Register a SA Forums Account here!
JOINING THE SA FORUMS WILL REMOVE THIS BIG AD, THE ANNOYING UNDERLINED ADS, AND STUPID INTERSTITIAL ADS!!!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
 
  • Locked thread
chitoryu12
Apr 24, 2014

Koramei posted:

That dog looks skinny as gently caress, is that why it's hanging around all the freshly dead bodies, looking longingly at the next one?

How did people feel about animals etc eating up remains on battlefields etc? Was it just like "eh whatever" or would people try to stop it

That earlier link to Napoleonic "treatment" of the dead on battlefields mentioned that sometimes the bodies would just be left to decompose and be eaten by animals.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Fangz
Jul 5, 2007

Oh I see! This must be the Bad Opinion Zone!

Koramei posted:

"what would the Germans have had to do to win Stalingrad?" "Oh that's way too far into Gay Black Hitler territory, the amount of counterfactuals that'd have to take place makes discussion absurd"

"what if you pitted America... against the entire world!" *2 pages of posts* :catbert:

never change, milhist thread

There's a difference between an undirected prompt 'what if...' and a question that is seeking a particular answer 'how to make X happen'. Especially with something as vague as 'win Stalingrad'.

Saint Celestine
Dec 17, 2008

Lay a fire within your soul and another between your hands, and let both be your weapons.
For one is faith and the other is victory and neither may ever be put out.

- Saint Sabbat, Lessons
Grimey Drawer
How is "How could the 6th army win Stalingrad" vague ?

Its about as precise a question as you can get, short of getting down to spergy details about actual divisions and equipment counts.

Siivola
Dec 23, 2012

chitoryu12 posted:

This has to be the best way to get your mouth haunted.

On the subject of flag twirling, Epcot recently replaced its Romeo & Juliet comedy troupe with Sbandieratori Di Sansepolcro in the Italy pavilion. It's a group that does a display of Tuscan flag throwing in renaissance-style costumes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPSNovCGGqs

For comparison, actual flag twirlers in Sansepolcro:


I need to get a pair of tights like that.

aphid_licker
Jan 7, 2009


Saint Celestine posted:

How is "How could the 6th army win Stalingrad" vague ?

Its about as precise a question as you can get, short of getting down to spergy details about actual divisions and equipment counts.

Wouldn't parking slightly to the north, west, and south of the city and shooting at anything trying to go up or down the river basically have achieved the German objectives? Wasn't it mostly about cutting the Volga?

KYOON GRIFFEY JR
Apr 12, 2010



Runner-up, TRP Sack Race 2021/22

Saint Celestine posted:

How is "How could the 6th army win Stalingrad" vague ?

Its about as precise a question as you can get, short of getting down to spergy details about actual divisions and equipment counts.

Well, define winning. Is it tactically holding on to all of the rubble on the west bank of the river? Is it operationally pushing forces across to the east bank of the river and destroying the 62nd army while taking the city? Is it performing some feat that materially changes the strategic picture of the war in 1942 - winning at Stalingrad without capturing the Caucasus does not really benefit the German war effort in a meaningful way.

Fangz
Jul 5, 2007

Oh I see! This must be the Bad Opinion Zone!

Saint Celestine posted:

How is "How could the 6th army win Stalingrad" vague ?

Its about as precise a question as you can get, short of getting down to spergy details about actual divisions and equipment counts.

It is incredibly vague. Look at all the things it could mean, in roughly ascending order of improbability:

1. Just get into the city?

2. Boot out all of the Soviet defenders from the city?

3. Hold the city until summer 1943? 1944?

4. Extract themselves safely from the encirclement and score a strategic victory that way?

5. Make Operation Uranus not happen?

6. Actually defeat the entire Soviet counterattack?

7. Actually accomplish the objectives of Case Blue and make it to the oil fields? Then hold it?

8. Win the war?

If this was a game, then the Germans *did* win Stalingrad, they had more of their guys in the city than the Russians and held a higher percent of the city, they score 200 vp.

