How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

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How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#1

Post by Futurist » 01 Dec 2018, 21:26

How many lives would have been saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

For the record, I am talking about both Europe and Asia here. Of course, one would also need to figure out what effect an early end to the war in Europe would have on Japan's attitude towards the war.

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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#2

Post by maltesefalcon » 02 Dec 2018, 02:32

No one could possibly know the answer to this. Germany may have surrendered, they might have fought on or even degenerated into a civil war.

As for Japan, it took two nukes on top of everything else to finally induce surrender. IRL Hitler died months earlier, so his death was moot to their end game.


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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#3

Post by Helmut0815 » 02 Dec 2018, 19:59

Well, it is frequently stated, especially in Germany's TV history channel, that in the following months between the July plot and the unconditional surrender of the german armed forced in May 1945 more humans got killed than in the entire five years of WWII before. I find this claim highly doubtful or is it fact?

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Helmut

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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#4

Post by Cult Icon » 02 Dec 2018, 20:17

more Germans they mean?

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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#5

Post by maltesefalcon » 02 Dec 2018, 20:20

Helmut0815 wrote:
02 Dec 2018, 19:59
Well, it is frequently stated, especially in Germany's TV history channel, that in the following months between the July plot and the unconditional surrender of the german armed forced in May 1945 more humans got killed than in the entire five years of WWII before. I find this claim highly doubtful or is it fact?

regards


Helmut
I think the true figure for the final 12 months is closer to 12-15 million, which does not exceed the previous years. Perhaps you were thinking of total German casualties, which would possibly be higher during this period than the rest of the war.

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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#6

Post by Helmut0815 » 02 Dec 2018, 22:21

maltesefalcon wrote:
02 Dec 2018, 20:20
I think the true figure for the final 12 months is closer to 12-15 million, which does not exceed the previous years. Perhaps you were thinking of total German casualties, which would possibly be higher during this period than the rest of the war.
A scenario for a successful July plot:

ETO:

If the July plot would have been successful the war on the ETO would have continued for several weeks. The germans would have retreated from both western and Italian front using defensive tactics to avoid being overrun by allied forces while trying to send as much reinforcements as possible to the eastern front where fierce fighting continues to the bitter end. Meanwhile the new German government would start peace negotiations with the western allies in order to get better peace conditions but the allies insist on unconditional surrender. The anglo-american bomber campaign against German cities continues until then. The deportations of jews to the extermination camps would have been stopped immediately but too late for most hungarian jews. The german goverment would also have given orders to release all KZ inmates but numerous would have been murdered by fanatic SS guards before the camps could have been liberated by regular german troops. The V weapons campain would have been stopped and the V2 would have never seen military action. All U-Boats would have been called back to the harbours and the meaningless U-Boats warfare stopped.
Berlin would have been captured by the western allies at least in October 44, maybe earlier. Major WWII battles of the western front would never have occured, e.g. Market Garden, the battle of Huertgen forest or the Wacht am Rhein. No hunger winter of 1944/45 in the Netherlands. No bombing of Dresden, Pforzheim, Würzburg, Madgeburg, Hildesheim and other german cities.

PTO:

Almost no or only little effect on the amphibious landing operations of the western allies; the Philippine campaign, Iwo Jima and Okinawa, all this would have happened. But the soviets would be able to send reinforcements to far east and could have launched a massive attack against Manchuria and Korea in the spring of 1945.

Given this scenario, is it realistic to say that approx. 6 to 8 million lives could have been saved if the July plot had been successful?


regards


Helmut

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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#7

Post by maltesefalcon » 03 Dec 2018, 00:34

Sorry to disagree. The figures you are citing would be very close to the combined war dead figures of the USA, UK and Germany for the entire war including all the German civilian dead.
Since the bulk of Germany's military deaths occurred in the East, most of those deaths would still take place in any case.
Last edited by maltesefalcon on 03 Dec 2018, 16:09, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#8

Post by T. A. Gardner » 03 Dec 2018, 00:37

Helmut0815 wrote:
02 Dec 2018, 19:59
Well, it is frequently stated, especially in Germany's TV history channel, that in the following months between the July plot and the unconditional surrender of the german armed forced in May 1945 more humans got killed than in the entire five years of WWII before. I find this claim highly doubtful or is it fact?

regards

Helmut
Very possibly. It might have reduced Soviet casualties signifantly, but the Soviets were likely to still occupy much of Germany and then brutalize it. I could see them forcing the surrender of more troops into their custody as the Eastern Front would still be in Poland. That would likely result in far more German troops ending up in the Soviet gulag system than historically occured.

It woudl save the US and Britain some casualties, but for the most part they weren't taking really heavy casualties to begin with by 1944.

I also suspect that many concentration camps would still massacre their prisoners simply to eliminate them from being able to identify the guards, who would recognize their potential for being found criminals.

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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#9

Post by maltesefalcon » 03 Dec 2018, 01:07

An early end to the European war could possibly induce Stalin to commence hostilities vs Japan a year earlier than IRL. So possible 8-10 months of conventional war spilling into China and Korea. The Anglo American forces would not have nukes yet and would not be able to stop this as they would largely be fighting the same war they did IRL in the Pacific.

Perhaps more casualties here and Communist governments in both China/Korea by end 1945?

