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Old September 3, 2000, 16:19   #1
Captain Nemo
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Best Army of WWII?
I had this E-mail exchange with Mikael Andersson regarding who had the best Military & Tanks during WWII... I thought it was quite interesting and could open the door to more discussions, though it is not directly related to a specific Civ2 scenario. The exchange started as a result of Mikael asking me if an actual alliance existed between Germany and Japan

Captain Nemo:
Japan officially joined the Axis through the "Tripartite Pact" signed the 27 of September 1940

Mikael Andersson:
Coool . Have you seen that document anywhere??? what was the name of the japanese representatvie . i guess the german one was Von Ribbentropp.
You did not have civ2 any more right. Verdammt i say . Because your scenario is awsome never seen any better.

Captain Nemo:
I have not seen the document I just read in my book "2194 Days of War" when it was signed.
I don't understand about not having Civ2 anymore? I still have Civ2 and I am working on another scenario right now... Which on did you play? Red Front or 2194 Days of War? Soon I will release "Second Front" for Civ2.

Mikael Andersson:
Where will it be released do you know any other rather new scenarios ?
do you only do ww2 scenarios ?
As i said earlies i will need your help with my ww2 site later on i know nada about pacifik war . only what i learned from your scenario

Captain Nemo:
I worked with Alex "The Magnificent" on Spartacus and I made the scenario "1861: The American Civil War". Right now I am concentrating on finishing Second Front.
Harlan Thompson's "WWII in the Pacific" is quite good.

Mikael Andersson:
Where can I find Harlan Thompson ?? and the second front is that D-day ?? and you are not interested in ww1 ?
And i want to ask you so i can see if your historical.....
Where the German Armies superior trained, better equiped, had better tanks . but not as good fighters as the rest of the world . The Allied did not win by skill they won by quantity.
Am i right ??? same in Pacifik.

Captain Nemo:
Harlan Thompson scenarios are in the CsC (Civilization Scenario Collection) on Apolyton. You can also find them in most sites that have a decent size collection of scenarios since they are recognized as some of the best work on Civ2. He also made Mongols, Vikings and Lord of the Rings, all very good scenarios. If nothing else you can reach him by E-mail at harlant@earthlink.net

Now regarding the WWII outcome:

There were many reasons for the outcome.
Undeniably the Germans had the best strategy early in the War and faced very inferior enemies: Poland had nothing that could stand up to the Germans. The French had a big army but really poor strategies. The British had a very small Army and Airforce. The Dutch, the Danes, the Belgians, the Norwegians were absolutely not prepared for war. The Germans had the best Airforce in 1939 and 1940 but their tanks were not that great. The French Char B-1 for example could knock out anything the Germans used in June 1940 but the French spread them so thin they were isolated and most of their crews abandonned them.

By late 1940 the British had built an Airforce that could definitely challenge the Germans and from then on they never had a numerical or technical superiority in the air on the Western front. By 1943 the American planes had arrived and were much better, in average, than anything the Germans could produce. A few fantastic German planes like the Me262 could not make up for 1000s of excellent American planes like the P51, P47, B24s and B17s.

Also after the initial successes of 1939-1941 when German infantry faced the best British and American troops like in Africa, Italy, Normandy they fought pretty close to an even battle. And in cases where the Allied were outnumbered and in desperate tough situations they beat the Germans (Bastogne, Anzio, El Alamein) or at least inflicted tremendous casualties before they gave up (Arnheim). It is true that the situation created by Hitler by attacking more enemies than Germany could handle precipitated the fall of the Axis but ultimately he was doomed from the time the Americans started supporting Britain with the Lend-Lease program. Even without attacking the Soviet Union he was up against the combined US-British industrial potential and it was just a matter of time before the Americans would intervene, even without Pearl Harbor.

In the Soviet Union there was a very different situation. They faced troops as fanatical as themselves and because of their inhuman treatment against Soviet prisoners they were only able to capture large groups of prisoners until the Fall of 1941... After that the Soviets fought to the last man and that made HUGE holes in the German army. The key to a great military success is to trade casualties 10-to-1 or 20-to-1 which is possible when the enemy is encircled and surrenders but not when they fight to the last man. So even defeating Soviet armies would require destroying them almost to the last man and the casualties started running a ratio of 2-to-1 which meant that all the Germans would be dead and the Soviets would still have 20-30 million soldiers left... That closed the deal.

Hitler himself was also one of the main ingredients of the defeat. An effective (Though totally Evil) political leader, he was an idiot as far as mititary strategy and matters. He blundered away the bulk of the German army by setting unrealistic goals, issuing "No retreat" orders and dismissing all his effective Generals when they could not accomplish the impossible, controlling the issuing and development of new weapons. (He did himself order that the best German fighter designs, the Fw190 and Me262, be used as bombers exclusively...one of his most idiotic decisions)

