Originally posted by Pepe:
Don't know by heart the structure, I think it's right but only in the numbers, not in the "weight". If we are to number what were the main reasons for Wehrmacht's success in early stages of the war, I would mention:
Pepe
With all due respect, Pepe, your views contain many misconceptions that I used to share untill I junked history books written by historians and journalists and started reading books written by professionals (military strategists) and participants - like Liddel Hart, John Keegan, Kurt Tippelskirh, Erich Von Manstein, W. Chirchill, ets.
a) Their approach to line of command. Officers, either hight or low rank were commanding troops in the very front line, often taking physical risks. Quite the opposite. Germans had strict separation since times of Moltke:
1)
Staff officers that were planning strategy, never saw combat and were more mathematicians and logistic experts then military.
Germans invented and perfected the theory of analytical operation that makes heavy use of math (differential equations, etc) to plan their strategy, maneuver and predict the results of combat.
2)
Line officers that were strictly leaders and were only responcible for local tactical matters.
b) Combined usage of Armoured + Tactical Air Forces. This change radically the speed the battle developped.These two aspects gave German army the edge in the beginning. If you mean that they used their planes to conduct reconnaisance, direct their armoured columns around the enemy strongpoints and provide air cover then it is true. But we are not really talking about battle here but maneuver.
French approach to war was mostly the opposite. Armoured was saw as a side force, in service of infantry, with little to none credit given to airforce. Line of command was everything but close to landscape, and guidelines painted the high ranked officers commanding the battle far into friendly line, and safe from risks. Same as germans and just what it was supposed to be.
The reason for that was that guiding troops was mostly an intellectual exercise, and war was, more or less, some real version of chess. Exactly what it is. And as in chess, a player with inferior staregy loses, so no reason to blame the board. You see much more of a battle from head-quarters then from a turret of a tank. Times of genrals leading their troops in a charge instead of directing the battle were over at the time of greek hoplites. If you are talking about directing and leading local action, that is what leutenants are for, not generals.
Traditional thinking painted war with continuous front, 5 to 15 days ploughing resources into the front, dense artillery fire for another good couple of days minimum, and finally infantry attack. Only in this way you can explain locking the best of their troops into the Maginot line, and their Armoured far from front line. First, that is exactly the way germans did with great success. Except that there was not and artillery barrage and then an attack but a painstainking several-day long penetration, reconnaisance by fire in close cooperation with artillery and slow advance.
Second, the problem of french was that they did not keep their tanks far enough and concentrated enough behind their line. Then they would have been able to maneuver and counter the advances of german columns that broke through into their rear, instead of being cut of at the fornt.
Tanks were lousy at the defence - artillery was more effective and much more cost-efficient.
German army used Armoured to penetrate into enemy lines, disrupting communication and supply lines. The main point was "momentum" and speed, and they laid aside resistance points, which either depleted their resurces, or were blasted by Lüftwaffe, should they threaten German lines. Quite the opposite again - if you mean penetration as in "penetrate the resistance". When german army were on the offencive, they righly chose light armor and armament for their tanks in favor of better speed and longer operational range.
The goal of tanks was disruption of enemy rear and communications.
Only wher the war turned defencive to them they produced "anti-tank" heavy tanks like Tiger and Panther, but those were not as cost-effective (for defence) as much more produced self-propelled AT guns.
Even heavy tanks would suffer extremely heavy casualties while breaking through prepared enemy defences. Even if you throw enough of them to break the defence, they would lose their battle order and would not be suitable for deep operations the tanks were designed for.
That I can personally vouch as a former tanker. It's hard enough to keep battle order without enemy shooting at you, and in deep operations the tanks had to move fast and that could only be done in column formations on roads. If you have to shoot someone or get shot at yourself, the deep tank operation is usualy over... And do not get me started on how often the damned things break... Tanks are too fragile to be used in combat.
That is why tanks were not really designed for blowing stuff up or taking damage. Tracks and engine are tank primary weapons, not armor or firepower.
One solution would be to use one group of tanks for breaking the defence and the other fresh one for entering into the breach. But that was impossible for many reasons. First, germans did not have that many tanks (russians did by the end of war, though). Second, germans were reluctant to lose experienced crews. Third, the enemy can amass anti-tank defence as fast as you can amass tanks for attack (and tanks gathered for attack are hard to hide, vulnerable to artillery or aviation strikes - russians in 41 and arabs in 67 can testify to that). Once a battle starts, enemy can move resources much better in his territory then you can move them through the occupied terrotory - that is the reason any offencive operation is mathematically destined to stall. If you do not know strategy math wery well, you could actually extend a bit further then optimal - and pay the heaviest price for that.
So german tanks never penetrated anything.
All penetration was done strictly be the infantry supported by artillery. Only when the front was broken did germans send their tank columns through.
In fact the some amasingly effective operations in WWII were conducted without tanks altogether - Manstein besieged and captured Sevastopol and Krimea without a single tank and with enemy air superiority. In fact, he had fewer troops then defending russians did.
This way of acting required more officers, since initiative was more important than clear-cut line of command, and war became even more "fuzzy". That would explain why a "heavier" structure was far more "agile" in practice. That also believe is true. When you fight with maneuver and mathematics, you win by through strategy, tactics and logistics rather then by killing all anemy soldiers. And once killing is less essential, there is less need for grunts with guns, heavy weapons or thick armor.
Of course the victors who considered 6:1 casualty rate acceptable somehow decided that their ways were more correct because they won.
Thanks for you reply.
miko
[ 06-29-2001: Message edited by: miko2d ]
