Alternative Artillery of the 20th Century

[nuyt]

Huge? Really?

At the "start of the war", well France 1940, the Heer committed to the west fielded 4,316 leFH, 1,723 sFH, 484 10cm sK, 45 15cm sK, and 171 17cm sK and 21cm Mrs. For effectively 114 divisions or 59.1 field pieces per division. Then, in June 1941, they "increasingly expanded" it to 5,890 leFH (an expansion of 27%), 2,204 sFH (an increase of 22%), 516 10cm sK (an expansion of 6%), 90 15cm sK (an increase of 50%), and 357 17cm sK and 21cm Mrs (an increase of 52%). For effectively 145 divisions or 62.4 field pieces per division (an increase of 5%).

Several thousand pieces 7 years later is rather large for a country that only had equipment for 20 divisions in 1932 and a very limited military industry relative to rivals. You might disagree on the use of the word 'huge' but that is a semantics argument rather than a serious counter argument to the point that they invested in artillery just as much as anything else. It was simply a problem of lack of sufficient productive capacity to produce larger numbers than countries who didn't disarm after WW1, especially given that the war happened 3 years before rearmament was slated to be complete.

Then let's jump forward to January 1945. The Heer fielded 6,022 leFH, an increase from just the Ostheer to the total Heer of 2%. 2,079 sFH, an increase of 17%, 537 10cm sK, an increase of 4%, 31 15cm sK, a decrease of 66%, and 280 17cm sK and 21cm Mrs, a decrease of 27%. With nominally about 285 divisions that was just 31.4 field pieces per division. However, the shortfall was "made up" by a massive increase in the number of captured pieces - 276 leFH, 884 sFH, 661 10cm sK, 249 15cm sK, and 106 21cm Mrs - and large numbers of 7.5cm leFK, 1,069 repurposed 7.5cm Pak and aging nA 16, plus 6,022 others captured from the French, Belgians, Soviets, Norwegians, and others. Then there were the 979 mountain guns and howitzers, so all told the number of pieces per division was closer to 67.4 pieces per division, an increase of 7% since summer 1941...and never mind of course the issues with ammunition supply and maintenance of the mass of captured and antique weapons.

Are you factoring in all the massive losses in equipment between 1941-45? Or the impact of bombing on production as well as the loss of raw material sources? Since you're obviously not it is a pointless comparison you're making. Clearly the use of captured artillery by this point was driven by all of the above constraining factors rather than the choice to skimp on artillery production. By your logic we can also claim that the Germans didn't focus on aircraft production because they had a massive reduction in number of airframes by 1945 compared to 1940.

The secret armament plans that Germany had since 1923 meant that a lot of WW1 era weapons were part of that 1940 inventory. Not to mention some captured material from Austria and Czecholovakia (Skoda 15cm hows eg).

Those numbers included some elderly weapons. In 1940 the Wehrmacht had some 1000 leFH16s in use (mixed in the data with leFH 18s), a number that had miraculously grown during the 1930s when the secret stocks were made available. I have my books in storage, but this quote covers it well: "In 1933 there were 28 in use with 24 artillery batteries. As the army re-armed after the Nazi's came to power that increased to 496 in 1934, 568 in 1936, 728 in 1936 and 980 in 1937." From: http://www.historyofwar.org/articles/we ... FH_16.html

Similar situation for sFH13, that was still in use and had been restocked during the 1930s (as well as several dozen 10,5cm K17, still used in 1940).

The 15cm heavy gun park was mainly K16, another WW1 vintage weapon.

Nothing wrong with that, as the Allies still fielded lots of French 75mm, 18pdrs, 155mm howitzers, etc. in the same year.

[antwony]

But, while you're correct about radars pre-war, not sure I'd agree about proximity fuses.

I studied advanced, extended, Physics in High School. I am also tall. In AHF terms this makes me basically up there with Einstein and Newton. We (by which I mean the teacher did and we watched) made a Theremin in physic's class. Swap the speaker for a detonator and put a resistor in front of it and a Theremin is a proximity fuse. Theremin's were (I'm pretty sure) 1920's tech. There was an antenna, a battery, we used IC's and transistors but pretty sure vacuum tubes would work for an oscillator and OP amps. Well, tubes would definitely work as they were what were eventually used.

