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Germans doomed to failure

Discussion in 'Eastern Europe' started by the_patr1ck, Dec 4, 2010.

  1. the_patr1ck

    the_patr1ck Member

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    Hi, I'm writing an essay about the Eastern Front. I'm trying to prove that Germans couldn't defeat Russians despite their early victories. I want to show that American supplies, Russian mentality, weapons, and number of troops were insurmountable for Germans. Could you give any sources that I would base my thesis on?
     
  2. JeffinMNUSA

    JeffinMNUSA Member

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    Patr1ck;
    You could start here; https://www.cia.gov/library/center-...es/studies/vol50no1/9_BK_What_Stalin_Knew.htm Scroll to the bottom where you find Hitler admitting to Finland's Von Mannerheim that he had underestimated Soviet reserves-this was a year into the war and things really did not look so bad on the German side. Was it inevitable that the German war in the East was lost? With Hitler and NAZIs running the German war effort PROBABLY (they really needed major defections from the Soviet side-not likely when they came as enslavers and mass murderers). But as the famous American football coach Vince Lombardi once said "It ain't over until it's over." From this distance in time it is easy to say that NAZI was doomed, but to the people involved in the War on Hitler it has always seemed a close run thing.
    JeffinMNUSA
     
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  3. IRu

    IRu Member

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    I have a lot of resources, but they are all in Russian.
    If it's convenient for you (translated by Google) - let me know, I'll post the links here
    It is desirable to know more specifically - what area you are interested in?
     
  4. the_patr1ck

    the_patr1ck Member

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    Well, I would like to know more about numbers of soldiers, but also weapons, tanks, and aircraft - how many of these did each side have?
     
  5. LJAd

    LJAd Well-Known Member

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    Some corrections:
    1) there were no early German victories:the war had to be won on 1 september 1941;it was not;and afterward;with hindsight,the Germans had no chance .
    2) I don't think that Russian mentality (if such thing exist)had any thing to do with the German defeat
    3American supplies :ai!!!one counsel:unless you have a patriotic professor,don't mention Lend-Lease :it is the box of Pandora
    sources :
    Russia and the USSR in the wars of the 20th century:the losses of the Armed forces(the "Krivosheev" studies
    on :radikal .ru/FiO44 you will find a most detailed summary of the Russian strength in WWII:men,small arms,tanks,artilery,aircraft;trucks ...
    for the German side :
    A must :the wages of destruction
    also a must :Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweiten Weltkrieg,but ,alas,the English translation is beyond the wallett of a normal citizen .
     
  6. IRu

    IRu Member

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    Main:
    A lot of background information on the composition, size of the Red Army, the major combat operations
    http://www.rkka.ru/
    http://www.soldat.ru/
    The fighting Red Army in WWII (documents, orders, reports)
    http://bdsa.ru/
    Mechanized corps of the Red Army
    http://mechcorps.rkka.ru/
    Weapons, mostly of tanks and artillery
    http://www.battlefield.ru/ru/home.html
    All about tanks
    http://www.tankfront.ru/index.html
    All about airplanes
    http://www.hranitels.ru/
    Military memoirs of military chief can be found here
    http://militera.lib.ru/
    Database to search for a specific person
    http://www.obd-memorial.ru/
    Biographies of heroes
    http://www.warheroes.ru/
     
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  7. Kai-Petri

    Kai-Petri Kenraali

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    We have previously ( some ten year´s time ) discussed all the needed information with sources in the Forums, I believe. Just use the search function... :)
     
  8. C.Evans

    C.Evans Expert

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    Great stuff guys. Also, I remember speaking with a German Vet about his time on the Eastern Front. He said he knew the war was lost (speaking of an early 1943 experiance he had) when they attacked and took a Russian position (I forget where) and he saw discarded cardboard boxes littering the ground which were labled something like: "k-Rations and manufactured in the USA" etc. This was sometime before Kursk happened and he knew they were in deep dew-dew, when he saw those discarded food cartons lying about.
     
