caucasian oilfields would have strenthen the germans either.Just think of how many battles Germany actually lost due to oil shortage.

Atomic bomb would have been the only chance for the allies to win the war, the question is, could Britain resist that long.

 

With US help, and with the remains of the Soviet Union being encouraged to conduct raids with the promise of economic aid, yes probably.

The Convoy system did a lot to help protect the merchantmen from the U-boats, and crucially with Britain still in the fight, once the Liberator became available more U-boats may well have just meant more German lives lost at sea.

No Germany would not have been able to concentrate her resources on aircraft and U-boats particularly, with the German's counter-productive occupation techniques I think there would be a large scale guerilla war going on in the Occupied East which would require huge numbers of troops and equipment to police (and casualties!), plus I wouldn't expect Stalin to just sit back and take it, sulking from a hidey hole beyond the Urals, especially not if a fairly steady trickle of US aid could be brought in from the west, and especially if Japan could be removed from the equation.

 

1946 Newspaper Headline:
Sneak A-Bomb raids by B-36 aircraft destroy all major German cities overnight!

Seriously, a Soviet defeat would have led to a long and "iffy" war with Germany. A 300 division U.S. Army would have been required and an earlier all out attempt to beat the U-Boats. We should be glad we ended up with the cold war. There is always the probabality the Nazi "leadership" would implode and lead to a civil war.

 

1942 Ceasefire

You might find this interesting

http://p069.ezboard.com/falltheworldsba ... =672.topic

 

Personally, I don't think that Germany could have taken Britain but neither do I believe that Britain and the US could ever have hoped to defeat Nazi Germany.

Because of the occupying effort and the lack of air superiority over Britain, the German forces would never get fully ready to invade and capture Britain but would rather agree to some kind of fancy peacy treaty in order to keep the flank calm and secure. Germany couldn't hope to defeat the Brits on their own soil with US help, and they had other things on their mind; oil sources, territorial control, securing the alliances with Italy and Japan.

The other way around, Germany would never have been weakened sufficiently for the invasion to be succesful, anywhere, because the erosion of the Wehrmacht in Russia did not occur if the SU had been defeated. Even if the Allies had thrown A-bombs, which I doubt they would have because they didn't know what was actually going on in Europe and judged themselves insufficiently strong to follow up with an assault on the country, then it remains the question whether the Germans would have surrendered. The Japs, when they did so, were exhausted and clearly beaten; their defeat was a matter of time and lives. It still took two A-bombs to clear them. In the case of an undefeated Germany with strong army, strong industry, plenty of resources and a good morale, I don't want to know how many civilian lives it would take to break their back mentally and physically. Then still, what fist could the Allies make in military power if they couldn't actually invade because of the strong German army awaiting them?

Therefore, the western Allies couldn't have done this alone, but neither could the Soviets have done it alone.

 

Right on Roel!

 

Oh... hogwash, Roel!

The fact that the US did employ nukes against Japan is strong evidence they would have employed them against Germany. Once they A Bombs started being dropped, there would have been no strong German economy. Have you ever seen films of what the shockwave does with an atomic weapon? Once a dozen or two bombs were dropped, there would be no German economy.

As for Germany not being weakened if defeating the USSR, how do you figure? Even if the "A-A Line" had been achieved, and western Russia fallen, the campaigns in the east would have gone on for years. The might of Soviet production came from further east and would have required even more German manpower to secure.

Germany could never win the war. All they could ever hope for is a negotiated peace, and on that, I think we may agree.

As for the Allies with or without the USSR being able to win alone is a moot point. Germany decided to take on the world as of June 22, 1941, and it was a war they could never win.

:smok:

 

Right on Greg! Whoops I'm on both sides now, but then I think you're both right. The A-bombs would definitely have been dropped on Germany, that would have happened if the war in Europe had continued into July/August 1945. However dropping them on Nazi Germany would have required several "ifs": if the U.S. had continued to developed them (very likely) after the USSR defeat in 1941; if the B-36's could get them there; and and if enough A-bombs and B-36s were available in large enough numbers.

 

Oops I forgot about the A-bomb. Its quite conceivable that the Germans would have sued for peace on Allied terms when faced with the threat of nukes. Of course, if they had developed their OWN nukes, then that would have been a different story. A cold war, this time with the whole of continental Europe as well as Russia, against the Western Allies of America and Britain.