Unsurprisingly, we didn't study cavity magnetron's in High School. But, would think there development didn't really affect proximity fuses. Think the bigger (biggest?) problem would be designing something to survive going from being at rest i.e. in the breech to going supersonic i.e. exiting the muzzle. Small , very robust tubes are what you need. They may have been around pre 1939

A Theremin wouldn't work for a proximity fuze. The detection range is far too short. By the time the fuze makes a detection, impact will occur before it can go off. Even if the fuze were instantaneous, the shell would be centimeters from the target when the fuze activated. You needed a radio signal and detector that could pick up the return. Sort of a omnidirectional radar of the simplest sort.

Making one in the 30's was well beyond extant technology. The Allied proximity fuzes required development not only of miniaturized tubes, but ones that could stand tens of G's or more on firing, then rotational force from the spin of the shell. They also had to invent a new kind of battery to power it. Alkaline dry cells took up too much space and would likely lose charge before the fuze was used. The cost of development alone in peacetime would have been prohibitive.

You're correct that an actually theremin wouldn't work. But increasing the range of the antenna sounds, to me, like a solvable engineering problem. i.e. the theory behind the operation was understood.

Also, good point about rotational focre. I hadn't mentioned that and it would, obviously, be an big problem. But I think that this is similiar to the range of a theremin's antenna i.e. an engineering problem (admittedly rather a big one). The requirement to make something capable of withstanding acceleration down the barrel is the same engineering problem as making something rugged enough to deal with centrifugal force. Well same problem, different vector i.e. both backwards (acceleration) and sidewards (rotantial) force need to be withstood. In addition, I hadn't mentioned the battery. Understand they came up with a elegant solution to charge up the circuit after the round was well clear of the barrel. That could've been a big hurdle for any pre war development project.

Reread some literature on the proximity fuze development. The Germans had in several programs looked at near fifty possible detection/trigger systems. Most of this was inter war & some post 1939. None progressed to practical fuze design. The Brits had a proposal for a radio wave fuze as early as 1931 & laboratory level development by 1936. Vacume tube type fuzes were fitted to AA rockets by 1941.

Some thought had developed in the US, but effective lab work was unfunded until 1940. When the Brit examples were examined in the US it took the project engineers just a few days to reproduce it with off the shelf materials. The main difference being identifying a solid capacitor of metal & dielectric material that would be suitable.

Had anyone put the funding into development the paper concepts could have become production items several years earlier. The engineering of the seperste components like capacitors were already understood in manufacturing.

Not sure if I should apologise for you going back to rereading stuff.

I do basically agree with (my understanding) of your previous post that the nation's capable of producing prox fuses probably wouldn't have spent the money on their development and also Shelldrake's post that the research money required could (probably) have been better spent on more AA and AT guns.

Am a bit disappointed, but not massively surprised that part of my initial post has remained unanswered.

Had the Germans made any moves to replicate WW1 era British sound ranging technology

We've forum members who can identify which sub- varient of Tiger it is in photo, or which SS branch a tunic belong to by the buttons used. Yet, no one seems to know WW2 German counter battery practises/ capabilities.

Several thousand pieces 7 years later is rather large for a country that only had equipment for 20 divisions in 1932 and a very limited military industry relative to rivals.

At what stage of the war did the UK or the US have 20 equipped divisions? Think the answer would be surprisingly late. Your logic is all over the place, to me. Not quite sure what use the US made of the WW1 era M1897 (little I suspect) but the UK barely used 18 pounders or 4.5 inch QF despite the 25 pounder not entering operational service till 1940.

[Michael Kenny]

Am a bit disappointed, but not massively surprised that part of my initial post has remained unanswered.

'Had the Germans made any moves to replicate WW1 era British sound ranging technology'

We've forum members who can identify which sub- varient of Tiger it is in photo, or which SS branch a tunic belong to by the buttons used. Yet, no one seems to know WW2 German counter battery practises/ capabilities.

If you routinely fail to find an 'expert' who can can answer technical questions in your specialist area then that is the time to accept you are the board expert on that subject .

[antwony]

Am a bit disappointed, but not massively surprised that part of my initial post has remained unanswered.

'Had the Germans made any moves to replicate WW1 era British sound ranging technology'

We've forum members who can identify which sub- varient of Tiger it is in photo, or which SS branch a tunic belong to by the buttons used. Yet, no one seems to know WW2 German counter battery practises/ capabilities.

