Historical The biggest strength of Wehrmacht which is rarely mentioned

[500]

When we compare WW2 armies virtually always discussion goes to comparison of tanks. There are thousands of threads and videos comparing tanks, their numbers and quality.... But we should not forget that artillery played not less important role than tanks in the war, probably even much more important.

The artillery in WW2 was overwhelmingly towed.

Here German 150-mm sFH 18 howitzer and Soviet ML-20 152-mm howitzer. No major difference here. So whats to compare there?

One of the major factor of German success was large number of fast and powerful artillery tractors:

During the WW2 Germans produced over 31,000 Sd.Kfz 6/7/8/9/11 artillery tractors with 115-270 hp engine and over 50 km/h max speed. This allowed Germans to move artillery together with tanks, providing them artillery support, swiftly concentrate the fire power in desired locations.

By comparison USSR produced less than 14,000 artillery tractors. Nearly 10,000 out of them were slow and underpowered STZ-5 (22 km/h max speed, 55 hp engine). When towing artillery their speed was barely 10 km/h. The remaining 4,000 were also much slower than German and were mostly lost in the beginning of the war (USSR stopped their production in favor of tanks).

As result during the entire war Soviets towed their artillery with slow STZ-5 and even more slow civilian tractors. Thats why Soviet tanks very often remained without artillery support, Soviets could not concentrate their artillery fire quickly.

For the sake of truth since 1944 USSR got some 200 US M5 fast artillery tractors and also produced some 1500 Ya-12 good quality artillery tractors with American supplied engines. They improved mobility but were not in sufficient numbers.

The second strong point of Germans was the total amount of artillery shells produced. Germany has extremely strong and developed chemical industries. Even under the massive allied bombings Germans produced more shells than Soviets:

In order to compensate German chemical industry advantage Soviets relied heavily on mortars which were much easier to produce and required cheaper lower quality explosives (you can see it in diagram).

But mortars have lower range and accuracy compare to regular artillery.

Also Soviets recieved huge help from the allies. 1/3 of all Soviet shells fired in the war were made with US supplied explosives. Nevertheless even in 1944 Germans fired more artillery shells than Soviets. Especially big advantage Germans had in heavy artillery.

 

[Kaptaan]

Interesting but I think the real strength of the Wehrmacht lay in it's officer quality and training. Concepts like Blitzkrieg and Kampfgruppe were fitst applied on scale by the Germans. The former gave the template at statregic level whilst on the ground the Kampfgruppe provide a fast, flexible tactical ability that quickly evolved and resolved issues. So I would place doctrine and training as the real strenghts of Wehrmacht.

So even if Alies had more tanks and often better tanks, more numbers the Germans would often come on top.

 

[VCheng]

Also Soviets recieved huge help from the allies. 1/3 of all Soviet shells fired in the war were made with US supplied explosives. Nevertheless even in 1944 Germans fired more artillery shells than Soviets. Especially big advantage Germans had in heavy artillery.

And yet they lost the war, despite such clear advantages.

 

[500]

And yet they lost the war, despite such clear advantages.

They had no chance. Allied advantage in resources and manpower was overwhelming.

 

[VCheng]

They had no chance. Allied advantage in resources and manpower was overwhelming.

Some authors argue that the fatal mistake was opening up the second front with Russia, and its brutal winter, and not anything the Allies did.

 

[Kaptaan]

They had no chance. Allied advantage in resources and manpower was overwhelming.

Ultimately it was the brutal numbers. The Germans simply got outgunned, outmanned and swamped fro the forces of the combined Allies. The Germans did not lose on account of valour, fighting ability or skill. But brute numbers did them in.

If anybody has watched Mike Tyson boxing will know the guy was a brute with killing skill. But if you threw 100 average guys at him at some point they would bring him down. Numbers. It was that simple.

 

[Nilgiri]

Some authors argue that the fatal mistake was opening up the second front with Russia, and its brutal winter, and not anything the Allies did.

That is one really broad thing to get further into, especially Halder's crucial mistakes (though many in hindsight) once the operation was committed to.

Suffice to say Germany did not help matters by engaging in extreme evil with its armed forces (and related directives and strategies for the general civilian forces etc).

The einsatzgruppen for example, under rational leadership (though this likely would have been one that never did the ostplan to begin with among other things) could have been repurposed as part of the spearheads and support units at the front than what they were used for instead.

Then the larger matter of the Wehrmacht Eastern front reaching its zenith (near Moscow) and could not advance past it, and later went for the caucasus and Don strategy the following year to try achieve another breakthrough (And ended up with Stalingrad at the end of it).

