Maneuver and Annihilation Battle

[Cuirassier]

As I continue to play CMBB, I am becoming more interested in using the historical tactical doctrines unique to the specific nationalities. For most of my CM career, I've played mostly as the Russians, using the attritionist methods often explained by JasonC. Finally, I feel I am beginning to master this doctrine.

Now however, I'm interested in also learning how to play CM with a more maneuverist approach, particularly using the Germans and their historical methods of annihilation battle.

Earlier in the 'German tactical system' thread, I learned the basics of the German system, such as how maneuver units are expected to win the fight, attacking weak points, the use of shock action, reinforcing success, and the use of flanking, feigning and encircling.

However, I've found putting these concepts into practice to be more difficult. Because of this, I think it would be valuable if noobs and veterans contributed their knowledge alike to this thread asking and discussing how the German maneuver doctrine truly works, given different force types and terrain.

Off the top of my head I have a few questions.

Do players who use this doctrine plan where they will conduct 'feints' and where the schwerpunkt will occur during the set up phase, or do they just send infantry across the map on a broad front hoping to find a weak point to send their forces through, making the decision where to attack later in the game?

For scouting, what are appropiate forces? I'm thinking a half-squad would be too brittle and small. So perhaps for each scouting route a platoon lead by a half-squad?

How is this doctrine used by tank heavy forces? Similar to the Russian Mech idea? And can infantry only forces still use the maneuver approach, or are they too brittle?

Also, I know speed is important, so how does one quickly run over positions covered by an HMG without becoming bogged down?

So those are a few questions I can think of right now. So if the brilliant tacticians could share their experiences using the German maneuver system and how it can be used in CM, it would be greatly appreciated.

[MikeyD]

I read recently a comment that German tacticians practically worshiped the battle of Cannae in 216 BC where Hannibal flanked and defeated the Roman army.

Most CM scenarios frustrate attempts at encirclement because of the time constraint & map size. I do remember one game a long time ago. The German opponent assaulted me frontally and I successfully held them back. But at scenario's conclusion I was presented with a major defeat! Going back to the map I discovered the AI(!) had held me in place by the frontal feint and entirely circled around my units. I found him sitting under the flags in strength. A human player would've then attackd me from behind and easily routed me.

Not many scenarios where youve got the time or the proper map to accomplish such heroic feats.

[Joachim]

There are no rear areas, no supplies or comms lines in CM and the enemy HQ is out of reach for the Pixeltruppen. So what should a maneuverist aim for?

My background regarding M&A:

Vs the AI I am deeply maneuverist - cause it is the best thing to annihilate the stupid AI troops running for the lone lost flag. (Yes, gamey... but not vs +100% bonus)

Vs humans I am an attritionist. The AARs usually rank losses over flags and an attrited opponent has no units to hold flags. Maneuver is to reduce the slaughter on my side.

I don't think maneuverist and attritionist exclude each other.

IMHO CM is not well suited for maneuver at all. Most battles are too small regarding space and time. If you have to advance 1k in 25 turns there is no time for maneuver.

Annihilation was achieved when troops were forced out into the open - either to prevent an encirclement, trying to break an encirclement or surrendering. Next best thing in CM is when a forward plt tries to make it back to avoid getting overrun by superior firepower or tanks. But that does not happen with a static defender in CM - or a small map.

In a btn sized inf only attack ("South of Kharkov", several square km, a big wood as Soviet centerposition with open ground elsewehre.) I set up with a Schwerpunkt on the right flank and a "pinning" force on the left that tried to look bigger than it was (halfsquads). I did not want to face Andreas whole btn where I would enter the forest... across 100+m of open ground.

I broke thru as I had more firepower on my Schwerpunkt. The StuKas killed one of his FOs while he overlooked the 2nd plus they killed one plt on each side. I replaced it, he preferred not to reinforce his flank as I had MGs set up to deny some areas. Despite lots of open ground I easily broke thru on the weakened flank, moved my reserves in - including a lateral shift of forces and then turned his flank.

I don't think this was very maneuverist but it gave me quantitative odds in almost every firefight while I had only qualitative odds overall (vet btn vs conscripts). Fighting conscripts helped a lot.

In smaller battles it depends on the terrain. Given the usual attacker odds in CM, you can't expect to have odds everywhere plus some reserves.

If parallel movement is possible and does not take much time, it is possible to have a broad front and concentrate once a weak spot is found.

In some terrain you need reinforcements up very quickly or all of your heavy weapons concentrated to deny movement of the defender around your Schwerpunkt - just to prevent an ambush killing your men and getting away. Then you can't use broad front if you can't support your whole front.

The scouting force depends on the force size. A company can't scout with a plt. In the above example I had halfsquads scouting for plts, plts scouting for their sector and heavy weapons covering the scouts when moving across open ground. Once in the woods, I used 2-3 up and 1-2 back and tried to achieve a broad front. Not much cover differential in the woods so scouting ain't that important (except for minefields). It's find-fix-destroy. If you can't fix, finding is expensive. It is not important how brittle the scouts are - it is important that their backup can spot and fix what is shooting at them. IMHO the morale bonus for squads vs halfsqauds is not worth the cost. I prefer having the 2nd hald being able to take the heat off the scouts. Either by support fire or by going forward and drawing fire.

