Red Army after fall of Moscow

[dpapp2]

BTW, Manchuria did have the oil they needed, but nobody knew it back then.

 

Actually, the Japanese were aware of the oil (guess some of it sept into water wells) and were looking for it.

Japan hunted oil in Manchuria before World War II. In 1927 Japanese geologist found scattered asphalt in vugs of basalt and quaternary gravel deposits on the north western shore of Hulun Nur (lake), NW Manchuria. Geological Survey of China made a check survey of the area, and found the same asphalt in 1931. After establishment of Manchukuo, geological survey, tortion balance and refraction seismograph survey, and drilling were conducted during 1932-1941. One deep well (1,114m TD) and 21 core holes were drilled on the northern shore of the lake, but no potential oil were found. That the core hole drilled in Fuxin coal mine hit oil shows in 1938, led to extensive oil exploration program. Geological field party mapped a broad anticline located on east of Fuxin, and the core hole drilled on the anticline recovered some 30m thick sandstones (100-200m in depth) impregnating with oil. To explore this oil called on massive drilling campaign, and 47 or more wells were drilled on this anticline, but the reservoir quality was not good enough to establish commercial production. It is noteworthy to point out that the geologists engaged in Fuxin oil exploration thought that the oil came from Jurassic shales deposited in fresh water lake. In 1940 oil shows were found in the water wells near Chengde, and a one-month field check survey was conducted, and mapped a small anticline in Jurassic shales, but no further exploration was conducted.

 

http://sciencelinks.jp/j-east/article/2005...405A0526807.php

[nitflegal]

Agree on the tanks and thumping and pointlessness. Disagree on aviation, when the Zero comes along.

 

It does bring up the question of what were the Japanese securing in China? It didn't have the oil they needed. Perhaps metals, food?

 

The zero was a great plane, especially for the year in question. However, the Japanese never had enough of them or pilots. Again, which front gets robbed of zeroes to supply them to Siberia? Besides, the SU had better and more tactical bombers, transport A/C, etc.

 

Matt

[nitflegal]

Satisfaction for the Imperial ambitions of the army clique which came to power around 1930. It was not economically rational. Absolutely the opposite.

 

It's certainly true that the knife fights between the Army and Navy, never-mind the fights between internal factions within each, were outright nasty. However, both the Army and Navy had reasonable aims for their chosen plans (at least as long as you consider starting a war that they can't win as moot) that attacking the Soviets simply didn't have. Heck, it would make more sense for Japan to attack India and try and meet the Germans there then try and link in the Soviet Union.

 

Matt

[Mote]

Agree on the tanks and thumping and pointlessness. Disagree on aviation, when the Zero comes along.

 

The Zero was a naval fighter though, so its highly unlikely that the Russians would have been facing it. The Ki-43 Oscar is the most likely opposition with some Ki-27 Nate in secondary roles. These are more maneuverable than their Russian opponents, but they are so at the expense of practically any ability to take damage and a pathetic armament (the Ki-43 was initially armed with only two 7.7mm machine guns, later replaced by two 12.7mm machine guns, and finally 2 20mm guns on the last model).

[JWB]

The most sensible thing would probably be to try and destroy any bridges along the railway, since they should take more time to repair. But on the other hand, then the enemy would probably expect this, or at least after he detects the pattern in the attacks, and place a lot more of his AA guns around them, compared to the normal parts of the railway.

Dropping bridges sounds great in theory but in practise it is extremely difficult. Heavy duty bridges require multiple direct hits by bombs weighing at least 1000kg. Bombs that heavy require the bomber to drop the bomb at altitudes where direct hits are few and far between. It also requires large bombers that are scarce and needed elswhere. Those conundrums were what hampered operation STRANGLE in Italy. Eventually STRANGLE began to succeed when the theater command decided to bomb the rail lines themselves. That worked in Italy because there were very few valleys suitable for rairoads. In the USSR almost everywhere was suitable for a railroad.

[A2Keltainen]

Dropping bridges sounds great in theory but in practise it is extremely difficult.

