Feed your mind: Part II Blitzkrieg Doctrine

[peo]

One thing to note is that Blixtkrieg is a tactic, a correct use of resources on a tactical scale. Noone ever wins a war on the tactical scale.

It is sometimes said that the Germans did everything right on the tactical scale and the Russians everything right on the strategic.
That is why it didn't work.

Operational Manouver warfare isn't the same thing realy, it is on the level between tactical and strategical and is realy about moving troops around the battlefield to exploit weaknesses or counter attacks.

Modern tacticsare not realy blixtkrieg, nowadays most people think of the fragmented battlefield witout fronts, which makes the blixtkrieg which is a way of tacticaly breaching a front a bit obsolete. However the manouver warfare is exactly what the US doctrines are about.

As for Manstein using blixtkrieg, that depends how you see it. IIRC he never commanded a tactical unit. Druing the initial part of ww2 he was chief of staff to Rundstedt and a planner. Rommel, Guderian and a lot of others were commanding the panzerdivisions and therefore should have the credit of using it.

 

[unmerged(3221)]

The word Blitzkrieg is not a German military word. It was invented by the British press to describe (capsulate for headlines) what happened in Poland and France.

There were plenty of theories during and after WW1 that advocated something like Blitzkrieg. In WW1 the main problem was that there was little capability for mobile operations with trenchlines extending from the Channel to Switzerland. Even if an army broke thru with infiltration tactics that went around strongpoints, they could not sustain any advances as supplies and reinforcements could not be bought up swiftly enough by horse (trucks were too primitive and the terrain was chewed up by years of fighting over and over again in the same place). The Germany did effect breakthrus in 1917 and 1918 but none could be sustained due to this lack of mobility. The tank and the use of airplanes in WW1 were signs that mobility could be restored to the battlefield, but how to accomplish that became a major concern in decades following WW1.

Guderian's ideas were influenced both by traditional German thinkers and by foreigners. The difference between Germany and other nations was that his ideas were implemented while other's were stymied. Guderian's idea of a completely mobile, self contained, combined arms division was implemented while other countries redirected these ideas and technical advances to unsupported armor brigades or small armored bn linked to inf. Guderian also stressed Communications: his Panzers were all linked by radio and he expected his Pz div to lead from the front. This meant that they could flexibly and quickly respond to changing circumstances. And he always stressed knocking out the enemy's command centers behind the front lines.

Bltizkrieg WAS implemented in Poland to a lesser extent and in France to a full extent. Claims that blitzkrieg did not happen in France in May 1940 are preposterous. Contrast WW1's four years of trench warfare with the German Panzers breaking thru and cutting the Allied armies in half in 10 days! (Guderian reaching the Channel on May 19). How can a complete reversal of the stagnation of WW1 that destroyed the ability of the Allies to effectively respond in just 10 days be dismissed as not being blitzkrieg? If that wasn't blitzkrieg at it's high point, then what was? and why are we all discussing this? Some posters are in effect saying that blitzkrieg did not happen in WW2, so what would be the point of this entire discussion? All we have is theory since 1915 ?

Of course German's successful blitzkrieg in May 1940 in France was aided by the French high command's incompetence and backwards thinking (fighting the last war mentality). But that does not negate how successful this blitzkrieg operation was. The Germans rapidly broke thru the frontlines and over ran the HQ behind them which complete negated the ability of the French high command to effectively respond. Every attempt they made to move blocking forces around was always a day or two late. This effort broke the will of the enemy to resist (a Von Clausewitz precept).

Later on this theory failed to work in the vast expanses of the Soviet Union. This was primarily due to Germany's overall inability to mass and supply enough mobile forces to cover a much larger area. John Ellis in his 'Brute Force' book pointed out that each Panzer or German aircraft was effectively asked to cover 4 to 5 times the amount of space that they had successfully covered in the France/Low Countries operation.

