Could the Western Allies Win Without the USSR?

Again you display either an incrdible ignorance or you are a very brazen troll.

Let's see you use a movie adoptation of a graphical novel very loosely based on a historical event and you think it actually means something?

Another opinion rather at odds with history. But heck why not maintian your string.

 

So a much larger German force over 4 years only used 30% more trucks than a much smaller force used in a few months....

 

That someone would make such a general statment is absurd. Doesn't matter whether you say < > or =.

 

The Red Army in 1944-45, with was good. No the Red Army in 1942, with was made of untrained recruits.

 

Remember 600,000 VEHICLES is not 600,000 TRUCKS.

A motorcycle is a 'vehicle'
A VW is a 'vehicle'
A horse drawn bakery is a 'vehicle'.

If we were to include every Allied VEHICLE in Normandy then we would get a number in the millions.

 

No, it wasn't.

The Soviet Union inflicted 90% of the casualties of the Wehrmacht. The Soviet Union won the second world war singlehandely in military terms.*

The second world war for dummies:

Germany attacks Poland, France and Britain declare war on Germany. Germany finishes off Poland, then attacks France and Britain. Destroys France and routs the British army. Then Germany attacks the USSR, and the USSR destroys the Wehrmacht after 4 years of fighting. The US and Britain notices that Stalin will rule over all Europe if they stay around doing anything, so they lauch and expedition to recover some land in Europe from the communists. The western front was a savaging operation.

The second world war for excessive patriotic Americans:

Germany attacks Poland, France and Britain declare war on Germany. Germany finishes off Poland, than attacks France. The French sissies surrender themselves, while poor Britain is under heavy attack. Them poor USSR is attacked by the Nazis and they manage to hold them off by unloading millions of squads with 2 men with 1 gun , they lose 10 million death and kill 400.000 nazis in the process. But them, the US intervenes, saves poor England from the U-boats, makes the best army in the world and invades Europe against the entire German army. In the Battle of the Bulge the US army confronts 40 Elite SS panzer divisions with 100% fresh troops that were stored for 5 years only awaiting for the US to come. The US loses 80.000 men but kills and wounds 2 million Germans, the bloodiest battle in WW2 (well, after Iwo Jima and Okinawa, of course )! After 1 year if fighting the US loses 200.000 men and kills 3 million Nazis, the US defeats Germany and let the poor Soviets have a piece of Germany because of pity.

The role of the US and Britain was economic: Bomb the cities to reduce industrial production to help the soviets and provide lend-lease aid to the Soviets.

Let's see if I have fabricated numbers:

From wikipedia's page of operation overlord we have:

226,386 Allied casualties, of with 36,976 KIA plus 19,221 missing. Plus "16,714 airmen were killed in direct connection to Operation Overlord."

209,875 German casualties second to one source and a very round and probably very wrong 450,000 casualties number.

Where:

"Tamelander states the German Army lost 288,875 men in France, this figure breaks down to 23,019 dead, 67,240 wounded, and 198,616 missing. However according to Tamelander, these figures also include losses from the fighting in Southern France as well as from following the retreat. He suggests roughly 79,000 men should be deducted from this total to give an accurate figure for the Normandy"

Anyway, let's compare KIAs:

So, second to Tamelander, less than 23,.00 German soldiers were KIA in Normandy. If we deduct the same proportion of 79,000/289,000 we get 16,700 German KIA in Normandy, while the Allies have 37.000 KIA. A ratio of 2,216 to 1.

For illustration, in the Battle of France 1940, there were about 46,000+ KIA German and 120,000 KIA French (second to many books that I have read, including Wages of Destruction). A ratio of 2.61 to 1.

Now, lets compare total OPERATIONAL CASUALTIES:

In France the Germans had 90,000 KIA+WIA, however only 72,67% of these casualties were in Normandy, so we can reduce that to 65,4 thousand german operational casualties in Normandy. While the allies had 207.000 operational casualties in Normandy. A ratio of 3.16 to 1. I.e.: For every german soldier killed or wounded in battle, we had 3.16 allied soldiers!

For comparison, in France 1940, the allies lost 360,000 dead or wounded while the German's lost 137.000 dead and wounded (source: wikipedia). A ratio of 2.63 to 1. So the French were indeed better fighters than the British and Americans.

Considering that in Normandy the allies had total superiority in numbers in men, equipment and airpower while the Germans had soldiers with 8 weeks of training. And while in 1940 the French faced roughly even odds vs German soldiers with adequate training, I would say that the French army in 1940 was better than the British-American army in 1944, with makes perfect sence since the French have way more military tradition in ground warfare.

 

You seem to have no concept of what the British and later the Americans were doing to the Germans in North Africa, Sicily, Italy, the Atlantic, and in the skies over Germany from 1941 to 1944.

 

Total German KIA for the Western front from June 1944 to 30 November 1944:

66,300.

11,000 KIA per month.