The Soviet War industry also took off to an incredible extent after 1942... For example the big Tankograd factory in the Urals alone produced more tanks than the entire German-Austrian tank industry. The same was the case with the Americans. They produced over 40,000 Sherman tanks from 1943 to 1945 alone... More than the entire German tank output from 1938-1945...In the aircraft industry the numbers were even more staggering, so you are right, pure numbers also contributed to the outcome.
By 1943 I think the US, British, Soviets and Germans all had well trained, well equiped armies and would fight on an equal footing. The German tanks would rate 2nd behind the Soviets who had T-34/85s and IS-2s by then... The German aircraft were well designed but too few and not so good they could even come close to compensate. The US had huge numbers of very good heavy bombers that could effectively cripple the German industry.
The early parts of the battle for Normandy give a good idea of the relative valor of the soldiers on both sides. For about a month the Allies were outnumbered in Normandy until they landed enough troops. A lot of the fighting was man to man because there was no room to maneuver tanks and heavy equipment on the narrow country roads. The Allies had total air superiority but they could dislodge infantry from hedgerows and forests... So it came down to infantry against infantry... At the end the Allies beat back the Germans but the losses were about even. The German tanks destroyed a lot of British tanks, the American fighter-bombers knocked out as many German tanks... Way at the end the Germans collapsed and ran and the Allies captured most of their equipment and 250,000 prisoners, but that's a good indication that in 1944 both sides were very equal in quality, courage, training and determination.
In the Pacific it was very different:
The Japanese gained ground initially by surprise and by being well prepared... They outnumbered their enemies in all their victories. Their equipment was poor except for some of their planes and they too were also quickly outclassed when newer US planes entered the theater. After getting beat at Guadalcanal in 1942-43 they didn't win any significant victory and just slowly crumbled to the end. They fought with determination and fanatism but NOT WELL and got killed in terribly bad ratios (4 or 5-to-1) which doesn't make sense when you are the smaller country. In the last few air battles of the war (Over the Phillippines) the USAF shot down Japanese planes in ridiculous ratios like 10-to-1 and even higher.
IMHO, they lost the war when they dropped the first bomb on Pearl Harbor... and they did it because they mistook Western "pragmatism" for weakness. They didn't understand that the Americans would be just as determined as them to make war after the attack (They should have applied their own mentality to the Americans to project how the Americans would react to the attack, then they would have known that there would be no peace, no settlement, no compromise until they were defeated)

That's my view on the subject!

Yes I am interested in WWI and all other history but I know WWII better than anything else in history.

Mikael Andersson:
The Americans where as they where in WWI . Ill prepared . Many troops but not as good as the british or the Russians and not the Germans either.

Captain Nemo:
Please note first that I am NOT American

I take exception to your assessment. In the beginning of the War, they were certainly ill-prepared but by 1943 they were better than any of the other nations.

Their kill ratios were much higher than any of the other nations in the war, meaning they inflicted more casualties on the Germans and Japanese than they took by a factor of 3 or 4... or even as high as 10 against the Japanese. The reasons why:

-They used their best troops, only 18-25 year-olds when the Germans were down to enlisting 14 year-olds and 60 year-olds.

-They had the overall best equipment by far. Their tanks didn't break down, their transport vehicles were reliable and available by the 10,000s, they had the best planes and enormous numbers of them. Huge supplies of ammunition and fuel as well.

-They were the best organized... In Normandy they were totally radio coordinated. They had observation planes talking to artillery fire control to fighter-bombers in the air. The Germans said they couldn't move or fire at the Americans because they would reveal their positions and immediately be annihilated by artillery barrage or bombers... That's part of having the best Army, using it efficiently.

-Most German witnesses in Normandy said that as soon as they had been up against the Americans they knew the war was over. Like fighting an invincible enemy... And not like in Russia where they still could manage to inflict higher losses on the Soviets than they took themselves even at the end of the War.
And this was using their best forces: the Panzerlehr, the 1st, 2nd and 12th SS-Panzers, 17th SS-Panzergrenadiers, the 3rd Fallschirm division etc... The best divisions of the German army were destroyed by the Americans in Normandy.

-They were the most inventive in finding new solutions to war problems... The British continued with the same tactics and continued to lose massive numbers of troops; the Americans changed tactics when the old ones weren't working. They won the battle of Normandy without much help from the British and caused 4 times as many casualties to the Germans as they took.

My conclusion is that they had the best army of any nation in the War by 1944.

But let me know why you think they weren't?

Mikael Andersson:

Well first of all 10 American tanks on one German tank . All Historians . on tv in books says this .
Second of all . The americans where not used to war . The Germans had a lot of skillfull troops . .
The German army was better.
But in the end of the war the people that normaly would be used for troops where hard to find so they had to go down in ages and therefore the wehrmacht started to be bad.
And as for Japan . All know that an country with an goal , moral , Example . An Country that says" Fight for the Emperor" Fight better than . "Lets Revenge Pearl harbour". Maybe the Japanese Land army was not as good but they where better in sea. But they had too few ships.

Captain Nemo:

I didn't understand the ten American Tanks, on one German tank? Did you mean that the Germans were outnumbered 10-to-1 or the losses were 10-to-1? Actually the tank losses in Normandy were almost even. About 2,500 on each side. While Wittmann made about 20 kills by himself (Against the British) the 2nd SS-Panzer lost over 150 tanks before they even arrived on the front because of the American P-47s bombers knocking them out. Wittmann was killed in Normandy by a RAF Typhoon that hit his Tiger I in the rear deck and instantly killed him and his crew. Also many German tank losses were due to mechanical breakdown and impossibility to recover them. The Falaise pocket escape cost them nearly all their Panthers and Tigers on the Western front. They even lost about 30 Tiger IIs and 14 Jagdpanthers in the disaster... So you are right, 1-on-1 with both tanks operational and no other factors the German Tigers and Panthers were much better than the M4A3 Shermans which were almost all the American tanks in Normandy. But overall the Americans compensated with air superiority and better coordination for the fact their tanks were poor and by August 20th when the German army in France collapsed the losses in tanks were even but the Germans had lost approx. 2.5 times as many soldiers as the Allies. Then, in the rout, the Germans running away left behind most of their equipment and tanks having no gasoline or spare parts to repair them and by then their were totally demoralized. This gave the Americans their greatest victory.

As for the M-26 Pershing it only appeared in April 1945 so there are very few records of its capability in battle against the German tanks, but it was superior to the Panther and Tiger I, outgunned them with a more powerful 90mm high velocity cannon, was heavily armored, very fast and reliable. It's main battle record was in Korea were it was intensively used. It was the direct predecessor to the M-60 Main Battle Tank that is still in service with the US army today along with the M-1 Abrams.

Ideology, like "Fighting for the Emperor" does not make good soldiers or an effective fighting force. Besides that, the Americans had the better ideology... they were fighting for freedom and democracy and believed they were right. The Japanese were fighting for a Military dictatorship which wanted to expand it's Empire. Even Admiral Yamamoto, the best Japanese Naval Commander knew that were on the wrong side after commanding the attack on Pearl Harbor. After hearing that he had attacked without a declaration and in the middle of peace negotiations with the Americans he said: "We have awaken a sleeping giant and made him really mad... We will not endure his wrath" .

