May 10th 1940 - Germany invades the USSR

I've not seen this covered anywhere else - apologies if it has - but the question is "What If Hitler had decided to strike east rather than west in the spring of 1940 ?"

Some thoughts to promote the discussion:

1) Hitler and the Generals had seen the lack of Anglo-French response to the invasion of Poland in Sept 1939 apart from the pro forma Declaration of War. How would they react to a German attack on a country to which they (Britain and France) were less than positive ?

Britain and France had failed to secure a diplomatic agreement with Moscow in the summer of 1939 and had opposed the Soviet attack on Finland. The signing of the Nazi-Soviet Pact on 23 August 1939 had estranged Moscow from the West. Can anyone think, Hitler reasoned, they would help the Bolsheviks ?

2) German reports on the state of the Red Army, based on the meetings that had taken place in Poland in October 1939, had been less than positive. It seemed the Russians were well behind in terms of armour, infantry support, aircraft and other logistics quite apart from the calibre of junior and senior officers.

3) Ideologically, Hitler was committed to the extermination of Communism and that meant the military defeat of the USSR. Once that was done, Hitler argued, Britain and France would be forced to recognise German military domination of Europe and come to terms.

4) The French diplomatic attempt to build an alliance of central and east European states against Germany had failed completely. Poland and Czechoslovakia were occupied by German troops while Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria were now allies of Berlin as were Italy and Yugoslavia.

Thus, Hitler decides not to push for a full campaign in Scandinavia in April 1940 though Denmark is occupied without resistance. Britain and France believe they have won a major success in forestalling German action against Norway though Norway will not accept Anglo-French troops on Norwegian soil.

Meanwhile, while holding a reasonable flank just in case Britain and France prove him wrong, Hitler mobilises his forces in the East.

May 10th 1940 - German forces smash into Soviet positions in eastern Poland and elsewhere while Hungarian and Romanian forces move forward to the south. The Soviet airforce is obliterated on the ground.

British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain meets his French counterpart to consider the dramatic turn of events. A proposal for Anglo-French forces to move into Belgium and southern Holland is rejected - London and Paris will watch and wait.

Ok....how does this play out ?

Two thoughts:

German Victory: let's say the Wehrmacht occupies Moscow in September 1940 and Leningrad falls soon after. A convulsion in the Politburo leaves Stalin dead and Beria in command. He seeks a deal with Berlin via Heydrich. On December 10th 1940, the Soviet Union surrenders to Germany. The Treaty of Moscow imposes harsh conditions on Moscow - a cordon of pro-German states is set up including Ukraine and Belorussia.

With Communism crushed, Hitler seeks peace with Britain and France and the Treaty of Rome (Feb 1941) ends the European War. Germany is militarily and economically dominant in east and central Europe.

Soviet victory: - The war of attrition continued for six long years. The Russians endured huge suffering - up to 40 million dead - but refused to surrender. Eventually, the sheer scale of the slaughter told on the Germans. At Rostov in 1944 and Kursk in 1945, the Germans suffered huge defeats. By the summer of 1946, the Russians had liberated Poland and were poised to enter Germany.

The British and French moved into Germany up to the Rhine but could only watch as Berlin descended into a hell of flame and destruction. On October 1st 1946, Hitler committed suicide. A week later, the Germans surrendered. The Red Army occupied Denmark, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Italy and Germany to the Rhine. Yugoslavia was untouched and Soviet forces stared at Anglo-French forces across the broken bridges of the Rhine and along the Dutch frontier.

Comments, observations, thoughts ??

stodge said:

Comments, observations, thoughts ??

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You are too stingy toward winning Germany and too generous with winning USSR. Victorious Germany will not play silly "protectorate" games in Ukraine and Belarus, it will swallow them whole. As far as I remember, Germans envisioned "Arkhangel to Astrakhan" borderline, although Urals looks more likely to me. And, with bloody and exhausted Soviet Army barely reaching Poland by the war's end, no British or French leader in his right mind would allow Soviets to get Eastern Europe. Stalin will be happy to get OTL 1945 border, although I suspect he would be contained somewhat East of it (after all, 1945 border had been drawn by victorious Stalin to get most favourable border layout).

