From the mouth of Aristotle

[Boron]

Very interesting answers Arryn . You are right that one book can be very reasoned but maybe not correct . This is why i wrote but future will hopefully show more arguments pro or contra Hitler being gay .

Arryn said:
Himmler's almost schizophrenic mindset on the subject of Hitler. On the one hand he adored Hitler and had immense personal loyalty to him. On the other hand, the cold, calculating part of him knew that Hitler had to go. In between, Himmler's fear of what would happen to him should Hitler find out that he was plotting against him. Days before the war's end, Hitler did find out and ordered Himmler's death, after stripping Himmler of all his titles and offices.

Not really. But Goring was a highly decorated WW1 officer who thought Hitler was more-or-less inept (which Hitler was) and Goring's ego pretty much assured that he thought he could do a better job. Which he couldn't, as the Battle of Britain and Stalingrad's relief proved beyond any doubt. Though Goring couldn't have done worse than Hitler, either. (It's very hard to imagine anyone doing a worse job of managing the war than Hitler did.)

Göring at least tried to replace Hitler after his dead . Though it is so sad i find this always amusing that Göring really thought he becomes Germany's first "Bundeskanzler" when the war was off .
You are right probably that Himmler was more dangerous there .
If he would have had in addition to his "Waffen-SS" the Airforce which Göring had he would have perhaps killed Hitler already . But in the current state both had significant powers and both didn't want to grant the otherone more power so they "balanced" them .

Btw i am not that familiar with Stalin do you know if he had that significant opposition in his "inner circle" too with most of them only lurkering for a chance to get rid of him ? And do you know how many assasination attemps were made on Stalin ?

Arryn said:

That is a VERY tough call. Stalin (by far) had more of his own people killed than all the deaths that Hitler caused. But (syphillis aside), Stalin was more ruthless than he was outright evil. Hitler, OTOH, was genocidal. And demented. And perverted. I'd have to pick Hitler.

Saddam Hussein is in the same league as Hitler, BTW.

Stalin always seemed so pleasant in his productions like the good old uncle .
Hitler seemed always like a maladjusted child .
But Stalin had more time to let him look better and he had the "won the war" bonus .

I heard in a documentation some days ago for the first time that Stalin had made some really ugly things with his own population for which i even don't know a german similiar action :
Coming once 20-30 minutes too late to work was a crime . You got a few years prison for that . During the war it was modified : You had to go in a punishment batallion .
Your main job there was called euphemistically armed reconnoissance . That meant you had to attack the german lines and the generals observed then the german counter fire to evaluate if an attack was promising .
If you were seriously wounded you were allowed to retreat but if you weren't you were shot .

Furthermore no russian soldier was allowed to go into war captivity . After the war most of the freed russian soldiers were sent into "gulags" for lots of years because they made the crime of becoming a war captive .
And after the war Stalin once again murdered most of his officers . He would have murdered even Schukov but he was too popular .

So i really don't know who of the 2 was even worse .

Saddam is of course evil too but he isn't in the same league as Hitler and Stalin . He couldn't do as much damage fortunately only local and not semiglobal like Hitler and Stalin .
To make a dominioncomparison : Saddam would be a devil while Hitler + Stalin would be Arch demons .

If Saddam would have had really a nuke i am quite convinced that he wouldn't have had a rocket to shoot it only into germany and definitely not to shoot it far enough to hit the usa . Basically only the soviet union and the usa have this knowledge . France e.g. has no ICBMs they need to workaround this by putting them on submarines .

[Arryn]

Boron said:
Btw i am not that familiar with Stalin do you know if he had that significant opposition in his "inner circle" too with most of them only lurkering for a chance to get rid of him ?

He didn't. Beria made sure that there were no threats to Stalin. Not even minor ones. Stalin's regime was by far more ruthless and efficient than Nazi Germany at quashing any dissent. Also, you must remember that, unlike Germany, Russia at this time lacked a (well-educated) noble class, especially one that was highly skilled at the arts of war and politics as was Germany's.

Boron said:
And do you know how many assasination attemps were made on Stalin ?

I don't know offhand. I could look it up if you need me to.

Boron said:
Your main job there was called euphemistically armed reconnoissance . That meant you had to attack the german lines and the generals observed then the german counter fire to evaluate if an attack was promising .
If you were seriously wounded you were allowed to retreat but if you weren't you were shot .

The Russians elevated the concept of "cannon fodder" to all-time lows.

Boron said:
Saddam is of course evil too but he isn't in the same league as Hitler and Stalin .

