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 Grey Templar wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

Would Shermans in the 1980s still be viable? I know that in Fate of a Nation for FOW, the Israeli Super Shermans are half decent, but in 1984?

I'm not so sure. I suppose you could upgrade them with modern weapons and defence, but would the Sherman be able to handle it?

It took a hell of an effort just to fit a 17 pounder on a Sherman during WW2.

Sure, after the war has gone on for 6 months or so. By that point, all of your high tech modern tanks and aircraft are destroyed, and the few that aren't are held in reserve in case the enemy makes a breakthrough. All of your missiles are used up, except a few kept to protect a very few key strategic targets. The enemy is in the same boat as well.

It doesn't necessarily have to be Shermans. There might be a new design of similar tech level rolled out, and they would probably have a 105mm gun on them, but the general gist is you are deliberately producing well below your current tech level simply because the war destroys anything more advanced faster than you can replace it.

This idea applies today too as I mentioned before. The modern 1st world military simply does not have the stockpiled material to prosecute a "real" war. We've become so focused on precision high tech equipment that gives a massive lopsided edge, that we've forgotten that that gear only gives an edge if we're fighting insurgents in the desert. It doesn't give enough of an advantage if fighting a peer level military.

To give a little perspective. Patriot Missiles. Out of the many many countries which use the Patriot Missile, and variants thereof, the number manufactured across all these countries is only a little over ~10,000. 10,000 missiles is nothing, and they cost $3 million each.

In WW2, the Allies dropped 3.4 million tons of bombs. That absolutely dwarfs by many orders of magnitude what conventional missiles and smart bombs are ready today, and WW3 would likely require many more bombs than WW2 ever did. All the drones, high tech tanks, smart bombs, and missiles would quickly disappear in WW3 simply because you could not make enough of them fast enough.
Russia's equipment might be technically worse than the US's equipment, but the difference is minor and doesn't justify the extra expense in the event of full blown WW3.

Don't get me wrong, I'm always in favour of Shermans Vs T-34s , but would they be scraping the barrel like this?

By that logic, the British would be getting WW1 whippet tanks out of storage.

But I agree with your last point.

 Iron_Captain wrote:

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
The year is 1984, the season is Spring/Summer,

By 1984, Mao has been dead for a while, and Deng Xiaoping and his technocrats are running the country. The US had normalized relations with China, so there's the potential to open the South-Eastern front for Russia with a second country that has limitless manpower and isn't afraid to use it. Offer China control of ALL of Asia if they support us in defeating Russia, and they probably bite, in order to gain absolute border security. The Sino-American alliance places Russia in the position of Nazi Germany during WW2... fighting two fronts, one of them being a land war in Asia.

Probably not. By the 1980's Chinese-Soviet tensions had mostly died down and China was looking towards economic improvement. It would have been a very strange move for them to risk absolutely everything for pretty much nothing. Remember that China has nothing really to gain from a war with the Soviet Union. Control over all of Asia sounds great on paper until you realise that all of northern Asia, which the Soviet Union controls, is an empty wasteland that is of very little value to anyone and which is very hard to defend. In other words, it would worsen Chinese border security rather than strengthen it.
Furthermore, the early 1980's was also a period in which Chinese-American relations were strained over disagreements such as the Palestine-Israeli conflict. It is virtually impossible that China would attack the Soviet Union on the bidding of the US. That would have been ideological suicide and would have most likely led to intense internal conflict within the Chinese Communist Party. China may have been a rival to the Soviet Union (after de-Stalinisation), but that did not make it a friend of the US or NATO. China would have almost certainly stayed neutral in a NATO-Warsaw Pact conflict, safe in the knowledge that no matter who would win that conflict China would be the laughing third.

That said, even if China were to attack the Soviet Union it would not significantly alter the balance of power in Europe. The Far Eastern areas of the Soviet Union are vast and almost completely empty, so the loss of those areas would not be felt in Europe, and after taking the few industrial/population centers in the area (Khabarovsk, Vladivostok) the Chinese military would have extreme difficulties advancing anywhere because of the almost total lack of infrastructure.


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 Vaktathi wrote:
The Warsaw Pact nations faced a couple primary issues in the economics regard, aside from the fact that they're starting with a much smaller economic engine to begin with if the US is included on the NATO end.

First, their ability to maintain the logistics train or dynamically adapt it was significantly behind that of the NATO nations, so while I don't doubt that the USSR would and other Warsaw pact states would continue to produce, I think the problem becomes in getting that to the front adequately and communicating between elements efficiently. The NATO nations had dramatically better communications, transportation & fuel infrastructure, substantially more transport vehicles (both ground and air), etc.

