How would World War II Have Gone had The US and Britain not helped the Russians at all?

I agree that attacking the Russians would not have been a popular move, but if they had continued to move through Germany and then started to attack the British/US troops the situation would have changed. What kind of a supply line would Stalin's troops have? There was precious little available in Germany itself, and with the destruction of towns and cities, the supply lines would have struggled. On the other hand, the US/British troops in France, Belgium and Holland would be better equipped and better supplied.

It's one thing to force an enemy from your land and push him back until defeated, it's another thing entirely to launch a surprise attack on your allies on their turf.

With the RAF and USAAF, combined with the Royal Navy supplying food, men and tanks along with systematic carpet bombing of Stalin's forces, it's hard to see the Russians achieving victory. On the other hand, with the tenacity, bravery and sheer numbers of Russian ground forces, the likelihood of Britain and US defeating the Russians was pretty low.

I think that if it had happened , it would have been down to negotiating a more favourable land share. I suspect that the Russians would have kept all the ground they had captured and the centre of Germany would have been declared no-man's land. Almost inevitably it would have led to WW3.

Thankfully none of that happened!
 
I agree that attacking the Russians would not have been a popular move, but if they had continued to move through Germany and then started to attack the British/US troops the situation would have changed. What kind of a supply line would Stalin's troops have? There was precious little available in Germany itself, and with the destruction of towns and cities, the supply lines would have struggled. On the other hand, the US/British troops in France, Belgium and Holland would be better equipped and better supplied.

It's one thing to force an enemy from your land and push him back until defeated, it's another thing entirely to launch a surprise attack on your allies on their turf.

With the RAF and USAAF, combined with the Royal Navy supplying food, men and tanks along with systematic carpet bombing of Stalin's forces, it's hard to see the Russians achieving victory. On the other hand, with the tenacity, bravery and sheer numbers of Russian ground forces, the likelihood of Britain and US defeating the Russians was pretty low.

I think that if it had happened , it would have been down to negotiating a more favourable land share. I suspect that the Russians would have kept all the ground they had captured and the centre of Germany would have been declared no-man's land. Almost inevitably it would have led to WW3.

Thankfully none of that happened!

We had the A-bomb, which we could have used against Stalins armies if necessary . Unfortunately , the use of that would opened up a very nasty can of worms for the future.
 
We had the A-bomb, which we could have used against Stalins armies if necessary . Unfortunately , the use of that would opened up a very nasty can of worms for the future.


Yes, but there were very few available, and the RAF and USAAF could carpet/fire bomb just as effectively as atomic bombs at that time.

Having said that, the effect of the dropping of just one of those weapons would make Stalin think twice about attacking. But tbh I don;t think it was ever his intention to do so. It was all about getting a good deal after Germany surrendered.
 
Fair enough if the war had been fought by robots not human beings. But the moral and motivation is a crucial factor. The men of the British armed forces would have had no interest in defeating Russia and would have told their officers where to get off. Don't forget that we (the Brits that is) elected a Socialist government towards the end of WW2, with about the biggest majority of any British election win in modern times. And the Russians are intensely patriotic. In how many countries would you hear people singing the national anthem in the street, just for the hell of it, not as part of a demonstration or rally? I've seen that in Russia. Over a million people died in the siege of Leningrad but they didn't give in.
I've heard it in Paris as well. It was a week or two after the Bataclan attack in 2015 and people were feeling VERY Patriotic.
 
with a decent tune and a tempo that wouldn't suit a funeral.
Having done my share of funerals I'd like to point out that in my experience funeral music is not as predictable as once it might have been. Here, at least, many funerals become "celebration of life" events which can include the music the person felt closest to. So, in some sense, all music can be "funeral" music. But your point about the Marseillaise being an excellent national anthem still stands.
 
One of these days Rule Britannia will replace God Save the Queen/King. Far more upbeat. Or perhaps Jerusalem. Assuming they are still politically acceptable?
 
Yes, but there were very few available, and the RAF and USAAF could carpet/fire bomb just as effectively as atomic bombs at that time.

Having said that, the effect of the dropping of just one of those weapons would make Stalin think twice about attacking. But tbh I don;t think it was ever his intention to do so. It was all about getting a good deal after Germany surrendered.
There is also the resource/Manpower issue. It could take hundreds of Bombers day and night, getting shot at, having accidents and generally getting people killed, to inflict the damage of one small A-bomb. There were only six or seven B29s on the attacks on Japan in 45.
 
There is also the resource/Manpower issue. It could take hundreds of Bombers day and night, getting shot at, having accidents and generally getting people killed, to inflict the damage of one small A-bomb. There were only six or seven B29s on the attacks on Japan in 45.


