Comments by "David Himmelsbach" (@davidhimmelsbach557) on "TIKhistory"
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@ Bond ... 1) The SS documented the hell out of their activities straight through the war. They even went so far as to radio into Berlin (Himmler) about their liquidation numbers -- day after day -- especially in the Pale of Russia.
2) My Uncle was on the burial detail at Dora. At Dora, the V-2 works, execution was by way of truncheon... truly up close and personal. By the time he made it to the SS 'hospital' (irony alert) he was down 50% in body weight.
3) Denialists commonly run the math on Auchwitz crematoria -- as in there was no way that the facilites could dispose of so many victims. However, they've never read "Bloodlands." ALL of the evidence points to most victims being gunned down in the field. Later, after the Kaytn massacre was exhumed, the SD realized that it was bad public relations -- for posterity -- to leave millions of corpses in the ground. So, with extreme urgency and secrecy, the SD went all over occupied lands exhuming the dead -- to cremated them. Their technique has been written down. It consisted of using 2nd hand rails -- hoisted above the ground about five feet to create an open-field burning platform -- with an air-draft coming up from below. The fattest victims -- always overweight women -- were laid down first -- like cord wood. Leaner victims were placed high in the pile. Then a blaze would be started from below -- until the dripping remains ignited and over the next hours, every victim was reduced to ashes. A single grid was able to cremate over a thousand bodies per roast. These pyramids of crime eventually reached the size of a major soccer pitch.
4) The Big Problem with 'The Holocaust' is that even Jews are semi-denialists. Namely, that Hitler didn't restrict himself to Jews. He compulsively murdered:
All opponents -- with a very loose definition of opponent;
All elite Roman Catholics -- FIRST on his death list, BTW;
All visibly wealthy non-Germans in Poland -- and elsewhere -- his Socialism kicked in;
Millions of -- so called -- Partisans, that is, anyone running for the hills and hiding from his tyranny;
Straggling Red Army soldiers -- if caught solo -- you're a 'Partisan';
Gypsies -- again with the racial purity obsession;
Roman Catholic clergy -- to number in the hundreds-of-thousands;
Orthodox clergy -- vast numbers -- by definition all Soviet clergy were NKVD operatives... which was actually true by dint of Stalin;
Homosexuals -- if and only if -- they were flamingly gay;
{ Hitler's own personal body guard was 100% gay -- at his insistence! Rohm & his buddies were as gay as could possibly be, BTW. The SS was HEAVY with gay troopers. When Himmler wanted his boys to reproduce -- his boys rebelled ! Yup. }
5) Then there is the super abundant film archival record. Most is so repulsive that it has NEVER been generally released. No-one would care to sit through it. Even editing it would be traumatic in the extreme. There was one time it was released for popular viewing: in Germany. My own Father had to stand at the door, returning Germans for a second and third sitting until the horror sunk in. You'd be surprised to know that the hardest core Nazis were always young, unmarried women. (!!!) The theater had to be hosed down as every showing produced more stomach content. Later that afternoon, every backyard in town featured their Sunday finest being burned. All vere so soiled from vomit that they were unwearable.
6) And then there are the surviving Germans and their Holocaust accessories that even now can give oral testimonies. One in particular sticks in my mind: a very young Latvian witnessed an SS officer gun down 50% of the Jews standing in the ranks... as in every other one. The back splatter was so extreme that my witness had to dispose of the uniform of the SS officer. This shooting took every bit of two and a half hours... while this witness had to stand at attention. I can assure you that he HATED that SS officer. You might ask how in hell he got into the Freicorps? The bolsheviks killed his parents, he was an orphan. The bolsheviks involved were Jewish -- imagine that !
The Holocaust didn't involve 6,000,000 Jews -- but rather -- at least 12,000,000 souls: Jews, Gypsies, clergy, Poles, professors, capitalists, -- and anyone running for the hills.
The twin tyrannies created an ocean of blood: pot meet kettle.
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Germans didn't have cigarettes -- they had ersatz cigarettes -- these were NOTHING like American cigarettes.
The Germans also didn't have access to bona fide coffee or tea, either.
It's a fact that GIs blowing cigarette smoke and coffee fumes were able to get German troops to surrender on that basis alone. Bradley reported -- in total disgust -- that one GI got over a hundred German soldiers to surrender via this gambit. He, the offender, was taken-out by a German sniper called up just to stop his action. Things were getting totally out of hand. He was bringing back yesterday's surrenders and getting them to call their buddies on over... speaking through K-rations... munch... munch... munch...
Clueless Bradley slammed this GI -- in his second autobiography of the war. What a dunce!
There is a fair amount of footage of surrendering Germans (1945) to the USA. They are extremely relaxed. It's a wholly different vibe than Germans taken captive by the Russians. In such cases, the strain is plain to see. The Germans are terrified, at their wit's end.
BTW, at the end, half of most German combat formations are runts just entering puberty. They can barely tote their sleeping gear. But for the war, it'd be a funny sight.
&&&
The big unknown: how much access did the trapped 6th Army have to horsemeat?
I've read that by the time of Uranus, most of the horses had been withdrawn to the rear. Hauling fodder up to Stalingrad was murder on their fuel supplies and truck repair. Further, there were no stables that would shield the draft animals from the horrific weather. By now, the Germans had figured out that you just about couldn't use horses in such weather. Any such attempt sickens or kills the beast. Further, their feed tab goes into orbit... just like the troops.
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@David Briggs
I don't comprehend your lack of comprehension.
8th USAAF destroyed the refineries that were in Germany (not Romania) and their adjacent tank farms where the Luftwaffe held its avgas reserve stocks. It was from these tank farms that the Luftwaffe passed on avgas to units across Nazi occupied Europe -- primarily Germany, itself, at this point in time.
This period was branded the "Big Week" by the USAAF -- and many a propaganda film// newsreel was released shortly after its success. The burning avgas, and more, took days to cook off. The smoke cloud was visible forever into the distance.
These stocks were refined fuels -- not crude oil -- which is what the US 9th AAF ( Tidal Wave, North Africa) and US 15th AAF (many raids, Foggia complex) hit around Ploiesti.
Yes, Ploiesti had some refining capability, but its real claim to fame was the production of crude oil. Wiki has everything all screwed up.
[The primary goal of Tidal Wave was the Tank Farm. ( Which was adjacent to the refinery complex.) It was obvious from the start, that a tank farm is self destructive once it's lit, and that once things really get rolling, the burning crude oil and refined products will spill out and ruin the nearby refinery.
They also made for a Fat Target whereas the refinery, itself, is actually a pretty tough target. ( It's always made out of high quality THICK steel, commonly thicker than tank armor!) The sensitive and touchy components would be TINY. ( valves and pumps ) The electrical controls in a refinery are always inside rigid steel pipe as no sparks from the power system can ever be permitted to ignite gases or fuels.]
Yes, other German refineries could still produce avgas, but they couldn't re-form crude feed stock up into higher octanes. The Luftwaffe had to settle for that natural fraction of crude oil and synthetic crude oil that distilled off as avgas. For most feedstocks this was a pathetically low fraction. Such a process is know as a distillery -- not a refinery.
[ In the oil business, a distillery is derisively termed a 'teapot.']
It was just enough avgas to let the Luftwaffe limp along. It became common for the Luftwaffe to just sit on the ground and let the Americans do their worst, as the Luftwaffe couldn't put up enough fighters to even mix it up with the escorts.
Shortly after the Big Week, Ike took personal command ( ie redirected Spaatz) ordering the 8th and 9th AAF to ignore German industry and to concentrate on the the transport grid. This went on for months. (March, April, May, June... Ike didn't release these air forces until the Cobra breakout, itself a massive heavy bomber tactical attack.)
It was at this time that Speer and Galland made a MAJOR plea with Adolf to use the respite to train a whole new batch of fighter pilots while the sky over Germany was clear of USAAF fighters. But they lost the 'debate.' Both of them later published their tale in Reader's Digest. ( 1946, IIRC ) [ Strange... as Speer was in the docket at the time.]
Their pitch was basic: this is the last time that the Luftwaffe has any shot at re-blooding the fighter arm, and that all bomber pilots have to be re-tasked away from bombing the enemy. The US 8th AAF is destroying Germany's war industries. This must be stopped at all costs, or the war will be lost for lack of production.
Also, during the respite, Speer threw every man at rebuilding crippled refineries -- and he even opened up fuel plants inside hollowed out mountains. ( These cavities were originally dug out for other critical war industries (IIRC, radio tubes) -- but were taken over for liquid fuel production. )
Fortunately for the Allies, Speer was largely unsuccessful.
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@averige
You're splitting dogmatic hairs.
Both of the tyrants wanted to run a despotic empire ... and run it on new-wave Socialist principles -- so scientific they would be.
Both rejected the idea of INTERNATIONAL Socialism/Bolshevism/Naziism/Hitlerism/Stalinism.
Both tyrants wanted total 'brand control.'
As for Marxism, no-one can really say what that is.
Out in the real world, it kept being re-defined by this or that tyrant: Lenin, Stalin, Mao, ... et. al.
In its essentials, Applied Marxism has always entailed massive coercion of the population. (totalitarianism) and centrally planned economies that opt for extreme militarism; usually directed internally at first, with it turned outwards the moment the correlation of forces are favorable.
Hitlerism was of this nature with a few personal twists. He was a Socialist that hated racially incorrect Socialists. Lest you not know, Hitler absorbed virtually EVERY Socialist in Germany into the Nazi Party. (They were given 72 hours to do so.) They didn't object. Other than a handful of fleeing Socialists, everyone signed on the line that was dotted. It was quite a sight to see. Today, this has largely dropped down Winston Smith's Memory Hole.
Conservatives fled the Nazi Party. They usually simply dropped out of politics. So long as they did, Hitler looked the other way. Many Weimar officials survived clean though the war, staying in retirement.
Many German Socialists rose to VERY high rank in the Nazi Party.
This is something that post-war German Socialists can't bear to admit, to see brought up with the younger generations.
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Margarine was never made from coal -- except as a pilot test. It was way, way, way too expensive.
Margarine was made from edible, but runny, vegetable oils: corn oil, cottonseed oil, safflower oil... you name it.
The process involves HYDROGENATION. The hydrogen used is, itself, created from water by electrolysis. This is expensive hydrogen. It's used because of its reagent grade (absolute) purity. One simply does not need much for the chemical reaction is to simply add hydrogen to a fatty oil.
When such a food is packaged and labeled it reads: "Hydrogenated Oils." Look for that term, or something very close to it.
The net result is that the oils become 'butters' -- ie thick as butter. For presentation, such butters are COLORED with dye.
During WWII, if and when the dyes were not available, the product would ship looking like LARD. But it would actually taste just like today's margarine.
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@averige
The scary thing is that Lenin had Stage IV syphilis by the time he gained power -- and died from it.
The Russians admitted this during Yeltsin's presidency. They coughed up Lenin's medical records. It's significant that Lenin's last personal physician was brought in because he was Russia's national expert on syphilis. He had a towering reputation based on his expertise with this killer.
The so-called stroke that Lenin had was nothing more than Lenin ranting and raving from the ravages of syphilis. These rantings continued until the day he died of syphilis.
As you might imagine, Stage IV syphilis is famed for triggering raving paranoia. Lenin was not only warning his Bolshevik pals about Stalin, he was warning Stalin about his Bolshevik pals.
By that hour, Lenin was paranoid about everyone and everything. His mind was collapsing.
By the end, the spirochetes just eat the brain alive, parasitically.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syphilis
MANY of Lenin's tyrannical decisions were obviously driven by his syphilis.
Other famous syphilitics:
Adolf Hitler -- with proof ( heart murmur ) in the American national archives + the testimony -- in writing -- of both of his last physicians. Like Lenin, Hitler sought out Germany's top expert in syphilis and made him his personal, attending, physician. (Dr. Morell ) Hitler not only went insane due to Stage IV syphilis -- he was addicted to meth ( speed ) courtesy of Dr. Morell. This addiction was totally out of hand during the summer of '42. Adolf's antics were so extreme that Himmler had his 'medicine' analysed by expert chemists. It was a frightful concoction. He was being poisoned. His addiction caused him to flip-flop his panzers all through Case Blue.
Napoleon Bonaparte -- with proof in the diary of his personal attending physician. This diary was kept hidden until late in the 20th Century. The sole and only reason that the French did not march on Waterloo, June 17, 1815 was because Napoleon's organ was on FIRE from a fresh syphilitic infection. It cost him everything. Later, he died from it on St. Helena. Penicillin hadn't been discovered yet.
Winston Churchill's father. He broke down from Stage IV syphilis right in front of Parliament. He was the Defence Minister at the time. No wonder Winnie had a life-long compulsion to become Defence Minister -- and Prime Minister. We tend to forget, but Winnie was his own Defence Minister. Of course, Winnies father died from the disease.
Just like Stalin -- who was his own Defense Minister, too.
And here I thought that the Spanish Flu was the big killer.
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Paulus was never going to break out. He was a deer-in-the-headlights kind of fella.
The ONLY shot that the Germans had was to cut the panzer corps loose right from the start, BEFORE the Soviets pocked them with the infantry. As necessary, the lesser valued panzers would've been left behind so that enough fuel was there for the best panzers to make it all the way to German supply heads near Rostov or west of the Don.
The Don bridgehead HAD to be priority. In the event, it wasn't. The Soviets even conned the repair troops there to advance forward into the Stalingrad pocket!
( German survivor's accounts.)
These repair troops were soon a priority to fly out of the pocket, being at the top of the list. They had to leave all of their tools behind, (weight)
Once the 16p,24p,29m etc were outside the pocket, they could immediately begin to rip the Soviet light infantry to pieces... totally frustrating the encirclement.
That the above was not done is a tribute to Paulus. He froze. Guderian, Hoth, Rommel, not one of them would've froze.
Panzers are useless on defense. Why Paulus let them stay with the infantry is a complete mystery. You would've expected Hube to be howling.
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@David
Because of telecommunications security, the Axis Allied armies were actually getting their orders via the German net -- namely that of 6th Army -- which was actually operating as an army group in its own right.
Even though the Romanians and Italians were organized as organic armies, complete, they still had to co-ordinate with 6th Army -- even if -- on paper -- they were directly subordinate to Army Group B.
As a practical matter, these Axis armies were hugely passive. The krauts were STEALING their heavy weapons on a systemic basis. This was the exact inverse of the American scheme.
{
The American supply system was so robust that entire Allied armies were supplied, off the cuff, based upon surplus// replacement heavy weapons. This is how the French 1st Army in the Rhone river valley came to be. It was originally intended to be just a corps of ex-territorial French troops ( read that to mean French led African colonial formations at the heart of de Gaulle's FFA ) As the American 7th Army drove up the Rhone, the local Frenchmen fell out to join their own reserve formations.
In this, the French entirely duplicated the Wehrkreis system -- which actually hails from Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden. (1620s -- Thirty-Years War) [ Regiment = raised for the king ]
The US Army simply handed over all of the necessary weapons so as to re-create southern French infantry divisions. It didn't hurt that the 81mm mortar and the 155mm howitzer were French designs cloned by the Americans.
}
The Ostheer systematically stole all of the PAK sent by Italy and Romania to their forces in the east. They KNEW that these armies had absolutely no defense against Soviet tanks.
THIS was the height of folly.
OKH knew all about all of this. The Axis armies had been bitching about weapons theft for just about forever.
OKH should've adopted the American system where everyone at the front is being given the same stuff. The Axis armies just didn't need that much stuff, either.
Absolutely no modern army replicates the folly of OKH.
BTW, because of the Wehrkreis system, the Stalingrad fiasco caused Hitler political troubles. He, essentially, promised that the divisions that had been destroyed in the kessel would not have to serve in the east again. They were re-raised and then sent down into Italy and Yugoslavia and even southern France. This is why the Italian occupation army looks like the Stalingrad kessel. (305,76,44, on over)
The 14p, 16p, ... et. al. also had a 'vacation' in Italy. ( Being posted to 10th Army was deemed a dream vacation from the war by German troops. ( It was common for German units to be posted way up the spine of Italy as reaction troops lest the British-Americans land more troops. Italian winters may be wet, but they're mild compared to Germany. )
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@Steven
Nope, Nazi Germany was already in a two front war -- had been since June 22, 1941
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Von Rundstedt was right, Rommel was right.
The Americans were impossible to stop at the beachhead;
the Americans were impossible to stop once they got inland.
Yup. They were both right: you're not going to stop the Americans.
Neither FM was concerned about the British.
Their army was just too small.
It was landing in France only because Big Brother, USA, was landing at the same time. Shortly after D-Day the British Army just started to fade away. London just couldn't // wouldn't provide replacements for losses. Everytime you turned around, another British infantry division was being broken up -- entirely.
In contrast, the Americans needed the entire front, from the sea to the Swiss border to get all of their troops into action. This was finally achieved, April 23, 1945. ( Handshake day.)
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@John Burns
The US armies NEVER had to divert supplies in the manner described. General LEE and IKE were totally in charge of such matters, NOT Bradley, not Patton.
That's why they had to sit on their azzes and watch MG while doing nothing. If they'd had any say at all, they'd have kept on going.
Ike TOTALLY SHUT THEM OFF with a phone call to Lee.
He issued orders to General Lee, who ran the supply echelon.
The American system was unlike that of any other army's. All supplies were brought up by non-combat troops that the generals at the front had no control over. They were delivered to the various army-level supply depots, whence 1st, 3rd and 9th picked them up to haul them the last miles to the front. That's how the system really worked.
When Bradley was desperate for soldiers, he requested that Lee's boys be diverted to combat. He was shot down in flames. He didn't get ANYBODY. General Lee, of course, had a FIT.
Ike was trying to mollify Monty, nothing more.
Official histories are nothing more than azz wiping for the record. When you've read enough of them, it becomes baffling why anyone in any army ever put a footstep wrong.
( In this regard, Halder's revisionism is epic by any standard. )
NO WAY is the American official history -- or any other official document -- going to put the blame on Monty -- or the British, more generally.
Grow up.
As for 'Maxwell' (Taylor) -- you're looking at parachute DOGMA. No way is the school for parachutists going to opine that the biggest drop of the war was all goofed up because Browning -- its godfather -- phu cked up. Instead, the official line had to be: it could've worked, yes it could.
Well, who can argue against could'ves?
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TIK is falling victim to the Fraz Halder effect.
1) Paulus was a Halder boy going all the way back. Paulus was selected by Halder Precisely BECAUSE he followed orders -- which were supposed to be Halder's orders.
Hitler thought better on the equation -- and dumped the Catholic. Zeitzler was brought in. ( The hero of Dieppe could run panzer armies on thin air.)
2) Halder -- and Von Manstein -- wrote for the 'ages' ( as did Bradley, Monty, et. al. No-one wanted to make their armies out to be baffoons. )
Yet if you REALLY look at the German response to Uranus -- Paulus looks like a total fool.
3) The REAL story WRT Uranus is STILL obscured.
3a) The Soviet heroics in bagging the German Signals detatchment sent up to the Hungarian Army is STILL suppressed. It was as war-turning as the British super-success at the First Battle of Tel el Isa.
( Fact chance of finding anything about it these days. What used to be a Google snap search is now buried way down into the bowels of the Internet. )
4) In both cases, the British and the Russians pulled off the coups of the century -- and refuse to give any publicity to their master strokes.
I still can't figure out how the NKVD EVER bagged the Germans during at total White Out.
Bet you never heard a word about that.
Bet you never heard that the Soviets WAITED for the White Out.
Bet you never heard that Uranus was weeks late -- 'cause STAVKA was waiting upon IDEAL conditions.
Bet you never heard that Mars was DELIBERATELY compromised by STAVKA so as to paralyze OKH... to stop it from returning the panzer corps promised to Paulus. You read that right, STAVKA compromised its own massive offensive in front of Moscow so that OKH would be freaked out.
Bet you never heard about OKH having an entire reserve panzer corps waiting on flat cars for the inevitable Red Army Winter Counter-Attack. ( patent pending ) Yeah. EVERY German saw it coming.
Starting with Zeitzler - Chief of Staff at OKH. ( September 24, 1942 )
TIK, your 'problem' is that you're using BS that was cranked out during the Cold War -- BS that made every attempt to hide what had actually transpired.
Neither the Victors nor the Vanquished were willing to go on the record.
So you've got DECADES of BS from all parties.
The crypto-war -- the need for the Ostheer to go to Five Rotors -- Suddenly -- like overnight -- goes without comment. ( Heh. heh. heh. heh.)
[ The German Navy ordered the 5-rotor machines because they became concerned. Von Manstein ordered out NAVAL Enigmas -- in a total panic -- once he doped out that the Reds were reacting to German (four-rotor) signals.
This reality was hinted at in von Mellenthin's Panzer Battles. Even he would not admit the obvious: the Soviets were reading German signals in real time. THAT'S the reason why the rescue attempt at the Chir and Don went totally sideways. Von Mellenthin dances around that reality.
THAT'S why von Manstein gave up on rescuing 6th Army.
What you must understand: von Manstein is gagging on the fact that a four-star German general made horrific gaffs usually associate with Inspector Clouseau.
We all remember him. He told his superior that the organ grinder couldn't be the look-out for the bank robbery gang - because he was blind. This was the same French inspector that was found arguing with a monkey.
The FACTS are plain: Paulus allowed the Reds to rope and dope him -- LONG before von Manstein was called in to bail him out.
1) Omitted in virtually ALL (Halder tellings) accounts Paulus WASTED his fuel reserve by sending his panzer regiments thither and fro BEFORE the ring was closed.
2) Omitted from virtually ALL accounts: the southern wing not only started days late, it couldn't bring ANY heavy weapons across the Volga. Yup.
3) Omitted from virtually all accounts: the Soviets couldn't dig in... not for DAYS.
Yes, you read that right. The Germans -- in panzers -- could just mow the Russians down. They had NO heavy weapons, NO fox-holes, and minimal reserves of food and ammo.
When the 29th Motorized division moved against the southern wing, it was a SLAUGHTER. Who could stop panzers with their pricks? It took STAVKA spoofing to stop this German counter-stroke. If left as intendened, the 29th would've totally ruined Uranus -- all by itself.
Paulus actually believed -- and operated upon -- totally absurd Soviet spoofs that should not have fooled at four-year old.
Once von Manstein dopes this all out, he is stunned. Even years afterward, he can't lay this out to the general public. ( Get it? )
Like virtually ALL WWII commanders, his accounts are deliberate lies designed to not embarrass his nation's army.
In the case of Bradley, I just about had the heaves. ( A Soldier's Story. Gag, gag. gag.)
&&&&&&&
TIK is wrong:
By the time von Manstein is involved it's TOO LATE.
The 6th Army was fated to suffer the slings of the French of 1812-1813.
Von Manstein could see that, could FEEL it, by just walking outside his HQ.
Lost Victories is a weird read, no doubt.
1) The dude was serving to extend the tyranny of a mad-man.
[ Stage IV syphilis, jacked up on meth// speed ]
2) Day by day, he saw EVERY asset being pulled away:
He lost a panzer corps -- before he even showed up.
He lost 11th Army -- it was piece-mealed to the Ostheer.
He couldn't even get panzers up out of Army Group A.
( 13th Panzer particularly burns in his mind, see Lost Victories. )
&&&
OKH// OKW// Adolf should've had their hair on fire. Panzer divisions ought to have been recalled from Army Group A. But the WEREN'T.
%%%
Lastly, Paulus was FIXATED upon removing his ENTIRE 6th Army -- which was an ARMY GROUP.
I"ve never read of a signal scheme to merely shift the 4th Panzer Army.
It's ALWAYS the ENTIRE army.
That could NEVER WORK.
It's no wonder that von Manstein nixed every flight to the west.
It, such an attempt, would have been a fiasco beyond any imagining.
For some crazy reason, Paulus was fixated upon retreating the ENTIRE infantry army -- even though the numbers said that it was a total impossibility. The German army NEVER had the transport to shift an army in the winter -- so far.
Paulus didn't even see the significance of his position in terms of the prosecution of the war.
Astride the Volga, 6th Army was in a WINNING POSITION. STAVKA had to move heaven and Earth to shif it away from the Volga,
Yet, he didn't see that. (!!!!)
Everybody else did. ( Zietzler. (
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Lucas and Clark BOTH deserve scorn. Clark ought to have jumped all over Lucas within the first day. Clark should never have even made it to Korea. Amazing.
BTW, Bradley send down no end of American generals after only one screw-up. They were not kept in Europe but sent back to the USA.
Alexander had a killer rep with the US Army. At his level of command, he can't ride heavy on Clark. This is the same dynamic between Ike and Monty.
BTW, Churchill delayed D-Day by taking// holding onto the LSTs. Their lack was used by Bradley to convince Monty to delay D-Day by five weeks. Both agreed that they ought to wait for more LSTs. Sadly, both Monty and Bradley were wrong. The blame lies mostly with Bradley.
BTW, both the USN and RN hated operating off of Anzio. It was just too close to Nazi air power. The Krauts had already sunk two Italian heavies with their first generation smart bombs. Indeed, that's why Anzio was selected as the limit.
Further both navies were gearing up for D-Day. They wanted their crews at 100% - and at first they expected to be off Normandy May 1, 1944. That was not a lot of time. As it proved out, the navies just got stuck in the Med. This was NOT where they wanted to be.
Once it was obvious what the trend was, Dragoon was pencilled in.
Now Churchill didn't want a landing! He expected another Anzio! Oh, my!
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@Mstislaw
BTW, EVERY army had penal battalions// formations.
In the US Army 'Graves and Registrations' was always a penal formation. It was a duty that absolutely no-one wanted.
Because every army needed troopers to staff out chit details -- like Graves and Registrations -- the infractions// crimes required to be sent down to a penal formation whipped all over the lot, by army, by nation and by recent history.
The film "The Dirty Dozen" , while highly fictional in every way, did touch on the fact that penal troops were routinely given Hell work.
One job out of many: clearing mines.
If captured German engineers could be found, they would certainly be pressed into such service. My own father stood guard over such details in Normandy. There are no end of photos showing this activity. Naturally, these photos are not now popularly reprinted.
If the enemy combat engineers could not be found, then ANY enemy trooper was set to the task. Indeed, they'd be thrown into the mix even if engineers were on hand.
Of note, German mines were designed to be lifted and re-set. The Heer was in no economic situation to leave mine fields behind that could be re-set all over again when the front shifted. Further, it was often the case that the Germans wanted to attack straight through their own existing mine fields. German engineers got to the point that they could lift mines at night.
Where it got tricky was when a German mine was set to be a booby trap. ( One atop the other. ) Boy was that exciting.
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Von Manstein and Guderian MADE France fall. (1940)
Von Manstein was the brain. Adolf never forgot his contribution.
Guderian was the executioner. Dittos.
With a minor assist from Rommel. ( MUCH more Adolf's style )
Guderian was not enough of a Nazi to become a Field Marshall. Merely conquering France was not enough. ( he disobeyed/ faked out Adolf, get it ? )
He created the 116th Panzer Division for the expressed purpose of civil war against the Nazis. Yes, it was stuffed to the brim with anti-Nazi Germans.
Guderian gave it two Panther battalions + a Mark IV battalion -- ultimately the 116th was a Panzer Corps in its own right. It had THAT much magic stuff.
Right through until the last, the 116th Panzer was kept 'in reserve.' This formation is usually a mystery in most military histories.
When the Mortain counter-offensive was commanded, the 116th became the primary panzer force. It was the only panzer force that had -- essentially -- escaped the Normandy campaign -- until then.
For most readers, the question pops up: where the Hell did this oddly numbered super-panzer division spring from?
BTW, it, the 116th Panzer, was presented by Guderian to Adolf as a BIRTHDAY GIFT. ( April 20, 1944 ) Yeah, he was happy as can be.
Heh.
The 116th Panzer Division was entirely equipped with that gear that was a surge of production. ie Gear that was not previously projected. The extra tanks -- and much else -- were a tribute to Guderian, himself. ( He was working in tandem with Minister Speer.)
Yes, Guderian pulled two battalions of Panthers out of his azz. He was already trying to stop the formation of Panther brigades.
Adolf thought that he could inject these puppies to bulk up virtually every infantry assault.
[ Something like this happened against Elsenborn Ridge (Bulge) ... but that King Tiger assault didn't quite pan out. Crazy amounts of Nazi armor were employed in that micro-campaign. ]
Guderian DID have a sense of humor.
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@Koelebig
Stalin was willing to sell Hitler two or three times as much oil as previously -- just to buy him off in the Summer of 41.
The negotiations were under way June 22, 1941 -- and HAD been under way for some time.
The Nazis were able to explain away their panzer concentrations along the Polish partition line as being in context: they were there to pressure Stalin into making more concessions.
Stalin totally bought that interpretation. THAT'S WHY he was so stunned June 22, 1941. He'd told his negotiating team to give away the store -- do ANYTHING to keep Hitler sated.
The CRAZY idea that Hitler's fuel situation was going the wrong way is TOTALLY WRONG.
Stalin was going to ENTIRELY solve Hitler's fuel crisis.
For starters, Stalin had lost his oil sales to France. He couldn't even get his oil out through the Mediterranean See.
[ A primer: the Baku oil was developed by John D Rockefeller way, way back when. It, the oil, was exported by way of pipelines that went from the Caspian to the Black Sea. ( The terminals were in Georgia. )
IF -- and it's a BIG IF -- Hitler could restore the Baku fields, it would make perfect sense for him to draw Soviet oil out the exact same way. As we can all appreciate, there was no way that Stalin was going to let any of the oil infrastructure stay intact for the Nazis.
The ONLY shot the Nazis had was by way of a parachute drop. His paras would have to jump at night and get the drop on the Soviet detonation teams. That's why Crete was such a pivotal battle.
Indeed, Hitler needed a parachute CORPS by this time. Such a formation was also exactly what he couldn't fuel. Airborne formations are avgas pigs. It takes about 15,000 gallons to train each paratrooper... and that's if you're a fuel miser.
Lest we forget: Ploesti oil is crappy oil. It is no where near as easy to refine as Soviet oil... or American oil. Even Iranian and Venezuelan oil was still light and sweet at this point in time. ( The heavy oils extracted today didn't get tapped until decades after WWII. )
Crappy crude oil translates into crappy octane numbers or serious losses in the refinery stream -- plus major capital expenditures. The Germans were really behind the eight-ball.
Since coal-to-liquids produced mostly middle distillate, it's astounding that Guderian ever built up the panzer force with gasoline engines. Germany had the world's best Diesel technology -- and heavy tanks were already expensive as Hell. A Diesel engine would DOUBLE its fuel economy.
Nazi Germany was an economic Clown Show: cruel, despotic, but still a total mess. Stalin permitted Hitler to get a LOT further along with his empire than he ever could've done on his own.
Soviet oil produced the bulk of the Luftwaffe's avgas. All that was necessary was distillation. ( This was also true for Texas crude. )
All other German sources of liquid fuels required INTENSE refinery processing, so much so, that Nazi Germany could never compete.
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@Treblaine
Ike had standing, General Orders about how American officers were to behave with the British.
1) Absolutely NOTHING was to pass your lips that would insult or denigrate British military prowess or contribution to the fight.
2) Rule #1 goes double for senior British commanders.
3) When under the command of senior British officers, your role is to go along -- and provide absolutely no static -- don't even open your yap. Under no circumstances should you attempt to correct a senior British officer or to show him up.
4) It is forbidden to gloat about American technical excellence and production prowess.
Any SHAEF (USA) officer would be sent packing if Ike heard anything indicating that you've violated #1-4 rules. And, I might add, there was a steady stream of departures from SHAEF all through the war.
Ike wanted team players. The only folks allowed to blow off steam were our allies.
1) They'd been in the war years longer than the USA.
2) They were under far more stress back home than any American.
( V2s, V1s -- they'll do that. Rationing will do that.
Gavin knew all of the above. Ike was delighted with the performance of the 82nd and 101st.
Lest we forget, the Americans lost more men (dead) during MG than the British did. (!!!) The British won the 'captured para' sweepstakes, though.
The American Airborne ( nee XVIII Airborne Corps ) fought continuously pretty much from the second day onward. 15th Army just keep trickling in from the west, and scratch formations kept popping up out of Germany.
Which brings up another point, MG basically crippled 15th Army. The only route left to it required tip-toeing across the Dutch sea barrier, leaving all heavy equipment behind. It, the 15th Army was eventually slotted in north of 6th Panzer Army during the Ardennes offensive. (Bulge)
In all of the planning, this 'reflux' of 15th Army was not anticipated. It really bogged down the 101st.
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@John Burns
Can't you get ANYTHING right?
The Aachen story has been documented in both book and made for TV video broadcast.
The Germans were totally befuddled as to why the Americans didn't show up 'on time.' They'd been rolling right along.
The fact that 1st Army was stopped by Ike, at this time, in favor of Monty was something that you have to piece together, as neither the US Army nor the British Army want that connection made, then or now. It's evaporated from the narrative.
But the German general's plan would've put US 1st Army CLEAN over the Rhine within HOURS -- a full week before the Garden drop.
He, literally, expected to surrender Aachen to a jeep -- the traditional lead element of an American Armored Corps. By this time, Germans were accustomed to surrendering to jeeps.
[ It was common for the jeeps to announce themselves by way of 50 caliber machine gun bursts. This always terrified Germans, as the M2 machine gun usually required a closed coffin for the dead. Jeeps, of course, never travelled alone. They'd pack a tank brigade over their shoulder. ]
(Two jeeps took the surrender of Prague in 1945 -- an event that the Czech Republic honors to this very day. It refuses to acknowledge the Red Army is its liberators. Those monuments have all been torn down. A plaque thanking the US (3rd) Army was erected in their place.)
The jeeps were driven by Jewish Americans on a hunt for their cousins, BTW, and totally against orders. When they returned, their colonel told them, "Don't do that again." And that was the extent of their punishment for disobeying orders. Now contrast that with any other WWII army. Heh.
When Gavin rolled north to the Baltic, (April 1945) he just used two jeeps, with his mounting an American flag. That ended all resistance. The arrival of the US Army was a fantasy come true for northern Germans. They feared the British or Russians.
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"Hitler took hours to reply: 6th Army could break out, he said, but it
still had to hold existing fronts north, east, and west of the city.
This was manifestly impossible. Paulus now showed his moral cowardice.
He informed Manstein that his one hundred tanks had enough fuel to go only twenty miles. Before he could move, air deliveries had to bring in 4,000 tons of fuel. There was no possibility of this, and Paulus knew it.
Drawn between Hitler demanding he stay and Manstein demanding he move, Paulus clutched at the straw of fuel to do nothing. Not even to save his army was Paulus going to buck his Fuehrer. Yet he and Manstein knew that the fuel could have been allocated to half his tanks, giving them mobility for forty miles—enough to break through.
In the week that followed, the fate of 6th Army was decided. For six
days Army Group Don had run every conceivable risk to keep the door open. But Manstein could leave 4th Panzer Army in its exposed position no longer."
https://weaponsandwarfare.com/2016/05/04/manstein-saves-the-army/
Paulus has many detractors.
IMHO, Paulus and his panzers had to squeeze the trigger way back in November -- before the ring was closed. The infantry had to stay put.
Somehow, Paulus and von Manstein didn't see the strategic need to stay on the Volga as a war-winning -- and ending -- move.
It's just that you didn't need the panzers staying inside the pocket to block the Volga.
If put back in full supply, the 24p, 16p, 29m, 3m, 14p would've shredded the Red Army. Its lead elements were light infantry. They didn't even have heavy weapons. That stuff was so difficult to move that it took days to get it across the Volga and up to the front.
The Volga's river ice has to be seen to be believed. It's one compression ridge after another.
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Someone should've told the Luftwaffe that most of the fuel in air flight is used to come to altitude.
Instead of landing their Ju-52s and the occasional Go-244 and He-111 (the Luftwaffe did some crazy stuff) they should've just parachuted the goods down to the boys.
I read somewhere that one T-34 brigade was sent straight across the steppe to a Luftwaffe base that was supporting this airlift. He tore the place up, so the story goes, and was given the medal: Hero of the Soviet Union.
If anyone knows the truth about this tale, speak up.
The plane in TIK's video that's all shot up looks like a likely victim of a ground attack, perhaps the one I've read of.
The story went that the brigade caught the Germans totally by surprise and that the tanks just rolled down the flight line shooting everything up with machine gun fire. The Germans were so far to the rear, that they assumed that they were safe. They'd not even put up a perimeter defense of any kind. The base didn't even have ground troops.
That was the story.
&&&
TIK, when you're talking such huge plane numbers, one has to ask: Where could the Luftwaffe station such a large fleet?
The typical Luftwaffe air strip was a tiny operation able to handle less than 40 planes.
Further, just hauling avgas to the various bases would've been a first class bitch. The German rail head stopped at the Dieper. ( European gauge) Then they humped the goods across that river by truck. ( a 100,000 prisoner operation I've read ) and either trucked it all the way, or -- if lucky -- transferred the goods onto Russian scaled flat cars for further transit.
If anyone knows more about the zany German logistical solutions for Case Blue -- this is the place to pipe up.
I've read nothing but conflicting tales: trucks all the way or trucks to steam locomotive trains east of the Dnieper. I'm corn fused.
But, I'm convinced that this is a big part of why Case Blue went totally off the rails. (Heh)
The Nazis just couldn't afford to burn that much motor fuel... but they tried... anyway.
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@bill
Your analysis is fact-free, I'll give you that.
1) Grabner was ACROSS the Arnhem bridge BEFORE Frost arrived.
That meant that MG was DEAD, DEAD, DEAD.
Arnhem bridge was ALREADY lost before Frost showed up.
Interdicting the northern approach is ALWAYS conflated by British eyes with taking the Arnhem bridge. Such is not so.
2) Once Grabner was on the island, he proved to be too much for both the 82nd and the 1st Airborne. He'd brought FLAK with him.
Yeah, he had both 88mm & 20mm FLAK.
XXX Corps accounts tell of 4 88mm guns. Which would ring true, as that was the standard deployment for such guns. ( They were simply not deployed singly or in duos. Back in 1940, a quad-set destroyed the British counter-attack at Arras. a quat-set destroyed the British ( Indian ) attack at Hell Fire Pass. ( North Africa, see TIK's video on that campaign.)
Once Grabner was across, Frost, Urquhart, and Gavin -- and BROWNING -- were all screwed.
2) Even without Grabner, the SS had continuous access to the island and to the southern end of Arnhem bridge.
Consequently there was ABSOLUTELY NO WAY to stop the SS from dropping the Arnhem bridge into the lower Rhine -- it didn't mater what Horrocks// XXX Corps did.
THIS ^^^ is the REAL reason why the Irish Guards didn't charge off into the night after rolling across the Nijmegen bridge. All other tales are BS.
Not only would the Irish Guards have to blindly roll up a solitary causeway at NIGHT but they could absolutely COUNT ON SS Panthers showing up before they reached the approaches to Arnhem bridge.
Regardless of the opinions of this or that para, the Irish Guards knew from bitter experience that the SS was sure to pull a rabbit of their helmet and slot four more 88s some place further down the causeway. They were the #1 killer of Allied tanks. Nothing else comes close. The Irish Guards had just destroyed four of them around the southern approach to Nijmegen bridge, and that took ALL DAY with both their grenadiers and the 82nd paras.
[ A single 88 could wipe out a platoon of Shermans faster than you can drop your underwear. This was a known fact. ]
The Germans had routine access to the island by way of a ferry that the RAF never put out of business. For some reason, the RAF is given a pass on this matter -- while TIK and jingoist John Burns tees off on Gavin.
If Gavin were such a boob, why did he get a prompt promotion?
If Browning were such a whiz why did he disappear from WWII history?
It takes a LOT to disappear a national hero with three-stars -- an army commander. Browning attained this distinction; yeah he was sent off to INDIA.
( Good grief, what a demotion! )
"In December 1944 he became Chief of Staff of Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten's South East Asia Command. "
Considering the travel time, Monty had him hustled out of England ASAP.
( Americans would call that the MG Lloyd Fredendall 'solution.' If you'll recall Lloyd was even 'promoted.' Well, that's what the paperwork said. Heh. )
His trip to India kept Browning away from Fleet Street, that's to be sure.
&&&
You Brits, knock it off with the Gavin thesis.
Browning blew it with the drop zones. Monty, Ike, Urquhart, Gavin, Horrocks ALL saw that to be true -- after the battle was decided. The after-action report must have been BRUTAL.