The vast bulk of NATO's production capability was and is located in North America, on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. Meanwhile, the bulk of the Warsaw Pact's production capability was just a one or two days drive away from the frontlines.
NATO had much better communication and transportation infrastructure because they needed it to be able to coordinate between a dozen different nations all with dramatically different militaries, political systems, supply and command chains spread out over a massive distance. The Warsaw Pact on the other hand was only a handful of nations geographically clustered together all with the same political system and all using the same military equipment. They just had a whole lot less logistics and communication issues to deal with. The other Warsaw Pact militaries were just divisions of the Soviet Army in all but name.
Simply because of the geography, the Warsaw Pact would have been able to rush reinforcements to the front at a much higher rate than NATO, simply because they do not need to ship their reinforcements across the Atlantic first.

 Vaktathi wrote:
Second, the sum total of Warsaw Pact industry was in much more danger of direct non-nuclear strike (via long range bombers, cruise missiles, carrier launched aircraft, etc) than NATO industry was, particularly with the bulk of that being tucked away in the US.

Well within reach of Soviet bombers and missiles based in Asia. The Soviet Union and the US pretty much border one another after all. The US would not have escaped widespread destruction. And as the war is going to be waged in Western Europe for the most part, the still significant NATO industry there is going to be taken out of the picture entirely.

 Vaktathi wrote:
Likewise, international market exposure will generally provide greater stability in the long run over a more closed economic model, as while you're more vulnerable to being impacted by world events by dint of simply being exposed to more stuff in general, you're also able to access stuff you otherwise wouldn't and surpass constraints not possible on the value or availability of one's own domestic resources. Being able to turn to another supplier for oil, or steel, or other such resources is a game changer. If you can't make enough guns or tanks, being able to buy them from someone else is a huge deal. If you can't raise enough money domestically for your war needs, being able to borrow money from the international market is important. The previous world wars were won by the sides that could call upon the power of the international market, while those cut out by blockade or combat or sanction were crushed or collapsed.

That is not a conclusion you can draw from WW2. The countries that lost WW2 were capitalist market economies just as much as the US or Great Britain. The misfortune of Germany in that regard is just that they were stupid enough to wage a two-front war, allowing themselves to be cut of from any trade or supplies. Meanwhile, the Soviet Union, the only non-capitalist country that participated in WW2, ended up on the winning side largely because it could keep producing stuff even after its economy had collapsed completely. It was not limited by financial constraints to the degree that capitalist systems were. Despite complete economic ruination and the destruction of the Soviet industrial heartland, Soviet war production actually continued to increase throughout WW2. Most of this was made possible by what was effectively slave labour, forcing workers to work extra hard in appalling conditions with little to no pay. Something like that would never be possible in a market economy like the US.

I read somewhere that the major rivers in Germany/France/Belgium would slow up the Warsaw Pact forces for a while, and the bridgeheads across the rivers would be targets for NATO air forces. Soviet amphibious and river crossing capability was rated adequate, but not great, and there's also the problem that Western Europe has many major urban areas. The Soviets knew from their own experience how hard urban fighting is in a war, so urban areas being defended did concern them.

A question for everybody, but would there have been 5th column activity behind NATO lines during a third world war? Italy had a decent sized Communist movement for years, as did France.


Possible infiltration and industrial sabotage missions behind the lines by partisans allied to Moscow?


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 Disciple of Fate wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

This reply is for everybody. The reason why I went for no nukes is that, nobody would be daft enough to hit the red button, because we'd be entering end of the world territory.

I'd like to assume, unless things got really desperate (NATO at the gates of Moscow or the Soviet Navy sailing up the River Thames into the heart of London) that both sides would still be 'rational.'

The problem with the really desperate scenario of Moscow or the Thames is that it glosses over France being a nuclear power and willingly rolling over. This is the issue, being rational for the French stops the moment tanks roll over the Rhine. Either we have to totally take nuclear weapons out of the equation in any event or were talking about WW3 being fought over Germany and Poland.

I think we could all live with France being sacrificed.

But would France nuke their own territory to stop it from being overrun again? I suppose it's possible, because another occupation would have been another utter humiliation for them, but they would surely hold out hope for a NATO victory, because after all, if the war was finished, re-settling irradiated French territory would be tricky. Nobody would obviously want to live on it.

The France factor is a good point, but a complex one. And you never knew if they were in or out of NATO half the time. Damn De Gaulle!

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:


I read somewhere that the major rivers in Germany/France/Belgium would slow up the Warsaw Pact forces for a while, and the bridgeheads across the rivers would be targets for NATO air forces. Soviet amphibious and river crossing capability was rated adequate, but not great, and there's also the problem that Western Europe has many major urban areas. The Soviets knew from their own experience how hard urban fighting is in a war, so urban areas being defended did concern them.

