Kar; After the Battle of Britain, British production was greater than their losses. There was in effect air Parity between the Allies and Germany after that, with both sides having a powerful enough airforce to defend but not attack.

By Normandy the allies had air dominance, germany simply didnt have the planes to defend their army.

Throughout the war bombing raids took place at night, when anti-air weapons struggled to do much. It would not have been difficult to get bombers to germany (and certainly wasnt, as was seen by the bombings of Dresden and other cities both in daylight and nighttime.

However, had the war gone differently from early on the chances were that germany would have also had a nuke.

Yes, and thats right tacticus, but I was trying to say that it woudnt be a breeze nuking germany if germany had beated russia and had the men, the safe distance factories, and resources to replenish airforce.

@BaronHarkonnen

|> What you guys think would have happened if Germany would not have surrendered in May 1945 ?

They would have been utterly wiped out in June 1945...

After D-Day, the situation looked pretty bleak. The [Ardennes Offensive](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ardennes_Offensive) was pretty much the last chance they had of seriously turning the situation around. Sure, Market Garden failing bought them some time, but by then it was a lost cause. Even if they could've stopped the Russian advance, it's extremely unlikely there would've been a way to utterly defeat Russia (as in: a full scale Russian surrender) before the spring of 1945, when the Western Allies crossed the last big river and had no serious remaining obstacles on their way to deep into Germany.

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@rebojones

|> (..) you might come close to having a non-biased opinion.

There's no such thing as a non-biased opinion...

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[Warning: I probably forgot a couple sarcasm-tags in the following part]

@Kar98k

|> @dkristopherw and the prophet, let me tell you it is easy to deter an a bomb attack when you got miles of flak Ack ack and other AA fire.

Ah yes, I completely forgot Japan had not invented AA yet, seeing as how *both* nuclear bombing raids (each involving five or six aircraft?) did not lose a single plane to enemy fire.

|> No doubt it the Germans beat the russians they couldve made Europe one big fortress

Ever heard of the Atlantic Wall? Europe *was* one big fortress, that's why D-Day was so incredibly important (and cost so many lives).

|> You guys have little to no knowledge of America and britains air losses in 1944, it was catastrophic, watch any show or look at any reliable website on he air war

All hail Kar98k, The All-Knowing... How about you give us a link to such a reliable website; since we have no knowledge, you cannot expect us to be able to find reliable websites by ourselves.

|> We lost 9,000 + bombers( troops inside not planes) in 1944

This is the first time I've heard aircrew referred to as "bombers", usually that word is reserved for referring to numbers of aircraft...

|> Im sorry for your guts to post on a thread despite lack of knowledge on the topic .

The Warlight rules of etiquette prohibit me from being too specific about my thoughts on your guts to address other people in such a way, especially when combined with a complete and utter lack of proof to back up your claims.

@RvW Im not trying to make you sound like youre idiots, in fact you guys may know some things I dont know, its just that there was no garuntee we could get a nuke across to berlin, and Germanies AA and other anti bomber materials were 10x stronger than japans. And I dont know why it matters if I said I meant to say air crew in place of bombers, and you gotta pick that apart. See my point and look up World war 2 in hd ; The air war, it should explain how bad our losses were in 1944 if you watch the whole 2 hours. Thats my "source" Hope I dont have to right a bibliography for you next.

Sorry if I offended any of you with my post, Im trying to get my point across, and Im hoping for this thing to die, because some people have to pick apart a post and not even listen to the real point. , Im just trying to defend myself

Im pretty sure Kar98k, is right.

Well, that seals it then. Kar is an idiot.

Actually, most of his information is correct. Lets see you provide some information dumbass.....

Oh, that seals it. WWII in HD on the history channel. Forget all the books I have read, because one utterly-demoralized TV series has proved all the historians wrong. By 1944, and certainly after the invasion of Normandy, the Luftwaffe was finished. The Germans did not have the planes, pilots, or fuel they needed. As you may be able to deduce, this doesn't bode well for air defence. As for the effectiveness of AA, it wasn't very high. The Germans were getting kicked around day and night.

It is clear that Kar, while seemingly American (I can't decide if that is in spite of the terrible grammar and spelling, or because of it), he is a big German fanboy. The Germans lost, dude. It's not some sort of evil plot we are talking about to disparage the glorious German people, it is a fact that by 1944 the Germans were retreating everywhere, and generally getting the shit kicked out of them at every turn.

@TexasJohn Typos are not broken English. I know we won the air war by D-Day, but You guys act like we did nothing to smash them into the ground. It wasnt until we had to sacrifice all of those bombersto knock out their fighters until we won. I Read books on WW2 too, I just never said when the germans were finished off.

Anyways, Im not a fanboy for germany. They shouldve been firebombed all the way like Dresden, only sick disguisting people would think of cleansing races from earth because they are the "master Race."
I named my account after the gun because I couldnt find a better name if youre going to use that against me, and I used a World war two rifle because I read about it. If you got a problem with the shows on World war 2 on the history channel, you can go complain to someone else.
I didnt start the post because I wanted the Germans to win, Im just saying I have heard lots of times too many that russia couldve won the war on its own, and thats not true the allies in the west took alot of pressure off of the russians by opening fronts in Europe and North africa

Airplanes don't need to fly low enough for flak to get them when they are dropping a bomb with a 1 mile blast radius (the "5 psi contour"). Just sayin!

