Was the USSR set to attack Germany before Operation Barbarossa??

[Sublime]

. Just wait until you try and tell someone that Kursk was NOT the largest tank battle of the war

What was the largest.tank.battle.then?

[Sailor Malan2]

Good question.

I am still waiting for the answer to my question... who murders a large proportion of their senior army officers just before they plan to attack someone?

Or was Stalin so keen on a fair fight he wanted to give the Germans a head start?

[DMS]

DMS,

Suvorov/Rezun a clown? Hardly.

...

Regards,

John Kettler

Too long reply needed for my English language knowledges. Sorry if it is illegible.

He wouldn't be a clown if he would tell the facts that he knows in his books. His "very intersting" theories and hypothesis, based on false statements looks like a military history fiction. He states his fiction like a scientific research, that's why "clown". May be he was good and very competent as an intel source, but as a historian... + his fiction corresponds with official new Russian propaganda of 1990's about evil tyrant Stalin e.t.c., and military history lovers in Russia usually don't like that kind of propaganda. In fact, his books are the part of that propaganda. From that point of view - they are good. From historian point of view - there are a lot of false statements, they are sorted out in several Russian books.

[76mm]

John, unfortunately when I tried to watch the video I got the following error message: "The YouTube account associated with this video has been terminated due to multiple third-party notifications of copyright infringement." So I guess I won't be seeing that one. In any event, I know that Russian troops used just about everything to cross rivers, including planks, bundles of hay, etc. So I guess you'll say that planks and hay bundles are offensive weapons as well?

This whole discussion about amphibious tanks is rather ridiculous. If you want to talk about offensive weapons, talk about the 10k tanks or 5 airborne corps, not a couple thousand pea-shooter amphib tanks.

Regarding Suvorov: While I haven't read his books, I've read quite a bit about him, most of it critical. The problem is that I can read his facts and even if I accept his facts (maps of Germany! German phrase books!) I draw completely different conclusions. But I was at one of Moscow's largest bookstores today and you'll be glad to know that there were two entire shelves groaning under books either by, or about, Suvorov, so I'm sure he'll continue churning out his oeuvre.

But I will throw you a bone: just today I was reading the memoirs of Konstantin Rokossovsky, one of Russia's senior generals by the end of the war. Below I quote directly from his memoirs:

“Having studied the nature of the operations of German troops in operations in Poland and France attentively, I could not make out the plan of action of our troops in the given situation in the event of a German attack.

Judging by concentration of aviation on advanced aerodromes and the disposition of centralized supplies in the forefront of the front’s sector, this resembled preparation for a forward movement, which did not correspond with the disposition of the troops and measures undertaken by the troops. Even when the Germans concentrated their troops on our border, moving them from the West, about which the General Stafff and KOVO command must have known, no changes were made in our unit. An atmosphere of incomprehensible peacefulness continued to reign in KOVO’s units...In an event, if there was some kind of plan, then it clearly did not correspond to the situation arising toward the beginning of the war, which led to the heavy defeat of our troops in the beginning period of the war.”

But even this quote, from a credible source, falls far short of convincing me that the Soviets planned to attack anyone in 1941.

[dsf]

What was the largest.tank.battle.then?

Near Dubno and Brody, June 1941, when Army Group South clashed with the tanks of the Kiev Special Military District.

Regards

Scott Fraser

[dsf]

... I will put this extract from Прелюдия к Барбароссе (M.Kolomiets, M.Makarov; 2001) up for perusal. Pardon the formatting, but it Microsoft HTML I just converted from Word. It is in Russian, but the tables are fairly self explanatory. It contains chapter and verse regarding Red Army force deployments in June 1941. Tables 16 and 17 detail the tank forces assigned to the border MDs.

http://moto.hobby-site.com/junk/Прелюдия_к_Барбароссе.htm

Here is a better link. I have consolidated the tables so they are easier to find. It is an HTML document, so online translators can be used to determine the content.

http://moto.hobby-site.com/junk/tables-all.html

Regards

Scott Fraser

[George MC]

Near Dubno and Brody, June 1941, when Army Group South clashed with the tanks of the Kiev Special Military District.

Regards

Scott Fraser

If I recall the battlefields after this were a visitor attraction for German troops. So many KO'd tanks in a comparatively small area.

[Michael Emrys]

...who murders a large proportion of their senior army officers just before they plan to attack someone?

Someone who values loyalty and subordination above all else? Stalin appears to have been constantly afraid that someone would do him in and steal his job.

