Lend-Lease tanks and aircrafts

Lend-Lease tanks and aircraft for the Red Army 1941 to 1945.
Figures of supplied armored vehicle and aircraft types from the United States and Britain to Soviet Union during the Second World War.

P-63 Kingcobra lend-lease aircrafts for Russia
Bell’s plant at Buffalo delivered well over 2,000 P-63 Kingcobra to Russia, where they stood up well to the harsh environment.

The Red Army used numerous lend-lease tanks and other armored vehicles from the USA, Great Britain and Canada.

Lend Lease Tanks

M3 tanks on the railway near Murmansk
American M3 tanks on the railway near Murmansk after arriving in Northern Russia.
A total of 22,800 armored vehicles were delivered to the Red Army during World War II, of which 1,981 were lost in dangerous Arctic convoys. These deliveries represented about 20 percent of the total number of armored vehicles produced by Russia during the war. Specifically, this was 16 per cent of Russian main battle tanks, 12 per cent of Russian self-propelled gun carriages and tank destroyers, and 100 per cent of Russian infantry fighting vehicles, as Russia did not manufacture any armored infantry fighting vehicles during the Second World War.

 

The first deliveries of tanks took place already in 1941, namely 487 Matilda II tanks, Valentine and Tetrarch from the UK as well as 182 M3A1 Stuart and medium tanks M3 Lee from the USA.
In 1942 Britain delivered another 2,487 tanks and the USA 3,023. The first Russian units equipped with these lend-lease tanks went into action with Valentine and Matilda tanks at Staraya Russia and in the Valdai area in December 1941 and January 1942.

At the beginning of 1943 there were 1,023 lend-lease tanks in Russian units, although 6,179 had been delivered since 1941. In the years 1944 and 1945, with the large access of American M4A2 Sherman, some Tank Corps and Mechanized Corps were equipped exclusively with this tank type. The M4A2 Sherman was not as brilliant a design as the Russian T-34 tank, but in the subsequent conflicts in Korea and the Middle East the US tank was – despite the superiority of the T-34 on paper – always the winner between the two.

 

Of much more decisive importance for Russian warfare, however, were the deliveries of motor vehicles, especially from the United States. During the Second World War, Russia built only 343,624 cars and trucks, since the major automobile manufacturers, such as the GAZ factories, were used to manufacture armored combat vehicles. The USA alone supplied the Russians with 501,660 tactical wheeled and tracked vehicles, including 77,972 Jeeps, 151,053 1.5 t trucks and 200,622 2.5 t trucks.

Valentine tanks in Iran during transit to Russia
Valentine Mk VIII tanks with 6pdr gun awaits unloading in Iran during transit to Russia.

This assistance was crucial, not only because of the enormous quantity, but also because of its quality. While the Russian automotive industry focused exclusively on the production of obsolete copies of American civilian trucks from the 1930s, the vehicles provided under the lend-lease agreement were modern military designs with multiple drive axles and functional off-road capability.

In addition, 15,631 guns and 131,633 submachine guns were supplied to Russia by the Allies.


Lend-Lease Armoured Vehicles supplied to the Red Army 1941-1945:

Armored vehiclessuppliedlost on seaarrived
US armored vehicles
M3A1 Stuart 1,676443 1,233
M5 Stuart5-5
M24 Chaffee2-2
M3 Lee 1,386?969 (?)
M4A2 Sherman 2,007(M3+M4 total 417) 2,007 (?)
M4A2(76mm) Sherman 2,095? 2,095 (?)
M26 Pershing1-1
M31 ARV (tank recovery)115-115
M15A1 MGMC (37-mm AA gun)100-100
M17 MGMC (quad AA MG) 1,000- 1,000
T48 tank destroyer (57-mm AT)650-650
M18 Hellcat5-5
M10 Wolverine52-52
M2-M9 Halftrack 1,17854 1,124
M3A1 Scout Car 3,340228 3,112
LVT5-5
US Universal Carrier T1696?96 (?)
US total 13,713 1,142 12,571
British armored vehicles
Valentine 2,394320 (including Canadian) 2,074
Valentine Bridgelayer25-25
Matilda Mk II 1,084252832
Churchill30143258
Cromwell6-6
Tetrarch20-20
Universal Carrier 1,212224 (including US and Canadian)988
British total 5,042839 4,203
Canadian armoured vehicles
Valentine 1,388? 1,388 (?)
Universal Carrier 1,348? 1,348 (?)
Canada total 2,736? 2,736
OVERALL 21,491 1,981 19,510

see also: Russian vs German tanks in WW2


Lend Lease Aircraft

British Hurricane pilots were playing football
British Hurricane pilots were playing football in the snow at Murmansk.

