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Did Operation Barbarossa ever actually have a realistic chance of succeeding?
Posted on 7/7/16 at 8:57 pm
Posted on 7/7/16 at 8:57 pm
The Germans split through the Soviet lines and devastated their armies all the way through November. But they bogged down in the rain and cold right outside of Moscow. If the Nazi attack started earlier than they did and Germany captured Moscow before the winter did Germany even have a chance of holding Moscow? The Soviets had millions upon millions of men in reserves and they had no value of life so they weren't going to surrender no matter how many men they lost.
Hitler was in a losing battle from the day it started based on the Soviets lack of care for life and property. They Soviets would fight to the death and they didn't care how many men they lost. They would throw wave after wave of troops at the Nazis in Moscow until they drove them out.
They expansive land didn't defeat Hitler as much as the endless supply of troops did.
Hitler was in a losing battle from the day it started based on the Soviets lack of care for life and property. They Soviets would fight to the death and they didn't care how many men they lost. They would throw wave after wave of troops at the Nazis in Moscow until they drove them out.
They expansive land didn't defeat Hitler as much as the endless supply of troops did.
13
Posted on 7/7/16 at 8:58 pm to Jtigers99
quote:Yes.
They expansive land didn't defeat Hitler as much as the endless supply of troops did.
It was logistics not the Russians.
Btw, the Russians had two choices, German bullet in combat or a Russian one behind the line.
This post was edited on 7/7/16 at 9:01 pm
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:00 pm to Jtigers99
Absolutely
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:01 pm to Jtigers99
I doubt it. Although they did come pretty close.
I actually just finished listening to Dan Carlin's series on the Eastern Front. Talk about brutality. I think anywhere between Berlin and Moscow during WWII may have been the worst place in history to be.
I actually just finished listening to Dan Carlin's series on the Eastern Front. Talk about brutality. I think anywhere between Berlin and Moscow during WWII may have been the worst place in history to be.
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:01 pm to Jtigers99
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:02 pm to NYNolaguy1
quote:I am going with China.
I actually just finished listening to Dan Carlin's series on the Eastern Front. Talk about brutality. I think anywhere between Berlin and Moscow during WWII may have been the worst place in history to be.
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:03 pm to ninthward
quote:
I am going with China.
He actually mentioned Nanking as probably the only other place that has a case.
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:05 pm to GeauxxxTigers23
ahhhh, ghosts of the Ostfront. Great episode
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:06 pm to lsuroadie
quote:
Absolutely
How can you say that when the Soviets had millions upon millions of men in reserves? They were never going to surrender.
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:06 pm to fr33manator
My favorite so far.
Enjoyed it more than Blueprint for Armageddon and The Wrath of the Khans.
Enjoyed it more than Blueprint for Armageddon and The Wrath of the Khans.
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:14 pm to GeauxxxTigers23
Russia has two great defenses: its climate and its vastness.
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:17 pm to Bestbank Tiger
It's endless supply of men and no care for life had more to do with their victory than vastness of land did.
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:20 pm to Jtigers99
Yes.
Hitler made several blunders in 1941 and 1942 that cost his armies the campaign and the war, however. The first blunder was turning his panzer divisions south to aid the assault into the Ukraine instead of continuing east for Moscow. Another was dispersing his forces over too wide an area in southern Russia during the summer offensive of 1942.
Hitler made several blunders in 1941 and 1942 that cost his armies the campaign and the war, however. The first blunder was turning his panzer divisions south to aid the assault into the Ukraine instead of continuing east for Moscow. Another was dispersing his forces over too wide an area in southern Russia during the summer offensive of 1942.
This post was edited on 7/7/16 at 9:21 pm
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:25 pm to GeauxxxTigers23
quote:
I actually just finished listening to Dan Carlin's series on the Eastern Front. Talk about brutality. I think anywhere between Berlin and Moscow during WWII may have been the worst place in history to be.
Read Bloodlands. A really good history about the people stuck between Hitler and Stalin.
