DBWI: The Soviet Victory in WWII Thread

I think we might have had some discussions on this before, but I wanted to ask the board, once and for all-is there any way Trotsky could have won WWII? Yes, I know he was fighting the entire rest of Europe and that, after the Soviet intervention in the German Civil War went pear-shaped, its kind of hard to imagine him coming out on top-but was it impossible? Is there any way the Reds could have triumphed, or was communism doomed from the start?
 

d32123

Banned
I don't think Trotsky could have done any better than Stalin did IOTL.

OOC: Trotsky leading the USSR is a tired, old, ASB cliche.
 

Meerkat92

Banned
Doubtful. It's not so much a question of military stategy (if I recall my European History 101, Trotsky was a pretty decent commander-in-chief) as much as it was logistics. If there was one thing The War proved, it was that command economies are unbelievably inefficient. Although the heightened repression on the home front lead to significant rebellions, the situation would never have gotten as dire as it did were it not for the massive famines that wracked the USSR near-continuously well into '46. And of course by that time, the Anglo-German force at Archangelsk was finally getting its shit together, The French and Australians were fighting their way up the Dneiper, and the war was pretty much lost. Pity about Moscow--I mean Trotskygrad--,though. The German forces made a point of avenging the Rape of Frankfurt, eye-for-an-eye and all that...
 
I tried gaming it at what I thought the optimal date for the Reds, the mid to latter 1930s. Just could not figure out how to make work for the poor Bolsihes. No matter how you start it Red Armies marching west cause a resurgence of Facist & conservative politcal groups who are able to suppress active pro Red leftist partys or revolts in Europe. Homegrown Bolshivik revolts can slow down a coalition of anit Soviet governments, but cant halt them. ...and of course th revrese is true. Anit communist revolts in the USSR emerge eventually and hampper the efforts of the Reds. The anti communist allies are no more able to plunge quickly & deeply into the Russian heartland than Napoleon. Better to work a step by step constriction strategy. Working inward from the edge by picking off the martime littorals & then the non Russian ethnic areas.
 
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