If you take the time to study the rise of Saddam, and his rule, you will learn that he's as wicked as Hitler (and as perverse in his own ways), and as ruthless as Stalin (perhaps even more so). The ONLY thing that has kept him from joining Hitler and Stalin's ranks is that as the leader of a (relatively) small nation (as far as industrial might and population goes) he never had the chance to commit crimes on the same scale. But he most assuredly would have had he been able to.

Boron said:
Basically only the soviet union and the usa have this knowledge . France e.g. has no ICBMs they need to workaround this by putting them on submarines .

You left out China, India, and Pakistan. As well as the UK and North Korea. And Israel. France does have ICBMs. Their subs carry 64 of them, each missile with a 6000km range and 6 MIRVs with a 100-150Kt yield. 6000km is more than enough range to qualify as an ICBM.

[The Panther]

So, Zen returns and we start talking about Hitler? What gives???

[Arryn]

The Panther said:
What gives???

The usual. You're fairly new here, so you aren't used to it ... yet.

[Boron]

Arryn said:

You left out China, India, and Pakistan. As well as the UK and North Korea. And Israel. France does have ICBMs. Their subs carry 64 of them, each missile with a 6000km range and 6 MIRVs with a 100-150Kt yield. 6000km is more than enough range to qualify as an ICBM.

Yeah i left them out with purpose
Israel has them from the Usa .
Great Britain is now more or less the little ally of the Usa . Blair is like Bushs dog .
In ancient times ( before the american civil war ) Britain was still like the caring father for the Usa .
Now they have gotten old and the Usa cares for them .
Sure any patriotic British citizen will hate me for saying this but Great Britains great times are long over . Now it is just another european country like France or Germany . Still remarkable but not any longer a big power .
Basically they have only the choice wheter join the EU as an rather important country ( like france and germany the 2 historic arch enemies ) or become the Ally of the Usa if they still want to play a major role in the world .
Afaik China has only "shortrange" missiles which can target japan or huge parts of russia . In some years they may become the successor of Russia as second big power in the world .
Pakistan and India have mainly short range missiles too which can target each other but not much farer .

With North Korea i didn't know that they possess good enough ICBMs to target the Usa .

That Russia had no

(well-educated) noble class, especially one that was highly skilled at the arts of war and politics as was Germany's.

is not so surprising since Stalin killed with his Great Officer Purge the Last remaining onces .
I think it was Schukov who wanted to make a preventive strike on germany when they massed their troops in spring 1941 for operation Barbarossa . Stalin refused because he didn't believe it .
Really sad because i think this preventive strike would have perhaps ended World war 2 a lot earlier .
Russia had at that time lots of KV-1 series tanks and already lots of T-34/76 ( Both about 1000 each ) .
The only question is if the at that time still relative impressive german air force would have been enough to stop the russian advance to Berlin .
So if Stalin hadn't executed most of his good officiers but studied the german blizkrieg strategy really only the german air force would have been between him and Berlin in 1941/42 already i think given how inferior the german army was at that time to the russian army technically and equipmentwise .
Only the good german tactics / strategies combined with Stalins officiermurdering + his own military incompetence similiar to Hitlers made the german "success" in 1941 and early 1942 possible .
He gave away the command to the army then to his generals and the success hadn't to wait long and was already great in stalingrad .

Btw are you familiar with german/russian tanks ?
Do you think that Steel panthers world at war is a really superb/realistic simulation of that or rather not ?
If you think not please say why .

[Boron]

The Panther said:
So, Zen returns and we start talking about Hitler? What gives???

Yeah that happens unfortunately always too quick that the topic drafts away from the main topic .
The only thread which i remember where it didn't draft for 200 Posts was when norfleet was caught cheating

[Arryn]

Boron said:
Israel has them from the Usa .

You really should check your facts before you speak/write. Israel developed its own nuclear devices, with the clandestine assistance of the then-racist South African government.

Boron said:
Afaik China has only "shortrange" missiles which can target japan or huge parts of russia .

Quit guessing, please, or making assumptions without actually doing any research. Repeating my advice above, check your facts BEFORE you post. China has 20 ICBMs with 13000km range. That's enough to hit the continental US.

Boron said:
With North Korea i didn't know that they possess good enough ICBMs to target the Usa .

They can hit Alaska and Japan. That's more than sufficiently dangerous. But even short-range missiles versus South Korea are a big problem.

Boron said:
The only question is if the at that time still relative impressive german air force would have been enough to stop the russian advance to Berlin .

Easily. The Soviets lacked the logistical capability to support massive operations against Germany in 1941. It's questionable whether they even could have done it in 1942 assuming they had attacked first in 1941 and kept the fighting away from their own factories. Russia had more men and tanks, but they had a bad organizational structure and poor morale. Even after the Finnish Winter War and the lessons they learned from it.

