# Would a land based invasion of Russia with modern technology cause major problems
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
**Created:** [December 24, 2018, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647 "2018-12-24T20:18:27Z")
**Posts on this page:** 14
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)
#### Post date: [December 24, 2018, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/1 "2018-12-24T20:18:27Z")
When Napoleon invaded Russia in the winter it caused a ton of problems for his military. Same with the Nazis.
But technology has advanced. If the modern armies of western europe did a land invasion of Russia in winter would they face the same problems that Napoleon and Hitler faced, or are those problems surmountable?
Plus I’d assume Russia has far better infrastructure now which would make it easier.
Basically would equipment stall, soldiers get frostbite, supply lines fail, etc. if a european nation invaded Russia today the same way this happened in the 20th and 19th centuries?
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### Author:  [@mind\_the\_gap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mind_the_gap)
#### Post date: [December 24, 2018, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/2 "2018-12-24T21:10:54Z")
Nah, the heat from all the nukes going off would keep them all nice and warm.🙂
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### Author:  [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)
#### Post date: [December 24, 2018, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/3 "2018-12-24T21:44:02Z")
To clarify, you’re wanting to do the same style of warfare (good old land grab colonial conquest), but with modern gear, right?
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### Author:  [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)
#### Post date: [December 24, 2018, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/4 "2018-12-24T22:20:44Z")
Fun facts: Russia has 100 times the land area of South Vietnam had and over 7 times the population. Plus industrialized, etc.
We couldn’t control S. Vietnam today with our modern weapons. If anything they would get in the way.
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### Author:  [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)
#### Post date: [December 24, 2018, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/5 "2018-12-24T23:44:10Z")
> [@Inigo\_Montoya](#):
>
> To clarify, you’re wanting to do the same style of warfare (good old land grab colonial conquest), but with modern gear, right?
Yes but I’m mostly wondering if the Russian Winters would affect a modern military like they did in the 1940s.
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### Author:  [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)
#### Post date: [December 25, 2018, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/6 "2018-12-25T00:26:55Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#):
>
> Yes but I’m mostly wondering if the Russian Winters would affect a modern military like they did in the 1940s.
Probably not quite as bad because the individual German soldier was not well equipped with winter gear. Non combat cold casualties would be less but not insignificant.
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### Author:  [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)
#### Post date: [December 25, 2018, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/7 "2018-12-25T03:55:53Z")
I would guess that yes, modern gear would make the cold much more manageable. In Afghanistan, for instance, there was an instance of American-made winter gear being so good that a 10th Mountain Division commander wished for cold weather to set in, knowing that his troops could handle the cold and the Taliban couldn’t.
> **[ECWCS-III: Dressed for the Cold](https://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/ecwsiii-dressed-for-the-cold-02941/)**
>
> "During Operation Mountain Lion I found myself praying for bad weather, the first time in my military career I was actually begging for a cold front to come through. I knew my soldiers could handle it and the enemy couldn't. ECWCS allowed my men to
So if ECWCS-III gear were manufactured and distributed on a massive scale to American and NATO forces invading Russia, it could greatly reduce the hypothermia risk. But I don’t know if modern tanks, vehicles, etc. are better at handling cold than WWII ones. Lubricants might still freeze, etc.
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### Author:  [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)
#### Post date: [December 25, 2018, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/8 "2018-12-25T04:02:55Z")
> [@Loach](#):
>
> Probably not quite as bad because the individual German soldier was not well equipped with winter gear. Non combat cold casualties would be less but not insignificant.
Its not just the soldiers though. My understanding is that vehicles couldn’t get through the snow, and the fluids inside the would freeze making the materiel unusable. Batteries would die. Guns wouldn’t work. Tank treads would freeze to the ground, etc. Guns, artillery, tanks, trucks, planes, etc. all failed to work properly in the soviet winter.
Plus there are issues of supply lines, providing all the food and equipment a military needs in several feet of snow is not easy.
But I don’t know how much of that was due to lack of technology back in the 1940s, or how much was just bad preparation by the Germans. The USSR seemed to be able to get their heavy equipment to work in the winter, probably because it was designed to work in those temperatures.
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### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [December 25, 2018, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/9 "2018-12-25T04:34:17Z")
Well, as one data point, when my father was growing up in Saskatchewan in the 30s, most people stopped using their cars for January and February and sometimes into March, because they just wouldn’t start or run in the cold. The fluids in particular turned to jelly in the oil pan, batteries didn’t work, etc. Now, Saskatchewan isn’t Russia, but it was clearly a technology problem in winter weather.
That’s not the case today. Cars run year round, and we don’t even have to “winterise” our cars in November anymore, which we still had to do when I got my first car.
So I would conclude that a well-equipped invading force would be in a better position than the Germans in 1941/42.
