The German Army in the Soviet Union 1941-45 - Effective or not?

[kipanderson]

Hi,

When it comes to relative combat effectiveness, in fact we are really talking “combat power” but why argue the point, the figures are known with reasonable certainty. The reason I say this is that the casualty ratios, and force ratios are now known with “reasonable” certainty. Anyway, using the casualties and force sizes reported in the latest Glantz books for the Soviets you will find that relative combat effectiveness, the “lower” the figure the better, are, Soviet to German, 6:1 for the first year of the war in the east and 1.15:1 during the last two years of the war in the east. The casualties suffered by the German army are only counted up to the end of March 45, i.e. not the round up during the last six weeks of the war.

What these figures mean is that during the first year of the war in the east, a combat team of just 1,000 Germans could sometimes hold its own against a force of 6,000 Soviets. The stories one reads from the German side of single German battalions holding off one or more regiments did in need happen at times. However, during the last two years of the war in the east, a German combat team of 1,000 men would, on average, generate the same combat power as a Soviet force of 1,150 men. It is also clear that this is not due to a decrease in the combat power of the Germans. A study of German combat effectiveness during the Bulge showed it to have been the same as during Normandy, and Italy a year earlier.( Unless US combat effectiveness decreased over the same period, unlikely in my view as they gained in experience.) It did not decrease until January 45. (PS. All armies always complain about the replacements not knowing what they are doing, no doubt with good reason.) What happened is that Soviet combat effectiveness improved immeasurably between June 41 and the autumn of 43. Given the massive, in fact tragic amount of experience, the Soviets had accumulated over the first two years the above relative combat effectiveness figures for the second half of the war are not a surprise. In retrospect anyway.

All the best,

Kip.

PS. Just to give one detail that gives a favour to what was happening. In 43 the Soviet annual intake of recruits was greater, just, than their “irrecoverable losses”.

PPS. The German high command, including Hitler, realised they had lost the war in September 42. Before Stalingrad or Alamein. This was "the crisis" month for the German high command. Post September 42 it was a case of damage control.

[killmore]

Something to add to Axis effectivness.

At the start or Barbarossa Axis had 40% advantage in manpower. They held manpower advantage until december 1941.

[Andrew H.]

Grisha and I are making very similar points. Our conclusions are the same, I think, although we may be taking different routes to get there.

I'll restate my point: the problem that the German army had was that it was unable to capitalize on its tactical and operational excellence because it neglected to pay sufficient attention to strategic goals. But, for operations to have a point, they need to be subordinated to some sort of strategic goal.

Stalingrad is a good example of operations working together to achieve a strategic objective, and is also an example of the existence of a strategic objective helping operations be more successful.

Basically, as the German army bogged down in Stalingrad, Stavka realized that they might be able to surround and destroy a large German army. In order to achieve this strategic goal, this, the red army would have to accomplish several subordinate goals. First, they would have to maintain their ability to contest Stalingrad city - if the Germans weren't pinned down there, there would be no one to encircle. Second, they would have to transport enough troops and equipment to the breakthrough points, without tipping the Germans off. This was done by secretly stripping units from the rest of the army holding the line against the Germans and transporting them to Stalingrad. This involved a huge amount of deception, since the troop movement could be detected either at the place where the troops were stripped off, or at the marshalling points in the Stalingrad area.

--As a side note on transport, the USSR used almost all of its trucks (most of them lend-lease) in the transportation phase of Stalingrad. Even though the USSR did not have much of a motorized army, by priortizing strategically, they were able to motorize those parts of the army that needed to be motorized to achieve their specific goal. AFAIK, the German army, which also lacked motorized transport, never concentrated its motorized vehicles in this way, meaning that units in important areas that could have made gains if they had been motorized were no more motorized than armies in side areas.

The rest of the stalingrad battle is pretty well known - the red army found the appropriate weak spots to break through, and then held off German counterattacks until the army in stalingrad had to surrender.

So in this case, not only was every operation fought in the Stalingrad area important for achieving the Soviets' strategic goal, but because this strategic goal was clearly identified, the troops in the operations received a lot of additional materiel, support, intelligence, and reinforcement - which made the operations more likely to succeed.

I don't know whether the Germans' problem was that they did not appreciate the role that operations played between tactics and strategy, or whether Hitler was just an amateur - but in any event, it made the German army much less effective than the sum of its parts.

[Grisha]

JasonC,

You are correct to state that German operational-strategic directives were very general in meaning, and that it was the field officers, the large unit commanders (Army Group, Army) who made a lot of the decisions past the breakthrough stage. I took license with the German General Staff planning in order to prove another point, and now I stand corrected. However, this does further illuminate just how the German General Staff officer corps intuitively understood operational art, since they did link their operations and make a lot of the right decisions early on from that level of warfare. However, its one thing to have an intuitive sense for operational art, and quite another to fully grasp its capabilities.

