raharris1973
Well-known member
Credit goes to the HistoryLearner for discovering this idea-
ObssesedNuker and Chris S, discussed with the OP and believed that in the rush to exploit the German collapse in the east the Soviets could not be as thorough in occupying *all* the same Central or Southeastern European countries as OTL while trying to fast-track themselves through Poland and into Berlin.
ObssesedNuker and Chris S. both believed it was Hungary that was more likely to be skipped over by the Soviets than Bulgaria.
Supposing that is correct, a thought occurs to me about the effects of a noncommunist, free market, neutralist Hungary throughout the Cold War.
If the Kovel Option ends the war early, and leaves Hungary outside of the Soviet sphere, it could have interesting consequences. Hungary could be a western aligned island, or a Finlandized or Austrianized neutral. Austria could be a pro-western republic.
In any case, with Hungary non-communist, and smallholders and bourgeois parties dominating, its politics will be different. Romania will be in the Soviet sphere and Sovietized. The Czechoslovakian Communist party will be strong and seek Moscow's permission to obtain total power, and seize it at some point, Yugoslavia will still have its own strong native communist movement under Tito, that will brook no opposition.
I wonder if a likely side effect of this divide, the Trianon-benefitting countries all becoming communist dictatorships, while Hungary remains capitalist, and possibly democratic, results in mass voluntary exodus of ethnic Hungarian populations from Romania, Slovakia and Vojvodina, basically eliminating coherent blocks of Hungarian majority territory in the formerly Hungarian majority lands lost in Trianon. Communism becomes a force making the post-Trianon Hungarian state be the only true national home for Hungarians, and, presuming that the Communist regimes ever do fall in Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Yugoslavia in later decades, there might no longer be any coherent demographic-territorial basis to support Hungarian claims to lands lost in Trianon - the ethnic Hungarians having voted with their feet to live in relatively much more prosperous Trianon Hungary over the prior generations?
History Learner said: From Germany and the Second World War, Volume VIII: The Eastern Front, 1943-1944 by Karl Heinz Frieser, Pages 599 to 600:
The Soviet operation in Belorussia doubtless achieved a great deal, but it did not do what appears to have been possible with hindsight, that is, bring about the collapse of the German eastern front with a single mighty blow. In the spring of 1944 the war was not only lost for Germany, but was already almost over. The situation was particularly critical in the east, where the Wehrmacht’s inferiority had attained dramatic proportions.In those circumstances the OKH feared the Soviet command would exploit Germany’s acute vulnerability at the beginning of the invasion in the west to launch an offensive that would decide the war. It was believed that the Russians would concentrate all available forces in one place to deliver a death blow to the German eastern army. Foreign Armies East, under Maj.-Gen. Gehlen, had long since located the Archimedean point at which the German front could be operationally dislodged. That point was the Kovel salient, from which Red Army armoured units could rapidly advance to the Baltic via Warsaw and enclose two German army groups. Then the whole eastern front would collapse and the road to Berlin would be open. In retrospect it seems highly likely that such an encirclement attack would have succeeded. Today, unlike the Soviet leadership in the early summer of 1944, we possess precise information as to the real relative strength of the two sides and the subsequent course of events. At all events, in the summer of 1944 the Red Army rapidly achieved an operational breakthrough in every offensive. On 18 July, 1st Belorussian Front began a secondary offensive at Kovel and, although only its left wing took part in the attack, the German defenders were simply swept away. Only a few days later there was a gap almost 100 kilometres wide in the German front.It is therefore easy to imagine the avalanche that would have been set in motion if Operation BAGRATION had been carried out from Kovel in the direction of Warsaw, rather than from the Belorussian balcony in the direction of Minsk. It was, after all, the greatest mass of forces ever deployed in an offensive till that time. The Red Army command nevertheless made the mistake of dispersing its strategic potential at operational level. The glorificatory Soviet historiography repeatedly invoked Stalin’s ‘ten blows’ (offensives) of 1944, but close examination shows that they were several blows too many. The fact is that in the summer of 1944 the Soviet command did not risk mustering its forces for the decisive death blow, but contented itself with inflicting a multitude of wounds on the enemy. Instead of a decisive strategic offensive in a single sector, it conducted a series of operational strikes along the whole front. Operation BAGRATION against Army Group Centre was only the main blow of the summer of 1944. It was followed by other major offensives, staggered from the outset, with the result that all four German army groups on the eastern front were attacked simultaneously.
Further, on Page 601:
During the ongoing offensive there was nevertheless a second chance to put that idea into practice. On 8 July, given the surprisingly favourable course of the operation, Zhukov called for the establishment of a new point of concentration. The plan which the German general staff so feared was now on the table. The Soviet attacking forces concentrated near Kovel were to turn north towards Warsaw, and from there advance on East Prussia in a bold manoeuvre that would have cut off the whole north wing of the German eastern front. But Stalin refused. Not until 27 July did he instruct Rokossovsky to turn a section of his troops north towards Warsaw. It was too late, however, since Field Marshal Model had meanwhile brought up his last armoured reserves, with which he was able to stop the advance on Warsaw at the last moment. The result was a second ‘miracle on the Vistula’. Having lost the first battle by risking too much, Stalin lost the second by risking too little. Thus, the end of the war was needlessly postponed. Hitler and his regime were granted another stay of execution, and the bloody battles ended only in 1945.Inspired by a debate me and @ObssesedNuker have in another thread, but what if Stalin had been less cautious in early July and approved of Zhukov's suggestion for a deep strike? Army Group Center would unquestionably be encircled and destroyed in its entirety and quite probably Army Group North too, given the inability of the Germans to launch Operation Doppelkopf as per OTL in August of 1944; even in a best case scenario, the most AGN could do is withdraw into East Prussia, which is likewised encircled by the Soviet strike to the mouth of the Vistula.
