The Blitz myth?

[A.E.B]

JasonC

I am NOT DEFENDING IT: don't confuse me with the German cheerleaders who cannot see beyond the big tanks and the cool uniforms.

Germany lost the war the instant they started it, from the moment the first Brandenberger who failed to get the memo set foot in Poland. Germany's great achievement in WWII is that it avoided defeat for so long (although if they had given up in a similar postion to the one they were in in 1918, the war would have ended mid 1944).

In WWI Germany failed to knock out France but Russia collapsed. In WWII they knocked out France but the USSR endured. WWI went for four years (ignoring the post peace chaos). WWII went for five and a half years. That was the great German achievement of WWII, to last one and a half years longer than in WWI.

The only possible way the Germans could win, and the Germans knew it, was if their enemies let them win. Initially the collapse of the low countries and France made it seem possible, although even the nations like Norway could dish out the occassional bloody nose. The instance Britain refused to throw in the towel, for Germany the war was over.

There is of course a political and ideological layer on top of the simple economic and military equations that many people cannot see past. Swap Turkey with Italy and in many ways WWII was WWI again with more modern weapons. Germany needed to change the equations that condemned Germany in 1914 to defeat, they tried hard but in the end they couldn't and they lost.

A.E.B

[Wartgamer]

I do not believe that Germany could have ramped up as fast as Jason is guessing.

They could have ramped up all sorts of vehile/plane production but ramping up all the fuel needs for those items would not be as easy.

Germany did ramp up production in the long run but at the expense of spares. They clearly made a mistake there also.

[Code13]

Originally posted by A.E.B:

The instance Britain refused to throw in the towel, for Germany the war was over.

A.E.B

Hurray!

Someone who agrees with me.

I have long postulated that the Battle of Britain, and the cancellation of Operation Sealion by the Germans was the real turning point of the war. From that moment Germany had lost.

Sure the events on the Eastern Front, the joining of the war by the US and the events in the Far East all shaped the speed and map of the world later, but in Europe, the moment Germany faield to stop Britain, they had lost the war.

In Europe without the US intervention we would have had a map dominated by the Soviet Union who probably would have control of Europe all the way to France and the Low Countries

In the Far East I suspect the British Empire would have collapsed far sooner than it did, with an eventual stalemate being reached with the Japanese (though the rise of Japanese economic and military power in the Pacific would have demanded the US entry into the war even without Pearl Harbour).

[von Churov]

Please provide your definition of "blitzkrieg" and then give a concrete example of it in action. I'll try and find my copy of Cooper tonight and provide some relevant quotes.

Allied newspapers, in time of war, calling the Germans revolutionary? Gee, could that be perhaps because they had a national bias and saw their own armies being utterly beaten in short periods of time? [/QB]

[JasonC]

"The German oil industry was increasingly productive until the spring of 1944, when the strategic bombing began. The increase was fairly steady-about 900,000 tons per year-and production in the first quarter of 1944 was at a rate of 8,000,000 tons per year." From the US strategic bombing survey.

That is double the prewar level. Domestic crude increases to 1 m tons, new fields in Austria added 1 m tons, synthetics provide the bulk of it. Motor gasoline was about one quarter of overall demand (air, navy, civilian sector took other caterories). The army could have indefinitely supplied an armor force twice as large with 1 m tons additional fuel, which is what German industry was adding every year from expansion of synthetics production.

By 1944, the Germans were supplying a larger air force and navy in addition to 50 mobile divisions, compared to 20 at the time of Barbarossa. The oil issue would not remotely have prevented an increase in the tank fleet and accompanying PD force in 1941 and 1942. It took the loss of Rumania plus the destruction of 90% of the hydrogenation plant (by capacity) to ground the Luftwaffe, and the army still had enough for its vehicles at midyear.

The loss of aviation fuel from loss of the plants to bombing (which has to be highest octane, and was the hardest to make synthetically) grounded the air force, that allowed western air to hit the rest of the oil target set, and this ran them critically low on gas for the army only in the final quarter of 1944. They readily supplied the far larger forces of 1943 and early 1944, out of rising synthetic production.

