ORIGINAL: wadail
Now, to be fair I never said ohgermanywouldhaveeasilywonifhitlerwouldnothavebeensostupid, I said Germany would have lasted 3-4 years longer than it did. Maybe after Stalingrad, definitely after Kursk, the best thing Germany was going to get out of WWII was a negotiated surrender with terms. It simply did not have the manpower or industry to win a long war fought at that level of intensity against so many belligerents.
I read that Churchill said upon hearing of Pearl Harbor, "well, it appears we have won after all".
Some outstanding decisions of Hitler's that helped expedite their collapse were:
Invading Poland and starting the war before his war plan was ready to implement
He also forced industry to keep producing consumer goods until 1942 because he didn't want the population to turn against him due to deprivation. Great Britain went on a total war footing from day 1 which meant by the Battle of Britain they were producing more single engine fighters per month than Germany was.
Declaring war on the US after Pearl Harbor - It is no sure thing Roosevelt would have gotten a declaration of war against Germany and a commitment from Congress for a 2-front War in the days after Pearl Harbor. It might not have mattered, but the presence of the units sent to defend the boot of Italy may well have made the difference at Kursk
Not to mention the resources they were pouring into the west wall. The UK did not pose a serious invasion threat to Western Europe until the US got into the war.
Though I'm not sure the Germans could have won at Kursk no matter what they threw into the cauldron. The Soviets had the time and resources to build probably one the best examples of defense in depth in history.
Aryan supremacy - yes, I get that was what the Nazis were about, but he ended up killing about 12 million people who might well have fought for him if allowed
Fanatic idealism will get people worked up and running to your cause when you're winning, but it will turn against you when things go badly. The Nazis aren't the only example of this in history, though they probably are the most dramatic.
Unleashing the Gestapo and SS on Ukraine and the Soviets, turning the Eastern front into their version of the no-quarter combat we experienced in the Pacific, only against a country with several times their population. He killed so many people that the rest of the world was highly unlikely to give Germany a negotiated peace, which was one of his greater errors, IMHO. His ideology put Germany in a corner from which it had to "whip all comers" or eventually be destroyed
The Ukrainians were ready to join the German cause en masse in 1941. If Hitler had used them instead of killing them and burning their villages, he could have fielded several divisions of Ukrainian troops by December 1941, which probably would have made the difference at the gates of Moscow.
Ironically a lot of Ukrainians were actually the Aryans he went on about. "White" Russians are descendants of Swedish vikings who sailed the Russian river system during their peak on the world scene. Many of them are genetically closer to Hitler's ideal Aryan than most Germans are.
Allowing Goering to "smash them on the beach" at Dunkirk.. well, listening to Goering at all for that matter
Refusing to allow his general staff to retreat when appropriate
Using meth (well, back then who knew?)
Allowing his focus to shift from a front when things were not going to suite him (Battle of Britain, Leaving Rommel hanging)
His penchant for having "fits" so severe that his general staff was afraid to present him with accurate information
He valued loyalty over advisers who would tell him the truth. A leader needs accurate information to make good decisions and a leader in a bubble is going to make bad decisions. Hitler is not unique in that respect.
His interference in the ME-262 program
This alone would not have been a war winner, but with Me-262 fighters available in mid-44 in large numbers would have made the bombing campaign in Germany very expensive. The critical problem with the jets in the end was they were very tough to fly and it took very experienced pilots to fly them. Putting masses of poorly trained pilots in Me-262s would have just resulted in staggering accident rates. The operational losses for Me-262s was already extremely high.
His refusal to allow the development of an automatic assault rifle (The StG 44 was developed behind his back and against his wishes and when one is fighting hordes of Soviets, every bullet helps)
Invading Russia before the Western Front was secure (well, invading Russia at all, but I digress)
Not accepting a peace offer from Stalin that ceded Ukraine (by post-Cold War document accounts)
Bombing British cities instead of continuing the pressure on the RAF
Pais de Calais
Failure to develop a long-range bomber
Not sure this one was uber critical, though a fleet of long range maritime bombers would have made life difficult for the British. Strategic bombers would not have done them much good. The two biggest industrial areas for the Allies were deep in Allied territory (the US and the USSR centers built in late 1941). It would have taken a strategic bomber on the order of a B-36 to reach the US and that would have just stretched Germany's resources even further.
Not releasing armor against Normandy
Absolute faith in the enigma machine (he had help from his Generals on this one)
His squandering of resources on "wunder weapons"
Not invading Turkey to get at the Crimean oil and Southern Soviet flank
Stripping the Eastern front for the "Battle of the Bulge"
It is a long list and it's a far longer list than the things he did right, with regard to military operations.
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I'm not sure invading Turkey would have been a good idea. He would have ended up with another flank to defend in the Middle East. The Allies could have put a force in Syria and gone north. Once they linked up with the Russians in the Crimea, it would have given the USSR a new supply route with the west.
The critical resource Germany lacked was oil. Central Europe is very poor in oil. Romania was the only place that had any of significance. (Ironically all three axis countries were very shy in oil.) The key of the treaty between the USSR and Germany in 1939 was a deal for the USSR to sell Germany a large quantity of oil. When Germany invaded the USSR in 1941, that source shut off and it was a race to capture the oil centers before the stockpiles ran out. That was the reason the thrust in the 1942 offensive was in the South. Germany needed to capture the oil.
There were a few other resources Germany lacked, like they didn't have access to large tungsten deposits, which affected the quality of AP shells, but oil was the critical large volume commodity they needed.
In a sense, WW II was the world's first war over access to oil.
Bill
