How To Prevent WW2?

[sapphirenebula]

I've seen talk pop up once in awhile about 'preventing WW2'
A lot of focus was on Germany's treatment, but are there other regions that could be focused on instead?


Focusing on Germany itself, the Nazi party during and post-war 'justified' their actions through the harshness of the treaties that ended WW1. While those treaties were less or more harsh than others of the time wasn't too relevant to many civilians in the region, just that they were harsh enough to be linked to difficulties suffered by citizens of Germany in the region.

I've seen various things proposed. An even less harsh treaty. I've seen some suggest that the Nazi party's argument in this area had some aspects of truth. On the other hand, I've seen some others suggest an even less harsh treaty would cause war sooner. France even with the few war reparations that were paid never really rebuilt its infrastructure, industry, or its population which was devastated since most of WW1 was fought on its soil. I've seen some suggest less harsh treaty might make France more vulnerable and attacked by another party like the Italians or Germans even earlier. Though I've seen suggested that treating Germany 'nicer' through the global affecting Great Depression might have not caused the Nazi party or other extremist party to rise.

A treaty of equal 'harshness' executed differently is another proposal I've seen.

I've also seen it proposed that the treaty should in some ways have been even harsher. An example is linked to WW2's end of war treaty. For this war, the occupation of a nation and direct control is extremely harsh in many ways.
Though the Marshall Plan and Lend Lease loan forgiveness is the opposite of that in many ways. So end of WW2 treaty could be seen as both more harsh and less harsh in different ways. Though something like that happening in WW1 would have issues of practicality with if physical industry is unable to do that, and the social or political will might not exist to make such actions feasible.

 

[Spartakrod]

Starting world war two was most definitely done on Germany and Japan's initiative with countries like Italy, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Thailand and so on hopping along for the ride. The most effective way to prevent world war two is thus to change Germany and Japan.

 

[Fivemarks]

Stop WW2 by shooting the Nazis before they get in power.

 

[Usili 2.0]

I think the kind of question comes into mind is well, what is it meant by 'prevent World War 2'? Is it meant to prevent a full-on global scale conflict as you saw in OTL? Is it meant more-so for the kind of conditions that created it?

If you meant the former, the latest that you could have prevented World War 2 as it was from happening, it would've been basically Germany winding up at war with Czechoslovakia, France, and Britain. In no way was Germany ready for any kind of conflict in September/October of 1938, and if a war had broken out, it would've resulted in the defeat of Germany. In terms of the earliest, probably something involving the Treaty of Versailles or like early Weimar Germany maybe?

 

[Spartakrod]

I think the kind of question comes into mind is well, what is it meant by 'prevent World War 2'? Is it meant to prevent a full-on global scale conflict as you saw in OTL? Is it meant more-so for the kind of conditions that created it?

If you meant the former, the latest that you could have prevented World War 2 as it was from happening, it would've been basically Germany winding up at war with Czechoslovakia, France, and Britain. In no way was Germany ready for any kind of conflict in September/October of 1938, and if a war had broken out, it would've resulted in the defeat of Germany.

In terms of the latter, I'm honestly not sure there.

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The ideal would be the USSR, Poland, Czechoslovaks, France, and Britain all pummeling Germany, Italy, and Hungary at the same time which could have been done with the right circumstances but there were multiple failure points in that particular alliance that eventually resulted in the whole sordid situation being allowed to spiral out of control.

 

[firefossil]

Starting world war two was most definitely done on Germany and Japan's initiative with countries like Italy, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Thailand and so on hopping along for the ride. The most effective way to prevent world war two is thus to change Germany and Japan.

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You are leaving out the Soviet Union, which was an aggressively expansionist state happy to split Poland in half with the Nazis, as well as funding communist insurgencies elsewhere like in Spain. If fascism was less successful or aggressive, then the probable outcome is that WWII still happens but is just communists vs not-communists.

 

[Spartakrod]

You are leaving out the Soviet Union, which was an aggressively expansionist state happy to split Poland in half with the Nazis, as well as funding communist insurgencies elsewhere like in Spain. If fascism was less successful or aggressive, then the probable outcome is that WWII still happens but is just communists vs not-communists.

