Russia: we could have defeated the Nazis alone

[emad]

May 01, 2005

Sunday Times
Mark Franchetti, Moscow



WITH dozens of international leaders expected to attend, Moscow’s celebrations to mark the end of the second world war are being billed as a show of unity as well as remembrance.

But 60 years on, Soviet army veterans are accusing Churchill of denying Russia credit for defeating the Nazis and are vowing to use the event to claim that they — not the allies — won the war.

“The role the Soviet army played in liberating Europe from the Nazis was deliberately played down in the post-war period and during the second world war,” said Filipp Bobkov, a former top KGB general who fought in the war.

“Our allies, especially Great Britain and Churchill personally, sought to show that the main role in the victory belonged to them and Britain in particular. We showed the world we could liberate half of Europe without the allies.”

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,176-1593079,00.html

HUMBUG: Stalin effectively hired the Nazis by recruiting the Polish Fascist Party in the 1920s to do its dirty work in Germany.

[stpalm]

1. why did Stalin keep bitching at us to start a second front, then? (nt)

[malmapus]

5. Exactly

If Germany didn't have to worry about anything on the western front and commited all of the forces they had tied up, no doubt they could have done better in the Russian front.

Plus the way the Russians fought, Zhukov espicially, throwing thousands of troops to the slaughter and just plain overwhelming the Germans. They couldn't of kept that style of fighting up for a more extended period of time.

[Yupster]

32. What an interesting what if

What if the US and UK stayed out of the war after the fall of France.

I'd say that if we still got to supply the USSR with material, then the USSR could have defeated Germany and its allies on its own. It;s true the Germans kept many divisions in France, and fighting the allies in Africa or Italy, but were we not involved, I don't think too many of those divisions would have been too helpful in Russia anyways.

Surprisingly, the biggest advantage the Russians had over the Germans as the war progressed besides numbers, was mobility. You think of the blitzkrieg, but that was a small percentage of the German Armed Forces. The bulk of the German divisions were marching infantry, and they marched with wagons and horses. The Russians made their own tanks, but their trucks were generally American, and that's what transported the huge numbers of Russian infantry.

If the Germans could have shaved 15 or 20 of thir 50 occupation divisions from France and the Low countries, they definately would have helped. A German infantry division, even with its wagon train was a fierce fighting machine, but they would have been used mostly for stationary defense which was not so helpful in the expanses of Russia. Still, switch the Rumanian armies with German infantry divisions on the Don, and you don't hhave a Sixth Army being destroyed at Stalingrad I believe.

It should also be noted that the occupation divisions were by and large lower calibre formations than the ones sent to Rusia.

Where the lack of US involvement would have been the biggest help though was with the approx ten Panzer divisions which were usually rotating through France to rebuild. These were top rank formations, and even if they were in the act of rebuilding, they could have been considerable help on the Russian front. For example, one weak Panzer Division came close to sealing off the entire southern rupture of the Stalingrad front. If there were 3-4 other Panzer divisions behind the southern fronts, even if only at half strength, they may have beaten or at leadt blunted the Stalingrad counteroffensive.

Still, in the long run, I'd say it would be much harder, but the Russians still win.

Now, if the US also refused to send any aid to the USSR, then I think the decision could have gone the other way.

Without the millions of trucks and communications systems that we sent to Russia, I think it very possible that the Russian armies never gained a mobility advantage over the Germans, and in that case, I think it more than possible that the Germans could use their better training and tactics to slice up the Russian armies all the way to the Urals.

An interesting what if for sure.

On edit, D-Day takes no place in my thinking because the war was over before D-Day was completed. Once Operation Bagration was sprung, the war was over whether we got invoilved or not. The Germans simply called Operation Bagration, "The Destruction of Armee Gruppe Centre."

[malmapus]

41. Looking at the "no support at all scneario"

Since it seems that some in Russia think they could of done it alone.

If we're talking about nobody else being involved in the war, the extra man-power that Hitler would have had available at the begnining of Barborosa would have really made for quite a change. I really think the Wermacht would have rolled over Russia, heck maybe could have even convinced the Japanese to come in from the east if they made enough gains and tied up Russian forces in the west.

[radar]

51. The wonder of hindsight...

...Monday morning quarterbacking & what-if's galore.

Without the western allied air forces bombing german factories & oil fields - how many more tiger & panther tanks, fighters & bombers, could the nazis have available on the eastern front?

Without the V1 & V2 bombs targeting London - what would they have been pointed at on the eastern front?

Jet fighters the Lufwaffe used to defend Berlin - what could they have done over Russia?

The conquered peoples treated as sub-humans by the nazis - what if they were treated as equals? Lotsa volunteers.... Plus, no large insurgency to police.

Russia didn't have to worry about a 2nd front against the Japanese - if only America had that option... Geez, they didn't even have to pack up & transport their fighting forces, build their navy & supply ships, and cross oceans to meet the enemy.

