Johnny Carwash

When the Market Garden module gets released I will be releasing officially the Combat Mission Tactical Problems Blog (link).
It has been up for some time as I have been slowly adding content. Eventually I will have practice scenarios that will be targeted towards practicing and experimenting with different tactical concepts. The first scenarios are completed and tested, only waiting for the module to release and for me to finish the content necessary for their completion. These problems will be progressive, meaning that you will start with small units (squads and tank sections) and then build to full company (+) combat teams.
The tactical concepts and procedures will get more complicated as you progress. I will add to this content as I get the time and motivation.
I thought a little sneak peek, now that Market Garden preorders are active, was in order. Feel free to look around and comment, either on the blog or in this thread if you have any questions or if you see any errors or issues.
If any of this information helps your CM play, in any of the different CM games (the concepts will be similar from game to game) please drop in and let me know.
Here is the overview post from the Combat Mission Tactical Problems Blog:

One interesting point is the fact that much of WW2 doctrine was developped in WW1 and was often developped in reaction to enemy doctrine.

For example, mid WW1, the Germans developped the concept of the "elastic defence", which remained their basic doctrine until 1945. In a nutshell, it was composed of 3 basic elements:

1. the forward line was very lightly manned to reduce casualties from the prep barrage. Its main role was to warn when the main assault was coming and to slow it down;

2. The Main Line of Resistance ("MLR") was placed farther back, usually on a reverse slope so it could not be fired on directly by enemy guns; and

3. a reserve force would be positioned farther back, ready to reinforce the MLR or counterattack if the enemy force broke through.

At first, it worked very well, CW assault troops once they broke through the MLR would often advance outside of friendly artillery range, become disorganised and were often pushed back by the German counterattack, often wiping out all the original gains.

In reaction, the British developped the concept of "Bite and Hold". The idea was that by consolidating early within range of friendly artillery, CW troops would have an organised defence AND artillery support once the German counterattacked.

Fast forward 20+ years, in the western desert in 1941 and 42, British Armour was operating independently, trying to out-german the Germans, usually with disastrous results.

Once Monty took over, the first thing he did was to bring back the concept of "Bite and Hold", bringing the armour under tight control and using it just as infantry support. It worked very well at El Alamein, in a series of limited "Bite and Hold" operations over several days, the British dismantled the German defensive position piece by piece and forced to Rommel to use up his reserves until he was forced to retreat.

The Normandy campaign followed the same pattern. We have to remember that the German defensive position in the British sector was very good. Most of the terrain was wide open and dominated by high ground, so CW tanks could be fired on from far away. The Germans had also massed most of their armour and several SS Panzer divisions in that sector. Yet, in a series of "Bite and Hold" operations, some succesful ("Totalize"), some less so ("Goodwood"), CW troops again dismantled the German defensive position and wrote down German armour to the point where they could no longer prevent the breakout.

"Bite and Hold", not flashy like Blitzkrieg, but it works.

sandman - I can talk about US doctrine, sure.  I am not going to put it into its own thread here, because it isn't really about CMRT and it also isn't one of the "ideal types", like Russian attrition methods and German maneuver methods.  It is closer to the Russian way of doing things but with some specific differences, and also with the US Armor force more inclined to the German approach.
 
First some background.  The US army was relative young in WW II, as a major conventional war ground force.  The US learned most of its military doctrine from French models at the end of WWI. Many of the force structures, tasking, even specific artillery pieces and their roles, came directly from French models.  In the interwar years, the US army was very small, but retained a professional officer corps of WWI veterans and active military schools.  Those tried to learn the lessons of WWI, including places where they saw a need to depart from French methods, and to keep abreast of developments in military strategy elsewhere through academic study and liason postings of officers and mutual observers and the like.  The US was blessed with some particularly sound characters in that effort, notably George C Marshall, the chief of staff during WWII, who basically ran the US infantry school in the 1930s and oversaw its doctrinal publications.  Meanwhile men like Patton were experimenting with the new armor warfare methods during peacetime maneuvers.  There were some weaknesses in US doctrine at midwar - early for the US - but those had largely resolved by the time of the ETO campaign.
 
