# Is there any one person the Nazis could have killed to win the war? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 5, 2016, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724 "2016-10-05T19:09:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/61 "2016-10-09T02:18:23Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > Everyone has their own patriotic view that is distorted by history, of course, but if you take an objective look at it, the Russian viewpoint is probably a bit closer to what actually happened than the American viewpoint. > > The US lost about 400,000 men in the war. Great Britain lost pretty close to the same amount. Together, that’s a lot of men, somewhere around 800,000 or so. The Russians lost somewhere between 10 and 15 times that amount, or 8 million to 12 million men or so, depending on whose numbers you use. > > I’m not so sure that would have worked. Once you start Barbarossa, you’ve got a nearly endless supply of pissed off Russians. Stalin certainly ruled with an iron fist, and if you take out that kind of dictator you generally don’t have someone waiting in the wings to take his place (whenever there was anyone strong enough to be a threat, Stalin tended to make them just “disappear”). Chaos would have certainly been the immediate result after Stalin’s death. But at some point the Russians will get reorganized, and Russia is just freaking huge. Once they do get reorganized, wave after wave of men, tanks, guns, etc. just go pouring over the border. > > There’s no possible happy ending there for Germany after that. As some have quoted Patton as saying “No bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making some other poor dumb bastard die for his country.” The war was won by three things: Churchills bullheaded refusal to deal or surrender. The USA massive industrial might, and The USSR’s manpower. Even Stalin agreed that without American aid, he would have lost. Before Poland, the Germans could have made a nice settlement by killing Hitler\*. Austria, the Sudetenland, parts of Czechoslovakia, etc. The question would be- the URRS had plans to invade Poland- what would happen then? Stalin? _Maybe_ the USSR would have collapsed and withdrawn behind the Urals. Maybe. Churchill? Well, without Churchill, Hitler could have made a deal with the Brits, withdrawing from most of France, etc. Now, could a concentrated just against the USSR Germany have won the war? No sideshows in Africa or Yugoslavia or Greece, the invasion leaving on time? It’s a _maybe_. Wargames show a Yes, they \*could \*have done it. Roosevelt? No, the USA would have entered with Pearl harbor anyway. \*The German General staff was going to remove Hitler if the Allies stood up to them in Czechoslovakia. Thus in theory the man most responsible for Hitler and WWII was Chamberlain.:eek: ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/62 "2016-10-09T02:22:08Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > OP: No, Hitler aside. > Only due to political collapse. For all their faults, Stalin and the CCCP had the support of the Russian people throughout the war. The loss in 1917 in fact spurred them to fight even harder so it wouldn’t happen again - conversely it gave the Germans false confidence. > > In the absence of a loss of leadership, of will, the Germans cannot beat the Russians no matter what. They simply did not have the resources or manpower required in 1940 or 41, and after that it’s too late. Read **Tooze**. _loss of leadership_ is exactly what would have happened had Stalin been killed. Wargames and reenactments show the Germans would have had a \*slight _chance if they didnt waste a month going into Yugoslavia . But with_ no Western front at all \*to worry about, yes, they could have beaten the USSR. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/63 "2016-10-09T02:26:49Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Boy, there’s a lot of 20-20 hindsight in these discussions. The statement that the Germans would have certainly lost even if you completely removed the Allies from the equation - which is the claim that was made - is flatly crazy. The effort the Germans expended fighting the Allies was, contrary to what people keep saying, really huge. The German order of battle in the West in June 1944 was something in the order of sixty to seventy divisions. Even discounting the crappy ones, you’re looking at 50 full strength divisions. IF the Allies aren’t in the war all of that goes to the Eastern Front, plus, of course, most of the Luftwaffe, which is now much larger since it needn’t worry about the Allies. That would have made a difference (against a much less well equipped Soviet side, since of course, without Allies, they don’t get all that Lend-Lease help. How easy is it to launch Bagration if you have no trains or trucks?) > > If the Allied contribution did not help in defeating Hitler, Stalin sure was wrong about it. He pestered the Allies to open a second front from 1942 on. He sure seemed happy accepting all that material aid, too. Stalin himself agreed with you and said both were needed. But honestly, once Barbarossa was launched late, with the Western front being a distraction, and allied aid pouring into the USSR- the war was over. The Germans lost it right there. Maybe, just _maybe_ if the Japanese had invaded the USSR from the East. But the Imperials had no interest in doing that. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/64 "2016-10-09T02:33:38Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > And if you kill Hitler and Germany doesn’t attack the USSSR? Any opinions on that? I am not being snarky, I just don’t know enough about it. OK, Germany and the USSR divvies up Poland. USSR takes Finland. Rest of Eastern Europe is then divvied up, at least becoming protectorates. The western war drags on. Germany takes Egypt and seals the Med. Since Hitler is dead, Churchill can justify making a deal. France gets demilitarized, Germany gets A/L, France then is “free”. A uneasy peace is signed. But what happens when Japan hits Pearl harbor? ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/65 "2016-10-09T02:36:31Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > Of course the Russians wanted Allied aid and commitment. Who wouldn’t? But that’s not an argument that they would have lost without it. The German’s failure to win in late 1941 doomed them, and that’s well before any significant Western aid arrived. Please read **Tooze**. > > . Tooze\* be dammed. I read _Stalin_, and he said they would have lost without them. \*?There are several Toozes and Adam wrote several books? ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/66 "2016-10-09T02:43:47Z")
He’s written exactly three books, only one of which is on this topic. I thought that was clear enough, but here you go: > **[The Wages of Destruction](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wages_of_Destruction)** > > The Wages of Destruction is a non-fiction book detailing the economic history of Nazi Germany. Written by Adam Tooze, it was first published by Allen Lane in 2006. > The Wages of Destruction won the Wolfson History Prize and the 2007 Longman/History Today Book of the Year Prize. It was published to critical praise from such authors as Michael Burleigh, Richard Overy and Niall Ferguson. > In the book, Tooze writes that after the Germans had failed to defeat Britain in 1940, the economic logic of t... ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/67 "2016-10-09T03:27:48Z")
Churchill was the rock the British relied on throughout the war. I can’t see British morale surviving the blitz without Churchill’s reassuring presence . Eisenhower was the most indispensable military leader. His management of the various allied forces was critical. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/68 "2016-10-09T03:57:42Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > Germany gets a great improvement on their PR. No, they don’t. The American government considered the same kind of idea during the Civil War. They wanted to kick all the freed slaves out of the United States after the war and send them to Africa. Black leaders spoke with Lincoln and members of Congress and protested that they didn’t want to go to Africa; they had been been born in America and lived all their lives here. I’m pretty sure most European Jews felt the same way prior to the Holocaust. Most of them wanted to live in Europe where their families had been living for centuries. It took the horrors of the Holocaust to break that sense of community and make a significant number of Jews want to leave Europe and start over in a new land. Those of us looking back at what the Nazis actually did can agree that forcibly exiling millions of Jews would have been far better than killing them. But if the killing hadn’t occurred then that forcible exile would stand as the worst crime ever committed against the Jewish people and the Nazis would justifiably be condemned for it not praised. ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 10:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/69 "2016-10-09T10:32:44Z")
Actually, depending on when the putative German assassin might have been brought into play, the biggest bang-for-their-reichsmark might have been to kill Dowding before the command and control system for the Battle of Britain was fully worked out and in place. But even then, they would still have had to reckon with the ability of the Navy to limit their capacity to keep an invasion force supported and supplied. ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 10:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/70 "2016-10-09T10:36:23Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > With the Duke of Windsor under wraps, the British would have been compelled to seek a separate peace, and the Allies’ war effort would have collapsed. Tosh. Most British politicians with any influence would have said either “Good riddance” or “No surprise there, then”, or would barely have noticed. ---
**Author:** ![TonySinclair](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/49beb7/32.png) [@TonySinclair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TonySinclair)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 10:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/71 "2016-10-09T10:52:00Z")
> [@drewder](#): > > Eisenhower and Churchill might disagree with you. Churchill told the king It is thanks to the secret weapon (the ULTRA decrypts) of General Menzies, put into use on all the fronts, that we won the war!" > > Eisenhower described Ultra as having been “decisive” to Allied victory. > > Estimates say that breaking enigma shortened the war by 2 to 4 years and it’s unclear who would have won otherwise. > > Turing almost singlehandedly designed the machine, with some help from the polish research and development who had designed a similar machine for a much simpler version of enigma, that produced the daily cipher keys for the Germans. It was so successful that they had to actually hold back from revealing all they were learning in fear that the Germans would realize what had happened. > > The truth is that the UK has not been able to feed its populous from domestic farming for over a hundred years and the island would have starved had the code not been broken. And on the other side of the world, breaking the Japanese codes was essential to winning the Battle of Midway, generally considered the turning point in the Pacific. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 11:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/72 "2016-10-09T11:41:59Z")
> [@PatrickLondon](#): > > Actually, depending on when the putative German assassin might have been brought into play, the biggest bang-for-their-reichsmark might have been to kill Dowding before the command and control system for the Battle of Britain was fully worked out and in place. But even then, they would still have had to reckon with the ability of the Navy to limit their capacity to keep an invasion force supported and supplied. This fails on the one-big-man-makes-history fallacy. Dowding \*was \*important. But the organizational and electronic tech was coming anyway. Being delivered by a large group of people all working generally towards the goal. > [@TonySinclair](#): > > And on the other side of the world, breaking the Japanese codes was essential to winning the Battle of Midway, generally considered the turning point in the Pacific. This fails on the one-big-battle-determines-a-war fallacy. Imagine that around the time of Midway the US had no such decoding. The battle may not have even occurred. The Japanese may have taken the island with little effective resistance from the hopelessly outnumbered garrison. OK. What next? Eventually the two fleets find each other. Either in a big set-piece aircraft-centric battle like the real Midway, but on a different date in a different place. Or instead a bunch of more minor skirmishes happen over 8 months. Slowly attritting both forces. Maybe the US gets lucky and catches the IJN with its pants down a couple times. Maybe the opposite occurs. Either way come 1944 the IJN is not getting any new ships. And the USN is getting a new (escort) carrier and air wing every 3 weeks. Plus new and better subs. And destroyers. And improved aircraft. The IJN and the Japanese government was doomed at 7:48 on 12/7/41. The only question was how long it was going to take and how many people would be killed finishing the job. TLDR: Winning Midway was very, very helpful for the USN and the US. But not essential. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/73 "2016-10-09T14:34:24Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > I can’t quite decide if you’re serious or I’m getting world-class whooshed. After all this time, you’re unsure? ---
**Author:** ![watchwolf49](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9c0ed/32.png) [@watchwolf49](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/watchwolf49)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/74 "2016-10-09T16:20:52Z")
> [@Frodo](#): > > Hitler? I’m not sure that killing any one single person would have changed the war very much. These leaders that have been mentioned didn’t become leaders because only a very few people agreed with them, they became leaders because they had immense followings. I’ve picked Hitler, I think if he had been killed, then Germany would have had the greatest probability to change directions, not that this probability would be very large. My reasoning is that Germany may have settled for less as the win condition. Having half of Poland and crushing France, calmer heads in the German Nazi party may have felt that undoing the Treaty of Versailles was enough. I agree this is a slim chance, just that it’s a better chance than the UK or USSR surrendering if they lost their top leader. Killing Albert Einstein before he signed the letter to FDR would have prolonged the Pacific War, perhaps long enough that Japan gets their conditional surrender. It’s assumed that the atomic bombs made invading mainland Japan unnecessary, but it’s entirely possible such an invasion wouldn’t be successful. How many more years of fighting would the American public tolerate? ---
**Author:** ![K364](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k364/32/5_2.png) [@K364](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/K364)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2016, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/75 "2016-10-09T17:19:39Z")
How about taking out Hermann Goering? He insisted upon wasting a year on air attacks on Britain at a time when they were very vulnerable. Eventually the Brits rallied, ramped up the war machine and secured their island. The next 3 years Britain was a base for the devastating bomber attacks that destroyed German industry. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2016, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/76 "2016-10-10T00:59:49Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > The cult of Churchill has to end, it skews objective thinking. The UK was not a strongman dictatorship that it would have fallen without the top dog. > > Without Churchill, there is some other PM who leads the UK, Churchill was an elected PM, he was at the end of the day expressing the will of the Parliament and the people, which was…fight. As stated above, without Churchill the US would never have entered the war when it did. The cooperation between GB and the US was substantial and led to many advancements which shortened the war. ---
**Author:** ![drewder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/57b2e6/32.png) [@drewder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewder)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2016, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/77 "2016-10-10T01:36:01Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > Patton was an asshole, but I thought he was a good military guy. Didn’t he save the Bulge by moving his armored unit some distance that was difficult? Patton was a great American General, probably the best General of the war, However I don’t know that he would have been a good Coalition General. I don’t think he would have been willing to swallow his pride the way Eisenhower did. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2016, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/78 "2016-10-10T01:43:53Z")
> [@drewder](#): > > Wonder if eliminating Eisenhower would do it. He had a very tough job where he had to keep all the allies happy each with their own agenda. In his book he talked about how tough a job that was. If he wasn’t there it likely would have gone to Patton or Montgomery. Either one would have been a disaster as they would let their egos and national pride destroy the alliance. My guess would be that if Eisenhower wasn’t around, Roosevelt would have had to allow Marshall to assume command of SHAEF. Marshall had wanted that job but Roosevelt insisted Marshall was too valuable in Washington so Eisenhower was assigned instead. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2016, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/79 "2016-10-10T01:57:01Z")
[Juan Pujol Garcia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Pujol_Garc%C3%ADa). ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2016, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724/80 "2016-10-10T02:02:24Z")
> [@drewder](#): > > Patton was a great American General, probably the best General of the war, However I don’t know that he would have been a good Coalition General. I don’t think he would have been willing to swallow his pride the way Eisenhower did. Patton was certainly not one to swallow his pride, but I do not understand the reference to Eisenhower swallowing his. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-any-one-person-the-nazis-could-have-killed-to-win-the-war/767724.md?page=5)