Originally Posted by Doppleganger

The 3 biggest mistakes were as already stated namely:

1. The Stalinist purges of the late 1930s purged many fine officers from the ranks of the Red Army. Because of this, inexperienced and mediocre commanders were placed in charge of Red Army formations that otherwise they never should have had the right to command. A good example of this would be Marshall Semyon Budenny, a character that looked like Daniel Day Lewis's character from 'Gangs of New York' but who was responsible for the loss of over 600,000 men at Kiev.

Very true. Stalin's purges killed off vaste numbers of highly skilled and experenced officers. He then replaced them with political commissars which had little or no military training. The Red Army was staffed largely by Stalin's old cronies and suffered for this greatly in the Winter War and early days of Operation Barbarossa.

2. The failure of Stalin to believe that a German attack was imminent. Old Josef had the 'Lucy' Spy Ring, Winston Churchill and Richard Sorge all warn him of the aggressive intent of Germany. Stalin had the date of the attack, the German campaign plan, the names of each Army and all the names of all Army commanders down to Corps level. He also knew exactly how many tanks each Army Group had, what type they were and their initial deployment and lines of attack. Never has there been a state that was better warned about the intentions of another but Stalin did nothing, fearful that 'enemies' were trying to put a wedge between himself and Hitler.

Really quiet interesting when one really thinks about it. Stalin - a ruthless sociopath who had lied and backstabbed his way to power was dumb enough to believe that hitler wasn't plotting against him. I mean come on that guy believed everyone (just look at the earlier part of your post) was trying to destroy him BUT Hitler! I have been trying to figure out why he thought Hitler would never attack the USSR since I was 13 and my search never seems to get anywhere.

3. The Red Army defending the border with Germany was wrongly dispersed. As a means to appease Hitler and not give him any possible provacation, Stalin had the Red Army widely dispersed in forward positions. The length of front allocated to each Army was far too long for them to realistically defend and the distance from each Army to its HQ meant that orders to withdraw into defensible positions couldn't possibly be received in time when the Germans attacked. Also, as a result of their forward dispersation, the Germans had suceeding in cutting much of the communication lines between the Red Army forward units and their HQs, further adding to the confusion. Moreover, the Soviet airforce, the VVS, was not able to be properly dispersed in time and consequently the Luftwaffe destroyed a large proportion of it on the ground.

The Red Army was badly placed at the beginning of Operarion Barbarossa. It's units where deployed WAY too far forward and where just sitting there waiting for the Blitzkrieg to rush in and destroy them. The basic idea behind communist warfare doctrine is as follows: rush a better trained, better equiped enemy with massive numbers of men and equipment. Which tends to work in the long run but you lose - massive numbers of men and equipment. I do believe that Fallshrimjagers could have been of great use in the early days of the war for reasons you descibed.

I haven't included the Winter War because, although a humilating defeat for the USSR, IMO it didn't really have a long term impact on the war. Of the 3 mistakes above No 2 is the most glaring.

The Winter War was a victory for the USSR but a real costly one. The USSR gained 10% of Finnish terrority and which contained 20% of Finnish industry. "Just enough to bury our dead" as one Soviet commander put it. Again it was classic communist warfare doctrine overrun a better trained (this time not so well equiped) with massive numbers of men and equipment this tends to work long term but you lose a shitload of men and equipment in the process.

I hope you find this interesting.

Originally Posted by Easy-8

Very true. Stalin's purges killed off vaste numbers of highly skilled and experenced officers. He then replaced them with political commissars which had little or no military training. The Red Army was staffed largely by Stalin's old cronies and suffered for this greatly in the Winter War and early days of Operation Barbarossa.

Amazing that people so easily make such blanket statements. Can you please name all the commissars who had 'little or no military training' and the killed off 'experienced officers' whom they replaced?

Originally Posted by Easy-8

Really quiet interesting when one really thinks about it. Stalin - a ruthless sociopath who had lied and backstabbed his way to power was dumb enough to believe that hitler wasn't plotting against him. I mean come on that guy believed everyone (just look at the earlier part of your post) was trying to destroy him BUT Hitler! I have been trying to figure out why he thought Hitler would never attack the USSR since I was 13 and my search never seems to get anywhere.

What would be interesting is if you actually knew what you were talking about. Stalin suspected quite a lot, one example being that Germany and Hitler would ask for concessions another was that he would have time to mobilize the Red Army, etc. Looks like you haven't learned much since 13.

