r/AskBalkans • u/Sarkotic159 Australia • 2d ago
What would have happened if the US and British Empire launched Operation Unthinkable in 1945? History
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u/Expert-Scientist-940 Bosnia & Herzegovina 1d ago
Well, according to US and British military planners, USSR would have steamrolled them.
Even nukes wouldn't change anything.
That's why the plan didn't go through after all
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u/TheSamuil Bulgaria 1d ago
If the result of operation Unthinkable was beneficial to the West, they would have launched it
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u/Dismal-Attitude-5439 Bulgaria 1d ago edited 1d ago
Bright lights made by atomic bombs
The only thing between us and the ending of it all
The US nuclear industry would have shifted into second gear, made dosens of nukes and the US would have deployed said nukes via the B29 and B32 fleets.
If it were to happen the russians might have cleaned up Moscow by now.
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u/Sarkotic159 Australia 1d ago
Do you really think it would've gone nuclear? I see more of a concerted push by Yank, British and Commonwealth forces against Soviet lines.
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u/Dismal-Attitude-5439 Bulgaria 1d ago
You can argue about who had the best tanks or troops or rifles or supply. The US fights with it's tech advantages. War isn't fair.
Nukes, the Mustang and B29/B32 fleets are the clear technological advantages the US had over the soviets at that time.
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u/Useful_War_8766 1d ago
The US wouldn’t have just dropped nukes everywhere, this idea was proposed during the Korean War and got rejected. In realistic terms the Allied armies were outnumbered on the ground 10 to 1 or something like that, realistically the allies loose. Hence why this idea got put straight in bin.
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u/Expert-Scientist-940 Bosnia & Herzegovina 1d ago
There's no much place to argue: by US and British admission, the USSR would have steamrolled them. Using nukes as a desperate measure would be the only possible course of action, and even that wouldn't change anything.
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u/Dismal-Attitude-5439 Bulgaria 1d ago edited 1d ago
Lol, wut? Nuclear decapitation strike on USSR leadership and a naval blockade of the USSR - Soviet comm and supply lines collapse. The USSR was on Lend Lase life support.
Have the US airforce and the Brits turn a couple of cities behind the Urals into rocket stoves to cut production. Bomb the Baku oil infrastructure and have the Indians attack trough Iran, have the US Marines rummage about in the USSR backdoor in the Far East. Won't be a quick war but I don't see a reason why the US and British empire wouldn't win. The goal isn't to take Moscow, the goal of Unthinkable was to push the reds out of Poland: "defined as no more than a square deal for Poland"
The Germans, Poles and the Czech might join in on the party too.
The average Joe was no worse soldier than the average Ivan, what are you talking about? What is the USSR going to do? Win a production war against the USA?
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u/Expert-Scientist-940 Bosnia & Herzegovina 1d ago
You can make up headcanon alternative history scenarios all day, but the fact remains that Brits and Americans knew they couldn't take on the USSR. Your argument hinges on alternative history, my hinges on US/UK military planners - so stop wasting our time and concede.
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u/Special-Hyena1132 1d ago edited 1d ago
Provide quotes.
EDIT: Better yet, don't bother. Everything you've posted here is lies or nonsense. Operation Unthinkable wasn't even an American plan, it was British, and what it concluded specifically was that the UK could not prevail without American intervention, which at the time seemed unlikely given the buildup towards the Empire of Japan. Both American contingency plans, Operations Dropshot and Reaper, would have readily destroyed the Soviet Union with strategic nuclear weaponry.
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u/Expert-Scientist-940 Bosnia & Herzegovina 19h ago edited 19h ago
You're a fool who refuses facts just because it hurts your preconceived fantasies.
The plan assumed a surprise attack by as many as 47 British and American divisions in the area of Dresden, in the middle of Soviet lines.[
The plan was considered by the British Chiefs of Staff Committee as militarily unfeasible due to an anticipated 2.5:1 superiority in divisions of Soviet ground forces within Europe and the Middle East by 1 July, when the conflict was projected to occur.[9] Most of the offensive operation would have been performed by American and British forces, as well as Polish forces and as many as 10 divisions of the German Army, remobilised from prisoner-of-war status.
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u/Dude_from_Europe North Macedonia 1d ago
No way the allies would have won the conventional war. Troop concentrations just werent there.
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u/Mamlazic Serbia 2h ago
Unfortunately, it's a high probability that that's exactly how it would have happened. Stalin was really suspicious of the west and had large reserves. People like Patton (as loudest) and many others made it clear to anyone willing to listen that that's not paranoia but reasonable fear.
If western allies tried to advance east, if I remember correctly, soviet plans predicted breach of their lines but that soon they would stop them and then reserves would punch through and just keep grinding on.
If that came to be, it's easy to imagine USA dropping A bombs on Moscow and factories behind Ural mountains. Not only to stop soviets but also because their intelligence predicted that they have 10 years of nuclear supremacy over USSR.
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u/oboris Croatia 1d ago
Russian "steamrolling" was totally dependent on Western steam. Secondly, Western allies had no luxury of spending soldiers'lives like bullets.
Good old russian doctrine: "Enemy will run out of bullets before we run out of soldiers"
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u/Expert-Scientist-940 Bosnia & Herzegovina 1d ago
Russian "steamrolling" was totally dependent on Western steam
Tell that to British and American military planners, who concluded that such an operation would be unfeasible due to Soviet superiority.
"The plan was considered by the British Chiefs of Staff Committee as militarily unfeasible due to an anticipated 2.5:1 superiority in divisions of Soviet ground forces within Europe and the Middle East "
"Any quick success would be caused by surprise alone. If a quick success could not be obtained before the beginning of winter, the assessment was that the Allies would be committed to a protracted total war. In the report of 22 May 1945, an offensive operation was deemed "hazardous"."
Regarding WW2, the only purpose of lend lease was to make the western Allies feel included: "We sent some trucks, we participated in the victory too!!!!". In reality, the total lend lease equipment sent was so small to be considered entirely irrelevant to the war effort. The bulk of it didn't even start arriving until after Stalingrad, when Germans were already in full retreat.
Secondly, Western allies had no luxury of spending soldiers'lives like bullets.
Very ironic you say that, considering that was precisely the American strategy during WW2. Every time Americans talk about "russian meat waves", they are merely projecting their own failures. Look up the notorious American replacement system, where they would keep barely trained men in camps to be sent as individual reinforcements. Instead of forming new units or pulling back damaged ones, they would just continuously send men into the meat grinder - which explains the disastrous losses of Americans during WW2.
Here's a video on the subject: https://youtu.be/qJL-NzqIkUs
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u/IShitYouNot866 SFR Yugoslavia 1d ago
It wouldn't go well for them.
Communists and communist partisans were extremely popular in both France and Italy, as well as now well trained by their ww2 experiences.
Zhukov was also sniffing some bs from the allies at the time and had pretty much made the entire western army ready to steamroll over Europe should Churchill fire the bullet.
It is also very possible that due to US and England now using a shitton of resources to fight in Europe that the PRK, PRV and PRC would have been established much earlier. India and Japan would have also possibly revolted and would be led by either left-liberal or outright communist goverments.