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This is a persistent one. Am I wrong it was actually fabricated by Heidirch & his boys to justify Germany's attack?
While there was a disinformation campaign along these lines conducted by the Germans, it isn't the only reason people point to a possible Soviet pre-emptive strike. Meltyukhov for example was drawing heavily on Soviet era sources rather than German sources. Thanks to the idiotic ravings of Vladimir Rezun aka Viktor Suvorov, it's hard get people to discuss the topic any more.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalin's_Missed_Chance

From my perspective:
- Stalin didn't trust Hitler, but he thought/hoped that he would be stuck fighting in the West for a long time. He had remarked that he thought that it would be the allies hanging him out to dry. Had he figured out this was not to be the case, I think it's fair to assume he would realise he was last man standing, and fight accordingly.
- Soviet military doctrine was offensive in nature. There was little training for the defensive, and it didn't feature heavily in the manuals in use by the military. Offensive action was seen as a reasonable counter to an opposing offensive... which if you think about the Russian Civil War, fits neatly with the Soviet experience.
- The Soviet army was clearly deployed too far forward in 1941 for a strictly defensive strategy.
- It is believed that Zhukov presented a plan in May 1941 for a pre-emptive strike.
- Stalin's reluctance to prepare for war when all signs pointed to Barbarossa becomes more explicable if you consider the plan was to attack, rather than defend. Aside from his distrust of the sources around him, Stalin would be hesitant to commit to an offensive war against a powerful opponent unless he was completely without doubt. That he probably was hoping for Hitler to stay facing West for a bit longer so that the Red Army could finish regrouping/rearming injected a certain amount of wishful thinking.

Admittedly the evidence is pretty thin and I'm speculating heavily... but this is AH.:)

What do I think would have happened? I envisage a sort of macro-scale Battle of Moscow but inverted. The Soviets make significant headway (German ill preparation replacing the virtual collapse of the Red Army) but attrition starts to ramp up when the objective is in sight, quite possibly forcing a pause. At this stage the Wehrmacht unleash a counter attack with previously uncommitted reserves, pushing the line back but probably not all the way back. 1941 ends with both sides unsure where the next blow will fall, and things very much up in the air.

Where it might benefit the Soviets is that all of this happened in someone elses backward this time. So fewer civilian casualties, little industrial dislocation and a less critical strategic situation all round. The war would might end a little bit earlier, but not by say a whole year. German supply lines would be a lot better in this scenario and would be fighting for home much sooner without the attrition of fighting for years in the depths of the Soviet Union. The immediacy of the threat might even cause the Nazi leadership to see the situation is serious sooner, so perhaps you see some Speer-like reforms for German industry earlier in the piece.
 
Just for the record: Fighting on the defensive is considered less difficult than conduction offensive operations, especially in mobile warfare(deep battle aka. Blitzkrieg). The Soviets were bested by the Germans in mobile warfare as late as summer 1943, in 1941 they will be cut into pieces if they stick out their necks.

Actually they weren't. In summer of 1943 Soviets stopped Blitzkrieg cold then went to offensive right away. In early 1943 they still haven't synched wishes to capabilities and still overreached (Kharkov). But by summer they have learned
 
Admittedly the evidence is pretty thin and I'm speculating heavily... but this is AH.:)
FWI've seen, the evidence is pretty equivocal. Thanks for taking a balanced view.:D Your picture of the possible outcome is as good a start of a TL as anything I've thought of.:cool: (Hmmm... :( :p)

IMO, your scenario is a bit generous to the Sovs. One, it leaves them with large amounts of obsolete armor & a/c which they still think is adequate. Two, they've yet to learn the lessons of blitzkrieg (having thrown away Tukachevsky's manual). Both of these IMO make a bigger Red Army disaster than OTL likely. Maybe not hugely worse, but worse. For the rest, I agree. And if Speer does persuade Hitler to turn over the economy as a reaction, the war's liable to be longer...:eek: maybe long enough for the jets & Type 21s to become a real threat.:eek::eek:
 
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FWI've seen, the evidence is pretty equivocal. Thanks for taking a balanced view.:D Your picture of the possible outcome is as good a start of a TL as anything I've thought of.:cool: (Hmmm... :( :p)
Hey, no problem.

