How did DIVISIONS deploy to fight?

[Cogust]

Hi there Rob, glad to see you in this thread.

[Tero]

Something that is not evident so far is the effects of the German doctine vs the organizational changes.

IIUIC the organizational change pretty much coincided with the cathegorical order to hold ground at all costs. IMO this lead (naturally) to the formation of static strongpoints beacuse of the sheer lenght of the frontline to cover. And in turn this lead to the formation of the mobile firebrigades when the front line started leaking seriously. It seems the Red Army took this into account when they were designing their attacks. They would crush a strongpoint (in Yassy-Girgisiev for example) and then they deployed to take out the mobile firebrigade thus ripping the entire frontline to pieces forcing the less mobile German infantry formations to start manouvering and be cut down on the move as it were.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by jrcar:

An additional benefit of this is that it is cheaper to train say an artillerymen than an infantryman (especially in a country that had, by the standards of the time, well educated citizens), and you can use people that would not make good infantry (ie hearing defects…), thereby optimizing your human resources.

Rob, this is the first time I hear that it is cheaper to train artillery than infantry. Do you have any figures on that? I have always assumed the opposite is true, so would welcome a correction. Having said that, since there was much less capacity for training artillery men than infantry men, it is not just a pure cost issue, but also one of supply constraint. Something to think about anyway.

Regarding your point on 2-regiment or 3-regiment organisation for a six battalion division, I would tend to agree that the light, and Jaeger divisions were not exactly marvels of divisional organisation, so it is a case of choosing between a rock and a hard place.

Just to repeat this - I fundamentally disagree with the notion that a six-battalion division in the sort of combat expected from 1942 onwards (which is not quite correct anyway, the realisation that their offensive days were over did not dawn on the Germans until much later) would perform reasonably well compared to a 9-battalion formation, and that firepower can make up for the three missing battalions. Keith is fully correct on this in his first post, and no post-rationalisation of this re-structuring that I have seen in this thread is convincing me otherwise.

What those who think that a six-battalion division could function decently in defense tend to forget is that German doctrine mandated counter-attacks to re-take lost positions. Obviously, you will have trouble doing that when you lack 1/3rd of the infantry. The other problem is that because of the lack of depth, any crisis moves up one level. What in a 9-battalion division is a regimental crisis, that a regiment can cope with on its own, is a divisional crisis in a 6-battalion division.

Regarding the question whether Germany had the industrial capacity to fit all these divisions - I would disagree with someone saying that it did. The equipment of a lot of divisions with captured equipment should be a clear indication that this was not the case. Even if it had though, in terms of opportunity cost this industrial capacity may well have been employed better doing something else. Just another point here, I have numbers from at least two Panzerartillerie Regiments (13.PD and 4.PD, I think) saying that the regiments were not up to strength in 1942 - they only had three-gun batteries in the light batteries, and no or an even more reduced complement in the heavy batteries. If in 1942 even the elite formations could not be fully re-equipped for their losses, what hope for the infantry? So it stands to reason that in effect divisions were created that were short on manpower both 'Ist' and 'Soll', while short on fire-power 'Ist'.

Cogust,

I don't rate von Mellenthin particularly highly as a source. He is just another participant of Marshall's fantasy project explaining to posterity why the Germans actually won the war against the Soviet Union. I just remembered another shortage of ammunition case, in Normandy, of all places. Counterattack by 10. SS PD on Hill 112 (Odon battles). At one point two pages of the KTB were online somewhere, I have since forgotten where. The division had a total of 700 artillery rounds to support its attack. For comparison, that would be the daily rate of two guns in a 25-pdr regiment in their UK opponents during battles of this intensity. So unless you can convince me with actual production numbers, I am sticking to my guns (groan), that the Germans had ammunition shortages far earlier than 1945. BTW - small arms ammo and artillery ammo are rather different things, so availability of one would not indicate to me that the other is available as well.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Tero:

IIUIC the organizational change pretty much coincided with the cathegorical order to hold ground at all costs. IMO this lead (naturally) to the formation of static strongpoints beacuse of the sheer lenght of the frontline to cover. And in turn this lead to the formation of the mobile firebrigades when the front line started leaking seriously. It seems the Red Army took this into account when they were designing their attacks. They would crush a strongpoint (in Yassy-Girgisiev for example) and then they deployed to take out the mobile firebrigade thus ripping the entire frontline to pieces forcing the less mobile German infantry formations to start manouvering and be cut down on the move as it were.

