Germany knows Soviets are strong in 1941

From anyone that might know I am looking for more details on either of the above. Any hints as to where to look?

1) Info on Germans seeing a KV-1 in 1940

2) Guderian's writings

In English if possible.

Michael

I don't have an easy english source on the KV-1 that is readily available, it's mentioned in the OKW war diary in the spring of 1940 after Falkenhorst goes on an observation tour after the armistace; the exact date slips my mind. 20 day selections of the OKW war diary (translated into english) can be pulled through a college level library

Guderian's memoir's panzer leader mention his writings on the soviets in passing (ie when he talks about Hitler recalling him to active duty in the spring of 1943)... the books he is referring to are "Achtung Panzer!" and "the pocket book of tanks", both of which are widely available in english and the former of which can be purchased on amazon very cheaply

He also authored a number of military periodicals on the subject for several Reichswer and Heer publications... some of the later Heer ones in "signal" magazine may be available english, otherwise you will need to bone up on your German
 
I don't have an easy english source on the KV-1 that is readily available, it's mentioned in the OKW war diary in the spring of 1940 after Falkenhorst goes on an observation tour after the armistace; the exact date slips my mind. 20 day selections of the OKW war diary (translated into english) can be pulled through a college level library

Guderian's memoir's panzer leader mention his writings on the soviets in passing (ie when he talks about Hitler recalling him to active duty in the spring of 1943)... the books he is referring to are "Achtung Panzer!" and "the pocket book of tanks", both of which are widely available in english and the former of which can be purchased on amazon very cheaply

He also authored a number of military periodicals on the subject for several Reichswer and Heer publications... some of the later Heer ones in "signal" magazine may be available english, otherwise you will need to bone up on your German

I have Achtung Panzer some place but haven't read it in years, I will check.

Do you have a full title for the German War diary? Inter Library Loan and I are old friends I know how it works but I need to know what to ask for.

Thanks!

Michael
 
On the issue of the KV-1: as it was tested in the Winter War, what if the Finns manage to capture one and transport it off the front by train, to be tested by Finnish engineers? This is what happened to BT-series tanks, frex.

Everything else going as per OTL, the Germans would have all the information about the tank by late 1940 at the latest, maybe even the tank itself.
 
I will have to get back to you on appropriate titling... i know for a fact that harvard has a set translated into english and annotated by liddle-hart himself

I failed to find something with Liddle-Hart but I did find this.

World War II German military studies : a collection of 213 special reports on the Second World War prepared by former officers of the Wehrmacht for the United States Army : a Garland series / Donald S. Detwiler, editor, Charles B. Burdick and Jürgen Rohwer, associate editors.

http://discovery.lib.harvard.edu/?itemid=|library/m/aleph|000865115

Also I have found references to just OKW War Diary Series, I have no idea if they are one and the same with the above.

Michael
 
Germans staked everything on the breaking Red Army. They wouldn't choose to destroy or disable railroad, they knew was needed to them.

This is, or at least was until recently, an alternate history board, which means it is a place where we discuss alternative strategies historical figures might have taken to meet their objectives. "They wouldn't..." isn't an attempt to discuss alternatives. It's an attempt to declare the alternative off-limits. That's not what this board should be about. Sorry to single your post out, but I've noticed a lot of that type of argument here lately, and it cuts the heart out of what this board is all about.

Besides, to seriously affect Soviet railroad LW needed strategic arm, which it did not posses.
True to some extent, though with air superiority and the accuracy of dive bombers, the Germans would be able to disrupt train movement within the range of the dive-bombers, which would give the Soviets two bad alternatives: Limit use of trains to night-time within range of German dive-bombers, or lose scarce locomotives.

The fact is General Thomas, for example recognized the impossibility of Barbarossa as it was planned. However, he realized the atmosphere in OKW was such that his report would not be received well and he edited it. Hitler would simply refuse to accept any response different from what he wanted to hear.

