"That's a piss poor understanding of history.
The only thing that turned the tide of the war for the Russians was winter. Stalin's kill 'em all approach had virtually no effect on the performance of his army. "
First of all, your "That's a piss poor understanding of history." is a pretty crappy comment for a forum like this that wants to stay civil. I hope you choose better wording and are not like this with your friends, and colleagues.
Second, attributing the defeat of nazis to weather, is trivalizing the whole history. I am not saying Stalin's orders to not surrender won the war, but it was a huge factor on the battle field, while you say it had no effect.
The nazis caught almost 2 million soviet prisoners in the first part of the war. Imagine those people actually haven't given up, but fought to death, then the outnumbered nazi machine would have never reached so close to Moscow (16 miles).
One of the reason, after the war, a lot of ex-soviet prisoners, were treated really bad, almost as traitors.
First of all, your "That's a piss poor understanding of history." is a pretty crappy comment for a forum like this that wants to stay civil. I hope you choose better wording and are not like this with your friends, and colleagues.
Second, attributing the defeat of nazis to weather, is trivalizing the whole history. I am not saying Stalin's orders to not surrender won the war, but it was a huge factor on the battle field, while you say it had no effect.
BBC - The Battle For Russia http://joox.net/cat/44/id/1971071
The nazis caught almost 2 million soviet prisoners in the first part of the war. Imagine those people actually haven't given up, but fought to death, then the outnumbered nazi machine would have never reached so close to Moscow (16 miles). One of the reason, after the war, a lot of ex-soviet prisoners, were treated really bad, almost as traitors.