It’s nearly impossible to imagine the world today had WWII not happened, as it was the touchstone of development for the next century. Technologically, it was a turbo-boost. Internally, migration patterns not just of rural to urban but of the increased black diapora north to cities like Chicago, Detroit, etc. Certainly Zionism as a philosophy was established prior to the war but it was propelled in force by the experience of the Holocaust. Israel probably wouldn’t be what it is today, and Middle East might have had quite a different course. Russia, or more accurately the USSR, certainly would not have accelerated technologically as much as they had by the end of the war, and who knows if Stalin could have survived without the war - the German invasion, particularly in its brutal execution, galvanized the USSR and shored up support for Stalin. The European nations would have remained stronger, with empires intact and viable far longer, and the power - economic and military - would not have shifted so profoundly to the US. Remember, the US military prior to the war was relatively small and thin. It would have been a much more multi-polar world politically, economically and militarily…probably thus would have led to a few more wars of competition between various players. It almost certainly wouldn’t have been as much an “American Century”, if at all. The war changed that forever. Much of Europe was a wreck after the war, and people in India, Africa and Asia experiencing the weakness of western colonial powers like Britain, France and the Dutch during the war definitely accelerated the colonial breakdown.
I think railroads, perhaps one of the lesser affected areas if WWII didn’t happen.
But then again, so much for counter-factual history! What if… [;)]
The one thing I dislike about “what if” history, is that sometimes crucial facts and events are igonored, or minimized. Don’t forget World War I. Going through history, WWI was the impetus for WWII in Europe. The “Great War” was destructive not only to the nations involved, but the economies as well. In order for Hitler to not have come to power would have meant that either Germany won WWI, or was defeated but was able to negotiate a more favorable peace that would have left the Kaiser on his throne, and the House of Hohenzollern in order.
But that didn’t happen. You cannot discount the events of the early part of the century before World War II. Discounting them, or ignoring them then leaves holes in the “No WWII” theories. World War I grew out of the arms race, and the seething tension between Germany and France over France’s humiliation in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870. The Continental Arms Race was in full swing starting about 1898, with the passage of the Navy Bills in the German Reichstag. Germany was bent on designing and building a navy that could challenge the British on the open sea. Lenin called Europe “A powder keg” in 1902, and all it needed was a spark. That spark came in 1914 with the assassination of Archduke Franz Joseph of the Austro Hungarian empire.
If WWI had ended in less than a humiliating defeat for Germany, then Hitler would have been reduced to a blabbering Socialist, along with a few others. If that had been the case, then the 20’s, 30’s and 40’s would have been far more peaceful, maybe. Who knows how many other “small wars” between say, France and Germany, Italy and Austria, or the like would have happened. It is true WWII is what revved up the technology boom of the postwar period, in addition to the other “booms” that went on. The Russian Revolution probably would have been po
Quite correct, and to go even further, the flashpoint for WWI actually came from the Turkish conquest of the Balkans. The assassin of the Archduke, some bonehead named Princip as I recall (a Bosnian Serb), had grown-up with tales of daring-do of his ancestors fighting a guerilla war against the Turks. He and his unemployed cohorts had no Muslim Turks left to fight, so the next best thing were the Catholic Austrians, and it all hit the fan from there.
And just to tie my comments back to railroading, I believe the Archduke and his wife both travelled to Sarajevo by train. [;)]
But I base my hypothesis upon the provisions of the 1917 Balfour Declaration, and the fact that even with that in place, the creation never gained much traction until after the post WWII sympathies brewed a sense of urgency. In fact, if you look at one particular provision of the original text of the declaration, where it reads "it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine "
I attribute the afore mentioned sympathies to the near total disregard for that stipulation in the way the cards ultimately fell when Israel was created in 1948.
Said sympathies were the catalyst that made it happen.
I’d have to disagree with you on that point. The atomic bomb was developed under great pressure and expense because of the war. Without the war, it’s hard to conceive putting that much time, effort, and money into it’s development.
As I recall, a big factor in speeding up postwar dieselization was escalating coal prices, due to demands by labor for higher wages, brought on, no doubt, by the economic conditions of the war. Perhaps, without the war, steam would have retained it’s advantage? The folks at ALCO seemed to have believed it would work out that way.
I wonder if Alco would have perhaps failed sooner if not for those phat war time contracts? (Alco armor , etc)
The war time traffic boost seemed to breath new life into some withering roads, freightwise.
And I seem to recall that passenger ridership was in steep decline before the war, only to pick up for the duration. So it’s plausible to consider that passenger rail might have died an even earlier demise, if not for the war.
Since I’m not a geo-political authority I’ll confine my remarks to what might of happened to the railroads if the war hadn’t have occurred. Because of the Depression many railroads were baxket cases living on borrowed time by the late 30’s. Many if not most were bankrupt and hadn’t had the funds to invest in keeping up their ROW’s, motive power and rolling stock since the pre-1929 years much less to invest in modernization. The WW2 traffic boom was a fininacial windfall that enabled them to invest heavily in modernization in the post war years. Without these wartime profits I think a growing number of railroads would have gone belly up in the 40’s very possibly resulting in the government nationalizing the entire rail system.
The decline in both the frequency and quality of rail service would have given added impetus to highway construction and the shift from rail to auto and truck transport. WW2 staved this off until the early to mid 50’s. Airline service would have grown much more slowly lacking the advances in aviation that were an outgrowth of research and development for military purposes.
