Londoner

LOL!!

Glad you found it interesting Ferdinand/RMC. Broadly speaking, the "warrior ethos" seems to be the belief that battle is the ultimate test/trial of manhood. However as you point out their are other attributes attached to it. Gyene? Is that how you spell it? No insult meant I just couldn't remember you name. Ok fair enough, I'll drop the insults, the only reason I used so crude a term was because you seemed to be oblivious to some of objections raised. You just dissmissed them. Also you knew what I meant when I said "do you think I'd waste my time.." Of course I dont think it was time wasted. I discovered alot of stuff I didnt know about a fasinating subject, and I got a nice grade that went towards my final degree. Again you mince words. BTW are you really a child or did I, in my stupidity miss the joke? Oh and your little after thought about being on different continents is pathetic in the extreme. I'm a 6 foot black Londoner with almost 10 years of heavy weight training behind me. I'd happily tell you in person, what I've said here, without to much fear of an effective physical response from your good self. LOL why did you have to add that BS on the end? [ 05-03-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

American Combat Motivation in World War Two. Over the past fifty-five years many theories for combat motivation in World War Two have been put forward. Dinter argued in his book Hero or Coward, that humans are innately aggressive. He went on to argue that this aggression can be used effectively if military training is tough and realistic, reminiscent of the Fuller and Hart era. However, in many academic’s minds, the modern battlefield has made this argument ambiguous. Historians such as Ambrose, Holmes, and in the last two years, Bourke and Linderman argue that Comradeship, particularly the primary group had become the most important factor in combat motivation by World War Two. The eminent Paul Fussell remarked, men ‘will attack only if young, athletic, credulous, and sustained by some equivalent of the buddy system.’ Most contemporary commentators tend to agree with this theory, especially where British and American Armies were concerned. Others, such as Forster believe that ideology, principally in regimes with excessive propaganda, played an important role. Bidwell argues that race and ethnicity are important motivators. According to him, ‘martial races’ like the Irish have a natural aptitude for military operations. Strachan emphasised discipline and terror, (in German and Russian soldiers), kept men fighting in extreme conditions. Keegan also added his “big man" theory to the debate which reverts back to the individual approach rather than group paradigms. Linderman on the other hand argued that an animal like coarsening and eventual brutalisation simply took hold of most American combat infantrymen, turning them into robot-like brutes. There are psychiatrists, historians, psychologists, soldiers, politicians, sociologists and many more miscellaneous commentators who have provided a wide variety of answers to the question of combat motivation in World War Two. However, the aforementioned factors seem the most recurrent and well-studied theories. None of which are mutually excusive, but the relative importance of these ideas have caused heated controversy. The Primary Group Unravelled. However, certain assumptions have been made. Janowitz and Shils argued that the primary group was the key motivator in the German army of 1939-45. Bartov and Strachan both dismissed this idea, pointing out, high levels of attrition shattered units relatively quickly. Bartov substitutes the primary group, for harsh discipline (15,00 German soldiers were executed during World War Two) and terror of the enemy, as the primary combat motivator. Bartov and Strachan also argue that the same can be said of the Soviet Army. The Soviet Army suffered almost eleven and a half million active service personnel killed in Action and a further eighteen million wounded in action. Seventy five percent of which fell on the rifle companies, thus decimating them many times over. In 1941 Stalin decreed ruthless punishment for desertion, panic mongering and surrender. Families of soldiers who deserted would be arrested and families of those taken prisoner would lose state benefit. Also NKVD “holding detachments” were placed behind the frontlines to deter would-be deserters. Again discipline and terror were, according to Bartov and Strachan, of fundamental importance to Soviet combat motivation. However, Beevor remarked that many actions involved supreme sacrifice, which could not be explained by merely discipline and terror. However, arguably revenge and hate made up for many of the acts that Beevor cites. As Erickson pointed out, the driving force behind Soviet combat motivation was an all-consuming hatred of the Germans, personalised by millions who had seen for themselves or suffered through their families, what German rule had done. The reasons for German and Russian combat motivation are not central to the question. They are used to highlight and question the relevance of comradeship and the primary group. Some commentators are acknowledging that comradeship was not the most salient factor in the motivation of certain Armies in the Second World War, (Bartov writing in 1992 and Strachan in 1997). However, most historians still hold the view that discipline, terror and hate do not explain American combat motivation. Discipline was certainly a contributor but the severity of military discipline had declined significantly over the one hundred years preceding World War Two. The US Army executed a handful of men. While probably more important than many believe, discipline, terror and hate was much less of a factor in American combat motivation. Comradeship is purportedly the fundamental variable in motivating young British and American men in World War Two. Ellis commented that Western armies are held together at the squad and platoon level. Comradeship, he affirms ‘was no fleeting, boozy sentimentality’. Holmes argues much the same, ‘mate ship tied men willingly to the altar of battle’. Ambrose also goes along with this, arguing in his book Citizen Soldiers, ‘What held them (American infantrymen) together was not country and flag, but unit cohesion’. Most major surveys also concentrated on the primary group, Marshall’s comprehensive surveys, summed up in his book Men Against Fire, being the most obvious example. However there are numerous problems with such a singular approach. Most notably the question of casualties arises. American casualties amongst rifle companies made up the majority of total American combatants killed and wounded. The decimation of the primary group would, in many sections and platoons committed to combat for more than a few days, become reality. The purported nature of comradeship simply does not stand up to the number and speed of American casualties. Keegan also points that the scope of many studies is often limited. Many commentators automatically assume that once a man becomes a soldier he internalises a set of beliefs induced by training, to the exclusion of all others. In Keegan’s words, “The military historian’s man in uniform bore no resemblance to the man in the street. He was a being without family or friends, without future or past, without values, good or bad, except for the incidental flash of courage or self-sacrifice.”. Such a narrow view of motivation is inherently flawed. Mitchell raises the question, how much is American about the American combat experience in World War Two as compared to how much is the product of twentieth century technology and mass society or how much is human, or even animal. Motivation is a fundamental part of the combat experience, furthermore it cannot be described by one factor alone. This dissertation will attempt to show how other factors, which have been marginalized, influence men to fight and ultimately kill. Oral History and Combat Motivation. Many historians have frowned on the use of oral history. Carlyle commented, ‘battles and war tumults which for the time dim every year, and with joy or terror intoxicate very heart, pass away like tavern brawls, and…remembered by accident, not by desert.’ Time is not the only factor, the increasingly complex nature of operations in modern warfare troubled Clive. He asks how can the historian recreate the multi-dimensional modern battlefield using oral history, which is non-dynamic and one dimensional in nature? Marwick put oral history eleventh out of his list of twelve primary sources; he argued that oral history is only useful for studies concerning the poor and underprivileged. Also, if oral evidence is the main source available, Marick believes it should still be cross-referenced with any other available evidence. For the purposes of studying combat motivation, oral history is normally the only evidence at hand. Diaries were rarely kept and cameras and tape recorders were rarely close enough to see and hear the actions, words and emotions of infantrymen in combat. Discovering the secret to combat motivation surely requires an in depth examination of oral history. Dee Lee argued ‘information obtained from the individual soldier can have historical value. It is not just the actions of individuals that are important; oral history is the only major form of evidence that allows the historian to truly the understand the conscious and unconscious feelings and emotions of the veterans of World War Two. The Role and Nature of Motivation in Modern War. The relevance of morale and combat motivation has long been established as an essential element on the modern battlefield. In spite of the efforts put forward by techno-centrics, Keegan, Ellis and Griffith to name but a few, have demonstrated that motivation is still fundamental in the twentieth century, and for the purpose of this dissertation, World War Two. As Ellis illuminates, until very recently military history has been the general’s story and the role of the infantryman has been marginalized. There is some justifiable reasoning behind this, historians cannot quantify morale, and so it is rarely incorporated into explanations for victory or defeat. In many studies, states which emphasise morale, do so because they are backward and weak, because motivation must substitute for technological and material advantage. Despite contemporary technologicalists, Overy and his book Why the Allies Won, being a poignant example, the “keeganisation” of military history has taken firm root in many academic circles. Marwick argues, “in the past historians have been fascinated by the origins of wars; more recently they have begun to play due regard to the consequences of war.” He goes on to say “the conduct of war must determine the outcome and consequences”. So the dynamics of the battlefield have been put under the microscope, but one must be careful to remember the civilian nature of World War Two. The soldier cannot be sensibly divorced from society and its system, especially in the “total war” environment that has characterised the twentieth century. Why and how men cope with the stresses of modern combat cannot be simply defined in terms of technology or comradeship. Others have taken controversial steps in different directions. Linderman and Dinter suggest there are other factors that influence men to kill and sustain them through combat. Both argue that there are certain pleasures in war, Linderman using his brutalisation theory to explain this. And Dinter believing that man is an innately primitive being who has always enjoyed violence. But, and it is a big but, most academics including these authors still come back to the assumption that Americans in World War Two killed for comradeship, albeit sometimes in a different light. As Bourke says, men killed for love, especially that of their comrades but also for their love of the enemy, “men love the things they kill.”. Linderman and Bourke relegate to insignificance, the presence of a modern ‘warrior ethos’ on the battlefields of World War Two. Bourke called it the ‘warrior myth’, because abstract notions of ‘warriordom’ cannot survive the modern battlefield. In this regard her argument is unoriginal and flawed. Linderman’s brutalisation thesis, in his book “the World Within War” contrasted sharply with Bourkes’, but they held some crucial common ground. Linderman’s opinion of the warrior aspiration mirrors Bourke’s. But he also believes that society, as well as technology had largely retired warriordom. ‘The conception of combat as a test of the individual has lost most of its specificity and some of its gravity… but an aura of its influence remained and some of its precepts continued to circulate: that combat was the ultimate test of the soldiers courage and manhood…it confirmed character by strengthening the strong and diminishing further the already weak…The test had largely lost its social dimension.’ However he admits that this was not wholly the case, the trial of warriordom still remained a source of private, painful curiosity within many soldiers. Both Linderman and Bourke affirm that the warrior ethos could not survive the technologically driven battlefields of World War Two. This dissertation will try to prove how the warrior spirit adapted, and how it has been nurtured to survive firepower dominant warfare, using oral evidence for a building block to a slightly different look at American combat motivation in World War Two. However, much evidence has been harvested in the favour of the traditional arguments. Casualties. At a glance American casualties look much lighter than all the other major ground combatants. On close scrutiny, American casualties look horrific. Infantrymen constituted only fourteen percent of the total number of US servicemen stationed overseas, but infantryman suffered seventy percent of the United States’ total casualties in World War Two. When looking at the number of men committed to combat in proportion to casualties, the US ratios look much closer to the Axis forces’ losses. The ratio of combat troops to non-combat personnel was 1-14 respectively in the US army in World War Two. So on paper, when a unit took casualties, the true damage to its fighting strength was obscured. For instance, the average US infantry division had 14,253 men of all ranks but only 9,771 men were allocated to three divisional regiments, each 3,257 strong. A battalion’s theoretical strength was 871, which meant only 2613 men served in the three regimental battalions. However, a mere 192 men served in each of the three rifle companies in a US infantry battalion, so only 576 men were put into all companies. Overall, that meant that out of 14,253 men in a Division only 5184 men actually did the fighting in twenty-seven divisional rifle companies. The allies were also notoriously short of infantry divisions. The 21st Army group for example, had a total strength of 750,000 men but only nine infantry divisions assigned to it, which meant its real fighting power was concentrated in about 45,000 men. American rifle companies on the front lines regularly suffered in excess of fifty percent losses. Casualties could also mount very quickly. It was in fact safer to be a rifleman on the Western Front of 1914-18. Even though the actual number of dead and wounded on the Western Front of the Great War was higher than in the Second World War, there were far more riflemen at the front who served between 1914-18. The ratio of supporting personnel to front line troops had doubled in the US in the interwar period, thus casualties were concentrated to a very small group of men. The intensity of combat at the front had also significantly increased in 1944-5. Passchendale lasted one hundred and five days; allied forces suffered 24,000 casualties or 2121 a day. In contrast, allied killed and wounded in Normandy was 2354 a day, in eighty-eight days the allies took over 200,000 casualties; seventy percent of these borne by infantrymen. On average, infantry battalions suffered 100 casualties a month on the First World War’s Western Front. In comparison, by the Second World War, the typical Allied battalion took a minimum of 100 casualties a month and 175 were not uncommon. Even when no major operations were ongoing, casualties coming from patrols, artillery and mortar fire meant a constant flow of casualties at a rate that was unheard of in any previous conflict. For example, fighting through the streets of St. Lo in 1944 took a terrible toll on the rifle platoons of the 30th division, the typical platoon suffered ninety percent casualties. Units were smashed at all levels. On the 11th of November, G Company, 328th Regiment, 26th Division, went into the allied line east of a village called Nancy [on the Franco-German border]. In three days of advancing in a skirmish line, they covered about a kilometre; enemy fire was a constant menace throughout. By the third day G Company’s Battalion was done from 525 to 150 men. The battle for Hurtgen Forest provides many apt examples of the devastation that was routinely inflicted on American units. If the Germans were well dug in and supplied, wrestling ground from them almost always proved costly, especially in terrain like the Hurtgen. In four weeks of bitter fighting in the dense woods, the 4th, 9th and 28th infantry divisions all took in excess of eighty percent casualties. The total campaign called on nine divisions, 24,000 combat casualties were taken and 9,000 lost to trench foot, disease or combat exhaustion in ninety days, averaging a loss at company level of more than sixty five percent. The 29th Division had a saying after more than 35,000 men had gone through its ranks; we are three divisions, one in the grave, one in hospital, and one at the front. However this could be applied to more than twenty-four US divisions in Europe. Sections, platoons and companies lived, trained and bonded together for months, sometimes years, particularly in elitist outfits like the Airborne, Commando and Ranger units. When such units were put into combat, these highly cohesive groups of men were in many instances almost completely wiped out. Ninety American divisions were shipped to France between D-Day and the German Surrender, more than a third of these had taken at least seventy-five percent casualties. Even this figure is distorted because many saw very little time in action while others fought from D-Day, in almost every campaign. Most of the infantry divisions committed since the 6th of June had an almost compete turnover in their rifle companies by November 1944. This is exactly what happened to the 2nd ranger battalion. By November only a tiny core of veterans remained. For example, the Battalion’s commanding officer, Captain Sidney Salomon, had been a platoon leader on D-Day. The trend continued downwards, in November Len Lovell was a platoon leader because he received a battlefield commission for destroying the big coastal guns at Paste-Du-Hoc. Also Lieutenant James Eikner, who used a signal lamp to direct naval gunfire at Omaha beach, was now a captain and the battalion’s communications officer. American Units were kept in the line indefinitely. The 2nd Ranger Battalion’s experience is typical. After the Ranger’s initial commitment to battle on D-Day, they received a constant stream replacements. A hard core of veterans did survive, but were in many instances promoted and sometimes separated. Privates who made it through the Normandy campaign, became the NCOs of the winter battles, every rank down from the battalion level was affected. The Myth of the Primary Group in the West. As a consequence, the primary group was invariably broken up relatively quickly, either by promotion, reassignment injury or death. Also replacements were integrated as individuals in the US Army, Van Creveld argued that this individual reinforcement system, especially the replacement depots or ‘repple depples’ was the most important single factor that contributed to the weaknesses displayed by the US Army during World War Two. The close-knit section or platoon, made up of old friends is a myth, casualties were overwhelming and constant, even new friendships had the odds stacked against them. By the Battle of the Bulge eighty percent of US combat infantrymen were individual replacements. Also, in many of the theatres in World War Two more than half the replacements committed were to be made casualties in their first three days on the line. So the ‘old hands’ were often reluctant to make new friendships with newcomers, as one Marine points out: ‘My best friend was another under-aged kid. He was killed on New Georgia. After that I didn’t get very close to people. There were many replacements over time…its harder to make new friends.’ Adam DiGenard of the 3rd Marine Division also dismissed mate ship. He said, ‘We weren’t that close on the squad level. You’ve pretty much on your own. People come and go very frequently. The ones that survive have an independence, and initiative. Frank Marks of the 35th Regiment 25th Division commented. The men who survived, ‘no doubt formed new friendships and bonds of a sort. But it was rarely the same as it has been for those men in 1942 who went to war with their friends and comrades.’ The Reality of “Comradeship” Many suggest that men bonded together regardless, because of the extreme circumstances they were thrust into. This does not relate to many veterans’ experiences, especially during their first few weeks, and sometimes months. Assignment to a unit could take a matter of months. During that period men were treated like battery hens, Van Creveld’s argument had many supporters. Private Morris Dunn spent weeks in a ‘repple depple’, ‘We were just numbers we didn’t know anybody, and I’ve never felt so alone and miserable and helpless in my life.’ Another soldier remarked, “Being a replacement is just like being an orphan. You are away from anybody you know and feel totally lost and lonesome. When a replacement arrived at Le Havre, he was sent to a ‘reception depot’ (which was nothing more fancy than a mass of tents). Then he went to a ‘stockage’ depot where he was given a rifle, and some extra training if he was lucky. Finally he went to a ‘replacement depot’ where he was assigned a to unit. Eventually he was sent to a forward battalion, who passed him up to a line company command post, finally a sergeant would lead him to a foxhole. At this juncture most replacements felt totally dislocated form society. All that was familiar to him, even the mates he found at boot camp were gone. The replacements experience only got worse. Men were all to shockingly hurled into the most dangerous place of the Second World War- the front line. Private Donald Chumley was, in December 1944, a replacement in the 90th infantry Division. He remembered, ‘I was nineteen, just out of high school a farm boy with little experience of anything.’ He was led to a foxhole and told to watch for Germans. He didn’t know the sergeants name, he couldn’t see anyone to his left or right, and he didn’t even know what section, platoon, company or battalion he was in. Another replacement who arrived in K company 333rd Regiment, 84th US infantry Division on the eve of battle said, ‘not one person offered advice.’ Replacements were not warmly welcomed into a close-knit community, instead they were thrown into an unknown and often hostile unit of men. On many occasions replacements were actively intimidated. Clayton Shepard, a replacement in K Company, highlights such events. ‘They said “this man got his head blowed off, this man his arm blowed off” and all that. And I thought, Jesus Christ, what am I getting into here? …. They scared the hell out of me before I even got started.’ An ‘old hand’ summed up the feelings of many veterans, ‘when you bring in a bunch of recruits, the talk gets louder and more boisterous to make an impression.’ Replacements tended to stay together, many were killed because of this. According to many veterans nonchalance and even hostility didn’t just extend as far as ‘green’ replacements. If a man was wounded he usually became desperate to return to his unit, because if he convalesced to long he would probably be reassigned, which again meant strangers and isolation. Some units even used replacements to keep the veterans out of harms way; a soldier in Irwin Shaw’s Young Lions describes the replacements dilemma. ‘You go up as a replacement and your chances are awful. The men who are there are all friends…That means every dirty, dangerous job they hand over to the replacements. The Sergeants don’t even bother to learn your name…they just trade you in for their friends and wait for the next batch of replacements. You go into a new company…you’ll be on every patrol, you’ll be the point of every attack.’ The same can even be said in some so-called ‘elite’ units, according to a Ranger Staff Sergeant. ‘One day at Anzio we got eight new replacements into my platoon. We were supposed to make a little feeling attack the same day. Well by next day, all eight of them replacements were dead…but none of us old guys were. We weren’t going to send our own guys out on point in a dam fool situation like that.’ There didn’t even seem to be much camaraderie amongst veterans of different companies or battalions, even after successful offensives, as Russell Davis highlights. After reaching the top of the hill on Peleliu, ‘In the next foxhole was (a Marine) rifleman. He peered at me through red and painful eyes. Then we both looked away. I didn’t care about him. He didn’t care about me. I thought he was a fool and he probably thought I was the same.’ The Influence of Training and Leadership on Combat Motivation. So the question still begs, what motivated US infantrymen? General Julian Thompson believes that motivation boils down to two factors, training and leadership. However US troops in the ETO were, in a lot of units neither well trained nor well lead. Authors such as Marshall suggest that towards the end of the war, training was made more realistic through the introduction of psychologists into the military circles. Others point to the advances in practical training in light of the brutal fighting in the Pacific. More live firing being an issue highlighted and implemented. General Thompson argues that tough, realistic training gives men confidence; this rarely seems to be the case with many veterans of World War Two. Most veterans still felt themselves totally unprepared for combat. Even paratroopers, whose training regime was so tough they thought, ‘combat can’t be worse than this’ only to find out that it was. Ambrose argues, after interviewing over one thousand veterans most agreed that ‘Nothing can prepare you for combat.’ And as the war dragged on standards of training arguably got worse instead of better. For example, lieutenant George Wilson, commanding officer of a rifle company that was heavily committed to the defence of the Ardennes, received one hundred replacements on the 29th of December 1944. ‘We discovered that these men had been on the rifle range only once, they had never thrown a grenade or fired a bazooka, mortar or machine gun.’ Some replacements, who had taken basic training before 1941 hadn’t even held an M1 due to the Springfield’s lengthy service. Eisenhower’s gamble in the ETO was falling apart, cooks, drivers and mechanics were being drafted due to the desperate shortage of infantry. Still, most replacements were still coming from the United States, but training was reduced, as bodies were needed more and more urgently. So many eager young men found themselves with less training than most of their predecessors, yet for the most part, they still fought with considerable ferocity, bravery and skill. If training didn’t contribute significantly to motivation, did leadership? As Thompson, Ambrose and others have argued, leadership was very important to motivation, but not in the way the US wartime military and many military historians envisioned. Officers and NCOs within rifle companies suffered disproportionately higher casualties than did Privates. The 1st 4th 21st lost one hundred percent of their junior officers in the July hedgerow fighting. And in Italy it took just eighty-eight days of combat to cause one hundred percent casualties among a division’s second Lieutenants. Most of the junior leaders who stormed the D-Day beaches were either dead or wounded by October 1944. The privates of Normandy, Falaise, Holland and the Bulge became the NCOs and occasionally the junior officers, of the Ardennes and beyond. Battlefield promotions provided leadership, as well as a steady stream of eager youths from Officer Candidate Schools. These eager youths would commonly find that the transition from replacement to the ‘old hand’ in a platoon could take a matter of days due to casualties. Also, seeing their leaders actually fighting, not simply barking orders motivated men. Brig. Gen. Norman “Dutch” Cota 2 I.C .of the 29th Division came across a group of infantry pinned down by some Germans in a farmhouse. When asked why they hadn’t taken the house, the senior officer (a Capt.) said, “the Germans are shooting at us”. Cota promptly took a squad of his men and worked his way round the building, then charged, yelling like a wild man, kicking in the door, throwing grenades driving the Germans out the back door. Cota said afterward, “well, I won’t be around to do it for you again…. I can’t do it for everybody.’ The more combat active the better, a fellow officer described Lieutenant Ed Gesner, ‘He was all over the place…I saw him using three different weapons…He seemed to be firing a lot more than most officers…One time when he ran out of ammo at the edge of a trench he jumped in and began to club a German with his rifle butt…they [his platoon] all thought he was great.’ Leading from the front meant fighting. Good leadership gave men a personified example of ‘the warrior cult’. The Allure of the Warrior Code. The ‘warrior code’ was not incompatible with World War Two’s battlefields, as Bourke, Linderman and others argue. As Doctor G. Bychowski said, ‘Heroism simply could not survive the horror of twentieth century warfare.’ Even on the modern battlefields of World War Two the warrior code survived in many a youths’ mind. For all Lieutenant Gesner’s efforts, he probably didn’t see, let alone hit any Germans during his flurry of fire described in the last section. Modern warfare only made the warrior code obsolete in a strictly technical sense. The ‘warrior society’ of World War Two saw killing as an inevitable cycle, boys followed in their father’s footsteps and were tested before being reintegrated into mature society. Infantrymen were brutalised long before they donned the uniform. Literature, art, and film all portraying combat as a ‘right of passage’ or an ultimate test of integrity. Bill Crooks thought, ‘The rifle company was Gods own band. It was the “queen of battles”…the subject of millions of words and thousands of books and countless films… Everything else in the Army was back there supporting that rifle company man.’ Private Alex Bowlby’s infantry battalion had to clear an area with German activity in front of the tanks of the Kings Dragoon Guards. The tank crews applauded as the riflemen went forward, even though danger was close he wrote, ‘I wouldn’t have changed places with anyone.’ Belief in Film, art and literature gave a sense of purpose and righteousness. Sergeant George Lucht was leading his men across a footbridge over the Roer river ‘the Germans had to regroup and their artillery was falling on both sides of the river, and I was thinking, boy, this is just like Hollywood.’ The Second World War battlefield thus became a place that was ‘larger than life’. Eric Sevareid explains, ‘there is an atmosphere at the front…. Until one becomes drugged with exhaustion, every scene is a vivid masterpiece of painting…. Each common order goes down to the final nerve ending…every unexplored house is bursting with portent, every casual word bears vibrant meaning; those who live are incredibly alive, and others stupefying dead.’ There was also a powerful incentive to emulate the head of the family, particularly in the United States, which was not tempered by the memory of First World War losses. Hundreds of thousands volunteered in 1941 alone. War and the traditional military notions of loyalty and bravery, were very much part of the young man’s world. For many there was an unquestionable element of adventure involved. This call to arms seemed strongest in the young. Marine Chadwick relates, ‘I joined up when I was sixteen. I changed my birth certificate…. In our platoon in boot camp we had 62 men: I would bet that at least 10 of those men were under seventeen.’ Developments in warfare were hard pressed to shatter dreams, the warrior ethos continually adapted. Many young men went to war with killing and heroism at the forefront of their mind. Private Morton Eustis worried, ‘I’m so scared Germany may sue for peace before I’ve had a chance to take a crack at her…I don’t believe there’s a man in our company who wouldn’t rather be under enemy fire than in a garrison over here [in the UK].’ Those who were at the ‘sharp end’ in World War Two didn’t necessarily heed the admonitions of the war literature. One 19 year old, whose father was living with a severe wound received in 1918, contemplated the future. On 3rdSeptember 1939, ‘As I closed my eyes the picture which appeared on the screen of my eyelids was of myself leading a charge of cavalry’ Others were so bent on their notions of warriordom, they because irritated with ‘lesser’ tasks. A marine Private refused to continue labouring in the hold of a ship anchored off Guadalcanal, his Captain asked, ‘You volunteered…why did you come out here. Why did you enlist?’ He replied, ‘To fight sir. I’ve been working all the why across [the Pacific], swabbing decks, cleaning heads.’ He’d come to the South Pacific ‘to get me some Japs-not work as a stevedore.’ Men simply itched to fight, Mario Sabatelli, a Marine Raider, was on his way to the invasion of Tulagi. He remarked ‘we wanted to get our hands on the Japs.’ And another Marine bound for Guadalcanal laconically said, ‘I just want to kill a Jap, that’s all.’ Encounter with Battle. Linderman and Bourke argue that two integral parts of the warrior code were dispelled when the rifleman saw battle at the ‘sharp end’. Both authors affirm that almost all infantrymen lost their sense of invulnerability and any feeling of control over the battlefield very quickly. They both came to the conclusion that expectation rarely lived up to encounter. ‘[What] contributed most to the demoralization of the American soldier…was the chill recognition that most of those who died had committed no error, that no superior knowledge would have saved them.’ But this theory simply doesn’t marry with many veterans’ experiences. To be sure, some men did adopt fatalistic attitudes but most still refused to believe they could be wounded or killed unless they were very unlucky. Even in the face of heavy casualties young men couldn’t conceptualise their own death. ‘You hear of casualties, see casualties and read of casualties, but you believe it will never happen to you.’ Marine Private James Bruce wrote to his wife, ‘nothing could make [him] really, fundamentally believe that a bullet or chunk of bomb or shell might suddenly rip the life out of him.’ Frank Chadwick, a veteran of Guadalcanal and New Georgia said ‘we didn’t know any better… Most of us felt it will never happen to me. You knew people were being killed and wounded all the time, but deep down you thought it would happen to another guy.’ Scott Wilson affirmed, ‘At 20 you’re invincible. Its never going to be you, it’s going to be the other guy. Its not bravery, its idiotic adolescence.’ Private Geddes Mumford believed, there was still room for excitement even if he didn’t share it, he said, ‘I felt the machine gun bullets passing my shoulder. Two of my buddies were hit by the same burst. It’s a great life if you like excitement.’ Terror and death delighted and excited those who remained unscathed, and even some who weren’t so lucky: Corporal Walter Gordon was hit in the left shoulder by a sniper’s bullet, he was paralysed from the neck down. Two mates hauled him out of his foxhole towards the nearest medic, in Gordon’s words, ‘…as a gladiator was dragged from the arena.’ Even after being grievously wounded he still held onto notions of warriordom. Many young men who had nurtured ideas of warriordom simply refused to accept the reality of the battlefield. Even men who became disillusioned with modern combat still, in many cases wouldn’t let go of the warrior ethos. A Canadian remarked ‘if only I could see the [the Germans], as in battles long ago, at close range, before engaging them…. The warring sides are getting further and further apart and war is getting more and more meaningless for field warriors.’ He still considered himself a ‘field warrior.’ Even though many men didn’t get to engage a live, un-captured enemy soldier in the frontlines, enough did to maintain the generation’s belief in the virtues of warriordom. After Morton Eustis’ first engagement he was ‘impatient for more action.’ Keegan’s ‘big man’ theory can be used to support this argument. Keegan cites, that there is men whom have a natural thirst for combat, he goes on to argue that men are a key factor in the way battles work. Keegan uses two examples, Corporal Lofty King and Regimental Sergeant Major Desmond Lynch. Brigadier J. Durnford-Slater described Corporal King, ‘[he] was a hard fellow and very hard with his men; he didn’t give a damn if he knocked a man down….He genuinely enjoyed fighting and looked happiest, indeed inspired, in battle.’ Lynch is described in a similar light, he was bitterly disappointed with the official account of the battle of the Bon in Tunisia, complaining that he ‘was the star of the battle.’ Keegan suggests ‘mimicry as a crucial influence to combat motivation. ‘In any competitive or dangerous activity, those who are seen best to meet its challenge set the standard which others, not necessarily voluntarily or consciously, emulate.’ Keegan believes that such men motivate others, even though they neither lead nor command. What he neglects to mention is that many men want to be energised, not just because of competitive instincts, comradeship, training or leadership, but also because of a warrior code that has grown inside them from childhood. ‘Big men’ simply ratified the apprentice warrior’s cherished beliefs. Also ‘Big men’ don’t have to be, and in most cases probably weren’t ‘old hands’. On the contrary many were new to combat. Arguably most would-be ‘big men’ had eagerly awaited combat for along time. An officer candidate dreamt of action ‘it keeps coming back just when I’m falling off to sleep…how it will be to draw a bead on a living man and take his life away. I really can’t wait to get over.’ Another youth commented, ‘I just know I want to get in their and kill some Japs…[My] last hope before going to sleep was that our boys might have left a few Japs for me.’ There are many documented cases of men desperate to seek glory, whom would seek it at the earliest opportunity. Many of these men would get themselves and other killed or wounded in the process. However, it seems many others were much more calm and calculated when confronted with a scenario that might fit in with their dreams of combat. Lieutenant Lyle Bouck lied about his age (being a year too young) when he volunteered in 1941. Volunteers were given the choice in the service they joined, Bouck choose the infantry. On the 16th of December 1944 he was the replacement CO of an intelligence and reconnaissance platoon in the 99th Division. His platoon was dug in, North of the town of Lanzerath in the Ardennes. The two tanks that were supporting him pulled out after their position was shelled. Bouck asked his Battalion’s head quarters for artillery support because he’d sent a two-man patrol to the town, which had spotted a German column approaching. No artillery came and Bouck’s men told him it was time to retreat, after all they had done their job. Bouck said no. From Dawn to mid-afternoon Bouck’s platoon held off a German battalion with small arms (a jeep mounted .50 cal. machine gun being their heaviest weapon), and inflicted 400-500 casualties. When the ammunition ran low Bouck told Private James to take the men who wanted to go and get out, but all of them stayed, after an hour they surrendered. For a day Bouck had blocked the Lazerath road and shattered a German Airborne battalion. Thus Bouck, obviously a man desperate to see military service would have had his notions of warriordom reaffirmed. He also became a ‘big man’ overnight. Ambrose argues ‘…the I and R platoon’s experience was typical’ Linderman and Bourke argue that men who were inspired by warriordom generally felt overwhelmed and powerless on the modern battlefield. Close quarters combat in World War Two still provided feelings of self-enrichment through battle. Those imbued with the warrior code, and occasionally even men who weren’t, still felt ‘exhilaration’ when participating in close combat. Sapper R. Eke was strictly job orientated, but his section commander, who was a vet of the Spanish civil war was ‘slightly mad and brave, and a little out of place in a section that hoped to avoid being heroic at all cost. He volunteered for everything, and we never seen him show any fear.’ This enthusiasm even infected Eke, when he became involved in a firefight. ‘The experience was terrifying yet exhilarating…. Against all my instincts I had put my life at risk, and told myself never again would I be infected with this frontline madness.’ It wasn’t just the big man who ‘energised’ Sapper Eke, it was fight its self. The ETO provided plenty of opportunity for very small groups of men to perform acts of self-enrichment, skill and guile, which were all integral parts of their warrior ideal. It is striking that even in Europe, engagements like the Falaise gap and the Ardennes winter battles, vital contacts were between very small numbers of infantry fighting over a roadblock. It is important to realise that even large encounters often broke down into very poorly coordinated collection of squad actions. For example, the failure of the German winter offensive could be attributed to a handful of men. As Ambrose affirms, ‘thanks to an unknown squad of GI’s here, a platoon there, fighting, although surrounded…until their ammunition gave out.’ Most of these men were replacements, motivated by nothing more than a warrior ethos. Sergeant Carwood Lipton illuminates the point, ‘No man would choose disgrace. If the stockade was preferable the stockades would have been full, the foxholes empty, and we would have lost the war.’ Disgrace from whom? Not the close-knit primary group, that was, as already has been proved, completely shattered. Rather disgrace would come from within, as a young soldier explains; Dutch Schultz of the 82nd Airborne had dysentery, flu and trench foot, he said ‘I secretly experienced a great deal of guilt about going to hospital for anything other than a bona fide wound…. but when you are an immature kid trying to be a hero it is something of a problem, particularly when you are trying to prove your courage to no one other than yourself’ As a consequence, men imbued with the warrior spirit were arguably less liable to mental brake-down than others. However many men still became psychiatric casualties. Major J. Wishart, XXX corps psychiatrist, wrote in his 1945 notes (concerning No. 35 dressing station for battle exhaustion.). Out of about 1000 psychiatric casualties in the space of two weeks, fifty percent of the men he saw had been previously wounded, of these, ‘many seemed to have small multiple flesh wounds that hardly justified so long a period out of action, during this period they have enjoyed all the glamour attached to being wounded in the invasion.’ The other fifty percent were made up of ‘young, immature boy experiencing their first severe action…it was noticeable that many of them were of very poor combat temperament, and often rather below average in intelligence…. One said he joined the army because he was fed up with living with his mother and her nerves.’ There were undoubtedly many genuine cases of battle exhaustion, but Wishart suggests a trend in both groups. Aspirations of heroism, worries of disgrace, and curiosity about combat are apparently lacking in these men. Men needed these traits to endure to terror of combat. Many men did not feel belittled in battle. Instead many felt a keen sense of achievement in what they had become. As already mentioned, due to terrain many areas of the battlefields in the ETO and Pacific enabled small groups of lightly armed men to have significant impact, nowhere was this more so than the war against the Japanese war. G. M. Fraser prided himself on his ‘killer instinct…the murderous impulse of the hunter…the jolt of delight he felt each time he hit a bastard’, when fighting in the jungles of Burma. The South Pacific contained elements of modern industrial warfare, however its essence more closely resembled a knife fight out of the Stone Age. In no theatre of war during the twentieth century did infantry experience as much combat at point-blank range as they found in the South Pacific. "Platoons with good men in them and good leaders got results. Average patrols produced casualties but often no worthwhile results." According to many, a ‘good infantryman’ was a man who knew how to kill, as Paul Sponaugle, a section leader points out, ‘Good soldiers, the ones who made it through…were tough and used to killing.’ Many overcame anxiety with thoughts of enrichment, ‘…for all the misery and fear and hating every moment of it the war was a great, if terrifying adventure’ In contrast to many stereotypes, the best combat infantrymen of World War Two were, in many instances, the ones who displayed traits of warriordom before they entered combat. Marshall and Stouffer argued combativeness was a group rather than individual attribute and training must therefore utilise psychological principles. Stouffer interviewed 12,000 soldiers, but the best soldiers were those who before combat expressed a desire to kill. Forty eight percent of veterans who performed particularly well said before combat that they would like to kill. Forty four percent of men who performed adequately said they would like to kill and only thirty eight percent of those who didn’t fight well expressed the same desire. Furthermore forty percent of combat infantrymen were willing to perform further combat duty, highlighting a clear trend. Arguably, many veterans had longed for combat, enjoyed the experience, and were receptive to the idea of more combat. Comradeship and group cohesion played a critical role in building morale at certain junctures in the GIs wartime experience, but it wasn’t the most predominate motivator, particularly when in combat. Dinter’s argument, that primitive man reappears in the soldier: ‘He liked killing and killed as a matter of course… deep down in his subconscious, man seems to enjoy killing’ also seems erroneous, instead twentieth century culture nurtured men to enjoy modern war, they were imbued with a ‘warrior ethos’, as Ambrose believes took place in Germany. "The German soldiers of late 1944 and 1945 were mostly born between 1925 and 1928. They had been deliberately raised by Nazis, which nutured a fanatical bravery that their Fuhrer counted on." Arguably, American twentieth century culture did an equally good job raising young Americans exactly the same way. Bibliography. Paul Addison and Angus Calder (Ed.) Time to Kill (London: Random House 1997). Steven Ambrose, Citizen Soldiers (New York: Simon and Schuster 1997). Eric Bergerud, Touched With Fire, The Land War in the South Pacific (New York: Penguin Books 1996). Shelford Bidwell, Modern Warfare, (London: Allen Lane 1973). Joanna Bourke, An Intimate History of Killing, Face-to-Face Killing in Twentieth Century Warfare (London: Granta Books 1999). T. Carlyle, Critical and Miscellaneous Essays: Collected and Republished (London: 1872). John Clive, Not By Fact Alone (London 1872). Elmar Dinter, Hero or Coward, Pressures Facing the Soldier in Battle (London: Frank Cass and Co. 1985). John Ellis, The Sharp End, The Fighting Man in World War Two (London: Random House 1980). David Fraser, And We Shall Shock Them (London: Hodder and Stoughton 1983). Paul Fussell, Wartime (New York Oxford University Press 1989). John Gunn, Violence, (Newton Abbot: David and Charles 1973). Morris Janowitz and Edward Shils, ‘Cohesion and Disintegration in the Wehrmacht in World War Two.’ In Public Opinion Quarterly 12 (Summer 1948). Harold P. Leinbaugh, and John D. Campbell, The Men of Company K: The Autobiography of a World War Two Rifle Company (New York: William Morrow 1985). Gerald F. Linderman, The World Within War, America’s Combat Experience in World War Two, (Massachusetts: Harvard University Press 1997). Colonel S. L. A. Marshall, Men Against Fire. The Problem of Battle Command in Future War (New York: William Morrow 1947). A. Marwick The Nature of History (London 1989). G. Edward Miller, Dark and Bloody Ground: the Hurtgen Forest and the Roer River Dams 1944-1945 (College Station: Texas University Press 1995). Richard Overy, Why the Allies Won (London: Pimlico 1995). Irwin Shaw, The Young Lions (New York: Random House 1948). Samuel Stouffer et al., The American Soldier: Combat and its Aftermath. Volume 2 (Princeton: Princeton University Press 1949). Richard Tregaskis, Guadalcanal Diary (New York: Random House 1943). Martin Van Creveld, fighting power: German and US Army Performance 1939-45 (Westport: Conn. 1982). [ 05-03-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

