Nothing could have saved the Germans, they were fighting a war that couldn't have been won under the best of circumstances. Hitler didn't learn from Napoleon and never had the logistics for what he wished. German armaments were also a logistical nightmare. The number of different rounds of ammunition they needed to supply their troops with was a nightmare. Of course the majority of their weapons were chambered in either 8mm Mauser (the Mauser K98 rifle also being a fine weapon in its own right, though antiquated in some respects) and 9mm Parabellum for front line troops. The problem though was that they also adapted so many other firearms into their arsenal from the countries they conquered, along with a variety of domestic cartridges. I'll have to look to see if I can find the link I read on this, but it was a serious problem in their supply system and diverted other resources just to keep up.
No, they were pretty much fucked. They put up a hell of a fight, but they were well and truly fucked. Hoards of raging, possibly drunk, angry Russians is not actually an enemy I'd like to face. They rampaged through.
We probably could have stayed out of the European theater and just kept feeding the USSR potatoes to make vodka and eat, and some more equipment. The USSR was a beast. They pretty much angrily raped, murdered, pillaged, and burned their way to the capital. They'd have kept going, too. They were pretty pissed.
Yeah, Germany never had the manpower or oil needed to be successful. Nice try, but Stalin wasn't going to cave like Poland, France, the Czechs. As I read once somewhere ... the Germans may have had great weapons, but too few no matter how advanced, and though they based their warfare on Blitzkrieg, the vast majority of their forces still used horses to draw artillery and supply wagons over mechanized. And never had the oil reserves to do otherwise. It's all about logistics.
As far as Stalin, I agree, he never needed a Western front. But without one, the world would be a completely different place today. He wouldn't have stopped at Germany ... all of Western Europe would have fallen. Britain and the US would've been up shit's creek, with only the late arrival of the atomic bomb maybe putting a damper on him. Eventually the Soviet Union would've still fallen under it's own weight, but a world I can't even imagine would be in place today IMHO.
What many people don't know is that, as soon as they were done (even before), they went and raped, murdered, and pillaged across China and Japan. Oh fuck yeah, they stomped across of a few of the Japanese isles and kicked some serious asses in the mainland China territory. They happily rampaged, looted, raped, murdered, pillaged, and more. Sometimes, they probably messed up the order and did worse than rape, murder, pillage, and burn. Those are horrible things, but doing them out of order is just plain wrong.
(post is archived)