The plan was made before I started, including Schwerpunkt and the "feint", but I could have shifted the attack (I had 120 turns) if I had encountered massive resistance.

Inf only forces can advance, even across the open - depending on how packed the map is. In dense terrain inf rules anyway.

Advancing vs an MG? See JasonC's posts on the topic. But you need firepower and/or odds if you want to do it quickly. If you don't have the firepower to silence the MG quickly, go around it.

Gruß

Joachim

[Cuirassier]

Thanks for the replies.

Joachim,

When using your half-squads 'feint,' did you actually have to engage the enemy with them to fix them in place, or just hold their portion of the front static in cover?

Also, where did you get that scenario. I can't find it at TSD II or TPG.

Normally, as you did in your example scenario, I plan how my attack will be launched in the Setup phase. I've played a couple of scenarios though trying the broad front scouting idea followed up by shoving the main body through a weak point. In my tries, I never had much success, because I seem short on time, and the speed my column has to move at means a single holdout shooter that scouts missed can severely slow down my forces.

Also, if the defense has any depth, I find its difficult to keep momentum with the attack.

With the broad front approach, I also found there might be a little too much of division of effort. For example, in one scenario, I was given two infantry companies (one would arrive later as a reserve). I decided to spread my initial company out so it could search for a weak point to exploit. However, my half squad scouts, backed by a platoon each for support, all ran into platoon sized positions: there was no weak point in his front. Also, the terrain was tight, and my overwatch weapons were quite light (50mm mortars and HMGs only). So basically, my first company was exchanging off platoon for platoon with the enemy. With an attritionist approach this wouldn't have happened.

So I'm thinking after Joachim's and MikeyD's comments, in addition to my recent experience, this concept is unworkable in CM, unless conditions are very favorable (lots of time, big reserve, low force to space so there are actually weak points)

Again, thanks for the input.

[Redwolf]

Well said, Joachim. By the time a battle arrives on a CM size field the maneuver attempt has already failed and you are stuck with one of these even, "fair" slugouts that colonel school told you to avoid at all cost.

The concept of "Deep Battle", however, can be applied to a certain degree.

Instead of attacking just a portion and the front of that portion, you try to always bring targets under fire throughout the whole depth of the enemy setup. Unless the terrain on the CM map hides the enemy rear area you can usually implement something along those lines. You want to stack shooters so that different shooters can cover the whole depth of your chose attack sector. That should allow you to catch moving reserves on the run, to get side shots on cross-front moving AFVs or to shoot at halftracks before they unload. You can also hope to disable gun transport.

The trick is to do that in a way that you don't open parts of your force to enemy flank fire, which might be quite tricky to do.

[Tactical Command]

Hi Cuirassier,

I found your first posting to this thread to be confusing (i.e. all over the place). I did a search for "The German tactical system" thread that you mentioned in your post and now I believe I have a better understanding of why you wrote what you did.

As earlier posters have already mentioned some of your questions are simply at a higher scale or scope of warfare than what can be represented within CMBB.

Now however, I'm interested in also learning how to play CM with a more maneuverist approach, particularly using the Germans and their historical methods of annihilation battle.

"German historical methods of annihilation battle" simply cannot be represented in a small unit action game such as CMBB. While the fundamental principle of German offensive doctrine during WW II was to encircle and destroy the enemy, accomplishing this feat generally took weeks of fighting (both offensively and defensively) before a large surrounded Soviet force was eliminated or surrendered. CMBB battles are nothing more than small skirmishes over small pieces of real estate.

Finally, I just want to mention that I have read your second post to this thread and I am still confused on EXACTLY what questions you are seeking answers to.

Do you want advice on a specific scenario you recently played (i.e. How to attack with the units you were given)?

Do you want to know how other forum members generally conduct an attack and if their recipe of tactics differ when they play as the Germans as opposed to the Soviets?

Maybe you only know how to attack an opponent ONE WAY and are looking for different/better methods of attacking?

[JasonC]

He just wants the other side of the attrition vs. maneuver debate to put up already, in a tactical CM context. Since they haven't, really, I'll take a stab at it. Shortly.

[Cuirassier]

Thanks JasonC for explaining my purposes to Tactical Command, so I didn't have to.

[JasonC]

The main idea of maneuver theory is perfectly applicable in the tactical, CM context. It is surprise. Most of the other ideas characteristic of maneuver attack are means to achieving it or characteristic ways of exploiting it. But the fundamental idea is to do something the opponent does not expect, and then to do five other things, hard, before he is done reacting to the first one. Think head game, and playing the enemy commander up in the sky, rather than his men down on the map.

To be useful, surprise has to have tactical consequences. The enemy has to somehow be caught "out of position", in the wrong stance or formation or direction, and this has to translate into something more lasting. The German version was very clear on what that more lasting consequence needs to be. Dead enemy. So, the idea is to anticipate the enemy, don't let him anticipate you, wrong-foot him, and cash that wrong-footing for dead bodies before he has time to get right-footed again. After you've cashed momentary surprise for lasting odds, you can always win the rest of the fight the brute force way - the enemy shouldn't have enough left to resist.

The scale issue is just to find ways of wrong footing someone that can translate into lousy fighting power for him compared to you. Classic ones on an operational scale are encirclements or cutting supplies, but those are mere means, not the point.