* I believe ALL countries involved had a hand in winning/contributing to end of WWII in Europe when it happened in May '45.
The proverbial "straw that broke the camel's back." How far could the camel travel with a few less straws to carry? Heh

[SweetLeftFoot]

56. Hmmmm

The only major contributions that the non-Russian Allied Forces in Europe made was blunting the Luftwaffe in 1940 and the area bombing campaigns from 1942-45. Neither of which involved US forces.

Once the Red Army had broken the Nazis at Stalingrad (when there were no US troops in Western Europe), the die was cast. The major US contribution to defeating the Nazis was aiding the Russians - largely with ammunition and trucks. The decisive Russian weapons system - T-34, Katyusha - were home developed. It would have taken longer but it still would have happened. Don't forget the strength of the communist partisan insurgencies in occupied areas too.

Sorry guys but your propaganda about the "Greatest generation" etc has fooled you. We Aussies know the truth - the Yanks turned up late both times once the real danger had passed.

[DeaconBlues]

2. they are right to an extent

the Nazis would have never been able to handle a guerrilla war that covered something like a sixth of the land surface of the globe. It might have taken decades and wiped out half of the population, but the Germans would have finally had to go home.

But making it all the way to Berlin is another matter. Winning an insurgency and fighting an offensive war are very different, and the Soviet Union would not have been able to conquer eastern Europe without material aide and assistance a second front. Hell, they may have not been able to reconquer Ukraine, as Ukrainians were never too fond of the Russians.

[blogbear]

3. That's right and also I recall the Warsaw Pact between Hitler-Stalin..

The two and their forms of government were from the same 'thread' even though they didn't 'blog' in those days..

[DeaconBlues]

4. Stalin was a total incompetent before and during much of the war

As you pointed out, he made a nonaggression pact with Hitler and was stupid enough to believe the Germans would honor the agreement. Stalin refused to believe to the Germans would invade right up to the day of the attack, leaving the military totally unprepared.

That, and doing things like purging the military of the people who actually knew what they were doing during the thirties, pretty much ensured the Soviet Union would get its ass kicked during the initial part of the war.

[blogbear]

6. This is true but Stalin was also a sociopath as Hitler even though for

awhile he was 'Uncle Joe' here..

[DeaconBlues]

8. Stalin was a pig

By the time he died, he had almost killed as many of his own people as Hitler had killed in Europe. He was scum, but for a while there he was "our" scum.

[blogbear]

9. true enough!

[SweetLeftFoot]

58. Deaths

Stalin killed far more of his own people that Hitler ever did.

[Charon]

39. Incompetent

Yes, Stalin's meddling in military affairs early in the war caused horrible losses on the Soviet Army. However, unlike Hitler, Stalin came to realize that He would be better off leaving military matters to the officers of the Soviet Army. For pretty much the rest of the war, Stavka planned and executed the military operations of the Soviet Army with little direct interference from Stalin.

[TreasonousBastard]

7. They're exaggerating, of course, but...

they do have a point that in the mad rush to demonize Stalin and Communism after the war, the Red Army and the incredible sacrifices of the Russian people were pretty much ignored by the West.

Ater all, maybe some have heard of Stalingrad, a turning point where the entire German 6th Army surrendered, but who has heard of Kursk, where the Russians paid with 250,000 dead and 600,000 wounded to defeat the largest armor attack in the war.

[Zuni]

17. Kursk was the largest battle in all of WWII

it only lasted for about a week, but more forces were engaged at once during the Battle of Kursk in July 1943 than at any other time during the war.

The Battle of Kursk was a tactical stalemate, actually but a major strategic victory for the Soviets. Not only did the Germans lose far too many men and tanks, though less than the USSR, but they could not replace them and the Soviets could.
Actually, Kursk would not have ended the way it did but because of the Allied invasion of sicily, Hitler pulled several crack Waffen SS divisions out of Russia and ended the Kursk offensive. Now I am not saying the Soviets would have lost the battle, which I am sure is not the case (they had far too many men, guns and tanks in the salient for the Germans to gain more than a few more miles of ground), but the battle would have raged far longer. As such, the Soviets were able to win at a far smaller cost than otherwise would have been required.

[TreasonousBastard]

31. Well, 85% casualties is pretty damn high...

and that's what the Russians had, if the numbers I've seen are correct.

Musta been a hell of a fight-- 2 million men facing off, fully equipped with some of the most destructive weapons of the time. Can you see Patton storming around pissing about how he'd never be in anything like that? Russians and Germans, he hated them both, and they get the greatest battle of all time.

Anyway, looking at the other comments here, the original point was that the Russians are trying to take the credit for winning the war, which thay have always tried, and we generally ignore their contribution, largely because it was Stalin running things there at the time.

