|
What's the most important stroke of dumb luck in WWII?
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 05:48
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 9, 2024 08:56 |
|
|
Tunicate posted:What's the most important stroke of dumb luck in WWII? Midway I should qualify this with it being a whole lot more than luck, but it would have gone way differently if the air patrols hadn't basically bumped into the IJN carrier group just before deciding to head back. FAUXTON fucked around with this message at 06:14 on Feb 22, 2019 |
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 06:04
|
|
|
FDR becoming a senile wreck just in time for Yalta was pretty lucky for Stalin.
OctaviusBeaver fucked around with this message at 06:17 on Feb 22, 2019 |
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 06:15
|
|
|
Hitler sleeping in on D-Day so the panzer reserves didn’t get ordered into action was a pretty important stroke of dumb luck.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 06:21
|
|
|
Biffmotron posted:Hitler sleeping in on D-Day so the panzer reserves didn’t get ordered into action was a pretty important stroke of dumb luck. How much difference would this really have made? Allied air superiority made moving armored formations around in the day time a huge liability, I suspect they would have wanted to wait for evening anyway to move, but I really don't know. Also he wasn't asleep very long. It cost the Germans like an hour at most.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 07:11
|
|
Yes, it's like a lava lamp.
|
The winter of 41-2 was one of the worst in the 20th century.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 07:15
|
|
|
Saint Celestine posted:In hindsight, the best move for Lutjens to make would have been to finish off the POW and immediately head back to Germany the way he came. Apart from Halsey, I can't really think of any naval officers in WWII who were really willing to throw their capital ships into an attack like that. The real nuts are always destroyer commanders, or escort ships if you give them half a chance. Slim Jim Pickens fucked around with this message at 07:25 on Feb 22, 2019 |
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 07:21
|
|
|
PittTheElder posted:As near as I can read online, everywhere except Omaha the allies had the exits to the beaches cleared within an hour or two. Cleared meaning large lanes the engineers have had time to remove mines and obstacles from, and allow reinforcements off the beach in column. Huh, fair enough. I wasn't thinking of saving private Ryan though, but a series of posts from a decent while back, that detailed things that went wrong during the landings.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 07:38
|
|
|
Piloting a maritime recon plane must've been something. Months of staring at "idunno, could be an oil slick / sub periscope / wake" and then they use you to get a fix on a carrier group by sending you out and taking note of exactly where you disappear.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 07:55
|
|
|
Saint Celestine posted:In hindsight, the best move for Lutjens to make would have been to finish off the POW and immediately head back to Germany the way he came. Probably. A quick repair, re-arm, re-fuel port visit in Norway and back out, but with the British down two capital ships ? The convoy system would have broken down, scattering the transports for the U-boats to run down at will. Slim Jim Pickens posted:Apart from Halsey, I can't really think of any naval officers in WWII who were really willing to throw their capital ships into an attack like that. The real nuts are always destroyer commanders, or escort ships if you give them half a chance. Note that DD squadron commander in 1942 Burke ended up as CNO for a long stretch.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 08:12
|
|
|
Epicurius posted:It wasn't. Conditions were a lot better in the Channel Islands than in a lot of places under German occupation. I think it's more a "huh, didn't know things were that bad compared to what I thought they were"
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 08:19
|
|
|
mllaneza posted:Probably. A quick repair, re-arm, re-fuel port visit in Norway and back out, but with the British down two capital ships ? The convoy system would have broken down, scattering the transports for the U-boats to run down at will. Prince of Wales was penetrating the armour on Bismark and unlike Hood, had proper battleship armour and wasn't going to lose a magazine. There were also a bunch of torpedo-armed cruisers just outside of the action which would have dived straight into combat because cruiser commanders are psychos too. The British would probably have lost PoW if Bismark gave an intense pursuit, but I don't think the Germans would have just had light damage. Returning to Norway would also mean sailing towards the Home Fleet, which was sortieing with KGV and the carrier Victorious, who were part of the final battlegroup that sunk the Bismark. Not really the best outlook for Lutjens either. I think he was doomed.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 08:38
|
|
|
Yeah I was thinking that even if that lucky torpedo hit to her rudder didn't happen, the Bismarck was too outnumbered and too trackable to really escape either way, even if it came down to a knock-down, drag-out fight
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 08:53
|
|
|
PittTheElder posted:How much difference would this really have made? Allied air superiority made moving armored formations around in the day time a huge liability, I suspect they would have wanted to wait for evening anyway to move, but I really don't know. Zero, because when he was called, Hitler couldn't believe the attack was more than a diversion, and ordered the tank forces to not attack. Then he went back to sleep. (Hitler apparently had this irrational believe that the real attack would fall on the place where the Dieppe Raid took place.)
