Stalin’s Purge of the Red Army and Its Effects on the WW2 Eastern Front
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 30 มิ.ย. 2024
- Did the Purge have a massive impact on the Red Army's ability to fight WW2? Historians continue to argue, and the answer may not be as clear cut as previously thought.
Military History Visualized's video on the Purges • Stalin's Great Purge -...
Thomas Ricks' video “Why our Generals Were More Successful in World War II” • Why our Generals Were ...
Check out my other History videos here • History
Thank you to my Patreons for helping me create this content! You guys are awesome! Help me make these videos / tikhistory
Biography -
Books:
Getty, J. Manning, R. Stalinist Terror: New Perspectives. University of Cambridge, 1993.
Guderian, H. Panzer Leader. Penguin Classics, 2000.
Hill, A. The Red Army and the Second World War. Kindle, 2017.
Liedtke, G. Enduring the Whirlwind: The German Army and the Russo-German War 1941-1943. Helion & Company, 2016.
Manstein, E. Lost Victories. Zenith Press, 1982.
Overy, R. Russia’s War. Penguin Books, 1999.
Ricks, T. The Generals: American Military Command From World War II to Today. Kindle, Penguin Group, 2013.
Service, R. Stalin: A Biography. Pan Books, 2010.
Unger, D and Unger, I. George Marshall : A Biography. Kindle.
Articles:
Philips, J. The Soviet Military 1936-1945: Devastation to Victory. British Conference of Undergraduate Research. bcur.org/journals/index.php/Di...
Websites:
The British Army Website. Join as an Officer. www.army.mod.uk/join/Join-as-a... . Accessed 27/08/17.
The US Army Website. U.S. Army Officer Program.
www.goarmy.com/careers-and-jo...
thanks for the shoutout(s)! Just watched the first 9 minutes, so far, great work! Gotta get a stream ready, will watch the rest later!
No worries! :) good luck on the stream, and let me know what you think when you've finished watching it
Military History Visualized ITS YOU!!!!!
I think there is an important distinction between the German and Soviet Army that wasn't mentioned. The Germans did a rigorous self-examination of themselves after Poland and found that their officers needed more training but were ready for the war with France. I remember Military History Visualized talking about it but I don't remember the name of the episode. I'm not aware of any of this happening in the Soviet Army
@Illya: I think your memory might have mixed me up with Chieftain here, or I said it on stream (I say a lot on those ;) referring to Chieftain. As far as I know, he said it in one of his Dunkirk videos.
Although the Soviets were also drawing various lessons from the Winter War etc.
Heck yea!
Good video. One thing that needs mentioning is that Tuhachevsky's reforms were in many ways deeply flawed, for example he tried to replace pretty much all of Red Army's artillery with giant recoilless rifles that straight up didn't work (look up Kurchevsky cannons), severely undermining the Red Army's artillery arm on the eve of WWII.
He was probably planning something exotic against Stalin, or was ridiculing Stalin in his closer circles, thinking that he is above any danger. I don't know, but I don't think that Stalin eliminated him just because.
Actually if we look at Stalin's profile, I think that it is safe to assume that while some form of dissent was indeed presented by the actions and words of Tukhachevsky -something that Stalin ordered him to do and he did not follow -the guy did not plot conclusive actions against him. Must be something more likely of a domestic manner who enraged Stalin against him, like one of those small offenses who can turn a very suspicious guy against you -something that undermined Stalin's authority in front of his subordinates.
It would be interesting if there would be any report in regard to the interaction between the two, during the last few weeks before the arrest -if they met, what was the discussion, who was present, and so on.
@@user-ze6tb4xq5fyawn
The amount of research you did to produce this video is pretty impressive. The effort definitely shows in the end product.
Thank you! I was able to put a lot of time into it, which shows :)
@@TheImperatorKnight u know jackshyte dikhead
It's interesting to compare as well to the French army, which was largely led by WW1 veterans. That experience certainly didn't help increase the effectiveness of the French army in 1940.
French army was useless in world war 2
Paris fell in six weeks
Red army took back Berlin from moscow
Political division and infighting really screwed France over. Instabile government, either influenced by, or fighting socialism
The German army in the Battle of France was led by leaders from World War I
950,000 communist parry members were purged so it wasn't just the Russian army. It paralyzed their whole society. Especially in a 1 party country. It was alot more than just army and fear can't be computed in statistics
It’s so refreshing to come across a video on the USSR that mentions any of the significant research developed in the last 30 to 40 years. Well done.
My second platoon sergeant, an E-7, was a fine soldier, college educated, and I asked him if he was interested in Officer Candidate School (OCS). No, he wasn't. In a combat situation, I'd consider commissioning him and giving him command of a company if the situation presented itself (as an E-7, he was already able to command a platoon). My first platoon sergeant, an E-6, was a fine soldier, but a promotion (other than in conjunction with retirement) might've revealed the Peter Principle. Good people - which isn't the same thing as people with experience or people with college degrees - are a force multiplier. You should always be on the lookout for people who can grow into the next level. "Grow your own." Stalin's purges hurt, but "how much" is a legit question.
Agreed, all of our sergeants knew what they were doing. I even ran into two lieutenants who were still competent human beings and not young gods-in-training. The rest of the officers on the other hand had their sights on becoming the next Westmoreland. That was not a good thing for the people under their command or for the Army.
I’d disagree with your assessment of German officer corp expansion. While the perceived number of officers was low, the surplus of men who were well qualified but unable to have commissions were waiting in the wings in police and paramilitary formations. Also the disguised staffs in the Versailles Treaty era allowed for rapid expansion of the armed forces. The Germans never stopped planning for future conflicts and the requirements that would be needed.
And one thing everyone forgets is that Germany was preparing for conflict way before Hitler got to power... the German tank school at Kuma, the air school at Lipetsk and the gas warfare school in Tomka (all in the USSR) were set up in 1929, 1926 and 1928, respectively. Set up by the Weimar Republic. But nobody remembers that.
@@KnightofAges I don't think they were 'preparing for conflict' in the same ideas that Hitler had, but would rather find ways of self-defence in case a foreign nation struk again. (Well, France just took over Rheinland as far as I remember of that time-frame)
Wrong, they nearly failed at logistics. The infantry and artillery still relied on campaigns in Poland and France on horse drawn vehicles, as did (largely) infantry battalions invading the Soviet Union in Operation Barbarossa. The German armed forces continued to suffer from the lack of logistics mobility by having a scarcity of trucks and having a deficit of spare parts to keep the trucks going. Trucks were not standardized to a few types, keeping standardization and mass production supply of parts a continual issue (and of course the lack of available fuel). Rolling stock in railways were also inefficiently used and was continually in short supply. In a large long-distance land war, like Operation Barbarossa and subsequent army operations in the Soviet Union, logistics bottlenecks began to acutely tell on the effectiveness of the Wehrmacht to sustain offensives and later to defend against Soviet counterattacks. This was a major failing of OKW and OKH to put into effect BEFORE Barbarossa, but also due to inefficiencies in the total war economy production of the Third Reich (early in the war), and Hitler hurrying offensives out of personal convictions and political expedience.
According to AH own book, he had had good connections within the army. Were he saw the true national morale that was lacking. So the SA and SS, as well as jugend made it possible to train soldiers.
@@nottoday3817 "I don't think they were 'preparing for conflict' in the same ideas that Hitler had, but would rather find ways of self-defence in case a foreign nation struk again."
Germany and Prussia before it were not big on "self-defence" even in defensive wars. They were big on aggression, carrying the fight into the territory of the enemy in the hopes of winning bigly, and when forced to fight defensively usually suffered. Von Seeckt- the godfather of the Interwar Reichswehr and the greatest author of German remilitarization- in particular focused on the potential of an aggressive, irredentalist future conflict, and while he did make plans for defensive campaigns against both Poland and its Western Allies he was fundamentally geared towards an aggressive war.
Herx's "The Political Thought of General Hans von Seeckt" and Shannon's "Preparing for the War of the Future in the Wake of Defeat" talk about this a fair amount. Johnson's "Faustian Bargain" mostly looks at it from the POV of Soviet-German co-operation but also deals with it.
I like your delivery and format. You constantly question assumptions, data, and facts. You present counter arguments and allow the viewer to come to their own conclusions based on the facts (although most times, the conclusions are pretty self-evident). I wish you the best of luck. Thanks.
hell of a good work TIK!
