How did DIVISIONS deploy to fight?

[Wunsche]

I know I am going to be trampled underfoot here, but I will give it a try. Both Andreas and JasonC have time and time again in the past shown a great, in-depth knowledge about the goings-on in World War II. Furthermore, this thread has proven to be very thought-provoking for those of us not as well versed like myself.

The only request, besides continuing the debate, I have is that both Andreas and JasonC keep this fight clean and stick to teaching me stuff and leave out the name calling. Thanks again for taking the time to share your knowledge, guys.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by JasonC:

OK, Andreas, you ask for it, you get the reprise of the thread to date. I didn't post in this thread until well over half way into it. Before I said a word, this is what you said about German defensive ability in the second half of the war -

"the decision to remove the three battalions from the division was almost certainly the wrong way to go about things, because it saddled the Wehrmacht infantry with a force structure that no longer allowed it to contribute in any significant form to combat operations"

My position on the 6 battalion division has indeed shifted - as you could have noted. I am no longer as convinced as I was when the discussion started that it was a failure, but unless I can get some more information about scarcity of the 'overhead' elements, I will not be convinced that

Originally posted by JasonC:

"The missing battalions had indeed gone somewhere. They were under birch crosses"

And that is wrong? Were they on holiday in France?

Originally posted by JasonC:

"you open yourself up to constant infiltration"

And that is wrong?

Originally posted by JasonC:

"Such a division 'lite' is a castrate"

Yep, compared to a full division it is.

Originally posted by JasonC:

"If you look at the number (and quality) of guns available by mid-war, I don't think there were enough to go round"

Well, do you have figures showing that there were enough around?

Originally posted by JasonC:

"not very convincing if you actually look at the effect it had on the ground"

Don't know where you got this from.

Originally posted by JasonC:

"supply shortages were not uncommon from 1942 onwards"

And that is incorrect?

Originally posted by JasonC:

"...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."

And that is wrong?

Originally posted by JasonC:

"whether Germany had the industrial capacity to fit all these divisions - I would disagree with someone saying that it did"

And I still would, unless I see the actual production figures. I have not gone that far in my research yet.

Originally posted by JasonC:

"If in 1942 even the elite formations could not be fully re-equipped for their losses, what hope for the infantry?" Later we had "a logistical nightmare" and bemoaned "the shortage of specialists."

And that is wrong how? Are you saying specialists were not lacking? Are you saying that creating more units does not add to logistical strain? Are you saying that logistics in the east were not a serious problem?

Originally posted by JasonC:

Then you got personal "you can have a reasonable discussion with me, or you can go and screw yourself...you can continue your Wehrmachtworshipping admiration fest alone...I won't hold my breath though...You obviously need to grow up"

In response to an insulting post, which you conveniently forget to mention.

Originally posted by JasonC:

prompting someone to tell you "You begin to sound like one of those Russians that claim one is a Nazi as soon as one criticizes the Red Army, and points out that the Wehrmacht was not such a dumb organization".

What has that got to do with anything? People say all sorts of things, and I can not help if they have a warped perception of my opinions. Dogs bark, the caravan moves on - to use one of the favourite phrases of Helmut Kohl.

Originally posted by JasonC:

Please note, I hadn't even shown up yet. But I'm the debator. You never get pissy.

Oh I do. But at least I am not accusing other people of 'debator's pose' while shamelessly pandering to the gallery like some 3rd rate US TV lawyer.

Originally posted by JasonC:

Still you felt "the move was a really bad idea. I don't really get what there is to argue about."

I think I said that quite early on, and I am actually reconsidering that.

Originally posted by JasonC:

Obviously not. Despite some very patient explaining, by Keke, Cogust and later myself.

No need to respond to that. You have forgotten Rob, who made some great contributions here.

Originally posted by JasonC:

At one point you almost noticed that AG North held out a while - but quickly retracted it "parallels between the failure of the Red Army to deal AG North the deathblow they meted out to all other Army Groups, and the Red Army's failure to make short work of the Finns...I would not rate AG North's performance as a success. They just got lucky, and then that luck was wasted"

Well, actually they managed to withdraw in the nick of time, to a secondary theatre, with one flank anchored on the sea. I would consider that lucky. As I posted above, there is also the possibility that they used a different tactic than the relatively inflexible strongpoint defense.

Originally posted by JasonC:

Of course there is an immediate rhetorical problem with the "everything was hopeless, forever" pity party line.

Where did I say that?

Originally posted by JasonC:

Why the heck did it take so long, then, and why did so many Russians buy the farm? Another poster noticed this and quickly supplied the Standard Answer "the reason why Germany held out so long against superior numbers is that its forces were operationally superiorly led". The poor put upon Landser were lead by genuises, as we are all supposed to know.

Not geniuses, just someone comparatively more skilled than most of their Red Army counterparts in that period. Of course that idea must be anathema to you, since you seem to believe that the Red Army did not need to improve after 1943.

Originally posted by JasonC:

You agreed, adding that "once the Soviets managed to get on a par with that operational capability from 1944 onwards, it was game over for the Germans". Thus brilliant officers of 1943 segue to the put upon Landser of 1944, as the Red Star rises into sentience, apparently for the first time.

I don't get it, are you saying something different from the last para? Does not appear so.

Originally posted by JasonC:

But there is a problem. Anyone can look at a map, and the claimed operational virtuousity is simply not in evidence. Russian operational "play" is clearly superior. Way earlier. So, how did the Germans hold out so long against superior odds, again?

1. Their tactical doctrine was for ****.

2. They screwed up their organizations.

3. They had no manpower.

4. They had no guns.

5. They had no ammo.

6. They weren't allowed to do anything sensible.

7. They got dumber orders.

8. They faced superior odds.

9. They faced superior operational direction.

10. They were losing ground and the war.

How about - their comparative advantage in operational direction started to diminish, and therefore their tactical superiority did no longer matter as much. The Red Army only re-introduced Corps by mid 1943, and did only set up the first mech corps and tank corps a year earlier. Handling massed armoured forces, and the understanding of logistical constraints seems to not have been as well developed in the first half of 1943 as it was in mid-1944. Even in autumn 1943 Konev got a real fright out of the Zhitomir operations, with the Kharkov nightmare coming back.

If you want to claim that Russian operational play was superior in 1943, you will have to explain Star and Gallop to me, together with the failure to keep Army Group A from escaping, if you please.

Originally posted by JasonC:

They were "begging for a vicious kicking". Why oh why, then, did the Russians lose several times more men to these pity party pussycats? You quoted a figure for German losses in calendar 1944, but none for the Russians. (Some sources give Russian losses in 1944 as high as 5 million men).

I did not quote a figure for the calendar year, but for the period June - November. Since most of the casualties would have been from late in June, we are talking 5 months. The problem for the Germans was that they could not kill their way out of their situation. They could do that in 1942, when casualty ratios were far more favourable, and in 1943 they traded a lot of space for survival. Quite apart from the fact that you are comparing Apples and Oranges with your 5 million figure. The German 1.5million are only irrecoverable losses, while Glantz (based on Krivosheyev I assume) gives just short of 2 million Soviets for the whole of 1944 KIA/MIA and another 5.5 million wounded and sick. The figures are absolutely not comparable, in time, and scope. But if you have figures that are, I would be interested in seeing them.

Originally posted by JasonC:

Then there is the sheer comedy of it all. You introduced the example in question with the phrase (and I indeed quote) "I can hardly imagine something worse". You *introduced it* with the idea that it can't get any worse - and object to any suggestion that things were ever better.

No I don't. The question was whether this was an outlier. You contend it was, I am not so sure.

