The early deaths of Franz-Joseph - 1896, 1906, or 1911
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sillygoose
Well-known member
Could be, I can't find any 'wastage' rates for horses for 1914 or really any part of the war, just general numbers about horse losses per year. Obviously those numbers are open to interpretation.
That's a weird comparison to cite food supplies in an active war zone during the war to home territory food supplies during an armistice. I'm not excusing Germany's treatment of occupied areas, but remember during the fighting of the war (i.e. not after the armistice) the blockade was on and German civilians were starving and dying from nutrition related issue on a large scale, several hundred thousand excess deaths in non warzone home territories.
Also looking up the citation for the claims about food supply levels of occupied territories and it comes back to Sally Marks, who is infamous for uncritically accepting any French claims about the ToV or German 'wickedness' during WW1. Her 'scholarship' is not exactly unbiased. She seems to think that more punishment should have been inflicted because it would have prevented WW2. Never mind that the Allies didn't have the ability to actually keep enforcing the ToV and all it did was increase misery and suffering until effectively repealed. I could write a book about all the flaws in her arguments in the paper that was cited for that claim.
AFAIK the situation in the Rheinland bridgeheads were even worse during the armistice due to the occupying armies sourcing their food from local German farms; since they could pay better than a defeated German state they got preference for food over civilians. I'd have to check my Herwig book for details later on.
300,000+ Brits, 130,000+ Americans, and additional allied smaller states casualties. It was a pretty serious theater overall, substantially worse than the casualties the US took in the Pacific theater. Was the US campaign in the Pacific relatively small then?
Replace losses with similarly well trained troops. They could and did replace plenty of losses with relative ease just due to the large population and large standing army, which meant a large training apparatus already in place to deal with the yearly conscript haul as well as large 'stockpile' of reservists built up over the years. Much like in WW2 when they had 12 million reservists on top of the standing army, there was a large reserve of trained manpower that just needed limited refresher training.
I do question some of the claims about how bad the Czarist regime was at various things, especially compared to the Soviets. Looking up the Czarist education system (among other things) the system was considerably better than is commonly presented in popular histories (of which there is very little in English about this period), I think most of which was influenced by Soviet historiography that consistently tried to justify their existence/performance by contrasting it with the Czarist era, which they consistently unfairly denigrated and had no one able to refute their portrayal since they controlled the archives. Post-Soviet Russian historians how are challenging what the Soviets claimed with archival material, though by now only nerds or specialist historians care.
I did see that and he makes a decent point, though it doesn't really explain then how the Germans were able to project large forces beyond the Vistula in 1915. Or why that would limit the number of armies able to be sent against Prussia.
Maybe with hindsight relative to OTL it wouldn't be a bad, but then Germany has to rely on a negotiated peace deal and internal strife with their enemy civilian populations, which is not really a great strategy to gamble on. We only know with hindsight about the French Socialists and Russian morale issues (which BTW were caused by Germany conquering so much of Russia without the Russian armies able to do much to stop them, plus the resulting problems with food supply, rail breakdown, etc).
It would be a question of how well German-British relations were by the point an ATL war happens. A big part of the reason for the Schlieffen plan was fear of how powerful Russia was (hindsight shows they weren't as big a threat as thought) and Britain basically signaling it favored the Entente already, so the need was to win quick in the west to make the British army irrelevant for a long war given that France would be taken out, and then allow for a one front war to take place; with France knocked out the food situation would also be a non-issue in the event of blockade, while it would be less likely the war would go on long if France was knocked out quickly.
In hindsight yes; at the time it wouldn't really known that the French would do so poorly on the offensive. Extra defenses for the Germans and extra artillery for the French would be an arms race; the limited purchases the French made IOTL and planned to make were to deal with existing German forts, so more forts would mean more and earlier French investment in heavy artillery. It just comes down to when the war happens and how was temporarily ahead in the arms race.
Which wasn't really known outside of France AFAIK, so the Germans couldn't rely on that in planning and if they did know about it they'd probably assume the French government could break it quickly, not realizing the full power of an organized general strike in the French capital. Their memories were based on the Paris Commune, which didn't last long against the French army; by 1914 though the situation had changed given that the French left learned their lessons from that experience. Ultimately the fate of any strike would depend on the results of the early offensives in A-L; if the French army failed bloodily then the strikers look smart and probably gain some support against the war, while if the offensives do well then the strikers look like traitors and lose support among the average person.
Agreed.
I mixed up the two groups, which were intertwined after the latter was formed. As Emperor he wouldn't have a reason to go to Bosnia at all, even more so because he didn't even want to go IOTL.
The book I linked has significantly more than that. While the Russians didn't plan anything they absolutely knew about it and gave the green light for it to go ahead; given their influence they could have stopped it if they wanted to, but didn't out of the misapprehension that FF was a warmonger. I included a different link below.
Try this link:
The Russian Origins of the First World War
The catastrophe of the First World War, and the destruction, revolution, and enduring hostilities it wrought, make the issue of its origins a perennial puzzle. Since World War II, Germany has been viewed as the primary culprit. Now, in a major reinterpretation of the conflict, Sean McMeekin...
www.google.com
I don't think that is true, but the civil service guaranteed retired NCOs jobs, so postmen, rail workers, paper pushers in government offices, etc. were mostly ex-army NCOs.
Theoretically the French were to have more by 1916, but realistically they would lag considerably behind due to fights over funding, the French left being pissed about the 1913 army expansion bill (they were going to try to repeal it in 1915), and not really having any plan or doctrine for what do with the heavy guns other than to have them to keep up with the Germans.
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Not really as given the stance, especially in Germany that the war might be resumed Germany is as much an active war zone post 11-11-18 as Belgium or Poland for instance were during it.
Actually the allies did have the ability to enforce the treaty of Versialles and that might well have avoided WWII. They after a short period lacked the will. Marks may be somewhat biased -can't tell as I've never read here, as far as I'm aware - but unfortunately that's all too common on such issues.
Didn't realise that the US casualties in the Pacific were so small! Or is that just the army/army air force? Considering the size of the theatre and victory that is very cheap for a great power. The Med could have been a serious theatre in result if there had been the willingness to commit resources to it, especially amphibious units to avoid so many frontal assaults.
Replacement of conscripts, although given Russia's longer period of conscription, still 3.5 years according to one of my source books [The WWI Source Book by PJ Haythornwaite] the quality of such replacements would probably be somewhat inferior because of the long time since many would have been at service. I note that the same book said that Bruslov noted that after a year's combat "the trained regular army had almost ceased to exist". Haythornwaite estimates that Russia probably moblised ~12M men, in part due to the difficulty of organising recruiting outside the more developed western areas.
Conscript replacements would be even more so the case in a technical army like the artillery which would almost certainly have had a greater proportion of long term professions. Probably even more so with the equipment as early defeats are going to see a lot of that lost to destruction or capture of equipment. Plus its often noted that due to the inadequacies of the Russian government units were often limited even more than other nations by shortages of ammo and other stuff.
Well the source you quoted below, skimming through the intro pages mentions it only had ~30% literacy rates in 1914.
Simply because the limited logistics prevent them deploying more.
Well Russian morale only became an issue after numerous defeats and heavy losses, especially probably on the offensive but every nation started suffering morale problems in the final stages especially.
Germany actually needs to hold out until either:
a) The EPs realise that any gains will be vastly exceeded by the huge losses their taking
or
b) The fear that Germany would be defeated prompting other nations to intervene. Which is likely to happen very quickly with Austria and probably not too long before Britain starts applying pressure for a peace settlement or a threat of intervention on the German side.