My small contribution to the discussion is that whether or not the Western Allies or the Soviets could have beaten Hitler by themselves is largely irrelevant. Historians will have fun arguing the point for years to come, but what actually did happen is that Stalin starved his country and sent millions off to certain death to beat back the German invasion. We then attacked from the west, and between the two of us, rather decisively beat the piss out of Hitler.

Would Stalin's human wave attacks have beaten off the Germans if we didn't come from behind? Very likely, given enough time. They would have had an easier time of it if Stalin hadn't purged the best officers earlier and didn't make as many stupid strategic errors himself as Hitler did.

Would we have been able to invade and defeat Germany without the diversion of German troops to the Russian front? Probably not.

Stalin was one of the worst scumbags in history, I believe worse than Hitler himself, but he was useful at the time.

And, again, no country saw the destruction, or the sacrifices, that the Russian people saw in that war.

Well, OK, maybe Nanking and some of the other Japanese horrors...

But that's another discussion.

[Yupster]

47. Not to divert from your main point, but

The Poles suffered the worst percentage losses of any country in the war.

[SweetLeftFoot]

59. Or the heroic

defense of Moscow in late 41 when the citizens were out digging tank traps in the blizzards and the T-34's made their first appearance in numbers. Or the siege of Leningrad.

[wolfgirl]

10. From my view of history....

it took all of us...Russia to keep the Germans bogged down on the Eastern front, while Britain & the US tackled the Western front.

It took us all. But of course, our history books wouldn't dare portray the Russians as anything but Communist devils....

revisionist history is not just in which others are engaged

[kenny blankenship]

13. Don't Kid Yourself

Not only could the Russians do it alone, they were clearly doing it, which must have scared the crap out of our leaders.

The fighting on the Eastern Front from 1941 to D-Day when the Atlantic Allies finally returned to France, was titanic and apocalyptic compared to everything and anything that went on in Western Europe either France or Italy or N.Africa. By D-Day 35% of Wehrmacht forces had already been wounded at least once. You can chalk that up to the gigantic battles in the east. World War Two cost the United States slightly more than 400,000 dead in both the Pacific and European theaters of combat, however German side lost 400,000 dead in just the Battle of Stalingrad ALONE a year before the Western countries resumed their serious fighting with the Nazis. Stalingrad is usually regarded by military historians as the DECISIVE battle of the war, meaning the loser lost so much strength compared to his opponent his total defeat and ruin has become inevitable. If Eisenhower hadn't authorized the DDay invasion in early June 1944, as the chances of further delays (as he knew) would continue to go up and up, then the possibility that they would run out of time to establish a large defendable position on the continent before fall would grow into a probability and then into a certainty. Russia would take Berlin and the rest of the German heartland unassisted in Summer 1945, and America and Britain would have little to say about postwar Europe and their prestige in the postwar world would have been fractional.

It's nice to think of The USSR and the ANglo-American Alliance holding hands and singing campfire songs and defeating Nazism through the power of togetherness, but that isn't the way it was. If you polled 100 serious military historians, and asked would the USSR have defeated Hitler if Britain got out of the war after 1941, and the Americans had never invaded on D-Day, I'm sure over 90 of them would say, "Of course."

[Zuni]

14. total BS

you know where 3/4 of the motor transport the Red Army used was made? The US. Do you know where most of the locomotives were made used by the Red Army? The US. Do you think the Soviets could have had the production success they had without all the industrial equipment and There is NO way the USSR could have made 1/2 the weapons they had not the US and UK shipped tanks, planes, trucks, food, cloth for uniforms. Did you know the US and Britain sent millions and millions of tons of food to feed the Soviet people because the Germans controlled the main agricultural areas in the Ukraine?
The UK holding out in 1941 forced the Germans to leave 1/4 of their land forces, at least 1/4 of their air forces and almost all of their navy out of the invasion of the Soviet Union. Just think about how close the Germans were to defeating the Soviets. In 1941 alone, they took over 4 million Red Army soldiers prisoner in mass surrenders. The Soviet Union was practically on it's last legs when they mounted the Moscow offensive in Dec 1941
Do you realize how close the Soviets were to losing the war in 1941 and 1942?

And how many people would the Soviets have to sacrifice? They already lost 27 million during the war.

[kenny blankenship]

18. Yes, Yes, Yes, and uh Yes

I know about those things. I also know you're trying to change the subject.

Obviously (within fuctional limits that bind even the insane megalomaniacs of history) Stalin didn't care how many the Soviet people would have to sacrifice.

