tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post1963871406801003386..comments2023-11-10T04:17:00.492-05:00Comments on View From The Porch: Meanwhile, in Bizarroland... Part IITamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07285540310465422476noreply@blogger.comBlogger46125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-12176673170078440312011-02-16T03:21:33.379-05:002011-02-16T03:21:33.379-05:00When I got my first history lessons in school, nob...When I got my first history lessons in school, nobody mentioned anything bad about the Stalin, only that he was our ally during WWII, and that sort of seemed to be the general consensus. It was only later that I started hearing about how horrible things had been under Stalin. I suspect Stalin's misdeeds weren't publicized way back when because we (the US) weren't prepared to do anything about them, but we did do something about Hitler, so we wanted to get all the positive publicity we could.<br /><br />Information did not flow as freely back then, and it still does not flow as freely as you might think.Chuck Pergielhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14473338620167201696noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-39313012107141051012011-02-15T21:41:44.561-05:002011-02-15T21:41:44.561-05:00Sorry, I forgot to close the parenthesis.Sorry, I forgot to close the parenthesis.Justthisguyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17277333206171756636noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-64348922673287167502011-02-15T17:12:33.921-05:002011-02-15T17:12:33.921-05:00I think I have read (about, at least) people calli...I think I have read (about, at least) people calling other people Dicks on this blog, so in the interest of equal time for gendered rude remarks, may I say that PC does not stand for Politically Correct, but for Police Cunt. (as the British would use the "C"-noun.Justthisguyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17277333206171756636noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-83933849279062754172011-02-15T08:50:55.236-05:002011-02-15T08:50:55.236-05:00Robin,
Not to belabor the point, but there's ...Robin,<br /><br />Not to belabor the point, but there's a lot more to tank warfare than guns and armor.<br /><br />If armored battles were decided by tanks squaring off glacis-to-glacis at 1000 yards and duking it out, then we'd all be speaking German...<br /><br />(And the Pershing was less mobile off-road, not due to ground pressure but due to size and weight and mechanical reliability issues, which is why US tank crews in Korea preferred the "Easy 8" over the M26 once the threat of Nork armor had been eliminated early in the war.) <br /><br />German tanks had gasoline engines, just like ours, were more prone to ammunition fires when the armor was penetrated, suffered from poor-quality increasingly-brittle steel as the war went on, were maintenance nightmares, had poor ergonomics and mediocre visibility for the crews (except the commander) but they look sexy and have thicker armor and bigger guns, which is most of what counts in Advanced Squad Leader or Steel Panthers...Tamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07285540310465422476noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-38429595642325723552011-02-15T02:23:15.137-05:002011-02-15T02:23:15.137-05:00Robin,
I can understand why Patton might have bee...<b>Robin</b>,<br /><br />I can understand why Patton might have been consulted both for his experience as a wartime commander and because he was closely associated with tanks through his career starting in the Great War. But there's quite a gap between "Patton didn't think that deploying the Pershing was a good idea" and "Patton single-handedly killed it".<br /><br />From what I've read, I agree that McNair was the prime opponent of the Pershing. Why did he latch onto the whole tank / TD mix? It seems silly to build two very similar vehicles when one could be built that could do both jobs.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-34314589639983609742011-02-15T01:06:47.376-05:002011-02-15T01:06:47.376-05:00docjim505, Patton did not delay the Pershing deplo...docjim505, Patton did not delay the Pershing deployment by himself but his opinion was consulted. This is documented by several historians. For various reasons, the Allies had not noticed in the Italian campaign that the German heavies were almost immune to US tank gun fire from the frontal aspect. The Normandy campaign brought home this fact. <br /><br />Among the reason that Patton gave was that the Pershing would be less mobile off road, which is an odd reason since Patton understood ground pressure in tanks - and the Pershing's was less than the Sherman's.<br /><br />That said, you are correct that the Pershing was not really developmentally mature much earlier than it showed up in ETO. The real villain was Gen. Leslie McNair who saddled the US Army early in WWII with a ridiculous armor / tank destroyer doctrine and did not understand the race between armor and main guns that was going on in the Eastern Front and leaving the US Army behind.<br /><br />Most of the advantage that the M4A3E8 Sherman had over the T34/85 post WWII was from better trained crews. As an aside, the 76mm gun actually had a lot of problems with its ammunition - a problem called "shatter gap" where there was a slot of ranges where the AP round shattered on armor even though it would penetrate at greater distances. It was not well understood in WWII and was a big reason for the poor performance.<br /><br />We were actually lucky that there were so few tank v. tank battles in the western ETO.Robinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05699652902909032781noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-69235397535391063342011-02-14T21:48:58.150-05:002011-02-14T21:48:58.150-05:00WTF is Applebaum on about??? I think that publicl...WTF is Applebaum on about??? I think that publicly stating that Stalin was a bloodthirsty dictator has been "politically correct" in the vast majority of the United States since... oh... 1947 or so. <br /><br />That being said, I recall a moment of surprise (dismay?) in a graduate-level Euro history class. We got 'round to talking about the "totalitarian era", and the vast majority of my classmates - again, GRADUATE students - had no idea that Uncle Joe was quite the monster that he was. Oh, they knew that he was not a nice guy, but they were shocked when confronted by the numbers: when it comes to mass murder, Hitler was strictly bush league.