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The ALL Things HISTORY Thread


G.A.C.O.L.B.

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Been talking about making this thread for a minute now. **** it. Now is now. I know we got a TON of history buffs and lovers on here, including myself. I say if you fall into that category, we introduce ourselves, our areas of interests and passion and (self-proclaimed) expertise. And then any questions we may have or topics we wish to discuss. I'll start

 

My name is Colin (aka G.A.C.O.L.B.) and I'm a history nerd

 

I love modern history. 20th Century history. I've read and watched a ton on WWII (do they show anything else about history on TV?) like many but that's not my passion. I prefer WWI and the Cold War. Read and watch every single thing I can about them. I just find them fascinating. The way I see it, WWI was the death of the old world, WWII was the battle for the new and the Cold War was the final fight for complete control (and thank God we won).

 

 

My history question, watching a WWII documentary right now ("WWII in Color"). It's about the start of Operation Barbarosa. Can someone please explain to me Hitler's thinking behind taking Kiev before taking Moscow. I mean Moscow was right there for the taking. Wasn't that the crown jewel? The potential knockout blow? Stalin was holed up there, just imagine what his capture/death/ending would've meant. I know his top general strongly disagreed with his Kiev-first strategy and he overruled him, but why? I don't get what his thinking was there? Can someone please explain that?

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Hello, my name is TJ (aka, GhostofSparta), and I am a history nerd.

 

My areas of interest are military history. Mostly American, the Civil War in particular.

 

As for your question GACOLB, I found this article: http://www.historynet.com/what-if-the-germans-had-captured-moscow-in-1941.htm

 

A quick summary is that Kiev had over 650,000+ troops, 3000 artillery pieces, and 900 tanks. If the Nazis take Moscow before eliminating that threat, they'd better hope to hell to capture Stalin, or he'll flee west (and he's got a lot of territory to the west of Moscow) and you'll have a massive army threatening your supply route with your army split in 3 (or 2, if they bring their northern split from Leningrad to either Moscow or Kiev).

 

If Stalin isn't captured, Moscow means nothing to the Russian war effort. Especially with 18 divisions in Siberia protecting against Japan. And the second Japan went south instead of north, those divisions are coming. So if the Nazis capture Moscow, the Russians still have the manpower to stop them, and then besiege them in return.

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I really appreciate the link TJ. Really do so I hate to say this: for this thread I was think questions being answered by folks whose passion is the topic behind the question. Like a WWII nut for my question. And then they provide a link to back up their answer.

I hope I'm not coming across as a dick with this. That's just the vision I had for this. Thank you again, so much, for the info and link though.

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I find it super interesting that the Russians also used female pilots in WW2 with wooden bi-planes.

It's not something people talk about much, but these were just teenage girls ... I forget what the group was called...but it's right on the tip of my tongue.

 

Because they were made of wood (frames obviously) radar couldn't detect them as planes.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Question for you WWII buffs, specifically the Pacific side of things.

Was there any chance at all of the Pearl Harbor attack working? My understanding, and correct me if I'm wrong, was to knock out the US's Pacific fleet in a mortal blow and force us to sue for peace from the start.

Now it didn't really all go according to plan and our carriers happened to be out at sea and weren't damaged. But even if the plan went PERFECTLY, was there any chance in hell that we'd be suing for peace?

Or were the Japanese just that desperate (with the whole boycott and oil thing for invading French Indochina (Vietnam) that they had gone full desperate delusional and were willing to try anything?

What was the debate inside the Japanese government like regarding Pearl Harbor?

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From what I understand the Japanese were trying to take over all of South East Asia.

U.S. prohibited any exports to them...that simply makes sense. Then the U.S. and Brit's froze their assets...so they couldn't get oil.

 

The best chance of it working would have been if they had lost that port completely.

 

Japan also wanted Hawaii as a territory for their military (Same could be said for Alaska).

 

There was no chance at peace...Americans pushed their buttons relentlessly. Japanese leaned on the Russians for support...it was going to happen either way. Certainly no chance of suing...Japan would have simply become a place that we would have been vacationing at without a passport these days.

