At what point did Germany lose WW2?

Discussions on High Command, strategy and the Armed Forces (Wehrmacht) in general.
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ljadw
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1741

Post by ljadw » 01 Aug 2020, 10:01

Paul Lakowski wrote:
01 Aug 2020, 00:19
ljadw wrote:
30 Jul 2020, 14:48
Paul Lakowski wrote:
30 Jul 2020, 04:29
ljadw wrote:
29 Jul 2020, 19:29
Gallup polls are not very serious : they predicted GOP victories in 1936 and 1948 and a Democratic victory in 2016 .

Too Roosevelt GALLUP POLLs allowed him to steer a course through politics and he never went any were with out them. They repeatly told him to avoid war , especially in Europe.

It was critical to America's entry into the war.

Churchill ALMOST had to cave in to the war-cabinet during DUNKIRK and enter peace negotiations through Mussolini in mid 1940. When he turned to Roosevelt for help , he hid behind the legalities of Congressional politics and had to refuse any help to Churchill.
To refuse any help to Churchill? And the Destroyer Deal ?
And The British Purchasing Commission in the USA? There was no German Purchasing Commission .
And Cash and Carry ? Adopted by Congress in November..1939 .
Cash and Carry was restricted to Britain and France .
If you sell war materials to one party and refuse to sell them to the other party,it is obvious that you make a choice .
AT THAT CRITICAL JUNCTURE IN TIME he bowed to congressional rules and refused Churchill , thus painting him into the corner as the WAR Cabinet forced him into peace talks with Herr Hitler.
There were no British peace talks with Hitler

Paul Lakowski
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1742

Post by Paul Lakowski » 01 Aug 2020, 17:46

ljadw wrote:
01 Aug 2020, 10:01


There were no British peace talks with Hitler
Really !!!!! READ some history and stop polluting the forum with propaganda and misinformation.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_cabin ... ,_May_1940


ljadw
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1743

Post by ljadw » 02 Aug 2020, 06:24

Your source does not mention peace talks with Britain .

ljadw
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1744

Post by ljadw » 02 Aug 2020, 07:11

If there were peace talks,we would know everything about it : chairman and members of the British delegation,ditto for the German delegation,where and when did the peace talks happen,instructions for both delegations, why there was no peace..
What Halifax proposed was to look after the German demands (which does not implies a contact with the Germans ) :if these demands were reasonable(very improbable ),one could decide or not ,to start negotiations,if (as it was expected ) these demands were unacceptable,the war would continue .
Even these proposals were rejected by the war cabinet,especially by Chamberlain,who was till he resigned because of bad health, the real leader, it was not Churchill .
Thus : nothing happened: London did even not inquire what were the German demands and there were no peace talks .
Al the rest are inventions by journalists and would be historians to make money by reconstructing history .
On September 3 1939,Chamberlain said that the war would last til the total destruction of national socialism and at no point during the war was Britain changing this policy .
The Unconditional Surrender claim was not formulated in 1943,it was the aim with which Britain started the war . There would be no peace talks with Hitler and there were never peace talks with Hitler .

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Yuri
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1745

Post by Yuri » 02 Aug 2020, 09:48

ljadw wrote:
02 Aug 2020, 07:11
On September 3 1939,Chamberlain said that the war would last til the total destruction of national socialism and at no point during the war was Britain changing this policy .
British Prime Minister Chamberlain said a lot of different things.
A year before September 3, 1939, or rather September 30, 1938, British Prime Minister Chamberlain, waving a piece of paper, declared that he had brought peace for a generation.
So I would not attach absolute importance to the words of political figures: For them to say or promise anything is like hitting the pavement with two fingers.

ljadw
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1746

Post by ljadw » 02 Aug 2020, 11:15

I was talking about what he said during the war .What he said before the war is not very relevant for what he did/said during the war .
Peace and war were two different situations.

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Yuri
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1747

Post by Yuri » 02 Aug 2020, 11:22

Not true. War is a continuation of politics only by other means

Max Payload
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1748

Post by Max Payload » 02 Aug 2020, 12:23

Paul Lakowski wrote:
01 Aug 2020, 17:46
ljadw wrote:
01 Aug 2020, 10:01


There were no British peace talks with Hitler
Really !!!!! READ some history and stop polluting the forum with propaganda and misinformation.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_cabin ... ,_May_1940
Please indicate which part of the link you provided suggests that Britain conducted peace talks with Hitler.
In the critical last week of May, Churchill had the backing of all but one member of the war cabinet and the entirety of the wider cabinet for his ‘no negotiation’ policy. Halifax advocated exploring the possibility of Italian or US mediation in line with French proposals, but Chamberlain, Halifax’s closest ally in the war cabinet was primarily concerned with keeping France in the fight by stalling on the issue and keeping alive French hopes of a joint approach to Mussolini.
There were no British peace talks with Hitler and there were never going to be any peace talks with Hitler. That penny didn’t drop in Germany until the middle of July.

glenn239
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1749

Post by glenn239 » 04 Aug 2020, 17:06

ljadw wrote:
02 Aug 2020, 07:11
There would be no peace talks with Hitler and there were never peace talks with Hitler .
While I tend to agree with you on this point, I would note that one of the things missing from the records of the war are Hitler's personal papers and library of diplomatic correspondence.

