Could the Western Allies Win Without the USSR?

1- You mean Americans? Well, Americans are bad at war. That was proven many times. Including in WW2, were they could have occupied Berlin by October 1944, a few months after D-Day. Complete incompetence and lack of fighting skills of the American soldier explained why they took 11 months to defeat only 30% of Germany's armed forces (with a superiority in numbers of 3 to 1 in men, 4 to 1 in vehicles and 10 to 1 in aircraft).

The Iraq war today: The US spent more money in it than the entire GDP of Iraq several times over. The US is very inefficient in war.

2- It was true that the US made more of various items, it was not true that the US produced 4 times more weapons than the Soviet Union. I have read various estimates of total production and the estimate that the brndirt1 gave was the most favorable to the US I have ever read.

I have calculated that the US produced twice as many weapons as the USSR and 50% more than Germany. Second to my calculations the US never reached a 2 to 1 advantage in military expenditures to Germany (before 1945, of course).

3- Sure, the tonnage in aircraft that the US produced was more than 1/0.6 times larger than the USSR production. But there were some items were the soviet tonnage was larger, like tanks and artillery.

 

Yes, they didn't have the capability to deploy and supply 10 million men in Europe without any help from Britain.

No, before black may 1943, Germany was sinking ships faster than the US could make then. In total, Germany sank 20 million tons of shipping, while the US produced 30 million tons. While 65% of germany's resources were in the soviet union!!!!!!1

 

No it does fit real well with the data. The US probably produced more steel in one year then the Soviets did for the whole period of 1941 to 1945. On aircraft production once again if you take each aircraft produced times their wieghts I think you'll find the US massively outproduced the Soviets & Germans combined, 4 engined bombers each with oxygen systems for up to 8-10 crww members,norden bombsights, radars and hydraulic powered turrets are far more complex,more expensive and require much more material then single engined fighters. How many tons of merchant shipping did Germany or the SU produce? Furthermore you can't compare what the US produced in the period of 1939-1945 because their industray wasn't really mobolised till late '41 you have to figure in the period of 1941-1945.

 

Yes, I'm certain the Soviets could have done it "all on their own", without ever talking to or using an American in any way shape or form. Oh, please.

The Soviet’s (Magnitogorsk) iron and steel production was the "core" of its industry; the assembly and research plants (which could be more easily relocated) were the end producers using Magnitogorsk iron and steel. However, one must remember that in the late twenties Magnitogorsk wasn’t chosen as a site because it was "on the other side of the Ural mountains and the Ural river to protect it from invasion, but because it was close to the largest known iron deposits in the new USSR (at the time) and access to river transport of product. The fact that they were far from the Germans on the east of the Urals was serendipitous, certainly it could not be any other. Stalin’s Soviet was struggling to create a state, the Nazi regime was still two years away in the future.

That said, it must be remembered that in those same late twenties and thirties (‘29-‘31); "The biggest single blast-furnace installations in the world were going up…a job undertaken and completed entirely by the Americans, for the Soviets. Eight blast-furnaces were built, each over sixty feet high, with a capacity of 1,500 cubic yards and generating 1,000 tons of pig iron per day. At that time there were only eight other such giants in the whole United States (as well).…The Bolsheviks had been far-sighted. The Mackee Company would only have fulfilled their part of the contract when Magnitogorsk was in full production, with Russian personnel, and running smoothly. The Americans were to run training courses for Russian technical personnel and, furthermore, were to send the workers and specialists whom they had thus trained to the United States for further specialized technical instruction." (East Minus West Equals Zero, p.212) [emphasis mine]

And don’t forget that the one and a half ton GAZ-AA was a Ford deriviative, built in a plant assembled by Henry Ford himself and originally staffed with Ford engineers until it got "up and going". It started out producing Ford AA trucks from parts shipped from the USA, see:

Oldtimer gallery. Trucks. GAZ-AA board platforms.

that site explains how the GAZ-AA is the Ford based unit, and this one:

Oldtimer gallery. Trucks. ZIS-5

explains that the ZIS-5 (called "Tryohtonka" for its 3-ton payload) takes its origin from American Autocar truck, not the much smaller Ford. I wonder how the USSR would have fared without those older American aids in production?

