Soviet-German relations

[innonimatu]

Hitler became Chancellor in 1933, not 1934. Hitler also never "seized power." He was the constitutional head-of-government, appointed by Himmler.

You might want to correct that slip, lest <nuke> actually mentions it!

Compare % of Polish Jews who survived WW2 and % of ethnic Poles who survived WW2.

Even in actual numbers of victims more Polish Jews died than ethnic Poles.

And deaths among ethnic Poles were not only as a result of direct extermination.

But but but... there can be no such thing as a jewish pole, wasn't that what you were implying?

 

[Domen]

But but but... there can be no such thing as a jewish pole, wasn't that what you were implying?

No, it wasn't.

I was implying that large part of non-Jewish Poles were persecuted not even nearly as much as Jewish Poles.

Only some of non-Jewish Poles (particularly those considered as elites of Polish nation) were persecuted as much as Jewish Poles.

There can be such thing as a Jewish Pole, of course.

Actually many of Jews in Poland considered themselves as both Jews & Poles (not just as Jews).

But I guess it didn't matter at all for Hitler.

Just like it didn't matter for him that German Jews considered themselves as both Jews & Germans.

 

[Dachs]

Exactly. They had problems even when fighting one Corps (not even an Army - just a Corps) in Africa.

The DAK wasn't the sole German formation in North Africa, let alone the sole Axis formation. By the summer of 1941 - less than six months after Rommel got to Libya - the Axis forces had been reorganized into a panzer group, a force equivalent in size and fighting power to a field army; although the KStN did not reflect a field force of appropriate size for the moniker, in 1943 the Axis forces in Tunisia were redesignated as an army group.

So the Eighth Army was, to be entirely fair to the British, engaged with an enemy force of more or less equivalent size and strength.

 

[Domen]

The DAK wasn't the sole German formation in North Africa, let alone the sole Axis formation. By the summer of 1941 - less than six months after Rommel got to Libya - the Axis forces had been reorganized into a panzer group

Yes, but I thought that we were discussing how well the British dealt with Germany before Germany invaded the Soviet Union - and in the Summer of 1941 the Soviet-German war was already in progress.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

The best defence is counterattack...

Perhaps.

If Stalin was an internationalist, then I am Mother Theresa.

Fair enough point. His ideological heritage was internationalist enough to be expected to show complete disregard for nation-state claims to "right of rule" and such.

That's correct, and even more correct when it comes to Stalin. A pragmatic and a powermonger, he annexed what he could, vassalized what he could, and left the rest alone. If he actually had the opportunity to perform a successful invasion of "the West", he would have done so, but the reverse also applies. The "Red Menace" paranoid concept is deservedly worthy of scorn.

It's, however, a double standard to condemn Poland's expansionist policy in Eastern Europe, and then exonerate Stalin for doing the same thing. Like I said, if Stalin was an internationalist democrat whose policies granted freedom from oppression to all the peoples of Eastern Europe, then I am Mother Theresa.

I didn't intend to exonerate Stalin, I was highlighting the fundamental difference between the two powers which together absorbed the Polish state: one who killed and otherwise removed their ruling class, and the other who engaged in wholesale extermination of the country's citizens, because their ideology regarded them as suitable for manual labor or field fertilization.

As for his activities in Eastern Europe, of course it makes sense for them to seize the initiative if they can. Stalin’s primary concern was greater security for the Soviet Union (apart from greater security for himself, that is), all his actions really flow from those two concerns. I am not in much of a position to disagree with that first concern.

The condemnation is more for dividing it with Germany before September 1939. There's a reason why the secret protocols to the MRP pact were kept secret and weren't mentioned in Soviet WWII scholarship - they reveal a darker moral view of things. As red_elk points out, they were sure pragmatically useful to the USSR.

Certainly. I’m not suggesting altruism on a communist’s part.

Discuss with ardent Communists - you may as well discuss with a brick wall. They live in their own Utopian world.

