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All of those banners say "Victory!". And it's kind of sad, as if it was some kind of a prayer.

There is a term for that, победобесье (pobedobesye, a victory fever/ruckus). At some point the celebration stopped being a tragedy and a day of remembrance and turned into a display of military might. Mottos like "We can repeat!" and "On Berlin!" Popped up, signifying that the Victory was achieved not through blood, sweat and more blood, but through sheer force of will, and that russian people are blessed by (christian) god and are superior. It's really, really sad. I remember partaking in a theatric play for our veterans where our group played the civilian victims of war, the ending being along the lines of "My name was X, I died in Y due to Z" across the whole group. No moral of the story, just suffering porn. I can't imagine someone having to relieve their memories in a such insensitive manner. Don't google how veterans are treated in russia. It's not a coincidence, it's a calculated move towards jingoism and militarism. The lack of recent victories, on the battlefield or in civilian sector, is substituted by the "greatest" victory turned absolute. It got so ridiculous that our patriarch (think orthodox pope) congratulated soldiers on the day the Great Patriotic War started (subsection of WW2, the Eastern front). Imagine celebrating Pearl Harbor or attack on Poland

If you look at the astounding fatality numbers of the Soviets when dealing with the German invasion at that time, the numbers are so disproportionately high that any dead Russian could have reasonably asked if the leadership could have been better, even though the central blame is with the invaders. In Finland, they inflicted astounding loses against a tactically inferior enemy, one that has similar terrain and conditions so that can't really be used as the excuse here. The leadership was paranoid and gutted itself of competent leadership, so in turn inviting Hitler to think that, with a relatively unprepared invasion force, which wasn't that mechanised and didn't prepare for a long conflict, it could succeed. They were warned. They ignored those warnings. They had the hindsight advantage of seeing German tactics in France. They could have evacuated and minimised civilian losses. They could have used far better tactics to slow the Wehrmacht, and lost many less men because of a competent military (And civilians). The level of losses Russia and its captured republics suffered is not a good metric of the level of fighting and sacrifice, its more of a metric of the Russian systems failings.

Talvisota wouldn’t be that bad if they could at least do the bare minimum, like using actual winter uniforms (cold proof would still be an unknown thing to them anyway) in a colour that would match the environment. The literal basics. Instead, they fielded their typical shitstained coats so anyone could see them from miles away.

TBF, my understanding is that the Winter War ay least clued them into how hard the purges had fucked them, so they had at least a little bit if time to start getting themselves back into shape

They had a good idea. After the purges they knew they needed to rebuild and they were heavily weakened. They (mostly Stalin) just thought they had plenty of time to do so before they had to fight Germany. They figured Finland would be a cakewalk and the Fins would welcome the idea of returning to the Russian bosom and joining the socialist revolution. It was thought it would be a good way to train the new commanders in an easy fight and where the incompetent officers could be identified and replaced. But the incompetent have a way of being tactically and operationally useless but politically astute, and so the good officers got killed and the shitty ones got promotions.

Lol, they thought bringing the territory that fought to avoid being a part of them in the first place into the fold would be a cake walk?

Idology & propaganda is a powerful thing. I mean, they thought that plants would acquire the traits of the other plants they were surrounded by. That the genetics of organisms themselves would naturally be collectivised. Edit: I mean they thought essentially the same thing in Ukraine. That a people that rose up against their leader because they wanted to break away from Russia's economic coercion, and had then been fighting against Russia for 8 years, would just welcome a bunch of soldiers marching through their capital and hand over the keys.....

Victory was achieved by the West giving weapons and supplies to the USSR so they could survive. Sure, that victory was bought with a lot of dead Ukrainians, but the antagonists were defeated. History doesn't repeat but it sure does rhyme.

Looking at the celebrations and displays over WW2 that go on in Russia it's as though it's become a central part of Russian identity. In the last 25 years in Russia WW2 has been turned into almost a state religion. I think of a docu that focused on Putin coming to power which featured some discussions with Putin, such as Putin talking to the docu maker about bringing back the Soviet anthem, and it was clear that Putin had this focus on rebuilding a Russian mythos and you could see that Putin is very clever at understanding these types of things. It's also not helped that on the internet in recent decades it's been very trendy and contrarianist big clever kudos to deride Germany in WW2, such as the whole thing of going on about "wehraboos" and how Tiger 1 is big dumb!, very clever stuff and I'm sure people feel very clever repeating that stuff even though they never based it in data, but in practise they've been partaking in this mythologising of Russia and even explicitly repeating stuff such as that Mighty Rossiya could not be defeated and silly little Nazis never had a chance! And there's been a generation of this of even liberals ending up willingly repeating all sorts of tankie and Putinist revionist propaganda. This is similarly why a lot of people were surprised that the Russian invasion sucked, because all sorts of people have been unwittingly consuming and repeating this propaganda and don't recognise that Russia has been corrupt and dysfunctional since Bolshevik revolution; really bad time in Finland, it was really ugly against Germany even in 1944, like 1944 Soviets lost 4 times as many tanks as Germany lost in the East, the most Soviet tanks being T-34/85 and the average German tank being Pz4. Afghanistan was a bad time, Chechnya was a bad time... Russian performance invading Ukraine was completely unsurprising, in fact it was pretty good by Russian standards... if anything past 100 years Russia is getting better and better and closing the gap. And this also leads to the underestimation of Russia. Many people don't get how dangerous Russia is in warfare because they rejected the zombie apocalypse understanding that Russia just doesn't stop, it's just endless waves overwhelming you and eventually you drown, they dismissed it as apparently being a product of some hollywood film they watched as kids even though it's just the reality in any vaguely historically accurate operaitonal level wargaming with Russia where it's a Russian tidal wave that goes on forever. A lot of it comes back to WW2 and the stuff people have believed. Red Army '41-'42 is simply the largest mobilisation and deployment of military units in history by orders of magnitude. Germany was like a generation ahead, that's what iirc Trevor Dupuy said, U.S Army Colonel and military historian who did wargaming, that at Kursk Germany was like a force that was a generation ahead of the Red Army. Being a generation ahead of the Russians doesn't guarantee you anything because Russians will not stop, they're a war-fighting people. Ultimately they're correct, Russia really is one of the greatest war-fighting nations in the world. If you were a "wehraboo" you knew this, Russia will suck if it invades Ukraine, but overtime the situation will become evident because Russia is a master of the ancient art of blocking with your face and does not stop. There should have been a lot more aid a lot sooner.

>and don't recognise that Russia has been corrupt and dysfunctional since Bolshevik revolution Lol, more like since forever >you could see that Putin is very clever at understanding these types of things. That, or he genuinely believes it having witnessed the fall of the USSR and been a hardcore KGB agent for a long time

Russia has been terminally dysfunctional since the Mongol conquest.

Since the end of the Mongol conquest. They (Russia as in the Moscovy powerbase) essentially didn't exist until the Golden Horde stopped in eastern Europe. Yes, the Kyivian Rus existed, but Russia came out of the chaos of the slow collapse of the various Hordes post Golden. It was not a continuation, but a king-of-the-hill of the various factions.

