Could the Soviet Union have won by itself?

[waldzee]

Definitely. The T26's would have swarmed past any local strongpoints in a multi point deep penetration, supported bythe early IL-2s, clear across the Polish plain to at least the Oder river.

[apollo144]

The problem of the Rumanians was [...] generally about having too many obsolete french weapons

So why do you think romanians were going to the trouble of schlepping these obsolete weapons around?

That is what they had and furnishing more modern german weapons was not obvious as even some german divisions were equipped with french weapons.

[BDV]

waldzee,

You forgot the shock action of the veteran troop of flying T34s from Khalin-Gol!

[apollo144]

No. There were also french medium tanks (Somuas and CharD2s), and french aviation engines (the famed GnomeRhone), french fighter planes (Dewoitine 520s), french antitank guns (the 47 mm Puteaux), and french bombers (Amiot 351), and french transports which would have suited Romanian (and Hungarian, and Italian) Army's needs perfectly from mid '41 to end of '43. Well for Italians, from 1940 onward. An ATL tank battle at Sidi Barani pitting O'Connors' Matildas against Graziani's SOMUAs...

All products that the french economy was organized to mass produce in July 1940, if only germans would be kind enough to order the continuation of production.

The heavy artillery however is a particular pet peeve in the context of the significant trouble the romanian invader had in southern Ukraine, Crimeea, and at the Don bend due to lack of this STANDARD tool for tackling fortified/entrenched troops.

There is no reason why the germans would produce french weapons . German weapons were generally better.
Atacking an entrenched enemy is a combined arms battle in which the heavier artillery plays a part. You overestimate its role and you wrongly allege a significant lack of heavy artillery.
The problems of the rumanian army were of a much more general nature. Its problems had to do with motivation, trtaining, relationship between officers and men,lack of trained NCO's,obsolete equipment... Where the latter is concerned artillery was not the main problem.

[BDV]

It'd be somewhat more illuminating if you'd support your sweeping statements. For example, that romanians only managed to take Odessa AFTER germans provided artillery reinforcements is a well known factoid. Gen. Dumitrescu's request for support of eliminating the Don bend bridgeheads is also a known factoid. And the general usefullness of heavy artillery in dealing with city defenders / entrenched infantry is also ordinary knowledge.

Seems that everyone needed artillery in WWII - Rasputitsa?

So would you care to provide a justification why the rusty 155 mm GPFs, and their 43 kg shells lobbed 20 km (much beyond the range of 1941 soviet field artillery) would not have helped?

[waldzee]

waldzee,

You forgot the shock action of the veteran troop of flying T34s from Khalin-Gol!

That was a one - off.
However- seriously.
Soviet military plans:


Schematics of the Soviet military blockade and invasion of Estonia and Latvia in 1940 (Russian State Naval Archives)
The Soviet troops allocated for possible military actions against the Baltic states numbered 435,000 troops, around 8,000 guns and mortars, over 3,000 tanks, and over 500 armoured cars.[5] On June 3, 1940 all Soviet military forces based in Baltic states were concentrated under the command of Aleksandr Loktionov.[6] On June 9 the directive 02622ss/ov was given to the Red Army's Leningrad Military District by Semyon Timoshenko to be ready by 12 June to a) capture the vessels of the Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian navies in their bases or at sea;
FIf the 435,000 Sovietshock army Germany is expecting to hit the Baltic rolls across the Polish border, what is going to stop it in May/June 1940?

The T-26 was an optimised, bugs free machine for fast infantry support,& travelled far on rather little fuel. 240 km / tank
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-26
follow the deep probes with motorised infantry ,then with Kv-1 supported by Polish troops mobilised é Freed along the way

It is the ultimate what if..

[BDV]

]"BDV":waldzee,
You forgot the shock action of the veteran troop of flying T34s from Khalin-Gol!

That was a one - off.
However- seriously.
Soviet military plans:


.....

It is the ultimate what if..

Care to formulate it as a separate thread?

