Encirclement Battles of WWII

Discussions on WW2 in Eastern Europe.
Carl Schwamberger
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Re: Encirclement Battles of WWII

#46

Post by Carl Schwamberger » 10 Aug 2014, 13:27

AJFFM wrote:As the eastern front demonstrates the best terrain for encirclement operations is open terrain. Most of the major encirclements there happened in the Ukraine and North Caucasus steppe.

In the larger encirclements bad terrain plays a role in that the best units are trapped in the bad section (usually wood\urban areas) while the flanks are in open terrain and guarded by weak troops.
Carl Schwamberger wrote: The Axis army group trapped in Tunisia was not encircled in the common usage of the term, but I am wondering how that event can be described. The Anglo US forces did use their advantage with terrain - the sea, and their numbers in the air, to cut off supply and prevent withdrawl of the Axis air and ground forces in Africa. I this mere semantics, or is there a real difference between a group encircled only by ground force & a group which is trapped by a combination of different military forces?
AJFFM wrote:
While that is true I think the fact that the allies had full air-sea control denying German retreat makes it as close to an encirclement as possible. Another feature of encirclement, denying manoeuvrability in space and time, exists in this case.
Aber wrote:Arguably Tunisia after Operation Vulcan was an encirclement; IIRC the British armoured divisions who broke through encircled the divisions still facing 8th Army in the South. Granted the Germans had little to gain by fighting on as they could not escape by sea, but they collapsed and surrendered fairly quickly.
steverodgers801 wrote:They were encircled in the sense they had no where to retreat to. Allied control of the air and sea completed the task.
Following all that , then the Pacific war included a number of encirclements. That is the deliberte isolation fo Japanese forces was conducted though both naval campaigns, and combined air/naval/ground campaigns. The Isolation of the Raubal garrison in 1943 would be a example of such a deliberate combined campaign.

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Re: Encirclement Battles of WWII

#47

Post by AJFFM » 10 Aug 2014, 19:10

Some but not all.

I would argue Okinawa, Papua, and others fall into this category but not for example Iwo Jima where the force was small and mobility was limited.


Hegemony
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Re: Encirclement Battles of WWII

#48

Post by Hegemony » 12 Aug 2014, 23:24

Humbly I beg to Differ on "no war before it (WWIII) saw so many Encirclements . . ." -the Napoleonic Wars indeed had the most Encirclements . . . or, in post-Napoleonic French terms, "Envelopements" (same thing, militarily Speaking) . . ..

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LWD
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Re: Encirclement Battles of WWII

#49

Post by LWD » 13 Aug 2014, 18:28

I'm not sure that you can quite equate "envelopment" and "encirclement". An envelopment can simply mean that one flank is turned can it not? While an encirclement implies the defending force is surrounded.

HMan
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Re: Encirclement Battles of WWII

#50

Post by HMan » 16 Aug 2014, 00:35

Any encirclement battles on fronts not mentioned - for instance in China?

Also, I wonder about WWII having the most encirclement battles. I guess it makes
sense, but there is an awful lot of wars in history. How about war with the highest
% of battles that turn into an encirclement ?

eldras
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Re: Encirclement Battles of WWII

#51

Post by eldras » 09 May 2015, 12:36

Hi I'm new.

Encirclement IMO can backfire.

It's beauty is fewer troops defeat larger enemy.

The encircling army pushes the enemy so close to each other they cant use their facilities against the attacker. This was done eg by Hannibal ( Battle of Cannae), and Suetonius (Battle of Wattling Street).

But if the encircled ary knows what's happening it must be possible (I haven't studied this yet) to arrange so that internal forces builds up and you utterly defeat the encirclers?
It could certainly work with ancient warfare.

Is there classic text on replies to encirclement?

steverodgers801
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Re: Encirclement Battles of WWII

#52

Post by steverodgers801 » 09 May 2015, 19:35

Frederick the Great was a master of fighting on internal lines. This allows a general to react to different fronts as long as the opposing armies do not attack at the same time.

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Re: Encirclement Battles of WWII

#53

Post by WINIK » 09 May 2016, 07:38

Dear Sir,

Your comment:

Front: Eastern Front.
Campaign: Operation Barbarossa.
Date: August-September 1941.
Attacking Forces:German Army Group South: 1st PzG, 6th and 17th armies. Army Group Center: 2nd PzG, 2nd Army.
Defending Forces: Red Army's South Western Front: 5th, 37th, 26th and 21st armies.
Units encircled: The armies mentioned above
Result: All 43 divisions of the armies above perished. Soviet estimate that 616000 men were either killed, captured or missing with 700k men being the total number of casualties. Only 15000 men were estimated to have escaped.