Michael

[John Kettler]

dsf,

Short answer regarding Stalin? He quotes chapter and verse from Stalin's own words: in official statements, whether press, radio or newsreel; in his books and accounts of those who were in his presence, whether intimate groups, such as him with his closest advisers, or to the 200-man class of the Frunze Academy.

I invite you to go look at the overwhelming mass of data supporting his case that Stalin was planning to attack Germany. Chapter 9 in "Icebreaker" talks about the enormous buildup, against all rational military behavior if defending, of the rail and road network at and near the new border. Rather than preparing bridges for demolition, the charges in the columns were removed, and the bridges were all reinforced. Damaged bridges were repaired, too. Every obstacle to high speed advance into Germany was ruthlessly removed. There was vast track laying right up to the German border, with more planned, as evidenced by gleaming piles of freshly delivered railroad track steel (if it's sat around for any time at all it rusts a bit) and huge stacks of railway ties. Suvorov's got direct quotes from primary sources attesting to these things and more. Chapter 10 talks about the Stalin Line, how potent it was, how extraordinary the maskirovka regarding it, and how, in a veritable eye blink, a huge fortification complex running 1500 km and unflankable from land (ran Baltic to Black Sea, I believe) was torn apart and the weapons stored. He talks about how the partisans and detachments designed to fight in the immense security zone were disbanded. He talks about the wholesale lifting of mines, leaving the new border wide open to German attack, but the plan was to go the other direction. He talks about how artillery caponiers, constructed at huge expense and resource use, were blown up, covered over, or simply abandoned, with their weapons being stripped out and stored. A relative handful of weapons from the gutted Stalin Line wound up in the farcical Molotov Line on the border, whose, in Suvorov's view, real purpose was an Economy of Force measure to allow more troops to be used in the offense, while those in the line could deal with minor attacks not in the primary sector of operations. And while the Russians were doing all they could to pave the way into Germany, the Germans were quite plainly noted doing the same sorts of things. Here, again, he's got fully attributed direct quotes from those involved, much to their incredulity and consternation, in carrying out the work of systematically demolishing Russian border defeses, fromn the Stalin Line forward. The statements made to a minelaying officer regarding his unit's true task and appropriate unit name are damning, as you'll see for yourself. Suvorov deftly skewers Marshal of the Artillery Vorontsov who, after the GPW, pretends not to understand why the Stalin Line was torn up, why the artillery was repositioned forward and much more. Suvorov keeps hammering away at the squirming and spin and lies being told to hide what was done and why.

76mm,

Haven't you ever seen a film the critics hated, yet you loved? What makes you think it'd be any different in this case? How many academics have reputations resting on the Standard Model of History, the safe orthodoxy which threatens no assumptions cum conclusions arrived at decades ago and which serve the interests of all concerned? I have no history or military science degree; hold no academic position or government job, so my "rice bowl" isn't at risk. All I care about is the truth, and I care not how many upheavals result as it's revealed. When I was in junior high I read quite a few of the core Marxist-Leninist works, the gist of which may be stated this way.

"The triumph of Communism is historically inevitable, but it is nevertheless the duty of every good Communist to work night and day to bring it about. In pursuit of this noblest of all goals, everything is permitted; indeed, required. Lies, cheating, theft, murder, even genocide are valid means to bring about the triumph if Communism throughout the globe."

Suvorov zeroed in on the official USSR Coat of Arms, noting the hammer and sickle cover not Russia, but the entire world. This coat of arms is thus the visual depiction of the ultimate goal of Russia: global Communism. Everything is oriented toward that goal.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_symbolism#mediaviewer/File:Coat_of_arms_of_the_Soviet_Union.svg

As far as I'm concerned, Suvorov's got a tremendous case just using the material he relentlessly researched and presents in Chapter 9. He then comes at it another way in Chapter 10, with equally devastating proofs. Since you read Russian, and I don't, and since you are theoretically able to access much of his source material there in Russia, you are perhaps uniquely positioned to check his citations and see how well they stand up. At the very worst, the carefully marshaled evidence he adduces would, in my estimation, carry the day in a lawsuit, and people have been put to death over far, far less in criminal proceedings. Suvorov shows the Russians were planning their armed move against the West as early as 1920.

Given the crackdown on writing things unflattering about the RKKA/Red Army during the GPW, I wonder how much longer books like Suvorov's will stay available where you are, both in the stores and in the libraries. Ditto the access to various documents.

