Andreas

They probably borrowed those ideas from the Soviets, but Grisha maybe able to comment on this a bit more meaningfully. Wasn't there something about the Germans buying some dive bombers from the US in the early 30s?

Michael I am reasonably convinced that it was radios only on battalion level, and below all would be done by runner/landline. Can't give you any sources for that at the moment. Kip may have some info on this.

Bah, you must be from the countryside where they have lock-ins. Here in London you are more likely to see dawn's early light while propping up a lamp post. Yeknod - are you still up for the preview, you Berkshireite?

Just as an aside - Soviet officers on many levels comment uniformly in their memoirs that the Germans did not like to be active in the night. That maybe an urban legend, or it may not be. It is very difficult for me to tell. I think there is at least anecdotal support that would indicate some truth in this. Some of them mention that the Germans liked to fire flares randomly, or fire off their MGs at random. Anyone who has been behin an MG in a trench at night may understand why - happened to me in an exercise, and you end up thinking that the night is full of enemies... But I digress. If one were to accept this anecdotal evidence, then using the night to defeat the Germans would make sense, and sensible enemy officers in the East, Africa and elsewhere would recognise this and act accordingly.

Just as an aside - Soviet officers on many levels comment uniformly in their memoirs that the Germans did not like to be active in the night. That maybe an urban legend, or it may not be. It is very difficult for me to tell. I think there is at least anecdotal support that would indicate some truth in this. Some of them mention that the Germans liked to fire flares randomly, or fire off their MGs at random. Anyone who has been behin an MG in a trench at night may understand why - happened to me in an exercise, and you end up thinking that the night is full of enemies... But I digress. If one were to accept this anecdotal evidence, then using the night to defeat the Germans would make sense, and sensible enemy officers in the East, Africa and elsewhere would recognise this and act accordingly.

Woops. Speak to a journalist for 25 minutes and find your name plastered all over the internet. Well, that at least should allay the question of whether I do any work

Bets are still being taken on who Reincarnated really is, while the forum police prepares the papers for his inevitable trip on the prison train to Coventry. Will the jackbooted enforcers of historical accuracy get their before Reincarnated can rip the mask of decency off the sordid reality that are these forums. Tune in next week, when you hear Dr.Bob say: 'Have a look at THAT!' This was a public forum announcement, brought to you by the brotherhood of tractor factory workers of Collective No.6. Only tractors by Collective No.6 are good tractors built in the spirit of brotherly love.

Halfway down?! What kind of maps are you using? :eek: </font>

Berli, interesting that it is a similar machine. I was looking at upgrading mine, with an 80GB HDD, a CD-RW, an LCD screen and various stuff. Would have set me back by >£200, but left me with the old processor. A processor upgrade would have been unspeakably expensive. Since I can probably flog the Mac for £300+ on Ebay, if I so choose, the new machine may actually end up being a net gain. Amazing, but so it is. I will keep it for the time being, just to see how much the PC sucks. I work with one in the office though, so I am pretty much used to it by now.

ISTR the Sovies were halfway down Norway or sumfink after the Petsamo-Kirkenes operation. Don't know when they retreated. Sweden would just stay 'neutral'. Denmark has lost the landlink to a free Germany, but they still have a lot of butter, until the government takes away the cows.

Many things! </font> The loving moderation of the bald one</font>The sensational brainpower of me</font>The control of the forum by the four horsemen of the apocalypso</font>There is a general forum for all sorts of stuff </font>

Matt, thanks a lot. This is the system I ended up getting, for £481 + shipping. Now for the LCD shopping. Any recommendations? So forgive me Lord, for I have sinned. After 8 years of Apple I return to the PC world. Bugger.

How come? :confused: </font>

You could try Werner Haupt 'Army Group Centre' for an overview. If it is like his Army Group North, it will be division level, but sometimes drill down deeper than that. Then you can pick and choose for specific operations. Otherwise you may have to find a divisional history of an infantry division (they were often in just one Army Group until the very end) for more detailed stuff. That will be next to impossible in English, and very costly in German. Haupt is so-so as a writer, IMO. He was an officer in AG North, and he has written an awful lot. I usually only trust him if it is high-level stuff or corroborated elsewhere.

