German "East First" Plan in 1914?

[ljadw]

Vichy units not resisting Torch is telling you that Vichy was not a German puppet.
The fact that Italy declared war on Britain and France does not mean that it was a German puppet.It declared war because it considered this as good for its interests .
In 1934 the same Italy was sending forces to the Brenner Pass after the Austrian nazis tried a coup and killed Dollfuss . That does not mean that Italy was a British/French puppet .
Italy was sending a small force to the USSR, Spain also ,but no one will say that Spain was a German puppet.
There was no Russification of Congress Poland before WWI.The Russians did not try to assimilate the 10 million Poles of Congress Poland .They knew by experience that the results of Russification were very bad .
Before WWII Germany supported the KMT in its fight against Japan, this does not mean that Germany was an ally of the KMT. US was selling oil to Japan, this does not mean that US was an ally of Japan .
A few days after PH,Hitler declared war on the US,but not to help Japan : Germany was not a Japanese puppet .

[glenn239]

Did it not later on in 1940 and then contribute forces to Russia?

The Italian DOW on France and Britain in June 1940 was a purely opportunistic move, done with the expectation of aggrandizing Italy after the major fighting had ceased.

[Futurist]

In discussions of the Central Powers strategy in the Great War, it is common suggested that Germany should have fought on the defensive in France, relying on their fortifications, while going on the offensive against Russia. Proponents argue that doing so would keep the British Empire out of the war, keeping her economic might and navy from strangling the CP. Wilhelm II supposedly tried to do this before Germany's troops were deployed, but Moltke successfully argued that it was too late. Had such a shift been made, Germany's troops would have had no objectives once they were deployed, as Germany's Eastern-focused plans were out of date.

This scenario assumes the Große Ostaufmarsch plan continues to be updated, so that by 1914, it is a viable option for Germany. They declare war on Russia, but wait for France to declare war on them. Wilhelm decides to focus on attacking Russia, likely over Moltke's objections.

For my money, while Britain may not immediately join, I doubt they will allow France to be utterly defeated. Italy, Japan, and the Ottoman Empire will probably stay neutral, especially the former two. A surefire way to have Britain intervene is for the German navy to try sailing through the English Channel, so it'll probably only operate in the Baltic.

For what it's worth, I have recently created a new thread about this topic here:

viewtopic.php?f=11&t=260738

I'll quote it here in its entirety:

What if Germany would have adopted a defensive strategy in the West in World War I while aiming for a limited offensive strategy in the East? Specifically, here is what I am thinking of: Have Germany play defense in Alsace-Lorraine and watch French forces constantly get mauled as they try to break through German fortifications. If the French try to take heavily fortified Metz, for instance, then they could endure a bloodbath comparable to what they and the Germans endured when the Germans tried to take Verdun in 1916 in real life. An advantage of this would be that Germany would have a significantly shorter front line in the West in comparison to real life and also would not be seen as an aggressor state since Belgium's neutrality wouldn't be violated by it, through a downside of this approach is that France would still be able to keep control of the natural resources in northeastern France--though I suppose that Germany can still make a move for iron ore-rich Briey and Longwy after the French bleed themselves dry in a much larger version of the Battle of the Frontiers in this scenario:

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/proxy ... BKhrjQJQE-



As far as I know, Briey and Longwy contained 90% of France's iron ore reserves, so losing it during the war would have undoubtedly hurt France.

As for the East, Germany's logic here would be simple: Help the Austro-Hungarians fight the Serbs and the Russians. If Germany focuses more resources on the East, I was wondering if it was capable of doing something comparable to the Gorlice-Tarnow Offensive back in 1914:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/ ... t1915b.jpg



After such an offensive, Germany can rest and play defense in the East until the end of the year, and then launch a new offensive in the East in the following spring where it would aim to expand up to the Dvina and Dnieper Rivers:

https://camo.voz.tech/7118f084a56449811 ... 76d646c48/



Then, a new permanent defensive line in the East can be set up on the Dvina and Dnieper Rivers, after which point Germany can sit back and watch the Franco-Russians bleed themselves try in trying to penetrate the German defensive lines in both the West and the East. Eventually, the logic would go, the Franco-Russians (and maybe British as well, depending on whether or not they are actually in the war here) would get tired of pointless and endless offensives and thus ask the Central Powers for a ceasefire, where the existing ceasefire lines would more-or-less become the new national borders.

