Superman Averts World War II?

[Christopher]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

Superclone should attack at night. WWII defenses are a lot less effective at night.

And he can see the "entire Electromagnetic Spectrum", so he propably has perfect Night vision.

[massey]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

Rex and Clonus have already done a pretty good job of setting the parameters of the debate. There is no question that there are Superman concepts that can win WWII single handed. Good Lord! There are Superman concepts that can travel through time, move planets, swallow the contents of entire oil tankers, manufacture arbitrarily large numbers of equally powerful robot servants....

 

We're specifically talking about Superman at a level where WWII can challenge him. He can't fly to Pearl Harbor as it is happening. He can fly faster than a Bf109E, but probably not faster than a Hawker Fury. He has 20 rPD. Which, if he has 10 Body, means that a 7d6 2XAP RKA will kill him extra dead. Megaplayboy persuasively gets the 88mm AA/AT round at 6d6 RKA, 1xAP, which is marginal for killing someone with 20rPD, 10 Body.

 

Now how likely is a hit? It depends. The figure of thousands of rounds for a kill (not a direct hit, which would be still less likely) is based on shooting at aircraft at distances well in excess of 2000 yards. That's a very long shot for an 88 in an AT role. In tactical combat, most tank-killing was done at ranges of well under 1000 yards, and, for infantry anti-tank combat, under 60. At that range, I have great difficulty imagining an AT rifle missing if shot at Superclone's back while he's standing still. The final incarnation of the Boys Anti-Tank Rifle, which was often used as a sniping weapon, fired a tungsten APCR penetrator round at 3,100 fps. That's a little high tech for 1939, but even the vanilla round of that year was a very big bullet, albeit at a modest muzzle velocity of 2,495 fps. That yields 6x the muzzle energy of a standard rifle round, and more than the .50.

 

What's more, the Boys wasn't even a particularly powerful AT rifle, the designer having taken the somewhat odd perspective that barrel life was more important than armour piercing capacity. ("This thing can't hurt that tank!" "Yes, but we can shoot it a lot!")

 

If I crank it up a bit to the 2 pounder, we get a 1.08kg round with a muzzle velocity of 792 m/s. This "tinkertoy" gun was relatively high profile and heavy, but very quick to train. Again, I doubt that good gunners would have any problem putting a round into Superclone's back if he were foolish enough to stand around talking for a moment. In British testing, that round would go through 49mm of steel at 90 degrees at 500ish meters, compared with 19 for the Boys. I'm going to call that a 4d6+1 RKA. Not enough to get through the rPD, but certainly expecting Con Stun for a reasonably Body score. At that point, a satchel contact AT mine should do for Superclone.

 

The reason that I harp on this stuff is, again, that we've set the terms of the debate as one in which Superclone can be hurt, and can't bring the war to an end with some spectacular demonstration of miniature rainbow-coloured superclones shooting out of his hands. (Or "super-weaving," for that matter.) It's only once we've set these terms that the thought experiment can even be made.

 

Rex says that WWII weapons could actually hit their target. Eyeballing the casualty figures, I'm going to suggest that he's probably right. In a weapon-dense environment (which typically describes the forward edge of the battle area), even in 1939, Superclone is going to run into a great many weapons that kick like a mule. He's probably going to get killed.

 

That doesn't mean that he couldn't conceivably have an effect on the outcome of the Battle of Poland, because the Germans went into that war with no idea what they were doing and actually came close to suffering the "kettling" of 10th Army at the Bzura. Which kind of proves that actual, regular people (even the Polish Army of 1939!) are usually a great deal more competent than the more dismissive among us assume. Which is why I, personally, think that the answer to the thought experiment is that Superclone couldn't win WWII single-handed.

 

As for the "capture Hitler and put him on trial" thing, it is naive at best. But what I don't think has been sufficiently underscored here is the waste of points. I honestly doubt that you could bring a Superclone who can fly as fast as a Bf109 in at as few as 400 points. For that number of points, I could easily design a character who could win WWII. Actually, I could design many characters who could win WWII.

