1941 soviet have defensive strategy and deploy their armies on Stalin line

[NATO1949]

soviet have defensive strategy and deploy their armies on Stalin line 1941

soviet put 180 divisions as first strategic echelon in 100 km depth from border and second strategic echelon of 60 on western Dvina and Dnieper. German destroyed soviet border armies in July battles OTL

what if soviet deployed whole red army on Stalin-line aka Dnieper and western Dvina 300 km distance to border.so that strategic surprise don't have effect. have better logistical support on their prewar bases.
soviet dont make Molotov line instead soviet continue to build Stalin line

 

[FBKampfer]

Basically you hand the Wehrmacht another month of time to assault Moscow.

The problems with the Red Army in 1941 were endemic, not strictly resultant from the surprise (cough "surprise" cough) attack. Poor communication, lack of flexibility, incompetent officer corps, greatly reduced numbers of NCO's, and piss poor logistics were all crippling.

Remember as late as 1943, the Germans could still dismantle entire soviet field armies.

 

[Thoresby]

incompetent officer corps, greatly reduced numbers of NCO's, and piss poor logistics were all crippling.

I would partially disagree with this one, while the Red Army was NCO light by Western standards it was made up for by a higher TOE of officers. The issue was that the purges had taken out a generation of mid-ranking officers meaning their replacements were promoted beyond their experience, the raw material was perfectly competent as 1944-5 showed where the surviving mid-ranking officers who had performed poorly in '41 led divisions into Berlin in '45. As for logistics that goes back to the purges, repeatedly you had key staff officers mess up because the didn't know what they needed to do, because 6 months earlier they had been platoon commanders. If you have those officers fight a prepared defence in depth some distance behind the border many of those issues are going to be less severe. The problem is that abandoning Eastern Poland is politically impractical.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

soviet have defensive strategy and deploy their armies on Stalin line 1941

That is a LOT of territory to give up, being undefended.

 

[Histor32]

soviet have defensive strategy and deploy their armies on Stalin line 1941

soviet put 180 divisions as first strategic echelon in 100 km depth from border and second strategic echelon of 60 on western Dvina and Dnieper. German destroyed soviet border armies in July battles OTL

what if soviet deployed whole red army on Stalin-line aka Dnieper and western Dvina 300 km distance to border.so that strategic surprise don't have effect. have better logistical support on their prewar bases.
soviet dont make Molotov line instead soviet continue to build Stalin line

not to mention the stalin line was all but utterly abandoned and easily flanked

 

[ObssesedNuker]

Basically you hand the Wehrmacht another month of time to assault Moscow.

That's rubbish. To start with, the Germans weren't even delayed a month by the historical defense along the 1941 border. Beyond that issue, deploying along the Stalin-line would greatly improve Soviet fighting capability because...

The problems with the Red Army in 1941 were endemic, not strictly resultant from the surprise (cough "surprise" cough) attack. Poor communication, lack of flexibility, incompetent officer corps, greatly reduced numbers of NCO's, and piss poor logistics were all crippling.

It mostly solves the bolded issue. The Soviet logistical issues were largely caused by deploying to the new frontier despite most of the supply centers being along the old one, on the other side of some truly awful rail and road networks. This left them too far from their own logistic bases to be properly supported. This left them low on fuel and ammunition when the war began, with much of their equipment poorly maintained or inoperable. This was a significant factor in the Whermacht's easy destruction of so many Soviet armies. Forming the main defenses further east would considerably ease the strain on the rear services and consequently would greatly increase the combat power of the supported formations, allowing a much larger number of them to fight much more effectively even with their other flaws.

On the flip side, the Germans would be seriously hindered. As I noted above, the Soviet defense along the frontier, save in the south, neither seriously held up nor damaged the German advance. The hastily raised reserve formations east of the D'niepr, which were even worse in terms of equipment, communication, officers, etc then those that had previously been annihilated, did manage to seriously hold up the Germans for months and do a lot of damage to them. The reason for this is (1) those new Soviet formations were fighting on territory that they could be logistically supported and (2) the Wehrmacht had moved, drastically and now the same awful road and rail nets that had hampered Soviet logistics were crippling the Germans, greatly reducing German combat power.

