1944: 20th Mountain Army sent to the Wester Front

The Saint · Sep 14, 2005

The Germans had 400,000 men in Norway in 1944. WI Hitler, instead of being obsessed with an Allied invasion of Norway, had thrown 300,000 into the Western Front?

Would it have made any difference to eg Normandy, Arnhem, the Battle of the Bulge and Westwind?

If that kind of additional Ma Deuce fodder is to hand at the beaches, Normandy becomes touch & go, 82nd & 101st are mauled and none of 1st Airborne make it back from Arnhem, and Bastogne and Strasbourg would've fallen. The war ends in June 1945, with some Soviet inroads in to Norway.

DMA · Sep 14, 2005

Well for one thing the Allies Intelligence services would be well aware of the large scale troop movements. But that's not the main problem - the main problem lays with the Germans. Almost everyone in the German High Command believed the disinformation campaign which the Allies had conducted for over a year. Few believed D-Day was to take place in Normandy. Instead the Germans believed it was to be Calais.

So the Germans, hence, would have probably placed these reinforcements around Calais. If so, well they're useless in repelling D-Day. Furthermore, by the time the Germans realise they've been sold a lemon, the Allies are well & truly ashore & the beachhead is well & truly secured.

Then the Germans have to transport these reinforcements to the Normandy area. Well the Allied air forces will thus have a field day bombing the crap out of them. In the OTL, German divisions suffered up to 50% losses getting reinforcements to Normandy. I expect the same thing to be repeated here. All of a sudden, instead of 300 000 extra troops, you're down to 150 000 before one of them has even entered the front lines.

Gettng out of Normandy will, however, be more difficult for the Allies, I grant you that. But sooner or later, a breach will occur somewhere in the German lines & the Allies will go pouring through it. It's just a matter of time as the Allies can keep sending reinforcements to Normandy, whilst German reinforcements are limited. As a result, the Falaise Gap will probably be repeated, although considering Hitler will think that because he has more troops this should equate to a more stubbon defence, the Falaise Gap ends up an even worse disaster for the German Army than the OTL.

Overall we still have an Allied victory although casualties are higher all round. The war might last an extra month or so.

Cockroach · Sep 15, 2005

The Germans had 400,000 men in Norway in 1944. WI Hitler, instead of being obsessed with an Allied invasion of Norway, had thrown 300,000 into the Western Front?

Would it have made any difference to eg Normandy, Arnhem, the Battle of the Bulge and Westwind?

If that kind of additional Ma Deuce fodder is to hand at the beaches, Normandy becomes touch & go, 82nd & 101st are mauled and none of 1st Airborne make it back from Arnhem, and Bastogne and Strasbourg would've fallen. The war ends in June 1945, with some Soviet inroads in to Norway.

As DMA has already suggested these troops will suffer badly and probably end up deployed in the wrong places if they are sent to France. However I have a little extra to add:
How do you plan on moving them from Norway?
By air? Allied Fighters start patrolling over the North Sea and Norway and you find a lot of the transport aircraft shot down.
By sea? Coastal Command Beauforts and Beaufighters or the RN smashes your convoys leaving the men either stranded in Norway or dead.
In short it seems unlikely these troops can play any useful role on the western front for the simple fact that they won't be anywhere near alive by the time they are meant to get there.

Gedca · Sep 15, 2005

Cockroach said:
How do you plan on moving them from Norway?
By air? Allied Fighters start patrolling over the North Sea and Norway and you find a lot of the transport aircraft shot down.
By sea? Coastal Command Beauforts and Beaufighters or the RN smashes your convoys leaving the men either stranded in Norway or dead.
In short it seems unlikely these troops can play any useful role on the western front for the simple fact that they won't be anywhere near alive by the time they are meant to get there.

Would it be that hard to move them by sea? We're not talking about open sea here. Just a quick hop from Norway to Denmark.

DMA · Sep 15, 2005

Gedca said:
Would it be that hard to move them by sea? We're not talking about open sea here. Just a quick hop from Norway to Denmark.

Maybe so, but if the Allies hear wind of it, expect a major operation against the troop convoys. It wouldn't surprise me if the Germans suffer 10% casualties. That's 2 divisions gone before they're even deployed to France.

Cockroach · Sep 15, 2005

Would it be that hard to move them by sea? We're not talking about open sea here. Just a quick hop from Norway to Denmark.

1. Moving all troops south by land will attract attention (and hence local partisans, commandos, bombers, etc.) plus will be extreamly slow.
2. The shortest 'hop' between Scandinavia and Europe proper requires entering Swedish territory (and so is out).
3. IIRC most major docks etc. in Norway are at Oslo, Stavanger and Narvik. Result: Either opt for slow loading and unloading at small ports down south or load quickly at one (or more) of these ports.

