Comments by "bakters" (@bakters) on "Stalin’s Purge of the Red Army and Its Effects on the WW2 Eastern Front" video.

  1. Great video, though of course I disagree with some ideas put forth here. First, I do not think that the parallel between Marshal and Stalin goes very far. Peacetime army is dominated by guys skilled at internal politics, wartime army rewards skilled fighters. As you mentioned yourself, Red Army was at war pretty much all the time. They already had fighters on top, but Stalin ended it with the purge, and replaced fighters with apparatchiks. Marshal did the opposite. Second, there is this idea that the old staff was not capable of fighting a modern war, which differed hugely from earlier wars. I disagree, on many levels. Like, the cavalry was not outdated, especially its tactics, if you wanted to do mobile warfare without huge amount of trucks. Put those guys on tanks, they'll do just fine. Infantry not so much. And also I do not think that WWII differed much from earlier wars, but that's another story. Then, Stalin removed Tukhachevski and other military theorists who figured out how to end the trench stalemate. Old guys they might have been, but somehow they figured it all out. Their replacements were careful to forget all that in fear. Finally, Wehrmacht was led to battle by old men... USA had practically no war experience. It's obvious that their ranks were dominated by professional paper-pushers and ass-lickers. This "they are just too old" rhetoric is simply an euphemism, so they can feel better, while incompetence was the real reason. Big and crucial difference between Marshal's and Stalin's "purges". Still, wonderful video.
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  2. +__ __ - Actually, it doesn't seem like you disagree with me at all. I agree that Tukhachevski was competent and probably innocent. I agree that the reason for purges had nothing to do with army reorganization and everything to do with the rein of terror. Though, I do disagree with some points you bring up, but that's a different story. Mainly, I value Marshall highly, Red Army was not oversupplied, definitely not by the USA and I don't think that the overall value of Lend-Lease help was crucial to victory. Oh, and I don't feel that the Rape of Germany was a biggie. At least not compared to "strategic" bombing of the western allies or just about anything the Germans did in the east. But that's a different story. We agree on Tukhachevski and the reasons for purges.
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  3. +Nikolaj Winther - What I wrote elsewhere. It appears that both of us doubt that removing of the old brass was of any real value. After all, Zhukov was purged, the victor of Khalkyn Gol. Red Army had war experience. They already had successful fighters on top. Not so in the USA.
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  4. +__ __ - So, now you say Soviets didn't build tanks. Sure, they won the war with pure maskirovka instead of raw numbers. That's an improvement, I'd say. ;-)
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  5. +__ __ - If you say Lend-Lease was decisive, show it, instead of asking a bunch of loaded questions, and telling bits of wisdom about Marxists. Whom you probably never met... You do trust American bookkeepers, don't you? Anyway, Wehrmaht was not a small force. For the most part of Barbarossa they had numerical advantage. Just watch a TIK video on this subject, or David Glantz's, or "How the Red Army Defeated Germany: The three Alibis - Dr. Jonathon House".
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  6. +__ __ - The plan of taking Moscow involved deep encirclement of the whole city and then starving it into submission. Germans at this time were not capable of doin so. Their logistical support was so bad, that they still didn't provide their troops with winter clothing (which almost killed those troops!) Wehrmach survived by a thread. I can see someone arguing, that without Allied help (though not Lend-Lease!), soviets wouldn't be capable of counteroffensive. I'm not sure how true that may be, but I am quite convinced that they were capable of defense with or without British help. No, Moscow wouldn't fall. Even without Matildas.
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  7. +__ __ - "Technology transfer" would have happened, with or without wartime help. Part of it happened before the war with fully legal purchases. During the war they stole what they could from Germans. (I used to own two Russian bikes with their roots deep in WWII captured vehicles, and our first car was based on Ford. I think it was fully legally licensed at some point in time, then the patent expired. - Just a side note.) On top of that you had genuinely brilliant homegrown engineering, post war espionage, further legal purchases and all sort of stuff. Prolonging the war in hopes that Soviets will be a few steps back for a few years longer in the technology race doesn't seem to be worth it to me. Even in hindsight. War was terrible. Really. And if Soviets didn't kill all those German soldiers, somebody else would have to do the job.
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  8. +__ __ - Every system has its inefficiencies. In capitalism money talks, so you can simply buy the most advanced jet engine in the world. I read a book on how industrial espionage worked back in the Cold War era. It was based on greed. Did it work? Make your own guess... BTW, I'm from Poland, raised under their rule. No, I'm not a Rusophile. I like the people, all of us do, but their "vlast" is a different story altogether. Anyway, stuff like that happened before. Two superpowers in eternal struggle, one based on trade, the other on discipline. One was the cultural capital of the world with loads of money on disposal, the other had better soldiers. You know who eventually won? Not Athens, not Sparta, but Thebes. Who were promptly beaten by yet another even younger and hungrier power. In essence, stop worrying about Russia. If they could beat you, they would already. Worry about who is new Thebes, and even more who is about to become the new Macedon.
