Wandering the information superhighway, he came upon the last refuge of civilization, PoFo, the only forum on the internet ...
I don't suppose you know at what point the Soviets first approached the Germans for negotiations?
As such, in May (I think, if memory serves), Maxim Litvinov (a Jew) was replaced as commissar by Vyacheslav Molotov.
Britain's defense posture was largely appropriate to its defense needs, that is, the protection of the British Empire and the maintenance of SLOC. Aside from the Great War Britain traditionally did not field large land armies for extended periods of time on the Continent and tended to fight in a coalition and attack the periphery. 16 divisions were appropriate. And really, the French Army was larger and better equipped than the German Army in 1939 as it was. The RAF should've been larger, but it ultimately proved adequate in the hour of need.
Japan almost certainly would behave differently without Hitler in the picture, probably choosing to expand solely in Asia instead of taking on the United States - and that would result in there being three superpowers, not one, in 1945.
I do not think so. Japan did not "take on" the United States - there was no plan for any invasion of the US by Japan. The whole reason for Japan's attack was to take the US Navy out of the picture in the Pacific just long enough to enable Japan to reach their territorial goals in Asia. By the time there would have been a sizeable Pacific arm of the US fleet again, Japan would have created a fait accompli.
That is rather well known actually.
R_G
India got its independence largely due to World War II
By the middle of August the military conversations in Moscow between the
Western democracies and the Soviet Union had come to a virtual standstill – and
for this the intransigence of the Poles was largely to blame. The Anglo-French
military missions, it will be remembered, after taking a slow boat to Leningrad,
had arrived in Moscow on August 11, exactly one week after the frustrated Mr.
Strang had left the Russian capital, obviously relieved to be able to turn over to
the generals and admirals the difficult and unpleasant job of trying to negotiate
with the Russians.∗
What now had to be worked out hurriedly was a military convention which
would spell out in detail just how and where, and with what, Nazi armed force
could be met. But as the confidential British minutes of the day-to-day military
conversations and the reports of the British negotiators reveal595 the Anglo-
French military team had been sent to Moscow to discuss not details but rather
”general principles.” The Russians, however, insisted on getting down at once
to hard, specific and – in the Allied view – awkward facts, and Voroshilov’s
response to the Allied declaration of principles made at the first meeting by
General Doumenc was that they were ”too abstract and immaterial and do
not oblige anyone to do anything . . . We are not gathered here,” he declared
coolly, ”to make abstract declarations, but to work out a complete military
convention.”
The Soviet Marshal posed some very definite questions: Was there any treaty
which defined what action Poland would take? How many British troops could
reinforce the French Army on the outbreak of the war? What would Belgium
do? The answers he got were not very reassuring. Doumenc said he had no
knowledge of Polish plans. General Heywood answered that the British envis-
aged ”a first contingent of sixteen divisions, ready for service in the early stages
of a war, followed later by a second contingent of sixteen divisions.” Pressed by
Voroshilov to reveal how many British troops there would be immediately on
the outbreak of war, Heywood replied, ”At the moment there are five regular
divisions and one mechanized division in England.” These paltry figures came as
an unpleasant surprise to the Russians, who were prepared, they said, to deploy
120 infantry divisions against an aggressor in the west at the very outbreak of
hostilities.
As for Belgium, General Doumenc answered the Russian question by saying
that ”French troops cannot enter unless and until they are asked to, but France
is ready to answer any call.”
This reply led to the crucial question before the military negotiators in
Moscow and one which the British and French had been anxious to avoid. Dur-
ing the very first meeting and again at a critical session on August 14, Marshal Voroshilov insisted that the essential question was whether Poland was willing
to permit Soviet troops to enter her territory to meet the Germans. If not, how
could the Allies prevent the German Army from quickly overrunning Poland?
Specifically – on the fourteenth – he asked, ”Do the British and French gen-
eral staffs think that the Red Army can move across Poland, and in particular
through the Vilna gap and across Galicia in order to make contact with the
enemy?”
This was the core of the matter. As Seeds wired London, the Russians had
now
raised the fundamental problem, on which the military talks will
succeed or fail and which has indeed been at the bottom of all our
difficulties since the very beginning of the political conversations,
namely, how to reach any useful agreement with the Soviet Union
as long as this country’s neighbors maintain a sort of boycott which
is only to be broken . . . when it is too late.
