Interesting thought

[paul kennedy]

Recently I read a very interesting book, and it got me thinking...was the Marne in 1914 the most pivotal battle of the 20th century? I know we all havwe opinions about Stalingrad, Kursk, Midway, etc. but if the French army was defeated in 1914, the rest of the 20th century would have been very different. The Hohenzollern family would have probably ruled a victorious Germany for a long time after. Victory in 1914 for the Central Powers probably means the Romanovs and Hapsburgs continue their reign. There would never have been a Third Reich or Soviet Union. What do you think?
Thanks,
Paul

[pauke]

thought

Consider the Royal Navy and sleeping USA in the equation. Still doesn't look too likely for a German Europe. But one can conjecture on and on....

[paul kennedy]

thought

I wasn't intending to conjecture about a German Europe. My point is that the Battle of the Marne in 1914 was pivotal in 20th century history. Maybe more than it gets credit for.

[Michael Fay]

"What if" History department

Recently I read a very interesting book, and it got me thinking...was the Marne in 1914 the most pivotal battle of the 20th century? I know we all havwe opinions about Stalingrad, Kursk, Midway, etc. but if the French army was defeated in 1914, the rest of the 20th century would have been very different. The Hohenzollern family would have probably ruled a victorious Germany for a long time after. Victory in 1914 for the Central Powers probably means the Romanovs and Hapsburgs continue their reign. There would never have been a Third Reich or Soviet Union. What do you think?
Thanks,
Paul

Allright: you got me to think this multi level chess game out a few further steps!

I cant but doubt the continuation of the Romanovs and Hapsburgs...
Note that in swift succession the almost total annihilation of the European Royal houses (and The sick man of Europe: Turkic Ottoman Empire) as having political rule in the early 20th cent.

I submit Aristocratic rule was going to end one way or another

It seems to me that much like if Hitler had died in WWI there would still have been a Fuhrer-like leader backed by exactly the same forces....i see that the reign of Kings was going to end...COmmunism was a powerful force....and if it had not been set into reality in Russia...it would have started in another country...like say, Germany and even America (where Communism had great appeal to the working classes - -we just refuse to remember this fact).

After all who were the Freikorp actually fighting to the death in the German streets?---it was the Kommunists, the Sozialists and the Democrats.

Also Ex-General Ludendorff would have enjoyed even greater prestige -and no one likes to remember that after WWI he went hard core right wing-and Anti Semitic racist-and completely PAGAN with a vast fan group of militant members in his own Tannenburg Bund.
Sounds a bit like the NSDAP...hmmm?


So I suggest that if your original scenario endedup with the Monarchys still in place...Communism would have started somewhere else...somewhere that might have allowed it to be more resilent and less totalitarianist...and/or sink many nations into internal instability.
That could have included Western Europe, Amerika and Kanada) and all of S.Amerika.

All those places had caught the Anarchist bug that segue-wayed out of Nihilism and Nietzches Uberman breaking all Christian moralities into utopian dreams of the Proletariat Heaven...

ANd what was Fascism? it was the monarchial/Capitalist/ religious authorites antidote to Communism.

Communism was coming no matter what.
But fascism would not have come if WWI outcomes had been different.
Italy would not have gone the way it did...Their old monarchial system would have survived better and so corporatist Fascism would not have been created/funded by italian industrialists in the same way.

And Italy was full of Communists/Socialists /and democrats pre WWI.
Benito Mussolini started out a socialist. His father named him Benito after a populist revolutionary in Mexico whose movement was anti-monarchy/wealthy classes and anti church .
Benito may have stayed a Socialist newspaper writer if WWI had ended as you set it up.

Even crazier and more fun:
Then the 60's movements of the youthmovements/hippys might have been authoritarian and right wing in character ...like the 1900's german Wandervogel movement ending in HJ and BDM!
Classic mindbending history ramifications

[paul kennedy]

interesting

Definitely interesting to ponder. However, my main point was the idea of the Battle of the Marne 1914 being the most pivotal battle of the 20th Century because of the what ifs...as opposed to the what ifs themselves.