Not many enthusiastic correspondents or fervent opponents...
Iīll try a little citate from Wikipedia then:
"According to Steven J. Zaloga and James Grandsen, by 1935 the Red Army "... possessed more armoured vehicles, and more tank units than the rest of the world combined." (p. 107 of Soviet Tanks and Combat Vehicles of World War Two, 1984. Arms and Armour Press, London.
(...)But from 1937 to 1941, the Red Army's officer corps, the armour design bureaux, and leadership of the factories were gutted by Stalin's Great Purge. Tens of thousands were executed. Military knowledge completely stagnated and armoured vehicle production dropped drastically (though still remaining the world's largest). Nevertheless, by the eve of World War II, the Soviet Union had some of the world's best tanks (including the T-34 and KV-1, which were basically a generation ahead, coming as a shock to the Wehrmacht)."
One: There were many voices, there always are, that Stalinīs officer purge was a lunatic and paranoid undertaking, maybe even originated in Germany. Suvorov-Rezun ( in further entries just Suvorov) disagrees, saying that it was pragmatic and even needed. Fresh blood, fresh energy, blind loyalty... There is always a greedy vice- behind every boss.
My feeling is that Stalin (temporarily called Uncle Joe) had more ambitious plans on conquering the Earth, or at least Europe than Hitler had.
Is there anybody here, who DISagrees?
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a Polish boychik
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