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On December 29 2011 02:02 BlitzerSC wrote:Show nested quote +On December 29 2011 01:48 Isillian wrote:On December 29 2011 01:22 BlitzerSC wrote:On December 29 2011 00:30 wBsKillian wrote:On December 29 2011 00:24 BlitzerSC wrote:On December 28 2011 04:30 nalgene wrote:
Hitler started the war too early. His armies in Africa were always saving Mussolini's ill trained army. ( It would have been good for Germany to train Italy's forces and use their resources. ) WHAT THE FUCK ? You don't know nothing about the Africans wars during WW2. German soldiers were a BUNCH OF PUSSIES ! They just kept retreating while stealing gas from italian tanks, but italians soldiers just stayed there and fought until the last bullet against english soldier even though english equipment was WAY BETTER that the italian one. Seriously, germans didn't save anyone in Africa, it's quite the opposite. I just leave you with some quotes by ROMMEL: Good soldiers, bad officers; however don't forget that without them we would not have any Civilization.
On Italians, as quoted in The Rommel Papers (1982) edited by Basil Henry Liddell Hart
The German soldier has impressed the world, however the Italian Bersagliere soldier has impressed the German soldier.
On the plaque dedicated to the Bersaglieri that fought at Mersa Matruh and Alamein.
Could you give a legitimate source for this (not a Rommel quote)? I haven't heard anything like this before and it doesn't seem to me that it was that way. Second battle of El Alamein. Folgore division is left alone by germans to fight the english allowing them to retreat with their tanks ( italian tanks had no gas ... who knows why...) + Show Spoiler +I don't have a specific internet source for that because it's what my grandpa told me, so i could be wrong ^^ On December 29 2011 01:02 Isillian wrote:
I think it's difficult to hold the Italian soldiers in such a high regard, given that a force of 200,000 of them were defeated by a force of 30,000 British soliders commanded by Archibald Wavell who somehow managed take half of the Italian force as prisoner.
I think a lose as staggering as that in early 1941 can't purely be a result of poor leadership of Italian generals and being less well equipped. What are you talking about ? Where did you pull those numbers off ? It's IMPOSSIBLE that GB had so few soldier given the fact that they had a lots of colonies, just think about it. As far as i know the british doubled the axis in pretty much everything. Double the troops, double the tanks ecc, better equipment, double anti-tanks weapons, ecc. I can't believe that there are still people who can't realize the "guts" that italians soldiers ( particulary the Folgore division) had against the english army. At the end of the battle of El Alamein, Harry Zinder of Time magazine noted that the Italians paratroopers fought better than had been expected, and commented that: In the south, the famed Folgore parachute division fought to the last round of ammunition Well, unless the history textbook next to me is simply lying, then it's safe to assume that the numbers are fairly accurate. I can assure you that the British did not double the axis forces in sheer numbers, given how streched thin Britain was at the time and had no help from France by that point as they had already capitulated. I'm not by any means questioning bravery of the Italian forces, merely that they were not paritularly succesful at that time and their failure in the region was what promoted Hitler to send General Rommel to support Italian forces in Libya. Ok, probably we are talking about different battles. I'm 100% sure that during the first and the second battle of el alamein the british had the biggest army. What battle are you talking about ? I did a little research and i wasn't able to find numbers like that.
He was talking about the battles before Germany had to help the Italians where Great Britain completely decimated huge Italian armies for almost no loss. Just an FYI most of the African battles you refer to were fought by the Germans with the Italians in a support role.
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On December 29 2011 02:17 Feartheguru wrote:Show nested quote +On December 29 2011 02:02 BlitzerSC wrote:On December 29 2011 01:48 Isillian wrote:On December 29 2011 01:22 BlitzerSC wrote:On December 29 2011 00:30 wBsKillian wrote:On December 29 2011 00:24 BlitzerSC wrote:On December 28 2011 04:30 nalgene wrote:
Hitler started the war too early. His armies in Africa were always saving Mussolini's ill trained army. ( It would have been good for Germany to train Italy's forces and use their resources. ) WHAT THE FUCK ? You don't know nothing about the Africans wars during WW2. German soldiers were a BUNCH OF PUSSIES ! They just kept retreating while stealing gas from italian tanks, but italians soldiers just stayed there and fought until the last bullet against english soldier even though english equipment was WAY BETTER that the italian one. Seriously, germans didn't save anyone in Africa, it's quite the opposite. I just leave you with some quotes by ROMMEL: Good soldiers, bad officers; however don't forget that without them we would not have any Civilization.
