I play these games based on WWII like medal of honor and call of duty and I see 5 americans storming a town or garrison full of germans and winning. Was it true that the americans, even though were outnumbered 5 or 10 to 1, still won? Or is it just plain propaganda?

no youre thinking about the russians

the american vs german part of the war was pretty much the last 15 minutes or so, after the germans got their ass kicked in russia, so it was more like 10 americans for every german and 50 american tanks for every german tank

I play these games based on WWII like medal of honor and call of duty and I see 5 americans storming a town or garrison full of germans and winning. Was it true that the americans, even though were outnumbered 5 or 10 to 1, still won? Or is it just plain propaganda?

As a general rule the United States typically outnumbered its German opponents in most of the battles fought in Europe. The majority of the German Army was arrayed against the Russians so that in 1944 157 German Divisions faced the USSR and 56 were in France, Belgium and Holland and another 20 in Italy fighting the Western Allies.

After the D-Day landings the Allies outnumbered the Germans in France about 2:1 and the ratio continued to improve throughout the campaign as the Germans were worn down.

The Axis powers in WWII were drastically outnumbered and even more drastically out-produced. To give an idea:

Combat Aircraft in Europe June 1944

United States - 11,800
Soviet Union - 14,700
Britain - 13,200
Germany - 4,600

Expediture on Armaments 1943 (Billion $ US)

United States - 37.5
Soviet Union - 13.9
Britain - 11.1

Germany - 13.8
Japan - 4.5

no youre thinking about the russians


In 1943 The German Army had 3.9 million soldiers facing 5.5 million Russians on the Eastern Front this disparity grew fast in 1944 and 1945.

As a general rule the United States typically outnumbered its German opponents in most of the battles fought in Europe. The majority of the German Army was arrayed against the Russians so that in 1944 157 German Divisions faced the USSR and 56 were in France, Belgium and Holland and another 20 in Italy fighting the Western Allies.


Also consider the fact that by 1944 so many Germans had been killled on the Eastern Front yet the Western Front had been relatively quiet.

In 1943 The German Army had 3.9 million soldiers facing 5.5 million Russians on the Eastern Front this disparity grew fast in 1944 and 1945.

yeah except the russians didnt have guns or leadership! :lol:

i actually read about these militia units that were formed from russian school kids (dunno how old, but i imagine they were at least around 15 y o) to fight the germans outside moscow, they didnt have any guns for them, so they were given knifes and bayonettes and were told to stick them on sticks and make spears!!

they were sent to some forest outside moscow, i dont remeber if they did see any "action" or what happened to them :spear:?

and the units that did have guns, usually didnt have enough

The Western allies out numbered the Axis in the west as most of the German army and Airforce were fighting the Russians in the east, but qualitfy vise the Germans were better atleast in tanks. During D-Day one german tiger destroyed 52 american and british tanks in 5 minutes, but the American air superiority prevented the German tank counter offencive during 7.6.44 to hit the american's back to the sea.

michael wittman

im not sure his tiger destroyed 52 tanks, dont you mean 52 vehicles?

Wittman's company destroyed 62 vehicles in the engagement that made him infamous, his personal total was 8 half-tracks, 4 Bren Carriers and 2 6 pdr anti-tank guns, 3 Stuarts, 7 Cromwell IVs, I Firefly and 1 Sherman OP tank. His tank was immobilized by a 6pndr A/T gun. That made his total that day 26, precisely half of the figure mentioned.

This btw was D+6, not D-Day itself, to my knowledge there is no account from D-Day of 1 Tiger blowing away 52 vehicles or tanks, and had there been we would have to assume there would be a record of it somewhere. The nearest other example in Normandy was probably Barkmann's corner where a Panther from Das Reich took out 9 shermans plus a number of other vehicles singlehandedly whilst coming under heavy air attack.

When I saw this thread, I thought it was about the Pacific front, where, indeed, the Americans were often not the statistical favorites before battle began.

Midway in particular stands out in this regard.

yeah except the russians didnt have guns or leadership! :lol:

i actually read about these militia units that were formed from russian school kids (dunno how old, but i imagine they were at least around 15 y o) to fight the germans outside moscow, they didnt have any guns for them, so they were given knifes and bayonettes and were told to stick them on sticks and make spears!!

they were sent to some forest outside moscow, i dont remeber if they did see any "action" or what happened to them :spear:?

and the units that did have guns, usually didnt have enough
In 1941 or so, sure. But the Russians went through several armies during WWII. The first ones were crap (no equipment, no plan, no defensible positions, no leadership, no chance.)
The armies that made the final push to Berlin however, were well trained, equipped and led. They surprised the Germans by being good at "blitz" style combined operations using arty, inf, armour and airpower. This had been a German speciality at the beginning of the war, but they had subsequently lost these capabilities. A complete reversal of roles.

