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You’re referencing WW1, he’s referencing WW2. Pretty sure that latter one’s not in doubt considering what happened to the Wehrmacht after the Soviets could rearm and they were *properly* introduced to Ivan’s God of Battle. The Germans, characteristically, were rabid about accurate stat keeping and the numbers of German troops that got sliced, diced and pureed by Ivan’s artillery were pretty well documented. Do NOT f**k with Ivan when his artillery is properly set up and ranges on you.

9 minute multiple loop of Ivan sending his greetings via the classic Katyusha batteries in WW2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0bWt81vhIyY

The Germans, characteristically, were rabid about accurate stat keeping and the numbers of German troops that got sliced, diced and pureed by Ivan’s artillery were pretty well documented. Do NOT f**k with Ivan when his artillery is properly set up and ranges on you.

Concur, historically and tactically. As a young tank crewdawg looking at the potential for a visit to the Federal Republic by the Eighth Guards Tank Army in the mid-1960's, I was not overly impressed with the 17-1 tank versus tank odds we'd be facing the first day, nor did we overly sweat Soviet air support. Artillery was our second-largest fear; artillery during rearm/refuel was our biggest.

“You’re referencing WW1, he’s referencing WW2. Pretty sure that latter one’s not in doubt...” [Spktyr, post 87]

Still in doubt. Historians cannot agree over numbers from the Second World War.

Soviet figures merit the least confidence, due to the propensity of the Soviet government to come clean about anything, until driven to the wall - if they do so then. Recall that they concealed a population undercount of over 20 million, until the 1970s or so.

Third Reich German records are suspect for similar reasons, despite the incorporation of BRD into NATO in the 1950s. A fair amount of destruction and chaos was injected into the mix by the Allied Combined Bomber Offensive, introducing new layers of uncertainty.

And national governments have always been reluctant to divulge particulars on combat losses and weapon effectiveness. Applies to information released into the public domain, and to what they share with each other. No less true among the Western Allies.

The main limitation is that actual combat is the worst place to collect data on system effectiveness.