The next bit of background is to understand some of the strengths of the US force structure.  The US emphasized the firepower arms, which effectively substitute money spent on munitions for blood or brilliance.  Send shells; its only money.  This reflected logistics being a very long suit for the American armed forces generally, and the army specifically.  The US air force was the best in the world, and the US artillery arm was also arguably the best in the world, when the manner in which is could be coordinated was tied to its logistics and supply, etc.  So there was a definite and justified tendency to lean on fire support and let it do as much of the job as possible.  The US army also had a lot of armor by the standards of other nation's forces, with even its infantry divisions well equipped with supporting tank and tank destroyer battalions, as well as truck mobility lift.  Nearly the entire army was mechanized, by the standards of German or Russian contemporary armies.  Culturally, the US army didn't have any of the class or political hierarchies of other period armies; it was more level and the officers relied on voluntary cooperation of the men to get things done.  Initiative at the lower levels was good, discipline and subordination were not, by the standards of the martinets of other armies.  This put a premium on doing things the safe way, the way that was cheapest in blood, not cheapest in time or forces committed, ammo expended, etc.
 
With that as background, I will first describe the typical way the US infantry division force fought, and especially how it attacked.  (Mostly it was attacking, from the overall strategic situation etc).  That system can be described as persistent nibbling, endlessly repeated small probes backed by firepower.  These methods were frankly a marginal updating of late WWI practices, in which "artillery conquers, infantry occupies".  One veteran described his role as an infantry officer fighting clear across Europe as that of a glorified forward observer, whose constant mission was to get close enough to the enemy to call down accurate artillery fire on his positions, and little else.  That's an exaggeration but not a misleading one.
 
The typical tactical unit for infantry division missions was the infantry battalion, but it rarely used all of its component companies in a single attack.  Instead the normal, almost formulaic tasking was to have one company "in assault", a second "in support", and the third "in reserve".  The support company occupied the start line and held it.  It would observe the attack, fire in support of it, shelter anyone who had to retreat, and fight off any local counterattacks if those occurred, but it was not expected to leave its cover and advance, until the immediate objective of the attack was taken.  Then if would move forward to relieve the assault company.  The reserve company didn't have frontage assigned, typically, and could be half a mile behind the support.  It was deliberately left out of action to give the commander flexibility to meet any contingency, and also just as a deliberate "rest" period of less exertion for the men.  They would reorganize, take replacements, restock ammo, repair damaged equipment, etc.  Their primary mission was just to be ready to fight *tomorrow*.  Meanwhile the assault company got to deliver the attack for the whole battalion, as a modest probe.  Yes they would occasionally depart from this normal usage to put 2 or even all 3 companies "in assault" while some other formation stood as reserve, but this was the typical daily way the formation fought.
 
The assault company was thus supported by the full battalion's mortars and all available artillery fire support.  It would also get at least a portion of any supporting tanks, typically a platoon of Shermans or perhaps of SP TDs, and sometimes twice that.  The assault itself was not much more than a reconnaissance by the standards of other armies.  A few scouts leading, their squad behind them, their platoon behind that in a wedge, and the company's platoons and weapons typically only 2 up and 1 plus weapons supporting.  Thus a small number of scouts and a few skirmish lines walked toward the enemy.
 
But they had God Himself on the radio, and called his Wrath down on whatever messed with the scouts.  A US infantry division had 12 155s and 36 105s in its divisional artillery, and another 18 105s in its regimental cannon companies.  Corps level artillery groups added another 36 155s or larger per division slice.  An intantry division would typically use 2 up 1 back deployments at the battalion level and sometimes also at regiment, so that only 4-6 infantry battalions were sending forth these company sized probes at one time.  The support of a single company level probe was thus frequently 1 or 2 *battalions* of artillery fire support - plus the infantry battalions own 81mm mortars, if those had any ammo.
 
And that's with even tasking.  But they didn't use even tasking, they let every 2nd Lieutenant with a radio call for anything he could, passing fire mission requests up the divisional command nets.  This could even cause large scale problems down the road because they could fire off all the ammo that could be trucked up to the guns, if let unchecked - the artillery "pull" appetite was practically limitless.  The aggressive and capable FOs and infantry officers got more than their share of support, and sometimes the others heard that the guns were busy or ammo dry.  But the amount of firepower that *could* wind up supporting each little company probe topped out at wrath of God levels.
 
Of course, it wasn't always trivial to make use of that.  Fire at unlocated enemies or enemies deep in their cellars was wasteful and ineffective.  The infantry had to create the threat that made the enemy stand, man his forward defenses, and fight.  And the enemy could "go thin" to fight with just the infantry, not giving the guns enough to chew on, by using scattered small MG nests and snipers and the like.  Against those, the infantry and its armor support had to make their own way.
 
