Post by eurofed on Oct 6, 2018 22:45:20 GMT
In January 1942, a version of Germany replaces the Nazi one from a TL where Weimar democracy successfully weathered the Great Depression and the early 1930s crisis, and achieved all its reasonable foreign-policy objectives without causing a general war or alienating international public opinion.
In the original TL, Chancellor Bruning was able to secure the support of all major German parties but the Nazis and the Communists in 1930-32 for his plan to restore the Hohenzollern monarchy and implement a thorough political reform. Thanks to the timely death of William II, he got the support of the crown prince for putting his own son on the throne, and therefore Hindenburg and the Nationalists felt compelled to go along with the plan. An uneasy but sufficiently functional grand coalition of the Nationalists, the Socialists, the Centre, the Liberals, and few other minor parties formed in the Reichstag to support Bruning's reforms. They had the two-thirds majority necessary to implement a reform of the constitution. The Nazi and Communist parties got banned with the justification of their extensive involvement in street violence. When the SA and the Communist paramilitary tried to stage an uprising, the Reichswehr supported by the Nationalist and Socialist militias crushed them in a brief civil war. Besides the monarchical restoration, other political reforms that helped stabilize the German political system included introduction of the constructive vote of no confidence, an electoral reform to limit political fragmentation and ban extremist parties, and a revision of the internal borders of German states to make them more functional. The new system was broadly similar to Nazi Gaue or Bundesrepublik Lander. An extensive program of public works, infrastructure and agriculture modernization, and rearmament cut down unemployment, eased recovery of German economy, and greatly helped political stabilization. This happened in a broadly similar way to what the Nazis did but at a more moderate pace that did not cause serious financial problems or alienated the Western powers. Besides the Hohenzollern, a few other major German royal houses were restored at the head of their respective states, such as the Wittelsbach in Bavaria, the Wettin in Saxony, the Welf in Hanover, and (after the Anschluss) the Habsburg in Austria.
Weimar Germany was able to exploit the Great Depression and ongoing Soviet rearmament to secure the assent of the Western powers for suspending payment of reparations indefinitely and enacting a reasonable amount of land and air forces rearmament. In order to appease Britain and France, it was careful to avoid any major naval rearmament and keep the Rhineland demilitarized. The plebiscite for Saar took place on schedule in 1935 and returned an overwhelming majority for union with Germany. Bruning was also successful in his efforts to establish a customs union between Germany and Austria in 1931, since the Great Depression distracted France enough to stop them from intervening to derail the project. The customs union helped improve the economic situation and stabilize democracy in Austria and Germany, and paved the way for a political union of the two countries in 1936. They won the support of Britain and the USA for the democratic Anschluss and France acknowledged it as inevitable. Germany secured the assent of Italy to the project with a package that included German diplomatic and economic support to Italy for its conquest of Ethiopia and intervention in Spain, demilitarization of Tyrol, and transfer of the ethnic German population of South Tyrol to Germany. The German government was also able to secure the diplomatic support of Britain, France, and Italy in 1938-40 for internationally-monitored plebiscites to settle the Sudetenland, Danzig, and Corridor issues. The Czechoslovak government yielded to international pressure and agreed to cede the Sudetenland after the plebiscite returned a large majority for union with Germany. Poland resisted and sent its army to occupy the Free City of Danzig after its pro-German government staged the plebiscite. This gave Germany a casus belli which Britain and France deemed acceptable. Germany won the war with Poland w/o too much effort and annexed Danzig, West Prussia, and Upper Silesia. It enforced a population exchange of the Polish and German minorities between the two states. To appease the Western powers, they avoided getting Posen as well and allowed Poland to keep an extraterritorial sea access at Gdynia. The Soviets exploited the situation to backstab the Poles and annex the Kresy. Lithuania accepted to cede the Memelland soon afterwards.
After winning the Danzig War, Germany basically turned into a satisfied great power with political and economic stability comparable to the Western powers and good relations with Britain, France, the USA, and Italy. Much like the other European powers, it kept pursuing rearmament to counter the growing Soviet threat. Due to peacetime conditions, it was nowhere as extensive as the Nazi one but it allowed the German army to become significantly more technologically advanced than OTL (a half-decade, more or less) thanks to its research programs avoiding Nazi administrative chaos, ideologically-minded screwups, and loss of brainpower for political reasons. Notably, TTL Germany had functional jet plane and rocket technology, radar, transistors, tanks and airplanes of much better quality than OTL, and if they really put their mind to it, they would be able to build nukes more or less at the same pace as America. The 1936 Olympics took place w/o any controversy and were an unquestioned success. Minorities kept the same civil rights and integration in German society they had enjoyed before WWI and in the 1920s.
