Could the UK have defeated the Nazis on its own

[spmetla]

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.

[gaelic cowboy]

Well if the UK had managed to convince the Ireland to allow them acesss to the flying boat landing area in Foynes the ability to control more effectively the north atlantic anti submarine wise would have being greatly enhanced.
Incidently most Irish artillery was facing north to the border as it was assumed the UK would violate our neutrality to obtain control of certain strategic ports and airfeilds.

[Duke of Gloucester]

It isn't that straightforward though, is it? Several times British and American troops strayed south of the border and instead of being interned (which they should have been) they were returned to the North, so were the Irish that worried about invasion?

I suspect that plans were considered by the British to invade the Eire, but they probably thought that if they couldn't contol the South in 1922, it would be more trouble than it was worth in the 40's. My understanding is that, surprisingly perhaps, given the number of Irish Americans, the USA were more serious about these plans. They had no direct experience of the Troubles in the 20's.

[Blodrast]

ok, my 2 cents ;)

I have to agree with spmetla and Ar7.
The USSR could and would have, in my opinion, defeated Hitler alone well enough.
For this, and many other conclusions, I recommend Viktor Suvorov's books:

1. Cleansing: Why Did Stalin Decapitate His Army? (1999)
2. The Icebreaker (1993)
3. The Last Republic: Why the Soviet Union Lost WWII? (1996)
4. M-Day: When Did World War II Begin? (1996)
5. Suicide: Why Did Hitler Attack the Soviet Union? (Viktor Suvorov, 2000)

Of course, everything is arguable and debatable, and, as
this wikipedia entry points out, there were/are pro and con groups that probably are still arguing about who's right and who isn't.

They do make for some good lecture, though (if nothing else).
You may of course choose to believe them or not.

The main point is that USSR were strong enough economically to survive and push back the Germans. What they did lack in technology, they made up for in numbers. They had the capabilities to build more tanks in a month than Hitler fielded throughout the entire war. Hitler _had_ occupied most of Europe, but he was stretched waaaaaay too thin. After all, MOST of his lost battles were because of the poor logistics: the war in Africa was lost because of logistics; then he ended up fighting a 3-front war: Western Europe, N Africa, and USSR. He simply did not have the manpower, the economical strength, the communication and transporting infrastructure, to cover all this area, or even the resources.

(USSR's oil fields were also behind Caucasusl Hitler failed to get them. - this in reply to earlier posts).

Afrikakorps were defeated because they simply had no more ammo, provisions, oil, etc, etc.
Same in USSR. What with the winter and poor transportation conditions and possibly poor management of resources, the German troops weren't getting nearly enough supplies and reinforcements.

Occupying Europe combined with the Nazi mentality did not fare all that well for the Germans either. Sure, _theoretically_ they had access to all the occupied countries' resources and manpower, but:
- they couldn't use the resources as much as they would have liked because of the continuous sabotages and such. There were resistance movements in most (if not all) occupied countries. Of course those movements alone could not push the Germans out of the country, but they could harass them constantly, force them to keep significant occupation forces committed away from the front lines, and cause significant economical damages (sabotages).
- their manpower was stretched too thin as well. Partly, this was because of their silly Arian ideology: they wouldn't enlist "Untermensch", which is what they called non-Arian races.
Of all the "tolerated", or accepted races (e.g. Germanic, Scandinavian, latin), a lot of the forcefully recruited men were reluctant, deserted a lot, and were poorly equipped. Sure, the Soviets didn't have much better morale (they weren't all happy to fight Stalin's war), but keep in mind they were much better motivated by 2-3 decades of indoctrination, and by fear, which the under-occupation peoples did not have.

Well, the arguments can go on and on and on, and there are certainly some questions that we'll probably never know the answer to (was Stalin planning an invasion of Europe ? apparently so; why _did_ Hitler turn to USSR when he wasn't done in Europe or Africa ? did Stalin bait Hitler, provoking him into declaring war (remember they were _allies_; they had split Poland between them a couple of year earlier); and many more, along with a bunch of really controversial actions (if not downright stupid) both Stalin and Hitler did.

But this has been a long post anyway, and I don't want you to fall asleep.

