Re: Could the UK have defeated the Nazis on its own
You can't blitzkrieg an island. Nor could Germany invade England without gaining air superiouty first.
UK - and her empire!- vs Germany would probably have ended in a stalemate, since neither could defeat each other. My guess is that it would've turned into a cold war for a few decades, with the third Reich imploding in the end.
That's disregarding the US, USSR, Japan and global developments elsewhere. Which really we can't, off course.
Re: Could the UK have defeated the Nazis on its own
While many people here believe that the UK would have held out indefinately because of it being an island it would also be the end of it. During the entire war the UK had to import oil, metals, bullets, food, etc from both the US and it's own Empire but without the US it would never had been able to hold out even in 1940. Although most of the planes of the BoB they can't run without fuel and during the tightest pinches of the battle the Brits were counting feul supply in weeks not months. Each tanker of oil that made it past the U boats and past the Stukas over the Channel allowed the UK to hold on a bit more.
Without the lend lease coming in in Sep of 1940 without those 50 destroyers it's reasonable to believe that the UK wouldn't have had the resources to begin a real bombing campaign or have been able to afford sending precious fighters to the mediterrean. Without US destroyers and corvettes to escort those conveys and without the ability to mount a serious bombing campaign against U boat manufacturing the UK would have been starved into submission and seperated from the rest of it's empire. In addition to that the US allowed the Brits to refeul and repair their ships in the US which certainly helped the battle of the atlantic. I'd guess about 1942 that Britain would have finally been long enough cut off from the rest of the world that it wouldn't have the oil to power it's air force or run it's navy. It would probably have just slowly lost it's ability to defend itself from the Luftwaffe and been forced to surrender to Germany.
Now with my guess of 1942 for british surrender what would that mean for the ongoing campaign in Russia? Although I highly doubt that the Germans would ever had been able to completely conquer russia I'm certain that they would at least have taken the The major cities and be able to prevent the Soviets from ever being able to launch a counter offensive. Remeber, with the Luftwaffe able to to swing all those planes from Northern France and Germany along with it's Luftflotten in the Mediterrean I believe it would have been able to retain air superiorty over the Soviets almost indefinetely. And with un interuped manufacture of PzIIIs and PzIVs and later on the Tigers and Panthers they would have enough quality and quantity to prevent a strong soviet counter offensive. Russia would probably have been a battle ground for another 10 years or so or at least long enough before Stalin was lynched or just plain died and the upper echleons of the the Communist party sued for peace or begin interfighting.
http://www.historians.org/projects/G...Lease_Pix5.gif
Link to US help to Soviets:
http://english.pravda.ru/main/18/90/...roosevelt.html
Escort Carriers given to Brits:
http://www.ww2pacific.com/brcve.html
Lend lease amounts in Billions of Dollars:
http://www.multied.com/ww2/events/lendlease.html
Ultimate lend lease link site I've seen:
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=372591
Re: Could the UK have defeated the Nazis on its own
Sorry my bad about the Napoleon thing, I was thinking 1700's from today. ~:eek:
Of course as always with these "what-if" debates anything could be possible, Britain eventually overthrowing Germany and Germany crushing all resistance. Heck for what we know if the US hadn't entered the war the Irish might have taken over the world with their crazy drunken brawler corps.
Hitler was Germany's greatest weakness and the greatest window through which the Allied forces could have won. If he had been eliminated and some other more able ruler placed in his stead, I believe that Germany might have stood a good chance of winning a massive two-front war.
Re: Could the UK have defeated the Nazis on its own
Without Hitler the whole Nazi cult thing would have broken down and the German people wouldn't have put up with a losing war.
My opinion anyway.
Re: Could the UK have defeated the Nazis on its own
Let me start off early with Napoleon, saying that UK defeated him alone, it is a quote from the start of this thread, is just insulting to history, Europe countries and especially to Russia and with that to me, since i am a Russian.
Secondly, without the help from US Britain would most likely not survive the early years of war and would fall somewhere around 41-42. If not conquered they would be forced to sign a treaty with the Germans due to lack of every possible resource. England was a heart of a huge colonial empire and highly relied on imported resources, with all sea routes blocked there could be no way they would survive, being as fanatic as they are.
Even without the help from the US ( i find it hard that it was this significant as you all say ) the soviets could have beaten Hitler. At the start of the war the numbers of the soviet army outnumbered Hitler greatly, it also applied to the tanks, planes and other machines. The quality of the machines was great, there was a big problem with the generals and the ability of the soviet troops to use the machines, this was the reason for the losses at the start of a war. It all changed towards the end, since the men got experienced and better generals were appointed.
Even after the huge losses at the beginning of the war the soviets still had a superior army. When the Germans were near Moscow all the important factories and their porduction facilities were already behind the Ural and safe. The Russians even at the critical moments could easily out produce the Germans mainly due to the size of the country and the population and the fact that the Russian war equipment: the tanks, planes etc were very easy to manufacture. While towards the end of the war the Third Reich was running out of steam, Germany was simply too small and just didn't have enough resources or men to continue to fight they way they did at the beginning, they had no way to refill the losses they took at the east.