Pretty rich, coming from a Polish nationalist of all people, around whom the world’s definitions and history revolve.
Such a useless slander, “utopianism,” because for one, the modern Marxist communist is by definition not utopian, and two, really none of my positions can be honestly regarded as anything but brutally realist.

Katyn is just a drop in the sea of crimes.
Soviets targeted Polish elites just like Germans did. They were not a whit "inferior" to Nazis in extermination of Polish elites.

Certainly not. The difference being that the Nazis went after the rest of Polish society as well.

Especially the generations born in 1918 - 1920 were put to the edge of the sword.

But of course an ardent Communist like Cheezy will always demonize Nazi crimes, and whitewash Communist crimes.

I have certainly done no whitewashing here.

In fact Nazi Germany did not conduct a large scale extermination of Poles similar to that of Jews.

The very problem being that you regard Poles and Jews as being two separate entities. Maybe if you had regarded Polish Jews as Poles equal to yourselves then things might have gone better for you.

Nazi Germany also didn't put any ethnic Polish generation to the sword.

They targeted Polish elites rather than entire nation - when it comes to physical extermination.

And I'm the one accused of whitewashing crimes...

This is what Stalin had to say about "Socialism in one country"...

Spoiler :

Can the victorious Socialism of one country, which is encircled by many strong capitalist countries, regard itself as being fully guaranteed against the danger of military invasion, and hence, against attempts to restore capitalism in our country?

Can our working class and our peasantry, by their own efforts, without the serious assistance of the working class in capitalist countries, overcome the bourgeoisie of other countries in the same way as we overcame our own bourgeoisie? In other words :

Can we regard the victory of Socialism in our country as final, i.e., as being free from the dangers of military attack and of attempts to restore capitalism, assuming that Socialism is victorious only in one country and that the capitalist encirclement continues to exist?

Such are the problems that are connected with the second side of the question of the victory of Socialism in our country.

Leninism answers these problems in the negative.

Leninism teaches that "the final victory of Socialism, in the sense of full guarantee against the restoration of bourgeois relations, is possible only on an international scale" (c.f. resolution of the Fourteenth Conference of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union).

This means that the serious assistance of the international proletariat is a force without which the problem of the final victory of Socialism in one country cannot be solved.

This, of course, does not mean that we must sit with folded arms and wait for assistance from outside.

On the contrary, this assistance of the international proletariat must be combined with our work to strengthen the defence of our country, to strengthen the Red Army and the Red Navy, to mobilise the whole country for the purpose of resisting military attack and attempts to restore bourgeois relations.

This is what Lenin says on this score :

"We are living not merely in a State but in a system of States, and it is inconceivable that the Soviet Republic should continue to coexist for a long period side by side with imperialist States. Ultimately one or other must conquer. Meanwhile, a number of terrible clashes between the Soviet Republic and the bourgeois States is inevitable. This means that if the proletariat, as the ruling class, wants to and will rule, it must prove this also by military organization." (Collected Works, Vol. 24. P. 122.)

And further :

"We are surrounded by people, classes and governments which openly express their hatred for us. We must remember that we are at all times but a hair's breadth from invasion." (Collected Works, Vol. 27. P. 117.)

This is said sharply and strongly but honestly and truthfully without embellishment as Lenin was able to speak.

On the basis of these premises Stalin stated in "Problems of Leninism" that :

"The final victory of Socialism is the full guarantee against attempts at intervention, and that means against restoration, for any serious attempt at restoration can take place only with serious support from outside, only with the support of international capital.

"Hence the support of our revolution by the workers of all countries, and still more, the victory of the workers in at least several countries, is a necessary condition for fully guaranteeing the first victorious country against attempts at intervention and restoration, a necessary condition for the final victory of Socialism," (Problems of Leninism, 1937. P. 134.)

Indeed, it would be ridiculous and stupid to close our eyes to the capitalist encirclement and to think that our external enemies, the fascists, for example, will not, if the opportunity arises, make an attempt at a military attack upon the U.S.S.R. Only blind braggarts or masked enemies who desire to lull the vigilance of our people can think like that.

No less ridiculous would it be to deny that in the event of the slightest success of military intervention, the interventionists would try to destroy the Soviet system in the districts they occupied and restore the bourgeois system.

