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

Discussions on alternate history, including events up to 20 years before today. Hosted by Terry Duncan.
Post Reply
Hanny
Banned
Posts: 855
Joined: 26 Oct 2008, 21:40

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

#136

Post by Hanny » 18 Feb 2019, 23:36

History Learner wrote:
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:
Thanks for you thoughts. Im looking at https://www.hgwdavie.com/s/Wartime-Nati ... ebsite.xls

Line 404 on and converting year to a %

Pressed for time, will be back tomorrow for the rest, you do know all this fun is keeping me from reading your book recommendation :lol: right?

LL sent and lost in transit.
download/file.php?id=8462
Last edited by Hanny on 19 Feb 2019, 10:45, edited 1 time in total.
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

ljadw
Member
Posts: 15584
Joined: 13 Jul 2009, 18:50

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

#137

Post by ljadw » 19 Feb 2019, 09:27

History Learner wrote:
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.
I did not cite Moskoff as a proof that official rations did not matter .
THat official rations did not matter is a historical fact for ALL occupied countries : if the official figures are correct ( which one can doubt,given what we know about Soviet official figures ) people could not survive on these rations .If they are not correct, this means that the rations were even lower than the Soviet state claimed ,thus ...
And they were even lower, because they were lower in Western Europe than the authorities claimed, thus they were also lower in eastern Europe .At the start of the war, the Soviet regime said clearly to the population : we can't feed you : you must feed yourselves . And the population did it .
Even Moskoff admitted it ,when he said : the civilians were fed,not because of the regime,but in spite of the regime .
In no country of the continent that was at war did the authorities succeed into feeding the population . People always fed themselves .
Other point : the use of Soviet stats is meaningless and gives a wrong picture .Example : the industrial production decreasing to 37 % of the 1940 values : this means nothing ,as the population in the non occupied territories also decreased and as you can't compare a production in peacetime with a production in wartime because needs are different .
That the majority of the population was depending on rationing for bread,does not indicate the importance of this rationing ,not for the collective population, not for the individual citizen : it does not prove that all bread that people received came from the state , it does also not indicate how important was bread for the individual Russian .It does not prove that without this bread the individual citizen would die .It does not prove that the individual Russian survived because of the bread he received from the state .
And : there is a contradiction in the figures : if 80 % of the population received bread from the state,excepted the peasants, that means that the peasants were only 20 % of the population, something for which there is no proof .


Hanny
Banned
Posts: 855
Joined: 26 Oct 2008, 21:40

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

#138

Post by Hanny » 19 Feb 2019, 13:27

History Learner wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 12:41
Hanny wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 12:23
Its not a very usfull point, it matters not where they are, only that they require x calories as a civilian and y in the military, LL was a insignificant national calorie requirement. As i showed their own methodology at national level is that it ran the war for 19 days.
It very much needs to be said we're talking about a benchmark here in terms of what the Soviets would optimally need, not what they were actually able to provide; indeed, Hunger and War goes into great detail about the extent of hunger and starvation-induced deaths in the USSR during the war, which was quite large. With that said, utilizing your benchmark of the Soviet state needing 286 million calories a day to feed civilians, adding the 45 million calories used by the RKKA would've meant increasing the burden on the rationing system by 15%. This is critical, as in the late 1942-early 1944 period, particularly in 1943, there was no slack in the system to accommodate such an extra burden given that civilian rations had been cut to their lowest possible point without engendering general starvation. Finally, as the authors noted in terms of Moskoff's assessment, attempting to average out the calories over the course of the whole war is an error in of itself, given that Lend Lease food aid reached its peak from 1943 to 1944, which was also the time of greatest dearth of food in the USSR:

Image
Image

Look at page 328 where they speculate on alternative scenarios of how the state could have used LL in 44, ( its assumed it all used for the military) they calculate that the 1620 extra calories LL per day provided could instead of going to the Army would increase rations by 270 calories instead. Or provide 1620 for the 22.5 million most vulnerable by 810 calories. The cost to the state of that is the SU military is now operating on 2400 calories in 44,btw.

Something of interest, 2500000 tons of cereal crops were promised by Stalin to AH in the economic exchange, over 456 days, thats 2267961850 kilos at 1750 calories=3968933237500 thats 8703800959 calories a day, thats 51% of the LL calories, traded with no starvation as a result.


Another way to look at this is by year total national calories required for both mil/civil/horse in mil use, and LL as a % of that requirement, its 42, 1%, 43, 2% 44, 3% and 45 2%. I just dont see LL as being the difference between losing by starvation without its presence.

