Published on 16 Jun 2016
This week 100 years ago the whole war hangs in the balance, the Germans are about to break through the lines at Verdun, the Russians actually break through the Austro-Hungarian lines but fail to seize the opportunity further north. It all boils down to the lack of communication between Erich von Falkenhayn and Conrad von Hötzendorf which created a situation in which Falkenhayn has to save Conrad’s Army and loses his momentum at Verdun.
June 17, 2016
What If – Two Pivotal Moments of World War 1 I THE GREAT WAR Week 99
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June 14, 2016
Beyond The Genocide – Armenia in WW1 I THE GREAT WAR Special
Published on 13 Jun 2016
The region of Armenia was a play ball between the interests of Russia and the Ottoman Empire long before World War 1. But the Armenian people were striving for self determination like the peoples all across Europe were doing too. In our special episode we take a look at the struggle of the Armenians beyond the Armenian Genocide.
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June 12, 2016
Cossacks – Cavalry – Wolves I OUT OF THE TRENCHES
Published on 11 Jun 2016
Indy sits in the Chair of Wisdom again and this week we talk about Cavalry on the Eastern Front, Cossacks and wolves.
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June 10, 2016
The Brusilov Offensive – The Arab Revolt I THE GREAT WAR Week 98
Published on 9 Jun 2016
The Brusilov Offensive is unleashed on the Eastern Front this week 100 years ago. General Aleksei Brusilov wants to crush the Austro-Hungarian Army and uses a variety of new tactics for his plan. At the same time, the Germans take Fort Vaux during the Battle of Verdun and in the Middle East, the Arab Revolt is declared.
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June 7, 2016
Russia’s Finest General – Aleksei Brusilov I WHO DID WHAT IN WW1?
Published on 6 Jun 2016
Aleksei Brusilov was the mastermind of Russia’s finest moment in World War 1: The Brusilov Offensive. Although it didn’t achieve it’s planned objective, it broke the back of the Austro-Hungarian Army. The life of Aleksei Brusilov was an interesting one between the cultures and even after Imperial Russia was gone, his career was not over.
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May 11, 2016
Prisoners of War During World War 1 I THE GREAT WAR Special
Published on 9 May 2016
Millions of men were captured during World War 1 and most of them spent years in prison camps as pawns of the nation that captured them. However, their experience was a taboo in the post war society. We take a look at the hardships of being a prisoner and how the world powers used the POWs as leverage.
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May 3, 2016
The Battle of Verdun – The War Moves To The Middle East I THE GREAT WAR WW1 Summary Part 5
Published on 2 May 2016
The winter 1916 ends with the invasion of Serbia and Montenegro and unrestricted submarine warfare. And the spring of 1916 starts with the Battle of Verdun at the Western Front and Russian successes in Anatolia. The British are in trouble in Ireland and in Mesopotamia but are still carving up the Middle East in the Sykes-Picot Agreement. The Eastern Front drowns in spring thaws while the Russian homefront is in disarray.
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April 22, 2016
The Muddy Graves of Russia and Kut I THE GREAT WAR Week 91
Published on 21 Apr 2016
With the spring in Russia and the Caucasus came the thaws on the Eastern Front and all the way down to Mesopotamia. The soldiers had to adapt to survive let alone fight. The Battle of Verdun still rages on though the French are not moving more airplanes to the area to break the German air superiority.
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April 15, 2016
The Meat Grinder at Verdun – Brusilov’s New Plan I THE GREAT WAR Week 90
Published on 14 Apr 2016
The Russian offensive at Lake Naroch were an utter failure but the Russian General Aleksei Brusilov is already gearing up for the future mother of all offensives on the Eastern Front. At the same time the meat grinder at Verdun is sucking in German and French troops alive. Erich von Falkenhayn realised that his initial idea probably won’t work but he still tries to capture the Mort Homme and Cote 304. In far away Mesopotamia the siege of Kut is still going on even though the British and Indian soldiers are already killing the hunger with Opium pills.
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April 7, 2016
The Battle of Kursk – IV: Control of the Eastern Front – Extra History
Published on 28 Mar 2016
German divisions had not expected the level of resistance they met from the Soviets, and their planned advance was behind schedule. At the same time, the Soviets were concerned by the breaches in their first level of defense and by the Tiger tanks which so decisively outgunned their T-34. Fighting on the north side of the Kursk salient came to focus on the small Russian town of Ponyri, where the Germans saw an opportunity to break through and encircle the Soviet defenders. But every time they took control, the Soviets countered and took it back, until finally it became clear that they would never hold Ponyri and could only hope to divert troops from reinforcing the Soviet line elsewhere. But in the south, General Vatutin of the USSR had come up with a clever strategy: he literally buried his T-34 tanks up to the turrets, making them fortified anti-tank guns whose small profile negated the range advantage of the Tiger. His methods were extremely effective, but the Germans continued to fight forward inch by bloody inch. The Soviets needed to hold until reinforcements arrived. An attempted counterattack failed, but managed to slow the Germans, as did the sudden arrival of rainy weather that bogged down their materiel. In the midst of this, the brutal war criminals in the SS Division fought on with a ferocity best exemplified by Joachim Krüger, who once ripped off his pants to escape a smoke grenade and charged bare-assed at a Russian tank. But this wild back and forth could not continue. On July 12, 1943, the Germans sought a decisive outcome through a hard push at Prokhorovka. They did not get it, and the tides quickly turned against them. The Allies invaded Sicily, pressuring Hitler. He gave the command to withdraw the troops at Kursk, over his commanders’ objections. His general, Erich von Manstein, attempted one final assault just as Stalin’s long-planned counterattack rolled out in full force. The Soviets routed the Germans and collapsed their Eastern Front. Over the course of the war, they continued to push the German forces back – all the way to Berlin in 1945.