( Frost didn't comment: he was in enemy hands, wounded. )
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You must understand that ALL of the generals so quoted are hiding the fact that Bletchley Park is decoding German radio traffic. It would've been signals intelligence, human intelligence and flat out paranoia and miscalculation that created the 1,000 panzers.
Further, most of those panzers would've been HALF-TRACKS. Even half-tracks would've been nightmares for the paras. Germany was still producing half-tracks at quite a clip -- and the key factories were only a two-hour drive from the battle!
And the Germans WERE pouring half-tracks, Tigers, Panthers, you name it into Arnhem to rebuild 9&10 SS divisions.
Further, American tank factories produced X amount of tanks per month. Intelligence simply assumed that something like that number, say .3X, would spit out of Germany's tank factories in the Ruhr. They assumed that most of Germany's production was going to the east -- but now that Monty was knocking on the devil's door -- that ALL of the Ruhr's production would be vectored their way.
Adding it all up, you start to see where Big Numbers come from.
( For paras, half-tracks are just as deadly as panzers, and perhaps even worse. Look what happened to Frost ! )
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@at6686 One additional point: no-one knows how much petroleum is out there to be extracted. VAST areas are politically impossible to explore: Russia, Red China, ... and a slew of 3rd World nations. Libya could've been discovered when the Italians ran the joint. But hole-punching had to wait until the 50's... and American firms. Then Libya was discovered to have as much, perhaps more, crude oil than the USA. It took until the late 50's for the industry to even scope out the size of KSA's reserves. Then, further exploration was STOPPED by royal edict. Once publicized, said discoveries caused the price of crude oil to crash in international trade. It was THIS price drop that caused OPEC to be formed -- by Venezuela and Iran -- not the Arabs. KSA and Kuwait jumped on board PDQ once they got the sales pitch. (The common man thinks that OPEC was an Arab creation.)
We now know that Russia sits on top of an oil strata that runs from the Urals to the Baltic and off to the Black Sea that has dreamy light crude oil. It's not economic without fracking. Even though its total volume utterly dwarfs that of Venezuela and KSA, it's a pretty thin strata. (1,000x as large! ... Centuries of global demand. )
When Ukraine brought in Americans to frack her slice of the pie -- Putin was furious. He invaded Eastern Ukraine as a result. (Check the time-line.) The Ukrainians have aimed their fracking effort at natural gas, because for them, natural gas is their big import deficit. They were importing more gas from Russia than crude oil from anyone.
When Putin went to shut off oil exports to Ukraine (they were dead-beats) the Saudis stepped up -- big time.
Putin subsequently countered with a charm offensive with the Saudis -- which has led to them dickering back and forth about production volumes -- so much in the news.
The whole NordStream II dust-up is so that Putin can totally cut-off natural gas deliveries via Ukraine.
BTW, Putin, PERSONALLY, is the largest single owner of Gazprom. So the completion of said NordStream is putting billions into his wallet. Thank you slow ol' Joe!
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@michaelhart7569 You alluded to it up-thread, but PLANTS a starving for carbon dioxide. It's the RATE LIMITING compound for plant growth all along the tropical zone. There, there is sunlight aplenty, water aplenty and soil aplenty. So, at the margins, atmospheric carbon dioxide -- the ultimate plant fertilizer -- determines yield per acre of everything vegetative: wood, crops, weeds, grass, -- and that which eats them.
If the Greens have their way, more souls will die from starvation than those consumed by WWII. For it is in this belt that poverty is concentrated. Note how it is from out of the tropics that the US is being invaded by the poverty stricken.
In Biblical times, Sodom was a filthy rich city. Why? it was raising crops just north of the Dead Sea -- by canal irrigation in the desert -- and the local Partial Pressure of Carbon Dioxide there is the highest on Planet Earth. Think about it. It just took far less effort to grow food, and Sodom was at the cross roads of trade -- being right next to the world's first 'highway' -- meaning International Road. Traders were not compelled to pay off locals to transit it.
They were getting their cut by being hoteliers. (Actually, running RV parks. Bring your own tent.)
And then, out of the blue, Sodom was hit by a meteor that terminated in an air burst. Green trinitite micro-spheres are now to be found all over Sodom's ruins.
( For centuries, folks had been looking at the wrong end of the Dead Sea for Sodom. Isn't that a hoot? The pile of rubble that is Sodom is glaring to the eyeball. )
The whole Biblical tale is just that. A morality saga laid on top of a cosmological tragedy.
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@at6686 I can't argue with that. Europe is doing absolutely everything wrong. But then, they have their legacy from the first fifty-years of the 20th Century.
What's happening is that smart phones are broadcasting back to Nigeria, et. al what a cruise it is up in Paris, London, Berlin. The Africans have absolutely no conception of Winter. They do identify with living in hovels on the street, though.
Europe, as a whole, is NOT a net food generator. France exports a lot -- but it's to Germany, Britain and Italy -- and just a touch to the USA. Britain, Germany, Italy, Spain are net food importers -- and have been for quite some time. (More than a century.)
France is directly headed for civil war -- and even though the generals have told the politicians -- the latter do not want to listen. The result: carmagedon, and car-B-ques. Most young Africas simply go on the dole, pimp out women, or distribute hard drugs. As you can imagine, the social service bureaucracy LOVES them.
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@nicholaskelly6375 My counter argument is that coal is super-strategic. It rarely travels across the seas -- unless it's met coal. But each nation that industrializes does so on the back of its own coal mines:
Britain
America
Germany
France
Japan ( It invaded Korea and Manchuria to steal coal for steel.)
Red China
India
What this means is that it never appears as important as it really is because outside powers can't effectively throttle the coal mining and distribution of other countries -- until NOW.
Yes, the Red Chinese and Arabs and Russians are doing their damnedest to stop the West from burning coal. Without government intervention, coal produces the cheapest electricity on the planet -- unless you're blessed with hydro-potential. (Brazil, Bolivia, Venezuela -- and such)
This lowest cost power impacts the entire national economy. So, it's super-strategic, but it can't be fought over -- except by religion. For the faith in Global Doom by Global Warming is based entirely on pure faith. The statistics so often proffered have been revealed to be frauds -- time and time, again.
What really kills me is that carbon dioxide phobia is derived from the Montreal Convention WRT Freon. This was the first man-made global atmospheric pollutant ever discovered. Three chemists got the Nobel in Chemistry in 1995 over this matter.
As for myself, Rowland was MY professor. Freon was MY research white paper presented to him -- all those years ago. Rowland dropped EVERYTHING to follow my advice: that he'd get a Nobel if he pursued Freon, Fluorine chemistry, generally. It was I that spent countless hours going through Chem Abstracts - - 1906 to the time (1974) tracking down EVERY SINGLE abstract on Fluorine. (!!!)
Freon research was what I wanted to do. That was supposed to be MY Nobel.
Instead, Rowland has written me out of (chemistry) history. His (fake) history is up on the Web. He got his Nobel for starting the research, Molina was his grad student, and in my same class. I was the only Junior undergrad in that class. To attend, I needed Rowland's specific permission. Since I was the smartest kid he'd ever seen, I was in.
[ I held the thickest scholastic record in North America coming out of high school. It ran two reams and could not be filed in the cabinets. It took two-days to read. Wonderlic rated me +8 SD up. This was so high that Wonderlic spent Large to prove test fraud. They gave up upon getting my academics. So you can see why Rowland dropped all other suggestions to pursue Freon. He even pulled strings to get on a cruise ship convention entirely dedicated to atmospheric research. Yeah, he was a nationally known chemist even back then.]
I coughed up my project to Rowland KNOWING that he'd get a Nobel. I told him so. ( The number and quality of my predictions would totally freak you out. The less said, the better. No-one can handle such truths.)
So here I sit watching the West going pagan-religious over carbon dioxide because the reverend al Gore is preaching from his bullpit. This is the idiot that had to attend three-universities -- Animal House style -- to get a degree. So, he gets global attention for the "sky is falling" while I'm unknown now... and forever.
The idea that a melting Arctic ice cap can raise sea levels is nonsense on stilts.
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@Worthian
The Ju-52 had EVERYTHING going against it.
The DC-3// C-47 was adopted virtually world-wide by 1938 -- and was the obvious choice for the Luftwaffe. But the Nazis wouldn't have it.
Hungary already had built DC-3s under license, BTW. Their version used Daimler liquid cooled motors -- essentially the same ones needed by the BF-109. When the war came, further access to these engines ended. The total run of Hungarian DC-3s was tiny, BTW. You'll only find them as a footnote.
Airliners of the period did not have cabin pressurization. IIRC Howard Huges brought that into being with his Lockheed machine.
What this meant in practice was that airliners// cargo planes just didn't fly above 12,000 feet. ( The average Joe is going to need oxygen once you pass 15,000 feet. Some Sherpas can take it, but not the average guy. )
The USAAF produced a training film for heavy bomber crews compelled to face German FLAK.
( FLAK = AA or AAA depending upon the period. During WWII the major combatants started adding radar control to their AA -- with the British leading the way -- just as you'd expect. All British advances were kept top secret, so don't expect to find any contemporary documents until well after the Cold War was over. )
In this USAAF film it is asserted that -- at working altitudes -- pilots must assume that 1,000 feet of altitude buys them one-second of FLAK flight-time. The Luftwaffe was so proficient -- with all the practice the USAAF was giving them -- that they could project// predict where the bomber stream would be if they stayed on a given heading for more than X seconds -- with X = (feet in altitude) / 1,000)
What this meant in practice was that Ju-52 and C-47 had to jink all over the sky every few seconds.
This reality goes a long way towards why USAAF pilots were staining their underwear June 6, 1944. They were WAY too low, and were not permitted to jink. The experience of flying through a fire storm of FLAK just has to be experienced to be believed.
One of my old business pals was the SINGLE most off track 82nd paratrooper on the night of June 6, 1944. He was Lieutenant in charge of his plane. His pilot was so whacked out that that he couldn't bring himself to punch the GREEN light. This led this particular stick of paratroops to land right in the middle of the 17SS Motorized Division. He fluttered down straight into a motorized company of SS men, with lights ablazing. If you grab a map, then you realize that my man was dozens of miles south of his drop-zone. He had to surrender before he even hit France.
[ Events have reached the absurd when an entire SS company is surrounding one lieutenant in the middle of a French wheat field. Gavin mentioned my pal in his tome: "On to Berlin." Yes, they met. Gavin chuckled that "Al" had won the booby prize. He was an instant legend among captured American paras, BTW. ]
Later as a PoW he was put on starvation rations. That's where the German guards threw out three potatoes to a hundred prisoners. That was chow time.
In the days immediately preceding his liberation by the Red Army, his pals were fed nothing. The German supply system had broken down. Even the guards were not getting their proper rations. (!!!) All of the roads had become clogged with fleeing German citizens -- all headed west.
Al never had a nice thing to say about the German prison system. He felt that "Stalag 17" got everything wrong, too light.
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@Benedict... Adolf phucked up in the Ardennes. Other than the trite influence of the British 43rd division, and the preening of Monty, the Ardennes was a purely American show.
In the eyes of Germany -- and history -- the Americans crushed the offensive -- throwing it totally off the rails within 72 hours -- the single fastest reversal of a Nazi offensive during that war.
Famous for a time, but now lost to the kids, American engineers totally derailed 6SS Panzer Army -- its spearhead in particular. These were not front line assault engineers. They were trained in bridge building. Which also meant they knew where all of the bridges were and how to blow them up.
Strategy & Tactics magazine cranked out a Wacht on Rhein simulation that used the US Geological Survey of that battle zone. If you should ever obtain a copy -- it's an eye-opener. With it you can follow company level movements during every account -- both sides.
( Wacht on Rhein is the tune being sung by Germans in Casablanca, for you film buffs. It was written in the 19th century as an honor to the Germans that fought against Napoleon. Hence, the Casablanca scene is irony compounded many times over. The French anthem is the aggressive one. By the time of Hitler, what had been a totally defensive ode had been transformed into an opus of offense.)
It is Bradley that smeared Patton as Blood & Guts. Under Bradley's leadership, 1st US Army suffered crazy high casualties -- especially to include the Hurtgen Forest. He OWNED it.
In contrast, Patton was parsimonious with blood. He correctly understood that you can't allow the Germans to get their bearings back. You must keep driving them like a broken herd of sheep.
The second the Germans recover their wits, they become Hell to shift.
THAT was Monty's epic mistake. When his own subordinate commanders brought this fact up -- he had them canned. ( retired, sent to India -- something that happened to Browning. )
The fact that Browning was CANNED by Monty is not something that Burns & Coy can bear to face.
In contrast: Monty and Gavin had a (military reputation) love affair to the ends of their careers. Monty 'forgave' Gavin -- yet NEVER forgave Browning. ( Gavin was absorbing the blame truly belonging to Browning and Monty knew absolutely everything about the events. )
The 1,000 panzers came from BROWNING and Bletchley intercepts. No British general would put ANY faith in brigadier general Gavins strategic insights. No-one tossed off Bletchley's transmissions.
Bletchley was not wrong. They got the timing off. The panzers were for the BULGE. Adolf really expected Speer to crank out that many panzers in time for his dream counter-offensive.
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@ DParry
You've missed your reading assignment.
1) Grabner had crossed to the southern side of the Arnhem bridge BEFORE Frost even closed up to the northern approach.
As a direct consequence, the battle was already LOST.
Arnhem bridge was NEVER captured... and barely interdicted.
MG can't work with Arnhem bridge in SS hands.
2) Both bridges were built with explosive charges -- hidden inside -- no-one could possibly see them -- nor remove them -- with detonation cables that ran off to their south sides.
This was a COMMON feature of Big Bridges in that era. The Germans wired their Rhine bridges the exact same way. That's why the bridge at Remagen was such a shocker. It had been built strictly as a railroad bridge to support the Kaiser's armies during WWI. It was constructed in such a rush that no thought was given to building in explosive charges. At that moment (1916) the Kaiser's armies were heading west, so there was no way that a French army was seen as a risk.
3) A DUTCHMAN severed the detonation circuit at Nijmegen bridge. Stories you hear from Brits or Americans must be laughed at. They are either totally made up ( most likely ) or are things that came in their sleep. The detonation circuit and the explosives were a Dutch national defense secret. Everything about them was highly classified. The detonation cables were encased in concrete -- the usual habit for key electrical circuits even now -- and led off to bunkers right close to the bridges.
The Nijmegen bunker was built into the telephone and post office complex. ( one building with a divider ) The Dutchman who cut those critical cables did so while the Americans were still floating down from the sky. I'd bet your life that he was an out-of-uniform Dutch soldier ( officer ?) who knew the lay of the land, instantly. I figure he'd have a high profile but for the fact that his kin lived on the wrong side of the lower Rhine. The SS would whack his extended family if they knew what he'd done. After the war, no-one cared, no-one believed. And to let his story out would embarrass both Britain and America, as both nations had soldiers taking credit for saving the bridge.
&&&
So, to keep it IDIOT simple for you: MG was DEAD, dead, dead, the second Grabner got onto the island with his recon boys.
They not only screwed up Browning's and Gavin's assumptions -- they RUINED any chance for 1st Airborne to complete its mission.
If 1st Airborne fails, then the whole enterprise fails.
The Poles, XXX Corps, 101st Airborne, even the 82nd Airborne -- they are all irrelevant. Monty needed EVERY bridge -- and Arnhem was NEVER TAKEN.
The northern approach does NOT equal taking the Arnhem bridge.
Grabner & Company HAVE to be driven away from the southern end of Arnhem bridge before he drops it into the river.
Lastly, the RAF never took out the German controlled ferry that was shifting additional panzers, half-tracks and whatnot onto the island straight through the battle -- every night.
This means that even if Grabner didn't get there first, some other SS formation would've crossed over on the ferry and blown the 1st Airborne off of Arnhem bridge. There is absolutely NO COVER for the paras on the south side of that bridge. They'd be standing there with their peckers in their hands, for heaven's sakes. XXX Corps would be days too late.
Browning's scheme was HOPELESS -- deal with it.
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@TIK
But Stalin DID start WWII -- all the way back in August 23, 1939.
The war was rolling right along even before Barbarossa.
We know this is true because of releases from Soviet archives. (Yeltsin)
These clearly show that it was Stalin that wrote the terms of the Nazi-Soviet Pact -- especially to include the start date of the attack and the demarcation line between Nazi spoils and Soviet spoils. Specifically, Stalin made sure that Brest-Litvosk was in Soviet possession. That alone, it may be argued, cost the Nazis victory. ( Their rail road links to the east could not be rebuilt for a solid three-weeks. The pressure was so great that work started before the fighting stopped. All during this period the Germans had to burn gasoline something crazy to shift their supplies past this bottleneck. )
Stalin pledged to invade eastern Poland on September 1st. That's what the treaty called for. He begged off with excuses for Adolf.
'His army was not able to mobilize all that fast.'
This excuse was to have fateful results when Barbarossa was contemplated. Between Poland, Finland, et. al. Stalin really sold Hitler on military ineptitude.
Instead, Stalin delayed his invasion until the Polish government fled. This fig leaf was bought hook line and sinker by the West.
(And fighting both despots at the same time was too daunting. Churchill rightly figured that there was no way that these two tyrants would not fall out within a couple of years -- if not sooner.)
Stalin proceeded to invade more nations than Adolf Hitler -- who had to play catch-up in the tyranny department -- starting April 1940.
Lest we forget, Stalin even nibbled off eastern Slovakia when Adolf swallowed up the balance of Czechoslovakia. ( He grabbed the critical eastern pass. )
Stalin managed to drive nations into the Axis that didn't even like Hitler: Hungary, Romania -- both were reluctant allies. Finland could also be put in this category, too.
1941 and the Suvorov thesis is actually irrelevant. It's all too late by 1941.
Lost in all of the rancor: FDR pledged to aid Nazi Germany if Soviet Russia attacked westward... in mid-June 1941.
That's how obvious it was to America that both sides were gearing way up to have at it.
Exactly how FDR could aid Germany if she was invaded from the east? Beats me!
I'd say that FDR was talking out of both sides of his mouth. ( A common feat for him. )
And that he always expected that the USSR would end up in the anti-Nazi camp.
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@David
All during MG, the Germans started shelling the highway with heavy artillery. (150mm guns)
Any successful hits would cause pure chaos -- as the British not only had to attend the wounded, but they had to haul the crippled trucks away.
Doing so was a first class bitch... with no tow trucks to hand, the Brits had to improvise with Tommies and tow cables.
BTW, the film leads to the wrong impression: it shows British lorries.
Whereas, Monty received 2,000 GMC trucks from Ike for this battle. This was a Big Deal. They were off the essence -- specifically demanded by Monty. The whole op was delayed by three-days just for these 2,000 trucks.
It's a pretty good bet that Monty wanted them for their 4x4 capability in the polders. British lorries were dead meat should they leave the highway. They didn't have limited-slip differentials. So when the ground got soft, they totally lost traction.
In 4x4 mode, GMC trucks would LOCK UP their differentials so that all wheels received power. ( This mode could not be used on a tarmac as it'd tear up the transmission, duh. ) Monty saw this problem coming a mile away, of course.
The Germans did more than shell the highway. They penetrated it with ground assaults, too. Such interdictions cut the highway for as much as a day and a half at a stretch. (!!!)
This is why I contend that Monty screwed up by not requesting jeeps. Jeeps would've permitted British grenadiers and infantry the luxury of establishing a distant defense of the highway. Jeeps had such a light foot-print that they could roll ANYWHERE. And, when it counted, there were no Germans to run into. All that was necessary was to drive on over and set up your machine gun positions, your OPs, etc.
Even Universal Carriers ( aka Bren Carriers) could not compete with 4x4 jeeps. Jeeps were simply a faster, lighter machine. And the enemy could barely hear them until they were pretty close. Tracked machines put up an awesome racket: it's the track itself that does so.
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@mPky1
Britain was broke no later than July 1940.
Absolutely NO-ONE would trade with them. HMG had totally tapped the till.
LendLease, from the very start, was a total give-away.
On paper, Britain ran up a Fat Tab.
Then the 'debt' was thrown away... rolled perpetually into the future -- eventually to be cancelled ENTIRELY... ie after the war was won.
Until then, it looked great on paper that the USG was collecting quite an IOU from the UK and from the USSR. What a hoot.
This way both British and American politicians could hide what was really going on. FDR could never have gotten away with saying," America is just going to give away billions of dollars in war aid on my say so to my pals in England."
As for the UK, it was embarrassing to admit that she was BROKE. So, HMG didn't admit it. This made it MUCH easier to collect taxes from British citizens. Imagine trying to collect taxes in grand style -- at the same time admitting that HMG has totally blown everything ever collected. Yeah, it wouldn't work. You just NEVER hear of a government admitting they're broke. I give you Venezuela.
Europe was so broke that America had to extend Marshall Plan aid to it. Britain was the number one taker, IIRC. Being able to speak English really helped with the Marshall Plan paperwork. Everyone else needed a team of translators roaming all over the place.
Your proffered stats are total garbage, of course. The USA sent more than 3,000 Sherman tanks, alone. You must suspect that something's off when Britain's shipment comes remotely close to that of the USA. And the other joke is that Britain's own tank divisions were re-equipped with Shermans, en masse. She then sent her rejects ( rejected by the British Army ) off to Stalin.
The Russians were pissed at Britain's crappy stuff. -- Stuff like USED fighter aircraft -- the retired models of Spits and Hurricanes. Yup. That's what Churchill sent off to Archangel. What a jolly joker.
Britain even sent on used tanks, too. When the American Shermans arrived, out went the old crappy stuff -- off to the USSR. Well, beggars can't be choosers.
Most modern Brits are totally unaware that used gear was being sent on to Moscow.
The Americans never sent used crap. We didn't have any laying around, and no-one was sending US LendLease aid.
During a crisis, the US took first rate gear out of USA hands and shipped it on to our Allies: Britain received Shermans that were originally supposed to go to Northwest Africa. They ended up at El Alamein. The Soviets received Western Electric land lines that were rolled up only days after they had been delivered to new American infantry divisions. This happened in secret -- without ANYTHING being committed to writing. We only know about this because of memoirs written fifty-years after the event by the very guys that had to execute this order. The Russian and British panic need for land lines was so great that it delayed the deployment of American infantry divisions. It took a whole year of panic production to supply the Russians, Brits -- and then finally have enough to roll out fresh sets to the US Army.
It's been 75 years, and Brits and Russians STILL can't stand to learn of their economic and military dependencies during WWII.
I still read of Russians and Brits that think they actually paid for all that LendLease stuff. No doubt this myth was generated by the KGB. It's the kind of lie that the KGB was famous for.
It sits along side the KGB lie that the US invented AIDS as a biological weapon against Blacks, Africans, the Third World, etc.
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@mPky1
But LendLease aid WAS free you knuckle-head. It was like a credit card that had no limit, and never required any payments. Then the 'tab' was simply torn up. It doesn't even show up on Britain's ledgers as a debt. That's what the rest of the planet calls FREE stuff.
America didn't take any gold from Russia, either. Quite the reverse was true. America paid IN GOLD to Sweden so that Sweden would ship tungsten carbide tool bits to Russia. Stalin wouldn't buy his own tool bits even with the gold he DID have, not even to save his nation.
The TC bits WERE the production miracle of wartime Soviet Union. THEY were the source of the astounding production increases. Tool bit speed had ALWAYS been the limiting production factor with High Speed Steel tool bits. HSS is fine for final beauty finishes in softer metals, but it is totally uncompetitive with TC and other cutting edges.
This tool bit revolution is lost on most modern citizens. All that they've ever known is TC bits. They are totally unaware of the speed difference between what was before (HSS) and what was new. (TC)
This explains why the general public -- and the propaganda media -- actually BOUGHT the Soviet production miracle BS -- both then and even now.
BTW, when the Soviets removed their factories in a total panic, MOST of the stuff was tossed off of flat cars straight into the snow banks. When everything thawed the next summer, most of the stuff was RUINED. These were all scrapped out, to be replaced by LendLease, brand new, American motors, sheaves, wiring, -- everything. We know this to be true from personal testimony from Russians that were DIRECTLY involved in this panic action.
When it counted, there were absolutely NO warehouses to receive the immense volume of factory equipment that had been unmounted and placed on flat cars -- with the occasional tarp to cover said equipment from the rain and snow -- if lucky.
Everyone but you has figured that out -- over 75 years ago.
As for Australia supplying the USN in the Pacific -- she didn't.
All USN food supplies left the port of Alameda -- which lies next to Oakland, California. That supply depot was not shut down until the mid 1990s and the end of the Cold War.
You can see a bit of the Alameda Air Station in the Ball-Fonda film: "Mine, Yours and Ours."
America has a STERLING reputation with our Allies.
Britain, Canada, Ausralia and New Zealand went on to be founding members of the Five Eyes -- or Echelon system. It still functions today.
Good grief, you are literally ANTI-informed.
You've got every specific detail ack bass wards.
BTW, NZ and Australia, to the best of my knowledge, traded with UK regular way during the war. They didn't ship ANYTHING to Britain for free. They couldn't afford to do so. The flip side was that both were a part of Britain's trading network -- and so would import back from Britain manufactured goods in payment for food -- the primary export for both nations... plus wool.
Sober up, buddy.
Essentially EVERYTHING you think you know about LendLease is wrong... which stands to reason. Stalin lied to his nation about every aspect of LendLease. He was ashamed. His Capitalist enemy was bailing him out. Everything HE touched turned to chit, no exceptions.
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@mPky1
Inventing facts is no defense.
LendLease was a give-away program from the first.
Check out its name. LEND....
One of its provisions was that any 'debts' incurred would be voided when the military equipment was returned, returned to be scrapped out, that is.
And this actually happened.
Ship loads of Soviet Shermans WERE sent back to the USA.
We picked them up in identical Liberty Ships. (Vladivostok)
This confused the locals. A myth arose that Sherman tanks were being loaded up one day, to be shipped out -- and DUMPED INTO THE PACIFIC OCEAN -- thence the same ship to return in a few days to pick up more Sherman tanks. Heh, heh, heh.
The Russians had NEVER SEEN identical freighter ships. They assumed that it was the same ship coming back, and back, and back. Whereas, by that time, the US had hundreds of identical Liberty ships in the fleet.
Go with me on this: the US never collected a thin dime from Moscow -- EVER... as if Stalin were a good credit. Heh.
Moscow even turned down Marshall Plan aid -- free money.
Britain took BILLIONS of Marshall Plan aid. This was ANOTHER one-way wealth flow from the USA to UK. No nation took down more Marshall Plan aid than Britain. Speaking English, they all knew how to fill out the paperwork, and they all knew the American commercial game... typically having American trading partners going back many, many years.
Some Marshall Plan funding was a pure gift. Other Marshall Plan funding was extended as a loan -- at an artificially LOW interest rate.
Because all currencies have been fulsomely debased since WWII, it became easy for such ancient debts to be 'repaid' by the great-grandchildren of WWII.
IIRC, even Germany recently repaid some super old debts.
In real terms, the Europeans paid off about $0.04 on the dollar. The rest had been inflated away to nothing.
No European nation could possibly really pay back LendLease aid. The numbers were too astounding. The gear was sent based upon military urgency, not on the basis of whether an allied power was a good credit risk. ( the USSR was deemed a total zero from the start )
No other nation in the history of the planet EVER extended such largesse to allied powers...
LendLease during the war, Marshall Plan after the war.
One of the tragedies of the Marshall Plan was that Whitehall used it as general funding to carry on the business of Empire. Big mistake.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/modern/marshall_01.shtml
" This is utter myth. Britain actually received more than a third more
Marshall Aid than West Germany - $2.7 billion as against $1.7 billion.
She in fact pocketed the largest share of any European nation. The
truth is that the post-war Labour Government, advised by its resident
economic pundits, freely chose not to make industrial modernisation the
central theme in her use of Marshall Aid. "
[Back then $1,000,000,000 was an ASTOUNDING amount of money.]
"As he [Keynes] pointed out, the entire British war effort, including all her overseas military commitments, had only been made possible by American subsidies under the Lend-Lease programme. If the Americans stopped Lend-Lease, Britain would face a 'financial Dunkirk' - his words - unless Washington could be touched for a loan of $5 billion. Keynes wrote that such a 'Dunkirk' would have to be met by: ... "
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@TIK
Stalin's post-war behavior supports the thesis, in a general sense.
The problem is timing. Stalin wanted to move west only after Germany was so ripe it'd fall into his lap. THAT'S his style.
In 1941 there is NO WAY that Stalin was intending or set to move against Germany.
I figure that it'd be 1943 at the earliest before Stalin would get the itch.
All of which is why I regard Hitler's push in '41 mighty insane.
The hand you cannot bite, you must kiss.
All during this period, Hitler was NOT short of fuel -- as Stalin was supplying Germany plenty.
Forgotten by most, Hitler was stashing away Russian oil at a furious tempo -- limited only by his ability to build storage tanks -- all during the November 1939 - June 1941 period. That policy made for pretty expensive oil ... crude oil tanks don't come cheap. Once they were tapped, Germany was not able to re-fill them.
Of course, Hitler was importing every manner of strategic materials during this period.
He was absolutely crazy to attack the USSR when his strategic reserve was so pathetic.
The smart play was to just kiss Stalin's azz... and build up his navy, his panzer force... etc. But Hitler, being Hitler, just couldn't do that.
Suvorov's thesis -- was 'written from hunger.' That is, the boy needed to sell books, grab attention, get on the rubber chicken circuit. It doesn't pass the smell test.
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@Mstislaw
It's a composite history built up from survivor's accounts, German accounts, the staggering number of "Hiwi" that were gained this way, etc.
This scheme was also used by the ChiComms in Korea 1950-53.
What an AMAZING co-incidence!
Obviously, they picked up this brainstorm from Stalin.
( For those unaware, ALL of the early (Korean) war pilots came from the USSR. It takes years to become a proficient jet pilot. No way did Mao or the Norks have ANYONE able to fly Migs.
I've been told by USAF Korean fighter pilots that it was forbidden to admit that they were shooting down Russians. Even though they could be clearly seen -- the flying being so close.
Now that the Cold War is over, they all 'fess up.
The USAF and USN also fought Russians over Hanoi, too. Same story, of course. )
During the Korean War, ENTIRE DIVISIONS were marched into American guns for the express purpose of suiciding them. You see, these formations were SOUTHERN Chinese boys. The very formations that had just been defeated in the Chinese Civil War. (1949) Mao wanted them all dead.
So, not only did the Bolsheviks use penal battalions, the ChiComs did them one better. They destroyed entire armies by the time it was all said and done.
Americans could NOT comprehend what they were looking at... even though this went on for THREE-YEARS.
[ Mao did NOT use his Northern boys. They stood behind the front, rather like those imperial guards of old.]
[ Think Mandarin vs Cantonese. ]
[ China is STILL split between the North and South -- and historically such splits can go on for centuries at a time -- with the North and South organized as separate nations. ]
See "Pork Chop Hill" for Hollywood's take on this befuddlement.
The Germans were just as corn fused at Stalingrad. It was only when the Heer realized that Stalin was suiciding these Russians that they learned to lift their fires.
Naturally, the survivors promptly 'volunteered' to be Hiwis. Heh.
These Hiwis were normally sent to the divisional artillery battalion. Most of the German artillery battalions soon became over-run with Hiwis. It was an astonishing sight, BTW. The Hiwis couldn't scarcely wait to load guns aimed at the Red army. (!!!)
Later, Hiwis became so numerous that the Heer started to organize light infantry formations out of Russians. (!!!) Such formations would be a company by company affair. ( A pretty rare thing, but still it was done -- on the down low.) These had to be hidden from Hitler, as he was totally against what was going on here.
( Something about the glory and honor of the Heer.)
Unit commanders determined that it takes a Russian to really fight a Russian. The fighting was that feral.
Penal battalions could only be used in major offensives. (Kursk) Their existence REALLY stiffened the spines of every other Red trooper, let me tell you.
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You ought to know that the Germans stopped re-gauging their rail net at the Dnieper: right nearby Zaporozhye. That minor city was the base camp for the construction of the big hydro-electric power project, the Dnieper dam, which was blown to ruin by the retreating Soviets.
https://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=52940
This was also the spot that von Manstein met Hitler as it was the most eastern major HQ that the Heer ever used. During the Manstein counter-offensive and Stalingrad relief, this was his HQ.
Further east, the rails were left with the traditional Russian gauge.
At Zapo, the Germans used 100,000+ Soviet prisoners to hump supplies off of European gauge trains and onto trucks... thence to cross the river. ( the rail road atop the dam had been blown to bits )
To an astonishing degree, the German army DID NOT use rail road locomotives to shift supplies. They stayed with trucks -- way too long.
Late in the campaign, the Germans FINALLY started to bring a rail line down towards Stalingrad. This spur was LONG.
The Germans were able to capture some Russian locomotives, but for the most part, brand new German locomotives -- gauged to the Russian scheme had to be brought forth so that the eastern rail net could be used. There were plenty of captured Russian flat cars -- and they could be easily augmented with brand new German flat cars.
This whole project deserves a video. The Germans repeatedly used flat cars for every purpose -- notably to include shipping Russian soldiers back to Germany in the dead of winter. Naturally the prisoners all froze to death as the wind chill put them down at 40C below zero.
Any idea that the Germans were in a position to shift troops, prisoners, supplies by rail during the Stalingrad campaign must be dismissed.
One would think that Rostov-on-Don and points south would've been well served by barging over locomotives and flat cars. But, AFAIK, the Germans never used the main line that ran from Bake to Rostov. What a goof.
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@josephking6515 FORGET? !!! My Uncle is likely the ONLY survivor from DORA -- the hell factory that manufactured said wonder weapons.
You'll see it named anything BUT Dora because it was so secret that the Allies didn't even know its name !!!!
Typically it'll be termed Nordhausen, after the nearby smallish town. This is flatly wrong.
It was 'Dora' because it was Camp D of the Buchenwald Camp. ALL of its paperwork was addressed to Buchenvald, Camp D, and then a motorcycle courier would bring the mail up the road to Dora. Dora had no lights at night, no outside lights at all. It had no phone connection to the outside, either. No-one in Dora was EVER in contact with Nordhausen. This is why the civilians there played totally dumb to the US Army interrogators. They really didn't know anything. (!)
No guns were worn in Dora. All death was by TRUNCHEON. Yeah, real up-close-and-personal. Most of the time, there were no huts for the labor force. You slept on open ground -- under the trees. I could go on and on. I'd publish, but there's no market for a book that just makes you throw-up and then have nightmares -- forevere.
My Uncle was in the USAAF and because he was hiding in civilian clothes waiting for the US 1st Army to advance, he was given a RED triangle and sent to die at Dora. Specifically, he was a compelled grave digger. No bodies were burned at Dora, lest the RAF spot the factory.
)Yes, the RAF had largely figured out where Dora was, but not to the point of knowing enough for a bombing strike.)
The RAF was Super-Motivated to stop the V-2. But, of course.
His life was saved because of the bridge at Remagen. When it was captured, Goering and Himmler knew the Americans could not be stopped at the Rhine -- and would be in Berlin PDQ. So they mutually began negotiating to trade 100,000 camp victims for their own skins. Yup. At the end, Adolf found this out. He whacked his brother-in-law over Himmler's betrayal. He sentenced Goering to death -- by radio. He was only days from death, himself.
So my Uncle was transferred out of the death detail -- over to Buchenwald. There he was rescued by the US Army Medical Corps under Patton. He was so weak that he could only whisp his name rank and serial number. He was the ONLY American in that - so-called - hospital.
It took him half-a-year in England before he was well enough to even travel to the USA. (!!!!!)
He did send one French traitor to the gallows -- with his testimony. She'd killed off all other witnesses to her Gestapo collaborations. (!!!!)
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@John Burns
It STILL does not sink in. From the first hours the II SS Panzer Corps was in sole possession of the southern end of Arnhem bridge.
That RUINS MG.
It means that even if every other player executed perfectly, the SS would merely blow the Arnhem bridge -- from the south side -- and escape via the ferry.
Browning's // Monty's plan did not have ANY provision to guarantee that the entire bridge would be captured.
We now know -- for a certainty -- that the recon elements of British Airborne had absolutely NO CHANCE of getting past the pill box at the north end of Arnhem bridge.
We now know -- for a certainty -- that the II SS Panzer Corps had access to the south side of that bridge -- and could NOT BE STOPPED as the Allies had NO TROOPS on the island. No-one to stand in the way -- and no provision for TAC air to sink the ferry.
The Germans were going to get to the south side -- even if Captain Grabner had not rolled over the bridge before Frost got there, others would still do so.
In the film, a PIV is shown advancing north across the bridge. Whether that actually happened in real life, it certainly could have happened -- as the PIV was light enough for the ferry.
There would've been Krauts crawling all over the south end of Arnhem bridge if the Nijmegan bridge was lost on day one.
So, the MG scheme was hopeless from the first.
Half of a bridge would never get XXX Corps across the river. Indeed, if Nijmegen were lost Grabner would've spent all of his energies -- right from the start, pounding the daylights out of Frost. He still would've set up his 88s to frustrate XXX Corps.
If he brought even two 88s with him, he could've blown Frost to heaven from the south side of the river, too. All of these things would've been 'automatics' for the SS.
Browning HAD to drop paras on the island the first day. Failing to do so sunk the entire enterprise. When you think more on it, Browning can't even allow Grabner to cross the bridge in the first place... he can't even be allowed to get onto it... not even the north side.
He actually blew it by not leaving a rear guard to frustrate Frost.
That error made MG look like a closer run than it was.
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@John Burns
Ike prioritized the entire front. About the only Army Group he didn't favor was 6th Army Group. He had a grudge with Devers.
Earlier in the war, Devers -- in England -- denied Ike's demand that additional B-17 squadrons be sent to him in Africa.
Devers justified this denial because he'd received explicit orders from Marshall and Arnold. Left to his own devices, Ike would've delayed the 8th Air Force bomber offensive just about forever.
Ike NEVER forgave Devers.
Naturally, Bradley and Patton sucked up to Ike and froze out Devers, too. By the end, Patton laughed and giggled, he'd trapped two German armies and 6th Army Group. Ike, Bradley and Patton thought that was just a riot.
The idea that Ike favored Monty -- and you believe that, too -- tells us all we need to know about how un-grounded you are.
MG proved -- to Ike's satisfaction -- that Monty's scheme was lame, hopeless, in fact.
1) Hitler could ALWAYS vector elite troops against such a spearhead, whether it was British, Canadian or American. It didn't matter.
2) The German army was losing its azz when its infantry had to fight against Allied infantry. Battles with German panzers were never that lopsided. In fact, they were a bitch. ( Goodwood )
Ultimately, Patton was right. The traditional invasion route to Germany was the BEST invasion route. Everything further north proved to be brutally difficult to pull off.
Bradley's fiasco in the Hurtgen was even worse than Monty's during MG. It ran MUCH longer and had a MUCH higher blood price.
Think of it as the Somme in slow motion -- and in the forest -- the Allies' version of Stalingrad.
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@Xander Turon
Let's stick with the facts. WHEN IT COUNTED, Hitler held back his armies and let Goering's Luftwaffe have bombing practice. THIS is when most of the French and British soldiers escaped.
There was VERY low cloud cover, and both armies were largely fleeing at night.
This gambit fooled the Germans very well.
ONLY AT THE END, when it finally became apparent that the BEF was getting away, did Hitler send in the infantry to mop up.
Yes, he still held the panzers back. They were needed to get to Paris.
The above sequence entirely explains why Hitler let the BEF escape... he actually didn't... he thought that they were hopelessly trapped from the first... that they COULDN'T get away.
Later, after their escape turned into a PR disaster for Hitler, he came up with "I was not really interested in capturing the BEF."
[ I really didn't want that cookie, mother. ]
Another in a LONG line of patented Adolf Hitler lies.
Ever since analysts have imputed to Hitler some bizarre desire to see the BEF get away. That thought NEVER crossed his mind.
To repeat, the BEF snuck away, right under his nose; something that he could not possibly imagine. It's not for nothing that the whole escape was then and now regarded as a national miracle. That's how SHOCKING it was that the BEF got out of Dunkirk.
Worse, the French army replicated the British escape. This is something that is normally new news to moderns. Today's man-in-the-street has no idea that the French escaped the Dunkirk perimeter, too.
The problem was that they had to leave ALL of their weapons behind. Even their rifles.
France simply didn't have enough weapons to re-equip all of the men who had escaped. And all of the best gear had been captured by the Germans in that pocket. ( front line tanks, artillery, FLAK, etc. )
Consequently France threw in the towel June 22, 1940.
