1:1 --> 2:1 Redux

[BletchleyGeek]

ORIGINAL: elxaime
However there remains an enduring myth of the Soviet armed forces as this undifferentiated mass, numbly marching in lock-step with fixed bayonets into crafty German machine gunners. While this certainly did occur, especially early on, by mid-war this was no longer the case and by late war the Soviets best units were a match for all but the most elite forces the Germans could throw against them.

Not only the commanders got more experience, they also got more confidence from the Soviet State, which allowed them a freedom of maneuver they hadn't previously been able to enjoy. The irony is that, in parallel, the Third Reich political leadership grow less confident of field commanders...

In any case, I see a bit of exaggeration implicit in your last sentence. It wasn't a cake walk for the Red Army either, to push AGS all the way from Kharkov to Lvov in nine months. Actually they had to stop large-scale operations everywhere else. When I see that in WitE, that the Soviet has to forego any kind of activity in half the front to get that kind of victory, then I'll be completely sure that the game will be the best ever rendition of the conflict. I think it started pretty close, and is pushing the bar even higher with each patch (or iteration).

[Flaviusx]

ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek


In any case, I see a bit of exaggeration implicit in your last sentence. It wasn't a cake walk for the Red Army either, to push AGS all the way from Kharkov to Lvov in nine months. Actually they had to stop large-scale operations everywhere else.

No, they did not.

People keep saying this. It's just not true. 1943 was a broad front offensive that included a good 2/3 of the front. You don't hear much about the stuff up north because the Sovs didn't do as well as the Ukraine, but these fronts were active and made their own, slower, bloodier advances. Indeed, they started operations during the whole Kursk battle, by launching their own offensive on the Orel salient. Bryansk, Western, and Kalinin Fronts were quite as busy as Steppe, Voronezh, Southwestern and Southern.

Only by Leningrad did the Sovs stay put until year's end.

This is one of the things that seriously annoys me about the stock 1943 campaign, btw. It seriously underestimates the Red Army's potential by keeping virtually 3/4 of it on static at a time when 3/4 of it was active, and you don't have anything like the required amount of APs to get it moving when it should. There are some expedients around this, but it definitely reflects this preposterous old school view that the Red Army didn't do broad front offensives.

Absolutely wrong. The Red Army didn't do anything but broad front offensives until 1944.

[Pipewrench]

backing you up Flaviusx,


By 1943 it was over The Soviets had the manpower, material and experience to launch broad front attacks.

edit: good read on Kursk.

http://etd.lsu.edu/docs/available/etd-0 ... thesis.pdf

[Flaviusx]

Pipewrench, thing is, they launched broad front offensives also in 1941 and 1942. This was just their style in general -- they were remarkably persistent about this, even when the results were not amazing. (As in, say, the lamentable operation Mars in 42.)

Only in 44 did they change it up, and they switched to staggered offensives.

[mmarquo]

The cornerstone of Soviet doctrine, and this was honed from the beginning up to the end, was the deep operational breakthrough. Infantry and artillery massed at limited, focal attack points, and cleared the way for tank/mtz units to exploit the breach and then rove hundreds of kilometers into the rear. For the life of me I do not see this happening with any version of the game presented so far, and I fear 1.05 will not be the answer. We will see. I am in a PBEM which is on turn 18, getting ready for the first Mud/Snow/Bizzard; we just upgraded to 1.05 so we will be into '42 pretty soon.

Great game in any event.

Marquo [:)]

[Erik Rutins]

Hi Marquo,

How far into the full campaign have you played?

Regards,

- Erik

[Pipewrench]

Flaviusx,

that early? I did not know that but that is something I definitely will look up.

I knew about operation Mars and Uranus which could of lead to Jupiter in 42-43 but really never looked into 41 except for the Moscow offensive against AGC in 41 and the push on Kharkov in early 42.

Have to do some more reading ...thanks for the heads up  [;)]

[daft]

I don't think the historical composition of Soviet forces really supported the deep battle doctrine that early in the war. When they reorganized the tank armies in may -42 they were done so with a fashion to support the breakthrough - exploitation thinking permeating the Red Army. Problem was it didn't really work too well due to the low motorization of the attached rifle divisions as well as due to the fact that the tank armies often were deployed well forward an the front lines. Obviously they had some successes in the winter of -42 with this type of composite armies, but they were still hampered by the force structure. It took some additional time (and the experiences of the winter of 1942 offensive) for the Red Army to make their tank forces more self-sufficient and geared towards exploitation with the tank elements detached from the un-motorized rifle elements.

[cherryfunk]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx
The Red Army didn't do anything but broad front offensives until 1944.

True, but many of these offensives went horribly wrong and caused massive casualties for almost no gain, didn't they? One of the criticisms aimed at Stalin's grand strategy is his tendency to push for too much, too soon, in too many places. Even Zhukov complained about this (after the big guy was dead of course).