KYOON GRIFFEY JR
Apr 12, 2010



Runner-up, TRP Sack Race 2021/22

aphid_licker posted:

Wouldn't parking slightly to the north, west, and south of the city and shooting at anything trying to go up or down the river basically have achieved the German objectives? Wasn't it mostly about cutting the Volga?

The German objectives were rather unclear and changed over time (THANKS ADOLF) so even the tactical definition of "winning" is pretty debatable based on the timeframe.

Ensign Expendable
Nov 11, 2008

Lager beer is proof that god loves us
Pillbug

HEY GAL posted:

in their (grudging) defense, wide familiarity with cars is not a big thing in the lives of lots of people back then!

Yeah, the regiment had three weeks of rest, and no one bothered to train the new drivers during this time, oops.

Fangz
Jul 5, 2007

Oh I see! This must be the Bad Opinion Zone!
The other fallacy is that the question pretends that the solution to German victory is simply a matter of them doing the right thing, as if the millions of red army forces were merely a punching bag.

Nebakenezzer
Sep 13, 2005

The Mote in God's Eye

KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:

The German objectives were rather unclear and changed over time (THANKS ADOLF) so even the tactical definition of "winning" is pretty debatable based on the timeframe.

Like global thermonuclear war, the only way for the Germans to win is to not play.

But that could be said of WW2 generally

Cyrano4747
Sep 25, 2006

Yes, I know I'm old, get off my fucking lawn so I can yell at these clouds.

KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:

in 1942 - winning at Stalingrad without capturing the Caucasus does not really benefit the German war effort in a meaningful way.

Ehhhh that's debatable. At the very least not losing like they did historically helps a lot. The wholesale loss of 6th army just megafucked the southern front for a year+. They also had some real material shortages afterward.

It's been said before in this thread that the Wehrmacht didn't have the ability to replace losses like the Red Army did. Through that lens a fighting withdrawal that kept the army intact would have made a big difference in 43-44. Not having a shattered southern flank helps too. Does this win the war? No but it also doesn't begin the death spiral at that time and place.

KYOON GRIFFEY JR
Apr 12, 2010



Runner-up, TRP Sack Race 2021/22

Cyrano4747 posted:

Ehhhh that's debatable. At the very least not losing like they did historically helps a lot. The wholesale loss of 6th army just megafucked the southern front for a year+. They also had some real material shortages afterward.

It's been said before in this thread that the Wehrmacht didn't have the ability to replace losses like the Red Army did. Through that lens a fighting withdrawal that kept the army intact would have made a big difference in 43-44. Not having a shattered southern flank helps too. Does this win the war? No but it also doesn't begin the death spiral at that time and place.

It changes the calculus to "lose less quickly," sure. I think that typically when people say "how do the Germans win Stalingrad?" what they really mean is "Could the Germans have won at Stalingrad in such a way that had a meaningful impact on the outcome of the war" and the only way that really works is if you can capture the oilfields and choke off lend-lease from Persia, and that probably isn't even enough.

Nebakenezzer
Sep 13, 2005

The Mote in God's Eye

Thomamelas posted:

I'd have to sit down with a population map for it and figure out percentages. The West Coast kinda screws this up. The 1940's population in California isn't what it is today but it's still pretty big. So if I did it as one invasion from the East Coast, it probably goes a ways into the Midwest. Figure roughly half the country? It would be easier for Canadians since their population is mostly clustered on the US border.

Actually if you made it North america and imagine a big arrow pointing toward the US Midwest, with the invaders starting in Quebec and Atlantic Canada it makes sense. All of Upper Canada burned for a Ukraine analogue! (Note to non Canadians and even Canadians not living in "upper Canada": Upper Canada is the confusing name given to southern Quebec and Southern Ontario. It is so named as it is the upper part of the St. Lawrence River. "Lower Canada" is the Maritimes, which *obviously* does not include Newfoundland and Labrador. In a distinction literally nobody outside of the Maritimes cares about, the Maritimes are New Brunswick, PEI, and Nova Scotia. Lump Newfoundland in that list, and you've got Atlantic Canada.