The fundamental approach, though, was relentless artillery pounding ahead of those endless small infantry probes.  The rotation system was designed to ensure another one could be launched on an hour's notice, and another the next day, every day, with all the men getting enough reorganization and rest to keep it up indefinitely.  They were not trying to win the war today, or even tomorrow.  They were trying to take yet another very nearby terrain objective, and get the artillery some nice shoots if anyone tried to stop them.  That artillery shooting was conceived as protecting and supporting the *movement* of the infantry, and the fact that the infantry was sending a pittance was conceived as an economy of force measure to limit losses on any given fearsome screw up.  The whole line of nibbles was also supposed to find softer spots in the enemy defense and advance more surely, if not appreciably more rapidly, in those locations.  The harder spots could stick out into the advancing line and worry the higher commanders, but would call down upon themselves more than their share of artillery pounding, in consequence.
 
That pretty much describes the US infantry force's way of war.  It has similarities to the Russian attrition method, in its emphasis on just finding the enemy and then clobbering him by fire.  It doesn't launch wave after wave regardless of losses to ensure advance, though.  It backs off from anything too hard and just lets that place hold, though plastering it, and expects somebody else to efficiently advance elsewhere.  Anything left relatively undefended, it will find and pocket pretty cheaply, and the whole thing is a broad front ratchet washing over the enemy.
 
The US armor force way of fighting was different, however.  Its standard operating formation was an armored task force, which means a battalion sized force created by cross attaching tanks with armored infantry or the other way around.  They could vary from 2 to 4 companies in maneuver force strength, but 2 tank and 1 infantry company or the reverse were the usual amounts.  They would then have additional smaller attachments, platoon sized typically, of other supporting arms - cavalry, TDs, engineers, etc.  They might also have a battery of 105mm self propelled, or just have a battery to a battalion of those on call, instead of co located with the task force.
 
A task force was conceived as a force for, and operated along, a single major road or direction.  It might split off minor pieces to recon or block flanking routes, but the main body was a one road affair, and normally stayed together for the most part.  Once it finds the enemy, it deploys to fight, off road, and leads with the appropriate arm for the terrain and enemy.  A task force expected all of its elements to fight; any reserve was strictly local and temporary.  In other word, they didn't leave out of battle a third or two thirds of the force to fight later.  (The whole armor division could and did, as a "combat command reserve",  but the committed task forces were themselves all committed to action).
 
Their methods were much closer to the German way of war, described, with special emphasis on flanking and bypassing the enemy.  Something would find him, much like the German scouting wave, and try to fix them.  Another element would then flank them, and either destroy them by doing so or secure a way around them that was safe from their fire.  The whole task force would then exploit any such wedge or entry into the enemy position, with only minimal elements left to "mask" whatever they worked around that way.  The 105s in support would plaster the bypassed, but the task force itself moved on to its next target.
 
The firepower, especially the soft or anti-infantry firepower, of a US armored task force was very high.  The tank component was usually very close to TOE, 80 to 90% of strength being typical, much higher than the running strength often found in German or Russian armor (outside of the very beginning of an offensive, in the latter case).  All the infantry was halftrack mounted with a plethora of full machineguns, both 30 and 50 caliber, mounted on those vehicles.  Every halftrack carried at least 1 and sometimes 2 bazookas.  There was little that a full armored task force could not simply outshoot, locally, outside of a company of German armor and even in that case, only the superior types would be likely to check the task force.
 
Tactically, they could lead with dismounted armored infantry squads when the terrain was close, and with Shermans when it was open.  A little economy of force for scouts, then a main body dominating enemies found by direct firepower.  They were perfectly willing to use recon by fire, as well, with the Sherman coaxials liberally spraying the countryside as the formation advanced.
 
The basic idea was to smash anything small by just hitting it with way more armor than it could handle ,and bypass larger forces after "blunting" their edges or outposts in the same fashion.  The bypassed are just shelled and follow on forces from the same armor division encircle them, or leave them to infantry division forces to mop up later.  In the meantime, "bypass and haul ass".  
 
Up at the full division level, the armored division is attacking with 2 combat commands of 3-4 task forces each, and reinforcing success, shifting away from failure.  It finds or creates routes into the enemy defense, then through it to his rear area, with bypassed "cells" of holdouts just left in the division's wake.  The objectives are terrain ones - gain ground, get through the enemy, keep moving - not focused on the destruction of enemy forces.  That will come, if the division as a whole gets around or through them.
 
