#Lecture 1: Intro and What is Total War?
#Introduction
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And yet there is so much we do not understand about the Second World War. We are blinded by hindsight and our biases. Nothing had to happen the way it did.
- Why did Hitler declare war on the United States?
- Blitzkrieg: the Germans never used it as official military doctrine or terminology. The first German mention was actually Hitler’s speech: “I have never used the word Blitzkrieg, because it is a very, very silly word.” The term was popularized by Western journalists; Time magazine used it in September 1939 to describe the invasion of Poland.
- Consider: in 1928 the Kellogg-Briand Pact outlawed war. No one could have predicted WWII. We cannot predict the future even if we feel that current trends are very strong. And the surprises are not small: “the US will join the war alongside the USSR” would have sounded ridiculous in 1928. It's not just that the future is going to surprise you, it's going to surprise you big-time.
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Not sympathy (that would be very weird), but empathy. Understand the human behind the action. What brings people to do such things, or to accept others doing them without saying much?
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Chocolate in the war: Hershey bars were part of K-rations, packed for calories, not pleasure. Every soldier carried three. But who gets to eat chocolate? German soldiers couldn't get any because trade had stopped. Now picture a soldier landing in Europe and handing a bar to a child in France who was born into the war and has never tasted chocolate. That child loves America forever. And they're also watching Hollywood movies. This is power: give a child chocolate, show them a film. Propaganda is huge.
- Also interesting: Hugo Boss manufactured Nazi uniforms. Ford factories retooled to produce tanks. How did they do it, and how did they do it so fast?
#3 Key Military Terms
Only three terms of military jargon we need to know:
- Strategy: we have political goals, we have means (production, scientists). Strategy is the way we bridge goals and means. The abstract plan of winning the war.
- What was Germany's strategy? Purge the "subversive elements" of society. Lost WWI because the Jews and socialists stabbed us in the back. We're going to be strong by purifying. Build a powerful Germany in the heart of Europe, Festung Europa (Fortress Europe). In which direction? I don't know, but it will grow. Take 40% of all of France's exports. Send it through Poland.
- Tactics: the engagement, what you're doing on the battlefield.
- Operations: the translation layer between big abstract plans and small everyday tactical doing. The operational concept for a given front. You fight differently in the Pacific than in Europe.
- Analogy from our own lives: goal is to be happy. Strategy is going to Stanford. Operationally speaking, that's your major. Tactics: this course.
#What was Germany’s Goal?
They had a goal? Yes.
To wage war you need troops, oil (Bulgaria, Romania, the Middle East), and food.
- In WWI, Germany wanted to be a strong, recognized power and sought territory overseas. But in WWII they said: I'm going east. Where did they get this idea? In 1917, they forced a punitive peace on Russia with the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk: Russia lost 34% of its population, 54% of its industrial land, 89% of its coal fields. The Germans realized there was a whole empire to be built right next door. Not just for the empire, but for the race.
- You think Versailles was a punitive peace? Take a look at Brest-Litovsk.
- When you think about German strategy, understand it from the racial perspective. By Week 2, stop saying "Germany," because this is not the entity for which they fight. They fight for Lebensraum for the Aryans. The state has very little meaning. It is a tool in service of the race.
#What Makes a War Total?
Three elements: total mobilization, total aims, and no distinction between combatants and noncombatants.
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No distinction between combatants and noncombatants. We're going to bomb you and the factories. Nothing that belongs to an enemy country is out of reach. Nothing is out of our considerations. Children in Eastern Europe are the enemy: they are the future of a nation the Nazis want to retire out of existence.
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Total aims: unconditional surrender. WWI was limited (e.g., a piece of France). Now it's total. World domination. The Hunger Plan (der Hungerplan): a Nazi policy to systematically seize food from the Soviet Union and redirect it to German troops and civilians, deliberately starving millions. An estimated 4.2 million Soviet citizens died of starvation between 1941 and 1944.
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Total mobilization. Everything. In the Soviet Union: 16-hour days, 7 days a week. Anything you used to own. In the US it's different: you're not going to eat a lot of meat or drive your car anywhere. So there are degrees. But it will affect everyone. What's it like in Africa, or for indigenous peoples in Australia? Everyone is involved. No one is detached.