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Secrets of the Dead: Deadliest Battle

2fisted

Grizzled Veteran
Jun 26, 2006
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MN usa
Did a search & didn't find any word on this, looks quite interesting!

THIRTEEN’s Secrets of the Dead: Deadliest Battle uncovers the evidence that described a forced retreat by the Russians, not a tactical one, in addition to much fiercer fighting in the countryside than previously thought. The battle not only turned the tide of the war in the East, it established the Soviet Union as an emerging superpower for the looming Cold War
Code:
[URL]http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/episodes/deadliest-battle-preview-this-episode/550/[/URL][URL="http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/episodes/deadliest-battle-preview-this-episode/550/"]
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Also check out the secret Japanese sub show, very cool!
 
Yes, thank you for this!

IMO it seems that Glantz's revision of the Stalingrad battle and his more general mission of uncovering of "forgotten battles" is receiving some attention, for example the Soviet offensives around Kotluban:

From this article:
"With the offensive going so well for the Nazis, Hitler prematurely declared victory and diverted his forces, including the 4th Panzer tank army, to other locations. This gave the Red Army a chance to regroup and counter-attack the remaining German forces near the village of Kotluban. History has all but overlooked this action because of the huge number of Soviet troops who were killed, but in actual fact, it set the stage for the victory in Stalingrad and sealed the fate of Hitler
 
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I'm curious about that aswell. That so-called preview is just like 30 second commercial what you see on some of the TV shop channels instead of showing off any real stuff related to the documentary.

I guess it's just matter of waiting before it gets released on DVD or so in the worst case scenario.
 
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Well, we will see how much new info they can actualy tell us in 1 hrs time (I have a feeling there won't be a ton of new info that the typical Stalingrad history buff wont already know) But if there is new footage & new historic accounts from the soldiers that where actualy there, it will definatly be worthwhile for me!
 
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I must take serious issue with David Glantz's assertion that the battle at Kotluban so significantly crippled the 6th Army that it doomed the Germans even before they reached the city of Stalingrad. Kotluban was a catastrophic Russian gamble of haphazardly throwing Russian troops into the left flank of Paulus's army with disastrous effects for the Russians. Paulus' tanks were not held there as stated by Glantz but supported Paulus's drive on the city. However, the Luftwaffe bombardment of Stalingrad turned the city into an unrecognizable maze of ruins and debris that stifled effective armor usage. The Wehrmacht was trained for blitzkrieg and large scale sweeping mechanized attacks, not urban warfare. A major German blunder occurred when Paulus failed to cross the Volga north of Stalingrad and Hoth's 4th Panzer Army failed to cross in the south. This pincer type attack was standard German operational procedure throughout 1941-42 with great success. As long as the Russian held the eastern bank, basically unopposed, German attempts to take the city head-on were doomed.
 
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Oh please don't tell Hans Guderian who stated in his memoir Panzer Leader,
"In this year (1929) I became convinced that tanks working on their own or in conjunction with infantry could never achieve decisive importance. My historical studies; the exercises carried out in England and our own experience with mock-ups had persuaded me that the tanks would never be able to produce their full effect until weapons on whose support they must inevitably rely were brought up to their standard of speed and of cross-country performance. In such formation of all arms, the tanks must play primary role, the other weapons being subordinated to the requirements of the armour. It would be wrong to include tanks in infantry divisions: what was needed were armoured divisions which would include all the supporting arms needed to fight with full effect."
So what ever term of combined arms attack was used, it no doubt was most effective against the Poles, the French and the early part of the 1940's agains Russia.
`swamp
 
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Yes, the Germans practiced high-mobility, deep-penetration campaigns, but they referred to it as Bewegungskrieg. That term and its principles were first codified in the writings of Carl von Clausewitz, studying the campaigns of Napoleon and Prussia's early defeats against his armies, and then first applied by Prussia and/or Germany in the Franco-Prussian War.

The argument being made is that "Blitzkrieg" was not a doctrine, it was a buzzword.
 
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Oh please don't tell Hans Guderian who stated in his memoir Panzer Leader,
"In this year (1929) I became convinced that tanks working on their own or in conjunction with infantry could never achieve decisive importance. My historical studies; the exercises carried out in England and our own experience with mock-ups had persuaded me that the tanks would never be able to produce their full effect until weapons on whose support they must inevitably rely were brought up to their standard of speed and of cross-country performance. In such formation of all arms, the tanks must play primary role, the other weapons being subordinated to the requirements of the armour. It would be wrong to include tanks in infantry divisions: what was needed were armoured divisions which would include all the supporting arms needed to fight with full effect."
So what ever term of combined arms attack was used, it no doubt was most effective against the Poles, the French and the early part of the 1940's agains Russia.
`swamp


Oh yeah, the great Guderian ("author" of Achtung Panzer!)... He made a Guttenberg b.t.w.
Achtung Panzer was only 20% Guderian's work....80% was plagiarized...
Main contributers were Ludwig Ritter von Eimannsberger and Ernst Volckheim. Both never got acknowledgement for their contribution.

:rolleyes:
 
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Oh yeah, the great Guderian ("author" of Achtung Panzer!)... He made a Guttenberg b.t.w.
Achtung Panzer was only 20% Guderian's work....80% was plagiarized...
Main contributers were Ludwig Ritter von Eimannsberger and Ernst Volckheim. Both never got acknowledgement for their contribution.

:rolleyes:

I would love to take your word for it, but some documentation for your claims would be nice. Both for this and the blitzkrieg one. A heavily slanted Wikipedia article just doesn't cut it.
 
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125 references are not enough to convince you about Blitzkrieg.
Then a couple of books written (years before "Achtung Panzer") by von Eimannsberger and Volckheim most definately won't.

never mind then....

125 refences indeed, but the "controversy" section (which contains 50 citations) all cites the same 4 authors, and three of them seems to base their claims on the fourth namely Frieser, and none them seems to be highly regarded by general academia on the subject.

And you are most welcome to name the titles of those books by Eimannsberger and Volckheim, and I won't mind you pointing out the instances where Guderian copied them.
 
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