I'm not pro-Soviet--far from it. In contrast to some other posters, I believe you cannot overstate the evil of Stalin, or the state he created.
(And I think you are maybe getting a little carried away by your understandable hatred for the man. What I said was that if the Americans hadn't invaded on D-Day and Britain never got back into the war after evacuating from France and repulsing the Luftwaffe in 1940-41, then Germany still would have lost, but the USSR would have the singular credit. I don't believe serious historians would dispute this. You know as well as I do WHERE the Germany Armed forces were destroyed; although western students do not learn this, it was not in the West! I do know how close the USSR came to collapse--I also know how many T34 tanks they had built during and after that dangerous period and that most them were far superior to the US Sherman comparable even to the German Tiger depending on terrain and conditions, but available in Sherman-like numbers. The USSR's military was far stronger after 1943 than it had been in 1941, the reverse of Germany's situation--despite the horrific losses and Stalin's near fatal bungling. You cannot argue that the Anglo-American alliance is why the Wehrmacht was so much weaker after '43--substantial combat between these two sides had yet to happen! The USSR's size had simply ground the superior German Army to shreds, while the USSR had grown in strength, making Hitler's defeat a matter of time. WHen Ike was pondering D-Day and whether to put it off some more you better believe that he was aware that "Stalin's Hordes" were on their way to Berlin, with or without any American troops to help them.) It could not be put off, not if the Americans wanted to be in Germany, when Germany capitulated.

[Zuni]

25. Most of your facts are correct

Soviet armor was by far the best during the war.
But The Soviets lost several men for every man the Germans lost.
It is debatable wether the USSR could have made it to Berlin without Allied help---I don't think Germany could hold them down, even if they did seize Moscow and Leningrad, but I don't think the USSR would have been able to defeat Germany singlehandedly, not after their enormous losses in material, weapons and manpower in 1941 as well as natural resources.
The T-34 production was only possible because the US and UK were building almost all the transport. The Red Army wouldn't have gotten too far if they had little mechanized transport or supply trains.

At best, the war would have gone on for a long time longer. I think a armistice between the USSR and Nazi Germany would have been the outcome, personally.

[Yupster]

48. The trucks and the radios

were the most decisive contributions we made.

Mobility is always important in any war, but this war of such immense spaces made mobility and communications so much more important than usual.

The Russian masses of infantry just would not have been nearly as effective if they couldn't be moved quicker than the German infantry.

That was our contribution to the Russian front and it was a very important one.

[bennywhale]

66. The British won it

Had the RAF not won the battle of Britain Hitler would have had control of Europes skies, laid waste to the RAF, Britain and the Russian army from the air with no-one touching Germany for years.

As it was the Brits could go on fighting Hitler until the Soviets turned him in the East and the Americans eventually joined in the West

"Never have so many owed so much to so few"

[THUNDER HANDS]

11. didn't Russia lose 40 million people?

in WWII?

How many would they have lost if the Allies weren't helping?

[Zuni]

16. 27 million

my grandfather was a Red Army officer in WWII. He was wounded and captured during the massive Soviet defeat when they attempted to retake Kharkov in May 1942. Because of Stalin's arrogance 3 entire armies were destroyed, one of which, the 9th, was the army my grandfather was in (a Soviet "Army" was approx the size of a Western Army Corps (US and UK)

[Selatius]

40. Wasn't Gen. Zhukov commanding Red Army units by then?

[pretzel4gore]

12. Even Churchill admitted that it was the USSR who ripped the guts

outta germany.....and even then the west was schemeing (btw does anyone here know that on eve of Stalin-Hitler non aggression pact russia was trying to get clearance to attack germany through poland, poland refused and negotiations were to be finalized in Moscow but the allies negotiators went to moscow on a slow boat? The boat took days to get to Russia; meanwhile Ribbentrop persuaded Stalin to make the famous deal!)...there's too much 1984-type historical revisionist wisdom here. Stalin wasn't as bad as the propagandaists say (though he was indeed a world class political gangster) and the Russians astonished everyone with their emergence as a military power while under massive attack; 20 million russians were killed in the Great Patriotic War, which trivializes any dabate about the heroism of the west.....btw what does anyone think the Russians thought when they liberated Buchenwald? Had the Germans played their cards better, we NEVER EVER HEARD of the holocaust (that commie propaganda!) because hitler would have been allied with the western allies....the USSR exploded its nuke in 1949, 4 years after the west....

[Zuni]

15. yet more pro-Soviet revisionism here

I don't even know where to start with this one. pracxtically every 'fact' in this is completely false.

And Stalin wasn't that bad? My grandparents lived under that man, thank you, and lost many friends and family to famines and purges.

this is complete nonsense---.....and even then the west was schemeing (btw does anyone here know that on eve of Stalin-Hitler non aggression pact russia was trying to get clearance to attack germany through poland, poland refused and negotiations were to be finalized in Moscow but the allies negotiators went to moscow on a slow boat? The boat took days to get to Russia; meanwhile Ribbentrop persuaded Stalin to make the famous deal!)...utter tripe that doesn't even require a rebuttal because it is completely and totally false

[pretzel4gore]

21. what is truth?

