Probably Cuban missile crisis 1960s? At that point it was either now or never for the Soviet’s to attack. And notice after that, they began to decline severely.
This, 60s maybe into the early 70s in terms of just raw military power, but by then the concept of overwhelming NATO by numbers was starting to fade in light of new technology in the West, and while the Soviets was starting to reach some parity in technology by the 80s the will just wasn't there any more, and the cracks were already starting to form.
Cuban crisis was the absolute biggest soviet bluff in their history. For a nation flexing nukes they had less than 1/10th of nuclear arsenal just for US, espcially ICBMs. During the crisis the soviets housed almost half of the BMs that could reach US in there because the only ICBMs they had at home were less than a dozen of R-7s that were a colossal failure in all respects and 2 dozens of their other ICBMs that were hardly any better. This is when just 2 years ago US spy planes were doing unimpeded overflights over the USSR territory and observing all launchpads being used and built since soviets didn't know how to make silos yet. The soviets lacked a functional early warning radar system until the early 70s and their early ICBMs took hours to prepare, enough for US to nuke them, check the ones that might survive and nuke them again, just with ICBMs. The accuracy of soviet missiles with then fairly unimpressive but overly heavy warheads couldn't reliably threaten all but the largest cities, let alone military targets and the failure rate would have been abysmal. Then all the bombers, smaller BMs in europe and subs make this even more one sided.
Basically, in terms of nukes US could freely annihilate entire soviet union at literally every given minute from 1945 up to about 1964 while taking maybe one or two stray nukes that got through via sheer luck, and not against the specifically chosen target either. After that, US could still probably do that but the soviet silos and subs had been developed and built enough that taking them out without missing some might have been difficult, although exactly how much is uncertain and it's definitely possible that US could still wreck them with that massive numerical advantage they still had. Only in the very late 60s and early 70s did soviets manage to catch up to US in terms of number of missiles, although still not in quality or tech.
Post FDR the NOOK argument must have more or less come down to if "do we want another Marshall plan on our back after euro is bombed again?". True about the chubby little hands vatniks had in regards of inter continental exchanges although for tactical engagements they had things like nook torpedoes which they famously almost used in the Cuban blockade.
WW2 should have never ended with Berlin but with the capture of Moscow. WTF was the wheelchaired weirdos problem anyway? Was he a closeted socialist as the rumor suggest??
>spent the last 4 years spamming out propaganda about how the soviets are OUR LOYAL BROTHERS BRAVELY FIGHTING THE NAZIS >think the public will go for a STARTING a war with these people after already being pretty war fatigued.
tactical nukes were more prominent but since they are hard to use on strategic targets they are not nearly as threatening, especially when things have already escalated to the point of using strategic nukes that would likely involve the breakdown of command and logistical structure, making tactical nukes even less threatening.
They are major escalation that can kill thousands of people if you nuke some camp or a ship, however because these are soldiers that if dead still won't significantly impede the function of the armed forces as a whole and because the weapons cannot target military or political command structure or civilians they are not nearly as threatening unless employed on a mass scale that would almost immediately escalate into strategic exchange.
1960’s-1970’s, Khrushchev actually wanted to modernize things while removing Stalinist brainrot that became obsolete once WW2 ended. Unfortunately for him he didn’t take into account Brezhnev being a moronic proto vatnik that did everything he could to undermine Mr. K and even oust him into an early retirement.
Thing is we have the power of hindsight to realize how full of shit the USSR really was, during the Crisis there was almost no actual way to truly gauge their arsenal, not to mention the US tends to hype enemies up for the purpose of building a billion super weapons. That said FDR should have nipped Stalin in the bud and tell him to frick off from Europe once WW2 ended, given how ridiculously reliant they were on American everything.
>Thing is we have the power of hindsight to realize how full of shit the USSR really was, during the Crisis there was almost no actual way to truly gauge their arsenal
that's true, however during the crisis US actually got intel on the extent of soviet capabilities that allowed them to call their bluff. i don't remember the name of the guy who leaked the info.