As for K.K. Rokossovskiy's observation, I invite you to look at it in the context of the staggering intelligence mosaic assembled by Suvorov, ranging from the CPSU's grand strategic plan for conquering first Europe, then the world; its expression through the many times iterated statements of Lenin, Trotsky, Tukachevsky and numerous others; through the astronomic cost across the board to pour out armaments while the people starved from policies Stalin himself ordered and had ruthlessly implemented; through stacks of statements, decrees, military quotes and such (some all but completely vanished down the Memory Hole from the relevant libraries and archives) bluntly stating there is nothing but the offensive; that war will be fought on the enemy's territory; through the simply awesome measures used to grease the skids for attacking Germany, all the way down to a humble battalion busily pulling up mines or tearing down barb wire.

The story is consistent at all levels and fully reflects the known policies, over a period of two decades, of the CPSU in general, and Stalin in particular. Stalin wanted war. Stalin was preparing at full tilt for war, and Suvorov pretty much annihilates the claim the Russians were caught unprepared. They were caught unprepared in the sense that they were preempted before they could finish their own breathtaking in scale attack preparation, but they knew perfectly well the Germans were postured for attack. Some units went on alert in April, universal conscription was introduced, and many other actions were taken. That Stalin abruptly developed cold feet reflected, not a change in the overall objective, but rather, Stalin's acute realization that, until his own preparations were complete, he was fully exposed, having gutted his own defenses in depth and deliberately not fortified his border in any militarily useful way to clear the path for a stupendous attack intended to sweep through a Europe in chaos; a Europe with Hitler way over on the English Channel, to a potentially lethal stroke from Hitler, who was ready, a fact widely known in a succession of RKKA levels and by no means only the GKO and STAVKA. I recommend you not take the opinions of Suvorov's critics as a basis for assessing his work or his qualities as a researcher. Instead read what he says and decide for yourself!

Regards,

John Kettler

[76mm]

I had a copy of Icebreaker in my hands yesterday but decided not to buy it (or read it)--I have too much else on my reading list. If people such as yourself can't give any convincing reasons to believe Suvorov, why should I waste my time reading an entire book on the topic? A few responses:

Chapter 9 in "Icebreaker" talks about the enormous buildup, against all rational military behavior if defending, of the rail and road network at and near the new border.

Well, since much of the new border had been part of Poland, I imagine that the road and rail network was in an abysmal condition, and best case not integrated with Soviet networks, so the area needed to be tied in to the rest of the USSR. No reason to assume it was meant to support an attack.

Rather than preparing bridges for demolition, the charges in the columns were removed, and the bridges were all reinforced. Damaged bridges were repaired, too.

Damaged bridges repaired? Shocker! Bridges probably reinforced because they were rickety structures that couldn't hold a panje wagon, much Russia's 10k tanks. It is well known that even Russia's "defensive" plan called for an offensive in many areas, which would need adequate bridges. And much of the new border area had populations not particularly favorably disposed towards the Russians, so maybe not a good idea to leave lots of explosive charges on bridges throughout the countryside that they could pick up. I would also remove demolitions charges.

Every obstacle to high speed advance into Germany was ruthlessly removed. There was vast track laying right up to the German border, with more planned, as evidenced by gleaming piles of freshly delivered railroad track steel (if it's sat around for any time at all it rusts a bit) and huge stacks of railway ties.

Maybe this had something to do with all of the trains going back and forth with imports/exports under the peace pact, which were important to Russia both for its own uses and to keep Germany happy.

Chapter 10 talks about the Stalin Line, how potent it was, how extraordinary the maskirovka regarding it, and how, in a veritable eye blink, a huge fortification complex running 1500 km and unflankable from land (ran Baltic to Black Sea, I believe) was torn apart and the weapons stored.

OK, please explain why this is rational even if you are planning an offensive? Why not just let it lie there? In fact, I doubt the weapons were stored, but rather incorporated into the many new army units or transferred (or in process of transfer) to the Molotov line.

He talks about how the partisans and detachments designed to fight in the immense security zone were disbanded.

arming partisans among an unfriendly populace doesn't sound like a great idea to me. Plus the army was being greatly expanded at this time, they could probably better use the bodies in the real army.

He talks about the wholesale lifting of mines, leaving the new border wide open to German attack, but the plan was to go the other direction. He talks about how artillery caponiers, constructed at huge expense and resource use, were blown up, covered over, or simply abandoned, with their weapons being stripped out and stored.