<br /><br /><b>D.W.Drang</b> - <i>[T]he author describes how Patton was directly responsible for nixing the opportunity in 1943 to replace all the Shermans in the ETO with the far more capable Pershing.</i><br /><br />I don't claim to be an expert on World War II US tanks, but this sounds to me like a historian trying to make a bit of a name for himself by attacking a dead man and rewriting history.<br /><br />1. It presupposes that Patton, only an army commander in 1943, had decisive influence over US tank doctrine AND that he would have favored the heavy tank. My recollection of his notes on tank design in <i>War As I Knew It</i> indicates that, to the contrary, he wanted more <i>machineguns</i> in US tanks, the better to chew up enemy infantry and AT guns, not a bigger cannon or more armor;<br /><br />2. It presupposes that the Pershing was ready for mass-production in 1943;<br /><br />3. It pre-supposes that the Pershing was really "far more capable" than the Sherman. There is no question that the later tank had a more powerful gun and better armor, but I think that the Sherman was really a good design for the sort of fast-moving warfare that the Army saw in France after the Normandy breakout.<br /><br />I think that <b>Tam</b> and <b>Don Meaker</b> cover the rest of the case for the Sherman (and thanks to both of them for the history lesson).Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-81325900760602236922011-02-14T20:43:39.931-05:002011-02-14T20:43:39.931-05:00Stalin may not have cared for homefront opinion, b...Stalin may not have cared for homefront opinion, but he knew that homefront opinion cared about him. <br /><br />Stalin worked hard to keep people misinformed, all to keep his homefront position strong. His casualty figures were hidden or falsified, production numbers inflated or deflated, German casualty reports twisted to meet his need of the day. His murder of the Poles while USSR was a German ally was carefully hidden, and strongly denied after the ("Shocked! Shocked I say") Germans found the evidence.<br /><br />Considering Stalin started the war as an ally of Germany against Poland, then lucked into getting the US as a generous ally against Germany, even the secret police might have had a good reason to remove him if he got into another war.Don Mhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06057058763094040058noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-81159722536515628572011-02-14T20:06:47.628-05:002011-02-14T20:06:47.628-05:00"(Did anyone in the British Empire before it ..."<i>(Did anyone in the British Empire before it was used?)</i>"<br /><br />Yes. British physicists helped with the Manhattan Project, after all...Tamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07285540310465422476noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-9689718260591898652011-02-14T20:05:27.984-05:002011-02-14T20:05:27.984-05:00"the effectively endless supply of cannon fod..."<i>the effectively endless supply of cannon fodder Stalin had.</i>"<br /><br />Largely a result of postwar Soviet propaganda.<br /><br />In 1945 the Soviet Union was bled as white as anybody else, if not more so. For forty years after the war it was a rarity to find an un-gimped male between the ages of 20 and 60 west of the Volga...Tamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07285540310465422476noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-60977156802654083302011-02-14T18:58:07.584-05:002011-02-14T18:58:07.584-05:00The Sherman may have been better than it is given ...The Sherman may have been better than it is given credit for, but that does not meliorate the personnel shortages we had, vs. the effectively endless supply of cannon fodder Stalin had. Even adding in the two or three Army's worth of troops no longer needed to invade Japan, I doubt we would have had enough.<br />OTOH, that "Operation UNTHINKABLE" staff study was pre-VJ Day, and was clearly written by people who did not know of th A-Bomb. (Did anyone in the British Empire before it was used?)Dranghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08082177597135236652noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-70568368918755268172011-02-14T17:10:47.085-05:002011-02-14T17:10:47.085-05:00Anonymous, if you wargame the "US vs. USSR in...Anonymous, if you wargame the "US vs. USSR in 1945" scenario, I hope the simulation includes the feelings on the Home Front once the Red propaganda machine cranks up.<br /><br />Combine Stalin's utter disregard for Red Army casualties with his utter disregard for Home Front opinion, and our extreme regard for both, and the outcome is pre-determined.Borepatchhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05029434172945099693noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-25196702492061570282011-02-14T16:37:31.150-05:002011-02-14T16:37:31.150-05:00I don't see how it is a disadvantage for the U...I don't see how it is a disadvantage for the US to advance across the demolished infrastructure of Germany, without being a disadvantage for the Soviets also. Soviet advances would have created vulnerable flanks, US/UK amphibious invasions could have exploited them. The Rhine and Alsace-Lorraine barrier would have provided a good barrier vs. Soviets. Soviet high losses were due to their slow tempo of operations. As Geo. Patton Jr would say, they spend a lot of time in preparation for breaking the crust, and got little pie from each operation. US operations tended to be continuous, with the exception of the pause caused by diversion of resources to move Lee's zone of communications from Normandy to Paris.Don Mhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06057058763094040058noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-17899421338541660482011-02-14T16:29:31.468-05:002011-02-14T16:29:31.468-05:00Sorry Tam, you posted before I did.
