How would you rank the militaries of the WW2 powers before the war started?

Army size is not synonymous with overall military strength

Military =! Army

>1000 BC
>Judah
that's hard to believe really.

There was nothing quick about American rearmament. It took something like 6 years before the US army was in a fighting shape.

Not him, but what? The U.S. wasn't even in the war for 6 years, had only really started arming on a large scale in mid-41, and was on the offensive in the Pacific within a year of that, and in Europe in a year and a half.

What exactly wasn't quick about it?

Well you are wrong.

Great rebuttal there m8. Mind supporting your bald assertions somewhere?

Mind learning some basic facts before posting on a history board? US rearmament did not begin in mid-1941. It began in the late 30s, with 1939 as the latest acceptable point.
I would argue the US army was a pitiful fighting force until 1944, hence the 6 years figure. But if you'd like, one could argue that it took the US army 5 years to become a decent fighting force.
Meanwhile, Germany built up its military from literal nothing in less time, and Soviets expanded their military at an equally impressive pace.
There's nothing outstanding about the US rearmament. It was just one among many such feats.

Obviously. But the rankings OP mentions were.

> It began in the late 30s, with 1939 as the latest acceptable point.

Mind learning some basic facts before posting on a history board? STSA reintroduced peacetime drafts in late 1940, and people starting being called up for training and possible mobilization in 1941.

You also might want to look at the actual production figures themselves. Here's what 30 seconds on google turns up.

nationalww2museum.org/learn/education/for-students/ww2-history/ww2-by-the-numbers/wartime-production.html

Notice how their aircraft production multiplies by a factor of 6 from 1939 to 1941, and how by the first year in total war, they produce a bit over triple Germany's aircraft, when they started the war at 1/4 of their production.

>I would argue the US army was a pitiful fighting force until 1944,

Yes, based on their unbroken successful record of offense and advancement, that is clearly a fine assessment you have there. Even in their "terrible" theater of Italy, they were killing 5 Germans for every 3 men they were losing, and continually, if slowly, advancing.

>1943 Soviets and Germans the same size
>somehow most battles end up germans being out numbered 2:1

>STSA reintroduced peacetime drafts in late 1940, and people starting being called up for training and possible mobilization in 1941.
US started rearming for war earlier than the start of the draft. This is elementary shit, user. Get your act together.

>Here's what 30 seconds on google turns up.
Maybe 30 seconds on google is not enough education to rely on. Just a thought.

>based on their unbroken successful record of offense and advancement, that is clearly a fine assessment you have there.
Based on the US army's own assessment, which put the US troops at 80% fighting capacity of the Germans. And even that was an overestimate.

>Even in their "terrible" theater of Italy, they were killing 5 Germans for every 3 men they were losing
>wiki results box history thread

>There's nothing outstanding about the US rearmament.

Not this guy but one area in which America's military did not downsize and flounder amid economic woes was the artillery branch. They spent the interwar years invested in R&D after their experience with French guns in WW1. The weapons and tactics developed made them easily the most prepared and effective units in Africa and arguably the best artillery of the war.

You're also neglecting that both Germany and the Soviets mobilized while dependant on millions of horses while by 1942 the Americans were the only fully mechanized army on the planet. That's a little outstanding.

>US started rearming for war earlier than the start of the draft

No they didn't. They started some very basic naval armaments due to the naval treaties lapsing.

>Maybe 30 seconds on google is not enough education to rely on. Just a thought.

Maybe you're talking out of your ass and even a basic perusal of common online sources reveals it. U.S. was spending a tiny fraction of their GDP on the military pre 1941, far less than contemporary European powers were spending in say, 37-39

>Based on the US army's own assessment, which put the US troops at 80% fighting capacity of the Germans. And even that was an overestimate.

And yet their results against Germans were victory after victory after victory, and comparatively easy ones.

>wiki results box history thread

Name a metric of your choice then. The Americans kicked the Germans asses a hell of a lot, and at worst suffered tactical reverses, never strategic ones.

Well yeah, Germans were fighting in Africa, Italy, Western Europe (air war) as well.

