Could Germany have won WWII?

[Beskar]

I have na ex-lover from Russia and another girl I know from there. Both tell me that outside of Moscow the ratio between men and women is skewered. There's usually 20 girls on the dance floor of a club and only 1 or 2 guys. They attest this to the heavy losses from WWII, not sure how accurate this is...

Well, even on the premise that children are born 50/50, there has been at least three generations since the Great War. Any deficit would have recovered in the younger generations by now, so going to a club with a bunch of young adults will not the be the result of the Great War, unless these 20 girls on the dance floor are Old Age Pensioners.

[Montmorency]

As I said:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[Papewaio]

Well, even on the premise that children are born 50/50, there has been at least three generations since the Great War. Any deficit would have recovered in the younger generations by now, so going to a club with a bunch of young adults will not the be the result of the Great War, unless these 20 girls on the dance floor are Old Age Pensioners.

1) Any deficit would have recovered in the first generation.
2) More boys are born then girls
3) Boys engage in more dangerous activities and are more like to use more violent (effective) suicide methods. So the ratio over time skews to girls.
4) Socially in a lot of countries men don't dance.
5) Or Myth's preferred date is in her nineties.

[Myth]

She is 30 currently Don't know about that though. Perhaps it's just more propaganda? A lot of it finds place in modern Russian textbooks. The other girl, whom I met while riding on a bus, took her time to explain to me about this issue. Also she explained that the Russians were the only ones who stopped the Mongol invasion of Europe so...

[ReluctantSamurai]

They attest this to the heavy losses from WWII, not sure how accurate this is

There is some validity to this. Of course, absolutely accurate numbers will never be known, but the Soviet Union lost about 20% of its population and 25% of its resources during WWII.

Mark Harrison states in Accounting for War that "supply-side shocks to Soviet population, fixed capital, and GNP were never made up post-war in terms of trajectory" (as of 1996 when the book was published).

He goes on further to say that "...the USSR began 1946 with an overall demographic deficit of 35 million...combining war deaths, emigrations, and wartime birth deficits."

As a comparison, combined Anglo-American civil + military losses were roughly 1 in 250; Soviet losses were 2 in 9 for military personnel, and 1 in 10 for civilians. And the Soviet Union was the only one of the victorious Allies to suffer significant post-war economic stagnation. All other nations (and in particular the US) experienced economic booms and high population growth.

Or Myth's preferred date is in her nineties

Let's hope not

[Papewaio]

There is some validity to this. Of course, absolutely accurate numbers will never be known, but the Soviet Union lost about 20% of its population and 25% of its resources during WWII.

Mark Harrison states in Accounting for War that "supply-side shocks to Soviet population, fixed capital, and GNP were never made up post-war in terms of trajectory" (as of 1996 when the book was published).

He goes on further to say that "...the USSR began 1946 with an overall demographic deficit of 35 million...combining war deaths, emigrations, and wartime birth deficits."

As a comparison, combined Anglo-American civil + military losses were roughly 1 in 250; Soviet losses were 2 in 9 for military personnel, and 1 in 10 for civilians. And the Soviet Union was the only one of the victorious Allies to suffer significant post-war economic stagnation. All other nations (and in particular the US) experienced economic booms and high population growth.



Let's hope not

It explains the generation that fought in WWII having skewed ratios of men to women. It does not in any ways go remotely close to being a reason for skewed demographics from the baby boomer generation onwards.

Any skewed demographics real or perceived post WWII would have to be because of lifestyle choices. Male to female birth rates should be the same. There might be a ratio change due to poor nutrition and maybe males die off quicker.

But all one needs to do is look at a western dance floor to see a ratio skewed towards females. It isn't an accurate way to poll populations.

[Sp4]

Women just go out more... We're sitting here playing video games ^^

[Myth]

Exactly. Women go out for fun. Men go out for women.

Men go out for fun too. But fun for us is women, booze and food. So if we can't get a girl, we drink and then we get the munchies at 4 AM.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Well, even on the premise that children are born 50/50, there has been at least three generations since the Great War. Any deficit would have recovered in the younger generations by now, so going to a club with a bunch of young adults will not the be the result of the Great War, unless these 20 girls on the dance floor are Old Age Pensioners.

