Sustainability of the Nazi economy? - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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Inter-war period (1919-1938), Russian civil war (1917–1921) and other non World War topics (1914-1945).
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#14166695
A common criticism of the Nazis is that their economic miracle was based on militarism, and was unsustainable without warfare. What's the truth to this matter? Is there a professional analysis of this subject by an actual economist?
#14166701
I find it unlikely there would be, Andropov. According to economists, both the Neoclassicalists of today and of the Classical and Keynesians in preceding generations, The Soviet Union wasn't sustainable, China isn't, and the protectionism of 19th century America shouldn't have been.

Of course, I can't say too well what the particulars of the German economy were, but it might depend on what sort of victory they might have achieved to merit their sustainability. If they had not gotten bogged down in Stalingrad, they'd have had a much larger pool of resources to draw from; turning the British in Al-Amin, rather than vice versa, might have allowed for the Ribbontrop-Molotov (sic) pact to go through.

I'd think the amount of R&D they performed would have encouraged higher technological turnover. I suspect they'd have maintained good economic growth.
#14166851
The author to most recently write on the topic that I can think of was Adam Tooze - The Wages of Destruction. He seems to come down on the side of the Nazi economy not being self sustaining but I haven't actually read the text myself.

I don't know that I would say that the Nazi economy was built on militarism, more that the pursuit of militarisation was the key cause of the emerging economic crisis by 1939. Basically a lot of short term gambles were made on the assumption that it would somehow work out at the end. I think in 1933 when practical economic policy was being forged, foreign conquest wasn't exactly a clear plan in anyone's mind and militarisation may have been pursued for domestic/political reasons rather than under any economic logic. In a way its hard to imagine was a sustained Nazi economy would have looked like, because militarisation was pursued early in the piece and that doesn't really give a good view of 'business as usual'.

I tend to take the view it wouldn't have been sustainable due to the Nazi government's erratic policies etc. no matter what, but that's more of a guess.
#14221065
Smilin' Dave wrote:The author to most recently write on the topic that I can think of was Adam Tooze - The Wages of Destruction. He seems to come down on the side of the Nazi economy not being self sustaining but I haven't actually read the text myself.

I have but its been a while and I wouldn't claim to have studied it exhaustively. As I recall Tooze is not quite as economically deterministic as some of the people who quote him. Tooze is absolutely right to stress that the miracle war economy of late 44 was totally unsustainable. That doesn't mean it wasn't an economic miracle. I feel it was one of the great surprises of the twentieth century just how durable totalitarian states were and their incredible ability to mobilise and focus resources. No one expected the early Bolshevik regime to survive. The production of the SU during World War II was another miracle. Similarly Saddam's regime showed incredible sustainability after losing two wars a massive uprising and then years of sanctions.

If Hitler had died at the beginning of 1939 or even in late 1940, he would almost certainly have been remembered as one of the greatest German that ever lived. I also think that Hitler might have been content if he'd got peace with Britain in the summer of 1940. He ordered the beginnings of demobilisation. Maybe he wouldn't have attacked the Soviet Union at all. I'm not suggesting that Hitler was reasonable or trustworthy, just that he'd sated his big discontents, restored pre World I borders (with the exception of the land grabbed by Denmark, Slovenia and south Tyrolia), destroyed the hated Czechs and avenged the humiliation of November 1918.
#14596779
pugsville wrote:foreign exchange. They ran deficits funded initially be German gold reserves. Then Austrian gold reserves, then Czech. Without war in 1939 imports would have ground quickly to a halt, unemployment inflation would follow.


This has been my understanding of it; the big Auto Bahn project was the last gasp domestically. after that, Hitler was at a dead end domestically and it was either start wars and loot the neighbors or sink politically at home.

I'll add that Germany would have been at war with the Soviets even if Hitler had opted for a stagnating domestic economy and eventual removal. The Russians have always been expansionist as a people, and the Revolution didn't do a thing to moderate that aspect of their mindsets, certainly not in the case of any Soviet leader in power from Stalin on. The Soviets were preparing to invade just as Hitler was, and would have regardless of the Pact. The real 'what if' is how the rest of the world would have lined up in that war, whether Hitler was still around or not.