[waldzee]

]"BDV":waldzee,
You forgot the shock action of the veteran troop of flying T34s from Khalin-Gol!

That was a one - off.
However- seriously.
Soviet military plans:


.....

It is the ultimate what if..

Care to formulate it as a separate thread?

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Feel free. I'm cutting down my posting

[apollo144]

It'd be somewhat more illuminating if you'd support your sweeping statements. For example, that romanians only managed to take Odessa AFTER germans provided artillery reinforcements is a well known factoid. Gen. Dumitrescu's request for support of eliminating the Don bend bridgeheads is also a known factoid. And the general usefullness of heavy artillery in dealing with city defenders / entrenched infantry is also ordinary knowledge.

Seems that everyone needed artillery in WWII - Rasputitsa?

So would you care to provide a justification why the rusty 155 mm GPFs, and their 43 kg shells lobbed 20 km (much beyond the range of 1941 soviet field artillery) would not have helped?

It is your unsupported pet theory that there was a lack of heavy artillery which was a significant problem. There is no reason why the german army need to put french artillery more to use than they did.And,as stated ?before the problems of the rumanian army were much more complex than you are putting out here under the influence of your heavy artillery obsession.
It is ordinary knowledge that attacking an entrenched enemy is a combined arms story in which different types of artillery play a part. Heavy artillery is not the solution in street fighting. One of the things the germans learned in stalingrad. Just creates easy to defend ruins.

[waldzee]

]"BDV":waldzee,
You forgot the shock action of the veteran troop of flying T34s from Khalin-Gol!

That was a one - off.
However- seriously.
Soviet military plans:


.....

It is the ultimate what if..

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
there were an additional 460,000 men, 300 tanks, 12,000 artillery
viewtopic.php?f=79&t=189614 Deployed against Bukovina / Bessarabia that could hahve combined to form a million man invasion force, Pincered into South Poland & East Prussia.

[BDV]

It is your unsupported pet theory that there was a lack of heavy artillery which was a significant problem.

What is the evidence that romanians had sufficient artillery?

Heavy artillery is not the solution in street fighting. One of the things the germans learned in stalingrad. Just creates easy to defend ruins.

You're mistaking artillery fire for level bombing.

Anyway the problem for Romanians at Odessa was not the city fighting, of which there was little, but the lines of fortifications and entrenched infantry. Modern rapid fire armed defenders make short work of attacking infantry, if there is no heavy artillery to gobsmack the defenders, as demonstrated first at New Orleans in 1815, re-confirmed in 1861-1865, and detailed in 4 years of prior slaughter (1914-1918).

[apollo144]

It is your unsupported pet theory that there was a lack of heavy artillery which was a significant problem.

What is the evidence that romanians had sufficient artillery?

Heavy artillery is not the solution in street fighting. One of the things the germans learned in stalingrad. Just creates easy to defend ruins.

You're mistaking artillery fire for level bombing.

Anyway the problem for Romanians at Odessa was not the city fighting, of which there was little, but the lines of fortifications and entrenched infantry. Modern rapid fire armed defenders make short work of attacking infantry, if there is no heavy artillery to gobsmack the defenders, as demonstrated first at New Orleans in 1815, re-confirmed in 1861-1865, and detailed in 4 years of prior slaughter (1914-1918).

You are still stuck in your heavy artillery obsession. Anything else is ignored.
To attack entrenched infantry, a mix of weapons is used. And in city fighting, heavy artillery is not the solution as the germans learned at Stalingrad.
Your thinking has not evolved beyond the massive artillery barrages of ww1.

[BDV]

Still, no evidence, only sweeping (unsubstantiated) general statements.

[apollo144]

Still, no evidence, only sweeping (unsubstantiated) general statements.

Which is the advantage of expressing common sense instead of coming up with some strange theory which overemphasizes the role of one type of weapon.

[waldzee]

Still, no evidence, only sweeping (unsubstantiated) general statements.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Perhaps apollo 144 can advise us why Stalin's Soviets didn't sieze the day in June 1940...