If you routinely fail to find an 'expert' who can can answer technical questions in your specialist area then that is the time to accept you are the board expert on that subject .

While I was bigging myself up before due the level of physics I studied in high school, I failed to mention that was ages ago and most of what I learned I've probably forgotten and for the impressive sounding part of it (the advanced extended classes) I got a couple of C's and a D. Would be a little sad if I'm the forum's electronics expert.

[stg 44]

The secret armament plans that Germany had since 1923 meant that a lot of WW1 era weapons were part of that 1940 inventory.

That doesn't mean that the Germans actually had them in inventory as of 1933. As you note they grabbed a lot of other country's inventories by 1940. And what month was that 1940 inventory taken?

Not to mention some captured material from Austria and Czecholovakia (Skoda 15cm hows eg).

Sure, but those are besides the point other than to add older pieces to the German stockpile as of 1939-40.

Those numbers included some elderly weapons. In 1940 the Wehrmacht had some 1000 leFH16s in use (mixed in the data with leFH 18s), a number that had miraculously grown during the 1930s when the secret stocks were made available.

And how many of those were taken from Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Poland?

I have my books in storage, but this quote covers it well: "In 1933 there were 28 in use with 24 artillery batteries. As the army re-armed after the Nazi's came to power that increased to 496 in 1934, 568 in 1936, 728 in 1936 and 980 in 1937." From: http://www.historyofwar.org/articles/we ... FH_16.html

Which seems to support the idea that they had much less than 1000 as of 1933 and many of those were of new construction, since it's replacement, the LeFH18 wasn't introduced into production until 1937. Don't forget too that the Reichsheer had effectively started rearming in 1932 anyway before Hitler even seized to power, not counting things that were hidden or produced in the interwar period...though I suspect that was much less than you might think given the Allied Control Commission managed things until 1927.

Similar situation for sFH13, that was still in use and had been restocked during the 1930s (as well as several dozen 10,5cm K17, still used in 1940).
The 15cm heavy gun park was mainly K16, another WW1 vintage weapon.

Right, because new designs did not enter production until 1937.

Several thousand pieces 7 years later is rather large for a country that only had equipment for 20 divisions in 1932 and a very limited military industry relative to rivals.

At what stage of the war did the UK or the US have 20 equipped divisions? Think the answer would be surprisingly late.

Ok, and? The US and UK had a lot more non-divisional artillery that the Reichsheer was forbidden by the ToV.
Besides I was incorrect, they had 10 official divisions, I misremembered that they had 20 due to the 'black Reichswehr' which was a militia that could double the size of the standing army if needed. So 20 is the official and unofficial number, when in reality they had 7 infantry and 3 cavalry divisions officially:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reichswehr

The Reichswehr was a unified organisation composed of the following (as was allowed by the Versailles Treaty):

The Reichsheer, an army consisted of:
seven infantry divisions, and
three cavalry divisions.[3]

The Reichswehr was limited to a standing army of 100,000 men,[1] and a navy of 15,000. The establishment of a general staff was prohibited. Heavy weapons such as artillery above the calibre of 105 mm (for naval guns, above 205 mm), armoured vehicles, submarines and capital ships were forbidden, as were aircraft of any kind. Compliance with these restrictions was monitored until 1927 by the Military Inter-Allied Commission of Control.

The BEF in 1939 was larger:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_E ... ld_War_II)

Size 390,000[1]
13 divisions (maximum)

Your logic is all over the place, to me.

That's a fault of your understanding.

Not quite sure what use the US made of the WW1 era M1897 (little I suspect) but the UK barely used 18 pounders or 4.5 inch QF despite the 25 pounder not entering operational service till 1940.

Why would the US matter when we were referring to the French, British, and Polish armies having WW1 left overs?
As to the 4.5 QF and 18 pounder...I don't think you know what you're talking about:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QF_4.5-in ... _World_War

The 4.5-inch howitzers equipped some batteries of the British Expeditionary Force in France in 1940. Ninety-six were lost, leaving 403 in worldwide service (only 82 outside UK) with the British Army, plus those held by Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa. The British holdings were expected to increase to 561 by August 1940 due to the completion of reconditioning and repairs.

