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Random Historical Observation.

By The Armorer on January 5, 2006 | | Comments (14)

This (or something like it), is what most people think of when they conjure up a mental image of the German Army in WWII.

This is generally more accurate.

That is all.

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14 Comments

By Jack on January 5, 2006 1:27 PM
They did have a bit of a petroleum supply problem, especially towards the end of the war, didn't they?
 
By John of Argghhh! on January 5, 2006 1:34 PM
They were *never* as mechanized as Dr. Goebbels would have had us believe, so the photo- & cinematographers didn't go out of their way to record the fact that the bulk of the infantry marched through the whole war (as did a lot, but not as much, of ours) and their artillery was more horse-drawn than motorize (unlike us, who towed everything behind a motorized asset of some sort.) The fact that after the 1944 bombing campaign against the oil pipelines and refinery system they were low of fuel is more akin to making a virtue of a vice than anything else.
 
By cw4(ret)billt on January 5, 2006 1:51 PM
The Third Reich was sorta-kinda in better shape for fuel than most people realize. By most postwar accounts, the synthetic fuel programs were working well--but the distribution system was kaput. Interesting that the Wehrmacht knew all about the US tactic of massing artillery fires (and feared facing it), but could never get the hang of doing it themselves.
 
By AFSister on January 5, 2006 3:26 PM
That's what I thought, Bill. They had the supplies (including fuel), but couldn't get it to their troops.
 
By Dr_Funk on January 5, 2006 5:58 PM
There was a funny scene in Band of Brothers about this particular issue. One American soldier starts cursing at the German PoWs who are marching along the road while the Americans drive past in trucks and so forth. His line is something to the effect of "Say hello to Ford and General Motors. You have horses, what the hell were you thinking."
 
By kat-missouri on January 5, 2006 6:50 PM
Dr. Funk, I just watched that series again earlier this week and I caught that line. It was dang funny. But, if they weren't that mechanized, how in the helk did they get all the way down to the Caucuses and Africa, etc, etc, etc?
 
By John of Argghhh! on January 5, 2006 7:05 PM
On foot. The same way Sherman went through Georgia, or Napoleon to Moscow.
 
By Fred on January 5, 2006 10:05 PM
"Interesting that the Wehrmacht knew all about the US tactic of massing artillery fires (and feared facing it), but could never get the hang of doing it themselves." The Russian taught them all about massing fires, long before they met any American efforts. Reading about the long advance into Europe is chilling, "quantity has a quality all it's own", when you read about "concentrated corps level battery fire" you can't help but feel sorry for the bastards onthe recieving end. The final assaults into Berlin are examples of how to concentrate artillery like nothing was ever done in history, before or since. whole armies worth of artillery lining up. It's also instructive to read about how the German Panzers and Mech Units where used on eastern front, letting the foot infantry hold the line, while they moved around "like a fire brigade" plugging gaps, cutting off spear heads, that the Russian would pound into the front. Conserving fuel, men and tanks for the emergencies. Makes you realize that if the Red Army hadn't being tieing down so much of the German assets, and grinding them down for years, that the Western front would never even have been considered.
 
By John of Argghhh! on January 5, 2006 10:50 PM
The thing about US artillery the germans hated was it's accuracy, speed, and, most importantly, the VT fuze. They hated the VT fuze.
 
By Walter M. Clark on January 5, 2006 10:59 PM
The photo with all the horses brought up a memory from probably 35+ years ago (back to a time I can remember, not the stuff that happened fifteen minutes ago that's gone from my leaky memory). I was buying and devouring books about WWII from shortly after I learned to read, and one of the many I read (don't remember which one, darn it) had part of an interview between an American intel guy and a high German Army officer shortly after the surrender in Europe. Whey the American asked why the Germans didn't use poison gas, which we knew they had, in the defense of "the Western Wall" he replied that they had never been able to develop a gas mask for horses. From what I learned about nerve agent during my 24 years in Uncle Sam's Army I'm sure the Allied troops, had they known, would be very glad the horses couldn't handle gas masks. A guy who was in the same U. S. Army Reserve unit I was in back in the early to mid 1980s had served in the Czech Army and trained with the Soviets before he'd managed to escape through the Iron Curtain. They trained with the real poison gas, only diluted to the point that it wouldn't wipe out most of the unit in training. He said that you really concentrated on getting the mask and everything else to work properly after the guy who bunked next to you died because he hadn't. Made me think then, and again now.
 
By Fuzzybear Lioness on January 5, 2006 11:19 PM
Re: gas masks for horses, mechanized artillery, and concentrated artillery fire... I'm sure I'm not the first to say this, but from where we sit today we tend to think our WWII Victory had a certain inevitability to it. But of course it was a long hard slog, and in many ways turned on so many "little" things... for example, gas masks for horses. Really makes one think. And be grateful, too.
 
By WillyShake on January 6, 2006 6:22 AM
*w/ German accent* Veeeerrry EEeenterrestinggg. ...I learn something every time I visit the castle--what the hell do I need an Ivy League PhD program for? LOL.
 
By John of Argghhh! on January 6, 2006 6:36 AM
Fuzzy - dangers of Post-War Generalissimo's... First - what is obvious after the fact is *never* that obvious before the fact. There are plenty of what-if's, choices made by the Germans and Japanese that could have made differences. Vast differences. Hitler's Balkan Diversion that set back the timetable for the invasion of Russia by over a month. Having that month back might have made a huge difference in whether or not the Germans captured Moscow or not. The diversion to the Caucasus, and the way that Hitler forced the Germans to fight at Stalingrad. Arguably *those* two choices, vice what we did, make the outcome in Europe inevitable. Absent a first year win over Russia, had the Germans fought competently at the strategic level, the war in Europe would have ended in a conditional defeat for the germans, but quite possibly with them still sitting in western Poland. If the Japanese had left Pearl Harbor *out* of the December 7 festivities, American 'war fever' (i.e., being *pissed*) might well have stayed our hands. The war would have happened, but might well have gone differently. If the US carriers had been at Pearl Harbor that day, the whole course of the Pacific War might well have gone against us - again, with a negotiated settlement. We had real help in WWII, and not just all those Russians and Chinese dying to kill and tie down massive numbers of our enemie's troops and assets - we had the bad strategic choices made by them, backed by generally better strategic choices made by us.
 
By cw4(ret)billt on January 6, 2006 7:31 AM
Wars are not won by the armies which are the most competent; they are won by the armies which are the least *IN*competent.
 
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