raharris1973
Well-known member
Here's a topic for discussion and debate -
I'll assert that if America hadn't become a belligerent in the Great War, Hitler and a genocidal Nazi regime wouldn't and couldn't have taken control over Germany, invaded most of Europe and implemented a partly successful genocide.
....more simply put - If America hadn't entered WWI, Hitler & Nazis wouldn't and couldn't have taken power, invaded Europe & done the Holocaust.
[consider this Part 2 of my 'Blame America first' pair]
After all American intervention in the war and Wilson's rhetoric about 'peace without victory' amplified themes, aspirations, and legitimacy of self-determination globally, and encouraged false hopes of leniency among the German people and officials. Without this rhetoric German self-deception about the meaning of surrender or armistice on Allied terms would have been harder and the terms of Versailles less surprising.
While it is debatable whether it was decisive in the final outcome of forcing Germany to armistice on terms Allied advantage/German abject disadvantage, American belligerency certainly boosted the resources and confidence of the Entente powers and helped remove thoughts of having to consider compromises from Allied leaders' minds. Without America providing unlimited supplies of men, horses, supplies, and unsecured loans from 1917, the Allies might have compromised, or, like General Haig proposed, accepted less severe armistice terms not forcing the occupation of the Rhineland & Rhine bridgeheads & leaving the retreated German Army with more weapons, leaving it all less helpless & with more autonomy autonomy to shape its eastern borders with the Poles and Czechs and Austria.
American belligerency in the war, and the fact of the Americans being 'over there' post-war for the peace conference and a (limited duration) occupation of the Rhineland allowed the United States to join Britain in (supposedly) credibly promising France a 25-year treaty of Anglo-Franco-American alliance in exchange for France dropping its preference to either annex the Rhineland or prop up a separatist Rhineland puppet state as a buffer with Germany. If only the British were in position to press the French and promise the carrot of alliance while America was a military nullity in Europe, France might have done as much as it physically could in the Rhineland, possibly a multi-decade protectorate. The Americans and British both reneged on the alliance promise to France.
American belligerency in the war, and America's vast resource contribution, probably gave both the major Entente/Allied powers, and the smaller and newer nations benefitting from the collapse of the Central Powers and the Russian Empire, an exaggerated sense of the strength and permanence of the post-Armistice and Versailles order as written and mapped out. Without that American influence, Britain and France might have accomodated Italian or Russian aspirations more. Smaller, newer nations might have anticipated futures with a resurgent Russia and Germany and been more selective about how many and which neighbors to have territorial disputes with.
US belligerency allowed a further explosion of war debt from Europe to America, via unsecured loans. Without unsecured loans, the Allies couldn't have gone much deeper into debt than they'd gotten by early 1917, with loans backed by collateral. The Allies would have had to source more materiel internally, tax more or requisition more assets, sell more foreign collateral, tighten their belts more, reduce peripheral efforts to keep up the war effort. They could consequently win or lose or draw, but they'd sure try to win and hadn't been cut to the bone or had a turnip winter yet (at least west of Russia). As it was, while accumulated date through early 1917 was quite serious, combined with the additional debts from the remainder of the war, they haunted economies for decades and encouraged the Depression which encouraged the rise of Nazism.
Without unsecured loans being extended from spring 1917, and hopeful American rhetoric (and optimism about US participation) indeed the Russian Provisional Government and its leading parties might not have been able to delude themselves into thinking a continuation of the war was even possible, making it more likely they would quit the war with Germany before the establishment of a one-party Bolshevik state, and all the knock-on consequences of that, which ended up being favorable for Red Scares and European Fascism and Nazism.
In short, without American intervention in WWI, the alternative futures you get, in descending order of probability, are:
1. A 1919 Entente victory that is nearly a peace of equals, with an armistice on less harsh terms. Germany loses all its colonies, all the Central Powers Empires fall apart, Russia had quit the war in fall 1917 and given up Poland and Lithuania doing it, the Poles and Lithuanians now de-puppetize themselves and the Czechs set up their own state, but the Germans can set up eastern borders incorporating the Polish corridor, Sudetenland and German Austria. In the west, they have had to fall back from France, including Alsace-Lorraine, Belgium, and the Saar, but no further. They've had to party disarm heavy weapons and fortifications and agree to reparations in order to get the blockade lifted, and exiled the Kaiser and liberalized the constitution but not overthrown the monarchy.
Later day Germany, Britain, and France are all more concerned with rebuilding than with European territorial gain or colonies. Germany resents its fairly unique lack of colonies, but sublimates it by paying lip service to colonial independence movements. Germany does not have any border claims to make on a self-determination basis.. And nostalgia for lost land in France and Denmark is not enough to inspire war.
