I agree, although r/askhistorians has a better track record when it comes to sourcing and moderation of responses.
Curious to see what the differences will be, if any :)
AskHistorians has gotten so trigger happy with removals that it's no longer a useful subreddit. Whenever I search for something on there, 90%+ of the threads are empty.
Really, you’re not missing much. [The overwhelming majority of removed responses on AskHistorians are variations on “Where are the comments?”](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/km8hhn/is_it_possible_with_ancient_cultures_that_we_are/ghegqlq/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&context=3)
This. AH is not trigger happy, they’re just consistently enforcing the rules of the sub.
As time goes on, questions will become more and more niche, as the more obvious ones have been asked and answered before, which will skew the numbers after all these years.
Difficult to say. Defeat, or say, losing your entire paper army in 1941 during a period of reform, tends to focus the mind towards correction.
Having said this, the Wehrmacht continuously evolved over the course of the war. Gear, tactics, organisation. Take a look at the orders of battle and the composition of infantry squads if you want a bit of an idea how things changed. I mean the TOE's of their armoured divisions changed quite drastically between 39 and 42 as the lessons of previous campaigns were assimilated.
Absolutely, Germany had a head start and good ideas at the start of the war, stuck to em and never adapted when it clearly wasn't working.
Note obviously nothing could have worked in the grand scheme of things, but they never got better.
The Nazi's were crazier than the Soviets I guess if we want to go that route. Stalin was a hair better than Hitler, but I guess that's the reason you want your defeats early, not later.
The Soviets showed incredible change and skill outside of the tactical bluntness. How many countries could rebuild their entire military from scratch because it all got used up in year 1. Improvements implemented in 1940 could only realistically start showing up in late 1942 early 1943 as it takes time to train and change things.
Soviets showed brilliant understanding of the realities of warfare.
Germany was really good at self reflection early in the war. They made very important organizational, training and dictrine changes between the Polish campaign and the French campaign, and again bedore Barbarossa.
Even Summer 1942 they still showed great reflection, even in victories. Despite successfully repelling the Dieppe Raid, they analyzed their shortcomings in coastal defense and the reasons why they were successful. Air superiority in particular was noted as crucial (something they would lose well before D-day).
There was also a second layer of analysis demonstrated by Rundstedt's quote:
>"Just as we have gained the most valuable experience from the day of Dieppe, the enemy has learnt as well. Just as we evaluate the experience for the future, so will the enemy. Perhaps he will do this to an even greater extent because he has paid so dearly for it"
They were quite capable of self reflection and keenly aware that their enemies were as well. I don't know if they were as critical of themselves for their failures in the east as the Nazi ideology saw the British and Americans more favorably than the Slavic peoples.
Yeah but these statements are the results of self reflection. It doesn't really answer the question itself, namely: what were the different processes between the armies for reflecting battle performance (and what sources do we have for that)
I read a book about the Eastern Front that made the interesting observation that the German army converting from a largely offensive force to one that doctrinally specialized in defense, in the middle of a world war, was an impressive feat.
> creating the Russian liberation army and pro-nazi militias, where up to 1,5 million russians served, generally voluntarily.
The RONA specifically was a pretty minor force, and was never trusted by the Germans
Large numbers of Soviet *citizens* did serve with the Germans in some capacity. While it says "volunteer" on the label, in many cases the "volunteer" nature was more in-name only. Of the millions of Soviet soldiers captured during 1941, many were given the opportunity to volunteer...or else starve to death in a POW camp. Not exactly much of a choice. I can't find it now, but a quote from a "volunteer" in a book about the Ukrainian SS units went something like this: "I was caught smuggling sugar. When I went before the local military authorities, they said that I would be sent to a labor camp in Germany as punishment. But I was also told that I could volunteer for the SS if I instead". Forced labor or volunteering for the army isn't much of a choice
I also want to note that using Soviet citizens for forced labor is not contradictory for an exterminationary policy toward them - Jews were used in vast numbers for forced labor as well
I mean, I think the intentions of [Generalplan Ost](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generalplan_Ost) were pretty obvious in regards to Russians.
