Just creating this thread for ppl who want to discuss WW2 etc.. just dumping the recent ones/quoted ones in, hopefully future ones can go in here:
WW2 discussion (spillover from Ukraine thread)
- Thread starter dowie
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Soldato
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- 21 Jan 2010
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Ww2 has the best armour.
Modern tanks are boring and all look the same.
WW2 had class and variety. From the Polish "clown car" tankette, to the ludicrously top heavy KV2.
My personal fave, on gun alone, is the Sturmtiger.
Modern tanks are boring and all look the same.
WW2 had class and variety. From the Polish "clown car" tankette, to the ludicrously top heavy KV2.
My personal fave, on gun alone, is the Sturmtiger.
By the summer of 1940, France had fallen to the Nazis in just 6 weeks, and Britain was fighting virtually alone against Germany on land, at sea and in the air. After the new British prime minister, Winston Churchill, appealed personally to Roosevelt for help, the U.S. president agreed to exchange more than 50 outdated American destroyers for 99-year leases on British bases in the Caribbean and Newfoundland, which would be used as U.S. air and naval bases.
By the end of 1941, the lend-lease policy was extended to include other U.S. allies, including China and the Soviet Union. By the end of World War II the United States would use it to provide a total of some $50 billion in aid to more than 30 nations around the globe, from the Free French movement led by Charles de Gaulle and the governments-in-exile of Poland, the Netherlands and Norway to Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Paraguay and Peru. before 1941 American public opinion also limited Roosevelt’s options. Many Americans opposed involving the United States in another war. The US formally entered the European Theater of World War II on December 11, 1941, only days after the events of Pearl Harbor, when Germany declared war on the United States. “We must be the great arsenal of democracy,” Roosevelt declared in one of his signature “fireside chats” on December 29, 1940. We must apply ourselves to our task with the same resolution, the same sense of urgency, the same spirit of patriotism and sacrifice as we would show were we at war.”
What was United States then, it's not what it is today
As their British and Canadian allies had already learned, the GIs and their officers soon came to respect the resolute fighting qualities of their enemy. they discovered, with considerable chagrin, that although they possessed a greater abundance of weapons, some of these were decidedly inferior to those of the Germans and the Wehrmacht’s machine guns and machine pistols had a higher rate of fire, its multiple-barrel mortars were more effective than the Allies’ single-tube weapons, and its self-propelled antitank guns were better in terms of armor, the difference was daunting, with German tanks frequently outgunning and outmaneuvering the ubiquitous American medium Shermans and the British Army’s Churchills, Valentines, and Cromwells. The third-ranking German tank was at least the equal of the Allies’ best tanks, and the formidable Tiger, mounting a high-velocity 88mm cannon, was superior to all armor in the European Theater of Operations.
By the end of 1941, the lend-lease policy was extended to include other U.S. allies, including China and the Soviet Union. By the end of World War II the United States would use it to provide a total of some $50 billion in aid to more than 30 nations around the globe, from the Free French movement led by Charles de Gaulle and the governments-in-exile of Poland, the Netherlands and Norway to Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Paraguay and Peru. before 1941 American public opinion also limited Roosevelt’s options. Many Americans opposed involving the United States in another war. The US formally entered the European Theater of World War II on December 11, 1941, only days after the events of Pearl Harbor, when Germany declared war on the United States. “We must be the great arsenal of democracy,” Roosevelt declared in one of his signature “fireside chats” on December 29, 1940. We must apply ourselves to our task with the same resolution, the same sense of urgency, the same spirit of patriotism and sacrifice as we would show were we at war.”
What was United States then, it's not what it is today
As their British and Canadian allies had already learned, the GIs and their officers soon came to respect the resolute fighting qualities of their enemy. they discovered, with considerable chagrin, that although they possessed a greater abundance of weapons, some of these were decidedly inferior to those of the Germans and the Wehrmacht’s machine guns and machine pistols had a higher rate of fire, its multiple-barrel mortars were more effective than the Allies’ single-tube weapons, and its self-propelled antitank guns were better in terms of armor, the difference was daunting, with German tanks frequently outgunning and outmaneuvering the ubiquitous American medium Shermans and the British Army’s Churchills, Valentines, and Cromwells. The third-ranking German tank was at least the equal of the Allies’ best tanks, and the formidable Tiger, mounting a high-velocity 88mm cannon, was superior to all armor in the European Theater of Operations.