True, but that was also the closest we’ve ever been to all out nuclear war. Can’t blame JFK for taking the cautionary route.
khruschev was a reformer that tried to change soviet society however don't make the mistake of thinking that he wasn't a dirty commie that was bent on dragging other people into the miserable existence that his country created.
remember, he was the guy that authorized the creation of the berlin wall, and the guy who put down the Hungarian revolution.
Of course he was still a commie, but he was one who actually tried to improve the USSR and not just sit on top like a fat pig. In a commie society that deserves credit where its due.
khruschev was a reformer that tried to change soviet society however don't make the mistake of thinking that he wasn't a dirty commie that was bent on dragging other people into the miserable existence that his country created.
remember, he was the guy that authorized the creation of the berlin wall, and the guy who put down the Hungarian revolution.
The biggest, realest peak was probably in the late 60s/early 70s, I think by the mid 80s it was mostly fluff besides the threat of nukes. I think much like in the west, all the really smart determined engineers and scientists and other experts kinda got old and died out
I think although looking back the WWII era portrays them as an unstoppable united patriotic force doing its best with the least resources available, and that stoked a lot of fear from the west out of their pure perceived determination, I think in reality we kind of always know it probably wasn't much more than an endless wave of moronovich soldiers willing to die in human waves than anything else, save for a few very expensive, possibly dangerous wafflefabrics. But the nukes was enough to make up for the rest. I am drunk and high, so
This, 60s maybe into the early 70s in terms of just raw military power, but by then the concept of overwhelming NATO by numbers was starting to fade in light of new technology in the West, and while the Soviets was starting to reach some parity in technology by the 80s the will just wasn't there any more, and the cracks were already starting to form.
The thing about soviet army in general and also in the 60s was that the competence you can expect is not some more advanced tactics or grand strategies, it's the same competence that we try to find in their performance today. - the ability to bring and throw more things head on to overwhelm the attacker and the ability to carry the things far enough that they reach the enemy instead of running out of fuel half way. In this order of battle there still are 2 kinds of vehicles that are most important - tanks and artillery. In the 60s functional soviet tanks consisted of only T-55s and souped up T-55s named T-62s. These were inferior to most western tanks and would have to rely on numbers, and during the 60s their numerical advantage was far less prominent than in the 70s.
Now to the most important part - the artillery, which is detrimental to any and all soviet military operations that don't involve driving tanks freely into unsuspecting cities with unprepared civilian populace. And here's the most important part - in the 60s soviet artillery constituted almost entirely out Grad's and older MRLSs, primarily due to the then active party leadership decision that rockets are the future and gun artillery is outdated and obsolete. After vietnam war started and the party heads changed the new government decided that this is wrong and pulled out ww2 era guns but their condition and capability was so lacking that i don't need to explain it. Only in the early 70s and through the decade did soviets actually field more modern artillery pieces.
Now Grads are artillery too, and soviets made very, very large number of these but due to the large number of rockets expended to hit a target even compared to a massed and poorly aimed gun artillery barrage and due to the significantly bigger logistical footprint of the rockets the real might of the soviet artillery during the time period should be considered significantly hindered.
>In the 60s functional soviet tanks consisted of only T-55s and souped up T-55s named T-62s. These were inferior to most western tanks
M60s and L7 centurions designed to destroy T-55s? Yes
T-62? About equal
The biggest, realest peak was probably in the late 60s/early 70s, I think by the mid 80s it was mostly fluff besides the threat of nukes. I think much like in the west, all the really smart determined engineers and scientists and other experts kinda got old and died out
I think although looking back the WWII era portrays them as an unstoppable united patriotic force doing its best with the least resources available, and that stoked a lot of fear from the west out of their pure perceived determination, I think in reality we kind of always know it probably wasn't much more than an endless wave of moronovich soldiers willing to die in human waves than anything else, save for a few very expensive, possibly dangerous wafflefabrics. But the nukes was enough to make up for the rest. I am drunk and high, so
It depends, however in terms of military power relative to the rest of the world, 70s, however the 1976 was the year that soviet dreams of military achievements just died and it would be going worse and worse from then on due to the massive numbers and variations of game changing tech US were taking out.