[Don Corleone]

I'm moving a post over from the tavern that discusses my views, even though they're not quite directly targeted at the question on this thread:

I believe the point Goofball is trying to make, and correct me if I'm wrong, was that this notion that Europe was being overrun left and right in 1942 and that we single-handedly saved them, while it makes for nice John Wayne movies, leaves a few choice details out.

Yes, the Nazi regime had occupied almost all of mainland Europe. What they didn't take of Scandinavia (Sweden) was pretty much on board with their policies anyways (sorry, I have to call them as I see them). The French, Greeks, Danes and Norwegians did offer resistance, sure, but while it was heroic and commendable, they just didn't have the capability to seriuosly injure the Nazi war machine.

That being said, while yes, we played a key role, it's very short sighted to ignore the contributions of the Canadians, the Russians (yes, they started on the wrong side, but hey, they saw the light) and all of the resistance groups. We did a great service to Europe in WWII, but they likewise did a great service to us. It's insulting to our former allies to suggest they played little to no role and that it was a mano-a-mano slugfest between us and Hitler.

All of this still leaves a big gap and I've saved the best for last. If you ever want a lesson on heroism, courage and determination, you should read some of the accounts of what was going on in Fortress Britannia during those 6 years (including the 2 we weren't helping them). Their shipping was being constricted by Nazi wolfpacks operating out of Norway, Britany and Ireland (translation, they had the Brits surrounded). They took pounding after pounding, beating after beating. At times they actually encouraged the Luftwaffe to bomb population centers and toughed it out so that the RAF fields were safe. They played to Hitler's ego and they won, but they paid a terrible, awful price. Civilian casualties were at levels previously unheard of. Churchill's speeches weren't just good chat, it was the words of a great leader telling his people they had two options, fight or die. They did both, but in the end, they came up victorious. Think Leonidas at Thermopylae. I know that sounds dramatic, but the UK had no reason to believe we would finally ride out of our own fortress and come to their aid until we finally did. I know it's a popular joke about the French would be speaking German now if it wasn't for us, and perhaps that's true. But trust me, if Britain had fallen before we had gotten into the war, we would have been too.

[Don Corleone]

I don't think UK could have defeated the Nazis. I'm not sure how much longer they could have held out, the Nazis were really starting to cut into their shipping and if the US followed a strict neutrality policy, ala Sweden, I believe the UK would have been a non-player by late 1942, not for lack of trying.

Interesting question about Soviet Union and whether they would have been able to defeat the Nazis on their own. I'd have to go back and do some serious analyses on just how many men/tanks/guns etc were tied up in North Africa and also how bad the logistics of transporting them there from Europe slowed Hitler down.

An interesting thought that doesn't get covered much... by 1941 most Germans realized they had unelashed a monster and there's some evidence that there were some early assination attempts even before the Germans got stymied. The drug Hitler was feeding the people was victory, and if he had to deprive them of it for a while (UK holes up and is a minor victory, but they haven't overrun the island, things drag out out on the Steppes) I wonder how long popular opinion would have kept the Third Reich in power. I mean, don't get me wrong, the Nazis wrote the book on counter-insurgency tactics, those people were governed harshly, but a war machine like that... even a soft rebellion (production slows, recruiting slows, generals start making 'mistakes') could have had big consequences.

Personally, at the end of it all, I believe that if the US didn't enter the war when it did, Rommell would have fortified Normandy and Brittany against UK and then just proceeded to periodically bomb them to keep them soft, let the wolfpacks do their work. I can't imagine the UK invading Europe in light of that. The Nazis then would have been free to shift multiple divsions and air wings over to the Eastern front. I think it would have been really rough, and the steamroller ride would have been over, but in the end, I think the USSR would have fallen. So much of the industrial production in the USSR was in Ukraine, Belarus and the Baltic states, they never would have been able to keep up. I can even imagine the Germans falling back but destroying all those facilities, only to reinvade 6 months later. After USSR was finished, Hitler would have pressed into China from the NW to help the Japanese.

