US Armor Doctrine Comments

[Aacooper]

I'm in the middle of "Hell On Wheels", the history of the US 2d Armored Div. There's a long section in the beginning on the development of US armor doctrine. Although armor was the neglected stepchild of the Army in the 20's and 30's, there were enough interested officers to develop the doctrine that was used in WW2. Interestingly, the idea to coordinate armor with air came in 1936, though it wasn't fully realized until 1944 when P-47 pilots were assigned to armored units as forward air controllers. Teamwork, combined arms, and speed were stressed early. The US armor advocates believed im 1937 that US armor theory was ahead of the Europeans, but the equipment was behind.

The German invasion of Poland vindicated many US armor theorists. One theorist, Major General Charles Scott visited the British Eighth Army, and found the British armor would stop and try to outgun German longer-range AT guns, had no concept of air-ground coordination, and didn't train armor, anti-tank, artillery, and infantry together. All those concepts were against US doctrine.

Though this is all coming from one source, it's interesting, and does anyone have more light they could shed on the development of US armored doctrine?

[Berkut]

I would recommend Camp Colt to Desert Storm by George Hofmann & Donn Starry. University Press of Kentucky

It goes into it from ww1 to modern day and is quite informative. Hope this helps a little.

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BERKUT

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>As always feel free to query, deride, or just nod knowingly<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

[LimShady]

Closing with the Enemy by Michael Doubler has a great chapter on the development of Air-Ground coordination as well.

LimShady