[WarInEur] Pro German Bias

[Buckley, John D.]

I am intrigued by what everyone here is calling blitzkrieg. All seem to be accepting that the Germans had a plan or model which was 'blitzkrieg'. I would like to see the evidence upon whihc this assupmtion is being based because the reality is that there was no new model, or set of tactics that conformed to a 'blitzkrieg' plan or model, and no economic organisation to allow short campaigns so as not to put too much pressure on the German economy. Likewise the Luftwaffe had no widespread or dedicated army support model; less than 10% of the Luftwaffe was considered army support and Luftwaffe officers really wanted to push for a strategic bombing model and a fully independent role.
The German armed forces made the most of what they had, the deal dealt them by Hitler's foreign policy and stuttering military-economic expansion. They had thought about the lessons of the First World War, but in essence they carried on with the same classical Prussian/German approach or fast encirclements and manoeuvre as the key to success. Limited mechanisation and motorisation allowed them to do this against the slow reacting and static defensive enemies they encountered until 1942. Once the Soviets and Western Allies started to be able to dictate terms and drive operations and battles according to their strengths - essentially firepower - the Germans were stuffed and had no real answer to it.
It's also worth bearing in mind that although the Germans were very good at manoeuvre war (bewegungskrieg?) they were rubbish at most other aspects of campaign/multi-operational level management - intelligence, logistics, operational sequencing, development of strategy, matching capability to resources and so on. In addition, the much lauded concept of mission based command (auftragstaktiks?) was good in the short-medium term but became much less of an asset when strong operational- strategic level control was required to ensure that available assets and resources were deployed to the key areas; a lower level commander wasn't able to see the big picture and allowing commanders to achieve objectives as they saw fit and because they could, was counterproductive in an army running out of steam and resources, and unable to match low level objectives to the broader strategic goals.
Finally, the German army did a very good job in the post-war era blaming everyone else for their defeat - the Luftwaffe, the Allies for having too much equipment and resources, and of course, Hitler. Very few  said that they had screwed up, made bad choices and that they had for much of the time supported Hitler's strategies. During the war senior military commanders at OKH and OKW often sided with Hitler and not just for sycophantic reasons; most said after the war that it had all been Hitler's fault and if only they'd been properly backed with resources and sound grand-strategic direction. The obvious point, even if in conjecture and as a counter-factual, is that if the German army had had such support and wasn't pushed into desperate situations requiring big gambles, it wouldn't have been the army it was; it would have functioned much more like its opponents, who ultimately found the solution to successfully dealing with the Germans.
How does this relate to WinE? Well, I actually agree that the Germans should have more dynamism at the start to simulate the slower reactive capabilities of the Allies, but let's not think this should be rolled out across the game simply because the German army was the German army. There are also aspects of the game at the strategic level that might simulate the German state a bit more that get missed. One could argue that as Hitler's policy was to avoid putting pressure on the German state unless it was necessary, the German economic multiplier should be tied to political points or events in the game, not to a chronological timescale. Therefore, it would be failures and disasters that would trigger the move to a higher economic footing. Consequently, if the German army does too well, the multiplier drops or sticks. How this would be measured is an interesting debate.
John  

Professor John Buckley
History and War Studies
HLSS - University of Wolverhampton
Wulfruna Street
Wolverhampton
West Midlands
UK
WV1 1SB
Tel: 0044 (0)1902 323388



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Today's Topics:

   1. Re: Pro-German bias (sgminfo)
   2. Re: Pro-German bias (Don Lazov)


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message: 1
Date: Thu, 31 Jan 2008 14:33:42 +0000
From: sgminfo <sgminfo at aol.com>
Subject: Re: [WarInEur] Pro-German bias
To: Chuck Sutherland <csutherland at dpcs.org>
Cc: "warineur at mailman.halisp.net" <warineur at mailman.halisp.net>
Message-ID: <47A1DC46.2060006 at aol.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed

Chuck Sutherland wrote:
> Operational truth is operational truth, and blitzkrieg used combined arms and speed to win battles. This truth has not changed, the balance of power between weapon systems may have altered but the truth is the truth. And it was this truth that the allied took along time to grasp and counter. Had the Germans been able to supply their forces properly in Russia we would all have been speaking German.
>
> They were not lucky, they just did their homework and got it right as far as battle operations go. Fortunately for the world the allies had time and numbers and production on their side and those forces simply ground down the Axis.
>
> Considering the allies knew what the Germans were going to do makes the case for blitzkrieg even stronger. It would be like playing a basketball game and giving the other team your playbook and signals and seeing now long it takes for them to learn how to stop you.
>
> That operational prowess the German military used does not appear in the game system as it stands now because you can mount an effective delaying battle against the Germans.
>
> Early on that should not have been possible at least in the operational area of the Panzer Corps.
>
>
>
>   

One extract I read from a British officer's musings brought the lesson 
home forcefully.