The 4.5-inch howitzers equipped British and Australian batteries in the Western Desert in 1940 and 1941, and Australian units in Syria.[14]
Two guns that had decorated the main gate at Habbaniya aerodrome in Iraq were refurbished by the RAF and used by Habforce in the Anglo-Iraqi War in May 1941. [15] The batteries with the 4th and 5th Indian divisions went with them to East Africa and South African batteries with 4.5-inch howitzers also fought in this campaign.[16]

In the Far East in 1941, 4.5-inch howitzers equipped some British and Australian batteries in Malaya, and a troop in each mountain battery in Hong Kong. The 4.5s of the 155th (Lanarkshire Yeomanry) Field Regiment were instrumental in holding back Japanese attacks at the Battle of Kampar, in late December 1941. The last operational use of 4.5 by the British Army was in early 1942 in Malaya.[17] They were withdrawn from field formations in 1943 and declared obsolete in 1944 when ammunition stocks ran out.[18]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QF_18-pou ... _World_War

During the Second World War, the 18-pounder was used mainly by Territorial Army regiments in the British Expeditionary Force. Some Regular units also had them, the most famous being K (Hondeghem) Battery which won its battle honour with them. A total of 216 guns were lost in the 1940 campaign. This left the British Army with 126 guns in UK and 130 in the rest of the world, according to a stocktake in July 1940. It was used in East Africa by British and South African regiments,[62][63] the North African Campaign, in the Far East until replaced by the 25-pounder, especially in Malaya where a number of British Field Regiments had them and by 965 Beach Defence Battery in Hong Kong.[64] At the Battle of Kota Bharu, some of the first shots of the Pacific War were fired by an Indian Army manned 18-pounder.

[nuyt]

The secret armament plans that Germany had since 1923 meant that a lot of WW1 era weapons were part of that 1940 inventory.

That doesn't mean that the Germans actually had them in inventory as of 1933. As you note they grabbed a lot of other country's inventories by 1940. And what month was that 1940 inventory taken?

Not to mention some captured material from Austria and Czecholovakia (Skoda 15cm hows eg).

Sure, but those are besides the point other than to add older pieces to the German stockpile as of 1939-40.

Those numbers included some elderly weapons. In 1940 the Wehrmacht had some 1000 leFH16s in use (mixed in the data with leFH 18s), a number that had miraculously grown during the 1930s when the secret stocks were made available.

And how many of those were taken from Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Poland?

I have my books in storage, but this quote covers it well: "In 1933 there were 28 in use with 24 artillery batteries. As the army re-armed after the Nazi's came to power that increased to 496 in 1934, 568 in 1936, 728 in 1936 and 980 in 1937." From: http://www.historyofwar.org/articles/we ... FH_16.html

Which seems to support the idea that they had much less than 1000 as of 1933 and many of those were of new construction, since it's replacement, the LeFH18 wasn't introduced into production until 1937. Don't forget too that the Reichsheer had effectively started rearming in 1932 anyway before Hitler even seized to power, not counting things that were hidden or produced in the interwar period...though I suspect that was much less than you might think given the Allied Control Commission managed things until 1927.

Austria nor Czechoslovakia had German artillery so the Wehrmacht did not grab the leFH16 and sFH13 from them. All came from hidden inventory of weapons or parts.
If those "new" 900 or so leFH16 that miraculously appeared in the 1930s were new production is debatable but irrelevant. They were either hidden stocks or assembled from WW1 era parts kept in storage. For example there was a large stock of WW1 Rheinmetall artillery (either unassembled or dismantled) stored in the Netherlands, which miraculously disappeared around 1933
Same for the K17 and sFH13. If these old weapons had been newly produced in the 1930s they would have been marked like Rheinmetall-Borsig 1935, due to German precision The first leFH16 with markings from the 1930s will have to be found...

[stg 44]

Austria nor Czechoslovakia had German artillery so the Wehrmacht did not grab the leFH16 and sFH13 from them. All came from hidden inventory of weapons or parts.

Got a source on that claim? Looks like the majority was new production before they introduced a replacement in 1937.

If those "new" 900 or so leFH16 that miraculously appeared in the 1930s were new production is debatable but irrelevant. They were either hidden stocks or assembled from WW1 era parts kept in storage. For example there was a large stock of WW1 Rheinmetall artillery (either unassembled or dismantled) stored in the Netherlands, which miraculously disappeared around 1933

Why would that be irrelevant if the majority of the inventory of 1940 came from new production in the 1930s? You've only made claims, but have demonstrated no proof beyond vague references to 'books in storage'. I'm willing to believe you if you have sources to actually support what you're saying. That said of the 400+ pieces available in 1934 I'm willing to accept the majority of those were clandestine pieces, however from that point on the extra 500+ pieces added were most likely new production since they restarted artillery production in 1932, the increases after 1934 were much smaller per year than from 1932-34, and introduced a new design only in 1937.