On Italians, as quoted in The Rommel Papers (1982) edited by Basil Henry Liddell Hart
The German soldier has impressed the world, however the Italian Bersagliere soldier has impressed the German soldier.
On the plaque dedicated to the Bersaglieri that fought at Mersa Matruh and Alamein.
Could you give a legitimate source for this (not a Rommel quote)? I haven't heard anything like this before and it doesn't seem to me that it was that way. Second battle of El Alamein. Folgore division is left alone by germans to fight the english allowing them to retreat with their tanks ( italian tanks had no gas ... who knows why...) + Show Spoiler +I don't have a specific internet source for that because it's what my grandpa told me, so i could be wrong ^^ On December 29 2011 01:02 Isillian wrote:
I think it's difficult to hold the Italian soldiers in such a high regard, given that a force of 200,000 of them were defeated by a force of 30,000 British soliders commanded by Archibald Wavell who somehow managed take half of the Italian force as prisoner.
I think a lose as staggering as that in early 1941 can't purely be a result of poor leadership of Italian generals and being less well equipped. What are you talking about ? Where did you pull those numbers off ? It's IMPOSSIBLE that GB had so few soldier given the fact that they had a lots of colonies, just think about it. As far as i know the british doubled the axis in pretty much everything. Double the troops, double the tanks ecc, better equipment, double anti-tanks weapons, ecc. I can't believe that there are still people who can't realize the "guts" that italians soldiers ( particulary the Folgore division) had against the english army. At the end of the battle of El Alamein, Harry Zinder of Time magazine noted that the Italians paratroopers fought better than had been expected, and commented that: In the south, the famed Folgore parachute division fought to the last round of ammunition Well, unless the history textbook next to me is simply lying, then it's safe to assume that the numbers are fairly accurate. I can assure you that the British did not double the axis forces in sheer numbers, given how streched thin Britain was at the time and had no help from France by that point as they had already capitulated. I'm not by any means questioning bravery of the Italian forces, merely that they were not paritularly succesful at that time and their failure in the region was what promoted Hitler to send General Rommel to support Italian forces in Libya. Ok, probably we are talking about different battles. I'm 100% sure that during the first and the second battle of el alamein the british had the biggest army. What battle are you talking about ? I did a little research and i wasn't able to find numbers like that. He was talking about the battles before Germany had to help the Italians where Great Britain completely decimated huge Italian armies for almost no loss. Just an FYI most of the African battles you refer to were fought by the Germans with the Italians in a support role.
Maybe you should listen a little less to your grandpa and more to a bit more... reliable sources.
I'm sorry but there are a lot of bitter old men in this world.
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On December 29 2011 01:28 Maenander wrote:Now imagine Germany could actually buy oil, rubber and other resources on the world market and the Soviet Union wouldn't get raw materials for free, don't you think that would change the production numbers by quite a bit, as well as change the combat readiness of the air fleets? Not to mention German production would not be hampered by air raids and they wouldn't have constant aircraft losses against the more advanced fighters of the western powers.
The problem is that I can't see any reasonable scenario where Germany would be able to buy significant ammounts of oil, quite simply because the largest producer by far at the time was the US, and I can't even begin to imagine why would the US, even if not in direct war with Nazi Germany, would feed it's war machine.
The most likely scenario for a Germany vs. Soviet Union only war would be that the British politicians would have gotten too scared during the Battle for Britain and Hitler would have had the common sense to accept a negotiated peace. This takes out GB and the US from the direct war, but it doesn't make them want to cooperate with Hitler either.
And while the Wehrmacht was always smaller than the Red Army, they could have still won had they had enough resources and a strong and efficient logistics system, but they had neither. It doesn't matter how many more panzer divisions and air wings the german send to Russia if they don't have the logistics to support them.
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On December 29 2011 02:42 CrimsonLotus wrote:Show nested quote +On December 29 2011 01:28 Maenander wrote:Now imagine Germany could actually buy oil, rubber and other resources on the world market and the Soviet Union wouldn't get raw materials for free, don't you think that would change the production numbers by quite a bit, as well as change the combat readiness of the air fleets? Not to mention German production would not be hampered by air raids and they wouldn't have constant aircraft losses against the more advanced fighters of the western powers. The problem is that I can't see any reasonable scenario where Germany would be able to buy significant ammounts of oil, quite simply because the largest producer by far at the time was the US, and I can't even begin to imagine why would the US, even if not in direct war with Nazi Germany, would feed it's war machine. The most likely scenario for a Germany vs. Soviet Union only war would be that the British politicians would have gotten too scared during the Battle for Britain and Hitler would have had the common sense to accept a negotiated peace. This takes out GB and the US from the direct war, but it doesn't make them want to cooperate with Hitler either. And while the Wehrmacht was always smaller than the Red Army, they could have still won had they had enough resources and a strong and efficient logistics system, but they had neither. It doesn't matter how many more panzer divisions and air wings the german send to Russia if they don't have the logistics to support them.