On a small enough scale, you have to worry that the enemy is deployed in a flexible, robust way and that the integration of his arms achieves itself. He might be intellectually surprised by something you do, but if all he has to do about it is have a few units rotate 30 or 90 degrees in place and fire in a different direction, that won't count as "surprised" in the sense required.

There are lots of ways CM forces get wrong footed, in ways that matter. Simplest example - 3/4 of your force is on a part of the map where only 1/4 of the enemy are, and the rest of his force can't help them. That is a many on few wrong footing, and can happen at any scale. It does require that ranges and LOS lines aren't so long everybody can help everybody else.

But other simple examples are at least as likely to matter on the CM scale. Infantry caught moving in the open rather than in cover, especially moving en masse and with the cover they'd like to end up in already occupied by the enemy, constitutes being "wrong footed". A flock of tanks taken in flank by shooters they hadn't expected or seen, constitutes being "wrong footed". A tight main body of infantry in dense woods walking right under barrage, constitutes being "wrong footed".

Even having the wrong force selection can count as surprise. Obviously the classic case is also possible - just being flanked. More generally, any strong attack (or fire) delivered by a part of your force the enemy did not know existed and would not expect where it appears, has a decent chance of catching the enemy "wrong footed".

What conditions further effective surprise? It helps if the enemy is blind. He might be blinded by night or fog or smoke or dense wooded or factory-urban terrain, or he might be blinded by having his eyes gouged out (in the recon screen battle, I mean). It helps if your own forces are speedy and robust enough to rapidly be where they were not expected - which means vet squad infantry rather than regular teams, in lots of cover, or it means tanks rather than infantry, and in a fist not penny packets. It helps if the enemy is stunned or on long command delays, which can come from a barrage or just from buttoning early AFVs.

It also helps if you know where you are going. Which can come from a recon screen, or from differential push (by which I mean piling on success while failures backs off). But the best place it came come from is a clear blue sky - by which I mean, flat guessing where the enemy is going to be and what he is trying to do, betting heavily that you are right.

Tenatively probing until you are sure is not the way to conduct a maneuver attack. You may or may not have a few minutes to look around first. Then you have to decide on a course of action and ram it home. Sometimes it is better to just ram it home from the set up onward, dispensing with prior knowledge entirely. If the plan is wrong, adapt once, rapidly. Terrain analysis at the start can tell you plenty, particularly against a cautious opponent, and particularly in MEs it is frequently far more important to use all available speed than to have half a dozen reports of enemy half squads.

Other themes - winning the armor war, the top of the escalation chain. Early. Intact armor vs. none makes it possible to cut up the enemy force with fire threats to open areas, and then gang up on the resulting pieces one at a time.

Big moves by all the heavy armor early are thematic - as opposed to leaving it all hanging back waiting for something. But you can't afford for such moves to be predictable. You have to avoid kill sacks not by scouting or attrition-ee prep work, but by sheer "nose" for where they are, and picking the unexpected route.

Another theme is using infantry as the main component of the force only inside large bodies of cover, so that LOS is very short and FP very high. That makes any initial many-on-few tend to snowball. Or using it very aggressively (recklessly, really) in conditions of low visibility, which again isolates the first few enemy hit.

Recon screen, typically a line of full squads side by side and moving rapidly, that wrap around smaller enemies and overrun single teams or outposts. Supported by a few pieces of armor, including at least one full AFV able to trump light armor. In wide open country a line of full tanks can be used instead. The purpose is to blind the enemy and get at least some infantry deep into his positions, which gums up any shifts of reserves. Then they go stationary and shoot, while the follow-on guys pick places to gang up on.

Wing attacks or envelopments are thematic, fighting only half the enemy force with almost all of your own. The remainder of the front is screened by a split platoon and teams, who look bigger than they are, but do not press beyond unoccupied cover.

As for forces, mostly tank infantry teams. Max the armor budget, or in a armor force type fight spend half the available points on just armor. High quality infantry (squads, therefore "fast" speed) to support them, or items that help win the armor war (without costing too much - shrecks, or one heavy PAK e.g.). A few specialized items that promise very high payoffs for perfect use against a wrong-footed opponent (SPW 251/2, flame vehicle, high capacity HE chucker e.g. a StuH).

Also thematic - feints, tricks, bait, traps. Stealth for the force maneuvering for the surprise bit, whether infantry in deep cover or anything in dead ground or sneaking and hiding while enemy pass you. And of course speed once stealth is dropped, to follow up the first attack before the enemy adapts and restores his coordination.

If you try to fight this way and aren't any good at getting inside your opponent's head, telegraph your punches, etc, then it won't remotely work and it can be hard to see the idea. If you guess right three times running and win each time because of it, you will get a big head rush (and probably overconfident). It can produce variance, as some guesses are right and others are not. And it can also simply work.

[ January 10, 2007, 11:11 PM: Message edited by: JasonC ]

[JasonC]

Now your specific questions

"plan where they will conduct 'feints' and where the schwerpunkt will occur during the set up phase"

Usually yes. Sometimes the plan changes once, but typically terrain analysis and anticipation of the enemy move (the latter more than the former) suggests the basic plan. And there is a plan.