RenardR31
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1750

Post by RenardR31 » 22 Aug 2020, 01:16

Hello everyone,
I am new to the site.
I live in Mexico, but I am originally Belgian and have lived in my country for 57 years.
Belgium paid a heavy price in the 2 world wars, remember May 10, 1940 and the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944. That said, I don't think that we can reasonably give a date or a particular event to explain the reason for defeating Germany in 1945. We do not lose a war in a battle, but for a set of reasons. I add that in all the military academies of the world we learn that fighting on 2 fronts is a big mistake, and that an attacker, with equivalent weapons, must be 3 times more numerous than his enemy on the defensive. Finally in my country they say: "That the next day, everyone is smart ..." It is therefore easy for us today, behind a PC, to redo history ...
I'm already going to stir up trouble by talking briefly about the attack on Belgian fort Eben Emael on May 10. The garrison of the fort was +/- 1500 men. The German airborne troops +/- 150, so mathematically 10 times less numerous and yet the Germans took the Belgian fortress, considered impregnable by André Maginot, in 35 hours!
The Germans did not fight with the same weapons as the Belgians, they had a war ahead. They used gliders, for the first time in military history, shaped charges to destroy the cupolas which contained the guns and finally the technique of the Blitzkrieg which was also an invention, by involving the Stukas, dive bomber of very high precision. If the Germans had attacked the Belgian fortress while respecting the military logic of the time, namely: by land, flag in mind, and at the sound of the bugle, they would have had to be 3 times more numerous to have an equal chance of winning ...
Some reasons for the failure of the Nazis:

-1. Dunkirk, it was not the 250,000 English and the 80,000 French and Belgians who could have changed the course of the war, but the positive psychological effect that the evacuation of Dunkirk had on the English population. It should not be overlooked, however, that a reduction in strength of 250,000 would also have had a disastrous effect considering the situation of the British army in May 1940.

-2. England. Once France was defeated, it was necessary to attack the English Islands, defeat England, and occupy it. It was necessary to bring down the Commonwealth and thus to get rid of Malta, Gibraltar and eliminate British influence in Egypt, Greece and Crete in particular. There was the possibility of requisitioning the natural resources of the conquered countries and their colonies… The capture of England also meant the end of the Polish, Belgian, Dutch, French, Yugoslav, Czech, etc… The governments in exile would have had to cross the Atlantic and seek asylum in Roosevelt. From there, support for resistance fighters in occupied countries would have been much more complicated if not impossible. Finally, without England, where would the troops who liberated North Africa, Italy and finally Europe have left on June 6, 1944?

-3. The rapid defeat of France. It’s paradoxical, but I sincerely believe that defeating France, which according to commentators at the time had the best armies in the world in 3 days, had a very negative effect. 3 days ? No ! the French laid down their arms around June 20… Yes, but the French general staff, when it understood that the real attack was made in Sedan on May 13th / 14th and that it was going to surround the French and Belgian armies and English women in Belgium understood that the war was lost. The Manstein plan, known as the sickle stroke, is still studied in military academies today. This crushing of the Allied armies gave Hitler a sense of invincibility and blind faith in his judgment and analytical power. He will later take serious decisions in Russia which will be contradicted only lip service by his generals who will long remember the glorious campaigns of Denmark, Norway, Holland, Belgium, Luxembourg and France. One thinks, for example, of the hijacking of Army Group Center to support Army Group South in front of Stalingrad when Moscow was within gun range ...

-4. The hunt and the elimination of the Jews. It is estimated that 6,000,000 Jews were murdered. This massacre required colossal energy and resources. At the end of the war we know that trains of reinforcements or ammunition were put to the side to allow the passage of convoys of deportees. Paradoxically, the Jews, through their sacrifices, helped defeat Germany by monopolizing material and human resources.

-5. The lack of rigor in the choices and the industrial strategy. If the Germans, in many industrial fields, have often been at the cutting edge of technology in terms of innovation, the first Jets (Me 262), the first ballistic missile (V1,) the first rocket (V2), synthetic fuel, synthetic rubber etc. there was hardly any consensus on streamlining production. Aside from the construction of the Kriegslok steam locomotive (6000 built on the same model) there was an incredible amount of type, model of tank, armored vehicles, fighter jets, bombers which dispersed production and made the maintenance of the park very complicated. Hitler who was not a technician and even less an engineer had the right of veto and according to his belief, often erroneous, took decisions which would prove tragic. In fact, Goering once said: "He preferred to build 2 medium twin engines mid-range bomber than a 4-engine aircraft, because for Hitler it was 2 planes instead of just one ..."

