Comments by "Nicholas Conder" (@nicholasconder4703) on "Battlestorm Stalingrad E9 - FIRESTORM" video.

  1. Stalingrad was bad, but so was Leningrad. It is estimated that one-third of the population of Leningrad, around one million people, starved to death during the winter of 1941-1942. They too had to live under continual bombardment until the siege was finally fully broken in early 1944. How they survived I'll never know.
    36
  2. @Félix Sánchez One should remember the vast majority of civilian deaths in Leningrad occurred during the first winter. Many civilians were evacuated afterwards. The problem for Leningrad is that from September 8, 1941 until January 27th, 1943 (when a land route was finally re-established), the only way to supply the city was across Lake Ladoga. Nothing could come from the Baltic, and there are no ports (as far as I can tell from the literature and Google Earth) on Lake Ladoga. The only way they could supply the city that first winter was via an ice road over Lake Ladoga, which was under constant shelling and air attack.There was cannibalism, yes, but people also did things like stripping wallpaper off and consuming the wallpaper paste! Salisbury (1969) "The 900 Days" is a fairly good source for a description of conditions during the siege, as is the episode 11 "Red Star" in "The World at War", the 1970s BBC production. The latter is something I highly recommend as a good initial starting point for learning about WW2. Of course, some of the material has been invalidated because of the opening of the Russian archives and proper perusal and analysis of the German archives, but it is still a great series.
    6
  3. I agree with your assessment that there wasn't, yet was, an evacuation. Based on what we know about him, I also think that the sociopath Stalin probably did forbid a mass evacuation of the city. Given the priorities of transporting war materials, foodstuffs and soldiers across the Volga (and via the railroads for as long as they operated), it made sense not to transport large numbers of civilians. Moving large numbers of civilians would reduce the amount of war-related materials you could ship (including food), and lead to issues of finding housing for the displaced population. It also made sense to evacuate key personnel or highly trained professionals. Evacuating small numbers of individuals would not have strained the transportation system or panicked the population (egads, now I'm thinking like Stalin!). However, one other factor comes into play here, that being the inability of people to sense danger or ignore perilous situations. Up until August 20th, it appeared that the Wehrmacht had been stalled at the Don, and would be unable to proceed much further. This sentiment was probably reinforced by Soviet propaganda and erroneous reporting of the facts. Army commanders and political commissars had a lot on their plate at this time, so in all likelihood they either did not have time to think about organizing an evacuation, or felt they might have the situation somewhat in hand. For the civilians, the quotes from residents talking about going for a picnic on Mamayev Kurgan or shopping at the market strikes an almost surreal note, especially if one considers the Germans were only 50 km from downtown Stalingrad. So, in summary, although the population was ordered to stay put, I think they also did not fully grasp the peril they were in.
    2