In terms of absolute power relative to the soviet union of past or the future the question is a lot more difficult because it's very hard to pinpoint when soviets really were competent, if they were at all, ever. I can only refer to Belenko about the decay already being well established by the mid-70s, so late 60s is probably the time when they were the most likely to be able to organize anything. Although in the early 80s they rolled out a lot of new tech that was pretty intimidating so it's even more confusing as you have to weigh the amount of decay and corruption that's hard to estimate against military equipment with unproven capabilities that you're unsure if was even maintained enough to function at all, lest according to the paper specs.
>flying shilka
I can't find it! I remember the thread and have been looking but just can't find it. Have this Queen Victoria being arrested by a Russian solider instead
>The USSR had the US so outclassed by 1979
The ussr at no point 'outclassed' the USA or the west simply because its clown car economics command economy was ludicrously inefficient compared to free market capitalism. Take way the scientists and machinery looted from Germany and eastern Europe, the allied lease lend (which they never paid back) and they were barely able to grow potatoes. They could not even make a decent car.
Except they did, you fricking moron. The T64 and T72 shit all over the M60, the Soviets expanded their ICBM's and built it's nuclear arsenal to the point that even after SALT they still have more warheads.
Who built Russia's railways? That's right the USA. Mostly prior to WW1
>USA built the railways
No, just no.
https://i.imgur.com/LKKR6NA.jpg
[...] >a butthurt vatBlack person entered the thread
>No I'm American, and cam provide proof if needed. >Soviets expanded their ICBM's and built it's nuclear arsenal
Thank you John from Texas Oblast for your clunky ESL contribution to this thread.
You will never be a real glowie. You have no intelligence, you have no analytical ability, you have no successful missions. You are a diversity hire and/or Zogbot twisted by goyslop and a love of Israel into a crude mockery of Cold War-era competence.
All the “consent” you manufacture is two-faced and half-hearted. Behind their firewalls the FSB and Ministry of State Security mock you. American citizens are disgusted and ashamed of you, your information campaign targets laugh at your illogical arguments behind closed doors.
Millennials and Zoomers are utterly repulsed by you. Dozens of years of failed brainwashing attempts have allowed younger generations to sniff out glowie intel operations with incredible efficiency. Even glowposts that “pass” look uncanny and unnatural to a millennial. Your faith in our failed government is a dead giveaway. And even if you manage to get a newbie to fall for your bait, he’ll post sneed the second he gets a whiff of your diseased, infected support of a supposed rules-based international order.
You will never be influential. You hoist up a manufactured narrative every five minutes and tell yourself it’s going to be impactful, but deep inside you feel the futility creeping up like a weed, ready to crush you under the unbearable weight.
Eventually it’ll be too much to bear - government debt will accumulate, inflation will get out of control, more money will be sent to Israel and Ukraine, and the United States will collapse. Looters will break into your offices, elated and relieved that they can sell some computers to buy food. They’ll burn down your agency’s offices to stay warm, and every passerby for the rest of eternity will know another failed gloworg is buried there.
>What decade is considered peak soviet military before it started to rust?
2000s and 2010s.
That is, when the internet was widespread enough for vatniks to cream themselves over Russia's fantasy military and actually influence the broader discourse that way, but before Russia decided to fight an actual war to shatter the illusion.
In reality, it has always been rusty shit.
1970s or 1980s
They were way ahead of the curve on a lot of military technology. Unfortunately they are just too fricking moronic to have it mean anything.
Too much corruption throughout has rotted them away at the core.
Too little training, too much bravado and machismo to understand you can't just make cool shit and win wars, you have to be proficient and develop a solid doctrine.
missiles, helicopters, radar, submarines, planes, mechanized warfare, etc.
if they weren't such colossal frickups as a people they would have actually been a real threat to the rest of the world.
