most destructive battle of the european theatre

St. Lo was pretty fierce, no?

 

very but was it the most destructive

 

Got to be Stalingrad !!!!!!

Is a campaign a Battle ?? No !! therefore the Air campaign is out.

 

Anything classed as a battle so the battle at kursk, the air battles such as 'BoB', battle of air normandy and so on, yeah I thought stalingrad as well some of those pics I have seen, there is nothing left.

 

still stalingrad. aside from the germans losing 350,000 men (most of the 90,000 who surrendered died in prison.) the russians lost almost as much. stalingrad's civilian population went down from 1.0 million before to just 16,000 afterwards.

 

As I have said before, its not just about the troop and civillian losses, but also the destruction of the city its self as well as the belief that the Germans were unstopable, so it was destructive to the german war effort.

 

ok then. a campaign is considered a battle. the two most destructive campaigns were the battle of the atlantic and the 1944 air war. the atlantic victory was far more decisive than the strategic bombing of germany, though the allies lost billions worth of tonnage and material. the latter campaign's 'strategic' effect would have been felt much later (1947 had the war drawn on.)

 

well a campaign and a series of battles are different, the atlantic battle took years whoch dosn't make it included, I consider the air different becasue it had different phases,eg. BoB, then normandy, destruction of germany factories and so. A series of battles such as at kurst, or the battles for berlin and normandy but that dosn't include after normandy, that is a different series of battles.

 

the most 'destroyed' cities following a land battle were warsaw, manila, and stalingrad. berlin was dostroyed mostly from bombing; hardly any major resistance when the russians moved in. tokyo was almost fully destroyed by bombing alone.

 

where is monte cassino, or rotterdam. tokyo dosn't fit here becasuse this is european theatres otherwise hiroshima and nagasaki would win hands down. But about the battle fore Berlin it was the artillery and aircraft that destroyed the city but it still was some of th hardest fighting ever seen with house to house fighting and many units being equipped with panzerfausts ad told to kill.

 

granted, but you have to look at initial size also. leningrad, stalingrad and manila were more or less wiped out because they were far smaller than berlin. but you're right, berlin was probably the only big city to get torn apart by lang fighting. much of the buildings survived though.

 

well can you compare the amount of shells fired and the amount of bombs dropped on berlin to those other places, as you said they were smaller, which means overall less damage that can be done then to berlin. The buildings maybe still stood after the battle but how many needed new roofs or wall and how much of the street need to be cleaned and repaired and then the surrounding infrasture around berlin.

 

To answer the question, i'd say Stalingrad ans leningrad, but also the battle for Ukraine and belarus were quite destructive.

 

you could even argue that el alameain was destructive for the germans in there own right, look at what was said about the german loss ."Before El Alamein we never had a victory and after we never had a loss"(please correct me if that is not completely right) That was destructive to the germans for the loss of there pride and the fact that the allies saw the german army as 'invincible' well until then. Destruction comes in many ways.

 

Yes but the battle for Tunisia is an other turning point in Africa. The axis lost 275000 prisonners, The US began to fight in the West front, the french africa could now be use as a base to attack europe and free france (fighting france) could now provide an interesting help for the operations that were about to come. And the italian army moral must have suffer of this battle.

 

Yes, Tunisia was a huge blow to Italian morale and the losses they sustained there and in other campaigns was one of the major reasons for the surrender of Italy.

 

I feel the Ost front was not part of the European affair, so Berlin is out of the picture. Normandie is top dog in this case, Cassino is a close second due to the arrangements beforehand and then closely after

of course a Battle is a singular engagement and not a campaign where most of you are associating your answers along with myself

 

In terms of body count, probably Dog Green Sector/Omaha.

 

Im going to take a completely different angle on this one...

In stead of counting tanks and guns, civilain deaths in a certain theater, my choice is based on the destructive cosequences of the battle.

The most destructive battle of WWII was the Battle of Britain. (I can hear jaws drop)

Destructive in the sense that it destroyed the illusion of German martial invicibility to the world. The German failure in the Battle of Britain and the scraping of operation Sea Lion not only showed the world that the Third Reich could be stopped but it brought hope to all the opressed nations already under boot.

Without Britain "the unsinkable aircraft carrier" the liberation of Europe would never have been possible. Germany's falure to complete the war in the west lead to the two front war that enevitably lead to the destruction of The Third Reich and the devestation wrough apon Europe in the process.

it was the stakes and destructive consequences of this battle that trump all others for me.

 

In that case I will say the battle for Russia. And the German invincibility ended at Typhoon (As Germany never lost a land battle till then).

Oh and welcome aboard.