The problems Germany faced there was that whatever they did better in one area would expose a weakness in other areas and that they had to do many things simultaneously while they could only do one thing well. Ex.: If Germany had more mobile divisions, they would have had to simultaneously go on a war footing much earlier and still have enough oil and rubber (tires) to support this expanded mobile army (which they never had). If Germany wanted to thrust directly towards Moscow, they could not also defend their flanks over a 600 mile (1000 km) front.

Finally all operations in WW2 had a limit of about 200 miles (300 km). The Germans made one such leap in France and had to make three leaps to reach Moscow. The Red Army advances after Kursk including Operation Bagration ran out of steam after advances of around 200 miles. Even the Allies after the Cobra breakout advanced about 200 miles before supply problems kicked in so much that even the Red Ball Express supply operations could not overcome them. Logistical restraints for major operations were a very real concern in WW2 and it is good to see that the game is starting to account for these in a better fashion.

 

[Archangel85]

One thing to note is that Blixtkrieg is a tactic, a correct use of resources on a tactical scale. Noone ever wins a war on the tactical scale.

It is sometimes said that the Germans did everything right on the tactical scale and the Russians everything right on the strategic.
That is why it didn't work.

Operational Manouver warfare isn't the same thing realy, it is on the level between tactical and strategical and is realy about moving troops around the battlefield to exploit weaknesses or counter attacks.

Modern tacticsare not realy blixtkrieg, nowadays most people think of the fragmented battlefield witout fronts, which makes the blixtkrieg which is a way of tacticaly breaching a front a bit obsolete. However the manouver warfare is exactly what the US doctrines are about.

As for Manstein using blixtkrieg, that depends how you see it. IIRC he never commanded a tactical unit. Druing the initial part of ww2 he was chief of staff to Rundstedt and a planner. Rommel, Guderian and a lot of others were commanding the panzerdivisions and therefore should have the credit of using it.

The Blitzkrieg is very strategical. Tactical it would see its implementation in the atctics trained, the fast attacks and the small scale combined warfare. But as I said before, for it to work it does matter little if its horses, trucks or tanks, all that matters is that it is faster then the enemy and can encircle, destruct and quickly advance onto important objectives.

 

[Darks63]

7)Rasiputa russian spring plain=sea of mud

 

[TheLand]

The main difference between Blitzkrieg and modern 'shock and awe' is that Shock and Awe involves direct degradation of enemy command, control and communications across the whole theatre of combat.

Pre-Blitzkrieg manouever doctine was that you use operational maneuver to gain superiority in forces, ground etc to give tactical superiority, without worrying about C3 capabilities. The enemy general can command his troops, but there are more of yours in the right place at the right time for decisive battle.

Blitzkrieg extends this in both a more strategic and more tactical direction. It uses strategic mobility to interfere with lines of communication and tactical mobility to produce exceptional local concentrations of force. The enemy general's ability to command is degraded by the fact that his troops have their supply lines cut and they always find that any engagement with yours is met with overwhelming superiority of armour, air and artillery.

The Blitzkrieg doctrine was extended in the 1980s by the USA into the Air-Land Battle idea. Using air superiority, tactical bombers and air cavalry units interdict enemy supply lines. The enemy general (in this case Russian) tries to mount an operational breakthrough but finds that his lines of communication are interdicted by bombing and airmobile raids while his armoured spearhead is bogged down by infantry AT missiles. Tom Clancy's Red Storm Rising gives a good idea of how this might have gone.

Shock and Awe is a more evolved variant of the Air-Land Battle. It relies on a level of air and intelligence superiority that means that the enemy general himself is one of the first targets, along with key logistical and intelligence assets. Ideally the enemy has no commanding officers, no ability to gather intelligence on which to issue orders, and no ability to communicate orders to combat assets. This makes it so easy to concentrate force against the enemy that his combat assets might as well give up and go home (which seems to be what they did)...