Same for the K17 and sFH13. If these old weapons had been newly produced in the 1930s they would have been marked like Rheinmetall-Borsig 1935, due to German precision The first leFH16 with markings from the 1930s will have to be found...

Again if you have a source to support your contention I'll accept your claim, however at this point I'm going to remain skeptical.

[stg 44]

I just read the article, thanks. Liedtke's argument is air tight:

Does not read that way to me. It is just 'What-Iffery' where hindsight is used to work out how to best rob Peter to pay Paul and gain the Germans an extra month or two of survival. An extra Tiger Abteilung here, a fresh Panzer Division there and perhaps they could have lasted until the Haunebu entered service.

What a bizarre response to totally ignore the sections were were actually talking about and fixating on only a subsection that talking about the II SS Panzer Corps.

And why did you quote me as having written the comment you're responding to? That was The Marcks Plan's comment.

Let's look at the section I was actually referring to about how equipment and manpower losses diverted replacements to Ukraine rather than France to get the divisions there up to strength:

Screen Shot 2021-11-01 at 9.13.55 AM.png

Screen Shot 2021-11-01 at 9.14.14 AM.png

Screen Shot 2021-11-01 at 9.14.26 AM.png

Screen Shot 2021-11-01 at 9.14.40 AM.png

Screen Shot 2021-11-01 at 9.14.57 AM.png

[stg 44]

Continued:

Screen Shot 2021-11-01 at 9.15.17 AM.png

Screen Shot 2021-11-01 at 9.15.34 AM.png

Screen Shot 2021-11-01 at 9.15.54 AM.png

[nuyt]

Austria nor Czechoslovakia had German artillery so the Wehrmacht did not grab the leFH16 and sFH13 from them. All came from hidden inventory of weapons or parts.

Got a source on that claim? Looks like the majority was new production before they introduced a replacement in 1937.

Have you got a source to your claim that Nazi Germany was manufacturing new but WW1 era leFH16s and sFH13s in the 1930s? No, you haven't and its a ridiculous claim in any case

Again if you have a source to support your contention I'll accept your claim, however at this point I'm going to remain skeptical.

You have all the rights to be skeptical and nobody will take those rights away from you, buddy!

[stg 44]

Several thousand pieces 7 years later is rather large for a country that only had equipment for 20 divisions in 1932 and a very limited military industry relative to rivals.

The exact same could be said of Great Britain and the United States, which began at a lower level. However, this is not about "several thousand pieces" more, it is about how those could be used and what capability they gave to the Heer. In this case, the coin of the realm is the number of field pieces per division, because, well, the division was the coin of the realm for maneuver. Now of course you can busily shift the goalpost again and say that not all German divisions were the same, or that some divisions were more maneuver divisions than others, but that does not change the metric, rather it simply raises the question why Germany created so many nominal maneuver units that were incapable of maneuver and only diluted the pool of artillery?

What are you babbling about? How is that in any way related to what I posted?

So, anyway, as a contrast we can look at the U.S. Army in 1932, which had a stock of 4,236 75mm guns, 973 155mm field guns, 2,971 155mm howitzers, 475 8inch howitzers, and 320 240mm howitzers, but it was ineffective, antiquated, mostly in storage, and with few active Army units to man them. And yet, as of 8 May 1945, there were 2,832 non-divisional pieces in the ETOUSA, supporting the 61 Infantry, Armored, and Airborne divisions there, so each division, in addition to its 48-54 organic FA pieces, had another 46 on average in support...roughly 96 pieces per division versus the 67.4 polyglot of the Heer.

Thank you for proving my point, US stockpiles in 1932 were vastly larger than anything the Germans had.
As to what existed in 1945 in the US arsenal that is what was built up after replacing all the old stuff from 1938-45 without the major losses of equipment experienced by the German army during the war, since US forces saw much less combat and opportunity for major defeats that would strip them of existing stockpiles of equipment. Your comparisons are getting increasingly bizarre and pointless.

Are you factoring in all the massive losses in equipment between 1941-45?

Why should I, other than as an exercise in chasing your moving goalposts?

