mullauna
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Post by mullauna on Apr 19, 2018 18:59:16 GMT
the conspirators thought Germany could keep Austria, Danzig and the Sudetenland among other things in a peace settlement.
They also thought Germany could avoid a military occupation.
Mind you, the Japanese thought that they could keep Manchuria, Korea and Taiwan.
The July 20 conspirators were living in total fantasy land.
One knock-on effect of the coup succeeding will be that those Weimar-era politicians that were executed in the after-math will survive and be part of the post-war political world, which will have odd effects on the Bonn Republic and the GDR.
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raunchel
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Post by raunchel on Apr 19, 2018 19:53:51 GMT
It indeed was a complete fantasy, but there are more reasons why the plotters shouldn't be put on a pedestal. After all, they only decided to act when things went wrong, not because of any moral reasons or the like. Not very big ones at least. They didn't coup at starting a war, or the genocide, or anything like that. They just tried to save the position of their own social class.
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Apr 19, 2018 21:13:22 GMT
It indeed was a complete fantasy, but there are more reasons why the plotters shouldn't be put on a pedestal. After all, they only decided to act when things went wrong, not because of any moral reasons or the like. Not very big ones at least. They didn't coup at starting a war, or the genocide, or anything like that. They just tried to save the position of their own social class. Very true. It wasn't motivated by "this regime is evil and must be stopped". Very much, "we're losing the war. Got to get rid of those incompetents so we can try and negotiate a peace that leaves us with some gains." |
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mullauna
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Post by mullauna on Apr 19, 2018 23:48:14 GMT
Austria was far from "Hitler's first victim", too. They happily became part of Germany and if Hitler hadn't started WWII, Austria would still be part of Germany today.
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jasonsnow
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Post by jasonsnow on Apr 20, 2018 1:51:10 GMT
Can we really blame them? They were brave enough to go against Hitler, and if they had succeeded, they would've been treated fairly by the Allies. Perhaps morality wasn't their forte, but they had Germany in their intentions. They hoped to save a nation... even though, indeed, the whole thing was pretty seedy.
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jasonsnow
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Post by jasonsnow on Apr 20, 2018 1:56:39 GMT
"So, Stauffenberg. What do you wanna do today?"
"Eh, I dunno."
"... Wanna go kill Hitler?"
"Hm... Sure, why not."
Just a typical Thursday morning with nothing to do...
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raunchel
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Post by raunchel on Apr 20, 2018 6:22:57 GMT
Can we really blame them? They were brave enough to go against Hitler, and if they had succeeded, they would've been treated fairly by the Allies. Perhaps morality wasn't their forte, but they had Germany in their intentions. They hoped to save a nation... even though, indeed, the whole thing was pretty seedy. They hoped to save a certain version of a nation, in which they just happened to retain power. If they had actually cared for the population, they would have acted years earlier. It's nice for myth-forming, but other assassination attempts had far better chances to really change things to the better. I don't see the allies dropping the demand for unconditional surrender either. |
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Apr 20, 2018 9:57:40 GMT
Can we really blame them? They were brave enough to go against Hitler, and if they had succeeded, they would've been treated fairly by the Allies. Perhaps morality wasn't their forte, but they had Germany in their intentions. They hoped to save a nation... even though, indeed, the whole thing was pretty seedy. They hoped to save a certain version of a nation, in which they just happened to retain power. If they had actually cared for the population, they would have acted years earlier. It's nice for myth-forming, but other assassination attempts had far better chances to really change things to the better. I don't see the allies dropping the demand for unconditional surrender either. In general agreement, although I'm aware that an earlier assassination of Hitler, while it may have prevented or delayed the war, would still have left the Nazis in power and could possibly