Please tell me that the Cold War era Soviet armed forces

Were not such an embarrassing disgrace as Poopeen's "army". World in Conflict is my favorite RTS and I don't want its magic to be destroyed. Well, at least among the Soviets there were Ukrainians and Belarusians, which already gives some hope...

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  1. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    it was just as shit. All non vatniks stuck in that open air prison are telling the exactly same stories that are coming out of ukraine. From rampant marauderism to closeted homosexualry to non existant training to paper stronk equipment to broken officer core etc.

    There was just more stuff to throw around, yet the fundamental defects were all there. Only ones in denial about it are just western boomers trying to justify why they were so scared to death of that shithouse and the usual suspects like turdies and assmad tankies

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      >There was just more stuff to throw around, yet the fundamental defects were all there. Only ones in denial about it are just western boomers trying to justify why they were so scared to death of that shithouse and the usual suspects like turdies and assmad tankies
      based

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Ukrainians were part of the same army, you imbecile!

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        Ukrainians started modernizing their army after 2014 with Western assistance. Breaking with Soviet traditions and doctrine and consequently transforming the Ukrainian military into a force that can resist the Russian invasion is considered Zaluzhnyi most important accomplishment. Before 2014 the Ukrainian military was just as rotten as the Russian one, but the Ukies got their wakeup call with the annexation of Crimea and the Russian sponsored Donbas insurgency. They had 8 years to prepare for the worst case scenario, while the Russians never saw the need for reform.

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          Russia went through drastic changes with their own forces which is why there's no more Interior Army or Moscow Military District.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        And the Ukrainian military in 2014 lost half their country to some insurgents with the backing of a couple thousand Russian troops.

  2. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    It didn't start to deteriorate until the mid 80s, and then the privatisation that followed the fall of the SU made corruption worse.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Wasn't Brezhnev era the start of the stagnation?

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        I think so, as he rolled back a lot of the reforms that Khrushchev started to introduce. But to be fair, I think the Soviet Union was in a state of stagnation before that, as the only ones getting into power were the original Marxist Leninists of the original revolution until Brezhnev took over due to the sheer fact that everyone else had died.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      >didn't start to deteriorate until the mid 80s
      lol
      >the privatisation that followed the fall of the SU made corruption worse
      lmao

      utter tankie delusions

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        >the privatisation that followed the fall of the SU made corruption worse
        >lmao
        You don’t have to be a talkie to believe that the privatization of the 90s was handled in almost the worst way it possibly could have been.

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          Funny how it only went terrible in post communist countries that stayed allies with russia and csto

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        >privatisation
        You mean selling businesses for cents to the dollar to your KGB buddies will taking kickbacks from the Mafia which is also full of your KGB buddies.

  3. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    Remember that Russia didn't have a military police until the mid 2000s as unit political officers were expected to deal all issues in house.

  4. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    they were a might to be reckon with in the 60s and 70s then as the west continued to develop the soviets lagged behind due to their corrupt inefficient regime and them not being white

  5. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    Don't know, they had some top tier songs tho

  6. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    They were arguably better than the west for a time during the 70s. From then on they lost a step and by 91 it was baddddd

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      I was never a hardcore slavaboo but you gotta just accept the reality anon. If you are lucky there'll be some nostalgic holdout you can deny the impotency of. That or Ukraine or someone else uses it competently. I still think Hinds are a cool concept and while they probably are dogshit in a modern war environment I'd bet they were capable enough back in their day.

      What was the deal with 70s Russia being so scary? Everyone knows USA 80s mogged the shit out of the soviets, but it always felt to me like the 50s was a real flex time for Russia too. I can't speak to the 60s. Also kinda hilarious that lo and behold this comic panned out perfectly so far. Makes me wonder what people'll deal with in 2050s. Some kinda neo-islamist jihadism out of ChechnoRussia.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        We had just came out of Vietnam worse for wear. The army was in shambles and staffed by a lot of men who weren't the best and brightest, indeed, many vets and servicemen were seen as scumbags, sharp contrast to the worship of them we see today. Meanwhile the Soviets were at the peak of their economic power, had come out with several new tanks and other pieces of tech, and were making serious gains in their nuclear arsenal. Then we recovered hard while the Soviets started the slow process that led to their collapse.

