Can one person change the course of history? The case of Georg Elser vs. Adolf Hitler.

i think it's interesting to talk about counterfactuals, as long as it's with the aim of understanding the past, illuminating history that did happen, and informing of the myriad details therein. Inventing wholesale possible histories is usually pretty needless and often propaganda-oriented, and the definitive statements eg "Had Hitler died that day, according to the article, the atrocities of WWII would've been avoided" are meaningless and unhelpful.

sorry take out the "according to the article" bit, i'm not impugning you tuomas.

yes of course a single person can change the world, but only in his/her time and context; inventing one for them is called science fiction.

Thanks to the postings of one single person, thousands of others all around the world have a completely different opinion about Finland now. This influence will not only echo through the generations as this one tells their offspring about this, but as long as the interwebs are being archived, new people will have the opportunity to gather the knowledge for themselves.

Then again, maybe not. I guess the opposite poles here are a functionalist view of history, i.e. that history is moved by large societal forces which a single person can hardly stop, and an individualist view, where a single person can change the world. What do you think?

that isn't functionalist btw, but those two things aren't actually opposed. of course a single person 'can' change the world, but i know of no view of history where, as the opposite pole to 'big social forces' determining everything, you have -- simply -- individuals changing the world ex nihilo.

I can't see that changing the course of history though, unless one of you becomes the leader of your country and decides to declare war on Finland or something.

Frogman Henry, what do you think would've happened if Elser had succeeded then?

(x-post)

but i know of no view of history where, as the opposite pole to 'big social forces' determining everything, you have -- simply -- individuals changing the world ex nihilo.

Ever heard of mass movements?

I mean, of course mass movements have individuals too, but the Elser case is interesting in as, according to that article, one person acting all by himself, could've changed history in a major way.

Great Man Theory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Man

would it take a bomb for one person acting all by him or herself to change history in a major way?

I guess my off the cuff answer to the question posed by the thread-starter would be: yes, one man - at the right place at the right time with the right mindset - can make a difference. The example given is not a terribly good one, though. Not the least as the Nazi party hardly saw a shortage of people ready to step into Hitler's shoes.

Maybe it's not a good example, but I can think of few instances where one person could've made such a huge difference.

I give you ... Gavrilo Princip:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gavrilo_Princip

that carlyle quote in the wiki seems to apply to historiography rather than the actual course of history -- any case the scope of "history" at that time was narrower than it is now. if history means the political history of statesmen and kings, as it more or less did then, then you can allow a lot more in terms of "great men".

the Elser case is interesting in as, according to that article, one person acting all by himself, could've changed history in a major way.

-- Tuomas, Tuesday, June 12, 2007 12:07 PM (45 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

it's not interesting at all. hitler dying in 1939 would have changed history in a major way. wouldn't necessarily have stopped the war happening but it'd be a big deal.

also, individuals changing history is not about dramatic one-offs.

Gavrilo Princip as a prime example of a case where one person's act seemingly changed history, but in reality it was nothing like that. The murder of Franz Ferdinand was merely an excuse the Central Powers needed to act upon their interests. I think most historians agree that the situation in Europe was such, that a conflict of some sort was almost unavoidable. Or at least it wasn't Princip's fault.

The alternative is that Elser's assassination of Hitler would have ensured that the incredibly powerful Nazi party would all of a sudden have somebody not certifiably bonkers in charge, the Final Solution would have been even more pervasive, and Russia would have been left well enough alone while Western Europe is forced to endure a nuclear detonation as Rommel et al. are not on vacation during D-Day because whoever ends up in charge is actually paying attention and not indulging in narcissistic, paranoid rants at the drop of a hat.

So I think the article is bullshit

By 1939 Hitler's already done everything Hitler needs to do to set things in motion. By the summer of 1941 he was practically on our side.

I think most historians agree that the situation in Europe was such, that a conflict of some sort was almost unavoidable.

in 1914? seriously? dunno who you've been reading.

Wikipedia natch!

However, if the assassination had not occurred, it is very possible that a general European war would still have erupted, triggered by another event at another time. The alliances noted above and the existence of vast and complex mobilization plans that were almost impossible to reverse once put in motion made war on a huge scale increasingly likely from the beginning of the twentieth century.

Well, okay not necessarily unavoidable, but saying Gavrilo Princip changed history is a bit of an exaggeration. There are other individuals (such as British and German politicians) who are way more to blame for that war.

(x-post)

Harry Turtledove to thread!

in 1914? seriously? dunno who you've been reading.

Are you being sarcastic or deliberately obtuse?