Another is what % of calories were in civilian or military consumption, Military consumption of national calories by year, 42 15%, 43,19%, 44 12%, 45 12%. This looks like food policy of winning the outcome in 42/3 by high military participation falling back thereafter. If LL was only going to the Army, its not showing up as that. So the assumptions in the book are open to question. Was the SU nation save from starvation by LL?, i dont see it yet but ive just started the first chapters.

I fear i wont have the time/inclination to go deeper into other LL deliveries. :oops: so ill leave you with yes the SU AFV production equalled losses, just like the Red army lost on average all its 6 million on average strength every year.

How LL is viewed in Russia
https://histrf.ru/uploads/media/default ... 550653.pdf
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

Hanny
Banned
Posts: 855
Joined: 26 Oct 2008, 21:40

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

#139

Post by Hanny » 20 Feb 2019, 10:56

History Learner wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 23:12

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.


June, 22, 1941-December, 31, 1941
Tanks Listed Received Total Lost % lost
Heavy 500 1000 1500 900 60
Medium 900 2200 3100 2300 74.2
Light 21200 2400 23600 17300 73.3
Total 22600 5600 28200 20500 72.70


January 1, 1942 - December 31, 1942
Tanks Listed Received Total Lost % lost
Heavy 600 2600 3200 1200 37.50
Medium 800 13400 14200 6600 46.50
Light 6300 11900 18200 7200 39.60
Total 7700 27900 35600 15000 42. 13


January 1, 1943-December, 31, 1943
Tanks Listed Received Total Lost % lost
Heavy 2000 900 2900 1300 44.80
Medium 7600 16300 23900 14700 61.50
Light 11000 5700 16700 6400 38. 30
Total 20600 22900 43500 22400 51.50

January 1, 1944-December 31, 1944
Tanks Listed Received Total Lost % lost
Heavy 1600 4000 5600 900 16.1
Medium 9200 17000 26200 13800 52.7
Light 10300 200 10500 2300 21.9
Total 21100 21200 42300 16900 40


January 1, 1945-May 10, 1945
Tanks Listed Received Total Lost % lost
Heavy 4700 1500 6200 900 14.5
Medium 12400 6100 18500 7500 40.5
Light 8200 900 9100 300 3.3
Total 25400 8500 33900 8700 25.7
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

Carl Schwamberger
Host - Allied sections
Posts: 10054
Joined: 02 Sep 2006, 21:31
Location: USA

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

#140

Post by Carl Schwamberger » 01 Mar 2019, 06:39

There are frequent remarks in these LL threads how essential the US made trucks were to the Red Army. This usually goes off the deep end in assuming the USSR won't trade off some other item to increase its own truck production. While there are limits it is a option to reduce tank production by X percentage to increase transport production by Y percent. The automotive transport of the Red Army would not be entirely waived away.
Carl Schwamberger wrote:
16 Feb 2019, 06:22
...
Wonder how much cargo shipping that saves the Allies. For realism lets day the LL is not ramped up beyond late 1942 levels. Is enough cargo shipping now available to make any difference in the progress of the west Allies? ...
T. A. Gardner wrote:
16 Feb 2019, 07:42
In the Pacific, almost all Lend Lease went on Russian merchant ships. The Russians also regularly picked up aircraft in Alaska and flew them to the USSR. Lend Lease ships of various sorts would sail with Russian crews under the Soviet flag. ...
My understanding has been the Soviet Pacific cargo fleet of 1943-45 were US built Liberty Ship models. In the Autumn of 1941 concern about a Pacific war breaking out caused the Soviet maritime transport agency to order much of its Pacific cargo fleet off to the Atlantic. Apparently the Pacific cargo fleet was regenerated with ships built in US shipyards 1942> The numbers I recall looked as if the Soviet cargo fleet of 1944, including losses, exceeded both the size of the 1941 fleet, and the 1942-43 capacity of Soviet shipyards. Maybe we can find sources that confirm or refute that. If its correct then less US LL means fewer US made hulls with the Soviet cargo fleet ensign, but with other Allied ensign & on a trans Atlantic run to Liverpool or Algiers vs Vladavostock.
Last edited by Carl Schwamberger on 01 Mar 2019, 14:07, edited 1 time in total.