Originally posted by JasonC:

Up to then the nastiest thing I had said was that you seemed fixated on one example. So you wanted any example, and I gave you one. But that is 1943, you objected, it has to be 1944 "Come on, just one - if Leontina was such an outlier, you must be able to find one, with all those massive offensives going on". I produce a half a dozen and you object to their being smaller than Bagration. One involved *6 armies*, another involved *40 divisions*, but those don't count.

'Tactical' - 'operational'. What is the difference Jason? Do we know that in your examples strongpoint defense was actually used? But if you want to get really into unrelated territory - Fester Platz Tarnopol, March/April 1944. I did not quote it because it is not relevant to the discussion, IMO, but I can easily drag it out. I am sure you are well aware of what happened there, with all your deep understanding of the east. Maybe you can patiently explain to me poor sod how it relates.

Originally posted by JasonC:

But simply to be exhaustive, I just have to get in a few of the other screamers we've enjoyed. Byelorussia is wide open compared to France - news to the Landser lost in the endless forest east of Minsk.

I suggest you go back to my post. I said 'more open', and compared to the Bocage country of Normandy. The comparison you claim I made would indeed be a screamer, which is why I did not make it.

Originally posted by JasonC:

There was only a second half of 1944 stand in the west, because there are no natural obstacles in Poland (the Bug, Vistula, and Oder don't count, the Moselle and Rhine do).

You were talking about the stand at the 'borders' that was so successful. I was just pointing out that the stand did not really happen much on the borders, since the Oder was not a border then. Indeed my whole point was that it happened behind a natural obstacle, and not at some border. Such are the perils of taking things out of context Jason, as you here do.

Originally posted by JasonC:

Actually the west was static from at most September 1944 to January 1945. The AG center line along the Vistula was basically static from August 1944 until January 1945, though of course the Russians attacked in the south and in the Balkans.

Indeed, except for some heavy fighting in East Prussia, and a few significant operations at the AG Centre/AG North intersection. Also, the clearing of the Carpathians on the southern flank of the AG Vistula frontline. Again, the Soviets did clear flanks before they got to the major business at hand. The experience from Kharkov showing again?

Originally posted by JasonC:

But you weren't trying to say it was monotonic losing, no nothing like it. You demanded examples of any successful German ID defense, challenging their existence as though none had occurred, but did not mean to imply they always lost.

I am saying it was not monotonic destruction of strongpoints with 1,500 men in them. I would agree that it was fairly monotonic losing, but with the loss of a much smaller number of men per day in typical operations. Again, you would benefit from reading more closely what I write.

Originally posted by JasonC:

And you ask for any example ("come on - just one") source, and I give you one of the most obvious, common ones, in the most obvious place, in the worst year and place for my claim, and you sniff that it isn't more obscure or learned.

I am not 'sniffing' at his learning. Questioning the validity of a source was par for the course at the universities I visited. I am surprised it is called 'sniffing' at your learned institution. I am uncertain about the quality of Haupt for a source - I have his AG North book here, and while the list of sources is impressive, I do not think it is that well written or instructive. I have not seen the other Army Group ones, but I own other books of his, about Leningrad, Demjansk and Kiev. These are not so great. I can not judge his AG Centre book, because I have never read it. As for 'sniffing' about obscurity. Well, you could not twist it more if you wanted, this was an admission by me that I don't know a lot about it, and therefore would need to look it up. Neither of which addresses the scale problem of your example by the way, and the fact that an operational history can hardly count as an AAR.

We are still having the minor problem that we are talking different scales here. Your examples (including the ones from Haupt) are operational in nature, while Leontina was a tactical situation with an operational consequence. Do you know what sort of defensive tactics were used at Vitebsk? I don't, and my guess is Haupt does not make it clear either.

Originally posted by JasonC:

But I've saved the best for last. The whole dispute was over whether cases like Leontina were typical or rare. I say they were rare, and so do you. You even say "of course". I quote "of course these were not typical examples of combat. But they could have been the typical examples of combat when it really mattered."

Yes - and your point is? Throughout it has been my contention that you don't need a lot of Leontinas to wreak havoc on the Germans. In AG SU, one may have been enough. What I mean by 'rare' is that there was not a lot of combat like this. What you seem to mean by 'rare' is that there were not a lot of outcomes like this. Rather different.

Now, I still stand by my earlier statements which you have not quoted, presumably because you don't have an answer to them, that your statistical approach is not able to elucidate tactical happenings, or indeed judge whether a tactical approach is valid. This sort of information is lost when looking at the overall picture. You have still not addressed that criticism of your method, which you drag out in this discussion to prove something that is so obvious, it is not even in contention. I leave it up to you to figure out what that might be. It will be more rewarding for everyone to see the answer than having to read through your biased, selective and out of context quoting in your previous post.

[ August 23, 2003, 05:31 AM: Message edited by: Andreas ]

[Tero]

Originally posted by JasonC:

They had the resources to keep an entire army group in reserve for Kursk, and then launch major army group sized attacks after the defensive period of that fight, on not one but *both* flanks of the salient itself. And to push the resulting offensive clear to the Dnepr, take Kiev, and pocket German forces in the Dnepr bend. The Russians won the decisive battles of the war in 1943.

So what makes the year 1943 stand apart from 1944 ?

The Soviets did have ample resources during both periods. But they did not have the resources in 1943 to win the war in their 1943 style and manner. They had to change their tactics and strategies to get the mix right. Their resources in 1943 and 1944 were not that much different. What changed was how they used them.

They had the resources to conduct attacks with high local odds, CB fire on main German gun positions, and infantry infiltrating between their strongpoints. Nothing in the example given says you need 100 IS-2s or 300 T-34/85s to overrun a lone German infantry regiment.

Indeed. Nor does say having them hurts.

The strongpoint defense is supposed to be stupid and easily destroyed by IDing the gun positions and hitting them with enough tube arty prep, and then hitting the gunless German infantry with high local odds.

When was the last time you actually studied the tactics in detail ? The Soviet histories (as per Glantz) note some of the attacks were NOT preceded by heavy barrages.

There is nothing inherently wrong in the strongpoint defence. IF the opponent plays ball and does not take full advantage of its inherent shortcomings. In the Leontina example the defenders lost all their arty (which was concentrated in one location) to CB, in the Valkeasaari example the defenders lost their arty (which was dispersed) due to lack of transports to haul them out of the way of the advancing enemy. The brunt of the arty preparation was directed to pulverize the forward infantry positions. NOTE: the Finnish defences were not based on the strongpoint principle. Nevertheless the original Red Army plan seems to have assumed the Finnish defender would follow the established German doctrine and consequently the outcome was not quite what they expected.

I bring it up to show the pre-assault preparations were similar but adaptable to local condisions.

The Red Army spend a considerable time perfecting their entire concept, timing etc. You are hung up on what you consider important (the strategic level stuff). The preparation fire was directed so it would have the maximum effect on the defenders. It hit both the gun positions and infantry positions as needed.

Yes, by mid 1944 the Russians had odds ratios and equippage high enough that an uninstructed 7 year old child should have been able to finish the job.

Wrong. They had the ratios already in 1941. And an instructed 40 year old general could not make it work. It was the deployment of them that was changed dramatically in 1944.

In 1943, maybe they needed the operational skills of a 14 year old pimply faced amateur wargamer. There is no question they outplayed the Germans operationally in either year, and in the transitional period from November 1942 to Kursk, for that matter. But what they didn't manage to do in 1943 was blow the Germans off the map, to annihilate their whole army.

How would you rate the German proficiency in 1941 ? Scarfaced war veterans ? They could not blow the Red Army off the map then. What changed with the Germans between 1941 and 1944, in your opinion ?

And if all it took to kill a German ID was a little prep fire and decent local infantry odds, they would have been able to, easily. It simply wasn't that easy, much of the time.

