Was there ever a point in world history where Russia could have actually beaten the US in a war?

Honestly, in 1966-72 the Warsaw Pact probably could have taken Western Europe while the US was pinned down and/or demoralized by Vietnam. Colin Powell even said as much in American Generals, and described 72 as the low point.

>Honestly, in 1966-72 the Warsaw Pact probably could have taken Western Europe while the US was pinned down and/or demoralized by Vietnam
Warsaw pact had better/larger army for most of the Cold War. The main reason Americans wanted to develop the nuke was because they knew they couldn't beat USSR in a land war and nuke is a great equalizer in that sense because it relies on science and industry being top notch to even produce it and then on your industry being able to outproduce the enemy and on air superiority which again goes to industrial superiority.

Between the establishment of the soviet state and the WWII

There would've been no possible way for the soviets to defeat the US, their economy and the purges of Lenin and Stalin would have crippled their armies.

Even with the fact that we barely had a trained fighting force post WWI.

At one point the US was providing food aid to the soviets during a particularly bad famine.

>There would've been no possible way for the soviets to defeat the US, their economy and the purges of Lenin and Stalin would have crippled their armies.
Funnily enough there was another chap who thought the same. I think his name started with Adolf and ended with something weird like Schicklgruber. He figured he'd just send the lads in and they'd have a picnic, bit of a field day, go around, kill some Russians and take over the country and get on with the real plans.

1970s.

Soviet was at their peak power and the US military was in shambles because of post Vietnam cuts and end of the draft.

>implying anyone could invade America
You'd have to go through at least 20 million armed militiamen, probably closer to 50 million should the government supply arms to volunteers, all fighting to death for their homes. And that's AFTER you go through the US military.

Plus you got the pond on both sides, so supplies need to be shipped overseas, meaning you'd need to completely wipeout the US Navy unless you want your supply lines constantly pirated.

>1943
>implying the Russian navy, who couldn't even beat the Japanese navy, could have beaten the much larger, more advanced, better trained American Navy from any point in history

The US has always had a powerful navy. In the War of 1812 the US trounced the British on the high seas regularly. In 1812 the Russians could not have hoped to compete, especially not so far away from home. Any time after 1812 the US navy only grows larger, and the Russian navy more and more irrelevant.

>Was there ever a point in world history where Russia could have actually beaten the US in a war?
No.

And he would have been at least partly right about that too if his country hadn't been at war with Britain and the USA as well as the soviets.

>first strike
Lmao

Most of the Cold War, I'd say 1989 at the absolute latest although the match would have been much more even then.

>offensively
Absolutely not
>defensively
Every point in history except directly after the fall of the Soviet Union. The US could technically beat Russia in a war now, but it would be far from a total war. It would be much more of a blockade and deep strike bombing missions from stealth aircraft, very little actually shooty shooty bang bang would happen and the conflict would be very low key to avoid nuclear escalation. The war's terms for defeat would also be very light, probably bordering more on the humiliation side of things than any actual demands and certainly no territorial changes would take place, except perhaps land going back to Ukraine.

>1989
lolno
The Russians lost the advantage in the 70s. Maybe before that they could have steamrolled Europe if nukes could have been avoided, but the Russians fell behind super hard in the 70s, especially in regards to aircraft. By the 80s, especially '89, the Russians were a fucking joke of an armed forces. Armies don't do well when a country goes bankrupt.

>implying the US wasn't a top 3 world power by 1890
You actually have no idea what you're talking about.
Kill yourself.

>russians could have launched a first strike
>all doctrine for Russian forces was for a retaliatory strike because they knew the US had much superior first strike capabilities, especially in regards to nuclear weaponry

Real life isn't World in Conflict.

>amerifat got triggered

Well memed!

Hey I'm not a dumbass that jumped in an argument and started telling people to kill themselves.

The Warsaw Pact still outnumbered NATO in 1989, and their technology was about on par. They would however have to deal with a bunch of internal unrest.

>and their technology was about on par.
No it wasn't.

>American tests in the 90's showed that the M1A1 Abrams's 120mm gun could not reliably penetrate the T-80U's armor
>MiG-29s achieved incredibly lopsided K:D ratios in wargames with the German Air Force

Sounds on par to me.

