what if the cold war had turned hot?

No nuclear weapons? I'll throw some more uneducated guesses...

They wouldn't need to conquer Britain. Any power which held the whole of continental Europe would be able to starve Britain into submission. Unlike Germany in WW2 the USSR had the resources to build a navy capable of blockading Britain. Not immediately, but in a couple of years... also unlike nazi Germany with its racist policies, the soviets would probably be able to integrate Western Europe into their block and take full advantage of its resources.
well, tactical nukes only. honestly, I don't see how they would be able build up a navy during the war. Certainly not big enough to take on the USN and RN, and western Europe would probably be devastated pretty hard in the fighting, so it's resources wouldn't really help. They might have enough submarines and missiles to blockade Britain that way, though.
The hardest places to speculate about on your "WW3, no nukes" scenario are the Middle East, Turkey, and the Iberian Peninsula.

The Middle East, with its oil, was far more important to the USSR that the USA, which could still find plenty of oil in the Americas and Africa. It would also be the gateway to northern Africa. An obvious place for the USA and Britain to continue fighting against the USSR, even while the european front was still hot. Turkey, being a member of NATO, would have the role of delaying the USSR's advance there. But I'm not sure that Turks wouldn't switch sides rather than face certain defeat - so long as their territorial integrity was guaranteed against greek, armenian and kurdish claims.
Why would they need oil from the Middle East? The Soviet Union had plenty of oil. Russia is still a member of OPEC, after all.
 
From memory you're about right on the supply score. I believe NATO had more supplies, but the Russians were actually trained to function with less. Interesting dichotomy.

But you're dead wrong about the war being over in a month. The US would not allow Russia to control Europe. Period. It would be suicide for the US, in the same way that allowing Germany and Japan to eat their respective zones of conflict would have been in WWII.
Well, even if they decided not to allow it, that doesn't change much when they're physically unable to fight on, does it? I suppose they could go into seige mode and maintain a state of war for years (or resort to ICBMS) but I don't see what they could do, conventionally, after losing most of their forces in Europe.

NATO wouldn't be stupid enough to position that much of their materiel within range of Russian artillery. Come on, do you think they'd act like the Civ AI and continuously send troops into a deathtrap?
No, but the Russian artillery was very mobile and had a very long range. NATO tanks during the 60s and 70's were notoriously slow. They only way they could avoid being in range of artillery would be to run away.

You're also assuming that both sides were aware of the buld-up of the other. In the case of actual war, it would almost certainly be a sneak attack, as either side getting wind of the other's plans would result in the other side being prepared for them. That's why Russia was so frightened during the 1983 crisis (Abel Archer? I've got about four names circling around in my head): they suspected the West would attack them while holding an 'exercise.' If the West knew Russia was preparing an attack, the US would send massive amounts of troops and materiel, not to mention the hectic preparations Europeans would themselves be making. If Russia got wind of an American attack, well, they were paranoid to begin with. They'd likely pre-empt.
Well, we can consider multiple scenarios, if you want, based on who is sneak attacking who. But given the amount both sides spent on intelligence to try to detect any invasion plans by the other side, it seems unlikely that they wouldn't get at least some advance notice. I mean, how hard is it, really, to notice that either the US starts shipping mass quantities of troops across the atlantic, or that the WP suddenly mobilizes all of its tanks?


Also, your idea that the use of tactical nukes wouldn't lead to strategic nukes is ridiculous. If Russia drops a nuke on a French Army, France would retaliate, as would everyone else. The idea that such a war can remain limited is just ridiculous. Europe would not allow itself to be conquered, the US cuold not commit state suicide by losing Europe to the Soviets, and Russia would desperately try to survive by attacking every nuclear facility they knew about. It's an incredibly farcical argument. The 'no nukes at all' thing is bad enough, but I can live with. 'Some nukes but not the really big ones' is a crock.
I agree, that is the most likely scenario. I was just interested in exploring the idea of what if only the small nukes were used, since that's what the battle plans for both sides revolved around. It seems to me that, the reason the USA needed such a large stockpile of nukes is because they were our only deterrence to war. We NEEDED to use them in a war, because if we didn't then we'd lose.

If you think the Soviets can cross the Rhine and the Alps with ease, you don't know much about geography or logistics. Even if Russia succeeded in taking France and Italy - and Italy would probably be more directly threatened by Communist insurgents in Italy than the Soviets outside - they sure as hell wouldn't '"quickly roll over" France. West Germany knew it was a speedhump. But France wouldn't fall without one hell of a fight. And I don't see De Gaulle surrendering. He strikes me as the type who would unzip his pants and tell Brezhnev to mind his teeth rather than surrender. France knew what reaching an accomodation with an invader meant, intimately. They wouldn't do that again, they would have to be conquered.
I'm not suggesting crossing the alps, I'm just assuming that if they could conquer France and West Germany, Italy would be cut off from any aid, and wouldn't be able to hold out for long. It's not like there were a whole lot of troop in Italy, anyway.

The Rhine would be an obstacle, I guess. But it's not exactly impassable terrain, and the Russians also have the option of following Hitler's footsteps by swinging north through Belgium. Once they get into France, the terrain is perfect for tanks to roll. What are French resistance fighters going to do, anyway (not to mention the fact that France always had a sizable population which supported the USSR)? It wouldn't be like WW2 or modern Iraq where they could snipe at foot soldiers. I'm sure the Soviets would have no problem leveling any city that resisted them, and de Gaulle would have been executed immediately.

You obviously don't know what a medium-range rocket entails. The Soviets could hit Britain with medium-range rockets from the USSR, let alone Poland or East Germany. They certainly wouldn't need to set them up in Normandy. And the US was perfectly capable of flooding Britain with planes and flying over troops and materiel in order to shore up the levies, so to speak.

The question is whether said medium-range missiles could be shot down outside of a test situation. The opportunity to find out never happened until the Gulf War. If they could, much less damage would be done than you assume. If the technology wasn't there yet, I sincerely doubt the British would allow their planes to be caught on the ground. They'd immediately begin moving them around and establishing new airfields unknown to the Soviets.
If the USSR can hit Britain with rockets from eastern Europe, then that makes it even easier for them. Considering that the coalition did rather poorly at shooting down Iraqi Scuds during the Gulf War, I DOUBT that they'd be able to shoot down Russian missiles, especially as many as they were capable of launching. And how is the US going to flood Britain with planes and material when all of the airfields are destroyed?

They can easily base their aircraft in Britain, as I've already mentioned. You also seem to be forgetting Iceland and Scandinavia as potential sites. Not to mention the fact that Russia was certainly not capable of knocking out half as many carriers as you seem to think. They could take out some, but the US would still have control of the seas. And carrier-based aircraft, while limited, are still more than enough firebomb Dresden all over again if necessary.
Really don't see Iceland and Scandinavia as having the logistical support necessary to base a significant number of troops. They could launch some raids from there, but not enough to really effect things.

I have no idea how many carriers might be destroyed. I just think it's a mistake to assume that they'd all be operational throughout the fighting. And good luck doing any heavy bombing with a few fighter-bombers launched from carriers, when they'd have to go through massive numbers of interceptors and SAMs.


They won't need to, as they'll arrive before France falls. Secondly, D-Day nearly failed because it was done in the wrong goddamn spot - Churchill's plan of attacking through the "soft underbelly" of Europe was a better idea. Also, you're completely ignoring Turkey, Greece, and other nations bordering Russia, including a giant pink elephant I'll mention later. The US could land troops in those nations. Unless you think Russia is magic, and can simultaneously win a war on two, three, four, or more fronts?

If the US was forced to launch an amphibious invasion, why the hell would they do it across the Channel? Because that's what Roosevelt wanted in '44? There are easier places in Europe to attack. They'd go there. And you seriously over-erstimate exactly how much force Russia will be able to bring to bear. It's not like the US is going to call them up and say; "we're landing in Sarajevo tomorrow, lulz." They'd keep the precise location of the assault a secret, and while Russia would have an inkling, they wouldn't know the exact place. So they'd have considerably fewer aircraft and artillery to hand than you think. Railroads wouldn't grant the WP free movement you know. It takes time to move things, even planes. And the US would have been moving stuff into position since the second the Russians attacked the Fulga gap, if not sooner. Russia wouldn't.
They TRIED going through the soft underbelly, and they spent a year fighting bloody battles in Italy to no purpose. It doesn't matter where the US lands troops, if the WP can detect it (and they WOULD detect any large invasion attempt- do you think a submarine or spotter plane can't spot a massive convoy of troops?) then they can be there, waiting, with much larger numbers and embedded artillery.


If things got that desperate, the US would launch ICBMs. You and I both know they would launch them much earlier in your doomsday scenario. But it wouldn't reach that point. The USSR could overrun Europe, but not quickly enough to secure it. The US could get supplies and men to Britain and elsewhere despite Soviet attempts to stop them. Therefore, the Soviets would never be in such a powerful position anyway.
While I do think that they would launch them, like I said above, I think that if they DIDN'T launch them then NATO would have very little chance of victory.

If you think the US is allowing the war to end with a massive Soviet victory, I'm sorry, but you're an idiot. That's not to mention the small matter of the conquered territories not exactly rolling over and dying; they'd fight, and fight hard. I wouldn't be surprised if former terrorist groups all of a sudden turned their wrath on the invaders, and that's discounting the more usual resistance groups that would crop up.

Russia might, MIGHT, be able to occupy Western Europe. They could never hold it. Not unless America's balls dropped off and it announced an all new "girly-man" Doctrine.
The thing about guerrilla resistance is, it's very effective against us because we have a free media and we're very concerned about our public image. It doesn't work so well against a country like the Soviets who have no qualms about destroying any opposition. Or do you think that some civilians with rifles and home-made bombs would be able to fight an open battle against massed tanks and artillery?

It was behind, but not that much. it was elsewhere that the technological advantage was comfortably in the West's favour.
I'd like to see some sources or statistics that would prove this.


They were so inundated with anti-Western propaganda that many of them idolised the West and jeans were the ultimate fashion accessory? The Russian people distrusted the West, but they never succumbed to Communist propaganda to the point where they hated and feared it with a passion. And the other nationalities within the USSR and WP had much more reason to hate and fear Russia than they did the West. A Russian soldier in a predominantly Lithuanian unit would probably stand more chance of being shot in the back than the front.

