What would the immediate and long term effects have been if the US had decided to embrace isolationism (at least temporarily) after WW2? Does this greatly help the USSR?
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Yes. It is a massive boost to the Soviet Union. All the borderline countries, like Italy, will vote in Communism out of frustration at corruption without the West actively acting against their factions.
Without a strong, coherent, military presence in Germany; keep an eye on the Fulda Gap because Soviet armor would almost assuredly come flowing through sooner or later.
Without a strong, coherent, military presence in Germany; keep an eye on the Fulda Gap because Soviet armor would almost assuredly come flowing through sooner or later.
And in the long term, would control over Germany and a preponderance of power in Europe have saved the USSR?
Well without the Marshall Plan and relative isolatinsm of the USA, then France also aligns with the USSR given how powerful the PCF was strong in 1945. I think that with Western Europe on their side the Soviets have a shot at "winning" the Cold War or at least not implode in the medium term. Although it would be difficult to vassalize all Europe as they did with the Warsaw Pact members, think of Prague Spring more violent and more frequent along with dissensions between the local Parties and the USSR one I'd say.
Boxer the horse was very optimistic about the rule of the party, but Benjamin the donkey was far more wise and pragmatic; and unless I'm mistaken it is he who reads the words 'All animals are created equal, but some animals are more equal than others'.
Personally, as all my communications are monitored, I am very grateful the Ministry of Peace perpetuates eternal war against our enemies, against whom we rage during our ritual of Daily Hate. We are fortunate we have the Ministry of Truth to use its casuistry and Doublespeak to explain the Doublethink of the Party so we may know the truth of this war and the glory of The People. And, most of all, let us be thankful for the Ministry of Love, who ensures no earthly, romantic, familial or spiritual entanglements dilute our love for our Nation, our Folk, Our leader. Hail President Katniss Everdeen! Hail, Hail, Hail!
(insert sound of buzzer ringing loudly signaling the allotted time for hailing our leader has been met and we may now resume Party Bidness)
Define 'save the USSR'? Does an infinite amount of flies bloat a spider until it is grotesque and horrible to look upon, unless you are one of the Spider Elite who looks on people such as you as nothing but prey?
The Gestapo might be preferable. It's a tough choice.
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No. Believe it or not, it would probably make its life more difficult.
But first we have to define isolationism. What would an isolationist US look like? Would it maintain its existing commitments but refuse to take on new ones, a'la the US before 1941? Would it be like China is today, a state which is for the most part politically isolationist (bribing certain foreign politicians notwithstanding) but economically internationalist, or would it be more like Australia: highly interventionist in its region but mostly isolationist everywhere else? Would it be a Swiss-style militarised neutral republic or a Loupist model state which abolished its defence forces and replaced them with an army of strongly-worded-letter-writers?
Except in the Loupist scenario where the USSR is free to invade any country it wishes, things become more and not less difficult for the USSR. How so? There are essentially six major factors that we need to consider in this scenario, and the sort of state the US becomes affects how each of these factors will affect the USSR. They are: Britain, Italy, France, Japan, Germany and China.
Of these six countries, Britain is the only one which we can safely assume will not turn Communist on its own. The CPGB was never a serious electoral force, and even in a world in which communism has more popular appeal worldwide, FPTP makes it highly unlikely that the CPGB could ever win enough seats to form a government barring a Labour split. In all scenarios with the possible exception of the first, Britain would essentially be the leader of the free world in this timeline. IRL Britain played an important role in the early years of the Cold War in stemming the communist tide in Southern Europe and Asia. Britain would still have the means to do this without the Marshall Plan, but the relative burden of doing so would be much, much higher.
The moment of truth for Britain would come in the mid-1950's with the crises in Iran and Egypt: a non-interventionist US would paradoxically increase the chances of Britain retaining control of Suez, but without access to Iranian oil Britain simply could not continue to function as a world power. The best case scenario for Britain would be one in which France remains Gaullist, Britain remains capable of deposing Mossadeq on her own or with French help, and the US remains interventionist enough to at least ply the British government with money and/or favourable trade deals while not caring too much about the Empire or her actions in the Middle East. This would be the FU wet dream scenario, in which an Anglo-French Entente takes up the mantle of world policeman and fights a cold war against the USSR. Instead of the US and USSR vying for influence in independent third world countries, you would have the USSR funding independence movements in Anglo-French colonies. It is conceivable that either side could win this cold war, but it would take a lot longer to resolve than in OTL given the relative weakness of the Entente relative to the US.