Again, why do any of this (other than removing some of the mines) even if you're planning an attack?

you are perhaps uniquely positioned to check his citations and see how well they stand up.

actually, hundreds, if not thousands, of Russian historians have already done this, and unlike you, I am willing to take them at their word if they say he is full of bunk. So my incentive to spend any more time on this is very low...

At the very worst, the carefully marshaled evidence he adduces would, in my estimation, carry the day in a lawsuit, and people have been put to death over far, far less in criminal proceedings.

er, what criminal proceedings do you have in mind?

Suvorov shows the Russians were planning their armed move against the West as early as 1920.

This is the crux of the matter. Russia's armed forces were clearly built for an offensive strategy. Soviet Russia generally had an offensive geo-political mindset. Germany had invaded the USSR before, and was threatening to do so again. Any rational Russian planner should have assumed that Russia should be prepared to invade Germany, either as a pre-emptive measure or as an opportunistic lunge in case Germany became engaged elsewhere. But none of this means that Russia was planning to attack Germany in 1941. An attack in 1942-1943? Maybe... A potential attack, eventually, at some point in the future, given an opportunity? Probably... But 1941? Don't think so.

[niall78]

Their is a lot more of this revisionist nonsense these days after the relative quiet of the 90s and 2000s. Lots of resurgent fascist movements in Europe now who conspicuously jump back and forth between either saying the Nazis were super bad and they aren't like them, or how the Nazis were just misunderstood and really trying to save Europe from Bolshevism!

One thing will never change about fascism, they'd lie about the color of the sky if it would suit their interests.

We have a fascinating example of Goebbels-esque stuff right here folks. I argue keep him around for just a little bit more so we can study him.

Hellas references the David Irving book 'Nuremberg: The Last Battle' in one of his posts. Of course Irving is a well known British Holocaust denier.

In a 1991 speech in Regina Irving called the Shoah "a major fraud...There were no gas chambers. They were fakes and frauds".

Goggling 'Nuremberg: The Last Battle' the first hit on the list is an aryan-nation website.

I argue that staff should dump Hellas as soon as is possible. He brings this forum into disrepute.

[sburke]

"The triumph of Communism is historically inevitable, but it is nevertheless the duty of every good Communist to work night and day to bring it about. In pursuit of this noblest of all goals, everything is permitted; indeed, required. Lies, cheating, theft, murder, even genocide are valid means to bring about the triumph if Communism throughout the globe."

Suvorov zeroed in on the official USSR Coat of Arms, noting the hammer and sickle cover not Russia, but the entire world. This coat of arms is thus the visual depiction of the ultimate goal of Russia: global Communism. Everything is oriented toward that goal.

That's worthy of Stephen Colbert as satire, but as a historical argument represents a pretty juvenile uninformed understanding of the socialist and communist perception of capitalism during the period. Communists had declared that communism and capitalism represented two totally irreconcilable political movements being that they represented two classes at war. The hammer and sickle does not represent Soviet conquest of the world, it represents the workers and peasants society of the world.

There is no hidden meaning there, it is simple recognition that communism and capitalism had irreconcilable differences. A position shared by the capitalists. That is pretty irrelevant when speaking about the Soviet Union as by that time their adherence to any kind of worker's revolution was simply clap trap to maintain a dictatorship. That idea pretty much died in 1917. It just took a lot longer for the illusion to fade.

[dsf]

dsf,

Short answer regarding Stalin? He quotes chapter and verse from Stalin's own words: in official statements, whether press, radio or newsreel; in his books and accounts of those who were in his presence, whether intimate groups, such as him with his closest advisers, or to the 200-man class of the Frunze Academy.

Stalin's speech to the Academy was significant in that it was the first time that Germany was publicly labeled a threat. Up to that point, Soviet propaganda had described Germany in positive terms. There was no timetable announced. The speech is consistent with Stalin's decision in March 1939 to prepare for war. That decision was premised on the four years it would take to get a new generation of tanks and aircraft into service and that takes us to 1943.

There is no question that Stalin intended to attack Germany — the question is when. To answer that, the first place to look is the Red Army. The Soviet defensive strategy is a matter of record, a three-tiered defense in accordance with "deep battle", which included a counterattack and invasion of German-held territory if the Germans attacked. That's a big if.