 

[Braedonnal]

Bltizkrieg WAS implemented in Poland to a lesser extent and in France to a full extent. Claims that blitzkrieg did not happen in France in May 1940 are preposterous. Contrast WW1's four years of trench warfare with the German Panzers breaking thru and cutting the Allied armies in half in 10 days! (Guderian reaching the Channel on May 19). How can a complete reversal of the stagnation of WW1 that destroyed the ability of the Allies to effectively respond in just 10 days be dismissed as not being blitzkrieg? If that wasn't blitzkrieg at it's high point, then what was? and why are we all discussing this? Some posters are in effect saying that blitzkrieg did not happen in WW2, so what would be the point of this entire discussion? All we have is theory since 1915 ?

German divisions running amock after penetrating a completely undefended front, the Ardennes (well, ok, a front lightly held but then abandoned) hardly implies an tactical mastery over their opponents but rather a case of the victory of strategic thinking.

As further proof of this, you have a large German armored force pouring behind your lines but you have massive forces both to the North of this penetration and south of it so as the defender what do you do? Me, I trade ground in the north and counterattack from the north and south to attempt to pinch off this German force and encircle them. In fact, this was the Germans greatest fear but given the fact that no one on the strategic level of the Allied command was thinking clearly by this point, it naturally did not happen.

To give the historic timeline of the panic events, on May 15th, Paul Reynaud, the French prime minister, phoned Churchill and told him that the battle was lost and that his country was defeated. Churchill and his High Command took this at face value and began plans to withdraw the BEF from the continent on May 16th. This withdrawl left a new massive section of front open for the Germans to pour through and effectively doomed the Belgian Army (the Belgians held the coast along with the 7th French Army, the BEF held the middle and the French the rest). Once this withdrawl began and effectively removed the Belgian and British armies from the campaign, things were pretty much over. Mind you, the Germans weren't even close to the Channel on the 15th and already French was defeated. Too bad no one told the French Army that they were defeated and saved them the 100,000 killed they would take over the next month.

Let's apply typical myths of WW2 on the Britsh side. They had no choice to withdraw as the French had given up and the Germans had them completely outclassed (and in the earliest accounts vastly outnumbered as well, a hold over of WW1 mythology). Moreover, not only were the French beaten and quitting but the BEF itself was poorly equipped and trained (outright lies given that the BEF was the only completely mechanized army in the world), its officers with no idea how to deploy armor while on the other side the Germans motored along French roads like herds of buffalo because as we know, only the German knew how to deploy armor which is true if we ignore the Franco-German armor clashes in various battles.

Of course, we need to look at facts and the facts are very disturbing. At Gembloux Gap, the Germans essentially had an entire armored division destroyed. It's a pity we never hear about this battle but it hardly fits the mythology of the war with the French employing combined arms tactics against the Wehrmacht and over the course of a two day battle (without any air cover, mind you) emerging victorious but were then withdrawn. In another armored clash the German lost the equivalent of another armored division. German superiority in armor and armored tactics hardly fits the evidence. On May 31, German armored losses were at 50% and bomber and fighter losses at 40%. This hardly fits into the idea of Blitzkreig!

This isn't to say the Allies didn't have losses but when one considers that the major Allied forces were untouched by combat that the bulk of the RAF and French Air Force had yet to be committed to action (unlike the histories that say it had been destroyed on the ground by the Luftwaffe per the Blitzkreig mythology) to say that the Allies had lost by May 16th is proposterous.

"Great events often have simple causes. In this case the cause was Churchill's acpuiescence to Reynaud's panic, a decision that brought the curtain down on one of the most discreditable periods of the European democracies and was the culmination of two years of betrayal and capitulations. Here were two leaders who could, if they had stayed the course, have fought Hitler to a bloody stalemate. Instead they panicked, Churchill no less than Reynaud."

