Would the world be a better place if Germany had won WWI?

[Heresson]

Re: Would the world be a better place if Germany had won WWI?

Yes, for the world would be Germans.

nah, I am a Pole, and as existance of Poles as a nation would be in peril then, I would not be happy with that.
Also, I am partly Armenian, so I do not like the perspective of Ottomans slaughtering the remaining part of Armenians, and perhaps other christian nations of ME.

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by Arrian


Really? I thought that's precisely what we did (throw troops into machine gun fire).

-Arrian

Well yeah, but only because that's what all the cool kids were doing.

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by Lancer
I'd say we researched up the tree to 'Let the euros kill each other off by the millions THEN come in'.

I am still puzzled with the U.S. watching that unspeakable slaughter go on for years and then say, "Yeah, let's get in on that "

The War to End All Wars -- what a crock

[Colonâ„¢]

I believe the casus belli was the sinking of the Louisiana. A vessel hiding armaments amongst civilians.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
A Q-U-I-C-K War... Germany wouldn't have felt hardly anything or lost close to 10 mil people if they took Paris in that first year.

Why are you assuming a quick war?

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Patroklos
*HAHAHAHAHA, as a case in point

@ Americans who don't know their own history. The Klan had five million members in 1925 and Marched on Washinton that year. Sure, the collapsed soon afterwards due to a sex scandal involving the Lt. Gov of Indiana and a young woman, but if the U.S. had lost the war and been bitter and resentful, things might have turned out very differently.

[Kontiki]

Originally posted by Ecthy
The US managed to lose 100k men in less than a year. Tactics?

I don't buy the tactics line much myself, but that's a far sight better than the 1.12 million men collectively lost during the four and half month Battle of the Somme, including 58k Brits on the first day.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Ecthy
The US managed to lose 100k men in less than a year. Tactics?

As opposed to Germany, who lost, what, 8 million over four years, for an average of two million a year? We look positively brilliant compared to the Germans then.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
As opposed to Germany, who lost, what, 8 million over four years, for an average of two million a year? We look positively brilliant compared to the Germans then.

IIRC, WW1 killed 9 million people total.
I'd be very surprised that 8/9th of the victims were German.

[chequita guevara]

IIRC, twenty million died in WWI.

[Maniac]

military casualties

http://www.firstworldwar.com/features/casualties.htm

http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/FWWcasualties.htm

Not the same figures, but in the same order of magnitude

[Wycoff]

Originally posted by Zkribbler
I am still puzzled with the U.S. watching that unspeakable slaughter go on for years and then say, "Yeah, let's get in on that "

Two primary reasons for U.S. intervention:

1. The American political and intellectual elite at the outbreak of the war were heavily Anglophile. The political elite pushed for the war, the intellectual elite argued for war, the media elite propagandized and muckraked for war. They eventually succeeded in whipping up a frothing anti-German frenzy in a country in which at least 33% of the citizens had German anscestry.

2. Woodrow Wilson was a misguided Anglophile idealist. He lead a democratic crusade against Imperialists by allying with the two largest empires on the planet. Though claiming that the U.S. was at war with the Kaiser but not with the German people, he gave full support to the British blockade even after the cessation of hostilities. Though he entered the war to get a seat at the peace table, he ended up compromising on virtually every one of his 14 points. IMO, he's the most overrated US President.

[chequita guevara]

Or I could be totally wrong

http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/resources/casdeath_pop.html

[Maniac]

Originally posted by Colonâ„¢
I believe the casus belli was the sinking of the Louisiana. A vessel hiding armaments amongst civilians.

Lusitania IIRC

[Wycoff]

The US had the highest ratio of deaths to days in combat of any major power, IIRC.