Hitler and Stalin as wartime leaders

Linda and I are listening to a 36 lecture course on World War II taught by Dr. Thomas Childers of the University of Pennsylvania.  We learned that both Stalin and Hitler fancied themselves excellent military leaders, but both were incompetent.  Stalin, for example, ignored the intelligence that pointed to Germany’s invasion.  He couldn’t believe that Hitler would break his word.  Later, in the summer of ’42, when Hitler was moving south into Russian territory, Stalin kept a large force in front of Moscow, convinced Hitler would try to overrun the capital, even though the Germans had no interest in doing that.  As a consequence the Germans reached important oil fields.

Hitler, of course, thought Britain would come to the peace table once France had fallen.  He later thought the U.S.S.R. would be easy to defeat.  He said if you kick down the door, the whole structure would fall.  Whoops.  Later, he could have cut off the Suez Canal, taken the Middle East, and linked up with Japan.  He did not because he thought it wasn’t important.

Both Stalin and Hitler thought they knew more about military strategy than their generals, many of whom had extensive military experience.

This all sounds vaguely familiar.