The War to Postpone All War

Updated Sunday 15 May, 2011 12:18 PM

The War to Postpone All War

World War I can hardly be called a neglected topic in AH, but it does not draw the interest of World War II, the American Civil War, or even the Revolutionary/Napoleonic period. Part of the reason for this may be the limited scope that it seems to offer. A Nazi or Confederate victory, or even a French victory at Waterloo, would lead to an entirely different world. Men would still be men, but the history and sociology of those ATLs would hardly be recognizable. A German victory, or a negotiated peace in WWI, however, could only lead to a not very different version of what actually happened in the 20^th century, despite the physical and spiritual devastation caused throughout Europe by the war.

To a degree, however, this makes WWI and its aftermath a more fertile topic for AH. In a world unimaginably altered by circumstances, further bizarre changes can always be justified under the rubric of, "In this TL, it could happen!" In a less different TL, occurrences need better support.

The particular must be differentiated from the general. If it were asked, "Could the OTL World War I have been avoided, or at least reduced to a minor conflict that does not entail the mobilization and destruction of a continent?", my answer would be, "Yes, of course". Any number of events can be pointed to in the beginnings of the war that could have altered its course; from irrational decisions (although no one behaved rationally) to sheer accidents (the things that did not happen were no more improbable than the things that did). If, however, the more general question, "Can a continent-wide conflict be avoided in the second decade of the twentieth century?", my answer would have to be, "Probably not". To do so would require a rationality of thought and a ration of luck going back decades; neither of these were demonstrated in the quarter-century before World War I.

Out of economy of thought (to say nothing of sheer laziness), then, I shall assume that World War I begins and runs through much of its OTL course. I shall also not take advantage of PoDs that would end it fairly quickly, such as the aptly named von Klucks's refusal to drive on Paris, the German High Command's lack of imagination in not being prepared to exploit the use of poison gas at Ypres, or a defeat of Jellcoe at Jutland.

By the end of 1917, both sides had fought to exhaustion on the Western Front. The only significant power that had not done so -- because it had not been directly involved in the conflict until recently -- was the United States. OTOH, the collapse of the moderate socialist republic of Kerensky, and its replacement by a Bolshevik regime looking to get out of the war, allowed Germany to free up (relatively) fresh troops in the East. It was, in essence, a race to see who could build up a decisive striking force first. The Allied offensive in the summer of 1918, although eventually contained, panicked Ludendorff into opening peace negotiations with Wilson. The revelation of those negotiations was not a Machiavellian ploy by Wilson; he was a publicity hound and careless of security. However, the effect was the same; Germany took itself out of the war, not because it was unable to sustain the conflict, but because it was worn down enough that no price seemed too high to pay for peace.

The Kerensky government's decision to try and sustain the war can be pointed out as the last PoD that can be plausibly presented as offering a chance to the Germans of something approximating victory (although the better exploitation of the breakthrough of their Spring 1918, or Ludendorff not trying to negotiate a peace in the summer of 1918, are possibilities).

I will feign, therefore, that Kerensky decides that peace is not too high a price to pay for the continued existence of the Russian Republic. Germany at no time had any concrete intentions for victory, although the notion of a Drang nach Osten, in economic if not political or ethnic terms, had crystallized in minds of the German leadership. Something very much like Brest-Litovsk would probably have been imposed on a Kerenskyite Republic out of sheer lack of alternative ideas on the part of the Germans.

I proposed the following timetable for this AH:

15 March 1917: Tsar Nicholas II abdicates in favor of his brother, Grand Duke Michael.

16 March 1917: Michael abdicates in favor of the provisional government.

6 April 1917: The United States declares war on Germany.

12 April 1917: Miliukov (provisional minister of foreign affairs) and Guchkov (provisional minister of war) announce that Russia has no prospects for continuance of the war, and offer peace to Germany on a basis of no annexations and no indemnities.

22 April 1917: Grey (U.K.) and Clemenceau (France) denounce the Miliukov-Guchkov proposal as a "shameful betrayal". The Russian Republic thereupon opens separate negotiations with the Central Powers at Lvov.

9 July 1917: Treaty of Lvov. The Russian Republic grants "independence" to Finland, Poland, the Baltic provinces, Ukraine, Byelorussia, etc. (German troops immediately occupy these territories and set up puppet governments; all save Ukraine under German princes). Lvov does not impose an indemnity on Russia, and the principle of "no annexations" is technically adhered to by Germany.

17 July 1917: Russian armies demobilized. Simultaneously, German troops sent from the Eastern to the Western front.

21 September 1917 - 7 February 1918: The great German offensive in the West. A German attack from St. Quentin, although carefully concealed and prepared, eventually stalls against the British, although they are driven back about 40 miles. An attack at Lys, south of Ypres, however, is successful; lack of Allied reserves (used up at Montdidier at the beginning of October) and the presence of German troops newly arrived from the East allows the Germans to exploit the wide breach in the British lines. Paris taken on 3 December. French government flees to Toulouse; BEF surrounded.