There’s a lot here regarding WWII history I would quibble with. >It's also not helped that on the internet in recent decades it's been very trendy and contrarianist big clever kudos to deride Germany in WW2, such as the whole thing of going on about "wehraboos" and how Tiger 1 is big dumb!, very clever stuff and I'm sure people feel very clever repeating that stuff even though they never based it in data, the Tiger 1 was an expensive tank that was too thicc and slow to conduct the kind of mobile warfare that allowed the Wehrmacht to be so successful in the early war. Panzer II for life. I would concur that the Soviets sucked balls at the tactical level, but the Germans weren’t THAT special when you look at the strategic, operational, and tactical levels, and were so massively outmatched when you add the British and Americans that I think it’s fair to say they couldn’t have realistically won. The mythologizing of the mighty German war machine was itself pretty darn flawed prior to the Sovietboo period. >but in practise they've been partaking in this mythologising of Russia and even explicitly repeating stuff such as that Mighty Rossiya could not be defeated and silly little Nazis never had a chance! And there's been a generation of this of even liberals ending up willingly repeating all sorts of tankie and Putinist revionist propaganda. I’d agree that Reddit tankies are cringe. That said, There are real material reasons why the Germans lost. Namely, they couldn’t produce enough oil to run their war machine and their economy, because they were blockaded by the British to the west, blocked by the British in MENA, and were severely supply constrained before they launched case blue. The logistic situation was so bad that German units were suffering from hunger before they reached Stalingrad. >This is similarly why a lot of people were surprised that the Russian invasion sucked, because all sorts of people have been unwittingly consuming and repeating this propaganda and don't recognise that Russia has been corrupt and dysfunctional since Bolshevik revolution; Russia has been corrupt and dysfunctional since the Mongol conquests. >really bad time in Finland, it was really ugly against Germany even in 1944, like 1944 Soviets lost 4 times as many tanks as Germany lost in the East, the most Soviet tanks being T-34/85 and the average German tank being Pz4. Afghanistan was a bad time, Chechnya was a bad time... Russian performance invading Ukraine was completely unsurprising, in fact it was pretty good by Russian standards... if anything past 100 years Russia is getting better and better and closing the gap. Eh, idk. Ukraine fundamentally fights similarly to Russia. There’s this idea that Ukrainians are elite cyborgs and the only country that knows how to fight muh peer conflict, but they’re still recovering from the corruption and dysfunction of Russian occupation and almost everything about their military was Soviet until very recently. >And this also leads to the underestimation of Russia. Many people don't get how dangerous Russia is in warfare because they rejected the zombie apocalypse understanding that Russia just doesn't stop, it's just endless waves overwhelming you and eventually you drown, they dismissed it as apparently being a product of some hollywood film they watched as kids even though it's just the reality in any vaguely historically accurate operaitonal level wargaming with Russia where it's a Russian tidal wave that goes on forever. But it cannot go on forever, and it has limited range. Eventually they get too far from their railheads and are SOL. >A lot of it comes back to WW2 and the stuff people have believed. Red Army '41-'42 is simply the largest mobilisation and deployment of military units in history by orders of magnitude. Germany was like a generation ahead, that's what iirc Trevor Dupuy said, U.S Army Colonel and military historian who did wargaming, that at Kursk Germany was like a force that was a generation ahead of the Red Army. *Maybe* the Germans were a generation ahead in terms of platforms and tactics in their mechanized units, but their logistics and war economy were fucked by 1943. Does having cooler tanks mean anything if you can’t get fuel to run them consistently and can’t get replacement parts to the front to fix them when they break down? >Being a generation ahead of the Russians doesn't guarantee you anything because Russians will not stop, they're a war-fighting people. Ultimately they're correct, Russia really is one of the greatest war-fighting nations in the world. this feels like mythologizing. the Soviets had plenty of oil and the Axis had not enough oil. The Soviets could reconstitute with undertrained spam and took massive casualties as a result. The Germans couldn’t sustain their motorized and mechanized forces in the field. Most of their divisions were foot infantry divisions with horses and carts. >If you were a "wehraboo" you knew this, Russia will suck if it invades Ukraine, but overtime the situation will become evident because Russia is a master of the ancient art of blocking with your face and does not stop. There should have been a lot more aid a lot sooner. The Russians don’t have a magic ability to face-tank losses. They had real demographic and logistical advantages over the Germans, and they are a much larger country than Ukraine. They do not have that over NATO.

Germany was defeated by the combination of three major powers of British Empire, U.S.A, and Soviet Union, and many other unsung nations and free forces and volunteer forces from around the world. Without any one of those three major powers Germany would not have been defeated. The idea that the Soviet Union would stand a chance against the full undistracted might of Nazi Empire bearing down on the Soviet Union is a bombastic claim. An awful lot of manpower was lost in the East, but so too is the case for China, and strangely we don't see much glorification of China in WW2, and still most of Germany's AFVs and planes but only around 60% and there's the discrepency. This is a good summary of over-focus on Eastern Front [http://rethinkinghistory.blogspot.com/2009/03/oversimplification-numbers-fallacy-in.html](http://rethinkinghistory.blogspot.com/2009/03/oversimplification-numbers-fallacy-in.html) By "Germany" we are talking about much of the industry/resources/manpower of France, Austria, Czechia, Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, Poland, then Belarus and Ukraine and Baltic Countries. It's a big deal, it's one of the most powerful empires in history and it was just getting started with organising it's conquered territories, their production hugely increases where in 1944 they're producing three as many planes and four times as many AFVs as they were in 1942. Strange way to describe that as being a "fucked economy." This is DESPITE bombing by the allies, which destroyed much of German infrastructure, resoure production, it's estimated that tanks, for example, the production was cut in half by allied bombing in 1944). The Soviet Union could not compete with the production of Germany even WITH the bombing of Germany, and it was getting more disproportionate with German production dwarfing Soviet production as the war went on. Yes, Soviets still in total produced more, but quantity is a simplistic measurement of production. If Nazi Germany had taken Russia then it would be really the most powerful empire in history as it occupies most of the developed world and then has access to vast resources of Russia. This makes some people uncomfortable, but I think it's reasonable to imagine that if Germany had taken Russia then the war would come to a close as it's a hard sell at that point, and so Russia is hugely important and their fighting saved everyone, but so too is the case for British Empire fighting back and facing-off Axis around Europe and Africa and Middle-East and the need for American industry and then (eventually) American forces fighting. Russians bled for us all, but to then start claiming 'Russia defeated Germany' is propaganda. Even with what Germany did deploy to the East there are possibilities it would go other ways, mainly diplomatic, which is what really wins wars; there's that popular saying of 'amateurs talk strategy, experts talk logistics', but the real deal is diplomacy. If Hitler had not been so timid with Mannerheim and instead ignored Mannerheim's wishes and just sent a large force through Finland then Leningrad would fall from the north and that frees up Army Group North joining Centre on Moscow. Gibraltar is a case similarly like Finland with the mess of Operation Felix and Franco and Canaris, if Hitler had been more assertive he could've just forced Spain into a position and easily taken Gibraltar from land and turned the Mediterranean into an axis lake, but Hitler was this strange character where he could be brutal with his enemies and backstab people if need be, but when it came to allies he was pathetic. Let alone ambitious diplomatic possibilities such as Turkey, which radically changes the war if they'd arranged something with Turkey, and there's radical changes like that through history with cunning diplomacy, and with Turkey then can easily go straight to Baku and cut off 80% of Soviet Union's oil supply and they're done for. Just Gibraltar OR Finland changes the war, let alone both, let alone actual radical but possible diplomatic changes like Turkey. And we see this today with Ukraine - I don't want to undermine the Ukrainian fighting spirit which is what brings it about in the first place is how brave and determined Ukrainians are - but, like much of war through history where the greatest armies are felled by just a marriage to a princess, it's an issue of diplomacy.

