Comparison German Field Army 1917 vs 1944 [Document]

Special thanks to Matthias Hoffmann for providing information on the German Field Army in 1917.

Intro

The title of this video may appear like click bait, yet actually it is the short version of a document from the organization department of the German Army’s Generals Staff in July 1944.

The original title of the document was:
“VERGLEICH DES FELDHEERES 1917 MIT DEM FELDHEER 1944” which means “comparison of the field army in 1917 with the field army 1944”

So, this video is mainly a visualization of selected parts of the document with some additional information and context. The document has a quite interesting date, namely the 20th July 1944, which was the day of the best known attempted assassination of Hitler. I don’t know if this is a coincidence or not, after all the officers behind the assassination wanted prevent an unconditional surrender similar to 1918. And in their assumptions stable front-lines were an important foundation for any negotiations. (Müller, Klaus-Jürgen: 20. Juli 1944 – Der Entschluß zum Staatsstreich, in: Beiträge zum Widerstand 1933-1945, S. 5)

What is the Field Army?

Now, you probably want to know what is the difference between the Army and the Field Army? Well, the field army is the part of the Army that does most of the killing and dying, one could say the field army is out in the field. For some contrast, other parts of the army would be the Reserve Army (Ersatzheer) or the Occupation Army (Besatzungsheer).
So, since we got that covered let’s get started.

Front Length

In terms of the front lines the Western Front in 1917 had a length of 650 km, whereas in 1944 it was 151 km, yet this only covered the invasion front not the coast lines.
The Italian the front was 450 km in 1917 and 281 km in 1944.
Yet, the huge difference was of course on the Eastern Front with 1700 km in the First World War vs 2720 km in 1944, whereas the later number does not include the front lines in Northern Finland and Norway.

In total the 1917 front length was 2800 km, whereas the 1944 front length was 3152 km.
Now, let’s look at the number of divisions next.

Number of Division

On the Western Front in 1917, there were 148 German divisions, whereas in 1944 there were 60 division of those 22 division were on the invasion front.
On the Italian Front there were 54 Austro-Hungarian divisions in World War 1, whereas in 1944 there were 22 German divisions and 1 foreign division, for a total auf 23 divisions.
On the Eastern Front in 1917 the Germans were probably not up to modern diversity regulations, but still a quite mixed composition with 82 German, 43 Austro-Hungarian, 3 Bulgarian and 4 Turkish division, in 1944 there were 128 German and 36 allied division. Thus in total of 132 and 164 divisions for the Eastern Front.
If we add all these numbers together we get 334 Division for 1917 and 247 division in 1944. Thus there is a total difference of 87 division. Additionally, you can clearly see that in World War 2, the Eastern Front was the most important frontline, whereas in the Great War it was the Western front.

Total numbers

Now, the total numbers of men in the field army are from December of the previous year, because in the document there are only the numbers given for December 1943 and the number for the First World War is missing, but thankfully someone provided proper sources for the First World War.
Now, the total number of men in the field Army in December 1916 were almost exactly 4.8 million (4 799 095), whereas in December 1943 it were about 4.3 million (4 270 000). Note that this difference is considerable smaller than the gap of 87 division, because these numbers only account for the manpower of the German Field Army and not their Allies.

Manpower per Front km

Now, since we have the total numbers of men and front lengths, let’s see how the many German soldiers were available for each front kilometer. Although note that the total numbers of men are from December 1916 and 1943, whereas the front lengths are from July of the following years. So this part is more about giving you a general idea on the situation than historical accuracy.
For final stages of the First World War there was a total front length of 2800 km, which had around 4.8 million men stationed there, whereas for the final stages of the Second World War there was total front of 3152 km with about 4.27 million men. Thus, we get 1714 men per km in World War I vs 1355 men in World War 2. (2759 per mi, 2180 per mile)
Note that these numbers are only for the German soldiers and don’t include the manpower of all Axis Forces in Europe, which had considerable more manpower in World War 1, thus the difference in men per front kilometer was even more significant.

Cut-Content: Battalion per Front km

A German infantry battalion of 1917 had a required strength of 750 men [NOTE: That before the number was 1050 before and changed to 850 in 1918.] (Nash, David: German Army Handbook April 1918, p 44) As a result about 2.3 infantry battalion per front kilometer.

Now, since a German infantry battalion of 1944 had a required strength of 700 men (708). (Keilig: Bl. 101 – V 64) This means a little less than 2 infantry battalions per front kilometer.

Sources

Vergleich des Feldheeres 1917 mit Feldheer 1944, Generalstab des Heeres Organisationsabteilung (I), in: Keilig, Wolf: Das Deutsche Heer 1939-1945; Bl. 201 / 1944-1 & 2

Inf. Div. 1944, Keilig, Wolf: Das Deutsche Heer 1939-1945: Bl. 101 – V 64

Müller, Klaus-Jürgen: 20. Juli 1944 – Der Entschluß zum Staatsstreich, in: Beiträge zum Widerstand 1933-1945, S. 5

Sanitätsbericht über das deutsche Heer im Weltkriege 1914/1918

Nash, David: German Army Handbook April 1918

Total Manpower of the German Army in 1916/1917?

Feldheer

NATO Unit Counter Guide – Niehorster Dialect

Intro

Well, time to look at the NATO counters or to be more exact at what I called the Niehorster Dialect. For all those who don’t know, Leo Niehorster did a lot of research on unit organization specifically the German Army in World War 2. Additionally, he provides a lot of information on his homepage for free.

Now, why doesn’t he use the full NATO standard, well because NATO didn’t account for certain unit types that were common in World War 2, hence there are some slight differences. I prefer the Niehorster dialect, because it encompasses nearly all WW2 unit types and it is also well-documented and updated.

Note that these symbols are mainly NATO inspired, but there are a few but significant differences, e.g., infantry looks the same, but marine infantry looks quite different. Niehorster uses an anchor, which looks awesome, whereas NATO uses waves, which makes the counter look like hippie infantry. Yeah, well, the term Joint Chiefs of Staff probably confused some people in the design department.

Unit Types – Basics

Anyway, every symbol consists of two basic areas, the type and the size indicators. I will start with the basic types then expand a bit on them and finally give some information about the size indicator.

Infantry

So, let’s start with the Infantry, a big X. Why? That is simple, those should represent the two bandoliers of Napoleonic Infantry. In general, these symbols make sense in one way or another and once you know the background or a hint, they are quite easy to remember.

Artillery

Next up is artillery, one big black dot. For me that symbol is the most obvious one. And a simple way to remember it is that artillery tends to make lot of holes in the ground. Although World of Tank players have a bit of different view, they will agree on the hole part, but might indicate that it is actually not located in the ground, but about 1 meter above.

Cavalry

Next up, is the mighty pony force, the Cavalry, which is a black triangle that takes up the lower right. Now, the best way to remember this is symbol is that you think of it as half man and half beast.

Recon

Now, there is a very similar symbol used for recon troops, simply because to a large degree they originated or had quite many cavalry units in them, e.g., an early World War 2 German infantry divisions often contained a substantial number of cavalry units in their recon battalions.

Tank

And finally, for the last basic units, the Tank. Which looks like this, now I don’t know how to call the geometric object, but it clearly resembles the tracks of a tank. So this is probably the most obvious symbol out there.
Now comes the fun part. Combining the basic unit types.

Unit Types – Combinations

Mechanized Infantry

Now let’s take the tank symbol and combine it with the infantry, looks great, this is now an armored or mechanized infantry unit.

Infantry Gun

If we combine an infantry with an artillery unit, we get an infantry gun or infantry support gun unit, which is a specialized artillery weapon that is usually used as a direct fire weapon unlike regular artillery, additionally it is also allocated to infantry regiments or battalions and not within the artillery regiments.

Self-Propelled Artillery

Now, if we combine artillery with a tank, we get self-propelled artillery. Now, if you guessed this should be an assault gun, I can’t blame you, but an assault gun unit looks a bit different. Yeah, just one more line, but since an assault gun usually has less firepower and also a lower angle, just imagine the line limiting the power of the artillery and it makes more sense.
Now the difference between self-propelled artillery and assault guns is that the latter put a stronger emphasis on armor protection and are usually well armored and enclosed, whereas self-propelled artillery is usually weakly armored and not enclosed. There are also used differently, assault guns are used directly at the front usually in direct fire missions, whereas self-propelled artillery is used behind the lines in indirect fire missions.

Armored Recon

Next up, let’s combine the recon unit with the tank, now we have an armored recon unit. Well, I think you got the basic idea of NATO combinatorics.

Unit Types – Intermediate

So time to look at some more advanced unit types.

Anti Tank Gun

Let’s start with the anti-tank gun. Well, the dot clearly indicates a gun, whereas the two lines can be seen either as a firing arc or as an arrow directed to the ground, which makes more sense if look at the next unit.

Anti-Aircraft Unit

The Anti-Aircraft unit, because in this case the arrow is directed to the top. Additionally, instead of a dot, it has a short horizontal line, which also can be seen as a horizon.

Engineer Unit

An engineer unit, is an E turned by 90 degree, which also can be interpreted as a bridge or just a drunken engineer worshipping the porcelain god. As usual, it is your call, which hint you take.

Signals & Maintenance

Next is the Signal unit is quite simple, it is represented by a simplified flash symbol. And finally, a very similar unit, the maintenance unit, which is represented by a simple wrench.

Combinatorics short version

Again you can combine all these units, for instance a maintenance combined with a Tank symbol gives Armored Maintenance or Tank Recovery unit. Which is a unit with recovery tanks like the Bergetiger or theM32 Sherman based recovery tank.

Unit Modifiers

So, let’s add one more layer to this the unit modifiers.

Headquarters

If you add a black bar at the top, this means we have a headquarters unit. For instance, this unit would be an artillery headquarters battery.

Supply – Service – Quartermaster

Now, here we have transport unit, when we add the previous bar at the bottom, this indicates a supply, service or quartermaster unit.

Medium

The next modifier is important for tank units, a single vertical line on the left indicates a medium modifier, like here we have a medium tank company.

Heavy

Whereas a heavy tank company, would look like this. It is a vertical bar instead of a just a line.

Mountain

Now, since we covered the most important tank modifiers, time for the various infantry modifiers. A small triangle to the middle of the rectangle indicates a mountain unit, in this instance mountain infantry regiment.

Airborne

Replace the triangle with simplified wings and you get an Airborne regiment.

Marines

And if add an anchor, you guessed it, it is a Marine unit.

Motorized

If there are two circles at the bottom of the rectangle these indicated a motorized regiment.

Unit Sizes

Now, finally, the indicator at the top indicates the size of the unit.
If there is no indicator there, it means the unit is of undetermined size. If it is just one dot, it is a team or fireteam (Trupp). Two dots means a squad or section, 3 dots a Platoon or Detachment. Now, 1 vertical line is a company or if it is an artillery unit it is called a battery. 2 lines mean a battalion, 3 lines a regiment. Now, the next one is the brigade with one X, 2 X are a division and 3 X a corps. 4 X an Army and 5 X an Army Group or in case of the Russians a Front.