Originally Posted by Easy-8

The Red Army was badly placed at the beginning of Operarion Barbarossa. It's units where deployed WAY too far forward and where just sitting there waiting for the Blitzkrieg to rush in and destroy them. The basic idea behind communist warfare doctrine is as follows: rush a better trained, better equiped enemy with massive numbers of men and equipment. Which tends to work in the long run but you lose - massive numbers of men and equipment. I do believe that Fallshrimjagers could have been of great use in the early days of the war for reasons you descibed.

I'm sorry, "communist warfare doctrine", are you just making things up now? Can you provide a source where I can read about this "communist warfare doctrine"?

Originally Posted by Easy-8

The Winter War was a victory for the USSR but a real costly one. The USSR gained 10% of Finnish terrority and which contained 20% of Finnish industry. "Just enough to bury our dead" as one Soviet commander put it. Again it was classic communist warfare doctrine overrun a better trained (this time not so well equiped) with massive numbers of men and equipment this tends to work long term but you lose a shitload of men and equipment in the process.

One has to wonder where you get your education, is it the TV? Is that it?

Originally Posted by Kunikov

Amazing that people so easily make such blanket statements. Can you please name all the commissars who had 'little or no military training' and the killed off 'experienced officers' whom they replaced?

What a stupid red herring. I'll bet he can't name all of the Jews killed by the SS, or individuals who have been killed in any number of natural or man made disasters. But that does not mean that they never happened. There is any amount of literature, much of it published in USSR that supports his story. Stop being an wise a*se.

You are free to believe what you will, but don't try to discredit those who tell the truth merely because the facts do not suit your argument.

I have seen your type before, first, you demand a source, then once a source is provided you then disallow the source on some other pretext.

Get over it, Joe Stalin was one of history's f*ckups who was responsible for the deaths of millions of his own people, some by design, most by ignorance and neglect. It has not been a state secret since Kruschev denounced his personality cult and mass murder program 50 years ago. That opened the floodgates and told the people of the USSR what the West had known for 20 years.

The list of the 660 Generals who were purged is readily available, and would be a good start. Just because you're too lazy to research a topic doesn't mean others are as well. Keep your fallacies to yourself next time.

WTF are you trying to say? On one hand you are saying that Easy8 is incorrect, in the next post you quote that the information confirming what he said is available and therefore known to you. I think you just shot yourself in the foot.

For information like this, sources do not have to be quoted as they are common knowledge.

Obviously you are just trolling.

Maybe you shouldn't jump to conclusions and make assumptions about something you know little to nothing about. The following comment was made:" Stalin's purges killed off vaste numbers of highly skilled and experenced officers. He then replaced them with political commissars which had little or no military training. The Red Army was staffed largely by Stalin's old cronies and suffered for this greatly in the Winter War and early days of Operation Barbarossa." Why is it assumed that all of these men were 'highly skilled'? Perhaps you didn't know, Commissars were also purged. Secondly, who are these 'political commissars' who replaced the 'highly skilled' commanders? Zhukov was a commissar? Vasilevsky? Kirponos? Malinovsky? Who? These are called BLANKET statements because someone is too lazy to do any research before they open their mouth and blanket an entire group of people with their ignorant ideas.

Because it is a BLANKET in no way detracts from it's validity.

You seem to be more interested in showing that everyone else's statements are incorrect rather than making a valid point towards your own argument or showing that they are conclusively wrong by quoting checkable sources that refute their statements.

I feel that this is nothing to do with right or wrong, but more a personal power game (trolling) on your own behalf. I noticed earlier in the debate that when you were cornered you suddenly started quoting sources written in the Russian language.

Very convenient, but not the least bit convincing. Yes, you are all knowing and everyone else is ignorant. I believe you,.... honest!! but I know a lot who would not.

Blanket statements have no validity as they are generalizations with little to no foundation. Why is it that you use ad hominem attacks instead of proving my statement(s) wrong? You can't? Thought so.

Originally Posted by Kunikov

Blanket statements have no validity as they are generalizations with little to no foundation. Why is it that you use ad hominem attacks instead of proving my statement(s) wrong? You can't? Thought so.

Tell you what how about you give us something to disprove first?

By this I mean...
Example of your current approach...
"You are wrong and ignorant"
This is usually followed by...
"Why is everyone angry"
-------------------------------------------------------------
Example of an approach that would actually encourage dialogue...
"Your are wrong because [insert knowledgeable answer or your opinion here]
-------------------------------------------------------------
See the difference?

That would mean I'd have to disprove something that's worth disproving, i.e. has been sourced. Blanket statements would take too long to disprove, that's why I asked for proof to begin with.