I am a professional translator (pair of language: Portuguese/English) and as soon as I am able to find some time in my agenda I will give it a try translating your lessons.
“He was not a soldier, he was an idiot”
Wish I could give extra likes for that
The Russians might not have been completely mechanised by 1941, but then, neither were the Germans. In fact the Germans never fully mechanised by the war's end.
The German Infantry marched to the Soviet Union with 800,000 horses all eaten!
We forget that this Hellish conflict was 77 years ago. Both sides used Horses in the East. The US was the only fully motorised country providing Trucks to Soviet and British forces. The British used mules in Burma!
The USA was the strongest economy and strongest nation, the USSR had the strongest land army, British had strong naval and economy, it was hard for Germany to keep up, think of it like this, barring any super natural phenomenon Germany was out numbered in brain power man power, army size, moral, etc, and experience. usually when a smaller army beats a larger army something has to explain the odds, larger armies are divided and conquered piece by piece size isn't a good argument, Russians out performed the Germans because size isn't an excuse, they had the talent to beat Napoleon, they had the talent to beat the Ottomans so their infrastructure is built to withstand German fire power and they don't quit which is huge in a long war.
The British had the only fully motorised army at the beginning of the war. Motorisation and mechanisation were most universal in the British Army of all combatants early on. Eventually, the US Army became the most modern force ever seen, fully motorized and extensively mechanized.
*I use the British spellings for the British comment and the American spelling for the US Army comment.
@@Tethloach1 Even then our troops were still the best trained
Dude I absolutely love your videos and I'm so glad I stumbled across your channel. When most people doing videos and topics like this make short, 5 or 10 minute long videos here you come with 30+ minute videos packed with information and details that most people over look or just hardly touch on. Keep up the good work, man.
The 2nd half of this is the huge loss the USSR took to its officer corps in the encirclements during Barbarossa. In particular, more technical officers, such as artillerists, must have been difficult.
You should revisit this issue. There are a number of crucial weaknesses in the video on both the military effect of the purges and more broadly on the role of Stalin and Stalinism.
During the Winter War when things were going badly and Stalin was yelling invectives, Voroshilov chastised him “Well you killed the General Staff”. Khrushchev wrote in his memoirs, “There is no question that we would have repelled the fascist invasion much more easily if the upper echelons of the Red Army command hadn’t been wiped out. They had been men of considerable expertise and experience.” The video doesn’t deal concretely with either battle or why these insiders would make such comments. A video like this needs to show they were wrong, especially as you claim the purge “may have increased the skill” of the officer corps.
The Red Army may have won in the end but a good reason it was even close was poor and negligent leadership beforehand. Stalin thought the deal with Hitler meant war in 1941 wouldn’t happen unless they provoked Germany. Tuchachevsky spent the 1930s warning of an Nazi invasion and was preparing for it. His conflict with Stalin and Voroshilov this goes much deeper than just tanks versus cavalry. (See the points below from Rogovin’s book).
At 15:50 you ask “What type of experience was lost?” and say that because they were mainly civil war veterans their loss wasn’t significant. But wasn’t Tukhachevsky also a civil war veteran and he had promoted modernisation and helped develop the deep battle strategy? The connection with the civil war as an inherent negative makes no sense. Richard Harrison in this video th-cam.com/video/g7Tp-sM9v60/w-d-xo.html (go to 53:00, it’s in the Q&A) notes the officers who were promoted to fill the void were out of their depth.
Regarding the purges themselves, the divisions within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union were real and expressed genuine differences in outlook. The Left Opposition, including Trotsky, were expelled from the party in 1927 but that doesn’t mean the support for revolutionary internationalism they advocated just evaporated. The same could be said of Bukharin and the right wing. That’s why the regime of socialism-in-one-country had to use repression in times of peace when there was no immediate external threat. It is thus wrong to say the Great Terror was just the product Stalin’s paranoia or the purges were his responsibility alone.^ The purges were actively supported by those around him and Stain was the spokesman for whole bureaucracy.
Most importantly there were reasons for Stalin to target the officer corps. In “1937: Stalin’s Year it Terror” by Vadim Rogovin, chapter 46 is titled “Reasons for Reprisals Against the Generals”. It raises seven reasons as follows:
1. The Red Army was a powerful material force that was outside the normal controls of the party.
2. A significant proportion of the officers of the Red Army had fought in the Civil War under Trotsky’s leadership and many were at least sympathetic to the Left Opposition
3. The commanders and personal to a certain degree reflected the dissatisfaction of the peasantry, especially given the catastrophe of forced collectivisation.
4. Tuchachevsky has conflicted with Stalin and Voroshilov on strategic doctrine and warned of the USSR being drawn into a war with Germany. In 1930 his proposal for modernising the Red Army was sharply criticised by Stalin and Voroshilov. Tukhachevsky wrote to Stalin that the current plan would preclude discussing important aspects of defence capability. Only in May 1932 did Stalin accept the error. Tukhachevsky was also consistent in his opposition to fascism and said Stalin was a “Germanophile” who would do a deal with Hitler.
5. The army leadership disagreed with the negative influence of Voroshilov and his group on the Red Army. (In their confessions in 1937 they admitted discussing the need to remove Voroshilov)
6. Stalin could was alarmed by the genuine prestige and respect given to Tuchachevsky. Stalin called him a “little Napoleon” at one point.
7. The officers were very familiar with Stalin’s actual role during the civil war, especially the failure at the battle of Warsaw when Stalin had disobeyed orders to send troops from the southern front to assist Tukhachevsky. This was still being raised in the 1930s despite Stalin’s efforts to falsify the history.
Given the disasters that Stalin and his henchmen had created it was not paranoia to think they might be replaced. In late June 1941 Stalin thought he was going to be arrested which shows he could be conscious of his culpability. The story of Voroshilov, Molotov, Beria and Mikoyan going to retrieve Stalin from his dacha neatly exemplifies the relationship between Stalin and the bureaucracy - they needed him and he needed them.
At 2:00 you quote Stalin from 1931 that “We have fallen behind by fifty to a hundred years” and then say “Stalin and the Bolshevik party were dragging the Soviet Union into the modern age. The five year plan saw the rapid expansion of Soviet industry and agriculture at the expense of millions of lives.” “Dragging into the modern age” is the standard narrative but this just the propaganda of the Stalinists, makes out Stalin as a progressive force and leaves out the unexplained jump from Stalin’s position which indicates his relationship to the development of the policy.
From 1923 to 1928 Stalin and Bukharin had supported the “tortoise tempo” of development, ie. slow industrialisation & slow or not collectivisation. This was against Trotsky’s calls for rapid (and rational) industrialisation and the need to deal with the imbalance between the rural and urban economies. It was only when this imbalance reached an acute crisis that Stalin began to act in mid 1928. For the next decade the bureaucracy lurched from one crisis to the next - forced collectivisation and famine, the Third Period/social-fascist line that led to the Nazi ascension to power, the “anti-fascist” Popular Front line that led to the defeat of the Spanish Revolution, the Great Terror and the Nazi-Soviet pact that led to the catastrophe of Barbarossa.
It is worth noting that even during 1933, while the Nazis were imprisoning members of the KPD, the Stalinists accepted Hitler’s assurances that there was a separation between domestic and international policy and they intended to maintain good relations with the Soviet Union. They would return to this policy in 1939 and, obviously, they only gave up on it on June 21, 1941.
I’m not suggesting you need to go into a long history about Stalinism in your videos, but when you do refer to it you can do so without repeating tropes that flatter Stalin.
^ Robert Service’s biography of Stalin is not a reliable source of information. Here’s a review that goes through the major problems with it.
Review of Robert Service’s Stalin: A Biography-Part One
www.wsws.org/en/articles/2005/06/stal-j02.html
Service’s biography of Trotsky was so tendentious that a review in the American Historical Review said “In his eagerness to cut Trotsky down, Service commits numerous distortions of the historical record and outright errors of fact to the point that the intellectual integrity of the whole enterprise is open to question.”
Did Voroshilov not accuse Stalin of being solely responsible for the disaster during operation Barbarossa, not during the Winter War? I did not look for specific info about the subject, but in the movie Stalin from 1992 the event is presented as such.
@@user-ze6tb4xq5f What is the name of the film?