Synthetics are expensive, but modern economies can remove bottlenecks by paying enough in overall wealth to move widen whatever place is tightest. Making overall output, not shortage in any one thing, the determining factor. And overall output can be ramped by increasing labor inputs, forgoing longer dated projects, and focusing exclusively on the critical subset of tasks. Only economies already at full mobilization in all resources, experience critical value effects with specific raw materials.

Even those are not absolute bottlenecks, but as cases where a little more of something one otherwise has to "overpay" for poor substitutes for, frees up a lot of that overpaying effort, for better uses. (E.g. if Germany had needed less synthetic oil, the steel and labor used for those plants could have mated with coal not pushed through them as raw material to make additional military equipment).

It would have been easy, it would have made all the difference in the world, they didn't do it because they were stupid, the variety of stupid that comes from pride.

[Wartgamer]

http://www.feldgrau.com/articles.php?ID=16

</a> From 1939 to 1941, Germany used her now well refined Blitzkrieg tactics to conquer Poland, Denmark, Norway, the BeNeLux nations, France, the Balkan, and so on. The end goal was to obtain a German victory through the utilization of the minimum quantities of men, materials and supplies as possible, and in the shortest time. This worked quite well in the early years of WWII. If there was a chance to win the war, it was most probable during the summer and fall of 1941 provided that the existing resources were not squandered or misused.

But in 1941, the Germans came up against a proverbial brick wall - their summer and fall offensive against the Soviet Union stalled. The winter season arrived with bitterly cold temperatures. Interestingly, on 16 August 1941, General Keitel and the Wehrmachts-Waffenämter agreed that Germany reduce its military production efforts in the fall of 1941. Both were so sure that Germany had defeated the Soviet Union, and Hitler concurred. Then came November and December of 1941. In short, the Germans had not adequately prepared for an extended winter campaign. One of the negative consequences was that many Wehrmacht infantrymen and tankers suffered accordingly (of note is that the Luftwaffe and the KM had sent proper winter clothing to most of their troops in the east).

In the end, Germany’s excellent military leadership and her many technical advantages were not enough to overcome the economic advantages of her enemies. From the very beginning, Germany should have been able to exploit many of her economic and technology advantages far more optimally. Placing Herman Göring in charge of domestic economic planning was not the wisest of selections either. While Albert Speer did achieve some very impressive production increases in 1943, 1944 and 1945 (he became Armaments Minister on 18 February 1942, replacing Fritz Todt), the German efforts were essentially a day late and a dollar short.

Germany lost the Second World War not because of any single military action, she lost it primarily to a war of economic and human attrition.

Germany reached a critical point when it decided to continue attacking England. It could have negotiated after the Fall of France. But it did not seal its own fate till it attacked the Soviet Union. THAT is when it started to lose the war.

Germany was like a very good middle weight fighter taking on a pretty bad heavy weight fighter (SU). The heavy weight could stick it out and get better.

[ June 02, 2005, 09:10 AM: Message edited by: Wartgamer ]

[A.E.B]

JasonC

You are of course viewing the entire picture backwards - starting in 1945 and working backward to 1939 to see what Germany should have done.

Try viewing it forwards.

The fact is that German planners in 1940 could not forsee the eventual demands of 1942.

You are assuming that they should have been planning for the worst case scenario of a war of attrition in the East.

But at the same time there was start of the bomber war, the battle of the Atlantic, the need to rescue Italy, Yugolsavia, Greece, Crete and North Africa.

Should Germany ramp up U-boat production to starve Britain? Should they build larger bombers? The current tank forces seem adequate against the British, so are heavier tanks and bigger guns needed? How about an aircraft carrier to protect the Tirpitz? These Jet Aircraft have a lot of teething problems, should we invest the resources to make them work or build more ME109F2s? How about this nuclear thingy, should we pump resources into heavy water and try to make a theoretical bomb?