On the whole, this seems to me to be the type of PoD that could actually end the war by Christmas, as the Germans would likely be forced to pull everything they can from other fronts to screen Berlin. IOTL, the Western Allies very nearly broke into the Po Valley in August and Operation Luttich probably delayed things in France by two to three weeks. Likely the Anglo-Americans will meet the Soviets further West than they did historically. One ironic bit is that, while the Soviets will be stronger in Central Europe, they might be less so in the Balkans; Bulgaria here might be a NATO member and Romania neutral like Czechoslovakia was IOTL until 1948.
ObssesedNuker said:
While I can see Soviet influence in the Balkans being lessened, I don’t see it being those two countries. The Red Army is still well poised to reach Romania and Bulgaria first. I figure it would be Soviet influence over Hungary that would be lessened, since they are further afield and Hungary is liable to be better poised to jump ship compared to OTL, when the Germans thwarted their defection attempt via pre-emptive coup. And there’s Yugoslavia of course, but then as the Tito-Soviet split shows it wasn’t like Soviet influence specifically was quite that strong there.
Chris S said:
I think if this occurred you still get Soviet influence in Bulgaria since the war in Europe being over by Christmas possibly means the Soviets still go into Bulgaria by September. Hungary jumping ship might be more effective though and as a result they might escape full Soviet domination and end up more like Finland.
Even if the Soviets meet the western allies further west they will will withdraw towards the agreed zonal boundaries which had mostly taken shape by 1944 anyway (besides which Stalin will still get on fairly well with Roosevelt relatively speaking and will also want to confirm Soviet gains for entering the war with Japan; if they don't go with the zonal borders that they and the British had independently agreed the outline on initially in 1943 then they can kiss any agreements on the post-war order in Asia goodbye..).
What will change is what the Soviets can grab before pulling back - some German scientists who in OTL ended up in the West might end up in the East or dead in TTL and I can easily see the USSR stripping the temporarily occupied areas of agri-food stuff and industrial stuff as reparations. This alone should make for interesting PODs on how it changes (or not) Western and Eastern military and space research.
This will also change the war in the Pacific as it allows for earlier Soviet entry, gives time for French entry into the Pacific and for the Americans, British and Soviets to actually throw even more at the Japanese since presumably they all lose less men as a result of a speedier collapse of Germany (for instance the Americans might lose say...7,000-10,000 less men killed in action probably and they get to free up 15+ divisions almost 5 months earlier than in OTL..) . It might even bring forward Allied moves to such an extent that American forces are already on Kyushu (at the start of the equivalent of Operation Olympic, whatever it would be called) when the first atomic bombs are used and the British have retaken Malaya, Singapore and taken Sumutra.
ObssesedNuker and Chris S, discussed with the OP and believed that in the rush to exploit the German collapse in the east the Soviets could not be as thorough in occupying *all* the same Central or Southeastern European countries as OTL while trying to fast-track themselves through Poland and into Berlin.
ObssesedNuker and Chris S. both believed it was Hungary that was more likely to be skipped over by the Soviets than Bulgaria.
Supposing that is correct, a thought occurs to me about the effects of a noncommunist, free market, neutralist Hungary throughout the Cold War.
If the Kovel Option ends the war early, and leaves Hungary outside of the Soviet sphere, it could have interesting consequences. Hungary could be a western aligned island, or a Finlandized or Austrianized neutral. Austria could be a pro-western republic.
In any case, with Hungary non-communist, and smallholders and bourgeois parties dominating, its politics will be different. Romania will be in the Soviet sphere and Sovietized. The Czechoslovakian Communist party will be strong and seek Moscow's permission to obtain total power, and seize it at some point, Yugoslavia will still have its own strong native communist movement under Tito, that will brook no opposition.
I wonder if a likely side effect of this divide, the Trianon-benefitting countries all becoming communist dictatorships, while Hungary remains capitalist, and possibly democratic, results in mass voluntary exodus of ethnic Hungarian populations from Romania, Slovakia and Vojvodina, basically eliminating coherent blocks of Hungarian majority territory in the formerly Hungarian majority lands lost in Trianon. Communism becomes a force making the post-Trianon Hungarian state be the only true national home for Hungarians, and, presuming that the Communist regimes ever do fall in Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Yugoslavia in later decades, there might no longer be any coherent demographic-territorial basis to support Hungarian claims to lands lost in Trianon - the ethnic Hungarians having voted with their feet to live in relatively much more prosperous Trianon Hungary over the prior generations?