Originally posted by iskander
reply to post by HowlrunnerIV
Only from my reading.
Of what, comic books?
When I'm talking about live-action adaptations, yes. When I'm talking about Russian-German combat in WW2 I usually go back to my Purnell's History of the Second World War.
Well show me which bit is nonsense...
I’ll do this one more time, and from that point I’ll just stay away for the sake of keeping ATS forum clean and mature.
BT-7 tank was a waste of time. Panzers ate them for breakfast.
In one on one combat the BT-7 proved that it was the equal of the Panzer III, but Soviet tank units were often inexperienced unit commanders who were outmatched by their German counterparts. Poor crew training and lack of spare parts also worked against the BT-7 tank fleet, and by late 1941 many of the tanks were either destroyed or captured. In fact, the German army also made use of captured BT-7 tanks, but had to mark them so that they could avoid friendly fire incidents.
They also used the T-38 (Czech) tank, British trucks in NAfrica, Char B1 and Somua hulls...
I may have overstated the case about BT-7 as a tank, but not its combat record.
KV1s were used in such low numbers they were outmanouvred and overwhelmed before they could do anything. Not much of a (nasty) surprise, as you insinuate.
KV1s overwhelmed? LOL! I’ll save you and everybody the reading time, so just watch the moving pictures and LISTEN.
KV1s were put into combat in such limited numbers that the Panzers went around them. Thus: overwhelmed. The KV1s did not provide a significant or decisive hurdle to the German advance.
its flaws were quite serious. It was very slow and difficult to steer. The transmission was unreliable. The ergonomics were poor, with limited visibility and no turret basket. Its weight tended to strain smaller bridges.
en.wikipedia.org...
It also mounted exactly the same gun as the medium tank. So what was the point?
MiG 1s and 3s were shot out of the sky in waves.
MiG-1/3 had the HIGHEST kill-to-loss ratio of ALL Soviet fighters through the ENTIREE WAR!
Wonderful, so it was the least shot down of a bad bunch. Whoo. Okay, that is exaggeration, but it's not entirely wrong. The MiG 1/3 was
forced into a low altitude and even a ground-attack role, but it was quickly found to be inferior, and withdrawn from this role.
en.wikipedia.org...
This fact is so obvious and well known that I’m not even going to bother with a source.
Again, you either have a biased agenda to slander Soviet/Russian topics or purposefully misinforming the ATS community. Knock it off.
I have proven before that I am not biased against Russian/Soviet topics, if you care to look.
The MiG 15 was faster and had a higher ceiling than Sabre, didn't do it much good.
Same thing. BASIC FACTS!!!!!! MiG-15 was NOT faster then F-86. Stop polluting this forum!!!!!
MiG 15: 668 mph, 50 m/s, 15,500 m
F-86 Sabre: 678 mph, 41.5 m/s, 15,100 m
Define faster.
Sun Tzu, a professional warrior born from a warrior class. WORLD War II was not a war of the warrior classes, it was a WORLD WAR, and that includes civilians.
Then why did you quote him if you're only going to undo him?
“Life of War” came from Leningrad and Stalingrad.
You mean you're not quoting a book or other published shource?
That means that there are no “military operations”, the life it self is turned into war in every aspect and that means pure SERVIVAL.
But it doesn't refute my statement.
There was no “scorched earth” policy
But you just said everything should be sacrificed to ensure victory.
but when it was necessary there were specific orders to take provisions from civilian population when Soviet Army was retreating, with authorized use of force.
"When it was necessary"? You started by trying to tell me that it was an organised policy of retreat, that the Germans weren't walking it in. Now you say that it was a series of ad hoc actions forced by different circumstances?...
Also, I doubt that you’d care, but my personal diligence recommend that you look into what “salting the earth” means, maybe then you’ll understand.
It's what Rome did to Carthage at the end of the Punic Wars to ensure their defeated rival could never again grow to prominence and threaten Rome. Or is it when you make your dirt taste better?
Really? Man, the Russian must literally be either the luckiest people in the world, or had some sort of a weather controlling ability since the times of the Golden Horde.
Who said anything about controlling the weather? Tell me, how many victories did you have against Napolean? All you had to do was wait for the Grand Armee to freeze to death. But Hitler's supply train was a little more sophisticated than that. And, as I said, had he not postponed Barbarossa to pull Mussolini out of the # in Greece, then he could have been sitting inside Moscow with secure supply lines when winter finally arrived.
Don't for a moment think I am saying the Soviets did not use winter as a weapon. They did, just as every Russian ruler has. But take a look at Finland to see the Russians failing to use winter as a weapon. Stalin used the same strategy as the Czars, because a) he had no choice and b) in the USSR he had the space to do it. On the Karelia he did not. On point "a", his own intransigence forced his hand. As I said, had he not put all his forces on the border then the people of Leningrad need not have "endured".
At this very moment I can’t even count how many times Russian victories are attributed entirely on luck vast lands and weather.
Talking such nonsense can only mean that in order to conquer Russia one has to be a good card player, have a really big gas tank and a double Doppler weather radar like the ones they have at TV stations.
Don't know about the cards, but the big gas tank and the weather radar would seriously help. I mean, I don't drive out into the snow without a jerry can in the boot and the radio tuned to the weather reports...A bit like going into the desert, really.
I guess Hitler and the entire German army were just idiots with short memory and forgotten what happened with Napoleons army, or the Teutonic knight Crusade into Russia.
Yes. I guess they were.
HowlrunnerIV, you might really have something there, Russian magical weather control powers is what allowed them to survive every single attempt to conquer their lands…
As I said, don't know about control, but certainly use of. A bit like the UK using a certain strip of water...
Oh ho, I should respect the commander who destroyed that first batallion? I don't think so.
What was his name and whos order was he forced to follow? Answer that one, know it all.
Ah, so Russian generals can't refuse orders and resign? Or you mean the Colonel who followed the General's order. Either way, the command authority that gave the order perfectly fits my description. No matter how far up or down the line you try passing that buck, someone gave the order and that someone earned my description "an idiot, because he was stupid".
And my comment on Russian military history is dead on. Too often through Russian/Soviet history recon has been by bodycount.
I have an original and unpublished biography of a 19 year Soviet recon paratrooper that details his recon missions, behind enemy lines, under sniper/MG and mortar fire, in teams of two or even by him self, testing river beds and taking water levels, counting haystacks to identify and mark the ones that in actually are camouflaged MG/heavy gun positions, etc.
Where do you get you ideas from?
Well obviously I don't get them from unpublished manuscripts, do I? And again, read my words "too often through Russian/Soviet history. That's Russian then Soviet, not Soviet then Russian. So the Red Army, sorry the Russian Army, actually learnt the lessons from Chechnya, did they? It would be bloody hard not to.
Even the great (and that is not sarcasm) Marshall Zhukov marched his men across minefields.
You ever bothered to find out why? Do so and then we’ll talk.
He said the casualties that resulted would have resulted from battle anyway.
cont'd
edits: quotes, itals
[edit on 8-1-2008 by HowlrunnerIV]
[edit on 8-1-2008 by HowlrunnerIV]