>US military was a joke before and even during world war 1

Because they had no reason to have a standing army or any large size. Hell we still had militias until the National Guard became a thing in 1903. In percent of total population in the military, the Union Army had been larger than America's WWI military. Unless you account for potential size it's not a very good metric.

The Russian Imperial military at the beginning of WWI wasn't much better. They liquidated a ton of assents and especially gold and still needed substantial loans and equipment from the British, a position very similar to their needs fulfilled by Lend-Lease in WW2.

During the Carter administration.

Though, it would be more the fault of Carter than the Soviets being better.

They outnumbered NATO in the age of cluster bombs, MLRS, cruise missiles, and 120mm depleted uranium shotguns. And of course, they were not technologically on par.
Again, the USSR started to shit the bed in the 70s, they completely fell behind in the air, with the F-14 and F-15 especially being two planes they simply could not compete with, which is why the Russians doubled down on SAM systems. An already shaky keep up became an impossible gap to close. Computer systems in general were laughably behind the West, which led to the West outpacing the East in practically every area. Fire control, Command and Control, radar, aircraft, night vision, you name it. But it would also be due to the USSR simply collapsing in on itself. Their supply lines faltered, most units went without new replacement tech entirely, training faltered, their satellite countries were openly refuting them by the late 80s even. The USSR was a shitshow by the 80s.

The first one simply isn't true, the second one is irrelevant.

The peacekeeper missile, the Ohio ballistic missile sub, and the stealth bomber were all started under the Carter administration and finished just in time for Reagan to claim credit for them.

>armor
1990 called. Soviet doctrine a shit. Also, not all, or even most, of soviet union units had access to t80s of ANY model, nor would production be bale to fix this in the event of war.

The reverse is not true as far as the us army is concerned.

>mig-29
Performed terribly the few times it had to face f15s. Those being the american air superiortiy fighter.

MiG-29's also had a laughably pathetic flight radius.
Something like 500 miles, if I recall.

>1990 called. Soviet doctrine a shit
The shit? But was talking about late 80s and 90s

1960s-1970s

There was a lot of mistrust towards the US government from the populace. There were also numerous gangs and armed organizations like the Black Panthers, Black Guerrilla Family, Black Liberation Army, Puerto Rican independence groups, etc. Pair all this with a failing economy and obvious constrained racial relations, then it's likely many groups would rise at the chance to rebel while uncle sam is heavily distracted.

The Soviets also had loyal and sympathetic terror groups operating worldwide. These groups would answer the call to attack American logistics and supply lines. The Soviets also have Cuba, and Cuba is notorious for sending its military trainers to foreign lands. Imagine the Black Panthers being trained by the KGB and Cuban military. Imagine the Cubans making a surprise attack in New Orleans or Houston or elsewhere.

The only way the US could defeat the Soviets would be to convince Mao to join against the Soviets. Even then, terror groups and rebels would still reek havoc upon the mainland and the US would be greatly fractured.

Weren't most of those groups absolutely riddled with government agents?

The geography of both countries make them almost impossible to invade and fight a conventional war. It would probably require significant internal uprising.

Retarded question

Russia would never defeat the United States in the United States. The United States would never defeat Russia in Russia

>reek havoc

Maybe, but the US gov't would be tied down with the war.

I'm pretty sure insurrection started by agents of the enemy would be considered part of the war, user.
And its not like the FBI would suddenly stop existing just because of a war.

Oh completely.
Some guy on /k/ had a dad who was part of a state police force, who created a honeypot for a white supremacist group, who then seeded an assassination attempt on a senator to see if the group was serious and if so, arrest the fuck out of them, and it turned out like everyone in the group were FBI or police and even a couple guys from the ATF trying to find machine guns or bombs.
The whole thing was a government honeypot and the only people who took the bait were other government officials and LEO.

Here senpai

Federal funding though.

>I will not accept answers for any year before 1800 because the USA was barely even a country at that point.

So was Russia.

Governments just don't suddenly shift all their funding to the military in times of war.
And like I said, if these anti-government groups were a sufficient threat, they'd probably be dealt with.

