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Originally posted by JustAGame:
On the contrary. I told my opinion and he disagreed. I argued my point further and he argued his as well. There was no issue until he tried to "win" the discussion by dissecting my posts and rewording my points to strengthen his own and finalizing his post with an empirical retort that was far from being correct to my factual statement that noone really knows what could have been. My response to his "I Know" was that he isn't omnipotent, then I find such a claim to be amusing. No sir. It was my opinion that was being attacked. He is far from being a victim.

You still don't get it do you? This had nothing to do with "winning" or "losing" this argument. There's no prize for "winning" around here and no penalty for "losing", and if you use excessive sarcasm and insults to "win" arguments here, you'll just end up debating with yourself as no one will speak with you. The "omnipotence" remark became the primary issue because it *was* an attack/insult, and totally unrelated to what was being argued. It was not a reasoned response for a debate, even a heated debate.

In retrospect, my arguements would have been served by pointing out the inaccuracy of his "I know" in a more candid than sarcastic manner.

Yes, this is what you should have done. I admit in retrospect that my "I know" response could be interpreted as being a little sarcastic. I don't believe it to have been a serious mistake and it wasn't intentional, but I don't expect you to believe that anyway. Your actual response went beyond sarcasm however, never mind it having nothing to do with the argument, and your crack about Russians not being able to get beyond their original communist teachings of history didn't help any.

I have also learned that "history" is a living entity and what we "know" now is not everything and always accurate. In short, my point of view is not fixed and I try not to limit it to what is popular at the moment.

It may shock you to know that I agree. There is a lot I don't know, I don't claim to be knowledgable of all things, and the truth is often very hard to find and sometimes downright impossible. I don't know the details of every controversial military order given by Hitler during the war. If you had looked carefully you would have noticed I was concentrating on Hitler's "Southern Strategy" for '41, since that was mentioned as being a good idea. I was not making a sweeping assertion that every one of the acts Hitler made were bad military decisions. I don't know enough to carry on a detailed argument on that, and I'm quite willing to accept the likelyhood of some of what I've learned about Hitler's military competency could be wrong, although I think most of us can at least agree that by '44 Hitler was not totally in touch with reality, rendering whatever military skill he had useless. The question is how much of what I've learned is wrong? Are *all* the German officers who have gone on record discounting Hitler's talent lying?

What I do believe, and what I was arguing about, was that the "Southern Strategy" was clearly a mistake given historical hindsight. To repeat my basic argument:

Because of Hitler's shifting forces around, Moscow did not fall before the winter set in, and Hitler stuck to this Southern Strategy on a much more massive scale in '42, with the results being exactly what I believe would have happened in the Soviet counterattack in the winter of '41. Too much frontage to hold and not enough men, a lesser advance in the north do to units assigned up there being sent south, giving the Soviets more breathing room around Moscow allowing *them* to shift forces south for their winter offensive, and leaving portions of a now lengthy front line very weakly held, making a Soviet winter counterattack in '41 even more effective than they historically were.

If you disagree with that, by all means lets continue our argument, but lets do so without dragging my highly overrated omnipotence back into the debate.

Originally posted by Frank:
has created wirhack, a Wir based version of alternative history.

Hi Frank, I've figured out how to modify the infantry replacement multipliers so the next version won't use the kludge of disabling city allegiance. This may be useful to Rick's scenario too, I don't know.

Originally posted by Matthew Buttsworth:
Rick,
Have read Suvorov in detail. Early books thought provoking. Last book trash. German sources - Post especeially - much better.
Suvorov's claims that the Soviet units and Stalin line guns were on way to border when attacked. Therefore the Soviet disposition in depth was accidental not ordered...

In many respects he is highly suspect and deserves all the criticism he gets.
I however do not have the access to historical documents or the knowledge of Russian to look at his specific claims about orders given to Russian units, armies, generals to advance to the front and cannot prove or disprove his claims.
...
Nor do any markings on the May 1941 plan say Stalin read it, with Soviet accounts saying it was definitely not backed.
But if it was knocked back, the failure to withdraw massed tank forces from the Lvov salient, and to really defend in depth on Army group centre was catastrophic reflecting either a total over-estimation of Soviet ability to stop German attack and go on the offensive (doubtful but possible) or in my opinion paralysis and a vain hope that the ever so obvious attack will not fall.

Thanks, Matthew,

I appreciate hearing the detail of what you know on this. It provides enough information to at least show some basis for Suvorov's claims. I may have to track down the Icebreaker book and give it a read to see what he supports his arguments with. That (as I have probably said too often already) is what I disliked about Hitler's Panzers East. The sources for it were just so one sided that I had problems trusting any conclusions in it, although some arguments do make sense.

