Italy's mountainous terrain slowed the fighting, less than the trenches. Fighting in the mountains by nature is going to be a slow slog.
France halts the 1940 blitzkrieg - historiographical impact - WWII & lessons perceived more like WWI?
- Thread starter raharris1973
- Start date
Manstein, Model, et al would beg to differ, especially after getting their guts torn out at Kursk
The allies weren't fighting the mountains, they were fighting the German's in trenches in the valleys. The movement of the allies may have been slowed by the mountains, but it was the successive fortified defensive lines that would stop their advance for weeks at a time. Trench warfare happened and made an impact.
A Blitzkrieg that gets bogged down is a win massive for the Allies. People tend to forget that the Nazi victory in May 40 was mainly due to fact that the German got inside the French Command & Control loop, meaning that the German were moving too fast for the French High Command to respond in time. If the Blitzkrieg doesn't work for whatever reason, it means we get back to something closer to what the French wanted, an attrition battle more akin to what was done during the 100 days in 1918. So there will be campaign fortifications, but no trench warfare per se.
Now it's easy to forget but Nazi Germany essentially did an "All In" in May 40 and they don't have the reserves and resources to fight an attrition campaign. That was the essence of the French and Allies strategy of OTL, where they could use their superior reserves in manpower, industry, resources, ... to prevail in a longer run.
A big myth on the 1940 Wehrmacht was that they were very mobile and motorized, that's not true. As a whole the Wehrmacht was not that motorized, the French had far more motor transport and the British were the only one being all motorized, but the German grouped all their motor in one pool, the Panzerarmée in the Ardennes.
My personal view is that the Germans need to break the Allies lines decisively before mid-June before they lose their advantage over the Anglo-French.
Now it's easy to forget but Nazi Germany essentially did an "All In" in May 40 and they don't have the reserves and resources to fight an attrition campaign. That was the essence of the French and Allies strategy of OTL, where they could use their superior reserves in manpower, industry, resources, ... to prevail in a longer run.
A big myth on the 1940 Wehrmacht was that they were very mobile and motorized, that's not true. As a whole the Wehrmacht was not that motorized, the French had far more motor transport and the British were the only one being all motorized, but the German grouped all their motor in one pool, the Panzerarmée in the Ardennes.
My personal view is that the Germans need to break the Allies lines decisively before mid-June before they lose their advantage over the Anglo-French.
Why was trench warfare more viable in Italy? The mountains weren't great for tanks.
groundhogday666
Banned
If 1940 was to be summarized into one sentence
"Germany, insane luck was only matched by Maurice Gamelin total and absolute stupidity".
Please note I don't have any axe to grind against Gamelin.
Let me explain.
I have started a collection of "most unfortunate punchlines, France, 1933 - 1940". Paul Reynaud "Nous vaincrons car nous sommes les plus forts" is pretty well known. But I've found at least a dozen of similar - and very, very uninspired ! - punchlines.
Well, french politicians had a knack for the silly things. Except Gamelin was probably worse !
So brace yourself for uncontrollable laughter or despair- or just shake your head in disbelief.
"How could they say that ??!!! WTF, WTH were they smoking back then ??!!" ROTFL
"Weygand, c'est un mur, Gamelin, un édredon"
"Weygand is a concrete wall, Gamelin is a quilt / comforter"
"La Meuse, Corap, ça ne m'intéresse pas"
"Corap, I'm not interested in your front sector - the Meuse river".
I have some others in storage, if anybody is interested with a good laugh...
"Germany, insane luck was only matched by Maurice Gamelin total and absolute stupidity".
Please note I don't have any axe to grind against Gamelin.
Let me explain.
I have started a collection of "most unfortunate punchlines, France, 1933 - 1940". Paul Reynaud "Nous vaincrons car nous sommes les plus forts" is pretty well known. But I've found at least a dozen of similar - and very, very uninspired ! - punchlines.
Well, french politicians had a knack for the silly things. Except Gamelin was probably worse !
So brace yourself for uncontrollable laughter or despair- or just shake your head in disbelief.
"How could they say that ??!!! WTF, WTH were they smoking back then ??!!" ROTFL
"Weygand, c'est un mur, Gamelin, un édredon"
"Weygand is a concrete wall, Gamelin is a quilt / comforter"
"La Meuse, Corap, ça ne m'intéresse pas"
"Corap, I'm not interested in your front sector - the Meuse river".
I have some others in storage, if anybody is interested with a good laugh...