I don't know where you read that, but it is incorrect. Crossing rivers quickly was a primary concern of the Soviet military since their attack plan relied on speed (and overwhelming force), and almost all Soviet military vehicles were amphibious for that reason. The Soviet Army did not need any bridges to cross rivers. Furthermore, engineering units were attached to combat units on most organisational levels which meant that the Soviet military could build bridges or erect defences at a very high speed.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
A question for everybody, but would there have been 5th column activity behind NATO lines during a third world war? Italy had a decent sized Communist movement for years, as did France.


Possible infiltration and industrial sabotage missions behind the lines by partisans allied to Moscow?

Of course. There were and are many communists in the West, and many of those symphatised with the Soviet Union and were recruited by the GRU. The Soviets put a lot of effort in preparing and planning all kinds of infiltration and sabotage up to the point that they hid weapon caches across the West for their agents to use in case of war. Their aims were to create chaos by assassinating key Western leaders and commanders, sabotaging industry and disrupting vital infrastructure (especially power plants) and communications.

 Iron_Captain wrote:

The vast bulk of NATO's production capability was and is located in North America, on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. Meanwhile, the bulk of the Warsaw Pact's production capability was just a one or two days drive away from the frontlines.

And thats the problem, because its all in easy attack range, same with all the EU Nato stuff like Rheinmetal and FN. Thats why the US was able to become such a huge power in the first two world wars, because we could produce in quantity and relative safety. Going nuclear takes this option out, but with nukes off the table its a powerful advantage.

NATO had much better communication and transportation infrastructure because they needed it to be able to coordinate between a dozen different nations all with dramatically different militaries, political systems, supply and command chains spread out over a massive distance.

Thats a secondary factor, its more that stuff like every vehicle has a two way radio that everyone knows how to use (whereas such was not the case in many WP forces), theres a color TV in every house able to distribute emergency information, tons more radio stations, more kilometers of rail and highway, more vehicles, more ports and airports, more devoped economic ties with other parts of the world, etc.

The Warsaw Pact on the other hand was only a handful of nations geographically clustered together all with the same political system and all using the same military equipment. They just had a whole lot less logistics and communication issues to deal with. The other Warsaw Pact militaries were just divisions of the Soviet Army in all but name.

The WP had its own issues to deal with. They too had lots of different peoples and nationalities to manage.

Equipment and command was more standardized, but the command structure had its own drawbacks, particularly in being able to react dynamically to events. Likewise, not everyone was in strict lockstep, as demonstrated by Budapest and Prague.

But yes, in many respects these factors do work in the WPs favor.

Simply because of the geography, the Warsaw Pact would have been able to rush reinforcements to the front at a much higher rate than NATO, simply because they do not need to ship their reinforcements across the Atlantic first.

In many respects thats true (though its not like Europe didnt also have its own industry and large reserves of manpower) and would certainly tell in the outset, but after the inital carnage is over and central europe is little more than rubble and ashes, thats likely to fall apart.

Well within reach of Soviet bombers and missiles based in Asia. The Soviet Union and the US pretty much border one another after all. The US would not have escaped widespread destruction. And as the war is going to be waged in Western Europe for the most part, the still significant NATO industry there is going to be taken out of the picture entirely.

It would have absolutely been apocalyptic for all involved with tremendous devastation everywhere. Nobody was going to get through unscathed. However, looking at the general strategic air situation, the USSR was substantially more vulnerable in this regard. That doesn't mean the US is invulnerable, or that stuff in Europe is safe, it's just noting which way the scale leans. I don't think anyone would achieve decisive victory in any such conflict, just a bloody stalemate.

 Vaktathi wrote:
Likewise, international market exposure will generally provide greater stability in the long run over a more closed economic model, as while you're more vulnerable to being impacted by world events by dint of simply being exposed to more stuff in general, you're also able to access stuff you otherwise wouldn't and surpass constraints not possible on the value or availability of one's own domestic resources. Being able to turn to another supplier for oil, or steel, or other such resources is a game changer. If you can't make enough guns or tanks, being able to buy them from someone else is a huge deal. If you can't raise enough money domestically for your war needs, being able to borrow money from the international market is important. The previous world wars were won by the sides that could call upon the power of the international market, while those cut out by blockade or combat or sanction were crushed or collapsed.

That is not a conclusion you can draw from WW2. The countries that lost WW2 were capitalist market economies just as much as the US or Great Britain.

Sure, but my point wasnt about capitalism, it was about international markets. Once WW2 kicks off, Germany's resource pool is basically what it can conquer and a couple smaller allied states. Japan had even less. The USSR, while not being capitalist, had access to the international markets, particularly after 1941. This allowed gargantuan amounts of materiel to come in to help support the Red Army's war effort and keep Soviet industry fed and put trucks on the roads that it otherwise would not have had access to.

The misfortune of Germany in that regard is just that they were stupid enough to wage a two-front war, allowing themselves to be cut of from any trade or supplies.

Right.