Such "what ifs" are useless. "If the Red Army had had giant robots the outcome would've been different". Well... of course.
Many of such assumptions just imagine if one side had a bigger advantage at the time.
What if France had attacked instead of waiting for a whole year? Now that's an interesting "what if" (even though its logistical inferiority wouldv'e probably led to defeat).
Edit: but to be clear, I do agree that the aformentioned scenario where Germany magically gets unlimited supplies from its very enemies is not likely.
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On December 29 2011 02:42 CrimsonLotus wrote:Show nested quote +On December 29 2011 01:28 Maenander wrote:Now imagine Germany could actually buy oil, rubber and other resources on the world market and the Soviet Union wouldn't get raw materials for free, don't you think that would change the production numbers by quite a bit, as well as change the combat readiness of the air fleets? Not to mention German production would not be hampered by air raids and they wouldn't have constant aircraft losses against the more advanced fighters of the western powers. The problem is that I can't see any reasonable scenario where Germany would be able to buy significant ammounts of oil, quite simply because the largest producer by far at the time was the US, and I can't even begin to imagine why would the US, even if not in direct war with Nazi Germany, would feed it's war machine. The most likely scenario for a Germany vs. Soviet Union only war would be that the British politicians would have gotten too scared during the Battle for Britain and Hitler would have had the common sense to accept a negotiated peace. This takes out GB and the US from the direct war, but it doesn't make them want to cooperate with Hitler either. And while the Wehrmacht was always smaller than the Red Army, they could have still won had they had enough resources and a strong and efficient logistics system, but they had neither. It doesn't matter how many more panzer divisions and air wings the german send to Russia if they don't have the logistics to support them.
A major share of Germany's imports in 1938 came from South America:
USA 404.6
UK 282.7
South America 809.7 million Reichsmark
It would have made quite a difference if only the naval blockade would have been lifted. And yes, the UK was not willing to accept any peace agreement, but for the sake of the argument we must make that assumption. Hitler would have gladly accepted peace with the UK btw.
It's not my idea to set up the Soviet Union alone against Nazi Germany, so don't blame me for the implausibility of the scenario 
edit: I agree with the major points from your previous posts though, Nazi Germany could never have conquered Russia permanently.
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On December 29 2011 02:39 SilentchiLL wrote:Show nested quote +On December 29 2011 02:17 Feartheguru wrote:On December 29 2011 02:02 BlitzerSC wrote:On December 29 2011 01:48 Isillian wrote:On December 29 2011 01:22 BlitzerSC wrote:On December 29 2011 00:30 wBsKillian wrote:On December 29 2011 00:24 BlitzerSC wrote:On December 28 2011 04:30 nalgene wrote:
Hitler started the war too early. His armies in Africa were always saving Mussolini's ill trained army. ( It would have been good for Germany to train Italy's forces and use their resources. ) WHAT THE FUCK ? You don't know nothing about the Africans wars during WW2. German soldiers were a BUNCH OF PUSSIES ! They just kept retreating while stealing gas from italian tanks, but italians soldiers just stayed there and fought until the last bullet against english soldier even though english equipment was WAY BETTER that the italian one. Seriously, germans didn't save anyone in Africa, it's quite the opposite. I just leave you with some quotes by ROMMEL: Good soldiers, bad officers; however don't forget that without them we would not have any Civilization.
On Italians, as quoted in The Rommel Papers (1982) edited by Basil Henry Liddell Hart
The German soldier has impressed the world, however the Italian Bersagliere soldier has impressed the German soldier.
On the plaque dedicated to the Bersaglieri that fought at Mersa Matruh and Alamein.
Could you give a legitimate source for this (not a Rommel quote)? I haven't heard anything like this before and it doesn't seem to me that it was that way. Second battle of El Alamein. Folgore division is left alone by germans to fight the english allowing them to retreat with their tanks ( italian tanks had no gas ... who knows why...) + Show Spoiler +I don't have a specific internet source for that because it's what my grandpa told me, so i could be wrong ^^ On December 29 2011 01:02 Isillian wrote:
I think it's difficult to hold the Italian soldiers in such a high regard, given that a force of 200,000 of them were defeated by a force of 30,000 British soliders commanded by Archibald Wavell who somehow managed take half of the Italian force as prisoner.