Hmm, those are nearly the same things. Oops. Still, point stands. Conflict was unavoidable.

tom otm. there were already fascists all over europe! franco and mussolini, always bridesmaids, sigh. + stalin doing his thing.

the idea that going BACK IN TIME to KILL HITLER and make the 20th century LESS OF AN ABSOLUTE MISERABLE SHITHOLE is pretty silly

you could say that about, i dunno, the time the stalin nuked nyc

Hitler seems to have been fairly important to the stability of the Nazi state, which wasn't a totally Nazi state at all. With him dead in '39 it's quite possible to imagine Germany not going to war, or not entering the same kind of war. And therefore quite possible to imagine no Final Solution. I don't think any of the other leading Nazis were suitable candidates to lead a unified country. I agree with Tombot about his post-41 batshitness, but I think the question is more about whether a non-Hitlerian Germany would have marched so enthusiastically to 1941.

That's basically true, but Elser's assasination attempt came two months after the war had begun, and I don't think Hitler was the only Nazi leader who believed in the war. But it seems to be that the cult of his personality, rather than the cult of the Nazi party, was a major driving force in Germany, so it isn't clear whether anyone else could've stepped into his shoes and done the same thing.

But what if the Nazis had hoverboards?

Carlyle vs. Tolstoy again?

Frankly, bringing someone besides Hitler in November of '39 to power might have made the whole thing worse. A slightly more rational German head of state mightn't have screwed up as much as little Dolfie.

I ALREADY SAID THAT

GOD

I admit I like my favorite counterfactual more as a brain exercise, and think Tombot's conclusions are essentially OTM.

Sorry, Tombot. I hadn't noticed.

ONE BOMB can change history, like the time my vacation was ruined because everyone kept singing "You Dropped A Bomb on ME" by the Gap Band every 15 seconds.

Ruined? More like Awesomed!

It was pretty awesomed when we sang it at a baseball game really loud whenever someone was batting. Which was often.

it's always amazing to me how people talk about "history" as if it's some abstract force that has nothing to do with actual people. history is simply everything that people do, added up. it doesn't have some mysterious life of its own. if a bunch of people (i.e. the nazis) get together to do something, it doesn't mean that "large societal forces" have somehow taken them over and robbed them of their free choice.

so of course history would be radically different without hitler. an even better example, though, is lenin - take lenin out of the equation, and the bolsheviks have almost no chance of coming to power. no october 1917, no soviet union. for that matter, replace nicholas II with a smarter guy and you might not have a russian revolution in the first place.

But nicholas 2 was one of the funniest guys in history! (barring Peter the Great) I know that was all a bunch of bad & deadly shit, but Nick 2 just cracks me the fuck up.

so of course history would be radically different without hitler. an even better example, though, is lenin - take lenin out of the equation, and the bolsheviks have almost no chance of coming to power. no october 1917, no soviet union. for that matter, replace nicholas II with a smarter guy and you might not have a russian revolution in the first place.

But the February in Russia were hardly Lenin's work - he just managed to ride the momentum with October revolution. Though you're right it would interesting to think what would've happened if the bolsheviks wouldn't have managed to take the lead of the revolution, and the other leftist forces of the time (the Socialist-Revolutionary Party, anarchists, etc.) would've lead to some sort of a more democratic version of socialism. But some sort of a revolution was bound to happen, I think.

And yeah, of course I recognize "societal forces" are formed of numerous individual choices, but in many cases societal changes follow from such massive and intricate convergences of these indivual actions that it's hard to see how certain things wouldn't be, if not inevitable, then at least extremely likely, and hardly something one individual can change. I guess I'm enough of a historical materialist to think that, for example, the material and social situation in 19th century Europe was such that some sort of a major leftist movement and the following conflict between capital and workers was inevitable, even if Marx had remained just an esoteric philosopher.

"the February revolution"

It is generally more common for an individual to change history by adding some vital new item(s) to its store of knowledge, or by inventing a better mousetrap. Consider the person who discovered blood types and made safe blood transfusions possible - whose name escapes me and I am too lazy to find.

um tuomas that's what j.d. was saying.

I guess I'm enough of a historical materialist to think that, for example, the material and social situation in 19th century Europe was such that some sort of a major leftist movement and the following conflict between capital and workers was inevitable, even if Marx had remained just an esoteric philosopher.

i suppose my perspective is british but marx(ism) never achieved much pruchase on the labour movement here because the labour movement predated him; in a way it wasn't left-wing, or did not have the same kind of goals that the french or german movements had.

even then, in your non-marxist clash between labour and capital there would still be leaders, decision-makers, and whatnot.

And yeah, of course I recognize "societal forces" are formed of numerous individual choices, but in many cases societal changes follow from such massive and intricate convergences of these indivual actions that it's hard to see how certain things wouldn't be, if not inevitable, then at least extremely likely, and hardly something one individual can change.

power is not distributed evenly across society, though; and in a historical perspective, and while carlyle or whoever was wrong to neglect the little people enitrely, i think some people's individual actions are more significant or effective than others.

the labour movement didn't have to support the war in 1914, for example.

power is not distributed evenly across society, though; and in a historical perspective, and while carlyle or whoever was wrong to neglect the little people enitrely, i think some people's individual actions are more significant or effective than others.