[mmarquo]

Erik,

We did the first 18 moves with the prior 1.04 xx and now are using 1.05 xx. At least this will give some idea as to the winter offensive and then the '42 riposte. I will ask my opponent if it is okay to share.

BTW, it seems like players have already found a way to confound the intention of llimiting the detection limit of airbases. I am playing as the Soviet, and we had agreed to only one attack/AB/turn when playing under 1.04 xx; we were going to allow unlimited AB attacks under 1.05 xx; but I do not want to play against an Axis player with a neutered Luftwaffe. Any suggestions as to how to deal with this? I was thinking going back to 1 attack/turn; other thoughts???

Regards,

Mark

[mmarquo]

ORIGINAL: daft

I don't think the historical composition of Soviet forces really supported the deep battle doctrine that early in the war. When they reorganized the tank armies in may -42 they were done so with a fashion to support the breakthrough - exploitation thinking permeating the Red Army. Problem was it didn't really work too well due to the low motorization of the attached rifle divisions as well as due to the fact that the tank armies often were deployed well forward an the front lines. Obviously they had some successes in the winter of -42 with this type of composite armies, but they were still hampered by the force structure. It took some additional time (and the experiences of the winter of 1942 offensive) for the Red Army to make their tank forces more self-sufficient and geared towards exploitation with the tank elements detached from the un-motorized rifle elements.

My reading suggests otherwise. The problem is that often the infantry often did not effect the desired breakthrough, and therefore the mobile units were committed too early as they had to help effect the breakthrough rather than exploit it. Operational failures were analyzed at the highest levels, and adjustments made. Contrary to Pelton's incorrect assertion that "the Red Army never got any better only bigger," it did get better, much better, and dangerously so.

Marquo

[janh]

The Red Army developed its edge during the war, and by mid-44 both its human material as well as its equipment surely had reached an impressive state of combat efficiency.  It not only grew in size, it also improved substantially at all levels. It didn't rely on high-tech toys like the Germans fancied so much, but on simpler and much more robust equipment like the T-34, the IS series, Sturmoviks, Katyushas, and other stuff that wrote history. Though the average training quality of enlisted and officer corps never reached the Prussian standards of the early Wehrmacht days (which of course also declined as the war drew on), by 1944 it had learned the tactical and strategic lessons from modern armored warfare and implemented them with the advantages and drawbacks of all the new equipment in mind. 
Yet the early offensives in 1942 were still a different matter, and also the defensive fighting conducted in the 43 salient at Kursk showed that Soviet thinking and flexibility at that point was still not as intricate as German defensive doctrine would become within a year. The Russians slugged it out, and both sides were ground down. Glantz, who comes to my mind, talked a lot about this development. The later spring offensives in 1942, around Izum, for example, not only saw the armor wasted partly in infantry support roles, but once breakthroughs had been scored, the flank security and rear was often performed halfheartedly, assuming that the Germans would break and run (like themselves) -- yet with the flanks holding, and the Germans knowing how to fight in depth, the Russians soon found their own formations pocketed by pincers squeezing through the flanks.  Some of these early Russian offensives in spring resulted again in huge numbers of captured, and lost vehicles, and were still quite impressive successes showing the superiority of the Wehrmacht even after the hard winter.  Until Stalingrad, the Russians still had a hard learning curve, and even Stalingrad was still an expensive experience for them...

[daft]

ORIGINAL: Marquo

ORIGINAL: daft

I don't think the historical composition of Soviet forces really supported the deep battle doctrine that early in the war. When they reorganized the tank armies in may -42 they were done so with a fashion to support the breakthrough - exploitation thinking permeating the Red Army. Problem was it didn't really work too well due to the low motorization of the attached rifle divisions as well as due to the fact that the tank armies often were deployed well forward an the front lines. Obviously they had some successes in the winter of -42 with this type of composite armies, but they were still hampered by the force structure. It took some additional time (and the experiences of the winter of 1942 offensive) for the Red Army to make their tank forces more self-sufficient and geared towards exploitation with the tank elements detached from the un-motorized rifle elements.

My reading suggests otherwise. The problem is that often the infantry often did not effect the desired breakthrough, and therefore the mobile units were committed too early as they had to help effect the breakthrough rather than exploit it. Operational failures were analyzed at the highest levels, and adjustments made. Contrary to Pelton's incorrect assertion that "the Red Army never got any better only bigger," it did get better, much better, and dangerously so.

Marquo

Oh, I agree fully. They certainly got better. I'm essentially saying that the Tank Army reorgs performed in -42 weren't as effective as had been hoped in part due to the way the armies were deployed and in part due to the mobile elements being somewhat hamstrung by the less mobile infantry. This was from what I understand something that was debated heavily during the year and rectified later. I'm just saying that the soviet force structure of -42 weren't as suited to the deep battle doctrine as they were in -43 and later. That is not to say that the Red Army had no successes in -42. They did, and learned from that which weren't as good as they had hoped.