Hanny
Banned
Posts: 855
Joined: 26 Oct 2008, 21:40

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

#141

Post by Hanny » 01 Mar 2019, 09:32

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

ljadw
Member
Posts: 15584
Joined: 13 Jul 2009, 18:50

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

#142

Post by ljadw » 01 Mar 2019, 12:31

The arrival of US aircraft in the SU does not mean that these aircraft were operational, because, the pilots and, more important, the crew of bombers had first to be trained, something which would last not weeks, but months . Than, there is the problem of the aviation oil needed for these aircraft and which was not available in the SU . And the whole airforce infrastructure had to be adapted to these new aircraft : mechanics had to learn how to work on these aircraft .Besides, even if Soviet pilots would/could kill more German aircraft using American aircraft, the impact of this on the airwar in the east is very questionable, even insignifiant, as most aircraft losses did not happen in air battles .
It is not so that countless trained Soviet pilots/crew were waiting on the arrival of unknown US aircraft .
The same argument is also valid for US tanks ,trucks and supplies in general .
The information in English only for all these things was a big obstacle for their use . The number of people in the SU who understood English in 1941 was insignifiant . Not only in the SU .

AriX
Member
Posts: 184
Joined: 29 Jun 2015, 09:07
Location: Ukraine

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

#143

Post by AriX » 03 Mar 2019, 13:44

LL fighter and bombers consisted something like 10-14% of the VVS.
Much more important for soviet aircraft production were imports of duralaminium (67.000 metric tons) and aluminium (180.000) .

History Learner
Member
Posts: 433
Joined: 19 Jan 2019, 10:39
Location: United States

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

#144

Post by History Learner » 04 Mar 2019, 12:10

ljadw wrote:
19 Feb 2019, 09:27
I did not cite Moskoff as a proof that official rations did not matter .
Except you did, as you even concede later in this post with this bit:
Even Moskoff admitted it ,when he said : the civilians were fed,not because of the regime,but in spite of the regime .
In no country of the continent that was at war did the authorities succeed into feeding the population . People always fed themselves .
You also cited it here:
ljadw wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 11:47
Moskoff P 237 : the rationing system was in many ways a farce .
P 238 : people were fed, not because of the system ,but in spite of the system .


In a lot of cases, the official rations were not available . This means that if they were decreased, it was notthat important .
People were feeding themselves .The Soviet state was unable to do this .
It was the same in Belgium : you could survive without the official rations, but not without the black market, not if you did not produce food yourself : on all balkons in the cities, food was cultivated ,people were holding pigs and poultry in their flats .People had relatives in the country,etc
THat official rations did not matter is a historical fact for ALL occupied countries : if the official figures are correct ( which one can doubt,given what we know about Soviet official figures ) people could not survive on these rations .If they are not correct, this means that the rations were even lower than the Soviet state claimed ,thus ...And they were even lower, because they were lower in Western Europe than the authorities claimed, thus they were also lower in eastern Europe .At the start of the war, the Soviet regime said clearly to the population : we can't feed you : you must feed yourselves . And the population did it .
Except we have both Moskoff and Hunger and War saying the rations were critical, with Hunger and War directly saying the lack of Lend Lease would've sent the Soviet state into a collapse. I've yet to see any contradictions to this established fact, as I previously asked for citations to back up your assertions.
Other point : the use of Soviet stats is meaningless and gives a wrong picture .Example : the industrial production decreasing to 37 % of the 1940 values : this means nothing ,as the population in the non occupied territories also decreased and as you can't compare a production in peacetime with a production in wartime because needs are different .
If statistics are meaningless, debate is pointless because that means there is just as much a lack of a basis to your argument as to mine. Ignoring that, 44.5% of the Pre-War population was behind the occupied lines while Soviet food production collapsed by 63% in 1943. This means that the loss of food production far exceeded what was lost in population, which further points to the validity of my argument.
That the majority of the population was depending on rationing for bread,does not indicate the importance of this rationing ,not for the collective population, not for the individual citizen : it does not prove that all bread that people received came from the state , it does also not indicate how important was bread for the individual Russian .It does not prove that without this bread the individual citizen would die .It does not prove that the individual Russian survived because of the bread he received from the state .
Except Moskoff, who cited, does state it in fact did come from the State (Hence why it was a ration) and does state they were dependent on it. The non-State food sources, as I've already cited had collapsed and if there is no food at all the black market doesn't hold enough either. Hunger and War has taken this a step further and shown that rations were stripped to their lowest point in 1943 and that starvation related morality massively increased at this time.
And : there is a contradiction in the figures : if 80 % of the population received bread from the state,excepted the peasants, that means that the peasants were only 20 % of the population, something for which there is no proof .
There much is if you read the census data and research, in fact this perhaps one of the easiest things of all to prove. As it was, the citation in question is for 80 million in 1945, not 80% of the population.