I would think that the Germans would fell Moscow only by November 1940 at the earliest. That's a long ride. And I doubt the Germans would want to stop there, unless the Russians are willing to give them a border on the Urals, which isn't going to happen. The war would most definitely continue, though I do agree the Russians would be shattered if they were invaded a year early, much more than OTL. Those Siberian divisions aren't going to be of much help.

Meanwhile, Hitler wants Alsace-Lorraine at the very least. France isn't going to let that happen. So the war with France will continue. By this point who knows how much more prepared the Allies will be.

Hnau said:

I would think that the Germans would fell Moscow only by November 1940 at the earliest. That's a long ride. And I doubt the Germans would want to stop there, unless the Russians are willing to give them a border on the Urals, which isn't going to happen. The war would most definitely continue, though I do agree the Russians would be shattered if they were invaded a year early, much more than OTL. Those Siberian divisions aren't going to be of much help.

Meanwhile, Hitler wants Alsace-Lorraine at the very least. France isn't going to let that happen. So the war with France will continue. By this point who knows how much more prepared the Allies will be.

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Don't forget that the Germans are a lot weaker as well. Both in terms of quality, with a lot less panzer IIIs and IVs for instance and in total number, let along the equipment looted from the west. While the airforce may well be stronger without the BoB and Med fighting the army will be a lot weaker. As such, even with a disorganised Red Army its still a huge task defeating the SU.

Furthermore the Germans are going to have to leave substantial forces back to watch the western powers. Especially as both Britain and France were re-arming a lot more intensely than Germany at this stage. Just because they did nothing while Poland was conquered doesn't mean they will continue to be inactive. And if they attack while most of the German forces are half way to Moscow!

Your also got to consider that while the Nazi-Soviet Pact lasted Germany gained massive amounts of raw materials and a way of breaking the western powers blockage. This will now end with a lot less resources in German hands. Furthermore, unlike OTL 41 Germany doesn't control France, the low countries or Norweign. AS such its fighting a two front war from a much weaker military and economic position.

If the Germans were mad enough to do this they might well make substantial early gains. Under those circumstances you couldn't blame Stalin for refusing to believe Hitler was about to attack him! However they will almost certainly be stopped well short of Moscow and even without major western action will probably be back to the border by 42 at the latest.

The only complicating factor might be if Japan, still angry at the earlier defeats and not yet having moved south - hence no western embargo - might join in the attack on the Soviets. In that case while I would expect the Soviets to win in the end it could well be a long and bloody struggle on both fronts. At the same time, without France falling and once he realises Hitler's gamble in the east has failed Mussolini stays neutral.

Steve

A couple of problems with 1940 Barbarossa. First, Germany relied on the element of surprise to capture smaller amount of territory, with good roads and infrastructure allowing blietzkrieg to work as intended. Russia simply has much larger territory, and much poorer infrastructure. Which ended up being a major problem down the line in OTL as it came to supplying the German forces in Russia.

Second, German military capabilities are not as great in 1940 as they were in 1941. Many of the newer Panzer models are only entering service, and Germany has to actually rely on mediocre tanks for the most part (don't quote me on exact models, not really my speciality) - in fact, I distinctly recall that the French tanks of the time were actually more advanced than the German ones, but the French doctrine was not as developed as the German blietzkrieg. Additionally, many of German troops are still quite green without the Western campaigns of 1940, meaning the overall experience level is likely to be somewhat less, and perhaps the training would have suffered as well.

Third, Germany has to leave large enough forces guarding against possible Anglo-French attack. This is instead of simply occupying the already defeated France, where lesser troops and Vichy forces could be spared. So, some of the higher quailty/training German forces are inevitably tied up in the West.

Combine the three factors, and even if the Soviets respond as ineptly as IOTL, German attack is likely to be a bit weaker, and the end result still largely the same in the long run.

France and Britain were absolutely set on not attacking. The memory of the great was too much for them to overcome and order a frontal attack against fixed German positions. They might have sat there till doomsday.

The other problem is the marginal line was a solid line of forts with entrances only the French side. Pretty hard to move men, tanks and gear through to the German side while the Germans are bombing and shelling your troops.

Hell the British and the French were even unwilling to bomb German traffic on the Rhine. If the Phony war had continued indefinitely I very much think UK and France would have sued for peace. Remember their idea of winning the war was to starve Germany out.