True. It does surprise me that there were so few raids on Japan, although when you have almost 300 planes fire-bombing Tokyo in just one attack, I suppose you don't really need too many. I think it was a case of trying to break the spirit of Japanese high command, even though it hadn't worked with air-raids on Germany or Britain earlier in the war. The atom bomb gave the Japanese a chance for an honourable surrender, as they now faced a foe that it was impossible to oppose.
 
Joseph Stalin was a mass murdering devil and by rights should've been put on trial for his crimes and hung .
 
Joseph Stalin was a mass murdering devil and by rights should've been put on trial for his crimes and hung .
I don’t disagree with you but it’s important not to simplify the man because that would lead to a lack of understanding his nature and motivations. If we don’t understand these people, we won’t recognise them for what they are until it is too late.

Stalin was, for example, also a meteorologist, a bank robber in his early bolshevik days, and a poet (at one point very popular in his native Georgia). There is a story that one of the generals he imprisoned during the purge spent his prison time translating a Georgian poem called The Knight In The Panther Skin into Russian. At the end of each day, the guard would remove his work and return it the next morning, It was covered in red pen corrections. Stalin was the one correcting his work. Like most historical monsters, Stalin was an enigmatic mass of contradictions.
 
I don’t disagree with you but it’s important not to simplify the man because that would lead to a lack of understanding his nature and motivations. If we don’t understand these people, we won’t recognise them for what they are until it is too late.

Stalin was, for example, also a meteorologist, a bank robber in his early bolshevik days, and a poet (at one point very popular in his native Georgia). There is a story that one of the generals he imprisoned during the purge spent his prison time translating a Georgian poem called The Knight In The Panther Skin into Russian. At the end of each day, the guard would remove his work and return it the next morning, It was covered in red pen corrections. Stalin was the one correcting his work. Like most historical monsters, Stalin was an enigmatic mass of contradictions.



His childhood was horrific , his father was a no good drunken ******* who used to beat him and his mother was, at best, indifferent to him. He lost his frirst wife whom he adored and that too affected him . But , none this excuses him from the choices he made in his life. When came to power, he knew the things he was doing were wrong. He didn't care one iota about about people whose lives he destroyed and ended . As for his talents , those didn't make him any less of the monster that he was.
 
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Not accepted them as allies against Nazi German and, not give given any aid or supplies . How would have the war have likely progressed had that happened ?
The threat of an atomic bomb would have forced Hitler into a peace treaty. The rest of the world would have fallen into line.
 
The threat of an atomic bomb would have forced Hitler into a peace treaty. The rest of the world would have fallen into line.

Disagree. FIrstly he wouldn't have believed the threat...and even if one had been dropped early enough before Germany collapsed he probably wouldn't have cared.

According to Speer on March 19th 1945: “Inside the Third Reich,” Hitler then told him: “If the war is lost, the people will be lost also. It is not necessary to worry about what the German people will need for elemental survival. On the contrary, it is best for us to destroy even these things. For the nation has proved to be the weaker, and the future belongs solely to the stronger eastern nations. In any case, only those who are inferior will remain after this struggle, for the good have already been killed.”

While I may suspect Speer of massaging the truth on some accounts of his actions and behaviours during the war, I see no reason why he didn't accurately report this exchange.

After all Hitler also issued an order for all German infrastructure, around that time, that would have been necessary for the populations survival after the war, to be systematically destroyed so that the allies could not 'take advantage' of it. Atomic bombs would have just accelerated this order.

At the end he would have probably really wanted Germany to be a radioactive wasteland.

Near the end Hitler was looking for the frankly amazing idea that the Western Allies would join with the Germans and attack the Russians, but when that harebrained idea finally evaporated and the Soviets were parked outside his front door in the bunker, he was never going to accept a surrender, but take the suicide route. (Note also that the allies had announced well before this, that they were only going for unconditional surrender, there would have been no peace treaty offered anyway.)
 
Talking of WW2, this has left me flabbergasted.
A German pensioner had been given a suspended sentence and a fine of 250 000 euros for stashing war memorabilia in his basement. Had had a variety of nazi items, ammunition, an anti-aircraft gun and……wait for it…..a Panther tank. How on earth did he get this into his basement?

There are something like five working Panthers in the world and they’re worth around £5 million each. Take a look at this pensioner’s…it’s immaculate (although I don’t know if it actually runs). An expert commented that the barrel was corroded but could be sorted in a few days. :oops:
 
I find it funny that he has to sell his items to a private collector. He seems to be the definition of a private collector. I guess his real crime was to not pay the licence fee?
A German pensioner had been given a suspended sentence and a fine of 250 000 euros for stashing war memorabilia in his basement.
 
It seems this case is to do with German law and working weapons. The reason I mentioned the gun barrel is because it could quickly be made functional according to the expert. Of course, Germany also has very strict laws regarding nazism (although the man denied being a nazi sympathise). He could possibly sell to a private collector outside of Germany where the laws are less strict.
 

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