This is key thing about WW2, if it doesn't fit in the fairy tale it is convinently disregarded and forgotten. The lies have been told so often though that it had become truth and anyone saying otherwise is a fool. "The Allies deployed their armor wastefully in support of the infantry" or "in penny-packets" as British historians love to state it. Given that the BEF didn't even have an armored division deployed in France this is a truthful statement but it is certainly false when applied to the French but it doesn't fit the story and so it is discarded.

You must remember, the first casuality in war is the truth.

 

[Azkor]

1. Blitzkrieg was in essence not developed it was the next natural extension of available resources, trucks/tanks, to classic manuver warfare.

The best distilation of blitzkrieg is the famous quote by Nathan Bedford Forest "get there the firstest with the mostest."

 

[unmerged(38522)]

1) Who "invented" blitzkrieg?
&
2) Why had no one thought of this before?
&
3) What was the first use of this doctine?

After WW1, when the tanks were first employed, most countries saw them and started using them as the infantry support weapon. They became an auxillary force for most countries, including Germany, until some argued that with the use of fast advancing units (tanks) one could make sure that a battle line of the opponent does not develop, so that a quick advance could be possible. The main proponents of this concept were J.F.C. Fuller and B. H. Liddell Hart of the British Army. So they were technically the pioneers of the lightning war doctrine. They called it "Indirect Approach" doctrine. The idea was to punch through defences at the weakest point and then advance with the full force through the hole in the battle line. Divisions capable of such attacks were created in England, France and Poland, but were simply too weak and fewly numbered to be of any significance.
Heinz Guderian took Fuller and Hart's ideas and implemented them into his ideas, publishing them in his book Achtung! Panzer! which was read and then widely supported by Hitler, even though most German commanders opposed the idea.
The first aspects of Blitzkrieg were tested during the Spanish civil war of 1936, the first division to test is was Panzer Batallion 88, involving three companies of PzKpfw I (Panzer I), including a wide variety of air support under the codename Condor, air support being part of the Blitzkrieg doctrine as well. The campaign was of too little significance to see actual results, but it was there that Guderian understood the importance of Luftwaffe in his newly established doctrine. This was the first time that Stuka saw first battle as well (Ju 87, the infamous whistling dive bomber).

4) How does this play into modern doctrines?
Recent operation Iraqi Freedom was a blatant plagiarism of Guderian ideas (Lieutenant General John F. Sattler has admitted he copied the tactics used by Germans during their French campaign).

5) Why did this not continue working in russia OR why were the Germans defeated in Russia if their armies were so successfull elsewhere?
The importance of Blitzkrieg lied in an nonobstructed terrain for a swift and decisive attack of panzers. They also required a lot of fuel to opperate. So the terrain was of outmost importance. If it was instead hilly, wooded, marshy, or urban, panzers would be vulnerable to infantry in close-quarters combat and unable to truly breakout at full speed. As well, units could be halted by mud (thawing along the Eastern Front regularly slowed both sides), or extreme snow. Russian terrains were full of the worst possible conditions a tank commander could imagine. Not only the terrain was almost impassible, Russian partisans along with constant English air strikes that slowly deteriorated German industial capacity made sure that tanks that did get through had little or no oil to operate further.

6) name some famous people who used this strategy?
Heinz Guderian, Lieutenant General John F. Sattler

7) name some of the flaws of using this strategy?
The backside and the sides (weakest spots) of the tanks became exposed as they rushed through the defences of the enemy. Allies developed a defensive doctrine they called "hedgehog" where AT guns would be placed as to protect the flanks instead of protecting the front and would fire on the passing tanks, slowly deteriorating the attacking forces.
Air superiority was critical to successful tank advance and by 1944 German Luftwaffe suffered a serious blow by RAF and had little fuel available for successful operation of planes. Most fuel went into the tanks and thus most blitzkrieging had to be done during bad weather so that enemy planes could not hamper the advance, but in this case, bad weather would. So by the time Operation Overlord was in progress, Blitzkrieg became quite outdated and had little success (Battle of the Bulge was the last large scale attempt on the German side that ended very badly for the SS).