22 is, of course, the magic number at Rick's Cafe. Heh.
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@John Burns
It was ESSENTIAL that the Allies seize Arnhem bridge... ALL of it.
Losing the southern half = total failure of MG.
For the SS would surely blow the bridge into the river before XXX Corps could do anything about it.
As Grabner showed, the SS could cross virtually the whole distance before Frost could shoot.
But the SS needn't even travel that far to set explosives. Indeed, as a matter of fact, the Dutch had ALREADY placed explosives in both bridges. They were pre-charged with explosives before 1940. This was not unusual.
So all that the SS had to do was to double check the charges, the wiring, and boom, down she went. The Dutch explosives were PERFECTLY set to take the bridge down ENTIRELY. Further, the detonation cables ran to the south side of the river. The Dutch always assumed that the Threat came from Nazi Germany, not Belgium.
Hence the Nijmegen cables went to the post office cum telephone exchange ( where a Dutchman severed the link -- right at the start of the battle -- he immediately realized that Nijmegen bridge simply HAD to be the Allies objective, too obvious it was.)
Ditto for the Arnhem bridge. Its detonation cables led straight to the south side.
In short, Frost couldn't do a THING to stop the SS from dropping the entire bridge into the river. This destruction was pre-engineered -- by the builders of the bridge, themselves. The SS didn't need to even bring in explosives or cables. The Dutch had done all of their work for them. (!!!)
Monty never could cross the Rhine in Holland. He (wisely) didn't even make the attempt. Urquhart was mistaken that Monty would find British Airborne's pitiful bridgehead suitable for 21st Army Group.
The reason for the 'sloth' of Horrocks, and Monty late in the battle was due to the fact that both understood what I've posted here. At a minimum, the local Dutch had spelled it all out. Arnhem bridge was a goner. No Dutchman could save it buy cutting the cables.
Deal with it. MG went south once the Big Brains kept every airborne unit away from the island on Day One. ( Over the protests of both Gavin and Urquhart, BTW. )
Yeah, I could just cry.
In all airborne operations, the drop zones are THE critical decision. If you get them wrong, God help you. That's what happened here.
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@Whitpusmc
The Soviets were getting staggering amounts of FREE economic inputs for their war economy on top of weapons systems transfers.
Avgas
Explosives
Lubricants ( industrial cutting fluids + the stuff you're thinking of )
Signals cables ( ie phone lines )
Copper
Steam Locomotives
Rails, too
Machine tools ( the most sophisticated ones, at that )
Tungsten Carbide bits -- from USA and Sweden -- the latter bought with gold by the USA. These are the REAL reason for the Soviet production miracle.
Medical supplies of all types
Military food -- ie rations suitable for mobile operations
Tanks, planes, trucks, ...
Tires, rubber hoses of every type,
100% of Russia's radio tubes. (!!!!!)
All of the above was FREE and in epic quantity.
Oil drilling rigs + drilling tool bits
Critical oil refining technology -- especially high tech catalysts
Atomic secrets and example materials suitable to clone America's plutonium production reactors at Hanford in Washington State. Obviously, the blue prints were sent over, too. Materials without instructions would be largely worthless. These shipments were duly listed circa 2000AD -- and posted to the Internet by Russian college kids. They had access to the astounding database of LendLease transfers -- but did not know the significance of the atomic materials, even though they were highlighted as 'atomic materials.' Only an atomic scientist// technician would realize their import.
Yeah, I fell out of my chair. Klaus Fuchs could never have sent these materials to Moscow. ONLY FDR and Harry Hopkins had that level of authority. Even traitor J. Robert Oppenheimer couldn't export atomic technology.
Yes, he was the Primary traitor, giving Uncle Joe every imaginable atomic secret. JRO was the ONLY person in the entire Manhattan project who could go anywhere, see anything, know everything. For everyone else, knowledge was compartmentalized. JRO didn't trust FDR. That was his motivation. Oh, the irony.
[ Of course, Harry Hopkins, traitor, sent these on their merry way. FDR let Harry stand in for himself when he was feeling tired. By 1944, Harry was busy, indeed. Harry's private diary makes it plain that he was a Bolshevik, himself, a real True Believer. These sentiments were kept hidden from the nation for fifty-years after WWII ended. ]
Tail-gunner Joe was right: FDR infested our national government with Stalinists.
Today that role has been replayed by 0bomba -- who has slotted CAIR operatives all through our Government. The effect is the same as before. We are naked to our enemies.
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Adolf broke up the SS Corps: the 1SS left all of its heavy equipment -- donating it to the 3SS and 2SS. It, the 1SS, was sent to northern Italy. It was supposed to be joined with the 2SS, but the Soviet offensive at the Mius forced Adolf to flip around, yet again.
However, once that battle was over, the 2SS went off to Italy, never to 'visit' Russia again.
The 2SS left its 170mm guns in Russia, though.
The Western Allies ultimately destroyed these divisions -- only the rump of the 1SS ever was sent east... to Lake Balaton. There the Red Army kicked its azz.
Additionally, the formations destroyed by the Russians at Stalingrad were re-constituted -- and then all sent to Italy.
Lastly, the 24th Panzer Corps which stood as reserve at Kursk was also sent to Italy. ( 14p, 16p, 24p, 26p, 29m -- again all Stalingrad panzers )
Indeed, this shift is the very reason that Hitler stopped the Kursk attack. He was reacting to the Allied invasion of Italy -- and Italy's surrender to the Allies.
So you couldn't possibly be more wrong. Adding them up we have a panzer army and an infantry army. (!!!!) That's what it took to occupy Italy.
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@mPky1
LendLease WAS free to everyone except the American taxpayer.
The program got rolling because it was obvious that Britain was broke.
What I might say is that WWII was launched in Europe as a joint operation between Stalin and Hitler.
I might say that the USSR invaded MORE countries than Germany between 9-1-39 and 5-9-40.
I might say that during the first half-year of war between these two 'buddies' the USA was stuck at peace.
I might point out that EVERYTHING Britain 'gave' to Moscow came by way of a LendLease gift from America. London was merely 'flipping the assets' -- being in absolutely no position to create them. Even manufactures that bear Britain's stamp could NOT be so manufactured without American inputs.
[ Britain DID make a huge contribution to victory, but that came by way of British aid to the USA, not British aid to the USSR. ]
I might point out that Britain NEVER gave the USSR tens-of-thousands of tanks -- ONLY the USA could -- and did -- do that.
I might say that London sent thousands of its lousy tanks that were failures in the hands of every other power that tried them in combat, and Moscow was grateful.
I might say that until Barbarossa, Moscow's agents visibly and very actively obstructed the function of America's docks so that aid to Britain was throttled; then, suddenly, the West had peace on the docks.
Russia paid in blood for the folly of Stalin -- the TRUE initiator of WWII in Europe.
The partition document shows Stalin's initials and his wide -- almost smeared -- crayon that dictated the merge line between the Nazis and the Bolsheviks. Until Stalin romanced him, Adolf Hitler was actually BOXED IN.
He was critically short of:
Nickel
Tungsten
Chrome
Copper
Rubber
Crude oil
Met coal ( not used for steam -- used to make steel )
Ball bearings
Aluminum
Stainless steel
Heavy water
And that's just off the top of my head.
Stalin not only launched the war, but provided the Nazi tyrant with the means to defeat France: unlimited crude oil became unlimited avgas. The French were NOT expecting the Luftwaffe to be able to fly so many sorties as they did because in ordinary circumstances, the Luftwaffe would've LONG since run out of avgas. Stated another way, Paris was counting on Berlin to be throttled by its critical fuel shortage -- and this was figured into its strategic calculus. They discovered, via Stalin, that they were totally wrong to do so.
As it was the French air force didn't even stock enough avgas to carry on the fight, nor did France even build remotely sufficient fighters, either. This is astounding to read, but Paris spent as much as Berlin on fighter aircraft -- but just didn't get any. (!!!) What was happening was that, with every switch in government, the prior contracts were terminated and new ones let to industrialists that the new 'In' party favored. So Paris ended up funding scads of new design research -- while actually not buying any fighters in a production run. The Spring of 1940 was the earliest that mass production began. Less that 40 days later, Germany was over-running France. (!!!)
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@Neil
The British Army was in LOVE with direct fire artillery straight up into WWI. It was SO much more effective than indirect artillery... so much cheaper... and it worked like a charm against natives that only had small arms.
WWI changed Britsh doctrine. They adopted the Kaiser's solution: indirect fire.
( The BBC even ran a video documentary covering all of this. )
Niel, the 32pdr has been already discussed in a post stream right here, look for it.
BTW, the British converted the 32pdr to a true AAA role. Automatic gun-laying was the reason for British AA successes against the V-1. It couldn't be defeated any other way. ( save the RAF, itself )
The V-1 was engineered to defeat the gun-laying speed of all traditional AA. It was flying too low, too fast, requiring crazy levels of gun slew to get ahead of it. The Germans never conceived that the British had jumped to the next level, and on a mass production basis.
( AAA 32pdrs would've shot US 8th AAF and RAF Bomber Command to pieces. No wonder the British kept their stuff top, top secret.)
( The British were so obsessed with radar that they built 'Elephant' to jam German long range radar. This was another top, top secret project. It turned out to be totally unnecessary. It radiated insane amounts of microwave power towards the German radar set -- to flood its electronics. No-one knew that the Germans had shut it off due to lack of performance. It, the German radar, was sucking down crazy amounts of electric power while not providing ANY additional information on Allied bombers. Their own coast watchers cost nothing and were more accurate. All they had to use was the human ear. Bomber streams are both loud and comparatively slow. )
BTW, the radars that adjusted the fire of the 32pdrs were TOP SECRET for years and years. You just won't find any reference to their employment from period documents. Instead, the V-1s just seem to fall out of the sky by brilliant crew training. Heh.
The fact remains: the WDF and 8th Army simply refused -- for doctrinal reasons -- to use 25pdrs as PAK. One wonders if PAK rounds were even in the theatre.
It boggles the mind, but the nation that invented armored warfare managed to be WAY behind Germany and the Soviet Union. The contrast with the RAF and RN is stark. The British Army was simply the step-child of the military services. That may well have been the correct decision, strategically, but it sure produced poor results in North Africa and Malaya.
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@Neil
The British Army just didn't do it.
The very idea of using their howitzers as PAK was well nigh universally rejected.
Finding last-gasp defenses in the archives is irrelevant.
The idea that a single man can pivot a 25pdr makes all of us giggle.
How in the world is that relevant to combat?
How in the world is he actually supposed to AIM the dang thing?
FLAK guns can easily be re-purposed towards ground targets. Everyone knows that.
Everyone also knows that the American, German and British armies would rather pull their eye teeth than commit their indirect howitzers to a direct fire role.
[ Yet sometimes this had to be done. Famously the USA brought up its most awesome 155mm Long Tom self-propelled gun to fire flat trajectory into German bunkers on the far side of the lower Rhine. The gunner got a medal for it. He was aiming at vision slits, as even the 155mm round was too weak to bust the German fortification. ]
This is still true.
The Americans still have direct fire rounds for their M198 and M777 howitzers. The LAST thing they wish to do is to use them.
As for footage of 25pdrs rolling up ramps, there is too much out there.
Ramps as an expedient for the WDF seems to have been universally adopted. Considering the terrain, it's easy to see why.
The discussion is about what the WDF found to be practical, to be doctrinal, not what some armchair historian might conjecture could pencil out.
The number of German panzers knocked out by 25pdrs and other howitzers is trivial.
The number of British (and other) tanks knocked out by 88s is legendary, epic, history-making.
There IS a difference.
It actually would've made more sense for the British to use their 32pdrs -- FLAK -- but such a scheme was rejected out of hand -- regardless of what the Ordnance boys thought.
No, the evidence is crystal clear: the WDF favored the 6pdr PAK. It did the job, and did it well.
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@Perera The USA pulled Japan off of Russia once Stalin's man informed him that Japan was certain to attack the USA. He promptly shifted 500,000 soldiers out of the Far East -- with tremendous impact December 1941 -- and the USA was not even at war at the time.
The USAAF pulled the Luftwaffe out of Russia -- almost entirely -- BEFORE Normandy. In financial terms, the Air War was MORE expensive than the land campaign. So you entire line of reasoning implodes.
The USA + UK pulled one panzer army and one infantry army out of Russia when they invaded Sicily. That invasion stopped the German attack at Kursk dead in its tracks. The Germans NEVER had a strategic attack in Russia for the rest of the war.
As the Germans shifted into the west -- they were ground up and destroyed. The units involved were the PREMIER units in Germany. The only super-units in the left east: 3SS, 5SS and Grossdeutchland.
In the west: 1SS, 2SS, HG, 1st Para, 2nd Para, 4th Para, 7th Para,116th Pz, Pz Lehr, -- and ALL of the decent units in the Luftwaffe. The USAAF shut off Adolf's oil supply: Ploesti and the Big Week ( February 1944)
ALL of the critical oil attacks occurred LONG before Normandy.
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@Bob Fink
Monty was AWOL for this battle. ALL of the evidence indicates that he was so drunk with Victory Disease that he left the matter to Browning.
Here's the rub: Browning didn't have the 21st Army Group's staff. Monty had gathered around him the Cream of the British Army. It's what you'd expect of Britain's top field command.
The result was a plan that was loaded with brain farts from end to end. And the average Joe or Tommy actually STILL thinks that MG was Monty's plan.
It's so against Monty's style -- it's not funny.
Monty, himself, would NEVER have failed to drop the 101st on the island between the two bridges. In all of the posting here, no-one addresses this mega-gaff. That goes double for Brits.
Forget Gavin, Browning and all the rest -- how in the WORLD could ANY senior officer look at these drop zones and miss the fact that THE critical terrain was the ISLAND between the two bridges?
The fact that it's an island is lost for most civilians as the map they see does not back away far enough to show that the island is part of the greater delta of the lower Rhine.
The idea that you can't parachute onto a polder because the ground is soft -- that's a GOOD one. Just tell the boys to land soft and roll into the mud. Make absolutely no attempt to stand up until you're at a stop.
BTW, the Poles DID land on the island -- just too late to be shot up something silly by German FLAK.
No-one discusses why Monty didn't ask for JEEPS. These were known to be perfect for off-road transport -- even in the polders. They WERE used by both the 82nd and 101st to great effect. Why not XXX Corps? I'll tell you why, they were overlooked.
In the film, XXX is shown using British trucks. Whereas, Monty specifically demanded 2,000 American GMC trucks for this battle. What happened? Monty, rightly, figured that XXX Corps trucks would have to drive off the road and onto soft ground. He KNEW that his lorries wouldn't roll five feet once they left the high ground.
The lack of observation aircraft passes without remark. Strange. Most strange. The Americans had been able to get away with observation aircraft at all times prior.
Naturally this omission led to no co-ordination between ground and air. The standard drill was for buddies to be assigned such duties. That is the ground trooper was a USAAF airman from the same outfit that was overhead. They'd switch positions from operation to operation. This way both ground-man and air-man knew how things looked from both positions.
What actually happened is that Monty put his seal on Browning's plan -- without tearing open the box and looking inside. Browning's reputation was on par with all army commanders. So there was no WAY that Monty was going to smear Browning's rep. This is why the chit landed on the Poles. It certainly couldn't be dumped on the Americans. ( Which would be politically insane. )
Monty, Gavin -- BOTH are covering for Browning's gaffs.
The failure to drop the 101st on the island makes every other gaff look tiny by comparison.
Frost would've had a cake walk if the southern end of the bridge was held by the 101st. They'd just come marching over the span by the battalion. There'd be no-one for them to fight on the island.
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@Bob Fink
Military politics dictates that officers that rise to the top ALWAYS dump gaffs onto others. The slightest bit of stink is usually a career ender. That's the world as it is.
My own sister in a corporate climber of the first order.
She's not bright, not bright at all. Just check out her academic record.
What she's is a first class blame shifter and credit taker... and not a bad liar, either. Consequently she fits right in with her corporate peers. She's one of the club. They're all like that.
If you've EVER met a top corporate honcho you soon realize that he's nothing special. He's got political skills: blame shifting and azz kissing being at the top of the list.
Such is the nature of man.
Rommel, Monty, Patton, MarArthur, on down the line, all owe their reputations to junior officers, that you know not of.
(Sometimes they are revealed in specialist histories.)
In the case of Allied generals, their track record is immensely puffed up by Bletchley Park -- and the code breakers in America.
[ Strangely, the biggest intercepts of WWII occurred by reading Purple transmissions from the Japanese embassy in Berlin to Tokyo. It was the Americans that broke this code -- and sent Purple machines to London. These were so few in number that London's machine came at the expense of Pearl Harbor. (!!!)
The USN was PISSED. (King)
This was a DIPLOMATIC code -- only. The reason it was so important was that Hitler loved to spill his guts to the Baron. Then the Baron, with an astounding audio memory, transmitted every last bit to Tokyo. ( What a FOOL. )
These were the transmissions that informed the Allied that Patton could NEVER be given Army Group command in Normandy. Why? Adolf told the Baron that if and when Patton showed up -- then that would be the main show -- and then he, Adolf, would commit EVERY reserve to that front.
This was NEVER explained to Patton. Hell even Bradley didn't know it.
Only Ike knew it. It is of the record that Ike stayed away from Patton -- lest he let this little detail slip -- as Patton was a buddy of his going back decades. Indeed, Patton's three stars came directly off of Ike's old uniform... with a photo op to match. ( North Africa )
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@allangibson2408 NO. While many Right Wing governments are dictatorships// kingships Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot -- on down the line were WAY far to the left -- and totalitarian to boot.
Right Wing always means a government that has a state religion. That's what todays' Saudi Arabia is. It's hardly alone:
Iran, Kuwait... the Taliban... Pakistan are all nations that have fused their governments to a state religion -- in this case Islam.
During the French Revolution when the very term came into being, Monarchists ALWAYS wanted the restoration of the fusion of the French Catholic Church with the King and his Lords.
In the ancient past, the vast majority of all nations were just so: Right Wingers.
It was the USA that broke that mold in a major way. It's ILLEGAL for any faction in the US to be Right Wing. For it's illegal to have a state-sponsored religion... straight from the US Constitution.
The slur of Right Wing is now used against any faction more traditional/ classical/ conservative than the fellow cursing said Right Winger.
Hence, we now have even AOC cursing (under her breath) Pelosi for being too far to the 'right.' Naturally, Nancy is hugely insulted.
During WWII absolutely NO-ONE ever accused Adolf Hitler of being Right Wing. BTW, he not only hated the Jews, he hated the Church -- Catholic or Protestant. That's why so many clerics died during the Holocaust. In this, Hitler lined right up with Stalin and Mao. BOTH also hated religion -- and clerics.
Ironically, Adolf did have nice things to say about imams. One gave him a fatwa so that he was morally justified in the genocide of European Jewry. This tidbit has blown by historians. They are not a religious crowd -- so a fatwa goes right over their heads or into the circular file.
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@ben... BTW there is film footage of the British 8th Army's tortured advance up the boot, for they had to set Bailey bridges virtually every step of the way. The soft underbelly turned out to have simply no end of rapid, but short, rivers to cross. What the Allies failed to bomb, the Germans blew up. There wasn't a single decent bridge standing as the Allies advanced. The engineering effort was astounding. THIS was why the Germans looked so good -- on paper -- during their retreat. Further, the destruction was so vast that the Allies had to use their supplies to stop civilian starvation. This was something that no Allied commander anticipated. The tonnage involved was vast. Sophia Loren, the actress, suffered starvation until the Allies rolled in. She was hardly alone. So, at a fundamental level, while necessary, the Italian campaign was a first class bitch from start to finish. It DID pull a panzer army and an infantry army out of Russia. But the Reds NEVER bring that up.
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@Donald Hill
You've got everything backasswards.
Marshall told Ike that he'd be relieved of command if he mirco-managed.
Yup.
Ike let Monty be Monty. No-one could stop him anyway.
Just ask Alexander and Tedder.
Ike NEVER dipped his toes into battle tactics. He didn't have the time of day to play at being despot. ( Two exceptions: the Kasserine fiasco and Pantelleria -- hope my spelling isn't too bad -- note these both occurred when Ike was commanding tiny formations -- just few armies.)
(Stalin, Churchill, Hitler all loved that game. FDR didn't have either the energy nor the inclination. And playing despot during wartime has always blown up for American presidents. Note how President Trump promptly moved war decisions back to the Pentagon, unlike Barry. )
Bradley and Patton were fit to be tied when they found out that Ike had given Monty ALL of their gasoline and 2,000 trucks and anything else he wanted. This decision was a done deal without Tedder, Bradley, Patton, Hodges, Simpson, et. al. having a word edgewise. Bradley and Patton opined that Ike had committed treason, that he'd gone over totally to the British. Tempers were HIGH.
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@ ger du
You'd think so, wouldn't you?
Once back in full supply, the panzer troops would've had a field day mowing down Soviet infantry that simply could not dig fox holes in ground frozen so solid.
Remember that their heavy weapons are still sitting on the east side of the Volga until the river is made 'truck worthy.' This entails a brutal slog of dynamited ice peaks followed by spot re-flooding to create extra thickness and a flatter, sweeter ice bed for the trucks -- and their brittle tires. At the temperatures involved, any sharp ground// ice will ruin a truck tire -- instantly.
[ A hole must be bored though the ice so that cold water can be pumped up and over -- sprayed like you'd make snow for skiers on a mountainside. This snow is then compacted -- as if it were asphalt -- until the ice-road is both strong and sweet. This process takes days to pull off. The Volga south of Stalingrad is just huge. Think: Mississippi, Rhine, Vistula, Waal, lower Thames.
While all of this was going on, the Germans are shelling the engineers performing this work. Crossing even further down river would've made encirclement all the more difficult... and require even more troops... a lot more.]
The Germans were to discover JUST how frozen solid that ground was when they had to pull back and set a new defense.
1) You either started a bonfire and thawed the ground, which would be quite a trick on the treeless open steppe...
2) Or you blasted the earth with howitzers pointed down. This craft was first performed during WWI. It was something that Adolf Hitler knew all about -- and recommended to his generals. You do have to watch your step and it is laborious. But, at least you'll end up with some sort of hole in the ground.
Ammo consumption goes crazy, though.
This method had best be done before Winter really sets in. When that happens, you may find that you need five shots to get any decent depth. The early attempts just about bounce off the dirt.
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@jsfbr
MG was lost the INSTANT Grabner got across the Arnhem bridge.
The Nijmegen bridge became irrelevant at that point.
NOTHING could stop the SS from dropping the Arnhem bridge into the Rhine after Grabner got onto the island.
TIK, and the other Brits, are engaged in a fantasy.
They ALL operate from the view that Frost was in command of the Arnhem bridge. But, he never was. He was totally thwarted by the pill box -- and then -- later -- by the SS sitting on the south end of Arnhem bridge.
What everyone has skipped past is that both bridges were wired -- from day one -- the day they were built -- to be exploded down into the rivers. This was a COMMON feature for major European bridges of the period. EVERYONE did it.
It was NOT a common feature of American or British bridges. Neither nation figured on losing control of their bridges to invaders.
The Germans and Dutch were obsessed with such a consideration.
The detonation cables led off to bunkers on the SOUTH side of both bridges, as the Dutch figured the Germans to be the primary Threat from the very first. (History, heh) They did not figure on the Belgians or French being remotely as threatening.
There NEVER was a need for the Germans to bring in explosives, cables or anything else. All that they had to do was break into the detonation bunker, and hook up a plunger.
MG was RUINED as a plan the moment Browning didn't put paras on the island from the VERY FIRST.
If Grabner had never crossed Arnhem bridge, Gavin's tempo would be irrelevant. BTW, the local Dutch had already sabotaged the Nijmegen detonation cables. That's why the bridge stayed put.
Neither the British nor the Americans had anything to do with it.
BOTH have taken credit, though.
Lastly, the explosives that count CAN'T even be seen from the outside. You can't even touch them. They are inside an armored assembly. This was standard engineering practice at the time.
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@agentorange6085 It's more complicated -- but of course. Warsaw was a BIG sticking point. It turned out that the British wanted to pump up Poland's strategic position -- WITHOUT Britain doing the pumping up. For example, Warsaw pitched that the RAF should send Spitfires to augment the pitiful Polish air force. Whitehall said: "No dice." The RAF objected on the ground that sending three-to five squadrons to Poland was no different than throwing them away -- and that even their deployment could and would be used by Hitler as a casus belli. Further, there would be no chance of keeping such squadrons supplied -- and aircraft chomp through supplies. Likewise, Polish proposals to station a token force of RN ships went no-where. The diplomatic status of Danzig was just to weird. ( The "Free City of Danzig" ) Warsaw was trying to establish a trip-wire that would crystalize in the mind of Berlin (Adolf) that to invade Poland// seize Danzig was to initiate a general Great War.
Very Secret discussions with Stalin to bring the USSR into alliance with Poland, Britain and France terminated because Stalin wanted a FREE CORRIDOR forty-to eighty miles wide straight through Poland on to Germany. In this, he'd be re-creating the logistics of WWI in the East. His armies wouldn't have any dependencies upon the Poles to speak of. For some crazy reason, Warsaw didn't trust Stalin. Imagine!
However, it's BECAUSE of these negotiations that Staline came to fully understand TOO MUCH about what was up with Poland, France and Britain. It was with this knowledge that he CONTRACTED FOR WAR WITH ADOLF HITLER.
Yeltsin exposed the Soviet-Nazi Pact (for War) to the world's press. The paperwork was shocking to all assembled. For the first time it was realized that STALIN, not Hitler, started WWII in Europe. Hitler ALWAYS wanted his war, but without Stalin, he couldn't dance. He had hyper-critical shortages in rubber, nickel, tungsten/wolfram, oil and food. Stalin eliminated the corset that the West had Adolf in a bind. Stalin's oil conquered France. It put the Bf-109s into the sky.
BTW, the Nazis were on fumes when Poland fell. They'd used up their strategic reserve. Their show of sufficiency faked out France and was the primary reason that France stopped invading from the West. By going so low into the barrel, Hitler had impeached the intelligence estimates of Paris so badly that they'd lost credibility.
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@auguststorm2037 You're the closest poster to what happened. Stalin's pitch to Warsaw was that he wanted a 40-80 mile wide exclusive zone for Soviet forces ( the Red Army ) to attack westward. That zone was never nailed down -- as it was a non-starter with Warsaw. Based on the rail grid there were just not that many spots that could possibly support the Red Army in Stalin's scenario. The Polish rail grid, no surprise, netted around Warsaw, itself. Since Berlin had to be the focus of any Red offensive, Stalin was a rotten ally -- even logistically. This is something that is always left off the table by historians.
BTW, note how Stalin's Pact was certain to include Brest-Litovsk East of Stalin's division line. Yeah, he crayoned in how much of Poland he be given by the Nazis in his Pact. That document was produced by Yeltsin direct from Soviet archives a generation ago. Yeltsin's revelations are so inconvenient that twenty-years on -- they are totally ignored. BTW, the Pact settled on 9-01-39 as the invasion date for BOTH Hitler and Stalin. In the event, Stalin conned Hitler and the world by stalling his invasion. He lied to Berlin that his boys couldn't be mobilized all that quickly. This was a bald-faced lie. His huge tank armies would've rolled across eastern Poland even quicker than Germany's XIX Panzer Corps.
The M-R Pact was Stalin's Pact and it was TOTALLY one-sided. It was a Contract for War. In it the stop-lines for their mutual war of conquest were pre-negotiated -- if you can call Stalin's deal any kind of negotiation. Hitler had NO INPUT -- nor did Rippin-fool. The Nazis were THAT desperate for war... as part of the Pact was Stalin's economic rescue of the Nazi economy. Over Poland's dead body, Hitler gained access to Soviet oil, Soviet war-critical metals, foodstuffs -- even a back-door to rubber. The counter-trade included everything from ball-bearings to machine tools. These latter items are virtually ALWAYS over-looked as to why the Nazis wanted to invade the USSR. The army was up in arms about providing the most advanced metals technology to their next, and ultimate, enemy. But these were the ONLY exportable items that Nazi Germany had to offer Stalin. She lacked any commodities, as Stalin had plenty of everything.
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The Greens were a significant political force in Germany when it was unified. They absolutely flipped when they actually saw East German atomic plants -- that had NO containment worth talking about. { Soviet units went naked -- hence Chernobyl; their exported versions often had some semblance of containment -- but no-one in the West would trust such engineering. Soviet atomics had a LARGE reactor volume -- raising steam at lower temperatures than found in the classic Westinghouse design or the classic GE design. This meant that any containment for a carbon pile would be very much larger in mass... and cost.}
So the pressure to shut down East German atomics began right from the start. It didn't need the Japanese fiasco.
You'll also note that the Greens spread their dogma to Sweden. It's stopping its atomics, too.
What Japan did was show that in extremis, the crews are witless. Straight out of "China Syndrome" they proved that they were able to do just about EVERYTHING wrong.
Badly sited atomics, (tsunami coast, anyone?)
Badly sited emergency power, (right at sea-level)
Badly reacting crews, (didn't scram PDQ; didn't use sea-water to flood the cores; didn't vent N-19 to stop a gas pocket at the top;...good grief!)
Badly schemed strategic back-ups; ( what if an earthquake// tsunami of severe power? Yet, the geology told all that such events MUST be expected.)
In sum, the Japanese showed that from top to bottom their entire scheme was not as advertised. In reality the crews FROZE. They panicked. Then they made every wrong decision possible in the matrix.
BTW, drastically more citizens died from the tsunami than atomic radiation. Total fatalities were in the many thousands. So, atomic hysteria is very much with us.
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@elLooto It's on the record that Red China imports staggering amounts of steam-coal from Australia. AFAIK, Red China does NOT import steam-coal from the USA -- certainly not in any size. For Red China has steam-coal coming out of its ears. And it's right near the surface. And there has been a HOWL from the work force every time the CCP cuts back steam-coal mining. Their stuff is filthy, too. While they have the technology of bag-houses and all the rest, the Reds simply shut off the air pollution control gear as it costs money to operate. And the price of wholesale electricity is set by the CCP. This means that power plant operators are under insane price pressure. But, their WHOLE economy is run in this crazy fashion. This is another story that Western publications just don't allow into print.
Red China imports met-coal from just all over -- especially Australia. The US is a MAJOR exporter of met-coal -- which overwhelmingly goes to Europe. That's what our deep mines produce. It goes at one heck of a premium.
Your tale about (slave-produced, price-controlled) cotton reflects what I'm 'on-about' namely that Red China is using staggering amounts of forced labor to crank out primal commodities without letting the 1st World in on what's up.
That's the story of the Muslim 'labor-force.'
FYI, what triggered the recent genocide: jihad. A hefty crew of Muslims used knives quite a few years back to mass-attack Han commuters in Southern China. It was THEIR 911. The attack was at a train stop. Knives met Mohammed's dictums, BTW. Muslims would LOVE a gun-ban, for then the stage would be perfect for old-school jihad by blade.
The CCP concluded that the problem was innate to Islam -- and that across 1400 years there has been no cure (from jihad) except the complete expulsion of Muslims. (Hungary, Spain, et. al ) So the CCP opted for genocide and total repression of islam. Not mentioned, the CCP is certainly whacking ANY imam they can get their hands on. If you preach islam, you're dead by torture. A koran is now more incriminating than a Bible. ( Yes, they hate those, too. Atheism is the state religion of the CCP. )
You might note that you NEVER read about any of this rationale in any Western publication. It's taboo.
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@Strizhi
You are mistaken on this one.
Glantz goes into this in great detail.
The so-called battle of Stalingrad was actually fought well outside the city and to the north: the land bridge between the Don and the Volga. Russian losses to the Germans on this front are EPIC. This one zone had FOUR Soviet armies committed under the command of a Front. They received four times as many replacements as any received at Stalingrad, proper.
Every last time the Germans tried to swap out the motorized formations pinned down there, a new wave of attack would take off.
All accounts report Russian corpses stacked up so HIGH that you had to push through or over them to make further progress. They were not buried. So in no-time the smell wafted off for miles and miles. This last aspect demoralized the German troops. As for the Russians, they were DEAD.
This was also a situation where it was EASY for fresh Russian troops to find 'spare rifles' laying all over the ground.
These insane attacks were ordered directly by STAVKA -- and no-one else. Allowing this panzer corps any freedom of movement was seen as a lethal blow to the Soviet state.
The most intense period was at the start, when Stalingrad, itself, was very much up for grabs.
The motorized divisions HAD to be pinned down. (3m, 60m, IIRC )
It was THIS fighting that triggered most of the post-war blather about the Russians having unlimited man-power.
Which was wrong.
They only had unlimited manpower for this situation. IIRC, no less than TEN reserve armies were committed to the larger campaign. They were all totally consumed.
Uranus was launched with a fresh batch of reserve armies.
IF TEN ARMIES evaporated, then the loss ratio is much more like 3:1 maybe even 4:1. ( Soviet armies of this period tended to run about 100,000 or less. (some times much, much less, as no attempt was made to keep them at original strength, whatsoever) 6th Army had about 22ish divisions -- something like 350,000 Axis soldiers running with it. It really was an Army Group in its own right. )
[ A Soviet Rifle Division might start out with as many as 12,000 souls -- and not leave the front until it was down to the last 800 survivors. While at the front, it would receive no replacements -- accept those able to walk back from the aid station.
This philosophy was the exact opposite of George Marshall. He had the totally mad idea that you could piecemeal GIs into line formations like they were nuts & bolts. It was a disaster. Behind his back, Bradley changed things towards the German solution: integration battalions. GIs would be assigned to a beaten up division, but they'd not be sent into combat straight away. Instead, they'd be forced to meld with this or that battalion, held back in reserve, until they'd learned the ropes. Only then was the battalion sent back into action. This 'adjustment' was as commonly breached as not... depending upon war urgency.
As a rule, Bradley wasted lives at a tremendous clip.
He had a WWI mentality in WWII.
He'd have gotten far in the Soviet system.
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@Strizhi
On Glantz you've got everything backwards. ALL of his writings are based upon Soviet archives -- he scarcely ever interviews Germans. He spends virtually all of his work debunking German// Ostheer claims about their military achievments.
When he does bring up German records, in variably it's to illustrate another embarrassing factoid... like the Panther D fiasco at Kursk.
There is ONE location where picking up fallen rifles was known to happen -- and not just once or twice -- the Don to Volga land bridge. This was the Verdun of WWII.
FOUR Red Armies were lined up, side by side, across this land bridge. They were under the direct control of a Front commander -- who was just up the road, behind them.
BY FAR the bulk of the blood lost at Stalingrad was at the land bridge. Stalingrad, proper, was actually a side-show from the point of view of Soviet casualties. ( This is not true for the Ostheer. It really DID bleed in that city. )
The imbalance at the land bridge was due to the fact that the Ostheer stood pat. No attempt was ever made to advance northward. They just stood at their MG34s and mowed Soviets down by the thousand. It was this insanity that had Hitler & Co totally convinced that Russia MUST be running out of manpower.
During 1942, Stalin burned through no less than TEN reserve armies between the land bridge and Stalingrad proper.
Since we're not ever going to get accurate figures from the Soviet archives -- they didn't even establish decent records during the panic -- we'll just have to estimate that each Red army had ~100,000 souls. The implication is that Stalin burned through 1,000,000 men in less than four-months. (!!!) And that's just along this front.
The general word is that Stalin burned through 400,000 DEAD during Mars. Casualties must have also been great. But I figure that few could take a bullet and survive in that cold, the overwhelming fraction would simply be dead, most all wounds would be mortal.
Gender imbalance after the Great Patriotic War was so severe that one can only conclude that Red army losses were epic by any standard.
It's only now that the very last of the war widows are laid to rest.
BTW, when drafted, Soviet boys were often taken from the same village -- and then thrown away in the same battle. The result is that you could go into smaller villages and find virtually the entire male population erased by the war. Their widows kept waiting until the war was over -- and then kept on waiting -- since there was no military mail they had no clue that their loved one had perished in 1942 or 43.
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@Stirzhi
I don't trust battle accounts out of Stalingrad because both sides crafted totally self-serving propaganda straight through the battle.
In the case of the Soviets, they over-promoted their Russian sniper -- and glossed over astounding Ukrainian and female snipers. ( It's pretty crazy, but the Soviets ended up with a slew of female snipers with hefty kill numbers. These gals received high honors -- but were almost never publicised outside of the USSR during the war. Stalin did not want the West to realize that he was using ( forced to use ) women on a grand scale.
Further, I just can't buy that anyone at any time had the paper and pencil to write down this or that guy's heroics. Things were just too crazy.
The ten armies I mentioned were the standard Soviet recruitment cycle through their induction system. Due to the harsh weather and the impracticalities it introduced, the Russian 'system' was to induct waves of new recruits every Spring... after the harshest weather had passed, but before the snow had melted. ( You can't tromp through 5 feet of snow with raw recruits.) Training -- such as it was -- was hyper accelerated. (OJT was expected to bring the boys up to speed.)
The typical boot camp// induction center could cycle through an astounding number of men per year -- because two to three weeks was often deemed enough for the purpose.
Due to the language barrier, eastern recruits were trained to respond to but a few command words -- and to do exactly what their officer was doing.
During the 1942 period, Soviet tactics were so primitive that the above synopsis is considered to be correct. Every surviving 'cucumber' has told essentially the same tale from this period: boot camp was astoundingly brief -- and then off to the front!
I must assume that a given boot camp could process at least eight formations per year.
As for STAVKA, best as I can tell, it didn't order around units smaller than an army. Remember that a Soviet army ~ a Western corps. A 'Front' ~ a Western army.
As to whether Stalin sent eight, ten or twelve of his armies to Stalingrad, does it really matter?
It must be plain on the record that STAVKA was never going to allow the Stalingrad front to run out of blood. It's also plain that Stalin never wanted the larger world to realize how much blood had been spilt there or anywhere.
BTW, after the war, the US Army captured essentially ALL of the Heer's battle maps -- notably those of the Ostheer.
They are an eye-opener. It was after viewing them that I realized what Glantz brought up to the general audience, though I discovered it all independently YEARS before I knew Glantz existed. He was preaching to the choir, in my case.
My memory is weakening, but I do remember that the maps are available over the Internet and IIRC they are in the Dartmouth collection. If not Dartmouth, then some other classic Ivy League library. Google is your friend.
These battle maps were to the exact scale used by Hitler, and ARE those maps. They are virtually 100% perfect as to German dispositions. They are remarkably accurate as to Soviet formations that are in contact with the Ostheer. They are 'soft' WRT Red Army formations behind the front lines.
( As the Ostheer discovered to its sorrow November 1942. )
The unit designations -- of the Red Army -- give the game away. They are TOO many. They are so many because the units are rump formations after the Ostheer has shredded them during Soviet frontal attacks.
What's most remarkable is to count the Red formations along the land bridge and then count them in and around Stalingrad, the city.
Yiikes.
BTW, based upon the German maps, it would appear that the land-bridge was under a different Front than the city. This would make perfect sense as its logistical tail went up the west side of the Volga, whereas the city was fed from the east of the Volga.
Extra rail lines were extended by the Red Army during this campaign. The most remarkable I found was the one out of Astrakhan. The Germans couldn't BELIEVE how fast the Reds built out that line. It was jumping more than ten-miles a day. ( LendLease rails, BTW )
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@Strizhi
Any jerk that loves Stalin and Bolshevism -- doesn't love Russians.
That's for sure.
In his gut, Stalin largely hated Russians. It's why he kept putting Georgians in all of his critical command positions. To an astounding degree, Stalin kept Russians out of his government.
You would've thought that his government would be 99% Russian. Instead you discover it was larded with Jews, Georgians, Ukrainians ( Nikita ) -- just a slew of out-cast minorities.
His hatred of Jews and Ukrainians was unbounded. ( Nikita's diary )
He was a real 'divide-and-rule' tyrant, all right.
There are more than a few war games that illustrate Soviet reserve army creation during that war. All of them are modelled on extremely short boot camps -- based on every Russian 'cucumber's' account of their experiences. This uniquely short cycle time has to be the source of Stalin's instant armies. It certainly corn fused the Germans -- all the way up to Hitler. Western military men just couldn't imagine a boot camp that didn't even last three-weeks. Some Russians write of boot camps that didn't even last two-weeks. (!!!)