With hindsite we know what Germany needed to do, but once the initial surprise wore off, Germany now had to react to its enemies moves.

So why built ten new panzer divisions to invade Russia in 1940 if your planners don't think you need them? Why not build 100 U-Boats and the Graf Zeppelin instead? Or heavy bombers to level Britain?

Germany had limited industrial output and limited resources. Hence what was build was what they though would win the war in 1941, not what was needed to stave of defeat in 1944.

And once you commit resources to produce ceratin items, those resources are often hard to redeploy. Even factories producing one model of tank suffered delays and reduced production when switched to another model. Hence a torpedo factory could suddenly start pumping out tanks.

Germany had limited industrial resources to commit, and in 1940 had to make strategic choices on where to invest those resources.

You believe the Germans suffered from an excess of pride, of a stupidity born of ideology and maybe "victors syndrome". This may be true.

I suspect that instead Germany did what it always did - stick to the plan and concentrate on what is needed now, not what might be needed in 1944 to fend of tanks and planes that don't exist now.

German planners thought they would be choosing their estates in the Urkraine in 1943, not that they would be fighting for their lives in a war of production that they knew they couldn't win.

Maybe the true visionaries of WWII were those American Army officers who pre-war realised that the coming war would be one of production, not super men and super weapons. They at least got it right.

A.E.B

[ June 02, 2005, 09:17 AM: Message edited by: A.E.B ]

[Bigduke6]

SNIP

Originally posted by JasonC:

They failed in Russia because they did not try hard, no other reason. The only reason they didn't try harder is overconfidence, they didn't think they'd need to. It cannot be defended or rationalized away

Although I pretty much buy Jason's arguement about the Germans' being able to mobilize better, here's another point for consideration. The problem the Germans had in taking the Russians out of the war, as Jason and others have repeatedly pointed out, was not destroying Soviet armies, but dealing with Soviet capacity to create new armies.

I happen to be rereading Erickson's Road to Stalingrad, and to me at least his chapter on what industrial potential the Soviets shifted to the east is astounding. Here are some of the numbers, which I think we can take as official Soviet numbers (all 1941)

In August - October up to 80 per cent of Soviet war industry was "on wheels"

From August-October 1,523 war industry plants relocated from the western provinces to the Urals or farther east. (455 - Urals, 210 - Western Siberia, 200 - Volga Region, 250 - Central Asia)

From August-October, at the same time, the Soviet rail shipped 2.5 million men to the front, in the other direction.

The official number of freight cars needed to do the eastward shift by November was: 38,000-aviation industry, 20,000-munitions industry, 18,000-weapons industry, 27,500-steel industry, 15,500-tank industry, 16,000 heavy industry. Total rail cars involved was 1.5 million.

Here are some "Heroic Soviet Worker Achievements" which of course don't show how that shift was run over all, but at least give an idea of how serious the Soviets were about getting their industrial potential out from under the Germans' noses:

Mikoyan factory is producing aircraft in Saratov two weeks after the last train rolls in.

Kharkov tank works is producing T-34s in Cheliabinsk, ten weeks after they got the order to pick up sticks and get out of east Ukraine. This is not just the biggest assembly line but the design bureau, distribution system, spare parts numbers - Kharkov was the heart of Soviet tank-building. The "works", if you will pardon the pun.

A 10,000 ton press - one of the world's five largest - is stripped down and put on rails at Novo-Kramotovsk in five days, less than a week before German troops arrive. By 10,000 tons that means how much pressure the machine could generate. Lord only knows what the thing weighed. The Soviets later figured out how to use it to stamp (!) T-34 turrets from rolled steel.

Erickson lists major raw materials the Soviets were forced to develop new fields for, since the Germans had captured the old ones: oil, manganese, molybdenum, nickel, tin. Aluminum, copper, and other non-ferrous metals were in deficit before the German attack, and so filled by Lend Lease.

