To me the Questions are why involve Spain at all in the scenerio**(1)** and which country, and why, would allow the U.S to establish many thousand troops there**(2)**
(1)
*(a)*I guess I wonder if “Vietnam-style” American advisors in Spain would change the course of that War. There were actually Italian and German Regulars fighting there, would the U.S. intervention have just pushed a local Civil War into a World War? That is what France-Britain believed and convinced FDR of.
*(b)*Further, the 1936 election - last election before the war the Left-Right parties were extremely close :
*Out of a possible 13.5 million voters, over 9,870,000 participated in the 1936 General Election. 4,654,116 people (34.3) voted for the Popular Front, whereas the National Front obtained 4,503,505 (33.2) and the center parties got 526,615 (5.4). The Popular Front, with 263 seats out of the 473 in the Cortes formed the new government.
*
While I am not sure how “grateful” democratic Spain would be - I need to ask *grateful enough for thousands of battle ready American troops to be stationed there permanantly as a front line to fight the Germans * - I doubt it.
(2) (a)I guess it depends on which countries would allow American troops to be semi-permanently stationed there prior to September 1st 1939 - you imply but don‘t say Spain.
(b)Then I guess I would ask would American trip-wire troops, in say a prescient France, intimidate Hitler in the East? If the answer is no (not sure) then I think American Troops would have even less impact being in Spain. I guess I wonder - not saying I am sure it absolutely wouldn’t make a difference but really am not seeing it would be a slam-dunk.
Sorry again I f’ed up your thread man - tried here to answer you straight up!
I wasn’t proposing it as a “solution” to WWII. I had f’ed up the thread and felt honor-bound tohad to come up with :
**one thing that FDR could have done with a change that would have ended the War quicker **
and I say jazzing up the Manhatten Project would do all that. I’ll stick with that as a truth – but sure, there are plenty of other things he might have doen too.
I’m okay with a sizable American presence maybe intimidating Hitler, maybe not. We should discuss if there is, in retrospective fact, any way in hell FDR could have gotten those troops over to Spain anytime in the late 1930s, of course, but if we reach the conclusion I[m positing (that US troops would have gotten us a better Spain, and a staging ground to wage a European land war from) then we try to figure out strategies available to us through the magic of hindsight to accomplish that goal, assuming we find that goal a desirable one.
The “Manhattan project sooner” is also interesting–was there much the government could have done to speed that one along? Was FDR being pestered for atomic research funding earlier but he ignored it? If FDR had gotten the idea in his head that nuclear physics was the wave of the future in the 1920s and came to the White House with a secret plan to channel all possible funding in that direction, would that have eliminated most of the problems in developing an A-bomb. or where the probelms technical and unrelated to funding?
Sure in Retrospect I would love to have American troops in a Spain that welcomed them by the time the War clouds rolled in.
Yes, with Hitler there, I think in retrospect that would be desireable - because I think the U.S. would have probably had to deal with Hitler in a violent manner and those troops in position would obviate the need for a Normandy style Invasion*.
The Spanish wanting them, The American Public Allowing it are the two big work arounds in the scenerio to me.
*Or, post 1941- Germany may have invaded Spain and captured the American force and never invaded Russia (D’oh!)
There is a really good and deep well of knowledge on the SDMB on the History of the Project. I have learned a little something every time the subject is discussed. So I will take a broad stab, but expect to be illuminated.
I think the 20’s was too early. The 1932 the discovery of Nuclear Fission (in Germany) or the first time someone smart says “Hey This could be made into a huge bomb” in 1933 when Leó Szilárd proposed an expanding nuclear chain reaction - are usually given as the starting guns where a realistic bomb program could be begun
Einstein famously wrote his letter in 1939 and Roosevelt set up the Uranium Committee and some basic and uncoordinated research started in 1940. I think here – if Roosevelt (not blaming him he did more than many would have) had thrown more money, coordinated it better, gave it more resources - once the War started he would have been in a stronger position.
The Manhattan Project really picked up steam in 1942 – there really wasn’t anything (except the War -* other than that Mrs. Lincoln how did you like the play?*) technical/theoretical that had changed between 1940 and 1942 – if FDR could have convinced Physicists to give up their lives and live in camps, congress to throw money at it, and the military to make it a priority - absent a War - well great ….
