Sequoia Posted February 25, 2011 Share Posted February 25, 2011 I recall the 1st and 2nd US Armored Division and maybe the 3rd too had a different "Heavy" organization then later Armored Divisions. Did this difference extend down to the battallion level or did they simply have more tank battalions? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Emrys Posted February 25, 2011 Share Posted February 25, 2011 1st. Armored reorganized to the combat command TO&E, but the 2nd. and 3rd. retained the "heavy" TO&E. They were organized as two regiments of tanks and one regiment of armored infantry instead of three battalions of each. The two heavy divisions had roughly half again as many tanks, but less infantry than the combat command divisions. There were other detail differences as well. Michael 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sequoia Posted February 25, 2011 Author Share Posted February 25, 2011 Do you know if the battallions they did have were organized the same as other armored divisions? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PZKW IV Posted February 25, 2011 Share Posted February 25, 2011 Tank Battalions were the same in both types of divisions. All TK BNs had 3 Med Co. (M4 variants) and one light Co. (M5A1) 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sequoia Posted February 25, 2011 Author Share Posted February 25, 2011 Okay, well that makes it easier on Steve since no one will demand a differently organized US tank battallion. I think he will have enough problems sorting out TO&E for the next two modules. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JonS Posted February 25, 2011 Share Posted February 25, 2011 Tank Battalions were the same in both types of divisions. All TK BNs had 3 Med Co. (M4 variants) and one light Co. (M5A1) Actually, that isn't quite true. Indep Tk Bns and Tk Bns in divs except 2 and 3 Armd were organised with 3 med + 1 lt coys. Tk bns in 2 and 3 Armd Divs were different in that they had 3 coys only, and were 'pure' in terms of tk type. Each armd regt in those two divs consisted of two bns of mdm tks, and one bn of lt tks. However, it is my understanding that in practice they often cross-attached coys so that in combat the bns weren't actually pure. Oh, there were also a pair of indep lt tk bns deployed to NWE. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PZKW IV Posted February 25, 2011 Share Posted February 25, 2011 Disregard the following as it is talking about the "light" Armored Divisions. According to Stanton's WW II OOB book, 15 Sep 1943 all tank battalions were reorganized. He states "The 1943 structure replaced the two armored regiments with three tank battalions, but each tank battalion was increased to three medium and one light tank company." I do believe that JonS is absolutely correct 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted February 26, 2011 Share Posted February 26, 2011 Yeah, I got lucky with the US forces. Far, far fewer exceptions and special circumstances below Battalion level. Not so lucky with the Germans I've worked with so much TO&E over the years I've come to really appreciate the US Army's usual insistence on clean, simple, uniformity of its forces. It's tidy. Compare this to the Germans which looks like they took 10 guys with ADD, put them into a room, and said "create as many formational variations as you like". Then every 6 months they told them to do it all over again, but never bothered to tell anybody out in the field they had to change. At least that's what it feels like Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hellfish Posted February 26, 2011 Share Posted February 26, 2011 Okay, well that makes it easier on Steve since no one will demand a differently organized US tank battallion. Pfff. You wait till I start screaming (SCREAMING) for CDL and Amphibious Tank battalions. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sequoia Posted February 26, 2011 Author Share Posted February 26, 2011 Yeah, I got lucky with the US forces. Far, far fewer exceptions and special circumstances below Battalion level. Not so lucky with the Germans I've worked with so much TO&E over the years I've come to really appreciate the US Army's usual insistence on clean, simple, uniformity of its forces. It's tidy. Compare this to the Germans which looks like they took 10 guys with ADD, put them into a room, and said "create as many formational variations as you like". Then every 6 months they told them to do it all over again, but never bothered to tell anybody out in the field they had to change. At least that's what it feels like Steve What I was getting to is I was wondering how much of these special TO&Es in neccessary and practical and will we be seeing any in the game such as US Heavy Tank BN or will they be simulated by making ad hoc extractions from regular TO&Es? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hellfish Posted February 26, 2011 Share Posted February 26, 2011 There were no heavy tank battalions in the US Army in Europe in '44-'45. There were a small number (~200 by May '45, though most of these were in depots) of M26/T26 Pershings classified as heavy tanks for morale purposes sent over beginning in January '45, IIRC, but these were handed out in platoon-sized units to a small number of armored divisions, and acted as a 4th platoon in a company, not as a separate unit. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sequoia Posted February 26, 2011 Author Share Posted February 26, 2011 Okay, what I meant was the organization of tank bns in the 2nd and 3rd armored with the "heavy" organization was different than tank bns in other armored divisions. I'm guessing Battlefront doesn't want to have to include all these special types of bns especially the myriad of German ones in thier unit selection menu, but one can form them by taking elements of different units. Of course command would then be an issue. I would be interested in hearing Battlefront's take on this. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Emrys Posted February 26, 2011 Share Posted February 26, 2011 Of course command would then be an issue. Wasn't it posted that a unit can be attached to another unit? If so, it then falls under the command of the adopting unit. Michael 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JonS Posted February 26, 2011 Share Posted February 26, 2011 Be careful with your nomenclature Michael. Individual vehicles and teams (ie, a 'unit' in CM terms) can be placed under the command of any HQ be it platoon, company, or battalion (ie, a 'unit' in military terms), so what you said is strictly correct, but I suspect that isn't quite what you meant? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Emrys Posted February 26, 2011 Share Posted February 26, 2011 Be careful with your nomenclature Michael. Individual vehicles and teams (ie, a 'unit' in CM terms) can be placed under the command of any HQ be it platoon, company, or battalion (ie, a 'unit' in military terms), so what you said is strictly correct, but I suspect that isn't quite what you meant? I guess what I had more in mind was attaching (typically) a platoon of one type to a company of another type and coming under the command of the company. But of course the same thing could apply to individual vehicles or teams. Or, as you say, the adopting unit could be a battalion or even larger force, depending on how far up the scale available HQs go. Michael 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Erwin Posted February 26, 2011 Share Posted February 26, 2011 "I've come to really appreciate the US Army's usual insistence on clean, simple, uniformity of its forces. It's tidy. Compare this to the Germans which looks like they took 10 guys with ADD, put them into a room, and said "create as many formational variations as you like". The only problem is the uniformity of all units and formations (as in CMSF). In CM1 I enjoyed the massive variety of inf and vehicles - esp on the German side. Modern stuff seems very cookie-cutter and hence less interesting. Am hoping for more variety/eccentricity in the WW2 iteration of CM2. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akd Posted February 26, 2011 Share Posted February 26, 2011 Okay, what I meant was the organization of tank bns in the 2nd and 3rd armored with the "heavy" organization was different than tank bns in other armored divisions. I'm guessing Battlefront doesn't want to have to include all these special types of bns especially the myriad of German ones in thier unit selection menu, but one can form them by taking elements of different units. Of course command would then be an issue. I would be interested in hearing Battlefront's take on this. Both tank battalion orgs are in the game. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Emrys Posted February 27, 2011 Share Posted February 27, 2011 Cool. Michael 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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