The disastrous course of the initial Russian response to the German invasion, and the resulting enormous losses suffered by the Red Air Force, made it necessary for the Allies to provide massive reinforcements until Soviet industry could produce modern aircraft in large quantities. The first foreign aeroplanes to arrive were two squadrons of Hawker Hurricane fighters, which were flown in combat by RAF pilots in the autumn of 1941 and then handed over to the Russians (see picture on the right).


Under the Lend-Lease act large numbers of American aircraft were assigned to Russia. A total of 14,833 US aircraft of all types were sent to Russia between 1942 and 1944.
Russian aircraft production 1942-1944 was 42,427 fighters and 11,797 bombers (additional 30,506 ground attack planes), which results that approximately 20 per cent of the fighters and 30 per cent of the bombers of the Red Air Force were American-built and approx. 10 per cent of the fighters were British-built.

Russian aviation made full use of American and British aid throughout the war, in many cases using Western aircraft as the basis for new Russian designs. A number of American types, notably the Douglas C-47 Dakota and Boeing B-29 Superfortess, were simply copied without permission.


Lend-Lease aircraft supplied to the Red Air Force 1942-1944:

US and British aircraftTotal
US aircraftTotal
Curtiss P-40 2,097
Bell P-39 Airacobra 4,746
Bell P-63 Kingcobra 2,400
P-47 Thunderbolt195
B-25 Mitchell862
Douglas A-20 Boston 2,908
US total 13,208
British aircraftTotal
Curtiss Tomahawks, Kittyhawks270
Hawker Hurricane 2,952
Spitfire Mk V143
Spitfire Mk IX 1,188
Handley Page Hampden46
Armstong Albemarle14
British total 4,613
OVERALL 17,821

References and literature

Soviet Tanks and Combat Vehicles of World War Two (Steven J. Zaloga, James Grandsen)
World Aircraft World War II (Enzo Angelucci, Paolo Matricardi)
Operation Barbarossa: the Complete Organisational and Statistical Analysis, and Military Simulation, Volume I – IIIB (Nigel Askey)


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56 thoughts on “Lend-Lease tanks and aircrafts”

  1. Robert

    I recently read book CRUSADE TO EUROPE by Dwight D. Eisenhower. Very-very interesting. Gave me more info on usa role in wwii. If you didn’t reat it yet i strongly recommend to do so.

    1. Why still lies and outright propaganda claims?, especially as we now know exactly what arms were sent and delivered, and what date they were received? And we know for sure that the USA did not supply the USSR with anything at all until 1944. Far too late to have made any difference at all. As the USSR said themselves, and refused to pay for any of it!

      The British supplied the USSR with all the military equipment they had and used to fight Germany when they got to Moscow. Before the British supplies landed in the USSR, it’s known the Soviet Red Army we’re sharing one rifle between 5–10 troops in places. The Soviets kept the British supplies they received under wraps/secret for years, and they never did acknowledge or thank the UK for that critical help.

      The USSR only acknowledged they received USA “Lend Lease” supplied to them in 1944. With the USSR refusing to pay for any of it, saying that it was too late (true), and they did it anyway! But since the collapse of the Soviet Union, much more information has emerged from archives in Moscow, containing Information shedding a new light on the subject. Much was in the Russian-language materials of the (State Defence Committee)—the Soviet equivalent of the British War Cabinet, held in the former Central Party Archive.

      While much of the documentary evidence remains classified “secret” in the Central Archives of the Ministry of Defence (Russian State Archive of the Economy). Both Western and Russian historians and researchers have been able to gain access to very important, (previously unavailable) first-hand documents of the USSR’s complete war effort.

      Together with other recently published sources, including the wartime diaries of N. I. Biriukov, (a Red Army officer responsible for troops from August 1941 onwards). Who was also responsible for the distribution of recently acquired Tanks (from the British) to the front lines. This newly available evidence, paints a very different picture from the USA’s “perceived wisdom”, or should we just say, lies?