I think a lose as staggering as that in early 1941 can't purely be a result of poor leadership of Italian generals and being less well equipped. What are you talking about ? Where did you pull those numbers off ? It's IMPOSSIBLE that GB had so few soldier given the fact that they had a lots of colonies, just think about it. As far as i know the british doubled the axis in pretty much everything. Double the troops, double the tanks ecc, better equipment, double anti-tanks weapons, ecc. I can't believe that there are still people who can't realize the "guts" that italians soldiers ( particulary the Folgore division) had against the english army. At the end of the battle of El Alamein, Harry Zinder of Time magazine noted that the Italians paratroopers fought better than had been expected, and commented that: In the south, the famed Folgore parachute division fought to the last round of ammunition Well, unless the history textbook next to me is simply lying, then it's safe to assume that the numbers are fairly accurate. I can assure you that the British did not double the axis forces in sheer numbers, given how streched thin Britain was at the time and had no help from France by that point as they had already capitulated. I'm not by any means questioning bravery of the Italian forces, merely that they were not paritularly succesful at that time and their failure in the region was what promoted Hitler to send General Rommel to support Italian forces in Libya. Ok, probably we are talking about different battles. I'm 100% sure that during the first and the second battle of el alamein the british had the biggest army. What battle are you talking about ? I did a little research and i wasn't able to find numbers like that. He was talking about the battles before Germany had to help the Italians where Great Britain completely decimated huge Italian armies for almost no loss. Just an FYI most of the African battles you refer to were fought by the Germans with the Italians in a support role. Maybe you should listen a little less to your grandpa and more to a bit more... reliable sources. I'm sorry but there are a lot of bitter old men in this world.
Wut are you trying to say? Also I'm a Chinese Canadian so I hardly have any nationalistic bias in this subject.
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Just wanted to say some stuff after reading the posts in this thread.
1) To anyone who thought the German high command (including its nocs, officers,) were somehow incompetent, that is blatantly not true. Since the Napoleonic and Civil Wars, two countries far exceeded strategic command than the rest of the world, and that is Germany and the US. This is seen truly evident in WWI and even moreso in WWII (look at German generals... Rommel, Guderian, Gerd von Runstedt, Manstein, etc. etc for Germans and Pershing's man in the States including Omar, Patton, etc. etc.). The Germans, for the longest time in the 20th century, had the only dedicated training of cadres, officers, and NOCs and thus were more effective on the battlefield (though this would change a little bit after the end of the Great War, where Allied forces copied either German or American counterparts). Had Hitler listened to any of these people (which, halfway through Barbarossa, he completely ignored)
2) Russia had no resources to actually push or defeat the Germans in their own ground. Given this, Russia had competent 'young' commanders (Ivan Konev and Zhkuov) who matched Germany's competence of command. Regardless, Russia had suffered great defeats in Eastern Europe and though production output in the Ural mountains/caucasus were attempting to keep up with the war effort, it was only because America mechanized (one of the greatest advancements coming into WWII, other than improvements with the air force) its transports and the entire army. It is ignorant to say that Russia did all the work, any1 who says this is either a Russian or extremely unacknowledged in WWII history. It is true that the Soviet Union, with France out of the war, had to withstand and survive as the only real allied power in continental Europe, and played a huge role in the war, but they weren't the only ones.
3) As for Africa... the only reason Rommel had to intervene in Africa was because the Italians were losing against the British, which as ppl had said, were somewhat undermanned. Most people forget that India, Britain's greatest manpower source in these colonies during WWI, did not participate in the war fully (Gandhi), and the only real force for the British in these regions (though irregular Free French forces played a vital role) was the Eight Army. Not only did Italy fail to take Egypt and Greece, they were pushed out of both of these regions and pushed further back into Libya and Albania, forcing Germany to intervene and ending British/Greek dominance in these regions.
4) The majority of Germany's oil production came from Romania and Venezuela, not the states, and when they lost Romania, they built synthesized oil factories, so Germany wasn't doing that bad in resources (at least compared to the Japanese)
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I think Wikipedia sources can only provide the general picture to the great wars, often the link they provide are out of date or does not exist anymore.(not all links but sometime you do see some dead ones)
It give more a general idea in statistic number and the timeline of events and sometime only one point of view on an event based off only one source(depend on the source).
The situations in the war are often more complicated and detail then what we can find just through one or two books. Often if we want to crunch numbers to see which side got the real advantages at what time, we need to look at alternative resources other then Wikipedia and sometime we can even find contradiction between stories in many books.