 

Japanese were very desperate, because the loss of oil and assets would have crippled their military.

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So the Japanese actually believed Pearl Harbor had a chance of succeeding?

I'm just trying to understanding their thinking. Was it a last grasp at survival? Did they think they'd be able to defeat the US? Did they think so low of us that they assumed We'd sue for peace asap? I just want to understand them,not us

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Yes, the aircraft carriers were out during the bombing, and that was a critical mistake, but the Japanese Admiral also called off the attack early. Basically the first wave took out some battleships, planes, and air strips. The next couple of waves that were supposed to come would have taken out more aircraft and the oil/gas fields. Which would have been a major setback. But because the military had managed to scramble some planes and take out a few Japanese aircraft on their final run, the Admiral called the next waves off and left.

 

Whether or not they thought that could win them the war, I have no idea. But it would've made the Pacific Theater a hell of a lot harder if our fleets had to launch/refuel from the West Coast vs. Hawaii. And if such a blow had given the Japanese a real chance to push the American forces out of the Pacific Islands and let them consolidate their conquests (including all the oil fields they captured)...?

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I'm a history nerd too. I got my degree in history with a minor in philosophy. Undergrads didn't have concentrations within the history department at my university, but a good chunk of my coursework was about the Civil War. I wrote my thesis on the religious rhetoric of the Union soldiers during the war--my primary method of research was to look at how they talked about God and religion in their correspondence to get a picture of their religiosity and the nature of their religious ideology. In terms of historiography, I tend to be most interested in social and intellectual histories. More so than political histories I guess. I think it was comfortable for me because of my background in philosophy. I'm most interested in knowing how people thought and lived.

Studying and understanding history is as natural and essential to me as breathing.

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Just got a $1 coin with Franklin Pierce on the front.

 

WTF? Isn't he usually considered one of the top 5 worst Presidents in our history?

 

Am I missing something? Why would he be honored..the only thing I can think of is that the modern conservative movement must now love his popular sovereignty beliefs?

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cool thread ... thinking of doing a career change and teaching history! I have more of a interest in it right now that working knowledge. 

 

One thing I find interesting ... as soon as I saw the thread title, I thought of a WW2 topic, by scanning a few posts in this thread, I see discussion has already started about the war. 

 

Why is that? I know the obvious reasons, but there are so many topics and events in this world's modern history, and boom, the first thing we all talk about, for the most part is WW2. 

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Just got a $1 coin with Franklin Pierce on the front.

 

WTF? Isn't he usually considered one of the top 5 worst Presidents in our history?

 

Am I missing something? Why would he be honored..the only thing I can think of is that the modern conservative movement must now love his popular sovereignty[/size] beliefs?

It's part of a presidential dollar series and they're releasing one for each president, in order: http://presidentialdollarguide.com/franklin-pierce-presidential-dollar/

The presidency was weak by tradition between Jackson and Lincoln, so that's a period where we find most of our worst presidents. Strong presidents probably weren't needed then. During that period the U.S. finds an equilibrium in global geopolitics because there was a decline of European power and presence in the New World. England's gaze really turned towards their colonies in Africa and Asia after the War of 1812 and a strong alliance with the U.S. became the core of their foreign policy in the New World from then onward. And following the Congress of Vienna, the threat of pan-European liberal revolution once every generation kept most of the conservative powers of Europe pretty inward looking. England and France were mainly worried about Russia. We got left alone to dominate our hemisphere. And this period is really where we started to do that: rapid industrialization, rapid westward expansion and settlement, rapid expansion of the railroads to the point they became overbuilt, removal of the Indian populations on the frontier, war with Mexico and the annexation of a ton of Mexican territory.

I think Pierce's legacy is pretty ugly because he was such a reactionary about slavery. And even being surrounded by all of those other weak one term presidents, Pierce still looks particularly bad because he was a sitting president that lost his party's nomination for re-election. Kansas descending into violence after the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska act sunk him. He pretty much lost all support in the North and thus became un-electable for the general election. I think the 1856 election shows the first signs of the eventual North-South schism in the Democratic party. Buchanan won the nomination because he still had the support of the North and Stephen Douglas, still a fairly young man, got out of his way, planning a run in 1860.