The German Panzers being weaker would have made very little difference. The strength of blitzkrieg was based around lightning speed and not fighting pitched battles against other tanks and anti tank weapons.

Rommel had it right, Tanks against infantry, anti tank guns/bomber against tanks.

Oil and rubber

It would be interesting to see how this played out. My impression is that the Germans probably don't do as well as they did historically, but there are a lot of factors on both sides that could impact this.

Arguing for a less successful attack:
1) Historically the Germans captured rather large oil stocks in France, which helped them with their chronic oil problems. They ran through some of those stocks in the Battle of Britain, but were still probably in a better position in regard to oil at the start of Barbarossa than they would have been in May 1940.
2) The Germans were getting natural rubber from Japan through the Soviet Union until Barbarossa. They needed that rubber more in the early part of the war than they did later on as synthetic rubber production came on-line.
3) Until the fall of France, the Germans couldn't import vital raw materials like Wolfram from Spain and Portugal.
4) The Germans wouldn't have effective control of much of French industry to increase their industrial capacity. They also wouldn't have control of the small French oil wells or the coal and iron of Alsace-Lorraine.
5) They wouldn't have access to French and Spanish workers to help alleviate the chronic German labor shortage.
6) They might not have access to Romania or to Romanian oil. Romania fell into the German orbit AFTER the fall of France, not before. Up until the Fall of France and the Soviet seizure of a part of eastern Romania a little while later, the Romanians maintained a pro-Allied neutrality, though the did sell the Germans some oil in exchange for captured Polish military equipment.
7) The Germans would have been less confident in Blitzkrieg techniques.
8) As mentioned, they wouldn't have had access to captured French military equipment. Most French tanks were not usable as front line tanks in the panzer divisions, but they played a lot of subsidiary roles. French artillery was a very welcome addition to the German arsenal.
9) No French trucks or horses. As the war dragged on, the Germans ransacked France for trucks and horses to maintain mobility in the Soviet Union. They couldn't do that in this scenario.

Arguing For a More Successful Attack:

1) The Soviet army grew a lot in the year and change between this attack and the historic one. A larger active army and more trained reserves.
2) The Soviets had more time to build their industrial base in the Urals so that they didn't have to start from scratch in terms of infrastructure when they moved factories there.
3) The Soviets didn't have T34s (at least not in quantity) and if they had KV1s the number would have been small.
4) The Germans wouldn't have victory disease to the same extent, and might treat people in occupied territory somewhat better, at least in the short term.
5) The Soviets would not have the US to bail them out in terms of filling in gaps in their ability to produce stuff. Historically the Soviets lost a major part of their ability to produce a variety of industrial material, as well as much of their ability to produce food. Key things they wouldn't get from the US, at least not without paying for them:
a) Food: The Soviet army ran on spam. After they lost the Ukraine the Soviets couldn't feed themselves. US food shipments prevented the worst of the famine that would have otherwise occurred, but even with that the food situation in the Soviet Union was tight, especially in 1942 and early 1943.
b) Aluminum: The US supplied a lot of aluminum to the Soviets, helping their aircraft production.
c) Trucks and radios. The US supplied a huge number of trucks and radios to the Soviets. The Soviets would have produced some of the trucks themselves, but at the cost of tank production.
d) Locomotives and other railroad materials. The Soviets wore out the bulk of their locomotives in the frantic early days of the war, and couldn't produce new ones quickly enough. The US stepped in with replacements.
e) Uniforms, ammunition, synthetic rubber, aviation gas: All supplied in large amounts by the US.

If they had had to buy all of that, the Soviets might well have run out of hard currency not far into the war.

On balance, I'm not sure how this would have turned out. I'm sure the French and British would have been happy to sit back and let the two duke it out. One problem with that though: If the Japanese didn't attack the Soviets, then the German-Soviet war would have freed up a lot of Japanese troops for mischief elsewhere, probably in China.

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Dale Cozort - 11 years of alternate history e-zines at:

http://members.aol.com/althist1/index.htm

(March and May 2008 zines are now up)

wolfstar said:

The German Panzers being weaker would have made very little difference. The strength of blitzkrieg was based around lightning speed and not fighting pitched battles against other tanks and anti tank weapons.

Rommel had it right, Tanks against infantry, anti tank guns/bomber against tanks.