Note that although there is a clear hierarchy this is a very theoretical depiction. Depending on the time period, unit type and also country certain unit sizes may be omitted, e.g., some infantry division layouts don’t use brigades, also some nations – especially those which like to drink tea – have a tendency to use the name Brigade for battalion sized units.

Sources

Niehorster – Military Organization Symbols Key

NATO Joint Military Symbology

[Unit 101] Archer and Bow (Medieval)

Intro

The Medieval era is a bit problematic, because it spans a very large time period of around 1000 years, depending who you ask, after all historians have different views on when the Middle Ages started and ended. This video will cover for most part the general information about what we know about Archers and their weapons during the medieval period. Be aware that debates among scholars are common and a lot of previous research needs to be reevaluated. Two give two examples from different scholars:
“Indeed, for those military historians who wrote about the Middle Ages, the focus on battles not only led to a grossly misleading depiction of medieval warfare, but by failing to place the focus where it rightly belongs, i.e., on siege warfare, they did a substantial disservice to our understanding of a millennium of European history.” (Bachrach, Bernard S.: Medieval siege warfare: a reconnaissance, Journal of Military History 58, No. 1)

Whereas Bradbury notes about army sizes:
“It has been argued that medieval armies were smaller than once assumed. Exact figures are rarely if ever available but reasonable estimates support this thesis in general. Medieval armies seldom consisted of more than a few thousand men and sometimes of only a few hundred. We must however be cautious, since large numbers were often available and we can rarely be certain how many were used.” (Bradbury, Jim: The Routledge Companion to Medieval Warfare, p. 281)
Hence, you should take everything about medieval times and especially warfare with a grain of salt and this video is of course no exception. As always all sources are in the description, as is a link to the script with references to the various sources.

Attitude towards Archers

Archers in the Middle Ages for the most part were not well respected by the nobility, this had nothing to do with their effectiveness. Rather on the contrary, the church condemned the bow and also forbid the use of bows and crossbows against other Christians in the 12th century (1139) [ at the Second Lateran Council.] Yet, due to its effectiveness of bows the ban was largely ignored. (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 1)

The bow in Europe was always a weapon of the lower classes, thus it was often neglected in literature and we shall not forget that the hero Robin Hood was an outcast. Yet, nobles used the bow quite regularly, but not as a weapon in combat instead they used the bow for hunting, one of their favorite pastimes. (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 1-7) Nevertheless, there was a rather negative attitude towards archers. Bradbury notes that “One reason for hostility to the bow was precisely its effectiveness, especially from a distance. Nobles could be killed by low-class archers, without even an opportunity for retaliation.” (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 3) After all, quite many nobles were killed by bows or crossbows, probably the best known was Richard Lionheart, who died after a bolt hit him in 1199. (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 3)

Now, there is an important aspect about medieval combat, but isn’t really shown in popular culture. Even though nobles fought regularly, they were quite often spared when captured due to codes of conducts among nobles and thus captured for ransom, especially in the early Middle Ages. The thing is, arrows don’t discriminate. Of course, the practice of capturing nobles for ransom or sparing them was abandoned occasionally, whereas in general the common men were not spared on the battlefield or even after capture. (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 1-2) Hence, the gameplay mechanic in the computer game Mount & Blade, where you can’t kill nobles in combat is actually not so far-fetched.

Archers Social Status

Now respect on the battlefield is one thing, another thing is the social status in society. Due to the effectiveness of archers, they were paid more than regular infantry, which also resulted in a better social status. This is also indicated by comments on the composition of armies that suggest a higher status for archers than ordinary infantry, but definitely lower than knights. Their status grew over time, but they generally didn’t reach the lower classes of the nobility. (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 171-175) Bradbury sums it up the following way:
“So the archer’s place in society was a humble one, but respectable and increasingly respected.” (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p.175)

Recruitment Training

In terms of recruitment and training a, it should be noted that for the most part there was no standing army in the Middle Ages. Also there were various forms of recruitment depending on the region and era. In general armies were raised for a campaign and afterwards disbanded. Of course some of these troops like militias or knights were in some way professionally organized, but quite different from an organized standing army like it was common in later centuries. (Bartlett, Clive; Embelton, Gerry: English Longbowman 1330-1515, p. 4)
Since archers were ordinary people they were usually recruited from rural areas, militias and mercenaries. For this reason rulers encouraged their population to train archery. In England this was especially successful, nevertheless archery was a sports for the common man even before that. There is little doubt about the various archery activities for sports or training, because there are many documented accounts of practicing archery and also quite some fatal accidents. (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 160) The effects of archery and its training on the archers should not be underestimated, from the shipwreck from the Mid 16th century we know that the bodies of two supposedly archers were quite affected:
“They were both in their twenties, but already physically affected by their occupation, which suggests constant training and practice. One had a thickened left fore-arm, from the pressure of drawing his bow; and both had spinal deformations, from the pressure of drawing the bow hile the body was twisted sideways.” (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 157)

Types of Bows

Now, let’s look at the weapons of the archers, there were several types of bows, the short-bow, the longbow and also the crossbow. Often it is not clear from the sources which of them were used due to writers back then not clearly noting and using the same words them, thus often the correct weapon can only be determined by context, presuming there is enough information provided. (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 8)

Short Bow – Composite Bow

Now, the short bow is often seen as a lesser and simpler bow, but this is, according to Jim Bradbury, both wrong and misleading: “The problem would be diminished if modern writers avoided describing short ordinary bows as shortbows. The shortbow proper is a particular kind of bow, built with considerable craftsmanship. It is a composite bow, the stave made normally in three pieces: a centre part and two wings.” (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 12)
Now, it was constructed broadly the following way. The inside is strengthened with bone that pushes outward, whereas the outside uses a sinew to pull inward. There is little evidence for a significant use of shortbows in Western Europe, only from illustrations and it can be assumed that it was very rare. Yet, shortbows were common in the east, for instance the Saracen used them quite often. Due to its size and power, it was ideal for horse archers. (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 12; Waddell, Jack; Palermo, Brent: Medieval Arms, Armor, and Tactics. p.126-127; Bradbury, Jim: The Routledge Companion to Medieval Warfare, p. 256)

Longbow

Now, the Longbow is a quite iconic weapon, but:
“What was a longbow? It may be surprising to find that the answer is not as obvious as one might have supposed. For a start, the word ‘longbow’ was never used in the age with which we always link the weapon. Nor was there any special word in Latin or in French until the very end of the middle ages. Even then it was only called ‘longbow’ to distinguish it from the crossbow or the shortbow proper.” (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 71)
Bradbury notes that the notion that Longbow is something special is actually a modern depiction.(Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 71) Now, the Longbow is actually an ordinary wooden bow made from a single piece of wood, although it could be enforced with horn at the nocks. (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 14)
Bradbury notes further that the Long Bow probably didn’t emerge at a certain point, but rather was the result of constant improvement of ordinary bows over a long period of time. (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 12-15) He states that: “There is no fundamental difference between the Nydam bows from the Roman period, the Norman bows on the Bayeux Tapestry, and the longbows of the Hundred Years’ War.” (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 15; Bradbury, Jim: The Routledge Companion to Medieval Warfare, p. 253) Now, since the Nydam bow is estimated to be around from 200 to 400 AD and the One Hundred Years war lasted til 1453 we have a timespan of about 1000 years with very similar bow designs. (Stampf, Siegfried: Eine sozial und militärhistorische Analyse der englischen Langbogenschützen während des Hunderjährigen Krieges, S. 77)

Measurements & Range

Now, let’s look at the long bow, it was usually made of yew. (The sapwood was on the outside and the heartwood in the direction of the archer). The size of the longbow depended on the archer’s height. The typical size of a bow was about 2 meters (six feet). In the center there was a thickened grip and the string was usually made from gut and sometimes from hemp. (Bradbury, Jim: The Routledge Companion to Medieval Warfare, p. 253) The range of a longbow was about 270 meters, although the effective range is considered to be 180 meters. (Stampf, Siegfried: Eine sozial und militärhistorische Analyse der englischen Langbogenschützen während des Hunderjährigen Krieges, S. 38)

Effectiveness of the Longbow

Now, there is quite some debate on the effectiveness of the longbow, there are various historical accounts that claim that arrows could penetrate plate armor, whereas others deny this. (Stampf, Siegfried: Eine sozial und militärhistorische Analyse der englischen Langbogenschützen während des Hunderjährigen Krieges, S. 95) Both are probably right, but as Rogers notes:
“King David and King Philip, after all, doubtless had the best armour available, yet that did not save either of them from suffering multiple serious wounds.” (Rogers ,Clifford J.: The Efficacy of the English Longbow: A Reply to Kelly DeVries ,p. 239)

Yet, we need to consider that the material of the armor and the arrow heads probably differed widely even for the same period. After all, even in World War 1 the steel armor plates for German machine gunners had a huge variety in terms of quality and those were produced in an industrialized age.
Another aspect is of course that only a limited number of troops were equipped with plate armor or other high quality armor. Hence, a knight in shining armor amongst a large number of troops and horses being killed and incapacitated by arrows is probably not ideal for the morale. After all, many times the number of wounded and killed soldiers was below 50 percent and often it is even below 25 percent. (Rogers ,Clifford J.: The Efficacy of the English Longbow: A Reply to Kelly DeVries ,p. 235)

Yet, as always there is a certain dynamic in tactics, technology, measures and counter-measures, which makes statements about the effectiveness of a certain weapon that was used for centuries quite problematic. As Rogers points out:
“I am willing to concede Gaier’s point that in the decades after the end of the Hundred Years War in 1453, armour improved (and archery declined) to the point that the English longbowmen were no longer capable of wreaking the kind of havoc I have described above. But I think there is plenty of evidence to show that, at the battle of Agincourt in 1415 and for some decades thereafter, English longbowmen remained fully capable of ‘killing many’ on the battlefield.” (Rogers ,Clifford J.: The Efficacy of the English Longbow: A Reply to Kelly DeVries ,p. 241)

Crossbow

Now, let’s move on to the crossbow, which was already used in Roman times and considerably improved throughout the middle ages. It was not very popular with the English, although it was often used by mercenaries. (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 8) One major advantage of the crossbow was that it could be readied and aimed without additional effort unlike a bow, where the string constantly needed to be held back. But this came at a price reloading a crossbow took quite some time, thus the rate of fire was considerably lower than that of bows. (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 8) Depending on the size of the crossbow it could be reloaded by hand or needed mechanical devices ranging from simple ones like push and pull levers to more complex ones. . (Bradbury, Jim: The Routledge Companion to Medieval Warfare, p. 248)

Longbow vs. Crossbow

Now, both the crossbow and longbow had different characteristics, which made them better suited for certain circumstances.
In short the main differences were: (Mortimer, John: Tactics, Strategy, and Battlefield Formation during the Hundred Years War: The Role of the Longbow in the Infantry Revolution, p. 52-53; Stampf, Siegfried: Eine sozial und militärhistorische Analyse der englischen Langbogenschützen während des Hunderjährigen Krieges, S. 38)
• Higher rate of fire for the longbow with about 4 to 5 shots in the time a crossbowman could fire one bolt and reload a second.
• Higher penetration of the crossbow for short ranges
• Less space taken up by the longbow on the battlefield, due to the horizontal bow of the crossbow, thus the same amount of frontage allowed more firepower
• A crossbow could be used by used with just basic training, whereas a longbow required years of training.
• No extra strength required for aiming a crossbow, thus in general the crossbow was less dependent on strength
• Longbows were in overall quite simple weapons, thus they were easier to maintain, repair and cheaper to produce
Although, the longbow has an advantage in nearly all areas, one should not forget that training was an ongoing investment, which of course takes time, resources and probably most importantly a proper system.