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Question for you WWII buffs, specifically the Pacific side of things.

Was there any chance at all of the Pearl Harbor attack working? My understanding, and correct me if I'm wrong, was to knock out the US's Pacific fleet in a mortal blow and force us to sue for peace from the start.

Now it didn't really all go according to plan and our carriers happened to be out at sea and weren't damaged. But even if the plan went PERFECTLY, was there any chance in hell that we'd be suing for peace?

Or were the Japanese just that desperate (with the whole boycott and oil thing for invading French Indochina (Vietnam) that they had gone full desperate delusional and were willing to try anything?

What was the debate inside the Japanese government like regarding Pearl Harbor?

 

They did it because it worked for them against Russia three decades earlier.   At the battle of Port Arthur, the Japanese sneak attacked and destroyed some  of the Russian fleet at anchor.   They then defeated the Russians decisively in the Russo-Japanese war, surprising the world and establishing themselves as a world power.   Then aftert the British destroyed the Italian fleet at anchor in Taranto in 1940, it looked like a really effective tactic.

 

Not everyone in the Japanese command thought that attacking the US was a good idea, but our oil embargo was really hurting their military efforts in China and the militarists were in full control of the government.  Yamamoto and Tojo, like true fascists, thought America was inherently weak and unwilling to fight if its fleet was crippled.  They knew that there was a huge isolationist sentiment in the US, symbolically led by Charles Limburgh.  They thought we would just pull out of Asia entirely.  They didn't realize how much it would pizz us off. 

 

oh yeah.  I'm Predicto and I'm a history nerd.

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My history question, watching a WWII documentary right now ("WWII in Color"). It's about the start of Operation Barbarosa. Can someone please explain to me Hitler's thinking behind taking Kiev before taking Moscow. I mean Moscow was right there for the taking. Wasn't that the crown jewel? The potential knockout blow? Stalin was holed up there, just imagine what his capture/death/ending would've meant. I know his top general strongly disagreed with his Kiev-first strategy and he overruled him, but why? I don't get what his thinking was there? Can someone please explain that?

 

 

A lot of good points have been made, but I think the real reason was Hitler's overconfidence.  After the initial battles, Hitler did not think his troops could be defeated by the Russians, and thought Kiev would fall easily.  There were a lot of troops holed up in Kiev there - even more than in Moscow.  It was the only major army in the area with the force to launch a counter attack at that time.  Of course Hitler, like Napoleon, failed to account for the danger of even a few week's delay in light of the oncoming Russian winter,   

 

Honestly, Moscow didn't matter that much, except symbolically.   I think Hitler knew by then that capturing Moscow was not going to make the Soviets collapse entirely.   

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I appreciate it Predicto. I'll try to get you some more thorough responses thus week sometime.

I will say for the longest I've wanted to more about the 1905 Russo/Japanese war. The outcome seems like it's the biggest shocker in war history or something. The Buster Douglas/Mike Tyson War. Except Japan didn't get fat and disappear.

To Hitler and the Soviet

Unio, the fall of Moscow wasn't going to be the fall of the Soviet Union. Stalin had remained in Moscow. What happens if Moscow falls and Stalin is captured? I got to think by that point that Stalin had society so dependant on him, would the Soviet Union not become become completely paralyzed with his capture?

God I love history. I'd kill to be a history teacher. Honest to God, hand on whatever Holy book, that's the icky thing that could keeo me from Kurdistan in 2016. Be a part of history of I can't teach it.

Would love to see this thread blow up. Such a **** not having anytype of computer,just a smartphone. To keep up and reply with everything. Goddamn if I went try

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I need to do the readings on WWII apparently. In the mean time, if anyone wants to know anything about European diplomatic history from the end of the Napoleonic wars to the outbreak of WWI, I'm your man. Or if you want to know about Antiquity, I'll bust out my Plutarch and Livy texts.

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