The ISOT area equates the early 1940s political borders of Weimar Germany, that is the 1937 ones plus Austria, the Sudetenland, Danzig, West Prussia, Upper Silesia, and the Memelland. After being plunged in the midst of WWII and realizing their new situation, Alt-Germany is surely going to be horrified and eagerly pursue a white peace with the Western Allies according to their original status quo. They would certainly be willing to restore the prewar status quo with the democratic powers and the independence of the countries invaded by the Nazis, but just as surely they would not accept a new Versailles peace or being unfairly punished for the misdeeds of a vanished evil counterpart of themselves they bear no responsibility for. Theoretically speaking, in optimal conditions they would not mind keeping Alsace-Lorraine, Luxemburg, Eupen-Malmedy, some kind of confederal bond with Czechia, and Posen (with a population transfer of the Poles) if feasible, but they surely are not going to make these potential claims a stumbling block to peace. As it concerns the USSR, they would optimally prefer at least restoration of the 1939 borders, or even better a Brest-Litovsk peace, to lessen the Soviet threat on their Eastern borders, but they would be reluctantly willing to accept the 1941 borders in a pinch. They would fight like lions to resist the imposition of anything more onerous by the Allies.
As it concerns the troops of Nazi Germany which the ISOT left displaced across Europe, they would likely be willing to assimilate Wehrmacht members in their army or civilian society that were not personally and directly responsible for atrocities if the soldiers and officers recognize their authority and undergo some political vetting and re-education. However absorbing a few extra millions of young males with the same identities as ISOT German citizens may prove socially burdensome (this large male surplus kind of demographic imbalance is a recipe for trouble), so in the long term Alt-Germany would probably encourage OTL Wehrmacht veterans to immigrate to other countries that would take them. Alt-Germany would of course fight Wehrmacht troops if they tried to re-establish fascism at home. They are going to be appalled by Nazi crimes and willing to cooperate with the democratic powers (but not the USSR) to punish war criminals that escaped elimination by the ISOT event. They would prefer doing so with German tribunals but may be willing to use international ones with reasonable guarantees for the civil rights of the defendants.
In the original TL, Chancellor Bruning was able to secure the support of all major German parties but the Nazis and the Communists in 1930-32 for his plan to restore the Hohenzollern monarchy and implement a thorough political reform. Thanks to the timely death of William II, he got the support of the crown prince for putting his own son on the throne, and therefore Hindenburg and the Nationalists felt compelled to go along with the plan. An uneasy but sufficiently functional grand coalition of the Nationalists, the Socialists, the Centre, the Liberals, and few other minor parties formed in the Reichstag to support Bruning's reforms. They had the two-thirds majority necessary to implement a reform of the constitution. The Nazi and Communist parties got banned with the justification of their extensive involvement in street violence. When the SA and the Communist paramilitary tried to stage an uprising, the Reichswehr supported by the Nationalist and Socialist militias crushed them in a brief civil war. Besides the monarchical restoration, other political reforms that helped stabilize the German political system included introduction of the constructive vote of no confidence, an electoral reform to limit political fragmentation and ban extremist parties, and a revision of the internal borders of German states to make them more functional. The new system was broadly similar to Nazi Gaue or Bundesrepublik Lander. An extensive program of public works, infrastructure and agriculture modernization, and rearmament cut down unemployment, eased recovery of German economy, and greatly helped political stabilization. This happened in a broadly similar way to what the Nazis did but at a more moderate pace that did not cause serious financial problems or alienated the Western powers. Besides the Hohenzollern, a few other major German royal houses were restored at the head of their respective states, such as the Wittelsbach in Bavaria, the Wettin in Saxony, the Welf in Hanover, and (after the Anschluss) the Habsburg in Austria.