 

The catch is that they would have to be team players. Which, I think, is the real issue here. People who see "superhero" and think "god." I call these people "DC Comic fans."

 

So, in conclusion, Make Mine Marvel!

 

We still are talking vague numbers here. The 20 rPD was a number I threw out. And I disagree with some of the numbers people are using for the weapons of the day. That 7D6 x2AP RKA is more powerful than the book writeups for an Abrams cannon. When you're looking at those numbers, ask yourself "how many hexes of solid rock will that blast through?"

 

The question with Superclone is do you want him to be killed by WWII weapons or not? If you want him to get killed, you'll write him up to get killed. If you want him to live, he'll live. You seem to believe that he's going to stand with his back to an artillery piece while he's taking a leak or something. But whatever, it depends how you write him up. Of course, there are millions of people who survived fighting in WWII. These are normal humans who didn't get shot in the chest by anti-tank rifles. A Superclone who can't survive those big hits would probably be better off just dressing as a civilian. Fly over the front lines on a moonless night, or just go around them. Avoid tank cannons. Tear up rail lines. Dress as a German soldier and just break someone's neck if they ask for your papers. Pretend to be a normal guy and they won't drop 1000 lb bombs on you. I'm reminded of the Superman cartoon where he dressed up like Batman and pretended to be a normal human. Batman's villains kept trying to catch him in these deathtraps, kept shooting at him with normal guns, etc.

[assault]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

I honestly doubt that you could bring a Superclone who can fly as fast as a Bf109 in at as few as 400 points. For that number of points' date=' I could [i']easily [/i]design a character who could win WWII. Actually, I could design many characters who could win WWII.

 

The catch is that they would have to be team players. Which, I think, is the real issue here. People who see "superhero" and think "god." I call these people "DC Comic fans."

 

So, in conclusion, Make Mine Marvel!

 

It is, of course, trivial to build a character who can fly as fast as a Bf109 at 400 points.

 

My 1938 Superman character was 5e, and came in on 250 points, so would convert to about 300. That would give me around another 100 points to play with - enough, I think.

 

I'd rather go 500, of course. That would be much nicer.

 

For the record, the Nazis wouldn't know who was attacking them, or even necessarily that someone was actually attacking them.

 

So now I've got to update my 1938 Superman to 6e... Sigh.

 

PS: And now I've done a rough update, it looks like my 1938 Superman comes in at close to 350 points in 6e anyway. Once I give him the flight and senses people are suggesting, he's not going to have room for the nice stuff I would prefer to give him. A shame: most of it is very cheap (multipower slots), and would make him massively more effective in this context.

 

Looking at the Zero in The Ultimate Vehicle, matching its speed is easy. Matching its maneuverability isn't, because the sane way of matching its speed is to go for a x8 Non-Combat Modifier, rather than burning 80 points on flight. (The Zero is a reasonable surrogate for a Bf109 in this context, since its performance will be in the same ballpark). Still, Our Hero will have a higher SPD, which should make the difference.

 

Captain Marvel, Bulletman or Green Lantern would be cheaper, and still able to do the job.

 

The Human Torch or Namor would be interesting alternatives. Certainly Namor was able to carry out a nice little rampage against the USA, only halted by the intervention of the Torch!

 

PPS: Actually, I'd use a 400 point version of my Golden Age Green Lantern character. He'd be ideal.

[Andrew_A]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

I think you guys are looking at this backwards. This is what I was talking about upthread. You're starting from the event and looking forward to the consequences. That's not terribly fun or interesting. After all, what's going to make for a more exciting campaign: "Back in the 30s there was some costumed freak who got killed by the Heer while trying to stop the invasion of Poland?" Or would you prefer, "World War Two started in 1944 after Stalin and the German Communists invaded Romania?"

