Sir Basil H. Liddell Hart Quote

lljadw said:
The Soviets did not need the Volksarmee and did not trust the East Germans . US need the Bundeswehr but did not trust the West Germans .
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That's why Hans Speidel was the NATO commander of all ground forces in the CENTCOM between 1957-1963. NATO and the US didn't trust him. The Soviets needed the GDR to be faithful to communism even if they didn't trust them. That's why they used former wehrmacht officers and former nazi police officers to establish the East German security police (Stasi)
 
I3BrigPvSk said:
That's why Hans Speidel was the NATO commander of all ground forces in the CENTCOM between 1957-1963. NATO and the US didn't trust him. The Soviets needed the GDR to be faithful to communism even if they didn't trust them. That's why they used former wehrmacht officers and former nazi police officers to establish the East German security police (Stasi)
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The Germans did not receive nuclear weapons ,because US did not trust them .
The Soviets used former nazis for the Stasi,because they were short on capable candidates and because the nazis became enthusiastically communists .
Besides, NATO used also Gehlen, who during the war said : Heil mein Führer and after the war : long live democracy .
The Bundeswehr had ( and still has ) no chief of staff but only an inspector general with limited power, because no one trusted Heusinger ,his henchmen and his successors .Speidel betrayed Rommel to not be implicated in the conspiracy of the 20th July .
The Soviets did not trust,rightfully, the armies of the satellites,especially not the Volksarmee ;when the Soviets left the satellites, the communist system collapsed and the gauleiters disavowed Marx .
In 1956 the Polish army, the Polish communists and the Polish Cheka said no to the Kremlin, in 1968 Ceausescu refused to participate into the suppression of the Czech Spring,the Czech army accepted the liberalisation in CZ, the Hungarian army the liberalisation in Hungary .And let's not talk about Yugoslavia.
The Soviets knew that in a crisis they had only one ally : themselves .
 
lljadw said:
The Gloster Meteor did already active service in July 1944 and was as good or better than the Me 262
The Me 262 did active service not in April 1944 but in July 1944. Erprobungskommando is a test unit , not a combat unit .
And the Germans would be better off without the Me 262 .
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I have to agree with you regarding the ME262 and Gloster Meteor.
If my memory is correct the engines on the 262 required a major service every 12 to 24 hours and had a bad habit of catching fire, the Rolls Royce engines in the Meteor only needed a major service every 100 hours.

It doesnt matter that the Erprobungskommando is a test unit, the 262 still flew
 
lljadw said:
The Germans did not receive nuclear weapons ,because US did not trust them .
The Soviets used former nazis for the Stasi,because they were short on capable candidates and because the nazis became enthusiastically communists .
Besides, NATO used also Gehlen, who during the war said : Heil mein Führer and after the war : long live democracy .
The Bundeswehr had ( and still has ) no chief of staff but only an inspector general with limited power, because no one trusted Heusinger ,his henchmen and his successors .Speidel betrayed Rommel to not be implicated in the conspiracy of the 20th July .
The Soviets did not trust,rightfully, the armies of the satellites,especially not the Volksarmee ;when the Soviets left the satellites, the communist system collapsed and the gauleiters disavowed Marx .
In 1956 the Polish army, the Polish communists and the Polish Cheka said no to the Kremlin, in 1968 Ceausescu refused to participate into the suppression of the Czech Spring,the Czech army accepted the liberalisation in CZ, the Hungarian army the liberalisation in Hungary .And let's not talk about Yugoslavia.
The Soviets knew that in a crisis they had only one ally : themselves .
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Have you ever heard of the non proliferation treaty? The US didn't gave Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Holland, Norway, Italy and all the other NATO countries any nukes. Britain and France developed their own nukes. A lot of the other NATO countries could and still can produce their own nukes if they want to do that, but they have signed the NPT. Although, you said the US didn't trust the Germans, but they allowed their own forces to be under the command of Speidel.

I do agree with the Soviets didn't trust their WP allies if the cold war went hot. They needed to have the WP countries under strict political control.
 
I3BrigPvSk said:
Have you ever heard of the non proliferation treaty? The US didn't gave Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Holland, Norway, Italy and all the other NATO countries any nukes. Britain and France developed their own nukes. A lot of the other NATO countries could and still can produce their own nukes if they want to do that, but they have signed the NPT. Although, you said the US didn't trust the Germans, but they allowed their own forces to be under the command of Speidel.