"do they just send infantry across the map on a broad front hoping to find a weak point"

This is done too, maybe half the time not always, but not as a substitute for the former. A recon screen of full squads may advance on-line across half the map, while thinner stuff pretends to be doing the same thing on another portion.

The screen runs over any single team or half squad outposts to reduce enemy spotting and find his main positions. It laps around any real resistence. This is as much to take away space from the enemy and so reduce his intel, as to gain any for the attack. It also pushes squads into his position, finds routes, gets LOS into his backfield that gum up repositioning of reserves, and the like.

The main body is somewhere behind the screen, and may be as strong as the screen itself, plus most of the armor. It has a definite idea where it is going from the get-go. But it also has chances to kill stuff left relatively exposed and isolated by the recon screen having wrapped around it on three sides etc.

Sometimes the main body just launches, though, with only thin stuff elsewhere for deception and to keep an eye on enemy moves. If so, the main body wants an initially covered route (behind a hill e.g.).

"For scouting, what are appropiate forces?"

A full company of infantry with ~9 squads, nearly all of them on-line. 1-2 squads in second line behind them, with a company HQ or best platoon HQ. Plus one full AFV to trump light armor. Yeah, that is quite heavy compared to attrition methods. Call it "heavy front". All moving at speed. Will some run into full positions and get whacked? Very likely. Someone will do so first, probably.

"How is this doctrine used by tank heavy forces?"

The main idea is typically to make a fist of tanks and have it follow a covered route or a route found by the recon screen, and then blast portions of the enemy from unexpected places, and repeat. Always looking first for a chance to run the enemy out of armor in one violent minute.

Sometimes the armor will plain lead, if the ground is open. Attritionists stress keeping their armor alive as long as possible, making it hard for the enemy to get at it, babying it to deliver plenty of shells eventually. Maneuver instead stresses leaning on the armor, relying on it, expecting it to carry its weight and then some.

"can infantry only forces still use the maneuver approach, or are they too brittle?"

In the open with long LOS, they are too brittle and too slow. But in deep cover, they are fine at it. In night or fog, they are fine at it.

"how does one quickly run over positions covered by an HMG"

Drive a tank to 100 meters away and blow the heck out of it. Then rush the infantry forward again. Maneuver means taking risks to get speed. "But there could be a towed gun covering". Sure, so figure out exactly where it is, in your head, and put the tank in the right spot to see one and not the other. You are using maneuver strategy, "I don't know" is not an acceptable answer. You guess and you get it right because you can think your opponent's thoughts, or the whole thing doesn't work.

[Cuirassier]

Thanks for the analysis, JasonC.

I have some comments on your posts. For the first one:

Your comments on surprise and 'wrongfooting' the enemy seem very valid to me, especially the many on few idea and engaging enemies in sequence. But how some of these can be achieved still seems like somewhat of a mystery, because it depends largely on the other player and his mistakes.

"But other simple examples are at least as likely to matter on the CM scale. Infantry caught moving in the open rather than in cover, especially moving en masse and with the cover they'd like to end up in already occupied by the enemy, constitutes being "wrong footed". A flock of tanks taken in flank by shooters they hadn't expected or seen, constitutes being "wrong footed". A tight main body of infantry in dense woods walking right under barrage, constitutes being "wrong footed"."

For example, against competent players, I think it is unlikely that they would move significant portions of their force in the open in a big clump. They would probably use packet movement, even if they were almost 100% sure a maneuverist wasn't there.

Also, overconcentrated infantry being shelled in woods I also see as a mistake that need not happen in competent play.

Another thing:

"Another theme is using infantry as the main component of the force only inside large bodies of cover, so that LOS is very short and FP very high. That makes any initial many-on-few tend to snowball. Or using it very aggressively (recklessly, really) in conditions of low visibility, which again isolates the first few enemy hit."

I can see Soviet SMG's ending such an attack quite quickly and bloodily.

These are just potential issues I see with the doctrine so far. To me it seems that it could be rather difficult to 'wrong foot' a more competent and cautious player. Nonetheless, it sounds like a doctrine that can work if you can consistently achiever surprise, as you said. When comparing it to the attritionist doctrine however, I can see it is much more risky.

Now for your second post:

I understand all the answers to my questions except one:

""For scouting, what are appropiate forces?""

"A full company of infantry with ~9 squads, nearly all of them on-line. 1-2 squads in second line behind them, with a company HQ or best platoon HQ. Plus one full AFV to trump light armor. Yeah, that is quite heavy compared to attrition methods. Call it "heavy front". All moving at speed. Will some run into full positions and get whacked? Very likely. Someone will do so first, probably."

In this description, are you assuming this that I have more forces supporting this company (ie 1 or 2 more companies), or that the company is your only force? If the company is your only force (plus the support weapons), travelling fast on such a heavy front seems quite dangerous. But that is maneuverism I guess.

I look forward to trying some of these concepts out.

[JasonC]

Wrong-footing certainly happens. Take the men in the open case as an example.

In MEs, sometimes people rush to reach flags, and can be caught wrong footed by armor driving unexpectedly fast to catch them before the reach cover they thought would be easy to get to before anybody saw them, for example. Or a large force may be caught in the open by a force sneaked to an unexpected location, that hides as early enemy forces pass over the ground, and only unhides when they have a lot more people in LOS. People often think a route some of their forces have crossed without drawing any fire is safe, particularly when they have no reason to expect the region is under enemy LOS.