A much more likely scenario would be one in which the British (or Anglo-French) economy collapses under the weight of its growing defence obligations, essentially mirroring the fate of the USSR in OTL. Of course this would happen to Britain much, much earlier than it happened to Russia: probably around the mid-1960's, though it's conceivable that Britain could have continued well into the 70's if she retained control of Iranian oil and/or was in bed with an American sugar daddy. In the aftermath Britain would cease to be a combatant in the Cold War, but nor would she likely join the Soviet bloc outright. Instead, she would probably assume a role reminiscent of Russia during the Yeltsin Era: not a part of the Soviet bloc, but not openly antagonistic towards it either.
France could potentially go down the same route, depending on how close ties remained between it and Britain. Unlike Britain though, France could certainly turn Communist unilaterally; though I would stress that this was by no means guaranteed and even if it did France wouldn't necessarily automatically choose to join the Soviet bloc. Again, this is mostly depending on how the US behaves towards France in this scenario. For instance, an Asia-focused US could find common cause with France over Indochina, or Indochina could be a potential cause of friction if the US chose to sympathise with the rebels.
Italy would almost certainly go Communist regardless of what form the US took. IRL the 1948 election was a proxy war between the cold war powers, with the CIA bankrolling the Christian Democrats and the KGB the Communists. Even in the most interventionist scenario where the US retains an occupying garrison in post-war Italy, it's hard to envision a scenario in which the Garibaldi Front fails to win the elections without the significant CIA intervention we saw in OTL -- it's entirely possible, indeed likely, that the Catholic Church and the mafia would still aid the anti-Communist parties, but they would be considerably less effective without CIA help. Even if the Garibaldi Front lost the 1948 elections, the lack of CIA aid combined with the deteriorating economic situation would almost guarantee a PCI electoral victory at some point during the 50's.
The late 1960's is where things get interesting for the USSR: Duclos, Thorez and Togliatti were all Stalinists in the broadest sense of the term, and would have been receptive to Moscow and the party line. Thus, France and Italy would be assets to the USSR in the short term, and even if they remained independent of the WP relations between them and Moscow would have remained cordial. The problem is that their successors were not, and that as highly charismatic and strong-willed individuals with close ties to the outgoing leader, both Marchais and Berlinguer would likely still have ascended to the leadership of their respective communist parties in this timeline. Hungary, the Sino-Soviet Split and the Prague Spring -- or some similar events -- would have occurred in some form regardless of what the US did, and the conditions for the advent of the New Left would still broadly be in place. As Italy and France would have joined the WP willingly in all but the last scenario, they would retain enough independence from the USSR to act independently if they so wished; they wouldn't be puppets and thus couldn't be cocerced in quite the same manner as a Czechoslovakia or a Hungary.
This would all cause some massive headaches for the USSR. Instead of a protest against Gaullism, the '68 protests would be directed against Stalinism. Instead of impotently denouncing the expulsion of the Chinese from afar, Berlinguer's stance would carry real political weight coming as it did from the second or third most influential Communist power. It would provide a catalyst for a much larger Sino-Soviet split with France and Italy supporting the Chinese, and/or for the foundation of a third Eurocom bloc between states who independently chose communism and those Russian puppets who had it thrust upon them. This bloc could in turn be pragmatically supported by the Americans and maybe the British much as the US backed Mao and Tito in OTL -- if the Empire collapses and Britain turns socialist, they could even formally ally themselves with the Eurocoms -- and potentially go on to "win" the Cold War outright.
So with all due respect to LBJ, it would be far better for Moscow to have them outside the tent pissing in than to have them inside the tent pissing out.
Japan meanwhile is Italy or Yugoslavia on steroids. Obviously if the US retains interests in Asia it won't turn Commie, but assuming they don't a socialist Japan has the potential to really screw things up for the Soviets. Japan's economy recovered quickly after the war and IRL benefited from a great deal of dirigisme, so unless the US is prepared to wage economic warfare against it it's entirely plausible that the Japanese economy would still take off under socialism. Even if you exclude the bounce it received from US investment during the Korean war, Japan could still become the economic and scientific powerhouse it was in OTL, it just might take a few extra years to achieve.