His opinion,
In a nutshell,


The Germans  were not particularly revolutionary,
much of this had all been worked out by 1918,
But they were very good at it.

Lower formations had simple opening book approaches in standard 
predictable ways,
the revolutionary aspect of this was that commanders in the Wehrmacht 
were rehearsed in this,
and thus could place reliance on other units behaving in predictable ways,
ways that could be hooked up to and allow larger,
and more complex plans to take shape and be made manifest,
The general allied reaction allowed far too much low level ad hoc 
battleplay,
to the point that the multiplying complications
outran the ability and the experience of the field officers to cordinate 
their units.

i.e. experience and familiarity told heavily against us.

Once we had learned the moves,
their approach perversely played into our hands,
as that very predictability enabled low level counter measures to
operate with confidence and gusto.

So, it then became a battle environment which our field commanders could 
follow and thereby operate in, without groping around in the dark.

In 1940 many battles were not won by the Germans. they were lost by the 
allies, once things got a bit fluid and confusing, our commanders could 
not see the forest and the big picture, and once that sight had been 
lost the thread of the action went with it.

In the Western Desert Ritchie and other British commanders fell into 
this trap. When Rommel was forced to retreat the first time, it was only 
the timely stepping in of the vastly more experienced theatre commander 
that prevented the Army commanders from acknowledging (erroneously) that 
they were beaten and withdrawing in confusion.

Pondering this, you can then understand why the changing unit strength 
options is such a useful mod. Churchill was bedeviled by it, he saw the 
8-10s lined up (he knew the ration and toe's). But unlike in the game, 
he could not see that his wonderfull 8-10 was in fact a 5-10, or 6-10 
instead. Many basic actions went awry because of such a simple, but 
devastating overvaluation of our actual capabilities of the time.

Later in the War similar miscalculations as to capabilities and actual 
fighting performance led directly to many desasters in 1944-45 under 
Hitler's gaze. Mortain and Falaise were  prime examples of this, a 
fundamental misappraisal of the physical and organisational capabilities 
of the German Army, when faced with an adverse balance of circumstance 
and forces., a misapprehension not shared by commanders more directly 
linked to their fighting formations.



-|steve|-


------------------------------

Message: 2
Date: Thu, 31 Jan 2008 15:29:28 +0000
From: dlazov at comcast.net (Don Lazov)
Subject: Re: [WarInEur] Pro-German bias
To: sgminfo <sgminfo at aol.com>, Chuck Sutherland <csutherland at dpcs.org>
Cc: "warineur at mailman.halisp.net" <warineur at mailman.halisp.net>
Message-ID:
	<013120081529.20506.47A1E95800073B500000501A22165499769001960E040B at comcast.net>
	
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

My take on all this is a bit different.
 
The Germans invented the strurm (strosstruppen) groups during WW1 to break into the trench lines. They developed this with small detachments (which morphed in WW2 to kampfgruppen) at the tactical unit level. They then took the new ideas invented by the British and French of mechanized and air warfare to the next level. The Brits went one way (infantry support) and the French another (both infantry support and use as cavalry). The Germans then morphed the concepts learned from WW1 (those to break the trenches that they had developed and those that were used against them-tanks) and applied them in the Polish campaign and then the lessons drew from this they also applied in France 1940 and Russia 1941. 
 
Another thing the Germans did really well at the beginning of the war (1939-42) was to make decisions on the spot by the commander at the front and to send by word of mouth any changes. By 1943 Hitler had more and more of a micro command and a lot of leaders were attrition off in the 1941-42 battles in Russia and North Africa or were fired. By 1944 only Hitler had control of the strategic command structure (theater level) and independent thinking was punished by death or removal. Only Manstein kept his post and only till April 1944. October 1943 till the end of the war on the eastern front resulted in both army group commanders having no freedom of action or were directed by Hitler to either hold the line at all costs (and if they failed to obey they were either relieved of command or shot).
 
By 1943 the Soviets had learned from the Germans the art of war and in 1942 they tried to emulate the German operational ideas but failed miserably which led to the development of their own operational art of war that fit their own model and methodologies. This was attacking in echelon (very narrow fronts packed with Divisions, the correct stacking in 1943-45 for the Russians should be changed from 3 Soviet units to 6 or more in a hex (pile on 6 x 5-5 Guards Corps to crush the German line with support from 4-6 x 10-1-10 Art divisions).
 
