WWII Eastern Front - Did Stalin win or Hitler lose? - Page 2 - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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#14709256
fuser wrote:Yes, German Army numbered one hundred thousand at the time of MR pact, you and history don't mix well, Rich. Give it a rest. :)
Not a clever comment. You know full well I was referring to the Versailles limit which the Nazis revoked soon after getting into power. The expansion of the army achieved under Hitler was incredible. Communism is a lie. In practice it cares not a hoot for the ordinary workers and farmers in whose name the middle class and upper class Marxist intellectuals rule. We see that in the military sphere as in others. Communism only achieved its victories with a callousness for its own soldiers that make the British "Donkeys" of WWI look positively motherly in the concern for their men.
#14709292
:lol:

Your rant about communism is hilarious but neither this topic nor my comment has to do anything with it. In cases you didn't noticed, I explicitly gave a time frame for expansion of the Red Army as per German the rearmament was under way before Hitler but albeit covertly. So, yeah you and history don't mix well, give it a rest.
#14729050
Igor Antunov wrote:Turns out Germany came late to the party, with all the games in france and the balkans, the Ribbentrop pact was a grave strategic error. Hitler ran face first into a brick wall as a result. The soviets had geared up for total war by that point. He ignored rule 1-never underestimate your opponent. They threw everything they had at that operation, but they did it too late. They couldn't support those armies across so much territory against such an opponent. He could have made it to the Urals as it turns out, and still lost.

Why Barbarossa failed, a retrospective according to Hitler, by Hitlers own words:


The Sowiet Union, spent 38% of GDP for Millitary. The Wehrmacht was not such strong. Germany could just since 1933-39 produce arms , therefore the Germans lead Blitzkrieg, which is a dangerous strategy, in Blitzkrieg you put al on one card.

Hitler thought after the failed Sowiet Invasion against Finland, the sowiets are an easy victim.

Finland came easy out of WW2 although they sieged Leningrad with the Wehrmacht.

Todays Russia, has 20 000 MBTs and 20 000 IFV...
#14729273
Germany was too casual about it, it never even employed women in the arms industry. Everybody else did. That's 50% of the workforce not utilized to prop up much needed hardware production. Germany put too much stock in the lightning war. It sought out campaigns that would last mere weeks and never had the impetus to supply and maintain so many panzer groups for so long. France campaign must have induced a false sense of security.
#14733122
The Germans were massacring and enslaving populations in the parts of the USSR they took over. When they were limiting those actions to Jews, Poles and Russians then the other ethnic groups were largely indifferent or on side with the Germans - an enemy of my enemy mentality. Once the Germans starting persecuting the other groups too, as was Hitler's policy towards Slavs, the Germans lost a lot of local support. Since the Soviets were moving forward, I dont think that lack of support (his 'loss') really materialized.
#14733301
Igor Antunov wrote:Probably a good thing long term, it meant soviet government and armed forces would stay more stable going forward. The motive was centralization of the command structure. And it needed unity in the face of the German attack.


Good point--just as I've said for years.


By 1942-43 it was over for German tactics, soviets had adapted.


But Manstein was still able to smash Popov early in '43.

Prior to the German invasion Soviet forces were stationed in an offensive posture-preparing for an eventual invasion of Germany, i.e they were in the process of mobilizing for an offensive.


:?: If Stalin had planned to initiate hostilities why didn't he do it in May-June 1940, when the reich had almost nothing in the east to stop him? Authors have given the impression Stalin was very fearful of Germsany early in '41, and did everything to prevent war.

Axis threw everything it had available at the height of Barbarossa at Moscow-and failed.


But Adolf resisted his generals initial (summer '41) call to go after Moscow as he preferred economic targets. He didn't prioritize Moscow until the fall.

Moscow would have made an operationally useless prize. Russians would have just burned it down before giving it up like they did when nappy showed up for his ill fated visit.


But German generals and wargamers thought otherwise--they pointed out that Moscow was the hub of the Soviet transportation and communication network. ""Take it and the Soviets....would be unable to move troops and supplies to the more distant fronts which would thereafter weaken, wither and collapse."
#14733314
OK assuming a June 22nd kick off, Germany's initial objective for the first four weeks of the campaign was to eliminate the Soviet border armies. This they failed to do because two much of their forces were deployed north of the Pripet marshes and too little to the South. The bulk of the Soviet armour deployed in the border regions was in the South. The forward deployment of Soviet forces and Stalin's unwillingness to retreat were a huge boon to the Germans. They took advantage of this in the North but failed to surround and eliminate Soviet border region forces in the South.

The second reason for a more a balanced attack was that it took time to secure and develop supply lines. Over rapid advances in particular places were an inefficient use of resources and led to far greater rates of attrition. The Germans made rapid penetration towards Leningrad very quickly, but this achieved no strategic purpose, pushing German forces into a narrow front, rather than keeping broad operational freedom which was one of Germany's big advantages while they had force superiority.

We can understand this better if we look at Soviet priorities in the opening weeks of the war. Yes the Soviets obviously needed to slow the German advance, but they could have done more effectively with less troops by focussing on strong hold defences. The greater priority was to save the bulk of their border forces, men, equipment, organisation from destruction giving them time to mobilise and redeploy their eastern, central and southern forces.

This greater focus on the southern forces would not have reduced the chances of taking Moscow in 41 it would have increased it, because the Soviets would have lacked the forces to defend it. The Kiev pocket should have been taken in July.
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