JasonC
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Posts posted by JasonC
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The VG with guns and bunker is fine. The armor and armored car support isn't. But that is a result of the "combined arms" force type, which gives the 'puter armor points and vehicle points.
A more realistic defense would be an infantry force type, which would not have those goodies (wespe and armored car), but might have an FO, or the rest of the infantry company, or minefields, or HMG&schreck teams, etc.
In general, the combined arms force type is unrealistic for the Germans under about 1500 points. Panzer forces would have the "armor" force type and infantry forces the "infantry" force type.
Combined arms produces single vehicles supporting infantry when the force size is small, and in reality they rarely had that. Once the battle is big enough, around 1500-2000, it becomes more realistic - as e.g. a StuG platoon supporting an infantry attack, or Panzergrenadiers with some armor and halftracks.
The Allies on the other hand should use combined arms often, sometimes armor, with the infantry force type rare, especially attacking. The size of the fight doesn't matter very much. Even small forces had some sort of vehicle support quite often.
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Jeff's Russian loss figures are perfectly believeable, but they do not tally with the ratio claims some have made. 28 million total casualties including wounds and non-battle are believeable. That many irrecoverable losses are not, and Jeff gives the figure of 11.3 million for that, which is about what I expected. His sources also give 3.5 million for German irrecoverables, which is 1:3 not 1:10. And I know the total battle German battle casualties, including wounded but not counting frostbite and disease, came to 6.5 million in the east, from other sources. With some non-battle included, that would probably amount to 1:3 in total casualties as well.
Moreover, his figures show half of the Russian killed and missing suffered through the 3Q of 1942 (5.5 million), thus the phase of the German offensive. German losses in that period were lighter than in the second half, of course. The feldgrau site has losses by month but overall rather than Russia (they also have Russia alone, but not by month). They give about 650K killed and missing for the Germans from Barbarossa to 3Q 1942. Other fronts were light in that period, and other non-recoverables aren't included in it. Those figures leave 5.8 million Russian IR losses for the Russian offensive part of the war, vs. 2.85 million Germans, which is 1:2 from Stalingrad on.
Overall, then, the ratios would be 1:10 in 1941 only, 1:5 in the German offensive portion of the 1942 campaign, then 1:2 average for the rest of the war. In other words, it was not their own "reckless offensives" that cost the Russians so much, it was the German offensives in the first 15 months of the campaign. Once the Russians were attacking, the loss ratio was down to the military age population ratio and the tank output ratio, and the Germans were being "bleed white" every bit as fast as the Russians were.
[ 06-14-2001: Message edited by: JasonC ]
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Maas says "the western allies weren't conducting the war in a way that produced many POWs", meaning apparently, broad front vs. pincer movements. But the Allies in the west took more prisoners than the Russians did. The Germans had 1 million missing in Russia, a portion of whom were KIA rather than POW, but 3 million missing overall, before the final collapse. In other categories, 2/3rds of the losses occurred in the east, but in prisoners it was 2/3rds the other way.
He also says there were few pockets in the west. But 250,000 men were taken in Tunisia, 100,000 at Falaise, groups of 10,000 to 25,000 at a time in the fortress ports starting with Cherbourg, between 50,000 and 100,000 in the Colmar pocket, against the Alps, and on the order of half a million in the final Ruhr pocket. We can perhaps exclude the last as simply the end of the war.
Pockets account for between 1/3 and 1/2 of the prisoners taken in the west. Broad front captures make up in time operating whatever they lack in scale on each occasion. What you see in the figures is 5 figures every month the Germans are retreating (quite low before that), jumping to low 6 figures for occasional large pockets. Of course, veterans also have said it was much easier to surrender in the west.
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PzKfw I -
LOL. Those are the silliest figures on this subject I've ever seen. What, perhaps German military KIA vs. Russian civilian and military wounded or worse?
1941 - 18.1:1
1942 - 13.7:1
1943 - 10.4:1
1944 - 5.8:1
1945 - 4.6:1
Average between 10 and 10.5, depending on whether one weights by months or years.
The Germans took ~6.5 million military casualties in the east. Did the Russian military take 65-68 million? Not!
If you look at just KIA (even though leaving out MIAs is even sillier in the east than in the west, since far more of them are really KIA), those numbers would imply 21.2 million Russian military KIA. The actual figure is at most 1/3rd of that, and heaviest in 1941.
The Germans probably didn't get a 10:1 loss ratio even in 1941, let alone average over the whole war. They took 1 million casualties by the end of the battle of Moscow (Typhoon and Russian counterattack). It was certainly the only time they even got close. 2:1 from Kursk on is a more realistic figure - in fact near parity in 44 and 45 is quite possible - with something between 3 and 5 for the period between Moscow and Kursk, at best.
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To Kip -
I have a different take on it. Your 4:1 loss numbers for Stalingrad and Kursk I simply do not believe. It may well be a "definition" difference. The attrition battles in the center, at the city of Stalingrad and in the Kursk salient, I'd believe those figures. But not the overall campaigns, including the breakthrough fighting after both German flanks get crushed in each case.
The center attrition fighting involves the Germans concentrating most of their force on a small portion of the front in slugging offensive action. Which the Russians meet with stand-and-die and copious reserves. It is entirely believeable that the Russians lost heavily - in that sort of ratio - standing in front of the meatgrinder like that. And some might call those the "battles" of Stalingrad and Kursk.
But the campaigns are not just those. Those are the Russians meeting the German strength, in the center in each case. In both cases they also throw their own armor at the German flanks, and break through, and advance hundreds of miles in a few weeks, and destroy large infantry formations "left" by the move. And I do not see any way in a warm place for the ratios you cite, to apply to those portions, and thus to the campaign as a whole.
I'll bet it is a measurement of the schwerpunk, not of the war up until that date. Your implicit assumption, that numbers "that high" mean overall losses to that point were always that high, I think completely unwarranted.