29 December 1917: Foch, on his own initiative, opens armistice negotiations with Ludendorff.

28 January 1918: Haig surrenders.

8 February 1918: Effective collapse of the Third Republic; Foch the only authority in France.

18 February - 21 July 1918: Negotiations at Paris, resulting in the Treaties of Paris. Belgium and northern France de-militarized; German restoration of Belgium. Germany granted all Italian colonies in Africa and French Indochina; Britain agrees to make no objection to the unlimited expansion of the German High Seas Fleet. The U.S., which had never really gotten into the war, makes peace with Germany with no concessions.

What of the aftermath? France and Russia definitely lose; the British defeat is somewhat masked by German inability to formulate meaningful concessions by it. The U.S. is both relieved and disgruntled by the war's ending before it can fight (the 1918 elections produce strong Republican majorities in both houses of Congress, and the beginnings of the near-disappearance of the Democratic party and its replacement by the Socialists).

The post-war period sees an chaotic alternation between weak radical governments and military "men on horseback" in France. In the U.K., 1922 not only sees the establishment of the Irish Republic, but the deposition of George V and the establishment of a British Republic. India descends into chaos; the self-proclaimed viceroy, Sir Michael Nicklesby, makes it perfectly (albeit diplomatically) clear that India wants no part of the King-Emperor to further muck up its political life. The recently-renamed Windsors flee into exile in Chicago; the Empire is dissolved.

Although the Weimar Republic never happens, Weimar culture still occurs; it has clear roots in pre-war Germany. Wilhelm II himself was neither a competent executive, nor a man who can appoint one as chancellor and then step out of his way. ATL Imperial Germany in the 1920s and 30s is very much like OTL Imperial Japan in the same period; a brief but unsustainable flowering of democracy leaves the government in the hands of the military, with the emperor as a convenient figurehead (although of course he does not have the sacral character that made Hirohito at once untouchable and impotent).

The role of the U.S., as the only intact power (Germany, although victorious, is exhausted by its effort; we can easily get a decade or so of peace whilst it catches its breath) is uncertain. It will likely be as isolationist, if not more so, as it was in OTL, although that isolationism will be expressed differently and perhaps be less noticeable (the League of Nations is a dream debated by a few academics, not a reality that the U.S. obstinately refuses to join). It may not neglect its military in the same way, though; with an ascendant and unfriendly German Empire dominating Europe and the Mediterranean, it may well adopt a "Cold War"-like stance toward it. Likewise, if the Great Depression happens (and the political decisions leading up to it were complex enough that I won't try to guess if something like them occurs in this TL), the para-FDR may find, as Hitler did, that re-militarization is a potent short-term weapon.

America would, I feign, become a fascist nation. The honest-to-Heaven Fascism of Mussolini is often confused with Nazism, the racist militarism of Japan, and right-wing dictatorships everywhere. The total destruction of democracy is not necessary; it should be remember that in 1918 the U.S. was much less "democratic" than it is today. Women did not have the vote; the XX Amendment was only formally proposed to the States in 1919, and ratified in 1920. It is easy to imagine even well-intentioned men shunting it aside in order to consider matters which they feel are of greater import. Likewise, although black men are technically voting citizens, they are effectively disenfranchised throughout Dixie, and in many places throughout the U.S. In ATL, unrestricted immigration to the U.S. ended in 1923; it is hardly an AH at all to move that terminus back a few years.

Note that in this TL, there is no Soviet Union; the acquiescence of the Russian Republic to German demands, and its willingness to demobilize, means that the Germans see no need to unleash Lenin against it. Bolshevik agitation neither began nor ended with Lenin, of course, but a potent weapon and an opportunity are taken out of his hands. Without a Soviet Union, the Red Scare of 1919 is diffused into general xenophobia instead of being concentrated on Bolshevism (and, incidentally, fails to give rise to the ACLU). Marx remains a minor theoretician in political economy, not without influence in political and academic, but hardly the devil invoked by half a world as justification for brutality.

To invoke a commonality of thought in the U.S. so complete that only a few radicals notice that freedom of speech and genuine electoral dissent has been given up is hardly bizarre in itself. The American expatriates of the OTL 1920s in Paris and Berlin insisted that it had happened, that they were fleeing it. I merely take them at their word in crafting this TL.

The end of the 1930s could easily see a radical Britain and a fascistic America allied against a militaristic Germany, ready to touch off Round 2 of the global war.

World War II, in fact.

(Note: this AH is not related to or inspired by Kyle Schuant's "Petain's Panic", which I only read afterward, and which proceeds from a rather different PoD. We did come to much the same conclusions, however. I will leave the significance of that, if it has any, to be debated by the readership.)

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