8) What exactly is blitzkrieg? What does the word mean?
Lightning War. Operational-level military doctrine which employed mobile forces attacking with speed and surprise to prevent an enemy from organizing a coherent defense.Just a few to get ya started. Look forward to getting educated and hope this series is a success.

 

[unmerged(3221)]

German divisions running amock after penetrating a completely undefended front, the Ardennes (well, ok, a front lightly held but then abandoned) hardly implies an tactical mastery over their opponents but rather a case of the victory of strategic thinking.

As further proof of this, you have a large German armored force pouring behind your lines but you have massive forces both to the North of this penetration and south of it so as the defender what do you do? Me, I trade ground in the north and counterattack from the north and south to attempt to pinch off this German force and encircle them. In fact, this was the Germans greatest fear but given the fact that no one on the strategic level of the Allied command was thinking clearly by this point, it naturally did not happen.

To give the historic timeline of the panic events, on May 15th, Paul Reynaud, the French prime minister, phoned Churchill and told him that the battle was lost and that his country was defeated. Churchill and his High Command took this at face value and began plans to withdraw the BEF from the continent on May 16th. This withdrawl left a new massive section of front open for the Germans to pour through and effectively doomed the Belgian Army (the Belgians held the coast along with the 7th French Army, the BEF held the middle and the French the rest). Once this withdrawl began and effectively removed the Belgian and British armies from the campaign, things were pretty much over. Mind you, the Germans weren't even close to the Channel on the 15th and already French was defeated. Too bad no one told the French Army that they were defeated and saved them the 100,000 killed they would take over the next month.

Let's apply typical myths of WW2 on the Britsh side. They had no choice to withdraw as the French had given up and the Germans had them completely outclassed (and in the earliest accounts vastly outnumbered as well, a hold over of WW1 mythology). Moreover, not only were the French beaten and quitting but the BEF itself was poorly equipped and trained (outright lies given that the BEF was the only completely mechanized army in the world), its officers with no idea how to deploy armor while on the other side the Germans motored along French roads like herds of buffalo because as we know, only the German knew how to deploy armor which is true if we ignore the Franco-German armor clashes in various battles.

Of course, we need to look at facts and the facts are very disturbing. At Gembloux Gap, the Germans essentially had an entire armored division destroyed. It's a pity we never hear about this battle but it hardly fits the mythology of the war with the French employing combined arms tactics against the Wehrmacht and over the course of a two day battle (without any air cover, mind you) emerging victorious but were then withdrawn. In another armored clash the German lost the equivalent of another armored division. German superiority in armor and armored tactics hardly fits the evidence. On May 31, German armored losses were at 50% and bomber and fighter losses at 40%. This hardly fits into the idea of Blitzkreig!

This isn't to say the Allies didn't have losses but when one considers that the major Allied forces were untouched by combat that the bulk of the RAF and French Air Force had yet to be committed to action (unlike the histories that say it had been destroyed on the ground by the Luftwaffe per the Blitzkreig mythology) to say that the Allies had lost by May 16th is proposterous.

"Great events often have simple causes. In this case the cause was Churchill's acpuiescence to Reynaud's panic, a decision that brought the curtain down on one of the most discreditable periods of the European democracies and was the culmination of two years of betrayal and capitulations. Here were two leaders who could, if they had stayed the course, have fought Hitler to a bloody stalemate. Instead they panicked, Churchill no less than Reynaud."

This is key thing about WW2, if it doesn't fit in the fairy tale it is convinently disregarded and forgotten. The lies have been told so often though that it had become truth and anyone saying otherwise is a fool. "The Allies deployed their armor wastefully in support of the infantry" or "in penny-packets" as British historians love to state it. Given that the BEF didn't even have an armored division deployed in France this is a truthful statement but it is certainly false when applied to the French but it doesn't fit the story and so it is discarded.

You must remember, the first casuality in war is the truth.