There is a pretty good set of models from WW2, - both Alameins, Normandy and the 100 Days from WW1.
You wont get Trench warfare, you may get position warfare up to 41, when Germany collapses and is overrun and torn apart as the Italians, Yugoslavs and everyone else joins in.by 1917 at the outside everyone new how to break a trench line, or field fortification line like the Hindenburg Stellung very quickly the issue is whether you can exploit before the enemy can bring up reserves
Italy (and Tunisia) are possible models but different in key ways.
Or Germany could collapse in 40.
Germany is in poor shape in terms of ammo stocks. They really need a stand down or decline in the intensity of the fighting to build up absolute stocks. Which they get with the collapse of France. Even Case Red is not that ammo happy. Tooze goes into some detail but its a perennial in the German war industry
That said they probably have one more attack in them. After that things look bad, very bad, really so terribly bad its time to test the cyanide pills.
The Germans are then forced to stand on the defensive until stocks and replacements are brought up. The General system was fight for about 6 weeks solid. Stand down. Factory refurb kit and absorb replacements. OTL of course the germans had about a year to prepare for Barbarossa train and raise a lot more troops, win with relatively little ammunition expenditure - until they are so far way from the depots the issue is supply not absolute stocks. Also remember that while the Germans introduced conscription in 35 that does not mean they had lots of trained conscripts. It took 6 - 9 months to train a division and around 30% trained troops to do it. OTL the Germans lost 47k dead in May June 40 with the bulk of their infantry divisions not engaged seriously for long periods.
With a failed attack, well 20-30% AFV losses, not many men. With a failed infantry attack very few AFV and lots of men. German casualties in the first four months of Barbarossa are around 170k dead. Mainly in the infantry vs a 'broken' enemy. First 6 months around 300k dead 800k + casualties.
Thats probably high for a longer battle of France because the Germans will run out of artillery ammo and/or tanks long before that but say for the first 6 months around 200k dead of which 180k infantry dead or roughly 217 inf bn KIA and 2-3 times that WIA. This is not unrealistic compared to others and what it means is the OTL conscripts forming the divisions for Barbarossa will have to be rushed into service as replacements over the summer of 1940 AND the french POW that otherwise did labouring work in Germany not available for farm, forestry and mining work. Somewhere there is a hard cap where germany cannot feed itself, produce kit and maintain high loss levels.
A minimum on a quiet sector in the west i.e. noone is seriously attacking is probably on the order of 1000 casualties per corps per week ( 27 corps x 26 weeks assuming all the corps are on the line which they wont be).
The Luftwaffe is even worse OTL they lost around 20-25% of strength in the Battle of France and probably 15-20% of aircrew. Having suspended training ( at least on type) at the start of the campaign. Allied aircrew losses much lower and from a much higher basis.
The Kreigsmarine is now sunk and has limited bases from which to conduct a U boat war and the Allies have the right kind of escort for the job plus another 70 odd MN escorts.
The Allies on the other hand have no urgency to attack right now. They are still mobilising and will be much stronger in 3 months or 1941 than they are now. They may get dragged into it but systemically they are geared up for positional warfare still mobilising both manpower and industry and have access to the rest of the world.
In terms of planning. They are likely to take fewer casualties except when attacking of in serious defensive fighting. The Maginot line is designed to do this. Their artillery is better and better supplied. and have more vehicles and more AFV. A lot of those casualties are in mundane things like feeding the troops. If you are manpacking the rations forward you will take more losses than if you are driving them up in a carrier.
In the air the french have a surprisingly large aircrew reserve - their issue was sortie rate and lack of GCI systems which can be fixed more easily and distribution of trained personnel into useless recon squadrons both aircrew and ground. The industry is fixing itself and the AdA has very large orders of US aircraft incoming.
Eventually you will get an attack on a massive scale - or to be more precise a series of corps level attacks dragging in german reserves to be slaughtered by allied artillery followed by a massive influx of mobile divisions in unstoppable numbers. According to plan the British Empire alone would be fielding in 1941 between 25 and 40 panzer and panzer grenadier divisions ( 30 British say 3 Anzac, 4 Canadian 3 Indian) with maybe 20 French.
Noone on the allied side has any interest in any sort of Germany except the one they make.
You wont get Trench warfare, you may get position warfare up to 41, when Germany collapses and is overrun and torn apart as the Italians, Yugoslavs and everyone else joins in.by 1917 at the outside everyone new how to break a trench line, or field fortification line like the Hindenburg Stellung very quickly the issue is whether you can exploit before the enemy can bring up reserves
Italy (and Tunisia) are possible models but different in key ways.