I do agree with the Soviets didn't trust their WP allies if the cold war went hot. They needed to have the WP countries under strict political control.
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Speidel could command US soldiers,because the Bundeswehr had 12 divisions and the US only 6 , but Speidel never had any authority on the US nuclear weapons in Europe .
 
I3BrigPvSk said:
Have you ever heard of the non proliferation treaty? The US didn't gave Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Holland, Norway, Italy and all the other NATO countries any nukes. Britain and France developed their own nukes. A lot of the other NATO countries could and still can produce their own nukes if they want to do that, but they have signed the NPT. Although, you said the US didn't trust the Germans, but they allowed their own forces to be under the command of Speidel.

I do agree with the Soviets didn't trust their WP allies if the cold war went hot. They needed to have the WP countries under strict political control.
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Nato members did not sign the NPT.
 
lljadw said:
Nato members did not sign the NPT.
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Nato countries signed it

Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Iceland, Netherlands, Norway, United Kingdom, and the United States signed the NPT in 1968

Germany (both of them) signed it in 1969

France signed it in 1992. The majority of the former WP countries now members of NATO signed the treaty in either 1991 or 1992
 
lljadw said:
Speidel could command US soldiers,because the Bundeswehr had 12 divisions and the US only 6 , but Speidel never had any authority on the US nuclear weapons in Europe .
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Nuclear weapons can only be launched on the order of the US president, the British PM, or the French president. The French nukes aren't integrated in NATO's nuclear strategy
 
I3BrigPvSk said:
Nato countries signed it

Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Iceland, Netherlands, Norway, United Kingdom, and the United States signed the NPT in 1968

Germany (both of them) signed it in 1969

France signed it in 1992. The majority of the former WP countries now members of NATO signed the treaty in either 1991 or 1992
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But not before 1968 :Adenauer and Strauss wanted in 1960 nuclear weapons for the Bundeswehr under German command . But the US refused. Even tactical nuclear weapons were not allowed .
The reasons were
a the US did not trust Germans with nuclear weapons
b the other NATO members also were hostile
c nuclear weapons for Germany would be a threat for the US dominant position in Nato. Germany would no longer need the US.
d there would be a very harsh reaction from the Soviets .
The spectre of Auschwitz was still present .
 
Strauss and even Adenauer wanted to have an important and even independent role from the USA,and wanted thus to have nuclear weapons .
Strauss was eliminated in the Spiegel affair ,and Adenauer had to resign a year later . In the Spiegel affair, Adenauer wanted the arrest of Gehlen, who worked against Strauss,and every one knew that the BND was an extension of the CIA . A colonel of the BND was arrested, but Gehlen could get away with it .
20 years later,Paul Erdman wrote a fictional (?) book :The Last Days of America,where Strauss become Bundeskanzler,ordered to produce secretly nuclear weapons and missiles and made a treaty with the Soviets : both West and East Germany left Nato and Pact of Warsaw and US had to leave Europe .
Strauss was a dangerous person and was eliminated.
 
Konrad Adenauer was a pragmatic politician and was more interested in getting West Germany integrated into the European Coal and Steel Community and the West European Union. Adenauer really wanted to get the British into the ECSC and the WEU, nukes would have made all of it impossible. Adenauer was one of the German politicians building up West Germany from the ruins of the Second World War to be a very economically successful country, so after the war, they were and still are buying things instead of using military force.

There were concerns if the French nuclear weapon program could provoke West Germany or even cooperate with the French to get nukes. The French excluded the Germans and the Italians in their own weapon program. The US would have reacted differently to if they got indication of a German nuclear weapon program. They might have left Europe and it had been the end of NATO.

The bottom line is; it wasn't worth it for the Germans to get nukes. West Germany and later the reunified Germany is now integrated in the world community. Germany doesn't need nukes when they are under NATO's nuclear umbrella

We need to address how NATO perceive the nukes. NATO has always viewed them as a political tool as a deterrence. The nuclear powers don't give nuclear weapons to others, they keep them to themselves. Nukes aren't like tanks, aircrafts, ships, howitzers etc.
 
