Stalingrad or North Africa?

Originally posted by Red4tribe   Originally posted by Sun Tzu Kursk was the largest tank battle right?? Yep.

no, not necessarily, there was a thread about this some time ago.

either way, i would considder the battle for Moscow as most decisive, but we can say that Leningrad, Moscow and Stalingrad together did their job in reversing the fortune of the Wehrmacht.

however Al Jassas got some point. while i still say Stalingrad as single event was more devastating than the whoel North African campaign, Germany lost innumerable hardware there, and even more en route to it in the meditteranean.

I also agree with the battleof Moscow (possibly with Leniingrad) on the Eastern front, and would pair that with the battle of Britain in the West.

Edited by gcle2003 - 06-Jan-2009 at 16:11

Operation Seelöwe was the first campaign that wasn't won by Germany, that's the significance of the battle of Britian. it also was an unnecessary waste of many planes and pilots. there's simply no way Germany could not have involved in North africa though. another Italian failure and Italy would have had to quit the Axis. Germany already had to intervene on behalf of Italy against Greece and Yugoslavia, those went well. as Italy was losing ground in North Africa as well, it was nevessary to send German troops there that could change the outcome and prevent an earlier collapse of Italy than it already was. after El Alamein, an evacuation would have been the best bet perhaps, but sealanes were not save for the Axis and retreat was not favoured by Hitler in any case.

back to the eastern front however. Germany without any significant defeat was unable to take both Leningrad and Moscow, which already marked the peak of German land sucesses. Operation Blue, while initially sucessful, stalled in Stalingrad and in the course of Soviet Operations Mars, Uranus and Saturn, Germany lost all gains in the Caucasus and the 6th Army in Stalingrad (Mars between Leningrad and Moscow was a failure).

so far so good. nothing what happened so far on the western front or africa was so far significantly decisive to the outcome of the war. the evacuation of Tunis happened only in 1943 and was the culmination of the overall pointless North African campaign. Stalingrad was the first serious loss of many men and materiel at all and in a shorter period of time than NA until the evacuation of Tunis.

it is a debatte on its own whether or not Moscow or Stalingrad was most decisive. in my opinion the failures of Germany to take Moscow and Leningrad made the operations Mars, Uranus and Saturn only possible. a loss of Moscow would have meant the end of the Soviet Union and war within days or weeks. without the failure of taking Moscow and Leningrad there would have been no Operation Blue in the first place, which only set the stage for the Stalingrad disaster.

but Stalin descided to stay in the Soviet Union. considderign he reigned by terror, this would have been the signal fire for others to claim his place or call for a change.and the loss of the capital is always a serious blow, in 1812 for example it wasn't, therefore there was no serious result to it. in case of ww2, Moscow was also the crossroads for many railway lines and also fucntioned as supply and adminitsrative center as with every capital. the loss of both Leningrad and Moscow would have meant the complete collapse of west-uralic Russia.

Originally posted by Sarmat What battle of Britain has to do with stopping Germany?

Hello to you all

http://www.strom.clemson.edu/publications/sg-war41-45.pdf

 

 

Throughout the entire period from 22 June 1941 through 6 June 1944, Germany

devoted its greatest strategic attention and the bulk of its military resources to action on

its Eastern Front. During this period, Hitler maintained a force of almost 4 million

German and other Axis troops in the East fighting against a Red Army force that rose in

strength from under 3 million men in June 1941 to over 6 million in the summer of 1944.

While over 80 percent of the Wehrmacht fought in the East during 1941 and 1942, over 60

percent continued to do so in 1943 and 1944 (see Figure 2).

Figure 2. Scope of Operations

                  AXIS FORCES                                             RED ARMY FORCES

June 1941: 3,767,000                                                2,680,000 (in theater)

                  3,117,000 (German)                                  5,500,000 (overall)

                  900,000 (in the west)

June 1942: 3,720,000                                                  5,313,000

                   2,690,000 (German)

                   80 % in the East

July 1943: 3,933,000                                                    6,724,000

                 3,483,000 (German)

                  63 % in the East

June 1944 3,370,000                                                   6,425,000

                  2,520,000 (German)

                   62 % in the East

Jan. 1945 2,330,000                                                   6,532,000

                2,230,000 (German)

                60 % in the East

April 1945 1,960,000                                                  6,410,000

Total Mobilized 34,476,700

In January 1945 the Axis fielded over 2.3 million men, including 60 percent of the

Wehrmacht’s forces and the forces of virtually all of its remaining allies, against the Red

Army, which had a field-strength of 6.5 million soldiers. In the course of the ensuing

winter campaign, the Wehrmacht suffered 500,000 losses in the East against 325,000 in

the West. By April 1945, 1,960,000 German troops faced the 6.4 million Red Army

troops at the gates of Berlin, in Czechoslovakia, and in numerous isolated pockets to the

east, while 4 million Allied forces in western Germany faced under 1 million Wehrmacht

soldiers. In May 1945 the Soviets accepted the surrender of almost 1.5 million German

soldiers, while almost 1 million more fortunate Germans soldiers surrendered to the

British and Americans, including many who fled west to escape the dreaded Red Army.

As gcle said, if Germany was going to win, it had to win quick, and I believe, that after the defeat at Moscow any hope of taking the Soviet Union was a bit unrealistic. But Stalingrad sealed the deal. It was the turning point. After Stalingrad there could be no Germany victory, the loss of man power was too great. After Stalingrad it was only a matter of time before the Soviet Union defeated Germany. As I said before, North Africa was a crushing defeat, but it did not mean the end of the war against the US and Britain, whereas Stalingrad did, against the SU.

Originally posted by Sarmat The German initial impetus run out at Stalingrad.

Originally posted by gcle2003 Originally posted by Sarmat The German initial impetus run out at Stalingrad.   Then how come they didn't occupy London?   Apart from that, they were definitely stopped in front of Moscow and Leningrad.   When you stop, your impetus has run out.