Von Lucke, fanatisism counts for little without the right equipment, tactics and leadership. The thread starter, no I wasn't reviving a flame you fool, I was simply giving my, as you point out somewhat over-generalised opinion. I wasn't attempting to write an essay on Australian combat motivation or effectiveness for god sake, I was trying to give a quick summary of my thoughts regarding your question. Obviously I dont think every Aussie trooper was an outdoor, rugged, type, and no I dont think that automatically makes a good soldier. Of course anything I can say in a few paragraphs will be somewhat generalised. Also, if I don't like your question i'm surely entitled to tell you so, no? Don't you see its flawed and inviting nationalistic nonsense? You could have at least worded it more clearly. Furthermore, I spent almost a year researching, with the help of a PHD student, what made combat infantryman fight in WW2. This doesn't make me an expert, but it did give me some insight into the subject. As Mr Dorosh points out, this argument needs to be narrowed down. I would argue, to understand what makes troops perform in combat conditions, you have to look at combat motivation. So heres a rather wordy account/argument I wrote, discussing US combat motivation in WW2. It was graded a 2:1 by the KCL War Studies Dept. If you are interested in an opinion that isn't simplfied to a few paragraphs, on what made a good US combat infantryman, read on...( I want to ignore all US involvment/achievements in WW2 you say? Why in hell would I waste a year studying the US combat infantryman in WW2 you moron.) [ 05-03-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

