Soviet troops "fighting to the death" in CM2

[Tiger]

I've been reading up on the Eastern front lately and it seems that a big problem the Germans encountered in their initial invasion was that Soviet troops would simply not surrender when under similiar circumstances Western troops would have.

One way this could be modeled in CM 2 is to have, during the 1941 to mid 42 dates, a greater chance of Soviet troops fighting to the last man instead of routing and running away. This tough "fight to the death" would balance out the inherent lack of tactical independence (i.e. longer command delays) that plagued Soviet troops during the inital German onslaught.

This greater tendancy of Soviet Troops to fight to the death seems to be pretty well documented, as is their lack of tactical independence and flexibility. It was this fight to the death that seems to have bled off the strength of the attacking Wehrmacht armies.

"Victoried to death" is a phrase I've come across.

Any thoughts?

-Tiger

[Michael Dorosh]

You would need to investigate further if this really applies at the tactical level, and to which units. The German captured thousands of men during this period; so there is obviously some variance here.

I think the scale of prisoner-taking in CM is quite low as it is - some have posted here complaining that they never seem to take any.

Just my two cents, but I'm not sure the Russians deserve any special treatment as far as this goes.

It kind of relates to the National Characteristics discussion going on in the Frontsoldaten thread - and how far you want to go with these kinds of things. I think BTS doesn't want to model "national characteristics" at all, and I agree with the arguments given by others on this board against it as well.

FWIW, I've read that the Soviets were also masters of camouflage and entrenching - but do you want to give them special modifiers in the game? You could get quite silly, and once you include one, I guess you have to include them all

- British cool under fire

- Americans more mechanically inclined

- Germans more tactically flexible at the squad level

etc. The case has yet to be made that including these kinds of things would be realistic and fun to play.

Or so I think.

[The Commissar]

Im not sure about this (we need an Ostfront expert to help us out here), but wasnt this fight to death mentality more present in the later years?

Ive also heard that in 1941, more prisoners were taken then in the later war. When was this "turnaround" in fighting mentality present, then? Sometime around winter, when the slowdown in German advance heartened the Soviets? Again, we need an Ostfront expert.

If this IS included, it would be pretty easy to implement. Just give Soviets higher fanaticism. Oh yeah, and one more thing: wasn't a good part of this mentality due to commissar units shooting at you if you ran off? Either way you were dead, so why not take some Germans with you? If these are modeled, their presence could raise fanaticism levels higher then normal. Seems pretty simple to me.

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"...Every position, every meter of Soviet soil must be defended to the last drop of blood..."

- Segment from Order 227 "Not a step back"

[109 Gustav]

That's a good idea. BTS should model commissar units to "boost troop's morale." How else are we going to be able to use human waves to clear minefields?

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Well my skiff's a twenty dollar boat, And I hope to God she stays afloat.

But if somehow my skiff goes down, I'll freeze to death before I drown.

And pray my body will be found, Alaska salmon fishing, boys, Alaska salmon fishing.

The Last Defense- Mods, Scenarios, and more!

[Tiger]

What I've been reading lately is that yes there were a huge number of prisoners to deal with but also many accounts of Soviet units fighting on when their Western counterparts would have surrendered. While the commisars shooting people who fled would insure non-surrender behaivor, what else would induce this amonst Soviet troops? Lack of education, fear of their superiors, love of the Motherland, abject hatred for the "teutonic" germans coming to rape murder and pillage? Their seems to have been a good bit of animosity esp in the Ukraine (sp) against Communism and in particular Stalinism. Some of the problems for the German invaders that I've been reading were the masses of Soviet pows and also the tendency of a many Soviets to fight to the death.

Not trying to start a "racial modifiers flame fest" but some more insight and discussion if possible. Michael has a point that these things are difficult to determine and likely not implementable or desireable in the game. So how about a "not looking to add this to the game" discussion?

-Tiger

[chasd]

Originally posted by The Commissar:

Im not sure about this (we need an Ostfront expert to help us out here), but wasnt this fight to death mentality more present in the later years?

Ive also heard that in 1941, more prisoners were taken then in the later war. When was this "turnaround" in fighting mentality present, then? Sometime around winter, when the slowdown in German advance heartened the Soviets? Again, we need an Ostfront expert.

If this IS included, it would be pretty easy to implement. Just give Soviets higher fanaticism. Oh yeah, and one more thing: wasn't a good part of this mentality due to commissar units shooting at you if you ran off? Either way you were dead, so why not take some Germans with you? If these are modeled, their presence could raise fanaticism levels higher then normal. Seems pretty simple to me.

I dont know if they were Commissar units, but they were called NKVD troops, and they were waiting behind the lines with machine gun bunkers and barbed wire entanglements.

Originally posted by 109 Gustav:

That's a good idea. BTS should model commissar units to "boost troop's morale." How else are we going to be able to use human waves to clear minefields?