Arrows

Time to look at arrows, let’s start with some basic anatomy: An arrow consists of the following parts the shaft with a nock at the end, the fletching and the head. [MAKE THOSE PARTS APPEAR]
A typical English arrow of the Hundred Year War had probably a length between 0.7 to 0.9 m(28 to 36 inches). (Stampf, Siegfried: Eine sozial und militärhistorische Analyse der englischen Langbogenschützen während des Hunderjährigen Krieges, S. 92; Mortimer, John: Tactics, Strategy, and Battlefield Formation during the Hundred Years War: The Role of the Longbow in the Infantry Revolution, p. 32)

Arrowheads

Now, there were various arrowheads, a general purpose, bodkin, bodkin needle and broad head.
The early military arrowheads were usually broad with a flat blade, this had changed by the 13th century, when narrower arrowheads became common due to the common use of body armor. This resulted in a bodkin needle design. (Mortimer, John: Tactics, Strategy, and Battlefield Formation during the Hundred Years War: The Role of the Longbow in the Infantry Revolution, p. 31-32) The bodkin needle was especially effective against mail armor, because the narrow tip would penetrate between the rings and broader part could break them. Consequently Plate armor was designed in a way that such long arrowheads would be deflected, sometimes they even broke or bent on impact. To counter this the arrowhead was shortened and strengthened. (Stampf, Siegfried: Eine sozial und militärhistorische Analyse der englischen Langbogenschützen während des Hunderjährigen Krieges, S. 92) Generally, bodkins were ideal for penetrating armor, whereas broadhead would inflict more damage against soft targets.

Equipment & Armor

In terms of armor and equipment there was a wide variety depending on the time period and region. Hence, here I will only broadly refer to English archer’s situation from 12th to 16th century. A decree from the late 12th century required free men to have a certain equipment depending on their income. This ranged from a gambeson, a spear and a simple helmet for the lower income to chainmail, helmet, shield and lance for knights. (Stampf, Siegfried: Eine sozial und militärhistorische Analyse der englischen Langbogenschützen während des Hunderjährigen Krieges, S. 10-11) A Gambeson was an armor made of several layers of linen, wool or other fabric that were sewn together and stuffed with cloth or others material. It could be worn as independent armor or underneath other armor. (Bradbury, Jim: The Routledge Companion to Medieval Warfare, p. 264-265) A follow-up decree in Mid 13th century also included specifically archers which were required to have a bow and arrows. [Assize of Arms 1252]. (Stampf, Siegfried: Eine sozial und militärhistorische Analyse der englischen Langbogenschützen während des Hunderjährigen Krieges, S. 10-11)
In terms of specialized equipment, I am bit unsure about archery gloves, since less reputable sources list two different archery gloves, whereas in more academic sources I only encountered very limited information on them, it seems that in general that bracers were common, but dedicated archery gloves probably not. (Stampf, Siegfried: Eine sozial und militärhistorische Analyse der englischen Langbogenschützen während des Hunderjährigen Krieges, S. 92-93)

Combat

Now, let’s take a look combat. Archers as mentioned before were quite effective in combat, this was the result of numerous factors like firepower, rate of fire, range, speed and also their flexibility. Archers could be used for the offensive and defensive in open field battles as during sieges. They were used for ambushes, providing covering fire, weakening the enemy, disturbing his preparations and provoking him to attack. (Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer, p. 3-5; Bradbury, Jim: The Routledge Companion to Medieval Warfare, p. 287)
On the battlefield the archers could be protected by ditches, stakes or natural obstacles in order to discourage or limit the impact of an enemy cavalry charge. Originally, stakes were not used by this changed around the 15th century, they were probably a direct response to the introduction of special cavalry units targeting archers. (Mortimer, John: TACTICS, STRATEGY, AND BATTLEFIELD FORMATION DURING THE HUNDRED YEARS WAR: THE ROLE OF THE LONGBOW IN THE INFANTRY REVOLUTION, p. 75) Besides these passive defenses archers were usually protected by Pike or other infantry as well. (Waddell, Jack; Palermo, Brent: Medieval Arms, Armor, and Tactics, p. 143)

During a battle archers opened fire at large initially firing in a wide arc, thus the enemies were showered by arrows. Even if those arrows weren’t deadly, they were at least disorienting, which could lead to breaking up enemy formations. When the distance decreased and direct fire was possible the archers switched to direct aimed fires.(Waddell, Jack; Palermo, Brent: Medieval Arms, Armor, and Tactics, p. 142-143)

The number of archers varied for each army, but for the English who were using archers to a large degree this ultimately lead to degree 3 to 1 between archers and men-at-arms. (Bradbury, Jim: The Routledge Companion to Medieval Warfare, p. 281)

Summary / Conclusion

To summarize, the archer in the Middle Ages was a common soldiers, whereas the nobility disregarded combat with the bow, they couldn’t ignore the archers effectiveness on the battlefield. After all, the dominance of cavalry in the High Middle Ages was to a certain degree ended by the use of archers, although cavalry wasn’t made obsolete its effectiveness was severely reduced.
Nevertheless, neither archers nor their weapons were without flaw. The main drawback of archers with longbows was they required proper and regular training, something that not all rulers could achieve due to various reasons. Even the English that had established a proper system for replenishing their pool of archers faced major problems when the black plague hit. (Mortimer, John: Tactics, Strategy, and Battlefield Formation during the Hundred Years War: The Role of the Longbow in the Infantry Revolution, p. 89) This illustrates that seemingly excellent and simple weapon systems often rely on infrastructures that can be quite fragile and missed with a superficial glance.

Sources

Bradbury, Jim: The Medieval Archer (amazon.com affiliate link)

Bradbury, Jim: The Routledge Companion to Medieval Warfare (amazon.com affiliate link)

Mortimer, John: Tactics, Strategy, and Battlefield Formation during the Hundred Years War: The Role of the Longbow in the Infantry Revolution

Rogers ,Clifford J.: The Efficacy of the English Longbow: A Reply to Kelly DeVries

Bachrach, Bernard S.: Medieval siege warfare: a reconnaissance, Journal of Military History 58, No. 1

Waddell, Jack; Palermo, Brent: Medieval Arms, Armor, and Tactics.

Bartlett, Clive; Embelton, Gerry: English Longbowman 1330-1515 (amazon.com affiliate link)

Stampf, Siegfried: Eine sozial und militärhistorische Analyse der englischen Langbogenschützen während des Hunderjährigen Krieges

Archery Handbook

Gambeson

Arrow

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[Battle of the Bulge] Why were the Allies surprised?

Intro

The Battle of Bulge was the last major German offensive operation in World War 2. Yet, it caught the Western Allies by surprise. How was this possible? After all, the Allied military intelligence throughout the war was for the most part very good or even excellent. There were major successes for longer operations like the Battle of the Atlantic or rather short engagements like the Battle of Midway.

What were the reason for this? Did the Germans suddenly became sneaky or did the Allies become complacent of their victories? So, let’s find out and take a closer look.

The Allied “Mood” prior to the Attack

After the successful landings of the Western Allies at the Normandy beaches in June 1944, the Wehrmacht was defeated in almost all major operations, except the operations Market and Garden. In general, the Allied troops were advancing, whereas the Germans were retreating. The basic attitude of the Allied commanders is probably well expressed by the following situation: One day prior to the attack the British Field Marshal Montgomery asked General Eisenhower, if he can spend Christmas back in England, Eisenhower agreed. Additionally, Montgonomery reported:
“There is nothing to report on my front or the front of the American Armies on my right. I do not propose to send any more evening situation reports till the war becomes more exciting.” ( Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 7, S. 623) Since Montgomery isn’t really that popular with most people , it should be added that his attitude in this case was by no means the exception, it was the same for other high-ranking officers too. ( Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 7, S. 623)
This may sounds a bit like complacency, but let’s not make hasty conclusions yet.

German Preparations

Let’s take a brief look at the German preparations for the operation “Wacht am Rhein” meaning “Guard at the Rhine”.
The initial preparations were performed in August 1944 by creating a new Tank Army intended for offensive operations, yet any other information was omitted from the involved personnel. Only Hitlers closest officers were informed about his intentions at this time. In October 1944 the commander of the West was informed to prepare for offensive operations in the Ardennes area, but was instructed that secrecy of the operation was paramount. (Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 7, S. 619-622)
The measures for keeping the operation secret were strict, in some cases units were moved into the assembly areas only the night prior to the attack, which thwarted any attempts for proper recon operations. (Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 7, S. 623)

Additionally, the Germans were ordered to not use of radio transmission of orders during the preparation, thus signal interception program ULTRA by the Allies couldn’t pick up anything substantial. . (Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 7, S. 625)

Yet, the question is did this secrecy paid off or did the Allies pick up substantial information from others sources anyway.

Indicators of an Attack

So let’s look at the indicators for a German offensive that the Allies did pick up.
In the book “The Ardennes: Battle of the Bulge” from the center of military history of the United States Army it is noted “With the advantage of hindsight, seven items can be discerned in the corps reports for the period 13–15 December which might have given the alarm.” (Cole, Hugh: The Ardennes: Battle of the Bulge p. 59)
But there is one problem with this book, it was published originally in the 1960ies and at that time the ULTRA intelligence program was not declassified yet, hence crucial information was not available to historians back then.

Also looking just at the days before the attack might be a bit too limited. After all it was known to the Allies since August 1944 that the Army Group B (Heeresgruppe B) was preparing for a counter-attack. The Allies also knew about the creation of a Panzer Army and the German removal of motorized units on different front areas. Additionally, large parts of the Luftwaffe were concentrated in the area and an increasing number of rail and motor transports were noticed too. (Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 7, S. 623-624)
The crucial indicators before the attack were: (Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 7, S. 624)
1) Warnings by defectors and civilians that the Germans amassed vehicles, tanks and bridging equipment.
2) The increased amount of weather reports sent by German submarines since the beginning of December.
3) Reports that the Germans planned an operation behind enemy lines.

Allied Interpretation of the Intercepted Indicators

All this information was not ignored by the Allied intelligence officers, but acquiring information is only one part, the other part is analyzing this information. So let’s take a look on how the Allies interpreted the information in context of the overall situation on the Western Front.

