At what point did Germany lose WW2?

[BDV]

Italian contribution at distraticting Britain and Empire from fighting Nazi Germany from 1940 to 1942 was significant. Most of British Empire's active war effort in this time interval counteracted Italian contributions to Axis. France war exit and Japan war entry, without Italy in the war, is improbable. That's why June 20th 1940 is such a high mark for the Nazi war fortunes, which Schicklgruber et Co haughtily frittered away in the next 17 months.

[ChrisDR68]

The problem for both the Chamberlain and Churchill governments was that after Hitler broke the Munich Agreement by invading Poland they simply could not trust anything the Nazi government said they were going to do in terms of a compromise peace following the fall of France.

If Hess did in fact fly to Scotland with a detailed offer of peace from Hitler in May 1941 that would be the main stumbling block to any negotiations taking place (even if the offer was relatively generous).

The only way Britain could seriously negotiate a peace treaty with Germany was if Hitler was removed from power and preferably with the Nazi's no longer in power as well.

That would have been General Beck's fantasy scenario too...

[durb]

Just tactical points, which could have made some difference:

Battle of Britain 1940 - why not Bf 109´s with drop tanks giving more range? The Bf 109 E-7 with drop tanks came too late, when the decisive battle was over.

Midway, June 1942 - Japanese victory or at least some acceptable result for Japanese instead of complete defeat. Could have helped also Germany and distracted USA in some extent from the war in Europe.

Stalingrad 1942 - avoiding the whole operation there and concentrating in the operation at south toward Caucasus and oilfields of Azerbaidzan. Afterwards it is difficult why so much resources were allocated to take one city without much strategical importance. There was of course the propaganda value of taking Stalin´s city, but that was far less important than to take oilfields of Caucasus. Anyway all was not lost, if Hitler had allowed retreat of German and other Axis troops to leave Stalingrad in good order. It would have been a defeat, but much less serious than to lose all the troops in Stalingrad. In propaganda the retreat could have explained as a well thought tactical manouver. Stalingrad was pretty much destroyed anyway by the autumn of 1942. For the official propaganda something like this could have been used: "The German Wehrmacht has showed its force and destroyed Stalin´s once proud city. Mission accomplished and we left enemy to have only miserable ruins."

North Africa 1941/42 - what if Italians had known that there was plenty of oil in Libya? They could have built a refinery there and then there would have been plenty of fuel for Afrikakorps. The refinery would have been obvious target for Allied bombers, but some squadrons of Bf 109´s and effective flak could have been allocated for the defence.

Kursk 1943 - abandoning the whole operation altogether. It is difficult to understand afterwards why Germans decided smash their heads and waste their resources against rocksolid defence there. Soviets knew far at advance of German attacking plans and were well prepared. Why not abandon the Kursk idea and surprise Soviets by choosing some other target letting Soviets expecting in vain the attack at Kursk? In early 1943 Germans were still holding relatively well in Russia, but after the failed Kursk operation they lost the initiative permanently to Soviets.

It is well possible that despite all the mentioned points Germany was lost anyway due it´s strategically unfavourable position against too big alliance. But the war would certainly have been longer and more difficult to win for Allies.

[LWD]

...
Midway, June 1942 - Japanese victory or at least some acceptable result for Japanese instead of complete defeat. Could have helped also Germany and distracted USA in some extent from the war in Europe.
....

A pretty strong case can be made for Midway allowing the "distraction" of Gaudalcanal. A US loss or even exchange and the US might not have tried for it sending those assets to Europe instead.

[Graeme Sydney]

. But the war would certainly have been longer and more difficult to win for Allies.

And French could have conducted a 'smash and grab' offensive into the Ruhr in Sept '39, the German Officer corp would have said 'I told you so' and there would have been a German revolution and Hitler and Nazi's removed and no WW2.

[steverodgers801]

For Stalingrad, what might have happened if the Germans had pushed farther south, they didn't have the manpower to cover their flanks and they could have suffered an even greater defeat. As far as Kursk, don't forget the Soviets had access to German plans and would have known about any changes.

[antfreire]

To summarize it could be said that Hitler, even though he won great battles and astonished the world, he never got close to win "HIS" war. Was close to win the battle of Britain but lost it, was close to win the battle for Moscow, but lost it, was close to win in Stalingrad, but lost. And no matter had he sent Himmler and Goering together with Hess to confer with Churchill, the PM was sure that Roosevelt was on his side and was not going to give Hitler a carte blanch to conquer Russia and then become the unbeatable power in Europe. So Hitler lost the war on Sept 1, 1939, or should I say the day in Munich when broke the promise not to demand more land?

[checkov]

I Just read an interesting article written by General Blumentritt around 1948. In it he theorized Hitler wanted a peace with Britain and wanted it so badly he deliberately allowed GB to escape the Dunkirk pocket. To do so he ordered the 3rd air army to not attack strongly and held back the available panzer divisions.