I think thats what penal battalions were for, commiting suicide to redeem themselves.

Is BTS going to model these? I'd feel sad sending a bunch of people with no weapons into German lines. Most of them were old men and children my age who stole food to feed their families.

Stalin was nice wasnt he?

[Sirocco]

Originally posted by Tiger:

the tendency of a many Soviets to fight to the death.

The reading I've done suggests the Germans found the Soviets hard to predict. Sometimes they would flee at the first shot, and at other times they'd stand firm even when their position was hopeless.

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"He belongs to a race which has coloured the map red, and all he wants are the green fields of England..."

- Joe Illingworth, Yorkshire Post War Correspondent

[niles]

Besides, soviets in the beginging all of their front line troops were all conscripts, poorly equiped and un coordinated it would not matter how fanatical they are. Besides Russian troops even the Elite are not all that good. Hell when it takes the russians 2,000 troops to take a village in chechnia with a pop. of 600 and they encounter 1,300 of theirs dead or wounded that proves they are not good fighters, stupid generals and crappy troops make up 85% of the Russian army then and now/

[The Commissar]

Originally posted by niles:

Besides, soviets in the beginging all of their front line troops were all conscripts, poorly equiped and un coordinated it would not matter how fanatical they are. Besides Russian troops even the Elite are not all that good. Hell when it takes the russians 2,000 troops to take a village in chechnia with a pop. of 600 and they encounter 1,300 of theirs dead or wounded that proves they are not good fighters, stupid generals and crappy troops make up 85% of the Russian army then and now/

Not precisely true. You see m'boy, Chechnia is a guerrilla war. It is very difficult to fight a guerrilla war, especially in an enviorment as rough as Chechnia! Remember Vietnam? This is worse. Guerrillas here have had lots of practice and are devoted as hell to their perception of this war as a holy "Jihad".

Have you ever been there, looked at pictures or even maps of the place? Its all mountains and woodland. The guerrillas dont even need to try that hard to hide from the Russians. Although they are being foolish, sending AFV's into that sort of terrain. I still dont understand why anyone would do this. Sometimes I feel I could wage a war then some of those so called "generals".

Tiger,

There were a lot of reasons. Those you mentioned are all good ones. Coupled with the cruelty Germans (well, actually SS) treated many Russian civilians. They burned down over 650 villages, and all killed all their occupants in Belarus alone. Word quickly spread that no matter how bad Stalin and his bolsheviks were, these guys were worse.

Also, remember there were no TV and the radios were rare. Some Russian villages, hundreds of miles away from civilization, didn't know a war was going on! When men were conscripted from these villages, they had every reason to believe that everything was going jolly good and the Germans were losing. So of course they fought hard.

Oh yes, and despite communism, Russians were still religious, to the point of fanaticism, and considered their country as the last great Orthodox empire.

Most of this I got from various internet sources and history books.

Cheers!

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"...Every position, every meter of Soviet soil must be defended to the last drop of blood..."

- Segment from Order 227 "Not a step back"

[Berlichtingen]

The Germans took huge numbers of prisoners in 41, so I don't believe there is any reason to change anything in CM as far as that goes. As a scenario designer, you can always turn fanaticism on

[ADAman]

WRT national characteristics, there is always the 'fanatic' factor. I can see this being used a fair amount when CM makes it to the Pacific. I expect Stalingrad will have its fair share of these looney goons also.

[Tiger]

"...no matter how bad Stalin and his bolsheviks were, these guys were worse. "

Aye, I've also read this in a few sources, that the cruelty of the German invaders, esp the SS, made even Soviets who hated Stalinism support the regime. Take the best of two evils I guess, with the information that they had. Of course, hindsight is always 20-20.

I've read in one book that following the war the "courageous Soviets who held out a month or two at Brest-Litovsk (fortress on the Russo-German frontier) that managed to survive the German prison camps, were sent to the Gulag by Stalin after the war as traitors for having surrendered. Stalin even disowned his own son!"

-Tiger

[CJMello]

Tiger:

I've read in one book that following the war the "courageous Soviets who held out a month or two at Brest-Litovsk (fortress on the Russo-German frontier) that managed to survive the German prison camps, were sent to the Gulag by Stalin after the war as traitors for having surrendered. Stalin even disowned his own son!"

This was also mentioned on a series on the History Channel: War Of The Century. One female POW was relieved at first when her countrymen freed her but was immediately chastised and labeled a traitor.

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War Is Heck !!!

[This message has been edited by CJMello (edited 03-04-2001).]

[This message has been edited by CJMello (edited 03-04-2001).]

[Goofy]

I've read in many wars sometimes unseasoned troops simply didn't "know enough" to realize they were beaten and should quit. Although this doesn't fit the bill for fanatisim it's quite applicable to the early war in Russia. As has been mentioned in this thread most of the troops the Germans were facing were conscripts and they tended to act at both ends of the spectrum, surrender at the first shot or fight to the bitter end.