2. A 1919 Entente victory where the armistice terms match those of OTL 1918, and the Entente follows a French-driven policy maintaining a seperate Rhhineland protectorate and supporting a cordon of states east of Germany. Germany is simply bludgeoned and blockaded into accepting Allied armistice terms that enable imposition of such a harsh peace, because of exhaustion and internal unrest. Although Britain sees the French-directed order as less than ideal, they tolerate it because they know France is their only available partner. In the 4 decades ahead, France and its eastern allies, sometimes supported by Italy, reliably keep Germany in line.
3. A genuine peace of equals - either a precise, or near-precise reversion to status quo ante-bellum, or a finely equitable horse trade of equally valuable territories and assets. Boths sides step out of the war feeling it was quite futile., especially in the first instance.
4. German victory - Germany imposes territorial cessions on Belgium, France, and Italy, possibly restores some colonies, and forces Britain to suspend the war and blockade. Germany's preoccupation going forward is protecting its dominat position in Europe and buffer states, not new expansion. It never gets motivated to mass murder its own citizens/subjects or those of its puppets/clients.
---
The counter-argument I suppose would be that Hitler and the Nazis, or an equally murderous leader/party could come to lead Germany to conquest and genocide even under somewhat altered circumstances. Perhaps in scenario #4, victorious Wilhelmine Germany could have evolved into something as genocidal as the Nazis. Perhaps in scenarios 1-3, a different power, maybe a Soviet Union or Russian dictatorial regime , would have committed a Europe wide 'Red Alert conquest or a genocidal pogrom. Or to turn away from usual suspects, maybe Anglo-French imperialists would atomically massacre colonial subjects rather than let them win independence. Or in some of the more evenly matched endings to the Great War, perhaps a cycle of endless rematches and intermitted Cold War in between leads to European and possibly global immolation from multi-sided atomic warfare at close quarters developing in its midst. But I feel like I am working kind of hard to top OTL here.
See attached poll, respond to it. Articulate on the thoughts behind your vote in this thread!
Did Woodrow Wilson and his Uncle Sam give the world the 'gift' of the torchlight Nuremburg rallies, Anschluss, WWII, the Holocaust, and Generalplan Ost, not to mention the Cold War aftertaste, or could Germany and the rest of the world done as bad all by itself? Was there more than one way to skin this cat? What thinks you?
I'll assert that if America hadn't become a belligerent in the Great War, Hitler and a genocidal Nazi regime wouldn't and couldn't have taken control over Germany, invaded most of Europe and implemented a partly successful genocide.
....more simply put - If America hadn't entered WWI, Hitler & Nazis wouldn't and couldn't have taken power, invaded Europe & done the Holocaust.
[consider this Part 2 of my 'Blame America first' pair]
After all American intervention in the war and Wilson's rhetoric about 'peace without victory' amplified themes, aspirations, and legitimacy of self-determination globally, and encouraged false hopes of leniency among the German people and officials. Without this rhetoric German self-deception about the meaning of surrender or armistice on Allied terms would have been harder and the terms of Versailles less surprising.
While it is debatable whether it was decisive in the final outcome of forcing Germany to armistice on terms Allied advantage/German abject disadvantage, American belligerency certainly boosted the resources and confidence of the Entente powers and helped remove thoughts of having to consider compromises from Allied leaders' minds. Without America providing unlimited supplies of men, horses, supplies, and unsecured loans from 1917, the Allies might have compromised, or, like General Haig proposed, accepted less severe armistice terms not forcing the occupation of the Rhineland & Rhine bridgeheads & leaving the retreated German Army with more weapons, leaving it all less helpless & with more autonomy autonomy to shape its eastern borders with the Poles and Czechs and Austria.
American belligerency in the war, and the fact of the Americans being 'over there' post-war for the peace conference and a (limited duration) occupation of the Rhineland allowed the United States to join Britain in (supposedly) credibly promising France a 25-year treaty of Anglo-Franco-American alliance in exchange for France dropping its preference to either annex the Rhineland or prop up a separatist Rhineland puppet state as a buffer with Germany. If only the British were in position to press the French and promise the carrot of alliance while America was a military nullity in Europe, France might have done as much as it physically could in the Rhineland, possibly a multi-decade protectorate. The Americans and British both reneged on the alliance promise to France.
American belligerency in the war, and America's vast resource contribution, probably gave both the major Entente/Allied powers, and the smaller and newer nations benefitting from the collapse of the Central Powers and the Russian Empire, an exaggerated sense of the strength and permanence of the post-Armistice and Versailles order as written and mapped out. Without that American influence, Britain and France might have accomodated Italian or Russian aspirations more. Smaller, newer nations might have anticipated futures with a resurgent Russia and Germany and been more selective about how many and which neighbors to have territorial disputes with.
