If Stalin attack the West, what year and month was optimum?

So what were you asking for?

Thank you.

My point is that once the Soviets attack you start out using your plan especially when it involves other foreign powers and hours if not weeks of delicate negotiations. You wouldn't change the plan until it appears that is wasn't working and that wouldn't happen to the US and Brits until it was way too late if ever. The plan was to run to the Pyrenees and then try and stop them there. There was no plan to make a stand at the Rhine or any other defensive line in France.

You can't notice they are building up when they aren't. They are just maintaining their end of war strength that is quite enough and is exactly what they did on the German border through 1948 when they actually increased their forces.

There were many conflicts over Turkey, Iran and Greece and the US and Brits still demobilized at a frantic rate. They were counting on the atomic bomb and the B29 to keep the Soviets in line.

Well that's your opinion. A lot of other people think otherwise including of course me.

Pilots they need pilots. They would have about 30 days to find the pilots get the planes out of mothballs etc. by that time the Soviets could have air superiority over England. How are you going to land when the enemy is circling your airfields waiting.

It would be the same problem with our air forces within 300 miles of the opening wave. Say your a fighter pilot and you somehow get in the air. You defend your air space like your paid to do. Maybe you even wipe out the first wave with the help of your buddies. Your our of fuel and bullets but they still keep coming. You can't run anymore and you can't hide. Your dead meat. Just like the German 262s were when the Germans lost air superiority.

As to the carriers. That might be a good idea. How does the Bear Cat and Hell Cat measure up to the late model Yak 9, Yak 15 and MiG 9. Again it appears in no proposed plan but would be one way to save the Brits from being defenseless in their own airspace.

Not if within the first 200 miles or so all opposition is ended.

No there weren't. The Brits had demobilized as well and the French were messing around in their former colonies. The occupation forces were not anywhere near combat ready or even the least bit competent at survival.

There's a difference between an offensive and a route.

You're right. It is much easier supply problem, better troops, shorter distance, larger air force, more time to prepare, more unprepared enemy and total surprise.

Not in 3 hour from a total surprise start. They couldn't even get to the bridges much less receive the orders, mush less find the explosives and then place them.

No I definitely put you in the conventional thinking category. Sorry but you have not shown much of an imagination.

No I have to disagree. You cannot classify every time he interacts with anyone or anything a new DOB sorry.

The kind of resources he identifies are useful for working on technologicallly challenging weapons not but force weapons systems. Stalin needs brute force like tanks, artillery and the Sturmovik. What was needed for the B28 was something with more finesse. In RL he killed them and still won the war.

I agree. The actual production starts about Sept. 1945 or so.

See brndirt1 post.

 

The whole thread is totally improbable :why should Stalin attack the west between 1945-1953 (exit Stalin in 1953!)?
Even if the Soviets could go to Paris,the risk was that it would be at the cost of Moscow,Kiew,Leningrad resulting in the collapse of the SU.
To put it bluntly :a conventional Russian attack could-would be replied to with nuclear attacks on the SU,and against these attacks,the SU was powerless .

 

The question is how well did it work? Part of Ford's "genius" if you will was his concept of selling his cars to his workers. It wasn't just an assembly line there were parts of the system that motivated the workers and encouraged them to do good work. Ford had this system up and working before the war started so a lot of the bugs were worked out already.

 

From what I've read the Soviets demobilized a lot of their forces in 45 adn 46. In part this was forced on them due to the food situation and log structure. It looks like we have a different understanding of what the Soviet force posture was in Eastern Europe. If you look at this chart for instance you will see that the Soviet peak strength in 45 was in January and it had dropped to almost half that by December.
ImageShack® - Online Photo and Video Hosting

Do they? Not from what I've seen. Again I don't think this section of the forum is intended to write alternative history novels or even stories. It's too look at reasonable alternatives and discus them in a historical context. As with most discussion of this type the weight of proof resides on the proponent. That's implicit in the no one line clause in the rules.

