A different Barbarossa.

Maur

Banned
The USSR population was, what, five times that of Germany?
Significantly less than two times. (if we mean Germany in its wartime borders, which we should)


Manstein's plan was highly dependent on the Russians attacking where he wanted them to (and with 2000+ miles of front this was not a garauntee) however by 1945 the Russians where experiencing a manpower crises
By 1945 almost everyone faced manpower crisis...
 
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Maur

Banned
1. There were some within the Nazi party who wanted a more moderate approach. If they get Hitler's ear over some of the complete a holes they might get a more lenient occupation while Germany is still at war... afterward... :(

3. Again considering how bad the Red Army performed in the beginning of the war with commanders committing Darwin Award levels of epic fail rather than contradict Stalin's orders... I'd say the purges were NOT exaggerated at all... If Stalin executes Zhukov, Konev and other competent Russian commanders later you get stuff like the Red Army dying due to the Russian winter worse than the Germans and advancing along a front and getting encircled and annihilated by the hundreds of thousands like the early war as well as the domino effect in morale these continuing disasters cause. Sure the Red Army has a lotta men but losing hundreds of thousands time and time again for seemingly little gain is not going to work...
1. Germany still have to deal with the fact that there is not enough food and that means Wehrmacht living off the land, basically starving the SU countryside.
3. The purges weren't aimed at good commanders, so their extent is irrelevant, you will have some talented people replacing the ones that got executed. What was important about them that they went a long way to prevent anyone from doing anything out of fear, and its most important effect was on mid and lower level, not higher command.

Manstein's plan had about as much chance at succeeding as the Japanese had chances of getting anywhere past Vladivostok.
Well, i totally can see Japanese landings near Okchotsk, Komsomolsk or Petropavlovsk...
 

Maur

Banned
Yes, you're right, you'd think that Stalin would leave in plenty of time. However, lots of people got trapped behind enemy lines because they didn't leave soon enough, the Blitzkrieg was much faster than they thought possible. Plus if for some reason Stalin gets it into his head that he HAS to stay in Moscow to make some kind of military-political statement... or to maintain control...

Granted all of the above is a stretch but you need a stretch for Barbarossa to be a success, and that's how this thread started.
Stalin is pretty irrelevant to USSR surrender. Seriously, that the Hitler had some silly idea that if you get rid of opposing country leader you won does't mean it is true.
 
There were some within the Nazi party who wanted a more moderate approach.

Unfortunately, this isn't going to happen. While there were "moderate" Nazis like Alfred Rosenberg who wanted to work with Germanized client states, that is not what Hitler wanted. Hitler wanted lebensraum which meant the enslavement of the east Slavs, eventual forced expulsion or mass murder, and future German settlement. For Hitler to not want this, you need ASB to abduct him and rewire his brain.

Germany doesn't have to conquer the whole country... at most they have to reach the Urals and take out the industry there.

This is based on the same wrong assumptions that made Barbarossa a deeply flawed plan. Hitler expected the Soviet government to collapse. The Red Army would disintegrate and melt away. After several pitched battles, the German army would cakewalk to Urals. There they would deal with any disorganized Russian resistance like the US Cavalry did against the Plains Indians. That won't happen. The Red Army will not fall apart, and the Soviet government will continue to fight. New formations will be raised, and the Soviets will counterattack. Even if the Whermahct reached the Urals (which is highly unlikely), it will not end the war.

If Stalin executes Zhukov, Konev and other competent Russian commanders later you get stuff like the Red Army dying due to the Russian winter worse than the Germans and advancing along a front and getting encircled and annihilated by the hundreds of thousands like the early war as well as the domino effect in morale these continuing disasters cause.

