Could the League of Nations have worked?

[Thanas]

*snip pics*

And what of those are primary sources? Isn't he saying something like "As study X has shown via a review of German letters (or something) homefront morale was collapsing"?

Ok, but in your interpretation would you say that:

- he puts forward this argument in the context of Germany having the upper hand in the war, as Zinegata claimed?

I do not think it is as clear cut as that. To me it reads more as if he is endorsing his own plan first and foremost. Notice how he spends little time to talk about the military situation at all and just focuses on "THIS IS A WAY TO WIN NOW"? I would suggest this says more about him as a power broker than about the situation at the fronts.

I mean, the absolute worst consequence he talks about is a standstill - neither side winning or losing but Germany unable to win overwhelmingly (which was the whole point behind the weltmacht ideas that started cropping up along with the fantasy war goals like "we are just going to annex all of Belgium and a quarter of France").

So I would say that he thinks the situation is in the balance now with enough of an advantage for Germany to win if - but only if - they use the tactic of unrestricted sub warfare.

Given that he is also a Naval officer unaccustomed to land warfare, I think this memo should not be overinterpreted as to what the OHL thought. If the OHL really thought that the war was being lost in 1917 then it should be relatively trivial to find some paper trail to prove it via a memo from the OHL or the General staff itself.

A memo by an Admiral who wants his own personal strategy to be implemented and endorses it and who is also trying to prove the Navy is just not a waste of resources is not the best way to go about this I think.

- and what is your view on the issue I raised in my previous post: if Germany did indeed have the upper hand, why did the leadership undertake such a huge gamble?

I assume by this you mean to enact unrestricted sub warfare? My guess - and this is only a guess unsupported by anything - would be that they underestimated the resolve of Wilson to go to war. I mean, you had stuff like people openly debating in the US whether the US should not go to war with Britain over their illegal north sea blockade. They also probably felt that this was the only way to hurt the British economy in return.

[Zinegata]

Yeah, I am still not getting how thejester is mistaking my position as "The Americans war the war on their own", when it's "They tipped the balance in favor of the Allies".

Cherry-picking individual offensives and anecdotes - when there were again 330K casualties suffered by the Americans (which did not have to be borne by the other powers) - still does not overturn that 1 million additional men did tip the balance.

And I still haven't seen any supporting figures to show that the French and British alone would have won 1918 via a slam dunk anyway. Just a repetition of cherry-picking the performance of American units. It doesn't matter if the Americans did poorly. What's important is that they were there - if only to soak casualties.

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Moreover, again, the memo isn't an admission of defeat by the German government. It's the German navy urging the government to switch to unrestricted warfare. And the context again is that the HSF had been beaten, so the only way for the navy - but not the nation - to "win" is via commerce war.

[thejester]

And what of those are primary sources? Isn't he saying something like "As study X has shown via a review of German letters (or something) homefront morale was collapsing"?

He's taking a broader view than that:

That's basically how he frames the debate. He doesn't specifically cite 'x study' but he's leaning pretty heavily on Deist specifically - hardly surprising given he dedicates the document to him. Again, like Winter Deist mentions this as almost an aside in his article:
The idea of ending the war, the cause of all the grief, through a last great effort had clearly overcome the mood of resignation prevailing up to then in the field army and on the home front. One testimony for these sentiments is a letter from a Silesian estate inspector of pronounced nationalist views, who was serving as a corporal on the Western front: ’Let us hope the party gets going the sooner the better, so that these injustices that stink to heaven will come to an end, so that we can all eat out of one pot again, and there will be no more masters and slaves’.
Deist cites the monthly Prussian Ministry of War report on morale as some sort of basis for this as well, and returns to the theme later in the article.

I assume by this you mean to enact unrestricted sub warfare? My guess - and this is only a guess unsupported by anything - would be that they underestimated the resolve of Wilson to go to war. I mean, you had stuff like people openly debating in the US whether the US should not go to war with Britain over their illegal north sea blockade. They also probably felt that this was the only way to hurt the British economy in return.

Even if we accept that he's framing this issue purely in terms of internal politics, again - why does German leadership take the risk? Why are they forcing the issue? It'd be interesting to have a look at that broader decision making process. How much did the events of 1916 - failure at Verdun and the Somme - affect OHL perspective?

