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Originally Posted by Doppleganger The war was not winnable for Germany after the successful Moscow counter-offensive by the Red Army in December/January 1941. I did not hold this view before but have now revised my previous opinion. As I've stated a few times before for Germany to win they either had to:
A) Capture Moscow and hope that it would cause an internal collapse of the Soviet regime
OR
b) Halt after the Kiev operation until Spring 1942 and try for Moscow in a 2nd season campaign
The Germans chose A) and failed. Their only hope thereafter was to bleed the Red Army white and force a stalemate which Stalin seemed at various points to be agreeable to.
As far as Stalingrad goes 4th Panzer Army could have captured the city almost without a fight in July, 1942. Hitler's dithering caused a huge traffic jam between 1st and 4th Panzer Armies which held both Armies up for a fortnight, allowing the Soviets to gather just enough forces to prevent any quick capture of Stalingrad. Case Blau was also hopelessly optimistic as a quick look at a map of the southern Soviet Union will confirm.
The failure to capture Leningrad was a setback but it did not in itself determine the outcome of the war in the East. Therefore, it cannot be considered decisive. | I think we are going to have to agree to disagree on this one as I believe that over all the failure to capture Leningrad was at least as big a setback as the failure to capture Moscow if not bigger as it would have freed up the men and material to facilitate the capture of Moscow.
I also believe that had Stalingrad been taken while it was "undefended" it would have made the position of Russian forces to the south of the city almost untenable due to the loss of Stalingrad's communications and supply links thus making "Case Blau" a much more viable campaign and more than likely resulting in eventual Russian capitulation through lack of fuel. Quote: |
Originally Posted by LeEnfield Each Battle in it's own way was important in winning the war, I think one one of the most important ones in the European Zone was the Battle Of Britain for if Britain had fallen, Hitler would have taken the whole of Ireland as well and mad it almost impossible for an attack to have taken place to retake Europe. If Britain had fallen the Spain would have joined in with Hitler and Taken Gibraltar which would have closed up the Mediterranean so the Suez Canal and the oil fields would have fallen into Germany's hand. Hitler could then have attacked Russia a bit later on with a far bigger Army that Stalin might have been unable to stop it, as there would not have been the number of troops require in Africa or Norway or in air defence to protect the father land. Which would mean that Hitler might have had another two million men to throw into the battle in Russia |
This has been a view I have held for quite a while although recently I have read some theories that having Britain in the war was what gave Germany the initial element of surprise as Stalin did not believe Germany would fight a war on two fronts, it is thought that he expected war with Germany but only after Britain had been taken out of it and therefore did not give Allied warnings and intelligence reports any credence in fact he saw Allied warnings as an attempt to drive a wedge in the Russo-German alliance.
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We are more often treacherous through weakness than through calculation. ~Francois De La Rochefoucauld
Last edited by MontyB; April 18th, 2008 at 00:40.
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