General World War 2 Discussion Thread

snip

Well put. +1

You are missing the point. It was "drawn-out" like you say....no other military force has lasted so long while being so ill-equipped, outnumbered, strategically displaced etc...

In light of the situation at the time, I do no see many other historical examples of such a tenacious defense against a vastly superior coalition of forces that, by mid 1944, had Germany spread on three major fronts.

No one is crediting Germany with any kind of success, other than prolonging the war well past when it should have ended. This is not much room for discussion/interpretation in this regard.

You are missing the point. It was "drawn-out" like you say....no other military force has lasted so long while being so ill-equipped, outnumbered, strategically displaced etc...

In light of the situation at the time, I do no see many other historical examples of such a tenacious defense against a vastly superior coalition of forces that, by mid 1944, had Germany spread on three major fronts.

No one is crediting Germany with any kind of success, other than prolonging the war well past when it should have ended. This is not much room for discussion/interpretation in this regard.

Hogwash and bullsh-t.

They succeeded spectacularly early in the war because they were both starting from their "home base" (zero length lines of supply) and against both the French and the Russians they weren't just better trained and lead but were veterans of real warfare.

Neither was the case for their opposition by 1944. Once the Allies broke through in Normandy They kept those supposedly defensively brilliant Germans on the run ... until they ran out of gas. They neither attacked from some home base since they had to transport everything over the channel and onto beaches or through distant and inadequate ports (Cherbourg). Likewise the Russians moved the Germans some 600 miles during Operation Bagracian and since they had already made progress they were not starting from some built up home base nor was it against something like the non-veterans, poorly lead Russian Army of 1941. They too had to stop once in a while to rearm and reequip.

By 1944 they had a couple of years to prepare for defense and they got to do it with experienced troops and officers.

Germans aren't ubermencsh. Quite fooling yourself. In fact they were so stupid they killed or chased away all their smart people and destroyed their future.

(From 1900-1932 Germany won 16 Nobel Prizes in Physics. The US, a much larger country, won only 7. From 1950-2000 the US won 62... the Germans only 5.)

Do you read operational history? It sounds like you are talking about generalities here.

You are missing the point. It was "drawn-out" like you say....no other military force has lasted so long while being so ill-equipped, outnumbered, strategically displaced etc...

In light of the situation at the time, I do no see many other historical examples of such a tenacious defense against a vastly superior coalition of forces that, by mid 1944, had Germany spread on three major fronts.

The German military had advantages that offset this, such as early preparation, efficient troop training and later, a very defensive posture. This is why it was 'drawn out' and the front didn't collapse immediately to an Allied blitzkrieg. The Allies had severe hurdles of their own- the RKKA started the war as a paper tiger, British armored doctrine was considerably worse than the Germans in North Africa, and the US was green going into 1943, but learned quickly.

The Wehrmacht peaked in 1941 vs the Soviets/W.Allies peaked 44-end.

Come fall of 1943 and much of the Wehrmacht is pretty static, and of low offensive value. The armored divisions are the only ones that have real weight.

Hogwash and bullsh-t.

This is not the way to open a dialogue.

They succeeded spectacularly early in the war because they were both starting from their "home base" (zero length lines of supply) and against both the French and the Russians they weren't just better trained and lead but were veterans of real warfare.

There are many reasons for the early successes of '39, '40. and '41. Vague oversimplifications like "starting from their home base" is neither an explanation for their success, nor is it a good basis to discredit military accomplishments.

The French, British and Russians (to a lesser extent) all had their share of WWI veteran commanders and command staff, no different than the Germans. It was their inability to anticipate and respond to the new wave of fast moving/motorized warfare, among other things, that led to their early humiliations.

Neither was the case for their opposition by 1944. Once the Allies broke through in Normandy They kept those supposedly defensively brilliant Germans on the run ... until they ran out of gas. They neither attacked from some home base since they had to transport everything over the channel and onto beaches or through distant and inadequate ports (Cherbourg).

I hope you realize than the whole of England was essentially the world's largest military base leading up to mid 1944. The massive buildup and organization of the invasion forces was done covertly...but in relative safety and the English channel was really no great obstacle for the Allies as they had full navy and air superiority in Western Europe at that time.