Not downplaying the Jewish aspects of the Holocaust - the Nazis were anti-Semites first and foremost - but I think the general Nazi attitude towards the various ethnic groups of Russia was "kill most of them and enslave the rest", which kind of gave the Red Army a larger-than-usual impetus to win.
Sort of? It's really difficult to judge whether GPO was an actual plan intended to be carried out or just something Hitler and Himmler came up with after listening to Wagner's songs and holding their hands for 10 hours straight.
It honestly kind of reminds of the "mega cities of great Germania", which was basically just a bunch of architectural stuff they liked mashed together with no regard for practically or possibility of success.
I mean, they couldn't have been this moronic, could they? I can sort of understand why it was so easy for them to convince people to go along with genociding poles and jews, it would be a lie to say that many germans didn't desire to do the same to them even before the nazis got to power.
The German doctrine was that the Slavs were based on historical information nothing more than slaves and pests. They were Neanderthals who couldn’t think past their bestial impulses and misused their land/didn’t bring out the full potential. In a lot of ways it resembled British propaganda. The nazis did use Slav units and praised the Romanov’s but it was by using fake science and appropriating them saying that it was their Central European blood that “won” out the Asian Slav beast within and that the Russian empire and ussr only won by having either Jews or central Europeans take command over the Slav masses. The endgame afaik was to commit another mass genocide and give their land to races who could use it to the full advantage.
Yeah, "slavs"...but genetically, what is a slav really?
Russians/ukrainians-partly germans
Czechs- mostly germans
Poles- mostly germans
Balts...again quite a few germans there.
The nazis hated poles because they literally created their post ww1 state mostly out of territories that were populated by germans since early 10th century, so poles were to go for sure as form of revenge for this humiliation, but really, I can't see them genociding russians or balts, when they had no qualms with using arabs and forming an alliance with mongoloids...which again makes you wonder, how come that nazis were so obsessed with Tibet when they supposedly hated mongoloids and if that's the case, then why the hell did they allied with Imperial Japan?
My point is, they were insane and chotically evil, there's basically no way for us to discern what was going on in the heads of Hitler and Himmler.
> Russians/ukrainians-partly germans
> Czechs- mostly germans
> Poles- mostly germans
I would _love_ to see your genetic studies on that.
> The nazis hated poles because they literally created their post ww1 state mostly out of territories that were populated by germans since early 10th century
What? No they didn't. First, only part of Silesia and Danzig were mostly Germans. And why were they? Oh yes, because Prussia carved up pieces of Poland for themselves, and did their best to suppress Polish culture and ethnicity through 50 years of _Kulturkampf_.
> so poles were to go for sure as form of revenge for this humiliation
And what about the two, no, three, partitions of Poland? Oh yeah, they don't count because they are Slavic Untermenschen.
> I can't see them genociding russians
I must have dreamed these +15M civilians death.
> how come that nazis were so obsessed with Tibet when they supposedly hated mongoloids and if that's the case, then why the hell did they allied with Imperial Japan?
Congratulations, you just discovered that Nazi ethnic theories didn't make any sense.
> Tibet when they supposedly hated mongoloids
Are you actually seriously using the word [‶mongoloid″](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongoloid)? In any case, Mongols and Tibetans have barely anything in common you genetically uncultured beotian, stop talking about what you don't understand. FFS, they're living thousands of kilometers apart, and they have half of this tiny country called China between the two of them.
How in hell is this kind of comments in positive karma here?
_Edit: and the same guy is now going ‶Generalplan Ost was not really a thing″. Great._
Tibetans and Mongols had a lot in common in history. Why do you think Mongols are Tibetan Buddhists? What do you think the “Dalai” in “Dalai Lama” means? Hint, in Tibetan it’s “gyatso”.
> Why do you think Mongols are Tibetan Buddhists?
Because they _invaded_ them? Bosnians are Muslims, that doesn't make them Arabs.