The purpose of purges was to establish Stalin's control of the Red Army. That purpose was accomplished. Anyone in charge is due to Stalin. By 1941 the purges are over. Even if Zhukov or others end up dying in an altered purge, the Red Army will still have some really good generals who survive. They will rise to the top. The course of the war will be changed slightly, but I don't see it being decisive. As the war lasted longer, Stalin learned to trust his generals and allowed them more and more to make the decisions (unlike Hitler who interfered more and more). For Stalin to keep interfering would mean to completely change his personality.

No Lend Lease and you get stuff like Leningrad being starved into submission... Stalingrad and Baku falling and the Red Army being incapable of making the massed deployments like Mars and Bagration that it did.

Lend Lease is important. The Soviets will still make their own guns, tanks, and planes. So the Red Army will still be able to create new formations. But Lend Lease basically gave the USSR most of its supply trucks, railroad stock, canned foods, radios, and lots of technical data, managerial technique, precision equipment, and raw materials they needed for their industry.

The Red Army did not need that to stop Hitler in 1941 and 1942, but they certainly needed it to push the Germans back as they did in 1943-1945. Reduced Lend Lease doesn't mean the Soviets are defeated, but it does mean they don't reach Berlin before the Western Allies do.

The Germans cannot force the Soviets to collapse - which was the entire rationale behind Barbarossa. The most they can hope for is to do enough damage to force a Brest-Litovsk type treaty. This is possible, but it requires a completely different plan. The Germans would need to acknowledge that this is going to be a multi-year campaign that will inflict massive casaulties on themselves. It guarantees a long two front war at the same time the US is obviously preparing for war as well. It is doubtful the Nazis would agree to such a plan; instead they might look at another means to hit the British in the hopes they push out Churchill and negotiate a peace.
 
To get back to the original post on what would happen with a southern strategy, this is what I see as being most likely.

1) The Germans achieve great success in early summer as IOTL. Units advance into the Baltics and towards Smolensk. The Soviet counterattack there is contained as IOTL, and seems to give validation to Hitler's southern strategy.

2) If Finland enters the war, the Finns might accept Stalin's offer to return the territories he takes. Since Leningrad and Murmansk are not a priority for Hitler, he may not object to a separate peace so soon. Or precisely because the north is not important, the Finns don't enter the war in 1941.

3) Germans achieve great initial success in the south. Although Sevastapol holds, Germans continue to advance to the Donetsk basin. Their goal is Rostov, Voronezh, and perhaps Stalingrad. Resistance is heavier than expected. The lack of good infrastructure is hurting the Germans. They find out that they do not have enough tanks to replace those that they have lost,a nd the Luftwaffe likewise finds it harder to keep an air umbrella over the advancing troops.

4) Autumn rains halt the advance shortly after German units cross the Donets. Hitler believes the Red Army is out of reserves. Once the ground freezes hard enough for the panzers to roll, Hitler orders an all out attack towards Stalingrad to occupy the Volga and cut off the Caucasus. German troops are increasingly affected by the cold.

5) The Germans overextend their lines, thinking the Red Army has no reserves. A massive Soviet counterattack near Stalingrad forces the unprepared Germans to retreat, causing them to take many casaulties. Hitler orders the army to stand and fight. The southern front lines stabilize somewhere between the Donets and Don.

6) Hitler declares war on the United States after the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor and invade the Allies' colonies in Southeast Asia.

7) After the initial success of the Stalingrad counter-offensive, Stalin orders attacks in the Baltics and Smolensk. Both are beaten back by prepared German defenses at high cost to the Soviet Union.

8) Hitler plans a new offensive for 1942. He has achieved many of his initial war aims, but the Soviet Union has not collapsed. He thinks their reserves are low, and that another offensive will allow him to gain the Caucasus oil. The German Army makes new preparations.

9) The Red Army now guesses that Hitler's objectives are the economic resources in the South. They plan to deal with an attack there. Note this is different than OTL when the Red Army guessed wrong that Moscow would be the objective.