 

If history stays on the same course as before, then what is the point of this thread? You might as well start a new thread about why Superman (or the Justice Society or the Invaders or the Freedom Fighters or whomever) couldn't prevent World War Two. It might make for an interesting thought experiment but it wouldn't make for a very fun campaign.

 

Let's just agree right now that 30s and 40s Superman couldn't end the war. What if it was the John Byrne Superman instead? What if it was 40s Superclone, but he decided to use his powers strategically instead of engaging the German military directly? What if the League of Nations had the intestinal fortitude to prosecute Hitler for war crimes? What if getting rid of Hitler led to the collapse of German fascism?

 

Rather than deciding that Superclone stopping the war is impossible, start with the end and figure out how we got to "here" from "there".

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

OK so some Superman knockoff decides to fly over to the German Polish border, exposes the false flag operation (which nobody bought anyway), then flies into Germany, abducts Adolph Hitler, and dumps him in from of the International Court. Which of course has no idea what to do with him. But, rattled, Hitler calls the invasion of Poland off for now.

 

Consequences:

....

 

Okay, this has been bugging me, so forgive me first for rescuing it from beneath the fold, and second for ignoring the meat of Clonus' thread-starting posting, the consequences that he thinks might have ensued.

 

So what's my problem? "Superman."

 

Arguably, the idea was launched by Friedrich Nietzsche, a young man brought up in an intensely Lutheran household and led, by the old Higher Criticism, to consider the radical notion that God was obsolete. Now, in Lutheran theology, man is depraved. Unable to live a moral life by their own strength of character, either humans depend on God's grace to do good, or get into Heaven by unearned grace, where it all gets sorted out. If God is dead/never existed, this is no longer possible. a new kind of human is needed, with the capacity to be an autonomous moral agent: a 'superman.'

 

'Superman' might be more than moral, though. There is the notion that true Supermen will be physically and mentally superhuman as well, as much by their indomitable will to power (which they must by definition have to force themselves to live morally) as anything else. My example here is London's Sea-Wolf, so maybe we won't push this too hard, but by the time that London was writing, others had taken the "Superman" idea on board as a rationale for 'eugenics,' a programme of human improvement by breeding or whatnot that would produce super-athletes as well as super-intellects.

 

In 1930, Philip Wylie took this idea on and produced a superhuman who did --nothing. Because individuals, even if they do happen to be more powerful than a locomotive and faster than a speeding bullet, are just individuals. To comfort his dying father, who is a little down about how little his son has made of himself, Hugo Danner tells a story about how he forced the Armistice of 1918 by penetrating behind German lines and overturning all their guns. It eases Professor Danner out of this life, but, really, come on, Wylie suggests.

 

Whether or not they were influenced by Gladiator, Shuster and Siegel had an answer. In an America where a corrupt alliance of the powerful had brought criminals, politicians, and the wealthy together in a heedless conspiracy against the rest of us, the Superman had a very real part to play. In the early issues of the comic, Superman was apparently a primitive rebel. Later, he became a shining example of someone who, like mobsters, corrupt politicians, and industrialists, possessed vast power, but who refused to use it selfishly. Rather, perceives that there is only one thing that someone in his unique position can morally do. He must put his powers to the service of society.

 

It's a powerful insight to get out of a comic. No wonder Superman has been around so long.

 

My problem with Clonus' scenario is that Superman is now acting in the realm of international politics. There is no longer a society to sanction the use of his powers. Moreover, he is acting against German and Russian society, which have, however irresponsibly, willed this war. And not to put it too finely, he's acting like a bully. Sure, by bullying Germans and Russians in 1940, he has a chance to stop (most of) the Holocaust. But no-one knows that the Holocaust, in its full horror, is going to happen.

 

I could go on, but when I discussed this earlier, I talked a lot about powers. Why? Because this kind of Superman has exactly the wrong power set for the job, even though the "superman," as he has been proposed, has exactly the right powerset. What do I mean by that? My favourite Superman build in Hero is the 1800 point Supernova character in Galactic Champions. There is no question that 1800 points of pure physical power could single-handedly win World War Ii by smashing enough things and killing enough people that eventually the Nazis would just give up on fighting. (And embrace all of Clonus' anti-Superman tactics.) At the other extreme, perhaps a 250 point Superman couldn't win WWIi single-handedly.

