This all makes sense to me, what I am trying to square is what’s the thinking in Berlin while all this is going on? Why do they make the choices they do? With the benefit of hindsight, why would Hitler ever even consider getting on Britain or France’s bad side? We know Hitler wanted his Lebensraum to the east, it seems like it would be straightforward to just hash that out with the eventual “Allies”?
The best answer I have is, Germany and the US/UK/France ultimately were never on the same page. I think the Allies wanted Germany to invade the USSR, but kind of in the way they want the Ukraine/Russia war in the present to grind on as long as possible. They wanted to use Germany to wear down the USSR. Best case scenario for them is for both Germany and the USSR to essentially destroy each other, so you eventually get two weakened states beholden to western hegemony.
That said, I can’t help but wonder how much the irrationality of fascism comes into play here. And I hate to ascribe irrational motives to anyone, even fascists… I have a hard time with any other explanation for a lot of the diplomatic and foreign policy choices the Nazis made.
Keep in mind the French government was going through a shitload of changes at this time. They collapsed mid-crisis more or less and significant changes occurred. The Germanys couldn't be guaranteed who they would be negotiating with. The British also had internal strife from people like Churchill which made it more difficult at times for Chamberlain to pressure the French.
This is on top of the populations being far and away pro an alliance with the USSR. So Germany can't trust that Britain can fully just control French policy, or at least is not privy to how cucked the French really were to Britain and so worried immensely about the French government's gestures towards the Soviets. Remember things got so far as Romania offering the Soviets their airspace to protect Czechoslovakia. Germany could've been dealing with a real alliance any second now as far as they knew. They picked what is called the phony war over risking that
This all makes sense to me, what I am trying to square is what’s the thinking in Berlin while all this is going on? Why do they make the choices they do? With the benefit of hindsight, why would Hitler ever even consider getting on Britain or France’s bad side? We know Hitler wanted his Lebensraum to the east, it seems like it would be straightforward to just hash that out with the eventual “Allies”?
The best answer I have is, Germany and the US/UK/France ultimately were never on the same page. I think the Allies wanted Germany to invade the USSR, but kind of in the way they want the Ukraine/Russia war in the present to grind on as long as possible. They wanted to use Germany to wear down the USSR. Best case scenario for them is for both Germany and the USSR to essentially destroy each other, so you eventually get two weakened states beholden to western hegemony.
That said, I can’t help but wonder how much the irrationality of fascism comes into play here. And I hate to ascribe irrational motives to anyone, even fascists… I have a hard time with any other explanation for a lot of the diplomatic and foreign policy choices the Nazis made.
Keep in mind the French government was going through a shitload of changes at this time. They collapsed mid-crisis more or less and significant changes occurred. The Germanys couldn't be guaranteed who they would be negotiating with. The British also had internal strife from people like Churchill which made it more difficult at times for Chamberlain to pressure the French.
This is on top of the populations being far and away pro an alliance with the USSR. So Germany can't trust that Britain can fully just control French policy, or at least is not privy to how cucked the French really were to Britain and so worried immensely about the French government's gestures towards the Soviets. Remember things got so far as Romania offering the Soviets their airspace to protect Czechoslovakia. Germany could've been dealing with a real alliance any second now as far as they knew. They picked what is called the phony war over risking that