The area eastwards of the Ardennes was rather calm. Hence the major explanation for the troop concentration was that the area was used for regrouping and refreshing of combat troops before they were sent to the Eastern Front or used for counter-attacks in case of an Allied advance. The commanders noted the rather weak number of Allied troops in the Ardennes, but at the same time in the North and South the Allies were conducting offensive operations, which should have made a German attack unlikely. (Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 7, S. 624)
Generally, the Allied didn’t rule out a German attack, but they assumed it would be a small operation or highly unlikely, due to a number of reasons, to quote an US historian:
“It may be phrased this way: the enemy can still do something but he can’t do much; he lacks the men, the planes, the tanks, the fuel, and the ammunition.” (Cole, Hugh: The Ardennes: Battle of the Bulge p. 57)
This base assumption combined with the lack of information from ULTRA lead the Allies to interpret various indicators differently. As Dr. Pogue noted in his talk to the NSA:
“But nothing was coming from Ultra. […] So there was a tendency to feel that there was no great buildup. There was a tendency to explain what was occurring on other grounds.” (Pogue, Forrest C.: The Ardennes Campaign: The Impact of Intelligence. P. 3)

To cite two of his examples:
“Then we found out the Germans were issuing very strict orders on saving gasoline. We interpreted that to mean that they were about to run out of gasoline. The point was that it was a part of a strict conservation program to make sure there was enough gasoline for the attack.” (Pogue, Forrest C.: The Ardennes Campaign: The Impact of Intelligence. P. 3)

“There was evidence in October that a new Panzer Army had been created. But again that didn’t seem to upset anybody, because again the theory was that the Germans knew we were going to mount an attack somewhere around the middle of December in the area south of Cologne and that therefore they were setting up a reserve to meet that attack.” (Pogue, Forrest C.: The Ardennes Campaign: The Impact of Intelligence. P. 3)

So, basically due to indicators from Ultra the Allies drew wrong conclusions about existing intelligence. Furthermore, they knew that the German forces were in a dire situation.

Why did the Germans attack nevertheless?

Now, the question is, how could the Germans launch a major attack with their rather limited capabilities? Well, they did what most people do – even nowadays – if they basically have lost and can’t admit it, they literally played the Hitler card. [or maybe Hitler played them…]

And the Allies weren’t expecting Hitler. Probably the greatest irony is that Mongomery’s intelligence officer noted that he would expect a surprise action before Christmas if Hitler was running the war. But added:
“We know that von Rundstedt is now running the war and he is a cautious man.” (Pogue, Forrest C.: The Ardennes Campaign: The Impact of Intelligence, p. 4)

Now, the interesting part here is that the mentioned American historians are quite positive about von Rundstedt and blame mostly Hitler, whereas the German military historian Detlef Vogel notes that the operational plans from von Rundstedt and Model were also quite lacking in quality. (Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 7, S. 625) Furthermore, the German commanders still were convinced that their officers were superior to the Allied ones on the tactical and operational level. (Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 7, S.623)

Conclusion

To conclude, as so often it was not a single factor that explains properly why the Allies were surprised by the German attack in the Ardennes. It was a combination of several factors:
First off, the Allies knew that the overall strategic situation for the Germans was dire, thus the Germans ability to launch a proper offensive was limited and the result of the battle clearly confirms this. Second, based on the overall situation the Allies assumed that an attack would make no sense. Third, this basic assumption lead to misinterpretations of several indicators that could have alarmed the Allied commanders. Fourth, these misinterpretations were also not reevaluated because ULTRA didn’t pick up any indications of a major attack. Which of course, brings us to the fifth point, which is the lack of intelligence that was achieved by the high secrecy enforced by the Germans during the preparations of the operation “Wacht am Rhein”. Based on all this the Allies concluded that there were no indicators of major offensive, but Hitler wouldn’t have that.
Based on that, one might still argue that the Allies got complacent of their victories to a certain degree this is probably also true. Yet, after the initial German attacks the overall size of the offensive wasn’t known, nevertheless Eisenhower assumed a major attack and immediately reacted. He ordered troops into key areas. Probably best known the 101st Airborne Division to the Bastogne area. (Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 7, S. 627)

Now, if someone really wants to pinpoint only one factor, which I think is almost always an oversimplification, I would say the gravest error of the Allies was to assume that they were facing a rational enemy that wasn’t willing to risk everything even though the chances were extremely slim.

Sources

Germany and the Second World War. Volume VII. (amazon.com affiliate link)

Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Band 7. (amazon.de affiliate link)

Pogue, Forrest C.: The Ardennes Campaign: The Impact of Intelligence. (Declassified by the NSA in 2007)

Cole, Hugh M. The Ardennes: Battle of the Bulge. United States Army in World War II

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Bernhard Kast is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com.

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Bernhard Kast is a participant in the Amazon.com.ca, Inc. Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.ca.

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Assault Artillery – History & Organization of Assault Gun Units #Stug Life

Intro

Time to talk about the famous the German assault guns or as they are called in German “Sturmgeschütze”. Now this video is more about the branch and organization and not individual vehicles. Thus, the name “assault artillery”, because this is the translation of the original name for this branch in German which was “Sturmartillerie”.

Origin Story

Now, the origin story of the assault artillery begins unsurprisingly in World War 1. During the war a common problem was that after a successful initial attack, the follow-up attack advanced too far for proper artillery support or that it took too long to move the guns forward. Furthermore, there was a lack of direct fire support, after all most guns were quite unwieldly and the terrain usually quite deformed from artillery fire, additionally these guns were usually not well protected even from small arms fire. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 2; see also Artillery Combat in World War 1)

The Initiative – Manstein’s Memorandum

The first major call for a “Sturmartillerie” as a mobile and armored infantry support gun was in 1935 in a memorandum from Erich von Manstein, back then, when he was still a Colonel. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 3)

He proposed three main formations as the base for the Army:

1) Independent Tank division with their own organic infantry and artillery units to support the tanks.
2) Independent Tank Brigades that consisted only of tanks and that were under the authority of the Army Command to allow for the localized concentration of force.
3) Regular Infantry division with organic assault gun units to support the infantry units.

Now, the important part here is that the assault gun units should be an organic part of the infantry division. Why is this important? Well, organic divisional units are trained with the division and stay with the division all the time. This means, that other division units are familiar with these units and are also trained in operations where the various different units supported each other, thus everyone involved knows of the strength and weaknesses of the units.
Remember, even to this day tanks without proper infantry support can be quite vulnerable. Additionally, you need to consider that back then most of the German division weren’t even motorized, thus a Sturmgeschütz was quite an oddity that was mostly known from propaganda. Hence, a lot of soldiers attributed qualities to these units that they couldn’t fulfill. Something that could be deadly in combat situations. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 3-4)

Note that the proposed number of units per division was still relatively small. Every division should have one battalion with 3 batteries each with 6 stugs, thus only 18 stugs in total. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 3-4) But, numbers without context can be misleading. So, let’s look at a weapon system with a similar role and its number, this would be the light infantry support gun and in a regular German infantry division of 1940, just 20 of these were present, thus the number of 18 stugs is actually not that low as it might appear at first glance. (Source: Alex Buchner: Handbuch der Infanterie 1939-1945)

The first 5 prototypes were ready in Winter 1937, after which a first series of 30 units was ordered. This series wasn’t completely delivered until May 1940, hence the first time StuGs were used in significant numbers was during Operation Barbarossa. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 4)

Problems & Delays

The original plan called for an assault gun battalion for each active division until Fall 1939. Yet, due to changes in the command structure, delays in the specifications, limits of the German arms industry and internal rivalries this goal was never achieved. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 3-4)

Even far from it, even in in May 1940 only 2 batteries were operational, whereas around 180 would have been necessary to equip all active divisions in May 1940. (Frieser, Karl-Heinz: Die deutschen Blitzkriege; in: Wehrmacht: Mythos & Realität. (S. 184); Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 4-5) Furthermore, the Tank Brigades were realized neither. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 7)

Operational History

At the start of Operation Barbarossa in June 1941 the situation had changed, around 250 StuGs were ready, these were organized in 11 battalions and 5 independent batteries. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 6)

During combat it became obvious that the combat effectiveness of infantry units was increased by a large degree due to the use of the assault gun units. Due to the high amount of training, firepower and mobility. It should be noted that the assault guns were part of artillery branch, thus they were accustomed to supporting infantry from the get go. Furthermore, the better optics and stronger emphasis on artillery practice resulted in higher hit chances. Yet, one major problem was that the battalions were part of the overall Army Units and not organic units of the infantry divisions as Manstein originally had proposed, thus the coordination between the infantry and StuGs was limited. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 6)

By the end of 1942 around 27 Stug Battalions were operational on the Eastern Front, furthermore the required strength increased from 22 to 31 StuGs, although on average only 12 were operational. This means around 320 Stugs operational. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 7)

Although the assault guns were originally intended for infantry support, their role changed on the Eastern Front. Soon they were used more and more as tank destroyers, because the German anti-tank guns with 37mm and 50 mm were simply not able to deal with the T-34 and KV-1, although in Summer 1942 the 75mm Pak 40 was introduced this gun was too heavy to have tactical mobility.
Since Spring 1942 the StuGs were upgraded to the F version that used the long barreled 75mm gun that was also capable with dealing with Russian tanks. And unlike the dedicated tank destroyers like the Marder I and II, it was better armored and also had a far lower silhouette. Thus, the StuG III F was the best German anti-tank weapon at its introduction. As a result, many StuGs were used in the anti-tank role, but thus they were missing for their intended role, namely supporting infantry. This was the reason for the development of the “Sturmhaubitze” (StuH), literally meaning assault howitzer. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 7-9)

By the end of 1943 there were 39 assault gun battalions on the Eastern Front with a total of 1006 StuGs. The average operational rate increased to 15 Stug for each battalion. In 1943 the Wehrmacht was mostly on the defensive and the StuG became a mainstay of the defense. Once Guderian became inspector for the tank troops (“Generalinspekteur der Panzertruppen”), he continuously tried to get the assault artillery integrated into the tank destroyer units, yet without success. Nevertheless, quite a large number of produced StuGs were transferred into tank divisions to compensate for the lack of regular tanks. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 9-11) This situation worsened after the failed 20th July assassination attempt against Hitler, after which Guderian became Chief of Staff. He limited the total amount of assault gun battalions to 45 and furthermore assigned a smaller portion of the produced StuGs to the assault artillery branch. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 11)

Although the output of assault guns increased year by year and reached its peak in 1944. More and more numbers were assigned to other branches. Ultimately, in March 1945 the total number of assault gun battalions was 37 with a total number 606 operational vehicles. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 12-13)

Panzertruppe – Parallel Developments “Sturmpanzer”

Now, some of you might wonder, what about the various other variants of German armored support vehicles with large guns that were similar to assault guns, like the Sturmpanzer “Bison”, the Sturmpanzer 38(t) “Grille” and of course the “Sturmtiger”? Well, those were all parallel developments by the German Tank branch.
Most of them were used with rather limited success, they were usually built upon obsolete vehicles and traded firepower for mobility and protection. Thus, giving them a rather unbalanced quality, their combat effectiveness was quite limited and for the most part they were just a waste of already limited resources. To a certain degree these parallel development by the tank branch were motivated by the fact that the assault guns were part of the artillery branch and thus avoid any dependencies to that branch. (Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie, S. 5-6)

Organization of StuG Units

Now, there is one question that military historians up to this day haven’t answered yet, namely what is the difference between Thug Life and StuG Life?
Well, first, the German accent and second, organization, organization , organization, so here we go.