In sum, drawing the Soviets MLR as the Stalin line will see a greatly improved outcome for the Soviets. While a defensive line further east would allow the Germans a slightly easier time crossing the border, the shoddy roads and rails would still inevitably weaken them and when they ran into the Soviet main defensive line, that line would be both stronger (due to having much better logistical support due to not having to deal with the same hundreds of km of shitty roads now hampering the Germans) and able to effectively apply greater numbers against the invaders.

The fundamental problem, of course, is how you convince the Soviets to accept this both politically and militarily (it rather runs against what their 1941 doctrine called for).

Remember as late as 1943, the Germans could still dismantle entire soviet field armies.

No they couldn't? Even 3rd Kharkov saw the Soviet armies involved merely mauled and routed, not outright annihilated as happened in 1941 and '42, and the rest of 1943 tended to see Soviet armies emerge intact and holding their ground on the other end even in fights they lost.

That is a LOT of territory to give up, being undefended.

With hindsight, sacrificing a lot of land of miniscule value to greatly strengthen ones own forces while weakening the enemies is a good idea. The problem is that in this case is that term "with hindsight". The OP needs to figure out how the Soviets come to the realization that they should defend along the Stalin line.

not to mention the stalin line was all but utterly abandoned and easily flanked

Reread the post you quoted: the OP is positing that is not the case.​

 

[RGB]

With hindsight, sacrificing a lot of land of miniscule value to greatly strengthen ones own forces while weakening the enemies is a good idea. The problem is that in this case is that term "with hindsight". The OP needs to figure out how the Soviets come to the realization that they should defend along the Stalin line.

On top of that, this could all still go badly (possibly worse than OTL) if the Soviets still persist with the "immediate massive counter-attack" idee fixe. Defending deeper and closer to supply lines isn't an advantage if you're going to squander it all recreating the battle of Uman 100 times or turning the whole front into Rzhev v.2.

But I suppose a Red Army that's defending at the Stalin line clearly also has had a huge doctrine change somewhere along the way.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

With hindsight, sacrificing a lot of land of miniscule value to greatly strengthen ones own forces while weakening the enemies is a good idea. The problem is that in this case is that term "with hindsight". The OP needs to figure out how the Soviets come to the realization that they should defend along the Stalin line.

And not disassemble it to build the Molotov Line. Beyond that though Minsk was a pretty significant manufacturing center, so a deployment to the Stalin Line would mean pre-evacuating everything west of it of industry and valuable people. It would be a HUGE peacetime problem to try and pull off even just from a political standpoint.

 

[ObssesedNuker]

On top of that, this could all still go badly (possibly worse than OTL) if the Soviets still persist with the "immediate massive counter-attack" idee fixe. Defending deeper and closer to supply lines isn't an advantage if you're going to squander it all recreating the battle of Uman 100 times or turning the whole front into Rzhev v.2.

But I suppose a Red Army that's defending at the Stalin line clearly also has had a huge doctrine change somewhere along the way.

Even with the "mass counter-attack idea" would probably work out better for the Soviets, although still quite not as well. The attempts at mass counter-attacks at the Battle of Smolensk OTL almost managed to bring Barbarossa to a crashing halt and prevent the Kiev encirclement and even in failure imposed critical delays and inflicted a lot of damage upon the Germans, so it's entirely conceivable that if it was the better armed and trained troops that had been on the frontier carrying out the counter-attacks they could do more damage and halt the Germans, although they probably would pretty heavily gut themselves in the process. Even if formations get cut-off, actually having their assigned reserves of fuel, spare parts, and ammunition would allow them to operate against German supply lines for months at a time, as opposed to OTL where many of the same formations would have all their vehicles run out of fuel and/or breakdown without even seeing the enemy.​

Beyond that though Minsk was a pretty significant manufacturing center, so a deployment to the Stalin Line would mean pre-evacuating everything west of it of industry and valuable people. It would be a HUGE peacetime problem to try and pull off even just from a political standpoint.

Minsk technically lies within the Stalin line, east of it's first line of fortified regions. Even then, it was "industrially significant" only by the terms of the Belorussian SSR. By the terms of the USSR as a whole... well, it wasn't nothing but it was still quite small. The Soviets evacuated much larger industrial facilities then those found in Minsk under much more severe circumstances then those found in peace, so emptying it in peacetime wouldn't be as much a difficulty in terms of execution as you are making it out. The politics of the matter are, as you say, a different story.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

Minsk lies east of the Stalin line. Even then, it was "industrially significant" only by the terms of the Belorussian SSR. By the terms of the USSR as a whole... well, it wasn't nothing but it was still quite small.