Weimar Germany was able to exploit the Great Depression and ongoing Soviet rearmament to secure the assent of the Western powers for suspending payment of reparations indefinitely and enacting a reasonable amount of land and air forces rearmament. In order to appease Britain and France, it was careful to avoid any major naval rearmament and keep the Rhineland demilitarized. The plebiscite for Saar took place on schedule in 1935 and returned an overwhelming majority for union with Germany. Bruning was also successful in his efforts to establish a customs union between Germany and Austria in 1931, since the Great Depression distracted France enough to stop them from intervening to derail the project. The customs union helped improve the economic situation and stabilize democracy in Austria and Germany, and paved the way for a political union of the two countries in 1936. They won the support of Britain and the USA for the democratic Anschluss and France acknowledged it as inevitable. Germany secured the assent of Italy to the project with a package that included German diplomatic and economic support to Italy for its conquest of Ethiopia and intervention in Spain, demilitarization of Tyrol, and transfer of the ethnic German population of South Tyrol to Germany. The German government was also able to secure the diplomatic support of Britain, France, and Italy in 1938-40 for internationally-monitored plebiscites to settle the Sudetenland, Danzig, and Corridor issues. The Czechoslovak government yielded to international pressure and agreed to cede the Sudetenland after the plebiscite returned a large majority for union with Germany. Poland resisted and sent its army to occupy the Free City of Danzig after its pro-German government staged the plebiscite. This gave Germany a casus belli which Britain and France deemed acceptable. Germany won the war with Poland w/o too much effort and annexed Danzig, West Prussia, and Upper Silesia. It enforced a population exchange of the Polish and German minorities between the two states. To appease the Western powers, they avoided getting Posen as well and allowed Poland to keep an extraterritorial sea access at Gdynia. The Soviets exploited the situation to backstab the Poles and annex the Kresy. Lithuania accepted to cede the Memelland soon afterwards.
After winning the Danzig War, Germany basically turned into a satisfied great power with political and economic stability comparable to the Western powers and good relations with Britain, France, the USA, and Italy. Much like the other European powers, it kept pursuing rearmament to counter the growing Soviet threat. Due to peacetime conditions, it was nowhere as extensive as the Nazi one but it allowed the German army to become significantly more technologically advanced than OTL (a half-decade, more or less) thanks to its research programs avoiding Nazi administrative chaos, ideologically-minded screwups, and loss of brainpower for political reasons. Notably, TTL Germany had functional jet plane and rocket technology, radar, transistors, tanks and airplanes of much better quality than OTL, and if they really put their mind to it, they would be able to build nukes more or less at the same pace as America. The 1936 Olympics took place w/o any controversy and were an unquestioned success. Minorities kept the same civil rights and integration in German society they had enjoyed before WWI and in the 1920s.
The ISOT area equates the early 1940s political borders of Weimar Germany, that is the 1937 ones plus Austria, the Sudetenland, Danzig, West Prussia, Upper Silesia, and the Memelland. After being plunged in the midst of WWII and realizing their new situation, Alt-Germany is surely going to be horrified and eagerly pursue a white peace with the Western Allies according to their original status quo. They would certainly be willing to restore the prewar status quo with the democratic powers and the independence of the countries invaded by the Nazis, but just as surely they would not accept a new Versailles peace or being unfairly punished for the misdeeds of a vanished evil counterpart of themselves they bear no responsibility for. Theoretically speaking, in optimal conditions they would not mind keeping Alsace-Lorraine, Luxemburg, Eupen-Malmedy, some kind of confederal bond with Czechia, and Posen (with a population transfer of the Poles) if feasible, but they surely are not going to make these potential claims a stumbling block to peace. As it concerns the USSR, they would optimally prefer at least restoration of the 1939 borders, or even better a Brest-Litovsk peace, to lessen the Soviet threat on their Eastern borders, but they would be reluctantly willing to accept the 1941 borders in a pinch. They would fight like lions to resist the imposition of anything more onerous by the Allies.
As it concerns the troops of Nazi Germany which the ISOT left displaced across Europe, they would likely be willing to assimilate Wehrmacht members in their army or civilian society that were not personally and directly responsible for atrocities if the soldiers and officers recognize their authority and undergo some political vetting and re-education. However absorbing a few extra millions of young males with the same identities as ISOT German citizens may prove socially burdensome (this large male surplus kind of demographic imbalance is a recipe for trouble), so in the long term Alt-Germany would probably encourage OTL Wehrmacht veterans to immigrate to other countries that would take them. Alt-Germany would of course fight Wehrmacht troops if they tried to re-establish fascism at home. They are going to be appalled by Nazi crimes and willing to cooperate with the democratic powers (but not the USSR) to punish war criminals that escaped elimination by the ISOT event. They would prefer doing so with German tribunals but may be willing to use international ones with reasonable guarantees for the civil rights of the defendants.