>that's hard to believe really.

lots of stuff from the bible is :^)

>French Empire at 1800

dam son

>They started some very basic naval armaments due to the naval treaties lapsing.
They started
>20% increase of the navy
>a massive air corps program towards an air force that would equal the LW in size
>preliminary preparations for similar expansions in army
If you are counting the date when huge amounts of equipment actually rolled off the assembly lines as the start of rearmament, then you can just as easily say Germany began rearming in earnest in 1943. Or you could stop twisting facts to match your narrative and simply go with historical truths.

>U.S. was spending a tiny fraction of their GDP on the military pre 1941
I didn't realize rearmament meant spending a certain fraction of your GDP there, but hey, as long as you get to decide what words mean in your mind, you'll always come out the winner in every argument!

>And yet their results against Germans were victory after victory after victory, and comparatively easy ones.
You really know nothing about the Italian campaign, do you?

>The Americans kicked the Germans asses a hell of a lot, and at worst suffered tactical reverses, never strategic ones.
That tends to happen when you have every possible advantage outside of being on the offensive.

>20% increase of the navy

Wrong, actually, if you go by tonnage, the usual metric for naval armament, But whatever.

>a massive air corps program towards an air force that would equal the LW in size

Except the Luftwaffe was a pretty small air force, all things considered. Extremely effective, but small. To "match" a country whose population is roughly 2/3 yours and whose industrial resources are even less than that 2/3 isn't arming for war.

>preliminary preparations for similar expansions in army

Yes, the STSA bill, which at most, puts it in late 1940, which means 6 years from that is 1946.

>. Or you could stop twisting facts to match your narrative and simply go with historical truths.

Pot, meet kettle.

I didn't realize rearmament meant spending a certain fraction of your GDP there, but hey, as long as you get to decide what words mean in your mind, you'll always come out the winner in every argument!

And if you don't come up with any sort of metric for the difference between normal peacetime armament building and "rearming for war" you can win any argument too!

>You really know nothing about the Italian campaign, do you?

Actually, quite a bit. I know of the difficulties around Salerno, which nonetheless failed to dislodge the American landing force despite having panzers right at the beachhead. I know of the advance primarily through infiltration tactics over the mountains through southern Italy. I know of the casualty ratio, and the slow, but uninterrupted advance. Compared to the constant reverses on the Eastern Front, or really, any evenly gunned war throughout history, it wasn't that bad. And that was the worst American experience in Europe.

>That tends to happen when you have every possible advantage outside of being on the offensive.

Except for that intangible "good at war" thing. It's almost like they were in fact good at what they did, and their combat records showed that.

>Except the Luftwaffe was a pretty small air force, all things considered.
Luftwaffe was not a small air force, what the fuck are you on m8.

>To "match" a country whose population is roughly 2/3 yours and whose industrial resources are even less than that 2/3 isn't arming for war.
Here you go again with your redefining of words to suit your narrative. If you want to argue that rearming doesn't mean rearming, then why do you even bother to try to discuss things with other people? Just talk to yourself. That's what you are essentially doing anyway.

>Yes, the STSA bill, which at most, puts it in late 1940, which means 6 years from that is 1946.
You honestly think the planning for the expansion of the army began with just randomly passing a conscription bill then playing it by the ear?

>And if you don't come up with any sort of metric for the difference between normal peacetime armament building and "rearming for war" you can win any argument too!
Maybe the fact that the government figures literally discussed rearming for war in those terms? Or that the rearmament of late 30s were nowhere in line with normal defense spending? Or that scholars agree that the rearmament was in full swing in 1939?

>Actually, quite a bit
Yet you manage to be wrong about literally everything.

>Except for that intangible "good at war" thing. It's almost like they were in fact good at what they did, and their combat records showed that.
No, their combat records show that they were fighting a greatly outnumbered force with less supplies, less equipment, and no air support. The fact that you are pulling out "intangibles" out your ass is pretty conclusive proof that you can't see beyond your biases. Good thing the actual US military staff wasn't so blinded by American exceptionalism and planned accordingly.

>Luftwaffe was not a small air force, what the fuck are you on m8.

It was smaller than the British air force, the Soviet air force, and I think smaller than the French. However, their CAS doctrines proved much more effective than the strategic air doctrines that the allies employed, and wound up winning despite their size.