Likewise the Russians moved the Germans some 600 miles during Operation Bagracian and since they had already made progress they were not starting from some built up home base nor was it against something like the non-veterans, poorly lead Russian Army of 1941. They too had to stop once in a while to rearm and reequip.

My point was that Germany nearly captured Moscow in much less time, through continuous outmaneuvering of Russian garrison forces and entire armies. The Russians however continued to grind their way through every battle including Berlin itself, suffering atrocious casualties despite being well-supplied, well-equipped and facing inferior forces.

Germans aren't ubermencsh. Quite fooling yourself.

Really?! I am quite sure they are. Just look at Arnold. If he isn't ubermencsh, who is. /sarcasm.

Do you read operational history? It sounds like you are talking about generalities here.



The German military had advantages that offset this, such as early preparation, efficient troop training and later, a very defensive posture. This is why it was 'drawn out' and the front didn't collapse immediately to an Allied blitzkrieg. The Allies had severe hurdles of their own- the RKKA started the war as a paper tiger, British armored doctrine was considerably worse than the Germans in North Africa, and the US was green going into 1943, but learned quickly.

The Wehrmacht peaked in 1941 vs the Soviets/W.Allies peaked 44-end.

Come fall of 1943 and much of the Wehrmacht is pretty static, and of low offensive value. The armored divisions are the only ones that have real weight.

I respect and appreciate what you are saying here but I do not feel that any of it is in contradiction to my argument.

After Kursk the German situation was very fragile, the fact that the war progressed two more years until the capitulation is remarkable, in my opinion of course.

^^^^

I can see the confusion here. It was your comment on German 'strategic genius' that caused me to comment. "Strategic" in military terms is not at the fighting division's level. It is at the political & economic plus Hitler/OKW/OKH,AGS, AGC, AGN, level.

You mean tactical, it seems.

After Kursk the German situation was very fragile, the fact that the war progressed two more years until the capitulation is remarkable, in my opinion of course.

For reasons already stated, I didn't find it remarkable- it is expected given the circumstances. Defending without surprise was usually much cheaper than attacking. The Soviets had a economical formation just for this purpose: It was called 'Fortified region' and it was low on manpower, had low offensive capability, and based on support weapons. It was used to hold areas with minimal production cost, much like what most of the Wehrmacht was doing.

With the Wehrmacht's units, I find that it was the most tactically/operationally effective in 41 and 42, and much less so afterwards.

Besides recurring training/tactical leadership defects in 44-45', the Soviet tactical command culture was a bizarre weakness, as it tended to force units to be overly aggressive without encouraging creativity, and forced them to attack the same dangerous place over and over with the resultant losses.

IMO, It is interesting that as a whole by 43, Soviet Front and Army commanders were effective but the same cannot be said for corps commanders (outside of exceptions) or division commanders as a whole.

In contrast, the German division commanders were mostly effective or outstanding with the Army commanders getting hammered.

No offense, this is pretty much a 1990s/1980s POV when Eastern front research and scholarship was one sided, based solely on the German POV. This tended to exaggerate German and axis allied military capabilities.

With research on both sides, the double sided POV is that the war was lost at Smolensk in July-Sept. 1941 and they didn't have a chance on consolidating gains even if they managed to take Moscow. In truth, they were intimidated by the Moscow grouping and turned right to take an easier victory, the Kiev pocket.

My point was that Germany nearly captured Moscow in much less time, through continuous outmaneuvering of Russian garrison forces and entire armies.

The key here is the strategic capabilities of the RKKA, and its ability to field substandard forces in emergency situations and replace losses, which they did. They fielded 600 divisions in 1941, much of these built were built in little over a month or two. The Wehrmacht was already depleted of combat power by the time they launched Typhoon.

By the March of 1942 the Soviet Union had already recovered economically, accumulated offensive reserves, and was outproducing the Axis in key weapons categories. The Soviet military system, as established by pre-war planning, was based around a future long war of attrition.

No offense, this is pretty much a 1990s/1980s POV when Eastern front research and scholarship was one sided, based solely on the German POV. This tended to exaggerate German and axis allied military capabilities.

