I read White Eagle Red Star, partly because I've enjoyed some of Davies' other books. The Polish-Soviet War of 1920 is involved in my best solution to an alt-history puzzle. In WW2 the western allies teamed up with one dictator to defeat another: Stalin over Hitler. The puzzle is to ask what it would take to fight the war the other way, teaming up with Hitler to defeat Stalin. My speculation is that if the Soviets beat the Poles in 1920, that puts the expansionist Soviet Union (or a Soviet puppet state) right on Germany's doorstep, and everyone to the west of that will be more worried about a chain reaction communist revolution than in our timeline. Maybe the Soviets have more conquests in eastern Europe before WW2 kicks off. (There was quite a bit of extended chaos in the east after WW1; you could even say that WW1 didn't come to a definite end there as it did in the west. So if the Poles didn't stop the Soviets...) It is plausible then to imagine WW2 as a fight between Central and Western Europe on one side and a more threatening communist East on the other.
In that eventuality, you'd also get a Soviet Union more interested in sparking that chain reaction Communist revolution! And they'd have interested takers - this was after Hungary and Bavaria got suppressed, but not that long after.
I don't know what this would do to the Weimar Republic. Even historically, the Communists were a strong active force throughout its life; here, they're going to be stronger because of the expansionist Soviet Union. I don't know how this would impact Hitler's rise, but I'm sure it will...
*2025?
Ouch; thanks! Fixed.
I read White Eagle Red Star, partly because I've enjoyed some of Davies' other books. The Polish-Soviet War of 1920 is involved in my best solution to an alt-history puzzle. In WW2 the western allies teamed up with one dictator to defeat another: Stalin over Hitler. The puzzle is to ask what it would take to fight the war the other way, teaming up with Hitler to defeat Stalin. My speculation is that if the Soviets beat the Poles in 1920, that puts the expansionist Soviet Union (or a Soviet puppet state) right on Germany's doorstep, and everyone to the west of that will be more worried about a chain reaction communist revolution than in our timeline. Maybe the Soviets have more conquests in eastern Europe before WW2 kicks off. (There was quite a bit of extended chaos in the east after WW1; you could even say that WW1 didn't come to a definite end there as it did in the west. So if the Poles didn't stop the Soviets...) It is plausible then to imagine WW2 as a fight between Central and Western Europe on one side and a more threatening communist East on the other.
In that eventuality, you'd also get a Soviet Union more interested in sparking that chain reaction Communist revolution! And they'd have interested takers - this was after Hungary and Bavaria got suppressed, but not that long after.
I don't know what this would do to the Weimar Republic. Even historically, the Communists were a strong active force throughout its life; here, they're going to be stronger because of the expansionist Soviet Union. I don't know how this would impact Hitler's rise, but I'm sure it will...