On a side note, I work with a Russian who considers herself a strong history buff. She has quite a few thoughts about the war that I enjoy discussing with her. Her grandparents were in Brest-Litovsk the day before the attack and left on a train to visit elsewhere. On June 23, her grandfather was removed from the train they were on and fortunately for him assigned to ground support for the air force, or I doubt he would have survived the initial battles. Her father was a general officer in the Soviet army and is a strong communist, but she isn't. She said that leads to some arguments between them. She doesn't seem any more blinded to WW2 history than a typical American, and definitely knows more about the Soviet side of the fighting than the average American would know about the US side of things. Just a side note, but I think these kind of things are interesting.

Originally posted by Ed Cogburn:
Hi Frank, I've figured out how to modify the infantry replacement multipliers so the next version won't use the kludge of disabling city allegiance. This may be useful to Rick's scenario too, I don't know.

Good job. I will take a look at it for a wirhack version of the scenario. After I created it based on the normal exe, I am playing a game of it with wirhack and the Soviets are hopeless with all the airpower of the Germans, so I need to tweak it for this situation. Actually, it may be too balanced overall as the Soviets attack okay at first, but the Germans bounce back too quickly. Then the high Soviet output from undamaged factories keeps them strong, so it seems like a stalemate based on the limited WIR engine. Hard telling though. Great hack job though!

Originally posted by JustAGame:


This is far from an effort to objectively moderate. Such as it is, I realize that this is not a place where I stand a chance of winning an arguement with Ed. If arguing one's opinion is contentious, than I am guilty.

This is the 3rd or 4th time that you have asked for an insult and, to date, the only insult between us is you calling me arrogant and it is possible that you were implying that I know nothing. The ONLY person or group who I have insulted is Ed (although it suited someone's purposes to manifest an insult out of a purely logical comment about being Russian does not equal critic of historians). Considering the bait thrown my way by Ed's friends, ask yourself who is really being contentious. If you really feel I am being contentious for the sake of it, then why didn't I attack the numerous others who disagreed with my opinion.

That said, I throw in the towel. This is not enjoyable, entertaining or thought provoking. Ed, by virtue of his popularity on this board, wins. Hitler was an "incompetent" and Ed knows who would have won the war if the German generals hadn't deviated from and resisted the plan.

To JustaGame

No, i was not trying too hard to objectively
moderate but i think if you can disprove the premise of those you are debating with then you can 'win' an arguement, whether it be with Ed or anyone else. To argue ones 'opinion' is fine but to actually comment on the way a person argues or if other people support him/her is if feel being contentious or maybe just introducing emotion into the conversation which is the first step to turning the event into a total waste of time.
The 'insult' comment was actually me taking your side to an extent. There is nothing wrong with being arrogant as long as you know what you are talking about. In my late twenties and thirties i thought i knew everything and as the saying goes 'the more you know the more you realise that you know nothing' (see PS at end). I can still be arrogant today so i have to watch myself to make sure i'm not talking out my a**e.

Ed could have snapped at you simply because you seem to have had a bad time with a bunch of soviet tourists who were as about as educated on world events as the next guy (ie, not at all) and you commented on soviets 'en mass' as ignorant. This was the mistake, each of us is our own world that has nothing to do with our origins. Look at Clinton, the man was US president and i've forgotten more geopolitics and such than he ever knew(in my opinion).

I do'nt think you were being contentious for the sake of it but you have to realise that the people who talk on this board are above average as far as smarts are concerned and this is great 'cause its a rare thing. I've tried all types of philosophical chat boards and such and they do not match up in the least for objective thought and common sense no matter what the subject. (try the CNN chat board on the religious thread and you'll not find a bigger bunch of dogmatists and rigid thinkers)

To 'throw in the towel' sounds a lot like my Born Again sister who has to walk away when her core beliefs are threatened. Come on!!
I think you have a lot to offer, keep posting.

Nick

PS. A great man once said that socrates was the wisest of all men, for he knew that he knew nothing.

Originally posted by RickyB:
a game of it with wirhack and the Soviets are hopeless with all the airpower of the Germans, so I need to tweak it for this situation.

Ouch. It makes sense; the Soviets haven't had 4 years to wear the Luftwaffe down with the help of the Western Air Forces.

Actually, it may be too balanced overall as the Soviets attack okay at first, but the Germans bounce back too quickly. Then the high Soviet output from undamaged factories keeps them strong, so it seems like a stalemate based on the limited WIR engine. Hard telling though.

What is the theory behind your alternate reality scenario? If you're using wirhack then are you assuming Germany is not at war with Britian/US in '42, or have you made your own modified wir.exe that still has the Western Allies strategic bombing campaign?