If the division hits serious enemy armor, but only then, it has to get more circumspect about its attacks.  Then it cares about maintaining a line and a reserve, and attrites the enemy by putting armor on armor, with TDs and firepower arms helping.  It still tries to envelop that enemy.  The effectiveness of all the division's armor increases significantly if they get on 2-3 sides of the enemy.  They also try to win the soft firepower, HE war, to strip the enemy of his infantry support.  That is a matter of divisional and higher level artillery, tank and assault gun fire, and air support; L-5 spotting aircraft also direct artillery fire and add to an intel differential.  The assumption is that winning the soft firepower war will deprive the enemy armor of its "eyes", and that then maneuver to its flanks and cutting its road routes will render it immobile and impotent.
 
I hope that helps understand US tactical methods, and how they differed between its infantry division and armor division components.

Kevinkin - fair question, but not quite right about how it worked in WWI. Yes you knew where the enemy trenches were. But that wasn't the same as knowing where his infantry was. There were way more than enough trenches, three layers deep, with dugouts, communications trenches to let reserves move about without exposing themselves above ground, and similar. But also, the defensive schemes had just had forever to set up, and create the coordination and integration that makes movement vital. The first of the haikus begins with, if we can win the war from shooting from right here, we probably should. If you went over the top vs a manned WWI defense you gave the enemy that. They didn't need to move to adapt to get good coordination of their various weapons, they set them up coordinated, three months ago. (Exaggerated for clarity).

But this is still a simplification of WWI. Early manned front line trenchlines were countered by heavy artillery, and that counter was entireky successful. The Germans fielded parks of 300 210mm howitzers for Verdun, for example, and artillery firepower that heavy could and did just execute any French infantry formation that tried to man front line trenches against them.

There is a counter to this method, though, one everyone backed into but that the Germans perfected by 1917. The denuded front or strongpoint based defense was precisely a counter to heavy artillery prep fires. It worked by using depth, driving the defender density low - just a few fortified machinegunners and registered artillery, plus of course wire obstacles, for the forward parts of the defense. Then the bulk of the defenders, who lived 40 feet below ground in artillery proof dugouts when not needed - manned parts of the rearward trenches when a major attack was on. The surrounding areas were covered by fire, and then local counterattacks insude the trench system fought any intruders that made it that far. With grenades, bombing up the communication trenches, and similar tactics, not going over the top, themselves. This defense in depth scheme precisely left the defenders unlocated somewhere in the full depth of the trench system, at the time any artillery prep had to be fired. Infantry artillery communication was bad enough that reactive fire could not be placed on these infantry reserves after they were encountered. The brawl between reserves and best penetrating attackers was a frankly attrition, even exchange thing. But the attackers had to pay a toll to get there through the defender MGs and barrages into no mans land, the defenders had better local intel from their stance and outposts, and their reserves and ammo and such got to reach those fights through their communication trenches, instead of above ground ir across the moonscape between the lines.

The defenders thus had a better time to front than the attackers, and safer approach and withdrawal than the attackers had. After the shift from the manned front trench to the defense in depth scheme, mind.

Hutier or infiltration tactics were developed after that dialectic had already taken the steps above. If the enemy manned his front trenches, they were not needed - just wheel up the 210s and murder the poor sods. The idea of the infiltration attack system was first off to forgo a big opening barrage that announced a major attack - prep fire, if used at all, was kept to 30 minutes or less, and usually more like 15 - but its intended target was a defense system sheltering from long term artillery threat by usng dugouts and reserve positions.

Then the idea is first, pick low visibility conditions like night or fog, and - in WWI you could do this - reduce visibility still further by firing gas, so that everyone had to fight in their masks. Push forward patrols by stealth, economy of force fashion, to find undefended routes. Diversions by firing and a local barrage laid here or there could try to focus the defenders on sectors besides the ones these pathfinder teams were infiltrating. Then the storming parties follow the pathfinders in narrow columns, to trace their steps, maintain control and direction, and present as narriw an "edge" as possible to gaps in the enemy defense. If any of the path finders were checked, the parties behind them followed others instead. Then they take out enemy outposts to widen gaps, and race as deep as they can afterward, before the alarm spreads and the enemy can react. The result was again a brawl with the enemy reserves inside his trench system, but that brawl could be started under more favorable conditions of local surprise, enemy confusion, and limited visibility, and all without paying much or any toll to defending MGs and barrages in no mans land before that brawl.