All through this (prolonged eastern front) resources were being diverted to liquidation of entire people, past the intense resources tied up in subjugation and handling resistance of others.

This all took accumulated major impact on Germany's war effort and logistics it could deliver to its frontline troops throughout the duration of the war but especially the 2nd half (i.e after the wansee conference).

It cannot be stated enough I feel (because this is often underlooked as to the impact on the war effort)

While the Heer remained well armed to the very end of the war, they were extremely under-resourced in such things as gasoline and diesel.

You can almost calculate (to the last barrel) how many oil barrels were in deficit during such intense counter-liquidations of the German army like operation bagration. They all had good weaponry (even with the masses lost during the retreats so far)....problem was the tanks and logistic supply vehicles really were not at liberty to use fuel like they once could.

Quite unlike the Soviets (who knew this quite well by now about the Heer)....and who would make sure to engage effectively (it was no a mass-human wave thing at all) to ensure adequate to good out-maneuvering of the enemy to conserve their own resources and men as far as possible. All kind of deception strategies were used to make the Germans use their scarce fuel for it first, before the real thrusts would come. Number of German units would siphon fuel from overstretched (and soon to fall to enemy tanks and vehicles) and try take that back with them in their retreat...it had become that desperate at this point of the war.

Germany's field mobility had fallen drastically in this 2nd half (again because of what they expended in evil irrationally and continued to expend, especially at the critical times/ramps when their frontline forces needed railwaylines to be as unclogged as possible and as much fuel etc as possible).

Their formations were picked off nearly one at a time and quickly (it became a matter of how many and what type of units the Soviets decided to deploy in an area)...especially when there were no terrain to entrench and hold out in (for longer, without such need of fuel).

Consider what happened in Operation Bagration for example:

Combat, War, Geopolitics History and Analysis

I was just about to post this 😅😅

defencehub.live

It was not brute numbers that did them in (as the main factor), it was a prolonged consequence of own brute stupidity.

@Joe Shearer @Kartal1

 

[Kaptaan]

It was not brute numbers that did them in (as the main factor), it was a prolonged consequence of own brute stupidity.

German tank production WW2.

Total	3,502	370	1,888	3,623	5,530	11,601	18,956	4,406	46,274	49,777

Allied Tank production WW2

American

1937	1938	1939	1940	1941	1942	1943	1944	Total
150	99	18	365	4,021	26,608	37,198	20,357	88,816

Russian

	Total	131	128	3,016	13,473	19,808	22,618	16,606	76,296

British

Deleted

For the sake of simplicity I have not bothered tabulating the sizeable production by Britain. Just US and Russian tank production stood at about 165,000 tanks almost all would have been used against Germans. This compares to just under 50,000 for Germans meaning for every German tank the Allies pumped out 3 tanks. Also by 1944 the differance was even greater. The highest number of Tiger Tanks produced by Germany was 100 per month. The Russians churned out 1,200 T-34s the same month. Enough to service three entire tank divisions. This excludes US production.

Personnel​

Service	Allies	Axis
Combat	25,000
Auxiliary force	15,000
Merchant Marine	50,000
Irregulars	90,000
Total	80,000,000	30,000,000

Tanks, self-propelled artillery, vehicles	4,358,649	670,288
Artillery, mortars, guns	6,792,696	1,363,491
Aircraft	637,248	229,331
Missiles	(only for test)	45,458
Ships	54,931	1,670

Look at the figures. The differance is vast. It's a surprise the Germans even managed 5 years. By end of the war German Divisions had been bled white and many only existed on paper. German Army had lost most of it's mechanized force and in fact contrary to what is shown on Hollywood movies was reduced to using animal transport and or on foot. WW2 was largely a war of attrition in which Germans would lose. They simply could not replace their manpower and equipment losses.

The WWII German Army was 80% Horse Drawn; Business Lessons from History​

The bulk of the German Army—the dough feet of the normal infantry divisions—moved on shank's mare. The rifle companies' transport consisted of three-horse wagons, on which the troops loaded their packs, as did this outfit on campaign in Russia in the summer of 1941.

 

[Nilgiri]

Look at the figures. The differance is vast. It's a surprise the Germans even managed 5 years. By end of the war German Divisions had been bled white and many only existed on paper. German Army had lost most of it's mechanized force and in fact contrary to what is shown on Hollywood movies was reduced to using animal transport and or on foot. WW2 was largely a war of attrition in which Germans would lose. They simply could not replace their manpower and equipment losses.

