Is Red Army overrated in its strategy and tactics in WW2?

[Panzermahn]

Numerous times that i hear many authors said that Zhukov was a brilliant organiser and planner and improve communications and control plus deception since 1943 after the gigantic battle of Kursk...

Especially the red-armyphile David Glantz who organised the Art of War Symposium in 1985 and books like The Collapse of Army group Centre 1944 led us to much of this credence..

But the real truth is, Zhukov is a great implementer (sending his troops to their death) BUT NO MASTER TACTICIAN

why?

ALL the Victories by the Red Army in WW2 had something in common, that is masses of reserves, tanks and aircraft....

Even that, they took almost 4 years to defeat Wehrmacht, one of the finest and the greatest armed forces in the history of the world since the Roman Legions where the Wehrmacht was fighting at so many fronts, Italian Theater, Atlantic Theater, Western front, balkan front, Norway front

Let me give you some examples

1) Battle of Narva, Estonia 1944
Masses of Russian troops outnumber the german-european Waffen SS force in the ratio of 5:1 and many more in aircraft tanks..failed to even penetrate the Narva line until the germans was outflanked and retreated


2)Battle of Cholm 1942
5,000 German troops against 40,000 Russians..Still the cholm Pocket wasn't overrun


3) Battle of Tcherkassy 1944
50,000 German troops trapped in a pocket by 3 Soviet armies yet 30,000 troops escaped


4) Battle of Debrecen 1944
2 German Corps hold 3 Soviet Armies and yet the Russians advanced only when the Germans withdrew

5) battle of Demyansk 1942
100,000 German encircled by 2 Russian Fronts yet it was not overrrun

6) Battle of Rzhev 1942
Disastrous offensive by the Russians although they themselves outnumber the germans 4:1

[Michael Kenny]

Quote:
2)Battle of Cholm 1942
5,000 German troops against 40,000 Russians..Still the cholm Pocket wasn't overrun.

5) battle of Demyansk 1942
100,000 German encircled by 2 Russian Fronts yet it was not overrrun.


So they are still holding out then?

[milos]

How about this:

1.Brest-Litovsk surrounded since the first day of the war by 3 korps against a local garisson and only fell 6 weeks later

2. 2 Red Army corps hold the entire Army group North on the river Luga in August 1941(field marshall von Leeb had to endure quite a pasting from Hitler because of that)

3. Tula, surrounded for a month in November/December 1941 - never fell

Not to mention Leningrad, Sevastopol...

So, is the Wehrmacht over-rated?

[Paul Timms]

Don't forget the Wehrmacts victory in the Bagration defensive action so overrated by Glanz.

You have got to admire anyone who regards the loss of 20,000 (other sources say higher) men and the heavy equipment of 6 Divisions as evidence of the superiority of the Wehrmact.

In fact i'm fairly sure PM is one of the posters who keeps on about the warcrimes that occurred during this victory,When the victorious troops got run over by Red Army tanks in their thousands.

To be pedantic why would Zukhov need to be a master tactician, he wasn't commanding a company or a batallion. He commanded an army group !!

[De Ruyter]

Hi there!

Of course both sides had their great moments. he fact of the matter is that the german troops were far better trained in both small and large scale operations. This of course doesn't mean that they couldn't suffer crushing losses in combat, but, it does mean that in the long run they would most often outclass the enemy (soviet russian troops) in both small and large scale operations.

Losing a battle doesn't have to mean you are the least effective side, but it most often meant you were the side with the least reserves, especially in Russia. This because of two things:

1. The scale of the field of battle was much, MUCH larger than anything anyone had ever seen before. This of course meant that keeping units in touch and coordinated was almost inpossible.

2. The amounts of men and equipment were enormous, which means the logistical and organisational parts of an army must be tip top, especially on the side which ahs the least troops.

Now, many people might dissagree with me, but I belive this is why the red army was most often a "lower grade" fighting formation. But, strength most often crushes skill anyhow, so it wouldn't really matter in the long run!

