Hitler could have been defeated when he invaded Poland

The Germans march in Warsaw

Andrew Roberts the author of the book, The Storm of War: A New History of the Second World War, says that Britain and France could have attacked Germany and defeated it when the cream of the Wehrmacht was busy in Poland

The fear of a war on two fronts led the Führer to detail no fewer than 40 divisions to protect his back. Crucially, however, three-quarters of these were only second-rate units and they were left with only three days' ammunition. His best troops, along with all of his armoured and mobile divisions and almost all his warplanes, were devoted to the attack on Poland.

The Americans cross the Siegfried-Maginot Line later in the war. If only the British and French had done that when Hitler attacked Poland........


Says Roberts in article in The Telegraph...

Hitler was forced to leave 40% of his 100-division army out in the West, guarding the still-incomplete Siegfried Line, or 'West Wall'. The fear of a war on two fronts led the Führer to detail no fewer than 40 divisions to protect his back. Crucially, however, three-quarters of these were only second-rate units and they were left with only three days' ammunition. His best troops, along with all of his armoured and mobile divisions and almost all his warplanes, were devoted to the attack on Poland.

Had a large, modern British Army and RAF been waiting up against the Siegfried Line in late August 1939, primed for action and superbly armed, trained, equipped and led, having been properly financed in the two decades since the Great War, and ranged alongside the French army to invade Nazi Germany the moment the Wehrmacht crossed the Polish border, history could have turned out very differently.

THE NAZI LEADERS WERE SCARED!

Paul Schmidt was a translator in the German Foreign Ministry and present at the history-making events of those last days of peace in Europe. The scene is the office of the German Foreign Ministry in Berlin. It is just after midnight on September 3, 1939 and the German juggernaut continues to slam its way into Poland. The Germans have not responded to an earlier British and French demand to withdraw their troops and a message is received stating that Sir Neville Henderson, the British Ambassador to Germany, wishes to meet with German Foreign Minister Ribbontrop. It is obvious to all that the Ambassador's message will probably mean war.

When I entered the next room Hitler was sitting at his desk and Ribbentrop stood by the window. Both looked up expectantly as I came in. I stopped at some distance from Hitler's desk, and then slowly translated the British Government's ultimatum. When I finished, there was complete silence.

Hitler sat immobile, gazing before him. He was not at a loss, as was afterwards stated, nor did he rage as others allege. He sat completely silent and unmoving.

After an interval which seemed an age, he turned to Ribbentrop, who had remained standing by the window. 'What now?' asked Hitler with a savage look, as though implying that his Foreign Minister had misled him about England's probable reaction. Ribbentrop answered quietly: 'I assume that the French will hand in a similar ultimatum within the hour.'

As my duty was now performed, I withdrew. To those in the anteroom pressing round me I said: 'The English have just handed us an ultimatum. In two hours a state of war will exist between England and Germany.' In the anteroom, too, this news was followed by complete silence.

Goering turned to me and said: 'If we lose this war, then God have mercy on us!' Goebbels stood in a corner, downcast and self-absorbed. Everywhere in the room I saw looks of grave concern, even amongst the lesser Party people."

References:
Schmidt, Paul, Hitler's Interpreter (1951); Shirer, William, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich (1960); Taylor, A.J.P., The Origins of the Second World War (1962).

Source: Eyewitnesstohistory

Some unknown facts about Second World War: From historian Andrew Roberts new book

It is after 30 years that new book on the second World war has been written. It is The Storm of War: A New History of The Second World War by Andrew Roberts. Why 30 years? The earlier book was the classic Rise and Fall of the Third Reich by William S Shirer. Shirer's book is a gem. Absolute page-turner with a jungle of details and figures. A must read.
Then why did Roberts write another book on WW 2? Because in the intervening years, new documents came to light that added to what is known.

