How Much of WW2 Was an Oil War?

[Enrico Cernuschi]

It's quite funny. Any time some English speaking guy, who does not agree about some WW I and WWII historical opinions different from the old propaganda schemes, encounter me he loves to use the word "conspirancy".
This is a term I NEVER used, but they adopt it any time; it must be a relict of the old islanders mentality: " Booh, sigh and sob, the world is against us, poor Britons (and descendants)".

Tim, I said you before answering your private e-mails; I'll have to do it again in public, hoping this is the last time:
You, like anyone, have got the right to contest anyone; but as long as your protests are not supported by, at least, some argouments contesting sources, datas, documents, infos, ect. they are only blatatnt and bombastic inititives, without any scientific dignity.
It's an hooligan cry in a stadium which damns its author as confirms he has got no other intellectual tools than brutal manners.

You are simply a loser, and a bad one.

Now, and this is the real matter, what's the attitude to follow in this Forum?
I know there is no moderator in this Division, but I believe Jason would have to establish anyway a rule.

If this is a correct Forum you may say: "I dont't like your opinions" full stop, ant that's OK.
You can say too: " I contest yours opinions and reconstruction for A...B...C..." and this is quite better.
But to declare: "You are wrong" without explaining why is only a confirmation to the readers I hit the target of your vanity (and phoney, conventional BBC history).
Your aggressive style is, then, beyond good taste.
If I had had to follow your rules I would have to write, for example, I could suspect you are a child molester according the best British traditions mentioned by Churchill regarding the illustrious history of sodomy in the Royal Navy or that you are, maybe, a descendant of a British XVIII Century deported bitch, just as you are Australian.
I would adopt, this way, your not polite and correct manners, but it would be, in the long run, the end of Feldgrau itself.


Your Lordship's
most humble, most obedient
Servant to command

Enrico Cernuschi

[timobrienwells]

Enrico.sei patso!

[timobrienwells]

Could it be that you have some residual shame about the disgraceful performance of the Ialian army in WW2. Mussolini took 3 years to defeat ethiopian tribesman armed with spears,a pathetic british force in egypt kicked your arses in 1940,and as for Russia.Atleast the romanians put up a fight,and did so with honour.The italian 8th army were useless.Count Ciano was at Rastenburg when news came through of the italian collapse on the upper Don Dec 1942.He asked,'was there heavy causulties?' A german staff officer replied,'No casualties at all, they are running!' Enrico,you harp on about us 'british',and where we get our information from.Could it be that your university has given you a few things that may not be exactly Kosher?I am not the first person on this forum to criticize you for your whacky view of history.In fact,you dont have a view of history,you have a political mindset through which you interpret the facts of history.Your rediculous ideas about WW1 and WW2 being 'oil wars'.Absolute rubbish.Other people on this forum have exposed the flaws in your knowledge about this,and you have not been able to counter them.But please prove us wrong,tell us about a guy named gavrilo princip,what was the 'black hand',what was the caustive action in russia that led to implimentation of the Schliefflen plan by the Germans?Who after all was killed in Sarajevo?These are all basic questions that anyone can answer,but i can bet right now that you WONT answer them,because it will interfere with your cosy,little political view of history.You obviously have real issues with English people and their decendents[my grandparents were free settlers from Ireland].Your knowledge of the native tasmanians is as wrong as the rest of your thinking.Sid said it right that the vast majority died as a result of disease[which has happened the world over to many indigenous peoples]The tasmanian 'holocaust' is a fiction created by leftist university people in Australia who are just like you.You are what is known as an ' historical revisionist '.Facts dont matter to you,only your political interpretation of those facts.Your not an historian or a scolar, and it will be proven because you will not answer those questions I have given you.You could answer them but you wont.You have come on this forum in an attempt to throw your left-wing,revisionist rubbish around,and that is why no one takes you seriously. Regards Tim Wells

[John Kilmartin]

Gentleman,
Who here is going to deny the fact that both the British and US navies in 1914 were running on oil? The importance of this being at that point in history only a navy allowed these two countries to project their influence outside their own borders with any significance.

