Soviet blunders in World War 2

Interesting point, Johann - it would take more than 15 years, even CENTURIES to reform the culture, seeing as it was also the Samurais some 200-300 years before WWII who considered it honourable to die for their emperor rather than surrender - some centuries later and Tojo's armies were STILL doing it!

They even fell on their swords like the Samurais did! (so I heard)

 

I thionk I see part of my problem. I'm naot saying that the Japanese who committed suicide weren't brave, just that it was a stupid waste of trained men. Admiral Yamaguchi went down with the Hiryu at Midway rather than be rescued and "dishonored" for having lost a battle. He was supposedly one of the best Japanese admirals and a potential replacement for Yamato. The Kamikazes were at least an attempt to make the deaths militarily useful, and were not totally sensless.

 

You could have a good point there but I'm not sure if the japanese actually used their best pilots/drivers/soldiers to perform Kamikaze missions. If they did, then the waste of them is comparable to Stalingrad. If they didn't, which I assume, then they wouldn't be wasting their trained men, just some of their average.

 

The original, and in terms of numbers, most successful Kamikazes were those used during the Philippines campaign in 1944/1945 and were among the best pilots there. Later on they used pilots barely able to fly and any plane that would fly. The better pilots were used as navigation and escort. Not all kamikazes were volunteers either. The idea was that any plane sent against the U.S. fleet stood no chance of surviving anyway, so they should at least try to sink an American ship in the process.

 

In "The Big E," a book following the USS Eisenhower, the kamikazes are wiped out by the hundreds because the poilots are so inept. The Japanese put everyone who could fly into a plane, and sent them at a ship.

 

the main mistake for the japs is that instead of attacking in groups to overwork the defenses the decide to go one on one,so they got shot out of the sky :bang:

 

So goes the way of the Samurai.

 

Well, Skua, I don't see a difference, save, perhaps, in degrees of tyranny.

 

Small correction, the "Big E" was the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Enterprise.
The Kamikazes at Okinawa were successful in part because the came in big groups. There were over 1,900 used at Okinawa, most groups averaging 150 planes and one raid had 350.
Some stats:
15 Kamikazes shot down per allied ship damaged
100 Kamikazes shot down per ship sunk
In 1944 one in six kamikazes hit something, at Okinawa, April-June 1945, it was down to one in nine. U.S. defences got better, pilots got worse.
There were about 5,000 Kamikazes available for the invasion of Japan. Estimates were that 1:12 to 1:20 would hit something, and an esitmated 300 ships would be hit.

 

Tyranny is not inherited in communism, in fact if it would ever have worked it would have been because of a caring government. It lead to tiranny because it was the only way of forcing all labour and posession into government hands. This is why it never worked.

 

You say that tyranny is not inherent in Cummunism; I disagree. How many Communist governments came into power by means other than the point of a gun? That says a lot, in my view.

 

This topic is hilarious.

OK, for all people that spoke with "expertise", please name those great Soviet generals that were purged by Stalin in 1939 and would have undoubtedly routed Hitler and his army. At least a couple. I am curious.

You do realise that Soviet Red army had no dog tags correct? So you could not possibly lose your dog tag. However, by the mid-end war, Red Army accepted so called "code of honor" where it was customary for soldiers and officers to kneel and kiss flag of the regiment before the battle and shoot cowards in front of entire regiment. Regiments that dishonored or lost its flag in combat were disbanded and soldiers were either sent to disbats or included in other regiments. Before you say it was communist BS, same code of honor existed in Roman legions.

What else? Oh yeah, fighting to the last soldier order was stupid. And human losses are stupid and soviets have no regard for human life. On other hand French are very civilized and instead of being stupid and fighting to last soldier and dying they just surrendered. And collaborated with Nazis. You people have very very very slanted view of WW2 history. For some reason fighting and dying is a mistake, you much rather French variant? Would you rather Soviets had French regard for Human life and lost war in 3 months and just sat comfortably under occupation while Germans pillaged Britain?

 

Again, have you read the posts?