Sturmbatterie / Sturmgeschützbatterie 1939 (K.St.N.445)

Now the original Assault Battery from 1939 had the following organization:
1 battery headquarters, 3 Platoons, an lightly armored ammo column, a transport unit and a maintenance squad.
Each of the three platoons consisted of just of 1 observation halftrack, 2 StuG III and 2 ammo half tracks.
Now, this is a rather odd setup, because the headquarters unit actually is only equipped with an observation halftrack, whereas armored headquarters units usually had a similar vehicle than their combat units. In total the unit had 5 light observation vehicles, 6 StuGs, and 6 light armored ammo carriers.
Note that this was an intended organization that was probably never achieved due to a lack of proper halftracks, which to a certain degree were replaced by trucks in the following layouts.
(Spielberger, Walter: Sturmgeschütze. S. 233)
(Fleischer, Wolfgang: Die deutschen Sturmgeschütze 1935-1945. S. 18)

Sturmbatterie 1941 (K.St.N446)

Now, the 1941 version was quite similar, a major change was the addition of the 7th StuG in the headquarters unit. Furthermore for this unit, I have some data on men & equipment.
In total there were 5 officers, 1 official, 37 NCOs and 83 enlisted men. Additionally, 9 light machine guns, 17 trucks, 6 cars, 7 StuGs and 3 light armored ammo carries.
As you can see the early batteries were quite small with only 2 guns, this number increased throughout the war.

Sturmgeschützbatterie (mot) K.St.N.446 (1.11.1941)
(Spielberger, Walter: Sturmgeschütze. S. 236)
(Fleischer, Wolfgang: Die deutschen Sturmgeschütze 1935-1945. S. 33)

Sturmgeschützabteilung November 1942 (K.St.N. 446a)

Now, let’s take a look at the organization of an assault gun battalion from November 1942.
It consisted of a headquarters unit and 3 assault gun batteries. Each assault gun battery consisted of a headquarters unit, 3 platoons and a transport unit. Now each platoon now had 3 StuGs and each headquarters unit one Stug, now if add the multipliers, we get a total of 31 StuGs. Finally, let’s take a look at a late war unit.

Sturmgeschützbatterie (mot) (zu 10 Geschützen) – K.St.N.446a (1.11.1942)

(Fleischer, Wolfgang: Die deutschen Sturmgeschütze 1935-1945. S. 67)

Heeres-Sturmartillerie-Brigade Juni 1944 (K.St.N. 446B)

One of the latest organizations was the “Heeres-Sturmartillerie-Brigade” which means Army assault artillery brigade from 1944.
It consisted of a brigade headquarters, 3 assault gun battalions and 1 support grenadier Battery. Each of the assault gun battalions consisted of a headquarters unit,1 assault gun battery and a transport unit. Finally, the assault gun batteries consisted of 2 assault gun platoons, 1 assault howitzer platoon, an ammo column and 1 maintenance column.
Now, if you think this is overly complicated, well, you might be right or you may not be German enough. Anyway, each assault gun platoon consisted of 4 StuGs, whereas each assault howitzer platoon consisted of 4 assault howitzers. Now, let’s take a look at the whole unit. The headquarters units together consisted of 9 vehicles. Whereas the Combat platoons for each Battalion had a total of 12 vehicles. Together there were 30 assault guns and 15 assault howitzers in the brigade.
(Fleischer, Wolfgang: Die deutschen Sturmgeschütze 1935-1945. S. 105)

Summary

To summarize, the original concept for the StuG was to be a direct fire support weapon for the infantry, especially in the attack against enemy defensive position. The StuG combined mobility, firepower and protection, additionally since it was part of the artillery branch, its members were better trained in firing and also are more accustomed to support infantry units, unlike regular tank units.

Due the lack of proper tank destroyers the StuGs were used quite often as tank destroyers, for which it was also ideally suited due its strong frontal armor and low silhouette, although this was not their initially intended role. Ultimately assault gun units were also added organically to infantry divisions, but at this stage the German side was on the defense, thus the StuG was mainly used as a tank destroyer and not its original role supporting infantry in offensive operations.

Sources

Wettsein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie Geschichte einer Waffengattung (free article)

WW2 day by day – Kriegsstärkenachweissungen ” T&OE” (Homepage)

Spielgerger, Walter: Sturmgeschutz & Its Variants Amazon.com (affiliate link)

Spielberger, Walter: Sturmgeschütze. Entwicklung und Fertigung der sPak Amazon.de (affiliate link)

Fleischer, Wolfgang: Die deutschen Sturmgeschütze 1935-1945. Amazon.de (affiliate link)

Buchner, Alex: The German Infantry Handbook 1939-1945 (amazon.com affiliate link)

Buchner, Alex: Das Handbuch der deutschen Infanterie 1939-1945; Gliederung – Uniformen, Bewaffnung – Ausrüstung, Einsätze. amazon.de (affiliate)

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Bernhard Kast is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com.

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Bernhard Kast is a participant in the Amazon EU Associates Programme, an affiliate advertising programme designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.co.uk.

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Bernhard Kast is a participant in the Amazon.com.ca, Inc. Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.ca.

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Bernhard Kast ist Teilnehmer des Partnerprogramms von Amazon Europe S.à.r.l. und Partner des Werbeprogramms, das zur Bereitstellung eines Mediums für Websites konzipiert wurde, mittels dessen durch die Platzierung von Werbeanzeigen und Links zu amazon.de Werbekostenerstattung verdient werden können.

US and German Atlantic Strategy 1939-1941

Intro

Time to take a look at the overall Strategy in early World War 2 concerning the Atlantic. This video will cover the views, actions and development of the German and American side from the time of the outbreak of the war to the situation just before the German declaration of war against the United States. So let’s get started.

The Initial Situation in 1939

Hitler’s first directive for the war concerning the German Navy was a focus on a trade war against the United Kingdom. Similarly, the Commander of the German Navy Admiral Raeder wanted to break the British economy by cutting it off from the supply lines. Yet, a prerequisite for this would have been a clear focus on the production of the necessary weapon system to achieve this, namely submarines and air planes. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 275)

Yet, Hitler’s view was different. He was focusing on a short land war in Europe and a peace with the United Kingdom and thus wanted to limit an extensive attack on the British economy. Whereas the German Navy Command realized quite early that a long war with the United Kingdom was very possible and that an entry of the United States into the war was quite certain. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 275-276)

Raeder tried several times to convince Hitler of the “Atlantic nature” of the war. After all, Great Britain was dependent on imports and those came to a large degree from the United States, which was likely to intervene if the United Kingdom was under serious threat.

The Situation in 1940

These assumption of the German Navy command were mostly correct. In July 1940 US congress approved of the “Two-Ocean-Navy-Act”, which called for a major expansion of the US Navy by around 70 %. The following decision in September 1940 was to provide the British with 50 older destroyers in exchange for 8 bases. This act was interpreted as quite hostile by the German Navy. To give you some reference at the outbreak of the war Germany had 21 destroyers. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 276 & S. 398)

Of course, the US build up would take time, the German Navy assumed that the US Navy’s expansion would begin to be an important factor from 1942 onwards, thus a crucial success or at least determined stance against the United Kingdom was necessary before the US would enter the war or provide further assistance to the British. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 276)
Although Hitler made some concessions to the Navy, there was no general shift in the strategy in late 1940/early 1941, after all Hitler considered the United Kingdom as a potential ally and not the main enemy, furthermore the preparations for the invasion of the Soviet Union were already in motion. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 277)

1941 – Lend Lease and Beyond – The Continuous Escalation

On the other side of the Atlantic the situation was quite different, in November 1940 Franklin Roosevelt was re-elected, this guaranteed the further continuation of the close cooperation between the US and British politics. In December 1940 Churchill noted that the British ability to pay properly for the arms trade couldn’t be sustained much longer. Soon thereafter in March 1941 Roosevelt announced “An Act to Promote the Defense of the United States”, you probably didn’t heard that one before, because it is commonly known as Lend-Lease. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 278-280) This act allowed the support with equipment “of any country whose defense the President deems vital to the defense of the United States.” (Source )

The British and American cooperation was continuously more formalized and got a unified strategy. This also included agreements on cooperation for the Asian-Pacific area. And probably most importantly, there was an agreement that Germany was the major threat and that the control of the Atlantic was crucial in winning the war in Europe. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 278-280) The US Navy began preparations for escorting convoys in the Western Atlantic, but Roosevelt couldn’t allow the protection of convoys yet, due to the political factors in the United States. Nevertheless, the British were allowed to repair their war ships in US ship yards, which took off quite some pressure from the British ship yards .(Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 280-281)
Nevertheless, the British situation was quite problematic, the monthly losses from January to April 1941 grew from 320 000 Gross Register Tonnage to 688 000. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 282)

German Reaction to Lend-Lease and Occupation of Greenland

In order to counter the Lend-Lease agreement Admiral Raeder called for several actions, yet, Hitler only agreed on expanding the operational areas. As a reaction Roosevelt confiscated all German, Danish and Italian ships in US harbors. Furthermore in April 1941 the US occupied Greenland and expanded the security zone. Additionally, the US-Navy transferred several ships from the Pacific to the Atlantic. In total by June 1941 3 battleships, 1 carrier, 4 cruisers and 18 destroyers were transferred. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 281)

Yet, these transfers made it clear that the US Navy wasn’t yet ready for a war. It lacked the number of ships and personnel to provide proper convoy escort missions in the Atlantic, furthermore there was only a limited backing by congress, and hence no escort operations were conducted. Yet, the patrol activity within the expanded security zones was extended and the zone also clashed with the German operational areas, thus the foundations for future incidents were laid. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 281-282)

German’s Navy View on the US

The German Navy interpreted Roosevelt’s actions as hostile, but was also aware of his political limitations regarding the congress and the public opinion. Basically, there were two approaches in the German Navy. The first one, which was favored by Admiral Reader, was to take determined stance against any further initiative by the United States. The second one, was to try to keep the United States in check by giving no reason for change in the American public opinion. Hitler wanted to prevent a conflict with the United States before the Soviet Union wasn’t defeated, after all he assumed that it would only take several months to defeat Soviet Army. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 282-283)

1941 – The Incidents & Actions – Short of War

In May and June 1941 there were two incidents, in May the US ship “Robin Moor” was sunk by a German submarine and in June a German submarine tried several times to get a proper firing angle on the battleship USS Texas. In the first case Roosevelt didn’t order the direct protection of convoys yet, but expanded the protection zone and also patrols into German operation areas. In the second case, the USS Texas was operating in an area that was clearly known as a warzone. The German Navy informed Hitler, and he decided that before Operation Barbarossa any incident with the United States should be avoided. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 284-285)