Britain was favouring the EP because it was seeing Germany as the primary threat, due to the latter's actions. However it should be remembered that OTL Britain wasn't formally committed to war against Germany and definitely not if the latter was the victim of aggression.
I don't think the British army was really a factor for Germany OTL as they vastly overestimated both the chances of the Schlieffen plan working and also the threat from Russia.
Actually the Germans seem to have been very confident that the French would do relatively little on the offensive and if anything wanted them to do better as they wanted the French army to be further east when their expected right wing sweep would take Paris and more easily isolated the French army.
I'm still doubtful such unrest would be that likely to occur given the heated national feeling at the time. Socialists in a number of countries talked of opposing any war but none had any significant impact.
OK.
The book I linked has significantly more than that. While the Russians didn't plan anything they absolutely knew about it and gave the green light for it to go ahead; given their influence they could have stopped it if they wanted to, but didn't out of the misapprehension that FF was a warmonger. I included a different link below.
Try this link:
The Russian Origins of the First World War
The catastrophe of the First World War, and the destruction, revolution, and enduring hostilities it wrought, make the issue of its origins a perennial puzzle. Since World War II, Germany has been viewed as the primary culprit. Now, in a major reinterpretation of the conflict, Sean McMeekin...www.google.com
OK that works thanks.
Read through the 1st few pages on display and he racks up a lot of comments from assorted people but then as he quotes himself figures from other powers were making similar statements about their own nations plans. At least on the continent. Also he does some hyperbola himself. For instance the distinctly farcical suggestion that Serbia getting a port on the Adriatic would 'threat Austrian control of the Adriatic'. Apart from the fact Italy would query that statement
Serbia would never pose a threat to the Hapsburg empire at sea. Even aside from the fact that Austria was able to use diplomatic pressure to prevent Serbia gaining any part of what became Albania. Which might have had an impact on the 2nd Balkan war, the collapse of the alliance against the Ottomans and the run up to WWI that otherwise might have been avoided.Very likely.
Steve
sillygoose
Well-known member
Thinking the war might be resumed doesn't necessarily mean they planned on it being resumed by Germany; given that they had already given up Rheinland bridgeheads to Allied armies they probably though that given the maintaining of the blockade the Allies might try to further strong arm Germany during ToV negotiations.
How is Germany an active war zone AFTER the armistice was declared? Fighting stopped everywhere. They were supposed to be negotiating peace, especially considering Germany gave up bridgeheads over the Rhein to Allied armies, but the Allies insisted on starving out the civilian population anyway.
How? The terms so badly screwed the German economy that trade on the continent virtually collapsed, which stagnated the British economy and crippled their ability to pay off their war loans; that was made even worse due to the Soviets/Russian civil war cutting off much of the exports that were vital to the European trade system. There is a reason the US and Britain forced France to abandon their occupation of the Ruhr in the early 1920s:Actually the allies did have the ability to enforce the treaty of Versialles and that might well have avoided WWII. They after a short period lacked the will. Marks may be somewhat biased -can't tell as I've never read here, as far as I'm aware - but unfortunately that's all too common on such issues.
Occupation of the Ruhr - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Great Britain and the Ruhr Crisis, 1923-1924 on JSTOR
D. G. Williamson, Great Britain and the Ruhr Crisis, 1923-1924, British Journal of International Studies, Vol. 3, No. 1 (Apr., 1977), pp. 70-91
www.jstor.org
This led directly to the Dawes plan to sort out reparations payments so that the German economy could recover and start buying US and British goods again so both economies could recover after the post-war downturn.
This PhD Thesis really covers the British situation and how weak their economy was in this period and as a result of reparations policies:
If the French continued to loot the German economy and it collapsed then it would had a national revolt and an epic mess that could well collapse order in Europe. In fact this entire episode was a directly influence on Hitler and resulted in the Munich Beerhall Putsch attempt, as discussed on page 206 in the paper.
The French basically helped create Hitler as a political force. It is much more involved than that and goes into the 1930s and Credit Anstalt collapse too; if you really want to get into it I can lay out the TL of how France's behavior from 1923-32 created Nazi Germany and absent that behavior there would have not even been a Great Depression.
That is for every service. Even throwing in the ethnic British casualties (i.e. not counting the Aussies or Indians), US+British losses were still less than the Mediterranean (~450,000 vs 430,000). The reality is that the Japanese suffered the vast majority of their military casualties in China and everything else in the Pacific was a relatively side show.
As to the Mediterranean...there were plenty of screw ups during the campaign, especially in Sicily, which if fixed wouldn't have required any more shipping/landing craft. However as Operation Anvil showed the issue wasn't lack of amphibious operations, it was something systemic in Allied warfighting that caused them to bungle operations repeatedly; if not for the masses of men, material, and Soviets they could have well lost in a straight fight against the Germans, as demonstrated in 1940 and much of the North African campaign.
Brusilov's statement equally applies to every army in the war by 1916. Combat experience though is often more important than training.
Mobilizing men wasn't the issue necessarily, it was overcoming the technical advantages of Germany in the field.
Not sure what you mean. The artillery often has the least casualties of the combat arms. 70% of casualties are suffered by the infantry, so really, baring major disasters that wipe out artillery units too, the infantry and cavalry (or tanks later on) suffered the vast majority of losses and would have the replacements; the pattern held in WW2 as well with the artillery arm gaining huge experience from 1942 on (when massive losses among all arms tapered off) due to low casualties.
Ammo and replacement equipment wasn't an issue by 1916 thanks to both industrial mobilization and foreign imports of machinery. Everyone had problems with sufficient ammo and artillery production until 1916. The CPs more so due to the blockade IOTL. Without the blockade though if Germany and Russia fought the Russians would be at a severe disadvantage in ammo supply.
I don't think that is accurate to what the paper says in the conclusion, the 30% is what is often claimed about the period rather than the reality.
Not against Prussia; the Russians ended up deploying several there once they had mobilized more in the region.
No, it was the massive 1915 retreat that really broke the morale of the Russian army (see Norman Stone). They lost 1 million men in a matter of a 3-4 months. Never during their offensives did they lose that many in such a time frame. In fact that was probably about 45% of the losses they took for the entire war!
True, but generally it is considered unwise to bank on that as military strategy.
Eh, Sleepwalkers makes the case it was more fear of German economic competition and industrial potential of their military expansion that made Britain fearful of an expanding German empire, though the calculus could well have changed when Germany focused on the army and the Franco-Russian alliance develops its military potential. Also whenever Italy decides the Triple Alliance is no longer in their interest and lets it expire they may join the Entente, which further tilts the balance of power.
Britain and France were the Entente:
Entente Cordiale - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
The Russo-French alliance was separate:
Franco-Russian Alliance - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
To make it even more confusing there was also an Anglo-Russian convention:
Anglo-Russian Convention - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Interesting info about it:
Welcome to Encyclopaedia Iranica
The Encyclopaedia Iranica is a comprehensive research tool dedicated to the study of Iranian civilization in the Middle East, the Caucasus, Central Asia, and the Indian subcontinent
So in an ATL where the CPs are less threatening or the balance of power shifts could well see the Russians and Brits on a collision course in Central Asia.
The Schlieffen Plan was mangled by Moltke, so it could very well have worked had he not changed it before the war, altered it during its implementation, and of course panicked and had a breakdown during the Marne.
