I’ve never understood how bagration has been considered operational art. They advanced roughly 10km per day for the same daily casualties as Paschendale (though casualty numbers varies). If any other participant in the second world war would have such a slow advance at such a cost of life it would be considered a strategic disaster. Especially considering the material superiority the Soviets enjoyed at the time.
I’ve never understood how bagration has been considered operational art. They advanced roughly 10km per day for the same daily casualties as Paschendale (though casualty numbers varies).
10km a day is extremely fast against a dug-in foe before mechanized infantry were the standard. And they were operating with about double the troop numbers, on both sides, that were involved in Paschendale.
If any other participant in the second world war would have such a slow advance at such a cost of life it would be considered a strategic disaster. Especially considering the material superiority the Soviets enjoyed at the time.
Combat casualties between the Sovs and the Nazis were roughly equal - when on the offensive in modern combat, that’s a good sign. Bagration, furthermore, completely broke the Nazi army on the eastern front, and forced it into a humiliating, and ultimately war-ending, retreat.
I’ve never understood how bagration has been considered operational art. They advanced roughly 10km per day for the same daily casualties as Paschendale (though casualty numbers varies). If any other participant in the second world war would have such a slow advance at such a cost of life it would be considered a strategic disaster. Especially considering the material superiority the Soviets enjoyed at the time.
10km a day is extremely fast against a dug-in foe before mechanized infantry were the standard. And they were operating with about double the troop numbers, on both sides, that were involved in Paschendale.
Combat casualties between the Sovs and the Nazis were roughly equal - when on the offensive in modern combat, that’s a good sign. Bagration, furthermore, completely broke the Nazi army on the eastern front, and forced it into a humiliating, and ultimately war-ending, retreat.