A perspective on Hitler's motivations

[heydaralon]

Yes, well, count me in the contrarian camp with Suvorov then, I come to my own conclusions, argumentum ad populum of course, being a glaring fallacy.

Most professional historians are actually totally and utterly full of shit, whereas Suvorov's case, it rather compelling indeed, and, it can be cross referenced in order to deduce by logical extrapolation as well.

I know politics in academia is real, but whats an example of professional historians missing the mark on something that you are interested in? Also, are there any professional historians that you respect?

[Smitty-48]

Yes, well, count me in the contrarian camp with Suvorov then, I come to my own conclusions, argumentum ad populum of course, being a glaring fallacy.

Most professional historians are actually totally and utterly full of shit, whereas Suvorov's case, it rather compelling indeed, and, it can be cross referenced in order to deduce by logical extrapolation as well.

I know politics in academia is real, but whats an example of professional historians missing the mark on something that you are interested in? Also, are there any professional historians that you respect?

Pretty much everything, I put no stock in historian as a profession, they're more clerics of the preferred establishment narrative than they are professionals.

How do you tell a "professional" historian from an amateur one? The "professional" one is on the take, being paid by the establshment to tow the party line.

I don't respect any historical analysis based on who is telling it, I come to my own conclusions based on a broad cross referencing of the preponderance of evidence and logical deduction therein.

The "professional" historians rely on argumentum ad populum and appeal to authority, and that's how you know they are not professionals at all.

Outside of the hard sciences, it's not that there is "politics in" academia, rather academia is simply politics by other means.

Bear in mind the liberal establishment politics against Suvorov's assertion; in that the inference is, Hitler's war may have in fact been justified, and our stalwart ally Stalin was in fact the greater threat, and in fact it was Stalin attempting to manipulate us into a war with Hitler all along, while Hitler was in fact trying to avoid that, and was only forced to fight us, when we took Stalin's bait.

Hiler didn't declare war on us, we declared war on Hitler, and we only did that, when Stalin baited Hitler into Poland, and us into declaring war over it, while Stalin hung back for that critical extra week, until his plan had come to pass, war between Britain, France and Germany, but not against Stalin, Stalin the king maker, lying in wait.

[heydaralon]

Bear in mind the liberal establishment politics against Suvorov's assertion; in that the inference is, Hitler's war may have in fact been justified, and our stalwart ally Stalin was in fact the greater threat, and in fact it was Stalin attempting to manipulate us into a war with Hitler all along, while Hitler was in fact trying to avoid that, and was only forced to fight us, when we took Stalin's bait.

It seems like the "new" conclusion many historians have reached now is that Stalin's death numbers were not as bad as believed and based on Cold War propaganda, and that Hitler was the chief aggressor of WW2 and Eastern front. Timothy Snyder has been pushing that narrative in Bloodlands. His point about Stalin's mass murder being overestimated is bullshit in my opinion. I think Robert Conquest had it right years and years ago. As far as who is more to blame for the Eastern Front, are you saying that historians have warmed up to Hitler in this regard, and put more of the blame on Stalin? If that's what you are saying, I'm not sure I agree with that. The stuff I've read, which is admittedly not as much as you, always emphasizes how weird it was that Hitler turned on Stalin when they had an alliance. Aside from Icebreaker, few authors even think that Stalin had a plan drawn out for invading Germany, and at best it was a distant aspiration.


Personally, I think Stalin was at least 2 or 3 years away from trying anything like that, but I don't know for sure. I don't think longterm peace with Germany and USSR was ever in the cards.

[Smitty-48]

The Pact of Steel was an alliance of convenience, both parties holding the knife behind their backs, looking for their oppotunity to strike, Stalin saw the opportunity of inciting a war between Germany, Britain and France, Western Front all over again, and he wasn't going to make the same mistake the Romanov's did, he was going to hang back and let them exhaust themselves, and then he was going to pounce from the East.

