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that wasn't really rommels idea though. the 8,8-cm-FlaK was already used as anti tank weapon during the spanish civil war. rommel was not really involved in that...

True. Germans were keen on using any big gun for AT purposes when they encountered heavy armor, 105 mm howitzers, 150 mm, just whatever was around.
 
that wasn't really rommels idea though. the 8,8-cm-FlaK was already used as anti tank weapon during the spanish civil war. rommel was not really involved in that...
the allies did see von Runstedt as the most dangerous general in the west. they didn't really care about rommel.
i dont mean the 88 as AT in general, i mean feigning a retreat with panzers to lure british tanks into 88s fields of fire
 
i dont recall the feign retreat-88 screen being used before (or a variation with some other AT guns)

so he maybe had one "great" moment... if that makes him into one of the greatest generals of all times we are going to need a much longer list.
rommel also ordered a frontal infantry attack on tobruk because he didn't believe it was a fortress even though he was warned. it was a disaster. rommel liked to lead his division directly from the frontline. that makes good stuff for war stories but is really stupid. a general is supposed to stay out of danger and in a position where he can actually give and receive orders...
he was hitlers pet-general and an above average division commander but nothing more.

This is a strange argument... Double envelopments also happened in many cases, but you still needed skill to pull them off.

but its hardly innovative when you use a standard tactic.
 
For me, the important thing is to ensure that you DO NOT have to perform under these conditions. That's strategy - to put yourself in a position which makes the opponent's chance of victory slim or non-existent.

*facepalm*

The very idea of great general-ship is to save supplies, men, weaponry etc. to be used elsewhere. Your performance as a general is what determines how many supplies, planes, ships etc. you actually need to get the job done.
It is in fact very poor strategy to saturate one area with soldiers, weapons and supplies, and then just roll the enemy down over a wide front - UNLESS you have near-infinite supply. If you have near-infinite supply there's no need for generals - or their performance is irrelevant - strategically and operationally.

To me, what you say, is like saying "the best mountainclimber doesn't put himself in a position where he has to actually climb the mountain. Therefore the best mountainclimbers are helicopter pilots". Or, the ultimate concequense in military terms would be to avoid fighting at all - making Neville Chamberlain the greatest strategist of the war.

Besides, when it comes to strategy, operation etc. it's important to distinguish between field commanders and General Staff generals. Eisenhower was a good planner. Does that make him a great general? Dunno. We didn't see him in the field. Marshall - well Marshall had FDR's confidence (but according to Alanbrooke he had no strategic understanding) - does that make him a great general? Rommel performed excellently in the field. But he seemed a poor strategist. Does that make him a great general?

Not very many generals get to perform in both fields. Alanbrooke is one - he performed as well as could be expected in France in 1940 - hardly stellar, but no worse than others. But as a strategist he was probably the number one in the entire world war, including the Soviets, the US and the Germans.
 
so he maybe had one "great" moment... if that makes him into one of the greatest generals of all times we are going to need a much longer list.
rommel also ordered a frontal infantry attack on tobruk because he didn't believe it was a fortress even though he was warned. it was a disaster. rommel liked to lead his division directly from the frontline. that makes good stuff for war stories but is really stupid. a general is supposed to stay out of danger and in a position where he can actually give and receive orders...
he was hitlers pet-general and an above average division commander but nothing more.

I think Rommel had more than one "great moment". Every move you make can't be original or without precedent. But he did fool the british several times and defeated them in the field time and again.

Re: Tobruk, true, he was warned. But generals are warned ten times a day about all kinds of things. He might have been warned against NOT making a frontal assault for all we know. And while his frontal assault failed, it's remarkable that shortly after he actually took Tobruk with a feigned move! He learned from his mistake. And innovation demands failure. It takes a great innovator to learn from his mistake and then get it right.

Re: Leading from the front. It has its pro's and con's. If you have a good staff whom you trust it's unimportant if the General is there or not. However, if you want to form exact knowledge of what is actually going on at the front, you need to be there. Rommel had good help at times - and his greatest victories came when he was at the front or had drawn inspiration from being at the front. Today it's probably less important, as we can see video-feeds from the front. But in the Afrika Korps, there was only one way to get a feel of things. I don't think it's a coincidence that throughout history, generals was within view of the battle - if not in the thick of it. It's only relatively recent that the general is located well behind the lines and never see the muzzel-flash from battle.
 