According to the map above it was west of it.

But according to this probably more accurate Russian map you're right:

Which then leaves the primary issue of leaving all the gains of 1939-40 to the Germans and giving them airbases right near Leningrad. Plus it effectively cedes control over the Baltic to the Germans and lets them lock up the Baltic fleet at little cost. Even with infrastructure destruction plans, which would be very difficult if not impossible to carry out without Soviet military units in the occupied territories and given the quickness that the Germans would overrun those territories without resistance and with local help, the Soviets lose their entire buffer without a shot being fired. Granted there are substantial advantages to keeping the border forces intact, but realistically you'd need to keep an occupation force in the zone west of the Stalin Line and use them as sacrificial lambs to buy the USSR time to mobilize and destroy infrastructure.

The question then is whether Stalin then orders major counterattacks west of the Stalin Line once the Germans reach it, which could well end up getting them demolished, albeit at less cost than fighting near the border.

 

[ObssesedNuker]

According to the map above it was west of it.

Yeah, I don't know what's up with that one. Pretty much every other map shows a series of fortified regions between the '39 border and the D'niepr.

Which then leaves the primary issue of leaving all the gains of 1939-40 to the Germans and giving them airbases right near Leningrad. Plus it effectively cedes control over the Baltic to the Germans and lets them lock up the Baltic fleet at little cost. Even with infrastructure destruction plans, which would be very difficult if not impossible to carry out without Soviet military units in the occupied territories and given the quickness that the Germans would overrun those territories without resistance and with local help, the Soviets lose their entire buffer without a shot being fired. Granted there are substantial advantages to keeping the border forces intact, but realistically you'd need to keep an occupation force in the zone west of the Stalin Line and use them as sacrificial lambs to buy the USSR time to mobilize and destroy infrastructure.

One could conceivably still move up the northern line onto the Daugava and thereby hold onto Estonia and the northern half of Latvia without too much logistical trouble while positioning the northern reserve echelon along the Stalin-line parts around Pskov. Otherwise, under such a scheme you'd have a trip wire force of NKVD regiments along the border, a few divisions in the frontier region for garrison, demolitions, and partisan cadre purposes, a first strategic echelon along the Stalin line, and then a second strategic echelon along the D'niepr (in the center and south) and Luga (in the North). Outside of the Baltic States, though, there is no advantage to keeping significant forces west of the Stalin line: the infrastructure there is so terrible that demolitions are redundant.

The question then is whether Stalin then orders major counterattacks west of the Stalin Line once the Germans reach it, which could well end up getting them demolished, albeit at less cost than fighting near the border.

Well, as I noted, even that is liable to end up better for the Soviets compared to OTL since they'll suffer less and do more damage to the more logistically strung out Germans while still having a reserve echelon as a backstop if things really go tits up. It's still not as ideal as it might be if the Soviets stick to a more mixed batch of defensive and counter-offensive action, but it's a improvement over OTL.

 

[Changundramon]

Question: was the Stalin Line of uniform standard everywhere, or were the areas facing the Baltic countries fortified to a lesser degree?

 

[ObssesedNuker]

Question: was the Stalin Line of uniform standard everywhere, or were the areas facing the Baltic countries fortified to a lesser degree?

Generally the region north of the Pripyet Marshes were less heavily fortified then the regions south of it, as the natural terrain in Belarus and northern Russia is better suited for defense. Fortifications are basically artificially-created terrain features so the forts in the north were meant more to augment natural terrain features then act as ones themselves as was the case in the south.

 

[Riain]

IIUC the biggest problem was that with so many forces close to the new border the foot-horse mobile majority of the Whermacht was able to encircle huge numbers of Soviet units in a foot advance of about 100km (or some ridiculously small distance) from their jumping-off points. If the Soviet forces were back behind the Stalin Line the majority of the foot-horse mobile forces would have to undertake a long administrative march/move merely to get within firing range of the bulk of Soviet forces, which would weaken the Wehrmacht but not the Soviets.

