Who had the best (overall) military in WW2?

[Skywalker_T-65]

Inspired by the 'why did *insert nation here* peform so badly in WW2' threads, this one takes a different take. I'm curious what the opinions on here are as to which military performed the best, overall, in World War Two.

Naturally, the obivous answer (and one I'd get anywhere else) would be the German Army. Probably closely followed by America. But that is taking the easy way out, and is also somewhat shallow. So I ask of the SDN community this question...taking into account logistics, battle results, casuality figures, etc...who had the best military in World War Two?

EDIT: While my answer is still dependent on time, I change it to the United Kingdom for early war, taking into account the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force. Germany comes in second thanks to the Army and Luftwaffe. And late war remains America/USSR in a tie.

[Mr Bean]

The answer depends on the year but 44-45 I'd say Soviets, battle harden, well trained and well armed having gone through the worst fighting of the second world war. 1939-1940 the Germans for sure... 1941-1943 I'm less sure about.

[General Mung Beans]

For Navy, Air Force, and logistics definitely the US military. The Soviets probably had the toughest army by the end of the war as pointed out while the Germans had some very advanced equipment (much of which however was unreliable) and excellent and innovative commanders.

[D.Turtle]

Overall military? The United States. They simultaneously fought on two fronts on opposite sides of the world and at the end of the war had the capability of blasting any country into rubble with no chance of being hurt back.
Overall air force? The United States. Best tech, largest numbers, best training.
Overall navy? The United States. No one even comes close.
Overall army? The Soviet Union. Though suffering massive losses, they destroyed the German Army even when it was at the peak of its strength, and at the end were capable of offensives stronger and deeper and faster than even the "famed" German Blitzkrieg.

[CaptHawkeye]

At the end of the day the Wehrmacht was never as "modern" or "advanced" as people think it was. Less than half of the big bad Army of Blitzkrieg was ever truck-mobile. The grand majority of German soldiers got around the old fashioned way. Walking or riding a horse. Riding a train if you were really lucky. Compare this to the American and British Armies both of which were 100% Motorized by 1944. Even the Red Army never completely mobilized, but this was because personnel counts in the Army ballooned so fast it was impossible to build enough trucks for every Russian soldier to ride in before the war was out. As it was I wouldn't be surprised if the contingent of the Red Army that *was* Motorized was still twice the size of the whole Wehrmacht by 1944.

[Sea Skimmer]

Early war, the Germans, late war the US by some silly margin. Nobody could do what the US did at the end of such a long supply line, while also supplying all of its allies with huge amounts of war material and having the effort leftover for insane projects like building secret oil refineries in Alaska or the Ledo road.

The USSR motorized few complete units, it went against Soviet doctrine. They kept as many trucks as possible pooled in high levels of command and used them for logistical purposes and moving specific high value pieces of units like anti tank artillery. For the Red Army to have twice the motorized troops as the whole Wehrmacht would require in 1944 that the Soviets had 18 million motorized troops. Note that only about 16 million people served in the entire US military in the entire war, with a peak army strength, including the army air force, of about 8 million, of whom at the peak only about 2.7 million were in army ground forces. So rather clearly the Soviets had nothing even remotely like such number of motorized troops.

[Irbis]

For the Red Army to have twice the motorized troops as the whole Wehrmacht would require in 1944 that the Soviets had 18 million motorized troops. Note that only about 16 million people served in the entire US military in the entire war, with a peak army strength, including the army air force, of about 8 million, of whom at the peak only about 2.7 million were in army ground forces. So rather clearly the Soviets had nothing even remotely like such number of motorized troops.

Red Army in WW2 conscripted 34,5 million men, and that, to the best of my knowledge, only counting land forces. While obviously not all of them saw service at the same time, peak strength outweighing US and UK Army combined isn't out of the question. Yes, they might not have 18 million motorized men, but motorized component twice that of purely motorized force Wehrmacht or US Army could field in Europe is pretty likely.

Anyway, yes, US economic force gives it a large advantage, but I wonder how the answer would look like if we had, say, German-sized economy build respectively German/Japanese/British/Soviet/US-like armed forces and pitted them against each other. Which force would provide best bang for the buck, so to say?

[CaptHawkeye]

Early war, the Germans, late war the US by some silly margin. Nobody could do what the US did at the end of such a long supply line, while also supplying all of its allies with huge amounts of war material and having the effort leftover for insane projects like building secret oil refineries in Alaska or the Ledo road.