>Here you go again with your redefining of words to suit your narrative. If you want to argue that rearming doesn't mean rearming, then why do you even bother to try to discuss things with other people? Just talk to yourself. That's what you are essentially doing anyway.

And you have failed to provide any other criteria, preferring instead to attack mine. Come up with a way to demonstrate the difference between arming for war, and general replacement and modernization.

>You honestly think the planning for the expansion of the army began with just randomly passing a conscription bill then playing it by the ear?

When you have to deal with a decentralized power structure endemic to a country like the U.S., yes, it fucking was.

>Maybe the fact that the government figures literally discussed rearming for war in those terms?

[citation needed]

>Or that the rearmament of late 30s were nowhere in line with normal defense spending?

[citation needed]

> Or that scholars agree that the rearmament was in full swing in 1939?

[citation needed]

1/2

>Yet you manage to be wrong about literally everything.

I notice how you haven't actually rebutted any of the factual claims I made there.

>No, their combat records show that they were fighting a greatly outnumbered force with less supplies, less equipment, and no air support

And? Part of war is actually preparing your industrial base, producing the things you need, and having the strategic depth to realize which fights you can win and which ones you can't. This might come as a shock to you, but most people prefer to fight wars they can win, and win relatively easily.

>The fact that you are pulling out "intangibles" out your ass is pretty conclusive proof that you can't see beyond your biases.

Can you read? I mention intangibles to refer to your claim that Americans were a "pitiful" fighting force. Because by any objective battlefield metric, they were either the best or one of the best.

>Good thing the actual US military staff wasn't so blinded by American exceptionalism and planned accordingly.

It has nothing to do with "American exceptionalism" you fucking retard. Americans enjoyed overwhelming material superiority (because they performed one of the most comprehensive and biggest rapid armaments in history), and planned accordingly. Why stick in your infantry in risky assaults like others were often forced to when you have overwhelming air and artillery advantages that enable you to advance at the same speed with far less risk?

It is in fact because they planned accordingly that they were better, and the only way you can claim that the Americans underperformed is to either invalidate their logistical achievements, which is stupid; or to make some claim that they weren't fighting "ruggedly" enough to meet your arbitrary standards because they didn't have to, which is also stupid.

The US ranked low because they weren't preparing for war.

>Germany not number 1

>It was smaller than the British air force, the Soviet air force, and I think smaller than the French.
No, it was not. You could've found out by spending another 30 seconds of googling but no, you couldn't be bothered to waste an entire minute on learning history before making several posts.

>However, their CAS doctrines proved much more effective than the strategic air doctrines that the allies employed, and wound up winning despite their size.
Yeah that's exactly why the French and the Brits lost in the air in BoF, because they were using their "strategic air doctrines." Seriously, how do you morons even imagine shit like this?

>When you have to deal with a decentralized power structure endemic to a country like the U.S., yes, it fucking was.
No it fucking wasn't.

>[citation needed]
Funny how citationfags are always the ones who never provide any themselves.

>And?
And? It means US Army was a comparatively incompetent fighting force. Do I really have to spell everything out for you?

>Because by any objective battlefield metric, they were either the best or one of the best.
By any objective battlefield metric, German army was far superior to American army. See Zetterling or van Creveld. Oh, and plz gib citations for any of your halfwit claims.

>It is in fact because they planned accordingly that they were better
Are you incapable of reading? US army planned for an overwhelming advantage because it acknowledged that it was 80% as good as the Germany army pound for pound. Now you are trying to spin that as the reason why the US army was actually the best evah and got leet k/d ratio?

>No, it was not. You could've found out by spending another 30 seconds of googling but no, you couldn't be bothered to waste an entire minute on learning history before making several posts.

Completely wrong

>Seriously, how do you morons even imagine shit like this?

We read award-winning historians like this guy

amazon.com/Bomber-Command-Zenith-Military-Classics/dp/0760345201

>Funny how citationfags are always the ones who never provide any themselves.

You can't read too good, can you? But if you want to know more about the campaign in Italy, I would recommend this

amazon.com/Path-Victory-Mediterranean-Theater-World/dp/0374529760

Where, among other things, you will find that Allied advances in Italy were mostly done by a mountain infiltration technique, and about how the Salerno counterattack failed despite everything kind of going right for the Germans, which were the factual claims I mean.

