So if the Europeans were speaking German right now it's more than likely so would we.
The rest of your post is true true true and I've never disagreed with any of it. However, I just don't see it possible to really know with a high degree of certainty that the Germans, had they controlled Europe, could've successfully invaded and subjegated the US of A.
I just want to eliminate some confusion here. I'm not trying to argue that the brits would be speaking german had it not been for the americans.
I'm talking about the UK's freedom in general. As far as the UK's way of life is concerned, there should be no distinction made between the nazis and the russians.
Had the Russians defeated the nazis and taken europe for themselves, what would've stopped them from rolling right into Britain and sending everyone and their mothers off to the gulags?
So, again, nazis = russians. That's the reality of the situation.
So let me rephrase the premise of this thread: If it weren't for our granddaddys, the Brits would be communists.
So let me rephrase the premise of this thread: If it weren't for our granddaddys, the Brits would be communists.
i very much doubt that.... and besides Scotland was the only country in europe that the Romans couldnt conquer... and if the romans couldnt do it, then russia couldnt either
oh scary... 40000 morbidly obese christians wearing fanny packs invading europe is probably the least scariest thing since I watched an edited version of The Care Bears movie in an extremely brightly lit cinema.
why do americans go on about 'freedoms'... no-one is truly free... certainly americans are no more free than British, Australians or French... so why batter on about freedoms all the time
its a humorous quirk you guys have... makes me snigger
Your reluctance to include any communist bloc country just leads me to believe that you're not following what I'm getting at. The Russians did not take control of any of the countries you mentioned. In fact, the fact that you listed only countries that did not fall under Russian control just goes to prove my point, which is that you really do have a distorted sense of your own freedom. Some people don't know what they have until they've lost it...
i very much doubt that.... and besides Scotland was the only country in europe that the Romans couldnt conquer... and if the romans couldnt do it, then russia couldnt either
See, now we're getting somewhere. So, from your point of view, the Russians could never have taken britain because the scotts would've stopped them. ok...
Your reluctance to include any communist bloc country just leads me to believe that you're not following what I'm getting at. The Russians did not take control of any of the countries you mentioned. In fact, the fact that you listed only countries that did not fall under Russian control just goes to prove my point, which is that you really do have a distorted sense of your own freedom. Some people don't know what they have until they've lost it...
i only gave 3 completely random nations as examples of being just as free as america, why you keep coming back to the UK being a latent communist state evades me
oh scary... 40000 morbidly obese christians wearing fanny packs invading europe is probably the least scariest thing since I watched an edited version of The Care Bears movie in an extremely brightly lit cinema.
So let me rephrase the premise of this thread: If it weren't for our granddaddys, the Brits would be communists.
.. which is not automatically a bad thing! What is communism for you? I think the americans have a distorted view of what this is. Seeing we're having a problem agreeing what 'ally' means (accepted definition, eg. dictionary vs. subjective 'feeling' about the word), maybe we'll just run around in circles again!
See, now we're getting somewhere. So, from your point of view, the Russians could never have taken britain because the scotts would've stopped them. ok...
i'd love to think they couldn't but chances are if Soviet Union invaded then they'd conquer UK in time.... no matter how glorious our past is we'd be chewed up by them!
oh scary... 40000 morbidly obese christians wearing fanny packs invading europe is probably the least scariest thing since I watched an edited version of The Care Bears movie in an extremely brightly lit cinema.
i only gave 3 completely random nations as examples of being just as free as america, why you keep coming back to the UK being a latent communist state evades me
If that's true that those countries were "randomly" selected, then let's throw , say, post WWII Lithuania or pre-1989 E. Germany, into your list.
Would you say that Americans and the British don't have freedoms that are greater than those of those countries?
