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What is the thread's opinion of Erik Larson's books, the arsenal of democracy and in the garden of beasts? I've taken them as generally entertaining historical fiction, but I'm curious as to how accurate they are regarding the general feelings and moods of their respective settings.
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Sep 17, 2016 05:48
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How big of a deal were Silver Star medals awarded for service during WW2? I know their general position compared with other medals, but I don't have perspective on how rarely they were given.
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Sep 19, 2016 06:08
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Dapper_Swindler posted:on one of your points. people kinda forget that France and Britain were at each others throats up(at least politically) until like 20ish or so years before WW1. everyone thought WW1 would be like a fast war like they were when they fought various tribes in africa or the boxer rebellion. The various European militaries were not using the Boxer Rebellion and Boer Wars as the basis of their decisions prior to WWI, they were using the Franco-Prussian War and the Russo-Japanese war. The Franco-Prussian war led people to believe that wars in Europe would now be resolved quickly through decisive battles, and that there was no way countries would be able to sustain the kinds of casualties that modern firepower could cause. The Russo-Japanese war showed that you could overcome any defensive emplacement with enough courage and grit, and that advancements in artillery would only make this easier. These, in various mixes, are what the European powers are expecting coming into 1914. It should be pointed out that the European militaries are highly aware that: 1. A sustained war has not been fought in Europe for 100 years, the closest they have got is the Franco-Prussian war which consisted of 2 battles, a siege and was over in 9 months 2. Nobody is really sure what the impact of the vast increase in army size will do to the battlefield. One of the huge debates prewar is whether to incorporate reserve units into front line units. The Germans do this very well, which the allies know about, but for various reasons the French believe that having reserves on the front line will just be a waste of time since they are not as good as full timers; problem is they assume that the Germans think the same way they do, and plan accordingly for no German reserve units on the front line, which is one of the reasons for their huge troubles in the early days of the war.
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Sep 19, 2016 10:16
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The fact that England and the dirty French hated each other and had gone to war 20 times in the past pre WW1 never occurred to me before.. What caused them to take the same side? Surely their mutual hate of the hun couldn't overcome that?
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Sep 21, 2016 01:54
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504 posted:The fact that England and the dirty French hated each other and had gone to war 20 times in the past pre WW1 never occurred to me before.. In very short, and leaving out a ton of details, nuance, and analysis? The rise of Germany and a lot of odd/botched diplomacy in the late 19th century. For the full answer you're really going to read something like Massie's Dreadnought, which by complete coincidence I am in the process of re-reading right now.
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Sep 21, 2016 02:15
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Beaten with better-worded expression. 504 posted:The fact that England and the dirty French hated each other and had gone to war 20 times in the past pre WW1 never occurred to me before.. Shared fear of Germany was part of it. France had been embarrassed in the Franco-Prussian war, while Britain was antsy over Germany's fleet ambitions threatening British naval dominance.
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Sep 21, 2016 02:16
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504 posted:The fact that England and the dirty French hated each other and had gone to war 20 times in the past pre WW1 never occurred to me before.. Since almost always Britain acted as a force to prevent any one power from controlling Europe. Always opposing the strongest power to maintain a competitive balance of power within Europe proper and maintaining a very high relative strength of Britain. WWI was largely a continuation of this policy. Napoleonic France was long gone and now the rising and strongest force in Europe was Germany. That Germany violated Belgium neutrality provided a very easy avenue for Britain to enter the war. But I think it was extremely likely that Britain was going to get involved.
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Sep 21, 2016 03:12
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BattleMoose posted:Since almost always Britain acted as a force to prevent any one power from controlling Europe. Always opposing the strongest power to maintain a competitive balance of power within Europe proper and maintaining a very high relative strength of Britain. WWI was largely a continuation of this policy. Napoleonic France was long gone and now the rising and strongest force in Europe was Germany. So in an attempt to ensure British supremacy they threw their whole empire into a meat grinder? There may be a lesson there.
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Sep 21, 2016 06:03
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504 posted:So in an attempt to ensure British supremacy they threw their whole empire into a meat grinder? Well they didn't expect it was going to be a meat grinder at the beginning.