>And? It means US Army was a comparatively incompetent fighting force.

How does that prove any degree of incompetence? Competent forces fight battles on advantageous terms. It's the incompetent militaries that enter into wars on a position of inferiority and then try to figure out a way to win anyway.

>By any objective battlefield metric, German army was far superior to American army.

I'm not seeing a metric.

>See Zetterling or van Creveld.

I'm not familiar with Zetterling, but I've read and quite enjoyed things of Van Creveld's like Supplying War, where he constantly trashes the Germans and German generals for their inability to conduct a modern logistical war.

>Oh, and plz gib citations for any of your halfwit claims.

Well, let's see, you can refer to the above links for casualty reports, and I think it's common knowledge that the U.S. forces constantly gained ground, but if you really need to be educated about the general course of the Western Front of WW2, I'd honestly start with wiki.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Front_(World_War_II)#1944.E2.80.9345:_The_Second_Front

Note how the Americans constantly advance and the Germans constantly retreat.

>Are you incapable of reading? US army planned for an overwhelming advantage because it acknowledged that it was 80% as good as the Germany army pound for pound.

That's the stupidest thing I've heard all night. The Germans outnumbered the Soviets at the opening contact of Barbarossa. Was that because the German soldiers were worse than the Soviet ones and needed to make up the difference?

amazon.com/Stumbling-Colossus-World-Modern-Studies/dp/0700608796/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1464753437&sr=1-1&keywords=stumbling colossus the red army on the eve of world war

Armies aim for overwhelming advantage because they generally want to fight on the best terms possible. They don't always get it, but they always want it. Fair fights are for suckers. And the people who get those overwhelming advantages are usually the best armies, almost by definition.

> Now you are trying to spin that as the reason why the US army was actually the best evah and got leet k/d ratio?

[sarcasm] Yes, clearly they should have charged into battle buck naked and beaten the enemies to death with their giant glorious penises, because that would show off their martial spirit the best. [/sarcasm]

It's not spin you retard. It's the definition of good operations.

Americans + Brits + Canadians took a year to defeat 30% of the Wehrmacht while having 3:1 troop advantage, 4:1 AFV advantage, and 10:1 aircraft advantage. Not to mention the gross disparities in ammunition, rations, medicine, fuel, radios, and everything else that mattered. You are telling me that means the US army was objectively superior to the Wehrmacht in WW2?

>Note how the Americans constantly advance and the Germans constantly retreat.
Americans should've advanced a lot faster, except for their inefficiency.

>Armies aim for overwhelming advantage because they generally want to fight on the best terms possible.
That's great. But that has nothing to do with my point, which is that the US military staff calculated American fighting power at 20% less than the German one pound for pound. This is not something we can explain away by repeating cliches.

>It's the definition of good operations.
Only in your headcanon.

>Completely wrong
Really? What award winning historian says the LW was smaller than the French air force in 1939?

>Americans + Brits + Canadians took a year to defeat 30% of the Wehrmacht

Wrong again.

axishistory.com/axis-nations/134-campaigns-a-operations/campaigns-a-operations/2085-number-of-german-divisions-by-front-in-world-war-ii

don-caldwell.we.bs/jg26/thtrlosses.htm

> 3:1 troop advantage

Wrong.

ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USA/USA-E-Supreme/USA-E-Supreme-E.html

4:1 AFV advantage

Amazingly right, more or less

10:1 aircraft advantage.

Why do you pull numbers out of your ass like that? I mean eventually they got there by shooting down most of the Luftwaffe, but when it comes to aircraft committed? You're wrong again. Go look at the production figures put in upthread.

> Not to mention the gross disparities in ammunition, rations, medicine, fuel, radios, and everything else that mattered. You are telling me that means the US army was objectively superior to the Wehrmacht in WW2?

Yes, I am, because they

A) Actually made the things they needed, which makes them more effective

and

B) Won, consistently.

You don't get brownie points for being a dirty, underequipped, ragged horde, no matter how much you try to claim that is the case.

>Americans should've advanced a lot faster, except for their inefficiency.

Why should they have? It's a strategic decision to trade more risk and consequently lives for time. They were winning the war, and handidly. Why rush things?