As far as the commisar units, should the squads show losing a man or two as their morale is boosted to show the "examples" being made? This seems to have been true.

Do I understand why the Russians behaved the way they did? In that same History Channel feature on The War of the Century I remember one Penal Bn member saying his crime was speaking in protest when his teacher was denounced so he was sentenced to 3 years. He also spoke of serving with people convicted of being late for work. That was considered a crime against the state, like sabotage. It's hard for me, an American born in 1950, to understand how a Russian living in the late 30's and early 40's thought. The fact that the mentioned Penal Bn trooper didn't rail at the injustice of it all, rather just talked about it matter of factly tells me I may accept their outlook while never understanding it.

Is there a way to set up unpredictability (ie all or nothing)? That seems to be more the case.

[Skipper]

OK, here are some hard, cold facts:

1. Germans captured several million soviet POWs in the first 3 months of the war - more than during the whole Oct '41 - May '45 period.

2. Fanatical fighting was quite widespread throughout the war. It has nothing to do with orthodox religion at all - rather with culture, education and indoctrination (USSR was preparing to the big european war for years before it all started).

3. NKVD blocking squads during the time of their existence (that's about 1 year) killed several thousand people - that's much less than one or two per squad. There were no blocking squads in summer of 1941 and after Stalingrad.

4. The only incident of big armor losses in Chechnya occurred in December 1995 - when several armored columns entered Grozny to assume controlling positions on

crossroads - they simply did not anticipate organized resistance. They paid dearly for this intelligence screw-up. Takeover of Grozny in 2000 was conducted with minimal losses of soldiers' and civiians' lives.

> that proves they are not good fighters,

> stupid generals and crappy troops make up

> 85% of the Russian army then and now/

Kiddy (couldnt be older than 14 with that sort of wholesale generalisations), those generals and troops crushed the glorious german military THEN. Go figure.

[jasoncawley@ameritech.net]

I think this can be quite accurately modeled, by using a "25% fanaticism" chance for all troops, combined with a "green" quality rating. The result is long command delays, troops that pin pretty easily, and don't shoot particularly straight - but 1/4 of them simply will not panic under any circumstances. Neither side knows who these will be, until it happens. In any given platoon, there will therefore be some "die-hards" more than half of the time (2/3rds of the time if you count the HQs).

I have used similar settings with an even higher fanaticism chance for a scenario about 1945 German youths, and the effect it gives is pronounced. They lack tactical flexibility and skill in many ways. The ones that fold do so relatively easily, with their low quality ratings and difficulties maneuvering to support each other. But some, just plain will not give up.

[jasoncawley@ameritech.net]

A Russian willingness to retreat noticably increased in 1942, and the willingness to surrender noticably plummeted. There were no huge pockets taken prisoner after 1941.

The main reason was undoubtedly the known treatment of prior waves of PWs. Enough escaped for this to become notorious, and partisans also spread reports. The early 1941 prisoners taken en masse in the Ukraine, for instance, were often simply not feed at all and died where they were captured. Others went to labor camps. 3/4ths of Russian PWs did not survive German captivity.

By 1942, most Russians knew that surrender to the Germans was simply not a rational option - they weren't really taking prisoners in the conventional or western sense. And the Russians reciprocated - their treatment of German PWs was equally awful.

This was, incidentally, completely opposite to the western war, where both sides treated prisoners well.

[Jarmo]

Some reasons for the greater "fanaticism" of soviet troops:

- It was the "great patriotic war", blessed by the church, soviets were actually defending their country.

- NKVD troops and support machine guns gunning down those trying to retreat.

- Propaganda claiming the enemy would not take prisoners, but would instead torture and kill everybody attempting to.

- That being true on several cases, especially when fighting SS.

- If you were captured, you'd be an enemy of the state and would likely be shot if you'd ever make it back. (although not all soldiers knew this at the time)

- During Stalin's purges you'd be likely to gain a fatalistic attitude to matters of life and death. Living in constant fear of death for a decade would build certain tolerance.

And yet, as mentioned before, the soviets did surrender in massive quantities. Would this have more to do with the leaders of those surrendering than individual soldiers.

[JunoReactor]

I am sorry I cant mention sources, its been a long while since I read about these.

Someone mentioned that there was plenty of animosity towards communism in Ukraine. Ukraine produces wheat, but when Stalin sold that wheat to the West for cash to build up Russia's industry at an incredible pace, it was the Ukranians that suffered the "great famine". On the opening months of Barbarossa, many saw Germans as liberators. That quickly changed as Germans began to destroy whole villages. This was the fuel that drove the propaganda engine which turned the war into the "Great Patriotic War". "Russian" and "Soviet" were an identities few could assume before the war. Perhaps this explains why during the first months of the war Germans captured much more than they captured later.

