What are your thoughts concerning this topic?
Hmmm… That’s a hard one. I’m torn between Coming to England’s aid and the merchant ship option.
I have been looking on the Internet for the “eagle talons.” I haven’t had a lot of luck the first thing that pops up is that stupid Mitsubishi Eclipse.
My Great Uncle was one of them. I only meet him a few times. My Grandmother (his sister-in-law) told me he got shot down prior to the US going to Europe.
Since Wikipidia is failing me on this matter can any one answer when they went to England’s aid? Based on that answer I think I can make my decision.
LT
It would have really made it difficult for King FDR to get us in war. It was Hitlers worst mistake to have declared war on Dec11. Japan should have just taken the dutch oil and US would have done nothing either. Japan could finish off the British in India and the Chinese and then worked on other things, but reasoned that we were going to war real soon.
i chose other usa would only come if the notice radar was coming at them (subs from germany around them they would not come after germany for killing great britian)
I choose other too, as both possibilities listed were good options, but I doubt they were enough by themselves. It probably would have taken a combination of events to push the US to war.
Hitler was generally too aggressive, and bit off more than he could chew, since it is rare for a change of personality (a leopard changing its spots) it is likely Hitler would have stuck to this course of action and eventually provoked the US or would have declared war on them for some alleged wrong. Heck, Hitler didn’t change his strategy even when hunkered down in the bunker at the end.
US aid to England and Russia was already flowing, something Hitler already considered an act of war, and US warships and German U-Boats were already shooting at one another, and losses were being taken. Its not to hard to see that this was a recipe for war. Cooked up in Washington and even perhaps Berlin.
Remember, most Europeans (and Hitler was a huge Euro-centrist) still considered the US not a formidable power in 1939, 1940, 1941 etc…And frankly we weren’t. We had potential but not actual proven strength in 1941. They viewed our success in WW1 as us arriving with new fresh troops after they the Europeans had fought the war and were simply worn out from the effort. Even the Brits and the French felt this way in 1918. Heck, whose planes, artillery and equipment did we have to use? Germany certainly wasn’t shaking in its boots when we declared war in 1917.
Hitler was part of that generation and believed the Us would enter the war at some point, his policy was simply to delay that entry. At some point he probably would have changed that policy.
Hitler didn’t need to facilitate US entry in the war. Sure FDR sent stuff to UK/USSR but he didn’t send American soldiers to land in Morocco unless FDR got the invitation from Hitler. failing that USA would be fighting Japanese, and probably diverting some of its war material to fight them leaving Hitler to either finish off the Russians or surrender. In any event he was not hurting USA by making war against them. He didn’t learn Ludendorfs lesson with the US doughboys on 1918 and repeated the mistakes of the last war.
The oil embargo was ordered because Japan entered French indo china which was too close to our holdings at the Philippines. If the Dutch holdings had been taken the American public would never go to war for that reason. They didnt fight to help the British in 1939 and if the British lost Malaya or Ceylon or other holdings America was not prepared to go to war over that either. FDR could sit in the chair all day, but it would not get the congress to move for Declaration of War over lost Dutch Islands near the Indian ocean.
The German sinkings of ships had no effect either and Hitler could have called off unrestricted warfare if it had.
‘America first’ organization was huge and the situation was not unlike today in Iraq except much more effective.
Public opinion polls of the period had overwhelming support against any further European wars and the Japanese in Asia were often looked at like Asia ridding itself of the European yoke and assuming power for itself.
Their is no way we would have gone to war aside for continued tricks of provocation by king FDR which were not working unless direct axis action was taken. People were not buying into the threat of war.
Charles Lindbergh was not a Nazi either. He just had the opinion that the European conflict was not of our doing nor warranted our efforts because the common perception was Europe was warlike and prone to all sorts of conflicts. Lindbergh just wanted American lives to be protected and that is not the same as being a “hitler admirer” and more than saying people in America opposed to Iraq are communists or terrorists.
This is off topic but is simliar to how us canadians are in afganistan while you are in iran i beleive we should nto be in those 2 countries.
Also u.s.a. was not prepared for war and many of the people would not just join a war for no reason except an attack at them (thank god that happened or allies would have lost)
In my opinion the USA where kind of in a war against Germany since 1939.
Delivering so much material and guarding British convoys.
I guess in the next two years after Pearl Harbour the USA would have made up a reason to enter the war like they did with the Maine, the Lusitania, the reason for Vietnam at the Tonkin or even “weapons of mass-destruction”.
Even after watching this series I’m not sure of the answer:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00fkx70/World_War_II_Behind_Closed_Doors_Episode_1/
But one thing to emerge from the show is Rooseveldt’s almost child-like willingness to disbelieve tales of Soviet crimes. He died insisting the Germans carried out the Katyn massacre, and perhaps might have found Russia, rather than Britain, the best means of resisting “tyranny”.
