If we had lost WW2...

[morpher001]

What would be the implications today and how might the world be different?

Would Hitlers ideology have persisted, or would he have quickly lost popularity once he ran out of boogeymen? If so, what system or person is most likely to have taken his place to guide the number one world power?

Now in 2011 would we be better or worse off as a species; would the world be a better or worse place to live in?

 

[sssssssssss]

not sure but sometimes i feel were missing something about hitler.

 

[DressedInBlack]

In my opinion it is obvious that the world would be a worse place in one particular aspect: Nearly every man of Jewish origin, who was not able to hide throughout your imaginary prolonged NS-period, would have been killed. The annihilation of a whole culture is one of the worst events I can think of.

Regarding the current events in Lybia on the other hand, I do not expect the dictatorship to be lasting very long, since the defeated states trusted in democracy or communism for a long time and we see that effectively opposing dictatorships is even possible in states without any experience with democracy. To appease all different peoples and keep them from renitency would have only been possible, if Germany made an attempt to adopt certain democratic rights, which seems to be unlikely, due to racial ideology, which not only included Jews, the Sinti and Romanies, homosexuals, communists and the mentally handicapped, but also to Russians, black people and other "races". Of course, not all of those were as "inferior" to the Nazis as Jewish people or the Sinti and Romanies, but giving the Russians equal rights in politics as Germany is very unlikely and would lead to protest and resistance as a consequence. Furthermore, the adoption of democratic rights will lead to the adoption of other democratic laws as seen in modern history. Democracy has always been a long-term development, if you think of slavery in America and rights of homosexuals all over the world. In Germany, women even had to gain permission from their husbands to apply for work until ~1970.

not sure but sometimes i feel were missing something about hitler.

What do you mean exactly? Don't get your point.

By the why, I am German

 

[panic in paradise]

not sure but sometimes i feel were missing something about hitler.

i dont exactly think we are...
Ghettos do still exist, Nazis have always existed in some form - WW2 was also a mesmeric action of fear;; this is how terror is most effective do you think they didnt hope for such a wave to come?
this can be so hard to comprehend, and seems near impossible evil - we dont see how the racism in our day to day lives is not much different, and is being perpetuated and fortified deeply into our existence - we are blinded with fears and false hopes, unable to see what more beauty exists and could exist to greater extents with the acknowledgment of all of our origin...

we can have what we all need and want- humanity in a world of harmony -that is so easy to do - it is effortless - dont ask how, be why(cliche to you?) we are not primary colors here, we are a shade of the colors of others. share your time, and help make more for others.

 

[swilow]

I really don't believe that NAZIism would have spread throughout the world as an accepted ideology, as (in WW2 form) it was very German-centric. It may have been imposed on us, but those situations are inherently unstable, and a hugely racist philosophy is unappealing to most, even fervent racists.

 

[Portillo]

Relative morality would have meant that the idea of Nazi eugenics would not be wrong!

 

[Belisarius]

Two things:

*I think a Nazi victory would've been very nearly impossible. Hitler might have conquered Russia and England, to be sure, but eventually--Hitler being Hitler--he would've fucked up by overreaching himself, because that's what megalomaniacs do. His policies drove the best minds out of Europe into the U.S., where they helped carry out the Manhattan Project, which would've resulted in every German city turning into a slag pile. Eventually.

*Using a little handwavium and saying that they won anyway, the answer depends on how complete their victory was. If they won "only" Europe and the U.S., I think those realms would be culturally impoverished nightmares, while better and brighter people went to countries where they didn't have to worry about getting thrown onto a train in the middle of the night. I also think that a Nazi-dominated Europe (let alone U.S.) would be unstable, not just because totalitarianism is a thin reed on which to build a functioning society. The more you read about Nazism, the more you realize that the Party wasn't a monolithic group of ideologues, but a bunch of cutthroats and backstabbers whose infighting was probably as useful to the Allied cause in the long run as guns and bombs. On a hemispherical scale that kind of jockeying for power would be immeasurably worse, and it would catch up to them eventually, IMO.

The slave-based agricultural colonialism of lebensraum also was--and is--completely out of touch with modern economic efficiency, while strong-arming and exterminating millions of civilians would cut into that all-important linchpin of consumer spending; strong, resource-rich states outside of the Nazi sphere would eventually outstrip it in productivity, wealth, and living standards. Yes, look past the brutality and idiocy of it, and you'll see Nazism as archaic and consummate romanticism that carries the seeds of its own destruction.

 

[Pegasus]

^This. It's not really feasible that the Nazis could have won IMO, especially not to the degree of conquering the Allied nations. A lot of the impact of Nazi Germany was due to its very effective start to the war.

Hitler's early success was due to his army commanders running panzers through Belgium and Northern France in an extremely short time, catching the French, who were expecting trench warfare (and were also largely inept), off-guard. The panzer divisions got to the sea in an extremely short time, crippling France and leaving the English with little assistance. Note the following images detail only 11 days. Look how quickly the Germans struck through Belgium and to the English Channel in Northern France:

NSFW:

NSFW:

I'm sure you're asking more philosophically what would the world could have been like, but I really don't think that an Axis victory was ever truly in the realm of possibility once the war reached its full scale.

 

[Belisarius]

^
There are people who say one of the worst things that happened to Hitler was the rapid fall of France--which surprised even him--because it made him extremely confident that the invasion of the Soviet Union would be a cake walk. Whoops!

 

[hiphophippy]

This isn't the lounge.