10 days, completely reversing years of trench warfare in WW1, trapping half of the Allied forces.

There is nothing more that needs to be said. That is blitzkrieg.

 

[unmerged(38250)]

First of all I must go along with Braedonnal on almost every topic, brilliant thread!

1) Who "invented" blitzkrieg?

Well, no one really invented it, it was derived as a step forward in military doctrine when technology allowed it.

5) Why did this not continue working in russia OR why were the Germans defeated in Russia if their armies were so successfull elsewhere?

Take a look at the map. Russia is a HUGE place. Front was very long and to achieve strategic goals...well, Germans simply didn't have enough divisions, both Panzer both infantry.
Many factors discussed previously but I think one of bigger reasons is a hoorrible state of Russian roads, sometimes even the lack of roads at all It was easy in France and Belgium where a network of very good roads existed...

6) name some famous people who used this strategy?

All of the classic proponents: Manstein, Guderian, Rommel, Patton,...

 

[unmerged(8319)]

While the lot of you have answered the Q about the anatomi of Blietzkrieg very well as far as the military aspect is concerned, let me supplement with the economical side.

Blitzkrieg in a very grand, strategical view, is a question about wearing down a bigger oponent by using the advantage of striking first. Not by surprise (well, in some cases that too, but that's a sideeffect), but by deploying a larger stock against an enemy with lower stock and kill him off before he can compensate with a higher production.

If one studies the wareconomies of Germany and USSR (which I did), their productions can be translated directly into to functions. Something like:

Germany: P=f1(t)+B1
USSR: P=f2(t)+B2

Where P is total production, f(t) is a function increase over time with parameters 1 and 2, and B1 and B2 are the inital levels of the production.

F2 was larger than f1 whereas B1 was larger than B2. Hence Germany started out with a higher production (for waruse), but the annual growth of the USSR economy was larger. The productionfunctions are, interestingly, almost linear - even in 1941.

The intersectionpoint, the point where the USSR productionincrease overtakes the german ditto, is late 1942.

Since the USSR wasn't defeated by that time, the war of economies had allready been lost, barring a really massive scale blunder on the soviet side (which never happened).

As a sidenote, a similar analysis of the US versus Germany shows a different result as the US increase is non-linear and by the time of US entry into the war, Germany - let alone Japan - had been surpassed by US by far.

 

[unmerged(17984)]

Blitzkrieg in a very grand, strategical view, is a question about wearing down a bigger oponent by using the advantage of striking first.

I think something is missing from this discussion, and these posts are getting out of scope.

Some questions to first consider:
What is the difference between tactical, operational, and strategic doctrine?
Which one is blitzkrieg?

The people who are posting that blitzkrieg is a myth, or that blitzkrieg failed to defeat the Soviets, are misunderstanding what it is.

Someone posted earlier that blitzkrieg is an operational-level doctrine. I don't think it is. Employment of blitzkrieg, such as it was, does not involve a strategic objective. That makes blitzkrieg a tactical doctrine. Its objective is the destruction of an enemy line of defense.

In fact, I believe the main difference between German blitzkrieg and Soviet deep operations is that the latter is an operational doctrine and the former tactical. In the field they looked quite similar, but the Soviet doctrine had additional scope.

Once we get this out of the way then a lot of the tangents of this discussion can be pruned. Exploration of the strategic and/or operational aspects of blitzkrieg is misguided. Also, comparing to strategic and/or operational doctrines is difficult: apples and oranges, people.

 

[unmerged(38211)]

I think something is missing from this discussion, and these posts are getting out of scope.

Some questions to first consider:
What is the difference between tactical, operational, and strategic doctrine?
Which one is blitzkrieg?

The people who are posting that blitzkrieg is a myth, or that blitzkrieg failed to defeat the Soviets, are misunderstanding what it is.