1) 1937 - The purge of the Red Army begins. The purge results in the execution, imprisonment or dismissal of 36,671 officers, including about half of the 706 officers with the rank of brigade commander or higher. Three of the army's five marshals and 15 of its 16 top commanders are executed.

2) The point was made that the average Soviet soldier DID NOT have dogtags

3) Just because the Romans practiced the decimation of units, does this make it right in 1941? Would you also like to bring back the Gladiatorial fights, crucifixions, and slavery?

4) Fighting to the last soldier can be very stupid, if it would be better to retreat to a properly prepared defensive position as part of a stabilised front line. See The German refusal to do this during Soviet offensives. Russia has space. Space, and scorched earth, is a good weapon. Ask Napoleon. The Soviets did this as well during WW2.

5) You obviously are very interested in arguing for Soviet Russia. That is good. We all have our favourites! But LEARN TO RESPECT OPINIONS AND TO BEHAVE WITH POLITENESS. This forum is for discussion & debate, not simply attacking views & refusing to listen or learn.

 

I respect opinions..

I respect opinions if those are based on things called "facts". I will respect your "opinion" of Stalin's purge of 40.000 officers just about as soon as you realise that the number you were given is impossible in theory. I will further respect your opinion if you actually name some of those marshalls and 15 out of 16 top commanders and give me reasons WHY they would have changed course of war. I happen to know their names and reasons behind their dismissal. Do you? I can assure you dismissal of those was best thing Stalin did to his army. If you want facts, ask and you shall recieve.

None of average or non average soviet soldiers had dogtags. Soviet Army never had dog tags. Not for officers not for soldiers, they use entirely different identification system.

Romans conquered entire Europe and about 1/3 of Asia. I would not dismiss their military practice that easily. Courage under "fire" and fighting to the last man standing proven to be key to success for lets say Spartans. I understand that for some people military history begins and ends with books of Nazi generals, but dismissing military traditions of the past that easily is rather... unwise? I am not sure about gladiatorial combat, but public executions and forced slave labor were both common during WW2. So yes, lets bring those back and examine them.

Yes, fighting to last man is stupid. Just retreat, or run, the hell, just surrender as say French and then collaborate. Why the hell not? I see your point, French = smart, Russians = stupid. And yes, France lost less people in WW2 than Russia, therefore they are better at it, smarter and much more courageous.. point taken.

 

I am not dismissing the Roman military effectiveness. However, the Greco-Macedonian armies of Alexander the Great conquered more territory that the Roman Empire, as did Nazi Germany, as did the British Empire, and none of those armed forces practiced the decimation of units.
Execution for cowardice was an option, however!

Yes, it is very good. In some situations. Like for the British troops on the Burma/India frontier in 1943. In some situations, it is better to hold a fighting withdrawl to better positions, tactically & strategically.

The 36,671 officers happened to be the first number I came across!
Sadly I am away from my books. If it is wrong, I will retract it. However it does not seem impossible, given the size of the Soviet Army.

And how about:

Vasily Konstantinovich Blyukher, who had in 1938 defeated the Japanese in battle at Lake Khasan. Plus his impressive 'Civil War' record, and his military advising period in China.

Mikhail Nikolayevich Tukhachevsky, who had an impressive 'Civil War' record also. He did fail to capture Warsaw in the 1920 war with Poland, and apparently this caused a fall-out with Stalin... He was apparently very popular with his men.

Replacements!

Semyon Timoshenko and Grigory Kulik, both brought in as new Marshals after the purges, both later removed for incompetance.

 

Forgot one!
Aleksandr Ilyich Yegorov, who was one of the leading Soviet strategic thinkers (along with Tukhachevsky). He was purged by Stalin, and executed, but later "rehabilitated" by Nikita Khrushchev!
Well, to be fair, Khrushchev was doing all hecould to discredit Stalin, so that point is neither here nor there.

I should point out that my reference for this all is just
en.wikipedia.org
If anyone has different / more facts, please chip in!

 

Ok, I will bite.