WP soldiers were tough and brutal, largely because they were treated brutally themselves. But the majority weren't exactly supporters of the party. There's a reason for the old joke about the Soviet apparatchik being the greatest enemy of Communism.
They might not have loved the party, but they sure did fight for it. After all, the soviets did horrible, horrible things to anyone who deserted... I think that might prove to be a powerful motivating factor.


And? The USSR needed three months to get troops into position to treacherously invade a crippled Japan. Is that supposed to show their might? No, it shows their weakness. Stalin needed time to recover, and they were hardly fighting the creme de la creme of Japanese troops. They were fighting starving, ill-equipped troops, most of whom had never seen any action, or not in years. This was Manchuria after all, pretty far from the front line. You did notice the "on paper at least" line didn't you? That's because they were beating up on an off-guard, numerically inferior and ridiculously under-supplied enemy, after they'd just been re-equipped.
Not the toughest of opponents, of course. But that's not the point. The point is that they displayed an extremely powerful command of logistics , firepower, and tactics, despite all the losses they suffered during the war. They managed to move their entire army across Russia, and keep it a secret, too. It's not that they NEEDED 3 months, Staline USED the 3 months because it allowed him to set up the most one-sided fight possible. Why take risks when you don't have to?

The USSR had local superiority in many regions at the end of WWII. But every single time they were militarily confronted they withdrew! Do you think Stalin withdrew from Iran, Austria, Berlin, etc., because he was a lovable rogue, spreading cheer under cover of darkness by leaving toys underneath trees at Christmas time? He withdrew because he was outmatched! And he knew it. Russia's policy post-WWII was based on fear and bluff. Fear of the West's strenght, and one great big bluff about its own.
Stalin withdrew from Berlin? That's news to me. I would say that if he was afraid of anything, it would only be nuclear weapons. And he may have been sane enough to simply not WANT a war, even if he could win.

If Russia truly wanted world domination - and that argument can be made, though I disagree with it - why didn't it continue to advance in Europe in 1945? It was the best chance it would ever have, right? They had massive local superiority, many Communist insurgencies in France, Italy and elsewhere would have welcomed them, and it wouldn't be the first time Uncle Joe broke a treaty. It's not like Manchuria was anywhere near as important as France.
Two reasons come to mind. One, they weren't really enemies with the western allies at that point. Two, the USA had (the capability to build) nuclear weapons, and the USSR did not. That's a pretty powerful trump card. Logistical support would also have been a big issue.


Russian tanks may have been relatively easy to repair, but Russian manufacturing policy didn't include making spare parts. Russian tank strategy called for not bothering to repair tanks. If they stopped working, hop in another one. Western strategy called for replacing the nut that had come loose. Which one do you think is cheaper and more effective?
If this is a US military nut then it might well cost more than a Russian tank :crazyeye:
Seriously though, the T-55 also tended to just not break down very much, so if it did break down, it was probably because something was seriously wrong with it.

And you over-estimate the Russian ability to keep the West from gaining air superiority. The Soviets would likely enjoy initial air superiority, but it wouldn't last. And air power is massively important. The Gulf War involved a strategic bombing campaign. That means bombing the factories said tanks come out of, not the tanks themselves. If the US had used bombing tactically, they'd have taken out many more tanks from the sky.
OK, so why do you think Nato would quickly gain air superiority? Do you think that our fighters were so much better that they would be able to shoot down large quantities of Soviet planes very quickly? Because that's a point you'll have to justify.
I admit that I don't know a whole lot about the performance capabilities of either side's airframes, though.

This brings me to other, miscellaneous points.

The giant pink elephant: China. WTF is China doing throughout all this? You don't think China might decide to invade the USSR while Russia's busy? Or help themselves to Taiwan? Maybe both? China wouldn't sit this one out, depending upon the time period they'd get involved in favour of one party or the other. If nukes started flying they'd lay low, but if your magical 'tactical nukes only' scenario came to pass, Vladivostok may well be speaking Mandarin now, or Taipei may not have its own political party.
China at that time simply didn't have any capability to project force outside of it's own borders. Most of it's planes didn't even have the ability to hit Taiwan, let alone Russia, and it's soldiers were needed to maintain control of the citizens.

The Middle East. Russia didn't have the capacity to utilise its own oil and natural gas supplies effectively during the Cold War. Hell, some would say they still don't. They'd need oil. Would the Middle East be willing to supply them with it? Depending upon the time period, Russia may have many allies in the region, or none, but either way there are problems. Does Russia bring the oil overland through the Caucasus, or via the Dardanelles? Either way, they'll run into opposition from Turkey. Could Russia get enough oil to satisfy its demand? I don't think so.
Why wouldn't they have that capacity? It's not like they didn't have refineries. Besides, they'd have all the fuel necessary for a war stockpiled before the fighting began. It would take a long time for a fuel production shortage to effect the actual fighting. In the longterm, they could easily strong arm Turkey into helping them if they succeeded in occupying Western Europe.

Then there's the question of the volatile situation in the Middle East itself. Would Israel take advantage of the war to snatch some territory from its neighbours? Would they use the opportunity to attack Israel? Would autocratic regimes be overthrown as their backers were busy elsewhere? Or would said backers tighten their grips? I suspect that if war broke out in Europe, the ME would very quickly follow suit.
Probably at least one of these things would happen. I have no idea, really.

Russia's strategy. A little-known - and frankly quite frightening - aspect of Russian invasion plans is that they seemed to think they could nuke an enemy, then send their own troops in through the breach with no ill-effects. Now, obviously this is not the case. Russia's plans relied on tactical nuclear weapons, and Russian generals did not fully appreciate how problematic these things would be for their own men. Or maybe they just didn't care. Expect many, many Russian soldiers to die of radiation sickness. If you don't think that's going to affect morale negatively, not to mention the sheer numbers of Russian troops that would be out of commission, and the resources tied up in treating them, you're not thinking.
Radiation sickness can take YEARS to manifest. And if they did hit an area with a low-yield nuke, and then drive a shielded vehicle through, it probably wouldn't suffer too much radiation. The effects were so bad at Hiroshima because there were survivors LIVING right next to the blast site, completely unprotected.

The Pacific. What does Japan do? Taiwan? Korea? How about Soviet and American carrier groups? The US had an absolutely massive advantage over the USSR in the Asia-Pacific region. It wasn't even close, especially after the Sino-Soviet rift and subsequent rapprochement. You were wondering about an amphibious invasion earlier. What exactly is supposed to stop American troops in Japan deciding that Vladivostok has nice beaches, and that it's more fun raping teenage Russian schoolgirls than Okinawan ones?
Japan, like China, did not have any capability to project force outside its borders (and in fact, still does not, since that's forbidden by its constitution). There might be a war between North and South Korea, but both sides would be pretty much on their own until the fighting in Europe settled down. Hard to tell who'd win that one, but I'm sure it would be incredibly bloody.

The Americans could land troops in Vladivostok if they wanted, but Siberia is not known to be a hospitable place. I don't see what they could accomplish by being there? The Soviets could just wait for them to run out of supplies and then die during the winter.
 
The Soviet Union had a lot of soldiers. Lots and lots of soldiers. Their average age happened to be 15.7 years. 15.7 years!

It means that the vast majority of Soviet soldiers had to be 14-15 or younger. How it is possible?

Stalin beat Hitler in large part by simply throwing troops at him.

Let's compare irrecoverable losses (dead, missed and captured) in the beginning of WW2:

Eastern front, 22.VI - 30.IX, 1941
USSR - 2.129.677 (~1.300.000 captured)
Germany - 135.566 (116.908 dead)

Battle of France, 10.V - 25.VI, 1940
Allies - more than 2 mln. (~1.900.000 captured)
Germany - 45.458 (27.074 dead)

As we can see, Wehrmacht was extremely effective in the beginning. But to inflict the similar damage (about 2 mln of enemy soldiers), their casualties on Eastern front were 3-4 times higher than in France.
 
It means that the vast majority of Soviet soldiers had to be 14-15 or younger. How it is possible?



Let's compare irrecoverable losses (dead, missed and captured) in the beginning of WW2:

Eastern front, 22.VI - 30.IX, 1941
USSR - 2.129.677 (~1.300.000 captured)
Germany - 135.566 (116.908 dead)

Battle of France, 10.V - 25.VI, 1940
Allies - more than 2 mln. (~1.900.000 captured)
Germany - 45.458 (27.074 dead)

As we can see, Wehrmacht was extremely effective in the beginning. But to inflict the similar damage (about 2 mln of enemy soldiers), their casualties on Eastern front were 3-4 times higher than in France.

That may be comparing apples and oranges a little. The Battle of France sucessfully outmaneuvered the static French battleplan, and broke morale decisively. On the Eastern Front, Hitler found out the hard way that that he couldn't blitz Russia----partly because of Russian defense in depth I believe, and partly weather. Geographical depth of the two invasions is very different. And I believe the Russian Front had significant, urban battles while the Battle of France did not.
 
That may be comparing apples and oranges a little. The Battle of France sucessfully outmaneuvered the static French battleplan, and broke morale decisively. On the Eastern Front, Hitler found out the hard way that that he couldn't blitz Russia----partly because of Russian defense in depth I believe, and partly weather. Geographical depth of the two invasions is very different. And I believe the Russian Front had significant, urban battles while the Battle of France did not.

You are right about broken morale - the absolute majority of allies' losses were captives. USSR had much more resources and land to retreat, so direct comparison of such numbers is not fully correct.

Unfortunately the fact is that comparing to Germans, both allies and Soviet army performed extremely bad in the begginning of war. About the differences of campaings, the numbers were for the first few months when geographical depth and weather didn't make much difference. Germans used similar strategy and achieved similar results - in the beginning.
 
pi-r8 said:
The Rhine would be an obstacle, I guess. But it's not exactly impassable terrain, and the Russians also have the option of following Hitler's footsteps by swinging north through Belgium. Once they get into France, the terrain is perfect for tanks to roll. What are French resistance fighters going to do, anyway (not to mention the fact that France always had a sizable population which supported the USSR)? It wouldn't be like WW2 or modern Iraq where they could snipe at foot soldiers. I'm sure the Soviets would have no problem leveling any city that resisted them, and de Gaulle would have been executed immediately.