Did not Denikin and Kolchak restore the bourgeois system in the districts they occupied? Are the fascists any better than Denikin or Kolchak?

Only blockheads or masked enemies who with their boastfulness want to conceal their hostility and are striving to demobilise the people, can deny the danger of military intervention and attempts at restoration as long as the capitalist encirclement exists.

Can the victory of Socialism in one country be regarded as final if this country is encircled by capitalism, and if it is not fully guaranteed against the danger of intervention and restoration?

Clearly, it cannot, This is the position in regard to the question of the victory of Socialism in one country.

It follows that this question contains two different problems :

1. The problem of the internal relations in our country, i.e., the problem of overcoming our own bourgeoisie and building complete Socialism; and

2. The problem of the external relations of our country, i.e., the problem of completely ensuring our country against the dangers of military intervention and restoration.

We have already solved the first problem, for our bourgeoisie has already been liquidated and Socialism has already been built in the main. This is what we call the victory of Socialism, or, to be more exact, the victory of Socialist Construction in one country.

We could say that this victory is final if our country were situated on an island and if it were not surrounded by numerous capitalist countries.

But as we are not living on an island but "in a system of States," a considerable number of which are hostile to the land of Socialism and create the danger of intervention and restoration, we say openly and honestly that the victory of Socialism in our country is not yet final.

But from this it follows that the second problem is not yet solved and that it has yet to be solved.

More than that : the second problem cannot be solved in the way that we solved the first problem, i.e., solely by the efforts of our country.

The second problem can be solved only by combining the serious efforts of the international proletariat with the still more serious efforts of the whole of our Soviet people.

The international proletarian ties between the working class of the U.S.S.R. and the working class in bourgeois countries must be increased and strengthened; the political assistance of the working class in the bourgeois countries for the working class of our country must be organized in the event of a military attack on our country; and also every assistance of the working class of our country for the working class in bourgeois countries must be organized; our Red Army, Red Navy, Red Air Fleet, and the Chemical and Air Defence Society must be increased and strengthened to the utmost.

The whole of our people must be kept in a state of mobilisation and preparedness in the face of the danger of a military attack, so that no "accident" and no tricks on the part of our external enemies may take us by surprise . . .

From your letter it is evident that Comrade Urozhenko adheres to different and not quite Leninist opinions. He, it appears, asserts that "we now have the final victory of Socialism and full guarantee against intervention and the restoration of capitalism."

There cannot be the slightest doubt that Comrade Urozhenko is fundamentally wrong.

Comrade Urozhenko's assertion can be explained only by his failure to understand the surrounding reality and his ignorance of the elementary propositions of Leninism, or by empty boastfulness of a conceited young bureaucrat.

If it is true that "we have full guarantee against intervention and restoration of capitalism," then why do we need a strong Red Army, Red Navy, Red Air Fleet, a strong Chemical and Air Defence Society, more and stronger ties with the international proletariat?

Would it not be better to spend the milliards that now go for the purpose of strengthening the Red Army on other needs and to reduce the Red Army to the utmost, or even to dissolve it altogether?

People like Comrade Urozhenko, even if subjectively they are loyal to our cause, are objectively dangerous to it because by their boastfulness they - willingly or unwillingly (it makes no difference!) - lull the vigilance of our people, demobilise the workers and peasants and help the enemies to take us by surprise in the event of international complications.

As for the fact that, as it appears, you, Comrade Ivanov, have been "removed from propaganda work and the question has been raised of your fitness to remain in the Y.C.L.," you have nothing to fear.

If the people in the Regional Committee of the Y.C.L. really want to imitate Chekov's Sergeant Prishibeyev, you can be quite sure that they will lose on this game.

Prishibeyevs are not liked in our country.

Now you can judge whether the passage from the book "Problems of Leninism" on the victory of Socialism in one country is out of date or not.

I myself would very much like it to be out of date.

I would like unpleasant things like capitalist encirclement, the danger of military attack, the danger of the restoration of capitalism, etc., to be things of the past. Unfortunately, however, these unpleasant things still exist.

