Dear Professor Hanson,<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n I read your article on Stalingrad and I wanted to respond.<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n The German 6th<\/sup> army in Stalingrad had Slovakian and Croatian units in the city. On the flanks of the 6th <\/sup>army was the Italian 8th<\/sup> army which played a huge role in Russia and was successful in Russia and was a revere[d] force. The Italians committed many troops for army group south and <\/em>b<\/em>y the way this is coming from a Greek. I would also stress the importance of the Hungarians and Romanians.<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n You write, \u201c<\/em>It<\/em>\u00a0marked the turning point of World War II.\u201d I would say that R.H.S Stolfi has argued that Kursk was the turning point, because a counter attacked at Kharkov won a major battle that regained the stability on the eastern front, in his book Hitler\u2019s Panzers East. I would also add that my view is that operation Bagration was more a turning point in 1944 because it destroyed Army group Center and annihilated whatever remained of the German infantry forces which had been severely weakened and its allies like the Hungarians and the foreign SS units. Operation Bagration also moved soviet forces closer to Hungary and Romania and pushed army group north to be closed off to Germany. I would call that a greater victory then Stalingrad. However your view on Stalingrad as the turning point is conservative which is somewhat true. Also the soviets overextended, still was losing battles even in 1944, and the Germans captured more troops before Stalingrad, which had destroyed the red army, and half of the USSR\u2019s industry and agriculture was captured. The Germans fixed the inept railroad systems. The Soviets were able to gain ground because the Germans were exhausted, but German units were murdering Soviet divisions.<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n Sincerely, Angelo<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n \u0395\u03c5\u03c7\u03b1\u03c1\u03b9\u03c3\u03c4\u03ce\u00a0\u03a0\u03bf\u03bb\u03cd<\/em>\u00a0(Thank You)<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Dear Sort of Angry Reader Angelo,<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Patton\u2019s Third Army included the 2nd French Division as well; so are we then wrong to call it an \u201cAmerican army\u201d? The Sixth Army was overwhelmingly German and to call it such is just fine and does not deprecate the sacrifices of other Axis armies. The invasion of the Soviet Union was one of the most multinational efforts in military history, involving eventually Germans, Romanians, Hungarians, Italians, Spaniards, Finns, and Western and Eastern European volunteers.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n After Stalingrad, the Germans could not complete Hitler\u2019s original agenda of controlling Russia to the Volga River. The later \u201ctie\u201d at Kursk and even a German victory there would have made no ultimate difference, given the increasingly lethal Anglo-American bombing that was siphoning off huge artillery assets, even before D-Day, and successive open German wounds in North Africa, Sicily, and Italy\u2014as well as vast diversions of Luftwaffe and artillery assets to offset Allied bombing.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Bagration came much later than Stalingrad when Soviet numerical and logistical superiority was unquestioned. In contrast, at Stalingrad the forces were much more evenly matched, and thus it was a turning point after which things went downhill for the Germans. Bragration was a continuation of what happened at Stalingrad to the nth degree, given far greater resources at the Red Army\u2019s disposal.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Do not define German superiority in terms of killing ratios (anywhere from 3 to 7 \/ 1) or the German ability to destroy more tanks than it lost. There were no finer soldiers than those of the\u00a0Wehrmacht but it eventually mattered little against a 12.5 million man-military, which received 20 percent of its supplies under Lend-Lease, at a time Germany was bombed 24\/7 and under assault after June 1944 in Europe and Italy without much help militarily in Europe from its Italian and Japanese allies.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Sincerely, Victor<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" From an Angry Reader: Dear Professor Hanson, \u00a0 I read your article on Stalingrad and I wanted to respond. \u00a0 The German 6th army in Stalingrad had Slovakian and Croatian units in the city. On the flanks of the 6th army was the Italian 8th army which played a huge role in Russia and was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[6,1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-2Nm","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":10727,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/remembering-stalingrad-75-years-later\/","url_meta":{"origin":10748,"position":0},"title":"Remembering Stalingrad 75 Years Later","author":"victorhanson","date":"November 9, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson\/\/ National Review \u00a0 It is now fashionable to demonize Russia, but most Americans have forgotten key aspects of 20th-century history, including the Russians\u2019 fight to stop the march of Nazi Germany. \u00a0 Seventy-five years ago this month, the Soviet Red Army surrounded \u2014 and would soon\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Stalingrad"","block_context":{"text":"Stalingrad","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/stalingrad\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9561,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/9561\/","url_meta":{"origin":10748,"position":1},"title":"Comment from an Angry Reader:\u2026","author":"victorhanson","date":"November 1, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Comment from an Angry Reader: You\u2019re a civil guy, and it is appreciated. It would be a waste of time, however, for us to engage in colloquy. I can only hope that you are not spared the results of your short-sightedness, and cheerleading for Donald Trump\u2014the word is apt, despite\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Angry Reader"","block_context":{"text":"Angry Reader","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/angry-reader\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4041,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/fighting-words\/","url_meta":{"origin":10748,"position":2},"title":"Fighting Words","author":"victorhanson","date":"March 26, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"The definitive books on the battles of the 20th century. by Victor Davis Hanson WSJ Opinion Journal 1. \"The Price of Glory\" by Alistair Horne (St. Martin's, 1963). Over the course of 10 months in 1916, the French and Germans killed or wounded about 1.25 million of their best soldiers\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "March 2006"","block_context":{"text":"March 2006","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2006\/march-2006\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10180,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/from-an-angry-reader\/","url_meta":{"origin":10748,"position":3},"title":"From an Angry Reader","author":"victorhanson","date":"May 19, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"DR HANSON. \u00a0TRUMP TRAITOR IS A RUSSIAN SPY. I LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING HIM IN JAIL WITH THE ENTIRE ADMINISTRATION. THE TRUMP JOKE PRESIDENCY IS GOING DOWN IN FLAMES. TRUMP FIRED COMEY TO CONCEAL HIS RUSSIAN CONNECTIONS. DEMOCRATS WILL BE IN POWER FOR 30 YEARS AFTER THE TRUMP DEBACLE. \u00a0-HEIN\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Angry Reader"","block_context":{"text":"Angry Reader","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/angry-reader\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10079,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/10079-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":10748,"position":4},"title":"04\/10\/17 From an Angry Reader:\u2026","author":"victorhanson","date":"April 10, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"04\/10\/17 From an Angry Reader: Mr. Hanson \u2013 In your truly myopic article about the Russian\/Trump connections you point out the Democrats\u2019 contacts with Russians but you fail to make an apples and apples comparison. You don\u2019t mention BUSINESS and MONEY. You don\u2019t mention Trump making $50 million on a\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12220,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/angry-reader-02-28-20\/","url_meta":{"origin":10748,"position":5},"title":"Angry Reader 02-28-20","author":"victorhanson","date":"February 28, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"From An Angry Reader: Subject: Gray Matter Your articles are so offensively lacking in context, thoughtfulness, and reflection on history--basically simpleminded attack ads-- that I am going to erase the National Review\u2019s bookmark from my browser. And there is no case for Trump any more than there was a case\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10748"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10748"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10748\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10749,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10748\/revisions\/10749"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Victor Davis Hanson’s Reply:<\/h3>\n