That's fine, I'd rather not discuss things with those who choose to parrot what others write without taking the time to find out the facts for themselves. I have the original source in my hands at the moment, do you? I can read Russian, can you? I can afford a 'holier than thou' attitude because it's backed up by something, can you say the same?
Most decisive battle in WW2?
That's fine, I'd rather not discuss things with those who choose to parrot what others write without taking the time to find out the facts for themselves. I have the original source in my hands at the moment, do you? I can read Russian, can you? I can afford a 'holier than thou' attitude because it's backed up by something, can you say the same?
MontyB
All-Blacks Supporter
So in reality you are parroting someone else's work as well?
senojekips
Active member
That wasn't fair MontyB. It was very true, but not fair in his eyes, he wanted to have his sources accepted as reliable whilst writing off those of everyone else.
It's a great way to win a debate. Just tie the hands of your opponents before you start.
It's a great way to win a debate. Just tie the hands of your opponents before you start.
LeEnfield
Active member
One battle that never gets talked about much is the Russian Invasion of China when they drove the Japanese out of China in WW2 in about two weeks flat. Knowing what a formidable foe the Japanese are makes this Victory even more remarkable, they then went on to invade and capture Islands along the coast are were poised to invade the Japanese mainland. This in turn was one of the reasons that the Atom bomb was used to bring the war to a quick end and stop the Russians claiming large chunks of Japan to be handed over to them for administration reasons
Pay attention, I said parroting without knowing the real context. You can quote, that's fine, but understanding the context is key. Simply throwing out numbers isn't all that useful.
Ollie Garchy
Active member
Listen to yourself...if you can. Jesus, what are you talking about? The arrogance of your words is pure satire.
MontyB
All-Blacks Supporter
I don't know I am intrigued as to what a 24 year old flying the American flag knows about the context of battles fought 60 years ago between Germany and Russia that no one else knows even though they have probably read the same books.
As I have said its great Kunikov wants to be pro-Russian as differing opinions are what make discussions work but if he is not backing his "You are wrong" arguments with fact of his own then he is just trolling.
So far I really think it would be easier if he got a moderator to put a sticky post at the top of the forums that says "Kunikov says you are all wrong" that way he wouldn't have to post at all.
Its certainly a part of the war that few have mentioned my only question is how decisive the action was given that Japan was by that stage pretty much finished and probably only months from giving up with or without the use of the atomic bomb. There is certainly no doubt that it was an impressive campaign and that it forced a decisive moment in world history.
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I live in the US, I'm from the former Soviet Union. As for the books I've read, unless you can read Russian, you wouldn't have read the same ones.
MontyB
All-Blacks Supporter
You do realise books are translated/released in multiple languages I assume?
As it goes how would those books be anymore accurate on a particular subject than the English, German, French, Italian, Spanish or Chinese translation of the same book, 1000, 100,000 or 1,000,000 is exactly the same in any language.
on top of this which book would be more accurate a Russian statistical breakdown or a German one of the same battle or heres a thought perhaps they are both one sided and lacking all the information.
However no matter how you look at it if your sole knowledge on a subject is from books and anecdotal evidence then in the end you are still just parroting someone else's opinion as the only people who can lecture us on the context of these battles are those that actually were there at the time.
Are you really this naive? Obviously books are translated, even more obvious is that the amount of books out there in Russian in regards to the "Great Patriotic War" surpass the abilities of translators and even worse the fact that many publishers are simply not interested in publishing them. I have hundreds of Soviet/Russian books, document collections, etc, that will never be translated into English. You can stop going off on tangents now. I do not proclaim myself better than anyone else, but, I will judge you based on what you write in regards to the Eastern Front. What you profess on a forum says more than enough about what you've read and how much you know. If you were a Russian, German, Spaniard, or anyone else, my opinion would solely be dictated by what you write.
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MontyB
All-Blacks Supporter
You can judge what you like how you like but if you are not prepared to back up your arguments with some corroborating evidence then I hope you realise you will probably just end up ignored.
What I write on this forum is generally my opinion and I am happy for people pull that opinion apart with evidence, fact, information to the contrary but if all you are going to do is type "WRONG" to everything then you may as well save us all some bandwidth as it is clear that you have no concept of what "discussion forums" are all about, lets face it people are not going to just change their posts until you agree with them you need to give people a reason to change their views.
So how about this for a change how about you give us your opinion as to what the most decisive battle of ww2 was which is after all the topic of the thread.
What I write on this forum is generally my opinion and I am happy for people pull that opinion apart with evidence, fact, information to the contrary but if all you are going to do is type "WRONG" to everything then you may as well save us all some bandwidth as it is clear that you have no concept of what "discussion forums" are all about, lets face it people are not going to just change their posts until you agree with them you need to give people a reason to change their views.
So how about this for a change how about you give us your opinion as to what the most decisive battle of ww2 was which is after all the topic of the thread.
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See my post "90":
Kursk, like Normandy, simply brought the conclusion of the war to a quicker end. Casualties during the Kursk defensive offensive were quite small compared to other operations, like the Moscow Counter offensive and Stalingrad. The ensuing operations to take Belgorod and Orel were much heavier in terms of casualties for both sides. I'd say that it was in fact the Moscow Counter-offensive that decided the war in the East, even if Stalingrad was taken by the Germans there wasn't much more they could do. Soviet bridgeheads were already there for the encirclement of the Sixth Army. The fact that the Germans could only launch an offensive with one army group shows how far their war waging abilities had been degraded.
MontyB
All-Blacks Supporter
Its a good question, I think there is fairly even split between camps on this one.
There is certainly a sizable group that say they would have had the role of the Emperor been defined/agreed on earlier but it is hard to say for sure.
