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this war HAD to be taken to German soil...the germans HAD to see what real war was like, so they would loose their taste for it
Germans already *knew* what "real war" was like. Or are you forgetting Allies were bombing (including using incendiaries) major cities and surrounding areas to smithereens.
Meanwhile as the Russians were advancing from the east Germans fleeing to the west were spreading the word at what horrors awaited (mass rape, looting, massacres, etc....).
None of this touches fact by late into things Nazis/German military was turning on Germans themselves, stringing up young boys/men and anyone else they thought wasn't holding up their end.
Without a second front in the west, the war between Germany and Russia would have stalemated and become something more like the stalemate of World War I. A long war of attrition with central Europe as the battleground.
But it would be a more war in slow constant motion than a fixed trench war.
So the only way to stop it was a large invasion from the west, moving fast toward the German border, forcing the Germans to retreat back to their motherland. Germany had to be caught in a pincers from both sides to force the retreat.
The invasion and the sudden thrust eastward almost worked better than was planned, too, but the thrust depended on a string of bridges being intact to work, and it went so fast the supply line couldn't keep up with the front, so when the front met a destroyed bridge it collapsed and gave the Germans the time they needed to withdraw from the east and re-group in the west.
The Russians were able to move at the same speed as the Germans, so the Allies were able to find the intact Remagen bridge, the only one left that crossed the Rhine, and that bridge ultimately ended the war.
The invasion was necessary, as the Allies couldn't move quickly enough from Italy and over the Alps to trap the Germans into a pincers. Supply from the Mediterranean Sea was too long and problematic.
That the invasion became so deadly was due to many mistakes made in the crossing and the tactical plans, along with mistakes in intelligence and ineffective bombing. The Allies believed most of the fight would be at the Juno and Sword beaches, those closest to Dunkirk, not Omaha and Utah.
The British and the Free Forces of Europe wanted to lead the fight in the invasion, so they were given those beaches. The inexperienced American forces were supposed to be flankers and reinforcements. All of them had been driven from Europe, and they all intended to take Europe back.
Rommel understood this, and shifted his Germans toward Omaha and Utah at the last minute. Then the weather took over, so the invasion went against the plans, and Omaha and Utah became the un-planned battlefield.
Without the invasion, the Russians would have chased the Germans around until they became exhausted and their own supply lines too over-extended.
Air power alone would have never broken the German will to fight.
The closer to their motherland the Germans went, the more mobile they became.
Without a second front forming a pincers, the Germans could withdraw, re-form and move to assault for a long time to come.
All of those reasons were enough to call for an invasion, and there were more reasons than just those. Germany controlled Europe's food supply and industry and the coal in the Ruhr valley. The French, Belgians, Italians, Dutch, and Scandinavians would all starve before the Germans starved.
The invasion was the only way to stop them fast. America couldn't afford to fight a massive 2-front war half the world away for very long. And America could keep supplying the European war for much longer by itself either.
Without a second front in the west, the war between Germany and Russia would have stalemated and become something more like the stalemate of World War I.
The Axis were stopped at the Battle of Britain in the west and Moscow in the east in 1940 and 1941. In late 1942 the Axis were on the run at the battles of El Alemein and Stalingrad. The Soviets were constantly pushing back the Axis. The Soviets developed heavy tanks like the IS2 and excellent ground attack planes.
Germany was being starved of supplies. All they had was synthetic oil and coal in the Ruhr.
Extremely. See below. The sin is that the Allies stopped at the Elbe River to allow the Soviets to take half of Berlin.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Toyman at Jewel Lake
So, was the D-Day invasion and the Western Front even necessary? Could the US and Great Britain have stayed off the continent and let the Soviets defeat Germany on their own, in conjunction with our arial and naval support? Was it necessary to sacrifice the American and British lives?
2nd question. Had that occurred, and had the Soviets been the ones to "liberate" Europe alone...what would have been the aftermath? Would the "Iron Curtain" have been at the coast? Would the USSR have been more powerful, or would they have fallen sooner in trying to subdue the conquered nations?
The two questions should really be answered together. If Germany simply imploded, the USSR would have been happy to occupy Europe to the coast or else turn them into satellites. The postwar history of Europe provides no comfort that Europeans would have resisted being tyrannized.
The Europeans, Great Britain excepted, have a tradition of top-down, often royal governments where the people look to their governments rather than their neighbors to solve problems. That was noted by Alexis de Tocqueville in Democracy in America. The root of American democracy was Britain's more individualistic, self-reliant system. The fact that the USSR was resisted literally three times, in 1956 in Hungary, 1968 in Czechoslovakia, and 1980-1 in Poland shows that Europe probably would have rolled over. It was only the 1985-6 collapse in oil prices that undermined Soviet hegemony.
