Turning point of WW2

GuyontheRight said:
According to Alan Clarke, who was the leading historian on Barbarossa In the decade or two after It happened, the real importance of lean-lease came through trucks to mechanize the Infantry. The Soviet Infantry was behind the rest of the world In the first phase of the war, and this Is why you saw German encirclements so successful, because their operational maneuverability was so poor. The Mech Infantry allow the Soviets to push the advantage after Kursk, and did not allow time for Hitler to coordinate a strong defensive line, or rebuild up his forces like he did after Stalingrad. But this is not a Russia vs. Germany discussion, it's a turning point discussion.
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Remember though that it wasn't just the Red Army that suffered from a lack of mechanization. The Wehrmacht too never fully achieved Guderian's ideal of fully motorized Panzergrenadier battalions that drove alongside the Panzers. As you probably know the German Army took over 600,000 horses with them into the Soviet Union in 1941. Therefore you can't just put down the Red Army's appalling losses to their lack of mechanization as other factors were far more important. It's important too to recognize that Germany's initial stunning successes in Russia were as much due to the brilliance of some of her frontline commanders and strategists (Guderian, Hoth, Manstein, Bock et al) and the revolutionary nature of Blitzkrieg and combined arms as it was due to any failings in the Red Army.

Trucks were obviously very important to the Soviet Union's war effort but it was locomotives and not trucks that brought Zhukov's 25 Siberian divisions to the rescue and played a very decisive role in winning the Battle of Moscow for the Red Army.

Here's a link:

http://orbat.com/site/sturmvogel/SovLendLease.html
 
I do not contest that, or the importance of locamotives, but it was the ruckes which kept Zhukov on the adavnace In '44, and really helped accelerate the collapse of the German forces In the East.
 
Hey dopp, you forgot to throw credit to Stalin for decapitating the Red Army by purging most of its commanding officers. The Red Army of during Barbarossa is akin to a headless dragon (only not dead). Tremendous potential, no direction.
 
I too would have to go with Pearl Harbor, I see it as a turning point because the Japanese failed to catch the Carriers in port...The US was going to enter the war, it was just a matter of time. Missing the carriers was a critical turning point.
 
On such a subject consensus is almost impossible. To compare the Eastern Front with Pearl Harbour is a most dangerous route to pursue. Historians like to take dates and events and attribute additional importance to them (usually as they are writing a book on it at the time).

In my opinion one event impacts on another, Battle of Britain - then Hitler turns East. German Propoganda films deluded even the Nazi High Command, so much that they never reached peak industrial output and so on. Indeed the BoB was preceded by Dunkirk, failure to evacuate here could have left GB scrambling for peace with Adolf, then no BoB and so on.

I would conclude with the fact that Germany (economic reasons aside) should have held back from war until 1943/44. This could have meant the RAF and USAF fighting Jet Fighters, V2 rockets a plenty and even an atom bomb.

Surely the haste of Mr Hitler was the real 'turning point' of the war even although it had yet to start.
 
Hitler was the greatest asset and the greatest downfall of the Third Reicht. This fact has too many examples to document. Blitzkrieg would have never had a chance to develop if Hitler had not been around. Rethinking all aspects of the German military goes along the same lines. Germany could have have won the war if it hadn't been for Hitler. The miracle of Dunkirk was courtesy of Hitler. The Russians still holding Moscow after Barbarossa ground to an icy halt was also thanks to Hitler. Wartime production was stifled by Hitler. Whole lot of roles to take for a funny little man with a stupid looking moustache.
 
First, the question is biaised : if you consider there was a turning point in the war, this means that one side could have won until the turning point and, after the turning point, the other side took advantage and finaly won.
So if you say there was a turning point it means that Axis could have won the war...maybe, maybe not ;)

I also think that every important event is partly a consequence of events before, so you can not really make one single event standing out.

Anyway, Pearl Harbor is not a turning point, it’s just US entrance in the war. I strongly believe that US would eventualy have entered the war, even without Japanese agression and the following German declaration of war against US.
From this point, war was eventualy to be won by allies because US had the A-bomb.
In the long term, Japan didn’t stood a chance against US.

About Europe, the Eastern Front is the only one that matters. (North Africa was a small scale thing, I guess more soldiers have fought around either Moscow, St Petersburg/Leningrad or Stalingrad than in whole North Africa !)

D-DAY was of a great importance (although you can’t compare with Barbarossa for example),it made the war in Europe end way faster and relieved Soviet forces (and spare the western European countries to fall into Stalin’s hands but that’s another story). But D-DAY was possible only because England managed to win the Battle of Britain (could they have lost this one anyway ?) BoB was Germany’s first important defeat, and a big spank on myth like LW unvulnerability!

On the Eastern front I won’t put Stalingrad in the first place. From a morale and symbolic point of view – which is important – Stalingrad stands out, but I think german lost when they started to loose time at Smolensk and Kiev and were unable to launch attack against Moscow before it was too late.

After Stalingrad, germans were still able to kick soviets in many occasions (failure of operation Mars), but after Kursk (mid-1943) they never gained initiative and Soviets were always on offensive.

So I would say Kursk is the turning point of WWII in Europe, even if as I said above, you can’t speak of a single turining point if any.
 
PE_Sushi said:
On the Eastern front I won’t put Stalingrad in the first place. From a morale and symbolic point of view – which is important – Stalingrad stands out, but I think german lost when they started to loose time at Smolensk and Kiev and were unable to launch attack against Moscow before it was too late.

After Stalingrad, germans were still able to kick soviets in many occasions (failure of operation Mars), but after Kursk (mid-1943) they never gained initiative and Soviets were always on offensive.