I think it's pretty telling when you see the next two most powerful nations on, the USSR and Britain, were frequently seen wielding American built equipment. Everything from Thompsons, to Shermans, to Avengers and Corsairs on the decks of British carriers. I remember me and Stark joked way back that the US had more Classes of Destroyer than some Navies had Destroyers.

I'm sure the average American had no idea how pronounced the US's advantages were though. To them the war was always on the verge of being lost right up until 1945. When ugly battles like Okinawa were still going on though who could blame them?

The USSR motorized few complete units, it went against Soviet doctrine. They kept as many trucks as possible pooled in high levels of command and used them for logistical purposes and moving specific high value pieces of units like anti tank artillery. For the Red Army to have twice the motorized troops as the whole Wehrmacht would require in 1944 that the Soviets had 18 million motorized troops. Note that only about 16 million people served in the entire US military in the entire war, with a peak army strength, including the army air force, of about 8 million, of whom at the peak only about 2.7 million were in army ground forces. So rather clearly the Soviets had nothing even remotely like such number of motorized troops.

I thought the Soviets wanted 100% Mobilization like the West too, but couldn't do it before the end of the war because the Red Army was just too massive. What was Soviet Doctrine then? Give every man a Mosin and tell him to walk until he sees "Berlin" on a sign?

[D.Turtle]

Anyway, yes, US economic force gives it a large advantage, but I wonder how the answer would look like if we had, say, German-sized economy build respectively German/Japanese/British/Soviet/US-like armed forces and pitted them against each other. Which force would provide best bang for the buck, so to say?

That question is stupid, because obviously you are going to plan your armed forces around what you are able to give them. If you have the economy, you can build dozens of fleet aircraft carriers, a hundred escort carriers, hundreds of other warships, tens of thousands of fighters, bombers, tanks, etc. Obviously after a certain point you will lose efficiency, but if you can sustain that without even running a pure war economy, why not do it anyway?

I thought the Soviets wanted 100% Mobilization like the West too, but couldn't do it before the end of the war because the Red Army was just too massive. What was Soviet Doctrine then? Give every man a Mosin and tell him to walk until he sees "Berlin" on a sign?

At the end of the war, the Soviet Army was the largest, most experienced, most capable army ever seen up to that point. Look up the invasion of Manchuria to see what they were capable of. Hell, look up Operation Bagration, which pretty much ripped out the heart of the German army in 1944. They were a very long way away from simply giving each man a rifle and telling him to walk forwards.

[Sea Skimmer]

I thought the Soviets wanted 100% Mobilization like the West too, but couldn't do it before the end of the war because the Red Army was just too massive.

Who didn't want 100% motorization? All the trucks built in WW2 could not have fully motorized the Red Army, so they focused the resources on key operations. They did that with every kind of equipment they had.

What was Soviet Doctrine then? Give every man a Mosin and tell him to walk until he sees "Berlin" on a sign?

Yeah, people walked, or rode tanks, or used horses, and strategic movement was all by rail. This is all a big reason why those big Soviet offensives tended to bog down and then take months to get going again. Overall even with all that US aid the Soviets had fewer trucks then the Germans had, but the Germans had those trucks spread over multiple fronts.

In fact its a bit of a myth to even say the US was truly 100% motorized. Sure, a US infantry division did not normally have any draft animals after 1941, except in Italy when they were used in the mountains, but at the same time a US infantry division could not move all of its men and weapons by truck at one time. They did not have enough motor vehicles to do this. The infantry had to be moved in shuttle relays of trucks, or else they walked. When deployed for combat they just walked. Only US armored divisions, which numbered 16, vs about 80 other army ground divisions, had the trucks to move everyone at one time. The armored divisions were also the only ones who normally had armored half tracks. The US strongly considered fielding a limited number of true motorized infantry divisions to operate alongside the armored divisions but gave up the idea as too resource intensive early in the war. Indeed the number of trucks in US Army units was actually reduced several times during the war, though the typical size of the trucks went up. Fewer 3/4th ton trucks, more 2.5 ton trucks.

Being stuck with horses and walking was not the end of the world either in terms of mobility, against any real opposition you'd move just as fast as a motorized unit (very slow), but one the biggest problem with horse drawn units was the supply of horses was limited as it took several years for expanded breeding to have any effect, and horses could not easily disperse off the road when under attack, nor shrug off minor bullet or shrapnel hits the way a truck body could. In both world wars the Germans ended up with serious shortages of horses, and also had too many light breeds of horses as opposed to heavier more durable breeds suited to pulling artillery and supplies. Not all horses are equal, not even close, which became a big problem in its own right. The invasion of Russia likely wouldn't have been possible without the capture of so many Dutch, Belgian and French horses, but seizing them all then made the food situation even worse.

