The "Balance of Power" Argument for Going to War with Nazi Germany

The West was not Afraid of a German Hegemon

So the first thing to consider regarding the necessity of war with Nazi Germany, is the question of whether the regime was actually a plausible threat. This is the “balance of power” argument.

This is the argument that Germany must be defeated in the 1930s lest she become too powerful.

I’ll divide this into “escalatory power” and “operational power”. Escalatory power is population, war-relevant resources and

=== Escalatory Power ===

So a quick pinch test on this would be to compare the German Empire in 1914 to Germany in 1936-1939, just in terms of geographic footprint. These are made using the HOI4 province map, so like not “real professional history” or whatever, but it’s quick and convenient and works fine.

Europe 1914, in lighter grey showing the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which was an ally but also economically interdependent with Germany.

The two states were joined at the hip and operated as one. The grey area gives one an idea of what a chonky boy the two German states were, and this was nearly balanced by the British Empire, France, Italy and Russia, even with the Ottomans joining the German states.

As it turned out, a revolution in Russia ended up disrupting this balance, and the United States ended up being required to prevent a German victory. But that was after 3 years of war - the key takeaway is that in this situation, the powers were nearly balanced. Germany, even at this tremendous size in 1914, was NOT hegemonic.

Okay, so lets take a look at the Germany which was a terrifying threat in 1936:

With the benefit of hindsight, sure, we know this Germany actually ended up being more scary, but that was down to specific early victories as a result of an early war operational advantage. Nazi Germany had weaker “bones” than Imperial Germany.

But in terms of escalatory dominance and who appeared to be a threat of becoming a hegemon, it’s clear that 1914 Germany was far more substantial. And yet we know that the situation in 1914 was actually balanced.

In both instances Italy is being treated as a wildcard.

Next lets compare populations of the two coalitions:

I’m only counting the Ethnic Rus, based on the 1897 census, and assuming the proportions are stable in the Russian Empire to 1914, and the UK includes Canada, Australia, New Zealand. None of this includes what usable manpower could be gleaned from overseas imperial holdings, particularly by the UK.

The German states had 61.67% of the “fighting population” of the starting coalition arrayed against them.

What does this look like in 1936?

In 1936, the likely starting coalition had 64.48% of the “fighting population” of the likely starting coalition arrayed against them. In 1936, Poland and Hungary were still unaligned, but by mid-1939 both had aligned.

Also included are the populations of various Asian states, for whatever they might mean.

So one could say the situation was similar in 1936 as 1914 in terms of “core population” ratios, which seem a good indicator of fighting power of a state, especially when industrial output can be dispersed among an alliance, as there are diminishing returns to industrial power. For navies, industrial output is certainly closer to being 1:1 with actual fighting power (Japan was in the WORST possible fight: a naval war with the United States).

But the situation is really worse, as even though the USSR was not part of the starting coalition against Germany in the way Russia was in 1914, there was only one side it could end up on for religious and geographic reasons. By not differentiating ethnic Russians, I am counting the USSR with nearly double the effective population of Imperial Russia, but I believe this is appropriate as the state religion of the USSR was more universalist and they more effectively utilized non-Russians than Imperial Russia did. (I understand there is a debate regarding how the state religion of the USSR crippled operational efficiency, and I lean toward the idea that it did, however the USSR state religion undeniably raised the “escalatory potential” of the area.)

So while the USSR was not in the starting coalition against Germany, likely due to Stalin’s “icebreaker” grand strategy, which ended up sort-of working though not in the way he expected, there was only one side the USSR would enter in on.

In hindsight, we know Italy joined the Anti-Comintern Pact, but this was by no means guaranteed at the time, and Italy did not join until after “sickle cut” was clearly successful.

Next, we should consider industrial output. This is obviously important, especially in regards to air and naval power, but difficult to measure. I’m of the opinion that population is MORE important when comparing European states in a land war, since population will dictate war production somewhat independent of pre-war industrial output the longer the war goes on, as well as dictating the number of infantry. And if you’re in a coalition with the United States, getting access to US industrial output can nullify the weakness of your own industrial output (see China, and also the USSR, though the USSR definitely wasn’t industrially weak, the US’ absurd industry meant even a state like the USSR benefited).

We can also look at some GNP numbers, which are informative, but by no means should be taken as some absolute indicator of real war-relevant industrial output. On the left are number from 1913, on the right from 1938. Again, Canada, Australia and New Zealand are lumped in with UK. These are in constant 1960 dollars.

The basis is Bairoch, but the values for the US and Canada/Australia/NZ are inferred from Maddison 2007, and the ratios there were multiplied off of the UK value as I assume the UK being the most analogous country in Bairoch’s dataset to the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

In 1913, the German states were 55.48% of the GNP of the starting coalition excluding Serbia and whatever value the overseas empires of France and Britain provided, and in 1938 it was 62.76% of the presumable starting coalition.

However, if the USSR entered in 1938, and Poland were defeated, this ratio changes to 42.91%. The USSR, in 1938, presumably being “closer to the starting coalition” than the United States.