US belligerency allowed a further explosion of war debt from Europe to America, via unsecured loans. Without unsecured loans, the Allies couldn't have gone much deeper into debt than they'd gotten by early 1917, with loans backed by collateral. The Allies would have had to source more materiel internally, tax more or requisition more assets, sell more foreign collateral, tighten their belts more, reduce peripheral efforts to keep up the war effort. They could consequently win or lose or draw, but they'd sure try to win and hadn't been cut to the bone or had a turnip winter yet (at least west of Russia). As it was, while accumulated date through early 1917 was quite serious, combined with the additional debts from the remainder of the war, they haunted economies for decades and encouraged the Depression which encouraged the rise of Nazism.
Without unsecured loans being extended from spring 1917, and hopeful American rhetoric (and optimism about US participation) indeed the Russian Provisional Government and its leading parties might not have been able to delude themselves into thinking a continuation of the war was even possible, making it more likely they would quit the war with Germany before the establishment of a one-party Bolshevik state, and all the knock-on consequences of that, which ended up being favorable for Red Scares and European Fascism and Nazism.
In short, without American intervention in WWI, the alternative futures you get, in descending order of probability, are:
1. A 1919 Entente victory that is nearly a peace of equals, with an armistice on less harsh terms. Germany loses all its colonies, all the Central Powers Empires fall apart, Russia had quit the war in fall 1917 and given up Poland and Lithuania doing it, the Poles and Lithuanians now de-puppetize themselves and the Czechs set up their own state, but the Germans can set up eastern borders incorporating the Polish corridor, Sudetenland and German Austria. In the west, they have had to fall back from France, including Alsace-Lorraine, Belgium, and the Saar, but no further. They've had to party disarm heavy weapons and fortifications and agree to reparations in order to get the blockade lifted, and exiled the Kaiser and liberalized the constitution but not overthrown the monarchy.
Later day Germany, Britain, and France are all more concerned with rebuilding than with European territorial gain or colonies. Germany resents its fairly unique lack of colonies, but sublimates it by paying lip service to colonial independence movements. Germany does not have any border claims to make on a self-determination basis.. And nostalgia for lost land in France and Denmark is not enough to inspire war.
2. A 1919 Entente victory where the armistice terms match those of OTL 1918, and the Entente follows a French-driven policy maintaining a seperate Rhhineland protectorate and supporting a cordon of states east of Germany. Germany is simply bludgeoned and blockaded into accepting Allied armistice terms that enable imposition of such a harsh peace, because of exhaustion and internal unrest. Although Britain sees the French-directed order as less than ideal, they tolerate it because they know France is their only available partner. In the 4 decades ahead, France and its eastern allies, sometimes supported by Italy, reliably keep Germany in line.
3. A genuine peace of equals - either a precise, or near-precise reversion to status quo ante-bellum, or a finely equitable horse trade of equally valuable territories and assets. Boths sides step out of the war feeling it was quite futile., especially in the first instance.
4. German victory - Germany imposes territorial cessions on Belgium, France, and Italy, possibly restores some colonies, and forces Britain to suspend the war and blockade. Germany's preoccupation going forward is protecting its dominat position in Europe and buffer states, not new expansion. It never gets motivated to mass murder its own citizens/subjects or those of its puppets/clients.
---
The counter-argument I suppose would be that Hitler and the Nazis, or an equally murderous leader/party could come to lead Germany to conquest and genocide even under somewhat altered circumstances. Perhaps in scenario #4, victorious Wilhelmine Germany could have evolved into something as genocidal as the Nazis. Perhaps in scenarios 1-3, a different power, maybe a Soviet Union or Russian dictatorial regime , would have committed a Europe wide 'Red Alert conquest or a genocidal pogrom. Or to turn away from usual suspects, maybe Anglo-French imperialists would atomically massacre colonial subjects rather than let them win independence. Or in some of the more evenly matched endings to the Great War, perhaps a cycle of endless rematches and intermitted Cold War in between leads to European and possibly global immolation from multi-sided atomic warfare at close quarters developing in its midst. But I feel like I am working kind of hard to top OTL here.
See attached poll, respond to it. Articulate on the thoughts behind your vote in this thread!
Did Woodrow Wilson and his Uncle Sam give the world the 'gift' of the torchlight Nuremburg rallies, Anschluss, WWII, the Holocaust, and Generalplan Ost, not to mention the Cold War aftertaste, or could Germany and the rest of the world done as bad all by itself? Was there more than one way to skin this cat? What thinks you?