What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

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Richard Anderson
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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#121

Post by Richard Anderson » 18 Feb 2019, 20:13

T. A. Gardner wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 19:38
On motor vehicles, the numbers above don't add up.
Indeed, Vorsin's figures are odd and I've never managed to figure out where exactly they go wrong. For the U.S. Lend-Lease alone, the Soviets recorded the arrival by 20 September 1945 of 362,288 trucks (2/4-ton and larger) and 47,238 cars (1/4 ton and amphibious jeep). So well over 400,000 vehicles, but Vorsin's figures only account for 307,600. Where did the other 101,926-odd go? Oh, and the 2,293 ordnance field repair, field recovery, and tank transporters that arrived in addition to that...where did they go?

The annualized figures don't really match either. For example, in round numbers Lend-Lease recorded shipping 8,300 vehicles in 1941, 79,000 in 1942, and 144,400 in 1943, and 198,000 from 1 January 1944 to 20 September 1945, compared to Vorsin's 300, 30,900, 83,700, and 192,200 respectively. While, of course date shipped and date arrived, combined with losses would effect the annualized figures, overall they seem odd. For example, total losses in shipping were actually just 14,747, so cannot have a dramatic effect on shifting the figures, even if it is assumed they all occurred in 1941-1942. For some reason, there appears to be a major under count in Vorsin's figures for the critical period 1941-1943.
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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#122

Post by Richard Anderson » 18 Feb 2019, 20:30

Interesting. I haven't looked into the matter in some years, but there always seems to be something interesting that leaps out from the Soviet figures. For example, the Soviet's recorded receiving 39,200 Dodge 3/4-ton trucks, but only 25,200 WC51, 52, and 53 vehicles were actually shipped. :lol: They record receiving 80,800 Willis and Bantam cars (1/4-ton jeeps), but only 52,770 were shipped. :lol:

BTW, the Soviet figures pretty much ignore motorcycles, but Lend-Lease shipped 35,170, as well as 8,071 track-laying tractors, which tend to get lost in translation too. :lol:

Oh, also BTW, the Soviets alone weren't the only ones having trouble deciding on what the figures were. In the U.S., depending on who compiled the figures, the total of "jeeps" shipped was 51,503, 52,770, or 53,606. :lol:
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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#123

Post by Hanny » 18 Feb 2019, 21:01

T. A. Gardner wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 19:38


On motor vehicles, the numbers above don't add up.
Add up to what?, the numbers he is using are those in the Red Army, ie not lost in transit/combat, not in civil use, not put together yet from the parts and so on. SU lost 45% of its RR net but kept 85% of its stock, it out moved the Germanys on rail, because it had more locos and engines as it lost few and started out with more as RR was the principle way to get anywhere of any distance.
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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#124

Post by Hanny » 18 Feb 2019, 21:07

T. A. Gardner wrote:
17 Feb 2019, 21:04

I'd wager it'd be less than 10 miles a month mainly because many of the advances would be countered and the ground lost requiring a "replay" of the offensive. The reason for that is the gains would be smaller making them more manageable for counterattacks and other actions by the German defenses. The larger gains allowed the Soviets to make up some of their losses by impressing / drafting people in newly retaken territory, along with capturing more German troops unable to avoid the Soviet advances. Here, the advances are much smaller giving exponentially less return.

First, you have to consider that there'd be fewer tank brigades and tank corps. But, the big hurt would be the loss of roughly half the mechanized corps the Soviets formed. They wouldn't have the trucks and other motor vehicles to build these. These units are vital to a deep penetration as they are the mobile infantry formations that hold the ground gained. Without them, you can only advance as far and fast as the infantry can walk. That in turn means far less encirclements of large pockets of German troops, far less wastage on the German side in long and deep retreats.

My guess is that it would lead to a stalemate with both sides bled white.
Could be 10, we can never know as its a counter factual, so a judgement call at best. My understanding of his argument is that a 20% LL increase in LL MTV gave it 30 miles a month, if its not present the rate of monthly advance drops to 66% of 30 which is 20. You prefer 33% or that LL is twice as important as he judges. Of course i dont know, but he may have looked deeper at LL, discarded the LL arriving after Dec 45 as having no influence, which drops the LL% of MTV park to 14%.

