A perspective on Hitler's motivations

[Speaker to Animals]

Adolf should have avoided attacking Western Europe.

He could still refuse to pay reparations and it's not like the French could do anything about it. Focus on the Soviets.

Imagine if he waited and he was able to pursue atomic weapons unmolested. The Soviets would have been fucked.

[GloryofGreece]

Nah, we Hanoverians were going to annihilate them all along, we bombed them first, but that was just bait, to get them off the airfields, we put London in the kill zone, to save the Royal Air Force, and Hitler, being the dumbass that he was, took the bait, hook, line and sinker.

The Nazis are the South Germans, we're the North Germans, the Nazis aren't the Prussians, we are.

Do you think 1940s Britain vs. Germany = Britain victor? (if no other European power participates)

More like stalemate, and then either the Germans attack the Soviets or if they don't, the Soviets attack the Germans.

Do you think its fairly certain that the Soviets would have invaded Germany even if Hitler didn't do it first? I know it hard to really deal in counter factual/alternative history etc. but from what you know and have read do most people believe Stalin invades Germany by 1942 or 43? or...not so much.

[Smitty-48]

Do you think 1940s Britain vs. Germany = Britain victor? (if no other European power participates)

More like stalemate, and then either the Germans attack the Soviets or if they don't, the Soviets attack the Germans.

Do you think its fairly certain that the Soviets would have invaded Germany even if Hitler didn't do it first? I know it hard to really deal in counter factual/alternative history etc. but from what you know and have read do most people believe Stalin invades Germany by 1942 or 43? or...not so much.

Oh yes, I agree with Viktor Suvorov, the Soviets were actually poised to invade, Hitler simply preempted them. The Soviets thought they had more time, but this is why Hitler went early and unprepared, to try to catch them napping and beat them with a blitzkrieg, war of encirclement.

You see, this is why it went so well for the Germans, at first, because rather than being in defense in depth, the Soviets were in fact pressed up against the German frontier prepared to attack, and that whole Soviet army does get encircled, cut off, and destroyed.

The Soviet army which eventually stops Hitler at the gates of Moscow, comes all the way accross from Siberia, when they are freed up, when Japan goes and attacks America and Britain in the Pacific, rather than doing what they were supposed to do, which was attack the Soviets from the other direction.

This is why, despite the fact that the Germans and Japanese neither liked nor trusted each other, Hitler still needed an Axis with the Japanese, but the monkey wrench got thrown into that plan, when the Americans and British embargoed japan of the Southeast Asian oil fields, and then suddenly Japan decided it had more important things to do than help Hitler with his war against the Soviets.

[Smitty-48]

At the end of the day, despite being tacically inferior at first, and operationally unprepared for war, Winston Churchill and the British do in fact outmanuever both the Germans and the Japanese, strategically, at every turn, the Germans and Japanese are playing checkers, while the British are playing chess.

The Axis is fighting a kinetic war, the British are fighting an intelligence war, the Axis is using tanks, ships and aircraft, the British are using diplomacy, economics and logistics.

The Axis were actually fighting like amatuers, obsessed with the tactical, while ignoring diplomacy, economics and logistics, and operating blind on bad intelligence, whereas the British approached the war as professionals, and unlike Hitler in particular, this wan't their first rodeo.

Despite their reputations for being great warriors, the Axis powers were more fanbois than they were warfighters, and the British were able to manipulate the battlespace at the strategic level, in order to box them both in and bring them down in the end, the Americans and Soviets, merely instruments of the British, until near the very end when the Americans and Soviets finally cut Churchill out of the deal, but by that time, Land of Hope and Glory was saved, so mission accomplished.

[GloryofGreece]

"While most agree that Stalin made extensive preparations for an eventual war and exploited the military conflict in Europe to his advantage, the assertions that he planned to attack Nazi Germany in the summer of 1941, and that Barbarossa was a preemptive strike by Adolf Hitler, are dismissed by many historians, including David M. Glantz.[1] Authors, such as amateur historian Viktor Suvorov, argue that Stalin's plan was to attack Hitler in the rear while Germany fought the Allies. Either way, most historians agree that war between the Soviet Union and the Axis was inevitable due to their vast ideological differences."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_of ... ontroversy
Seems like there is no real consensus on Survorov's opinion.

