The Beginning of the End for the Reich.

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Eventually, maybe, but remember, Hitler's attack took Stalin completely by surprise.  It took him some time to actually believe the reports of the attacks.  remember that Hitler was not the only party to invade Poland.

Pearl Harbour was the real beginning of the end for the Reich, had the Japs not awakened the "sleeping giant" I think I could easily have been born into an entirely different europe, a German one.

Just my £0.02, not backed up by anything resembling fact! 

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Honestly, by 1941, I think it was just a matter of time.  For all practical purposes, the US and Germany were fighting in the North Atlantic.

There is some truth in every post. As Felix indicates, the U.S. was already greatly involved. In that respect, Britain didn't totally lose out in resources when it lost 13 of its colonies at the end of the 18th century. Over a century later, long before its own official declarations of war, the resultant country was supplying Britain with not only resources but manufactured equipment.

and the coldest winter in russia in the last 100 years did help a bit too

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WTF? If any country contributed to a big degree to the decimation to the german ground forces it was Russia.

And an invasion of Europe would have become nearly impossible.

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When they joined in they did play a massive role. However I believe ultimately the result would have been the same.

I suppose the UK and occupied Europe did not appreciate the thought of joining their enemy in this endeavor.

The Soviet Union was an Ally because it fought Germany.  The mindset was, "We will deal with that communism/world domination thing after the war" - but we didn't, leading to a 40 year cold war.

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Not all the Germans. And this "teaming up with the Reich against Russia" feeling also came from the island.

For one thing, Hitler noted the "English" relationship to its Germanic (Anglo-Saxon) origins -- not that Russia was totally void of it.
As already stated, the U.S. was already involved in the war, the major Allied supplier. Germany could not compete with this: even supplies in the areas Germany was taking over were being decimated in the process.
Hitler well knew that Germany's most notable allies (Soviet Union and Italy) were under the leadership of world-power-wanna-be's.
Italy wasn't seen as much of an actual future threat to Germany or the world (many Italians were not supporters of their own leader -- even fewer after his 'partnership' with Hitler, a partnership that committed extra German forces/supplies to areas where they weren't originally intended to go).
Hitler's view of Stalin and the Soviet Union was quite different.  The Soviet Union was definately a future threat. While Germany's resources were totally committed to -- and drained by-- a continuing war, the Soviets could continue to build and refine their resources under a leader who would never remain subservient to anyone else.
Also, Hitler was already planning for open war with the United States. He couldn't maintain world control with two huge, unsubjugated lumps in it (U.S. and U.S.S.R.); with the U.K. (Canada, Australia... all combined ) remaining in the equation, certainly not.
Unable to take the U.K. out of it by force, attempting to ally it -- at least for the time being -- was an alternative by which he might at least take out one definite, major threat.

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Um, like designing an "Amerika Bomber" just for the fun of it (that wouldn't have given us a "wake-up"?); this was begun well before the BoB had even begun. His original thought seems to have been that he could overwhelm the UK home island and the rest of the UK would dissolve or fall in line -- there was no way to maintain any objective with the UK against him.

Sorry -- there's more but have to quit.

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It was actually his own objective. But since France and Britain protected Poland and joined the war, he had to fight them, although I think that France had to be overrun nonetheless, due to Versailles. If he had really planned to attack Britain, he would have ordered his Generals to prepare for an invasion way earlier, and not two months before the BoB.

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I don't think so. The so-called "Amerika bomber" was either planned in the case that the US joined the war in Europe later on, or research on this bomber had begun in 1942 and not earlier.

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Well, they made a nice impression with things like the "buzz-bombs" and the V-2. If they could have gotten the V-4 into service, and fired a few of them in the direction of New York, it would have certainly made an impression on the US.

The only mainland territory of America to be invaded during World War II were the rather small Aleutian Islands by Japanese forces.  This by a force experienced in amphibious invasions, and more than proficient in defense (Later to be demonstrated at Okinawa and Iwo Jima).  I don't know the specifics, but the distance Japan had to travel is nothing foreign to them if past campaigns are of any measure.  Granted, the Japanese were not replused, but rather willingly pulled out.
  As Hagar points out, the Germans faced the ever more frustrating prospect of crossing the Channel, and would have the utmost difficulty in ever doing so.  Somehow reaching North America would be a daunting prospect.  Unless they could somehow launch from Japan, but then logistics would be just as problematic.  How Germany could succeed where Japan fell short in it's own game is beyond my comprehension.
  It's unlikely Hitler truly even wanted to concern himself with America from the start.

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If it wasn't for the Channel, Britain would have fallen as easily as the Low Countries in 1940. The only defense there was was the RAF...which was almost wiped out by September 1940.

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The russian government did to their soldiers what the nazi government did to theirs, namely filling them with hate against the other side, hence the raping and pillaging and stuff. But the russians did all that on a larger scale than the german soldiers.

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Were not. They were more or less a better option for PoW candidates.

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No, they wipe out entire cities with bombs instead...

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Aussies,eh? They've only seen a small part of the war.

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Think about it. Most of the Luftwaffe and Wehrmacht was bound to the eastern front. With more Luftwaffe planes in the air, the absolute allied air supremacy could have never been created and any invasion attempt would have been crushed.