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I have once read of Voroshilov's repost - "Because you killed the General Staff" - but I can't recall where and a web search was unsuccessful. I note that Wikipedia says "[citation needed]" (SEE BELOW)
FROM Wikipedia entry on Kliment Voroshilov:
" ... Voroshilov commanded Soviet troops during the Winter War from November 1939 to January 1940 but, due to poor Soviet planning and Voroshilov's incompetence as a general,[23] the Red Army suffered about 320,000 casualties compared to 70,000 Finnish casualties.[24] When the leadership gathered at Stalin's dacha at Kuntsevo, Stalin shouted at Voroshilov for the losses; Voroshilov replied in kind, blaming the failure on Stalin for eliminating the Red Army's best generals in his purges.[citation needed] Voroshilov followed this retort by smashing a platter of food on the table. Nikita Khrushchev said it was the only time he ever witnessed such an outburst.[25] Voroshilov was nonetheless made the scapegoat for the initial failures in Finland. He was later replaced as Defense Commissar by Semyon Timoshenko. Voroshilov was then made Deputy Premier responsible for cultural matters. ... "
[23] Rappaport, Helen (1999). Joseph Stalin: A Biographical Companion. ABC-CLIO. p. 307. ISBN 1576070840.
[24] Buttar, Prit (2015). Between Giants: The Battle for The Baltics in World War II. United Kingdom: Osprey Publishing.
[25] Khrushchev, Nikita Khrushchev Remembers, London, 1971, p.137.
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It makes perfect sense that it was said at the start of the Winter War. Given the mass execution of Red Army officers in the Great Terror had taken place in the three years prior and Voroshilov would have had good reason to fear his life might be next.
It makes little sense that it was said at the start of Operation Barbarossa because Voroshilov had been demoted. Also Voroshilov was one of three Stalinist bureaucrats who went to get Stalin from his Dacha as the scale of the disaster in mid-1941 became undeniable and Stalin went into hiding. (One thing missing from this account is one of the three who went later said Stalin thought they had come to arrest him. At the point, and up to 1956, the bureaucracy needed Stalin to defend its interests, just as much as Stalin need them.)
The following is a quote from a 2015 interview with the Russian State Archives Director, Sergei Mironenko.
Q: Has anything new and interesting been discovered about the beginning of the Soviet-German War [the “Great Patriotic War” in Russia] and Stalin’s behaviour at the time?
A: It has, of course, long been known that Stalin was not expecting Germany to attack the Soviet Union. It happened because suspicious people often believe what they want to believe. Stalin wanted to believe that the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (MRP) would prevent Germany from attacking the Soviet Union. It has been confirmed that what happened on 22 June 1941 [when Germany attacked the Soviet Union] made Stalin deeply depressed. He was not seen in the Kremlin for two days. You can imagine what this meant in a situation in which Minsk fell as early as 28 June and the Germans were moving 60-80 km a day, sometimes even 100 km a day, straight towards Moscow. [Minsk is a little over 700 km from Moscow.-JP] Leading the whole country was entirely in his hands. Then his closest comrades - Voroshilov, Malenkov and Bulganin - decided to drive to Stalin’s Blizhnyaya dacha [Stalin’s favourite summer residence, situated in Kuntsevo relatively close to the Kremlin; its name means “nearby”. Today, it is inside the Moscow city boundary.-JP]. Going there on one’s own initiative was strictly forbidden, even for Molotov or Malenkov [the most important leaders of the Soviet Union after Stalin]. Stalin would invite people there himself when he wished to speak to them. But they went there anyway, and discovered a completely exhausted Stalin. That was the moment when Stalin uttered the famous words: “Lenin left us a great inheritance and we wasted it all” (“Ленин оставил нам великую державу, а мы ее просрали”). Only the words of Voroshilov - “But Koba [Stalin’s nickname from the beginning of his career as a revolutionary], you must lead us, unite us, for we are counting on you” - inspired Stalin so that the decision to create the Defence Committee was made right there. Stalin did not forget this and, in the spring of 1945, at the Victory Day reception where he was making his famous speech, he uttered a sentence to which few have paid attention: “Some other nation might have said that you did not justify our choices, we will put another government in office; but the Russians did not choose this path”. He remembered perfectly well in what kind of situation he found himself in 1941!
But since Voroshilov was still around Stalin it is still possible that this happened in 1941, since high ranking party members did not always respect the protocol. I uploaded the part of the movie here th-cam.com/video/YbdMTLQgHQM/w-d-xo.html@@tjejojyj
@@user-ze6tb4xq5f Thanks. Given that the references I cited document the confrontation occurred at the start of 1940 over the crisis in the Winter War against Finland, I think it is far more likely the 1992 film was using artistic licence to include the reproach of Stalin at a more critical point in history. (I just looked up the film and I notice it skips over the Winter War and seems very superficial otherwise. th-cam.com/video/Ujrv-YoKZno/w-d-xo.html).
It should be noted Voroshilov was a key participant in the Great Terror (1936-1939). The dialogue in the clip you posted suggests Voroshilov disagrees with calling the Red Army officer victims (up to 40,000) "enemies of the people". Is there any evidence Voroshilov every denounced the mass executions? (I did a quick search and cannot find anything).
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A study of the degeneration of the first workers' state and the usurpation of power by Stalin and the bureaucracy is essential. As the crisis of capitalism accelerates the question of an alternative arises so again and again we hear "What about the Soviet Union?"
The books by Vadim Rogovin on the Great Terror and the opposition to Stalin are essential reading. I highly recommend the following video.
Book launch of Vadim Rogovin’s Was There an Alternative?
th-cam.com/video/8Wx6Mk_F568/w-d-xo.html
I tend to ignore movie's accuracy I well, movie makers usually take the liberty to interpret fact by their own will -ie the idea that Stalin alone was the initiator of all crimes, when usually in any totalitarian regime the leading class have a role as strong as their leader's role in the way the regime go, and the idealistic image of his wife which was supposedly "progressive" and was teaching Jakob about "human rights". TIK's way of denouncing Stalin's actions as "paranoia" is a habit he probably instinctively learned from so many BBC documentaries who are full of propaganda@@tjejojyj
Worth noting that in 'Stalin: Waiting for Hitler,' Kotkin writes that in the Great Purge Stalin pursued the same agenda on the civilian side, replacing old cadres that Stalin believed were not fully on board with what his program needed, with new men who had fully absorbed the revolutionary ethos he required to run the government. That makes it all of a piece, both the civilian and military sides of the Purge.
The annihilation of the old cadres of convinced internationalist communists was indeed a requirement for waging war with Germany
Far more simple than that: Stalin eliminated any real or potential competitor. Period.
@@emmanueldidier321 Hardly. Kamenev, Zinoviev and Bukharin weren't really a treat anymore, two of them were already in jail. Thing is that system that was put in place already by Lenin, in atmosphere of collectivization, industrialization and militarization breed distrusts, dishonesty, paranoia of both those under and above you in the chain of command and creates plenty of incentives to lie, to mask real situation and to blame everything on the enemy. Those same men that were on board with Stalin rather than Trocky and that in large majority supported 5 years plan in 1928 found themselves unable to fulfill high expectations and created worse and worse conditions for peasants and workers in trying to do so. However they could lie because they had their people in NKVD and CK. They were still afraid that failure, popular uprising to worse being held accountable to public by means of election (which Stalin viewed as one of method to clean house and create more incentive and meritocracy while he would be safe). And then Ezhov took over and removed local heads of NKVD, evidence of corruption, falsification and discontent of Party official towards Stalin became clear. And in atmosphere of fear this was viewed as treason. When Stalin ended Terror in late 1938 NKVD had some 1,2 million people that they suspected of "counterrevolutionary crimes" but system started to collapse. Productivity went out of the window, people were complaining about innocents being jailed, there was no incentive to do more because any attention would also mean that NKVD will also notice you... So it stopped. However, the core problems remained because they were integrated in the system and remained there until 1991. System did not give incentive to honest and responsible management and bureaucracy, on lower levels things were constantly a mess and there were always clans of party members and experts in responsible positions who knew how bizarre and backward system was but still played it by dishonestly, clientelism and protectionism. Not to mention that constant treat of new war never went away and economy still functioned on same unrealistic and exploitative principles as in 1929-1933 with targets only slightly lowered. Those are essentially same things that lead to Great Terror of 1936 and 1938. But nothing on that scale ever happened, mostly because of how chaotic, out of control and counter productive it was. In short, system was bound to create more "competition" and purges didn't help.
I think the issue with the old officeres beeing stuck in outdated warfare might be a reason why the french army did suffer so badly against the germans. They never purged their ranks or had to expand from a few hundres to 200.000 officers. So the french army was stuck with the old way to fight and lost. Mind you, the french army was considered the most powerfull army in the world.