Ramp-Rat · Sep 15, 2005

Forget rail form Denmark i have a vague recollection of seeing a documentary
about Brit/US plans using resistance to cut all north south rail links after D-day, to stop such a move.If the move started earlier,i am sure they could have activated it sooner. That leaves, the following choice, by sea Norway to Germany rail Germany to France.

Wozza · Sep 15, 2005

I have been googling around trying to find more details about this garrison.

I have seen the figure of 372,000 for the end of the war - but was it higher or lower a year earlier

also what proportion of these are air force and navy?

Also what proportion are logistics to maintain troops in arctic and long Norway?

Finally what percentage are needed to protect against a Soviet incursion?

carlton_bach · Sep 15, 2005

Cockroach said:
As DMA has already suggested these troops will suffer badly and probably end up deployed in the wrong places if they are sent to France. However I have a little extra to add:
How do you plan on moving them from Norway?
By air? Allied Fighters start patrolling over the North Sea and Norway and you find a lot of the transport aircraft shot down.
By sea? Coastal Command Beauforts and Beaufighters or the RN smashes your convoys leaving the men either stranded in Norway or dead.
In short it seems unlikely these troops can play any useful role on the western front for the simple fact that they won't be anywhere near alive by the time they are meant to get there.

Move them by land. They can assemble in Southern Norway, cross Skagen (that's small enough even for the Kriegsmarine to cover) and then head south through Denmark and west to the Rhine. That way, they can also bring along their vehicles and artillery. It would be slow, especially if the railway can't handle the full load (likey enough, given the strain on the system), but that is how troops move traditionally. No reason to put them on ships going out of Norway - that was only necessary for the invasion.

carlton_bach · Sep 15, 2005

Cockroach said:
1. Moving all troops south by land will attract attention (and hence local partisans, commandos, bombers, etc.) plus will be extreamly slow.
2. The shortest 'hop' between Scandinavia and Europe proper requires entering Swedish territory (and so is out).
3. IIRC most major docks etc. in Norway are at Oslo, Stavanger and Narvik. Result: Either opt for slow loading and unloading at small ports down south or load quickly at one (or more) of these ports.

1) in 1944, Germany could still move large units through its territory in relative safety. I do not see partisans attacking a troop concentration this large directly, and anything less than that would merely be an annoyance.

2) it's perfectly short enough to go across Skagen. The trip takes a day, and even relatively small ships can make it.

3) if I were the general in charge, i would regard such distribution as an asset. No big troopships to sink or big railheads to snarl up.

Of course this will be slow. Moving 300.000 men (or even the maybe 100.000 that will be reasonably effective and expendable in Norway) in an emergency move isn't feasible at this stage. If you want them on the beaches in Normandy, you'll have to start moving them in spring.

Johnestauffer · Sep 15, 2005

Aside from the problem of movement, what about the quality of the troops. There were large numbers of personnel assigned to coast defence batteries and security divisions. They probably would not be able to contribute a great deal to the Western Front without additional training and re-equipment.
Even the PzDiv Norway was equiped with the older PzIII tanks that were outdated

DMA · Sep 15, 2005

carlton_bach said:
Move them by land. They can assemble in Southern Norway, cross Skagen (that's small enough even for the Kriegsmarine to cover) and then head south through Denmark and west to the Rhine. That way, they can also bring along their vehicles and artillery. It would be slow, especially if the railway can't handle the full load (likey enough, given the strain on the system), but that is how troops move traditionally. No reason to put them on ships going out of Norway - that was only necessary for the invasion.

Such an operation will still not stop Allied strike aircraft, such as Beaufighters, Beauforts, Mustangs, Typhoons, & goodness knows what else, from attacking the troop convoys in large numbers. Then there are also the Allied subs who could operate in the region as well. I'd say a 10% German loss rate would be about right.

Kurt_Steiner · Sep 16, 2005

Mountain troops are not well equipped with field artillery or AT weapons. Since that is where the real firepower for a unit comes from, that is a big problem. If they have some extra organic firepower added, then they are a good reinforcement to the Atlantic wall. If they are put in action before Normandy you have that more tough troops to add to the defenses. Perhaps it would be better to send them to Italy, which was the terrain they where trained to fight in, and then remove from Italy some of the better troops there such as the paratroopers, motorized and regular infantry divisions and send those to France. Anyway, the lack of heavy weapons would still be a great problem.

Fost Longstrider · Sep 16, 2005

Though only a short 'hop' from Norway to Denmark the British in particular were heavily mining the sea lanes through there 'Gardening' operations by Bomber/Coastal Command.

As already noted such a large movement of troops would attract attention of local partisans etc and the information would get back to London.

LowLevelFunctionary · Sep 16, 2005

Well - I think the better question is what if they weren't deployed there in the first place?

Or even - if they had been moved a year or two prior to the Allied invasion...

