WW1 Alt History Help

[Zinegata]

Keegan, in "The First World War", argued that it could have been just an Austro-Serbian War - rather than a World War - had they acted immediately rather than waiting for firm German support.

It needs to be remembered that the Austrians did in fact have a solid casus belli for war. The heir to their throne was murdered by state-sponsored terrorists. And they managed to prove this conclusively rather quickly. However, by waiting for Germany to become involved, the other great powers by extension also became involved as it became an issue of prestige for all great powers, as opposed to merely another "Balkan police action".

Keegan also argues that there were many other flashpoints wherein war could have been averted. Notably, there were several instances when the civilian leadership asked their militaries to stop mobilization in order to give more time for peace talks. These orders were in many cases violently opposed. A high ranking Russian officer, for instance, threatened to smash his telephone the moment he got the order to mobilize, to prevent the Czar from issuing him a cancellation.

[Sea Skimmer]

Euro militaries had to spent a vast sum of money, which several powers actually kept as literal piles of gold, in ordered to execute a mobilization. Taking over the rail roads and pulling hundreds of thousands of men and horses off the fields (for which harnesses ect.. had to be bought) was a enormous undertaking that could not stop or start easily. So once started, some rather pressing reasons existed not to cancel it. Really it was hopeless, too many people wanted war and once they got the chance to order a mobilization they could easily argue it was a dangerous blow to national defense to halt it.

[Duckie]

LaCroix:

On the flip side of that, the Germans and Austro-Hungarians had ambitions of their own- Germany had a quite ambitious list of war aims, once they got round to publishing them. Austria-Hungary's main goal was just to survive as an empire, but given the rise of nationalism in the Balkans, that inevitably meant frustrating the ambitions and desires of several subject ethnicities.

Germany had no war aims to speak of. They first of all were very surprised there would even be a war with Britain and until 1916, there did not even exist a plan about the terms of what peace Germany would like.

Honestly, despite all the bluster, Germany had no real interest in a war, given that it was peace that enabled the prosperity. Notice how Germany tried to find allies all around to avoid fighting wars - the Dreibund was designed to allow Austria-Hungary to pretty much fight on two fronts only etc.

You don't think much of Fisher's theory about Germany purposefully provoking the first world war? It's apparently still widely accepted among western pop history authors (that doesn't say much of course) and western textbooks.

Which isn't to say I buy that Germany has some special culpability, but it's apparently a popular opinion. Personally I don't buy it, but I'm not an educated historian: I just have some vague idea that probably every country had bellicose politicians in the pre-WWI era (I know Germany had serious problems domestically getting the SPD to support the war, so it can't be that all of the germans were raring to go), and that I recently read the wikipedia page on the July Crisis and it was an amazing hatchetjob with a trillion quotes cited to Fisher about germans essentially being scheming liars who tricked the world into the war and bullied Austria into it and whatnot, which sets off my bullshit alarms instantly because it sounds like an agenda.

[Thanas]

You don't think much of Fisher's theory about Germany purposefully provoking the first world war? It's apparently still widely accepted among western pop history authors (that doesn't say much of course) and western textbooks.

It really is not, except for some fringe british historians. Let me put it this way - a while back there was a concentrated effort by international scholars to write a comprehensive history. Not one followed Fisher, who was discredited since the 80s anyway. You also do not see him pop up in modern history books except in the vein of "oh, btw, here is the theory of Fisher, which then got discredited in part and heavily modified by XXX".

To clarify: The specific war culpability of Fischer has been reversed. What has however stuck (and rightfully so) is his assertion that the German Government failed to deescalate the crisis and that once war started, Victory and becoming the hegomon of Europe were the most important war aims. However, the idea of Germany being solely responsible has been pretty much thoroughly reversed.

Which isn't to say I buy that Germany has some special culpability, but it's apparently a popular opinion. Personally I don't buy it, but I'm not an educated historian: I just have some vague idea that probably every country had bellicose politicians in the pre-WWI era (I know Germany had serious problems domestically getting the SPD to support the war, so it can't be that all of the germans were raring to go), and that I recently read the wikipedia page on the July Crisis and it was an amazing hatchetjob with a trillion quotes cited to Fisher about germans essentially being scheming liars who tricked the world into the war and bullied Austria into it and whatnot, which sets off my bullshit alarms instantly because it sounds like an agenda.

