People always imagine taking Moscow as some war winning thing when in reality it was anything but. After all, Napoleon took Moscow and it didn’t do him any good.
(1) Most of the Soviet government was already in the reserve capital of Kuybyshev. Stalin only stayed behind because he was assured that Moscow would hold, but if it was clear that the Germans were coming full force then he would’ve retreated as well.
(2) Moscow would’ve been evacuated, mined, boobytrapped and burned as the Germans approached, with some forces remaining to harass them. The metro was already built in the 30’s, so defenders could’ve made use of all the tunnels to move around and harass the Germans all over the city. Add to this that it’s the coldest European winter of the 20th century and German weapons and vehicles are constantly failing. The urban combat would’ve made Stalingrad look like a joke.
(3) The bulk of Soviet strategic industry was relocated behind the Urals at the start of the war. Take the whole distance that the Germans crossed from Poland to Moscow during Barbarossa, then do it all again. This time over much worse roads, with less major cities to resupply from, and in the middle of winter.
In short driving south was the winning move, with the oil being the main objective of the whole campaign. IMO they could’ve diverted more from Army Group North to either Center or South, but in the end they wouldn’t have won anyway. Even if they did relentlessly drive south towards the oil, the Soviets would’ve sabotaged and destroyed all the infrastructure there to make it impossible to use. This would’ve crippled them (I think something like 70-80% of their oil production was from those regions, the remainder being from Siberia), but it would’ve also removed any chance of Germany winning the war.
No, the war was effectively lost in early 1941. When discussing counterfactuals people forget that Hitler had an incredible streak of good fortune up to 1941 and it’s difficult to devise scenarios more favorable to Ze Germans that the actual ones.
Proponents of the alternative “Mediterranean strategy” like Raeder and Doenitz advocated taking Malta, Gibraltar (Operation Felix under the assumption that Franco would cooperate) and Suez, pushing through Palestine and linking with the pro-Axis Iraqis. But with Hitler deep down remaining a corporal in a land army they had to chance of successfully arguing their case, especially when ideological factors are taken into account. So Operation Barbarossa had to happen.
At the end of the day, the successful completion of the Manhattan project would have put an end to all those speculations.
For more obscure WW2 stuff, check out Mark Felton’s excellent channel. Some things that even I didn’t know about (and that’s saying something), such as Russians in the Imperial Japanese Army.
Talking with my nephew yesterday. Girlfriend busts his balls for the past few months, making the relationship hard and is now pressuring him about marriage.
It reminded me of many of my early relationships. I never quite understood what was happening here. Make life excruciating and then petition me to make the rest of my life like that?
Is this a nuclear option being deployed on the relationship to kill it off or do some people see this as a good way to glide into marriage?
She probably really wants to be with him , but wants to “whip him into shape”
My mom did and still does this with my dad. They’ve been married for 20years
Should I trust the nutrition labels of quest bars?
I really want to believe that a bar is only 200kcal and they did win the lawsuit, but the whole net carb thing seems really suspicious
Plus, winning a lawsuit means nothing
I don’t endorse revenge on someone who hasn’t done anything but be herself, but I would certainly offer that most of us have trouble labeling a relationship “a poor idea” despite most people (including @strongmangoals’ nephew and young me) absolutely recognizing it.