      In particular, it shows that British assistance to the Soviet Union in late 1941 and early 1942, played a far more significant part in the defence of Moscow and for the swift revival of the USSR in WW2 than has ever been acknowledged or credited. It was an integral part, a critical part, the most important part of allowing the USSR to counter-attack the Nazi’s outside Moscow that very nearly saw the Nazi’s completely annihilated (as Hitler refused to allow them to retreat). And without which, the USSR would have been unable to remain fighting the war.

      It can now clearly be seen, and now said, that the British help and supplies to the USSR in late 1941 & early 1942, were the only reason we saw the revival of Soviet fortunes in WW2 from late 1941, absolutely not anything to do with the USA at all!

      In total, 4 million tonnes of war materials including food and medical supplies were delivered to the Soviets. The munitions totalled £908m (not including naval munitions supplied), the food and raw materials totalled £728m in the 1946 index (approx £4.6 billion today).

      In accordance with the Anglo-Soviet Military Supplies Agreement of June 27, 1942, military aid sent from Britain to the Soviet Union during the war was entirely free of charge.

      3,000+ Hurricanes aircraft
      4,000+ other aircraft
      27 naval vessels
      5,218 tanks (including 1,380 Valentines from Canada)
      5,000+ anti-tank guns
      4,020 ambulances and trucks
      323 machinery trucks (mobile vehicle workshops equipped with generators and all the welding and power tools required to perform heavy servicing)
      1,212 Universal Carriers and Lloyd Carriers (with another 1,348 from Canada)
      1,721 motorcycles
      £1.15bn worth of aircraft engines
      1,474 radar sets
      4,338 radio sets
      600 naval radar and sonar sets
      Millions of various rifles
      Hundreds of naval guns
      15 million pairs of boots.

      Yet you go and try to find this history out? See how difficult it is to find? When it should be the first thing being seen, as it’s so important, a huge part of history, REAL HISTORY! Not the US creation of fake history, as they ”pretend” to see it. That’s the truth!

      And we also see them claim the supplies we got from them were American supplies paid for by the USA? Rubbish!! Nearly every one of those boatyards and factories, built for the manufacture of weapons, was paid for by the British. The British paid for their construction, and all the machinery needed in them. Not the USA.

      Their accounts of WW2 are some of the biggest lies of modern history, as anyone that studies world history will find. This is the real history, the provable history making anything they want to say or claim irrelevant, as this is the real history, the facts.

  2. Another important fact is that Soviet airforce was supplied by American aviation fuel. Soviets didn’t even produce the high octane fuel newer airplane models required, as they lacked the necessary tech for that. The majority of aviation fuel was provided by America.

    1. Aviation fuel just for planes provided by the west,those produced by russians used a lower octane fuel.Lend lease material was approximately 7 percent of the entire soviet war effort,and started to appear in the late part of 41, after the battle for Moscow,when it was clear that the germans could not win the war

      1. It is a good thing the Russians had all these countries supplying them. Without a doubt the German army was vastly superior to the Russian one that had an almost never ending supply of men. If not for lend lease it would have changed history substantially. Add in the countless stupid decisions made by few of them like fighting on multiple fronts, as well as some terribly humongous military decisions among countless other things and you get a German rout of the Soviets. It is amazing how long the army fought on against several of the worlds strongest military countries at the same time. The Soviet Union/Russia are lucky they are not speaking German right now.

        1. You are absolutely correct. Historian John Mosier’s book, Hitler vs Stalin The Eastern Front 1941-1945, clearly delineates that it was the Western powers that defeated Germany. Even with all his Strategic Errors, Hitler would have won the attrition war against the USSR had it not been for 1) Western Mediterranean Front 2) Western Air War 3) Massive Western aid to the USSR. Germany would have defeated The Commonwealth and the USSR — but the huge American industrial productivity was the clear decision maker.

  3. Understanding why and not just what happened is essential. You are allowed your own opinions but you certainly are not allowed your own facts.

  4. Another victim of the Sherman myths trotted out by everyone who read Belton Cooper’s book. It’s a pain to see the Sherman so unfairly stepped on.

    If the Sherman was so inferior to the T-34, why does it compare so favorably to it?…it had superior frontal armor (between 50-75mm of frontal sloped armor compared to the T-34’s 45mm of sloped armor), comparable mobility, and superior base armaments (Sherman 75mm gun was superior to the 76mm gun on the T-34, and the Sherman 76mm gun was comparable to the 85mm gun on T-34-85, with superior rate of fire). The sherman also boasted a stabilizing system, allowing for more accurate first-round shots and even reasonable accuracy while on the move. Not to mention that the sherman was a significantly safer and more comfortable tank, allowing for much more efficient crews (hell, just having a loader loading the gun instead of making the commander do it makes a huge advantage).