Or take a tight force caught in woods by a barrage. You say a competent player won't be caught that way - but tight forces in woods can smash thinner forces in woods, rapidly, if there isn't a barrage on the way. It is a paper scissor rock kind of thing. Sure it is risky to bunch up in woods, due to arty. It is risky to stay thin in woods, due to bunched enemy infantry. It is risky to cede woods to the enemy, because it can be good cover and allow large amounts of infantry to get close to you. But you get to pick one of those, pretty much.

Maneuver theory is all about anticipating the enemy's choices. You don't much care whether those choices were fundamentally solid and professional and informed, though sure you'd rather they were reckless and silly. But the main thing it just, if you can guess them ahead of time, you can burn him for being too predictable. If "solid play" is more predictable, so much the worse for "solid play". That is the idea. Naturally there may be conditions (of force mix, opponent, your own skill or lack thereof) in which it can't be pulled off, but there will be others in which it can.

As for the fear that SMGs will kill your woods-infantry team, four separate points. One, you are supposed to have guessed what the enemy would try, and you are supposed to have specifically picked your own force and approach to counter it. Clearly if you don't, he might wrong foot you. Isn't saying anything. Two, if the SMGers were just hit by a serious barrage, they will lose to such an attack regardless of their armament. Forest fights go to the side up and shooting and are lost by the first side to pin. Three, Germans have SMG infantry of their own from late 1943 on, no reason they should cede that to the Russians forever. Four, SMGers sitting in a big block of woods waiting for a big infantry attack, can be wrong footed just like anything else - e.g. a few HMGs or armor covers their routes to help the other side of the field and then they are out of position, or the attack is mostly armor and doesn't much care where they go.

Every enemy move has some counter, that is the whole idea. So the goal is not to do something that cannot possibly be countered - the whole approach denies there is any such thing. Nor is it to laboriously and slowly and expensively discover what moves the enemy made 5 or 10 minutes ago, and then try to counter them by adaptation after the fact. Instead, the battle is meant to turn on whether you outthink your enemy and anticipate him correctly, even before your men know enough to say either way. Your mind leads your eyes, not the other way around.

The reason this can work is that human beings are somewhat predictable. Sure there are hundreds of things they might possible try - and if you think you have to counter all of them, you will come prepared in a half-hearted way for all of them, and tentatively tiptoe around until you know more, imagining all the things that could go wrong. But there is also only one thing the enemy actually does. And if you counter that and that only, you have a perfect target and focus.

If you are wrong in your guess, gosh darn, improvise adapt and overcome. If you are right, on the other hand, you cream him. Maneuver strategy does not shun risk, it seeks it and seeks to plunge the enemy into it as well, expecting the enemy to become relatively cautious and lethargic in consequence.

As for what else there typically is behind the recon screen company, it is typically about half the force. The main body is a platoon of armor. If it also has another company of infantry helping out, great, a strong attack. In a pinch maybe they only have a single platoon riding the tanks, and an FO. The tanks are the business end anyway.

To help see the recon screen idea, lets be a bit more concrete about deployments of that front company. Either the company HQ is highly capable, or it isn't but there is one strong platoon HQ out of the 3 - you generally have at least one or the other. Call this the best HQ. It keeps 3 squads - in the case of the company, one drawn from each of the others. Each of the other HQs gets 2 squads, company included. You thus have 4 "platoons", 1 of them "heavy". (A variant is to have 2 "heavy" platoons and 1 worst one with only a single squad, then split that squad, as a "patrol" aka "dummy platoon").

OK, now the deployment. All four platoons on-line, left to right. Each with 2 squads up and the HQ centered between and trailing somewhat. The "heavy" platoon(s) keep their 3rd back beside the HQ, as a "second line" behind a modest 1-2 out of 4 groups.

Each platoon can pick its own route. The squads can sometimes squeeze onto corners of the same tile, when cover is good but scarce. Or they can be up to 80m apart, at the limits of command reach for the HQ between. Between each group there can be just 25m of seperation, or their can be 100-150 yards. Ergo, the whole company can squeeze down to 200 yards or expand to 800 yards.

Everybody is in a group with a small command span, which can maneuver independently. They can each pick covered or unexpected routes, pack in tightly into minimal available cover. They can all move fast. Nobody is waiting around for info from somebody else or for the battle to develop. Nobody is hanging back 200-400m, "blowing" the first 3-5 minutes.

The groups have just enough for minimalist packet movement when it is called for, but mostly "travel" (all move at once) until shot at. Each small group is strong enough to "run over" tank hunters, DP LMGs, ATRs, or half squad outposts, without any delay or trouble. A single MG will slow a group, but if there is cover to leapfrog to along the picked route, not to stop even the one shot at, from closing.

The goal is not to attack any full battle position, beyond the scout level forces mentioned above. If a single forward platoon is encountered, one of the groups will be directly opposite, but at least one will be nearby and able to support but typically not directly engaged yet. You can if you want support laterally.

At least as thematic, though, you can sideslip past with the neighboring groups, rather than reinforce the failing one. Just park an HE chucker or call a barrage on the position, and keep pushing forward elsewhere. The "checked" platoon rallies as best it can and just screens them in front. No need or desire to smash into the defenders and knock them down.