EDIT: (and deployed to the western front - keeping to the original question)

The Saint · Sep 17, 2005

In Norway in May 45, the situation was this:

20. Gebirgs-Armee (headed by "General der Gebirgstruppe" Franz Böhme), with;

XIX. Gebirgs-Korps (Armee-Abteilung 'Narvik'), led by "General der Gebirgstruppe" Ferdinand Jodl)
the XIX. Gebirgs-Korps consisted of the following divisions;

6. Gebirgsjäger-Division (Generalleutnant Max Pemsel);

270. Infanterie-Division (Generalleutnant Hans Brabänder) amalgamated with the
193. Grenadier-Brigade; and the
388. Grenadier-Brigade.

Korps-Reserve was the "Radfahr-Aufklährung-Brigade 'Norwegen'.

LXXI. Armeekorps ("General der Artillerie" Anton Reichard Freiherr von Mauchenheim von Bechtolsheim) with the following units;
Division 140 (Generalmajor Mathias Kräutler);
210. Infanterie-Division (Generalleutnant Curt Ebeling) amalgamated with the "Festungs-Brigade 'Lofoten". (Formed from infantry and weapons from both army and navy)
230. Infanterie-Division (Generalmajor Bernhard Pampel umbenannt in Pamberg);
503. Grenadier-Brigade;
139. Gebirgsjäger-Brigade.

XXXIII. Armeekorps (Generalleutnant Friedrich-Wilhelm Neumann) with the following units;
14. Luftwaffe-Feld-Division (Generalleutnant Günther Lohmann);
702. Infanterie-Division (Generalleutnant Dr. Ernst Klepp)
295. Infanterie-Division (Generalleutnant Sigfrid Macholz).

LXX. Armeekorps ("General der Artillerie" Hermann Tittel) with the following units;
280. Infanterie-Division (Generalleutnant Johann de Boer);
274. Infanterie-Division (Generalleutnant Kurt Weckmann);
Division Nr. 613 (Generalmajor Adrian Freiherr van der Hoop).

XXXVI. Gebirgs-Korps (General der Gebirgstruppe Emil Vogel) with the following units;
'Finnland' MG-Ski-Brigade;
Panzer-Brigade 'Norwegen'.
Armee-Reserve: 7. Gebirgs-Division (Generalleutnant August Krakau).

Separate: SS-Polizei-Grenadier-Batallion 506 (mot.)

Together with coastal defence units, 51 387 men, naval units, 24 380 men, airforce units, 40 626 men, the German Military Force in Norway counted 311 979 men at 10.5.1945, 12 O´Clock.
Additional were 15 414 men and women from SS, Organisation Todt, Transportflotte Speer and other.

The number of German forces in Norway is 330,000.

Fost Longstrider · Sep 17, 2005

LowLevelFunctionary said:
Well - I think the better question is what if they weren't deployed there in the first place? Or even - if they had been moved a year or two prior to the Allied invasion...

EDIT: (and deployed to the western front - keeping to the original question)

Why?

The disadvantages to this retrospective action far outweigh any benefit(s)

Superdude · Sep 17, 2005

Why not put them on the Eastern Front to slow down the Soviet advance?

Romulus Augustulus · Sep 17, 2005

Would the short period of time for which the war would be prolonged be enough to encourage the US to use nukes on the Germans?

Jason · Sep 17, 2005

Think you are forgetting the Norwegian resistance were one of those bunches who had guts plus there was a damn excellent support network including, what was it called?, something like the 'orkneys bus' or something taking supplies, reinforcements and brit commandos into Norway as and when required.

Could have an interesting situation where the Germans try to start moving forces south from Norway and every step of the way the Norwegians (who lets be honest were in addition to their resistance movement-give me a dozen of them over a 100 french resistance fighters any day- a very powerful 'free' force) doing what they can to slow them down. Brit Commandos, now free from initial ops in France, are being moved in small groups whilst RAF Coastal Command, a bit bored since the defeat of the U-boat threat some time earlier, sends every attack aircraft it has and starts blasting merry hell out of any German ship moving. Hell, the Danish resistance would most probably start causing chaos as well!

Even if the German losses are as 'low' as 10%, the rest reach France demoralised, tired and more than a tad fed up. More of a risk than a benefit!

carlton_bach said:
1) in 1944, Germany could still move large units through its territory in relative safety. I do not see partisans attacking a troop concentration this large directly, and anything less than that would merely be an annoyance.

2) it's perfectly short enough to go across Skagen. The trip takes a day, and even relatively small ships can make it.

3) if I were the general in charge, i would regard such distribution as an asset. No big troopships to sink or big railheads to snarl up.

Of course this will be slow. Moving 300.000 men (or even the maybe 100.000 that will be reasonably effective and expendable in Norway) in an emergency move isn't feasible at this stage. If you want them on the beaches in Normandy, you'll have to start moving them in spring.