Arguably Moltke underestimated the Russians in 1914 due to failures to realize how quickly they would mobilize, which when coupled with Prittwitz's panic led him to cripple the western offensive by stripping it of two vital corps to reinforce East Prussia, where they only arrived after Tannenberg.
What's the source of your claim that they'd do relatively little? Schlieffen wanted the French further East, but Moltke altered the plan to reinforce the A-L to ensure the French didn't get very far...this of course started the original plan to spin off course, which got worse the more Moltke got anxious over the way things were playing out.
The only reason the French Socialists didn't revolt after the assassination of their leader was the German attack, which buried any class objectives, since it became a war of self defense rather than aggression; in a war of aggression (attacking unprovoked other than to honor an alliance with Russia that the French Socialists hated anyway) they would revolt.
The German Socialists bought into the idea that Germany was surrounded and had to strike first to avoid being invaded, so they declared a political truce with the conservatives:
Burgfriedenspolitik - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
In Russia and Britain the Socialists were relatively weak and fractured, so didn't really have the ability to pull off what the French or German Socialists could have. Though the French left in general was the strongest in the world at the time, which is why of all the nations France could have experienced a general strike that would be crippling, but only if they were not attacked first and it was the French government who declared war and acted militarily first.
The book is hardly perfect, but when you get into the meat of the book, namely the section on Russian involvement in Serbia, it is based on solid sources and less hyperbole (IMHO).Read through the 1st few pages on display and he racks up a lot of comments from assorted people but then as he quotes himself figures from other powers were making similar statements about their own nations plans. At least on the continent. Also he does some hyperbola himself. For instance the distinctly farcical suggestion that Serbia getting a port on the Adriatic would 'threat Austrian control of the Adriatic'. Apart from the fact Italy would query that statement
Serbia gaining a port on the Adriatic would be a threat to Austria given their OTL hostility to the Habsburgs, ability to clandestinely ship supplies or agents into other A-H territories to help separatists, and base naval units there. Threaten though doesn't necessarily mean 'seriously endanger'. Still, the A-Hs should have not been able to threaten the French, British, and Italians from 1915 on given the naval imbalance, but still sank quite a few Entente ships in the Adriatic and Mediterranean.
Italy was allied to Austria during the time period that your quote was from, so Italy theoretically presented no threat until 1915.
Buba
A total creep
I remember reading a quote stating same for German Army, that Verdun+Somme killed off their pre-war trained infantry.
BTW - again going by memory - in 1914 the BEF in France suffered 120% casualties. By the end of the year these "Regulars" were a mix of reservists and new enlistees.
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There is still the potential for continued conflict since it was still only an armistice. Active is probably the wrong word but both sides had to prepare for a continuation of the war. As pointed out the allies were willing to allow imports of grain but not in their shipping in case that was seized.
I will admit I'm not sure why the allies determined that Germany couldn't use their merchant shipping other than under allied control. Possibly there was concern that it would be used in some other way or simply extreme mistrust and hard feelings over the last 4 years of bloodshed and suffering but its something I think was a mistake.
How? The terms so badly screwed the German economy that trade on the continent virtually collapsed, which stagnated the British economy and crippled their ability to pay off their war loans; that was made even worse due to the Soviets/Russian civil war cutting off much of the exports that were vital to the European trade system. There is a reason the US and Britain forced France to abandon their occupation of the Ruhr in the early 1920s:
Occupation of the Ruhr - Wikipedia
Great Britain and the Ruhr Crisis, 1923-1924 on JSTOR
D. G. Williamson, Great Britain and the Ruhr Crisis, 1923-1924, British Journal of International Studies, Vol. 3, No. 1 (Apr., 1977), pp. 70-91
This led directly to the Dawes plan to sort out reparations payments so that the German economy could recover and start buying US and British goods again so both economies could recover after the post-war downturn.
This PhD Thesis really covers the British situation and how weak their economy was in this period and as a result of reparations policies:
If the French continued to loot the German economy and it collapsed then it would had a national revolt and an epic mess that could well collapse order in Europe. In fact this entire episode was a directly influence on Hitler and resulted in the Munich Beerhall Putsch attempt, as discussed on page 206 in the paper.
The French basically helped create Hitler as a political force. It is much more involved than that and goes into the 1930s and Credit Anstalt collapse too; if you really want to get into it I can lay out the TL of how France's behavior from 1923-32 created Nazi Germany and absent that behavior there would have not even been a Great Depression.
Actually wrong. Germany could have afforded to pay reparations. Possibly not the full amount but since the German government was willing to sink its own economy rather than make any attempt to pay we will never know. Germany had the only basically undamaged industrial structure on the continent.
The other issue was the US's insistence that its war loans, for which it had often charged high rates, be repaid in full. That was the primary cause of a lot of the economic problems in Europe after WWI and because it left the world dependent on US finances the reason why a US financial crisis in 1929 became a world wide depression. The US didn't help this by being so hostile to the western democracies on this issue. You mention the Dawes plan but the key element of that for the US was not only cutting reparations from Germany but that they take 2nd fiddle to repayment of US loans to Germany.
France needed some help in recovering considering the devastation of so much of its heartland, as did Belgium especially in the west of Europe. That's why when Germany unilaterally cancelled reparation payments Belgium was the other country alongside France that joined in the occupation of the Rhur. Other countries also suffered but the collapse of most of the political system in eastern and SE Europe with the collapse of the old empires and the rise of the Soviet one they tended to get overlooked.
To get a stable world economy you needed a solution to the war debts problem and probably a lower level of reparations, plus a German willingness to pay them. Getting the 1st and you might have gotten the other two and saved a lot of the problems that plagued the world in the 20's and 30's.
Which makes the insistence of the US in putting so many resources into the Pacific so much more frustrating.
Japan suffered its worse losses in China or in the final stages of the war in the fire bombing of its cities, which noticeably exceeded the losses from the two nuclear strikes. It did some some very heavy miliitary losses in parts of the island campaign because by then it was committing men against steel and firepower in overwhelming force.
There were some but later on the hogging of amphibious and other resources for the Pacific closed options that might have been taken up in Italy.
Which requires more surviving regulars and an adequately education new recruits.
Artillery often escapes the worst losses especially in fixed battles such as occurred in the western front. However guns, especially the big ones, aren't exactly mobile so in more mobile warfare losses of equipment and also men trying to move them can be an issue. Also as I said the problem was also in terms of shell supply and management of logistics, which was a more serious problem in Russia than in the west.
Everybody had big problems with ammo and equipment. For Britain it wasn't really fully equipped in the force until probably 1917. For Russia, compounded as well by its isolation from its allies it was never really resolved.
That's what he says however.
You can say its the defeats and retreats during the period of the Austro-German offensives, from early May to October that cracked morale but the Russians were still able to fight in 1916 and early 1917 albeit despite heavy losses. They were however very fragile by 1917.
True but given the corner their backed into in this scenario - and assuming no support from Austria which I suspect would be likely to support its ally - beggers can't be choosers. Mind you will Austria out of the way as an ally for an offensive war at some point then Germany might change its stance earlier and reduce tension with Britain.
Eh, Sleepwalkers makes the case it was more fear of German economic competition and industrial potential of their military expansion that made Britain fearful of an expanding German empire, though the calculus could well have changed when Germany focused on the army and the Franco-Russian alliance develops its military potential. Also whenever Italy decides the Triple Alliance is no longer in their interest and lets it expire they may join the Entente, which further tilts the balance of power.
