France and england had a defense pact with poland. The su attacked poland two weeks after nazi germany did. So how come the two only declared war on germany?

Yeah that's an excellent geo-political macro strategy, let's piss off the largest Industrial Nation in Europe ( maybe world) just so the already defeated Poland won't think we're dishonorable. The only reason they even declared war on Germany was because they knew they were eventually gonna attack France anyway.

Their thinking was "who's the biggest threat to us?" not "what is just?"

They declared war on Germany because Germany attacked first and they figured they could defeat Germany.

Once Russia attacked though they could not also declare war on Russia, since they'd have no way to win the war. They'd have no chance to defeat Russia & Germany.

In 1941 Hitler decided to attack the Soviet Union (Operation Barbarossa); he reportedly said to his generals, "We have only to kick in the door and the whole rotten structure will come crashing down."

In June 1941 the Germany invaded Soviet controlled territories, and the Red Army retreated. Military observers around the world watched closely. It appears that most of them shared Hitler's opinion, expecting Germany to win, destroy the Soviet system. I think many people thought they would let Germany of doing the dirty work without formally needing to declare war and having them still as a potential allies if what was expected didn't happen.

Very few American experts thought the Soviet Union would survive. British analysts also shared this view. Negative predictions had an important impact on Franklin D. Roosevelt; while the United States was not at the time at war, he favored the Allies (Britain and the Soviet Union), and decided to try to avert the collapse of the USSR by supplying them with munitions through Lend-Lease, and also to pressure Japan not to attack while the USSR was so vulnerable. I think it is pretty clear Germany was perceived as a great threat as the events played out at the time, and they didn't want Soviet Union joining sides with Germany. That would have completely changed the war. Without the eastern front to spread the German's thin it's very possible WWII has a far different outcome.

What does analysis predictions of Germany vs Soviet Union have to do with the French/British declaring war on the Soviet Union on top of Germany?

France/Britain had their hands completely full with Germany. So even if the SU wasn't thought of as strong as it ended up being, it was plenty enough to be too much for the allies to handle on top of Germany.

By the time Germany went to war with the SU, they were thought of as nearly invincible. They'd crushed the french like they were children. This was a huge part as to why people thought Germany would easily defeat Russia. Not because Russia wasn't a big power.


Also I doubt the war has a different outcome. Germany never had the navy craft to invade Britain and they also lost air supremacy. So they'd be at a stalemate with Britain until eventually the US enters the war and Germany still loses.

I mean its a big part of why Germany went to war with the SU when they did. They had no way to invade Britain, and figured if the conquered the soviet union the either the British would lose hope and make peace or Germany would at least have enough raw material to build a sufficient water/air fleet to invade Britain.

Well, first of all you are correct that Hitler couldn't have invaded Britain as he had no sizable Navy at the time he invaded the Soviet Union. I think that was one of the main reasons behind Barbarossa is that Hitler had no where to send the Wehrmacht: Britain couldn't be invaded but was unable to threaten Germany on the continent, Spain was friendly, Switzerland and Sweden were neutral and surrounded, everyone else (Finland, Italy, Romania, Hungary etc) was on Hitler's side.

Hitler's massive, plan was to kill all Slavic peoples by 1955 and replace them with Germans. Jews, Gypsies etc were the first priority for genocide but the Slavs were next in line. Fortunately the Nazis never got to carry this plan out completely. Like Leo Tolstoy argued in War and Peace, like Napoleon in 1812 it seems that Hitler had very little choice if he wanted to invade someone. Russia was the only realistic choice at the time he went in to "kick down the door." He thought they would fall easily to carry out his master plan.

However, let's suppose Hitler didn't invade Russia. What would he have done? The obvious answer is renew efforts in North Africa and efforts to take down Britain. Can you imagine what Rommel would have done in Africa if the resources that went to the eastern front would have been diverted to Africa. I can't see how the allies would not have been completely wiped out of Africa.

Germany might have finished the Graf Zeppelin, Bismarck and Tirpitz to form an invasion task force and renewed efforts to subdue the RAF. Would he have invaded Britain successfully? Would a potential fall of Britain have brought the USA into the war? I don't know...

I am not saying for certain because nothing is for sure, but the biggest mistake Germany made in WWII was invading the Soviet Union. If Hitler kept Stalin thinking they were allies with Germany, he would have had tremendous amount of resources to push the allies off of Africa. If Japan still attacks Pearl Harbor maybe America gets distracted in the East and the post WWII map looks completely different depending on the result of a later conflict with the Soviet Union.