I'm just saying it not the main factor...it was definitely a secondary one. I have studied this at depth.

To begin with the numbers you give are not really for the argument I am making...given the allied tanks w.r.t americans+british only deployed and were brought to bear against bulk of Wehrmacht from mid 1944 onwards (after operation overlord). We can do the math w.r.t major afrika corps and southern italy before it (and we would have to take into account what significance those were to german heartland)....but these were again post-wansee.

It is just matter of fact that Germany inflicted a huge self-harm on its own war effort that it committed (at much higher intensity than before) from 1942 onwards to do mass scale murder and commit significant resources for it (along with and adding to occupation of territory resources given the encircled soviet units and resistance groups).

This all detracted heavily from what it could present in any concerted strategy to knock out the USSR either with Halder's eventual "managed" option or the hypothetical vectored (but more vulnerable) approach to just one "knock out" goal (say either south to wheat and oil... or "Guderian or bust" north to moscow).

It set them up for the final doom given these three crucial years (1941 - 1944) and vastness of Soviet land and resource (and thus the wehrmacht commitment and sensitivity to needing absolutely everything it could get its hands on supply wise and consistent logistics wise, esp after the first brutal winter)... before operation overlord could come into play for bringing the detroit arsenal + monty support to normandy.

 

[dani92]

Germans despite being outnumbered they killed more of their enemies

 

[500]

Some authors argue that the fatal mistake was opening up the second front with Russia, and its brutal winter, and not anything the Allies did.

I am talking what happened after he attacked Russia. What would happen if he did not attack is mostly political question and too speculative.

Interesting but I think the real strength of the Wehrmacht lay in it's officer quality and training.

Thanks to officer experience they knew what kind of equipment they need to order.

 

[VCheng]

While the Heer remained well armed to the very end of the war, they were extremely under-resourced in such things as gasoline and diesel.

Good point. Interestingly, the Allies took care of such supplies in conjunction with their operations. Who remembers this?

Operation Pluto - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[mulj]

Ultimately it was the brutal numbers. The Germans simply got outgunned, outmanned and swamped fro the forces of the combined Allies. The Germans did not lose on account of valour, fighting ability or skill. But brute numbers did them in.

If anybody has watched Mike Tyson boxing will know the guy was a brute with killing skill. But if you threw 100 average guys at him at some point they would bring him down. Numbers. It was that simple.

many times discussed topic but my opinion what caused nazi defeat was not number and power of allies, it was hitler stupid decision to diverse jet fighter program into bomber one, otherwise that airplane would enter into service massively in 42-43. that would be quick stalemate for allies as they could not achieve air supremacy anymore.

 

[Nilgiri]

Good point. Interestingly, the Allies took care of such supplies in conjunction with their operations. Who remembers this?

Operation Pluto - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

There is a very brief video summary here worth watching on the larger part of that operation:

Combat, War, Geopolitics History and Analysis

Cross posting for interest of watchers in this thread about the fog-of-war documentary: https://defencehub.live/threads/book-excerpt-governance-of-azad-kashmir-and-gilgit-baltistan.1027/page-2#post-7088

defencehub.live

Logistics really is the first principle thing you need to design and account for as spot on as possible...and expand everything else about a military from that laterally.

That whole thread is a good one to keep tabs on.

I might unpack later (to contrast) just how awful the German logistics were at the beginning, middle and end (i.e all stages) of the Eastern Front.

There are a bunch of things I would need to think a bit how to present well on it.

That (and what it was exacerbated by on top due to Nazism and related extreme irrationality) was the largest reason for the sheer level of failure there, and at that ultimate cost and scale too.

@Joe Shearer might find it interesting read when I get to it.

 

[VCheng]

That (and what it was exacerbated by on top due to Nazism and related extreme irrationality) was the largest reason for the sheer level of failure there, and at that ultimate cost and scale too.

Part of that process that played a role in the downfall were Hilter's purges of his top generals, the likes of Rommel et al. The adverse effects rippled throughout Hitler's forces.

 

[Kaptaan]

many times discussed topic but my opinion what caused nazi defeat was not number and power of allies, it was hitler stupid decision to diverse jet fighter program into bomber one, otherwise that airplane would enter into service massively in 42-43. that would be quick stalemate for allies as they could not achieve air supremacy anymore.