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Sep 21, 2016 06:06
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Thing about speculating how WWII could have gone differently- American carriers crushed at Midway, Germany repels the D-Day landings, etc- all that may not have changed the eventual outcome. Fast forward to August-September 1945 and cities start getting vaporized until the bad guys surrender. The USAAF ordered the B-36 sight unseen in 43 and its development would have been accelerated to make intercontinental bombing possible by 46. Just in time for mass production of atomic bombs. FuturePastNow fucked around with this message at 06:31 on Sep 21, 2016 |
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Sep 21, 2016 06:29
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Ron Jeremy posted:Well they didn't expect it was going to be a meat grinder at the beginning.
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Sep 21, 2016 06:41
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FuturePastNow posted:Thing about speculating how WWII could have gone differently- American carriers crushed at Midway, Germany repels the D-Day landings, etc- all that may not have changed the eventual outcome. If you look at it just in dollar terms, the B-29 program was bigger than the manhattan project.
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Sep 21, 2016 06:44
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FuturePastNow posted:Fast forward to August-September 1945 and cities start getting vaporized until the bad guys surrender. The USAAF ordered the B-36 sight unseen in 43 and its development would have been accelerated to make intercontinental bombing possible by 46. Just in time for mass production of atomic bombs. Well in order to be able to vaporize cities via aerial bombing you do need air supremacy so, if the things that could lead the Axis to have air supremacy over their cities gone differently, then the B29 bomber raids aren't possible. I mean things would have had to have gone *a lot* different but while we are playing that game...
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Sep 21, 2016 07:10
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FuturePastNow posted:Germany repels the D-Day landings, etc- all that may not have changed the eventual outcome. The only thing to speculate here if the Germany repels the D-Day landings is whether the Soviets choose to stop at the Pyrenees or continue to push their boots up Franco's rear end.
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Sep 21, 2016 07:16
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Ron Jeremy posted:The only thing to speculate here if the Germany repels the D-Day landings is whether the Soviets choose to stop at the Pyrenees or continue to push their boots up Franco's rear end. Also, what happens to Switzerland?
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Sep 21, 2016 07:22
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504 posted:So in an attempt to ensure British supremacy they threw their whole empire into a meat grinder? Imagine that you are Germany in, say, 1916. You stand triumphant over Europe like a colossus. France and Russia have been neutered for a generation. The rest of Europe is either allies, satellites, or vassals carved out of France and Russia. You have already clarified Italy's place in the world vis a vis your friend Austria-Hungary's reasonable claims. With the High Seas Fleet installed in the Low Countries and Channel ports, you now seek some trifling colonial border readjustments from your friend Britain, who stood aside while you became master of Europe. Nothing major, nothing humiliating. Just a few adjustments here and there. A few wee changes to acknowledge who's boss. That prospect was not enormously appealing to the British Government circa 1914.
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Sep 21, 2016 07:49
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Ron Jeremy posted:The only thing to speculate here if the Germany repels the D-Day landings is whether the Soviets choose to stop at the Pyrenees or continue to push their boots up Franco's rear end. I dunno about this. Let's say D-Day was a brutal disaster - the US still had hundreds of thousands of troops in the Channel ports, a second front in Italy that was slowly crumbling by 1944, and an entire second D-Day lined up to liberate Southern France. Basically, no matter how you shake it, by 1944 the war is wrapped up in the West, with only the minor details about who gets to have a nice German/Austria puppet state not yet settled. It would've taken incompetence of cosmological scale for the Allies to fail to conquer Western Europe in 1944-45. Even Market Garden and the Battle of the Hurtgen Forest only really served to delay the Allied war machine by a couple of months. BattleMoose posted:Also, what happens to Switzerland? The Swiss set up their country to be intentionally as dickish as possible to conquer. The Soviets doctrine would've proven hilariously ineffectual in the cramped mountain passes leading up to the National Redoubt. My guess is that, in some weird alternate history timeline where the Germans somehow repelled the Allies in the West but failed in the East, the Soviets would've left the Swiss well enough alone.
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Sep 21, 2016 09:15
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Did Hitler actually believe that jews were part of some kind of Illuminati that was planning a New World Order, or did he just make that up to get everyone else to go along with his polices against jews? It would be interesting if there is evidence of private conversations Hitler had where he expressed his true beliefs about jews.
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Sep 21, 2016 09:26
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qkkl posted:Did Hitler actually believe that jews were part of some kind of Illuminati that was planning a New World Order, or did he just make that up to get everyone else to go along with his polices against jews? It would be interesting if there is evidence of private conversations Hitler had where he expressed his true beliefs about jews. He was utterly committed and private conversations bore that out. It was not at all a pretext. There is also not really a reason to search for a pretext for genocide if you don't utterly despise a race of people. In any event, insofar as his circle and many of his senior commanders were concerned, he was pushing on an open door.