And, yes, maneuver is only as good as its ability to contribute to the destruction of enemy forces.

[Grisha]

Originally posted by Andrew Hedges:

Grisha and I are making very similar points. Our conclusions are the same, I think, although we may be taking different routes to get there.

Yes, I think we do agree actually, just some details here and there.

[Tarquelne]

1) I'd thought this was mentioned, but I didn't find anything when I looked through the thread to get the details... so: IIRC, the German army made much more of an effort than the other major armies of sending wounded back to their home unit (this is after the wounded are feeling better, you understand), and also of drawing replacements from a formation's "home" area.

Speaking of home areas, I wonder if there's anyone here interested in the GD?

Question: Did the German army make the most of rebuilding broken formations around a "cadre" of experienced soldiers? IIRC, the German army was known for this, but I'm not at all certain I'm remembering correctly.

2) I believe we should be carefull about thinking of France, Poland, the BEF or the Low Countries as "weak." In 1939-40 I know that many thought France, at least, was quite strong. That the Germans used a method of defeating it's early foes so very, very quickly is something that should be seen as an example of the Army's great skill*, not it's enemies' frailty. It's easy to look back and see that the LC's great fortresses, for example, weren't really usefull in "20th century warfare", but it was the German army that figured it out and demonstrated it. (Arguably in 2 wars, come to think of it.)

A suggestion:

3) Please keep in mind that the topic's questions are about the German Army, not Germany in general. In some posts I havn't been able to tell if the author was really speaking just about the performance of the Army, or about the combination of the Army and Hitler (he exerted a huge amount of control and influence over the army, but I wouldn't consider him "of" the Army) or other unpleasent strategic realities outside the Army's control. (Did the Heer have a pre-Hitler (but post Pz Division) plan for an invasion of Russia? If so, what was it like? Hopeing it wasn't similar to Hitlers...)

[Michael Dorosh]

Official German policy was that if your convalescence took less than 8 weeks, you went back to your parent Regiment.

Really, though, when in hospital, you were assigned back to your Ersatz Regiment in Germany, and Ersatz Regiments were associated closely with only a handful of regiments, so I would suppose that even if you were out of it longer than 8 weeks the odds were very good that you would go back to your Field Unit.

GD, as always, is a special case, as their recruits were drawn from all over Germany - but the Ersatz und Ausbildungs units were located I believe in Wehrkreis III.

I agree that there is a lot of talk about Hitler rather than the Army. My main questions really haven't been answered.

a) did the German Army accurately identify its own weaknesses between 1941 and 1945

did they attempt to rectify these weaknesses, or could they?

c) did the Soviets take full advantage of these weaknesses.

In general terms what I am getting is that the Soviets could make good losses faster than the Germans could inflict them. So the question then becomes (to turn it around back on the Germans) why didn't they inflict these losses faster and in greater numbers?

[ August 06, 2002, 07:09 PM: Message edited by: Michael Dorosh ]

[gatpr]

Andreas my contention was not that there were no Soviet offensives in that period. My contention was that the more successful ones targeted the "minor allies". Please reread my original post.

[gatpr]

One idea that leaps to mind is the ratio of actual combatants to support troops. I have no figures at hand, but I believe the Russians not only had smaller support (not necessarily less effective) units than any other major combatant with the possible exception of Japan. I think Dorosh is possibly too generous in attributing a significant combat advantage for German squads until late 1944. The freres Dupuy did some statistical research that shows there was an advantage earlier but after late 1943 it was pretty much gone.

[Tarquelne]

a) did the German Army accurately identify its own weaknesses between 1941 and 1945

did they attempt to rectify these weaknesses, or could they?

c) did the Soviets take full advantage of these weaknesses.

Maybe it'd help to list the weaknesses.

I only know the obvious ones: "The Russians have 500 divisions, we don't. The Russians have many American trucks, we don't. The Russians have thick winter coats, we don't. We have socks."

Hmm... one weakness was certainly Hitler. Several officers recognized this, and there were attempts to "rectify" the weakness.

Engima - certainly a weakness they didn't know about. I guess that really just goes under "Intelligence", which has already been discussed. I don't know what they did about it, though. If Russian intelligence relied on partisans then the anti-partisan operations would be a move to rectify the weakness.

The fact that most of the citizens in the area occupied hated their guts didn't help at all. Did the Army do anything to, ah, soothe the Russian people? This could easily be something they couldn't have done anything about. "Hello, madame, I'm Major Siekel. Funny weather yesterday, wasn't it? Heh." "Good afternoon, Major. I wouldn't know. The SS shot my family and I spent the whole day in church."

I've read that at least one Heer officer wrote that he believed increasing the severity/number of anti-partisan operations did more harm than good - could easily have been the only one, though. Where did anti-partisan operations originate? With the Army, or another (probably Nazi) body?