Goo look up what happened in 1990 and 1991, user. Then look up the soviet reactions to it. I'll wait.

Still though, covert operations would seem less important.

Plus, if KGB came into the mix, it's likely suspected informants would be purged.

I'm going to ignore nukes because nukes just make everyone lose.

No. Russia has some navy but they are not a naval power. They don't have the means to support an invasion across the pacific into the USA.

>black nationalists were a threat
A few dozen roof Koreans managed to put down the nigger rebellion during the Rodney king riots, these group were controlled opposition at best and glorified drug dealing gangs at worst. Not a legitimate threat in any regard.

>covert operations would seem less important.
On the contrary, subversive action against the government in times of war is a pretty serious matter.
There is a reason why the gubbament has multiple branches, its so they can concentrate on multiple things at the same time.
You think the US government hasn't taken into account possible insurrection in times of war?

>Governments just don't suddenly shift all their funding to the military in times of war.
lol are you serious? No no governments totally don't care about a state of war while they're in a state of war fighting a war. Who would be crazy enough to raise war funding at such obviously peaceful times?

Nor do they dedicate all of their funding to the military.
There's still a country to run, which takes funding.

>There's still a country to run, which takes funding.
Funding, yes, but reducing funding. Believe it or not a war is a pretty serious thing and countries tend to stop caring about less important things when they're in times of war. And not to mention if it's a state of total war; then 100% of the economy or damn near close to that is dedicated to the war effort.

But what I'm saying is homeland security would be seen as an equally important part of the war effort.
If the enemy is trying to disrupt your nation's stability by funding and training subversive elements, yes, the government would indeed take that as a serious threat, and try to stop int.

Is this a joke? Or is this another 'Russia so backwards' dig.

Are you retarded? Homeland security is considered fucking important in a war, especially when you KNOW that both you and your enemies are actively trying to subvert each other and have been for decades. On top of that, things like the state police don't just lose their funding in a war, even if the white house goes full fucking retarded and forgets to pay the FBI.

Stop playing rts games. They're turning you into a moron.

I love this R-RUSSIA CAN'T BE INVADED! L-L-LOOK AT HISTORY! meme

Those invaders were retards and did not properly prepare and were too arrogant. If you give Russia the due respect you can easily take it.

What do you mean by defeating?

For the entire cold war Russians could streamroll over continental Europe which is why NATO didn't even consider non-nuclear scenarios(WP did). They didn't have chance to invade mainland US, so I don't know if you count it as "beating".

Probably in 1945 if they played their hand well.

If we're just talking about armies, the Soviets in 1945 could have defeated all of Europe with American deployment included, but it would have achieved nothing, just a ton more of dead people.

>If we're just talking about armies, the Soviets in 1945 could have defeated all of Europe with American deployment included, but it would have achieved nothing, just a ton more of dead people.
This. The westerners realized it too which is why there was Operation Unthinkable but they pussied out at the last chance.

This map is disingenuous and I wish people would stop posting it.
An Allied division was made up of around 20,000 men. A Soviet division was made up of 2,000-4,000 men.

It had almost no trained reserves. Zero. The army was smaller than British Army and due to lack of funding it was trained/equipped worse than Brits(who performed very well in 1914 despite their limited numbers for instance).

The navy itself was quite strong but navy doesn't win wars alone, so countries like France with strong navy(weaker than US but still formidable) and ability to mobilise much, much faster would theoretically beat it easily in head-on clash.

Of course, there's the other problem which many people don't realise. US, similarly to UK needed and needs strong navy, army was an afterthought(not anymore). French for instance needed huge army and reserves, same goes for Germans or Italians as all of them bordered with potentially hostile great powers. Therefore in 1890 nobody in the US cared about army being weak, neither did anybody consider them less of a Great Power because of it, the army was still stronger than Mexican army and UK/Canada wasn't really hostile towards them for a loooong time now so nobody cared. You shouldn't take it personally as well.

Well first off, the US had a massive amount of armed population (militia) compared to everyone else. The army being small is less of an issue when you have a large pool of qualified shooters who will enlist or can be drafted from.