>missiles
Aside from that one time with the R-73 and AIM-9M, the US always had a lead in missiles. Like the soviets did not have a response to the 1950 AIM-7 till the fricking 1970s. >radar
The US was always ahead on that one. The APQ-120 blew out the fricking water every soviet radar till the fricking 70s, and by then the AWG-9 and APG-63 did the same till the end of the cold war >planes
lol, lmao even. You could maybe make that argument for the first (F-86/MiG-15) and second (Century Series/MiG-19/21) gen fighters, but by the late 1950s/early 1960s the F-4 put the US a whole generation ahead in terms of aircraft, and it stayed that way ever since. I mean by the time the soviets made a plane that could somewhat match the F-4, the MiG-23, the US was already starting to field the F-14 and F-15, aircraft which were a full generation ahead and completely shat on the MiG-23. The MiG-29 and Su-27 only came in the mid 1980s
This. The only time I can think of that the Soviets were ever ahead of the US or NATO militarily was when they first adopted the AK. By then however, assault rifles as a doctrine weren't really fleshed out so it couldn't have been taken full advantage of at that time, and small arms rarely make that much of a difference. The rest of the world using battle rifles up to Vietnam was probably still good enough to deal with the majority of Soviet infantry on the ground, assuming a ground war happened. In fact, most of our weapons, gear, and everything else was drafted on the idea that the Soviets would invade Europe (they were so sure it would happen that they had weapons caches and Gladio stay-behind agents in preparation to deal with a Soviet-occupied Europe). Vietnam and other small conflicts sort of threw a wrench into those works, they would have been fine in Europe's urban areas and open fields, but not in the jungle and rural Montagnard villages.
According to all veritable reports, the USSR was never in a position to take on NATO in a ground war at any point in the Cold War.
Their military peak was most likely some time immediately after their founding in 1917, since then it's been a slow burning decline into obsolescence punctuated by several great leaps downward that became increasingly common to the end, and then became the norm from then until right now, and it's going to continue getting lower for the foreseeable future.
1940s
>Insert meme about USS Milwaukee
Probably Cuban missile crisis 1960s? At that point it was either now or never for the Soviet’s to attack. And notice after that, they began to decline severely.
This, 60s maybe into the early 70s in terms of just raw military power, but by then the concept of overwhelming NATO by numbers was starting to fade in light of new technology in the West, and while the Soviets was starting to reach some parity in technology by the 80s the will just wasn't there any more, and the cracks were already starting to form.
Cuban crisis was the absolute biggest soviet bluff in their history. For a nation flexing nukes they had less than 1/10th of nuclear arsenal just for US, espcially ICBMs. During the crisis the soviets housed almost half of the BMs that could reach US in there because the only ICBMs they had at home were less than a dozen of R-7s that were a colossal failure in all respects and 2 dozens of their other ICBMs that were hardly any better. This is when just 2 years ago US spy planes were doing unimpeded overflights over the USSR territory and observing all launchpads being used and built since soviets didn't know how to make silos yet. The soviets lacked a functional early warning radar system until the early 70s and their early ICBMs took hours to prepare, enough for US to nuke them, check the ones that might survive and nuke them again, just with ICBMs. The accuracy of soviet missiles with then fairly unimpressive but overly heavy warheads couldn't reliably threaten all but the largest cities, let alone military targets and the failure rate would have been abysmal. Then all the bombers, smaller BMs in europe and subs make this even more one sided.
Basically, in terms of nukes US could freely annihilate entire soviet union at literally every given minute from 1945 up to about 1964 while taking maybe one or two stray nukes that got through via sheer luck, and not against the specifically chosen target either. After that, US could still probably do that but the soviet silos and subs had been developed and built enough that taking them out without missing some might have been difficult, although exactly how much is uncertain and it's definitely possible that US could still wreck them with that massive numerical advantage they still had. Only in the very late 60s and early 70s did soviets manage to catch up to US in terms of number of missiles, although still not in quality or tech.
>flexing nukes
Stopped reading here. Why write paragraphs about something you clearly know nothing about
>a butthurt vatBlack person entered the thread
The Cuban missile crisis happened as a result of America moving missiles to Turkey and ended when they were moved out
Post FDR the NOOK argument must have more or less come down to if "do we want another Marshall plan on our back after euro is bombed again?". True about the chubby little hands vatniks had in regards of inter continental exchanges although for tactical engagements they had things like nook torpedoes which they famously almost used in the Cuban blockade.
WW2 should have never ended with Berlin but with the capture of Moscow. WTF was the wheelchaired weirdos problem anyway? Was he a closeted socialist as the rumor suggest??