That is an interesting point tero, and I had not really thought of it that way. I understand from discussing this with Grisha that a sort of continued preparation for defense was built into Soviet attack plans, which would probably be based on this contingency.

[Keke]

Originally posted by Andreas:

Regarding your point on 2-regiment or 3-regiment organisation for a six battalion division, I would tend to agree that the light, and Jaeger divisions were not exactly marvels of divisional organisation, so it is a case of choosing between a rock and a hard place.

Just to repeat this - I fundamentally disagree with the notion that a six-battalion division in the sort of combat expected from 1942 onwards (which is not quite correct anyway, the realisation that their offensive days were over did not dawn on the Germans until much later) would perform reasonably well compared to a 9-battalion formation, and that firepower can make up for the three missing battalions. Keith is fully correct on this in his first post, and no post-rationalisation of this re-structuring that I have seen in this thread is convincing me otherwise.

What those who think that a six-battalion division could function decently in defense tend to forget is that German doctrine mandated counter-attacks to re-take lost positions. Obviously, you will have trouble doing that when you lack 1/3rd of the infantry. The other problem is that because of the lack of depth, any crisis moves up one level. What in a 9-battalion division is a regimental crisis, that a regiment can cope with on its own, is a divisional crisis in a 6-battalion division.

Oh boy, you just don't get it. You just keep on comparing the 6 Bn Division and 9 Bn Division like their mission was exactly the same, and of course forget the Kampfgruppen. Now could you tell me why Finns found out that a 4 Bn brigade was more combat efficient formation than 9 Bn Division? From your standpoint it would be impossible; how could a 4 Bn brigade do a job of 9 Bn division?

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Keke:

Oh boy, you just don't get it.

Keke, you can have a reasonable discussion with me, or you can go and screw yourself. Your choice, I wait for your reply to my comment on the post below. But anymore or 'you don't get it, and you can continue your Wehrmachtworshipping admiration fest alone.

Originally posted by Keke:

You just keep on comparing the 6 Bn Division and 9 Bn Division like their mission was exactly the same, and of course forget the Kampfgruppen. Now could you tell me why Finns found out that a 4 Bn brigade was more combat efficient formation than 9 Bn Division? From your standpoint it would be impossible; how could a 4 Bn brigade do a job of 9 Bn division?

From my standpoint, Kampfgruppen were not an invention to deal with the sudden absence of 3 battalions. They existed well before that. That Kampfgruppen may have been used to cope with the effect is therefore neither here nor there, since they were not invented to cope with the sudden tactical problem. No matter how much you would like to think that only the Ubergerman Supergenerals could come up with this idea of forming KGs (what in your opinion are Soviet late-war forward detachments, if not a KG?).

Now, let's do some math, it is quite simple. If you have three regiments, you can form three KGs, plus maybe another one from the support elms. So that much stayed the same. But do you honestly want to tell me that a KG based on a 3-battalion regiment is the same as one based on a 2-battalion regiment in terms of its combat value? Regarding the different roles - I look forward to you providing me with an analysis of frontages in later war, showing that the 6-battalion division only covered 2/3rds of the frontage of the 9 battalion division. Happy digging, or should I say 'inventing', of the data.

Edit: when I understand more about the Finnish area of operations (your attitude pretty much ensures that I have no desire to educate myself about it though), I may come back to you on the question of the brigade against the division. My first question would be though - what are the respective frontages and missions. In the rather specific circumstances of fighting in Finland, this may well have been a better organisation. I wonder if the Finns would have done as well with it in Ukraine though.

[ July 29, 2003, 09:53 AM: Message edited by: Andreas ]

[Michael Dorosh]

Even the Canadians and British used task Forces in a manner similar to kampfgruppen; they are simply a mean of grouping disparate forces from different units under a unified command for a specific purpose. The Germans excelled at them, and often combined the remnants of shattered units into Kampfgruppen. But it doesn't mean

a) they were the only ones to use the concept. The Americans also had Task Forces

or

they were used specifically to compensate for changed in TO&E of larger formations

I don't believe there is much evidence for the latter; perhaps a quote or a specific instance of a KG being specifically used because of shortcomings of a higher formation TO&E would be in order to better present Keke's point. Personally, it seems on the face of it to be a great leap of logic to no good end.

