The most annoying thing with that movie, is they didn't pick an actor with a wide enough chest to sport all the medals Zhukov actually had, in full size.
A lot of them were given to honor him more than anything but Zhukov was absolutely a great general, and whatâs more, he managed to be one while keeping his head, which was not easy under Stalin
The real test of the Soviet generals' acumen in general was the disorganization and unpreparedness of the Red Army as a whole. That, and its enormous size. They were not German generals, working with the absolute best soldiers in the world at the start of the war, with outstanding organization and training.
Soviet generals were commanding vast legions of men who were barely trained, and led by junior officers who themselves were barely trained. Their forces were haphazardly equipped with a mixture of old equipment and new equipment that they had no training in or knowledge of how to use even in theory.
They also had to navigate an intensely hazardous political environment around Stalin and his inner circle, where one wrong turn of phrase could end your career, and even your life. Zhukov in particular excelled at this, and was notably firm in his opposition to Stalin's orders on many occasions. He still managed to maintain his post and defeat the Wehrmacht. In the first months of the war, when losses were most acute, Zhukov advocated for what are now regarded to be the correct moves, even though Stalin typically overrode him and forced the Red Ay repeatedly into desperate losing fights.
Zhukov was later closely involved in many of the Red Army's key victories against the Germans, and thus he earned his legacy as one of the great generals of the war.
Were the medals overkill? Maybe, but Zhukov himself was the best general on the side that fought 80% of German forces.
It should be mentioned the poor training at the highest levels of the soviet military was self-inflicted due to Stalin's purges in the late 30s. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge :
3 of 5 marshals
13 of 15 army commanders
8 of 9 admirals
50 of 57 army commanders
154 of 186 division commanders
all 16 army commissars
25 of 28 corp commissars.
I suspect that if Zhukov had annoyed some communist party Apparatchik he would have been swept up in the purges also. Lucky for Russia he didn't.
Wasn't Zhukov the one who said, to Stalin's face, that he wasn't the best general the USSR had to offer, but he was the only living one after Stalin killed them all?
I canât speak to the quote specifically but Zhukov was famous for being one of the few people who could say no to Stalinâs face and get away with it. I donât know if that extended to open criticism of Stalinâs politics, I honestly doubt it, but I can certainly believe he thought it.
But also the reason he was able to be more blunt with Stalin while others were not is precisely because he was a great general. Good enough that openly defying Stalinâs orders didnât get him killed, he was too valuable.
So itâs a little of both. Itâs perfectly possible that better generals were killed during the purges, and Zhukov himself wouldâve certainly thought so, having studied under a lot of them. But when push came to shove, Zhukov did do his job very well, which to me makes a great general.
If anything doing what he did with an army bereft of most of its talent makes him a better general
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u/Gruffleson Norge/Noregâââ â 4d ago
The most annoying thing with that movie, is they didn't pick an actor with a wide enough chest to sport all the medals Zhukov actually had, in full size.