 

But Wolf Larsen isn't built on 1800 points physically, or even 250 points. He's strong, but that's because he works out. What he is, is smart, determined, and enormously knowledgeable for someone with no formal education. At the end of the day, Wolf complains that he could have been great, if he'd only been given a chance. London's Sea-Wolf, the novel that introduces Wolf Larsen, may be taken in parallel with Kipling's more human Captains Courageous, a novel that takes its title from --businessmen, the true "captains courageous" of his day, Kipling tells us.

 

Well, Gilded Age folderol aside, could a "superman" with the same superiority of mental faculties (and moral) over the normal man as the Kal-El Superman have prevented the Holocaust? Duh! Imagine a guy with 50 Int, 100 points in science skills, and clairvoyance (Only to see future historical events, with the special effect that he's just so darned smart). All he would need to do is invest in French and British industry and build up the military capabilities of the western democracies so that they could win the Battle of France. Hitler falls in disgrace, crisis averted!

 

In fact, here's my programme for him:

 

i) Make some money betting on sports.

ii) Use it to buy a vacuum tube plant at the bottom of the post-WWI business depression, when the Ministry of Munitions was busy downsizing and getting government out of industry.

iii) Invent the tetrode/pentode vacuum tube and the ribbon microphone to use it. Get into the sound-recording business and then into making equipment for radio stations in the mid-20s.

iv) Notice that electronic amplification/feedback has lots of other applications, and invent one. The lowest of low-lying fruit that I can think of is industrial furnace thermostats, which is where Honeywell got its start in what later became "computing."

v) Notice that the same sorts of problems arise in electrical power transmission and get contracts for the National Grid in 1929--31.

vi) Invent the metadyne.

vii) Get a contract building metadyne motors for AA installations for the Royal Navy in the early 30s.

viii) Go small: offer the RAF an "Electronic Brain" for engine control in competition with the Dowty Live-Line hydraulic system in 1935/36.

ix) With planning for production of these electronic control systems well under way, offer the Post Office electronically computating switchboards for the new "trunklines" between major cities.

x) Launch a line of fuel-injection control systems for marine engineering plants. Cooperate with established firms such as Brown-Boveri in developing a gas-turbine for shipboard power. Impress the boffins with the way that your new computators can calculate aerofoil shapes for turbine blades!

x) The Prime Minister announced his National Defence Loand, a massive investment in defence industry. Offer computators for design work.

xi) By now you're a big name in British defence. Back a couple projects: an aeronautical gas-turbine engine plant in Birmingham, a computator plant in Manchester; marine engineering plants to build plant with economisers and reheat for the Royal Navy in Glasgow and Newcastle; an electronic music plant in Liverpool.

xii) When the Prime Minister decides that the army isn't going to be cut into the National Defence Loan because the army uses too many men and the result will be rising wages, meet with him in private. Point out the extent of your campaign contributions; appeal to his scientific education; then scream until you're blue in the face about how their can be a British-made "stereo" and "television" in every house if the British worker just has the discretionary income to pay for them. Forget export markets for a second. Let domestic demand drive the economy. Foreigners will be lining up to buy British "computators," anyway. Let the army have some money.

 

xiii) Six months into the 1914 war, the BEF had 12 infantry divisions and two-and-a-half cavalry divisions in the line. All of those units existed in Britain in 1940. There were men in all of them. But only 9 infantry divisions and one-sixth of a cavalry division was in France because of shortfalls in equipment and training that were entirely due to underfunding. Let's set aside all the technological possibilities of my proposed accelerated electronics revolution. How would the Battle of France have gone for the Germans if the BEF had had another full infantry corps and an armoured corps in hand? Not well, I suggest.