Britain and France were the Entente:
Entente Cordiale - Wikipedia
The Russo-French alliance was separate:
Franco-Russian Alliance - Wikipedia
To make it even more confusing there was also an Anglo-Russian convention:
Anglo-Russian Convention - Wikipedia
Interesting info about it:
Welcome to Encyclopaedia Iranica
The Encyclopaedia Iranica is a comprehensive research tool dedicated to the study of Iranian civilization in the Middle East, the Caucasus, Central Asia, and the Indian subcontinentiranicaonline.org
So in an ATL where the CPs are less threatening or the balance of power shifts could well see the Russians and Brits on a collision course in Central Asia.
Very likely. There was concern about the success of German as well as American industry, the latter being an even greater threat but largely that was realised to be because of stupid policies by Britain itself with free trade discouraging new investment and the laissez faire mythology hindering the development of new industries and especially of its human capital.
The primary concerns of Britain was the powerful German army and its willingness to use it as a primary tool of policy, which can be seen as early as the The_Battle_of_Dorking in 1871. Note that was before Germany saw its dramatic economic and industrial growth. It wasn't a serious concern however until Germany coupled that army and stance with building up a powerful navy it openly said was aimed at Britain.
As I have pointed out before when Britain started to respond to this by further expansion of its own navy then Germany could have eased tensions greatly by not further expanding their own construction. They could have concentrated on facing their immediate threats i.e. a possible French intrusion into the North Sea - although that would be a dodgy process for France - and facing up to the Russian Baltic fleet.
The Schlieffen Plan, or rather the memorandum which he drew up actually called for substantially more troops than the entire German army had in 1914, i.e. including reserves and what was on the eastern front. Even if those numbers had been deployed it would probably have failed simply because of the logistical problems it posed. There simply wasn't enough room to deploy so many men, even if the Netherlands had also been occupied and the forces at the front would have relied on horse drawn transport back to the German border which wouldn't have been able to bring up supplies and equipment. The hot summer of 1914 didn't help but by the time of the 1st Marne both sides had been marching considerable distances for several weeks and those involved were increasingly exhausted. However the French were pulling back towards their supply sources while the additional forces that helped form was it the 6th Army that helped turn the tide had been pulled from further south by rail.
I was referring to what they actually achieved, which was very little for the massive losses they suffered. That there was some additional forces added to the German defences in the south made minimal difference to this.
The only reason the French Socialists didn't revolt after the assassination of their leader was the German attack, which buried any class objectives, since it became a war of self defense rather than aggression; in a war of aggression (attacking unprovoked other than to honor an alliance with Russia that the French Socialists hated anyway) they would revolt.
The German Socialists bought into the idea that Germany was surrounded and had to strike first to avoid being invaded, so they declared a political truce with the conservatives:
Burgfriedenspolitik - Wikipedia
In Russia and Britain the Socialists were relatively weak and fractured, so didn't really have the ability to pull off what the French or German Socialists could have. Though the French left in general was the strongest in the world at the time, which is why of all the nations France could have experienced a general strike that would be crippling, but only if they were not attacked first and it was the French government who declared war and acted militarily first.
The book is hardly perfect, but when you get into the meat of the book, namely the section on Russian involvement in Serbia, it is based on solid sources and less hyperbole (IMHO).
That is your opinion on the French socialists but again it was always going to be seen as a war of survival for France simply because, as was fairly well known among the military at least Germany was committed to attacking France in any war. The French totally underestimated how strong the German right was and expected to meet the bulk of the German army in Lorraine rather than it pushing through the single army [and fortunately for all concerned the BEF] that stood in its way.
To be honest poppycock. Serbia was never going to be a naval threat to the Austrian empire nor even one on land unless the Austrian empire fell apart because of its internal failings. A port on the Adriatic would have posed no threat to Austria at all. The most it would have been would have given Serbia more independence from Austrian economic control, which was already happening to some degree as a result of the Pig_War_1906-08. Which as you will see was a 'conflict' initiated by Austria - or more accurately its Hungarian component to try and keep Serbia economically dependent on it and milk it of resources.
I'm not saying that there wasn't hostility between the two countries and Serbia was a less than friendly neighbour, albeit both sides had a role to play in this. However to say a Serbian port on the Adriatic posed some sort of threat to Austrian control of the Adriatic is preposterous.
Italy and Austria were technically ally but both, with good reason given Italian designs on territory it thought of as its currently ruled by Austria there is little doubt the leaders of both nations viewed each other with suspicion. As such "theoretically" makes your statement accurate but as we all know theory and reality often diverge.
sillygoose
Well-known member
Theoretically, but practically speaking given that Germany was in civil war and the navy mutinying and entire kingdoms were breaking off it was entirely impractical to restart the conflict for them.
"Willing to allow" only if Germany surrendered her merchant fleet with no guarantee it would ever be returned and only for payments in gold, which were not even available given wartime spending at smuggling rates. By 1918 (if not earlier) they were down to bartering commodities for food with neighboring states like the Netherlands.
Your take seems plausible.
Define 'afford'. I mean if you're willing to starve your people and curtail trade sure they could. See the aftermath of WW2 and the reparations regime imposed on Germany. No one was willing to go that far in 1919 considering it would require total occupation of Germany for years and a pretty abusive occupation policy. Without the Holocaust there was simply no way that was going to fly.
The German government didn't sink its economy after WW1, they were on the brink of social collapse and revolution, so had to stop making payments; the French simply seized whatever they wanted as a result and the US and British intervened to stop them, because that hurt their economy since Germany couldn't buy their trade goods and British reparations payments stopped since the French took everything.
Germany had the only undamaged industrial infrastructure? That would be news to the French who built up a war-winning industry during the war that exceeded their industry pre-war. Britain too, minus the physical destruction. If you count the limited bombing of Britain as damage, remember Germany was bombed just as much by France and Britain.
Why wouldn't the US demand full repayment?
Funny the Entente wanted all the benefits of US industry in WW1, but didn't way to pay for it....maybe they should have negotiated an end to the war that was sustainable for everyone rather than go into debt it couldn't pay off for victory.
And given how the French drastically increased their gold stocks during the 1920s (went from 7%-27% of the entire world's reserves) while building the Maginot Line, they certainly were not hurting for money.
Britain's recovery was actively hindered by the reparations program, since Germany, as one of the biggest trade partners of Britain, was unable to buy their goods. That led the British and US together to force the French to abandon the occupation of the Ruhr and the creation of the Dawes Plan to displace Entente war debts on to Germany via loans.
The US market crisis in 1929 didn't actually create a depression, only a recession. It was French manipulations with Austria that turned it into THE Depression, since it resulted in the collapse of the Credit Anstalt bank and with it started the domino collapse of Europe's banking industry:
THE GREAT DEPRESSION: CREDIT-ANSTALT CRISIS 1931 – Central European Economic and Social History
centraleuropeaneconomicandsocialhistory.com
The cause of that was France, who even screwed up the US markets by 1928:
Did France Cause the Great Depression?
Founded in 1920, the NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers, and business professionals.
The Creditanstalt Crisis of 1931 and the Failure of the Austro-German Customs Union Project on JSTOR
This article reveals that the diplomatic and financial history of 1931 was even more turbulent than believed to date. New documents found at the Bank of England...
www.jstor.org
Unintentionally the financial pressure France put on Austria resulted in the banking collapse that turned the recession into the depression:
Great Depression - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
The problem was not the US it was France's extremely selfish behavior that ultimately broke the entire world's financial system. The US was quite magnanimous with the Dawes and Young plan, plus later Hoover moratorium, which happened even as France was collapsing the Austrian banking system, which led to collapses in Germany and throughout Central Europe.
