long time guy wrote:
My original point pertained to Russia being the most significant factor in winning the war. They were the country that provided the bulk of the fighting against Germany and they were the ones that took most of the casualties. Without their effort things may have been different. You say American aid to Russia is more significant. I disagree for a myriad of reasons.
Roosevelt's quotes and actions strongly suggest that he agrees with my assertion too. He clearly stated that the ",heavy lifting" was being conducted by the Russians. There is really no other way to interpret them either.
Your original point was:
LTG wrote:
As far as the WW2 thing goes get it right if you're going to quote someone. Misquoting and misrepresenting people is sort of your thing but I never said that America didn't play an important role. What I stated is that without Russia the Allies do not win the war
I have focused my efforts this weekend on countering the point that without the russians, the allies do not win the war.
Now as to your new point about being the most significant factor in the war, that's debatable. Yes. The russians succeed the most casualties of the war excluding civilians and certain ethic groups that were targeted. Getting killed doesn't win wars.
Now, I do not postulate that aid to russia was more significant (than russian fighting), I was trying to impress that the russian effort was not without help.
And again, no one disagrees that Russia did a shitload of work. That was never the argument.
Was russia the most significant factor? It really depends on your metrics. One reason english and american losses were low compared to russian was code breaking. Another was a superior strategy. Stalin as noted before ran headlong into battle disregarding losses. The other allies did not. Other significant factors were economic and manufacturing advantages the US enjoyed. And the technology was on our side by the end of the war.
Dont forget, the us was tied up on another whole theatre when stalin made his request and at that time, just having fought the battle of midway. Our naval production (and preparing for the necessity of amphibious island hopping assaults in the near future) was tied up to pacific concerns. Remember, we were behind the 8 ball fighting the world class of navies that just decimated our pacific fleet in a surprise attack. Who do you think was a higher priority? A navy that did indeed have capacity to expand its sphere of influence to the american coast or Germany who was dedicated to a land war and was not an immediate threat to the homeland?
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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014
bigfan wrote:
Many that is true, but an incomplete statement.