I'd really like to hear of some unrecognized weaknesses.

[Jack Carr]

If you ever get a chance to see a documentary entitled, "Why Hitler Lost the War", don't pass it up.

The documentary speculates that Hitler initially won the war and then with his bumbling, mind changing, moronic doctrines then lost it.

After Poland had been defeated, no one really doubted the outcome of that conflict, the French army was considered one of the finest fighting forces in the world. "Thank God for the French Army", was the mindset in Great Britain after Poland fell. The French turned out to be no more than speedbumps for the panzers.

If Hitler had followed through with his air war on the British air fields and then followed that up with Operation SeaLion, there is no longer a war on two fronts. Even the British High Command when asked today would Hitler have succeeded if he invaded Great Britain? Several British commanders answer this question in the documentary by answering with a resounding "Yes, he would have". The British had nothing ready for the likes of an invasion by the Reich.

Attempting to keep to the original topic, I like to oversimplify the question posed. The German army of 1939-1945 held off the armed might of the rest of the mechanized world for five years before succumbing to defeat. It can be argued that for two of those years, they were winning!

Hitler simply bit off more than his Army could chew. His bumbling, bad decisions, horrific war crime policies, etc. certainly didn't help his men in the field.

Good question. Interesting responses. You really could talk about this one for a while.

[Guest Mike]

Jack anyone who thinks Sealion could have succeeded in Sept-Oct 1940 must know nothing about it.

there are scenarios where it might've, but none of them came close to actually existing, and the only scenario that matters, fortunately, is the one that happened.

It would have been a massacre - Germany would have lost it's navy in its entirity, much of it's Rhine river transport (the barges were going to be used to transport troops), significant amounts of other naval transport (ferries, merchant shipping, etc) and 3-500,000 troops - a very large number of them drowned.

Some misconceptions:

1/ The RAF was badly knocked about.

Not so. The British thought it was happening, but post war nalysis shows they never came close to suffering any serious damage. British fighter production was twice that of German fighter production, and there weer far more pilots for the British fighters than there weer for the German ones - if British pilots were getting exhausted then German ones weer asleep on their feet!!

2/ The German landings would be like D-Day.

No - the Germans had no specialised landing craft at all. their plan called for troops to be kept on ships for up to 3 days off the English coast to be unloaded. Given that the RN had destroyer bases that were outside Me-109 range and within a few hours sailing of the roadsteads, night-time destroyer sorties would ahve destroyed these troops.

The RN had, in Home waters, twice as many destroyer-class vessels as the KriegsMarine, 2-3 times as many submarines, and 3-4 times as many light cruisers.

Tirpitz wasn't launched yet, and Bismark only recntly so.

3/ the 2nd and subsequent waves of the landing were to use to same transports as teh first. See note 2 for how many of those might've survived.

4/ Commonwealth land troops in England at teh time amounted to some 20-25 division equivalents. about 1/3rd werr fully equipped 9with 3/4ths or more of their heavy equipment, another 1/3rd reasonably equipped (ie with more than about 40% of their heavy gear). There weer several hundred tanks, of which, IIRC, about 200-300 were Matilda 2's.

5/ None of this relies on any effective beach defences, or includes home guard or guerilla operations.

Certainly everyne at hte time thought the Germans would be able to do it, but any objective look at the forces involved and the overall logistical situation puts that idea to the sword quickly.

[ August 06, 2002, 10:53 PM: Message edited by: Mike ]

[Andreas]

Originally posted by gatpr:

One strategy the Soviets used to great effect in 1942 and early 1943 was simply defend against the Germans. The offensive operations were launched against the Axis allies, and the general idea was to strike along boundaries betweeen units as much as possible.

Originally posted by gatpr:

Please reread my post.

Done. Next time you should maybe put 'successful' in at the point where you mean it to go in, and not rely on people reading your mind. Offensive operations were launched against the Germans too, but they were not successful. On that we can agree. The question is whether that was because of better efficiency of the Germans, or because of their better equipment and motivation. Probably a mix of both.

Regarding the statistical research by Dupuy. I am not sure what the unit of analysis is in there, is it the squad, or something higher? I always thought that it meant that on the whole, the Germans no longer outfought anyone else as clearly. That does not mean that in specific segments they don't outfight them, or are being outfought. Artillery would be an example of the latter, I guess.

I fully agree though that putting the date when comparative German combat effectiveness deteriorated in late 1944 is probably too late. I think the effects of constant losses, reduced training, Notabitur etc. were probably felt long before then. More so in the specialist branches with higher losses. A comment by a German officer in Glantz 'The early period of war' clearly states that from mid-war on German junior officers were probably worse than their Soviet counterparts because of the shortened training period.

