The 4 Worst Mistakes Of The Axis Powers During WWII

[third eye]

Looking back at WWII there have been decisions made that, in the end, did not work out to the Axis advantage. Of course you can argue that starting the war in the first place was the biggest mistake made. but, for the sake of the argument, let us look at 5 mistakes that were made after the war was started.

1. Nazi Alliance with Fascist Italy
Mussolini and Hitler in the heady days of 1940 (Bundesarchiv)

Having allied themselves with Italy, although ideologically similar, was something that the Nazi’s should have forsaken. Time and again the Nazi’s were forced to come to the aid of Italy after the fascists launched an ill conceived invasion or bitten off more than they could chew.


Getting the German forces involved in North Africa, a costly side show, was bad enough but the forced German invasion of Greece could not have come at a worse time.

In March of 1941 Mussolini, the Fascist dictator of Italy, was still angry with Hitler after he failed to inform the Italians beforehand of his plans to invade France and the low countries. This made Mussolini decide he was going to surprise Hitler and invade Greece without telling him. The Italian advance quickly bogged down and after a few weeks the Greeks had fought them back to their starting point. The British came to the aid of the Greeks and landed forces in, what Churchill always called, the soft underbelly of Europe.

This loss of face for the Axis powers could not be accepted by Hitler who ordered his generals to come up with a plan to secure his, now vulnerable, Southern flank. This meant that the Invasion of the Soviet union, that was supposed to be start in early spring, had to postponed to June 22nd. As it turned out, this delay proved fatal.


2. Nazi invasion of Russia

German troops on the move in Russian (Bundesarchiv)

Even though it was inconceivable that Nazi’s would not invade the Soviet Union, so was the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact which they signed on August 13th 1939. This non-aggression pact allowed Nazi Germany to invade Poland without having to worry about a possible war with the USSR. It even went so far that Poland was divided among the two and the part that the Soviets took in September 1939 has never been returned to Poland. It also gave the Soviets free reign in expanding its influence in the Eastern European countries and they lost no time in subjecting them to their rule.

The fact that the two sworn ideological enemies were willing to sign a non-aggression pact shook the world and allowed Nazi Germany the time to focus its attention on the west without having to fear a war on two fronts. Germany made the most of this freedom and, in quick succession, defeated Denmark, Norway, The Netherlands, Belgium and France. Only their planned invasion of the United Kingdom was thwarted by the Few of the Royal Air Force, the first setback for the Nazis. Deteriorating weather caused the invasion of Britain to be postponed indefinitely and Hitler once more turned to the East where, according to his book Mein Kampf, he believed the “Lebensraum” (living space) was which the Germans needed above all other things. However, this living space was occupied by the Russians which had now moved it’s western borders hundreds of kilometers closer to Nazi Germany as a result of the pact.

Unwilling to knock Britain out of the war first and thus faced with a war on two fronts, which Hitler had vowed to avoid at all costs, he invaded the Soviet Union. Hitler was confident the Soviet Union would be defeated in mere weeks and he is quoted as having said “We have only to kick in the door and the whole rotten structure will come crashing down”. However most of the first month, if not 6 weeks, was spent fighting a way through countries now occupied by the Soviet Union. These countries might otherwise have been ensnared into the Axis camp, as some were later to join, had it not been for the pact.

The extra territory gave the Soviets the ability to trade space for time and, with the extra delay caused by the invasion of Greece, meant that Nazi Germany could not complete it’s conquest in during the remaining period of good weather. The autumn rains rolled in and turned most of Russia in a quagmire of mud which made all movement virtually impossible. Then winter arrived early and with extreme cold for which the Germans were not equipped.

 

[third eye]

3. Attack on Pearl Harbor


Photograph taken from a Japanese plane during the torpedo attack on ships moored on both sides of Ford Island shortly after the beginning of the Pearl Harbor attack.


A history similar to the German attack on the Soviet Union, the Japanese wanted an empire of their own in order to secure the future prosperity of a country which they thought did not have enough natural resources to sustain the population. The Germans called it “Lebensraum”, the Japanese the “Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere”, it amounted to the same thing. Having occupied vast portions of China and a number of countries in East Asia the next step was to expand it’s empire east into the Pacific ocean. Their eye was on the prosperous and natural resources that were under the control of the British and Dutch empires and the American governed Philippines. However attacking these would cause the United States to join the war on the side of the allies.

America, on the other hand, had kept an eye on Japanese conquests and brutality and, short of war, did what they could to restrict them. In July 1941 they embargoed the export of oil to Japan which then calculated that, without acquiring the oil in the Dutch East Indies, they only had enough fuel for two years. They reasoned that now there would be no other option than going to war.


Realizing that they could not defeat the USA in direct battle they chose to deliver a crushing blow to the American fleet based at Pearl Harbor. This would give them time to complete their desired conquests and present the Americans with a “fait accompli”. They reasoned the Americans would not be willing to enter a protracted war with Japan and they would be able to make peace, keeping their vital conquests and handing back the less desirable places.

Fate, or bad Japanese intelligence, intervened on the Allied side on December 7th 1941 and the vital American Aircraft carriers were not in port when the Japanese struck Pearl Harbor. This meant the Americans were able to fight back causing the Japanese Admiral in charge of the attack to say (supposedly) “I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve.”.