For America not to use nukes it would have had to have been an orderly retreat from West Germany and into France and the Low Countries. Assuming that was the case every bridge and useful piece of infrastructure would have been knocked out. The Soviets would have begun to run into serious supplies issues quite early on. That isn't to say that they wouldn't have driven hard into Europe... but it likely would have been quite an elastic front liable to snap when gaps in aircover and other factors came into play.

pi-r8 said:
I have no idea how many carriers might be destroyed. I just think it's a mistake to assume that they'd all be operational throughout the fighting. And good luck doing any heavy bombing with a few fighter-bombers launched from carriers, when they'd have to go through massive numbers of interceptors and SAMs.

Not a single carrier would go down period except to submarines. The Soviet navy was trapped by geography such that it only had a chance of sallying out from Archangelsk and Vladivostok. The first was not taken as a serious base by the Soviet Navy because of its northerly position and had relatively few ships and the second wasn't expected to last long and for that reason was loaded up with submarines simply because America had a significant conventional advantage. The carrier groups could sit at a significant distance away from Soviet reach whilst still managing to pen the Soviet navy in. The only fleet under direct threat is the Med. fleet and that has more to do with the size of the Med. than any percieved Soviet naval strength. The Soviet submarine arm was also it turns out outclassed by the American submarine arm. The Soviet hunter-killers would have been dealt some fairly stinging blows quite early on in the conflict.

pi-r8 said:
OK, so why do you think Nato would quickly gain air superiority? Do you think that our fighters were so much better that they would be able to shoot down large quantities of Soviet planes very quickly? Because that's a point you'll have to justify.

Super sabers. Although the war in the air would have been quite close it would likely have fallen in NATOs favor. I don't tend to think it would have been the decisive factor in neutralizing Soviet spearheads they were designed around the notion of NATO air-superiority and were stocked up correspondingly on AA and SAMS.

pi-r8 said:
Seriously though, the T-55 also tended to just not break down very much, so if it did break down, it was probably because something was seriously wrong with it.

The Soviets didn't repair anything beyond the simple. They scrapped it and built a new one.

pi-r8 said:
China at that time simply didn't have any capability to project force outside of it's own borders. Most of it's planes didn't even have the ability to hit Taiwan, let alone Russia, and it's soldiers were needed to maintain control of the citizens.

Vladivostok would have been sufficient to render the Soviet Far Eastern Fleet irrelevant in any case they couldn't have hit much else.

pi-r8 said:
The Americans could land troops in Vladivostok if they wanted, but Siberia is not known to be a hospitable place. I don't see what they could accomplish by being there? The Soviets could just wait for them to run out of supplies and then die during the winter.

They blow up the drydocks... and your fleet is now on working on borrowed time. They take out your fuel and supplies and bits of your fleet will fall away starting tomorrow. Naval ships at war burn through frighteningly large numbers of parts.

pi-r8 said:
Why wouldn't they have that capacity? It's not like they didn't have refineries. Besides, they'd have all the fuel necessary for a war stockpiled before the fighting began. It would take a long time for a fuel production shortage to effect the actual fighting. In the longterm, they could easily strong arm Turkey into helping them if they succeeded in occupying Western Europe.

They couldn't have stockpiled all the fuel. Thirty days of fighting with how many vehicles to supply? Including all the thousands upon thousands of trucks and trains required to heft that fuel to the front? Your talking about fueling hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of vehicles from stockpiles? The Soviets had stockpiles but nobody period had that much in the way of fuel lying around.

*

I personally believe the Soviets would have made it into France and probably pocketed NATO forces somewhere probably in the South. But at that point your looking at Soviet lines running for thousands of kilometers with a large section devoid of viable supply lines because of destroyed bridges et al. Supply shortages would have been a reality correspondingly. Air-cover would have been sporadic as Soviet bases got further and further away. Even assuming the Soviets had managed to take half of NATOs airbases your still looking at a less than optimum spread of air power. I suspect that any initial Soviet push would have to at some stage contract quite significantly probably all the way back towards the Rhine. By this stage I would guess that the sea-war is largely over with NATO out on top. At this stage it becomes a war of attrition in Europe something that the Soviets are better placed to win. But why would the Soviets want to win and risk nuclear war? They would begin negotations aimed at a return to the status quo the couldn't expect to keep any of their conquests. The best they could would be to wreck it as they retreated. It would likely end up in a draw.
 
Masada made a really good post, but my two cents need putting in.

Well, even if they decided not to allow it, that doesn't change much when they're physically unable to fight on, does it? I suppose they could go into seige mode and maintain a state of war for years (or resort to ICBMS) but I don't see what they could do, conventionally, after losing most of their forces in Europe.
Why would America, which had suffered nothing except maybe some bombing raids over the Bering Strait and the North Pole, be "physically unable to fight on?" The second war breaks out, if not earlier, the US would immediately mobilise, factory output would switch from peacetime to wartime production, and millions of people would voluntarily enlist to fight those "godless commie bastards." Also, I give the Soviets six months, tops, beyond the WP's borders. Not years.

No, but the Russian artillery was very mobile and had a very long range. NATO tanks during the 60s and 70's were notoriously slow. They only way they could avoid being in range of artillery would be to run away.
And Russian artillery wasn't exactly swimming with accuracy, you know. Mobility and range are only part of the issue with artillery. Besides, you know the best way to avoid artillery? Run towards it, and take it out. That becomes even more likely once the Soviets actually penetrate WG, not just from NATO, but from guerrillas.

Well, we can consider multiple scenarios, if you want, based on who is sneak attacking who. But given the amount both sides spent on intelligence to try to detect any invasion plans by the other side, it seems unlikely that they wouldn't get at least some advance notice. I mean, how hard is it, really, to notice that either the US starts shipping mass quantities of troops across the atlantic, or that the WP suddenly mobilizes all of its tanks?
They'd almost certainly have some advanced notice. There's an old adage about wars favouring the defensive side. With few exceptions, it's true. If NATO notices Russian troop movements in East Germany, all of a sudden the Fulga Gap becomes much more fortified. If Russia notices American troops steaming across the Atlantic, they pre-empt. Which is part of what makes such a war difficult to start - the one starting it is guaranteed to take massive losses, even if they eventually win. So if one side notices the other is ready for them, they're far more likely to back off. Unless they're desperate, in which case the war is even more in favour of their opponents.

I agree, that is the most likely scenario. I was just interested in exploring the idea of what if only the small nukes were used, since that's what the battle plans for both sides revolved around. It seems to me that, the reason the USA needed such a large stockpile of nukes is because they were our only deterrence to war. We NEEDED to use them in a war, because if we didn't then we'd lose.
Read about brinksmanship and massive retaliation. The point of such a large nuclear stockpile was to contain the Soviets without bothering with a massive standing army, which it was felt would be bad for the US. After Eisenhower was replaced by that chump Kennedy, that got thrown out the window, and the US started manufacturing everything the "military-industrial complex" could ever want. Way, way more than they could ever need.

Strategic nukes were more than enough to keep the Soviets in check. And there was no need to fight proxy wars unless they genuinely threatened American interests. Most of the time, the most obvious example being Vietnam, they weren't. You didn't NEED nukes to win a war, you used them to save money while achieving the same result - deterrance - as spending much more on conventional arms. A shame that was forgotten.

I'm not suggesting crossing the alps, I'm just assuming that if they could conquer France and West Germany, Italy would be cut off from any aid, and wouldn't be able to hold out for long. It's not like there were a whole lot of troop in Italy, anyway.
You are aware that in order to conquer a country, it is normally necessary to cross their border? Italy is not as dependent upon foriegn trade and resources as Britain in WWII. They could survive. And if France fell, where the hell do you thing the NATO troops would go? Surely they wouldn't ALL go the England?

The real threat to Italy comes from paratroops, as the Alps are easy to defend with a competent military force (though, we are talking about Italy here). I have no idea how many of those the WP had, but I do know that they were very, very good. But paratroops are always vulnerable, which is part of the reason so many got killed in Crete - peasants stabbed them while they were helpless. Italians would do the same, so the best use of them would be to seize a corridor through which the Russians could pour troops. Not easy.

The Rhine would be an obstacle, I guess. But it's not exactly impassable terrain, and the Russians also have the option of following Hitler's footsteps by swinging north through Belgium. Once they get into France, the terrain is perfect for tanks to roll. What are French resistance fighters going to do, anyway (not to mention the fact that France always had a sizable population which supported the USSR)? It wouldn't be like WW2 or modern Iraq where they could snipe at foot soldiers. I'm sure the Soviets would have no problem leveling any city that resisted them, and de Gaulle would have been executed immediately.
The Rhine is in Belgium as well, you know? And France had a sizable population of Communists. The majority didn't actually support the USSR. They just didn't particular like those filthy Anglo-Saxons, De Gaulle included - hell, he was probably personally responsible for much Anglophobia in France.

French resistance fighters would do exactly what they did in WWII; sabotage, harassment, assassination, espionage, etc. That probably includes sniping at foot soldiers. And if you think the Soviets are going to "level" Paris or Bordeaux, you're a fool. They're too valuable, and levelling a residential area is a sure-fire way to push neutral people into the enemy camp. America discovered that for themselves several times in its history.

Also, De Gaulle would almost certainly be kept alive. You'll forgive me for channelling Darth Vader for a moment: "If he could be turned, he could become a great asset." De Gaulle was too valuable to execute outright. Besides, making martyrs is always bad for business. So's regicide, which would cause Russia to lose a great deal of whatever international support it had.

If the USSR can hit Britain with rockets from eastern Europe, then that makes it even easier for them. Considering that the coalition did rather poorly at shooting down Iraqi Scuds during the Gulf War, I DOUBT that they'd be able to shoot down Russian missiles, especially as many as they were capable of launching. And how is the US going to flood Britain with planes and material when all of the airfields are destroyed?
I was under the impression that quite a few scuds were shot down. Regardless, you have quite the imagination when it comes to Soviet accuracy. They wouldn't even know where "all" the airfields were, let alone be able to hit them. Especially when Britain started making more of them.

Really don't see Iceland and Scandinavia as having the logistical support necessary to base a significant number of troops. They could launch some raids from there, but not enough to really effect things.
Iceland and Scandinavia are more than capable of handling significant numbers of troops temporarily. It's not like they're setting up shop there, they're transit points. Besides, bases in Norway and possibly Sweden put the US in range of Moscow quite comfortably. I'm sure that'll be great for Russian morale.

