In Defense of the Red Army

[Webstral]

So what you're really saying is Grenadiers would be just like Australian reserve infantry

Less beer"at least in the field. And also a greater variety of first names. It does no good for the platoon to yell in the heat of combat oeBruce, get down there and put some fire on their flank! and have the whole platoon up and move. Or oeBruce, give us a tinny! and get hit in the head with 30 cans of whatever Aussie infantry really drink instead of Fosters.

Or better yet, only half as good as a US Cav trooper

Less of an unwholesome fixation on horses.

[Webstral]

Try the porridge they sent us one morning as an attempt to apologise for the meat snafu - absolutely riddled with weevils!

Weevils You were lucky!

http://www.youtube.com/watchv=Xe1a1wHxTyo

[raketenjagdpanzer]

I think it's appropriate to this thread to bring up an old joke:

Right at the end of the second world war, three generals, a British General, an American General and a Soviet General are meeting in Berlin and discussing the hows and whys of their successes in the field, and the adage that "an army marches on its stomach" comes up. Soviet general proclaims that the Red Army did so well because its men were well fed - a thousand calories a day! The British general chuckles a bit and says sorry old man, we gave our lads fifteen hundred calories a day. The Soviet is flabbergasted but before he can speak, the American general chimes in and lets it be known that the US Combat soldier received three thousand calories per day, even under battle conditions. At this point the Soviet general cries foul and says "Impossible! No man can eat three sacks of potatoes in a single day!"

[Raellus]

As I see it, the West's main advantage over the ComBloc was technology. This advantage became more pronounced over time. I sometimes wonder how well NATO would have been able to deal with a conventional Soviet attack before the advent of the Western armored triumvarent- Leopard II, M1, & Challenger I.

In my view, that Western faith in, and reliance on, technology can also be considered a weakness. Superior technology allowed us to route Saddam's army not once but twice, and that only reinforced this belief that Western technology would have been the decisive war winner we hoped it would be during the Cold War. We tend to ingore historical examples that contradict that deeply-held belief. For example, it's easy to ignore the fact that the WWII-era German's belief that a complex, expensive, and technically superior Panther or Tiger was worth five or ten crude, relatively inexpensive T-34s still resulted in their eventual defeat (it should be noted that the T-34 was muchbetter than some Germans gave it credit for- some historians rate it the best overall tank of the war, in spite of some fairly glaring technical shortcomings).

We also seem to ignore or discount the fact that Western technological superiority failed to win the wars in Korea and Vietnam and, more recently, the war in Afghanistan. Yes, those are different types of wars, but GWI and II were not really comparable to a WWIII in Europe scenario either. It's not fair to say that the lessons of Korea and 'Nam don't apply to WWIII whereas the "lessons" of GWI somehow do.

Therefore, I think it's fair to say that the west clearly had a technological advantage over the ComBloc, but that this advantage was not a decisive one.

[95th Rifleman]

As I see it, the West's main advantage over the ComBloc was technology. This advantage became more pronounced over time. I sometimes wonder how well NATO would have been able to deal with a conventional Soviet attack before the advent of the Western armored triumvarent- Leopard II, M1, & Challenger I.

In my view, that Western faith in, and reliance on, technology can also be considered a weakness. Superior technology allowed us to route Saddam's army not once but twice, and that only reinforced this belief that Western technology would have been the decisive war winner we hoped it would be during the Cold War. We tend to ingore historical examples that contradict that deeply-held belief. For example, it's easy to ignore the fact that the WWII-era German's belief that a complex, expensive, and technically superior Panther or Tiger was worth five or ten crude, relatively inexpensive T-34s still resulted in their eventual defeat (it should be noted that the T-34 was muchbetter than some Germans gave it credit for- some historians rate it the best overall tank of the war, despite some fairly glaring technical shortcomings).