If the question came up – and how could it help coming up? – Admiral
Drax had been instructed by the British government on how to handle it. The
instructions, revealed in the confidential British papers, seem unbelievably naive
when read today. The ”line of argument” he was to take in view of the refusal
of Poland and Rumania ”even to consider plans for possible co-operation” was:
An invasion of Poland and Rumania would greatly alter their out-
look. Moreover, it would be greatly to Russia’s disadvantage that
Germany should occupy a position right up to the Russian frontier
. . . It is in Russia’s own interest therefore that she should have plans
ready to help both Poland and Rumania should these countries be
invaded.
If the Russians propose that the British and French governments
should communicate to the Polish, Roumanian or Baltic States pro-
posals involving co-operation with the Soviet Government or General
Staff, the Delegation should not commit themselves but refer home.
And this is what they did.
At the August 14 session Voroshilov demanded ”straightforward answers”
to his questions. ”Without an exact and unequivocal answer,” he said, ”con-
tinuance of the military conversations would be useless . . . The Soviet Military
Mission,” he added, ”cannot recommend to its Government to take part in an
enterprise so obviously doomed to failure.”
From Paris General Gamelin counseled General Doumenc to try to steer the
Russians off the subject. But they were not to be put off.596
The meeting of August 14, as General Doumenc later reported, was dra-
matic. The British and French delegates were cornered and they knew it. They
tried to evade the issue as best they could. Drax and Doumenc asserted they
were sure the Poles and Rumanians would ask for Russian aid as soon as they
were attacked. Doumenc was confident they would ”implore the Marshal to
support them.” Drax thought it was ”inconceivable” that they should not ask
for Soviet help. He added – not very diplomatically, it would seem – that ”if
they did not ask for help when necessary and allow themselves to be overrun,it may be expected that they would become German provinces.” This was the
last thing the Russians wanted, for it meant the presence of the Nazi armies
on the Soviet border, and Voroshilov made a special point of the Admiral’s
unfortunate remark. Finally, the uncomfortable Anglo-French representatives
contended that Voroshilov had raised political questions which they were not
competent to handle. Drax declared that since Poland was a sovereign state, its
government would first have to sanction the entry of Russian troops. But since
this was a political matter, it would have to be settled by the governments. He
suggested that the Soviet government put its questions to the Polish govern-
ment. The Russian delegation agreed that this was a political matter. But it
insisted that the British and French governments must put the question to the
Poles and pressure them to come to reason. Were the Russians, in view of their
dealings with the Germans at this moment, negotiating in good faith with the
Franco-British military representatives? Or did they, as the British and French
foreign offices, not to mention Admiral Drax, later concluded, insist on the right
to deploy their troops through Poland merely to stall the talks until they saw
whether they could make a deal with Hitler?**
In the beginning, the British and French confidential sources reveal, the
Western Allies did think that the Soviet military delegation was negotiating
in good faith – in fact, that it took its job much too seriously. On August
13, after two days of staff talks, Ambassador Seeds wired London that the
Russian military chiefs seemed really ”to be out for business.” As a result,
Admiral Drax’s instructions to ”go very slowly” were changed and on August
15 he was told by the British government to support Doumenc in bringing the
military talks to a conclusion ”as soon as possible.” His restrictions on confiding
confidential military information to the Russians were partially lifted.
Unlike the British Admiral’s original instructions to stall, those given Gen-
eral Doumenc by Premier Daladier personally had been to try to conclude a
military convention with Russia at the earliest possible moment. Despite British
fears of leaks to the Germans, Doumenc on the second day of the meetings had
confided to the Russians such ”highly secret figures,” as he termed them, on
the strength of the French Army that the Soviet members promised ”to forget”
them as soon as the meeting was concluded.
As late as August 17, after he and Drax had waited vainly for three days for
instructions from their governments as to how to reply to the Polish question,
General Doumenc telegraphed Paris: ”The U.S.S.R. wants a military pact . . .
She does not want us to give her a piece of paper without substantial under-
takings. Marshal Voroshilov has stated that all problems . . . would be tackled
without difficulty as soon as what he called the crucial question was settled.”