The JCP were a lot weaker than the PCF or PCI electorally, but a lot of this was due to pervasive US influence in Japan -- MacArthur effectively did everything to curtail the party's electoral prospects outside of banning it outright; a leftist victory is therefore certainly plausible assuming the US does not retain its iron grip on Japan. Assuming that the JCP or a popular front do win power, Japan would be unlikely to join the Soviet bloc. Miyamoto was a Eurocom long before Eurocommunism was a thing: he advocated Dubkecism a full decade before Dubkec himself, denounced both the Soviets and the Chinese, criticized both NATO and the WP and repudiated both Stalinism and Leninism way back in the late 50's. In short, he was the closest thing the world got to an electorally successful Left Oppositionist, and would be a major thorn in the Soviet's side.
The only way for Japan to become a net asset for the USSR would be to either rewrite the end of WWII as a Russian rather than US occupation, or to have Miyamoto meet the same fate as Dubkec. The latter would be difficult to achieve without violence, but given the JCP's pacifistic stance in OTL violence wouldn't be difficult to achieve. The exception of course would be if Miyamoto foresaw a Soviet invasion by choosing to pragmatically rearm, much as the Lib Dems did IRL. Either way, invading or potentially nuking the world's most successful non-European Communist state would not be a good PR move for the Soviets.
Germany is far too difficult a variable for me to accurately predict. Even if the US relinquishes its garrison, West Germany could still exist in this timeline if Britain and France chose to retain theirs (which I think quite likely, even in a state of severe economic hardship.) Russia could easily overrun such a garrison, but that applies in OTL as well, and in this TL Britain and France would still have nukes. Without the US and the Marshall Plan, I would expect the British to be much less keen to foot the bill for Germany's defence and thus be more tolerant of German rearmament.
Even if the Soviets united Germany under communism, I can't say for certain whether Germany would prove a loyal client state or not. If the same people who ran the DDR in OTL ran the new Germany, I think it likely, but it's entirely possible that an influx of Western Leftists combined with the absence of the West as a galvanising rival force would have resulted in a more independent, if not outright Eurocom, DDR. On balance though a unified Germany would have probably been a net asset to Moscow, and a useful counter-balance to the Paris-Rome-Tokyo axis.
Unless the reason for US isolationism in Europe is due to massive interventionism in the Orient, China would likely proceed as it did historically. The difference in this timeline would be that it would have a lot more potential friends to play with. Thus, even if the US decides to play no role in China's affairs at all, China could still find herself making friends with Western (Commie or otherwise) powers in order to counter the threat posed by the USSR. I don't forsee US isolationism altering Sino-Soviet relations at all.
tl;dr US isolationism might be good for communism, but unless the USSR decides to go full Trotsky and the US full Loupie, I don't foresee it being better for the USSR. Communism was screwed the second fate chose Russia to be its standard-bearer.
Logical and rational.
The only places where I might not totally agree are in areas of extreme conjecture, and at that point we would only be arguing over what shapes we see formed by the clouds.
Not sure you can say the 1948 Italian elections were a forgone conclusion without American involvement. Remember that the Popular Front only got 31% and the Christian Democrats 48% OTL with all others being anti-Communist (although some parties might have been softer on this point without an American led Cold War). Even if the lack of US intervention would almost certainly led to a closer result - seems a stretch to believe that it would have shifted the millions of vote necessary for the Communists to actually win. Not even sure you could say that the eventually the worm would turn and the PCI would get in. Even in favourable circumstances, Italy's proportional electoral system would have been a big barrier to any sort of Communist led government, even if they were substantially more popular than historically.
I think an interesting factor would be whether the Soviets and Communist Parties would behave the same way as they did historically in Eastern Europe. Would they have been more comfortable allowing democratic states that were Soviet-aligned and had big Communist Parties (something that would certainly make CPs more attractive to Western European electorates) in the absence of a real military threat, or would they have just gone ahead and implanted one-party dictatorships anyway.