Does anyone know if Hitler had ever arranged an agreement with the Japanese regarding the Berring Straits? Eventually, Canada and the US would have been dealt with and there's only way into North America, especially given naval capablities back then.... through Alaska. Maybe they would have fought each other over who would get North America?

[spmetla]

Diverting abit again let me touch a bit on the Soviets.

I firmly believe that the Germans could never have conquered and occupied the entire USSR, it's not just theory its a logistical impossibity but I do believe it would be possible for them to take everything up the Ural Mts. Here's why:

The Communist party was fairly tight knit but it was also a very competitive organization. If Stalin were to lose the major cities then I believe he would be promptly done away with. He was certainly disliked by the Army officer corps and almost all intellectuals not to mention by several of the top leaders of the Communist party.

The Communist party of the Soviets was an Urban based party. In the countryside their support was out of support for Russia not communism. According to the accounts Col Hans von Luck, a german Recon Officer when the Germans invaded the USSR in the countryside they would occasionaly come across the odd hamlet or village that didn't even know that the Czar had been killed all those years ago. Also like most farmers the people in the country side were religeous people and the communist party's forbiding of religeous practice was a major cause for lack of support in rural areas, Stalin later caught on to this and allowed the churches to be reopened for the duration of the war.

Although all Soviet industry was promptly moved to the Ural Mts it was not up to full capacity until late 1942, up to this point the Soviets were using primarily outdated tanks from the 30s and lend lease tanks that the Brits and Americans could spare, primarily MatildaIIs and later on American Sherman tanks.
Tank productions: http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionar...rld%20War%20II

Aircraft production: http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionar...t%20production

If the Germans had been able to divert the majority of their western and mediterrean Luftwaffe and Wehrmacht forces by early to mid 1942 they would probably have been able to get just enough man power there just early enough to capture Leningrad or Stalingrad I firmly believe that the rest of European Russia would have fallen.

And to help back up my theory check this page out:
http://www.angelfire.com/ct/ww2europe/stats.html
Scroll down, it has a whole bunch of useful statistics. Using this site you can really see some of the economics of the war.

[gaelic cowboy]

It isn't that straightforward though, is it? Several times British and American troops strayed south of the border and instead of being interned (which they should have been) they were returned to the North, so were the Irish that worried about invasion?

I suspect that plans were considered by the British to invade the Eire, but they probably thought that if they couldn't contol the South in 1922, it would be more trouble than it was worth in the 40's. My understanding is that, surprisingly perhaps, given the number of Irish Americans, the USA were more serious about these plans. They had no direct experience of the Troubles in the 20's.

Correct De Valera pursued a policy of shall we say official neutrality while quietly lending a hand to England in a subtle way ie any info gained about german nationals or agents in Ireland was passed on to the UK. Incidently a nice factoid for you all the weather forecast predicting good weather on D Day was from the Belmullet weather station in my native Mayo. Any allied troops accidently landing on Irish soil with very little fuss found themselves back in the north soon enough. Thankfully both our countries were spared invasion whatever about England we had little chance I'm afraid.

[CrackedAxe]

Nope the UK could not have done it. Thanks to Chamberlains pre-war appeasement approach to Hitler, Nazi Germany was free to gather a massive military machine while the UK buried its head in the sand, beleiving war could be avoided through diplomacy, and didn't arm itself to the huge degree needed. Consider what happened to the British Expeditionary Force at Dunkirk.

Germany was still doomed though, without intervention from the US. It never recovered from the disastrous invasion of the USSR, and had no hope of defending against the soviets counter invasion. Even if it had been able to pull extra divisions away from France and 'Fortress Europe' to meet them, The Soviets offensive at this point was probably pretty much unstoppable.

[fenir]

Hmmmm Ok all this informatiion is freely available if you request it from the national records of each country.
This has also been thrashed to heck.

1. The GDP figures that where orginally posted have been long ago been declared invalid, as the UK was the only western nation to actually achieve full national war mobility. That is it quit nearly ever industry to concentrate on war production. No other nation, not even Germany was able to achieve this. The only other country was the USSR. USSR also produced more tanks than the USA, and under more extreme conditions. And with a 1/4 of the GDP, don't figure does it. whereas germany produce only a 1/4 of the USSR prodcution, yet was kicking the **** outa them.