Doumenc strongly urged Paris to get Warsaw to agree to accepting Russian
help.
Contrary to a widespread belief at the time, not only in Moscow but in
the Western capitals, that the British and French governments did nothing to
induce the Poles to agree to Soviet troops meeting the Germans on Polish soil,
it is clear from documents recently released that London and Paris went quite
far – but not quite far enough. It is also clear that the Poles reacted with
unbelievable stupidity.597
On August 18, after the first Anglo-French attempt was made in Warsaw
to open the eyes of the Poles, Foreign Minister Beck told the French ambas-
sador, Leon Noel, that the Russians were ”of no military value,” and General
Stachiewicz, Chief of the Polish General Staff, backed him up by declaring that
he saw ”no benefit to be gained by Red Army troops operating in Poland.”
The next day both the British and French ambassadors saw Beck again
and urged him to agree to the Russian proposal. The Polish Foreign Minister
stalled, but promised to give them a formal reply the next day. The Anglo-
French demarche in Warsaw came as the result of a conversation earlier on
the nineteenth in Paris between Bonnet, the French Foreign Minister, and the
British charge d’affaires. Somewhat to the Briton’s surprise, this archappeaser
of Hitler was now quite aroused at the prospect of losing Russia as an ally
because of Polish stubbornness.
It would be disastrous [Bonnet told him] if, in consequence of a
Polish refusal, the Russian negotiations were to break down . . . It
was an untenable position for the Poles to take up in refusing the
only immediate efficacious help that could reach them in the event of
a German attack. It would put the British and French Governments
in an almost impossible position if we had to ask our respective
countries to go to war in defense of Poland, which had refused this
help.
If this were so – and there is no doubt that it was – why then did not
the British and French governments at this crucial moment put the ultimate
pressure on Warsaw and simply say that unless the Polish government agreed
to accept Russian help Britain and France could see no use of themselves going
to war to aid Poland? The formal Anglo-Polish mutual-security treaty had not
yet been signed. Could Warsaw’s acceptance of Russian military backing not
be made a condition of concluding that pact?***
In his talk with the British charge in Paris on August 19, Bonnet suggested
this, but the government in London frowned upon such a ”maneuver,” as Down-
ing Street called it. To such an extreme Chamberlain and Halifax would not
go.
On the morning of August 20 the Polish Chief of Staff informed the British
military attache in Warsaw that ”in no case would the admission of Soviet troops into Poland be agreed to.” And that evening Beck formally rejected the
Anglo-French request. The same evening Halifax, through his ambassador in
Warsaw, urged the Polish Foreign Minister to reconsider, emphasizing in strong
terms that the Polish stand was ”wrecking” the military talks in Moscow. But
Beck was obdurate. ”I do not admit,” he told the French ambassador, ”that
there can be any kind of discussion whatsoever concerning the use of part of
our territory by foreign troops. We have not got a military agreement with the
U.S.S.R. We do not want one,”
Desperate at such a display of blind stubbornness on the part of the Polish
government, Premier Daladier, according to an account he gave to the French
Constituent Assembly on July 18, 1946, took matters in his own hands. Af-
ter once more appealing to the Poles to be realistic, he telegraphed General
Doumenc on the morning of August 21 authorizing him to sign a military con-
vention with Russia on the best terms he could get, with the provision, however,
that it must be approved by the French government. The French ambassador,
́
Paul-Emile Naggiar, was at the same time instructed by Bonnet, according to
the latter’s subsequent account, to tell Molotov that France agreed ”in principle”
to the passage of Soviet troops through Poland if the Germans attacked.
But this was only an idle gesture, as long as the Poles had not agreed – and,
as we know now, a futile gesture in view of the state of Russo-German dealings.
Doumenc did not receive Daladier’s telegram until late in the evening of August
21. When he brought it to the attention of Voroshilov on the evening of the
next day – the eve of Ribbentrop’s departure for Moscow – the Soviet Marshal
was highly skeptical. He demanded to see the French General’s authorization
for saying – as Doumenc had – that the French government had empowered
him to sign a military pact permitting the passage of Russian troops through
Poland. Doumenc, obviously, declined. Voroshilov next wanted to know what
the British response was and whether the consent of Poland had bean obtained.