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 09:39
|
|
|
Nebakenezzer posted:Another thing I took away from Inferno: long lances are goddamn scary. I forget what cruiser it was (maybe Portland) that got hit by one and had the entire bottom half of its bow just gone, like it had taken a gigantic shark bite. At Tassafaronga, the New Orleans and Minneapolis were both hit at practically the same time by torpedoes. Minneapolis lost everything forwards of the first turret while New Orleans lost everything forwards of the second turret.  
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 09:57
|
|
|
Kind of amazing that they bothered to repair New Orleans.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 10:29
|
|
|
aphid_licker posted:Kind of amazing that they bothered to repair New Orleans. Eh, it'll buff out.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 10:41
|
|
|
OctaviusBeaver posted:FDR becoming a senile wreck just in time for Yalta was pretty lucky for Stalin. I'm not sure what at Yalta indicated FDR was a senile wreck.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 11:06
|
|
|
Libluini posted:Zero, because when he was called, Hitler couldn't believe the attack was more than a diversion, and ordered the tank forces to not attack. Then he went back to sleep. (Hitler apparently had this irrational believe that the real attack would fall on the place where the Dieppe Raid took place.) The god-man fuhrer couldn't get up at 7 am? I guess meth hangovers are real 
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 11:31
|
|
|
I actually just went back and re-read the wiki article for Omaha and dear god I knew they were technically getting off the beach by midday but I hadn't appreciated that by the end of the day they were still basically in sight of the beach.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 11:35
|
|
|
HEY GUNS posted:i spoke to a german dude once whose father was killed like two days before ww2 ended, in the middle of one of the nordic countries My ex once showed me a photo album of her great aunt. She got married just as the war started and the husband went to fight Russians. Then in 1944 the husband's unit was moved from the east front to Lapland to fight against Germans. The truce with Soviets stipulated that Finland had to demobilize all reservists by December and so the unit was finally called off from the front. He was in a truck on its way back home when it hit a mine* on a road and he died. Welp, I get emotional again just thinking of the photos of them together at the wedding, then on his leaves and then the obituary and funeral pictures.  *German army laid a fuckton of mines on their retreat to Norway and the official mine clearing operation continued until 1952, the last reported mine casualty happened in 1960's and UXOs are still found. In 2013 a young dude died and his buddy was injured when they were loving around with old explosives they had found. For those who understand Finnish here's an Excel spreadsheet of Finnish civilian deaths 1944-1949 caused by mines and explosives. Some excerpts that sound all too familiar from Afghanistan and other later wars: - 12 year old boy died in September 1945 after finding mines - four year old girl died in October 1945 after someone had put explosives into a fireplace - five year old girl died in October 1945 after hitting a mine while playing on the ruins of her home  also two occasions of sitting on a mined tree stump, one occasion of death by tapping on a UXO with your fingers, and one case of heating a bomb with a magnifying glass, god drat
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 11:44
|
|
|
Nenonen posted:For those who understand Finnish here's an Excel spreadsheet of Finnish civilian deaths 1944-1949 caused by mines and explosives. Kinda related, I believe that post-war the Finnish conscript pioneers were often assigned to find and clear both land and naval mines. Apparently the naval mine clearing was quite a poo poo show even in the context of the day since the USSR took most of the purpose-built equipment, including the mine clearance vessels, as reparations.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 11:55
|
|
|
Tunicate posted:What's the most important stroke of dumb luck in WWII? Neither the Germans or Japanese attempting to work out whether their codes had been broken for ages
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 13:58
|
|
|
All this talk of Normandy reminds me of one of my favorite scenes from The Steel Helmet, written and directed by Sam Fuller. Fuller was a veteran of the 1st Infantry Division and fought in North Africa, Sicily, France, and Czechoslovakia, and also wrote and directed the semi-auto biographical movie The Big Red One starring Lee Marvin and Mark Hamill.              
