another allocation of armour question - plz help

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Steiner14:

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

Maybe you can give me a single source for your claim?

I don't remember anymore from where i have the knowledge, because i heard/learned about that from several sources.

I can't understand, why you are that stubborn and can't accept such a simple (and quite logical) fact.

If you are interested in, simply take a look at the history of anti-tank weapons.

There are enough books and surely websites about that topic.

Due to the well known Panzerschock from WWI, Panzerabwehrabteilungen were included into infantry-divisions.

Their name was program: simply to be able to withsand tank-attacks, or at least to give the soldiers the psychological feeling, that they are not completely helpless.

If you don't believe me, inform yourself.

After war against Poland, tanks (i.e. Panzerjäger I) were attached to the Panzerabwehrabteilungen and in consequence soon they were renamed to Panzerjägerabteilungen.

Anti-tank weapons, their use and the organizations were in the same way developed as every other weapon.

And as reaction to the Panzerschock the PzAbwAbt. were included.

And as logical evolution when enough experience was collected, they were supported by flexible AT-weapons.

@Scarhead:

All GE unit designations were inspired by propaganda.

Have you ever heard from the old german saying: Mehr Sein als Scheinen? (being more than seeming to be).

Don't make the mistake to believe, all times were that shallowly and full with advertisements everywhere like actual times.

Panzerabwehrabteilungen were renamed not because of fooling the own soldiers, but because of the included tank-hunting units. </font>

[Andreas]

Ah, I note Steiner14 has come riding back into town.

So, brought any answers to my question in your saddlebags? Or have you not had time yet to translate Martin's excellent quote?

[Michael Dorosh]

Michael Pruett, who authored a couple of books on German panzer uniforms, emailed me a day or so ago with info on the piping colour of AFV uniforms; indeed, Panzerabwehr units were renamed Panzerjäger units....

[Steiner14]

@Moon

I forgot to answer. Sorry.

This is a very interesting article from this book, but i wonder, why speculation is taking place,when the facts are really simple.

Let's look at the facts:

From 1940 on, the Panzerabwehrabteilungen within the Infanteriedivisionen were equipped with Selbstfahrlafetten (IIRC 1 company) and the official renaming on March 1940, was the logical consequence of the already changed role and in the future even more changing role.

Not propaganda or renaming per se, but the (changed) use and equipment of the weapon, led to the renaming.

[ September 02, 2003, 08:49 PM: Message edited by: Steiner14 ]

[Andreas]

How about you bring some evidence for your claims for a change. Which divisions were equipped with Sfl? Division numbers please, date of change, and type of vehicle. Also, numbers of the divisions which were not re-equipped, and where the name stayed the Panzerabwehr after this date (according to your logic).

If you can not bring that very simple info, I will stick by my current opinion that you are talking out of your rear-end Steiner, and that it is time for you to admit it. None of that hand-waving and 'everyone knows it' stuff. Pure and simple facts please. For a change.

BTW - to continue to call it 'speculation', when someone like Fleischer has given you the exact reason, while you continue to fail in providing a single source for your statements is just ridiculous.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Steiner14:

Let's look at the facts:

From 1940 on, the Panzerabwehrabteilungen within the Infanteriedivisionen were equipped with Selbstfahrlafetten (IIRC 1 company) and the official renaming on March 1940, was the logical consequence of the already changed role and in the future even more changing role.

Not propaganda or renaming per se, but the (changed) use and equipment of the weapon, led to the renaming.

Originally posted by Steiner14:

The Panzer-Abwehr-Abteilungen had no tanks (but PAKs), while the Panzerjäger-Abteilungen consisted of tank-destroyers.

Well, just realised that when looking at 'the facts', it also pays off to look at how Mr. 'Why don't you come off your high horse' Steiner14 has shifted his original statement quite considerably, without of course ever admitting he was wrong. Nice try.

[Steiner14]

Too bad, i don't remember the sources anymore (and honestly i don't want to spend my time seeking and reading the books i could have read that in), but here you have another source:

http://members.tripod.com/~Sturmvogel/pzjgabt.htm

I.e. the renaming date of

Pz.Abw.Abt. 521 and Pz.Abw.Abt. 169 is different and fall together with the reorganization and equipment with SP-guns.