I have no idea how many carriers might be destroyed. I just think it's a mistake to assume that they'd all be operational throughout the fighting. And good luck doing any heavy bombing with a few fighter-bombers launched from carriers, when they'd have to go through massive numbers of interceptors and SAMs.
Masada was right when he said no carriers are getting taken out except by submarines. Unless the yanks lose a few in the Baltic or something early on, they only have subs to fear, and they can handle them comfortably. After all, as Masada also said, the WP only really had two viable naval bases. It's not like the French would let them have Marseilles or Bordeaux with all its facilities intact.

Why would you need heavy bombing? Any bombing in the early stages of the war would be tactical. It's not like the USSR has SAMs everywhere. Or are you thinking they're magic again? Not to mention the fueling problems.

They TRIED going through the soft underbelly, and they spent a year fighting bloody battles in Italy to no purpose. It doesn't matter where the US lands troops, if the WP can detect it (and they WOULD detect any large invasion attempt- do you think a submarine or spotter plane can't spot a massive convoy of troops?) then they can be there, waiting, with much larger numbers and embedded artillery.
Conqueing Italy was purposeless? Besides, Churchill's plan involved attacking the Balkans, not Italy. Do you honestly think a spotter plane would actually make it to a position where it could see said troops? It'd be shot out of the sky. Subs are different, but they'd have to already be in position to notice movements. That takes luck as much as skill.

And you think the USSR is magic again. Simply knowing where the enemy is going to attack you sure as hell doesn't guarantee you can have troops there. Once again, rails don't give you free movement in real life, okay? It takes more than a single turn to move an arty from Brest to Athens. Besides, the initial invasion would be to gain a beachhead. The large-scale stuff would follow.

While I do think that they would launch them, like I said above, I think that if they DIDN'T launch them then NATO would have very little chance of victory.
And you'd be wrong, for reasons I've previously stated.

The thing about guerrilla resistance is, it's very effective against us because we have a free media and we're very concerned about our public image. It doesn't work so well against a country like the Soviets who have no qualms about destroying any opposition. Or do you think that some civilians with rifles and home-made bombs would be able to fight an open battle against massed tanks and artillery?
:eek: :rotfl: :lol: :crazyeye: :rotfl:
I don't have nearly enough smilies to encapsulate how hilarious that is. Do you know anything about guerrilla warfare? It just became painfully obvious you are way out of your depth here, upon reading that one sentence. That's not how guerrilla warfare works son, the whole point is to avoid such open battles. To use some boxing terminology, to "stick and move." Go in, blow stuff up, and get the hell out before the cavalry arrives. I'll channel Star Wars again: the Rebels didn't do so well on Hoth, did they? Or at Endor, until the shield went down.

Guerrilla warfare is about making it more expensive, both in lives and materiel, not to mention cash, for an enemy to fight you than it is for them to leave. If you're trying to overthrow someone, it's a little different, but if you're trying to force them out, that's all that is needed. The final movement of guerrilla warfare is the switch to conventional warfare, and the US could handle that part nicely.

As for qualms, you are aware of the atrocities committed by the US in the Philippines, Vietnam, and elsewhere, aren't you? "Winning hearts and minds" the old-fashioned way: rape, murder, and looting. What more could a democracy want? In war, both side gives a damn about their public image. That's what propaganda is for. Everything that contradicts it is a filthy lie.

I'd like to see some sources or statistics that would prove this.
Those books I mentioned. I'll find them, I keep forgetting. You'll note I don't need sources for you stuff, since I know it's wrong.

They might not have loved the party, but they sure did fight for it. After all, the soviets did horrible, horrible things to anyone who deserted... I think that might prove to be a powerful motivating factor.
They fought for Mother Russia. Desertion becomes far more attractive when you're losing. As Russia would. Again, the Baltic states and others wouldn't really need much incentive to turn.

Not the toughest of opponents, of course. But that's not the point. The point is that they displayed an extremely powerful command of logistics , firepower, and tactics, despite all the losses they suffered during the war. They managed to move their entire army across Russia, and keep it a secret, too. It's not that they NEEDED 3 months, Staline USED the 3 months because it allowed him to set up the most one-sided fight possible. Why take risks when you don't have to?
Exactly, a one-sided fight. Which Europe wouldn't be. Unless he spent several months moving troops there as well, in which case the West wouldn't be caught by surprise, as Japan was. It remained a secret from Japan because Japan's espionage service was pretty much dead by this point - and had never been that good to begin with, especially in Russia. Europe's wasn't - it was very, very good.

It displayed more command of firepower than Japan; not impressive. Decent logistics; not hard with a massive army that's not currently doing much. Need to do something with them, or they'll rape 2 million women in East Berlin. Oh wait, they did. Tactics were fine, the Russians were pretty good at that. But their tactics involve the aforementioned 'marching through minefields as if they weren't there.' Not exactly a good idea when your enemy really does have mines, unlike the Japanese.

Stalin withdrew from Berlin? That's news to me. I would say that if he was afraid of anything, it would only be nuclear weapons. And he may have been sane enough to simply not WANT a war, even if he could win.
There's this little thing called the Berlin Airlift. You may want to look into it. Ground-breaking use of air power and all that.

Stalin didn't fear nuclear weapons. He said so himself, shocking the world. He knew the US didn't have enough to cause him any serious problems. And if Stalin thought he could win a war, he'd fight it. Witness the gobbling of the Baltics, Ukraine and Poland. Finland he pulled out of when it become obvious it would cost too much. You think Europe wouldn't cost more? Stalin was one of the greatest practitioners of realpolitick of all time. He wouldn't back down if he didn't have too. Why give up what you can hold onto?

Two reasons come to mind. One, they weren't really enemies with the western allies at that point. Two, the USA had (the capability to build) nuclear weapons, and the USSR did not. That's a pretty powerful trump card. Logistical support would also have been a big issue.
They weren't enemies with Finland either, didn't stop them from invading, did it? Secondly, Stalin knew the US only had two nukes when it went after Japan. His espionage service was the best in the world at the time. You are aware of how the USSR learnt how to build said nukes themselves, aren't you? A combination of their own scientists and some damn good spying. It was a non-existent trump card. The USSR was under no credible nuclear threat while Stalin lived.

I thought you just said they were a logistical powerhouse? There would be far less logistics involved in invading an area you already have troops than moving them to frigging Manchuria. You also seem to ignore the logistical problems with a war in the sixties, seventies or eighties, which would be worse.

If this is a US military nut then it might well cost more than a Russian tank :crazyeye:
Seriously though, the T-55 also tended to just not break down very much, so if it did break down, it was probably because something was seriously wrong with it.
Things have a tendency to break down much more if they're in a combat situation. Guns seldom jam when used only on the parade ground and oiled every day. They do so far more when you take them into battle and wade through rivers. Same with all equipment.

OK, so why do you think Nato would quickly gain air superiority? Do you think that our fighters were so much better that they would be able to shoot down large quantities of Soviet planes very quickly? Because that's a point you'll have to justify.
I admit that I don't know a whole lot about the performance capabilities of either side's airframes, though.
I wouldn't say NATO planes were a great deal better. The Soviets had some very, very good aircraft. But they weren't as good, and that's a problem. Nor were their pilots. By no means would NATO dominate, but they would win.

China at that time simply didn't have any capability to project force outside of it's own borders. Most of it's planes didn't even have the ability to hit Taiwan, let alone Russia, and it's soldiers were needed to maintain control of the citizens.
Russia is closer to China than Taiwan, if you hadn't noticed. And the PLA was - and is - massively popular in China. Chinese citizens didn't need controlling - with all due respect to Jackie Chan - unless your war is happening during the Tibetan fracas or the Cultural Revolution. China was more than capable of reaching Vladivostok, Taipei, or anywhere else they wanted. Hell, they may even use the opportunity to attack India again, which I hadn't thought of.

Why wouldn't they have that capacity? It's not like they didn't have refineries. Besides, they'd have all the fuel necessary for a war stockpiled before the fighting began. It would take a long time for a fuel production shortage to effect the actual fighting. In the longterm, they could easily strong arm Turkey into helping them if they succeeded in occupying Western Europe.
If Russia was capable of stockpiling that much oil, they wouldn't have imported it. Tanks use a lot of fuel in combat. So does everything else. Fuel shortages effected the Allies in WWII, and they controlled the whole frigging ME at the time. Fuel shortages would effect the USSR very, very quickly. Not to mention that they'd need it more anyway. They're the ones extending force beyond their borders the most. And there'd be no long-term, the war wouldn't last six months, as I've already stated.

Probably at least one of these things would happen. I have no idea, really.
The one thing that can be predicted about the ME to this day is that whatever is least rational and most brutal will happen.

Radiation sickness can take YEARS to manifest. And if they did hit an area with a low-yield nuke, and then drive a shielded vehicle through, it probably wouldn't suffer too much radiation. The effects were so bad at Hiroshima because there were survivors LIVING right next to the blast site, completely unprotected.
Radiation sickness can also manifest very, very quickly, especially if you happen to drive through a freshly nuked area in an inadequately shielded tank. And I don't think the Soviets would be too bothered about making sure those things were radiation-proof, do you? And low-yield nukes still leave a fair amount of radiation.

Japan, like China, did not have any capability to project force outside its borders (and in fact, still does not, since that's forbidden by its constitution). There might be a war between North and South Korea, but both sides would be pretty much on their own until the fighting in Europe settled down. Hard to tell who'd win that one, but I'm sure it would be incredibly bloody.
Japan actually has very good force projetion capabilities today, though they're forbidden to use them. It was industrialised however, and that means that said capability wouldn't elude them for long, especially if they were frightened. And there were more than a few US troops in Japan at the time, and they did have force projection capacity. Lot of it.

Depending on the time period, either North or South Korea could win. You're right though it would be very bloody.

The Americans could land troops in Vladivostok if they wanted, but Siberia is not known to be a hospitable place. I don't see what they could accomplish by being there? The Soviets could just wait for them to run out of supplies and then die during the winter.
Depriving Russia of their only major port wouldn't be a major feat? A crippling one, perhaps? Also, all Russia's oil, and much of its manufacturing base, is in Siberia, if America felt the need to push that far. They probably wouldn't, since they wouldn't need to. And US troops would be kept extremely well-supplied through that major Russian port they'd just taken.