Plainly, after you've read enough personal accounts from survivors, ( these number in the thousands, more than anyone can bear to read) you come to realize that Stalin's system for recruits was a meat grinding machine. In its essence, the Red Army just got the extreme basics down, and then depended upon On-The-Job training to carry the day. Lucky for Russia that her sons had no limit for selfless bravery.
It's shocking to read personal accounts of jumping into a T34 -- right before a major action -- for the first time. It was only later that STAVKA realized that this 'training program' was not optimal.
Similarly short training cycles impaired the Red Air Force. The guys were thrown at the Luftwaffe before they were really fledged. When this was finally changed, the Red Air Force became very good.
After reading enough personal accounts -- the stuff the fellas are writing while on their death beds -- one can only conclude that both armies sabotaged their own men via grand stupidities.
Like the Ostheer letting its draft horses freeze to death in the Autumn rains. Good grief. Thumb though the vet statistics. They were reporting astounding losses, day by day, as the animals died. They must have been crying while doing so. The horses you see in those old photos became food stuffs in very short order. (Gag)
Dead horses in Autumn became dead men in Winter. Pure insanity.
And like 1812-13, the weather didn't get any warmer for the Russians. Their own losses driving the Ostheer back were also a fright... largely due to the lack of training and support from their own superiors. (Gag)
I don't know how anyone could survive a bullet wound when it's 40 below.
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@Takh
I think you meant pkwVIs...
But, your thesis is essentially correct.
It's more than production numbers. It's also a case of how LONG a given tank could remain in service and how well it could be kept fuelled. In this basis, the German heavies were DISASTERS.
1) The Nazis used forced labor// prisoners brought in from France, Poland -- even Italy (!) to build their war machine. (!!!) The result was that the second their backs were turned, the production workers sabotaged Panthers and Tigers in a way that was not easily discovered. This typically took the form of phu cking with their lubrication systems. Foreign objects// crud was rammed deep into various lubrication channels. Long after the war, recovered and restored panzers repeatedly show just such sabotage. No panzer has been discovered that didn't have jacked up lubrication systems.
The beauty of this kind of sabotage is that it passed undetected straight through the war. It did cause German panzers to break down in the field for inexplicable reasons. The Nazis could never quite put it all together. Heh.
2) The Panther had a critical weakness that the Allies never picked up on. It's final drive was too weak. The Panther was over-weight by 20,000 pounds. Those extra ten-tons were really too much for the Panther's final drive.
( Final drive = the sprocket that transmits torque to the track. )
Worse, to repair damage to this sprocket, it was necessary to TOTALLY un-build a Panther tank. You had to pull the turret up and off. Then you had to pull the engine, drive shaft and many internals. Only then could you get at the final drive and its transmission -- which were the first thing that the factory dropped into a Panther.
This process was so involved that Panthers had to be sent back to the factory. Germany never developed a field repair solution.
[ The same task took four-hours for Sherman tanks -- which could be performed under a shade tree in the field. ]
BTW, Germany had a LOT of minor factories dedicated to rebuilding panzers. You'd be astounded as to how many micro-factories the Nazis used to crank out repairs and custom modifications, especially of captured enemy tanks. ( Soviet and French )
When the Germans had 500 panzers on the western front, the Allies had 10,000 Shermans. (late 44) ( 1,000s were sitting back as 'spares' ) The Army simply assumed that losses would be stiff, so the system just kept cranking them out and sending them to France. The production tempo kept surging, too.
It got to the point that every front line division had its own tank battalion. Tank divisions would have 300 to 450 Shermans. Regardless of the official TO&E every division just kept adding Shermans. One company of the 1st Infantry Division ended up with its own (secret) tank platoon. Shades of 'Kelly's Heroes.'
By the end, Shermans were used as much as mobile artillery ( shades of the original intent of the Mark IV panzer ) as they ever were as direct fire weapons. Tank destroyers were also tasked as artillery -- most firing 10 indirect rounds for every 1 direct fire rounds.
Like the V2, the Panther and Tiger were mistakes. Strategically, they didn't pencil out. Germany couldn't keep them running, so they had amazingly short operational lives. ( commonly just one battle )
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@Steve
Bletchley was not given a time-line within their intercepts. It's a pretty good bet that Bletchley was tapping into morale boosting chatter between Adolf and OB West about its reinforcement priority -- which was -- in fact -- at the top of the stack. Hitler had ALREADY decided to counter attack out of the Ardennes even before the Allies rolled up to the West Wall. Yes, in his imagining he would repeat his super-success of 1940. All of this was in his head even before Paris was liberated. Quite simply, Hitler had ALWAYS assumed that his play was in the west, and that only Britain and America were sensitive to casualties, for clearly, Stalin was not deterred by even insane levels of blood.
The disposition of Browning's HQ betrays the fact that he KNEW that the ONLY terrain suitable for a counter attack by panzers lay directly between the heights and the German border. Everywhere else, the ground was so soft that tanks bogged down. This was why Hell's Highway was an elevated highway, why XXX Corps tanks had to stay up on that 60-mile berm.
The CRAZY thing about 1st Airborne and 82nd Airborne drop zones: they weren't on the island.
The zone between the two bridges was an ISLAND in the Rhine river delta. The Germans couldn't get on it except by the bridges and a ferry. This ferry, indeed both ferries, were totally ignored by Browning and Monty. ANY Dutchman could've, would've brought them up. They were the traditional way of reaching the farmland that WAS the island.
The island had no Germans, no FLAK, no nothing. No place to hide panzers, either. The island was the OBVIOUS place to take all subsequent air drops. It just screamed: land here, land here, land here!
All of the FLAK was in Arnhem. That's where the RAF was taking a beating.
BTW, the RAF DID adjust its drop zones after crews bitched about loads lost to Germany. However, no matter what was done, the SS kept over-running the new, tighter, drop zones. That's how fast the 1st Airborne was shrinking its perimeter. It was but a short time before its pocket was so tiny that the RAF couldn't hit it. Any plane making the attempt would have no more than a two second window between crossing the Rhine and reaching the (far ) German line.
That's why the film is painting a false picture WRT the RAF. Its crews were not that stupid. What had happened is that British Airborne had lost the ability to defend its perimeter early in the fight. .
ALL of Airborne's problems traced back to Browning's selection of drop zones. He had the PERFECT spot -- the island -- and he didn't select it. Urquhart and Company could not redeem that catastrophic error no matter how much blood they spent.
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@John Burns
Gavin DID follow orders.
His General Order ( from Ike ) was to NEVER lose Browning -- nor to tarnish Browning's reputation.
Taking the Nijmegen bridge became a SECONDARY objective.
If Browning was lost and the bridge taken, Gavin would've been sent down in disgrace.
Even taking that bridge would not make the 2SS Panzer Corps disappear.
Lost in all of the hand-wringing, the sloth of XXX Corp just guaranteed that the Arnhem bridge would be blown up.
This would've happened IMMEDIATELY once it was clear that Nijmegan was lost to the Allies.
The Arnhem bridge was saved precisely because it led to Nijmegen.
IIRC, eventually the Germans pulled back and blew it up.
The ONLY way that the Arnhem bridge could be won was by way of changing the 101st's drop zones on day one. The Germans had be be denied the ability to get to the southern end of the Arnhem bridge, and British Airborne needed IMMEDIATE reinforcement as the city, itself, could easily absorb an entire infantry division.
The ONLY drop zone that could be ABSOLUTELY guaranteed was that of the ISLAND.
So you had both Urquhart and Gavin wasting their time and men defending the unnecessary when the island was RIGHT at the twin bridges.
Duh.
Putting the 101st on the island would also mean that Browning would have 18th Airborne Corps right to hand to defend his HQ and the Germans could not stop further parachute drops.
British Airborne would NEVER fail to obtain drops, either.
The island was the central position -- and the British didn't see it.
The Americans were told to SHUT UP -- to never opine on British operations.
Even Bradley and Patton, who totally disagreed with MG, would not utter a peep! They merely groused about it, referring to events in the most elliptical fashion. Patton didn't even dare run his mouth off in his diary. All because Ike had put them on notice.
If three-stars are choking in silence, imagine one-star Gavin!
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@Nick
Join the Peace Corps and make an impression.
My Nephew did. He discovered that they really ARE fools. It really is hard to save them from themselves.
It doesn't take too long before frustration kicks in.
To the locals, all of your advice, everything, smacks of arrogance.
For you are challenging the wisdom of their fathers, all of them.
The fact that they a taking craps in public, drinking out of mud puddles, and trying to get by on $0.00 dollars per day for a lifetime....
It's so easy to criticize.
The fact is that MOST societies are vastly inferior to the USA.
1) They resist - often violently - to new thinking, to new ways. Many times this resistance is shocking. You'd think that clean water would be an automatic 'seller.' Nope.
No project gets MORE resistance than any scheme to bring in clean, fresh water to a village, to a town, to a city. Such thinking is the LAST thing on the local's mind. Your proffered project is universally deemed a total waste of money. "What were you thinking of?"
2) They are parochial in the extreme. They really hate their neighbors down the road, or over the hill.
[ Florentines still hate Venicians and vice versa. (sp ?]
3) Lying to you -- and each other -- is a local art form. Hell, it's a competition. This reaches extremes with Muslim Arab culture. This is the tic that caused so much grief in Iraq during reconstruction. Local 'talent' would lie about every phase of construction or repair. When you'd visit a work site, you never knew what to expect. You'd be thrilled if the foundation was actually poured. And so forth.
Need I say it? ALL of these loser societies would regard the Americans as the 'problem.' Too arrogant, and all that.
The REAL problem is that all Americans are naive. We can't imagine societies that are quite that disfunctional. Yet, eventually we come around to the truth. Their cultures prohibit adoption of even a fraction of what we deem normal behavior. Those few souls that figure things out promptly try and flee to the West. They have totally given up hope WRT their own neighbors.
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@MrStoneycool
The NUMBER ONE source of looting: local Frenchmen. After years of privation, they just could not sit still and watch all that coffee roll by. So what you had was a conspiracy: the French would conjure up fresh eggs, the occasional chicken, cognac, and more -- and the GI would discover coffee beans, chocolate, tobacco, even cigarettes.
The other item looted: gasoline. After PLUTO came out of the Channel, it pumped gasoline into a storage farm. (Cherbourg ) Thence it traveled by multiple 4" pipes (laid directly on the ground) towards the front. It was THIS pipeline that the French kept robbing. It got to the point that the US Army had to station two divisions of "pipeline guards" to stop the theft.
Naturally, all of this stuff was kept hush, hush, as it would be VERY bad PR, bad for morale.
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What OKH, OKW, and Adolf Hitler didn't seem to remember was the the 6th Army hard upon the Volga was a WAR WINNING MOVE.
It was no different that having the USA 9th Armored// 1st Army upon the Rhine. ( March 6, 1945 ) [ Remagen happened the very next day. ]
What his meant was that the actual positions of 2nd Panzer Army and 3rd Panzer Army were largely irrelevant. They should've given ground -- which they eventually HAD to -- right off. That was the correct German response to Mars.
The next move was for OKH to vector EVERY strategic reserve to counter-Uranus.
For Uranus HAD TO BE the STAVKA attempt to push 6th Army off its economic jugular vein.
OF COURSE 6th Army had to stay put. Its position would win the war in the east for the Nazis. You can't run a mechanized war economy on coal. The Nazis figured that out the hard way. The pain was already evident.
It was ESSENTIAL that the 4th Panzer Army elements within the kessel leave it before it was formed, and that its 'missing corps' be returned to it,(*) but that Army Group B must shed at least two panzer corps ( 4p + 2m ) to reverse the flow of events.
These latter formations would be at essentially FULL strength. Motoring across the steppe bores you, it doesn't kill you.
{
(*) Hitler took away a panzer corps from 4th Panzer Army way back in July-August. I'd have to look up the exact dates. The first to go was GD motorized division. It had to be extracted from Voronezh where it had gotten tied up in urban fighting consequent to its occupation of the western bank of the Don... where the Voronezh river borders the city to its west. (grab a map)
"By July 6, the German army occupied the western river-bank suburbs
before being subjected to a fierce Soviet counter-attack. In July 24
frontline was stabilised along Voronezh river. This was the opening move
of Case Blue"
The other divisions were shunted north to pump up 2nd Panzer Army - but mostly held in reserve... in a centralish position. The idea was that they'd throw their weight to stop any Soviet Winter Counter-Offensive, by which time, STAVKA held a patent on the content and execution thereof.
The existence of this RQF was a HUGE factor in the Luftwaffe's air lift optimism. The top-of-the-head assumption was that THREE fully equipped reserved panzer divisions would be shooting down to 6th Army in very short order. A rail line heading off to the southeast had been under construction at a furious pace for months.
(It was following a route that involved virtually no river crossings, hence its very long route.
}
It's nothing short of amazing that OKH's staff weren't barking like mad dogs about the cross-up in priorities. Backing away from Moscow was strategically meaningless. All of the ground east and west was already totally destroyed, militarily barren. Useless.
Further, the twin panzer armies were ideally sited for logistics. Backing away from Moscow would actually release trucks and gasoline -- so dearly needed to stop Uranus.
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@beacon
Guderian, himself, laid all of this out in 1953 in his own book. Others have weighed in on the issue. The 'prof' is correct. The condition of the panzer arm had NOTHING to do with the decision.
Guderian protested right on the spot and at that time.
The decision to let Goering loose was the world's worst kept secret as the Nazis used it in their propaganda at the time. (1940) You'll see it referenced in Allied newsreels of the period... endlessly.
The British-French escape was all detailed years ago -- before YouTube even existed by a British author. Dang if I can't locate my copy any more. It's his work that under-pins the recent film. It's been sitting around for decades, BTW.
That author was stunned as to how much spin the Churchill administration put on the BEF story. Prior to his writing, the larger public never knew about the BEF escaping over the mole.
The actual mechanism was one of the deepest secrets of the war - at that time. Every Tommy was sworn to secrecy about every aspect of the fiasco. Naturally, no-one wanted to ruin the chances for their buddies -- so every Tommy kept his mouth shut.
And Britain had ultra-hard line censorship, too. So nothing leaked into the press. The Press wasn't even let near the debarkation piers, either. The outer image was one of Tommies coming back to England all kitted out in spiffy uniforms, rifle in hand, too. That's what the public saw. Actually, the BEF came back without even small arms, ... and the UK had to re-equip every lad from the boots on up. (typ)
The BEF became the cadre for the massive build out of the British Army that soon took place. So its escape from Dunkirk was the ruination of Nazi Germany.
It was at Dunkirk that Brook and Monty made their bones. Both were destined to the highest rank. Monty proved to be a step-ahead of every other commander. The entire BEF would've been lost without him. Yup. He plugged all of the holes. The man had ice-water running in his veins.
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@John... good grief. After taking all of that credit Monty nearly got FIRED. It's pure BS. Bradley was down in Luxembourg City. He wasn't dithering. What a hoot. Bradley was shamed for not 'getting it.' It was IKE that sent the 7th Armored south, the 10th Armored north and the 18 Airborne Corps into the fray. He did so BEFORE the evidence was in.
(Said evidence was what Bradley was waiting for. That's not quite dithering. Rather, he was working to British//Russian speed. It was doctrine at that time that one didn't send in reserves until enemy intentions were clear. Ike had enough clarity to figure it out just by the screams from the front. BTW, it took V Corps's commander, Gerow, ALL DAY to figure out that his 2nd Division MG was right to disobey his attack order of the day. He apologized, humbled by the reality. Bradley placed HUGE weight on Gerow's opinion. Between the two of them, they basically ran 1st American Army, Hodges was a place holder for Bradley who never wanted to leave.)
This German offensive was the WORST performance by them during the war. They went off the rails within the first 72 hours -- that's the GERMAN opinion -- not mine.
The war was running long because of Market Garden. Stopping the 12th AG (gasoline restriction) caused the battle of Aachen.( ... and then the Bloody Hurtgen.) It was going to be surrendered as an open city. With that, the main bridges into Germany would've been secured. (!!!!) This is so embarrassing to the Allied cause that both British and American histories bury it.
Losing Aachen as an open city was the REAL tragedy of MG. Break out a map some time.
The British were barely in contact during the Bulge. They were, generally, relegated to being WEST of the Meuse. They just weren't needed. By the time XXX Corps was settled in -- the tide had reversed.
You're STILL eating Monty's BS. The stuff that nearly got him canned. It's a fraud. BTW, at the time the British army couldn't keep its divisions at proper strength. So they were broken up. In contrast the US Army was adding about a regiment every day at the time. We were still building up 9th Army... and then lending it to Monty! He was bitching and fetching when he had to give it back to 12th AG. US 9th Army WAS Monty's Big Punch. Once he had it, it became his leading attack formation straight through until he lost it to Bradley. Once that happened, the British Army kicked it back into idle. No-one wanted to be the last Brit to die at the front. Read the British accounts.
Monty forced the Americans to retreat -- to clean up their lines. Gavin was choking on such orders. Read his account. Monty got the 7th Armored to withdraw from St. Vith -- just for starters. These quite unnecessary retreats ran up the American blood lost. St. Vith was more important than Bastogne. It was THE choke point frustrating 6th Panzer Army -- later 6th SS Panzer Army.
The Bulge was an American victory. Period. Hitler lost his entire strategic reserve -- two panzer armies and the gasoline to power them. This campaign is the PRIMARY reason that Monty had a walk-over when he crossed the Rhine. Duh.
Then again, Monty was the LAST Allied commander to get across the Rhine, Bradley (Hodges) and Patton had stolen the march. Patton's punch through was so extreme that Bradley made him hold up. At the time Patton joked that he'd captured four ( 4) armies: 6th AG + two German armies. Heh.
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@ Dwarov -- Put down the bong. Get therapy.
Stalin triggered WWII in Europe by initiating the Soviet-Nazi Pact of August 23, 1939. Stalin wrote it, held the original in Soviet archives. Hitler merely signed on the line that was dotted. It, the document, was released to the world's press twenty-some years ago by President Yeltsin. His press conference was attended by the ENTIRE world's press in a huge auditorium -- the biggest in Moscow, IIRC.
Stalin, not Hitler, partitioned Poland -- with his own Fat Pencil. So fat it was that you'd think it was smeared lip stick.
Stalin had penal battalions by the dozen. They were suicide assault units. Defectors from such units became the German's most loyal 'volunteers.' Heh. Such 'volunteers' number in vast numbers by the end of the war. They never laid down their weapons, being 'ghosts' in the first place.
Read also: "Bloodlands." It's a totally depressing eye-opener.
Mass executions of politicals, partisans, Gypsies and Jews was strictly a Bloodlands phenomenon. No Western Power engaged in such atrocities at any time.
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@John Burns
Every German opponent only achieved success when they went with the Broad Front strategy.
The Germans "owned" the narrow front technique.
Broad Front = attacking German infantry -- not panzers.
Further, it meant attacking horse drawn infantry with you're own motorized formations. You'd pin their infantry with your own infantry, then punch through with tanks and half-tracks and race deep.
This was a consistently winning solution.
Panzers would merely back up as fast as you could ever advance, then they'd counter attack -- most inconveniently.
(This was the correct German solution for both Stalingrad and Kursk, BTW. During Uranus, the panzer formations should've fled west, leaving 6th Army behind, on the Volga to interdict it. Then, having reached the German supply network east of Rostov-on-Don the panzers would've wheeled around and begun counter attacking the most extended spearheads of the Soviets. It would've been a rout. By that time most T34s had broken down just motoring westward. Most Red formations were reduced to light infantry, without any heavy weapons. When the Russian north wing met the south wing, no-one carried anything but small arms. The big stuff was MILES to the rear.)
The German infantry could never quite back up fast enough to avoid being pocketed. Usually they, the infantry divisions, came apart in a shredded manner, with individual companies being swept up by on coming motorized formations.
The horses were particularly vulnerable. Once they were in the bag, all heavy weapons had to be left behind. Then the entire division lost its defensive cohesion. ( Artillery can't be pointed in every direction at once, so the simple trick was to come at it from an off angle. )
It wasn't too long before the German Army had a full blown horse crisis. It started in the late Autumn of '41 and never let up for the rest of the war. It's the reason that the Ostheer was restricted to the southern front. ( Case Blue ) and why 6th Army had no horses up with it at Stalingrad.
( They were short on horses in the first place. They had to get their horses back out of the winter weather -- which meant that they had to pull them back -- way back -- to where horse stalls still existed -- that is, had been newly built. The Russians had destroyed everything standing by such a time.)
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@Kristina
WRONG.
Britain defeated Germany the same old way she did in WWI.
Resource denial.
Indeed, that's TIK's main point.
London simply throttled Berlin's economy by denying it access to its critical war imports:
Crude oil ( imported from the USA )
Met coal ( imported from the USA )
Rubber ( imported from the British Empire )
Chrome ( imported from the British Empire )
Tungsten ( imported from China, Russia, British Empire )
Nickel ( imported from the Commonwealth// Canada or France )
Aluminum ( same as Nickel )
Magnesium ( imported from the USA, others)
Copper ( imported from the USA, others)
Canada was a MAJOR exporter of Aluminum and Nickel at that time. The RAF was built out of Canadian Aluminum.
Virtually all of these war-critical imports were dominated by British, American or Canadian firms.
The Americans also had all of the Gold in the world. The figures astonish. You name it, America had it in spades.
Some of these items could also be imported from South America -- however the firms involved were either American or British. If it came from the Westen Hemisphere, the Americans ran the show. If not them, then it was the British. ( Shell Oil, et. al. )
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@thunderbolt
Don't invent history, please.
It was Freddie de Goungand, Monty's chief of staff, that brought Monty around. Churchill was not even in the picture.
He returned to 21st Army Group HQ -- having just left Ike -- who had ALREADY drafted the magic letter addressed to the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Freddie flipped out, BEGGED Ike to not send it on until he'd had a chance to 'smooth things over with Monty.'
When he revealed to Monty just how perilous his position was -- Monty countered with the astonishing question: "Who can (possibly) replace me?"
Freddie had to tell his own boss that Monty's old boss FM Alexander was the American favorite to succeed Monty. [ The Americans had wanted Alexander ALL ALONG. ] And that their thinking was that Monty would be 'promoted' to some command back in England, and Alexander would be brought up from the Med, where he was already operating as a theatre supreme commander.
(SHAEF actually didn't cover the Med. You can see the politics of it: Britain had its Supreme Commander; America had its Supreme Commander. Their joint status was fuzzed by the press during wartime.
BTW, Churchill bitterly railed against 'Dragoon' precisely because it would take two armies away from Alexander. Churchill had all kinds of crazy ideas about using them in the eastern Med: Rhodes being at the top of the list. Ike had a major row with Winnie over the matter. )
"[Alexander] Commander-in-Chief Middle East and commanding the 18th Army Group in Tunisia. He then commanded the 15th Army Group for the capture of Sicily and again in Italy before receiving his field marshal's baton and being made Supreme Allied Commander Mediterranean."
The fact that Alexander was independent of SHAEF is only apparent when you pull the organizational chart for SHAEF. His entire command is missing, of course. The Med was considered a theatre in its own right. But, with D-Day the BIG action had shifted to Northwest Europe. This latter term was ginned up to make explicit the split between Ike's command and Alexander's command. Both reported to the Joint Chiefs of Staff. As you can imagine, Alexander would cough up anything that Ike needed -- namely the newly constituted 6th Army Group. ( French 1st Army; American 7th Army )
&&&
AFTER Monty realized that Churchill would accept Alexander with no qualms at all... he drafted a contrite 'apology' to Ike about how he LOVED working as a team-member, etc. etc.
Obviously, Freddie drafted this letter. He'd been crafting it while on the plane flying to 21st Army Group HQ.
( Monty never went to Ike's HQ if it could possibly be avoided -- and it usually was. )
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@Magnus
They (incredibly) depended upon the Dutch explosives and Dutch detonation cables. Keep in mind that Bittrich gave express orders to NOT blow up the Nijmegen bridge.
As a result, the attempt was a last second affair. Whoops. But, the impulse was there.
No such reluctance would EVER be shown at Arnhem. The arrival of XXX Corps dispelled any crazy notion of Germany launching a counter attack. Bittrich suddenly shut up. Shooting up paras was one thing, the Irish Guards was a totally different kettle, all right.
A Dutchman had sabotaged the detonation circuit right from the start. It ran into the town precisely because the Dutch figured that the Threat came from Nazi Germany -- not Belgium. They did have a back-up detonation connection that ran back to the opposite bank. This was the one the SS activated. The problem for the SS was that the back-up circuit was in SERIES with the primary detonation circuit. No Dutchman explained that to them. Everything looked kosher right up until nothing happened. It's not as if the SS could test the circuit without dropping the Nijmegen bridge into the Waal. (They assumed.)
Being a civilian, none of the military paperwork// write-ups ever caught this. Hell, the Allies didn't even know that the detonation cables ran through the post office cum telephone exchange. ( in the same building... right at the base of the bridge... obviously built at the same time. ) Neither side prioritized getting into the post office// telephone exchange. It just didn't hit the average soldier that this was 'magic' ground.
Military (unit) histories are not going to waste ink praising a heroic civilian.
For some crazy reason, the Allies looked past the fact that all of the locals were allied with them. When the Germans figured this all out, they starved the Dutch. They had them down to eating boiled tulip bulbs, which makes for a very expensive and tasteless meal.
Once Grabner got across the Arnhem bridge -- long before Frost arrived, MG was dead, dead, dead, dead, dead.
Without Grabner, Gavin waltzes across Nijmegen bridge, no matter what. THIS explains why both Browning and Gavin placed it on such a low priority.
1st Airborne was assumed to have blocked Arnhem bridge from the get-go -- and everyone knew that there were no Germans on the island. Hell, it was naked farmland. It only had a hamlet north of the Waal at Nijmegen.
Arnhem bridge could never be taken, was never taken. Interdicting the north approach did not constitute bridge capture.
Arnhem bridge had massively long approach bridging that went on and on. The bridge had to be pretty high over the river, while the surrounding land was way low.
What this meant was that when Frost shot up Grabner, Grabner was already leaving the bridge proper and descending the northern approach. This is why Frost had to shoot from the upper levels, and why 2nd Para could shuttle from side to side underneath the massive approach. It also meant that mortars, etc. couldn't reach under the approach. The SS had to slug it out, man to man, in street fighting. Even the panzers were rather freaked out because they had to wade among tall buildings that provided Molotov fire bomb opportunities galore. The SS took tremendous casualties while attacking Frost.
All of the above explains why ignoring Dutch and Ultra intel that the II SS Panzer Corps was in the area was such a catastrophe. And that event happened up at 21st Army Group and AA Army levels. No-one below the rank of army commander was let in on the Ultra secret.
It's for this reason, that Browning must be assumed to know all about Ultra -- and that Ike may have told Gavin to assassinate Browning at the last second -- rather than let Browning fall into SS hands. For there was no way that the SS would not torture Browning to cough up what he knew. Browning should never have landed with his boys. He simply knew too much.
In the Pacific, USN Captains suicided themselves rather than be caught by the IJN -- for just this reason.
Once Browning was on the ground, he lost all control of events. 1st Airborne needed him, critically, to un-phu-ck their air drops. He could do it. I can't think of anyone else with the authority to step in and stop the insanity of dropping supplies to the SS.
BTW, every time the RAF boys complained about what they saw, the drops were adjusted. Then the SS ran over the new drop zones. The RAF could never 'find' British Airborne in its ever shrinking perimeter.
By the end, the perimeter was so tiny that the RAF would need 'smart chutes' to hit the bullseye. 1st Airborne really didn't have a drop zone any more.
As for the 1,000 tanks story... that just HAD to come down from Bletchley Park// ULTRA... who probably intercepted Adolf's promise to OB West that they were priority. Hitler's promise was in connection with his Ardennes offensive. Bletchley had no idea that the panzers were to be assembled for November ( the original Bulge target date was mid-November ) not mid-September.
And, yes, OB West was the priority for all panzers. The Ostheer had to make do with what StgIIIs, Hertzers, and PAK that they got. The only Ostheer formation that was kept up to strength was Gross Deutschland. ( Hitler was a 'Colonel' for one of its brigades, BTW. Heh. Yes, yes, he made himself honorary Colonel of a brigade. How many hats can that tyrant wear?)
Naturally Bletchley assumed the worst, as did Browning. It's a VERY good bet that the so-called estimate from Gavin's S-2 came instead from Browning. Gavin would never have been clued into ULTRA. The lie that the intel came from his S-2 was generated to hide its source as being Browning. ( and ULTRA) After the fiasco was over, the estimate looked embarrassing, of course. So Gavin 'owned' it.
For falling on his sword, Gavin was given his second star. He was definitely one of the Big Boys after MG was over.
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@caelachyt
Yup.
I'd say everyone would have to agree with you.
Browning took advantage of Urquhart and Gavin.
Both were leading their divisions into a drop for their first time.
With more experience under their belts, both would've thrown those insane drop zones back in Browning's face.
He picked them, not Monty.
Monty merely trusted Browning to get such things right.
Monty knew he didn't know the airborne art.
Both armies accepted that Browning was the Big Brain and the fella that had created both the British and American airborne corps.
For the American airborne was nothing but a clone of Browning's op.
The Americans did change some of the PT and related gear, but that's about it.
I suspect that Gavin spent a LOT of time picking Browning's brain.
Remember that Gavin wrote the American how-to text for the airborne.
The island was rejected solely because it was deemed bad for gliders. This thesis was not even put to the test, BTW. It was merely assumed to be true.
It would've been a SNAP to make any glider tip-over proof for the island. Merely put a runner way out in front of the glider, extending from its nose, in effect a ski-nose.
Such an extension is not going to have a significant influence on drag or in-flight handling. Then, at the end, when the glider is at risk of flipping over, such a leading runner would stop the turning motion. The whole glider was made out of wood, and England was overrun with super-skilled furniture makers -- the boys that made the Mosquito the super-plane that it was. They could've patched this 'fix' together in their sleep -- if only someone would've asked.
More generally, I'm astounded that this fix was not adopted because time, and time again, glider pilots were being injured because their craft had no energy absorber out in front of them. The envisaged ski nose would've been engineered to break and bend UNDER the pilot's position. He, himself, should've had the equivalent of a Mae West across his chest so that even if he was pushed forward, his body was cushioned. This 'pillow' could've been slipped on just prior to the landing sequence. Simple, no ?
It's also rather baffling that Panzerfausts weren't made part of the TO&E of the airborne now that so many had been picked up all across France. ( Dropped only once, never fired. ) The British PIAT was revealed as a dud long before MarketGarden.
BTW, Panzerfausts and Bazookas were known to be super effective in urban combat, effective against much more than tanks.
Why the Airborne landed in Arnhem without a bicycle battalion?
What a mistake that was. A fire-team on bicycles would've been perfect for scouting out ahead of the battalions. Instead, 1st Airborne kept stumbling into SS men as a main body. They didn't pick up a Dutch telephone ONCE when it counted. Indeed, they were instructed to NOT use the Dutch phone network.
Good grief. Can't any Brit speak Hindustani ?
It, Hindustani, worked like a charm in North Africa... 8th Army, anyone?
Who in the 21st Army Group hailed from 8th Army?
Wouldn't that be just about anyone in high command?
Horrocks
O'Connor
Monty
My how they forget.
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@steve w
One SS Major, having fought everywhere against everybody, up from the ranks the whole way to major, stated that fighting Americans was by far the WORST he'd ever known.
Nothing compared.
1) Pure physical strength. Americans were bigger, better fed, just flat out stronger across the board.
2) Technical acumen. Americans could not only operate and fix their own stuff, they were astoundingly adept at fixing and using enemy (German) equipment against its former master.
3) The American army simply didn't have any formations that rated less than First Line divisions. It also had Elite formations. It did not have Static troops, Second Line divisions, stomach and ear battalions, ... etc.
4) Uniquely, the American army was the only combatant power that kept its combat formations at 90-105% of TO&E strength all the time. In the event a unit took heavy casualties, it was pulled out of the line and promptly re-blooded, and at a very fast tempo.
This was not the smartest move by a long shot, but it was a fetish that George Marshall had. He regarded troops as so many machine parts.
The greatest division of WWII -- any army -- was the 29th Division on D-Day.
Why?
General Bradley totally rebuilt it in the previous two-months. He took only the CREAM of the US Army in Britain and stuffed it into this one formation. The typical company within this division only retained ONE trooper through this reformation process. (Junior officers, too.)
Everyone else was washed out due to athletic reasons:
a) Wore glasses -- gone
b) 'Slow' in training camp -- gone
Only the top 1% passed Bradley's muster. (!!!)
c) Couldn't read or write -- gone
d) Couldn't read a map -- gone
e) Couldn't field strip an M-1 blind-folded -- gone
f) Overweight -- gone
g) Underweight -- gone
h) Too short -- gone
i) Couldn't shoot well -- gone
This above wash-out and rebuild is virtually buried in military history. It's only alluded to in Bradley's autobiography.
It's historically significant in that this ultra-elite formation was shredded on D-Day -- with immense consequences thereafter.
The loss of so many elite troops on D-Day meant that the formations that they'd been robbed from were seriously weakened. These were the guys that would've been natural promotables in the field. In effect, this was a division of sergeants.
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@Shandwen
Patton was relegated by the Grand Plan to the TRADITIONAL invasion route into Germany. The further south you go, the smaller the Rhine gets. By the time you're in Holland, the Rhine is an absolute monster. It's as big as the Volga, Mississippi, Columbia, etc. MOST of that water landed north of the southern Rhine.
In the actual event, 3rd Army found that it was a cakewalk to set pontoon bridges across the Rhine.
Patton didn't use ANY of the exotic preparation that Monty required -- and he was across BEFORE Monty was.
The Germans were so concerned about 1st Army ( Remagen ) and 21st Army Group ( Monty ) that the door was wide open.
Shortly thereafter 3rd Army made a MASSIVE penetration that was so DEEP that Bradley told Patton to knock it off, to stop, damn it!!!
You'll never find any battle maps showing this -- no matter how far you look. You'll have to craft one yourself from 3rd Army records.
What happened is that 3rd Army was forced to stay in place, killing time, while 1st Army caught up. Only then Bradley permitted position maps to be published for general release.
The big hang-up with 1st Army was that Hitler had thrown EVERYTHING in front of it at Remagen. So it took 9th Armored and friends a lot of fighting to eliminate this blocking force.
Once this was done, one arm swung north to meet 21st Army Group and the Ruhr was pocketed. The rest of 1st Army ( it was a monster ) then pushed forward at the same time -- ultimately to the Elbe.
It was at this time that 15th Army was established. It was a huge army. You'll have to look long and hard to find 15th Army in any history map. Why? It was an administrative and occupation army. It took over the vast bulk of 1st Army -- so that the fighting troops could spend the final weeks of the war taking it easy.
1st Army was, day by day, re-blooded with brand new infantry divisions. There were some exceptions: the 2nd Armored was loaded with Pershing tanks, so it was sent forward so that the Soviets would be impressed. ( It's sole reason for staying in the front line. ) It didn't take part in any substantial fighting. Bradley absolutely did not want it crossing the Elbe.
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@Neil
Point-blanc defense or a deliberate trap?
It's plain on the record that no nation deliberately used howitzers as PAK fronts -- with the possible exception of the Soviets.
Rommel, and other German commanders, routinely used FLAK 88s as PAK fronts, as doctrine. It was nothing exceptional for them.
Whereas, for the British it would appear that direct fire missions for the 25pdr were strictly desperation fire. If the gunners could shoot directly, then the enemy panzers could shoot directly, too.
The universal problem for all artillery is that it can dish it out, but can't take it.
The universal doctrine is to keep one's artillery at a safe remove or cleverly hidden at all times.
One starts popping off direct fire missions only when caught by surprise and conditions are dire.
Neil, you're trying way too hard and not really advancing the ball.
To what purpose?
It's a FACT that the 25pdr was not seen as a decent PAK. Its entire layout is in dramatic contrast with the German FLAK 88 -- which can slew rapidly in all directions.
If the WDF had any confidence in what you're pitching here, they would've adopted such PAK fronts as doctrine, too. But, they didn't.
BTW, ENDLESS film footage of 25pdrs bouncing up recoil ramps makes your assertions rather humorous. The was a real reason that the British army stayed with that system... starting with the fact that you couldn't really dig-in in the desert.
The German 88 had a steady base that didn't require its crew to dig it in to speak of at all. Indeed, it was common for 88 crews to fire it while it was limbered. ( ie while still towed or ready to tow -- up on its wheels.
Go to Google Images to see endless photos of same, with many showing the German crews actually firing the weapon while limbered.
The 25pdr had absolutely no recoil system comparable to the Swedish--German weapon. Without the recoil ramps, the 25pdr had to be seriously dug in. Fat chance of doing that on the quick and dirty in the Western Desert.
Your supposition must be rated, then, as a fail.
The 25pdr was rejected by the British Army as a PAK. Fact.
The PAK of choice was the 6pdr, of which the British built many.
It was an extremely popular size for a time.
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@Neil
But it DOES.
In WWII just about every dang thing could happen ONCE.
But such expedients did not amount to doctrine.
You, yourself, are going to great lengths to find extreme circumstances that show this or that occasion that goes against doctrine.
That's known as 'try-hard.'
The 25pdr was a howitzer, and intended to be used as such.
Absolutely no-one is ever going to corn fuse it with a PAK.
It didn't have ANY of the features deemed essential to a PAK.
Well, other than it had a big gun.
Howitzers are intended to be fired as batteries -- and to lay down patterns of indirect fire. They are ONLY supposed to fire in direct fire when circumstances are dire... things have truly gone sideways.
It's a testimony to the uselessness of the 2pdr that we even hear of 25pdrs being used as an expedient in front of Tobruk -- an occasion so rare that it's never come to my attention before.
Do tell us if said howitzers actually knocked out any panzers. I would expect them to be ineffectual, more as a psychological buttress for the troops.
Much more likely, they fired HE straight at German infantry and in so doing caused any assault to flag. Howitzers make for crappy PAK.
If this were not so, we'd be reading endless accounts of howitzers stopping panzers straight through '41-'42. Instead, panzers ate howitzers as appetizers. All that they had to do was to come at them from an off angle. In real life, gun crews just dropped everything and ran for their lives.
BTW, Tobruk deserves a TIK video all by itself.
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@Neil
You're not going to be able to jump back 75 years in time and make the British Army fall in love with the 25pdr as a PAK.
Other than (weird) expedients, (actually doubtful) you've only established that the British Army HATED to use 25pdrs in such a manner.
Saying that this or that unit used 25pdrs as PAK ... what's telling is that the BA categorically refused to adopt such a use for said gun.
It SUCKED. That's why. You can't slew it, properly, as a PAK.
In contrast, the BA loved the 25pdr in its howitzer role.
That puppy was everywhere the BA was.
&&&
In a studied contrast, the Soviets loved their 76.2mm howizer --they produced scads of them.
The Germans and the Americans adopted the SAME howitzer: the German 105mm gun.
Yes. Patton's army even captured an entire German battery of 105mm howitzers -- and then turned them upon the Germans. Yes, they were listed in 3rd Army's TO&E in late 1944. (!) The German-American howitzer was SO identical that Patton could shoot American ammo straight through his captured German guns. Patton thought this was a laugh riot.
[ This latter trait had Family significance. My Uncle was given up to the Gestapo by a French traitor precisely BECAUSE she heard American 105mm howitzers and -- having heard the German version -- was convinced that the German army was winning in Normandy. It didn't matter how much my Uncle and his patron wailed, this traitorous bitch was convinced that the Germans were winning.
His patron was hanged -- after extreme torture -- by the Gestapo in Paris. The French traitor was nabbed by the French underground when the Gestapo fled Paris. ( France, like Germany and Italy, has astounding local accents. Her Normandy accent told every Frenchman that she was a Nazi collaborator of the most extreme sort when she rolled through eastern France. They grabbed her azz during a 'relief break.' She was shorn of hair and hanged as a traitor, ultimately upon the personal testimony of my Uncle.
( Her crimes were so astounding that she was not called to account until the war was over. )
He was rescued out of the SS so-called 'hospital' at Buchenwald. He was so weak that all he could do was whisper his name, rank, and serial number. The attending USA physician, a Jewish doctor, just about flipped out. He didn't expect to hear English at all... let alone run across a USAAF sergeant.
He weighed about 75 pounds. It took English doctors half-a-year to get him up to enough body weight to fly him back to the USA. Yeah, he was on IV most of that time.
During his stay in London he had to give two interviews WRT the French traitor. She'd managed to kill every other witness. His testimony hanged her. As he was the only surviving witness to her treason. The Gestapo had murdered (by torture) everyone else. I can't remember her name, but she's virtually at the top of the list of most hated Nazi collaborators.