The French effectively did purge their ranks by restricting promotions of non-socialist officers.
No the French lost because nobody in their right mind up till that point thought that sending Panzer armies through a forest was particularly good idea, that and the Luftwaffe had twice the number of planes the French and British had. The French and British put most of their tank forces up north and left little to defend other sectors so when Heinz Guderian and Erwin Rommel did their very daring and potentially suicidal run for the coast there was nothing to stop them.
So what you're saying is that to keep everything fresh, every nation should imprison, exile or kill their officer corps?
The US situation was a bit different as promotion stagnated between WW1 and WW2 with the rapid reduction in the size of the US Army. Dwight Eisenhower held the rank of Major for sixteen years. A similar situation occurred in the National Guard where the Division Commanders were in their late Fifties or Early Sixties, and several were suffering from health issues. In general most senior National Guard officers were older than their equivalent even in the regular army.
hey man, I appreciate that you take the time to make the subtitles because I don't have a sound card at the moment and it makes a world of difference reading good subtitles compared to the youtube automatically generated ones.
David Glantz' "Stumbling Colossus" is an excellent book on this subject.
Part of the problem of bringing young officers up, no matter what nation, is that, in the beginning of their training, small unit tactics are taught. As they go up in rank, they are introduced to larger scale tactics, and even overall strategy. But as anyone who served in the military will tell you, armchair generals discuss strategy, professional soldiers talk logistics. And there is the problem. As a captain, you might know how to lead your company, but you aren't concerned with logistics because that is outside the scope of your command. If you take this captain and elevate him to colonel because he shows promise, he leaps over not only the instruction he needs in involving combined arms tactics, but he fails to learn the truth that a division only moves as fast as it's fuel and ammo trucks.
"If you take this captain and elevate him to colonel because he shows promise, he leaps over not only the instruction he needs in involving combined arms tactics, but he fails to learn the truth that a division only moves as fast as it's fuel and ammo trucks."
Erwin Rommel is the best example of this synrio
Excellent presentation. Your argument is sound, and it makes an excellent introduction to this particular topic. As it happens, I am currently reading Richard Overy's book (Russia's War) and it is a revelation to me. Thanks for uploading this video!
It was my pleasure :) highly recommend the books listed in the description if you want to go super in depth with this topic. And Overy's book is great, if a bit short
The failures of the Red Army during the Winter war of 1939-'40 against tiny Finland also must have affected their both performance and morale, well before Great Patriotic War.
Cannot believe I discovered your chan like 2 days ago. Found your chan thanks to " Military History Visualized " . Great structure and such a deep and captivating work. Thank you so much!
Always amazed how you can have Khalkin Gol on one hand, and the Russo-Finnish war on the other.
Mikhailia Gacesa I think when we look at the two, Gol saw mainly the new style officers, supporting a more modern doctrine. While the Winter War saw the older style officers in charge.
Also the two campaigns were different. While both were offensives from the Soviets, Finland had the advantage of winter, terrain, flexible officer corps and a few other advantages. The Japanese were more rigid and didn't have much in terrain advantage.
A well-reasoned and thoughtful comment on TH-cam with no insults...How dare you? .... ;-)
Mikhailia Gacesa please accept my apologies. I must not be well this morning ;)
The difference was the opposing forces. Japanese army was poorly prepared for large scale land battle and for one did not have modern tanks. Finns fought defending their own land and were very well prepared. Just in a nutshell 😐
pawelpap9 they weren't all that prepared, they were mobilised and in position but so was the Japanese. They had around 30 light tanks and some of them didn't have weapons. They lacked AT guns (they were lucky to have 4 per Division instead of the 4 per Battalion). They lacked Artillery and ammunition. Their main defensive line was a loose line concrete bunkers and trench works.
They did have the advantages of a looser command structure. They were allowed to use initiative and flexibility. They also used the Soviet tactics against them, like halting the entire force upon contact etc.
On paper the Soviets should have steamrolled through the entire Finnish force but couldn't because the Finns used better tactics. Unfortunately that wasn't enough and the Finns ultimately lost the war.
I listen to your videos while driving to and from work, I love WWII and I love how detailed your videos are. You've earned a new subscriber out of me. Please please please keep doing what you're doing!
My great grandfather was born in 1885, served in army since 1914. At the times of the purges he was a colonel. Arrested in 1937, died in prison in 1940. He could have become a very capable general if survived until the war started. Lots of arrested officers were released from prisons when the war has started. I believe that lack of these experienced officers played a crucial role in Soviet defeats during the first months of the war.
By the Military Ministry decree he was restored in ranks and awards in 1957, post mortem.
I bought his dossier from archives recently, so I do even have his autobiography handwritten in 1927 and other information unknown for our family all this decades. His daughter, my grandmother is still alive at 93 y.o.)
A lot of those who were purged were really the sleeper cell. There's been multiple cases of the treason by such high commanders in the summer of 1941 who were sympathizing Hitler.
Amazing. You ought to post it or provide it to historians. The idea you can wipe out half your trained and experienced people for imaginary crimes and it not debilitating your organization is laughable. Who would have courage to make a decision ?
The Purge was one piece, but you are right that it was a massive confluence of factors that led to the officer corps being unable to effectively command troops in WWII. I also like that you show the different facets of this the Purges and look at Hill and Overy and some other sources. Like you say, it can be true that they had an effect, whether it was numbers or the increase of political influence on Red Army military policy.
I think that the effects of the purges is summed up at about 39:00. I've read this in interviews with troops involved, micromanagement, field commanders being second guessed, etc. I think that you've shown that the purges themselves were of minimal impact, and perhaps beneficial, but it was the Soviet system of oversight that the purges allowed to inflict damage. It would be interesting to hear a deep dive discussion of that which was just mentioned at 39:00.
Wow, loved it! Thank you so much for this take!
Glad you enjoyed it!
This is the 4th video of yours I've seen & they are all vvell researched & presented, keep up the great vvork & you've definately earned the Likes & Subscription .
My man, good, indepth and with clear information, thanks you so much!
Hey TIK, although this video is a long time ago, this is extremely interesting and I stumbled upon it strolling on your profile. I am absolutely baffled by the length, historical accuracy and research that you do for your videos.
Have you ever read Moscow 1937 by Karl Schlögel? It's how I got introduced (and hooked) on this subject.
Tukhachevsky wasn't one who invented deep doctrine. That was Triandafilov, a professor in a military university
Triandafilov, his book should be in pocket of any soldier, professional or not. After Sun Tzu is the second man on earth able ,with simple words, to make you to understand the battle field.
@@Cornel1001 Especially in a pocket of a French 1940 soldier, cause they mostly did nothing when Germans attacked, so they had time to read books.
@@Paciat Oh, shut up. If you weren't there at the time, then shut up. Fie on you. Cheap shots. Is that the best you can do ?
@@Flynnmiv why does it affect you so much pussy?
Hi TIK, hope you can read this at some point.
I'm mexican, but my russian father was born and raised in the USSR. I showed him many of your eastern front videos and appreciates your less biased info a lot. That said, I have some questions myself arising from some comments he made, excluding him always correcting your pronunciations haha.
Q1: My father says that apparently Tukhachevsky was also tried for using chemical weapons against civilians during the civil war. What are your comments/observations on that, and could you find any sources on that?
Q2: My father pointed out that during the civil war many ex-zarist officers were in command of red army troops, but since the USSR officials didn't trust their loyalty, and thus feared insubordination, commissars were appointed to keep them in check. Later he says, they were the ones to explain to the troops what is going on politically, and gave them more reasons to keep fighting, *TO DEFEND OUR MOTHERLAND*. What do you think of this? Is this really the case?
That is all, although I'd like to share some relevant info from my family.
My great grandfather, meaning my dad's grandfather (paternal) was a commissar, and fought valiently in the defense of Moscow. He was actually a history teacher! He was hurt by artillery and shrapnel in one battle, though (I'm editing this later after I ask again in which battle, since I don't remember atm). He initially survived his injuries and was medically discharged, but after some time (2 years?) his injuries caught up with him (bacterial infection, I assume). Every Día de Muertos we put his photo in the altar, among many others.
We unfortunately have no photo from his brother, who was also fighting. M.I.A. Either captured (and thus brutally murdered by the germans) or, as my dad said, "blown up to pieces by artillery"...
