EE Victory Conditions: What If WE Loses?

[Owl]

How on earth can anyone in the 21th century takes Fritz Fischer seriously? I give up discussing here, if you want to belive in a fairy tale where the german society was dominated by monsters who wanted to dominate the world, while Great Britain, France and company were part of the "Justice League" fighting against evil and injustice in the world, then I think we won't ever reach a reasonable consensus here

Nobody was talking about monsters - the realities of normal human beings and their ambitions/outlooks are far more interesting, in my book. Writing people off as monsters prohibits real analysis of their motives and deeds. You disagree with the notion of Germany having a pivotal role in how the events of WW1 conspired - fair enough, but you are doing Fischer injustice while doing so. The results of Brest-Litovsk give you an indication of what German victory entailed, while Versailles was, for all that it's worth, a comparatively lenient frameworks, in spite of its faults.

You will also, I think, find that nobody (at least, not me) here has been 'rooting' for the Entente powers, let alone displayed them as omnibenevolent champions of good. The realities are not that black and white.

I think we will just have to agree to disagree here. Ultimately though this entire war was a tragedy, I guess we can agree on that.

[HerrDan]

Nobody was talking about monsters - the realities of normal human beings and their ambitions/outlooks are far more interesting, in my book. Writing people off as monsters prohibits real analysis of their motives and deeds. You disagree with the notion of Germany having a pivotal role in how the events of WW1 conspired - fair enough, but you are doing Fischer injustice while doing so. The results of Brest-Litovsk give you an indication of what German victory entailed, while Versailles was, for all that it's worth, a comparatively lenient frameworks, in spite of its faults.

You will also, I think, find that nobody (at least, not me) here has been 'rooting' for the Entente powers, let alone displayed them as omnibenevolent champions of good. The realities are not that black and white.

I think we will just have to agree to disagree here. Ultimately though this entire war was a tragedy, I guess we can agree on that.

I don't think that the "treaty of Brest-Litovsk gives an indication of what a German victory entailed", indeed that huge territory ceded by Russia would turn into many other nations like those we have today in East Europe, those very countries that were "opressed" by the russians would turn into "satellites" of Germany you could say, but in the end it was this very treaty that gave strenght to these countries claims of independence and not to forget about Finland that was basically freed by the germans as well, unfortunatelly many of these would fall to the Bolsheviks. You see during the negotiations of the "foul" treaty of versailles the allies asked the german government to keep troops in these regions in the east to defend them from the bolsheviks.

All in all, I don't think that a german victory could have changed the world as much as some people tend to think (perhaps it could have "saved us from nazism" some say ), perhaps it would just anticipate the german economic domination in Europe, indeed some even argue that if it wasn't for the First World War the germans would have dominated Europe with it's growing economy within a decade or so, some even point out that the german domination in Europe's economy is just unavoidable due to many factores, in any way, it's a very complex subjet to discuss here.

At least we both agree on something here, the war as a tragedy and it's good to see Europe unified today, with all it's differences and some tensions of course, but the democratic Europe is unified and it's great (let's not mention that bullshit Putin is doing in the east ).

Cheers.

[fred zeppelin]

Actually, if we want to model that, higher threshold for WE defeat would be better. The British still representing WE even with France signing an Armistice.

I'd favor that, again just to add some variety to the game. Wouldn't necessarily do anything to spice up the game for the EE player, though.

[ohms_law]

The problem that I see throughout this thread is pretty simple, really: everyone seems to be looking at pre-Great War and the wartime history through a modern lense, with the events of World War II and Hitler's Nazi Germany squarely in mind. That's a huge mistake, in my opinion.

Britain and France were hardly blameless in the events leading up to the Great War. Let's not forget the Franco-Prussian war, and everything that happened up to the start of the War. Nobody expected the Great War to turn into the bloodbath that it became ("Home by Christmas", anyone?) . Germany isn't at all a villain at this point, either... I'd expect, with a Central Powers victory, that some sort of Fascist/Nazi regime would have taken hold in France just like it did in Germany, and this whole conversation would be completely different.

Anyway, I really just wanted to lend support to the idea of a "higher threshold for WE defeat" and "The British still representing WE even with France signing an Armistice."

[Shri]

Belgium knocked out by 1917? Not in a long shot. Almost knocked after the opening months, but behind the Yser they recovered and participated in a big offensive at the end of the war.
They send troops to help Russia out, and were active in Africa. Also, Willy Coppens ruled as balloon buster (34 balloons and 3 aircraft destroyed).
Hardly knocked out. As for Serbia and Romania, I can't comment on that as I lack knowledge of their WWI history.

Let us get real here.. i am commenting on a massive scale, not micro scale. Joseph Stalin in his talks with the British and French asked the British in 1939 how many divisions does BEF have- he was told 2 now and 2 later. The British Admiral added- The POPE and GOD are on our side too.
Stalin replied famously after a bellyful laugh - How many divisions does the POPE have? If you have GOD i have the DEVIL on my side. I need 300 divisions just to man the border with Germany leave alone any offensive operations.

By Knocked out i mean- DID NOT MATTER. 1/2 divisions did not matter at all it was just participation. Germany by 1917 had 200+ divisions in the field.
The only people who come close are France and UK, UK had some 60+ and France had twice that number. Franco-British Divisions had more number of men per division as they still retained the 4 regiment component instead of the Triangular composition.