Even this source should be enough to see, that the renaming wasn't done just as an end in itself, but reflected the changing role of AT-weapons.

If you additionally take into conclusion, that before the troops can receive 'new' weapons, they need to be invented, planned, constructed, built, tested and approved, we can say, that the renaming reflected the rapidly changing role of AT-weapons in the request of the Blitzkrieg.

And to come back to the original question:

yes, Infantriedivisionen were equipped with their own tank units, following the CM-nomenclature of counting SP-guns as tanks.

Hope that solves your doubts.

[Andreas]

Oh dear...

A quick skim is enough to show that this website, if anything, disproves what you are still holding up as gospel.

Panzerjäger-Abt. 463

15 Sep 40 formed in Norway from Stab/Pz.Jg.Abt. z.b.V. 233 and Pz.Jg.Kpn. 303, 304, 305 (Stellungs-Pz.Abw.Kpn vom Oberrhein)

[Niehorster: 22 Jun 41, Mountain Corps Norway, Army Norway (Finland) (3.7cm guns)

28 Jun 42 20th Mountain Army, Finland and equipped with 6x Marder II, 21x 37mm and 3x 28mm AT guns in three companies]

1 Jul 43 20th Mountain Army, Finland and organized with three companies of 50mm guns

[Niehorster: 4 Jul 43 20th Mountain Army, Finland and organized with twelve 37mm and two 75mm guns per company]

TW (draft): Army Norway: 1x 1-10 mot AT II 463

Woops! A whole Panzerjaegerabteilung with lots of towed guns. I guess you know something they did not...

Panzerabwehr-Abteilung (mot.) 525

Panzerjäger-Abteilung 525 (from 1 Apr 40)

schwere Panzerjäger-Abteilung 525 (Nashorn) (from 1 Jun 43 )

26 Aug 39 mobilized in WK IX

1 Sep 39 1st Army reserve, Army Group C

3 Nov 39 re-equipped with 8.8cm guns

10 May 40 II Corps, 4th Army, Army Group A with three companies (@ 4 x 8.8cm Pak)

By Jove, another one! Why could the Heer not look up "Steiner14's guide to naming of tank hunters"?

Panzerabwehr-Abteilung 543

Panzerjäger-Abteilung 543 (from 1 Apr 40)

26 Aug 39 mobilized in WK VI

1 Sep 39 5th Army reserve, Army Group C

10 May 40 XXVI Corps, 18th Army, Army Group B with three companies (@ 12 x 3.7cm Pak)

Deary me, will it ever stop? Those idiot Wehrmacht officers.

Of course, just picking out the two that seem to prove your point is a time-honoured internet debating technique, that works fine if you expect the other people are too bored by the inane repitition of completely false claims that you exhibit. Sorry it does not work this time.

I'm sorry, but it is time to do this:

Come back when you have read a book.

[Steiner14]

Originally posted by Andreas:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Steiner14:

Let's look at the facts:

From 1940 on, the Panzerabwehrabteilungen within the Infanteriedivisionen were equipped with Selbstfahrlafetten (IIRC 1 company) and the official renaming on March 1940, was the logical consequence of the already changed role and in the future even more changing role.

Not propaganda or renaming per se, but the (changed) use and equipment of the weapon, led to the renaming.

Originally posted by Steiner14:

The Panzer-Abwehr-Abteilungen had no tanks (but PAKs), while the Panzerjäger-Abteilungen consisted of tank-destroyers.

Well, just realised that when looking at 'the facts', it also pays off to look at how Mr. 'Why don't you come off your high horse' Steiner14 has shifted his original statement quite considerably, without of course ever admitting he was wrong. Nice try. </font>

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Steiner14:

Time to come down from the high horse, i think.

While you are wailing about me being harsh to you, may I remind you of that challenge by you to me a while back? Wenn Du keine Lust hast Deine eigene Suppe auszuloeffeln, brock sie Dir nicht ein.