    Believe me, I don’t want to diminish the significant historical and tactical effect the T-34 had on the war (it really was the right tank at the right time), nor do I want to put the sherman on this insane pedestal, but I’m very sick of seeing everyone parrot the same old myths about the sherman. Stuff like “it took 5 shermans to take out a german tiger tank” (it took 5 tanks because 5 tanks was a platoon, why would you send half a platoon to fight a bad guy? were you being sporting?) or “sherman tanks were nicknamed ‘Ronsons’ because they ‘lit first every time'” (first of all, sherman tanks statistically didn’t burn any more than any other tank of the war, including the T-34, and second of all, that nickname is pure myth, considering the slogan that the nickname is based off of was a post-war thing)

    1. Yeah. I agree whole heartedly. I read Deathtraps and believed a bit of it, until I read Zaloga’s work on the Sherman where he dispelled all the myths. The movie Patton propagated a lot of them, particularly about the fuel fires and that German tanks ran on diesel, which they did not. That should have been caught by the “technical Advisor” on the film none other than Gen Omar Bradley. Alas he was probably too focused on doing a hatchet job on Patton and making himself looking good. He did tha same bang up job there as he did in the Ardennes.

      The propensity for tanks to to burn was due to ammunition fires. Period, and nearly all tanks of the time had the same problem. The Panther stored its ammo in sponson racks over the tracks too and suffered the same for it. Probably the only big thing that the T-34 had over the Sherman was ground pressure. It’s wide tracks gave it flotation than no early war tank could match.

      1. Martin Lienert

        It’s wide tracks gave it flotation than no early war tank could match.
        That was the main reason. The German tanks stuck in the mud while the T34 were able to go trough the horrible terrain.
        The mass production of that simple tank allowed the Soviets to throw and loose hundreds of T34 against the Germans. Don’t forget the Soviets did not care about their own people as the Americans did.

  5. In the debate on aid, just remember the following reverse analogy. If my son has a drug problem and comes to me for money to help him buy food for his kids and to pay his rent, I am really enabling his drug habit. I am doing so, because ANY of MY money I give him will allow him to use HIS money to buy drugs. In the case of the Soviets and foreign aid it is the same case. ANY aid they received allowed them to use their limited and shrinking industrial capacity to manufacture other things that were critically needed. One commenter mentions canned meat as an example of the “token” aid given by the US. Well, starving soldiers don’t fight too well for long. Seems some of the Stalinist attitude took hold from teaching in school. A T-34 tank with no petrol, and a bootless, starving and freezing crew is called a practice target. As a wise man once said, Professionals talk logistics, amateurs talk strategy. In other words, an army moves on its stomach, boots, fuel tanks and truck tires. It has to get to the fighting to do any good. If the West had not caused Hitler to siphon off troops, air squadrons and sent supplies, the Soviets would not have triumphed.

  6. Nice write-up on the Combat Effectiveness of the various combatants in WWII. I read the original Trevor Dupuy study which was somewhat more qualitative than later numbers I read. I cannot for the life of me recall what book I read it in. It gave numbers of CE of 3-1 on the Russian Front and a bit more even odds on the western. I want to read your numbers to digest the statistics a bit more. Do you have more recent citations of studies upon which you based your tables?

    On another point, I raise the ire of our Russian friends on the Quora forum (from which I have since been banned…lol) by pointing out, much as you have that the Soviets could not have won without the west. I made the same Identical points you do along with a few others.

    Your tables of Soviet tank, artillery, and transport production would have to all be scaled down due to the fact that Soviet industrial capacity would have been bled off to produce such things a locomotives, boots, wire, and all the sundry other things the US and Britain sent the Russians, not the least of which was food. Without the ability to focus on building tanks, planes, artillery and trucks how many fewer of each would they have produced. In the dark days of 41 and 42 US and British production filled the gap. How much farther might the Germans have gotten without Lend Lease equipment.

    Have a great day and keep up the good works.

  7. So much for the progressive lies that the Russians beat the Germans all by themselves. What isn’t included is that America give the red army about a years worth of food …. the rest of their provisions were from forage. Virtually none of the filibuster by the Russians came from Russia.