Second, the navy guarantees defensively the army will never actually be used, making that whole deal completely irrelevant. Offensively, it means the US would never attempt more than a blockade until the US had drafted and trained said armed population into a usable army. The US army was small because there was literally no need for it to be big.

Buuullshiiiiit

The US could have militarily defeated Russia in a conventional war from about 1890 to 1949 when they got nukes.
The US propped up Russia during WW2 and if it wasn't for that economic aid USSR would have been rolled by Germany, succinctly.

The US militarised quick enough due to it's overwhelmingly superior economy so any arguments of the US having an inferior or dysfunctional military prior to the war are minimised- the war would be fought over two continents by two extremely large nations, so it wouldn't be quick. US had enough time to reform its military and the economy to do it.

Russia, just as much as the US at any point prior to 1949, needed to reform it's military but it didn't have the economy to do it.

You're basically saying the same thing I've just said.

It's also worth of note that militia alone isn't really example of "trained reserve" as evidenced by American Civil War. Aka. hicks with rifles aren't even close as easy to turn into soldiers as a conscripts who spent 1-3 years in the army few years ago. Things like cooperation between different branches and units, although still not really advanced(lack of coordination between infantry, artillery and support troops was one of the main reason why WW1 devolved into trench warfare) was still beyond the reach of militia because of the scale of the whole thing.

That's not really what I mean.
You can draft anyone to the military, but men who have grown up using a gun all their life are much more likely to make a good soldier than someone who's never even seen a gun before. The US has historically been very quick to create a usable military, much faster than comparable nations have, and largely because so much of its population was very used to, well, using guns.
Not to say other nations weren't able to create massive armies out of civilians, but well, Russian conscripts were simply not the same caliber of troops an American GI was. Germans turned out great quality men with years of training pre war, but during war new soldiers were distinctly under trained by 1944. Largely due to their geography. The US has quite favorable geography, allowing them to create and train armies largely at its own leisure, as basically nothing can actually interrupt said training.
I'm not really saying a militia is a replacement for uh, replacements. I'm saying it's way easier to turn a militia into a military than it is to turn a Californian into a military man.

Just don't count the USA among those who could. The USA citizenry wouldn't tolerate those kinds of casualties.

The US population hates overseas casualties. All casualties at home does is make the US enlistment rate skyrocket and make liberal soccer mom's cry for the blood of the children of our enemies. Any mainland invasion of the US, and subsequent civilian casualties would turn the US into the most militant, nationalistic, Ghengis Khan-esque warrior nation the world has ever seen.

>the USA citizenry wouldn't tolerate those kinds of casualties.
that would depend on who started the war first.

If black nationalists weren't a threat, then why were their groups subject to mass surveillance, COINTELPRO, and political assassinations (Fred Hampton)?

Might I remind you these weren't crips or bloods. These were highly organized groups, led by educated blacks, which were successfully providing for their communities. They had a relatively clear ideology/goal in mind, and they were armed. They had connections too; Huey P. Newton even met with Chinese leadership. If they were to have more arms, proper training, and funding, they would be able to start an extensive urban guerrilla campaign.

>muh niggers!
Go back to /pol/

>The US population hates overseas casualties.
Only in the context of military adventurism.

If you can make a case that the US was attacked first-or if it actually is-nobody gives at a shit.

People got raw, uncensored footage of Tarawa, including of Americans dying.

It fucking raised homefront morale.

You only need to see the first few years after 9/11 too.
Even the Democrats were out for blood.
If the US public have enough reason to believe they were attacked first, they'll be gung ho about fighting all right.

This is the beach at tarawa. That's a pile of dead marines. That's a fucked american tank.

People were shown this with the war in full. Fucking. Swing. They died fighting over some shitty island nobody cared about, against a foe they MASSIVELY outnumbered.

The meme of America not tolerating casualties is exactly that. A meme. A shitty one started by edgy kids and Europeans pissy that their entire continent is militarily impotent.

Well since we were just talking about Russia getting invaded, what did you think I meant?

mexicans are doing a pretty good job right now m8.