Nobody's trying to short change the Germans. But you seem to be totally incapable to grasp the notion that the idea that you collect your resources in one location and the enemy knows their disposition and strenght fairly accurately and they even know how you will react is an invitation to military disaster. The strongpoint may well be able to repell the attacks. But even so the overall tactical situation may develop so that the strongpoint may be cut off and isolated if it does so. Either way the forces are neutralized.

By any other standard, the post Kursk offensives were a huge success. The Germans did not exactly come out of the fall and early winter battles unscathed, either, though the front did stabilize a bit west of Kiev. The Russians tried in other places too, though on smaller scales sometimes.

True. But how much would you say the fact the Eastern Front lost a considerable number of its armoured (ie mobile) formations to the Italian front during that period affected the situation ?

You say, "not left to chance". Some Russian offensives that they thought were fully prepared with massive odds failed with high losses - particularly early in the war of course.

You really should not try to mix and mingle the tactical and operational/strategic level with no regard to the developments in tactics and strategies. It was not all about numbers. How could the Finns survive the Winter War and the French could not survive Fall Gelb, if it was all about the numbers ?

Later, they tried many smaller ones, some of which worked and some of which did not, or made only limited gains. Their biggest ones, late, did tend to work. But they were not the only things they were trying. And the scale of the success varied. The post Kursk one retook Ukraine but the German forces - depleted certainly - basically survived. In Bagration they did not.

How would you say the German tactical freedom changed during that period ? Right after Kursk they were not restricted by CHQ strategies to the extent they were during Bagration.

In Courland they did not wipe them all out despite trying. In Crimea they basically did. The results of operations vary, that is in the nature of war. That is all my "roll low" and "roll high" comment means.

And your rolls are still flawed. The Crimea was lost because the Germans could not support the defenders by sea. In the Baltic the Russians were only beginning to get their naval operations into gear after having them being non-existent when the Baltic Fleet had been bottled up from 1941 until late 1944 (free movement from the base of the Gulf of Finland starting only in September).

Because that is when the war was actually won.

In the strategic level, maybe. It was only in 1944 when the Red Army was able to put its strategic upper hand to work. And even then they had to be careful.

1942 the Russians evened the strategic score, and there is indeed some interest in that, too. In 1943, the Russians beat the Germans. Obviously the decisive year is more instructive and more interesting than the aftermath. It matters what either side tries to do, which is not true e.g. in 1945.

What is your take on Winter War ? By strategic definitions and pure numbers it should have been a cake walk for the Red Army and yet they managed to botch it up.

As for "how should they have conducted the operations", it misses the point.

No, it does not. It is precisely the point. The Germans had the strategic and tactical upper hand and yet they could not defeat the Red Army. Why would Stalin have ignored the apparent German proficiency if he had the strategic take on them and could just wait for the numbers to creep up on the Germans ?

It is a statement that they didn't for a reason - that the job was hard, because the Germans were not as weak as Andreas is portraying them.

Andreas says nothing of the sort. It is just that you seem to be blind to the tactical level vs the strategic level aspects. I think what Andreas and I mean to say is the strongpoint defence hastened the German defeat by several factors. With the right tactics and CHQ attitude they could have fought off the Red Army for a much longer time they actually did.

It kept the German army alive despite huge operational defeats for a year, against opponents who definitely were "there yet".

Here is where we part ways. My POV is from the Finnish army and how it developed as opposed to the Germans. The 6 battalion division was weak, weaker than its Finnish counter part. The main diffences however was their tactical use. The Germans wanted/needed to keep the number of divisions in the level it was. Which was dictated by their chosen defensive doctrine. The Finnish doctrine and the German doctrines were different when it came to giving up ground. Had the German commanders been given total freedom I am sure they would have been able to use what they had, no matter what the organization, much more efficiently.

If you hit a regiment with 300 T-34/85s after a 1000 gun prep fire, then yes you will get through it. That is not the same as saying "just put your guns on his gun strongpoints and lap your infantry around his forward positions, ta da, you will always break through in 1-2 days tops". The latter is simply not what happened. It makes nonsense of the length of the war and the scale of Russian casualties. It paints far too easy a picture, and renders the Russian accomplishment trivial.

Poppycock. You fail to appreciate the importance of the restrictions imposed by the OKW/OKH on the front line commanders. Take a look at the Finnish casualty rates, kill/loss ratios and POW exhange rates. For example, during the Continuation War the Soviets captured only ~2 000 Finns, most of them during the summer of 1944. During the same time we took 64 000 POW's. The Finnish nation could not afford the kind of man power losses the Red Army was metering out to the Germans. To conserve the man power the Finnish CHQ had to do things differently than the Germans. They had to plan the defences so that the local superiority of the Red Army could be evened out.

Of course the local odds ratios are far above the global ones. When you have 2:1 overall the way you make it pay is to pick select portions of the front and get 5 or 10 to 1 there.

To work this however would require exact knowlegde of the disposition of the enemy troops and exact knowledge of their MO and propable responces.

As for the idea that AG South was not subject to major operations in 1943, um, huh? Of course they were. The Russian main effort in 1943 was in the south, from Kursk defensive and Kursk offensive to the Dnepr battles.

Yes. So why did they leave AG Center alone ? If they had the capability to do their pleasing ?

As for Grisha's comments, on German tactical skill and C&C ability, that is exactly what I am talking about. It existed.

Yes, it existed, And no. You are NOT talking about that at all. You are spouting strategies and operational figures and trying to make them fit your thesis by trying to apply them by jumping between tactical and strategic scale as you see fit. So far you have not given a plausible explanation (beyond the strategic dodging and mumbo jumbo) why the Germans survived in 1943 but failed in 1944 and beyond. The depletion of the German forces was serious but not severe in 1943 so how was it possible for the same forces to endure at one time and fail the next ?

Andreas is effectively denying it as a factor.

He is not. He is just trying to explain away why the Red Army doctrine was so effective.

Everybody can see looking at the map that German strategic "play" was stupid in 1943 and 1944. They blow their reserves attacking at Kursk, and so don't have them to respond in 1943 late summer and fall.

Actually the widrawal of the mobile forces to counter the invasion of Italy hurt them far more in the long run than the actual losses at Kursk.

Dumb orders about pockets prevent saving numbers men.

Dumb orders to form WWI style strong points was the reason these pockets developed.

Manstein is sacked for trying to be rational about the Dnepr bend.

He and many others for trying to be rational about so many other situations.

Then all the armor of AG center is sent to North Ukraine just in time to leave it naked to Bagration.

Not all armour, I'm sure.

If there were places the 44 operations were clearly superior it was not in concentration (adequate to excessive in both cases), but in smarter use of their exploitation phase opportunities, less (not no) exposure of the spearheads to counterattack deep in the German operational rear, etc.

Except their objectives were much more limited (more realistic) per individual operation in 1944 than they had been in 1943.

This is not a sign that 6 battalion divisions and strongpoint defenses and the rest of the items in the German *tactical* defender's toolkit were stupid.

It shows however that all of them were wearing thin. The patches were only making the work easier for the enemy.

[JasonC]

"So what makes the year 1943 stand apart from 1944?"

1943 does. The difference is the Russians had smashed large portions of the German army in the previous year. The odds ratio they had available was higher as a result. Attrition takes time. The Russians were still learning in the period Stalingrad to Kursk, but from then on it was largely a matter of chewing long enough. It was not their style and manner that changed in 1944. Nor was it any drastic sea change in the German style and manner. It was their available equipment, and the reduced numbers on the German side of the line.

"Their resources in 1943 and 1944 were not that much different."

