5 ms·

USSR point of view: 1. Elimination of opposition abroad, Trotzkyi assassination and many others. 2. Discovery that Japan will not enter war. Results in transf

by tlear 13y ago

USSR point of view: 1. Elimination of opposition abroad, Trotzkyi assassination and many others. 2. Discovery that Japan will not enter war. Results in transfer of Siberian divisions to Moscow that play decisive role in war 3. Plans for operation Citadel. Key point in war in the east 4. Nuclear bomb, author discounts 1-3 years.. that had huge effect on politics around the world Invasion of USSR failure, one of the reason for lack of reaction was that NKVD had apparently established set of citeria that would tell them that Germany of planning an attack. Winter uniforms production, non-freezing oil production and some others.. since none of those were crossed, detailed and very good humint they were getting was discounted. Also he forgets that Nazis also broke a lot of allied codes. If I remember correctly one of the allowed them to know most of the convoy routes through atlantic Also forget that Battle of Midway was basically won because of sigint. Generating believable crap is not that easy.

philwelch 13y ago
Stalin actually had really good intel that Germany was going to invade, he just refused to believe it and had people executed for spreading "disinformation".
- tlear 13y ago
  There are many stories on that.. honestly I think a lot of stuff about Stalin disbelief are pure propaganda aimed at providing an explanation at how bad Soviet army did initially. In reality I think it was a combination of Soviet Army just being really bad initially compared to Germans(remember Germans destroyed French and British without breaking a sweat just a year before) and legitimate conflicting assessments of German army no preparing for war in Russia. This lack of preparation is what cost them in December 1941, if your tank oil freezes.. well you are not going anywhere
  - philwelch 13y ago
    The British evacuated Dunkirk but their Air Force and navy did very well against their German counterparts.
  - willvarfar 13y ago
    Winston Churchill talks about how the Brits sent info to Stalin at the very highest diplomatic levels that he was going to be invaded. And later when Winston met Stalin, Stalin said that he thought he had to do everything to avoid provoking the Germans as they had started their previous war by pretending to have been attacked by the Poles. Stalin said that he hoped he had more time. So its easy to read into this account that Stalin knew well that he was probably going to be attacked, and rather than 'not wanting to believe it' in a wishful way, rather balanced doing nothing to provoke Germany with taking defensive steps and decided on the former course rationally.
    - philwelch 13y ago
      Something I've read a lot of places but is hard to track down--apparently there was one incident where a German communist actually defected to the USSR, warned them that Germany was preparing to invade, and was literally executed for spreading disinformation. He also disappeared to his dacha and reportedly seemed to have an emotional breakdown when the invasion did happen. The fact that Stalin tried to play this off to Churchill doesn't really refute anything. You don't become a legendary dictator and erect statues and portraits of yourself everywhere without being a little prideful.
  - memracom 13y ago
    I just watched a Soviet film called Gosudarstvennaya Granitsa (State Borders) which showed various events in the evolution of the Soviet Border Patrol, and in the 5th film, about a few days around the invasion. In it they showed border guards doing a lot of dumb things including being woefully unprepared. So even the Soviets acknowledged that there was a lot of military incompetence around the German invasion. Later on, they got a lot more serious about competence in their military forces, and won the war while the victorious Germans, gloating about overcoming their enemy and having captured such an astounding amount of territory, let down their guard and paid the price.

by tlear 13y ago

philwelch 13y ago

Stalin actually had really good intel that Germany was going to invade, he just refused to believe it and had people executed for spreading "disinformation".

tlear 13y ago
There are many stories on that.. honestly I think a lot of stuff about Stalin disbelief are pure propaganda aimed at providing an explanation at how bad Soviet army did initially. In reality I think it was a combination of Soviet Army just being really bad initially compared to Germans(remember Germans destroyed French and British without breaking a sweat just a year before) and legitimate conflicting assessments of German army no preparing for war in Russia. This lack of preparation is what cost them in December 1941, if your tank oil freezes.. well you are not going anywhere
- philwelch 13y ago
  The British evacuated Dunkirk but their Air Force and navy did very well against their German counterparts.
- willvarfar 13y ago
  Winston Churchill talks about how the Brits sent info to Stalin at the very highest diplomatic levels that he was going to be invaded. And later when Winston met Stalin, Stalin said that he thought he had to do everything to avoid provoking the Germans as they had started their previous war by pretending to have been attacked by the Poles. Stalin said that he hoped he had more time. So its easy to read into this account that Stalin knew well that he was probably going to be attacked, and rather than 'not wanting to believe it' in a wishful way, rather balanced doing nothing to provoke Germany with taking defensive steps and decided on the former course rationally.
  - philwelch 13y ago
    Something I've read a lot of places but is hard to track down--apparently there was one incident where a German communist actually defected to the USSR, warned them that Germany was preparing to invade, and was literally executed for spreading disinformation. He also disappeared to his dacha and reportedly seemed to have an emotional breakdown when the invasion did happen. The fact that Stalin tried to play this off to Churchill doesn't really refute anything. You don't become a legendary dictator and erect statues and portraits of yourself everywhere without being a little prideful.
- memracom 13y ago
  I just watched a Soviet film called Gosudarstvennaya Granitsa (State Borders) which showed various events in the evolution of the Soviet Border Patrol, and in the 5th film, about a few days around the invasion. In it they showed border guards doing a lot of dumb things including being woefully unprepared. So even the Soviets acknowledged that there was a lot of military incompetence around the German invasion. Later on, they got a lot more serious about competence in their military forces, and won the war while the victorious Germans, gloating about overcoming their enemy and having captured such an astounding amount of territory, let down their guard and paid the price.