For the most part, RKKA deployment in 1941 is consistent with that strategy. It was assumed that a German attack would come in the south, toward Kiev and the Ukraine, so the Kiev OVO had priority in the delivery of new tanks. Elsewhere, tank brigades were driving worn out junk, some of it dating back to 1932. Mobilization had begun but was months away from completion. Tank production was increasing slowly and outside a few select units, neither the drivers nor mechanics had touched any of the new tanks. The Stalin Line had been abandoned, with the guns removed to use in the Molotov Line along the new border. The NKVD was the prime contractor for fortifications, airfields and other facilities. They were months behind schedule, particularly with airfields, which contributed to the wholesale destruction of aircraft on the ground in June. The troops were new conscripts, there were not enough NCOs, there was no fuel or ammunition allocated for training — it is indescribable how scrambled and incomplete everything was in 1941. Many of the units had only partially arrived, with their weapons or tools strung out for hundreds of kilometers along the railway line. The more you read about it, the worse it gets. All in all, it simply boggles the mind. The Germans could not have attacked at a better time.

The reality is that the Red Army was so dysfunctional in 1941 that they could barely conduct defensive operations against the Germans. Launching a general attack was impossible. The only place where they were not overrun immediately was in the south, where Kirponos had the tanks and took the initiative to mount a spirited defense against the Germans, briefly, until they were overwhelmed by events. Kirponos was dead by then. It's a good story.

...Chapter 9 in "Icebreaker" talks about the enormous buildup ... of the rail and road network at and near the new border...

Recall that there was an enormous volume of trade between Germany and the USSR. Both Stalin and Hitler relied on it. There is nothing sinister about improving the transportation infrastructure, on either side of the border.

... Chapter 10 talks about the Stalin Line, how potent it was, how extraordinary the maskirovka regarding it, and how, in a veritable eye blink, a huge fortification complex running 1500 km and unflankable from land (ran Baltic to Black Sea, I believe) was torn apart and the weapons stored.

The Stalin Line was obsolete, overtaken by events. The border had moved west hundreds of kilometers. There was no point in keeping the guns there when they were needed for the Molotov Line. Common sense.

... Suvorov deftly skewers Marshal of the Artillery Vorontsov who, after the GPW, pretends not to understand why the Stalin Line was torn up...

There were many generals who can be skewered for their performance in June 1941. Some of them were even shot. The overall level of competence was abysmal, generally, which is just one more manifestation of the half-baked state of the Red Army. Suvorov tends to make mountains out of molehills, but it's all a matter of context. It is still not a realistic scenario.

After you finish Suvorov, check out Gorodetsky's Grand Delusion. He is much more readable than Glantz (Stumbling Colossus) and offers a different point of view.

Regards

Scott Fraser

[Melchior]

Hellas references the David Irving book 'Nuremberg: The Last Battle' in one of his posts. Of course Irving is a well known British Holocaust denier.

That's gold. I mean David Irving? One might as well just cite Goebbels.

I argue that staff should dump Hellas as soon as is possible. He brings this forum into disrepute.

Fascists bring human civilization into disrepute to say nothing of the forum. In a just world he would be totally ostracized from society.

[Battlefront.com]

I'm closing this one up.

As for neo-nazis, fascists, white power, anti-semetic, thug thinkers on this Forum, we tolerate them as long as they hide it well. Citing one of the worst birth defects that managed to learn how to write (I consider David Irving such a creature), that's not enough to get banned. It is, however, enough to get someone on our "watch very carefully and boot off this Forum without shedding a tear the first time the line is crossed" list. Fortunately the title of this list is longer than the names on it

Hellas,

Friendly warning. Avoid discussing anything even remotely close to the utter crap in Irving's drivel and you'll remain on this Forum. Pushing the likes of Irving into discussions on this Forum will more than likely cause us to ban you sooner or later. Everybody is on notice to alert us if you do.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Hellas references the David Irving book 'Nuremberg: The Last Battle' in one of his posts. Of course Irving is a well known British Holocaust denier.

That's about the kindest description I've seen of David Irving by anybody who doesn't buy into his BS. Irving is as much a "historian" as I am the King of England. A long time ago, as part of a formal education to become a historian, I tried reading some of his crap. I love reading fiction, especially science fiction, and I found things like "Make Room, Make Room" (aka Solent Green) to be more historically accurate.

Steve

[Hellas]

Wow, free speech has come a long way.

As a libertarian I can hardly express how disgusted I am from your unbelieveably unprofessional behaviour of a company, your ad hominem attacks on the lowest level and not the slightest exchange of arguments.