In every area of the Pacific, even against much smaller American forces like on Guadalcanal the Japanese were completely outmaneuvered and beaten tactically. As to their Navy, at Midway 3 American aircraft carriers with a few escorts annihilated a much larger Japanese Force sinking 4 aircraft carriers, cruisers, transports and destroyers losing only one Carrier themselves. In the Island landings, like Tarawa, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, Saipan etc... where the Japanese were entrenched and fortified the Americans landed and destroyed the defenders with loss ratios of 1-to-4 or 1-to-5... That can only be explained by far superior tactics and much better trained troops...
After their initial victories at Pearl Harbor, the Philippines and Indonesia due to surprise, the Japanese were not able to stop or slow down the Americans a single time. In the Pacific the Americans had better land troops, better tanks, better ships, better aircraft, better submarines, a better Navy, better pilots and much better commanders... This is unquestionable.

A good example of this is Okinawa... heavily fortified, defended by 120,000 Japanese troops with over 5,000 artillery pieces. The Americans landed only 116,000 Marines... at the end of the battle 7,500 Japanese surrendered the other 112,000 were dead. The Americans had 15,000 killed and 28,000 wounded... Most of the other island invasions had similar scores.

Numerical superiority cannot explain why the Americans had lower losses than the Soviets for example. In 1944 and 1945 the Americans were fighting the Germans from the West and the South (Italy) while the Soviets were fighting them in the East. On the Eastern front the losses ran approx. 2-to-1 in favor of the Germans but they were still losing because the Soviets had 5-6 times more troops than the Germans and more like 10-1 advantage in tanks and artillery.
On the Western and Italian front the losses generally ran 2-to-1 in favor of the Allies... How do you explain that? A lot of the best German divisions had been shifted West (At the regret of many German generals who hoped the Allies would reach Germany before the Soviets) so most of the elite SS panzerdivisions fought in Normandy in 1944... The elite Fallschirm divisions fought in Normandy and in Italy. The only possible explanation is that the Americans (Which formed 80% of the Allied troops and almost all the equipment) were much more effective than both the Soviets and Germans by 1944... Better tactics, better coordination, better equipment and especially a much more inventive way to fight. A excellent book on the subject is "Citizen-Soldier" by Stephen Ambrose, it gives an excellent recounting of the American campaign from Normandy to Germany with many eyewitness stories from both sides.

I know that many people have a semi-mystical view of the "invicible" German Army of WWII but I don't believe it's true. In 1939-40-41 yes! 1942 maybe... By 1943 the Americans had picked-up most of the German ideas and made them better, the Soviets had done the same though they used brute force without regard for the cost...The troops that landed in Normandy were battle veterans from North Africa and Italy. The Germans they faced were battle veterans from the Eastern Front.

Mikael Andersson:
Even tho . The Americans won the war they did one mostly by quantity.
They could have been good fighters. But Fanatism is something americans have trouble with (VIETNAM) .

Captain Nemo:
I think the picture of Vietnam is very different from WWII. I consider Vietnam a little colonial war fought against the people's will, with only limited involvement (The Americans couldn't win without starting WWIII)... They fought without heart, without being right, without real goals and without their full might.

In WWII they fought for freedom and democracy and they fought completely evil regimes.
They were truly more numerous and had more equipment but they also had the best Military in the World. Having higher numbers will lead to victory but with high casualties. The Americans did it with minimal casualties. They fought 2 wars simultaneously (Pacific and Europe) against both the Japanese and the Germans, had the most impact of any nation in the defeat of the Axis and did it with much lower casualties than any other nation... That cannot be explained by higher numbers alone. About fanatism you are right. They were less fanatic than the Germans and Japanese but fanatism does not win Wars. Smart strategy does. If you say the Americans were less fanatic than the Germans or Japanese. Yes! But they were also much smarter and organized their military much better. They never won by brute force, they always looked for option with the least costs to them and used them. Normandy is a perfect example: They landed, started moving forward and saw that the Germans entrenched in the hedgerow country would not be dislodged without enormous casualties. They brought in bulldozer tanks to clear lanes throught the hedgerows, white phosphorus shells to incinerate any German positons that revealed themselves, equipped every unit and tank with radios so they could call in planes and artillery when they ran into resistance, brought in a great number of observation planes to locate the Germans so they paralyzed any movement during the day... Greater numbers, no! Better organized and much better tactics, yes!

Regarding the "Best Tank of WWII"
I completely agree that if we talk tank-to-tank the American tanks were far inferior in Armor and Armement. Fighting a pure tank battle the German tanks would win. But it doesn't take into account that many German tanks were lost due to mechanical failure before getting to the front and that the Allies also inflicted tremendous casualties on the German tanks using artillery, infantry and planes. Here is a typical engagement described in one of my WWII books. 12 Germans tanks (Panthers and Pzkw IV) protect a causeway near St-Lo. American Shermans try to cross. The Germans hit the first and last tank in the column and then systematically destroy the 6 tanks between them. The Shermans return fire but can't harm the Germans tanks. One Sherman drives into the river to avoid certain destruction. About a dozen Shermans from the American side of the river exchange fire with the Germans without getting any kills, but the Americans also call in air and artillery support. Within 10 minutes 155mm shells start raining on the Germans and within ten minutes 9 German tanks are in flames and the 3 last tanks must withdraw and the rest of the American column crosses without further resistance. Final Score 8 American tanks, 9 German tanks destroyed... but the Americans then recover the damaged Shermans and within 3 days 4 of them are back in action.

