Turning the Nazi Tide: Forgotten Lessons from the Battle of Moscow 75 Years Later

Rogue Money

The Lessons of Barbarossa for NATO's New 'Defensive' Drang Nach Osten and Partial Occupation of Ukraine: National Will and Not Just Technology Matters in Warfare


(Though Russian Intel and Military Tech Usually Comes as a Nasty Surprise)



Although the specter of a hot war with Russia is receding, thanks to the election of Donald J. Trump and the unseen efforts of many unseen 'white hats' in intelligence agencies across the (post)West, there are still many lessons from World War II (to Russians, the Great Patriotic War) that those still pushing for confrontation with Moscow deliberately forget. Including their false belief that wars are won through superior technology if not organization, rather than through the more brutal combination of logistics, cunning and will.

“On 27 November 1941, Eduard Wagner, the Quartermaster General of the German Army, reported that “We are at the end of our resources in both personnel and material. We are about to be confronted with the dangers of deep winter.”

— https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_Winter#German_invasion_of_1941

When Hitler's generals saw the advance slow to less than two miles a day in the mud of late October, those who had read about Napoleon Bonaparte's disastrous campaign of 1812 recalled in their post-war memoirs getting that first sinking feeling in their guts. That sense, though unspoken, that perhaps God was not on the side of the Third Reich. Hitler of course, believed that with one more massive push Soviet resistance could be broken at the Russian capital. And indeed, while there was panic and some Soviet officials hastily sought to flee, those sentiments were ruthlessly suppressed by the NKVD [predecessor to the KGB] declaring martial law. Sending the message that Stalin intended to stay in the capitol to the bitter end, on November 7, the Soviets defiantly held their October Revolution parade through Red Square. Thousands of men streamed through Red Square, under the cover of steady snowfall, the Red Air Force, and the massed anti-aircraft guns and balloons around the city. Many of the troops who participated marched straight to the front lines.



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