 

Why do I prefer this scenario? Because it's the true Kal-El scenario, the one that recognises that "the superman" is a superman within society. He sets an example; he helps (and in my scenario, the benefits to human welfare are deep and lasting, taking only the alleviation of unemployment in Britain in the 1930s into account and nothing else). He doesn't do it all, and by defeating the Nazi armies in the field, the democracies refute Nazi ideology and the "stab in the back" theory.

[Shadow Hawk]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

That was a interesting thought experiment, Lawnmower Boy. And when I'm done writing this 'riff' off of it, I'll rep you.

 

So, out Superman can figure out psycho-history style 'the future'. So, he makes preparations...

Part of the reason the British backed down before Hitler at Munich is that the Royal Air Force was not 'ready to fight' and told Chamberlain so. When the British backed down, it forced the French to back down since they were afraid to face the Germans without British support (with good reason; the Germans outnumbered them.) But, our 'Superman' has seen what's coming, and given the RAF 2nd generation radar and 1st generation jet intercepters (Think 'Gloster Meteor' or Me-262 or even P-80 Shooting Stars). With the RAF ready to defend against the bomber hordes (a real fear in 1938), the Royal Navy with improved sonars (thanks, Superman!), and other improvements, Neville Chamberlain can stand up to Hitler, and with French support back the Czech government against Nazi bullying. A properly timed demonstration of the new fighters plus implying there's a bomber version, and WW2 starts in 1938 with a Anglo-French offensive into the Ruhr in response to the German attack on Czechaslovakia(sp). Properly done, our Superman will ensure that the sun never, ever sets on the British Empire.

[Andrew_A]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

That was a interesting thought experiment, Lawnmower Boy. And when I'm done writing this 'riff' off of it, I'll rep you.

 

So, out Superman can figure out psycho-history style 'the future'. So, he makes preparations...

Part of the reason the British backed down before Hitler at Munich is that the Royal Air Force was not 'ready to fight' and told Chamberlain so. When the British backed down, it forced the French to back down since they were afraid to face the Germans without British support (with good reason; the Germans outnumbered them.) But, our 'Superman' has seen what's coming, and given the RAF 2nd generation radar and 1st generation jet intercepters (Think 'Gloster Meteor' or Me-262 or even P-80 Shooting Stars). With the RAF ready to defend against the bomber hordes (a real fear in 1938), the Royal Navy with improved sonars (thanks, Superman!), and other improvements, Neville Chamberlain can stand up to Hitler, and with French support back the Czech government against Nazi bullying. A properly timed demonstration of the new fighters plus implying there's a bomber version, and WW2 starts in 1938 with a Anglo-French offensive into the Ruhr in response to the German attack on Czechaslovakia(sp). Properly done, our Superman will ensure that the sun never, ever sets on the British Empire.

 

What happens to America in this scenario? Does Roosevelt get re-elected? What about the Great Depression? Or the New Deal? What happens to Trueman? What does the Empire of Japan do? Does Pearl Harbor still happen? Assuming Hitler's out on his @$$, does that mean the Communist Republic of Germany invents the atom bomb? Without his war record does Eisenhower enter politics? Do we see a baby boom? Does my mother exist in this timeline?*

 

So many questions.

 

*Mom was born in '49. Uncle John was '47 and Aunt Maggie was '48.

[assault]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

Does my mother exist in this timeline?*

 

No. Your daughter is her own grandmother.

 

...

 

Going back to the conventional Superman situation for a moment... If Germany is really militarily messed up, and is forced back into following Versailles Treaty type military restrictions, it would be quite plausible that the responsibility of developing counters to Superman would fall into the hands of covert organisations.

 

Like, say, Hydra. In a Champions type Universe, VIPER or RAVEN.

 

This would definitely help make a game in such a setting work, wouldn't it?

 

Now all we need is to explain the formation of the UN and UNTIL...

 

The technological advances that gave rise to Mechanon and Armadillo are easy to explain - without the war, science evolved in a "mad" direction. And it's not as if alien contact is all that rare after 1947...