-6. Diplomacy. Germany was allied with Italy, but especially with Japan. It would have been necessary to be able to convince the Japanese not to attack the USA, but rather Russia. American public opinion was not at all in favor of engaging in Europe. Roosevelt was unable to attack the Axis Powers without prior aggression from Japan. So Japan had plenty of time to prepare for a US attack on Germany, why not, once Russia was defeated. The opening of a second front in Russia would have divided the Russian forces and given the Axis powers an additional chance to defeat. Arms production factories relocated to the east could find themselves within reach of the Japanese. Moreover, when Stalin received confirmation from his Spy (Richard Sorge) in Tokyo that there would be no attack, he repatriated a large part of the troops massed at the eastern borders to turn them around. to the Germans.

-7. The Hitler dictatorship. In my professional career, I have worked with Germans. Believe me, it is not by chance that they are able to manufacture Porsches, Audi and BMWs… In the German army, there were generals like Rommel, Guderian, Student, Von Manstein, Donitz also soms Adolph Galland, Rudel, Wittmann…. Men who are still recognized militarily today as great leaders, great strategists, precursors, innovators or elite soldiers ... But there were also Goering, Heydrich, Keitel, Bormann, Himmler and others still who were part of the inner circle of the Führer and who in many cases were unable to understand the situation and to advise Hitler effectively. In many cases, the inner circle was content to support the chief's decisions whether they were good and more often than not bad. As often, and still today a few times, those who knew did not have the right to make decisions ...

Here are some points that IMHO are reasons that can explain the failure of the Nazis,

Best regards

RenardR31

ljadw
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1751

Post by ljadw » 23 Aug 2020, 10:01

The figures for Dunkirk are not 250000 BEF and 80000 others, but 190000 BEF and 140000 others .
Point 6 : the influence of Sorge is a myth
Point 7 : Heydrich and Bormann did not interfere in military matters and Goering and Keitel had a better military knowledge than is assumed .

RenardR31
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1752

Post by RenardR31 » 23 Aug 2020, 23:40

Thank you ljadw for your details on dunkirk. when presenting figures it is best to ensure that they are correct.
Mea Culpa. when Sorge warned Stalin of the invasion in June 41, Stalin didn't believe him ... it's true! but he was forced to realize that it was a mistake. when Sorge warned that Japan would not attack Russia from behind, the Russian secret service had cracked the Japanese codes. So Sorge may not have had the first news, but I think he contributed ...
Heydrich and Borman did not have a "military" impact. It is also true on the other hand for Borman mainly they were able to influence Hitler by recommending to see, listen or not to certain people. for Goering and Keitel, it is well known that the first was morfinomaniac and that he was gradually discarded, when the second his surnon was "Lakeitel" the valet or servant Keitel ... that says a lot ...
My apologies for the inaccuracies and my thanks for your comments.

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hambubger
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1753

Post by hambubger » 30 Sep 2020, 16:58

Probably when Hitler started getting injected with meth. If you're at war, you'd LOVE to hear that your rival was injecting that.
"History doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes." – Mark Twain.

mezsat2
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1754

Post by mezsat2 » 10 Oct 2020, 13:43

A Question With Many Possible Answers

There's the Dunkirk theory. The Mediterranean vs. Russian strategy. This question however, means to extrapolate on exactly what DID happen rather than what SHOULD have happened. If that's the case, the single most catastrophic move by OKW was directing Guderian's panzers to support operations in the Ukraine. Again, this throng of poorly equipped, trained (and led) troops were little threat to the flank in the short term. Rundstedt had them pinned down on the Dneiper in the center and Kleist was pushing to Rostov to their south.

Yes, they captured 600 some odd thousand troops who they then had to imprison or put to work (not feed, of course) when the focus had to be the nexus of Soviet power and the entire rail and road hub of the entire country- Moscow. These pitiful hordes were small game compared to the vast evacuation of Soviet industry to the east. A rapid, single thrust occupation of Moscow would have completely disrupted that critical procedure. After that city is occupied, at the very least the troops had a solid place to winter. The SS and "allies" could take care of the riff raff in the rear.

mezsat2
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Re: At what point did Germany lose WW2?

#1755

Post by mezsat2 » 10 Oct 2020, 13:43

A Question With Many Possible Answers

There's the Dunkirk theory. The Mediterranean vs. Russian strategy. This question however, means to extrapolate on exactly what DID happen rather than what SHOULD have happened. If that's the case, the single most catastrophic move by OKW was directing Guderian's panzers to support operations in the Ukraine. Again, this throng of poorly equipped, trained (and led) troops were little threat to the flank in the short term. Rundstedt had them pinned down on the Dneiper in the center and Kleist was pushing to Rostov to their south.

Yes, they captured 600 some odd thousand troops who they then had to imprison or put to work (not feed, of course) when the focus had to be the nexus of Soviet power and the entire rail and road hub of the entire country- Moscow. These pitiful hordes were small game compared to the vast evacuation of Soviet industry to the east. A rapid, single thrust occupation of Moscow would have completely disrupted that critical procedure. After that city is occupied, at the very least the troops had a solid place to winter. The SS and "allies" could take care of the riff raff in the rear.

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