>Was he a closeted socialist as the rumor suggest??
His advisors certainly were.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alger_Hiss
>spent the last 4 years spamming out propaganda about how the soviets are OUR LOYAL BROTHERS BRAVELY FIGHTING THE NAZIS
>think the public will go for a STARTING a war with these people after already being pretty war fatigued.
tactical nukes were more prominent but since they are hard to use on strategic targets they are not nearly as threatening, especially when things have already escalated to the point of using strategic nukes that would likely involve the breakdown of command and logistical structure, making tactical nukes even less threatening.
They are major escalation that can kill thousands of people if you nuke some camp or a ship, however because these are soldiers that if dead still won't significantly impede the function of the armed forces as a whole and because the weapons cannot target military or political command structure or civilians they are not nearly as threatening unless employed on a mass scale that would almost immediately escalate into strategic exchange.
1960’s-1970’s, Khrushchev actually wanted to modernize things while removing Stalinist brainrot that became obsolete once WW2 ended. Unfortunately for him he didn’t take into account Brezhnev being a moronic proto vatnik that did everything he could to undermine Mr. K and even oust him into an early retirement.
Thing is we have the power of hindsight to realize how full of shit the USSR really was, during the Crisis there was almost no actual way to truly gauge their arsenal, not to mention the US tends to hype enemies up for the purpose of building a billion super weapons. That said FDR should have nipped Stalin in the bud and tell him to frick off from Europe once WW2 ended, given how ridiculously reliant they were on American everything.
And its awesome.
>Thing is we have the power of hindsight to realize how full of shit the USSR really was, during the Crisis there was almost no actual way to truly gauge their arsenal
that's true, however during the crisis US actually got intel on the extent of soviet capabilities that allowed them to call their bluff. i don't remember the name of the guy who leaked the info.
True, but that was also the closest we’ve ever been to all out nuclear war. Can’t blame JFK for taking the cautionary route.
Of course he was still a commie, but he was one who actually tried to improve the USSR and not just sit on top like a fat pig. In a commie society that deserves credit where its due.
khruschev was a reformer that tried to change soviet society however don't make the mistake of thinking that he wasn't a dirty commie that was bent on dragging other people into the miserable existence that his country created.
remember, he was the guy that authorized the creation of the berlin wall, and the guy who put down the Hungarian revolution.
The thing about soviet army in general and also in the 60s was that the competence you can expect is not some more advanced tactics or grand strategies, it's the same competence that we try to find in their performance today. - the ability to bring and throw more things head on to overwhelm the attacker and the ability to carry the things far enough that they reach the enemy instead of running out of fuel half way. In this order of battle there still are 2 kinds of vehicles that are most important - tanks and artillery. In the 60s functional soviet tanks consisted of only T-55s and souped up T-55s named T-62s. These were inferior to most western tanks and would have to rely on numbers, and during the 60s their numerical advantage was far less prominent than in the 70s.
Now to the most important part - the artillery, which is detrimental to any and all soviet military operations that don't involve driving tanks freely into unsuspecting cities with unprepared civilian populace. And here's the most important part - in the 60s soviet artillery constituted almost entirely out Grad's and older MRLSs, primarily due to the then active party leadership decision that rockets are the future and gun artillery is outdated and obsolete. After vietnam war started and the party heads changed the new government decided that this is wrong and pulled out ww2 era guns but their condition and capability was so lacking that i don't need to explain it. Only in the early 70s and through the decade did soviets actually field more modern artillery pieces.
Now Grads are artillery too, and soviets made very, very large number of these but due to the large number of rockets expended to hit a target even compared to a massed and poorly aimed gun artillery barrage and due to the significantly bigger logistical footprint of the rockets the real might of the soviet artillery during the time period should be considered significantly hindered.
jesus, imagine going to war as a soldier of a moronic horde with nothing but cramped tin cans and grads with cep of 1km.