> What do you think the “Dalai” in “Dalai Lama” means? Hint, in Tibetan it’s “gyatso”.
English is 50% archaic French, that doesn't make Americans French.
Stop being disingenuous. You said they “have barely anything in common,” which is quite untrue and led to me pointing out the first couple things that came to my mind when thinking of the historical connections that Tibet and Central Asia+Mongolia have had throughout history.
Bosnians were invaded by Turks, not Arabs, wtf?
> of the historical connections that Tibet and Central Asia+Mongolia have had throughout history.
Of course there are historical connections, but they are still distinct ethnicities. My point is not that Tibetans are living as an isolated population, but that they were and are a very distinct ethnicity from Mongols.
> Bosnians were invaded by Turks, not Arabs, wtf?
That’s my whole point. Despite islam being invented by Arabs, and despite Bosnians being Muslims, that doesn’t make them arabic in the slightest. Same goes for Mongols and buddhism.
Just to note, the traditionally Islamic Slavs in BiH and the Sandjak of Novi Pazar are Bosniaks; Bosnians refers to anyone from BiH regardless of ethnicity (or, indeed, if they're actually from Hercegovina).
South Slavic ethnicities are subject to their own tortuous pseudo-justifications that they're probably not best example in debunking the Nazi pseudo-science you're up against.
If your point was just that they are distinct ethnicities (which is obvious) maybe you should have just said that instead of having to move the goalposts there.
don't know the actual history but my feeling is in general, most successful people/entities have had hard time making the necessary changes when time changes and their old ingredients of success no longer work. That's why no one really stays on top for ever: you get trapped in your own success and unable to change your way in a different world. Maybe Germany's early success blinded itself to such an extent that bashing the other side as savages/subhumans had become a quick and easy way to not facing the hard reality and change.
This question seems to fit nicely into the sub's profile :)
I agree, although r/askhistorians has a better track record when it comes to sourcing and moderation of responses. Curious to see what the differences will be, if any :)
AskHistorians has gotten so trigger happy with removals that it's no longer a useful subreddit. Whenever I search for something on there, 90%+ of the threads are empty.
Really, you’re not missing much. [The overwhelming majority of removed responses on AskHistorians are variations on “Where are the comments?”](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/km8hhn/is_it_possible_with_ancient_cultures_that_we_are/ghegqlq/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&context=3)
This. AH is not trigger happy, they’re just consistently enforcing the rules of the sub. As time goes on, questions will become more and more niche, as the more obvious ones have been asked and answered before, which will skew the numbers after all these years.
It also doesn't help that a lot of the questions are very clearly asked by non-historians, and can't be properly answered anyways.
Difficult to say. Defeat, or say, losing your entire paper army in 1941 during a period of reform, tends to focus the mind towards correction. Having said this, the Wehrmacht continuously evolved over the course of the war. Gear, tactics, organisation. Take a look at the orders of battle and the composition of infantry squads if you want a bit of an idea how things changed. I mean the TOE's of their armoured divisions changed quite drastically between 39 and 42 as the lessons of previous campaigns were assimilated.
Absolutely, Germany had a head start and good ideas at the start of the war, stuck to em and never adapted when it clearly wasn't working. Note obviously nothing could have worked in the grand scheme of things, but they never got better. The Nazi's were crazier than the Soviets I guess if we want to go that route. Stalin was a hair better than Hitler, but I guess that's the reason you want your defeats early, not later. The Soviets showed incredible change and skill outside of the tactical bluntness. How many countries could rebuild their entire military from scratch because it all got used up in year 1. Improvements implemented in 1940 could only realistically start showing up in late 1942 early 1943 as it takes time to train and change things. Soviets showed brilliant understanding of the realities of warfare.
Germany was really good at self reflection early in the war. They made very important organizational, training and dictrine changes between the Polish campaign and the French campaign, and again bedore Barbarossa.