Meanwhile, the Soviet Union, the only non-capitalist country that participated in WW2, ended up on the winning side largely because it could keep producing stuff even after its economy had collapsed completely.

Yup, but it had extensive foreign aid during that time period as well, the Soviet Union was importing huge quantities of stuff from international markets. Steel, explosives, food, specialist chemicals, tanks, etc.

It was not limited by financial constraints to the degree that capitalist systems were. Despite complete economic ruination and the destruction of the Soviet industrial heartland, Soviet war production actually continued to increase throughout WW2. Most of this was made possible by what was effectively slave labour, forcing workers to work extra hard in appalling conditions with little to no pay. Something like that would never be possible in a market economy like the US.

The USSR was absolutely limited by financial constraints, it just had different choices on where to allocate those resources, and skimping on paying workers was one of those. That is a cost and has its own effects. Most everyone's production increased through the whole of the war, Germany's included up until the last few months.

When it comes to mid 80's Warsaw Pact stuff, hard currency was a necessity, as the USSR was importing food (lots of grain) and foreign goods and had to pay for those with currency, and likewise needed currency to prop up the other WP states and was borrowing heavily from European banks at the time, owing tens of billions to western creditors by 1985.

Not Sherman's but a cheap M 48 with a 120mm would work.

It's the aircraft that are hyperexpensive.

Edit: great discussion guys!

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
It's unlikely NATO would have struck first anyway

No more or less unlikely than WP forces attacking westwards in the first place.
IMO the Cold War was largely a western construct.

I honestly believe the USSR wanted security, buffer states to aid that and a say in global interests, not to increase its empire across Europe.

 War Drone wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
It's unlikely NATO would have struck first anyway

No more or less unlikely than WP forces attacking westwards in the first place.
IMO the Cold War was largely a western construct.

I honestly believe the USSR wanted security, buffer states to aid that and a say in global interests, not to increase its empire across Europe.

I would concur with this sentiment. Based on my own understanding of the Soviet Union during this era and the economic/political/military realities, I dont think it was any likelier for the WP to have attacked than NATO, and the WP was at least as paranoid about a NATO invasion as NATO was back. Any major confrontation likely would have been the result of misunderstanding or confusion rather than on either side looking to conquer the other, but there was a lot of potential for confusion and misunderstanding

From a demographic point of view, the Warsaw Pact in 84 has about 1/3 to 1/2 of NATO's population. This would leave their forces quickly and heavily outnumbered or their production diminished in any long conflict. NATO's countries are far more productive then those of the Warsaw Pact. The entire economy of the Warsaw Pact nations were geared toward military production. Those of the NATO's nation were not and yet produced about as much military material and equipment then the opposition. Should both nation ramp-up and go to war, the Warsaw Pact nations can hardly increase their current level of production, while NATO nations could quickly double or even triple it. In 85, the USSR was loosing its best and brightest in the fields of engineering and science. In any war, that would cost them a lot. The network of intellectuals and scientists in NATO nations were much, much stronger and more numerous. Simply on these fact, it doesn't bode well for any conflict. Even in term of experience, in 84, the US and NATO nations had more military experience then the Warsaw Pact nations.

 War Drone wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
It's unlikely NATO would have struck first anyway

No more or less unlikely than WP forces attacking westwards in the first place.
IMO the Cold War was largely a western construct.

I honestly believe the USSR wanted security, buffer states to aid that and a say in global interests, not to increase its empire across Europe.

To be fair, during the 80s, the Soviet Leadership, their parents, grand-parents and great-grandparents all had living memory of being invaded by Western Europe, first Napoleon, then Hitler. It's not an unreasonable concern, given the history. To that end, it is impossible to fault Russian annexation and occupation of any border country that does not completely Findlandize. A strong Russia with absolute border security makes for a safer Europe.

I think the biggest selling point for a NATO victory in my eyes is the year you picked. 1984, the Soviets had not yet started equipping their armor with Kontakt 5 armor.

It would be a turkey shoot.

Switzerland would be pretty hard to invade would it not? Isn't there a whole set of tunnels and redoubts built into the Alps? Would be a tough nut to crack.

Redoubts, pff, don't make me laugh.
Fortresses,nuclear safe, yes that is the correct word. Fortresses, bunker lines, rigged infrastructure, oh and the height of something that would probably classify as indoctrination.

But this are mere nuissances compared to the terrain. Invading switzerland with conventional means is on a scale from absolutely idiotic to lacking a brain. No a normal scale can't be used for such idiocity.
The alps to the south and center, the Jura chain to the north west, various lakes, rivers, swamps, forests and if nothing of the above, welcome to cities villages and other urban areas.

Also, let's just say that switzerland might have entred diverse weapons prohibition contracts, like not using chemicals, or phosphor, or cluster ammo for mortars and other howitzers, but frankly if push comes to shove we would absolutely use any of the named things above (and have any of the named things above probably somewhere in a bunker).

