What if the Germans attacked Moscow instead of Stalingrad?

So who gives a #@&* if any woman "prostitutes" themselves to get out and have a better life, many women in the west do it all the time marrying into wealthy families. A case in point Heather Mills married Sir Paul MacArtney and after 4 years of marriage will get a rumoured 700 million for her trouble after their secret Divorce deal is sealed, if thats the case and that figure is correct she (Heather Mills) would almost go down in history as the most expensive "Prostitute" that has ever lived.

 

Wow! I'm a recent divorcee, is Heather available? I have a special preference for one-legged women!

 

Za, just check what Paul is telling about the marriage and you don´t wan´t to get involved with her...even if only 10% was true.

Also on why there are such sites with Russian women. Could it be...

"Russian men have an "exceptionally low" life expectancy of 59 years, compared with 72 years for women. "

BBC NEWS | Health | 'Aftershave drink' kills Russians

Another example

Just a couple of years ago the price of alcohol went down in Finland due to EU prices. Now we have 40% more deaths due to alcohol consumption and that is not acute deaths but deaths due to liver and pancreas malfunction. Just how much will that cost to the society even if they get more money from alcohol taxes....

 

she has a smile that lights up the world, but she chose to be a "prostitute". What a shame!

 

Not sure they always are prostitues or the kind. We have lots of women from Thailand and Russia who have married Finnish men . the odd thing is that often neither understands what the other is speaking but then again maybe it´s just good....

 

i friend of mine used to tell me this:

"the woman that you pay soon is the woman that you pay less"

i've always considered him a wise guy, if only sir Paul Mecca had known him

in my country too, marrying a woman from east europe has become a standard.

 

Maybe I'm a soft-heart, but I sense tragedies uncountable behind those 'Russian Bride' sites. For me I don't find it funny at all.

 

no that's not true.
Russian had the best tank, the best winter clothing, the best acknoledg of country, a more efficient industry than german (chaos is the best word to describe german industry before Speer).
Like Clauswitz said " to win in war, you must have a clear goal, a political will and a superior organisation or technology in warfare" Germans had only the last.
Soviets want to win the great patriotic war (they want survive) then they learned on battlefields with an uncommon sense of sacrifice. they pay the lessons of war, by the blood.
the fact is simple,if the german didn't reach moscow at september or october 41 (even they did, could they take a massive urban aera with only panzer when infantry was far away behind with 600 000 frontovik on their south flank in kiev's zone), they lost.
At the moment where political power survive and Stalin succeed to "collect" all russian behind a nationalist vision of war with the eternal russia.
so the simple fact to miss the capture proove that the german army was unable to do the job and to win.
they have three objectifs in june 41, none is taken.
for red army,the only 41's disavantage is the efficient behaviour in fighting, disavantage lost in 42.
don't forget the faith of Paulus who believe to plan victory in 6 weeks without to know the right number and quality of tanks...(try to knock out a T34 with one of 600 PzII in front line..)
they made from Uranus a mighty succes, because the troops are better and stavka too. She's is better than OKH and works with more freedom.
the ostkrieg is th defeat of generals more than troops.and to answer to initial question, if germans would have attack moscow they meet sooner the million of frontovik in reserve. the initial succes of case blue is more the result of disastrious attack on kharkov than the case blue itself.

 

philippe, i agree with you.

compared to T34, german tanks looked like toys. from strategical point of view, barabrossa attack was a joke, driven mainly by ideology and arrogance. the whole operation was based on the assumption that the soviet building would have collapsed in no more than 3 months. So in early october the attack was over.

On the contrary, the blue operation at least assumed that red army existed! i repeat again, the '42 offensive could not succed but it had some (i didn't say "many") good points. for exemple: despite 1 year war experience stalin did not expected at all the attack in the south.

 

Yes me too, but then again such such are common from many other countries....


And now back to our regular scheduled programe

 

Yes indeed!

Im also going to add that German intelligence played a critical role in their demise. The German high command estimated no more then 300 divisions facing them. 592 divisions certainly came as a nasty surprise.

 

I'd better start to say something to defend the Germans with all the stick they are getting here!

 

You got me thinking Miguel.....

Im hearing more and more posts defending the Ruskies this was usually not the case!

The Nazi bashers are prevailing!

 

Ok lets get things sorted out.

1, Soviets had better clothing, fact 100's of thousands of Soviets died of their winters as did the Germans.

2, Better knowledge of territory, fact many Soviet commanders were as confused as their German counterparts because many came from central or eastern Siberia.

3, Yes you are correct the German Army had no direction as Hitler consistantly diverted his forces with no absolute objective in mind and the commanders in the East were hamstrung because they were not aloowed to decide for themselves the dictates of battlefield conditons.

4, Moscow could not have held with a combined attack from Heers Gruppen Nord and Mittel had the original goal of a pincer movement so as to the Panzers meeting at their eventual destination of Kazan.

5, You mention that Stalin rallied the nation behind a kind of "Mother Russia", bullsh1t, many russians rallied at the barbarity of the Sicherheitdeinst and Einzatgruppen, it was more of a case of the devil you know and the devil you don't know.