France was more concerned with keeping the German economy crippled than avoiding the Depression, so rather than accepting a customs union that would help stabilize the German and Austrian economies by reducing trade barriers it was more concerned with breaking any links between Germany and Austria to potentially avoid a political union. So we got the Great Depression as a result of France's fears as well Hitler, WW2, and the conquest of France (twice).
Belgium recovered thanks to exploiting the Congo:
Belgian Congo - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
France was rich enough to drastically increase its gold stocks while building the Maginot Line, so it was just fine financially.
What you needed was a France less obsessed with crippling Germany, less interested in building up way too much gold stocks, and be more interested in paying its debts. There is a reason the rest of the world took Germany's side in 1923 over France and force France to back down from their insane demands for reparations payments.
Increased trade and political rapprochement would have made everyone richer, but instead France focused on colonial exploitation, trying to cripple Germany through resource extraction (it got the Saarland for 15 years on top of all the other items, including gold, that were on their shopping list...which they priced below market standards so they could take even more), and building up their military. Astride Briand and Stresseman at least tried to form an early European Union to create a political and economic structure to prevent another war, but the French government among others wasn't interested.
Limiting the punishment of Germany to create a stable economy and a free trade organization in Europe (and frankly the world) rather than economic imperialism of France, Britain, and the rest of the European imperialists would have prevented another war and stabilized the world economy. If not for the selfishness of the various European states in the power position the Nazi government and WW2 could have been avoided, but instead France, the prime culprit, created the conditions that led to the rise of Hitler (first via the Ruhr occupation, then via global deflation caused by gold hoarding, then by collapsing the Austrian banking system which turned the recession from the gold induced deflation into the Great Depression).
Understandable given that it was the Japanese who attacked the US to first drag them into the war and that being the front that the US public was most interested in fighting. Politically it was unacceptable not to do so.Which makes the insistence of the US in putting so many resources into the Pacific so much more frustrating.
I was talking about military casualties only, not all the civilian losses inflicted by the US. The island campaign against the US was small potatoes for the IJA, but it was the majority of the IJN's war. Given that the IJN was much more technologically focused than manpower focused it would make sense that the actual casualties were much lower, but the overall expense of fighting that campaign was much higher. Really no different than the war in Europe with the fighting between Germany and the Wallies being very expensive and technologically demanding, while the war in the East was much more manpower intensive for both sides.
Sure, but why do that when the US public demanded action in the Pacific and in Europe Russia was already doing the necessary bloodletting?
Not really that important since it was the infantry that would taking the losses; where Russia needed improvement was all the unsexy stuff like communications, command and control, artillery spotting, etc. Those usually weren't casualty intensive jobs.
As with WW2 it wasn't equipment losses that were a big problem once industry spun up by 1916 (or even during the East Prussian campaign or Lodz battle in 1914). Logistics was probably a bigger issue, but as we saw in 1916 the issue was more administration of the battle and coordination of arms. For some reason the Russians and Austrians simply couldn't compete with the Germans; it might have been the 'soft' factors in terms of communications, a flexible/innovative military system that allows for innovation and improvement more quickly, and promoting quality leaders over politically connected ones.
France and Britain each independently outproduce Germany in number of shells during 1915. 1917 was more when Russia finally got its production sorted. Norman Stone at least claims that and he wrote the most famous book on the subject.
Who said what now?
Able to fight is not able to fight effectively, nor does it mean morale was in a good way by that point. The fragility of 1917 was a function of the accumulated issues of 1915-16, up to and including the failure of their allies on the western front.
Agreed.
Indeed.
Speculative fiction from 1871 means anything about public concerns or government policy by 1914? You sure that wasn't about the Franco-Prussian war more than anything? The war that France started and lost?
Seems like the British started taking Germany seriously once it could defeat France and united into a single political entity. When and where did Germany openly say its navy was aimed at Britain? They were threatened by Britain during the Boer wars with blockade and a naval strike on their bases, aka a 'Copenhagen' (see Sleepwalkers for interesting details on British outright threats that helped prompt German naval construction before 1900), so built a defensive navy to ensure they weren't at Britain's mercy. The German army was built up to counter France and later France+Russia after Russia decided it was more interested in threatening Austria than being friendly with Germany.
Read Sleepwalkers, British historiography has left out most of what Britain did to create the so called 'naval race' which behind the scenes they admitted was never really even a race since Germany never had a chance of even catching up even with planned construction that was never ultimately built. Germany did build up her defensive fleet to deal with France+Russia and Britain (who repeatedly threatened Germany with blockade and naval attacks before and during the 'naval race').
The OTL variant nearly worked however; the forces demanded for the plan was more to get a bigger budget than what was actually needed to make the plan work. What was more crucial was inducing the French to advance 'into the bag' in Alsace-Lorraine rather than reinforce that sector with additional corps as Moltke did. That's a whole other discussion that we should separate out of this if you want to get into it.
Had Schlieffen's original concept been stuck to the Germans wouldn't have resisted so hard and conducted retreats to draw in the French rather than resist them with full force that resulted in the OTL losses.
Not really my opinion, I'm relying on scholars with better understanding of the situation who have claimed that.
Fairly well known?
Also the BEF didn't achieve much other than get thrashed and run away until the Marne.
Threat doesn't mean major or existential threat. Serbia did end up being a pretty substantial military threat, not least of which was due to the Russian alliance. If the Russians ever could base naval units there then they'd be a huge problem for Austria (and potentially Italy).
Serbia wasn't really economically controlled by Austria, not sure where you're getting that from?
The Blackhand had already butchered the old Serbian royal family around 1901, so had ended any political influence Austria had on the country, while the Russian alliance had largely ensured Serbia was not substantially militarily threatened.
All that pig war stuff really amounted to was Serbia mainly traded with Hungary, diversified their exports, had a trade argument, and Serbia found other trade partners successfully. Not sure where any economic or political domination came in.
It may not have been clear how disorderly the situation was during much of this period although the assorted militaristic elements seem to have crushed opposition pretty quickly.
Well they still had the most powerful economy in Europe with a lot of scientific expertice. If they had tried then like France post 1871 it would have been possible to do a lot more than what they did.
So the Germans didn't trigger hyper-inflation in their country? Which as well as preventing reparations being made also wiped out their own internal war debts to their own citizens, causing great suffering for the latter.
Germany had the only undamaged industrial infrastructure? That would be news to the French who built up a war-winning industry during the war that exceeded their industry pre-war. Britain too, minus the physical destruction. If you count the limited bombing of Britain as damage, remember Germany was bombed just as much by France and Britain.
Your ignoring where I said on the continent. Yes French did miracles in generating a new military economy after its primary industrial centres were occupied. However the production of millions of shells and large numbers of heavy guns, tanks and a/c aren't exactly that useful especially when the country was exhausted after 4 years of warfare and occupation/devastation as well as having to take large amounts of foreign debts. Everybody else on the continent was prostrate.
Britain had the potential for an economic revival even with the heavy war debts. However the Tory dominated government went for the 'return to normal' with the scrapping of economic policy and would rather massive tax cuts than social spending or faster paying off debt.
Try common sense. Who said something about it being a mistake Germany being too poor to but from other powers a little above? Having most of Europe deeply indebted and prostrate doesn't make them good markets even when your not highly protectionists yourself. Its noted that eventually the US took a different stance after WWII with the Marshall Programme.