  9. Pelekys

    Pelekys Member

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    Same story happened during the Battle of Bulge. A german high officer checked the American military post office things and found a cake (!) which was made 2 days before in USA and family sent it by post to their son who was a soldier in Ardennes area.
    The German said 'if this cake was before 48 hours to USA, there is not any posibility to win'.
    I beleive a good source for the reasons, it was very difficult for the Germans to win, is the memoirs of the their generals like Manstein, Gouderian, etc. Also the interviews they gave to historians like Liddel Hart in the first years after the war.
     
  10. belasar

    belasar Court Jester

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    The general consenses is that Germany was doomed from the beginning, there are a few us who feel that Germany had a limited chance. In my opinion 15-20 percent chance. Keep an open mind, look at all the info you can collect, and make up your own mind. Good luck on your project!
     
  11. T. A. Gardner

    T. A. Gardner Genuine Chief

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    I suggest starting with Martin Van Creveld's book Supplying War. The biggest thing stopping the Germans in Russia in 1941 -42 is logistics. I would rate it as the number 1 cause of their defeat there.
     
  12. T. A. Gardner

    T. A. Gardner Genuine Chief

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    There are lots of stories like that one. Another is of a German officer captured at Anzio at the height of the German attack to reduce the beachhead. He saw all the masses of equipment and supplies sitting around the beachhead as he was taken to the rear and though the same thing.
    Or, German POW's crossing the US to POW camps seeing miles and miles of farm fields, factories, towns, warehouses, all untouched by war day after day riding on trains and they realized Germany was finished.
     
  13. Sloniksp

    Sloniksp Ставка

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    May I suggest "The Greatest Battle" by Andrew Nagorski

    Google Image Result for http://d28hgpri8am2if.cloudfront.net/book_images/cvr9781416545736_9781416545736.jpg

    The book talks about the build up, planning and launching of Barbarossa all the way up to the Battle of Moscow and a very nice description of the two leaders involved. It was a very easy and interesting read; not dry or filled with a bunch of numbers that may confuse a reader who is not accustomed to such. I found this book to be an excellent source and enjoyed reading it so much that I was disappointed when I came to the end. I highly recommend it!

    Best of luck
     
  14. TiredOldSoldier

    TiredOldSoldier Ace

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    IMO from a purely military standpoint the 1941 German army didn't have the logistic capabability for winning a prolonged campaign, it's debatable whether any army after the mongols was capabable of defeating Russia by occupation, far less the even larger USSR.
    This didn't prevent a political victory, like the one Germany achieved in 1917, the German generals memoirs always fail to remenber that their fathers succeded where they failed, and imperial Russia was even larger than the USSR. But the Nazis were inherently incapable of it, they were completely outplayed politically by Stalin and ended up reinforcing rather than weakening the Communist control over the USSR though if you look at the number of Russian "collaborators" in the German 1942 OOB they did have a chance there.
     
  15. LJAd

    LJAd Well-Known Member

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    I am not denying that logistics were very important,but IMHO,US and British posters have the tendency to give logistics to much importance .
    My POV (and it is corroborated by the German planning)is that the only German chance to win,was to defeat the SU in a quick,short campaign ,as in 1940(some Blitzkrieg);the reasons are
    1) Germany was to weak to sustain and win a long campaing in the East:there already was a second front in june 1941,most divisions were equipped with captured trucks,there were less artillery and aircraft available for Barbarossa than for Fall Gelb
    2)The longer the war,the stronger the SU would become:the SU could,if given time,mobilize millions:thus,the only possibility was to defeat the SU before it could mobilize those millions,and this was the essence of the Barbarossa plan .
    The Barbarossa plan failed (already on the end of august),because those millions were immediately mobilized .
    IMHO,the decisive period was the 10 weeks between 22 june and 1 september 1941,period,that has been ,almost totally,neglected by the historians.
    The historians were-and are still(IMHO erronuously) concentrating-on the Kiev decision ,operation Typhoon,the battle for Moscow,the Russian Winteroffensive,all things that were not decisive for the outcome of the war .
    One exemple:if the Germans had captured Moscow on the end of november (IMHO very unlikely),the German offensive would have stopped,due to the winter,thus the consequence would be a new campaign in 1942 .
     
  16. lwd

    lwd Ace

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    But weren't the Germans already exeriancing significant logistical problems at that point in time? Then there's the fact that the Soviets were mobilizing much faster than the Germans expected which is, to a large extent, a logistics effort.
     