[Paul C Herman]

I think the answewr is partly. I think there is no question Hitlers goal in North Africa was a link up with the 17 th Army ithru the Caucuses and into Iraq via Egypt. The fact he supported the pro-Axis faction in Iraq even providing aircraft assistance is part of this plan. I have no doubt Hitler had the foresight to realize that cutting this last oil reserve of the British would have had devestating consequences for Britain. It would have eliminated them from the war. Also he was very keen on helping the Arab population with respect to the Jewish question. I have no doubt that Hitler would have cut a sweet deal with the Arabs to drill exclusive oil right for the Greater German Reich. Just think were the world would be today had he succeeded!!

[Ron Klages]

Paul,

I believe you give far to much credit to Hitler as being a great thinker. He had no plans, in my opinoin, for Africa other than to bail out Italy as he had done in Greece.

Look at his continued conduct of the war. He never grasped reality and consistently focused on his perceptions of what would be or what he wished would be. Not a great thinker. His great errors just to mention a few.

1. He never grasped the fact that Churchill would never consider a conditional surrender.

2. When he had Moscow at its knees he changed the strategy.

3. Struck out for the oil Fields in the south rather than continuing the drive to Moscow or failing to withdraw from Stalingrad.

4. He never recognized the allies he had in the Ukraines and other elements of the Soviet block so rather than enlisting their assistence he considered them sub-human and treated then so.

5. Surrounded himself with Yes men and idiots and would not listen to his strength, the Wehrmacht commanders.

6. Sent Rommel to North Africa but never supported him. This is indicitive of the fact that he had no grand plans for the Middle East and linking up with the 17. Armee.

7. Declaring war on the US. Dumb in fact dummer.

8. He stuck to the belief that Stalin-Roosevelt-Churchill would break apart because of their differences. That is what he wished, he never grasped how much he was hated and as a result caused the three allies to be cemeted together in a common cause that outweighted their individual differences.

9. and so many more.


Hitler was never a threat to being able to create a 1000 year Reich. He was our best weapon in his own defeat.

Of the big four, Hitler-Stalin-Churchill and Roosevelt, Hitler ranked dead last. For that I am thankful as should the rest of the World.

Hitler wished Germany to be the big stud on the earth
Churchill came to recognize that Britian was no longer the big stud
Roosevelt recognized that the US was now the big stud

and

Stalin saw the opportunity to be a big stud if not the biggest.

Hitler was a distant 4th.



Best regards,

Ron Klages

[phylo_roadking]

Gentlemen - and there ARE some in this discussion despite all appearances to the contrary...note I said SOME lol....this has veered into modern-day economic-strategic thinking. To put it QUITE simply - The idea of oil as a STRATEGIC commodity in the Allies' planning for the outcome of the Second World War is a complete fallacy for ONE major reason - THEY had it all, or interdicted (ploesti) anyone ELSE having it lol lol They simply didnt need to worry about it in the future as YET - cos NOONE expected it to run out, even over the horizon of the rest of the century.

Phylo

[corderex]

Well, here's my contribution to the present discussion.

The Second World War was not an "oil war" in the sense that, say, the First Gulf War of 1990-91 was. Its causes were much more complex than that.

Having said that, it is obvious that acces to oil was a matter of life or death for the Axis powers, and many "grand strategy" decision revolved around the very issue of oil supply.

The oil embargo imposed on Japan by the U.S. after the takeover of French Indochina was definitely the most important factor behind Japan's ill-conceived decision to go to war against the U.S. Having made the decision to go to war, the main strategic objectives for Japan were precisely the oil fields in the Dutch East Indies.

Now, returning to Europe, examples abound, but just to name a few:

1. The Soviet takeover of the Bessarabia and Bukovina (the latter not contemplated in the secret annex to the Nazi-Soviet Pact of August '39) really scared the heck out of Hitler, who saw the oil fields in Ploesti menaced by the Soviet advance. It only reinforced Hitler's decision that the invasion of the USSR had to be undertaken in the summer of '41 at the latest.

2. The Italian invasion of Greece upset Hitler so much because it gave the British an excuse to intervene in the Balkans and to set up airbases from where, he feared, they could strike at Ploesti. Operations Marita and Merkur, had to be undertaken not only to straighten out the mess caused by Mussolini, but also to put Ploesti out of the range of any British bombers based in the Greek mainland or in Crete.