10) A new German offensive happens in the south. There are additional Italian, Hungarian, and Romanian units. German forces may be slightly larger than IOTL. After some initial success, the Germans run into fierce resistance. They reach the Volga again, but are unable to take Stalingrad. Some German units reach Astrakhan. Others slowly advance into the Caucasus mountains, attempting to reach Baku.

11) If hard pressed to defend the Caucasus, Stalin agrees that several British divisions from the Middle East can enter the Soviet Union. The Germans manage to seize some oil wells north of the mountains, but they find it hard to cross. The line stabilizes with the Germans not reaching Baku.

12) Stavka plans for its next winter offensive. They know that the Germans are overstretched. They decide that they will not attack the Germans at the front near Stalingrad, but well to the west. Their objective is to drive south towards Rostov and cut off the German troops in the Kuban. They mass their armies in secret, and achieve surprise. The rail center at Kurks is retaken. The Red Army crosses the Don and reach the Donets before Germans recover their lines. A salient is formed between the Don and Donets that threatens all German troops to the south.

13) Diversionary attacks by the Soviets elsewhere achieve little success.

14) Determine to enter the war and fight Germans as soon as possible, American troops land in French North Africa in the fall of 1942. Their objective is to seize the entire coast and trap and destroy German and Italian forces between them and the British 8th Army. If this can be done, they plan to invade France in 1943. The plan proves too ambitious as the failure to secure Tunisia allows Hitler to send troops into Tunisia, prolonging the fighting. Eventually, the Germans and Italians surrender.

15) 1943 begins. The German Army has not taken as many casualties as they had IOTL, but the strategic situation is not that different. One major benefit is that the armies of the Axis satellites are not as badly mauled in this timeline. It appears unlikely that Axis forces will be able to seize Baku, and Don salient threatens to possibly cut off all forces to the south. At this time, Hitler considers a separate peace deal with the Russians, if Stalin will agree to the Ukraine being ceded to the Germans. Stalin balks at such a concession. Hitler plans one last summer blitzkrieg to inflict massive casaulties to force Stalin to come to terms.

16) Hitler decides to focus on the salient between the Donets and Don. It has prime economic importance and offers the chance to cut off large numbers of troops. The attack will be vital as failure will mean the troops in the Kuban and Caucasus are at a risk. After a long delay, the attack begins in July 1943.

17) The Soviets have fortified the salient extensively. Despite initial German successes, they are unable to close the gap. Instead, the Russians launch a counterattack. Instead of heading south to Rostoc, they veer west towards the lower Dnieper and Sea of Azov. Another attack strikes Smolensk which is also successful.

18) The long front of the Germans cannot be maintained. Despite the oil wells at Maikop, there are too many troops there being idle. The troops begin evacuation. Some head towards Rostov to keep the route open, but the southernmost units cross into the Crimea. While the Germans have stabilized their lines, they have lost all their 1942 conquests, and are in a worse position than how 1941 ended. However, they are doing slightly better then OTL in terms of casulaties and lost units.

19) The Western Allies invade Sicily and then Italy. In Tehran in late 1943, they promise Stalin that they will invade France in May or June 1944.

20) Hitler decides that the German Army must be on the defensive in the east in 1944 in order to prepare for the inevitable invasion of France.

21) Stalin orders an offensive in the winter of 1944. The Red Army takes Kiev and crosses the Dnieper. They drive south, liberating most of the Ukraine and cutting off German forces in the Crimea.

22) Allies invade Normandy in June 1944. Coordinating their attacks, the Red Army unleashes a new offensive towards Minsk, inflicting heavy German casaulties. Hitler orders his forces in the Baltics to stay so that the Baltic Sea can continue to be used for U-Boat training.

23) After some initial delays, the Western Allies liberate France and drive to the Rhine.

24) Romania, Hungary, and Bulgaria begin secret talks with the Allies to switch sides. Western Allies refuse unless the Soviet Union agrees. Eventually it is agreed that in the spring of 1945 that they can switch sides, but must accept Red Army troops to cross their country so they can aid Tito in Yugoslavia, and cut off German forces in Greece. Britain plans to land troops in Greece to support them.