(Signed) J. Stalin.
February 12, 1938.

Pravda
14 February 1938

Wow, you just made a huge point in my favor. Thanks!

1938, a point in time where Stalin was in the position to make decisions on his own head. If you read between the lines, which is what you should do with any statement by any politician, especially a Soviet one, you might notice that what Stalin said is the exact opposite of what he meant.

In other words: don't read what he said and meant, read what you think he said and meant. Proof means nothing, gut feeling everything. Take your snake-oil elsewhere, we deal in facts here.

I mean, whose assistance could he possibly expect to help "to strengthen the defence of our country"?

The Soviet understanding was that, although they had sparked the world revolution in Russia, because of its unique social character which made class struggle so acute as to spark such a revolution easily and first, it would be the job of the proletariat in imperialist and developed capitalist nations to help the Russians and other backwards nations to come up to speed with them once the revolution spread there. This was why intense concern for internal development wasn’t shown in the USSR until several years after its formation: their concern was with fomenting in and/or carrying revolution to Europe. After that was apparently off the table was when they shifted towards a Socialism in One Country approach, the goal of which was to advance themselves as much as possible until the revolution came, while still sponsoring that revolution financially and ideologically from their socialist bulwark, and to build up their defenses, economically, militarily, and politically, to protect themselves and the socialist revolution until it could catch on elsewhere.

The French communists? Also, defence from whom? The USSR and the Reich didn't even have a shared boudary yet, while the Japanese weren't that much of a military (or economical threat) and were soon to be decisively dealt with in '39 at Khahlin Gol.

And all-knowing Stalin should have seen the future, where the Japanese were defeated? Goodness, and I thought Stalinists were guilty of over-veneration...

Also, you realize that most of the foreign intervening nations in the Civil War were ones which shared no border with the USSR, right? And that even when the Soviets did have a Navy, they never used it to invade or attack anyone, right? Probably not, since you’ve proven yourself so utterly clueless with regards to all other parts of Russian history thus far.

We must also take into account that the whole Soviet military doctrine (call it "defence strategy" if you will) and pre-war propaganda was based on "Bring the war to the aggressors" (whoever they might be. Apparently the Finns).

Certainly you don't expect a defensive war to be waged only until the enemy is expelled from your borders, do you?

Also, if I remember correctly the Spanish civil war happend a bit later than '24, which is kind of a problem for anybody who insists that the USSR let go of the idea of World revolution.

Spain was a capitalist, imperialist nation. Supporting a revolution there is not against the stagist doctrine the Soviets had adopted by then.

The wholesale militarization of Soviet industry and society during the pre-war years is not something I would call economically catching up. It isn't even military catch-up.

Yes it was. Do you even know anything about this time period at all?

It is preparation for war on a very large, continental scale.

Prove it. You can’t, because no serious scholarship agrees with you.

Yes, the USSR matched it's enemies militarily. All of them combined, and then some. Did the Soviets really need upwards of 24 000 tanks for defence, while the Wehrmacht could barely scrape up 3300 for Barbarossa?

Citations for those numbers? And did you see how much it took the Soviets to deal with the German issue? I’d say a military of that size was well-proven to be a necessity!

If you want peace, prepare for war. That's what Cheezy will tell you

Certainly. I’m not suggesting that, if a weak and demilitarized Europe lay before him, that Stalin would refrain from invading it and ending capitalism. What communist would? But that was never really an issue, so the idea that the USSR was building up for some epic pan-European invasion is ridiculous, and as I said, neither supported nor proven by any serious scholarship.

 

[Lord Baal]

You might want to correct that slip, lest <nuke> actually mentions it!

Ouch. That was a dumb one on my part. Hindenburg, not Himmler.

 

[Dachs]

Yes, but I thought that we were discussing how well the British dealt with Germany before Germany invaded the Soviet Union - and in the Summer of 1941 the Soviet-German war was already in progress.

