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PaperclipPerfector  10mo ago (text post)   33046 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 19, 2023

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As far as I can see, nobody else has made this point so far, so I'll argue that if any (future) Allied government deserves real blame for not averting another world war, it is the French, for not opposing the German remilitarization of the Rhineland in 1936, which would have been easily justifiable legally and carried no risk.

the French, for not opposing the German remilitarization of the Rhineland of 1936, which would have been easily justifiable legally and carried no risk.

Disallowing the militarization of your own territory is the definition of not having sovereignty... Maintaining this arrangement in perpetuity was neither possible nor reasonable. Even if they scared the Germans away, they could just do it again and again whenever the French let up pressure. "We are going to go to war with you if you put military in your own country" was never going to be a stable arrangement, it was always going to lead to a showdown.

Agree. Hindsight is 20/20, the allies didn‘t know it was the first in a long line of increasingly demented demands, but this one was still reasonable. And when the french (and belgians) previously tried to play hardball with the ruhr occupation, the anglos weren‘t supporting them, they had to withdraw and scratch some reparations. So it would have been just france versus germany, with the rest of the world increasingly favouring the defenders, and condemning france.

Afterwards it came to light that the deployed Wehrmacht units had orders to retreat without a fight if armed resistance was offered by the French. There would have been no defenders.

And then what? They level german cities to the ground, demanding unconditional surrender? They'd just go home after a while under diplomatic pressure like in 1925.

It'd have been a great embarrassment for Hitler and obviously would've eroded his willingness to take similar political gambles in the future. It'd have also demonstrated that the French government will respond militarily to violations of the Versailles Treaty. I'm not arguing that it'd have prevented another Franco-German war forever and ever, but it'd have averted another world war, eventually.

Alternative history scenario: three years later, a sympathetic germany beats down france first, to the indifference of the anglos, sick of the high-handed bellicosity of the gallic rooster. When the germans get to poland and tschekoslovakia, the brits realize too late that Hitler is a bad actor. Deprived of a large allied power on the continent, they no longer have the leverage to threaten war. So later it's just germany versus soviet union, longer, bloodier, and Hitler gets baku‘s oil.

Yes that was really the main treaty violation that should have triggered a response because it was the only real strategic threat to France and Britain. Germany taking Czechoslovakia or Austria or Danzig doesn't really do anything to change the balance of power. Sure, the Skoda Works are nice to have but they aren't going to affect the outcome of a war if Germany can't defend the Rhineland. So the one actually critical treaty provision is the one that gets ignored but then France and the UK decide to kamikaze into Germany over annexations that primarily threaten the Soviet Union. It makes absolutely no sense and I don't think they could have handled things in a less competent way.

It makes absolutely no sense

It makes sense if you think of it as them developing an evolving model of Hitler's behaviour, rather than looking at each annexation in isolation.

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