As a result of normal PH factors, there is a slight advantage toward girl children, usually in a .2% or so swing. You are, of course essentially correct that with 3 full generations of "turnover" since 1945 that a more or less 50/50 balance must have reasserted itself.

That said, I don't think that the Russians have yet recovered from the deaths of so many during the Stalin era. Russia lost more than 13 % of its population (maybe even higher if the Soviets had been inflating the population numbers for propaganda purposes) in WW2 and those figures are exclusive of the purge/starvation campaigns of the 1930s or the Gulag efforts of the Post-War era. The pre-war CCCPP claimed over 168 million. Current day Russia claims fewer than 144 million. By contrast the UK had 46.5 million in 1939 and has over 62 million today. France had over 40 millions in 1939 and now has a population of over 61 million. The USA had 132 million in 1940 and has over 310 million today.

Some of Russian's retrograde is the divesture of all of its other countries -- the stans, Belorussia etc. But even if you add in their current total population, Russian barely keeps pace with France in terms of growth percentage.

[El Barto]

Back on the Pacific front… what would have happened if Japan had not attacked Pearl Harbour? What would have happened to Australia, would it have been invaded, would there have been a sort of no-man's land across Insulindia?
How long would it have taken for the US to join the Allies? I don't know to what extent they were already helping the Allies in the Southeast Asian area, if any.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Back on the Pacific front… what would have happened if Japan had not attacked Pearl Harbour? What would have happened to Australia, would it have been invaded, would there have been a sort of no-man's land across Insulindia?
How long would it have taken for the US to join the Allies? I don't know to what extent they were already helping the Allies in the Southeast Asian area, if any.

Deserves its own thread.

That Summer, the USN was already fighting against the Unterseebooten in the Atlantic -- Roosevelt was pushing for us to intervene on behalf of Britain but couldn't get past the isolationist lobby at that time. Lend Lease was finally getting Americans back to work, but that did NOT translate as a desire to involve themselves in a European war for many.

In the Pacific, we really weren't positioned to do anything but haul out Case Orange and go for a big fleet battle with the IJN. The Embargo etc. was begun because, at the time, it was truly believed that Japan would find a face-saving excuse to back down in China or, if they went to war, would be striking against the Phillipines with their limited sea-lift. The Phillipine Army would fight a delaying action until the USN could smash the IJN and then Japan would sue for peace with their navy broken and no way to project power. Obviously, it didn't turn out that way.

Roosevelt and Winston were ecstatic that Germany declared war -- it was gonna be impossible to sell "Germany First" when only Japan had attacked or declared.

[El Barto]

Erm, what is Case Orange?

I really do think -from reading your posts- that both the US and Japan overestimated their own power.

Still, if Germany hadn't declared war -I don't think they could have with their ideological blindfold, but let's assume so- the US could've taken charge of the APcific front and the UK and the Soviet Union could've engaged Germany.

Another big question is what if the Japs had attacked Vladivostok and then Mongolia and Siberia instead of trying to fight across the Pacific? The US would've been mired in its own internal politicking and I don't think the Red Army could've handled two land fronts across such a large distance, but I don't know how good their railway network was beyond the Urals.

[Montmorency]

No one in the world would have had the logistics to cross 1500 miles of empty taiga to get to the Urals.

Disabling the Pacific ports would have been the limit for the Japanese, and in that case would at least have dealt a noticeable blow to the Lend-Lease transfer. At that point, there would have been nothing for the Soviets to create a second front against - no enemy infantry on the opposing side, and no strategic points to defend from them anyway.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Erm, what is Case Orange?

I really do think -from reading your posts- that both the US and Japan overestimated their own power.

Still, if Germany hadn't declared war -I don't think they could have with their ideological blindfold, but let's assume so- the US could've taken charge of the APcific front and the UK and the Soviet Union could've engaged Germany.

Another big question is what if the Japs had attacked Vladivostok and then Mongolia and Siberia instead of trying to fight across the Pacific? The US would've been mired in its own internal politicking and I don't think the Red Army could've handled two land fronts across such a large distance, but I don't know how good their railway network was beyond the Urals.