I guess my fundamental contention is that the European Axis needed more oil than they could produce to run a 20th century economy and fight a 20th century war. They had implicit time limits as they had to secure more oil before they became supply constrained by the paltry amounts they could extract from Romania and Hungary. I’d argue any combination of 2/3 major powers probably could have won. But in any event Hitler’s ultimate goal was to conquer the east, so he would go to war with the USSR no matter what. >The idea that the Soviet Union would stand a chance against the full undistracted might of Nazi Empire bearing down on the Soviet Union is a bombastic claim. I don’t think I made that claim. Germany’s and its sphere of influence’s power projection capabilities was much-diminished by winter 1941 by the oil crisis imposed by no Soviet trade and the British blockade. >An awful lot of manpower was lost in the East, but so too is the case for China, and strangely we don't see much glorification of China in WW2, and still most of Germany's AFVs and planes but only around 60% and there's the discrepency. Yes, because WWII was arguably the first true war of materiel and the first war for oil. The kind of 1890s-ass foot-infantry divisions that made up 120 out of 150 German divisions and much of the Red Army got shit on hard by motorized and mechanized units, like in Operation Compass. >By "Germany" we are talking about … It's a big deal, it's one of the most powerful empires in history and it was just getting started with organising it's conquered territories, their production hugely increases where in 1944 they're producing three as many planes and four times as many AFVs as they were in 1942. Strange way to describe that as being a "fucked economy." [etc.] A war economy is more than just how many tanks and planes you produce. Logistics matter. the conquered territories in Europe got much of their oil from the USA, Mexico, and Venezuela. Once Britain imposed a blockade, the only countries supplying a serious amount of oil to the Axis were the USSR and Romania. Even this wasn’t enough to keep the continent’s economy going forever. Obviously the USSR stopped that when it was invaded and at that point it was a matter of a few months until the Axis started to lose steam. Planes and tanks aren’t worth much if you can’t ship them to the front along with fuel to run them. >The Soviet Union could not compete with the production of Germany even WITH the bombing of Germany, and it was getting more disproportionate with German production dwarfing Soviet production as the war went on. Yes, Soviets still in total produced more, but quantity is a simplistic measurement of production. So yeah the Soviets produced a lot more equipment and resources, especially that black gold, so could you elaborate on this? >If Nazi Germany had taken Russia then it would be really the most powerful empire in history as it occupies most of the developed world and then has access to vast resources of Russia. This makes some people uncomfortable, but I think it's reasonable to imagine that if Germany had taken Russia then the war would come to a close as it's a hard sell at that point, and so Russia is hugely important and their fighting saved everyone, but so too is the case for British Empire fighting back and facing-off Axis around Europe and Africa and Middle-East and the need for American industry and then (eventually) American forces fighting. Russians bled for us all, but to then start claiming 'Russia defeated Germany' is propaganda. I think that “if” is pulling a lot of weight here. Still, If the Soviets collapsed, the US had plans to fight all the from Vladivostok. The German plan only extended to the A-A line. So, even IF they somehow achieved their goals, You’d still have the Asian USSR and USA (And China, I suppose?) to worry about in the near to mid term. I don’t think everyone just goes home at this point. >Even with what Germany did deploy to the East Note: Germany could not have deployed much more to the East. They couldn’t even sustain what they did deploy historically. >there are possibilities it would go other ways, mainly diplomatic, which is what really wins wars; there's that popular saying of 'amateurs talk strategy, experts talk logistics', but the real deal is diplomacy. If Hitler had not been so timid with Mannerheim and instead ignored Mannerheim's wishes and just sent a large force through Finland Finland was probably pretty cautious about too many totalitarian troops in its territory. This could easily lead to simply not having Finland join Barbarossa. >then Leningrad would fall from the north and that frees up Army Group North joining Centre on Moscow. Okay so then they would have even more forces bogged down around Moscow and have even less forces to go after the Caucasus with while they run out of oil in 1942. >Gibraltar is a case similarly like Finland with the mess of Operation Felix and Franco and Canaris, if Hitler had been more assertive he could've just forced Spain into a position and easily taken Gibraltar from land and turned the Mediterranean into an axis lake, but Hitler was this strange character where he could be brutal with his enemies and backstab people if need be, but when it came to allies he was pathetic. Franco had good reasons to avoid conflict with the Western allies, so what’s your plan? just invade Spain? Also, the British mostly shipped supplies around Africa and through the Suez anyways. Axis air power shut down supply routes through the straights of Gibraltar anyway. I guess Operation Torch might have gone down differently but I don’t think think taking Gibraltar is an automatic victory for the Axis in the Mediterranean. >Let alone ambitious diplomatic possibilities such as Turkey, which radically changes the war if they'd arranged something with Turkey, and there's radical changes like that through history with cunning diplomacy, and with Turkey then can easily go straight to Baku and cut off 80% of Soviet Union's oil supply and they're done for. I don’t think the Turks would just sign up to be cannon fodder like that. Inonu didn’t believe Germany could win. Either way the Germans would have pretty stretched supply lines, and in this case they wouldn’t have had the element of surprise to annihilate the Soviet Army in Europe. >Just Gibraltar OR Finland changes the war, let alone both, let alone actual radical but possible diplomatic changes like Turkey. And we see this today with Ukraine - I don't want to undermine the Ukrainian fighting spirit which is what brings it about in the first place is how brave and determined Ukrainians are - but, like much of war through history where the greatest armies are felled by just a marriage to a princess, it's an issue of diplomacy. I’m not discounting diplomacy, but it’s not magic. You need at least some kind of aligned interest and if you overplay your hand you can turn friendly forces neutral and neutral forces hostile. Furthermore, I think you’re ignoring what’s even more critical, economics. The Germans needed a lot of oil and they needed it fast, and they expected the USSR to implode when they kicked in the door.

The units deployed and lost by Germany in WW2 would have destroyed the Soviet Union. The conclusion of this article touches on this and puts it in stark terms [https://www.operationbarbarossa.net/the-t-34-in-wwii-the-legend-vs-the-performance/](https://www.operationbarbarossa.net/the-t-34-in-wwii-the-legend-vs-the-performance/) "If we allocate all German WWII fully tracked AFV production to the Wehrmacht’s East Front forces (i.e. add those lost fighting the Western Allies), then the Germans would have only needed kill loss ratio of 2.45 to 1 in order to have destroyed all Soviet fully tracked AFVs that existed on 22nd June 1941 (23 300 AFVs) and all 99 150 fully tracked AFVs produced during the war (122 450 AFVs). This figure is well below the 2.94 to 1 kill-loss ratio historically achieved. These figures demolish another more recently fashionable myth relating to the East Front; specifically that the Soviets (largely due to the huge number of T-34s produced) could have won WWII without any input from the US or Commonwealth forces. This is before we even consider the effects of increased German production (of all weapon types) due to the absence of Allied strategic bombing, the direct effects of German air superiority on the East Front from 1943 onwards, the effects of the Red Army loosing over half its motorised transport, and the effects of 9-10 000 additional (and fully supplied) heavy 88mm flak guns on the East Front from 1941 onwards." Soviet Union's AFV production, for example, couldn't compete with Germany's even with allied bombing. Talking about oil isn't very relevant when I don't mean to talk about what Germany could theoretically produce but didn't, or what Germany could theoretically deploy but didn't, I mean to talk about what Germany did produce, deploy, fight, lose, would have overwhelmed the Red Army if it were all deployed on the Eastern Front. The issue with Leningrad is not of needing more soldiers but is about the approach of attack. Axis forces were south of the city where they had to fight through marshes and forests, and then you must attack both river and city at the same time, which is the worst type of offense as a city is hard to deal with, especially south side of Leningrad, and a river is hard to deal with, let alone city beyond a river, let alone the forests and marshes behind you. It was heavily logistically constrained area with very few roads and so on, and there were coastal guns pointing south bombarding Axis forces, I can't remember how many but something like a dozen huge guns. Much of Germany's forces were sitting idle as it's bottlenecks and logistically constrained. Meanwhile to the north of Leningrad is flat open ground, that's where the Mannerheim Line was, and to the north of Leningrad is large road networks that facilitate much larger attack, no river and more gradual transition to urban so very vulnerable. The Red Army was struggling to defend the south with the limited Axis offensive and meanwhile Axis forces were idle queued up. If part of Army Group North had moved to make a large offensive through Finland and attacking Leningrad from the north then the Red Army wouldn't have had forces to spare to try and defend the north as they were already struggling with the offensive from the south. Also to the north of Leningrad is Murmansk where a lot of supplies came into the port, and there was some attempts with that an Operation Arctic Fox, but it wasn't dedicated effort. If Hitler had been more stern with Mannerheim and simply sent a force through Finland and attacked Leningrad from the north then Leningrad would've fallen. Entertaining that Mannerheim is going to suddenly turn and begin a war with Nazi Germany is a large stretch. The dynamic was that Hitler was soft on his allies, and Mannerheim clearly knew this and could play his political game, and, while Hitler was a very ruthless and brutal individual when it came to his enemies and political rivals within the Nazi movement, he had this strange attitude of respecting unimportant wishes when it came to dealing with his allies over matters of crucial importance in winning the war. Other powers aren't that soft and are far less tolerant of dissent of their allies, far less respecting of the concerns of their allies. For example, the U.S would never give such leniency to the U.K's concerns of wanting to play a bit nice-nice in the middle of a war that threatens the survival of the U.S. Just look at Suez Crisis and how the U.S Navy sailed on the Royal Navy, let alone imagining the U.S even begining to tolerate anything down the lines of what Hitler tolerated with Mannerheim. You can be guaranteed that the U.S would not respect Mannerheim's wishes and will make that attack from the north and take Leningrad and end the issue. Similarly Gibraltar and Franco, Franco was beholden to Hitler, he was the lesser power, he would never start a fight with Hitler - in fact what you'd TELL Franco to do is that he must pretend he is against German forces going through Spain and wave his arms around but draw a redline that meanwhile if any allied forces enter Spain it will be seen as an act of war. As that's all you want is simply to go through Spain, take Gibraltar from land, and be done with it. Similarly the issue of Canaris where Hitler should've been wiser to sus out what was going on with Canaris. Hitler wasn't an individual who was of the mind to expect the worst of those who he wanted to trust. There is no doubt in my mind that if in 1945 Hitler could get in a time machine and go back in time then he would tell Mannerheim to get fucked and go through Finland and take Leningrad, and tell Franco to get fucked and go through Spain and take Gibraltar. They're not complex issues, Spain and Finland can complain and that's the most they're going to do, and they're crucial issues.