That you threaten customers to be banned if they express their opinion, in fact that you demand that they must hide it, if it goes against your opinion, is unbelieveable.

That's probably the worst kind of totalitarian behaviour I have ever experienced from a company.

Btw: I just read Arnold Kramish's book about Paul Rosebud and even Kramish had referred to Irving as authority.

Who calls Irvings books science fiction but avoids to discuss facts, but instead shuts up any discussion, has said more about himself, than is necessary!

Now you little Hitler/Stalin, you can feel free to ban me. I would see it as honor!

[niall78]

That's about the kindest description I've seen of David Irving by anybody who doesn't buy into his BS. Irving is as much a "historian" as I am the King of England. A long time ago, as part of a formal education to become a historian, I tried reading some of his crap. I love reading fiction, especially science fiction, and I found things like "Make Room, Make Room" (aka Solent Green) to be more historically accurate.

Steve

Irving's has been a darling of the fascist movement preforming many recruitment drives in Germany and Eastern Europe for disaffected youth. Of course his fake history plays a major part in the rehabilitation of the Nazis by minimizing and excusing their crimes. I respect the forum too much to type what I really feel about Irving or his quoter's or supporters.

And to be fair - in ten plus years reading here you guys do a great job policing the nastier elements that can get involved in World War Two discussions.

[sburke]

Wow, free speech has come a long way.

As a libertarian I can hardly express how disgusted I am from your unbelieveably unprofessional behaviour of a company, your ad hominem attacks on the lowest level and not the slightest exchange of arguments.

That you threaten customers to be banned if they express their opinion, in fact that you demand that they must hide it, if it goes against your opinion, is unbelieveable.

That's probably the worst kind of totalitarian behaviour I have ever experienced from a company.

Btw: I just read Arnold Kramish's book about Paul Rosebud and even Kramish had referred to Irving as authority.

Who calls Irvings books science fiction but avoids to discuss facts, but instead shuts up any discussion, has said more about himself, than is necessary!

Now you little Hitler/Stalin, you can feel free to ban me. I would see it as honor!

Well it is a private forum, not a public space. They are well within their right to define any parameters they want and not affect your free speech. Just the same way I can't come into your house and say whatever disrespectful things I want before I get booted out.

BF has always been clear that nazi apologists and holocaust deniers including the likes of Irving are not welcome here and were diplomatic enough to remind you of that instead of just booting you for bringing it up. It is a fair warning of forum rules you agreed to when you joined. You certainly can't fault them for providing the courtesy of reminding you of the rules.

And Steve you forgot to lock the door.

[ASL Veteran]

Wow, free speech has come a long way.

As a libertarian I can hardly express how disgusted I am from your unbelieveably unprofessional behaviour of a company, your ad hominem attacks on the lowest level and not the slightest exchange of arguments.

That you threaten customers to be banned if they express their opinion, in fact that you demand that they must hide it, if it goes against your opinion, is unbelieveable.

That's probably the worst kind of totalitarian behaviour I have ever experienced from a company.

Btw: I just read Arnold Kramish's book about Paul Rosebud and even Kramish had referred to Irving as authority.

Who calls Irvings books science fiction but avoids to discuss facts, but instead shuts up any discussion, has said more about himself, than is necessary!

Now you little Hitler/Stalin, you can feel free to ban me. I would see it as honor!

You are not a Libertarian.

[Melchior]

Wow, free speech has come a long way.

As a libertarian I can hardly express how disgusted I am from your unbelieveably unprofessional behaviour of a company, your ad hominem attacks on the lowest level and not the slightest exchange of arguments.

Those who would deny free speech, liberty, and civil rights to others deserve none themselves. Fascist.

[Battlefront.com]

Dang. Forgot to close this thread up. Oh well, it would have produced a new thread anyway, so might as well keep it all in one place.

Wow, free speech has come a long way.

As a libertarian I can hardly express how disgusted I am from your unbelieveably unprofessional behaviour of a company, your ad hominem attacks on the lowest level and not the slightest exchange of arguments.

Hmm. Where to start. First, there is no such thing as free speech. Try yelling "FIRE!!!" at the top of your lungs in a crowded movie theater and see what happens. The person who gets arrested for doing this might find it to be a violation of his rights, but the rest of the theater would strongly disagree. Second, we are under no ethical or legal obligations to give hate speech an outlet. I posted a reminder of this policy, which is in the rules you agreed to when you signed onto this Forum. Third, I did not make a single "ad hominem" against you, just David Irving. And even there I was being kind to someone who is less valuable to this world than a handful of pond scum.

