Was there any chance he would succeed ?:roll:What if Patton had been allowed to push the Red Army back into the Soviet Union?
(can you say WW2 all the way to 2000? )
Was there any chance he would succeed ?:roll:What if Patton had been allowed to push the Red Army back into the Soviet Union?
(can you say WW2 all the way to 2000? )
No. 1. The Allies signed a treaty dividing up Europe, it isn't likely we would have violated it, if the Russians had advanced west beyond the line & refused to pull back....2. in conjuction with #1, or seperatly on the original question the Russians proved they could retreat a long way & take the casulties nessesary to win in the end, so no chance w/o atom bombs.Was there any chance he would succeed ?:roll:
Was there any chance he would succeed ?:roll:
Was there any chance he would succeed ?:roll:
It is a tough one to predict as the Soviets had the upper hand in manpower and armour quality but the west had the upper hand in the air which is major leveler.
Purely in terms of a ground war the West would have been destroyed however I am not really sure of the quality of the Soviet air force.
Another way America might have won is via logistics. If they cut off lend-lease aid to the USSR, that would have a serious impact on their supply lines, espicially on fuel and foodstuffs. The Germans did a good job destroying the Ukraine, Stalin might have had a serious problem feeding his troops with US wheat imports.
To be honest I don't think it would have taken the Russians all that long to reach the channel ports had they actually wanted to.
The Western Allies were always struggling logistically to keep all of the armies supplied and at operational readiness (this is shown by the Market Garden operation where Patton had to be stripped of supplies to allow Montgomeries drive to go ahead), further to this Russian armour and artillery was always going to dominate its Western counterpart at the time, the only saving grace for the west was in air power.
I disagree about the Artillery. Soviet Artillery Fire was certainly plentiful but not fire accurate. The UK-Canadians were experts in Artillery. Remember the Allied had radiomen that could call in accurate air and artillery strikes on very short notice. The Russians never adopted this, they preferred to blanket areas with Artillery before advancing. More to the point Artillery is even more vulnerable to air power than tanks. The reason the Russians were able to fire such massive volleys in 44-45 was because they controlled the skies. Allied Fighter-Bombers would have had a field day.
In terms of supply, much of what you mention was due to Patton himself (meaning ego) not because of US logistics. Remember the Russian supply lines were much longer. Patton wanted to push the reds out of eastern europe he didn't really want to invade Moscow. Its easier to get supplies into Poland from the UK than it is from the Urals, and remember no more U-Boat menace to hamper them. Soviet supply system was largely but not completely motorized either, the allies was.
The Western Allies, never mind Patton and just one army, did not have nearly anything like the numbers of troops on the ground to even begin to contemplate offensive operations. To cut a long story short it would be a very stupid thing to do. Churchill drew up a plan that asked the same question you did; could the Western Allies defend a Soviet push into Western Europe and could they even push the Red Army back into Russia? It was called Operation Unthinkable and it would have involved the re-commission of up to 100,000 German soldiers to fight for the Allies. British military planners concluded that the plan was 'militarily unfeasible'.What if Patton had been allowed to push the Red Army back into the Soviet Union?
(can you say WW2 all the way to 2000? )
I don't think Patton or the whole of the allies could have done it. Heres anotehr what if. What if eth Soviets hadn't stopped? What if they conquered everything all teh way to the Atlantic Ocean?
Ok thats an interesting thought,
ok heres another what if...............What if the truth about the U.S.S Ward had been published in 1941?
That it HAD INDEED shelled and sank a Japaneses mini-sub outside the harbor nets at Pearl Harbor
Well, the bulk of the Western Allies had only been at war for a year compared to 4 years for the Red Army. This wouldn't have made much difference though to the Red Army; they had critical forward momentum and advantages of numbers. If the Western Allies had attacked the Red Army they would have been pushed back to the Atlantic or would have nuked Moscow, Stalingrad, Leningrad etc before this ever happened. One of the main reasons why 'Operation Unthinkable' was drawn up was because Churchill was very concerned that this indeed would happen. As the Germans learned the only way to fight Russia is by committing yourself to a 'total war'. Would there even have been the political will in the West to commit to such an 'all or nothing' concept? I think not.On the whole though I suspect that by May 1945 all parties in Europe were exhausted and could not have continued large scale combat for very long.
Well, the bulk of the Western Allies had only been at war for a year compared to 4 years for the Red Army.
But, in 1945, the technology to manufacture hundreds of atom bombs to nuke these huge cities wasn't available. Also, the soviets would have reached the Atlantic before the allies could deploy nukes.This wouldn't have made much difference though to the Red Army; they had critical forward momentum and advantages of numbers. If the Western Allies had attacked the Red Army they would have been pushed back to the Atlantic or would have nuked Moscow, Stalingrad, Leningrad etc before this ever happened.
Had Trinity failed I suspect there would have been 2 possible outcomes:
1) The Allies invade Japan and suffer huge numbers of casualties before finally winning.
2) Russia invades Northern Japan and suffer huge casualties before Japan surrenders to the Allies.
Never going to happen, Japan did not have the manpower or plans to invade Australia, there is no way they would have planned a US invasion.
In august/1945 the Soviet Union destroyed a army of 1.2 million Japanese soldiers losing only 40-50.000 casualties.
Simulations show that an allied invasion of Japan would suffer around 250.000 casualties, compared to the 11 million allied casualties in the 1944-1945 "invasion" of nazi europe.
Japan was a second rate power, in fact, its fighting power was about roughly the same as Italy, maybe Poland. Their victories in Asia were the result of even weaker enemies.
I have never been a fan of the Japanese army or navy during WW2 as I think they were poorly led throughout but I am not sure I would relegate them to the level of Italy, at least they did fight and die for their cause the Italians just surrendered in droves.