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Lend‑Lease Act: Definition, Ukraine & World War II ‑ HISTORY
The Lend‑Lease Act of 1941 allowed the U.S. government to lend or lease war supplies to any nation vital to U.S. defense, such as Britain during World War II.
www.history.com
No, it helped contribute but it wasn't really comparable to the atomic bombings. This is because the Japanese government knew they could defend their homeland against invasion so adequately and inflict such massive casualties on invading forces, that they believed the allies would be likely to sue for peace rather than feed their men into a meat grinder on mass, the Soviets joining in made things worse but did little to deter this belief (despite the fact that feeding men into meat grinders until they broke was Stalin's preferred battle tactic). To put in perspective how much of a deterrent the projected death toll would have potentially been to the allies: US servicemen and women killed or maimed in combat receive a medal called the purple heart, the US hasn't produced any since WW2, they're still using the stockpile that had been ordered in preparation for the invasion of Japan.
The atomic bombings on the other hand were much more persuasive, as they had no way to defend against them or strike back, and especially as they were worried the next one would fall on Tokyo thus wiping out the imperial family. However even despite all this the Japanese government was still deadlocked on whether to surrender or not, some preferring to fight to the death, and so they asked the emperor to decide for them. Thankfully he chose the saner option.
It should be noted when discussing all this, that whenever the topic of Japanese surrender comes up you always get some uneducated fool bouncing around the notion that Japan wanted to surrender before the bombs dropped, this is a complete fabrication, but one sort of based in truth. That may sound like an oxymoron, but it's to do with things being lost in translation. While it's true that Japan had no intention of surrendering prior to the bombings (and only did so after by the slimmest of margins) they were attempting to negotiate a "surrender", the difference being is that by surrender they meant that they would agreed to stop fighting us, we would agree to stop fighting them, we would agree to leave their them in charge of their military, agree not to try and occupy their territory, promise never to try and convict any of their war criminals and everyone would go about their business.
It wasn't just a case of him overestimating his military, it was also a case of him underestimating his enemies. I.E one of the main reasons Blitzkreig worked so well for Hitler was because his enemies were either idiots, completed unprepared to defend themselves, or both. I.E France knew for years an invasion may come so what did they do, put all their effort into building defences and superior tanks. Defences the Germans went around and superior tanks that got outnumbered, swarmed and "rekt". Ukraine knew for years this was highly likely to happen and so spent the time reactivating/upgrading their Soviet era SAM systems, reactivating/upgrading their tanks, and acquiring anti tank weapons.
Putin found out the hard way that blitzkrieg is actually quite ineffective against a competent adversary that's actually prepared for it.
The official Japanese surrender statement explicitly referenced the atomic bombs as the reason for surrendering. The idea that they didn't play a part is nonsense made up much later for political reasons.
Apart from all the other countries that were fighting too. Some did so under the British flag as they were part of the British empire at the time (most notably India, just for reasons of scale). There were also a fair few people from other countries who fought in the British military. For example, there was an entire unit in the RAF in WW2 that was Polish. There were even some Americans who came over as civilians and joined the British military long before the USA entered the war. Australia and New Zealand were definitely in the war by 1941. Maybe by 1940, I don't know. Then there were the resistance movements in occupied countries and, in a different way, in neutral countries. For example, some Spanish people secretly working for the Allies smuggled people from the French-Spanish border to Britain. There was also a Spaniard who really should be much better known - Agent Garbo. An astonishing combination of courage and skill. I forget their real name. Juan Garcia, I think. But better known as Agent Garbo. A double agent so successful that they were awarded high military honours by both sides. Right through the war, German military intelligence had not the slightest clue that their top agent in Britain (so they thought) was actually their enemy and was feeding them disinformation. So successfully that he even had German military intelligence sending significant amounts of money straight to British military intelligence. Along with a German encryption system that British military hadn't cracked.
I disagree with this although my opinion isn't particularly popular.
Putin/others high up in Russian government seemed to be under the impression it would be as simple as taking Crimea, that when push came to shove Ukraine would fold in the face of force and the West would be too timid, too divided to get involved - Russia invests a lot into sowing subversion and fragmentation in the West.
Russia thought they could roll in, rely on a degree of support from the pro-Russian leaning segments of Ukrainian society and it would mostly just be mopping up of isolated army groups and individual hold out cities once they'd head shot the Ukraine government and military leadership and destroyed stuff like air-defences and other infrastructure in initial attacks.
A controversial one, though I'm not sure why as it has been fairly obvious if watching things blow by blow on OSINT outlets, etc., but the initial force composition was designed to minimise the impact on the main Russian forces should it be lost - vast amounts of very old hardware was pulled out of mothballed stock, rather than main reserves, to reduce how much they took from the main active forces and active reserve stock, not because of the quantity and/or condition/availability of active equipment - the intention was different regardless of the reality of the state of the main Russian army. Putin is paranoid about the West and would not willingly deplete the main army beyond what was necessary. I think people including government intelligence agencies, etc. are vastly overestimating the impact on the main Russian army* - though that does still deplete from their ability to mobilise on a grand scale and fight a longer war.
* There are some exceptions to that - they ended up throwing good money after bad with the airborne forces, etc.