Russia would be fighting a two-front war, Stalin's greatest fear in WWII, when he was petrified Japan would attack him. It wouldn't survive long without suing for peace. The question would be what the terms were, and if the West was willing to give it to them. There's also more than a little chance of another Russian Revolution if the capitalist imperialist pigs were to smite them in war.
 
For America not to use nukes it would have had to have been an orderly retreat from West Germany and into France and the Low Countries. Assuming that was the case every bridge and useful piece of infrastructure would have been knocked out. The Soviets would have begun to run into serious supplies issues quite early on. That isn't to say that they wouldn't have driven hard into Europe... but it likely would have been quite an elastic front liable to snap when gaps in aircover and other factors came into play.
It's not like the Soviets weren't capable of crossing rivers/constructing new infrastructure where needed. Their tanks were even designed to move through a river, underwater, with no problems.


Not a single carrier would go down period except to submarines.
Yes, that's what I assumed they would use. Well, that and some land-launched missiles. That "except" clause there is a big one... it's sort of like saying "we wouldn't lose any soldiers, except to firearms.


Super sabers. Although the war in the air would have been quite close it would likely have fallen in NATOs favor. I don't tend to think it would have been the decisive factor in neutralizing Soviet spearheads they were designed around the notion of NATO air-superiority and were stocked up correspondingly on AA and SAMS.
Why would a Super Saber be better than a Mig-19, exactly

Vladivostok would have been sufficient to render the Soviet Far Eastern Fleet irrelevant in any case they couldn't have hit much else.

They blow up the drydocks... and your fleet is now on working on borrowed time. They take out your fuel and supplies and bits of your fleet will fall away starting tomorrow. Naval ships at war burn through frighteningly large numbers of parts.
[/QUOTE]
The Far Eastern Fleet would be useless, anyway. Destroying it would be a symbolic victory only.


They couldn't have stockpiled all the fuel. Thirty days of fighting with how many vehicles to supply? Including all the thousands upon thousands of trucks and trains required to heft that fuel to the front? Your talking about fueling hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of vehicles from stockpiles? The Soviets had stockpiles but nobody period had that much in the way of fuel lying around.
I'm saying that the stockpiles they'd have before a war began, combined with their own refining capacity and war time rationing on civilian use would be enough for them to fight with, at least for the critical first month.

I personally believe the Soviets would have made it into France and probably pocketed NATO forces somewhere probably in the South. But at that point your looking at Soviet lines running for thousands of kilometers with a large section devoid of viable supply lines because of destroyed bridges et al. Supply shortages would have been a reality correspondingly. Air-cover would have been sporadic as Soviet bases got further and further away. Even assuming the Soviets had managed to take half of NATOs airbases your still looking at a less than optimum spread of air power.
Getting supplies that far would be difficult, yes. But I still think they could have found ways to keep their army supplied. Engineers can build new bridges fairly quickly, you know. And, NATO troops might have had more trouble destroying bridges then you'd think- they'd probably be clogged with fleeing civilians, and I suspect that the governments of France and West Germany would not be willing to use a scorched earth strategy. For air-cover, as they got farther away they'd also be reducing the number of NATO bases available, and thus reducing the need for air cover.
 
Sharwood said:
Strategic nukes were more than enough to keep the Soviets in check. And there was no need to fight proxy wars unless they genuinely threatened American interests. Most of the time, the most obvious example being Vietnam, they weren't. You didn't NEED nukes to win a war, you used them to save money while achieving the same result - deterrance - as spending much more on conventional arms. A shame that was forgotten.

In general, I can agree, but strategic nukes really aren't a pancea for defense, especially because of M.A.D. Strategic nukes are more of a Jones type situation. If your belligerent neighbor has them, then you want them too, just for show, just so you can set the stage for M.A.D.

Generally nukes are not a replacement for conventional forces for sensitive situations. For instance, we couldn't use nukes in Desert Storm/Desert Shield---the oil, the civilians, etc... And strategic nukes have a poor ability for tactical, proportionate response. For protecting hostages/civilians, nukes are poor option.

If you have a quick response, rapid deployment, and a deep no man's land that stalls an invading enemy, then maybe nukes would be all you needed.


And I was under the impression that the USA fought intervened in Asia because it genuinely wanted to expand Western influences against ChiCom, not to fight proxy with the Soviets for kicks.
 
Why would America, which had suffered nothing except maybe some bombing raids over the Bering Strait and the North Pole, be "physically unable to fight on?" The second war breaks out, if not earlier, the US would immediately mobilise, factory output would switch from peacetime to wartime production, and millions of people would voluntarily enlist to fight those "godless commie bastards." Also, I give the Soviets six months, tops, beyond the WP's borders. Not years.
They also would have lost quite a few (probably most) of their ground forces in Europe. You're not going to be able to replace losses that big with a few months of wartime production, and the WP countries would be building just as fast. If they were unable to launch an invasion of Europe, then they wouldn't really be able to do much of anything.

And Russian artillery wasn't exactly swimming with accuracy, you know. Mobility and range are only part of the issue with artillery. Besides, you know the best way to avoid artillery? Run towards it, and take it out. That becomes even more likely once the Soviets actually penetrate WG, not just from NATO, but from guerrillas.
It's not particularly difficult to hit a large group of tanks or mechanized infantry. Especially when it's fortified in a known position, the Fulga gap. Oh, and ESPECIALLY not if you're using nuclear artillery shells. If you run towards it, you might take some out, but then enemy troops can just move behind you and surround your forces. The M 60 tanks weren't particularly fast either, they could only more at something like 30 MPH.

They'd almost certainly have some advanced notice. There's an old adage about wars favouring the defensive side. With few exceptions, it's true. If NATO notices Russian troop movements in East Germany, all of a sudden the Fulga Gap becomes much more fortified. If Russia notices American troops steaming across the Atlantic, they pre-empt. Which is part of what makes such a war difficult to start - the one starting it is guaranteed to take massive losses, even if they eventually win. So if one side notices the other is ready for them, they're far more likely to back off. Unless they're desperate, in which case the war is even more in favour of their opponents.
Hmm where's that Patton quote where he talks about how offense has won out every time in history... I dunno I can't find it or remember it exactly. But generally, if you're on the defensive it's because you CAN'T go offensive. This goes double in a war with tactical nukes. How could they fortify the Fulga Gap? The more troops they put in there, the more they risk losing to a nuclear barrage.

Read about brinksmanship and massive retaliation. The point of such a large nuclear stockpile was to contain the Soviets without bothering with a massive standing army, which it was felt would be bad for the US. After Eisenhower was replaced by that chump Kennedy, that got thrown out the window, and the US started manufacturing everything the "military-industrial complex" could ever want. Way, way more than they could ever need.
Agreed, although I'd say that despite Eisenhower's famous speach warning of the dangers of the military-industrial complex, he certainly did his share to expand it. But Reagan just... man what a waste of money.:mad:

You are aware that in order to conquer a country, it is normally necessary to cross their border? Italy is not as dependent upon foriegn trade and resources as Britain in WWII. They could survive. And if France fell, where the hell do you thing the NATO troops would go? Surely they wouldn't ALL go the England?
Well I'd say that most of NATO's forces would be destroyed, if France fell. And I wasn't proposing that they parachute in (although of course that can supplement any invasion). I was thinking that, after blitzing through France, they'd have plenty of time for a more leisurely invasion of Italy from France. It's not like there aren't any roads. And I'd think that, as soon as Italy saw them doing that, they'd surrender to save themselves the destruction that would happen in a real invasion.


French resistance fighters would do exactly what they did in WWII; sabotage, harassment, assassination, espionage, etc. That probably includes sniping at foot soldiers. And if you think the Soviets are going to "level" Paris or Bordeaux, you're a fool. They're too valuable, and levelling a residential area is a sure-fire way to push neutral people into the enemy camp. America discovered that for themselves several times in its history.
No you just level whichever areas of the city have the most guerrilla activity. Then you capture the leaders, torture them until they talk, and then also kill all of their family and friends for good measure. You know, just like the Soviets did with dissidents in their own country. They were pretty good at that.

Also, De Gaulle would almost certainly be kept alive. You'll forgive me for channelling Darth Vader for a moment: "If he could be turned, he could become a great asset." De Gaulle was too valuable to execute outright. Besides, making martyrs is always bad for business. So's regicide, which would cause Russia to lose a great deal of whatever international support it had.
Good point, instead of executing him they'd probably torture/brainwash him until he ordered France to surrender and proclaimed how great communism is.

I was under the impression that quite a few scuds were shot down. Regardless, you have quite the imagination when it comes to Soviet accuracy. They wouldn't even know where "all" the airfields were, let alone be able to hit them. Especially when Britain started making more of them.
The INITIAL reports were that, out of 42 Scuds engaged, 41 had been intercepted.Later the army backed that down to detecting 88 Scuds, engaging 53, and destroying 27. Some people think it was even lower. And that was with the 1990 military fighting just a few Iraqi scuds. With 1960's technology we'd be lucky to hit ANY, and the Russians had... well I don't know how many, but a lot. You don't need a lot of accuracy when you can just saturate the area with missiles. Any time you see fighters leaving or landing in an area, just launch 100 missiles at that area.

Iceland and Scandinavia are more than capable of handling significant numbers of troops temporarily. It's not like they're setting up shop there, they're transit points. Besides, bases in Norway and possibly Sweden put the US in range of Moscow quite comfortably. I'm sure that'll be great for Russian morale.
They could launch some air raids at Moscow, but that's not going to do much. Those bases would just be too far away and too limited to provide the kind of CAS that NATO would need to win a ground war.

Conqueing Italy was purposeless? Besides, Churchill's plan involved attacking the Balkans, not Italy. Do you honestly think a spotter plane would actually make it to a position where it could see said troops? It'd be shot out of the sky. Subs are different, but they'd have to already be in position to notice movements. That takes luck as much as skill.
Planes have radar, you know, and Subs have sonar. When you're transporting an intercontintal amphibious invasion force, that's a very big, hot, noisy target. It's not like the USN has cloaking devices. They didn't even have stealth technology then.