But I take it that your little rant is final confirmation that you have no sources to back up your statement. Well, you could have just said so a long time ago. To now complain about the quality of discussion on this forum is the height of cheekyness, when you have been asked time and again to come up with some source for your statement, yet have failed every time. If that sort of challenge to back up your statements to you is 'arrogance', then I freely admit to intellectual arrogance in that regard. Best leave it at that, before I get into my opinion of your behaviour in this discussion.

Apologies to non-German speakers, this one does not translate well: 'If you don't want to eat your own broth, don't make it' is the closest, and it is derived from an old German proverb.

[Steiner14]

Originally posted by Andreas:

[QB] Oh dear...

A quick skim is enough to show that this website, if anything, disproves what you are still holding up as gospel.

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Panzerjäger-Abt. 463

15 Sep 40 formed in Norway from Stab/Pz.Jg.Abt. z.b.V. 233 and Pz.Jg.Kpn. 303, 304, 305 (Stellungs-Pz.Abw.Kpn vom Oberrhein)

[Niehorster: 22 Jun 41, Mountain Corps Norway, Army Norway (Finland) (3.7cm guns)

28 Jun 42 20th Mountain Army, Finland and equipped with 6x Marder II, 21x 37mm and 3x 28mm AT guns in three companies]

1 Jul 43 20th Mountain Army, Finland and organized with three companies of 50mm guns

[Niehorster: 4 Jul 43 20th Mountain Army, Finland and organized with twelve 37mm and two 75mm guns per company]

TW (draft): Army Norway: 1x 1-10 mot AT II 463

Woops! A whole Panzerjaegerabteilung with lots of towed guns. I guess you know something they did not...

</font>

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Steiner14:

What do you expect?

That the units were renamed all the time, when their composition changed?

You are quite amusing in your inability to stop digging.

That renaming took place when a composition change happened in 1940 is exactly what you were claiming, remember? Now suddenly all these units pop up that according to your logic should be named 'Panzerabwehr', yet are named Panzerjaeger, and that should somehow prove what exactly? I note with interest that you have still not delivered any documentary support for your claims.

[Steiner14]

Originally posted by Andreas:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Steiner14:

What do you expect?

That the units were renamed all the time, when their composition changed?

You are quite amusing in your inability to stop digging.</font>

[Michael Dorosh]

If the intent was to name self-propelled AT units as panzerjäger and towed AT units as panzerabwehr, why didn't they do so?

I would say, as Andreas is attempting to explain, that that was not the intent. If it was, why didn't they just do that?

How many times did they rename Assault Artillery units - and authorize new insignia - when the composition of the units never actually changed?

I think it is clear that the intent was for panzerjäger to be applied as a blanket term for the older panzerabwehr units regardless of gun type or higher formation association. To argue otherwise would require some sort of proof, I should think.

Or is Steiner14 trying to infer that the plan was for all anti-tank units throughout the army to eventually re-equip with self-propelled pieces? Not that the Third Reich was devoid of pie-in-the-sky ideas but again, there needs to be some sort of proof that this was the case.

[ September 03, 2003, 01:23 PM: Message edited by: Michael Dorosh ]

[Andreas]

The important thing to know in this discussion, and an information that steiner14 has not provided, although repeatedly asked for it, is that it actually was the case that in March 1940, the first SP ATGs left the production line. 50 to be precise - Panzerjäger I. The total production run was eventually to reach a whooping 132, produced in March, April and May 1940. The website linked by steiner14 earlier indicates though that most of these may have gone to independent Panzerjäger formations, i.e. not to any infantry divisions - it appears the first to see combat were with Heeres-Panzerjägerabteilung 5 in France. The next run of SP ATGs would be the Marder series (unless you want to count the menace that was the 3,7cm PAK36 auf Sfl Bren Carrier) in 1941. There certainly were nowhere near enough Panzerjäger I in 1940 to even begin thinking of equipping all 1. Kps of the divisional AT battalions. Not even for the motorised and Panzer divisions. Since there were obviously neither the equipment, nor the plans, to make any element of the infantry divisions AT battalions self-propelled, I am at a loss why they would be renamed 'Panzerjägerabteilung' from 'Panzerabwehrabteilung'. The only answer I can come up with is, you guessed it, propaganda. it certainly can not have been connected to any plan, or even pie-in-the-sky idea, of giving them anything other than their prime movers to drive around in.