Originally posted by JustAGame:
This is far from an effort to objectively moderate. Such as it is, I realize that this is not a place where I stand a chance of winning an arguement with Ed. If arguing one's opinion is contentious, than I am guilty.

I am not your nemesis here. I gave out info in two posts yesterdaty that turned out to be wrong, Ricky can confirm that. I'm not some tower of intellect dominating all discussions here. Frank is definitely a friend, but the rest said what they did, not so much because they're my friends, but because they were trying to point out to you, politely, the mistakes you were making.

(although it suited someone's purposes to manifest an insult out of a purely logical comment about being Russian does not equal critic of historians)

"Someone's purposes"? That's cute.

Your twisting your own words here, perhaps some stealthy revisionism of your own?

This statement (the original):

"but I hardly find Russians online as credible critics of historians."

does not equal this statement:

"being Russian does not equal critic of historians"

The state of "being Russian" of course does not imply they are all "critics of historians". Your original statement says something very different though, it says "I hardly find Russians online". You've lumped together all Russians on the Internet, minus one or two, or a dozen, depending on how you translate "hardly", as being incapable of critiquing an historian. Stop playing word games.

ask yourself who is really being contentious. If you really feel I am being contentious for the sake of it, then why didn't I attack the numerous others who disagreed with my opinion.

Your the one calling this contentious, not us. That word was first used by you in this same post at the beginning:

"If arguing one's opinion is contentious, than I am guilty."

"arguing one's opinion" is what ALL of us do here, but we manage, more or less, to do it without starting flame wars.

As for not attacking the others, you made at least 7 posts to 4 different people all debating the issue while our argument was going on, and later on, you just started accusing anyone with a critical remark as being one of "Ed's friends" which, due to the obvious sarcasm, could be construed as an attack in and of itself. The "friends" label gave you your excuse to simply dismiss them.

Ed, by virtue of his popularity on this board, wins.

You didn't read my last post, did you? People "win" here only by coming away from an argument knowing more than when they started.

Don't use me or my grossly over-exaggerated popularity as your excuse for quitting. We may not have anything to say to one another now, but there were several other interesting debates going on that didn't involve me that you should continue to participate in. The discussion about the various books with conflicting statements was interesting.

Hitler was an "incompetent" and Ed knows who would have won the war if the German generals hadn't deviated from and resisted the plan.

Those are simply my opinions, maybe they're right, maybe not. This thread has been a learning experience as I've heard conflicting things about Hitler's alleged skills and never knew it was such a hot button issue. You certainly aren't the only one who disagrees with me, so why are you the only one throwing in the towel? Now that our little spat is over, hopefully, the guys who still disagree with what I said may end up having the last laugh, as they skewer me on their spit.

Originally posted by Ed Cogburn:
What is the theory behind your alternate reality scenario? If you're using wirhack then are you assuming Germany is not at war with Britian/US in '42, or have you made your own modified wir.exe that still has the Western Allies strategic bombing campaign?

Actually, my original thought was that Germany concentrated on the West for all of 1941, taking out North Africa, getting Spain to join the war, etc. but the British Isles were still in the war, and the normal course in the West would be carried out, using the normal WIR game. I added in Madrid and Cairo as cities on the west edge of the map (not on map but having coords there), with Madrid having some very weak factories and Cairo being mostly resources from North Africa along with 1 or 2 factories. I assumed the Germans went home after this except for strong forces in Africa ready to return to the East front after the Soviet attack and fair forces in the east, along with the typical forces in France. Maybe Hitler was killed by the Generals (although he is still in the game), the Soviet Union was not invaded, war continues against Great Britain only, etc. The original WIR handles this fine. Also, I moved up Tiger availability to the beginning of my scenario (May 1942) and Panthers also, as the Germans had plans for newer tanks but put them on hold so as not to delay current production for the attack on the Soviet Union.

However, a number of people have asked about using it with wirhack, and someone I am playing wanted to use it so I said okay, but after some original great attacks, the massing of the Luftwaffe in the east makes any real offensives tough for the Soviets after the first couple of turns. Wirhack does fit in with this based on the fighting in the West totally ending, although that was not in my original scenario.


[ June 29, 2001: Message edited by: RickyB ]

Originally posted by Ed Cogburn:


Some of his Generals would have said much more than this, and none of it nice. Unfortunately, by making this a Hitler-versus-his-generals thing, you automatically discount what they had to say.

On the contrary, the view that Hitler was good command material lacking only proper training was Manstein's. This view seem to be shared by Alan Clarke who interviewed many of the German generals for his book "Barbarossa". His veredict was that Hitler was extremely able at the tactical level (he liked to rewrite regimental orders) and at the Strategic level but not that good at the operational.