Occupation of Iceland

Another major step by the US in 1941 was the occupation of Iceland. Originally Iceland was part of Denmark, after the capitulation in 1940 the British occupied Iceland and in Summer 1940 the US took over. Now, this was done by US Marines, because they were volunteers and thus Roosevelt could act without the approval of the US Congress. Now, at first this seems to be a move with limited consequences, but once you have a base somewhere you need to supply it. So US convoys that were protected by US warships were used to supply Iceland and British merchant ships were welcome to join these convoys. These joint convoy operation also served as a foundation for the future cooperation between the US and Royal Navy. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 284-286)

The USS Greer Incident – Rattlesnakes

So basically, everything was set and in September 1941 there was an incident about 200 nautical miles south-west of Iceland. The Destroyer USS Greer and the German submarine U-652 attacked each other, although both missed. Both sides assumed they were attacked by the other. Originally, a British recon plane attacked the submarine with depth charges and the captain assumed it was the destroyer. Unbeknownst to the Germans the British plane was exchanging information with the US destroyer. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 291)
Roosevelt used this incident and called the German attacks piracy and this is origin for his rattlesnake quote:
“But when you see a rattlesnake poised to strike, you do not wait until he has struck before you crush him. These Nazi submarines and raiders are the rattlesnakes of the Atlantic.“ – President Franklin Delano Roosevelt Fireside Chat to the Nation, September 11, 1941

Yet, besides this rhetoric the speech also contained a new escalation:
“That means, very simply, very clearly, that our patrolling vessels and planes will protect all merchant ships — not only American ships but ships of any flag — engaged in commerce in our defensive waters.” – President Franklin Delano Roosevelt Fireside Chat to the Nation, September 11, 1941
Both Churchill and the German Navy Command interpreted this message basically the same way, either Germany would lose the battle in the Atlantic or it had to risk to be engaged by US Forces every time. Admiral Raeder called it a localized declaration of war, yet Hitler was still hoping for a successful operation Barbarossa and ordered to prevent any incidents with the United States. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 292)

USS Kearny and USS Reuben James Incidents

In October 1941 there were two further incidents. First, the destroyer USS Kearny was hit by a German torpedo, which resulted in first US casualties in World War II. Roosevelt declared the intention to revise the neutrality acts, including the armament of US merchant ships and delivering goods directly into the harbors of warfaring countries. Yet, the Germans didn’t react to this escalation. Second, in the end of October 1941 the destroyer USS Reuben James was sunk, which strengthened Roosevelts position in Congress for revising the neutrality acts. Nevertheless the final vote on changing the neutrality acts was still a close call with only a majority of 18 votes. This clearly showed Roosevelt that the congress was clearly not willing to support a declaration of war anytime soon. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 293-294)

Mediterranean

For Germany the situation in October 1941 was quite difficult, the Army was still heavily engaged with the Soviet Union, the incidents with the United States further increased the support for the British and the situation in the Mediterranean was endangering the Alliance with Italy. In order to solve the crisis German submarines were ordered there. After all the loss of North Africa would expose Italy. This showed already how over-stretched the Axis capabilities were in late 1941. Hitler still believed he could beat the Soviet Union and that the Mediterranean was central for stabilization of continental Europe. He assumed that Italy could easily collapse, thus he focused on improving German naval and air units in the Mediterranean.
The low numbers on the German navy units in the Atlantic in the end of 1941 is obvious, if one considers that after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Hitler declared war against the United States, yet only 6 submarines were ordered against the US coast. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 294-297)

Summary

Germany

To summarize, Hitler and the High Command of the Navy had quite different views. Whereas the Navy considered the Battle of the Atlantic as crucial from the get go, Hitler considered it more important to eliminate all continental enemies first. Furthermore, the main enemy for the Navy were the British, whereas Hitler wanted a peace with the British even in late 1941, although it was clear to him that Churchill wouldn’t budge. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 294-296)
Naturally, the Navy and Hitler had a different approach, the Navy wanted to take clear stance against the escalation by the United States early on, whereas Hitler tried to deescalate as long as possible, in order to prevent a three front war before defeating the Soviet Union.

British

Now, the British didn’t got mentioned a lot in this video, mainly due to the fact they became the junior partner of the United States and most of the initiative on a strategic level was either determined or dependent from the United States. Of course the British still did most of the fighting in this period, but this will be part of another video or probably video series.

United States

Finally, the United States with Roosevelt was a constant escalation course which is usually called “short of war“-policy. Roosevelt was mainly held back by three factors, the relatively unprepared US forces, public opinion and of course the US congress. Yet, by Mid October 1941 the public opinion was already in 70 % in favor of defeating Hitler than keeping out of the war. Still, congress wasn’t willing to support a declaration of war. (Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 293-295) The attack on Pearl Harbor by the Japanese and the following declaration of war from Hitler against the United States clearly changed this situation, the Second World War was set in full motion by the end of 1941.

Sources

Main source

Rahn, Werner: Der Seekrieg im Atlantik und Nordmeer, Kapitel I: Der Atlantik in der deutschen und alliierten Strategie, in: Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg – Band 6 – Der Globale Krieg. S. 275-298

Supplementary sources – mainly used for translation, quotes and correct titles

“Lend Lease” Act

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt Fireside Chat to the Nation, September 11, 1941

Two Ocean Navy Act

Lend Lease

Destroyers for Bases Argreement

Update: HOI 4 – Historical Infantry Division Layouts – Early War #Hearts of Iron

Original video & script: HOI 4 – Historical Infantry Division Layouts – Early War #Hearts of Iron

Intro

Since my first historical division layout video was a major success and a lot of people asked for more, I will do more, but first I have to address the errors in my original layouts, so here is a short update were I discuss the errors, some community contributions and of course the updated layouts briefly.

Thank you

First, thank you all for the great feedback, especially on the paradox forums. Now, there are two people I want to mention explicitly:
First, the steam user ramadawn, who created a mod with various historical divisions, which is also available on the steam workshop.
Second, the paradox user elfiwolfe for giving a lot of good feedback and creating a wiki page with divisions that are derived from my layouts with additional ingame values.
In both cases I didn’t have time to check them out thoroughly, but from their conduct, comments and the data I looked at, I have a good initial impression.

Errors in my first video

Now, when I did my first video I missed a few things that lead to several errors, most notably:
1) Initially, I wasn’t sure if the Artillery Battalions ingame were actually artillery regiments or not.
2) I missed that the support units have less equipment and guns than their equivalent regular combat units.
3) I assigned far too small numbers of anti-tank units in the original video.
The first part, the ingame artillery battalions are actually 3 historical artillery battalions, additionally the game files calls them artillery brigade. Whereas a historical artillery battalion had 12 guns the ingame has 36. For this reason the number of artillery units in my original videos were way too high.
Second, I missed that the number of guns in the support units for anti-tank, artillery, and anti-aircraft is less than that of the regular combat battalions. Basically, a regular combat unit has 50 % more guns than the support version. This allows a bit more fine-tuning, but also note that the support units have special characteristics ingame that I won’t cover here.

Third, in my original video I was far too strict on the anti-tank units. For some reason I neglected the ingame number of guns and used the German Infantry division as reference, whereas in this video I will set the ingame numbers in direct reference to the historical numbers.

The Changes

Since I covered the historical division setups in the original video, I will not narrate the whole setup again, so if you are interested in the background and haven’t see the original video you might want to check it out beforehand, it is mostly military history.

Note that these units are optimized historical accuracy and not gameplay.

German Infantry Division 1940

So, let’s get started, the adapted setup for the German Infantry Division from 1940is as follows:
Due to the high number of more than 70 anti-tank guns, I recommend to use 2 regular anti-tank battalions and remove the support anti-tank gun unit. The number of artillery battalions should be reduced from 4 to 1, since the ingame artillery battalion are three times the size of historical ones.

Now, since the historical unit had 48 artillery guns, an alternative setup would be to use no regular artillery unit, but two support artillery units, this would give the correct amount of artillery pieces for this unit.

german_infantry_division_1940_hoi4_v1_1

Soviet Rifle Division 1941

Since, we covered fifty shades of grey, time to take a look at Big Red, well no that is too scary, so let’s go with the Soviet Rifle Division from April 1941 instead.
Based on the data, I propose the following changes:
Reduce the number of artillery battalions to 1 or 2 units. Since, the division had 54 anti-tank guns and my original proposal had a regular anti-tank battalion included, one could add an additional support anti-tank unit. This would bring up the total ingame number of 60 guns, which slightly above that of the historical numbers.

Source: Sharp, Charles: Soviet Order of Battle World War II – Volume VIII

soviet_infantry_division_1941_hoi4_v1_1

US Army Infantry Division 1943

Yeah, well, the Fourth of July is over, but freedom never ends, so next is the US Army Infantry division layout from July 1943.
The changes are very similar to the German and Soviet unit. Reduction of the artillery units to just 1 artillery battalion. Then adding a regular anti-tank unit and also an optional support anti-tank unit, since the historical division had a total of 57 anti-tank guns, thus just being short 3 guns to be on point. Also similar to the German division, it had 48 artillery guns, so an alternative setup could be no regular artillery unit, but two support artillery units, to get the same amount of artillery pieces as the original division layout.

Source: Stanton, Shelby: Order of Battle of the US Army in World War II

us_army_infantry_division_1943_v1_1

British Infantry Division 1939

Now, if you like to call things Spandau, here we go, the British Infantry Division in 1939 of the British Expeditionary Force.

The changed layout for the British is as follows:
I would add an anti-tank battalion and maybe an anti-tank support unit, although the real division had only 48 anti-tank guns, it had a large amount of anti-tank rifles. Also only one artillery battalion. The rest stays the same.

Source: http://web.archive.org/web/20150702060849/http://usacac.army.mil/cac2/CGSC/CARL/nafziger/939BXIA.pdf (Note: that it lists 147 pieces of the 25mm anti-tank gun, a number that seems completely off and likely is, because it was a French anti-tank gun and I doubt they received so many of them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/25_mm_Hotchkiss_anti-tank_gun )

british_infantry_division_1939_hoi4_v1_1

Japanese Infantry Division 1940 Standard B

Now the war situation may still not necessarily develop to your advantage, nevertheless here is the update for the Japanese Infantry division Standard B around 1940.
The changed layout for the Rising Sun is as follows:
No regular artillery battalion, because of the very limited amount of firepower provided by the Japanese. At most one artillery support unit should be added.
(Source: Rottmann, Gordon: Japanese Army in World War II – Conquest of the Pacific 1941-1942)

japanese_infantry_division_1940_standard_b_hoi4_v1_1

Italian Infantry Division 1940

In case you want to go full duce, here is the changed layout for one of the most dangerous pizza delivery services in history, the Italian Infantry division from 1940:
I would make the optional anti-tank support unit a definite one, since the original division had 24 anti-tank guns, which is exactly the number of the ingame unit. No regular artillery unit, but one support artillery unit, although the historical unit had 36 artillery guns those had limited firepower. (12 guns with 100mm and 24 with 75mm, thus of rather weak firepower.)
Source: Schreiber, Gerhard: S.56-62, in Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg, Band 3;
Soruce: Handbook on the Italian Military Forces, August 1943, Military Intelligence Service – TME 30-420

italian_infantry_division_1940_hoi4_v1_1

French Infantry Division 1940

What is faster than a pizza delivery, well, some argue it is the United Baguette Division, so, let’s look at the changes for the French Infantry division of 1940:

There should be a reduction of the regular artillery battalions to just one. Instead of the support anti-tank unit a regular anti-tank battalion and optional an additional one as support, similar to the US and Soviet division, because the French division had 58 anti-tank guns historically.