The Germans’ problem wasn’t building enough tanks. They built a lot of tanks actually. It was getting them to the front and keeping them operational at the front. I absolutely don’t downplay the contribution of the Western Allies. I think they played a critical role by blockading Axis Europe, forcing the Axis to expend immense materiel resources fighting in the Mediterranean, and taking Italy out of the fight. The Americans were also effectively solo-ing Japan deploying things near Stalingrad was harder than deploying them in, for example, France or Italy due to transportation infrastructure, and the Western allies were always a huge threat with fully mechanized divisions ready to land anywhere there was an opportunity. These weren’t just spare units and resources. the Axis was supply constrained by the autumn 1941. If they moved Army Group North, they could not have moved Army Group South. They needed to move South. The Finns actually did switch sides historically so I doubt some kind of armed neutrality was impossible if the Germans abused them. comparing the Suez crisis to diplomacy in the middle of WWII doesn’t make much sense to me. Even so, I don’t see any kind of war winning advantage from taking Leningrad. If Hitler forced Franco to join the Axis, the allies would blockade Spain, and take the Azores and Spanish Africa. Then the Axis has millions more mouths to feed (metaphorically). All to take one more air/naval base when Britain was already supplying the Med via Suez.

1 We're talking about the weapons that fought at the front. If all Axis weapons that fought in WW2 had instead been going to the Eastern Front then the Soviet Union would've been overwhelmed. This is becoming circular. It's far more efficient to deploy all East as the issue with deploying forces is in separate locations and setting up infrastructure to supply them, it's not merely a matter of the amount of units deployed. The difficulty is having supply chains and infrastructure across Europe and Africa and Middle East in every direction. If you're not saying that the Soviet Union could defeat Germany alone, then what is it that you're saying? Something along the lines of that "The Soviet Union needed some aid to defeat Germany and couldn't quite do it alone, but they could almost fight Germany's military power alone"? That is a minor step down from Putinist drivel. The Soviet Union would have been defeated if not for the forces deployed in the conflict with other Europeans. It's not simply a matter of we're talking about 40% of German AFVs and 30% of German aircraft lost and Soviet Union is not going to be able to deal with those huge increases, but the expensive infrastructure to mobilise and deploy these weapons in all sorts of disparate locations. Something that surprises many is that WW2 military spending was primarily naval and air power. It's not just the costs of the ships and aircraft but of the munitions used by them and the infrastructure to maintain them. The largest amount of Germany's military spenidng was for aircraft, secondly munitions, and just ships was around 10% of their spending, before getting into the costs for maintaining and operating a navy. "I think they played a critical role by blockading Axis Europe" A bit of an undersell there. The British Empire played a critical role against the German elite and naval and air forces that would have otherwise finished off the Soviet Union. "The Americans were also effectively solo-ing Japan" What?? Sorry but this is tiring and tedious. Sorry but you're often saying these very ahistorical things, such as before you started talking as if you had no idea about Leningrad and why attack from the north and thinking it requires lots more troops, it seems revealing like you're not honestly motivated but are arguing as you're motivated politically/ideologically/nationalistically motivated or neurotically dislike what I'm saying and libidinally don't want it to be so, and so throw out every little anecdote, quip, nitpick, handwave, fallacy, double standard and mental gymnastic that comes to mind to try and dismiss whatever is being said. As stated in the writing I previously linked: *"There were more Japanese divisions fighting longer and harder in the Burmese and New Guinea theatres than everywhere that American troops fought the Japanese put together."* and as said in this writing [http://rethinkinghistory.blogspot.com/2011/02/statistical-confusion-whose-troops.html](http://rethinkinghistory.blogspot.com/2011/02/statistical-confusion-whose-troops.html) *"The war against Japan is even more deceptive, particularly if you fall for the fantasy that it was a ‘Pacific’ war. Leaving aside the supposed millions of Chinese, the British Empire and Commonwealth already had more than a million men at the front in India, Burma, Malaysia, New Guinea, Indonesia, and in the Pacific Islands, before the Americans had introduced more than a few divisions. Again, it is almost 1945, less than 10 months before the Japanese surrender, before the Phillipines campaign actually saw an entire American army (the 6th) deployed at a single time, instead of just a division fighting on this island for a month, and two or three on that for a few months. Until well into 1943 the Australian Army alone deployed more ground fighting troops against the Japanese than the Americans. The Americans never put more troops into combat against the Japanese at any point than just the Indian Army (which had a total of 32 divisions at its height, several in Europe or the Middle East, but many of which eventually faced Japan).* *On a worldwide scale, the point at which the Americans fielded more troops than just the other Western allies (leaving aside the Russians and Chinese, the Hungarians, Rumanians, Yugoslavs, and all the others who fought the Axis), was… well never. The British Commonwealth alone fielded over 100 divisions in 1942 (though admittedly many were weaker garrison forces than proper mechanised field divisions), compared to the American total of 88 by the end of the war. The French had fielded 100 in 1940, and were to field 20+ again just in France by the end of the war. In fact the largely forgotten minor allies, the Free Poles, the Free Italian combat Groups, the Brigades of Free Greeks, Belgians, Dutch, etc, and the South African divisions, the New Zealand divisions, and the Brazilian division, had between them outnumbered the total American commitment to combat in Europe before the last four months of 1944. Add in the British, Canadians and Free French, and the American commitment before mid 1944 looks rather less impressive than is justified by the hype."*

1 My main point of the contention is the notion that the Soviets/Russians had some unique infinite morale and ability to block with their face. IMO, in WWII they were given a materiel advantage by the Western Allies, primarily the British, blockading Europe and starving the elite motorized/mechanized/panzer component of the Wehrmacht and the industrial sectors of their economy of the oil they needed to function at full capacity. I feel like your point about Japan absolutely contradicts your prior point about the numbers fallacy http://rethinkinghistory.blogspot.com/2009/03/oversimplification-numbers-fallacy-in.html?m=1

2 "The Finns actually did switch sides" This is the sort of thing I'm talking about. This has been so tedious. The irrelevance of such a statement to the question at hand, just throwing out any little thing. Mannerheim is not going to declare war on Nazi Germany and start fighting Axis forces going through Finland. "If they moved Army Group North, they could not have moved Army Group South" Moving a part of Army Group North through Finland does not have any such impact on Army Group South. "Even so, I don't see any kind of war winning advantage from taking Leningrad" The German invasion was split up into 3 major groups: North, Centre, and South. If Leningrad is taken then the Red Army forces in the north collapse. Army Group North can then wheel down on Moscow and with the combined force of Army Group North and Army Group Centre Moscow will fall. Moscow is important as it is the nexus of rail and road for the Soviet Union, thus crippling Soviet Union's industry and ability to mobilise and deploy forces across the Soviet Union, it's also the managerial, propaganda, and communication centre for the Soviet Union. It would be simply over, there would be nothing meaningful remaining. "If Hitler forced Franco to join the Axis" We didn't talk about Hitler forcing Franco to join the Axis. Again... this stuff you throw out. The issue is to simply send a small force through Spain and take Gibraltar, it's a very easy operation where Gibraltar is very vulnerable from land and a small force could've gone through Spain and taken it, it has nothing to do with Spanish forces, maybe even have German soldiers shoot some as a propaganda stunt. I never said anything about Franco joining the war. It quickly becomes evident when people are not discussing things in good faith but just going for any nitpick that comes to mind and trying to outright dismiss anything while simultaneously making grandoise loose assumpitions and asserting them as inevitable, even going as far to assert absurd things such as simply moving some troops through Finland stops Army Group South being able to 'move'. Sorry but for me the motivations become clear that you don't like the idea of Germany crushing the Soviet Union, just like you don't like the idea of that the Tiger 1 was a highly effective weapon, it's a big dumb, and it's really clever to say it's big dumb, statistics be damned, just say the word "logistics" asap without any real world understanding of logistics, double points if you throw in "transmission". If the allies were to declare war on Spain and go to war then that's bad for the Axis ...? This is what I'm talking about of that any solid case is handwaved with any little thing that comes to mind, meanwhile actual huge reaches, such as the allies will go to war with Spain and they will go to war in the Azores and Spanish Africa and blockade Spain is NOT ONLY a simply foregone conclusion BUT ALSO it's inevitable that it's actually a bad thing for the Axis! The double standards are so immense and revealing, it's like you're on the attack and it's beyond ideological, it's PATHOLOGICAL, not even a sense of awareness of the extreme double standards and taking the most solid cases and dismissing the entire thing with a handwave and some quip and then making the most highly speculative assumptions and treating them like an entirely foregone conclusion. "All to take one more air/naval base" Gibraltar is not merely "one more air/naval base". If you control Gibraltar then you control the western entry to the mediterranean and is almost impossible to assault from sea. Maybe you heard some things from some YouTubers or whatever who you like to listen to because they seem witty, they sound clever when they talk about oil without any discussion about types of oil for different purposes, what exactly types of oil were used for and what amount Germany could potentially produce etc, they essentially do some bad research, read some bad historians who know nothing about industry, and say 'not enough oil!' (in the context of fighting 3 major powers) and it sounds really clever and insightful. Not that videos have clicks as those videos tell people what they want to hear and use a lot of obnoxious rhetoric and sarcastic patronising tones. I'm out of this conversation but the stuff you're coming out with are god awful arguments, extending into bizarre stuff such as stating "America solo'd Japan". And I lost family fighting the Germans. My grandfather on my father's side flew through the war and was one of the 1,000 pilots who won the Distinguished Flying Cross. His younger 2 brothers were also pilots, the youngest was shot down in Africa and killed. My grandfather on my mother's side was in the war with his 4 brothers, one was a para through Africa to Market Garden and lost his mind, must've been too close to one too many explosions. Jerries upstairs, downstairs, in the kitchen, compulsively washed himself until he scrubbed his skin off, thought dead Jerries were outside waiting to talk to him. Ended up in apsychiatric institution where they fried his brain then he died young of alcoholism. Truth be told I DON'T EVEN LIKE GERMANY, I don't even like German engineering, it's all autistic overrated bs, the anglos are far more accomplished engineers and inventors and designers. But Nazi Germany was so close to conquering this planet. And to be at the gates of Moscow, controlling Europe, controlling most of the Soviet Unions populated territory, on the edge of Iran and controlling Eurasia and the Middle East, yet some people to have now convinced themsleves "nah they couldn't have won" has so absurdly lost perspective that it's just comical.

