Is there any plausible scenario in which Operation Unthinkable could happen? How close would it be...

>Soviet divisions were smaller.

But contained equal numbers of riflemen and roughly 2/3 the number of artillery: They were smaller primarily because most logistical functions were handled at the HQ/Army level rather than the divisional level.

>Soviet Army however was far more experienced.

Not really, no. You had British units which were in the fray for far longer than the Soviets were in the war, and American land involvement was about a year and a half behind. How many of those men who were fighting the first push of Barbarossa do you think were still around in 1945?

>Pro-tip: they found Americans and British to be inferior opponents in every sense, and while they dreaded their air superiority and materiel superiority, they found their fighting skills to be lacking.

Which is why they lost ground further and faster and sustained more losses fighting the Americans per given kilometer of front.

>Pro-tip: they found Americans and British to be inferior opponents in every sense, and while they dreaded their air superiority and materiel superiority, they found their fighting skills to be lacking.

They whined because it was "unfair" that they would just smash them with air and artillery fire instead of running in to fight in infantry traps. How does that prove inferiority exactly?

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>Soviets broke German fortified positions on Eastern Front, what makes you think Rhine would be some insurmountable challenge, especially given how Western troops would be demolished even before they retreated behind Rhine?

user. It took the Soviets about 4 months to go from the Vistula to Berlin. Against German forces in 1945 that surrendered as often as they fought, were lacking pretty much everything in material, and were drafting boys and old men to pitch into the meat grinder.

It's about 300 kilometers from the Soviet occupation zones to the Rhine, and you have a big city belt just west of it. How long do you think it will take to even reach the river? Almost certainly the good summer weather will be gone by the time you hit the river, and the Americans will be flooding the area with more troops should hostilities break out.

And that's not counting the fact that they have overwhelming air superiority and love bombing the crap out of logistical nodes, which they can and will do with near impunity.

>Let's say they had 20-30 nukes. That's still nothing. These were early nukes, plus they would be unreliable as fuck.

The ones dropped on Japan blew up just fine. Sure, they're not "Blow up entire USSR", but you can put some serious dents in Soviet industry concentrations, and bases in Northern India (nevermind somewhere like Iraq) could reach just about anywhere in the USSR.

>As you can see, US nuclear arsenal was 13 nukes in 1947. 50 in 1948.

Are you seriously implying that in a field with extremely rapid development like first generation nuclear weapons, that the production decisions aren't going to be the same during a huge war as they are during peace? You know damn well that if war with the Soviets had happened, it would be "Make the nukes we can make now" instead of trying to develop new and better ones.

>But contained equal numbers of riflemen
You're basically picking a non-subject to discuss, those are differences in organization, nothing else.
In absolute terms Soviets had superiority in just about everything.
>You had British units which were in the fray for far longer than the Soviets were in the war
Are you seriously comparing warfare in North Africa with Eastern Front? Jesus Christ man.
>How many of those men who were fighting the first push of Barbarossa do you think were still around in 1945?
Not many but point is Soviets consistently faced best Germany had to offer.
Western Allies faced reserve formations for the most part.
>Which is why they lost ground further and faster and sustained more losses fighting the Americans per given kilometer of front.
Americans had overwhelming superiority in air power and artillery, as well as armor.
Again, those were reserve formations.
>They whined because it was "unfair" that they would just smash them with air and artillery fire instead of running in to fight in infantry traps. How does that prove inferiority exactly?
I'm telling you what German veterans of EF remarked you retarded American.
>user. It took the Soviets about 4 months to go from the Vistula to Berlin. Against German forces in 1945 that surrendered as often as they fought
German troops in East surrendered as often as they fought?
Jesus Christ number 2.
>and the Americans will be flooding the area with more troops should hostilities break out
Yes because it's very easy to flood Western Europe with troops while your mainland is 4000km across the ocean.
>The ones dropped on Japan blew up just fine.
Which doesn't prove shit. Early nukes in general weren't so reliable. US really had proper nuclear arm in early 50's.
>but you can put some serious dents in Soviet industry concentrations
With what arsenal? And devastation nukes cause is overrated, especially for those early nukes.