My grandfather (my dad's father) also did service in the Red Army, but post-WW2. He did three years in Eastern Germany as a motorized officer (he had gone to officer school). Apparently he was among the first people in the world to shoot an AK-47. So secret it was that he would tell my father that every single casket had to be collected in the base. If ANYONE left a casket in the training range, all soldiers were ordered to search the entire field for missing caskets. Pretty cool!
He died of a heart attack, months before I was born. I wish I had met him, since he seems to be a very cool guy.
I'm a huge fan. ILY.
Thanks for all of your hard work.
You are an absolute treat.
Thx man
Thank you. Lots to think about. Love History and new information always makes the story more interesting.
I really like the new perception of the Red Army Purges that you have provided. I think it is a very interesting perspective of the Red Army's shortcomings being not the purge but rather the overemphasis on the power political commissars were supposed to hold. I guess the mistake was truly learned, as the Red Army was able to defeat the Germans at Stalingrad thanks to a more effective leadership as well as the myriad of other reasons for their triumph.
You have overlooked one important aspect: The purges not only had an effect on an organizational level (killing and sacking of lots of commanders). Together with the execution of Tujachevsky, the Deep Battle doctrine (=modern warfare) was banned as well and replaced by...well you should look into the 1938-39 field manuals and check for yourself
That was in the video
But, realize, more important was the fact that few (mobile) units had their TOE of equipment, fuel, ordnance, or completed construction.
Your thumbnails look like the box covers of 90's video games on cartridges... and I love it.
I enjoyed the video too. Keep it up
Thanks man... Great video!
Cheered up the Stalinists!
18:05 - Small date typo. In September 1389 the red army did not had that much spears
:)
Good Willy's maybe?
The Red Army existed in 1389?
:)
1805 Trafalgar.Lol
Red Army jump from 100 divisions to 300 division before August 1939. They were not operational in 1939. Stalin switch to the war economy the industry again before August 1939. Any factory had two set of production, civilian and military. So at Stalingrad was a Tractor Factory up to 1939, who became a tank factory in 24 hours.
Time Travel
Some of the things you think you have a pretty good handling of can dissolve in almost one video,by just putting the Jack boot on the other foot.
Thanks man.
Smart guy, very well read, who is turning my opinion on the conventional wisdoms of the war. I started your series with Crusader and watched it in a week..
Now subscribed, I am working my way through your lectures and am very impressed. This rethinking of the purge is bold because it challenges the traditional narratives, but your argument is convincing.
I really enjoyed your narration of the material, thank you
My pleasure, glad you liked it :)
Great video.
I have a book, where they compare results of combat drills of the Red Army in 1935 and in 1940 for every region. Results mostly are the same or better in 1940.
Wow, watching or listening to you is always and education! Thanks!
What a brilliant video, thank you so much!
The German generals were mostly old and they did exceptionally well in the war. They were trained for different type of warfare too just like the Soviet generals. So getting ride of the older officers because they weren't trained for mobile warfare doesn't make a lot of sense; they could have adopted to the new type of war just as the Germans did.
Also, FDR replaced few high ranking naval officers only after their failures at Pearl Harbor. It wasn't because they were old... Your remarks about General Marshall are true though.
44 weeks isn't 3.6 years. Its under a year. Love your content though. Keep it up, much more educational than a lot of the over produced docs Ive seen.
There was an initial ineffectiveness in the US military at the begining of the war. But it was not as critical as in the Soviet Union, because we were not being invaded (very much). The US had time to organize somewhat.
I love your channel. I only recently discovered it. Thank you for confirming I'm not completely insane yet. Many of your conclusions, I had come to years ago, but I was just called stupid and crazy. I'll admit a lot of my conclusions were hunches, but you are filling in the picture for me. Much appreciation for your work.
Great information. Thanks for sharing it.
Thanks for watching :)
four years after this video first came out, I'll note an oblivious mistake or two. 1) McArthur was a WW1 general who was kept on to lead army units (as an 'old man') and had a huge impact ... not mentioned. 2) Eisenhower and all the 'young' guys promoted to replace the 'old generals' had undergone 4 years of military training at the US Military Academy at West Point. Eisenhower had been chief of staff to both McArthur and Kreuger before being promoted to general -- kind of like he'd been groomed for his WW2 job while the 'older' guys blocked his career path in a downsized (1930s) military organization. But yeah, politics should never be allowed into military operational control.
i liked this video alot. you changed my mind on a lot of key points about the structure and effectiveness of the red army. i very much appreciate the modern, and more informed rational vs. the propaganda/cliche rational that i unknowingly hads been a part of for a long time. good job mate. ;)
You cannot assume ‘military training’ is good or that longer training is better.
At the start of WW2, there was no Basic Training in the US and civilians were shipped directly to Europe. Congress eventually required Basic Training for all.
LTC DePuy in WW2 complained bitterly that officers were inadequately trained for WW2. He then was able to create TRADOC (Army training command) decades later and implemented a variety of innovations.
When they implemented ‘Force on force’ training at the National Training Center (NTC) with MILES, many units struggled.
Training above company level is difficult because of the volume of people and costs involved ( and the amount of terrain). DARPA’s SIMNET (a massive multi player simulation) was an amazing innovation.
Very insightful and detailed - this is a topic that deserves a thorough analysis - thanks !
I've stopped this video at around 16 minutes to query your analysis of experience. In a fighting force, experience of actually fighting, witnessing horrific destruction, men friend and foe being killed and wounded and the logistics of dealing with the dead, wounded and eventually other supplies, etc.etc. is not to be underestimated.
Soldiers who would have experienced much of the above would be more mentally prepared for the shocks of combat.
Briefly put battle hardenedness is not to be underestimated.
I'll continue watching this video now.
TIK has the shortcoming that he doesn't seem to have any first hand experience of the military. Theory is fine until somebody starts shooting at you.
I like these theses kiddo. Very well thought out. It is my first exposure to the new archives. EDit: Am very interested in hearing, over time of course, of the battles. Have heard that some of the battles in the East are unknown in the West?
Love this channel so much.
I learned a whole lot, great work !
the first part of Fitzroy Maclean's autobiography, 'Eastern Approaches'. He was stationed in Moscow with the UK embassy. His description of the show trials from his seat in the courtroom really brings the events to life.
A great book.
Your channel just came up for me today. I listen to a lot of documentaries while working and really enjoyed the ones I listened to today. I was especially interested in hearing about the US purges. I had no idea that happened - and I watch a lot of WWII documentaries. Thanks for the effort you put in to your videos. I subscribed.
Glad to have you along for the ride :) obviously the US "purge" wasn't as bloody as the Stalinist one, but the point was that they were also removing officers from the ranks during a mobilization effort and that didn't affect them, so why would it affect the Red Army? Just wanted to put things into perspective, since a lot of documentaries and even books don't seem to do that
Well I figure after The Depression, the US Army would be full of 50 & 60 year old Leutenants & Captains who were retreads from WW1. With war on the horizion, the Army needed weeding out of the deadwood and fast.
@@nickmitsialis 50 and 60 year old Captains and Lieutenants would hardly be ready to withstand the physical rigors of combat, in would be time to retire them,I guess in a way you could call it a purge,but I wouldn't bc that word has rather bad connotations, makes you think they were executed, but no one died,I believe the U.S. Army calls what happened a Reduction In Force, which usually happens after a war when the Army doesn't need as many officers or enlisted as it is now a peacetime Army,it also could happen in bad economic times,when because of tight budgets the military has to has to reduce its force levels to the minimum.
The Germans had in June 1941, 7.3 million men (200 000 Officers). They
Invaded Russia with about 3.2 million
men in 172 Divisions (119 Infantry, 1
Cavalry,19 Panzer, 13 Motorised Rifle,
12 Security, 4 Light, also 4 Mountain Divisions). They had 3 Army Groups
(With 8 Infantry Army's and 4 Panzer Grouppen). With 3500 Tanks (Out of 7700 Tanks), 7000 Guns, 600 000 Horses, 600 000 ( 125 000 vehicle were German trucks), ? Half- Track Trucks, ? Mortars.
Plus 3 Air Army's (2000 War Playns).
The Russians had about 5.7 million men (300 000 Officers) in about 320 Divisions ( 195 Infantry, 55 Tank, 12 Motorized Brigades and 6 Cavalry Divisions. To become + 25 Cavalry Divisions by 1945). Also + 12 - 17 million reserves. They had 6 Army Groups (With 24 Infantry Army's and 12 Tanks Corps). With 24 000 tanks, 50 000 Artillery ( Most was old ), 750 000 Horses. Plus 6 Air Army's (With 14 000 War Playns. Most were old).