I agree with most of this, but you're conflating two issues: (1) The Germans (including most of the high command as well as Hitler) were more optimistic than they should have been based on the information they had available to them. That, I think we agree on. but (2) The Germans also lacked key pieces of the intelligence puzzle. The Germans underestimated the number of divisions the Soviet had, their potential resilience and their ability to evacuate personnel and industry.

Yes, Hitler would reject any analysis that said, defeating the Soviets was impossible. That doesn't mean he was wedded to the exact concept of historic Barbarossa. As a matter of fact the concept changed considerably in the months leading up to Barbarossa. His accepting an analysis that said, "That approach won't work, but this one will," is certainly a legitimate area for speculation on an alternate history board.

Besides, at the moment Germany was becoming more and more economically dependent on Soviet Union and would soon face situation of being blackmailed by Stalin. And Hitler would not tolerate it.

Agreed. I doubt that Hitler would delay the invasion or call it off altogether unless he could coerce Stalin into coming into the war on the Axis side or coerce him into giving up territory through threat of war. Neither of those are impossible outcomes, but they aren't likely given Soviet perception of their own strength.
 
This is, or at least was until recently, an alternate history board, which means it is a place where we discuss alternative strategies historical figures might have taken to meet their objectives. "They wouldn't..." isn't an attempt to discuss alternatives. It's an attempt to declare the alternative off-limits. That's not what this board should be about. Sorry to single your post out, but I've noticed a lot of that type of argument here lately, and it cuts the heart out of what this board is all about.

Point taken. You are right of course.

One could argue that in view of German understanding of Soviets and German own perception of their capabilities, they could only adopt a short war strategy. And the only way to defeat Soviet Union in a short war is to aim to destroy their army. Any other objective would guarantee long campaign and Germans did not want that and certainly could not afford it. With a right kind of POD this can be negated, but IMHO that point is long passed by 1940. That choice can only be made earlier. It is not only Barbarossa was planned as a lightning campaign. It is the entire German armed forces, doctrine, force structure and even to some extent industry orinted to short bursts requiring extended pauses to make the war they waged posible. This can be changed but only in long term and not in 9 months of operational planning for Barbarossa.
 
With a POD of the fall of France:
1 A massive increase of the war time economy rather than a relaxation of it as ITTL.One of many crazy Nazi decisions:your going to war against the biggest country in the world in a years time and you cut back military production in favour of civilian for popularity.:confused:IMHO Hitler was at the height of his popularity and could have gone to a full wartime economy without the German people worrying.Use the conquered countries factories properly:all French auto factories producing 3 or 4 standard designs of military transport,Gnone-Rhone producing BMW radial aeroengines and Argus-Mercedes Benz etc.
2 Battle of Britain Lite.Just enough attacks to cause an invasion panic but not enough to cause serious damage to the Luftwaffe combined with no London Blitz increases the LW by 30 to 40% even without point 1.
3 Panzer IV L43 asap moving up to L48 as soon as technology allows.A massive increase in tank making.30 or 40 per month? No 300 to 400 per month.Stug 111 the same.A somewhat contensious argument: all Panzer 111 production turned over to Stug or Panzer 1V?
4 Tell Mussollini no help whatsoever in any Balkan adventures.
5 A proper plan! No kick the door in and the whole house falls in.Leningrad-Moscow-Kharkov-Rostov and stop for the winter.Rest,recuperation and resupply and start again in the spring to Arkangelsk and Stanlingrad.
Even with this 20/20 hindsight could the Germans have won?

NO
 
If Germans retool their industry more towards ground combat, more tanks you put it the Soviets will notice. German production was one of issues that caused Stalin to discount invasion warnings I believe.
 
Point taken. You are right of course.

One could argue that in view of German understanding of Soviets and German own perception of their capabilities, they could only adopt a short war strategy. And the only way to defeat Soviet Union in a short war is to aim to destroy their army. Any other objective would guarantee long campaign and Germans did not want that and certainly could not afford it. With a right kind of POD this can be negated, but IMHO that point is long passed by 1940. That choice can only be made earlier. It is not only Barbarossa was planned as a lightning campaign. It is the entire German armed forces, doctrine, force structure and even to some extent industry orinted to short bursts requiring extended pauses to make the war they waged posible. This can be changed but only in long term and not in 9 months of operational planning for Barbarossa.