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:28 pm to Jtigers99
quote:
Did Operation Barbarossa ever actually have a realistic chance of succeeding
Had Hitler not had to delay Barbarossa for 4 weeks in order pull Mussolini's chestnuts out of the fire in Albania?
Yeah, I think there's a better than even chance of success. They were on the outskirts of Moscow on 6 December 1941 as it was before being thrown back.
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:38 pm to Godfather1
Y'all are acting like taking Moscow meant anything. Why would the Soviets give up when they had millions in reserves? It would have been exactly like Stalingrad where the Nazis took the city then the Soviets surrounded them and choked them out and pushed towards the center.
Posted on 7/7/16 at 9:43 pm to Jtigers99
Yes. Take out Stalin and Moscow and tell the Russian people that they will be free from Stalin's rule and will be able to run their own country. If the Russians are guaranteed independence then they wouldn't care about fighting against Hitler.
Posted on 7/7/16 at 10:16 pm to Jtigers99
quote:
Y'all are acting like taking Moscow meant anything
It did.
quote:
Why would the Soviets give up when they had millions in reserves? It would have been exactly like Stalingrad where the Nazis took the city then the Soviets surrounded them and choked them out and pushed towards the center.
The context in 1941, especially given a scenario where the Germans started the campaign earlier and successfully took Moscow was quite different than Stalingrad in 1942.
You can have millions of people and still collapse internally, logistically, geopolitically, etc. Also, succeeding in these objectives would have allowed the Germans to turn to a defensive holding position. They would also deprive the Soviets of a major transportation hub in Moscow. It likely meant the inevitable fall of Leningrad and the bolstering of the Finnish military situation in the North. It also likely would have dramatically undermined the organized partisan campaign that caused the Germans so much trouble behind the front in the East. They weren't going to go chasing the Soviets across the Urals deep into Russia. The Germans would not have suffered the tremendous losses in the December Soviet counteroffensive and, to the contrary, would have been able to rest, reequip, and consolidate their forces from much better territorial position and bought themselves time to implement their updated armor platforms which would offer them mass parity with the best Soviet platforms. Unity in the German political and military institutions would have been strengthened, rather than completely undermined as it was with the failures in the East and Hitler possibly continues to allow his generals to improvise rather than turn into the distrustful micromanager which plagued German military operations after the failure of Barbarossa. They also would have had tremendous bargaining chips in the political diplomatic game with the West and their own allies, neutral and otherwise. They might now be in position to offer more resources to the Italians and could perhaps convince the Spanish to enter the war and seize Gibraltar, which would have had a transformative effect on the entire dynamic of the war. There are infinite alternate possibilities. But the short answer is yes, it had a chance.
ETA: Not to mention the possibility of denying the Allies the from getting necessary Lend-Lease supplies in via the Arctic convoys.
This post was edited on 7/7/16 at 10:21 pm
Posted on 7/7/16 at 10:18 pm to Jtigers99
quote:
Y'all are acting like taking Moscow meant anything. Why would the Soviets give up when they had millions in reserves? It would have been exactly like Stalingrad where the Nazis took the city then the Soviets surrounded them and choked them out and pushed towards the center.
Well, Moscow actually did mean everything. Moscow was the central hub of everything in European Russia. Moscow was the central hub of all road, rail, and river transport in European Russia. Without Moscow, the northern half and southern half of Russia are compeltly isolated from one another and thus open to encirclement and defeat in detail. If Moscow falls, Lenningrad, Stalimgrad, and the oilfields of Baku would fall as well.
If the Soviets lost Moscow, they'd have lost all ability to mount and support any sort of cohesive front on the European side of the Urals. And the region beyond the Urals could not support itself nor could it be easily supplied from the outside. This means that whatever factories the Soviets had been able to move behind the Urals would be cutoff from both the supplies from the West (lend lease). But more than this, the real killing blow would be the fact of what's left of the Soviet Union would be cut off from most of its food supply. In short, had the Germans took Moscow, which is at least possibility had the invasion started in May instead of June, it's most likely the Soviets would have either collapsed totally or at least been forced to sue for peace.
This post was edited on 7/7/16 at 10:26 pm
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