Her Gestapo reward was the entire estate of my Uncle's patron. After it was all said and done, the reverse occurred. The traitor's land rights to her descendants were expunged -- totally. The patriot's family -- was endowed with everything -- tax free -- but of course.
This reward was for her silence as a member of the underground as much as anything. The Gestapo beat the crap out of her. Even so, she didn't give up anyone. Right there, she was remarkable. ]
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@vlad... "As a result, tactical and organizational measures in the West came down to plugging holes. Commanders, troops and military equipment, frankly, became second-rate.
Since 1943, the basis of the German troops of the Western Front was the elderly, equipped with obsolete weapons. Neither the personnel nor the weapons met the requirements of the coming heavy battles."
More proof that you can't believe anything a Nazi says or writes.
1) Adolf SHUT OFF all tank reinforcements to the Eastern Front 12-31-1943. Stug IIIs would have to do.
2) The SS panzer divisions in the West were brought totally up to strength.
3) The 116th panzer division ( 2 panther battalions + 1 Mark IV battalion ) was created from scratch. ( by Guderian as a birthday present... heh... it was filled with anti-Nazi Germans, BTW. )
4) Panzer Lehr was built out as a super division, too.
5) 2nd Parachute was sent to France -- at full strength.
6) In mid-44, 9th & 10th SS panzer divisions were sent to Normandy -- from Poland. (!) They were supposed to reinforce the East. Oh, well.
Taken altogether, Adolf created a new panzer army, the 5th, in the West. He even sent west machines explicitly designed to stop Soviet tanks -- namely the Jagpanther. Not one of these terrors ever went east. (!)
Lastly, the Germans sent a LOT more divisions into Italy than just 8. Those were merely the first wave.
In this telling, the Nazis are trying to convince the Americans and British that they were not facing the REAL German Army.
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@Vlad... Stalin had an entire CORPS of NKVD troops dedicated to this task. It pissed the British and Americans off Big Time. Yeah, it reached diplomatic levels. The children of the USA sent CARE packages to to the USSR. They'd gone door-to-door to pick up pennies for this drive. Even THEIR charity goods were held up and re-labelled. This infuriated our diplomats.
That you are in denial about this Stalinist policy shows you how effective it was.
Alien machines were easily explained away as new Soviet machines. After all, all of their internal dials and legends were in Cyrillic. Many Soviet tanks were designed by Christie -- the American. So when Western technologies popped up -- they were not new.
BTW, the engine for the T-34 started life as a French dirigible motor. The 82mm mortar started life as the French 81mm mortar -- a design that every army of note adopted: French, German, American, Soviet -- and more. The Reds also knocked off the Browning 50 cal, too. (14.5mm gun) { Like the 82mm mortar, the Reds copied the device but increased the size a bit.}
All of the above is why it was child's play to convince the general population that Lend Lease goods were miracles of production from east of the Urals.
You'd have to be at the very top to know what was going on.
As for historians: they are total zeroes when it comes to chemistry or mechanics -- or mass production. That's why the switch from High Speed Steel to Tungsten Carbide triggers no mental activity -- it goes in one eye-ball and comes out their ears. TC is the TRUE source of the Soviet war production miracle.
It's impossible to build any major war plant in the depth of a Siberian winter. You can't pour concrete -- there is snow everywhere -- you can't dig frozen ground -- etc. It took the US two-years to get B-24 production really going -- and we had everything going our way.
The removed Soviet factories were largely destroyed in the process. How do we know? Russians who were there, who unloaded the flat cars, have told us so. The panic was so great that he merely shoved electric motors off the train into the snow and mud. The train didn't even stop! It just crawled along as it was 'unloaded.' No-one knew where anything was when the snow melted.
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@Vlad... The 116th Panzer Division was presented to Adolf Hitler on his birthday, April 20, 1944. He didn't even know it existed before. Guderian raised it up behind his back... out of the new production of Panther tanks -- of which he was in charge of as Inspector General of Panzer Troops. ( In reality, he was in charge of de-bugging the Panther and accelerating all tank production. In that role, he thwarted the production of Jagpanthers... in favor of Panthers. At one time, it was proposed that 2 Jagpanthers would be built for every single Panther. Guderian stopped that production priority. Turret rings and turrets cost a fortune. Turret-less machines cost about 35% less. They don't need a vertical turret lathe.
But Jagpanthers were what the Nazi armies needed. They could open up a JS-2 tank like a can of spam. Thank God we had Guderian on our side. (sarc)
My own Father faced one of these beasts. They were terrifying. They had the massive 88mm gun -- in the longest form -- first used at Kursk. Hitler redirected them towards his Ardennes offensive -- December 16, 1944 and other operations in the West. As tank killers, they were the ultimate machine in WWII.
Your Googling is the first instance I've read that ANY Jagpanthers made it east -- even though they were expressly designed to stop Soviet tanks. No wonder you hardly know of them.
&&&
Vald, by Adolf's order -- the eastern armies were to no longer be a priority -- December 31, 1943. All that had gone before was stopped.
Other than a handful of super-elite divisions ( GD, 3SS, 5SS -- and at the end HG ) the East Heer lost all of its punch.
The 1SS, 2SS, 9SS, 10SS, 12SS, -- and others -- were sent west.
The HG, 1st para, 2nd para, 4th para went west.
The 116th and Panzer Lehr went west.
The Luftwaffe went to Central Germany -- to fight the USAAF -- not to fight the RAF or Red Air Force. ( Hitler would not prioritize the RAF.)
The German Navy was ALWAYS in the west.
Both the Luftwaffe and the Kriegsmarine cost Nazi Germany a fortune... MUCH more than the war in the East. (!!!!) After the blood-letting in the East, it's impossible for Russians to accept that their's was the minor theater of the war... drawing off never more than 40% of all German war production.
Planes and boats cost a fortune. They use ONLY elite manpower. They consume the best materials... the most expensive and rare. They use crude oil in vast amounts -- whereas armies can live off of horses and coal.
BTW, the real secret to Barbarossa -- the Germans ran their draft horses into the ground -- during the mud season. They never recovered. This did not happen to the Soviet Army.
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Gavin messed up so BAD that he was given his second star immediately after MG was over.
Gavin's REAL orders were to protect Browning -- an army commander -- and to protect Browning's reputation, too.
He followed these orders -- American orders above and outside MG.
You can't trust ANY of the generals, as they are all world class liars.
That's how they became generals in the first place.
This is still seen. When British or American generals speak to the public -- everything is spin.
In the case of MG, the subordinate commanders are falling on their swords to protect their superiors -- right up the line.
Monty is protecting Churchill, Allen Brooke, and the Joint Chiefs...
Boy those guys never make a mistake, and so forth.
If Gavin had lost Browning to the Germans -- his career would've been over. Period.
Browning OWNS the failure of MG by even landing with his army.
He needed to stay above the fray -- the only way he could allocate reinforcements and make THE key decisions. As it was, all of the key decisions were being made by his subordinates. For example, it should NEVER have been up to Urquhart to decide where the Poles drop. That should've been Browning's call. It does not appear that anyone even contacted him. Browning appears to be out of the loop even after XXX Corps hooks up with the 82nd.
The delay in providing TAC Air is bizarre. Browning was the man that should've accelerated its arrival.
The futzing around by XXX Corps after they crossed the Nijmegen bridge is baffling.
And, STILL, where are the jeeps? Why scout with Shermans when jeeps can shoot all over the island? It's not as if the Germans can enter the island except by bridge and ferry.
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The REAL impact was HUGE because Stalin was liquidating officers based upon DOCTRINE.
Anyone that he deemed in Tukhachevksy's camp was shot. The doctrine that Stalin hated was Deep Operations, which, of course, was exactly how victory was to be had.
Zhukov survived because he was such a total prick. Stalin knew, without any doubt, that Zhukov's peers wanted to shoot him. He often shot them. ( Compel them to lead the next attack, personally, from the very front, with a machine gun at his back. )
Like Hitler, Stalin loved to put two tomcats in a bag -- and then shake.
Zhukov brought back Deep Operations -- and had to anoint a slew of new generals -- making him the George Marshall of the Red Army. Eventually, as the war progressed, Stalin was forced by events to fire virtually all of his pre-war favorites. They were duds.
Guderian was placed under 4th Army (Nominally, that's what the organization chart showed. It's commander hated Heinz, but of course. )
Rommel famously disdained Italians, hence he was sent to North Africa -- and so forth.
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@Alexander
Wrong.
American LendLease was already kicking in and influencing the Eastern Front by September 1942.
The Germans were giggling and laughing when they captured American jeeps at Stalingrad, still strapped to flat cars, still in USA markings, at that time, in the very beginning of the assault of the city proper.
Boston bombers* (A-20) were already actively frustrating Army Group A on its way to Baku. The Red Air Force instantly fell in love with this light bomber and used it to attack German bridging attempts and supply columns during the Summer of 42.
(That'd be a great title for a period military film for the Caucuses Campaign.)
(*) Boston bomber was the British slang for this machine. It was also labelled the Havoc by the USAAF. Thousands were sent to Russia.
LendLease aid was ESSENTIAL to the Soviet victory against Case Blue, aka Uranus.
The Americans rolled up and trans-shipped military grade land-lines to the USSR. (Western Electric// Bell Telephone) It was these cables that kept STAVKA in control of events while blinding Gehlen as to what was going on. Just as at el Alamein, the radio net was used to fake out the Germans. The Reds stopped using their command radios for their original purpose. Instead, phoney radio activity was used to totally spoof the German B'dienst teams. They lulled the Krauts to sleep.
This rush shipment of land-lines was so hush-hush that they travelled by oral command -- and were flown in. ( The first American - Soviet LendLease link was by way of Alaska to Siberia. This explains the crazed tempo of the ALCAN Highway construction.)
The land-line cables discussed here were removed from American infantry divisions only days after they arrived -- on the QT -- on the down low -- and without paperwork. We only know any of this because, more than half-a-century after the events, ancient GIs have detailed all of this because they, personally, did the work. They were signals troops.
The demand for these land-lines was so intense that the mobilisation of American formations was delayed for almost a full year. It took that long for Western Electric to 're-wire' the Soviet armies. They had priority.
American land-lines were the magic secret that faked out the Germans twice: el Alamein and Uranus. I would posit that they were significant military events... and they happened in 1942.
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@Ken McD
Gas economy. The 190 used more avgas. And, on paper, the Me109 looked VERY competitive with Russian planes.
The problem was that the 109 was NOT designed for field conditions. It really needed a paved runway.
In Russia, about 2% of the 109s would crack up with each landing.
Do the math, after X number of missions these planes have destroyed themselves. The Russians don't have to lift a finger.
This landing weakness also existed -- in spades -- for the Ju52.
The ENTIRE Ju-52 fleet lost its landing gear in Russia.
THIS ^^^^ is the REAL reason that Hitler turned away from Moscow. It changed the course of the war. The Luftwaffe general most responsible planted his brains on his office desk with a PPK later in December. EVERY HQ blamed him for ph uc king things up, royally.
Because the Germans were never able to repeat it, it has been lost to history: the magic solution in the early weeks for the panzers was re-supply by air, by Ju-52. This was totally novel.
Guderian's grand plan was to break-through and then just keep going. The popular idea that the panzers are circling around to the rear is total nonsense during these weeks. It, encirclement, was never tried, never intended. Blitzkrieg dictated that the panzers go ULTRA deep and attack the rail net -- and the truck fleet. Both were totally defenseless against panzers -- even ones armed with a pathetic 37mm gun. NOW you understand why OKH found that pop gun tolerable. A 37mm gun is actually BETTER for such a campaign. Each panzer could pack in some crazy amount of ammo. And each 37mm round would totally destroy one truck. Each round would ruin a steam locomotive. It would also ruin any small block house. Just aim for the vision slit. Eventually, you'll get a round inside.
Everything was clicking until the Jus52 fleet lost its feet. The landing gear could NOT take the abuse it suffered while landing in Russia. The Luftwaffe ph uc ked up Big Time. Then a TOTAL panic overcame the Luftwaffe. Up until the last, the Luftwaffe was LYING to the Heer! BTW, there are wartime photos of 'beached' Jus52s all over Russia at this time.
You might imagine that the Germans kept this a Top, Top Secret at the time. You'll not be surprised that the Germans KEPT this boner top secret straight through the Cold War. To reveal it would be to reveal that the Luftwaffe let EVERYONE down -- to include the dictator. No excuses were possible.
Repair kits were soon crafted, and repair crews were flown out to fix the fleet. This took about a month... just the repairs... so MANY planes.
The last time I Googled Ju-52 the first page detailed a Ju-52 with broken landing gear. Heh. Heh. Heh.
The deep drive of the Summer was over. Suddenly Adolf became obsessed with BOTH flanks. The Ju-52's absence was the reason why. Every other tale is PURE BS -- put out to hide the fact that the Luftwaffe lost its ENTIRE logistical fleet -- due to stupidity and crappy engineering.
The fix was no biggie, BTW.
If the Luftwaffe had come clean from the beginning this war shifting fiasco would never have occurred.
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@myroseaccount Adolf PROMISED his western generals "a thousand tanks" and Bletchley Park found out about his assurance. German war production in 1944 totally eclipsed all that had gone before. So DON'T use 1941 metrics -- or even 1943 metrics. Speer had the numbers going through the roof -- right up until SEPTEMBER 1944. Yeah, the Krauts were building as many tanks in a month has they had in six-months earlier in the war. Next, the real worry for any parachute commander is not tanks -- it's HALF-TRACKS. They sport more machine guns... and their crews will have their heads on a swivel. Infantry HATE, HATE, HATE, attacking half-tracks for this reason. Adolf could've easily had 1,000 half-tracks sent to the fighting... given enough lead time. What Bletchley had picked up on was Adolf's pitch about his grand November counter-offensive against VIII Corps in the woods. He had visions of 1940 on his syphilitic brain.
Lost in all of the posts: the ONLY terrain that could support tanks was where Gavin focused his attention. His PRIMARY mission was to protect Browning -- his hero. If an Allied 3-star ARMY COMMANDER had been lost to the enemy -- that would've been the end of Gavin's career. Due to his rank, he was able to be read-in-on Ultra. No-one else was. So the 1,000 tank tale HAD to have come from Bletchley and HAD to have become knowledge via Browning to Gavin. Gavin's account was spewed out to protect Browning's reputation AND the existence of Ultra. Plainly, Browning let Gavin in on the Big Secret.
And, since you're asking: YES, Adolf DID promise his generals that they had priority #1 and that 1,000 tanks were to be given to them for the up coming counter-offensive. So Bletchley was not really wrong. They did not have a date-certain to go along with Adolf's pledge. He also pledged some crazy amount of fighter-cover, too. The counter-offensive was supposed to occur in November. In the event, it was launched in mid-December. The delay was primarily about GASOLINE. And yes, panzer production was insufficient to properly equip his attack force. For example the 12SS was never brought back up to strength. Elsewhere on YT there is a whole lecture on its problems. They were vast. The 12SS had been gutted by the Canadians and the fiasco of Falaise.
Browning was in charge NOT Gavin. It was HE who had received the estimate from Bletchley -- and Bletchley's track record was towering at this point.
The reason that Gavin was not so concerned about the magic bridge is because he believed British intelligence estimates -- and reasoned that 1st Airborne would entirely prevent German reinforcements from coming down from Arnhem. BTW, the solid ground was GERMAN ground. He, Gavin, had no Dutch spies telling him what was up in Germany, proper. He also figured that since this turf was the FIRST German soil to be occupied by any Allied force, that a stiff reaction just had to be in the cards. In this he was RIGHT. It's just that the Krauts couldn't do a very good job with an instant-outfit.
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@myroseaccount IF -- and that's a BIG IFF -- Bletchley Park DID get things right. They received inside dope -- but even Adolf didn't know WHEN his directive would be fulfilled. His intent was for his counter-offensive to go off in mid-November.
Bletchley merely gave Browning -- and SHAEF -- the heads up about where Hitler's head was at.
The idea, posted by TIK and others, that the G2 of the 82nd Division had access to or CLOUT enough to influence Browning and Gavin... well everybody rejects such an assertion... including TIK.
Gavin was BSing the public -- a job requirement for ALL generals.
There is ONLY one source that had total credibility WRT German intentions: Bletchley Park. Browning was the ONLY general read into Ultra. ( WRT to Market ) Corps commanders routinely doped out what was up -- but had to settle for suspicions.
When Bletchley tells Browning of the tyrant's directives, that intel HAS to be taken seriously.
FYI, early in the war, Winnie did not use the term 'Ultra' as a source. Instead, he conjured up a totally fictive agent. And that agent was purported to be stationed within Nazi high HQ. What then happened was that his generals REFUSED to believe that the agent was real, REFUSED to act on said intel, and walked straight into one fiasco after another. This blindness is the PRIMARY reason for British defeats in North Africa for quite some time. Winnie finally doped out that he would HAVE to somewhat come clean with his army commanders. The source of the intel was changed to 'Ultra' -- and Winnie informed his army commanders that anyone stupid enough to ignore Ultra would be on the chopping block PDQ. Suddenly, British fortunes in the desert war really picked up. But to keep the Ultra secret -- secret -- ONLY army commanders were read into the secret. Gavin, Ridgway, et. al were left in the dark. Ultra was the reason why Patton gained such an astounding reputation within 3rd Army. Ditto for Monty. Rommel's rep in North Africa also entirely turned on his intel. The British destroyed his B'dienst team -- and Rommel never was smart again. Heh.
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@ben... the famous 'open door' issue occurred when Clark turned to Rome after everything was in motion -- June 4-5. Alexander instructed Clark to get 5th Army to block 10th Army's retreat. Clark should've been sent down for his stunt. It's been a sore point for the British (8th Army) ever since.
Once the Germans had even a few days of grace, they totally escaped the trap. Then, the blown bridges stopped the Allies from a rapid pursuit. This was totally unlike France, where Patton could sweep ahead without hardly worrying about bridges. The most critical bridges were in Paris and they were NOT blown. See the film "Is Paris Burning." For video of the 12th Air Force's systemic attack on Italy's rail system -- and roads, too visit YouTube and google for P-47s. It should come right up. These fighters had been operating since late December 1943. Specifically, the video explains that the P47s just about never see any German fighters. They had crushed them virtually from the start. Their entire campaign was north of Rome. This is shown on a map. The 12th, BTW, was operating from an ex-German series of air strips. These were massively expanded in no time by the USAAF. Sardinia was invaded precisely to obtain these bases. From them they could even participate in Dragoon. These planes were also a part of Anzio as they WERE expected to drive off the Luftwaffe... which is exactly what happened.
So Lucas had air cover, naval support, and rivers to his north and south (Tiber, Pontine marshes -- they had been re-flooded by the Nazis.) Both flanks were impassible for German heavy panzers. Lucas needed to rush forward and THEN dig in. If he was forward then the USAAF could've built instant air strips in the beachhead -- same as was done in Normandy. ( My Father built the first one there -- right on the bluff over Omaha.) Getting the USAAF to be based right over his back was THE solution for Lucas. However, Lucas never had enough depth for any air strips to be laid. What a fool.
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@Donald Hill
On the contrary, I'd rate Monty VERY high as a logistician.
The British Army was as good as it gets, logistically.
Proof: El Alamein. Monty 'logged' the hell out the 8th Army.
Indeed, one can easily maintain that Monty was TOO obsessed with logistics.
Let's all get this straight: Monty had an ego bigger than Jupiter.
Every single account agrees on this point, even Freddie.
But Monty is FAR from incompetent. He has some of the MOST significant battles and campaigns to his credit. He'll never be forgotten by history -- long after all of us are dust.
Ike, Tedder, Bradley, -- hell everyone -- found Monty's pre-D-Day lecture spellbinding -- just totally awesome. He knew is chit... down to extreme, even excessive detail. He was a remarkable general. It was this level of knowledge that he had, that FEW could ever hope to attain that led to his arrogance.
[ Patton was of the same stripe. In Patton's case the guy was a walking military history professor. You (literally) couldn't bring up ANY battle, modern or ancient that Patton didn't know more about than you. Then sit down for a major lecture -- like you're back at West Point. These would be spellbinding, BTW. ]
Lord Allenbrooke considered him the best field commander he'd ever had the pleasure to command. He LOVED the man.
Churchill loved Monty, too. Now THAT'S saying something. Winnie was hell on generals. IMHO, Churchill ruined the reputations of some of Britian's finest... starting with Wavell. I regard Wavell as tip top. He reached five-stars -- no thanks to Winnie. I think Winnie took years off his life, BTW.
I would've had a stroke if I had to work under Churchill.
Like Adolf and Stalin, Winnie would brook no rational argument.
We're talking about national heroes that have no peers. Yeah, they screwed up, really screwed up, but they never screwed up like the Russians, Germans, or the Japanese -- let alone the Chinese.
All four were colossal screw-ups compared to Britain and America. The graveyards are full of their victims.
The Russians didn't defeat the German Army.
The German Army defeated the German Army.
Halder & Co must have been high on crack cocaine and heroine in '41.
Lastly, what makes MG such painful reading is that Monty was NOT Monty for this operation. He'd come down with VICTORY DISEASE.
This damn illness had become pandemic across all Allied counsels.
If you think Monty was the only fella infected, check out the insanity that floated through 12th Army Group.
It was EVERYWHERE. For us, sitting 70 years after the event, it's impossible to wrap ones mind around how strange generals get when Victory Disease hits -- especially after a LONG war.
It hit the Japanese during early '42. It hit the Germans in late '42.
They went crazy, too.
One could well argue that the American and British armies had Victory Disease in the Summer of 03. Then things went sideways.
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@Sanders, nuisance attacks. Antwerp entirely replaced London as the strategic bombardment objective. Antwerp suffered FAR MORE than London. (!) That includes the record one-shot kill.
What had been a rain of terror became a propaganda stunt -- unable to arouse the British... though they were looking for some pay-back.
Bomber Command supplied THAT.
The Nazis even continued to fire off V-1s, too. But having lost their coastal bases, they were forced to use He-111 bombers as mother craft. These flew out over the North Sea to get around the British AAA along the Channel. However, again, it was a propaganda stunt. The Krauts had run out of gas. A trickle of V-2 and V-1-s looks great for the history books but totally lacks the umph that the Nazis wanted and the British feared.
Keep in mind that the British were reacting to intel they were getting from the French. They were being told that a MASSIVE expansion was in the wings. They were being told that a HUGE longer range rocket was deep into development. The Germans were going to gang together their engines to create a monster missile. ( This is actually true.) No-one knew just how fast this project would come along. No-one knew if the Germans were going to greatly improve their aiming accuracy. They'd ALREADY introduced the world's first Smart Bomb. They'd been experimenting with the world's first SAM, too. The prototype was massively instrumented -- and fell into Allied hands. If that guidance system had been retrofitted to the V-2 -- good grief. THIS is what the British were facing. THIS is what they are reacting to. Once V-2 launches halted, then trickled on, well, priorities had moved on. When it counted, the V2 'problem' was at the top of the list.
This is the ONLY explanation for why Monty got total priority and why the Scheldt fell to the back-burner. Once you accept these facts, everything else falls into place. Suddenly, Monty, Ike and Churchill don't look so stupid.
If you're going to take the island -- why not take the WHOLE ball of wax? So that's what Monty shot for. MG would kill two birds with one campaign. Indeed, getting across the Rhine would absolutely shut down even nuisance V-2 attacks. Driving on and on to Berlin was a pure fantasy. For by this point it was obvious that trucks couldn't provide that much strategic logistical reach. The rail system and ports would have to be restored. And the storms of Autumn would surely shut down the 35,000 tons per day coming over the beach at Omaha. Yes, it was still up and running. Omaha's 'instant port' didn't stop until the weather made it unworkable.
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@Sanders... you're not my college professor. These days we have Google. At my rate of pay, zero, I'm willing to post the facts as best I know them after fifty-years. I'm not willing to pull through half-a-century's worth of books and articles.
If you use your HEAD you'd understand that the V-2s sold the project to Ike. The idea that Monty was just going for the bridges would have been a total non-starter. Ike had shot down Monty's grand vision time and time again -- going all the way back to Normandy.
When Monty brought up the reality that V-2s were ruining London -- Ike was SOLD.
BTW, for your edification: the British -- with the highest secrecy -- got the Germans to recalibrate their V-1s so as to drop short. This was done by way of turned German agents in London. They just kept reporting that the V-1s were flying past the city -- and hitting empty farmland. Heh. Good one.
So the Nazis kept choking the range back -- such that they were now landing on Tunbridge Wells... which was where Ike, himself, was hidden away. (!!!!) The area was chosen because Kent was up-scale with lots of nice homes -- and had a low population density. It was this latter fact that had the V-1s sent its way.
There were so many V1s landing on top of Ike that he moved to France WEEKS early. This entailed a tremendous disruption as he insisted on this on short notice. By this time his HQ had the manning usually associated with a brigade -- if not a small division -- only most of the fellas were officers or high non-com officers.
NOW you can see why Monty's plea that the V-2s had to be shut down RIGHT NOW hit home. This is why Ike didn't even ask Tedder his opinion. Tedder tried to get the damn operation cancelled -- but it was too late. Ike would not go back on his pledge to Monty -- even though Tedder, Bradley, Patton, Hodges, and others were all howling. Tedder saw everything that was to come to pass. He knew the personalities -- and had outstanding judgment. When it was all over, Ike admitted to Tedder -- Tedder was right again!
Tedder argued, correctly, that it was MUCH wiser to just keep the pedal to the metal and never let Jerry get back on his toes. At the rate 21st AG was advancing, the V2 problem would take care of itself without the paras. Indeed, the paras ought to be saved for the Rhine.
Tedder never seems to get enough ink. Tedder was Ike's COO -- actual chief of operations. He let Ike take all of the limelight -- while he did plenty of heavy lifting, himself.
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@ The colonel...
In "Patton", the movie, Omar Bradley explains to Patton that SHAEF has new priorities.
1) Churchill demanded that Monty stop the V-2 attacks.
2) 12th Army Group would NOT get its normal supply of gasoline, etc.
3) Because it had to go to 21st Army Group. ( Monty, his peer )
4) Patton, you're a pain in the neck.... Obey orders... I do.
Elsewhere in Bradley's memoirs and biographies it's repeatedly established that 2,000 GMC trucks were promptly diverted to 21st AG. My own father drove one... until it was taken away for for MG.
Yup. So he had a week's 'vacation.'
The movie is relevant because Bradley -- basically -- wrote the script. For financial reasons, the money went to his wife. (!) The scene where Bradley tells Patton he's a pain in the neck is straight from the actual event.
The credits are inverted. The actual author is BRADLEY. He used ghost writers -- and then un-ghosted them -- so as to ghost himself.
Bradley wrote the grosser script for "Patton" but did not want that fact publicly know. Note how many scenes in the film turn ENTIRELY upon Bradley and Patton. Yup. Those scenes were not fiction. They constitute a docudrama.
The scenes that don't involve Bradley came from well established records.
For you Brits: officers are NEVER to strike an enlisted man -- and vice versa. So, regardless of the condition of the GIs -- Patton had REALLY crossed the line. A lesser figure would've been busted out for such a stunt.
You'll never convince me, or anyone, that an AG Commander was not totally in the loop on strategic thinking. That was their primary task.
The total absurdity of crossing the Rhine// Waal into Germany must be evident: it's NOT tank country. Holland is like Switzerland: before airpower and parachute troops, Holland was impossible to invade.
The French were stymied during the War of the Spanish Succession.
Strangely, DD tanks were at hand -- hundreds of them. Jeeps in their thousands were to hand. DUKWs were to hand, too. Monty and Browning didn't ASK FOR THEM.
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@Burns
Can't you get anything right? Generals LIE. Check out Bradley and Manstein -- et. al.
In his writing Monty is HIDING all of the Allied intelligence and discussion that had been rolling along for MONTHS. The true nature of the V-2 peril came from the FRENCH. Their spy was sleeping with the SS General in charge. The RAF had been all over the V2 project going back many months.
For the last time:
CHURCHILL called the tune;
Monty obeyed orders;
Ike was INSTANTLY persuaded -- didn't even pass it by Tedder. (!)
The trickle V2 fire AFTER MG was merely an irritant. Before MG, Churchill, Monty and Ike all thought that the V2 could reverse the course of the war. Nazi propaganda claimed it was so. They also KNEW that the island was launch central. The entire launch procedure was replicated by the British after the war - with captured SS rocket troops. You can view it on UTube.
Moving their parade to a new launch zone was quite a production... since they had virtually no gasoline... and were running low on locomotion. The RAF had flown no end of recon // reccee missions over the island, day and night. The insane level of FLACK at night is what caused Browning to lay out the terrible drop zones for MG.
The tale of soft turf is a ruse. Parachute troops LOVE soft ground. In the whole scheme of the Airborne -- gliders were deemed BACK-UP. Somehow, in the heat of the moment, they were brought in during the original drop. Just dumb!
FINALLY -- IKE shot down Monty's single thrust idea at every other point of the war.
BTW, if you think about it, Sicily was a Monty single thrust -- until Patton threw away Monty's over-write of his own plan -- which entailed him marching east from Palermo. Monty was truly pissed to see Patton get his way. The blow-back came as soon as Salerno. Monty deliberately got the S L O W S. Gallipoli Narvik Winston had his back.
The critical problem for 21st Army Group -- the LOWER Rhine is a bitch -- it defeated virtually every army in history. ALL successful commanders -- once the word got out -- took the southern route. Longer was QUICKER. In the era of trucks, the distance difference was meaningless. Terrain was critical.
Patton and Bradley were flipping out because they KNEW that they had to get into the super fortresses before Hitler corrected things. Even with scrub formations defending, taking Metz was a first class BITCH.
C. Ryan spent years in research -- and never discovered what you Brits tell me was plain in your face obvious. In the film, you have to love the way the ferries evaporate from the tale. The Grenadiers were WISE to not advance into the night after Nijmegan. (SP?) The Jerries were ferrying over heavy equipment EVERY night.
Monty began MG with total confidence in Browning. After MG, Monty fire him. The ultimate humiliation: being sent to a desk job in India... not any part of the final campaign.
In both the American and British armies, to be sent out of theatre was the supreme burn. All of their peers knew that they were skunked.
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@ Burns
Patton's route was -- and ever remains -- THE classic route into Germany from France.
In an era of trucks, pure distance became almost meaningless. The USA never ran out of logistical reach because they never ran out of ever more 2.5 ton trucks. So many that they were backed up in England. The Pentagon assumed that truck losses would be vastly higher than events proved. That's why America had trucks coming out of its ears.
IKE stopped Patton.
The flick you doubt is nothing more than scenematic testimony by BRADLEY. He wrote those lines. The convo was strictly private at the time. Bradley was the only surviving witness -- and a witness privy to EVERYTHING. He was, de facto, the American ground commander. 6th Army Group (Devers) was out of the Med and notionally under Alexander. [ Obviously, only on paper. Once the 6th AG merged with the 12th AG Alexander had backed entirely away from further involvement. He had all of Italy on his plate.]
It was PATTON that split the Jerries in two in Sicily. It was BRADLEY that tore into Patton's reputation -- not Monty. And he did so mostly within the film you dismiss.
Both Bradley and Monty were wrong. Going up the coast, side by side would've been logistically insane. What tactician would cross mountains instead of the pass? No-one.
What pissed off BRADLEY -- far more than Monty -- was that he was junior to Patton -- and was getting NO PRESS. He -- at the time -- believed that he was in danger of being stopped out as merely a corps commander.
Being a genius ( est IQ 153 ) it was galling for Bradley to see sloppy, impulsive staff work. In his own bio, Bradley openly wrote that he STILL couldn't understand how Patton got such good performance out of a staff that Bradley wholly disdained.
The crazy idea that Bradley was in Patton's corner must be dismissed. It must have totally stunned Bradley that Patton gifted him 1st Army -- by breaking the ultimate taboo -- slapping an enlisted man -- while in a hospital -- no less.
What Bradley didn't know, nor did Ike, was that Marshall had already decided that it was IMPOSSIBLE for Patton to lead 1st Army. Why? The Japanese ambassador sent massive missives to Tokyo. In one of them he detailed Adolf's opinion that ONLY Patton would lead the Americans in Overlord. And once his leadership was correctly established, Adolf would send his ENTIRE French garrison to oppose him.
This was exactly what London and Washington wanted to prevent. In this regard, the English performed one of the greatest deceptions in military history. Astonishing, really.
McNair was originally supposed to lead 12th AG. About which Bradley has lied his ass off about. McNair had no other job at that time, having previously been in charge of the USA build-up -- which was effectively over.
So what you have is Bradley telling you the absolute truth one moment -- when it makes him look good -- and then lying his ass off when the truth would diminish is awesomeness.
In sum: the classic, striving, climbing, military general.
A pattern you'll find in Monty, Patton... and many another.
Instead of quoting obtuse historians, you must use your HEAD. All of the decisions in written form were reached many hours if not days and weeks before. For security reasons, generals don't even let their staffs in on what's to come -- until there really is no other choice. Being inside the insider's loop is what command is really all about.
All in all, the Anglo-American alliance of WWII makes all other collaborations look bad. Think of the French-British command situation in WWI. That crap is exactly what Marshall and Ike had to stop. De Gaulle was astounded when Ike treated him as peer to FDR and Winston. He was allowed inside the insider's information loop. He was totally ungracious - and rightfully earned the ire of Churchill.
Let's face it, De Gaulle was a prick, a genius, but still a prick.
In sum: with all of these inflated egos bloating around it's amazing that Ike could keep the crew together. Ike's right-hand man was Tedder, of whom not enough is praised.
The fight was against Adolf's tyranny -- not which peacock had the nicest military record.
BTW, Monty, Bradley and Patton and all the rest had their days of excellence -- and some full on fiascos, too.
Let it go. They're all dead.
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@ Burns
As for MG -- Monty shielded Churchill's involvement -- his insistence on it. His line of reasoning TOTALLY turned on what the French spy was feeding him -- and she was always right. London knew practically all they needed to know about the V2 -- in terms of stopping it -- they couldn't once it got going.
From the first, the RAF spared no resources (fighters// recce ) trying to shoot up the rockets before launch.
As Desert Storm showed, even decades later, neither the RAF nor USAF could perform a decent job against Saddam.
So the counter-V1 program that had worked so well -- all of those launch ramps being destroyed -- would not work. As you well know, the NAZIS built the first 'IBM' launch base. It looked all the world like today's USAF Minuteman in a silo scheme.
The RAF pulverized it. That's one reason the V2 arrived so late in the war. Plan A was destroyed by the RAF! So von Braun's team had to develop -- on the fly -- the mobile launch system. That the Jerries didn't see that they HAD to be mobile -- well, I guess they were not super men after all.
Under Plan A, the Nazis figured to launch and launch and launch from the handful of ultra-bunkers that they'd crafted. This would save them a LOT of gasoline -- and actually decrease the need for launch crews. The silos would be factories of death.
This is the kind of stuff that had Winston freaking out about. He put his own son-in-law on the case. Any news about the V2 went straight past all other commands straight to the top.
Even Monty would've loved to have just carried on the same old way. 21st AG was advancing VERY rapidly and in good order. That would look great in the history books, every general saw that.
Monty was no child. He knew that he could never stop Patton from grabbing headlines. But then, Monty was ALL OVER the news with his victories, much to the dismay of the Americans. Their desks were over flowing with British newspapers -- whereas American papers were at least a day or more behind the British. On some days, the British press covered the entire front page with the 21st AG. Well, what would you expect?
Whiners need to grow up.
That MANY British authors disdain America, its army, its culture -- infects their take on reality.
Check out the crazed bias of Zucker versus Trump. Everything that Zucker hates in Trump is but a mirror of Zucker's own personality. This is typical human behavior -- to see in others ones very own faults.
Bradley, Patton and Monty were of exactly that stripe. In the movie, Bradley -- its ghost author -- paints himself as a SAINT. What tripe.
He takes virtually no swipes at Monty at all. Indeed, virtually every subordinate commander under Monty sung his praises. But then, that's also true of Patton. My father worships him. When his division was under Bradley -- it bled to death. When under Patton things ran smooth. It was like night and day.
So Bradley has everything backwards. Patton was the GI's general -- flash and all -- whereas Bradley -- the genius -- is bleeding his AG white. BTW, Bradley NEVER let go of 1st Army. Marshall stopped him from growing it even larger than 15 divisions. So he kept the best.
When 3rd Army broke out across France -- it was HALF the size of 1st Army. It was to take weeks to bring the rest of 3rd Army over. Patton was well set to liberate Paris. Bradley stopped him by vectoring him south. Yet, no-one comments on that vanity.
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@LtBrown
For anyone curious as to what is entailed in making an ice bridge, check out "Ice Road Truckers."
Keep in mind that the American & Canadian truckers are crossing virtual mill ponds versus the mighty Volga.
During the annual freeze-up the Volga cascades relentless compression ridges -- each much taller than a commercial truck. They start out looking nothing too spectacular -- and then they just build and compound away. By the end, they look like the scene from "Superman II", the movie, where the man of steel has his abode in a crystal palace of ice shards. Superman has much better house-keeping, that's for sure.
Even Lake Ladoga was a piece of cake compared to the Volga.
The Red Army had combat engineers hopping all over the southern wing of the Uranus advance. Getting down, across, and up the Volga bank was a first class bitch. It's the reason that the German army thought twice about marching eastward to encircle Stalingrad, something that most cardboard generals would've thought of straight off.
The northern wing of Uranus was LONG. You were still crossing major rivers, but at least the crossings were east and north of the battle front. Still, the Reds had to hide their logistical preparations where they crossed such obvious channel points.
The Germans arrogantly assumed that the Soviets just couldn't do something that the Germans couldn't do. It's a fact of WWII, the Reds, the Brits and the Yanks schooled the German army on logistics -- and the dullards never picked up on the craft.
Once the Red army was across the Don, it still had to contend with peasant tankers who only knew how to beat a burrow// ass. The reason that the T-34s had epic failure rates turned largely on the astounding ignorance of its drivers -- and crews generally.
The contrast with the USA Armored Corps was night and day. The typical American tanker had been in his Sherman for about two years before it was sent into battle. ( 2nd, 3rd, 4th Armored, especially ) The result was that once they got away from head to head tank shots, they ran wild all over every German formation -- including Panther battalions. Even the pop-gun 75mm would destroy Panthers from the side or rear. This became the standard mode of counter-attack. Panthers were just mobbed. StgIII and Mark IV were at even greater hazard. This is why no German panzer attack really got rolling against the Americans. They needed to punch 'clean air' -- a tank-free seam.
During the Bulge, the 7th Armored and 10th Armored just ruined things for the Germans. Within days, Joachim Pieper's unstoppable panzers were stopped.
It never happened, but if Shermans and T-34s met, the Shermans would've utterly destroyed their opponents. The T-34 had about HALF the glacis armor of the Sherman, while their guns were rather similar in penetration. The Sherman would've been five times as reliable. So after but a few days of combat, there would've been no T-34s left. Most would 've been abandoned due to running gear issues.
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@Ixsalit
At this scale, your best stats come from gender imbalance.
Keep in mind that the Red army used widows by the thousand, too.
The answer is stark: Russian fatalities were EPIC.
The widow count was through the roof.
BTW, the STAVKA attitude towards its troops is reflected in such terms as: 'Cucumbers.' -- Yes, that was the slang lingo for fresh meat sent to the front.
When ordered to cross the Dneiper, an entire company of cucumbers immediately followed orders -- and jumped into the freezing river. All were lost. An hour later, the engineers arrived with boats and paddles. They were pissed. All of the cucumbers were missing. Now they would be in trouble.
All of this was recounted by a 1st Lt in the Red Army. He was an eye witness to this folly. (Artillery observer, he was there should the Krauts show up on the far bank.) He had no authority -- and just sat their in amazement and disgust as his superiors threw the boys away. Later, he cried himself to sleep. With boats, the cucumbers did get to the west bank.
The cucumbers jumped into the water because of insane Red army demands. ANY cucumber questioning an officer's order was pulled out of the unit and sent to a penal battalion -- PDQ -- never to be heard from again.
Did you ever hear about Stalin's take-a-shower order? May 1943 EVERY front line trooper had to take a shower. IIRC this was a Sunday, too. (A courier had showed up at STAVKA smelling like walking chit. ) So it was with total amazement that the Germans were treated to an astounding sight: shower equipment for field troops was erected in plain sight -- right up to the front lines. Then ENTIRE formations lined up to take turns showering -- obviously as fast as possible. The Germans held their fire. And then, when it seemed as if every Red was standing in line, every German formation across the 2,000 km front opened up with mortars and machine guns, belt-fed, too.