 

Yes, but I was thinking about the case where the only alternative to cause mentionable amounts of damage is a direct, or extremely close, hit on the railway track. I guess a direct hit on a bridge isn't be harder to hit than a direct, or extremely close, hit on a railway track.

[Marek Tucan]

Yes, but I was thinking about the case where the only alternative to cause mentionable amounts of damage is a direct, or extremely close, hit on the railway track. I guess a direct hit on a bridge isn't be harder to hit than a direct, or extremely close, hit on a railway track.

 

After all look at the efforts taken at dropping Remagen bridge, and even though IIRC one bomb hit was scored, cause of the collapse was rather result of damage by the demolition explosives.

[Archie Pellagio]

The Zero was a naval fighter though, so its highly unlikely that the Russians would have been facing it. The Ki-43 Oscar is the most likely opposition with some Ki-27 Nate in secondary roles. These are more maneuverable than their Russian opponents, but they are so at the expense of practically any ability to take damage and a pathetic armament (the Ki-43 was initially armed with only two 7.7mm machine guns, later replaced by two 12.7mm machine guns, and finally 2 20mm guns on the last model).

 

There was only one Squadron equipped with Ki-43's on 07/12/41

 

So any June 22 '41 supporting operation would've been Ki-27's and a hand full of Sally's as the most advanced aircraft in the theatre, both of which would've performed rather poorly against even I153's and SB2's yet alone more modern Sov. aviation...

[swerve]

Actually, the Japanese were aware of the oil (guess some of it sept into water wells) and were looking for it.

http://sciencelinks.jp/j-east/article/2005...405A0526807.php

 

Interesting. I didn't know they'd found traces. Thanks for that.

 

But no matter, what's important is that they hadn't found workable oilfields, & weren't sure there were any.

[Ken Estes]

Interesting. I didn't know they'd found traces. Thanks for that.

 

But no matter, what's important is that they hadn't found workable oilfields, & weren't sure there were any.

Excellent, we are sucking Swerve into the thread.....

[swerve]

Yes, but I was thinking about the case where the only alternative to cause mentionable amounts of damage is a direct, or extremely close, hit on the railway track. I guess a direct hit on a bridge isn't be harder to hit than a direct, or extremely close, hit on a railway track.

 

Attacking trains is fairly effective, I think. If you can wreck a train while running, which I think is easier than damaging the track directly by air attack, the train wreck is likely to damage some track, & the wrecked train will close the line until removed. Wrecking trains will also reduce the carrying capacity of the railways, even if the track itself is soon repaired.

[JWB]

Attacking trains is fairly effective, I think. If you can wreck a train while running, which I think is easier than damaging the track directly by air attack, the train wreck is likely to damage some track, & the wrecked train will close the line until removed. Wrecking trains will also reduce the carrying capacity of the railways, even if the track itself is soon repaired.

What sort of weapon will be used to wreck the train? I imagine the amount of HE required to wreck a train is about the same as that which is needed to crater a rail line. Actually hitting a moving train with a bomb is only slightly more difficult than hitting a rail line. To hit the train requires knowing when the train will be where or loitering about over the line waiting......... It also must be remembered that the train could be very well be carrying FLAK.

 

The ultimate way of causing destruction in this situation is to have demo teams bury timed demo charges between the tracks. It is not difficult to hand form an IED that will explode when the train rolls over it. That combo could concievably shut down a line almost indefinetely depending upon how many demo charges could be deployed. It would also likely be a suicide mission. Finding an unguarded section of track isn't impossible. Deploying the teams isn't terribly difficult either. But getting them back out is another kettle of fish.

[harryRIEDL]

What sort of weapon will be used to wreck the train? I imagine the amount of HE required to wreck a train is about the same as that which is needed to crater a rail line. Actually hitting a moving train with a bomb is only slightly more difficult than hitting a rail line. To hit the train requires knowing when the train will be where or loitering about over the line waiting......... It also must be remembered that the train could be very well be carrying FLAK.

