Why did so many Russians die in World War 2?

Answer 1

Several reasons. The Russians were fighting the WWII German military, still one of the best ever seen. The main German war goals were to win massive amounts of territory in the east, which would have to be carved out of Russia, and to stamp out Communism. And the Russians were absorbing most of the German war effort. When the Allies were fooling around in North Africa and Italy they were taking up no more than 10% of German war resources. Even after D-Day, when Allied strength in the west reached its peak, the Russians always continued to face better than 60% of the German military.

But the main reason for the gigantic Russian losses was the Russians themselves, the Russian leaders, particularly Stalin. In 1941 Stalin refused to believe that his partner, the only person on the planet Stalin trusted, Adolph Hitler, was about to turn on him, despite numerous warnings. Four or five million Russian troops disappeared in the initial maelstrom. Most were taken prisoner but were starved to death by the Germans. When the Russians began to be able to strike back, they were completely ruthless with their own troops. Russia had such a vast sea of manpower the Russians did not concern themselves whatsoever about their own losses. If they came to large minefields, they would march their troops straight through, reasoning that they would have lost an equal number of men if the Germans had been there to defend the area with machine guns. When Russian troops were in the front line, behind them were other Russians serving as "blocking units", whose job it was to shoot their fellow soldiers if any tried to run away, or retreat. The Russians would order waves of suicidal attacks until the defending Germans were finally whittled away or ran out of ammunition from slaughtering Russians. Only in the last three or four months of the war did Russia finally start to run short of men, and this forced some consideration on commanders of limiting losses to the extent possible.

Answer 2

The German invasion of Russia in 1941, Operation Barbarossa, was one of the most deadly battles in history. The total numbers are not known but respected estimates put the figures at:

20 Million Russian civilians

7 Million Russian soldiers

5 Million German soldiers

Answer 3

They thought the Germans were their friends. Turns out they weren't!