Realistically I doubt he could do that - I think he COULD have Increased things though and set it up so we hit the ground running faster and further along than we did. (Again I think FDR was more farsighted as to how important this was than many of his contemporaries - he “got it” just in hindsight …)
The other question to ask vis a vis Spain is: What side would these American troops be fighting on? Are we beefing up the Abraham Lincoln Brigade and siding with the Communists? Do we try to go head to head with the Condor Legion, or are we just “advising?”
Personally, I don’t think there is a single thing the US could have done to prevent WW2. We could have delayed things a bit, but that could have just made things worse.
Again, let me retreat from my poorly stated OP, and get off the whole "preventing WW II thing, " and onto making the US position vis-a-vis the Axis go better for the US. At worst, knowing what knew later, we could have anticipated Pearl Harbor better but I’m thinking if we got a single do-over it had better apply to some large-scale policy decision and not to a better set of tactics to employ in a single engagement.
As to the Spanish Civil War question, I was assuming our troops would have fought Franco’s troops but for the purposes of this discussion, I guess you can pick any side that would have won and then welcomed our ground troops to oppose Hitler when the time came for that.
We are “advising” in the same sense we were advising in Vietnam, nod nod wink wink.
We now know (see the “VENLO INCIDENT” that there were several german generals who were ready to unseat Hitler. What the British should have done: encourage the anti-Hitler crowd with real support. Follw up witha declaration of war on Germany , with an alliance with Czeckoslovakia. Hitler would have been overthrown, and very likely WWII would never have happpened.
As long as we’re allowed to use the “politically impossible” argument, the idea that we would support the Fascists in Spain is absurd. Not many people wanted to go to war in Europe, but thye certainly had a rooting interest. It wasn’t the “King, dictator and Catholic Church run the country” side. There were many Americans who fought for the Republicans. I don’t know of any who fought for the Fascists (although some must have existed).
Nor do I, but I’m not on this issue for polemical reasons, I’m on it for practical ones. I’m thinking that this involvement (apart from any virtues it has on its own) gives us a foothold of troops in Europe. I agree that selling it to the Congress was a very tough sell, but if FDR was determined to send troops to Spain, if he was presciently convinced that having a military presence in Europe would be essential to US interests, I think he could have found the support in Congress, maybe.
I’m just not quite persuaded it was the single best use of a major policy shift toward US interests, that’s all.
What’s the “politically impossible” argument? Tough, unlikely, costly, yes, but very little is impossible politically.
The trouble with intervening on the Republican Spain side is that it doesn’t get you very much. When Hitler smashes into France he just has to keep going a bit and take out Spain as well. And this might be BETTER for the fascists. After all, Fascist Spain largely sat out the war. A Nazi occupied Spain means a Spain fighting for the Nazis. There would be plenty of Nationalists willing to join up with Hitler once the Republicans were finished, and then Spain is a fully committed German ally.
And Roosevelt isn’t in a good position to shorten the war. America was totally isolationist. Even after the fall of France, even after the invasion of Russia we still hoped to stay out of the war. Roosevelt worked as hard as he could to support the Allies, but short of declaring war on Germany how much more could he do, even with foreknowlege? And he couldn’t declare war on Germany, only congress could do that, and congress WOULD NOT.
Obviously, the best thing to do is get rid of Hitler. Another German dictator would be bad…but only Hitler was crazy enough to take all the chances he did. A fascist Germany in the hands of another Mussolini or another Franco rather than Hitler is a very different Germany.
But if Hitler’s already in power, the French and the Brits have got to ally with Czechoslovakia. Without “Peace for our time”, Hitler would never have dared invade Czechoslovakia over the Sudetenland. And this early loss would have humiliated Hitler, made his hold much less tight, would have turned the army against him.
So the person you’ve got to talk to is not Roosevelt, but Chamberlain. And the trouble is that the British public was willing to do almost anything to avoid another war.