Quoting no less a military genius than Marshall Zhukov: "Speaking about our readiness for war from the point of view of the economy and economics, one cannot be silent about such a factor as the subsequent help from the Allies. First of all, certainly, from the American side, because in that respect the English helped us minimally. In an analysis of all facets of the war, one must not leave this out of one's reckoning. We would have been in a serious condition without American gunpowder, and could not have turned out the quantity of ammunition which we needed. Without American `Studebekkers' [sic], we could have dragged our artillery nowhere. Yes, in general, to a considerable degree they provided our front transport. The output of special steel, necessary for the most diverse necessities of war, were also connected to a series of American deliveries." Moreover, Zhukov underscored that `we entered war while still continuing to be a backward country in an industrial sense in comparison with Germany.

These statements of Zhukov in 1965 and 1966, are corroborated because they were recorded as a result of eavesdropping by security organs which began in 1963. Before he wrote his book and changed his tune to the party line he also said: "It is now said that the Allies never helped us . . . However, one cannot deny that the Americans gave us so much material, without which we could not have formed our reserves and could not have continued the war . . we had no explosives and powder. There was none to equip rifle bullets. The Americans actually came to our assistance with powder and explosives. And how much sheet steel did they give us? We really could not have quickly put right our production of tanks if the Americans had not helped with steel. And today it seems as though we had all this ourselves in abundance." (he is heard to chuckle quietly)

This secretly recorded conversation of Marshall Zhukov is in contradiction to his own book where he "toes the party line" and denigrates the Lend-Lease aid later. In view of the Soviet control of publishing, I wonder which I would put most faith in?

Then using Soviet records disclosed in June of 1990, to qualify for U.S. loans and IMF credits under the still active (American) Johnson Debt-Default Act, when the USSR re-negotiated an agreement for repayment of her remaining WW2, non-military material L/L war debts. And this is only my interpretation of those nasty years for the Soviets, when without Stalin's new western allies promise of aid in July of 1941, it is not outside of the realm of possibility that Stalin's soviet might have actually signed a separate "truce" with Hitler in either late 1941 or mid-'42. However, when he was promised and started to receive aid from the west he must have decided to "soldier on", and he spurred his populace to admirable, valiant effort and sacrifice in the combat of National Socialism/Fascism expansion into the USSR.

American aid alone (not counting the UK), received by the Soviets not just "shipped", looks like this from October '41 through June '42 (before the Nazi Stalingrad offensive), and this is also NOT counting the military equipment bought outright by gold transfers before and after June, 1941 when the Soviets funds were unfrozen in American holdings, and they were actually included in the Lend/Lease Act. In those nine months alone (Oct. '41-June '42), L/L totaled:

All aircraft types; 1,285.
All AVF types including tanks; 2,249 (mostly light Stuarts and those sad stop-gap M3 Lee/Grants).
Machine-guns, all calibers; 81,287.
Explosives, in pounds; 59,455,620.
Trucks, all types; 36,825.
Field telephones; 56,445.
Copper telephone wire; 600,000 kilometers (375,000 miles).

All BEFORE Stalingrad! The Lend/Lease material was kept close track of by the Soviets, since the terms of the agreement meant they were required to pay for, or return anything NOT destroyed by, or "used" in the war itself. This was received material, not shipped material, and fully accounted for in June of 1990, to qualify for U.S. loans and IMF credits under the still active Johnson Debt-Default Act, the USSR re-negotiated an agreement for repayment of her remaining WW2, non-military material L/L war debts. One year later the Soviet Union ceased to exist, but the CIS did honor the commitment for and I believe they have completed the repayment. That remembered, plans to continue Lend-Lease as part of a post-war reconstruction program (pre-Marshall plan) died with Roosevelt, when President Truman ended all Lend-Lease aid to everybody on Aug. 15, 1945, the day the Japanese officially surrendered by accepting the "Potsdam Declaration".

To fully understand how important something is for a nation when it goes to war, one should think what happens if that certain thing is missing. The L/L items of most significance to the USSR appear to have been food, trucks, tires, communication equipment and fuel additives (in that order). None of those items exactly "captures the imagination" of the public and it's hard to clearly assess their importance. It really was the mundane goods that made the difference, not the "war material" per se, as in the completed battle material of tanks, planes, explosives, or infantry weapons.

Look at it this way my friends, if Zhukov, and Soviet records are correct; No LL food = more soviet citizens required to remain in agriculture and food processing factories = fewer soldiers available and less military output.