    1. Russians never say that they fought alone. They always mention allie’s help during the ww2..On the contrary, Americans like to say that they saved the world without mentioning somebody else. Allies help was tremendous and helped to earn approximately 1.5 year of peace, but the main force in the land war was USSR. Period.

      1. You’re wrong. I lived many years in the occupied territories of the Bolsheviks (Poland), I read many historical books published in the USSR, in which the authors wrote directly that the USSR was alone fighting with a coalition of “fascist” states, including the Home Army (Armia Krajowa). “Soviet historians” wrote how the great fascist Finland suddenly attacked the peaceful, small country of the world proletariat and Stalin. The aid of the Western states to Stalin’s empire was barely mentioned, sometimes bypassed by silence. In the Bolshevik books, the Polish Army was described as an ally of Hitler. The Bolsheviks have a short memory, they forgot how they had triggered the Second World War with Hitler. It’s a pity that this false propaganda in the historical books “cделано в СССР” has been removed from Polish libraries, it would be “funny”.

        1. problem is that you lived in Poland. I had no idea about Poland because i never being in Poland but I do have idea about USSR where I was born and leave for 33 years. I don’t know about propaganda in Poland but I do know about propaganda in USSR. Official propaganda over there was always mentioning help of allies forces. Of, course, this help was diminished, but at least it was mentioned. Moreovere, Russian moviws shows American jeeps and studebeкеrs carring Russian missles Kaтюша.

        2. Hey!
          What about your (Poland) joint invasion with Germany of Czechoslovakia in 1938? The country you partitioned afterwards with your ally – yes ally! Before Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, Poland has non-aggression treaty with Germany made much earlier, the one Soviets had.
          How many red-army soldier died and been killed in Polish POW-camps (Tuchola, Strzalkowo) from 1920-1922? Around 40 000 people.
          And talking about fascists, you were quite active in extermination of jews, ukrainians and other small nations, according to Josef Pulsidski. How was it called? Sanacja – ethnic cleansing.
          Now Poland has total memory loss about those facts.

    2. Thanks for selling us shit during war; sitting back; dropping nukes on the Japanese civilians; and joining the European theater at the end of the war, just before USSR took Berlin. Didn’t even join the battle for Berlin.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwKPFT-RioU

      You’re welcome for having the greatest impact on the German army. Maybe if mainland US is invaded, we can sell you shit next time.

      1. Soviet propanga always mentioned that USSR beat Germans with help of the USA and Britain. Always. Help from USA was tremendous but it started not from the beginning. As a matter of fact when Germans were near Moscow in October 1941, Stalin just met with American representative to discuss this help. Period. If USSR didn’t have American help it would fought another year or so, according to comment of Mr. Mikayan who was very close to Mr. Stalin all years from the 1917 to the 1953. Help was huge and loss of the soviets life’s were huge as well. So, every side gave as much as it can under their circumstances. Problem is today that a lot of times American propaganda says that Americans saves the world. Propagand fogot to add “together with Russians.”
        At the end of the soviet movie “Libearation” the people can read on the screen that Americans lost about 300000 people in this war. Soviets lost about 20 millions.
        Can you point to American movie which will introduce similar data?
        Thank you.

        1. The loss of life was huge because Stalin and his generals did not care how many men died. There were disastrous offensives that cost half a million casualties that were swept under the rug until Glasnost. Then there were the 100,000 or so men executed to stiffen the resolve of the others, or for being taken prisoner. That is about the equivalent of nearly 10 Soviet divisions. When one knows that Joe Steel killed 20 million of his own countrymen to make collectivization happen, starving the Ukrainian and Russian kulaks to death, it makes you wonder if we were really fighting the right guy. Stalin’s pre- war, war and post war death count makes Hitler look like Mother Theresa. Stalin was having to deal with wars of independence in the Soviet occupied territories until the late 1950’s. One could say based on the events of the early 1990’s that the Warsaw Pact countries were not really allies of the Soviets as much as slave states.

          There is not doubt Hitler was a bad guy, but just comparing numbers Stalin was by far the worst of the two. Many Holocaust scholars believe that if Hitler had not started in on the Jews, that Stalin would have eventually, just like he did with the Polish Intelligentsia after the partition of Poland. I suggest you read, Bloodlands: the land between Hitler and Stalin. It gives a pretty horrific account of the mass murder on both the German and Soviet sides.