Or Germany could collapse in 40.
Germany is in poor shape in terms of ammo stocks. They really need a stand down or decline in the intensity of the fighting to build up absolute stocks. Which they get with the collapse of France. Even Case Red is not that ammo happy. Tooze goes into some detail but its a perennial in the German war industry
That said they probably have one more attack in them. After that things look bad, very bad, really so terribly bad its time to test the cyanide pills.
The Germans are then forced to stand on the defensive until stocks and replacements are brought up. The General system was fight for about 6 weeks solid. Stand down. Factory refurb kit and absorb replacements. OTL of course the germans had about a year to prepare for Barbarossa train and raise a lot more troops, win with relatively little ammunition expenditure - until they are so far way from the depots the issue is supply not absolute stocks. Also remember that while the Germans introduced conscription in 35 that does not mean they had lots of trained conscripts. It took 6 - 9 months to train a division and around 30% trained troops to do it. OTL the Germans lost 47k dead in May June 40 with the bulk of their infantry divisions not engaged seriously for long periods.
With a failed attack, well 20-30% AFV losses, not many men. With a failed infantry attack very few AFV and lots of men. German casualties in the first four months of Barbarossa are around 170k dead. Mainly in the infantry vs a 'broken' enemy. First 6 months around 300k dead 800k + casualties.
Thats probably high for a longer battle of France because the Germans will run out of artillery ammo and/or tanks long before that but say for the first 6 months around 200k dead of which 180k infantry dead or roughly 217 inf bn KIA and 2-3 times that WIA. This is not unrealistic compared to others and what it means is the OTL conscripts forming the divisions for Barbarossa will have to be rushed into service as replacements over the summer of 1940 AND the french POW that otherwise did labouring work in Germany not available for farm, forestry and mining work. Somewhere there is a hard cap where germany cannot feed itself, produce kit and maintain high loss levels.
A minimum on a quiet sector in the west i.e. noone is seriously attacking is probably on the order of 1000 casualties per corps per week ( 27 corps x 26 weeks assuming all the corps are on the line which they wont be).
The Luftwaffe is even worse OTL they lost around 20-25% of strength in the Battle of France and probably 15-20% of aircrew. Having suspended training ( at least on type) at the start of the campaign. Allied aircrew losses much lower and from a much higher basis.
The Kreigsmarine is now sunk and has limited bases from which to conduct a U boat war and the Allies have the right kind of escort for the job plus another 70 odd MN escorts.
The Allies on the other hand have no urgency to attack right now. They are still mobilising and will be much stronger in 3 months or 1941 than they are now. They may get dragged into it but systemically they are geared up for positional warfare still mobilising both manpower and industry and have access to the rest of the world.
In terms of planning. They are likely to take fewer casualties except when attacking of in serious defensive fighting. The Maginot line is designed to do this. Their artillery is better and better supplied. and have more vehicles and more AFV. A lot of those casualties are in mundane things like feeding the troops. If you are manpacking the rations forward you will take more losses than if you are driving them up in a carrier.
In the air the french have a surprisingly large aircrew reserve - their issue was sortie rate and lack of GCI systems which can be fixed more easily and distribution of trained personnel into useless recon squadrons both aircrew and ground. The industry is fixing itself and the AdA has very large orders of US aircraft incoming.
Eventually you will get an attack on a massive scale - or to be more precise a series of corps level attacks dragging in german reserves to be slaughtered by allied artillery followed by a massive influx of mobile divisions in unstoppable numbers. According to plan the British Empire alone would be fielding in 1941 between 25 and 40 panzer and panzer grenadier divisions ( 30 British say 3 Anzac, 4 Canadian 3 Indian) with maybe 20 French.
Noone on the allied side has any interest in any sort of Germany except the one they make.
If the POD is in 1940, that means Italy is already committing genocide in Ethiopia, the Japanese have started their campaign of genocide in Asia, and the Nazis would still be known for Kristallnacht and the bombing of civilian targets like Guernica in the Spanish Civil War. Even in the isolationist USA, these things disgusted the public.
We have to remember that a lot of the fighting in 1918 was fought in the same way as the fighting in WW2
What hamstrung many of the nations defeated by Germany early on in WW2 was that in 1939 and 1940 and 1941 they were simply not up for it (neither mentally nor materially) and Germany was.