[Andreas]

Indeed, Michael is spot-on here. What the Germans were mostly credited with is not the formation of Kampfgruppen itself - anyone with a piece of paper, a pen, and an infantry division can do that - but with the ability to weld together highly effective Kampfgruppen from different formations, extremely quickly, and deploy these as fire brigades. Which is exactly not an Ubermechanism to compensate for structural weaknesses within the same formation.

But maybe I am wrong, and Keke will show us the proof that Kampfgruppen were invented to deal with the structural reform by allowing quick internal reorganisation. I won't hold my breath though.

[Keke]

Originally posted by Andreas:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Keke:

Oh boy, you just don't get it.

Keke, you can have a reasonable discussion with me, or you can go and screw yourself. Your choice, I wait for your reply to my comment on the post below. But anymore or 'you don't get it, and you can continue your Wehrmachtworshipping admiration fest alone. </font>

[Keke]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

Even the Canadians and British used task Forces in a manner similar to kampfgruppen; they are simply a mean of grouping disparate forces from different units under a unified command for a specific purpose. The Germans excelled at them, and often combined the remnants of shattered units into Kampfgruppen. But it doesn't mean

a) they were the only ones to use the concept. The Americans also had Task Forces

or

they were used specifically to compensate for changed in TO&E of larger formations

I don't believe there is much evidence for the latter; perhaps a quote or a specific instance of a KG being specifically used because of shortcomings of a higher formation TO&E would be in order to better present Keke's point. Personally, it seems on the face of it to be a great leap of logic to no good end.

Michael, see my reply to Andreas. He just likes to twist the words of those who don't agree with him right away.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Keke:

Could it be shocking to you that Finnish brigades had smaller frontages than Finnish divisions?

Well, the 6-battalion divisions did not have smaller frontages than the 9-battalion divisions, so care to tell me what, if any, relevance your comparison has?

The point therefore stands - since the mission of the formation did not change, and no specific coping mechanism was invented, the move was a really bad idea. I don't really get what there is to argue about.

Your personal insults do not detract from the fact that you have a really poor grasp on the issue at hand, and a clearly very limited understanding of the whole matter. So far you have dragged out:

</font>

• Kampfgruppen</font>
• Finnish Brigades and</font>
• not much else</font>

to show that the Germans somehow magically found coping with the structural change easier than one would suspect from outside appearances. You have just admitted yourself that the first two points do not really amount to much, since you now admit they are not relevant, so that leaves you with the latter.

Others have used rational argument, and have not resorted to personal insults in the discussion. You obviously need to grow up.

Regards 'twisting' your words - no need to. Here is what you wrote again, to remind you:

Originally posted by Keke: That is not quite true, since Germans formed regimental Kampfgruppen which were very flexible. Two battalion regiments meant nothing else but one battalion less in the regiment.

My point of contention with this statement is that it means a lot more than just 'one battalion less in the regiment'. So far, you have singularly failed to address this point of mine. I take your continued resorting to personal insults to be an admission by you that you have run out of arguments, if indeed you ever had one to start with.

[ July 29, 2003, 10:39 AM: Message edited by: Andreas ]

[Cogust]

Originally posted by Andreas:

Just to repeat this - I fundamentally disagree with the notion that a six-battalion division in the sort of combat expected from 1942 onwards (which is not quite correct anyway, the realisation that their offensive days were over did not dawn on the Germans until much later) would perform reasonably well compared to a 9-battalion formation, and that firepower can make up for the three missing battalions. Keith is fully correct on this in his first post, and no post-rationalisation of this re-structuring that I have seen in this thread is convincing me otherwise.

IIRC the Germans began to change their infantry division pattern to the three regiment, 6 battalion pattern in -43 and the change continued well into -44 and one can argue that the changes weren't finished when the war ended. I think that it was a sensible decision to reform their regiment into two battalions instead of three while keeping all the heavy weapons as that would create two useful units instead of three weakened units. It would also make it easier to keep their divisions closer to TO&E strength while still retaining almost all of the firepower of the larger division.

What those who think that a six-battalion division could function decently in defense tend to forget is that German doctrine mandated counter-attacks to re-take lost positions. Obviously, you will have trouble doing that when you lack 1/3rd of the infantry. The other problem is that because of the lack of depth, any crisis moves up one level. What in a 9-battalion division is a regimental crisis, that a regiment can cope with on its own, is a divisional crisis in a 6-battalion division.