The Europeans, Great Britain excepted, have a tradition of top-down, often royal governments where the people look to their governments rather than their neighbors to solve problems. That was noted by Alexis de Tocqueville in Democracy in America. The root of American democracy was Britain's more individualistic, self-reliant system. The fact that the USSR was resisted literally three times, in 1956 in Hungary, 1968 in Czechoslovakia, and 1980-1 in Poland shows that Europe probably would have rolled over. It was only the 1985-6 collapse in oil prices that undermined Soviet hegemony.
There was a massive contradiction in the USSR's top-down economic planning - the five-year plans. They wanted to set prices @ the top, without any method to track real prices & costs, let alone any way to control costs to industry & individuals. Absent computers & bar code systems (or something functionally equivalent), they were always operating blind, hoping that their inputs nudged the system in the directions they wanted.
Between the destruction of infrastructure & croplands in European USSR, plus the same in the segments of East Europe that the USSR & Nazi forces had fought over, plus manpower losses (directly by military action, wounds, disease, starvation, exposure - both military & civilian) - it's no wonder that the USSR finally collapsed, unable to actually rule under the glitchy economic command system they'd installed. Their political & crony systems also contributed to poor local decision making, wasted resources, poor budgetary allocations, & on & on.
There was a massive contradiction in the USSR's top-down economic planning - the five-year plans. They wanted to set prices @ the top, without any method to track real prices & costs, let alone any way to control costs to industry & individuals. Absent computers & bar code systems (or something functionally equivalent), they were always operating blind, hoping that their inputs nudged the system in the directions they wanted.
Between the destruction of infrastructure & croplands in European USSR, plus the same in the segments of East Europe that the USSR & Nazi forces had fought over, plus manpower losses (directly by military action, wounds, disease, starvation, exposure - both military & civilian) - it's no wonder that the USSR finally collapsed, unable to actually rule under the glitchy economic command system they'd installed. Their political & crony systems also contributed to poor local decision making, wasted resources, poor budgetary allocations, & on & on.
That's all true. Many don't realize this but Russia is essentially, like Iran and Venezuela, a gas station. They rode high with favorable oil prices; not so much during the more typical price swoons.
To defeat Germany? No. The war might have stretched into 1946 but Germany were holding off the inevitable by 1944. The most important aspect of the the 2nd front was to prevent the Soviet Union from having a free hand across continental Europe once the war was over.
To defeat Germany? No. The war might have stretched into 1946 but Germany were holding off the inevitable by 1944. The most important aspect of the the 2nd front was to prevent the Soviet Union from having a free hand across continental Europe once the war was over.
I wonder when I read a post like yours if you bothered to read this thread. Please review posts 7, 17, 22, 24, 32 and 34. This issue was discussed and many reasons were given why the invasion was more than a pretext for containing the Soviet Union after the war had ended. Apparently, you paid no attention to these. Let's review,o.k.
1. Stalin asked for a second front in France, against Germany, on any number of occasions.
2. There was concern on the part of the western allies that unless a second front established that Stalin might try to make a separate peace with Germany and leave the war.
3. Establishing a second front was a main topic during meetings between Stalin, Churchill, and Roosevelt at the Teheran Conference in 1943. Stalin wanted that front in 1943 and was distressed when Churchill and Roosevelt made it clear that it could not happen before 1944.
4. Even if Russian forces had been sufficient in and of themselves to defeat Germany, there is no way either the Russians or the western allies could have known that.
Geez, it seems as though some posters are only here to give an opinion or propagate a view. They seem to learn little.
Last edited by markg91359; 06-21-2019 at 11:13 AM..
the allies would have eventually come up through Italy and accomplished the same thing. We stalled in Italy because we changed focus to Normandy and left ragtag troops and horrible generals in place there. had we continued to focus on Italy, they could have come in that way pretty quickly. However getting large numbers of troops and supplies through the mountains may have been difficult. With god generals, it may have been faster and less costly (in lives) to go that way.
Or we could have waited and let Russia do the whole thing. getting France et. al. back form them might have been a bit difficult though.
Extremely. See below. The sin is that the Allies stopped at the Elbe River to allow the Soviets to take half of Berlin.
Why do you consider stopping at the Elbe to be a sin? The zones of occupation of Germany, and Berlin, had been finalized at Yalta. Why waste (western) allied lives fighting for territory just to give control of it to the Soviets?
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The last victims of WWII?
