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How did Hitler plan to fight World War II

 

             How did Hitler plan to fight the war? Did he get the war he wanted? These questions have been asked by numerous historians since the end of World War II, and by Weinberg, Bartov, and Overy thus far in our reading. The answer to these questions according to the reading appears to be yes and no. First, Hitler got to concentrate on one front at the beginning of the war because of the non-aggression pact he signed with the Soviets on August 23, 1939. Second, he got to concentrate on the west because of the agreement he signed with the Soviets as well. Third, although Hitler stated that he wanted to begin the war in 1942-43, he appears to have been ready for war in 1938. So the timing of the war thus becomes a factor. Fourth, although Hitler might have been ready for war that does not mean that Germany was. Hitler did not have the have a significant portion of the German population, nor his generals fully committed to the idea in of war 1938 or 1939. Add to these the factors the fact that Italy bungled every attempt at conquering territory (except for the fact that they took Albania), which caused Hitler to divert troops away from the eastern front to cover up the blunders of Mussolini; and this becomes the picture of war that faced Hitler and Germany by the time he was focused at conquering Lebensraum in the East in 1941. Finally, one most focus on German and Japanese relations to see, that although Hitler got the blue water navy he wanted by agreement with Japan, he did not get the Japanese to agree on strategy by the time he began to focus his attention on the Soviet Union in mid-1941. .
             Because of the signing of the Soviet-German non-aggression pact on August 23, 1939 Hitler got to do two very important things that he included in his war plan. The first of these was the defeat of Poland in two weeks by mid-September 1939, and the second was having the ability to focus on France and Great Britain in the west, while not having to fight at two front battle in Eastern and Western Europe like Germany had in World War I.


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