have resulted in a similar or even worse bloodbath. If killed before Sept 39 or even before June 41 you could even see Hitler becoming a martyr within Germany, especially given the Nazis control of news and propaganda within their rule. It would seem that given how many deaths he was responsible for an earlier death for him could be better but we will never know for sure. Fully agree that by this time the allies would never drop their demand for unconditional surrender. Churchill might have been willing to consider it if he thought the replacements government would be responsible enough, although I think he would have rejected a continued highly militarised Germany with gains but neither Roosevelt or Stalin would have accepted the idea. At the very least, even assuming a successful coup the allies would have insisted Germany be disarmed and occupied to allow a proper removal of the Nazi party and trial of war criminals. [Which might well have included a number of the plotters given the involvement of so much of the army in atrocities in the east especially] The western allies might have "treated them and Germany fairly" but that would have been by US/UK standards not what they wanted and the Soviets would want savage revenge control of a large occupation zone. |
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steffen
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Post by steffen on Apr 20, 2018 16:52:29 GMT
Err... it is terrible that so many knows so little. First, a lot of the 20th july plotters had planned/fought the hitler regime since a few years... Oster for example. Also, they tried hard to kill ALL leaders, to avoid the switch from Hitler to Himmler. For sure they were no leftist socialists, they were hardcore military. It is also true that some of them only joined because they knew that the war was lost. But there are many others, esp. the core of them, who fought hitler since 1938. Stauffenberg wasn´t one of these, but he was only the person who could reach Hitler. It is also quite disturbing how little sane thinking exist... these people tried to remove hitler, one of the most evil creatures of human kind, that is more as the allies ever did. One thing about them waiting quite some time was the lack of support by the allies... they contacted em, but got nil support. That their "dreams" about post-war was nonsense is true, but if you read a thing or two about them, they were ready to kill hitler, even if they do not get what they want from the allies. Some, like von Kluge were opportunists, but the core of them weren´t. And no, neither the western nor the eastern allies wanted to treat the germans human... in the time of the 20th july-plotter acted there was more or less the morgenthau-plan the rule... The big misunderstanding from the plotters POV was, they never understood that for the allies it wasn´t important who ruled germany, for them it was "germany" who was evil. And - if you look into the sources, they wanted hitler to stay in power, because they (rightfully) judged him as less competent as a potential plotters government. By the way, the white rose was also no leftist pro-western organisation, the scholls were "german nationalists" who thought that Hitler raped the honor of germany. If you look for some radical communist, you need to look for Elser, that guy was a communist. Really, the resistance against Hitler was strong, but failed because Hitler had more luck as one ever could belive. Here a link to the german wikipedia-entry: de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_Attentate_auf_Adolf_HitlerIf you see how often Hitler had changed dates it is incredible. Some other problem was, that the plotters allways tried to kill not only Hitler, but also Goehring, Himmler and the other high ranked nazis. They too did not recognize that it was Hitler who bound the whole bunch of criminals. Cut of that head and the others fell appart. The best chance had elsner, if he had had succsess europe had been spared a lot of deaths, but the general problem (for the Entente-members Hitler wasn´t the true leader, but the evil prussian officers) would not have been solved. But we would not have to discuss the near extermination of the jewish culture in europe, not around 12 million killed people by the nazi ideology. |
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jasonsnow
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Post by jasonsnow on Apr 20, 2018 23:29:29 GMT
Regardless of the intentions any of the plotters had, assassinating Hitler would have positive consequences... period. The simple fact that many lives could've been saved is enough to believe killing Hitler was morally correct.
Yes. I just said murdering someone was morally correct. That's how nasty Hitler was. Sometimes even that is justified. Sometimes, however.