[Sarevok]

Can't horses live off the land sometimes ? Might be beneficial for Germans who were seriously short on fuel of all kinds.

[Vehrec]

Horses can live off the land if you're willing to let them graze and have enough grassland for them to do that for more than six hours a day. More significantly, this only works in the spring and summer when there is enough graze of high enough quality to sustain heavy work, and it is absurdly counterproductive if you try and go anywhere in winter. On the flipside, equine feed is not exactly energetically compact-a horse's rations in war are about ten times that of a human's according to my sources.

Most damning of all though, you must disperse and then gather your draft animals regularly, creating opportunities for partisans and raiders to seriously cramp you supply line by rustling or simply cutting throats.

[ChaserGrey]

Can't horses live off the land sometimes ? Might be beneficial for Germans who were seriously short on fuel of all kinds.

I read a very detailed study of this problem in a military history course (context was the Crusades, but it was still horses and logistics). Short answer is no, not if you want to sustain a military operation with them. Horses need to graze most of the day to get enough nutrition, and that's assuming they're not doing anything more strenuous than grazing. If you want to get a day or even a half-day's worth of useful work out of them, you've got to supplement their forage with feed. If there's enough interest I can try to dig the paper up.

Horses are also fragile, because they can't lie down. That means any kind of moderate to serious injury of the leg is a euthanasia situation, because there's no way to take weight off one leg and let it heal. The horse will try, but it'll almost certainly get infections in its other hooves and die from that. That means artillery, air, or machine gun fire against a horse-drawn supply column is absolutely devastating, much more so than against a motorized column.

[Sea Skimmer]

Horses can live off the land if you're willing to let them graze and have enough grassland for them to do that for more than six hours a day. More significantly, this only works in the spring and summer when there is enough graze of high enough quality to sustain heavy work, and it is absurdly counterproductive if you try and go anywhere in winter. On the flipside, equine feed is not exactly energetically compact-a horse's rations in war are about ten times that of a human's according to my sources.

I don't know how true it is, but I've read that heavy horses raised for life on grain can actually die from being shifted to a grass diet, and being put out to pasture was basically a death sentence because of this. So it would seem that grazing is not even a vague option. German ration tables for horses meanwhile only allowed about a pound more fodder per day for a horse working vs one not working, around 9lb vs 10lb (varies some based on what kind of fodder) which shows one of the many limits of relying on an animal.

Horses are also fragile, because they can't lie down. That means any kind of moderate to serious injury of the leg is a euthanasia situation, because there's no way to take weight off one leg and let it heal. The horse will try, but it'll almost certainly get infections in its other hooves and die from that. That means artillery, air, or machine gun fire against a horse-drawn supply column is absolutely devastating, much more so than against a motorized column.

Interestingly one of the motrized units German foot/horse mobile infantry divisions normally did have was a motorized veterinary ambulance column. They'd transport the wounded horses back to veterinary parks that followed the field forces, and thence by horse ambulance trains back to the German interior. This seems to have been more useful for horses suffering from exhaustion or disease then injury though since as you say, the leg wounds aren't going to heal. Body wounds would but recovery times could be 1-2 years. Not good when the working life of a war horse even in peacetime was under ten years.

[Thanas]

I don't know how true it is, but I've read that heavy horses raised for life on grain can actually die from being shifted to a grass diet, and being put out to pasture was basically a death sentence because of this.

That sounds about right - even today horses die from just eating the wrong things.

[Blayne]

From what I've read it's kinda hard to judge the German military as being inherently better early war; partly because the OKW was just as conservative and tank phobic as the French and Hitler had to overrule them for Manstein's plan to be considered. A plan that could have failed spectacularly had the French been on the ball and hadn't overextended themselves moving into Belgium. The Germans it seems to me primarily held the advantage over their European counterparts in the Franco-Prussian war period, when their military-industrial complex working together with Molke's General Staff and full conscription was a revolution in military affairs.

In the 1930's environment I think this advantage had wore off somewhat as the French and British were doing their own armoured warfare experiments and had their own General Staffs. It seems to me that being only marginally better led to lopsided victories in the field, aided that the German's seemed to have to rebuild their military from scratch and could field newer stuff while the French and British were stuck having to upgrade or maintain their WWI and interwar stuff.

Although Paul Kennedy maintains that the German's must have had a marked superiority in doctrine, training and initiative for them to have held on for as long as they did against such overwhelming material advantages; this is supported in the copy of the German Army Handbook I have that claims that as the war went on and the German's were having manpower troubles due to attrition the ratio of firepower to manpower went up so that a division with 12,000 men with a firepower rating of say 6; went to 8,000 but with a rating of 9. So the equipment/firepower improved as manpower decreased. This fits I think with the 1944 boost in armaments production under Speer.