That's probably the worst kind of totalitarian behaviour I have ever experienced from a company.

BS. Most would boot you the second they sniffed what was in the air. You've received a warning only.

Who calls Irvings books science fiction but avoids to discuss facts, but instead shuts up any discussion, has said more about himself, than is necessary!

I've debated holocaust deniers before. It's like having a discussion about physics with someone who believes the world is flat and the universe revolves around the Earth. It is neither fun nor intellectually productive. All it does is reaffirm my suspicions that our species is doomed in the long run.

Now you little Hitler/Stalin, you can feel free to ban me. I would see it as honor!

I can ban anybody I like at any time I like. Yet I don't. In fact, I don't think I've banned anybody for a year or so. The last one I can remember was a well known neo-nazi whom we all put up with for many years. I was willing to give you a chance to prove yourself capable of controlling your urges to veer way off topic into subject mater, but if you don't think you are able to then I'm happy to do everybody a favor and flip the switch on your account. We're all about providing excellent customer support.

Your choice.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Those who would deny free speech, liberty, and civil rights to others deserve none themselves. Fascist.

I don't know for sure that Hellas is a proper Fascist or not, but you are spot on about the mindset of those who are. I find it rather humorous that the ones who are most likely to take away the rights of others based on personal whims are the ones who get all hot and bothered by even the most gentle forms of control. They never grasp the contradictory nature of their logic either.

Steve

[dsf]

... I've debated holocaust deniers before. It's like having a discussion about physics with someone who believes the world is flat and the universe revolves around the Earth. It is neither fun nor intellectually productive. All it does is reaffirm my suspicions that our species is doomed in the long run.

I had to laugh when I read this. I approve, and agree. It's almost like debating Rezunites.

Regards

Scott Fraser

[John Kettler]

Steve,

A reprieve on a declared, not threatened, thread lock? Alert the media! This is the first time I have ever seen such a thing occurr, and I've been here quite some time.

All,

Can't recall which thread it is, and am a bit fried from writing an article for hours on end, but I wanted to speak to the issue of trains and railroad issues in the frontier region, a topic used to discredit the Suvorov premise. In chapter 22 of "Icebreaker" Suvorov shows the Russians began a titanic series of troop movements so massive they pretty much killed the railway system starting six months prior to Barbarossa and intensifying enormously over time. The result of this was to put 57 divisions (their artillery preceded them) right up on the border of Germany and Romania, with another 114 close behind and in easy attack position. This was the entire First Strategic Echelon. 170 divisions! And where the First Strategic Echelon had been, the Second Strategic Echelon, whose existence the Germans did not know of, and whose movements and arrival were thoroughly concealed, took the former place of the First Strategic Echelon. The upshot? Because the First Strategic Echelon was on and near the border, it was wrecked. That accomplished, the Germans thought they were in the clear, the war won. Which was when they ran smack into another wall of armies. He's got fully documented account after account from the various senior COs attesting to things like calling up reserves, going "on exercise" out of season and with full war stores, the employment of special orders reserved solely for wartime, rigorously camouflaged encampments already in place in the forests for the arriving units, senior officers running around in much lower rank insignia, same people traveling in (gasp) box cars with their staffs and commo gear, all amid night movement only. He's got the goods from officers' memoirs, unit histories, MD histories, archive docs, letters from civilians in the zones the endless trains passed through (lots of sleep lost) and zeks in their camps in the boonies of far Russia. The latter categories are taken from letters in journals and those written to him by people from all over the world, many whose nations were gobbled up by Russia and smashed, then smashed again and again. Further, he's got the same sort of evidence when it comes to the Russian Air Force and Russian Navy, including the putting to sea of the Baltic Fleet with orders for an offensive mission the eve of Barbarossa. And over all of this hung denials from TASS anything was going on other than normal exercises, to include "testing the railways." Some test.

'By the end of June 1941, there were 1,320 trains laden with motor vehicles standing on the railways.' (VIZH 1975, No. I, p. 81) The standard weight for a military train at that time was 900 tons (45 wagons each

weighing 20 tons). Assuming that there was one vehicle to every wagon, this would mean that at least 59,400 vehicles were expected to be offloaded. However, it often happened that, in conditions where an enemy attack

has not been foreseen (and this one was not foreseen), the vehicles were loaded 'like a snake', that is with the front wheels of each vehicle placed on the body of the one in front. In this way an increased number of

vehicles can be loaded onto one train.