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 14:29
|
|
|
The Colonel Taylor referenced is this man: who was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for that action, though the quote was a little saltier than what was allowed in a 1950 movie. "There are two kinds of people who are staying on this beach: those who are dead and those who are going to die. Now let’s get the hell out of here" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_A._Taylor#Omaha_Beach
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 14:43
|
|
|
SimonCat posted:All this talk of Normandy reminds me of one of my favorite scenes from The Steel Helmet, written and directed by Sam Fuller. Fuller was a veteran of the 1st Infantry Division and fought in North Africa, Sicily, France, and Czechoslovakia, and also wrote and directed the semi-auto biographical movie The Big Red One starring Lee Marvin and Mark Hamill. Oh hey, the "Buddha Bless" movie, with the portable altar-and-organ.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 14:50
|
|
|
https://twitter.com/apiecebyguy/status/1098368462240518144
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 14:55
|
|
|
dont doxx me
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 15:18
|
|
|
HEY GUNS posted:dont doxx me Too late. https://twitter.com/darylmeador/status/1098392101572751360
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 15:31
|
|
|
it is difficult to train for cav if you have no opportunity to ride--the way it was told to me is you sit on a chair backwards with your legs to either side of it
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 15:48
|
|
|
Vahakyla posted:What do you mean? It was fast as gently caress, and many variants werent much behind the Mosquito. Yeah but it just looks fast so I ways assume I’m going to bullshit my way out of bad decisions and am rarely correct. It is fast but I expect it to be faster for no reason.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 15:50
|
|
|
Biffmotron posted:Hitler sleeping in on D-Day so the panzer reserves didn’t get ordered into action was a pretty important stroke of dumb luck. aphid_licker posted:Piloting a maritime recon plane must've been something. Months of staring at "idunno, could be an oil slick / sub periscope / wake" and then they use you to get a fix on a carrier group by sending you out and taking note of exactly where you disappear. gradenko_2000 posted:Yeah I was thinking that even if that lucky torpedo hit to her rudder didn't happen, the Bismarck was too outnumbered and too trackable to really escape either way, even if it came down to a knock-down, drag-out fight
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 15:54
|
|
|
Man, Oddball is pissed off.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 16:05
|
|
|
I'll always believe those Ju-88s accidentally dropping their bombs on London prevented a UK/Germany armistice.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 16:07
|
|
|
Cessna posted:Man, Oddball is pissed off. It's a great movie because it's the earliest American war movie I know of that has soldiers being dirty and tired and pretty cynical about the whole affair. SGT Zack here shoots a NK POW in anger, leads a patrol in exchange for a box of cigars, lets a guy die by booby-trapped body, essentially to spite the LT, and spends most of the film calling the Nisei SGT "buddhahead," and calling the Koreans "gooks" until corrected by his young ward, "Short-Round," who was Spielberg's inspiration for the character in Temple of Doom.    Short-Round has a pretty grim story arc:    Fuller was branded a Communist sympathiser for including scenes that touched upon the internment of Japanese Americans during WWII:  This movie is definitely not The Sands of Iwo Jima There's nothing glamorous about it. 
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 16:38
|
|
|
Also, another cool quote from COL Taylor: When General Taylor checked the surrender document, he noted that the place of surrender was written as the city "Elbogen, Sudetenland". Taylor struck out the location "Elbogen, Sudetenland," adding a note "does not exist," and wrote "Loket, Czechoslovakia" instead, changing its name back to before the Nazi invasion. This act brought him great respect in Czechoslovakia
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 16:41
|
|
|
SimonCat posted:Also, another cool quote from COL Taylor:  tho
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 17:00
|
|
|
HEY GUNS posted:german-speaking bohemians are a huge Czech sympathy for German speaking Bohemians was very low at the end of the war for some unexplained reason.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 17:20
|
|
|
Epicurius posted:Czech sympathy for German speaking Bohemians was very low at the end of the war for some unexplained reason.
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 17:22
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 9, 2024 08:56 |
|
|
aphid_licker posted:Piloting a maritime recon plane must've been something. Months of staring at "idunno, could be an oil slick / sub periscope / wake" and then they use you to get a fix on a carrier group by sending you out and taking note of exactly where you disappear. Just from shattered sword, the guys piloting the scouts are definitely trying to strike a balance between "able to usefully report" and "be alive" Frankly maritime patrol and recon must have sucked generally, especially with no radar. You have a navigator who just has to dead reckon everything and won't know if he's done it right until they find the convoy/land, a bunch of dudes watching the featureless ocean, and pilots that are expected to learn things like drift based on ocean conditions. C.M. Kruger posted:At Tassafaronga, the New Orleans and Minneapolis were both hit at practically the same time by torpedoes. Minneapolis lost everything forwards of the first turret while New Orleans lost everything forwards of the second turret. That's a whole lot of nautical "nope" right there
|
|
#
?
Feb 22, 2019 17:28
|
|
