Killing Hitler

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There is common question people ask that goes something like this. " If you could go back in time would you kill Hitler?" How many lives would you say that Hitler would have to take before you would kill him?

You can't really quantify that with a number. The best time to knock Hitler off would have been after he got Germany back on the road to recovery but before any hostilities. In the last 2- 3 years of the war he did more to lose the war for the axis than win it so it would have been better to leave him in place to continue f*****g things up. Under better leadership, Germany could have fought on a lot longer than it did.

Stop World War I from happening and then Hitler probably stays an artist

As terrible as it was, the world would be a very different, and poorer place today had WWII not happened. It was an incredible time for both medical and technological advancement.

There was a Doctor Who episode with this idea presented. I don't know that I would want to change the flow of time. It's a difficult question.

Agreed. I would've put more emphasis on saving Holocaust victims.

See, this is what is interesting about AS. Most NT people say that they would kill him outright.

[opinion=mine]

Kill Hitler before 1945, and Stalin would own both Europe and the U.S.S.R ... and probably the British Isles, as well!

Nazi Germany was an impediment to Stalin's desire to rule over all of the resources of northern Eurasia, and lasted just long enough to deplete what few resources Stalin had managed to acquire before WWII.

[/opinion]

Completely disregarding the fact that causality makes retrograde time-travel impossible, of course.

Reminds me of the plot of Red Alert in which Einstein goes back in time to assassinate Hitler just as soon as he got out of prison (ca. 1925) only to leave the door wide open for the Soviets to invade Western and Central Europe, the main plot of the game.

I would not kill Hitler because how things are post-Hitler is known, and what would have happened otherwise is unknown, and not necessarily better. Of course this goes for every mass injustice in history. Just by the fact that this question is asked about Hitler and not the millions of unsavory characters before him. In only about another century or so, Hitler will be an ancient artifact, and the question will be asked of some other dictator who atomized two billion humans into bio-dust or however we fight then.

The Chinese could ask themselves what would have happened had they gone back in time to kill Wangli Emperor. Or Russians go back in time and kill Boris Yeltsin.

The question doesnt make any sense.

If you were either a modern person magically going back in time, or a person of the time with the magical powers of claravoyence to foresee the Holocaust and the war- then you wouldnt operate that way. You wouldnt use a quota for how many people he would be allowed to kill. You would pick the best moment in history to off him to prevent most of the killing (if you would do it at all).

It would be tempting to kill him. And the time to do it: anytime before September first 1939 would seem ideal because even though Hitler's reign started in 1933, both the war (20 million plus deaths) and the whole concentration camp industry ( killing six million jews, and another six million non jews on top of that for a total of 12 million victims) were not inititiated by Hitler until that last post 1939 phase.

I'd rather prevent the treaty of Versailles, cleaner all around.

So you mean never? Because what you desribe as "getting Germany back on the road" where done by him by violance, murdering, intimidating and arresting of any sort of political opponents (even passive ones) inside of Germany.

perhaps 10 or 15 years back, I read of a surviving british tommy was part of a company that managed to capture a german unit in the WW1 trenches including a young hitler.

If IRC correctly, he spoke of his regret at not pulling the trigger.

I think with the benefit of hindsight its easy to say that you wouldnt wait for him to kill anyone before doing the deed.

Personally I would rather kill Stalin prior to 1924. Why?

The door would be left open for Leon Trotsky to become Secretary General of the Soviet Union (who wouldve been a far better leader as a true Marxist).

Stalin wouldnt have been able to oppose the German socialists forming a coalition, and the National Socialist Party wouldve been defeated electorally.

I meant after economic recovery, political stability, and the rebuilding of the military (even though the latter was in violation of the Treaty of Versailles). This way the country would have been much more stable and viable as a nation to pose a threat to any plans of westward expansion by the Soviets. Whatever went on inside of Germany during that time is an internal issue for Germany and nothing anyone outside needs to worry about. That's about as good as it's going to get from me.