Spades and Men

http://militera.lib.ru/research/suvorov6/01.html

by wallflower • 16 years ago

78 24 16 years ago

militera.lib.ru

DCoder• 16 years ago

Some background: This was written by a defected Soviet military intelligence officer Victor Suvorov: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victor_Suvorov .

Suvorov wrote a lot of books exploring WWII and demonstrating large amounts of evidence for his "Icebreaker" theory, claiming that Stalin intentionally led Hitler to power, planning to occupy Europe after Nazis and the Western countries were both weary and weakened. The theory has a lot of vocal opponents, but Suvorov never misses a chance to point out that most of them are (paid by) Soviet political/military figures, who are obviously biased and would never admit such a plan. It's a shame that these books are not all translated to English.

He also wrote two memoir books, (Tales of a) "Liberator", describing his service in the Soviet regular forces, and "Aquarium", covering the period after he got noticed by and accepted into the intelligence forces. The first one contains some rather fascinating stories of everyday Soviet life and dogma, well worth a read if you can find it. The second one is also good, even though it lacks those everyday stories.

Summa summarum, the book OP linked to is an interesting view into the old Soviet thinking. Might be an eye opener for those who believe the Soviets were anywhere near as humane as the Western countries.

pvg• 16 years ago

Suvorov never misses a chance to point out that most of them are (paid by) Soviet political/military figures

There's plenty of criticism of his theories from Western historians as well.

Most of his major works are available in English:

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=ntt_athr_dp_sr_1?_encoding=UTF8&...

He's certainly a colourful and interesting writer and personality; fun to read while keeping things like grains of salt and critical faculties handy.

lionhearted2• 16 years ago

"Operation Barbarossa Saved the World" is one of the strangest and most interesting articles I've read about WWII. I don't buy the whole theory, per se, but it's methodical in listing German and Russian armaments, soldiers, aircraft, and positioning. It draws heavily from Suvorov and argues that the the Nazi pre-emptive invasion of the Soviet Union saved all of Western Europe from Soviet conquest.

The basic premise is that Stalin was geared up for a very fast sweep through German territory and following through immediately into Western Europe, but all plans had been made with first strike in mind. It was all first strike aircraft, shock troops, paratroopers, and offensive battleplans without defense or contingency. By violating the Molotov-Ribbontrop Pact first, Germany overran the forward positions of the Soviets quickly, destroying their first strike capability, many aircrafts, logistical details, depots, fuel supplies, and other things which the Soviets weren't prepared for. The author argues that if Germany didn't do that, Russia might've conquered all of Europe, and with the combined might of a Soviet Europe, conquered the world.

Interesting idea. I'm not sure I buy it, but it was a fascinating article.

philwelch3• 16 years ago

Oddly, the conventional argument--that the Soviets destroyed the bulk of the German army and hence saved Europe from German domination--shares with this theory the odd consequence that liberal democracy in the West was saved from brutal, absolute dictatorship by another brutal, absolute dictatorship.

sedachv• 16 years ago

He's also a compulsive liar, attention-seeker and conspiracy nut (you can kind of tell already because "Suvorov never misses a chance to point out that most of them are (paid by) Soviet political/military figures"). Half the facts in that book are rumors he overheard from colleagues or things he made up based on seeing something he didn't understand (the "backwards-print shoe" is pretty hilarious, for example). Try tracking down any of the sources he bothers to cite and see how he misinterprets them.

VladRussian4• 16 years ago

>The theory has a lot of vocal opponents, but Suvorov never misses a chance to point out that most of them are (paid by) Soviet political/military figures, who are obviously biased and would never admit such a plan.

Highly recommend "Rise and Fall of the Third Reich", the work which is almost academic in quality, if not in shape :

http://www.amazon.com/Rise-Fall-Third-Reich-History/dp/06717...

zyang• 16 years ago

Here is a live demo, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b60OZhrTB6o

gaius• 16 years ago

Article specifically says the Soviet spade was NOT folding.

VladRussian4• 16 years ago

in my childhood i played with both types - folding and not.

ars• 16 years ago

The folding one seems more useful. And that's a pretty impressive demo.

DannoHung• 16 years ago

That's not a folding shovel. It has a rotatable spade head.

zeteo• 16 years ago

This reminds me of a scene in "All Quiet on the Western Front", where the young recruits are told by a veteran to sharpen their shovels' edges and use them instead of bayonets. The strike he preferred was, IIRC, between the neck and the shoulders.

tlack• 16 years ago

Buy a fairly serious recreation of the Spetznas spade here: http://www.coldsteel.com/spshovel.html Be sure to bring it to your local startup party to impress your investors and mutilate your opponents.

VladRussian4• 16 years ago

spades were very effective when "unarmed" soldiers were used to pacify civil uprisings, for example in 87-89. It worked like Rome soldiers' short swords in the crowd of the battle.

c00ki3s• 16 years ago

Holt sh!t I read it all. Do I get a cookie?

On a more serious note, seeing that the author is not exceptionally trustworthy (apparently), how much of it is real and how much isn't? Seems plausible to me at least, but I wouldn't know for what to look out.

Spades and Men

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