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          They were scumbags, though. The warcrimes the US military committed in Vietnam put Nazis and the Japanese to shame. Whole slaughter of villages for no reason, widespread use of chemical and biological weapons, and unrestricted bombing of the North even after it was clear the war was completely lost. There is a reason why Vietnam hates America to this day.

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            Jane Fonda, you're drunk again. Time to get off the internet.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        >What was the deal with 70s Russia being so scary?
        The 70s and 80s were a really shit time in the Us because the golden age of the 50s/60s burned out after all the new deal era stuff got pulled back, scaled down, or not upgraded to match more modern needs. Russia and other totalitarian countries seemed to be doing great(a mirage like all totalitarian regimes since they project strength until the cracks become to big to potemkin village over), which made boomers scared as they lost the shiny utopia they believed their parents had.

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          >all the new deal era stuff got pulled back, scaled down, or not upgraded to match more modern needs
          This is so incredibly moronic. Zero chance you aren't a troony.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        The smart weapons meta which made american air power powerful and ATGMs/long range artillery useful didn't take full effect until the 1980s. In the 40s through 70s, tanks were the dominant land meta and dumb mass mean a lot more.

  7. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    the ability of a state to wage war is constrained by its productivity
    as long as the ussr was in the range of the top economies they were powerful, once they stagnated give it a few year of momentum and then their might drops

  8. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    They were relatively better equipped, better supplied and more importantly, better organised. Particularly, the Russian armed forces is ill-equipped to perform large scale military operations with any sort of endurance or large scope.

    In that aspect, the soviet union wasn't that great either, but especially the ability to use manpower and supplies from the Warsaw Pact nations lessened that a lot. More importantly, the organisation of the soviet military was simply better and had more resources at its disposal than modern russia.

    Modern russia is essentially attempting to build a "US gulf war" type of expeditionary force, without really knowing why or how such a force operates.

  9. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    Anon, let me tell you about one of the most successful operations conducted by the Soviets during the Cold War, which was the coup against Hafizullah Amin that instigated the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.

    >Be Hafizullah Amin
    >Be Deputy Leader of the PDPA (Afghanistan's Communist Party) and head of the Khalq faction
    >Be a raging homosexual who is actively trying to replicate Misc Pot and Stalin's purges in order to bring communism to Afghanistan
    >Leader of the PDPA and the Parcham faction, Nur Muhammad Taraki, thinks this is a fricking moronic idea and the Soviets agree
    >Amin launches a coup, kills Taraki after the Soviets promised to protect him and makes them look like impotent fools
    >Proceeds to go full Misc Pot and kills tens of thousands of his own people
    >Soviets decide that they've had enough of his shit and decide to replace him with Karmal, an equally genocidal homosexual who will be absolutely buttmad that Marxism doesn't work in a non-industrial country, but at least one that might listen to them occasionally
    >The Soviets know this is an absolutely moronic thing to do, as it means getting involved in Afghanistan as a stabilising force so that the communist government doesn't instantly collapse, but decide it's the best out of the bad options.
    >Move an entire army up to the border and begin to fly tonnes of equipment into Bagram and other airfields.
    >During this, a transport plane carrying a VDV platoon crashes into a mountain, killing all 33 people onboard.
    >Amin is fricking thrilled, as he has been begging the Soviets to send in troops to assist him for years.
    >Soviets carry out Military Training Exercises outside Amin's palace so they get used to the sight of flares in the night and Soviet troops moving about.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      cont...
      >Also convince the Afghans to let their officers into the palace so they can get a good idea of its interior.
      >Day before the attack, the commanding officers almost get arrested by Afghanistan police, which would have meant that the attack would have had to have been carried out without it's proper leaders
      >On the same day, the KGB successfully poison Amin and a large number of other people at a party celebrating the birth of Amin's Granddaughter, rendering the need to assault the palace pointless.
      >However, because the KGB did not tell anyone they did this, the Afghans called for help from the Soviets who sent two doctors over that managed to save Amin's life.
      >The doctors would still be present during the assault and one of them would die in the crossfire.
      >Attack starts well, Soviets take out the tanks guarding the palace and begin to advance with the Afghans being none the wiser.
      >That is until the two Shilkas open up, BRRRTing the entire palace, causing minimal actual damage and alerting the entire palace about what the Soviets were actually doing
      >During the assault, one of the BMPs drives off the bridge they constructed other a dry moat and gets stuck, trapping the squad of eleven men inside.
      >Panicked commander won't stop crying into the comms, jamming the entire comm network for the attack and not allowing anyone to talk to each other
      >Actual attack goes well, except that the Russians keep shooting each other, as most of them are wearing the uniform of the Afghan National Army to aid in their deception
      >Use white cuffs on their sleeves as ID.
      >Somehow did not know that this is the uniform of the Presidential Guard.
      >Also quickly gets dirty and indistinguishable.
      >Resort to swearing loudly in Russian as a form of identifying each other
      >Amin is found half-dead comforting his five-year old son with the Russian doctors.
      >Amin gets rinsed with automatic fire by an unknown person, killing him, his son and one of the doctors.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        >Commander of the operation gets killed when he goes outside to tell them it's over due to shrieking Monke on comms.
        >Gets shot by his own troops because they were ordered to shoot anyone leaving the building.
        >Rest of the objectives are seized with speed and efficiency, as the Afghan Army really doesn't want to fight the Soviets.
        >Main trouble comes from the fact that the Russians don't tell each other they've secured the objectives, so there is a lot of friendly fire.
        >The head commander of the Soviets in Afghanistan and his staff are almost killed by a sentry who panickily fires a burst at their staff car as it drives towards their position for a sit-rep.
        >Only saved because it's a raw recruit who can't shoot for shit.