 

[serated]

WHAT IF HISTORY-mmmmm- great mental masturbation, til some fucker brings up something like all of the third reich petrol came from Romania and the allies were prepared to knock it out, even if somehow the third reich managed to aquire nuclear weapons.

Had someone taken out Hitler earlier on, an the emphasis on expansion were tempered against diplomatic concerns, Were not the whole top tier and 2nd tier of nazism filled with mentally dense sociopaths and someone in their midst could anticipate things beyond a six month scope. On to Castltle Wewelsberg and the Sword of Destiny---except there I pass into Indiana Jones territory. WW2 is a board game that can be constantly replayed in many genres. For play-game purposes it doesnt matter its already played out and done.

 

[MyDoorsAreOpen]

Wow, I had no idea that the Nazis were such a sorry regime when it came to actually running a functioning country. I guess it shouldn't surprise me, though, because regimes that do the revolution and conquest part well but then fail at everything subsequent are sadly more the rule than the exception.

Is there any way that Hitler could have pulled off peaceful diplomatic relations with Russia? If that had been feasible, I could have seen him briefly taking most of Western Europe. But even then, I think Soviet Communism next door and an unhappy populace at home would have been his undoing. The end result of this could have been most or all of Europe, at least for some period of time, going Red. (Sure, Mother Russia will leave you in peace. With the expectation that you'll someday join us.) This would definitely have made for a different world today, even if it, too, was doomed not to last.

On the other side of the war, I think Japan was actually a pretty worthy adversary of the Allied Powers, and had they built the atom bomb first, I think they would have had a shot at winning the war. The map of Asia would look entirely different today, and I can't begin to imagine the implications for today's global economy. I have no doubt Hawaii would have been integrated into Japan, serving much the same function as it does to the US today: a military outpost and refueling station.

 

[Belisarius]

Re Germany and Russia:
I think it's extremely unlikely; Nazism and Communism were diametrically opposed, not just ideologically, but because of the very fact that Hitler saw Communism as tainted by Judaism (well, along with most other things), and the fact that it was linked to a Slavic (Untermensch) state. On the other hand, IIRC there's pretty good evidence that Stalin would have struck a blow someday if Hitler hadn't; the planet wasn't big enough for the two of them. The pact they made with the Soviets was--on both sides--a play for time.

Re Japan:
Japan's war effort has a much loftier reputation in the West than it deserves; the Japanese were pretty much outclassed from the start. A fierce rivalry between their army and navy severely hamstrung their capabilities, their total dependence on imports put them at an immediate disadvantage, their technology fell increasingly far behind during the War (while, say, Germany's was competent pretty much through the endgame). If they caught you with your pants down, you were finished, but once they lost that element of surprise their battle tactics were remarkably hidebound. For instance, they never really engaged in heavy commerce warfare against the Allies, nor effectively organized convoys for their own transports, despite their usefulness in the Atlantic theater (in both World Wars, for that matter).

But, as serated wrote, this is all mental masturbation.

 

[hiphophippy]

Re Japan:
Japan's war effort has a much loftier reputation in the West than it deserves; the Japanese were pretty much outclassed from the start. A fierce rivalry between their army and navy severely hamstrung their capabilities, their total dependence on imports put them at an immediate disadvantage, their technology fell increasingly far behind during the War (while, say, Germany's was competent pretty much through the endgame). If they caught you with your pants down, you were finished, but once they lost that element of surprise their battle tactics were remarkably hidebound. For instance, they never really engaged in heavy commerce warfare against the Allies, nor effectively organized convoys for their own transports, despite their usefulness in the Atlantic theater (in both World Wars, for that matter).

But, as serated wrote, this is all mental masturbation.

Many people forget that japan had already conquest like 1/3 of Asia in the years prior and then hat to fight the US and try to keep their territories, so in essence they were fighting on two fronts as well.

 

[lbdgweb]

after seeing the heading i thought about this site http://www.anomalies-unlimited.com/Denver_Airport.html
and thought we lost not won, if they can use tax payer money to create Nazi crap out in the open in denver, specially with the german kid in the mural.

 

[Druide Panoramix]

^ lbdgweb, that's sick. Gonna have to get my reading glasses on.
Hmmm... Well for one, there wouldn't be a virtual apartheid in Palestine because the Jewish country probably wouldn't have had the international community's support to establish itself. http://philosemitismeblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/caricature-de-la-shoah-ce-que-le.html This isn't the cartoon I was looking for but... you get the picture. The irony is that :Ce site est dédié aux millions d'Européens qui, malgré d'incessantes campagnes de désinformation, ne croient pas que les Juifs ne sont capables que du pire; ne dissimulent pas leur antisémitisme dans le langage de l'antisionisme; et savent qu'Israël représente ce qu'il y a de meilleur dans une démocratie.
English translation : This website is dedicated to the millions of Europeans who, despite the endless disinformation campaigns, do not believe that the Jews are capable of the worst; do not hide their antisemitism behind the language of anti-zionism; and know that Israel represents that which is best in a democracy. Lord help me I'm an anti-semite because I believe Israel shouldn't be using white phosphorus (an illegal weapon, although, in warfare, who cares about legality?), on a mostly civilian population which can only defend themselves with rocks and suicide bombings!

If the Allies had not won, there would not exist this hypocrisy where the Allies give themselves the glory of saving the Jews from Nazi persecution. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_St._Louis#Voyage_of_the_Damned Most people forget that very few people outside Germany even knew about the concentration and extermination camps before the Allied front starting encountering them on German territory in 1944-45. Also, had the Axis won, many American companies would have made a heaping profit from helping the enemy. See here and here.