Russians blame Stalin’s ‘blunders’...

Daily Times - Leading News Resource of Pakistan

Almost half of Russians in a recent poll blamed dictator Joseph Stalin’s “blunders” for the Soviet Union’s huge losses of life in World War II, Russian news agencies reported on Sunday.

Forty-nine percent of respondents told the Levada polling agency that “the blunders of Stalin” were the “main reason” for massive Red Army losses in the first two years of the war, the Interfax news agency reported. Stalin erred by purging the military of top officials, failing to prepare for combat and abandoning millions of Soviet prisoners of war, respondents said.

While Stalin supporters stress the vital importance of his wartime leadership, only eight percent of respondents said that Stalin played the key role in winning the war.

 

I would say both are true; after the first few months, Stalin developed into a remarkably competent supreme commander, all the more remarkable since there was no one who could tell him he was doing wrong and straighten him out! For most of the war he provided effective direction, displayed knowledge of military and technical affairs without meddling excessively, and let men like Zhukov get on with their jobs.

 

1)no country that is invaded,will retreat without fighting
2)the no step policy cost the Germans a lot of casualties
3)the'no step policy' bought the SU time,to mobilise its manpower and to evacuate the industry
4)'trade space for time' was impossible,because a major part of the Red army(with most of its operational tanks) was located at the frontierin saillants,and to save them would be impossible .

 

Agreed. Also to add, not one step back (order 227) was administred only at Stalingrad and not before.