As we can see the Russians out numbered the Germans in everything. Best would of been to not Attack Russia at all. But if they wanted to, best would be to wait. First fix the Logistics Problems and reinforce all the Divisions with more Equipment.
Also stocking on Supplies (Mostly on Oil, Ammunition,Spear, Food and also Medicine).
Then in May 1942, Attack Russia
with 4.5 million men + 1.5 million reserves (Having then 8.3 million men) in 188 Divisions
( 125 Infantry, 3 Cavalry, 24 Panzer, 12 Motorised Rifle, 12 Security, 4 Light, 4 Mountain, 4 Construction / Rail Way / Supply Divisions. Having 4 Army Groups (With 12 Infantry Army's and 6Panzer Grouppen). With 6500 Tanks, 9500 Artillery, 650 000 horses, 450 000 Vehicles ( 150 000 Vehicles been German Trucks), ? Half -Track Trucks, 18 500 Mortars. Plus 4 Air Army's (With 7000 War Playns).
With a Strong Force mentioned above, they would of reached the 4 Army Groups ( Leningrad, Moscow
/ Gorgi Area, Kursk / Krakow Areas and Rostov) in 4 months and taken them. The Russians that had most of there Reserves in the Army Group
Centre Area, wouldn't have time to Mobilize most of these Reserves. Nothing here, that each Army Group would only concentrate on there Area of Advance. Also Japan would Attack the USA Pacific Fleet in Haway, in December 1942. Destroying 80 US War Ships, 2 Air Craft Carriers (100 War Playns), 6 Airports there ( With 450 War Playns) and the Oil Stored.
Were by then Japan would of had more War Ships. Also the Germans should of taken with the rest of there Army been 2.3 million, Northern Africa and the Middle East Oil Fields, in February 1941- February 1943. The Germans in September 1942, would of been in a better position. Then moving to in Russia East about 500 km, to get to the A Line and then Stop, rest, reinforce all there Divisions (In about 4 months). By the End say of December 1942. Then in February 1943, the Germans Forces would move East again, an Other 1000 km and reach the Ural Mountains Area.
Taking 4 more months. By the End say of May 1943. Winning the War in Russia in 12 Months. Then they will concentrate on reinforcing the all the German Forces in Northern France, Northern Africa and Middle East. So they can First Attack England in June 1943, with 2 Air Army's (7000 War Playns) and bomb Airports. After they would make an Amphibious Landing and land 2 Infantry Army's --- With 34 Divisions (18 Infantry, 6 Panzer, 2 Motorised Rifle, 3 Security, 1 Light, 2 Mountain, 2 Air Born). Plus 2 / 5 of the Italian Fleet and 4 / 5 of the German Fleet. Germany would have Won then the War in Europe by taking
England. So the next move of Germany would of been to take Sudan, Ethiopia, Erythrea, Somalia and Kenia in Africa, S. Arabia and Persian. Contracting these Areas.
Just an absolutely wonderful program. I don't always agree but it sure gives me food for thought. Keep it up.
FInally, an objective English Speaking person. One thing you should consider, is that some Comissars were not major assholes, there were those who understood that it's best to let the commanders do their job, and they would sometimes mind their own business.
This is not so true it appears early in the war but later in the war analysis shows that these commissars were effective and served as an effective bridge between troops and officers.
@@WagesOfDestruction makes sense. Commissars could be assholes during peace time with out consequences. In war time, an asshole commissar could be purposely abandoned during combat by his men so the Germans would kill him, so he had the motivation to be kind to the men under his command.
@@danielaramburo7648 I wonder about that sometimes, how many commanders that got men killed were murdered by their own men.
@@WagesOfDestruction I’m sure it happened. Of course, no record of it exist for obvious reasons.
@@danielaramburo7648 The American’s called it fraggings. It is reported done by soldiers at officers who are deemed incompetent, overly aggressive or danger.
A small note on the last name:
"voroshilov"
It is pronounced
"vah-rah-SHILL-ahf"
The stress should fall on "SHILL", not on "OFF".
Voroshílov
He was disliked by his fellow Officers as incompetent. Adored by Stalin as they both Murdered ex Tsarist Officers by drowning in barges at Tsaritsyn now Volgagrad.
Trotsky wanted Professionalism in the Red Army and had exTsarist Officers with Commisars overseeing them. Trotsky's Red Army swept the field. Stalin and Voroshilov hated Trotsky as an Intellectual. They wanted a Militia run by ex NCO's like Voroshilov. Tsaritsyn was crucial for the Revolution so Lenin withdrew Stalin and sent Trotsky who of course saved the day.
It means in Russian totally incompetent!
a very good explanation. Very good job. Numbers and facts ! and you know how to makes it quiet interesting in the presentation !
I'm glad you found the video useful! I do think this is one of my better videos, although the views don't reflect that.
i'm fond of Arnhem vid too but not only, your accuracy makes it very good. Few things would make it better but they are not necessary. Your english is clear (thx for us the not born englaender). Presenting a battle or such an event with its consequences is an uneasy task. well done !
thank you very much for your presentation. i enjoyed it very much!
Another benefit from the purge might be getting rid of corruption in the army. When I read Mannsteins book, he says that the rumenien troops lacked fighting morale because their officers treaded them badly and allocated all the good food to themselves. I guess after the purge the officers who were left over were afraid and treaded their troops better. All the new officers are from the lower ranks, so they still have a good connection with the fighting troop.
Brilliant work as always, thank you for this video! I'm curious about the quality of purged officers in the Red Army compared to those who survived the purges however - for instance, commanders who did not fare well in World War 2, like Voroshilov and Budyonny, were able to retain their positions, while those with prior formal military education, like Tukhachevsky, Svechin and Egorov did not. Would this key difference between the pedigree of victims in the Red Army's purges and the purges in other countries contribute to explaining their poor performance until 1943 onwards?
Lovely video mate, and thank you.
thx for bringing new perspective into the debate
'He was an idiot', love that line. Great video as always. Any plans to do some on the Pacific war? Since watching 'The Pacific' and reading 'With the old breed' by Eugene Sledge and 'Helmet for my pillow' by Robert Leckie I've got a new interest in this theater.
Richard Miller if you want to know more about War in the Pacific check Hirohito's War by Francis Pike.
Thanks, I will.
I do want to cover battles about the Pacific theatre, but unfortunately I'm not well-versed in it. Maybe after Stalingrad I'll give it a go
Looking forward to it, as always.
I had no idea the size of the army grew so much. That basically massively dwarfs the impact of the purges.
Great video, TIK
Nice analysis. You just earn another subscriber with notification bell on.
Fantastic assessment totally agree with your review. I think the purges did get rid of some dead wood in the Red Army, but it did also got rid of some of the great military minds that the Red Army had at that time. What is significant between the purges within the Red Army and the removal of deadwood from other armies is that the purges were aimed at loyalty to the regime not aimed at getting rid of out dated Generals. Add this to the forced introduction of commissars into the decision making process and you just have to look at the Red Armies performance during 1941 to see the impact. Anyway, thanks for another great review. Looking forward to your next.
Commisars were introduced when Trotsky was given the job of forming the "Red Army".
Trotsky needed the professional Tsarist Officers. Since they were untrustworthy a Communist checked them. Trotsky himself shot a General who marched his troops to battle when railway transport was available.
As the Bolsheviks gained confidence Workers and Peasants were trained at the Frunze Institute they were trained and less need was needed for political supervision.
Stalin hated professionalism and wanted a Militia Guerilla warfare. Run by NCO's.
Lenin and Trotsky wanted World Revolution. Lenin's death and the enfilading of The civil service ex Tsarist into the Party. Stalin was they're man by 1924.
Not until the 1930's was Stalin able to destroy Lenin's Party, but never strong enough to remove the gains of the Revolution. Socialisation of land, Industry and a planned economy and eradication of illiteracy and huge Scientific advances. This saved the USSR from Hitlers savage Capitalist attack. Thanks to Stalin and his attempts to appease Hitlers fascists. 27M Soviet Citizens died and a country in ruin. Russia has turned to Bourgeois Nationalism.