25) Hoping to push the Western Allies back and obtain a separate peace, Hitler orders a winter offensive in the Ardennes with the objective of the port of Antwerp. It fails, destroying most of the German reserves.

26) In early spring 1945, the Western Allies cross the Rhine and drive towards the Elbe. In the east, the Red Army enters Romania, Hungary, and Bulgaria as those countries change sides. An offensive in the center drives towards Poland.

27) The Western Allied offensive near Berlin stalls as the city's defenses are too great. Rather than waste troops on a prestige target, Eisenhower authroizes Patton to take Prague and attempt to reach Cracow. Other American armies are sent south and reach Vienna, as Allied forces in Italy meet them. Tito's partisans liberate Yugoslavia. American and Red Army troops meet on the Danube near Vienna.

28) As the Red Army nears Warsaw in May 1945, the Polish government in exile launches an uprising supported by American and British airpower. Polish airborne troops are dropped into the city. The Red Army enters most of Poland, but Patton does reach some of prewar Poland, and also occupies some of Silesian territory which is due to be given to the Poles.

29) The Allies agree that Berlin is to be taken by a combined offensive by the Soviets, Americans and British. The Red Army continues through Poland,a nd after heavy fighting crosses the Oder. The British liberate Denmark, opening up the Baltic. The Polish government in exile requests all Polish units be sent to northern Poland so that can have a token presence in the Battle of Berlin. The Americans welcome home to Prague the return of the Czechoslovakian government-in-exile.

30) The Battle of Berlin begins in August 1945. The Americans discuss whether to drop the atomic bomb on Berlin, but decide against it as they need a government to negotiate final surrender. The city surrenders shortly after Hitler kills himself. Karl Donitz, new leader of Germany, surrenders to the combined Allied powers.

31) Occupation zones are similar to that IOTL, but the Western Allies have a northern land bridge to their sectors in Berlin. Americans evacuate Czechoslovakia, and the Red Army established their supply line through that country as the Polish government is insistent that the Red Army cannot stay in Poland. Crisis is averted.

32) In Eastern Europe, Communist regimes establish themselves in Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, and Yugoslavia. Baltic countries remain part of the Soviet Union. Czechoslovakia retains its democratic government for the time being, but is quite friendly with Moscow. The Poles continue to cause trouble as relations with the Soviet Union deteriorate.

33) Japan surrenders in our time line, but because of the longer war in Europe, the Red Army never enters Manchuria. Nationalist China is able to hold onto Manchuria's industrial assets, and the Red Army does not leave stores of weapons for Mao's Communists to use. This greatly hurts the ability of the Chinese Communists in their upcoming struggle against the Nationalists.
 
...3. The purges weren't aimed at good commanders, so their extent is irrelevant, you will have some talented people replacing the ones that got executed. What was important about them that they went a long way to prevent anyone from doing anything out of fear, and its most important effect was on mid and lower level, not higher command.

The purges were aimed at those who were thought to be "politically unreliable", whether they were good, bad, or indifferent. Considering that good people tend to be outspoken and opinionated, and therefore have pissed someone, anyone, off...

While there were talented people in the replacements, they were inexperience in their new jobs and had to learn on the job during Barbarossa.
 
Stalin is pretty irrelevant to USSR surrender. Seriously, that the Hitler had some silly idea that if you get rid of opposing country leader you won doesn't mean it is true.

Stalin irrelevant???

Are you serious?

Stalin had complete control of all aspects of life in the USSR, that's why the USSR was called a totalitarian state. If Stalin is captured alive and then "persuaded" to sign a peace treaty, then the treaty will be honored out of inertia. How long it will be honored is debatable, but at least in the short term.

If Stalin's corpse is displayed, then a civil war breaks out as to which group calls the shots.
 