And you think the USSR is magic again. Simply knowing where the enemy is going to attack you sure as hell doesn't guarantee you can have troops there. Once again, rails don't give you free movement in real life, okay? It takes more than a single turn to move an arty from Brest to Athens. Besides, the initial invasion would be to gain a beachhead. The large-scale stuff would follow.
Yes, and the USN can't instantly transport troops or establish beachheads. The soviest can certainly move an army from Poland to Athens faster then the USN can sail there from New York. And even if they do get a beach head set up, one low-yield nuke is all it will take to destroy it.

And you'd be wrong, for reasons I've previously stated.

:eek: :rotfl: :lol: :crazyeye: :rotfl:
I don't have nearly enough smilies to encapsulate how hilarious that is. Do you know anything about guerrilla warfare? It just became painfully obvious you are way out of your depth here, upon reading that one sentence. That's not how guerrilla warfare works son, the whole point is to avoid such open battles. To use some boxing terminology, to "stick and move." Go in, blow stuff up, and get the hell out before the cavalry arrives. I'll channel Star Wars again: the Rebels didn't do so well on Hoth, did they? Or at Endor, until the shield went down.

Guerrilla warfare is about making it more expensive, both in lives and materiel, not to mention cash, for an enemy to fight you than it is for them to leave. If you're trying to overthrow someone, it's a little different, but if you're trying to force them out, that's all that is needed. The final movement of guerrilla warfare is the switch to conventional warfare, and the US could handle that part nicely.

As for qualms, you are aware of the atrocities committed by the US in the Philippines, Vietnam, and elsewhere, aren't you? "Winning hearts and minds" the old-fashioned way: rape, murder, and looting. What more could a democracy want? In war, both side gives a damn about their public image. That's what propaganda is for. Everything that contradicts it is a filthy lie.
Give me SOME credit, OK? I know what guerrilla warfare is. I wasn't suggesting that it would be a good idea for resistance fighters to try an open battle. I was suggesting that, if Guerrilla warfare doesn't work, then the only possible alternative is an open battle, and since that's ridiculous, then the resistance fighters would be ineffective.

You need to realize that this is the Soviets- the "evil Empire"- not the US. Unlike us, they did not have a free media to report there atrocities. They had a secret police which was highly experienced at snuffing out resistance, and they were perfectly willing to kill as many civilians as necessary to do so. Guerrilla warfare just doesn't work against an enemy like that.

Those books I mentioned. I'll find them, I keep forgetting. You'll note I don't need sources for you stuff, since I know it's wrong.
I don't really mind if you don't cite sources, because I doubt I'll be able to dig up any random book that you have lieing around. But I'd like it if you'd just give me some more DETAILS. For example you've repeatedly said that NATO subs and aircraft were a lot better. In what ways were they better? We need more numbers and concrete facts to go on, here.

Exactly, a one-sided fight. Which Europe wouldn't be. Unless he spent several months moving troops there as well, in which case the West wouldn't be caught by surprise, as Japan was. It remained a secret from Japan because Japan's espionage service was pretty much dead by this point - and had never been that good to begin with, especially in Russia. Europe's wasn't - it was very, very good.
I'm not trying to argue, at all, that Russia had the capability to conquer all of Europe in 1945. I'm just trying to show that their army, even then, was extremely impressive. If anything, there were rather paranoid that Germany might someday invade them again, but if they had been weak then they wouldn't have been able to occupy Eastern Europe and Manchuria.

There's this little thing called the Berlin Airlift. You may want to look into it. Ground-breaking use of air power and all that.
Right, but you said that he WITHDREW from there. He didn't. He simply gave up on his efforts to annex west Berlin. Hardly a sign of weakness and fear if he's trying to annex west Berlin.

Stalin didn't fear nuclear weapons. He said so himself, shocking the world. He knew the US didn't have enough to cause him any serious problems. And if Stalin thought he could win a war, he'd fight it. Witness the gobbling of the Baltics, Ukraine and Poland. Finland he pulled out of when it become obvious it would cost too much. You think Europe wouldn't cost more? Stalin was one of the greatest practitioners of realpolitick of all time. He wouldn't back down if he didn't have too. Why give up what you can hold onto?
Yeah... I wouldn't trust anything Stalin says. He was not known for being entirely honest. I'm sure attacking Europe would have been horrific, though, and that's probably another reason he never tried.

They weren't enemies with Finland either, didn't stop them from invading, did it? Secondly, Stalin knew the US only had two nukes when it went after Japan. His espionage service was the best in the world at the time. You are aware of how the USSR learnt how to build said nukes themselves, aren't you? A combination of their own scientists and some damn good spying. It was a non-existent trump card. The USSR was under no credible nuclear threat while Stalin lived.
But it took the Soviets until 1950 to build their own bomb. The US probably could have built new bombs in less than 3 months, if they had really wanted to. They just didn't need any more, after the war was over.

Things have a tendency to break down much more if they're in a combat situation. Guns seldom jam when used only on the parade ground and oiled every day. They do so far more when you take them into battle and wade through rivers. Same with all equipment.
Sure, and the more complicated your equipment is the more likely it is to break down. NATO tank commanders would probably not have a great amount of time to repair their tanks during the actual fighting, no matter how good they were at it.

I wouldn't say NATO planes were a great deal better. The Soviets had some very, very good aircraft. But they weren't as good, and that's a problem. Nor were their pilots. By no means would NATO dominate, but they would win.
The thing is that a small victory in the air war for NATO would actually be a net loss for them. NATO relied on air support to provide support fire for their troops, whereas the Russians relied much more on artillery. So even if NATO did, eventually, win out in the air, that wouldn't be enough to help them. They'd need to win complete air superiority almost immediately so that they could begin bombing the WP tank divisions.

Russia is closer to China than Taiwan, if you hadn't noticed. And the PLA was - and is - massively popular in China. Chinese citizens didn't need controlling - with all due respect to Jackie Chan - unless your war is happening during the Tibetan fracas or the Cultural Revolution. China was more than capable of reaching Vladivostok, Taipei, or anywhere else they wanted. Hell, they may even use the opportunity to attack India again, which I hadn't thought of.
What are they gonna do, march a million foot soldiers across the himalayas? That's pretty much what India tried to do to them, and that didn't work so well. At that time, they simply didn't have planes with range or amphibious assault ships to invade Taiwan. Their army was almost entirely land based. They MIGHT be able to reach vladivostok, but to what end? They'd just be starting an unnecessary war and provoking a possible nuclear response from the Russians (when did China get nukes, do you know?). My guess is, China would sit the whole war out. If the rest of the war was devastated, and China was unscathed, China would be the new world superpower even without gaining any territory.

Radiation sickness can also manifest very, very quickly, especially if you happen to drive through a freshly nuked area in an inadequately shielded tank. And I don't think the Soviets would be too bothered about making sure those things were radiation-proof, do you? And low-yield nukes still leave a fair amount of radiation.
I dunno, I mean the tanks WERE designed to be shielded against radiation. That was never tested, of course, but even if they weren't, having a thick layer of metal does rather help in keeping down the radiation. If you're only in the radioactive area for a few hours, and you're inside a shield of metal the whole time, you really wouldn't have any major problems from radiation sickness. At worst you might develop cancer 20 years down the road.


Japan actually has very good force projetion capabilities today, though they're forbidden to use them. It was industrialised however, and that means that said capability wouldn't elude them for long, especially if they were frightened. And there were more than a few US troops in Japan at the time, and they did have force projection capacity. Lot of it.
They can't just instantly start producing tanks and carriers, though. It takes a long time to convert a car factory into a war factory. Even if they could, they probably wouldn't be willing to launch a full scale invasion into eastern Russia. Remember that all of Japan was still suffering from the effects of WW2 at that time. I think that, at most, they might intervene in Korea or China if they were threatened. Really doubt that the US troops there would make a difference too- if there were enough to really make a difference, they'd probably get moved to Europe before the fighting started.


Depriving Russia of their only major port wouldn't be a major feat? A crippling one, perhaps? Also, all Russia's oil, and much of its manufacturing base, is in Siberia, if America felt the need to push that far. They probably wouldn't, since they wouldn't need to. And US troops would be kept extremely well-supplied through that major Russian port they'd just taken.
Ports don't really do anything when they're blockaded, do they? The soviets could just destroy the port facilities as they leave. And the oil fields and refineries are located far west of there anyway. Any significant landing of troops there would be even more difficult than landing in europe, since the american forces would have to be shipped across the entire pacific, giving the Russians ample time to prepare for them.
 
pi-r8 said:
It's not like the Soviets weren't capable of crossing rivers/constructing new infrastructure where needed. Their tanks were even designed to move through a river, underwater, with no problems.

Its supply trucks couldn't swim so in any case the armoured spearheads would have been held up for fuel et al.

pi-r8 said:
Yes, that's what I assumed they would use. Well, that and some land-launched missiles. That "except" clause there is a big one... it's sort of like saying "we wouldn't lose any soldiers, except to firearms.

What missiles? Anything and I stress anything with sufficient range to hit an American carrier battle-group at sea in a stand off blockade/interdict would be assumed to have a nuclear warhead on board simply because the Soviet had nothing analogous to a cruise missile i.e anything accurate enough to hit a moving ship at sea from a great distance to make up for this they would have had to have put nuclear warheads on it (or so the assumption would have been). The same thing applies with Britain, anything with sufficient range to hit British bases, over a certain range and size is going to be assumed to be hot and will meet immediate nuclear retaliation even before its hit the ground. Nobody will use large conventional missiles which might be mistaken for nuclear missiles if they can possible avoid it. You can't tell while its in the air and you don't wait to see (especially given the assumption that you would fire them en-mass to overwhelm anti-air defenses and at multiple targets in order to deny aircraft in the air places to land) you retaliate in full with your nuclear arsenal.

pi-r8 said:
Why would a Super Saber be better than a Mig-19, exactly

Disclaimer: I should have typed Sabre not Super Sabre my bad.

Who won the air war in Korea? Who also won it against crack Soviet "volunteers"? It wasn't the Soviet Union. It's instructive to note that the DPRK had for at least a time air superiority (including numbers) over United Nations forces... before the introduction of the Sabre. Even the Soviets themselves didn't believe they could air-superiority over Europe for long if at all. They therefore predicated there whole armoured column on that reality and correspondingly loaded them to high hell with AA.

pi-r8 said:
The Far Eastern Fleet would be useless, anyway. Destroying it would be a symbolic victory only.

