PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - Great Britain v. Soviet Union all out total war 1946.
Old 19th Sep 2016, 21:13
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Dryce
 
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I still think the range and power projection of the RAF would have been the decisive factor in 1946 against Russian forces in grinding them.
I believe the Soviet strength in WW2 was overstated. It suited their own propagandists and it suited people in the west to lap it up.

The Soviets received large amounts of aid from the west - and I suspect that the benefits have been airbrushed from their historyl. So in official WW2 footage we tend to see homogeneous groups T34s riding over the countryside and not a lot else.

They never had to tolerate strategic bombing campaign -and AIUI for all the fact I was taught in school that all the industrial production moved east of the Urals from what I have since read there was an awful lot that didn't and the Luftwaffe simply didn't have the resources to attack it.

The Soviet Navy wasn't particularly significant. And the UK had a decent submarine force and aircraft carriers.

And it's not as if after 1945 theat the Soviets weren't likely to be fatigued.

I would guess that after VE day there would have been people in Moscow concerned about an attack from the West.

Moreover given their lack of strategic airpower I sometimes wonder if Bomber Command's role in WW2 and its subsequent treatment was in part influenced by a subtle campaign from the east using sympathisers in the west.
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