Looking at the maps Dunnigan done by time periods in his Russian front i get the following:

1942 350/12=30 ( Grozney to past Rostov, 220/12=18 more like an average on Vor/SW/stalingrad fronts)
1943 400/12 =33 ( more direct Moscow to Berlin line)
1944 475/12 =40
1945 325/4=80

Logistics of the Combined-Arms Army — Motor Transport
Journal of Slavic Military Studies Volume 31 (2018) Issue 4
data set from above
https://www.hgwdavie.com/s/Wartime-Nati ... ebsite.xls
43 LL O%
43 LL 6%
44 LL 19%
45 LL 31%

So the distance achieved between 42 and 43 is a 10% increase due to LL,in 43/4 is a difference of around 20% increase in distance from three times the amount of LL. Difference in 44/45 is around a 60% increase from quadruple increase in LL. So SU with no LL is a best case SU at 30 miles a month but more likely to achieve 18. So Glantz 18 months more with No Ll is off by 2 miles a month on the above figures, so pretty close as to how he may have arrived at them
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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#125

Post by ljadw » 18 Feb 2019, 21:17

About the rationing system : the reality was ,not only in the SU,but also in the other occupied countries ,that you could not survive on official rations only . These were less important than what people obtained on the black market and what they cultivated themselves .Mostly the official rations were not available, thus if they decreased, it was not important : 50 % of 0 is 0 .
And, there is also the fact, which most Americans do not know, because US are an other society,an other world ,that before,during and even longtime after the war (where I lived : til the end of the sexties ) people were buying food only exceptionally, because it was cheaper to cultivate themselves vegetables, poultry, potatoes,even bread, than to buy it . Meat was a luxury ,and most people had pigs . I know several people who never bought potatoes.Thus, if there was almost nothing to buy in the few shops, it was not a disaster .
And,this was also the case,and more than that,in the USSR : you could not survive with the official rations,even if they were available . And still, most inhabitants of the SU survived , not by LL food that was going to the military, but because they were feeding themselves .It is wrong to say that in 1945 80 million people in the SU relied on bread rations, because if they relied on bread rations, they would die . The truth is that 80 million people received in 1945 bread from the state, but that this constituted only a marginal part of their food and that they could do without this bread, but not without the food they cultivated themselves .
Ask poeople who lived during the war if they could subsist on official rations only ,and their answer will be negative .

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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#126

Post by Richard Anderson » 18 Feb 2019, 21:20

Hanny wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 21:01
Hanny wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 20:59


On motor vehicles, the numbers above don't add up.
Add up to what?, the numbers he is using are those in the Red Army, ie not lost in transit/combat, not in civil use, not put together yet from the parts and so on.
It might be more conducive of understanding if you replied to my comments on the figures, rather than to yourself? :lol:

Seriously, I think I pointed out where "the numbers...don't add up" and, as I mentioned, even including those "lost in transit" (those lost in combat are addressed by Voisin as a unitary figure, which is to be expected, there would be little reason to separate combat losses of domestic and imported vehicles) and "not in civil use", the numbers don't add up.

The last may be a partial factor, except the primary source for truck deliveries was Persia...and they were assembled prior to delivery. I suspect though a possible culprit for the discrepancy may be the 13 May 1945 Milepost Agreement, which initiated the final deliveries made to the USSR. It was intended to facilitate buildup stockpiles for the proposed Soviet attack on Japan. By 2 September 1945, some "46,140 vehicles [were] stockpiled in Far East (42,599 Trucks)", according to Jones, "The Roads to Russia", which are only partially accounted for by Voisin's figure of 12,800 vehicles delivered to eastern ports in 1945. I suspect that Voisin did not included the Milepost Agreement shipments at all in his figures and they then are likely not included in the Soviet military/civilian breakdowns either.