Total German KIA for the Eastern front from June 1941 to 30 November 1944:

1,419,000.

34,600 KIA per month.

Total German KIA vs France 1940:

46,000 in 44 days.

31,360 KIA per month.

Source: Feldgrau.com - The German Armed Forces 1919-1945

Total German KIA in Field Army only in the Western front from June 1944 to April 1945:

46,800.

Source: Twentieth Century Atlas - World War Two Casualty Statistics

 

I'm sure it had nothing to do with Stalin's repeated requests for the western powers to open additional fronts.

And what is this "recover some land in Europe from the Communists."? France, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxemburg, etc, where firmly in Fascist German hands, not communist.

 

German KIA:

North Africa: 12,808

Italy: 47,873

Western Front: 66,266

Skies of Germany: 64,055

Total vs US + Britain: 190,930.

Total vs USSR: 1,419,000.

Proportions:

USSR: 88,2% of KIA

USA+Britain: 11,8% of KIA

Source: http://www.feldgrau.com/

 

Proportions of KIA+WIA of the Wehrmacht:

Vs the USSR: 4,900,000 dead and wounded.

Vs the US+Britain: 580,000 dead and wounded.

Proportions:

89,4% for the USSR.

10,6% for the Western Allies.

Source: http://www.militaryhistoryonline.com/wwii/armies/default.aspx

 

It is true that the Western Allies took a loot of prisoners in proportion to their casualties, in France from June to 30 august, 70% of the German casualties were prisoners.

However, that only means that the Western allies came to Europe to rescue them from the commies, in fact, many German soldiers assigned to the Eastern front surrendered themselves to the Anglo/Americans. The reality was that the Western Allies were doing an rescue operation of Europe from the USSR. The 11,000 KIA per month didn't make a real difference (for the americans: and since 60% of the allies in the western front were Americans, the Americans inflicted about 6,600 KIA per month, compared to 36,400 for the soviets, that in the peak participation of the americans in WW2, rather insignificant?).Overall it is improbable that more them 150,000 germans died in action agaisnt the western allies in ww2 in ground battles, however, since there aren't decent statístics for the battle of the bulge forward, we have to content with 120,000 KIA from 1941 to 30 november 1944.

Also, in the Normandy campaign the Germans had 380,000 men in Normandy in 23 July, facing 1,452,000 British and American soldiers (in 25 July) (source: wikipedia). The 200,000 casualty figure for Normandy seems right to me. And that discrepancy explains why there were so many prisioners.

If there were 1 million germans in Normandy, instead of 380,000, the allies would have a real battle in their hands. And without 4 million men allocated to the Eastern front in June 1944, they could put easily 1 million men in every possible landing zone and realocate them if the allies landed in one of these zones.

 

A simple retabulation of the casualty figures you first used from D'Este.
The Allied loss figures are fairly well known. No disputes here.
I remind you that it includes Air Force and Navy losses.
Nothing new here.

Opps! Your bias is showing. The actual quote is:

"The German casualties remain unclear. The estimates of the German casualties stretches from 209,000 men to 450,000 men."
This is you introducing a source and then rubbishing your source's conclusions!
Sorry but you can not do that. The range is now up to 450,000.

You should be aware I already mentioned the Southern France losses in a post above.
How is it that you can not understand the German problem?
They had 200,000 men who had 'vanished' and they reported them as missing.
Why do you not admit that there were a lot of dead soldiers in that missing total?. The Germans who compiled the early reports did not know how many of the missing were dead
Nothing new here.

Wrong. You partially quote Tamelander by using his ESTIMATES of casualties in Southern France and applying a completely bogus reduction to the MINIMUM number of Germans killed in Normandy.
Where did the 77,000 German Soldiers buried in Normandy come form?

Bollocks! The Germans did ESTIMATE their casualties I gave you this earlier but here it is again:

(Müller-Hillebrand, Heer, Vol. 3, p. 171) 54,754 dead and 338,933 missing.

Total garbage.
The German death total was 54,754 (min)-77,00 (max) Your whole case is built upon fabrication and falsehood.
I think this might interest you:

 

Do you think he even notices how his sources contradict each other?
No matter what figures he finds to bolster his distorted world view he simply has no explaination as to why there are 77, 000 German soldiers buried in Normandy alone

 

The Red Army is men per men as good as the British and American armies?

Well, at the battle of Kursk armies of 900,000 well trained Germans and 1,300,000 Soviets resulted in 55,000 German casualties and roughly 250,000 Soviet casualties (source: Battle of Kursk - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia).

Very few prisoners were taken so we can assume that these casualties were operational casualties. A ratio of rougly 4 to 1.

While at Normandy an army of 380,000 not so well trained German soldiers and 1,400,000 British/American soldiers resulted in 65,000 German operational casualties and 210,000 allied operational casualties. A ratio of rougly 3 to 1. Since the 300,000 germans faced overwhelming odds, the ones that could, retreated, the other 200,000 surrendered.