I also suspect that the Communists would win the Greek civil war and god knows how much of the Far East would fall to them without US involvement.
If more major countries went red (and didn't have the Red Army on their doorstep), then we could have expected all manner of inter-Communist rivalries in the style of the Sino-Soviet split and Yugoslavia. Probably lots of additional flavours of Communist ideology as well. Especially after the big man dies in 1953.
I think an interesting factor would be whether the Soviets and Communist Parties would behave the same way as they did historically in Eastern Europe. Would they have been more comfortable allowing democratic states that were Soviet-aligned and had big Communist Parties (something that would certainly make CPs more attractive to Western European electorates) in the absence of a real military threat, or would they have just gone ahead and implanted one-party dictatorships anyway.
I also suspect that the Communists would win the Greek civil war and god knows how much of the Far East would fall to them without US involvement.
If more major countries went red (and didn't have the Red Army on their doorstep), then we could have expected all manner of inter-Communist rivalries in the style of the Sino-Soviet split and Yugoslavia. Probably lots of additional flavours of Communist ideology as well. Especially after the big man dies in 1953.
The USSR surviving requires far less than that. Gorbatchev not being elected is one. It's one of the easier alternative history that exists.
Now the USSR actually winning the cold war is another story.
In the scenario presented I don't see much changing immediatly in Europe. Greece was a UK-USSR affair and Stalin kept his word there.
West Berlin fall but West Germany has Allied troops there so it's relatively safe.
Communist will have a stronger presence in western Europe but not enough for dramatic changes as far as I see, it's possible that France and UK (both under socialist government) seek a detente deal with the USSR.
(which really Churchill had already negociated)
In the east, Korea is definetly united under the reds and so does Vietnam and probably the whole Indochina peninsula.
And I don't see Communist making more progress there for the time being.
Africa and the M-E will depends on how the allies deal with decolonisation. Does the US still support Israel as they did in OTL ?
Does the US intervene in the Suez crisis or will they let the USSR be the only anti-colonial superpower ?
A lot of things can go the USSR way there.
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I do think we're missing the timelines a bit, so we need to figure exactly how things happen.
Historically, the fundamentals of west-European military alliance were in place from 1948, the same year the Marshall plan began. And by 1954, it included the critical remaining WE powers (namely West Germany and Italy). It is anyone's guess how rapidly this would really go if the USA disengages straight in 1945, but I think it's more realistic to give it a few years of declining US interest which would if anything spur this along.
So what I imagine is a fundamentally allied Carolingia+Britain that, while not nearly as able to oppose the USSR, is still very much in favour of keeping it out of local affairs. And I think there would be plenty of socialist/social-democrat politicians to capture the leftist vote sufficiently to prevent any overt pro-USSR stalinist selling out the country. I agree with Lord Tempest that it would try and probably fail to engage in global opposition to the USSR, but the shape of that failure is also strongly dependent on how things develop.
For example, take Indonesia. Seems a clear-cut case of 'the Netherlands already tried and failed so still will'... except the USA was strongly anti-Dutch-intervention, and so were most of the rest of the west (at least after the initial Dutch attempts ended rather bloodily). The USA used the direct threat of cutting Marshall plan aid to stop the Dutch offensives (which had been, at least militarily, quite succesfull). If the Dutch and West Europeans in general have been left out to dry by the USA, expect the final shape of the agreement to take more blood, and based on military trends, to be more pro-partition of Indonesia (e.g. if the Dutch had firmly cut the ties between the Javanese and Sumatran/Atjehan parts of Indonesia, this might suffice to keep the rest of Indonesia free of their direct power). This would mean an ongoing Dutch commitment to at least parts of the archipelago.
Similar dramas can undoubtedly cause a ton of messes throughout the world, resulting in either much more areas of the world in a sort of 'Francafrique' dependency on the European powers (and thus still outside the Soviet sphere) while a few areas (in my Indonesia example probably Java/south-Sumatra) rely on aligning with the USSR to oppose them, or in ever increasing commitments until the whole thing collapses under domestic pressures (like the Portuguese).