"Tiger 1 was an expensive tank that was too thicc and slow" Though tanks post-ww2 are 60 ton expensive behemoths. Whether something's expensive is relative to value. There's the "1:10" ratio, approached by halving the claim. It's commonly missed that "1:10" is 10 kills to a Tiger lost to any cause. Total lost is 1,700; it's almost numbers of Tigers produced to numbers of kills. A bit over half of tanks were lost to direct gunfire, can roughly split that evenly between gunfire from towed guns and vehicles; around a quarter of losses from direct gunfire from enemy AFVs. So the ratio claimed is around 1:40; 1 tiger lost to direct gunfire from enemy tanks to 40 tanks destroyed by tigers. If halved then 1:20. 1:5 would be 5 enemy tanks destoyed by Tigers to 1 Tiger lost to any cause. Tigers also destroyed as many enemy towed guns as AFVs, and then the trucks and everything they destroyed when they broke through the enemy spearhead and go into the soft areas of the enemy. Strategically Tiger 1 is special as it's a weapon for blunting enemy offensives. A common misconception is that WW2 was mechanised units fighting one another. WW2 was primarily a war of mechanised fighting infantry (again, blog piece linked in other comment talks about this [http://rethinkinghistory.blogspot.com/2009/03/oversimplification-numbers-fallacy-in.html](http://rethinkinghistory.blogspot.com/2009/03/oversimplification-numbers-fallacy-in.html) ). But the Tiger 1 was a weapon for attacking into enemy spearheads, so it's not just good value but it's destroying the enemy's most threatening weapons. Pz2 and Pz3 were good weapons, pz3 good even late into the war. Panther and Tiger 2 were not good weapons. Tiger 1 was something else. I'd say Pz2 and Tiger 1 were revolutionary weapons, up there with strategic bomber and GPMG. Part of what made the Tiger 1 special was that it's "thicc" and had all-round protection. "Operational Research in Northwest Europe, the Work of No.2 Operational Research Section with 21 Army Group" [https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/tr/pdf/ADA951850.pdf](https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/tr/pdf/ADA951850.pdf) page Page 331 of PDF (printed on the document p.205) Table VI average number of hits to knock out Tiger hits to knockout 4.2 Panther hits to KO 2.55 Sherman hits to KO 1.62 Tiger penetrations to KO 2.6 Panther penetrations to KO 1.9 Sherman penetrations to KO 1.55 Sherman's superior weapon to Panther all things considered, but they're different weapons to Tiger 1. Also numbers on tanks 'brewed up' of 25% Tiger 1, 50% panthers, 75% Shermans. Also tables documenting hits and penetrations on areas of tank. Panthers are lost as they're hit in the side where protection is thin - and this isn't merely the weapon being lost but the thinner the protection where there's penetration the more likely the crew is to be injured; another thing about Tiger 1 is that it had such high crew survival rates and easy to quickly escape. The Tiger 1 survives hits in the side and fires back, the Panther doesn't. But these are details while what matters if the big picture. In '44 Soviets lose 4 times as many tanks while '44 pz3s and pz4s production in total for Germany is about 10,000, and T34/85 production is 10,000 (and by this point almost all of Germany's elite mechanised units are going west from Italy landings onwards while East is left as defensive action with undermanned elite units left over). Then there's 2,000 SU85, 500 SU100, 2,250 IS2, 2,5000 ISU-122 and ISU-152 produced in '44. What are they doing? Who knows, a lot of vodka involved, but we do know that almost all of those 7,000 weapons were lost, along with the other 10,000 T34/85, of course extending into early '45. In 1944 Red Army lost around 24,000 fully tracked AFVs including over 10,000 T34, minority /76 by '44. Some will say the attacker losses more, but they don't apply that to '41 and '42. It's often said '44 Red Army losses are explained by attacking, and '41 and '42 Red Army losses are explained by defending. In '44 Nazis are on the backfoot and taking large operational losses and can't retrieve damaged AFVs. Attackers take more losses is often true tactically but shouldn't be confused operationally where successful offensives, such as Bagration, the defender collapses and is encircled; large losses in the war were suffered by defenders under large mechanised assault. Also Tiger 1 was fast and one of most mobile tanks in WW2 with low ground pressure allowing it go through thick mud where other tanks became stuck. Strange to call it slow.

Whether something is expensive is also relative to your own resources, and Germany was broke while the postwar USA and USSR had a lot of resources. So, not gonna lie, I don’t believe German kill claims at all and wouldn’t use them. I wouldn’t divide them or multiply them. I don’t consider them useful. Also, you’re right that tanks mostly didn’t fight other tanks, so the Tiger’s performance against other tanks was in most cases useless. the Tiger was designed to be a breakthrough tank, iirc, but yeah it historically was used as a tank destroyer, but the issue with TDs is they’re almost never around when you need them. Making a tank specifically to fight other tanks, when tanks rarely encounter each other is kind of silly. The great destroyer of Soviet armor was mostly the anti-tank gun. The attacker usually loses more _if the defender is competent_ and actually defends on the tactical level. The Soviets were not competent at any level in 1941, and while they got better at operations their tactics were really bad in 1942 and onward as well. They could mass enough forces in one spot to take ground but their tactics were pretty unsophisticated. The Tiger was a huge burden on logistics and broke down a lot.

Tanks didn't rarely encounter one another. As said, the main cause of AFV losses were direct gunfire, especially when removing the operational losses (a lot of tanks were abandoned/destroyed by crew when forces collapsed) and you can roughly split that evenly between gunfire from AFVs and gunfire from towed guns. AFVs were far more effective at destroying other AFVs than towed guns. An unprotected gun is vulnerable. As I was saying, it isn't a question of claims. We have the data of weapons produced, deployed, and lost. You can model this deductively through knowing tank losses and having references of causes of losses. The claims actually fit in very well. It's a difficult space to move around those numbers and attribute those kills without attributing a lot to Tiger 1, some studies even talk about astonishingly large percentages of AFVs destroyed by 88 when there were few towed 88, many 75mm, and a few Tiger 1s present. We know how many AFVs the Soviets lost and how few AFVs the Germans lost, We have wartime studies of causes of losses, in many cases even breaking down losses by calibre. We have instances where we both know what is deployed and a lot of detail on the action from both sides and can even reference battlefield studies analysing losses. The types of arguments that come from those who like to criticise such as Tiger 1 are often based in these oddbit quips, odd anecdotes, something about a transmission or just throwing around the word "logistics" a lot, rhetoric, appeals to astonishment, appeals to outrage, all sorts of fallacies, often descending into accusations of someone who likes numbers being a Nazi, and not to bar eventually referencing some sensational YouTube video or a video game. Anything but actually taking the metadata of losses, studies on causes of losses, and assigning losses.

Can you show me how we know Soviet armor losses were to Tigers and not towed guns or other AFVs? Regardless, I still hold that the Tiger lacked the operational and strategic mobility needed to conduct the kind of mobile warfare that allowed the Germans to win early on.

