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The Nazi Scheme to Bombard New York City With Rockets and Other Unfinished Military Plans

Khalid Elhassan January 16, 2020 32 min

South Vietnam - United States — American troops in South Vietnam. USA Today

17. The Red Army Was Formidable in 1945

Size of the Soviet military during WWII. Quora

As WWII drew to a close, the Soviet military was no longer the hapless rabble it had been in 1941 when the Germans invaded. By 1945, the Red Army had become a veteran and battle-hardened force, that had won bigger campaigns against significantly greater opposition than the Allies had faced.

In a nutshell, Churchill’s generals concluded that it would be ill advised to take on the Soviets. Far from being a pushover, the Red Army when plans were drawn for Operation Unthinkable was dangerous, vicious, and very big. If war broke out, Churchill was advised, it was more likely to end with the Red Army conquering all of continental Europe, rather than getting chased back to the USSR.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.