The real job is being done where no enemy were encountered, and another scrap of cover can safely be reached. That job is simply getting farther forward, intact. It works using limited visibility or cover or both. The advance is typically faily stealthy - short arcs, little outgoing fire, whether there is incoming or not.

The goal is simply to push infantry closer to the enemy position, grabbing all the open, unoccupied locations. The enemy gets less intel because his smallest scouts can't get through a screen that heavy, or survive it passing them. You get more because your foremost squads, worming through cover and skulking here and there, see lots of the enemy side of the map. Their fire also cuts up his repositionings.

That is all the recon screen needs to do. It takes away enemy "luft". It freezes portions of his force in place. It simultaneously informs you about real enemy positions. And it leaves bits and pieces of infantry all along the enemy front.

It isn't the main body. It doesn't need to do more than that. It is the shield or the obscuring cloak. Behind comes the sword, aimed at one picked spot. It has to win the battle for you. The screen just gets it nice conditions to go to work in.

See, now with the screen closed up everywhere, whenever anything fires is it actually IDed. See, now when your sword hits the enemy way over on the left, his men in the center and and on the right can't help, there is too much of your infantry looking into open in the way, far enough forward to cut up the fields. See, now the foremost enemy infantry, when actually hit by "sword force", has already spent half its ammo shooting at your screen. Etc.

None of this means, incidentally, that the company has to span the whole map. It can, but it needn't. More often, a dummy patrol is all there is on half or more, and the others advance on a front of only ~400 yards. But the purpose and the drill are the same.

[Joachim]

Originally posted by Cuirassier:

Thanks for the replies.

Joachim,

When using your half-squads 'feint,' did you actually have to engage the enemy with them to fix them in place, or just hold their portion of the front static in cover?

Also, where did you get that scenario. I can't find it at TSD II or TPG.

Normally, as you did in your example scenario, I plan how my attack will be launched in the Setup phase. I've played a couple of scenarios though trying the broad front scouting idea followed up by shoving the main body through a weak point. In my tries, I never had much success, because I seem short on time, and the speed my column has to move at means a single holdout shooter that scouts missed can severely slow down my forces.

Also, if the defense has any depth, I find its difficult to keep momentum with the attack.

With the broad front approach, I also found there might be a little too much of division of effort. For example, in one scenario, I was given two infantry companies (one would arrive later as a reserve). I decided to spread my initial company out so it could search for a weak point to exploit. However, my half squad scouts, backed by a platoon each for support, all ran into platoon sized positions: there was no weak point in his front. Also, the terrain was tight, and my overwatch weapons were quite light (50mm mortars and HMGs only). So basically, my first company was exchanging off platoon for platoon with the enemy. With an attritionist approach this wouldn't have happened.

So I'm thinking after Joachim's and MikeyD's comments, in addition to my recent experience, this concept is unworkable in CM, unless conditions are very favorable (lots of time, big reserve, low force to space so there are actually weak points)

Again, thanks for the input.

Scenario source: Andreas' "I wish it was der Kessel" page. "http://homepage.mac.com/a.biermann/Scenarios/Menu13.html" You can also find it in sig link.

One of Cory Runyan's CMBB scen.

The halfsquads did not engage - they moved towards an enemy half a mile away. I think they never got closer than 400m. Most of them then rejoined in cover as I had already turned the right flank. I'd need Andreas memory to help tell us whether the feint was successful.

Your conclusions about force to space are correct. But given Jason's post above, I'd rather put it as "force to range ratio". If there is low LOS or you have SMG squads only, a small map might do. With Tigers or Panthers and 2k viz, you need a massive map. E.g. try my CMAK "A big one" scen where I put RCT sized forces on each side on a huge desert map in late '42. A massive strain with 20min calcs for some turns. You need all the space for the tanks while the inf concentrates on the center. Source: IIRC only in some salvaged scen packs from the old TSD. The opposite is any night battle or Andreas foggy "Prime real estate" (if yet available).

What Jason says about achieving surprise and then exchanging it for dead enemies - well... to me attritionism is achieving favorable kill ratios while maneuverism is avoiding fighting a prepared enemy. So surprise is a key element in maneuverism. But if you trade surprise for dead enemies (aka something lasting) then surprise is attritionist to me.

But maybe I just don't care about the maneuverism vs attritionism debate, take the best of both and fail to correctly identify the borders between both theories

Gruß

Joachim

[Cuirassier]

Thanks for clarifying the few questions I raised JasonC. Its obvious I just have a difficult time wrapping my head around the high risk headgames that maneuverism requires. I've always been a cautious player.

Nonetheless, I'm beginning to see how it works now. I have a few new questions now though:

Is the description you give of maneuverism in CM essentially the same the Germans used tactically in WWII?

If yes, do you know any historic examples where it succeeded? (I guess there would be many since the Germans did quite well tactically)

Any examples where it failed? (quite disasterously)

If you know any off the top of your head, or can point me in the direction of some online AAR's, that would be fine.

Joachim,

Thanks for the link.