Regards,
Dustin

[Starinov]

BUT NO MASTER TACTICIAN

What about Vassilevski or Antonov? I guess you forgot about them? Of course, you did. Russians can not have a brilliant mind on their side, can they Panzermahn?

[Mark V]

BUT NO MASTER TACTICIAN

What about Vassilevski or Antonov? I guess you forgot about them? Of course, you did. Russians can not have a brilliant mind on their side, can they Panzermahn?

I agree.

There were a lot of skillfull Soviet commanders. I am no particular fan of Zhukov either, but simplification like that Panzermahn posted is not true either.

Soviets had serious command difficulties at the start of Barbarossa and it did take few years for them to reach the level where they could seriously contest German level in tactics..

... but they did learn. Hard way, but they did learn. And by 1944/1945 Red Army was a force to be taken very seriously in battlefield, even in tactical situation where opposite sides had equal battle strenght.


Regards, Mark V

[Panzermahn]

Guys,

u must think, Red Army is victoriuos because of immense reserve of man, machines and materials not because of any tactics or what....

As i said, most people see that in Stalingrad, the Wehrmacht lost a quarter of million men but look at the Soviet losses in Stalingrad..Almost 1 million men and the 6th Army tie up 7 Russian Armies where Beevor mentioned that actually von Manstein knew it earlier in fact in December 1942 that 6th Army can never be save anymore....He only needed them to tie up the Soviet Armies so that Army Group South frontlines is not threatened


Yes of course, i never said that the Wehrmacht had no weakness..But compare to the russians, they win more at battlefields but lose the war..(a freudian slip, eh?)

More examples,

1) Battle of Sevastopol
2) Battle of Kamenets-Podolsk
3) Battle of Kharkov
4) Battle of Seelowe Heights
5) Battle of Kurland
6) Battle of Breslau
7) Battle of Krivoi Rog

[Darrin]

BUT NO MASTER TACTICIAN

What about Vassilevski or Antonov? I guess you forgot about them? Of course, you did. Russians can not have a brilliant mind on their side, can they Panzermahn?

I agree.

There were a lot of skillfull Soviet commanders. I am no particular fan of Zhukov either, but simplification like that Panzermahn posted is not true either.

Soviets had serious command difficulties at the start of Barbarossa and it did take few years for them to reach the level where they could seriously contest German level in tactics..

... but they did learn. Hard way, but they did learn. And by 1944/1945 Red Army was a force to be taken very seriously in battlefield, even in tactical situation where opposite sides had equal battle strenght.


Regards, Mark V

Except the rus never appeared to reach even the levels of sopistcation the ger did even in 44. At least from a cas and combat ratio comparison the rus still took at least 3 times more tot cas for the entire year despite having roughly 3 times as many people. Each ger soilder was 10 times more likly to cause a cas as the avg rus soilder.

[Oleg Grigoryev]

Guys,

u must think, Red Army is victoriuos because of immense reserve of man, machines and materials not because of any tactics or what....

As i said, most people see that in Stalingrad, the Wehrmacht lost a quarter of million men but look at the Soviet losses in Stalingrad..Almost 1 million men and the 6th Army tie up 7 Russian Armies where Beevor mentioned that actually von Manstein knew it earlier in fact in December 1942 that 6th Army can never be save anymore....He only needed them to tie up the Soviet Armies so that Army Group South frontlines is not threatened


Yes of course, i never said that the Wehrmacht had no weakness..But compare to the russians, they win more at battlefields but lose the war..(a freudian slip, eh?)

More examples,

1) Battle of Sevastopol
2) Battle of Kamenets-Podolsk
3) Battle of Kharkov
4) Battle of Seelowe Heights
5) Battle of Kurland
6) Battle of Breslau
7) Battle of Krivoi Rog

the Wehrmacht lost a quarter of million men but look at the Soviet losses in Stalingrad..Almost 1 million men

-what?
how 4 and 6 are German victories?
Red Army lost 323856 dead and missing during Stalingrad defensive (July 17th November 18th) and 154885 between November 19th and February 2nd. To compare this to loss of the 6th army is simply wrong because these soviet losses also correspond to operation which halted Manshetin drive as well as to the destruction of large number of forces allied to Germany. Even Kamenets- Podolsk is basically large "run for your life" kind of thing.