I would argue that this rather overstates the degree of planning and understates that of improvisation in the Nazi way of war. The Nazis didn't do plans, they did asspulls and made them into the basis of their own methology.

With a POD of the fall of France:
1 A massive increase of the war time economy rather than a relaxation of it as ITTL.One of many crazy Nazi decisions:your going to war against the biggest country in the world in a years time and you cut back military production in favour of civilian for popularity.:confused:IMHO Hitler was at the height of his popularity and could have gone to a full wartime economy without the German people worrying.Use the conquered countries factories properly:all French auto factories producing 3 or 4 standard designs of military transport,Gnone-Rhone producing BMW radial aeroengines and Argus-Mercedes Benz etc.
2 Battle of Britain Lite.Just enough attacks to cause an invasion panic but not enough to cause serious damage to the Luftwaffe combined with no London Blitz increases the LW by 30 to 40% even without point 1.
3 Panzer IV L43 asap moving up to L48 as soon as technology allows.A massive increase in tank making.30 or 40 per month? No 300 to 400 per month.Stug 111 the same.A somewhat contensious argument: all Panzer 111 production turned over to Stug or Panzer 1V?
4 Tell Mussollini no help whatsoever in any Balkan adventures.
5 A proper plan! No kick the door in and the whole house falls in.Leningrad-Moscow-Kharkov-Rostov and stop for the winter.Rest,recuperation and resupply and start again in the spring to Arkangelsk and Stanlingrad.
Even with this 20/20 hindsight could the Germans have won?

NO

1) Fear of repeating the aftermath of WWI is why this is not going to happen. The Nazis believed their own ideology about this too much.

2) Somewhat plausible.

3) Then the Soviets make more of their own tanks and things get no improvement and much trouble.

4) Not going to happen.

5) Nazi plans were asspulls IOTL and it worked, so they'd have neither the skills required nor the vision for serious planning, and if they did it would be directed against the USA, not the USSR.
 
I would argue that this rather overstates the degree of planning and understates that of improvisation in the Nazi way of war. The Nazis didn't do plans, they did asspulls and made them into the basis of their own methology.

Well, now. It is not that they did not have any plans. If you are talking of purely military plans, well they had those weird combination of wishful thinking and hopes intertwined with actual plan. And sometimes, someone would actually engage in planning. And they did have economic plans. And they did actually structure their armed forces in certain way. It even sort of worked when they had opponents that did not have space to trade for time. If I read Tooze correctly they staked everything on short term successes.

Question is can this tendency for short term gains be weeded out of Nazism? Could Germany suffer some reverse that would stem from this that would cause them to plan, like Soviets did for years?

IMHO, way I see it, not possible. The entire lead up to war would be derailed and this would butterfly away war. In fact, Germany could only hope to bluff their way to success. When that didn't work, the game was up for them.
 
Well, now. It is not that they did not have any plans. If you are talking of purely military plans, well they had those weird combination of wishful thinking and hopes intertwined with actual plan. And sometimes, someone would actually engage in planning. And they did have economic plans. And they did actually structure their armed forces in certain way. It even sort of worked when they had opponents that did not have space to trade for time. If I read Tooze correctly they staked everything on short term successes.

Question is can this tendency for short term gains be weeded out of Nazism? Could Germany suffer some reverse that would stem from this that would cause them to plan, like Soviets did for years?

IMHO, way I see it, not possible. The entire lead up to war would be derailed and this would butterfly away war. In fact, Germany could only hope to bluff their way to success. When that didn't work, the game was up for them.

They staked them on short-term successes that were basically Indy Ploys that were transformed into a continuation of the myth that treacherous backstabbing egomaniacal menchildren were infallible geniuses. The German armies in the World Wars lost for good reasons, one of which is that they were too often focused on the tree to notice the forest.
 
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