This is the industrial capacity which, tied with the manpower reserves of the Soviet Union's central and eastern provinces, that allowed the Soviet Union to absorb the shock of the blitzkrieg. As has been pointed out above, the French had nowhere to evacuate their industry to; once the Saar and Ile d' France are in enemy hands, that's all she wrote.

To me the Soviets' ability to get all that stuff out from the Germans' path, before the Blitzkrieg could catch up with it, has got to one of the decisive allied successes of the entire war. Had the Soviets chose to leave their industry in place, the Germans would clearly have won, as the Soviets would have lost their ability to replace their equipment losses.

It seems to me at least arguable that we again can see the hand of the German "superiority complex" here - be it hubris, vodoo racism, bad strategy, too good tactics, too much faith in a cheap way to win the war, obscession with Clauswitz, or however you want to call it.

Certainly the Russian shift of industry east was an amazing achievement. If you had asked me in mid-1941 if the Soviets were up to something like that, I would probably have laughed along with every other German officer. The railroad got purged like every one else, after all.

If we accept that Red victory came due to the Soviet Union's ability to absorb the worst blows of Blitzkrieg and still come back punching, then it seems to me arguable - not a fact guys, arguable - that the Germans lost the entire second war by failing to aim their Barbarossa campaign at the right target: Soviet industrial capacity.

Me, I of course find the German General Staff's unwillingness to consider the economic aspects of the war a real good scape goat. Yikes! - I think that's what Hitler said. :eek:

[ June 02, 2005, 09:29 AM: Message edited by: Bigduke6 ]

[Wartgamer]

The Operational Art of Retreat? Also, don't forget the scorched earth policy. The Soviets were playing hardball.

Could the Germans have really stopped the movement of that industry? They did not have a bomber fleet that would reach that far? Blitzkrieg could only move so fast also.

One of the things to keep in mind about fuel is that it is not just production, but alos distribution.

The US, beyond argument THE POL king, had problems keeping its motorized divisions supplied with fuel once they were moving. In some cases (Anvil), they were lucky and captured German aviation fuel (runs great in tanks) and also diesel (not sure if they could use it).

[ June 02, 2005, 09:57 AM: Message edited by: Wartgamer ]

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by von Churov:

Please provide your definition of "blitzkrieg" and then give a concrete example of it in action. I'll try and find my copy of Cooper tonight and provide some relevant quotes.

Allied newspapers, in time of war, calling the Germans revolutionary? Gee, could that be perhaps because they had a national bias and saw their own armies being utterly beaten in short periods of time?

I didn't say that Allied newspapers called the Germans revloutionary.

(I called it revolutionary in implementation of simple ideas in a very complex environment,such as a war of major nations.)

I said that they were completely amazed with how easily the Germans were winning the War. And they were unplesently amazed with the Blitzkrieg. I don't have to like the a-bomb to be amazed with it's effect.

And the blitzkrieg was a great "engeneering" effort.

Once more on theory and practice.

The theory of an atom bomb existed since 1905, but it took 40 years to build one.

The fact that the theory of an a-bomb was known to everybody, does not dimishes the REVOLUTIONARY success of american engineers managing to produce it.

As of Blitzkrieg, the success was to put it all together and to make it work. And it was put together, and it worked. Hell.

I look at the other posts. But most of the talk here is about the war economy. The Blitzkrieg itself as a phenomenon has nothing to do with the war economy. Put the blame on the term Blitzkrieg (the lightning WAR). The war economy is about how to win the war ( WWII ), the Blitzkrieg is about how to win the campaign (Poland, Denmark, Norway, France, Yugoslavia, Greece, USSR ), and as a long term strategy it is probably unsuccesfull.

The war economy that is mainly discussed here is a WAR OF ATTRITION, and that's what Germans tried to avoid with the LIGHTING WAR.

Those two are opposite things.

More appropriate term for Blitzkrieg may should be a BLITZCAMPAIGN.