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          cont...
          >Also convince the Afghans to let their officers into the palace so they can get a good idea of its interior.
          >Day before the attack, the commanding officers almost get arrested by Afghanistan police, which would have meant that the attack would have had to have been carried out without it's proper leaders
          >On the same day, the KGB successfully poison Amin and a large number of other people at a party celebrating the birth of Amin's Granddaughter, rendering the need to assault the palace pointless.
          >However, because the KGB did not tell anyone they did this, the Afghans called for help from the Soviets who sent two doctors over that managed to save Amin's life.
          >The doctors would still be present during the assault and one of them would die in the crossfire.
          >Attack starts well, Soviets take out the tanks guarding the palace and begin to advance with the Afghans being none the wiser.
          >That is until the two Shilkas open up, BRRRTing the entire palace, causing minimal actual damage and alerting the entire palace about what the Soviets were actually doing
          >During the assault, one of the BMPs drives off the bridge they constructed other a dry moat and gets stuck, trapping the squad of eleven men inside.
          >Panicked commander won't stop crying into the comms, jamming the entire comm network for the attack and not allowing anyone to talk to each other
          >Actual attack goes well, except that the Russians keep shooting each other, as most of them are wearing the uniform of the Afghan National Army to aid in their deception
          >Use white cuffs on their sleeves as ID.
          >Somehow did not know that this is the uniform of the Presidential Guard.
          >Also quickly gets dirty and indistinguishable.
          >Resort to swearing loudly in Russian as a form of identifying each other
          >Amin is found half-dead comforting his five-year old son with the Russian doctors.
          >Amin gets rinsed with automatic fire by an unknown person, killing him, his son and one of the doctors.

          https://i.imgur.com/8GiNkWl.jpg

          Anon, let me tell you about one of the most successful operations conducted by the Soviets during the Cold War, which was the coup against Hafizullah Amin that instigated the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.

          >Be Hafizullah Amin
          >Be Deputy Leader of the PDPA (Afghanistan's Communist Party) and head of the Khalq faction
          >Be a raging homosexual who is actively trying to replicate Misc Pot and Stalin's purges in order to bring communism to Afghanistan
          >Leader of the PDPA and the Parcham faction, Nur Muhammad Taraki, thinks this is a fricking moronic idea and the Soviets agree
          >Amin launches a coup, kills Taraki after the Soviets promised to protect him and makes them look like impotent fools
          >Proceeds to go full Misc Pot and kills tens of thousands of his own people
          >Soviets decide that they've had enough of his shit and decide to replace him with Karmal, an equally genocidal homosexual who will be absolutely buttmad that Marxism doesn't work in a non-industrial country, but at least one that might listen to them occasionally
          >The Soviets know this is an absolutely moronic thing to do, as it means getting involved in Afghanistan as a stabilising force so that the communist government doesn't instantly collapse, but decide it's the best out of the bad options.
          >Move an entire army up to the border and begin to fly tonnes of equipment into Bagram and other airfields.
          >During this, a transport plane carrying a VDV platoon crashes into a mountain, killing all 33 people onboard.
          >Amin is fricking thrilled, as he has been begging the Soviets to send in troops to assist him for years.
          >Soviets carry out Military Training Exercises outside Amin's palace so they get used to the sight of flares in the night and Soviet troops moving about.