Our British Heritage :canada:

Main Paineframe
Oct 27, 2010

HEY GAL posted:

i still think you need the idea that human beings are interchangeable, disposable objects first, and that definitely has to do with the modern state, although i agree that capitalism also has a lot to do with it

I'm not sure exactly where you draw the line for "modern state", but I'd say that slavery certainly gets pretty close to seeing human beings as interchangeable and disposable, and that was around long before the modern state. Once you see human labor and human lives as disposable commodities to extract maximum profit from (which was definitely around by the days of the Atlantic slave trade), it's not much of a leap to do the same for human bodies.

Overall, I'd say the greatest sign leading to that sort of disregard of humanity is strong commercial interests whose power equals or exceeds that of the state itself, allowing them to influence and compel the state to move in support of those commercial interests. In the Southern US, major slaveowners practically constituted an aristocracy who held most of the political power and were able to use that to pull government support for their commercial interests. British India was initially conquered by the East India Company, which maintained a large private army and used both diplomacy and military force to bring India under its control, and ruled the country for the sake of its own profit for nearly a century before the British government finally dissolved and absorbed the company, which had grown weak and increasingly dependent on bailouts and special privileges from the government. In the case of the notorious Congo Free State, a British official investigating reports of human rights abuses reported that "The root of the evil lies in the fact that the government of the Congo is above all a commercial trust, that everything else is orientated towards commercial gain..."

Mycroft Holmes
Mar 26, 2010

by Azathoth
Can anybody tell me about Siberia during WWII? I'm trying to run a quest thing on another site and the thread has decided to be an NKVD border guard in Siberia. It's a Worldwar quest where you run partisan ops against the Lizards. https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/worldwar-changing-the-balance.30343/

Klaus88
Jan 23, 2011

Violence has its own economy, therefore be thoughtful and precise in your investment

Mycroft Holmes posted:

Can anybody tell me about Siberia during WWII? I'm trying to run a quest thing on another site and the thread has decided to be an NKVD border guard in Siberia. It's a Worldwar quest where you run partisan ops against the Lizards. https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/worldwar-changing-the-balance.30343/

Oh joy, its spacebattles 2.0. :nallears:

Cythereal
Nov 8, 2009

I love the potoo,
and the potoo loves you.

Raenir Salazar posted:

To be fair, it was a really interesting digression. I'd love to read such a story.

It's also a digression this thread hasn't really done before which is always interesting, unlike most talks about Nazi Germany hypotheticals or tankchat.

pthighs
Jun 21, 2013

Pillbug
What could the Lizards have done to win at Stalingrad?

Slim Jim Pickens
Jan 16, 2012

Mycroft Holmes posted:

Can anybody tell me about Siberia during WWII? I'm trying to run a quest thing on another site and the thread has decided to be an NKVD border guard in Siberia. It's a Worldwar quest where you run partisan ops against the Lizards. https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/worldwar-changing-the-balance.30343/

Nothing really happened in Siberia. Siberia itself is fairly developed along the rail lines, there's lots of farms and a few big cities like Novosibirsk where all the industry is concentrated. If you go farther North the terrain turns into thick forests that stretch on for thousands of miles.

The Far East is way less developed. I don't think any factories were even evacuated past Irkutsk. The rail lines are still there, but they're mainly there for strategic purposes.

SeanBeansShako
Nov 20, 2009

Now the Drums beat up again,
For all true Soldier Gentlemen.

chitoryu12 posted:

This has to be the best way to get your mouth haunted.

At odd hours in the morning you'll taste cheap wine, gin and the taste of game meat!

And you'll cuss a lot more.