Such a peace deal would involve a more-or-less status quo ante bellum in the West (depending on what exactly happens to Briey and Longwy--and France might be insist on getting it back if it will actually want to make peace) while Germany would get to set up satellite states in Poland, Lithuania, Courland, western Belarus, and western Ukraine, with Romania of course getting Bessarabia. Austria-Hungary would get no additional territories of its own but some kind of modus vivendi would have to be reached between it and Serbia. And it's possible that Austria-Hungary might have to make some territorial cessions to Italy, such as Trentino, in exchange for peace on that part of the front. But it all depends on the relative strength of each side's military positions at the time of the eventual ceasefire--assuming that there actually is one--of course.

Anyway, any thoughts on this?

The final defensive line in the East that Germany would acquire in this scenario would look like this:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Kaiserreich/co ... r_dd_line/



So, it would be a type of mini-Brest-Litovsk. And the beauty of it is that almost all of this line will be located on either the Dnieper River or the Dvina/Daugava River, thus likely making this line relatively easy for Germany to defend against Russian attacks.

[Futurist]

IIRC, Germany didn't have any fortifications on its border with France in 1914. So it will still get bogged down in trench warfare, only in a different location than OTL. Britain and the USA will still probably come up with an excuse to enter the war against Germany. Once that happens, Germany slowly starves under the British blockade.

If Germany is dumb enough to try a Napoleonic/Hitler style attempt to conquer Russia, then WWI might end a lot earlier once its armies freeze to death somewhere between Smolensk and Moscow.

Based on this map, Germany does appear to have had some fortified towns near its border with France in 1914, specifically in Alsace-Lorraine:

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/proxy ... -RR7chMPeX

[Futurist]

Germany's war plan was predicated on the talents and technology available to both sides at the time.

Forseeing a two-front war, it was assumed that Russia would take longer to mobilize, gather and transport their troops and equipment to the front. This due to greater distance and fewer railroad miles/rolling stock. So Russia could wait.

France in the meantime, had better equipment and could get their troops to the front much faster. So France ended up the priority, and the plan called for defeating their enemies in detail.

Going on the defensive in the West would have been disastrous for Germany. France could wait until Russia was ready or at least fully involved before launching their offensive. Germany in the meantime would advance in the East, but take few prisoners etc because the bulk of Russia's troops would not be at the frontier yet.

Once launched, the French offensive would take place on German soil, threatenng production of goods and foodstuffs in Alsace, Lorraine and the Ruhr. Even in a stalemate, a long campaign fought here would not be in Germany's best interests.

I don't believe that Germany ever intended to "conquer" either France or Russia. By this I mean totally defeat them and occupy their territory to a large degree. They only wanted to neutralize military threats.

IMHO, any attempt to upset the balance of power in Europe, by large-scale occupation of Russia or France (including colonies in Asia, Africa or the Caribbean) would in fact bring the UK into the fight.

The thing is, though, that Germany only needs to expand in the east as far as the Dnieper-Daugava Line, after which point Germany can be on the defensive on both fronts while watching the Franco-Russians (and British, if they decide to step in) bleed themselves dry trying to penetrate through the German defenses. Then, when the Franco-Russians are too tired to try this any further, Germany can propose making the existing front lines new international boundaries, which would more-or-less mean a status quo ante bellum peace in the West (depending on whether or not Germany will subsequently capture Briey and Longwy and be willing to return it to France in exchange for a peace deal) and Russia being reduced to the territories east of the Dnieper-Daugava Line in the East.