Anyway, I certainly don't feel that Eastern Russia could hope to fight the Germans. With all major raw materials as well as the crucial railway network in German hands now, I think it would be next to impossible for the Russians to make a comeback from the east, especially since the Japanese might want to take up a slice of the pie as well.

Moreover, why wouldn't Germany want to link up with Japan? The invasion of India and China by the Germans would free up Japanese resources for the pacific war with the Australians and Americans. The Italians, now virtually impregnable to attacks due to their strategic location (surrounded by German territory) could then concentrate on the construction of a powerful navy and perhaps employ German expertise in the modernization of her third-rate military.

 

Indeed, and this is why I can't agree with Greg's points. Russia would have been far more extensively destroyed than it was during WW2 if everything west of the Urals would have been in German hands. By the way, my post was an answer to the question of western Allies winning without Soviet help.

Oh, and btw: what makes you think the Germans couldn't pull a stunt like the Soviets did in moving all of their industry somewhere else?
Another thing, imagine an unbeaten Luftwaffe with literally thousands of experienced pilots in Me262 fighters. What bomber would ever get through?

 

Whaat yo have to bear in mind is that the germans were developing their own A bomb, and without the hassle of the eastern front may have had more labour. I don't know but would hazzard a guess of maybe, if Britain was still independant of Nazi rule.

 

Yes, but they handicapped themselves by insisting on disregarding most of the physics that led to the US successfully developing the A bomb because it was discovered or developed by Jewish scientists. The Nazis would never have brought themselves to using a "Jewish" weapon, so they never really stood much chance of developing their own Atom Bomb.

Also there seems to be this conception that the German Occupation in the East would be a breeze and the Stalin or his successor would just sit back and sulk beyond the Urals. If the Germans achieved their objectives in Barbarossa this would still leave a fairly sizable chunk of the Soviet Union and its industry in existence, and a huge Guerilla army operating out of the Pripet marshes and in the Occupied territories with the co-operation, willing or otherwise of the local populace.

The German occupation of Russia would have been a nightmare for the troops, especially those in and around the Pripet marshes, and would be a huge drain on German resources and manpower (I would expect a sort of WWII German Vietnam, only nastier!). The only alternative would be to withdraw troops to west and give up all the recently captured land.

Don't forget that the Me262 was good, but the Spitfires and Mustangs made a good account of themselves against them and the fight was far from a one sided battle, a bomber offensive, especially one using B-29s instead, would be far from a hopeless cause.

Still the question is a difficult one to answer. If the Soviet Union was defeated in Barbarossa and Germany achieved her aims, then the Soviet Union was still not out of the fight. Would Germany have pushed on and tried to capture the entire of the Soviet Union? Unlikely, if Barbarossa had been succesful then the Nazis would have achieved their objectives, there was nothing they were interested in beyond the Urals.

So the only way this Question can really be answered would be if Barbarossa didn't happen in the first place, this is the only way really of totally removing the Soviet Union from the equation. The only likely way that could happen would be if the Nazis weren't in power to begin with, so no Czechoslovakia, no Poland, in short no war to begin with.

 

I believe that the Western Allies could have won the war on their own. The industrial capacity of the United States still dwarfed that of Germany, as did America's manpower resources. It must be remembered that the USA fought what amounted to two major wars, one in the Atlantic/ETO and one in the Pacific, simultaneously. No one else has fought in so many places at the same time and emerged victorious. As long as England was available as a base and America entered the war at the same time and under the same circumstances as we are familiar with, then the Western Allies would have won the war, even without Russia. I am also certain, however, that the price paid by the Western Allies would have been a lot higher, especially in blood.

 

Yes I agree. England is the key here. Without Russia or England, the huge industrial gap would eventually be overcome. With Russia removed, the German-Japanese link up might have been stronger, i.e. more technology and resources traded. How about Me262 kamikazing U.S. carriers? Germany might develop nukes, but not as quickly as the U.S. After all, we had the greatest physicist in the world, Einstein. The U.S would have pressured other nations into aiding more in the war, and eventually, Germany would lose. Without England, there is no bombing. No Allied countries near enough to get information from. England is the key.