Sure they were, their weapon mix improved considerably. (Look at the tank fleets, the air force, the depth of the arty park). But above all, German strength fell, from combat losses during 1943. It was attrition, between, that allowed the big offensives in 1944 to inflict even greater damage than the big offensives in 1943 - which themselves inflicted quite serious damage, individually and together.

"When was the last time you actually studied the tactics in detail?"

I've studied the actual tactics in detail continuously for 20 years, and I still am. Condescension gets you nowhere. I am not a babe in the woods.

"There is nothing inherently wrong in the strongpoint defence."

Oh really? Here we are at post 125 in the thread, and this is just being admitted?

But only to be retracted. The shortcomings you pretend are so easy to notice and exploit would certainly amount to something "inherently wrong" with that defense. Which just happens to have put in the most impressive performance, in losses inflicted against odds faced, in the history of great power warfare. If German defense tactics were as plain stupid as you and Andreas have been maintaining, they would have been blown off the map in no time. They were not stupid.

Anyone looking to the German army in Russia during WW II for strategic sense won't find anything, except by learning from mistakes. Anyone looking to the German army in Russia during tbe second half of the campaign for operational excellence can look until he turns blue, and will find at best a handful of cases of not completely brain dead "play".

But anybody who maintains German tactics in Russia in WW II sucked, is claiming something with absolutely massive evidence against it. The Russians had a better strategy, and from the fall of 1942 on they had clearly superior operational direction. From mid 1943 on, they had entirely adequate doctrine and large scale odds, combined with outstanding operational play against quite poor play. They were winning the war with highly successful, large scale offensives with complete control of the initiative.

In essentially every near approach to that stacked a deck, in favor of one side, in the history of great power war, the side with all that going for it would have inflicted vastly higher losses than the side with all of those things against it. Yet the opposite was the case in Russia. This is not a sign of tactical stupidity. It is incoherent to claim German defensive tactics in Russia sucked.

To maintain it, people here have been resorting to the hackneyed claim (only plausible before any of the Russian studies appeared) that German operational direction was superior, and the Russians only equalized on that score in 1944.

But this is clearly false, if you just look at the map and follow the operational moves each side actually made. The Russian moves are vastly better. The German moves are often incredibly bone-headed. They occasionally rise to the same level consistently seen in Russian moves throughout the period - very briefly. Then they suck again. There is no German operational superiority in 1943.

What is clearly going on is that German tactics were very strong. So strong they managed to inflict massive losses on a clearly superior attacker in full possession of the initiative and outplaying them on the operational level. At division level and below, the combat power of similar formations, similar equipment, similar numbers, clearly and strongly favored the German side. Against enemies who were not babes in the woods, who had already developed sound TOEs, sound mobile doctrine, excellent equipment, and understood and applied it all at the larger, operational scale better than even the Germans ever had. (They just didn't benefit from inexperienced opponents - they had to fight Germans).

Those superior tactics allowed them to inflict the losses they inflicted in 1943, and even in 1944 when their own front was coming apart. (The Germans lost 6 million including wounded on the eastern front from the invasion through the end of November 1944. Their allies might have added 1 or 2 more. The Russians lost 5 million in the year of their greatest successes, 1944, alone).

They even allowed them to hold together a line overall despite massive operational defeats in the course of 1943. They were not enough to repeat that performance in 1944 because the numbers were no longer there. The Germans on defense were tactical monsters who had to be laboriously bled to death at tremendous cost. Despite their operational mediocrity (to be as charitable as possible) and their strategic ineptitude.

"The preparation fire was directed so it would have the maximum effect on the defenders."

Duh. And there was a ton of it. Nevertheless, German divisions in their supposedly stupid deployments routinely fought against stacked decks and intelligent fire plans and outscored their numerically overwhelming attackers. So apparently it wasn't so easy to waltz right over them.

"the deployment of them that was changed dramatically in 1944."

Compared to 1943? Hardly. What critical formation or use changes do you detect between fall 1943 Russians and summer 1944 Russians? Even compared to late 1942, the changes are not large, though they are certainly more experienced at it.

"How would you rate the German proficiency in 1941?"

Strategically poor, operationally and tactically monsters. Benefiting also from inexperienced and unprepared opponents.

German operational ability declined with loss of the initiative, because it was based on an extremely offense minded doctrine. Only a few of the best German commanders learned defensive mobile operations, and were treated as somewhat heretical for their views about it.

Even in mid 1942 German operational play declined (e.g. targeting the Caucasus instead of Voronezh, terrain rather than the enemy army, then the nonsense about frontally storming Stalingrad). But the reason they couldn't win in 1942 was primarily strategic not operational. They hadn't mobilized the economy before attacking in the first place, and as a result by late 1942 they were behind a full year's worth of AFVs at maximum production rates, etc.

What changed by 1944? They kept their tactical skill. Their operations got worse without the initiative because of how offense minded their operational doctrine was, and because of high command interference. But marginally so - those hadn't exactly been brilliant in 1943.

The main operational change, though, was in their opponents, who were playing expert level chess by late 1942, while they had played like "fishes" in 1941. By mid 1943 they were playing master level chess and the Germans weren't anymore. Their strategy still sucked.

"Nobody's trying to short change the Germans."

Sure you are. "The Russians only learned how to do anything in 1944" or words to that effect. Well, that is horsefeathers, and you only have to look at a map.

Andreas has been maintaining all along that the poor whittle Wehrmacht had simply impossible working conditions, and oh by the way their basic organizations made the majority of their army "unable to contribute in any significant form to combat operations", and their primary defense scheme was wide open to very simple tactics.

Everyone knows their strategy sucked and anyone who can read a map knows their operational play pretty much sucked. If the two of you are right that their organizations and tactics also sucked, then they just plain sucked. That is short changing the Germans.

And it is historical nonsense, because they were monsters and it took an incredible level of skill, odds, and losses to take them down - even when they were completely screwing up the higher direction of the war. Which are signs of good organizations and tactics, precisely at the division level and below, and precisely on defense.

"how much would you say the fact the Eastern Front lost a considerable number of its armoured (ie mobile) formations to the Italian front during that period affected the situation?"

Absolutely none. The Germans did not lose Kursk because of Sicily, it is a ridiculous canard and a revisionist whitewash. They lost Kursk because the Russians had an entire army group in reserve and the Germans could not match that. Offensive maneuver by concentrated armor has a counter, it is the principle of reserves. The Russians applied it and Kursk offensive failed as an immediate and direct result. Russian operational play was superior.

The only thing the Germans had going for them at Kursk were tactical skill and an armor quality edge. Those were enough to inflict very high losses on the Russians, something the Germans continued to do throughout the war, whether they were winning or losing, precisely because of their tactical skill - but were not remotely enough to make the operation succeed.

"How could the Finns survive the Winter War"

They didn't. They lost, both times. They held out a while and made it expensive, and so were able to get terms - better ones the first time, largely because of how inexperienced the Russians were. But their army was defeated on both occasions, and had they not made peace on terms they would have been conquered outright. Not surprising given the odds, which yes do matter.

"How would you say the German tactical freedom changed during that period? Right after Kursk they were not restricted by CHQ strategies to the extent they were during Bagration."

Sure they were, Manstein just ignored the stupidest orders. He eventually got fired for it. It was entirely open to AG center to ignore stupid orders too.

But the problem in Bagration was not stupid orders during it. Orders during it didn't matter a tuppenny damn. Nobody could hear them, or follow them. The army came quite completely apart, in a matter of days. (And yes, essentially all the armor had been shifted south. There were 3 mobile divisions and 300 AFVs in the whole AG. There was 5 times that much for the south).

