hi I'm Griffin Johnson the armchair historian the strategy of the Red Army during the second world war is one of the most analyzed yet misrepresented topics in history films and games often portray the Soviets mindlessly throwing themselves against their enemies and ordered to be shot by their own officers if the men refused orders these myths were primarily perpetuated by German officers seeking to slander their enemies and in this video we'll analyze both the highs and lows of Joseph Stalin's war effort how he both helped and hindered his nation and how his commanders performed under his
leadership if they weren't already dismissed one of the few good decisions made by the USSR before the second world war was the adoption of the one-time pad system an encryption method that utilized single-use pre-shared keys to make individual messages literally unbreakable this brings us to the sponsor of today's video nordvpn nordvpn helps keep your messages secure with military-grade encryption on up to six devices at once for every major platform including Linux and even Android TV tools like nordvpn helps us access historical information and region locked documentaries by routing connections through 5600 servers in 59 different
countries while features like nord's threat Protection keep researchers safe from malware and dodgy websites in a digital landscape where content is progressively becoming more segregated between regions and continents nordvpn is the great equalizer putting everything at your fingertips as it should be trying nordvpn today with a risk-free 30-day money-back guarantee and get a two-year plan with a huge discount and four months for free by signing up using our Link in the description below or by visiting nordvpn.com historyvpn the USSR inflicted 10 million casualties on Germany plus 1 million casualties on German allies and client states
75 percent of all German casualties were inflicted by the Soviets including the losses of 48 000 tanks 167 000 guns and 77 000 aircraft on the other hand Soviet military casualties were around 16 million with another 16 million civilian deaths of these figures Germany suffered around 3 million killed in action to the Soviet Union's 8 million killed in action an unbelievable 14 of its total population of all the powers involved in the second world war the USSR not only suffered by far the highest losses it also suffered a far higher proportion killed in action as
a direct result of the conflict yet despite this colossal body count the USSR not only emerged Victorious but went on to become a global superpower to explain how the Soviets could simultaneously suffer such losses yet still somehow be on The Winning Side we will first explore its leadership then move down the chain of command to see how individual war strategies were implemented all power within the USSR was centralized around a single figure Joseph Stalin not a single decision was made without Stalin's approval either directly or indirectly notoriously paranoid and suspicious Stalin entered the second world
war having just spent three years conducting the infamous Great Purge which saw over half of the officers in the Red Army imprisoned or killed but while some genuinely seditious elements were exposed the purges also spilled an ocean of innocent blood totaling at least seven hundred thousand Army personnel and sixty thousand high-ranking officers Stalin was obsessed with ideologically purifying his nation of all non-soviet influencers even if that meant killing men deemed too intelligent to make reliable underlings these murderous prejudices deeply affected the Soviet military Doctrine as many officers were killed simply for proposing changes influenced by
capitalist thought processes promotion relied on adherence to proper communist ideals while any demonstration of genuine Talent OR leadership ability amounted to a death sentence surprisingly enough at the same time the Red Army was suffering through the worst of the purges it was also seeing an unprecedented period of growth and rearmament while historians have frequently debated Stalin's motives and geopolitical Outlook during the 1930s the majority agree that he foresaw a major conflict within the next decade and he had no intention of presiding over another disastrous defeat this illustrates the strange dualistic nature of Stalin's War preparations
which saw him pouring vast resources into the military while simultaneously ripping out its teeth to ensure it couldn't be used against him Stalin also actively courted the attention of Adolf Hitler several high-ranking defectors have claimed Stalin believed a new world war would trigger socialist uprisings in Europe which the USSR would sweep to the aid of others have claimed that Stalin couldn't care less about International socialism but instead wanted to recapture the various tsarist territories that splintered from Russia during the revolution still others believe Stalin held Hitler in very high regard considering him a kindred spirit
thanks to their shared authoritarian values regardless of Stalin's real motives he planned on keeping the USSR out of conflict until it was ready to fight an offensive War sometime in the 1940s thanks to his close diplomatic ties with Nazi Germany Stalin gained the molotov ribbon Trot pact in August of 1939 which included a secret protocol dividing Eastern Europe between the two Powers after war broke out in September the Red Army moved into the eastern half of Poland with Little Resistance Stalin then turned his attention to Finland whose administration contained many white russian Exiles after Finland
refused to cede its border territories and join the soviet-led Bloc in the Baltic Stalin ordered an invasion only to witness his hand-crafted Red Army take nearly four to one casualties against the determined Finnish Defenders confronted with a butcher's bill of nearly 170 000 men Stalin was forced to sit down with his top military commanders and begin inquiries into analyzing the disaster unsurprisingly these revealed a shocking lack of initiative amongst Soviet commanders embarrassingly poor coordination between units a total inability to rapidly communicate with Frontline troops and massive logistical issues enormous reforms in both Doctrine and Equipment