This worked well tactically. It produced break ins and break throughs. Those just didn't prive strategically decisive, because on a larger operational scale, the defender still had a better time to front than the attacker. Defending divisions *railed* to the break in sector. Attacking artillery had to be manhandled across the blasted moonscape to have combined arms again for the follow up, once the attackers gained 15 miles or so. Shells for that artillery had to be moved by horses, which don't like barrage zones very much. Or wait for the construction of narrow gauge rail extensions to haul meaningful numbers of shells. If the artillery was not brought up, the defenders coukd revert to the manned front line trench - even a hasty one - 15 miles behind the previous front line. The attacker options were then to attack with poor combined arms, inefficiently in exchange loss terms, to try to maintain op tempo - or to wait for the guns to catch up, but give the defender time to rail in more infantry, dig deeper and second line trenches, bring in their own artillery and shells, launch local counterattacks, etc. As a result, the attacjers would have to pause, then do it all again.

Those deeper relationships are the reason infiltration tactics, while they worked as intended and were tactically very successful, could not be translated into strategic results, under WWI conditions. They just took their place as tactical means in a still fundamentally attrition struggle, with defender dominance, with heavy shells and infantry bodies being exchanged off until one side or the other couldn't take it anymore.

In WWII, there are better comms to put down reactive fire on located enemies, armor to carry concetrated power through hus defended zone, trucks to move guns and shells, across more intact terrain and shallower defensive works because no one had years to dig deeper in the same spot, etc. And the sane tactics coukd therefore achieve at least operational results. At the highest level, it was *still* a war of attrition. Depth and reserves and mobility used reactively by such reserves could tame break through, and leave an attrition brawl again. But it was all a lot closer, more promising for the attacker, than the conditions seen in WWI after gaining the first 10 or 15 miles.

In the thread on Russian doctrine in CM, we went through how the Russian attack, especially their Rifle formation branch.  That method applies the principles of attrition warfare, depth, firepower, relentlessness, last man standing stuff.  German doctrine on infantry attacks was entirely different.  SlowLarry asked about it in the previous thread, and rather than bury an answer there, I am moving that part of the discussion to its own thread, here.
 
Elements of German attack doctrine apply to panzer forces as well, but the focus here will be on infantry division attacks.  Which may include StuG support or similar, generally divisional artillery FOs, battalion and company mortars - and squad infantry up at the pointy end.  Obviously there are some requirements of overall odds, suitable terrain, fire support, and enemy strength that are needed for infantry formations to attack successfully.  But the German doctrine uses everything differently, because the focus of their attack doctrine is positioning and articulation of forces - maneuver warfare stuff  - not primarily force ratios and losses and attrition thinking.
 
In the German doctrine, the chief element of the offense is surprise.  The idea is always to hit where and when one isn't expected, to catch the enemy napping, unprepared, with the wrong dispositions to deal with your chosen point and method of attack.  To achieve that, the focus is on information on the one hand, and adaptation on the other.  Adaptation includes mobility, heightening your own safe, feasible shifts of forces and weights, and restricting those of the defender.  Those can then all be used to arrange many on few fights at chosen points, which once won, further disarticulate the enemy force.  His elements are supposed to become less able to help each other, to find their proper combined arms targets, or to have the conditions of terrain and range and such they need to fight effectively. Some local advantages may be "cashed in" for dead enemy to move the overall forces in your favor, but most will be focused instead on continually reducing the enemy's options and moves.
 
In the ideal case, this ends with a surrounded and trapped enemy unable to move an inch without taking murderous fire.  Fire lanes into open ground wrapped around an enemy position are like ropes binding his legs.  Once all sides are covered around a given enemy this way, his "movement allowance" has been reduced to zero.  His ability to pick what firefights he will engage in has therefore disappeared.  You can decide whether to engage him, and he can't make an equivalent decision.  By fire and movement principles, that is as good as a kill.  An artillery barrage can then be laid on that immobilized enemy to destroy him at leisure.
 
