Pz Gdrs not SPW hotrodders - US MTO experience

[flamingknives]

Originally posted by Determinant:

Well shame on the two of you. You should both march yourselves off to your nearest staff college library.

Once there read the recent Jane's IDR article about the US Army saying that the Bradley is a poor recon vehicle on account of its large size and noise signature that causes OPFOR to kill it regularly and reliably at NTC. Thus the use of the HMMV in the recon role. Also not a perfect vehicle but less likely to be spotted and killed, resulting in the loss of your valuable recon unit.

Reminds me of a comparison I did recently. The top of the Bradley's hull is level with the top of the Warrior's turret adn taller than the entirity of a BMP. Compare it to a proper recon vehicle (Fennek, CVR(T)) and it's even more extremely huge.

[jrcar]

Sorry I should have been more specific on the recon I mentioned, the 30 Corps recon regiments ranged well ahead of the advance.

The para jeeps were the recon company.

The Bradly is a poor recon vehicle IMHO, it just goes to show how far the fight rather than stealth concept went, especially in the US.

To sum up my perspective on this:

SPW mounted attacks were done, but I totally agree were rare.

Jasons last lot of firepower centric/Airforce based dribble just proves his lack of military experiance. Worked wonders in Vietnam and Yugoslavia didn't it... what was I heard once from a USAF Col after Gulf War 1... ah yes "we do desert, we don't do jungle".

But then I come from a different military culture, a light infantry one where even getting battalion mortars in support is a great thing! Where seeing your enemy is rare, even at 50m and targeting through triple jungle canopy through cloud by an Airforce plane is impossible.

But I must commend him on his work on the forum, and for the record I do agree with a lot of his points, just take umbrage at others.

I think I am done. I'm off to have fun playing CM... maybe I'll even do a mounted attack in SPW... probably I won't, There is a reason I went to a cushy Int job and not into mech recon...

And I like tassles on my hats , goes well with those shiny silver badges.

Cheers

Rob

[George MC]

Just found this reference in a book called Fighting Techniques of a Panzergrenadier by Dr Matthew Hughes and Dr Chris Mann. On page 27 they mention that –“It was only at the time of the invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 that large numbers of Sdkz 251s became widely available enough to equip full battalions of panzergrenadiers within panzer divisions. Now, the Germans could experiment fighting directly from their half tracks.” Before we all go off one the paragraph continues – “Due to the heavy losses suffered amongst the half tracks when accompanying the tanks into the heart of the battle, the Germans fairly quickly resorted to debussing at least 400m or so in front of the enemies positions, even when using the Sdkfz 251. Nonetheless, under certain tactical conditions, the halftrack could provide a useful firing position.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by George Mc:

Just found this reference in a book called Fighting Techniques of a Panzergrenadier by Dr Matthew Hughes and Dr Chris Mann. On page 27 they mention that –“It was only at the time of the invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 that large numbers of Sdkz 251s became widely available enough to equip full battalions of panzergrenadiers within panzer divisions. Now, the Germans could experiment fighting directly from their half tracks.” Before we all go off one the paragraph continues – “Due to the heavy losses suffered amongst the half tracks when accompanying the tanks into the heart of the battle, the Germans fairly quickly resorted to debussing at least 400m or so in front of the enemies positions, even when using the Sdkfz 251. Nonetheless, under certain tactical conditions, the halftrack could provide a useful firing position.

Are there lots of good stock photos in that one, and do they use the word "blitzkrieg" a lot?

But seriously - does it outline what those "certain tactical conditions" were? Like, when the enemy consisted of aged women armed with corn husk brooms or somefink?

[winkelried]

Originally posted by jrcar:

The Bradly is a poor recon vehicle IMHO, it just goes to show how far the fight rather than stealth concept went, especially in the US.

There is room for both approaches in intelligence gathering. I served 15 years with recon (with jeeps/humvees, if we were **very** lucky with choppers but most of the time on foot with a huge backpack) in mountaineous and covered terrain (forests and cities).

We used both methods:

1) If we had time, we did "unarmed" recon. Infiltrating, observing ... slow, but efficient. In the later days supported by drones etc. The task was "find the enemy, don't be discovered, observe, report and - sometimes - call in the artillery".

2) If we didn't have time we called the Mechanized Infantry and sent them in or went in ourselves in force . The task was "go in and see where they are shooting from". Quick, efficient and bloody.

... I think that most armies in the world use both ways to do recon. Just depends on the timeframe you need the information.

[Colonel Warden]

I think it would depend on the situation. Standard doctrine was probably to stop at a safe covered distance and drop your troops from the HT. This is probably the case with the standard Army units.