One, it leaves them with large amounts of obsolete armor & a/c which they still think is adequate.
Used correctly, even obsolete armour can be a dangerous thing. Think of what the Germans managed with the Panzer I & II, which were both under-gunned and armoured for their time. Besides, some of the really silly stuff, the the T-35, were on the way out.

Two, they've yet to learn the lessons of blitzkrieg (having thrown away Tukachevsky's manual).
Not quite. Some of Tukachevsky/Triandafilov's concepts made their way into general discourse in the Soviet military, though admittedly it took a while for the whole body of work to be re-thought. IIRC the Red Army was in the process of re-organising its armour into tank corps around 1941 as a step towards independent tank (not quite combined arms yet, but getting there) formations.

One thing that could go wrong for the Soviets: paratroops. Red Army paras didn't get employed often early in the war because they were needed on the ground. Their employment on a small scale on the other hand was such a disaster that it detered their use for the rest of the war*. But, in this scenario, the Red Army doesn't know that yet, and might think a 'carpet' of troops in the enemy rear might be just the trick they need to break the German front.

I suppose the gamble would be that the shock and resulting chaos of a massive Soviet offensive would prevent an effective German response. Perhaps the greater independence of German commanders would come in handy in this scenario short term? Something else that occurs to me is that the Soviets might try to attack on too wide a front, diluting their numeric advantage. On the other hand they might have drawn some conclusions about massing resources at key points for the latter stages of the Winter War.

*I think Glantz did a study of Soviet WWII paratroop operations, available online, if anyone is interested.
 
Thing is, the Soviets could still win this war. Their advantage, and it is a considerable one, is on the wings. The Soviets start with advanced positions in Romania and Finland, and on those fronts, Germany would have little strength at hand.

Attacking Western Poland does little good in this conflict; it does have considerable mineral and agrarian wealth, but consider the implications of the Soviets grabbing the Ploesti Oil Wells and wiping out the entire Northern Front.

Germany would be well suited for a counterattack directly Eastward into Soviet Territory, but a massive hammer on the flanks may well lead to the cancellation of Barbarossa in favor of a desperate countergambit as the Soviets smash right through Romania and into the Balkans. The loss of Ploesti Oil would be crippling to Germany, and while Germany can probably retake the facilities, they face pretty serious interruptions to their oil supply.

This doesn't end the war for the Soviets, but it would leave the Soviet/German war in far better shape in 1942. Germany would probably not have been able to advance into 1938 Soviet Territory, Finland has been forced to join the Commintern as the Finnish people are forcefed Communist control.

The Soviets are, however, growing more proficient in fighting a war. Even without the possibility of imminent defeat on their shoulders, high command is learning how to wage a war effectively and learning from their serious miscues and mistakes just like OTL. The Price is lower, but the lessons are still learned.

Germany, meanwhile, is growing less proficient as Hitler demands more control over the conflict as he leads it to disaster. It may be in 1942 or 43 that the Soviets simply start to out-General a Hitler-led Wehrmacht. The Soviets aren't going to rush into Berlin; they'd be forced backward, bloodied, battered and humiliated in many ways. But they would win.

The Soviets would find the postwar world to be more hostile to them, but also to be in a stronger position.
 
Even if the Soviets could make it to Paris (as suggested in the OP), wouldn't the British have had something to say about it? Especially if they decided to do some political tinkering whilst they were there.
 
One big thing Stalin would have over Hitler is that the German's were advancing into a country with few paved roads, whereas the Russians would be able to utilitze western Europe's road structure to their advantage. Of course the rail gauges still remain different...
 
I doubt that the Soviets would have been able to motivate their troops through a couple setbacks without the whole "defending the motherland"-angle. With Stalin as the aggressor and a competent German defense that can focus on the East - i.e. France is already out of the war - you might be looking at mutinies in the Red Army. Maybe another 1917, the troops forming Soviets and whatnot.
 
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