"What Jason says about achieving surprise and then exchanging it for dead enemies - well... to me attritionism is achieving favorable kill ratios while maneuverism is avoiding fighting a prepared enemy. So surprise is a key element in maneuverism. But if you trade surprise for dead enemies (aka something lasting) then surprise is attritionist to me.

But maybe I just don't care about the maneuverism vs attritionism debate, take the best of both and fail to correctly identify the borders between both theories"

Its certainly a debate that has gone on for along time. I enjoy reading about it, and often look in the old archived forums to see what information I can pull from those. From what I've learned tactical maneuverism has the same end goal as attrition (destruction of the enemy), except its accomplished differently (maneuver units the primary arm, rushing to engage enemies in sequence, etc)

Yet everyone certainly has their own views. I learned that when reading the heated debates in the archived forums from the old CMBO days.

But anyway, thanks for the replies.

[JasonC]

There are more than two positions involved. What complicates it is some claim "ownership" of others who actually disagree with them on various points, or do so selectively.

There is modern maneuver doctrine as exemplified by people like Leonard Wood. They cite Sun Tsu with approval, they believe JFC Fuller was right about deep penetrations, in addition to widely citing German postwar writings and WW II practices. But they tend to overlook the ways Guderian disagreed with and "corrected" Fuller. They take Sun Tsu out of context. They ignore the main German tradition informing their WW II practice, which was considerably older than armor or Guderian etc.

Sometimes they also cite BHL Hart with approval, and he in turn tries to appropriate figures as disparate as Lee, Napoleon, and even Scipio Africanus as supposedly "grocking" before the letter BHL Hart's Secret of the Great Captains On A Cereal Box Master Lesson, "Go Around". For which he uses Napoleon's term for something else, that had a different object (I mean "the indirect approach").

That is at least 1 position and maybe 5 (Wood, Sun Tsu, Fuller, Hart, Napoleon), several of whom are talking about quite different things. On top of the historical Germans, who are one or two themselves.

The critical point of difference between actual German practice in WW II and modern Woodesque maneuver theory, is the Germans still believed in annihilation battle, as the thread title alludes to. Annihilation battle was the 19th century German theory term for it, and is thinking, itself, of practices and doctrine from the Napoleonic era, and of Napoleon personally, in particular. Sedan 1870 is annihilation battle - the whole French army surrounded and destroyed in one engagement. Jena-Auerstadt is annihilation battle (up to requiring a pursuit as well, to be sure) suffered by the Germans rather than wielded by them, and burned into their collective military brain the importance of the subject.

Napoleon's stylized formula for his doctrine of annihilation battle is that all the good generals around him and before him "saw too many things at once", whereas he Napoleon sees "only one thing - the main body of the enemy. This I crush, confident that lesser matters will take care of themselves".

In its Napoleonic form it is a counsel against secondary operations, against worrying about the flanks, against frittering away time or reserves. It also preaches against seeking small advantages gradually, trying to win without fighting, maneuvering the enemy out of his position, conducting seiges, worrying about supply lines. Instead, seek battle immediately, seek decisive battle, aggressively face defeat and destroy the main enemy field army. And all the rest will become easy.

"But what if I lose that battle?" So don't lose that battle - but do make it so winning that battle really means something.

It has to be understood that this is a gusty, specific, and non-traditional approach. It is emphatically not what Sun Tsu is talking about. To Sun Tsu, the able captain seeks advantages, and his able opponent is moved by their possible effects and threats. Both sides assess whether they wish to risk battle, and if both know their limitations and the situation, only one of them ought to seek it and the other ought to avoid it. Which generally means no battle.

To Sun Tsu, is the the reckless and the bankrupt who hazard the coin-flip of a battle - it is a kind of confession that you expect the enemy to outplay you if the preliminary maneuering for advantage continues. To him, the best is to win outright because the enemy was force to withdraw by the mere threat created by your accumulated advantages. And the next best is to reduce the enemy to such desparation that he seeks battle even though you have all the advantages, and then you win. Compared to either, it is to him a sign of lack of art if you engage an even enemy on even terms, and it leaves to chance (the chances of a day of premodern battle that is) what ought to have been controlled by generalship and art.

Now, there is no question whatever that that is precisely the doctrine Napoleon was consciously exploding when he told generals to pay attention to none of that stuff, and instead just go smash the enemy, immediately. In fact, the indirect approach beloved on Hart was to Napoleon, first of all, a means of compelling the Manlian battle-denying kabuki maneuvering generals of his day, to stand and fight. Get between them and their supplies and capital and they will accept battle to get through you, that was the idea.

(Aside - "Manlian" refers to the strategy used by Manlius Capitolinus against Hannibal, consisting of mirroring his movements with a "force in being" but denying pitched battle. It was designed to exhaust Hannibal of supplies, confined as he was to southern Italy, which was rapidly "eaten" in forage terms by both armies trapsing over it for a long period. And is a typical example of the sort of thing Sun Tsu was trying to praise).

The Germans came to believe in annihilation battle thanks to Jena-Auerstadt, Leipzig, and Waterloo. The new forces designed by Gneisenau were meant for it, and the new general staff system was meant to institutionalize and professionalize the practices that Napoleon had made as innovations of his own personal genuis. Clausewitz tried to codify those as a body of academic theory, and the general staff tried to train whole generations of intellectually picked and groomed professionals, to know it in their bones. By the mid 19th century, the Germans think of themselves as having duplicated as a system what was originally the quality of a single human brain.