I'm not sure as I haven't seen much about it, but at the time I don't think there were much resources in Africa that could be used for the German war machine. So even if he does focus on Africa all he gains is territory. It would make an invasion for the US harder, but he'd still lack the ability to produce at a rate high enough to win if the Americans entered the war.

So winning Africa doesn't give him much. More territory but he's back to square one because that doesn't give him resources to build his navy. He needs the factories and oil and minerals in the Soviet Union to do that.

Hitler couldn't win a war of attrition, which is exactly why he designed the wehrmacht for blitzkrieg style warfare. Germany didn't have anywhere near the resources that the allies had. He was consistently growing weaker and lower on oil while the US mass produced for the British and for themselves getting ready for the war. Hitlers only hope of not getting massively out produced was to conquer Russia and gain their massive resources.

Hitler pretty much had to attack the Soviet Union as it was his only way to get enough resources to invade Britain and or try and match the US production.

So while while attacking the SU ended bad for him, it was pretty much his only real move. His failure was in not defeating them, not in attacking them.

Of course... these are all my opinions

Africa is the gateway to the Middle East and the Red Sea, especially Egypt. Cut Britain off from the Suez region, and Germany puts a real hit on their supply lines. Knock Britain and France out of North Africa, and the Middle East and its oil are yours for the taking in 1942-1943.

The oil production in the middle east at that time was not that great yet. Most oil production in the middle east didn't start till after the war. There was some oil there, but it wasn't anywhere near enough.

Not to mention all the logistic problems of getting the oil back from the middle east to Germany. The Axis had very little shipping capabilities and there weren't any trains from the middle east to germany.

Also the Germans needed more than just oil, they needed all kinds of resources. Those which the industrialized Soviet Union had and the nonindustrial africa/middle east didn't.

There were still valuable facilities in Mosul and other area of modern Iraq that Britain had been keen to get control of after WWI--the rest of the Gulf was not producing significant quantities of oil, though, true. Control of the Suez was much more vital to hurting the British war effort than actively aiding the Germans, though. Hitler might have been able to force Churchill into a peace settlement that gave him time to fortify Europe if he put the Empire in jeopardy.

We probably agree more than you think.

That said if Britain is knocked out of Africa they still might not have come to an agreement at the peace table, but it could have bought Germany time to reload to go after the Soviet Union on one front while Britain is effectively pushed back on the home island, looking for plan B and the US to enter the war in full.

If the US gets distracted in the east with Japan also hoping the the Soviet Union issue is eliminated by Germany, which is what many would have predicted might make the US hesitate to enter the war at this point.

Finally the US fully commits to going back after the German's after winning the war against Japan. If the Soviet Union is beat that would make an invasion of the European far more difficult. I think the Allies still win the war but at a much greater cost.

Thinking about this possible alternate line you wonder if the Atomic bomb becomes and option for use in Europe against Germany? So many possibilities. So interesting to think about.

It definitely would of hurt the British, but to be fair the British weren't that much of a threat to Germany in terms of offense anyways. Britain didn't need huge amounts of oil to move their forces around like the other countries at that point, as all they were doing was digging in on their island and waiting. Not to mention the US, the largest producer of oil at the time, was already sending them aid.

Also I don't think Britain would of made peace. They showed their unwillingness to make peace throughout the war when it was just them against Germany. They attacked French ships. Even when their cities were being bombed during the Blitz and attacked by v1-v2 rockets the British never even hinted at wavering. I think the only thing that would of made the British surrender is a full on invasion that meant surrender or annihilation.

To be fair Germany definitely could of defeated the Soviet Union, they just made several strategic blunders which lead to their demise.

It's possible. I don't think Britain was much of an offensive threat at that time anyways. They had no land force, and their only offense was bombings which didn't have much effect on the Germans, and really small water craft invasions on small occupied territories. So they didn't really have to locate a ton of resources towards Britain. I'd like to see some numbers on how much men/tanks/aircraft they had on the western front at the time of barborosa though.


Without a doubt I think. I believe The US would of dropped that bomb on Berlin without hesitation. I mean they used them on Japan, when they had Japan 100% defeated. Japan was completely cut off and surrounded and had really no way to win the war. The US still used it to save America lives. If that's the case I'd definitely think they'd use it to win the war and save American lives.

You give far too much credit to the "official" rationale IMO, but that's an issue for another thread.