History Learner
Member
Posts: 433
Joined: 19 Jan 2019, 10:39
Location: United States

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

#145

Post by History Learner » 04 Mar 2019, 12:15

Hanny wrote:
19 Feb 2019, 13:27
Something of interest, 2500000 tons of cereal crops were promised by Stalin to AH in the economic exchange, over 456 days, thats 2267961850 kilos at 1750 calories=3968933237500 thats 8703800959 calories a day, thats 51% of the LL calories, traded with no starvation as a result.
If you're talking about trade with Germany before the war there is a very obvious difference: the USSR hadn't lost a lot of its farmland.
Another way to look at this is by year total national calories required for both mil/civil/horse in mil use, and LL as a % of that requirement, its 42, 1%, 43, 2% 44, 3% and 45 2%. I just dont see LL as being the difference between losing by starvation without its presence.
For one, horses can largely subsist off foraging and what LL was sending could not really be fed to them so should not be counting. Next, you're again engaging in the averaging error; Lend Lease food was largely delivered in 1943-1944, so 1941 and 1945 are outside the bounds. I'll give you 1942, however.

History Learner
Member
Posts: 433
Joined: 19 Jan 2019, 10:39
Location: United States

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

#146

Post by History Learner » 04 Mar 2019, 12:16

Hanny wrote:
20 Feb 2019, 10:56
tank data
Not sure I follow? Hope you're doing better, by the way.

ljadw
Member
Posts: 15584
Joined: 13 Jul 2009, 18:50

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

#147

Post by ljadw » 04 Mar 2019, 17:07

History Learner wrote:
04 Mar 2019, 12:10
ljadw wrote:
19 Feb 2019, 09:27
I did not cite Moskoff as a proof that official rations did not matter .
Except you did, as you even concede later in this post with this bit:
Even Moskoff admitted it ,when he said : the civilians were fed,not because of the regime,but in spite of the regime .
In no country of the continent that was at war did the authorities succeed into feeding the population . People always fed themselves .
You also cited it here:
ljadw wrote:
18 Feb 2019, 11:47
Moskoff P 237 : the rationing system was in many ways a farce .
P 238 : people were fed, not because of the system ,but in spite of the system .


In a lot of cases, the official rations were not available . This means that if they were decreased, it was notthat important .
People were feeding themselves .The Soviet state was unable to do this .
It was the same in Belgium : you could survive without the official rations, but not without the black market, not if you did not produce food yourself : on all balkons in the cities, food was cultivated ,people were holding pigs and poultry in their flats .People had relatives in the country,etc
THat official rations did not matter is a historical fact for ALL occupied countries : if the official figures are correct ( which one can doubt,given what we know about Soviet official figures ) people could not survive on these rations .If they are not correct, this means that the rations were even lower than the Soviet state claimed ,thus ...And they were even lower, because they were lower in Western Europe than the authorities claimed, thus they were also lower in eastern Europe .At the start of the war, the Soviet regime said clearly to the population : we can't feed you : you must feed yourselves . And the population did it .
Except we have both Moskoff and Hunger and War saying the rations were critical, with Hunger and War directly saying the lack of Lend Lease would've sent the Soviet state into a collapse. I've yet to see any contradictions to this established fact, as I previously asked for citations to back up your assertions.
Other point : the use of Soviet stats is meaningless and gives a wrong picture .Example : the industrial production decreasing to 37 % of the 1940 values : this means nothing ,as the population in the non occupied territories also decreased and as you can't compare a production in peacetime with a production in wartime because needs are different .
If statistics are meaningless, debate is pointless because that means there is just as much a lack of a basis to your argument as to mine. Ignoring that, 44.5% of the Pre-War population was behind the occupied lines while Soviet food production collapsed by 63% in 1943. This means that the loss of food production far exceeded what was lost in population, which further points to the validity of my argument.
That the majority of the population was depending on rationing for bread,does not indicate the importance of this rationing ,not for the collective population, not for the individual citizen : it does not prove that all bread that people received came from the state , it does also not indicate how important was bread for the individual Russian .It does not prove that without this bread the individual citizen would die .It does not prove that the individual Russian survived because of the bread he received from the state .
Except Moskoff, who cited, does state it in fact did come from the State (Hence why it was a ration) and does state they were dependent on it. The non-State food sources, as I've already cited had collapsed and if there is no food at all the black market doesn't hold enough either. Hunger and War has taken this a step further and shown that rations were stripped to their lowest point in 1943 and that starvation related morality massively increased at this time.
And : there is a contradiction in the figures : if 80 % of the population received bread from the state,excepted the peasants, that means that the peasants were only 20 % of the population, something for which there is no proof .
There much is if you read the census data and research, in fact this perhaps one of the easiest things of all to prove. As it was, the citation in question is for 80 million in 1945, not 80% of the population.
There is no proof that all the bread people in the non occupied parts of the SU were eating, came from the state .The Soviet state abdicated on June 22,and told people that thet had to care for themselves,while the government would care about the armed forces .In the occupied parts,the inhabitants did not receive food from the Germans, but,mostly,survived, because they took care of themselves . It was the same thing in the non occupied parts .
There are two possibilities . Only two .
1 The food the population received from the state was not sufficient to survive, and than,you have to explain how the SU survived .
OR
2 The food the population received from the state was sufficient,and than, the stories about the famines in the non occupied parts are inventions and there was no need for a black market .
The same situation existed in Western Europe and there also the truth was that those who were depending to survive on what the government promised them ( but failed to deliver ) ,did not survive .
Those who died were poor,old people,living in the cities and who were unable to produce their own food .
You also ignore that there was in the SU before the war a flourishing private food market,who became more important during the war .