*facepalm*

The very idea of great general-ship is to save supplies, men, weaponry etc. to be used elsewhere. Your performance as a general is what determines how many supplies, planes, ships etc. you actually need to get the job done.
It is in fact very poor strategy to saturate one area with soldiers, weapons and supplies, and then just roll the enemy down over a wide front - UNLESS you have near-infinite supply. If you have near-infinite supply there's no need for generals - or their performance is irrelevant - strategically and operationally.

To me, what you say, is like saying "the best mountainclimber doesn't put himself in a position where he has to actually climb the mountain. Therefore the best mountainclimbers are helicopter pilots". Or, the ultimate concequense in military terms would be to avoid fighting at all - making Neville Chamberlain the greatest strategist of the war.
You are confusing things - it seems that you are talking about the economy of force, while I was talking about sth different. Conditions which were previously mentioned make your life harder, i.e. they decrease your chance of victory or make your victory more costly. Therefore, a good strategy is the one which will minimise the exposure to the ill-effects of such conditions or avoid them altogether in a given context. In war, a good general doesn't climb the mountain if he can get around it and achieve the same effect faster and more efficiently (that's a metaphor ofc). When he HAS TO climb the mountain, then you can determine how good he is when compared with an another general in these conditions.
 
You are confusing things - it seems that you are talking about the economy of force, while I was talking about sth different. Conditions which were previously mentioned make your life harder, i.e. they decrease your chance of victory or make your victory more costly. Therefore, a good strategy is the one which will minimise the exposure to the ill-effects of such conditions or avoid them altogether in a given context. In war, a good general doesn't climb the mountain if he can get around it and achieve the same effect faster and more efficiently (that's a metaphor ofc). When he HAS TO climb the mountain, then you can determine how good he is when compared with an another general in these conditions.

The point is, that a generals capabilities as a general is primarily shown, when his "tools" are limited, either in quality or quantity or both. It is not a problem for any general to win provided he has plenty of "tools" of an adequate quality and his opponent is in a worse sutiation. Only on a few occations did the allied generals lack, say, air support, or were outnumbered. For half the war the German generals had to perform with little or no air-support and against allied forces they always faced a strong air arm. So the german generals were really tested. The allied generals, with a few exceptions, never really were, making it impossible to really compare the two, as allied generals never had to think outside the box, just like they never really had to worry about "economy of force" - not to mention "complete and indefinite lack of, say, air support".

A good example is Monty vs. Rommel before Overlord. Monty had his contry's undivided attention and ressources at his disposal, along with the majority of the US forces. When he laid out his plan, Eisenhower, Churchill, even the King was present at the presentation.
Rommel was, in ressource terms running a sideshow with battered or inexperienced divisions. And when he wanted to present his plans, Hitler wouldn't even answer the phone.
 
The point is, that a generals capabilities as a general is primarily shown, when his "tools" are limited, either in quality or quantity or both. It is not a problem for any general to win provided he has plenty of "tools" of an adequate quality and his opponent is in a worse sutiation. Only on a few occations did the allied generals lack, say, air support, or were outnumbered. For half the war the German generals had to perform with little or no air-support and against allied forces they always faced a strong air arm. So the german generals were really tested. The allied generals, with a few exceptions, never really were, making it impossible to really compare the two, as allied generals never had to think outside the box, just like they never really had to worry about "economy of force" - not to mention "complete and indefinite lack of, say, air support".
And who claimed otherwise? You are basically saying that it's hard to compare the generals, while I said that the fact that X operated under favourable conditions doesn't make him a bad general. Surely you don't expect the general to reduce his assets in order to even out the odds? o_O I also think that you are oversimplifying things, as you make it seem that the Allied generals didn't even care about strategy and just pushed forward...

The topic is very broad - we aren't debating who was the best at desert warfare or who was the best tank commander, but who was the greatest general - it's obvious that it will be hard to compare all the generals. One thing which irritates me is that people are compiling lists of the best generals based on... what? They rarely provide explanations. Why MacArthur? Why Rommel? Why Zhukov? You get the idea.
 
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A good example is Monty vs. Rommel before Overlord. Monty had his contry's undivided attention and ressources at his disposal, along with the majority of the US forces. When he laid out his plan, Eisenhower, Churchill, even the King was present at the presentation.
Rommel was, in ressource terms running a sideshow with battered or inexperienced divisions. And when he wanted to present his plans, Hitler wouldn't even answer the phone.