There is a clear historical comparison with a century earlier. In 1815 Britain had an economic and industrial dominance markedly greater than the US had in 1918 and possibly even in 1945. Also most of Europe was deeply in debt to it as Britain had repeatedly subsidized its allies heavily. However the British leadership realised that insisting on replayment of those loans would both cause deep resentment and make it far more difficult for the improvished nations to purchase British goods. Hence they cancelled government debts to Britain. I have seen a reference Britain suggested a similar thing in 1918/19 with both Britain and the US cancelling all such debts. Unfortunately the US was too short sighted to agree.
Lets see:
a) It takes two to make peace. Germany had already made clear it was unwilling to do so without considerable economic and territorial gains.
b) The French drastically increased their gold standings during the 20's after economic warfare from the US forced them to accept drastically reduced reparations. To try and give them some economic security from future such actions. Their construction of the Maginot line in the late 30's at considerable cost was because they were feeling vulnerable with a facist Germany rearming madly - albeit the German figures being actually markedly less than Nazi propaganda suggested - and with no reliable allies to support them.
c) What was that about being unable to buy goods if your economy is too improvished again. Actually the Dawes plan while it reduced reparations further increased the vulnerability of the world economy to a failure of the US economy as it created a circle of US loans paying for what Germany did pay back to the allies who then had to pay huge amounts in war debts.
The US market crisis in 1929 didn't actually create a depression, only a recession. It was French manipulations with Austria that turned it into THE Depression, since it resulted in the collapse of the Credit Anstalt bank and with it started the domino collapse of Europe's banking industry:
THE GREAT DEPRESSION: CREDIT-ANSTALT CRISIS 1931 – Central European Economic and Social History
The cause of that was France, who even screwed up the US markets by 1928:
.Did France Cause the Great Depression?
Founded in 1920, the NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers, and business professionals.www.nber.org
The Creditanstalt Crisis of 1931 and the Failure of the Austro-German Customs Union Project on JSTOR
This article reveals that the diplomatic and financial history of 1931 was even more turbulent than believed to date. New documents found at the Bank of England...
Unintentionally the financial pressure France put on Austria resulted in the banking collapse that turned the recession into the depression:
Great Depression - Wikipedia
The problem was not the US it was France's extremely selfish behavior that ultimately broke the entire world's financial system. The US was quite magnanimous with the Dawes and Young plan, plus later Hoover moratorium, which happened even as France was collapsing the Austrian banking system, which led to collapses in Germany and throughout Central Europe.
As stated above the US by repeatedly prevent either harsher terms for Germany or attempts to reconclie the European nations - because it would make the Europeans more capable of resisting US financial pressure - made the entire world too dependent on a cash flow through Wall Street. Hence when their under-regulated economy went tits up everybody else was dragged down as well. Then to make matters even worse they crippled world trade by even higher increases on their tariffs.
The Dawes and Young plans were magnanimous to Germany and to the US bankers as the priorities were reducing reparations - while insisting the allies continued to pay war debts - and giving repayment of loans to the US priority over the payment of reparations to the allies.
Belgium recovered thanks to exploiting the Congo:
Belgian Congo - Wikipedia
France was rich enough to drastically increase its gold stocks while building the Maginot Line, so it was just fine financially.
France was determined to keep Germany militarily weak to secure itself. Since both the US and Britain refused any defensive alliance and the US stepped in a couple of times to block attempts inside Europe to resolve economic and political differences its only option, as well as needing reparations to rebuild its own shattered economy was to cripple German economic might, Especially when the latter became controlled by an insane revanchist and militaristic party.
As pointed out above your details are inaccurate.
What you needed was political and economic security for all. However the US refused to consider the latter as the only real step to reduce reparations was some deal on war debts. It also refused a defensive alliance and unfortunately Britain, without the US agreeing followed suit.
If you think that Germany with a much larger population and an infrastructure largely undamaged by the war as well as forbidden from maintaining substantial forces couldn't afford to pay any reparations how the hell could France, smaller, the site of much of the most bitter fighting and facing continued demands from the US to pay its debts?
What are you on here? There was no economic imperialism in Britain as it stupidly insisted on maintaining free trade regardless of the dumping that made possible by such a policy. The big power that did the danmage by being protectionist throughout this period and continuing working to prevent any co-operation was the US.
Yet the US was blithy talking about invading France in 1942! There was some sense that Germany, especially given the knowledge available at the time, was the primary threat.
The US public was demanding action against all the powers attacking it. I suspect that more Americans died in the 1st 6 months of the U boat campaign against its west and southern coasts in 1942 than at Pearl and a lot more economic and military damage was inflicted by Germany.
Yes but they also lacked artillery and shells which was a major reason why they suffered so much worse. That was less a question of logistics than simple production capacity, organizational failures and as you say inferiority in some 'soft factors'.
Its fairly obvious why neither Austria nor Russia could compete with Germany. Their multi-national empires with poor education and industrial bases as well as lacking a strong and efficient government, hence with large scale corruption and incompetence.
I'm dubious about the former statement given that Britain had a relatively small military industrial base and France had lost the bulk of its industrial heartland. What book is that please?
Your other statements show the problem. Russia wasn't able to get anywhere near a level playing field with artillery and supplies, let alone efficiency of the same until its morale was shot.
The book started the concern due to the German military strength and repeated eagerness to use it. It wasn't really significant however until the actions of the Kaiser and Tirpitz meant a possible threat was becoming an increasingly clear one. Coupled as well probably with the industrial development in Germany that gave them increasingly capacity to pose such a threat.
That's a matter of opinion as the bulk of the German army was facing exhaustion after the long march and facing increasing problems getting supplied as they moved further and further from their railheads.
As I understand it the additional forces added to the A-L area were less important that the actual fortifications and the French inability to counter them due to the lack of suitable heavy artillery and doctrine. In fact IIRC Molke complained because the local commander actually started counter attacks against the exhausted French forces and drove them back.
I suspect there are plenty of scholars who would disagree.
As stated before. The French had a rough idea how the Germans would attack even before they invaded Belgium. The massive rail construction is relatively isolated parts of the western Rhineland was also a big hint. They just, possibly partly blinded by their own doctrine issues thought the main attacks would come further south than they actually did.
A lot of sources, including German ones would disagree with you. The BEF was small and French was an idiot but it was pretty well armed and organised. Albeit not at the same level of the best German units.
By that standard Luxemburg is a potential threat to the US. Serbia only ended up being a substantial 'military' challenge because the Austrian leadership totally underestimated it when it decided to attack Serbia. Your streching things to excuse what you said, especially when your talking about Serbia getting a major port facility and Russia then being able to base a fleet there.
Its also odd saying that Serbia wasn't threatened because of its alliance with Russia when Austria with full German support decided to invade Serbia. Arguably because Germany felt it was running out of time before it could win a quick war against its rivals.
Serbia had a large degree of reliance on routes through Austria, hence the latter's use of this in the 'Pig War' which you will notice Austria [or to be strictly accurate] its Hungarian part started. Hence yes Serbia did seek to make itself less dependent on such pressure.
Steve
Buba
A total creep
There is neither nothing "obvious" nor "cannot compete" here.
In 1890-1913 Russia doubled its GDP, same as Germany. In terms of GDP the two were roughly similar. Per capita is a different story, of course.
But with Russia having three times the population and a lower starting point it was likely to pull ahead.
A-H - in the aforequoted period grew a respectable 60% - slightly better than UK, France or Italy, all of which were performed somewhere in the 30-50% band. In raw GDP A-H was in same league as France (discounting colonies and investments abroad). Again, a lower starting point and larger population, thus lower per capita (not versus Italy, here more or less same).