In short, the idea is to surprise the defender, hogtie him, and fight the remainder of the battle with him in that condition.  Needless to say, this places considerable greater demands on the attacking commander than the comparative straightforward methods described in the Russian doctrine thread, and it can readily be screwed up, and will fail if it is screwed up.  The German approach in the matter was to take risks and generate chances for lopsided wins, and expect enough of those to pay off, to defeat the overall enemy more efficiently than the attrition method. The Germans don't ever want to fight fair - meaning no even engagements of like arm vs like arm without a big edge in their favor from one factor or another.  If there isn't yet such an edge, maneuver for one before engaging too closely.
 
That difference in approach is easily stated, but what does it mean in practice for infantry attack methods?  Three ways, really, each with some variations and subject to mixing with the others, at different distance, time, and force scales.  The three ways are (1) broad front, recon pull, aiming at envelopment (envelopment for short), (2) the coup de main, which is effectively trench raid tactics on a grander scale, and (3) infiltration tactics proper, which stresses getting well into the enemy defended zone, by slow and stealthy processes, before the main engagement occurs.
 
Broad front recon pull means that a skirmish line of infantry sweeps forward like a single wave, and finds *all* the enemy positions.  Not just one or two of them to chew on, but locating the entire enemy front line.  Weak outposts are driven in by this wave to find the real enemy positions, the ones with enough strength to stop a single thin infantry wave.  Besides finding the enemy, this leading wave is expected to pin him in place, to "find and fix".  That works by not pressing hard anywhere, sitting down in the cover nearest the enemy but not physically held by him.  Then reaching out by fire - from the LMGs the squad infantry brings forward, first of all - to cut up the enemy side of the field with fire lanes, around each body of cover on his side of the field.  The goal is to freeze in place as much of the enemy force as possible, by making lateral movement far too risky, several hundreds yards deep into his own positions.
 
Then a reserve and assault group, which has been kept back out of that leading wave, picks targets found and isolated by it.  The goal is to find gaps in the defenses already, and to widen promising fissures by destroying specific bits of the defense, to get deeper into it.  The reserve maneuvers in the German "backfield", sheltered by the leading wave and the knowledge it has provided as to which locations are clear of the enemy, which routes already traversed drew no enemy fire, and the like. It sets up opposite its chosen targets.  It brings with it heavier weapons - StuGs, FOs, 81mm mortars - and infantry weight in numbers.  These supplement the fire of the elements of the scouting wave nearest the chosen target, and "escalate" the pressure on those chosen enemies.  Meanwhile the rest of the battlefield is being ignored.  The scouting wave is just waiting in the ground they took and preventing easy lateral movement by the enemy, to help the position chosen for the point of attack.
 
The overloaded point is thus destroyed.  Now a new wave spreads from that point, into the deeper parts of the enemy defense.  The scouts nearest follow in the wake of the now leading reserve, and form a new reserve behind the entry point.  The new spreading wave finds the new enemy positions, and the process is repeated.  The goal is to roll up the enemy defenses or break through them, always fighting only the new few that matter for the moves the attack is making next.  But the attacker lets enemy weakness dictate where those points of attack should be.  Always, hitting where they ain't, and trying to get into them before help can come from either side, or from the enemy rear and reserves.  
 
Speed matters in this, because the enemy learns where the main point of attack is, as it gets going, and he will try to adapt.  The attack wants to adapt too, faster, with better information.  The scouting wave is also a counter-recon screen blinding the enemy as to one's own deployments.  If a reserve is arriving at A, the point of main effort wants to already be over at B by the time they get to the front.  Think of a running back making the defensive linebackers miss - it requires anticipation of enemy moves, faster reaction to new information.  It helps if ranged weapons can also disrupt enemy movements - StuGs get missions like interdicting all movement across a certain road, pairs of HMGs put down fire lanes with a similar intent, an FO may plaster the only cover point that allows movement from the east side of the map to the west side.  In other words, the role of fire is as much or more to restrict enemy movements as it is to hurt him directly.  
 
Every area of open ground on the enemy side of the field is analyzed for its usefulness on cutting up enemy moves, and locations that can see each are determined, heavy weapons teams maneuvered to such positions long before the attacker knows he will need them.  Enemy moves are systematically taken off the board by firepower threats into such open ground areas.
 
Frequently the scouting wave may start with a bias or direction, too.  E.g. as a wing attack on the left 2/3rds of the field, with the intent of turning the enemy's left flank.  Such routes or plans are made with an eye to being the least expected and likely to be the least defended against, *not* on the principle of the most promising terrain or routes for the attacker.  Otherwise put, since the first principle of the attack is surprise, "most promising" normally equals "least expected" - even if it means crossing dangerous ground - as long as that can be done quickly.
 