3. The decision in August '41 to go south instead of advancing straight on to Moscow -a decision that many people here consider a mistake- was based on purely long-term calculations. By the beginning of August Hitler must have realized privately that the war in Russia wouldn't be over "in eight weeks", and it seems that he began to think in terms of a protracted war. He sent Guderian southwards because he wanted to make sure that the Donbass region would fall before winter set in and also because he considered the Crimea as a sort of "unsinkable aircraft-carrier" from which Soviet bombers could bomb Ploesti.

4. Fall Blau was designed from the get-go to take the oil fields and refineries in Batumi and Baku, or at least to deny the Soviets access to these oil fields.

5. The combined Bomber Command/USAAF bombing offensive against the synthetic oil facilities in Germany from July '44 onwards was one of the biggest contribution that the Anglo-American forces ever made in the war. Speer's so-calles miracles in weapons production during 1944 amounted to nothing if those planes or tanks couldn't move due to lack of fuel.

And the list goes on, and on...

[Kitsune]

You sum it up quite nicely, corderex.
I concur with nearly everything you say in your post.

[von_noobie]

i for 1 belive that north africa was not an oil war, i belive that north africa was only the back door into germany which the germans defended with a scratch panzer division. it was never about oil. the germans never spread through africa in the search of oil. that is why they invaded russia becouse at the time russia was the only known country which could supply the german army with large amounts of fuel. And they only sent the 5thlight and 15th panzer div becouse of the defeat of musolinies forces.

Personnely i think that you would have to be an idiot to think north afrika was for the search of oil and if it was the german high command(hitler) would have appointed some 1 with more skill in manouvering large numbers of men.im not saying that rommel was not good at using large numbers of men but it would be smarter than risk the loss of so much fuel.

[von_noobie]

Ron Klages, you would have to be verey right about hitlers stupidity. He never had no military strategy and his worst mistake was giving the no retreat order to so many of his men. he stoped the drive on leningrad on so many occasions that had they still kept going it would have beeen useless as it gave more than a month for the civilans of the city to dig anti-tank traps and fox-holes. he formed army group africa nearly 1 year to late and even thoe this was late he never pulled these forces back to sicily which could have been verey usefull to repell the invasion of sicily. and his worst mistake was to still go ahead with the invasion of russia in 1941 even thoe he had wasted half of his 10 week plan on the balkans. he should have ever waited until 1942 allowing him to gain more men tanks and material or left a scratch force of fighters to stop the british bombers in greece bombing oil fields in romania. thus saving a lrge sum of his tanks and allowing him to invade russia with 19 panzer divisions while 2 went to north africa. and these 19 panzer divisions would be at a better strenght.

[Michate]

9. and so many more.

Stopping AG North in front of Leningrad at a time defense of the city was very weak.

[phylo_roadking]

All, as I said elsewhere here, lets not confuse the tactical importance of oil with the Strategic. Yes of course you can talk about operations on the Eastern Front running out of gas - literally, but in turn how many gallons of petrol did it take to man the pillboxes of the Siegfried Line and halt the Allies over the winter of '44?

Phylo

[von_noobie]

not much

but what will a pil box be up against a tank

germany came out with alot of great equiptment in the last 18 months of the war but none of this didany good to save germany?

it is pretty obvious , OIL

without oil there luftwaffa still had a number of jetfighters but almost none ever flew becouse of lack of fuel and for the ones that did fly they proved exelent .

[phylo_roadking]

I'm afraid its NOT that simple. Fileds of completed Me 262 jet fighter were found unused and unflown - NOT because of a lack of oil but because their engine pods were empty, the Third Reich couldn't cource enough specialized alloys etc to complete enough engines. Those early engines only had a 10-12 hour service life. They ran not on any fancy aviation spirit, but on KEROSENE, lamp oil, at a pinch refinable from COAL. Many fighter projects were bombed into oblivion in their factories.
Tanks were built that had terrible reliability problems and were modded in the field....and couldn't be delivered in great enough numbers when modified. Tactical mistakes like the Falaise Gap robbed the Wehrmacht of whole Armies. A lack of aviation fuel...and effective aircraft and pilots after the air offensive preceding the Battle of the Bulge kept the Luftwaffe from providing effective ground support, and priority was anyway given to trying to stem the bomber stream.
Phylo