Dieselization would have progressed slowly and Alco, Baldwin and Lima would have raced to produce a new generation of steam locomotives that incorporated technical advances such as those pioneered by Porta. Their incentive would be to increase sales by making engines that were far more efficient and less costly to operate and maintain than the 1920’s engines in gereral use in pre-war times.
In short, WW2 gave railroads a new lease on life and enabled them to survive and once again become the vital transportation arteries that they are today.
Ben Gurion offered all Arabs within Israel citizenship, and many did stay and received citizenship, and their rights are not compromised in any way. They vote in Israeli elections, are represented in the Knesset, and share in all pension and other citizenship rights. King Feisel, who was murdered much later by people presumed by many to be Saudi agents, told the League of Nations that he welcomed Jewish immigration and gave the specific reasons. Then the League of Nations gave Britain the Mandate to provide a Jewish National Home, and then broke off 2/3rds to give the Heshemite Kings, who may have been rightful rulers of Saudi Arabia, a kingdom, then named Transjordan. The Jewish population of the Holy Land was about 50,000 and the Arab population about 70,000, but Jews had been a majority in Jerualem for a long time, ever since census has been established by the Turks. More Arabs entered the Holy Land during the Mandate because the British Colonel Office was basically anti-Semitic, undermined the Balfour Declaration, and restricted Jewish immigration, and Arabs from the surrounding countries were attracted by the economic improvements Jewish immigration brought. Ben Gurion set the basic policy for the Zionists “Help the British win the war against the Axis as if they were helping settle the land, and fight the British as much as possible to facilitate immigration as if there were no Axis.” A rather Schizophrenic policy, but I guess the only realistic one. But perhaps if there had been no WWII, the local Arabs and Zionists would have combined to fight the British and get an independent state, again assuming that Saudi Arabia had not had the wealth and ability to spread is virulent hatred of non-Muslims throughout the Islamic world.
Anyone who wishes evidence in this matter may contact me at my email address:
Hard to say, since both our space program, and that of the Soviets benefited greatly from the German rocket programs, and their wartime rocketry research. Both the U.S. and the Soviets managed to get many of the high ranking German scientists from the V-1 and V-2 weapons programs to work with them, or for them, to develop not only rockets for space exploration, but for ballistic missle use as well.
I think that the space programs probably would not have been started until the 1970’s at least…
When I worked for EMD, the summer of 1952, an ex-German Rocket scientist named Rudy was one of my best friends. My first personal wheels came over a year later, so Rudy would pick me up a the La Grange - La Grange Road station and drive me to the plant and return me there in the evening. He was an expert on diesel fuel combustion. I worked purely in electrical controls.
Except, of course, those who fell victim to the “Absentee Property Law of 1950”, the “Land Acquisition law of 1953”, those who lost their homestead to creative employ of Israel’s “Closed Military Zone” mechanism of property seizure, …and then there was curfew, expulsion, and administrative detentions to reel in those belligerent enough to belive they were going to preserve their native culture within their new enviro.
This is antagonistic and way off topic. Aside from representing a false implication nearly libelous on its face.
Under the Land Acquisition Law of 1953, land could be taken only under certain conditions:
(1) that on the 6th Nisan, 5712 (1st April, 1952) it was not in the possession of its owners; and
(2) that within the period between the 5th Iyar, 5708 (14th May, 1948) and the 6th Nisan, 5712 (Ist April 1952) it was used or assigned for purposes of essential development, settlement or security; and
(3) that it was still required for any of those purposes
The owners of acquired property were entitled to compensation therefore from the Development Authority. The compensation was to be given in money, unless otherwise agreed between the owners and the Development Authority. Compensation was fixed by agreement between the Development Authority and the owners or, in the absence of an agreement, by the Courts.
The Act further stated in the event the lands taken were agricultural lands which had formed the absentee owner’s main source of livelihood, agricultural lands elsewhere would be found at Government expense and offered.
I find it not just ironic but maliciously hypocritical that people will lecture o
A related “what if” would be what if the US did not get involved in WW1?
Some of the negative effects on RR’s included an almost doubling of costs between 1917 and 1920 with rates pretty much frozen at pre-1917 levels (especially bad for urban transit). Then there was the USRA mess caused in part by the draft taking up a lot of RR workers - and the impetus it gave to the trucking companies.
The US economy might have been on a more even keel in the 1920’s not having to deal with the let-down from war spending after 1920 (and the great let-down in naval construction after the Washington Treaty). Another major difference is the economy may have avoided the aftershock of the Great Influenza (AKA Spanish Flu) - which would have probably stayed in western Kansas ahd it not been for the massive mobilization - which ocurred under ideal conditions for transmitting flu viruses (cold and dry).
Michael, I appreciate your help. Again, may I ask that anyone wishing to challange me on any of the points regarding Near East politics and interpeople relations do so by emailing me at:
and not repeatedly use this forum for a purpose not intended by the vast majority of its users.
All these points raised can be answered. Even Warsaw Ghetto Partisan survivors, would never have (1) gone into German schoolyards to wreak injury and death or (2) used children as camoughflage for automatic weapons or (3) ambulances as ammunition carriers. Obama did state before a Jewish audience: “The problem in the Mideast is Islamic Fundamentalism and not Jewish occupation of Arab Lands.” I hope he has the courage to say it to everyone, not just Jews. (I am waiting to hear anything like this from the other two frontrunners.) Incidentally, I do hope the IC-EJ&E merger does go through and hope that some mitigation of noise and traffic will be enough to make everyone happy.