The other aspect is that a tank's "value" is not only judged by it's pure tank to tank tactical value. The Americans continued to use Shermans because they were great tanks in street fighting, they were fast, extremely reliable and better than the Germans tanks in many of the auxiliary roles like infantry support, operating radius, cross country movement...
The Tiger II, very well protected by 150-200mm armor and equipped with a gun that could kill any Allied or Russian tank at 1000m, was heavy (70,000 kg) had the same engine as the Panther so it was slow, difficult to maneuver, to heavy for small roads and country bridges, too big to maneuver inside cities, extremely prone to mechanical failure (More than half the Tiger IIs made were lost when they broke down and had to be abandonned) and they were extremely complicated and expensive to produce. Peiper, who spearheaded the Ardennes offensive in Dec 44 had approx. 70 Tiger IIs in his force... He left them behind because they couldn't keep up with his Panthers and Pzkw IVs which lead the offensive. They only saw fighting after the Germans started retreating and the advancing Americans caught up with them... Several were destroyed in fighting but about 55 were abandonned when they broke down or ran out of fuel...
Hitler was obsessed with making a miracle weapon that would change the war and that's where "bad ideas" like the Tiger II came in. Nothing more than a slow moving bunker. I think the Germans would have been better off building 3 Panthers instead of each Tiger II (Which was the ratio of the work required to make them).
So aspects like production cost, mechanical reliability, speed, operating radius and maneuverability have to be taken into account when you rate a tank. My score card:
Best tank of the War: T-34/85 without a doubt
Next 5: Panther, Sherman, T-34/76, Pzkw IV, Pzkw III (Including StuG variants)
This is based on overall impact not just pure killing power.

In the pure tank-to-tank fighting category:
1.Tiger II and JS-III
2.JS-II, M-26 Pershing, JagdPanther and Su-100
3.Tiger I, T34/85, Panther


Mikael Andersson:
OK...Who was first in war science ??? Germany or America ???
Acording to me Germany , v-1 . Rocket fighter , etc etc.
your opinion?

Captain Nemo:
That is very debatable also. Certainly, the Germans were ahead in rocket and jet engine research but only about 1-2 years. The Soviets were actually ahead in rocket artillery. The Americans and British both had operational jets in 1945 but nothing as good as the Me262. The Americans were many years ahead in nuclear research as they proved in 1945. They also were far ahead in production technology (The average factory worker in the USA produced 2-3 times more than anywhere else in the world) In the design of surface ships the US were ahead of everybody, while the Germans were the first to develop a truly modern submarine. In war tactics the Americans were ahead both in amphibious and airborne warfare. The American led air-sea invasions in North Africa, Sicily and Normandy were great successes while the German similar attack on Crete was an dismal showing. Both Germans and Americans had an operational helicopter design by the end of the war. The Americans were far ahead in the design of high altitude bombers and heavy bombers. The Germans were ahead in tank design even if many of their designs were impractical, however the Soviet JS-III, which had almost no impact on the War because it only became operational in April 1945 should probably be considered the most "modern" tank of the War because it remained the most powerful tank in the World until the 1960s. The Americans were far ahead in radar and sonar design.

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Old September 3, 2000, 16:46   #2
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I remember once I was watching a ww2 documentary that had a lot of former nazis and british officers being interviewed about how Hitler lost the war, and one of the things that interested me was that originally, in the invasion of France, the Germans were orginally going to use the exact same plan that they used in WW1, sweep across Belgium and the Netherlands to reach France. But one Nazi general (who's name I conveinently can't remember) pointed out that the Allies would be expecting this and they would simply bog down in their trenches. So he proposed a plan where they would strike through the "impregnable" Ardennes Forest to catch the Allies completely off guard. However, this general was overruled by the other generals. But by a freak twist of fate, the general attended a lunch and got to propose his plan directly to Hitler, who loved it. It turned out that the general was right, and while they struck through the Ardennes Forest the Allies were blindly marching up through Belgium and the Netherlands.

There were other things too, like how if Hitler had allowed the Ukraine to remain relatively independent a la "Vichy France", he would have had an anti-communist army ready to fight against the rest of the Soviet Union. And how if Hitler hadn't delayed an invasion of Britain, it would have been successful (The Brits were guarding miles of land with old ww1 artillery pieces at that time and would've been unprepared for an attack, even a badly coordinated one).

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Old September 3, 2000, 18:08   #3
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I would have to guess that the General in question might have been Guderian who was one of the architects of the German Blitzkrieg tactics.
There were many lost opportunities for the Axis, both for the Germans and Japanese. The early assault on Britain might have succeeded, but the Germans were not quite ready to wage an amphibious war across the channel. The British Navy could have inflicted heavy casualties on the German transports and the Germans had very few support vessels and transports. They were already stretched out from Germany to France as they had not yet put the occupation infrastructure in place in France by the time the Battle of Britain started.
Great opportunities were lost in 1941 in Russia when the drives on Moscow and Leningrad were stopped in favor of less important objectives. The Japanese missed an opportunity at Pearl Harbor when they didn't follow up their first attacks with many more bombings that would truly have crippled the American fleet and the harbor installations.
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Old September 3, 2000, 18:14   #4
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This will interest you, Nemo. An article from the Chronicle of Germany.
quote:


Three-power pact signed.
September 27th. (1940)
The states Germany, Italy and Japan sign the three-powers pact in which they assure political, economical and military help on each other.
The alliance will become active when one of the parties is "attacked by a force that is presently not active in the European War or the Japanese-Chinese conflict".
The treaty is supposed to prevent an entry of the war by the USA, whose interests are touched by the Japanese-Chinese war that lasted since 1937.
The relation of the three forces to the Soviet Union is not stated by the alliance. In negotiations with the Soviet head of state and Foreign Minister Vjacheslav M. Molotov, who visited Berlin on November 12th and 13th the German side tries to convince the Soviet Union -despite the Soviet-Japanese conflict about Manchuria- to join the pact. When these efforts failed, Adolf Hitler declares that the Wehrmacht must be prepared "that even before an end of the war with England they must defeat the USSR in a quick campaign."
Until June 15th 1941, Hungary (11-20-40), Romania (11-23-40), Slovakia (11-24-40), Bulgaria (4-1-41) and Croatia (6-15-41) join the alliance.



