>CB: Such precision; "wholly unprepared" .So the Soviets did all of their
>preparation for the fight AFTER the invasion started. Patently false.
Was 'scorched earth plus hoping for a nasty winter' Stalin's defensive plan from the off, then? S'pose it worked back in Napolean's day ...
>CB: You are not a very good military scientist. Don't you get it ? The
>German attack on France first was an expenditure of time and forces that
>made a big difference in their ultimate failure to conquer the Soviet
>Union. The best thing that could happen for the SU was exactly for the
>Germans to force the Western Europeans into the war against them.
>Otherwise, Germany could have attacked the SU , and the "Allies" would
>have just let the Nazi anti-communist machine do its main job, which was
>always to destroy socialism. The Soviets played Hitler's German
>nationalism and historic rivalry with France perfectly ., played Hitler
>like a fiddle.
Sure, the SU would have been in big trouble if Germany had attacked her in May 1940 instead of the lowlands and France. Was that decision really a consequence of the pact, though? After all, it would have been pretty important to take Britain out of the war, too. She was the airstrip and staging post Uncle Sam would need if he was ever gonna come in mob-handed. And, if my suspicion that Hitler was surprised by the Allied declaration of war is right (he had some right to be; they'd given him plenty of reason to suspect he was free to do with Slavic Europe what he bloody well liked), then he was more or less obliged to take care of the Western Front firsty. It didn't look too hard, he had the arsenal for that sort of war already, and he was at war with them already.
>>CB: Henry Ford was collaborating with the Nazis. The SU was maneuvering for
>>time to save the world. And it worked.
Maybe you're underestimating the importance of the French and British declaration in September '39, Charles. Kinda forced Hitler's hand. If that's true, Goering's botch-up of the Battle of Britain does become a very important factor in determining the shape of things.
>CB: As if not signing the pact with the Germans would have saved Soviet
>lives. It is sick to blame the Soviets for the mass murders of the German
>Nazis. Talk about blaming the victim, this has got to be one of the
>extreme examples of it.
I'm not sure Hitler was thinking about the East in 1940. He wanted that train carriage at Versailles, *needed* Britain, and probably thought he could rely on oil from North Africa (meaning the Ukrainian deposits weren't vital in the short term). Barbarossa was immensely ambitious in April of 1941, and a huge risk by the time it got going two months later. So I'd like to see argument for the proposition that the pact was crucial to the SU's fortunes.
>CB: The fact that they won the war is the best refutation of your claim
>that the military was unprepared. It relies defies the obvious to claim
>that they somehow "got prepared" during the war and turned it around and
>won.
That doesn't hold by itself, Charles. Had the winter of 1941 come a little later, and mebbe a little softer, well, it could all have been a very sad picture indeed.
>Again you are supremely arrogant in claiming you have some plan (without
>hindsight) that would have won the war more efficiently. As if Germany was
>not the most powerful war machine of the period.
Taking Britain before charging into the steppes was hardly rare thinking at the time. Opening a new front is not to be done lightly at any time. I mean, the chance of American involvement was always there, and they'd have been much disadvantaged without a British airfield and harbour from which to threaten Germany ...
>CB: You haven't established that the Pact didn't contribute to the Soviet
>victory. Those who warned against the pact would have lost the war, like
>you would have.
And you haven't established that it did, Charles! I reckon my bit of speculation kinda puts it in the strategic background. Anyway, I'm looking forward to some putting right by the list's impressive array of military historians.
Cheers, Rob.