I would be interested in the institutional mechanisms for sharing knowledge in the Wehrmacht. Somehow or other, the Red Army managed to learn from its defeats (Kharkov 1942) and failure to fully exploit successes (Little Saturn) to a degree that when it had digested all these lessons, they wiped the floor with the Wehrmacht. The Wehrmacht does not seem to have had that ability. Was there someone doing general staff studies comparable to the Red Army ones that Glantz is now bringing into English?

[kipanderson]

Andreas,

“Regarding the statistical research by Dupuy. I am not sure what the unit of analysis is in there, is it the squad, or something higher?”

The statistical analysis done by Dupuy was designed to work best at numbers between 10,000-30,000 men. However, it can work reasonably well, and was used to analyze battles, down to battalion combat team. He some times gets a lot of stick; however, his work was accepted by both the US DOD and UK’s Operational Analysis units in the 1970s. The final acceptance test for the US military was to enter all the mass of information known about the Battle of the Bulge, run his equations, and see what the result was. You will have guessed that the result was the same as it had been in reality and all involved were converted to his work.

When it comes to German combat effectiveness in the late war, and we are now talking genuine “combat effectiveness” not “combat power”, hence one side having more artillery is fully accounted for as is one side having Uber tanks, the evidence is very powerful that German combat effectiveness did not decrease until 45. Dupuy was tasked with the specific job of studying this question and the conclusion was clear. German combat effectiveness was still higher than US combat effectiveness during the Battle of the Bulge. Also, by a margin that is consistent with Normandy and the war as a whole. As all combat effectiveness is relative it is possible that German combat effectiveness during the Battle of the Bulge had decrease from the early war in absolute terms. However, this is only possible if US combat effectiveness decreased over the first six months of the war in NWE. If you consider that even more US units were green during Normandy, also if you read books such as Closing With the Enemy, is it my view that it is highly unlikely that US combat effectiveness decreased over this period.

I have the full explanation by Dupuy of German combat effectiveness during the Battle of the Bulge and will be happy to let you borrow it when I have unpacked all my books.

All good fun,

All the best,

Kip.

[freaky ol'man w/very long wings]

This is a big subject at hand, for all of us, "newbie" historians, and one that has compelled many works and many different opinions.

That may need to be reinforced by some "vets".

I want to point out some authors that had dedicated much of their time to the study of the German Army during WWII, it's policies and strategy.

Barry A. Leach;

"German Strategy Against Russia. 1939-1941".

Oxford At The Clarendon Press. 1973.

Franz Halder

"The HALDER WAR DIARY. 1939-1942. Edited by Charles Burdick and Hans-Adolf Jacobsen. Presidio. US, 1988.

note: F. H. Chief of the German General Staff.

Hans-Adolf Jacobsen is a German historian which had many works in the subject, the German Army. He's also the editor with Andreas Hillgruber and trans. Robert Frhr von-Friegtag, of "The Soviet History of The Great Patriotic War" by Boris S. Telpuchowski, that is, the official Russian history of the period. They took care of the German edition of this work.

Another work I would like to add;

David M. Glantz

"BARBAROSSA. Hitler invasion of Russia 1941. Tempus. USA, 2001. For his tactical intuition.

This, to help us form our own opinion of how things did stand on the strategical level.

In the tactical level, imo, Hitler, when playing the Germans, was as "gamey" as it can get.

[kunstler]

I have a question though about separating the Army from things beyond their control (ie. Hitler's blunders and such).

Is this really possible to do? The Wehrmacht was Hitler's creation in the 30's. He endorsed Blitzkrieg warfare, yes? My knowledge here is mostly superficial so much may be inaccurate but that is my understanding. He built it, it was his baby. How can you then separate Hitler's role from it?

Was not Hitler responsible for pushing the German Army in the beginning, when they opposed his daring gambles? They planned to overthrow him if he screwed up early on but his gambles always paid off. So if the army is separated from Hitler's bungling, should they get credit for Hitler's successes? Should not those go to Hitler instead?

What about the Soviet performance? Should it not be looked at minus Stalin's bungling, his orders not to provoke the germans, not to fight back, then fight back, but totally unrealistic? What about the commisars who hampered Russian forces in the first part of the war? If political/ideological aspects of the Germans are removed, should not the Soviets be viewed in the same sort of light?

In which case the Wehrmacht would not have done nearly as well as it did.

In which case can you not argue that the millions of Soviet casualties/prisoners caused at the beginning of Barbarossa are mostly the result of Stalin's incompetence/meddling in military affairs? What about his culling of the armed forces generals? Without that, the red army would have performed much better, no?

I'm not criticizing here, I'm just thinking about how hard it is to separate the army from the state it functions on behalf of.

The Waffen-SS for example, where the armed branch of the Nazi Party, and not part of the german wehrmacht; they would not exist without the Party, so how do you view their role in the war if you are trying to separate the army from the state?