 

The ultimate way of causing destruction in this situation is to have demo teams bury timed demo charges between the tracks. It is not difficult to hand form an IED that will explode when the train rolls over it. That combo could concievably shut down a line almost indefinetely depending upon how many demo charges could be deployed. It would also likely be a suicide mission. Finding an unguarded section of track isn't impossible. Deploying the teams isn't terribly difficult either. But getting them back out is another kettle of fish.

don't you just strafe the train rather than try to bomb it

[Yama]

Attacking trains is fairly effective, I think. If you can wreck a train while running, which I think is easier than damaging the track directly by air attack, the train wreck is likely to damage some track, & the wrecked train will close the line until removed. Wrecking trains will also reduce the carrying capacity of the railways, even if the track itself is soon repaired.

 

Obvious problem is that trains can move in any weather, whilst aircraft need good weather to be able to find & attack the train. Especially in far North, trains are pretty safe from air attack most of the year. Obviously, if the locomotive is wrecked it blocks the track but it can be simply heaved aside and new locomotive takes surviving cars to next station. Of course, it means still loss of valuable locomotive, but it won't block the track for very long.

 

IIRC, in at least Finnish Air Force strafing trains was usually banned - it was dangerous as trains had flak cars, and Finns had shortage of cannon armed fighters (machineguns were fairly ineffective against trains).

 

The ultimate way of causing destruction in this situation is to have demo teams bury timed demo charges between the tracks. It is not difficult to hand form an IED that will explode when the train rolls over it. That combo could concievably shut down a line almost indefinetely depending upon how many demo charges could be deployed. It would also likely be a suicide mission. Finding an unguarded section of track isn't impossible. Deploying the teams isn't terribly difficult either. But getting them back out is another kettle of fish.

 

Finns & Germans indeed sent numerous patrols to sabotage Murmansk rail line (which was in many places less than 50km from the frontline), they were dangerous missions but not suicide runs. As said, air attacks were tried too. I won't say they did not have any effect, but they could not prevent Soviets hauling massive amount of equipment by rail.

[Redbeard]

After some technical problems about getting a reasonably good quality print of the Soviet railway atlas (and not being able to find my Russian dictionaries) I have now studied it closer and it confirms my first impression of the railway capacity going outside Moscow being very limited.

 

The Donetz industrial region in the south has a fairly dense network involving double track lines, but there is only one double track line from this network into still Soviet held territory and that is from Rostov north to just south of Voronez and then NE over Penza to Kazan (and the TransSiberian railway) - appr. 500km from Moscow centre. Apart from this there is a not very dense network of single track railways east and SE of Moscow, but as I understand these lines had a very limited carrying capacity (relatively spaced soft wood sleepers/ties placed directly on sand - no rock-bed etc.).

 

500 km AFAIK would be outside strafing range with anything the Germans had in 1941-42 (apart from Bf 110), but well inside medium bomberes like the Ju88. But anyway, even if not a single bomb or bullet hit that railway line, I seriously doubt if the Soviets could have rebuilt the Red Army to anywhere its historical size, strength and coherrence as historical 1942 and later.

 

Instead I could imagine a number oif relatively "independent" armies operaing from each their port and/or industrial centre. Could be one on Archangelsk (I guess Murmansk is gone), one from the Urals, another from the Donetz and perhaps one from Central Asia. These armies would be in very limited contact with each other and some suplied mainly by western allies through ports and railways from there (Archangelsk o. A. and Central Asia over Persia) and perhaps more importantly practically outside the reach of Stalin's terror machine. So, while still having a common enemy, they might if they survive soon take on a rather independent Warlord like character - not unlike the whites in the Russian civil war.

 

The Germans will of course also be limited by their logistic troubles, but hardly more than in historical 1942, where they emerged with an army even stronger than that of 1941. Even if the varrying opposing armies in total are not smaller than the historical Red Army the Soviets/Russians (or whatever we shall call then now) are of course seriously handicapped by their loss of unified command, and the Germans now occupy a clearly advantageous position of the inner lines. As the relatively dense western Soviet railway network is retracked, they will even have a favaourable logistic basis. If German I would focus my mobile troops in a deep push (500 km) towards the SE (Rostov/Voronez) and thus both cutting off the only lifeline between Urals and Donetz and cutting off the Donetz/Ukraine from the rest. In 1942 the battles will probbaly still be fairly "regular", but I doubt if the Soviets /Russians can focus enough force to achieve results like at Stalingrad or later.