Not Online!!! wrote:

Switzerland would be pretty hard to invade would it not? Isn't there a whole set of tunnels and redoubts built into the Alps? Would be a tough nut to crack.

Redoubts, pff, don't make me laugh.
Fortresses,nuclear safe, yes that is the correct word. Fortresses, bunker lines, rigged infrastructure, oh and the height of something that would probably classify as indoctrination.

But this are mere nuissances compared to the terrain. Invading switzerland with conventional means is on a scale from absolutely idiotic to lacking a brain. No a normal scale can't be used for such idiocity.
The alps to the south and center, the Jura chain to the north west, various lakes, rivers, swamps, forests and if nothing of the above, welcome to cities villages and other urban areas.

Also, let's just say that switzerland might have entred diverse weapons prohibition contracts, like not using chemicals, or phosphor, or cluster ammo for mortars and other howitzers, but frankly if push comes to shove we would absolutely use any of the named things above (and have any of the named things above probably somewhere in a bunker).

Nobody really wants to invade Switzerland in the first place. They are always neutral anyways, the country is mostly just mountains making it not very useful for anything and their cheese is full of holes.
They also talk funny.

They also talk funny

Wait, that comes from a dutch?

I mean we are the only other people that actually can Correctly learn dutch and use the ch sound correctly and now we talk funny?

Get your wooden shoes outta here!

It always amuses me when people who live below sea level talk crap about people who live on a mountain. In 50 years, when the oceans have risen 10-20m, we'll see who's laughing...

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
It always amuses me when people who live below sea level talk crap about people who live on a mountain. In 50 years, when the oceans have risen 10-20m, we'll see who's laughing...

Na, laughing at dutch for that is unfair, they did not earn that.
Reminds me i need to go visit the northern venice before it drowns


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They are always neutral anyways,

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swabian_War

Or for a more recent one.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuch%C3%A2tel_Crisis


Also forgot to add the regular occupations of Liechtenstein.
To this day i don't understand how one can not read a 1:25'000 map propperly....

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
By 1984, Mao has been dead for a while, and Deng Xiaoping and his technocrats are running the country. The US had normalized relations with China, so there's the potential to open the South-Eastern front for Russia with a second country that has limitless manpower and isn't afraid to use it. Offer China control of ALL of Asia if they support us in defeating Russia, and they probably bite, in order to gain absolute border security. The Sino-American alliance places Russia in the position of Nazi Germany during WW2... fighting two fronts, one of them being a land war in Asia.

Irrelevant.

If there's a serious danger of foreign invasion of Soviet territory there's NO WAY the conflict is not going nuclear, and that includes China. That means this is beyond the 'no nuke' threshold of the scenario being contemplated.


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 Grey Templar wrote:
As you say, it would probably devolve into a stalemate with neither side being able to make headway. Both sides would also quickly use up all of their expensive modern equipment. Modern aircraft and tanks are incredibly expensive and simply can't be churned out in the numbers WW3 would destroy. So you'd probably have a stalemate where most of the combat devolves back to just infantry warfare, with the occasional tank or plane making an appearance.

Its possible that you might see both sides start kicking back up production of WW2 era vehicles, just because they're cheaper and it doesn't hurt as much when they're lost, and hey you need something out there!

This is where the Soviets would eventually win at in the sixties and seventies. They had warehouses of WWII hardware and ammo still sitting around in case they were ever needed. Whole divisions of T-34/85s sitting around just in case. NATO... not so much.

By the eighties the technological gap between even T-60s and the most modern NATO tanks was becoming a severe handicap. You would basically have to run NATO out of ammo before they'd be seriously threatened by even second-line Soviet tanks, much less WWII relics.


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 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Good point. I've always wondered why the Soviets never took advantage of American difficulties in Vietnam, during or after the conflict, because even in the mid-1970s, the morale of the US military was rock-bottom.

The simple answer is that despite all the rhetoric, the Soviets really didn't WANT to fight a third, massively destructive war in under a century that would cost them millions of men, and could very well cost them their very existence.

It that, they were simply being rational.


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 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
But would France nuke their own territory to stop it from being overrun again? I suppose it's possible, because another occupation would have been another utter humiliation for them, but they would surely hold out hope for a NATO victory, because after all, if the war was finished, re-settling irradiated French territory would be tricky. Nobody would obviously want to live on it.

Which is why they'd nuke the Soviet formations the moment they started assaulting the Rhine. Nuke them while they're still in Germany, and France stays (relatively) intact.

After all, France ALSO suffered two enormously destructive wars that cost them millions of men and, unlike England, cost them massive and systematic destruction of land and economy - in WWI by the majority of the trench warfare being held on French property, and in WWII by being outright occupied and then comprehensively fought over in 1944-45.

In comparison the bombing England suffered, while severe, was significantly less destructive than what France endured.