>that's great. But that has nothing to do with my point, which is that the US military staff calculated American fighting power at 20% less than the German one pound for pound.

I haven't seen a citation for that.

>This is not something we can explain away by repeating facts.

FTFY

>Only in your headcanon.

Show me an operational manual which advocates throwing away advantages you possess in terms of things like fire support or logistical efficacy.

>Really? What award winning historian says the LW was smaller than the French air force in 1939?

>It was smaller than the British air force, the Soviet air force, and I think smaller than the French.

Notice how the French were the one I said I wasn't sure of? By the way, I'm assuming you're implicitly surrendering the point that the LW was smaller than the British or the Soviet air forces.

Russia was top before and after the war the difference was that before the war no one knew and after the war everyone did.

Well you greatly.reminded us in kore and vietnam burgerclapper ;)

I can't tell if this is one of the better Veeky Forums threads or one of the worst.

>Fleet that isn't worth shit
>Less planes and tanks than France
>Military production is worth balls
>Starts the war with a debt of 40 billion Reichsmarks against GDP of 30 billion.

>Putting Germany at number 1, ever.

>>Korea
Well we won that conflict seeing as how we went in with the objective of preserving the ROK which we achieved.

>>vietnam
Our loss in this conflict had nothing to do with our military being weak.

America's record over the last 50 years with conventional operations and warfare is pretty stellar. The US might not have counterinsurgency down, but they're easily the best military in the world as far as conventional means go.

Oh how the French had fallen ):

>I saw a documentary that said the US was ranked 19th or something before the war
We had a powerful navy, but our army strength was severely lacking. Truthfully, even during WWI our manpower was limited. We didn't have a strong standing army until WWII. We were also lacking in airpower before the war kicked off. Once the war began we started manufacturing a lot of the airpower that would be used in WWII.

I'd probably say
>Germany
>UK
>France
>Japan
>USA
>Russia
>Italy
If you wanted a definite strength tier. By '42 it went

>USA
>Germany
>Russia
>UK
>Japan
>France
>Italy

user seeing you completely BTFO that naziboo made my day. Thank you for posting the good reading material as well.

>Notice how the French were the one I said I wasn't sure of? By the way, I'm assuming you're implicitly surrendering the point that the LW was smaller than the British or the Soviet air forces.
RAF had around 3500 operational aircraft (of all types), half of them obsolete biplanes like the Gladiator or Vildeveest. LW had around 4000 operational aircraft, most of them modern aircraft like Bf 109E.
The VVS's situation was similarly dire. They had a large air force, but nearly all of their aircraft were obsolete.
Basically you had zero knowledge of WW2 before you entered this thread, then you made it up as the thread went on, and kept up an argument by willfully ignoring facts and selectively googling whatever confirmed your biases. It's pathetic that there are people who choose to spend their time that way.

Your "citations" are literal nonsequiturs. Even ignoring the poor quality of your sources, the fact is most of the time they don't even address the point you claim. Moreover it's patently clear that you don't even understand what you're reading. For example, you hold up
>axishistory.com/axis-nations/134-campaigns-a-operations/campaigns-a-operations/2085-number-of-german-divisions-by-front-in-world-war-ii
as if it proves anything. Ignoring the fact that you are "citing" to a forum page, and ignoring the fact that the person reading your post has to guess what the fuck you are even trying to say (assuming your point is that more than 30% of the Wehrmacht was committed to the western front), you completely fail to understand that division numbers do not translate directly to troop strength or force strength. Not all divisions were equal, and this was the case within armies and across different armies.

>Why do you pull numbers out of your ass like that? I mean eventually they got there by shooting down most of the Luftwaffe, but when it comes to aircraft committed? You're wrong again. Go look at the production figures put in upthread.
You are literally arguing that aircraft committed = aircraft produced. Do you even have the mental capacity to understand why that is retarded?

>RAF had around 3500 operational aircraft (of all types), half of them obsolete biplanes like the Gladiator or Vildeveest. LW had around 4000 operational aircraft, most of them modern aircraft like Bf 109E.