We also seem to ignore or discount the fact that Western technological superiority failed to win the wars in Korea and Vietnam and, more recently, the war in Afghanistan. Yes, those are different types of wars, but GWI and II were not really comparable to a WWIII in Europe scenario either. It's not fair to say that the lessons of Korea and 'Nam don't apply to WWIII whereas the "lessons" of GWI somehow do.

Therefore, I think it's fair to say that the west clearly had a technological advantage over the ComBloc, but that this advantage was not a decisive one.

WW2 is a good point.

Every allied nation was behind Germany in terms of tech and yet Germany still lost.

Compare the M4 Sherman to the later model Panzer IV's let alone the Panther and Tiger. The German Panzerfaust and Panzerschrek where superior to both the Bazooka and the joke (sorry, by joke I mean the british PIAT). The Germans had the jet aircraft which where superior in every way to the allied fighters.

The problem Germany had was numbers and fuel. In a WW3 scenario the Russians have a massive numerical advantage and this could prove as telling as it was in WW2.

If it takes ten T72's to kill an Abrams and the Russians have those tanks to spare, the Abrams will die. It;s how the American shermans killed Tigers.

[B.T.]

Once again, a very educated ans very inspiring thread, Thank you all for sharing your thoughts.
I would like, to add some of my own:

The degree to which US Army infantry is reliant upon close and consistent fire support is dismaying. Its a major weakness. Once again, I feel the irresistible urge to advance my personal campaign for supplementing the traditional light/mechanized distinction in the US Army with a dragoon/grenadier distinction. Like typical mechanized infantry, the dragoons would be expected to move operationally and tactically in organic transport and to fight dismounted with close support from organic fighting vehicles as well as artillery and CAS. Dragoons could come in a variety of configurations while meeting the above conditions.

Grenadiers, on the other hand, would move tactically and operationally in vehicles belonging to a higher echelon. They would fight dismounted without close support from fighting vehicles. Support from corps-level artillery and CAS would be worked into the doctrine, but grenadiers would be expected to execute their missions without heavy fire support. I would add, though, that they should have some vehicles that could carry packs, ammunition, and other consumables over short distances so that the light fighters themselves could move and fight carrying the minimum additional mass. Every pound counts.

Dragoons probably would fight during the day, and they would never get very far from their fighting vehicles. Grenadiers probably would operate at night. Dragoons would go into the crucible of combat with the principle role of defending the tanks against the enemys infantry and dismounted anti-tank fires. Grenadiers would avoid combat as much as possible, preferring offensive or defensive ambushes. Dragoons could operate in any terrain, being all combined arms and junk. Grenadiers would operate in restricted terrain where the enemys dragoons would be forced to fight dismounted and with limited assistance from fighting vehicles. Dragoons could be produced relatively quickly. Grenadiers would take some training. Grenadiers would be junior Rangers, in effect, with a healthy dose of WW2 Japanese light fighter thrown in for good measure. Infiltration, camouflage, deception, superior leadership, superior training, superior marksmanship, superior conditioning, superior unit cohesion, superior leadership (~cuz it needs to be mentioned twice), superior perks in the rear, and superior leadership (~cuz it really does need to be mentioned three times) would distinguish grenadiers from dragoons. Id have never been an NCO in a grenadier unit, though I might have done okay as a private.

I agree. As I see it, this was the reason behind the German (=West Germany in the Cold War) decision, to field the Panzergrenadier-units (mech. Inf with the Marder IFV) and the J$ger-units (Kind of "light Infantry", equipped with trucks or the M113.) Every PzGren-Btl in the Bundeswehr of the 80ies had one integrated J$ger company. Those would have been asked to support the Panzergrenadiers in FIBUA situations and in fighting in wooded areas. The J$gers were better trained. Every single soldier in my unit was trained with rifle, MP, Pistol, handgrenades, MGs, and the le. Panzerfaust. Everyone had seen the Milan and was instructed, to use it (although not everyone visited the 6 week training course).
We were trained in lying minefields and in improving booby traps with grenades.
The Panzergrenadiers, on the other hand, were not trained with the Uzi. At a time, when the Marder still had the firing ports for the Uzi!

