• Hi Guest!

    The costs of running this forum are covered by Sea Lion Press. If you'd like to help support the company and the forum, visit patreon.com/sealionpress

What would a Post Nazi Maximum Reich be like?

varyar

giver of existential dread
Patreon supporter
Published by SLP
Location
Western New York
By Maximum Reich, I mean one where Germany annexes Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, large parts of northern and eastern France, most of Switzerland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Poland, bits of northern Yugoslavia, and the USSR out to the Urals. Probably ASB, but let's allow it for the basis of discussion. Eventually, the Nazi Party (probably for economic reasons, because good luck on that front with your ideology of choice) loses control and is replaced. What happens now? It's 2020 and the non-German 'Germanic' areas have undergone several generations of brutal assimilation. Slavs have been assimilated, murdered or expelled, but aside from western and central Poland and maybe the Baltic areas, the Greater East is fairly thinly populated by 'Germanic' settlers concentrated in cities and towns instead of a flood of yeoman farmers tilling the land.

How much toothpaste can be put back in the tube? Can the rump-USSR/Russia reestablish control over its pre-1941 territories? What about the smaller countries with their tiny, unknown governments in exile?
 
It would be nice to imagine a wave of romantic nationalism following the collapse in Western Europe but it’s difficult to imagine, if memory serves in the own world a large part of the Swedish population were relocated east to deliberately prevent this from happening and I could see similar population transfers making this very difficult to get off the ground. Then again the Anglo-Americans and/or Italy might force a German withdrawal as part of the terms of any bailout for the new regime.

As for the east, it’s going to be hard for rump-USSR/Russia to reestablish control of areas where the Slavic peoples have been systematically murdered to the extent they no longer exist as a recognisable culture. Naturally there’s the option of just invading and forcing the Germans out but that might not be feasible with a German successor regime that’s likely to still have nuclear weapons.
 
Naturally there’s the option of just invading and forcing the Germans out but that might not be feasible with a German successor regime that’s likely to still have nuclear weapons.

I could see "nibbles", for lack of a better word, at least. More brazen barely-disguised "partisans", genuine partisans who are better-supplied and organized than the usual, and/or a combination, used to grab a bigger chunk of something too small (at least at first) to be an existential threat of any kind but bigger than what was managed before. That chunk is more of a political item than anything else, but it could have large ripple effects.
 
If the Nazis have gone several decades before falling, the exile governments probably can't do anything - they're no longer going to have any legitimacy in the homeland. The monarchs could be an exception, as in Spain, in some countries and the post-Nazi governments can go "look, the monarch's back, we're turning a corner, isn't that good?" But the longer the Reich lasted, the harder I'd think that'd be to happen.

A wave of nationalism seems likely, probably with some nasty murders, but would that nationalism fit the old borders? The French parts back to France, fine, and the Netherlands probably want to go back to being that; Belgium could be forever split in two; Switzerland may be a mess because of decades of ethnic divisions being ramped up, and bits will want to go to German, France, or Italy; Poland and the annexed bits of Yugoslavia won't have many Poles and Slavs left above the ground, creating a whole new country from whoever's still there if the Aryans don't leave.

The Scandinavian parts might go back to their old national borders, but then again, they were considered Good Aryan Volks. How many want to leave the Reich where they were partly on top and a large number of young people grew up swimming in Nazi ideology? If some do and some don't, do you get partition? In 2020, is Germany having to deal with the politics of a regional parliament split between the Democratic Aryan Party and Sinn Dane?
 
Lots of good ideas here. I think people suggesting the situation will largely be pro-German in the end are correct. The peripheral areas of Scandinavia are most likely to get independence under the old borders, as is the Settlement Zone of eastern France (in my TL, at least, not many settlers in the Settlement Zone). Denmark and the Netherlands are likely to be too assimilated to escape, while Belgium is probably split along the main ethnic line. The Walloons might join France simply for security's sake as there's no guarantee post-Nazi Germany is going to be friendly. Eastern Europe is just a mess, a sad mess, with the Germans insisting on their right to ownership as 'all the Slavs are long gone' - which is essentially true. OTOH, outside the cities, there's not many Germanics on the ground, either. Likely to be some ugliness around those facts.
 