About troop quality - I believe the Red Army lacked good officers after the purge. This could represented by the scenario designers simply by giving platoon HQs low/no bonuses.

[Ksak]

I am more interested in balanced game play than somebody's subjective attempt at modeling "national characteristics."

That whole discussion is a slippery slope that is best not traveled.

[Gen-x87]

I dont think the Soviets were any more fanantical than any other armies of the world. There are always times when certain units just hold thier own against staggering odds.

In the first week or so anywhere from 170,000 to 250,000 Soviets were taken prisoner.

As for the people of the Soviet Union. They were really in a horrible situation.

They had the Germans, and then the freedom fighters.

Neither were particularily nice to the people. Both sides committed horrible acts.

But the general consense I have come to is the people generally felt less threatened from the German Invaders than from the Freedom fighters, and eventual return of Stalin.

Gen

[Skipper]

> It was the "great patriotic war", blessed

> by the church, soviets were actually

> defending their country.

Even more simply, russians defended their kin, which Germans were going to exterminate. Nothing to do with church at all - religion was not too popular, practically all people younger than 30 were convinced atheists.

> Propaganda claiming the enemy would not

> take prisoners, but would instead torture

> and kill everybody attempting to.

Propaganda being not far from the truth.

> - That being true on several cases,

> especially when fighting SS.

That being true on most occasions thoughout 1941 and 1942. All but a few POWs simply did not survive more than a few months in captivity. Better die from a bullet than like this.

> If you were captured, you'd be an enemy of

> the state and would likely be shot if

> you'd ever make it back. (although not all

> soldiers knew this at the time)

Not correct. You would go through NKVD scrutiny, but that did not mean anything like certain death.

> - During Stalin's purges you'd be likely

> to gain a fatalistic attitude to matters

> of life and death. Living in constant fear

> of death for a decade would build certain

> tolerance.

Not true. These purges were not as wholesale as you might be led to believe. Really large repressions were carried out for less than two years in 1936-37. People were not driven by fear even then - it was a much more complicated cocktail, where such things as communistic enthusiasm were no smaller ingredients than fear.

> And yet, as mentioned before, the soviets

> did surrender in massive quantities. Would

> this have more to do with the leaders of

> those surrendering than individual

> soldiers.

This wouldnt. Not more than frequent cases of heroic behaviour. It's difficult to explain, but these are the two sides of the same coin.

Basically, attempts to find a logical explanation for an illogicval behaviour are futile by definition. The answer is in the thousands of years of russian history.

[Skipper]

+++

But the general consense I have come to is the people generally felt less threatened from the German Invaders than from the Freedom fighters, and eventual return of Stalin.

+++

West Ukraine was annexed by USSR in 1939 (was Poland before). For sure, people there did not exactly "assimilate" with soviet regime. There and in Low Baltics situation with "greeting the german liberators" indeed took place. Elsewhere it was quite different.

And well, what germans were doing in the occupied territories, especially in Belorussia, was by an order of magntude worse than anything soviet regime ever did.

[The Commissar]

Originally posted by Skipper:

Nothing to do with church at all - religion was not too popular, practically all people younger than 30 were convinced atheists.

Thats an interesting statement. I knew that religion was looked down upon by the communists, but not by the people, who from personal experience (mainly account of varuious family members and some reading) were still very religious. I'd like to know where you read about most people younger then 30 being atheists.

Dont get me wrong, Im not necessarily disagreeing with you, Im just interested in the subject and a different opinion.

Originally posted by Skipper:

Basically, attempts to find a logical explanation for an illogicval behaviour are futile by definition. The answer is in the thousands of years of russian history.

I think I know what youre talking about here, or at least what in my opinion the reason was. Russian people were used to extreme hardships from centuries of living as serfs, treated worse then slaves in some countries, and yet still going on in the belief of "this is fate, its the way it ought to be". Thats what I really meant by the religious convictions, as I see fate and religion somewhat intertwined.

Again, in my opinion.

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"...Every position, every meter of Soviet soil must be defended to the last drop of blood..."

- Segment from Order 227 "Not a step back"

[Skipper]

Religion was not looked down upon, it was actively discouraged by the regime for some 20 years. To the point of destroying the churches and jailing the priests. Orthodox Church was almost an outlawed organisation. Giving religious education to youth was a crime. Atheism, as one of the basic concepts of Marx's materialistic philosophy, was taught in schools. That's an official perspective.

From social perspective, people were creating a completely new way of life. Religion was past - something for elderly or uneducated.

From personal experience (we are talking early 1970-s here) I've read in a textbook that religion is "an opium for people" something like in the age of 9. But I had that idea much earlier than that - from relatives or kindergarten, apparently.