Frankly I'm surprised BTS hasn't closed this thread. One of the first things I learned at uni was, never be afraid to question the credibility of the question. As a question "best soldiers of WW2?" is BS. Its so vague is plain stupid. Every nation has combat units/formations which could cite amazing feats of "combat effectiveness". All this nationalistic crap is mind numbingly boring. Since the thread starter has persisted with his flawed question, gleefully disregarding the arguments against it, I may as well add my 2p. IMO certain Australian and New Zealander units were the most "combat effective" Allied troops of WW2. Not because they were genetically "tough" or "superior", but for their background. These guys lived a life that was about as close to an infantryman's routine as you could find outside of military life. They were given good (for the time) combat training and their infantry weapons were solid, if not outstanding. Also, for the most part they adopted the "warrior myth/code" more wholeheartdly than other Allied combat troops (see An Intimate History of Killing, J. Bourke). Furthermore Australian and NZ units were regularly in action against large numbers (relative to their own) of the most experienced, well trained/led/equiped combat troops of WW2, the Germans. Along with the Australians the Japanese arguably had, although for differing reasons, the best "natural aptitude" for a combat infantryman. However this alone is not enough to make a soldier "combat effective" in modern times, as the Japanese painfully found out. I dont want to anger the Captain Americas here, but you are complete morons to compare operations against half-starved, poorly equiped, badly led troops, ie the Japanese, to land warfare against the Germans in WW2. Ok, so the US fought the Germans too, as so many of you kindly point out. Yawn, all Allied efforts are dwarfed in comaprison to the Soviet effort. It was the Russians who broke the back of the German war machine's biggest asset, namely the Wehrmacht. Lets be clear about this, it was NOT the GI or the intervention of the US military. I shudder to think of the numbers Russian soldiers who bravely and skillfully fought and died against the most dangerous land army of the era, despite the corrupt, calous and incompetent system that suposedly "supported" them. The number of "USMC is best/GI's kick ass, Rangers rocked here etc" posts is plain silly and offensive. However thats partly the fault of the question. Dont get me wrong, of course there were some tough US combat infantry units in WW2, but you havn't convinced me that they are any "better" than x number of other very "combat effective" units in WW2. In fact you havn't really tried, you've just asked the question, who are the "best soldiers of WW2?" and added USMC are best. I would expect a child to come up with a thread like this. Arrgggghhh the question is silly, I'm wasting my time ffs. Thankyou to those Americans who have taken the time to point out that not everyone in the US is as historically ignorant as some would have me believe after reading this thread.