[Futurist]

In my opinion it would keep Britain out of the war for maybe a month or two at most. I would suggest that the British would make a 'suggestion' that Germany cease attacking Russia (after maybe inflicting a significant 'token' victory) and return to the status quo or else Britain will go to war as Germany and Austria are clearly the aggressors against its effective ally, Russia. Wilhelm did order Moltke to deploy to the east, and Moltke did tell him that this was not possible, and they reached a compromise where the troops would mobilise to their allocated depots and then redeploy to the east as needed. After the war Groener, who was head of the railway department, said it would have only taken a few days to improvise a plan and that Moltke was wrong. As Moltke was long since dead, he had no ability to put forward his case, but at the time he was not contradicted even in Falkenhayn's diary notes.

What if Germany says "We're fine with returning to the status quo ante bellum in the West, but in the East, we insist on the Dnieper-Daugava Line?"

[Futurist]

Not if it's a German puppet state.



Well, Prussia was able to swallow much more Poles back in the 1790s, though back then nationalism was not as big of a thing as it was in the 1910s.

You should look at the Ostflucht numbers : BEFORE 1914 2,3 million people were leaving the Prussian eastern provinces,while only 300000 were migrating to the east .Due to the mass immigration from out the Russian Empire, the population of East Prussia, Pomerania, Silesia,Posen, West Prussia was stagnating ,otherwise the situation would be catastrophic.

What exactly is the problem with chronic population decline in the German east, though? I mean, as long as Germany was strong, Germany was perfectly capable of using military force to prevent these regions from seceding.

1 ''As long as Germany was strong ": how long ?
2 It was very unlikely that this Polish state would be a puppet of Germany : in 1914 the population of Russian Poland was 13,3 million of whom 10 million Poles and 3,3 million Jews, Germans, Ukrainians and Lithuanians .
3 There is not much imagination needed to know the effect of the existence of a Polish state on East Prussia where 15 % of the population of 2 million was non German, mostly Polish .
4 And what about Austrian Poland ?
5 What about the Polish minority in eastern Germany ?
6 If you give the Poles their own state, why not the Czechs?
7 What was better for Germany :
the Tsar in Warsaw or Dmowski or Pilsudski ?
8 What would be the benefit for Germany of the existence of a (puppet ) Polish state ?

One wonders how Vichy France, Fascist Italy and the like were all German puppets then, given they had populations far in excess of 10 million. More particularly, I fail to see any real danger of the Polish minority in Prussia; the Masurian and Silesia Poles, for example, decisively voted in favor of remaining with Germany, after all.

Minor nitpick, but the Poles in eastern Upper Silesia, especially in its rural areas, actually voted for Poland:

https://www.lbi.org/news/upper-silesian-jews/

(There's a map of the results of the Upper Silesian plebiscite in there.)

So, Yes, overall, Upper Silesia did vote for Germany, but not all of its regions did and a large part of its pro-German margin of victory likely came from Ruhrpolen who formerly used to live in Upper Silesia but were nevertheless allowed to vote in this plebiscite.

[Futurist]

Neither of both .
An independent Poland would want to recapture the territories it had lost to Prussia at the end of the 18th century .

Not if it's a German puppet state.

And no one in Germany wanted a new partition of Poland : Prussia had already too many Poles,it was losing the demographic battle :the Germans were leaving the territories east of the Elbe, already before 1914 and the Poles had more children: thus why should Prussia incorporate even more Poles ?
To colonize parts of Russian Poland, Prussia needed colonists and..these did not exist .

Well, Prussia was able to swallow much more Poles back in the 1790s, though back then nationalism was not as big of a thing as it was in the 1910s.

You should look at the Ostflucht numbers : BEFORE 1914 2,3 million people were leaving the Prussian eastern provinces,while only 300000 were migrating to the east .Due to the mass immigration from out the Russian Empire, the population of East Prussia, Pomerania, Silesia,Posen, West Prussia was stagnating ,otherwise the situation would be catastrophic.

What exactly is the problem with chronic population decline in the German east, though? I mean, as long as Germany was strong, Germany was perfectly capable of using military force to prevent these regions from seceding.