          This really sounds like a good plan executed by people with absolutely zero communication and coordination skills

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            It really was, reading through the account the first time, I thought "Wow, it really sounds like these guys have their acts together, surely this will go through without a hitch" and then it just suffered this massive comedy of errors that sounded like it came out of a Hot Shots script rather than a military history book.

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            That's Russia's problem in a nutshell. Their doctrine isn't that bad on paper, even if it's a little simple, but they can't even execute it properly

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          This is so absurd, this can't be real.

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          Ha, I've been watching Afghanistan war documentaries and this is always portrayed as a brilliant attack with some minor friendly fire incidents. I mean it was successful but, lol

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      cont...
      >Also convince the Afghans to let their officers into the palace so they can get a good idea of its interior.
      >Day before the attack, the commanding officers almost get arrested by Afghanistan police, which would have meant that the attack would have had to have been carried out without it's proper leaders
      >On the same day, the KGB successfully poison Amin and a large number of other people at a party celebrating the birth of Amin's Granddaughter, rendering the need to assault the palace pointless.
      >However, because the KGB did not tell anyone they did this, the Afghans called for help from the Soviets who sent two doctors over that managed to save Amin's life.
      >The doctors would still be present during the assault and one of them would die in the crossfire.
      >Attack starts well, Soviets take out the tanks guarding the palace and begin to advance with the Afghans being none the wiser.
      >That is until the two Shilkas open up, BRRRTing the entire palace, causing minimal actual damage and alerting the entire palace about what the Soviets were actually doing
      >During the assault, one of the BMPs drives off the bridge they constructed other a dry moat and gets stuck, trapping the squad of eleven men inside.
      >Panicked commander won't stop crying into the comms, jamming the entire comm network for the attack and not allowing anyone to talk to each other
      >Actual attack goes well, except that the Russians keep shooting each other, as most of them are wearing the uniform of the Afghan National Army to aid in their deception
      >Use white cuffs on their sleeves as ID.
      >Somehow did not know that this is the uniform of the Presidential Guard.
      >Also quickly gets dirty and indistinguishable.
      >Resort to swearing loudly in Russian as a form of identifying each other
      >Amin is found half-dead comforting his five-year old son with the Russian doctors.
      >Amin gets rinsed with automatic fire by an unknown person, killing him, his son and one of the doctors.

      >Commander of the operation gets killed when he goes outside to tell them it's over due to shrieking Monke on comms.
      >Gets shot by his own troops because they were ordered to shoot anyone leaving the building.
      >Rest of the objectives are seized with speed and efficiency, as the Afghan Army really doesn't want to fight the Soviets.
      >Main trouble comes from the fact that the Russians don't tell each other they've secured the objectives, so there is a lot of friendly fire.
      >The head commander of the Soviets in Afghanistan and his staff are almost killed by a sentry who panickily fires a burst at their staff car as it drives towards their position for a sit-rep.
      >Only saved because it's a raw recruit who can't shoot for shit.

      That sounds fricking hilarious, do you know where I can read up on it?

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        That picture has a new level of humor to me now that I've read up on the shitshow and found out that the bow didn't actually blow off, but instead the salvage company the Russians contracted were so low budget that they couldn't be assed to deal with any UXO in the front and just cut it off.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        This is so absurd, this can't be real.

        The account comes from the book Afgantsy: The Russians in Afghanistan 1979-89 by Robert Braithwaite (I included an image of the book in the first post

        https://i.imgur.com/8GiNkWl.jpg

        Anon, let me tell you about one of the most successful operations conducted by the Soviets during the Cold War, which was the coup against Hafizullah Amin that instigated the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.

