The Russians won because of the weather, the Russian people, the T-34 and Zhukov. Stalin was a hindrance if anything.
OSS analysts did credit Stalin with the idea someone came up with of promoting officers based on their win/loss record. If you won a battle you got promoted. if you lost you got dismissed (or whatever it was Stalin wanted to do).
Zhukov himself rose rapidly through the ranks under that policy.
Now, was it really Stalin who came up with the idea, or some party appratchik who didn't look forward to being hanged by the Germans?
The marketplace of war demonstrated the utility of capitalist enterprise Fur Shur.
“The Russians won because of the weather, the Russian people, the T-34 and Zhukov. Stalin was a hindrance if anything.”
Bingo! I congratulate a true student of history.
Don’t forget the arrogance of the German Command.
Big assist by Hitler’s mistakes including his reign of terror in the Ukraine and other occupied terrorities when the Germans were first greeted as liberators by the Ukrainains and his decision to not immediately take Moscow and instead shifted forces south to surround Kiev.
The Russians also won because Hitler was crazy- his master race doctrine and hatred of slavs prevented him from turning the Ukrainians against their hated overlords in Moscow.
The Russians also won because of the Strategic Bombing Campaign- American and British bombers, with little fighter protection, systematically destroyed Germany’s ability to wage war. Germany could neither repair nor replace tanks and planes lost on the eastern front because the factories that produced critical parts like ball bearings had been reduced to rubble. Fuel also became scarce.
The Russians also won because of the Battle of the Atlantic. American and British airmen and seamen kept the critical Murmansk shipping route open, despite German U-boats and bombers based in Norway, which kept the supplies flowing into Russia. Much of the Red Army often survived on Spam, which they called “Roosevelt Sausage”.
Add Lend Lease. 750000 military transport vehicles,8000 Sherman tanks, 25000 locomotives,100 octane aviation gas,1000s of A20 attack planes ,P39s,P40s Hawker Hurricanes,diesel fuel, and the list goes on. No soft skin transport and the great Russian advances lose momentum and bog down. T34s sans accopnyiing infantry are targets for 88s and panzerfausts.No deuce and a halfs, no accompanying troops. If Soviet industry has to make up the motor transport, then fewer T34s are built. Without Lend Lease there are no dramatic Soviet offensives and the war stalemates in the East.
Neah.
Stalin was willing to fight to the last drop of (everybody else’s) blood. That sort of determination actually counts for something.