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April 3, 2016
QotD: What might trigger a new war in Europe
I have said on a few occasions that, in my opinion, based on my reading of history, wars are, as often as not, caused by fear. Even Vladimir Putin’s naked aggression is, I think, a result of his fear of what is happening to Russia: a steady decline back into political and strategic irrelevance. It is not at all unreasonable to suppose that fear of the societal changes that very large scale migrations will bring cannot and will not provoke people into electing governments that will, out of fear of the unknown, attack their neighbours in a misguided effort to sauve qui peut in their own societies.
I think Sir Max [Hastings]’s “think-tank friend in Washington,” was (still is) wrong when he “observed last week: ‘Democracy only works where there is a broad consensus about the distribution of wealth and power.’ And it is because this consensus faces unprecedented stresses in consequence of migration in Europe, that he believes some factions may resort to violence, even outright war.” The “broad consensus” is not about wealth or power, it is about respecting the rules, living with and within the “institutions” which make democracy work. Those institutions are strong in e.g. Britain, the Netherlands and the Scandinavian countries; they are weaker in e.g. France, which, for example, tossed out a democratic government and constitution in 1958 when the Algerian war went sour.; they are weaker still, in my opinion, in the entire “Southern tier” of Europe (Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, and the Balkans and in the Eastern European states that only recently tossed off the yoke of Russian/communist rule. If trouble is going to start it will happen, I think, in those weaker states. A European war is likely to start when one of the countries with weaker institutions decides, our of fear, that it must break the rules that hold Europe together.
Ted Campbell, “Everyman’s Strategic Survey: Europe(2)”, Ted Campbell’s Point of View, 2016-03-22.
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March 31, 2016
The Battle of Kursk- III: Day One – Extra History
Published on 21 Mar 2016
The Germans planned their assault for July 5, 1943 but a defector warned the Soviets and denied them the element of surprise. Even without the warning, General Zhukov had found plenty of time to fortify Kursk with layer upon layer of pillboxes, minefields, and more. He planned to bloody the Germans with this staunch defense and weaken them for later. The new German tanks, such as the Tiger, arrived only to find themselves outnumbered by numerous Soviet T-34s and ill-supported by maintenance crews who were stretched too thin by the number and variety of new tanks being deployed. General Manstein ordered his strongest tank unit to push through, targeting the small town of Oboyan, but although he made the most progress along the line of the assault, even he had not expected resistance on this scale. By the next day, the Germans had barely reached the second line of Soviet defenses, and while they hadn’t been forced to retreat anywhere, they were distinctly behind schedule. Hitler needed them to win. It wouldn’t win the war, but he hoped that it would force the Soviets to withdraw, leaving him free to concentrate on the Western front and the threats from the United Kingdom and the United States.
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March 27, 2016
The Russian Navy – Submarines – Trench Mortar I OUT OF THE TRENCHES
Published on 26 Mar 2016
More pictures from Flo’s Great Grandfather: https://imgur.com/a/R1T92
It’s chair of wisdom time again and this week we talk about the Russian Navy in the Baltic Sea, submarine warfare and trench mortars.
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March 25, 2016
Russian Spring Offensive – Confusion at Fort Vaux I THE GREAT WAR Week 87
Published on 24 Mar 2016
The Russians want to relieve the pressure of their French allies at Verdun by starting a huge spring offensive near Lake Narroch. But this is not the only reason: The spring thaws are coming and the Germans on the Eastern Front have the high ground. At the same time, the epic struggle at Verdun is continuing: Neither the French nor the German Army can gain a decisive advantage at Fort Vaux. At sea, the British use the depth charge successfully for the first time and the German ship Greif tries to run the British Blockade.
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March 23, 2016
World War II: The Battle of Kursk – II: Preparations – Extra History
Published on 29 Feb 2016
Richard “the Challenger” Cutland, ex British tankie and military specialist at Wargaming, stops by to talk about the types of tanks involved in the Battle of Kursk! Early in Operation Barbarossa, the Germans didn’t expect much from their opponents. They did not know about the T-34 and KV-1 tanks, which turned out to be superior designs. The Germans deployed a special commission to study Soviet tank designs and soon introduced the Tiger, Panther, and Ferdinand tanks which Hitler believed were key to victory. The Panther in particular was now outclassing Soviet tanks, but it had giant mechanical issues and broke down frequently. The Soviets had produced a new T-43 model tank, but it was designed to tackle the old German Panzer IV and didn’t measure up well to the new German tanks. So they preferred to focus on the trusty T-34 tanks, which made up in speed and numbers what they lacked in range and firepower. The Kursk region also played to the Soviets’ advantage in Russia: the dust storms and mudfields hindered air support from the Luftwaffe and the advance of the Wermacht. Erich von Manstein, the German commander, decided not to advance. Instead he yielded ground to the Soviets in an attempt to lure them into overextending. He successfully caught them out at the First Battle of Kharkov, but even though the Soviets suffered heavy casualties there, it wasn’t enough to make a dent in their huge army. Manstein needed to do something more drastic. Both he and the Soviets recognized that the Soviet line had a weakness where it bulged out to defend the city of Kursk, making it an obvious target for the next stage of operations.
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