2, it also does not take into account the rest of the British empire, see the national archives in the UK. Or the Overseas terrorities of the other nations.
Remember after the Germans had taken the rest of France, (vichy France), the overseas territories delcared themselves Free French, bringing Huge resources to the allied side. and Large amounts of Troops and material.

3. You have also not included, GDP's of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, The Indian Empire and the rest of the empire.
Also not included is the British and Canadian governments setting up of production in canada, while tens of thousands left USA to work in Canada's new production facilities. Or the Americans that also travelled to the UK to fight in the British Forces or work in it's factories.

4. The British Commonwealth and Empire also controled the whole middle east after 1941. So nearly all the oil was in allied hands. Where is the GDP representing this?

5. by 1941 The Nazis knew there oil was running out, that is also true that the main German/Italian oil supplies from Hungary and Rumania had all but been used up by 1944, hence the conversion to Coal derived products. By 1945 the Russians arriving in these countries, the oil fields where more or less capped and declared empty, they remain that way today. Hence both Countries are net improters of Oil.

NOTE: The UK alone depended upon the sea for ~60 million tons of imports per annum, Excluding Oil Products, and had ~22 million tons of merchant shipping.

Also, pre war requirements worked out that to survive a total war, Britian would have to (excluding Oil products) have ~47 millions tons per annum of imports, however in 1942 Britian Survived, and was winning on ~22.9 million tons and ~10.7 million tons of Oil Products. Far less than any other nation. Hence the effectiveness of a wartime total mobility. Hence born the concept of " Total War", yes that is what it is called.

6. Germans Worked out that they would need ~350 U-Boats to defeat the British in the Atlantic. And have to sink ~750,000 Tons of Shipping per month to achieve this out come. They started the war with only 57 U-boats.
The highest they ever got was in April to June 1942, a 3 month period, when 2.2 millions tons of All allied shipping was sunk, that includes a feeding feast on unprotected USA shipping, espeically coastal shipping.
And that still fell short of the required total. By this stage the british yards where well and truely out stripping the Losses, and U-boat losses where very high, so high the production of the u-boats could not replace them.
Hence the ratio that for ever 5 U-boat seaman, 4 died.
By this time the British merchant fleet had grown even beyond it's prewar tonnage, can't remember the amount though. Then Add to that the French, Dutch, USA, Norwegian, and Greek, being the Biggest merchant navies.

7. By ~oct 1941 the British Shipping yards where producing so much shipping that they had actually outstripped the u-boat tonnage lost.
In other words the British where beating them at there own game. Also the amount of Frigates and destoryers being produced far out stripped U-boat production. And the U-boats by mid to late 1941 where being hunted extensively.
In fact the number of U-boats killed compared to tonnage sunk was climbing alarmingly, as the German production and high command (OKW)records show.

8. By ~1942 even the Germans had admitted they had failed in their objective.

9. The Uk sent a huge amount of it's war capacity to the USSR, long before the USA got into the mess. Thats a lot. The whole empire also sent food, so USSR could release more men to fight.

10.Sweden, from the records, the German high Command Considered Sweden to be too high a cost to take, because of it's high standing army and complusory conscription that had been going for years. They had Sweden in a postion where they had no place to go, so it was not like she was a huge threat, as Swedish forces where Defensive in nature. Therefore could not threaten the Axis at all.

11. all this is open public knowledge, it doesn't need to come from a opinion book. As most books these days are opinions rather than fact.
If you want to check any of this???? Go to your local university, join up, and do a micro finch request of different countries data and records, most, if not all, is now open to everyone as a matter of public domain.
Also note, Websites are hardly what most would call, informative, and espeically not concise.

Some thoughts only.
Would the USSR have beaten Hitler if the USA had not come into the war? maybe, mabye not. We don't know, because there are to many factors to consider, to many things that would have changed if it did not happen.
Would the allies with out the USA have had the strenght to happen upon a D-Day in 1944? I personally don't thing so.
Would the allies have eventually beaten Hitler? In my personal opinion, yes I believe they would have, it would have taken a lot more lives, and a lot more time, but yes it would have happened eventually. based on the data that we have today. Hind sight is a wonderful thing.