By Maximum Reich, I mean one where Germany annexes Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, large parts of northern and eastern France, most of Switzerland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Poland, bits of northern Yugoslavia, and the USSR out to the Urals. Probably ASB, but let's allow it for the basis of discussion. Eventually, the Nazi Party (probably for economic reasons, because good luck on that front with your ideology of choice) loses control and is replaced. What happens now? It's 2020 and the non-German 'Germanic' areas have undergone several generations of brutal assimilation. Slavs have been assimilated, murdered or expelled, but aside from western and central Poland and maybe the Baltic areas, the Greater East is fairly thinly populated by 'Germanic' settlers concentrated in cities and towns instead of a flood of yeoman farmers tilling the land.

How much toothpaste can be put back in the tube? Can the rump-USSR/Russia reestablish control over its pre-1941 territories? What about the smaller countries with their tiny, unknown governments in exile?
If this Greater German Reich will have nuclear weapons--and especially lots of them--then I really don't see this rump-USSR/Russia actually being able to do anything about this. After all, it's certainly not going to be willing to risk a nuclear war and thus MAD in order to try reacquiring its old homeland (however attached and sentimental to it the Russians might still be). Even the Palestinians would probably be unwilling to risk this in real life if they actually had nuclear weapons. So, ultimately, the status quo in the East is unfortunately going to be likely to remain for a very long time--possibly even permanently. Obviously if the rump-USSR/Russia won't be able to restore its old borders, then neither will countries such as Poland (due to them having much less people than the rump-USSR/Russia has). What I could see would be a movement among extreme German left-wingers to allow for a mass Slavic "right of return" to Eastern Europe, but just like advocacy for a mass Palestinian "right of return" to Israel proper is considered a fringe movement in Israel in real life (at least among Israeli Jews), such a mass Slavic "right of return" movement to Eastern Europe would likewise probably be considered a fringe movement in Greater Germany in this scenario--at least among Greater Germany's German population, who are likely to be the ones who are going to make the decisions in regards to this.

The one thing that I could see is a post-Nazi German regime slowing down the rate of Slavic expulsions due to the fact that it might very well become aware that it might need to keep some Slavic manpower in the farms of Eastern Europe in order to prevent those farms from completely collapsing. As you said, some Germans might move to the cities and suburbs of Eastern Europe, but probably not to the farms of Eastern Europe unless forced to do so at gunpoint--or unless they will move there in order to be farm managers as opposed to farm workers (since being farm workers would probably be perceived as being a job for "those lowly Slavs"--not for "Aryan Ubermensch" like the Germans).

Another thing that I want to point out here is that while the farms and rural areas of Eastern Europe are likely to remain relatively empty (with the exception of the bare minimum of Slavic manpower that's actually necessary to sustain things such as farms, foresting industries, et cetera), over the centuries, Germany's birth rate should gradually increase due to "breeders" becoming a larger and larger percentage of Germany's total population. (You can actually see this pattern occurring among Israeli Jews even right now as their high-fertility groups appear to become a larger and larger percentage of their total population with each and every generation.) Unlike Israel (with its extremely small amount of Lebensraum), Greater Germany will certainly be (like both Canada and the United States of America) in an especially favorable situation in regards to this due to all of the vast Lebensraum that it will have at its disposal in this scenario. So, over the centuries, you might very well see tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of Germans live in Eastern Europe--but again, primarily in the cities and suburbs rather than in rural areas. This certainly won't happen by the year 2020 (since there will be nowhere near enough time for this to occur yet)--but maybe it will happen by the year 2500 or the year 3000. Seriously.
 
Last edited:
It would be nice to imagine a wave of romantic nationalism following the collapse in Western Europe but it’s difficult to imagine, if memory serves in the own world a large part of the Swedish population were relocated east to deliberately prevent this from happening and I could see similar population transfers making this very difficult to get off the ground.

Can you please elaborate on the part about the Swedish population being relocated east?

Then again the Anglo-Americans and/or Italy might force a German withdrawal as part of the terms of any bailout for the new regime.

Frankly, I strongly don't think that any post-Nazi German government would actually be willing to agree to this in the event of a Nazi victory in WWII. After all, the West can't even get Russia to withdraw from tiny Crimea--and you expect them to be able to get Germany to withdraw from the extremely massive amount of Lebensraum that Hitler acquired for it and that is meant to turn it into a superpower like the US is? Yeah, not happening.

Even if Germany will experience a severe financial crash and/or crisis after the ouster/fall of the Nazis, it should be capable of dealing with this. After all, it has plenty of smart people, high human capital, as well as plenty of resources in Europe (especially, but not only, in Eastern Europe) to loot. Sure, there might be some initial hardships and challenges--just like there were for Russia after 2014--but a country as capable as Germany should be capable of overcoming these hardships and challenges--at least if it will have sufficiently competent leadership.