Spook - thanks for summing up. Just to get back to basics. My own assumption would be that any such conflict would have come shortly after the surrender of Germany. 4-12 months sounds about right. Any later than that, and atrophication along the demarcation line would have set in, making large operations more difficult. Also the unpredictable effect of nuclear weapons would have made the decision to go to war quite difficult. This is the speculation bit In the end, I would assume that a very bloody stalemate would ensue, but with the Soviets controlling a larger part of Germany, up to the North Sea coast at least, Austria, and a good part of north-eastern Italy. The most likely event would have been a well-concealed sudden deep operation. The W.A. had already shown in the Ardennes (or indeed again in Korea) that their intel work was not really up to the standards required, so I see no reason to presume that they would be able to detect the build-up sufficiently in advance. Such an operation would have created severe shock in Allied HQs, as indeed the Ardennes offensive did. With the logistical support, force structure, and experience available to them the Red Army could probably have broken through deep into the W.A. rear before any organised response could have taken place. So far it would have looked like a typical deep operation against the Germans. But then other factors would have mitigated against further exploitation. 1) The W.A. would probably have been able to adopt a more flexible defense, if only (I share Spook's concerns about the comparative levels of generalship) because they are fully mechanised. 2) Air superiority could be achieved by the W.A. (albeit not as easily as against the Germans) and Soviet logistics could be harmed, especially in small break-through corridors. 3) A new frontline is established further west, strong enough to hold any further advance now that the 1st class of Soviet troops have been used. This would likely have checked much deeper advances on the scale seen in Eastern Europe in 1944/5. Then negotiation starts - and the W.A. have to think how many of their soldiers they want to have killed to retake the newly occupied German areas from the Soviets. The answer is probably - very few, if any. So the territories are written off, and the Berlin garrison chaps are ransomed. Scandinavia as a whole, not just Finland will enter the Soviet sphere of influence. The Soviets have grabbed some more land and now have an ice-free harbour in Hamburg that is not restricted to narrow approaches. The W.A. have shown they can stand up to the Soviet juggernaut, and will be better prepared next time round. Bunch of medals all round. Everyone's a winner, except the ones killed in battle, and the additional batch of Germans who are now facing up to years of government by Ulbricht and Honecker and others who otherwise would have had the privilege of living in the free world. This is where total speculation ends How is that for some alternative history?

Ruthless, in case you are reading this (and since you don't supply an email addy in the profile), my apologies for the last post. That was uncalled for. We have really been talking past each other more than anything else.

HI I have the opportunity to pick one of these up cheaply. Can someone tell me what sort of CMBB performance I can expect from the machine? TIA! Alternative would be this one: Would also be interested in LCD screen recommendations for them. 17" preferably 1,280xwhatever the other number is. Does anyone have an opinion on LG or Hercules? [ October 20, 2003, 08:33 AM: Message edited by: Andreas ]

Well crikey, there was I thinking we also talked about stuff that actually happened, like, uh, Bagration or the Vistula-Oder operation, or the 'Swan' across northern France . But maybe it is you who is doing all the speculating, and other people who try to bring in some relevant facts? The Romanians were trained by the Germans. I leave it up to you with your in-depth study of matters to assess the significance of this statement. Yep, and previously the boot was on the other foot. Was all 'whoever' (me) was saying. The problem of the North Koreans was that they had a one-shot army. Since they did not succeed in the first instance, they lost. But they came bloody close to succeeding. As I said before: irrelevant, but I am happy to repeat that until you get it. See it as a friendly gesture. All those non-existing bombs would have made a huge difference. But apart from that, I don't think I said that the Soviets would have rolled over the W.A. - all I think I was saying is that certainly the W.A. would not roll over the Soviets, and as I said before, I think a stalemate would have been the bet possible outcome for the W.A. - and also quite likely. BTW - Does it take you long to build up those strawmen, or is that a hidden talent? Until here this reminded me of the old 'My mind is made up, please stop confusing me with facts.' Here it stopped reminding me of that, but that maybe because in German we don't have a word for 'strawman argument'. Neither do Grisha or I agree with the idea that the Soviets would have rolled over the W.A.. No - should it? Well, gee. Reading it like that it sounds significant to me to, unfortunately I have no idea how significant. What is your point? The Karelian front was a backwater from July 1941, and torpedo bombing was hardly a prime activity of the Red Army air force. The Karelian Front was also the one covering Murmansk, where all those western planes were unloaded. So why not leave them there? Not sure about the PVO, but is that not the strategic air defense?