Not according to my beliefs and some simple math using the assupmtion that a higher percentage of heavy weapons would make it possible to hold more frontage per rifleman. That would, if anything, make it possible to hold more forces in reserve for counterattacks if you have lots of HMGs, mortars and other support weapons. Not more forces per division, but more forces per any give frontage. Reducing the frontage would be another way to get the same thing, or even improve it if you do both, but the Germans seldom shortened their lines in time to benefit from it.

Just another point here, I have numbers from at least two Panzerartillerie Regiments (13.PD and 4.PD, I think) saying that the regiments were not up to strength in 1942 - they only had three-gun batteries in the light batteries, and no or an even more reduced complement in the heavy batteries. If in 1942 even the elite formations could not be fully re-equipped for their losses, what hope for the infantry?

What had those divisions been doing recently? Had they been enduring heavy fighting or had they just been given replacements? It stands to reason that a division that hadn't had the time to be replenished properly would be depleted and would you want those depleted artillery units to support 6 infantry battalions (before the reduction) or just 4 (after the reduction)? I choose that latter.

I just remembered another shortage of ammunition case, in Normandy, of all places. Counterattack by 10. SS PD on Hill 112 (Odon battles). At one point two pages of the KTB were online somewhere, I have since forgotten where. The division had a total of 700 artillery rounds to support its attack. For comparison, that would be the daily rate of two guns in a 25-pdr regiment in their UK opponents during battles of this intensity. So unless you can convince me with actual production numbers, I am sticking to my guns (groan), that the Germans had ammunition shortages far earlier than 1945. BTW - small arms ammo and artillery ammo are rather different things, so availability of one would not indicate to me that the other is available as well.

Of course the Germans had less shells per gun that the western allies, that's a given. That forced the German artillery to choose their targets more careful and not 'waste' as much artillery on secondary targets as the allies could afford. The thing was to have a good gun to infatry battalion ratio so thatthose in need of support could get the support it needed. Having fewer but larger divisions would make it harder to support the infantry battalions properly during an attack and you would probably end up with the exact same amount of rounds in your depot anyway. Having more guns doesn't mean that you'll fire more rounds, it only means that you will be able to hit harder when it matters and respond quicker to a local crisis as there would be more guns per front kilometer.

Local shortages will happen in any army from time to time, the German army in WWII was no exception and was often prone to hamstring itself overall I find that they managed to keep a steady flow of ammunition to the divisions so that they could avoid frequent shortages.

[Cogust]

Originally posted by Andreas:

Well, the 6-battalion divisions did not have smaller frontages than the 9-battalion divisions, so care to tell me what, if any, relevance your comparison has?

A six battalion infantry division in 1944 had probably the same frontage as a nine battalion division in 1941-2, but that's no what's important. What's important is what frontage a nine battalion division would have in 1944 if there were no six battalion divisions around. I'd say that their frontage would be roughly 33% larger than otherwise (simple math as if you have fwere but stronger divisions holding your line you must have more frontage per division).

My point is that the smaller division, with the same amount of support weaponsas a larger division, would be able to hold more frontage per Landser than the larger division. This will make it possible to create a larger mobile reserve to use for attacks and counterattacks, imagine the Army Group Center having even smaller reserves on the eastern front in June 1944 than they actually did, what could have stopped the Russian tide then when the most successful approach in stopping Russian assaults was to converge sizeable reserves on the Russian breakthrough?

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Andreas:

Just another point here, I have numbers from at least two Panzerartillerie Regiments (13.PD and 4.PD, I think) saying that the regiments were not up to strength in 1942 - they only had three-gun batteries in the light batteries, and no or an even more reduced complement in the heavy batteries. If in 1942 even the elite formations could not be fully re-equipped for their losses, what hope for the infantry?

Were these batteries towed or SP? If the latter, there might have been a bottleneck in the production of the necessary chassis that would not apply to towed guns.

Michael

[reinald@berlin.com]

Now could you tell me why Finns found out that a 4 Bn brigade was more combat efficient formation than 9 Bn Division? From your standpoint it would be impossible; how could a 4 Bn brigade do a job of 9 Bn division?