[Shadow Hawk]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

What happens to America in this scenario? Does Roosevelt get re-elected? What about the Great Depression? Or the New Deal? What happens to Trueman? What does the Empire of Japan do? Does Pearl Harbor still happen? Assuming Hitler's out on his @$$, does that mean the Communist Republic of Germany invents the atom bomb? Without his war record does Eisenhower enter politics? Do we see a baby boom? Does my mother exist in this timeline?*

 

So many questions.

 

*Mom was born in '49. Uncle John was '47 and Aunt Maggie was '48.

 

Well, let's see...

One of the campaign soundbites against Roosevelt was that he was too 'pro-British' and too 'get involved in Europe's War. With the European war over and done with before the election, that issue goes away. Roosevelt wins re-election in 1940, but probably not in 1944.

New Deal continues. Without the massive government 'stimulus' of the war build up in late 1940 + employment program known as The Draft, the depression lasts longer.

Truman doesn't become vice president if Roosevelt isn't re-elected in 1944.

Without the German conquest of Holland and France plus the British* not tied up fighting Germany and Italy, Japan doesn't dare move south against the Dutch East Indies oil fields. There is no Pearl Harbor attack. The Imperial Japanese Army instead moves north against Russian controlled Siberia... but that won't work out well, since the Russians have no German Army to worry about.

Communist Germany? With the Nazis discredited, the right wing would rally on the Royalists. Since our 'Superman' likes monarchies (apparrently), Kaiser Willhelm II is re-instated... or his son is put on the throne more likely. With no war here, nuclear weapon programs stagnate... until Russia uses one on Japan in about 1949 (if that war lasts long enough, that is).

With no war, Eisenhower never gets his fourth (or fifth) star. He's out of politics.

With no draft, we don't have a pre-war baby boom. With no military deployments, there's no post war baby boom. My Mother and Father are born later if at all (the timing of thier births could be a result of the 1940 Draft law, which gave exemptions to men with two children at home. They're both second children.)

 

And... are thier other 'Supermen' out there other than our British pro-monarch one? Does Sir Kal-El of London have a rival anywhere?

 

*The Royal Air Force is the world's most advanced. The Royal Navy is the most technologically advanced, although thier ship age is rather old. The British Army is well equipped, if not very high tech.

[assault]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

With no war here' date=' nuclear weapon programs stagnate... until Russia uses one on Japan in about 1949 (if that war lasts long enough, that is).[/quote']

 

Probably not. If Japan annoyed Russia enough for to focus their attention, the latter would tear them a new hole. The problems would be air superiority and logistics. Once they were dealt with, the Soviet tanks would start rolling, and stop rolling somewhere in Thailand.

 

And... are thier other 'Supermen' out there other than our British pro-monarch one? Does Sir Kal-El of London have a rival anywhere?

 

Without a doubt.

 

"Herbert S. Fine" is Jerry Siegel under a pseudonym.

[Clonus]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

In 1930, Philip Wylie took this idea on and produced a superhuman who did --nothing. Because individuals, even if they do happen to be more powerful than a locomotive and faster than a speeding bullet, are just individuals. To comfort his dying father, who is a little down about how little his son has made of himself, Hugo Danner tells a story about how he forced the Armistice of 1918 by penetrating behind German lines and overturning all their guns. It eases Professor Danner out of this life, but, really, come on, Wylie suggests.

 

Frankly...I don't agree with Wylie. While Danner couldn't single-handedly win the war, it was well within his physical capability to ensure that any one of those futile frontal assaults would instead become a victory just by taking out a few machine guns.

 

My problem with Clonus' scenario is that Superman is now acting in the realm of international politics.

 

You may have noticed that it's not really my scenario. It's cribbed from an actual Superman story with minor modifications.

 

 

 

There is no longer a society to sanction the use of his powers.

 

That's why I made him an alien who doesn't quite understand the limitations of the International Court of Justice and the League of Nations that sponsored it until he learns the hard way.