The infiltration method can be thought of as a more extreme version of this on a wider scale and with less of an emphasis on fixing the enemy, and more on using stealth to find his gaps.  Night actions, fighting in fog, use of smoke sometimes, are used along with this approach.  The idea is to sneak into the enemy position.  As much as possible, as deep as possible into his whole defense scheme, before first trigger pull.  And after first trigger pull, the triggers are used as a distraction - look, look, over here, there are some Germans over here - while the haymaker is winding up from the other hand.  The same principle of removing enemy moves by a tactically defensive stance and fire lanes to cut up enemy positions, executed by advanced wedges, is used here too, just like the scouting wave did in the previous method, once it went to ground.  
 
There is a critical mental shift involved in this understanding of the value of positions pushed forward.  They do not need to assault straight onto enemy positions. They do not need the weight to do so.  They don't need the weight to shoot down enemies in good cover, nor do they need to press home to root him out of his holes.  All they need to do is prevent him from leaving his present positions, without being cut up by ranged fire into the open ground bits he has to cross, to leave that cover and get to some other body of it.  Anything isolated in this sense, by having all its useful safe moves taken away, is "hogtied".  No reason to run up against them or fight that at all.  They are already in a prison cell, and artillery can execute them later if need be.
 
There is also a new principle in true infiltration methods - to just bypass, wherever possible, rather than fight.  Any position that can be ignored should be ignored.  If there is a route that blocks LOS to that position, maybe someone watches it or at least prevents easy moves out of it, but for the rest, they might as well be on the far side of the moon.  Consider anything that can't see you already defeated by poor positioning.  Bypass and press deeper, all the way to the back of the defense.  German infiltration attackers do not expect to keep the enemy in front of them.  They expect to have enemies on all sides of them.  Then blind them and pin them in place, and move between them.  You can see how limited visibility conditions are critical to the full application of this method.
 
I passed over the coup de main.  It is about surprise in the purest sense.  Here, instead of waiting for recon pull to tell you everything about the defense, you need to guess it.  Rapid, more limited scouting may be used, and there are certainly leading half squads going first - the usual drill.  But you just guess where the enemy is and isn't going to be; you pick a key point you think you can get to that will put some portion of those enemies at a disadvantage, and then you drive like hell for that key point.  Faster than the enemy can react.  Others are trying to pin him where he is - heavy weapons from back at the start line, e.g., or a 105mm artillery barrage that discourages anyone from getting up and walking around from over on the right side of the field.  But the basic idea is just "get there first with the most", where you picked the "there".  Win at that point by weight of numbers and the right combined arms brought to that fight for the enemy faced, and do so before the enemy can adapt his positions to that new info about what you are doing.
 
The follow up can be another such adaptation, or just to exploit what was taken in more of the "fixed them, then pick the next spot to overload" method described in the first approach.
 
Coup de main differs from the broad front recon in that it is less driven by what the scouts first discover, more by your command push decision.  But you are trying to base that on a guess as to where the enemy will be weak and won't be expecting you.  If your guess is wrong, you back off and try something else, don't turn it in to an attrition attack on enemy strength.
 
The coup de main effort can be materially aided by having armor behind it, or as a second best, good approach terrain over a wide area (e.g. large continuous woods or city).  It expects to win at the chosen point by getting a many on few fight there and winning that fight before the enemy can even the local odds.  For that to work, it can't be the case that all the enemy weapons bear on the chosen point.  You need to pick both the concentration objective and a route, such that only a modest portion of the enemy force has any chance to contest your approach, at first.  Then you just want to go down that route so fast that "at first" equals "until the fight for that objective is over", because they only differ by 2 minutes (5 max, 2-3 a lot better).
 
Now, in all of this, you still have to pay attention to combined arms, meaning having 81mm mortars around and HQs to spot for them if there is going to be an enemy gun or HMG position, and a StuG or a panzerschreck up close if there is going to be an enemy tank, and 105mm or 150mm artillery fire if there is going to be a big block of woods full of Russian tommy gunners.  Or you can put HMGs on fire lanes on 3 sides of those woods and just go around them, never into or by them.  Remember, if they can't see your main force, and they can't safely move to change that, they are already dead (hogtied, same thing).  They just don't know it yet.
 
I hope that helps explain the very different way German infantry attacks.