Why do I think this? Because the Russians go to a huge odds ascendency through two of those operations. They start the Stalingrad -campaign- with parity, and end it with 3:2 odds. They start the Kursk -campaign- with 3:2 to 2:1, and they end it with 3:1. The losses are as big as the replacement rates, so this is not build up despite 4:1 losses in low-level fighting.
Remember that all the people doing this stuff were trying to figure out, is whether to make a German infantry corps a 4-4-4 or a 3-3-4 for a game like AH's "Stalingrad". Nothing more involved or more exhaustive than that. Certainly not an assessment of the whole campaign.
In addition, the combat effectiveness numbers are endlessly confused with the loss ratios. No. I don't know why this is so common, I guess some people just think of "effectiveness" one way in their heads and can't be got to see that someone is talking about something different. If the Germans with 100,000 men attack 200,000 Russians and the defenders lose as many men as the attackers (with reserves included, the center-attrition battles of Stalingrad and Kursk were minus-odds German attacks that failed, or rather led to simple exchanges), then German effectiveness is going to be on the moon, without it meaning total losses were different. If the Russians with 100,000 men attack the Germans with 30,000 and the losses are the same, then German effectiveness will be marginally better.
Because effectiveness measures everything -relative- to the odds ratio, and it assumes that defenders have a large edge. Its imputed effects of odds and attacking or defending, its "combat results table" (CRT), stands between actual losses and the effectiveness numbers. Notice, when the Germans do better in effectiveness terms when attacking, this is not merely an odds effect. But it may well involve a limitation of the induced "CRT".
What they actually did was seperated attack and defense factors and left them even for the Germans, while the Russians got higher defense factors than attack factors. Anyone who has played the genre of wargames knows what I am talking about. A German corps is a 4-4-4, and Russian army gets a 3-6-4, or whatever. Which means alone either will repulse the other, while three of either attacking one of the other will give a modest 2:1 "odds" attack. The Dupuy sort of effectiveness numbers are the backstage version of that familiar wargame story, or where the numbers are being estimated.
Now, it is very important to understand that the larger you go up the scale of military organizations, the less of an edge the defender has - the less defense can balance any existing odds ratio. The reason is the attritionist's version of maneuver, or simply putting more guys opposite one part of the front. 150 vs. 100 can be made 25 vs. 25 on 3 parts of the front, and 75 vs. 25 on one.
But scale matters for the ability to do that, for two reasons. One, the range of the support weapons (and for tactical level, even direct fire, but especially artillery at longer ranges) carries over from the areas not concentrated against, into the ones concentrated against. Two, reserves kept out of the initial fighting can top off the defenders in the needed spots and not in others, resulting in a more even odds ratio along the length of the front. This is much easier to pull off at the level of battalions than at the level of armies.
And this means any odds based CRT with a built in defender's edge, is relative to the game scale. Change the scale up or down one or two organizational levels, and the CRT will be flat wrong. I think some here (though I don't see this in your statements, kip) are trying to draw conclusions from C.E. numbers that simply don't follow from them, at all.
On the subject of PWs, it is not true that they only occur in big pockets through successful operational maneuver. That is one way, sure. But they also happen a company and a battalion at a time, when a force is locally outmatched, runs out of ammo, gets cut off tactically, or succumbs to firepower tactics. The western Allies combat histories are full of these incidents. "We came upon a defended village. We set up a base of fire. 13 battalions of artillery fired a time-on-target with 105, 155, and 8" shells for 20 minutes. 250 Germans were killed or wounded, and the rest of the battalion surrendered from their cellars when the infantry advanced". That is how firepower tactics play out. Some U.S. divisions captured their own numbers in single months this way, repeatedly. Without any large operational pocket. The -locally- mismatched odds of pursuits and rear guard fighting, produce such results.
Excluding PWs will never give a clear indication of combat effectiveness, because it will show plus-odds attacks resulting in less than lopsided losses. That is, suppose a Brit column or two battalions attacks a German company rear guard with 6:1 odds. The Germans lose 25%, one platoon, as combat losses and the other 75% surrender, overrun. The Brits lose one platoon as combat losses. The odds were 6:1. The real loss rate was 4:1 in the same direction as the odds. The combat losses alone were even. If you only look at the second, you will get a ridiculously high defender's CE number - "It takes 6:1 odds to expect even exchanges against these blighters". Nooo.
You give the Germans a 1.2 to 1.5 effectiveness so the attack is resolved at 5:1 or 4:1 "odds" (for 1.2 and 1.5 respectively), then put 1-2 "exchange" results out of 6 on the CRT in those odds columns. 3-4:1 German attacks (for 1.5 and 1.2 respectively) will do the same going the other way. Which will not change the basic fact, that if 6 of anybody hit 1, they will take lower losses not higher and the defenders will get wiped out.
This stuff is, incidentally, very simplistic by modern wargame design standards. I mean, I find it amazing that there continues to be such interest in how the combat factors for AH's old boardgames were arrived at. Nobody these days thinks such one-size fits all CRTs can work and give accurate results any more, on the old pattern. Nobody thinks the nature of the fighting in North Africa is adequately simulated by giving a German panzer regiment a "7", no matter how depleted in strength, and a Brit armored brigade a "4", and the same to an Italian armored division.
Today the paradigm everywhere is the TSS one, step losses and mutual fire-based "attack" results, sharply differentiated by "shooter" and target type. Even when old style CRTs are still used, they try for the same effect with seperate columns for "attacker result" and "defender result", step reductions, etc. The old notion that everything about attack vs. defense and this odds vs. that and unit qualities and differential capabilities, could all be rolled into 1-2 numbers for every unit, or even one number for a whole -nationality- - nobody believes such things anymore.