 

[Mr.J]

not to mention the stalin line was all but utterly abandoned and easily flanked

OTL it was. If it was properly manned and maintained as in this scenario it would've been a legitimate barrier, at least the Germans thought so when looking at the remnants of it. Whether that's worth the Germans getting to the Stalin Line sooner is the debatable part.

Also a lot less Soviet divisions are getting encircled and surrounded ITTL, so there's going to be a lot of Red Army at and beyond the Stalin Line. Troops that the Germans will now have to face while at the end of a longer supply line.

It seems like a historically legitimate strategy to me: let the enemy advance, then hit back hard once they're in deep.

 

[Mr.J]

That is a LOT of territory to give up, being undefended.

Based on this map though the Soviets were basically pushed back to the Stalin Line in like 2 1/2 weeks.

 

[BobTheBarbarian]

Maybe you could make the pitch to Stalin to use his namesake line as a staging ground for whatever functioning armored and mobile reserves that existed at the time. That way you could still keep a large amount of infantry and artillery near the border while (theoretically) maintaining the ability to follow through on your promise of throwing back the enemy from the state frontier. The concentration of armored reserves near the Stalin Line URs would allow the STAVKA to judge the strength and direction of the main German blows and hit back with compact groupings after the former have revealed themselves and been slowed by the infantry. If worst comes to worst, you'll still have an intact armored force to parry the Germans during a much more organized fighting retreat to the fallback points.

Setting up the main airbases behind the Stalin Line wouldn't be a bad idea either: ground-based "coast-watchers" at the border could send advanced warning of a Luftwaffe assault and provide the VVS with time to get airborne rather than be caught on the ground. The AA defenses of the URs themselves would also be useful to whittle down the Germans over home territory.

 

[cracou]

Let's have a serious look at the main consequences:

1) the first air attack just can't happen the same way. As most planes are far far behind the lines russians get a much better warning (300km = 30-45mn), attacks are less effective (try to find a base far from your territory, at night, with bad maps)
2) Russian planes can use the bakup airfields
3) Do russians give up a lot of territory? Yes... but not their! From an industrial point of view those territories were nothing as they were pole, latvian and so on. They don't give up anything
4) Will the soviet army remain as bad? Yes, of course, but they will fight on prepared positions. Even if the line is not really perfect Germans will have to mass to attack it.
5) Will Siviet Armour fare better? Of course as you remove the 300km approach that shattered so many formations. They won't lose those 2000+ tanks to mechanical failures.
6) Will they have a better logistic system? Of course as it has been developped betwen 1928 and 38.

But is it politically acceptable?

We can expect a 50/50 approach: Soviets keep their main forces behind the line but they send lightly armed units in all those territories for occupation duty. It can have a really negative effect on Germans: they will see only badly armed russians and then suddenly they will have full tanks corps, many of them with the T34, KV1 and KV2. On a not so mobile battle, the KV2 is stupidly strong.

 

[raharris1973]

Maybe you could make the pitch to Stalin to use his namesake line as a staging ground for whatever functioning armored and mobile reserves that existed at the time. That way you could still keep a large amount of infantry and artillery near the border while (theoretically) maintaining the ability to follow through on your promise of throwing back the enemy from the state frontier. The concentration of armored reserves near the Stalin Line URs would allow the STAVKA to judge the strength and direction of the main German blows and hit back with compact groupings after the former have revealed themselves and been slowed by the infantry. If worst comes to worst, you'll still have an intact armored force to parry the Germans during a much more organized fighting retreat to the fallback points.

Setting up the main airbases behind the Stalin Line wouldn't be a bad idea either: ground-based "coast-watchers" at the border could send advanced warning of a Luftwaffe assault and provide the VVS with time to get airborne rather than be caught on the ground. The AA defenses of the URs themselves would also be useful to whittle down the Germans over home territory.

David Glantz criticized this as the so-called "Shaposhnikov Plan" saying that in practice it would waste forces by putting them out of support of each other.

 

[marathag]

David Glantz criticized this as the so-called "Shaposhnikov Plan" saying that in practice it would waste forces by putting them out of support of each other.

Still would be better than wiped out on Day One, the fate of most of the VVS OTL, between on the Ground and later when ordered to get into the air and 'Attack!!' with zero coordination between groups