The fighting was so fierce that if weapons were not to hand they fought with their hands and even their teeth. There are numerous reports of German soldiers receiving serious bite marks and even having their eyes gouged out on some occasions by their Soviet counterparts. The Germans and the Russians are the only people in modern times who understand the concept of 'total war'.

"The Germans and the Russians are the only people in modern times who understand the concept of 'total war'"

Seems to me there was some kind of shindig in the Pacific that wasn't that pretty.

Originally Posted by Doppleganger

The fighting was so fierce that if weapons were not to hand they fought with their hands and even their teeth. There are numerous reports of German soldiers receiving serious bite marks and even having their eyes gouged out on some occasions by their Soviet counterparts. The Germans and the Russians are the only people in modern times who understand the concept of 'total war'.

This happened in the Korea War too.
Apparently the Korean War had the highest death rate of any other previous war. It didn't have the highest body count as the War was "short' compared to wars duirng those times... so that entire war really could be a candidate.


http://www.theforgottenvictory.org/old/kwstats.htm

That's a link ... most comparisons are between it and Vietnam.

Originally Posted by Charge_7

"The Germans and the Russians are the only people in modern times who understand the concept of 'total war'"

Seems to me there was some kind of shindig in the Pacific that wasn't that pretty.

I'm not belittling the Pacific War at all, but you misunderstand what I mean. Total War is a concept where the entire nation, it's peoples, it's will, it's whole reason for being, is committed utterly to the destruction of another people, another nation, another ideology. As the Eastern Front wore on, it became more than just a war for conquest or for liberation, it took on a greater significance. You had 2 nations that were bent and focused on each other's destruction and where for example the shooting of prisoners and the burning of villages and towns, normally considered atrocities, became matter-of-fact and everyday. This has happened before and since of course, but not approaching the scale of Barbarossa and not encompassing entire nations as what happened to Germany and the Soviet Union in WW2.

The US was certainly almost utterly untouched. The same cannot be said of Japan, the Phillipines, or China. They also know the concept of "total war".

Originally Posted by Charge_7

The US was certainly almost utterly untouched. The same cannot be said of Japan, the Phillipines, or China. They also know the concept of "total war".

Well I don't doubt that those nations suffered horribly (I know they did) during WW2 but the concept of 'total war' cannot be applied to them in the same way as it was to Germany and especially the Soviet Union, whose very existence as a people and a nation was at times perilous. Hitler considered the Soviet people as untermensch, literally 'sub-human' and if he had beaten the USSR a lot more than 6 million people likely would have been gassed or otherwise slaughtered in concentration camps. A frightening thought.

Certainly you have the Germans Withdraw through Russia.... Stalingrad was a terrible battle, but You didn't have the tens of thousands being mowed down as you did in WW1 on a single day. I think that the Battle's of the first World War could be considered more gruesome than that of the second.

"the concept of 'total war' cannot be applied to them in the same way as it was to Germany and especially the Soviet Union, whose very existence as a people and a nation was at times perilous"

Oh yes their existence as nations and as people's was perilous. You need to read a bit more about something other than Europe I suspect.

It's one thing for Hitler to order his Generals and soldiers to fight to the last man and that last cartridge, the 33% who surrendered tells you it was far short of total.

1% of the Japanese had surrenderd at the time the Marines left the island.

Originally Posted by Charge_7

"the concept of 'total war' cannot be applied to them in the same way as it was to Germany and especially the Soviet Union, whose very existence as a people and a nation was at times perilous"

Oh yes their existence as nations and as people's was perilous. You need to read a bit more about something other than Europe I suspect.

perhapse you need to read a bit more about something other than usa I suspect.