          1. We are not talking about reasons for loses but we are talking about that soviets always mentioned participation of another allies and Americans do not mention at all.
            Why Russians had such loses is a completely different story and will be subject of another discussion if you are willing to participate in it.
            The only thing is that not you or myself have a full and complete information about that time, so both of us rely only on information we can read. But here is a catch for you: I was born and grew up in Odessa, USSR, so Russian language is my native one. I am reading about this war since I was a kid, also in my time almost anyone from previous generation took participation in this catastrophic event including my father ( Jew, Officer, communist – automatic death penalty if caught) who started to fight on June 24, 1941 (2 days after Hitler bombed USSR) and finished on May 9,1945 in Berlin. War stories were all over when I grew up, and stories about putting kulaks in prison were next to zero.
            Huge loses were due to mistakes of Stalin and generals. Nobody will take their mistakes from them. But…
            If you want to discuss it then be my guest. Thank you for your time.

          2. We weren’t fighting the right guy. But, they guys who control America were fighting the right guy. And, because they control America, they made us fight their right guy for them. It’s all so simple, once you know about how money works and who controls it.

          3. Mother Theresa didn’t look like Mother Theresa. I know I’m being off the topic, but the bitch had got her damn hands covered in blood. So yeah, those three were pretty close, each of them inflicted as much harm as they could

        2. I lived in a country occupied by the Bolsheviks for almost 30 years. I do not remember the Bolshevik propaganda saying that the USSR defeated Germany with US and UK support. Moscow’s propaganda claimed that the Stalin state itself defeated the Nazis and their allies, while the assistance of Western states was small and insignificant. The Bolsheviks argued that the Americans and the British were doing their utmost to ensure that the Soviet Union could not easily defeat the Germans and that the Poles were helping Hitler. On the other hand, all data indicate that, without the help of Western states, Stalin’s empire would have fallen. It is worth to investigate the issue of the annual production of tanks in the USSR and the amount of losses incurred by RKKA during the following years of the war. It is also worth asking, why the USSR produced in 1931-1939 21322 tanks T-37, T-38, T-26, BT, T-28, T-35, as well as mass of other armaments? It is also worth asking who launched the second world war … It is worth asking whether the one who sets fire to the world can be considered a firefighter … It is worth to ask also how many of these 20 million killed Soviet citizens were murdered by the order of Stalin as ordered by Hitler, How many died because of the Soviet commanders’ incompetence.
          In conclusion I will say this: the gods of all countries, forbid the world against such “Liberators” as Stalin or Hitler. My family members were murdered by Nazis and Bolsheviks. Your entry smells of Soviet propaganda …
          Thank you for your attention

          1. My family members were fighting against Nazi and some of them were killed on the battle fileds. I don’t know how my entry smells but I do know that the deal between Stalin and USA didn’t start until the end of 1941. So, the darkest days in Oct 41 when Germans were close to Moscow, soviets were fighting on their own and won!
            I don’t know how come you didn’t hear from soviet propaganda about economical help. Probably, because you didn’t want to hear it. Watch movie “liberation”. Over there foot soldiers eating canned meat and called it “2nd front”. This canned meat was part of American help.

        3. Friend, Your “historical sciences” end in the Dniester and the Bug, where my “historical sciences” begin. I am a historian, I have studied many books. Soviet and Russian historical books diminish, sometimes bypassing Western aid during the Second World War. On the other hand, You are right, Americans often overlook the contribution of other nations to the victory over Hitler, but so do many nations …

          1. How come you decide where is the end of my historical science? Secondary, your Poland was occupied by polish Bolsheviks and not by Russian s So, it was your’s own nation who run your own country. Third, to the best of my shorty knowledge, Stalin started war against Poland about 17 days after Hitler and his goal was to take bak western Ukraine and western Belorussia, land which was taken by your POLAND twenty years earlier. So, it was Polish people who occupied this land and knobody else. Nowadays, I am do hear voices to return this land back to Poland. Why? And also, if you are historian, could you, please provide explanation why such a peaceful Poland had in the thirties military plans to attack USSR? And I also want to give you an advice: no matter how many books you are reading there is always will be pieces of missing information. One of comments says that 100 000 were executed by Stalin. Another saying that Stalin killed 20 millions of kulaks! Where these numbers came from? Who counted these people? Who made this statistics? It is absolutely unknown. Loses of USSR were huge because initially about 7 millions of Germans crossed the borders and Russians simply wasn’t prepared for it. If each of 7 million will kill one Russian then automatically will be 7 million Russian corpses. Only absolutely blind person may say that Stalin did not care about his solgiers. Loses on poorly planned military operations were only because Russian generals were making mistakes. But they are human beings and all human beings are making mistakes including those who supervised Pearl Harbor, Dunker, and Bulge!!!!!!!