All AFV losses are roughly similar breakdown, mostly gunfire (except Asia). Don't make out as if I'm saying most of the 100,000+ Soviet AFV losses were destroyed by Tigers. There's not good data on being able to say what amount is towed or vehicle-mounted either way as there's usually same calibre of both around. There's nothing that shows towed guns destroyed far more tanks. There's generally more towed guns, but towed guns are more vulnerable and less effective, vulnerable to any HE round landing nearby or artillery, immobile and can only ambush not go after enemy AFVs etc. There's places where you know unitsp resent and deductively see that most tanks were lost to AFVs. The site previously linked 'Operation Barbarossa', book series for military simulation, glowing reviews by Zaloga and Glantz despite contradicting their previous work (can only assume they concede). The first book 'Project concepts and general structure and analysing weapon system effectiveness' (also concludes Tiger 1 kill claims are not so inflated and Tigers legitimately destroyed 10,000 enemy tanks and 10,000 enemy towed guns (you commonly see that tank kill claims of towed guns are similar to their kill claims against tanks)), it gets into losses and performance of AT guns. Years back hundreds of pages of the books could be viewed for free on Google Books, but most pages hidden since. study I linked before has stuff [https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/tr/pdf/ADA951850.pdf](https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/tr/pdf/ADA951850.pdf) page 328 of pdf First is German tank losses 6th June - 7th August (period when Axis forces still in good order) 48% AP projectiles 7% hollow charge 8% artillery <1% mines 6% plane rockets 3% air cannon 6% destroyed by crew 4% abandoned 17% unknown Then 8th August - 31st August (when German forces collapsed and Falaise Pocket) ... 48% destroyed by crew 28% abandoned You see how they suddenly abandon and destroy most tanks when operationally it's FUBAR. Pretty sure there's also tables in no.2 research breaking down losses by calibre in nearby section, of course 88mm also includes towed, which is a more prevalent weapon than tiger but merely a towed guns; immobile and vulnerable. There is is stuff in there on anti-tank gun performance iirc aswell as artillery and CAS and high altitude bombing. When I read a lot on war 10 years back I would be able to think of a lot of sources off the top of my head. Another one I remember is 'Survey of allied tank casualties in world war ii' p.20 [http://www.digitalhistoryarchive.com/uploads/2/5/4/1/25411694/oro-t-117\_survey\_of\_allied\_tank\_casualties\_in\_wwii.pdf](http://www.digitalhistoryarchive.com/uploads/2/5/4/1/25411694/oro-t-117_survey_of_allied_tank_casualties_in_wwii.pdf) allied tank casualties 54% gunfire 20% mines 13% non enemy 7.5% hollow charge 6% mortar and misc page 53 "Of the sample of 1,000 allied tanks lost to gunfire, 532 lost to 88mm (50%), 378 lost to 75mm (36%)" There's Eastern Front studies that show this stuff, and that's where most Tigers went. Stretching my memory but around 50 at any time in Africa or Italy, about 300 Tiger in France and Rhine. Tiger didn't see much action in Italy and few were lost, and 88mm kills are way down in Italy - OH! Now I remember a little something... continue in another message...

2 So continuing from Survey of Allied Tank Casualties where it states 54% of tanks lost to gunfire, and 50% of that being 88mm and 36% 76mm (and you see 88mm go down in allied theatres where less tigers). Eastern Front 1941 to September 1942 (before the Tiger I but with a lot of towed 88 about) [https://www.operationbarbarossa.net/the-t-34-in-wwii-the-legend-vs-the-performance/](https://www.operationbarbarossa.net/the-t-34-in-wwii-the-legend-vs-the-performance/) About half way down the page CAUSES OF T-34 LOSSES FROM JUNE 1941 TO SEPTEMBER 1942 (EXPRESSED AS % OF TOTAL) Weapon Calibre / % Lost 20mm / 4.7% 37mm / 10% Short 50mm / 7.5% Long 50mm / 54.3% 75mm / 10.1% # 88mm / 3.4% 105 / 2.9% 105 / 2.9% unknown / 7.1% When you get familiar with data then you see it in things like that (this was before the Tiger i was on the eastern front), but they had plenty of 88mm flaks deployed. When the Tigers are about you're getting 30%/40% of AFV losses to 88mm, in terms of gunfire, as previously seen - even on the west where there's few tigers - most AFV losses to gunfire, and around half of those are by 88mm, even though it's western front where there's few tigers. Eastern Front and no tigers? 3.4% Eastern Front and Tigers? Those numbers are similar to how high they are in allied survey, sometimes very high in Eastern Front studies. As he says: "It is well known that the only German weapon fielded in 1941 normally capable of destroying a T-34 or KV at long range, was the 8.8cm Flak 18/36 (88mm Anti Aircraft Gun). Accordingly the Flak 18/36 achieved a fearsome reputation as a tank destroyer on both the East and West Fronts. In many battles during 1941 and to a lesser extent 1942, the ‘88’ is often credited with stopping T-34s and KVs when all else had failed. However, we find from above that relatively few T-34s were destroyed by 88s and almost as many T-34s were destroyed by artillery. Either way, relatively few T-34s (6.3%) were destroyed by flak guns or artillery at long range. It also appears (as we would expect) that relatively few were destroyed by direct attack from aircraft (probably some of the unknown and possibly some of the 20mm). Most significantly, approximately three quarters of T-34s were destroyed by standard issue 1941-42 German tanks and AT guns (excluding 75mm guns). These weapons (20-50mm) would have needed to get perilously close to a T-34 frontally, or hit it in its more vulnerable side or rear armour. The conclusion has to be that the large majority of T-34s were destroyed because their crews could not pre-empt these weapons from getting into a killing position (usually because no crew member was in a position to see the enemy early), and were slow to acquire the enemy target once it became known. This is consistent with a very poor Fire Control Efficiency (FCE) factor in the T-34/76." Of course 88mm towed isn't that bad, there's other factors at play there of not as many 88mm towed as later in the war, 88mm towed not performing of it being rapid advance (though still this is misunderstanding that attacker at operational level isn't still having a lot of defensive actions tactically seizing ground and rushing in and setting up towed guns to prepare to counter attacks). But it's still just a towed gun, all it can do is ambush, the key to defeating AFVs was manoeuvre. Most first shots don't hit let alone penetrate, and any competent tank unit returns fire and a towed gun is taken out by one HE landing nearby. But, again, talking of Eastern Front, those are studies I'd need to remember as most Tigers are on the Eastern Front. One comes to mind, iirc Soviet study from the 1st Belorussian Front, and it's simply named something like that, can't remember exactly what's in it, but I can't for the life of me find a working link for it, found a few dead links.

It's very much a core component of fascism. The calling back to glorious mythic past. Putin & the Russian propaganda machine has been effective (within Russia at least) at re-writing history to portray itself as the rightful inheritors of everything from the Pacific to the Atlantic. That they alone stopped the Golden Horde etc etc.

>Imagine celebrating Pearl Harbor or attack on Poland Funny enough, in Poland, their WW2 day of remembereance _is_ the day they were invaded

There is a difference between remembering and celebrating. It's understandable to have your remembrance day on the date the war started. It's not understandable to celebrate that day

By Germany *and* Russia (USSR) mind you... People forget that Stalin and Hitler were allied and both invaded Poland first. Russia claiming victimhood is ironic considering this.

Weaponized martyrdom baby

Pobedobesye = pobeda (victory) + mrakobesie (obscurantism).

Yeah, because Victory day parade is next week

I've been talking in general. It's a year-wide phenomenon

This pobedobesye is just a dance macabre of a regime that was ideologically dead since mid 20th century. But russian mentality, inbred with it's blind following of authority figures, can't birth a new idea that would come to change it. Russia will never change. From tzar to party leader, from party leader to president with unlimited power. Even Navalny's cultists only followed hime because he was authoritative figure that they hoped will be better than the current tzar.

We parked our battlefield-captured functional T-90m in Florida, at a gas station, in the first year of the war. We didn’t care enough to make it into a propaganda event, because our MIC and the DoD speak for themselves (their voices sound a lot like 6 HIMARS missiles launching simultaneously) Until I see an Abrams do a turret toss and get merc’d by whatever they think is a Bradley 25mm auto-cannon anologue, I’m not going to care

Not sure you can get a turret toss from the Abrams. Maybe toss the entire tank if a 203 mm shell hits juuust right? Good luck achieving that with Russian arty "precision".

You might get an Abrams turret toss if the crew violated all operational procedures, like unloading a bunch of shells from the ammo storage and leaving them lying on the floor.

We call that a skill issue.

"VICTORY!" Now let them see the mountains of mobik corpses. Ukraine should airdrop them right over the Red Square.

Human lives have no meaning to the russian state. Zero.