        >Be Hafizullah Amin
        >Be Deputy Leader of the PDPA (Afghanistan's Communist Party) and head of the Khalq faction
        >Be a raging homosexual who is actively trying to replicate Misc Pot and Stalin's purges in order to bring communism to Afghanistan
        >Leader of the PDPA and the Parcham faction, Nur Muhammad Taraki, thinks this is a fricking moronic idea and the Soviets agree
        >Amin launches a coup, kills Taraki after the Soviets promised to protect him and makes them look like impotent fools
        >Proceeds to go full Misc Pot and kills tens of thousands of his own people
        >Soviets decide that they've had enough of his shit and decide to replace him with Karmal, an equally genocidal homosexual who will be absolutely buttmad that Marxism doesn't work in a non-industrial country, but at least one that might listen to them occasionally
        >The Soviets know this is an absolutely moronic thing to do, as it means getting involved in Afghanistan as a stabilising force so that the communist government doesn't instantly collapse, but decide it's the best out of the bad options.
        >Move an entire army up to the border and begin to fly tonnes of equipment into Bagram and other airfields.
        >During this, a transport plane carrying a VDV platoon crashes into a mountain, killing all 33 people onboard.
        >Amin is fricking thrilled, as he has been begging the Soviets to send in troops to assist him for years.
        >Soviets carry out Military Training Exercises outside Amin's palace so they get used to the sight of flares in the night and Soviet troops moving about.

        ). Specifically chapter 4, The Storming of The Palace, pages 82-102.
        Going back through the book, I forgot to mention that the palace cat was the last victim of the siege when it made a noise in the attic and all the troops inside preceded to light the entire place up with grenades and AK fire as they thought it was a rouge palace guard attempting a sneak attack.
        The entire book is filled with accounts like this, and they come across as being unintentionally funny, as the author is a former ambassador to Russia and he is trying his best to portray the Russians in a fair and objective light, which just makes things like a Colonel b***hing out a driver for being shit at his job, before accidently blowing himself up with his own grenade funnier. (Chapter 9, sub-chapter: Operations, Page 213, in case you're curious)

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      cont...
      >Also convince the Afghans to let their officers into the palace so they can get a good idea of its interior.
      >Day before the attack, the commanding officers almost get arrested by Afghanistan police, which would have meant that the attack would have had to have been carried out without it's proper leaders
      >On the same day, the KGB successfully poison Amin and a large number of other people at a party celebrating the birth of Amin's Granddaughter, rendering the need to assault the palace pointless.
      >However, because the KGB did not tell anyone they did this, the Afghans called for help from the Soviets who sent two doctors over that managed to save Amin's life.
      >The doctors would still be present during the assault and one of them would die in the crossfire.
      >Attack starts well, Soviets take out the tanks guarding the palace and begin to advance with the Afghans being none the wiser.
      >That is until the two Shilkas open up, BRRRTing the entire palace, causing minimal actual damage and alerting the entire palace about what the Soviets were actually doing
      >During the assault, one of the BMPs drives off the bridge they constructed other a dry moat and gets stuck, trapping the squad of eleven men inside.
      >Panicked commander won't stop crying into the comms, jamming the entire comm network for the attack and not allowing anyone to talk to each other
      >Actual attack goes well, except that the Russians keep shooting each other, as most of them are wearing the uniform of the Afghan National Army to aid in their deception
      >Use white cuffs on their sleeves as ID.
      >Somehow did not know that this is the uniform of the Presidential Guard.
      >Also quickly gets dirty and indistinguishable.
      >Resort to swearing loudly in Russian as a form of identifying each other
      >Amin is found half-dead comforting his five-year old son with the Russian doctors.
      >Amin gets rinsed with automatic fire by an unknown person, killing him, his son and one of the doctors.

      >Commander of the operation gets killed when he goes outside to tell them it's over due to shrieking Monke on comms.
      >Gets shot by his own troops because they were ordered to shoot anyone leaving the building.
      >Rest of the objectives are seized with speed and efficiency, as the Afghan Army really doesn't want to fight the Soviets.
      >Main trouble comes from the fact that the Russians don't tell each other they've secured the objectives, so there is a lot of friendly fire.
      >The head commander of the Soviets in Afghanistan and his staff are almost killed by a sentry who panickily fires a burst at their staff car as it drives towards their position for a sit-rep.
      >Only saved because it's a raw recruit who can't shoot for shit.

      This shit absolutely has to be screenshot. Just fricking incredible.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        got it

        • 1 year ago
          Anonymous

          Many thanks. That was one of the most amazing greentexts i have ever seen here.