Yeah, I am still not getting how thejester is mistaking my position as "The Americans war the war on their own", when it's "They tipped the balance in favor of the Allies".

Cherry-picking individual offensives and anecdotes - when there were again 330K casualties suffered by the Americans (which did not have to be borne by the other powers) - still does not overturn that 1 million additional men did tip the balance.

And I still haven't seen any supporting figures to show that the French and British alone would have won 1918 via a slam dunk anyway. Just a repetition of cherry-picking the performance of American units. It doesn't matter if the Americans did poorly. What's important is that they were there - if only to soak casualties.

For starters I'm not cherrypicking. If you want to name the military action undertaken by the US that I didn't include in the list in my previous post, please do so. Otherwise, drop the accusations of 'cherrypicking' and address the evidence. Secondly, a report out of French GHQ criticising the Americans for taking excessive casualties is not an 'anecdote'. It's evidence, especially when it's backed by the observation of men in the field - the Australian Corps, fighting alongside two American divisions at St Quentin. If you want an examination of American inexperience and the disproportinate casualties it created, have a look at 'The Cost of Inexperience: Americans on the Western Front, 1918', Meleah Ward, 1918: Year of Victory. This shows that asking 'but can the Allies afford to soak up 330K extra casualties?' is ridiculous - French and British Commonwealth units in the same position wouldn't have taken anything like that level of casualties in the first place.

The simple fact remains that by Aug 14 - two weeks before the US First Army went into action at the St Mihiel salient - even Ludendorff was telling the Kaiser that the jig was up. EVERY historian I can find - Doughty, Foley, Deist, etc - agrees that the Marne and Amiens counteroffensives had killed the German Army. It was in freefall - rising desertion, insubordination, flu, material inferiority, and simple operational ineffectivness. Moreover, Deist in particular points out that morale was already sagging by the end of 1917, dramatically rose as a result of the March offensive, and then collapsed when it became clear victory was unachievable. This had been achieved by two counteroffensives in which total US participation was two divisions out of SEVEN French and British ARMIES. I would suggest that shows pretty clearly that US troops did not mark a 'tipping point' and that the exercise of counting bayonets does not reflect the reality of what actually happened on the ground.

[Thanas]

And what of those are primary sources? Isn't he saying something like "As study X has shown via a review of German letters (or something) homefront morale was collapsing"?

He's taking a broader view than that:

So why did you cite him as evidence that the German morale was collapsing by 1917 then?

The idea of ending the war, the cause of all the grief, through a last great effort had clearly overcome the mood of resignation prevailing up to then in the field army and on the home front. One testimony for these sentiments is a letter from a Silesian estate inspector of pronounced nationalist views, who was serving as a corporal on the Western front: ’Let us hope the party gets going the sooner the better, so that these injustices that stink to heaven will come to an end, so that we can all eat out of one pot again, and there will be no more masters and slaves’.
Deist cites the monthly Prussian Ministry of War report on morale as some sort of basis for this as well, and returns to the theme later in the article.

What is the context of that letter and the citation for the article and source?

Even if we accept that he's framing this issue purely in terms of internal politics, again - why does German leadership take the risk? Why are they forcing the issue? It'd be interesting to have a look at that broader decision making process. How much did the events of 1916 - failure at Verdun and the Somme - affect OHL perspective?

Sure it would, but I doubt you could put it on Somme and Verdun. In any case, I was not trying to write a chapter on why the OHL acted the way it did, I am merely pointing out that citing a memo by Holtzendorff of all people is not great evidence for your argument.

The simple fact remains that by Aug 14 - two weeks before the US First Army went into action at the St Mihiel salient - even Ludendorff was telling the Kaiser that the jig was up. EVERY historian I can find - Doughty, Foley, Deist, etc - agrees that the Marne and Amiens counteroffensives had killed the German Army. It was in freefall - rising desertion, insubordination, flu, material inferiority, and simple operational ineffectivness. Moreover, Deist in particular points out that morale was already sagging by the end of 1917, dramatically rose as a result of the March offensive, and then collapsed when it became clear victory was unachievable. This had been achieved by two counteroffensives in which total US participation was two divisions out of SEVEN French and British ARMIES. I would suggest that shows pretty clearly that US troops did not mark a 'tipping point' and that the exercise of counting bayonets does not reflect the reality of what actually happened on the ground.

