Alternate what if's are always interesting to talk about but sport poor support structures for arguments most of the time. Especially if we're talking about the past. Hindsight is always 20/20 right?

Quote from: DAS B00T x2 on October 09, 2016, 09:56:25 AM

>stalin was an idiot
>stalin did absolutely nothing to prepare when a bunch of people were telling him that fall blau was gonna happen eventually
>trotsky was smart
>trotsky would have invaded Nazi germany right after the poland invasion in '39

I really don't like this guy.

It's a scenario for a reason. Stalin was pretty stupid for trusting the Nazi's somewhat. (((Trotsky))) didn't trust them at all and probably WOULDN'T have been in an alliance. That's all they're saying. He was the more charismatic and powerful of the two for a while. Either way, the alternate sounds worse tbh.

Stalin Didn't trust Adolf though, and that's why there was a build up of the army, Russia's military manufacturing, long range bomber projects, and an oddly high number of BT 'convertible' tanks, which in thirty minutes a crew could turn from a tracked vehicle to a roadfaring, wheel driven one... for sophisticated road networks... that Russia entirely lacked but Central Europe was full of. hmm...

The winter war still would have happened, it might have ended quicker though, but Trotsky would still have a large portion of his army up north and not be ready to fight the well prepared German army who had just conquered Poland. Additionally, he seems to imply that Trotsky would attack the Nazis before the 1940 invasion of France. This would be a complete disaster for Trotsky's army, as Adolf's western fronts would never come to be and the rest of the world would also not be helping the soviets (especially America via lend lease. Dodge and Studebaker trucks were the backbone of soviet logistics in the war)

So really, without Stalin, the Nazis win. Game over. You can't beat  Cossack Stormtroopers.