And before the Germans invaded Russia, there were many other forces than the DAK in North Africa. Almost all of those were there before the DAK got there - the Italians, who by and large performed competently under competent leadership and without whom Rommel could not have had such success as he did. The only thing that changed in the summer was the reorganization of the Axis forces in North Africa into a single unified command structure and the addition of slightly more German reinforcements.

So the Eighth Army was still opposed by more than just a single corps in the six month period between the collapse of the offensive into Cyrenaica and the commencement of BARBAROSSA.

 

[Domen]

Cheezy:

His ideological heritage was internationalist enough to be expected to show complete disregard for nation-state claims to "right of rule" and such.

If anything - anarchist, rather than internationalist. But in fact he wanted all of power for himself.

The very problem being that you regard Poles and Jews as being two separate entities. Maybe if you had regarded Polish Jews as Poles equal to yourselves then things might have gone better for you.

IIRC, you regarded Polish officers and non-Communist Polish officers (who refused to collaborate with NKVD) as two separate entities.

This happened when we were discussing about Katyn.

Certainly not. The difference being that the Nazis went after the rest of Polish society as well.

No. A plain Polish peasant from the countryside or worker from some city had over 95% chance to survive the Nazi occupation.

The Nazis targeted Polish elites, patriots and those who opposed their rules. Pretty much like the Soviets did.

I can tell from example of my own family that those who died were mostly - businessman from Gdynia who was arrested and executed in Piasnica, woman who told political jokes about Hitler and died in Auschwitz, those who died serving in the Polish underground or in regular units, etc.

Most of other members of my wartime family survived. And they lived under German occupation (Western Poland).

Citations for those numbers? And did you see how much it took the Soviets to deal with the German issue?

Total incompetence of the Soviet military when real war started, does not exclude the fact that on paper they were stronger than Wehrmacht.

Regarding these numbers for Soviet tanks:

I will let Mize to provide his citations - but these are so common and well-known numbers that I'm surprised that you even ask.

Such a useless slander, &#8220;utopianism,&#8221; because for one, the modern Marxist communist is by definition not utopian

Wow. Not only an ardent Communist, but also a stubborn one.

Pretty rich,

You started with pretty rich ad personam arguments.

========================================

Dachs:

And before the Germans invaded Russia, there were many other forces than the DAK in North Africa. Almost all of those were there before the DAK got there - the Italians, who by and large performed competently under competent leadership and without whom Rommel could not have had such success as he did.

Weren't the Italian divisions also part of the DAK (after DAK came there)? IIRC, the DAK consisted of both German and Italian divisions.

Yes, the Italians performed competently when they fought under German leadership (North Africa after Rommel arrived, Eastern Front).

The only thing that changed in the summer was the reorganization of the Axis forces in North Africa into a single unified command structure and the addition of slightly more German reinforcements.

Maybe this is when Italian divisions were incorporated into the DAK.

 

[Lone Wolf]

His ideological heritage was internationalist enough to be expected to show complete disregard for nation-state claims to "right of rule" and such.

I'd say that Stalin was cynical enough to switch between internationalism and nationalism as he saw fit. When he sponsored movies like Alexander Nevsky, he was a nationalist, when he presided over ethnic deportations and the "campaign against rootless cosmopolitanism" he was a xenophobic chauvinist, and when he "disregarded nation-state claims" he was an internationalist. Brilliant fellow was, that Stalin. And a true marvel of internationalism.

The very problem being that you regard Poles and Jews as being two separate entities. Maybe if you had regarded Polish Jews as Poles equal to yourselves then things might have gone better for you.

Nice shot! Admittedly extermination of a specific group of civilian population =/= extermination of the civillian population as a whole. But yeah, USSR was certainly better then Nazi Germany. I think even our Polish friends will agree

----------------------------------------------------------------------

We don't share our basic frameworks. If you asked me about the nature of WWII, I'd say that it was, fundamentally, an imperialist war, but with struggles to preserve the independence or of national liberation by the people who were fighting against Nazi Germany and her allies. The greatest of these liberation struggles was the struggle of the USSR's peoples. That's why during the war the interests of Stalin and the peoples he presided over were fairly close.