In all probability, however, he would likely have used sinkings of American ships a pretext to go ahead to full-blown war.
NBut this begs the question: if Hitler hadn’t promised to declare war on America would Japan have launched war on the Western powers in the first place?
Yes of course. Japan had no joint operations with Hitler at all. All that rubbish about linking up in India is fabrication to sell more books with a new assortment of half baked ideas and conjecture.
Hitler wanted Japan to attack, but even the reality of this would have just opened up more cans of worms for Japan, which only indirectly would be helping Hitler by holding troops from railing westward.
By the time Stalin called his eastern forces to cover Moscow the Germans already ran out of time to win the war. The war was lost in October 1941 and Stalin brought his winter troops just after that point.
I think both Legion 3 and Imperious have made excellent points here.
We must not forget that despite Hitlers insane lust for power, he was a negotiator. I chose the loss of Mechant ships. THe US was publically very opposed to another war in Europe. If Hitler had been able to negotiate (or had the sanity and foresight to do so) with the US, terms could have been reached but we’ll never really know if that ever could have happened.
We must not forget that The British won the Battle of Britain almost completely on their own. We really didn’t help them significantly unitil war was declared. I do believe that us supplying England with oil or anything else was a definate act of war in Hitlers eyes. Let us not forget how hard The German ambassadors tried to come to terms (with false promises) with England. If only Hitler could have given up on the idea of taking The UK and come to a cease fire with them prior to or in the beginning of the Battle of Britain, I believe England would have backed off and Hitler could have allocated resources to defeat Moscow.
I still think theres a strong chance the UK would have used that time to for a military build up and things would have errupted between Germany and them eventually but had Germany already taken Moscow, things could have gone far differently and the war gone on much longer. However the US involvment meant certain defeat for Germany one way or the other so I think that if the US would have agreed to stop sending supplies to England, (who knows if they ever would have but public opinion could have swayed that decision after Peal Harbor) then the US involvment would really depend on provokation by Germany.
However it’s been said in this discussion and I agree that Hitlers greed, pride and anger may not have allowed any of this to happen. Every major mistake he made was due to his pride and anger and a demonic like power lust. This is a very tough situation to look at in hindsight. We don’t really know what COULD have happened. We do know that the US was strongly opposed to a Euopean war however and we do know that Hitler considered our helping England an act of war. Great topic and great points here from everybody so far.
@Imperious:
Yes of course. Japan had no joint operations with Hitler at all. All that rubbish about linking up in India is fabrication to sell more books with a new assortment of half baked ideas and conjecture.
Hitler wanted Japan to attack, but even the reality of this would have just opened up more cans of worms for Japan, which only indirectly would be helping Hitler by holding troops from railing westward.
By the time Stalin called his eastern forces to cover Moscow the Germans already ran out of time to win the war. The war was lost in October 1941 and Stalin brought his winter troops just after that point.
I don’t know the details, but Hitler might have believed that if the Japanese seized British Colonial possessions then the British would be more likely to come to terms, with the Germans as potential mediators. His strategy was crush England in order to force them to surrender…he just couldn’t stick to it.
Declaring war on the United States was insanely stupid given the US political climate. However, the United States was keeping his enemy Great Britain afloat and was delivering the bombers and other weapons that were destroying Germany.
He must have believed his forces would take Moscow before the United States had any impact.
Merchant ships would decied. If U-boats started sinking our boats we would go against Germany. But if no u-boats attacked we would eventually be against the nazis. I saw on the History channel that Hilter was going to attack America but when Japan struck Pearl Harbor he forgot about his attack and declared war.
Bare in mind that Great Britain won the battle of Britain with damn near no help from us in a military sense.
I think I would say that once Japan attacked the US at Pearl Harbour that the US declaring war on Germany would have been a very remote possibility.
Declaring War on the USA was one of the dumbest things Germany did. The American public welcomed war against Japan only because they were attacked, convincing them to go after Germany, while a clear and present danger existed in Japan would have been difficult to say the least.
Bare in mind that Great Britain won the battle of Britain with damn near no help from us in a military sense.
Really, So where did Britain get its 100 octane fuel that The RAF so desperatly needed. From the US.
In terms of raw manpower, yes I agree. Otherwise I disagree
wrong
They Lacked High Quality Aviation Fuel
The US simply shipped UK aviation fuel to the UK btw, not US aviation fuel to the UK
I Need not say More.
You said it for Me.
If It wasn’t for the Good Old USA, Britain Was Sunk.
Bare in mind that Great Britain won the battle of Britain with damn near no help from us in a military sense.
the US also sent planes to help with the battle of britain. old design planes, but they were used.
Winston Churchill said it himself, “if america doesnt enter the war, Britain is finished”