Different Historians can provide different numbers and timeline depend on what they research and what their belief.
It is very often the exact number is never know. What we can learn from the history is to understand how the events happened and what is the result of those events. In addition, what we want to get out of it is we try not to repeat the same mistakes that were made by our parents, grandparents or our ancestors. It is regrettable to say that is not always the case.
Sometime the best way to learn something is to experience it first hand which can be a very bad idea in worst case.
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On December 29 2011 03:05 Feartheguru wrote:Show nested quote +On December 29 2011 02:39 SilentchiLL wrote:On December 29 2011 02:17 Feartheguru wrote:On December 29 2011 02:02 BlitzerSC wrote:On December 29 2011 01:48 Isillian wrote:On December 29 2011 01:22 BlitzerSC wrote:On December 29 2011 00:30 wBsKillian wrote:On December 29 2011 00:24 BlitzerSC wrote:On December 28 2011 04:30 nalgene wrote:
Hitler started the war too early. His armies in Africa were always saving Mussolini's ill trained army. ( It would have been good for Germany to train Italy's forces and use their resources. ) WHAT THE FUCK ? You don't know nothing about the Africans wars during WW2. German soldiers were a BUNCH OF PUSSIES ! They just kept retreating while stealing gas from italian tanks, but italians soldiers just stayed there and fought until the last bullet against english soldier even though english equipment was WAY BETTER that the italian one. Seriously, germans didn't save anyone in Africa, it's quite the opposite. I just leave you with some quotes by ROMMEL: Good soldiers, bad officers; however don't forget that without them we would not have any Civilization.
On Italians, as quoted in The Rommel Papers (1982) edited by Basil Henry Liddell Hart
The German soldier has impressed the world, however the Italian Bersagliere soldier has impressed the German soldier.
On the plaque dedicated to the Bersaglieri that fought at Mersa Matruh and Alamein.
Could you give a legitimate source for this (not a Rommel quote)? I haven't heard anything like this before and it doesn't seem to me that it was that way. Second battle of El Alamein. Folgore division is left alone by germans to fight the english allowing them to retreat with their tanks ( italian tanks had no gas ... who knows why...) + Show Spoiler +I don't have a specific internet source for that because it's what my grandpa told me, so i could be wrong ^^ On December 29 2011 01:02 Isillian wrote:
I think it's difficult to hold the Italian soldiers in such a high regard, given that a force of 200,000 of them were defeated by a force of 30,000 British soliders commanded by Archibald Wavell who somehow managed take half of the Italian force as prisoner.
I think a lose as staggering as that in early 1941 can't purely be a result of poor leadership of Italian generals and being less well equipped. What are you talking about ? Where did you pull those numbers off ? It's IMPOSSIBLE that GB had so few soldier given the fact that they had a lots of colonies, just think about it. As far as i know the british doubled the axis in pretty much everything. Double the troops, double the tanks ecc, better equipment, double anti-tanks weapons, ecc. I can't believe that there are still people who can't realize the "guts" that italians soldiers ( particulary the Folgore division) had against the english army. At the end of the battle of El Alamein, Harry Zinder of Time magazine noted that the Italians paratroopers fought better than had been expected, and commented that: In the south, the famed Folgore parachute division fought to the last round of ammunition Well, unless the history textbook next to me is simply lying, then it's safe to assume that the numbers are fairly accurate. I can assure you that the British did not double the axis forces in sheer numbers, given how streched thin Britain was at the time and had no help from France by that point as they had already capitulated. I'm not by any means questioning bravery of the Italian forces, merely that they were not paritularly succesful at that time and their failure in the region was what promoted Hitler to send General Rommel to support Italian forces in Libya. Ok, probably we are talking about different battles. I'm 100% sure that during the first and the second battle of el alamein the british had the biggest army. What battle are you talking about ? I did a little research and i wasn't able to find numbers like that. He was talking about the battles before Germany had to help the Italians where Great Britain completely decimated huge Italian armies for almost no loss. Just an FYI most of the African battles you refer to were fought by the Germans with the Italians in a support role. Maybe you should listen a little less to your grandpa and more to a bit more... reliable sources. I'm sorry but there are a lot of bitter old men in this world. Wut are you trying to say? Also I'm a Chinese Canadian so I hardly have any nationalistic bias in this subject.
I was obviously talking to the guy you quoted...
I think you never mentioned your gramps during these quotes or did you?
Well he did.
Read the post again and give one reason except the position of the post why I could've ment you, try seeing the actual content of the post.