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Sep 21, 2016 09:38
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E.g. Wolf's Lair, Night of December 1-2, to his close confidantes, re: Jews quote:He who destroys life, exposes himself to death. And nothing other than this is happening to them. He is, here, blaming the Jews for the war, which he often did.
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Sep 21, 2016 09:41
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The whole thing about the Soviets pushing to the Channel if not for the Western Allies getting in the way thing seems to be a myth. The Soviets really didn't have the resources to garrison all of Europe, and I don't think anyone has ever discovered anything indicating that Stalin would have even wanted to do so.
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Sep 21, 2016 10:09
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Disinterested posted:E.g. Wolf's Lair, Night of December 1-2, to his close confidantes, re: Jews I wouldn't consider that to be a private conversation, since he was talking to an audience. Maybe there is a quote from one of Hitler's close associates where they say they had a one-on-one talk with Hitler about jews where Hitler said he thought jews were responsible for major negative events in Germany.
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Sep 21, 2016 10:11
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It's private. The Wolf's Lair was Hitler's private bunker-retreat, the only sorts who would have been there would have been closest party allies.
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Sep 21, 2016 10:22
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qkkl posted:Did Hitler actually believe that jews were part of some kind of Illuminati that was planning a New World Order, or did he just make that up to get everyone else to go along with his polices against jews? It would be interesting if there is evidence of private conversations Hitler had where he expressed his true beliefs about jews. Whenever I see this question my conclusion is "what does it matter?".
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Sep 21, 2016 10:46
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Kemper Boyd posted:The whole thing about the Soviets pushing to the Channel if not for the Western Allies getting in the way thing seems to be a myth. The Soviets really didn't have the resources to garrison all of Europe, and I don't think anyone has ever discovered anything indicating that Stalin would have even wanted to do so. He probably would have occupied Germany and Austria and leveraged further support to Communist Parties in France and Italy (both of which in our time came pretty close to coming to power). The Soviets may have not had the manpower to garrison all of Europe, but they also had quite a bit of local support they could have used to their advantage. Either way, even if the allies were only delayed a few months, it would have probably gave the Soviets a much more significant edge in Central Europe at least. The big issue would be that the Soviets would also have access to full access to German research and industry which would have probably balanced how the Cold War quite a bit (the US would still have a massive economic and trade advantage).
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Sep 21, 2016 11:17
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Kemper Boyd posted:The whole thing about the Soviets pushing to the Channel if not for the Western Allies getting in the way thing seems to be a myth. The Soviets really didn't have the resources to garrison all of Europe, and I don't think anyone has ever discovered anything indicating that Stalin would have even wanted to do so. It's not just a question of resources really, it's also a question of strategic and political interest. There really is nothing to indicated that Stalin had much interest in subjugating any more of Europe than what ended up being agreed upon in any event, and the whole notion of the Western Allies opening up a second front in the west was a demand from the Soviet Union in the hope that it would take pressure of their forces. There doesn't really seem to have been much fear in either the US or the UK that the Soviets were going to push all the way to the Atlantic ocean, probably the opinion that such an invasion was unecessary and too risky had much greater traction than what is essentially a Cold War narrative. Furthermore there is Stalin's adamant position throughout the war that they would not support and actively discouraged attempts at seizing power or carrying out a revolution by the Communist parties in Western Europe (out of strategic and diplomatic interest). Then there is the case that in the event that D-Day fails, it really seems likely, to me, that Germany would have been beaten and surrendered when the Soviet forces took Berlin (and/or the rest of Germany). And in line with previous agreements and Stalin's policy towards revolution in Europe during and immediately after WWII they probably would not have attempted to install or support communist regimes in either Italy or France atleast immediately after WW2. With a Western failure in Normandy the German army might even have been able to resist for a little longer, alot of quality formations (some 1/3 of panzer and panzergrenadier divisions IIRC) were sent to the West which probably did have the effect of seriously weakening the resistance in the East. And if that were the case then come August 1945, Germany is probably gonna be nuked. But, yeah as above it probably would have given the Soviets far greater control over Germany and