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Stalin's foreign policy was to sit and wait for a general european war and finish off the winner. Red Alert esque scenarios where he declares war on the entire planet simultaneously to conquer all of Eurasia from Lisbon to Singapore are fantastically nonsensical; not even Trotsky or Zinoviev at their most hawkish were that suicidally aggressive. The only scenario where he might have considered going for broke is if he had a communist Germany as an ally and even then it'd be more likely that the Germans would be dragging the Soviets along for the ride rather than the other way around.

 

[Eliar]

Execute Hitler like the treasonous dog that he was when his first go at a dictatorship failed and he was convicted of high treason instead of giving him a few years time out, a bed, a nice room, some time to produce his manifesto and the street cred that goes with being a "revolutionary" that did time.

 

[Osteoclast]

For Europe, abolish Imperial Germany and forbid anything more than a customs and standards union among the German states.

For Japan, eh. Not sure how you'd stop them from murderizing China.

 

[Frog Thor]

Hindsight is 20/20. A less harsh Versaille treaty might have helped. Japan on the other hand probably would have required not being forcibly "opened" by the US for trade to not engage in the industrialisation that built up their military and positioned them for the power grab. Shakoku period-style Japanese policy where they resisted westernisation would not have left them in a position to engage. (There were guns, but they were generally rare).

 

[Spartakrod]

For Japan you'd probably need to save Taisho period liberalism and deal with the growing cancer of military and zaibatsu influence on Japanese politics.

 

[Fivemarks]

Japan going imperialist isn't a direct result of being opened. You can probably put the blame on the shit deals they consistently got from the British and Russians after the first Sino Japanese War.

Saving Taisho Era liberalism though might'v helped.

 

[BlindLine153]

People say kill Hitler like that's some sort of panacea. Its not. There were a dozen+ would be Hitlers. Give old Adolf an art scholarship and he becomes a decent to good artist and one of a couple dozen other would be strongman visionaries takes his place. I think a less harsh treaty of Versailles would help on the German front. But I'm even less knowlegable about Japan.

 

[lotho]

Stalin's foreign policy was to sit and wait for a general european war and finish off the winner. Red Alert esque scenarios where he declares war on the entire planet simultaneously to conquer all of Eurasia from Lisbon to Singapore are fantastically nonsensical; not even Trotsky or Zinoviev at their most hawkish were that suicidally aggressive. The only scenario where he might have considered going for broke is if he had a communist Germany as an ally and even then it'd be more likely that the Germans would be dragging the Soviets along for the ride rather than the other way around.

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Yeah, the soviets were just as aggressive as the Nazis towards foreign nations. Hitler did not want a war with Britain, or America and the majority of the western world. But he still invaded the Chezcks, and Poles, and wanted to go east. Stalin also would not want to fight Germany, or France, or the UK, or America. But he still invaded Finland, Poland, Romania, etc. They were both pushing around and stealing land from smaller weaker nations.

Japan going imperialist isn't a direct result of being opened. You can probably put the blame on the shit deals they consistently got from the British and Russians after the first Sino Japanese War.

Saving Taisho Era liberalism though might'v helped.

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To be fair, if America had a prime directive instead of colonialism/capitalism and Japan was left alone and allowed to be a feudal state no one would have had to worry about the Japanese empire invading and raping all of east asia and the pacific.

 

[Spartakrod]

Yeah, the soviets were just as aggressive as the Nazis towards foreign nations. Hitler did not want a war with Britain, or America and the majority of the western world. But he still invaded the Chezcks, and Poles, and wanted to go east. Stalin also would not want to fight Germany, or France, or the UK, or America. But he still invaded Finland, Poland, Romania, etc. They were both pushing around and stealing land from smaller weaker nations.

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The soviets only engaged in those conflicts because Stalin correctly figured no one would bother to interfere if they were already busy with Germany. The key thing about him regarding his foreign policy is that he was a coward who shirked away from any conflict with anything resembling a peer country where he couldn't be guaranteed to have strong allies. With a Communist Germany or more at his side; maybe; but even then it's more likely that Red Germany would drag the USSR alongside it into a world war than that the Soviet Union would instigate it.

Hitler was extremely bold and liked to gamble and fully believed it was Germany's destiny to forever shatter the power of Jew dominated America and subjugate the Soviet Union and all the other "asiatics". He had no obligation to declare war on America after Pearl Harbour; he just did because he believed America was a mongrel nation of shop keepers in thrall to the largest Jewish population of the world whose war effort (and ability to support the United Kingdom and Soviet Union) would collapse with a little bit of doing and that once Britain had rightly recognised Germany as its fellow Aryan nation; the two would join hand in hand to one day forever shatter American power in a great war for the Atlantic.