Also, the German Army was *defeated* - totally. What better excuse could the German generals offer for their defeat than to blame it all on the stupid directives of the thoroughly (though rightfully) demonised Hitler? In fact, in many cases there were many Generals who agreed with Hitler *at the time*, although they denied it later if diares and the such are to be believed.

On the few times they were truly united in their oposition to Hitler's decisions, they were more often wrong than Hitler was - the invasion of Poland (the Army was sure the Allies would attack) and the conduct of the 1941-42 defensive battle on the Eastern front (they wanted a fighting retreat, which would likely have caused a complete disaster for the German Army, instead of a serious setback).

Originally posted by Ed Cogburn:

Since I maintain the opinion that a Southern strategy in '41 would ultimatly lose the war for the Germans, I believe Hitler was very wrong on this point, and his generals largely agreed with that, thus their resistence to his orders shifting units to the south instead of moving on Moscow, and moving other units around willy-nilly as he reprioritized the objectives every other week.

The "flanks first strategy" might, or might not, have been a mistake, but conventional wisdow say you win wars by destroying enemy forces, not taking geographical areas. If it was a mistake, without the benefit of hindsight, most other good Generals possesing the same info Hitler had would have made the same mistake.

And Hitler did NOT change the objectives every other week! In fact, he never even mentioned Moscow in directive 33 except for saying that it should not be considered an objective simultaneously with Leningrad except in case of an unexpectedly fast Soviet collapse. The Generals *assumed* Moscow was the objective, but Hitler's strategy was all about destroying the Red Army, not taking this and that area (except for the Baltic coast and Leningrad).

[ June 29, 2001: Message edited by: Yogi Yohan ]

I,ve noticed that many of the usual names have been presented for "Best German General", et.al. Manstein, Rommel, Guderian. I want to add one that hasn't been presented, Hoth! Check out his perfromance, since he wasn't one of the big names he nevers gets much credit. He did save Army Group A(could be wrong) from the Caucasas during the Stalingrad debacle.

Someone actually mentioned Montgomery as a "Great General", if average makes one great then he should be included. :rolleyes:

Very good analysis of Model and Kess - you have to look at his italian campaign as excellent. the other thing about Rommell is the Brits had a good reason to make him more than what his was.

Originally posted by RickyB:

Actually, I haven't read these arguments about the Soviets attacking in July as being based on any Nazi bashing/hating or anything - that seems to be more from a seperate issue regarding how bad Hitler was, which seemed to have been sparked by the Hitler was a genius post.

My only concern about the Stalin attacking in July argument, as partially stated before, is that I have yet to see any pointers to evidence of this. Hitler's Panzers East had no evidence in it and used only one source - Suvorov. I have not read Suvorov so I still can't judge in any way the validity of his statement, without knowing what evidence he based his thoughts on. So far nobody has posted what this evidence might be. There are also references to the Nuremburg trials, which are meaningless to me and Soviet prisoners. The prisoners would mean something, if there are more details as to number of them, rank, etc.

Overall, everything I have knowledge of indicates that the Red Army planned on an immediate offensive in case of war with Germany from the Lvov area in 1940. However, after wargames in early 1941 showed that a Soviet offensive would fail, the plan was dropped but the units left in place. The deployments that occured in the spring of 1941 were not up to the German/Rumanian border, but about 300 km behind the border. The Soviets only had approximately 64 divisions on within 50 km of the border on June 22 and another 35-40 divisions within another 50km, while they massed well over one hundred weak divisions in this 300+ km zone. All this means to me that the Soviets were deploying a defense in depth as they so often did during the war, with the frontline forces basically sacrificed to gain time. With the exception of any evidence that Soviet prisoners can give, and the definite lack of any written Soviet documents showing a plan to attack in July 1941, the evidence I am aware of is completely against a Soviet attack in the near term. Another thing that just popped into mind is that Zhukov pushed Stalin to keep the guns that were emplaced in the Stalin line along the 1939 borders in place, while others were pushing to use them to fortify the Polish border. Guess where the guns were in June - the old Stalin line positions where they did almost no good, but then they would have been totally worthless there in the case of an offensive against the Germans.

Anyway, I just want to see (hear about) some real evidence of an attack before feeling it was a possible plan.