Just to add my 2 cents to this interesting discussion. My teachers at NCO-school thought (and I myself agree) that the best setup for any combat unit is a 4-fold one. Mostly (today and historical) only a platoon leader has the luxury of having 4 complete combat detachments (his 4 rifle squads) available.

As early as company level things get tricky. e.g. 3 rifle platoons + 1 heavy support platoon for an Austrian infantry coy.

Why would commanders prefer to have 4 'line' combat units? Well, 3 abreast and 1 in reserve to deal with contingencies is a good setup. 2 abreast can't form a fully combat worthy center plus 2 fully combat worthy flanks plus a fully combat worthy reserve.

And don't tell me the heavy platoon can fill the reserve role.

[Keke]

Originally posted by Andreas:

Well, the 6-battalion divisions did not have smaller frontages than the 9-battalion divisions, so care to tell me what, if any, relevance your comparison has?

The point therefore stands - since the mission of the formation did not change, and no specific coping mechanism was invented, the move was a really bad idea. I don't really get what there is to argue about.

So you finally "got it". I have been arguing all along, at least I tried to, that if this imaginary mission of this imaginary division is *the same* with less Bns, it is naturally in weakened position, *but* 6 Bn division structure in an army does not *automatically* mean a weaker army, given that missions of division are adjusted according to their strength. Note that I tend to agree with Cogust though that the firepower of 6 Bn divisions were almost equal to 9 Bn divisions, thanks to more heavy weapons, so it can be argued that the former had almost the same capacity for *defensive* missions, but that is (well everything is) debatable.

Originally posted by Andreas:

Your personal insults do not detract from the fact that you have a really poor grasp on the issue at hand, and a clearly very limited understanding of the whole matter. So far you have dragged out:

</font>

• Kampfgruppen</font>
• Finnish Brigades and</font>
• not much else</font>

to show that the Germans somehow magically found coping with the structural change easier than one would suspect from outside appearances. You have just admitted yourself that the first two points do not really amount to much, since you now admit they are not relevant, so that leaves you with the latter.

Others have used rational argument, and have not resorted to personal insults in the discussion. You obviously need to grow up.

May I point out that you resorted to childish language first (Wermachtworshipping etc.), and I get the feeling that you are just trying to prove more casual readers that I have not done nothing else but personal attacks and used empty arguments. Pathetic.

Originally posted by Andreas:

Regards 'twisting' your words - no need to. Here is what you wrote again, to remind you:

Oh how appropriate for you to "forget" my earlier response to you: See my above replies.

[jrcar]

Originally posted by Andreas:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by jrcar:

An additional benefit of this is that it is cheaper to train say an artillerymen than an infantryman (especially in a country that had, by the standards of the time, well educated citizens), and you can use people that would not make good infantry (ie hearing defects…), thereby optimizing your human resources.

Rob, this is the first time I hear that it is cheaper to train artillery than infantry. Do you have any figures on that? I have always assumed the opposite is true, so would welcome a correction. Having said that, since there was much less capacity for training artillery men than infantry men, it is not just a pure cost issue, but also one of supply constraint. Something to think about anyway.

Well artillery training is at two different scale, there are the people who do the calculations, and then those who meerly load ammo, un pack crates and generally lift heavy objects. Artillery need a core of intelligent smart people with training, then lots of "gun bunnies" who dopn't need much training.

Infantry training has lots of things to learn, section on the attack, section on the defence, platoon on attack, platoon on defence, plus a wider range of weapions all which take time to learn. The main cost is in time. But then as today dumb infantry men are dead infantry men very quickly, so while they don't have to be too bright you don't want the worst itelligence and fitness wise.

Just to repeat this - I fundamentally disagree with the notion that a six-battalion division in the sort of combat expected from 1942 onwards (which is not quite correct anyway, the realisation that their offensive days were over did not dawn on the Germans until much later) would perform reasonably well compared to a 9-battalion formation, and that firepower can make up for the three missing battalions. Keith is fully correct on this in his first post, and no post-rationalisation of this re-structuring that I have seen in this thread is convincing me otherwise.

Fair enough, and to a point I agree with you, but if you have the choice of fewer divisions or larger divisions (with the only difference being infantry), then history has shown (WW1 and WW2 in particular) that it doesn't make that much of a difference, as long as you have enough to slow the enemy to bring firepower onto them. Artillery, not rifle fire is the real killer, but you need to fix them first to bring the arty down.