Central Europe, depending on how an agreement to handle the occupation of Germany and other countries went through, which I would be willing to bet would still be put in place. And the question of capturing stuff like the V-Weapon scientists and infrastructure is important. A White Guy posted:The Swiss set up their country to be intentionally as dickish as possible to conquer. The Soviets doctrine would've proven hilariously ineffectual in the cramped mountain passes leading up to the National Redoubt. My guess is that, in some weird alternate history timeline where the Germans somehow repelled the Allies in the West but failed in the East, the Soviets would've left the Swiss well enough alone. Stalin really hated Switzerland though. I think it was Churchill, thought it may have been someone else, who had suggested that Britain and the US might invade Germany by going through Switzerland (by way of Italy and Southern France) and Stalin was all over it, thinking it a great idea to teach those dastardly Swiss a lesson, I even think he kept teasingly suggest that the Western Allies might as well invade Switzerland while they were at it when they had liberated France and were advancing on the Rhine. Randarkman fucked around with this message at 14:52 on Sep 21, 2016 |
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Sep 21, 2016 11:44
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BattleMoose posted:Well in order to be able to vaporize cities via aerial bombing you do need air supremacy so, if the things that could lead the Axis to have air supremacy over their cities gone differently, then the B29 bomber raids aren't possible. I mean things would have had to have gone *a lot* different but while we are playing that game... IIRC fighters had a very hard time reaching the B29 at altitude and few were shot down in aerial combat when applied that way despite the Japanese maintaining homeland air supremacy for much of the time B29s were deployed. B29 chat always reminds me of this part of the always excellent The Fog of War: https://vimeo.com/149799416#t=30m50s
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Sep 21, 2016 13:51
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By the time D-Day happened Germany had lost the war. At the same time as the Western allies were invading France, the Red Army was destroying an entire German army group in Operation Bagration. By June 1944 the Red Army was the most powerful and massive military fighting force on the planet and nothing Germany did was going to change that. D-Day helped end the war faster but its failure would not have meant Germany winning because by June 1944 Germany had a zero percent chance of defeating the Soviet Union. Any discussion of what happens after the Soviets beat the Nazis with a failed D-Day is speculation but the ironclad fact of the matter is that the Soviets would have beat the Nazis, so we can all stand around counterfactualing til we turn blue in the face about what that means for Europe but there was no feasible way for Hitler to win the war, at all. It's much the same story for a crushing Japanese victory at Midway. That's great and all but US industrial production was orders of magnitude higher than Japanese, to the point that one year after Midway (assuming no other carrier losses by either side), assuming all US carriers were sunk at Midway and no Japanese carriers were sunk, the Americans would have more carriers than Japan again. By two years after Midway the advantage is nearly two to one. Jonathan Parshall of Shattered Sword fame has done an entire writeup of why losing Midway wouldn't have mattered in the long run, though it may have extended the war, here. Japan was doomed the moment America resolved to fight to the bitter end rather than negotiate a peace, which happened about three minutes after the first bombs fell on Pearl Harbor.
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Sep 21, 2016 14:15
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vyelkin posted:By the time D-Day happened Germany had lost the war. At the same time as the Western allies were invading France, the Red Army was destroying an entire German army group in Operation Bagration. By June 1944 the Red Army was the most powerful and massive military fighting force on the planet and nothing Germany did was going to change that. D-Day helped end the war faster but its failure would not have meant Germany winning because by June 1944 Germany had a zero percent chance of defeating the Soviet Union. I think you can make a decent argument that by the time the war ended the US military was more potent, but that's beside the point. Did anyone argue for Germany really having a shot at winning the war in 1944 though? Germany might not have a shot at winning the war but the Soviets still wanted the second front which, all in all, was the reason for the invasion of France.
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Sep 21, 2016 14:28
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Randarkman posted:I think you can make a decent argument that by the time the war ended the US military was more potent, but that's beside the point. Did anyone argue for Germany really having a shot at winning the war in 1944 though? Germany might not have a shot at winning the war but the Soviets still wanted the second front which, all in all, was the reason for the invasion of France. No, but you don't even need to go through to German cities getting nuked to get a scenario where D-Day fails and Germany still loses. Nukes or not, second front or not, the Soviets win. The second front makes it easier and significantly reduces Soviet casualties, but the Soviets win either way.