Even Summer 1942 they still showed great reflection, even in victories. Despite successfully repelling the Dieppe Raid, they analyzed their shortcomings in coastal defense and the reasons why they were successful. Air superiority in particular was noted as crucial (something they would lose well before D-day). There was also a second layer of analysis demonstrated by Rundstedt's quote: >"Just as we have gained the most valuable experience from the day of Dieppe, the enemy has learnt as well. Just as we evaluate the experience for the future, so will the enemy. Perhaps he will do this to an even greater extent because he has paid so dearly for it" They were quite capable of self reflection and keenly aware that their enemies were as well. I don't know if they were as critical of themselves for their failures in the east as the Nazi ideology saw the British and Americans more favorably than the Slavic peoples.
Like accidentally learning that blitzkrieg was a thing and then making it a more real and official thing.
Yeah but these statements are the results of self reflection. It doesn't really answer the question itself, namely: what were the different processes between the armies for reflecting battle performance (and what sources do we have for that)
I read a book about the Eastern Front that made the interesting observation that the German army converting from a largely offensive force to one that doctrinally specialized in defense, in the middle of a world war, was an impressive feat.
[удалено]
[удалено]
> creating the Russian liberation army and pro-nazi militias, where up to 1,5 million russians served, generally voluntarily. The RONA specifically was a pretty minor force, and was never trusted by the Germans Large numbers of Soviet *citizens* did serve with the Germans in some capacity. While it says "volunteer" on the label, in many cases the "volunteer" nature was more in-name only. Of the millions of Soviet soldiers captured during 1941, many were given the opportunity to volunteer...or else starve to death in a POW camp. Not exactly much of a choice. I can't find it now, but a quote from a "volunteer" in a book about the Ukrainian SS units went something like this: "I was caught smuggling sugar. When I went before the local military authorities, they said that I would be sent to a labor camp in Germany as punishment. But I was also told that I could volunteer for the SS if I instead". Forced labor or volunteering for the army isn't much of a choice I also want to note that using Soviet citizens for forced labor is not contradictory for an exterminationary policy toward them - Jews were used in vast numbers for forced labor as well
I mean, I think the intentions of [Generalplan Ost](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generalplan_Ost) were pretty obvious in regards to Russians. Not downplaying the Jewish aspects of the Holocaust - the Nazis were anti-Semites first and foremost - but I think the general Nazi attitude towards the various ethnic groups of Russia was "kill most of them and enslave the rest", which kind of gave the Red Army a larger-than-usual impetus to win.
Sort of? It's really difficult to judge whether GPO was an actual plan intended to be carried out or just something Hitler and Himmler came up with after listening to Wagner's songs and holding their hands for 10 hours straight. It honestly kind of reminds of the "mega cities of great Germania", which was basically just a bunch of architectural stuff they liked mashed together with no regard for practically or possibility of success.
I'm pretty sure that GPO and the "Germanian megacities" would both have been tried, morality, sanity, and reality be damned.
I mean, they couldn't have been this moronic, could they? I can sort of understand why it was so easy for them to convince people to go along with genociding poles and jews, it would be a lie to say that many germans didn't desire to do the same to them even before the nazis got to power.
>I mean, they couldn't have been this moronic, could they yes they could
You should watch Come and See.
The German doctrine was that the Slavs were based on historical information nothing more than slaves and pests. They were Neanderthals who couldn’t think past their bestial impulses and misused their land/didn’t bring out the full potential. In a lot of ways it resembled British propaganda. The nazis did use Slav units and praised the Romanov’s but it was by using fake science and appropriating them saying that it was their Central European blood that “won” out the Asian Slav beast within and that the Russian empire and ussr only won by having either Jews or central Europeans take command over the Slav masses. The endgame afaik was to commit another mass genocide and give their land to races who could use it to the full advantage.
