What IF? GB had signed a peace treaty with Germany? WW2

Great Debates
1

We just had a similar Alt-hist

But I am afraid that the Hypothesis- What if the USA stayed Neutral in WW2" was both very unlikely, and many posters could not help but to fight the hypothetical.
Yes, while both Hitler declaring War on the USA, and the IJN sneak attack on Pearl Harbor were both very foolish decisions- still, Axis aggression and FDRs reactions would have brought America in someday- and once America is in, the Axis is pretty much doomed. Let us set that aside.

So, let us look at something more likely, in fact quite plausible. Halifax (or his picked man) becomes PM, not Churchill- and so GB and Germany sign a peace treaty- something Hitler was very anxious to do. This takes GB out of the European war. This is the hypothetical. Please do not fight it.

Now, FDR was a avowed anglophile, but he did not like Stalin or Communism. Once England is safe, there is no reason at all for American to send aid to Russia, nor would GB have done so.

Stalin and Communist Russia aka the USSR are now alone. This bodes ill for Russia, as both Stalin and Khrushchev said that without American Lend lease- the USSR would have lost. No one knows better the sitrep that the leaders of that nation. The USSR is in deep trouble.

But on the Pacific Front, things get interesting. Even if Imperial Japan had not sneak attacked Pearl Harbor, I think conflict between the USA and Imperial Japan was inevitable. Then, Imperial Japan is in deep trouble.

Assuming the initial stages played out-Imperial Japan is now at war with GB and the USA. GB can send more ships and planes to that front, and the USA can bring most of their two ocean navy, plus full Aircraft production, etc.

And interesting side note-in a book I read, one Naval Expert claims that the only reason the sneak attack got thru is that the Atlantic Front had first call on resources, and most importantly Catalina flying boats, thus the long distance air patrol wasn’t there. Many more Flying boats= maybe Pearl harbor gets a short warning?

The battle of the Coral sea would likely still have been a sort of draw. But GB would have been able to escort the Repulse and the Price of Wales. Would that have helped?

Would Imperial Japan take advantage of a Russia on it’s knees and back-stab them?

How soon would the full might of the USN have ended the war? Before the Bomb? I think a year earlier, leading to either the “starve out” Navy strategy or more likely the invasion of the Home Islands.

Then what? Imperial Japan is defeated. Russia is defending the Urals? Or is conquered? Nazi Germany is still aggressive but maybe bogged down- or Russia collapses?

2

Well, I’m the one who threw out the scenario in the other thread, so I’ll bite…
The early part of the Pacific War plays out much the same. The Philippines fall. Japan never really settled her strategic goals, but Australia doesn’t have to send the bulk of her troops to the MTO, so it’s not as desperate in the Solomons and New Guinea, and I suppose the RN is more active in the Indian Ocean and Singapore. Not sure if we have a Coral Sea under these conditions, or so much fighting in the Solomons.

More resources went to the Pacific in the early part of the war anyway, but in this scenario I imagine the US might start its Central Pacific campaign earlier, and with no ETO or MTO obligations, the full weight of the USN, the USAAF and US Army bear on the Pacific, plus the Royal Navy, RAF, and Royal Army…No competition for shipping, or landing craft, or aircraft. The PTO would get it all. The logistics would be simpler, though still daunting.

Japan would be defeated 6 months to a year earlier. The endgame may be vastly different: without Hitler, would the US start the Manhattan Project? Would Operation Downfall be needed? Or would The USN and RN blockade the home islands and starve the people of Japan?

Germany and the USSR…I don’t know. The German advance would start sooner, but still stall somewhere. I don’t see the great Soviet advances of '44 and '45 happening, though, without Lend-Lease aid. Without trucks and boots, how would the Red Army maintain its momentum? I see long, bloody stalemate.

3

I suspect that GB would feel a need to keep a great many resources tied up close to home to convince Hitler to abide by any treaty.

4

That would depend on whether or not Hitler would invade the USSR. If he did not, he would have had a huge, powerful ally to the east and a treaty in place in the west along with an ally in Italy to the south. I’d say he would have been pretty well set to hold all of his gains with the exception of, perhaps the war in the Mediterranean. If he did, however, I think it would have led to his eventual undoing.