[Michael Dorosh]

Uwe Feist (himself a veteran, I believe) mentions in Squadron-Signal's book GERMAN INFANTRY IN ACTION that German soldiers were "taught to be aggressive" and that they were taught "anti-tank guns were for attacking tanks, not defending against them." I can look up the exact quote at home. It's not a definitive source, just a snippet done to illustrate what is essentially a picture book, but I think perhaps it may be some hint as to an intended "propaganda" usage of the terms. Certainly, if German soldiers were taught, as Feist suggests, that an anti-tank gun was to be used aggressively, then the renaming from Tank Defence Unit to Tank Hunter Unit makes sense from that perspective.

It is not evidence in itself, but I got the impression Feist was talking from personal experience, and may have even been referring to official doctrine or training methods in which German soldiers were taught to think aggressively. The renaming of panzerjäger certainly fits that perception.

Infantry were renamed Grenadier for "propaganda" reasons also, though as Andreas points out, propaganda isn't really the best term for that, as its use has come to infer a negative connotation when in the 1940s it clearly wasn't a negative word at all. German war correspondents proudly wore the PROPAGANDAKOMPANIE cuff title, for example.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

Infantry were renamed Grenadier for "propaganda" reasons also, though as Andreas points out, propaganda isn't really the best term for that, as its use has come to infer a negative connotation when in the 1940s it clearly wasn't a negative word at all. German war correspondents proudly wore the PROPAGANDAKOMPANIE cuff title, for example.

In the good old days, the catholic church built itself this:

Collegio di Propaganda Fide - Roma

I doubt they would use the same name today. Still there though, and still used.

I think the best modern term to use for it is 'spin'.

[Steiner14]

"Panzergrenadiere (gp.) sind die stählernen Sturmtruppen der Panzerdivision.

Ihr eigenartiger, schnell beweglicher Kampf bildet die Voraussetzung für den operativen Einsatz.

Sie bilden mit den Panzern eine enge Kampfgemeinschaft.

Selbstständige Aufgaben lösen sie in kühnem, schnellem Zugriff.

Große Beweglichkeit, Geländegängigkeit, Panzerschutz, hohe Feuerkraft und reichliche Ausstattung mit Führungsmitteln befähigen sie, schwierigste Lagen schnell und erfolgreich zu meistern.

Panzergrenadier-Verbände(gp.) kämpfen vom SPW.

Feindeinwirkung und Gelände können vorübergehend zum raschen Wechsel zwischen aufgesessenem und Kampf zu Fuß zwingen. Auch diesem Kampf zu Fuß geben die auf den SPW beweglich einge setzten schweren Waffen seine Eigenart.

Angriffsschwung und Kühnheit, vereint mit blitzschneller Entschlusskraft und großer Wendigkeit zeichnen den Panzergrenadier aus".

H.Dv.298/3a "Ausbildungsvorschrift für die Panzertruppe

- Führung und Kampf der Panzergrenadiere"

Heft 1: Das Panzergrenadier-Bataillon (gp.) vom 05.08.1944

Here is a lot of useful information, i.e. dealing with the usage of Panzergrenadiere units and why their renaming was representing their usage, not propaganda:

www.freundeskreis-panzergrenadiere.de

[Andreas]

'Grenadiere', not 'Panzergrenadiere'.

[Michael Dorosh]

Steiner, you obviously don't know what the difference between a Grenadier Regiment and a Panzergrenadier Regiment is.

I was clearly referring to the renaming of Infanterie Regimenter, not Schützen Regimenter, which is what you refer to.

I also refer to the renaming of the rank of Schütze.

Again, this has nothing to do with panzergrenadier regiments.

Tell me, why was the rank of Schütze renamed Grenadier, and why was every infantry regiment in the army renamed to become a Grenadier regiment?

EDIT - heh, Andreas beat me to it.

[ September 03, 2003, 04:38 PM: Message edited by: Michael Dorosh ]

[Steiner14]

Originally posted by Andreas:

'Grenadiere', not 'Panzergrenadiere'.

Right, sorry. My mistake.