>In the 60s functional soviet tanks consisted of only T-55s and souped up T-55s named T-62s. These were inferior to most western tanks
M60s and L7 centurions designed to destroy T-55s? Yes
T-62? About equal
lol, a cramped deathtrap with half the fire rate and ammo load and an inaccurate gun? lmao
probably post WWII? but without US logistical support it looks like russia is/has always been a paper tiger
The biggest, realest peak was probably in the late 60s/early 70s, I think by the mid 80s it was mostly fluff besides the threat of nukes. I think much like in the west, all the really smart determined engineers and scientists and other experts kinda got old and died out
I think although looking back the WWII era portrays them as an unstoppable united patriotic force doing its best with the least resources available, and that stoked a lot of fear from the west out of their pure perceived determination, I think in reality we kind of always know it probably wasn't much more than an endless wave of moronovich soldiers willing to die in human waves than anything else, save for a few very expensive, possibly dangerous wafflefabrics. But the nukes was enough to make up for the rest. I am drunk and high, so
It depends, however in terms of military power relative to the rest of the world, 70s, however the 1976 was the year that soviet dreams of military achievements just died and it would be going worse and worse from then on due to the massive numbers and variations of game changing tech US were taking out.
In terms of absolute power relative to the soviet union of past or the future the question is a lot more difficult because it's very hard to pinpoint when soviets really were competent, if they were at all, ever. I can only refer to Belenko about the decay already being well established by the mid-70s, so late 60s is probably the time when they were the most likely to be able to organize anything. Although in the early 80s they rolled out a lot of new tech that was pretty intimidating so it's even more confusing as you have to weigh the amount of decay and corruption that's hard to estimate against military equipment with unproven capabilities that you're unsure if was even maintained enough to function at all, lest according to the paper specs.
>What decade is considered peak soviet military before it started to rust?
post flying shilka, blyatsekai anon
>What decade is considered peak soviet military before it started to rust?
post flying shilka, blyatsekai anon
>blyatsekia
icykai
>What decade is considered peak soviet military before it started to rust?
.
>Vatniks
>Furries
>Alt-History
>Fantasy
Its all so fantastically gay.
>flying shilka
I can't find it! I remember the thread and have been looking but just can't find it. Have this Queen Victoria being arrested by a Russian solider instead
>Its all so fantastically gay.
Fetal alcohol syndrome is a hell of a drug, I suppose.
It has a lot in common with what they post here mind you
Up until Yom Kippur.
1970's. The USSR had the US so outclassed by 1979 it wasn't funny, so much so it got Regan elected.
>The USSR had the US so outclassed by 1979
The ussr at no point 'outclassed' the USA or the west simply because its clown car economics command economy was ludicrously inefficient compared to free market capitalism. Take way the scientists and machinery looted from Germany and eastern Europe, the allied lease lend (which they never paid back) and they were barely able to grow potatoes. They could not even make a decent car.
Except they did, you fricking moron. The T64 and T72 shit all over the M60, the Soviets expanded their ICBM's and built it's nuclear arsenal to the point that even after SALT they still have more warheads.
>USA built the railways
No, just no.
No I'm American, and cam provide proof if needed.
>cam provide proof
Show bobs and vagene
I've got bobs but no vagene.
>tankie
You don't know what that word means.
>how do you do, fellow RT viewers?
>t.glowBlack person
>t. schizoid
Yes.
tankies deserve lethal beatings
>No I'm American, and cam provide proof if needed.
>Soviets expanded their ICBM's and built it's nuclear arsenal
Thank you John from Texas Oblast for your clunky ESL contribution to this thread.
Who built Russia's railways? That's right the USA. Mostly prior to WW1
Wrong!
You will never be a real glowie. You have no intelligence, you have no analytical ability, you have no successful missions. You are a diversity hire and/or Zogbot twisted by goyslop and a love of Israel into a crude mockery of Cold War-era competence.
All the “consent” you manufacture is two-faced and half-hearted. Behind their firewalls the FSB and Ministry of State Security mock you. American citizens are disgusted and ashamed of you, your information campaign targets laugh at your illogical arguments behind closed doors.
Millennials and Zoomers are utterly repulsed by you. Dozens of years of failed brainwashing attempts have allowed younger generations to sniff out glowie intel operations with incredible efficiency. Even glowposts that “pass” look uncanny and unnatural to a millennial. Your faith in our failed government is a dead giveaway. And even if you manage to get a newbie to fall for your bait, he’ll post sneed the second he gets a whiff of your diseased, infected support of a supposed rules-based international order.