Anybody who cites Fisher as support in these days has a huge agenda to speak of.

[Duckie]

I see, that's about what I suspected. Also, for a lol, go check out the citations on July Crisis then. It's like 50% some guy named fromkin, 50% fisher. When you see two names repeated like that over and over again on something that shouldn't be obscure (I mean, if there's only one expert on wolof phonology there's only one expert, but WWI diplomacy? no way.) it totally makes me go 'huh'. That and the hatchetjob in the article.

(Also, man, I need to stop switching from speaking about japanese to speaking about europe without changing my words, because "Western Textbooks" says nothing useful but I figure you got that I meant "Anglosphere or American or something")

I was unaware he had been so discredited. The basic thrust of his claims of "It was all germany's fault" was pretty much given in my history textbooks alongside Heroic Wilson Saves Europe From Authoritarianism, so I figured that pop history and textbooks were all like that. Maybe I just had the world's shittiest US revisionist textbooks.

[Zinegata]

Oh, I don't disagree about the massive resources that were devoted to mobilization. "War by timetable" and all that. But it still provides a possible way to prevent a general conflagration.

I still think the first scenario I mentioned offers the best chance to avert a general war however - which is an immediate Austrian DoW against Serbia, followed by swift military action before Russia can even think about supporting Serbia. Say Conrad brow-beat the Emperor into committing the Austrian army into all out war.

The result would likely be the swift destruction of the Serbian army, followed by the Serbians turning to guerilla warfare. That would increase tensions in the Balkans, possibly leading to another Balkan war wherein the Great Powers would support various Balkan nations (i.e. Germany funds the Ottomans). Eventually, this Balkan war can lead to a world war in the 1920s when the Balkan proxies begin to collapse and the Great Powers themselves have to intervene.

[Thanas]

I see, that's about what I suspected. Also, for a lol, go check out the citations on July Crisis then. It's like 50% some guy named fromkin, 50% fisher. When you see two names repeated like that over and over again on something that shouldn't be obscure (I mean, if there's only one expert on wolof phonology there's only one expert, but WWI diplomacy? no way.) it totally makes me go 'huh'. That and the hatchetjob in the article.

Yeah, that is a very one-sided description. Just goes to show that Wikipedia should not be trusted on controversial subjects.

[Malagar]

Just goes to show that Wikipedia should not be trusted on controversial subjects.

Personally I'm amazed that the responsibility for WWI can still be considered a controversial subject.

[Thanas]

Just goes to show that Wikipedia should not be trusted on controversial subjects.

Personally I'm amazed that the responsibility for WWI can still be considered a controversial subject.

It is not for the professionals. I mean, it really got settled there and you will not find many people opposing the generally accepted view. All they are discussing are nuances, but the factual record is not in dispute. However, the same does not go for the general public. Just look how many popular histories are still coming out and many outright pander to nationalistic sentiment, especially in the english-speaking world.

[Samuel]

Thanas, I just finished a book called The Myth of the Great War by John Mosier. I hope this is the right place to bring it up.

He claims that
German casulties were between 1/3 and 1/2 that of the allies on the western front
The Germans had figured out how to break trenches in 1915
Germany had more and better artillary
German defenses were better and their doctrine of trading land for manpower was superior
Germany had a much better office and staff system
The war was ended because American intervention and the UEF
The allied armies systematically lied about what was occuring on the front and failed to learn from their mistakes, leading to the results of the second world war where the Germans conquered France and the myth of the Blitzcreig was created.

How accurate are these claims? I checked up on him and his books on ww2 seem to have... errors, but I want to know if his representation of WW1 is accurate.

[Crossroads Inc.]

I am at work right now, so I will expand on this later.

But I would look into preventing WWII via WWI more then stopping WWI as a whole. Europe was a powderkeg, everyone was looking for an excuse to go off at that time. Even if you prevent the assassination, who is to say there would not have been something out to give the excuse for WWI.