UK and France, the richest, were plateauing already, Germany could be expected to follow, hence by circa 1930-40 Russia and A-H would had closed the GDP per capita gap even more.
Possibly but that was ahead and they still had problems with deep internal divisions, [especially in Austria] limited education levels and weaker government structures.
sillygoose
Well-known member
Bavaria broke off from November 1918 until May 1919 when reconquered and was begging for Allied recognition for some time. Infighting did them in before the Freikorps even got there.
The German Revolution lasted for over 9 months:
German Revolution of 1918–1919 - Wikipedia
Killing went on from 1918-23 and one source claims ~20,000 people were killed in the end.
The situation really wasn't in hand until after Versailles was signed.
Not after WW1 they didn't. Certainly they had a lot of scientific expertise temporarily until the lost generation would have aged in to fill those roles and then they lost a step on Britain and the US.
Remind me of how long the war of 1870-71 was and how many lives were lost? WW1 and the Franco-Prussian war were not comparable, because Germany couldn't afford to pay much of anything after the expenses of WW1 and the aftermath. Plus you know France had a colonial empire in 1871 that was massive and Germany lost hers in 1914, right?
Plus despite the expense France was able to spend money freely:
French indemnity - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Sounds like a very different situation than what Germany experienced after the ToV.
In fact even the Allies realized Germany couldn't pay it:
Treaty of Versailles - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
That was in terms of gold marks. They paid in other ways:
France could and did borrow to pay off reparations and was able to go off on an infrastructure binge and colonial expansion, Germany was virtually bankrupt from the worst war in history to that point and forced to pay in commodities and a huge chunk of their exports and ended up in hyperinflation. Not sure how you think the situations were remotely comparable.
Nope. Though the situation is complex it was the reparations payments which had virtually eliminated what little remained of German gold reserves (pretty important for a gold based currency that the Allies required Germany to maintain), loss of commodities and export profits that were needed to pay reparations, and occupation of the Ruhr which then deprived Germany of any resource coming out of it (which had major knock on effect to the rest of their economy) that effectively gutted what remained of the already inflated value of the German Mark. Wartime inflation was also a factor and that was already hurting before the ToV even hit, which then drove the process into overdrive. Certainly the German government made things worse by organizing passive resistance that shut down the economy of the region, but with France already occupying it and taking anything it wanted little of it was flowing into the German economy anyway, it just limited the extraction France could pull off.
Any inflation benefits to internal war debts was incidental rather than intended, so the suffering from war debt payment to citizens is further economic damage inflicted by the ToV.
Maybe France should have reconciled with Germany as Astride Briand later wanted rather than antagonize the larger nation they were afraid of and had no allies of significance against. Did anyone really think it would be possible to keep Germany crippled long term? Or that they would forgive and forget? Seems like the leaders of the Napoleonic era understood that when they made peace with France at the end of a generation long ruinous war.
I thought reparations were to pay the US, not rebuild France? Do you have any source about how reparations payments were used by France? Again France spent a ton of money in the 1920s buying up 20% of the entire world's gold reserves as well as paying war debts and building the Maginot Line all while rebuilding from war damage, so they didn't seem to be hurting very much economically.
You do realize that the revanichist and miltiaristic party only took over in Germany due to French actions starting with the ToV and on to the collapse of the Austro-German banking industry in 1931-32?
Which details are those? Because I don't see where you have shown any inaccuracies in what I wrote.
Right, Briand's plan for an EU that even France (though not limited to them) didn't support. He had German backing for some time too thanks to his work with Stresseman.
So if it was known that there would be no defensive alliance and the US was going to want to be paid back, how was the ToV enforceable, especially when it was known at the time that Germany couldn't pay? Again France refused to acknowledge reality and picked the worst of both options: piss off Germany, but not have the means to keep them relatively weak.
See above. France had the money to buy up 20% of the world's gold reserves, rebuild, build the Maginot Line and maintain the largest army in Europe at the time. They had a massive world spanning empire second only to Britain and very valuable, so they had plenty of money while Germany was bankrupt and kept that way until the Dawes Plan, a short respite until France tanked the global economy.
Huh? Britain learned to hate free trade pretty quickly:
Economic history of the United Kingdom - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Imperial Preference - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
As to the US situation with protectionism on that we can agree, the US did really harmeveryone, including themselves.
They could have given what they were able to put into North Africa. Certainly the government considered Germany more dangerous, but the public largely did not and that ultimately caused the US to create the propaganda series "Why We Fight" to create a willingness to fight Germany among the public...which even before D-Day they really had not succeeded in and other propaganda methods were pursued.
So just Japan then? The US was already fighting a war with Germany before the war was formally declared, both in the naval realm and in terms of paying for the Allied war effort via L-L, without which the war would have ended in 1941 (against Britain).
As to the casualty rates between theaters, these were all the engagements in the Pacific from December 1941-July 1942:
Attack on Pearl Harbor - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Battle of Wake Island - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Philippines campaign (1941–1942) - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Doolittle Raid - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Battle of the Coral Sea - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Battle of Midway - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Aleutian Islands campaign - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Combined Allied losses to Operation Drumbeat, the German January-July 1942 submarine offensive against the US were 6,800:
/arc-anglerfish-arc2-prod-mco.s3.amazonaws.com/public/RRHJRSD6BVEFVM6LPI33IMWS6Q.jpg)
Undefended shore: American antisubmarine operations in 1942
In 1942 American merchant ships up and down the Atlantic Coast were being relentlessly attacked by German U-boats. Why did the U.S. Navy secretly decide to leave them unprotected?
www.navytimes.com
US deaths in the Philippines alone were several times that, especially if you include the Bataan Death March.
So until Operation Torch US casualties lost against Germany were a tiny fraction of what the Japanese inflicted. It only inverted during the invasion of Italy, US offensive action in Europe.
Norman Stone using Russian sources claimed that the issue was not the lack of shells or artillery in 1914-15, but administration and distribution of ammo as the reserves were held in the Polish forts and kept there just in case rather than be used in the field. Production thereafter didn't really match demand until the Brusilov Offensive, which was in 1916 and in line with the rest of the major powers, though as I said before thanks to US industry French and British production exceeded Germany (each) in 1915.
Both had strong governments and decent industries, each just had their own specific issues. A-H was entirely political and ideological: the government didn't want to spend money (austrian economics originated there) and the fight with the Magyar nobility meant that they couldn't get enough military funding approved to keep up with the other powers. Russia was late industrializing, so was still modernizing when the war happened; their 1914 Great Armaments Program was going to get them to catch up. Certainly more education, industry, and a non-nobility based promotion system would have helped tremendously, but certain structural factors in both beyond the above three was just as important to stifle their competitiveness by 1914.
I linked it above: Norman Stone, Eastern Front 1914-17.
As to British and French shell production don't forget US contributions;
How Germany lost the WWI arms race
Historian Saul David explains how an influx of women to the factories of France and the UK helped turn the war in the Allies' favour.
www.bbc.com
British production:
In 1871? The French started the war and lost. German use of military threats later on was a function of France violating treaties they had signed, like around Morocco. You do realize Britain did the same thing too, right? They threatened Germany with a naval attack for even daring to ask that their commercial rights be respected during the Boer war. Tirpitz and the Kaiser's actions came AFTER that.
