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Zhukov's Greatest Defeat

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  • Zhukov's Greatest Defeat

    Col. David Glantz again does an excellent job of synopsizing an epic battle into digestible content. I'm wading through it myself but feel it's worth offering to WABBITville-

    Counterpoint to Stalingrad, Operation Mars (Novermber-December1942): Marshall Zhukov's Greatest Defeat
    "This aggression will not stand, man!" Jeff Lebowski
    "The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else when you're uncool." Lester Bangs

  • #2
    Wading through it is right.
    Sometimes I imagine the books he could have written if he had a bit of Rick Atkinson style elegance.
    For Gallifrey! For Victory! For the end of time itself!!

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    • #3
      Originally posted by S2 View Post
      Col. David Glantz again does an excellent job of synopsizing an epic battle into digestible content. I'm wading through it myself but feel it's worth offering to WABBITville-

      Counterpoint to Stalingrad, Operation Mars (Novermber-December1942): Marshall Zhukov's Greatest Defeat
      Thank you sir. One of the braver historians.

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      • #4
        On the evening of 26 September, the Generalissimo ordered major strategic counteroffensives be conducted at both Rzhev and Stalingrad. Appropriately, Zhukov would command the former, and his contemporary, General A. M. Vasilevsky, would command the latter. Vasilevsky, then Chief of the General Staff and Deputy Minister of Defense, was a penultimate staff officer and a prot‚g‚ of former Chief of the General Staff, Marshal B. M. Shaposhnikov. At the outbreak of war, Vasilevsky had been chief of the General Staff's Operations Directorate, and, because of his obvious talents, he rose from colonel to colonel general in only four years.

        uh-huh, the next to the last soviet staff officer....

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        • #5
          Turns out that Zhukov was a myth.;)
          Those who know don't speak
          He said to them, "But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don't have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one. Luke 22:36

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          • #6
            Turns out that Zhukov was a fighter. I suspect Grant and he would have found some affinity.
            "This aggression will not stand, man!" Jeff Lebowski
            "The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else when you're uncool." Lester Bangs

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            • #7
              Glantz's prose is dry as bone but I appreciate the clarity.
              All those who are merciful with the cruel will come to be cruel to the merciful.
              -Talmud Kohelet Rabbah, 7:16.

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              • #8
                Originally posted by S2 View Post
                Turns out that Zhukov was a fighter. I suspect Grant and he would have found some affinity.
                Grant regretted Cold Harbor.Lee cried after Pickett's charge.Zhukov managed the entire war to lose men without much gain.Rzhev was attacked by Zhukov several months before the failed operation described by Glantz.
                After he managed to score several hundreds thousands Soviet KIA's and a whole year of failed assaults in the same area,Zhukov blamed the terrain,favourable for defense.
                Sir, there is a pattern.From Directive No.3(btw,this is Zhukov's greatest defeat),Yelnia,Rzhev up to Seelowe Heights and the siege of Berlin.Zhukov distingueshed himself only by reinforcing failure and throwing away men and equipment.He may have been liked and favoured because he was a great butcher.But he wasn't a great commander.
                General rule regarding USSR is that everything glamorized by its propaganda is a fake,a disaster or a crime.
                Those who know don't speak
                He said to them, "But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don't have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one. Luke 22:36

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                • #9
                  "...Grant regretted Cold Harbor.Lee cried after Pickett's charge.Zhukov managed the entire war to lose men without much gain..."

                  I'd need A.R. or Shek to chime in but I suspect that whatever misgivings Grant held about any particular engagement during the summer of 1864 would be weighed against his operational and strategic objectives. If I understand the campaign reasonably Grant did not surrender operational maneuverability, consistently strove to find and exploit seams or edges to the ANV defenses and applied constant pressure.

                  While seeking a rupture he would, if necessary, accept an attrition battle if it pinned and degraded ANV forces. Lee's army became fortress troops. Pickett's charge? Lee should have cried. He'd seen Fredericksburg. He had Longstreet's advice.

                  Best I'd say regarding your commentary reference Zhukov? He lost his way to Berlin. SOMEBODY would be attacking Rzhev in November 1942. For all we know, in the hands of others the defeat may have even been more decisive. Sufficient, perhaps, to free German reinforcements from Army Group Center immediately for the south and URANUS. We don't know.

                  I enjoy R.H. Stolfi's interpretation of events beginning approx. July 10, 1941. He's of the firm belief, with very justifiable arguments, that German forces were poised along the Smolensk-Moscow axis to rapidly encircle and seize Moscow by the end of August. Glantz? Not so much. What Stolfi considers disorganized remnants before triumphant German forces in the Yelnya-Smolensk A.O. Glantz instead describes as five fresh Soviet armies with two more enroute. Those Soviet troops would be no product of Zhukov's skills but their employment largely would.

                  If Glantz is correct, Hitler turned south as much out of frustration regarding a seeming inability of Army Group Center to rupture Soviet defenses east of Smolensk as opposed to any desire to help Army Group South regain operational momentum eastward. Soviet forces engaged in the defense of Kiev were viewed as easily vulnerable to envelopment from Army Group Center. A "soft target" as opposed to Smolensk.

                  In Stolfi's view, a distraction from the very attainable central purpose for Army Group Center.

                  IMV Zhukov had a "silent angel" ally- Adolph Hitler. If not for A.H. many of Zhukov's human disasters would have also qualified as military defeats.
                  Last edited by S2; 05 Oct 14,, 20:03.
                  "This aggression will not stand, man!" Jeff Lebowski
                  "The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else when you're uncool." Lester Bangs

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