The General Russia Thread

@Swanpride Yeah, Hitler more or less caught Stalin with his pants down. Supposedly, Stalin went on a drinking binge to cope with the shock.

edited 21st Jan '17 1:41:43 AM by M84

Disgusted, but not surprised

Stalin didn't go on a drinking binge, that's just something that Khrushchev came up with when he somehow didn't find Stalin's actual faults to be condemning enough and decided to invent some more in true Soviet propaganda fashion. In reality, Stalin worked overtime during the initial stages of the war, which is evidenced by a log of visitors to his Kremlin office and a whole bunch of documents that he wrote or signed in the period when he was supposedly drinking.

I would write a long post here about how the Nazis thought the Communists to be ideologically incompatible with them and therefore needed to be destroyed and how the USSR understood that and prepared for a war but was critically wrong in the timing of its preparations and how the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact was the result of the USSR trying to forge an alliance with every single other European power but getting the cold shoulder because everybody was perfectly happy to see the Soviets and the nazis destroy each other until the only option available for the Soviet leadership was to try to make a pact with Germany itself as a desperate geopolitical hail Mary, but I think that you're very firmly set in your conviction that Russia is and has always been a bunch of irredeemable goblins and arguing with you about it is futile.

Oh, you mean Stalin annexed his neighbour countries in self-defence? If he wanted a defence against Hitler, it would have been right there, with the eastern countries Hitler attacked...or with ANY other country Hitler was already at war with.

Look, I am the first who will point out that Russia did more to take down Hitler than any other alley, and also that the US wasn't bothered at all about the notion of Russians and Germans dying alike. But that doesn't change the fact that Stalin miscalculated badly by thinking that Hitler wouldn't attack because he was too busy elsewhere, while using the opportunity to conquer some territory of its own.

To be fair, Hitler attacking with the Western Front still open was stupidity on Hitler's part. He overestimated him. Once Stalin understood exactly how stupid Hitler was, things like Stalingrad ensued.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

There was also an economic reasoning to the Eastern Front. The economic policy of the Wehrmacht got Germany back on its feet, but it was ratcheting up foreign debt at an absurd pace.

The only reason it was even able to keep itself afloat after 1939 was because they got lucky and Poland had left most of its gold reserves behind. Even then, that wouldn't keep them going forever, hence the invasion of France and later the USSR.

Also, to say the Wehrmacht underestimated the Red Army is almost comically understated. The Wehrmacht believed that the Soviet Union's reserve in manpower and equipment was approximately 150 divisions. It was 800 divisions.

@Swanpride you may be surprised to learn that here in the real world, rearmament, re-equipment and retraining an army in the wake of a huge military purge and a still somewhat underdeveloped industrial base compared to its true potential is extremely time-consuming. Stalin was expecting Hitler to attack in 1942, not 1941, hence the Soviets being caught with their pants down.

edited 21st Jan '17 3:49:08 AM by math792d

Still not embarrassing enough to stan billionaires or tech companies.

A little mor than a year before the war, Red Army turned out to be extremely bad at it (Talvisota). Please show me a country that built its armed forces in a year almost from scratch. Stalin wasn't overconfident, he just didn't have enough time to prepare the army for war. Moving the border westwards just meant that when the inevitable war starts, Wehrmacht has an extra 200km to go through, which, as history shows, was barely enough for the fighting to not go into Moscow.

Damn 's.

edited 21st Jan '17 3:53:25 AM by Pz_VI

The purge wasn't even that bad, the Winter War-era Red Army just sucked that much by itself.

I back that , and then some: Winter War era = suckage on toast with ham and grilled cheese.

From corruption to dismal internal organisation, hopeless equipment, inconsistent communication between battalions, horribly insufficient training and morale in the gutter... Yeah. It had everything. <_< Including simply glorious weather to get miserably dead in.

And the reason why the Red Army sucked so much in the Winter War was because of the purges, that and taking a completely unprepared army to fight on the winter.

The almost entirety of the officer corps capable of conducting the military operations in Finland was killed in the purges before the war, leaving inexperienced and untrained officers to pick up the tab when the war started, by the time the officer corps started getting enough experience in Finland the war was drawing to a close and the sights were being set on the Nazis.

Inter arma enim silent leges

No they were not. 38 000 officers were dismissed during 1937-38, 9000 of them because of old age or illness, and 12000 were rehabiliteted before the war. Total number of officers in the armed forces by 1938 was 180 000.