1 ''As long as Germany was strong ": how long ?
2 It was very unlikely that this Polish state would be a puppet of Germany : in 1914 the population of Russian Poland was 13,3 million of whom 10 million Poles and 3,3 million Jews, Germans, Ukrainians and Lithuanians .
3 There is not much imagination needed to know the effect of the existence of a Polish state on East Prussia where 15 % of the population of 2 million was non German, mostly Polish .
4 And what about Austrian Poland ?
5 What about the Polish minority in eastern Germany ?
6 If you give the Poles their own state, why not the Czechs?
7 What was better for Germany :
the Tsar in Warsaw or Dmowski or Pilsudski ?
8 What would be the benefit for Germany of the existence of a (puppet ) Polish state ?

Austrian Poland could be given to the newly created independent Polish state in exchange for a Hapsburg King and/or a military alliance. And Poland can be given territories in, say, Belarus to distract them from the Polish territories that are still under German rule.

[Futurist]

IIRC, Germany didn't have any fortifications on its border with France in 1914. So it will still get bogged down in trench warfare, only in a different location than OTL. Britain and the USA will still probably come up with an excuse to enter the war against Germany. Once that happens, Germany slowly starves under the British blockade.

If Germany is dumb enough to try a Napoleonic/Hitler style attempt to conquer Russia, then WWI might end a lot earlier once its armies freeze to death somewhere between Smolensk and Moscow.

Actually, the German-French border featured heavily fortified points and this was critical to the German plan. Terrence M. Holmes, writing in "Not the Schlieffen Plan 1914", explains the situation thusly:

If Moltke had followed Schlieffen’s real intentions for the counter-offensive conduct of a two-front war, the first great battle of 1914 would have been fought in Lorraine in the third week of hostilities, on terms much more favourable to Germany than they were at the battle of the Marne. We can reconstruct this alternative scenario because we know exactly what the French chief of staff Joseph Joffre intended to do if the Germans did not invade Belgium.

French war planning was constrained by two political imperatives. In the first place, France was committed by agreement with her Russian ally to launch an ‘all-out and immediate’ attack against Germany as soon as possible after the outbreak of war. Moreover, the French government had resolved not to encroach on Belgian territory unless the Germans did so first. Joffre was therefore obliged to incorporate in his war plans a variant which allowed for a full-scale offensive avoiding Belgian territory altogether, and that would have come into effect in 1914 if the Germans had stayed on the defensive and not entered Belgium. For this eventuality Joffre decided that three of his five armies, comprising some 60 percent of his first-line troops, should invade Lorraine on 14 August, aiming initially to reach the line of the river Saar between Sarrebourg and Saarbrücken (Doughty 2010, 146-8, 155-8, 168). Ominously, that position was flanked at both ends by the German fortresses of Metz and Strasbourg.

Schlieffen had long before outlined how the Germans should exploit a massive French incursion through ‘the relatively narrow space between Metz and Strasbourg’. The aim must not be to push the enemy back to his fortified border. Rather, he had to be engaged on three sides, ‘from Metz, from the Saar and from Strasbourg’, and brought to a standstill there, which would give the Germans an excellent chance of decisive victory by means of envelopment attacks out of Metz and Strasbourg. The ultimate aim of this ‘attack on the enemy’s flank and rear’ would be to surround the
French invasion forces and ‘not just defeat them, but lay them low and as far as possible annihilate them’ (Boetticher 1933, 260).

Joffre himself was acutely aware of the perils attending a French offensive in Lorraine. He said that the object would be to rupture the German front, but he conceded​ that:​

"In the course of this operation our forces would be liable to be taken in flank by attacks coming in all probability from both Metz and the region of Molsheim-Strasbourg. By penetrating like a wedge into the midst of the enemy’s lines we would be more or less inviting envelopment (Joffre 1932, 74-5)."​
​
But a German defensive posture in 1914 would have compelled Joffre to embark on that hazardous course of action — that was precisely what he was committed to if the Germans refrained from attacking through Belgium and waited instead for the opportunity to counter-attack. In that event, the war would have started with a great battle of encirclement as soon as the French First, Second and Fourth Armies had completed their short advance into the danger zone between Metz and Strasbourg. Speaking in 1904 of the strategic importance of these fortresses, Schlieffen once again emphasized their role in counter-offensive operations: ‘I do not mean a Metz and Strasbourg that are to be besieged and defended, but rather a Metz and Strasbourg in which armies are assembled and through which they march in order to attack the enemy by surprise’ (Zuber 2004, 160).​