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 War Drone wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
It's unlikely NATO would have struck first anyway

No more or less unlikely than WP forces attacking westwards in the first place.
IMO the Cold War was largely a western construct.

I honestly believe the USSR wanted security, buffer states to aid that and a say in global interests, not to increase its empire across Europe.

Not entirely accurate. The Soviets would have been delighted to add the rest of the world to their state, little by little or all at once. That's why they worked so hard at espionage and propaganda about 'the inevitability of Communism as a worldwide economic system.' They just considered outright war to be too destructive to be worth the gain.

Consider it this way. The Russians are inveterate chess-players, especially in the military and political leadership. A skilled chess player plans the game up to a dozen moves ahead, and doesn't gamble on the other player not seeing a move. They conducted their military and political strategies in the same way - building up positions and maneuvering for advantage without risking their own position.

War, no matter how much you outgun the enemy, is the ultimate gamble. America showed the British that in the 1770s, then forgot it and had to relearn it in Vietnam. The Soviets re-learned it in Afghanistan.

And chess players HATE risking everything on one move.

Chess? LMFAO ... you're delusional, or have watched too many movies ... or both.

The best chess player in the world was American, not Russian.

 War Drone wrote:
Chess? LMFAO ... you're delusional, or have watched too many movies ... or both.

It's actually called game theory. It's quite regularly applied to political science; which includes conflicts and diplomacy.

Good post, thanks for bringing up this topic.

There is a considerable body of academic work on this subject in general, mostly created in the late 90's and early 2000's as old Soviet archives generally became available to Western academics and government think tanks. I was lucky in that both professionally and academically I got to study some of this material. Much of that material is now "easily" available to the more academically minded, especially from most major university libraries through internet and local collections.

There is a fairly big academic consensus on the matter concerning a military clash in Central Europe. Based on the replies Ive seen so far, many of you have come to the same conclusion: at no time, from 1945 until the fall of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact in the early 1990s, was there a significant challenge to the Western (primarily US) hegemony in that area. The Red Army, and by extension, the Soviet economy, was completely incapable of fighting the sustained, world wide effort that it would have taken to contain the NATO powers, and the US in particular, to be able to win a war in continental Europe. Academic study and soul searching by Western intelligence agencies found that the West wildly overestimated the capabilities of the Soviet military and economy. Secondly, the consensus is that it was highly unlikely that the Soviets ever even considered an invasion of the West a viable option to settle international affairs unless some hugely improbable turn of political events in the West made Europe more friendly to the Soviet economic model-which was abysmal.

To break it down by decades-and I'm remembering much of this off a few papers I did in my postgraduate days quite a few years ago:
1. In 1945 it is estimated that at least 60% of the war material (refined fuels, raw materials, trucks, aircraft, ammunition, food, cloth) used by the Red Army and the Soviet populace was provided by one source: the United States. Say we followed Patton's lead and continued East: after a few months of hard fighting, the Red Army collapses from lack of logistics, mass desertions (Soviet soldiers were shocked at the affluence they found in Eastern Germany) to the West and American tanks are quite literally liberating Eastern Europe and the Ukraine.

2. In 1954 the US is undergoing a massive increase in defense spending after the Stalin's go ahead for the NK's in the Korean War "proved" Red aggression (that's a whole other topic of discussion that as another poster said, was in many ways greatly exaggerated in the West). US nuclear forces are on the rise, and while seen as secondary to the nuclear deterrent, land forces are undergoing modernization and NATO is taking shape. The Soviets are still in recovery mode from WWII-with much Western aid, and the GSFG is just (re)forming. Only the US is able to project power world wide on a scale necessary to win a war.

3. By 1964 the Soviets are beginning to catch up. Their forces in Germany are modern and in many cases very close to technological parity with Western land forces, but their Air Forces are still significantly behind Western units and by this date, Western Europe, especially West Germany, are rearmed and well trained. However, the Soviet economy is unable to support or sustain large forces in peacetime without stripping their Eastern European "allies" bare of resources. They still receive large amounts of Western food aid, which could easily be cut off leading very quickly to starvation diets among the populace. Modern research suggests that their "allies" were dubious at best, and not a likely source of fighting strength. Some intelligence indicated that both Poland and East Germany may have been very averse to a war with the West. The US could easily expect almost all of Western Europe to rise up against any Soviet aggression.

4. In 1974 the Soviet economy and military is at its peak. Yet their GDP is still less than most Western European countries less than a quarter its size and with none of the raw resources. The reality was that while US defenses in Western Europe had been stripped to fight in Vietnam, and many consider this period the nadir of US military power, the reality is far different. The US remains the only global naval power and would have easily dominated the Atlantic crossing routes, had significant lift capabilities and a military packed with combat veterans with both conventional and unconventional military experience. Western European defenses continue to grow and improve (and the Soviets still cannot project power....).

