Russia Talk (not current event per se)

General General Discussion
1

I have had thoughts about Russia for a long time, recent events bring them up in my mind:

WWII thoughts: I have wondered many times if we/Allies should have left them to their fate with the Nazi’s. We saved their a$$ big time with the Lend Lease Act (LLA), and I understand the reasoning, but not convinced it was worth it. While there’s debate as to just how much a benefit the LLA was to the Russians, it ranges from they would have fallen without that assist (including some Russian generals who said that …) to it taking far longer and losing millions more to finally push back the Nazis’ it was a huge assist to them.

So what if they’d fallen to the Nazi’s? It would have remained a huge resource drain, they would never have been able to control the land mass of Russia, and I suspect it would have had the same effects on the Nazi war machine as to over extend them and cause major issues.

The LLA was banned from even being mentioned in Russia until the wall fell, you’d end up in a gulag for teaching it, and by then it was too late for anyone to even care. No appreciation from those commie chit heads, no statue of appreciation like the French at least, and a PITA our ass from the minute they won their side with our massive assistance.

To that end, we knew they were not our friends, we knew they would be our next foe after WWII (some general felt being we were already there, might as as well deal with them too…) and they 100% made their own problems with Hitler. Conclusion F those guys, I think the LLA was a mistake to apply to them and we continue to pay for it to this day.

Finally, post WWII and leading to where we are now, we see “Russians are committing war crimes in Ukraine, something must be done!” My take is, due to their “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” status they had in WWII, and the fact they obtained nukes, they have been getting pass for 70 + damn years.

Meaning, as commies or what ever they are now, what conflict have the Russians ever NOT committed war crimes? Far as I can tell, there’s is one long endless war crime for any and all events they have been involved in. They have never, not a once, followed the established conventions for War Crimes.

Yet, seems to me, they have gotten a pass of sorts, less so as time has gone on, but this seemingly new outrage of their behavior strikes me as people not knowing their history, and truth be told, not even close to as bad as they have been in prior conflicts, perhaps due to the entire world watching.

Russia is in a real sense a rogue nation, and has been a long time, regardless of their once status as a super power, or not. In conclusion, we may have, at least in part, made our own monsters with the LLA and unintended consequences are a real mother F-er some times.

You know what they say about those who don’t know/ignore, history…

2

Do lend lease, but make peace with the Germans on the western front. Frees up troops to fight on the eastern front, the Russians can mount a credible defense. More dead Germans and more dead Russians. Russians did it to us at the end of WWI and the start of WWII. We nuke who ever is left in 1946-47.

Mad props to the Russian people. Russia versus Ukraine is truly the “God and a mountain he can’t move” kind fight. I still think the US-Jap island campaigns were about as brutal as a war can be- truly elimination warfare; but the Eastern Front was pretty close to it- and at a 10-50X scale- and civilians mixed in (which neither side cared about).

ETA: From what I understand the LLA wasn’t that we contributed mass materials, but that we provided critical materials and equipment to fill gaps. Something like almost all the rolling stock for trains was US provided- something like that. So a catalyst, not a reactant.

3

Not sure I’m fully tracking some of what you’re saying, but the LLA contribution in all the above was massive, and not even a X Mass from those commie bastards for it:

https://weaponsandwarfare.com/2020/06/08/lend-lease-to-the-ussr/

4

My parents and grandparents were well aware of LLA, so I’m not sure that part is entirely accurate.

Stalin would have laid down every single Soviet life to stop the Germans. That’s just how it was.

In the end they would have burnt the country and all possible resources to prevent them being used by the Germans. Don’t forget that Rostopchin burnt Moscow to the ground rather than give it to Napoleon.

There is an old phrase in Russian; “cам не гам, и другому не дам”. It basically means “I can’t have it but I won’t let anyone else have it”

There is a well known

5

I’m assuming they were WWII era people, so it would make sense they would be aware. Post WWII, not so much, but regardless knowing about it and being able to openly discuss it, teach it, and dare I say, celebrate the help that saved their a$$, not so much is my reading. Apparently a very small museum was opened in Russia post fall of the commies to celebrate/educate, but you know how the Russians love to bask in their pride all that. Check that out:

https://russiatrek.org/blog/culture/the-museum-of-lend-lease-in-moscow/

6

My parents were born post WW2. 1954 and 1959.

Then again, they read Bulgakov and Solzhenitsyn when they were both still banned so they may be a bad example. The point is, it may not have been officially acknowledged but plenty of people knew.

7

The entire LLA list in case anyone was under the impression it was token amounts of goods for goodwill, or downplayed by the Russians as to the staggering amounts:

https://whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/pearl/www.geocities.com/Pentagon/6315/lend.html

8

Sure, that makes sense but also in line with what I was saying too.

9

The Nazi’s would have simply had the Ukrainian division of the Waffen SS run things for them like they did in every other country.