With the terrible English, I am not really complaining. Just pointing out that people will take you a lot less seriously if you refuse to follow the rules of the English language.

Also, I think your name should be M-1919 MMG. Still, better than naming yourself after the totally rubbish Mauser.

Lastly, do you honestly think that the Germans could have held off the Russian hordes? As I have pointed out numerous times, the Germans only ever had around 20 divisions facing the Western Allies. The fact that the Western Allies held up that few troops really doesn't support your claim. Better to claim that the Western Allies saved Western Europe from complete domination by the Soviets, because they weren't particularly inclined to stop rolling across Europe.

There are plenty of bolts on a Boeing 747 without which the plane will crash. Are they more or less important to the plane's flight characteristics than the vertical stabilizer? The whole premise of this debate is ludicrous!

|> It wasnt until we had to sacrifice all of those bombersto knock out their fighters until we won.

Bombers don't knock out fighters, other fighters do...

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|> Anyways, Im not a fanboy for germany. They shouldve been firebombed all the way like Dresden

You do know that the bombing raid on Dresden is considered a war crime by some? It did not serve any tactical or strategical purpose, it was knowingly and willingly massacring the civilian population without a military reason behind it.

|> only sick disguisting people would think of cleansing races from earth because they are the "master Race."

You seem rather eager to wipe out all Germans...

Guys what you write here, would make me lose all faith in mankind if i hadnt lost it already long ago. Your lack of knowledge is remarkable considering the amount of words you use to express it.

Therefore I wont comment on the biggest stupidities one can read here, but i have to correct some people I deem to be older than 14 years.

That means you, TexasJohn

Why do you repeat that 20 division bullcrap instead of checking your facts first?
With the internet you dont even have to pick up a book, a simple 3 word search in google and you'd know more.

In the beginning of the Soviet-German War in WW2 the Russians had less soldiers on the front than the Germans had.
Military historian David Glantz speaks of ~4.7 million germans while Michail Iwanowitsch Meltjuchow speaks of 4.3 million. Against 2.8 million russian soldiers (Glantz) or 3.3 (Meltjuchow). In any case the germans had 154 Divions at the eastern front.
At no point the germans had only 20 divisions facing the western Allies.
Even in 1944 the Germans still had 54 divisions in western europe, 27 in italy and 154 facing russia.

And concerning your "what if" game you play, whether or not the Germans could have held off the "Russian hordes", answer that yourself. But consider the land lease aid the Soviet Union got from the USA (total worth ~12 billion us dollar [ Wolfgang Schumann (et al.): Deutschland im zweiten Weltkrieg. Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1982, Bd. 3, S. 468](not inflation cleaned) consisting of:

14,795 planes
7056 tanks
8218 aa-guns
131,633 machineguns
105 submarine-hunters
197 torpedoboats
15.417 millionen pairs of boots

The biggest part of the aid accounted for not as weapons, but as food, ressources, machines and industrysupplies.

In ressources and food the soviets got:

4.478 millionen tons of food
2.8 millionen tons of steel
802,000 tons non-iron-metalls
842,000 tons of chemicals
2.67 millionen tons of Petrochemicals

Also delivered:

77,900 Jeeps
151,000 light transport vehicles
200,000 Studebaker-trucks
1.5 million km of telephonecable
35,000 Comstations
380,000 fieldtelephones
43% of all tires
56% of all railway tracks
1900 tenders (trains)

The British at the same time got triple the deliveries the soviets got from the USA in net worth.

sorry for the "millionen" , i know it should be millions, i forgot to correct it

Meh, it's all good. I wasn't really sure, and I didn't really feel like checking facts. I will leave that to others, such as yourself. There is always someone who enjoys doing that sort of thing, while I really can't be asked. That being said, my idea was right, my numbers were wrong. One question, do those figures include non-combat divisions (ie Luftwaffe ground personnel, security divisions), or is that just the combat strength?

As to the point about Lend-Lease, it is well taken. Although I consider the issue of tanks to be mostly irrelevant, as the main Lend-Lease tanks given to the Russions (as far as I recall) were Shermans and 57mm Valentines. Neither of these tanks were particularly good in Western Europe, and were even worse in Russia. The Ivans certainly benefitted from the transport and logistical aspects of Lend-Lease, but with the best tank of the war, I doubt they were super stoked to get a bunch of inferior Western hand-me-downs.

I am quite enjoying this friendly debate, as it seems some people have a lot to offer. Myself, I am pretty well acquainted with WWII, but I generally dislike reading too many big picture or stat heavy books on the subject. Personally, I most enjoy the small unit tactics and typical weaponry. I may not know (or really care to know) how many German divisions were on the Western front, but if you show me a picture of a German or Allied tank, I can immediately identify what it is. And I ain't talking MkIV vs MkIII, I am talking about which version of MkIV it is (F, G, H, etc).