What those who think that a six-battalion division could function decently in defense tend to forget is that German doctrine mandated counter-attacks to re-take lost positions. Obviously, you will have trouble doing that when you lack 1/3rd of the infantry. The other problem is that because of the lack of depth, any crisis moves up one level. What in a 9-battalion division is a regimental crisis, that a regiment can cope with on its own, is a divisional crisis in a 6-battalion division.

Don't disagree, and that maybe reason? for seeing counter attack forces moved out of div control, into CA forces in the korps

Regarding the question whether Germany had the industrial capacity to fit all these divisions - I would disagree with someone saying that it did. The equipment of a lot of divisions with captured equipment should be a clear indication that this was not the case. Even if it had though, in terms of opportunity cost this industrial capacity may well have been employed better doing something else. Just another point here, I have numbers from at least two Panzerartillerie Regiments (13.PD and 4.PD, I think) saying that the regiments were not up to strength in 1942 - they only had three-gun batteries in the light batteries, and no or an even more reduced complement in the heavy batteries. If in 1942 even the elite formations could not be fully re-equipped for their losses, what hope for the infantry? So it stands to reason that in effect divisions were created that were short on manpower both 'Ist' and 'Soll', while short on fire-power 'Ist'.

Generally the Germans had enough equipment to re-equip (self evident really, they continue to raise/refit new division less the infantry manpower), although local losses (especially after hard fighting) were going to occur until the div could be refitted. I thought it was German policy to burn a div down, then pull it out to rebuild, rather than feed lots of reinforcements in?

[/QB]</font>

[Tero]

Originally posted by Andreas:

That is an interesting point tero, and I had not really thought of it that way. I understand from discussing this with Grisha that a sort of continued preparation for defense was built into Soviet attack plans, which would probably be based on this contingency.

Indeed. It is common knowledge in Finland any and all counter attacks against the Red Army HAD TO come before they had time to dig in. Otherwise the task became very, VERY much more difficult.

Also, Finnish analysis right after the war (even during it I suspect) identified two types of breakthrough attacks: decoy breakthroughs which was inteded to draw in, disperse and expend enemy reserves in the area and the real thing.

In both types the artillery support was designed to have preplanned fire zones at the shoulders of the breakthrough. This because they projected counter attacks were directed from the flanks at the base of the breakthrough.

Incidentaly, to expand light on Kekes views on the organizational issues:

There was an organizational change in the Finnish army in 1942 to free up 250 000 men to work in the home front. The difference between the new German and new the Finnish TOE seems to have been the fact the new model Finnish infantry division comprised of two regiments of three battalions plus an extra (jaeger) battalion (and an engineer battalion plus assorted support asssets). In addition to that separate brigades were formed.

As to the firepower differences between the German and the Finnish divisions: the Finnish army did not have MG-42 so they had compensate by having more organic FP at platoon level (SMG's, LMG's automatic rifles) to beef up the FP as the Maxims, which were organizationally in a separate HMG company.

[ July 30, 2003, 03:54 AM: Message edited by: Tero ]

[Keke]

Originally posted by Tero:

Incidentaly, to expand light on Kekes views on the organizational issues:

There was an organizational change in the Finnish army in 1942 to free up 250 000 men to work in the home front. The difference between the new German and new the Finnish TOE seems to have been the fact the new model Finnish infantry division comprised of two regiments of three battalions plus an extra (jaeger) battalion (and an engineer battalion plus assorted support asssets). In addition to that separate brigades were formed.

The arrangement of 2 three Bn regiments plus an extra Bn (not jaeger Bn, but Erillinen Pataljoona = Separate Bn) was not satisfactory solution (according to Finnish commanders), and the army had started major reorganization, were divisions would have been eventually replaced by 4 Bn Brigades (like the army today). Soviet 1944 summer offensive interrupted these changes (which would have taken several years anyway), and most infantry units were still in their divisional organization by the time of attack.

Btw, when it comes to "rather specific circumstances of fighting in Finland", I here this every time when it's pointed out that Soviet operations had more difficulties there than against Germans. I just wonder how "normal" the conditions then were in the Petsamo-Kirkenes operation...

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Michael Emrys:

Were these batteries towed or SP? If the latter, there might have been a bottleneck in the production of the necessary chassis that would not apply to towed guns.

