1) The Germans underestimated the Red Army because of its poor performance in the Polish and Finn wars. As a Western Front veteran, Hitler did not appreciate the incredible staying power of Russian soldiers. 2) In the 1941 Campaign, the Reds had seven tanks to each Fascist one. They were poorly handled but resulted in a million German casualties. 3) In 1942 the Volga could have been cut below Stalingrad rendering its capture of no importance. 4) The Red Army was immense. Stalin had a million NKVD and a million top notch reserves even after a year of war. He had many millions more average troops also. The NKVD wre not chubby or out of shape troops, but top notch fit soldiers. 5) The principles of armor use were totally violated at Kursk. Breaking trench lines of incredible depth depleted German stamia. 6) The Germans were severely outnumbered on all fronts. They violated the rule that a 3:1 advantage is needed for the offensive in modem warfare. 7) In 1944, the Germans expected the main offensive in the Ukraine. When Belorussia was attacked, there was no armor, no planes and no reserves. 8) The prodding Soviet Army was fed, booted and transported by American SPAM, shoes and trucks. They became much more mobile than the Germans with more than 100,000 T-34's built. The American taxpayer won this war in this way and by paying for mountains of bombs to be dropped by expensive American and British warplanes. 9) Stalin mobilized everyone and Hitler did not. Women worked and fought in Russia. Hitler had only been Fuhrer for eight years and he spared the women and factory workers. 10) Stalin was much more ruthless than Hitler politically and internally. The number of Russians he had shot are unaccountable. He may have killed more Russians than Germans. Back to MWAN #102 Table of Contents Back to MWAN List of Issues Back to MagWeb Magazine List © Copyright 1999 Hal Thinglum This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com