A bridgehead was held out for stragglers, and those certainly tried to make it west, but they simply didn't. There was a stupid operational order beforehand that mattered, shifting AG center's armor south. But during it, operational direction was simply impossible. Everything was rapidly seperated from everything else (except for 2nd Army on the right). They couldn't have obeyed any coherent orders if they'd got them.

"The Crimea was lost because the Germans could not support the defenders by sea."

Oh horsefeathers. It was lost because the Russians brought massive combat power to bear on it in a sensible way. It was stupid even to try to hold it. 3 cruisers off the shore wouldn't have made the slightest difference, nor arty ammo runs. The navies were utter sideshows.

"It was only in 1944 when the Red Army was able to put its strategic upper hand to work."

No. They put their strategic upper hand to work begining in November 1942. Killing entire armies is "working". Clearing provinces the size of entire nations is "working". Attrition is the job.

What happened in 1944 that was new was just that the Germans had been weakened enough that practically their entire front collapsed - though they cobbled one together again in Poland at least. Which was a matter of attrition, of the "working" that had been going on for quite some time accumulating to enough damage.

"they managed to botch it up."

They were inexperienced and inept, and managed to take longer doing it and to take higher losses. But they did in the end defeat the Finns. They had such numbers they actually *didn't* manage to botch it, despite a herculean "effort" in that direction.

"The Germans had the strategic and tactical upper hand and yet they could not defeat the Red Army."

Um, what? German strategy sucked for the entire war in Russia. They had the initiative early, certainly. But not because their strategy was sounder than the Russian strategy. Just because they attacked first, had surprise, etc.

That they couldn't defeat the Russians despite their operational and tactical skill was due precisely to the superiority of Russian strategy, which was based on total war and the assumption of a long war of attrition right from the begining. The Russians correctly surmised that numbers would be critical, while early on the Germans did not.

The Germans wrecked the original army in front of them and still faced a new one just as large, because the Russians had already shoved their production and mobilization rates to the ceiling. The Germans simply didn't.

If they had, their early successes might have translated into odds - the Russians would have new stuff vs. the Germans old plus new. But the Germans basically had old, minus losses even. Because their strategy was not based on odds and a long war of attrition, but on supposed rapid victory with multipliers for skill and the initiative mattering, and odds not mattering. Well odds did matter. The strategy was a gamble, and it failed.

The Russian defensive success was determined by their superior strategy pretty much alone. Their offensive success depended on two additional new factors from late 1942 and especially mid 1943. Their organizations, officers, experience, and doctrines improved (one) and most important their operational play become clearly better than that of the Germans (two).

"Why would Stalin have ignored the apparent German proficiency if he had the strategic take on them and could just wait for the numbers to creep up on the Germans?"

What on earth are you talking about? lol. The idea of attrition is you force your own new forces rate to the moon, and then go about subtracting as much as possible from the enemy's existing forces in the field.

You expect this to eventually move the fielded forces ratio so far in your favor that you can't lose, and then farther still to where the enemy can't even hold. So of course as soon as the Russians have numbers from their superior mobilization, they try to use those numbers to subtract from German forces in the field.

By killing them. That is what all of those offensives are about, you know - killing Germans. Kill enough of them and there won't be enough left to hold, and their front will collapse. That is what happened from Stalingrad to Bagration.

Were the Russians also losing a lot in the process? Yes of course. But they were ahead on the mobilization side, from their superior strategy. (Or if you like, from the German's "own goal" of their dumb strategy, of not mobilizing completely the day they decided to attack Russia). Their replacement rate could afford it, the Germans could not.

"you seem to be blind to the tactical level vs the strategic level aspects."

He wants their strategy to be smart and their tactics dumb? (lol). No. We all agree the strategy level is dumb.

It nevertheless (no short-changing now) proves darn hard to take down the buggers. If their organizations and tactics are so stupid, why? If their tactics are as dumb as their strategy, where does their strength come from? Do they eat Wheaties or something?

Or are they supposed to not have any strength? If so, where do the Russian losses come from? Or are they supposed to be stupid, and the Russians even stupider until 1944, when a light bulb suddenly goes off and they are allowed to think for the first time?

Either the Germans have no qualitative superiority over the Russians (a) or

the Germans have a strategic or operational superiority over the Russians ( or

the German have a tactical superiority over the Russians ©.

If a, then the Russians should blow them off the map as soon as they have odds and their operations make sense, inflicting higher losses than they receive. They don't.

If b, then German play on the map (above division level) should be clearly superior to Russian play on the map. The reverse is quite clearly the case from late 1942 on - German play on the operational scale is occasionally sound and but usually sucks, while Russian play is occasionally uninspired but frequently brilliant.

Leaving c. If the Germans are monsters on the tactical level, a claim that their tactics suck is to say the least one that requires extraordinary evidence. Less politely, it is horsefeathers.

"from the Finnish army and how it developed as opposed to the Germans"

Ah yes, if only those poor idiot tactically benighted Germans had gone to school with the uberFinns, they might have held off the Russian hordes. The Germans inflicted more damage on a vastly superior enemy with vastly better strategies and operational direction than any great power in world history. Their tactics were not the problem. Their tactics, anybody can profitably learn from. (The Finns lost too).

"You fail to appreciate the importance of the restrictions imposed by the OKW/OKH"

lol. You can't even tell when you are making your case weaker instead of stronger. The stupider the high level play was, the greater the tactical superiority has to be to explain the empirical result seen. The empirical result cannot be changed or spun. It is data.

The question has nothing to do with what ifs, blame games, fantasies of changes that might have helped, any of that apologetic crap. The question is purely one of military technique.

If you can give me a military means of taking an outnumbered force that is totally hamstrung by idiot constraints, facing an enemy with superior operational direction, and still inflict far higher loses on that enemy, while holding out for years, I will take those military means.

I don't have to duplicate any of the rest of the crap associated with the German army in WW II. Military means that can accomplish that are superior tactics, not idiot tactics.

"why did they leave AG Center alone?"

One, because the whole point is to use an overall edge to get a bigger edge in one part of the front. It was a wing attack on the scale of the entire front. Roughly equal forces on 2/3rds of it allowed 2-3 to 1 on the remaining third.

Why the south? It was the most vunerable and that is where the forces were and thus the opportunity.

The German armor in the south was mispositioned for Kursk offensive. The salient itself divided those reserves in operational maneuver terms.

The southern wing was vunerable to isolation by the threat of a drive to the Azov or Black. A simultaneous threat to Kiev would give the Germans the choice of abandoning Ukraine with great danger to their southern wing, or risking all of AG south.

Naturally the German reserves would be attracted to the Kiev region to block the more direct route west, representing as it did a larger "solution" threat to all of AG South. Which would (and did) leave the Donets basin, Dnepr bend, and Crimea open and vunerable.

The Russian mass of maneuver right after the initial breakthroughs, around Kharkov and Kursk, has all the options. It can hit any point from Bryansk to Kiev to the Black.

In chess, you overprotect a blockade point. The fact that it can be adequately defended by less than all the forces that bear on that point increases the mobility, the options, of every one of the overprotecting pieces.

If that blockade point is also in the center, the mobility of each of those overprotecting pieces is higher. If the blockade point has already been attacked and you retain control of that square, any of the overprotecting pieces can maneuver through said square.

Enemy forces directed against it must do so in a converging manner. They are therefore seperated and disarticulated if they prove inadequate to actually seize that square.

This was the principle the Russians applied at Kursk. They overprotected it, divided the attackers directed toward it, and after their defensive success had a powerful mass of maneuver centered on it. With greater operational flexibility than the Germans had to respond with. They made use of that mass of maneuver immediately. So naturally they made use of it in the south.

"You are NOT talking about that at all. You are spouting strategies and operational figures and trying to make them fit your thesis"

You still don't get it. The Germans either excel at something or they do not.