Source: Sumner, Ian; et. al: The French Army: 1939-45
Source: https://web.archive.org/web/20111208085020/http://www.cgsc.edu/CARL/nafziger/940FXXE.PDF

french_infantry_division_1940_hoi4_v1_1

Polish Infantry Division 1939

Now, of course this is for Hearts of Iron IV and not Space Invaders, nevertheless, some update on the Polish Space Division is necessary, the changes for the Polish infantry division of 1939, is as follows:
The once optional support anti-tank unit is now definitely a part of the division, because the historical division had 27 guns. Since the historical artillery was quite similar to that of the Italian division, no regular artillery battalion neither, just one support artillery unit.

Sources:
Ellis, Johen World War II – A Statistical Survey – The Essential Facts & Figures for All the Combatants, Edition: 1995 reprinted with corrections
http://niehorster.org/029_poland/organizations/div-inf.html
http://www.cgsc.edu/CARL/nafziger/939PXPG.PDF

polish_infantry_divsion_1939_hoi4_v1_1

Romanian Infantry Division 1941

And the last division layout for this video, the setup of the Romanian Infantry Division of 1941.
Now, the updated Vampire Legions are as follows:
The historical division had 30 anti-tank guns, hence either a regular anti-tank battalion or support anti-tank unit are possible. The artillery battalions should be reduced to one support artillery battalion, since their firepower is just a bit more than that of the Polish or Italian divisions. (36 field guns with 75mm and 16 howitzers with 100mm present. )

(Source: Axworthy, Mark: Third Axis, Fourth Ally: Romanian Armed Forces in the European War, 1941-1945)

romanian_infantry_division_1941_hoi4_v1_1

Suggestion for Proper Artillery Battalions

Now, once I realized that the ingame artillery battalions are actually the size of 3 historical artillery battalions, I added a suggestion to the Paradox Forums. Maybe there is a good reason for this, but I haven’t found one so far. Because, well there are enough slots in the division designer to support very large units. Additionally, the other battalions have mostly correct values for manpower and equipment numbers that are on par with historical numbers.
If you think the same or otherwise, please check the link below to my suggestion post on the forums and add your thoughts and/or support there.

Sources

amazon.com amazon.co.uk amazon.ca amazon.de

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Bernhard Kast ist Teilnehmer des Partnerprogramms von Amazon Europe S.à.r.l. und Partner des Werbeprogramms, das zur Bereitstellung eines Mediums für Websites konzipiert wurde, mittels dessen durch die Platzierung von Werbeanzeigen und Links zu amazon.de Werbekostenerstattung verdient werden können.

Online Resources

[US Army] Anti-Tank Company – Tactics & Organization – World War 2

Intro

Time to cover anti-tank tactics and principles, for this I took a look at the War Departments Field Manual 7-35 from March 1944 that covers the anti-tank company and other anti-tank units in an US Army Infantry Regiment. So let’s examine the company before we dive into the overall defensive setup, tactics and how to properly deploy a defensive position with anti-tank mines.
So let’s get started.

Organization

An US Army Anti-Tank company of an infantry regiment consisted of a Company headquarters, 3 anti-tank platoons and an anti-tank mine platoon.
The company headquarters had 35 men, each anti-tank platoon 33 men and the anti-tank mine platoon 31 men.
In terms of equipment, the headquarters company had 2 jeeps, 2 0.75 ton weapons carrier trucks and a 1.5 ton cargo truck. Each anti-tank platoon had 1 jeep, a .50 cal machine gun, 3 trucks, 3 anti-tank guns with 57mm and 3 bazookas. The anti-tank mine platoon had 1 jeep and 2 trucks.
So let’s take a look at the whole company, in total the anti-tank company had 165 men, 9 anti-tank guns, 9 bazookas and lots of other stuff.
American Infantry Division – Anti-Tank Company for Rifle Regiment – 26 February 1944 – Table of Organization 7-19

Relationship to Regiment and Battalions

Note that the anti-tank company was part of the infantry regiment, which also consisted of 3 infantry battalions, which themselves had their organic anti-tank units, namely an anti-tank platoon each.

Now, these battalions had all their own assigned areas to defend, which were themselves located in the regimental zone. Thus, regimental anti-tank company was used to support the anti-tank units of the battalions. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p.92-93)

As stated in the field Manual:
“Frequently, one platoon of the regimental antitank company is employed to reinforce or add depth to the antimechanized defenses of each front-line battalion, and provide protection to its flanks (see fig. 12).” (FM-7-35 March 1944: p.93)

Function & Mission

Hence, the main function of the anti-tank company was to provide protection against enemy tanks in coordination with the battalion’s anti-tank platoons. To achieve this, the primary missions were reinforcing the front-line battalions to deepen the anti-mechanized defense and to protect the flank or rear of the regiment. Secondary missions were attacking enemy observation posts, fortifications, gun emplacements or other enemy positions. Note that if during a secondary mission a primary mission appeared the anti-tank units should switch without order to the primary mission, meaning engaging enemy armored and mechanized troops. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p.13-14)

Firing and Cover Positions

Now, something about how the defense was organized. There are three firing positions, the primary, supplementary and alternate position.
“The primary firing position is the position from which the gun can best execute its primary mission.” (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 14)
So let’s take a look at a specific situation. For instance this could be covering an approach. Now, since there are usually more approaches to cover, supplementary positions were necessary. A supplementary position is a firing position that can cover an area that can’t be covered by a primary position. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 16)

An alternate firing position is an additional position to a primary or supplementary position that covers the same area and thus can conduct the same fire mission. This alternate position allows to perform the mission even if the respective primary or supplementary position is under fire. It must be reachable with the gun drawn by hand, yet far enough to avoid being affected by fire directed at the primary position. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 16)

Additionally there should be cover positions near the firing positions, to provide protection for personnel and equipment not engaged with the enemy. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 16)

The usual construction order is to first build the primary emplacements, then followed by the alternate positions for these and then the supplementary emplacements and their alternates. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 101) Additionally, dummy position should be constructed, these should be located at least 140 meters away from any true position. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 154-155)

Concealment

Now, if you should ever setup an anti-tank position on your property or somewhere else, the manual contained two interesting bits that grasped my attention. First off, during the excavation of the position you should employ a camouflage net to avoid detection from the air. But as always the devil is in the details, when you use a camo net, be sure that it touches the ground everywhere, because if it doesn’t, it will throw a large shadow that makes it quite visible from the air. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 243) And second, after firing your gun several times, you should consider removing the blast marks in front of your gun. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 247)

Area of Responsibility & Engagement Rules

Now, for better coordination and organization, usually each unit was assigned a sector of responsibility, the size was dependent on the terrain, visibility and proximity of additional units. Ideally, these sectors should overlap with the sectors of adjacent units. The unit leader was responsible for observing the assigned areas. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 124)
In order to provide effective fire and prevent giving away the positions too early, there were several rules in place. First the unit leader defined the ranges at which enemy vehicles should be engaged. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 124-125) Second, approaching hostile recon and decoy vehicles should not be fired upon, unless the superior commander ordered this explicitly, e.g., for an anti-tank platoon the company commander and if the platoon was attached to a battalion the battalion commander. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 124-125) This prevented giving away the positions of the guns prematurely and furthermore, the enemy should be engaged when he had committed his main force.
In order to provide proper ranges, the squad leader for each gun was responsible creating a reference sheet, which he also copied for the platoon leader. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 160-161) Let’s take a short look at an adapted version of such a range card contained in the field manual.
Now, such a reference sheet was rather simple, it contained the position of the gun. An indicator for the magnetic north and various reference points with names and distance from the gun.

Defensive Combat

Let’s take a closer look at the defensive organization and tactics of the anti-tank units. The field manual has a quite interesting view on defensive combat stated under the point “defensive doctrines”:
“The general object of defensive combat is to gain time pending the development of more favorable conditions for undertaking the offensive, or to economize forces on one front for the purpose of concentrating superior forces for a decision elsewhere.” (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 91-92)

As you can clearly see, the defense is seen as a temporary situation until an offensive is possible or as a deliberate action in one area to provide the necessary forces for an attack in another area. Thus, on a strategic scale an offensive stance seems to be the determining factor.
“72. MISSION. The principal mission of the antitank company of a regiment defending a sector of the battle
position is to reinforce or add depth to the antimechanized defense provided by the organic antitank weapons
of front-line battalions, and to protect the flanks, and, if necessary, the rear, of the regimental sector.”
(FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 92)

Anti-Tank Mines

Now, one element in discussions about anti-tank operations that is often commonly neglected is the usage of mines. In defending an area against tanks mines can play a crucial part. Yet, mines are often misunderstood, the most important thing about mines is that they are first and foremost an area-denial weapon. This means, the enemy should be discouraged to use the mined areas and thus divert his approach into an area that is chosen by the defending side, which should allow an effective usage of the anti-tank guns and other weapons. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p.93)
Now, minefields don’t stop a professional army. The manual stated that mine fields must be laid in small arms range (50 to 450 meters) of an organized position. Furthermore:
“A mine field must be defended by fire to be effective. Undefended mine fields delay the enemy only for the relatively short time it takes to bypass them or to remove enough mines to permit passage.” (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 176)

Additionally, there should be a certain safe distance between friendly position and mine fields, furthermore they should not be laid in areas that are assigned for defensive artillery fire. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p.96)

Besides funneling an enemy attack into certain areas, mines could also be used to increase the resistance of outpost, by properly mining the approaches of an outpost the defending units could withdraw and lower the chances of being overrun.
Furthermore, in case of an enemy break through, a properly mined regimental sector would prevent the enemy tanks from moving freely and thus denying them to fully exploit their advantage. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p.95)

Example of a position with road block and mines

Let’s take a look an example position from the manual that uses mines and roadblocks to defend an area.
The road block is covered by the gun and also small-arms fire from infantry. The gun is positioned that it can cover the road and other approaches suitable for tanks. The mines are in range of small arms fire to prevent their removal, furthermore the infantry also protects the gun from enemy infantry. Additionally, rocket teams nearby provide additional protection from attacks on the flanks and rear. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 180)
Furthermore, if during an attack a tank comes within or below a range of 270m, all personnel not serving the gun or already attacking enemy foot troops, should employ rockets or other weapons against the enemy tanks. (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 27)
The manual states: “Doors and turrets, if open, offer particularly favorable targets to small-arms fire, as do also vision slits and periscopes. Should tanks succeed in approaching close enough to warrant such action, incendiary grenades, antitank bombs, and smoke grenades may be used. Fire is continued until defenders are forced to take cover to avoid the crushing action of tanks.” (FM-7-35 March 1944: p. 27)

Summary

To summarize, each battalion defended its sectors with their organic anti-tank defenses, whereas the regimental anti-tank company provided additional protection on the flanks and/or in the depth.
The use of anti-tank mines, natural and artificial obstacles was central in setting up a proper defense. In case of an enemy attack, it was important to wait until the enemy committed its main force. Additionally, firing at lone recon vehicles was performed only in accordance with the commander the anti-tank unit was attached to. These measures ensured that the positions weren’t given away prematurely and that the maximum firepower could be used once the enemy reached an effective firing range.