[Oleg Grigoryev]

BUT NO MASTER TACTICIAN

What about Vassilevski or Antonov? I guess you forgot about them? Of course, you did. Russians can not have a brilliant mind on their side, can they Panzermahn?

I agree.

There were a lot of skillfull Soviet commanders. I am no particular fan of Zhukov either, but simplification like that Panzermahn posted is not true either.

Soviets had serious command difficulties at the start of Barbarossa and it did take few years for them to reach the level where they could seriously contest German level in tactics..

... but they did learn. Hard way, but they did learn. And by 1944/1945 Red Army was a force to be taken very seriously in battlefield, even in tactical situation where opposite sides had equal battle strenght.


Regards, Mark V

Except the rus never appeared to reach even the levels of sopistcation the ger did even in 44. At least from a cas and combat ratio comparison the rus still took at least 3 times more tot cas for the entire year despite having roughly 3 times as many people. Each ger soilder was 10 times more likly to cause a cas as the avg rus soilder.

there is a lot more to military art when casulties ratio. but the agin.. how is the search fro 82mm mortars goes for you?

[kelty90]

I think that we have here a case of the "pot calling the kettle black". Granted, the Red Army made plenty of mistakes and could be very inept at times. But for sheer amateur blundering stupidity has the world ever seen a major offensive as appallingly planned and operated as Barbarossa?.
That the Germans have any reputation as competant soldiers after their invasion of the USSR defies belief. Here we have a major military offensive, where:
The Germans had no idea of the strength of their opponents.
The Germans had no idea of the equipment of their opponents.
The entire operation was predicated on the Red Army simply not fighting for more than a couple of weeks.
The Germans assumed that the Red Army was incapable of fighting well.
No provision was made for winter weather (which in russia comes only once a year!).
The majority of German soldiers were expected to walk to Moscow, or wherever.
Most artillery was horse drawn.
The Germans were trying to fight a modern enemy with armies most of which were little more mobile than Napoleon's.
The Germans burdened themselves with allies that were not equipped or motivated to fight the Red Army.
Operational goals were frequently altered.

All in all the Germans displayed appalling intelligence work, had too little logistical backup, based all their plans on racist fantasies, and were taken by surprise by winter weather.
And, they left enemies behind them. While most of the German army was blundering around the USSR the RAF and the USAAF was bombing Germany to pieces...and planning the invasion of mainland Europe, a considerably more professional piece of work.

[Starinov]

Except the rus never appeared to reach even the levels of sopistcation the ger did even in 44. At least from a cas and combat ratio comparison the rus still took at least 3 times more tot cas for the entire year despite having roughly 3 times as many people. Each ger soilder was 10 times more likly to cause a cas as the avg rus soilder.

Darrin, a personnal request: please write using full words.. You answer is more than hard to read...

Thanks

[Darrin]

I think that we have here a case of the "pot calling the kettle black". Granted, the Red Army made plenty of mistakes and could be very inept at times. But for sheer amateur blundering stupidity has the world ever seen a major offensive as appallingly planned and operated as Barbarossa?.
That the Germans have any reputation as competant soldiers after their invasion of the USSR defies belief. Here we have a major military offensive, where:
The Germans had no idea of the strength of their opponents.
The Germans had no idea of the equipment of their opponents.
The entire operation was predicated on the Red Army simply not fighting for more than a couple of weeks.
The Germans assumed that the Red Army was incapable of fighting well.
No provision was made for winter weather (which in russia comes only once a year!).
The majority of German soldiers were expected to walk to Moscow, or wherever.
Most artillery was horse drawn.
The Germans were trying to fight a modern enemy with armies most of which were little more mobile than Napoleon's.
The Germans burdened themselves with allies that were not equipped or motivated to fight the Red Army.
Operational goals were frequently altered.