If they do not, they should lose more not less to enemies that excel them in everything.

If they excel in something, that something must be a definite thing or a combination of things. If they do not excel in strategic direction or operations there is nothing left but the tactical level. And they don't, so that is where one is left.

German tactics can't suck along with absolutely everything else about them, and still fit the empirical result that the Germans were monsters. Nothing can change the empirical result that the Germans were monsters - it is not open to discussion or debate. There are too many dead Russians who died long after they and their commanders fully understood the art of war.

We can tell, because they were already applying it at the higher echelons in ways people will still be studying and learning at the feet of long after you and I are dust. Probably long after people no more remember Germany than they now remember the Hurrians and the Hittites.

What they may remember is tactics that didn't suck, just as they will remember operations that didn't suck. The former will have at one time been German and the latter will have at one time been Russian, but no one will give a damn about that.

[ August 25, 2003, 03:37 AM: Message edited by: JasonC ]

[Andreas]

I don't have a lot of time today.

Originally posted by JasonC:

"So what makes the year 1943 stand apart from 1944?"

1943 does. The difference is the Russians had smashed large portions of the German army in the previous year. The odds ratio they had available was higher as a result. Attrition takes time. The Russians were still learning in the period Stalingrad to Kursk, but from then on it was largely a matter of chewing long enough. It was not their style and manner that changed in 1944. Nor was it any drastic sea change in the German style and manner. It was their available equipment, and the reduced numbers on the German side of the line.

It is not the size of the ship, it is the motion of the ocean that counts. As a female friend once told me.

Originally posted by JasonC:

Sure they were, their weapon mix improved considerably. (Look at the tank fleets, the air force, the depth of the arty park). But above all, German strength fell, from combat losses during 1943. It was attrition, between, that allowed the big offensives in 1944 to inflict even greater damage than the big offensives in 1943 - which themselves inflicted quite serious damage, individually and together.

But they were not aiming that high - these offensives of late 1943 did not have as their goal anymore to destroy whole army groups. In 1944 that was their goal.

Originally posted by JasonC:

"There is nothing inherently wrong in the strongpoint defence."

Oh really? Here we are at post 125 in the thread, and this is just being admitted?

But only to be retracted. The shortcomings you pretend are so easy to notice and exploit would certainly amount to something "inherently wrong" with that defense. Which just happens to have put in the most impressive performance, in losses inflicted against odds faced, in the history of great power warfare. If German defense tactics were as plain stupid as you and Andreas have been maintaining, they would have been blown off the map in no time. They were not stupid.

Well, I am not saying something is inherently wrong with the tactic. But tactics do not exist in a vacuum. What I am saying it that it was wrong to stick to it regardless of the improvements in Red Army handling of their forces. Rather different. The tactics are sound - if you have an opponent who does not learn. Using your chess analogy - if you play against a much better player who uses just one strategy year-in year-out, you will eventually figure out how to beat him. If that player then refuses to change his play, he will continue to lose.

Also, is the decision to deploy a certain defensive tactic again and again operational or tactical? I think we need to clear that up now, otherwise we are talking past each other. In my opinion it is operational - and therefore falls into the realm of stupid decisions you outline below.

Originally posted by JasonC:

Anyone looking to the German army in Russia during WW II for strategic sense won't find anything, except by learning from mistakes. Anyone looking to the German army in Russia during tbe second half of the campaign for operational excellence can look until he turns blue, and will find at best a handful of cases of not completely brain dead "play".

Yes, but that does not mean there was no risk that they would bring superior operational play to bear on the soviets now and then. I.e. the Red Army was facing a risk in that respect.

Originally posted by JasonC:

But anybody who maintains German tactics in Russia in WW II sucked, is claiming something with absolutely massive evidence against it. The Russians had a better strategy, and from the fall of 1942 on they had clearly superior operational direction. From mid 1943 on, they had entirely adequate doctrine and large scale odds, combined with outstanding operational play against quite poor play. They were winning the war with highly successful, large scale offensives with complete control of the initiative.

They had the doctrine alright, but they still were not as good at implementing it.

Originally posted by JasonC:

In essentially every near approach to that stacked a deck, in favor of one side, in the history of great power war, the side with all that going for it would have inflicted vastly higher losses than the side with all of those things against it. Yet the opposite was the case in Russia. This is not a sign of tactical stupidity. It is incoherent to claim German defensive tactics in Russia sucked.

Nobody does, see above.

Originally posted by JasonC:

To maintain it, people here have been resorting to the hackneyed claim (only plausible before any of the Russian studies appeared) that German operational direction was superior, and the Russians only equalized on that score in 1944.

So in your opinion they equalised in 1943? In which case it is not a 'hackneyed claim', but a matter of difference about the timing when this happened.

Originally posted by JasonC:

Those superior tactics allowed them to inflict the losses they inflicted in 1943, and even in 1944 when their own front was coming apart. (The Germans lost 6 million including wounded on the eastern front from the invasion through the end of November 1944. Their allies might have added 1 or 2 more. The Russians lost 5 million in the year of their greatest successes, 1944, alone).

Ah - well now we are getting somewhere with the loss figures. So, from June 1944 to November 1944, the Germans lost 20% more than the Red Army in the whole year. Does not seem so bad to me, if I was at STAVKA. Looking at Glantz, and using some other figures, the loss ratio for Iassy is roughly 1:4 in favour of the Soviets (this is not directly comparable, since it excludes Romanians, but it gives a rough idea of the scale of what went on). For Bagration it looks at <2:1 in favour of the Germans. Again not too bad one could argue, and certainly a significant improvement on earlier offensives.

Edit to add: Even this makes the germans look good, because say >1/3rd of the Soviet losses would come back after recuperation, while the German losses are irrecoverable.

Originally posted by JasonC:

They even allowed them to hold together a line overall despite massive operational defeats in the course of 1943. They were not enough to repeat that performance in 1944 because the numbers were no longer there. The Germans on defense were tactical monsters who had to be laboriously bled to death at tremendous cost. Despite their operational mediocrity (to be as charitable as possible) and their strategic ineptitude.

If you look at the figures in Glantz again, you'll see it was not just a case of attrition, but really one of mobilisation on the Soviet side. If you exclude Kursk and the preparation for it, the force ratio is reasonably stable, but it suddenly crashes (or goes through the ceiling, depending on how you look at it) from July 1944.

Just picking the earliest figures for each year: 1941 - 1.00:1.4

1942 - 1.52:1

1943 - 2.03:1

1944 - 2.20:1

1945 - 2.96:1

These are of course masking quite significant goings-on within them and can therefore only be rough indicators.

Originally posted by JasonC:

Duh. And there was a ton of it. Nevertheless, German divisions in their supposedly stupid deployments routinely fought against stacked decks and intelligent fire plans and outscored their numerically overwhelming attackers. So apparently it wasn't so easy to waltz right over them.

Well, it was during Bagration and Iassy. So what had changed then? The strongpoints were still well manned, by equally capable divisions, if I am to believe what I read here.

Originally posted by JasonC:

"the deployment of them that was changed dramatically in 1944."

Compared to 1943? Hardly. What critical formation or use changes do you detect between fall 1943 Russians and summer 1944 Russians? Even compared to late 1942, the changes are not large, though they are certainly more experienced at it.

See the first reply about size of ships and motion of the ocean.

Originally posted by JasonC:

Even in mid 1942 German operational play declined (e.g. targeting the Caucasus instead of Voronezh, terrain rather than the enemy army, then the nonsense about frontally storming Stalingrad). But the reason they couldn't win in 1942 was primarily strategic not operational. They hadn't mobilized the economy before attacking in the first place, and as a result by late 1942 they were behind a full year's worth of AFVs at maximum production rates, etc.