I'm going to join the bandwagon and agree that the Soviets by 1945 had arguably the best army in Europe, and agree that this was more or less confirmed in manchuria (though Manchuria still highlights some serious weaknesses, such as the problems with logistics and air resupplying).

I'm not sure fi this has ever been linked here but here's the Leavensworth Paper's on the Manchurian Strategic Offencive: http://usacac.army.mil/cac2/cgsc/carl/r ... lantz3.asp

Extremely detailed assessment of the Russians kicking ass and taking names.

[Serafina]

Putting a stable-raised horse onto a pasture isn't so much an issue of them being unable to digest grass - but more of them not having learned what plants NOT to eat. There is a whole bunch of plants which is poisonous to horses (because they have a quite sensitive digestive system and horse colic is a major killer) which grow naturally on fields that are not specifically prepared for horses.

Thus, you can't put modern, stable-raised breeds of horses on wild fields without loosing a lot of them.

[Elfdart]

I remember one article where it was pointed out that using horses and mules had a very similar effect on logistics as using trucks -if you counted the vast amount of fodder required as fuel, and the grooms, blacksmiths, etc as vehicle maintenance.

Any domesticated horse used for pulling wagons or even riding on a regular basis requires large amounts of fodder. There simply isn't enough nutrition in grass for prolonged activity beyond walking around and maybe a few bursts of speed. This site is informative:

The first requirement for all nutrients is that they maintain the horse. If a horse is to work, reproduce, and suckle young, additional feed or, more logically, greater concentration of nutrients beyond the maintenance requirements must be provided (Table 2). The stage of production (lactation, work, etc.) determines what nutrient(s) must be increased and to what degree. For example, riding a horse 2–3 hours a day (light work) increases the animal's need for energy about 30 percent over maintenance, and 4–5 hours of normal riding increases energy needs 65–70 percent. Even more striking, when ridden hard (for polo, jumping, etc.) a horse may use as much energy in one hour as he requires for 24 hours of maintenance and six times more than for light work. However, protein requirements do not increase significantly with exercise. A mare during the last quarter of her pregnancy needs about 20 percent more protein than she requires for maintenance, but her energy requirement increases only slightly.

Emphasis mine.

Another issue is the vast amounts of water required for the animals (usually 5-10 gallons/ 1000# of weight -assuming mild climate, light workload and green hay or grass). This site breaks down water requirements based on 1100# animals, and suggests a minimum 0f 12-18 gallons per day for a horse doing "moderate" work in warm weather. In wartime, I rather doubt there is any such thing as moderate work for a horse or mule in military service.

[Lord Revan]

btw should also look at the small countries that did reasonbly well against a way stronger opponent but lost because the opponent had way more resources to spare and could just steamroll over them (say for example Finland (yes I'm bias but still)).

[Ziggy Stardust]

Pre-war, the French had the reputation of having the most formidable all-around military in the world. I don't know to what degree that reputation was deserved (I mean, the poor planning and lack of a strategic reserve were pretty damning), but without the benefit of hindsight people in 1939 would probably point to France.

[ryacko]

Man for man?
Nazis
Best soldiers?
Japan
Best officers?
Nazis
Greatest willpower?
Soviets
Best industrial capacity?
America
Best equipment?
Nazis
Best snipers?
Soviets
Best leadership?
British

To be fair, America is second best in many of the above categories, except equipment, where the Soviets are second best.

[fgalkin]

Best leadership?
British

The rest are clearly the product of watching too much Hitler Channel, but I am somewhat curious how you've arrived at this conclusion, as I don't recall them heaping praise on the Brits.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[Sea Skimmer]

If by leadership he means Churchill, period, and for politics only, one can make a very good argument.

[fgalkin]

If by leadership he means Churchill, period, and for politics only, one can make a very good argument.

Yes, because speeches win wars!

As opposed to things like, you know, organizing the evacuation of a third of your industry and millions of your population in the span of weeks. On rail lines under constant bombardment.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[ryacko]

Best leadership?
British

The rest are clearly the product of watching too much Hitler Channel, but I am somewhat curious how you've arrived at this conclusion, as I don't recall them heaping praise on the Brits.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

The British managed to maintain herself as a major world power until the Suez Crisis, despite being bombed out and dependent on American efforts.

To centralize everything on Churchill (no foreign office?) seems a bit excessive.
Although I'll admit early war the leadership of Britain and France were... bonkers.