I always though Mussolini and Stalin were the biggest fools of WW2, and maybe Winston Churchhill. I guess none of them read Mein Kampf
Churchill read it........he spent most of the late 1930's railing against the rise of Hitler and Mussolini. The problem was that Churchill was not Prime Minister until after the actual fighting started. Neville Chamberlin was Prime Minister until sometime in 1940. By that time most of Western Europe had eaten a shit sandwich.
All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a thousand enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning. Be cunning and full of tricks and your people shall never be destroyed.
i'd love to think they couldn't but chances are if Soviet Union invaded then they'd conquer UK in time.... no matter how glorious our past is we'd be chewed up by them!
Dunk... just get hundreds of thousands of scots in their kilts and let them do what they need to do! Any invader would run away!
i'd love to think they couldn't but chances are if Soviet Union invaded then they'd conquer UK in time.... no matter how glorious our past is we'd be chewed up by them!
OK. Then what if Russia had taken control of europe after defeating the nazis? Would you say that Britain would've been next?
OK. Then what if Russia had taken control of europe after defeating the nazis? Would you say that Britain would've been next?
Why is it automatically assumed that Russia would have taken control of Europe? They had other 'problems' to deal with after the germans.... they were battling it out on several fronts!
OK. Then what if Russia had taken control of europe after defeating the nazis? Would you say that Britain would've been next?
highly probable... but this is all subjective and is detracting from the main crux of this thread...
if the Russians had conquered all of Europe and it was a 'success' then lets just say America would have been shitting itself... even more than it did during the 50's... if the new USSR was all of europe it would have become a monumental superpower that might have had an eye on the States..
possible?
oh scary... 40000 morbidly obese christians wearing fanny packs invading europe is probably the least scariest thing since I watched an edited version of The Care Bears movie in an extremely brightly lit cinema.
That part of the world confuses me. I know it was the Brittish Royal Navy that was hitting the German's hard at sea. I was just saying that by the time the U.S. got involved Germany had done a number on the existing Allies. In other words, they were losing the war. I don't think America 'won' the war although the paratroopers were a great asset.
The British Navy did kick the shit out of the German surface assets prior to U.S. entry into the war.........the Bismarck was sunk in May of 1941 by a massive Royal Naval operation. The loss of that "flag" ship stung Hitler so badly that he ordered the other surface assets into what amounted to coastal patrol. The other heavy battleship that the German possessed, the Tirpitz, was sunk by RAF bombers while it idled in port.
However that being said, the German Navy's major role was U-boat warfare. That meant cutting off shipping to Great Britain. They achieved great success in this venture. Allied cooperation was what finally turned the tide against the U-boats.
All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a thousand enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning. Be cunning and full of tricks and your people shall never be destroyed.
highly probable... but this is all subjective and is detracting from the main crux of this thread...
if the Russians had conquered all of Europe and it was a 'success' then lets just say America would have been shitting itself... even more than it did during the 50's... if the new USSR was all of europe it would have become a monumental superpower that might have had an eye on the States..
possible?
More than likely, but mutually assured destruction and the cold war would've kept US shores free from communist aggression. I don't think brits had the bomb back then. Or did they? Even if they did, that would've been because of American technology.
So, I'm making the following assertions:
1. W/O US involvement, Russia would have wrestled nazi-controlled europe from the nazis.
2. After doing so, it would've invaded Britain
3. Russia would've refrained from invading the US because the US had the bomb.
4. Assuming Britain got the bomb before being invaded by Russia, the bomb is a form of US involvement
So, if it weren't for our granddaddys, the brits would be commies. In this case, "our granddaddys" are the Manhattan project scientists....and Albert Einstein I guess. So, it turns out the brits owe their freedom to America and Albert Einstein.
Why is it automatically assumed that Russia would have taken control of Europe? They had other 'problems' to deal with after the germans.... they were battling it out on several fronts!
Several fronts? The axis consisted of the nazis, the italian fascists, and the japanese. Mussolini lost control in 1943, so that just leaves the nazis and the japanese. How active of a role was Russia playing in the fight against japan?
