Did the Russians plan to invade Germany in 1941/1942

[bozon]

I read many claims and heard several lectures from history professors that claim that Stalin was preparing to attack Germany. Hitler was way ahead of him though and caught the Russians still very unprepared.

The biggest difference between Stalin and Hitler was that Stalin was concentrating on killing his own people.
That and the size of the mustache.

[KgB]

LOL obviously the germans won the Battle of Britain   

you seem to fit the description of

My grand father fought against Nazis, because of him i exist. I hope you and i never meet.

[Noir]

The odd thing is if Russia was planning to invade..... why were they so unprepared when Germany moved first?

Russia was expecting the attack, they were badly equipped and organized but still they were expecting it with massive numbers. The thing is that Stalin decided himself the defence plan and thought it would be a good idea do defend on the border without using the great distances to strain the German army. He also sacked most of the great leaders that served under the Tzars. The Germans just pierced the front lines with their blitzkrieg tactics and conquered unchallenged until that freezing winter in Stalingrad.

the link I provided earlier will tell you more.

[Noir]

My grand father fought against Nazis, because of him i exist. I hope you and i never meet.

My grandfather fought WWI from 14 to 18 years old. He nearly fought WWII but was a bit old and had 7 children. My grandparents were quite fortunate they managed to live through WWII laying low in the occupied Paris.

My other side grand parents weren't as fortunate and lost a lot of family and friends during the Allied bombings of Avranche in 44 despite the warinings of the resistance, with high suspicion that my Grand mother was raped by the German occupying troops. She took her secret and mental illness to the tomb.

Normal European life in the early 20th century!

[KgB]

KgB, you can disagree as much as you want, and also claim that water isn't wet. The fact is that the LW did not manage to acieve acceptable air superiority before the deadline of operation Sea Lion, and they bled heavily while at it. In short, - they failed so badly, that escorted bombers over Britain in daylight operations were abandoned as soon as the autumn of 1940. Withdrawal from that tactic was inevitable.
The air power that the LW lost to Allied guns in 1940 roughly equalled the whole force they used when invading Russia. And the force they used when invading Russia roughly equalled what they had tied up on the Western front, - from the Arctic to the Med.
Just facts. Disagreeing won't make a thing.

And for how long could Britain deffend itself?  They were running out of Spit's, never mind pilots. Hitler under estimated Brits, its a fact. If LW were taking too long, who knows how long would it take for ground troops? Then USA would step in and Russians would most likely use  that advantage to invade Germany?

[Ardy123]

No they abandoned it because they failed. They lost Battle of Britain.

  They could have broken the back of the British, but at the 11th hour, Hitler instructed them to focus on attacking the cities which gave the British time to recover and ultimately stop them.

[Angus]

And for how long could Britain deffend itself?  They were running out of Spit's, never mind pilots. Hitler under estimated Brits, its a fact. If LW were taking too long, who knows how long would it take for ground troops? Then USA would step in and Russians would most likely use  that advantage to invade Germany?

The LW was depleting faster, and it is questionable how badly the RAF was depleting. You see, the main fight, when the LW faired reasonably well was against RAF's southern system. 10th and 11th group. 12th group did not properly make it into the fight before September, and shone nicely on September the 15th. On September the 16th 1940, the operation Sealion was postponed indefinately due to two things mainly. Those were:
1- The RAF shows itself in growing numbers (which was true)
2- The LW losses are increasing and unacceptable as well as they cannot be replaced fast enough.
The real thing is that the LW never figured out the RAF's group system. 1.200 aircraft + lost in a few weeks and they yet had not figured out.
The BoB might of course never have taken place were it not fur Russian supplied fuel. You should watch the lecture I linked.
Odd enough, Russian patriots often fly off the handle when this theory is aired. I do not see any insult in it. Had I been Stalin, I'd have planned for war against Hitler. Just differently. Well, - there was of course the agenda of world communism....

[FLOTSOM]

 

[FLOTSOM]

They could have broken the back of the British, but at the 11th hour, Hitler instructed them to focus on attacking the cities which gave the British time to recover and ultimately stop them.

Ardy, why do we even bother?????

its not like anyone actually enters one of these conversations with an open mind. they have no real interest in a discussion of merit and value. but we asMuppet's can just take the conversation into our own forum where all the really smart guys hang out......... 

[oakranger]

Did they not fail because they abandoned it?

Operation Sea Lion was a three phase battle plane: 1) Gain air superiority over the RAF 2) destroy the Royal Navy 3) invade England and defeat the home guard and British Army. Germany could not do phase two or three with completing phase one.

To complete phase one, Hitler and Goring first worked on attempting to lure the RAF into one-sided air combats. Then, they change their strategies by attacking the forward air bases (little strategic important). The British radar defenses was the problem that LW realized that need to be taken out so they worked on that. It had moderate success.