As a general rule the United States typically outnumbered its German opponents in most of the battles fought in Europe.
Which is to say that the US fought WWII in exactly everyone in their right mind wants to fight a war.
Steady build up, no desperate heroics, and then you outproduce, outnumer and outgun the enemy without havinbg to take too many risks.
Not the most heroic or flashy kind of warfare, but the way to go if you have a choice and want to win.

Midway in particular stands out in this regard.

Midway is usually regarded as being one of the luckiest victories of all time. It was pure random chance that US Dive Bombers basically tripped over the Japanese Carriers with decks filled with aircraft being refuelled and rearmed.

Generally speaking though for most of the Pacific Campaign the US had heavy superiority in manpower and particularly material. The Japanese had perhaps as little as a tenth of the United States manufacturing capability.


yeah except the russians didnt have guns or leadership!


The USSR outproduced Germany in war material and by 1943/1944 they did have reasonably well equipped units. The Russians produced 29,000 Tanks in 1944 alone which was more than the USA and UK combined.

The initial leadership problems were also being sorted out. This was actually very easily done as the NKVD just stopped purging the decent officers which they had been doing for most of the previous decade. The Red Army of 1944/45 was a far different beast than that of 1941.

Which is to say that the US fought WWII in exactly everyone in their right mind wants to fight a war.
Steady build up, no desperate heroics, and then you outproduce, outnumer and outgun the enemy without havinbg to take too many risks.
Not the most heroic or flashy kind of warfare, but the way to go if you have a choice and want to win.

Exactly. If you have industrial superiority beat your opponent over the head with it until they give up.

The Allies won WWII on the factory floor.

In 1941 or so, sure. But the Russians went through several armies during WWII. The first ones were crap (no equipment, no plan, no defensible positions, no leadership, no chance.)
The armies that made the final push to Berlin however, were well trained, equipped and led. They surprised the Germans by being good at "blitz" style combined operations using arty, inf, armour and airpower. This had been a German speciality at the beginning of the war, but they had subsequently lost these capabilities. A complete reversal of roles.


sure, i knew that, i mean they won, so...

As a general rule the United States typically outnumbered its German opponents in most of the battles fought in Europe.

Except, there is the Battle of the Bulge, one of the biggest and most important engagements on the western front.

80,000 US troops vs 200,000 Germans
400 US tanks vs 600 panzers
400 artillery guns vs 1,900 German artillery guns.

Not for the entire campaign, only initially. The final figures involved saw the allies outnumber the Germans.

Except, there is the Battle of the Bulge, one of the biggest and most important engagements on the western front.

80,000 US troops vs 200,000 Germans
400 US tanks vs 600 panzers
400 artillery guns vs 1,900 German artillery guns.

Yeah, but they were scraping the bottom of the barrel. They were sending out 60 year old men, armed with hunting rifles, and 16 year old kids, armed with little more than single-shot anti-tank weapons.
Some of their tanks were Panzers II, Czech anks, or captured Allied (such as Sherman) tanks.

Uhmmm...

In the bulge they had a number of Panzer, SS panzer, Airborne and Panzergrenadier divisions deployed, were using King Tigers, Sturmtigers, Nebelwerfers, Panthers, Panzer IVs and all sorts of decent tanks. There may have been some Volksgrenadier divsions, and 1 unit using captured equipment on purpose, but it would be wildly innacurate to sum up the troops in the Bulge in that way.

Co-incidentally, using a Panzer II isn't such a bad idea when used as a light recon tank, hence the Lynx version of it late in the war. Using captured allied tanks is not usually too bad an idea either depending on the tank :D

Well, I seem to remember the use of Volksturm, the Paras and SS by that period of the war were in shambles (Congrats, you are and SS! To the front!) and that light tanks, as well as King Tigers with no fuel were being used, as well as some units using captured Shermans with German markings.

80,000 US troops vs 200,000 Germans


As privatehudson said the number of US Troops involved went up during the battle eventually reaching over half a million men.