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### Author:  [@Bookkeeper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bookkeeper)
#### Post date: [December 26, 2018, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/10 "2018-12-26T15:05:39Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#):
>
> Its not just the soldiers though. My understanding is that vehicles couldn’t get through the snow, and the fluids inside the would freeze making the materiel unusable. Batteries would die. Guns wouldn’t work. Tank treads would freeze to the ground, etc. Guns, artillery, tanks, trucks, planes, etc. all failed to work properly in the soviet winter.
>
> Plus there are issues of supply lines, providing all the food and equipment a military needs in several feet of snow is not easy.
>
> But I don’t know how much of that was due to lack of technology back in the 1940s, or how much was just bad preparation by the Germans. The USSR seemed to be able to get their heavy equipment to work in the winter, probably because it was designed to work in those temperatures.
A lot of it was bad preparation by the Germans. They apparently thought that the Russian campaign would be the same as their previous campaigns - a bit of supply stockpiling, then a lightning push deep into the country followed by a quick enemy collapse and and surrender, then back to barracks to rest, repair, and resupply. No need to issue winter gear or figure out how to winterize equipment as it would all be over well before the cold weather.
Germany arguably had the best army in the world at the tactical level, but both the political and military leadership were seriously lacking in longer-range strategic planning.
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### Author:  [@MeanJoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanJoe)
#### Post date: [December 26, 2018, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/11 "2018-12-26T15:52:26Z")
> [@Bookkeeper](#):
>
> A lot of it was bad preparation by the Germans. They apparently thought that the Russian campaign would be the same as their previous campaigns - a bit of supply stockpiling, then a lightning push deep into the country followed by a quick enemy collapse and and surrender, then back to barracks to rest, repair, and resupply. No need to issue winter gear or figure out how to winterize equipment as it would all be over well before the cold weather.
>
> Germany arguably had the best army in the world at the tactical level, but both the political and military leadership were seriously lacking in longer-range strategic planning.
An interesting point related to this was the German military had never developed lubricants with cold-weather properties. They simply had never had to do so before. So when the campaign ran into its first winter, they had nothing at home they could ship to the army to keep the guns and other material from freezing up. The Russian Army of course did not have this problem as they were equipped for winter conditions including lubricants that could handle the sub-zero temperatures.
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### Author:  [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)
#### Post date: [December 26, 2018, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/12 "2018-12-26T17:55:53Z")
Invading Russia in winter might actually be preferable. You comprehensively nuke Russia, preferably during a blizzard, wait a day or three for fresh snow to cover the radioactive fallout, then the troops go in to mop up.
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### Author:  [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)
#### Post date: [December 26, 2018, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/13 "2018-12-26T19:15:00Z")
> [@Bookkeeper](#):
>
> A lot of it was bad preparation by the Germans. They apparently thought that the Russian campaign would be the same as their previous campaigns - a bit of supply stockpiling, then a lightning push deep into the country followed by a quick enemy collapse and and surrender, then back to barracks to rest, repair, and resupply. No need to issue winter gear or figure out how to winterize equipment as it would all be over well before the cold weather.
>
> Germany arguably had the best army in the world at the tactical level, but both the political and military leadership were seriously lacking in longer-range strategic planning.
To be fair, the damage they inflicted on Soviet armies during the opening of _Barbarossa_ was mind-boggling. In a series of encirclement battles they killed, wounded or captured:
[Kiev](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Kiev_(1941)): 700,544
[Smolensk](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Smolensk_(1941)): 759,947
[Białystok–Minsk](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Bia%C5%82ystok%E2%80%93Minsk): 417,729
And that’s just the big ones.
That the Soviet Union did NOT collapse is something of a surprise. Stalin himself was out of public view for a brief period during the worst of _Operation Barbarossa_, and he may have wrestled with capitulation during that time, before resolving himself to endure the losses and press on regardless of the cost.
While the Germans would have been wise to be better prepared for a long war, it wasn’t entirely unreasonable to assume an attack inflicting such staggering losses might end the conflict quickly.
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### Author:  [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)
#### Post date: [December 26, 2018, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-a-land-based-invasion-of-russia-with-modern-technology-cause-major-problems/826647/14 "2018-12-26T20:07:53Z")
> [@Wesley\_Clark](#):
>
> … Basically would equipment stall, soldiers get frostbite, supply lines fail, etc. if a european nation invaded Russia today the same way this happened in the 20th and 19th centuries?
My impression is that our NATO allies in Europe have fairly limited capacity for power projection outside of their own territory, so the invasion would probably fail because [Germany (to pick on an easy target) can only deploy a pitiful number of tanks](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2018/01/24/afraid-of-a-major-conflict-the-german-military-is-currently-unavailable/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.5fa9f71adac0).
The American military has a fair bit of training and combat experience operating in extremely cold and harsh environments (F-22s operating from Alaska, deployments to the mountains of Afghanistan, the 10th Mountain Division trains specifically for cold-weather warfare, etc).