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  9. +__ __ - I just want to comment on rape accusations and Lend-Lease impact. Starting with this rape thing - I did not study the problem too much, but I'm sure it happened, simply because I read accounts of people I trust. Still, how much and how bad is questionable. What I know for sure, is that both Germans and USA wanted to paint a different picture after the war was over. Germany were allies, Soviets the enemy, so Orwellian 1984 kicked in, and you "had always been at war with Eastasia". And I know one other thing. There was this movement of refugees from post-war Poland, who constantly cried a river about "atrocities". Once we became an independent country, we went to them to apologize, but we asked first for documents and testimonies. They didn't come up with anything! It was all empty blame-shifting. While of course on the other side there are *tons*, literally, of documents and testimonies of unimaginable atrocities. So, take that into the account. Oh, screw Lend-Lease. My post is already long enough.
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  10. +__ __ - The estimates of Lend-Lease impact vary from 4% to 12%. With the bulk of it coming when the outcome of the war was already decided, mind you! Regarding "technology transfer", sure enough it happened. But not during the war, but during the rapid industrial expansion of the Soviet Union. They just bought it. From guys like Henry Ford, who built some factories for them. Capitalism at work, if you will. ;-)
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  11. +__ __ - Yeah, 466 British tanks, give or take, makes sense. And Americans through Lend-Lease almost none. That also makes sense, since Lend-Lease barely started. Whatever, let's round it all up to a thousand. Then what? Soviets lose? Considering they eventually build more tanks in a month than the whole occupied Europe (with slave labor!) in a year? Sorry, but I don't think so.
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  12. +Андрей Борцов - I have found an online source in English. Links require personal intervention by the channel host, so just put "the soviet economy and relations with the united states pdf" into Google to get it. The tables and numbers provided there definitely support 4-12% estimates (though the 4% low estimates are commonly misquoted out of context). The narrative concentrates on the premise, that those numbers do not tell the whole story, since even the small amount of help could have had crucial impact by allowing USSR's defense budget to grow, while the civilans didn't starve to death. That could be debated to no end, I guess. What ifs, what if-nots, and so forth. But the numbers are as they are. 1. Lend-Lease help to the USSR is dwarfed by the help to all other participants. 2. Most of it arrived rather late. 3. The numbers are not particularly impressive, when compared with domestic production. And what the author doesn't say, is that whatever actually reach the frontlines had lower effect than the same number of domestic products. Soviets either didn't know how or simply couldn't use those products to their full potential. In summary - Lend-Lease definitely helped. A little.
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  13. +__ __ - You corss-check the data. Which the paper I pointed to actually did. For example, we can rather trust the American record about how much they sent and where. It's consistent with the rough estimate of about 10% of the total Soviet war production. For Lend-Lease impact to become crucial we need to go to some sort of domino effecty hypothesis. Because dominos do not require a significant impact to fall over...
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  14. It came to me, that there is a topic which you might like. Namely: "Who paid for the Soviet Revolution?" You seem to thrive on controversy, and this topic is hugely controversial. As far as I'm aware, all evidence points out that the revolution was funded by German money, which is not what a bunch of Internet lunatics is willing to accept. I'd love to see them squirm! ;-)
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  15. +TIK - I do not think that removing the old brass did them much good at all. They purged guys like Tukhachevki, Svechin and Isserson. Young guys do not come up with revolutionary ideas by themselves. They pick them up from someone, then expand them and put in practice. The purge made it more *difficult*, not easier. The funny thing was, they were obviously aware of the importance of those ideas. We know it, because in case of this last guy, they let him finish the book before he was purged. (IIRC, he lost his teeth, but survived.) Then the book was hidden. Soviet logic... I'm not sure if links are OK on your channel, but the story of Isserson is on YT under the '"Architect of Soviet Victory in World War II" by Dr. Richard Harrison' title. So I do not object to the parallel because the means were different. I object because the goals were just about opposite.
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  16. +Chidis Skaniukas - Polish army was hardly professional, and the loss at the Warsaw battle was not Tukhachevski's fault. It was a close fight, which Soviets almost won, and would have if not for the lack of communication. BTW - I'm Polish, so obviously I looked at this battle a little bit.
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  17. +__ __ - "You don't think so. Why?" - Because we (can) know how many tanks were sent through Lend-Lease in 1941. I've no time to go through it again, but from memory it was 35 or something like this. I think there was an order of magnitude more British tanks, which made a bit of a difference, though. Still, hardly a difference between a won and lost war, until you go for the domino-effect hypothesis.
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  18. +__ __ - "Lend-Lease tanks constituted 30 to 40 percent of heavy and medium tank strength before Moscow at the beginning of December 1941." British help is not Lend-Lease. This quote needs fixing. Anyway, it's not like Moscow would fall without those tanks, is it?
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  19. Karol Wojtyła, usually known as the Pope John Paul II. (BTW - I'm an atheist, so if I'm biased, it's the other way around.)
