Cyrano4747 posted:

edit: hey, if an appeal to authority is what you want tell him that a guy with a PhD in German history says he's a loving idiot.

quote:

Were you there in pre-WWII Germany? Then what justifies your superior attitude? Even after the destruction of WWI, Germany remained the single most powerful nation in Europe, and more importantly, was proud of being the country of Kant, Nietzsche (not my idea of a wise man, but the Germans were proud of him), Freud, Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Wagner, etc. At the time just before WWII, America was still recovering from the Great Depression. Name one noted American philosopher, scientist, or composer up to that period. About the best you can do is Washington Irving, Poe, Thoreau. You have to go back to the founding fathers to find a community of people who wrote and spoke with real intelligence, and accomplished something truly noteworthy. Yes, we had Einstein; but he was born and raised in Germany.

quote:

buy him an account

Raenir Salazar posted:

You might like this, he also says:

Cyrano4747 posted:

He has half a point with the cultural reference, but every country in Europe can make that argument. gently caress, just spit a laundry list of French thinkers at him. The US is a young country that you really have to look at as an offshoot of the English intellectual traditions, whatever.

Most powerful country after WW2? Has he never heard of the Marhal Plan, aka "Welfare for western Europe (mostly Germany) so they don't all go commie or die of starvation or something?"

I mean, gently caress, I'm pretty sure the Netherlands could have won a war with Germany in 1947.

Raenir Salazar posted:

If you guys want I could post his argument, if you think it's worth reading, here's a taste:


The majority of it I don't think I need much help with in refuting but there's two suppositions that I haven't really seen before here:


This is new to me; the Soviets used large formations of paratroopers in the East but they seemed to mostly be failed operations IIRC that helped to buy time. Would there have been a situation where the German version wouldn't have been mowed down from lack of heavy equipment?

Raenir Salazar posted:

You might like this, he also says:



poo poo, now I'm tempted.

HEY GAL posted:

after world war one, ya dingus

you know, the other time they nearly all starved to death and died

Raenir Salazar posted:

If you guys want I could post his argument, if you think it's worth reading, here's a taste:


The majority of it I don't think I need much help with in refuting but there's two suppositions that I haven't really seen before here:


This is new to me; the Soviets used large formations of paratroopers in the East but they seemed to mostly be failed operations IIRC that helped to buy time. Would there have been a situation where the German version wouldn't have been mowed down from lack of heavy equipment?

Raenir Salazar posted:

You might like this, he also says:

Raenir Salazar posted:

This is new to me; the Soviets used large formations of paratroopers in the East but they seemed to mostly be failed operations IIRC that helped to buy time. Would there have been a situation where the German version wouldn't have been mowed down from lack of heavy equipment?

HEY GAL posted:

buy him an account

quote:

Were you there in pre-WWII Germany? Then what justifies your superior attitude? Even after the destruction of WWI, Germany remained the single most powerful nation in Europe, and more importantly, was proud of being the country of Kant, Nietzsche (not my idea of a wise man, but the Germans were proud of him), Freud, Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Wagner, etc.

HEY GAL posted:

buy him an account

Nenonen posted:

Germany, the country of Sigmund Freud. (Also Beethoven and Brahms lived most of their lives in Austria, but I guess none of that matters.)

HEY GAL posted:

germany and austria are the same thing, as far as i'm concerned

Arquinsiel posted:

Basically look at how the allies used paratroopers.Sicily and Italy? Massive dispersions, units scattered all over the place. Kind of hard to call either way. D-day? Decent success. Market Garden? The closer to the front they were the more successful their operation was. 101st did sterling work, 82nd did okay, and the 1st did far better than they should have but were eventually just overwhelmed through weight of supply. Varsity? They dropped after the Rhine crossing to muck up the German backfield and interdict troop movement. This was probably the most clear cut total success of the allied drops. If the Germans had used their Fallschirmjaeger in Varsity-ish roles then they might have managed to maybe advance a bit faster at times, maybe. Assuming they weren't just cut to poo poo by AA fire all the time. Long term it's deckchairs on the Titanic.

Cyrano4747 posted:

Nenonen posted:

Oh great, as if we needed with a Stahlhelm

spectralent posted:

If nothing else he's factually wrong about the time of introduction of the T-34; it was already in service before Barbarossa (as was the KV-1). Hell, the KV-1 fought in the winter war.




This is so wehraboo it hurts. It's literally "Now I don't approve but am forced to respect the glory of the aryan people".

quote:

The success Hitler had with the masses was substantial. Even 89% was substantial, not to mention the 98% in 1936--and Trump is having increasingly large numbers support him. Fortunately, not as large as Hitler and his Nazi Party claimed. But the important point to remember is that Hitler did indeed hijack a democracy. He did not overthrow the Kaiser, that had already been done. So having a democracy as a form of government is no guarantee that your country will not be taken over by a tyrant who will lead the nation into a ruinous war. It happened in Germany--which was arguably the most advanced, civilized, and cultured country of its time. So it could happen to us.

Cyrano4747 posted:

Eh, I wouldn't say deckchairs on the titanic. Modern air mobile infantry is a direct descendant of the better uses of airborne in WW2. I'd say it's morel ike the tech just didn't exit to do it optimally yet.