That was quite amusing old chap. As one of the Gang of Four™ who control this forum, I would like to let you know that you may continue to post in this vein.

Just to remind you about the effects of Lend-Lease. </font>

Don't think he sacked any. AG North's position had become untenable, I think and that was obvious to see. Next round of sackings was 21st July, I think. Speaking of organised withdrawals, the Büffelbewegung comes to mind, the withdrawal of 9th Army from the Rhzev salient. But this was not in response to any looming Soviet offensive, but to free forces for Kursk. I also think there was a fighting withdrawal in autumn 1943 in AG Centre sector, which ended in the positions from which Bagration would be launched. I don't know a lot about that though, middle-war in Russia is not my forte.

Hmmm... I am not aware of any in the central and southern sectors, at least not post winter 1941. I think von Rundstedt was sacked for withdrawing behind the Mius line. Think think think... AG North's withdrawal in February 1944 comes to mind. They managed to let the Soviets run into empty space, did not get encircled (except sometimes for rear-guards, my grandfather almost was encircled with one), and went into the Pantherstellung which they managed to defend for a while. Only example I can think of.

Probably - why?

Keke I think the Germans were really in a no-win situation when they attempted to hold the ground. If they did a picket line, it most likely would not stand up to recon in force. If they put the main force into the trenches, they would lose most of it in the barrage. The only credible defense, as acknowledged by the Germans in 1945, when it was too late, was to completely withdraw to the next line, just before the main attack. This would force the Soviets to completely start anew, even if it was only a 10-20km withdrawal. This approach was advocated amongst others by Raus, I believe. Of course you don't win the war by withdrawing, but you lose it a lot slower than by handing 400k soldiers and 500km of territory to the Soviets in the space of two weeks.

BTW - those gormless Russians helped the invasion of Normandy in another way, not usually widely known. I was only made aware of it recently. In Spring 1944 1st Ukrainian Front hammered at 4.Panzerarmee, and encircled Tarnopol (which had been named a Fester Platz) and three German armoured divisions at Kamenets-Podolsk. This led to 9th and 10th SS to be sent from France to deal with the developing desaster. Had the Soviets not continued to attack throughout the Rasputitsa, these two divisions would likely have been in northern France, ready to immediately launch into an allied landing. Also, Kamenets-Podolsk significantly damaged 1. SS - LSSAH, which was still rebuilding when the invasion happened and therefore was not available until July. Two extra, full strength SS Panzerdivisions early on in Normandy would not have stopped the invasion either, but would have made it a lot more costly and difficult. As it was, only one of the tank regiments was in France at the time of the invasion, and the two divisions did not arrive in the frontline before the end of June, three weeks after the invasion. By the way, the speed at which these divisions could be shuttled across the continent (9.SS left west Ukraine on 12th June and was in the line in Normandy on 26th June; 10th SS left from the 16th June and was in position on 29th; a division like this would take about 60-70 trains to move), should give some pause for thought to those who talk about the massive impact that the strategic air campaign had on transport. The Germans also did not have stealth trains, but they managed to use their railway system for shunting armies back and forth until it was physically occupied by allied forces in 1945. Strategic bombing certainly made it more difficult, but did not stop it.