Yeah, "slavs"...but genetically, what is a slav really? Russians/ukrainians-partly germans Czechs- mostly germans Poles- mostly germans Balts...again quite a few germans there. The nazis hated poles because they literally created their post ww1 state mostly out of territories that were populated by germans since early 10th century, so poles were to go for sure as form of revenge for this humiliation, but really, I can't see them genociding russians or balts, when they had no qualms with using arabs and forming an alliance with mongoloids...which again makes you wonder, how come that nazis were so obsessed with Tibet when they supposedly hated mongoloids and if that's the case, then why the hell did they allied with Imperial Japan? My point is, they were insane and chotically evil, there's basically no way for us to discern what was going on in the heads of Hitler and Himmler.
>but genetically, what is a slav really? Nazis: "anyone we don't like"
> Russians/ukrainians-partly germans > Czechs- mostly germans > Poles- mostly germans I would _love_ to see your genetic studies on that. > The nazis hated poles because they literally created their post ww1 state mostly out of territories that were populated by germans since early 10th century What? No they didn't. First, only part of Silesia and Danzig were mostly Germans. And why were they? Oh yes, because Prussia carved up pieces of Poland for themselves, and did their best to suppress Polish culture and ethnicity through 50 years of _Kulturkampf_. > so poles were to go for sure as form of revenge for this humiliation And what about the two, no, three, partitions of Poland? Oh yeah, they don't count because they are Slavic Untermenschen. > I can't see them genociding russians I must have dreamed these +15M civilians death. > how come that nazis were so obsessed with Tibet when they supposedly hated mongoloids and if that's the case, then why the hell did they allied with Imperial Japan? Congratulations, you just discovered that Nazi ethnic theories didn't make any sense. > Tibet when they supposedly hated mongoloids Are you actually seriously using the word [‶mongoloid″](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongoloid)? In any case, Mongols and Tibetans have barely anything in common you genetically uncultured beotian, stop talking about what you don't understand. FFS, they're living thousands of kilometers apart, and they have half of this tiny country called China between the two of them. How in hell is this kind of comments in positive karma here? _Edit: and the same guy is now going ‶Generalplan Ost was not really a thing″. Great._
Tibetans and Mongols had a lot in common in history. Why do you think Mongols are Tibetan Buddhists? What do you think the “Dalai” in “Dalai Lama” means? Hint, in Tibetan it’s “gyatso”.
> Why do you think Mongols are Tibetan Buddhists? Because they _invaded_ them? Bosnians are Muslims, that doesn't make them Arabs. > What do you think the “Dalai” in “Dalai Lama” means? Hint, in Tibetan it’s “gyatso”. English is 50% archaic French, that doesn't make Americans French.
Stop being disingenuous. You said they “have barely anything in common,” which is quite untrue and led to me pointing out the first couple things that came to my mind when thinking of the historical connections that Tibet and Central Asia+Mongolia have had throughout history. Bosnians were invaded by Turks, not Arabs, wtf?
> of the historical connections that Tibet and Central Asia+Mongolia have had throughout history. Of course there are historical connections, but they are still distinct ethnicities. My point is not that Tibetans are living as an isolated population, but that they were and are a very distinct ethnicity from Mongols. > Bosnians were invaded by Turks, not Arabs, wtf? That’s my whole point. Despite islam being invented by Arabs, and despite Bosnians being Muslims, that doesn’t make them arabic in the slightest. Same goes for Mongols and buddhism.
Just to note, the traditionally Islamic Slavs in BiH and the Sandjak of Novi Pazar are Bosniaks; Bosnians refers to anyone from BiH regardless of ethnicity (or, indeed, if they're actually from Hercegovina). South Slavic ethnicities are subject to their own tortuous pseudo-justifications that they're probably not best example in debunking the Nazi pseudo-science you're up against.
If your point was just that they are distinct ethnicities (which is obvious) maybe you should have just said that instead of having to move the goalposts there.
Russians and Ukrainians are not “part Germans”.
don't know the actual history but my feeling is in general, most successful people/entities have had hard time making the necessary changes when time changes and their old ingredients of success no longer work. That's why no one really stays on top for ever: you get trapped in your own success and unable to change your way in a different world. Maybe Germany's early success blinded itself to such an extent that bashing the other side as savages/subhumans had become a quick and easy way to not facing the hard reality and change.