However, there were probably instances of troops on special operations where they road right into the objectives on their SPWs. This was not a standard practice but was probably considered worth the risk in some odd circumstances. I would think that a Wehrmacht officer would hesitate to risk his transport especially if he needed it to retreat the next day as was so often the occurence from 1943 and on.

[George MC]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

/QUOTE]Are there lots of good stock photos in that one, and do they use the word "blitzkrieg" a lot?

But seriously - does it outline what those "certain tactical conditions" were? Like, when the enemy consisted of aged women armed with corn husk brooms or somefink?

In reply to your questions. Aye. Aye and No. Corn husk brooms, in the right hands, can be very dangerous to lightly armoured SPWs. Blocks the air intakes or some such thing...

[Determinant]

Originally posted by winkelried:

There is room for both approaches in intelligence gathering. I served 15 years with recon (with jeeps/humvees, if we were **very** lucky with choppers but most of the time on foot with a huge backpack) in mountaineous and covered terrain (forests and cities).

Well. You are a braver man than me Chum. I think that you will be luckier in recon on your own two feet (whilst carrying a pig on your back) than in a vehicle. Or God forbid the horror - a chopper. I'd rather walk.

But say. I see you are in God's own country of Switzerland. Have you really got rid of your bicycle unit? A pity if you have. But what do politicians and bean counters know?

[winkelried]

Originally posted by Determinant:

Even worse, we got rid of those message-pigeons ... a step I will never forgive those politicians

But we kept the horses ... they are cheaper than choppers in the mountains

[Kevin Kinscherf]

My reading indicates that WW2 armored infantry fought mostly dismounted - by design and doctrine. I would say mostly is better than 95% of the time. Dare I quantify? But with that information, how does that affect the way we design and play CM? Given the potential map sizes, APCs are appropriate to carry infantry TO the firefight. However, motorized transport was always in short supply. The USA had the most in proportion to the overall force. Should the loss value of trucks and APCs be increased to limit their tactical use?

Kevin

[sand digger]

Well when the game arrives, demo worn out, I'm going to try what the 9th div AIF actually did successfully in NA. Providing there are some carriers available.

And if it doesn't work, I'll be back.

[M Hofbauer]

first off, I think that Kursk is as representative of the War in Russia as is Michael Jackson for the American populace.

somebody based his conclusions about the use of HTs (or, rather, lack thereof) for mounted offensive operations on loss numbers, and somebody else asked for numbers...

Originally posted by winkelried:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> ... numerical analysis ...

i have a figure of 10'000 for the production of German 251 SPWs during the period of 1943 to 1945 - does anybody have a reliable loss statistic for the same time period? </font>

[M Hofbauer]

sorry,

this

total losses for all of 1943:

7,198 (!!) SPWs, 223 Pz III, 3,105 Pz IV, 2,680 Pz V, 756 Tiger I, 74 Königstiger, 3,756 StuG III, 125 StuG IV, 464 StuH.

should read "total losses for all of 1944".

sorry for any inconveniences this caused.

we now return you to your regularly scheduled program.

[JasonC]

Of course SPW production increases dramatically in 1943 and explodes in 1944. If you ask what portion of the fleet built until the end of that year, and not lost in the previous years, died in a given year, you get 21% for 1941, 10% for 1942, 25% for 1943, and 42% for 1944.

The average monthly loss rates are obviously lower, 1-4% per month. The 1941 figure is also for half a year, essentially, so the rate was at 1944 levels then. The trough in rate of loss is 1942, when they had more of them out but were still attacking. Most of the losses occur only after they go over to the defensive, not only because that is when the SPWs were built in large numbers, but as a portion of those fielded, too.

I'd be willing to bet truck losses follow a similar pattern, adjusted for how many were in the field. Rear area equipment dies faster when on the defensive, and the more thoroughly one is losing the steeper those losses should become. The loss evidence might support more offensive use in 1941, despite the low absolute figure of 285 lost that year, because only 1382 were produced by the end of that year. The rest of the loss changes track more of them fielded, and loss of the initiative not presence of it.

If anyone thinks the overall loss figures mean they were charging with them in 1944, rather than losing them in breakthroughs, they have only to produce the AARs in which the Allies they were used against report their presence and use. Shouldn't be too hard, since there aren't that many big German offensives by mobile divisions (the only ones that had them) in the second half of the war.

[jrcar]

Excellent, thank you very much.

Cheers

Rob

[Determinant]

Originally posted by M Hofbauer:

first off, I think that Kursk is as representative of the War in Russia as is Michael Jackson for the American populace.