However, that still leaves 55,786-odd unaccounted for by Voisin. :D
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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#127

Post by ljadw » 18 Feb 2019, 21:37

During the Hunger winter in the Netherlands,the caloric value of the official rations was going down from 1400 per day in October 1944 to 500 kcal in January 1945 , but still the number of victims was limited to 25000 on a population of the big cities of some 5 million : 99,5% of the population survived although one could not survive with 500 kcal per day .That indicates that to talk about the food situation during the war, one should not use the official rations figures/stats .

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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#128

Post by History Learner » 18 Feb 2019, 22:21

Hanny wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 15:07
LL in 43 was 5.4% of the MTV park not 15% my point was that it pushed forward in 43 with 5% LL c400 miles along half the total length of the front, in 5 months. If it can do that we can use those numbers to help understand the 15% of Ll presence in 44 for the pace of advance, and from that get a better idea of what no Ll might look like. If they for whole year can achive 400 miles, 30 a month with 5% LL, is Glantz more right than wrong or not. Ive never seen Glantz explain his reasoning on this anywhere. But if the SU can do it with 5% LL in 43, why cant they be in Berlin by 46 without any?
It was not 5%, however, according to Soviet data. The overall fleet was 629,000 vehicles in both civil and military capacity, of which 1943 imports alone were 84,000 or 13.3% of the total.
Except they did not run out, indeed they won big, with back to pre war numbers of AFV in 43. it all depends on how you use the maths to explain what was going on, viewtopic.php?t=145031
Obviously they did not run out historically but we're talking about a speculative scenario where they've been cut off to Lend Lease. Soviet production for the entirety of WWII was 73,000 but their losses were 83,000 which is a deficit of about -10,000 tanks.

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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#129

Post by Hanny » 18 Feb 2019, 22:23

Richard Anderson wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 21:20
Hanny wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 21:01
Hanny wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 20:59


On motor vehicles, the numbers above don't add up.
Add up to what?, the numbers he is using are those in the Red Army, ie not lost in transit/combat, not in civil use, not put together yet from the parts and so on.
It might be more conducive of understanding if you replied to my comments on the figures, rather than to yourself? :lol:

Seriously, I think I pointed out where "the numbers...don't add up" and, as I mentioned, even including those "lost in transit" (those lost in combat are addressed by Voisin as a unitary figure, which is to be expected, there would be little reason to separate combat losses of domestic and imported vehicles) and "not in civil use", the numbers don't add up.

The last may be a partial factor, except the primary source for truck deliveries was Persia...and they were assembled prior to delivery. I suspect though a possible culprit for the discrepancy may be the 13 May 1945 Milepost Agreement, which initiated the final deliveries made to the USSR. It was intended to facilitate buildup stockpiles for the proposed Soviet attack on Japan. By 2 September 1945, some "46,140 vehicles [were] stockpiled in Far East (42,599 Trucks)", according to Jones, "The Roads to Russia", which are only partially accounted for by Voisin's figure of 12,800 vehicles delivered to eastern ports in 1945. I suspect that Voisin did not included the Milepost Agreement shipments at all in his figures and they then are likely not included in the Soviet military/civilian breakdowns either.

However, that still leaves 55,786-odd unaccounted for by Voisin. :D
Sorry all thumbs today after physio for nerve compression op.

Perhaps he counted assembled in SU from parts as domestic, thats around 120k that could be counted as domestic, and would show up as half that as an under count of imports?.
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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#130

Post by History Learner » 18 Feb 2019, 22:33

ljadw wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 21:17
About the rationing system : the reality was ,not only in the SU,but also in the other occupied countries ,that you could not survive on official rations only . These were less important than what people obtained on the black market and what they cultivated themselves .Mostly the official rations were not available, thus if they decreased, it was not important : 50 % of 0 is 0 .
And, there is also the fact, which most Americans do not know, because US are an other society,an other world ,that before,during and even longtime after the war (where I lived : til the end of the sexties ) people were buying food only exceptionally, because it was cheaper to cultivate themselves vegetables, poultry, potatoes,even bread, than to buy it . Meat was a luxury ,and most people had pigs . I know several people who never bought potatoes.Thus, if there was almost nothing to buy in the few shops, it was not a disaster .
And,this was also the case,and more than that,in the USSR : you could not survive with the official rations,even if they were available . And still, most inhabitants of the SU survived , not by LL food that was going to the military, but because they were feeding themselves .It is wrong to say that in 1945 80 million people in the SU relied on bread rations, because if they relied on bread rations, they would die . The truth is that 80 million people received in 1945 bread from the state, but that this constituted only a marginal part of their food and that they could do without this bread, but not without the food they cultivated themselves .
Ask poeople who lived during the war if they could subsist on official rations only ,and their answer will be negative .
The citation for 80 million still being on bread rations in 1945 (By which point Soviet production had greatly improved from the 1942-1944 trough) is from Moskoff, whom you cited as the basis for your claim that official rations didn't matter. Further, in the same book, Moskoff decisively refutes the notion that ration was not the overwhelming source for most in the USSR as only peasants were excluded from it. Speaking of the peasants and the Black Market, he further eliminates that as a viable point elsewhere in the book:

Image
Image
Image
Image

Simply put, the idea that people were privately growing enough for themselves is not backed by the evidence provided by your own citation. Further, you continue to suggest the argument is that Lend Lease food was given to the civilian population directly; this is not the case and the citation where this is decisively refuted has been provided already. What actually is the argument is that Lend Lease removed the burden of feeding the Red Army from the Soviet state, allowing them to focus their reduced production on feeding the civilian population. In the absence of Lend Lease, this burden would've been forced upon the Soviet state and at a time it could not afford it, as indicated by production collapsing to 37-38% of 1940 values and ration allotments for all groups being reduced in 1943.

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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#131

Post by History Learner » 18 Feb 2019, 22:38

ljadw wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 21:37
During the Hunger winter in the Netherlands,the caloric value of the official rations was going down from 1400 per day in October 1944 to 500 kcal in January 1945 , but still the number of victims was limited to 25000 on a population of the big cities of some 5 million : 99,5% of the population survived although one could not survive with 500 kcal per day .That indicates that to talk about the food situation during the war, one should not use the official rations figures/stats .
On a temporary basis, one very much can survive on 500 calories. It takes, afterall, about a month to die from not eating anything so lasting until April was certainly possible.

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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#132

Post by Hanny » 18 Feb 2019, 22:43

History Learner wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 22:21

It was not 5%, however, according to Soviet data. The overall fleet was 629,000 vehicles in both civil and military capacity, of which 1943 imports alone were 84,000 or 13.3% of the total.
It is 5.4% using the link i posted, for 43 and all the other years as i posted from it, you just have to do the % calc from the data set yourself. :oops:
History Learner wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 22:21
Obviously they did not run out historically but we're talking about a speculative scenario where they've been cut off to Lend Lease. Soviet production for the entirety of WWII was 73,000 but their losses were 83,000 which is a deficit of about -10,000 tanks.
Er ok, they started with 20600 so they have 10k left, not a 10k loss.
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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#133

Post by Richard Anderson » 18 Feb 2019, 23:07

Hanny wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 22:23
Sorry all thumbs today after physio for nerve compression op.
Sorry to hear that...I had noticed your typing was affected by something. Best wishes for a speeding recovery.
Perhaps he counted assembled in SU from parts as domestic, thats around 120k that could be counted as domestic, and would show up as half that as an under count of imports?.
Then, heavens, that would mean the Soviets cooked the books to under-report Lend-Lease issues and effect. :lol: :lol: :lol:

It reminds me of the professor I had teaching Soviet studies (when that was a thing :lol: ) who was part of the U.S. Lend-Lease mission in Moscow. Among the more interesting personal observations he made was regarding his Soviet counterpart who became a pretty good friend. One night after drinking a fair bit they got into an argument over the value of the Lend-Lease that was arriving. The Soviet officer claimed that while the food and vehicles was welcome, the number of weapons arriving via L-L was minuscule, to which my professor replied to the effect that it was "nonsense, we just had a trainload of American tanks arrive for issue today...I saw them myself." "Nonsense yourself" was the reply, "I know the train you mean and happen to know, those are Soviet-produced tanks from beyond the Urals". So to resolve the impasse, they staggered out of their apartment, weaved down the road in their official car, and arrived at the rail yard where they clambered up on a tank, broke open the shipping seals, and climbed inside so that the American could show the Soviet the manufacturer data plate of what was, very clearly, an American-produced Lee/Grant tank. The data plate had been replaced by one in Cyrillic, stating the tank had been produced at Uralmash. 8-) Its a great story. :lol:
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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#134

Post by History Learner » 18 Feb 2019, 23:12

Hanny wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 22:43
It is 5.4% using the link i posted, for 43 and all the other years as i posted from it, you just have to do the % calc from the data set yourself. :oops:
First, hope you have a speedy recover; please feel no rush to respond to this, as I'll certainly be around at a later date to continue.