Someone posted earlier that blitzkrieg is an operational-level doctrine. I don't think it is. Employment of blitzkrieg, such as it was, does not involve a strategic objective. That makes blitzkrieg a tactical doctrine. Its objective is the destruction of an enemy line of defense.

In fact, I believe the main difference between German blitzkrieg and Soviet deep operations is that the latter is an operational doctrine and the former tactical. In the field they looked quite similar, but the Soviet doctrine had additional scope.

Once we get this out of the way then a lot of the tangents of this discussion can be pruned. Exploration of the strategic and/or operational aspects of blitzkrieg is misguided. Also, comparing to strategic and/or operational doctrines is difficult: apples and oranges, people.

Don't really want to get involved in the discussion, but I feel compelled (and I hope you all are enjoying this discussion BTW).

I must question those who call blitzkrieg a "tactic". One must assume that the strategic goal is political (as it ALWAYS is). BUT, considering that, one must also assume that TACTICS assumes the use of ones assets to accomplish stategic goals. Now if we use that, sure it's tactics. But if we consider this in this way... then there are indeed NO strategic military doctrines, as they always reinforce the political strategy. Well high-ranking soldiers like to think "grand tactics" if you will.... and call them strategies (as for them... the political goal is merely the objective which THEY must seek a strategy for defeating the enemies forces (and hopefully!) accomplishing the political goal. Thus strategic doctrines are given birth. One must assume now that tactics now refer to accomplishing the goals of the MILITARY'S strategic plan. Laid out like this there could be many stategies within an overall battle plan (subcontained within air, land and sea). Thrusts into an enemy over an entire theater can hardly be considered tactical doctrine now as the entire front has to be in on the entire overall plan (launching your panzers without air cover and infantry support seems kinda silly doesn't it). If a unit commander cannot make his own battle plan (even as high as Corp level) it can hardly be consider his tactical approach to the battle. He is a pawn in the strategic plan and must use tactics to achieve the overall strategic battle plan. An example contrary to this would this Corp level commander going after various targets of oppurtunity (towns, fuel depots, enemy hard-points, etc) with his corp on the front.
Blitzkrieg (as employed by the Germans in WW2) was obviously a strategic plan to punch deep behind enemy lines ignoring strong points and encircling these units to deny the "one-front" mentallity of WWI. In this way they planned to take great amounts of land and decimate the front after the initial push. Allowing for a general push through this gap until lines stabalized, and repeating. Tactics are not appopriate here as the tactical doctrine can be reffered to as the Stukas dive bombing of various targets or the tanks deciding how far to push, for example. The strategy for defeating the Polish armies was obviously what we now call "blitzkrieg".

Sorry for the rather unorganized response but I am at work, technicaly

 

[markpalm1]

If one studies the wareconomies of Germany and USSR (which I did), their productions can be translated directly into to functions. Something like:

Germany: P=f1(t)+B1
USSR: P=f2(t)+B2

Where P is total production, f(t) is a function increase over time with parameters 1 and 2, and B1 and B2 are the inital levels of the production.
The intersectionpoint, the point where the USSR productionincrease overtakes the german ditto, is late 1942.
Since the USSR wasn't defeated by that time, the war of economies had allready been lost, barring a really massive scale blunder on the soviet side (which never happened).

Germany didn't go to total war production until 1943, showing a lot of unused capacity for the prior years. Also, the extreme deficit spending of the four year plans in the 1930s enabled the german economy to function as much bigger economy would (at least for a while; they really needed to invade someone or inflate later to pay that all back).

 

[unmerged(17984)]

one must also assume that TACTICS assumes the use of ones assets to accomplish stategic goals.

That is not what tactics are.

Blitzkrieg (as employed by the Germans in WW2) was obviously a strategic plan...

I completely disagree. Aside from the fact that your conclusion is not obvious, it is neither correct. Consider what is involved in operational planning vs tactical planning.

