Originally posted by: BenSkywalker
On the T-34s
On July 4th, Das Reich had 48 Pz. III's, 30 Pz. IV's (1/4 with short barrels), 12 Tigers, 8 Pz. III command tanks, 18 T-34's, 33 StuG's, and 10 Marders combat ready. On the fifth, the first day of Citadel for the division, its Tigers knocked out 23 tanks in some 6 hours of heavy figting near Beresoff and Hill 233.3 to the north. On the 6th, south of Lutschki, I Bn. Tigers destroyed 10 tanks of the 2nd Guards Tank Corps, but anti-tank fire killed the 6th Pz. company commander, Ustuf. Worthmann. After being awarded the Iron Cross First Class as a company c/o in I/"Langemark" Hstuf. Dieter Kesten took over the 6th Pz. company. By July 13th, Ustuf. Hans Mennel in Pz. IV #621had knocked out 24 tanks during the campaign.
Although from July 5th through the 16th, Das Reich accounted for 448 Russian tanks and SU's, losing a total of 46 panzers and assault guns destroyed, Army Group South failed to completely break through to the final Russian defense line south of Kursk. On the 28th, before it departed for Italy, the Leibstandarte handed over to Das Reich 9 Tigers, 39 Pz. IV's, and 4 Pz. III's, which already had 33 Pz. III's, 17 Pz. IV's, 2 T-34's, and 2 Tigers combat ready.
Link.
Another take-
In the most famous action of the day the T-70 and T-34 tanks of the Red Army's 18th and 29th Tank Corps of the 5th Guards Tank Army charged headlong at the SS's Tigers. The T34s were faster but more lightly armoured and armed - they aimed to exploit weaknesses in the German machines' armour at close range. The Germans destroyed most Soviet tanks at long range, and relatively few became involved in short-range exchanges of fire. German units actually incurred relatively light casualties (only 2 Tigers were lost), and for most of the day they fought in good order. The battle can best be described as a very costly tactical loss but an operative success for the Soviets. The Soviets lost 822 tanks (more than half of them beyond repair), had more than 1000 dead and an additional 2500 missing or wounded. German losses reached less than 10% of that and they had the battlefield at the end of the day.
Link.
If the T-34s were close to as good as you try and make out the Russians were not nearly as inept as I have made them out to be- they were a staggering amount worse. They had the Panzers significantly outnumberd and according to you had superior tanks and yet the Reich managed a ~10:1 kill ratio.
You posted links saying the Allied bombing campaign was effective. That's great and all but that was never under scrutiny. Also your quotes have absolutely nothing do with the Russian front and have nothing to do with land attacks.
That link was about why they lost the war- the top reason according to Goerring was not the oh so poweful Russians as you are trying hard to make people believe- it was the US/UK assault.
Not only that but without the Luftwaffe's commitments in the east (of which the bulk of their forces were stationed there) the US/British would not have enjoyed the same tactical advantages in the air as they did.
Since you like to bring up Kirsk, the Luftwaffe had a 5:1 kill ratio over the completely inept Russians there too- despite the Russians having a numerical advantage(the Soviets lost nearly half their air force in that battle).
Also the Madagascar forces were controlled by Vichy France. I'm sure you kew that, you just like to waste time on irrelevant tangents.
We had an ambassador to Vichy France- the soldiers defending Madagascar were French Army regulars- they were ones we were killing. France was no ally to us.
That theory was also not only deemed unlikely, it was deemed impossible and it was refuted at the time by other members of the Manhattan project.
It is quite demonstrative of how little was known about secondary impacts of the atomic bomb.
Additionally as early as 1934 it was known that artificial radioactivity could be created in stable elements by bombarding them with alpha/neutron particles and hence your claim that scientists had no idea about radiation from nuclear weapons is utter lunacy, being second in terms of lunacy only to your claim that nuking France was a viable option.
How was it that they were to make the connection of what was happening internally inside of an atomic bomb and what the neutron activity was going to be miles away? What evidence did they have that that was going to be a factor? None.
All you would get on the coast is a few bunkers with a few nested machine guns, a far cry from the damage the Soviets did to the Germans on the Eastern front.
A few bunkers and machine guns? That's odd as Hitler already had plans drawn up and wanted work to begin on a construction comparable to the Maginot Line.
Propaganda? At ground zero where the bomb hits a person is literally coverted into a streak on the wall, assuming the wall survives.
Which relates how to troops moving through after the wake is long gone...?
Sure, those that weren't at ground zero when the bomb hit but were instead many miles away. The probability of radiation poisoning drops with distance. Of course it dramatically increases as you approach ground zero, something Allied soldiers would've done as they passed through France.
The people who took years to show syptoms are those that
were miles away and
then went to ground zero. Kind of like how the invading force would be.
The air battlle over Kursk between the Russian air force and the Luftwaffe was one the largest air battles ever fought. The Russians committed around 2400 aircraft into that battle and the Germans 1800. While it's true the US airforce was superior technically and numerically to the Russian airforce it doesn't change the fact that the Russions had quite a significant air force themselves.
As I will point out again, they were utterly inept at best. You keep talking about raw numbers but ignore that they were completely ineffective in combat- they were one of the poorest fighting forces in history. If you claims are correct they managed to pilot the best tanks in the world and get their @sses handed to them in an embarassing fashion by those operating inferior machinery. Their air force had a large portion wiped out in a single battle, one in which the Luftwaffe lost a whole 200 planes.
Nope, the bulk of the Luftwaffe were fighting in the Eastern front and the bulk of their force was defeated there as well.
Only in Soviet propaganda. Goerring saw it differently.
In 1941/1942 it dominated German tanks due to its ability to move through mud and snow with ease and it easily stood up to any German tank.
The only time the T-34 had an edge was in the mud/snow- the reason I compared it to a sport ute.
In terms of men for land forces, artillery and tanks the Russians were ahead of the US.
In terms of fighting men, men who were capable of actually performing land battle, tanks capable of doing anything but committing a suicide run and every other element the US was far ahead of the Soviets.
Also after the Luftwaffe had sustained heavy losses in the Eastern front,
Heavy losses, what heavy losses? When did these huge losses occur? Were their planes crashing into buildings?
Are you sure you aren't one of those US Cold War generals from the 1960s? Their universal answer to the world's problems was to push the red button and I'm detecting a similar thought pattern in your "nuke France" policy.
Why? When did I ever in the slightest way advocate what I'm saying
WOULD have happened? Everyone in this thread who is familiar with the subject matter seems to be well aware of the fact that it would have. Could you please point me to once ever where I have stated that the Soviets should have been nuked or anything remotely like that? I can tell you now you won't find anything. I'm simply pointing out the simple fact that the Russians were weak and inept in combat- they had weather on their side and an enormous margin in sheer numbers over the Germans- they were vastly superior in nearly every other element.