What hamstrung many of the nations defeated by Germany early on in WW2 was that in 1939 and 1940 and 1941 they were simply not up for it (neither mentally nor materially) and Germany was.
groundhogday666
Banned
France in the 30's was a bureaucratic, political, extremist mess. With a strong touch of antisemitism on top of that.
The 1940 collapse was and still is a shame, and Vichy is actually worse, make no mistake. But an enduring 1930's France because no 1940 collapse ? The horror, the horror. The politics, in particular, were pretty toxic (Roger Salengro suicide, cough)
The 1940 collapse was and still is a shame, and Vichy is actually worse, make no mistake. But an enduring 1930's France because no 1940 collapse ? The horror, the horror. The politics, in particular, were pretty toxic (Roger Salengro suicide, cough)
I'd be careful thinking we can predict the course of French politics post war. The old crocks would largely be gone and new younger generation of war heros would be pushing in with new ideas. Im not even sure Facism would be discredited in this scenario.
Of course. Trench warfare as is usually imagined was largely gone as a thing in 1918. Positional tactics and operations were the future, & in fact that was most of WWII, with periods of maneuver tossed in for color. Firepower dominated WWII & dwarfed that of the Great War.
Oh darn, the French and Brits won't be perfectly rearmed. Still there will be a lot of really cool French aircraft and combat vehicles we never got to see. Conversely we won't have to hear about how uber the Tiger and Panther tanks were. Nor will we have to put up with rants about the Me262.
The attrition of the panzerwaffee OTL was pretty bad. A back of the envelope calculation suggests 5% nominal losses per day. Rommel's 7th Div reached the Channel coast with 25 out of a original 221 tanks still operational. A lot of those were temporary losses. BUT, the June offensive was launched with only a 50% operating strength. Different defeat scenarios produce higher permanent losses. Working against this second attack is more French tactical commanders have survived. By this time the French were starting to understand how German methods worked and they'd be a bit more effective countering them.
I use the figure of 58,000 German dead for the entire six weeks of the campaign. Or about 1,300 daily. First six weeks attacking the Red Army was very similar, 56,000. 300,000 dead for the first six months in the east = 1,666 daily. For the 89 days of the Normandy battle Germans killed were somewhere above 90,000, or only 1,100 a day (Tho losses in PoW makes it one of the worst battles. ) If the French methods are effective vs the German infantry losses are very likely to rival or exceed those in the east.
Im long frustrated because I can't find numbers for projected French production. We have solid stuff for Germany and Britain in 1941, the Brits outbuilt Germany. & we have some ideas on what the US would have sold to France in 1940. It looks really bad for the Luftwaffe as replacement and attrition add up past 1940. Can the German AF even reach a operationing strength of 3,000 again, or will it be in a perpetual state of crisis, taking unsustainable losses each time a large air battle occurs?
It would be fun to examine French trends in the Spring of 1940 & try to guess what their army and air forces would look like 31 Dec 1941.
Clearly why everyone in WWII still made successful use of trenches and other defensive earthworks...
But we do get the G1R and maybe the Churchill Arabella ( with the 75mm TAZ) which leads to people speculating on whether the 88 could have been used as a universal AT/AA and Tank gun like the TAZ.
Yes to all. The germans seem to maintain ( but this is from Russia with more experience and less tank heavy Pz Div.) very high operational levels provided they a) keep control of the battlefield and can recover and b) are within 6 weeks of of campaign start, then they crash to 50% operability, After that with a brief pause ( 3-4 days) they can go up to 70-80% strength, for maybe a week when they are back at 50%. The whole system is designed around factory refurb. But you can quite easily lose a whole Bn in a single action and if you cannot recover you get a lot of permanent losses. There is also the char d'accompagnement issue. gain from Russia 41 the infantry commanders were demanding the break up of Pz Div because the defeated routed Red Army had a tendency to rock up with a couple of BT left running, the horse drawn At weapons were miles away and while the Panzer would turn up and kill the BT, not before they have massacred an infantry company.
On reflection I would tend to agree even or especially for the static periods. Unless the Germans prepare then withdraw to a prepared stellung they are in field fortifications. The accounts from the Somme - with vastly inferior allied artillery where the germans were losing a regiment a day bringing up the rations and there is much less armour available to do stuff.
Well as at May 40 they were at 619 a/c per month all types plus around 170 per month from the US. Germany is 622 for the same month,
So the Luftwaffe is screwed. French engine development is very good and the pressure of war is going to rationalise things and while they are slower to produce pre war the types are competitive and developable.