The picture you describe sounds more tragic than "awesome" to me. [ 04-24-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

So let me get this straight, you placed 2 FOs on the top floor of two out of the three buildings which has good LOS in your possesion on turn 1? In a QB as well, LOL! [ 04-24-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

ROFL!! Joe your excuses are a tad weak me thinks. LOL youve never had some joker smash the buildings in your setup zone with multiple gun/tank combos, from turn 1 before? Who in hell you been playing all these months? Hoards of first time PBEMers? Bit of advice m8, dont go anywhere near buildings with anything more expensive than a piat team until youve neturalised most of the enemys heavy weapons. LOL sorry i cant stop laughin

Aye Van, I always play Brits when playing allies and those standard rifleman are markedly inferior, due to those 8 Lee Enfields. A fairer rule would be force choice limited to 1 nationality for allies IMO. The airborne/glider squads have about the same FP at close range as the motorised squads no?

Well IMO its a good idea in principle but pointless in reality. On the current ladder I've played about 10 games. Only one or two of these games was "unrestricted", the rest being short 75, Oct 44 or before(no SMG squads) and sometimes only one force type allowed. Everybody I've asked at TH with maybe 1 or 2 exceptions, have happily agreed to these rules. Most peeps on TH are more than willing to go by fionns rules in some shape or form. From my experience this "powergamer" thing has been blown out of all proportion. If someone will not agree to any restrictions dont play em, theres hundreds of peeps on the ladder no? My point is that the system you suggest is already in operation. What happens if someone only whats "heavy armour" on the new ladder? Nothing, you cant force him to play a certain type of battle. Exactly like the current setup. If you really want to formalise these rules why not simply apply them to the current ladder?

Firefly, dont you think the score system at RD is abit dodgy? Somebody who total vics 10 peeps has the same score as a dude who has 10 minor vic? In my experience a minor vic can be a VERY close game, while a total isnt even comparible. I was gonna join the RD ladder but i think i'll stick to TH. IMO the TH scoring system makes for a much harder game. Peeps generaly are less inclined to surrender as you point out Joe. Exactly the way I like it. Maybe its just a matter of taste. [ 04-21-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

Fair enough Joe, dragging out a game when you feel you have no chance of winning or drawing does seem abit silly. Saying that, I had to do exactly what you pointed out in the game i mentioned, that is "goto ground". If I hadnt I wouldve got slaughtered. What do you expect any opponent with half a brain to do when he realises you have superior forces, shout "tally ho" and continue the advance? You er obviously have to revise you tactics/objectives when you take losses. LOL it sounds like your to used to the AI and its banzi charges. [ 04-21-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

LOL Joe, ladder players drag the game out? So what, in RL would an infantry comander launch an attack into the jaws of enemy tanks and infantry if he lost his tank support? Doubtful. In a recent ladder game I lost all my armour by turn 5. I faced 2 fresh enemy tanks, 3 HTs and an unknown infantry force, with nothing but infantry, piats and light/med mortars, no guns of any sort, and on a fairly open map. I'd lost both my tanks and inflicted 0 enemy casualties. Both myself and my opponent thought i was finished, I "dragged it out" 30 turns, and eeked out a minor victory. (Good game BTW Boff) I'm gonna make it as hard as possible for my opponent to win. Obviously. If that means "dragging the game out", hell yea i'll do that. After all its possible my opponent will make mistakes. You seem to think that most games are won and lost in the first few turns, thats IMO rubbish. Theres nothing gamey about using the time youve got. LOL sounds like you just want suckers to play. [ 04-21-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ] [ 04-21-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

LOL I feel somewhat foolish jumping on this bandwangon, but i will. Email me if your still up for another beating after the top 20 at TH have made a monkey outa you.