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raunchel
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Post by raunchel on Apr 21, 2018 9:04:07 GMT
Err... it is terrible that so many knows so little. First, a lot of the 20th july plotters had planned/fought the hitler regime since a few years... Oster for example. Also, they tried hard to kill ALL leaders, to avoid the switch from Hitler to Himmler. For sure they were no leftist socialists, they were hardcore military. It is also true that some of them only joined because they knew that the war was lost. But there are many others, esp. the core of them, who fought hitler since 1938. Stauffenberg wasn´t one of these, but he was only the person who could reach Hitler. It is also quite disturbing how little sane thinking exist... these people tried to remove hitler, one of the most evil creatures of human kind, that is more as the allies ever did. One thing about them waiting quite some time was the lack of support by the allies... they contacted em, but got nil support. That their "dreams" about post-war was nonsense is true, but if you read a thing or two about them, they were ready to kill hitler, even if they do not get what they want from the allies. Some, like von Kluge were opportunists, but the core of them weren´t. And no, neither the western nor the eastern allies wanted to treat the germans human... in the time of the 20th july-plotter acted there was more or less the morgenthau-plan the rule... The big misunderstanding from the plotters POV was, they never understood that for the allies it wasn´t important who ruled germany, for them it was "germany" who was evil. And - if you look into the sources, they wanted hitler to stay in power, because they (rightfully) judged him as less competent as a potential plotters government. By the way, the white rose was also no leftist pro-western organisation, the scholls were "german nationalists" who thought that Hitler raped the honor of germany. If you look for some radical communist, you need to look for Elser, that guy was a communist. Really, the resistance against Hitler was strong, but failed because Hitler had more luck as one ever could belive. Here a link to the german wikipedia-entry: de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_Attentate_auf_Adolf_HitlerIf you see how often Hitler had changed dates it is incredible. Some other problem was, that the plotters allways tried to kill not only Hitler, but also Goehring, Himmler and the other high ranked nazis. They too did not recognize that it was Hitler who bound the whole bunch of criminals. Cut of that head and the others fell appart. The best chance had elsner, if he had had succsess europe had been spared a lot of deaths, but the general problem (for the Entente-members Hitler wasn´t the true leader, but the evil prussian officers) would not have been solved. But we would not have to discuss the near extermination of the jewish culture in europe, not around 12 million killed people by the nazi ideology. It's not that I'm looking for a leftist or the like, but people who aren't perfectly fine with mass murder makes for a fine basic requirement or demand I think. If they had succeeded, I don't see very many differences aside from perhaps shortening the war a little bit, but that would be more due to opposition to them leading to infighting. Elsner indeed was one of the best options yes. If he had succeeded, there would at the very least have been a massive power struggle, and I am quite certain that the invasion of the West would have failed dramatically. This would still have meant a horrible war, but one that was infinitely better than what we had in real life. The Entente would still have moved to destroy German militarism (which was an issue), but I don't really know how things would have gone from there. |
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stevep
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Post by stevep on Apr 21, 2018 10:02:00 GMT
Err... it is terrible that so many knows so little. First, a lot of the 20th july plotters had planned/fought the hitler regime since a few years... Oster for example. Also, they tried hard to kill ALL leaders, to avoid the switch from Hitler to Himmler. For sure they were no leftist socialists, they were hardcore military. It is also true that some of them only joined because they knew that the war was lost. But there are many others, esp. the core of them, who fought hitler since 1938. Stauffenberg wasn´t one of these, but he was only the person who could reach Hitler. It is also quite disturbing how little sane thinking exist... these people tried to remove hitler, one of the most evil creatures of human kind, that is more as the allies ever did. One thing about them waiting quite some time was the lack of support by the allies... they contacted em, but got nil support. That their "dreams" about post-war was nonsense is true, but if you read a thing or two about them, they were ready to kill hitler, even if they do not get what they want from the allies. Some, like von Kluge were opportunists, but the core of them weren´t. And no, neither the western nor the eastern allies wanted to treat the germans human... in the time of the 20th july-plotter acted there was more or less the morgenthau-plan the rule... The big misunderstanding from the plotters POV was, they never understood that for