Quote:
Originally Posted by RN7
Who isn't a second rate power compared with the US?
The Poles have despised the Russians for centuries, and never more so than after the Second World War and when they were part of the Warsaw Pact. The Poles also hate the Germans. However they seem to have tolerated the East Germans, I suppose because they knew they were also being oppressed by the Russians. During the Cold War the non-brainwashed by communism part of the Polish establishment, especially the Polish military and intelligence services were notoriously uncooperative with the Russians to the point that the KGB had to use the East German Stasi has a proxy to keep tabs on the Poles.
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The important question isn't "Who isn't a second rate power compared to the US?", but...Why would a second rate power go to war against a half a dozen of the most economically and militarily powerful countries in the world all at the same time? More importantly, how would they do even as well as the cannon claims they do? This is why Russia "makes friends" with Iran, Iraq, and supports the South American drug Cartels in my timeline. Russia needs allies and "The Enemy of My Enemy IS My Friend." These regimes are also afraid of US "domination" and (in their minds) need weapons to protect themselves. Russia just happens to have a large number of weapons to sell. Hense, the relationship is born. This also helps answer the question of why the US didn't have M1s sitting outside the Kremlin or why everyone in the World isn't dying in a Nuclear Holocaust. The US was spread too thin by conflicts in The Balkans (Kosovo), Eastern Europe (Poland), The Middle East (Iran/Iraq) and Asia (support for China) to make the kind of gains one would expect them to make.
"The Poles hate Russia..." This is all true. I guess one could argue that Russia couldn't influence Poland. They said the same thing about The Ukraine too. My alternate timeline addresses the very unrealistic idea that a newly reformed Germany would form a pretext to "invade" Poland and that The UK and The US would even go along with this pretext.
Poland had joined the Visegrad Group with The Czech Republic, Hungary, and Slovakia as early as 1991 (the coup in the GDW alternate timeline could not have stopped this). This group was formed for mutual defense and economic growth with the aim of eventually joining NATO and The EU. Germany attacking Poland would have brought the other three countries to her aid immediately and created a huge rift in NATO that the US would NEVER consent to. An "internal conflict" in Poland wouldn't initially "ignite a firestorm" in Europe (as much as Russia would have liked this). Instead, it would appear that members of NATO were helping the legitimate government of Poland with what would become "externally backed" extremists. This is a more logical reason for both The UK and The US to become involved. Russia never really "intended" to get drawn into a deeper conflict in Europe, it just sort of "developed" into WW3. As for the "Insurgency," this starts out as a very small group of Poles supported by "freedom fighters" who "show up" to "help." This is much like modern day Ukraine where 9 out of 10 people polled support the new government but the "resistance" to the government continues to grow and get better equipped daily. It is kind of funny how many of those "random freedom fighters" speak Russian.