So I would say Kursk is the turning point of WWII in Europe, even if as I said above, you can’t speak of a single turining point if any.
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Yup. Germany was indeed still in a pretty good position after Stalingrad, but only after Manstein brilliantly recaptured Kharkov and stabilized the entire Southern wing of the Wehrmacht.

Kursk was significant because it actually happened in the first place. Consider this. Operation Mars has failed to destroy Army Group Centre, the Wehrmacht has recaptured Kharkov and the Soviet South and Southwestern Fronts are vulnerable to being outflanked and overextended. Germany has 2 options:

1. Pinch out the salient centered around Kursk, which would shorten the German defensive line, capture the useful railroad town of Kursk and destroy 4 entire Soviet Armies in the process.

2. Feign a counterattack against the South and Southwestern Soviet Fronts and then retreat into the Donets Basin. The newly re-formed 4th Panzer Army would then attack from Kharkov and trap the Soviet Forces against the Sea of Azov, causing possible collapse of the entire Soviet southern defensive lines.

Trouble is that Option 1 was so bloody obvious the Soviets had weeks to prepare for it. It was never gonna be as successful as the Germans had planned for this reason alone. Option 2 was a daring plan that had the element of surprise and IMO Manstein and Guderian (the 2 principal architects of this plan) would have pulled it off. Had they done so, the Wehrmact would have been in a much more dominant position and the outcome of the entire war may have been different.

Hitler chose Option 1, bless him.
 
IMO Stalingrad gave the Red Army a big morale boost and momentum after a severe shellacking during the early stages of the engagement. It also effected the morale of German Army who was used to running over all opponets.
 
03USMC said:
IMO Stalingrad gave the Red Army a big morale boost and momentum after a severe shellacking during the early stages of the engagement. It also effected the morale of German Army who was used to running over all opponets.
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Right. But at the same time as Stalingrad was being lost the Germans won a huge battle further north which was even bigger than Stalingrad in scale. Also, there's no evidence that the performance of the German Army was affected by any one single battle. They remained a potent fighting force and the best army man-for-man right until almost the end.
 
IMO, its best to view the turning of the tide on the Ostfront as a 3 step process. Stopping the Germans from taking Moscow was CRUCIAL but only part of the formula. Stalingrad allowed the Red Army to prove to itself that they could win a large scale battle. Kursk gained them the initiative and was the most evident point that the tide was completely turned . The Red Army was was primarily on the attack from Kursk on.
 
I'd say you could say a LOT more actually. Its a very valid turning point of sorts for the war, but I don't think it was the biggest one by a long shot.

The fact of it was that NOBODY had yet beaten Germany in a land battle needs to be taken into account. How long would the UK have lasted if Germany had managed to defeat the Soviet Union? If the Red Army had not stopped Germany, who would have?

The War was won or lost on the Ostfront, but the Battle of Britain meant that the USSR was forced to go it alone. Germany was unable to launch Opperation Sea Lion. That ends up saving the UK, North Africa and the Middle East. It forced Germany to spend valuable resources and production to the U-boat campaign, and toward setting up defenses against possible invasion of the continent. Diverting German resources from the Ostfront was the most important thing that the UK did to help ensure victory at that state of the game.
 
Well

Granted the US and the Soviet Union won the war but the Battle of Britain prevented the war from being lost. It also prevented Britain from being defeated and mean that Germany had to turn on Russia with an enemy at her rear.

If Britain had fallen, it is entirely likely (but of course cant be proven) that Russia may well have been defeated leading to a new dark age in Europe and possibly the world.

1940 was the only opportunity Hitler had of defeated Britain. With each passing month, Britain become stronger, new aircraft, new pilots, new equipment, it meant the Empire could mobilise, it meant Britain could send supplies to Russia.

And, of course, it gained time for the US to enter the war (at which point Churchill knew the war was won - can find his quote if you are interested)

Yes, the Battle of Britain - turning point of WW2 and probably the most important battle of all time bar none
 
Hm

Incidentally, an excellent documentary series on BBC2 features the Battle of Britain this evening
No doubt, they will confirm all my views
 
Re: Hm

spymaster said:
The Battle of Britain...need I say more? Didnt think so
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Yeah you need to say LOT more! I think you're just mucking around? If you're not, you need to explain what relationship the Battle of Britain had to the failure of Operation Barbarossa. You're VASTLY over estimating the importance of the Battle of the Britain in WW2. If Germany v the Soviet Union was T-Rex v Godzilla then in terms of overall importance and scale the RAF v the Luftwaffe could be likened to 2 small scruffy dogs scrapping over an old bone.

Don't get me wrong. I'm British and DAMM proud of the way our boys performed in that battle. We performed above all expectations (aside from possibly our own) and we managed to sow the seeds of doubt in Hitler's mind, so much so that he resorted to terror civilian raids instead. No mean feat. But it was a battle that with hindsight had limited strategic importance as it was in no way certain that Operation Sealion would have been launched had the Luftwaffe won. In any case, it did not affect the outcome of Barbarossa.

The Battle of Britain, the Africa campaigns, the war at sea around the North Sea and North Atlantic, all were minor sideshows to the *real* battles taking place thousands of miles to the east. Like it or not, that was where the fate of all Europe was determined in WW2, the UK included. It's a bit galling to know that your own fate is out of your hands. That's the way it was for us during WW2. No amount of nationalism or blinkered patriotism can hide the truth.

One more thing. Hitler's failure in the Battle of Britain had nothing to do with his decision to attack the Soviet Union. Ever since he wrote Mein Kampf it was clear to all that the Soviet Union was his ultimate target. Hitler also knew that any war with Stalin was inevitable, given the completely opposite ideologies of those 2 nations.
 
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