I was actually thinking more along the lines of new tactics, new ships and better sonar. Yes, it is great to read someone's mail and know their plans.....but in the case of a U-boat or a Wolf Pack, it's not easy to find them and sink them in the open ocean. In unrestricted submarine warfare, the individual U-boats were like the pirate raiders of yore.........they were just wandering the Atlantic looking for prey. It was not a dance directed by communication from Berlin.
All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a thousand enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning. Be cunning and full of tricks and your people shall never be destroyed.
Several fronts? The axis consisted of the nazis, the italian fascists, and the japanese. Mussolini lost control in 1943, so that just leaves the nazis and the japanese. How active of a role was Russia playing in the fight against japan?
OK battling should have been 'battling'. Though allies, they had china to worry about. - Unnatural allies, and when the alliance didn't serve it's purpose anymore, they would have turned back to their good old ways...
OK battling should have been 'battling'. Though allies, they had china to worry about. - Unnatural allies, and when the alliance didn't serve it's purpose anymore, they would have turned back to their good old ways...
China to worry about? You honestly think China was ever a threat to Russia?
I was actually thinking more along the lines of new tactics, new ships and better sonar. Yes, it is great to read someone's mail and know their plans.....but in the case of a U-boat or a Wolf Pack, it's not easy to find them and sink them in the open ocean. In unrestricted submarine warfare, the individual U-boats were like the pirate raiders of yore.........they were just wandering the Atlantic looking for prey. It was not a dance directed by communication from Berlin.
True. The decision to attack u-boats from the air in co-ordinated attacks between the Navy and RAF dealt them a serious blow. The co-ordination between the Navy and RAF was a new development.
3. Russia would've refrained from invading the US because the US had the bomb.
Germany - and thus Russia in your scenario, would have had the bomb if they wanted to. The Germans had the knowledge and capability to build a bomb but 'they weren't bothered' (to put it very simply), they had been working on one but it was not a priority at the time. The beginning of the war was going great for them. No need to spend valuable resources on a weapon they didn't need. After the soviet counter-attack, they rethought their position on that and for the first time challenged the scientists. While it was clear that they could build atomic bombs in principle, they would require a great deal of resources to do so. Instead, they put all their resources into building rockets, on the scale of what the Americans invested in the Manhattan Project.
Heisenberg and his team of scientist just didn't push hard enough.
Though, during the last months of the war Diebner and his team (and Gerlach) did build and test a nuclear device.
So..... Should the Russians have 'conquered' Europe, they would have had a nuclear bomb (albeit in it's infancy) but it only needed a few more months....
Germany - and thus Russia in your scenario, would have had the bomb if they wanted to. The Germans had the knowledge and capability to build a bomb but 'they weren't bothered' (to put it very simply), they had been working on one but it was not a priority at the time. The beginning of the war was going great for them. No need to spend valuable resources on a weapon they didn't need. After the soviet counter-attack, they rethought their position on that and for the first time challenged the scientists. While it was clear that they could build atomic bombs in principle, they would require a great deal of resources to do so. Instead, they put all their resources into building rockets, on the scale of what the Americans invested in the Manhattan Project.
Heisenberg and his team of scientist just didn't push hard enough.
Though, during the last months of the war Diebner and his team (and Gerlach) did build and test a nuclear device.
So..... Should the Russians have 'conquered' Europe, they would have had a nuclear bomb (albeit in it's infancy) but it only needed a few more months....
America would have been next....
...hence the term "mutually assured destruction." That's what I mean by Russia not invading....
We would've had the bomb...they would've had the bomb...as its been for the past several decades.
The only way Britain would've had the bomb before being invaded by Russia is if the US gave them the bomb, which again is why I say that Britain would be communist had it not been for US involvement.
And the Americans weren't out for themselves? Why did they only get involved two and a half years after the war started? Was it perhaps that they knew Hitler couldn't sustain a war on two fronts and that the U.S therefore saw an opportunity to grab a slice of the post-war cake in Europe?