Churchill gives a different view of the purges in his Memoirs (The Gathering Storm)
“When President Benes (of Czechoslovakia) visited me at Marrakesh in January 1944, he told me this story. In 1935 he had received an offer from Hitler to respect in all circumstances the integrity of Czechoslovakia in return for a guarantee that she would remain neutral in the event of a Franco-German war.. . . In the autumn of 1936 a message from a high military source in Germany was conveyed to President Benes to the effect that if he wanted to take advantage of the Fuehrer’s offer he had better be quick, because events would shortly take place in Russia rendering any help he could give to Germany insignificant.
“While Benes was pondering over this disturbing hint, he became aware that communications were passing through the Soviet Embassy in Prague between important personages in Russia and the German Government. This was a part of the so-called military and old-guard Communist conspiracy to overthrow Stalin and introduce a new régime based on a pro-German policy. President Benes lost no time in communicating all he could find out to Stalin. Thereafter there followed the merciless, but perhaps not needless, military and political purge in Soviet Russia, and the series of trials in January 1937, in which Vyshinsky, the Public Prosecutor, played so masterful a part.” (Churchill, The Gathering Storm, pp. 224-225.)
One must ask how historians could ignore a source like Churchill's "Memoirs". The answer is the Cold War: Robert Conquest is a well-known historian, but he was employed by British and US Intelligence (he first proposed that Stalin had killed 30 million people -- later reduced to 20 million -- yet the references he gives do not support this conclusion).
Nevertheless US and other Historians are now drawing on the Soviet Archives, dispelling many falsehoods. Many agree that the History of the Soviet Union needs to be re-written. One major complication is that Khrushchev lied about Stalin -- he made about 51 accusations against Stalin, but not one of them is supported by any evidence. The reason seems to have been to prevent the introduction of a new Constitution -- this would have reduced the power of the Party, confining it to Govt Affairs, making the development of a Nomenklatura much more difficult. (Khrushchev's Lies had -- and still have -- a huge effect within the Soviet Union).
Those plotting the overthrow of Stalin were followers of Trotsky who was making negotiations with Hitler -- he told his followers lies to induce them to revolt against Stalin. Hitler would have been handed Soviet Union on a platter -- Stalin had read "Mein Kampff" and knew of Hitler's plans for "Lebensraum".
A very good documentary! Thank you👏👏👏👏
I think your work is enlightening, complete and verifiable. Great work.
Incredible presentation. Really good stuff. I've seen Rick's lecture on sacking generals, and the Gantz lecture too. Curious as to why the Kommesars were removed prior to Uranus, but that's another topic I suppose.
Thanks Vern! Good to hear you liked it :)
This leads me to question the Winter War, which supposedly exposed deficiencies in Red Army leadership due to the purge. If it wasn't the case, then there must have been other reasons for their terrible losses in winter 1939/40.
Bit of a difference being "sacked" and being shot
Not for the army though. The same way as casualty number is important, not exact status of it. What is important for an army is quite simply, is that man in command/in his unit, or not. So it does not really matter from an army point of view if you simply sack 100 officers or shoot them. The point is, in either of those cases, they are not in command anymore.
You can play morality card here, but that is a different topic. Here it was not discussed. Here people have discussed about an effect a purge had. As TIK said, some 80% of the officers were reinstated at the end, meaning that only around 20% were actually permanently removed. That permanent removal might have been an early retirement or a bullet to the head - it does not really matter for the army and their performance as in either of those cases the officer is not in command anymore.
Yes for the army. It breeds chaos and fear, if the principle of respecting and trusting your superiors is dismantled by having such superiors arrested and shot. And this chaos and fear leads to major 'counterattack attempts', just to show you are doing something from the higher officers and mass desertions of the men as cohesion collapses.
Does it really? An ordinary soldier rarely sees or even cares about a colonel or a general. He does not have to respect or trust him - he never gets the chance to do so. He deals with lieutenants and captains for the most part, even a major is a rare sight.
To a soldier, if the general is arrested and shot, to him that means only one thing - another one will fill the place he has nothing to do with.
And the counterattacks you talk about with the benefit of hindsight plays no part here. You are mixing apples and oranges now - the collapse of cohesion and coordination had nothing to do with the purges themselves but due to the lack of actual communication service in USSR at the time. Only higher echelon command units had radios and too many messages were encoded pointlessly further complicating communication.
So when the attack started, a commander could not know, at first who is attacking and from where as he had no communication with the actual front line (he was sitting in an HQ some kilometers back). Second, he could not receive a clear message about his flanking formations as they too had little to no communication with their respective front line units.
And as you go up the chain with the same communication and organization problem, mounting an organized defense or counterattack is impossible. You don't know what the hell is actually happening around you.
"Counterattack attempts" as you call them were the consequence of (lack of) technology, not officer purges. And in a case where you don't know anything that is going on around you, if the attack is a provocation or not (Soviet Union already had several of those in previous years throughout its borders, from Europe to Manchuria - so the initial reaction was justified) and the actual scope of the bloody thing, when you don't know where the hell and in what condition are the parts of your division, corps or army, ordering a counterattack is actually the only thing you can do.
You cannot order a retreat as you don't know where to retreat. Maybe the rear is already taken. Maybe it is not, and by retreating you weaken the flanks of your adjoining formations and they collapse due to your decision. It is a huge gamble!
But a counterattack, as stupid as it might look to us from this vantage point when we know exactly what happened and how, for the officer in command back then was the best option he had. Stand and fight, until the mess clears up. And the attack is the best defense, always was, especially if you deal with the enemy on the move that did not have the time to entrench himself. Germans were well known for their counterattack method of defense. The difference is that Germans did it in a coordinated and organized fashion while the Soviets in summer 1941 did not have that luxury.
And I repeat, that had NOTHING to do with the purges themselves but the general organizational structure and the lack of communication equipment in the Red Army. That is why one the most prized things in the Lend Lease, besides logistics, was radio equipment. That little detail actually made Wehrmacht so effective - coordination through communication, from the lowest to the highest levels of command. As well as being the core mechanics in the Wolfpack tactics for submarines.
You mixed two concepts that had nothing to do with one another.
If you served, or come from an officer family, you'd know that an ordinary soldier does not give a rat's ass about what happens in higher echelons of command. He cares about the man next to him and at best the commanding officer just the level above him. General being shot? No effect what so ever. He could just as easily vanish into a thin air, for him it is the same thing. At best he knows just his name, probably not even how he looks like.
What brings fear and disintegration of your ranks is the unknown - you know some shit is going down but you don't know what, where, how severe.
Let me paint it as simple as possible. Imagine yourself blindfolded on the field. You can hear the screams and shouts around you and you can feel someone slapping you all over but you can't see them. What do you do?
You can try to run... and slip or run into someone's fist. Or you can start just throwing your arms around like a maniac hoping to hit the one (or ones) attacking you.
And that is a position Soviet commanders found themselves in in early summer of 1941. Blindfolded while slapped all over the place at the same time.
I was in the British Territorial's part time soldiers. In the 60's our equipment was WW2, including 88 Radio sets made in Canada and the signs were in English and Russian. One sign I remember was Russian,
Yacota in Cyrillic of course. The horror of war is no soldier knows what's going on. Only the Officers. I remember it took us 4hours to get started one Sunday morning. Vehicles and Radios faulty no co-ordination. Beer at night though.
All Armies ; Hurry up and wait! I enjoyed it though. Total waste of money! "Remember men"! One officer said," if we don't improve the Bolsheviks will win"! Most of us sympathised with the Bolsheviks
Александар Матић A US Colonel who has served as National Security Adviser in two US Administrations says an Army should be "Professional, Disciplined, and Altruistic". There is a huge difference between a Commander being 'sacked' and being summarily shot for the sake of 'efficiency'. Almost certainly this would have dire effects on morale -- an example would be when US soldiers in Vietnam began "fragging" new inexperienced Officers (psychologically the War was lost). Some German soldiers, even those brought up in the Hitler youth, were demoralised by the atrocities that they had committed. When the word "purges" is used we have been taught to automatically assume that those involved were shot -- when it only means removed from their position.
Soldiers do care about who commands them -- their lives may depend on it. The Italian Army is an example: they had bad Commanders who would lead the soldiers into impossible situations, and did not care how many died. Morale in the Italian Army plummeted, and they refused to fight for such Commanders.
