If Tukhachevsky survived the Great Purge....how far would the Germans advance?

[matthew.manhorn]

Was Tukhachevsky's death really that of a severe impact to the Red Army? How good is he when compared to Zhukov?

Does he really deserve the reputation of being the "Red Bonaparte"? The only wars that he had fought were the Russian civil war and the Russian-Polish war....

I'm not asking for help for my history project etc.. but the English sources of Tukhachevsky are way too limited imo....can some Russian friends help?

[Chiptox]

I'm no scholar but it was obvious that in the USSR they needed desperately any form of compotent general in the early days of the war.

It was, iirc, one of the many reasons Germany attacked.

Anybody who could think for himself and thereby command armies would have been most welcome to the Red Army in those dark days and contributed greatly to final victory. Sadly, the persons with that particular temperment were weeded out by Stalin's purges.

[shadowsrider]

IMHO it wouldn't slow down German advance that much. It was not the issue of a single competent general: there were some in RKKA even at that time. The reason of the fast German advance was the whole spectrum of factors which lead to total disassembly of Red Army organism. One more general would not solve this issue.

[NicNZ]

I agree. A single general would not have prevented Germany from pressing deep into the USSR any more than it could be said that Stalin alone led the USSR to victory over Nazi Germany; that one man may have been at the helm as a figurehead, and may have made some signficant decisions that affected the eventual outcome, but it is the contribution of many people that makes the overall difference.

[Lokos]

I'd throw my two cents in, but shadowsrider's answer is both adequate and succinct.

L.

[matthew.manhorn]

So were the negative effects done by Stalin's purges an exaggeration overall?

[Violet Fashion by Mindy]

No.

They decimated the officer corps. Officers who no doubt had extensive experience from WW1, the Civil War ect.

And if your a young officer who escaped the purges you are not going to come up with any new ideas for risk of being taken out back and shot.

[Teme]

So were the negative effects done by Stalin's purges an exaggeration overall?
Hmm,

Stalin killed 3 out of 5 marshals, 13 out of 15 army commanders, 8 out of 9 admirals, 50 out of 57 army corps commanders, 154 out of 186 division commanders.

There are more twists in to the Tukhachevsky affair. According to V. Krivitsky, a NKVD defector, the idea of planting forged documents to frame Tukhachevsky was introduced to the German intelligence by Stalin's agents.
[Edvard Radzinsky: Stalin (Paperback) P. 370]