Blumentritt was the operations officer under Rundsted of Army Group A and was the officer most responsible for the detailed planning for the invasion of France. He was also active in planning for operation sea lion.

There is no other person in existence now or in the past that knew more about the situation in France concerning the Dunkirk pocket than he.

Germany had won a Great War changing victory with their thrust through the Ardennes and Hitler threw it away with a 3 day stop.
Ive given facts on German available forces with references, I have given first hand accounts of german and french commanders in the area that have both said the pocket was essentially undefended and now I have offered direct opinions from the operation officer in charge of detailed planning on that front.

I really don't understand why some cant or won't see the facts on this. I don't know really when Germany lost WW2 but I know they lost the best chance to win it on May 24, 1940.

[Graeme Sydney]

I Just read an interesting article written by General Blumentritt around 1948. In it he theorized Hitler wanted a peace with Britain and wanted it so badly he deliberately allowed GB to escape the Dunkirk pocket. To do so he ordered the 3rd air army to not attack strongly and held back the available panzer divisions.

Blumentritt was the operations officer under Rundsted of Army Group A and was the officer most responsible for the detailed planning for the invasion of France. He was also active in planning for operation sea lion.

There is no other person in existence now or in the past that knew more about the situation in France concerning the Dunkirk pocket than he.

I think the same degree of skepticism and historical rigor should be applied to his opinion as any other source. His opinion describes the operational conditions only, and he might be right. You're using his opinion as the basis for a strategic and geo-political conclusion, and I don't think that is valid.

If Britain lost its army at Dunkirk it didn't mean the loss of the war. The British Isles were still protected by the RN and RAF, and their leadership had a full appreciation of that fact. It would be speculation and argumentative to argue the British Public would lose the will to fight. And even then it would not be an automatic conclusion that the British Public loss of will to fight would lead to a collapse of the political and National Will.

And then Germany/Hitler would have to deal with Occupied Europe, the USSR and the US.

Dunkirk was a milestone event but hardly war changing in the geo-political sense. The BofB and the decision to fight on two fronts were much more significant and 'game changing' decisions.

[Cult Icon]

In the summer of 1941...........

[ljadw]

Blumentritt has been proved not to telling the truth,when,after the war,he denied that Rundstedt had any responsability for the Halt Order of Dunkirk .

This is enough to exclude him as a reliable source .

[ljadw]

I Just read an interesting article written by General Blumentritt around 1948. In it he theorized Hitler wanted a peace with Britain and wanted it so badly he deliberately allowed GB to escape the Dunkirk pocket. To do so he ordered the 3rd air army to not attack strongly and held back the available panzer divisions.

Blumentritt was the operations officer under Rundsted of Army Group A and was the officer most responsible for the detailed planning for the invasion of France. He was also active in planning for operation sea lion.

There is no other person in existence now or in the past that knew more about the situation in France concerning the Dunkirk pocket than he.

Germany had won a Great War changing victory with their thrust through the Ardennes and Hitler threw it away with a 3 day stop.
Ive given facts on German available forces with references, I have given first hand accounts of german and french commanders in the area that have both said the pocket was essentially undefended and now I have offered direct opinions from the operation officer in charge of detailed planning on that front.

I really don't understand why some cant or won't see the facts on this. I don't know really when Germany lost WW2 but I know they lost the best chance to win it on May 24, 1940.

The facts are contradicting your claims .

[steverodgers801]

Hitler did not order the stop, he agreed with the order given by Von Rundstedt, who wanted to give the tanks a much needed break and be ready for the occupation of the rest of France. It was beyond German thinking that the allies could evacuate so many troops, so there was no urgency to finish off the job, since it was believed the troops would have so surrender so no point in wasting the tanks.

[BDV]

Hitler did not order the stop, he agreed with the order given by Von Rundstedt, who wanted to give the tanks a much needed break and be ready for the occupation of the rest of France.

... Or ready for the attack on France. France was by no means defeated yet on May 25th...

It was beyond German thinking that the allies could evacuate so many troops, so there was no urgency to finish off the job, since it was believed the troops would have so surrender so no point in wasting the tanks.

Do you have any sourcing for this assessment? To me, the fact that the tool for the job (infantry) was lagging behind, or worse, was being stopped at Lille and in the polders, was much more of a factor.

[ChrisDR68]

Why this obsession with the Dunkirk evacuation?

There were around 330,000 troops evacuated from Dunkirk including 120,000 French soldiers. All their heavy equipment was left behind in France.

At the time the UK had a population of 48 million.

Surely it wouldn't have been that big of a deal to replace those 210,000 British troops even had all of them surrendered in the Dunkirk pocket.

Much more important to the defence of the UK in 1940 was the Royal Navy and the RAF as events proved in the original timeline.