Krispy Kareem posted:

Hey, anyone know what kinds of Army Air Corps bombers took off from England to bomb Germany? I'm trying to remember what planes by grandfather worked/flew on. I thought it was a B-25, but that apparently was only flown by the RAF in Europe and I doubt they'd have an American ground crew.

I guess a B-19 is a possibility. I didn't know if there were any other bombers flown in great numbers from England.

Raenir Salazar posted:

In fairness there is a little bit of back and forth and context that is missing there; notably I mentioned the T-34-85 (and the Sherman) were the best tanks in the war overall from an operations perspective; and that variant of the T-34 was a late addition to the war; here's what started it though it isn't specifically that he's a Wehraboo, he's just weird:

spectralent posted:

One of the most amusing little facts I heard about the deception leading up to the German attack on the USSR was the fact that part of the intelligence service's argument that the Germans weren't going to attack was that the German preparations looked like the scramblings of a bunch of idiots who forgot winter happens, which meant they had to be bluster, despite the rhetoric.

Krispy Kareem posted:

Hey, anyone know what kinds of Army Air Corps bombers took off from England to bomb Germany? I'm trying to remember what planes by grandfather worked/flew on. I thought it was a B-25, but that apparently was only flown by the RAF in Europe and I doubt they'd have an American ground crew.

I guess a B-19 is a possibility. I didn't know if there were any other bombers flown in great numbers from England.

OctaviusBeaver posted:

Stalin didn't want to believe that the Germans were about to invade and mountains of intelligence weren't able to convince him otherwise. Maybe those reports were from people who knew what he wanted to hear.

That's some pretty sloppy intelligence work to see your greatest ideological enemy building up an army millions strong on your border, flying reconnaissance planes into your airspace and actually being warned that they are going to invade by the British, and then assume it can't happen because you don't see any winter coats lying around.

Cyrano4747 posted:

Eh, I wouldn't say deckchairs on the titanic. Modern air mobile infantry is a direct descendant of the better uses of airborne in WW2. I'd say it's morel ike the tech just didn't exit to do it optimally yet.

Acebuckeye13 posted:

Main bombers operated by the USAAF out of Britain were B-17s, B-24s, and B-26s IIRC. 17 and 24 were both four-engined heavy bombers, and the 26 was a two-engined medium bomber.

HEY GAL posted:

germany and austria are the same thing, as far as i'm concerned

LingcodKilla posted:

Wasn't the French Char-B one of the best tanks at the start of conflict?

LingcodKilla posted:

Wasn't the French Char-B one of the best tanks at the start of conflict?

Acebuckeye13 posted:

Main bombers operated by the USAAF out of Britain were B-17s, B-24s, and B-26s IIRC. 17 and 24 were both four-engined heavy bombers, and the 26 was a two-engined medium bomber. Do you have any other information, such as what unit he was assigned to or what airfield he worked on?

Edit: Also Raenir your friend is probably the funniest thing I've read all day.

sullat posted:

Under the glorious rule of the Hapsburgs, no doubt.

Cyrano4747 posted:

Any scenario where Germany wins has to be predicated on one thing: No invasion of Russia.

That said, no invasion of Russia is the archetypal "Gay Black Hitler" scenario. At that point we might as well be discussing how the 40s would have gone if Hitler was a socialist.

Tomn posted:

You know, come to think of it, do we have any records that might provide some insight on the strategic thinking behind that? Was it purely a "Let's support our allies" moment? Was there any kind of end-game or plan as to how to actually force the Americans to the peace table? Were they hoping the Japanese would thrash the Americans at sea soundly and then invade Russia from Siberia as thanks for the support or something?

Nenonen posted:

Germany, the country of Sigmund Freud. (Also Beethoven and Brahms lived most of their lives in Austria, but I guess none of that matters.)

Cyrano4747 posted:

bewbies posted:

(we still can't do airborne stuff competently)

Saint Celestine posted:

The superstructure of a battleship is definitely NOT the heaviest armored part. You're thinking of the conning tower, which IS the most heavily armored part, but the conning tower makes up a tiny portion of the entire superstructure of a battleship.
Edit2: Tanks and battleships aren't really an accurate comparison. Tanks don't worry about plunging fire. Battleships were built to account for plunging fire at extreme combat ranges and were armored to protect against them. They are armored for typical battleship shells, not a 2k kg JDAM or a modern supersonic ASM.

Delivery McGee posted:

Yeah, the conning tower. But as long as the rangefinders survived, the conning tower was all the superstructure a battleship really needed. The rest of the upper works is just funnels, admirals' staterooms, and the fairweather bridge. Cf. those photos of Seydlitz and others limping into port after Jutland.

CoolCab posted:

Right, and even during the weird faux peace brought on by the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact it's not like the Nazis were cool with the USSR. The Nazis were not subtle about their desire to eliminate communism (or Bolshevism or whatever they called it) and specifically destroy the USSR, they were screaming it from the proverbial rooftops from the very beginning. To paraphrase what is often repeated in this thread: there are often counterfactuals that would allow the Nazis to perform better, but they all rely on them not being Nazis.