You will never be influential. You hoist up a manufactured narrative every five minutes and tell yourself it’s going to be impactful, but deep inside you feel the futility creeping up like a weed, ready to crush you under the unbearable weight.
Eventually it’ll be too much to bear - government debt will accumulate, inflation will get out of control, more money will be sent to Israel and Ukraine, and the United States will collapse. Looters will break into your offices, elated and relieved that they can sell some computers to buy food. They’ll burn down your agency’s offices to stay warm, and every passerby for the rest of eternity will know another failed gloworg is buried there.
Probably the 60s, when their WW2 experience was still somewhat relevant, and before US tech started seriously outpacing them.
>What decade is considered peak soviet military before it started to rust?
2000s and 2010s.
That is, when the internet was widespread enough for vatniks to cream themselves over Russia's fantasy military and actually influence the broader discourse that way, but before Russia decided to fight an actual war to shatter the illusion.
In reality, it has always been rusty shit.
1917
1970s or 1980s
They were way ahead of the curve on a lot of military technology. Unfortunately they are just too fricking moronic to have it mean anything.
Too much corruption throughout has rotted them away at the core.
Too little training, too much bravado and machismo to understand you can't just make cool shit and win wars, you have to be proficient and develop a solid doctrine.
>They were way ahead of the curve on a lot of military technology
which ones?
missiles, helicopters, radar, submarines, planes, mechanized warfare, etc.
if they weren't such colossal frickups as a people they would have actually been a real threat to the rest of the world.
But in none of these did soviets do anything but copy US and make outdated tech?
>missiles
Aside from that one time with the R-73 and AIM-9M, the US always had a lead in missiles. Like the soviets did not have a response to the 1950 AIM-7 till the fricking 1970s.
>radar
The US was always ahead on that one. The APQ-120 blew out the fricking water every soviet radar till the fricking 70s, and by then the AWG-9 and APG-63 did the same till the end of the cold war
>planes
lol, lmao even. You could maybe make that argument for the first (F-86/MiG-15) and second (Century Series/MiG-19/21) gen fighters, but by the late 1950s/early 1960s the F-4 put the US a whole generation ahead in terms of aircraft, and it stayed that way ever since. I mean by the time the soviets made a plane that could somewhat match the F-4, the MiG-23, the US was already starting to field the F-14 and F-15, aircraft which were a full generation ahead and completely shat on the MiG-23. The MiG-29 and Su-27 only came in the mid 1980s
>till the fricking 70s
till the fricking 80s*
first soviet look down shoot down radar appeared in 1981
Didn't the original MiG-23 radar had some sort of shitty look-down shoot-down capability in the form of the MTI?
it did but it was like you said, shitty gimmick that's unworthy of being considered ld/sd.
This. The only time I can think of that the Soviets were ever ahead of the US or NATO militarily was when they first adopted the AK. By then however, assault rifles as a doctrine weren't really fleshed out so it couldn't have been taken full advantage of at that time, and small arms rarely make that much of a difference. The rest of the world using battle rifles up to Vietnam was probably still good enough to deal with the majority of Soviet infantry on the ground, assuming a ground war happened. In fact, most of our weapons, gear, and everything else was drafted on the idea that the Soviets would invade Europe (they were so sure it would happen that they had weapons caches and Gladio stay-behind agents in preparation to deal with a Soviet-occupied Europe). Vietnam and other small conflicts sort of threw a wrench into those works, they would have been fine in Europe's urban areas and open fields, but not in the jungle and rural Montagnard villages.
According to all veritable reports, the USSR was never in a position to take on NATO in a ground war at any point in the Cold War.
Their military peak was most likely some time immediately after their founding in 1917, since then it's been a slow burning decline into obsolescence punctuated by several great leaps downward that became increasingly common to the end, and then became the norm from then until right now, and it's going to continue getting lower for the foreseeable future.
1960s was when they were at their best.
we pay a lot of taxes just to be a little better than russia. with china, it's getting more expensive every day.