Another important possibility is that this WEU is, while fundamentally anti-Soviet at home, not anti-Soviet internationally. Supposing the colonial governments collapse after suffering higher strains, the WEU might be reduced to just Western Europe. In that case, its sphere of influence (and possibly alliance) might well be reduced to Iceland, Austria, Denmark, Norway, Greece, and Iberia. In that case, there's little reason (supposing West Berlin is also sneakily taken over without the US to save it) for USSR-WEU conflict. The USSR gets to run riot in the third world, sure, but I'm not sure that's actually a net positive.
Historically, the fundamentals of west-European military alliance were in place from 1948, the same year the Marshall plan began. And by 1954, it included the critical remaining WE powers (namely West Germany and Italy). It is anyone's guess how rapidly this would really go if the USA disengages straight in 1945, but I think it's more realistic to give it a few years of declining US interest which would if anything spur this along.
So what I imagine is a fundamentally allied Carolingia+Britain that, while not nearly as able to oppose the USSR, is still very much in favour of keeping it out of local affairs. And I think there would be plenty of socialist/social-democrat politicians to capture the leftist vote sufficiently to prevent any overt pro-USSR stalinist selling out the country. I agree with Lord Tempest that it would try and probably fail to engage in global opposition to the USSR, but the shape of that failure is also strongly dependent on how things develop.
For example, take Indonesia. Seems a clear-cut case of 'the Netherlands already tried and failed so still will'... except the USA was strongly anti-Dutch-intervention, and so were most of the rest of the west (at least after the initial Dutch attempts ended rather bloodily). The USA used the direct threat of cutting Marshall plan aid to stop the Dutch offensives (which had been, at least militarily, quite succesfull). If the Dutch and West Europeans in general have been left out to dry by the USA, expect the final shape of the agreement to take more blood, and based on military trends, to be more pro-partition of Indonesia (e.g. if the Dutch had firmly cut the ties between the Javanese and Sumatran/Atjehan parts of Indonesia, this might suffice to keep the rest of Indonesia free of their direct power). This would mean an ongoing Dutch commitment to at least parts of the archipelago.
Similar dramas can undoubtedly cause a ton of messes throughout the world, resulting in either much more areas of the world in a sort of 'Francafrique' dependency on the European powers (and thus still outside the Soviet sphere) while a few areas (in my Indonesia example probably Java/south-Sumatra) rely on aligning with the USSR to oppose them, or in ever increasing commitments until the whole thing collapses under domestic pressures (like the Portuguese).
Another important possibility is that this WEU is, while fundamentally anti-Soviet at home, not anti-Soviet internationally. Supposing the colonial governments collapse after suffering higher strains, the WEU might be reduced to just Western Europe. In that case, its sphere of influence (and possibly alliance) might well be reduced to Iceland, Austria, Denmark, Norway, Greece, and Iberia. In that case, there's little reason (supposing West Berlin is also sneakily taken over without the US to save it) for USSR-WEU conflict. The USSR gets to run riot in the third world, sure, but I'm not sure that's actually a net positive.
It would have let the Soviets play hegemon in Western Europe, spend less on their military, and press France and the other continental powers to trade technology and advanced machinery with them in exchange for oil and other resources. A dream come true for the historical USSR of the 1970s and beyond. It's what they dreamed of when they clamored for the USA to leave Europe. Of course it would help them immensely. Would it make the USSR survive indefinitely? Hardly.
I will say yes, and I will tell you why. What crashed the USSR wasn't any particular failing of it's own, but it's relative position compared to the west. nations, economies, and political entities live and die based on what they expect, and hope to achieve.
The fundamental problem with the USSR and Warsaw pact, was that as the West began to accelerate and pull away economically starting roughly in the early 1970's/late 1960's, it became more and more clear that whatever communism was doing wasn't as effective at creating prosperity and happiness as whatever the West was doing. This gap between reality (economy doing OK, but not great) and expectation (these other guys are doing much better from the same basic starting point) created the collapse of the USSR. absent the Marshall plan, the US taking the lead in defending and creating a low cost oil supply in the middle east, and providing a military security umbrella, Western Europe isn't going to experience the same level and degree of economic growth that it did in real life. This will vastly improve the situation for the USSR by greatly reducing the expectations of it's people, and the people of it's satellite states as well. Add in that they will probably perform better than IRL without active opposition from the USA, and there's no telling how things might turn out.