[ 06-13-2001: Message edited by: JasonC ]
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To PzKfw I -
If you like the Chaffee you would love the Walker Bulldog. Think of it as a cross breed Chaffee by Hellcat - LOL. 76mm gun on a Chaffee basically, with 45mph top speed, longer counter-weighted turret. First came out in Korea, though.
On the Stuarts, the interesting thing about them is they are close to what the early war tankers had, on both sides. So when taking on infantry, guns, light armor, you get an excellent sense of what early war armor could do.
But by the time of CMBO, they are really obsolete for any sort of heavy combat. The gun is just not adequate to face any kind of real armor. In practice, they did a lot of scouting and they also got every other sort of duty (armored resupply runs through barrages, ambulance, messenger, FO tank, patrolling long flanks of breakthroughs, etc).
It is interesting that the U.S. didn't use the turretless TD idea to get more combat power out of this chassis, as the other powers did with their successful light tanks. A Stuart chassis should have been easy to turn into a "Marder". Of course, the M8HMC was based on the chassis, but only with a short 75mm pack howitzer.
The Germans put 75 longs and 105mm howitzers on chassis this big. Instead the U.S. used M3 Grant chassis for Priests with 105s, and M4 chassis for M10 and M36 TDs. There were a ton of these things built, and it is a shame they never got a more powerful gun.
They knew the gun wasn't really enough by 1942, when they changed from the M3 to the M5 Stuart model. It should have at least been possible to make a 57mm SPAT out of the chassis. Another possibility would have been an AA tank with duel 37 or 40mm AA, and even higher ROF. Or a quad 50 mount.
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"why no turret?"
They are cheaper, yes. But in addition, the same chassis can carry a heavier gun without a turret than with one. That is the primary motivation. The vehicle also becomes shorter, making it harder to spot or hit, but that is more of a welcome side effect, rather than the motive.
A turret takes up weight and is limited in its size by the overall dimensions of the vehicle. For the largest guns, you also have to worry about the recoil when firing sideways. Heavier guns in turrets require counterweights at the rear to allow the turret to turn smoothly about its centerpoint, as the long barrel creates a long "moment arm" for angular momentum. The bigger the gun, the bigger the difference in overall weight for a turreted vs. an unturreted version.
In WW II, the StuG III used the chassis of the Pz III. It carried at 75L48 gun, and some versions used a 105mm howitzer. The best guns that would fit in the largest turret the chassis could handle, were 50mmL60 and a short 75mmL24.
The Pz IV chassis fit a 75L48 gun in a turret. Turretless versions of the same chassis carried 75L70 (Jadgpanzer-70), 88L71 (Nashorn), and 150mm howitzer (Hummel).
The Czech chassis, in tank form, carried a 37mm gun in a turret. Turretless versions carried 75L48 (Marder and Hetzer). The Pz II carried only a 20mm gun in a turret. But the chassis could handle a 75L48 (Marder) or 105mm howitzer (Wespe) in turretless form.
The difference is obviously most dramatic with the smaller chassis. With big ones, the increase is still there, but less important - Panther going from 75L70 to 88L71 as the Jadgpanther, or King Tiger going from 88L71 to 128mm as the Jadgtiger. All of them already capable, making the increase a bit of overkill for most purposes.
During the war, the chassis are already there. They are being made in large numbers. It is not a matter of designing a new vehicle from the ground up, which would be much more expensive and above all, take much longer. When an older and lighter chassis can no longer carry a powerful enough gun to be useful against typical enemy armor, it is natural to upgrade the gun and keep using the chassis.
On the Russian side, the T-70 light tank used a 45mm gun in a turret. Turretless, it carried a 76mm gun - the SU-76. The T-34 originally carried a 76mm gun. TD versions carried 85mm and 100mm AT guns, or the 122mm howitzer. The heavier KV had the same initial gun in a turret, but could carry 152mm howitzer as a TD. The IS series started with an 85mm gun and then upgraded it to 122mm. TD versions carried 122mm or 152mm long-barrelled gun-howitzers.
The Russians were essentially copying the Germans moves - they dropped their light tanks for SU-76 right after the Germans dropped theirs for Marders. They saw the Germans using StuG to support infantry with howitzer direct fire, so they made the SU-122.
The western Allies used turreted TDs, but sacrificed weight of armor on the turret and turret tops to get weight and room. The Sherman chassis could take a 90mm gun that way. Initially in North Africa, US TDs were based on lightly armor SPAT designs, on halftracks and such. Some dismounted AT guns were tried instead, for better concealment. But the Sherman chassis based TDs proved more effective than either.
Why did the sacrifice of a turret to get a better gun, seem worth it? When the old gun became obsolete for one. When on defense and firing from ambush for another. When staying entirely within one's own infantry lines and frontally bombarding enemy strongpoints, for a third.
Turrets were considered essential for the role of true tanks, which was to attack and penetrate the enemy defensive zone, bypassing points of resistence. Bypassing means enemies left behind one's position. Maneuvering through the enemy defended zone means enemies on either side, or all sides.
Now, assault guns did not bypass resistence, they parked opposite it and shot it up until gone. TDs did not plunge into the middle of the enemy position, they fired "keyhole" when possible from range or from ambush, and on defense.
In practice, the turretless AFVs were often pressed into roles more suited to tanks, and the lack of a turret was certainly a weakness in that case. But better that weakness, than the much more debilitating one of an ineffective gun, or not having an AFV at all. And when used in their intended roles, the lack of a turret was only a minor drawback, while a more powerful gun was an enourmous benefit.
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"If the Russians were frequently able to achieve local superiority of 10:1 or greater while only having 3:2 or even 3:1 superiority over all (strategic), then this is evidence that they did indeed out-maneuver and out-plan the Germans"
Exactly. They seized the initiative when the overall forces were still about equal. They retained after Kursk, the last time the Germans tried their own concentrating offensive maneuver to get local odds, when the Russians had about 3:2 overall.