Michael

Towed guns, and at the time at least 13.PD had been in a static defense role for a number of months along the Mius, followed by a period of one month or so for rebuilding prior to launching the attack into the Caucasus.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Cogust:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Andreas:

Well, the 6-battalion divisions did not have smaller frontages than the 9-battalion divisions, so care to tell me what, if any, relevance your comparison has?

A six battalion infantry division in 1944 had probably the same frontage as a nine battalion division in 1941-2, but that's no what's important. What's important is what frontage a nine battalion division would have in 1944 if there were no six battalion divisions around. I'd say that their frontage would be roughly 33% larger than otherwise (simple math as if you have fwere but stronger divisions holding your line you must have more frontage per division).

My point is that the smaller division, with the same amount of support weaponsas a larger division, would be able to hold more frontage per Landser than the larger division. This will make it possible to create a larger mobile reserve to use for attacks and counterattacks, imagine the Army Group Center having even smaller reserves on the eastern front in June 1944 than they actually did, what could have stopped the Russian tide then when the most successful approach in stopping Russian assaults was to converge sizeable reserves on the Russian breakthrough? </font>

[Andreas]

Originally posted by jrcar:

Well artillery training is at two different scale, there are the people who do the calculations, and then those who meerly load ammo, un pack crates and generally lift heavy objects. Artillery need a core of intelligent smart people with training, then lots of "gun bunnies" who dopn't need much training.

Infantry training has lots of things to learn, section on the attack, section on the defence, platoon on attack, platoon on defence, plus a wider range of weapions all which take time to learn. The main cost is in time. But then as today dumb infantry men are dead infantry men very quickly, so while they don't have to be too bright you don't want the worst itelligence and fitness wise.

Indeed, Dobler outlines that quite clearly in 'Closing with the enemy', IIRC. But isn't artillery training (and maybe some real-life gunner can come in on this) a bit more tricky than you describe? I would have thought that crew members of a gun crew are trained in each others jobs, on top of their own, to be able to keep the gun functioning when casualties rise. ISTR that I was trained for two jobs on the 20mm AA gun in the Bundeswehr, not just one. My infantry training by comparison was nothing to write home about, but it was not intended to get the full ATN for infantry, just the one for Sicherung.

Originally posted by jrcar:

Fair enough, and to a point I agree with you, but if you have the choice of fewer divisions or larger divisions (with the only difference being infantry), then history has shown (WW1 and WW2 in particular) that it doesn't make that much of a difference, as long as you have enough to slow the enemy to bring firepower onto them. Artillery, not rifle fire is the real killer, but you need to fix them first to bring the arty down.

See the point I made in the point above to Cogust. Sticking with stronger divisions, but fewer of them, may have had a healthy effect of bringing reality into planning in OKW. Who knows...

Originally posted by jrcar:

Don't disagree, and that maybe reason? for seeing counter attack forces moved out of div control, into CA forces in the korps

But that is a massive change in the role of the division as a formation, is it not? By definition, in the Wehrmacht a division was the smallest formation capable of individual, sustained action. In the definition of what a division is in the history of 13.PD, it says 'Sie [the division] ist in der Lage, selbstaendig zu wirken.' But if you move the counter-attack forces one level up, you basically move towards something more like what I understand the Red Army approach to be - the Corps (until 1943 the Army) is the smallest formation capable of independent action. If this is indeed the case, this would indicate a quite significant structural change that may or may not have been conscious.

Originally posted by jrcar:

Generally the Germans had enough equipment to re-equip (self evident really, they continue to raise/refit new division less the infantry manpower), although local losses (especially after hard fighting) were going to occur until the div could be refitted. I thought it was German policy to burn a div down, then pull it out to rebuild, rather than feed lots of reinforcements in?

I think only Panzerdivisions and the like were afforded this luxury. The ordinary infantry divisions tended to stay in the line, unless if they were actually disbanded following major desasters, e.g. 298.ID (IIRC, could be 295.ID) after Uranus. They may have been moved into a reserve role at some point, but even that was unlikely, I think. Of course, since most publications tend to deal with the 'sexy' formations, this is not a well-researched subject.

Regarding equipment - as I said above, the heavy reliance on captured equipment in equipping new formations would indicate to me that the Germans were struggling on an industrial level to cope with the number of formations they created. This is also indicated if you look at the tank production, where new brigades were created, while panzer divisions in the field were going with single Abteilungen.