were required but serious problems continued to go unaddressed Chief among them were the political commissars who held the power to execute officers for practically any reason given his extremely weak military position and the ease with which the clearly rotten Western democracies were failing beneath the heel of the German jackboot Stalin realized he needed time to consolidate his gains and avoid additional Bloodshed for now but this caused Stalin to become unhealthily obsessed with preserving peace with Germany his belief that Hitler would not invade while at war with Great Britain was initially reasonable but he clung to
it far beyond the point of rationality even rejecting intelligence from his own agents in Berlin and Tokyo in a report from laverenty birya regarding the prospect of an invasion Stalin wrote you can tell your Source from the German air headquarters that he can go and his mother this is not a source but disinformation in a similar display of maturity Stalin responded to the perfectly accurate reports from agent Richard Sorge in Tokyo that nine armies would attack the USSR on the 22nd of June by calling him a little Stalin also believed that even if the unthinkable
did happen his existing defenses could hold out until a full mobilization said defenses consisted of a Thin Red Line of Divisions stretched across the vast Soviet border territories all with orders never to retreat and no radios to coordinate a retreat anyway fortunately some officers of the Red Army foresaw the inevitable and risked their lives to prepare for a German attack on May 15th General Alexander vasilevsky worked with giorgi zhukov and Simeon timashenka to formulate a strategy that called for the Red Army to absorb the German attack and then counter-attack to destroy the bulk of enemy
forces and fight the war on foreign soil the plan proposed a preemptive strike against The Invasion force and requested Stalin permit a covert mobilization Stalin either never read the plan or instantly rejected it but even experienced generals substantially underestimated the speed of the German buildup and it was only on the 21st of June that Stalin finally issued an alert order which reached the front lines a whole one hour before the attack began even in this last communique Stalin showed his reluctance to believe the obvious by saying the task of our troops is not to respond
to any provocative actions that might result in serious complications at 3 15 a.m on the 22nd of June 1941 over 3 million German troops crashed through the Soviet border defenses with unstoppable Force the Red Army was caught in the middle of major reforms and commanders failed to exercise even the most rudimentary coordination between infantry and artillery Stalin himself was completely blindsided by The Invasion and wasted precious hours entertaining the notion that it was all a hideous mistake when he came to his senses his first moves were to order the evacuation of Soviet industry to the
euros and establish a general Supreme command or stafka with himself at the top but Stalin allegedly suffered a breakdown on the 28th after the fall of Minsk and fled to his private residence outside of Moscow after two whole days in solitude a delegation of senior Soviet officials convinced him to return whereupon he threw himself into organizing a series of massive counter-offensives while doubling down on his policy of No Retreat and no surrender this culminated in order 270 which read in part those falling into encirclements are to fight to the last those who prefer to surrender
are to be destroyed by all available means the order was enforced by Stalin's political commissars who were empowered to countermand the orders of operational commanders and administer summary executions without trial on July 3rd he addressed his Nation for the first time since the start of the invasion and called for A Patriotic War he also recognized the British as allies declaring the conflict part of a united front of people's standing for freedom this speech marked a turning point in Stalin's attitudes as he began to replace ideological sentiment with patriotism emphasizing this as a grand struggle for
these Soviet people rather than a battle between communism and fascism ironically enough it was perhaps Hitler's unswerving dedication to the extermination of the Slavic people that helped Stalin power through his darkest moments leaving him with a binary Choice except certain death or fight as hard as possible to avert it while Hitler's early victories convinced him that he was a military genius Stalin's early defeats shook him back to a semblance of reality though he continued ordering failed counter-offensives throughout 1941 he also reached out to other allied powers and began essential negotiations for supplies and military aid
these diplomatic overtures would be Stalin's greatest contribution to the war ensuring that the Red Army had the international backing necessary to absorb the horrific early losses inflicted by Operation Barbarossa however it should not be assumed that Stalin was the source of all military issues within the USSR even at his worst he did listen to advice from his generals and many supported his tactical decisions even giorgi zhukov wrote in his Memoirs we did not think that our armed forces would be such a failure at the start of the war and suffer such serious defeats in the