>Are you seriously implying that in a field with extremely rapid development like first generation nuclear weapons, that the production decisions aren't going to be the same during a huge war as they are during peace? You know damn well that if war with the Soviets had happened, it would be "Make the nukes we can make now" instead of trying to develop new and better ones.
I'm implying they were trying to build up a huge arsenal irregardless.
They couldn't do it so fast, those are estimates, I have no idea what that memo was but those were probably weapons that were already in the process of production.
I gave you the figures for US nuclear arsenal in 1947 and 1948.
First you need to understand how nukes are produced, you need fissile material, which isn't easy to produce and isn't produced quickly.

There's a reason OU never went ahead. Because Western commanders knew what I'm telling you.
You're some American idiot who's blinded by ideological and cultural opposition to Soviets/Russians so you construct some fantasy where outnumbered and practically green American and British troops would be able to destroy the most effective and battle-hardened army in the world at that time, because in your mind Americans and British are inherently superior to Slavs, or something like that.
You're totally fucking wrong, stop posting any moment.

>Is there any plausible scenario in which Operation Unthinkable could happen?

Going back in time to about 1900 and preventing every single Western political institution from being infested with Russophiles and Communists.

>idiots jerking themselves raw over inane technical details of irrelevant pieces of hardware ignoring the fact that appeasing russia has been the cornerstone of western foreign policy for almost 100 years

And you're ignoring one of the most important factors: in the mind of average Western soldier, thanks to propaganda Soviets were allies.
Do you really think mobilized Americans who just beat Germans and Japanese would be eager to go fight a far stronger opponent and shed ample amounts of blood?
Do you think they would be eager to attack troops they still considered to be their allies on Churchill's whim?
Sure they would obey orders but their motivation would be shit.
This isn't 50's.

>You're basically picking a non-subject to discuss, those are differences in organization, nothing else.

You're the one who tried to explain away historical force calculations by claiming that the only reason Western Allied divisions had more firepower was because the Soviet divisions were smaller.

Explain how those same clerks and truck drivers and signalmen being assigned at a higher level on the organizational chart changes raw firepower.

>In absolute terms Soviets had superiority in just about everything.

Except for tanks, mortars, machine guns, planes, trucks, and fuel, you'd be right!

>Not many but point is Soviets consistently faced best Germany had to offer.

No, not really. The Soviets faced about 80% of the Heer in 1942, which leaked its way down to about 60 % come 1945, but there were never decisions of "let's send our best people east and not west". Panzer Lehr wasn't some unfit band of babies, and the biggest deployments of the Volksturm were all East, not West.

>I'm telling you what German veterans of EF remarked you retarded American.

Yeah, and memoirs are such detailed tactical assessments of the relative strengths of forces, some of which you might or might not have actually faced.

>German troops in East surrendered as often as they fought?

Where exactly do you think those 2.8 million PoWs the Soviets took came from, user?

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>Yes because it's very easy to flood Western Europe with troops while your mainland is 4000km across the ocean.

When you have total command of the sea, not hard at all. A C4 troopship could make the trip across the atlantic in a bit less than a week. How long, by the way, would it take to get from a recruiting center in, I don't know, Omsk, to the front?

>Which doesn't prove shit. Early nukes in general weren't so reliable. US really had proper nuclear arm in early 50's.

What possible standard were you using to demonstrate "Unreliability"? I'm not aware of any nuclear failures post trinity.

>With what arsenal? And devastation nukes cause is overrated, especially for those early nukes.

About 7,000 B-17s, and well over 10,000 B-24s for a start. That's not mentioning the new B-29s, and oh yeah, the entire RAF Bomber Command. How much of Soviet oil production was concentrated at Baku again?

>I'm implying they were trying to build up a huge arsenal irregardless.

And you're basing that assertion on what exactly?

>They couldn't do it so fast, those are estimates, I have no idea what that memo was but those were probably weapons that were already in the process of production.

You didn't read it, did you? He's already mentioned the two that have already been dropped on Japan.

>First you need to understand how nukes are produced, you need fissile material, which isn't easy to produce and isn't produced quickly.

And you already had the pipeline in place to produce it. What the hell do you think Fermi was working on for most of the Manhattan project?

>There's a reason OU never went ahead. Because Western commanders knew what I'm telling you.

The reason it never went ahead was that it was a British design and the Americans weren't on board, because the COSTS WERE HIGH. Not that they were expecting INVINCIBLE ENDLESS SOVIET WAVES RAPING THEIR WAY TO BRITAIN!