[Smitty-48]

Yes, well, count me in the contrarian camp with Suvorov then, I come to my own conclusions, argumentum ad populum of course, being a glaring fallacy.

Most professional historians are actually totally and utterly full of shit, whereas Suvorov's case, it rather compelling indeed, and, it can be cross referenced in order to deduce by logical extrapolation as well.

[heydaralon]

"While most agree that Stalin made extensive preparations for an eventual war and exploited the military conflict in Europe to his advantage, the assertions that he planned to attack Nazi Germany in the summer of 1941, and that Barbarossa was a preemptive strike by Adolf Hitler, are dismissed by many historians, including David M. Glantz.[1] Authors, such as amateur historian Viktor Suvorov, argue that Stalin's plan was to attack Hitler in the rear while Germany fought the Allies. Either way, most historians agree that war between the Soviet Union and the Axis was inevitable due to their vast ideological differences."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_of ... ontroversy
Seems like there is no real consensus on Survorov's opinion.

Well, the thing is, Stalin behaved just as ruthless as Hitler did when it came to territory acquisition, although you could argue that most of his conquest was in response to the Nazis. Poland has already been mentioned on here. The Soviets took the Eastern half of it a little after the Nazis took the west. They ruled their half just like the Germans too, liquidating intellectual and civic leaders to weaken their spirit etc, shooting tens of thousands. They tried taking Finland, they fought against the Japanese in a little known battle called Kalkhin Gol in Mongolia. I have not read Icebreaker, but I have my doubts that Stalin would have been content with his current territory in 1940. There's no way of knowing for sure, but the land to the West of him was too tempting a prize for him and his Marxist project to pass up. Keep in mind too, the Soviets had spies and local red puppets throughout Europe before WW2 with the longterm goal of stirring up trouble and making those places amenable to Russia either via the ballot box or force. The head of France's communist part Maurice Thorez (I think thats his name) was in direct contact with Stalin. Hitler deserves a huge amount of blame for WW2, but Stalin had his own plans for Europe.

[Smitty-48]

Stalin was actually tripped up, by one man, a traitor in the British ranks, the former King himself, Edward VIII, bitter about being deposed by his mother, sympathizing with the Nazis, and communicating to his contacts in the German foreign office, the disposition of Anglo-French forces in Belgium, which tipped Rommel off and told him where and when to make the move, in order to cut to the south of them, and encircle them against the Channel.

This ended the war on the Western Front rapidly, when Stalin was counting on it being Flanders Fields all over again, and then Hitler was able to round on Stalin and his attack force, before the Soviets could adjust to the suddenly single front land war.

[GloryofGreece]

Not doubting that Stalin had "plans" and did horrible things. But I think Hitler was the instigator, sometimes the occums razor approach or the "standard" version is the real version. Alternative history that is interesting to ponder for me is whether Hitler and a unified Europe (say Britain and America stays out totally) could conquer Russia proper and it territories? (Japan stay out to for this scenario)

[heydaralon]

Not doubting that Stalin had "plans" and did horrible things. But I think Hitler was the instigator, sometimes the occums razor approach or the "standard" version is the real version. Alternative history that is interesting to ponder for me is whether Hitler and a unified Europe (say Britain and America stays out totally) could conquer Russia proper and it territories? (Japan stay out to for this scenario)

I'm not even trying to make a moral equivalency between the two, and as you say "plans" is kind of nebulous. I'm of the opinion that Stalin would have tried to take whatever he could hold. His past behavior supports this, although Icebreaker may be a reach, as I don't know how much evidence is there.

As to your other question about a unified Nazi ruled Europe conquering Russia, I still doubt it. You might be interested in this book:
https://www.amazon.com/Wages-Destructio ... estruction

It's not quite what you are looking for, but it takes quite a bit out of air out of the idea that Hitler's longterm goals were sustainable. It focuses on economics, so it can get boring as fuck if you are like me and you hate economics. You might enjoy it though.