Then they maneuvered better. When the Germans attacked they met PAK front and reserves, and did not achieve local odds for long. When the Russians attacked after that, they did, though more commonly 3:1 or 5:1, not 10.
And then the effects of attrition kicked in, because of that. As the Germans lost large forces for roughly even losses on the Russian side, the odds ratio moved further in the Russians favor. So that, by the time of Bagration, they -did- get ~3:1 overall odds. And continued to exploit that advantage well via maneuver, resulting in all the 10:1 memoires (especially noticable in the infantry, which couldn't maneuver as well).
Production and mobilization only got the Russians between 3:2 and 2:1. They turned that into no-odds German attacks and plus-odds Russian attacks by outplaying the Germans operationally. They turned the resulting victories into 3:1 overall odds (and by the very end, even more) through subtraction from the German side of the ledger. In the form of dead army groups.
Production got the Russians a recovery from the disasters of 1941 and a 1 year jump, because of German failure to mobilize the economy. It wasn't anything else - the Germans produced as much by 1944 as the Russians were making, they just didn't get it so high so soon. Everything else, the army did through maneuver and attrition.
And incidentally, it starts getting pretty silly when the Russians supposedly are performing worse than the Germans because they are winning battles that they have very high odds ratios for, which odds ratios they brought about by better operational maneuver. Where does operational maneuver fit in the "better" and "worse"?
The truth is, Dupuy was after more tactical stuff because he was estimating combat factors for sims, and all the higher level stuff, including the operations the Russians did better, were above the level he was looking at. He thus was not assessing the performance of the armies, but instead the performance of the soldiers. The two differ by how they are organized and used, in the sense of how they are ordered about.
The German soldiers and low level officers performed very well against daunting conditions. The higher German officers and high command put them in those daunting conditions, not Allied production successes.
Oh sure, eventually when the west front was opened too, production alone would have been quite sufficient, and the ultimate outcome was "overdetermined". But the war was decided before then, in the east. And it was won as wars usually are won - on battlefields.
Not tactically, not technologically, not even economically, though each of those created some advantage, the last probably the largest of them. I don't know why everyone always looks for privates, engineers, or businessmen to decide wars, instead of expecting them to be decided by the decisions of generals. I guess it is a sociological reductive fad, or perhaps is about shifting responsibilities.
But obvious reality is that political high commands and decisions of the highest level generals have the largest impact on war outcomes. The Germans decided to batter Stalingrad while stripping the flanks, to batter Kursk, to hold at all costs in retreats. The Russians decided to build reserves and then isolate Stalingrad by armored maneuver, to hold large reserves and then to counterattack aiming all the way for Kiev by armored maneuver, to seize Belorussia by combined arms concentric attack.
The Russians had certainly gone to school to learn how to do such things, in 1941 and 1942. The Germans had thrown their brains out the window for prestige objectives, psycho-twaddle about the cult of the offensive, will over material, and technological fantasies. They repeatedly blundered while Russian "play" was solid, so they predictably got clobbered.
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On the whole I agree, the Russians were caught before they were fully mobilized. Which just pushes back the question, however. And leaves the same general conclusion I've maintained previously, that the political surprise was effectively total. Stalin thought they had a deal. The endless reports suggesting otherwise were mostly discounted. Personally, I think the fact that the decision was a blunder of the first order is a large part of why Stalin did not expect it.
The Russians certainly knew there was a war risk with Germany, but they thought the Germans would attack them if the Brits made a peace - and that the Brits wanted them to get in simultaneously. After the Balkans campaign, there may well have been more awareness of the risk, but that was not time to do very much. The Russians were making their agreed deliveries under the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact, by train, up until 2 hours before the invasion. Even after it started, Stalin's at first hoped some sort of concessions might buy the Germans off.
This is not a popular view of the events on either side, because it highlights #1 the Russian political leadership's incompetence, and #2 the unprovoked and premeditated nature of the attack. The first contradicted contemporary propaganda from the Russians about Stalin's pretended wisdom. The second contradicted Hitler's propaganda about a "pre-emptive strike", which was based on selling the notion that the Russians were about to attack themselves. Neither was interested in a truthful account of the affair, which makes one look evil and the other dumb.
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To Stalin's Organ - fair enough on the realistic blast of the 4.5". But in CM it gets midway between a 105mm and a 155mm. That is, 77, 125, 200 respectively, with each of those steps 1.6 times. Arguably this overrates the Allied 4.5", but it would be about correct for the 122mm. 62% more blast than a 105 is nothing to sneeze at...
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Also incidentally, the Western allies used "sledgehammer" tactics at - El Alamein, Cassino and the rest of the Gustav line, Caen, St. Lo, Metz and the Lorraine generally, Aachen and the Hurtgen, and counterattacking the Bulge. About half of them were expensive battles of attrition and comparative failures, while the other half were expensive battles of attrition and comparative successes.
Overall, the Gustav, the Normandy period, and erasing the bulge were successful large-scale applications of attrition, with losses running from 50k to 250k on each side, and each ending in the exhaustion of the defenders and large scale breakthrough. The western Allies were quite able and willing to engage in such warfare. The only ones that aren't are maneuver theorists and their historians, in restrospect.
And it is quite obvious that the western Allies could have applied such tactics on far larger scales had they needed to. Thankfully they did not, because the Russians had already done so much of it. But the population of the USA alone in 1944 was closer to that of Russia than that of Germany, and the UK controlled 25% of the earth's surface, including India. There is no way the Allies, western or eastern, were going to run out of men. They might run low on trained soldiers for particular periods, but that is merely a matter of overall planning, and diverting manpower from one role to another.