the allies it wasn´t important who ruled germany, for them it was "germany" who was evil. And - if you look into the sources, they wanted hitler to stay in power, because they (rightfully) judged him as less competent as a potential plotters government. By the way, the white rose was also no leftist pro-western organisation, the scholls were "german nationalists" who thought that Hitler raped the honor of germany. If you look for some radical communist, you need to look for Elser, that guy was a communist. Really, the resistance against Hitler was strong, but failed because Hitler had more luck as one ever could belive. Here a link to the german wikipedia-entry: de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_Attentate_auf_Adolf_HitlerIf you see how often Hitler had changed dates it is incredible. Some other problem was, that the plotters allways tried to kill not only Hitler, but also Goehring, Himmler and the other high ranked nazis. They too did not recognize that it was Hitler who bound the whole bunch of criminals. Cut of that head and the others fell appart. The best chance had elsner, if he had had succsess europe had been spared a lot of deaths, but the general problem (for the Entente-members Hitler wasn´t the true leader, but the evil prussian officers) would not have been solved. But we would not have to discuss the near extermination of the jewish culture in europe, not around 12 million killed people by the nazi ideology. It's not that I'm looking for a leftist or the like, but people who aren't perfectly fine with mass murder makes for a fine basic requirement or demand I think. If they had succeeded, I don't see very many differences aside from perhaps shortening the war a little bit, but that would be more due to opposition to them leading to infighting. Elsner indeed was one of the best options yes. If he had succeeded, there would at the very least have been a massive power struggle, and I am quite certain that the invasion of the West would have failed dramatically. This would still have meant a horrible war, but one that was infinitely better than what we had in real life. The Entente would still have moved to destroy German militarism (which was an issue), but I don't really know how things would have gone from there. I think if Elser [that's the spelling on the English language Wiki] had succeed then as you say there would have been a power struggle, although I fear that the party would probably have stayed in power. It has a lot of prestige from its 'successes' and controlled the positions of power in the state. Also the bulk of the officer corp were happy with the increased military spending and influence they were seen to have. This would have given the allies more time to build up resources and quite possibly the new leaders wouldn't have gone for something as bold as the OTL Manstein attack through the Ardennes, which means there would be a good chance of the German offensive failing. Where things go from there is difficult to say as Germany lacked some of the resources for a long war but with continued support from the Soviets it would be difficult to defeat it quickly I fear. Probably the war goes on until 42/32 at a rough guestimate. Dubious about Steffen's claims many of the plotters had been strongly anti-Nazi, as the wiki entry on the attempt says otherwise, see 20_July_plot_Motivation_and_goals, which also shows the sort of Germany and Europe many of them wanted. Or possibly thought they would have to demand to get the support of the bulk of the military? Some of them had talked about some action to remove Hitler for some time but had made limited efforts or been unable to get the necessary support from the rest of the army. Although some officers seem to have refused to take part in plots but also refused to inform the authorities. However most had been loyal to the regime and benefited a lot from it, especially at the higher ranks. Find the statement "By the way, the white rose was also no leftist pro-western organisation, the scholls were "german nationalists" who thought that Hitler raped the honor of germany." rather odd? Hitler was raping the honour of Germany among other things and there's nothing wrong with nationalists having morals. Its when they, or any other group, have no morals or consideration of others that you have problems. |
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steffen
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Post by steffen on Apr 21, 2018 10:26:53 GMT
Err... it is terrible that so many knows so little. First, a lot of the 20th july plotters had planned/fought the hitler regime since a few years... Oster for example. Also, they tried hard to kill ALL leaders, to avoid the switch from Hitler to Himmler. For sure they were no leftist socialists, they were hardcore military. It is also true that some of them only joined because they knew that the war was lost. But there are many others, esp. the core of them, who fought hitler since 1938. Stauffenberg wasn´t one of these, but he was only the person who could reach Hitler. It is also quite disturbing how little sane thinking exist... these people tried to remove hitler, one of the most evil creatures of human kind, that is more as the allies ever did. One thing about them waiting quite some time was the lack of support by the allies... they contacted em, but got nil support. That their "dreams" about