Before the war has begun and even right up until he conquered France, Hitler was apparently willing to make peace with the UK, and there were some in the UK government that were apparantly receptive to this. So, in an alternate history, say the UK joined the Axis, what would have been the outcome of the war? With Japan and Italy in tow, and most of Europe conquered, would the USSR and USA still have succeeded?
You can speculate on either scenario. But the UK going the whole hog would be a more interesting scenario I suppose.
US writes off Europe and Russia. US proceeds to crush Japan. Europe + Africa + ME stay in Nazi control, England eventually becomes a puppet state. Russia without American/British assistance probably falls, at least all the military significant parts of it, though I don't think Germany presses across Siberia. China doesn't go Communist - the Sino-American pact keeps the Axis powers out of the Pacific once Japan falls. Proxy war in India after the European/Pacific theaters stabilize, resulting in Indian independence without Pakistan coming into existence. Thats all I got.
Yeah, mostly this. Except I'm seeing an eventual American domination over the world. I mean, the biggest parties would be enemies of America or crushed from war (Soviets, Republic of China). Interesting scenario. Canada and Newfoundland would be annexed, if the ANZAC twins were smart, they'd declare independence and ally with us, the Crown and its subjects would be fucked.
Without having to fight Germany, I think India stays part of the British Empire until after Japan falls - England can spend the resources to keep it and the US would be too busy elsewhere to intervene. But either the US or China intervenes after Japan is dealt with.
1940's America isn't out to dominate the world, we didn't get involved until after Pearl Harbor. If England and Germany are playing nice and beating on Russia, we might simply trade with them and turn a blind eye towards any of their social issues. Japan gets it with both boots though, the Pacific would end up completely dominated by the US as China isn't a unified nation at this point in history.
The United States would engage a policy of isolation around the British isles, just like it did with Japan. Unrestricted submarine warfare means starvation for the homeland and lack of supplies for the Empire.
Hitler declared war on the United States out of treaty obligations and hubris in this timeline, I can't see why he'd hold off with an even stronger hand.
Well, I guess it comes down to when England and Germany make peace. Before Pearl Harbor (and assuming Pearl Harbor still goes off on schedule) - and we're trading with England and Germany and have no reason to attack either. Germany might not even declare war with the US after Pearl Harbor in such a scenario. You could go even farther and say Pearl never happens if England and Germany are at peace before the US gets involved militarily. We'd be too busy supplying them over the Russians in such a scenario; and Germany wouldn't back a Japanese attack on the US. Honestly I don't see England at peace with Germany unless Germany and Japan sever relations - then Japan is on her own and very well might try and attack the US anyway.
It would mean that IF we did go to space it would just be the Nazis. Remember that it was the Germans (on both sides of the CW) that really put man into space, not the two empires that gobbled them up.
It is an almost impossibility to see a stable UK-Nazi peace. What the Nazi's stood for was too much against what the UK could live with. It would break down. Hitler also did not intend his non-aggression pacts to be long term. In war terms it was the US industrial might that wins the war. In a certain sense vast amounts of money, efforts, resources and blood went into supplying the UK. Without that the US might have been better off in some ways. In the end the result would probably be a lot like it was, only UK being punished post war by the US and other allies.
Faisent's observations are better than the ones I could make. At a purely tactical level it would be difficult. You've got no staging area in England, and the Straits of Gibraltar keep you from doing North Africa. At any rate if you do North Africa, you do it without the British. And even if you somehow win there, you've still got to get over the Italian Alps to break out and bring the war to Germany. I guess the Soviet Union would've been devastated and wound up fighting a sustained guerrilla war, so there's the option of invading across the Bering Sea. But it all comes down to political resolve. And God only knows how nukes factor into the equation.
I'm reminded of the new film Public Enemies when Dillinger said: "I can hit any bank I want at any time, they got to be at all of 'em". The United States would have the luxury of hitting whenever and wherever it pleased, and with the entry of the British Empire against us, we have many more targets to choose from.