5. In 1984 a Soviet invasion of the West ends in very rapid disaster. The Soviet economy is near collapse, thanks in no small part to the relatively tiny army they have fighting in Afghanistan, with very limited success. The military can barely support the !00K army in Afghanistan and the Western powers are now at the height of their technological and training superiority versus the Soviets. The West German army is a formidable force on its own, other NATO forces are well trained and equipped, the US forces in Germany are now highly trained, motivated and with new equipment, far superior to the GSFG (the best the Soviets have). In just seven years the Soviet nation collapses, a few years later their forces are roundly trounced in Chechniya (spelling?) and the US obliterates a Soviet trained and equipped army in Iraq in one of the most lopsided military victories in human history.

Key takeaways:
1. The West wildly overestimated Soviet power-wether purposely, through gross negligence, good Soviet counter-intel or just bad sources we'll likely never know.
2. The Soviets could not sustain a world wide military effort, only the US could do that.
3. The Soviets likely never considered themselves the equal of the West.
4. Although a war would have likely been very bloody, the West comes out the victor each time.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

This reply is for everybody. The reason why I went for no nukes is that, nobody would be daft enough to hit the red button, because we'd be entering end of the world territory.

I'd like to assume, unless things got really desperate (NATO at the gates of Moscow or the Soviet Navy sailing up the River Thames into the heart of London) that both sides would still be 'rational.'

The problem with the really desperate scenario of Moscow or the Thames is that it glosses over France being a nuclear power and willingly rolling over. This is the issue, being rational for the French stops the moment tanks roll over the Rhine. Either we have to totally take nuclear weapons out of the equation in any event or were talking about WW3 being fought over Germany and Poland.

I think we could all live with France being sacrificed.

But would France nuke their own territory to stop it from being overrun again? I suppose it's possible, because another occupation would have been another utter humiliation for them, but they would surely hold out hope for a NATO victory, because after all, if the war was finished, re-settling irradiated French territory would be tricky. Nobody would obviously want to live on it.

The France factor is a good point, but a complex one. And you never knew if they were in or out of NATO half the time. Damn De Gaulle!

Nuke its own territory? More likely everything east of the Rhine before they let the WP get that far. As for holding out hope for an allied victory, certainly the French will have remembered how the allies came back for Poland after WW2. That is the calculation to be made, if the WP had the strength to defeat Western Europe and occupy France itself, how likely would it be that the UK and the US would liberate them? Its taking big chances on any military or political outcome in the (possibly far) future.

The French already had 'trust issues' to some extent, hence they made their own nukes. But if this wouldn't be the time to use them nukes lose all deterrence value, why even invest in having so many? Reasoning this basically means UK and French nukes are irrelevant and don't have to be used as long as the US can still claw it back.

As for NATO, France was always part of it and never left, they just split from the top military NATO council to go do their own thing (they are back now though), but they never left the rest of the alliance.

1. Could the Warsaw Pact make its superiority tell in the opening days, and win quickly, which to the best of my knowledge was always their plan?

They had plans to quickly reach La Manche even under massive tactical nuke bombings. But great looking plans rarely works in reality.

2. Could NATO forces hold out long enough for American reinforcements to arrive?

Doubtful. It's possible only if Americans already prepeared to help somewhere. Otherwise, active part of war will be over before that. If the Soviets did not seize Europe or even rolled back, then the further conduct of the war loses its meaning and they will make an attempt at peace or a truce.

2. Could NATO forces hold out long enough for American reinforcements to arrive?
Doubtful. It's possible only if Americans already prepeared to help somewhere. Otherwise, active part of war will be over before that. If the Soviets did not seize Europe or even rolled back, then the further conduct of the war loses its meaning and they will make an attempt at peace or a truce.

@1/325AIR

An excellent post.

But I take issue with point number 4.

As I've said many a time before on dakka, American history is a hobby of mine, and few seem to appreciate just how rock bottom the US military was after Vietnam. The prospect of fighting another war against the Warsaw Pact would have driven them nuts. There seemed to be a conscientious effort to chuck the memories of Vietnam into a black hole. To paraphrase fight club, the first rule of the US military is that you don't talk about Vietnam.

And then Gulf War 1 came along, the US wins easily, and everything is rosy again, and it's high fives all around. And then Gulf War 2, and the insurgency, and the reaction is like feck, we're gonna have to learn the lessons from Vietnam again...

I appreciate there are US veterans on dakka, but IMO, from the literature I've read, the US military was badly scared from its Vietnam experience, and fighting the Red Army in the 1970s, is not something they would have relished. For sure, they would have been the ultimate professionals, I don't doubt that, but morale and prestige had been damaged...

Morale is so important in warfare, almost as important as training and equipment.