 

 

Moreover, he is acting against German and Russian society,

 

Not Russian society. Understand he doesn't do anything about nations declaring war. Had the Germans just gone ahead and said that Poland had something they wanted and they were gonna beat up Poland and take it, he would have stayed out of it. After all, he absolutely will not kill humans, and that leaves him ill-equipped to decide wars. But he flew out to Poland under the impression that private citizens were committing crimes that risked starting a war. He loses his temper when he discovers that it's a frame-up job and tries to bring the perpetrator to justice. But, discovering the hard way that just doesn't work, he doesn't keep on doing it.

 

That being the case, the primary impact of his stunt is psychological. At first, nobody knows what his limits are, in any sense of the word. If they decide to call his "bluff", he's not going to charge out into the thick of battle and try to single-handedly win the war. But they don't know that. They don't know whether he can single-handedly win the war or just fly back in and pop Hitler's head like a grape. The title of this thread is not "Superman wins World War II". It's Superman averts World War II...with a question mark. If the superclone can't do that, he shrugs and goes back to simpler issues that he actually understands.

 

What might end up happening is that he just ends up delaying the start of the war until 1942 when the Japanese attack Pearl Harbor. The Germans join in and attack Poland while sending creating robots, monsters and villains to menace the United States, hoping to defeat the superman, and consoling themselves in their failures that at least they are keeping him sticking close to home...unaware that he'd be staying home anyway.

[Cassandra]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

One question is when would Superman intervene?

 

Let's assume that Superman has the power to fly across the Atlantic, break into Hitler's office, and fly him away. Let's further assume that he takes him to the League of Nations in Switzerland, and they keep him. Then what?

 

If the invasion of Poland is under way, Hitler's removed would not stop it. If it was during the Battle of France is certainly would not have.

 

And Superman doing so would possibly draw America into the War in Europe, or make Superman in international outcast. Clark Kent might be able to go back to work at the Daily Star, but if the Man of Steel shows up in Metropolis the police and Feds will attempt to arrest him.

 

And lets say Superman does after Hitler on Dec. 11, 1941, the day that Germany declared war on the United States.

 

Simply removing Hitler would not end the war. Goring, or Himmler would take his place. While it would do much for moral, it would not by itself end the war.

[megaplayboy]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

Well, clearly, if you remove enough people from the leadership cadre, a government/military will start to fall apart. Removing the top 20-25 civilian leaders, and the top 20-25 military leaders, will effectively cripple that country for weeks if not months while they try to fill the leadership vaccuum. If the lesser ranked fill-ins are not as invested in the war effort, they may in fact agree to an armistice.

[Cassandra]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

Maybe, Mega, but who exactly would Superman know who to take and who to leave? I suppose as a reporter he might know the big players in the Third Reich if Clark Kent had been assigned to Berlin like William L. Shire and Edward R. Murrow, but that's only a possible list of targets.

 

I suppose if he had been intimately knowledgable of the inner workings of the Nazis, he could have cooperated with Admiral Wilhelm Carnaris, head of the Abwehr, German Military Intelligence who as a member of the Black Orchestra was secretly undermining Hitler. But that would be a long shot, and even then timing would be everything.

 

Furthermore until the war began to turn against the Reich in 1943, Hitler was popular among the German people. His capture by an American would only make him a martyr in their eyes.

[megaplayboy]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

Mostly I'd think the correct answer to this dilemma lies in the Axis having an equal and opposite number to the Superclone. If one side has a unilateral advantage in metahumans, it's the same as if Me 262s and jet bombers were available for the Battle of Britain.

[Clonus]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

One question is when would Superman intervene?

.

 

In my version, he intervenes on August 31st, the day before Germany invades Poland during the Gliewitz incident. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gleiwitz_incident. He tries to "arrest" Hitler and turns him over to the Court of International Justice in Brussels along with the SS troops who actually carried them out and the concentration camp prisoner they were planning to murder as stage dressing for the hoax. In the comic book book story the actual Superman intervenes in the invasion of Poland on what would have been a day or so after the 17th of September, and "arrests" both Hitler and Stalin.

