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MWIH pre-release discussion
Topic Started: May 17 2008, 02:34 AM (1,458 Views)
SladeJack
The Grand SladeJack
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*sigh* How I wish this discussion would actually go somewhere. Oh well.
When you wipe your ass, make sure you wipe it really well.
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Custer
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Resident Kamikaze Warrior
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Hungary stuck with Germany to the end, even while its government fell to the Germans in late '44.
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TR1
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It's kind of hard to speculate on this one.

I guess the obvious question: what impact does the uprising have on the relationship among the Allies? The USSR and I'm sure France would no doubt favor harsh reprisals. What about the Anglosphere?
"Nobody's gay for Moleman." - Hans Moleman
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eamonhart
The Liquor Lord
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Harsh reprisals all around at first but then the UK, USA and even a reluctant France (forced by the other Western Allies) would soften due to the menance from the East. Why piss off the staunchest anti-communists in Europe if you can win them over with using more of the carrot and only sparringly the stick?
_______________________________________________________
'No arsenal, no weapon in the arsenals of the world, is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women.'
-- Ronald Reagan
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TR1
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Germany seems more inclined to spit carrots in the Allies faces. That could get tiresome.
"Nobody's gay for Moleman." - Hans Moleman
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SladeJack
The Grand SladeJack
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Depends on how the Allies perceive the Werewolves. If they think the resistance is just a continuation of the war (a little birdie said HT's trying to draw Iraq parallels so this seems likely) they'll maintain their alliance. Finding ways to stick it to one another is all well and good but I don't see any Ally tolerating a reconstituted Nazi threat to pursue that priority. Any attempt by one to get the Werewolves to redirect their violence to another would be an act of war, besides, and the attacked party would be in the moral right. Supporting werewolves in someone else's sphere would be tantamount to switching to the Axis.
When you wipe your ass, make sure you wipe it really well.
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alchemist
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Supporting the Werewolves would would present the occupation in a more favoralbe light to the public as it isn't their soldiers being killed, just some Reds. I also weakens the Soviet position in Eastern Europe with any luck for the Allies.

At any rate I would be suprised if you didn't have NKVBD and OSS providng clandestine support to Werewolves in the other's occupation zone.

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SladeJack
The Grand SladeJack
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"Supporting the Werewolves would would present the occupation in a more favoralbe light to the public as it isn't their soldiers being killed, just some Reds."

That blade cuts both ways, as Beria, Donovan, and Menzies will easily figure out. Strengthening a common enemy against not just a potential but an actual ally is as irrational as it is dishonorable. One assumes the Werewolves will operate as a unit, and that what works in one sector will be implemented in all the others.

This isn't recruiting questionably denazified scientists or even spies from a thoroughly conquered nation, this is supporting active resistance under the Nazi flag. The Allies weren't a mutual admiration society, but in 1941 they recognized a common threat that they had no choice but to cooperate against, and by this version of 1946 that threat is still present and still dangerous. The decision to fight together till the swastika was seen no more had already been made, and the justifications will still be valid in MWIH. If one ally has completely eradicated all resistance from his section of Germany and is convinced he is in a position of unassailable strength even should another section fall to the Werewolves altogether, maybe he'd consider a double cross, but that doesn't sound like the book that's been written, based on all the available teasers and spoilers, and even if that does lie down the road, the book is set too soon after the war for it to have happened by then on anything close enough to a believable timeline to be seen by a Hubble-esque telescope in orbit of said timeline.
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alchemist
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I guess you're right, I just can't gpast the fct that you had guys like Patton advocating a war with the USSR and having no qualms in getting other people to die and fight them for you.
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MapleLeafs4Ever
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alchemist
May 25 2008, 10:31 PM
I guess you're right, I just can't gpast the fct that you had guys like Patton advocating a war with the USSR and having no qualms in getting other people to die and fight them for you.

But in OTL that was after Germany's unconditional surrender. With the ATL, that hadn't happened and so turning on the Soviets or the Soviets turning on the West wouldn't be an option.
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LoneHawkBoy
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Jarl of East Anglia
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MapleLeafs4Ever
May 25 2008, 10:39 PM
alchemist
May 25 2008, 10:31 PM
I guess you're right, I just can't gpast the fct that you had guys like Patton advocating a war with the USSR and having no qualms in getting other people to die and fight them for you.