first battles that they would be forced to retreat into the interior of the country and at that time our military theoretical science generally did not consider the profound problems of Strategic Defense mistakenly considering it not so important the entire Soviet military command fully subscribed to the doctrine of offensive action supported by mechanized units and many supported Stalin's insistence on no retreat even from obviously hopeless battles many officers were also obsessed with the idea of avoiding defeatism which led to absurd scenarios like General Clement varashilov refusing a massive food Convoy for the besieged city of Leningrad
because it gave the impression that the city was undersupplied as the Germans began knocking at the gates of Moscow Stalingrad and Leningrad Marshals like zhukov timashanka and vasilevsky were busy Reinventing the core doctrines of the Red Army Air power was concentrated into large centrally coordinated air armies that could flexibly respond to a rapidly evolving strategic situation while ground forces were finally freed from the oppressive hand of the political commissars in September of 1942 promotion by Merit was resumed as was the distribution of metals for valorous conduct to shore up morale and prevent desertions veteran blocking
detachments were stationed in the rear of Soviet divisions these blocking detachments were examples of morale ant discipline to nervous conscripts as they detained fleeing soldiers operated as emergency reserves and restored the cohesion of routing units on a strategic level the Red Army embraced the concept of deep operations which contrasted the German Blitzkrieg by emphasizing large-scale combined arms Warfare across a vast front depleting enemy reserves and exhausting their logistical capabilities commanders like zhukov and vasilevsky also became masters of mosqueirovka an institutionalized art of deception and misinformation that sought to fool German armies as to the size
and intent of their Soviet counterpart this strategy was enhanced by Stalin's diplomatic efforts granting access to the Allied code breaking Network and vital insight into German strategic intentions another common myth about the Red Army is its Reliance on chaotic human wave tactics to drown out their qualitatively Superior German foes the truth is much more nuanced first rifles and other Small Arms were plentiful men were not sent in without a weapon against fortified positions as movies and games like to depict and though Mass assault tactics were used in some capacity it was as a last resort
when all other options were unavailable and the instant that the Red Army adopted the radio improving coordination they all but ceased to occur furthermore deep operation Warfare emphasized the grand strategic picture rather than the outcome of individual battles therefore if the Red Army suffered technical defeats in 10 minor battles but inflicted enough losses on the German Army to keep it from winning one decisive engagement the Red Army retained an overall strategic advantage the one Doctrine the Soviet leadership had kept sacred throughout its tumultuous early years was that of total mobilization alongside the absolute prioritization of
military Recruitment and production this attitude paid dividends during the war as it enabled combat losses to be replaced at a phenomenal rate further adding to the illusion that the USSR had a bottomless well of Manpower in reality the German Army had a numerical advantage in operation Barbarossa and the scales only tipped toward the Red Army after 1941. throughout most of the war the Red Army failed to meet the three to one numerical Advantage most military thinkers believe necessary to counter a defender's Advantage yet was still able to wage the largest offensive war in history many
reports also conflate numbers of active personnel with reservists who hadn't even been called up yet only by early 1943 did the Red Army outnumber the Vermont and by the time the Soviet tanks rolled into Berlin this advantage had reached four to one by late 1944 the Red Army had reached its Zenith while Hitler was busy micromanaging his forces reassigning generals on a whim and generally interfering at every level of military operations Stalin had relaxed his grip on the reins of power just enough to let his now veteran officers prosecute the war as they saw fit
Soviet offensives now began with careful planning and deception followed by an initial wave of attacks that seized key positions and compromised the Integrity of the whole enemy defensive Network these initial thrusts were accompanied by Titanic artillery barrages and vast air attacks that rolled ahead of the main Advance while Mass tank formations punched holes through the disordered Enemy Lines Soviet field officers were now able to race their forces through the resulting salience and respond to emerging threats with speed and discipline the Battle of Kursk was the perfect example of all these new ideas coming to fruition
involving extensive campaigns reception to fool the Germans into striking and heavily reinforced sections of the Soviet line while vast tank and infantry columns tore across the open step Under A Sky Full of ground attack aircraft this new Dynamic approach to Warfare would enable such Feats as the lightning invasion of Manchuria a brilliantly coordinated assault across a virtually unindustrialized land mass with Soviet forces penetrating as deep as the Korean peninsula in less than two weeks the USSR presents a fascinating case study into a nation that entered the largest conflict in human history in perhaps the worst
position possible ruled by a paranoid autocrat with practically no military experience the Soviet Union paid a huge price during Operation Barbarossa and continued seeing defeats well into early 1943 but with each loss the Red Army learned from its mistakes methodically planning how to get the most use out of every individual Soldier Stalin also learned to trust his military commanders to do their job without micromanagement something his Nazi counterpart never grasped the Red Army went from a state of near Anarchy at the start of the conflict to inflicting the overwhelming majority of German casualties and swiftly
invading Japanese Manchuria in only 10 days [Music] [Music]
