Kek. The commissar in the Red Army structure is a political officer, not a military officer, and had little to no tactical training. The commissar is equivalent to a Military Police commissioned officer and is definitely not who soldiers report to in battle;
Sure, but it doesn't detract from my statement. If comissars are the equivalent of Military Police, then it would also fall upon them to prevent soldiers from breaking orders and deserting, yes? Also, it's not like comissars had no authority to lead troops: "The political commissar held military rank equaling the unit commander to whom he was attached; moreover, the commissar also had the military authority to countermand the unit commander’s orders at any time." (
I.E. an order to retreat that would break Order 227) That's according to Wikipedia. Please correct it if that is incorrect.
How I have interpreted the gamification it is that you, the player, are the rank structure and you, the player, thus represent the various officers that pass the order along and the guy talking back/taking orders is the squad leader. And by representing the whole command chain itself, you interact with squad leaders which then act on your behalf, in which everything proceeds in an orderly faction.
The game is all over the place as far as this goes. Supposedly you're commanding "squad" sized elements (which are really team sized, as far as a US army equivalent) so assumedly you're a platoon leader, but then playing as USF you not only give commands to a Lieutenant (who would be the same rank as you as a platoon leader), but to a Captain (above your rank) and even a Major! (Who generally doesn't lead troops but still outranks a platoon leader.) And not even to mention that the announcer refers to Penals as Penal Battalion sometimes. I mean maybe battalion is a smaller group in the Soviet army but again, it just goes to show that things are a bit goofy in the game.
Either way, it seems that what you're saying is that each squad receives orders from their next higher up on the chain of command. I think that makes sense.
But that means that the "squad" is receiving orders to retreat from their unit commander, and assuming that the commissar squad is attached to that unit, he would be the same rank as the unit commander. Meaning that he receives commands from higher than the unit commander.
Therefore, it would be like the commissar receiving word from the commander that the soldiers are to occupy a certain strategic point. Order 227, as I understand it, is to prevent retreats from a certain area without authorization from higher up. In that case, it doesn't matter if it's an "organized retreat" ordered by the unit commander if it will desert the objective that commander wanted held.
From what I understood in the video, and correct me if I'm wrong, is that the commissars were involved in discipline and did in fact make sure that nobody retreated past a certain point, because that would fall under breaking discipline and Order 227. Of course, it was not always by shooting at the soldiers, and certainly not to the scale depicted by some hollywood movies, but it did happen nonetheless.
My primary point is this:
In my opinion, the Soviets had enough common sense to rally around an officer without the use of Order 227, and the inclusion of 227 in the justification of something so basic as an FRP implies that the Soviets did not have such common sense, which promotes negative stereotypes in one way or another and ultimately disrespects those who have died in the war and the few veterans alive today.
And I disagree that it promotes stereotypes, especially if it simply acts as a forward retreat point. In that case it's even breaking a stereotype that the campaign has set previously.
Also, I never said that Soviets were too stupid to rally around an officer or anything of the sort. The whole point is not that "In order for Soviets to recieve FRP we must talk about Order 227". It's that it would make sense in the context of the unit.
If the soviets had a unit like the USF Major or something like that, the whole Order 227 justification would be unnecessary, but it fits with the Commissar because as you yourself had said; the commissar is not a leader of troops but instead is concerned with enforcing discipline among the ranks.
Such a depiction of Order 227 is anything but stereotypical and if anything is more authentic than the way the campaign depicts it.