Could USA defeat USSR before the WW2 begun??

godofthunder9010 said:
airmanpatroler said:
Well the Russians would have a really hard time BEFORE WW2 to fight anybody I man they really didnt have a decent army or air force or navy for that matter.
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They had the biggest of all of those except navy. At least double that of anybody else. 3 times as many tanks as anyone else. 3 times as many combat aircraft. They had a terrifying military force actually. Most of the world had no idea how gigantic their military truly was.
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Well they have had numbers, but were they trained, aor equiped, supplied effectivly? And American pilots were a heck of alot better than soviets and the KoreanWar proves quanity over quality does not always win a war.
 
godofthunder9010 said:
The transition of the US Army from tiny to huge: http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/2WWusaA.htm
Before the outbreak of the Second World War the US Army was a small professional force of 175,000 men.
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That force included barely any tanks or and a relatively small number of combat aircraft. Though people like General Patton were around, they're ideas were ignored in favor of "traditional" ideas. The concept of Mechanized Warfare was extremely poorly understood by the US Army.

Now we know that the USSR had a minimum of 10,000,000 men in the Red Army as of 1939, more than 10,000 tanks and more than 10,000 combat aircraft. They had a much more developed concept of Mechanized and Tank Warfare.
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This is my post from earlier in the thread. The Red Army would have had the USA for breakfast if there had been a war anytime pre-1939. Yes they were well equipped and well enough trained. Their biggest problem was that Stalin had killed off all their officers.
 
Before WWII? H*** no.

We were just getting out of a depression and we had an army of what? 350,000 troops about? I know we were very low but by the end of the war we had something like 7,000,000 men in the Army.
 
Logistics decree that the odds of either side defeating the other were slim to nonexistant.

Trying to logistically support forces across the atlantic without some "safe" landing ground is impossible.

If the US had some sort of ally in europe, who the soviets couldn't immediately run over then perhaps, but its doubtful.
Likewise, if the Soviets had some sort of ally in the America's, who the US couldn't immediately run over.

But in both instances, there would need to be a good year or two of building up before hand and most likely it simply would not have been possible. (Consider all the logistical build up for D-day)

Most likely, they would have simply faced too great odds due to the "home" advantage of which ever was attacked. They would have man power, food, ammunition, petrol.. wheras the attacker would have to wait for it to be moved half way around the world.
 
Yeah the main thing is the fact Russia would have had to get a landing location and be able to get enough supllies to that location to keep the war going.
 
Earling said:
Logistics decree that the odds of either side defeating the other were slim to nonexistant.

Trying to logistically support forces across the atlantic without some "safe" landing ground is impossible.

If the US had some sort of ally in europe, who the soviets couldn't immediately run over then perhaps, but its doubtful.
Likewise, if the Soviets had some sort of ally in the America's, who the US couldn't immediately run over.

But in both instances, there would need to be a good year or two of building up before hand and most likely it simply would not have been possible. (Consider all the logistical build up for D-day)

Most likely, they would have simply faced too great odds due to the "home" advantage of which ever was attacked. They would have man power, food, ammunition, petrol.. wheras the attacker would have to wait for it to be moved half way around the world.
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Well, you're thinking in terms of the Atlantic Ocean, which makes no sense for either side. The Bering Strait into Alaska is simple, quick and easy, the only drawback being its a tad cold up that way.
 
Yeah and the fact most of the water is unbreakable Ice didn't help the fact it is WW1, Not yet WW2 technology we are talking about. Breaking throug Ice was not thier strong point.
 
Dameon said:
Yeah and the fact most of the water is unbreakable Ice didn't help the fact it is WW1, Not yet WW2 technology we are talking about. Breaking throug Ice was not thier strong point.
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Not who's strong point??
 
godofthunder9010 said:
Well, you're thinking in terms of the Atlantic Ocean, which makes no sense for either side. The Bering Strait into Alaska is simple, quick and easy, the only drawback being its a tad cold up that way.
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I am sorry.. but this is about as insane as people argueing over a Japanese invasion of Siberia in ww2 bringing about the downfall of the USSR by military conquest. (The threat of an attack on the other hand might have had an effect.. but thats a different matter)

Do you really think that a force sent by this route could be maintained to ww1 strength and have a chance of defeating the nation you attacked?
In both instances, your attacking what amounts to the "back door" of the nation. Theres nothing that the opponent can take which will prevent the defender mustering overwhelming forces and then driving the invader back. For Russia, the far east was secondary to Moscow and St Petersburg just as to the US the west coast was significantly less important than the east in order to continue a war.