That's only if they can achieve complete surprise. Some of the changes you make however would almost assuredly raise tensions and could even result in call backs. Note historically the US sent B-29s to England in 46 and more in 47.

A rather unlikely situation though isn't it.

Just because they were demobilizing doesn't mean there weren't forces there. The British Army of the Rhine dates to 45. Likewise the French also had forces in Germany. Where did you get the information on their status?

But that's based on a rather unproven assumption and I'm not convinced it is one the Soviets would have made even if it was accurate.

The troops involved in the Manchurian invasion were the cream of the Red army from what I've read. As the attacks could come from three sides it doesn't appear to me that many of the routes had to go even 500 miles. The larger air force presents it's own problems especially as thier is more probable opposition even in porportion. It's also not at all clear that west would be totally unprepared or that it would come as a total surprise.

The Soviets aren't going to be at the Rhine bridges in 3 hours.

Irrelevant.

Not every time he interacts but every time he changes things in an ahistorical way. Otherwise all you would have to do to create a what if is hypothesise the birth of some genius and he just changes things all along the way to make it go the way you want it to. This works for an alternat history novel. It doesn't work for discussions in fact based forums like this.

Like what?

his post didn't address the fact that you created a straw man. And the question still stands as to which of Ford's innovations would work in the Soviet Union and how well.

 

Yeah, the plant was up and going by 1934 (I think) when it started making all the parts in the Soviet Union rather than assembling some crated parts from the US plants which it used in the early years. They produced two distinct models during the production run, the GAZ-AAA truck was a dual rear axle, 6x4; 50 hp larger version and there were 37,373 of this model made and well over a million of the GAZ-AA single axle; 40 hp version were produced by 1946.

Since there was only one customer for their product, the Soviet State, I don’t know how to answer the part about Ford’s workers buying his product. The Soviet State was the only customer for both the GAZ and ZIS products, built on American style assembly lines.

 

As for air superiority over England:

Given the mix of aircraft available to the Soivets they simply are not going to do this. Their fighter escort is pretty much limited (outside a relative handful of Yak 9DD) to about 200 or so miles from their bases. Their extant jets would be even shorter legged. The Yak 11 has a 'book' range of just 400 miles so realistically it is good for a mission radius of about 125 or so at most.

This means that, like the Luftwaffe before them, the Russians are limited to escorted missions over just the Southern tip of England. Also, like the Germans, the Russians lack the means to successfully invade.

Worse yet, the British early warning system in 1946 is far, far superior to that of 1940 and far less susecptable to neutralization. This means the British have a huge advantage in meeting Soviet air attacks just as they had over the Luftwaffe in 1940. Virtually any pilot the Russians lose will require a replacement while the Allies will get most of theirs back.

Of course, the US could add to the early warning system something totally new: An AEW component.

ttp://blog.usni.org/2010/10/11/project-cadillac-the-beginning-of-aew-in-the-us-navy-part-ii/

Steeljaw Scribe - Project CADILLAC: The Beginning of AEW in the US Navy (Part III)

As the VVS also lacks a real "strategic" bombing force the Soviets, like the Luftwaffe before them, will be forced to try and operate against Britain using their tactical air force as a strategic one.

Also, the British and US flak weapons of 1946 using VT fuzing are going to be far more devastating on Soviet bombers flying at 15 to 20,000 feet (at most) as well as likely to prove far too much for the Il-2m and Il 10 to try and take on using extant Soviet tactics. So, even if the Soviets can marginalize the RAF and USAAF over a small portion of Southern England the bulk of the country is relatively safe from attack.

The Soviets might try to switch to nighttime raids. This too would be problematic given that the RAF is the world leader in nightfighter forces and the US a close second. Just the near complete lack of electronic devices, let alone up-to-date ones, on their aircraft will render them incredibly vulnerable to interception. Worse, the Soviets lack any credible nightfighter to counter Allied ones.