All I can say...Sorry Tam, you posted before I did.<br /><br />All I can say now is "yup!"Don Mhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06057058763094040058noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-25691553139651169322011-02-14T16:27:33.835-05:002011-02-14T16:27:33.835-05:00I am glad the war against the Soviets never happen...I am glad the war against the Soviets never happened. Having said that, Soviet dependence on US trucks would not have mattered, in part because we shipped them truck factories, in part because they had a bunch of trucks already.<br /><br />I am probably a minority in that I think the Sherman was superior to any other tank of the war. 76mm tungsten armor piercing shot, 100mm frontal armor basis made it as good as any other. Stabilized guns, Ethelene glycol water jackets around the ammunition, and fast electric traverse made it better. T-34s and Panthers both had brittle armor, ammunition that detonated rather than burned and no practical ability to shoot on the move, which counted against them. Panther had hydraulic traverse which required coordination between driver and gunner even when sitting in ambush. The US 75 and 76mm HE rounds were superior to the late war 85mm HE rounds of the T-34.Don Mhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06057058763094040058noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-51622552741282961032011-02-14T14:38:07.749-05:002011-02-14T14:38:07.749-05:00I love your history lessons Tam. They are a thing...I love your history lessons Tam. They are a thing of beauty.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-77967797210281316862011-02-14T14:01:23.855-05:002011-02-14T14:01:23.855-05:00D.W. Drang,
Although it's worth a book on its...D.W. Drang,<br /><br />Although it's worth a book on its own, the Sherman, especially the later M4A3 with the long 76 and wet ammo stowage, is one of the most unfairly maligned tanks in history.<br /><br />I'd hate to be the person pointing that out to a WW2 vet, just like I'd hate to be the person telling a Vietnam vet that the M16 wasn't the worst rifle ever, though.<br /><br />The Other Guy always has better gear, and certain Sherman "facts", like "it took five Shermans to knock out a Panther", have been accepted so long that they've become truisms. (In the Ardennes fighting the Germans lost 180 out of 415 Panthers and only 45 percent of the survivors were operational, whereas the US suffered a little over 300 Sherman losses of all models, with only 9 percent of the survivors deadlined.)<br /><br />The Panther did not have a separate observation scope for the gunner, or an independent turret traverse control for the commander. The only reason they could sometimes win the "see-first/shoot-first" fight was that they were more frequently on the defensive.<br /><br />Incidentally, several spearhead Soviet Guards Armored units in the final assault on Germany were equipped with Shermans, and the M4A3E8 mopped the floor with T-34/85s whenever they went head-to-head in Korea and the Middle East...Tamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07285540310465422476noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-28159357267108150412011-02-14T13:45:08.886-05:002011-02-14T13:45:08.886-05:00"The US Army in 45 could have whipped the Red..."The US Army in 45 could have whipped the Red Army."<br /><br />Err. No.<br /><br />The US could have fought them to a stand still, and might have, given a year or two (and massive diversion of resources from Japan) turned the tide.<br /><br />But US Air dominance would not immediately have made up for the fact the Russian had better & more tanks, and very experienced army willing to take casualties in a scale that makes real-world US western front rates look like a footnote. I'd be afraid the Russian steam roller would simply have overwhelmed the allies, and thrown them back to the sea, at massive cost, granted.<br /><br />When you look at German vs. Allies in the West you realize it was pale side show to the main event out east. And comparing American to Germans ain't inthe cards, the germanswere fighting defensively, the US would have to advance across a compeltely demolished infrastructure as attacker. Yuck. No Blitz for YOU!<br /><br />I'd love to wargame it.<br /><br />( assuming no nukes, though losing Moscow and Joe might actually have improved Soviet operations.)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-56806912696074162832011-02-14T13:19:04.615-05:002011-02-14T13:19:04.615-05:00Britt,
Yes, the Russians would have missed America...Britt,<br />Yes, the Russians would have missed American trucks. Along with American high octane aviation fuel, winter felt boots, and bauxite. <br />But I'm not at all confident that it would have been the walkover you suggest. Read the staff study that Stretch linked to above - the Western allies themselves were hardly confident of the outcome of such a conflict.<br />We would have been vastly outnumbered, to begin with. If you look historically at all the "invincible" armies that came to grief trying to defeat the Russians, I'd say the 1945 Red Army was about as strong as the Russians have ever been, in relative terms, and the US Army was certainly no stronger (in relative terms) than the Grand Armee or the Wehrmacht.