China to worry about? You honestly think China was ever a threat to Russia?
After the Marco Polo Bridge incident they were both shitting in their pants (figure of speech) and thought best to enter into a non-aggression pact. Couldn't trust each other...
...hence the term "mutually assured destruction." That's what I mean by Russia not invading....
We would've had the bomb...they would've had the bomb...as its been for the past several decades.
The only way Britain would've had the bomb before being invaded by Russia is if the US gave them the bomb, which again is why I say that Britain would be communist had it not been for US involvement.
And Dunk's point that possibly with the might of Russia extending to include the rest of Europe + the bomb.... US could have been next. Assuming that Russia had no 'problems' with China and therefore ally there, the US wouldn't stand a chance! So communism for the US too!
Too many assumptions. What would probably have happened is that with Germany defeated and the Russians continuing their 'advance' alliances would have been broken and others made. Europeans would have 'reshuffled' and the war would have gone on. The Russians would have been over extended and therefore not so 'strong'.
The only way Britain would've had the bomb before being invaded by Russia is if the US gave them the bomb, which again is why I say that Britain would be communist had it not been for US involvement.
On the day Nagasaki was destroyed, 9 August 1945, the United States government published a book written by Henry De Wolf Smyth entitled Atomic Energy for Military Purposes, giving its account of the origins of this extraordinary phenomenon. The book would become an international bestseller, but when the first copy reached London later that month it caused outrage in government circles, for it gave the clear impression that the atomic bomb was an exclusively American achievement.
A senior scientific civil servant at the British ministry of supply, Michael Perrin, was immediately ordered to write a complementary work telling it from the British point of view, and so urgent was the need felt to be that he was given only 24 hours to write it.
Perrin’s brief history described how the first blueprint for the weapon was written in Britain and how the first feasibility studies were carried out at British universities by British scientists. He told how all the data and discoveries were given freely and promptly to the Americans, even before they entered the war, and how in 1941 Winston Churchill established a British A-bomb programme. Then, as the vastly bigger US Manhattan Project got under way after Pearl Harbor, Perrin explained how most of Britain’s top bomb scientists transferred to the United States.
What he did not say, though he might have, was that once in America these scientists made vital contributions to bomb design and were involved right up to the final stages – it was a professor from Imperial College, London who calculated the optimum height for the detonation of the bombs over Japan. Nor, for diplomatic reasons, did Perrin mention that Churchill had initialled a memo, which was transmitted to the Americans, giving Britain’s authorisation for the weapons to be used.
we practically had it... Russia could have invaded us but we would have held out for a while... i'd like to think we might not have used it though.. morally speaking
EDIT: i missed the start bit out
oh scary... 40000 morbidly obese christians wearing fanny packs invading europe is probably the least scariest thing since I watched an edited version of The Care Bears movie in an extremely brightly lit cinema.
And Dunk's point that possibly with the might of Russia extending to include the rest of Europe + the bomb.... US could have been next. Assuming that Russia had no 'problems' with China and therefore ally there, the US wouldn't stand a chance! So communism for the US too!
But dunk wasn't taking into consideration mutually assured destruction, which is basically what prevented WWIII during the cold war. So, no, it wouldn't have been communism for us too.
Too many assumptions. What would probably have happened is that with Germany defeated and the Russians continuing their 'advance' alliances would have been broken and others made. Europeans would have 'reshuffled' and the war would have gone on. The Russians would have been over extended and therefore not so 'strong'.
There would have been various forms of resistance, but that's about it - not a "war" like you say. Remember that aside from eliminating the jews and other impurities, the nazis wanted to maintain a way of life similar to that prior to the war. Russia's iron first and gulag with no questions policy would've made control much more assured.
What makes you think Russian control of europe would have been less constricting and effective than nazi control? New boss same as the old boss...