That is not operational, it is strategic.

Originally posted by JasonC:

What changed by 1944? They kept their tactical skill. Their operations got worse without the initiative because of how offense minded their operational doctrine was, and because of high command interference. But marginally so - those hadn't exactly been brilliant in 1943.

The margin in capability shrunk.

Originally posted by JasonC:

The main operational change, though, was in their opponents, who were playing expert level chess by late 1942, while they had played like "fishes" in 1941. By mid 1943 they were playing master level chess and the Germans weren't anymore. Their strategy still sucked.

"Nobody's trying to short change the Germans."

Sure you are. "The Russians only learned how to do anything in 1944" or words to that effect. Well, that is horsefeathers, and you only have to look at a map.

I think that is where we disagree. You seem to believe that right after the desasters of Gallop and Star, somehow the Red Army saw the Light™. I contend it took them longer to figure it out, and they only got really good at it in 1945 (Vistula-Oder).

Originally posted by JasonC:

Andreas has been maintaining all along that the poor whittle Wehrmacht had simply impossible working conditions, and oh by the way their basic organizations made the majority of their army "unable to contribute in any significant form to combat operations", and their primary defense scheme was wide open to very simple tactics.

Please refrain from putting words into my mouth. Where do I say that tactics as such employed in Bagration or Iassy are 'simple'. I do not think so. I actually do believe that putting together the operations, and then executing them, required a wealth of skill on all levels.

Originally posted by JasonC:

And it is historical nonsense, because they were monsters and it took an incredible level of skill, odds, and losses to take them down - even when they were completely screwing up the higher direction of the war. Which are signs of good organizations and tactics, precisely at the division level and below, and precisely on defense.

Division level and below was irrelevant in 1944 - this is the point I have been making all along. Therefore relying on division level positions to save your rear was a huge mistake. If your opponent plays on Corps/Army level to defeat you, you will have to play that level as well. If you continue relying on your divisional strongpoint, you are IDS.

Originally posted by JasonC:

But the problem in Bagration was not stupid orders during it. Orders during it didn't matter a tuppenny damn. Nobody could hear them, or follow them. The army came quite completely apart, in a matter of days. (And yes, essentially all the armor had been shifted south. There were 3 mobile divisions and 300 AFVs in the whole AG. There was 5 times that much for the south).

That figure is far too low. 4th Army alone had 246 Stugs, 40 tanks and 116 heavy SP ATGs on 20th June. Total 402 AFVs. You need to add 9th Army and 3rd Panzer Army plus Army Group reserves to that. 300 may have been the operational figure (without recourse to the KTBs that is impossible to know), but it seriously understates the number of AFVs available. 20th Panzer Division was moved to the Army Group on 16th June, I believe. A number of Panzer divisions were moved after the start of the offensive (at least 12th and 5th), but by then it was too late.

Can you please give the source for your 300 AFV claim? Mine is Niepold.

Originally posted by JasonC:

A bridgehead was held out for stragglers, and those certainly tried to make it west, but they simply didn't. There was a stupid operational order beforehand that mattered, shifting AG center's armor south. But during it, operational direction was simply impossible. Everything was rapidly seperated from everything else (except for 2nd Army on the right). They couldn't have obeyed any coherent orders if they'd got them.

2nd Army was not attacked until 18th July, I believe.

Originally posted by JasonC:

"The Crimea was lost because the Germans could not support the defenders by sea."

Oh horsefeathers. It was lost because the Russians brought massive combat power to bear on it in a sensible way. It was stupid even to try to hold it. 3 cruisers off the shore wouldn't have made the slightest difference, nor arty ammo runs. The navies were utter sideshows.

Not in the Baltics. Without the German navy, Kurland could never have been held. I do agree that it was not of relevance to the Crimea though.

[ August 25, 2003, 08:08 AM: Message edited by: Andreas ]

[Andreas]

Just a quick anecdotal piece of data for Soviet officer training.

10th Guards Rifle Division on the Arctic front was commanded by a chap called Chudalov during the second half of the war. The last time before the war that he had any sort of formal training was in 1933, at Cavalry School. At the break-out of the war, he commanded the reconnaissance battalion of the division. He then rose to take over a regiment. Then he became the divisional commander. Finally, in December 1943 he was assigned to a staff course in Moscow, which was to last from January to April. So here we have someone in command of a large formation who had zero formal training for the job, at the end of 1943.

The training was cut short in early March, when he was sent back to his division, BTW.

Contrast that with the German approach to training, explained quite well in 'Soldat' by Siegfried Knappe, where every officer with general staff training was trained to lead a division. So on this level, it may well have been that the Germans had the edge until quite late in the war. If Comrade Chudalov's example is not an outlier, of course.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Andreas:

Just a quick anecdotal piece of data for Soviet officer training.

10th Guards Rifle Division on the Arctic front was commanded by a chap called Chudalov during the second half of the war. The last time before the war that he had any sort of formal training was in 1933, at Cavalry School. At the break-out of the war, he commanded the reconnaissance battalion of the division. He then rose to take over a regiment. Then he became the divisional commander. Finally, in December 1943 he was assigned to a staff course in Moscow, which was to last from January to April. So here we have someone in command of a large formation who had zero formal training for the job, at the end of 1943.

The training was cut short in early March, when he was sent back to his division, BTW.

Contrast that with the German approach to training, explained quite well in 'Soldat' by Siegfried Knappe, where every officer with general staff training was trained to lead a division. So on this level, it may well have been that the Germans had the edge until quite late in the war. If Comrade Chudalov's example is not an outlier, of course.

I just reread "The Generals" about the Canadian Army's senior commanders in WW II. It struck me that all the major armies expanded considerably during the war and that many senior commanders would have had little formal training or experience. Canada went from an Army with only 450 officers prewar to having some 50,000 - quite a leap. There was a huge problem in finding adequate divisional commanders - and the problem was a pyramid, really, for once you have your divisional commanders, you must select from those that are suitable corps commanders; from those corps commanders, you need to find men suitable for Army command. In the German and Russian examples, you would then need to find Army Group (or Front) commanders. Not every division commander is capable of higher command, either, and there are significant differences in the responsibilities and ways of doing business of the various levels of command - meaning a corps commander would optimally have experience of leading a division, etc.

If the example of Knappe and Chudalov are really any indication, this is a significant factor. Some of Canada's costliest battles - Ortona and the fighting south of Caen at the end of July 1944, for example - were planned by two generals who were notorious for planning unimaginative frontal attacks (Vokes and Foulkes). But they were all we had.

The Germans had a rapid expansion also - from a 100,000 man standing Army in 1933 to several millions by 1939. As good as their staff officer training may have been, there is a limit to how much actual experience your corps, army and army group commanders can actually manage to achieve in the space of a few short years, not to mention the problem of identifying suitable candidates in the first place.

Canada's best generals were relatively junior officers at the start of the war (Hoffmeister was a major in the Militia); I take it so were the Germans - Rommel was an Oberstleutnant at Führerhauptquartier in Poland, was he not? For every prewar German general such as Guderian that commanded high formations in the field in WW II, were there many more formation commanders in Russia who had been colonels and company commanders in 1939?

I would be interested in learning more about the Soviet system, and whether or not the officer here is indeed an "outlier."

[JasonC]

"So, from June 1944 to November 1944, the Germans lost 20% more than the Red Army in the whole year"

No.

German KIA, Eastern Front 1941 - 11.30.44: 1,419,728

German MIA, Eastern Front 1941 - 11.30.44: 997,056

German WIA, Eastern Front 1941 - 11.30.44: 3,498,060

Not from June of 1944. From June of 1941. The date of the German invasion of Russia, not the start of Bagration.

