If Hitler had been smart, would Germany have won?

It's not true that Hitler was an idiot. To dismiss him as such is folly. In order to prevent future Hitler's we need to study and analyze him. Not dismiss or ignore him and his legacy. It is true however that he was a megalomaniac bend on world domination. He's ego was such that he believed himself a better commander than his most able generals. After the defeat in Stalingrad in 1943 he made himself chef of staff, a lucky break for the allies. Any general who opposed him was normally carted off on sick leave. His treatment of the great Menstein and Rommel are testament to his increasing frustrations at losing the war. He ended up surrounded by yes men who fled the bunker like rats at the first sign of a Russian T34.

I do believe that if he had let his general's command, Germany may have avoided defeat in 1945. Even after the reversal at Stalingrad, Germany was still in a commanding position on the Eastern front. It was Hitler decision to commit most of his armour (and nearly all of his new Tiger tanks) to a suicidal frontal advance at Kursh sealed Germany and the third Reighs fate. Whereas the Russians could replace armour and men, the Germans could not. He also insisted on setting defensive positions that were to be held to the last man and bullet. This robbed the German army of flexibility and allowed their positions to be surrounded and destroyed.

The War on the western front was always a side show for the Germans. They knew that the war would be won or lost in the east. Hitler was fully aware of this also but he had neither the understanding nor ability needed to command whole army's. How could he? He never got further than corporal and spent the great war as a runner, dodging bullets in no mans land.

Hitler made the mistake of believing his own propaganda. He saw himself as some sort of a messiah to the German people. After his early victories in Poland and France he saw the German war machine as invincible. He was a believer of divine providence and honestly thought God was on his side. It was a big mistake and one we should all be grateful for.

The Axis would never won it.
It is too impossible for them to conquer the whole world even though them had accomplished it, but only for a while....

How about several "world" revolution?

Was Hitler smart? Yes

Otherwise he wouldnt have been able to do what he did.....that and he had a lot of charisma that won people over...or moreso instilling confidence in millions of people

If you want to get technical....his estimated IQ was 141....which i'm sure played a role in some of his reign and the way that he did things....

My opinion? as was already mentioned....he was too aggressive, too fast....

Many People, believe that this was largely due to Hitler's Methamphetamine use.....He was reported to have gotten an injection of Methamphetamine daily...which he also made readily available to his soldiers so they can be awake longer and have more energy to fight and have to eat less.....

Altogether...thank goodness everything happened as it did and all the horror that was the holocaust was put to an end

Hitler is lucky, maybe more luckier than us
Oh at least Hitler are still alive

At least we remember him. His a historical man now
and will be marked at our history forever.

And what a life he had.

Maybe he was lucky

It's exactly that. Economically and militarily wise it is fairly easy to "calculate" the balance between the axis and allies. That has been done over and over again and the outcome is always the same: no, Hitler could not have won the war.

There are exceptions, but these views always stop analysing the events at a certain moment, e.g. after Hitler invaded Austria. And even then scholars will not call it a final victory. Why not? Because, regarding Hitler, we do not let us to accept any other result than either total victory or defeat.

So that leaves us with two simple questions:
1. Could Hitler have conquered the World? Answer: no.
2. Why did Hitler try to conquer the World?: Answer: because he wanted to.

Related questions like, "did he have a sound plan of attack" or "did he realise he did not have the means to conquer the World", are open for discussions, but on the latter one: yes, there is enough proof he did realise. Even before 1942.

Go figure.

Where did this come from?

Given that what is known as the intelligence quotient actually measures aculturation, as opposed to providing any coherent statement about relative intelligence, who gives a ****?

Mummy and Daddy Hitler?

Possibly . . .

Finland entered a military alliance with Germany as late as 1944 after pressure from Ribbendrop. Before that Germany and Finland were just "brothers-in-arms" (whether Hitler thought more or not). Finland waking their own war and giving miltary access to Germany. And Finland did cross their old borders in some areas over lake laatokka by many kilometers actually. Some people in Finland had a dream of "big" Finland if Germany won the war against Russia. The probelm was could Finland co-exist with Germany. And don´t forget that half-a-Finlands defence was in the hands of Germanys mountain divisions consisting of some 200,000 men and they did gross Finlands old borders in Lappland also. Finland refused to help Germany in taking Leningrad though and refused to advance beyond their old borders in the Kannas region.

I assume that you are referring to Lake Ladoga, as it is commonly spelled in English. Kannas means absolutely nothing to me, could you clarify that? I know of the traditional name of Karelia for the area between the Neva and Finnland. Whether or not there were those who wished for a "Greater Finnland," actions speak louder than words, and the Finns basically acted to insure the integrity of their pre-1938 borders.

Yes, i meant Lake Ladoga. Kannas (i don¨t think it has an English name) is between Lake Ladoga and the Gulf of Finland. And again Finland advanced way over their old borders north of Lake Ladoga (in some parts over 100 kilometers) hoping that Germany would win the Soviet Union and Finland could keep those new borders.

Well, i've not read that, but i also have no reason to dispute it, so i'll take your word for it.




From the Russian web-site, www.karelia.ru, a map indicating the contemporary area known as Karelia. Historically, the region around the outlet of the Neva and extending along the coast to Narva and beyond was known as Ingria.

First Finlands goal was to achieve pre-winter war borders. So you are right about that. But after they saw that they are actually advancing pretty well, they went even further than that in hope of uniting all of Karelia and Finnish-related regions into Finland. They fell a little short of that though.

Although there were stupid nationalists on all sides, the military objective of crossing the old borders was not to conquer more territory, but to threathen the railway link between Murmansk and Moscow and undoubtedly that was intended to be a negotiation trump.

However, since the Soviets had no intention on reneging on their claims to Finnish territory (and make piece with Finland to fight the Germans, which is what the Finnish leadership hoped), the Finns were driven into the arms of the Germans, who were the only ones (apart from Sweden) to offer support, in men and material. As for the Western Allies, they declared war on Finland to placate Stalin.

The United States of America was in the western alliance, and they never declared war on Finland. However Great Britain for example declared war on Finland. USA helped the Soviet Union during Continuation War with supplies though. In some occations these supplies were misdropped and Finns got to use them and it helped them a great deal.

And sorry that I presented assumptions as facts. I always thought that Finns wanted more territory in hope that Germany won. The attack phase was in 1941 and Continuation War ended in 1944. So it´s kind of weird to think that Finnish high command knew already in 1941 that they(and the Germans) were going to lose the war and were thinking about negotiation trumps. But I don´t doubt that either. Stratetical significance of that railway track was without a doubt great.

And if you mean that the Soviets would have agreed to make peace after Finland´s attack, i don´t think that Finnish high command wouldn´t have seen that in their wildest dreams.

And I also could have misunderstanded that sentence

...won? What?

Best breed at Crufts?
The world Cup?

get a grip man, tell us what he might have won (in your opinion) had he been smart.

And for your information he was not un-smart.

Well Hitler made many good decisions and just few errors. Those few errors were just too decisive for the WWII. So he was rather smart. Everybody makes mistakes. We are just human

I'd be interested to know what you consider his "good decisions" to have been.