Nenonen
Oct 22, 2009

Mulla on aina kolkyt donaa taskussa
Well, there's a bunch of remote forced labour camps, the inmates of which come from varied backgrounds - some are serial murderers while others dissidents and some others just were purged for no particular reason. Then many are Poles, Chechens, Balts and others displaced due to nationality. Finally there's POWs from all Axis countries plus volunteers from occupied and neutral countries. There's lots of potential for competing bands of partisans that way.

Mycroft Holmes
Mar 26, 2010

by Azathoth

Nenonen posted:

Well, there's a bunch of remote forced labour camps, the inmates of which come from varied backgrounds - some are serial murderers while others dissidents and some others just were purged for no particular reason. Then many are Poles, Chechens, Balts and others displaced due to nationality. Finally there's POWs from all Axis countries plus volunteers from occupied and neutral countries. There's lots of potential for competing bands of partisans that way.

That's the plan!

Polikarpov
Jun 1, 2013

Keep it between the buoys
I'm pretty sure that the overall operational objective of the 6th army was to find all the signs in the city that said "Stalingrad" and replace them with ones reading "Hitlerstadt".

Teriyaki Hairpiece
Dec 29, 2006

I'm nae the voice o' the darkened thistle, but th' darkened thistle cannae bear the sight o' our Bonnie Prince Bernie nae mair.
How would the Battle of Stalingrad developed if, towards the end, Gumrak Airport suddenly attained sentience, intelligence, and a whole lot more heavy weapons with lots of ammunition to defend itself?

KYOON GRIFFEY JR
Apr 12, 2010



Runner-up, TRP Sack Race 2021/22

cheerfullydrab posted:

How would the Battle of Stalingrad developed if, towards the end, Gumrak Airport suddenly attained sentience, intelligence, and a whole lot more heavy weapons with lots of ammunition to defend itself?

is it siding with the lizards or someone else

P-Mack
Nov 10, 2007

Do we need an alternate history thread so I can post my 50 page fanfic about a victorious Hong Xiuquan and the Heavenly Leap Forward?

Teriyaki Hairpiece
Dec 29, 2006

I'm nae the voice o' the darkened thistle, but th' darkened thistle cannae bear the sight o' our Bonnie Prince Bernie nae mair.

KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:

is it siding with the lizards or someone else

Well, it's Russian ground with German buildings, so essentially a Hiwi in German uniform. Some of those fought very valiantly with Reich forces. Also, if the Nazis are defeated, it's sure to be poorly used by the NKVD. There's no way that the Germans can cart an entire airport back to the Reich, they don't have the resources. If the airport has Nazi convictions, it's fighting a do or die battle.

lenoon
Jan 7, 2010

Fangz posted:

The other fallacy is that the question pretends that the solution to German victory is simply a matter of them doing the right thing, as if the millions of red army forces were merely a punching bag.

This always seems the important thing that tends to get overlooked In the counterfactuals. The Germans need to do A,B,C,DEFGH, whatever, to "win" but all of those are predicated on the Russians doing gently caress all. So they secure the supply lines, and the Russians do Bugger all about that changing situation, or they capture both sides of the Volga, and the Russians decide to flee in terror at this symbolic assault, or hunker down and let the "victorious" armies rest and resupply for a couple of months.

If the Germans had done A, Zhukov would have done B, and now we'd be here saying "what if they'd done c!".

They were at the end of a ludicrously long and precarious supply line, even winning Stalingrad they'd have just gone through a hellish grinder of a city assault. There's lots they could have done, but short of getting the gently caress out of dodge before even aiming for stalingrad, I'm not sure there's anything that could have stopped the overextension being cut in two by Zhukov and vasilenski.