I would like to check about towns: 1) POLOTSK 2) GOMEL are the two towns included in your comment?

Thanks for fast reply,

Best Regards

Michael Winik

Kelvin
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Re: Encirclement Battles of WWII

#54

Post by Kelvin » 09 May 2016, 08:23

steverodgers801 wrote:Frederick the Great was a master of fighting on internal lines. This allows a general to react to different fronts as long as the opposing armies do not attack at the same time.
Another Prussian General Moltke was a master of fighting on exterior lines.And the acheivement were much remarkable : Battle of Konnigratz of 1866 and Battle of Sedan of 1870. The former made Austria withddraw from the war and ended her supremacy in Germany and the latter led to destruction of the whole army : The Army of Chalons and collapse of the Second Empire and in military terms : real battle of annhilation.

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Re: Encirclement Battles of WWII

#55

Post by Kelvin » 09 May 2016, 08:27

WINIK wrote:Dear Sir,

Your comment:

Front: Eastern Front.
Campaign: Operation Barbarossa.
Date: August-September 1941.
Attacking Forces:German Army Group South: 1st PzG, 6th and 17th armies. Army Group Center: 2nd PzG, 2nd Army.
Defending Forces: Red Army's South Western Front: 5th, 37th, 26th and 21st armies.
Units encircled: The armies mentioned above
Result: All 43 divisions of the armies above perished. Soviet estimate that 616000 men were either killed, captured or missing with 700k men being the total number of casualties. Only 15000 men were estimated to have escaped.

I would like to check about towns: 1) POLOTSK 2) GOMEL are the two towns included in your comment?

Thanks for fast reply,

Best Regards

Michael Winik

Gomel was another battle, About 10 Soviet Divisions from 13th Army were enciclred there and another 45 divisions from 5th, 21st, 26th and 38th Armies plus front troop were encicled in Kiev area.

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Re: Encirclement Battles of WWII

#56

Post by Kelvin » 09 May 2016, 08:34

eldras wrote:Hi I'm new.

Encirclement IMO can backfire.

It's beauty is fewer troops defeat larger enemy.

The encircling army pushes the enemy so close to each other they cant use their facilities against the attacker. This was done eg by Hannibal ( Battle of Cannae), and Suetonius (Battle of Wattling Street).

But if the encircled ary knows what's happening it must be possible (I haven't studied this yet) to arrange so that internal forces builds up and you utterly defeat the encirclers?
It could certainly work with ancient warfare.

Is there classic text on replies to encirclement?

Sedan of 1870 and Gelb of 1940 were very successful battle of encirclement and the German was good at that. Some countries wanted to copy it but hard to learn well, like Japanese attempted to encircle Russian Army Group Manchuria in battle of Mukden in 1905, but in the end, Japan only defeated Russian troop and Russian succeeded in withdrawing most of their troop and refitting in Harbin in northern Manchuria and waited for anther battle.

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Sheldrake
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Re: Encirclement Battles of WWII

#57

Post by Sheldrake » 11 May 2016, 12:40

eldras wrote:Hi I'm new.

Encirclement IMO can backfire.

It's beauty is fewer troops defeat larger enemy.

The encircling army pushes the enemy so close to each other they cant use their facilities against the attacker. This was done eg by Hannibal ( Battle of Cannae), and Suetonius (Battle of Wattling Street).

But if the encircled ary knows what's happening it must be possible (I haven't studied this yet) to arrange so that internal forces builds up and you utterly defeat the encirclers?
It could certainly work with ancient warfare.

Is there classic text on replies to encirclement?
If you leave it until you are encircled it is usually too late! ;) There were some battles won against encircling enemies. These took place most usually when one side had far greater mobility than the other, but less firepower.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Pyramids
The battles of the Hussite wars http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/matthaywood/ ... events.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Ulundi

As has been mentioned the classic concept is to use the advantages of "Interior Lines"
Napoleon's campaign of 1796 is regarded as a classic. There is even a paper on "How to Maximize the Advantages of Interior Lines at the Operational Level" http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?verb=getRec ... =ADA184730

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