Rubbish. It would have kept the whole of the Pacific Fleet occupied and forced troops to remain in Japan in anticipation of a Soviet attack. Without the Far Eastern Fleet and Vladivostok all those assets are freed up for a war in Europe.

pi-r8 said:
I'm saying that the stockpiles they'd have before a war began, combined with their own refining capacity and war time rationing on civilian use would be enough for them to fight with, at least for the critical first month.

Two questions what are they going to achieve in that first month?
And what about after?

Which leads on to this little point.

pi-r8 said:
Getting supplies that far would be difficult, yes. But I still think they could have found ways to keep their army supplied. Engineers can build new bridges fairly quickly, you know. And, NATO troops might have had more trouble destroying bridges then you'd think- they'd probably be clogged with fleeing civilians, and I suspect that the governments of France and West Germany would not be willing to use a scorched earth strategy. For air-cover, as they got farther away they'd also be reducing the number of NATO bases available, and thus reducing the need for air cover.

There wouldn't have been fleeing civilians - both sides would have told them to stay in there homes. Neither side had any incentive to hurt the people they said they were protecting. Even had they begun fleeing, it would have played into NATO hands beautifully by slowing down the Soviet spearheads and opening them up to NATO airpower. In either case NATO would have knocked out all the bridges they could get there hands. This would have included critically the Rhine bridges which were large, difficult to build and spanned a deep, swift flowing and wide river. Smaller bridges could have been repaired assuming that damage was minimal but that didn't was unlikely to happen in the days of plastic explosives - the whole bridge structure would have been bought down from multiple points. Even assuming they were foiled in some of these attempts it still would have served to slow down the Soviet advance - even had there tanks circumvented the issue by going across the rivers themselves they would still be slowed down to the speed of there supply lines. Aside from going South where the Rhine narrows or going North and attacking through the low countries the approach into France would have been very difficult to break or contest. Soviet tanks would not have been able to advance without significant support from accompanying non-amphibious things like mobile AA and SAMs. You can see the result of Soviet armour moving in unsupported on a small scale in Chechnya they got hammered by troops fired from above hiding in buildings. It's also improbable that they could have leveled all the buildings as well. Then there is the ever-present NATO air force to contend with. None of the lines of egress into France were terribly good, the Low Countries dykes would have helped canalize Soviet armour and had they tried to go into the Southerly route they would have run into more or less the same thing with a very narrow front to grind themselves against. You should also note that that isn't scorched earth per say but simply denying your enemy useful infrastructure. Scorched earth would be burning down whole cities to deny the enemy supplies or blowing up everything possible useful for the war effort including factories et al.

Your point about air-cover is fallacious as well. NATO air-cover would have been more able to concentrate and thus would have been more effective even without a proportional decline in Soviet air-power.

pi-r8 said:
Ports don't really do anything when they're blockaded, do they? The soviets could just destroy the port facilities as they leave. And the oil fields and refineries are located far west of there anyway. Any significant landing of troops there would be even more difficult than landing in europe, since the american forces would have to be shipped across the entire pacific, giving the Russians ample time to prepare for them.

Japan? I don't see why they would want to do but meh. In any case the loss of Vladivostok would more or less render the whole of the Soviet Pacific Region utterly useless to the Soviets.
 
They also would have lost quite a few (probably most) of their ground forces in Europe. You're not going to be able to replace losses that big with a few months of wartime production, and the WP countries would be building just as fast. If they were unable to launch an invasion of Europe, then they wouldn't really be able to do much of anything.
You bet your arse they can replace those losses with a few months of wartime production. Do you have any idea what the industrial capacity of the US is? To this day it's a clear number one, it's just that it's not used terribly well, leading to economic difficulties. The GDP of the entire WP was less than that of the US alone, despite the fact that the WP had greater numbers of both people and materiel. So no, they would not be building just as fast, they'd be hopelessly outmatched in a production war.

It's not particularly difficult to hit a large group of tanks or mechanized infantry. Especially when it's fortified in a known position, the Fulga gap. Oh, and ESPECIALLY not if you're using nuclear artillery shells. If you run towards it, you might take some out, but then enemy troops can just move behind you and surround your forces. The M 60 tanks weren't particularly fast either, they could only more at something like 30 MPH.
I'll give you that, it doesn't take much accuracy to hit massed brigades. Too bad that that's not how fortification works with mobile units, they'd be split into smaller groups and moved around almost at random. Look up some Israeli tank warfare plans for more info on that, there's some old ones online. And any forces attacking artillery would be suicide units, and they'd know it. Probably West German's who always knew their job was to be a speedbump. They wouldn't be supposed to survive.

Hmm where's that Patton quote where he talks about how offense has won out every time in history... I dunno I can't find it or remember it exactly. But generally, if you're on the defensive it's because you CAN'T go offensive. This goes double in a war with tactical nukes. How could they fortify the Fulga Gap? The more troops they put in there, the more they risk losing to a nuclear barrage.
I know the quote you're talking about, but that has more to do with mobility than offence. If you can move and your enemy can't, you've won. It is usually easier to defend a position than to attack it. While the best defence is a good offence, if you can't do that it's best to let your enemies fall on your spear points while you buy yourself time.

Agreed, although I'd say that despite Eisenhower's famous speach warning of the dangers of the military-industrial complex, he certainly did his share to expand it. But Reagan just... man what a waste of money.:mad:
Eisenhower at least had the temerity to regret his actions and try to change their results when he saw what was coming. Reagan was just horrible, though he did unintentionally accomplish a few things.

Well I'd say that most of NATO's forces would be destroyed, if France fell. And I wasn't proposing that they parachute in (although of course that can supplement any invasion). I was thinking that, after blitzing through France, they'd have plenty of time for a more leisurely invasion of Italy from France. It's not like there aren't any roads. And I'd think that, as soon as Italy saw them doing that, they'd surrender to save themselves the destruction that would happen in a real invasion.
If France fell NATO in Continental Europe would be shattered. But France wouldn't fall because its troops were defeated in battle, it would fall if they were outmanouevred, as happened in WWII. If that happened, they'd retreat. Assuming De Gaulle's in command - even if he weren't President yet, he would certainly be recalled for something like this - a redoubt would be established in Brittany, every major facility that couldn't be held would be blown, and any troops that couldn't reach Brittany would be ordered to cross the nearest border or go underground.

Italy would destroy all roads and block all passes through the Alps if France fell. Yugoslavia and Southern France are the only place a major land invasion of Italy can be launched from that doesn't need to cross the Alps, and neither are very suitable entry points. Italy probably wouldn't so much surrender as collapse if it came to it. It's never exactly been a stable nation since Mussolini.

No you just level whichever areas of the city have the most guerrilla activity. Then you capture the leaders, torture them until they talk, and then also kill all of their family and friends for good measure. You know, just like the Soviets did with dissidents in their own country. They were pretty good at that.
And in doing so they'd create more dissidents. This isn't somewhere they're going to rule for fifty years with an iron fist. It's a warzone. Such tactics only work long-term, not short-term. Short-term they just piss the conquered people off. Besides, the French knew very well how to organise resistance movements so that the capture of leaders didn't compromise more than a handful of people. Something they learnt from the Bolsheviks, incidentally.

Good point, instead of executing him they'd probably torture/brainwash him until he ordered France to surrender and proclaimed how great communism is.
Which he wouldn't do, but they'd certainly try.

The INITIAL reports were that, out of 42 Scuds engaged, 41 had been intercepted.Later the army backed that down to detecting 88 Scuds, engaging 53, and destroying 27. Some people think it was even lower. And that was with the 1990 military fighting just a few Iraqi scuds. With 1960's technology we'd be lucky to hit ANY, and the Russians had... well I don't know how many, but a lot. You don't need a lot of accuracy when you can just saturate the area with missiles. Any time you see fighters leaving or landing in an area, just launch 100 missiles at that area.
Sounds like America was just blatantly lying then. Oh well.

They could launch some air raids at Moscow, but that's not going to do much. Those bases would just be too far away and too limited to provide the kind of CAS that NATO would need to win a ground war.
Any raids on Moscow would be for morale purposes. It's not like the raid on Tokyoin early 1942 accomplished a lot either, but it scared the Japanese, and lifted Allied spirits. Extra points if they actually take out some Soviet leaders, which is unlikely. And those bases were close enough that they could hit infrastructure behind Soviet lines, which would slow the advance even more.

Planes have radar, you know, and Subs have sonar. When you're transporting an intercontintal amphibious invasion force, that's a very big, hot, noisy target. It's not like the USN has cloaking devices. They didn't even have stealth technology then.
Planes need to be in the air for said radar to matter, and sonar still requires the enemy be reasonably close.

Yes, and the USN can't instantly transport troops or establish beachheads. The soviest can certainly move an army from Poland to Athens faster then the USN can sail there from New York. And even if they do get a beach head set up, one low-yield nuke is all it will take to destroy it.
The USN wouldn't have to sail straight to Athens from New York though, They'd mashal their troops somewhere closer, then go there. If somewhere like France or Greece held out - and I think both would - that makes an amphibious invasion unnecessary - it'll just be reinforcing existing positions and preparing a counter-assault. If not, there are still plenty of viable invasion points.

Give me SOME credit, OK? I know what guerrilla warfare is. I wasn't suggesting that it would be a good idea for resistance fighters to try an open battle. I was suggesting that, if Guerrilla warfare doesn't work, then the only possible alternative is an open battle, and since that's ridiculous, then the resistance fighters would be ineffective.
Except that guerilla warfare would be effective.

You need to realize that this is the Soviets- the "evil Empire"- not the US. Unlike us, they did not have a free media to report there atrocities. They had a secret police which was highly experienced at snuffing out resistance, and they were perfectly willing to kill as many civilians as necessary to do so. Guerrilla warfare just doesn't work against an enemy like that.
Because guerilla warfare was so terribly ineffective against Nazi Germany, which certainly had no brutal and efficient secret police of its own? Guerilla warfare most certainly does work against an enemy like that. There was guerilla resistance in Estonia and elsewhere behind the Iron Curtain for much, much longer than people realise. Lasted about a generation, it was just hopelessly outnumbered. Very different situation in somewhere like france or West Germany my friend.

