Would Hitler have won World War II if he had left Russia alone?

[Xithras]

87. It would have never got through.

The B-29's that bombed Japan only got through because Japan was essentially beaten already, and barely had a functional air force. If Germany had beat the UK, the Luftwaffe would have been at full strength along the British coast for the duration of the war. American bombers would have had to fly the length of the North Sea, which would have been a suicide run with the German military occupying the land on three sides. More importantly, if Britain had fallen the Germans would have captured their radar technology. Couple that with the fact that a defeated Britain would have also meant full ME-262 production, and the B-29's wouldn't have stood a chance.

Not that it matters much anyway. It's highly improbable that the United States would have carried on with a major engagement against the Nazi's if Britain had fallen. Without a functional allied government and staging area in Europe, continuing the war would have been nearly impossible. Nuking the Germans wouldn't have done much good without the ability to place troops in Germany to occupy it afterward.

Plus, there's another dangerous possibility. The Germans didn't get nukes because the heavy water plant in Norway was famously destroyed by the Norwegian resistance. That occurred only because the resistance had direction and help from British special forces (in fact, the rebels only targeted it because the British wanted it destroyed). If Britain had fallen in 1940, it's entirely possible that the Nazi's could have been a nuclear power by 1945.