According to Shirer in "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" the Soviet troops in the Lvov area, were there to perhaps press Stalin's claim to the Balkans. There could actually be some validity to the claim that the Soviets could have been thinking an assault in this region. Stalin kept pressing Hitler for concessions for the Soviet Union in this area, but with the oil fields in Romania, Hitler kept refusing to give up any more ground to Stalin. Shirer points out that there was a build up in Bessarabia and it was thought by the Germans that the Soviets intended to invade in order to press their claim to that territory. I have never seen any Soviet documents of this time period, but with Stalin so willing to jump in bed with Hitler in order to gain half of Poland, he could have conceivably looking at an invasion in the Balkans in order to get what he thought should belong to him.

Hey Ed, since you're popular, can I be you're friend?

Originally posted by Ed Cogburn:


Those are simply my opinions, maybe they're right, maybe not. This thread has been a learning experience as I've heard conflicting things about Hitler's alleged skills and never knew it was such a hot button issue. You certainly aren't the only one who disagrees with me, so why are you the only one throwing in the towel? Now that our little spat is over, hopefully, the guys who still disagree with what I said may end up having the last laugh, as they skewer me on their spit.

Hitler as supreme strategist? Not by a long shot.

What were his major strategic victories?
1) Making the Nazi Party (and himself) the only political force in Germany,
2) The bloodless conquests of Austria and Czechoslovakia. Impressive in their own right - he saw Britain and France at this point as willing to stretch their principles to appease him. And this at a time when Germany was still relatively weak.

Now for the idiotic blunders:
1) The original attack against France and the west was a dumb, unimaginative rehash of the Schlieffen Plan, which some believe would have failed as the Allies anticipated this. Hitler did not come up with that plan, but he certainly approved it. It was Manstein who came up with the Ardennes alternative after the original plans fell into Allied hands.

2) Hitler had too much of a land-locked mentality to see the many opportunities that lay before him after France surrendered. While Raeder and to a lesser extent Donitz urged him to finish the British off by focusing on submarine warfare and kicking them out of the Mediterranean theater. But all he could think of was lebensraum...

3) Making the decision to attack Russia in June 1941 has been described by many historians as the first great fatal blunder. In mitigation, however, Stalin's purges of the 1930s and Russia's dismal performance against Finland led many (including Western observers) to conclude that Russia in 1941 was militarily feeble and would quickly collapse in the face of German assault. When Barbarossa began, Stimson, USA's SecWar, gave Russia only about 3 weeks. That said, his stupid and criminal treatment of the Slavs heralded a limitless war in the East. Stalin was a monster, and Hitler could have capitalized on the fact that most Soviet citizens hated and feared him, but his asinine policies of subjugation and extermination only sent them running back to Stalin.

4) But the GREATEST strategic error of all has to be declaring war on the US. Consider the backdrop. Mid-Dec 1941. Your strongest armies are reeling before the Russian winter offensive and Britain's still alive and kicking and becoming more of a nuisance with each new bombing run. His arrangement with Japan called for a declaration of war only if one of the three Axis members were actually attacked by the USA, not the other way around. If Hitler had not declared war on the US, FDR would have been hard put to get Congress to issue such a declaration. Like most of the senior Nazi hierarchy, Hitler considered America a big but degenerate nation, whose chief strengths lay in beauty pageants, Hollywood and turning out luxury products. The fact that the US economic potential in 1941 was around FOUR times as great as the German even including the occupied European territories meant nothing to him! Having presided over a rapid rearmament program in the 1930s himself, he could not extrapolate this to the US situation. Like industrial plant cannot be reconfigured to produce aircraft instead of cars and household products!

5) Basically, after the US entered the war, Germany could no longer win, but a stalemate was by no means out of the question at this point. His temperamental opposition to giving up territory caused many of the later disasters, e.g. Stalingrad. To say nothing of his mania for over-ambitious offensives - Kursk, Battle of Bulge, Hungary offensive etc.

Originally posted by Lokioftheaesir:


To JustaGame
...

To 'throw in the towel' sounds a lot like my Born Again sister who has to walk away when her core beliefs are threatened. Come on!!
I think you have a lot to offer, keep posting.

Nick
...

I will continue to read and post here. By throwing in the towel, I chose to exit the arguement. While the discussion about the relevant historical issues was great, the arguement was fruitless and distracting.

Originally posted by Ed Cogburn:


This statement (the original):


quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"but I hardly find Russians online as credible critics of historians."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

does not equal this statement:


quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"being Russian does not equal critic of historians"

Just to set the record straight on this matter. If someone was arguing the point that JFK was the best President of the 20th century and substantiated their position by offering that they know several American Democrats online and those Americans emphatically agree, then I would argue that I "hardly consider the objective American Democrats online as credible political scientists". That isn't insulting anyone, but it is pointing out that the expert evidence presented isn't quite so "expert" afterall.