I like how you play up the Luftwaffe's making sure that all of their aircraft are ready to go (because they were planning for a war in September whereas the British weren't) to somehow claim that the RAF was smaller than the Luftwaffe. Because, it fucking wasn't.

ww2-weapons.com/raf-squadrons-in-september-1939/

ibiblio.org/hyperwar/AAF/AAF-Luftwaffe/AAF-Luftwaffe-2.html

And that's not even going into how the RAF prioritized bombers over fighters, and large bombers at that: It costs a hell of a lot more to build a twin engined bomber than a single engined fighter.

>Basically you had zero knowledge of WW2

Pot, meet kettle.

>and kept up an argument by willfully ignoring facts

Assuming you're the same guy from last evening, you haven't presented a single fact, not even an internet citation, let alone something from a real scholarly source. You've just made claims, and baseless ones at that.

Doesn't matter. USA was pound for pound number 1 after. Those list are like boxing PFP list. Its all subjective, we don't know how good someone is until they actually duke it out.

USA still PFP 1 but they keep ducking China and Russia. USA stop being soft and fight !

>Your "citations" are literal nonsequiturs.

Not my fault if you're too stupid to understand them.

>Even ignoring the poor quality of your sources

I've not only cited to them, I've cited to literal historical books written by literal historians. Meanwhile, I haven't seen anything backing up any of the shit against me.

>Ignoring the fact that you are "citing" to a forum page,

Which itself provides where it gets its information from.....

>and ignoring the fact that the person reading your post has to guess what the fuck you are even trying to say (assuming your point is that more than 30% of the Wehrmacht was committed to the western front

You can follow a reply chain!

> you completely fail to understand that division numbers do not translate directly to troop strength or force strength.

Except of course, that it's pretty damn well established that by 1944, you had a hell of a lot more than 30% of the Heer, to say nothing of the Luftwaffe, arrayed against the Western Allies. You want a more scholarly source? Try this

amazon.com/Battle-Belorussia-Forgotten-Campaign-October/dp/0700623299/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1464820941&sr=1-1&keywords=belorussia 1944

Where you will see the disposition of Wehrmacht forces all around Europe to give a sense of the scope of the Belorussia
>You are literally arguing that aircraft committed = aircraft produced. Do you even have the mental capacity to understand why that is retarded?

Nope, I also brought up Don Caldwell's research, which shows where the Luftwaffe was committed by ratio. You can then use the numbers there, combined with the total aircraft produced, to compute the amount of planes arrayed against whom.

>WE WUZ KANGS AND SHIIET

Fucking naziboos

>I like how you play up the Luftwaffe's making sure that all of their aircraft are ready to go (because they were planning for a war in September whereas the British weren't) to somehow claim that the RAF was smaller than the Luftwaffe. Because, it fucking wasn't.
Brits weren't exactly taken by surprise if that's what you're trying to say. Both countries were on war footing, and the reason British operational aircraft number is so low is because their inventory was largely obsolete. Why do you think their operational aircraft was 50% biplanes?

>And that's not even going into how the RAF prioritized bombers over fighters, and large bombers at that: It costs a hell of a lot more to build a twin engined bomber than a single engined fighter.
Around 1800 of Luftwaffe strength was in twin-engined aircraft, including 200 Bf110s which are fighters.

>you haven't presented a single fact, not even an internet citation, let alone something from a real scholarly source.
What are Zetterling and Van Creveld? Sorry I didn't hastily grab links from the internet, I have a different idea of what reliable source is.

>Except of course, that it's pretty damn well established that by 1944, you had a hell of a lot more than 30% of the Heer, to say nothing of the Luftwaffe, arrayed against the Western Allies. You want a more scholarly source? Try this
No, it's not pretty damn well established at all. In fact the opposite is the case. I don't know what you're trying to prove by linking a book on Belorussia. Possibly you are trying to make believe that you have read books in your life, hoping that if you toss links and book names people will take that at face value. You should realize, however, that reading about Belorussian campaign is not the best way to learn about the western front, and not the best source to lean on either.

>Both countries were on war footing, and the reason British operational aircraft number is so low is because their inventory was largely obsolete.

I don't think you know what "operational aircraft" means. Even backwards, obsolescent planes are operational if they are maintained and ready to fly.

Oh yeah, and with 16 hurricane squadrons, 11 spitfire squadrons, and 8 gladiator squadrons, to say nothing of all those blenheims and Hampdens they were fielding, your claim that they were "half biplanes" is full of shit.