So just because they have some industrial capacity they were a threat? If you'll read the book I keep bringing up, "Sleepwalkers" by Clark, internally the Royal Navy even said that at no point did the German naval construction even really pose a threat given the huge advantage the British had in shipyards (not so in army production of course until US industry got involved).
I'd say its an educated guess. We can't know for sure, but see how the French 6th army got whipped on the Marne in the first battle of the campaign by a single German corps:
First Battle of the Marne - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
They don't sound particularly exhausted or out of supply to drive back an entire army with two divisions.
Without those extra forces they couldn't have counter attacked.
You can always find at least one to disagree with anything.
Apparently an extremely rough idea if they bungled that badly. Not that their forces further south in the Ardennes did particularly well.
The BEF was beaten at Mons and fled only to fight a handful of delaying actions (despite orders to halt the Germans by standing and fighting), some better than others:
Great Retreat - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Serbia relative to A-H is quite a bit more of a threat than Luxembourg is to the US. See how well they did in battle in 1914-15. It was more than just underestimation since the Serbs had fought two relatively modern wars in the Balkans right before WW1 and A-H hadn't fought a war since losing to Prussia in the 1860s.
Nah, you're just trying to define words to your argumentative advantage, not actually engage with definitions of words.
Where did I say Serbia wasn't threatened by Austria due to the Russian alliance? This is what I actually said:
Where does it say they relied on routes through Austria? They did to trade with Austria, they traded with France through Salonika and Bulgaria via their common border. In fact they pressured Bosnia to let them use their ports, which is interesting that they had the capacity to put pressure on Austrian administered areas. And don't forget Austria lost the so-called trade war, so apparently Austrian routes weren't needed.
Serbia started the trade war by ending the sale of Austrian goods in their country per your link:
For scenario 1 or 2 yes, FF was very interested in playing hardball with the Hungarians and probably would have gone ahead with Plan U (written up under FJ), the invasion of Budapest and toppling of the Hungarian parliament to force a new constitution on them. That would have meant equal representation for everyone in Hungary rather than basing voting rights on property value and that would have broken the lock of the Magyar nobility on the government. Changing the constitution would fix the political problems of A-H, but might cause a civil war. Still, better to get it out of the way early on that later. Also FF was not in favor of a triple crown monarchy, he wanted to revert to the single crown and even get rid of parliaments entirely, but knew that was unfeasible, so was willing to settle for changing the Hungarian constitution.
I'm honestly not sure about the Austrian-Russian agreements, but given Russia's pan-Slavic proto-Fascism and Balkan ambitions the issue would more be about Russia than FF or A-H:
The Rebirth of Pan-Slavism in the Russian Empire, 1912–13
The Balkan Wars and the territorial changes that ensued spurred the rebirth of Pan-Slavic activities in Russia. Scrutinizing the entanglements among Russian foreign policy, diplomacy, and public opinion, this chapter describes how officials and civilians—far...link.springer.com
Pan-Slavism — EGO
This article introduces Slavic unity concepts of the "long" 19th century based on Russian imperial Pan-Slavism and democratic national Austro-Slavism. In the 20th and 21st centuries, references to "Slavism" also functioned as an instrument of (cultural) political mobilization. When...ieg-ego.eu
As to the situation in the Balkans, I think FF would be against adding any more territory given the issues facing the Empire already.
Scenario 3 sees FF more focused on internal issues. He was actually a peace-nik and wanted to avoid war at nearly all cost due to his fears the empire would implode if they participated in a major war. In fact a big reason the war even happened in 1914 was the head of the peace faction was killed before the debate for war even started.
So, Franz Ferdinand wanted to keep the Dual Monarchy's political structure intact but to simply implement universal suffrage in Hungary?
And Yeah, having no parliament at all would be EXTREMELY regressive by early 20th century standards since even autocratic Tsarist Russia already had a parliament after 1905-1906, albeit a largely powerless one. For A-H to have no parliament at all would simply very likely pave the way for an eventual revolution in A-H, perhaps similar to 1918-1919 in real life.
Also, when do you think that the first year that Russia would have actually been willing to intervene in Austria-Hungary over an Austro-Hungarian civil war, if ever, would have actually been?
I've always wondered about this and I wonder if in a 1917 alt-WWI, the Germano-Austrian strategy would be to give up on East Prussia, Galicia, Bukovina, Hungary, Bosnia, Croatia, Dalmatia, and maybe Slovenia--at least for the time being--and completely focus on protecting their core territories, which very likely contain the lion's share of their industries anyway. So, Germany minus East Prussia, German Austria, Czechia, and maybe South Tyrol, the Trentino, and/or Slovenia + Istria + Fiume. Germany and Austria could play defense while watching the Franco-Russians bleed themselves dry trying to break through their defenses. And the Germano-Austrian territory would be a tight compact mass after their withdrawals so they could very likely easily defend it for quite a while. The crucial question, of course, would be whether, after the Franco-Russians are sufficiently exhausted, the Germano-Austrians are actually going to be capable of going on the offensive in the East in order to try reconquering some or all of their lost territories--and whether they would actually be successful in regards to this, of course. But Germany can also occupy iron ore-rich Briey-Longwy in France after thoroughly bleeding France dry in Alsace-Lorraine, which Germany can subsequently use as a bargaining chip in any future peace negotiations.
I don't think that either Britain or the US will ever actually be coming to Germany's aid in this scenario, though a compromise peace does seem like if neither side is actually able to achieve a decisive breakthrough and to return to their pre-war borders. If the latter does happen by one of the sides, though, then the other side will very likely give up since they would know that the war is no longer winnable and will thus sue for a negotiated peace.
As a very off-topic side question, I wonder if the US would still purchase the Danish West Indies from Denmark in this TL, but perhaps a couple of years later than it did in real life.
Thoughts on all of this? @stevep
Please look at this industry map of Austria-Hungary, for instance:
The lion's share of their industry is located in their western Austrian territories, which are the territories that are the least likely to fall to the Russians, at least for quite a while.
The lion's share of their industry is located in their western Austrian territories, which are the territories that are the least likely to fall to the Russians, at least for quite a while.
sillygoose
Well-known member
No he wanted to recentralize the monarchy, but that wasn't an option, so he went for the next best thing: break the Magyar nobility's lock on parliament. He could then expect the lower classes to be more willing to work with the Emperor's agenda.
Yup, but FF was an archconservative like Nicholas. Still he did understand that was unlikely to happen, so did what he thought would work and cut the gordonian knot of A-H politics.
I don't really know for sure, but not before 1910. In 1908 Russia was willing to accept the L over Bosnia's annexation, but they remembered. So I assume recovery from 1905 took a little while longer.
Accept the L?
BTW, what are your thoughts on my analysis above about how a 1917 alt-WWI would go?
sillygoose
Well-known member
Accept the loss.
No offensive, but your scenario isn't workable politically. Plus it doesn't factor in agriculture and food was short in WW1 too.
Isn't workable politically in what sense? And Germany can import food without the British blockade, no?
sillygoose
Well-known member
Double monarchy, the Hungarians wouldn't appreciate being abandoned and they had half the soldiers in the empire. Speaking of which the Austrians would lose half their replacement pool at a minimum.
Why would there be no British blockade in this scenario?
But wouldn't WWI start over the Ausgleich in this TL?
Because I was presuming that WWI starts over the Ausgleich and thus Britain refuses to support open Russian aggression against Austria. That, and Germany doesn't invade Belgium since the Schlieffen Plan is no longer viable by then due to Russian railroad construction in Poland being completed as a part of the Russian Great Military Program (due for completion in 1917).