 

Yak-9D
Long-range version of Yak-9, fuel capacity increased from 440 l (115 US gal) to 650 l (170 US gal) giving a maximum range of 1,360 km (845 mi). Combat usefulness at full range was limited by lack of radio navigation equipment, and a number of aircraft were used as short-range fighters with fuel carried only in inner wing tanks. Circle time: 19-20 sec. Weight of fire: 2 kg (4.4 lb)/sec.

Yak-9DD
Yak-9D and Yak-9T modified to further increase the range, fuel capacity increased to 845 l (220 US gal) giving a maximum range of 2,285 km (1,420 mi), radio navigation equipment for night and poor weather flying. Yak-9DD were used primarily to escort Petlyakov Pe-2 and Tupolev Tu-2 bombers although they proved less than ideal for this role due to insufficient speed advantage over the bombers. In 1944, several Yak-9DD were used to escort B-17 Flying Fortress and B-24 Liberator bombers attacking targets in Romania using the Ukraine-Romania-Italy routes.

Yak-9PD
High-altitude interceptor (unrelated to the two other Yak-9P above) with Klimov M-105PD engine designed specifically to intercept Luftwaffe Junkers Ju 86R high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft overflying Moscow in 1942–1943. Initially poor performance due to unreliable engine dramatically improved with adoption of Klimov M-106PV with water injection, with the aircraft reaching 13,500 m (44,300 ft) during testing. Armament reduced to the ShVAK cannon only to save weight.

Yak-9U (VK-107)
The definitive Yak-9 variant, Yak-9U (VK-105) equipped with the new Klimov VK-107A engine with 1,230 kW (1,650 hp), and the 20 mm ShVAK with 120 rounds replacing the VYa. Weight of fire: 2.72 kg (5.98 lb)/sec. Early test flights in 1943 indicated that the only comparable Soviet fighter was Polikarpov I-185 prototype which was more difficult to fly and less agile due to higher weight. The prototype's top speed of 700 km/h (435 mph) at 5,600 m (18,370 ft) was faster than any other production fighter aircraft in the world at the time. Early problems with overheating were fixed by enlarging the radiators and production aircraft had further improved aerodynamics. Turning ability to complete a circle: 20 sec, best Soviet fighter at altitude.

Yak-3PD
high-altitude interceptor with Klimov VK-105PD engine and a single 23 mm Nudelman-Suranov NS-23 cannon with 60 rounds of ammunition, reached 13,300 m (43,625 ft) in testing but did not enter production due to unreliability of the engine.

Yak-3P
produced from April 1945 until mid-1946, armed with 3 × 20 mm Berezin B-20 cannons with 120 rounds for the middle cannon and 130 rpg for the side weapons. The three-cannon armament with full ammunition load was actually 11 kg (24 lb) lighter than that of a standard Yak-3, and the one-second burst mass of 3.52 kg (7.74 lb) was greater than that of most contemporary fighters. Starting in August 1945, all Yak-3 were produced in the Yak-3P configuration with a total of 596 built.

MiG 9 495 mile range.

Pe 2 High altitude fighter version. Range 731 miles

Pe 3 Range 930 miles

Tu2 Range 1260 miles

P47 Range 810 miles

P 63 Range 450 miles with 1,148 Kingcobras on strength in May 1945.

IL 10 Range 500 miles

I would suggest that the Soviets would not make the same mistakes that the Germans had made and would just concentrate on the British fighters and AA system. There sole purpose would be to gain air superiority and keep it. No distraction and no diversions with an at least 6 to one or greater odds. With at least a month before the US can respond in any meaningful way. By then it's all over.

The only possibility would be the US Navy and even then I don't know how the Bear Cats and Hell Cat measure up or if the numbers are great enough or could get there early enough to save the RAF.

Constant CAP over every Brit air fields should do the trick in a few weeks if not days. It doesn't matter is it's a IL10, PE 2 or Mig 9 shooting you down or blowing you up on the ground. The Mig 9s and Yak 9s can keep the British fighters more than busy while the IL10s, PE 2s, PE 3s and TU 2s kill anything that shoots back or tries to take off, hide or land.