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Yes, at the CM level armor specs matter, which is as it should be. It is simply that some on this board, or a general cloud of opinion here anyway, seen in various posts, seems to think that because such things matter on the scale of CM, their importance must scale up and be very important for the overall war. And there is simply no evidence of that whatever. This is not a criticism of CM - it gets a tactical detail basically right (although there are also artificialities of CM game situations that are also involved - like fixed edges, evenly balanced battles, small units, etc). It is a criticism of drawing false higher-level inferences from such tactical facts as CM brings out in sharp relief.
As for the Russian front, the Russians outplayed the Germans operationally from the fall of 1942 onward. Anyone who can read a map and looks at the actual campaigns can see that easily. The Russians started off with lousy doctrine, crippling bad at the outset, in addition to being strategically surprised and insufficiently deployed. They paid for it by losing the strength of their entire army in the first six months.
But after that, their doctrine steadily improved and by mid 43 it was good enough. They beat the Germans in war economy and production, primarily because the Germans did not mobilize their economy fully until after Stalingrad - the single biggest blunder of the war, and an "unforced error" caused by sheer arrogance, overconfidence, "victory disease" as strategy scholars call it today.
And German operational "play" on the Russian front from the time they reached the Volga until the time they patched something together in Poland in the second half of 1944, was quite abysmal. Relieved by occasional defensive successes, and occasional Russian mistakes, certainly. But on the whole, the Russians outplayed the Germans, not just in how many tanks they had or what losses they replaced, but in where they sent their tanks and spearheads vs. where the Germans sent theirs.
As for the silly statement about "unacceptable" Russian losses, like they had a choice. Presumably, calling them "unacceptable" means they ought to have rolled over and let themselves be exterminated. Most of the Russian losses were civilian, and most of those were in occupied territory. Civilian losses in Russian controlled territory were high because of the economic strain of the war, from limited territory - in the form of famine and diseases of malnutrition in seiges, and such.
Russian military losses were enourmous and lopsided in 1941 only, and mostly in the form of prisoners. After the first six months, Russian losses were comparable to German ones, though with a higher portion of killed compared to wounded. Certainly the Russian military after 1941 did not take losses more than twice what the Germans did. They had between 3:2 and 2:1 in population compared to Germany, and did not outnumber the Axis powers at all, with the minors included. They did mobilize a higher portion of that population, of course.
But the idea that the Russians were taking 3:1, 5:1, 10:1 losses and just "accepting them" and somehow making it up on volume, is simply poppycock. The Russians had a numerical superiority of only about 3:2 when the decisive battles of the war were fought.
The late war lopsided edge in fielded forces against the Germans, before Normandy, came not from addition by production, but by subtraction through attrition and large scale military victories. The Germans lost practically all of Army Group South twice, and of Army Group Center once. It was only because of losses on that scale that the initially limited Russian odds edge grew to decisive proportions. And it so grew, because the Russians did not lose in the victories involved, at the rate of the initial odds ratio (which was about 3:2, as mentioned).
The myth is continually repeated that the dumb Russians lost 5 and 10 times what the Germans did but won because they still outnumbered them afterward. This is the most transparent bilge. All you have to do is go through the actual campaigns, instead of this catch all, overarching abstraction, and ask whether it is so.
Did the Russians lose 5 times as much as the Germans in the push from the Volga to Rostov in the winter of 42-43? Hardly. Did they lose 5 times as much as the Germans in the push from Kursk to the Dniepr? Um, no. From the Dniepr to the Polish Border? Yeah, right. From the Ukraine to Belgrade? Hardly.
When you start with a 3:2 odds ratio and drive the loss rate on both sides to the moon, the odds ratio only moves in your favor if the ratio of those losses stays under 3:2. But you can end with 5:1 odds afterwards, even with equal losses, if only the loss rate is high enough. 300 vs. 200, subtract 175 losses from both sides and you will end with 125 vs. 25, which is 5:1. This is called attrition, and is one way a modest initial odds edge can be made decisive. In chess, it is like exchanging off material to make a one-piece advantage into a winning one.
Also, if you track the actual operations, you will find the German infantry commanders facing hopeless odds, even though the Russians have only a moderate overall edge, because they get ganged up on in sequence. Break out the 200 into 8 groups of 25. Put the excess 100 on the larger side opposite only one of them, and there the odds are 5:1, while being 1:1 everywhere else. Move that 5:1 point from place to place, and one after another groups of 25 on the weaker side will face overwhelming odds. This is called maneuver, and is another intelligent use of an initial odds advantages. In chess, it is like tying up the defending pieces guarding numerous threatened points, then overloading the attackers on one of them.
It was by such means that the Russians won the war in the east. Not by magically taking 5 times the losses and ending with 5:1 odds, even though they only out-mobilized and out-produced the Germans by 3:2 or 2:1. And German "counterplay" was generally poor - open flanks at Stalingrad, beating the head against a PAK front at Kursk, holding at infinite cost in the face of Bagration. Each is an obvious and largely unforced blunder. By comparison, Russian moves were sound to excellent in most of the decisive campaigns.
Russians are not bad at chess, either.
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The moral of it all is merely that the technological dominance thesis is quite completely wrong. It simply was not true that the side with the better tanks won and the side with the worse tanks lost. Almost the direct contrary, in fact.
France and Britain had heavier tanks with better armament and armor in 1940, and lost decisively. Russia had a larger fleet and more capable tanks in 1941 and lost decisively. In 1942 the Russians on the whole had the superior type, as the Germans scrambled to upgrade to something as good as the T-34, and by the end of the year they basically had such a vehicle in the uparmored Pz IV long. They won until late in the year and then started losing. In 1943 then rolled out Panthers and Tigers in some numbers, and everything they were producing had 75 long, and they lost all of Army Group South and the decisive battles of the war. In 1944 they had better tanks in the west and lost decisively.
