The “fact” that the Axis powers could not have won the second world war misses one of the most important historical lessons from the conflict.
As partial addendum to pervious article I have written on historical interpretation this is one I think have to be addressed very clearly. There are two elements I think has to be addressed to fully discuss this new consensus around the most destructive conflict in human history.
There is a 2 part series of YouTube videos that have received nearly 6 million views in total across both titles. The broad arguments are as follows: that the Axis, or more specifically Germany, did not have the materials to fuel their war effort and the Germany high command made several key mistakes. These decisions were systemic and thus even the minor deviations that alternative history types like to war game either wouldn’t be as impactful as they think or would be completely contradictory to the very mentality that had a stranglehold over the axis leadership. I have attached both videos at the bottom of this article so you are able to see exactly what I'm responding to.
So, I would like argue against these points in two ways. That the Axis could have won the war, and even if I concede that is not true, to hyper focus on that reality is not the true lesson that should be taken from the conflict.
Firstly, the Axis could have won the war and that should scare you.
It is no secret to suggest the odds were against the Axis when the war began and again by the end of 1942 it was becoming clear things were not exactly sliding in their favour. However, I want you to rethink how conflicts work in this sense. That the battles, even the most decisive, are not won by the victors but are just lost by the losers. The very defining nature of the early war for both Germans and Japanese could be said to be just serial failures of the Allies being prepared for the type of conflict they were faced in start of the war. The type of mobile and combined service warfare was not what the allies were expecting and nor were they able to respond in effective ways to meet these new challengers at first.
There was no doctrine of Blitzkrieg as much as “WW2 in colour” may tell you but structure of the German army into various independently acting armies within a larger organisation allowed for a type of war fare the allies could not counter effectively. This was a allied failure to adapt and learn from their new challenge in a very short amount of time. There are several reasons for this but worth inspecting. The combined command of the French and British forces were not were not particularly the unified entity they may have been near the end of the First World War. They were shell shocked from the last war from taking any perceived risky moves and thus you have a very reactive force that the Axis could dictate to.
This is all to say the fall of France, Poland, the Benelux, and parts of Scandinavia and Mediterranean were Allied failures and not so much Axis victories. There is a point in these videos that suggests the Germans shouldn’t have done as well as they did in the late war. However I would suggest the Axis should not have done as well as they did from the beginning of the war. The Germans, Japanese, Italy and their allies never had the Adequate forces, manpower, materials and equipment to reach many of their goals and yet saw a series of victories that defied all reason.
The Allies for their part had modern equipment, endless amounts of manpower, Vast resources, and some of the most advanced forces in the world. It wasn’t like the Axis should have ever done as well as they did in any part of the war. What was their undoing really was the very victories they achieved that shocked the world .This is why emphasising the that fact the allies lost those early battles is important because it then takes the crucial reasoning that follows in a new direction. Something that many historians and pop historians have not bothered to consider. The Germans weren’t the little force that could but rather, lucky, not risk adverse and had nothing to lose. This allowed a dynamic nature that the allies emulated in the opposite until the they felt like they too had nothing left to lose.
So when the tide began turning against the Axis in late 1942 you can see that what occurred was that the Allies had become the force that had adapted from their mistakes. Whilst the Axis, who hadn’t learnt from their victories, had almost chosen not to adapt any further and became increasingly concerned with maintaining their gains than risking any adverse consequences. The adaptability of armies is absolutely crucial and whilst it can be argued that the resources the Allies had ensured they could make more mistakes then the Axis is true. It doesn’t negate that the overall argument at hand is that the Axis only need to make a few less mistakes themselves and for the Allies to make few more for things to turn out quite differently.
SOME HISTORY
There are several example from the war that could be used to articulate my point. The initial success of operation Barbarossa could be put down almost entirely to the Soviet leadership and in particular Joseph Stalin. Stalin refused to believe reports that the Germans were planning to attack, then refused to allow his army to prepare as to not spook their aggressors into attacking. Stalin had signed a trade agreement at the same time of the Molotov- Von Ribbentrop pact that supplied the Germans extensive supplies in their war effort which they gathered and used against them. Let alone several strategic errors that cost the Soviets dearly, such as the second battle of Kharkov, which was a major military blunder, costing hundreds of thousands of soviet soldiers because Stalin would not head the demands of his generals and advisors.