  17. Black6

    Black6 Member

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    IMHO the most important reason for the failure of Barbarossa was the poor job of Intelligence gathering and the subsequent assumptions that were derived from the limited information gathered. We can fault the logistical support plan, but remember what exactly that plan was based off of. Franz Halder's quote about the campaign being won within the first few weeks is telling of the Intel failure, according to what they (the Germans) expected to meet from the Red Army he should have been correct. However, the Red Army was far more massive and its force generation ability far faster than they had planned for thus negating almost all of the pre-campaign assumptions from which the logistical support plan was based. It wasn't a set in stone conclusion that the Axis couldn't conquer the Soviet Union in 1941, but obviously the plan that they had was inadequate. If the Germans had Strategic Intelligence of the depth they had on the French prior to the 1940 campaign it is far more possible that they could have defeated the Red Army decisively and won the campaign.
    The only real chance for the Axis to defeat the Soviet Union was in 1941 due to what you mention above and a host of other issues. If your writing a short essay then you might only need one source and I would suggest Glantz or Erickson for depth, but for the quick functional version you need DA Pam 20-261 The German Campaign in Russia; Planning and Operations.
     
  18. LJAd

    LJAd Well-Known Member

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    Well,my definition of logistics is much narrower (maybe wrong):it is the transport to the front of all things the front needed,NOT the production of these things .
    Of course,the Germans had logistic problems in the period june-september,they expected that things would be difficult,of course not that they would be that bad ;but the logistic problems were incalculated:the only important thing was that on 1 september the Red Army was defeated,the German losses were irrelevant (exageration);on 1 september the Red Army was not defeated,and,it was not because of the German logistic problems .I have seen a lot of people arguing:if the German logistics were better,..than ..IMHO,that's irrelevant,if the Germans had received more tanks,the situation on 1 september would be the same:a strong intact Red Army facing the Ostheer and the Germans forced to start Barbarossa again ,on a small scale and far of their supply depots .The only thing that could save the Germans on 1 september,was a Red Army of some 1.5 million men,that would inevitably collapse,but there were not 1.5 million men facinf the Germans,but 3 million .
     
  19. LJAd

    LJAd Well-Known Member

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    I agree :it was essentially the force generation that saved the SU in the summer of 1941,without this,the Russian frontline would have collapsed .
    I disagree(on your point that with better Intelligence,they could have won ):better intelligence would reveal them that they could not win .They only could win ,if they were stronger (broadly speaking),but,that was impossible .
    The point is :the Germans knew that they only could win,if the Rad Army was defeated,before the force generation started .In 1914,the Schlieffen plan was based on the assumption that the Russian force generation would be slow ,and,this assumption was exact .When When the decision of Barbarossa was taken, the general POV was that it would be the same .It had to be the same ,otherwise,Barbarossa had no chance ,and,Barbarossa was (from the German POV) the only chance to force Britain to give up .Suppose you were colonel Kinzel,chief of FHO,and in april 1941,you were receiving informations about the exact pace of the Russian force generation.Would you go to Brauchitz,Keitel,and even Hitler,saying :you have to cancel Barbarossa,knowing that,from Hitler's POV,Barbarossa was the only chance to win the war ?Also knowing what normally happened with the messengers of bad news? The whole thing would be to say to Hitler:Barbarossa has no chance,thus :you have to capitulate or to shoot your self .One should not expect to much self-sacrifice .
     
  20. lwd

    lwd Ace

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    In order to mobilize troops you have to get the men and the equipment together then get them to the front. That's logistics. The actual production can be as well as you need to get the necessary materials and subcomponents to where they are needed and then get the completed equipment where it is needed.
    But logistics doesn't just mean more tanks it means fuel, ammo, and spare parts as well so that the offense can continue. If the Germans had had better logistics they would have gotten further by the 1 September date. Would it have been far enough? I don't know.
    I'm not saying it's purely logistics but logistics was a bit player. So was intel as others have pointed out. The German behavior also played a part, going from liborators to tyrants worse than the Soviets cause signficant problems as well. It affect the will to fight of Red Army and the resistance offered behind the lines as well as depriving the Germans of potential troops and other aid.
     

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