We also seem to ignore or discount the fact that Western technological superiority failed to win the wars in Korea and Vietnam and, more recently, the war in Afghanistan. Yes, those are different types of wars, but GWI and II were not really comparable to a WWIII in Europe scenario either. It's not fair to say that the lessons of Korea and 'Nam don't apply to WWIII whereas the "lessons" of GWI somehow do.

Therefore, I think it's fair to say that the west clearly had a technological advantage over the ComBloc, but that this advantage was not a decisive one.

Very true. Technical superiority does not win wars. The more advanced technical weapons would help in warfare, but what counts, are the single soldiers. You know: "(More) Boots on the ground!"

Every allied nation was behind Germany in terms of tech and yet Germany still lost.

Compare the M4 Sherman to the later model Panzer IV's let alone the Panther and Tiger. The German Panzerfaust and Panzerschrek where superior to both the Bazooka and the joke (sorry, by joke I mean the british PIAT). The Germans had the jet aircraft which where superior in every way to the allied fighters.

The problem Germany had was numbers and fuel. In a WW3 scenario the Russians have a massive numerical advantage and this could prove as telling as it was in WW2.

One should not forget, that the German society was in a constant state of paranoia. Even in the developement of weapons, several agencies tried, to convince all others, that their approach would be the best. And that led to a situaton, where different groups worked on the development of certain items, but a central "power" was lacking. Look at the development of a modern infantry rifle, as an example: Fallschirmj$gergewehr and Sturmgewehr both were interesting designs, both were really influential. But in the end, a lot of labour and intellectual manpower were wasted. Because everyone tried his thing, ignoring the work of others. (As an aside: This seems to be repeated in the current US: SOCOM, Marines and Army all search for a specific new rifle. But every force uses a different approach. Or look at the developement of helmets: Marines and Army both replaced the PASGT helmet, but both forces developed their own design!)
The majority of the German units in WWII were still equipped with an old rifle (Kar 98), even in the end of the war. And most soldiers did not ride in fancy halftracks, they moved on foot.

[Raellus]

I'm currently reading Ivan's War) (Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939-1945) by Catherine Merridale. It's an excellent book and it has me thinking, once again, about the Red Army of the Twilight War/WWIII (v1.0).

It's truly an amazing story how the Soviet Union weathered Barbarrosa in the summer of '41 and not only just survived, but eventually stormed back to take a leading and underappreciated (at least, in the West) role in defeating Nazi Germany. Even before the German invasion in the summer of '41, the Red Army was already decimated and enervated by purges of its officer corps, a crisis of confidence precipitated by the failure of its Finnish adventure, widespread resentment in the ranks caused by Stalin's collectivization program, major military supply deficiencies, and doctrinal confusion (no viable plans for fighting any kind of defensive war since planning for defense was perceived to be "defeatist"). Yet, despite all of these self-imposed disadvantages, and truly staggering losses (nearly 5 million killed or captured by February of '42), the Soviets were able to rally and, eventually, strike back with overwhelming force.

The Soviet military of v1.0 would have been in a much better starting position than the Red Army of 1941. Yes, a few of its top units would have already been bled white fighting in China, and yes, many among its ranks would likely have been questioning the sanctity and efficacy of the Soviet system, and yes, it would be contending with shortages of certain items like military trucking. But, overall, it would be on a much firmer footing than its WWII predecessor, when the Bundeswehr launched its coup-de-main into the DDR. Another German attack on "Soviet" territory would be a huge "we told you so" moment and a massive propaganda victory for the Soviet government. Furthermore, the Red Army of 1997 would surely have learned from its experiences on the China front. Mobilization of the military and industry would have already been underway, if not quite complete, by the time of the German action. Yes, the Soviet military would be on the back foot in Europe, but it would be in a much better position to fight back than the Red Army of WWII. Considering how well the Red Army bounced back a year into the Great Patriotic War, I imagine that they would give NATO a rather hard time of it almost from the get-go (at least relatively speaking).