one of Stalin's evils (thus also typical of all left/socialist types, according to the rush limbah-humbugs of the world) was that soviet prisoners were sent to the gulags for having been made pow...because the soviets thought even exposure to freedom in a pow camp was too much and they couldn't be trusted etc....but i saw pic of gorbachev during a meet with reagan where a soviet officer feeding a squirrel who spent most of the war a pow! and also your grandfather....point is, that stalin was a gangster, a bad ruthless thugs, but he was also the grandson of a serf who had been sold like a cow or something! And referring to his crimes, do you think the average american can be held accountable for the crimes of geeb, brother of 'Jeb' or ronald reagan? I've read alot about ww2, i also read massie's 'Nicholas and Alexandra' and shirer's 'collapse of the 3rd republic' plus numerous other things on the era...and i think the 1st/2nd 'world wars' were really just a european civil war between goofball white/aristocrat supremacy and its opposite, call it liberal democracy if you will....but the mediawhores incessantly lying about geebush and the crap going on now suggests they've been lying all the time, and stalin maybe wasn't a heartless monster at all...ferchrissake i have a travel book on 'Volvograd' right here: it shows a bustling clean functioning community fulla schoolkids and families built on the ashes of stalingrad....this book is circa 1980, when the so called 'opprresion' of eatern europe was at its worst (according to reagan)...and yet the USSR would collapse of its own weight within 10 years! It couldn't even defend itself! So I cannot defend the stalin era USSR, but i KNOW our side lies too fukkin much..they also eat too fukkin much, shit too much, kill too much, think too much believe too much bs and so on...
btw Churchill did say that the soviets ripped the guts outta nazi germany, that's fact Zuni....he gave credit where it was due

[Zuni]

23. The city is Volgagrad, not Volvograd

hint---it is on the Volga River.

Your post is relatively unintelligible. Most of the things you claim are lies are in fact true. Many Soviet POWs were shot or sent to Gulags after the war. My grandfather and grandmother (who was deported as a slave laborer from Rostov on Don in 1943 to berlin)escaped to American lines at the close of the war. They were terrified of going back into Soviet hands. Soviet POWs and deportees had come from the east said that (and this is true) that Red Army soldiers were raping women, beating and shooting the men or arresting them.
More than 2 million German women were raped by Red Army soldiers in 1945. It is not propaganda, it is well documented. As many as 2 million people of ethnic German descent deported from Poland and other Eastern European countries by the Soviets also died in 1945-1946

I have read literally hundreds of books about Nazi Germany, WWII, the USSR, Communism etc. Most of what you wrote is :crazy: and it is not even worth commenting on.

I am not even going to get into the history of Communism in Eastern Europe. I don't feel like debating history with someone who gets all their facts from ANSWER demonstrations.

[pretzel4gore]

27. you're too close to the conflict:

and your anger at the injustice might have inadvertantly included some innocence such as working peoples' aspirations for some goddam dignity! The Soviet ie 'workers' Union indeed got hijacked by a nazi tupe thug (stalin) but there's nothing we can do about it now....and fish do rot from the head (in wartime, even swiss guards probably commit rape forgodsake...see 'power corrupts... absolutely') I also grew up around people who fled communism; some of them hated the evil but still became strong union men who probably never knew that the 'Soviet union' was an effort to create a system where workmen got AT LEAST enough to live on! That the effort failed seems to be cashmoney to those who'd have workmen chained to their machinery, who today rule the USA! I think I know where you stand on that...i wish someone articulate and well read etc would look at the 1914-45 european conflict within the context of the mediawhoring of history! If you've read 'Cancer Ward' by Solytznitzin (who drove a volvo) there's a apparatchik guy from old days in the same ward as the protagonist; he murdered and tortured etc, but now he's just a wormlike pos and a heathy active family man who scurries away from any confrontation...believe me Zuni i feel for all the innocent people caught up in the terrible history, but the bastards who USE the innocents' suffering from long ago are today pushing really bad dope, and that's the main issue imho...

[Zuni]

29. dude, you are thinking fantasy

I am a strong Union supporter. The Soviet Union was a despotic shithole right until it collapsed, though Gorbachev improved it a lot. I actually have relatives who are still in Russia that I have met and spoken too, and read many, many books on the Soviet Union.

You should read "Lenin's Tomb" by David Remnick---it is the best account of Soviet Life in the 1980s and the best recounting of how the USSR actually collapsed I have yet encountered.

[Anarcho-Socialist]

36. "Stalin wasn't as bad as the propagandaists say..."

The people in the Gulags beg to differ.

[malmapus]

43. Gotta remember its due to Stalin that Germany was able to make the early

gains it had.

Stalin pratically wiped out the entire officer corp of the Soviet Army, leaving a big vacum to be filled. By the time Germany invaded, there were still large leadership issues in the Army.

[DoveTurnedHawk]

44. "Stalin wasn't as bad as the propagandaists (sic) say"

Uhh...

:wtf:

You have got to be fucking kidding.