 

But it is of course interesting to considder what the Anglo-Saxons will do. Reinforcing one or more of the relatively independent Warlords with allied armies would be very tempting, but the problem is, that the allies hardly can field anything by 1942-43 that the Germans can't beat with one hand tied on the back. Allied pressure on Turkey to join the allies will be intensified, but so will also be Turkish anxiousness about the Axis revenge. The allies will probably have to deploy strong forces in Persia and central Asia anyway - to keep the Germans away from Mid East oil, India etc. and will probably have a fair chance of doing so, but for the European continent all the way to the Urals prospects IMHO are rather gloomy for the allied cause.

 

Regards

 

Steffen Redbeard

[JWB]

don't you just strafe the train rather than try to bomb it

Strafing usually won't do the job. The effect can be visually impressive if the locomotive is hit and the loco uses a steam boiler. But the damage to the boiler can be repaired in a very short time. Unless the train is transporting fuel and/or munitions and explodes. Those trains were more likely to be armed with FLAK and run at night. So the most effective course of action is to drop large numbers of small bombs from one and two engined aircraft at low altitude where ever possible. "Servicing" the targets should be done every day. All of that was largely impossible for the Luftwaffe because they didn't have enough aircraft to it and everything else that had to be done.

[Guest Lkefct]

One of the things that was evidently discussed extensively about the Barborossa plan was what would happen once Moscow fell. The Germans had envisioned the attack as a series of bounds, each about 500 km, followed by a short rest, with the railway troops fixing the rails behind them, covering about 20 km per day initially. Dispersion of the supplies followed by 60 ton capacity truck detachments. During the first 2 bounds by AGC, they where able to cover their objectives (Minsk then Smolensk), followed shortly by the rail lines being fixed up. This got them approx 2/3 of the way to Moscow by the end of July.

 

According to the reports of the period, the units involved where at approximately 80% infantry effectiveness and about 65-70% tank once the usual short term maintenance is done. Provided that the Germans could make the following bound towards Moscow rather then the Ukraine (as planned), it is hard to think that they would not have been able to reach Moscow. It is also interesting to note, that historically, even allowing the soviets an extra 2 months, 8 of 9 field armies the Soviets deployed to stop Operation Typhoon where destroyed in the first 7-10 days. The Soviets would of course be able to deploy vast pools of manpower, but the question that comes up is how effective would they be?

 

The original German plan was that once Moscow fell, to take another brief rest 1-2 weeks, as they had done at Smolensk and Minsk, and attack south to destroy the armies in the Ukraine and drive on the Volga, severing the last effective means of communication and supply for the Soviets from N to S. According to the original plan, they expected that even after this, Soviet resistance would not cease completley. Soviet government would attempt to continue the battle. The hope was that once Moscow fell, that would remove effectively about 25% of the Soviet industry (based on 1940 estimates), and disrupt the economic infrastructure enough to make a well organized and effective resistance extremely difficult.

 

This begs a couple of questions. First, how effective would the Soviets be in defending Moscow. AS noted before that is well beyond the scope of the thread.

 

Second, I very well doubt that anyone, even the Soviets would have expected that their economic relocation would be nearly as effective as it was. The only other economic achievement to even rival it was the mobilization of the US economy for the war effort in the US, which was also underestimated by most everyone, so it is hard to envision that the Germans could have anticipated this. But, with the complexity of WW2 era weapons, would there be enough subcomponents and factories still existing to allow the Soviets to produce enough weapons to continue.