You would know this if you actually bothered to read the documentations involved.

>You're some American idiot who's blinded by ideological and cultural opposition to Soviets/Russians so you construct some fantasy where outnumbered and practically green American and British troops would be able to destroy the most effective and battle-hardened army in the world at that time, because in your mind Americans and British are inherently superior to Slavs, or something like that.

LEARN TO READ!>And they WILL advance. They're still a lot stronger on the ground then than the Western Allies are. It'll take time for the air and production advantages to make themselves felt.

American and British forces were not "practically green". They had an overwhelming air advantage. They had a significant artillery advantage. They had a colossal long term production advantage. They could strike at the enemy's heartland without fear of retaliation in kind. These are pretty solid material objective facts that you ignore because.... I don't know, were your parents siblings or something?

The Soviets are going to get one good push in 1945, that's it. If they can't break the Western Allies in it, they're going to lose. If the Western Allies were willing to suck up losses and write France off (assuming France falls, which is a long way from given), the Soviets lose regardless of what they do. If they fail to capture France in that one opportunity, they lose. The ONLY way they can win is if the western will to fight gives out, because Western production is vastly greater than Soviet war production.

Those are long odds, any way you slice it.

>appeasing russia has been the cornerstone of western foreign policy for almost 100 years

>All of Western continental Europe invades and attempts the physical extermination of all ethnic Russians.

FUCKING WHAT M8?

Oh and you are either a slav or at the very least russiophile. All you russiaboos are doing is downplaying the effect of lend and lease. Nobody is saying that the soviets would have collapsed without it but they wouldn´t have been able to push back the germans the way they did historically, so a stalemate/ceasefire is the most likely outcome.

So lets assume unthinkable starts in 45/46 (ofc there is no way in hell this actually would have happened), the soviets had a massive advantage in ground troops and were more experienced true but you don´t really think like it happened irl that most of the german military brass would aid the americans? They would have every it of wisdom the wehrmacht had, so thats about your retarded point about the russians beeing more experienced.

Now to the superiority in ground forces:
As this user said, the soviets would get a good push but are you seriously so deluded to think they would be able to clear all of mainland europe? Italy,germany,france and most likely spain? Especially if we choose not to ignore the effects of crushing air superiority like you do? The germans were basically unable to move divisions in daylight in 1944, do you seriously think the soviet airforce could prevent this from happening in the long run?

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Now to the issue of manpower:
Look up the huge losses shit like this caused,

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Dnieper

we can debate if the losses aren´t overblown etc but i think we can agree they were really high. Now the western allies would be a tougher nut to crack than the germans in 43, also there would be partisans but most likely they would act against the soviets (oh and not to mention all of this while beeing bombed to oblivion) so the crossing of the rhine would cause massive losses. My point is the soviets were not scrapping the bottom of the barrel but they sure as hell wouldn´t have been able to withstand the same losses again and at some point they wouldn´t be able to replace their losses. The Americans on the other hand still had a ton of manpower and allies who already were in war mode. The soviets only conquered ravaged lands, in which they took a good while irl to install satellite regimes who could provide meaningful military aid.

The even bigger picture:
From a technical/strategical aspect the americans always used far less of their GDP to achieve better military technology, field a superior (or later in the CW equal) airforce, a vastly superior navy, all of this while still maintaining enough ground troops to act as deterrent. A soviet victory could have never been more then overrun germany, france, italy and threaten the use of nukes to secure the gains. In this scenario we have no soviet nukes and americans who devote a similiar share of their gdp to the military, so how in gods name are the soviets supposed to win.

I think that a good and sustained propaganda effort on the Allied side, especially for Americans who didnt suffer that much throughout the war, could have convince the population to sustain the war effort for a few more years.

The problem is whether the Allies could beat the Soviets and i think the answer is yes but now without tremendous losses. We have to remember that the only reason there was a Soviet Union in 1945 is the American help they received throughout the war. The USSR was on constant life support from 1941 to 1945.
Without the aid and keeping in mind the huge amount of losses the soviets already suffered, the miserable living conditions in Russia as a result of the German invasion, the Allied victory is assured. Not to mention millions of Eastern Europeans who stood between the frontlines and the Motherland who absolutely hated the Russians and their criminal ideology. In 1945 there were already anti-communist partisan groups being formed everywhere in the Soviet occupation zone.
The problem is that the western powers are all democracies and thus their leaders are afraid to take such radical actions and assume responsibility in fear of losing the next .

