by Peter K on 16 Jan 2011 19:10 In view of allied air superiority, moving the armored reserves forward from a central location would take too long and they would arrive too late because the enemy landingforce would already be too strong. Rundstedt had never experienced the effects of allied air superiority.Rommel had.
This can be prevented by carefully planning in advance movement roads for these armoured reserves and covering them with Anti-Aircraft defense (especially viaducts, bridges and crossroads). Similar thing was efficient during the German evacuation from Sicily when the Allies cancelled their air attacks against the withdrawing German units because of strong AA defenses along the coastline of the Strait of Messina. Apart from active AA defense also passive means such as camouflage and night marches could be implemented during those movements.
Counterattack on the beaches themselves could have been carried out by surprise and at night.
This would have reduced the effects of Allied naval gunfire support and air support.
And even if you only counterattack after the enemy has moved beyond the range of his naval guns,then you will still come under the fire of the naval guns once the enemy falls back to within range of them.
Why? What about attempting to encircle, cut off from the beaches and destroy enemy forces inland?
Armoured divisions were not designed to fight on a beach - they were designed to fight inland.
Wrong. 2 Panzerdivisions were taken away from Heeresgruppe northukraine(4. and 5.) and one from AGN(12.).
2 Panzerdivisions more would not have made a significant difference for Heeresgruppe Northukraine and the counterattacks conducted by these divisions were more usefull in the area of AGC.
If only two Panzerdivisions were taken from AG North Ukraine, then three more Panzerdivisions were taken from AG South Ukraine, which was later defeated in Moldova. Because in total from AGs South and North Ukraine for the collapsing AG Center Germans took 12 divisions, including as many as 5 Panzerdivisions.
These divisions were arriving singly - from time to time - to the area of AG Center and were being sent to counterattacks - one after another - along the 350 km wide gap in AG Center's frontline. This was doomed to failure. Gathering these divisions together and trying to re-establish frontline somewhere more to the west (instead of throwing them to futile counterattacks one after another) would have been a much better solution.
Defeat(=losing a lot of terrain)was always inevitable with the odds as they were.Heeresgruppe Northukraine was not destroyed anyway.
Wasn't destroyed but Soviet forces (80 divisions with 2,000 tanks) easily broke its defensive lines and later encircled large part of its forces in the Brody pocket. On 27 July Soviet forces captured Lwow and captured the bridgehead on the western side of the Vistula near Baranow Sandomierski. Despite the usage of new King Tigers Germans didn't manage to push the Red Army back behind the Vistula from this bridgehead. In the end the Soviet advance was stopped thanks to... divsions transferred there from AG South Ukraine (sic!) and some newly formed units.
Soon also AG South Ukraine - which had been giving its most valuable divisions to the remaining three AGs in the previous months - was attacked (on 20 August) and its 6. Army was destroyed in the Iassy-Kishinev pocket.
Also AG North suffered defeats - on 10 October its main forces were cut off in Courland.
The divisions taken elsewhere were not sufficient in number to form a new line and anyway the job of particularly the panzerdivisions was to counterattack to relieve those units that were surrounded. I do not think any of them were destroyed.
Some were - two Panzergrenadier divisions and one Panzerdivision were lost during "Bagration". Remnants of Panzergrenadier divisions were delivered to newly formed armoured brigades and remnants of that Panzerdivision continued to exist as a Combat Group (so in fact a regimental-size unit, not even close to division).
Apart from that 20 infantry divisions, 2 Luftwaffe field divisions, one Sturm division and one Corps Group were destroyed (their remnants were reorganized into 7 divisional groups - an equivalent of 7 regiments). And also further three infantry divisions transferred to AGC yet during "Bagration" and 3 Sicherungs divisions were destroyed.
And AG North Ukraine lost 5 infantry division, one Corps Group (a divisional-size unit), two Sicherungs divisions and one SS Grenadiers Division. AG North didn't lost any division completely but several suffered heavy casualties. However, many of the AG North's divisions were cut off in Courland and fought there until the end of the war.
AG South Ukraine lost 18 infantry divisions alone. I don't know how many divisions of other types it lost.
German AT defense suffered huge losses. Highest losses were suffered by 8,8cm Pak 43 and 43/41.
Defeat(=losing a lot of terrain)was always inevitable with the odds as they were.
"Defeat = losing a lot of terrain" maybe was inevitable considering the superiority Soviets had in 1944.
But defeat = losing several dozen divisions destroyed probably could have been prevented (at least partially).
'Succesfully defend' means stopping the enemy attack with insignificant loss of terrain.
This is tactical meaning of "successful defence". Operational and strategic meanings are often different. In other words - not always the purpose of defence is to stop enemy attack with insignificant loss of terrain. And when defining which defence is successful and which isn't we should take into consideration what the defender planned to achieve.
For example the entire Polish defensive plan of 1939 assumed withdrawal and delaying enemy advance while withdrawing (and waiting for the French counteroffensive in the West). So successful defence in this case would mean: preventing the enemy from encircling and destroying our armies during their gradual withdrawal.
the job of particularly the panzerdivisions was to counterattack to relieve those units that were surrounded
Panzerdivisions are not only very good in attack, they are also very good in defence. For example tanks can be entrenched and work as potentially mobile resistance nests of artillery, Anti-Tank and MG fire.
Shorter lines are always always better than longer ones and will make it more difficult for the enemy to breakthrough,also because of having more reserves but that does not mean the attack can be held off indefinitely and could in itself not even prevent a division being blown away in view of the firepower the red army had.
One can only try to prevent being blown away by deep zone defense which is obviously only feasible with shorter lines.
Even if not, then it could at least make blowing divisions away more time-consuming for the Soviets.
There would be also more divisions to blow away if AG Center was stronger than in reality.
As I wrote compare Rzhev to Bagration - force ratios similar, results different.
That was always impossible.A lot of ground was always going to be lost.
Much less ground could have been lost in those battles. And Soviet advance speed could have been slower.
This would prolong the entire Eastern Front war. Maybe this would allow the Western Allies to capture Berlin.