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  20. Atheism is not a club. You don't go there to hang around with cool kids. But of course there are some who happen to be cool too. Steve Wineberg of quark fame, Richard Dawkins of selfish gene fame, James Randi, Penn Jilette - he organized narrated and produced "Tim's Vermeer", even if you don't care for stage magic. Christopher Hitchens was an atheist. Ayam Hirsi Ali (from memory, so maybe I butchered her name) is also one. Listen to what she has to say to second wave feminists. Powerful doesn't quite cut it. You can find cool kids just about anywhere. But I became an atheist before I knew anything about any of them, so that's not why I'm one.
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  21. +TIK - Yes. I actually accept your main premise, that the destruction to the chain of command could be the main reason of poor performance of the Red Army. It's not like it doesn't make sense... It could be that my objection is emotionally based, and I just can't accept that Marshal and Stalin did similar things with similar outcomes, even if for differing reasons. Sure enough, you made me think today. A lot!
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  22. +Chidis Skaniukas - Svetchin, Frunze and Tukhachevsky are usually credited with early deep operation concepts, while Triandafilov is credited with the name itself and further developments. Be it as it may, Tukhachevsky was replaced with Voroshilov. An incompetent pig. Winter war and all.
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  23. +Chidis Skaniukas - If you figure out how to break the trench warfare stalemate, and you are proven right, you can hardly be an idiot. Even if, which I find doubtful, but even if Tukhachevsky was an ineffective field commander. Even then killing him put Soviet war doctrine a few steps back. It's not like killing people was the only way of replacing them, even in Soviet Russia. He could be retired and offered a "honorable" office at the academy, or whatever. Then I could agree.
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  24. +_ __ - Yeah. The guy who runs Poland right now is a lawyer and a populist. Anyway, it seems to be a smoke screen for deeper machinations. Obviously they don't expect Germans to pay (and it's unofficial anyway), but they welcome the noise, as they try to erode our democracy some more. Dangerous bunch.
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  25. +__ __ - Sure. Every (potential) tyrant "protects" you from something. Former shift would agree to the refugee program, milk Germany for all they could in the process, and then the refugees would leave Poland and go there anyway, simply because our social help is so low, they'd have to work to survive. That's why one of the former shift rules the EU right now, and we can't have him. Several others died in this unfortunate plane crash at Smolensk, so we are left with second rates for a while. They can't take on this one skilled behind-the-scener. It might get worse before it gets better.
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  26. +__ __ - Yes, we had some veterans (though that does not mean professionals), but a lot of fresh recruits too. Some of them went to battle barefoot, though. Poland just emerged. Pretty much nothing was working right, including logistics. Soviets were equally badly supplied. That's why we had a chance.
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  27. +__ __ - Why does it matter? Please, explain your train of thoughts, and where are you trying to get with it.
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  28. +__ __ - I'm worried about Marxists in your country too.
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  29. +Андрей Борцов - Of course the documents confirm everything. I'll quote just one: "Due to strong Entante competition, 3 000 000 marks per month necessary. In event of early need for change in our political line, a higher sum must be reckoned with." A ciphered telegram sent by Count Wilhelm Mirbach, the German ambassador in Moscow, on 3 June 1918. Welcome to reality! :-D
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  30. +Андрей Борцов - Oh, of course they started the whole thing much earlier. In 1915, to be precise. On the German side there was a guy called Jacob Ganetzky, otherwise known as Fuerstenberg, and Parvus on the Russian side. Ganetzky had money from Count Ulrich von und zu Brockdorff-Rantzau, a German ambassador in Copenhagen. von und zu, what an irony! ;-D And, as I showed earlier, they continued the whole deal for a long time. "but the Bolsheviks' coming to power was unprofitable" - They planted Lenin in Petersburg, FFS. "TELEGRAM NO. I925 AS 4486 Berlin, 3 December 1917 [...] It was not until the Bolsheviks had received from us a steady flow of funds through various channels and under different labels that they were in a position to be able to build up their main organ, Pravda, to conduct energetic propaganda [...] The conclusion of a separate peace would mean the achievement of the desired war aim, namely a breach between Russia and her Allies. " I would say that a separate peace with Russia was "profitable" enough... "but you can not finance idea." - So, who paid for Pravda? Regarding Sissen documents - I barely know anything about them. Just that it was a fake, as you say.
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  31. +nineL7191 - Some of those idiots read Russian just fine...
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  32. +TIK - Don't get me wrong, please. Maybe "thrive on controversy" is too strong. I'm not trying to suggest that you try to gather publicity by forcing the issue, but in all your videos I have watched there seems to be this one thing, which you really want to say. That's good. I just love it! I consider it to be the result of well thought out research. With the emphasis on "well thought out". I see it like that. You do the research, just to get the background info, you get some picture in your mind of the whole problem, then you dig deeper. The deeper you dig, the more obvious it becomes that some aspect of the accepted view is at least doubtful, if not just plain wrong. Then you make the video and tell it to all of us. Call it as you wish. I didn't want to criticize your approach at all. I just love it.
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  33. +nineL7191 - Я в школе Русского учился. No klav u vas ochen strannyi dla menia, a ya nikogda transliteracyi pravilno nie nauchilsya - so it's a bloody pain to write anything. But I can read fine.
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  34. +Fuzzy Dunlop - Just read the comments. The other group which can't accept it are nazi lovers, but I guess they don't frequent this channel.
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