In case the analogy didn't hit home, I will break down the specific instance of my so-called insult. I had stated "We now have evidence that Stalin was already moving his own forces to the border for his own invasion in July of 41." That was followed a comment by someone who said they never heard such a thing and asked where I got that information, among comments by others suggesting the idea as not possible. I presented an article by Joseph Bishop of the Institute of Historical Review wherein he is critiquing Panzers East by Stolfi. In that article, Bishop supports Stolfi's claim that the Soviets were planning their own Barbarosa and cites recent evidence suggesting that Stalin was probably going to launch his own offensive around mid-July. That article made reference Suvurov in that Bishop stated that Stolfi's view "is consistent with the detailed revisionist study by Russian historian Victor Suvorov (Vladimir Rezun), Icebreaker: Who Started the Second World War, as well as research by several German historians." Anyway, that openend the door for the discussion over whether the Soviets were planning their own Barbarosa. The credibility of the researchers and historians who support the notion of a planned Soviet Barbarosa quickly became a target of those arguing that such a plan never existed.

Specifically, it was stated that "RE: Suvorov
In an entirely different forum (onwar.com) his research was thoroughly trashed by some Russian members of the forum. He apparently has no credibility as an historian, and is more suited to the althistory crowd."

So,
1. SOURCE his research was thoroughly trashed by some Russian members of the forum
2. LOGICAL CONCLUSION He apparently has no credibility as an historian
3. ARGUEMENT is more suited to the althistory crowd

For the arguement to be valid (#3), the conclusion (#2) has to be valid. For the conclusion (#2) to be valid, the source (#1) has to credible and reliable. In simpler terms, the arguement that Suvorov is only more suited to the althistory crowd only holds true if we are convinced that he apparently has no credibility as an historian as evidenced by his research was thoroughly trashed by some Russian members of the forum.

My reply to this arguement was:

Hmm. I wonder what else is more suited to the althistory crowd as opposed to the objectively educated Rusians. I'm not informed enough about Suvorov to claim to be an expert on his credentials, but I hardly find Russians online as credible critics of historians.

Apart from the typo, this is far from being an insult to Russians. He established his source as "some Russian members on the forum". Pardon my pointing it out, but the arguement didn't hold. Anyone who believes that the former Soviet Union, Russia, America or you name your nation teaches their history objectively can speak up. Furthermore, anyone who doesn't believe the former Soviet Union and the present day Russia had/has a more closed society than the free world, then please speak up. What is more important, does anyone actually find "Russian members of the forum" (besides the author) as CREDIBLE CRITICS OF HISTORIANS. It is a simple case of disputing the expertise of the evidence. By disputing the credibilty of the source of his conclusion and arguement, I established that this particular arguement isn't valid.

The truth is that "Russians on the internet" ARE NOT "credible critics of historians". The same reasoning holds true that "some (fill in your nationalty) members of the forum" ARE NOT "credible critics of historians".

Perhaps you forgot that my lumping "Russians on the internet" was a direct reference to the post I was replying to in which the author used "some Russian members of the forum" as his source. I wasn't playing word games at all. In fact, I was the only one who was still using it context with the post it was in reply to.

Originally posted by Ed Cogburn:

Your the one calling this contentious, not us. That word was first used by you in this same post at the beginning:


quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"If arguing one's opinion is contentious, than I am guilty."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Not that it is a big deal, but my use of "contentious" was in reference to Nick's analysis.

* Justagame. I feel that you are being contentious for the sake of it.

Originally posted by Ed Cogburn:
Now that our little spat is over, hopefully,...

What spat?

Ok.

I will try to repeat. I am not historian or critic of historians, but I know a sufficiently large quantity of people (historians including), which can give both the Russian and not Russian documents, which refute Rezun (Suvorov). As in it wrote, errors, cheat, the distortion of quotations, demagogy and incorrect logically conclusions/derivations exists, on the average, on 2 pages from any 3 pages of his "research". A question about open/close, true/false of the Soviet Union make it possible to leave for the boundaries of consideration, since it is too politic.

