When I say the west I mean US, UK, French, Canadina, etc. and when I say the east I mean mostly the soviet troops. I have read recently somewhere that the liberation and the entire WWII effort as we perceive it today was somewhat influenced by Hollywood's depiction of WWII (I think it was on this subreddit).
So, if one could try and quantify it, how much of Europe was liberated by which side of the later blocks? And a smaller sidequestion which made me ask this one... On wikipedia there is this image: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/11/Allied_army_positions_on_10_May_1945.png Why does it state that there are only 6 soviet armies and 15 US armies, when the graphic shows otherwise. What am I missing?
(first question on this subreddit so please feel free to advise me on how to properly format it to meet the guidelines)
And a smaller sidequestion which made me ask this one... On wikipedia there is this image: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/11/Allied_army_positions_on_10_May_1945.png Why does it state that there are only 6 soviet armies and 15 US armies, when the graphic shows otherwise. What am I missing?
I'm pretty sure that graphic is just using one of the actual formations as "sample" armies, not as a count of how many armies existed. The US and Soviet armies aren't the only ones mislabeled. Several of the smaller countries have a "1" army in the legend, but have more than army on the map. But you'll notice that every army in the legend is located somewhere on the map. US 15th army is on the left back by the Rhine, while USSR 6th is on the opposite side of the map.
Comparing numbers of armies is an odd way to compare, simply because armies aren't an apple to apple comparison. Armies weren't homogeneous, even within a single country. The Soviets had armies that consisted of more than a dozen divisions, or that consisted of less than a half dozen divisions.
That said there can be no doubt that the Soviets had far more men fighting Germany than the West had. At the time of Germany's surrender the Soviets had just under 500 divisions in Europe. Combined (US, British, and French) the West had 91 divisions. Now American divisions tended to be about 50% larger than their Soviet counterparts. But that still means there were roughly three times as many Soviet men fighting as the West combined.