The Soviet Union was never under any similar delusions about the strength of the big three western powers.

 

[lotho]

For Europe, abolish Imperial Germany and forbid anything more than a customs and standards union among the German states.

For Japan, eh. Not sure how you'd stop them from murderizing China.

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Yeah, that's going to not really work very well. I mean imagine if America lost a war, and was split into 50 countries with each state becomes a nation. At best they quikly form an alliance and they all say they are independant, yet they all secretly talk to each other and work together and there is nothing you can do about it. At worst within a few years they reform again and challenge you to stop them, basically you created the balkans in central europe on France's doorstep.

The soviets only engaged in those conflicts because Stalin correctly figured no one would bother to interfere if they were already busy with Germany. The key thing about him regarding his foreign policy is that he was a coward who shirked away from any conflict with anything resembling a peer country where he couldn't be guaranteed to have strong allies. With a Communist Germany or more at his side; maybe; but even then it's more likely that Red Germany would drag the USSR alongside it into a world war than that the Soviet Union would instigate it.

Hitler was extremely bold and liked to gamble and fully believed it was Germany's destiny to forever shatter the power of Jew dominated America and subjugate the Soviet Union and all the other "asiatics". He had no obligation to declare war on America after Pearl Harbour; he just did because he believed America was a mongrel nation of shop keepers in thrall to the largest Jewish population of the world whose war effort (and ability to support the United Kingdom and Soviet Union) would collapse with a little bit of doing and that once Britain had rightly recognised Germany as its fellow Aryan nation; the two would join hand in hand to one day forever shatter American power in a great war for the Atlantic.

The Soviet Union was never under any similar delusions about the strength of the big three western powers.

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They still engaged in them, and there is no proof you have that Stalin won't miscalculate or be able to gobble up small nations while the world is focused on some other issue like Japan, or colonial independence movements, etc.

 

[Fission Battery]

Kill Hindenburg in 1924 before he runs for President. He allowed more authoritarian and nationalists conservatives into power and weakened the Weimar Republic from within. The man worked towards established a military dictatorship and surrounded himself with other people that thought they could use him to further their own ends. The Treaty of Versailles was constantly renegotiated to be less harsh on Germany before the ink was even dry on the original draft.

German conservatives wouldn't have accepted any peace treaty and in fact openly called for an Entente occupation of Germany, since they thought it'd trigger the war to start back up. They could never accept peace that didn't involve the rest of Europe bending at the knee to them. The only way to save the Weimar Republic in the long term is to purge people like that from political power. The Weimar failed to build on the moment established by soldier and worker councils, siding with the military in the hopes of crushing communists, and failed to re-organized the civil service, judges, police, etc. It'd take a lot of work to remove a lot of high ranking bureaucrats but it would have helped in the long run, since those people quietly worked with the DNVP and Nazis to established an authoritarian/totalitarian state.

The SPD/Catholic/Liberal presidential candidate also nearly won the 1925 Presidential election. He only lost to Hindenburg by less than a million votes. That's because the KPD ran a spoiler candidate that managed to snag about two and a half to nearly three million votes away from the SPD/Catholic/Liberal alliance. Hindenburg allowed institution rot to fester and blocked attempts at cleaning house. Killing Hitler's a good start, since without him the Nazi party would completely fall apart to infighting and get absorbed by other volks parties, but that doesn't remove the reactionary politicians already in charge.

The rise of the Nazis to power was fueled almost entirely by internal develops and certain groups reactions to the current political order. The SPD/Catholics/Liberals were okay with the new international order and working to find Germany's place in it as a large industrial commercial country. The SPD were advocating for a common market across the continent as early 1922. The borders with France and Belgium were recognized, and the Western powers were deliberately left Poland's border an open question. It was left open for revision, as was the question of uniting with Austria. As stated above, it doesn't matter what peace treaty you put in front of Germany's face. Conservatives and reactionaries will howl for blood no matter how lenient it is. The SPD/Catholics/Liberals will sign just about any treaty too, since they don't want Germany occupied.