As for the ' perception' of failure re the U.S. and Viet Nam, that's another thread; suffice it to say it caused a complete failure as far as the imperialistic Khrushchev and Brezhnev doctrine ending in miserable failure everywhere around the globe, along with the Israeli victory over the Arabs in 1967 and 1972, bankrupting the Soviet Union and reducing it to dependency on the West, along with driving an even greater wedge in the Sino-Soviet split started in the Korean War, which was the greater goal geopolitically; VN was itself unimportant, only the threat of a major Soviet naval base there was, and that dream was shut down. The U.S. came out very well, actually. McCain is right about the 'modern' Russia, it is just a gas station pretending to be a superpower. Putin is just lucky the West is as full of appeasers as it was in the 1930's, and he can run around bullying the tiny little states around him for fun and profit and pretending to be a big deal. I suspect soon he will get a bullet in the back of his head from some of the oligarchs there, having cost them lots of money over his antics and desperation.
#14596787
Rich wrote:Tooze is absolutely right to stress that the miracle war economy of late 44 was totally unsustainable. That doesn't mean it wasn't an economic miracle.
Returning to this, France WWI springs to mind as an example of an economic miracle under a Liberal democracy.

Oberon wrote:The Russians have always been expansionist as a people, and the Revolution didn't do a thing to moderate that aspect of their mindsets, certainly not in the case of any Soviet leader in power from Stalin on. The Soviets were preparing to invade just as Hitler was, and would have regardless of the Pact.
This conflation of the Soviet Union with Russia is quite disgraceful. First we had a quarter German, quarter Jew who thought that everything good in Russia had been created by the Jews. He came to power after being transported across Germany his pockets stuffed with German Gold. He was able to hold on to power in the early days because of Latvian riflemen and the defacto acceptance of the German Army, ratified at Best-Litosk. he won the civil war because the Balts, Poles, Finns and other nationalities refused to support the Whites. His army was led by a Jew. his secret police were led by a Pole. It was the German army that stopped Poland, the Baltics, Finland and initially Ukraine from going Bolshevik. Russia was no more prone to Bolshevism than them or to Bavaria or Hungary. It was just that in Russia, unlike Bavaria and Hungry the German army stopped the Whites from counter attacking and allowed the Bolsheviks to consolidate.

Lenin was succeed by a faction fight between a Jew and a Georgian and two Jews. The two Jews then switched to the side of the first Jew and the Georgian defeated them to become dictator. He was succeed by another Georgian. he was succeed by an ethnic Russian who spent his formative years in the Ukraine. He was succeed by a Ukrainian. He was succeed by a Cossack. He was succeed by a half Ukrainian and then the final leader was a - yes you guessed - a Ukrainian, a victim of the great famine who lost two aunts and an Uncle.
#14596827
Rich wrote:This conflation of the Soviet Union with Russia is quite disgraceful. First we had a quarter German, quarter Jew who thought that everything good in Russia had been created by the Jews. He came to power after being transported across Germany his pockets stuffed with German Gold. He was able to hold on to power in the early days because of Latvian riflemen and the defacto acceptance of the German Army, ratified at Best-Litosk. he won the civil war because the Balts, Poles, Finns and other nationalities refused to support the Whites. His army was led by a Jew. his secret police were led by a Pole. It was the German army that stopped Poland, the Baltics, Finland and initially Ukraine from going Bolshevik. Russia was no more prone to Bolshevism than them or to Bavaria or Hungary. It was just that in Russia, unlike Bavaria and Hungry the German army stopped the Whites from counter attacking and allowed the Bolsheviks to consolidate.

Lenin was succeed by a faction fight between a Jew and a Georgian and two Jews. The two Jews then switched to the side of the first Jew and the Georgian defeated them to become dictator. He was succeed by another Georgian. he was succeed by an ethnic Russian who spent his formative years in the Ukraine. He was succeed by a Ukrainian. He was succeed by a Cossack. He was succeed by a half Ukrainian and then the final leader was a - yes you guessed - a Ukrainian, a victim of the great famine who lost two aunts and an Uncle.


Gibberish.

Maps of Russia, from Peter the Great to post-Soviet Union, the latter being a small blip in Russian history comparatively.

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Tsarist Russia circa 1914.

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Soviet Union 1920's-30's.

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Expansion 1613 to 1914, for those with poor memories and missed this the first time.

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All maps and some history from http://allrussias.com/index.asp

I.e., playing semantics about which state or region some leader or other hails from is making a distinction without a difference. The Soviet Union was Russia, either that or the maps are all wrong, because they look close to the same to most people.
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