OT Attack in Paris 60 dead

[aspqrz]

Originally Posted by RN7

Soviet manpower and war production beat the German Army in Europe. Soviet war production matched America in many statistics, although generally not in technology. I

Interestingly enough, this is the line the old USSR managed to sell the West hook, line and sinker during WW2 and during the following Cold War through to the late 1980s.

If you read more recent economic histories of the Soviet War Effort, especially (of course) by Western economists and historians you will find that it is now widely accepted amongst specialist circles that -

* Lend Lease was the enabler of the Soviet War effort. No ifs, no buts, no ands, no maybes.

* Whole segments of the Soviet War Economy simply produced only a fraction of what the Red Army required, and the bulk was actually provided by the Allies ... and this was in key areas (for example, something like 60% of all explosives produced in the USSR was produced from precursors shipped there from the west ... 100% of Soviet Rolling Stock, Rail and Locomotive requirements during 42-45 were provided by the allies ... most of the telephone wire [and all of the waterproof stuff] for field phones was produced by the allies ... 80% of all Tank Radios were supplied by the Western Allies ... most of the Boots and Uniforms, ditto ... something like half of the field rations ... etc. etc.)

* The manpower that Stalin's incompetence continually wasted was only available because Lend Lease provided all the above ... if it hadn't, assuming that the Soviets could have produced it at all, or in the quantities needed, they would have had to strip men out of the army to do it ... and, indeed, had to do exactly that on at least one occasion (1942?) if not more.

Could the Russians have held on without US Lend Lease? Probably. At much greater cost. Commonwealth LL would probably have been enough to stave off defeat ...

But the few popular histories that actually delve into economic realities are almost all stuck in a pre-1980's time warp and still spout the propaganda that the Sovs sold the West for so long.

Dig deeper and you'll find a different story.

Phil