I am sorry to interrupt your discussion at this point, but you do realize there are two different german states in this periods? On the one hand the Federal Republic of Germany (NATO Member) and on the other hand the German Democratic Republic (Member of the Warshaw Pact). Their historic assessment and Point of view of WWII is not the same.

^^
Obviously, western research, as opposed to eastern (Warsaw pact, Soviet Union). The more modern Russian research has moved away from the Soviets.

With the Wehrmacht's units, I find that it was the most tactically/operationally effective in 41 and 42, and much less so afterwards.

Besides recurring training/tactical leadership defects in 44-45', the Soviet tactical command culture was a bizarre weakness, as it tended to force units to be overly aggressive without encouraging creativity, and forced them to attack the same dangerous place over and over with the resultant losses.

When the war began, the soviets lacked experienced and skilled officers in the higher tiers, due to the great purge. The Germans on the other hand, had alot of those. During the course of the war many of the "good" Wehrmacht officers retired had to retire or got killed while the soviet staffs gained more and more experience and learned from their enemy.

I think this point gets neglegted way too often.

Well you can also use the word "strategy" in its traditional definition of meaning an organized plan. For instance, German generals favoured conceding some sector if the end result was a shorter front line, which would allow them to have deeper and stronger formations consistent across the front. This is strategic brilliance conducted through tactical levels of command.




Regarding the Soviet Unions' advantages in attrition...the Germans were well aware of that before Barbarossa was even idea. The whole gamble was in whether or not they could subdue the Soviet Union before the effects of attritional war ravage their forces. Of course they lost that gamble but they didn't having much of a choice, between Hitler's insistence on an invasion and the Soviet Union planning their own surprise declaration of war for 1942...the German high command could have done little differently. Perhaps not going ahead with the Kiev distraction.

There has been much written about this.

The purges had a serious effect. Besides the strategic coup (Red Army in transition), the Red Army was pretty much a 'paper tiger' that accumulated men and equipment but not training or develop formation capability. It was actually combat experience that eventually gave them a better command cadre as the pre-war cadre was filled with incompetents. A lot of the vintage 1941 commanders did not rise, but operational commanders like Konev, Chuikov, Malinovsky and tactical commanders like Rybalko, Kravchenko, and Bogdanov proved themselves through successful command.

It wasn't until the winter of 1942 where the Soviets fielded the equivalent of armored divisions that could attack in depth. So they were a tactically impaired army that relied on mass for a long time. Overall, though, they got the defensive part of their calculus correct in doctrine by 43', and improving offensive skills was the harder part.

Reading 1944, 1945 operations is like reading about a totally different army than 41 or 42.

When the war began, the soviets lacked experienced and skilled officers in the higher tiers, due to the great purge. The Germans on the other hand, had alot of those. During the course of the war many of the "good" Wehrmacht officers retired had to retire or got killed while the soviet staffs gained more and more experience and learned from their enemy.

I think this point gets neglegted way too often.

Yep, the army was ground down and watered down due to attrition among other things. I enjoy reading operational history, and it is interesting to see that the Wehrmacht in operations increasingly became reliant on the actions of a few elite divisions, while the rest of it didn't have much punch and were good only to hold ground.

Of interest is the death of the high reward move, the 'encirclement'- this was largely caused by lack of infantry combat power and numbers.

Also the factor "Hitler" is allways neglected.

His intervention in the military operations of the OKW amassed since "Barbarossa". After the failed assasination on Hitler in 1944,the whole coordination of the german military (Waffen-SS and Wehr) lay in his own hands. A german military high command staff which was independently coordinating operations in any shape or form was effectively not existing since early 1944.

Due to that you can explain furthermore the (strange) german focus on super heavy tanks like PzKpfw VII "Löwe", the PzKpfw VIII "Maus", PzKpfw IX, Superpanzer E-50, E-75 and E-100 instead of mass-producing and improving the concepts of the Panther or Kingtiger.

Comparing dictatorship and the modell of totalitarism you can come to the conlcusion that Stalin in relation to Hitler did it ironically the "right" way. After Stalin eleminated nearly his whole officer corps especially from 1937-1939, as already mentioned, his officers left had to gain experiece in operational warfare. The key point is that Stalin let them doing throughout the war not intervening in major operational decisions made by his staff, but so did the almighty Führer.

