The paper was not about supposed to be about Stalingrad though.

Thanks for the points though.

Then given my, and apparently others, thoughts on this paper makes it even worse. The lack of clear direction and conceptual analysis of the grand scope of the Eastern Front on a Grand Strategic scale covering the entirety of that war from a point of view of Stalin's actions is never brought forward in a recognizable fashion.
That is a major problem.

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Truth is stranger than bullshit!

In any case, the true reasons for Russian victory on the Eastern Front in World War II must include Hitler's madness, one of Russia's greatest generals, Georgy Zhukov, the historical Russian winter, and most importantly, the will of the Russian people.

The paper is about hand selected topics that I feel led to USSR's victory. At the same time, I was supposed to mention arguments which defended Stalin.

I mentioned things throughout Stalingrad and the Eastern Front, but the point of the paper was not to chronicle all the specific problems that occurred in Stalingrad or the Eastern Front. The paper was 14+ pages as it was - you are telling me I didn't mention enough; meanwhile, it was only supposed to be 12.....how much more could I have possibly added in?

Zhukov was no mastermind. He put togeather a sound, if not highly original, plan for the Soviet counter offensive.

That's your opinion - Erickson and Overy both wrote in their books that Zhukov was a great general.

Read Glantz' Zhukov's Greatest Defeat for starters. Since the Soviet Union collapsed a great deal more accurate information about the war in the East has come to light. Much of it puts a far bleaker picture on the competence of Soviet operations.
I can only go with what you put up here. If your paper was longer or had more citations and references I would not have known it.

Zhukov was only one of a number of Soviet marshalls and generals that showed a reasonable level of competence during the war. He is hardly responsible single-handedly for defeating the Germans. A great deal of credit goes to the Germans themselves for that cause.

Stalin's, and STRAVKA's most valuable input was after their initial defeats in 1941 not making too many further major blunders. Zhukov's operations Mars and Saturn of early 1942 were blunders. The Red Army lacked both the material and competence to carry these offensives out and it shows in how Zhukov was handed his ass for them by the far more tactically and operationally competent Germans.

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Truth is stranger than bullshit!

Isn't there a bulldozer make with your name on it, Terry?

Now it all depends on how good or bad the prof is.

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There is an ass in my avatar.

Its a backhoe not a bulldozer. That way I can dig your grave and bury you in it all at the same time....

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Truth is stranger than bullshit!

You give Evil an entire new meaning

Back on topic, that "Zhukov's Greatest Defeat" certainly was nothing to write home about. Operation Mars was an disguised failure (see the Glantz paper here http://fmso.leavenworth.army.mil/doc...t/countrpt.htm ), a paralell to Op. Saturn that did not run so well.

Later on in 1945, with all the means he had available then at the Seelowe-Berlin Offensive Operation (better known in the west as the Battle of Seelow Heights), 1st Belorussian Front (G. Zhukov) took an inordinate amount of casualties precisely due to blundering prompted by intense pressure from Above (read the appropriate chapter in Erickson's Road to Berlin). Z. did not exactly come shining out of this one but once you build a myth you can't dismantle it in the middle of an offensive.

Myths are dangerous for historians or wannabe historians like us here. Just look at how many times we have to bash Rommel's ghost inthe head.

Anyway, an interesting article I found.

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