:crazy:

DTH

[pretzel4gore]

46. i misspoke...eh, this is georgebushamerica ferchrissake!

yes, stalin was one of the dozen worst monsters in human history. period. however, the russian people were and are and forver will be divine! They deserve none of the contempt that stalin (khrushchev once noted that stalin was the loneliest person he'd ever known, and khruschev 'knew' 3000 people by 1st name according to his memoirs) earned by dint of his viciousness. If Stalin is placed within the historical record, and IF the record is TRUE, then my statement is nonsense, but i do not believe the truth has ever really been told about all that went on, in terms of how the world is today. I believe the guilt that our historians so eagerly pile upon hitler and stalin leave out mentioning that the 'democracies' were run by brutal heartless assholes who ...for example, supported hitler/mussilini during spanish civil war (stalin supported the republic, but not completely)...what i was trying to say was that the 'propagandists' slanted everthing so that the 'allies' looked like nice little schoolboys forced to stand up to bad men who lack humanity etc...and that annoys me because, well because BUSH is actually beloved and respected and chsmpioned by countless people whose entire understanding of history is propaganda- that really angers me, and if saying stalin was a 'victim' of lying bastards then hopefully people who know how awful stalin was can see that there should have been some adherence to truth for its own sake all along! It's too late now, and that wasn't hitler, or stalin, or even bush's fault....

[rinsd]

67. "Stalin wasn't as bad as the propagandaists say"

Yeah all he did was kill almost as many of his own people as the Germans did.

Oh yeah and then through his paranoia he devastated the military through "cleansing" 1/3 of it.

"20 million russians were killed in the Great Patriotic War, which trivializes any dabate about the heroism of the west"

Does the raping and pillaging done in retalitiation take away some of that heroism?

[bobthedrummer]

19. Well, that didn't prevent them from getting Stalin to sign a pact

promising "non-agression" and then launching Barbarosa, did it?
And Stalin was a political monster for the people of the former USSR, a very bloody political monster indeed.

Make a deal with Nazis, huh?

[Zuni]

26. The August 1939 Pact was what caused WWII in the first place

It was Stalin's agreement to share eastern europe with Hitler that allowed Hitler to invade Poland. Stalin also invaded Poland, 2 weeks later and took another chunk and annexed it (this land was never returned to Poland)

[cobaindrain]

20. they're right

and churchill could be an ass at times

[SweetLeftFoot]

61. Churchill

"could be an ass sometimes" --- sometimes???? The man was quasi-fascist alcoholic. Sending fully armed cavalry to break up the General Strike is but one example of his scuminess.

[Igel]

22. This is an old claim.

Lend-lease kept the Soviets up as their industrial base was ravaged; much of the equipment was dissassembled and relocated in the east, much of their civilian population relocated. This was a massive disruption, even while the most productive section of their industry was off trying to kill Germans. Lend-lease doesn't show up in Russian pop culture, except with enigmatic references to American labels and foods, but it was crucial. Cooperation with Americans was much more palatable to discuss before the Soviet Union collapsed, but was still downplayed.

On the other hand, the tide had certainly turned long before the Americans and British got back into the war. London was bombed into bits (not other parts of the country, thankfully, thanks to Hitler's monomania). FDR and Churchill sat back; they regrouped; they planned; they restocked. All the while shipping stuff to Russia so that millions of Russians could die sapping the Wehrmachts strength, pushing them back across hundreds of miles of scorched earth. What the Soviets, largely Russians, did shouldn't be dismissed. They'd likely have defeated Germany on their own, in time, provided lend-lease continued. If not, I think it would have taken a lot longer, and maybe peace would have broken out in the meanwhile.

However, the perception is that while the Russians were sacrificing their kids against Hitler in some horrendous battles, the Americans had it cushy, sitting out the fighting for a year or so, their cities and countryside not ravaged. This is especially true given the constant "the US is evil ... the US is against Russia ... the US wants Russia defeated" that was heard before the war. And then the long string of war movies and stories portaying US and even British bravado ... little about Russia, while the Cold War started up. And now many older Russians have the impression that the US has somehow defeated the USSR, which they were truly proud of.

The US version has downplayed the Soviet contribution for decades. I don't like the Russians doing the same sort of editing, but it's pretty inescapable. It ties nicely into post-Soviet nationalistic needs. It's offensive, but we bought the myth of the nearly all-powerful in theory, but very weak in practice, French Resistance, and downplay the collaborationist Vichy government. We play up the Warsaw Ghetto, while downplaying the Polish pilots flying with the RAF. What's another minor distortion?

[tinfoilinfor2005]

24. My dad was in Europe during the war. He tells the story that

when they saw planes coming overhead they quickly assessed "who it belonged to". He said that they learned to take quick and deep cover if the planes were German or American because they were deadly, but they often laughed at the Russian pilots because "if they were aiming for the left side of the road, they always hit the right side".