Red Army just lacked experience. Spain was obviously not enough, and conflicts with Japanese army at Khalkhyn Gol and Hasan left an impression that everything is fine.

It was a little more than that. The purges and re-management of the Red Army as a result, hampered the way it could conduct warfare at a strategical level.

To say the purges didn't matter or didn't have an impact on the Soviet War Machine isn't true.

Inter arma enim silent leges

@Silas - Ah, but most people do assume Africa and the middle east are singular ideologies outside of those who are experts on the region, as with Europe. Just have to listen to the average person or politician describe those regions (or really any region outside of the one they are from), and they do exactly that. You and Swanpride being European, you take umbrage at "the West", but you take the time to understand other regions while you both obviously understand Europe better than the average Russian or Arab or African would.

Analysis has to understand how the average citizen or politiican thinks of a region, and that means using the same terminology and definitions they do. Which is why, to argue how incorrect it is is inane because it doesn't matter if its wrong. Any expert would agree, sure, but we are not governed by experts.

Final Fantasy, Foreign Policy, and Bollywood. Helluva combo, that...

The purges were a factor, but they weren't the only one or even the most important one.

I'd contend that we're better than the average. Sure we're not experts but when do we here assume that the Middle East or Africa are the same politically? I'd like that to be extended to The West.

As for none of us being government agents, I'm still not convinced that there aren't high places nerds who might enjoy reading our discussions.

"And the Bunny nails it!" ~ Gabrael "If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we." ~ Cyran

I mean the average person. And frankly, going by certain comments in the refugee crisis thread, I'd contend people here do assume a lot about people outside of Europe.

Final Fantasy, Foreign Policy, and Bollywood. Helluva combo, that...

I'd say that most non-Western Europeans, including the Russians, really do see both Africa and the Middle East as homogenous entities and give the West the same treatment.

Although with our recent involvement Syria, our laymen have become very much aware of how the Middle East is divided into multiple squabbling nations. Who knows if Trump's reign will make us realise the same about the West in the future?

edited 21st Jan '17 7:52:54 AM by KnitTie

Isn't the goal to have an informed discussion? If we acknowledge that those terms are problematic unless used geographically, why use them?

Because those terms are used by decision makers and opinion-leaders among the public. When I'm explaining why a decision Russia takes has occured, for example, I use the term The West because the decision makers and the public there use that term. It has an understood meaning. Is that meaning overbroad and simplistic? Absolutely. Does it matter in the internal calculus that a nation's leaders would then use to inform their decisions (or vice versa)? Also absolutely.

I personally, and perhaps incorrectly, assume most people here understand the difference between political pop culture and the facts, and that the former often creates its own reality, a lot of times in contravention to the latter. But its not something the general public understands. A person is smart, people are dumb, etc., etc.

It's also true of every region and nation on earth.

Final Fantasy, Foreign Policy, and Bollywood. Helluva combo, that...

So, Trump is terrible and all, but is it possible that sanctions will be lifted, Russia will stop spiraling into self-isolation and the economy would unscrew itself?

If we disagree, that much, at least, we have in common

I thought your economy was doing fine.

Inter arma enim silent leges

Nah, Russia will continue to spread fascism around the world by interfering with elections. All to break up rival power blocs. Giving them concessions will only encourage more subversion.

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.

Russia isn't peachy, but I think spiraling is a bit of an overstatement...

Final Fantasy, Foreign Policy, and Bollywood. Helluva combo, that...

@Beholderess: That rather depends on Russian leaders' decisions in the coming months (will they be acting in good faith or will they be preparing to capitalize on weak leadership in the United States?), and whether or not Trump collapses the global economy again, which is entirely likely.

edited 23rd Jan '17 3:06:46 PM by CaptainCapsase

Russia's economy more or less starts and ends with the sale of the natural resources the country has. It could actually do much, much better if Putin were focussing on making Russia less dependent on imports instead of worrying about making the world afraid of Russia again. Which is exactly why Russia really wants the sanctions to be lifted. But Putin is actually making a big mistake by pushing for political unrest in Europe, because if the European states would really go back to the squabbles of the old and starting to fight with each other, it also might cut off Russia from some very essential products.

Russia is already the largest country in the world and barely do anything with all that empty space, so they shouldn't be invading their neighbors either.