Mycroft Holmes
Mar 26, 2010

by Azathoth
Turn 1 is posted, if anyone is interested. https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/worldwar-changing-the-balance.30343/#post-6447870

Disinterested
Jun 29, 2011

You look like you're still raking it in. Still killing 'em?

xthetenth posted:

Combined, the RN, IJN and Kriegsmarine (not sure why you picked them since France and possibly Italy have stronger navies) have less carrier aviation capability than the US. In fact they probably have comparable capacity to just the short hull Essexes. They do have closer to parity in modern battleships though if I don't miss my count! :v:

That's to assume that in this counterfactual all of these countries don't suddenly pump giant effort in to their navies. Which is kind a problem with goofy counterfactuals - people always assume the thing they want changes but everything else stays the same!

Nenonen
Oct 22, 2009

Mulla on aina kolkyt donaa taskussa

cheerfullydrab posted:

There's no way that the Germans can cart an entire airport back to the Reich, they don't have the resources. If the airport has Nazi convictions, it's fighting a do or die battle.

But Göring promised!! Maybe with a fleet of Zeppelins lifting it off?

Panzeh
Nov 27, 2006

"..The high ground"
The loss of almost all the Axis satellite forces in Stalingrad and the aftermath significantly depleted the German ability to defend the entirety of the front and eliminated any possibility of an Axis large scale offensive in 1943 being successful.

Trin Tragula
Apr 22, 2005

100 Years Ago

Welcome to Bazentin Ridge, site of an offensive that manages to, at the same time, prove that with the capabilities of mid-1916 it is both entirely possible and completely impossible to create and exploit a breakthrough. General Haig's verdict serves equally well as praise and censure; and Sir John French will no doubt be thinking some extremely uncharitable thoughts when he hears what's happened.

Teriyaki Hairpiece
Dec 29, 2006

I'm nae the voice o' the darkened thistle, but th' darkened thistle cannae bear the sight o' our Bonnie Prince Bernie nae mair.

Nenonen posted:

But Göring promised!! Maybe with a fleet of Zeppelins lifting it off?

I'm not sure how deep the topsoil is just west of the Volga, but those would have to be some big Zeppelins to lift the plucky sentient airport.

Also I guess it would be at least heavily affiliated with the Luftwaffe so yes would probably have some loyalty/faith in Hermann Goring.

Nebakenezzer
Sep 13, 2005

The Mote in God's Eye

Nenonen posted:

Well, there's a bunch of remote forced labour camps, the inmates of which come from varied backgrounds - some are serial murderers while others dissidents and some others just were purged for no particular reason. Then many are Poles, Chechens, Balts and others displaced due to nationality. Finally there's POWs from all Axis countries plus volunteers from occupied and neutral countries. There's lots of potential for competing bands of partisans that way.

Volunteers? Are you making GBS threads me?

Nenonen posted:

But Göring promised!! Maybe with a fleet of Zeppelins lifting it off?

Hilariously, the Zeppelin Company was up there on the Nazi's poo poo list, as the head of the company, Dr. Hugo Eckner, was a big anti nazi who was a rival of Hitler in the last election pre-Nazi Germany had. This meant that Zeppelin missed out on most of those sweet defense contracts - and why the company still exists today, since they thrived in the post war German economy.

Vincent Van Goatse
Nov 8, 2006

Enjoy every sandwich.

Smellrose

Kemper Boyd posted:

Clearly, a MacArthur coup would end by a bunch of privates killing him outside a bar or something with consecrated Patton-model cavalry sabres or something.

Probably led by Patton himself.

Osama Dozen-Dongs
Nov 29, 2014

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWLKiLXBGhg

Nenonen
Oct 22, 2009

Mulla on aina kolkyt donaa taskussa

Nebakenezzer posted:

Volunteers? Are you making GBS threads me?

You don't have to be rude if you want to be taught about the Blue Division, or SS volunteers from various countries.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

Nebakenezzer
Sep 13, 2005

The Mote in God's Eye

Nenonen posted:

You don't have to be rude if you want to be taught about the Blue Division, or SS volunteers from various countries.

Sorry, I think I misread you, I thought you meant good socialists in eastern europe were literally volunteering to work for a year in Siberian gulag-esque camps.

  • Locked thread