With respect, in my opinion it would have merely at best, extented the war. If you look at 1943 the Russians were hammering the Germans. They were being brutally beaten back. Most of this was down to massive Red Army attacks involving mass armour, artillery and infantry punches. Operation Citadel in the summer of 1943 on the Kursk salient was the death certificate of the Wehrmacht. The Germans threw everything including the latest Tiger tanks but to no awail.

In fact a post mortem of the defeat at Kursk not only told the war was lost but also WHY. Most of the senior German general staff knew the war was over. The reasons were simple. The Germans threw everything. The best tanks they had, some of the best units including elite Waffen-SS divisions. All cherrypicked from differant fronts across Europe. But the operation failed leading to massive losses of armour and men. A strict audit showed the Russians lost even more divisions.

But the critical differance was the Russians replenished the lost equipment and men with month. Destroyed divisions were reformed and replenished with weeks. On the German side most of the divisions would never reach their required strength. Quality and quantity went down.

The war on the western front was a sideshow. The easternfront was the meatgrinder for the German Army. Having few extra fighters would not have been sufficient to tip the balance within the narrow advantage the Germans would have gained as you know thew Allies were fast working on jet aircraft.

 

[mulj]

With respect, in my opinion it would have merely at best, extented the war. If you look at 1943 the Russians were hammering the Germans. They were being brutally beaten back. Most of this was down to massive Red Army attacks involving mass armour, artillery and infantry punches. Operation Citadel in the summer of 1943 on the Kursk salient was the death certificate of the Wehrmacht. The Germans threw everything including the latest Tiger tanks but to no awail.

In fact a post mortem of the defeat at Kursk not only told the war was lost but also WHY. Most of the senior German general staff knew the war was over. The reasons were simple. The Germans threw everything. The best tanks they had, some of the best units including elite Waffen-SS divisions. All cherrypicked from differant fronts across Europe. But the operation failed leading to massive losses of armour and men. A strict audit showed the Russians lost even more divisions.

But the critical differance was the Russians replenished the lost equipment and men with month. Destroyed divisions were reformed and replenished with weeks. On the German side most of the divisions would never reach their required strength. Quality and quantity went down.

The war on the western front was a sideshow. The easternfront was the meatgrinder for the German Army. Having few extra fighters would not have been sufficient to tip the balance within the narrow advantage the Germans would have gained as you know thew Allies were fast working on jet aircraft.

Sure, it happened like that, but let see what would happen if jet figter was introduced in large numbers in 42 as it could be. No allies victory in nort africa, no liberty to bomb germany, you can assume what would it mean for german war machine to have some time to replenish, but lets stick only to kursk, only reason why soviets won was that they achievied local air superiority there, otherwise they would not. My point is that certain done or not done things could chain different outcomes, with jet airfigther in 42, germans could reneiew air bombing campain over britain, won deciseveky in north africa, probably would habe better outcome of stalingrad battle, by my opinion all those event would cause decisive victory in war.

 

[Kaptaan]

kursk, only reason why soviets won was that they achievied local air superiority there, otherwise they would not.

It's been many years since I read the book Operation Barborossa by Alan Clark. But if memory serves was it not the fact that Russians got wind of the impending attack and laid line after line of defences designed to pull in German armour and then kill it. also they had reserves waiting which would be unleashed on both flanks to surround the German pincer?

 

[mulj]

It's been many years since I read the book Operation Barborossa by Alan Clark. But if memory serves was it not the fact that Russians got wind of the impending attack and laid line after line of defences designed to pull in German armour and then kill it. also they had reserves waiting which would be unleashed on both flanks to surround the German pincer?

Never the less, germans were on blink of "victory" in tactical sence but sicily invasion prevented them to deploy their own reserves into the battle, so they lost as they could not penetrate front, surely it did not help them that first time in war soviets won air battle vs germans and achievied local air supremacy, that is how important was hypotetical deployment of jet air figter in 42, because when you look more in details, each battle that germans lost was due lack of air dominance.

 

[500]

many times discussed topic but my opinion what caused nazi defeat was not number and power of allies, it was hitler stupid decision to diverse jet fighter program into bomber one, otherwise that airplane would enter into service massively in 42-43. that would be quick stalemate for allies as they could not achieve air supremacy anymore.

You are wrong on many levels.

1) Me262 could not enter massive service before 1944 in any case.
2) In terms of quality/price there was no any serious advantage for Me262 over piston fighters. Me262 was faster but piston fighters were much more agile. Me262 could stay little time in air and could not operate from simple ground airfields.

In fact bomber version of Me262 could change history if they were ready during the D day invasion. They could destroy Mullberry harbours which allies used for supplies.