User avatar
BDV
Member
Posts: 3704
Joined: 10 Apr 2009, 17:11

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

#148

Post by BDV » 04 Mar 2019, 17:48

ljadw wrote: There are two possibilities . Only two .
1 The food the population received from the state was not sufficient to survive, and than,you have to explain how the SU survived .
OR
2 The food the population received from the state was sufficient,and than, the stories about the famines in the non occupied parts are inventions and there was no need for a black market .
We experience no serious shortage of either food, or armaments or army clothing.

J.V. Djugashvilli, Public Speech, November 7 1941
Nobody expects the Fallschirm! Our chief weapon is surprise; surprise and fear; fear and surprise. Our 2 weapons are fear and surprise; and ruthless efficiency. Our *3* weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency; and almost fanatical devotion

ljadw
Member
Posts: 15584
Joined: 13 Jul 2009, 18:50

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

#149

Post by ljadw » 04 Mar 2019, 21:27

Do you expect that Stalin,or Churchill, or Hitler would say :we experience a serious shortage of food,armaments and army clothing ?
JV also said in 1941 that Germany already had lost millions of men .
The truth is that already before the war the Soviet regime did not succeed into feed its population and thus accepted the existence of a free market .
Moscow under Stalinist rule 1931-1934 : P 132 1.3 The role of the free (kolkhoz) market
" the decrees of May 1932 reducing grain and meat procurements and enabling kolkhoz peasants to sell their products at market prices in the city market ,was a frank recognition that the state and co-operative trade had failed to supply enough to meet the needs of the masses ".
The same can be read in '' The Industrialisation of Soviet Russia Volume 6 P 224 '' and in '' Everyday Stalinism :Ordinary life in extraordinary times '' ( no page number available ) where one can read the following: the kolkhoz markets became ''oases of private trade '' in the Soviet economy .

If this happened before the war, it also happened,on a much bigger scale ,during the war ,when the motto was : it is not important if a cat is black or white,as long as she catches mouses .
The state could not feed the population before the war , that means that if the state food rations decreased during the war, the importance of this was not important .
If you need 600 calories and you recieve instead of 200 calories from the state,only 100,that means .. what ?
What the state was giving was insufficient to survive, and if he gave less, it changed nothing .

User avatar
BDV
Member
Posts: 3704
Joined: 10 Apr 2009, 17:11

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

#150

Post by BDV » 05 Mar 2019, 00:19

ljadw wrote:
04 Mar 2019, 21:27
Do you expect that Stalin,or Churchill, or Hitler would say :we experience a serious shortage of food,armaments and army clothing ?
JV also said in 1941 that Germany already had lost millions of men .

The truth is that already before the war the Soviet regime did not succeed into feed its population and thus accepted the existence of a free market .
Moscow under Stalinist rule 1931-1934 : P 132 1.3 The role of the free (kolkhoz) market
" the decrees of May 1932 reducing grain and meat procurements and enabling kolkhoz peasants to sell their products at market prices in the city market ,was a frank recognition that the state and co-operative trade had failed to supply enough to meet the needs of the masses ".

The same can be read in '' The Industrialisation of Soviet Russia Volume 6 P 224 '' and in '' Everyday Stalinism :Ordinary life in extraordinary times '' ( no page number available ) where one can read the following: the kolkhoz markets became ''oases of private trade '' in the Soviet economy .

If you need 600 calories and you recieve instead of 200 calories from the state,only 100,that means .. what ?
What the state was giving was insufficient to survive, and if he gave less, it changed nothing .
Look, Djugashvilli mentioned not the SOURCE for that food.
Nobody expects the Fallschirm! Our chief weapon is surprise; surprise and fear; fear and surprise. Our 2 weapons are fear and surprise; and ruthless efficiency. Our *3* weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency; and almost fanatical devotion

Post Reply

Return to “What if”