It was time to call up for fresh cucumbers! Virtually no Soviet trooper escaped German fire. If a general attack had been authorized, the front line would've marched east at quite a clip. But it wasn't after Stalingrad, the Heer was quite happy to just sit in its trench line.
This entire travail was published in Russian, over twenty-years ago. It's one of THOUSANDS of such similar tales. Most of these cluster phu ucks could not be exposed until 1992.
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Stalin was negotiating with the Poles as late as July 1939 -- proposing that his armies be given a free corridor straight through Poland so as to attack the Nazis in conjunction with Poland and France. Britain was figured by Stalin to be a non-factor on the ground. Warsaw, amazingly, didn't trust Stalin. Go figure. So, Stalin double-crossed his erstwhile allies and launched WWII in Europe. Yeltsin's late 90s presentation to the world's press made it crystal clear that STALIN, not Hitler, launched WWII by way of the anti-Western Pact. Hitler always wanted a prompt war, see Munich, but was totally frustrated by both Goering (Munich again) and strategic realities (Oil, nickel, rubber, ... the list is long) The Soviet theory -- soon proven catastrophically wrong -- was that the Reds could 'aim' Adolf against the West and after a huge blood-letting the Reds could/would come in the back-door... reaching all the way to the Atlantic. Virtually to a man, Western experts are still stuck on the idea that Adolf started the war. BTW, the negotiated deal was for BOTH the Nazis and the Bolsheviks to invade 9-1-39. That was put in writing. 'Clever' Stalin delayed his entry until the onus totally fell upon Hitler. This entirely fake fumbling was to result in Barbarossa. One should note that MORE nations were invaded by the Reds as a result of the pact than by the Nazis -- right up until 5-10-1940. (Finland, Romania, the Baltics, Poland -- even a touch of Slovakia was taken when the. Nazis invaded from the west. ( The passes through the eastern mountains)
As for the Pact: Stalin had the original -- it was drafted in Moscow -- and Hitler merely got a 'carbon copy.' (!) It was the original that Yeltsin presented to the world. The Press was gobsmacked. Allied war propaganda was proven to be totally wrong. The West became allied with the initiator of the conflict -- the fellow that gasolined the French air force out of the sky. Yes, the crazy high number of sorties over the Meuse were ONLY possible because of Soviet crude oil. Paris never planned on that.
Poland's aggressive policy consisted of not trusting Stalin. Oh, my!
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mike mcmike Obviously you need to read "The True Believer" by Hoffer. This little tome is considered by all to be in the top-three political tracts of the 20th Century.
As for the 'converts' -- I'm talking explicitly about Top Politicians in the national legislature, mayors, and others of similar rank. This offer was NOT extended to the hoi poloi which you are describing. They were NOT part of the 72-hour "join us or flee" edict.
There were true Conservatives in the legislature. Those guys were NOT invited into the Nazi party. They just went into internal exile -- that is -- prompt retirement. There were no jobs/ government positions for them.
Socialists were kindred spirits. They merely had to jump from Stalin to Hitler. No other attitude adjustment was required.
Again: read "True Believer" to understand the dynamics described here.
There could never be an adjustment between Hitler and Conservative Germans. They were all-the-way-out of government. Yes, they had to keep their heads down. You'd be shocked as to how many went clean through the war with their noses clean -- pensioned off by the Nazis.
It's for the above reason that I gag and howl at all the cinematic references (Hollywood) about the Nazis sending Socialists to Dachau. Actually, if you kept your mouth shut -- and stayed lucky -- the SD was not really interested in you.
That all changed in a stroke if the Nazis thought that you were an activist. Free-thinkers were sent to Dachau in a steady stream.
BTW, Dachau was not only torture college -- but it was the only camp that entirely focused on POLITICALS. Early on, many of those Politicals were Jews. It took a while for the full insanity of Nazism to kick in. High profile Jews were not sent to the larger death camp system. They were tortured to death right there at Dachau.
Dachau was Camp #1 in the entire evil scheme. EVERY camp monster learned his evil craft while at Dachau. That's where the sadists 'made their bones.' Truly evil cruelty was propagated outward from Dachau.
BTW, don't believe Wiki. Dachau was founded by the SA -- not the SS/ SD. That all changed after the Night of the Long Knives. Eicke took over. He merited hanging, without a doubt, but beat the noose by death at the front, 1943. He was the villain that crafted the rationale for death camp torture. Mere murder was simply not enough for Eicke.
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mike mcmike Since you are plainly a True Believer -- evidence, so much in abundance -- will have no impact on you.
I'm not going to g@@gle for McMike.
But for the general readership, IIRC, the magic 72-hour window occurred after Hindenburg died -- over a three-day-weekend. IIRC sometime around August 1934.
McMike -- virtually NO-ONE fled. Hitler got 97+% to sign on the line that was dotted. Even Socialists and Stalinists were not so crazy as to actually go to the USSR. They knew, far better than most, just what was up in the Soviet Union. They had many personal contacts -- and many were in the Trotsky fan club, to boot.
In sum, your entire world view is false. After the 'mass conversion' there were NO Nazi reprisals for the very dudes that they'd been street fighting with for more than a decade!
For both factions were minorities compared to the general German population.
As seen today, Germans want Conservative Values and Socialist Outcomes. Note that Merkel, herself, was an EAST GERMAN college professor. No wonder she's a go-along politician.
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@Neil
Your line of argumentation is weird.
1) Ju-52s are TRI motors -- although I'd agree that they follow the stats for modern single engine reciprocating aircraft.
The ONLY salient point to modern readers is that the Ju-52 fleet had to fly OUT, land, take OFF, and Land on one fuel load.
That's brutal even now, let alone back in late '42.
This equation was last seen during the Berlin Airlift... and at least the Red Air Force was not shooting down USAF/ RAF machines.
( France was a joke at the time. )
2) The BIG issue for the Luftwaffe was that they couldn't easily avoid Soviet FLAK: 76.2mm guns -- and the occasional 85mm gun.
Either one was more than able to rip the Ju-52 to pieces.
These FLAK batteries were relevant because the Luftwaffe quickly determined that they couldn't get into the kessel during daylight.
Which rather stands to reason: most of the 24 hours available were in the dark in the first place.
The number of Luftwaffe pilots able to fly at night, navigate at night, was VERY much less than the total of pilots in the ranks.
This latter fact does not get much mention, BTW.
When you add up all the risks, the damages, the kessel was destroying he Luftwaffe. The Germans were not losing the average pilot, they were losing he very elite pilots.
This was all compounded during the Spring of '43. You'd scarcely believe the Lufwaffe fatalities when the weather broke.
The Red Air Force had been TRANSFORMED.
It was now receiving AMAZING amounts of British ( think Iranian ) and American avgas.
Yes, yes, the British, British Petroleum, were shunting astounding amounts of avgas up from the Persian Gulf once the rail lines were squared away.
Even before Uranus, the USA was shipping astounding amounts of LendLease aid: jeeps, tanks, -- the WORKS.
It's FALSE that LendLease kicked in only after Kursk.
LendLease was RESPONSIBLE for BOTH Uranus and Kursk.
The flood had already started.
1942 LendLease reached astounding figures -- from the start.
It just kept intensifying as the war years rolled on.
This causes moderns to miss the astounding impact of LendLease.
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BTW, the Americans found that drivers were the WORST of maintenance labor -- since they'd been up for 48-hours straight on a jag of coffee. My father's V-letters show him writing, ever writing, down into babble. When I converted them to English, (spelling issues) he couldn't dope out what he was writing about. That's how frazzled war time driving became. BTW, every 5th GMC 2.5ton truck had a ring mounted .50 cal machine gun -- because the US Army thought that the Luftwaffe would show up. Thanks to the USAAF, they were a no-show -- which is good. After 48-hours of driving, no driver could've hit anything in the sky. During the Red Ball, the routine was to drive 72-hours straight -- basically until you dropped. The US Army kept adding drivers and trucks straight through the project. Monty terminated the Red Ball with his 2,000 GMC truck request. Yes, it was the BRITISH that terminated the Red Ball -- and it was the Red Ball that was supporting 12th Army Group. This is the event that Bradley and Patton are howling about in the film "Patton." Hitler stopped the Western Allies by shooting up London with V-2s. Winnie, not Monty, was the inspiration for Market-Garden, and London was the reason why.
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Folks, once Graber got across Arnhem bridge -- before Frost even reached it -- the ENTIRE operation was dead.
Nijmegen bridge became ENTIRELY irrelevant with Graber owning the southern end of the Arnhem bridge.
Browning is the ONLY fella that can be blamed, he set the landing zones, and overruled Urquhart and Gavin's requests to land on the critical ISLAND.
The land between Nijmegen and Arnhem is an ISLAND. Until the bridges were built, that farmland was accessed by river ferry. The Germans used one of those ferries to shift men onto the island even after Frost interdicted the Arnhem bridge.
Without the Arnhem bridge Market Garden was DEAD, DEAD, DEAD. It's that simple.
Browning was 'fired' ASAP, by Monty; sent in disgrace off to hide in India, to a staff job of no importance. When you're an army commander, that's pure punishment.
Gavin was promoted to major general instantly after Market Garden.
Those are the irrefutable facts of Market Garden.
XXX Corps, the Americans, the Poles are all irrelevant side players, reduced to that status by the critical flaw in Brown's plan.
Monty can't really be blamed, as he deferred to Browning as England's absolute expert in airborne operations... for understandable reasons. That's why MG doesn't even look like a Montgomery operation. Set-piece battles were his speciality.
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Critically, and for decades keep secret in all memoirs -- the ENTIRE Ju-52 fleet was grounded when Hitler arrived at the front to direct Guderian SOUTH. Yes, the Luftwaffe had been bailing out the Heer -- and especially itself -- by fling critical repair parts and even petrol all the way to the front. The Red Air Force was 'missing' at this point of the war, so the Luftwaffe got away with murder. The Luftwaffe would no longer be able to bail out the panzer spearheads -- and Hoth and Guderian wanted to know why. Like the IJN's deceits to Tojo, the Luftwaffe air-cargo command was hiding just how many Ju-52s were grounded because they landed on Russian farmland -- with NO PREPARATIONS to speak of. The contrast with the USAAF, USMC, et. al is striking. On a total panic basis, Junkers came out with a repair-kit solution that was then cranked out by every manufacturer in sight... including its rivals. ( I was a simple kit. ) All of this was done on oral orders. Don't look for surviving documents unless you're Mr. Lucky.
Point #2 -- The Russian rail grid was NEVER BALLASTED in the daze of the Tsar. You know, the fella that laid a straight-edge on a map and directed the builders of HIS railroad to follow that line -- skipping all of the peasants between Saint Petersberg and Moscow. The Tsar was never going to ride the rails during the mud-seasons -- so think of all the money he saved by not hauling ballast all across Mother Russia. Further, unlike Western Nations, in the west of Russia there were virtually no hard-rock quarries to speak of. They would have to be built -- on a panic basis -- if you wanted quality ballast. Common rocks just don't suffice. We're talking about, ultimately, millions of tons of ballast -- that had to be hauled a vast distance before it could be laid under the sleepers/railroad ties. The ONLY double-track run in the USSR ran from Karkov to Moscow. It was so built because Stalin constructed a VAST, VAST rank of food warehouses to hold all of the grain the KGB stole from the growers. They were NOT burned down -- but captured during 1941 -- because burning Moscow's food supply was too daunting without a written Stalin order. ( I'm sure you all remember the mega-warehouse that held Leningrad's food for the winter. It was so huge that the Germans blew it up first -- with Ju-87s. Same thing here.) This Moscow-Karkov connection explains why so many mega-battles were fought nearby. Stalin never failed to shunt reinforcements there. From Autumn 41 to Summer of 43, count how many battles were a two-day drive from Karkov.
Because the ENTIRE system ( exception noted ) was unballasted ( a surprise for the Germans ) it basically shut down during the mud months. By shut down I mean that the main-line locomotives would fall off the rails into the mud. Thousands of Soviet engineers entered the GULAG with that blot on their record!
The change of rail gauge is wildly over-emphasized. The KILLERS were a total lack of ballast -- everywhere you turned -- and destroyed sleepers -- by the million. Green lumber makes for rotten -- and rotting sleepers. Even pulling cross-ties out of France -- and rails, too -- could not rescue the Germans. BTW, the CSA -- circa 1863 -- -showed how a single locomotive can destroy thousands of sleepers in a day by using a custom sleeper-plow. That lesson was not forgotten by the Reds.
Finally, when the Red Army needed to link Stalingrad to Astrakhan -- they built 15 KM a day -- by not laying ballast under their sleepers -- and skipping two out of three as they moved ahead. In this they were entirely replicating the American approach, for that was how the first track was laid to craft the Continental Railroad. The missing cross-ties were inserted after-the-fact by 'repair' crews. It was important that the money was in the bank, first. When this tempo of track lay-down was photographed by the Luftwaffe, the Heer was stunned.
The Nazis were defeated by the Soviet rail net. The Nazi Power of the Will did not pencil out.
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The only gambit that had a chance: ships in the Baltic change the numbers for AGN. Barges in the Black sea change the number for AGS.
BTW, Hitler was wrong, way wrong. AGN HAD to be the priority -- BECAUSE it could be supported by Baltic shipping -- especially to include barges. Yes, the Krauts DID use barges -- both north and south, too. However, they did so in a most trivial fashion. So much so that most histories don't even mention it having even happened.
It is critical to Nazi success to reduce the scope of the mega-campaign. Once Leningrad is captured, it becomes a port for Germany. Leningrad is the CENTRAL point for Soviet heavy industry -- in 1941. It's where Soviet heavy tanks were designed and produced. It's where the Russian rail system started. (British imports, later the French...)
It's a critical city for the Soviet economy for just this reason.
Once Leningrad is taken 4th Panzer Army is permanently released to AGC. All of this had to happen at lightning speed -- only possible if the Baltic sea link is employed.
AGS has the same dynamic -- logistically. However, Stalin made sure that Ukraine had NOTHING. The entire 'southern orientation' was flatly wrong. 1st Panzer Army should've been allocated to AGC. Yes, it needed all four panzer armies... all of the trucks to speak of.
Slid past, steam locomotives need water tanks -- just all over. Most trains could not travel 100kM without getting watered up... usually much less. Freights ( known as 'drags' in the industry ) suck down water. (It's the weight.) The Germans critically needed Diesel-electric locomotives at the front -- for they would not need so much support. They would also burn heavy middle distillate (ie Diesel fuel) that no others could use -- and which coal-to-liquids plants produce in massive amounts.
The entire campaign was based upon emotion. Crazy, it was. Hitler lost the moment he crossed the frontier. You can't win a motorized war without oil. Period.
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@Xuan
Panzerfausts operated as a deterent more than anything.
The operator was expected to fire from a spider hole, building or rubble, though training films show guys firing largely from the open, for obvious camera needs.
They were effective enough that when found by Americans, they were ALWAYS snapped up, being deemed much better than the Bazooka.
US Army stats show that tank destroyers were almost always used in the same role as the early versions of the German Mark Four tank: namely to fire high explosives, indirectly, from immediately behind the forward edge of the battle front. Hence high explosive rounds fired indirectly out numbered direct fire shots 11:1. { Like the Germans, the USA just loved to collect statistics.)
After the war, the USA determined that entire concept ought to be dropped, and so it was.
The open top did make for easy ammo loading... very handy when firing so many shots indirectly, but not so hot when receiving counter-battery fire.
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@Marko
You're deluded. Patton was relegated to 3rd Army because Hitler flatly told the Baron that if he showed up any earlier, he'd unleash his entire strategic reserve at once.
As for Bradley, he was never intended to be 12th Army Group commander. McNair was. But you can't lead when you're dead.
Promptly after McNair died at the front, Marshall had to make Bradley AG commander. There was absolutely no-one else in a position to move up, not even Patton. And Patton had already shown that he could go off the rails. Whereas Bradley was a Marshall boy to the core.
Bradley naturally took his 1st Army staff -- on no notice -- and kicked McNair's staff out of the way. Bradley never explained in his writings who his staff replaced ultra-quick. He pretended that McNair's staff wasn't even in the theatre.
But he facts are that McNair was ONLY there to take command of 12th AG. He was at the front to familiarize himself and to show his flag and his bona fides, which cost him his life.
Patton didn't need ANY education from Bradley, the other-way-round happened all the time.
The Cobra breakout was Patton's idea, not Bradley. Patton wrote it all up in his diary BEFORE he met Bradley in Normandy. Bradley instantly adopted it as his own -- and lied about all of this to the end of his days. Of course, Cobra has Patton's style all over it, not Bradley's.
Patton didn't need ANY explanation WRT the broad front. You won't find Patton begging for a narrow thrust into Germany -- the Monty plea. Patton just wanted to remain in supply. After that, he didn't really care what the other armies were doing -- not all that much.
His ego was such that naturally he figured he'd somehow end up in the vanguard.
Reason #1 was that HIS was the traditional invasion route going back to ancient times. All other armies were marching towards either a forest wall or epic river crossings. In the south, crossing the Rhine is tough, but not ridiculous.
When it happened, Patton didn't even need an artillery prep. He actually snuck across! The total lack of artillery completely faked out the Germans. Normally, artillery is the American calling card. The Germans figured that they'd have hours of advance notice, and so should hold back from the river, only advancing when the artillery fire calmed down. This thinking was exactly what Patton saw coming.
Marko, it's obvious that you post to troll, as you don't have any insightful commentary.
As for logistics, those were ENTIRELY handled by General Lee. He had a supply army that was fifteen times the size of the fighting front. Consequently, all front line commanders never had to sweat logistics whatsoever. It was totally outside their command. All that was necessary was phone calls and paperwork. And up the trucks would come, by the thousand.
Inre Rommel, his problem was MALTA. Bletchley Park, and the RAF. Bletchley was finking on Rommel -- telling Monty just how rotten his supply situation was. Indeed, at one point, Monty had to disobey orders and inform Smuts that London was reading German transmissions. This news was delivered in person, in private, and so that Smuts would continue to press the line with his blooded South African division. This he did. It was this final attack that broke Rommel's position. (near the coast, XIII Corps, IIRC)
Operationally, Rommel was brilliant, with a ton of prior battles to demonstrate his expertise. So you're post indicates that you don't know what the hell you're talking about.
As for myself, 45 years of obsession builds a picture.
If there was any money in it, I'd write my own history of the war.
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@John Burns
Can't you get ANYTHING right?
Patton had no involvement with the 17 Airborne Division. Hard to imagine him opining on it. It was up with 21st Army Group, so it's not as if he'd even be getting after action reports.
The path to Bastogne was blocked by the 7th German Parachute Division. The fighting went on around the clock -- in the dead of Winter. The fighting was so intense that the leading American battalion and its counter part German defender lost ALL of their officers... save a single American Lt. Every local building was flattened -- except for their cellars -- which is where you'd find surviving locals.
The rest of your drivel is so crazy and off base it constitutes an Alternate Reality.
BTW, the #1 detractor of Patton is and remains Bradley. He was a real meat-grinder. ( Hurtgen ) Patton has the best stats, going away.
The reason that the Panther Brigades existed was because Adolf had given up on the Heer. He had no intention of ever rebuilding formations that lacked the correct Nazi zeal. These brigades were, AFAIK, ALWAYS given Panthers. I've never heard of one getting Mark IV tanks.
Green troops routinely destroyed the final drive// transmission of their Panthers. In one battle -- against Patton's 4th Armored -- 35 Panthers were ruined and lost from this very fault in a single afternoon. This was a crisis for Berlin. Speer was called in to face Hitler over the issue.
It was resolved that the drivers needed more training -- and that -- above all -- Panthers had to be driven slowly, softly, whenever they went 'off-road.' The published stats for Panthers proved to be all wrong. Because of the weakly engineered final drive (the Panther was over-weight) panzer crews were instructed to take it easy, to never apply full power from a dead start.
It's for this reason the typical wargame values for Panther mobility are MILES off from reality. It ended up being a slower tank than the Mark IV. ( On flat level, paved, test track ground, it could look impressive, however. )
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@John Burns
Get help.
The reason that Ike couldn't let Patton touch Overload was due to Purple intercepts -- achieved by the British. The US had given London one Purple machine. Though it's a diplomatic code -- and you'd think it couldn't carry much military info...
Hitler talked up a storm with Baron Oshima:
I hope the wiki survives YouTube:
"Baron Hiroshi Ōshima (大島 浩 Ōshima Hiroshi, April 19, 1886 – June 6, 1975) was a general in the Imperial Japanese Army, Japanese ambassador to Germany before and during World War II — and unwittingly a major source of communications intelligence for the Allies. His role was perhaps best summed up by General George C. Marshall, who identified Ōshima as "our main basis of information regarding Hitler's intentions in Europe". After World War II, he was convicted of war crimes and sentenced to life imprisonment."
The Baron's most important contribution to the Allies was by way of telling us that Hitler was waiting for PATTON to show up before he'd release his entire strategic reserve.
Meaning, in this instance, the 1st SS Panzer Corps.
Contrary to popular histories, Hitler did NOT block the deployment of his panzer divisions. Just this corps, and a few Heer divisions. (116th immediately comes to mind )
In the event, the 12th SS was committed anyway by Hitler.
The 21st Panzer was automatically committed, even without contacting Berlin.
At every HQ there was a notice on the door:
If the Allies landed parachutists -- real or dummies -- a landing was on. All local forces were to be committed without further ado, by order of the Fuhrer. ( Other conditions would also trigger panzer release, but this one sticks out the most. Parachute dummies were detected no later than 12:30AM. They didn't put up much of a fight, BTW.)
Amazingly, most German commanders forgot this and other standing orders June 6, 1944 -- they were that excited.
It's with the above knowledge that you may come to realize why Patton's arrival was so delayed and why Hitler was paralysed about committing his panzers out of 15th Army. Instead, they just trickled in.
Our Russian friends ought to be reminded that the 9th and 10th SS Panzer Divisions were withdrawn from Poland to reinforce the German position in front of Caen. Then Bagration occurred. Whoops.
The Allies had sucked off: 1p,2p,9p,10p, 12p, 17mot SS divisions -- just in France alone.
The Russians faced 3p,5p,6p SS panzers. The rest were a motley crew of SS infantry and police units usually tasked with atrocities.
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@Sanders... don't write for me.
Compared to the Germans, the US Army had virtually infinite supplies -- as every captured German attested.
Bradley told Lee that he didn't need much more artillery after the break-out. That's how severe Victory Disease had gotten. This promptly led to ANOTHER supply crisis -- totally self-inflicted. It was patched over by using 6th Army Group's artillery supplies. Since these were trucked in FORD, not GMC trucks, Devers had to bring the ammo up out of Marseilles in Fords into the rear areas of 12th AG. Then the stuff was moved from Fords to GMCs for the next leg of the journey -- to 9th, 1st and 3rd Armies. (!) This crisis is mentioned by Bradley in his second autobiography of the campaign -- but almost entirely over looked by historians.
Marseilles was never crippled like Cherbourg, so 7th Army was able to start importing supplies right from the docks almost from the first. They had so many supplies that they fitted out 1st French Army -- on the fly. (!) Yup. This was totally unanticipated. The Rhone river valley boys had totally missed out on the 1940 campaign. They fell out into their ranks as the 7th Army advanced up country. They had their uniforms, they were trained reservists. They were missing all weapons. so 7th US Army simply diverted their supplies to flesh these divisions out. THAT'S how well endowed the US Army was -- across the board.
Somehow it doesn't sink in: the Allied generals were LYING: the V-2 problem caused ALL OTHER PRIORITIES to take a back seat. This is something that simply could not be admitted to at the time, nor even after the war. The V-2 problem is why Ike was brought around to accepting Monty's pitch in one single session -- Bradley and Patton had a fit. They were not consulted for any counter proposals.
BTW, note the goofs: the Brits missed the ferries -- both of them -- they failed to ask for jeeps, DUKWs -- both would've been decisive for MG.
My own Father sat on his azz during this period. The gasoline was just piling up in the PULTO storage tanks. No attempt was being made to drive it to the front PERIOD. Get it?
America had thousands of trucks IDLED at this time. Yup. When this latter on proved mighty embarrassing, it was scrubbed from the official accounts. There was NO WAY to make it look good.
General Lee had FAR MORE manpower than the front line army commanders. When Bradley pleaded for them to be diverted to his cause -- he was shot down in flames. Supply troops were simply not at all set up for front line duties. After basic, they'd never touched a rifle -- as a rule. As it was, Bradley was getting a regiment every 24 hours. He then wasted them in the Hurtgen -- another tale that the Army history does not want brought to full exposure.
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@Sanders...
At the scale of armies, Patton couldn't pull off the theft/ diversion you're dreaming of. One, he'd have to steal it all from Bradley, his boss. Such a stunt would get him sent back to the states. The diversion is a MYTH. 1st Army and 9th Army never faced shortages because of 3rd army. They got clipped by IKE and LEE. There were absolutely no work-arounds. A couple of sergeants have absolutely no influence at the scale required. They certainly DID help out with table chow. I'll give you that pranks were pulled. However, they didn't amount to a hill of beans.
The biggest drain on the supply echelon was the FRENCH civilians. Paris, alone, was a PITA. It sucked down supplies like an entire army. When the Black Market is invoked -- think Paris. The Allies found that feeding the civilians could not be avoided. This task was not in their battle plans. It never quite occurred to Allied commanders that blowing every rail bridge in France would then compel them to throw in thousands of trucks just to haul food to Paris.
My Father bitterly complained for decades about hauling coal to Paris on the Red Ball express. He couldn't understand it. I had to spell it out: French trains ran on coal. The French coal fields were still under German control, and the lines between Paris and the east were all busted up. THAT'S why thousands of tons of British coal was shipped on a panic basis to Paris in August. They didn't need it for heat -- but for their trains.
You'll look a VERY long time trying to find out about any of this in the written histories. Bringing the French rail net back up and running is deemed an unimportant side-show to the war. Of course, once it was running, the Red Ball was not needed. The trains were restored almost at the same time that Monty cleared the Scheldt.
Even Cherbourg became operational late in 1944, right in front of the worst weather. It became insanely busy straight through to the end of the war.
The PLUTO net was also doubled -- bringing pipes in in the Calais region on top of the Cherbourg operation. This is another event that is hard to find about in histories. You'd have to really dial deep to know of it. PLUTO was an awesome British invention -- and extremely significant for the prosecution of the campaign. It gets short shrift.
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@Sanders... the US armies were NOT in the British supply train. They NEVER took supplies away from 21st Army Group... EVER. PLUTO was designed and scaled from the outset for ALL of the Allied forces. So it was never the issue.
The 2,000 GMC trucks that Monty demanded -- he got. Their primary role, apparently, was to hump even more gasoline from PLUTO to the front. It would've been MUCH wiser for Monty to allocate the GMCs to XXX Corps. They were the only machines that had any chance at leaving the road (up on a berm) without instantly bogging down. Even so, they'd have to be only lightly loaded. Further, they'd have to fan out. The polders can't support repeated traffic. So every truck needed to create its own path.
No matter how strongly Bradley and Patton protested, modern Brits refuse to believe that these generals were CUT OFF from gasoline -- by Ike's order. Ike well knew that Patton would instantly try and make 'rock soup.' ( It's a hobo story, retold by Patton. )
Patton did NOT advance in an insubordinate manner. He advanced too rapidly to suit Monty because Patton had no rivers to cross! His only barrier, the Seine was solved by the Paris bridge network, which was not blown up. In contrast, everyone north of him faced ever widening rivers -- with Monty facing the worst of it. Just look at a map.
THIS is the reason why Patton was thrilled to be relegated to the southern arm of the advance. As a historian he knew that this was the traditional invasion route. Somehow that legacy does not sink in.
What really got Patton's goat was that he was almost able to take Metz via motor march. When he first approached it it was largely EMPTY. MG and the weather shift turned a cake-walk into a PITA. Patton KNEW that he was racing the calendar. He'd fought in that general area in WWI.
Stopping the Allied advance for a FULL week was a strategic gaff of the first water. And Churchill, Brooke, Monty and Ike owned it.
Stopping the V2s added months to the war -- in this way. Ike's order also triggered the nightmare of Aachen, too. It was about to be surrendered as an open city.
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@Sanders, the ONLY supply that could shift from Army Group to Army Group -- across the British-American logistics gap was POL -- namely GASOLINE. To speak of other supplies is to speak in ignorance. Food, medicine, and all the rest -- these could not be trucked under any circumstances from 12th AG to 21th AG. PERIOD.
Monty got Ike to give him 2,000 GMC trucks at the direct and immediate expense of General Lee. ( Not Bradley ) These missing trucks are the primary reason my own Father sat on his azz during MG. This shift was on such a panic basis that the Americans had to await fresh truck deliveries from those in Britain, and ultimately the USA. If Monty had asked for them, the US would've given him ANYTHING: DD Sherman tanks, DUKWs, jeeps, ... even a blimp or two if asked.
The reason Monty was not focused on the Scheldt was because of the V2 'problem' back in London -- and Churchill howling about it. The reason that Monty had primary access to the Allied Airborne Army was because it was expected ever since Overlord to be required to leap down the coast to shut down these strategic Nazi attacks.
The British, via the French, WERE getting horrific news. Namely that the Nazis were going to scale up the V-2 to create a rocket that could -- in theory -- even reach New York City. But long before that, they were told that London would be rubble, that V2 production was scaling to staggering levels. It never happened. But the Allies had to proceed based upon best estimates -- and Hitler had surprised the West more than once.
What infuriated Monty was that Patton was taking the easy way to the Rhine. This is something that didn't sink in until it happened. Patton saw it from the first -- because he was a world-class military historian and KNEW that Monty's path had been a bust for every commander going back into ancient times. Likewise 1st and 9th Armies were headed straight for a wall. The Rhine just keeps getting bigger as it flows north. It's no small thing even back up near Switzerland, either.
The whole myth of Patton advancing without orders myth corn fuses 1945 with 1944. It was in '45 that Bradley ordered Patton to stop in place. Patton was making the other armies look BAD. So the fantastic breakthrough 3rd Army had has been scrubbed from even American military histories. (thank you Bradley) The maps pick up only after 1st Army has finally pulled abreast of 3rd Army. The seven-day delay just was Winston'd down the Memory Hole. This is where the myth was born.
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@TDavid
Blinded by grand statistics -- and wholly off base.
1) LendLease solved CRITICAL Soviet economic nightmares long BEFORE Uranus.
1a) The US bought Swedish Tungsten Carbide tool bits -- paying in gold -- and flew them on to Russia. THESE would appear to a guy like you to be insignificant. They just happened to increase the output of machine tools EIGHT TIMES OVER.
You need to sit down with a machinist to grasp what I'm laying on you.
2) Critical war goods arrived BEFORE Uranus that decided the whole campaign:
2a) Radio tubes -- the Germans managed to destroy Stalin's ONLY radio tube factory, November 1941. This was kept ultra-secret then and for years afterward. The USA FLEW IN radio tubes to end the crisis. These came the LONG WAY -- via Alaska, Siberia, etc. This back-door route cost a fortune, but was the only way that America could bail out Stalin in 1942. Because the weights involved looked puny compared to oceanic traffic, they get over-looked in the stats.
Because of the extreme secrecy involved, radio tube transfers are usually MISSING from the official reports.
3) The US gave away the latest generation of oil drilling rigs -- the rotary stuff -- PLUS provided Hughes Tool and Baker drilling experts to instruct the Russians. ( Just three guys ) Previously, the Soviets used classic drilling methods that can be seen in the film: "There Will Be Blood." The rotary rigs were 25 times as fast. These were the fount of new Soviet oil that buried the Nazi state from 1943 onwards.
[ One of these fellas was interviewed on the McNeil-Lehrer News Hour circa 1979. He was astounded to report that since he left them in WWII, the Russians hadn't changed A THING. They were still stuck in 1940's drilling methods.]
4) The Americans also solved Russia's crappy refinery techniques. Like their drilling, their refining techniques were of the 19th Century. In Western terms, the Soviets didn't refine crude oil -- they merely distilled it -- something that America left behind forty-years earlier.
This is no place to educate you WRT chemical engineering applied to refinery process streams. Suffice it to say, the knowledge required is equal to rocketry and atomics. Stalin just skipped it. Making gasoline to support cars for the average Ivan was just not on his agenda.
I'll stop here.
Your knowledge is false knowledge -- made false by deliberate deceptions crafted by the Soviets to hide their dependencies. They never admitted to the world that they had lost their radio tube factory -- then or ever.
And so forth.
BTW, ALL of Stalin's mainline locomotives were produced up in Leningrad -- the original start point for the entire rail net -- as it was imported from the West. ( IIRR, from France, as Britain was a hostile power to the Tsar way back when, but don't quote me on that.) The USA had to shunt 2,000 main line locomotives to Stalin before the war was over. ( from the Baldwin works -- all of them )
America provided ALL of Stalin's front line military trucks: Studebakers. Even today, the Russian slang for 'truck' is 'Studebaker.' Yeah, they cloned the design.
Soviet trucks looked like Studebakers for decades after the war.
Look at the photos, you'll believe.
Uranus was a success solely because of American land-lines. These permitted STAVKA the luxury of staying off the air. Previously, the Germans were always able to spot Russian counter-moves merely by analysing radio traffic. Such German methods are mimicked today by ALL combatant powers. They were totally novel back then, and responsible for countless early war German victories. (North Africa)
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TIK's best exposition, yet.
OKH's fumbling -- logistically -- was epic for Case Blue.
Straight off it HAD to be apparent that Mykop without a rail connection was no asset at all.
So the tempo of Nazi victory for Case Blue had to be the advance of the rail net.
Yet OKH treated the rail net as a peripheral issue.
The 11th Army was the controlling army for the Romanians.
So 11th Army really DID get split up after the Crimean campaign.
It never should've been sent north, as the ONLY strategic prize that could end the war in the east was the Volga -- the Red's energy throttle.
The 'sickle' of Case Blue ran from Voronezh down to Stalingrad. That should've been transparent from the first. The 'sickle' deserved its own army group -- which should've been 'Army Group Don' from the first. Von Manstein ought to have been promoted up to command it from the very first.
AGD was the focus of Case Blue. Once the 'sickle' was in place, then AG South would've had free reign to consummate Mykop. Grozny was an oil field too far. The demand upon the rail net troops would've been entirely too much.
AGS- AG"A" was too strong... required too much gasoline.
The whole scope of Case Blue was determined by how fast and far the rail net could be expanded. Neither OKH, OKW nor AH seemed to ever grasp this.
So, TIK is correct, Case Blue blew up even during conception. Even perfect martial performance against the Reds would not have redeemed the German failure to get the rail net up and running ASAP.
The consistent blind spot: why did Nazi Germany not see that she HAD to Dieselize?
Diesel-electric locomotives would've been fantastic assets for the Ostheer. For you just knew that the Reds would destroy every water tower essential for steam locomotion.
The Ostheer needed locomotives that could roll the moment the rails were squared away, preferably smaller locomotives that would be easier to shift around in the field, barged in, even.
The British, the Soviets and the Americans constantly schooled the Germans in logistics.
But they never picked up a CLUE... even after the war was over.
( For those curious, look at the British use of their Egyptian rail net when it counted. The great DAK was so blind that they missed just about everything logistical. Absolutely no lessons were learned... but, of course.)
[ Imagine, the Germans and Italians NEVER thought to punch holes into Libya. Even though the British and American oil firms had LONG established that water and oil was commonly to be found under the deserts. ( Iran, Saudi Arabia ) ]
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Crusader was the first instance where the British discovered just how much electronic intel the Krauts were generating from B'dienst intercepts -- even when they couldn't quite break British codes.
Later, Auck would gut Rommel's B'dienst team while it was 'protected' by the Italians.
First -- really the first -- battle of tel el isa. ( Which is NOT the the same as the typical search engine result. That's actually the SECOND battle of tel el isa, and there is a Second battle of tel el isa, which is actually the THIRD battle.)
The truly first battle of tel el isa decided WWII. It caused a REVOLUTION in British, American and Soviet signals security. Naturally, every player involved lied for decades afterwards about this battle... made it drop down into the memory hole.
It cost the Auck his position, and brought in Monty. He took the fall for his loose talking subordinates. It was during this period that Monty swept out the old and brought in a winning team.
The top man in Rommel's B'dienst team was mortally wounded during the First battle of tel el isa. The British did everything in their power to save him. But, no luck.
This young captain was THE miracle man for Rommel, and is the true source of Rommel's desert magic. After his loss, the DAK/ PAA was never the same.
Account after account misses this critical event... 'cause every major power keeps lying about it.
Crusader almost had the same effect... but the British didn't capture the 'magic' captain. ( He was a genius, BTW. In British or American service he would've been a Lt. Col. ... or better. )
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@Stuart... of course the Americans were not involved with Crusader in any way.
IIRC, it was the British that -- through feed-back -- informed the Americans that their stuff had been not broken -- but stolen right out of the embassy safe. The moment the Axis attempted to exploit the American gaff the British were hot on the trail. Many of the transmissions were in plain text to London, in the first place. So now even the British were cracking the Americans.
One can always back into any encypherment scheme if you have plain text, encoded text and enough to work from. in the case of the British and the Americans, they had so much traffic -- of each other -- that they were soon cracking every scheme each other could come up with.
It was at this point that Echelon was 'born.' London and Washington decided that it was impossible to fake each other out -- and to what purpose? So they got married, instead. This marriage has lasted down to the present day, and has been re-named over the decades. It's also referred to as Five Eyes and many another spook name.
The Americans were the groom, the British were the bride. Canada, New Zealand, Australia, rounded out the 'Five.' Also in during WWII: China and Holland. The Dutch drove the Japanese absolutely crazy with their negotiating style. ( Royal Dutch Shell properties within the Dutch East Indies [Indonesia] and Brunei. It was based entirely upon goading from both the British and the Americans.
A tid-bit for you, Stuart: the Americans were intercepting Axis tank-to-tank radio traffic from North Africa -- from Rhode Island! Yes, the signals bounced off the Ionosphere and could be picked-up plain as day by an ultra secret set-up. These signals were then sent all the way back to London, encrypted, on the down low. These very same signals could NOT be picked up in Africa. The Germans never picked up on the fact that their signals were skipping all the way across the Atlantic.
These intercepts let Monty know with astounding detail the ebb of the PAA and its DAK. This set-up was kept secret for decades after the war. So don't look for it to be detailed in the average history. It did get a Big Write Up in the New York Times. The base was actually seriously considered as an ideal site for the brand new United Nations and its headquarters. Manhattan won out. More hookers.
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Hitler's Germany had WAY TOO MANY critical dependencies: OIL, tungsten, chrome, nickel, RUBBER. It also had way too many technological dependencies// gaps// behind: oil drilling, petro-geology, U-boat design, radar, sonar, refineries, turbo-super chargers, full-on-mass-production... etc.
In terms of war management: Nazi Germany was a case study in how to NOT wage war.
Enraging Ukrainians, declaring war on the USA, two-front strategic war, Italian non-assistance -- even Speer could make no headway on this front; German industrialists refused to 'share' blue prints. Pay-offs to Goering, et al, settled the matter. Oh, my!
In terms of strategic intelligence... the Nazi regime scores a perfect ZERO. There was no hostile nation that they didn't under-estimate -- usually by astounding amounts. Even in 1940 the Germans didn't realize that Britain was out producing fighter planes. (!)
It's amazing that Adolf got as far as he did. That's what momentum and reputation will do for you. Today's American armed forces have the same tail wind. Only primitive cultures even dream of tackling the USA. All other powers regard such attempts as madness.
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@Marko
Buddy, tell that to STALIN.
He was convinced that's exactly what was going on.
So he killed them off.
They were, as far as Stalin was concerned, Tukhachevksy's 'crew' // sympathizers, etc.
So he whacked them all.
Stalin was a politician--despot and had no time or interest in far-sighted military theory.
The ins and outs of who did what, who deserves credit, when each stage happened is irrelevant WRT the purges.
All that mattered was that Stalin was paranoid -- and hated Deep Operations Theory and all the thinkers behind it.
Like Adolf, he was more of a 'morale-is-the-key-to-everything' guy.
Stalin, Hitler and Churchill never came up to speed WRT tank warfare. This becomes obvious when you review their insane orders.