There were also 55,000 British soldiers from XXX Corps deployed against the Germans in the Bulge.

Well, I seem to remember the use of Volksturm, the Paras and SS by that period of the war were in shambles (Congrats, you are and SS! To the front!)

Volksturm yes, but the SS and Airborne retained still a good cadre of veteran soldiers even at this stage of the fighting. Describing formations like 1st, 9th and 12th SS, and the 3rd Airborne as being full of the dregs of German manpower is an unessecary and innacurate simplification of the topic. Besides, this escapes from the fact that the Wermacht was quite capable of fighting reasonably well despite manpower problems.

and that light tanks, as well as King Tigers with no fuel were being used

The King Tigers reached as deep as some of the furthest thrusts the Germans managed. Since you didn't see fit to add them to the list I figured they might matter, alongside the dozens of Panzer IV's and Panthers that were used that you also washed over in your haste to decry the formations the Americans and British halted and destroyed. I heartily suggest you look a little further into the battle as you seem to have a very innacurate view of what OOB the German army had there.

as well as some units using captured Shermans with German markings

Which was common throughout all armies throughout the war, what's your point here? You think the russians never used a Panther, or the Americans never pinched a German vehicle if they had the chance? They built one specialised unit that used some small numbers of real US vehicles and mock US vehicles to confuse the enemy. Anything else is again simplifying the point. We're talking maybe a dozen vehicles amongst a number of hundred if not thousand German ones.

To quote one site:

Exact figures on German tank strength are not available, but it would appear that of the estimated 1,800 panzers in the Ardennes battle some 250 were Tigers and the balance was divided equally between the Mark IV and the Panther.

I play these games based on WWII like medal of honor and call of duty and I see 5 americans storming a town or garrison full of germans and winning. Was it true that the americans, even though were outnumbered 5 or 10 to 1, still won? Or is it just plain propaganda?

It would seem to be propoganda, according to most of the posts.

It is full propaganda. How can anyone with a basic knowledge of history even ask it ?
The Germans fought miraculously well against OVERWHELMING odds. And the casualty/equipment lost ratio after the war gives a good idea of this. The reason Bastogne is a heroic and famous battle to the Americans is because there the Americans were our gunned and out numbered. The Germans fought in those conditions all of the time in the later parts of the war. Important to add: at no time in the history of the world has a nation so fast gained a technological superiority in nearly ever field as Germany did. Not to mention that no nation in the history of the world has risen so fast it's economy as Germany did 1933-1939. From a economically wretched nation what was foreignly owned to the bone to the worlds single highest net producing & income nation?!?

The Finns were still the most hard nosed soldiers of WW2. Non supported Finnish infantry against huge Soviet air, tank, artillery and infantry superiority the Finns gained a kill count of 1:20 against the Russians. (And this is not from a single battle, but the national totals of all battles from the whole war! Some battle had a ratio of 1 to 100 !?!?!? Talk about Call of Duty like battles ! :eek: ) More than half the artillery Finland had was artillery captured from the Russians in the war. The air wars casualty count was nearly 1:50 in favor for the Finns and even more in the tanks destroyed/captured ratio. Of course not all battles went so well for Finland.. In the battle of Ihantala the push (intended to take out Finland and capture the Finnish capitol of Helsinki) was stopped with the casualty count being: "The Soviet army has been reported to have lost from 400 to 600 tanks in Tali-Ihantala area, mainly to close defense weapons. 120-280 Soviet planes were shot down. Finnish army lost 8561 men wounded, lost or killed. Soviet estimates is 18000-24000 killed or wounded.

Midway is usually regarded as being one of the luckiest victories of all time. It was pure random chance that US Dive Bombers basically tripped over the Japanese Carriers with decks filled with aircraft being refuelled and rearmed.

Well, luck counts ;) , and I would argue that by making
an attack rather than passively defending, the Americans
gave luck a chance to happen.

Generally speaking though for most of the Pacific Campaign the US had heavy superiority in manpower and particularly material. The Japanese had perhaps as little as a tent

I would say that's true from around Jan/Feb of 1943 on. Before then we were definitely outnumbered, mostly due to
Europe getting priority. The common nickname for the
Guadalcanal landings was "Operation Shoestring".

Give any army decent terrain to defend and reasonable equipment and you're likely to see higher losses to the attacker.