 

The Soviets have a much larger manpower pool to take advantage of then the Germans, and this was to play a major role in the defeat of Germany. But with the most densely populated areas being over run in the initial attacks, and the areas that are covered in the what if, it does beg whether anyone wold be left to carry on the fight. For all intents and purposes, the pre-war Soviet army had already been destroyed during the summer. Presumably many of the newly formed units would be caught up in the fighting around Moscow. Many of the units that took part in the counter attacks in Dec and Jan where very poorly equipped and relyed a great deal of the attrition that the Germans had suffered during the fall advance.

[Detonable]

SNIP

Reinforcing one or more of the relatively independent Warlords with allied armies would be very tempting, but the problem is, that the allies hardly can field anything by 1942-43 that the Germans can't beat with one hand tied on the back. Allied pressure on Turkey to join the allies will be intensified, but so will also be Turkish anxiousness about the Axis revenge. The allies will probably have to deploy strong forces in Persia and central Asia anyway - to keep the Germans away from Mid East oil, India etc. and will probably have a fair chance of doing so, but for the European continent all the way to the Urals prospects IMHO are rather gloomy for the allied cause.

 

Regards

 

Steffen Redbeard

 

 

But, the British did well at El Alamein (late '42). Agreed, the German MK IV tank wasn't there in numbers, and the Luftwaffe was very weak in numbers.

 

 

It seems that the only successful German strategy would be to take Moscow, then turn south. However, was the weather in the south good enough to do this? Also, this assumes the armies in the south, which were destroyed before the return to the attack on Moscow, don't attack North along the long German flank when Moscow is being taken.

[yak_v]

More so then the Germans in the historic context, but if the Germans really capture Moscow then the losses of the Soviets, I believe that the Soviets would be off worse then in the historic context, considering they would throw in any reserves they had to prevent this from happening. So in late 1941 we would have a German army which should be at least as strong as in the historical context and a Soviet force that is weaker. If the Germans capture supplies around Moscow, then they are even better off. (Food, clothing, weapons etc.)

The railroad network of the Soviets would be compromised but they still could make it work, but it would be more open to attack and less flexibel.

 

Not necessarily. Just as the Soviet would throw everything into the fight, so will the Germans and their loses would be proportionally just as heavy as the Soviet ones, and given how exhausted their troops were in real life, they will be in just as bad or worse shape as the Soviets at the end of the campaign.

 

Vladimir

[yak_v]

Instead I could imagine a number oif relatively "independent" armies operaing from each their port and/or industrial centre. Could be one on Archangelsk (I guess Murmansk is gone), one from the Urals, another from the Donetz and perhaps one from Central Asia. These armies would be in very limited contact with each other and some suplied mainly by western allies through ports and railways from there (Archangelsk o. A. and Central Asia over Persia) and perhaps more importantly practically outside the reach of Stalin's terror machine. So, while still having a common enemy, they might if they survive soon take on a rather independent Warlord like character - not unlike the whites in the Russian civil war.

 

I think you are reaching... First of all I don't think Murmansk falls since the need to take Moscow will suck in a lot of troops from the outlying fronts (I know we are not debating taking Moscow, but realistically Germans will need to have a mot more troops than historically to do that and the only place to get it is from the periphery) so if anything the situation in the edges will me better than in real life. Second, the central government will not collapse, as Stalin will evacuate from Moscow and will continue to rule from Kuibyshev, the phone, telegraph and radio will continue to work and the NKVD will still be there. The only problem will be the rail lines, but the Soviets were pretty good in laying down emergency track. They laid track around the penetration on the Murmansk line, they laid track across the frozen Lake Ladoga and so on. So it all depends on how big of a chunk of land the Germans have captured and how fast the Soviets can lay emergency rails around the salient. Given that the Germans will be exhausted, Soviets will have until May to finish the track, which will give them 5-6 months to do it (depending on how early they realize that the Moscow will fall and start working on the track). Therefore the results may not be all that bad.

 

Vladimir

[Nobu]

The zero was a great plane, especially for the year in question. However, the Japanese never had enough of them or pilots. Again, which front gets robbed of zeroes to supply them to Siberia? Besides, the SU had better and more tactical bombers, transport A/C, etc.