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Sep 21, 2016 14:39
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vyelkin posted:No, but you don't even need to go through to German cities getting nuked to get a scenario where D-Day fails and Germany still loses. Nukes or not, second front or not, the Soviets win. The second front makes it easier and significantly reduces Soviet casualties, but the Soviets win either way. What I was saying there is a possibility of the Soviets not having conquered Germany by August 1945 and in that case Germany most likely is nuked. It wasn't an attempt to find a scenario where Germany still loses even though D-Day fails, it was just pointing out that even if a failed D-Day results in the Germans being able to slow down the Soviet advance, it wouldn't really matter, because they are not going to halt them forever or even for long, and even if they do (for a time) they are probably going to get nuked. Randarkman fucked around with this message at 14:50 on Sep 21, 2016 |
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Sep 21, 2016 14:46
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Randarkman posted:I think you can make a decent argument that by the time the war ended the US military was more potent Can you really? I mean, Zhukov ran a loving clinic in Manchuria.
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Sep 21, 2016 15:28
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Orange Devil posted:Can you really? I mean, Zhukov ran a loving clinic in Manchuria. Army, sure, but the US Navy and Air Force were huge. It's an apples to oranges thing that isn't worth worrying about too seriously.
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Sep 21, 2016 16:13
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Orange Devil posted:Can you really? I mean, Zhukov ran a loving clinic in Manchuria. It's an argument for sure and definitely not a sure thing (as regards the US military being more powerful). But by 1945 the US army itself was pretty drat big in terms of manpower and material and was throughly motorized with the best artillery in the world and combined arms operations with the USAAF had gotten a long way since 1942, and you also have the strategic bombers, the navy and nuclear capability. But yeah, it's probably not worth worrying about too much.
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Sep 21, 2016 16:32
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qkkl posted:I wouldn't consider that to be a private conversation, since he was talking to an audience. Maybe there is a quote from one of Hitler's close associates where they say they had a one-on-one talk with Hitler about jews where Hitler said he thought jews were responsible for major negative events in Germany. There's plenty of evidence of this variety too, don't worry. But that is a private conversation by any measure.
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Sep 21, 2016 17:57
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Kemper Boyd posted:The whole thing about the Soviets pushing to the Channel if not for the Western Allies getting in the way thing seems to be a myth. The Soviets really didn't have the resources to garrison all of Europe, and I don't think anyone has ever discovered anything indicating that Stalin would have even wanted to do so. I've read that at the Potsdam conference, Clement Atlee said to Stalin, "Marshal, it must be very satisfying for you to be here in Berlin." Stalin replied, "(Czar) Alexander got Paris." Randarkman posted:What I was saying there is a possibility of the Soviets not having conquered Germany by August 1945 and in that case Germany most likely is nuked. It wasn't an attempt to find a scenario where Germany still loses even though D-Day fails, it was just pointing out that even if a failed D-Day results in the Germans being able to slow down the Soviet advance, it wouldn't really matter, because they are not going to halt them forever or even for long, and even if they do (for a time) they are probably going to get nuked. Germany came closer to being nuked than most people know. A fair amount of U-235 was lost at the Oak Ridge facility due to mishandling sometime in early or mid-1945. Had this not happened, the first atomic bombs used in wartime would've fallen on Berlin and/or Hamburg (if Germany was still fighting by August of that year). Maybe someone might know more details about this? King Possum III fucked around with this message at 20:33 on Sep 21, 2016 |
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Sep 21, 2016 20:30
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The Sausages posted:IIRC fighters had a very hard time reaching the B29 at altitude and few were shot down in aerial combat when applied that way despite the Japanese maintaining homeland air supremacy for much of the time B29s were deployed. They also had unrivaled firepower and fire control. Not sure how it works but they had some sort of remote turrets that could accurately hit a target all at once. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3H_9iR7zvMk&t=857s Honda says you either approach it at a steep angle, or die, or you ram it. The germans might have had better interceptors, but it's still going to be hard to climb all the way up to engage such a formation.
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Sep 21, 2016 21:46
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Wasn't the whole point that he b-29 flew above the ceiling of Japanese fighters? I think they flew lower in the mass bombings of tokyo, but Wikipedia says the a-bomb was dropped from way the gently caress up.
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Sep 21, 2016 21:55
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I'm sure the guy feels some regret because he feels he could've stopped it. Even though he didn't have anything to say about the end of the war. Probably really traumatic experience all in all.
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Sep 21, 2016 22:02
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You can tell McNamara felt serious regret over what happened, but he still felt justified for doing it. On a level, I kind of agree with him. The entirety strategy of the Japanese government at the end of the war was to make the conquest of Japan so bloody that the Allies would balk at the losses. Instead, the Allies showed that they'd murder millions for victory, and that they had the weaponry to do just that, without the absurd losses that the Japanese were hoping for.
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Sep 21, 2016 23:14
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