Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2007/01/15
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]At 07:26 PM 1/15/2007, GREG LORENZO wrote:
>Putting large numbers of personnel on the ground in Europe does not
>mean that you won the land war in Europe (just ask Saddam's generals
>about their 4th largest army of 1990, or the French). To win a war you
>need to engage the enemy, pin them down and destroy their combat
>power. Once again, the Red Army won the land war in Europe.
I posted this in response to a statement that the
US concentrated its military efforts in the
Pacific. Such was not the case. We concentrated on Europe.
>Where do you get these bizarre facts? Your
source(s)couldn't be more incorrect.
>
>German WWII Ace Heinrich B???r spent the last two months of the war
>flying a ME-262
>Jet (your so-called dud). His last four shootdowns were all fighters
>(3 Lightnings and 1 Mosquito). BTW, German fighters were ordered to
>ignore allied fighters and go after the bombers.
I would suggest that you subscribe to the WWII
Lists or to H-War and post your suggestions
there. Others more knowledgeable on modern
scholarship shall soon set you right. The Allies
have not, to my knowledge, ever acknowledged a
shoot-down by an ME-262 and the modern Luftwaffe
concedes that the ME-262 did not score any kills
on Allied fighters. And I cannot recall any
ME-262 kills of Allied bombers, either. The
plane was just too little, too late, and too
limited in its abilities. Again, had it been
fielded in 1942 or 1943, when petrol was not a
major issue and when trained pilots were
available, things would have been different.
See my earlier post as to what constitutes a
confirmed kill. Dig around and find a single
confirmed kill accepted by both sides and by
modern scholars and I'll be delighted to hear of
it. Even the noted aviation scholar William
Green was unable to ever confirm a single kill by
the ME-262 though he tried hard to do so for two decades.
>I don't know what H-War is. Hopefully it is not a collection of people
>that generate facts by some weird kind of consenus. If this is the
>best they can come up with I'll go with recognised, published authors
>of non-fiction history - like MacDonald.
H-War is part of H-Net, the academic set of
social science lists run by the University of
Michigan. Almost all of the folks who belong are
professional military historians. Instead of
sneering, why not subscribe, post your comments,
and wait for some solid response by those who
have spent their careers in pondering these
matters? The same goes for MacDonald: a worthy
source but one now so dated as to have little
standing in the academic community save for COMPANY COMMANDER.
>I believe it was the Red Army's massive gains of 1943 and early 1944
>that allowed them "their massive gains in the summer of 1944".
>
>Perhaps it's time to get some books written by Soviet and German
>authors. You been reading too much of books like "War as I Knew It", etc.
Greg, you display a distressing tendency to get
into personal attacks. Instead of that, I would
suggest that you read books written after
1960. There is a lot available today on the
Eastern Front and your local library probably has
a few of these. Read them and learn that were it
not for massive Allied supplements to the Soviet
war effort ("Lend Lease") they would have
collapsed in early 1943. (See the old but still
authoritative Pogue on Marshall for
details.) You might want to read a selection of
Colonel Glantz' works on the Eastern Front as he
is the scholar most highly regarded both in the
West and in the East. I disagree with a few of
is conclusions but, all in all, I find his
assessment of the Soviet contribution to the
Allied victory in the Second World War
reasonable. Again, I don't agree with all he
opines but the ?stfront is his turf and is not mine.
Me? I'd rather be discussing the IIIcK camera
and leave the military stuff to H-War and the WWII Lists where it belongs.
Marc
msmall@aya.yale.edu
Cha robh b?s fir gun ghr?s fir!