post-war was nonsense is true, but if you read a thing or two about them, they were ready to kill hitler, even if they do not get what they want from the allies. Some, like von Kluge were opportunists, but the core of them weren´t. And no, neither the western nor the eastern allies wanted to treat the germans human... in the time of the 20th july-plotter acted there was more or less the morgenthau-plan the rule... The big misunderstanding from the plotters POV was, they never understood that for the allies it wasn´t important who ruled germany, for them it was "germany" who was evil. And - if you look into the sources, they wanted hitler to stay in power, because they (rightfully) judged him as less competent as a potential plotters government. By the way, the white rose was also no leftist pro-western organisation, the scholls were "german nationalists" who thought that Hitler raped the honor of germany. If you look for some radical communist, you need to look for Elser, that guy was a communist. Really, the resistance against Hitler was strong, but failed because Hitler had more luck as one ever could belive. Here a link to the german wikipedia-entry: de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_Attentate_auf_Adolf_HitlerIf you see how often Hitler had changed dates it is incredible. Some other problem was, that the plotters allways tried to kill not only Hitler, but also Goehring, Himmler and the other high ranked nazis. They too did not recognize that it was Hitler who bound the whole bunch of criminals. Cut of that head and the others fell appart. The best chance had elsner, if he had had succsess europe had been spared a lot of deaths, but the general problem (for the Entente-members Hitler wasn´t the true leader, but the evil prussian officers) would not have been solved. But we would not have to discuss the near extermination of the jewish culture in europe, not around 12 million killed people by the nazi ideology. It's not that I'm looking for a leftist or the like, but people who aren't perfectly fine with mass murder makes for a fine basic requirement or demand I think. If they had succeeded, I don't see very many differences aside from perhaps shortening the war a little bit, but that would be more due to opposition to them leading to infighting. Elsner indeed was one of the best options yes. If he had succeeded, there would at the very least have been a massive power struggle, and I am quite certain that the invasion of the West would have failed dramatically. This would still have meant a horrible war, but one that was infinitely better than what we had in real life. The Entente would still have moved to destroy German militarism (which was an issue), but I don't really know how things would have gone from there. Hi, we could not even know what would have happened if Elsners bomb hat killed the leadership of the nazis... that is something for a writer of a timeline (isn´t it true that some had tried to do that?) The ironic thing is, a lot people today in this ATL would blame Elsner for ruining hitlers chance to "stop" the jewish influence in europe (not understanding or ignoring the plans hitler had even as early as 1925 written in his "Mein Kampf"-book) Fall Gelb could happen or not .... but if it is the more conventional assault - it could still be a massive victory for germany. We do not know the results. But any time a german army engaged with similar numbers (and massive air superiority) western allied forces they won and the western allies got their butts whipped. |
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mullauna
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Post by mullauna on Apr 21, 2018 18:16:36 GMT
the plotters were still living in fantasy land. Germany was NOT going to be allowed to keep Austria, Danzig, the Sudetenland etc, just as the Japanese dreams of keeping Manchuria, Korea and Taiwan were NOT going to happen. Speaking of the Japanese, there's this persistent belief that the Japanese government were good, kind people who were begging for peace when the Evil Americans nuked them for shts and giggles. The Japanese leaders were completely detached from rational thought and morality. Remember the attempted coup to stop the surrender?
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Post by longvin on Apr 22, 2018 16:31:24 GMT
It indeed was a complete fantasy, but there are more reasons why the plotters shouldn't be put on a pedestal. After all, they only decided to act when things went wrong, not because of any moral reasons or the like. Not very big ones at least. They didn't coup at starting a war, or the genocide, or anything like that. They just tried to save the position of their own social class. Very true. It wasn't motivated by "this regime is evil and must be stopped". Very much, "we're losing the war. Got to get rid of those incompetents so we can try and negotiate a peace that leaves us with some gains." The moral high ground idea came about in the 1950's when Western Germany needed to rearm for the possibility of war with the Soviet Union. So they basically came up with the idea to elevate the plotters as the martyrs of German military leadership doing the right thing for the new military establishment to look up to. Prior to that they were still considered traitors by a large number of Germans. |
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