(If you ask yourself why I quoted you with him instead of just him then that's because your post helped to bring about my point)
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On December 29 2011 03:20 Jebusrocks wrote:
Just wanted to say some stuff after reading the posts in this thread.
1) To anyone who thought the German high command (including its nocs, officers,) were somehow incompetent, that is blatantly not true. Since the Napoleonic and Civil Wars, two countries far exceeded strategic command than the rest of the world, and that is Germany and the US. This is seen truly evident in WWI and even moreso in WWII (look at German generals... Rommel, Guderian, Gerd von Runstedt, Manstein, etc. etc for Germans and Pershing's man in the States including Omar, Patton, etc. etc.). The Germans, for the longest time in the 20th century, had the only dedicated training of cadres, officers, and NOCs and thus were more effective on the battlefield (though this would change a little bit after the end of the Great War, where Allied forces copied either German or American counterparts). Had Hitler listened to any of these people (which, halfway through Barbarossa, he completely ignored)
2) Russia had no resources to actually push or defeat the Germans in their own ground. Given this, Russia had competent 'young' commanders (Ivan Konev and Zhkuov) who matched Germany's competence of command. Regardless, Russia had suffered great defeats in Eastern Europe and though production output in the Ural mountains/caucasus were attempting to keep up with the war effort, it was only because America mechanized (one of the greatest advancements coming into WWII, other than improvements with the air force) its transports and the entire army. It is ignorant to say that Russia did all the work, any1 who says this is either a Russian or extremely unacknowledged in WWII history. It is true that the Soviet Union, with France out of the war, had to withstand and survive as the only real allied power in continental Europe, and played a huge role in the war, but they weren't the only ones.
3) As for Africa... the only reason Rommel had to intervene in Africa was because the Italians were losing against the British, which as ppl had said, were somewhat undermanned. Most people forget that India, Britain's greatest manpower source in these colonies during WWI, did not participate in the war fully (Gandhi), and the only real force for the British in these regions (though irregular Free French forces played a vital role) was the Eight Army. Not only did Italy fail to take Egypt and Greece, they were pushed out of both of these regions and pushed further back into Libya and Albania, forcing Germany to intervene and ending British/Greek dominance in these regions.
4) The majority of Germany's oil production came from Romania and Venezuela, not the states, and when they lost Romania, they built synthesized oil factories, so Germany wasn't doing that bad in resources (at least compared to the Japanese)
So.. Just to go wildly off topic for a second: wern't Americans considered having worthless command during ww1, when they stormed through the trenches through machine gun crossfire?
That's atleast what I learned in my history classes. The Americans didn't really understand what trench warfare was all about, and basically charged through with massive losses, ignoring the French and British with experience.
Granted this was like the first war where cavalry and swords wern't effective, so you can cut them some slack, but calling their commands superior is stretching it a bit far I'd say.
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1.) Japan's biggest mistake was giving FDR the excuse he needed to enter the war. Had Japan focused more on controling SE Asia (conscripting soldiers and building infastructure) with the primary goal after having a strong footing in Vietnam and Cambodia to take the Indian coastline and the natural resource abundant regions of the Himalayas. From there Japan would have a strong hold over most of Asia.
2.) Italy needed control the entire mediteranian by invading France with Germany marching around the southern end of the Maginot line, and once France was completely controlled by the Axis they would be in a supreme position to pressure Spain into controling the strategic point of Gibraltar.
3.) Germany needed to keep good relations with Russia until the area's of Turkey, India, Iraq, Iran, Egypt could be taken via invasions from Germany via Persia, and Italy via Libia. With Gibralta controlled the only way for England to defend her colonies would be to a. Counter attack and invade France/Germany, or B. Go all the way around Africa and come in through the Suez canal. With the Suez canal controled by the axis they would have had the Russians surrounded on all sides. With all of the major water ways controlled for resuppling.
4.) Had the Axis powers been able to control the mainland of Europe, Africa, and the parts of Asia that were not controlled by the Soviets, before trying to go and bring Russia and America into the war there's a good chance we'd all be living in a facist world today.
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On December 29 2011 04:47 Euronyme wrote:Show nested quote +On December 29 2011 03:20 Jebusrocks wrote:
Just wanted to say some stuff after reading the posts in this thread.