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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#10

Post by Futurist » 04 Dec 2018, 07:49

Helmut0815 wrote:
02 Dec 2018, 22:21
maltesefalcon wrote:
02 Dec 2018, 20:20
I think the true figure for the final 12 months is closer to 12-15 million, which does not exceed the previous years. Perhaps you were thinking of total German casualties, which would possibly be higher during this period than the rest of the war.
A scenario for a successful July plot:

ETO:

If the July plot would have been successful the war on the ETO would have continued for several weeks. The germans would have retreated from both western and Italian front using defensive tactics to avoid being overrun by allied forces while trying to send as much reinforcements as possible to the eastern front where fierce fighting continues to the bitter end. Meanwhile the new German government would start peace negotiations with the western allies in order to get better peace conditions but the allies insist on unconditional surrender. The anglo-american bomber campaign against German cities continues until then. The deportations of jews to the extermination camps would have been stopped immediately but too late for most hungarian jews. The german goverment would also have given orders to release all KZ inmates but numerous would have been murdered by fanatic SS guards before the camps could have been liberated by regular german troops. The V weapons campain would have been stopped and the V2 would have never seen military action. All U-Boats would have been called back to the harbours and the meaningless U-Boats warfare stopped.
Berlin would have been captured by the western allies at least in October 44, maybe earlier. Major WWII battles of the western front would never have occured, e.g. Market Garden, the battle of Huertgen forest or the Wacht am Rhein. No hunger winter of 1944/45 in the Netherlands. No bombing of Dresden, Pforzheim, Würzburg, Madgeburg, Hildesheim and other german cities.

PTO:

Almost no or only little effect on the amphibious landing operations of the western allies; the Philippine campaign, Iwo Jima and Okinawa, all this would have happened. But the soviets would be able to send reinforcements to far east and could have launched a massive attack against Manchuria and Korea in the spring of 1945.

Given this scenario, is it realistic to say that approx. 6 to 8 million lives could have been saved if the July plot had been successful?


regards


Helmut
Very interesting analysis!

Now, the question is whether a Soviet entry into the war against Japan in the spring of 1945 would have been enough to get Japan to surrender earlier or whether nukes would have still needed to be dropped onto Japan in order to get them to surrender. What are your thoughts on this?

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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#11

Post by Futurist » 04 Dec 2018, 07:50

maltesefalcon wrote:
03 Dec 2018, 01:07
An early end to the European war could possibly induce Stalin to commence hostilities vs Japan a year earlier than IRL. So possible 8-10 months of conventional war spilling into China and Korea. The Anglo American forces would not have nukes yet and would not be able to stop this as they would largely be fighting the same war they did IRL in the Pacific.
So, you don't think that Japan would surrender without being nuked?
Perhaps more casualties here and Communist governments in both China/Korea by end 1945?
You mean in all of China and Korea?

Also, are Soviet forces willing and able to reach French/Japanese Indochina in this scenario? If so, what would the effect of this have been?

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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#12

Post by MarkN » 04 Dec 2018, 18:58

Futurist wrote:
01 Dec 2018, 21:26
How many lives would have been saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

For the record, I am talking about both Europe and Asia here. Of course, one would also need to figure out what effect an early end to the war in Europe would have on Japan's attitude towards the war.
Don't you think that you've biased the discussion from the outset to the point of irrelevancy?

I mean, you've already decided that a successful July 20th Plot with have a positive (as in reduced) death count and you're asking how big a scale that reduction would be.

Perhaps you ought first to detail what alternative history you think produces that result before asking others about the scale.

Secondly, what do you mean by "saved"? Is that just your way of introducing a lower global total body count or are you looking more specifically about those who died in historically reality but would have survived in you alternate historical narrative - ie they were saved. It seems a very strange word to use to discuss total body counts if all you want to discuss is shifting death from one continent to another.

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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#13

Post by maltesefalcon » 05 Dec 2018, 03:07

Futurist wrote:
01 Dec 2018, 21:26
How many lives would have been saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

For the record, I am talking about both Europe and Asia here. Of course, one would also need to figure out what effect an early end to the war in Europe would have on Japan's attitude towards the war.
Suggested research into the somewhat vague aims of the success. The conspirators had neither intention nor opportunity of simply giving up in the West and focussing on the Eastern front.

For one thing they would still demand most of the Reich territory ca. 1939 including Sudetenland, Austria, and Western Poland.
On top of that they wanted Alsace-Lorraine. Not to mention a seperate peace with the West, which they patently refused to do when offered IRL.

This laundry list of demands make the continued war in the West more likely than the proposed scenario. So not many lives saved IMHO.

As for the question of Japan not surrendering without being nuked, they did not do so IRL despite massive losses and damage. Why would that change simply because Hitler died earlier? The Russians would however likely make more headway on the Asian mainland, hence my comment about early Communist regimes there.

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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#14

Post by maltesefalcon » 05 Dec 2018, 03:07

Double post

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Re: How many lives would be saved if the July 20th Plot would have succeeded?

#15

Post by jesk » 08 Dec 2018, 12:51

In this case, the Germans easily destroyed the bridgeheads in Normandy. No problem in a few days. The second front with the landing is an adventure in which Hitler drew the world.

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