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Wednesday, 3 April 2013

Quote of the week

"I am convinced that when the history of this war comes to written it will probably be found that the only man deserving of the title military genius — except, perhaps General Montgomery - will be Joseph Stalin, son of a cobbler."
Morpeth Herald - Friday 18 June 1943, page 5.

How very true.

9 comments:

  1. Matt3 April 2013 at 09:48

    Stalin purged the leadership of the Red Army in 1937, significantly weakening the USSR's ability to defend itself in 1941, signed a non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany in 1939 and then refused to believe that they had invaded, even as their tanks were speeding towards Moscow, before going to pieces for a week, too shocked to issue any orders. If anyone is the Russian military genius of World War II it is Zhukov.

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  2. BryanB3 April 2013 at 10:29

    Military genius? I didn't realise they did irony in 1943...

    Saw this interesting review the other day:
    http://www.economist.com/news/books-and-arts/21574468-stalin-and-his-cursed-cause

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  3. Ed3 April 2013 at 12:18

    Right, that's the avatar changed back.

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  4. Craig3 April 2013 at 13:32

    Except that Eisenhower was the son of a railroad mechanic turned creamery hand.

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  5. Rob3 April 2013 at 22:03

    Monty?

    While slow and plodding is sometimes useful, I wouldnt call it genius.

    Honestly, Im not sure there was a genius on the Allied side. Maybe MacArthur in the Pacific.

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  6. Ron Pattinson3 April 2013 at 23:56

    Matt, my son Andrew agrees with you: Zhukov. The "Russian Guderian" he calls him.

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  7. Shawn4 April 2013 at 09:21

    Nimitz and the other naval commanders in the Pacific were probably among the best of the Allied commanders. Patton probably the best of the infantry commanders. MacArthur, for all his glory in fulfilling the "American ideal" was responsible for the Philippines campaign, a completely pointless engagement in light of the overall objective of defeating Japan which was very costly to both combatants and civilians. It could have simply been bypassed and blockaded without the loss of life. Stalin was not a great commander in the military sense, but he was a great leader in that he saw his country through the war and had them emerge as a world power. This was only done through brutal sacrifice of just about everything his country had, including its people. The finest military minds that played a part in that war were squaring off closer to the battlefield on both the German and Russian sides. Zhukov, Guaderian, Manstein, Model, et al.

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  8. Ron Pattinson4 April 2013 at 11:17

    Shawn,

    surely Zhukov was on the Allied side.

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  9. Shawn4 April 2013 at 15:58

    of course, didn't mean to imply that they weren't part of the Allied cause, I guess I was just making the point that there were fine generals on both sides fighting in the east. Stalin didn't have a clue in regards to strategy and tactics, and the earlier comment about his purges affecting his country's ability to defend itself are accurate (see the USSR's pathetic showing in Finland in the early stages). In fact, it wasn't until Stalin finally relented and turned over some of the decisionmaking to Zhukov with the Germans at the doorstep of Moscow that they finally turned their fortunes around. Stalin was a brilliant power politician, and he had a massive population with massive resources at his disposal to accomplish the goals that he set out. Love this discussion on a beer blog!

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