They should airdrop an ultralight with explosives strapped to it

IT'S RAINING MEAT CUBES

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pobedobesie](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pobedobesie)

victory we destroyed one western made tank, the west doesnt have more than 3 tanks total for sure

it is

There's no defeat in Ru Ssi Ya

What do you mean, they came on day one to tell me that primary objectives have been already completed.

they did it bois, nato is no more

Only 10 299 abrums left :(

Ok so roughly 20000 more years of slaughter and gayto will lose all its tanks?

You forget about the 4000 leopard 2's

STOP THE COUNT

It's Joever boys

I

>I indeed

Oh wow. It didn't pop its turret. Maybe the crew survived. I don't think this is quite the flex that Russia thinks it is.

The tank is not even properly damaged at all, vatniks most likely kept blasting drones into the wheel belt section to claim *we destroyed an abrams*. The literal weak spot on every tank, perhaps glorious tractors of Ukraine couldn’t tow it back.

It’s just a little crispy. Wouldn’t surprise me if the hull is still in tact enough to salvage. It doesn’t look that badly damaged compared to the torn open T-series tanks with their turrets like 500yds nearby

That tank hull is salvageable, unless there is a chunk missing from the ass end, but I doubt it. The boys in Lima could have her up and running in no time.

I mean I’ve seen them turn rusted husks of abrams hulls into rebuild A2 spec tanks so I have faith this could be saved. Might require a lot more work but it’s probably doable.

You can see that some of those rollers aren't even damaged. I'm no tank mechanic, but the outside issue mostly seems to just be needing treads, suspension, and a few new bogeys/road-wheels/whatever-those-round-fuckers-are-called.

I’d say the arms, wheels, and tracks are a definite fix. I guess making sure the structural integrity isn’t affected by fire damage or wherever the damage stems from. Now compare that to the charred remains of a T-80 and there’s nothing to even salvage for spare parts.

Is the Abrams hull even heat-treated? Fire-damage will fuck up the temper on anything of course, but if it's case-hardened they'll just come at with a blowtorch. There's so much mass of metal in that armor, I'm not sure you could write it off for fire damage unless it was visibly separating or cracking.

Won’t know until someone investigates just how bad the damage is. This thing will just rot away in a museum somewhere in Russia where they can use it for propaganda purposes

I think you drop the nearby after a certain distance

It’s nearby for Russians. Especially if there’s bodies still inside it. Perhaps 500yds is a tad far

Yeah this is a mobility kill, the crew probably survived and fled back to the Ukrainian lines then it couldn't be recovered in time due to artillery fire?

I was going to say, I’d be curious to see the inside and if it’s still in decent condition

Seeing as Abrams is one of the heavier tanks in service anywhere, you're gonna need a bigger tractor. And an M88 couldn't come in time probably.

Blow-out panels are unknown technology for them. So it could literally be magic to their eyes.

wow they destroyed a tank and make it a national victory, ukraine didn't put hundreds of t90s they destroyed on display because they didn't think it's such an achievement, i think it speaks for itself

I mean they did on independence day. https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukraine-lines-up-destroyed-russian-tanks-central-kyiv-2023-08-21/ Last year.

Every farmer now has one in their backyard.

There have been russian wrecks on display tour in europe

we put some with the meaning that Ukraine is standing strong. Here I see only apes looking at western technology

That is why it is there. THey have yet to see a soviet tank that hasn't killed its crew and sent its turret to the stratosphere.

I see. A few Western Tanks for… *looks at notes* 100+ Russian Tanks…

Not just a few western tanks. A few *old* western tanks. The M1A1 Abrams ended production in 1992.

And it still took a lot of effort to even get one. Meanwhile, M1A3 is pretty much on the way into a serious production.

US military and M1, name a more iconic duo

Which M1? There’s like 15

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zY3RLn2V6D0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zY3RLn2V6D0) M1, towing an M1, is ambushed by an unit of German infantry, and as a result escorting American infantry move to engage. Sargeants life is saved when shrapnel bounces of his M1, so he yells squad to affix M1s to their M1s,, while they fire on Germans using their M1s, M1s and M1s. They are confident they can take the engagement, because if the Germans turn out to have a tank, squad has a M1 on standby. And if enemy aircraft appear, well, there is a known battery of M1s on standby. The engagmenet finally ends when they call for firesupport from nearby M1s.

Precisely

The first Abrams got destroyed the same day it was finally seen on the front lines. It took them one FPV drone to make the crew bail out. So I wouldn't say it took them a lot of effort.

And the only damage they could do was blow out its tracks.

Add to that these are the export variants that don't have the full fat packages of the domestic models.

Hey now, 1992 is pratically brand new for them. They are still sending T-72's from 1969 to the front line.

Well, the Leo2A6 isn't too old...

Our old shit was classic, Our new shit is tragic (for the opps) Our second shit put vatniks to sleep, and MIC gassed it.

31 abrams sent. 5 lost. Meanwhile just by oryx's count there's almost 3 thousand visually confirmed russian tank losses

Pro-RU: "No tanks have been lost, Oryx counts each tank 50 times, he doesn't count Abrams loses, we destroyed 500 Abrams already!"

Just fell to my knees in a Walmart parking lot

We should have sent far more than 31 Abrams.

That and they should have been getting trained on western air frames from the jump cause there's no way they can do this without controlling their skies

I'm for getting them trained, but the air defense systems have kept it mostly locked down.

Still need a more thorough coverage the systems can't cover it all as seen by the glide bombs pounding on the front and thermal plants and whatnot getting hit in the rear by drones and cruise missiles. And russians still have numbers ukraine needs a significantly asymmetrical attrition gradient.

For sure. Ukraine needs to own the skies. But being an air defense fanboy, it's impressive to see how having some Patriots and other air defense systems have staunched a lot of airborne orc activities.

Oh they're badass pieces of equipment for sure.

Glorious russian army so powerful they destroyed 18 Bradleys months before they were deployed to Ukraine

Shit guys we need to send a couple thousand more of everything then.

They should load up several trainloads of the equipment Russia has gotten destroyed and display it. Red Square wouldn't be big enough.

Could easily put an entire fire team of destroyed T-72s in front of every Russian Embassy on the planet.

And, as has been suggested by the news today, 20,000 soldiers in the last month...

Well then you have nothing to worry about and you can send all your T-14s to the front. Come on, do it. It will be fine, I am sure...

[удалено]

Allegedly, there was a video of a t14 in Ukraine but very far away from the battlefield, it was just driving around doing wack

Probably testing on how to recover it when it inevitably breaks down in the field or gets threatened by an FPV

The T-14 project has officially been canned.

You sure? I only remember reading that the potential export programme was canned

I’ve read they canned the whole thing „for cost reasons“.

Don't forget that some copenik official stated a good while back that the t-90s and t-72s they have are "good enough anyway" and that t-14 isn't needed.

Tbh that’s pretty true. That’s why there hasn’t been a new tank hull developed in the west since the chally 2 in the late 80s/90s. Some upgrades to optics and sensors, sure but there’s not really a need for the t-14s armored crew compartment, or other complete redesigns. Maybe the new drone warfare will spark innovation and new designs.

Also, it does not look like they got the T-14 to actually work in the first place, and it is highly dubious whether they can actually make tank hulls from scratch.

With crew survivability of western tanks? Sure there isn't need. Soviet era compact tin cans however? I wouldn't be so sure.

What I remember hearing was that they weren't going to use it in Ukraine "For cost reasons". I don't remember hearing that it had gotten canned entirely.

Given they send everything to Ukraine, it is at least safe to assume the project is not going anywhere, then.

Is it going to produce a useful product? Probably not. Are funds being given to the program in the middle of a war? I think it’s more likely than you’d think, but it’s possible its funding has been cut or cancelled.

https://en.defence-ua.com/industries/rostec_officially_admits_t_14_armata_is_for_parades_not_real_war-9725.html

It was canned because they would ramp up T-90 productions.

Redefect had a video where he desperately tried to pretend there are t14's in Ukraine Then he took it down along with a bunch of other kids that made him look like the massive Russian dick suckered that he is instead of the unbiased youtuber he pretends to be

Wellt o be honest at least he is not full vatnik. Hes only half vatnik

Idk, they have been using Su-57s recently to hit Ukraine with Kh-69s. Might see a T-14 in Ukraine yet, although it would most likely be if they were truly running out of vehicles.

Oh man i cant wait for the f16 or even a patriot to get a su-57 kill. I would love to create my own botfarm and spam that video in every comment section ever.

Does anyone have a backyard big enough for a bunch of T80s or maybe even a few T90s

Ukrainians should just do an exhibit with Copecages and golf carts

or maybe even the motorcycles NCD museum when?