OR less healthy people = less productive and less combat ready troops. No LL flat steel, multi-axle trucks, locomotives, railroad, communications, etc. = more people in factories to build those and therefore fewer T-34s, fewer trucks, and fewer soldiers;

OR less mobility of Red Army and therefore the possibility for Nazis to regroup and stop the Red Army counter-offensives perhaps producing a new "border" to the USSR in its west, and even less "grain and oil" for later. Then the puny little old ½ ton GAZ-AA (a Ford) supplied Leningrad because of its small size and low weight, not simply because the Soviets did NOT use any 2 ½ ton Studebakers, they couldn't afford to risk those units on ice. As to the "percentages" of the material sent to and used by the USSR in the three years, and ten months of Lend-Lease aid, these are the approximate percentages of the total materials, both direct military and non-military material made available to the Soviet military and industrial complex that were supplied by American Lend-Lease alone (UK and Commonwealth contributions to the USSR again NOT included, and these are verified by USSR documents):

80% of all canned meat consumed.
92% of all railroad locomotives, rolling stock and rails.
57% of all aviation fuel used.
53% of all explosives.
74% of all truck transport.
88% of all radio equipment.
53% of all copper.
56% of all aluminum ingots and sheets. (processed from much reverse Lend Lease bauxite, I think)
60% of all automotive fuel.
74% of all vehicle tires.
12% of all armored vehicles.
14% of all combat aircraft.

Then, post war Truman only requested that the Soviets repay the U.S. for the non-military supplies (including cargo ships), which all combined was worth about $2.5 billion of the original $11 billion Lend/Lease total. In effect "writing off" the other nearly $9 billion directly after the war ended in a vain attempt to mollify Stalin. When the "Cold War" erupted post-WW2, it effectively ended any such hopes of even reduced repayment from the Soviets, until the "Cold War" finally started thawing completely in the late 1980s with the outbreak of "glasnost". That prompted the desire of the former Soviet Union to qualify for both American loans and International Monetary Fund credits. Except for the Soviet indebtedness, repayment of most all "Allied" Lend/Lease debts had been set on "non-disruptive" scales of payment, under control and organized by the mid 1960s. (America had no desire to make the "reparations" mistake of WW1) In 1972 the American government really did accept an open offer by the Soviet Union to pay $722 million in installments through 2001 to settle their indebtedness (less interest) of $2.5 billion, but then we must remember the mood of the times as per the "Communists" (in general); when it was hoped that by inviting them into capitalistic "world finance" loops they would become less adversarial in the little "proxy wars" which had been started up and going on since Korea.

Those 1970's American hopes were in vain, and until well after the death of Brezhnev the repayment schedule just "hung fire". When the former USSR attempted to get IMF credits and US loans again in the 1990's they simply had to agree to repayment of the old L/L aid from WW2, using their own records. To the credit of the government which replaced them after their collapse, first the CIS and later the Russian states have (for the most part) honored their commitments on L/L repayments from WW2.

Yupper, American aid only helped keep the Soviet Union in the war a "little bit".

 

SO how many U-boats did the Germans have at the battle of Stalingrad?

You forget that the US had had already moved up through Italy and established a foot hold in Southern France.

The use of Great Brittain was certainly convienient; but, by no means necessary.

 

COMMENT: Yes and in some areas the US was very massively superior to the SU like ship production.

 

Yes, it is true that the US produced more than the Soviet Union (overall). But, it is not true that the US produced 4 times more munitions, the real figure would be 2 times (maybe 1.5 times, depending on the relative importance of tanks and guns in relation to aircraft and ships).

 

I wonder how many armoed the US could have formed from all the LL tanks sent to the UK & SU? I wonder how many squadrons the USAAF could have had extra if not for LL? Heck in the US economy one could still at least get tires and gasoline for your private automobile even if rationed.

 

1- Second to Mainstein, without the position in Britain the Western Allies would never been able to launch a major offensive on europe, even with the resources of the US.

2- The campaign in Italy resulted in a stalemate (i.e.: US and Britain lost).

 

No it's alot more then 2-3 times when you figure in everything. A MBT wieghs around 35 tons or thereabouts ,a BB comes in at around 35-40K tons. Soviet aircraft,some of them at least,used wood & glue for their construction.

 

1- Of the 200.000 combat aircraft that the US produced, 40.000 were sent to Britain and the USSR. An increase in 25% of combat aircraft would sure make the USAF more powerful. But, they would have to train more pilots (the fuel sent to the USSR could be used by themselves).

2- Anyway, lend lease consisted in 10 billion dollars in 1944, of the 87 billion dollars military budget. This would not make a huge difference against Germany. Instead of 7 Fw-190 for every B-17 we would have 6 Fw-190 for every B-17.