Interesting. Thanks for posting
Just discovered your channel. very nice work
Tukhachevsky is one of the most overrated general of all time, deep battle was not solely his idea if any one person should take most of the credit, it should be Frunze not Tukachevsky... The same general who failed utterly during soviet-polish war, the only reason he is so famous in west is because he was purged.
sahil singh yip
Frunze died on the operating for appendicitis as did Trotsky's son in Paris. The Red Army was too strung out. The Poles saw a gap and went into the rear. Probably the last cavalry war. You are gloating but it was a close thing and the political benefit of a Red Poland close to Germany raised the possibility of a Socialist Planet today. Instead of war and Nuclear horror we have today with all the other Jolly's!
And yet the many failings of Red Army in pop history is attributed to Stalin Evil Purges while conveniently forgetting the score of actual military reason but apparently in case of Tukachevsky its all about external factors and not him. How convenient.
Anyway a socialist planet would had been much better than a society created by vile slaver imperialists.
Frunze died strangely from an operation to remove his apendics. Leon Sedov too in Paris, Trotskys beloved son.
Mike Fay apendectomies carry risks even today of internal bleeding.
You mentioned similar purges, and you mentioned wartime sackings in Germany, but I'd be interested if you have numbers on German Officers sacked before the war for 'political reasons' The most famous of these is the Blomberg-Fritsch affair, which took out a War Minister, and the Chief of the Army, but there was also Kurt von Schleicher and Ferdinand von Bredow killed in the Night of the Long Knives, and there must have been more at the lower levels.
Thats just prove modern research that neither soviet or nazi purges affect officer corps on a bad side, but instead on better one :)
Wonderful work. Thankyou!
Great video, thanks.
@TIK Great video as always! Question, Because I'm not super knowledgeable about it, was the Russian-Polish war any factor for certain purges or the retaining of the older officers from 1919-21(I think)?
For Tukachevsky it was for sure an aggregating factor, as he was pointing out that that invasion failed because of problems of coordination and to concentrate force. Reading between lines, it meant, that in the key moment Stalin attacked a low priority target, instead of support Tukachevsky which let Polish to launch a decisive counterstrike.
Standardowy Login Makes sense, thanks for the reply stranger!
I will admit, I don't know enough about this to comment on it. The only book I've read on this subject in particular is "Warsaw 1920" by Adam Zamoyski - which I do highly recommend if you haven't read it already. I think what Standardowy Login said was probably correct though.
Wikipedia says so ;) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Warsaw_(1920)#Second_phase
Though to be honest I can't find good source, to what extend that failure mattered in later power struggles.
Standardowy Login Haha, hey whatever works. Maybe the book TIK mentioned may carry some relevant failures in it involving Tukachevsky or his subordinates. Anyway, thank you both for the replies and maybe the wiki sources could lead to something secondary or primary source material. But that does stretch it.
Sorry but I can't help at cracking laughing each time I watch you say "Operation Uranus" without even smiling 😂😂
Really? Just wait until I get to cover that operation during my Stalingrad documentary :D
Thank You for Your good shows.
This is absolutely brilliant well balanced informative and very good presentation
Thank you
Thank you for a balanced presentation.
I feel that the main impacts were:
1. Impact on morale is difficult to measure. True in the US, especially after Pearl Harbour, many heads rolled, but no one was taken out and shot. The idea that one could pay with his life, as well as those of his family, for mistakes must, I believe, have had an impact that is difficult to assess in mathematical terms.
2. I believe that the execution of Tuchechevsky and his men must have had a serious impact as not only the man but his principles were deemed politically incorrect. One can only assume the impact this must have had on the disastrous opening months of the war when an old cavalry dead beat like Budyanny was in charge. This, I believe, led to a great extent to the tragedy in the Ukraine when so many innocent civilians (especially Jews) fell victim to the Nazis.
Once again thank you for a well researched and thoughtful presentation.
I am arriving VERY late to the party, which - given how educational, intellectually stimulating, and thought provoking the videos have been for me - is most unfortunate! So, it is with apologies that I share a few questions:
1. Would it be fair to suggest that the comparison between the purging of senior & junior officers in the Soviet Union, and the sacking of senior & junior officers in the U.S.A. is helpful, but quite limited, because the majority of new, young officers in the U.S.A. had the luxury of waiting between 1 and 4 years before they would be tested in battle for the first time? For the young, recently trained officers in the Soviet Union, they would be thrust into the most deadly war in human history all at once, without having the opportunity to learn from the battles occurring in another continent?
2. Were there great purges of senior & junior officers in the French Army prior to 1940, or was the rapid defeat of the French Army in 1940 due to the fact that it did NOT purge leaders who were stuck in a WWI tactical mindset?
Thanks!
In answer to your questions - 1. yes, you can absolutely argue that. The primary purpose of this video (or any of my videos) is to get people to rethink the commonly held beliefs about the events by reframing them or showing parallels. Clearly, the USA "purges" weren't anywhere near as bad as the USSR's, and clearly there were different circumstances in which the USA and the USSR fought during WW2. But I wanted to show that the idea that the removal of officers by itself was a fundamentally bad thing, may not be correct.
2. I have no idea about the French Army. France 1940 is something I want to get to eventually, but I've been concentrating elsewhere. However, I suspect that you could be right that the French (and British) Armies suffered from outdated mindsets as a result of not "purging" their officers (assuiming that a purge didn't happen, which I don't think it did). The British Army's tank corps was definitely stuck in the 'cavalry' mindset during the North African Campaign, as my recent Crusader videos show, and some historians (noteably Butler) have suggested that the reason for the early British defeats was because of their out-of-date minded officers. It stands to reason then that a pre-war purge may have done the British Army some good.
@@TheImperatorKnight Awesome! Thank you! 👍👍
The French Bourgeoisie were paranoid about France becoming Communist. During the Molotov - Ribbentrop Pact. The French CP said "don't fight since who cares if the Boss is German or French".
Makes sense except the Boss is Nazi! Both agreed and with a decrepit French Military staff Vichy France was at war with Britain. Fa
scist to the core! The Common market was a Himmler construct. Vichy and Hitler planned the economy against the working class of Europe!
The French Army was white anted.
Excellent talk very
informative!
Brilliant as usual
Great job. Thanks
Unfortunately quite unusual, although badly needed, objective modern approach to complex historical issues that conventionalities of blocks' confrontation have reduced to misleading simplifications. Congratulations for this extraordinary iniciative of yours; it's high quality information big time! Please, keep up the great job and make us a bit smarter. Gentlemen, gentlewomen... subscribe!
Thanks for your comment, good to know my content is appreciated :) I'm aiming for highly detailed and accurate history, which is the type of videos/documentaries I wished I'd had access to as a kid. If it's helping others out there and providing value, I'll keep it up
TIK
1) German Versailles Officer Corps was trained for an eventual large increase of the German army. The story goes that every officer was actually trained for one rank higher. Did the Germans have any large-scale prewar officer purge like the USSR and USA had?
2) Didn't the Soviet purge purged the most competent of officers, and spared it least qualified? It purged the proponents of deep battle, tanks and airplanes while it spared the one who wanted to revert to cavalry and mass assault. Weren't the Soviet victories against Japan in 1938-1939 because of the 'old doctrine' of Tukhachevsky and the horrible result again Finland 1940 because of the 'new doctrine'?
Although even of the purges spared only the least qualified, you raise valid points to question the degree of the impact as it portrayed in the traditional view.
3) How many of the German officers were thinking of Bewegungskrieg against France in 1940? I heard Hitler believed the original plan of attack to be seriously lacking, and only quite late found an officer with the plan the Wehrmacht actually executed. Too what degree did the rapid succes in France lead to an overconfidence in the German army and in an infallible belief in Bewegungskrieg, even in situations unsuited for it?
4) Did you factor in others aspects of the Soviet purges? Like it hit the non-military bureaucracy very hard, the peasantry, national minorities got hit heavily. Did you factor in Stalin's tendency to let policies to be decided by factional struggle? When battling the Left Opposition mid-20ies Staling stood behind a 'liberal-kulak' economic policy, while shortly after the defeat of the left opposition in 1927 he switched to a 'leftwing' economic policy with the five year plan, sifting out who followed him blindly from the ones who truly believed in the 'liberal-kulak' economic policy? His clampdown on the Communist Youths in 1932, to prevent them from becoming too independent in thinking for themselves, and thus risking them becoming a faction on their own? Couldn't this have explained whom of the higher officers were purged in 37-38 - all the self-thinking, most competent ones - and why the less capable cavalry-lovers remained?
If you want to expand the army you don't create elite core. You create reserves. This is what Germans were not allow to do.
TIK...you are a legend...love your passion...
Great video. explain everything