The Germans developed and perfected the blitzkrieg model from 1939-42 from 1943 onwards they shifted more or less to the kampfgruppen idea in defense of France, Germany and their eastern frontiers. The Soviets developed and perfected the Echelon Attack (or attacking in depth) from 1943-45. The Allies mostly used a form of Blitzkrieg type of operational art but with a very heavy emphasis on the massive use Air Power.
 
In the original game from SPI this was modeled by the 4 CRT. Also, the original game War in the East the idea was for the Germans to attack the massive Russian lines at 2-1 to 4-1 odds with high casualties (flipping 6-5's) in mind.
 
Any way I am rambling we all know this shit right?

--
Don Lazov 
~Best Regards

-------------- Original message -------------- 
From: sgminfo <sgminfo at aol.com> 

> Chuck Sutherland wrote: 
> > Operational truth is operational truth, and blitzkrieg used combined arms and 
> speed to win battles. This truth has not changed, the balance of power between 
> weapon systems may have altered but the truth is the truth. And it was this 
> truth that the allied took along time to grasp and counter. Had the Germans been 
> able to supply their forces properly in Russia we would all have been speaking 
> German. 
> > 
> > They were not lucky, they just did their homework and got it right as far as 
> battle operations go. Fortunately for the world the allies had time and numbers 
> and production on their side and those forces simply ground down the Axis. 
> > 
> > Considering the allies knew what the Germans were going to do makes the case 
> for blitzkrieg even stronger. It would be like playing a basketball game and 
> giving the other team your playbook and signals and seeing now long it takes for 
> them to learn how to stop you. 
> > 
> > That operational prowess the German military used does not appear in the game 
> system as it stands now because you can mount an effective delaying battle 
> against the Germans. 
> > 
> > Early on that should not have been possible at least in the operational area 
> of the Panzer Corps. 
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > 
> 
> One extract I read from a British officer's musings brought the lesson 
> home forcefully. 
> 
> His opinion, 
> In a nutshell, 
> 
> 
> The Germans were not particularly revolutionary, 
> much of this had all been worked out by 1918, 
> But they were very good at it. 
> 
> Lower formations had simple opening book approaches in standard 
> predictable ways, 
> the revolutionary aspect of this was that commanders in the Wehrmacht 
> were rehearsed in this, 
> and thus could place reliance on other units behaving in predictable ways, 
> ways that could be hooked up to and allow larger, 
> and more complex plans to take shape and be made manifest, 
> The general allied reaction allowed far too much low level ad hoc 
> battleplay, 
> to the point that the multiplying complications 
> outran the ability and the experience of the field officers to cordinate 
> their units. 
> 
> i.e. experience and familiarity told heavily against us. 
> 
> Once we had learned the moves, 
> their approach perversely played into our hands, 
> as that very predictability enabled low level counter measures to 
> operate with confidence and gusto. 
> 
> So, it then became a battle environment which our field commanders could 
> follow and thereby operate in, without groping around in the dark. 
> 
> In 1940 many battles were not won by the Germans. they were lost by the 
> allies, once things got a bit fluid and confusing, our commanders could 
> not see the forest and the big picture, and once that sight had been 
> lost the thread of the action went with it. 
> 
> In the Western Desert Ritchie and other British commanders fell into 
> this trap. When Rommel was forced to retreat the first time, it was only 
> the timely stepping in of the vastly more experienced theatre commander 
> that prevented the Army commanders from acknowledging (erroneously) that 
> they were beaten and withdrawing in confusion. 
> 
> Pondering this, you can then understand why the changing unit strength 
> options is such a useful mod. Churchill was bedeviled by it, he saw the 
> 8-10s lined up (he knew the ration and toe's). But unlike in the game, 
> he could not see that his wonderfull 8-10 was in fact a 5-10, or 6-10 
> instead. Many basic actions went awry because of such a simple, but 
> devastating overvaluation of our actual capabilities of the time. 
> 
> Later in the War similar miscalculations as to capabilities and actual 
> fighting performance led directly to many desasters in 1944-45 under 
> Hitler's gaze. Mortain and Falaise were prime examples of this, a 
> fundamental misappraisal of the physical and organisational capabilities 
> of the German Army, when faced with an adverse balance of circumstance 
> and forces., a misapprehension not shared by commanders more directly 
> linked to their fighting formations. 
> 
> 
> 
> -|steve|- 
> _______________________________________________ 
> WarInEur mailing list 
> WarInEur at mailman.halisp.net 
> http://mailman.halisp.net/mailman/listinfo/warineur 
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