Wehrmacht Basic Training WWII vs. WWI

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Conacher1941
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Wehrmacht Basic Training WWII vs. WWI

#1

Post by Conacher1941 » 22 Sep 2004, 04:40

My question is what would the basic training of a German soldier in WW's 1 and 2 consist of? Where they allowed to be abused physically after WWI?

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...Conacher

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Christoph Awender
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#2

Post by Christoph Awender » 22 Sep 2004, 04:59

What do you mean by "physically abused"?

\Christoph


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Eden Zhang
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#3

Post by Eden Zhang » 22 Sep 2004, 08:06

Christoph Awender wrote:What do you mean by "physically abused"?

\Christoph
I'm guessing hes referring to "Hazing Rituals".

I posted a question about this a while ago, and these things did happend. Fellow forum member HaEn recounted to us an experience he had in which a few of his fellow soldiers from his barracks ganged up on him in the middle of the night. Apparently this was called "The Holy Ghost".

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Conacher1941
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#4

Post by Conacher1941 » 22 Sep 2004, 19:47

Do you have the link for that Eden?

Christoph, what I was referring to was that up until WWI Candian soldiers could be 'beaten' for mistakes. This was abolished and replaced by slapping and such lighter forms of corporal punishment. I was just wondering if the Germans had the same kind of progression.
I was also curious as to what the training of recruits was like for German soldiers during the WW's .

Cheers,
...Conacher

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Christoph Awender
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#5

Post by Christoph Awender » 22 Sep 2004, 20:28

Beating soldiers was not allowed in the Wehrmacht. It is needless to say that there were unofficial "methods" which were not very humane. But this existed and exists in every army then and now.
I think that such discussions about punishments, aggressions, inhumane treatment in the army are tiresome because when young people are together there is "cruelty" towards inferior comrades like everyone experienced it in his life. It also depends on the instructor and unit commander how he acts and how much "inhumanity" he allows in his unit.

The training of the Wehrmacht is often a topic asked. It is not different from any other military training in armies nowadays or in WW2. It consisted of the usual military basics.....Fitness (Running, swimming, crawling, jumping, obstacle parcour etc...), weapon exercising (shooting, cleaning, assemble - disassemble under normal and difficult conditions etc..) , marching (orientation march, forced march etc...), first aid, gas defense, uniform drills etc....
It was a normal military training.. nothing mysterial, secret or something.
I have no clue how training in WW1 looked like but I guess pretty the same.

\Christoph

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#6

Post by wlvanbesien » 23 Sep 2004, 04:36

I thought the wehrmacht of the second world war had superior training to their allies and enemies. From what I've read, American training routines only reached parity with that of the germans'.

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#7

Post by Christoph Awender » 23 Sep 2004, 05:21

wlvanbesien wrote:I thought the wehrmacht of the second world war had superior training to their allies and enemies. From what I've read, American training routines only reached parity with that of the germans'.
This is a wide spread myth and I have no clue why people believe it. What in the world do you think the german army did during training which was so superior??????? I nearly can´t hear that any more. Everyone is talking about it but never saw a original training schedule or brings in any evidence for this ridiculous claim.
How much more do you want to teach a soldier in basic training than the basic skills a soldier needs?
More and more during the war the training was reduced to just a few weeks because the men were desperately needed at the front. In each and every divisional status report you can read how badly trained the new recruits arrive at the divisions and that they had to be trained at the frontline divisions during calm periods.

\Christoph

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#8

Post by Eden Zhang » 23 Sep 2004, 09:29

Conacher1941 wrote:Do you have the link for that Eden?

Christoph, what I was referring to was that up until WWI Candian soldiers could be 'beaten' for mistakes. This was abolished and replaced by slapping and such lighter forms of corporal punishment. I was just wondering if the Germans had the same kind of progression.
I was also curious as to what the training of recruits was like for German soldiers during the WW's .

Cheers,
...Conacher
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic. ... ardisation

Enjoy!

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#9

Post by stcamp » 23 Sep 2004, 14:40

On Training:

US v. America.

I believe the US came to the conclusion in 1944 after France that a short training period was all infantry needed as the casualty rate was so high. This was based on what happened to divisions who had years of training and then were commited to battle in Normandy.

I think the German NCO training was better than the American because it was longer and usually the trainees already had wartime experience. German Regimental and above staffs were still intact for the most part and by 1944 had years of experience.

American and Soviet divisions stayed in the field with casualties being replaced big a constant flow of new men. They were almost never pulled out the field and retrained and refitted.

Corporal Punishment

From what I read I do not believe the Wehrmacht was undully harsh with its soldiers. Sweat saves blood probably defined there training program.

Elite units were a different story, especially depending on the year and the unit. Totenkopf Division was probably the harshest in the prewar and early 40's.

Soviet units were probably the worse at this sort of thing and still maintain a reputation for it.