Didn't Rommel have the largest concentration of Panzers / Panzer Divisions since Kursk? It was hardly a sideshow and I think that Overlord exemplifies how good some of the allied Generals were; Marshall/Alanbrooke were willing to let their staff control the operational detail, Eisenhower was willing to let Monty command in the field and Monty was willing to let Patton be the one to drive out in operation Cobra. At all levels you have officers who not only know their strengths but also trust their subordinates to perform better than they; a leader's greatest quality is to know when someone is better than he. With the German's we see a structure where each commander doesn't trust his subordinates and tries to control everything himself. Rommel's desire to 'lead from the front' is just another way of him not trusting his subordinates to do their job!

Also, I like your comment about Alanbrooke, but I think that the successes of Roosevelt, Marshall, Churchill and Alanbrook was determined by the dynamic of their skills and personalities; that is they complimented each other.
 
Didn't Rommel have the largest concentration of Panzers / Panzer Divisions since Kursk?

Not sure. There were a lot of paper-divisions around, just like many of the battered eastern-front units were sent to the west. Wikipedia says 2200 tanks from june-august. same number lost. Allied losses says 4000 tanks. Kursk has 40% more tanks on a period of 10 days. Not really sure how to read it.

It was hardly a sideshow

Compared to what was going on elsewhere it was a sideshow. And while Rommel techincally was in charge of a large force, much of it (the reserve) was out of his control entirely, whereas Monty could command all the troops that could be provided shipping for.

and I think that Overlord exemplifies how good some of the allied Generals were; Marshall/Alanbrooke were willing to let their staff control the operational detail, Eisenhower was willing to let Monty command in the field and Monty was willing to let Patton be the one to drive out in operation Cobra. At all levels you have officers who not only know their strengths but also trust their subordinates to perform better than they; a leader's greatest quality is to know when someone is better than he.

I think you overestimate the mutual trust in this chain of command. Overlord, indeed the western allies' operations were dominated by what could be accomplished diplomatically i.e. what compromises could be reached, rather than who trusted whom and how able this or that commander was thought to be by his peers. A good glimpse into this relationship is Alanbrookes diaries, and it wasn't limited to inter-allied relations but also largely between the different branches and indeed within each branch. (If you haven't already, the diaries are worth a read).

With the German's we see a structure where each commander doesn't trust his subordinates and tries to control everything himself. Rommel's desire to 'lead from the front' is just another way of him not trusting his subordinates to do their job!
Perhaps at the general-rank level. German doctrine was very much built upon unit independence, where the officer in charge thought up solutions to orders himself, and carried them out. Once you reach a certain level of rank (i.e. army- or theatre commanders) I'm sure there was immense rivalry and suspicions. That Rommel didn't trust his commanders is disputable. I think he simply preferred to be in the thick of it (probably to compensate from his lack of a staff education). But it's no secret he was clashing with his immediate subordinates on a regular basis - and even more so with his superiours (various Italian generals and Kesselring especially).
But I'm not sure you can apply it broadly across the Wehrmacht. If your example with Rommel is to hold water, it would mean that all generals not leading from the front did indeed trust their subordinates - something that we know is not true (Manstein is a famous example (i.e. the Kerch peninsula "incident" (Sponeck)).
Plus, there's plenty of evidence that show allied generals being highly suspicious or critical of their subordinates/superiours/peers (especially across nationality).

Also, I like your comment about Alanbrooke, but I think that the successes of Roosevelt, Marshall, Churchill and Alanbrook was determined by the dynamic of their skills and personalities; that is they complimented each other.
I know little of Marshall's personality or capability. I know Roosevelt liked him a lot and I know Alanbrooke was unimpressed (which he also was of Eisenhower - but being surpassed by him re. Overlord, he had a vested interest). There is little doubt that especially Churchill managed to pick his men better that his immediate and comparable enemy, Hitler, and managed to listen to their advise (something Hitler seemed adverse to!).
Roosevelt managed to pick wisely, but I wonder if so many others couldn't have done just as well as Eisenhower/Marshall. US capability came in form of force, numbers and ressources - something that would have been applied by any and all. UK and Germany were more limited in their capabilities and couldn't afford strategic blunders, so the difference came down to the individual.

But I suppose your claim of German generals being suspicious could be traced to the organizational dispositions of, ultimately Hitler alone, but by proxy especially Himmler and Göring, when building their own little (big!) armies, combined with Hitlers irratic behaviour towards generals. After Brauchitsch it seemingly became "every man for himself" (maybe even sooner). Churchill managed to pick the right man (at least in the second try) and stick with him. Same goes for Roosevelt and Stalin. I guess continuety, like quantity, has a quality all of its own.
 
And who claimed otherwise? You are basically saying that it's hard to compare the generals, while I said that the fact that X operated under favourable conditions doesn't make him a bad general. Surely you don't expect the general to reduce his assets in order to even out the odds? o_O I also think that you are oversimplifying things, as you make it seem that the Allied generals didn't even care about strategy and just pushed forward...