Now then, let's double check here because I think we're using the same source:

Military stock 01/01/43: 404,500
Civilian stock 01/01/43: 221,600
New Production: 48,000
Total: 674,100
Imports: 95,100

95,100/674,100 = 14.1%
Er ok, they started with 20600 so they have 10k left, not a 10k loss.
Even taking that at face value with no other considerations means they are completely unable to expand their armored forces like they did throughout the war and lack modern tanks entirely. Once you expand it into other considerations, however, the picture becomes even starker: the 1941 stock is overwhelming pre-war light tanks, of limited viability and livability in the modern environment that begins to emerge from 1942 onwards as the standard for German armor becomes the 50mm Panzer III at worse and begin to quickly move into the 75mm from then on.

Also, I really doubt Soviet production will be as high as it was historically. For one thing, the loss of the Ukraine and other occupied areas had engendered shortages of coal (The Donbass was home to roughly 60% of Soviet output by itself), aluminum (Main Soviet facility was along the Dnieper, about 60-80% of production), iron ore (60% of production), steel (50% of production), electric power (30% of output), manganese ore (30% of production), and nickel (30% of production). Overall output of the machinery and metal goods sector fell by 40%. The USSR was also unable to meet the demand for copper, tin, zinc, lead, aluminum, and nickel with remaining sources while antimony, tungsten, cobalt, vanadium, molybdenum, tin, and magnesium were also almost entirely lacking. Lend Lease was sufficient to meet all of these demands except for aluminum and nickel:

Image
Image

Even ignoring the lack of materials, Lend Lease provided something on the order of 25% of the machine tools growth in the Soviet economy during the war; this a rather critical point given the aforementioned decline of the machinery sector by 40%. Further, while Soviet production in certain sectors such as tanks and aircraft was large, it was entirely lacking in other areas:

Germany/USSR

1942:

Tanks and SP guns: 6,180 / 24,640
Armored cars: 982 / 2,623
Half-tracks: 10,152 / 0
Trucks: 81,276 / 30,947
Cars: 27,895 / 2,567
Locomotives: 2,637 / 9
Train cars: 60,892 / 147

1943:

Tanks and SP guns: 12,063 / 24,092
Armored cars: 806 / 1,820
Half-tracks: 16,964 / 0
Trucks: 109,483 / 45,545
Cars: 34,478 / 2,546
Locomotives: 5,243 / 43
Train cars: 66,263 / 108

1944:

Tanks and SP guns: 19,002 / 28,983
Armored cars: 485 / 3,000
Half-tracks: 17,143 / 0
Trucks: 89,069 / 53,467
Cars: 21,656 / 5,382
Locomotives: 3,495 / 32
Train cars: 45,189 / 13

Simply put, even if they had the materials to make the same amount of tanks and aircraft, they'd still have to reduce protection to meet their needs in other areas of war production.
Last edited by History Learner on 18 Feb 2019, 23:34, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: What if......no Lend-Lease to the Soviets?

#135

Post by Hanny » 18 Feb 2019, 23:33

Richard Anderson wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 23:07

Sorry to hear that...I had noticed your typing was affected by something. Best wishes for a speeding recovery.
Thank you for your best wishes, no quick fix sadly, carpal tunnel on the right wrist, nerve compression on the l elbow, and frozen shoulder on the left side, so maybe another 6 months to go. :oops:

Richard Anderson wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 23:07
Then, heavens, that would mean the Soviets cooked the books to under-report Lend-Lease issues and effect. :lol: :lol: :lol:
Could be, it was the cold war an all! :o
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