-snip-

the losses for the months July and August 1943, remember, this is the month of the much hyped Kursk Zitadelle battle

-snip-

Well, yes, Kursk is atypical for the War in Russia as it was the last time that initiative rested with the Axis. Also the first time that BLITZKRIEG utterly failed to break through the defence and advance into the defender's rear. Just the sort of role where one would expect one's, mostly bullet and splinter-proof, SPW mounted infantry to excel. If you believed the doctrine.

But they did not. They did not even try to motor through in SPWs. The Red Army had their measure.

But that's not to say that light armoured vehicles, like the SPW, do not have their uses. Try reading Sidney Jary's (author of Platoon 18) article in the British Army Review (112) 'I love my Bren Gun Carrier'. Jary says that the Bren Gun Carrier was, although very vulnerable to any form of anti-tank fire, invaluable in moving forward ammo and supplies in ground exposed to shell splinters and 'bullet drizzle'. Something that a soft skin vehicle could never do.

But they were not mounting up in them and driving through the enemy lines. That would have been a rather ostentatious form of suicide by remote control.

Oh, and the much hyped Kursk battle. Is that like the 'much hyped' battles of Waterloo, Midway, El Alamein and Normandy?

[Sirocco]

Originally posted by M Hofbauer:

But one thing should be kept in mind: if you're going to attribute all these losses to mechanical breakdowns, then the SPWs must be the most dysfunctional design ever. Which it wasn't.

If you take a look at August 1944, a lot of those SPW's would have simply been abandoned as the Falaise Pocket was closed and as Army Group Centre was routed on the Eastern Front.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Determinant:

Well, yes, Kursk is atypical for the War in Russia as it was the last time that initiative rested with the Axis. Also the first time that BLITZKRIEG utterly failed to break through the defence and advance into the defender's rear. Just the sort of role where one would expect one's, mostly bullet and splinter-proof, SPW mounted infantry to excel. If you believed the doctrine.

But they did not. They did not even try to motor through in SPWs. The Red Army had their measure.

But that's not to say that light armoured vehicles, like the SPW, do not have their uses. Try reading Sidney Jary's (author of Platoon 18) article in the British Army Review (112) 'I love my Bren Gun Carrier'. Jary says that the Bren Gun Carrier was, although very vulnerable to any form of anti-tank fire, invaluable in moving forward ammo and supplies in ground exposed to shell splinters and 'bullet drizzle'. Something that a soft skin vehicle could never do.

But they were not mounting up in them and driving through the enemy lines. That would have been a rather ostentatious form of suicide by remote control.

Oh, and the much hyped Kursk battle. Is that like the 'much hyped' battles of Waterloo, Midway, El Alamein and Normandy?

"Blitzkrieg"?

Talk about much hyped.

Considering that's not a German military word, what is it you are actually referring to?

[Determinant]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

Well you couldn't be more right old bean. It's a British journalists' description of what the Nazi war machine did to Poland, France and the Soviet Union (in the first few years of the War in Russia).

Now what would your point be?

Is it that because Blitzkrieg is not a GMW (whatever that means) that there was no such thing?

Does this mean that because I do not know the Russian word for umbrella that there are no umbrellas in Russia?

Are you suggesting that the Nazis went out to fight a good old fashioned stand up WWI style war of attrition in Poland and France but got into a freakish situation where tank heavy mechanised all arms columns closely supported by tactical air attempted to and broke through into the enemy's operational depth by accident?

Please elucidate.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Determinant:

Are you suggesting that the Nazis went out to fight a good old fashioned stand up WWI style war of attrition in Poland and France but got into a freakish situation where tank heavy mechanised all arms columns closely supported by tactical air attempted to and broke through into the enemy's operational depth by accident?

It is probably this what he means, to some degree. Not quite the way you wrote it, but certainly the German high command did not really plan for what happened, and when it happened were not quite sure what to do with it, as is shown by the headless chicken dance they performed first after Arras, and then again in front of Dunkerque. German commanders on the tactical and operational level acting against, or at least ignoring, explicit orders led to the success of the Sichelschnitt. Not high command planning according to some secret doctrine that was then called "Blitzkrieg" in British papers.

It is a German word, originating in German military thought though. First in the mid-30s. The legend that it was invented by a British hack is just that.

[Determinant]

Originally posted by Andreas:

It is probably this what he means, to some degree. Not quite the way you wrote it, but certainly the German high command did not really plan for what happened, and when it happened were not quite sure what to do with it, as is shown by the headless chicken dance they performed first after Arras, and then again in front of Dunkerque. German commanders on the tactical and operational level acting against, or at least ignoring, explicit orders led to the success of the Sichelschnitt. Not high command planning according to some secret doctrine that was then called "Blitzkrieg" in British papers.

It is a German word, originating in German military thought though. First in the mid-30s. The legend that it was invented by a British hack is just that.

