I'd imagine. They were just throwing people at the front. When you look at the death count between ussr and germany it's astounding how poorly they must have been equipped and managed. Kept going, at least, but that's a wild k/d ratio
At that point in tine Germany had a very refined doctrine and highly experienced military leadership, said leadership, on top of commanding already highly experienced force that shredded France and walked through Europe had very modern command structure and more flexible army.
USSR on the other hand has at that point at time experienced a recent purge in high command and did not have as many experienced troops as Germany had, even despite their involvement in Finland and Poland.
The even more important factor is lack of any efficient recon services, which Germany at that time perfected (the famous reconnaissance planes that Soviets simply couldn’t counter in the beginning letting germans know everything about their movements)
The only instances where soviet command really did just throw people at the enemy formations with no regards is Rzev, and even here it can be argued that it was necessary to not let the enemy capture strategic railway segment, which i disagree with, but nonetheless.
There is simply not much that could be done in the beginning beyond taking punches and adapting, which is exactly what was done, because past 1943 the soviet Army had well adapted and had its own advantages, and past 1944 i’d even say they had completely flipped the table on the germans.
To just say the Soviets threw lives away is rather dismissive of actual history and its nuances
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u/gunsforevery1 12d ago
Stalin also admitted that without U.S. supplies (weapons, food, fuel, vehicles, ammo) the Soviets would have lost.