Just wondering here, that's all.

I think the German Army lost the war (not the fault of back stabbing on the home front as in WWI or all due to Hitler screwin' em over in WWII, they lost); I'd give'm an A for effort and a D for realistic long term planning. That's from a mainstream casual interest in history perspective. =)

cheers,

kunstler

[Keith]

I noticed a couple of people blasting Hitler for his stand fast orders. I argue that in many cases, the stand fast orders were the best course of action. A case in point is the Moscow counter offensive in 1941-1942. The majority of the German divisions were infantry units with horse drawn artillery. Most of the infantry was malnurished, frost bitten, soles with limited mobility and most of their horses were dead and replaced by Russian ponies. They would have been scatered and slaughtered in the open steppes of Russia. Hitler's stand fast order saved AG Center.

Another example is Stalingrad. I argue that once Stalingrad was firmly surrounded, Hitler's order to stand fast was correct and in fact prevented the complete collapse of the Southern front. Sixth Army tied down numerous Russian divisions that would otherwise could have run pell mell further East and cut off the Army in the Caucasus. Furthermore the poor soles in Stalingrad had no real chance to escape given their miserable condition, lack of fuel, etc. The Russian tanks would have eaten them alive if they tried to break out.

Granted, in numerous cases Hitler decisions to hold territory at all cost resulted in the liquidation of countless German divisions. But also remember that the vast part of the German Army marched on its feet and lacked the mobility to disengage from the Russians.

[Michael Dorosh]

Thanks to all for the excellent discussion so far, though I was hoping more for a regimental level discussion. Perhaps I'll start a new thread over the weekend, but I hope this one continues.

I do think the Army can be singled out from Hitler's blunders, quite frankly. The German Army seemed almost as hidebound as the British in some respects. Doesn't Cooper say as much when discussing the failure to annihilate the BEF at Dunkirk? Or is that simply looking on with perfect hindsight?

Their ability to create battlegroups, to launch instant counterattacks on lost positions (was this any different than the Russians of 1944-45, really, though?), their fairly smooth system of recruit training, advanced training, transfer companies, and the relation between Ersatztruppenteil and Feldtruppenteil (if I've gotten that right) all put them in a league of their own, or so I would argue.

Was the MG42 really the right weapon for the job of "squad automatic"? Do you really want something pumping out 1200 rounds a minute on the attack, or was a Bren-type weapon far more suitable?

Was the non-issuance of semi-auto rifles to replace the K98 in the first half of the war a significant issue? I would argue not, but if not, then why so much attention paid in the latter half in providing semi and full auto weapons? Because they were on the defensive? Wouldn't they have been better off working out their system of on-call artillery?

Why didn't the Germans have on-call artilley in the amounts, or at the very least with the response time, of the Allies? Didn't they think it necessary?

The reliance on horseflesh - was this an economic issue, or a military issue? I don't see that Hitler had anything to do with this - or did he?

Was it they could not get enough oil, could not build enough trucks, or both? I imagine building all those U-boats on top of their supertanks took a lot of resources that were limited to begin with.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Keith:

I noticed a couple of people blasting Hitler for his stand fast orders. I argue that in many cases, the stand fast orders were the best course of action. A case in point is the Moscow counter offensive in 1941-1942. The majority of the German divisions were infantry units with horse drawn artillery. Most of the infantry was malnurished, frost bitten, soles with limited mobility and most of their horses were dead and replaced by Russian ponies. They would have been scatered and slaughtered in the open steppes of Russia. Hitler's stand fast order saved AG Center.

Another example is Stalingrad. I argue that once Stalingrad was firmly surrounded, Hitler's order to stand fast was correct and in fact prevented the complete collapse of the Southern front. Sixth Army tied down numerous Russian divisions that would otherwise could have run pell mell further East and cut off the Army in the Caucasus. Furthermore the poor soles in Stalingrad had no real chance to escape given their miserable condition, lack of fuel, etc. The Russian tanks would have eaten them alive if they tried to break out.

Granted, in numerous cases Hitler decisions to hold territory at all cost resulted in the liquidation of countless German divisions. But also remember that the vast part of the German Army marched on its feet and lacked the mobility to disengage from the Russians.

Hitler saved the Army in 1941 with his stand fast orders. Stalingrad I'm not so sure about, you may have an argument on your hands there. Conventional wisdom (which isn't always correct) has Paulus destroying his army because of his unwillingness to break out of der Kessel. Granted, it's easy to type that onto a compuer screen and quite another thing to break out of a pocket with starving, exhausted and despondent men.

[Tarquelne]

Originally posted by kunstler:

[QB]I have a question though about separating the Army from things beyond their control (ie. Hitler's blunders and such).

Is this really possible to do?

IMO: Sometimes, sometimes not.