The decisive factor simply was not the tech specs of top end deployed AFVs. Operational usage of armor, i.e. *doctrine*, was far more important than types fielded. And numbers were more important than anything after sound vs. unsound tank doctrine and operational usage.
If one wanted to make a case for AFV technical specs mattering, the only period in which it would be even half true is from around Stalingrad until mid to late 43, with that tech edge going to the -Russians-, and including the weighting of types in the fielded force mix. That is the only period in the war when a side with arguably better tanks (among the great powers, not counted Poland and what-not) won, operationally.
This ought to be trivially obvious to those that continually argue the superiority of various German types, since after all they lost. And specifically, lost after they had those types and did not have them when they were winning. The entire idea that tank warfare was dominated by tech racing is a simplistic myth and empirically false.
It was also, incidentally, the tank design philosophy of the losing power and of its leader in particular. Everyone else focused far more on mass production of a single capable medium tank design, whatever was the best type available at the moment the decision to mobilize the economy for war was made.
I have been explaining to anyone who will listen for months now, that the German successes in use of armor in WW II had nothing to do with the CM player's crutch of invunerable front armor plates. Of course those are useful, but they were never decisive. What was decisive was how tanks meshed their fighting with other arms, and how they were ordered around on the map, and how many of them there were.
Which are things mostly masked by game scale in CM, incidentally. The tactical game scale and relatively even fights on that scale, puts a premium on things that historically were quite secondary. Because armor fights actually occurred on a larger scale and were usually much more lopsided, locally, than they are in CM. And when they weren't lopsided, they were "noisy" and "random" enough, and involved enough input from other arms or factors, that the average result was relatively even attrition trades. Which in themselves simply favor the side that can replace the losses.
A secondary point of it all, is that those who think they anything about what German tankers actually accomplished in 1940 through 1942, but actually rely themselves, in wargames, on later war superior tech (actually limited to a portion of even the late war German vehicle fleet, incidentally), don't have a clue what the historical tankers actually did accomplish, facing what hurdles and odds.
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Some German panzer divisions were wholly equipped with the Czech 37mm tanks as late as Stalingrad. One of them in particular was right in the path of the north wing of the Russian counterattack (in addition to the Hungarian one, which was similarly equipped), and evaporated in about 48 hours.
It was not a matter of some expansion and a stop gap to meet it temporarily. The Czech chassis was as much a part of the German force mix for the entire war as the Pz II chassis was - more so, in fact. The early versions were the prewar 35t, the 38ts were made until mid 42, then Marders, then Hetzers.
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The IS-2 certainly stowed rounds in the back of the turret. Not under the floor. The ISU-152 had all 20 rounds in the ready racks, but only ~12 of the -powder- charges in them, and the rest in the floor. But those are considerably lighter to fetch out (though still not fun in action, obviously).
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I'd expect the blast factors for the 122 and 152 to be comparable to those for the 4.5" gun and 150-155mm howitzers in CM, respectively. Thus, on the order of 125 and 200 blast. The Russians would also use a lot of 82mm mortar, 76mm off-map artillery, and 120mm mortars.
Or -
82mm - 19 fast response and high ammo
76mm - 35 high ammo
120mm - 80 fast response, moderate ammo
122mm - 125 moderate ammo
152mm - 200 low ammo
And of course the rockets in various calibers, too. But those would be the big ones. Notice that the 120mm mortars would fufill much of the lighter work done by 25 lbers and 105s for the western allies, while the 122mm would do some of their heavier work with bigger shells, but somewhat fewer of them.
[ 06-09-2001: Message edited by: JasonC ]
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On the aside that StuGs averaged 2 AFV kills each, I suggest you take it with a grain of salt. I do not doubt that is the number of kills claimed, but claims tend to be inflated. The cross-check is to go through an accounting of all such claims. Thus, the heavies and Panthers are routinely said to have KO'ed 5 apiece on average. Both StuGs and Pz IVs routinely get claims for 2. The often overlooked towed PAK are as numerous again as the AFVs. Then the fausts get their share, and the mines (21 million AT types laid).
If you take the claims made for the various weapon types literally, you will quickly find that the Allies supposedly lost twice as many AFVs as they produced - yet somehow managed to end the war with larger AFV fleets than they started with.
I think it is quite unlikely either the StuG or the Panzer IV got KO totals as high as 2:1 on average over the whole war. And this is not exactly surprising, when you consider that many of both the StuGs and the Pz IVs were KO'ed by anti-tank guns or by aircraft, plus some to artillery, mines, bazookas, and molotovs - not to mention simply bogging or falling into anti-tank ditches or being abandoned after a breakdown, etc. And likewise, that tanks do not only shoot at other tanks, but also anti-tank guns, infantry, etc.
But I am willing to put the point in terms of a multiple choice optional set, which any claimant can stipulate to. When he claims vanilla German AFVs KO'ed 2 tanks apiece, does he also claim that Panthers and Tigers did no better than vanilla German AFVs in this respect? Or does he claim that 50,000 heavy PAK and front-line heavy FLAK KO'ed practically nothing? Or that several millions fausts and schrecks didn't hit anything because no one was brave enough to get close with them (which on its own is only worth half of the others above)?
Take your pick. But the Lake Woebeggone solution, where all German weapons are above average, will not stand scrutiny. The Allies only -made- so many tanks, after all, and you can only claim so many kills.
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37mm Pz IIIs were certainly used in Russia. They did not all have even the short 50mm by then.
Only 53 existing 37mm tanks were upgraded to 50mm during calender 1940. Another 285 were so upgraded throughout 1941, and 85 were in 1942. The rest were probably lost by then.
They did ramp up production of the 50L42 version, which was the main production model throughout 1941. The changeover for new tanks produced occurred during 1940 - although 1941 was the peak production year for the 37mm Pz38t, the Czech chassis, and those were made well into 1942. (Then Marders took over).