True. The decision to attack u-boats from the air in co-ordinated attacks between the Navy and RAF dealt them a serious blow. The co-ordination between the Navy and RAF was a new development.
Your bias is showing.......the co-ordination was between the Allied naval powers as a whole..........Liberty Ships.........better sonar.......radar coordination of naval flights........better convey tatics....or are you going to claim that the British forces staved off the U-boats alone.
All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a thousand enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning. Be cunning and full of tricks and your people shall never be destroyed.
Comments
The rest of your post is true true true and I've never disagreed with any of it. However, I just don't see it possible to really know with a high degree of certainty that the Germans, had they controlled Europe, could've successfully invaded and subjegated the US of A.
I just want to eliminate some confusion here. I'm not trying to argue that the brits would be speaking german had it not been for the americans.
I'm talking about the UK's freedom in general. As far as the UK's way of life is concerned, there should be no distinction made between the nazis and the russians.
Had the Russians defeated the nazis and taken europe for themselves, what would've stopped them from rolling right into Britain and sending everyone and their mothers off to the gulags?
So, again, nazis = russians. That's the reality of the situation.
So let me rephrase the premise of this thread: If it weren't for our granddaddys, the Brits would be communists.
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
i very much doubt that.... and besides Scotland was the only country in europe that the Romans couldnt conquer... and if the romans couldnt do it, then russia couldnt either
Your reluctance to include any communist bloc country just leads me to believe that you're not following what I'm getting at. The Russians did not take control of any of the countries you mentioned. In fact, the fact that you listed only countries that did not fall under Russian control just goes to prove my point, which is that you really do have a distorted sense of your own freedom. Some people don't know what they have until they've lost it...
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
See, now we're getting somewhere. So, from your point of view, the Russians could never have taken britain because the scotts would've stopped them. ok...
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
i only gave 3 completely random nations as examples of being just as free as america, why you keep coming back to the UK being a latent communist state evades me
.. which is not automatically a bad thing! What is communism for you? I think the americans have a distorted view of what this is. Seeing we're having a problem agreeing what 'ally' means (accepted definition, eg. dictionary vs. subjective 'feeling' about the word), maybe we'll just run around in circles again!
And Americans have lost a lot of it....
i'd love to think they couldn't but chances are if Soviet Union invaded then they'd conquer UK in time.... no matter how glorious our past is we'd be chewed up by them!
If that's true that those countries were "randomly" selected, then let's throw , say, post WWII Lithuania or pre-1989 E. Germany, into your list.
Would you say that Americans and the British don't have freedoms that are greater than those of those countries?
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
Dunk... just get hundreds of thousands of scots in their kilts and let them do what they need to do!
OK. Then what if Russia had taken control of europe after defeating the nazis? Would you say that Britain would've been next?
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
highly probable... but this is all subjective and is detracting from the main crux of this thread...
if the Russians had conquered all of Europe and it was a 'success' then lets just say America would have been shitting itself... even more than it did during the 50's... if the new USSR was all of europe it would have become a monumental superpower that might have had an eye on the States..
possible?
However that being said, the German Navy's major role was U-boat warfare. That meant cutting off shipping to Great Britain. They achieved great success in this venture. Allied cooperation was what finally turned the tide against the U-boats.
True! And the breaking of the Enigma code.
More than likely, but mutually assured destruction and the cold war would've kept US shores free from communist aggression. I don't think brits had the bomb back then. Or did they? Even if they did, that would've been because of American technology.
So, I'm making the following assertions:
1. W/O US involvement, Russia would have wrestled nazi-controlled europe from the nazis.
2. After doing so, it would've invaded Britain
3. Russia would've refrained from invading the US because the US had the bomb.
4. Assuming Britain got the bomb before being invaded by Russia, the bomb is a form of US involvement
So, if it weren't for our granddaddys, the brits would be commies. In this case, "our granddaddys" are the Manhattan project scientists....and Albert Einstein I guess. So, it turns out the brits owe their freedom to America and Albert Einstein.