I'll go into detail later, but the better was is to ensure that WWI ends in such a a way as to prevent the rise of Hitler, the collaspe of Germany and the spread of Facisim in Italy and Germany.

[PeZook]

German casulties were between 1/3 and 1/2 that of the allies on the western front
The Germans had figured out how to break trenches in 1915
Germany had more and better artillary
German defenses were better and their doctrine of trading land for manpower was superior
Germany had a much better office and staff system

These are dubious. I am not an expert, but if Germany was so superior and had it all figured out by 1915, why did the war drag on until their total collapse in 1918?

Better artillery, better staff system, 1:3 casualty ratio? What happened to make it drag for so long?

[Simon_Jester]

Speculatively, this may be the product of cherrypicking- during a given battle, whichever side fought on the defensive took much lower casualties. Something similar might apply to artillery- comparing the Germans' most impressive pieces (such as the heavy siege mortars and the unparalleled range of the Paris Gun) with their Allied counterparts, without regard to other issues such as production, cost, and the like.

With respect to defenses, "German defenses were better" sounds like an impression created by the fact that the Germans were on the defensive- they had the luxury of trading land for time and digging in strong fortified positions along the line over a period of many months. The Allies put a lot more effort into offensive preparations, because they were busily trying to drive the Germans off French soil.

Though I wouldn't be surprised if the Germans had a better staff system, since they'd practically invented the military staff in the first place.

[Samuel]

I put it badly. What he meant by breaking trenches is they could assault and take trench lines without massive casulties, more around 1 to 1 or better. It used up lots of shells so it wasn't an immediate war winner. I don't have the book on me, but I believe it was hurricane bombardments combined with just biting off a small part of enemy territory.

Better artillery, better staff system, 1:3 casualty ratio? What happened to make it drag for so long?

The allies had a massive numberical advantage and the ability to draw upon much of the rest of the world for supplies.

Speculatively, this may be the product of cherrypicking- during a given battle, whichever side fought on the defensive took much lower casualties.

Except he claimed that the allies took much higher casulties than the Germans when conducting offenses. Compare Verdun with Somme for example.

Something similar might apply to artillery- comparing the Germans' most impressive pieces (such as the heavy siege mortars and the unparalleled range of the Paris Gun) with their Allied counterparts, without regard to other issues such as production, cost, and the like.

He didn't consider those. He was refering to mortars and artillary that can be towed.

[Zinegata]

Thanas, I just finished a book called The Myth of the Great War by John Mosier. I hope this is the right place to bring it up.

He claims that
German casulties were between 1/3 and 1/2 that of the allies on the western front

This sounds like one of Falkenhayn's post-war delusions.

[Thanas]

Better artillery, better staff system, 1:3 casualty ratio? What happened to make it drag for so long?

The fact that the other allies were worthless? The Austrians (safe a few divisions) were ineffectual and the Ottomans were really only good for static defence and being cannon fodder. But yes, the casualty rate heavily favored Germany as seen here. You might also see this chart.

The casualty rate of 1:3 is misleading though. While some German units managed to achieve that rate, one must take the casualties of the entire central powers in account. Total military casualties (dead and wounded, not counting prisoners because I do not have those figures available) of the Entente was ~18.5 million. On the central powers, however it was ~12.4 million, of which a total of 6.2 million came from Germany. So you see how disingenious the 1:3 million casualties is - seeing how it snips out the other forces. Now, granted, Germany did the lions share of the fighting, but to claim a 1:3 casualty rate in Germany's favor is just wrong. At best, it was a 1:2 ratio. There is no doubt however that Germany was pretty much the most effective of the nations fighting in terms of casualties caused etc. Especially the casualty rates the Russians suffered were just horrendous.



Now, as for the rest:

(caveat: I am working from a memory from years ago here. It may be inaccurate in places and people like Sea Skimmer might be better qualified to comment on it.)

The Germans had figured out how to break trenches in 1915

I am assuming he is referring to the Sturmbataillon developed by Willy Rohr here. However, these tactics were only employed in a wide scale in 1916 and only really came to fruition in 1917 imo. So yes, the concepts did exist and they even had great success in 1915, but the Sturmtruppen really only got dominant in the years following it.