You will excuse for my disgusting English

Dear Moi,
I have read widely on the issue, reading all available English and German sources. Unfortuantely my lack of Russian makes it impossible for me to read the original Russian documents which would be conclusive to the debate if those documents exist which I doubt. Not unless they are hidden somewhere in a Presidential/Army archive and not yet released.
I agree with your point about Suvorov's writing style. Is polemic is terrible and his mixture of good points, propaganda and blatant falsehood is hard to take, whatever its initial interest. His latest book as I have said above is trash. Only Icebreaker and the Day M are worth looking at but even then only with a large grain of salt and continuing suspicioun.
He deserves to be taken apart by debunking his sources and not - as Glantz and Gabrielovsky have done, by misleading, factual but ultimately irrelevent arguments.
Post and Hoffman do a better job without the polemic and with proper references than Suvorov who can be read for fun, or horror, but not as a serious historian trying to prove a point.
As far as I can summarize the historical debate on the Russian attack issue:
- Soviet military theory 1930s/1941. Attack first in depth with armour and aircraft, using mobilization of second third wave while attack is underway, argued Post Suvorov. Proven. Shaposnikov/Tutelkevski main Russian sources.
- Soviet armenments program mass production of tanks and aircraft for such an aggressive war from 1931 on as main aim of five year plans. Proven. The tanks and aircraft were there and the cost tothe Russian people enormous. Best source Post.
- Bolshevik theory about using second imperialist war to exhaust capitalist powers and allow a triumphant Soviet attack in later stages of European war. Proven. Documents are there. Post Suvorov. Post best source.
As I stated above this was the probable reason for Stalin signing the Hitler/Stalin pact but the plan fell apart after the quick German victory in France.
- Zhukov/Timenshenko May 15 attack plan for a preventative war against the Germans. Proven. Plan is there. Danilov. Post. Hoffman.
Unproven - did Stalin agree to the plan or not. Zhukov no 1969 interview. Danilov disposition movement fo Soviet forces up to June 22nd 1941 shows that it was being put into action.
Needed to settle issue - orders showing that Soviet armies were on way to attack positions at front when Germans attacked and not deployed in depth as Rick above asserted.
Some deployment in dpeth so that the second third wave could join attack would be consistent with Soviet military doctrine. Assertion that Central Asian Far East Middle Eastern armies transfered to West were on way to front has to be proven.

Counter argument soviets werer not well enough trained for attack.
Good point but plan had to be changed due to fast german success. Original Soviet plan was to attack a year or so later when Western powers and germany exhausted.
May 15 plan was improvised to counter growing German threat and was a preventative attack. Whether it would have been launched with Soviet readiness, training so low I do not know.
I have a feeling it would have been, but I must repeat conclusive documents not found and may never be found.
Suvorov/post June 22nd Nazi propaganda assertion that German attack was a preventative war to stop Russian attack. Totally false. Germans underestimated Soviet army, did not believe it could fight, thought they would have an easy victory, and were totally shocked by the mass of German. Cannot therefore claim it was a preventative war.
Mainstain argument that Soviet disposition was threatening not immenent and could become threatening should Stalin make the decision to attack. Acceptable. As was the argument about German fear of Soviet bombing raids on Rumanian oilfields. They did not know about any Soviet military plans to acually attack it.
Probably a fair argument, one that at least had influenece amongst officers in German army.
Wheather Hitler felt threatened by Soviet disposition of forces I do not know. His arguments mixture of anger at Soviet rejection of his plan for a continental wide alliance, fear of long term soviet threat, paranoia about Soviet Jewish communism (downplayed in period of alliance when said to be new Soviet national socialist ledership), and racist dreams of lebensraum. true.
but which factors dominated the mixture I do not know.
But in no way can the German attack be seen as a prevantive war as was tje Zhukov/Timenshenko plan which Hoffman, Post do not assert it way.
Needed to end debate.
Detailed analysis of Soviet army and division movements amd orders prior to June 22nd 1941 to see if it did confirm that the Timenshenko/Zhukov plan was being put into action or not.
Enough evidence from captured and published Soviet memoirs (Sandalov is one) exists to assert that this is possible/probbable, but to end the debate detailed documentary evidednce is needed.
This positing I hope should stop the insults and the focus on the stupidity/fanaticism of Suvorov and bring the argument back to a factual plain which is where I believe it should be debated.
It is Danilov not Suvorov that is the key and it is his findings that should be debated.

Matt Buttsworth

To Yogi:


If we've reached the point where the argument is how many times Hitler was right for every decision he made concerning the daily planning of military operations, versus his Generals, then I'm underqualified to continue. I'm not a walking encyclopedia of all of Hitler's military orders. He made mistakes, big ones. So did the German generals. Hitler though, acquired a contempt and distrust toward the German High Command Staff. The attempted assasination didn't help any. All this led him to believe he was better than all of them, but he wasn't better than *ALL* of them. This leads eventually to the point where he takes away command authority from his field commanders to himself. The best example is the panzer divisions he didn't allow Rommel in the Normandy area to control, which resulted in these divisions not becoming involved within hours of the Normandy invasion.

His famous stand and die orders are another huge mistake, culminating in the destruction of Army Group Center in '44. Wild Bill Wilder in his introduction to his scenario "Watchword Freedom" (URL below) mentions Hitler's actions leading up to this battle, and he certainly doesn't buy into the idea Hiter was a good military commander.

http://www.tankheadcentral.com/campaigns.html

And Hitler made other mistakes too, but I can't list them all as I don't know about all of them.