[Shri]

Nobody was talking about monsters - the realities of normal human beings and their ambitions/outlooks are far more interesting, in my book. Writing people off as monsters prohibits real analysis of their motives and deeds. You disagree with the notion of Germany having a pivotal role in how the events of WW1 conspired - fair enough, but you are doing Fischer injustice while doing so. The results of Brest-Litovsk give you an indication of what German victory entailed, while Versailles was, for all that it's worth, a comparatively lenient frameworks, in spite of its faults.

You will also, I think, find that nobody (at least, not me) here has been 'rooting' for the Entente powers, let alone displayed them as omnibenevolent champions of good. The realities are not that black and white.

I think we will just have to agree to disagree here. Ultimately though this entire war was a tragedy, I guess we can agree on that.

Russia was a true "Prison of Nations" more than any power on earth in 1914.
Britain had the World's largest empire and 90% of British Empire's population did not like the English- The Indians (Including modern day Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Burma); the Africans and also the Irish.
France had a huge colonial empire in Northern and Western Africa and also in Asia.

And at the end of the war what did these 2 beacons of freedom do?? They took over the lands of the German and Ottoman Empires and increased their size.
Now, that is the biggest hypocrisy of the "JUSTICE LEAGUE".
Also what were the USA doing in Philippines at this point of time? Also what was the status of the 'Blacks' in USA in 1913? just a step above slavery?

Please see the kind of treaties imposed by Napoleon a hundred years ago-
Duchy of Warsaw created from Prussian Land
Dissolved the 1000 year old Holy Roman Empire
etc.

So, most of what FISCHER wrote is reiterating ALLIED(read: ENGLISH) propaganda.

And. NO- Imperial Germany is not NAZI Germany, in fact if you care to read deep into Imperial German policies under Bismarck you will find a state which was nearly 100% literate, near full employment, had disability-pension-safety laws at a time when children were employed in Welsh Coal mines, had established a basis for the modern welfare state with cities like ESSEN, actually invested a lot of money in German East Africa and improved the local facilities in a short time much more than the English ever did in any African colony so much so that the local people were loyal to the German Govt. even after the English took them over, moreover its universities were producing NOBEL laureates equal to the UK+France+Russia combined, its Industry had made the average German citizen who was poorer than rest of Western Europe ever since the 30 year war one of the richest, most prosperous and most safe citizen, JEWS were given equal treatment in Imperial Germany- Liman Von Sanders a General, Walther Rathenau a Economic Affairs Czar, Emmanuel Lasker a mathematician & the World Chess Champion and Fritz Haber a Chemist are some of the prime examples.

[wosung]

Wouldn't it be better to open a new thread for exchanging views about WW1 history?

[Owl]

Wouldn't it be better to open a new thread for exchanging views about WW1 history?

I suggested as much (an own history forum like for the other games), so if I'm not replying right now Shri it isn't because I'm ignoring you, but because I'm waiting to see whether a more appropriate place for this discussion will be opened up.

[Kensai]

Interesting discussion. Deserves its own thread. A moderator could perhaps move the respective posts.

[Shri]

+1 on that.

P.S.: the discussion is not against you- 'Owl' but just a discussion on facts and opinions.

[fred zeppelin]

We should move this elsewhere. I just wanted to know how the game works.

[minipol]

By Knocked out i mean- DID NOT MATTER. 1/2 divisions did not matter at all it was just participation. Germany by 1917 had 200+ divisions in the field.
The only people who come close are France and UK, UK had some 60+ and France had twice that number. Franco-British Divisions had more number of men per division as they still retained the 4 regiment component instead of the Triangular composition.

I can agree for the middle part of the war, say 1915, 1916 and 1917. But did matter a lot (and bled heavily for it) at the start of the war. They slowed the Germans down enough for Birtain and France to prepare.
At the end of the war, they joined a big offensive.
Most Belgian war casuatlies fell in the first and the last months of the war.
That's way I feel the game doesn't represent the Belgian forces correcly. They should have more troops, that in the end can do little more then retreat behind the Yser, while needing the BEF to hold Ypres.
And Belgian forces should be able to be build on the region Dixmuide but last they I tried, I couldn't do that.
To conclude, I agree they didn't matter that much as other countries like France and Brittain except for the opening months ((till nov/dec 1914) and the end of the war.

[ERISS]

after three years of fighting, the German army was still about 300 miles from St. Petersburg and Kiev and at least 500 miles from Moscow. That's still a lot of marching and fighting left.

German army seemed tired too, as east ukrainian mujiks could uprise against and send them home in starting makhnovtchina, before the whole retreat of germans under forks.
And in the Russian revolution after the Treaty, we see there are still many fighters and soldiers!

Actually, the main reason probably was the fact that the Bolsheviks had seized the government and needed to be freed from the war to consolidate their fragile position at home.

Even not the bolsheviks, just Lenin. Lenin talked long and hard against all others, even his own party, and won the hand for he had the (german) money of the party.. Without his money weigh, Lenin would have not take the control of the party (Trotsky feared this control of one and wrote it in 1905, but at that time he didn't know he was in fact talking about Stalin..).
The Treaty was said to end the war for the russians, but it made it at least 3 years longer with the 'Russian revolution', Red vs Whites. The Treaty gave many troops for the whites, so it was not so good for the bolsheviks.