The US Military Catch-All Thread

[John_Doyle]

I’ve had a very similar nightmare!

[Dejin]

A journalist visits the new USS Gerald R. Ford carrier. Lots of photos and some video.

It took me a while to figure out that COD mentioned several times was Carrier Onboard Delivery.

Xavier Vavasseur

[scottagibson]

Nice, thx!

[Matt_W]

Don’t know if y’all saw this yet, but as of Veteran’s Day this year, there is now a lifetime interagency pass for national parks and forests available for veterans and gold star families:

Entrance Passes (U.S. National Park Service)

You have to have a veteran ID to use it–just a DD-214 won’t suffice. I contacted my county veterans’ affairs office, filled out a form, took it to the DMV and got the word “Veteran” added to my driver’s license.

[ddtibbs]

Thanks for the heads up! That also reminds me that I need to update the address on my Veterans ID (that are issued at our county’s recorder’s office.)

[Dejin]

University of St. Andrews Professor of Strategic Studies make the argument that contrary to some popular opinion that Russia was primarily responsible for beating the Germans in WW2, an assessment of where German industrial effort went into arms production makes it clear they viewed the Western Allies as the greatest threat.

Sample excerpt:

Basically at least 55% of the German war economy went to building and arming aircraft. By way of comparison, for most of the war around 5-7% of the German economy was spent building and arming tanks and other AFV. When you add up all German war production, see where it was deployed and how it was destroyed, it becomes clear that the Eastern Front was not only a minority front for German national effort—it was increasingly so as the war went on.

Let me give two examples of how this worked. By 1944, easily the largest area of German war effort was the building of fighter aircraft (Germany basically abandoned building bombers after 1943 to build fighters to protect Germany itself from bombing). The fighters that Germany built were not sent to the Eastern Front to try and protect the Germany army fighting the Russians (who were desperately in need of air cover) but instead were deployed to fight the Americans and British. Here is chart of their deployment by theatre.[1]

Misunderstanding Soviet Power in WW2 and Russian power today

He also makes the claim that those giving most credit to Russia in WW2 are the most likely to believe Russia will prevail in Ukraine, which is partly why he wrote the article.

Phillips P. OBrien

[TheWombat]

That’s very interesting. It will take a lot more time, effort, and people noodling on it to really give it a workout, but it does add a wrinkle to a fairly stale corner of historiography.

I’d have to read his stuff to start to process it seriously, but if he’s focusing only on industrial production and not manpower that would be something to consider. The sheer number of casualties inflicted on the German armies fighting the USSR would seem to be significant, for example.

Others have made the argument that the Soviet role was exaggerated, but those claims were in the Cold War context. It will be interesting to see how much traction this idea gets among scholars.

[JonRowe]

I don’t think anyone with a lick of sense would say that Russia is responsible for defeating Germany in WW2.

They were necessary for the war to have ended in the way that it did, as it forced Germany to focus troops on multiple fronts, but they certainly didn’t win the war. They helped, like everyone else did. They played their part.

People really love to fetishize the Russians in WW2 though, with “Russia Stronk” memes while sleeping with their T-34 body pillows.

Now, what won WW2?

American led air power. Completely crippled Germany.

[KevinC]

@JonRowe

American led air power.

Not according to Lazerpig.

[Timex]

It’s worth noting that Russia definitely hurt Germany very badly and bought the allies a lot of time, by refusing to surrender despite taking really unimaginable losses.

Germany, in a totally rational take, assumed that if you killed 9 million Russians, you would would win.

They didn’t really appreciate how utterly insignificant human life was to Stalin.

[Sharpe]

When I was a history undergrad we were taught that the bulk of the defeat of Germany was the responsibility of the Soviets, specifically the Red Army. The US carried the bulk of the effort of defeating Japan, by a long stretch and also contributed materially to defeating Germany.

There is apparently a modern view looking at aircraft production but my understanding was shaped by things like tank production and number of soldiers fighting and number of casualties and those facts tend to support what I was taught.

I haven’t followed the recent scholarship in depth though.

[KevinC]

@Timex

They didn’t really appreciate how utterly insignificant human life was to Stalin.

Regardless of Stalin’s cares, when your enemy is genociding their way through your country there’s really not much of an incentive for people to surrender.

[Sharpe]

@Timex

Germany, in a totally rational take, assumed that if you killed 9 million Russians, you would would win.

They didn’t really appreciate how utterly insignificant human life was to Stalin.

I think it was less about Stalin and more about the quality of the character of the Russian people, and the threat they faced.

[Timex]

@KevinC

Regardless of Stalin’s cares, when your enemy is genociding their way through your country there’s really not much of an incentive for people to surrender.

Maybe? But, I mean, Stalin himself killed even more Russians. He sent, what, 20 million Russians to the gulag?

I feel like Russia could have surrendered to the Germans, and the Nazis probably wouldn’t have just continued murdering them.

[KevinC]

@Timex

I feel like Russia could have surrendered to the Germans, and the Nazis probably wouldn’t have just continued murdering them.

But there wouldn’t be lebensraum for the Germans if there’s a bunch of half-human Slavs squatting on the land.

[Houngan]

But, for certain values of cognitive suitability those 18 year olds are way ahead by dint of being willing to charge a hill or accept military bullshit unquestioningly.

[Sharpe]

@Timex

Maybe? But, I mean, Stalin himself killed even more Russians. He sent, what, 20 million Russians to the gulag?

I feel like Russia could have surrendered to the Germans, and the Nazis probably wouldn’t have just continued murdering them.

I feel this is deeply misguided. Don’t let your hatred of the Commies blind you to the evils of the Nazis.

[anonymgeist]

@Sharpe

Don’t let your hatred of the Commies blind you to the evils of the Nazis.

Or the dreaded Commie Nazis.

[abrandt]

@Timex

I feel like Russia could have surrendered to the Germans, and the Nazis probably wouldn’t have just continued murdering them.

Here, read about some of the things they did in occupied Ukraine and tell me you still believe this

Reichskommissariat Ukraine

[jsnell]

@Sharpe

There is apparently a modern view looking at aircraft production but my understanding was shaped by things like tank production and number of soldiers fighting and number of casualties and those facts tend to support what I was taught.

I haven’t followed the recent scholarship in depth though.

O’Brien’s “How the War was Won” makes a compelling case, and is a good read:

Amazon.com: How the War Was Won: Air-Sea Power and Allied Victory in World War...

It’s primarily an economic argument. All the major belligerents except Russia spent more on air/sea than on land. E.g. in 1944, out of Germany’s war production 50% was on airplanes vs. 8% on tanks. So in economic the attrition caused by the air war on the western front is much more significant than you’d think just from looking at the casualty numbers.