These are more appropriate when comparing states within Europe. China for example, even at this time, had a GNP twice that of Japan, to which the Japanese said “cool story bro”.

All of which is to say, the German States and Hungary were not any greater of an escalatory threat in 1938 than the German states in 1914 were, and when the USSR is factored as a likely member of the anti-German coalition, these states are clearly far LESS of an escalatory threat than the German states of 1914 were.

In addition, the United States went from 2.29 times the GNP of the UK in 1913 to 4.05 times the GNP of the UK in 1938, creating a greater “safety net” should the UK seek a war with Germany, and that war somehow started to go badly.

The fact that Germany was not an escalatory threat to the “Atlantic pseudo-alliance” of the UK, US and France, was borne out by events both times, as Germany never threatened to defeat the Atlantic bloc in either war.

In fact, the German states came closer to defeating the opposing coalition in 1917 than in 1942, as Russia had been removed, Italy effectively contained, and France, by all accounts, considered to be doomed without the arrival of US support.

Had France been knocked out in 1917, consensus is that Italy would have negotiated peace, at which point the US and UK would have been driven off the continent without a Russian front, and politics likely mitigating against any attempt by the US and UK to continue the war in that situation.

https://library.lol/main/61BD61A33C3A4338C9BFA36592440C2D
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_regions_by_past_GDP_(PPP)#1830%E2%80%931938_(Bairoch)

=== Operational Power ===

The second sub-argument for the “balance of power” rationale for starting the war against Germany over Danzig, and which on the surface appears more plausible, is the operational threat of Germany.

Clearly, during the “Great War”, the German States “punched above their weight” on the battlefield (including the Hapsburgs as the war went on, despite their early incompetence), and so ended up being a greater threat in real terms than their pre-war population and industrial output would suggest.

The problem is that this argument relies on hindsight. Yes, as it turned out, the early operational advantage of the Germans was far greater in 1939 than it was in 1914, but this was by no means obvious when simply looking at the correlation of forces in 1939.

France

1,114 Fighters
1,002 Bombers
800 Support / Scout Aircraft
11,000 Artillery Pieces
48,337 tons of viable tanks
99 Infantry Divisions of ~10,000 fighting troops each

UK

747 Fighters
871 Bombers
293 Support / Scout Aircraft
2,600 Artillery Pieces
7,605 tons of viable tanks
25 Infantry divisions of 13,600 fighting troops each
1 Armored division of 104 tanks

Poland

159 Fighters
154 Bombers
120 Support / Scout Aircraft
~3,500 Artillery Pieces
4,430 tons of viable tanks
39 divisions of 16,492 fighting troops each
11 Cavalry “Brigades” of 7,184 fighting troops each

Germany

1,320 Fighters
1,605 Bombers
1,035 Support / Scout Aircraft
~7,000 Artillery Pieces
28,849 tons of viable tanks
87 Infantry divisions of 16,500 fighting troops each
4 Motorized divisions of 16,500 fighting troops each
3 Mountain divisions of 13,056 fighting troops each
5 Armored divisions of 11,800 fighting troops each
4 “Light” divisions of 10,800 fighting troops each

So here we have those ratios between the starting coalition and Germany. You tell me, just looking at this, who looks more prepared for war? We’re not even considering the potential of the USSR.

Nor are we considering the additional combat forces Germany would likely have to deal with against Belgium if Germany attacked that way (It wasn’t clear that Germany would also attack through Holland).

“German equipment in 1939 was more modern, and this was especially important for fighter aircraft” - Cool hindsight bro.

In 2022, NATO equipment was supposed to be better than Russian equipment. While the fog of war is still very thick at the time of this writing, the relative silence regarding the performance of what were once hailed as NATO wonder weapons suggests that this is not true. That would be an example of expectations regarding equipment being incorrect that you, the reader, have likely lived through.

“Poland was going to fall quickly, so the value of their numbers should be heavily discounted” - Cool hindsight bro.

Poland of course did fall surprisingly quickly (consider how long Serbia held out in WW1), and the French army rapidly ballooned to match German infantry numbers, but this is just a snapshot of the situation in August-September 1939.

By all outward appearances, most considered that Germany would be contained by this starting coalition, and would not have predicted that Germany would succeed in mostly defeating this “first coalition” and expand the Anti-Comintern pact to Italy, Romania and Bulgaria along with Hungary, and that the bulk of the war effort in manpower and industrial terms would come from the United States and the USSR.

The point here is that there was no honest fear of Hitler, and the decision to go to war with Hitler in April of 1939 by the war party in Britain (Henderson, Halifax, Churchill) was probably not motivated by concerns that Germany would become a hegemon.

https://www.ww2-weapons.com/british-and-empire-armies-1939/
https://www.ww2-weapons.com/french-armed-forces-1939/
https://www.ww2-weapons.com/luftwaffe-orders-of-battle-september-2-1939/
https://www.ww2-weapons.com/polish-armed-forces/
https://www.ww2-weapons.com/german-orders-of-battle-for-september-1-1939/