//edit.
I am going for dates wise around 1920-1930's. Technologically nearer what was used in the first than the second world war..
 
Yeah around 1920-1930 it would be odd because no one could build anything, however I think we are refering to like 1937-1939
 
I still think most of what i said stands. The strategies would be primarilly ww1 strategies, such as the red army used in finland. The lessons of ww2 with the greater movement provided by tanks and vehicles had yet to be learned and even then it is doubtful such movement could occur if they did fight each other in that part of the world. Logistically it would all break down.

Even today, I doubt the US could defeat Russia by attacking via that route. Your not going to treck all the way across siberia, its logistically impossible. (Or just really, really stupid.. take your pick)
 
I think we all agree that war between the USA and USSR pre-1939 was about as likely as a war between Brazil and Poland. That's why its so puzzling that the thread has attracted so much interest -- its such an incredibly unlikely conflict that is barely worth contemplating.

I do think that if the USSR was the agressor, that they'd have easily taken and held most of Alaska ... but if they wanted Alaska so much, why did they sell it to us to begin with??

Bear in mind that the ONLY logical frontline between the two countries is the Bering Strait. Too much trouble getting to one another any other way. That said, its a pretty crappy frontline.
 
Pre-WWII Britian, France and America were preparing for war with Russia, most of these countries thought that Russia would be he enemy, not Germany, but that had changed by 1939 when Hitler made his intentions obvious.

I just wanna put it this way, Pre-WWII USA had a much better chance of defeating Pre-WWII USSR than Pre-WWII USSR had in defeating Pre-WWII United States, main reason, our Navy, we had one that had the newest ships and lots of them, Russia had one of the largest Navy, but it was an old one with morale at an all time low after being crushed by the Imperial Navy.
 
The Pacific Fleet is what we're talking about. Sure it would have beat the crap out of what navy that the USSR could muster, but then you have the very large problem of going against a land army superior to your own in every category but (post Stalin's Purge) leadership. They had better tanks and a ton more of them. They at least equivalent small arms and a ton more manpower to start out with. They had an enormous airforce -- in this department both the USA and USSR were weak in design but would have rapidly improved. WW2 Russian planes were excellent vs ground forces because that's what the USSR needed. They's have been able to alter their R&D to whatever the needs would be.

If you actually managed to get a foothold on the Soviet side of the Bering Straight, you had THOUSAND AND THOUSANDS of miles to go to reach the overwhelming majority USSR's industry and population (thusly their ability to wage war). Irkutsk and Vladvodistok would have been no great loss to the USSR's ability to fight the war. Lets not forget that the Japanese military machine that wrought so much havock and destruction upon China got their butts kicked by the Russians in the 1939 attempted invasion of Siberia. They had some success, but not nearly enough to want to continue to pursue the attack.

In reverse, is the Soviets had a long, long distance to cover going through Alaska and Canada, but not AS FAR.
 
The different between Russia and America in this war would be that if America got a foot hole in Russia they had to travel to get the major part. if Russia got Alaska and by some act managed to keep it they could come down and attack some of our major citeas in the west. However they would of cousre had to make it by our pacific Fleet.
 
Yeah, the "Russian Aggressor" would be based on surprise -- nobody in their right mind suspected that Russia might try invading. They were too busy planning and watching for the Japanese invading Alaska. Whatever the Russians could have snuck across very quickly BEFORE the Pacific Fleet got there would be all they had to work with.
 
yeah if they managed to mass at the straight then come over and do a suprise attack they would have a pretty good chance, also wasn't part of the Atlantic fleet moved to the Pacific Fleet before WW2? or was it after....
 
All new buildup was focussed almost 100% on the Pacific with very little concern for the Atlantic. I think you're right about a good chunk of the Atlantic Fleet being moved, but I haven't any details.
 
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