[SweetLeftFoot]

62. My Grandad

was in a POW camp during the war and he always used to say that if they saw B-17's or B-24's coming past they'd be trrified because the Americans were such poor bomb aimeers and navigators.

[bennywhale]

65. The RAF won it

The Battle of Britain took place before the Americans entered the war and before the Soviets had gained any advantage in the East.

Had the British not won this battle Hitler would have controlled all of Europes skies and conquered half the globe before America woke up to the threat.

As it was, the British could go on fighting for the years before America joined and Russia turned them back.

In Churchill's words "Never have so many owed so much to so few"

[mitchum]

28. They did (see: the seige of Stalingrad)

[PurityOfEssence]

30. They damn near did; 88% of German casualties were caused by the Soviets

Of course, Stalin cynically made a deal with Hitler that allowed the whole war to get started in the first place, and he then proceded to carve up Eastern Europe, the Baltic States and tried for Finland.

The real heroes of World War Two are the British and French, who stood up to Hitler to defend their allies. For this, they were well punished: they ended the war with their economies in ruin and their Empires falling apart.

[SweetLeftFoot]

63. Perhaps

us Aussies and Kiwis who volunteered to go to the other side of the world and fight two years before it occured to America that the Nazis were up to no good deserve some credit too. Especially given that we'd broken the back of the 1918 German offensives and then spearheaded the breakthroughs.

[Dr Fate]

33. Has anyone seen "Downfall?"

It's great.

[kentuck]

34. Americans perception

I think most Americans believe that D-Day was "the turning point" of the war and that the U.S. basically won the war by opening up a second front. That is what I learned in school, and that is what I see on the History Channel. The Eastern Front and what it meant to Germany and Russia and all other nations that got swept up (even Italy, they sent the Alpini) is a hole in most Americans perception of history, I wish it wasn't.

One entry point into a different perspective is via noting that the Red Army lost more soliders killed and captured (almost all of whom died in captivity) in the first 20 days of war on the Eastern Front than the U.S. lost during the entire war in both theaters (European and Pacific).

(Kentuck's Wife)

[Yupster]

35. By the date of D-Day

the war had already been decided.

By June 1944, the German army was no longer capable of stopping the Soviet attacks. By that time, the USSR could build overwhelming forces on any front it chose and achieve a breakthrough and there wasn't anything the Germans could do but inflict losses and reform a front after the Russians slowed down.

The war was over by the time the US attacked Normandy.

[Charon]

37. War over?

What about the million or so Red Army casualties that occured after D-Day. What about the 100000 American/British/French casualties that occured after D-Day. Saying the war was over by the time the Allies landed in Normandy is stretching things abit.

[Selatius]

38. "The war was over" = the end was already decided

Even if D-Day had not occured for whatever reason, by 1944 Germany was losing badly. The Russians were busy barreling through Poland and were continuing to advance on Germany itself. The outcome of the war may have been different, but the point of the matter is that the war would have ended with the defeat of Nazi Germany

[noonwitch]

42. Only because Stalin saw all of his military personnel as expendable

If it cost his country millions of lives due to inefficient fighting and equipment, so be it.
The russians always lost the most people in 20th century wars. The czar saw the people as expendable as Stalin ever did. Of course, in the long run, Nicky and his family ended up being just as expendable.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

45. The destruction of the Afrika Corps in northern Africa

by allied British, New Zealander, Australian, South African, Indian, French, Polish, American and other troops was every bit as dramatic as Stalingrad. It was a major blow to the Germans. I agree that Russia paid the highest price and did the greatest damage to the Germans. But as to whether they would have been able to stop the Germans alone? I don't think so. And Russia was relying upon American materiel to a significant extent. The Russian air force was also taking a royal reaming in the earlier part of the war with staggering losses and, if the French had not shot down 1000 German planes during the battle of France and if the British had not turned back and destroyed much of the Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain, I don't know if the Russians could have retained any control of the air. As it was, one of the bright spots in the Russian Air Force early on were the two air squadrons of French volunteers, called the Normandie Niemen, who were responsible for shooting down about 350 German planes.

[Javaman]

49. Ask the the Russians about the lend-lease act...

If we hadn't supplied Russia with arms, munitions, vehicles, uniforms, etc, Moscow would be speaking German now.

As the Germans overran the Russian forward positions they carted up all they could and sent it back to Germany, it wasn't until Stalin awoke from his depression and surprise over the German invasion, 3 days later, that he began to act. It was only the rear positions at that point that started to dismantle the various factories and send them to the rear. It wasn't until late 1944 that these facilities were up and running at 100%. Prior to that, the majority of materials were coming from us.