In happier times. Werner von Blomberg, Hermann Göring, Werner von Fritsch, and Adolf Hitler at the "Reich Party Rally for Work," Nuremberg (September 1937) .
At the end of 1937, Hitler believed that Germany's economic and military-strategic situation would soon permit the launching of a successful war of conquest. But when he shared his plans with the most important representatives of the military leadership at a secret conference November 5, 1937, Hitler met with skepticism, not enthusiasm. Foreign Minister Konstantin von Neurath, Commander-in-Chief of the Army Werner von Fritsch and Minister of War Werner von Blomberg were all of the opinion that Hitler's war plans were dangerously premature. Contrary to Hitler's conviction, they believed that Great Britain and France could not be kept out of the conflict and that in any case Germany lacked the resources and military strength for a war on several fronts. Hitler, who was convinced of the absolute necessity of "conquering living space" [Lebensraumeroberung], decided to rid himself of these conservative skeptics in the army and foreign ministry. In early 1938 he used Blomberg's marriage to a former prostitute and Fritsch's alleged homosexuality as pretexts for removing both of them from office. Moreover, Hitler used the "Fritsch-Blomberg Affair" to carry out a profound restructuring and reorganization of the military and foreign policy leadership. He dissolved the Ministry of War and took personal control of the armed forces, which were now led and coordinated by the new High Command of the Wehrmacht [Oberkommando der Wehrmacht or OKW] under General Wilhelm Keitel. He named Walther von Brauchitsch as Fritsch's successor and dismissed or transferred sixty high-ranking officers. Foreign Minister Neurath was replaced by Joachim von Ribbentrop, and Walther Funk became Minister of Economics. By March 1938, Hitler had thus achieved complete control over the military leadership and the country's foreign and economic policy.

Roberts says a lot of interesting things. Like....
How did Hitler become the chief of the Wehrmacht? How did he get rid of General Werner von Blomberg, the chief of the German army?

Hitler swiftly disposed of this irritant and seized control of the army. The Nazis were adept at smear campaigns, and Blomberg was forced to resign when it was revealed that his wife had posed for pornographic photographs.

Churchill often wondered why the Germans let the British soldiers slip away from Dunkirk. Hitler could have captured more than a quarter of a million prisoners of war and held the British government to ransom, but instead he ordered his panzers to halt outside Dunkirk. Then why?

Roberts says it was because of one of many Hitler's strategic blunders. "Hitler's antisemitism, culminating in the Holocaust, was central to his Nazism but it did nothing to aid Germany's chances of winning the war, and possibly a good deal to retard them."

If Hitler hadn't taken control of Germany's armed forces he might have won the war, but if invading Russia was his greatest error (an ill-fated plan "buried so deep within the Nazi DNA that it could not be stopped", Roberts writes), then his second major gaffe was underestimating America.

Relations between Britain and America during WW 2
"There was nothing inevitable about the wartime alliance between America and Britain," he says. "There had been much rivalry between Britain and the United States in the 1920s and 1930s, exacerbated by ignorant stereotyping on both sides."He even quotes a former US military attaché to London as saying, "The English feel about us just the way we feel about a prosperous nigger."

Rape during the war
Robert's American admirers will not enjoy having the US army's record of raping civilian women compared to that of the Red Army, even if Roberts concedes that the Russians were the more determined violators. He also exposes racism in the US army, observing that 79 per cent of those executed for rape were black, when blacks made up only 8.5 per cent of the US army in Europe.
Stalingrad was turned into rubble as the Wehrmacht and Soviet army battled here for years.

The Russians made the most sacrifices
America's crucial contribution to the war is not overlooked, but Russia's self-sacrifice and heroism is ultimately the dominant theme. "It was the Russians who provided the oceans of blood necessary to defeat Germany," he writes. "At the heart of the Second World War lies a giant and abiding paradox: although the western war was fought in defence of civilisation and democracy ... the chief victor was a dictator who was as psychologically warped and capable of evil as Adolf Hitler."