Another example could be the Battle of Midway. The forces were squarely in favour of the Imperial Japanese Navy before it began. However several factors lead to their defeat, that is the Japanese had pushed the date of changing their naval codes which the Allies has broken a month or so prior. The Japanese were not aware their codes had been broken but they had planned to change them just in case. War games were set up to ensure they had planned the battle out effectively but when flaws in the plan were discovered they were rejected. In the midst of battle two errors were deeply costly, that is ordinates were kept precariously loose under the main strip of the carriers. This was to ensure speed in rearming their planes but ensured that if the carrier was hit it would set off a chain reaction. Isoroku Yamamoto, who had planned the entire attack on Midway, had placed himself on a ship several hundred miles away from the air craft carrier force that was to make the first strike. He also enforced a strict radio silence and whilst that wouldn’t give traffic to the Americans, it also ensured he was not able to coordinate his forces or respond to events as they occurred.
The last example I will use is the the Dieppe Raid of August 1942. It was a extremely poorly planned exercise that lead to the deaths of thousands of allied soldiers. The commandos and units meant to land on the beach were all sent into battle without any proper naval or air support. Despite cracking the German enigma machine the plans for the raid were given to the Germans in advance by French double agents. The Allies were also not aware of the forts the Germans had and attacked the position in a full frontal assault.
The point of these examples is to outlay the fact that many of these battles could be said to have been decided long before the actual battles too place. Lack of intelligence, resources with over abundance of inflexibility and short term thinking cost many people their lives. The mistakes made were often avoidable but terminal as long as the other side didn’t make mistakes of their own. I’m sure examples of explicit victories from one side can be brought to counter these examples. However my point is not to say there is not such thing as a earned victory but broaden our understanding of the very history of conflict. That those who win aren’t necessarily those who earned the victory and those who lose may have defeated themselves and not actually been defeated by a foe.
You could translate this sentiment to many arenas as it comes with many lessons. To those in science, politics or even entertainment the gain of one does not and maybe should not mean the disregard of another. This is a very primal instinct of human society to make these types of assumptions and in some cases it can be true. However what potential history is trying to do is to create content for a very specific audience. That is of the younger male demographic that is often fascinated by war history and unfortunately especially the German militarism. So I’m sure whilst creating entertainment the goal was to communicate this to them in format they most connect to. I also might just be falling out of that demographic but i am very familiar with those who live inside it and so appreciate the desire. However whilst in a true fashion of a Abrahamic deity he has closed a window to open a door.
The point that is missing
The second point is that even if all the above reasoning is incorrect and there was no way for the Axis to secure any kind of victory, this almost misses the most crucial lesson to be learned. That the very mentality that this kind of conflict or these kind of people could never have achieved a victory is the very same mentality that lead to the Second World War in the first place, let alone seeing the ignorance of the growth of modern day far right movements. That if you treat these people as those who could never challenge you, it will put yourself and those you love into a false sense of security. This kind of lost cause myth has cross over with that of the neo fascists, today who lament the fall of the American confederacy or Nazi Germany, they then grandstand the these “great” defeats.
We as a group of people from the most advanced time of human civilisation need to have a in-depth understanding of our history in ways that go deeper then 10 minute videos on YouTube and the baseline facts of any events. This is the clear sign of the failure of history educators on a much broader level. Either in efforts to over complicate historical situations that impact the present or oversimplify it into meme, we then lose what should be the most important element of history. It is not the numbers, dates, people, events, wars, or other kind of segmented piece of information that is inherently important. Rather how to take such information and apply it to the contemporary lives of the people in this world now.
You can make some very good arguments about the reasons why the Axis could never have won the war and you might be very accurate. The lesson should be however that their reasons can all be true but it doesn’t mean the Axis should have ever gotten as powerful as they did and to treat their spiritual successors as a non threat regardless of their current power is only lulling us all. It shouldn’t take 60 million or even more human lives for us to relearn the lesson that you can’t treat these threats like they don’t exist. The Axis were not exceptional and that should be scary because that means they weren’t particularly bright, motivated or divinely blessed and were still able to conduct some of the worse atrocities known to man.
Videos I’m doing this response to
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbim2kGwhpc&ab_channel=PotentialHistory
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYTrjxOPYNY&ab_channel=PotentialHistory
Sources
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/percentage-of-countries-who-died-during-wwii-2014-5?r=US&IR=T
https://www.reddit.com/r/imaginarymaps/comments/5xo9vm/the_man_in_the_high_castle_world_map/