6, The German Army was around 100 kilometres from Moscow as of the 26th October 1941, Hitler had decided at this critical time to send Heers Gruppen Mittels Panzer Gruppen to Leningrad and Kyiv stripping Heers Gruppen Mittel of its Armour and ordered the rest to halt, at best had Hitler ordered that Moscow be attacked at the outset by the 1st November German troops would enter the outer suburban areas of Moscow itself.

7, Stalingrad, you forget had Stalingrad being subject to the Marckes Plan 1940 then the entire Heers Gruppen Sud would attack the city, but prior to that Hitler had a grand vision and ordered that Heers Gruppen Sud be spilt into tow seperate army groups, Heers Gruppen Sud (or what was left) go after Stalingrad and Heers Gruppen A go after the Baku oilfields. Had the Marckes plan gone as plan then once the entire Heers Gruppen Sud taken Stalingrad it's next target was to be Astrakahn, then go after the oilfields.

8, Tatics led to the defeat of the Germans in Stalingrad such as A, the Luftwaffe and Artillery leveling the city as to prevent freedom of movement of Panzer through the streets B, demolished building became perfect ambush bunkers C, Paulus had met Hitler and begged the Fuhrer to allow his engineers to begin construction of a pontoon bridge across the Volga to prevent the movement of river traffic and to allow a direct assualt on Soviets forces being delivered into Stalingrad, Hitler refused to allow this.

9, the million so called defenders were not in place until after the winter of 1941/42 had the Germans attacked on the 29th October 1941 Moscow was barely ready to defend itself.

 

For germans, the idea is that Red army is poor and unable to fight in winter, this idea is the result of distrious campaign in Finland. however, russians can retain lessons and get experience by feedback. the truth is russian are ready to fight.

when i said acknoledge is not as geographicaly but they know their home country better tha germans.

OKH under hitler's influence, constantly sideslip between political and economical objectives. they run behind so many things therefore and finally, they didn't catch anything. neither leningrad nor moscow

I do a supposition, they capture Moscow what they do after ? what the real goal, destroy bolshevik power, annihilate the power of USSR ? do you think really that the fall of moscow mean the fall of rotten house by knocking door ? I do not.

when in early september, PzG Guderian reach north of Kiev. there was still fighting on Ielna and even the pocket is closed many troops escape.
don't forget that panzerwaffe is at half strenght in september and one third when typhoon begins (only 900 tanks were available).
the german army have not the capacity to take moscow without infantry who is on oversteched front at this date.

(many years of wargaming, in particulary last productions, give me the minds without a perfect campaign in center by renforced Army group i.e. abandon or avoid one of three main objectives and whithout to slip from goals to another, I don't imagine moscow captured. I know it's only simulations but they are very closed from reality and well documented )

 

A city the size of Moscow could not have been taken with only panzers. The Infantry was catching up and was needed for the assault.

Yes the barbarity of the Germans helped in isolating themselves from the population but this population was mostly in countries like Ukraine and Belarus as these were the countries which suffered the most under Stalin. A captured Tsaristic generel when questioned by Halder said this. "If you guys would have come in here 20 years earlier we would have been on your side, but now all of the people have united and are fighting for their land".

The war indeed was just of that, FOR MOTHER RUSSIA

Also it was not only the Sicherheitdeinst and Einzatgruppen which commited crimes in the East. The germans which burned villages and massacred the population of these villages which were not cooperating or stepping forward to point out the partisans in Belarus were the soldiers of the Glorious Wehrmacht and the crimes commited in Ukraine and souther Russia against the population were done on the orders from Walther von Reichenau and an approval from Rundstedt who was impressed by his tactics and not by Einzatgruppen.

 

erm, how did German soldiers in summer uniforms survive the Russian winter? Looting clothes of civilians perhaps? Expelling them from their homes and leaving them to die of exposure?

 

good question! probably it is not just a matter of wearing winter clothes, to survive russian winter you need to know how to protect yourself. i read some "funny" examples on the nazi problems with cold.

- toilets: german toilets in the camps were located outside (as usual) but this resulted as a terrble mistake: many germans froze while going to the toilet at night. russsian of course knew that perfecly.

- boots: if you took them out at night they got frozen and in the morning it was impossibile to put them on. So many germans decided to wear them at night, but it was even worse 'cause in the morning you had your feet frozen pasted with boots. This because the nazis had boots with the rigth size and that was a terrible mistake! in such climate conditions boots must be 2 size larger. russsian of course knew that perfecly.

 

They did what the Soviets did they stole from civilians, one thing you haven't come to terms with just as many Soviet troops died in the Russian winters as did Germans, in fact some put it at more. No accurate figure can be produced because the Soviets almost never kept records. Oh and to one point, how many Soviets stole from German civilians and turfed them out of their homes.

 

Toilets, So on the Russian front the Soviets had inside fully heated toilets, sweet.

Boots, Better than sandals.