<br />Not to mention, the question whether the British and US people would have tolerated a new, and vastly bloodier campaign against the people who until last week had been our allies.<br />You do make the point that we had the nukes, and I suppose they could have been decisive in such a conflict. But then we're back to nuking vast swaths of Central and Eastern Europe, plus the Ukraine, Belorussia, and Russia itself - all in order to liberate them from Communism. <br />Total up the body count from that exercise, plus all the ongoing suffering from radiation effects, and I'm not so sure we come out as the Good Guys in that campaign.Anthonyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10687904318381762884noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-70031992661434434462011-02-14T13:12:59.865-05:002011-02-14T13:12:59.865-05:00In Death Traps: The Survival of an American Armore...In <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Death-Traps-Survival-American-Division/dp/0891418148/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1297706899&sr=1-1" rel="nofollow">Death Traps: The Survival of an American Armored Division in World War II</a>, the author describes how Patton was directly responsible for nixing the opportunity in 1943 to replace all the Shermans in the ETO with the far more capable Pershing. <br />By the end of the the summer of 1944, the US Armor Forces were towing Shermans back to the rear nightly, hosing them out, grinding off the German AT round even with the hull or turret, painting them over, and re-issuing them the next morning.<br />By January of 1945, they were rolling five-man Shermans with a three or two man crew, few of whom were trained tankers, because of a severe shortage of soldiers.<br />W might have been able to beat the USSR in 1948, but we would have had to retake Europe to do it.Dranghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08082177597135236652noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-33534539659068211312011-02-14T12:30:39.336-05:002011-02-14T12:30:39.336-05:00The US Army in 45 could have whipped the Red Army....The US Army in 45 could have whipped the Red Army. You have to remember, the Red Army rode to Berlin in the back of American trucks. Studebaker, in particular, sold them (the US taxpayer paid for them) thousands of trucks, which were moved on convoys escorted by American naval ships. The Soviets had lots of men, and somewhat fewer guns, but they were absolutely dependent on American aid for a large portion of their logistics capability. Add in American airpower, seapower, and the nuclear monopoly, and I think we would have beaten them. Wouldn't have been easy, but it could have been done.Brittnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-25639830134885215202011-02-14T01:12:23.722-05:002011-02-14T01:12:23.722-05:00Funny how so many Irish have a self image as tragi...Funny how so many Irish have a self image as tragic warrior poets descended from kings, and yet so many come across as self destructive drunken losers.<br /><br />Yo, uncle, I just got a call from the real Irish: they want you to STFU. Apparently they think you're making them look stupid.Steve Skubinnanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-6618632626813846692011-02-13T22:48:51.933-05:002011-02-13T22:48:51.933-05:00And of course there's that "with the help...And of course there's that "with the help" locution.<br /><br />Umm, Stalin didn't do any helping until the Germans invaded Russia. Well, no helping of the allies, th USR was shipping stuff to Germany until Hitlers tanks rolled.<br /><br />And "helping" sounds particularly odd coming from an American, since the U. S. didn't actually get in the war against Hitler until he declared it four days after Pearl Harbor.<br /><br />When the Germans were almost within sight of the Kremlin, having killed or captured what, five or six million Russian soldiers and who knows how many civilians.<br /><br />And there's that death toll, too.<br /><br />Sounds as though Franklin was helping Joe and not the other way around.staghoundshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05976667812875074135noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-12581124006838573452011-02-13T22:17:41.202-05:002011-02-13T22:17:41.202-05:00Nazis were vanquished and are represented in Ameri...Nazis were vanquished and are represented in America only by a few wannabes meetin' and plannin' and plottin'...and are about as real and scary as your average flock of high school emo chicks.<br /><br />Commies on the other hand? They live among us and off of us and occupy many if not most of the seats inside Hollywood, Ivy walls, the Fourth Estate, and of course all the Houses of gov. Now that's scary.<br /><br />It ain't Political Correctness that kept focus on the former while the latter loot and pillage...as always, follow the money/power.<br /><br />AT<br /><br />wv: frade...yes, be frade; be very frade.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15907727.post-28901555508368708122011-02-13T21:26:05.816-05:002011-02-13T21:26:05.816-05:00Operation Unthinkable - Churchill's question: ...Operation Unthinkable - Churchill's question: What will it take to impose UK and US will upon the USSR?<br />Short answer: More than we are willing to pay.<br />Full declassified records at: http://www.history.neu.edu/PRO2/<br /><br />I learned of this from NRO's The Corner posting by Peter Robinson.Stretchnoreply@blogger.com