Germany had more and better artillary

I can easily believe "better", but I cannot speak with regards to more. At the end of the war, the allies definitely had numerical superiority in guns.

German defenses were better and their doctrine of trading land for manpower was superior

I do believe that the german doctrine of defence in depth was better and I do believe the commanders like Fritz von Lossberg and Max Hoffmann had no matches on the allied side.

Germany had a much better office and staff system

Sure. The concept of a general staff after all is a German invention and was perfected under Moltke the elder. However, do note that this worship of the general staff also gave a lot of political power to Hindenburg and Ludendorff, with rather bad results.

The war was ended because American intervention and the UEF

....sure, material superiority decided the war. And the UEF was important just by bringing in new bodies, and Operation Michel was brought on by the pressing need for a victory before the USA would arrive in force. That said, the bulk of the fighting still was not done by the Americans.

The allied armies systematically lied about what was occuring on the front and failed to learn from their mistakes, leading to the results of the second world war where the Germans conquered France and the myth of the Blitzcreig was created.

Can't comment about that.

[Pelranius]

Thanas, out of curiosity, how widely accepted is the Goldhagen thesis in academia (if I remember right, boiled down it says that the Holocaust was the end result of the Germans being uniquely anti semitic)? Of course, Mr. Goldhagen doesn't seem to adequately explain how Russian (and others) antisemitism was less extreme than that of Germany's.

And how serious were World War I plans by Germany to annex former Russian territories for colonization by ethnic Germans?

[Duckie]

Thanas, out of curiosity, how widely accepted is the Goldhagen thesis in academia (if I remember right, boiled down it says that the Holocaust was the end result of the Germans being uniquely anti semitic)? Of course, Mr. Goldhagen doesn't seem to adequately explain how Russian (and others) antisemitism was less extreme than that of Germany's.

And how serious were World War I plans by Germany to annex former Russian territories for colonization by ethnic Germans?

Even in the wildest dreams of the septemberprogramm, that was mostly the baltic and a strip of land on the border of poland (granted one inhabited by quite a few people that would have led to a humanitarian crisis the size of the real life one that happened with the germans being expelled from prussia).

It's hardly like Hitler's dream of annexing literally all of Europe east of Koenigsberg to the Urals.

And at risk of making something up that I hardly remember, as I recall the SPD and a large portion of the german political establishment even outside the SPD were opposed to any border changes for colonisation in the east.

[Sea Skimmer]

WW1 Germany also wanted to split off the Ukraine and Caucuses to weak Imperial Russia for good; and provide a buffer to protect the Ottomans.

WW1 Germany was big on colonies, and intended to demand large areas of French and some British and protectorate holdings as spoils of war; meaning that she’d have more territory then colonists by a wide margin. So annexing large chunks of Europe without ethnic German populations was not a serious priority and the areas that would be annexed were limited. IIRC the main Portuguese colonies would have gone to Germany; these had basically been British protectorates since the Napoleonic Wars and Germany saw the transfer as more politically tenable then say, demanding Kenya.

[Samuel]

Do you mean Germany wanted to annex parts of France or that Germany wanted French colonies? Also, what happens to Belgium?

[Thanas]

Thanas, out of curiosity, how widely accepted is the Goldhagen thesis in academia (if I remember right, boiled down it says that the Holocaust was the end result of the Germans being uniquely anti semitic)? Of course, Mr. Goldhagen doesn't seem to adequately explain how Russian (and others) antisemitism was less extreme than that of Germany's.

It is not accepted at all. Goldhagen is a propagandist who has no interest in honest debate. His book is rubbish, pure and simple. His central thesis is that "the Germans" are a specially abhorrent example, a subspecies of the homo sapiens that has one character trait - anti-semitism. German anti-semitism was so virulent, that all it needed was a Hitler to kickstart it and voila - holocaust. That same anti-semitism apparently existed (according to him) since the middle ages. In short, luther to hitler, all Germans bad.

His book was (predictably) panned in book reviews. How did he respond to that? With lawyers, going after historians, suing them for libel and defamation and going even so far as to try to have one critical reviewer removed from a panel on Nazi crimes (because she dared to dismiss his book, she obviously was a Nazi). This was especially galling to hear about considering said expert was considered the preeminent scholar on his primary sources.