At the point of Operation Barbarossa, the Soviet forces numbered 303 divisions and 22 separate brigades, 6.8 million soldiers, with 166 divisons and 9 separate brigades, 3.2 million soldiers, in the Western district poised to invade Germany, pressed right up against the frontier, in a pre-attack formation.

They did in fact outnumber the Germans, if the Germans had been tied down fighting the British and French, they would have outnumbered them at least five to one, and the Soviets actually had more tanks, more artillery, and better tanks and better artillery, than the Germans had in 1941. The Germans in fact needed to capture this Soviet equipment, on the way to Moscow, and turn it around against the Soviets, in order to make up for their deficiencies.

The idea that Stalin was "2 to 3 years away", is not backed up by the preponderance of evidence.

[Smitty-48]

You see, it was in fact the Germans who were 2 to 3 years away, the Soviets were out ahead of them, Hitler knew he was up against the clock, and he had no chance of catching the Soviets absent some sort of dynamic action to outmaneuver them, and so his dynamic action was; blitzkreig, surprise attack, war of encirclement, Cannae on a grand scale, and before the Soviets could recover, the Germans would be comfortably esconsed in the Kremlin in Moscow.

And he did effect Cannae on a grand scale, and they make it all the way to Moscow, the Germans were in the subburbs, the Kremlin in sight, so they came that close, missed it by just a cunt hair.

[heydaralon]

The Pact of Steel was an alliance of convenience, both parties holding the knife behind their backs, looking for their oppotunity to strike, Stalin saw the opportunity of inciting a war between Germany, Britain and France, Western Front all over again, and he wasn't going to make the same mistake the Romanov's did, he was going to hang back and let them exhaust themselves, and then he was going to pounce from the East.

At the point of Operation Barbarossa, the Soviet forces numbered 303 divisions and 22 separate brigades, 6.8 million soldiers, with 166 divisons and 9 separate brigades, 3.2 million soldiers, in the Western district poised to invade Germany, pressed right up against the frontier, in a pre-attack formation.

They did in fact outnumber the Germans, if the Germans had been tied down fighting the British and French, they would have outnumbered them at least five to one, and the Soviets actually had more tanks, more artillery, and better tanks and better artillery, than the Germans had in 1941. The Germans in fact needed to capture this Soviet equipment, on the way to Moscow, and turn it around against the Soviets, in order to make up for their deficiencies.

The idea that Stalin was "2 to 3 years away", is not backed up by the preponderance of evidence.

Well, there were a lot of Soviets amassed, but they did not seem to be prepared for anything, much less an invasion. They had tanks and artillery, but they could not even defend their front. The fact that they were caught so off guard by the Germans, and lost insane amounts of men in a short time seems to indicate a criminal level of incompetence by the soviet military and intelligence services even more so on the eve of an important invasion. I'm not a general, but isn't scouting out the enemy terrain before a huge invasion a key part of the strategy? I have a hard time believing that Stalin could plan a huge invasion, keep it completely secret, and then somehow forget to check if the Germans, who had gathered the biggest land force in history were at his front door right beforehand. You may be right, and you have read more about WW2 than I have, but I am a bit incredulous about this.

[Smitty-48]

Well, there were a lot of Soviets amassed, but they did not seem to be prepared for anything, much less an invasion. They had tanks and artillery, but they could not even defend their front. The fact that they were caught so off guard by the Germans, and lost insane amounts of men in a short time seems to indicate a criminal level of incompetence by the soviet military and intelligence services even more so on the eve of an important invasion. I'm not a general, but isn't scouting out the enemy terrain before a huge invasion a key part of the strategy? I have a hard time believing that Stalin could plan a huge invasion, keep it completely secret, and then somehow forget to check if the Germans, who had gathered the biggest land force in history were at his front door right beforehand. You may be right, and you have read more about WW2 than I have, but I am a bit incredulous about this.

Yes, well, then you don't have a grasp of military operations, so to you it may seem odd that a massive attack force could be encircled, but the whole reason they could be encircled so easily, is because they were pressed up against the frontier in an attack formation, that's the only way they could have been encircled so easily, see how that works?