*in fear of losing the next elections

I don't think the eastern euros under soviet occupation would have supported the Soviets.

What the US and UK needed to make it successful. Was B-29s and atomic bombs. So they could go deep into Soviet territory and blow out their ability to produce war materials.

The soviets were basically at the limit of their logistics ability in Berlin. Though this wouldn't be a problem for them. As the allies would only roll them back and make the logistics trainer shorter. While making it longer on the US. Eventually they would reach a point where the Soviets' supply was good again, and the US could not truck in stuff fast enough. They would stalemate. The new Soviet border would be drawn there.

silly question: couldn't the USA just drop "the bomb" on Moscow or something? The US dropped two on Japan.

Also parachuting materials and supplies to eastern euro anti-communist partisans would also be a good idea.
The allies would have a massive and motivated guerilla force at their disposal to wreak havoc behind the enemy lines.
I'm eastern euro myself and i know for a fact that the communists were frightened at the thought of allied planes supplying local partisans.

The planes would still need to be able to get there. A b-29 probably could but the fighter escorts would need a closer base

How about a carrier group in the Baltic Sea? The Soviet navy was a joke

Sure, but it's extremely unlikely to produce a Soviet surrender.

Japan, you have to remember, was losing the war badly in every conceivable metric, and it's only due to the bizarre deadlock system their government had that surrender wasn't given sooner; the majority of the "Cabinet" was for it, but couldn't overcome the army veto. The nukes were a straw that broke the camel's back.

August 1945? The Soviets are advancing, not retreating, and while a bomb would have blown up a lot of Moscow, that's not going to stop their armies from advancing or most of their war production from churning.

Problem is, there just wasn't that much available manpower that hadn't already been killed or swept up into someone's army. I wouldn't be counting on Polish or Yugoslav irregulars very much. You might get a few hundred thousand minimally armed people, control some hills, but they'd be able to keep the supply lines clear.

A b-29 flies higher than everything the Soviets have except the Yak 9, and can defend itself moderately well. Even unescorted bombers against the German air defenses in 1943 usually made it through to target. Fighters might not be able to escort, but if you send in 400 B-29s, and you don't know which one is carrying The Bomb........

Terrible idea. For starters, Turkey is almost certain to want to stay neutral, and would block your passage through the Dardanelles with mines. Secondly, CVP just can't stand up to the sorts of fighters that were running around in late war Europe. They're too small and underpowered. A better bet is to take some long range fighters, like P-51Ds or P-63s from India or Iraq.

They could, but it wouldn't end the war instantly.

The Reds would still have a four to one advantage in men and equipment in Europe.

Nobody would win.

I'm sorry, I meant a P-61, not a P-63. It's the black widow, not the king cobra, that has the huge range.

except the future probably

Im talking about the Baltic Sea not the Black Sea

Oh, sorry, my mistake.

Still a terrible idea though, as the Soviets are sure to take out Denmark and mine the straits there, which again makes it almost impossible to get large vessels through (there's a reason the Royal Navy never raided into the Baltic during the war).

And the same objections about the relative weakness and low numbers of CVP still stand.

Plus, you're probably still at war with Japan for this, and you don't want to leave the Pacific completely unminded.

You'd need ships to mine a strait. Ships that the Soviets wont be able to put out there because the far superior Allied Navy wont let them.
Why didnt the Germans mine the English channel once they conquered France. Obviously because the RN prevented them from doing so.

what about dropping anthrax on their crops, and using Le Bombe indiscriminately on the mongol- erm I mean, "Russian" army?

>You'd need ships to mine a strait. Ships that the Soviets wont be able to put out there because the far superior Allied Navy wont let them.

No you don't. Ever hear of Operation Starvation? You can drop mines by air, or from coastal emplacements, or from those little littoral boats that have the advantage in shallow waters.

By your logic, the Germans shouldn't have been able to mine the Baltic sea access, their fleet was also vastly inferior to the British alone.
>Why didn't the Germans mine the English channel once they conquered France. Obviously because the RN prevented them from doing so.

Are you stupid, or just extremely ignorant? They did. Not very effectively due to the routine minesweeping and difficulties in operating that close to the English coast, but they sure tried.

naval-history.net/WW2CampaignsGermanWarships.htm

>whether the will to fight gives out before the Soviet material does

The Soviets were almost wholly dependent on U.S. Lend-Lease aid, cut that off and they'll begin to falter right off the bat.

