[WarInEur] Pro German Bias

[sgminfo]

Buckley, John D. wrote:
> My point is that if you look at Luftwaffe structure only a very small 
> part of it (less than 10%) was given over to battlefield air support 
> and the only dedicated CAS aircraft type was a biplane. It's not that 
> they weren't better than the others -they were - but there was no 
> grand concept of blitzkrieg. Nowhere did the Luftwaffe or Wehrmacht 
> have any new 'model' or 'concept' for doing things. BAS developed 
> slowly in the Luftwaffe and they really didn't want it to, but 
> circumstances dictated that it did.
>
> */Professor John Buckley/*
> */History and War Studies/*
> */HLSS - University of Wolverhampton/*
> */Wulfruna Street/*
> */Wolverhampton/*
> */West Midlands/*
> */UK/*
> */WV1 1SB/*
> */Tel: 0044 (0)1902 323388/*
>
>     -----Original Message-----
>     *From:* peterturkaly at comcast.net [mailto:peterturkaly at comcast.net]
>     *Sent:* 05 February 2008 18:45
>     *To:* Buckley, John D.; Chuck Sutherland; warineur at mailman.halisp.net
>     *Subject:* RE: [WarInEur] Pro German Bias
>
>     The luftwaffe had liasons with front line units to help direct
>     CAS.  Did the allies have anything like it early in the war?
>      
>     As far as increasing russian stacking later in the war - very good
>     idea, however 6 units may be too much.  The massive casualties
>     they suffered while pushing the germans back would disappear if
>     they were allowed stack 6 units per hex.
>
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>   

i would very much agree with this, Wever had amassed the very best of 
the best in his new, and youthful airforce, but at this early stage of 
the war, very little of doctrine had been substantiated by established 
practise, most of it was just that, theorey. It takes time to weld the 
operational and strategic with the youthful organisation, and many of 
the simple joints and command mechanisms were developed on the fly in a 
great adhoc adventure.

The actual details of ground support methods were almost non existent in 
1939/1940, there were endemic shortages of ground staffs, radio 
operators, ground controllers were only just being introduced, and much 
of the signals personnel and equipment were simply not in place at 
squadron level when the war started.Much criticism was laid at the door 
of the Luftwaffe when Poland was over, mostly on the disappointing 
performaces of ground support liason, and the failure of the ground 
component of an attack to capitalise on the effects created by the air 
groups. The breathing space over the winter allowed many of the yawning 
gaps in the performance to be filled, and the forward air controllers to 
gain practise and experience in their new positions. in 1940 the success 
attending ops usually blinds us to the fact that in most terms the 
Luftwaffe was operating on the perfected lessons of 1918, and just 
introducing innovations that would become standard operational practice 
for all later in the war.


  In terms of Doctrine General Wever's disciples had most of the theorey 
in place, but were as much astonished by the effects of their ground 
support in practice, as they had been by the first experiments in Spain.

 Looking at their performance in terms of results, they were a gifted 
and highly opportunistic crowd, not adverse to learning a new trick or 
two whenever the opportunity extended, but one should be wary of 
clothing their  actions in anything more purposeful than that.

The battle of Britain demonstrated, that when faced by a novel tactical 
situation they were obviously groping for a doctrine that would carry 
them through this 'unusual ' situation, a situation that had neither 
been forseen, nor 'gamed'.

The advantage, was a lack of preconceived notions, and out of date 
operational doctrine
the great failure was that self same problem, engendering a lack of 
persistence and an all too frequent switching of tactics when plans 
failed to gain immediate success.

One can contrast this with Harris' approach in 1942, where single minded 
application of basic theorey and planning, brought forth the honing of 
Bomber Command into a fearsome weapon of destruction.

One can see the downside of this same approach when over adherence to 
objectives in 1943 threatened to break the command as Harris pursued the 
Battle of Berlin.


-|steve|-
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