Generals (any officer) will always demand more. So I don't expect him to limit himself (not without having an agenda). But if a general is never limited (by reality), compared to his advisary, he never has to really be original or perform beyond what could be expected. Of course you can't fault a general from not being in that position. But you also have to relate to his immediate opponent. When Monty could grind his way across NA, never taking any chances, it was because he had the supplies to do it, as well as a "guardian angel" (Alan Brooke) who screened him from the most radical demands from Churchill. Rommel had neither the supplies nor the support to act as he did. This meant that not only did he not have the required forces to do the job, he was constantly pressured from high command to do something he found operationally and tactically unsound or even mad. This repeated itself in Normandy where Monty was shown a great amount of patience, as well as large forces, whereas Rommel, acting on a plan he found (and proved) wrong, with insufficient ressources was under much greater pressure to perform.

The topic is very broad - we aren't debating who was the best at desert warfare or who was the best tank commander, but who was the greatest general - it's obvious that it will be hard to compare all the generals. One thing which irritates me is that people are compiling lists of the best generals based on... what? They rarely provide explanations. Why MacArthur? Why Rommel? Why Zhukov? You get the idea.
Sure. And I try to point that exact thing out in my remark on Alanbrooke. Typically, a single general does not get to perform under all types of circumstances (Desert, polar, urbanized, plains, marches, high command, divisional-, corps-, army command etc. etc.). Personally, I would prefer to point at a general that has tried more than one of these positions, and to be rated at "great" also performed above average in these.
If one looks af Monty (that actually tried several, performed above average but is rarely mentioned by guys "in the know") he failed miserably as CIGS - but does that make him a poor - or average - general? Rommel had, well, mixed results, yet he consistently finds his way to a top-10 list. Zhukov is another general that performed with mixed results in both the field and (to some extent) as Staff officer - but he is also often ranked among the great. Interestingly, Slim, Alanbrooke, Alexander - many British generals except Monty (and sometimes O'Connor) are completely disregarded (Personally, I find Slim and Alanbrooke to be the finest British commanders since at least Wellington).

However, when one asks the question "top 5 generals", it doesn't ask for a "with a 20 page reason on every man on the list"-reply. If you look for long, thorough disseminations, I think this is the wrong place. Plus, no general did everything right. And while a general may have his fans, he also has his opponents, that will underline every single mistake a general has made, be it strategically, operationally, or personally (i.e. beat his wife, attention-whore, morally corrupt etc.), rendering the original reason invalid for some reason.
 
This meant that not only did he not have the required forces to do the job, he was constantly pressured from high command to do something he found operationally and tactically unsound or even mad.
This may be true during his later campaigns, but in the beginning it was exactly the opposite. Hitler and co. wanted to defend Libya and keep Italy in the war. Rommel had grand ambitions of conquering Egypt. Hitler gave Rommel his approval only after Rommel was surprisingly successful in his offensive moves. Of course, by then few wanted to hear of defending Libya anymore... They became hungry of success and this was the beginning of their doom.

However, when one asks the question "top 5 generals", it doesn't ask for a "with a 20 page reason on every man on the list"-reply. If you look for long, thorough disseminations, I think this is the wrong place. Plus, no general did everything right. And while a general may have his fans, he also has his opponents, that will underline every single mistake a general has made, be it strategically, operationally, or personally (i.e. beat his wife, attention-whore, morally corrupt etc.), rendering the original reason invalid for some reason.
I still expect sth better than 1. Rommel 2. Zhukov 3. von Mainstein...
 
Patton's repositioning and drive to Bastogne during the Bulge was a great feat of organization, discipline and logistical acumen, plus he was leading from the front. For that alone I think some of his reputation is well deserved. He held certain advantages over his opponents to be sure, but he made great use of his motorized units and close air support to move rapidly and effectively. Don't forget that he was taking part in an expeditionary campaign against enemy forces on the defensive with internal supply lines.
 
Patton's repositioning and drive to Bastogne during the Bulge was a great feat of organization, discipline and logistical acumen, plus he was leading from the front. For that alone I think some of his reputation is well deserved. He held certain advantages over his opponents to be sure, but he made great use of his motorized units and close air support to move rapidly and effectively. Don't forget that he was taking part in an expeditionary campaign against enemy forces on the defensive with internal supply lines.

There's plenty of quotes from German generals, stating that Patton was the allied general they feared/admired the most. On what basis I cannot say - but I guess if ones contemporaries find you good, then you are good.