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I disagree. The Blitzkrieg is based on speed, but at the end of the day it's the infantry who has to mop up the numerous pockets. And while the Panzers wait for the infantry, they are going to be forced up againts Russians trying to break out = Tank vs. Tank.

Rommel had it right IN THE DESERT. If you're fighting in the numerous villages and collective farm dotted landscape of Russia, the chances of your tanks getting ambushed are substatially higher.

That's another thing. If the Germans attack the SU in 1940, where will the requistion all the trucks from? Germany in 1940 (and indeed in 1941) is still a horse-drawn army, but still...

Slamet said:

I disagree. The Blitzkrieg is based on speed, but at the end of the day it's the infantry who has to mop up the numerous pockets. And while the Panzers wait for the infantry, they are going to be forced up againts Russians trying to break out = Tank vs. Tank.

Rommel had it right IN THE DESERT. If you're fighting in the numerous villages and collective farm dotted landscape of Russia, the chances of your tanks getting ambushed are substatially higher.

That's another thing. If the Germans attack the SU in 1940, where will the requistion all the trucks from? Germany in 1940 (and indeed in 1941) is still a horse-drawn army, but still...

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Another thing of note is that, up to the middle of about 1942, applied tank technology was firmly tilted towards the Russians, with their T-34's and KV-2's. This didn't matter that much in OTL (the moment the Germans fielding better tanks corresponds with the moment they started losing, utterly), but it might in TTL.

Do note that I might be wrong, as I can't find me books, and me memory's gone a bit hazy.

Theodoric said:

Another thing of note is that, up to the middle of about 1942, applied tank technology was firmly tilted towards the Russians, with their T-34's and KV-2's. This didn't matter that much in OTL (the moment the Germans fielding better tanks corresponds with the moment they started losing, utterly), but it might in TTL.

Do note that I might be wrong, as I can't find me books, and me memory's gone a bit hazy.

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Yes. But there is no reason that the Germans can't copy French/ British tank designs with their crippling overspecialization techniques. I can't find one British tank pre-1940 design that has HE rounds and AP ones...

But seeing the Russian tanks in action earlier, they will certainly tilt that way.

They will fare much better if they go after the SU immediatly after the fall of France, without getting involved in the BoF or in the occupation of Yoguslavia.

This will save them time, men, equipment (specially airplanes) to use in Barbarossa.

ruisramos said:

They will fare much better if they go after the SU immediatly after the fall of France, without getting involved in the BoF or in the occupation of Yoguslavia.

This will save them time, men, equipment (specially airplanes) to use in Barbarossa.

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I disagree.
How will the Germans transport all that load of war material East fast enough?, without the man in Moscow noticing?

Slamet said:

I disagree.
How will the Germans transport all that load of war material East fast enough?, without the man in Moscow noticing?

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Besides, the French didn't surrender until... oh, let's see, 22 June. Even if the wermacht uses their magical teleporters to go from Paris to Brest-Litvosk overnight, they're still one day behind the '41 date of invasion, and aren't going to reach Moscow before winter.

Zyzzyva said:

Besides, the French didn't surrender until... oh, let's see, 22 June. Even if the wermacht uses their magical teleporters to go from Paris to Brest-Litvosk overnight, they're still one day behind the '41 date of invasion, and aren't going to reach Moscow before winter.

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General : But we won't be able to get to Moscow before winter...
Adolf Hitler : That's it, get the teleporters I got for my birthday.

But I don't think the Germans will be idle, knowing that the French are crushed. They will start moving their war machines to the East, before the French even surrender.

But there's a chance for Hitler. If he manages to actually ignore the French (not likely) and turns east in 1940, the Soviets were still rearming and reorganizising the Red Army. So they will be even more unprepared ITTL. Who better to organize modernization than Kulik? EVERYONE is.

ruisramos said:

They will fare much better if they go after the SU immediatly after the fall of France, without getting involved in the BoF or in the occupation of Yoguslavia.

This will save them time, men, equipment (specially airplanes) to use in Barbarossa.

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No, that won't work, the men and equipment simply isn't ready - rest and refit is needed, particularly for armoured units. There is not enough time to harness all the French resources either, meaning that the German railways will really be pushed to the limit.

There is simply too much to do -all the men and all the supplies need to be moved at one, and how ready are the airfields and the camps.

There are presumably no plans, and how could they have made any, as they would not know when the fight in France would finish or where all the different units would be or in what state.