Give any army decent terrain to defend and reasonable equipment and you're likely to see higher losses to the attacker.These number are still miraculous. And Finland's strategy wasn't only to wait for the Russians to come. We made surprise hit and runs. Encircled the enemy..etc..

Not really, I mean they fought well, but given the conditions, the methods Russia was using and so on, bravely fought but not totally unexpected.

And I meant overall defender/attacker. Given good terrain, better knowledge of the terrain and so on it's all very predictable. One only has to look back through history to tell that.

Not really, I mean they fought well, but given the conditions, the methods Russia was using and so on, bravely fought but not totally unexpected.

And I meant overall defender/attacker. Given good terrain, better knowledge of the terrain and so on it's all very predictable. One only has to look back through history to tell that. Well if we look at the losses ratio you took in the Ardennes offensive. I wouldn't call it expected that the attacker always loses more. Would you ?

:lol: My country's army hardly lost anything in the Bulge my friend, funny how so many make this mistake :D

And the bulge is an entirely different situation to Finland earlier, like comparing chalk and cheese other than the weather.

I would say that's true from around Jan/Feb of 1943 on. Before then we were definitely outnumbered, mostly due to
Europe getting priority. The common nickname for the
Guadalcanal landings was "Operation Shoestring".

Actually the sides were pretty even at Guadalcanal. Both Japan and the US deployed around 30,000 personnel and the Naval forces in terms of ships were fairly evenly matched too

Naval Battles of the Guadalcanal Campaign

Savo Island
Allies - 6 Cruisers, 8 Destroyers
Japan - 7 Cruisers, 1 Destroyer

Cape Esperance
Allies - 4 Cruisers, 4 Destroyers
Japan - 3 Cruisers, 2 Destroyers

1st Naval Battle of Guadacanal
Allies - 4 Cruisers, 8 Destroyers
Japan - 1 Battleship, 1 Cruiser, 9 Destroyers

2nd Naval Battle of Guadacanal
Allies - 2 Battleships, 4 Destroyers
Japan - 1 Battleship, 4 Cruisers, 8 Destroyers

Battle of Tassafaronga
Allies - 5 Cruisers, 4 Destroyers
Japan - 8 Destroyers

Not really, I mean they fought well, but given the conditions, the methods Russia was using and so on, bravely fought but not totally unexpected.

And I meant overall defender/attacker. Given good terrain, better knowledge of the terrain and so on it's all very predictable. One only has to look back through history to tell that.

you call 20:1 ratio predictable?

why am i not surprised?

once in another debate you said casualties dont matter in a war! :lol:

sure, when defending you have an advantage, which negated when your outnumbered, outgunned and the enemy has air superiority

throw in the soviet disregard for their soldiers lives in to equation, and i say 2:1 ratio wouldve been really good numbers for the finns

20:1 is fanatics fighting with teeth and nail and outdoing themselves

:wow:

:lol: My country's army hardly lost anything in the Bulge my friend, funny how so many make this mistake :D



Thats because the British only had 55.000 men in the bulge all together. :lol:

I play these games based on WWII like medal of honor and call of duty and I see 5 americans storming a town or garrison full of germans and winning. Was it true that the americans, even though were outnumbered 5 or 10 to 1, still won? Or is it just plain propaganda?

It's just a game.

you call 20:1 ratio predictable?

In the proper conditions yes. One could say Witmann's tiger attack was unlikely until you consider the things in his favour for example.

once in another debate you said casualties dont matter in a war!

Context would be useful :rolleyes:

sure, when defending you have an advantage, which negated when your outnumbered, outgunned and the enemy has air superiority

Which is balanced against conditions favouring your army, the Russians suffering from the recent purges of their army, their equipment not at all suited to the war, the daylight hours limiting air superiority, the terrain limiting their axis of advance and the enemy's soldiers being often woefully inexperienced.

throw in the soviet disregard for their soldiers lives in to equation, and i say 2:1 ratio wouldve been really good numbers for the finns

Perhaps it's precisely because the Russians had that attitude that so many died? :mischief:

Don't get me wrong, I don't wish to detract from the valiant fight the Finns put up, or their ability, but to suggest it was unheard of, or extremely unlikely isn't the whole story at all. I have great respect for the way they ran their campaign and defended themselves, but I am not at all suprised that the campaign turned out that way, nor am I suprised at that kind of figure.

Thats because the British only had 55.000 men in the bulge all together

Well at least here's one Finn who can tell the difference between Americans and Brits :D

Not really, I mean they fought well, but given the conditions, the methods Russia was using and so on, bravely fought but not totally unexpected.