I can seldom remember a single book being met with that much derison and outright rejection by the community. I mean, you had nearly all historians from the far left (Hanns Mommsen) alll the way to the conservative sides rejecting it. In every country from the USA to Israel, his book got dismissed as sloppy work and outright misleading.

Even if you accept his thesis, you run head-on into a lot of different problems, mainly related to the reality of that time. First, Germany was the only country that even had specific versions of state orders to not "force" Jews to wear crosses. Second, Germany was the country where jews had by far the best and most integrated life in society. Jews were highly successful, even in politics (see Rathenau) and actually received proportionally higher decorations, including combat decorations in WWI. There were even Jewish student fraternities who fought the mensur etc. This does not speak to a life under permanent anti-semitism or something. When anti-semitism came, it was a heavy surprise for a lot of people.


Needless to say, Goldhagen wrecked his complete career with this and is now widely regarded as an abject lesson in what not to do. Of course, he did not learn anything out of this and wrote a "sequel", this time decrying the catholic church as the root of all evil. Needless to say, it was similarly received, with one difference - most people just ignored him.

And how serious were World War I plans by Germany to annex former Russian territories for colonization by ethnic Germans?

None at all except for some pipedreams. The reality was that Germany barely had enough colonists for her own colonies, so annexing anything more except for some important strategic areas (Riga?) would have been out of the question.

[Pelranius]

Ah thank you.

There ought to be a way to revoke academic credentials for that sort of cretinism (but then we run into the issue of censorship).

[Thanas]

There is a reason why Goldhagen is a former associate professor.....


that said, stuff like this definitely lead a lot of historians question whether Harvard still lives up to its reputation. The fact that one can get a Ph.D. with this drivel is not really that comforting.

I'll try and put up a few quotes from a professional review which says thinks far better than I ever could later on.

[Simon_Jester]

I put it badly. What he meant by breaking trenches is they could assault and take trench lines without massive casulties, more around 1 to 1 or better. It used up lots of shells so it wasn't an immediate war winner. I don't have the book on me, but I believe it was hurricane bombardments combined with just biting off a small part of enemy territory.

The Allies could do this too, up to a point- what made their major campaigns so bloody was that they didn't satisfy themselves with limited campaigns, and kept pressing forward. That took them out of range of their artillery support, gave the Germans more opportunities to regroup and counterattack, and generally made the offensive bloodier.

But, again, the Western Allies were on the strategic offensive- they could not satisfy themselves with taking a few square kilometers of ground at a time; they had to break the trench system and restore themselves to some kind of mobile warfare again.

That required of them a much higher level of commitment of manpower- and, inevitably, higher casualties.

Better artillery, better staff system, 1:3 casualty ratio? What happened to make it drag for so long?

The allies had a massive numberical advantage and the ability to draw upon much of the rest of the world for supplies.

Numerical advantage, yes, but not that high an advantage. I mean, compare the actual casualties on the front for the two sides. Overall casualties on the Western Front weren't at anything like a 3:1 ratio- the Allies lost more, but not that much more.

Casualties for the Russians were much worse, but the Russians were badly underequipped and usually suffered under inept generals.

Some of the issues at play were discussed here, in this thread, some months ago; anyone interested might want to look there.

[Zinegata]

One should never forget that Germany did in fact bring about the collapse of the Russian nation, and inflicted heavy enough losses on the French army that it mutinied in 1917. The German army was by in many ways the qualitatively the better army, although not necessarily better by a margin of 3:1.

German collapse only came a year after the Russian collapse and the French mutinies - and it's to a large extent because they decided to throw away tens of thousands of their best troops in one final last-ditch offensive. Which was a pretty desperate gamble that reversed the prevailing story in the West (the British/French went on the strategic offensive, and suffered higher losses) instead of say, grinding the inexperienced Americans to death while they started peace talks along the line of "We already beat Russia. Let's call the war even on the West".

That's actually one thing that has me wondering though - why didn't the Germans make peace with the Allies after the Russians surrendered? Getting most of Poland and Ukraine while giving back the captured French and Belgian territories sounds like a fantastic deal to me.