@ABWorsham:
How do you think the massive tank battles over Europe would result?
As far as I could tell, even up until the 80’s NATO had just accepted the fact that Europe would be overrun. Their main objective was just to inflict unnacceptable casualties to the Russians.
@11HP20:
I have to wonder how much the 1969 border fighting between Russia and China would have influenced the outcome. After that point the Soviets would have felt compelled to keep a large presence along that border just in case. Supposedly a KGB agent approached our side to see how we might react to a Soviet strike on China’s nuclear facilities. If so that shows a concern by the Soviets about some form of US - Chinese co-operation in a time of open hostilities. Surely both sides had to factor in the possibility of Chinese involvement if war in Europe had broken out. China also didn’t enjoy it’s role as the number 2 commie power and everyone know it. Yet more reason for the Soviets to concider Chinese involvement.
Well, seeing as how in 69’ we were engaged in a war specifically to combat the spread of communism, I doubt that there would be any cooperation between us and China. A communist was an enemy no matter where they came from.
And the Russians did have to consider China if they got into a European war. But there are plenty of factors that were in the Russian’s favor.
First, China wouldn’t be able to devote their entire army against Russia because of India. Since the 50’s, China and India have been in border disputes and they even had a small scale war over it in 1962. India was Russia’s ally in that region so there is no doubt that the Indians would have at the very least tested the Chinese defenses on their border. Especially if China left it lightly defended.
Second, most of Russia’s resources and manufacturing is in the west of the country so they could afford to engage in a fighting withdrawal with a far smaller force without losing anything important for quite a while. Probably long enough for them to overrun Europe and then turn the bulk of what was left back toward the Chinese.
Third, the vast majority of China’s army was non-mechanized infantry so their progress would be very slow and the Russians wouldn’t have to worry that the Chinese could do the mass encirclements that the nazi’s had done to them in WWII. As a matter of fact, with a few strategically placed armored divisions and carefully laid traps, the Russians could probably execute a few mass encirclements on the Chinese.
Lastly, the border region between China and Russia is extremely mountainous. Of course, the Chinese would easily make it past the mountains into the steppes of Russia but the fact that the only paths through those mountains were non-paved roads it would be a major barrier to their reinforcements and supply lines. It would be tiring for the infantry to walk through, costly in gas for their tanks and trucks to cross, and with such a massive army those paths would be choked with millions of people and vehicles trying to jam their way through. Resupply would be problematic and those mountain roads would be juicy targets for Russian aircraft.