Boron said:
Btw are you familiar with german/russian tanks ?

Very much so.

Boron said:
Do you think that Steel panthers world at war is a really superb/realistic simulation of that or rather not ?
If you think not please say why .

They've done the best that can be done given the limitations of that game's scale and design. There are more realistic games, but they are not turn-based overhead-view. You have to go to the 3D-style games to get better realism, such as Combat Mission.

[Stormbinder]

Arryn said:
That is a VERY tough call. Stalin (by far) had more of his own people killed than all the deaths that Hitler caused. But (syphillis aside), Stalin was more ruthless than he was outright evil. Hitler, OTOH, was genocidal. And demented. And perverted. I'd have to pick Hitler.

I would have to agree with Arryn's conclusion. I also studied a lot of history and in particular the history of WW2, this is my major hobby.

Both Stalin and Hitler were mass murderers, but Hitler was the only one in this "unholy" pair who murdered based upon nationality. Stalin mostly murdered whose that he though to be potentially dungerious to his reign or to "cummunism" ideas, he didn't use henocide against any particular nation. Although Stalin certanly murdered more of his own people than Hitler. According the various sourses anywhere from 15 to 25 millions died in Stalins's GULAGs during his reign. But than again Hitler murdered much more in the global scale.



As Arryn said it is a very tough call, but I would aslo pick up Hitler as being more evil of these two.



EDIT: As for the suggestions that Stalin was going to attack Germany in 1941 - it is pure nonesense. I have read few books about this very subject, written recently by few authors, who became quite popualr and was milking this idea for all it worth. Thir facts and arguments didn't hold much water, and they were riped appart by real professional historians.

That being said, yt is possible that Stalin was thinkng about backstabing Hitler somewhere in the distant future, if Hitler would be stupid enough to allow him to do it. But that was at best the remote possibility at least few years later, assuming Germany would provide him an opening. Stalin and Red Army was nowhere near being prepared for the invasion into Germany in 1941, and to face Wermaht war machine on their own turf, the best army in the world who have just crashed the every major and minor military power in continantal Europe. Especailly not after the beating Red Army itself got from the tiny nation in Winter War, and Stalin understood it very well.

[Boron]

My assumptions about nuclear missiles were only from an extreme viewpoint i fear which i tried to "simulate" .
The book/film The Sum of All Fears from Tom Clancy has impressed me there .
The scenario seemed pretty realistic to me when the Usa thought about a preventive strike on Russia . And in a few years if Bush keeps the power and gets another likeminded republican successor with better technics and his new anti-missile programs when they show results i guess it is even more realistic .

So if China would really shoot all their 20 long range nukes on the Usa the Usa would strike back , China would not exist anymore .
Since the newest military development is always kept secret i am not sure how it would exactly be but even with the current technic perhaps Patriots and other anti-missile missiles would even destroy 30 , 50 , 70% ?? of the incoming 20 nukes . A few would still hit and do some harm .

My fear is that in a few years some fanatic militarists may calculate the risk of being hit as worthy doing a preventive strike . If the new SDI Bush lets develop now in 5-10 years can kill 95/99% of all incoming missiles this might get a big problem .

And there is always the other problem mentioned in The Sum of All Fears that terrorists may get a small bomb and smuggle them to New York / Berlin etc. , just to the most important city with which nation they are "at war" atm.



Do you have played combat mission yourself ? I made a quick google search and saw it is from CDV .
I have Sudden strike this is one of their earlier WW 2 games and totally unrealistic . From my short glance at a few screenshots Combat mission 3 just looks like a sudden strike in 3d .
I don't care if the game is turn based or RTS but i want an as realistic penetration model like in steel panthers . If Combat mission 3 has this and you can convince that i am interested in it
But in sudden strike it didn't matter if you attacked a Tiger or a Panzer II with a small anti tank rifle . The Tiger just needed 2-3 more hits .
And 3-4 Panzer II could still kill a Josef Stalin 2/3 tank. So if this is still true with combat mission 3 or another such game you suggest i think it is not realistic

[Boron]

Stormbinder may i ask you too if you know any good realistic world war 2 strategy game ?
Your detailed post where you gave advice to Tinktank seeking a good rpg impressed me . You said there rpgs are your favourite genre but perhaps you have a good advice for me too

If you and Arryn recommend the same game to me it is even better because then i know that this game is most likely good

At the moment i like steel panthers world at war most tactically and i think Hearts of iron is quite good strategically .

I am really looking forward to HoI 2 and world in flames from matrixgames .
Any other recommendations or do i already have the probably best games for this genre for my special taste ?