Sources

FM 7-35 Antitank Company, Infantry Regiment and Antitank Platoon, Infantry Battalion

Niehorster – US Army Infantry Division Anti-Tank Company 1944

Nafziger Collection – US Army Infantry Division Anti-Tank Company 1944

German Panzergrenadier-Division 44 and Motorized Infantry Division 1939

Intro

In this video I will cover a German Panzergrenadier-Division setup and also its precursor the Motorized Infantry Division from 1939. Note that the word Panzergrenadier literally translated is “tank grenadier”, but the correct term nowadays is mechanized infantry or even armored infantry, but in World War 2 most Panzergrenadiers were actually motorized infantry.
There were basically 2 Panzergrenadier Division layouts in World War 2 the Panzergrenadier-Division 43 and 44. The latter one was only valid for a few months, until it was removed, because all German Panzer and Panzergrenadier divisions were reorganized in the Panzer-Division 45 organization layout. Thus, the 44 organization was the last motorized infantry division layout of the war. (Keilig, Wolf: Das deutsche Heer 1939-1945 Gliederung. Bl. 102 – V- 10)

Motorized Infantry Division 1939

So, let’s start with the motorized division.

Organization

It consisted of a mixed recon battalion with armored cars and motorcycle units, 3 motorized infantry regiments each consisting of 3 infantry battalions, 1 anti-tank company and 1 infantry gun company. Additionally, 1 anti-tank battalion with 1 heavy MG company and 3 anti-tank companies. Note that the heavy MG Company was equipped with 2cm anti-aircraft guns and no machine guns. Furthermore, an Engineer battalion, a motorized artillery regiment consisting of 3 light artillery battalions, 1 heavy artillery battalion and 1 observation battalion. And finally a signal battalion.

The main rear services consisted of a supply and transportation unit, administration and medical services.

Numbers – Manpower

Now, let’s take a look at the numbers and try to keep the organization in view. Note that these numbers are for single individual sub-units, hence the numbers displayed won’t always add up, because in some cases they need to be multiplied. Also platoons and even smaller sub-units are not visible.
For the Recon Battalion we have around 386 men, one infantry regiment had a total of 3106 men, the anti-tank battalion had 708 men, the Engineer Battalion 831 men, the artillery regiment 2837 men, the signal battalion 424.

Now the sub-units of the Infantry Regiment, the 2 infantry battalions had 864 men each, and about 200 men in the anti-tank company and the infantry gun company. For the sub-units of the anti-tank battalion, there was a heavy MG company with 189 men and about 170 men in each anti-tank company. The sub-units of the Artillery regiment were 3 light artillery battalions with 540 men each, 1 heavy artillery battalion with 554 men and an artillery observation battalion with 574 men.

For the non-combat units there were 984 men in the supply units, 208 in the administration units and 531 men in the medical units.
In total the division consisted of 16445 men, with 492 officers, 133 officials, 2456 NCOs and 13364 enlisted men.

Changes in 1939/1940

After the campaign in Poland and before the battle of France the Motorized Infantry division were slightly changed. Each Division was reduced by one motorized infantry regiment and one light field Artillery Battalion. (Keilig, Wolf: Das deutsche Heer 1939-1945 Gliederung. Bl. 102 – I- 5)
Now, since we know how an early war motorized infantry division looked like, let’s take a look at the last official organization of this unit type in 1944, the Panzergrenadier-Division 44.

Panzergrenadier-Division 44

Now the name can be quite misleading, because usually when somebody mentions the word Panzergrenadier they show either a picture or video footage of soldiers in or next to German halftrack. Yet, the reality was quite different than propaganda footage.

Even in late war the basic layout of the Panzergrenadier Division 44 was using only trucks and no halftracks for the infantry units. After all, there were only 7 armored halftracks assigned to the whole division.

Of course, there were Panzergrenadiers that acted as mechanized infantry and used halftracks, but these were limited and usually assigned to Panzer Divisions and some rare elite units. So a Panzergrenadier was usually motorized infantry and not mechanized infantry. Something, I wasn’t completely aware neither before doing this video. Let’s take a look at division layout.

Organization

It consisted of an armored car recon battalion, 2 motorized infantry regiments each consisting of 3 infantry battalions, 1 heavy infantry gun company and 1 engineer company. Furthermore, one engineer battalion, 1 anti-tank battalion with 2 tank destroyer companies and 1 heavy anti-tank company. One assault gun battalion with 3 assault gun batteries. An Army anti-aircraft battalion, one motorized artillery regiment consisting of 2 light artillery battalions and 1 heavy artillery battalion. And finally a signal battalion.
The main rear services consisted of supply and transportation units, administration, medical services, a replacement battalion and a maintenance unit. Now, let’s look at the numbers.

Numbers – Manpower

For the Recon Battalion we have around 1005 men, one infantry regiment had a total of 3107 men, the Engineer Battalion 835 men, the anti-tank battalion had 708 men, the assault gun battalion had 602 men, the Army anti-aircraft battalion had up to 635 (min 607 men), the artillery regiment 1580 men and the signal battalion 427.

Now the sub-units of the Infantry Regiment, the 3 infantry battalions had 868 men each, the heavy infantry gun company had 102 and the engineer company 217 men. For the sub-units of the anti-tank battalion, there were 57 men in each of the 2 tank destroyer companies and 117 men in the heavy anti-tank company. The 3 assault-gun companies had 64 men each. The sub-units of the Artillery regiment were 2 light artillery battalions with 486 men each and 1 heavy artillery battalion with 516 men.

For the non-combat units there were 667 men in the supply units, 233 in the administration units 530 men in the medical units, 973 men in the reserve/replacement battalion and 281 men in the maintenance unit.

In total the division consisted of 14732 men, with 402 officers, 83 officials, 2766 NCOs, 11487 enlisted men and 690 volunteers. Note that these volunteers were part of the official layout of the division not some ad-hoc addition on the front line.

Comparison

So let’s compare these two units. I won’t cover all changes, because some are quite obvious, like minor replacements, but there were quite some major changes in organization, equipment and the overall numbers.

Organization

Recon Element

First in terms of organization, both divisions had a recon layout, but internally the changes were quite significant. The 1939 version consisted of a company of motorcycles and an armored car company with 10 armored cars. Whereas the 1944 version had a headquarters company with 17 or 20 armored cars depending on the layout. Additionally, 3 companies of light motorized infantry with the same amount of weapons each like the motor cycle company and also a heavy company that doubled the amount of mortars. Hence, both the numbers in equipment and manpower was quite different. The 1939 version had 386 men, whereas the 1944 version had 1005 men.

Infantry Units

Now in terms of the infantry regiments, the 1939 version had 3, whereas in 1940 this number was already reduced to 2. Same goes for the 1944 version that had only 2 infantry regiments. The number of infantry battalions didn’t change. Yet, the infantry gun company was changed to a heavy infantry gun company, whereas the anti-tank gun company was removed. Yet, an engineer company was added, which had 18 flamethrower vehicles at its disposal.

Anti-tank Units

Let’s take a look at the anti-tank units. The 1939 version had only towed equipment available and the main force was located in 3 anti-tank companies, whereas the 1944 version had only one company of towed anti-tank guns, yet 2 companies with tank destroyers. Note that the early war anti-tank guns could be moved by infantry tactically, this wasn’t possible with the 75mm guns anymore, thus the introduction of tank destroyers was a necessity to provide mobile anti-tank capabilities on the tactical level. (Wettstein, Adrian: Stumartillerie)

Engineer Units

The engineer battalion stayed almost the same both in numbers and equipment.

Artillery Units

The Artillery unit had two changes, the minor change was one light artillery battalion less, but the total number of guns was the same, hence this was mainly a change in the overall structure. The original setup had artillery observation battalion. This unit was assigned to the Army units and removed from the division after the Polish campaign. (Keilig, Wolf: Das deutsche Heer 1939-1945 Gliederung. Bl. 102 – I- 2)

Anti-aircraft Defense

In terms of anti-aircraft units there was a major change, in 1939 only one company with 12 small anti-aircraft guns was available, the heavy MG company. In 1944 this setup had changed significantly, there was a dedicated army anti-aircraft battalion with a heavy company and an additional light or medium company, depending on the setup.

The different aa-guns were not only located in the anti-aircraft battalions, there were several in each infantry battalion, in the headquarters companies of the artillery battalions and the self-propelled AA guns were located in the assault gun battalion.

Assault gun

This assault gun battalion, was a major change. Whereas in 1939 there were only 24 light infantry guns available, in 1944 this number had changed to 8 heavy infantry guns, but an addition of 42 assault guns clearly increased the amount of high caliber direct fire weapons to support the infantry in combat.

Other Changes

There are quite many other changes, the number of supply companies in individual units increased, furthermore maintenance and other units were added also, which is a direct result of the increased amount of tracked vehicles most notably the tank destroyers and assault guns.

Numbers – Equipment

Now, to wrap this up, a short comparison in the equipment numbers, I choose various numbers that changed considerably and also show the evolution of certain areas.
In 1939 there were a mere 31 sub-machine guns assigned to the Division, in 1944 this number increased to 1230. In terms of light machine guns the number almost doubled from 374 machine guns or should I say Spandaus to 732 light machine guns. In terms of anti-aircraft guns there was a increase from 12 light anti-aircraft guns to 63 light and 12 heavy anti-aircraft guns. There was also some reduction in equipment numbers, the 1939 division had 1323 motorcycles, whereas the 1944 layout had only 153 assigned. Yet, in 1944 the division had 322 Kettenkräder, which is basically a half-tracked motor-cycle. In terms of anti-tank capabilities the original setup had 72 anti-tank guns, whereas the 1944 had only 19 anti-tank guns of a higher caliber, since now 31 tank destroyers were used in the anti-tank role. And an additional 42 assault guns that could be used similarly.

Summary Changes

To summarize the biggest differences were in terms of equipment were the reduction of the number of motorcycles. The vast increase in anti-aircraft weaponry, the addition of assault guns and the change of most of the anti-tank capability from towed anti-tank guns to tank destroyer.

Hearts of Iron IV

Now, for all those waiting for the division layouts for Hearts of Iron IV, don’t worry, I didn’t forget you guys. There will be an update video shortly on the infantry divisions and probably one for the units mentioned in this video too.

Sources

Books

Keilig, Wolf: Das deutsche Heer 1939-1945 Gliederung, Einsatz, Stellenbesetzung. (amazon affiliate link – deuk)

Wettstein, Adrian: Sturmartillerie – Geschichte einer Waffengattung or as download (pdf).

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Links

Volunteer – HiWi

Nafziger Layout

Panzergrenadier Division

Kurzchronik (checking some unit names)