For as long as it could have been applied in a short blows it worked. Prolonging it's effect stalls it and stops it. It's no longer a BLITZ ( a lightning) for a lightnings does not last too long. So, that's way it is not the war ecnomy in blitzkrieg. War economy lasts, the Blitzkrieg does not.

Hitler was all in war economy. The Guderian and von Manstein were in Blitzkrieg.

The Blitzkrieg is about the risk, the deception, coordination of all armed forces, propaganda and so on and so on...The blitzkrieg is using what you have at hand to strike you opponent as fast as you can, as hard as you can, and trying to make a decisive blow before he could consolidate.

It's about speed and maneuver. The revolutionarity of German Blitzkrieg was partialy in reintroducing the maneuver in the times of trenches, barbed wires, fortified lines, minefields and so on.

The Blitzkrieg is moving and maneuvering, and thinking in terms of imagination rather than in terms of numbers.

The war economy is about numbers. Blitzkried is about disabling opponent's fighting force.

Fire and maneuver again. [/QB]

[Wartgamer]

Yes please relieve us of your anal semantics.

[Wartgamer]

Originally posted by A.E.B:

JasonC

You are of course viewing the entire picture backwards - starting in 1945 and working backward to 1939 to see what Germany should have done.

Try viewing it forwards.

The fact is that German planners in 1940 could not forsee the eventual demands of 1942.

You are assuming that they should have been planning for the worst case scenario of a war of attrition in the East.

But at the same time there was start of the bomber war, the battle of the Atlantic, the need to rescue Italy, Yugolsavia, Greece, Crete and North Africa.

Should Germany ramp up U-boat production to starve Britain? Should they build larger bombers? The current tank forces seem adequate against the British, so are heavier tanks and bigger guns needed? How about an aircraft carrier to protect the Tirpitz? These Jet Aircraft have a lot of teething problems, should we invest the resources to make them work or build more ME109F2s? How about this nuclear thingy, should we pump resources into heavy water and try to make a theoretical bomb?

With hindsite we know what Germany needed to do, but once the initial surprise wore off, Germany now had to react to its enemies moves.

So why built ten new panzer divisions to invade Russia in 1940 if your planners don't think you need them? Why not build 100 U-Boats and the Graf Zeppelin instead? Or heavy bombers to level Britain?

Germany had limited industrial output and limited resources. Hence what was build was what they though would win the war in 1941, not what was needed to stave of defeat in 1944.

And once you commit resources to produce ceratin items, those resources are often hard to redeploy. Even factories producing one model of tank suffered delays and reduced production when switched to another model. Hence a torpedo factory could suddenly start pumping out tanks.

Germany had limited industrial resources to commit, and in 1940 had to make strategic choices on where to invest those resources.

You believe the Germans suffered from an excess of pride, of a stupidity born of ideology and maybe "victors syndrome". This may be true.

I suspect that instead Germany did what it always did - stick to the plan and concentrate on what is needed now, not what might be needed in 1944 to fend of tanks and planes that don't exist now.

German planners thought they would be choosing their estates in the Urkraine in 1943, not that they would be fighting for their lives in a war of production that they knew they couldn't win.

Maybe the true visionaries of WWII were those American Army officers who pre-war realised that the coming war would be one of production, not super men and super weapons. They at least got it right.

A.E.B

Yes Jason is indulging himself in mystical hindsight.

The realistic decision point would have been after Dec 41. The Germans not only had thier tit stuck in a wringer (Russia) but now had the US coming into the war.

To think that the Germans could magically get 1943 or 1944 levels of production happening in 1942 is silly. Speer only took over in 42 and had to not onlyy feed a large conflict, but increase production also.

1942 production of aircraft (besides Stukas) was not that much greater than 1941. German tank designs were in a state of change. Prolonged use of existing tanks placed a parts strain on any production increase.

[athlete]

Germany lost the war the instant they started it, from the moment the first Brandenberger who failed to get the memo set foot in Poland.

'Uh, they didn't start it' would be my only point. Let's remember who declared war on who, and why.