          • 1 year ago
            Anonymous

            of course, anon. Please enjoy this complimentary tostitos-themed AI story.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      cont...
      >Also convince the Afghans to let their officers into the palace so they can get a good idea of its interior.
      >Day before the attack, the commanding officers almost get arrested by Afghanistan police, which would have meant that the attack would have had to have been carried out without it's proper leaders
      >On the same day, the KGB successfully poison Amin and a large number of other people at a party celebrating the birth of Amin's Granddaughter, rendering the need to assault the palace pointless.
      >However, because the KGB did not tell anyone they did this, the Afghans called for help from the Soviets who sent two doctors over that managed to save Amin's life.
      >The doctors would still be present during the assault and one of them would die in the crossfire.
      >Attack starts well, Soviets take out the tanks guarding the palace and begin to advance with the Afghans being none the wiser.
      >That is until the two Shilkas open up, BRRRTing the entire palace, causing minimal actual damage and alerting the entire palace about what the Soviets were actually doing
      >During the assault, one of the BMPs drives off the bridge they constructed other a dry moat and gets stuck, trapping the squad of eleven men inside.
      >Panicked commander won't stop crying into the comms, jamming the entire comm network for the attack and not allowing anyone to talk to each other
      >Actual attack goes well, except that the Russians keep shooting each other, as most of them are wearing the uniform of the Afghan National Army to aid in their deception
      >Use white cuffs on their sleeves as ID.
      >Somehow did not know that this is the uniform of the Presidential Guard.
      >Also quickly gets dirty and indistinguishable.
      >Resort to swearing loudly in Russian as a form of identifying each other
      >Amin is found half-dead comforting his five-year old son with the Russian doctors.
      >Amin gets rinsed with automatic fire by an unknown person, killing him, his son and one of the doctors.

      >Commander of the operation gets killed when he goes outside to tell them it's over due to shrieking Monke on comms.
      >Gets shot by his own troops because they were ordered to shoot anyone leaving the building.
      >Rest of the objectives are seized with speed and efficiency, as the Afghan Army really doesn't want to fight the Soviets.
      >Main trouble comes from the fact that the Russians don't tell each other they've secured the objectives, so there is a lot of friendly fire.
      >The head commander of the Soviets in Afghanistan and his staff are almost killed by a sentry who panickily fires a burst at their staff car as it drives towards their position for a sit-rep.
      >Only saved because it's a raw recruit who can't shoot for shit.

      https://i.imgur.com/Nf3tAGG.png

      got it

      related, Russian fleet's voyage from the Baltic to the battle of Tsushima

  10. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    IMO '70s USSR was a legit threat, the west didn't have a huge technological advantage and their huge stockpiles of armor hadn't had time to fall apart or be stolen. The '80s seems to be the start of the decline and after the fall of the USSR it's nothing but "we was" bullshit.

  11. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    It's reasonable to assume that the GSFG were at a high level of readiness and training, their category A divisions were the face of the Red Army and went on regular exercises. It's safe to say their performance up until the mid 80s would not be as bad as the very "special" military operation.

    The conditions of war are very imporant to consider in the hypothetical WW3 scenario. A ton of things that seem small or unimportant at face value make huge differences. The Soviets likely would have gone into the war expecting a fight and would be drilled and prepared accordingly. In Ukraine we see the Russians driving in expecting little to no resistance.

    Late 70s is the best timeframe for a Soviet 'win' and that win depends a lot on the ultimate objective of the war. By the 80s, especially after the mid 80s, the Soviets would not be able to contend with NATO's new technological and doctrinal advances and would need highly favorable starting conditions (such as NATO having little to no warning) to subjugate Germany.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Oh, also by the mid to late 80s it is highly dubious whether the warsaw pact would be willing to go along with an invasion of the West. In 1989, no chance.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        It went terrible pretty much everywhere. Those countries that split away from Russia managed to drag themselves up with heavy western European assistance. But even still it wasn’t pleasant for pact countries in the 90s. German reunification has been a success because West Germany has spent a huge amount of money and effort on East Germany, even though it still lags behind 25 years later. And East Germany was the “good” communist country.

        The west should have taken a much more active hand in Russia in the 90s, but this was the period where everyone bought into the flawed idea that liberal democracy and effective free markets would just spring up as the natural status quo.

  12. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    posting in a legendary greentext thread

  13. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    They were probably much better. The idea that that sort of collapse in funding would have had no effect seems hard to believe.