Operational planning deals with broad objectives. In 1940, the German operational plan was to press through the Ardennes into northern France and then into Paris [Edit: before people disagree with this, I should note that their actual operational plan was much more involved than this, I just meant to say that this is an example of the scope of an operational plan]. Tactical planning deals specifically with engagement. Thus, their tactical plans specified breakthroughs, encirclement of large defensive forces, and elimination of the resulting pockets.

While it is true that the levels of planning are not clearly delineated and there is a great deal of overlap in practice, when you frame these properly, I would contend that blitzkrieg was obviously a tactical doctrine.

 

[Archangel85]

That is not what tactics are.




I completely disagree. Aside from the fact that your conclusion is not obvious, it is neither correct. Consider what is involved in operational planning vs tactical planning.

Operational planning deals with broad objectives. In 1940, the German operational plan was to press through the Ardennes into northern France and then into Paris [Edit: before people disagree with this, I should note that their actual operational plan was much more involved than this, I just meant to say that this is an example of the scope of an operational plan]. Tactical planning deals specifically with engagement. Thus, their tactical plans specified breakthroughs, encirclement of large defensive forces, and elimination of the resulting pockets.

While it is true that the levels of planning are not clearly delineated and there is a great deal of overlap in practice, when you frame these properly, I would contend that blitzkrieg was obviously a tactical doctrine.

maybe I have a grossly wrong idea of tactical, but for me, tactical is everything from squad up to regimental, operational everything from regimental up to corps, and strategical everything above. So one could conclude that blitzkrieg is employed on every level, but it would be wrong to assume that Blitzkrieg is a tactic when it aims (and succeds) at encircleing entire armygroups...

 

[unmerged(38250)]

Its objective is the destruction of an enemy line of defense.

Blitzkrieg's purpose is to thrust THROUGH enemy defences at one or two points with overwhelming strength (Schwerpunkt) and then destroy command posts, line of communications, encircle enemy forces and destroy them.
Of cource, I simplified it to a great degree, but that's about it.

 

[unmerged(8319)]

Germany didn't go to total war production until 1943, showing a lot of unused capacity for the prior years. Also, the extreme deficit spending of the four year plans in the 1930s enabled the german economy to function as much bigger economy would (at least for a while; they really needed to invade someone or inflate later to pay that all back).

There's no contradiction Markpalm. What I'm saying isn't that Germanys warproduction didn't increase. It did, but at a slower rate than in the SU.

But perhaps you get the idea from the 'total war' concept that somehow the german production skyrocketed by 1943? If that's the case, I must disappoint you. The increase was rather steady allthough ofc. there were variations in certain types of equipment (new SP ATs for example).

The 'total war' concept in fact was about another crucial aspect in Germany: manpower. There was a severe labour shortage allready by the early 40ies and drafting had to be increased. 'Total war' in Goebbels term was directed at manpower, not as much industry.

 

[unmerged(28)]

1) Blitzkrieg as practiced by the German Army in Poland and France was the distilled idea of Heinz Guderian, from his book Achtung Panzer, published in 1937 and used as the textbook for the German Panzer training programmes that followed.

The ideas contained within drew heavily from direct observation of Great War tank use, and the ideas of British strategists Basil Liddlel Hart and John. F. C. Fuller as well as personal opinion on tactical use.

This is unfortently a myth. Guderian learnt its basic formulations when attending the Weimar Generalstab called Truppenamt as a Colonel. The first German to use the tactics was von Seeckt in his late WW1 Romanian campaign.

Liddel B. Hart is not a trustworthy source IMHO. Fuller was into combined arms yes but calling it blitzkrieg is a too far conclusion. I recommend a book named "The Roots of Blitzkrieg" by James
S. Corum.


/Greven

 

[unmerged(8319)]

Yes, Lidell Hart should probably be more trusted. Blietzkrieg is a german word, but not a german invention. It was developed in UK AFAIR, but never implemented. Remember that the UK was the first country to invent some of the groundbreaking technologies in tanks and airplanes.