Posted on 06/22/2021 10:05:55 AM PDT by Captain Peter Blood
I was waiting to see of anyone would mention this and as of now no one has.
80 years ago today Germany invaded the Soviet Union in a surprise attack.
It started one of the bloodiest and catastrophic episodes of W.W. II.
The scope, scale, casualties , and atrocities almost dwarf anything that happened anywhere else in the ETO.
Without the sacrifices the Russians made on the Eastern Front the invasion of Europe would not have been successful.
Estimated deaths on the Eastern Front are not totally known but an estimated 20 million died
"Saddle up, cowboys."
Hitler told Stalin, too, in his rambling “Mein Kampf”. Hitler told the entire world again and again what he intended to do. And then did it.
Liberals do the same today. They constantly state their intentions to destroy all non-liberals. They talk about using camps and death squads. These are people in the RAT party apparatus. The RAT party leadership says it over and over, just not as out front. Yet the stupid RINOs just don’t listen. The fools think they can work a deal. They can’t. The RATs intend to utterly and mercilessly destroy all opposition. Forever.
What a great movie!
I wonder sometimes if they had pursued Fall Blau in 1941 instead of 1942 whether the Germans wouldn’t have won. They would have captured all that industry before it could be moved, as well as any harvest from Ukraine and 40% of the Soviet Union’s oil.
Yes, it was very dangerous to be more popular than Stalin in the Soviet Union (see Sergei Kirov).
Actually every day Hitler delayed Barbarossa, would have decreased the odds of success. They were already delayed by having to bail out the Italians in the Balkans.
It is suggested that Stalin planned to attack by 1943, as he felt the Red Army would be up to strength by then. That’s why he was so anxious not to do anything he felt could provoke the Germans, he needed to buy time.
Thanks!
Perhaps, though the Ivans were not as well prepared in 1941 as they were by the end of 42, at Stalingrad.
If Hitler would have gotten to Moscow months earlier than he did ...had it been the main focus from the get go...it might have been a different story.
But you’re right, it could well have been an earlier Stalingrad.
What amazes me is that of the 82 comments there is no mention of I believe I have the name spelled right Vlassoff and his Slav army of a reported million who were supplied by the Nazis and fought the Russians. It was that unit when the war ended that liberated Prague and kicked the SS out only to be given to the Russians and where most executed by them
Leaving the Red Army without equipment, food, or fuel in 1942 might have meant that the Germans could simply have pushed north and cutoff European Russia from Siberia.
So much about that part of the war I don’t know. Well I am going to start studying that next. Reading Max Hasting’s book right now of the spying during the war, very interesting.
A lot of “what ifs”. Although once the US entered the war, Germany was pretty much doomed. I think had the US not entered, eventually the Japs would have gotten involved and would have forced the Soviets to defend Siberia.
Hitler though was wary of Vlasov, and probably rightly so, because all indications that any Russian army Hitler would have supplied, would have ultimately turned on him.
The Soviets got really pissed when we allowed the remnants of the Ninth Army to cross the Elbe unopposed and surrender to us. There is archival footage of the Germans inching across a blown bridge while their AA goes after Soviet aircraft trying to bomb them while US troops watch from the other side doing nothing. Eisenhower agreed all troops captured afterwards coming across the US/Soviet demarcation line would be turned over to the Russians.
Operation Keelhaul, not our best moment.
That would have meant Japan destroyed, Germany destroyed and the Soviet Union destroyed. No Cold War, no Communist China, no Korean War, no Vietnam War, etc. The European Empires would probably only now be dissolving, and in a much more peaceful manner.
I can never figure out whom to root for in the war between the Wehrmacht and the Red Army.
The Chetniks saved the lives of hundreds of American and British fliers, but the whole story of this episode didn't come out until decades after the war.
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