Now Hitler shifted the plans by bombing the main airfields and fighter production. The strategy was working as RAF was loosing planes and production was dropping. With a handful of pilots and planes, RAF was on the blink of being defeated when faith was on their side. One German bomber accidentally bombed London. Churchill order RAF to bombed Berlin, something that Hitler order the LW to "terror bombed" London. Once again, the planes for phase one of Operation Sea Lion was change to night bombing. This gave RAF a huge advantage as they had time to recover and regain numbers and production. Britain defeated Germany, barely.

Hitler was forced to cancel Operation Sea Lion in which neither his army or navy had much confidence anyway.

[oakranger]

Why didn't Hitler invade Switzerland? It would make things much easier.

Nope, It would have been a very costly for Germany because the Swiss Families have a heritage of being gun-carriers and gun-owners. Every Swiss person is required to spend time in the military and they are required by law to take their weapons home after they have finished serving.  The army are well trained in fighting in the mountain environment, something that Germany Army did not.  Also, Swiss had a strong Air force that would have hurt LW.  And Hitler needed a neutral country so that Germany could deposit some of her national funds into Swiss banks.

[Angus]

Swiss was also a financial gateway to the rest of the world.
Catching Switzerland thus had only a negative side.

And Oak, - The BoB was concluded with almost half of RAF's fighter strength (12th and 13th group) taking very little part.
12th group entered only when the Germans shifted to bombing London, and 13th had their moment of glory when the LW tried to launch an attack on the NE of Britain from Denmark.
Funny that the LW did not figure that the British actually had defences all over the country, not just in the south. And equally funny, that slow thinking and arguments within fighter command kept several squadrons out of the fray.
When all hell was loose over hell's corner (Kent), the RAF had fully equipped and rested squadrons from the Cambridge area and all the way to Scotland, even in N-Ireland.

[Rich52]

And for how long could Britain deffend itself?  They were running out of Spit's, never mind pilots. Hitler under estimated Brits, its a fact. If LW were taking too long, who knows how long would it take for ground troops? Then USA would step in and Russians would most likely use  that advantage to invade Germany?

You talk as if we had thise huge military force to "step in" with in the early summer of 1940. In truth our entire military forces numbered less then 500,000. In contrast they were at over 12,000,000 in 1945. Most of our Navy was in the Pacific, I believe we had only one of our 4 CVs in the Atlantic, and mush of the surface fleet was of WW1 era dreadnoughts and DDs. We had hardly no landing craft of any kind. Our Air corp was pretty pathetic. Armored forces even worse. Army troops still riding horses. And from sea to shining sea were 50yo Mothers snarling like Pitbulls at Frankie to not draft their sons. We had nothing to step in with.

Truth is America wasnt a force to be reckoned with until 1943.

Who knows what Stalin was thinking. He'd have gotten is butt kicked if he tried invading Germany in '41 or '42. They had a hard enough time with FinLand let alone a Juggernaut like Germany. He had convinced himself that Germany would never fight a two front war and there werent a lot of advisors lining up to argue with him about it. Stalin was far more concerned with enemies within his borders then without. I think he would have simply kept nibbling at the edges like he did in the Baltics, Finland, and nudging closer to the Romania oil the way he did. Stalin was cautious. It wasnt until the Germans was approaching Moscow that spies in Japan reported Japan wasnt going to attack the Soviets in the east. Had Stalin attacked Germany he would have had to keep some of his best troops in the far east.

[KgB]

The LW was depleting faster, and it is questionable how badly the RAF was depleting. You see, the main fight, when the LW faired reasonably well was against RAF's southern system. 10th and 11th group. 12th group did not properly make it into the fight before September, and shone nicely on September the 15th. On September the 16th 1940, the operation Sealion was postponed indefinately due to two things mainly. Those were:
1- The RAF shows itself in growing numbers (which was true)
2- The LW losses are increasing and unacceptable as well as they cannot be replaced fast enough.
The real thing is that the LW never figured out the RAF's group system. 1.200 aircraft + lost in a few weeks and they yet had not figured out.
The BoB might of course never have taken place were it not fur Russian supplied fuel. You should watch the lecture I linked.
Odd enough, Russian patriots often fly off the handle when this theory is aired. I do not see any insult in it. Had I been Stalin, I'd have planned for war against Hitler. Just differently. Well, - there was of course the agenda of world communism....

Thank you sir, i wasn't aware of those numbers.

[Angus]

Finland was 1939, and on an "EGO" trip.+
Finland had its defences turning the right way.
The Germans had very little eastern defensive front.
Both Germany and the USSR stacked up their cards OFFENSIVELY on their seperated Polish borders.
Someone being ready for an offence and being attacked first has a bad day.
Anyway, from the lecture, it is well supported that much of Russias arsenal was and had been for years, - offensive weaponry. I could put a dent in the argument, but the sheer amount of info there was a bit stunning.
It's a worthwile lecture to look at. Link is on the first page.