Unfortunately the Pacific war is not an area I have spent much time looking at which is kind of odd given that it was fought on my back doorstep, I will look into it more and see if I can find anything to back up my claim though however I will probably take it to a new thread rather than pull this one off topic.
There is certainly a sizable group that say they would have had the role of the Emperor been defined/agreed on earlier but it is hard to say for sure.
Unfortunately the Pacific war is not an area I have spent much time looking at which is kind of odd given that it was fought on my back doorstep, I will look into it more and see if I can find anything to back up my claim though however I will probably take it to a new thread rather than pull this one off topic.
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LeEnfield
Active member
A country like Germany just could not go on losing men at the rate they did in Russia before their military ground to a halt. Add on to that the numbers that they lost in North Africa, is it any wonder that the ranks of the German had 12 year old children fighting in them.
Ollie Garchy
Active member
Ja, Ich weiß es war eine geile Zeit, aber WIR waren etwas anders. Und, es tut mir Leid...es ist vorbei. Aber, es war Geil. Es tut mir Leid.
tomtom22
Chief Engineer
Ollie, the language of this forum is ENGLISH!
Please revise your post to provide a translation in English.
Ollie Garchy
Active member
What I wrote was as useless as the comment that I was responding to. In any case, German is only an older form of the language that became English. So, who cares if I wrote some German.
In terms of numbers, let us bring up the issue of WWI. In that war, superior German technology defeated Russia. So, why was WWII different? There were many reasons including (1) a much larger American population base, (2) a brutally stupid Nazi military allocation system and (3) Stalin. The most important factor was, however, number 2. Had the Germans really prepared for the war against Russia, that country would have been wiped out during Barbarossa.
In fact, considering the advanced state of the German economy and German resources in general, I cannot even understand how anyone can make the argument that the Soviets were a real enemy. The main German enemy was Nazism...and certainly not the Prussian military tradition OR the totally inferior Russian state. As it was, only the COMBINED resources of the British empire, the United States and Russia defeated Germany. So, give me a break!
(and, dude, please spell Schwarzkopf's name correctly...another German-American who wrote history)
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Ollie Garchy
Active member
Another comment:
If we want to understand WWII, then let us look at the military actions of 1945. In that year, a year normally written off by historians as a foregone conclusion, the German military fought off the American-British invasion on the Rhine and the Soviet invasion and rape of eastern Prussia. Anyone who has ever looked into the issue knows of the immense Allied difficulties in penetrating Germany. The western Allies found the fighting extremely tough and bloody. More Allied soldiers were lost than in Normandy. Rough and poorly trained German "Ersatz" divisions fought off the best of the western world. But, the scale of these military actions fades into nothingness when we balance all western actions against the heroic German stand on the Oder.
In my opinion, the German defence of the Seelower Höhen stands as the greatest German defensive operation of all time. When we account for the difficulties confronting German arms at the time, even the fact that a defensive line was consolidated blows one away. Adding Soviet losses to the equation forces a new analysis of WWII. Had Germany not waged war on 4 fronts, the eastern front would have been different.
There is a reason why few historians focus on the incredible German defensive operations of the period. They have to confront the Nibelungen-style German staying power and the reason why the Soviets pushed for a suicidal termination of the war. To put things into some kind of perspective, Germany was reminiscent of Tolkien's Rohan. I have hinted at the reasons in previous posts. Here, today, I will only add the following...think about the Soviet Union. American analyses after 1945 were very clear. The future Cold War enemy was ruined by WWII. Russia literally sacrificed itself on the alter of human history to defeat Germany. Just like Britain and most of the planet.
And, I would like to add, the main reason why Germany lost the war was "Enigma" and manpower. Therefore, looking at any single battle becomes unimportant. The war was not won on any battlefield...the Germans were in any case much better soldiers than the rest of the planet combined. Extraneous factors such as OVERWHELMING MANPOWER counted. The Soviets were nothing but Allied cannon fodder.
If we want to understand WWII, then let us look at the military actions of 1945. In that year, a year normally written off by historians as a foregone conclusion, the German military fought off the American-British invasion on the Rhine and the Soviet invasion and rape of eastern Prussia. Anyone who has ever looked into the issue knows of the immense Allied difficulties in penetrating Germany. The western Allies found the fighting extremely tough and bloody. More Allied soldiers were lost than in Normandy. Rough and poorly trained German "Ersatz" divisions fought off the best of the western world. But, the scale of these military actions fades into nothingness when we balance all western actions against the heroic German stand on the Oder.
In my opinion, the German defence of the Seelower Höhen stands as the greatest German defensive operation of all time. When we account for the difficulties confronting German arms at the time, even the fact that a defensive line was consolidated blows one away. Adding Soviet losses to the equation forces a new analysis of WWII. Had Germany not waged war on 4 fronts, the eastern front would have been different.
There is a reason why few historians focus on the incredible German defensive operations of the period. They have to confront the Nibelungen-style German staying power and the reason why the Soviets pushed for a suicidal termination of the war. To put things into some kind of perspective, Germany was reminiscent of Tolkien's Rohan. I have hinted at the reasons in previous posts. Here, today, I will only add the following...think about the Soviet Union. American analyses after 1945 were very clear. The future Cold War enemy was ruined by WWII. Russia literally sacrificed itself on the alter of human history to defeat Germany. Just like Britain and most of the planet.
And, I would like to add, the main reason why Germany lost the war was "Enigma" and manpower. Therefore, looking at any single battle becomes unimportant. The war was not won on any battlefield...the Germans were in any case much better soldiers than the rest of the planet combined. Extraneous factors such as OVERWHELMING MANPOWER counted. The Soviets were nothing but Allied cannon fodder.