Cengiz Khan's army conquerred even bigger territory than Alexander's (whose was still smaller than Roman empire) and it did conduct strict code of honor. It's how you prefer your army and coffe I guess. I prefer my coffee black and with sugar.

Now, lets go over numbers. 1937, Soviet Red army has 1.1mln men total. In 1937 - 20643 people were laid off. In 1938, 16 118 were laid off total: 36 761. Note those aren't "purged" or shot dead, they were "laid off" because Army was reorganising. In a large enough army the rotation of personnel is about that number reorganisation or no reorganisation. Yes, some of the "laid off" people were fired for misconduct, but not nearly all of them. There are yours 36761 purged officers.

Now to Blyukher. Well, I will not dig into his Civil war record because it is nothing to be proud of. Lake Khasan incident was more or less embarracing for Red Army. If you want "decisive" victory on Far East, refer to Khalkin Gol, however Blyukher was not the one that commanded troops there, Zhukov was. From military standpoint, Lake Khasan battle was military disaster (unlike Khalkin Gol) so I dont think its good example. Now, Blyukher was an alcoholic that literally did not accomplish a single thing during 20 years of his tenure on far east. He had absolutely no military education of any sort, became famous for anti war speeches during WWI. His entire record during Civil war (one that is nothing to be proud of) is mass executions. Yes Civil war is ugly business, but I dont count it as real military record. Also, he was not replaced by Kulik. Nor Timoshenko, he was replaced by Apanesenko, graduate of military academy and a hero of Kursk battle that died under Belgorod in 1943. Let's compare again, a civil war butcher and an alcoholic with no military education vs. graduate of military academy that later proved to be a war hero. Pretty good exchange IMO.

Lets go ahead and see what can we say about military genius of Tukhachevsky. A little bit of timeline here, failure to capture Warshaw happened in 1924. The purge is in 1937-8, a little bit of delayed responce, dont you think? Let's see about his impressive civil war record as well. The civil war record of his consists of same exactly thing, mass executions. He didn't win a single goddamn battle. He killed a bunch of troops under Warshaw because he was absolutely incompetent. Yes, he was absolutely and entirely incompetent in military sense. In 1927 (I believe) he submitted to Stalin memo that demanded 200.000 tanks to be built every year in Soviet Union. The guy was simply put a whacko.

How did people like Tukhachevsky and Blyukher end up in top command positions in Red Army? One explanation: Civil war. The civil war of 1917-1924 was extremely ugly and bloody business where brother fought against brother and son fought against father. Winning the battles against each other wasn't the hard part, executing or subduing population was. That is what top command that was purged at the end of 1930's was. Civil war "heroes" that fought against their own peasants after deserting front lines of WWI.

The "purge" was absolutely necessary to get rid army of incompetent carierists and bring up freshly educated officers that were trained by often old school generals. Trained quite well I may add, Guderian was studying in Russian Military academy at about same time.

The "fresh" blood that was brought up instead of civil war "heroes" were people like Zhukov, Rokossovski, Konev, Apanasenko, Tchuikov and many more. Those have proven their worth in WW2, you can't deny that. In essence, Stalin got rid of bunch of incompetent drunks with butcher records and replaced them with educated and professional army generals. Excellenet choice IMO.

 

Um, didn't Zhukov gain Marshal's rank during WW2, not immediately after the 'reorganisation'?

 

Marshall..

wasn't the rank during 1937-8, those were Komissars of different ranks. Marshalls, generalissumuses and etc. came much later.

Top 3 were Timoshenko, Kulik and Shaposhnikov. Apanasenko replaced Blukher on Far east.

I can sympathise with Kulik (who was an idiot), Timoshenko was just talentless, not stupid enough to be detrimental, but wasn't very bright (hence replaced after Finnish campaign when it became apparent), but I dont think you can actually say a single bad word about Shaposhnikov who was old school general from czar army. Never woulda made it in a "revolutionary" army of Tukhachevsky and Blyukher.

 

Re: I respect opinions..

Hmmmmmmm Roman empire all of Europe and 1/3 Asia. Don't think so.