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Old September 3, 2000, 19:27   #5
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Also for me as a German it´s always a surprise what Nemo called a semi-mystical view of the "invicible" German Army of WWII.

I completely agree with Nemo that this wasn´t true. Yes, the Wehrmacht had its fast victories, yes, the Germans had very good equipment and yes, in some fields of science they were ahead.

But most of their first victories were against weaker opponents (for instance Poland or France). The Battle of Britain was the first defeat for the Germans, and it showed that neither their equipment or their strategy was as far superior as some people think today.

The same goes for the tanks and planes. The Me 262 could have been effective against Allied bomber formations and its highspeed should it make possible to escape Allied fighters. But in reality, the Me 262 wasn´t a very agile fighter, and the Allied pilots learned quickly the weakest points and shoot down many of the 262s during their takeoff or landing periods, the most vulnerable time for the 262.

For the tanks it must be said that even high decorated German officers believe that the T 34 was the best tank in the war. The German Panther was created under the impression of the T 34. The Tigers and Kingtigers were terrible weapons, but the T 34, especially the T 34/85 was the best combination from speed, maneuverability (err, -sp?) armour and weapons.

Also, a good army doesn´t mean only tanks, guns and planes. German leaders were completely surprised by the fact that the war in the east was not won in the same short time as the earlier campaigns. So, the army was completely unpreparated for a winter war. Some people say the Russian winter was a major enemy for the Germans, but in fact the Germans were simply not able to provide the right equipment for a winter war, some units hadn´t even warm clothes! Not a sign of good military leadership...

And in my eyes, also the morale aspects play a role here. The Germans followed a brutal ideology. As long as they were victorious they didn´t care about that, or they were so manipulated by the Nazi propaganda that they believed they have the right on their side. But as the Wehrmacht encountered more serious opponents, as the losses were getting higher and higher, as the Allied bombers brought the death back to Germany it was clear that this ideology couldn´t guarantee the victory for the Germany. From 1943/44 the morale in the front units was constantly falling (except some elite units, mostly SS). They still fought with fierce resistance, but for many soldiers it was clear that the war was lost.

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Old September 3, 2000, 19:50   #6
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A great book on this subject is "Why the Allies Won", by Richard Overy. It really hits all the points discussed above, and backs everything with facts. I've never read as informative a book on WW2 than that one.

Interesting point he makes: the German scientists were smart, yes, but they didn't conduct their research to win the war, but more for the intellectual challenge of discovering something new. Many times directions weren't pursued simply cos the scientist didn't find the problem interesting! So they came up with an amazing, bewildering array of half-completed weapons, while the Russians and Allies came up with far fewer, but perfected those. While the Germans worked on whatever flights of fancy they felt like, including things they knew wouldn't be operational for another five years or more, the other side found ways to constantly reduce production costs, speed up assembly lines and so on. German weapons were usually way overengineered and thus expensive, coming from designers who were perfectionists, yet because they were so complicated they broke down frequently. So while the Germans came up with all kinds of fantastic weapons, it was mostly intellectual wankery and massively wasted effort. Their efforts were so scattershot that after the FW190 came into production in 1941, they didn't make a single new airplane in significant mass production numbers.

The Germans never had enough good weapons, and most people don't realize that the vast majority of their tanks were Mark IV and earlier. When Russia was invaded, the most common tank was the tiny Mark III, and they actually attacked with fewer tanks than they had when they attacked France a year before. This was because the new tanks like the Panther, when they were finally available, were so incredibly expensive. When the Germans found out about the T-34, they considered simply copying it and rushing it out in huge numbers, but the issue of pride- copying from the hated Russians, prevented them from doing so.

Its scary to think what the Germans could have done if someone managed to direct and control their scientists, so they worked on a reasonable number of projects with an aim to maximize production numbers and minimize costs. Look how well they did in 41 attacking with souped up training tanks- imagine if they had large quantities of something like the Panther back then!

As Overy put it (roughly), the Allies created the weapons of the 1930s, perfected as far as possible. The Germans tried to create weapons of the 1950s, but the war ended long before they could make use of them.

Also, time and time I realize it comes back to the Germans' overwhelming pride and ego. For instance, they were so confident they would conquer Russia in a couple months that they demobilized much of the army that attacked France. Their economy didn't even start to get on a true war footing until 43, because it wasn't felt they needed to.

We're lucky they were so idiotic.

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Old September 3, 2000, 20:12   #7
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I went and looked it up, the general that proposed the radical change to the Fall Gelb plan was General Erich von Manstein. His plan was originally rejected by Brauchitsch, Halder, and a number of other generals. His plan to strike through the ardennes and avoid meeting the B.E.F. head on in the lower countries was accepted by Hitler because Hitler, and I quote, was "always attracted by daring and even reckless solutions..." and thus, was interested in Manstein's plan.

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Old September 3, 2000, 23:34   #8
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Anyone who's ever wanted to learn more about the Japanese Navy should really look up this website as it has exhaustive information on the topic.
www.combinedfleet.com
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Old September 4, 2000, 07:47   #9
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Great site on the IJN! Very interesting and informative.
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Old September 4, 2000, 08:18   #10
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Harlan:
The insight about the Germans trying to perfect weapons to an impractical extent is amazing. I never thought about it that way but I was completely aware of all these weird, half-baked, weapons that the Germans had, like air-defense missiles, dozens of different jet designs, anti-ship missiles, the biggest tanks in the world, the biggest siege artillery ever made etc... I always thought it was spurred by Hitler in his search for "the easy way to win the War: the Wonder Weapon"...
But it really comes down to the German "Engineering Mentality". Having worked for German Companies twice in my career, I have seen this exact same trait today... They want to do things "right", not do what is expedient, cost-effective or contractually required... Amazing insight!
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Old September 4, 2000, 09:24   #11
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Another item that made the Axis armies inferior, especially the German Army, was that they lacked flexibility. On the Eastern Front, when the Soviet Union launched its 1941 Winter Counter-Offensive, the German Commanders wanted to fall back to better defensive positions, but Hitler didn't allow them and they suffered a great defeat.
In 1944, right before Operation Bagration (The Russian Summer Offensive), Field Marshal Busch of Army Group Centre knew of that an offensive was coming and wanted to fall back to stronger defensive line on the the River Beresina, but Hitler didn't allow it and the badly outnumbered Germans in Army Group Centre were mauled and almost didn't exist as a coherent force.
In Normandy when the landings startedon June 6, Field Marshal Runstedt of OB West (The High Command of the West) and Field Marshal Erwin Rommel of Army Group B could not release reserves from the Pas-de-Calais without Hitler's permission, while an Allied Corps Commander could have gotten the reserves he needed on his own without authorization from higher levels.