In short, 60% of the French Army in August of 1914 was walking into a trap, which they only escaped thanks to the French re-orienting themselves to respond to the German advance through Belgium and into France itself. It would've been a war winning blow from which the French never would've recovered from. An Eastern Front-first strategy will also allow the Germans to build up four armies-42 Divisions-in the East which will force the Russians onto a defensive stance and thus allow Austro-Hungary to avoid the Galicia disaster that so battered their Army IOTL 1914. Serbia thus is likely destroyed by 2nd Army in October, as OTL their severe munition shortages nearly forced the Serbs to surrender anyway.

Likely, the French seek peace in late 1914, with the Russians to follow suit soon after with the Central Powers probably holding Poland up to the Bug river and half of Lithuania, while Serbia has been crushed and occupied.

Any chance of the Central Powers deciding to get a bit more greedy than this and thus aim for the Dnieper-Daugava Line in any final peace settlement in the East (with Russia)? :

https://www.reddit.com/r/Kaiserreich/co ... r_dd_line/



Advantages:

-The CPs weaken Russia as much as realistically possible without overextending themselves
-The CPs get a great defensive line that's almost completely based on two giant and extremely long Russian rivers
-The CPs get to portray themselves as the liberators of the various non-Russian peoples in the Pale of Settlement
-Russian nationalists themselves ironically get to celebrate since now their country ends up having much less Jews in it due to this border change
-The CPs get access to the Black Sea that doesn't involve going through the Balkans

[Futurist]

Of the three major enemy capitals, only Paris could be reached quickly. London was beyond reach unless a miracle happened at sea and Moscow was too distant to gain quickly. It had to be France first and quickly.

That's fine, save for the Russian Capital of the time being St. Petersburg.

It's likely still too far to reach in one campaign, though. But I personally don't think that it really matters if one isn't actually aiming for a crushing and decisive total victory.

Britain can get into the war very easily. They allow a week or two of bloodshed on all fronts, then step in with a proposal that all sides agree to return to the status quo anti-bellum and allow a few days for answers, and that unless this is accepted Britain will look to its own interests in deciding what it will do. Germany will have had time to inflict token defeats but little more, and the front lines are unlikely to be on German soil anywhere, so it will be very easy to show Germany as the aggressor if she fails to accept such a humane offer.

A status quo ante bellum peace will simply leave Germany in the unsatisfactory situation that it found itself before the war, though. Ditto for Austria-Hungary. This is why if I was in charge of either of these two countries, I would insist on at least significant Eastern border revisions.

[Futurist]

Hi ljadw,

France had an alliance with Russia that would, and did, bring it into war with Germany. Germany knew this, which was why it concentrated most of its army in the west.

Germany wanted to avoid a two-front war (and presumably giving the British time to develop their empire's strength) and the quickest way to do that was a quick defeat of France.

Cheers,

Sid.

Reasonable logic, no doubt, but it also created a much longer German front line in the West in the event of a failure to quickly knock out France. This much longer German front line no doubt required significant additional German troops to maintain.

Personally, I'm wondering whether it would have been more prudent for Germany to avoid going for a decisive victory in the West and instead aim for defense in the West and for limited offensives up to the Dnieper-Daugava Line in the East and then playing defense in the East as well. If the stalemate will hold indefinitely, then the front lines could become the new international borders, no?

[ljadw]

Going to the Dnepr-Daugava Line would be suicidal, as it would result in the incorporation of millions of non-Germans in the German Reich and Germany had already big troubles with the Poles east of the Elbe,where it was losing the demographic battle .
And economically there was nothing to gain in BieloRussia .As it still is today .
Other points : a Schwerpunkt Ost would ruin Germany ,as Russia could not pay for the German war expenses and Germany would be forced to have a big occupation army in these territories.How would it pay this ? It was already before the war on the limits of its financial possibility .The German government had issued war loans for 100 billion of Reichsmark.Who would pay them ?
France would be very pleased and if the Tsar had to leave ,Germany would be saddled in the east with a socialist/communist regime that would be a magnet for the German socialists .