 

Looks like you are quoting from wiki. You really should give credit when you do that.

Let's look at a few other things there while we are visiting though:
Yakovlev Yak-9 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Engine life is right up there with the Me-262.

 

I'm sure the Soviets would make new and equally egreious mistakes in their operations. Concentrating on "British fighters and AA system(s)" would be no more possible or effective than it was with the Luftwaffe. If most (or all) British fighters are on airfields beyond Soviet fighter range then their bombers are going in unescorted. Nothing in the Soviet inventory is as well defended or survivable as the stuff the USAAF was flying in the last half of the war. Most have like 2 or 3 .30 machineguns and 2 or 3 .50 at most.
Attacking British or US AA positions with aircraft would also prove costly. If the Luftwaffe could dish out unsustainable casualties against low level attackers on flak positions how much more effective will British and US guns be using POZIT / VT shells and far superior fire controls? Remember, there is more than one study showing that the 3.7" and 90mm are almost three times as effective firing VT rounds as a German 88 is. Since the Russians have ZERO jamming capacity versus British or US radar systems they are definitely going to take very heavy casualties trying to eliminate flak batteries.

What?!! Why couldn't the US simply ferry huge numbers of various fighters like the P-51, P-47 etc., to England and allow British pilots already trained on these aircraft to fly them? The US can also send their own pilots flying the same types. The USN isn't necessary for this operation unless they are bringing large quantities of aircraft over on CVE aircraft transports, something else the US and Britain would do.

Ahahahahahaha!!! Constant CAP over an airfield just 200 miles from Soviet airfields..... Sure..... Let's see: You have a bunch of fighters that have a, let's be generous here, 20 minute loiter time over the airfield. There are 12 hours of daylight. The CAP is say, one squadron of 12 planes. This means for one day on that one airfield during daylight hours you need 432 fighters dedicated to that mission unless you want to push your pilots into multiple missions, reduce the readiness of aircraft, ignore maintenance, and basically see your own forces wittled down from operational attrition.
Now, multiply that by a hundred or more airfields and you have an absurdly insane idea in that statement.

Channelling Hermann Göring now are you? Fat Hermann made a similar boast about dealing with the RAF in 1940....

 

Well I sure they wouldn't.

Why have you ignored the facts from Wikipedia I provided. There is no part of the British Isles that is beyond the range of the various Yak 9 models. There were Lend Lease P47s as well. The Yak 9 had a 20mm cannon from day one and one model had a 37mm.

Are you suggesting that the Soviet ground attacks were stopped by German flak positions at some point in the war? Where was this and why didn't it save the Germans from defeat? How large an area did this happen in? The whole front? Over their airfields? Did the Soviets at some point in the war stop using ground attacks and the IL2s were grounded for months at a time for fear of their lives? The Red Army was without air cover for long periods of time after 1944 or so?

I'm afraid that I need some references for this revelation before I can contemplate it's relevance.

And taking heavy casualties was something new to the Red Army Air force??? If it meant total air superiority over the British Ilse in days then it would have been very acceptable to the Soviet HQ. Are you suggesting that the AA guns along could defeat the Soviet forces?

Pilots and the time to get the planes out of mothballs etc. will be your limiting factor as I have suggested before. You may have as little as 30 days. Certainly no more than 60 at the most.

My goodness I hope you didn't hurt yourself fake laughing. What are the rules of this forum again in regards to decorum?

Please don't ignore the facts provided about the range of the various Soviet fighters to make an erroneous statement.

I have already corrected your error in the range of the fighters involved. Your 200 mile range is not correct. The idea that the Soviets would attack without providing the models needed after 6 months of preparation is not plausible. Don't know what more I can do to mitigate your mirth but provide the facts.