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#10

Post by OMK » 23 Sep 2004, 16:26

When it comes to training: Whether the German training was "better" is uncertain. I think training was pretty much the same fro all armies.

However, the German school/HJ organisations contained a lot of physical activity. PE was more vigorous from 33. In other words, when German kids came to military age they were quite fit. I.e. they could undertake more strenous training (maybe train faster as they did not need the same amount of basic fitness training).

I have unfortunately lost the reference or this, but: allied soldiers (at least in the first part of the war) were less fit/smaller than the Geremans. This might have allowed the Germans to push a battle when the enemy was more tired.

I also know that a few contries that still have conscription keep a fairly strenous PE regime in their schools simply so that 18 year old boys are capable of lifting a rifle.

OMK

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#11

Post by Christoph Awender » 23 Sep 2004, 20:31

I agree that the pre-military training and education of the german youth was indeed an advantage.

What is undeniable is that the NCO´s were the backbone of the professional german army. They were well trained, mostly experienced and had a high motivation. The tactical training they received was good and prepared them well for problems occuring in the field.

\Christoph

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#12

Post by OMK » 24 Sep 2004, 15:30

Did thye NCOs in the German army have more freedom to make decisions in the field than their allied counterparts?

I just seem to recall (probably from a TV program) that a strength the German army had was the fact that they allowed their officers in the field to have the last word (to a certain extent). I.e. to look away from standing orders if they could come up with a better approach to a problem.

As stated, if the NCO/lower officers are well trained and have freedom to trust their instincts, then the approach to any battle situation is likely to be very flexible. In fact on of the comments from this TV program was that the attack on the BeNeLux countries and France was so successful because of this great level of flexibility.

OMK

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#13

Post by nondescript handle » 24 Sep 2004, 16:31

OMK wrote:Did thye NCOs in the German army have more freedom to make decisions in the field than their allied counterparts?

I just seem to recall (probably from a TV program) that a strength the German army had was the fact that they allowed their officers in the field to have the last word (to a certain extent). I.e. to look away from standing orders if they could come up with a better approach to a problem.[...]
It's called Auftragstaktik:

http://www.leavenworth.army.mil/milrev/ ... widder.htm
http://www.baltdefcol.pims.org/document ... aktik.html
http://www.army.dnd.ca/38cbg_hq/Headqua ... tm#nco_trg

Regards
Mark

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#14

Post by wlvanbesien » 24 Sep 2004, 21:50

Christoph Awender wrote:
wlvanbesien wrote:I thought the wehrmacht of the second world war had superior training to their allies and enemies. From what I've read, American training routines only reached parity with that of the germans'.
This is a wide spread myth and I have no clue why people believe it. What in the world do you think the german army did during training which was so superior??????? I nearly can´t hear that any more. Everyone is talking about it but never saw a original training schedule or brings in any evidence for this ridiculous claim.
How much more do you want to teach a soldier in basic training than the basic skills a soldier needs?
More and more during the war the training was reduced to just a few weeks because the men were desperately needed at the front. In each and every divisional status report you can read how badly trained the new recruits arrive at the divisions and that they had to be trained at the frontline divisions during calm periods.

\Christoph
Think about the 1934 - 1939 period. What were all german male youth's doing? Were they going to college? No. Did they study abroad? No. Did they read books? No. They spent a good portion of their childhood and teenage years conditioning themselves for war, they were bred both physically and mentally to be nazi soldiers. Certainly by the end of the war the training was less intense, but in 1944 my grandfather (158th Inf Regiment, 90th Division) recieved only 6 weeks of basic training in the United States. How could 6 weeks in a boot camp compare to years of indoctrination and conditioning? The germans were best prepared for war and it certainly showed.

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#15

Post by Christoph Awender » 25 Sep 2004, 07:36

Think about the 1934 - 1939 period. What were all german male youth's doing? Were they going to college? No. Did they study abroad? No. Did they read books? No. They spent a good portion of their childhood and teenage years conditioning themselves for war, they were bred both physically and mentally to be nazi soldiers. Certainly by the end of the war the training was less intense, but in 1944 my grandfather (158th Inf Regiment, 90th Division) recieved only 6 weeks of basic training in the United States. How could 6 weeks in a boot camp compare to years of indoctrination and conditioning? The germans were best prepared for war and it certainly showed.
Sorry, but this statement shows that you don´t know very much about this time. You think they didn´t have students? You think they didn´t read books? Ridiculous!
The Hitlerjugend preparation was an advantage what I already said but it was not a tactical military training which made them to "better" soldiers.
They were physically fit and knew how to march and follow orders but this is just a part of a soldiers profession. Military training like group tactics, weapon tactics, platoon tactics etc.. was that they lacked of. And I Say it again and again... read some original reports about the reinforcements arriving at the front. Or read some original training schedules. As long as you didn´t do that you believe the same old myth so many people do. But I guess you don´t care to repeat what everybody "heard"
"The germans were best prepared for war and it certainly showed"...... A very questionable sentence.

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