While the Nazi regime of Germany was the aggressor, and was far more vile then either the USSR or "the West", I regard the "noble emancipatory revolutionary USSR" (or "noble emancipatory Western democracies" for that matter) view as over-idealistic. It's no coincidence that both USSR and the USA performed ethnic deportations during the war. These are quite large problems for everyone that seeks to present either power as a bunch of emancipatory democratic goodness.

The USSR was different ideologically and structurally both from Germany and "the West". Under Stalin it, however, was a great power, or wannabe great power, and engaged in great power political games. "Red Menaces" and "Second Imperialistic Interventions", IMHO, obscure this fact.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

I'd say that Stalin was cynical enough to switch between internationalism and nationalism as he saw fit. When he sponsored movies like Alexander Nevsky, he was a nationalist, when he presided over ethnic deportations and the "campaign against rootless cosmopolitanism" he was a xenophobic chauvinist, and when he "disregarded nation-state claims" he was an internationalist. Brilliant fellow was, that Stalin. And a true marvel of internationalism.

I would call that kind of flip-flopping "excuse-making," and my overall opinion of Stalin is very mixed. Don't mistake me for some kind of starry-eyed adulator.

Nice shot! Admittedly extermination of a specific group of civilian population =/= extermination of the civillian population as a whole. But yeah, USSR was certainly better then Nazi Germany. I think even our Polish friends will agree

I think you saw my point without the smartmouthed attempt to mock it.

We don't share our basic frameworks. If you asked me about the nature of WWII, I'd say that it was, fundamentally, an imperialist war, but with struggles to preserve the independence or of national liberation by the people who were fighting against Nazi Germany and her allies. The greatest of these liberation struggles was the struggle of the USSR's peoples. That's why during the war the interests of Stalin and the peoples he presided over were fairly close.

As you noted before, he was more than willing to draw on whatever justification he needed when he needed it. Personally, I regard the conservative slip backwards during the '30s as something to be regretted, and I think Stalin and his friends played a large part in that, so the fact that Stalin had to resort to nationalism (and even religion) to rouse and unite the Russian peoples especially in such a dark hour should be regarded as a great failure of his administration.

While the Nazi regime of Germany was the aggressor, and was far more vile then either the USSR or "the West", I regard the "noble emancipatory revolutionary USSR" (or "noble emancipatory Western democracies" for that matter) view as over-idealistic. It's no coincidence that both USSR and the USA performed ethnic deportations during the war. These are quite large problems for everyone that seeks to present either power as a bunch of emancipatory democratic goodness.

Not noble, perhaps, but brotherly, was the ideal at work. It did not work for very long. It's been discussed here before, though, how Stalin over-gambled in Eastern Europe post-war because he expected the West to force him backwards (diplomatically, not geographically) into a compromise, but instead the West acquiesced and Stalin got a lot more than he expected, and just ran with the success. Sadly the appropriate brotherly relationship slipped quickly into a paternalistic one; suitable for the relationship between the RSFSR and the more backwards SSRs or some Third World nations perhaps, but not between the USSR and nations like Czechoslovakia and Germany, which were much further along socio-politically than the USSR was, even after their "great leap forward" of sorts. And that's why things like Hungary '56 and Prague '68 happened: because the Soviets antagonized a society which their state ideology did not know how to interact with.

 

[Lone Wolf]

Not noble, perhaps, but brotherly, was the ideal at work. It did not work for very long.

Perhaps there was a certain brotherly ideal in Stalin's USSR Eastern European policy, but it was tertiary to geopolitical great power considerations, and, as a result, was defective from the very start. Like the USA, the USSR after WWII became a Great Power with everything that it entails. Its relationship between itself and its European satellites never reached colonial status - the level of general welfare in, say, Hungary was higher then in USSR -, but a Great Power, I'd even say a Great Empire, it was all the same. And the international relations game of Great Powermongering is dirty, cynical, and nasty. Any brotherly ideas in such conditions are going to disappear fast. Stalin was not the man to regret it.

