In Defense of the Red Army

[Raellus]

Originally Posted by O'Borg

Put them [the Israelis] in a uniform, give them top class equipment and training and convince them their homeland will be crushed if they dont fight, and its a far cry from a Soviet peasant being press ganged, fed on raw potatoes and issued with kit they soon find isn't as good as the stuff the other guy has.

It sounds like you're referring to the modern IDF. The IDF of 1948-1967 was equipped with cast-off, second-grade weapons and equipment (Shermans, Super Mysteres and essentially stolen Mirages, FN battle rifles, etc.). That they did as well as they did against the lavishly Soviet-equipped armies of the Arab states speaks volumes about the average Israeli's (of that generation, at least) fighting prowess. I guess that kind of proves your point, huh? That said, your description of the average Soviet conscript sounds like it was given by a Wermacht staff officer during the planning for Operation Barbarossa. That was a bit of a mistake back then. I don't think it's very wise to make that mistake again. See my next response to your argument.

In more recent times, the technologically superior IDF has had trouble with guerilla-style adversaries (The second Lebanon War and the recent fighting in Gaza). This has been with 100% air superiority.

Originally Posted by O'Borg

The Soviets weren't, except during WW2 when their enemies thought them subhuman and ethnically cleansed them. In a very real sense they were fighting for their survival.

I'm sure that the Soviet propaganda apparatus would whip up the Red Army with reminders of what a unified, militarily aggressive Germany was capable of doing to Mother Russia. After West German army (in the v1.0 timeline) crossed the frontier into East Germany, I think your average Soviet soldier (or prospective soldier) would have little trouble finding the motivation to fight hard on their western front. Plus, as I mentioned in my original post, some Red Army units would already have combat experience from China (and some officers and non-coms would have served in Afghanistan). I really don't think the image of press-ganged, potato-eating, simpletons is entirely fair or accurate, especially by the time the Twilight War kicked off in Europe.

Originally Posted by O'Borg

I prefer to think of the hypothetical Soviet invasion of Western Europe in the following terms :
Imagine the latter half of WW2, but give the Allied forces low morale and poor leadership, and the Germans naval & air superiority and remove Hitler's tactical and strategic blundering from the equation.

This is an interesting way of looking at it. I'm still not sure, given the conditions you listed, that the Germans could have achieved more than an operational stalemate against the massive weight of Allied men and material. That's kind of what we're looking at in the later stages of the Twilight War.