1) To anyone who thought the German high command (including its nocs, officers,) were somehow incompetent, that is blatantly not true. Since the Napoleonic and Civil Wars, two countries far exceeded strategic command than the rest of the world, and that is Germany and the US. This is seen truly evident in WWI and even moreso in WWII (look at German generals... Rommel, Guderian, Gerd von Runstedt, Manstein, etc. etc for Germans and Pershing's man in the States including Omar, Patton, etc. etc.). The Germans, for the longest time in the 20th century, had the only dedicated training of cadres, officers, and NOCs and thus were more effective on the battlefield (though this would change a little bit after the end of the Great War, where Allied forces copied either German or American counterparts). Had Hitler listened to any of these people (which, halfway through Barbarossa, he completely ignored)
2) Russia had no resources to actually push or defeat the Germans in their own ground. Given this, Russia had competent 'young' commanders (Ivan Konev and Zhkuov) who matched Germany's competence of command. Regardless, Russia had suffered great defeats in Eastern Europe and though production output in the Ural mountains/caucasus were attempting to keep up with the war effort, it was only because America mechanized (one of the greatest advancements coming into WWII, other than improvements with the air force) its transports and the entire army. It is ignorant to say that Russia did all the work, any1 who says this is either a Russian or extremely unacknowledged in WWII history. It is true that the Soviet Union, with France out of the war, had to withstand and survive as the only real allied power in continental Europe, and played a huge role in the war, but they weren't the only ones.
3) As for Africa... the only reason Rommel had to intervene in Africa was because the Italians were losing against the British, which as ppl had said, were somewhat undermanned. Most people forget that India, Britain's greatest manpower source in these colonies during WWI, did not participate in the war fully (Gandhi), and the only real force for the British in these regions (though irregular Free French forces played a vital role) was the Eight Army. Not only did Italy fail to take Egypt and Greece, they were pushed out of both of these regions and pushed further back into Libya and Albania, forcing Germany to intervene and ending British/Greek dominance in these regions.
4) The majority of Germany's oil production came from Romania and Venezuela, not the states, and when they lost Romania, they built synthesized oil factories, so Germany wasn't doing that bad in resources (at least compared to the Japanese) So.. Just to go wildly off topic for a second: wern't Americans considered having worthless command during ww1, when they stormed through the trenches through machine gun crossfire? That's atleast what I learned in my history classes. The Americans didn't really understand what trench warfare was all about, and basically charged through with massive losses, ignoring the French and British with experience. Granted this was like the first war where cavalry and swords wern't effective, so you can cut them some slack, but calling their commands superior is stretching it a bit far I'd say.
What about the U.S civil war? It was way before WW1. Cavalry and swords weren't effective then either.
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One thing that always bothered me was that nobody ever mentions the expulsion of German civilians during the last year and beyond. Was pretty much a death march through Europe with 500k to 2 million casualties, yet is never mentioned alongside the Holocaust or other atrocities, I suppose because the ones who did it won the war :/
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On December 29 2011 05:11 Piy wrote:
One thing that always bothered me was that nobody ever mentions the expulsion of German civilians during the last year and beyond. Was pretty much a death march through Europe with 500k to 2 million casualties, yet is never mentioned alongside the Holocaust or other atrocities, I suppose because the ones who did it won the war :/
If it helps you, we don't forget it.
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On December 29 2011 05:11 Piy wrote:
One thing that always bothered me was that nobody ever mentions the expulsion of German civilians during the last year and beyond. Was pretty much a death march through Europe with 500k to 2 million casualties, yet is never mentioned alongside the Holocaust or other atrocities, I suppose because the ones who did it won the war :/
Had Germany succeeded in world domination do you think there would be any mention of the holocaust? The winners hold the pens and write the history. This is they way it has always been.
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On December 29 2011 04:57 Sabin010 wrote:
1.) Japan's biggest mistake was giving FDR the excuse he needed to enter the war. Had Japan focused more on controling SE Asia (conscripting soldiers and building infastructure) with the primary goal after having a strong footing in Vietnam and Cambodia to take the Indian coastline and the natural resource abundant regions of the Himalayas. From there Japan would have a strong hold over most of Asia.
2.) Italy needed control the entire mediteranian by invading France with Germany marching around the southern end of the Maginot line, and once France was completely controlled by the Axis they would be in a supreme position to pressure Spain into controling the strategic point of Gibraltar.
3.) Germany needed to keep good relations with Russia until the area's of Turkey, India, Iraq, Iran, Egypt could be taken via invasions from Germany via Persia, and Italy via Libia. With Gibralta controlled the only way for England to defend her colonies would be to a. Counter attack and invade France/Germany, or B. Go all the way around Africa and come in through the Suez canal. With the Suez canal controled by the axis they would have had the Russians surrounded on all sides. With all of the major water ways controlled for resuppling.