At the battle of Monte Cassino the allies suffered "over 100,000" casualties and the germans "at least 20,000" (source:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Monte_Cassino). A ratio of 5 to 1, not to different from the Battle of Kursk.

Makes sense? In my view the western allies would have lost about 10 million men if they tried to reconquer Europe from 350 well trained and supplied German divisions, instead of the 50 divisions of not so well trained and supplied that they historically faced.

Anyway, the moderator can remove my penalty in reputation after I listed a credible set of sources for my numbers?

 

Complete distortion. If there were only 65,000 German dead AND wounded how come 77,000 German dead are buried in Normandy?

Anyone know where all the 'extra' German dead came from?

 

Guaporense:you can defend the point of view that without the SU (neutral or eliminated )the Allies could not win against Germany. I have my doubts on a automatic allied victory (some members will be indignant ),BUT you can not usu losses figures only as proof . Also you can not use only KIA,a MIA is aequal as a KIA.
The same for wounded of which many did not return to the front .
About Kursk:your figures are wrong:German strength was less than 770000 (and this is a ratio strength );the Soviet losses were 177000 men .
About the German losses in the East:at the end of 1944 :some 2000000 KIAand MIA (nobody is able to say how much MIA were killed )AND 3.4 million wounded =5.4 million,weekly =some 40OOO
German losses in the West from Overlord to september :some 200000 KIA and WIA + 200000 missing (POW and deaths )=400000,weekly 32000 .
That the German losses in the East were bigger than on the other fronts (btw :NOT,NOT 90 % )does not mean that the SU won the war alone .
Losses are not the only criterion :there was never more than 40 % of the Wehrmacht fighting in the East,and in most cases even less nly in june 1943 had the Ostheer some 3.2 million men .If there were not more than 5million men on the other fronts,do you believe that the SU would have won (not to mention the 100000's of men and the 1OOOO 's of AAguns not available due to the allied bombardments ) .?

 

Not trying to split hairs, but Stalin wanted a second front in 42', by 44' a second front while helpful was irrelevant in terms of deciding the outcome of the war.

To be fair, the allies too asked Stalin's help in stepping up his offensive in order to relieve pressure from Allied troops caused by the Ardennes Offensive.

I think the point which was being made here was that had the Allies not stepped foot in France, these countries would fall to Stalin...


Cheers.

 

Actually, I said that the allies could win without the USSR. I just said it would not be the walk in the park that was historically, the odds would be much more in favor of Germany. And I believe that Roosevelt would not let 10 million American boys die in Europe for the freedom of France (and he would never know about the death camps).

And note that the USSR killed monthly about 36,000 Germans while the allies killed 11,000, after D-day. However, the number of total casualties is proportional: Second to Glantz, the Germans lost 400.000 in the western front from June 1944 to December 1944, before bulge, while the USSR inflicted 1.2 million casualties. Note that the number of casualties is proportional to KIA.

I have already demonstrated that the distributions of the numbers of KIA+WIA are roughly proportional to the distribution of the number of KIAs.

While lots of MIAs happen after a lot of KIA+WIA has been inflicted on the armed force in question. In the case, in Normandy the allies captured 200.000 german soldiers because germany had already lost millions in the eastern front, with those extra millions in manpower they could have reinforced every mile of the western front to the point were the allies would never had the chance to envelop any german forces, so they would not have captured any germans. So we can say that these WIA in normandy were caused by the USSR, not by the western allies!

june 1944:

The Wehrmacht had 9.4 million men, of with 7 million in ground forces. Of with 2 million in supplies and 5 million on the frontlines.

Of these 5 million we have 3 million in the eastern front, 400.000 in italy, 1 million in the western front and 600.000 in other places (i.e.: norway, balkans, germany, etc).

Note that the strength of the armed forces =/= from the number of men in the front.

The bombing reduced German armament production by 20% in 1944, however Germany didn't need more weapons in 1944, they needed more pilots, more fuel and more soldiers, ie: more manpower and strategic resources.

If they had all their planes and guns that defended from bombardment in the eastern front, the war would have dragged longer for a few months. Note that only in the second half of 1943 that bombing became a real threat, by that time the USSR already had won WW2.

 

My opinion on the American army:

The American army was a fine and fairly competent army during WW2. During the course of the war the American army improved too, and by its end was the second most powerful military force in the world (after the Red Army, of course).

It was better than the Japanese army, better than the Italian army, I would say, roughly equivalent to the Red Army in combat effectiveness (slightly better if you include the equipment). However, the best armies in a per man basis were the Germans and the Finnish armies (as they proved in the Winter and Continuation wars). The Hungarians were very good warriors too.

On a per man basis I would say that the American army was above average, at least after 2 years into the war, when they had learned the art of war.

Of course, today the US military is one of the best on a per man basis, with Britain and Israel.