  14. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    From the 60’s and the 70’s the Soviets were a genuine threat that had a *slight* tech advantage in certain areas. Brezhnev being king vatnik fricked all of it up though because he thought that Khruschev was too much of a reactionary. By the 80’s all they really had going for them was the image that various movies like Rocky gave them and muh nooks, especially since that was the same time that the Berlin Wall was being called to be torn down and things like the Solidarity movement were spreading like wildfire as the Warsaw Pact collapsed in real time.

  15. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    >WiC
    >Russians get fricked by logistics and a stupid hail mary that gets punished hard, all while claiming massive victories to their populace
    >Reality
    >Russians get fricked by logistics and a stupid hail mary that gets punished hard, all while claiming massive victories to their populace
    Nothing changed.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      The idea that they could ever mount an invasion of CONUS certainly did.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        Well, that part was always fantasy - then and now.

  16. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    >Early cold war
    Sure, they had some weight to throw around.
    >Mid to late cold war
    Nah, they were just as corrupt and stupid.

  17. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    The Soviets were able to actually produce new, relatively advanced for the time equipment due to running just a few steps below a full war economy. Modern Russia for example, would've never been able to produce the T-64 in any appreciable number, let alone the T-72 or the T-80 and would've resorted to continuing to operate vast fleets of T-55s and T-62s while dangling a few dysfunctional T-64 prototypes around and claiming they were going to be an MBT paradigm shift that would mog HATO any year now.

  18. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    They had competent generals in WW2, who kept things together in the decades after the conflict, Once those geezers died off/retired in the 70s things started going to shit.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Stalin was infamous for purging competent leaders and soldiers after he took power

  19. 1 year ago
    Anonymous

    Yes they were massively better by literally every metric

    There is a reason that 90% of Russia's equipment is relics from the soviet dark age of technology. USSR was able to build a 4th generation aircraft within 5 years of the F-15/16 and field it in significant numbers while all the new aircraft Russia has produced in the last 20 years is a bigger 2 seat version of the Flanker as a ghetto strike eagle (only lacking all the PGMs and avionics) and a handful of cargo cult stealth fighters with the RCS of a harrier. The Harrier and Yak-141 are a good example by '91 the USSR had a had a supersonic jump jet with the radar/missiles from the Mig-29 that would have ended being better than the Sea Harrier FA.2 ( late 80s/early 90s revamp of the sea harrier with look down shoot down PD radar and AMRAAMS) if the USSR hadn't collapsed (not like Russia could ever have developed it).

    In terms of corruption the main difference is that the USSR actually tried to stamp out corruption and punish black market theft. It was a losing battle but it kept things running much better than modern Russia where the entire system is built on theft and kleptocracy from the very top all the way down and the government encourages it rather than making any attempt to stop it.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      >In terms of corruption the main difference is that the USSR actually tried to stamp out corruption and punish black market theft. It was a losing battle but it kept things running much better than modern Russia where the entire system is built on theft and kleptocracy from the very top all the way down and the government encourages it rather than making any attempt to stop it.

      Bullshit. Everyday people back in soviet times stole everything that wasn't nailed down at work. There's this russian guy who talks about his childhood on YouTube who talks all about it. Vatniks have always been like this.

      • 1 year ago
        Anonymous

        I had a Russian guy explain to me that corruption was widespread even back then, but the scale of it was that officials got themselves a nice dacha, or muscled themselves into some committee, not building $1bln yachts.

        This everyman skimming a bit off the top kinda corruption literally doesn't matter, the big leagues one does.

    • 1 year ago
      Anonymous

      Russia has been terminally corrupt since imperial times. Someone repost the article from The Economist of the 1850's which reports on the sorry state of the Russian army during the Crimean War. It's astounding how something written 170 years ago still rings true even today.

      It's also baffling how Russia ever managed to become part of the Great Powers at all. I guess it goes to show that sheer quantity has a quality all of its own. Russia used to have a near endless supply of cheap canon fodder, but those times have come to an end. In 1950 the USSR still had a greater population than the US (150mil vs 180mil) despite the truly staggering death toll of WWII. Nowadays the US has a population of 330mil and if the USSR still existed, would sit at 290mil. But it doesn't exist and Russia by herself only counts for 145mil, not even half the US population.

      THAT is the true difference between then and now. Russia used to have the capability to zerg rush her enemies if nothing else, now she doesn't even have that anymore.

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