How Hitler Could Have Won World War II The Fatal Errors That Led to Nazi Defeat

Most of us rally around the glory of the Allies' victory over the Nazis in World War II. The story is often told of how the good fight was won by an astonishing array of manpower and stunning tactics. However, what is often overlooked is how the intersection between Adolf Hitler's influential personality and his military strategy was critical in causing Germany to lose the war.With an acute eye for detail and his use of clear prose, acclaimed military historian Bevin Alexander goes beyond counterfactual "What if?" history and explores for the first time just how close the Allies were to losing the war. Using beautifully detailed, newly designed maps, How Hitler Could Have Won World War II exquisitely illustrates the important battles and how certain key movements and mistakes by Germany were crucial in determining the war's outcome. Alexander's harrowing study shows how only minor tactical changes in Hitler's military approach could have changed the world we live in today. How Hitler Could Have Won World War II untangles some of the war's most confounding strategic questions, such as: Why didn't the Nazis concentrate their enormous military power on the only three beaches upon which the Allies could launch their attack into Europe? Why did the terrifying German panzers, on the brink of driving the British army into the sea in May 1940, halt their advance and allow the British to regroup and evacuate at Dunkirk?With the chance to cut off the Soviet lifeline of oil, and therefore any hope of Allied victory from the east, why did Hitler insist on dividing and weakening his army, which ultimately led to the horrible battle of Stalingrad?Ultimately, Alexander probes deeply into the crucial intersection between Hitler's psyche and military strategy and how his paranoia fatally overwhelmed his acute political shrewdness to answer the most terrifying question: Just how close were the Nazis to victory? Why did Hitler insist on terror bombing London in the late summer of 1940, when the German air force was on the verge of destroying all of the RAF sector stations, England's last defense?With the opportunity to drive the British out of Egypt and the Suez Canal and occupy all of the Middle East, therefore opening a Nazi door to the vast oil resources of the region, why did Hitler fail to move in just a few panzer divisions to handle such an easy but crucial maneuver?On the verge of a last monumental effort and concentration of German power to seize Moscow and end Stalin's grip over the Eastern front, why did the Nazis divert their strength to bring about the far less important surrender of Kiev, thereby destroying any chance of ever conquering the Soviets? "Bevin Alexander, an experienced military historian who writes with clarity and alarm, here presents a new and insightful interpretation of Hitler's lost opportunities to win World War II. In the process Alexander gives us a concise history of the war in Europe."-- Martin Blumenson, author of The Patton Papers and Patton: The Man Behind the Legend"In his latest book, How Hitler Could Have Won World War II, author Bevin Alexander has synthesized and analyzed the military campaigns by Germany under Hitler's control in such a readable fashion as to intrigue both armchair generals as well as serious students of military strategy and tactics. It should be a required text for study at all military schools and war colleges."-- Thomas H. Moorer, Admiral, U.S. Navy (Ret.), former chairman, U.S. Joint chiefs of Staff"Speculation is the handmaiden of a historian's search for a story of the past.... Bevin Alexander has compiled his 'What if?'s' into a fascinating, plausible and, in retrospect, alarming scenario of what might have been if only Hitler had been a bit more rational, a bit better at grand strategy."-- F. J. Kroesen, former commander-in-chief, U.S. Army-Europe, and commander, NATO Central Army Group

Bevin Alexander is the author of five books of military history, including Lost Victories, which was named by the Civil War Book Review as one of the seventeen books that has most transformed Civil War scholarship. His battle studies of the Korean War, written during his decorated service as a combat historian, are stored at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. He lives in Bremo Bluff, Virginia.


From the Hardcover edition.