And I meant overall defender/attacker. Given good terrain, better knowledge of the terrain and so on it's all very predictable. One only has to look back through history to tell that. Im sorry I tought you were an American. It's just that normally when a person says something like this he is an American. And the name "privatehudson" sounds so American..

:lol: My country's army hardly lost anything in the Bulge my friend, funny how so many make this mistake :D

And the bulge is an entirely different situation to Finland earlier, like comparing chalk and cheese other than the weather.

BATTLE FACTS

· The coldest, snowiest weather “in memory” in the Ardennes Forest on the German/Belgium border.

· Over a million men, 500,000 Germans, 600,000 Americans (more than fought at Gettysburg) and 55,000 British.

· 3 German armies, 10 corps, the equivalent of 29 divisions.

· 3 American armies, 6 corps, the equivalent of 31 divisions.

· The equivalent of 3 British divisions as well as contingents of Belgian, Canadian and French troops.

· 100,000 German casualties, killed, wounded or captured.

· 81,000 American casualties, including 23,554 captured and 19,000 killed.

· 1,400 British casualties 200 killed. !!!

· 800 tanks lost on each side, 1,000 German aircraft.

· The Malmedy Massacre, where 86 American soldiers were murdered, was the worst atrocity committed against American troops during the course of the war in Europe. (Hmm... This I want to compare: What about the Dresden bombing ? Or the prisoner of war camps in Germany after the war where 1,5 million German surrendered soldiers died ?)

· My division, the 106th Infantry Division, average age of 22 years, suffered 564 killed in action, 1,246 wounded and 7,001 missing in action at the end of the offensive. Most of these casualties occurred within the first three days of battle, when two of the division’s three regiments was forced to surrender.

· In it's entirety, the “Battle of the Bulge,” was the worst battles- in terms of losses - to the American Forces in WWII.

Im sorry I tought you were an American. It's just that normally when a person says something like this he is an American. And the name "privatehudson" sounds so American

It comes from the Aliens movie, in which the character is indeed American, but I'm very British and sound so also I can assure you ;)

And I also know the Bulge very well thank you :D Compared to other campaigns, compared to the type of fighting and compared to the quality of enemy faced, it's hardly suprising at all.

In it's entirety, the “Battle of the Bulge,” was the worst battles- in terms of losses - to the American Forces in WWII.

The US lost more in the fall of the Pilippines. I think it is supposed to be the worst disaster in US military history.

None the lss, a lot of American troops in the Bulge were green. You could say Malmedy tipped it into the Allies' favour, as these green units who would previously have surrendered, now thought the Germans were taking no prisonersw, and were prepared to fight to the death.

Context would be useful :rolleyes:


well i said, that the soviets suffered the most, died in millions, took and inflicted most of the casualties of WW2

you said that it didnt matter

looking back, i think you didnt see the word "inflicted" in my sentence

but that would be weird, since you quoted that sentence, and then commented it (dosent ,matter),the way you tend to do,chop up posts and respond to every single word
i guess youre head was elsewhere at the time

my reply was "youre hot, you should be a comedian" :lol:

and you said excellent reply,(which it was, to something as funny as "casaulties dont matter!")

and of course i didnt discuss that any further, no point :rolleyes:

I almost certainly pointed out that just taking numerical data is not the only way to determine if one country could have won WWII alone, or did more than the other allies. This is the context I was refferring to, not that casualties do not matter, but they are not the only thing that determines such an argument one way or another. I thought this might be worth adding since you don't seem to have remembered this part in your context. I guess it's possible I didn't include my reasoning in the original discussion (I don't recall either way) but this was my reasoning anyway.

So no, I did not intend to imply they do not matter, I implied, or intended to imply that they are not the only factor to consider.

yes, but i wasnt talking about dates, i was talking about the fact that something like 90% of all the german casaulties taken during the whole WW2 was inflicted by the russians

and most of those, was before D-day

plus, it was the hardest ones, it was done back when the germans had some hardwear and experienced people from the earlier wars, not like what americans fought, militias + whatever was left from the regulars

yes, but i wasnt talking about dates, i was talking about the fact that something like 90% of all the german casaulties taken during the whole WW2 was inflicted by the russians

Sorry, that should have read data, my appologies for the typo :)

plus, it was the hardest ones, it was done back when the germans had some hardwear and experienced people from the earlier wars, not like what americans fought, militias + whatever was left from the regulars

Uhmmm, with respect, as I've talked about before, the Western allies fought a good portion of the Veteran formations during the 1944-45 period, and many of these contained veteran and experienced troops. One only has to look into the western front OOB for the German army to know this. My point is that without the bombing of Germany, without Lend Lease, without the other fronts, without the resistance and other things, the Eastern Front would have been a stalemate to a dreadful meatgrinding war of attrition. Which is why I would argue that the simple numerical data is only one aspect.