What should have happened? Well, the great victors (eng and france) ought to have conceded that the ToV was ridiculous, that the lack of any viable access to E.Prussia was unreasonable, and should have strongly suggested to Poland that for moral, political and military reasons they should consider giving up what wasn't theirs to begin with.

Would Hitler have stopped there? Probably not, but we'll never know because instead, eng and france decided to stick their chests out and defend Poland's right to be selfish and unreasonable with the lives of ill-prepared and ill-equipped troops. Well done.

After promptly getting their collective asses booted out of Europe the RAF did a decent job of stopping the Germs from invading, and the Eng government took whatever the US was willing to give until the end of the war in order to drive Germany into the ground and give Poland to Russia.

That is my sarcastic version of wwii...although I stand behind the 'uh, they didn't start the war' bit.

*braces self for impact*

[Wartgamer]

I thought Standard Oil started the whole thing by giving the Germans leaded-gas?

[athlete]

Actually, I heard Pete Rose started the war, and then bet on the outcome.

[athlete]

Not sure what that ^ meant...I getting really tired.

[JasonC]

Impact: what is the point. Buzz happily, gnats.

[Wartgamer]

Dullness! Unlaid readily, Jason's Story. Figures. His droniness continues.

[von Churov]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by von Churov:

Please provide your definition of "blitzkrieg" and then give a concrete example of it in action. I'll try and find my copy of Cooper tonight and provide some relevant quotes.

Allied newspapers, in time of war, calling the Germans revolutionary? Gee, could that be perhaps because they had a national bias and saw their own armies being utterly beaten in short periods of time?

I didn't say that Allied newspapers called the Germans revloutionary.

(I called it revolutionary in implementation of simple ideas in a very complex environment,such as a war of major nations.)

I said that they were completely amazed with how easily the Germans were winning the War. And they were unplesently amazed with the Blitzkrieg. I don't have to like the a-bomb to be amazed with it's effect.

And the blitzkrieg was a great "engeneering" effort.

Once more on theory and practice.

The theory of an atom bomb existed since 1905, but it took 40 years to build one.

The fact that the theory of an a-bomb was known to everybody, does not dimishes the REVOLUTIONARY success of american engineers managing to produce it.

As of Blitzkrieg, the success was to put it all together and to make it work. And it was put together, and it worked. Hell.

I look at the other posts. But most of the talk here is about the war economy. The Blitzkrieg itself as a phenomenon has nothing to do with the war economy. Put the blame on the term Blitzkrieg (the lightning WAR). The war economy is about how to win the war ( WWII ), the Blitzkrieg is about how to win the campaign (Poland, Denmark, Norway, France, Yugoslavia, Greece, USSR ), and as a long term strategy it is probably unsuccesfull.

The war economy that is mainly discussed here is a WAR OF ATTRITION, and that's what Germans tried to avoid with the LIGHTING WAR.

Those two are opposite things.

More appropriate term for Blitzkrieg may should be a BLITZCAMPAIGN.

For as long as it could have been applied in a short blows it worked. Prolonging it's effect stalls it and stops it. It's no longer a BLITZ ( a lightning) for a lightnings does not last too long. So, that's way it is not the war ecnomy in blitzkrieg. War economy lasts, the Blitzkrieg does not.

Hitler was all in war economy. The Guderian and von Manstein were in Blitzkrieg.

The Blitzkrieg is about the risk, the deception, coordination of all armed forces, propaganda and so on and so on...The blitzkrieg is using what you have at hand to strike you opponent as fast as you can, as hard as you can, and trying to make a decisive blow before he could consolidate.

It's about speed and maneuver. The revolutionarity of German Blitzkrieg was partialy in reintroducing the maneuver in the times of trenches, barbed wires, fortified lines, minefields and so on.

The Blitzkrieg is moving and maneuvering, and thinking in terms of imagination rather than in terms of numbers.

The war economy is about numbers. Blitzkried is about disabling opponent's fighting force.