Japan however posses another problem, the Japanese Knew they could not take European Asian territory without having a confrontation with the USA, as showen by the USA's diplomatic missions regarding Japanese postions in French Indo-China, so regardless of the circumstances any action by the Japanese, this would have brought the USA into the war. As it would threaten the USA's sphere of Influence. And left them In a very dangerous pridictament within the Philipines.
But who does the world owe for there freedoms from the 2nd world war? The USA? The British? Most say the UK,( most outside the USA that is), as they carried the world on there shoulders for 3 years before the USA came in.
Alot say the USSR, because she carried the greatest blunt of the war on it's people, and it's country.
I would say every single person that got out there and did some fighting, some little bit of help, even just by giving a peice of bread to hungary allied solider, or, simply worked their hearts out to give their and other troops the best equipment they could. Or even just buying war bonds to help their and others countries.
The world owes it's freedoms to each other, for standing up against an enemy who sort to impose upon us, their thoughts on what they decided was right, instead of asking us.
Kinda makes us think of today doesn't it? Appleasement again, that every western country has been involved in, at the expense of their own people.
We, this generation, owe the last generation a great debt. Even for all the stupid things that happened to cuase the leed up to the war.

We could what if all we like, what if the Anti-war demostrators had not been listened to, and france and the British Empire had started to Rearm earlier? What if the polictical left had not sort to allow Hitler to reoccipe the Rhine? What if the allies had not given in to Hitler and handed the Czech's over? Mind u ~25-30% of Czechslovkia was German.

What if Wilson had actually had a real look at the new Countries they made after the 1st World war, that was a main cause of the 2nd world war?
Rumania got translavania, which was Hungarian, or the large amounts of Hungarians left out of their own Country in Czehslovakia, ~ 15 - 20% by redrawing Countries boundries, or the Rumanians left out of their country, in Moldavia. Lots of reasons to go to war there? It's like removing California, and giving it to Mexico.
Or the real Problem, The large German populations In modern Solevnia, Czechslovkia, and Poland, and even France. (around Strasbourg, lots of them, they are still today about 1.9 Million of them). They speak what the french call Alsatian. Yes, like the Dog. Otherwise known as German Shepard.

Anyway just some food for thought, and some information.

fenir
have a nice day.

[ShadesPanther]

Very well witten fenir.

I do believe that the Allies would have won, eventually. But there are alot of factors that could make either side win.
eg. If Germany reached the Caucaus oilfields would that have made the war effort different. But, It probaly would be set on fire unless the Germans surprised them. It really is hard to say. But really When the Luftwaffe lost the Battle of Britain Britain was safe from invasion.

There are some very key moments during the war. eg. When the British routed the Italians in 1940, They could have marched on to Tripoli and completely knocked the Italians out of North Africa as they had no troops there, only fragmented, retreating, demoralised men. Rommel would not have been sent or if he was would a much larger German force be sent?

[English assassin]

As an aside, I'm glad Fenrir made the point about the percentage of production devoted to war material. I've always thought it very interesting that the Nazi German republic had to devote fair more of its production to civilian goods than the democratic UK. I saw another set of figures that showed that after seven months of war (which is to say before anything except the Poland campaign) the UK achieved a percentage of GDP devoted to war production that the Germans did not match until 1944.

This suggests to me that the populations of both the UK, and indeed the USSR, were much more motivated to win the war than the German population.

I can't add anything nearly as well reasoned as the posts above on the main subject of the thread, so I will simply say without arguing the points that I do not think the Germans could ever have defeated the Russians, that I am sure they could not have invaded the UK, and that without the US as at least a friendly neutral providing shiioping and supplies on easy terms the UK would not have been able to amass the supplies, oil etc for any offensive operations in continental Europe, and would have been in serious trouble in the middle east.

[ShadesPanther]

I believe the introduction of Women workers is quite important. With a bit of training and a short period of time they could equal the production of men but also more men are available to fight.

The Nazis believed that women were best at the home so they used men Aand this only really changed late in the war with the introduction of some women workers and alot of slave labour