Russia/USSR military was also a joke. Stalin made the purgs, so the army was lacking good leadership, their defensive lines were a joke. Their tanks were awful, their air force was poor. The navy was the only good thing.
Do i need to remidn people taht the german army was at a merely 15 km from Moscow during the barbarossa operation?
If they had conquered Moscow the entire USSR would have collapse, as the capital served as a transportation hub and every road and railroad went to there.
The russian advantage at that time was their high patriotism values, their hunt for revenge, the winter and their endless divisions reinforcing the front.
I believe that after ww2 both armies were more or less on the same level and kept that way until the late 70's

>surrender your weapons you racist gun nut
>theres no way you can resist the government drones

>a group of niggers armed with shotguns and hunting rifles could have overthrown the government if they wanted

Left wing logic

>strawman
/pol/ logic

>hunting rifles
He's actually holding a bolt action shotgun, and a shitty one at that.

Capacity is all of two shells in the magazine plus one in the chamber, with mediocre sights.

Great argument. As expected from a leftist cuckold.

1776

The could have beaten anyone and everyone in 1945.

No.

It's literally the reason for the creation for NATO.

>anyone and everyone
No.

1801

>which is highly, highly unrealistic to happen without Ruski retaliation

not between 1945 and 1950, when they didn't even have the bomb.

Patton was right.

I think the the best window of opportunity the soviet union could've used to attempt to defeat the US in a conventional war, at least on mainland europe would've been between the prague spring and the start of detente. Maybe possibly extending into the late seventies even.
Soviet advances in military technology allowed for the commencement of mass production of new equipment such as T-72s, which by the CIA's own admission outclassed American tanks in protection, firepower and mobility.
cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/DOC_0001066239.pdf

This was before the advent and mass fielding of later generation western tank designs such the m1 abrams, which were expected to be equals to the T-72 series. Which were only fielded in considerable numbers in the late 80s or so.

I don't know as much about the airforces of both countries in this time and I do know the american military had yet to make use of aircraft such as the F-14 and beyond hadn't fully replaced older models of aricraft, and that may have meant that the soviet and american airforces were roughly on equal terms.

>men who have grown up using a gun all their life are much more likely to make a good soldier than someone who's never even seen a gun before.

yo believe it or not, the army prefers to train people who have little to no firearms experience cause they won't have picked up any bad shooting habits or flinches.

And it's true, citizen militias are great but most American gun owners aren't on that semi-professional level.

The F-14 is crap though. It was basically a missile launch platform with 0 actual air combat capabilities. It was designed to defend carriers from russian bombers carrying nuclear anti-ship missiles, i.e track them and kill them with long range AA missiles before they get in range to fire.

It's not an air superiority jet. Hell even an old rusty mig-21 would easily kill a F-14 if it comes to a dogfight.

>SU/Warsaw Pact winning a war against Nato/ USA after 1985
>lol Wut

As it was stated again and again the 70s would have been their best chance. In the 80s the best weapons the SU had in its Arsenal where worse then what the NATO started introducing as standard armaments. In regards of computer technology they had a disadvantage of 30 years and weren't even able to reproduce a lot of the the western designs they stole (btw. it is estimated that 60% of soviet weapons were based on stolen designs).

So we assume a conventional war in europe breaks out. I think its safe to assume that after some initial struggle NATO would have air superiority. WP certainly would overrun several NATO defensive positions in the start. At some point a mix of air superiority, stretched logistics, Partisans and equipment malfunctioning would prevent the soviets from further attacking. At this point the better individual quality of NATO troops and armaments would come into play leading to a push back and eventual collapse of WP troops.

this mulatto thinks he wuz zulu and shit

Thanks for informing me, but as whole I do think during the time period the USSR and USA were on par with each other in regards to the capabilities of their aircraft. Though when it comes it sheer numbers the soviets probably outnumbered the americans, at least on mainland europe, but I'm not sure to what extant.

If you count mainland tackeover, the russians would've probably had the petential to shrek the early us up until 1820.
In a limited meme war, like the spanish-american, russia would've probably won at any point before 1890.

Other than that (in nukes aren't involved)
>1944-47
>1955-75
And again, in both periods, russia couldn't have gotten anything better than a strategic victory (as in kicking out nato from eurasia and preventing the us from pulling d-day 2.0)