OTL the Luftwaffe ( And KM) had priority for most of 40/early 41 which wont happen and from June 40 - 43 could decline battle when it chose. TTL they can't, so all the aircrew training problems happen and all the developmental problems happen and the fuel problems start now you not defend the army on the line, you can't not defend the Ruhr when the AdA and Bomber command launch massed attacks covered by hundreds of Dewotines and Spitfires. . The USSR is not your friend and neither is it the USA in terms of capacity. Romania is perfectly happy to sell oil for £.
It might reach 3000 a/c but the life expectancy of the aircrew likely measured in days.
Now thats a project.
Obstacles are covered by fire. There are more anti tank guns about that can be dug in. Mines are a good adjunct also. They can be overcome but not easily.
groundhogday666
Banned
I have some numbers for aircraft. The objective was 9500 total (reserves included) by 1941. With at least 3000 being US types.
Can you post them. We should take a close look at the trends through to late 1941
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We should but reality will intervene. What seems like a good idea before the fighting may not be. And if the AdA is like the ground army you can get weirdness in projections. The army only counted as produced .vehicles that could be issued immediately so the sudden jump in tank production in May/June is actually the release to units of vehicles made months before.
But in general terms the French army is not likely to change radically or be radically different in 18 months except as wartime experience demands. The formations work the way the French want them to, with the possible exception of the DIM, which tended to be operated as single division corps - not sure if this was pending adding more DIM or other formations or to make use of the corps level assets and the Group Recon of various types. The French really emphasised the corps level compared to the Germans and produced a mess of underarmed BN sized recon units. But then the US did something similar with its cav groups and they were fairly Frenchified.
The small arms suite is good, intending to introduce the semi auto MAS at some point, The SMG is good for the french, but expensive so they may like the Sten ( which with 40 days of development would be a world beater).
Mortars good. Arty park generally OK, the 155 units are old but then the GPF is very very good. APX AT gun good. AA guns good enough except for a heavy gun but then that's par for the era and they will pick up on the bofors about the same time as everyone else.
AFV are generally comparable except for the workload on the commanders and lack of radios. The radio thing they are rectifying the turret they know about and were looking to up gun to a 75mm but pressure of time and all that. I doubt they could introduce an entirely new design in numbers in the time available.
In general older weapon types will go out in favour of new ( so 75mm bty swapped out for 105, 25mm AT for 47mm etc.).
Like all the other armies that can afford it. Horse cav out for mechanised. Carts out for trucks the ' reserve' MMG issued all the while. More modern for older tanks. Maybe the semi static front gives rise to a Kangaroo type assault vehicle.
I suspect by Dec 41 the recon elements will have been rationalised. Most DI will be DIM or at least be truck mobile when not in the line. The BCC expanded they may not get one per division but they start with 30 odd anyway but organised in regimental groups then parcelled out in company and smaller groups. The DLM will probably drop one RCC, someone will provide a list of abbreviations, The DLC will become DLM which gives I think 7 DLM. The DCR are 2 tank BDe and one Inf Bn so wont work in practice. but the French are committed to the B1 Bis early on.
What that looks like is 123 inf div ( worldwide) of which 9 DIM in 1940 and 13 DIF. The DIF will probably stay so 110 Div but by 41 probably all to some extent motorised and a number - my guess would be around 20 total fully so, and the rest being able to access trucks when needed even if not in the TOE. The issue is going to be how much of everything else needs transport if you re in a fairly static front not much point in having your own section truck. France could raise more divisions, probably, but the front needs replacements not added divs, its not that big and Maginot line. So based on 1940 deployments, 13 DIF on the line, 80 Inf Divs of which 20 ish are motorised.
8 DLM with all the DLC converted. 6 DCR were planned. Also 8-12 Groups of tanks ( 90 - 120 per group). Conceptually the French had just dropped the Char de Fortification, but had the Char D'Accomagnement and Char de Bataille and as said both the DLM and DCR are tank heavy, just about everyone found this then dropped one regiment.
I am tempted to say the DCR will have a breakthrough role making use of the Char B and or the assault tanks/SPG planned. I suspect they will try that at some point and if it works keep if it does not then up the infantry component and DCR and DLM are different traditions of the same thing.
What that gives is mobile force of 20 3 Inf Rgt DIM which can have a tank Bn attached ( or even one per RI which seems excessive) and 14 binary Amd Divs as the Corps de Chasse. That seems large but it means wartime creation of 11 DIM, and the equipping of things they were planning to equip anyway.
Mangez le merde et mourez sale Boche .