I agree with this, of course. Certainly individuals with power can change a lot (though usually even them have to take a more general opinion into consideration, otherwise it's off with their heads), but when talking about very broad historical changes, I don't think one individual can make such a big change. I can't think of any single person who's removal from the equation would've made a definite change within the global history of, say, the last 200 years.

Let's get back to the original question. If Hitler had been killed in 1939, after the war had started, but before France and Britain had been defeated then any number of things might have happened. There would have been some kind of power struggle within Germany as various Nazi leaders competed for pole position. Maybe in the short term they would have buried their differences, or one of them would have just wiped out the others. I think maybe the most likely thing then is some kind of negotiated end to the war. None of the other Nazis had the gambler's instinct Hitler had, so they would have been loth to launch the kind of risky attacks on Norway and France he did. Likewise, the French and (particularly) the British weren't that keen on the war in the first place, and with Hitler gone they had a face-saving excuse to end it. I reckon Poland would have come back into being, shorn of the corridor, which with Danzig would be incorporated into Germany.

After that I can't really say. Central and Eastern Europe had a not of whacky regimes at that point, but without Hitler's escalatory instincts I'm not sure that a general war would have erupted. I don't know if the Japanese would have had a go at the Americans without Hitler as an ally, and Italy wasn't even in the war at that point, so maybe killing Hitler at that point does see the second world war peter out before it becomes a world war, leaving most of Europe under shaky authoritarian regimes.

Which isn't to say that with someone else in the place of Hitler, Stalin, or Mao, millions of lives couldn't have been saved.

(x-post)

i think it's interesting to talk about counterfactuals, as long as it's with the aim of understanding the past, illuminating history that did happen, and informing of the myriad details therein. Inventing wholesale possible histories is usually pretty needless and often propaganda-oriented

I know what you mean more than you might think, given the time I spent in an alternate history APA, but there are a couple of things that this kind of speculation is great for. Firstly, it can give you some great backgrounds for fiction writing, if you are good at writing fiction. Secondly it can illuminate the kind of questions being discussed above about the nature of history.

OMG let's all watch Back to the Future you guyz! LOL etc

(Please 2 excuse silliness on otherwise interesting thread)

Rogers' adoption/innovation curve to thread:

http://www.ou.edu/deptcomm/dodjcc/groups/99A2/curve.JPG
scrap the "Great Man Theory" and make way for the "Great Few Theory".

maybe i should read carlyle before weighing in, but i think the Great Man Theory is probably a bit of a strawman, a bit like Whig History. reading the biographies of great men will tell you quite a lot, after all. i wouldn't have thought that mid-nineteenth century biographies were particularly keen on delving into their subject's psyches either. there's more than one way to write a biography.

Carlyle asked where the Arabs would be without Mohammed. It's not a question to toss aside lightly. As usual, I think both poles have overstated positions and there's some validity to both.

I can't think of any single person who's removal from the equation would've made a definite change within the global history of, say, the last 200 years.

Well, if Churchill didn't exist, Britain would have agreed some form of peace treaty in 1941 brokered by Lord Halifax, Hitler would have had carte blanche to rule over continental Western Europe with the war being decided on the Eastern front. Lord knows where the Iron Curtain would have been then with subsequent ramifications for generations to come.

would it take a bomb

I can't think of any single person who's removal from the equation would've made a definite change within the global history of, say, the last 200 years.

napoleon, lenin, hitler... sessions

george bailey

the february revolution and october revolution were both largely the result of the actions of individuals. the former was caused by a series of mistakes by nicholas (refusing to deal with the duma, taking command of the army himself, etc), and the latter was the result of the power struggle between kerensky and lenin. what if kerensky had been as savvy as lenin? what if lenin had been as wishy-washy as kerensky or as stupid as nicholas? take out any of these three and replace them with other people, and you have a very different story.

I can't think of any single person who's removal from the equation would've made a definite change within the global history of, say, the last 200 years.

no Einstein, no nuclear bomb

would it take

By 1939 Hitler's already done everything Hitler needs to do to set things in motion. By the summer of 1941 he was practically on our side.

-- TOMBOT, Tuesday, June 12, 2007 1:30 PM (7 hours ago) Bookmark Link

uh whut?

By 1939 Hitler's already done everything Hitler needs to do to set things in motion. By the summer of 1941 he was practically on our side.

And despair at how the world looked like by 1962:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/45/Man_In_The_High_Castle_map.PNG

http://img20.photobucket.com/albums/v60/profmadhatter/nguyen4.jpg

wait wait i meant this
http://img20.photobucket.com/albums/v60/profmadhatter/nguyen2.jpg

RIP Jimmy McPerson. Earth thanks you.

*salutes*

where are those from?