In addition to Hindenburg, put Ludendorff and Kaiser Wilhelm up against the wall. They deserved a bullet to the head as much as Hindenburg did. They knew the war was unwinnable and refused to accept a ceasefire or communicate with the government in Berlin. When push came to shove they deliberately handed power over to the Reichstag to sign peace treaty in order to avoid ruining their reputation and then after the war began claiming they were stabbed in the back by the civilian government. They were all cowards, liars, and in general conmen that got to walk away scot free when they shouldn't have.

Perhaps it would have been better if Germany had been occupied. It would have stretched out the fighting even longer and lead to greater lose of life. There were many German paramilitary organizations running around, of various political stripes, who would no doubt try to fight the Entente, but also each other. Germany would begin to suffer an even worse Turnip Winter as the blockade would not be lifted and a full blown civil war would break out. That's something nobody wanted to see; an industrial country with a population of sixty million and a standing army of millions of young men tearing itself apart as Britain, Canada, France, Belgium, and America marched their troops into the quagmire to try to find someone to hold accountable for the actions of Imperial Germany. Chaos in the heart of Europe as war crimes, starvation, and deprivation run rampant.

Maybe then reactionaries could have been broken as the young, future foot soldiers for paramilitaries, are instead drafted as teenagers and die fighting their fellow Germans. They can't claim that Germany wasn't defeat proper when Entente soldiers march into Frankfurt, Cologne, etc. They'd still find something to complain and lie about, but the general public would have less reason to believe those specific lies. Perhaps a communist revolution would have broken out across sections of the country. They were crushed because they rose up prematurely and those in power put them down, but now there is no power. There's only armies fighting each other. I suspect France would break the Rhineland off as a buffer state, annex Saar, and reclaim Alsace-Lorraine.

So, to prevent WW2, as in stop Germany from becoming a belligerent nation, you either politically purge conservatives and reactionaries from power (which can only really be down internally) or you occupy Germany and accept dragging the war out until like 1920. The former is kind of up to the Germans themselves to deal with (unless you've got a time travelling assassin to send back and deal with certain people), while the latter would entail bankrupting Britain and France and costing potentially millions of more lives.

 

[Fivemarks]

To be fair, if America had a prime directive instead of colonialism/capitalism and Japan was left alone and allowed to be a feudal state no one would have had to worry about the Japanese empire invading and raping all of east asia and the pacific.

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Good, now Japan is opened up by the British, who'll treat Japan way worse. Or the Russians, or the French. Or it stays feudal and ignorant of the world until the the UK shows up with giant shipfuls of Opium.

 

[SeptimusMagisto]

Good, now Japan is opened up by the British, who'll treat Japan way worse.

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Seems like a good way of preventing them from becoming strong enough to be a factor in a World War.

 

[Triggerhappy]

People say kill Hitler like that's some sort of panacea. Its not. There were a dozen+ would be Hitlers. Give old Adolf an art scholarship and he becomes a decent to good artist and one of a couple dozen other would be strongman visionaries takes his place. I think a less harsh treaty of Versailles would help on the German front. But I'm even less knowlegable about Japan.

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Less harsh treaty . . . Signed only after Germany is totally overrun.

If I remember correctly, part of how the mythos of the great war grew into resentment in Germany was that the Germany government capitulated when they understood full well that they did not have the resources to continue the fight and were going to be overwhelmed, but before that fact had really sunk in for the rank and file of the enormous army they had built. So post war you had lots of angry veterans going on about how victory was stolen from them looking for someone or something to blame.

 

[lotho]

Good, now Japan is opened up by the British, who'll treat Japan way worse. Or the Russians, or the French. Or it stays feudal and ignorant of the world until the the UK shows up with giant shipfuls of Opium.

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I said prime directive so the Japanese would be allowed to be isolated like the sentinaliese for all eternity with the might of America nuking to hell anyone who tries anything.

Seems like a good way of preventing them from becoming strong enough to be a factor in a World War.

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That way leads to retardation where you can claim that Hitler was good because some of the people he killed could have ended up spawning someone who would be some rapist or genocider. Or that America should have nuked the rest of the world after ww2 because that would lead to world peace and we would not have to worry about communists, or other nations starting wars again. It's true but the cure is worse than the disease and the person who does it is worse than the original bad guy.

Less harsh treaty . . . Signed only after Germany is totally overrun.