IMO, Bill Slim is one of the all time great generals of the 20th century, and when you read his book about the WW2 Burma campaign (defeat into victory) which I would recommend to anybody, he's always visting units, and making people aware of what the plan is, what role they as individuals play, making them confident in the cause they are fighting for etc etc

And the end result was a crushing victory over the Japanese by the British and Commmonwealth forces.

That's what excellent morale and a belief in your cause will do for you. The US military never had that after Vietnam for a few years.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ketara wrote:

 War Drone wrote:
Chess? LMFAO ... you're delusional, or have watched too many movies ... or both.

It's actually called game theory. It's quite regularly applied to political science; which includes conflicts and diplomacy.

Given the state of the world, I'm not convinced that it actually works, but that's for another day, and probably for a another website.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 djones520 wrote:
I think the biggest selling point for a NATO victory in my eyes is the year you picked. 1984, the Soviets had not yet started equipping their armor with Kontakt 5 armor.

It would be a turkey shoot.

I was watching Red Dawn. For this scenario, the wheat harvest in Ukraine has failed, just like the film.

 War Drone wrote:
Chess? LMFAO ... you're delusional, or have watched too many movies ... or both.

Russians do play an awful lot of chess. If you are a kid in Russia you are almost forced to play it. Especially if you come from a military family like mine.
Which reminds me that I haven't really played much chess since we emigrated years ago.

And I don't know if it has anything to do with chess, but the Soviet and Russian leadership definitely are not the kind of people who take gambles. If they do something it will have been meticulously analysed, planned and prepared beforehand. The annexation of Crimea is a brilliant recent example. At first it might have seemed like some massive gamble, but it clearly was very thoroughly planned and prepared. And to go back to the Cold War, it is why the Soviet Union would never have attacked NATO unless they were very certain they'd have an easy victory. And the existence of nuclear weapons takes that certainty away completely. So instead they went all in on developing espionage, sabotage and hybrid warfare, while attempting to promote communism more aggressively in the Third World.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
The best chess player in the world was American, not Russian.

The best chess player in history is Norwegian. But Russia has by far the most chess grandmasters in the world. More in fact than most other countries in the world combined. Chess really is a national sport.

That post of mine you just quoted was actually a bit of a dick post. I'm not gonna edit it away, but I do apologise to Vulcan

1/325AIR wrote:

There is a fairly big academic consensus on the matter concerning a military clash in Central Europe.

Since you claim to be basing yourself on a academic consensus, can you offer any citations to support your points?

Because with a casual browse of my university's library I am not finding evidence for such a consensus, and many of your points are in fact contradicted by many mainstream academic sources.

 War Drone wrote:
Chess? LMFAO ... you're delusional, or have watched too many movies ... or both.

I suppose I should report this as a personal attack, but it's just too amusing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
The best chess player in the world was American, not Russian.

And?

I said nothing about where the very best player lived. I said that Russians in general play a lot of chess (and they do) and that they tend to apply the same sort of strategies to their other undertakings.

Don't read more into it than that.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 War Drone wrote:
That post of mine you just quoted was actually a bit of a dick post. I'm not gonna edit it away, but I do apologise to Vulcan

No problem, I found it more amusing than insulting.

Some of my relatives are Russian; when I met them after the Iron Curtain came down it seemed like chess was the main thing we had in common. Only...they were a LOT better at it than I was.

 Iron_Captain wrote:

 War Drone wrote:
Chess? LMFAO ... you're delusional, or have watched too many movies ... or both.

Russians do play an awful lot of chess. If you are a kid in Russia you are almost forced to play it. Especially if you come from a military family like mine.
Which reminds me that I haven't really played much chess since we emigrated years ago.

And I don't know if it has anything to do with chess, but the Soviet and Russian leadership definitely are not the kind of people who take gambles. If they do something it will have been meticulously analysed, planned and prepared beforehand. The annexation of Crimea is a brilliant recent example. At first it might have seemed like some massive gamble, but it clearly was very thoroughly planned and prepared. And to go back to the Cold War, it is why the Soviet Union would never have attacked NATO unless they were very certain they'd have an easy victory. And the existence of nuclear weapons takes that certainty away completely. So instead they went all in on developing espionage, sabotage and hybrid warfare, while attempting to promote communism more aggressively in the Third World.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
The best chess player in the world was American, not Russian.

The best chess player in history is Norwegian. But Russia has by far the most chess grandmasters in the world. More in fact than most other countries in the world combined. Chess really is a national sport.

I wouldn't put any more value on that then I would on Russia and China both producing more champion Olympic lifters than other countries. They've found a niche that other countries either can't compete in or have no interest in. Chess was very much a part of Cold War braggadocio that Russia one. Seems natural that it would continue to be significant since then.

I think it depends on when. In 1945? I think the USSR was at it's height then, and logistically in a strong position. 20 years later? Complete reversal.