As for the east, it’s going to be hard for rump-USSR/Russia to reestablish control of areas where the Slavic peoples have been systematically murdered to the extent they no longer exist as a recognisable culture. Naturally there’s the option of just invading and forcing the Germans out but that might not be feasible with a German successor regime that’s likely to still have nuclear weapons.

Yeah, any rump-Soviet/Russian attempt to reconquer its lost areas would very likely result in a nuclear war and in MAD. I strongly don't think that even a rump-USSR/Russia would actually want that. Ditto for the Palestinians if they actually had nuclear weapons.
 
I could see "nibbles", for lack of a better word, at least. More brazen barely-disguised "partisans", genuine partisans who are better-supplied and organized than the usual, and/or a combination, used to grab a bigger chunk of something too small (at least at first) to be an existential threat of any kind but bigger than what was managed before. That chunk is more of a political item than anything else, but it could have large ripple effects.
Frankly, if Nazi Germany's treatment of the Jews in real life is any indication, it would probably be willing to treat Slavic partisans in Eastern Europe extremely harshly. Honestly, even a post-Nazi German government might be willing to do this; after all, even the democratic French government was willing to engage in atrocities in Algeria in order to try maintaining its rule over the Algerians--and frankly, I suspect that Eastern Europe is going to be much more valuable to the Germans than Algeria was for the French. (It would also help that the Germans--unlike the French in Algeria in real life--would probably be quite willing to resort to mass ethnic cleansing or even worse than that if it meant getting rid of unpleasant demographic realities in their newly conquered territories. The French were thankfully never willing to expel the Algerians en masse and thus made it much harder for them to permanently hold onto Algeria without large-scale oppression.)
 
If the Nazis have gone several decades before falling, the exile governments probably can't do anything - they're no longer going to have any legitimacy in the homeland. The monarchs could be an exception, as in Spain, in some countries and the post-Nazi governments can go "look, the monarch's back, we're turning a corner, isn't that good?" But the longer the Reich lasted, the harder I'd think that'd be to happen.

Why exactly would a post-Nazi German government be particularly eager to restore former monarchies, though?

A wave of nationalism seems likely, probably with some nasty murders, but would that nationalism fit the old borders? The French parts back to France, fine,

TBH, if the French people are expelled from these territories en masse, even a post-Nazi German Reich might insist on keeping these territories. Plus, there is the whole issue of keeping these territories in order to punish France for declaring war on Germany back in 1939. Denmark and Norway would at least be innocent because they didn't actually declare war on Nazi Germany, but France did, in fact, do this.

and the Netherlands probably want to go back to being that; Belgium could be forever split in two; Switzerland may be a mess because of decades of ethnic divisions being ramped up, and bits will want to go to German, France, or Italy; Poland and the annexed bits of Yugoslavia won't have many Poles and Slavs left above the ground, creating a whole new country from whoever's still there if the Aryans don't leave.

TBH, I suspect that even a post-Nazi German Reich would be extremely unwilling to give up any of its conquered territories. I mean, just look at how reluctant France was to give up Algeria in real life, and that was when the demographics were much less favorable to France (something like 85+% of Algerians being Muslim) than they would likely be for Germany here since the French--unlike the Germans here--were thankfully unwilling to actually engage in mass ethnic cleansing and/or genocide in Algeria.

The Scandinavian parts might go back to their old national borders, but then again, they were considered Good Aryan Volks. How many want to leave the Reich where they were partly on top and a large number of young people grew up swimming in Nazi ideology? If some do and some don't, do you get partition? In 2020, is Germany having to deal with the politics of a regional parliament split between the Democratic Aryan Party and Sinn Dane?

Such a split sounds relatively plausible, actually. "Aryans" such as Danes, Dutch, Norwegians, and Swedes might be perceived as actually being "worthy" of secession from the Greater German Reich--unlike those "inferior" Slavs or perhaps even the French.
 
Some parts Germania might insist on keeping for strategic reasons. Crimea and Jutland, perhaps?
Why not keep as much of Germania as possible? After all, Germania doesn't need to be filled up with German settlers immediately. Rather, this could be done slowly over the course of several centuries or even longer than that. After all, there's no rush--is there?
 
Lots of good ideas here. I think people suggesting the situation will largely be pro-German in the end are correct. The peripheral areas of Scandinavia are most likely to get independence under the old borders,

Agreed.

as is the Settlement Zone of eastern France (in my TL, at least, not many settlers in the Settlement Zone).