^
Isn't "It's all hitler's fault" kind of the infamous excuse of self-serving German Generals? :-p However, it is true that Hitler's interference led to more blunders in an already lost war, particularly the stupid "fortified places" concept.

Stalin was a better supreme commander than Hitler, and unlike him he learned from his mistakes.

With German superweapons, I have long suspected that they were in reality propaganda weapons, designed to improve combat morale at the front and belief at home. The Nazi slogan was to repeatedly claim that the best weapons, best soldiers, best willpower will win the war and that the Axis had all 3 things.

Besides Hitler's failures, the other two: Himmler and Goering's empire were deleterious to the war effort. This is most obviously manifested in the waste entailed by expanding the elite pretenders, the Waffen-SS and Luftwaffe ground forces and then Parachute arm to an extent that was not reasonable. Literally there were around five divisions from these two empires that proved their salt in WW2, the rest were a waste of resources that were better used elsewhere.

^^
Agreed. And this reflects the self-conception of the nazi-ideology in its depth.

I think when examining Hitler's disruptive effect on the German High Command, we must remember than this man was an ideological politician first and foremost, and although they are often compared in our times, Hitler was no Napoleon. He neither had the spirit of a military commander, nor in my opinion, any desire to have one.

Perhaps due to his disillusionment with the German Army at the end of WWI or his encounters with the Reichswehr in the 1920s, Hitler was always held the regular armed forces in a level of contempt. He never fully trusted the professional career soldiers who had been involved in Germany's defense long before the "Wehrmacht" existed. This was part of why he insisted on meddling and intervening, as he was paranoid about being kept in the dark or misinformed about how the war was progressing.

He also understood politics and propaganda much better than his generals did. His obsession with Stalingrad for instance was not merely due to it's strategic or industrial value to the Soviets...but it's political one. Ultimately if Stalingrad was captured and secured...the war would continue, there would be other industrial centers...but Hitler wanted to break Stalin's regime through military victories which had political agendas and this proved to be a reckless and costly doctrine for Hitler throughout the war.

Comparing dictatorship and the modell of totalitarism you can come to the conlcusion that Stalin in relation to Hitler did it ironically the "right" way. After Stalin eleminated nearly his whole officer corps especially from 1937-1939, as already mentioned, his officers left had to gain experiece in operational warfare. The key point is that Stalin let them doing throughout the war not intervening in major operational decisions made by his staff, but so did the almighty Führer.

Again, ironically, you might call Hitler "the devil you know", whereas Stalin was something much more dangerous than a mere devil.

Hitler was in many ways a sentimental; he believed strongly in personal loyalties which often ended in him being betrayed and deserted. Stalin on the other hand refused to lift a finger for his own son was captured as a PoW by the Germans and offered back in a prisoner exchange.

Not to be crass, but even in the xenophobic police-state that was Nazi Germany, you could still enjoy more freedoms and rights than in the Soviet Union, at least if you were a high ranking military officer or businessman. Many of Hitler's generals, the most respected and distinguished (Guderian, Rudtstead, etc) were virtually untouchable to Hitler himself dude to the respect they garnered from others in power. Such a thing was unheard of in Stalin's regime.

Shortening the front via counter-operations and phased withdrawals is common sense, though?

Well you can also use the word "strategy" in its traditional definition of meaning an organized plan. For instance, German generals favoured conceding some sector if the end result was a shorter front line, which would allow them to have deeper and stronger formations consistent across the front. This is strategic brilliance conducted through tactical levels of command.

Outside of exceptions such as Model and Heinrici I haven't seen the genius of German Army and Army group generals during the defensive half of the war. The vaunted Manstein, in charge of the most critical group, was out of his depth at Kursk and afterwards. This cannot be explained purely by RKKA's numbers. He made many blunders and strategic miscalculations, often caused by lack of knowledge of the soviet situation and aggravated by Hitler's insistence on not retreating so much (caused byloss of faith on Manstein's promises of successful counteroffensives).