No offense, but I think you’re wrong. Congress and the American people were overwhelmingly isolationist in the 1930s. If Roosevelt had been crazy enough to suggest sending American troops to Spain, an impeachment trial would have been more likely than a troop movement.
I agree. Roosevelt couldn’t even get Congress to go along with a military draft until the middle of 1940 – after the fall of France and the Low Countries. Even then, it only passed by a single vote.
Aside from any such action as sending troops to Spain being nearly 20 years too late, it would have been worse than useless.
The US Army in the late 1930’s totaled about 150000. Using the usual ratio of about 4-1 support to combat forces that means we had a total of roughly 30000 combat troops. Those troops would need to be supported so we would need to provide combat forces to defend a port in Spain. We would also have to provide combat troops to defend supply lines within Spain. All of the armed forces we had at the time might have been able to support a single base located near to, or at, a seaport but if they moved anywhere or did anything I don’t think we had the logistical means to maintain them.
And, as others have pointed out, Congress would need to authorize this and make appropriations to keep the supplies moving. There was an extensive Senate group including such Senate leaders as Borah of Idaho and Vandenberg of Michigan, both Republicans when that was a peace party, who would have stopped cold any such suggestion as sending troops to Spain.
Okay, let’s suppose that my idea has been thoroughly discredited. (For now. I still think FDR had some political capital to spend, and was a very persuasive fellow when he wanted to be.) The absence of alternative suggestions here sounds a lot like, “If FDR could go in any different direction he wanted to before the war, he still should have done exactly what he did, because every single policy he pursued from 1933 until Pearl Harbor was the optimal choice, and no better ideas for the U.S. can be imagined.”
In order for your hypothetical to make sense you have to assume that anyone in the US gave a damn about Europe, Hitler and the NAZI’s starting in 1933. Actually few acts of FDR had any relevance to that until the war started in 1939 and by that time it was a little late for long range planning.
The 1930’s mood of the US was so wrapped up in the great economic depression that by the time FDR could have gotten anything relative to Hitler through Congress it would have long since been overtaken by events.
That seems to be what you’re hearing. I’m not sure it’s true, though. He could certainly worked harder to bring the Soviet Union closer to the western powers. He could have tried to get Poland and Romania to set up the “Eastern Locarno” with the Soviets, which would have prevented Hitler from invading Poland. HE would not have needed much domestic support to do that, even if he were offering financial incentives, since he had plenty of deference form congress on foreign policy.
And this is not to blame FDR for not doing these things. It’s quite unreasonable for him to have gone on a “Let’s Love Russia” campaign, but I’m asking you to be unreasonable. I’m asking what had the best chance of working, of all the options that were (retrospectively viewed) to have been available to FDR? He might have thought “God, it would have seeemed insane to do X back in 1936, but if I knew now what I knew then, I’d have done all I could have to accomplish x”–your job is to solve for x.
I’m unfamiliar with the term “Locarno.” Could you spell out exactly what you mean he might have done in eastern Europe? How would this have worked, in your view? Thanks.
The Locarno treaties were treaties signed in Locarno, Switzerland in the 1920s. Among other things, the major powers signed non-aggression and alliance pacts with each other, Germany entered the League. and Germany accepted its western borders and committed to solve any border issues with France and Belgium through international arbitration.
In the 1930s, there was a push for an “Eastern Locarno”, where the nations of Eastern Europe (and France) would all pledge to recognize each other’s borders and take collective action against any nation that violated those borders; in short, a defensive pact among the nations of Eastern Europe. It didn’t happen, though, in large part because neither the Rumanians or the Poles trusted the Soviets.
Was this of practical importance? Hitler was well known for paying almost no attention to his treaty commitments, wasn’t he? Or are you saying to have signed such treaties and demanded scrupulous attention being paid to them?
Also, is there perhaps a policy action the US might have taken that would have affected Japan rather than the Germans? Why are we focused on the Germans here?
Well, more than Hitler being treaty bound to keep the peace, the importance would be in having the Soviets, the French, the Poles, the Rumanians, the Czechs, the Hungarians, and the Baltic States all in one alliance, so that Hitler couldn’t attack any one of those countries without the rest attacking him.