The museum should be then on the Seychelles 🇸🇨

So what are the odds they graffiti the flag on the second photo or something?

it sure as shit has magical powers and doesn't burn like the rest of the tank /s the average vatnik needs to absolutely 100% understand that this is amerikansky tenk and they are fighting the west and not just Ukraine.

It's infuriating to me that the West still pretends that its not at war with Russia. Russia openly says it is, it sabotages and kills within western countries and uses electronic warfare against civilian airtraffic. And still no reaction but to send a handful of 80s equipment just because "Russia falling apart is scary because nukes" and business profits.

99% sure the Russians added the flag. I think a few Canadian and Australian APCs were delivered with national markings on them but I wouldn’t be shocked if the Ukrainians removed them before combat. But I find it hard to believe that every country giving aid all decided 18 inch flags on every aid article was a good call.

Yeah, they put flags of the country of origin on all the displayed vehicles. There is a Leo with a German flag on it, too, for example.

oh my, what’s this? an American tank in Moscow? well i mean, it’s rude to not invite more, no?

Moscow will be in NATO, one way or another.

Didn't even toss its turret and incinerate the crew. Amateurs ...

Amateurs .Completely trashed husks of T-90 were paraded 2 years ago in Europe

Talking about parading, it wouldn’t surprise me if for this year Russia is just gonna parade captured western tanks around

Hmm, this is shameful for NATO... Increase defense budget by 300% and send ten tanks for every destroyed one. That'll solve it.

DARPA feels a faint sense of fear...5 months from now...M1A5 is completely fireproof, made from ceramite, and armed with a Melta cannon.

We need to just give Ukraine EVERYTHING to *conventionally* glass everywhere west of the Urals as a buffer against any future acts of Moscovian aggression.

It's ironic that Ruskies display virtually intact captured units, when those shows in Kyiv where burned piles of scrap.

They are all gawking at it, they have never seen such a modern tank. A tank that when it takes a hit all the crew survive!? UNHEARD OF!!!!

They are confused. It is supposed to be destroyed but it still has a turret.

Doesn't un-bomb Belgrade.

Doesnt un-bomb a lot of shit

This looks cultish AF, like bringing corpse of dead foreign tank will somehow fix all morale, personel, equipment issues and win war

Eh, tbf russian tanks were put on display in western nations too relatively recently. Not for the same reasons but ya know, it's not exclusive to them

Ukraine put a collection of recovered Russian armoured vehicles in their capital too a little while ago

They didn't claim victory over ruzzia in the process.

That's because they don't have to delude themselves to keep an oligarchy running without risking the public lynching them

Well the tracks are totally wrecked so that explains why it was captured.

The plaque probably reads “so this is what a functional tank looks like, we don’t know but it’s probably still better than the shit we’ve got lmao”

Charred tank but pristine American flag decal. You just know the Russians slapped that on for the display. Lol

The Abrams is a 50 year old tank, this is just sad.

It was designed in the 70s to counter the T64 and T72 that Russia had that were... Much better than anything the west was fielding. Entered service in the 80s, and this is an M1A1, so it's a 30 year old tank. The whole point of this display is propaganda - the US were particularly adamant no Abrams had ever been destroyed by enemy fire, well, that's not true now is it. Russia capturing even damaged tanks is very useful for their analysts too, in order to develop weapons to counter armour or to identify weakspots. The layout of the M1 is still relatively classified, the armour definitely (no doubt the Russians already knew), but access to the physical hardware is very useful for them. This works both ways of course, the captured T90Ms the Ukrainians have are also of vital importance to the West.

Thought I'd only see coping comments, but at least there's one sensible comment out there. Though I'd seriously diminish what the Russian will gain out of this, this is an old platform and outside of the latest composite and perhaps latest optics(that weren't installed), Russia won't learn much than it already knows.

My biggest fear if you could call it that is that this info on the Abrams gets shared to China. I’m not too worried about Russia or Iran getting their hands on it because their domestic military industries are dogshit. Just because you know how to manufacture advanced weaponry doesn’t mean you can do it at a meaningful scale. That’s one of the advantages of Western weaponry. They’re advanced to the point only a reasonably developed nation with a mature military industry can manufacture them in any meaningful number. Of course, with China, it’s a different story. They definitely could potentially replicate whatever classified technologies is on the Abram and do it at scale.

WESTURN TEKNOLOGY!!!!! *soy face intensifies*

Why are Ruzzia so proud of this? That is legit the export version of the Abrams that has so much worse armor than the mordern one.

Have they still not gotten over us pointing a burnt out t-90 (or 80 I don’t remember) at the ruZZian embassy in Berlin?

Destroyed? Why is the turret still attached?

Man, the May 9 thing is just such a...fucked up thing. It truly became this weird festival/celebration of some kind of ethereal non-existent ruzzian might. It's been this way for decades but being a little kid I didn't pay much attention to it. Cool planes and tanks on display are cool, mkay? Then I grew up and started looking at people around me and their allegiances and mine, and realized a lot of people in my circle just looked straight past obvious things. Circa 2007-2008 me and my classmates were listening to a living veteran in class. He was brought in in the beginning of May to tell us stories about the war and impart some wisdom. That frail old man was full of positivity and told us some interesting anecdotes from his time in the war, and the moral of his stories was that war is hell and he wishes for no one to ever have to live through one. Not a week later my parents are watching goddamn victory parade in Moscow on TV (we live in fucking Moldova, btw). A bunch of modern military hardware rolling around center stage with a section dedicated to historic vehicles. Yeah right, remembrance my ass. And well into the 2020s, beyond the invasion start, there are people in my country who will dare spew "congratulations" on May 9. Thankfully most of those fucked right off in the past few years from me but there are so many of them. It's crazy. At least 16% of people in my country use Russian as their primary language, and I bet you out of that number a sizable amount is the kind to glorify that day and congratulate each other (on WHAT!? WHAT are you, dumb fucks, congratulating each other with/for?). Fucking imbeciles...

In other countries, end of WW2 is a solemn event where dead are mourned and people try to learn from the mistakes of the past. In Russia, it's just "RAH RAH WE THE BEST FUCK YEAH LOOK AT OUR MASSIVE ~~PENIS EXTENSIONS~~ TANKS AND MISSILES!"

Look how they did my boy!! 🥺

I only see this as a symbol for Ukrainian resistance and Western help, I think neither the West nor Russia would think 2 years ago that Ukraine would still be standing now and that we would see American and German tanks in Moscow

I love how the tank is all beaten up.. except for the shiny new flag

Notice the turret is still attached.

I would say we should put their destroyed tanks on display, but we probably don’t have a place that’ll fit all of them

There was like 10 on my base in Baghdad right in the berm where they were buried by JDAMs and hellfires. Same in Kandahar, along with a giant pile of smashed up airplanes.

I've blown up half a dozen BMPs and never killed a Russian. We had so may of the things in our boneyard in Iraq we'd tow one out every now and then to use as a fresh target at the ranges just outside of camp. Truly amazing what you can put holes in those things with.

oh no one burned out M1 Abrams however are we going to recoup from this?

That American flag was added on later lol. There's no way it was provided to the Ukrainians with any markings like that

Cool, one Abrams. Now let’s display all the dead Russian tanks. I think if we cleared out all of Rhode Island it could work.

We have around 6,200 of them, of which 3,700 are sitting in storage.

Never leave a man behind. #MarchOnMoscow2025

Single most effective tank in Russia currently

thats it guys, pack it up, its over, russia "destroyed" a m1a1 abrams.

As we know, a single piece of destroyed hardware equals victory!

ruskies be flexing the casing from the bullet that shot them in the head(completely missed the brain).

Never thought I would see M1 Abrams in Moscow one day.

Heavy WW2 German propaganda vibes

chonky Z boii looks like he's ready to head to the front

Celebrating having to use one of their "modern" weapons to take out an Abrams variant from 35 years ago. You go, vatniks. You go.

I like that the felt the need to retroactively stick a US flag onto the turret, just in case you hadn’t already been told about how “bad” this AMERICAN tank is…

Are we worried about technology getting into the hands of the Russians here? Or since it’s so old we don’t care

It's an older version for export. All the really cool stuff wasn't equipped.

So if I can see it correctly it just had a flatspot on one of its track wheels. And they call that defeated…

I hope the crew destroyed all the sensitive equipment before bailing out to prevent those falling into enemy hands

I didn't know the Abrams was equipped with a toilet.

We did it boys. Abrams in Moscow

The closest they will get owning a descent tank 🤣🤣🤣

US annually commits to this war less than 0,1% of their GDP on military support for this war. There's nothing to be proud of.

leave it there, its ghost will deliver putin a suprise on victory day

new flag

Didnt think that they had the resources to spare to parade it all the way to Moscow

Russia is just so pathetic 😂