Also if there wasn't a second front, not the European but the African front, Halter would have no doubt moved more of his divisions to the eastern front. Many people have argued that Russia had the numbers in men, but reality reads, many of these divisions were grossly undermanned, under trained, and under equipped. In many cases it was wholesale suicide for these untrained Russian divisions. If you look at the stats, the majority of Russian losses to Germany were in the first year. The German blitz ran right over them. What killed the German attack was not the Russians per say, but the Russian winter and the long supply line. If you remove the lend lease act, the German lines would have been virtually free from air attack.

These Russians need to check their facts.

[nightfire]

50. Hey. Stalin wasn't the only cynic around.

Stalin sought a deal with France and Britain first, but the conservatives in control in both nations at that time resisted it in hope that the Nazis (whom some conservatives rather liked) and Soviets would wind up pounding each other to bits alone. Stalin then had little choice but to buy time with a fleeting deal with his mortal enemy. He was evil but he wasn't all that dumb.

Who can blame the Russians for their (slightly) exaggerated claims when they - who inflicted 85% of casualties on the wehrmacht - behold a "Saving Private Ryan" mythos and its implication that the Eastern Front didn't count at all.

Would the other Allies like to have changed places by taking the Soviet proportion of casualties in exchange for a bunch of trucks and food?

[w4rma]

52. Stalin's "tactic" in Germany was for the Communist Party, there, to refuse

to side with and help the moderate Parties defend against the Nazi Party because their failed tactic was that the Nazis would go too far and then folks would run to the Communist Party to fight them. Instead the Nazis simply oppressed them.

Had Stalin not pushed for this tactic, Hitler might never have come to power in Germany.

[CWebster]

53. It 's true

Don't you know if it weren't for the US liberating Europe...(not to mention that Roosevelt had to sneak the US in) whereas Russia lost a generation of men--but don't you know it was the US who liberated those damned unappreciative frogs. The spin is all about us --the allies are invisable in the revision.

[bennywhale]

54. America sat on the sidelines

for 4 years until deciding to join the war in Europe, once being already attacked by Japan and having Germany declare war on the US. You didn't here Churchill Saying "You are either with us or with the terrorists" So much for special relationship and allies. Leave Britain as the only free nation in the world to stand toe to toe with the third reich (one of the most powerful war machines in history) for 4 years losing hundreds of thousands. Having a 9/11 every night in every city for months and months during the blitz.

It was Britain and the Soviet Union who defeated the Nazis as we were the only ones fighting the Nazis for most of the war. Without the Brits and the Russians the Nazis would have conquered half the planet before America had woken up to the threat posed.

America brought about a speedier end to the war, but if you study time spent fighting, men lost, battles won it was Britain (eg Battle of Britain, Battle of the Atlantic, El Alamein N. Africa, Then D-Day and beyond) and Russia (Stalingrad, The Kessle, Berlin, tens of millions dead) who primarily defeated the Nazis.

[blindpig]

55. winners of WWII:

European Theater: Red Army
Pacific Theater: US Navy

Not to say that either did the job single handed but they did the bears share of the heavy lifting. Even in 1945 the vast majority of German forces faced the Soviets. One cannot blame the Russians for feeling that their role has been under appreciated because between jingoism and Cold War propaganda they have been, at least by the general public.

Concerning what ifs: The German war against Russia was lost before it began if you take the position that taking Moscow on the 1st thrust was mandatory for success, as I do. The war was lost for Hitler when he was forced to bail out that idiot Mussolini in Greece and commit to a full blown Balkan campaign just months before Barbarossa. Those divisions, along with his nearly useless Balkan allies, could well have made the difference in Russia by filling the space in Ukraine, allowing Guderian and company to continue the march on Moscow before General Winter showed up.

Just as well.

[Boo Boo]

57. BWWWWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Yeah right. The allied bombing campaign (US, Britain) had nothing to do with Russian success. Nothing at all. Why would anybody think that having German cities and industry leveled would have anything to do with Russian victory.

Maybe because they couldn't do it themselves?

Russians have a right, perhaps, to feel a bit gipped on the world stage when it comes to recognition of their contribution. OTOH, they kinda did it to themselves, don't ya think? In any case American and Brit ground troops really never saw anything to compare with what happened between Russia and Germany.

But, without America in the war, Russia would have been slowly screwed. Germany didn't have heavy bombers with the range to reach all the way back into the hinterlands of Russia, allowing the Russians to move war industry, etc. out of the reach of German bombers. Germany would have eventually corrected that situation if it weren't for the fact that their own capacity was being destroyed by the US and Britain.

I don't believe that Russia could have invaded Germany without their allies. They're kidding themselves if they believe that shit.

[alcibiades_mystery]

60. Red Army was responsible for 9 out of 10 Wehrmacht casualties

A shocking number, but true.

[bennywhale]

64. Battle of Britain won it

Without victory by The RAF in the Battle of Britain the Luftwaffe would have had control of the skies over western Europe before America had entered the war.

This would have resulted in Britain being invaded and Hitler turning all power to the Eastern front.

"Never have so many owed so much to so few"

My Grandad God bless him was one of the few