5

That would have occurred inevitably, as Hitler and the Nazis wanted “lebensraum”.

The prospect of Nazi domination of Europe would have prompted substantial aid to the Soviets. Even if it was at a lesser level than what actually occurred, the Soviet Union would have turned the tide against Germany. It just would have taken longer than it did.

6

FDR did not like Stalin ?
well FDR was mostly an anti-Hitler, and rather pro-communist.
With the Commonwealth out of the war, Hitler would have attacked USSR anyway (for Lebensraum) and would have a better time than historically (more planes, no need to divert resources for naval warfare, no need for Mediterranean diversion, attack sooner, may be in mid-May instead of late June)
Invasion may trigger lend-lease for the Russians since FDR was very very willing to go to war against Hitler, but delivery will be risky without UK aid on the way (maybe by Vladivostok?)
Japan will likely face the same problems in China as historically, thus the North or South plan will be discussed. They still control Indochina, are still at war with China and so US embargo on oil will be there… they will certainly choose South, and act historically.
UK navy will intervene with stronger force (no need to escort convoy and hunt U-boots). FDR may had trouble passing the 2-oceans fleet Act, with Germany at peace (but still menacing, occupying France, Benelux and eastern Europe) so US Navy could had less CV on construction.
The Wehrmacht will still have heavy losses that German industry couldn’t match. A successful occupation of Caucasus is possible in 1942, leading to a (bloody) stalemate on the Eastern Front.
Japan is still crushed, at war with US without any derivation for European theater, maybe in 1944.
Manhattan project was triggered by the fear of a nazi bomb. Will it have enough resources in this case?

7

A treaty with the UK would free up the German Navy to oppose Japanese invasion of French and Dutch colonies that Hitler might feel entitled to having conquered their mother countries.

8

So as a hypothetical I think this is almost certainly the outcome if anyone except Churchill becomes PM (not the point of the OP, but worth pointing out IMO)

So I think most likely Hitler wins in this scenario. Firstly there is almost zero change that Hitler, completely in control of western Europe, with no Britain to worry about, declares war on the US in December 1941 (the driving factor for this was the hope that the pacific war would hurt British interests IMO). In that scenario the US doesn’t declare war on Germany either, wins in the Pacific, stays out of Europe.

No battle of Britain (1000+ more aircraft and pilots available for Barbarossa). No British support for Stalin (random factoid: at least a 1/3 of the tanks which fought in the battle of Moscow were British). No bombing campaign. No North Africa campaign. Its not 100% guaranteed but I’d say in these circumstances Barbarossa succeeds.

So you have Hitler unopposed ruler of all of Europe and the Soviet Union (and more likely than not at that point, he decides it would be a good time to invade Britain). That is about as bad an outcome as they come. And even if I’m wrong about Barbarossa, the alternative isn’t that much better which is Stalin does win against Hitler (albeit in an even more bloody and awful way for the people of the Soviet Union) and he ends up as unopposed ruler of Europe and the Soviet Union.

And whatever his faults, it’s Churchill, his beliefs and personality that avoided that outcome.

9

I mentioned in the other thread that GB would probably be willing to go neutral just to be left alone. Done soon enough the Luftwaffe could concentrate on the USSR. I don’t think the V1 and V2 would be seen as all that useful to the East and many other resources saved to concentrate on tanks and artillery. There would be much less need to fortify the Atlantic coast as well.

The position of the US would be interesting, we’d still want the USSR to put pressure on Germany but would we have any bombers in range of them without bases in the British Isles? We could offer money to the USSR but I doubt we could work out an acceptable deal with Stalin to conduct launch bombers from their territory.

I think this drags the war out for much longer.

10

Sounds reasonable. Yeah, I do not think The Bomb would be used.

No doubt. “Trust but verify”.

That was his ultimate goal, so I am assuming he would.

I concur to start, but I do not see American helping Communist Russia. FDR was an Anglophile. His willingness was due to the fact he wanted GB to survive. Since I have no doubt Imperial Japan goes to war vs the USA, that leaves out Vladivostok too.