Question for all the WWII buffs out there: OB West was the German High Command in the West and OKH is German High Command, but I've also seen OKW used for German High Command. So which is which? And what was the High Command name on the Eastern Front?

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Old September 4, 2000, 10:39   #12
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Some comments;

Japan and Germany both lost because of many factors;
1)Bad leadership;
Germany: Hitler making really stupid blunders, a leutnant would have made more rational decisions
Japan: No real command structure in the sense that Tojo served at the sufference of the Army, if he made a decision that the army didn't like, well he gets assasinated by the army of fanactics and the fact the army (land and navy) was profondly divised on the subject of how to run the war.
2) the economy
Germany and Japan didn't jump start their economy until 1943 and 1944
3)No real alliance like The allies

and last but not least: they went to war with the U.S.A. if Japan and germany would have waited even a year before engaging the U.S.A they would have been ( alist Japan) firmly entrenched in their positions and Britain would have lost most of her empire ( even India was threatened by Japan) so no industrial base to resupply from and the U.S.A would have tooken another year to gear up to war!

Now a what if scenario;
Suppose Germany Japan and even Italy had simple rational not brilland or great leaders and a real alliance between them!

Japanese naval tech with Reich land tech!
When Germany attacked Russia, Japan attacks tooo in the east thus then occuping the Siberiens troops or walking over Eastern Japan!
Mabye not Pearl Harbor! or alist a well carried out Pearl Harbor!

Now think of it; if russia is already divided between Japan and the Reich and Britain having lost most of her empire and both the Japanese and German armies free to conquer more; North africa and China;

Would the United State be able to fight theses 2 giants? I mean Germany with all those ressources in Russia with the Jump-started economy and Japan with the Siberian and duth oilfield and ressources of a bilion Chinese at their disposal!

Would the U.S.A. be able to even Challenge them?
With RATIONAL leaders at the helm the 2 Fascist States!!!
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Old September 4, 2000, 11:30   #13
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Ipso facto, any leader who launches a massive war of aggression is NOT rational. The only "successful" modern fascists were those who directed their aggression toward the enemy in the home country (Franco, Peron, et al) and didn't get sucked in by the mego-maniacal dreams of others.

Hitler and Mussolini were certainly good (albeit ruthless) politicians, but that skill set doesn't produce many good generals.
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Old September 4, 2000, 11:59   #14
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VietMinh:
I didn't know this myself until Harlan pointed it out to me but the Germans gained very few economic or industrial resources from the territories they captured in Russia (The vast area they held produced less than 10% of what they got from occupied part of France)... Achieving a major victory (Like capturing Baku, Moscow and Leningrad) would not have greatly improved their production capability. The oilfields they did capture (Grosny and Maikop areas) produced almost nothing during the time they held them.
The Soviets had already pulled back most of their industry toward the Urals so I am not sure the war wouldn't just have continued.
The Japanese could not, IMHO, have engaged the British and Dutch in the Pacific without immediately drawing in the Americans, Pearl Harbor or no Pearl Harbor. You realize that the Japanese attacked Britain, the Dutch and the USA at the same time in Dec 1941? They only threatened Burma/India much later in the War. Before Pearl Harbor they were only at war with the Chinese. So assuming the Japanese did not attack Pearl Harbor, the Americans weren't drawn into the War and the Japanese instead attack the Soviets in Siberia would be a more logical "What if" scenario. The Japanese would be forced to fight a land War against elite Soviet troops in the open steppes of Northern China. Imagine Japanese Type 94s up against T-34s? I think you can draw your own conclusions...
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Old September 4, 2000, 13:35   #15
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Kull; I am sorry; I mistated myself; I wanted to say a rational military leader caught in the same scenario; the second world war. but i disagree that a leader that lauches a massive war of aggression is not rational because there are legions of great leaders that have lauch massive wars of agression; Hannibal,Caesar,Napoleon,Karl XII,Abraham Lincon,Bismark,Charlemagne,Genghis Khan just to name a few. Remeber a war of agression is when you attack nation for conquest.

Nemo; I don't think so because the american people didn't want to go to war. The president couldn't go to war without the population and industries behid him. As for the T-34, they would have been commited in the west and the Jappanese could have fought a war of attrition or used their airforce wich was pretty good.
As for the ressources; It is true but the loss of the west would have galvanized the Russian people...
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Old September 4, 2000, 15:51   #16
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quote:

Originally posted by Harlan on 09-03-2000 07:50 PM
Its scary to think what the Germans could have done if someone managed to direct and control their scientists...


And I believe this to be the morale of the story for all Civers, especially those Fundie junkies.