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
Several fronts? The axis consisted of the nazis, the italian fascists, and the japanese. Mussolini lost control in 1943, so that just leaves the nazis and the japanese. How active of a role was Russia playing in the fight against japan?
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
OK battling should have been 'battling'. Though allies, they had china to worry about. - Unnatural allies, and when the alliance didn't serve it's purpose anymore, they would have turned back to their good old ways...
China to worry about? You honestly think China was ever a threat to Russia?
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
True. The decision to attack u-boats from the air in co-ordinated attacks between the Navy and RAF dealt them a serious blow. The co-ordination between the Navy and RAF was a new development.
Heisenberg and his team of scientist just didn't push hard enough.
Though, during the last months of the war Diebner and his team (and Gerlach) did build and test a nuclear device.
So..... Should the Russians have 'conquered' Europe, they would have had a nuclear bomb (albeit in it's infancy) but it only needed a few more months....
America would have been next....
...hence the term "mutually assured destruction." That's what I mean by Russia not invading....
We would've had the bomb...they would've had the bomb...as its been for the past several decades.
The only way Britain would've had the bomb before being invaded by Russia is if the US gave them the bomb, which again is why I say that Britain would be communist had it not been for US involvement.
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825
That was a pathetic, cheap jab.
And Dunk's point that possibly with the might of Russia extending to include the rest of Europe + the bomb.... US could have been next. Assuming that Russia had no 'problems' with China and therefore ally there, the US wouldn't stand a chance! So communism for the US too!
Too many assumptions. What would probably have happened is that with Germany defeated and the Russians continuing their 'advance' alliances would have been broken and others made. Europeans would have 'reshuffled' and the war would have gone on. The Russians would have been over extended and therefore not so 'strong'.
On the day Nagasaki was destroyed, 9 August 1945, the United States government published a book written by Henry De Wolf Smyth entitled Atomic Energy for Military Purposes, giving its account of the origins of this extraordinary phenomenon. The book would become an international bestseller, but when the first copy reached London later that month it caused outrage in government circles, for it gave the clear impression that the atomic bomb was an exclusively American achievement.
A senior scientific civil servant at the British ministry of supply, Michael Perrin, was immediately ordered to write a complementary work telling it from the British point of view, and so urgent was the need felt to be that he was given only 24 hours to write it.
Perrin’s brief history described how the first blueprint for the weapon was written in Britain and how the first feasibility studies were carried out at British universities by British scientists. He told how all the data and discoveries were given freely and promptly to the Americans, even before they entered the war, and how in 1941 Winston Churchill established a British A-bomb programme. Then, as the vastly bigger US Manhattan Project got under way after Pearl Harbor, Perrin explained how most of Britain’s top bomb scientists transferred to the United States.
What he did not say, though he might have, was that once in America these scientists made vital contributions to bomb design and were involved right up to the final stages – it was a professor from Imperial College, London who calculated the optimum height for the detonation of the bombs over Japan. Nor, for diplomatic reasons, did Perrin mention that Churchill had initialled a memo, which was transmitted to the Americans, giving Britain’s authorisation for the weapons to be used.
we practically had it... Russia could have invaded us but we would have held out for a while... i'd like to think we might not have used it though.. morally speaking
EDIT: i missed the start bit out
But dunk wasn't taking into consideration mutually assured destruction, which is basically what prevented WWIII during the cold war. So, no, it wouldn't have been communism for us too.
There would have been various forms of resistance, but that's about it - not a "war" like you say. Remember that aside from eliminating the jews and other impurities, the nazis wanted to maintain a way of life similar to that prior to the war. Russia's iron first and gulag with no questions policy would've made control much more assured.
What makes you think Russian control of europe would have been less constricting and effective than nazi control? New boss same as the old boss...
http://forums.pearljam.com/showthread.php?t=272825