Uhmmm, with respect, as I've talked about before, the Western allies fought a good portion of the Veteran formations during the 1944-45 period, and many of these contained veteran and experienced troops. One only has to look into the western front OOB for the German army to know this. My point is that without the bombing of Germany, without Lend Lease, without the other fronts, without the resistance and other things, the Eastern Front would have been a stalemate to a dreadful meatgrinding war of attrition. Which is why I would argue that the simple numerical data is only one aspect. Without allied bombing or the other fronts it is very likely that Germany with his allies would have taken Russia down. There was a famine in Russia and it would have gotten worse in a few years if Russia wouldn't have gotten South Russian/Ukrainian lands back.

The real question is Why the Hell did the Japanise not attack Eastern Russia ?!??! Hitler said they could have all the territory they advanced. Why not take free territory ?!? Not to mention how much resources they would have gained from there to the hungry Japanise Industry!

Actually the sides were pretty even at Guadalcanal. Both Japan and the US deployed around 30,000 personnel and the Naval forces in terms of ships were fairly evenly matched too
From what I understand (Toland, The Rising Sun) the fighting in the Pacific might be taken as an excellent example of how intelligence wins battles. The numbers may have been roughly even, but Japanese intelligence was so poor they were to a large extent fighting blind. The US troops knew where they were, what they were doing and most important of all, where the enemy was.

I play these games based on WWII like medal of honor and call of duty and I see 5 americans storming a town or garrison full of germans and winning. Was it true that the americans, even though were outnumbered 5 or 10 to 1, still won? Or is it just plain propaganda?

Well no, I'm of the opinion that WWII was lost on the axis side as soon as the US entered the war (if you're fighting the British Empire and the Russians at the same time you don't want to attack someone with an economy larger than that of your entire alliance)

I wouldn't call it propaganda though, in fact, I think its kind of silly, can you think of a game where the player is not outnumbered 10 to 1? Its called the way ALL video games of that type are made!

What exactly is the fun of a war game when the premise is: Well corpral, the Japanese attacked us and the Germans declared war on us. The bad news is that we are at war, the good news is that our economy outproduces the enemys' 2 to 1 and we have the British Empire and the Soviet Union on our side. Basicaly reguardless of you being a hero or a total faliure, we will win the war. Have a nice day. Ok I think I've made my point but if you think this is propaganda you're being a bit paranoid. Not sure if you are serious though so no offense intended if you arn't being serious.

Expediture on Armaments 1943 (Billion $ US)

United States - 37.5
Soviet Union - 13.9
Britain - 11.1

Germany - 13.8
Japan - 4.5

This is true, but the money gained in the initial takeover of europe paid for itself, and then some.

The US funds were straight from the treasury.

I play these games based on WWII like medal of honor and call of duty and I see 5 americans storming a town or garrison full of germans and winning. Was it true that the americans, even though were outnumbered 5 or 10 to 1, still won? Or is it just plain propaganda?

No, its a video game. Not every thing is a sinister US plot. :rolleyes:

Without allied bombing or the other fronts it is very likely that Germany with his allies would have taken Russia down. There was a famine in Russia and it would have gotten worse in a few years if Russia wouldn't have gotten South Russian/Ukrainian lands back.

The real question is Why the Hell did the Japanise not attack Eastern Russia ?!??! Hitler said they could have all the territory they advanced. Why not take free territory ?!? Not to mention how much resources they would have gained from there to the hungry Japanise Industry!

Allied bombing did little to slow up German war production which actually peaked in 1944. It didn't break the morale of the German people either.

The Japanese didn't take on the Russians because they were confident the Germans would take care of them. They also probably had bad memories of the couple of clashes they had with them at the end of the 30s.

By the time the Soviets got back the Ukrain most of it was trashed anway and it would have taken a couple of years to get crops happening again. The United States kept the Russians well supplied with food anyway.