In practice, they ran rings around their opponents, man for man, because of it. But the object sought was - defeat the enemy force in the field by annihilation battle. They wanted to do so fast, they wanted the fight to be on advantageous terms through prior maneuver especially flanking, etc. But they wanted to fight not to win without fighting, and the target was not the enemy capital or his sense of direction or his cohesion, it was his army and the bodies of his soldiers.

Thus, when they break through at Sedan in 1940, they go to the channel, not Paris. The momentary "unfooting" of the French is to be cashed immediately for a dead French army. When they are romping ahead in Russia, they encircle Kiev because it KOs a million men. They do not instead drive straight for Moscow.

Now, in and just after WW I, JFC Fuller was writing about new armor theory, and he said armor should strike for deep objectives acting alone and ignore enemy fielded forces. He inspired Guderian, but the latter did not simply take that advice. He changed "alone" to "all arms", and he changed the objective from deep capital win without fighting to deep envelopment as the way to the largest possible annihilation battle, but still battle and still targeting the enemy fielded force.

Some modern maneuverists pick and choose, and when what the Germans did worked, say it is maneuverism and they agree with it, and when it didn't, say it wasn't Fuller-ee enough and must therefore be regarded as a mistake and a holdover of attrition thinking. So they do not criticize the decision to go to the channel instead of Paris - because killing that army did KO France - but do criticize the decision to go to Kiev - because although that killed an even larger army, it did not simply defeat Russia.

Personally I think the Germans were far sounder in the matter than the modern maneuverists or Fuller. I regard both the channel and Kiev as correct decisions. But it is quite clear which the Germans were doing in practice - they were using large scale maneuver to kill large portions of the enemy army, cashing momentary advantage for lasting progress on odds.

Thus, when we discuss what is the maneuver-annihilation battle way of fighting in CM, we are talking about the specific mix of German maneuverism, still with the Napoleonic ideals and goals, of rapid decision through aggressively sought decisive battle, and cashing momentary advantage for dead enemy forces. We are not talking about Wood's dreams, because frankly they are dreams and academic and mostly hogwash.

[Cuirassier]

Does anyone know any good online sources or books that discuss German tactical and/or operational doctrine?

[Dook]

Originally posted by JasonC:

....In fact, the indirect approach beloved on Hart was to Napoleon, first of all, a means of compelling the Manlian battle-denying kabuki maneuvering generals of his day, to stand and fight. Get between them and their supplies and capital and they will accept battle to get through you, that was the idea.

(Aside - "Manlian" refers to the strategy used by Manlius Capitolinus against Hannibal, consisting of mirroring his movements with a "force in being" but denying pitched battle. It was designed to exhaust Hannibal of supplies, confined as he was to southern Italy, which was rapidly "eaten" in forage terms by both armies trapsing over it for a long period. And is a typical example of the sort of thing Sun Tsu was trying to praise).

....

The term I think JasonC had in mind is Fabian, after Quintus Fabius Maximus, who was named dictator by the Roman senate in 217 BC after the Battle of Lake Trasimene. The Fabian strategy of avoiding pitched battle, preserving a force in being, and harassing and wearing down Hannibal's forces, was effective but unpopular. The Roman senate removed him from command. His successors chose to confront Hannibal more directly and were defeated at the Battle of Cannae.

Manlius Capitolinus was a Roman consul in 390 BC who supposedly saved the city from besieging Gauls.

[Cuirassier]

Bump

[Redwolf]

The switch to "Maneuver Warfare" is usually done as a reaction to being so outnumbered that you cannot live with just having better kill exchange ratios.

Instead of just trading in numbers in your favor, you are so outnumbered that you would still lose.

Instead of giving up, you sell your politicians a concept whereby you don't only trade favorable numbers, the trades will also be less valuable units of your for more valuable units of the enemy.

Problem is, for it to work in the face of an organized enemy, you need a whole lot of overhead for suppression, surveillance and supply, and you need to make your own gear very expensive.

The theory being that trading a tank for a communications hub is better than trading a tank for three of his tanks.

So although you now, assuming it works, stop trading one tanks of yours for three of his and start trading one tank of yours for one communications hub of his, your tank is now as expensive as three of his and as expensive as the communications hub.

Of course, incompetence often prevails and allows this scheme to work by not offering any kind of resistance that would be organized above battalion level.

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[Cuirassier]

AdamL,

I was hoping you would contribute to this thread. By just reading some of your posts from older posts involving tactics, I have learned that you play CM using a more maneuverist touch (correct me if I'm wrong).

So would you be willing to share some of your maneuver concepts on the CM tactical level?

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[Cuirassier]

I've been trying various maneuver oriented methods just against the AI (and planning to in a pbem soon)using the methods described by you, JasonC and Joachim. They allow me to stomp the AI, but that has never been a hard thing to do. Nevertheless, it is allowing me to see how these concepts can work.

AdamL,

Thanks for the replies. I think what you said reinforces the importance of the recon screen. Simply guessing what the enemy will do in the game and countering it isn't so simple. Information certainly helps, and the recon screen (in combination with lots of thinking) gives one a better chance of 'wrongfooting' the enemy, without being wrongfooted in return.