Case Orange, or rather War Plan Orange, was the USA's ongoing planning program for war with Imperial Japan.

Of COURSE the USA and Japan overestimated their power. As did Germany in 1941, As did Germany in 1914, As did the USA in Korea and Vietnam, as did Pompey facing Sertorius. Pretty much everybody all the time overestimates their ability at the outset of wars.

The Japanese could have dealt the Russians a blow and either conquered Vladivostok or neutralized it along with the minor Pacific ports. It would have been a blow to the USSR, but not a crippling one. Had the Japanese seriously gone after the Russians, they would have had to have paid a horrible blood price to advance against an opponent with far better armor and artillery. On top of it all, logistically, there was, essentially, one double tracked rail line over which ALL of the logistics would travel and which would have been exposed to partisans with dynamite for virtually all of its distance. It was tough enough for the Mongols, and they didn't have to try to haul artillery shells and ammo reloads with them. Even had they been able to defeat the USSR forces, they would have been able to advance, at best, at the speed of their mule transport. All the while, the Soviets would be maintaining there and of the rail line while falling back toward their sources of supply. Simply not practicable.

[ReluctantSamurai]

Disabling the Pacific ports would have been the limit for the Japanese, and in that case would at least have dealt a noticeable blow to the Lend-Lease transfer.

As it turned out, this would be the case; but I doubt that anyone in 1941 could have predicted that Vladivostok would eventually become the single largest conduit for LL supplies to the Soviet Union.

was the USA's ongoing planning program for war with Imperial Japan.

All the Rainbow plans were rather overoptimistic as to what could be achieved. The US grossly underestimated IJN air capabilities, and even more so the Japanese innovation to place all six of their large fleet carriers into a single task force (something totally against the then current USN policy of having only one carrier per task force). Any sortie by US 1st Fleet would've meant alot of unrecoverable iron on the bottom of the ocean instead of the shallow water of Pearl Harbor, where all but several of the ships sunk were eventually salvaged. The US also had no information concerning the new land-based LRB's available to the Japanese---namely the G3M & G4M. It's not hard to imagine the USN 1st Fleet suffering the same fate as the PoW/Repulse when faced with land-based air from Saipan and Truk.

One other factor US planners failed to take into consideration for their Rainbow plans was the lack of fleet oilers in the Pacific Fleet, and lack of training in at-sea replenishment. In 1941, there were only 11 fleet oilers in the whole of the Pacific Theatre, and seven of them were servicing the West Coast. That leaves only four oilers at PH to service USN fleets. Not nearly enough to support a cross-ocean sortie to the PI (and no major stockpiles of fuel west of PH).

So essentially, once the PI's were attacked, it was a certainty they would fall to the Japanese.

Had the Japanese seriously gone after the Russians, they would have had to have paid a horrible blood price to advance against an opponent with far better armor and artillery.

This would have been true if the Japanese had chosen to advance in the tank-friendly country in the vicinity of Khalkin-Gol...but not in the rugged, forested terrain of Kharbarovsk and the westward approaches to Vladivostok. Khalkin-Gol is noted as a major set-back for the IJA, but what few realize is that for the first half of the campaign the Japanese were advancing and driving the Soviets and MPRA back. Zhukov's blitzkrieg-style victory grabs much of the limelight, but neglected is the horrible casualties suffered by Red Army regulars, and MPRA soldiers. Coox, in his monumental work Nomonhan: Japan Against Russia 1939, places Japanese casualties somewhere around 17000-20000. Soviet & MPRA casualties will never be known accurately, but when interviewed in the mid-fifties, several Soviet generals who participated in the campaign did not deny the assertion made by Japanese estimates of 30000 casualties.

Bottom line for the "go-north" option available to the Japanese was the virtual lack of strategic targets. Above all things, the Japanese needed oil. When the US embargo hit them in the summer of 1941, they had roughly two years stockpiled. With the exception of a limited supply of oil in the Sakhalin Islands, there is no oil in the Soviet Far East, and very limited sources of other raw materials needed for war. So unless the Germans compensated the Japanese heavily for attacking the Soviets in the Far East (another topic deserving of it's own thread...ie. what could the Germans have proffered?), Japan was going after DEI oil and rubber.