Also saying that Japan would invade eastern Russian areas if they stayed peaceful with the US is quite wrong. As somebody said earlier Japan was involved in quite a few areas in Asia and attacking eastern Russia would prove of no value, largely due to the fact that those areas have no real economical, military or strategic value.
Re: Could the UK have defeated the Nazis on its own
I did not say that Britain defeated Napoleon, I said that they were in a similar situation, that being all of coninental Europe being dominated by one force, seemingly undefeatable on land but weak at sea. Britain emerged as a victor because the entire continent did not want to be under Napoleon's control and after a long stalemate period revolted, united with other free countries who opposed Napoleon, and drove his forces back to France. You have to admit the two scenarios seem rather similar. At the start of their conquering rampage both Hitler and Napoleon seemed simple upstarts with no potential to forge an empire. They swiftly defeated their enemies, forced them to surrender, and moved on, after which later on those enemies revolted. In addition in both cases, Russia proved to be their ultimate challenge and the ultimate cause of their downfall.
As I see it there are few differences but they can be considered substantial.
1) United States
In the Napoleonic wars no major foreign power arrived to tip the balance in either scale, it was a drawn out conflict between two sides almost entirely defined at the beginning of Napoleon's expansionist policies.
2) U-boats
Napoleon had no means to block UK shipping as the British fleet was superior, in this way Nazi Germany showed greater promise in conquering Europe over France, however this was negated by
3) Hitler
Hitler was an insane dictator, often influenced by fairy tales and false beliefs that he was "superior" or the situation that saved Fredrick II hundreds of years earlier, that is the death of an enemy monarch, would save him. He tried to rewrite history based on the smallest of things, and he was paranoid.
No doubt even had he won WWII, forced all his enemies to surrender and became the undisputed ruler of Europe, he would have probably have shown signs of being psychotic as mentioned earlier. There is no small amount of evidence to support this, Hitler was paranoid, he did execute his own best generals, and most likely by the end of his reign as with those of other paranoid rulers, his chief officials would have been favor-grubbing greedy politicians, through which the empire would fracture on Hitler's death, most likely returning Europe to its post-war state. This has happened with every major empire in history (save perhaps the Rus) that tried to dominate an area with a different culture than its own. That is why many of the nations in Europe today are not too different from their base tribal groups that populated the area before the Roman empire.
I almost feel like I deserved to get flamed for this, if there is any piece of writing on history ever written that is more speculatory I'll have to shoot myself.
Re: Could the UK have defeated the Nazis on its own
Quote:
The quality of the machines was great
Uh, I though that, aside from the T34, KV 1, and KV 2(ugliest tank I have ever seen) the quality of Soviet tanks was horrible.
Re: Could the UK have defeated the Nazis on its own
Besides that, I think the KV's were very heavy and expensive. The T-34, which didn't come until some time after the initial German offensive, was much faster and more of a "heavy-medium" type of tank.
Re: Could the UK have defeated the Nazis on its own
Quote:
Originally Posted by discovery1
Uh, I though that, aside from the T34, KV 1, and KV 2(ugliest tank I have ever seen) the quality of Soviet tanks was horrible.
There was a pre-war comparison on this. Besically the machines were good, it was the lack of education that wasted them. The goverment did not want to educate the soldiers too much, since they thought they could act against them. It was all because of Stalin living in his illusions and being paranoid.
Re: Could the UK have defeated the Nazis on its own
Soviet tank technology was actually fairly good at the start of the war. It's the tactics, training, ammunition, and optics that were atrocious, thanks in no small part to Stalins purging of the Red Army during the 20s and 30s. The T-28 was an excellent tank for it's time and even though it was really just a mod Vickers 6 ton it was the best tank during the Spanish civil war and bested any armor but against it in the Winter war and the invasion of poland. The BT series tanks or fast tanks were the primary part of the Soviet tank force during the early stages of Operation Barborossa and were obsolete by that time. The BTs were designed around a modified doctrine used by the British of Infantry tanks and Cruiser tanks, the Soviets sacrificed armor for speed in both versions which is something understandable on the endless steppes of Russia.
The KV series wasn't actually all that good. The KV2 was far to heavy for anything, it was really just a mobile pillbox/gun carriage in it's use. The KV1 series was alright and certainly held their own against any German tanks up to the introduction of the PzIVF2 with the long barreled 75mm gun. The KV1 had problems both mechanically and practically, the early versions didn't allow the commander to be "buttoned down" while the main gun was being fired and the transmission was so faulty that each tank came with a shifting assistor (hammer) to help it into gear when it got stuck. Despite these faults though these along with the early T-34s managed to prevent the germans from taking Moscow, Leningrad, or Stalingrad in the Winter of 41 and caused a halt of any german offensive for miles around them until Stukas or 88 Flaks were brought in to deal with them.
As for Hitler himself, he and Stalin are the wild cards of WWII. They were both paranoid phycos but both could have faired well. Hitler during the early part of the war was actually fairly good, he let the Generals and Admirals run the war, only after the inconclusive year of 1942 did he begin interferring with military operations. He'd interferred in small things earlier but not much. Stalin was the opposite, he started of completely interferring with everything but when Moscow its was being threatened he had the sense to leave the war to the generals. He also had the foresight to move all soviet heavy industry to the Urals almost immediately after the Germans began their invasion.