Maur

Banned
The purges were aimed at those who were thought to be "politically unreliable", whether they were good, bad, or indifferent. Considering that good people tend to be outspoken and opinionated, and therefore have pissed someone, anyone, off...

While there were talented people in the replacements, they were inexperience in their new jobs and had to learn on the job during Barbarossa.
Yes, i meant that extending the purges (idea which my post was a reply to) wouldn't change much as they were extensive enough for the damage done.
 
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Maur

Banned
Stalin irrelevant???

Are you serious?

Stalin had complete control of all aspects of life in the USSR, that's why the USSR was called a totalitarian state. If Stalin is captured alive and then "persuaded" to sign a peace treaty, then the treaty will be honored out of inertia. How long it will be honored is debatable, but at least in the short term.

If Stalin's corpse is displayed, then a civil war breaks out as to which group calls the shots.
Of course i am.

Totalitarian doesn't mean autocratic, by the way, which you seem to imply. You can have collectively ruled totalitarian states and non-totalitarian autocratic ones. And i am unsure what you mean by "complete" control. He had very strong political position, but he was human, not an overmind.

Nevertheless, despite his position, if he is captured then he is replaced without much fuss among higher echelons of the party, although obviously he'd get martyr status.
 
By 1945 almost everyone faced manpower crisis...

Hovewer, the Soviet-Union already faced a manpower crisis by the beginning of 1942.

Stalin had complete control of all aspects of life in the USSR,


Not really, because the communists had to expand from a small group and to win the civil war, they had to be liberal on who they recruted, after the civil war millions who had fought communism could potentially rise again should an opportunity to do so came.
All branches of power, be it army or state apparatus, where filled with rutless backstabbers and plotters that cared everything for themselves, completely disregarded anything else.
Trotsky and others had the power they did because they had considerable backing, Stalin only won by outplotting them and their own failures made them loose popularity. Even with trotsky removed from the Soviet-Union, his partisans where still much active and trotskiste groups in the US openly admitted these worked to overthrow Stalin.

Stalin´s purges where necessary 1) to avoid a coup in the next few years, 2) avoid a coup in case the Soviet-Union faced a major defeat.
 
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Maur

Banned
Hovewer, the Soviet-Union already faced a manpower crisis by the beginning of 1942.
Weird. It certainly faced severe economic problems after losing territory in the beginning of 1942, and even worse problems in the beginning of 1943, but manpower? How so?
 
Weird. It certainly faced severe economic problems after losing territory in the beginning of 1942, and even worse problems in the beginning of 1943, but manpower? How so?

If I may jump in here. There was a manpower crisis in the Red Army in the 1945 time frame. Division organizations were repeatedly reduced in the 1944-1945 time frame, but units still had great difficulty keeping up to TO&E strength.

Bayonet Strength used to have a good article on this, but the Soviet section of the website seems to be gone. (??)

I'm not aware of a 'raw' manpower crisis in 1942, though the Red Army had a perpetual shortage of trained and equipped manpower up until late 1943 or so. This led to the 'every other man gets a rifle' attacks, or the ones where the leading line had improvised pole-arms. You can see a good example (though temporally and geographically misplaced) of this in the movie "Enemy at the Gates."
 

Maur

Banned
If I may jump in here. There was a manpower crisis in the Red Army in the 1945 time frame. Division organizations were repeatedly reduced in the 1944-1945 time frame, but units still had great difficulty keeping up to TO&E strength.

Bayonet Strength used to have a good article on this, but the Soviet section of the website seems to be gone. (??)