If I remember correctly, part of how the mythos of the great war grew into resentment in Germany was that the Germany government capitulated when they understood full well that they did not have the resources to continue the fight and were going to be overwhelmed, but before that fact had really sunk in for the rank and file of the enormous army they had built. So post war you had lots of angry veterans going on about how victory was stolen from them looking for someone or something to blame.

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Yes Germany was going to lose either way, the most they could have done was drag the war out and make it bloodier, which is something they should have considered. After all if Versaillie was followed to the letter it would basically make Germany into a tributary state. It's not paying reparations that is the big issue after all big reparations were a thing the french suffered in the Franco Prussian war, and the Russians in Brest Litovsk. What made Versaille worse than those treaties was that it basically neutuered the German state and made it have to ask permission from other nations to do things. I mean the Germans did not force the Russians to disband their entire air force, or to never build submarines again, or that they weren't allowed to move soldiers within the borders of their own nation on land they control. But those conditions were imposed on Germany. I mean the at that point it's not much worse than occupation and annexation, the only thing worse would be full on genocide. And I doubt Germany would have suffered that if they decided to keep fighting till they are overrun.

 

[SeptimusMagisto]

That way leads to retardation where you can claim that Hitler was good because some of the people he killed could have ended up spawning someone who would be some rapist or genocider. Or that America should have nuked the rest of the world after ww2 because that would lead to world peace and we would not have to worry about communists, or other nations starting wars again. It's true but the cure is worse than the disease and the person who does it is worse than the original bad guy.

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The question is how to prevent WW2, not how to prevent it humanely.

I said prime directive so the Japanese would be allowed to be isolated like the sentinaliese for all eternity with the might of America nuking to hell anyone who tries anything.

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Even assuming America would want to do that for some reason, I'm not sure they have the capability to "nuke" the British at sea.

 

[The Sandman]

Keep Germany from dragging the US into WWI. The Germans then win a peace of exhaustion some time in late 1917 or early 1918. Britain would have no particular interest in starting another war, and neither France nor Russia would have the capacity to.

 

[lotho]

The question is how to prevent WW2, not how to prevent it humanely.



Even assuming America would want to do that for some reason, I'm not sure they have the capability to "nuke" the British at sea.

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That's true but would Britain be willing to start a giant war that would tie up it's navy and fuck it's economy just to get too oppress some random peasants on an island on the other side of the world? Like if America was crazy enough to be willing to defend Japan prime directive style other nations may just say ok. Like it's the same with the Sentinalese, people debate about the way to deal with them, either leave them alone, or try to integrate them, or etc. But if a powerful nuclear capable nation like India decided to evict them people would complain, but no one would actually do anything because a few dozen people somewhere is not worth having millions of your own people die in burning agony. Like the calculus doesen't add up, nations and people tend to look after themselves and their close friends and allies and will only help others if it does not cause undue hardship. If a powerful nation publically says it has a do not cross line people won't cross it. Just like France will never be invaded again because they will bust out the nukes if one inch of French territory is crossed by a foreign army..

Keep Germany from dragging the US into WWI. The Germans then win a peace of exhaustion some time in late 1917 or early 1918. Britain would have no particular interest in starting another war, and neither France nor Russia would have the capacity to.

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America wanted to go in ww1 though the Wilson and the WASP's who own the nation were sympathetic to the British who they saw as their kin. Yes Germany did stupid things that did not help like the Zimmerman telegram, but even without that the U.S. was breaking the rules to supply the British, hell the casus beli of the war the Lusitania was actually transporting weapons so it was a valid target and it lost it's neutral status.

 

[Susano]

I mean... the "nicest" version probably resulting in the comparatively nicest world would be Weimar Germany surviving and thriving, which is not impossible to pull off. I don't think the successes of the early Nazi time would be entirely impossible for a democratic but slightly aggressive government to achieve, after all.

Failing that, well...

People say kill Hitler like that's some sort of panacea. Its not. There were a dozen+ would be Hitlers. Give old Adolf an art scholarship and he becomes a decent to good artist and one of a couple dozen other would be strongman visionaries takes his place. I think a less harsh treaty of Versailles would help on the German front. But I'm even less knowlegable about Japan.

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Killing Hitler early enough is actually completely viable. Even if you say the Weimar Republic is doomed anyway, well, chances were aways it would be replaced by a bog standard reactionary military junta. The Nazis and their genocial awfulness truly were something special in that regard, and that does first of all derieve from the personalities of their leaders.