History of germany

A turning point: June-December 1941

The nations of continental Europe are now either neutral (Switzerland, Sweden), neutral but Fascist (Spain, Portugal), merged with Germany (Austria), occupied by Germany (Czechoslovakia, Poland, Luxembourg, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, most of France), forcibly neutralized (Vichy France), allied to Germany (Italy, USSR), suppressed by the USSR (Finland), or a patchwork of such conditions (Hungary and the Balkans).

For a dictator who found himself at war with the world a year or two earlier than he would have wished, it is an impressive achievement. The only failure has been the Battle of Britain, frustrating his plans to cross the Channel - but these were anyway somewhat half-hearted. 

Admittedly in the very month when this situation is achieved, May 1941, there is one major setback. Germany's newest and most magnificent battleship, theBismarck, has been launched earlier this year at Kiel. On her first sortie out of the Baltic she is spotted by the British navy. After doing much damage to the pack pursuing her, the vast ship is sunk on May 27 with the loss of nearly all her crew of 2222 sailors.

The state of the navy is a sore point between Hitler and his naval commander in chief, Erich Raeder. In the mid-1930s Hitler has assured Raeder, responsible for building up the fleet, that the coming war will not begin until 1944. Raeder therefore regards Germany's strength at sea as inadequate. After the loss of the Bismarck, his naval campaign focuses largely on U-boats. 
If this is one of the significant turning points of 1941, two more are to follow before the end of the year. The first is Hitler's own doing. The second he has regarded as inevitable sooner or later. But together they will have a decisive effect on the outcome of the war.

The first involves Hitler's eastern policy. The USSR, the proselytizing force of world communism, has always been seen by Hitler as his main enemy. And it is to the east, through Poland and into the Ukraine, that his policy ofLebensraumand German expansion has been directed. An attack into these regions is part of his grand strategy. Hitler's skill has been to create the lull, with theMolotov-Ribbentrop pact, which enables him to secure his western flank before turning his attention eastwards. 

In this strategy he is, in effect, carrying out theSchlieffen Planwhich his predecessors in World War I had been unable to achieve. They failed in the first part of the plan, the conquest of France. With that behind him, Hitler is now ready to move on to stage two - the attack on Russia. His mistake, failing to learn the lesson of Napoleon's campaign, is to believe that this can be a quick affair (though he might reasonably expect the speed of motorized transport to make the difference).

When the first Russian winter is bringing home the harsh reality, the other great turning point of 1941 takes place without Hitler even being forewarned. His Japanese allies tell him nothing of their plan for a secret attack on the US fleet inPearl Harbor on December 7. 

The events of the second half of 1941 add four major powers to the cast list of the world war. Hitler has dragged in the USSR, just as Japan's action forces the full involvement of the USA. Japan herself, until now engaged only in a regional conflict with China, also becomes a new player on the global scene. And China, as Japan's enemy, is automatically now an ally of the western powers.

Thus by the end of 1941 the final alignment of the war is established, in terms of the major powers involved. The Allies are Britain and the Commonwealth, France, the USA, the USSR and China; the Axis powers are Germany, Italy and Japan. (In fact even this alignment is not yet quite final - in 1943 Italy changes sides.)