I'm not trying to argue, at all, that Russia had the capability to conquer all of Europe in 1945. I'm just trying to show that their army, even then, was extremely impressive. If anything, there were rather paranoid that Germany might someday invade them again, but if they had been weak then they wouldn't have been able to occupy Eastern Europe and Manchuria.
I've already said that they were relatively strong. Not absolutely strong. It's not very impressive to be stronger than Poland in 1944, or Japan in 1945. Their absolute weakness is actually what prompted Stalin to be so damn insistent about holding Poland and East Germany.

Right, but you said that he WITHDREW from there. He didn't. He simply gave up on his efforts to annex west Berlin. Hardly a sign of weakness and fear if he's trying to annex west Berlin.
He withdrew from his attempt to force the West out of Berlin, which was motivated by fear. Fear of a large Western military enclave deep within Soviet territory. He wouldn't be afraid of an enclave if it was no threat.

Yeah... I wouldn't trust anything Stalin says. He was not known for being entirely honest. I'm sure attacking Europe would have been horrific, though, and that's probably another reason he never tried.
Stalin was very, very honest behind closed doors. Remember his statement about the Pope? Stalin knew he had no reason to fear nukes, so he didn't. If he'd lasted ten years longer, he'd be afraid of them, but not before he died.

But it took the Soviets until 1950 to build their own bomb. The US probably could have built new bombs in less than 3 months, if they had really wanted to. They just didn't need any more, after the war was over.
Try 1949. The US had very few bombs until the Eisenhower administration. The weapons they had were difficult to produce and shockingly inefficient. The trick was a new fueling system, which wasn't developed until about 1954. The US churned out those things as fast as it could after WWII, in anticipation of a war with Russia that never came.

Sure, and the more complicated your equipment is the more likely it is to break down. NATO tank commanders would probably not have a great amount of time to repair their tanks during the actual fighting, no matter how good they were at it.
But NATO tanks were far easier to repair, so breakdowns would be significantly less problematic.

The thing is that a small victory in the air war for NATO would actually be a net loss for them. NATO relied on air support to provide support fire for their troops, whereas the Russians relied much more on artillery. So even if NATO did, eventually, win out in the air, that wouldn't be enough to help them. They'd need to win complete air superiority almost immediately so that they could begin bombing the WP tank divisions.
Artillery is useless without enough air cover, and I don't believe AAs and SAMs would provide enough for the Russians, unless they advanced slowly, which they wouldn't be able to do. And NATO wouldn't need complete air superiority, they'd need local air superiority. Two entirely different things. The first is ext to impossible, the second is easily managed.

What are they gonna do, march a million foot soldiers across the himalayas? That's pretty much what India tried to do to them, and that didn't work so well. At that time, they simply didn't have planes with range or amphibious assault ships to invade Taiwan. Their army was almost entirely land based. They MIGHT be able to reach vladivostok, but to what end? They'd just be starting an unnecessary war and provoking a possible nuclear response from the Russians (when did China get nukes, do you know?). My guess is, China would sit the whole war out. If the rest of the war was devastated, and China was unscathed, China would be the new world superpower even without gaining any territory.
China successfully invaded India once - very much in the manner you described - they could certainly do so again. if the US withdrew from Taiwan it would be relatively easy pickings. Planes aren't needed when you can shell Taiwan, which China most certainly could do. A sneak attack would be very possible, as China was always feinting at Taiwan.

And China could also decide to deprive the Soviets of Mongolia or parts of Central Asia, take Vladivostok - though I doube they would, as you say it would be big risk - and would almost certainly take some of Manchuria back. Remember, there was a secret, dirty war between China and Russia in the late sixties. Mao was personally as unafraid of nukes as Stalin, only the fool didn't have anywhere near as much logic behind his thinking as Stalin did. He seemed to think his peasants were immune to them or something.

I don't think China would completely sit out the war. I think they'd be very, very cautious, but they'd certainly take advantage of the situation somehow. It would be their best ever chance to satisfy revanchism in Taiwan, Manchuria, Kashmir, Vietnam and Central Asia. If the rest of the world were devastated by war, there'd be no superpowers, certainly not China. Japan would be more likely if it survived, but regionalism would probably re-assert itself, with South Africa, Australia, Brazil, India, Japan and China becoming new hegemonies in their respective areas. Indonesia too.

I dunno, I mean the tanks WERE designed to be shielded against radiation. That was never tested, of course, but even if they weren't, having a thick layer of metal does rather help in keeping down the radiation. If you're only in the radioactive area for a few hours, and you're inside a shield of metal the whole time, you really wouldn't have any major problems from radiation sickness. At worst you might develop cancer 20 years down the road.
I think they'd be in the radioactive areas for longer though. And I doubt they'd keep themselves shut inside the whole time, those things can get very, very hot at the best of times.

They can't just instantly start producing tanks and carriers, though. It takes a long time to convert a car factory into a war factory. Even if they could, they probably wouldn't be willing to launch a full scale invasion into eastern Russia. Remember that all of Japan was still suffering from the effects of WW2 at that time. I think that, at most, they might intervene in Korea or China if they were threatened. Really doubt that the US troops there would make a difference too- if there were enough to really make a difference, they'd probably get moved to Europe before the fighting started.
It takes less time than you'd think to convert a Western factory, which is designed to switch production to different models of things regularly. The USSR often had to build new factories due to structural differences. And I'm thinking more of US troops in Japan rather than Japanese troops themselves. I believe it is still, to this day, the largest foreign concentration of US troops - though it might have changed since there's a war on. There were lots of US troops there, much to the Japanese public's dismay, since American troops weren't very well-behaved. There were numerous rapes and, oddly, car thefts. Okinawa may even have been still part of the US at the time this war started, in which case there were even more troops.

And it takes much less time for more concrete result to move those US troops into Vladivostok than to Europe. It neutralises the Soviet Far East Fleet, which was very important, regardless of what you might think. That fleet, could starve Japan, keep China occupied and tie up Australia, which was never exactly rational about the Soviet threat - there wasn't one.


Ports don't really do anything when they're blockaded, do they? The soviets could just destroy the port facilities as they leave. And the oil fields and refineries are located far west of there anyway. Any significant landing of troops there would be even more difficult than landing in europe, since the american forces would have to be shipped across the entire pacific, giving the Russians ample time to prepare for them.
Who's blockading it? Vladivostok was the most important WP port. Neutralise it in any way, and the USSR is on borrowed time. Especially if the Dardanelles are closed and Archangelsk is taken out somehow.

US troops could be shipped from Japan, Okinawa, Guam and South Korea with speed and efficiency. That's primarily why they were there, in case of a Soviet, Chinese, or North Korean threat. And it's kind of difficult to prepare for an attack on Vladivostok when most of your troops are trying to cross the Rhine. Rails don't give free movement in the real world.
 
Once the USSR disolved and we got our hands on their equipment we found that we had overestimated the USSR in almost every way. After 1980 there was simply no real contest, against modern NATO weapons the vast majority of Soviet equipment was utter crap.

Oddly enough it was our overestimation of their equipment that convinced us to produce equipment that actually could do what we though the Soviets could do and then some.
 
Well they had 11 million troops in the Red Army at that time, and they had just finished crushing Germany in the west and Japan in the east. I don't think I'd call that weak! But they didn't have the logistical or nuclear capability to take on the western allies at that time, and besides they weren't particularly bad enemies then anyway

The Russian army was a shell in 1945. They had mobilized everything that could be mobilized. It would be decades before their population rebounded to be capable of providing and sustaining an army of that size again, and it was only about to do in in 1944/45 by cannabalizing the nation after a sense.
 
As we can see, Wehrmacht was extremely effective in the beginning. But to inflict the similar damage (about 2 mln of enemy soldiers), their casualties on Eastern front were 3-4 times higher than in France.

You are not including the effects of a route. More instuctive would be looking at casualties before either sides collapse.

And they way you massaged the numbers there is dispicable. Use a consistant method or don't do it at all.
 
You are not including the effects of a route. More instuctive would be looking at casualties before either sides collapse.

And they way you massaged the numbers there is dispicable. Use a consistant method or don't do it at all.

I was replying to the message that USSR defeated Germany by throwing people at them. The numbers I gave are enough to see that casualties of British/French and Soviet army in the beginning of WW2 were similarly huge, comparing to German. What you mean about massaging the numbers? If I was mistaken in some numbers, correct me.
 
I was replying to the message that USSR defeated Germany by throwing people at them. The numbers I gave are enough to see that casualties of British/French and Soviet army in the beginning of WW2 were similarly huge, comparing to German. What you mean about massaging the numbers? If I was mistaken in some numbers, correct me.
I assume Patty mis-spelled 'rout.' The French were outmanoeuvred, not outfought, which is why the majority of their troops were captured, rather than killed. Moscow was considerably deeper in Russian territory than Paris was in French, rendering such a push into Russia impossible. Don't confuse a war of attrition with a war of manoeuvre. The casualties will obviously be much greater in the former.

Good to see you in history Patty. Expected luiz to beat you to this thread and back me up about Russia in 1945 before you though.
 
I think he did mean route. Paris through Beligum is a lot different than Berlin to Moscow, including fortifications.
 
I think he did mean route. Paris through Beligum is a lot different than Berlin to Moscow, including fortifications.
You might be right there.
 
I assume Patty mis-spelled 'rout.' The French were outmanoeuvred, not outfought, which is why the majority of their troops were captured, rather than killed. Moscow was considerably deeper in Russian territory than Paris was in French, rendering such a push into Russia impossible. Don't confuse a war of attrition with a war of manoeuvre. The casualties will obviously be much greater in the former.

Good to see you in history Patty. Expected luiz to beat you to this thread and back me up about Russia in 1945 before you though.

Size of soviet territory, amount of resources, weather and so on - all of this played its role for outcome of the war. But war on the Eastern front for the first 3 months was not yet a war of attrition. Don't forget that after these 3 month, 30.IX, started battle for Moscow. Germans used the same blitzkrieg strategy in both cases - concentrate forces on a small regions of front line, attack and break it, enter armoured divisions to the breaches, surround and destroy defending forces (of course it's oversimplified).

When the war of attrition actually started, casualties were lower indeed.
 
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