Alternate WW2 alignment

wasn't the army that fought in khalkhin gol the most lavishly trained and equipped force the Soviets had at the time all with Zhukov in the lead?
 
wasn't the army that fought in khalkhin gol the most lavishly trained and equipped force the Soviets had at the time all with Zhukov in the lead?
Yes it was. IIRC, they basically stripped their best assets from the rest of the front, banking on the fact that the Japanese wouldn't expand the conflict, which of course they didn't
 
Well, I wouldn't exactly rank Japanese army as a strong adversary,

They were certainly numerically stronger than the Finnish Army, and they had actual recent combat experience.
But in any case, historians who studied the Nomonhan campaign wrote that the chief difference was in Soviet leadership. The Far East Army had not been purged to the same extent as the units in European Russia, so they did not have lieutenants in the positions that should have been held by experienced majors. Top leadership was not made of reliable political cronies.
Overall, the track record of the RKKA shows that in the midst of the heaviest losses conceivable - and in part thanks to them, by means of the mechanism of the survival of the fittest - they could learn quickly and in a matter of months put to good use their assets. Assets that at that time had no Lend-Lease labels.

and on the Russian front of WWII, the logistical infrastructure, roads, rivers, canals, railways, etc, was much more developped than it would be in the South Caucasus area.

Surely. That's why I posit that besides the Soviet advance into the Anatolian mountains (and, presumably, a landing West of Trabzon, which the Soviets may well botch but which will still hurt the Turks), the other important factor for the turning of Turkey is that the Luftwaffe will be bombing Istanbul. The only limiting factor is how quickly the Luftwaffe can deploy forward enough. Once that is done (with the acquiescence of the Bulgarians, probably, or elsewhere in the Balkans), the Turks have no air defence to speak of, and Istanbul is at this time a large city built of timber, with primitive civil defense resources.
 
How do you see them actually losing? Especially considering that the German surface fleet has been severely mauled trying to take Norway.
Starvation.
In 1939 the UK imported ~70% of it's food, even after rationing, in 1941 (for example) Britain imported over fifteen million tonnes of food.
Likewise about 13.5 million tonnes of liquid fuels was imported in 1940.

Britain also imported over five million tonnes of iron ore in 1939, which halved over the war and had to be substituted by domestic supply. Likewise vanadium, chromium, tungsten and molybdenum were mainly imported, about 52,000 tonnes in total.
Aluminum imports in 1939 amounted to 57kt of metal and goods and >300,000 tonnes of bauxite.
All are vital for wartime industry and not available domestically in the required quantities
 
Myself I have always wondered about a French Empire as a member of the Axis . Think of French Armored units on the eastern Front .
The French Had over 77 submarines, and building more in 1939 . And by June 1940 the French had some nice Aircraft joining the French air Force .
 
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