The Russians lost 5 million counting wounded in 1944 alone. (Their whole war losses have an additional digit...)

[JasonC]

The Russian system was certainly learning by doing. They had enourmous "churn", because of a high loss rate and a high mobilization rate. Failures got themselves killed. The Germans did most of that, the Russians did the rest by ruthlessly sacking anybody who failed.

As a result, talent went up the ranks like a rocket, but it was found almost purely empirically. It was not trained in. You can see this in the career trajectories of the later senior commanders. If you survived and fought and were doing anything sensible, you got promoted. If you were actually doing well, you got an army.

Tasks that demanded lots of training or planning were centralized at the higher echelons, especially army and above. That economized on specialists, who are much more dependent on training than line commanders are. There is no question the Russians were weaker on that score.

What is noteworthy is that the Germans, despite their training, experience, selectiveness of officers, and general wonkishness, did not get better command direction on the map out of it. The Russians did. Their operational play is clearly better.

But the training difference at the lower levels - and the fact that Russian higher level skill was selected out of the units below rather than trained in (therefore obviously draining them, to some extent) - undoubtedly accounts for some of the clear German tactical superiority.

[Andreas]

Woops, completely misread your sentence about the losses. My bad, thanks for the correction.

[JasonC]

It occurred to me what Andreas' problem might be. Perhaps he is judging things not by an independent standard of whether each makes sense, or by comparison with the other guy on the other side of the line, but instead by the standard of German victory. That is, he thinks anything the Germans do that isn't enough to still win the war must be stupid.

German tactics even in 1944 were outstanding. You can see it in the loss figures. But they certainly weren't enough to defeat the Russians. Andreas says that therefore "division level and below didn't matter in 1944". Well, it sure as heck mattered to the 5 million Russians that got shot by the Germans that year. But no, tactics alone can't win a war.

And it doesn't matter whether you adapt them. You can rejigger the German tactics all you want. You can remove every idiot restriction. From the set up of AG Center June 1944 on, you can do anything you please and can have as consultants in generalship anyone you want. I'll take the Russian set up and my only advice will come from a 7 year old boy, who I will ask "which little mess of counters do you want to annihilate next?" And blow you away.

Over. Won. Grasp the concept. There is such a thing as a forced mate, or a difference in position and material so large the outcome of the game is absolutely certain whatever the opponent does. (Look at the operational armor numbers in Jentz). If you want to make any material improvement in the German position, you have to instead go back to prior strategic and operational mistakes, and ask to "have them back".

Does this mean nothing the Germans did in 1944 was wrong? No. They didn't have to put their armor in the south before Bagration. They didn't have to defend so much, so far forward. They didn't have to wait until after the collapse to pull out the manpower stops. All true, all irrelevant if your standard is actual German victory or even defensive success against the Russians. Even if you change every one of them, the Russians are still going to squash you. They won the war in 1943, and were just "cashing in".

German tactics in 1944 weren't dumb because they failed to stop Bagration. It would have taken the US Strategic Air Command of 1955 to stop Bagration. It is an impossible standard. The standard of whether tactics are good ones or poor ones is whether they give you a force multiplier against a competent enemy, not whether that force multiplier is "infinity".

[Redwolf]

I think part of the problem here is that some are overly impressed with Soviet operational art.

Yes, it was one of the biggest factor for them for winning the war.

No, the same kind of opertional planning and conduct wouldn't have made sense for the Germans or any other Western army.

And it could have failed easily if the Germans figured out what the huge local superiorities that were hitting them really came from (instead of thinking the Soviet union just had endless manpower and production capablities) and could shift some equipment to counter it to the Eastern front (i.e. no/smaller bombing campaign and/or no invasion in France).

[Andreas]

Originally posted by JasonC:

It occurred to me what Andreas' problem might be. Perhaps he is judging things not by an independent standard of whether each makes sense, or by comparison with the other guy on the other side of the line, but instead by the standard of German victory. That is, he thinks anything the Germans do that isn't enough to still win the war must be stupid.

Perhaps, but that would be very stupid, wouldn't it? But you can always ask me.

Let me know when you have dug out the source for the 300 AFVs.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by redwolf:

And it could have failed easily if the Germans figured out what the huge local superiorities that were hitting them really came from (instead of thinking the Soviet union just had endless manpower and production capablities) and could shift some equipment to counter it to the Eastern front (i.e. no/smaller bombing campaign and/or no invasion in France).

Ahem - 'could have failed easily if...' Those are some stiff requirements for 'easy'.

So how many German forces would have been released by a non-invasion in France in Summer 1944, and in time to defeat in succession Bagration, L'vov Sandomierz and then Iassy, i.e. not when the autumn storms hit the canal?

[Tero]

They didn't. They lost, both times. They held out a while and made it expensive, and so were able to get terms - better ones the first time, largely because of how inexperienced the Russians were. But their army was defeated on both occasions, and had they not made peace on terms they would have been conquered outright. Not surprising given the odds, which yes do matter.

Ah yes, if only those poor idiot tactically benighted Germans had gone to school with the uberFinns, they might have held off the Russian hordes. The Germans inflicted more damage on a vastly superior enemy with vastly better strategies and operational direction than any great power in world history. Their tactics were not the problem. Their tactics, anybody can profitably learn from. (The Finns lost too).

While gathering data for rebuttal this occurred to me.

These remarks of yours present an intellectual and a scholarly problem. You seem to think the Soviet tactics and doctrine sucked against the Germans while their were effective against the Finns. In other words: the Germans were better than the Finns at defending against the new style Red Army assault.

On one hand you commend and vehemently defend the excellence of the German tactics and doctrine while you trash their operational skills and strategies. On the other hand you cathegorically berate and downright ridicule the Finnish tactics, doctrine, operational skills and strategy. On top of that you commend the Soviet strategies and operational art while you belittle their tactics and doctrine.

You seem to think that the German tactics and doctrine was par excellence and there can be no-one who can come even close to their level of proficiency (well, perhaps the Western Allies ?). You commend the Soviet strategies and operational art while you cast doubt on their tactics and doctrine. You speak of the Finnish tactics, doctrine, operational skills and strategies as if you had the same amount of in debth knowledge on them as you have on the Germans and the Soviets.

Riddle me this, oh great one: if the Finnish tactics, doctrine, operational art and stratgies sucked so much and they were so much more inferior to the German ones how was it possible for the events to unfold the way they did ?

The first peace feelers had been sent out already in late 1943. The Soviet attack started June 10th. The Isthmus part of the Vyborg-Petrozavodsk operation reached its goal (capture of Viipuri) in 10 days in June 20th as per their (post facto ?) stated final agenda. After that they pounded their heads against the Finnish defences for a month (from June 20th until July 18th) before this part of the operation was called off. The Petrozavodsk part of the operation started June 21st while the Finnish troops had started disengageing from the sector June 16th. The Finnish forces fought a delaying action, manned the U-line and beat back the attacking forces in fighting that went on until August 4th. The last enemy attempt was beaten back by encircling and routing two Red Army divisions in an engagement (operation ?) between August 1st and August 9th. Cease fire started September 5th, the peace treaty was signed September 19th. After all this the Finnish army was in far better shape it had been in 1940.

AFAIK the only German AG in the East which could hold out in the same positions for more than a month under constant attack (tactical and operational pressure) was AG North.

This leads me to believe that for all your 20-year detailed studies of the Eastern Front tactics, doctrine and strategies your knowledge of the field is rather narrowminded and incomplete in places. It can be said it is biased even. Your grasp of the strategic level is excellent (when it comes to the main contestants at least). Your attempts to apply that knowledge to the operational/tactical level are a bit wobbly.

[ August 28, 2003, 04:00 AM: Message edited by: Tero ]