All in all the Germans displayed appalling intelligence work, had too little logistical backup, based all their plans on racist fantasies, and were taken by surprise by winter weather.
And, they left enemies behind them. While most of the German army was blundering around the USSR the RAF and the USAAF was bombing Germany to pieces...and planning the invasion of mainland Europe, a considerably more professional piece of work.

Well although you may have found out the a few of the ger weakness you apparently think every body else was perfect. Wich they weren´t. I´m going to adress some of thes points in this frst post but I will miss some and may never come back to...


The ger transportaion
-------------------------

The ger did use horses just like every other coutry in continental europe. The only contries to not use horse were the Us and CW who used more trucks for thier inf divs insteand but the inf still walked. In 1941 the ger had almost a 1000 trucks per inf dv as well somethign that napoleon certainly didn´t have and he still managed to reach moscow. He did this also without the help of trains to supply his army which in 1940s I´ve heard the ger had this help too.

In fact with a comparison between rus and ger trucks levels you would find that it took rus until 1944 to just reach the same levels of trucks the samaller ger army had in 1939!!! Thats including all those LL trucks in many more formations than the ger had and supporting many more weapons than the ger had even in 44. In fact during 39-41 the ger built as many trucks as rus built during the entire four years of war. If you go and look at trains you would find this to an even greater degree of difference than just trucks.

If the ger placed to little on log basis the rus ceratainly had fewer reason to jump for joy. Less trucks, less trains, and only the same arty he ammo despite havoing 4 times as may guns. Double the oil despite havoing 4 times as many tanks and many more planes as well. Its obvious that the rus army is even more top heavy in waepaons and low in log then the ger are.

-
Except in late 42 and then late 44 the numbers of minor allies who were not exipped to fight was tiny in comparison to the ger forces. Less than 10%.


The ger íntell
----------------

They were there but they had a very good idea of the div anywhere near the borders 200km and the numbers of tanks and prod they would face. Many of these tank units were cer not even active according to the rus themselves but the ger still noticed them and couterd them.

Even the ger thought before the attack started it might take as long as 20 weeks. After that they had plans for being there on the def but not att. No paln survies contact with the enemy and the ger should have recognized this by late nov. Of course with huge encirclments in kiev and just in front of moscow you can´t really fault the ger for being a bit over confident.

I mean it wasn´t like the rus displayed a greater mil saviness than the ger. Thier enforced bielfs system gauaranteened they would underest thier enemy over and over again. Just look at fin not only did the rus army att in winter which was a bad thing to do but they displayed a huge weakness in winter feild craft during this attack as well. The suffered huge cas despit a huge adv in numbers over fin. Despite 4 moths of conflit were really only able to pry away a slice of the border. Thats a failing in intell that is real compared to anything about barbarasso...

Then after the huge intell failures that lead to barbarassoas near sucess by the ger the rus still get ready to make more in 42. They somehow think moscow is the main target and keep most of thier units there until it was far to late to stop the ger during the summer-fall. They also lauched thier main late spring att at kharkov into the waiting ger forces.

Western allies in Dday
-------------------------

Dday was fairly sucessful but it was the uptheeeth practice session for it and it was a bit of overkill. When 100,000 troops land in the first day on the beaches and ger has about 3 times that number to defend with throughout the normandy area its basically a lost cause. Esp when on the first day as many allied tanks were used as ger had all through france!!!

Even so the allies managed to crawl throughout normandy. Montyy certainly didn´t get to caen on the first day it took quite a few days later and many many more cas. The allies in generall fell further and further behind thier own sched. Then when the allies attacked at maket garden the att was poor an an entire brit para div was eliminated. And the allies were suprised by the ger att in the ard in mid dec...

[MadderCat]

@darrin
explain the following words for me, because I dont' know them:
CW
the samaller ger army
a 1000 trucks per inf dv as well somethign
on log basis
tank units were cer not even active
a greater mil saviness
in winter feild craft
The suffered huge cas despit a huge adv in numbers over fin.
the att was poor
the allies were suprised by the ger att in the ard in mid dec


thank You

MadderCat