>Around 1800 of Luftwaffe strength was in twin-engined aircraft, including 200 Bf110s which are fighters.

So that makes a bit less than half of their inventory. Meanwhile, 2/3 of the RAF was in bomber command at the outset of the war, primarily fielding twin engined planes.

>What are Zetterling and Van Creveld?

And who are Hastings, Glantz, and Porch? You've ignored those equally.

>No, it's not pretty damn well established at all. In fact the opposite is the case.

Read some Glatnz.

>Possibly you are trying to make believe that you have read books in your life, hoping that if you toss links and book names people will take that at face value.

Remind me, which of your claims by Zetterling and Van Creveld have you even alluded to by book, let alone by any real indication they say what you're claiming they do?

>You should realize, however, that reading about Belorussian campaign is not the best way to learn about the western front, and not the best source to lean on either.

Maybe you should read the book, because he goes into the dispersal of the German Heer, which is exactly the fucking point if you want to know about how much of their forces were facing the Western Allies.

Wait, North Korea has the largest army in history?

Prewar the U.S was pretty garbage because the Great Depression.
Pearl Harbor went down and the US war machine started turning and men were throwing themselves into recruiting offices. The draft helped sure but I'm willing to guess the volunteer rate was insane.

The Kingdom existed. It was in one of the most populace areas and it had extreme security threats on all sides. It wouldn't be shocking.

The Levant was very populated. Like 10% of the Roman Empire was Jewish in 40 AD.

At the time everyone ranked the French much higher, even the Nazis.

The Russians were ranked low even by the Russians. Primary sources from Synder's Blood Lands show Soviets afraid of a Polish invasion in the 20's and a Japanese liberation of Ukranians in work camps to take the east in the 30's.

Potential wise, the United States' combination of GDP and population dwarfed any other player by wide margins, but it would also need to have cross oceanic supply chains to win.

In retrospect, of course the U.S. was the most powerful. It's K/D ratio in combat against the Japs was highly favorable, it had a superior navy and airforce to the Germans, and though the Germans did better in head to head ground operations, the American had far more manpower to throw in.

Plus, historically they got nukes at the end.

how is it possible that the Germans gained more manpower between 1914 and 1918 did conscription far outnumber deaths? Also, I know nothing of Chinese history, but the jump from >250,000 men available under the Jin Dynasty in 400 AD to 650,000 only 200 hundred years later under the Sui Dynasty seems like a massive leap.

Interestingly, it is indicative of just how destructive the second world war was to Germany given the obscene number of men called upon to fight, the highest of any country in History, considering their population in 1944 was around 70million. An an entire nation completely submerged in the war, such a tragedy. Not to mention what else the Nazis got up to.

>the U.S. was the most powerful

Not him, and I don't know much about WW1, but very probably. In modern, postindustrial conflicts, you usually see troop counts on both sides rising for most of the conflict, and only the most disastrous of losses (entire army groups or the equivalent being obliterated) do the deaths outweigh the recruitment.

I mean, look at WW2. The time when the German forces were at their greatest overall number was in early 1944, and yet the writing was on the wall for them.

Also, the Jin dynasty was wrecked. The civil wars at the end of the Han period were absolutely devastating. The last census of the Han reported 55.4 million people. and the first of the Jin reported 16.1. Now, some of that is probably just breakdown of society and losing track of people, but it's very reasonable to assume that the overall population reduction was some 60-65%.

The Jin were very, very weak, and spent most of their time either fighting each other over the scraps or trying to hold out barbarians from just walking into a depopulated China.

America Fuck yeah,

we supplied guns to our allies, we supplied tanks to our allies, we supplied planes to our allies, we supplied food, tents, radios, all sorts of shit. The soviets liked our stuff, really liked it, crews were quite comfy in a sherman tank since it was reliable and fairly roomy (and easier to escape from if it went up in flames, which it rarely did since we sent diesel versions to them). the P-39 and P-63 air/king-cobra's were also well liked for their QUALITY control.

the US had the best logistics of any nation in ww2.
the US used a semi-automatic rifle as standard issue for every soldier, and had select fire carbines for support/rear-line soldiers.

The US was the best!