Please forgive me. The thought of that poor, pathetic old dog in agony, busting a gut and finally pissing next to you really shouldn't have made me howl with laughter. OMG what sort of monster is CM turning me into? :eek:

OMG ROFL!!!!!! As i write this my eyes are still watering. I've NEVER laughed so hard reading a CM thread. Capt, sir I Salute you and your faithful surbordinate, Lt PIPPU. Ok, i'm distressingly near the "Lost Cause", what do I do doc?? There's specks of food on my monitor and my girl friend said she heard me muttering something about panthers in my sleep. [ 04-19-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

Agreed Tom, designers shouldnt always give a correct intel report in the briefing, however I'm not sure how much use this would be in a single battle. However in an Op....

thanx rune! keep em comin m8 . BTW You have any thoughts on Toms email and the scenario "club med"? [ 04-15-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

Cheers tom , and moriarty do you TCP m8? [ 04-15-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

Thaks for advice all, I'll checkout the dispute thingy now.. Heh Colonel, well, his guns had compete coverage of the map bar the reverse slope of the only hill with the VL on it. Lucky I had postioned all my armour, a Wolverine, Challenger and Churchill ARVE on this reverse slope. Right from the off he opened up with everything, area firing the hill in prep from his armoured assault. I did however have 3 guns of my own, postioned more thoughtfully than his, I waited acouple of turns until i had 50-70% hit chances on his guns, then opened up. 3 of his guns went up with 3 shots . He was still area firing (hoping to smash up my recon force on the VL/hill) so i basically got a free turn of counter battery fire. Luckily I had a good HQ unit with mine (+2 morale, +1 combat and stealth i think), which i reckon made the dif. I dont think he had most of those guns in command, half of them were abandoned under fire in the next 5-6 turns. I lost 2 out of the 3 guns i had, but they all fought well, typically losing 90% of their crew but still firing. The last German gun (he may have had more !)didnt have LOS to my last gun and obviously vice-versa. He got his armour up to the top of the hill before me, which caused me some worry. I only had a light recon force in place, but he didnt cover his right flank (his guns had no LOS there because of this weird hill on my extreme left/his extreme right) and his infantry werent on the seen yet. So i drove a plucky little daimler round this hill-his flank, and charged my 3 tanks up the hill to meet him head on at the top, at almost point blank. Perfect for that dam ARVE. With his armour surrounded, all of em madly traversing their turrets left n right, and his infantry still 200-300m away, they were destroyed for little loss. My tanks bought the time that was needed to reinforce the hill with trusty British infantry. So by the time he hit the crest and was about to overun my tanks positions I had more than enough manpower to throw him back down. [ 04-15-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

Ahh the highs and lows of CM ladder games. After a somewhat surprising win, I was just about to go to bed when a fellow by the name of thedubman entered THCM irc. He talked me into a game and we finally agreed on the typical 1500 ME, moderate woods, village, med hills, clear day game, him Germans me Brits. I finally agreed to an unrestricted game(he didnt fancy short 75), even though I didnt really fancy facing the German heavies at such an ungodly hour. Anyway my point is I was happy to go by his preferences. We agreed on the game being a ladder match, he seemed eager, esp when I told him I'd only played 3 games. I checked his record and he hadnt played a game yet. No problem I thought, I'd only played 3 so I it didnt really concern me. However he told me he'd played many games on TH but he'd had to register again. Again no problem there i thought. The game itself starts pretty grimly for me, I've acidentally bought a Churchill ARVE, (mistaking it for the monster with 260mm front armour) yea one those 100m Hollow charge only jobs, and there wasn't exactly alot of woodland around . No matter I thought, a challenge is always more fun. On turn 1, to add to my troubles I find my cheeky opponent has 10 big guns with exellent LOS arosss the map. We both laughed, him somewhat harder than me, "hey it works", he says but again I thought what the hell, rise to the challenge, and thedubman seemed a friendly chap. 10 turns later and after a horrendous but wild barrage, 9 German guns lay smoking along with a Tiger a German TD and an assault HT. All for the loss of 5 men and a AC. Dubmans laughing was somewhat clipped by now, but he said he wanted to soldier on, after all his infantry was for the most part unmolested. So thedub decides to go for broke, he launchs a bum rush up his side of the only major hill in a last ditch attempt to capture the single large VL, god knows how he planned to hold it for 20 rounds with nothing but infantry, but anyway, he went for it. Turn 11, thedubs nazi hordes hit my line, 60 seconds of mayhem ensues, Germans are dying by the bucket load..... - EXIT thedubman never to be seen again. I setup game again, go back to TH irq, send the dude an email ffs, and nothing, sweet FA. Ive wasted over 3 hours with this ass. I went with his wishes for game paramaters, cheerfully put up with his obvious glee at the start of game, for nothing. The annoying thing for me is now I'll be less likely to play a so called ladder match with peeps I havn't played before. Which is one of the great aspects of CM online: playing lads with new/different/unknown tactics. Furthermore, theres nothing to stop him doing this again. He can keep registering until he gets a nice win to open his TH account with. Yobobo, is there a way to avoid this in the future? If there is I'd be much more willing to cough up $15. thedubman, sort it out m8, grown up ffs. :mad: [ 04-15-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

I agree m8, intel' is critical. However, in my experience, on the defence there is no need for this recon/screening force as you suggest, unless your were defending on a heavily wooded map. As long as you have at least one unit in a 2nd floor building or on a hill, you can get the gist of any large scale enemy movement without having to sacrifice anything.

Also I'd be very careful about placing infantry ahead of your MLR as mentioned earlier. Unless youve got good LOS from heavy weapons to their area they will simply get cut off and destroyed for little enemy loss.

Some good points here. Heres my 2p the day. As the defender you will typically have less armour than your opponent. DONT force or be forced into an armoured engagment early. Let your AT guns go to work first, remember your opponent has to take those VLs. At some point hes gonna have to come down from those nice HD postions and get dirty, esp. if he thinks you've still got hidden tanks near the VLs. When on the defence, using tanks as pillboxes is ineffective IMO, keep the enemy guessing. Also, even most German heavies will get KOed frontally from a relatively cheap allied TD. Keep your armour in reserve, only commit it when your opponent makes a major thrust, endangering a part of your line. Timing, as mentioned is critical though. Most maps gives the defender the option of defending at least some VLs while being out of enemy long range LOS. DONT be baited out, dont display ANY of your assets until your fairly sure you can bag a decent number of enemy troops before the enemy can react. IMO the best way to KO enemy armour is getting it as its moving, not when its sat on that hill HD, in overwatch. Make that tank move, dont give it easy targets! [ 04-14-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ] [ 04-14-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ] [ 04-14-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ] [ 04-14-2001: Message edited by: Londoner ]

Heh Grim, christ I'm finding little features I never knew about after almost a year of owning it. When will this game stop surprising me. If its not a bug it sure is a lovely little bit of detail.