These were embarrassing questions and Doumenc merely answered that he had
no information.
But neither the questions nor the answers had by this time any reality –
They were being put too late. Ribbentrop was already on his way toe Moscow.
The trip had been announced publicly the night before, and also its purpose:
to conclude a nonaggression pact between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union.
Voroshilov, who seems to have developed a genuine liking for the French
General, tried gently to let him know that their contacts were about to end.
I fear one thing [Voroshilov said]. The French and English sides have
allowed the political and military discussions to drag on too long.
That is – why we must not exclude the possibility, during this time,
of certain political events****
∗ ”A humiliating experience,” Strang had called it in a dispatch to the Foreign Office on
July 20.594
** The timing is important. Molotov did not receive the Nazi proposal that Ribbentrop
come to Moscow until the evening of August 15. (See above, p. 465.) And though he did not
accept it definitely he did hint that Russia would be interested in a nonaggression pact with
Germany, which of course would have made negotiation of a military alliance with France and
Britain superfluous. The best conclusion this writer can come to is that, as of August 14,
when Voroshilov demanded an ”unequivocal answer” to the question of allowing Soviet troops
to meet the Germans in Poland, the Kremlin still had an open mind as to which side to join.
Unfortunately the Russian documents, which could clear up this crucial question, have not
been published. At any rate, Stalin does not seem to have made his final decision until the
afternoon of August 19
*** Lloyd George, in a speech in the Commons on April 3, four days after Chamberlain’s
unilateral guarantee to Poland had been announced, had urged the British government to
make such a condition. ”If we are going in without the help of Russia we are walking into a
trap. It is the only country whose armies can get there [to Poland]. . . . I cannot understand
why, before committing ourselves to this tremendous enterprise, we did not secure beforehand
the adhesion of Russia . . . If Russia has not been brought into this matter because of certain
feelings the Poles have that they do not want the Russians there, it is for us to declare the
conditions, and unless the Poles are prepared to accept the only conditions with which we can
successfully help them, the responsibility must be theirs.”
**** At a session of the military delegates the morning before, on August 21, Voroshilov had
demanded the indefinite adjournment of the talks on the excuse that he and his colleagues
would be busy with the autumn maneuvers. To the Anglo-French protests at such a delay
the Marshal had answered, ”The intentions of the Soviet Delegation were, and still are, to
agree on the organization of military co-operation of the armed forces of the three parties . . .
The U.S.S.R., not having a common frontier with Germany, can give help to France, Britain,
Poland and Rumania, only on condition that her troops are given rights of passage across
Polish and Rumanian territory . . . The Soviet forces cannot co-operate with the armed forces
of Britain and France if they are not allowed onto Polish and Rumanian territory . . . The
Soviet Military Delegation cannot picture to itself how the governments and general staffs of
Britain and France, in sending their missions to the U.S.S.R. . . could not have given them
some directives on such an elementary matter . . . This can only show that there are reasons
to doubt their desire to come to serious and effective co-operation with the U.S.S.R.”
The logic of the Marshal’s military argument was sound and the failure of the French and
especially the British governments to answer it would prove disastrous. But to have repeated
it – with all the rest of the statement – on this late date, August 21, when Voroshilov could
not have been ignorant of Stalin’s decision of August 19, was deceitful.
R_G wrote:Back on topic, the world needed World War II, when you analyze all it did for the world in terms of technological advancement etc
Not to mention the War helped race relations in several countries like the U.S.
R_G wrote:the Brits lost a lot of hold on their colonies after the war
R_G wrote:Without the war we would still have empires.
Interestingly enough there is a similar claim of Britain and France failing with another potential ally: Italy. The theory goes that Italy feared Germany greatly and had even formed the earlier Stressa Front to stop the Germans from annexing Austria. Perhaps had the Allies been more open in 1939 Mussolini could have been an ally? The sticking point appears to have been Italian desires to given their alliance in exchange for colonial possessions (mostly at French expense).
- By grassroots1
Wake me up when you have something to replace it.[…]
Also, the Russians are apparently not fans of Isra[…]
Wars still happen. And violent crime is blooming,[…]
All of those were prior to WW2.
- By Verv