Slitherine

quote:

ORIGINAL: Hard Sarge

to be honest, I think it would of been the Western Allies who would of been in a for shock

in the long run, I think they could of won, but the first few weeks may of crushed them, they were not used to the size and scale of the battles on the Eastern Front, nor the losses, the English were in worse shape, manpower wise then the Russians were, and the US homefront couldn't of taken the losses from the first set of battles

and don't think the Western Airforce would of just has a milk run where ever they wanted to fly to

quote:

ORIGINAL: paullus99

We'll probably agree to disagree - but if the Soviets struck first, the home front would have been all for finishing what we started. Of course, Truman would have been under intense pressure to use the A-Bomb on the Russians - and I believe we would have done so with very little hesitation.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Gary Childress

quote:

ORIGINAL: Hard Sarge

to be honest, I think it would of been the Western Allies who would of been in a for shock

in the long run, I think they could of won, but the first few weeks may of crushed them, they were not used to the size and scale of the battles on the Eastern Front, nor the losses, the English were in worse shape, manpower wise then the Russians were, and the US homefront couldn't of taken the losses from the first set of battles

and don't think the Western Airforce would of just has a milk run where ever they wanted to fly to

The Soviet army was much better equipped in the tank department than the Western Allies.

quote:

ORIGINAL: paullus99

US Artillery was second to none - mostly due to enhanced communications. Late model US & British tanks were just as good as the standard T-34/85 & all of our tanks were equipped with radios.

what dreams are you having ? English Tanks wern't as good as ours were, and most of them were ours, and as they found out later, the T-34/85 was pretty good, not counting the fact that the Russians were already using the JS models, odd, from what I remember, all the Germen tanks had radios too, and they were better tanks then we had

As far as the war in the air, there might have been parity for a little while, but our ability to go strategic, as opposed to just tactical support would have played havoc with the Soviet supply lines.

oh, we could go Strategic, and where were we going to go with them ? the Urals ?, be easier from PTO side of things, in a long drawn out war, yes, I would agree, but again, my point is would we of been able to make it a long war, you have to remember, it was the Russians who bled the Germans white, not the Western Allies

Not to say that it wouldn't have been a bar-room brawl, but ultimately, we would have come out on top. We had a fully functioning economy, while the Soviets were running on fumes. As it was, it took until the late 1960's for the Soviet economy to fully recover to pre-WWII levels of productivity.

and running fumes, they were still making what they needed for the war, I am sure others can bring in the production numbers for 44 and 45 for the Russian side

quote:

ORIGINAL: paullus99

Lend-Lease was vital, so that 100% of the remaining Soviet industry could be dedicated to building war-fighting equipment. For all intents & purposes, the Soviet Union didn't have a civilian economy. If war broke out, no lend-lease anymore, no trucks to deliver supplies, etc.

As far as tanks, not to say Soviet tanks were overrated, but Pershings were able to handle T34/85s & JSIIs during the Korean war without any problem whatsoever. And before you blame shoddy North Korean training - most of those tank crews were Soviet-trained.

The Germans were constantly outnumbered by Soviet armor across the board - the US easily built as many tanks as the Soviet Union did during the war, if not more. Soviet supply lines would have been extremely vulnerable to not only US tactical air forces, but also strategic ones as well. There are plenty of bridges and other choke points that 8th Air Force would have had a field day hitting from day one.

I doubt the US/Western Allies would have struck first - but there is probably a much greater chance of Stalin (in a moment of less than lucid thinking) trying to make a go of it.

Regardless, the US was in a much better position to fight a global war against the Soviet Union in 1945/1946 than the Soviet Union was.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Hexagon
if soviets attack they smash all the front with tanks and tanks, tanks that west armor can stop because How many Pershings were??? and 76mm-17pounder are inferior to Panther 75mm and soviets has experience...

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battles around Berlin, so they weren't nearly as strong as they had been. Add to that about half a million casualties they had just lost

quote:

ORIGINAL: Helpless
hmm..

Soviet Losses in Berlin Strategical Offensive Operation 16.04.1945 - 08.05.1945:

2nd Belorussian Front permanent losses 13070
1st Belorussian Front permanent losses 37610
1st Ukrainian Front permanent losses 27580
Total : 78291 (includes 31 lost in Navy) which is 4.1% of starting capacity
Polish 1st and 2nd Armies lost 2852

Krivosheev "Grif sekretnosti sniat" http://www.soldat.ru/doc/casualties/book/

quote:

I suspect those figures are just the dead. This site lists over 300,000 casualties (70,000 dead), but I've read sources that exceeded 500,000. My guess is it depends on what the source considers as part of the Berlin campaign.

Jim

quote:

ORIGINAL: Helpless
That's official numbers form Central Archive of Ministry of Defense (CAMO). For example, David Glantz is using them in his book.

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Right but the term permanent losses means they are dead. Casualties as a general term include dead, wounded, captured and missing, which those numbers you posted don't reflect.

Many of the casualties (walking wounded, desterters, ex-prisoners) probably returned within days or weeks, but sorting them out and getting them ready to fight again took time.

Jim

quote:

ORIGINAL: Helpless
That's right. In your first statement you didn't specify what kind of casualties you mean. I gave you the link which contains all the stats without trailing zeros (can use google to translate).

I just wanted to say that permanent casualties where relatively light and nowhere near half-million. Some newspapers give millions, but it doesn't change the history.

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But that was the case for all the battles in WWII. As an example, Iwo Jima saw over 26,000 US casualties, but only 6,000 - 7,000 of those were dead. That doesn't change the fact that the Marine divisions were shot and wouldn't be in any shape to fight again for months.

The same would apply to most of the Soviet divisions that had just gone through the Berlin meat grinder. It would be months before they were in any shape to fight again.

I also wouldn't say 78,000 dead were light losses. That's about 1 out of every 4 or 5 casualties that ended up dead. Not a great survival rate.

Jim