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Old September 4, 2000, 19:39   #17
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This is such an interesting topic that it drives me out of lurking...
Who do you guys, all well knowledged in ww2, consider to have been the best tactician/general ?
I refer the "History of world war two" encyclopedia by Sir Basil Liddel Hart, good but somewhat old info, and the bottom line here seem to be in favor of Zhukov, for his flexibility to adapt to the changing situation and the use of 'improvised' (is that a word?) war material, i.e. mobilitating the populace to build fortification in the non threathened zone as the german army changed direction and so on...
Also, i have a remark to the 'soviet won by number' line: although that is certainly true for the majority of the war the won important battle by tactics alone: AFAIK at Stalingrad the proportion between the two army was 1:1, with the Soviets being slightly inferior.
Also one of the factor to take in account, although that may seem obvious, is the dreaded Propaganda. The Nazis were so deeply convinced of their racial superiority (as it was necessary in such a regime)that they considered russian to be less than human and thus unworthy of being targeted by prop (as if they hadn't an intellect to comprehend it). The Soviet on the other hand made an extensive use of it, and also thank to the impressive work of the Red Orchestra, it was terribly effective: there are reports of german division being 'bombarded' with leaflets depicting their army plan... Kinda scaring knowing the enemy knows every one of your move.
To everyone who object the nazi (NOT german!) way of thought during the war (arrogance and superiority), as a student of totalitarianism i say: it was needed. It is the only way in which such a regime can be run: all deeply rooted in the ideal of the Volkgemeinschaft, the racial (folk) community of nordic/arian populace... Totalitarian regime make an ideology which is totaly uncaring of factual reality their driving force... But if you want to know more about that read 'The Origins of Totalitarianism' by Hannah Arendt, a very enlightening text (I made a student term paper on it! ).
To VietMinh: make that 3 fascist states...
Farewell
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Old September 4, 2000, 19:42   #18
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Farewell
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Old September 4, 2000, 23:50   #19
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Nemo,
I'm glad you liked that insight, but it wasn't mine, it was from that book. Read it, and truly understand WW2 . Also, your other comment is very true: Hitler's search for a wonder weapons certainly was involved. The German scientists were already having the problems mentioned earlier, but when Hitler wanted his wonder weapons he goaded them on, reinforcing their worst habits, and gave them big budgets to waste to boot. When I say waste I don't mean that some of those weapons couldn't have been useful had the war gone on, cos they could have, but "bang for the buck" calculations were not considered at all. Doubly shocking in Germany's cash strapped economy. What the Germans might have afforded to do if they didn't waste so much money on their rocket program alone gives one pause for thought. That used one fourth of their military budget for several years and in the end killed about as many people as one big conventional air raid by the Allies over Germany.

And while the Axis could have done better, made the war go on much longer and had millions more killed, I think in the end they would have lost. Why? Cos in both countries their population was relatively small- less than 100 million each. Thanks to their racial beliefs, the more territory they conquered, the harder it was to maintain their empire. Russia they got virtually nothing out of, cos there was no one skilled (or the capital) left to manage and exploit it. Those people were already busy exploiting other conquests. And the guerilla warfare problem against them would have grown and grown. Plus, add up all of Germany and Japan's would be conquests, and it still doesn't add up to the economic might of the US alone at that time.

The best they could have hoped for was to make reconquest of their conquests by the Allies so costly that they would sue for peace instead, but they could have never conquered America. What very well might have ensued was a world looking just like Orwell's 1984. Not a lot of people know this, but he wrote that book based on what might have happened if WW2 ended in a stalemate. America eventually because Fascist cos they can't afford their freedoms in trying to beat the other Fascist nations, and then three equally powerful nations endlessly battle over the earth. It never ends, cos if one gets two powerful, the other two team up, and war keeps their own population under heel. Scary.

Best general? Hard to say, but Zhukov is certainly up there, not the least for managing to not get killed by Stalin!

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Old September 5, 2000, 21:53   #20
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Jeibel:
I would still say that numbers played a critical role in the Stalingrad victory. The stalemate in the ruins of the city was achieved with approx. equal numbers but the massive envelopment move was done with superior numbers and led to the isolation and destruction of the 6th Army mostly by supply starvation.
The battle of Kursk has always facinated me, because the view and even the facts vary so widely from account to account. Widely regarded as the first Soviet summer victory, one of my sources says it was actually a disaster for the Soviet Army? It states that the massive tank engagement cost the Soviets 600 tanks versus less than 100 German tanks being knocked out? Does anyone have actual facts that are uncontested?
In any case it is still pretty sure that the Soviets lost at least as many soldiers and equipment as the Germans from 1942-1945 so their massive ressources turned a potential STALEMATE into a complete Victory.

Best strategist:
Although I agree with Zhukov as the best Soviet general/marshal I would say that the American strategy in Europe seemed more effective, achieving better results with less losses. But whose strategy was it? I could not say that any specific American general set the strategy... Maybe the "average" US field commander?
I am reluctant to mention Patton because he really worked in a smaller scale, however he was quite successful. Omar Bradley was a better commander than many give him credit for.
On the German side Rommel, Von Rundstedt and Guderian come to mind.
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Old September 6, 2000, 01:38   #21
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Von Rundstedt?? Why would you say him? Wasn't he more of an old fashioned general than say... Manstein or Guderian? And wasn't he in favour of holding Guderian back during the invasion of France, thus allowing the British more time to evacuate at Dunkirk???

(Edited for misspelling)
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Old September 6, 2000, 16:05   #22
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Nemo, I only found an article in the net about Kursk that says that during the direct tank confrontation near Prokhorovka (-sp?) the German losses were only between 100 and 200 tanks, but the Soviet tank losses were much higher (around the number you said).

According to this article, most of these Soviet losses were reparable tanks that were abandoned. This seems a bit strange to me, and the author gives no reason for this. But generally the author considered Kursk still as a major victory for the Soviet Union.

The source for this article was the online edition of a German newspaper from the right political spectrum, so it´s also possible that the author see the Germans in a better light than they were in reality...
Has someone more serious info about this, from better sources (I´m also interested in this )

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Old September 6, 2000, 17:50   #23
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Have you guys seen this site?
http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/town/avenue/vy75/

It appears to use good sources for its data. Prokorovka: Armor at Kursk was the first cardboard strategy game I ever played and I would love to replace my lost copy of it or see a civ version.

Very interesting discussion gentlemen. Thanks for the good read.
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Old September 6, 2000, 18:25   #24
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I think I can put together everything collected on Kursk and the whole eastern front for WWII into a general idea. To me, it seems as though the Soviet Union won a "Pyhric Victory" against the Germans. So they won a victory and not defeat at Kursk, but with a high cost.