>every participant was completely broken except for the US and USSR

The USSR was also fucked, even more so then the UK or France.

And what makes you think that the Soviets would have been more efficient in mining the straits? The Soviet navy was even shittier than the Kriegsmarine.
Clearly the German mines didnt stop the allies from crossing the canal did they?

>dropping mines from the air
Good luck doing it efficiently under the allied air superiority.

No matter what people argue in this thread, the Western Powers had almost complete air superiority, if fighting on the ground got too rough, the U.S. would absolutely drop a nuke on Moscow or even St. Petersburg. The Soviets did not develop the bomb till 1949, so the Western Allies had a good four years to nuke the Soviets without fear of retaliation if they started to lose.

>And what makes you think that the Soviets would have been more efficient in mining the straits?

Nothing, but they would have been about as effective. Minelaying isn't exactly hard.

>Clearly the German mines didnt stop the allies from crossing the canal did they?

They did keep the Allies out of the Baltic just fine you idiot. Hell, most of those mines would still be there for an Unthinkable. I have no idea why you're having so much trouble with what is a very simple concept.

>Nothing, but they would have been about as effective.
Ok so they wont be able to stop the allied fleet. Glad we cleared that out.

>They did keep the Allies out of the Baltic just fine you idiot.
The allies had no reason whatsoever to go in the baltics. They did have a reason to cross the English channel and guess what they did. Despite the german mines.

>and you don't know which one is carrying The Bomb........
>........

You're not clever, asshole. Fuck you and your little dots.

>Ok so they wont be able to stop the allied fleet. Glad we cleared that out.

Where did you learn to read?

>The allies had no reason whatsoever to go in the baltics. They did have a reason to cross the English channel and guess what they did. Despite the german mines.

Except,the considerable amounts of resources, especially high quality iron, that Germany was importing from Sweden and shipping through the Baltic, and how interrupting it would bring the German war economy to desperate straits.

>he actually compares russians to one of the most hypercompetent militaries in history
RRRRRREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

Alright so the allies didnt want to enter the baltics because of the german mines.

Well at the endo of the war the allies could have used the germans to clear the barrage. Thes Soviets were not in Denmark at the end of the war and theres no reason to believe that they would be able to easily take it from the allies.

>Well at the endo of the war the allies could have used the germans to clear the barrage.

If the Germans co-operate. Especially if a new war is brewing right at the heels of the old one, they might not.

>Thes Soviets were not in Denmark at the end of the war and theres no reason to believe that they would be able to easily take it from the allies.

Other than the massive initial Soviet advantage in ground forces at the outset of combat and how even the British planners realized that they would face Soviet advances as soon as surprise wore off.

Sure, like I've said above, driving them into the Atlantic is unlikely. But it's a pretty short hop to Denmark, and the Allies are going to have a degree of trouble holding onto it since a Soviet advance into Frisia is going to split their forces.

Which of course, doesn't change the root problem of a few dozen CVP fighters aren't going to do jack shit to escort a B-29 on a bombing run, and you have actual land based planes which can do the job better.

I disagree a nuke would wipe out the Soviet command structure.

>support the Allies

I think it would be overwhelming considering half of EE allied with the nazis to keep Stalin at bay.

>Is there any plausible scenario in which Operation Unthinkable could happen?

The Soviets had 4 years of experience in continental European warfare, the Allies had 1 year of experience in fighting German reserves and kids. It's pretty evident how this war would've went. Nukes would've accomplished nothing but kill civilians.

It also wasn't in the US interest. With Western Europe weakened, the US could project their power on places that used to be under French/British control. Maybe the Soviets got half of Europe - but the US got half of the world. Both US and USSR were happy with the outcome of ww2. Churchill was a sulking warmonger.

Part of operation Unthinkable was rearming the wehrmacht and sending them to war, it wouldn't be just Brits and Americans fighting. They would also get all of the ex-Axis Eastern European countries on their side.

>soviets 4 years experience
>allies 1 year experience
>Somehow solving the crushing superiority the allies had in manpower, airforce,navy, technology
>also implying that not every wehrmacht officer would help the western allies

No, it was Unthinkable.

was waiting for this