Personally, I regard the conservative slip backwards during the '30s as something to be regretted, and I think Stalin and his friends played a large part in that, so the fact that Stalin had to resort to nationalism (and even religion) to rouse and unite the Russian peoples especially in such a dark hour should be regarded as a great failure of his administration.

I actually agree that Stalin resorting to nationalism during WWII was, to a certain degree, objectively forced (not to the degree of ethnic deportations, though). His post-WWII shenanigans with "rootless cosmopolitanism" I view as a much greater crime. By late forties, IMHO, Stalin reached the level of psychopathology.

 

[Louis XXIV]

The DAK wasn't the sole German formation in North Africa, let alone the sole Axis formation. By the summer of 1941 - less than six months after Rommel got to Libya - the Axis forces had been reorganized into a panzer group, a force equivalent in size and fighting power to a field army; although the KStN did not reflect a field force of appropriate size for the moniker, in 1943 the Axis forces in Tunisia were redesignated as an army group.

So the Eighth Army was, to be entirely fair to the British, engaged with an enemy force of more or less equivalent size and strength.

If Hitler had devoted more forces to the region (say he diverted forces from eastern Europe), would it have made a difference in Africa? Or were the main issues in that front more related to supply lines and the like, so it wouldn't have mattered?

 

[Domen]

But yeah, USSR was certainly better then Nazi Germany. I think even our Polish friends will agree

On a scale of evil from 1 to 10 Nazi Germany would be ~ 10 and USSR under Joseph Stalin would be ~ 9.

 

[Dachs]

Dachs:



Weren't the Italian divisions also part of the DAK (after DAK came there)? IIRC, the DAK consisted of both German and Italian divisions.

Yes, the Italians performed competently when they fought under German leadership (North Africa after Rommel arrived, Eastern Front).



Maybe this is when Italian divisions were incorporated into the DAK.

Italian units were not part of the DAK; it was called the Deutsches Afrikakorps for a reason.

Initially, Rommel's corps was made up of a single division, the Fifth (Light) Panzer Division "Afrika". All other units on the front were Italian ones, organized into their own command structure, which technically was supposed to be giving Rommel orders, not the other way around (in practice it never worked that way, obviously); in the March counterattack at El Agheila, Rommel commanded the DAK (1 division) and directed the movements of two Italian corps (4 divisions). By the summer, the Fifth was reorganized into the Twenty-First Panzer Division, and was joined by the Fifteenth Panzer Division; these two units would form the core of the DAK.

Shortly after the arrival of the Fifteenth and various other small supporting units that turned the DAK into a legitimate corps-sized formation instead of a glorified panzer division, the OKW created the overarching unit of Panzergruppe Afrika, which comprised all Axis units in the Libyan theater of operations, commanded by Rommel. The DAK was only part of this panzer group, and comprised most (but, weirdly, not all) of the German forces in the area; while Rommel commanded the full panzer group, Ludwig Crüwell commanded the smaller DAK. Eventually, the DAK grew to a size of some six divisions (the original two panzer divisions, a "special" motor-rifle division, and three infantry divisions designated "light" units that weren't actually light infantry) alongside the eight Italian divisions that made up the balance of Panzergruppe Afrika.

Eventually, the panzer group was redesignated as the First Italian Army; Rommel was kicked upstairs again to command Army Group Afrika, which comprised the First Italian and Fifth Panzer Armies.

The confusion comes mostly from the predilection many people have for referring to all forces under Rommel's command in Africa as the Afrikakorps. It's simpler and is somewhat more romantic; it also makes it easier to pretend that Rommel only fought with Germans under his command, making his relative success against the British compatible with the general assumption that the Italian military of the Second World War wasn't worth a wooden nickel.

If Hitler had devoted more forces to the region (say he diverted forces from eastern Europe), would it have made a difference in Africa? Or were the main issues in that front more related to supply lines and the like, so it wouldn't have mattered?

I dunno enough about the Axis powers' ability to sustain a larger force to be able to make a reasonably educated guess. And I don't know what "making a difference in Africa" might have meant, in terms of the overall course of the war.