I find it annoying that i have to check facts, because you arent reliable as a source. I dont like to do that either. You just give out a wrong information (seemingly confident in it, even repeating it) to rescue a point you set up before. It should be the other way around. Having a reliable information and adjusting your point to it, not the fact to the argument.

excerpt of wikipedia:

A total of 4,102 M4A2 medium tanks were sent to the U.S.S.R. under Lend-Lease. Of these 2,007 were equipped with the 75 mm gun, and 2,095 carried the 76 mm gun. The total number of Sherman tanks sent to the U.S.S.R. under Lend-Lease represented 18.6% of all Lend-Lease Shermans.[12]

thats more than half having 75mm to 76mm guns not 57mm guns. Not that it really matters, since you didnt read :

"The biggest part of the aid accounted for not as weapons, but as food, ressources, machines and industrysupplies."

I rather have the strategical overview over a topic, than a knowledge about trivial (allthough intresting) details, which is useless if you dont understand the setting it fits in.

That sounded harsh, so i add this:

I admit though, that details help a lot in having a better understanding of the overall situation.

Dude, I totally understand the point. That's just the way I am, I confidently spout (mostly true) facts without doing research. The forums are not something I really care to do much research for. With what little time I do get online, I am either rushed for time or multitasking.

I will point out, however, that I never said anything about 75mm or 76mm Shermans. The only gun size I mentioned was the 57mm (6lb) gun on the Lend-Lease Valentines, which was generally not good enough to defeat tanks better than a PzMkIII, at least frontally. The Sherman was a decent tank, and we gave them quite a few, as you have pointed out. However, the numbers of T-34s (much better tanks) have to make the numbers of Lend-Least Shermans seem meaningless.

Really, I am confused by your comment that I keep sticking to the same point, even when wrong. Which point would that be? If confronted with facts, I usually surrender the point. The only thing I can think of that I have consistently stuck to in the course of this thread is that the T-34 was a great great great tank. Surely I am not wrong about that?!

Sorry for dragging this topic up again, but to me the whole topic seemed to drift off topic to the specific battles, to the various armaments involved in WWII, abilities of Generals etc.
AND 9th of May is approaching, so it seemed fitting to me reiterate my point :-)

Quoting the OP

*Lots of people like too say the Russians won WW2, or that America saved Russia from the loss*

Having lived in England and Russia and also having met a large amount of Americans in my time, I have found that all 3 nationalities have their own view on the war and who won and why!
Anyone that had to live through the war and come out alive, in my opinion, has the right to say they won. War is not a game and no amount of history books and documentaries could convey the horrors of that time. England had the Battle of Britain and numerous other battles, Russia had the Great Patriotic War and America fought across many fronts across the globe.


*In my opinion we saved Russia from annihalation by taking pressure off of them, and yet they still claim they beat the Germans. Not that we didnt need them, its that they didnt win the war*

Your opinion, coming from an American should of course be on the side of the US of A and that it was soley American influence that "turned the war" and therefore achieving the victory.
During 1939 to 1945, there were many countries that fought on the "allies" side and can also lay claim to helping with victory.
I come from a small pacific nation that also fought in the war in Europe, in both WWI and WWII, these wars formed a major part of the development and culture of our very young country. When I 1st arrived in the UK I was appalled to hear some old timers explaining to me that I come from "the colonies" and that the UK alone won WWII. But, as time went by and understanding more about what happened in the UK from 1939 to 1945, I could understand their opinion and not begrudge them from thinking it in that way.
The same happened when I went to live in Moscow, but again living there and learning more history (which has only become available in the last 15 years after communism) I again could see why the former Soviet Union Countries should be so proud to win their war too (which from my previous post I explained is not WWII).
Americans I have met in all corners of the world and the propaganda that is fed to the general population it is natural to expect a one-eyed view on any topic. But, again I wouldnt begrudge anyone from claiming victory considering the human sacrifices involved on their side too!


Finally for those that don't know, 9th of May is Victory Day or День Победа. This is the day a large amount of countries commemorate the victory over Nazi Germany and Facism!

[Victory Day](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victory_Day_(9_May))

In Russia, it is a magical day, with many celebrations, marches and showering of gifts and flowers to surviving veterans. For some of the survivors of the war this is the highlight of their year and rightly so, as the sacrifices they made all those years ago are applauded and remembered in the hope it will never have to happen again!

I was lucky enough to watch the parade in 2010 which was the largest in non-communist times! Simply amazing

[2010](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Moscow_Victory_Day_Parade)

For WWII history buffs I would highly recommend "The Greatest Battle" by Andrew Nagorski - a superbly written best seller on the battle for Moscow that takes account from both sides of the battle.

And check out this [site](http://english.pobediteli.ru/) if you want see a depiction of war from 1941 onwards from the Russian side. This site is a dedication to the veterans of the USSR and is not politically motivated (please check the "questions and answers" before starting viewing.

С Днем Победа!!