Look at my playercard.
Look at the sov 1vs1 rank.
Consider my strat as sovjet relies heavily on maxims.
If after this you still think maxims are weak, you 1vs1 me and i'll show you how utterly wrong you are.
I don't care about "who has bigger ranks", really. Your high rank doesn't show, that USSR is good faction and Maxim is good MG - it only shows, that you can spend enough forces to beat more powerfull faction enemies by weaker faction.
Again, when I say that "USSR is bad", I don't mean, that Axis beats USSR in 100%, so bad it is, of course no. It only means, that playing as USSR requiers from you way more micro, attention and another inner resourses to get win, while for Axis it's not such important.
And Maxim-spam tactic playing, I think, requiers from you a lot of micro. Way more, than for your enemy, which can rightly put MG-42 somewhere and forget about it. It will automaticly cover by fire large area, providing with large arc of fire to MG-42. Or, dig bunker and forget about it too - same auto-stopping your infantry. Less micro, less headache, less skills.
Main problem is - it's not so hard to play as axis, than as USSR. And that means that game is not balanced.