The loiter time would be much longer and it could be a very similar situation the US used to defeat the ME262 and ME 163. A tried and true tactic that the Soviets are well aware of. The few British jets would be limited by both their range and the fact that they were limited by paved air fields easily damaged with the first wave of attacks and kept under constant attack from there on.

After the initial attack the advantage of the British radar would be irrelevant as they would be out of commission or their usefulness over. With the Soviets everywhere what would be the point? The Soviets would only have to hold air superiority for a matter of days catching hundreds of British fighters taking off or landing. Even is the Soviets lost the plane to plane battles between fighters they would be destroyed landing or refueling or taxiing etc. by the PE2s, Tu 2s etc.

My goodness again with the personal attack. Please don't fall into the same behavior you have displayed in other venues. You are after all the moderator and it is very unseemly for you to break your own rules. I would ask you to please control yourself in this forum and not fall into the same tactics you have used elsewhere.

 

Indeed I was. Sorry for the error.

Do you think the Soviets are idiots and incapable of providing their armed forces with long range planes and correct the engine defects?

I disagree. IMHO if the Soviets were going to attack they would have concentrated on and solved these and similar problems. If you are saying that they were incapable of solving these problems then I have to strongly disagree.

 

Range is not how far aircraft can fly to a target and then return to base. Combat radius is. This is the theoretical range of the aircraft divided by 2 and then reduced by about 15 to 20%. Thus a fighter with a 500 mile range has about a 200 mile combat radius.
That 200 miles is the distance from the fighter's base it can fly, engage an enemy in brief combat, and then return. In 1945 -46 the fighters of the VVS, with the exception of a handful of longer ranged fighers like the Yak 9DD had a combat radius of about 200 miles. The two potential jets, the Yak 11 and MiG 9 have less both being around 125 to 150 miles.
You also mentioned extraordinarily rare aircraft like the Yak 9PD high alititude fighter. Five were made. They had all their armor removed and the armament reduced to a single 12.7mm machinegun. The British to combat the same Ju 86P recon planes did something similar in Egypt to several Spitfire V as a stop-gap. This sort of ad-hoc fighter was not in general service nor was it considered an opitmal solution for production.

So, against England, the VVS cannot operate with fighter cover beyond a very small sliver of Southern England just as the Luftwaffe before them did.

 

Nothing outlandish here . If you would please keep the thicker skin statement in mind if and when I respond in kind. I will take a few shots without responding but then I will respond in kind.

There are a few who do not share that possibility and that is who I am addressing. They are basing their opinions on erroneous statements made by others. I'm just correcting those factual errors.

Here's how it's been working. A few state that in their opinion X is impossible. I provide proof that not only is it possible but that it has in fact happened before sometimes numerous times. They again state their opinion. Not much else I can do.

As to none of this actually happening... this is alternate history is it not? Do you folks have a different definition than the standard one?

 

It does seem telling that the Soviets did not seem to think they could have won as they never tried, despite their professed desire to see 'The World Revolution" take place.

 

I know you think the Soviets are totally incapable of many things. I disagree and history proves me right and you wrong. They could and did modify many weapons systems and were very capable of pulling off major surprise attacks.

How many Yak 9Ds where there? How many Lend Lease P47s? Both with a combat range of 400 miles.

Is it not probable that if the Soviets were planning an attack and had 6 months to prepare that they would not manufacture/retro fit/modify hundreds if not a thousand of the Yak 9s into Yak 9Ds with a range of 845 miles which translates into a combat range of 400 miles. Further would you not increase the numbers of Yak DD with a range of 1420 miles and a combat range of 600 miles and catch the conventional thinking person like you by total surprise?

Why did you ignore the Yak D in your last post? Why the Lend Lease P47? Why the Yak DD?

 

Let's start with the Lend Lease aircraft. The bulk of these, if not all, were destroyed shortly after the war ended per contract agreements.

Aircraft Deliveries

So, there would be few, if any, P 63 or P 47 available for anything. With few or no replacement parts those remaining in service would not do so for long. Aside from that just 195 P-47 were delivered in any case.