4.) Had the Axis powers been able to control the mainland of Europe, Africa, and the parts of Asia that were not controlled by the Soviets, before trying to go and bring Russia and America into the war there's a good chance we'd all be living in a facist world today.
They wouldnt have really had to pressure Spain would they? Despite the fact they stayed neutral, iirc Francisco Franco or whatever (the fascist leader) had Germany help them in the Civil War before WW2? So they were on somewhat good terms werent they?
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While it is true they were on good terms. Gibraltar never left British hands, allowing them to comfortably traverse from India to England via the Suez canal.
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On December 28 2011 05:27 Elegy wrote:
WW2 history "debates" are terrible affairs unless done by professionals in the field...amateur attempts at counterfactual historiography are quite laughable overall, and tend to assume a continuity of thought and achievement that far exceeds realistic expectations.
Best quote in the thread so far (by page 3). It is exemplified by
On December 28 2011 06:18 JudicatorHammurabi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 28 2011 06:13 atwar wrote:
lets talk about the winter war or how the finnish lost 70k men and the russians 323k LOL useless russians Bigotry and support of close Nazi allies in the same post. Smart. I'd be thanking all my Norse gods that after almost single-handedly beating the Germans, they didn't come back around and destroy Finland, because they very well could have, especially through total war and saturation bombing to nullify the heavy advantage of guerilla warfare of the Winter War. Just saying. It is good the Soviets were not too particularly vengeful against the Germans and German allies (like Finland, although Finland's wasn't so involved in the offensives against the USSR since they didn't have much of a military to speak of) who deliberately committed genocide against them.
JudicatorHammurabi, I don't know about other German allies, but Russia was EXTREMELY vengeful against Romania for being a German ally in the beginning of WW2. They took a huge chunk of territory out of Romania and annexed it to the USSR, which they haven't returned when the USSR collapsed (country of Moldova today).
Here's the territory Romania lost after the war
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Romania_WWII.png
Also, 50 years of communist occupation, no freedom, you lost all your property and you go to prison/die if you say anything against the regime. Particularly vengeful, I'd say.
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On December 29 2011 05:36 ggofthejungle wrote:Show nested quote +On December 28 2011 05:27 Elegy wrote:
WW2 history "debates" are terrible affairs unless done by professionals in the field...amateur attempts at counterfactual historiography are quite laughable overall, and tend to assume a continuity of thought and achievement that far exceeds realistic expectations. Best quote in the thread so far (by page 3). It is exemplified by Show nested quote +On December 28 2011 06:18 JudicatorHammurabi wrote:On December 28 2011 06:13 atwar wrote:
lets talk about the winter war or how the finnish lost 70k men and the russians 323k LOL useless russians Bigotry and support of close Nazi allies in the same post. Smart. I'd be thanking all my Norse gods that after almost single-handedly beating the Germans, they didn't come back around and destroy Finland, because they very well could have, especially through total war and saturation bombing to nullify the heavy advantage of guerilla warfare of the Winter War. Just saying. It is good the Soviets were not too particularly vengeful against the Germans and German allies (like Finland, although Finland's wasn't so involved in the offensives against the USSR since they didn't have much of a military to speak of) who deliberately committed genocide against them. JudicatorHammurabi, I don't know about other German allies, but Russia was EXTREMELY vengeful against Romania for being a German ally in the beginning of WW2. They took a huge chunk of territory out of Romania and annexed it to the USSR, which they haven't returned when the USSR collapsed (country of Moldova today). Here's the territory Romania lost after the war http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Romania_WWII.pngAlso, 50 years of communist occupation, no freedom, you lost all your property and you go to prison/die if you say anything against the regime. Particularly vengeful, I'd say.
Well I think most of us are in it for the fun. WW2 is a fun topic to discuss as it's a world war based in Europe and has tonnes and tonnes of research around it that is easely accessible. Who cares if some - or even if all of us have an extremely flawed view of it. We're here to enjoy ourselves after all.
I don't really understand your example about the northern strip of Romania being incorporated with the USSR either. All of East Germany was too, so that should be an even better example of showing how vengeful the Russians were.
After all Hitler ordered massive amounts of russians killed and put in concentration camps, and when they invaded Germany they repayed the favour to the German civil population that was left basically.
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The OP does seem a tad opinionated and ethnocentric, but it's good to see people interested in history. I'm all for this thread, though I'm not sure of its exact purpose. There are legions of books and docs. on WW2 and all the inherent arguing that happens in threads over pretty much choice of words could seriously detract from any educational purpose this thread could serve.
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EPT