There was a lot of distrust and hostility between Adenauer and Kennedy . For Kennedy Adenauer was a relic of the Cold War .A Kalte Krieger .
Source : Adenauer and Kennedy:An Era of distrust in German-American Relations .
And, it is a fact that Adenauer and Strauss wanted nuclear weapons for the Bundeswehr .
 
While Eisenhower had no objections to a German nuclear weapons program, Kennedy told the British Secretary of Defense (Thorneycroft ) that a German nuclear weapons program would force US to leave Europe .
For Adenauer OTOH,in a world where only US and the USSR possessed nuclear weapons,Europe would no longer possess the ability to decide its own fate .
De Gaulle could have said the same .
 
lljadw said:
There was a lot of distrust and hostility between Adenauer and Kennedy . For Kennedy Adenauer was a relic of the Cold War .A Kalte Krieger .
Source : Adenauer and Kennedy:An Era of distrust in German-American Relations .
And, it is a fact that Adenauer and Strauss wanted nuclear weapons for the Bundeswehr .
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So why didn't West Germany get any? Because West Germany realized it wasn't worth it. They would suffer politically and economically if they walked down that path. Maybe even risk the existence of their own country. No other country had defended them if the Soviets had attacked them. Adenauer was an anti-communist, the price of getting nukes would increase the risk of letting his own country to be another communist country. Adenauer wanted to integrate West germany to other West European countries and to rebuild West Germany's reputation. The West German/German governments have in the post war world been successful with it.

So we can conclude, the dual German states used former wehrmacht officers to build up the dual German armed forces, despite you saying that wasn't the case. You claimed the NATO countries didn't signed the NPT, which they did. Even the WP countries signed it. You seem to view nukes as any other weapons, but they aren't.
 
What you or I think about nuclear weapons is irrelevant .
The facts are
1 That in 1960 Nato would lose a conventional war against the USSR (it had only 20 divisions ).
2 To prevent this, there was the American nuclear umbrella , but this umbrella had become worthless when the Soviets launched the Sputnik and could thus nuke the US if these would nuke the Soviet Union if it attacked Nato with conventional forces .
3 Nato had also plans to not nuke the USSR ,but to use its nuclear weapons against the Soviet forces that would invade West Germany, what would mean the end of Germany .
4 What Adenauer and Strauss wanted were nuclear weapons for West Germany that could destroy the USSR and thus prevent a conventional Soviet attack .
5 What they also wanted (and De Gaulle also ) was to become more independent from the US ( a lot of people considered Nato members as US satellites ).
6 Strauss was for the US more dangerous than Adenauer who was already 84 in 1960 ,especially if Strauss became German PM .
7 It was also public knowledge in Germany that Gehlen and his BND were arch enemies of Strauss (the chief of the BND in Hamburg was an informer of Der Spiegel,which every week attacked Strauss very harshly .
8 In 1960 most of the WM generals who had served in the Bundeswehr had retired ,they were older than 60 .Heusinger and Speidel were exceptions, besides Speidel had only a very minor role during the war and his career after the war was determined by the fact that he had been during a short time,chief of staff of Rommel,who in 1960 was venerated in Germany as a Saint,the good German and brilliant general .
 
lljadw said:
What you or I think about nuclear weapons is irrelevant .
The facts are
1 That in 1960 Nato would lose a conventional war against the USSR (it had only 20 divisions ).
2 To prevent this, there was the American nuclear umbrella , but this umbrella had become worthless when the Soviets launched the Sputnik and could thus nuke the US if these would nuke the Soviet Union if it attacked Nato with conventional forces .
3 Nato had also plans to not nuke the USSR ,but to use its nuclear weapons against the Soviet forces that would invade West Germany, what would mean the end of Germany .
4 What Adenauer and Strauss wanted were nuclear weapons for West Germany that could destroy the USSR and thus prevent a conventional Soviet attack .
5 What they also wanted (and De Gaulle also ) was to become more independent from the US ( a lot of people considered Nato members as US satellites ).
6 Strauss was for the US more dangerous than Adenauer who was already 84 in 1960 ,especially if Strauss became German PM .
7 It was also public knowledge in Germany that Gehlen and his BND were arch enemies of Strauss (the chief of the BND in Hamburg was an informer of Der Spiegel,which every week attacked Strauss very harshly .
8 In 1960 most of the WM generals who had served in the Bundeswehr had retired ,they were older than 60 .Heusinger and Speidel were exceptions, besides Speidel had only a very minor role during the war and his career after the war was determined by the fact that he had been during a short time,chief of staff of Rommel,who in 1960 was venerated in Germany as a Saint,the good German and brilliant general .
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You don't understand nuclear weapons aren't like conventional weapons, if you did you shouldn't have questioned why army group commanders in NATO don't have access to them. American nukes are under American control, British nukes are under British control, the French nukes are under French control. They don't "give" them to officers from other NATO countries

