Did Hitler have Parkinson's?

Thetuois

And if so do you think he would have won the war if he did not develop this disease which possibly effected his decision making.

whupdedo

How would parkinsons affect your decision making abilities ?

spurious

Germany was never going to defeat the Russians - just on numbers. A second front following D Day absolutely settled it.

Teaks81

spurious wrote: »

Germany was never going to defeat the Russians - just on numbers. A second front following D Day absolutely settled it.

I think Germany could have defeated them with Hitlers interfering with his Generals decisions. They were severely handicapped without the option for tactical retreat. Then if they had treated and acted as liberators rather than conquerers in the Baltics and Ukraine they would have had an easier task. Russia was there for the taking if they had a bit of cop on.

ohnonotgmail

spurious wrote: »

Germany was never going to defeat the Russians - just on numbers. A second front following D Day absolutely settled it.

they were already on the back foot by June 1944. they had lost well before that due to hitlers meddling.

TerrorFirmer

whupdedo wrote: »

How would parkinsons affect your decision making abilities ?

Whatever Hitler was afflicted with drastically affected his decision making. Can't remember the exact quote but in Beevors Berlin, he says that by 1944 Hitlers once astonishing grasp of logistics and tactics had entirely disappeared.

whupdedo

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

Whatever Hitler was afflicted with drastically affected his decision making. Can't remember the exact quote but in Beevors Berlin, he says that by 1944 Hitlers once astonishing grasp of logistics and tactics had entirely disappeared.

But would parkinsons have affected abilities to make decisions , I would have though if he had something wrong with him that affected his mental capacity it would be something like alzheimers or some other cognitive disease

tricky D

One hypothesis is that his affliction was Nazi ideology with that being prioritised over the best interests of Wermacht strategy leading to poor decision making.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5agLW7fTzBc

lulu1

whupdedo wrote: »

How would parkinsons affect your decision making abilities ?[/QUOTE
Some people with parkinsons find it very difficult to make decisions

whupdedo

lulu1 wrote: »

whupdedo wrote: »

How would parkinsons affect your decision making abilities ?[/QUOTE
Some people with parkinsons find it very difficult to make decisions

Could you expand on your reply please , does parkinsons have an effect on cognitive abilities ? Does it just effect motor functions or is their a corelation between the two ?

lila1

Just to say I know nothing about Hitler winning or losing wars but I do know a bit about parkinson's

The above poster is quite right when they say that people with Parkinson's find it hard to make decisions.
Some because their thinking is slow find that when they are in the middle of a sentence that they completely forget what they were going to say.
Others who are fit to work sometimes find that say when in a meeting and they cannot grasp what is being said because there are too many talking at the one time.

I have to stress that not all people with Parkinson's will be affected this way
To the ordinary person on the street Parkinson's is just a bit of a shake in your hand but there is a lot more to it than that

Tony EH

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

Whatever Hitler was afflicted with drastically affected his decision making. Can't remember the exact quote but in Beevors Berlin, he says that by 1944 Hitlers once astonishing grasp of logistics and tactics had entirely disappeared.

There would have been few world leaders (if any) that could have contended a favorable outcome for their country if they faced what the Germans did in 1944.

It's unsurprising that Hitler's grasp on such things was failing. I could easily imagine that, put in the same place, Churchill, Stalin or Roosevelt would have experienced pretty much the same dilemmas.

Germany was effectively finished by mid 1943 and it's a testament to the average German soldier that they managed to hold off the inevitable for the next two years, where many other nations armed forces would have collapsed totally in less than half that time.

Also, while I've never entertained that Hitler was "mad" in say, 1939, by 1944/45, he was almost certainly so and more than likely due to the absolutely enormous pressures that must have been plaguing him on an hourly basis. These pressures were, of course, due to his betting everything on the roll of one dice, but still it's understandable that it would have taken a very serious mental toll. So, I think the (possible) Parkinson's brought on or exaggerated by the July '44 bombing, was the least of his problems.

Tompatrick

If he interfered less on the technology side the weapons to turn the war may have been available ealier to impact the outcome. For example the production of the ME262 was delayed over a year due to his meddling and wanting to turn it into a fighter bomber instead of seeing it's true potential as an interceptor to clean the skies of the flying fortresses.

Tony EH

That's not really the case though. While Hitler certainly liked to micromanage the war, the main reason for the 262's delay was the Junkers Jumo engine.

It's popular to blame Hitler on everything that went wrong for the German's during the war, because...well, he's Hitler. But more often than not it was simply circumstance that was against the Germans.

That being said, he did ask could it carry bombs, which wasn't actually that unreasonable (as the Jabo concept was quite sound) but coupled with the fact that there were only limited numbers coming off the lines (due to the engine problem), it wasn't the best line of thinking for the plane.

In any case, the vast majority of ME262's were fighters. Even the Jabo's spent most of their time as fighters.

Jawgap

Tompatrick wrote: »

If he interfered less on the technology side the weapons to turn the war may have been available ealier to impact the outcome. For example the production of the ME262 was delayed over a year due to his meddling and wanting to turn it into a fighter bomber instead of seeing it's true potential as an interceptor to clean the skies of the flying fortresses.

Doubtful it would have cleaned the skies of anything.

By late 1944 the Luftwaffe lacked the fuel to run proper training and operational conversion programmes - I don't have the figures to hand, but in 1940 the 'average' Luftwaffe fighter pilot taking off to escort bombers in the attacks against Britain had several hundred hours flying time under his belt, including significant time on type.

From the Staffel level, through the Gruppe and Geschwader levels up to the Luftflotte levels they were well led, and at the tactical levels (staffel, gruppe and geschwader) the leadership surpassed the RAF in terms of experience.

By 1944, a lot of the equipment (jets aside) was outmoded, their technology in a number of areas was superior to the Allies, but their organisation was lacking and, critically, a lot of the brilliant tactical leaders who should've been instructing and training were gone.

Hitler's decision to throw away the rest of the fighters assembled for the defence of the Reich in Operation BODENPLATTE only compounded their problems - it led not only to one of the worst days for the Lutfwaffe, in terms of pilot losses, and critically led to a large chunk of the remaining experienced veterans being killed, captured or wounded.

Tzar Chasm

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

Whatever Hitler was afflicted with drastically affected his decision making. Can't remember the exact quote but in Beevors Berlin, he says that by 1944 Hitlers once astonishing grasp of logistics and tactics had entirely disappeared.

I keep seeing references to this, isnt the prevailing theory that Goering got him hooked on amphetamines some time before barbarossa.

Speaking As a former speedfreak, i recognise a lot of his actions as consistent with someone who is buzzing off his tits.