Re: [GZG] Point Systems

["John Atkinson" <johnmatkinson@xxxxxxxxx>]

On 11/5/06, Eric Foley <stiltman@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> From: "John Atkinson" <johnmatkinson@xxxxxxxxx>
> > On 11/4/06, Eric Foley <stiltman@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >> The Greeks were ludicrously outnumbered by the Persians at Marathon, and
> >> won.
> >> Alexander the Great was outnumbered by Darius III at both Issus and
> >> Gaugemala, and won.
>
> > In both those cases, the "points cost" of the two sides were a lot
> > closer than it looks--the Persians went for bucket-loads of garbage
> > troops intended to swamp the opposition by sheer numbers.  Every one
> > of the Greek line infantry was wearing an expensive hoplite panoply.
>
> Yeah, this is largely true.  In a way, the Greeks against the Persians were
> probably the best example of quality defeating quantity -- as opposed to the
> Napoleonic French against the Russians or the Germans against the Soviets in
> WW2, where the opposite occured.

I'm going to dispute at least the latter point.

The Soviets were light-years ahead of the Germans in both strategic
thinking and fighting at the operational level.  They also tended to
have better equipment in the most vital categories (tanks, assault
guns, individual weapons, close support aircraft).  Most (90%+) of the
German Army was fighting with equipment no better than their fathers
carried into Russia in 1914, other than the MG 34/42 family.

The myth of the mighty ubermensch fighting with sophisticated tanks
and fighters against hordes of subhumans who choked their racial
superiors with their blood is born from the post-war
self-justifications of the Nazi generals, and was lapped up by their
racist adherants after the war.  It is myth, not fact.

The Soviets never outnumbered the Germans by more than 2:1 across the
front.  What happened was that they would ruthlessly concentrate all
resources (tanks, planes, artillery, troops) at the decisive point,
smash through the pathetic German defenders from some line infantry
division (or Romanians, or Italians), and make the stunts of some
scratch 'fire brigade force' (which was generally diverted into
counterattacking against a feint) utterly irrelevant.  The Soviets
fought smart, the Germans didn't, and that is all Clio wrote.

John
--
"Thousands of Sarmatians, Thousands of Franks, we've slain them again
and again.  We're looking for thousands of Persians."
--Vita Aureliani
_______________________________________________
Gzg-l mailing list
Gzg-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://lists.csua.berkeley.edu/mailman/listinfo/gzg-l