[Erik Rutins]

Hi Mark,

ORIGINAL: Marquo
We did the first 18 moves with the prior 1.04 xx and now are using 1.05 xx. At least this will give some idea as to the winter offensive and then the '42 riposte. I will ask my opponent if it is okay to share.

If that's as far as you've gotten in the campaign, I would definitely advise that you play well into 1943 with 1.05 and compare your results to history. We're all expecting some adjustments during the beta process, but the changes were based on games played well into the late war and the balance from late 1942 onwards. The winter offensive will not change a great deal in 1.05 vs. 1.04 and a lot of that depends on how hard the Soviets were hit and how much of a reserve they were able to keep ready. 1942 and 1943 should end up more historical in 1.05 vs. 1.04, but given competent play on both sides, the Germans should still be in trouble by 1943 and in big trouble by 1944.

Regards,

- Erik

[Erik Rutins]

I think it is important to realize how much help the Soviets had in 1942 in terms of the German deployment and fixation on Stalingrad. It seems unlikely that a human German player will leave a very long flank with mainly Axis minor troops waiting to get hit, and the other flank with barely a screening force.

We've been doing some testing with a future historical Stalingrad scenario and historical results are very achievable for the Soviets, just don't expect your opponent in a long campaign scenario to be as obliging, but then again the Soviet players tend to make better decisions than their historical counterparts too.

Even in the same situation, how many players would elect not to withdraw and counter-attack with 6th Army as soon as it's threatened with encirclement? It was a series of serious errors by the Germans on top of good Soviet planning and execution that made that possible. The results of the loss of 6th Army also changed the strategic balance in the south for 1943.

The Soviet player needs to try to achieve a similar success if he wants to similarly unhinge the German defense as early as that. Without a mistake by the German player (which is quite possible, I've seen a fair share in the AARs so far) the Soviets may not be able to achieve the same shift in the strategic balance until further into 1943.

Regards,

- Erik

[BletchleyGeek]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek


In any case, I see a bit of exaggeration implicit in your last sentence. It wasn't a cake walk for the Red Army either, to push AGS all the way from Kharkov to Lvov in nine months. Actually they had to stop large-scale operations everywhere else.

No, they did not.

People keep saying this. It's just not true. 1943 was a broad front offensive that included a good 2/3 of the front. You don't hear much about the stuff up north because the Sovs didn't do as well as the Ukraine, but these fronts were active and made their own, slower, bloodier advances. Indeed, they started operations during the whole Kursk battle, by launching their own offensive on the Orel salient. Bryansk, Western, and Kalinin Fronts were quite as busy as Steppe, Voronezh, Southwestern and Southern.

Only by Leningrad did the Sovs stay put until year's end.

This is one of the things that seriously annoys me about the stock 1943 campaign, btw. It seriously underestimates the Red Army's potential by keeping virtually 3/4 of it on static at a time when 3/4 of it was active, and you don't have anything like the required amount of APs to get it moving when it should. There are some expedients around this, but it definitely reflects this preposterous old school view that the Red Army didn't do broad front offensives.

Absolutely wrong. The Red Army didn't do anything but broad front offensives until 1944.

Well, I said "Kharkov" and "Lvov", because the center of mass of the Soviet effort was certainly moving along that line during the nine months that go from July 1943 to March 1944. That's hardly "absolutely wrong" What I got "absolutely wrong" was not giving any indication on the frontage.

Sorry Flavio, but looking at the dates of historical (major, involving a whole front or bigger) operations, I don't buy that the Red Army launched continuous offensives all the way from Velikiye Luki to the Black Sea, non-stop, from July 1943 to March 1944... We agree that there were absolutely no major operations going on from Leningrad to 50 miles north of Smolensk (and that's almost 1/3 of the frontline, indeed) in the period that goes from July 1943 to December 1943.

Kalinin, Western and Central Fronts initiated a series of linked offensives starting on August 7th and which died out on early October, taking them up to the Vitebsk - Gomel line. And then, they stopped, or rather advanced as the Germans retreated as far as Rogachev by November 1943. Also, if we compare the forces allotted to these fronts along this three month period and compare them with the forces allocated to the Voronezh, Steppe, Southwest and Southern Fronts, we'd see there were the double of Soviet forces in the latter four Fronts than in the former three. And I'm not counting the Northern Caucasus Front and its fight on the Kuban against 17. Armee.

From early November 1943 to spring 1944 the conflict was mainly fought on the Ukraine. The operation to lift Leningrad Siege started on January 14th 1944 and ended up in late February 1944. While it was a very important operation, it was nowhere near as big and massive and what the Soviet Union threw at the Ukraine.

