Sorry it has taken so long to get back to you, real life gets busy.
If France backs down due to French socialists deciding they prefer Germany overwhelmingly dominating Europe to France being an independent state then their likely to lose support pretty rapidly. If they fight you suggest they will suffer a lot less than OTL although the resulting economic controls that Germany is likely to force on them might make a difference here.
They didn't think about it like that, so the way you're framing the situation is already a problem.
French independence wouldn't be threatened if the country stayed out of the war and the French Left was pretty anti-war especially if it meant their participation would involved invading Germany to help Russia. Whether or not the majority of the public supported the general strike so long as the French Left supported it in their key strongholds then they will have the ability to shut down Paris and other industrial cities. If people turn on them then you have a civil war in the industrial heart of France. Either way it seriously negatively impacts the French war effort. When the bloody defeat inevitably happens at the border the French Left ends up looking like they were right anyway.
I'm not clear on what you're meaning in the second sentence above. Economic controls that the French government will impose won't really help given their lack of cash to actually pay for things; per Hew Strachan's magisterial work on the finance of WW1 the French relied on British loans taken out from the US to finance their war effort, so without Britain being in the war and borrowing from the US on their behalf the French don't have the money to fight a long war, so even without the invasion damage they are still unable to import the necessary materials to fight the war unless Britain is willing to give them unsecured loans or buy a colony off of them. Not sure the British public would be keen on that given that they aren't officially allied, Britain is likely neutral given that their tripwire in Belgium hasn't been hit, and Russia is still a rival of Britain, so helping them defeat Germany isn't really in their interest either.
Your arguing that Germany will do considerably better than they did OTL in the east even if the Russians have warning of Germany striking east 1st, which is almost certain to happen and hence time to change their plans and greatly improve their defences. Yes aided by Austrian siege guns the Germans were able to take down Liege pretty quickly but that I believe took up the vast bulk of their super-heavy guns so how quickly can they do that in multiple locations. Plus as you mention such firepower wasn't sufficient at Verdun.
Yes, because in 1915 they had that warning too and they got smashed despite being fully mobilized and Germany facing vastly heavier offensives in the west at the same time than the French could muster here. Oh and A-H was a basket case by 1915 and had to be propped up by Germany. So yeah all the advantages lie with the CPs, not Russia.
en.wikipedia.org
They had improved defenses in 1915 compared to 1914 not to mention vast combat experience and still they lost 1 million men and a huge swath of territory. So I have no idea why you think Russia would do so well in 1914 when basically facing 85% of the German and Austrian armies by itself. They'd be outnumbered and outgunned and those forts you think they can hide behind fell easily when actually attacked. If you want to see how quickly they could move and use their heavy artillery see the 1915 campaign and how quickly Russian forts fell:
ru.wikipedia.org
de.wikipedia.org
That was while supported by field armies too.
I didn't say the firepower was insufficient at Verdun, I said the forts were useless when hit by the heavy artillery. It was the endless willingness to sacrifice men in trenches that decided Verdun, not the forts. The Russians did not display that same ability when defending their forts in 1915.
I'm not assuming that Russia will win, especially if as you suggest France deserts them - although I believe the latter to be unlikely. I'm thinking it would be a longer and harder fight than your assuming. Especially since without losing a lot of manpower and resources in often poorly organised offensives to aid their allies elsewhere. Plus as the Germans force them back away from the frontier they not only stretch their own logistics but also the Czar can appeal to Russian/Orthodox nationalism. How far can they advance against a Russian army that stays organised and motivated? Note this might not even be under the Czar as OTL you saw the revolution replacing him in spring 1917 and under those circumstances Lenin's later coup that enabled the massive advances in 1918 are unlikely.
My suggestion is to check out the fighting in 1915 then, given that they had fully mobilization, actual combat experience to improve on their poor track record in 1914, and material aid from the US too. Still they were badly defeated even with the Austrians beaten to a pulp and Germany more than half tied down in the west repelling much heavier French and British offensives than the French mounted in 1914 at the border.
If what you claim is true, why did none of that work in 1915? Seems like you're pretending that the entire year of 1915 didn't exist for us to use as a model of what a Russian defensive posture performed like.
Yes without a blockade Germany will be able to trade somewhat on world markets but it will need either money, or goods that it doesn't commit to the military to buy such products. Also similarly Russia will also be able to trade with the outside world, although assuming the Ottomans still attack them their best supply route will still be cut. Is Germany going to send ships - or worse still subs - to attack British or US merchant ships sailing for Archangel?
Which they had and did spend at blockade pricing (i.e. much higher than they would pay if they could trade freely with the US rather than having to smuggle things through neutrals) and with British purchasing driving up prices. The Germans actually had more cash on hand than the French (this isn't WW2 where everyone but the French were short on gold) and they took over the gold reserves of Austria and the Ottomans to purchase for the alliance since they had more leverage in trading.
Russia was able to trade with the outside world IOTL and had loans from the US as well and purchasing from Japan (all those Arisaka rifles and ammo led Fedorov using the 6.5mm cartridge and barrel for his Avtomat rifle), but that didn't really make a difference.