I'm not aware of a 'raw' manpower crisis in 1942, though the Red Army had a perpetual shortage of trained and equipped manpower up until late 1943 or so. This led to the 'every other man gets a rifle' attacks, or the ones where the leading line had improvised pole-arms. You can see a good example (though temporally and geographically misplaced) of this in the movie "Enemy at the Gates."
Oh my... the film in question is the first instance this particular meme appeared on the interwebz. Nowadays almost every discussion about Barbarossa has someone bringing the "one rifle per two men" idea, whereas there are no mentions of it before that terrible thing :D

(that doesn't mean i disagree with 1945 crisis. Trained (military i suppose) manpower i don't know, never heard of it. On one hand, with such mobilization one would expect it, on the other hand, conscription and obligatory service pre-war - frantic attempts to stop Germans in 1941 aside)
 
Oh my... the film in question is the first instance this particular meme appeared on the interwebz. Nowadays almost every discussion about Barbarossa has someone bringing the "one rifle per two men" idea, whereas there are no mentions of it before that terrible thing :D

Can't speak to the internet, but I first encountered the 'every other man with a rifle' and 'first line with pitchforks' in a book about Barbarossa in the 1990's. The book had been around for a while. I'll see if I can find it.

That sort of thing was fading by/in 1943 and gone by 1944. I don't know of any cases of it occurring at or near Stalingrad.
 
Can't speak to the internet, but I first encountered the 'every other man with a rifle' and 'first line with pitchforks' in a book about Barbarossa in the 1990's. The book had been around for a while. I'll see if I can find it.

That sort of thing was fading by/in 1943 and gone by 1944. I don't know of any cases of it occurring at or near Stalingrad.

Those incidents did happen, the most visible and notorious where around Leningrad for obvious reasons, otherwise it was usually restricted to when the Germans pocketed Russian armies and they tried to break out, despite unnacceptably low levels of supplies (including small arms)
 
yes but the Russian one could be brought to a head earlier by more successful defensive battles in 1943 and 1944, and a longer german occupation of the Ukraine and Belaraus

You never seem to allow for the fact that the Heer had been chopped to bits by 1943 to say nothing of the lesser Axis powers while the Red Army was much better than it was in 1941.

The German are going to be pressing OTL Volksrumm recruits into the Heer long before they bleed the Soviets white. The fact is Germany is fighting on three fronts. The main one against an enemy with 2.5 to 1 manpower edge which will only get greater the more land they recapture and the German manpower pool already shallow in 1941 gets shallower.
 
The first thing Stalin decided after he came out of his self enforced exile at the start of Barbarossa was that he intended to stay in Moscow no matter what happened. So taking Moscow in 1941 could definitely result in regime change....given a desperate enough situation it could easily become ' lets make a deal'.

As to the troop strength issue , their may be some miss understanding. The soviets had a real problem with lack of trained junior officers etc and had to adjust their system as best possible to met this problem. They also recognized that to defeat the Germans they needed more guns [arty & AT] per km density to halt the German attacks.

According to Glantz extensive works, the simplest solution they developed was to let the line companies run down in trench strength but to maintain the weapons companies at full strength. Then they just adjusted employment so battalions were given company frontages etc and the whole system worked more or less. It took several years to work this out reaching its best in 1944/45.
 
Most likely, the manpower shortage (not crisis) in 1942 was due to Germany occupying most of the Russian homeland. Hard to recruit young men from Kiev, Smolensk, and Minsk when German troops are all over them. That manpower pool opens up once the Red Army takes it back.

The Red Army did lose a lot of men in 1941. Having said that, the Red Army kept getting bigger in 1941 and 1942. Maybe its pool of reserves were getting low, but the Red Army itself was still able to complete its new formations.

The Red Army was near the end of its manpower in 1945, but compared to Germany, it had all the men in the world. While the Soviet Union was dreadfully short of young men that were prime solider material after 4 years of war, the Germans were already out and dredging up Hitler Youth and old men. The Soviets were still a ways off from being that desperate.

I agree with Urban Fox that Germany will face manpower shortages way before it affects the Soviets to any real degree. The Germans had received a large number of casualties during Barbarossa, and they were struggling to replace them in 1942. Furthermore, in terms of tanks and planes, the Germans didn't replace them. Relative to the Red Army, the Wehrmacht was getting weaker.
 
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