Suvorov is highly conservative in his primary load assumptions, since it's readily demonstrable that a flatcar carried two motor vehicles, as seen here where an SU-122 and a T-34/76 are both clearly on a single flatcar.

http://www.wio.ru/tank/gal5/t34-su122.jpg

He does much the same thing with ammo trains, such as this.

"But before an offensive, ammunition

is stored on mobile transport, which is a very expensive and dangerous thing to do. 'At the small railway station of Kalinovka alone, the South-West Front had 1,500 wagons laden with ammunition.' (Sovetskie

Zheleznodorozhniki v Gody Velikoi Otechestvennoi Voiny, Izd. AN. SSSRI963, p. 36)"

At 45 boxcars per train, that small station has no less than 33 ammo trains! This was before war broke out. Elsewhere, a single decision sent 100,000 tons of fuel from Russia's interior to the western border, one of many similar actions.

Planes, trains and automobiles, as they say, hordes of troops, vast quantities of weaponry, ammo and fuel all going west. The all but incomprehensible in size move began months before Barbarossa, so Barbarossa can't possibly be the explanation.and for such things described above to be arriving from the far hinterland on June 22, 1941, it must be the case that the orders went out well before that.

Border defenses, right down to barb wire removed? Check? Mines lifted? Check. Fortifications in the path of the advance destroyed? Check? Bridge demo charges removed? Check. Bridges refurbished to carry the weight of tanks and such? Check. Transport network built and expanded to accommodate a high speed offensive? Check. Offensive naval units deployed? Check. Danube flotilla ready to go? Check. Combat aviation forward based to support attack by ground forces? Check. Multiple Airborne Corps, including Zhukov's favorite from Khalkin Gol, brought west, ready to pounce on strategic targets. Secret mobilizations? Check? Universal draft? Check.

This is not the combat posture of a defender, who should have actual defenses in place well away from the frontier and be burrowing away like a mole on steroids to make more, better and faster. In front of that should be a deep security zone, full of military nastiness. Instead, we have no security zone, no mines, no abatis, tank traps or wire entanglements, no bridges ready to blow. No partisans. No stay behind units. No weapon caches or underground bases.

The conclusion, based on the information presented, is ineluctable. Stalin planned to attack Germany; had had the wheels turning for many months, was making military movements the likes of which the world had never seen, apparently; had his units on war footing, etc. No ifs, ands or buts, he was going west--in full battle cry. The populace had been prepared for decades, and the Non Aggression Pact was both a blip in the main program and excellent strategic camouflage. Nor, it is evident, did Stalin's brief (in terms of his entire war preps) bout of cold feet ref annoying Hitler in any way interfere with Stalin's (running out of superlatives) relentless assembling, transporting and deploying his forces for war in the west. First Germany and Romania, then everyone else.

Supporting Suvorov's argument from the Russian side is that both the German and the Russian aerial recon pilots (drat those nav errors!) saw and reported the same things going on on the other guy's turf, likewise the ground units at the border. And we know the Germans planned to attack. Hmm.

Connecting the military intent dots is trivial, and what the Germans found once their attack began said it all, for much of what was to be used against them in offensive warfare was caught still on the trains, to include whole divisions going west and awe inspiring amounts of war materiel, whether hammered from the air, shelled or captured in the rail yards.

If somebody can manage to systematically refute the crushing aggregation of evidence Suvorov has so painstakingly assembled over many years, I'd love to see it. As it stands, I see no way for the Standard Model of History, if you will, to survive what Suvorov has come up with. If Suvorov's right, Stalin wanted to attack Germany in 1942, but realizing Hitler's preparation indicated attack at any time, was racing to do so before the end of July 1941. This is why he got so chary about doing anything which might upset Hitler, such as downing the Luftwaffe recon flights over Russia. So twitchy was he about giving no pretext under which Hitler could justify an attack, Stalin ordered his troops not to fire even after Barbarossa was well underway. As Bellamy notes, the Baltic Fleet was the first to open fire, and it was against explicit orders! Was also fascinated to read that NONE of the sealed war orders, as attested by numerous Russian divisional and higher COs, even envisioned defense, forcing Timoshenko et al. into a mad scramble to come up with something, anything to stop Hitler's fascisti from destroying the Motherland when the planned offense became the chaotic, unplanned for, not in the Field Regulations defense.

Regards,

John Kettler