So it was not until the summer of 1942 that the Germans stopped making 37mm tanks. Early '42 were the last upward conversions of Pz IIIs with 37mm.
In 1942 the main production model was the 50mmL60, the J and L makes. They started making the 75L24 version later that year - not at the end of the war as one fellow said. And some of those were produced into 1943. Essentially, the idea with the 75L24 was a role reversal with the Pz IV, which had just been upgunned from the short 75 to the longer ones, making it a superior tank dueler. The idea was the Pz IIIs could remain useful as the sort of CS tanks the short Pz IVs had been for the Pz IIIs earlier.
This wasn't the brightest idea in practice, though. The L24 wasn't great. So by later in 1943, they switched all Pz III chassis to making StuGs, which had carried the long 75mm versions since 1942. This let all the Pz III and Pz IV chassis go to make AFVs with the same, effective guns. The difference was just that the Pz IVs had turrets and the Pz IIIs, now StuGs, did not.
At the same time, production emphasis switched to the Pz IV. That had been made in numbers only ~1/3 or less the Pz III models earlier, but after the upgrade to the long 75, production of IVs jumped to about equal to total III chassis production.
Some also seem to have the impression that once a model change was made, all tanks had the newest and best type - the "averaging up" idea. Not at all. It took quite a while for the fleets in the field to transition from an older make to a newer and better one. Which mainly happened by new ones being added, and everything already there being lost to wastage and combat.
So for example, at Kursk the Germans had about as many Pz IIIs with long 50mm guns, and Pz IVs with long 75s - and those two were the bulk of the force. And they had well over 100 of both types with short 75s, and also of Pz IIIs with short 50s.
The total tank "population" in the summer of -43-, not 42, was divided about 1-2-2-1 between heavier tanks (Tiger, Elephant, Panther - combined = "1"), then Pz IVs with long 75 ("2"), then Pz III with long 50 ("2"), then mixed worse than that - IVs w/ L24, IIIs w/ 75L24, IIIs w/ 50L42, and Pz IIs (combined "1"). Roughly. It wasn't until 1944 that the IIIs (besides StuG) were basically out of the force, and the Panthers started to get numerous enough to give the force its Panther-Pz IV-TD "mix", that you see in CMBO and that it basically kept the rest of the way to the end.
In other words, it is not like they conquered western Russia in Pz III 50L60, and then fought the hordes of T-34/76s that came out in 1942 and 1943 with uniform Pz IV long and then Panthers. No siree bob.
They made the great gains of 1941 with mixed 20mm, 37mm, short 50mm, and short 75mm guns. Then they spent most of 1942 fighting T-34/76s in 50mm Pz IIIs mixed longs with shorts and winning (which is also what Rommel had by the way, while he was winning), and most of 1943 fighting the same Russian threat vehicles in larger numbers with the above mix, and losing.
Incidentally, where the got the first significant numbers of long 75s is also often misunderstood. People know the Pz IV with it came out in mid 42, but 900 of them were made or converted by the end of the year. 700 StuG were made with the long guns by then, and 1200 Marders in 5 different makes (German gun or Russian, various chassis). So only 1/3rd of the AFV long 75s fielded in 1942 were on actual tanks - most of them were on TDs. (Only 84 Tiger Is were made that year, incidentally). For comparison, the Russians made ~12000 T-34/76 in 1942.
In 1943, the German production mix continued about 50-50 tank and TD, but the big change was every weight of chassis was making effective AFVs carrying powerful guns. The Marders were still important, and StuG production match Pz IV production that year. Tiger I production ramped up and Panthers of course - about one out of four was a "heavy" in armor and gun terms that year. By 1944, that is what they were fighting with, essentially.
Force mixes in the field only match production after a lag. That is the main point.
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When designing the scenario, you get little flags with a number on them. Although it is not shown on that marker, each is also for a definite side, German or Allied. You probably have your "#2"s reversed or some such.
The best way to deal with this, I've found, is to put in the forces for one side, including the reinforcements in their seperate slots on the "units" screen, then -go to the map-, use "preview", and place the reinforcement markers for that side in the proper place. Then and only then, put in the forces for the other side. You will get new reinforcement markers for that side, and won't get them confused with the ones you have already moved to their correct, exact spot.
Often one is positioning multiple forces on a side, too. Seperate set up zones for instance, or various parts of a real force cooperating with each other. You can use the same idea, placing the units of one sub-force in a proper place on the map before the rest of the units are added on the units screen. Makes it a lot easier to sort out all the units. Then go to the next formation on that side, repeat. Afterwards you can tweak the deployments. But you won't have units jumbled up. Effectively, the units window will sort them for you.
I hope this helps.
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OK, on the report of some sort of heavy TD on the 22nd, run into by CCB 4th Armored, here is what I have been able to dig up.
The official history does talk about 4th armored running into German armor on the way to Bastogne, and in particular on the 22nd. But they were StuG IIIs from the 11th StuG brigade, and supporting infantry from the 26th Volkgrenadier division, not the 5th FJ. The number of them was estimated as 10 to 15. They KO'ed 11 Shermans and drove a company of armored infantry out of a particular village, with heavy loss.
The next day, the 4th did run into the 5th FJ, and specifically the 14th regiment of that division. But it was on a different axis, the one that succeeded. They were supported by 3 other StuG IIIs. 4th AD attack the village they were in and lost 4 Shermans to the StuGs and 1 to "bazooka" fire, but took the village and KO'ed those StuG. Soon after that, they had another tough fight with 13th regiment of the 5 FJ, and one incident against a single StuG on a ridgeline, probably a company commander left after his platoons were deployed to various villages. Unit histories of elements of the 4th AD confirm these encounters. The primary force that 4th AD fought its way through in the approach to Bastogne was the 5th FJ.
Panzer Lehr was not then in the area. It was west and northwest of Bastogne, on the other side of the pocket from the direction 4th AD attacked.