NATO should have lost a conventional war throughout the entire cold war because NATO implemented what they called the Forward Defense. It means all conventional NATO forces were close as possible to the inner German border and most likely it hadn't work if the WP attacked NATO. The nukes had and still have the purpose to deter WP during the cold war and later anybody else to attack a NATO country (Article 5) The nuclear umbrella still exist and it is part of the Atlantic Treaty. Your own country is part of that treaty so you should know about it, but you don't.

NATO's nuclear doctrine during the cold war was to prevent the Soviet second echelon, based in the western part of Soviet Union to participate in the attack on NATO. The American and the British nukes could have reached Soviet Union. The US had nukes in Turkey, they were removed after the Cuban missile crisis as a part of the deal between the US and the Soviet Union.
 
I3BrigPvSk said:
You don't understand nuclear weapons aren't like conventional weapons, if you did you shouldn't have questioned why army group commanders in NATO don't have access to them. American nukes are under American control, British nukes are under British control, the French nukes are under French control. They don't "give" them to officers from other NATO countries

NATO should have lost a conventional war throughout the entire cold war because NATO implemented what they called the Forward Defense. It means all conventional NATO forces were close as possible to the inner German border and most likely it hadn't work if the WP attacked NATO. The nukes had and still have the purpose to deter WP during the cold war and later anybody else to attack a NATO country (Article 5) The nuclear umbrella still exist and it is part of the Atlantic Treaty. Your own country is part of that treaty so you should know about it, but you don't.

NATO's nuclear doctrine during the cold war was to prevent the Soviet second echelon, based in the western part of Soviet Union to participate in the attack on NATO. The American and the British nukes could have reached Soviet Union. The US had nukes in Turkey, they were removed after the Cuban missile crisis as a part of the deal between the US and the Soviet Union.
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Again, what you think about nuclear weapons is irrelevant .
Nato strategy was ,till 1960,if they would lose a conventional war, and even,if they did not, to fight a nuclear war in Europe that would destroy Germany .
The nuclear umbrella became bluff in 1957 .
And,after the election of Kennedy, the leaders of West Germany no longer trusted the US and wanted their own nuclear umbrella .The protagonists of this policy were eliminated in the Spiegel Affair,where the BND ,who worked closely with the CIA,worked together with Der Spiegel against Adenauer and Strauss.
Given the countless interventions from the CIA in enemy, neutral and allied countries before and after the Spiegel Affair,it is obvious that Washington ordered to eliminate these two dangerous Germans .
It was all bad enough for Washington that France was making its own nuclear weapons and ceased to be a willing satellite,Germany with nuclear weapons would result the end of Nato and US withdrawal from Europe .
 
I3BrigPvSk said:
You don't understand nuclear weapons aren't like conventional weapons, if you did you shouldn't have questioned why army group commanders in NATO don't have access to them. American nukes are under American control, British nukes are under British control, the French nukes are under French control. They don't "give" them to officers from other NATO countries

NATO should have lost a conventional war throughout the entire cold war because NATO implemented what they called the Forward Defense. It means all conventional NATO forces were close as possible to the inner German border and most likely it hadn't work if the WP attacked NATO. The nukes had and still have the purpose to deter WP during the cold war and later anybody else to attack a NATO country (Article 5) The nuclear umbrella still exist and it is part of the Atlantic Treaty. Your own country is part of that treaty so you should know about it, but you don't.
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The nuclear umbrella ceased to exist in 1957 ,when the Soviets could reply by nuking American cities .Thus, why should US nuke Moscow if the Soviets started a conventional war in Europe ? The Soviets would nuke Detroit, Chicago, DC ,....
 
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