Relic naming policy has been a sequence of misnomers. Russians, in particular, where upset by a few namings of Sovirt unit representations, even thoug ironically I for one think Relic called them that exactly for the reason of not accidentally offending amparticularly patriotic and inflexible reader. WWII is taught in Russia, as a result of the period of Soviet hegemony therafter, in a very different way than in the West. Just as for example the Japanese nukings are interpreted and taught, for purposes of explaining their necessity, differently in the US than abroad. Or how the UK educarion skips elements of Dunkirk in favor of a glorious evacuation, or thr failed landing at Galipoli. Or in my own native Finland, how we whitewash our own emminently important period of civil war between our own reds and whites.
In the DoW series they had them dictated to them by GW, and CoH, well, the historical reality enthusiasts have had field days since forever on many naming, let alone performance, disparities. Countlessn threads derailed
Who, and what, the Wehrmacht (and all its denominations) actually was, is a fascinating area of historical study.
Dane tries in his casts to throw some light on that, but this period of history is very interesting in regards to military organisation, and even more importantly, in regards to loyalty of different divisions. And if you want to get really into it, which divisions where involved with attrocities and which where just fighting a conventional war. To this day, historians are very involved with this differentiation.
Not to derail this discussion, but the German reality (or the media based interpretation of it, both internally and externally) at this point, is often misunderstood. The Wehrmacht swore loyalty to Hitler himself, and his nominal position as Der Fuhrer, in an extremely controversial but not unprecedented direct connection between state and the military. Whether the Wehrmacht knew the extent of Hitler and his associates machinations, is not rrally debatable. Afterall, he had already outined it all in "Mein Kampf". It was a matter of public knowledge and record.
But when the Kaiser himself advocated Hitler, abdicated from that position, and gave up his position as commander-in-chief, the Wehrmacht was essentially obligated to swear loyalty. Either that, or civil war.
For the most part, to my reading, the Wehrmacht, and its associated generals, focused more on winning the war that they where obligated, professionally, and by oath, to wage.
It was the secondarily established SS divisions, recruited on political beliefs, who committed the vast majority of attrocity during WWII. This is especially prominent in the Einsatzgruppen who often followed in the wake of the actual regular Wehrmacht divisions (and sometimes, preceeding them for political purposes of subjugating or subverting Eastern European cities and towns to neutralise them)
We will probably never know the complete and real details. The hardest part of historical analysis, is interpreting it all though a modern filter, while still being aware of the sociological norms and pressures of the time. (Not only in Germany, but in this period especially, in EVERY country involved in WWI, and even most of those who did not directly participate.)
Anyways, returning to the point of nomenclature, Coh2 has some degree of innaccuracy (and also in represented unit types). And people react sensitively to terms like "Ober", when for rxample the Wolfenstein series has hollywoodized them to mean something not entirely representative of the German meaning (as compared to "Uber", simple semantic misunderstanding).
Still, it is absolutely true that the Nazi Regime at this time likened themselves, and called themselves ultimately, as the "Third Reich". As the Third Roman Empire. Many readers may not be aware of this, but the geograhic region that largely is Germany, was named the Holy Roman Empire for hundreds of years previous to German unification. A collection of duchies and counties in direct fealty to an elected Emperor.
European history is astoundingly complex. No continent has seen so much conflict. No less than world wars fought here, each an encylopdiea of complication, and even those, barely a shadow in relfection of how much conflict, attrocity, intrigue and upheaval there has been here in the centuries preceeding it
TLDR: Oberkommando translates to "Supreme Command". It makes sense in German, though yes, it is a bit precocious, but such was the fashion at the time. Just as Ostheer was, somewhat after the fact, a title given to the sum of forces on that front.Its a term to desginate the organisational structure for that front, not for the actual divisions dedicated to it, most of whom which had even more bombastic names (though, again, the Wehrmacht was parciularly resistant to this, and often quite simply carried the name of their commanding officer, and not some Germanic myth). Never forget the impetus of the idea of a Third Reich, though, and the Roman Empire connection. That is really what they believed at the time, and a key function of propaganda. Brits apply their military esprit de corp to the heirtage of their regiment. The US to a paritcular kind of action and specialty. The Germans, in this case, either to their commanding officer (if Wehrmacht),ethnic composition of the unit ( and yes, its scary how many foreign troops they recruited into so-called legions) and the SS who loved their occult references.
But Oberkommando, is benign. Just designates as the command structure of the Western Front.
The allies themselves, infact, referred to their highest tier, as Supreme Command...