So yes, summer 1943 involved a Soviet offensive along 2/3 of the Eastern Front, up to late September. They managed to keep that massive operation going on for exactly roughly two months (August, September) or in WiTE terms, six turns. But also no, they restricted their operations greatly, most certainly during Winter 1943-44.

[Flaviusx]

Bletchley, you're just quibbling here. My point stands.

[KenchiSulla]

ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek


In any case, I see a bit of exaggeration implicit in your last sentence. It wasn't a cake walk for the Red Army either, to push AGS all the way from Kharkov to Lvov in nine months. Actually they had to stop large-scale operations everywhere else.

No, they did not.

People keep saying this. It's just not true. 1943 was a broad front offensive that included a good 2/3 of the front. You don't hear much about the stuff up north because the Sovs didn't do as well as the Ukraine, but these fronts were active and made their own, slower, bloodier advances. Indeed, they started operations during the whole Kursk battle, by launching their own offensive on the Orel salient. Bryansk, Western, and Kalinin Fronts were quite as busy as Steppe, Voronezh, Southwestern and Southern.

Only by Leningrad did the Sovs stay put until year's end.

This is one of the things that seriously annoys me about the stock 1943 campaign, btw. It seriously underestimates the Red Army's potential by keeping virtually 3/4 of it on static at a time when 3/4 of it was active, and you don't have anything like the required amount of APs to get it moving when it should. There are some expedients around this, but it definitely reflects this preposterous old school view that the Red Army didn't do broad front offensives.

Absolutely wrong. The Red Army didn't do anything but broad front offensives until 1944.

Well, I said "Kharkov" and "Lvov", because the center of mass of the Soviet effort was certainly moving along that line during the nine months that go from July 1943 to March 1944. That's hardly "absolutely wrong" What I got "absolutely wrong" was not giving any indication on the frontage.

Sorry Flavio, but looking at the dates of historical (major, involving a whole front or bigger) operations, I don't buy that the Red Army launched continuous offensives all the way from Velikiye Luki to the Black Sea, non-stop, from July 1943 to March 1944... We agree that there were absolutely no major operations going on from Leningrad to 50 miles north of Smolensk (and that's almost 1/3 of the frontline, indeed) in the period that goes from July 1943 to December 1943.

Kalinin, Western and Central Fronts initiated a series of linked offensives starting on August 7th and which died out on early October, taking them up to the Vitebsk - Gomel line. And then, they stopped, or rather advanced as the Germans retreated as far as Rogachev by November 1943. Also, if we compare the forces allotted to these fronts along this three month period and compare them with the forces allocated to the Voronezh, Steppe, Southwest and Southern Fronts, we'd see there were the double of Soviet forces in the latter four Fronts than in the former three. And I'm not counting the Northern Caucasus Front and its fight on the Kuban against 17. Armee.

From early November 1943 to spring 1944 the conflict was mainly fought on the Ukraine. The operation to lift Leningrad Siege started on January 14th 1944 and ended up in late February 1944. While it was a very important operation, it was nowhere near as big and massive and what the Soviet Union threw at the Ukraine.

So yes, summer 1943 involved a Soviet offensive along 2/3 of the Eastern Front, up to late September. They managed to keep that massive operation going on for exactly roughly two months (August, September) or in WiTE terms, six turns. But also no, they restricted their operations greatly, most certainly during Winter 1943-44.

Actually, according to von Manstein, army group south was under constant pressure during winter 43/44..

[Zebedee]

ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek
We agree that there were absolutely no major operations going on from Leningrad to 50 miles north of Smolensk (and that's almost 1/3 of the frontline, indeed) in the period that goes from July 1943 to December 1943.

Major operations continued around Siniavino until September. In October, planning began for the offensive which commenced in 1944 whilst the Germans began to plan their withdrawal to a new defensive line in September. cf Glantz, The Siege of Leningrad. The chapter Cracking the Blockade covers some of the fighting.

[BletchleyGeek]

ORIGINAL: Zebedee

ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek
We agree that there were absolutely no major operations going on from Leningrad to 50 miles north of Smolensk (and that's almost 1/3 of the frontline, indeed) in the period that goes from July 1943 to December 1943.

Major operations continued around Siniavino until September. In October, planning began for the offensive which commenced in 1944 whilst the Germans began to plan their withdrawal to a new defensive line in September. cf Glantz, The Siege of Leningrad. The chapter Cracking the Blockade covers some of the fighting.

Zeb, Sinyavin operation took place in August - September 1942. I can't check that reference, I don't have the book. I can't find any reference on the Internet on major soviet operations to lift Leningrad Siege after Polar Star, in April 1943. Perhaps there were a third Sinyavin offensive, but my understanding was that after the Polar Star fiasco things got quiet up there.