[Futurist]

Going to the Dnepr-Daugava Line would be suicidal, as it would result in the incorporation of millions of non-Germans in the German Reich and Germany had already big troubles with the Poles east of the Elbe,where it was losing the demographic battle .

I meant as German satellite states, of course--not as direct German annexations. I was thinking of these newly independent states being a part of a German Mitteleuropa or something like that:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitteleuropa

And economically there was nothing to gain in BieloRussia .As it still is today .

It could be useful to the Poles as living space, especially if the Poles will lose Vilnius to Lithuania and Lviv to Ukraine. Germany might feel that it has to throw the Poles a bone, you know?

Other points : a Schwerpunkt Ost would ruin Germany ,as Russia could not pay for the German war expenses and Germany would be forced to have a big occupation army in these territories.How would it pay this ? It was already before the war on the limits of its financial possibility .The German government had issued war loans for 100 billion of Reichsmark.Who would pay them ?

Couldn't these newly independent states have their own armies? Think of a NATO-style arrangement here--Germany might help around the edges, as the US did in real life, but most of the preparedness will have to come from these countries themselves.

France would be very pleased and if the Tsar had to leave ,Germany would be saddled in the east with a socialist/communist regime that would be a magnet for the German socialists .

A socialist regime in Russia, Germany can live with. A Communist regime in Russia, Germany cannot live with and would have to overthrow them in one way or another. Honestly, I wouldn't view the German Social Democrats as the enemy here; after all, they could be persuaded that Germany simply wants to spread civilization and German culture to Eastern Europe in order for Germany to finally have its own place in the Sun.

[Futurist]

One more thing worth mentioning: The lion's share of Russia's Jews are going to be located west of the Daugava-Dnieper Line:

https://archive.md/kXndD/e2c4325e0977ba ... 10070d.png



Ashkenazi Jews are, of course, noted for their achievements and accomplishments and thus many of them could be of great use and value to Germany assuming that Germany is actually going to be smart enough to see this as opposed to being blinded by anti-Semitism. Granted, Imperial Germany was nowhere near as anti-Semitic as the Third Reich was, but still, ...

[TheMarcksPlan]

Granted, Imperial Germany was nowhere near as anti-Semitic as the Third Reich

In WW1 the great anti-semitic power was Czarist Russia; the (relative) perceived philo-semitic power was Hapsburg Austria. The latter would have been administering perhaps half of the occupied Ashkenazi population.

For discussion of Jewish perceptions of the Czarist and Habsburg regimes, see Michael Neiberg's work such as this lecture on Youtube. The video summary states:

When the war began, most American Jews supported the Central Powers, but would later side with the British and French. Join WWI scholar, Michael Neiberg, as he traces the evolution of American Jewish thought from 1914 to 1917 and shows how events in Europe and the U.S. led American Jews to support America’s entry into the war.

From the presentation, a quote from a Jewish American paper that is chilling given what we know happens 20 years later:

The Jews support [Imperial] Germany because [Czarist] Russia bathes in Jewish blood.

An aside: This is not the kind of alternate history I like to do, but what if post-WW1 Germany had gone in a direction similar to contemporary right-wing ideologies, which assimilate Jewishness into the ubiquitous (in my country) narrative of "Judeo-Christian" civilization. The Ashkenazm were, after all, a product of Germany (by far its best product) and they speak a language (Yiddish) closer to standard German than anything else, including what Danes and other "Aryan" peoples speak. A post-WW1 German identity politics didn't have to pick Jewish people as the outgroup - not as a matter of logic anyway. Ashkenazm arguably make the least sense as the salient outgroup. Could have been Slavs, Roma, Communists, etc. Of course it's not a matter of logic.