            Out of curiosity and only because one of comments says that if stalin was alive he would kill much more people then Hitler I also want to say “IF”.
            IF 7 millions Germans crossed the border of the USA or England then both coutries would give up in a matter of couple of weeks. Do not believe me? Then check out France. It had American and British support and …gave a shit in a two weeks.

          2. Leva You really should do some research. Soviet airplanes flew on high octane fuel from America, Soviet troops were transported by American trucks and locomotives, they eat American food, Soviets used telephone cables and clothes from America, boots, ammunition, Soviet war industry used industrial machines from USA.The list goes on and on. Without all of this there wouldn’t be any additional 1,5 years of war because UdSSR would have beem annihilated. Stalin himself admitted that, Zhukov did, you can even watch interview with him on youtube, N. Chrushtchov did as well.

            Besides, the Germans didnt even use 30% of all their resources in the war in the east. Their u boot fleet alone was worth as much as 50.000 Panther tanks.

          3. I am really do not understand what you want to prove to me. I said from the very beginning that american help was tremendous. Every russian movie about war shows geeps and studebekers – american cars and trucks. I repeat every movie.
            And canned meat as well. So, what is your point? That Russia could not wean this war without american help? But why France and England did not beat Germans with american help and without russian army in Dunkerk? Why?

          4. War is not fought in a vacuum. Every country has finite means to wage war and in the case of the USSR it was shrinking as the Germans occupied more and more of the industrial heartland. For every weapon, every can of meat, every tank, every airplane and every other item the Soviets received from either Britain or the US, that was one item less that they had to make in THEIR factories or go without. That meant that the factories of the USSR could focus on making tanks or artillery pieces. No consider how many T-34s or KV-1s could have been made if the limited resources of the Soviets had to go into making all the sundry items shipped ready made to them from the West. THAT is the point a lot of us are trying to make. The largest contribution the USSR made was in blood. No one denies that, but the USSR would never have reached the German Polish boarder if not for the material supplies sent by the West and the draining of German and their allies manpower to the west. The Germans lost 250,000 as prisoners in Tunis-grad in North Africa. The air offensive in the west drew away 80 percent of the German air force, and required commitment of a MILLION men to man the anti aircraft defenses of Germany. Imagine if there was never a air offensive, that 100% of the Luftwaffe stayed in the East and that additional one Million men were freed up to move to the Eastern Front. Based on the numbers, and combat efficiency ratings of the combatants, one million more Germans would have meant that the Soviets would have had to come up with Three million more men just to match them. Something they couldn’t have done. By the time they reached Berlin they were scrapping the bottom of the manpower barrel, and The Poles, and other occupied states were supplying a lot of manpower to make up the difference. Imagine that the USSR had to make each and every one of those 250,000 trucks that the US sent. The Soviet offensives would never have gotten very far because they were even less well prepared for the logistics tail they had to have than the Germans were.

          5. Robert,

            in spite the fact that we have huge differences in our views on this matter i want to tell you that you are a real man because you openly admitted that i was right when pointed that Americans overlook their contribution over another nation (russia). Not everybody on this site is capable to recognize that dead Russian people was deadly weapon against Germany. My respect to you!

      2. Have you ever heard the phrase “you reap what you sow”?

        Russia earned everything that happened to it during ww2. They earned it in Finland and in Poland. Try to remember the Russian invasion of two sovereign nations when you complain about “going it alone”!

        1. ^ Completely irrelevant, Jim. The Russian invasion of Finland and “Poland” has nothing to do with the effectiveness of Lend-Lease as it happened. Please try to keep your own personal insecurities to yourself.

          1. American production defeated the Germans. Period. there is a reason the Germans were so careful about the US for as long as they were. They weren’t scared of anyone else and had no reason to be scared of anyone else they all got their asses handed to them. But they really would have lost in 1942 without the massive amounts of supplies they were given.