It seems as if you do still do not get what Zinegata and I are saying. What we are saying is that you cannot use things that Germany tried specifically as a result of the US entering the war (like the March offensive which enabled the Allied counteroffensive) as evidence that without the US Germany would still have tried such risky tactics. As such, anything you base on the March offensive and the Marne and Amiens counteroffensive is not applicable to this situation because the US entry forced Germany to take risks they otherwise would not have taken.

[thejester]

So why did you cite him as evidence that the German morale was collapsing by 1917 then?

What is the context of that letter and the citation for the article and source?

Sorry, the citation is for Deist as listed in my previous post; p. 195 in the copy I've got (translated and published in War and Society, 1996, 3, 2. The context of the letter is a German soldier writing home in 1918, shortly before the Spring Offensive. As for Winter: I was unclear in my previous post, sorry. He's taking in broad brush strokes about the reasons for German failure and Allied success; as such the idea that German morale was briefly revived by the March offensives is only part of the essay rather than the focus of it. Is it even a particularly radical argument? As I said he clearly is influenced by Deist, who quotes the Prussian War Ministry reports; but you only have to look at the January strikes, the political splits of 1917 and the experience of the previous winter to know Germany had serious problems. I haven't looked at Offer's work yet, either.

Sure it would, but I doubt you could put it on Somme and Verdun. In any case, I was not trying to write a chapter on why the OHL acted the way it did, I am merely pointing out that citing a memo by Holtzendorff of all people is not great evidence for your argument.

TBH this diversion strikes me as a massive waste of time - Ludendorff and German leadership clearly accepted Holtzendorff's argument and believed that the U-Boat offensive represented not only the best but essentially the only way to end the war on Germany's terms. Not 'desperation' then but equally not something taken from a position of strength, as Zinegata claimed.

It seems as if you do still do not get what Zinegata and I are saying. What we are saying is that you cannot use things that Germany tried specifically as a result of the US entering the war (like the March offensive which enabled the Allied counteroffensive) as evidence that without the US Germany would still have tried such risky tactics. As such, anything you base on the March offensive and the Marne and Amiens counteroffensive is not applicable to this situation because the US entry forced Germany to take risks they otherwise would not have taken.

Finally, it still does not change the fundamental point that the "final score" at the end of the war was largely because America had tipped the balance. A net gain of 1.5 million soldiers on the Allied side is not a trivial contribution. It was the contribution that ensured final victory.

Those are not the same argument, and I've only been responding to the latter. Counting bayonets in Nov 1918 and saying 'Allies 1.5 million up thanks to America, ergo American contribution tipped the balance' doesnt' actually address what happened on the ground in mid-1918 - why the Westheer lost.

That's clearly not what Zinegata was arguing, though, either in the post I just responded to or in the ones before it.

[Zinegata]

On German Home Morale... one soldier's letter home is not a very valid basis for judging an entire nation's morale.

On the US involvement...

You've still yet to show how the Brits and French could have won without an additional 1.5 million men. To show that America didn't tip the balance, you need to prove the British and French could have won the war without American intervention. Thanas is merely also pointing out that the Spring Offensive - which crippled the German Army - wouldn't have been necessary if the Americans weren't coming over by the millions.

Again, do you deny this? Can you show that the British and French were so militarily superior even without the Americans?

And note that I'm only asking for troop numbers right now: We haven't even gotten to the financial and logistical aid that America sent over; which Sea Skimmer has already outlined in great detail. Again, can you show figures to prove that Britain/France could have won without this aid?

Moreover, your insistence that only two Divisions of US troops participated shows blatantly why you're cherry-picking. Over a million American soldiers were added to the Allied ranks. They suffered a total of 330K casualties in 1918. The casualties alone are far more than the total strength of two entire US infantry Divisions.

I would note that you are not even attempting to refute either figure. Not the 1 million troops. Not the 330K casualties. Instead, you're focusing on specific battles and offensives. Is your contention that American forces did not engage at all in combat then except for two Divisions? And do you realize how preposterous that assumption is when they suffered 330K casualties?

So again, how are you not cherry-picking by picking specific battles wherein American participation is minimal, and make no move at all to address the overall American troops deployed nor their casualties?

You have two massive holes in your argument that you still haven't addressed in any way or form.