Russians refighting the battle for Stalingrad

The Globe and Mail ^ | February 4, 2003 | Mark MacKinnon

[Travis McGee]

Plus "beaten wife" and "beaten children" syndrome.

[Matthew James]

Fortunately, Stalin's fans are dying off.

[Sparta]

Many in the Soviet Union did fight both. And died as a result.

Many foreigners who fought for Germany fought not for Hitler and Germany, but against Communism. If I was in occupied Europe and not a member of the Resistance, I would've told Hitler to give me a rifle and ship me east, then shot him after killing the Commies.

[Sparta]

WWII Eastern Front ping

If you want on or off the Western Civilization Military History ping list, let me know.

PS: Get out your barf bags on this one.

[Sparta]

Fortunately, Stalin's fans are dying off.

No, they've just become American leftists.

[Matthew James]

Sorry, I should have said "Stalin's fans in Russia..."

[SAMWolf]

If I remember correctly, Stalingrad was originally called Tsaritsyn. Stalin removed the reference to the Tsarf and named it after himself.

Ironic that Khrushchev renamed it, he was the political commisar during the battle.

[tet68]

Of the approximately 116,000 germans captured at the battles end, only 5,000 survived to return to Germany,
and that several years after the end of the war.
(Geneva Convention didn't do them much good.)

[Semaphore Heathcliffe]

thanks for the flag. great read.

[Riley]

I wish I could find it now, but I read a fascinating article where German veterans of the battle were travelling to Volgograd. One particular group bumped into a Red Army Stalingrad vets group. They got into an amicable conversation.

The state apparatchiks assigned to shepherd the vets groups around thought this was a terrible idea, and tried to separate them- and were told to bugger off by the vets.

It was an interesting conversation.

[tet68]

The Finns used a technique they called Motti or wood pile.
The russians were tied to the few roads so the Finns would ambush the head and tail of a column, then assault through
at several spots and chop it up into sections which could then be finished off as they couldn't offer each other support.


. A Finn farmer turned civil guardsman still holds the highest kill record of any sniper in history. Simo Häyhä, as recounted in the book, was responsible for the demise of 505 Russian soldiers! Another Finn tallied 400 Russians as a sniper and another 200 with a submachine gun. What truly amazes me is that these two gentlemen plied their trade at ranges sometimes in excess of 600 yards - with IRON sights!


, Stalin invaded Finland in November of 1939. The prognosis was a 16-day victory. As the war rolled on past that optimistic deadline, the Finn forces managed a kill ratio of 40 Soviets for every Finn soldier killed. Of the 1,500,000 man invading army, the Russians lost 1,000,000. In total, the Finns lost 25,000 men.

[tet68]

From, "Rifles of the White Death."

[tet68]

I have a 1927 Finn Tikka M-91 that will still put a
round in the black, (we shoot at golf balls for fun!)
Also have some M-39s which are great shooters too.
They are like bolt action Garands, it's hard to describe
how they handle they just feel right.

Got to love those Finns!

[weikel]

You wouldn't want a rifle the Ruskies used human wave attacks and you'd run out of ammo and die. You'd want a machine gun you'd have a fighting chance despite the loss of range. BTW if you wanted to fight communism you'd want Hitler dead his death would mean the General Staff would no longer be bound to the Nazi Government by oath and Rommel or Von Rundstedt or some other competent personality who didn't want to gas everyone could take over.

[weikel]

505 Russian soldiers

Wow! I think if I ever hire a mercanary company ill recruit from Finland.

[Guillermo]

The percentages I have seen are as follows: Of Sixth Army enlisted and NCO's, only 5% survived their capitivity. 45% of mid-level officers survived and 95% of high level officers survived. Of course, it depends on the sources you use. These numbers come from Antony Beevors book "Stalingrad".

One month after Operation Barbarossa began, the Soviets asked the Germans to follow the Geneva standards, saying that they would reciprocate as well...and they never got a reply.

To Hitler, Himmler and the Werhmacht (don't let anybody tell you they weren't politicized) this was a race war, above all else.

[Sparta]

I think the worst mistake of FDR's dictatorship was not allowing Rommel and the others in the General Staff to kill Hitler and let Germany switch sides and declare war on the Soviets. But then again, FDR was a stooge of the International.(The president who normalized relations with the Soviet Union)

[weikel]

FDR was not a total stooge the way Wilson was... the bulk of the general staff would not revolt against Hitler even if a conditional surrender were allowed. The Wehrmarcht officiers had sworn alliegance to Hitler, this was taken very seriously by those officiers likely to be most politically opposed to Nazism the oldschool junker vons. The real mistake was not letting Patton go to Moscow in the Summer of 1945 the Russians lived off the land and American supplies as they advanced there would be nothing to pillage and no American supplies gonig back. Eventually the Red Army would have run out of ammo and then a satisfactory end to the war could have come about which ended both Nazism and the Holocaust and communist tyranny. It would have also cost less American lives to push the Russians back at that point then we lost in Korea alone.

[LibKill]

Talk about a dilemna. Would you fight for Hitler, Stalin, or against both?

This is the problem I had with the movie "Enemy at the Gate".

Commies vs. Nazis. I had no one to cheer for.

[Valin]

All Hitler had to do to win the war in the East was to treat the Russians as human beings,

True, but that would have gone against everything he believed about the slavs.