1- China would have defeated Iraq using less money. Maybe Russia. Sure, modern Europeans are not good at war either...

2- In the case of Normandy, the difference in numbers and materiel was the same as the difference between Germany and Poland in 1939!

In the case of Germany vs Poland, the Germans defeated Poland in 35 days, with a force of 1.5 million men agaisn't 950.000 Poles, the germans lost 40.000 men (KIA, WIA) while the Poles lost 200.000. The Germans had 3 to 1 superiority in tanks and 6 to 1 in aircraft.

In the case of Normandy. The Allies defeated Germany in 77 days, with a force of 2.9 million men agaisn't 1.000.000 Germans. The Allies lost 218.000 men (KIA, WIA) while the Germans lost 90.000 (KIA, WIA, they had 180.000 captured, but that doesn't count). The Allies had a 3 to 1 superiority in tanks and 8 to 1 in aircraft.

Se the diference in operational effectiveness?

I calculated that from the GDP estimates of "The Economics of WW2" book plus the military mobilization I took from a article named "Resource mobilization for World War 2, Economic History Review".

Computing the two I derived some interesting numbers.

 

Based on the data that I have encountered in the tread about the GNPs of the belligerent countries and the data in two books (The Economics of WW2 and War and Economy in the Third Reich), I have produced some statistics in terms of 1939 dollars for the URSS, Germany and the US:

Military outlays:

USA:
Converted to 1939 dollars:
1941: 12.97 billion dollars
1942: 41.99 billion dollars
1943: 63.76 billion dollars
1944: 69.92 billion dollars

Germany:
(1939 dollars)
09/1940-08/1941: 22.47 billion dollars
09/1941-08/1942: 29.47 billion dollars
09/1942-08/1943: 34.65 billion dollars
09/1943-08/1944: 39.96 billion dollars

Soviet Union
(1939 dollars)
1941: 12.24 billion dollars
1942: 20.077 billion dollars
1943: 22.414 billion dollars
1944: 23.21 billion dollars

Note: I used the exchange rate of 0.2 for the ruble/dollar.

Ratio to US/German outlays:
1941 – 1.73
1942 – 0.702
1943 – 0.543
1944 – 0.5715

Military outlays per person in the armed forces:

US:
1944: 6,128 dollars

Germany:
1941: 3,074 dollars
1942: 3,504 dollars
1943: 3,655 dollars
1944: 4,242 dollars

URSS:
1941: 1,724 dollars
1942: 1,770 dollars
1943: 1,890 dollars
1944: 1,898 dollars

Military outlays per front:

Eastern front (axis/allies):

1941: (67% Germany vs 90% URSS)
15.06 billion/11.02 billion, ratio: 1.37

1942: (80% Germany vs 100% URSS)
23.576 billion/20.077 billion, ratio: 1.174

1943: (63% Germany vs 100% URSS)
21.83 billion/22.414 billion, ratio: 0.974

1944: (62% Germany vs 100% URSS)
24.775 billion/23.21 billion, ratio: 1.067

When the Germans had the strategic initiative in the eastern front, they had about 25% more resources allocated there than the soviets. When the volume of expenditures decreased to parity with the soviets, they lost the strategic initiative. That's because of the larger number of soldiers per dollar in the soviet side.

Historically the US is a poor fighter, in the sense that the Americans need to spend much more money in relation to their enemies to win. In terms of fighting power per dollar the Germans and the Soviets were more efficient (specially the Soviets).

Now I will stop posting here since I need to work. But I hope that my arguments should be good enough to convince people that bigger GDP doesn't implies in "win".

 

1- In combat aircraft the US produced about 2-2.5 times the Soviet production in terms of value (note that bigger aircraft have lower costs per ton).

2- In all ground items, except vehicles, the USSR outproduced the US (by about 1.5 times).

3- In naval vessels, the US outproduced the rest of the world combined (true, but a the cost of lower production in ground forces).

 

My sources are:

The Economics of WW2

War and Economy in the Third Reich

Economic mobilization for WW2

World Economic Outlook

Well, if the US was so good, why they took 11 months of large scale ground combat to defeat 25% of Germany's armed forces?

I mean, in terms of numbers and claimed quality of their equipment, they should have defeated Germany in a smaller space of time!!! The US was several times more powerfull than Germany wasn't? Them defeating 25% of their armed forces should have been easier than the case were Germany defeated Belgium em 6 days!!!