This is where deduction comes in, because the Soviets weren't that imcompetent, they knew what they were doing, but what they were doing, was preparing to attack rather to defend in depth, and that is the only way that the Germans could have got the jump on them, when the Germans actually had the inferior force.

As for Stalin, he was deluding himself, he did not want to accept that the Germans were actually on to him, the intelligence reports said that the Germans were massing, but Stalin rejected it as being overwrought and hysterical, which is why he was so shocked when Hitler beat him to the punch, that he fled into seclusion at his dacha to wallow in depression, fully expecting his own secret police to come and execute him, as they did the Romanovs.

He was rather pleasantly surprised, when they did come, but not to execute him, but to get him to buck up and ruck up, because by that point, they felt that Stalin was their only hope.

[Smitty-48]

And as for "scouting", this is 1941, what do you think they had, sattelite reconnaissance?

You couldn't see shit in those days, beyond a few miles in front of you, you could easily mass a huge force without being detected, that was the whole war, one massive surprise attack after the next.

[heydaralon]

Well, there were a lot of Soviets amassed, but they did not seem to be prepared for anything, much less an invasion. They had tanks and artillery, but they could not even defend their front. The fact that they were caught so off guard by the Germans, and lost insane amounts of men in a short time seems to indicate a criminal level of incompetence by the soviet military and intelligence services even more so on the eve of an important invasion. I'm not a general, but isn't scouting out the enemy terrain before a huge invasion a key part of the strategy? I have a hard time believing that Stalin could plan a huge invasion, keep it completely secret, and then somehow forget to check if the Germans, who had gathered the biggest land force in history were at his front door right beforehand. You may be right, and you have read more about WW2 than I have, but I am a bit incredulous about this.

Yes, well, then you don't have a grasp of military operations, so to you it may seem odd that a massive attack force could be encircled, but the whole reason they could be encircled so easily, is because they were pressed up against the frontier in an attack formation, that's the only way they could have been encircled so easily, see how that works?

As for Stalin, he was deluding himself, he did not want to accept that the Germans were actually on to him, the intelligence reports said that thge Germans were massing, but Stalin rejected it as being overwrought and hysterical, which is why when he was so shocked when Hitler beat him to the punch, that he fled into the seclusion at his Dacha to wallow in depression, fully expecting his own secret police to come and execute him, as they did the Romanovs. He was rather pleasantly surprised, when they did come, but not to execute him, but rather to get him to buck up and ruck up, because by that point, they felt that Stalin was their only hope.

Fair enough, never claimed to be a military expert. Here is a question I have for you though:
In one of Anthony Beevor's books the dude says that the soviet forces did not have much food, fuel, or logistics set up. For an invasion like that to work, there would need to be huge supply lines because an army of that size would run out of all of those quickly. If Stalin was planning an invasion, why didn't he have any of those key pieces in place? How far was he planning on getting without oil or food? Apparently a lot of Stalin's superior tank numbers was a mirage too, because many of them were inoperable come Barbarossa. They did not seem to be ready at all.

[Smitty-48]

Fair enough, never claimed to be a military expert. Here is a question I have for you though:
In one of Anthony Beevor's books the dude says that the soviet forces did not have much food, fuel, or logistics set up. For an invasion like that to work, there would need to be huge supply lines because an army of that size would run out of all of those quickly. If Stalin was planning an invasion, why didn't he have any of those key pieces in place? How far was he planning on getting without oil or food? Apparently a lot of Stalin's superior tank numbers was a mirage too, because many of them were inoperable come Barbarossa. They did not seem to be ready at all.

Yes, well, Suvorov goes over it, point by point, to show that Beevor doesn't know what he's talking about, and in fact the Soviets were massed, and ready to attack, and fully stocked, and had the better kit as well, and how the Germans actually took advantage of all that, after they encircled the Soviets and then plundered all their kit and stores to be repurposed to Barbarossa.