4. No alliance between the Nazis, Spain and Turkey

One look on the map of Europe will show the strategic importance of both Spain and Turkey, however these two, were two of the few countries on the European mainland that remained neutral during the second world war.


Even though Spain remained neutral during the First World War it was expected they would come in on the side of the Axis after all the help Hitler had given General Franco in the Spanish Civil war. However, despite pleading and perhaps even begging, Franco remained adamant. He would not join the Axis and would not even allow the Germans to pass through his country (as the Swedes did).

Not being able to pass through Spain meant that Great Britain was secure in using it’s military base in Gibraltar. This not only effectively sealed off the entrance to the Mediterranean from Atlantic ocean for the German Navy, it also gave the British a location from which it could support Malta and Egypt. Possession of Malta meant the British could interdict shipping from Italy to North Africa. Possession of Egypt meant it could stop the Axis from linking up with their forces fighting in the Caucasus (Soviet Union) and taking the much needed oil fields in the middle east.

Turkey fought on the side of the Axis in the First World War yet declined to join them in the Second. This, again, meant the Germans could not link up with their forces in the Caucasus making the capture of Egypt paramount. In February 1945, Turkey joined the allies and declared war on, a virtually defeated Nazi Germany.

 

[Tipu7]

Only Worst Mistake which Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan did was lack of co ordination between them and lack of setting definite goals.
Instead of hitting China and South East Asia, Japan must have invaded Russia. With Japanese on one side and Germans on other side, Russians stood no chance of Survival.................
Allies return back to war only because of Germany beating in Stalingrad..............

 

[third eye]

Only Worst Mistake which Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan did was lack of co ordination between them and lack of setting definite goals.
Instead of hitting China and South East Asia, Japan must have invaded Russia. With Japanese on one side and Germans on other side, Russians stood no chance of Survival.................
Allies return back to war only because of Germany beating in Stalingrad..............

Japan had ( has ) no resources. It needed areas rich in oil , rubber , metals etc for its war making effort.

 

[Indus Pakistan]

(1) Have a Allies versus Axis football game in Berlin marked as "Euro 1940"
(2) Invite Allies to partake in Octoberfest with beer paid by Axis powers. Busty blondes are set loose in the party.
(3) Axis powers (read Germany) pays hefty grant to Allied countries in return for opening market to German cars.
(4) Axis convinces the Allies that the true bad guy's are Muslims and future migrants and not the Jews. Kristallnacht is organized where all across Alllied/Axis countries any Muslims are attacked and killed.

 

[Butchcassidy]

Hind sight is 20/20.
Attacking soviet union did not seem like a bad then

 

[somebozo]

What ever you say..Hitler was one brilliant politician...and his has some great strategist too! He met near failure on so many fronts..that it made him over confident and over stretched...

Only Worst Mistake which Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan did was lack of co ordination between them and lack of setting definite goals.
Instead of hitting China and South East Asia, Japan must have invaded Russia. With Japanese on one side and Germans on other side, Russians stood no chance of Survival.................
Allies return back to war only because of Germany beating in Stalingrad..............

Dont under estimate the Russian war machine either..they have defeated every European invader.

This is the integrity of government in Pakistan

Just last month, the FBR faced embarrassment when it raided the boutique run by a daughter of a former finance minister. Tax officials were beaten, kept in illegal custody for hours and released only after police came to their rescue. To date, the FBR has been unable to register an FIR against the woman. The boutique owner, however, maintains that the FBR officials have harassed her and behaved like ‘gangsters’

 

[All-Green]

Few come to my mind as well.

German Army's lack of initiative in cutting off and capturing the 330,000+ Allied troops (included 200,000+ British troops) in France (Dunkirk) was a major let off at the beginning of the war.
Interestingly, Hitler was perhaps always under the notion that he would manage some sort of peace agreement with Britain. I guess Churchill showed him the error of his ways!

The ill conceived Air offensive over Britain was also a major blow to the German war machine as the endurance of the German fighters was not up to the mark and Germany lost morale, pilots and planes in an offensive which did not yield much advantage.

Hitler's obsession with certain cities and territories cost his most brilliant generals the necessary flexibility to engage a much larger enemy in the east.
Field Marshall Erich Von Manstein is rated as one of the most strategically astute generals by his peers in World War 2. Time and again he saved the eastern front due to his sheer brilliance in anticipating enemy movements and ensuring that he was ready to counter at the right time. However, the flexible warfare which was his forte was time and again interrupted by Hitler who became more and more impatient as the war dragged on and was fixated on holding certain territories.
The defeat at Stalingrad was the most decisive loss for Axis forces in my opinion as a whole Army Group (B) ceased to exist. Here the German Army lost nearly 400,000+ German Troops and overall count for Axis Forces was close to a million.All this was due to Hitler's insistence at holding the symbolic city of Stalingrad against all the advice of his capable commanders.

Hitler's reluctance to relinquish command to a Commander In Chief is perhaps one of the biggest reasons of German defeat, there was no real long term planning being encouraged by Hitler and this resulted in a lot of confusion and divergent forces within a highly politicized war Machine. Goring was very close to Hitler due to his Nazi roots, practically treated the German Air force as his personal domain and was a big obstacle in terms of combined arms tactics.