Fire and maneuver again. </font>

[Moon]

Let me open the windows, it's gettng hot in here... If it gets any hotter, I might have to shut and lock the door...

Martin

[von Churov]

Originally posted by Moon:

Let me open the windows, it's gettng hot in here... If it gets any hotter, I might have to shut and lock the door...

Martin

Sorry Moon,

I'll be cool.

I just don't like when someone underestimates other peoples knowledge, and starts rating books and arguments at will.

Just don't lock anything.

Thank U!

[athlete]

Originally posted by JasonC:

Impact: what is the point. Buzz happily, gnats.

LOL. Well, if this is directed at me, the point was just, "it's funny how we've been brainwashed to think that WWII was victory of good over evil, and that Germany started it...by the way, I for one don't buy it."

Nothing profound, just thought I'd throw it out there.

I have to say though, I thought the quote was funny.

[Wartgamer]

Some stats...

4. “Barbarossa” – war with USSR – campaign

3.30 am, 22 June, 1941

Front-line 995 miles + 620 miles on Finnish boarder

Sooner expand to 1,490 miles in length and 600 miles in depth

German Army amounting ¾ of its field strength

End-1941, USSR losses: (about twenty encirclements) 3,000,000 (3,500,000) captured, 4,000,000 dead, 14,287 tanks, 25,212 guns including:

July, Bialystok-Minsk pocket: 324,000 men, 3,332 tanks, 1,809 artillery pieces captured/destroyed;

July, Smolensk pocket: 310,000 prisoners, 3,205 tanks, 3,120 guns captured/destroyed;

August, Rolsavl: 38,000 prisoners (18,000 later), 250 tanks, 359 guns captured/destroyed;

August, Kiev: 103,000 prisoners, 317 tanks, 1,100 guns captured/destroyed;

August, Kiev, battle is over: 665,000 prisoners, 884 tanks, 3,178 guns captured/destroyed;

October, Bryansk-Vyazma pocket: 673,000 prisoners, 1,242 tanks, 5,412 guns captured/destroyed;

Beginning-November, front-line is 50 miles far from Moscow

By mid-November – 16 miles from Moscow

German losses

By July 31, 1941

213,301 casualties (15% total invasion forces), 863 tanks (25% of total invasion number)

Motor transport lost about 50% (regarding “bad” roads)

November (estimation by OKH (German Headquarter)

101 divisions = 65 full strength divisions

17 panzer divisions = 6 full strength

Combat power of 136 invasion divisions = 83

Croup Army Center required 31 supply trains / 16 provided

Example, Guderian: one panzer corps of 600 tanks established had 50 left

Total losses by end-November (starting June 22, 1941)

743,112 (not counting sick) men = 23.12% of average total strength of 3,200,000

Example, On Eastern Front Army (Moscow direction) is short of 340,000 = 50% of fighting strength of infantry

At home only 33,000 men available

50% of load-carrying vehicles runs

out of 500,000 trucks 150,000 lost, 275,000 need repair

December 1941 - March 1942

256,000 dead and 350,000 sick (frozen)

55,000 motor vehicles, 1,800 tanks, 140 heavy guns, 10,000 machine-guns

[Wartgamer]

1940 total = 3,381

PzKw-I – 1,062 + 243 (command tank)

PzKw-II – 1,086

PzKw-III - 329

PzKw-IV – 380

143 PzKw 35(t) + 238 PzKw 38(t) Czech tanks

Even if the Germans could mystically know to increase production in 1940 like Jason says, would they also mystically know that many of the designs were obsolete and useless?

Would they mystically know that they should concentrate only on the Panzer IIIL60?

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by athlete:

[snips]LOL. Well, if this is directed at me, the point was just, "it's funny how we've been brainwashed to think that WWII was victory of good over evil, and that Germany started it...by the way, I for one don't buy it."

Nothing profound, just thought I'd throw it out there.

Not profound, certainly.

Not even right, in fact.

All the best,

John.