Also, Italy never happened! They (US and Britain) fought 8% of Germany's armed forces and took almost 2 years to go from naples to venice! That never should happen... I mean, they were so good! Weren't they?

In fact, the operational performance of the American and British forces against Germany in ww2 were pathetic considering the parameters of the campaigns. Operating against a small fraction of a much smaller enemy, with worse equipment, technology, logistics and training, they managed to lost more personnel (in KIA and WIA)...

 

between 500-1000 AFV for and Essex.

 

Ok on some more questions...
1. US produced 200,000 aircraft??/ Try more like around 300,000+ for one thing trainers and cargo types.The US supplied alot of the trainers used by both the RAF & VVS.

2. According to Richard Overy's 'Why the Allies Won" the US produced DURING the war 297,000 aircraft(this doesn't include commercial types which countries abadoned construction of during the war) ,193,000 artillery pieces(probably not including naval guns or even the light AA types on naval vessels),86,000 tanks, 250,000+ half tracks(how many of those did Germany or the SU produce??), and several million trucks. These figures are only for the time when the Us was in the war from 12/7/1941 till 9/2/1945 remember some countries entered the war from a few months to a couple of years earlier.. The USN launched 8,800 naval vessels & 87,000 landing craft. On gun production figure how many 8", 6", 5",3" 20mm & 40mm AA along with their far more complicated FC sytems compared to tanks & aircraft were produced in addition to 193,000 artillery pieces.

3. On LL the US supplied over 1/4 of the SU's machine tools I imagine that helped their production output quite a bit .

4. Tank production numbers can be deceptive too the Germans produced 1800 Tigers but only about 1/10 of that number for spare engines/transmissions the same probably goes for other types of spares and I don't think the Soviets produced that many spare parts whereas the US Army lavishly produced spares for their tanks and virtually all weapon systems.

5. You listed the US only producing 86,000 tanks to the SU's 90,000 but what your leaving out is the US also produced the cargo ships to get them overseas,train the crews to man those ships,the AA guns on the ships along with escort vessels protecting them, and the landing craft to get them ashore . Now as to the numbers themselves according to "WW2 Tanks" by Eric Grove the SU produce 87,200 tanks,25,300 SU-SP vehicles, maybe a few thousand up to around 50,000 Half track type vehicles, and maybe around 300,000 trucks ,at least those are the numbers I remember. The US meanwhile produced 88,276 tanks(in a shorter time span), 43,481 SP vehicles,over 250,000+ half track type vehicles, and several million trucks. These figures don't include , locomotives, rolling stock,bulldozers,and other construction equipment which the US also sent in LL.

 

Ok then figure how many tanks for 10 modern fast BB's, 15 Essex's, 9 Independence CVL's, 100 CVE's, probably 60+ cruisers, 300 DD's, 400-500 DE's, and hundreds of auxiliiries?

 

You make the common mistake of confusing 75% of the CULMULATIVE total of men who served in the German Army with the overall numbers who served in the 3 services, Army, Navy and Air Force. 75% of the Army is not 75% of the German Armed Forces. There were actualy MORE panzers in Normandy in June 1944 than on the entire Eastern Front.

It did not take 11 months to defeat Germany in the West. She was defeated in 1944 but the mad dog was still twitching and needed to be beaten to death. A common sense capitulation would have prevented the needless death of over 1 million Germans in 1945 and prevented the total destruction of most of Germany.
Are you seriously claiming that the utterly stupid 'fight to the last' mentality is something we should admire?
Do you think the millions who died for nothing would share your slack-jawed admiration?

Why so?
Germany needed Russian help to subdue Poland.
Germany never occupied all of France until 1942
Germany faced Britain on her own in 1940-41 and failed to conquer her.
Germany failed to conquer Russia.

Can you tell me how many German POW's the Western Allies took and how many the Soviets took?
Why are the totals more or less the same?
Oh and once again it was not 25% of German ARMED FORCES.

I will let you brag about Belgium. Great victory Adolf!

Shucks there you go again. Can you give me the number of Axis troops (not just 'Army') in Italy and the number of Allied troops?
How may times did you say the Allies outnumbered the Axis?

In what respect was the German flight from France not a crushing defeat?

There you go again. You DELIBERATELY exclude POW totals. Why? Perhaps because they show that German soldiers surrendered (i.e.gave up) in their MILLIONS to Allied Force. They gave up in droves and could not surrender fast enough.