First, consider there to be a great big "IIRC" in front of most of my remarks.

The Wehrmacht was Hitler's creation in the 30's.

Re-arming Germany was certainly a major item on Hitler's agenda. However, he to a large extent left the Wehrmacht alone, at least in the early days. There was a low level of Hitler centric cronyism - officers were primarily products of Wehrmacht training, not Nazi indoctronation or Nazi training.

He endorsed Blitzkrieg warfare, yes?

The basic theories were developed and backed by others, including a number of Army officers. I think Hitler's main contribution was a great deal of confidence in Army's ability to win an offensive. Early in the war this made him look brilliant. He was, I submit, merely lucky, in that his conception of the German Army _happened_ to fit the current situation. Later on the situation changed, but Hitler's ideas didn't.

My knowledge here is mostly superficial so much may be inaccurate but that is my understanding.

Welcome to the club. We shouldn't let it slow us down!

He built it, it was his baby. How can you then separate Hitler's role from it?

Only with great care, I think. Focus attention on officers who probably would have held thier position without Hitler, and how they conducted operations that, as far as we know, didn't incorporate advice from Hitler. (Rommell in NA? I know Hitler yammered at him alot, but I seem to remember that R. went his own way pretty often.)

Was not Hitler responsible for pushing the German Army in the beginning, when they opposed his daring gambles? They planned to overthrow him if he screwed up early on but his gambles always paid off. So if the army is separated from Hitler's bungling, should they get credit for Hitler's successes? Should not those go to Hitler instead?

If Hitler alone (or nearly alone) was responsibile for such "pushing" then that's fine. We can then conclude that the early Wehrmacht wasn't as aggressive as Hitler. (Who was?) Hopefully a grog will come along and feed us the info on the W's plans to invade France, the LCs, Poland and Russia. The Army had plans to invade all of those, I beleive, except maybe Russia.

What about the Soviet performance? Should it not be looked at minus Stalin's bungling, his orders not to provoke the germans, not to fight back, then fight back, but totally unrealistic?

For MD's questions, I don't think we do, since we're not trying to compare the effectivness of the two armies. How "tough" the situation the Army faced at any given time matters, but I don't think it matters why the Soviets were in a good or bad position.

If political/ideological aspects of the Germans are removed, should not the Soviets be viewed in the same sort of light? In which case the Wehrmacht would not have done nearly as well as it did.

Remember, MD's trying to judge not Germany, or the USSR, but only the German Army.

If you just want to look at the overall effectivness, the results, then all the contributing factors don't matter. MD seems to want to look more closely than that, however.

If a poor officer issues some bad orders to his riflemen and the men lose a battle the group involved certainly wasn't effective. But if you want to judge the effectivness of just the riflemen then you should discount the effect of the officer's orders as much as possible. Likewise, since Hitler wasn't a product of the Army it's usefull to try to discover when he caused the Army to do something, and when the Army did it independant of Hitler.

What about his culling of the armed forces generals? Without that, the red army would have performed much better, no?

Sure, in the same way one might argue that the existance of so many Panzer Divisions is to Hitler's credit, not the Army, because without Hitler's backing Guderian's ideas wouldn't have been realized.

I'm not criticizing here, I'm just thinking about how hard it is to separate the army from the state it functions on behalf of.

Yeah, I agree. At least for us. I'm sure we havn't read all there is avialble on the issue.

The Waffen-SS for example, where the armed branch of the Nazi Party, and not part of the german wehrmacht; they would not exist without the Party, so how do you view their role in the war if you are trying to separate the army from the state?

Taking a slightly different tack, I wonder if we could compare the W-SS with the W to get some insight on Nazi or Hitleresque tactics vrs. W. tactics.

I think the German Army lost the war (not the fault of back stabbing on the home front as in WWI or all due to Hitler screwin' em over in WWII, they lost); I'd give'm an A for effort and a D for realistic long term planning. That's from a mainstream casual interest in history perspective. =)

I agree with that for the most part... though the long term planning was very often completely out of the army's hands. Hitler (don't forget that blanket "IIRC") made a point of keeping most of his generals uninformed about the Big Picture. That was supposed to be very much belong to him.

I think it'd be more accurate to give "Germany" as a whole the A for effort and the D for long range planning. Though I'd give it an "F". Too much "magical thinking" about Russia and the US.

(Here's hopeing this helps put the thread back on topic more than it causes digression. Ah, it probably doesn't, sorry MD.)

[ August 07, 2002, 07:41 PM: Message edited by: Tarqulene ]

[Michael Dorosh]

Digressions are fine, this is all very interesting.

Hitler DID leave the Army alone in the early 1930s, you are correct about that. He did have other things on his mind (SA and Roehm, for example).

[John D Salt]

Dammit, I hate it when this machine eats my posts and I have to do them again.

If you see this twice, things are screweder up than I thought.