Only their generals had a clue.
I'm a huge fan of Winnie, but as a military man, he lacked judgment. We can all thank the Lord that Monty showed up in the nick of time.
You're going off about arcana that has nothing to do with the purges. That story is one of enemies lists... of Thems and Us's. Period. The delusions of one tyrant.
BTW, I don't see any difference between German blitzing and Soviet deep operations. Both punched through and sent their massed tank formations thither and yon raising Hell and breaking things. Everything else is semantics.
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As we've seen in our own time, crude oil producers swing prices way high and way low because once a retail consumer has committed to using gasoline, bunker fuel, avgas [ when they purchase cars, ships and planes ] subsequent demand for liquid energy is highly inelastic. This dynamic has nothing to do with Central Bankers. Look at fracking. Just by slightly over producing light, sweet crude prices crashed from well over $120/bbl to less than $40/bbl. The reason for this is that unlike coal, once the drill pipe has found oil, the human labor required to keep energy flowing is trivial -- coal has opposed traits. It's easy to find, but entails tremendous on-going outlays to keep the coal coming. Until slurry technology came along decades after WWII, coal was not even all that cheap to transport. (trains versus pipelines)
The ultra-low-ball crude oil price quoted early in your presentation was so low that the oil industry was going broke. The Texas Railroad Commission had to step in and stop oil drilling. This hiatus lasted for more than a year during the Great Depression. This commission regulated crude oil prices globally right up until the Arab Oil Crisis -- when it became obvious that AOPEC had the upper hand. Ironically, the founding members of OPEC did not participate in the cartel's embargo. (Venezuela and Iran founded OPEC -- not the Arab producers. They jumped on board rather immediately, however.)
Back to the Great Depression: oil prices keep rising once the Texas Railroad Commission turned the American industry -- within that state -- into a cartel. Texas was so dominant that it pulled all other American production towards its pricing.
BTW, General Thomas was entirely wrong. The Americans sent rotary oil rigs to the Soviets. These punched holes twenty-one times as fast as what the Soviets had been using. Typically, a hole started on Monday was ready to cap by Thursday. The field was simply not that deep, (1500 feet) the rock was pretty forgiving. The reason that the Nazis knew nothing of any of this because the field that the Soviets were punching had just been discovered. (!) The land was as flat as Texas. So rail lines could be laid lickety split.
Stalin told Churchill that the Red Army reached its absolute nadir with Manstein's winter offensive. Uranus and Mars had entirely burned through Stalin's reserves. He needed the thaw to train a fresh batch of cucumbers.
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STAVKA consisted of Stalin and the generals// marshals he plopped in front of himself on any given day.
His style was to keep them seated, pretty much at all times, while he walked around their backs, interrogating them about their concepts.
Other than Stalin, himself, it's amazing how many generals moved in and out of these STAVKA meetings.
STAVKA best mirrors America's National Security Council... another committee with a totally floating membership. The only one absolutely assured of a position there being the President, himself.
[The American NSC actually ran WWII, but it was never called that during the war, itself. Afterwards, Truman formalized what FDR had long established, and thus we ended up with the NSC and CIA, etc. Both were started out is improvisations.]
Most of my 'take' on the Russians comes not from Glantz -- who I've never read, though I've heard his lecture -- but from Russians and Russophiles. ( To put it politely. )
As for the insane losses at the land-bridge, they are confirmed from all sources... most notably the survivors.
You might take a gander at the post-Cold War diary accounts from the 'cucumbers' -- they are a fright. They just go on and on and on and on. They ALL tell of crazy high infantry losses to German machine guns.
Even Stalin, himself, was pissed at wasteful commanders, and made many a statement to that effect. Said 'waste' was due to the extremely short boot camps that every 'cucumber' reports in their diaries.
There are no exceptions floating around out there in the Russian literature. If there were, they'd get PLENTY of ink from Putin & Co.
No, the Red Army took a beating at the land-bridge. Four Red armies against a single panzer corps? Yiikes. With that much man-power, they should've blown through the Ostheer. On paper, that'd be five to one odds. Obviously, something does not add up.
The ten-armies quote, BTW, comes from a Russophile -- not a German. He was gloating about the Red victory, and the stupidity of the Nazis.
&&&
The German army beat the German army;
The Red army beat the Red army;
-- right up until Stalin let his marshals run the show.
Then everything went the other way. This was also the same time that LendLease really kicked in... which was BEFORE Uranus.
Hell, there are German accounts of them capturing LendLease (American) jeeps and more still on flat cars as they rolled up to Stalingrad. The Germans were giggling and laughing because this stuff was still in American markings. How fresh can you get?
The date: September 1941.
Yeah, that tale surprised me, too.
Boston bombers arrived before Uranus, too. They were the primary reason that Army Group A was so frustrated. A-20s kept blowing up their supplies and attempts at bridging. Back at OKH, Adolf couldn't believe what he was hearing.
No, the history is clear, Stalin wasted lives at an astounding clip. Then it was Hitler's turn. German loses in the back half of the war had to be astounding. Entire divisions, corps, armies evaporated. That's as bad as anything that happened to the Russians in 41-42.
After the war, both sides wanted to fold their losses into their victories so that their extreme defeats didn't boggle the mind.
That's where you get TIK's statistical compilation.
BTW, German position maps don't carry a narrative. They just show deployments. They sure don't make the Ostheer look good, BTW.
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@wbertie2604 But, but, but -- the Colonel was convinced, too. The Krauts made THAT much noise. The 2nd Panzer and 26th VG were right in front of these guys.
When Ike hear the intel of the first day -- he leapt all over it, PDQ. He figured -- rightly -- that this is EXACTLY the kind of stunt that Adolf was prone for.
Not so, Bradley, who was STILL poo-pooing the reports sixteen-hours after the attack began. (!!!) He sent the 7th and 10th tank divisions off to XIII Corps -- almost under protest. This is in his own auto-bio. It's as close as he comes to admitting that he'd screwed up.
BTW, 2nd ID was to attack on the 16th -- a Bradley schemed attack, of course. Its commanding general disobeyed his corps commander... and stopped it. (Gerow, V Corps) Later Gerow apologized. The 2nd ID would've been mauled -- as the Krauts had preregistered fires awaiting them... plus king tiger tanks and the 12SS boys.
By going over to defense, the 2nd ID totally screwed up the 12SS. Adolf expected Big Things -- and yet nothing.
Middleton was NOT fooled. Fuller was not fooled. The Krauts could not tramp around with battalions of tanks, stugs, half-tracks and such in slippers. Their end-connector squeal is just too much to muffle.
The Armored Cavalry up north also was howling about end connector squeal. Piper was right in front of them.
It was Bradley who was dismissing these reports. Only in glancing, in his auto-bio, does Bradley admit that he was fulsomely dismissive of Kraut capabilities at this point. Though a bona fide genius, he utterly failed to imagine what a truly desperate dictator would do, what powers he could summon.
In military lingo: Bradley blew it. He was not getting just the one report. When Fuller sent the intel up the line -- he did so with his own written assurance that the dope was spot on.
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@solarfreak1107 The 19th Century folks called the distilled product coal-oil. You'll hear such references in many a Hollywood 'period' film. Petroleum based oil was the minor fraction of production until Rockefeller standardized refining in Ohio. Hence his brand: Standard (standardized) Oil.
[He made his breakthrough with kerosene that had no gasoline vapors in it.]
The destructive distillation of coal to produce coke for blast furnaces is a huge business even today. However, the coals used are chosen for their properties in iron reduction: low sulfur, low phosphorous.
For the Nazis, the play was to destructively distill 'steam coal' - the stuff that the Red Chinese and Indians have run short of. This process does not produce sweet coke -- but it does release far, far more volatiles -- which when condensed -- become very, very light 'crude oil' -- also termed 'gas oil' as it is a liquid recovered from hot gassified vapors by the process.
The kicker for the Nazis was that such an industrial process does not require exotic, high quality steels. It does not involve really high pressures.
It was not viable once cheap petroleum became widely available -- especially after Spindle top in Texas. (1903)
But, until then, coal distillation condensate dominated the fuel liquids market.
Before steam turbine driven alternators, the waste coke from said distillation was a drug on the market. But by 1935, the Krauts were in a position to partner up every distillation plant with a plain vanilla steam power plant -- of which the Nazis needed no end of.
THAT was their play -- and they blew it. The Nazis were destined to lose the war -- no matter what they did. But with coal oil, they would've had a route to far more liquid fuels at a practical cost. Thank the heavens that the Nazis were technical dolts.
BTW, a single ton of steam coal figures to emit about 1.3 barrels of coal oil condensate... IF you're using lighter, wetter thermal coal. At worst, you're looking at 1 barrel per ton. Nazi Germany was mining millions of tons per year -- over 300,000 tons per day...(adding in the occupied nations.) Scaling up to 100,000 bbl per day might have been possible. Then the Nazi fuel crisis would be over.
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@Peorhum
Nope. Not a chance.
The ONLY shot that the Germans had in North Africa was by way of a drilling campaign.
Astoundingly, it never occurred to either the Italians or the Germans to drill for water in Libya. It's not as if it had been tried and the holes came up dry.
Virtually the ENTIRE nation sits atop a massive aquifer, with the biggest deposits in the deep southern desert. Still, it had water virtually right up to the coast.
This water actually comes from the Nile river... by way of Sudan. You see the Earth is splitting apart there, so the ground gives way to an immense, bottomless swamp. And I do mean bottomless. Attempts have been made to find the bottom, and the drill string just kept going and going until the crew ran out of pipe. (!)
Then, with the passage of millions of years, the swamp water wicked its way north to create an immense aquifer from western Egypt all the way to the west. IIRC, it's the biggest ever discovered.
Underneath that lens of water lies the best crude oil ever discovered. It's practically gasoline. ( okay it's only 40-50% gasoline ) A single well could've supplied the DAK and the Italian fleet.
The Nazis and Fascist Italians could've pumped 2,000,000 bbl per day out of Libya -- if given enough time to build it out. ( Think fifteen years. )
What a gaff. They never looked, not even once. After the discoveries under Kuwait and Saudi Arabia -- why didn't they get curious?
This option was available BEFORE Barbarossa. With a modern rig, water would be hit after about three-days, BTW... oil would take another week, week and a half.
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@Peorhum
andrew is largely correct.
The assets used for Yugoslavia, Greece and Crete came from Army Group North almost exclusively.
This had a DRASTIC impact during Barbarossa.
1) The British SUNK 2nd Panzer Division -- not the men -- just the panzers. The Germans were shipping all of its equipment from Greece to Italy -- thence to be rail roaded back to Army Group North. They all ended up under the Adriatic.
This one panzer division counts as TWO, as it was still based on the TO&E of 1940. It hadn't been divided in half for Barbarossa. ~400 panzers were sunk -- in two ships. So, until the Battle of Moscow, the most elite, powerful German panzer division, Guderian's favorite, was cooling its heels back in Germany, being totally rebuilt.
2) Crete was the end of German airborne operations. This proved to be HUGE, HUGE, HUGE. The German parachute arm was the instrument of victory time and time again. It was originally intended to assist in the conquest of Leningrad. ( one scheme out of many ) The idea was to parachute it on top of the rail line leading off to the east and Archangel. This would entirely eliminate support to the defenders of that city. The plan would be to rip up the rail road and retreat back to German lines while the panzers surged forward to meet the paras. It could've worked.
3) The rail net of Yugoslavia and Greece was a travesty. So rail road repairs sucked down all of the SUPPLIES and tooling and troops intended for Army Group North. This was to have knock-on effects during Barbarossa. The Germans simply couldn't repair the rails as fast as originally planned. This was a MAJOR screw up that directly fed back into burning too much gasoline -- to replace the missing steam locomotives.
4) Greece also kept the 1st SS Brigade in the south, and much else. This was the wrong place for such an elite unit. The Romanian front did not move until Army Group South peeled the Soviets backward. This process took more than a month. Until then, 11th Army just sat on its azz... with two Romanian armies to keep it company.
5) Greece and Crete continued to be a drag on German resources -- especially oil. For you had to keep supplying the Crete garrison with motor transport ( no grass for horses ) and air cover and shipping to and fro. None of this was in the 'original military budget' for 1941. It was a total bleeder.
What proved to be a fiasco for the British Empire proved ultimately to be the utter downfall of Nazi Germany. But no-one saw that at the time. Indeed, most don't comprehend it to this day.
But Greece and Crete is where Nazi Germany really went off the rails. Germany couldn't afford to even enter this campaign. It was that much of a bleeder. Greece is probably the ONLY time in Churchill's life that he made a correct military decision of a strategic nature.
Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.
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@TIK
1) Von Manstein was correct. The moment of decision was BEFORE von Manstein was even brought into the picture... BEFORE the 6th Army was even encircled.
Once the army was encircled, it was too late.
ANY attempt to break out past the first FEW DAYS was doomed to failure.
1) The army was already fatally weakened by hunger and lack of transport. In the conditions then prevailing, 6th Army would've been chopped up, Napoleon style, just by exposure marching westward through the cold.
2) Paulus WASTED 6th Army's reserve fuel supplies in the magic hours after Uranus was launched and before the army was encircled. This episode is ALWAYS omitted in the telling and re-telling of Uranus. To do so makes the Ostheer look like IDIOTS. Yes.
The panzer regiments, the QRF for 6th Army that had been kept in reserve just for this possibility were run into the ground -- and then brought back into the kessel. To do so, they had to travel the LONG way back. The short route would've put them west of the Don bridgehead... a location that Paulus didn't bother to reinforce whatsoever in the early days of Uranus. (!!!)
3) The 29th Motorized// Mechanized division was held in reserve expressly to counter-attack any Soviet advance that might proceed across the lower Volga in an attempt to sweep 6th Army from the south. In the campaign it DID launch its pre-planned counter-attack into the Reds. This attack went off PERFECTLY. The 29th was just mowing down the advance elements of the Red army. The leading troops had absolutely no heavy weapons at all. They were still trapped east of the Volga, as no truck, no tank could cross the Volga -- the ice ridges were THAT BAD. ( They occur every year, so you can always re-examine the matter next winter.) It took DAYS for the Soviets to fix paths for their tanks and trucks. The primary reason that the southern pincer had cavalry was because horses could navigate the ice single file. Once to the west bank, the cavalry faced essentially no opposition of any kind, so it was a simple matter to trot westwards. When the cavalry ran into Germans, everyone dismounted and fought like Dragoons.
( Shades of the Australians of WWI fame in the Middle East.)
3a) The Soviets SPOOFED Paulus & Company into stopping the 29th's attack, by claiming the authority of Adolf Hitler. We now know for a fact that Hitler was in absolutely no position to issue the magic directive. He was on his train at the time.
3b) This event was mentioned in EVERY German account of the period. They just couldn't understand 'Hitler's interference.' Heh. Later von Manstein put it all together. He fed the Soviets garbage during his Winter Offensive and then bagged multiple Red armies. ( Spoofed them with 4-rotor Enigmas, sent true commands with 5-rotor Enigmas -- and shortly thereafter, the Ostheer went over to 5-rotor Enigmas across the whole front.
This transition was one of the reasons for the lull before Kursk. OKH could not bear to have side by side transmissions of 4-rotor and 5-rotor signals. Any such folly would allow the Soviets to back into the 5-rotor system.
(The IJN made this mistake with the USN. It resulted in the Midway fiasco.)
By the time von Manstein showed up, the die was cast. 6th Army had become immobilized. Paulus is the man most responsible for that status. He was the man on the scene allowing the Reds to WALK across the snow to encircle him. Yes, the great advance proceeded at a tempo that Napoleon could identify with.
The break-down rate of the T-34s in this campaign was astounding. The crews were so GREEN than even the slightest malfunction had them totally stumped. This is why 11 Panzer found themselves squared off against pathetically small T-34 formations. They had started life as tank regiments back at the Don. By the time they were confronted, they'd lost 65% of their strength do to motor-march grief.
( Later the Soviets would correct this epic gaff. They even put together a propaganda piece about cross-training the new T-34 crews back at the factory. That newsreel footage is up on YouTube to this very day, BTW.
This ^^^ is what separated the USA from the Red Army. GIs didn't need ANY training WRT mechanical trivia. And the USA gave its tankers about 18 months of training on their Shermans before being committed to combat. The USA originally ( on paper ) was scaled to invade France in May 1943. That's why the tankers had so much time to kill.
&&&
Strategy & Tactics Magazine ( Dunnigan ) cranked out cardboard war games forty-five years ago. One featured Uranus. They had to impose a Hitler-rule so as to achieve some semblance of history: the German contestant was prohibited from moving his panzers out of the pocket, of moving them to the Chir or Don rivers. For, during game testing, EVERY player was immediately sending his panzer corps to the west, while squatting in place with his infantry armies. ( 6th Army was really and army group in its own right. It had its own panzer army, and two Romanian armies and a Hungarian army and an Italian army -- all of whom were routing their command orders through Paulus. (!!!)
And Paulus was in DIRECT subordination to Adolf Hitler. I don't know where you, TIK, ever came up with Paulus reporting to von Manstein. It's on the record from many sources that Hitler had jumped the queue and was calling the shots for Paulus VERY shortly after 6th Army was encircled. It was at this moment that Adolf had finally come up to speed -- and was in his Prussian lair.
Keep in mind that Mars had OKH's attention, too.
Mars caused Hitler to reneg on his commitment to Paulus -- which was to seen a panzer corps to his aid should anything go sideways at Stalingrad. IIRC the panzers involved were the exact divisions that Hitler had taken away from 4th Army a few months back: 17th panzer, 18th panzer and GD motorised... The panzers were actually sitting on flat cars south of AGC when Hitler committed them to Mars -- BEFORE he even scoped what was up with Uranus -- BEFORE things truly went sideways.
He was reacting to the screams of 2nd and 3rd Panzer Armies. Stupid.
The correct play was to let the 2nd and 3rd bob and weave. They had PLENTY of power, short lines back to the rail heads.
Whereas 6th Army was in a heap load of trouble -- so obvious that Zeitzler// OKH had been screaming about it for WEEKS. He'd been told that he should calm down because a spare panzer corps was on call if anything erupted.
The Soviets knew all about this reserve panzer corps, and so actually turned over MANY secrets to the Germans so that it would not be sent south to bail out Paulus.
Further research figures to show that the RUSSIANS used spoofing to get the panzers to return back into the kessel. Hoth, Rommel, Guderian, Hoepner, not one of them would've bought such missives -- purportedly from Hitler -- same as the BS used to freeze the 29th Motorized division.
The infantry of 6th Army simply couldn't be shifted... not even before the encirclement.
The ONLY troops that should've broken out were the panzers and motorized troops -- and they needed to break-out before they were even encircled.
All later breakout attempts that were contemplated were TOO LATE. Paulus had already destroyed his panzer's gasoline reserve chasing ghosts.
This ^^^^ brutal FACT is something that ALL Ostheer histories try to obscure. Don't let them.
The chain of command jumped straight to Adolf Hitler. Von Manstein had to BEG Adolf to sign off on any orders he wanted to give to Paulus. Hitler duly threw in his two-bits.
I've quoted from just a piece of Hitler's insistences, already.
TIK, your thesis -- it doesn't fit the facts.
BTW, it was Franz Halder who established in the mind of Adolf Hitler that Paulus was a "does as he is told" kind of guy. His own peers were SHOCKED when he was promoted to army command... by Franz Halder -- his patron. Later, Hitler decided that now that he had Paulus -- why hang on to the Catholic? And out Halder went.
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@Edax_Royeaux You left out that the US adopted a uniform gauge AFTER the end of the Civil War. It's an amazing story all by itself. What happened was that over a three-day week-end (a national holiday in the Spring, IIRC ) all of the non-standard track was re-gauged. (!!!) How so? Ordinary joes were used to re-gauge all straight track. Veteran rail crews solely concentrated on switches/points. To re-gauge, only one rail was normally moved. With a gauging jig, even idiots could nail down the rails to spec. As for the rolling stock, that took a bit longer, but there was enough 'northern' rolling stock such that the South had enough time for the crews to re-gauge the locos and cars. ( Some before, some after. )
The American's contrast with Australia is astounding. The Aussies were unable to re-gauge their rails to a uniform standard -- even though decades were to pass. But, that's another story.
The issue with Soviet rails has been addressed repeatedly by me: the gauge was not the killer. The destruction of the ties/sleepers and the destruction of the water towers was the back-breaker. In the US Civil War the combatants developed 'sleeper ploughs' / tie-plows that a locomotive could drag to utterly ruin thousands of ties per day -- while doing a number on the rails, too. After that destruction, the only thing left was "The Way." That is, the graded path. Of course, all bridges were blown. The USSR had virtually no tunnels, so the Nazis lucked out on that score.
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@livingwill1 The kicker with steam locomotives is that they use a tremendous amount of labor on a per-mile basis. So as their utilization sky-rockets, the shops become jammed with work. This soon proved to be a choke point within the transport economy -- as you just can't throw common labor at such capital intensive heavy repair work. A minor taste of such work was illustrated on film in "The Train." Our hero (Lancaster) shows what a project it is just to repair a minor component. This particular repair had to be performed a million times during WWII. For the driving piston and its bearings ALWAYS gave way after so many miles.
As the Nazis expanded their terror empire, their ton-miles via railroad simply exploded. It didn't matter which side of the border the locos originated, there were never enough. Check out the USA and Canada. They went CRAZY trying to expand their locomotive fleet -- AND their rolling stock, too.
As for Stalin, his prison-state was critically short of locomotives virtually from the start -- as the Luftwaffe deliberately went after them. Steam locomotives are the easiest pickings a strafing pilot could imagine. By the fall of '41, the USSR was so short of main-line locomotives that the Siberian troops had to trudge the last hundreds of miles on foot. Stalin had brought a surge of such troops. So great was the panic, there were not enough locomotives to pull them all the way from Siberia in the time allotted. Further, their very existence (movement from the East) would've been betrayed by slews of locomotives showing up within range of Luftwaffe reccee flights.
The 2,000 American locomotives were CRITICAL for Stalin as the Nazis had bagged his Number One locomotive factory. It was in Leningrad -- the city from which the ENTIRE Soviet rail net expanded. This reality goes back to when the Tsar established it with imported machines. (French, IIRC -- Britain hated Russia as a geopolitical rival.) The very first substantial line ran from St. Petersburg to Moscow -- and was built for the Tsar and his family. The Tsar did not think of it as an industrial asset ! For him, his railroad was conceived as if it were a private jet -- almost a toy. He was keeping up with the other royals... and nothing more. (!!!) He was not too bright.
Subsequent expansion of the Tsarist grid aimed at hooking the royals up with their other estates. That's why every last one of them is just off the rail line -- but not so close that locomotive noise reached vacationing royals. These are now Russian tourist meccas.
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TIK's presentation is pretty awesome but there are elements that need to be laid forth:
Monty's panic request for 2,000+ GMC deuce & half 6x6 trucks. That delayed the show by three-days right off.
Monty's failure to request jeeps by the thousand -- this is inexplicable. The US Army could've coughed up thousands in no time. It'd take the Brits about 5minutes training time to drive a jeep. The 82nd and 101st proved that jeeps could drive ANYWHERE in a polder, their ground pressure and 4x4 drive made it a snap.
Monty FROZE the front line by his own volition. Yup. Even the START LINE is where it was because Browning and Monty wanted this airborne drop to be quite the show. Yup. They'd experienced so many cancelled drops because the Allied armies (typically the 2nd Army) over-ran the intended drop zones. These were always intended to take river-lines.
(Patton went south very happily because there were no serious river lines in front of him until late in the advance. He was following the classic route of invasion -- and damn well knew it. Monty was NOT taking the normal invasion route. The lower Rhine has usually stopped EVERY army. It's the Afghanistan of Europe. It's the reason that Switzerland has been invaded more often. )
THIS is the emotional back ground behind Monty and Browning's mutual decision to stop the 2nd Army. Right off, they figured that the war was over and that, having built it, it was time for the Airborne Army to be employed. This would be its last shot. These rivers were the ONLY target left in Northwest Europe that justified an airborne assault.
[ A similar panic hit the American 10th Mountain Division. It had been trooping all over Colorado for YEARS to scare Hitler into keeping a complete army up in Norway. Only late in the war, it panicked. It had to get into the war, PDQ. When it was committed, it blew the German army clean out of Italy in extremely short order. But that's another story. ]
TIK never brings up the single most obvious boner: why in the Hell was the 101st dropped so close to XXX Corps when the twin prizes begged for it to land between them? It's not as if there were ANY FLAK guns in the middle of farmland. Duh.
The need to protect landing zones had NO MEANING as this zone was an ISLAND. Get it? It was totally devoid of ANY Germans. ( I'm not going to count the bridge micro-garrisons. ) So, you could land ANYWHERE on the island. It SCREAMED: land here, you won't even bust your butt!
It's panzer-proof, too. Once the bridges are blocked the ISLAND is impossible for the Germans to get onto. Blocking the occasional ferry attempt would be child's play.
IMAGINE, your critical targets are north and south of an unoccupied island -- made so by rivers so vast that it takes the largest bridges in Europe to get across. And the Germans have no boats to speak of. No amphibious capability at all.
And then imagine two excellent British generals ignoring these salient facts. -- But not just them -- let's toss in their staffs -- and the American airborne generals, too.
Folks, this is VICTORY DISEASE on steroids.
ALL involved wanted this battle to go off as a show piece. And it blew up in their faces.
VICTORY if any of the following:
If the start line was advanced prior to MG,
101st dropped correctly,
Jeeps used by XXX Corps for its infantry,
TAC AIR,
Browning up in the sky -- like Ike, sure, he'd lend his P-51 to Browning,
VT fuses for XXX Corps,
Dutch telephone net actually used,
Dutch advice actually taken,
Hindustani used as British code talk,
Recognition of the Waal ferry -- the one British Airborne blew up -- and then needed.
[The assignment of USN blimps on day 2. There was virtually no FLAK until you're right over Arnhem. Blimps are floating mountains in the sky -- TOTALLY rigged for ground observation. They all had radios out you rears -- and optics beyond belief. Binoculars so heavy that they had to be mounted. (!) They could see a rat from 4,000 feet. Unlike a plane, they just hover. Subs and troops just run away when they see a blimp overhead. You just can't shoot them down. And they're bring absolute artillery and mortar Hell down upon you.]
[ Most of the British regulars spoke Hindustani. Generals and troopers, alike. The US used Native Americans in the Pacific, why pray tell this was not an obvious play for the British with so many called back from India? ]
Suddenly the 'Gavin Thesis' lies dead and buried.
Frost is right, TIK is wrong. This was a British operation, and Gavin, et. al. were told from on high, don't cross the Brits up. Don't make waves. Let them make ALL the decisions. Don't fight senior British officers at any time.
Imagine the repercussions if you turned out to be right! The chit storm would never die.
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BOTH sides were desperate and dehydrated. Even with their backs at the Don, the Soviets were not getting water to the front! Even when the Germans got to the Don, they found it virtually impossible to drink -- as the Reds kept shooting at them. This tactic became ever famous after Uranus. THIRST is the Big Story.
You'll also note that the German panzers need refit -- rather constantly -- same as North Africa -- as the dust is hardly different than the Sahara. Most tanks are dying from this dust -- not enemy action. That's why even rear area Soviets are pathetically weak.
Many of the 'Soviet defeats' were actually retreats to get back to the WATER at the Don. The Germans pressed on -- fanatically -- to get TO the water, to the Don.
EVERY account I've ever read tells of astounding heat and thirst.
The primary reason 6th Army had no horses when surrounded at Stalingrad was because the boys had EATEN them, already. That's how bad the boys were being supplied.
The Soviets didn't defeat the Germans. The Germans defeated the Germans.
By the time 6th Army was upon the Volga, the boys were totally worn out... as in they'd lost a lot of body weight. You don't see a single photo of a fat German from that area and that time.
Even Paulus was lean... very lean by the standards of his time.
Whereas, the Reds were bringing in fresh boys, who'd not been totally famished, all the while. Logistics totally decided the campaign -- something that the ground-pounders just did not appreciate. By this time, Germany was already cooked. The soldiers just didn't know it.
BTW, Stavka was totally foolish to defend to the west of the Don. The river was a killer defensive position. It was utterly stupid to not defend behind it. By expending so many troops, Stavka (Stalin) threw away the rational defense of the Volga. What a fool. No marshal could talk him out of his folly, obviously.
It took the battle -- a catastrophe -- for Stalin to give the reins to Zukov & company. After that, the Soviets never lost. What an amazing coincidence.
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@Mitch ... EVERY single account has the Reds being bagged straight at the FRONT... starting with Brest-Litovsk. The Stalin Line proved to be entirely EMPTY.
Stalin ordered INSTANT counter-attacks -- with objectives deep into Nazi occupied Poland... right from the start. Whereas ANY military graduate would've insisted upon a defensive posture to channel the Germans into super-kill zones.
Red officers were totally demoralized as Stalin imposed a top-down rigid command structure. THAT was their problem. As for supplies, the Germans were astounded as to how well equipped the Reds were. So MANY tanks, so MANY guns... stuff better than their own. Namely the 76.2 field gun that could kill tanks and shoot conventional rounds.
The Reds looked weak in retrospect because Guderian had CUT OFF their routine ammunition resupply -- at the rail heads. Their few decent tanks (T-34/ KV-1) were still not properly supplied with ammo. This was because they were THAT new. The 76.2MM gun was a new, hot item in 1941. The Reds were still scaling up.
As for artillery tubes: the Reds drastically out-matched the Germans. Stalin prioritised his army and air force. However, both were in transition from 1930's technology to 1940's technology. Because of their treaty, the Reds knew exactly what Guderian & Coy were bringing to the fight. (pop-gun 37mm Mark IIIs) The T-34 & KV-1 were their response. Even in 1941 the Reds were out-producing the Germans in tanks. The Germans were THAT slow off the mark.
The same 'crippled' Red Army invaded EVERY western neighbor, except Nazi Germany. Stalin didn't consider himself to be running a clown circus, nor could Hitler.
Famously, Adolf commented that if he'd only known that the Reds had 35,000 tanks he'd have totally reconsidered Barbarossa. Yup. The outside world didn't have a CLUE that Stalin had that many machines.
Such a tank force tells you all that you want to know about where Stalin's head was at. Other than Germany, NONE of his neighbors had a tank force worth talking about. (What a pacifist... NOT.)
As for pre-war and post-war Soviet military diplomacy -- they were ALWAYS in attack mode -- right up until 1991. They NEVER had a defensive doctrine.
The ONLY matter at issue was WHEN Stalin was in a position to attack.
Stalin even went after Truman when Truman had the Bomb -- and he didn't. How aggressive can you get?
There is NO nation on the periphery of the USSR that didn't feel threatened -- all the time.
Even today, the Baltics are fearful that they're about to get the Donetz 'solution.' Yet, Russia is weaker than ever -- save for its astounding nuclear arsenal.
Kid, you just don't have history on your side.
Do NOT take this argument to mean that I'm pro-Nazi. They damn near killed my father and my uncle.
Adolf merely calculated that time was absolutely NOT on his side.... Like Stalin, he kept looking back to WWI for his instructional.
That was an epic mistake for both of them.
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@ Mitch ... open your eyes.
You started off with an ad hominem against John Mosier. Weak.
Then you shifted to an appeal to authority. Weak.
Then you're back to ad hominem. Very weak.
Glantz's problem is that he actually believes internal Red Army documents. Whereas MANY Red officers have written that higher command's internal reports didn't have ANY correspondence with the facts in the field -- and they knew because they were in the battle at issue !
All of this is because Stalin would SHOOT any officer kicking the 'wrong' information upstairs.
The facts are beyond dispute:
1) The Reds WERE at the border. They WERE bagged by the thousands from the very start of the German invasion.
2) They were so far forward that within days they were out of supply -- as Guderian and Hoth had driven east into the Soviet rail net -- cutting off supplies at their source for the entire front. THIS was the trick during the early daze of Barbarossa. It did not last all that long.
( BTW, you'd be stunned as to how few rail lines led into Poland from the USSR. Going back to the Czars, such lines were just not built. Amazingly, the primary purpose of the Russian rail net -- from the beginning -- was to roll the Czar and his family around Russia. It was not built to support industry or commerce. All industry had to 'chase' the rails. That's the reason that 4-10-2 locomotives were in use, too. The lines were dead straight for miles and miles on end. In North America, all railroads stopped with 4-8-4 -- then shifted to articulated 4-6-6-4 designs.)
3) The REAL reason that Adolf went north and south instead of Moscow: the Ju-52 super-fiasco. Yup. This fiasco has been buried by ALL German accounts -- especially Guderian's. He was at the center of it. What happened? The landing gear under EVERY Ju-52 was being destroyed as they landed fuel and parts for Guderian's spear-head panzers. Yup. By the time Adolf showed up, the Luftwaffe was in crisis. There were 'dead' Ju-52s all over Russia. On a totally panic basis the RLM had to kludge up an enhanced landing gear repair kit. These were then flown out to Russia. All the while the planes were cracking up, Guderian BURIED the facts. He buried this fiasco in his own war bio, too.
But the Ju-52 was the linch-pin for his blitz. They were the reason he was able to defy expectation and just keep driving east. Even when the Russians had cut him off, the Luftwaffe just flew over the Russians and re-supplied the panzers. (!) Instead of coiling back, Guderian just drove even further east. Hurrying Heinz, indeed! The Russians were NOT being pocketed -- something that every idiot writes was happening. Guderian was simply going east faster than a man could walk. By grabbing every river crossing of note, they gradually trapped virtually every Red soldier. They fell behind, into the arms of the advancing German infantry. Without resupply, every formation ran out of gas and ammo. They were down to fists and knives.
Without their air lift fleet, Plan A was dead. THAT'S why Adolf sent his panzers to the wings. That's why all other generals assented. They couldn't drive into the zone of maximum rail road concentration without their air fleet.
4) Postwar: the USSR reversed ALL of Stalin's strategic errors. Under the new rules, the Red Army was to NEVER place their main body near the front. Further, the Ju-52 fleet was replaced by a massive helicopter fleet. This scheme is the reason why the Reds built the world's largest helicopters. They're too big for combat. They were built solely to fly fuel to Red tank spear-heads. As helicopters, they'd never suffer the landing troubles that the Ju-52 did. As for the Nazi Germans, they redesigned their airlift towards the centipede landing gear. (The C-130, C-5, C-17 uses a variation on this... a super robust assembly with excess tires for soft ground.) Their new design never had much impact as it was not so useful for defense, for retreat.
Mitch, you just don't know that much. Fifty-years of study makes a difference. Believe it.
Argue from FACTS -- not ad hominem.
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@Mitch... you are of slow wit. I'm not backing Rezun. I'm stating that John Mosier has a solid argument.
1) The Bolsheviks never DIDN'T aggress against their neighbors -- straight through from 1918 to 1991. It didn't matter who it was: Red China, Nazi Germany, Poland, Finland, Romania, NATO, the Baltics, eastern Czechoslovakia (when Hitler took the rest of that nation) -- and Korea and Iran.
2) That the USSR was not ready in 1941 is obvious to all. But Stalin was going to be pretty well set for 1942. That is what was obvious to German generals, virtually all of whom DIDN'T want to invade east. But, they couldn't argue that Stalin wouldn't be ready in 1942. EVERYTHING pointed to it as being a moment of maximum threat. By that time, Nazi Germany would be in DIRE straits WRT liquid fuels -- all of them. So much so that the Luftwaffe would be compromised. Further, Ploesti was WAY too close to the eastern Romanian frontier. Stalin had ALREADY put his strongest formation directly across from ROMANIA -- not Nazi Germany. Stalin knew that Ploesti was THE strategic prize. Yeah, it was that obvious.
Since Barbarossa, the Soviets totally changed their strategic doctrine. All during the Cold War their doctrine was: keep the Red Army on the defense from NATO -- with the very best weapons held at the Second Echelon -- ie inside the USSR. NEVER permit the First Echelon to deploy close to the border. It must be ready to motor there, but not be deployed there until hostilities are authorized by Moscow. This is why the 20th Guards Army was held back at Magdeburg all during the Cold War. It awaited orders coming from Zossen, HQ for the Western Direction. Ironically, Zossen started life as Hitler's twin HQ: OKW & OKH. It was so secret that the Red Army was shocked when they over-ran it in April 1945.
You're not well read, you don't know much, you don't argue well.
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@TIK
I went to Google and found a ton of images. Pretty sloppy data set: lots of not-88mm guns.
http://nationalinterest.org/files/styles/main_image_on_posts/public/main_images/88_mm_gun_eighty-eight_8.8_cm_flak_flickrjoost_j._bakker_ijmuiden.jpg?itok=Du5U4qY
Limbered 88mm guns LOOK like they're on trucks. They have wheels, etc. but no motive power.
If you look closely, their out-riggers can be dropped for firing even without un-limbering the gun from its carriage.
It's a split carriage BTW. The gun-mount is an integral part of the travelling chassis. It's hard to see, but two of the four supports ride between the tires// axles -- while those going left and right are plain to see.
At Arras, Rommel used 88s in both states. When the battle started, a FLAK battery had been already set up to drive off the RAF. This was a crew that didn't want to engage Matildas, BTW. Rommel shows up and orders these crews to shift to a PAK role. The were seriously pissed. This would require them to nix their standing order from on high. Rommel reminded them that he was the boss of their boss -- so get with it -- NOW!
This battery opened up Matildas -- much to the amazement of the 88 crews -- they'd never practiced against ground targets even once -- and the leading Matildas 'brewed up' // opened up like tuna cans.
As the battle flowed, 88s -- probably these very same fellas -- were towed after the British ( brought to new firing positions ) -- and the situation was so hectic that they started firing from a limbered position. When limbered, the side struts would be dropped -- this takes seconds, and then the crew does their duty. The road wheels are left as-is. This is why MOST distant observers would absolutely take such weapons to be truck-mounted 88s. I think that this is how the reference to truck-mounted 88s got rolling.
When limbered, the 88 is no where near as accurate, but it sure is a heck of a lot more mobile. It was after Rommel that the Heer realized that firing 88s while limbered was a VERY viable tactic. Previously, it was not recommended, simply not part of the 'FLAK syllabus.'
You'd never use a FLAK36 in a limbered condition to defend against aircraft. It'd be shooting all over the sky. Heh.
The Germans DID improvise 20mm and 37mm mounted upon truck chassis. This occurred before they cross-mounted these guns to tracked chassis. It was quickly determined that a truck chassis may be quick and cheap, but is actually quite impractical in combat.
1) It rocks way too much. You can't stay on target. It's hopeless.
2) In rotten weather ( mud ) you lose the machine all together. (Sucks!)
If there is one constant with German weapons designs, they couldn't stop changing things. Would you believe that even within major production runs, the Germans were changing this or that before even ten tanks went by? Yup.
In practice, virtually every German major weapon was semi-custom. This was WHY so many German tanks were out of the line. They had to constantly phone back to the factory for semi-custom repair parts. With multiple factories, they couldn't even count on MAN's stuff to repair Henschel's. (!!!)
The contrast with the American M4 was night and day. In the last twenty-five years tank collectors attempting to rebuild Shermans discovered that you could take a 44 Chrysler tranny and bolt it to a 42 GM Sherman -- and the fit was perfect.
Nothing like such repairs was ever possible when restoring German equipment.
The Soviets were half-way between. They had a standardized design, but their factory standards were SO sloppy that T34s were a plant, by plant, affair. But with their production numbers, one plant could flesh out an entire tank corps. *
( * The Reds stopped using the term tank division, BTW. So you have to watch out. Many Soviet accounts will refer to the 1st Tank Corps -- when it's the division that they mean. I've read one account of Kursk that transformed the SS Pioneer Corps into three SS tank corps: 1st, 2nd, 3rd. ( BTW, the 3rd arrived so late that it was a surprise to the Russians. They expected only the 1st and 2nd.) ( It had come straight from France, on the QT, and naturally looked to all outside observers to be one or the other of the former.)
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@TIK
Soviet archives made me a believer.
Yeltsin produced them. They were astonishing.
Until then I never knew that Stalin picked the launch date, the partition line, etc. ( It was not negotiated at all, Stalin was given carte blanche so long as he was willing to sign on the line that was dotted.) Yes the archives detail that the treaty specified that BOTH nations would invade Poland September 1st, 1939.
He used a FAT crayon, BTW.
The original was kept by the Soviets, the Germans had to make do with a copy. Stalin initialled it, BTW. He was big into pencils -- notably a blue pencil.