I highly doubt US merchant ships would get involved in the Archangelsk run. Britain very well might if Russia is purchasing, which Germany would have to accept given the worse problem of British entry into the war. Besides it wouldn't be necessary to even try to stop given how poorly the Russians did on the defensive.
Nobody likes being occupied, especially after hard fighting and I doubt that the Germans will be willing to treat the assorted other slavic nations especially any better than the Russians did while there will be differences in culture, religion and language. You may well see some support initially for German 'liberators' but once they realise they will have no real freedom and be tied to German economic control that's likely to dissipate pretty quickly.
Historically the Germans did treat the natives better than the Russians:
en.wikipedia.org
Alexander Watson, “Unheard-of Brutality”: Russian Atrocities against Civilians in East Prussia, 1914–1915, The Journal of Modern History, Vol. 86, No. 4 (December 2014), pp. 780-825
www.jstor.org
en.wikipedia.org
As the Russian army retreated, the Chief of the General Staff
Nikolai Yanushkevich, supported by
Grand Duke Nicholas, ordered the army to devastate the border territories and expel the "enemy" nations within.
[8][9] The Russian authorities launched pogroms against German populations in Russian cities, massacred Jews in their towns and villages and deported 500,000 Jews and 250,000 Germans into the Russian interior.
[9] On 11 June, a pogrom began against Germans in Petrograd, with over 500 factories, stores and offices looted and mob violence unleashed against Germans.
[9] The Russian military leadership regarded Muslims, Germans and Poles as traitors and spies, while Jews were considered political unreliables.
[8]
With about 5.5 million out of 16 million soldiers killed and wounded, the Russian Empire appears to have suffered less than France and Germany. But that does not take into account some other facts: 500,000 soldiers missing, 3 million prisoners of war, 1.1 million disabled, 6 million refugees and...
encyclopedia.1914-1918-online.net
Several
pogroms and mass repression reignited the political and ethnic fractures in the empire. If the anti-German riots of May 1915 in Moscow, directly linked to the war, only caused a few deaths,
[18] the same is not true of the revolt against mobilization in
Turkestan.
[19] The unrest first grew in the oasis zone before reaching the towns in July. Violent protests and raids on the institutions of the Russian colonizers and the colonial administration set up in the 1860s ensued. In response, army attacks and retaliation on the part of the colonizers caused more than 1,000 deaths among the native population. The repression extinguished the revolt within a month in Turkestan, but it continued among the neighbouring Kazakh nomads. In August 1916, detachments of Kazakh horsemen swept down on the Russians around Lake Issyk-Kul, killed the men, carried off 1,500 women and children as hostages and burned everything in their path. Around 2,000 settlers, ten times more than in Turkestan, lost their lives in a new anti-colonial war.
Finally, the
Jews became scapegoats in explanations for the series of defeats suffered by the Russian army on the western limits of the empire. Furthermore, they were used as outlets for the frustrations of the “white” units during the civil war. The imperial army was traditionally a hotbed of antisemitism. In September 1914, an army commander evicted the entire Jewish population in the Polish fortress of Pulawy, only allowing them twenty-four hours to leave. Continually accused of helping the enemy, the Jews found themselves up against all sorts of discrimination and were even taken as hostages.
[20] During the Great Retreat of the summer 1915, the army evacuated all the populations considered to be a potential threat for the immediate rear of the retreating units. Only a strong resistance on the part of the civilian authority stopped the operation degenerating into death marches like those of the
Armenian genocide. The violence of the Great War created a heavy legacy in which white military authorities enforced a whole range of forced displacements and ethnic segregations. The civil war was particularly violent in the old Pale of Settlement – the western regions of the empire where the tsarist laws had confined the Jews from 1791 onwards, forbidding them to enter the main towns and villages. In
Ukraine during the civil war, they were the target of the riots against "speculators"; approximately 150,000 men, women and children fell victim to the series of pogroms from 1918 to 1920.
[21]
en.wikipedia.org
For Higher History learn about the autocratic rule that kept the Tsars in power and the growing revolutionary ideas that threatened them.
www.bbc.co.uk
Remember the Russian empire was an absolute monarchy and quite violent at maintaining its rule:
en.wikipedia.org
Also we have a difference on wiki about the September programme. You posted a link to the German version, which apart from me being monolingual doesn't seem to show maps. The English speaking one does
Septemberprogramm and they match quite closely with what Germany attempted in 1918. Its one of the problems of Wiki as its very much user driven. The link above gives quotes from I assume a couple of professional historians albeit that they could be being mis-interpreted by the poster. But then that could be the same for the German version.
Google translate. I'm not aware of any maps being present in the memo.
The US ones just have 'possible maps' from modern interpretations. Also note the only part of the East that is even mentioned in the English version only mentions Poland as an associated state.
The OTL 1918 situation ended up being very different from what the Septemberprogramm talked about.
The problem is has a new pecking order been established. Neither Britain nor the US will accept the idea its allowed no real trade with most of Europe. France and any rump Russian/Slavic states won't be happy under the German heel. How long with Germany be willing to maintain large armies to maintain controls and threaten those areas beyond their direct control. Will they resume the naval threat to Britain? After a couple of years of war will the militants think their in total control and if so what happens when there's pressure for social reforms, especially with the restrictive Prussian franchise?
