Historical Thinking

I love history, but i have not read nearly enough of it in recent years. I am going to try to rectify that. I will go back to my favorite subject, World War 2. Why? Because it doesn't get any bigger than this. There are so many different ways to look it, but I am going to after some thoughts:

1. Reaffirming my senior seminar class from college. I wrote a shitty paper and still got an A. Thesis wasn't clear, support was crap, but I lucked out. Definitely better to be lucky than good in this case. I want to rexamine the topic though.

The topic was basically; Germany's primary failure to win it's goals in World War II stemmed directly from war planning that not only did not anticipate the true nature of the coming war but was also counter-productive to its own military goals. This will take a long time, but it is something worthwhile to look at again.

2. Historical what-if's are fascinating. I love reading alternative history. Well done they are like Science Fiction, the world we know turned upside down. I want to read more on some subject to better understand what might have been if different actions were taken. Some early contenders:

A. What if Hitler comitted a significant portion of his invasion force to drive on the Allied forces in Dunkirk? Could he have split forces and both held any counterattack and destroy the retreating force? If a majority of over 200,000 British troops surrendered, would it effectively knock Britain out of the war?

B. If Hitler held back from further aggressive moves after fully reincorporating the Rhineland for a year or two extra could he have bought more time for his armed forces to prepare without his future enemies making as significant improvements themselves?

Those will be more than enough to read up on. I'm sure it will be quite awhile before I come close to better understanding the situations.

Now that I've put everyone to sleep..