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LoL? They weren't even as far as Moskau. And there would have still been Siberia left.


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He simply stuffed his nose into his Generals' affairs....and was successful with that at first.

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You are right as well! Someone I know survived the Hamburg bombing! Dresden was horrible too. Barbarian. Long-range fighters machinne-gunning anything that moved on the ground. Including a children's choir! That hopefully wasn't the average standard for yankee europe theatre pilots...

But I was talking about US and British ground soldiers, not about that nut Harris or the RAF Bomber Command or USAAF 8th AF. (RAF Bomber Command I beleive inflicted more civilian suffering though! ).

Those Ruskies think pillaging is fun for others, eh? They did that in other countries as well! (Hungary, I think).

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You are comparing it with the rest of the world. They saw about as much as Italy. Not in land mass atacked, but actual ops. Kokoda? Milne Bay? Darwin? 75 Squadron? They saw even more, in D-Day etc. In fact they saw their fare share of the war!

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Bombs dropped on Germany (in tons):

1940:   10000
1941:   30000
1942:   40000
1943: 120000
1944: 650000
1945: 500000

Bombs dropped on England (in tons):

1940: 37000
1941: 22000
1942:   3300
1943:   2300
1944:   9600
1945:     770

Source: DTV Weltatlas Band 2; ISBN 3-423-03002

The bombing began after german bombers (accidentially?) dropped bombs on residential houses in London's harbor district. The next day, RAF bombers attacked a german city (Wilhelmshafen?) as an act of revenge and Hitler in return wanted Göring to "wipe out all english cities".
So the question about the "who" is highly debatable.

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The Holocaust is a completely different issue.

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Apparently, the non-expert-guided training worked, according to the numbers of "aces" in the Luftwaffe.

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No,it wasn't. It only happened to a small extent, fortunately. But disgustingly enough, it happened.

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But to what extent? The medium sized He-111 could only "tickle" London compared to the "1000 bomber attacks" (Lancasters ->very  high payload) of the RAF.

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"Equally ruthless" would have meant to send in only Blenheims and Wellingtons.

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Your own provided info reduces the debate to being questionably ("?") an accident, which is actually insignificant to the question, but certainly makes it clear as to "WHO" FIRST. Just singling out 1945 (by then most of the tonnage was US-made) for the reference, you may be familiar with the statements, "War is hell" and "Payback's a bitch."

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If it were 1945 "B.C." Annatolia or 1945 A.D. on the planet Neptune: unfortunately, the holocaust you mention was a definite issue of WW2 Europe.
Aside from the holocaust (not sure what was so 'holo' about it -- was quite hardcore) I DO NOT believe that no US soldier ever killed an unarmed, surrendered enemy due to his own personal rage; I verily DO believe it was not outright condoned nor ordered by command. However, there are still some in the US -- children during WW2 -- who never saw their father again because he was shot while an unarmed PoW; this was not only condoned but ordered by command.

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So well, in fact, that we were able to blow many of them out of the sky so they could never threaten us again -- and make aces of our own .

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Londoners were certainly "tickled" pink.

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Why would the Brits have given Germany Blenheims and Wellingtons -- would Germany have provided them with V1's and V2's? Oh, sorry, they did deliver those -- air mail! So what's the complaint? They got more for less. What a deal!

Heretic, you're rather outnumbered in this forum so, to mitigate the situation a bit,  Please Note:
Not every Nazi was a genocidal maniac and, more certainly, not every German ever was.
Because a country's leader is a tumor-brained lunatic doesn't make the entire country's populace such.
Unfortunately, insanity doesn't go hand-in-hand with a lack of ingenuity; when the two are combined it can be devestating to all concerned -- especially one's own.
It is natural to defend one's own -- even when  they have caused you the most harm.

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It makes a nice story but I wonder just how much truth there is in that. More than likely, the general view of history has once again been influenced by a film, in this case "The Battle of Britain".
This is the official RAF report for 24/25th August 1940, the night of the alleged accidental bombing of London by a couple of aircraft. http://www.raf.mod.uk/bob1940/august24.html

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Hitler reportedly lifted his restrictions on bombing London on September 4th, following the RAF token raid on Berlin on the night of 25/26 August 1940. Bombing was not an exact science in 1940 (it's not an exact science now) & some German bombers might well have missed their target. From what I've read, bomber crews on both sides had little idea of the effect of their bombing on civilians. They couldn't afford to think about it. Their job was to bomb the target as ordered.

The Luftwaffe bombers had been suffering high losses in daylight raids & the RAF fighters were still there waiting for them. Goering was not to know how desperate the situation actually was. His most effective precision bomber, the Ju 87 Stuka, had suffered such high losses by 18th August 1940 that it was permanently withdrawn from the Western Front.  I suspect they came to the same decision as RAF Bomber Command, to go over to night bombing. Whatever the reason, it's generally agreed that the decision to target London rather than RAF airfields was the turning point of the BoB. In this case, maybe Churchill wasn't so crazy after all.

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Goering's Luftwaffe was built around the Bliztkrieg concept. Swift tactical raids followed up by tanks & troops on the ground. This had proved highly effective throughout Western Europe & also on the Eastern Front. There was no need for a heavy bomber. I don't believe Hitler had seriously considered a prolonged war with Britain, or the US for that matter.