The US didn't really care if the CPs and Russia fight and if France invades. They were just upset about Germany fighting Britain and invading Belgium. British politicians might care, but the average Brit did not. In fact were it not for Grey and Asquith's backroom dealing Britain might not have gone to war in 1914 at all.
France couldn't really be conquered and would likely just cut a deal in conjunction with Russian as soon as it was clear Russia was beaten, so that means losses to France and Russia would likely be minimized. Likely Britain would encourage a deal sooner rather than later to ensure to avoid the balance of power being disrupted too much. That likely means there isn't going to be a long war that would disrupt things too much, as no one really wanted a long costly war and Russia/France would be worried about internal stability if things go on for long given the unique issue TTL presents them. So no major need to really have continued long term mobilization if it is a relatively short war; occupation of Lithuania and Poland would just mean peacetime garrisons are set up in those areas rather than in Germany, much like how the US and UK stationed troops in Germany during the Cold War without major issue.
There never was a naval threat to Britain from Germany, that was just fearmongering the RN did to get parliament to spend on the navy to replace the BB fleet given that the Dreadnought obsoleted the entire world's BB fleet overnight.
en.wikipedia.org
By securing a head start in dreadnought construction, the United Kingdom ensured its dominance of the seas continued.
[89]
The battleship race soon accelerated once more, placing a great burden on the finances of the governments which engaged in it. The first dreadnoughts were not much more expensive than the last pre-dreadnoughts, but the cost per ship continued to grow thereafter.
[k] Modern battleships were the crucial element of naval power in spite of their price. Each battleship signalled national power and prestige, in a manner similar to the nuclear weapons of today.
[90] Germany, France, Russia, Italy, Japan and Austria all began dreadnought programmes, and second-rank powers—including the Ottoman Empire, Greece, Argentina, Brazil, and Chile—commissioned British, French, German, and American yards to build dreadnoughts for them.
[91]
And don't forget that Britain initiated the race and was planning on blockading Germany long before the German fleet became a threat:
en.wikipedia.org
From 1905 onward, Admiral John Fisher developed war plans for blockading the German coast; it became a central British strategy and was implemented in 1914.
[8] In 1906, Fisher declared that Germany was the "only probable enemy" and that the Royal Navy should keep a force twice as powerful as Germany's navy within a few hours of Germany's shores.
[9] Eyre Crowe of the British Foreign Office wrote a memorandum on 1 January 1907 to Foreign Secretary
Edward Grey that became policy. In it, Crowe urged stalwart resistance to what he viewed as Germany's attempts at hegemony in Europe. He argued that German actions might be the result of a confused strategy, but that the intent was irrelevant to British national security.
[2]
Up to Germany's 1908 naval bill, Britain in general had largely ignored the buildup, though some individuals in the military and government were already keenly aware of the potential threat. In December 1907, the
Admiralty had in fact proposed reducing the rate of battleship construction to one dreadnought and one armored cruiser the following year, which was in line with the
Liberal government's priorities to increase spending on social programs and reduce overall government spending, under the new leadership of Prime Minister
H. H. Asquith in May 1908. However, in the summer following the 1908 bill, alarm among the public and in the government rose.
[2]
Funny, just after the Dreadnought was launched in 1905 and the German naval bill provided for funding a new class of BBs to match them while the Liberal government in Britain was planning on cutting the naval budget...
No my position is based on ~50 years of reading and thinking about history, politics and human behaviour. Note I'm not making assumptions about imperial Germany. I'm assuming that any militaristic and autocratic state will seek to behave in such a manner unless and until it realises that other will check it by force if necessary - or are actually defeated. WWI was far less black and white than WWII say but the basic rules still applied. As they did against Napoleon, Louis XIV, the Hapsburgs during the 30YWs, Spain under Philip II and the Hapsburgs again under Charles V. Most people don't want a foreign ruler dictating to them and this is a barrier that increased as national identities firmed up and social and political values changed.
That's the problem, the older stuff written in English about the war was heavily influenced by British propaganda before and during the war.
I also don't think you realize just how much of the continent was dominated by specific ethnicities that forced their rule on others; the French for instance worked very hard to crush regionalism and dialects to the point that by the end of WW1 they were virtually wiped out other than Breton identities. Russia was an entire empire set up to dominant dozens of groups. Meanwhile Germany had the Sorbs who were pretty happy with being German; the Poles of course wanted their own country, but the great majority were dominated by Russia, while those in Austria were generally happy with the arrangement as it was other than some nationalists who joined the Polish legion under Austrian control.
Germany was not an autocracy and no more militaristic than any other state of the era with the exception of perhaps France given its strong left wing movement. Russia was the most autocratic and militaristic of the European states of the time, which British politicians didn't mind supporting despite their colonial rivalries. Also the British weren't exactly above a fuck ton of militarism and imperialism. They weren't exactly known for their honest and moral deals with colonial native populations either.
So yeah history is a lot more complicated even that what you present above.