Eventually Germany would have delayed us in the Pacific. The final result likely being an atomic bombing of Berlin.

And while Putin is obviously not a very nice person, we’ve allied with bad people throughout the 20th century, and if ever there was a time to work things out, it was right after 9-11 when they reached out. Rather than bring them in as a true partner in the war on terror (and giving them a free hand to sort things out in Chechnya) Bush (43) decided instead to call them out on human rights issues as if that is going to get us anywhere with radical muslims.

I know we really screwed them in Afghanistan, and it was payback for Vietnam, but if we gave them eastern Afghanistan as a “zone of influence” there wouldn’t be a Taliban today. And yes I realize the irony Germany and Russia dividing up Poland prior to WWII but not exactly the same thing.

It would not have been difficult for a thinking President to establish who gets what in terms of the Middle East and then just respect the damn agreement. But instead Bush 43 decided to “rescue” Iraq even though it was already the closest thing to a secular democracy as the ME is capable of being and that is why Reagan allied with them in the first damn place.

Instead we played stupid games that resulted in Obama managing to reignite the Cold War over Syria of all the damn places in the world. Nearly every gain paid for in BLOOD was lost to ISIS and all we really accomplished is changing Iraq from a Sunni controlled state to a Shia controlled state where Iran has a lot more influence.

Sure we killed a lot of bad guys, but Iraq and Afghanistan are saturated with bad guys, plenty more willing to take their place. It’s like eliminating the Crips “Class of 87” and thinking you have rescued LA from gang violence.

10

Don’t forget the Doomsday Ship that was in the works and the only thing that stopped it from being built is that it lacked a failsafe. But they considered doing it and were willing to kill all life on the planet IF they got taken out.

11

The article that Will linked to mentioned that some LLA came into Russia via Valadivostok? My mistake was thinking that everything came around the Arctic, while a lot came in through Iran too- but Vladivostock? I know the Japanesse and Russians weren’t at war, but were Russian ships coming from America and passing by Japan???

Holy Crap? Half the LLA material went the Pacific route? Only ‘non-military’ stuff, but trucks and raw materials- on Russian Ships INSPECTED BY THE JAPANESE???

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Route

WWII just got even weirder. I though the Finnish thing was crazy…

12

Will, don’t forget that the decision to ally with Russia was based in strategy not morals and good will. Pretty sure nobody believed Stalin was a “good guy” or “our friend”. He was willing to throw bodies at the Nazi’s and take massive amounts of casualties. It was all about winning the war even if you had to make a deal with the devil. Without our help the Red Army would have been far less capable and much more Axis power would have been available to fight on the western front. Meaning our boys would have had a much harder fight.

13

Not only that, but the reason Japan didn’t surrender after Hiroshima (August 6) is they still believed Russia might approach the US about a negotiated surrender. Russia instead declared war on Japan on August 8, 1945 and a second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki (August 9) and Japan surrendered August 14, 1945. When Japan realized the invasion might come from the north and a southern invasion might never happen and we could just continue to obliterate cities with an unknown stockpile of atomic weapons that is what finally broke them.

They would have been happy to fight to extinction if it meant men, women and children meeting Marines on the beaches with spears.

14

Yep. He even held his armies at the Vistula River before moving into Poland so the Polish Home Guard would come out of hiding. Stalin let the Germans completely obliterate them and any other underground forces before moving into Poland so that there would be nobody to oppose him after the war. Stalin was willing to feed anyone and everyone into the meat grinder.

15

Russia was not like any other country and not a chance in hell they would have been able run, much less control, that one with a division. The outcome of not doing the LLA thing is always interesting conjecture to me though.

16

Human life, in the Soviet Union, was an expendable and replenishable resource. Just ask the “Bio-Robots” on the roof of the Vladimir Ilyich Lenin NPP turbine hall.

17

The amazing, crazy, cool thing about WWII is that no matter how much you think you know, there’s always something new to learn.

18

Well aware of all that obviously, as indicated in the OP, but I’m not convinced the man power, materials, efforts etc, would have been better spent/focused elsewhere and Stalin would have had to throw even more bodies at the Germans and would have, with the same outcomes.

19

That’s the attitude of all commie countries, individuals are of no importance and they’re value is only in what they can do for the system/country, unless of course you’re an elite…

20

I wonder how much concern there was that Russia might do a settlement with the Germans? I think we know now that the likelihood was basically zero, but with out LLA, it becomes a much harder fight- one the Russians probably prevail, but maybe not. After the end of WWI and the Russians already actually having allied with the Germans, it was impossible.

Alternate history- no LLA, things get really dire. Stalin pushes the no surrender/meat grinder line, but ends up getting whacked and a realpolitik Russian sues for peace. Maybe the Germans don’t take it. Maybe the Russian/Soviet empire that never really was ends up like the Austrian-Hungarian Empire and people wonder why it was a thing. And Germany has access to all the Russian resources…

We assume Stalin is a constant. He could also be a variable…