Anyway, I know that I'm badly beating a thoroughly dead horse now. It's just a topic that I'm rather passionate about. I really, strongly believe that in order for T2K to work on pretty much any level, you really need a good, strong Soviet military. Otherwise, there's not much there. Combine that belief with a fascination about the Red Army of WWII and I have become quite the late Cold War Soviet Military apologist.

[bobcat]

wait you guys had weapons when i reported to my old cav unit we had a guidon and four guys wearing stetsons.

and i still insist that guidon was the theif.

[Tegyrius]

Anyway, I know that I'm badly beating a thoroughly dead horse now. It's just a topic that I'm rather passionate about. I really, strongly believe that in order for T2K to work on pretty much any level, you really need a good, strong Soviet military. Otherwise, there's not much there.

Agreed. However we get there, the setting at the time of play (mid-2000 through early 2001) needs to be pretty well blown up or you don't get "post-apocalyptic" so much as "lightly used." If you want that end result, your setting design needs to start there and work backward, which means creating a set of preconditions that logically yield your desired world.

(Getting there, then, is one of the biggest problems in designing T2013 or any other mid-2010s post-WWIII world. With what we know today through open sources, it's really hard to engineer a plausible drawn-out land war in Europe with a resurgent Warsaw Pact on one side and NATO or the EU on the other. My best bet these days involves a combination of an expansionist and nationalistic Eurasian Union under the demagoguery of a Putin protege, American preoccupation with an explosively destabilizing Mexico, Iranian aggression in the Middle East, and a Sino-Indian war triggered by the shenanigans of a Chinese-backed Pakistan.)

- C.

[Raellus]

If this stuff is even half as effective as the article claims (I can't find much to coroborate it, except for some Russian defense industry blurbs which probably shouldn't be considered objective), NATO would have had a harder time with Soviet MBTs than some folks seem to imagine they would.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kontakt-5

I'd always assumed that kinetic energy penetrators wouldn't have much (if any) trouble against ERV-equipped tanks. It appears that I was wrong.

[dragoon500ly]

Isby quotes a stat in "Weapons and Tactics of the Soviet Army" that is of intrest:

"There is an average of 3.285 logistics, service, communications and support personnel for every US fighting soldier. The comparable Soviet figure is surprising, they average 0.68 support personnel per every fighting soldier."

"The reason why is the different missions of the two armies. While the Soviets are prepared to fight a lengthy war, their main emphasis is on a short, intense conflict. They also lack the large training base and overseas commitments which dramatically increase the US Army's support requirements."

"The Soviets also enjoy a higher readiness in equipment. Soviet weapons are simple, rugged and have lower maintenance requirements than their Western counterparts. In WWII, in spite of their shortage of trained personnel, the Soviets were able to repair between 75-80% of their disabled vehicles, 80-90% of these within two days, a performance that is currently matched only by the Israeli Army."

I remember a demonstration that a Vietnam veteran Sergeant taught his platoon on a rifle range at Graf, he took an AK-47 and an M-16, blew four magazines through each on full auto, then threw the weapons into a mud puddle, submerging both weapons. He ran a cleaning rod through the barrel of each weapon, hand cycled the action twice and then proceed to load and fire another magazine on full auto, the M-16 fired some eight or nine rounds and then jammed. The AK-47 went through another three mags before the sarge ended his demo.

[HorseSoldier]

I know that the Red Army of the late Cold War was not the same force as that fielded in '43-45, and that the WA, later NATO, armies also changed (mostly for the better), but it's hard to contend that young men raised during consumer goods shortages in the authoritarian U.S.S.R. were not tougher, in many ways, than those young men raised in the West on Pac-Man, MTV, and Big Macs (insert your prefered equivalent Western cultural equivalents here).