It is conceivable the StuG encountered included 10 StuG and 4 StuH. And that the heavier shell impacts from the StuH, lead the infantry to believe they were something more serious than just the regular sort of StuG. The force in the village was 1 medium tank company and 1 armored infantry company, and the tanks were practically wiped out (lost 11, as mentioned, and probably weren't at full TOE already). It is recorded in one of the unit histories (51st AIB's combat diary) that the German TDs stood off and shot a way clear for the German infantry, rather than charging into the village.
Now, there were certainly Jadgpanthers in the Ardennes. 51 of them initially, spread over 6 battalions (!). The 559th attached to Panzer Lehr had 12 of them (probably meant to be 14, a company, but some in the shop is my guess). So did the 560th, also 12, which was attached to 12SS, the Hitler Youth (HJ) division. Now, 12SS did counterattack not 4 AD, but 6 AD (also in 3rd Army), and not in December but in early January, as 6 AD was trying to drive out of the Bastogne area, to reduce the bulge. That was just east or northeast of Bastogne.
Incidentally, on the interesting question of where the rest of them were, one sees 7 of them in the 519th heavy -panzer- battalion, not panzerjaeger. I think what was happening may have been companies at a time were assigned to "schwere" armor battalions, some in the heavy anti-tank (two of them, each with 12-14), with the others probably used in place of Tiger IIs that weren't in running condition - or perhaps spread in company strength over AT battalions assigned to many panzer divisions. In any event, the Actung Panzer site says 51 used in 6 different battalions in the Ardennes, and other sources confirm 12-14 each in 559 and 560 with Panzer Lehr and 12 SS respectively.
The places they would have been seen were probably Rochefort (Lehr) and Bizory (12SS), in company strength. In other places, a platoon or two.
Another possible source of confusion, in the sense of sightings of long-barrelled TDs (some probably left on the field as wrecks) involves a number of Jdgpanzer-70s. The 3rd Panzergrenadier had ~15 of them in its divisional AT battalion, for instance. It did not come into the line until well after 3rd Army had reached Bastogne.
In the particular fight, then, I suspect the "5 Tiger TDs" were nothing but 4 StuH from the 11th StuG brigade, called "Tiger" by the US eyewitnesses to mean "heavier", just because their shell blast was noticably more deadly than that of StuGs to the armored infantry in the village they were plastering. And someone took the report literally and looked up Tiger chassis TDs, and assumed they were Elephants. (Why 5? Rounded to a platoon size and used a US size for the formation).
It is also possible that long-barreled wrecked TDs - either JdgPz-70s from 3PGR or Jadgpanthers from 12SS - were seen in the aftermath on the general battlefield area, and assumed by someone to be the unknown "heavy TDs" from 4 AD's fight on the approach to Bastogne, and misidentified as "elephants".
What I have been able to make of it, anyway.
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All sounds good, and the news feed is appreciated of course. I especially like the vunerable area/track hits and the pop-up sewers.
On the still considering bit about campaigns, I have one suggestion. It might help if you explain to those making suggestions to you, what sorts of things would be easy for you to do, as opposed to hard. Instead of them asking for a wish-list and it turning out to be too much work for you guys, give them some list of "here are the things it'd be easy to provide to campaign designers", and then let them think about what they can do with them, with external programs or procedures.
I think it may be a case of them wanting the moon, but only actually needing two scraps of string - that is the idea behind the suggestion. Like, perhaps, "write AAR to text file", which others might be interested in anyway for printed versions of their triumphs. (The added thing there might be listed of the "kills" for each unit, off the existing "enter" window, below the overall AAR screen summary).
Campaigns, I suspect, will remain a matter of work for some designer or GM. If only the easiest things are done to help them do them, though, that might be enough to see more of them.
[ 06-08-2001: Message edited by: JasonC ]
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Basically right, but there is one difference. When a mortar uses "relayed" info to fire at a target it can't see directly, it is -area fire- at the location selected.
Which means if the target moves, the point of aim will not move with it. So you want to hit -stationary- targets. You are unlikely to hit e.g. a moving halftrack with relay fire.
Otherwise, yes, the mortar can target any -location- the HQ can see, provided you have a red command line from the mortar to that HQ.
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To Freak -
I thought it was hilarious. It never occurred to me to consider it true.
Also, please do not take my word for it about what is on this guy's site. Read it yourself. My "loose translation" is what I think the moral behind each passage in the text is supposed to be, propagandistically. I don't mean I am translating it from German or anything, do not misunderstand me. I looked at each section of text and wrote under it what the cliched "moral" of that passage was obviously supposed to be, then strung those morals together without the original. And got the result above. I think it is pretty obvious, but people can decide that themselves.
[ 06-07-2001: Message edited by: JasonC ]
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"we are going to code up something that allows underclassed AT weapons, in given situations, to have a better chance of hitting a vulnerable spot such as the tracks"
That would be great. Certain westerners would like it too - LOL.
How Do You Make An Attack/Defense Scenario Fair?
in Combat Mission Archive #3 (2001)
Posted
I recommend 25 turns for medium sized battles, in the 1000-1500 point range, and 20 turns for small ones, under 1000 points. I also recommend random weather and random time of day, with the former the more important of the two.
30 turns is a very long time in smaller fights, and defenders essentially cannot delay that long against odds. They either stop the attackers by winning the firefights or they run out of men. 25 turns or less makes delay issues more important.
Also, avoid the combined arms force type on defense, as it scatters the points available too much, and can be especially tight in the "support" category, which defenders need. Infantry is better and armor works too, as it is flexible enough.
I do not find that green attackers vs. veteran defenders balances anything. The point cost difference makes the numbers gap even bigger than it already starts out. Lighter artillery support - which can still be effective on men out of cover - and less armor, are the point "economies" I find defenders can stand.