 

[privatehudson]

I'd say that maintaining a larger force in Africa is a stretch at best. The Axis powers had a hard enough time maintaining enough supplies for the troops that were in Africa as it was. I was recently reading a book about the Tunisian campaign which pointed out that Ultra gave the Allies such detailed reports on Axis shipping in the Med that it was almost like they could pick what supplies they didn't want to get through.

At one point things were bad enough that they were flying supplies over in Ju52s and the truly enormous ME323s, most of which were shot down in large numbers. Admitedly this is late in the campaign in North Africa, but I don't think things were enormously better throughout most of it.

On another issue mistakes about the composition and leadership of the Axis troops in Africa is nothing new. Even the Allied soldiers and generals during the war showed an obsession with Rommel. Kesselring and Von Arnim hardly get a mention half the time, let alone the Italians.

 

[Louis XXIV]

I dunno enough about the Axis powers' ability to sustain a larger force to be able to make a reasonably educated guess. And I don't know what "making a difference in Africa" might have meant, in terms of the overall course of the war.

I suppose I meant making a difference in achieving their objectives. Although, looking into this a bit, I suppose I mean Rommel's objectives, which I understood to be to seize the Suez Canal and threaten British mandates in the Middle East.

 

[Lord Baal]

I suppose I meant making a difference in achieving their objectives. Although, looking into this a bit, I suppose I mean Rommel's objectives, which I understood to be to seize the Suez Canal and threaten British mandates in the Middle East.

privatehudson is correct. Assuming even a successful Axis invasion of Malta - a distinct possibility in the first half of 1941 - the Axis simply couldn't supply Rommel and the Italians quickly enough to offset their losses. The fastest supply route to Axis-held/ influenced Africa ran through Vichy-held Tunisia, which went right by Malta. The resources necessary to pacify Malta would have rendered an invasion of Crete, and therefore Operation: Barbarossa, impossible in 1941, and without taking Malta the Axis couldn't get anywhere near the full-capacity of their supplies through to Africa.

Even if these supplies had made the trip unmolested, they would not have sufficed to achieve Rommel's goals in North Africa. That Rommel made it as far as he did is testament to his skill at desert warfare - combined with initial British stupidity, though by El Amarna they'd learnt their lesson - but even with more supplies he could never have forced his way through El Amarna without an insane lapse in common sense among the British. Even had that taken place, the Axis lacked the fuel reserves to successfully push the British out of Egypt, and pushing them out of the Middle East entirely is something even the most stupid althist scenarios avoid. And short of pushing the Brits out of the Middle East completely, there was no alternative source of fuel available for the Axis, which means they still run out of fuel before they can reach Moscow, assuming Barbarossa plays out as well for the Germans as in OTL, which is unlikely if the USSR is given another six months-to-a-year to prepare.

So, in the end, the Axis could not have adequately changed the outcome of the war by sending more resources and/ or troops to North Africa. They may actually have gotten themselves beaten quicker.

 

[Yeekim]

Not noble, perhaps, but brotherly, was the ideal at work.

I can't help but tell an appropriate joke.
A Russian and a Pole walk down the road, when they find a beautiful, red apple.
"Wow! What a beautiful apple", says the Russian. "Let us share this brotherly, shall we?"
"No way in hell!" shouts the Pole. "We'll split it in half!"

On a scale of evil from 1 to 10 Nazi Germany would be ~ 10 and USSR under Joseph Stalin would be ~ 9.

Where does that leave the Khmer Rouge?

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

I can't help but tell an appropriate joke.
A Russian and a Pole walk down the road, when they find a beautiful, red apple.
"Wow! What a beautiful apple", says the Russian. "Let us share this brotherly, shall we?"
"No way in hell!" shouts the Pole. "We'll split it in half!"

So did you read the rest of the post, or just that one line and stop paying attention? Because I think you'll find me being fairly critical of that statement.

 

[Ajidica]

General question: How competant was the Italian army in WWII? Almost everything I have read indicates that they performed poorly but the discussion about the Afrika Korps suggests that the Italian army performed well in Africa.