The "flanks first strategy" might, or might not, have been a mistake, but conventional wisdow say you win wars by destroying enemy forces, not taking geographical areas.

As I understand it, this is exactly what Hitler was doing, he was ordering the capture of territiory without sufficient concern on how he was going to hold it when the enemy counter attacked. He carried this strategy over to 1942 and the fiasco of Stalingrad and the destruction of the 6th Army was the result. In fact, his obsession with Stalingrad, because of who it was named after, was another mistake.

If it was a mistake, without the benefit of hindsight, most other good Generals possesing the same info Hitler had would have made the same mistake.

It depends. Would the command staff working cooperatively in developing an attack do better or worse than Hitler acting on his own, without input from the Command Staff because he doesn't trust them?

And Hitler did NOT change the objectives every other week!

Yes, that was a deliberate exagerration, but not deliberate enough to be seen as such. My bad.

In fact, he never even mentioned Moscow in directive 33 except for saying that it should not be considered an objective simultaneously with Leningrad except in case of an unexpectedly fast Soviet collapse. The Generals *assumed* Moscow was the objective, but Hitler's strategy was all about destroying the Red Army, not taking this and that area (except for the Baltic coast and Leningrad).

Uhh, you'd better look again Yogi. Look at the copy of the Operation Barbarossa plans that JustAGame posted to the forum (thanks for doing that JustAGame). The first post, section 3 called "Conduct of Operations", second paragraph:

"Only after the fulfilment of this first essential task, which must include the occupation of Leningrad and Kronstadt, will the attack be continued with the intention of occupying Moscow, an important center of communications and of the armaments industry."

..... later in section 3:

"In the North a quick advance to Moscow. The capture of this city would represent a decisive political and economic success and would also bring about the capture of the most important railway junctions."

Yes, destruction of armies was talked about first, but Leningrad and Moscow were explicit targets from the very beginning. Ironically, a person reading the quoted text above might reasonably come away with the idea that Moscow is priority #2, after Leningrad.

[ June 30, 2001: Message edited by: Ed Cogburn ]

Originally posted by RickyB:

Actually, my original thought was that Germany concentrated on the West for all of 1941, taking out North Africa, getting Spain to join the war, etc. but the British Isles were still in the war, and the normal course in the West would be carried out, using the normal WIR game.

You can disable the Italian Front without disabling the West Front, and I'm pretty sure you can disable the strategic bombing coming from the south but keep the bombing coming from the West (Britian), at least with the old code. I haven't looked at this closely enough with the 3.002 from Arnaud, but more than likely it can be done; I don't imagine the code changed that much.

I added in Madrid and Cairo as cities on the west edge of the map (not on map but having coords there), with Madrid having some very weak factories and Cairo being mostly resources from North Africa along with 1 or 2 factories. I assumed the Germans went home after this except for strong forces in Africa ready to return to the East front after the Soviet attack and fair forces in the east, along with the typical forces in France. Maybe Hitler was killed by the Generals (although he is still in the game), the Soviet Union was not invaded, war continues against Great Britain only, etc. The original WIR handles this fine. Also, I moved up Tiger availability to the beginning of my scenario (May 1942) and Panthers also, as the Germans had plans for newer tanks but put them on hold so as not to delay current production for the attack on the Soviet Union.

I like it, interesting possiblility. Reminds me of the "Spanish Gambit" with the boardgame 'Third Reich'. Take Spain, then Gibraltar (which is a catastrophe for the English), kick the Brits out of the Med, send the Italian Navy into the Atlantic, meet up with the German Navy and invade England, with the Luftwaffe providing the cover. The only real weakness to this idea is the Italian Navy. Its skill, morale, and capabilities are all questionable.

However, a number of people have asked about using it with wirhack, and someone I am playing wanted to use it so I said okay, but after some original great attacks, the massing of the Luftwaffe in the east makes any real offensives tough for the Soviets after the first couple of turns. Wirhack does fit in with this based on the fighting in the West totally ending, although that was not in my original scenario.

Why did they want to use wirhack with this scenario?

Yes, the Luftwaffe will make this scenario a little tedious. The only real way to stop this is either come up with an excuse to justify increasing Soviet air group experience, or find a reason for the Luftwaffe, or a big chunk of it, to be elsewhere. Does the scenario start in good weather or bad? Perhaps the Soviets attacking in snow/blizzard would give them an advantage as it reduces the Luftwaffe's influence somewhat (probably not enough) and the Soviets receive a readiness advantage in blizzard conditions?