Less sure about that--at least due to a desire to punish France for declaring war on Nazi Germany in 1939 if for nothing else. Also, a Greater German Reich can't have Danzig ... without also having Nanzig! :ROFLMAO:

Denmark and the Netherlands are likely to be too assimilated to escape,

Maybe; hard to say for sure.

while Belgium is probably split along the main ethnic line. The Walloons might join France simply for security's sake as there's no guarantee post-Nazi Germany is going to be friendly.

Agreed with all of this.

Eastern Europe is just a mess, a sad mess, with the Germans insisting on their right to ownership as 'all the Slavs are long gone' - which is essentially true. OTOH, outside the cities, there's not many Germanics on the ground, either. Likely to be some ugliness around those facts.

Please keep in mind, though, that Germania doesn't need to be filled up with German settlers immediately. Rather, this could be done slowly over the course of several centuries or even longer than that. After all, there's no rush--is there?
 
Here's one map--but it wasn't actually made by me:

https://images-wixmp-ed30a86b8c4ca8...0.lQcPUJlz70FqIreiSZaBIbHakn7OoEl8hcjOZXw7NaE

d6lcsby-d9dcacfd-19dc-42cc-82ad-59c5205cd2c3.png


The drop in the "Sub-Humans" population between 1949 and 1979 on this map is absolutely terrifying! :( :eek: :sick:
 
Why exactly would a post-Nazi German government be particularly eager to restore former monarchies, though?

Thinking more that when the Germans pull out, the monarchs slip in.

This and other theories are all based on the idea Germany goes "oh sod it" and does pull out, since as you say it is possible the Germans don't want to leave certain parts (like France). Or thinking about it, they could leave but it just so happens the government left behind is a very pro-German dominated one allowing German military bases and with Germanics staying in the rich neighbourhoods. "C'mon, France, you're independent again now, what's the problem?"
 
Thinking more that when the Germans pull out, the monarchs slip in.

This and other theories are all based on the idea Germany goes "oh sod it" and does pull out, since as you say it is possible the Germans don't want to leave certain parts (like France). Or thinking about it, they could leave but it just so happens the government left behind is a very pro-German dominated one allowing German military bases and with Germanics staying in the rich neighbourhoods. "C'mon, France, you're independent again now, what's the problem?"
Yes, I do suspect that if the Germans will withdraw from France, they would want to install a French government that is pliable to German interests before they leave. After all, Germany would certainly want a friendly or at least a neutral France after it withdraws from there. Of course, as I previously said, the fact that Germany might be willing to let most of France become independent does not necessarily mean that it would be willing to give up the northeastern territories of France that it previously acquired (specifically in 1940):

vichy.gif


Indeed, as I previously said, Germany might very well insist on permanently keeping the blue and at least most of the orange areas on this map as war spoils from France. After all, having Germany permanently keep the Holy Roman Empire's pre-1648 borders is probably going to sound much better to German ears than giving up these territories would.
 
I did have an official map made up for the setting a few years ago. Sapiento at the Other Place did his usual excellent job (with some small mistakes on my part):

https://www.deviantart.com/sapiento/art/Europe-2017-677335436
It's interesting that Slovakia is directly annexed to the German German Reich. I thought that it would be a nominally independent state like Hungary or Romania. Also, it would really suck for the Greater German Reich not to have control of Odessa. :(
 
It's interesting that Slovakia is directly annexed to the German German Reich. I thought that it would be a nominally independent state like Hungary or Romania. Also, it would really suck for the Greater German Reich not to have control of Odessa. :(

Slovakia got annexed largely because of certain late war developments in OTL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operational_Zone_of_the_Adriatic_Littoral

Admittedly, it's questionable, but in my timeline, when in doubt, the Nazis annex it.

As for Odessa, as it was annexed by Romania in OTL with German approval or at least acceptance, likewise here.
 
Slovakia got annexed largely because of certain late war developments in OTL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operational_Zone_of_the_Adriatic_Littoral

That's Slovenia; I was talking about Slovakia here.

Admittedly, it's questionable, but in my timeline, when in doubt, the Nazis annex it.

Yeah, I was talking about Slovakia--not Slovenia--here. Slovakia is the country right to the north of Hungary.

As for Odessa, as it was annexed by Romania in OTL with German approval or at least acceptance, likewise here.

Yes, I know--but from a German perspective, it still sucks to lose such a great port. Of course, I suppose that the Germans could always build another similar port elsewhere sort of similar to how the Russians built Odessa from scratch in the first place in the late 19th century.
 
Back
Top