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Old September 6, 2000, 19:51   #25
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quote:

Originally posted by The ANZAC on 09-06-2000 06:25 PM
I think I can put together everything collected on Kursk and the whole eastern front for WWII into a general idea. To me, it seems as though the Soviet Union won a "Pyhric Victory" against the Germans. So they won a victory and not defeat at Kursk, but with a high cost.




I suppose that this was the general idea of Red Front. You as the player would lose a lot of units, a lot more then the enemy, and any victory would be a hollow one paid for by hundreds of thousands of lives.
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Old September 6, 2000, 19:53   #26
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Excuse me if i go a bit OFF-Topic but this is sort of my speciality field

WARNING: Many of the things i am going to say may looks very cruel and inhuman. I am fortunate enough to not know totalitarian terror first-hand, nor any of my relatives has been a victim (i am from a country that was once Fascist). I am of course not trying to justify the oppression and cruelity of a totalitarian regime. HOwever it is a deep and involved subject, with many exisistential implication (wich i am not going to touch) and i feel compelled to exspose my thought.

I know '1984' very well... In fact i prepared my final exam paper as an inter-disciplinary confrontation between Hannah Arendt's real world theories and Orwell's fictional. Orwell started conceveing the book after the Tehran conference in 1943. As you will well know at the time the possibilietis of an allied victory was very high, if not certain; thus the Allies started making plan about the division of the world in zone of influence. The prospective orrified Orwell. However at the time the role of the Soviet Union was less regarded, since they hadn't had any major success besides Stalingrad... IIRC (i know this not by study of history but of literature ) Western europe was to be included in a sort of commonwealth under british leadership (the 'other' major power). So stalemate is not entirely accurate, as the premise for the Revoultions of the '50s was the fall of fascism (in 1984 the ruling party of the three states claim to be the heir of Socialist/Communist ideology...).
And there is another very important point to clarify that also allow me to perhaps answer the ANZAC: what was the true realization of those totalitarian states? And what had the Soviet Union truly gained from the war? Well it is not accurate to say that in 1984 the states keeps the population under heel to win the war (although, thanks to double-think, they do believe so...). Rather they have realized that by keeping the war in a stalemate, they would be able to mantain a fully mobilized society, by definition transitionary, permanently. (the kind of soc. whose enormous possibilities became evident in ww1), one where all the populace's efforts are directed towards a single goal... The sense of comradeship that arises makes the populace compact and utterly loyal to a leader. This, combined with police espionage and administrative slaughter of the populace would make an elite able to keep the power stably.
They reduce the people directly involved in the war to a minority (as it was done from antiquity to modernity), but mantain all other populace involved in the war effort.

Result: War is Peace

So, to come back to ANZAC post, what has the U.S.S.R. truly gained from the war? I think that it is the perfection of its totalitarian regime. Although the era of the Great Purges range between 1927 and 1936 it is during the war that the true cohesion in the nation is achieved. in an abused, but true, expression the war had galvanized the people. Stalin had realized a way to keep a population under control without significant risk of being overthrown. Even after the war, purge followed purge, and the society was constantly striving to achieve new goals (the five years plan, the 'foundation of a new society', the reconstruction, the space race...). Th situation of the Cold War was, in fact, ideal: a stalemate situation in which the populace can be kept under terror, and thus, control. In fact some historian consider Stalin's death the end of the Cold War, as it marked the end of post-war totalitarianism and the beginning of the 'normalization' process.
A side note. It is a little known fact that a few months before his death in 1953, Stalin was planning what could have been the greatest purge in USSR.

The purge of Jews.

Thank you for reading so far and excuse me for my ranting.
Farewell
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Old September 6, 2000, 20:00   #27
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To came a little back in topic.
Another little example of the lack of true cohesion between the Axis countries: during Italy's colonial war in Ethiopia the Nazi supplied high-grade military ammunition to the ethiopians.
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Old September 6, 2000, 21:40   #28
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I had about the same kind of report in an American Magazine specializing in WWII... But I must say there is a mysticism in America about the Germans in WWII and Americans have an unfortunate tendency toward history revisionism.
The main battle was when the 1st, 2nd and 3rd SS-Panzerdivisions ran into about 1000 Soviet tanks (Mostly T-34s) from the reserve 6th(?) Guard division...
The casualties in the article were derived from strengths reports of the units on both sides before and after the battle. The author was decidedly "pro-German" so I am suspicious of his data.
I also had separate data about the Germans losing 3/4 of the new Panther tanks engaged as well as almost all the 80 "Elephant" panzerjagers that were used which points to much higher losses. Also, the pictures I have of the battlefield are littered with destroyed German Pzkw III and IV tanks and many of the Elephant PzJg's, which really seems to point in the direction of huge German losses. Unfortunately, both sides had a strong tendency to "alter" the truth...
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Old September 8, 2000, 10:46   #29
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I'm no expert on the subject but I would just say to Nemo, don't trust pictures, they tend to be taken by the winner.
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Old September 8, 2000, 22:36   #30
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Its true that many of the "wonder weapons" looked good only on paper, but many of them were actually quite advanced and could have worked had the war gone on a few more years. Normally there is a strongly conservative streak in militaries that shoot down any thing new and significantly different. Because German scientists were given carte blanche during the war and even goaded into wierder and wierder designs in the pursuit of some magical solution, these conservative nay-sayers could be ignored.

An example would be forward sweeping wings on an airplane. Pretty common on advanced aircraft today. A German plane late in the war had this design, and being a totalitarian state they forced someone to test fly it. Even after this success, it took decades for the winning powers to build such a thiing, and when they did, no one was willing to fly it. People would say: that's not how planes are supposed to look, it will never fly. The Germans even came up with a "single wing" plane that looks remarkably like modern stealth fighters. That idea turned out to be 40 years ahead of its time.

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