        2. invasion in Finland and Poland are different things. War in Finland is not a Part of WW2. It is absolutely different wars. “invasion” in Poland was to get back just Ukrainian and Belorussian west lands which Russia lost 20 years earlier. Nobody today in Ukraine, Belorussia and Poland want to give this land back to Poland, because it was a proper move by USSR.

      3. What are you going on about? You are allowed to your own opinions but not your own facts. Perhaps a history lesson based solely on facts will clear the muck from your intellect. Understanding why things happened the way they did is more informative that blindly looking at what happened.

        1. As I’ve said time and time again. Industry does not work in a vacuum. For every ton of lend lease, that you never paid for by the way, that was sent, it freed up Russian industry to make something else. We sent hundreds of thousands of trucks that would have been made by at home, and cut into tank and artillery production. Without the trucks by 1946 the Soviets wouldn’t have even been to Poland. Their supply lines were getting longer and the Germans shorter. Dream all you want, oh sure the Russkies could throw bodies at bullets since life was cheap. I bet Stalin wished he had the male component of the 20 million Kulaks he starved in the 30’s during collectivization. Then there was the fact that US and British air power drained over 80% of the German air forces back to Germany and caused another Million men to be employed in the aerial defense of their industries. The Axis lost more men surrendering in Tunisia than they did at Stalingrad. That is why they in their black humor referred to it as Tunisgrad. Taking all things into account, The Soviets would not have made it to Berlin without assistance from The Brits and the US. They would have run out of men first. They were scrapping the bottom of the barrel by 1945 as it was. The release of divisions from Siberia that had been watching the Japanese and the influx of men from the liberated countries the enslaved later, afforded them the manpower they needed to make the final offensives.

          1. Keith Patton I just wanted to add that lend lease also oncluded industrial goods like electric machines, which boosted Soviet production even further. They were especially important because Soviets couldnt produce them by themselves.

          2. Adam, I recently read the book “Victory” about the US’s successful covert war against the USSR that led to its breakup. Reagan pressured our Nato allies to NOT sell computer equipment to the Soviets nor high tech oilfield equipment which they could not produce themselves, all in an attempt to hurt their hard currency earnings on oil. I bring this up, because it had not occurred to me that their machinery losses in the factories the Germans over ran and whom Krupp in some cases dismantled and shipped west had to be made good, and may have consisted of machinery that the Soviets themselves could not produce and had purchased abroad. Thanks for bringing that to my attention. I knew that the US sent hundreds of locomotives, but had not thought about industrial machinery.

  8. Philip S. Lyon

    The soviets got the license rights to the DC-3 before WW2, as well as the Japanese, and while admitting they produces a little over 2000, actually built at least a few thousand more.

  9. This isn’t the place for a debate about British vs American spelling. Both are usually 100% readable by the other.

    1. … well 99.5% understandable like if I were to say to you “oh while I’m in town I’ll go and knock up your girlfriend” that would mean I’m going to go and knock on the door and say hi but in English American version say I’ll go knock up your girlfriend well, we all know that’s a little bit different…

  10. Hey John I think you’ll find it’s the Americans that messed up their dictionaries. Seeing as the English language existed before the United States did I’ll take British English, thanks.

  11. You spelled “Armoured” wrong it should be Armored, unless you’re British… in which case its still spelled wrong, because the Brits messed up their dictionary, but good job m8 I r8 8/8.

      1. A lot of the differences in English and American spellings are on purpose. After the revolution English spellings were purged as we tried to distance ourselves from our former oppressors. We even changed the way we ate moving our use of the fork from the left to the right hand and discontinued using the knife in the right hand. This is a common thing in the US. Even after the Revolution town names were changed due to the use of German mercenaries. The Virginia town I am from changed its name from Müllerstadt to Woodstock to remove any German connection with its past.

    1. No only the USA spells it as “Armored” in the English-speaking world and beyond.
      It’s a French loan-word.

      1. Some people are spelling Nazis and/or get all panty wadded over sentence structure. Don’t know why. I am about as American as one can be and I think either spelling of armored/armoured is just fine either way. Nor would I ever tell another country they had screwed up THEIR language except maybe in jest. When people start to get upset over spelling I think of reading the unedited Journals of Lewis and Clark. Lewis was the US President’s secretary and would often spell the same word 2 different ways in the same paragraph or page. If researched the amount of aid of all sorts sent to the USSR was stunning.

    2. The correct spelling is armoured in English. Armored is the abortionated version of English that the US use.

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