(Shades of Harold Geneen of ITT fame, the corporate tyrant.)
Adolf ALWAYS wanted to launch his war.
He remained boxed in until Stalin let the devil run free.
Stalin's oil is the primary reason that France fell.
It energized the Luftwaffe. At all times prior, London and Paris had kept a weather eye on German avgas stocks.
There was a concerted Allied economic strategy to keep Germany on a short leash. ( Rubber, Oil, etc. were controlled by London, Paris and Washington. This leverage was their first go-to solution for tyrants. You'll note that this is STILL the West's opening gambit even today.)
Stalin broke the chains. THIS is what freaked Britain and France out.
It was transparent to Britain ( First Sea Lord Churchill ) that war had begun August 23, 1939 -- so he put the Royal Navy to sea -- and on a war footing right then and there.
I'm sure that Googling will pull it up. I just can't read Cyrillic script.
The first place I read about it (just summaries) was in the British press. So if you're able to go back through their archives, I'm sure that some articles will pop up.
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@Alexander
WRT Iceland, which is a colony of Denmark...
My school buddies father was a member of the Danish king's personal body guard. They were the platoon that got him out of Denmark right in front of the SS. ( Strange that the Heer was not detailed for this mission. )
Being the ONLY military formation left standing after Denmark was occupied, they were stationed on Iceland.
Britain was allowed to occupy Iceland with the King's permission.
When Churchill returned from Nova Scotia and his naval visit with FDR, he made a pit stop at Iceland. This is when my acquaintance was able to shake Churchill's hand, as the Danish 'Army' was in the front ranks of those assembled. They were joined by Britain's other European allies, mainly Holland. Every nation BUT the Danish made it into the newsreel footage. It was determined that the Nazis would retaliate against any Danish family that had a son in the King's body guard. They sure were pissed that the King got away.
Eventually my man ended up shipping out to the Dutch East Indies -- and after watching the IJN sink everything in sight, Battle of the Java Sea, he migrated over to the USN.
As for Iran ( it, the word, means Aryan in Farsi ) they jumped into bed with Adolf Hitler. ( Hence the name change away from Persia.) THAT'S why both Britain and the USSR invaded. It turned out to be quite convenient, too. As a land bridge to southern Russia was just what the doctor ordered. Arkangel was a bitch.
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@brianlong2334 It was the DIFFERENCE MAKER. BTW. Romanian oil is actually of low quality. Soviet (Baku, Mykop, etc.) was much better. It's like coal fields. Some are better than others. It's not true that all crude oil is the same. Rather oil is like coal. So oil trades off a BENCHMARK grade -- like Saudi Light or Brent (light) and then discounts are proffered as the crude is assayed to be heavier and more sour. (Iranian crude)
The Baku blend was MUCH MORE suitable for making aviation fuel. It didn't require as many refining steps to get what you needed. For the Nazis, that was ~91 octane.
In today's market Libyan crude and American fracked crude carry the highest price per barrel. Brent is right underneath them -- but because it's in the hub of European distribution, Brent is the benchmark.
Paris HAD modeled how many sorties the Luftwaffe could put up -- prior to the Pact. Because of internal politics, French air force fighters were not available in sufficient quantity, May 1940. Their Big Hope had just entered serious production -- about six-weeks back.
Paris HAD spent large on its air force -- without getting one. With each turn of government, the prior design was thrown out and a new contract let. This left France with the wealthiest design teams on the planet -- and little to show for their exertions.
Speer claimed that the Nazis were TAKING 50,000 tons per day of French steel. That's a tempo of 18,000,000 tons per year. Some of that steel came as a result of the French terms of surrender, back in 1940. That is, the steel was FREE to Hitler.
He was sucking dry France for just about everything he could think of -- and he had a great imagination for a thief.
Speer specifically called out his refusal to integrate war production with Italy.(!!!) It turns out that the industrialists disdained Italian anythings. The Krauts would not share even their obsolete Mark III tank blue prints. I believe that its armor plate manufacture was too touchy. The Nazis wouldn't even use Italian anythings in their supply chain.
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I can see by the thread that everyone is getting wound up trying to defend their pet economic theories, or how to structure some idea society.
When it comes to the essence of Hard Left and Hard Right; the Hard Left is ALWAYS obsessed with destroying religion. The Hard Right is ALWAYS obsessed with fusing State and Religion. Islam fits that bill perfectly. Until the American Revolution, virtually EVERY nation on this planet fit that description; from Pharaoh to Henry VIII they fused king and religion.
The above reality overwhelms ALL economic notions.
Collectivism can be practiced from the Left or the Right. One can do it straight up... or do it indirectly. Virtually ALL current societies practice Collectivism in the INDIRECT manner -- via VAT taxes and Income taxes. With enough re-distribution, you end up in the exact same spot as if you've got full bore Socialism.
Government spending, as a percentage of the GDP, is through the roof across most of Europe. That's de facto Socialism. Benefits are sure to shower upon you as if you owned a slice of the economy, even though you don't hold any stock certificates.
Further, even nominally independent, capitalist firms, have to bow and scrape to government edicts at least as intrusive as anything the Nazis cooked up. And the Nazis stationed SS men all across the German economy. These fellas never get portrayed on film, so youngsters don't even have a CLUE as to how Nazi Germany functioned. This, even after TIK has tried to lay it out. It goes in one ear and out the other.
Further, I read posts indicating that Hitler privatized firms. WHAT? He was no Margaret Thatcher, not by a long shot. Hitler never privatized any firm. Quite the reverse was the case.
De facto, Hitler had State Sponsored Enterprises: firms that had free and easy access to loans. If you were attempting to build a coal - to - liquid fuels plant, your funding would be unlimited.
And as the USSR and Red China show even today, racial repression is COMMON for Socialist// Communist societies. It comes in so many different flavors. Even Chavez ran a racial discrimination program. That's why there was 100% employee turnover at his national oil company. It never recovered, of course. Ideology -- religion -- trumps economics.
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The very terms Left and Right hail from the French Revolution, and how its politicians self-organized. The Right consisted of Monarchists who also believed in a state religion, Catholic, which would consecrate each succeeding King in a high ceremony. At the time, virtually EVERY nation had such a form of government, going back into the mists of time.
The Left was intensely anti-Monarchist and absolutely wanted to eliminate the state religion's connection to politics, if not crush it entirely.
By this standard, the budding USA was a Centrist polity. It has largely stayed that way in the centuries that followed.
At the end of WWII, the Soviets accepted into their ranks no end of minor Nazi officials. Neither party had any qualms, the new adherents fit right in.
The Modern Construction of the Nazis as Right Wing hails from the KGB and their Active Operations which started immediately after the war. No-one during WWII ever described the Nazis as Right Wing during the war. They were just Nazis. Calling them Right Wing would've smeared every conservative political voter in the country, USA, so it wasn't done.
The KGB couldn't even bare to call the Nazis, Nazis, so Fascist was used. But Hitlerism is not actually Fascism - which was an ITALIAN political movement. Allowing the KGB to determine the nomenclature of politics is just plain wrong. Most folks don't even realize that it was the KGB that placed the Nazis, their previous buddies, on the opposite end of the political spectrum -- and our Left bought that pitch hook line and sinker.
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@gr-s2143 You're going to have to read more widely.
Up until Tehran, the British ALWAYS got their way -- strategically -- vis a vis the Americans. They saw themselves as the Senior Partner and MUCH more savvy than the Colonial Upstarts. When Americans spelled out their production and mobilization schedules -- from Winnie on down -- they DID NOT BELIEVE such fictions. In the event, the Americans exceeded every one of the dis-regarded schedules. The reality of this was flatly attested to by Winnie, himself, in Missouri after the war. This admission was behind closed doors and not set to print for many years. I don't think his admission has ever been circulated in the UK. It's just too embarrassing.
In my post I omitted the reality that the 49th UK division was broken up to feed other UK infantry divisions. Winnie was. actually refusing to ship more blood over from the home islands. The primary reason so many of British 1st Airborne were guardsmen was that Winnie flatly refused to commit HRM's Imperial Guard. He was, however, more than willing to commit the IRISH GUARDS. You might note that they were at the head of XXX Corps during Garden.
After years of warfare, Britain simply had reached the end of its manpower. Winnie, unlike Adolf, was not willing to commit teen aged boys to the fight. By Overlord's success, Winnie knew that the war was going to terminate with total victory. FDR insisted on Unconditional Surrender all the way back at Casablanca. (A stunned Winnie dang near swallowed his cigar. Check the film footage.) [It was a forced 'choice' as there was no way in he!! that Adolf could be allowed to survive his war on humanity. No way that the Nazi Party could exist any longer in any form.]
Britain and Canada had CRITICAL roles in WWII -- but supplying manpower wasn't one of them.
Canada's Dieppe blood paved the way for Uranus and the death of Germany's 6th Army. Somehow decades have passed and Canadians don't connect Dieppe with Uranus.
Here's the connection. Zeitzler was the MG who defeated the Dieppe raid. Adolf boosted this two-star general up to run OKH -- and the Eastern Front -- at a single stroke. He canned Halder. Once in his new seat, he was screaming about Army Group B, ie 6th Army. He begged for reinforcements -- from where ? His old command, is where. That's right he wanted to bring the boys from the Channel into the northern wing of Army Group B. (The boys he knew best, of course. He was buddies with all of the commanders of same. Duh.) Adolf denied Kurt. Instead, Dieppe convinced him that the Channel needed MORE troops -- not Army Group B. So, during all of the weeks leading up to Uranus, Army Group B was starved of reinforcements -- they went to Kurt's old command -- staring at the sea, instead. Zeitzler wanted those troops to replace the Hungarians, Italians on 6th Army's left wing. It was THAT obvious to him, and everybody but Adolf, that the Soviets could just open the door and walk though. And they did so.
It was the BRITISH that informed STAVKA that they just HAD to grab their own Enigma machine ASAP if they wanted to stop Hitler. This they did so -- one was stationed -- against Hitler's explicit order -- with the Hungarian army up north. During a total-white-out the NKVD Special Forces captured that machine -- WITH all of its paperwork AND its operators!!!! This reality has never been admitted to by the USSR/Russia even to this day. You KNOW that they did so because they immediately started to use it to spoof Adolf Hitler's command instructions straight away. Even while he was on his train returning to HQ -- and totally out of communications -- STAVKA broadcast Fuhrer directives to 6th Army -- the most important being that the 29th Motorized Division was to stop its southernly counter-attack AT ONCE because the Soviets had broken across the Volga even further south and that the 29th needed to be committed further and down and away to be stopped. This was pure BS, of course. The 29th was actually a totally fresh, OVER STRENGTH motorized division, that had been held in reserve all during the previous months awaiting just this development. In its early going, it was just cutting the Soviets to shreds. They had not yet gotten their heavy weapons across the Volga, Those karst ridges were a bit$#@.
Manstein DID dope all of the above out PDQ. He counter-spoofed STAVKA to pull of his Winter Miracle.
Brits and Canadians almost always post errantly about their real contribution to the war. They keep looking over their shoulders at the Americans -- and benchmark against them. That's just stupid. The production miracle of the Americans is nothing that any nation can benchmark without looking very, very badly. Ditto for the US Army.
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@TheLoyalOfficer He kept delaying the battle for weeks. Finally Winnie put his foot down. As I said, Monty was looking at Churchill's life-long foul record of strategic decision. Narvik and Gallipoli were in his ears. Further, he had a HUGE morale problem with the SA troops, Aussie troops, et al. During the climax of the battle, Monty had to leave his HQ to convince the South African general commanding (IIRC Smitts) to press on. (!!!) He had to reveal ULTRA to him. (!!!!) Yet, he was forbidden to do so. THAT'S why Monty went to see him -- PRIVATELY. Monty was able to show Smitts that Rommel was -- literally -- out of gas, tanks, 88s, everything. Smitts only believed Bletchley Park. This final surge broke Rommel. THAT'S how close el Alamein was. Monty saw it coming a mile away. He was a first class staff officer.
The massive loses taken by 8th Army are glossed over by official records -- as they were hugely in terms of equipment. But for the boys at the front, el Alamein was a first class bitch. Because of the constrained terrain, even when chased, Rommel was able to screen his retreat with a tiny guard of 88s. The moment 8th Army left the road, it bogged down. The highway was SO much faster. And Rommel kept pulling back. Torch had worked -- and Torch was a British idea. ( Alan Brooke -- not Churchill. Brooke was Monty's best buddy and patron, of course.)
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@James
In point of fact, the Germans used barges -- both in the Baltic and Black Seas.
These were pre-existing assets, and had such shallow drafts that they were designed for the Rhine and Danube -- both were linked by canal, BTW.
A single barge of this type is equal to ~700 tons in capacity. So one barge per day could shift enough to support a corps. They aren't the fastest, but they do carry a lot. France, Germany and the low countries have large fleets of these barges -- even now -- typically family owned -- with the owners living on them, too.
The larger issue would be that such barges are ALREADY committed to the internal economies of said nations.
Germany did use barges, but only in tiny amounts, yes, all the way to Rostov-on-Don.
Logistically, the Germans never had their head screwed on right.
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@timobrienwells
Lastly, manganese IS a very important element, metal, BUT, is not anywhere near as critical as nickel.
I've never heard of any nation panicking over manganese -- even though it's essential in dry cell batteries and much else -- but virtually every modern power is obsessed with nickel.
There are just so few workable deposits, and even those are a bitch. It's a tough critter.
Russia, Canada, New Caledonia (France), were the big players back in WWII.
Speer was freaked out when the jet engine demanded so much nickel.
BTW, they STILL DO.
In the USA, nickel demand went through the roof during WWII.
It was the critical item in stainless steel -- THE limiting element in the production of PENICILLIN. Yup. Most nickel went for this drug.
The second priority: the diffusion plant at Oak Ridge. It was built entirely around nickel 'sponge' filters.
This technology is passe, but still can't be discussed. So we'll stop here.
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If he was to invade in 41, Adolf should've stayed out of Ukraine. The grain there would've automatically been harvested and stored in Kharkhov. Stalin built a MASSIVE food storage complex there, right on the Russian-Ukraine border. From Kharkhov up to Moscow Stalin built the ONLY double-tracked and ballasted rail line in the whole nation.
So the obvious play is to never send 1st Panzer Army into Ukraine, just block the Red 5th Army with the German 6th Army -- and send the 1st PA up with the 4th PA to Leningrad.
Why? ALL of Russia's locomotive production came from a super factory in that city. It took the USA to replace the lost production ~ 2,000 full sized locos by war's end. How can Stalin survive without trains ? He can't.
Everyone on the planet knew the factory was there, because it was imported, and Leningrad is where the ENTIRE Russian rail net originated. It went straight to Moscow and then branched out.
The route to Leningrad was greased: the Baltic nations hated the Reds. During the actual campaign, all of the locals would rat out the Red Army, and solve every 'map problem' for the lost and corn fused Germans. That's why the leap to Leningrad was so FAST.
Further, the Baltic sea solved German logistical nightmares. They did a chitty job of it, but they actually did use barges to ship everything up the Baltic coast -- the barges worked fine even without reaching port. There were tons of calm small bays that proved suitable.
Once Leningrad caves, both panzer armies could be fed from that port -- and then race south for the rest of the campaign.
No attempt at bombing Moscow, or Leningrad should've been attempted. Why destroy what you'll soon own? The Bismark and Tirpiz should've been buddied to take out the Russian BBs at Leningrad. They would've totally out classed anything there. They were totally over matched against the British. Forget the propaganda, they were dead meat in front of the Royal Navy.
All four panzer armies should've slammed into Moscow. Unlike Napoleon's day, CRITICAL war industries vital to the Red Army were right there. One stands out: the Germans actually destroyed Stalin's ONLY RADIO TUBE FACTORY. It was so small that the Germans didn't realize what they'd done. This fiasco was one of the deepest secrets of the USSR. They conned FDR in to prioritizing Lendlease raido tubes. Until these arrived the Red Army actually pull radio sets out of front line tanks -- to save what they had for command sets. (!) This fiasco explains why the Red tanks were so pathetic during 1942. It took that long for this matter to be corrected. (They basically had to redesign their radios to use American tubes. They were too embarrassed to take complete radio sets.)
As you might grasp, the same radio scavenging hunt occurred in the Red Air Force.
So, Moscow WAS important... think tank optics... etc.
The Red Army in Ukraine is parallyzed. It HAS to hold down the furious locals and collect the harvest. Attacking Moscow forces Stalin to force feed all of his best units straight into the maw of the panzer force... that's four armies side by side.
Then it's off to Kharkhov to pick up food rations, repairing the rail net ASAP -- like a maniac. ( The American Army did so at every occasion. They rebuilt the rail net in Northwest Africa for 7th Army... filmed it even. )
Then it's off to the oil fields racing away from the winter cold... leaving the infantry armies well behind.
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TIK -- the US Army did NOT run out of fuel on the way to the West Wall. That's a BRITISH trope. We gave up our transport to the British to make Monty happy. My own father lost his truck to them at that time. His entire truck regiment was 'un-trucked' at a stroke. With no trucks, the US Army's gasoline just built up back at its tank farm in Normandy. PLUTO ended up being TOO LATE to perform its duty. When the Break Out occurred, PLUTO was still delivering a trickle. Yeah, PLUTO was a screw-up. The Mulberries ended up being a fiasco, too. The American one was destroyed by the storm because the Americans constructed their's faster than its designers -- the British. The British Mulberry was not destroyed -- because it had not been completed. The terminus was, naturally, where the storm had its maximum impact -- and it was the terminus of the British Mulberry that was not built.
BTW, my father rode the rails to the port. The D-Day move was smooth as silk. The British civilians passed stood speechless witnessing the parade of the US Army going into battle. This transit occurred in the week prior to 6-5-44. When at sea, the convoy sailed in circles, as the landing was delayed 24-hours.
When ashore, the US Army ended up discovering, belatedly, the awesome niftiness of the DUKW. It entirely replaced Mulberry and PLUTO. The sands off Omaha were, and remain, so flat that one could easily get away with bottoming Liberty ships -- even Victory ships -- twice a day -- with each swing of the tide. When the sea was all the way out, mere GMC trucks sufficed to off-load the ships. When things got wet, the DUKWs stepped up. This scheme was so efficient that in no time flat, the British and Canadians started to get fully HALF of all their stuff across the American beach-head. This reality was suppressed for years and years. Try and find a photo of it. I've never seen even one. Every official photo omits the stream of British lorries coming down Highway 13 from Omaha.
Omaha was used because it was nature's instant port, a trait that every planner, British or American totally missed.
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Fortunately it's not that far. All that the panzers have to do is beat Soviet infantry marching across the snow on foot.
1) The lead elements had no heavy weapons until days passed.
2) The pincers didn't close up until THREE days passed. You might run some calculations as to how much faster a Mark III tank is versus a bunch of ground pounders.
3) The supply echelon would chase down the westward panzers, there can be no doubt about that.
4) The T34s coming down from the north have to cover twice as much ground -- and are racing AWAY from their supply echelon.
5) During this race, the panzer can pretty much stay right on their own supply trails// roads if you want to call them that.
6) The departure of the panzers would take with them as many soldiers as could reasonably ride on top -- just for the shear joy of escaping the pocket. Expect many volunteers.
7) No small number of the panzers would be half-tracks -- which are absolute death for light infantry. They're more deadly than Mark III panzers. They pack more machine guns and have better visibility. They also don't do so bad with fuel consumption.
8) In the actual campaign, Paulus sent the panzer regiments up to fight -- in a swirl -- with T34s -- northward. BIG mistake. They needed to race away from the Soviets and then shield their own supply echelon. Going all the way to Rostov was merely a term of art, as it would be expected that the supply stream would meet the panzers some place around the Chir river// or Kalach.
9) The 11th Panzer was located to the west of 6th Army and would've been very able to hook up with the 14th Panzer Corps or 24th Panzer Corps or both.
10) The key thing being that panzers are virtually worthless on defense. Their mobility is their number one asset.
( Kind of the same with helicopters, and helicopter troops. If they stay
put, they get shot to chit. )
As for your estimate of the fuel available to the panzers at start: wrong.
Those numbers came from Paulus AFTER he'd burned through their gasoline supply chasing off to the north, and then wheeling back into the pocket. (!!!) Most accounts omit the fact that this is what Paulus & Company did in the days prior to the pocket being sealed up. Yes, they went up and back -- back into the Stalingrad pocket. (!!!) This one pointless chase burned up the very fuel that would've permitted all of them to escape to the west.
That's called BAD leadership. NO WAY would Guderian, Rommel, Hoth, ... bring panzers back into a kessel, an obvious kessel.
The panzers had to break out BEFORE they were breaking out: BEFORE the Soviets ringed them in. The closure took THREE DAYS. The panzers could've shot out in less than six-hours. Paulus didn't even post sentries// observation posts to his rear. Yes, the Red Army advanced all that way ON FOOT without Paulus realizing what was unfolding. He really was surprised when the ring was closed. Even then, the panzers could've shot through it -- because the Russians had no anti-tank weapons of any kind. They couldn't even dig fox-holes in that cold weather.
( When the Germans retreated out of their fox-holes -- they couldn't dig replacement holes further back and in, either. )
None of the Soviet weapons and positions you posit were in place until a week had passed. Getting anything across the Volga, the southern wing, was a bitch and a half. The Soviets had to use dynamite to blow the ice ridges out of the way so as to finally have a truck route. Yeah, that process took days. All the longer because the Germans were shelling them at the time. (They were crossing that close to Stalingrad. The Russians had their own logistical nightmare on the east side of the Volga, too. )
To make things short: your thesis lies bleeding, wait, it's dead.
So sad.
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The tendency of WWII tanks to breakdown in the field was epic compared to the modern experience. The Panther Ds at Kursk is merely the tip off.
[ BTW, Gantz asserts that the unit history is explicit: only a trivial number of Panther Ds broke down due to fire at Kursk once committed. What did them in was the brilliant idea of parking the regiment in a hollow, out of sight, overnight. God was not with them. There was a massive downpour in the wee hours. This caused every Panther to sink down all the way to their hull. (!) It then took DAYS for the regiment to recover these Panthers.
For, you see, the only thing that could pull a Panther out of the mud was one, if not two, other Panthers. The boys fell upon their charges with shovel and bucket, but to a large degree the Germans had to wait for the mud to dry out. Since the weather was extra-ordinarily warm ( 90+ F ) the mud did dry out. ]
Because Russian tanks -- T34 -- also have such an astonishing breakdown rate, one is left lost as to what's up.
The best tank of the war, the M4 Sherman, had a breakdown rate of 500miles. The T34 had a breakdown rate of 150miles. (est) The Tiger and Panther had epic breakdown rates of 70miles and 100miles.
Much of the latter was due to sabotage at the factory. All recovered Panthers to date show factory production sabotage in their critical lubrication systems. This goes a LONG way towards explaining why most Tigers can't stay in action more than a day at a time. Heavy Tiger battalions would lose 65% of their strength even without taking any combat losses. (!!!) This can only be detected by working through unit histories. It's not something that the Heer is proud of. You won't see Germans gloating about this crazy failure rate in their personal histories. But it goes miles and miles towards explaining why you read endless German accounts of being overwhelmed by numbers. They really were, The rest of their gear was back in the rear for repair. (!!!)
German stats show that active Panthers at the front at the end of 1943 were almost the same in number as at Kursk. (!!!) Inactive// under repair Panthers were equal in number. Then there were Panthers that were in transit. Hitler's policy was to hold back tanks -- all of them -- to create new formations. Speer absolutely could not talk him out of it. The result is that the stats are skewed. An astonishing fraction of the tank force is always sitting idle back in Germany.
Late in the war, Hitler gave up on the Heer, and moved to create a wholly new army. He started creating Panther brigades. ( Typically numbered in the hundreds: 106th, 107th, etc. ) These were created by taking ardent Nazi officers of True Belief and mating them with young German draftees. Their performance in battle was horrible. I'd say that they were a tad short in the sgt department.
The bottom line is that you can't trust German stats in the least.
Further, Hitler would NOT let Speer produce spare parts. Weird, strange, I know. Speer bitterly recounted how many times this issue was run up the flag pole. In practice it meant that German repair troops had to learn to take cripples apart -- to run a junk yard -- so as to have any repair parts at all.
The Russians had their own problems, starting with their breakdown rate. Early in the war, their breakdown rate with the T34 was off the hook -- something like 50miles.
That is, 50miles of cross country transit would cause half of all the machines to break down to such a degree that they could no longer roll.
And Russia is actually a pretty flat place as things go. Later in the war, things go a lot better, but Russia could never attain what their LendLease Shermans gave them. That's why you'll see -- over and over -- LendLease Shermans leading DEEP penetrations behind German lines. Ploesti comes immediately to mind. Those old photos were Winston Smithed by Moscow after the war was won, BTW. You really have to root around for them.
German propaganda showed both British and American tanks ALL THE TIME. Because they were leading the deepest penetrations -- solely because they could keep on rolling -- and because they always had radios -- a some time thing with T34 machines.
In sum: the German army defeated the German army in Russia. And to a very real degree, the Russian army defeated the Russian army. The Soviets only stopped defeating themselves after Zhukov and his pals took over control of the Red Army. From that point onwards, Stalin had to remain sitting in on the meetings -- attempting to not look stupid and not look no longer in charge.
Asking decent questions and then rubber stamping his marshall's plans started to really work out for him.
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I see that Joseph Layton has a German Coal to Gas Program WW2 lecture linked in the YouTube side bar.
Man is that lecture full of both fact and error.
The PRIMARY error -- shared by the Nazis and their industrial chemists -- was to use the statistics ( chemistry results ) seen with the coking process of Met Coal with the same process when Lignite or Bituminous Coal is processed.
The shift in feedstock is ALL IMPORTANT. Met Coal is prized because it has LOW contamination from Ash, Sulfur and Phosphorous. ( The latter is even more trouble than sulfur, BTW. )
[ In a reducing environment ( iron smelter ) one is always at risk for creation of H3P and H2S -- BOTH are intensely toxic -- way, way beyond HCN -- the stuff used to execute criminals in the gas chamber. This is why Met Coal commands quite the premium. It doesn't create process headaches.
( 5 to 10 times by weight of inferior coals -- indeed many coals just can't be used in iron reduction no matter how cheaply they can be purchased.)
( Lots of ash also just gums up the works something awful. )
In contrast, the vapors that one can drive off of bituminous coal make for IDEAL crude oil feedstock. They HAVE to be light. They don't become vapors any other way.
Where the Nazis went totally off the rails: trying to muck around with the residium -- to convert it into synthesis gas. That's doable only if you're willing to just BURN money.
It just takes TOO MUCH equipment -- very high pressure equipment. It's these high pressure steels that the Nazis couldn't manufacture in sufficient amounts. They never ran low on low performance steels.
The correct solution was to set up a co-generation plant that would burn the residium to rais steam and to generate electric power. No attempt should've been made to muck around with the 'heavies' // aka 'bottoms' // coked out cr ap that the process generated.
Further, the correct device for coking bituminous coal can be seen in mass use: it consists of slots for the coal which are purged by a hydaulic ram after each cycle.
In normal coking the product desired is the coke. For the Nazis, the product desired was the off-gas. The remainder should've been shoved into rail road cars and shunted off to an adjacent power plant.
This kind of gear does not require exotic steels, nor tricky construction. It just needs to eat a LOT of bituminous coal.
To get even MORE syn-crude one should process Lignite. It will, however, produce a totally rotten heat value in the cr ap left over. The vapors will be WET... lots of steam in them. Fortunately, steam is very easy to condense out of the process stream. A wet stream will also largely cleanse the fluid of most acids and bases. They'll be so ionic that they just partition into the water phase. Poof, no longer a problem.
( Don't bring this up with the EPA. )
The kicker with the above scheme is that it dates from the 19th Century.
The ego-problem for German chemists was that they just couldn't bear to live with the energy waste required for maximum through-put and lowest cost. They, the CHEMISTS kept pitching processes that just SUCKED DOWN steel and capital -- as if they were still living in a peace-time economic equation.
It's notable that most of the Nazi plants were schemed up during the pre-war era -- with not one of the key players being told of the larger picture.
As for Diesel fuel ( aka middle distillate for those in the refining trade ) -- it should've been the OBVIOUS target -- never gasoline. Germany had the world's best Diesel engines. Herr Diesel was a German inventor in the first place. Practically every Diesel improvement was initiated in Germany as a result. They, the engineers, had received MASSIVE funding from the Kaiser for Diesel engined U-Boats going back two-generations earlier.
So it's astounding that Guderian and Hoepner ever designed the Mark III and Mark IV panzers to use gasoline. No nation uses gasoline powered tanks these days. They were abandoned, wholesale, during the 1950's. ( And those tanks were left-overs from WWII.)
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@JohnBurns -- incorrect.
The British recently tested those radios. Yes, they still had such radios in their possession -- and they were taken by investigators to Salisbury plain -- in optimal conditions -- and it was soon discovered that they, the radios, NEVER had decent range -- PERIOD. With the best operators, in ideal weather, in ideal terrain with radios totally squared away -- they STILL could not transmit // receive much past 2.5 miles. This was broadcast by the BBC. They had a show that looked back, forensically, at many famous British battles.
Time and time, again, they've discovered that the old historical version accepted for perhaps centuries is and was totally wrong. Famously, they discovered that the entire narrative about Agincourt was totally wrong. British long bows had NOTHING to do with Henry's success. The French actually just killed themselves. Strange, but true.
The British Army simply did not test its radios for range -- certainly not First Airborne. On manuvers the boys never got that far apart... and these were tactical radios. Driven by batteries, they were power hogs, too. (All tube driven electronics just sucks down the juice, which is why the range was so limited. To get more range, they needed line power -- not batteries.)
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@John Burns
After Bulge, Ike pushed Monty to the curb.
This explains why the British Army group was "pinched out" as they say when the Allied armies crossed the Rhine.
Ike basically cut Monty off of American support... once he crossed the Rhine. From that point onward, Monty had to TOTALLY rely upon British logistics.
He couldn't get out of first gear.
The boobs south of him then proceeded to over-run Western Germany so fast that it alarmed Stalin.
By the end, Monty had to ask Ike for the 82nd Airborne so that the Reds would not roll into Denmark. He got them.
Gavin, the 'loser' jumped into his jeep and then rolled Northeast across Germany using nothing more than his side arm and an American flag, pennant mounted on his jeep.
From time to time, he'd even have Germans saluting him! Being behind American lines was a dream come true for them.
In his book "On to Berlin" he recounted how weird it was. For before he rolled, the British had led him to believe that intense resistance was to be faced. However, it was a cake-walk... a motor-march.
By the end, Gavin had reached the Baltic... not Berlin! Heh.
And, keep in mind, Gavin admired both Browning and Monty. Loved them in fact.
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Ike had taken 9th Army away from Monty by the end.
Gavin, a Monty-phile -- big time, specifically stated in his book that the release came from IKE.
Monty HAD to go to Ike to get this division.
Ike pinched 21st Army Group out of the Front. By the end of the war, not one British formation was there to shake hands with the Russians.
This was deliberate. A snub, for sure.
Seeing the lay of the (political) land, Monty accepted the TOTAL surrender of Nazi Germany in his 21st Army Group HQ on May 5th, 1945.
When Ike heard the news, he flipped, ( off camera ) and informed Monty that the surrender could ONLY ever occur at SHAEF HQ. Please send your reps. Monty was not on hand, IIRC. Ike would also not appear in the ceremony. He deliberately stayed in the next room. He wanted to strangle the Germans, of course.
Ike actually had a TERRIBLE temper.
Marshall told him even a single additional outburst would be enough for him to be sent down in shame. Further, Ike was to NOT micro-manage subordinate commands. Upon the attempt, he'd also be sent packing. These General Orders from THE General explain what many Brits find inexplicable... Americans, too.
The Ike they 'know' is Mr. genial. His military record says the opposite. One of the reasons that Marshall hated McArthur was that McArthur took a fulsome chit on Ike's 'military jacket.'
As a result Ike was a mere Lt Col at the start of WWII. He was three stars in less than 12 months once Marshall was 'hip' to what McArthur had done. He'd lied... for years on end. Free-riding Ike's work as if it was his own. (!!!) Unforgivable. Any lesser rank would've been court martialed. But, McArthur was already a national hero.
[ Likewise Johnny Carson, known to every American as Mr. fun guy was, in fact, too tightly wrapped and was routinely drunk as a skunk -- and Johnny was an ANGRY drunk. He really did need Ed McMahon to chill him down// double as a body guard. ]
Lastly when Zhukov heard that Ike had taken the surrender he wigged out. The Germans HAD to perform the same ceremony for the Red Army. Each one of these German surrenders was total and complete across the board. Monty's ceremony has been Winston Smithed down the memory hole. Yet it was not a bit different than Ike's or Zhukov's.
All of which proves that it takes three times as much effort to surrender as it takes to declare war. Heh.
You MUST be kidding about the North Sea. The Russians were already on the North Sea and had been there for months and months.
The issue was DENMARK. You're exposing how twisted your 'logic' can be.
Not unreasonably, Monty wanted to be standing in place to shake hands with the Russians. Once it was obvious that this would never happen he dialled Ike and had the 82nd stand in for him. That must have been as much fun as gargling shards of glass.
Well, at least on paper, the 82nd would count as a subordinate command to 21st Army Group.
That had to count for something.
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@John Burns
You live in an alternate reality. Bradley slipped 9th Army into the merge between 21st Army Group and 12th Army Group.
That was his political solution. The 9th Army was but an over-grown corps at that time.
1st Army consisted of 15 premier divisions.
Marshall told Bradley that was his limit. Bradley, 12 AG commander was actually running 1st US Army at the exact same time. Hodges was nothing more than a go-fer and yes-man. Bradley routinely reached past Hodges to Gerow and Collins -- his twin favorites. Both reached 4 stars in the post war era, IIRC. (And Bradley 5 stars.)
Upon Marshall's dictum, every new division to land went to Patton... until 3rd Army became a monster. Then Marshall told Bradley, what goes for Hodges goes for Patton: no more.
Simpson was FORCED upon Bradley. He wanted Gerow. He had to eat crow and explain to Gerow that he was not in a position to dictate army commanders.
Simpson came out of the National Guard, IIRC, was McNairs favorite.
But whatever, Bradley came to fall in love with Simpson: who NEVER provided Bradley with any grief whatsoever. He was totally the opposite of both Hodges and Patton. Simpson was ALL business.
Monty QUICKLY realized just how lucky he was. Simpson beat Hodges all to Hell. Further, the new American divisions were 'cleaned up' doctrinally. They'd been cross training with American veterans, only the best were given this assignment, and so small unit tactics late in the war, with totally virgin infantry divisions, were night-and-day better than what was seen in Normandy. And Monty was sitting in the catbird's-seat as they rolled in.
One of them was the 104th. It was commanded by Terry Allen. He HATED Bradley. He couldn't have been HAPPIER than serving under Simpson and Monty. The 104th was an elite formation. Allen made it the sole and only night fighting infantry division in the USA. It pulled off miracles.
Need I say it? Monty just loved that division. It was constantly used as an infantry spearhead. It moved faster than most armored divisions, BTW. The Germans were simply not at all prepared for night attacks. They'd just fall apart. Simpson would batter them by day -- and then unleash Allen's 104th after nightfall. That's all she wrote.
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@JohnBurns
Wow, what are you smoking?
The Russians have been 'on the Baltic' all the way from Prussia, you moron.
The reason Monty needed Gavin was to stop them from marching into Denmark, indeed, conquering that whole nation.
The reason Ninth Army was removed from Monty was as a snub. It sure as hell surprised Monty. And he was NOT happy.
Ninth Army was 90% of his attack power. The rest of 21st Army Group was bled out... intolerant of casualties of any kind.
Six-years of bleeding was more than enough for those boys.
In Bradley's autobiography he relishes this humiliation of Monty -- quite bragging about the ENTIRE Russian-American front being just that.
Arriving after the surrender ceremony is NOT what Monty had in mind.
He'd insulted Ike, Bradley, Patton and Hodges -- repeatedly. That had consequences.
BTW, when NATO was founded, Ike and Monty were brought back into harness.
Once Ike left the scene, Monty was straight out the door.
Like hell he wanted to be around a superior that was his junior in the history books.
Even so, Monty continued to run down American military acumen until he died. He didn't have a kind word for Alexander, either. (!!!) He dissed him as being basically a pretty boy, harmless enough as long as he followed (Monty's) instruction.
What a pill.
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OKH failed to appreciate that Case Blue DEMANDED emphasis upon the rail net.
Germany didn't have the gasoline to support a truck fleet with that much 'reach.'
Even the Americans (1944-45) found that trucks can only take you so far. You must restore the rail net ASAP. The USA prioritized the rail link from Cherbourg to Paris, and even hauled British coal to Paris to get the train system back up and running, doing so with the Red Ball Express at one point. (!!)
"After a month of demining and repairs by American and French engineers, the port, completely razed by the Germans and the bombing, welcomed the first Liberty ships and became, until the victory of 1945, the largest port in the world, with traffic double that of New York.[45] It was also the endpoint of the gasoline which crossed the English Channel via the underwater pipeline PLUTO (Pipe Line Under The Ocean), and the starting point of the Red Ball Express, truck transport circuit to Chartres."
The German attempts at extending her Russian rail net were belated. The story is so embarrassing that you just about never read anything about it.
It's notable that the Nazis had access to French rail resources that could've entirely changed the picture. They refused to use them... probably as a matter of policy.
The massive Luftwaffe raids against Stalingrad were a triple crime: they consumed WAY too much fuel -- to no positive purpose. The raids destroyed the very assets that you'd think the Nazis would want for themselves. The raids provided the perfect terrain for the Soviet defense which would surely be a first class bitch. Lastly, they killed a lot of Russian civilians while providing absolutely no moral crisis for the larger Soviet Union.
The avgas consumed by the raids should've been given over to Ju-52 flights so that Army Groups A & B could roll on at exploitation speed -- taking critical objectives via motor-march -- as compared to fighting. This last gambit was what made Barbarossa so astonishing.
Army Group A was WAY TOO LARGE. 17th Army should've been reduced to a mountain corps, and given motorization -- say 2 mountain divisions and 1 jager division. The rest of that army should've been allocated to the main front -- 2nd Army in particular. A rump position west of the Kerch Strait would've sufficed. ( an infantry division or two being re-blooded )
1st Panzer Army should've given up most of its panzers to 4th and 2nd Panzer Armies -- and received GDm, 3m and 29m in exchange. You just don't need that many tanks, just motorized infantry. The bigger 1st Panzer Army gets, the harder it is to fuel up. It's destined to spend most of its time punching air. That had to be obvious.
All of these key decisions should've been made during the Halder era. He did more to advance the Allied cause than Adolf Hitler.
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@TIK... the General SS was the ORIGINAL SS organization. The Waffen SS was established only after Adolf was in power. It was the military wing of the SS that Hitler explicitly expected to use internally and externally against his foes.
During the Third Reich, the General SS expanded like topsy. It's role was strictly internal. Within its ranks: the Gestapo and SD. (The Gestapo was Goring's creature. He surrendered it to Himmler for a quid pro quo before WWII got rolling. )
Today, if you Google General SS you end up getting absurd links to SS generals... Waffen SS generals... which is totally off track.
The size of the General SS was staggering. It's where the factory goons were slotted. These guys patrolled the factory floors of Nazi Germany, hovering over forced labor -- not usually death camp labor. They numbered in the hundreds of thousands. You could've built armies in the field with this much manpower.
Consequently, EVERY significant industrial enterprise was -- de facto -- folded into Himmler's empire. He even established a parallel economy. Like the Soviet's GUM department store, General SS men could obtain luxuries denied to the general populous. They ran SS 'PX stores' rather like Costco (irony alert) where everything was better.
Himmler had a program to induce ALL technical talents into his General SS. Consequently, it was COMMON for the top brass within any industrial firm to wear the SS uniform -- being inducted -- but only on this or that ceremonial occasions. Von Baun was in the General SS, as was his boss. He only ever wore his major's uniform when he HAD to -- like visiting Dora -- twice.
This is why Himmler and Hitler didn't even have to wait for formal hearings about industrial policy. EVERY corporation -- even privately held ones -- was on their leash.
Famously, when Speer hauled the industrialists in for his first pow wow, every last one kissed his ring -- instantly. He promptly took control of ALL of their key policies. He forced upon them deals that they did not want to do, that they'd been resisting all along. Stuff like selling to their life-long business enemies and rivals.
So much for Nazi Capitalism.
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