Originally posted by jrcar:

Anyway this has generally been a good discussion

Thanks - it has certainly made me think through the matter a lot more.

[Cogust]

Originally posted by Andreas:

I think that it would not have made a difference, because the problem was a frontage problem, where numbers of divisions did not matter either way. Frontages were such that in a number of divisions guns had to be split along the front of the division, because there was no single area from which they could support the whole defense. As for reserves, AG Centre was unable to cope with its own means as the situation was. The only reserves that managed to at least slow down the Soviet advance came from AG North Ukraine (in particular 5.PD) and AG North (12.PD).

Absolutely, the Germans were suffering from a frontage problem on the Eastern front right from the start and it became worse the longer the war continued and the more the CinC insisted on holding every single piece of ground. My opinion is that it would be easier to cover this frontage with a higher percentage of heavy weapons than it would be with larger divisions that has the same amount of heavy weapons. Having fewer but larger divisons and therebye reducing the ability to cover the front might force the Armies to shorten their frontages due to the inability to hold them, but it might just as likely turn into another disaster if the CinC specifically forbids yet another retreat.

On the wider point, I think it is clear that either a 6 or a 9 battalion division structure would not have been able to cope with the length of front to defend in the east. IMO a lower number of divisions may have made it easier to adjust front lengths to available forces though, by driving the point home that there were not enough forces around. That remains speculation though.

True, the germans were in a piss poor situation anyhow and by autumn -43 it was no question anymore how it all would end, it was just a matter of time and no reorganization of their forces could do anything about it. A lower amount of divisions on Hitler's map might have made him a little less overconfident, but I wouldn't bet my salary on that.

My point is, and has always been, that the 6 battalion division was a desperate measure to free up as much forces (mostly the mobile divisions) from line holding duty and use these formations in a counterattacking role. This could be done as the new divisions could hold more front per Landser than the older divisions without losing defensive strength, they were worse on the offense though and weaker on a division by division basis but it's a trade-off that made sense as there would be more mobile divisions available for the offensive role this way.

My suggestion would be to reduce the frontage as much as possible, reduce the divisons to the 6 battalion pattern and keep all divisions relatively close to TO&E strenght (75% and above). This would reduce the amount of hastily raised divisions somewhat and allow the divisions to function reasonably well which would reduce the amount of situation that they're unalbe to solve themselves. The deletion of the third battalion in the regiments was the best option available and calling it a stupid decision is IMO a bit unfair as they were in a hopeless situation anyway you put it.

But it has been a very interesting discussion anyway and I begin to think that a consensus is not that far away.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Cogust:

My suggestion would be to reduce the frontage as much as possible, reduce the divisons to the 6 battalion pattern and keep all divisions relatively close to TO&E strenght (75% and above). This would reduce the amount of hastily raised divisions somewhat and allow the divisions to function reasonably well which would reduce the amount of situation that they're unalbe to solve themselves. The deletion of the third battalion in the regiments was the best option available and calling it a stupid decision is IMO a bit unfair as they were in a hopeless situation anyway you put it.

But it has been a very interesting discussion anyway and I begin to think that a consensus is not that far away.

Well, shall we just say then that the decision, while in itself rational, carried unforeseen (?) consequences, such as reducing the ability of the affected divisions for self-sustained action, that made it, well, problematic. Mainly because no other changes seem to have been undertaken, and the reduced divisions were still expected to do the same job as the stronger divisions before, something they were not well suited for.

BTW - I completely forgot about the change in the number of sections (not platoons I think). This would make for an even worse effect, since the reduction is not just 1/3, but 1/3 of the total + ~1/4 of the remaining, in terms of riflemen. That must have hurt somewhat.

[Cogust]

I think that we can say that the changes in the TO&E was rational and would probably have worked wonders, if the divisions were kept at or near authorized strength. The changes to division structure in addition to the habit of fielding divisions at 50% strength or lower is what broke down, especially on the Eastern front.

During the fighting in Normandy the German infantry divisions made a credible effort, despite being second line units with second rate equipment and manpower of somewhat questionable quality. Here they started at full strength and were able to remain stronger than the average infantry division on the East front, at least until the breakout where the Germans suffered massive losses.