In short it's impossible.

Back to the main question I really do not see it working. Besides the logistical points raised, which are extremely valid the Germans would simply need to leave too large a force facing the British and French, for whom this is a golden opportunity. Reynaud was a far more aggressive leader than Daladier, and Churchill may well still be replacing Chamberlain (I notice Norway has been left out of this equation.)

If the Germans have to fight a winter campaign in Russia there railway system wil probably grind to a halt without French rolling stock. This is really not a remotely rational gamble.

It probably balances out a lot but as was pointed out there is no way you could move the army to the East without Stalin realizing what is coming. And the time delay still puts you too far into the year. While the fall and winter of 40 was better then 41, it was not enough to make the difference.
The Luftwaffe of June 41 was not as good as the Luftwaffe of June 40. They lost a LOT of their best people in the BOB. To my way of thinking the Luftwaffe never came close to being as good again as they were before the BOB. Overall it probably is not too the Germans advantage. Though the point about the US support to Russia just might be the difference since there was no way we could get as much to them a year earlier since we had not really started to ramp up production.
To me the best scenario would be for Hitler to ignore greece and go after USSR a month earlier. That month lost I think makes all the difference in the world. Also, if there had been no BOB then the Luftwaffe of 1941 would be a lot stronger.

burmafrd said:

To me the best scenario would be for Hitler to ignore greece and go after USSR a month earlier. That month lost I think makes all the difference in the world. Also, if there had been no BOB then the Luftwaffe of 1941 would be a lot stronger.

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And let the British get a foothold there? Not a very good idea. A better one would be to...err...persuade Mussolini not to attack at all. Threathen him that Germany will cut all exports to Italy, which it is largely dependent on. And don't brag about France.

DaleCoz said:

It would be interesting to see how this played out. My impression is that the Germans probably don't do as well as they did historically, but there are a lot of factors on both sides that could impact this.

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I'll add to your list:

Impact of the Winter War is not considered yet. By May 10th a lot of those 50 divisions - about a third of the Red Army in Europe - are still deployed close to Finnish border. This would probaby be beneficial for Soviet Union as those forces would not be wasted in battles right after the start of the war.

Finnish Army would not be in condition to support German attack just two months after the end of the Winter War. I would estimate refitting to take at least six monts. Without Western campaign the refit would be slightly faster than OTL as more equipment ordered from the West could come to Finland quicker than OTL.

Due to this and Soviet new base in Hanko the Soviet Red Fleet would be much more active than in OTL, when it was physically netted in the bottom of the Gulf of Finland. Soviet subs, surface ships and naval aircraft would threaten the iron ore shipments coming from Sweden.

As for the reasons why German offensive would succeed better, I think they're fairly well listed. Most important, I think, is the condition of the Luftwaffe. The force was at it's best compared to Soviet air forces in 1940. The impact of air effort would be even more crushing than in OTL. Furthermore, with cargo planes not used in the Netherlands and Crete airborne landings could be used to speed up operations.

The threat from the West would be latent. Historically the British got competent in attacking even field fortified German positions only in 1944, and with benefit of four years of constant campaigning. Germans would have time to fortify the French border and could use their second-line forces to defend them. With precedent of First World War the Anglo-French alliance would only attack when victory would be certain. It must be remembered that in 1914-1918 Germany fought an active two front war for three and a half years.

However, I think a Soviet attack on USSR would mean a renewed Norwegian campaign with perhaps even expansion to a Scandinavian campaign to gain air bases in Southern Sweden and access to the Baltic. As Finland would not be able to participate in initial Barbarossa offensive this would mean that both Western Allies and Germany would court for Finnish participation. This could be achieved only, I think, if Finland would get her lost territories back together with some interest, from USSR.

Jukra said:

However, I think a Soviet attack on USSR would mean a renewed Norwegian campaign with perhaps even expansion to a Scandinavian campaign to gain air bases in Southern Sweden and access to the Baltic. As Finland would not be able to participate in initial Barbarossa offensive this would mean that both Western Allies and Germany would court for Finnish participation. This could be achieved only, I think, if Finland would get her lost territories back together with some interest, from USSR.

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Huh? Soviets attack the USSR?

Slamet said:

Huh? Soviets attack the USSR?

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To add scenario some twist, you see...