Consequences of Attacking Nazi Germany in 1937

Didn’t Italy attack Ethiopia in 1936?

this reminds me of “the last supper” - what if you could go back in time meet a young disillussioned artist named Hitler. Would you kill him? The conclusion to the debate over this question is that it is important to seek out the potential evildoers of this world and to kill them before they have the chance to become too powerful and unleash horrors on so many people blah blah blah.
This begs the question - who is the right person and when is the right time, and how can we predict these things?
If there was no intervention in Germany, they may well have burned themselves out against the Russians however the death toll may well have been much higher.
If there was early intervention, then what? Might we have ended the war earlier? Would the German people have understood? Would there have been a 3rd world war with a pissed off Germany? Would the rest of the world have understood and supported it?
My answers are:
Maybe, Absolutely not, probably, No.
but there are more questions, and many more opinions than mine, and i have few facts in this regard . . . . Could we have prevailled?
Also we would not have been able to count on the Americans AT ALL i don’t believe. They waited until Hitler declared war on them, how likely would they have been to pre-emptively attack Germany?
Of course now they are all too eager for pre-emptive attacks. Blame 9/11 if you will, i just find it ironic that they ignored the lessons of 1918 to the world’s peril in 1939.

This is the mentality that has us in Iraq at this moment. Some will say, “look what happens when the US stays out of the world scene!”, refering to WWII. I have misgivings about us being the world’s policeman, I hardly think Saddam can cause as much harm as Hitler. Europe obviously looks at us with discontent, since they think we’re treating them all as “children” who need direction and an occasional spanking “Iraq”. Clearly the world all read Hitler wrong, they all had problems and agendas of their own. Then, peace at all costs, cost the world the bloodiest war in history. Shall we as Americans give our Commander in Chief a little slack and say that he may have the intelligence that caused us to go to war? I say yes, rally behind him and most important our fighting troops who need our support. When it’s over we can go back and critique. I was against military action. But now that that decision is made, it’s time to be good soldiers and support. Remember, the President is making a difficult and sacrificing choice: will the lives lost in this war be less if we did not? Will other American city be attacked? Would the war be worse down the road, 1 year, 5 years, or 10? Will world economies fail either way?
Clearly we free Americans have the right to protest. But who is it really hurting?

Wrong thread - yes and no. There’s a lot of “what if” discussion on Hitler and his Regime. Several times he could have faced an earlier finish that could have saved the world from alot of pain and suffering. Clearly that war still shapes our world and makes our decisions today…

@BigBlocky:

Well, my contention was that had Hitler been taken out early that things couldn’t be worse and most likely better. It’s debatable when this should have occured or at least when it should have been obvious to the powers that be. Certainly 1934 was too early though I wonder why people didn’t realize that the author of Mein Kempf was now the leader of a heavily populated, educated and industrialize nation. I mean, it shouldn’t have taken experts to read his book and come to the conclusion there’s trouble brewing.

To be honest, I am suprised as hell that nobody did anything about Hitler, it should have been obvious after reading that book and doing a bit more research ie. slaughtering the brown shirts for political gain ought to have shown how ruthless and backstabbing he was.

this is fair, but hindsight is 20/20. We have to look at what the rest of the world was like then, and also consider what our criteria for invading a sovereign nation.
Oh, there is a crazy person in Germany who is rising to power - we should invade Germany. Shit - how many Canadians thought the same when we saw George “the prime minister of Canada is Jean Poutine” Bush rising to power? I mean - there was a case for invading a sovereign nation if i ever saw one . . . :D

@Field:

This is the mentality that has us in Iraq at this moment. Some will say, “look what happens when the US stays out of the world scene!”, refering to WWII. I have misgivings about us being the world’s policeman, I hardly think Saddam can cause as much harm as Hitler. Europe obviously looks at us with discontent, since they think we’re treating them all as “children” who need direction and an occasional spanking “Iraq”. Clearly the world all read Hitler wrong, they all had problems and agendas of their own. Then, peace at all costs, cost the world the bloodiest war in history. Shall we as Americans give our Commander in Chief a little slack and say that he may have the intelligence that caused us to go to war? I say yes, rally behind him and most important our fighting troops who need our support. When it’s over we can go back and critique. I was against military action. But now that that decision is made, it’s time to be good soldiers and support. Remember, the President is making a difficult and sacrificing choice: will the lives lost in this war be less if we did not? Will other American city be attacked? Would the war be worse down the road, 1 year, 5 years, or 10? Will world economies fail either way?
Clearly we free Americans have the right to protest. But who is it really hurting?

I think that you and i have fairly similar feelings in this regard. Now that America is in, let’s not have this turn into another Vietnam. At the same time, the best thing for America’s soldiers is to not be there. Maybe this is a good exercise for America - when there actually is trouble, at least your armies will be battle-trained, and recent tactics will have been tested and practiced.
And i can readily translate the metamessage into the point of the original thread, by the way . . . .

Big Blocky - I suggest you read “Rise and Fall of the 3rd Reich”. This will supply you with the answers you seek…

@BigBlocky:

IItaly rejected League of Nations (LoN) arbitration and attacked. The world waved their hands and imposed sanctions (sound familiar?). Italy ignored the LoN and to some historians this was the start of WW II.

Ignoring the LoN and then attacking was the start ;)?
BTW, “sound familiar”? No, the LoN was dead from the start with the first major power to promote it never having joined.

CC - agreed. Saddam has the potential to make this war a longer lasting, ugly, guerilla war. I just keep remembering reading about the hardships the German, British, Italian and later American soldiers had in North Africa. I visited Israel in 1991. Got a taste of the desert there. No thank you…

A few questions for those talkign about Hitler’s book being overlooeked: Was Mein Kampf widely printed in 1934? What languages had it been translated to by that time? Is it the responsibility of the intelligence agencies (which were mainloy military intelligence at the time – for example, the CIA didn’t exist in the US at the time) that the danger wasn’t pointed out to the leaders of the nations or the fault of the leaders of the nations for not having the information? OR did they really have the info and just not pay attention?

I’m asking seriously.