The most dangerous scenario would be a Japanese shift of airpower out of China (no mortal danger there at the time) to face Russia pre-war, and to maximize the effect of the inevitable surprise airfield strikes on day one of the war.

 

That said, an equally relevant question might be to ask which front facing the Germans the Soviets might want to strip of I-16s and pilots for the defense of Blagovyeshchensk, Khabarovsk and Vlad. Smolensk and Kiev? A much longer supply line along the trans-Siberian awaits.

 

The Luftwaffe may have something to say as well about the Soviets being able to field more tactical bombers and transport a/c against a Japanese attack in the East.

[nitflegal]

The most dangerous scenario would be a Japanese shift of airpower out of China (no mortal danger there at the time) to face Russia pre-war, and to maximize the effect of the inevitable surprise airfield strikes on day one of the war.

 

That said, an equally relevant question might be to ask which front facing the Germans the Soviets might want to strip of I-16s and pilots for the defense of Blagovyeshchensk, Khabarovsk and Vlad. Smolensk and Kiev? A much longer supply line along the trans-Siberian awaits.

 

The Luftwaffe may have something to say as well about the Soviets being able to field more tactical bombers and transport a/c against a Japanese attack in the East.

 

True, there wasn't a lot of mortal danger in China. However, the planes weren't sitting around either. The Soviet Union was actually fairly active in China through 1940, shooting down over 80 Japanese A/C and generating 14 Heroes of the Soviet Union. they were also busily supplying fighters, armaments, and advisors to China through 1943. The Chinese themselves were producing I-16s and their own Zhong 28-Qia fighters and had several active quadrons of fighters and bombers. Could they have won the war if the Japanese A/C were pulled? Probably not. Would they have hurt the Japanese in China? Most likely yes. I have a really dififcult time imaging the Japanese making China more difficult to take a swing at Manchuria.

 

Assuming that they decided to, so what? There was still a large fighter, SB-bomber, and AA force waiting for the Japanese to attack. Even when Moscow was fighting for its life they kept the material over there. Admittedly, they took most of their best pilots to the West and put in less experienced ones but they still had an advantage over what the Japanese were fielding in China. What they had there might not have beaten the Japanese but they could have easily held them for quite some time. To even do that Japan would have had to keep their better pilots for this instead of transferring them from China to the island campaign, so no oil in the Indes, no defensive ring, etc. It does raise the interesting "what-if" where the Japanese move aginst the SU and never attack the USA. While their fuel dries up in 6-12 months, what does an unprovoked US do?

 

Matt

[Redbeard]

I think you are reaching... First of all I don't think Murmansk falls since the need to take Moscow will suck in a lot of troops from the outlying fronts (I know we are not debating taking Moscow, but realistically Germans will need to have a mot more troops than historically to do that and the only place to get it is from the periphery) so if anything the situation in the edges will me better than in real life. Second, the central government will not collapse, as Stalin will evacuate from Moscow and will continue to rule from Kuibyshev, the phone, telegraph and radio will continue to work and the NKVD will still be there. The only problem will be the rail lines, but the Soviets were pretty good in laying down emergency track. They laid track around the penetration on the Murmansk line, they laid track across the frozen Lake Ladoga and so on. So it all depends on how big of a chunk of land the Germans have captured and how fast the Soviets can lay emergency rails around the salient. Given that the Germans will be exhausted, Soviets will have until May to finish the track, which will give them 5-6 months to do it (depending on how early they realize that the Moscow will fall and start working on the track). Therefore the results may not be all that bad.

 

Vladimir

 

A rail line is not just a rail line, and an emergency line will only have a fraction of the carrying capacity of a true double track heavy line - and the rebuilding and assembly of a substantial Red Army for the 1942 fightings will require the heaviest lines - we are not just talking of a few Divisions - but of the entire Red Army. Even with heavy lines available time is also needed. On the dense central European railway network it took almost 6 months to assemble the German forces for Barbarossa (but with most moved inside the last 3-4 months). So even if sufficient emergency lines are available by May (which I still doubt) a force capable of defeating the Germans is unlikely to be assembled in time for fighting 1942, and after that it is probably too late.