Thanks for that which is most illuminating. I am of course guilty of taking the OED at face value which records the first use of 'Blitzkrieg' in English by a journalist in 1939. But of course the OED is an English dictionary. Doh.

I completely agree that the Germans do seem to have developed a marvellous tactical technique but not necessarily developed their operational and strategic doctrine to the same level. What's the quote about tactical steps making up operational leaps while strategy points out the path?

The meandering around in Barbarrosa is another example. The German Army, or more precisely Hitler, never seemed to decide what was the Soviet centre of gravity: Moscow?; Stalin?; Kiev?; Leningrad?; the Red Army? They would have saved themselves much trouble if they had decided what it was that they were actually trying to do.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Andreas:

It is a German word, originating in German military thought though. First in the mid-30s. The legend that it was invented by a British hack is just that.

Source? Cooper says that Hitler thought it was an Italian word, FWIW. I am quite keen on finding out the truth of the matter....has it been spotted in some 1930s literature, for example?

[The Hapless General]

Hi Determinant,

Those quotes from the British Army Review look rather interesting. Is there an online publication or only by mail?

[Determinant]

Originally posted by The Hapless General:

Hi Determinant,

Those quotes from the British Army Review look rather interesting. Is there an online publication or only by mail?

Sorry, I'm afraid its not available online. It is consequently quite hard to get hold of. Although it is unrestricted it is an official publication and I suppose therefore that they aren't too interested in helping out the ordinary punter.

Distribution is controlled by DSDC Llangennech, Llanelli, SA14 8YP. I have no idea what they might charge for back copies.

I think that our best hope is that Sydney Jary (author of Platoon 18) publishes his collected articles in book form. He is a remarkable man to be still talking and writing about his experiences sixty years after.

[JasonC]

Determinant - they were tolerably clear about what they regarded the Russian COG as in 1941. It was their fielded forces. The operations order stated the objective as destroying the Russian army inside European Russia without allowing it to withdraw into the interior. Annihilation battle was German doctrine, not deep geographical objectives. Thus the turn to Kiev, to wipe out a million men. Moscow and control of the Ukraine as far as the Donbas industrial region were additional minor objectives, but the main idea was just to surround and slaughter the Russian army.

Which they proceeded to do. The Russians lost forces equal to the size of their original force by the time of Typhoon. But their force in the field was about the same size, because they had recruited and fielded a new force as big as the one lost. That was not part of German calculations, and they had a hard time believing it.

Not surprising - no one had ever done such a thing before, on that scale, successfully. In October they thought the Russians had run out of men and could not longer hold a continuous line, after losing contact in various places (Kiev to Bryansk - well, east of that line). If they had a replacement trickle as slow as the Germans, they would indeed have been out of men by then. But actually they lost 4 times as much by the end of the war without running out.

It was a reasonable choice of COG (clearly it was vulnerable - they did after all succeed in inflicting something like 7 million casualties in 6 months) but only if they had fully mobilized their own economy for attrition warfare at the strategic level. It was fundamentally an underestimation of the Russians rather than a mis-IDing of the COG or any failure to pick one. They were telling themselves before the invasion, "kick in the door and the whole rotten structure will fall to the ground". Overconfidence is often fatal in strategy.

As for France, they had a well crafted plan to achieve the breakthrough, drawn up by Manstein and approved by Hitler over the objections of the rest of the general staff. But they had no planning to speak of about what to use the breakthrough for, once they achieved it. That wound up being decided by Guderian personally. He didn't keep it to himself, though. In the wargames before the event, when he achieved breakthrough, he stated his subsequent intention, to turn north for the channel to cut off the Allied forces in Belgium. This was accepted without objection, as the obvious "school solution".

This was a straightforward application of the standing German doctrine to seek annihilation battle. Which was not new in 1940, it goes back to WW I and before, to the mid 19th century wars and Moltke the elder. Encirclement and flanking were viewed as creating favorable conditions for annihilation battle.

The objective of which was always the complete destruction of the fielded forces of the enemy. That is what they thought of as "decision" in warfare - a thought that goes back to the Napoleonic wars, and to Napoleon personally. And which the Prussians had hammered into them at Jena-Auerstadt and never forgot.

Later maneuverists, and also early British ones (Fuller, Hart) envisioned deep objectives as an alternative to destruction of the enemy force. That was not part of the German recipe in WW II. It was not that they failed to consider it, they did. But as a professional body, they rejected it as unsound. (Anybody who likes can think them wrong about that, but that is what they thought). Thus, the channel not Paris, and the Kiev pocket not Moscow.

[ March 13, 2004, 11:28 PM: Message edited by: JasonC ]