[Christopher]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

If the lesser ranked fill-ins are not as invested in the war effort' date=' they may in fact agree to an armistice.[/quote']

Unfortunately no (at least not in later phases of the war):

The western allies wanted to prevent another "Stab-in-the-back myth".

And Stalin was just out for blood.

[Andrew_A]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

Another question: If Superclone took out Hitler, wouldn't the Nazi party lose a lot of popularity? I'm a poor student of history (that's an understatement ), but didn't the Nazis' popularity result from Hitler's oratorical skills and fame (or infamy)?

[assault]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

Another question: If Superclone took out Hitler' date=' wouldn't the Nazi party lose a lot of popularity? I'm a poor student of history ([i']that's[/i] an understatement ), but didn't the Nazis' popularity result from Hitler's oratorical skills and fame (or infamy)?

 

Short answer: No.

 

Long answer: Oh dear.

 

By 1938/9, the Nazi government was well institutionalised, and could quite easily survive the loss of Hitler. There would certainly have been a power struggle between various would be successors, but that would probably have mainly been behind closed doors. Another Night of the Long Knives could have been possible, but the Nazis survived the original one well enough.

 

A massive loss of face could, however, lead to the German elite losing confidence in the Nazis. The risk for the Nazis then would be a military coup. The senior ranks of the military still included a lot of old school Prussian Junkers, who weren't fans of the plebeian riff-raff that infested the Nazi hierarchy.

 

On the left, it's possible that the largely defeated and demoralised Social Democrats and Communists might have been encouraged to start reorganising. By itself I doubt that would be sufficient to change things, but if the state fragmented into rival factions, the general population could quickly re-engage with political activity, in both pro- and anti- Nazi forms.

[megaplayboy]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

Is the underlying assumption here that there are essentially zero superhumans working for the Axis who could stand up to Superclone? And also zero superhumans elsewhere in the world who might have some issue with his interference in world affairs?

[assault]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

Is the underlying assumption here that there are essentially zero superhumans working for the Axis who could stand up to Superclone? And also zero superhumans elsewhere in the world who might have some issue with his interference in world affairs?

 

Essentially.

 

If other superhumans exist, they are probably mad scientists like the Ultra-Humanite, wannabe mystics who haven't quite got it together yet, or lurking in their castles working on their own plots.

 

Or training to avenge the murder of his parents.

[megaplayboy]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

Essentially.

 

If other superhumans exist, they are probably mad scientists like the Ultra-Humanite, wannabe mystics who haven't quite got it together yet, or lurking in their castles working on their own plots.

 

Or training to avenge the murder of his parents.

 

What if...Hitler is captured, and a powerful master-villain who can't simply be pummeled into submission takes his place? What if this villain was more rational, less petulant, had an excellent grasp of geostrategy and even some super-tech to help give the Axis a big edge? IOW, what if capturing Hitler just made things much, much worse?

[assault]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

That would be somebody like Vandal Savage, the Red Skull, or similar. They would have probably overthrown Hitler themselves sooner or later.

[phoenix240]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

What if...Hitler is captured' date=' and a powerful master-villain who can't simply be pummeled into submission takes his place? What if this villain was more rational, less petulant, had an excellent grasp of geostrategy and even some super-tech to help give the Axis a big edge? IOW, what if capturing Hitler just made things much, much worse?[/quote']

 

Maybe a certain doctor in the Champions U...

[Hyper-Man]

Re: Superman Averts World War II?

 

What if...Hitler is captured' date=' and a powerful master-villain who can't simply be pummeled into submission takes his place? What if this villain was more rational, less petulant, had an excellent grasp of geostrategy and even some super-tech to help give the Axis a big edge? IOW, what if capturing Hitler just made things much, much worse?[/quote']

 

You might end up with something like the Animated Justice League episode The Savage Time.