As for the Yak 9D and DD I would think that they would be in service in just limited numbers due to their relative obsolesence. But, the D with a range of about 850 miles would have a combat radius of about 350 to 375. That still leaves the bulk of England out of range. The DD model is available in very limited numbers even during the war having a specialized purpose.

Basically, the bulk of England is out of range of the VVS for major operations. The Soviets are not incompetent but neither are they omnipotent.

 

Acutally we are not ignoring it the question is not whether a rare Soviet plane could make it over England the question is whether they could do so in adequate numbers. Wiki certainly doesn't tell us that.

Obviously given time and inclination they could do so. The fact remains that they did not do so to any great extend in WWII i.e. the period in question.

Up until May of 45 they had other matters to concentrate on. Even afterwards there was this little matter of rebuilding and getting enough food in to prevent a famine. But keep the straw men coming it helps prevent others from taking your verbage too seriously.

From what I recallyou are being a bit generous. I think I've read that dividing total range by 1/3 was often used. Afterall they need some spare fuel in case of navigational errors, contrary winds, cloud cover over their home field, or a minor leak in a fuel tanks or such.

Perhaps that is because they were.

Does it? Care to point out where?

Operationally they certainly did. Strategically they did vs Japan but the Japanese were rather concentrating on other things at the time were they not? Nor did they have any good sources of intel.

You are the one making the claims you should be providing the numbers. I'll help a little here though. According to P-47 Thunderbolt - American aviation of World War II
The Soviets recieved 195 P-47 but they were built in 1942.
Republic P-47 Thunderbolt - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Says 203 P-47D's were sent to the Soviets. It mentions further that only 188 were operational at the end of the war. If the Soviets are training with them this number will decrease even further by 46. Then there's the matter of the high octain av gas that fighters need for maximum performance.
As for the P-63 Bell P-63 Kingcobra - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia gives its range as 450 miles but it's ferry range as 2200 miles. Note that the combat range is thus about 1/5 the max range.

Perhaps. It depends on how much material and effort was invovled. Then there's the question of whether or not their combat range is 400 miles or under 300 miles.

And just how many could they crank out in this period?

 

I agree, just some other thoughts...
"With World War Two at an end by the end of the summer of 1945, the United States knew that the Soviet economy was in a state of near-collapse. The Soviet Union had lost at least 20 million souls during the war alone and perhaps another 20-30 million from Stalin's decade of purge trials. Thirty thousand factories and forty thousand miles of railroad tracks had been destroyed. All the industrialization that Stalin had promised and delivered to his people with the Five Year Plans had been lost. Truman realized this and remained confident that the United States was in the stronger bargaining position."

Soviet famine in 1946 Famine of 1946-1947

Even if the Soviets managed to overrun Germany, France and the Low Countries there wouldn't be much point. They had suffered 27 million dead in the last 5 years and 27 million total military casualties (9 mil dead, 18 mil wounded) and the country was on life support to maintain itself in peace let alone war. The Eastern European countries they occupied were in some cases worse (Poland, Eastern Germany, Baltics). Once Allied air forces began exerting pressure and famine set in across Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union I believe the whole Soviet occupation would begin to unravel and disintegrate.

Compare the 1946 Soviet and Eastern European nations GDP's to the Western Allies of that year. This war has no chance of success on the weight of that alone. The basic idea here is the same as Japan's in 1941, the Americans wont have the stomach to fight. I find that almost comical if you consider what the reaction of the average American or Brit would be to being betrayed by an ally that you had made sacrifices for and just bailed out. In addition to that motivation is the idea that those sacrifices were in vain. Both of those ideas taken in the context of an underhanded sneak attack akin to Dec. 7 1941 would in my opinion illicit the SAME RESPONSE. General Patton was not alone in his anti-Soviet sentiment and a watershed event like a Soviet attack would be a suicidal gesture by Stalin.