Originally posted by kipanderson:

[snips]

The statistical analysis done by Dupuy was designed to work best at numbers between 10,000-30,000 men.

Was it? Where does he say this?

Originally posted by kipanderson:

[snips]

He some times gets a lot of stick; however, his work was accepted by both the US DOD and UK’s Operational Analysis units in the 1970s.

I don't know who you're referring to in the British OA community (maybe DOAE, as was?), but among my colleagues at Fort Halstead (none of whom go back as far as the 70s) the attitude to Dupuy is generally "Nice historical research, shame about the statistical method". He richly deserves the stick he gets, I'm afraid -- dodgy modelling, and even people who've done the short course on model validation ought to know how silly it is to validate against historical outcomes (they dopn;t, but they ought to).

Originally posted by kipanderson:

[snips]

Dupuy was tasked with the specific job of studying this question and the conclusion was clear. German combat effectiveness was still higher than US combat effectiveness during the Battle of the Bulge. Also, by a margin that is consistent with Normandy and the war as a whole.

IIRC Dave Rowlands' historical studies into "national characteristics" multipliers came up with Americans, British and Germans being on a par.

All the best,

John.

[Bastables]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

Was the non-issuance of semi-auto rifles to replace the K98 in the first half of the war a significant issue? I would argue not, but if not, then why so much attention paid in the latter half in providing semi and full auto weapons? Because they were on the defensive?

I argue the increase in semi-auto/auto weapons is directly attributable to shortages in manpower leading to lower numbers in sections, platoons, and company’s and so on as the war progressed. One can look to a certain commonwealth military for parallels. A military that is so strapped for infantry that it reflects the late 44/45 German TO&E for regt down. Sections that have dropped from 10 men down to 6-8 men yet now have two M203s and two C-9 LMGs to cover the drop in manpower.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Bastables:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

Was the non-issuance of semi-auto rifles to replace the K98 in the first half of the war a significant issue? I would argue not, but if not, then why so much attention paid in the latter half in providing semi and full auto weapons? Because they were on the defensive?

I argue the increase in semi-auto/auto weapons is directly attributable to shortages in manpower leading to lower numbers in sections, platoons, and company’s and so on as the war progressed. One can look to a certain commonwealth military for parallels. A military that is so strapped for infantry that it reflects the late 44/45 German TO&E for regt down. Sections that have dropped from 10 men down to 6-8 men yet now have two M203s and two C-9 LMGs to cover the drop in manpower.</font>

[JasonC]

Did the German army ID its own weaknesses? Some routinely, certainly, but in important respects the answer is no. They never corrected their penchant for reckless attacks, for instance. It is not like only the politicians thought that way. Some issues were IDed as problems and not corrected, like proliferation of types and the readiness nightmare that created.

Sometimes there was an erroneous practice clearly seen as such, with the remedy proposed for it false as well as impractical and therefore ignored - like the practice of long frontages assigned to mobile divisions on defense, which was a diversion from keeping reserves, but in fact was criticized as violating a doctrine of offensive employment of armor, which was itself wrong and wasteful.

So they had a choice between throwing away their AFVs gradually through front line attrition, and throwing them away all at once in reckless unprepared counterattacks. They mostly picked the former when things were going well, as it least it got some use out of their AFV strength. Then they resorted to the second when things were bad, and managed to make them collapse beyond bad to abysmal with some frequency (e.g. Mortain, Arracourt).

Did the Russians ID some of these weaknesses and take advantage of them? They certainly took advantage of them, but it is rather less clear that they ever IDed them. They simply stood on the defensive at Stalingrad and Kursk until the Germans had wasted their reserves in their typical manner. Then counterattacked on the deep flanks of the point of German main effort with their own husbanded reserves.

The Russians were simply more conservative and sounder in their use of reserves, and it showed. Part of that was simply trying to "play safer" after the ruinous losses of 1941, when all up front deployments proved so vunerable to German offensive maneuver. The Germans never really adapted themselves, to that adaptation on the Russians' part. They lost the initiative first.

As for trying to find times when the German army was more or was less effective, and to trace it to manpower issues or what not, it looks like a blind ally to me. Individual German unit performance in the first half of the war in Russia looks better simply because they were winning. Winning operationally is the best protection and best force multiplier available.

This is not simply some self-referential chicken and egg issue. The cause of the shift in initiative was not some global slow process but two definite battles, Stalingrad and Kursk, in each case involving both offensive and defensive stages. After them, German performance isn't as stellar as before them, not because of mysterious secondary causes, but simply because they are on their heels and losing, instead of winning and parading around hapless uncoordinated mobs already "bagged" by the armor.

As for one fellow going on about how the Russians planned Stalingrad and it showed they understood operations, the Germans did the same sort of thing in 1941 and did it even faster and more successfully. The Stalingrad pocket was half the size of any of the giant ones of 1941, going the other way.