 

If the scenario had been the Germans taking Moscow in their late 1941 attempt you may have had a point about the Germans needing to withdraw troops from the periphery (still would have been extremely difficult), but I was thinking more of them going straight for Moscow right after Smolensk (when the German focus still was at ArmyGroupCentre). The main German problem in that would have been the huge Red Army forces concentrated in the south, and which were expected to counterattack.

 

I understand why that caused concern in the German HQ in July/August 41, and Hitler probably had read Clausewitz about defeating the enemy's army in a decisive battle instead of going for the capital, but judging from how the Red Army in 1941 wasted entire Armycorps in frontal and un co-ordinated attacks, I doubt that would have resulted in more than a bulge in the front and massive Soviet losses.

 

Also important is if the Germans can stay in Moscow for the winter. Even if destroyed to a large degree it will allways be better to stay in the relative shelter of ruins than in the open field, and in much better defensive positions too. The Soviet Forces OTOH will have to unload and assemble dispersed or in the open outside Moscow.

 

By 1942 the Red Army is likely to be weaker and the Wehrmacht stronger than in real 1942 - and that IMHO is likely to make the outcome much different.

 

By nature we will never know what would have happened to Stalin if Moscow fell, but no leader, not even Stalin can survive any number of defeats. But even if he, and the core of his suppression apparatus, survives in the deep, deep Russian "hinterland" between Moscow and the Urals, they will practically be cut off. Of course there will be phone/telegraph lines and radios available, but the main cables probably ran along the main railway lines (usually did), and no matter how many emergency cables are laid the amount of communication will only be a fraction. In a system like the Soviet, where very little was left to local initiative, and almost everything to detailed and centrally issued directives, that will be decisive. The problem of relocating the huge central administration and have it work again, will in itself mean stoppages, even if the necessary communication is available.

 

Where a simple message like "STAVKA is displeased" would have any commander shiver and smell doom in our time line, a local commander in this alternative time line would not have to worry for that reason. As long as his troops were loyal to him, STAVKA really couldn't send anything but messages and a few emissaries (who can dissappear).

 

Finally I can't resist making a defence/excuse for Clausewitz. Clausewitz did recommend leaving the capitals and go for the enemy's army instead. That was wise in the 19th century, and Clausewitz probably was inspired by the two main combatants of the Napoleonic wars, Austria and Russia, who both had their capitals taken, but never were decisively defeated in the field - and thus came back to the fight each time. Long after Clausewitz had died both Russia and Austria dissolved almost in the same instant as their armies dissolved. By mid 20th century however things had changed a bit however - an army wasn't just THE main instrument of war any longer, but merely the point of a long chain held together by infrastructure. In Germany the railway network had grown dense enough to make it practically impossible to cut, but the WWII Soviet one is absurdly centered on Moscow - take Moscow and the Red Army growing after that will be blunt.

 

Regards

 

Steffen Redbeard

[Yama]

I think you are reaching... First of all I don't think Murmansk falls since the need to take Moscow will suck in a lot of troops from the outlying fronts (I know we are not debating taking Moscow, but realistically Germans will need to have a mot more troops than historically to do that and the only place to get it is from the periphery) so if anything the situation in the edges will me better than in real life.

 

Murmansk operation consisted of only two divisions from German side, it's not like it had whole lot of troops to "suck from" to begin with...

[swerve]

Steffen,

 

as I see it, you're proposing no Directive 33. A battle for Moscow in August, & Ukraine left for another day.

 

One implication of your proposal is that the Soviet armies in the south would remain relatively intact for longer, & another is that the USSR would keep control of the Donbas & a lot of Ukrainian grain production, offsetting, in material terms, the loss of Moscow. What we're considering is not really a physically weaker USSR in terms of industrial & agricultural production & manpower (indeed, perhaps stronger), but one which has lost the communications hub & national symbol which is Moscow.

 

pji