But in OTL that was after Germany's unconditional surrender. With the ATL, that hadn't happened and so turning on the Soviets or the Soviets turning on the West wouldn't be an option.

Not to mention difficult to pull off it you have to deal with resistance movements bubbling all over the place in Germany. Hard to fight the Soviets when Nazi guerillas are wreaking havoc on the best location for moving materials from west to east in central Europe.
Axe-time, sword-time shields are sundered,
Wind-time, wolf-time, ere the world falls;

Volupso, Lines 43-44
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SladeJack
The Grand SladeJack
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I'm guessing Alchemist would respond that the Werewolves would grant safe passage to Westerners going off to fight the Soviets, assuming they see the Soviets as the greater of the two evils. However, whatever their ideological differences may be once the Soviets get pushed out of Germany the West becomes the only occupier. So you'd have to see an Anglo-American-German alliance against the Soviets. Maybe the West agrees to liberate Germany from the USSR and let them go on their happy way in exchange for support in the new war (they won't) or maybe the Germans align themselves with the West in the hopes that having their enemies fight each other will mean good things for them. Unlikely. Or maybe the Werewolves will let the West through and then when they're good and committed to the fight close the door behind them and cut them off. Then we're looking at some very wily leaders who know better than to take a Nazi's word being royally duped. Any which way we're in some pretty improbable and dare I say lame scenarios. Scenarios involving the Germans making peace with one ally against the other have potential, but not if they follow this path. And even if this did work, it's very far from the book HT has written. No, the scenario HT has prescribed for himself makes anything other than united Allied opposition to the Werewolves impossible, except by hampering Allied leadership with massive attacks of stupidity, this after they just showed they had the military sense to win the largest war in world history.
When you wipe your ass, make sure you wipe it really well.
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eamonhart
The Liquor Lord
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Those are all very good points but we won't really know until the book's street date what actually happens. Lets hope Turtledove doesn't go ASBs on us.

What is the probability of former werewolves being recruited by the Western allies once they have been crushed? Will we see an even greater number joining the CIA against East Germany and the USSR?
_______________________________________________________
'No arsenal, no weapon in the arsenals of the world, is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women.'
-- Ronald Reagan
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TR1
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Quote:
 
No, the scenario HT has prescribed for himself makes anything other than united Allied opposition to the Werewolves impossible, except by hampering Allied leadership with massive attacks of stupidity, this after they just showed they had the military sense to win the largest war in world history.


Even in the united Allied opposition, expect attacks of stupidity, as they are inevitable in every war and are amplified in guerrilla wars.
"Nobody's gay for Moleman." - Hans Moleman
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alchemist
Serf
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SladeJack
May 27 2008, 01:25 PM
I'm guessing Alchemist would respond that the Werewolves would grant safe passage to Westerners going off to fight the Soviets, assuming they see the Soviets as the greater of the two evils. However, whatever their ideological differences may be once the Soviets get pushed out of Germany the West becomes the only occupier. So you'd have to see an Anglo-American-German alliance against the Soviets. Maybe the West agrees to liberate Germany from the USSR and let them go on their happy way in exchange for support in the new war (they won't) or maybe the Germans align themselves with the West in the hopes that having their enemies fight each other will mean good things for them. Unlikely. Or maybe the Werewolves will let the West through and then when they're good and committed to the fight close the door behind them and cut them off. Then we're looking at some very wily leaders who know better than to take a Nazi's word being royally duped. Any which way we're in some pretty improbable and dare I say lame scenarios. Scenarios involving the Germans making peace with one ally against the other have potential, but not if they follow this path. And even if this did work, it's very far from the book HT has written. No, the scenario HT has prescribed for himself makes anything other than united Allied opposition to the Werewolves impossible, except by hampering Allied leadership with massive attacks of stupidity, this after they just showed they had the military sense to win the largest war in world history.

It's no so much as gighting a new war as making the Soveits continue to fight the current one. but since we've already shown how unlikely that one is, there's no point in contiuning this.
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