An interesting footnote I read in Murray Feschback's pretty bleak Ecocide in the USSR: Health And Nature Under Siege is that polution and environmental contamination was so severe in the USSR that by the 1980s a huge percentage of potential conscripts to the Red Army were being turned away because they were medically unfit. This was mostly related to asthma and other respiratory problems caused by air pollution in industrialized cities, but there were various other problems all related to environmental mess the Soviets made of Mother Russia. It's been a long time since I read the book, but I think the reject rate was quoted as something like 45% -- but regardless, it was bad enough that there are various reports and documents reporting that this was considered a critical threat to national security by senior military leadership by the mid-late 1980s.

Now, obviously, one of the first things the Soviet government would do on the outbreak of a general conventional war would be to reassess their recruiting standards and criteria. However, I have to suspect that a lot of those guys who would have otherwise been rejected for service wouldn't have held up well on the battlefield.

I would guess that, with recruiting standards loosened for the Sino-Soviet War once the war starts in Europe at any given point in time, the Soviets would have much higher rates of duty-limiting illness and deaths from disease. (At some point after the nukes this probably flattens out more towards parity as everyone who is at increased risk of death from disease on both sides doesn't make it through short rations and cold winters, etc.)

Feschback's book deals almost exclusively with the USSR but environmental conditions were pretty much as bad, or maybe worse, in the other Warsaw Pact nations, so this was likely also a problem for the East Germans, Poles, and others.

How this interacts with growing up in a comparatively austere environment is an interesting question. I agree that Russian recruits in the 1980s/90s may have been better prepared mentally for privation, but it's likely that this was offset on the NATO side by better nutrition, medicine, and healthier environments personnel grew up in to maybe produce something of a wash at a big picture statistical level.

[Webstral]

I would argue that were not prepared to fight a lengthy war successfully. If we meant business, we would have flooded Afghanistan with troops from the beginning. We dont have enough trained manpower to do that, nor do we have the political will to have the reserves called up long enough to make up the difference. We have fought for years under the assumption that it was all going to get better any day now, relieving us of the effort of making an appropriate commitment. Were fighting the Rhodesian War in Central Asia and no closer to winning than the Rhodesians were. This makes me sad, because I know guys like Law have put real effort into getting victory over there.

[pmulcahy11b]

At the risk of becoming political on this board...

Afghanistan began right, but then Bush pulled away most of the troops to fight a war in Iraq that was designed for Cheney and Bush to make tons of money through Halliburton, the defense industry, and Blackwater, while simultaneously shoring up Bush's poll ratings.

Yep, I said it. Iraq was an opportunity for them and a few others to make money. We had no other reason to be there.

Afghanistan -- we're supposed to be there to scatter Al-Qaida to the winds. For the most part, we've done that. We're never going to build a viable, reliable allied country there, because the Afghanis aren't ready for it, let alone a democracy. It's time to leave.

And the usual cast of characters are making boatloads of money from Afghanistan. While our troops die for a cause that is unachievable.

[HorseSoldier]

Afghanistan -- we're supposed to be there to scatter Al-Qaida to the winds. For the most part, we've done that. We're never going to build a viable, reliable allied country there, because the Afghanis aren't ready for it, let alone a democracy. It's time to leave.

That's the problem with Afghanistan, regardless of take on other aspects of it. We went in and smashed up the bad guys, but ended up with a 90% solution, and the remaining 10% of the win is elusive because it just isn't going to happen unless Afghanistan becomes a much more functional country than it is. And I agree -- that's not likely to happen.

Where I was over there, the average Afghan on the street wants things to be better but they also have a culture where you take care of yourself and yours first, others very second. (Which makes sense if you live in an environment where all resources have to be triaged because of scarcity and precariousness.) It's an adaptive strategy for life in Afghanistan as it is now, and as it was under the Taliban, but it isn't a great strategy for Afghanistan to develop into a more stable nation. Unfortunately, it's an ingrained cultural thing -- getting people to step away from it is probably on par with convincing people in cultures coming out of western European sort of cultural backgrounds that democracy is a bad idea. Could be done, but there is a huge amount of inertia to overcome.