What is true is that the German plan of campaign in 1942 became incoherent after passing the Don. This was the flip side of German initiative granted to armor group leaders and the like. Their operational goals were set very much by "opportunity pull" processes exploited by leading commanders, rather than "command push" processes planned out beforehand by the highest HQs. Which could lead to divided command and divergent aims sometimes.

Thus in 1942, 6th Army considered its objective Stalingrad, a prestige objective set by the political leadership. Which had gone in for the habit of handing out Marshal's batons for the capture of major fortified areas or cities (e.g. Manstein's for the Crimea campaign). The southern portion of Army Group South thought the oil regions of the Caucausus were the real objective, and viewed the Stalingrad fight as a means of covering their left flank.

Neither saw its objective as destroying major Russian field formations, in sharp contrast to 1941, though they expected to accomplish that incidentally in the course of taking a particular city or region. When large opportunities do not present themselves to the front commanders, absence of command planning can be detrimental. When command planning focuses on sideshow objectives, the result can be even worse. In 1940 and 1941, the Germans were in fact relying on the skill, training, and judgement of a few armor group commanders far more than an army probably should. With that "probably should" governed by the consideration that not all of them can be expected to be brilliantly right independent thinkers all of the time.

As for the idea that the "hold at all cost" orders were actually brilliant and wonderful, it is revisionism and apologetics. Long before AG Center in the battle of Moscow was in such straits, the political leadership and the Army command were both forbidding withdrawls to more sensible defensive positions, with winter quarters and rationalized shorter frontages. A few front line commanders did it anyway, and some were even relieved for it. Guderian was, for one, hardly an imbecile or a shrinking violet. Things only got to the point where "hold at all cost" orders might in some cases have helped, because they had already hurt for months. And that is the best case.

In the case of Stalingrad, it is just ridiculous. The force destroyed there would have been infinitely more valuable outside the pocket, being supplied and fighting effectively, than inside it, immobile, and starving to death. That a significant portion of it could have broken out is pretty clear to me. The ring was quite thin at first, and the forces facing the relief operation did not do particularly well against it, even fighting in only one direction.

Did a point nevertheless arrive after which it could not have gotten out, where tying down Russians by just holding on was the best contribution they could make? Of course. But that was after the relief operation had failed. The best time for a breakout-withdrawl would have been right after the encirclement. A few weeks later, during the relief operation, it was also possible. Beyond that it was not, obviously.

As for things like small arms questions, I think their importance is ridiculously overrated. The differences there between one army and another simply weren't that large, and certainly did not matter as much as higher level command issues, or issues of overall doctrine. But a true belt fed LMG is certainly better than a magazine weapon like the Bren. It needn't have 1200 rpm cyclic rate of fire, but belt fed vs. magazine fed is a major advantages.

As for staying with bolt rifles, it mattered little. On the attack, most riflemen closed to grenade range or humped MG ammo. Personal small arms simply weren't that large a component of the combat power of any of the armies, and the rifles least of all.

The close in combat power of infantry stems as much from grenades (and infantry AT weapons, come to that) as from automatics, and the ranged firepower comes mostly from SAWs and infantry heavy weapons rather than rifles. Meanwhile artillery was doing most of the killing anyway, inflicting 70% of allied casualties or higher.

As for artillery tasking issues, the German system was perfectly workable and fit their organizational structures, commander abilities, and logistical realities. Why didn't they let every sergeant who could get to a radio call down a whole corps' worth of firepower? Because their shells available were limited, and they did not trust mere sergeants - or mere lieutenants or even captains - to decide where to apply the limited but vital artillery firepower of a whole defending corps.

The Russians didn't either, and centralized the fire support decision. Then they issued a ton of tubes, including some to every echelon of command. That gave each commander some ability to influence the battles he was involved in by artillery means, but in amounts limited by his own rank. The result was a command-push approach to *mass* fire, which fit with overall Russian doctrine and kept the most important support decisions in the hands of not quite as green corps and army level commanders.

In place of the "organic" tasking of the Russians, and the "rich man's" let everybody fire anything tasking of the western Allies, the Germans needed something flexible enough to get the effect of organic support without so many tubes as the Russians, or as many shells as the western Allies.

Their solution was to have artillery officers at division level, and corps level staff officers, make the firepower *allocation*, and then leave the actual employment to lower ranking officers in the field. This let their senior staffs plan larger battles (e.g. decide that regiment A needs n battalions of support to hold a bend in a river line or what-not), and their lower echelons get reliable fire support that wouldn't be called away by an aggressive FO in a neighboring unit, leaving them naked. Which a western tasking system could easily have caused, especially with one fifth the shell budget to work with.

[ August 07, 2002, 09:26 PM: Message edited by: JasonC ]