German industry with no strategic bombing, and plenty of resources? Vs USSR w/o Lend lease?

Very likely, I concur.

11

This sounds like what FDR’s right-wing critics were saying during his Presidency in response to the “socialistic” New Deal. FDR on charges he was pro-Communist:

“In this campaign another herring turns up. In former years it has been British and French- and a variety of other things. This year it is Russian. Desperate in mood, angry at failure, cunning in purpose, individuals and groups are seeking to make Communism an issue in an election where Communism is not a controversy between the two major parties.”

“…I repudiate the support of any advocate of Communism or of any other alien “ism” which would by fair means or foul change our American democracy.”

“Communism is a manifestation of the social unrest which always comes with widespread economic maladjustment. We in the Democratic party have not been content merely to denounce this menace. We have been realistic enough to face it. We have been intelligent enough to do something about it. And the world has seen the results of what we have done. In the spring of 1933 we faced a crisis which was the ugly fruit of twelve years of neglect of the causes of economic and social unrest…”

9/29/36 speech, Syracuse N.Y.

12

If Britain was building up its military, even for defense, Germany would have looked for ways to strongly discourage that, or, more likely, to get British forces to support Nazi goals.

Anti-fascism having been discredited, the British Union of Fascists, or at least their ideas, would come to dominate. My Jewish relatives in Britain would, long before now, have met the same fate as those in Ukraine.

So while we don’t know exactly how it would have played out, a 1984 sort of scenario seems most plausible to me. I take this as reasonable prognostication:

13

I only meant to that this wouldn’t free up as many forces for the Pacific theater as some were suggesting, GB would still prioritize the European theater, I would imagine.

14

Despite the interesting Small Change series by Jo Walton, I doubt that. Mind you there were lots of anti-antisemitism in GB, but also in American and many other nations.

15

Under this scenario Hitler absolutely still invades the USSR, that was his entire raison d’être. Everything else beforehand was clearing the decks for that.

He does not send his navy to the far east; I suspect the navy gets de-emphasized as being essentially irrelevant from this point onwards.

Presumably the coup in Yugoslavia does not happen so the Nazis don’t need to invade there; if Mussolini still gets stuck in Greece it would not take the time or resources to rescue him that it did historically. The point of this being the attack on the USSR gets going perhaps a month before it did historically.

Does all this mean they beat the USSR? I don’t think so; Tooze estimates the Germans had 1/3 of the necessary force to do that in the historical situation. This alt-hist does not triple their forces or military capability overall.

16

Right, the Brits don’t send a lot of stuff to help them. The Italian Navy has control of the Mediterranean. (The RN still sails around, has bases, but does not interfere, of course)

17

Oh, and of course there is not the diversion of the North Africa campaign. Given that historically the Germans only sent a handful of divisions there until near the end, again this does not materially affect the outcome of Barbarossa.

18

I don’t buy this analysis. For two reasons…

Firstly you could do the same analysis of the western allies in 1940 and I’m sure it would conclude based on the relative military sizes and industrial based that German was doomed to lose there too. There is a point where the theoretical ability to replace lost troops and equipment doesn’t matter and a nation is not willing to fight any more. IRL France reached that point early on and the Soviet union never did. But that doesn’t mean it would fight literally until the last drop of blood and last shell. Personally I think the USSR was close to that point around the battle of Moscow and if that had gone the other way Soviet resistance would have cracked.

Also even if you do think that analysis is valid. I agree that this counterfactual German would not be 3x more powerful than IRL Germany. But counterfactual USSR (without lend lease, and which lost moscow in 1941 and baku in 1942) absolutely could be 3x weaker.

19

There were 100s of thousands of Axis troops in North Africa during the critical battles on the eastern front in 41-42. That represents a significant percentage of the combat troops involved in Barberossa. It might seem small compared to the huge troop formations on the eastern front but there is no way that number of extra troops would not have made some difference

20

But it does take away one of Germanys best generals.

I concur.

Right- the analysis quite possible takes into account the truly massive amount of Lend-lease, etc sent to Russia. Note that both Stalin and Khrushchev were quoted as saying that without that aid, the USSR would have lost.