What moving goalpost? You made an irrelevant comparison and I pointed out why your numbers are just basic 'lying with statistics' tactics.

Or the impact of bombing on production as well as the loss of raw material sources? Since you're obviously not it is a pointless comparison you're making.

No, I was simply pointing out that you were - and still are - expressing your feelings on the subject rather than contributing actual data. You described a "huge" German artillery park, but it wasn't in the most critical sense, which was in its ability to provide fire support to the German divisions. The German field artillery may have been numerically large, but its size was not a measure of its effectiveness. In a sense, its size actually reduced its effectiveness, given the multiplicity of weapons, lack of ammunition, and lack of growth in the technical services supporting the field artillery.

It was huge compared to what they started with in 1932, which shows they were dedicating a substantial part of rearmament to rebuilding their artillery arm. Since the entire point of contention was whether German rearmament plans skimped on artillery very little of what you've posted has actually even bothered to deal with that point. The numbers show a major increase between 1932-39, which indicates they did not skimp on artillery production. No one was talking about effectiveness, we were talking about whether they tried to produce enough or relied on panzers and aircraft instead. You're just flailing to obscure the point you clearly either do not understand or don't want to engage with in good faith.

BTW nice confession through projection right here:

you were - and still are - expressing your feelings on the subject

Accusing me of doing exactly what you are.

Clearly the use of captured artillery by this point was driven by all of the above constraining factors rather than the choice to skimp on artillery production.

Clearly the Germans used captured artillery because they had insufficient numbers of their own production to make up the numbers they required. That did not make the German artillery more efficient though, it made it less efficient.

Yes, their production was limited by the fact that the general war started years before rearmament plans were completed, so combined with labor being mobilized, raw material access being limited by the blockade and somewhat earlier by financial constraints, and the vast demands of ammo production that reduced resources for artillery tube production they couldn't keep up with demand and were forces to use whatever they could get their hands on. Later bombing and loss of existing stockpiles in defeats was a major issue too. Who would have thought production limitations would impact production output!

Again no one is arguing about efficiency other than you with yourself. We're talking about investments in production and the various factors that went into limiting the number and standardization of pieces.

By your logic we can also claim that the Germans didn't focus on aircraft production because they had a massive reduction in number of airframes by 1945 compared to 1940.

Given I made no claims about production I think I can safely dismiss this as a red herring on your part.

First you don't understand what Red Herring means and second my point was to show how facile and pointless your comment about 1945 artillery stockpiles were due to confounding variables. Why don't you bow out now while you're behind and save some face?

[stg 44]

Austria nor Czechoslovakia had German artillery so the Wehrmacht did not grab the leFH16 and sFH13 from them. All came from hidden inventory of weapons or parts.

Got a source on that claim? Looks like the majority was new production before they introduced a replacement in 1937.

Have you got a source to your claim that Nazi Germany was manufacturing new but WW1 era leFH16s and sFH13s in the 1930s? No, you haven't and its a ridiculous claim in any case

Again if you have a source to support your contention I'll accept your claim, however at this point I'm going to remain skeptical.

You have all the rights to be skeptical and nobody will take those rights away from you, buddy!

I take it that means you don't have anything to back up your claims then?

[nuyt]

Austria nor Czechoslovakia had German artillery so the Wehrmacht did not grab the leFH16 and sFH13 from them. All came from hidden inventory of weapons or parts.

Got a source on that claim? Looks like the majority was new production before they introduced a replacement in 1937.

Have you got a source to your claim that Nazi Germany was manufacturing new but WW1 era leFH16s and sFH13s in the 1930s? No, you haven't and its a ridiculous claim in any case

Again if you have a source to support your contention I'll accept your claim, however at this point I'm going to remain skeptical.

You have all the rights to be skeptical and nobody will take those rights away from you, buddy!

I take it that means you don't have anything to back up your claims then?

Do you?

[stg 44]

Austria nor Czechoslovakia had German artillery so the Wehrmacht did not grab the leFH16 and sFH13 from them. All came from hidden inventory of weapons or parts.

Got a source on that claim? Looks like the majority was new production before they introduced a replacement in 1937.

Have you got a source to your claim that Nazi Germany was manufacturing new but WW1 era leFH16s and sFH13s in the 1930s? No, you haven't and its a ridiculous claim in any case

Again if you have a source to support your contention I'll accept your claim, however at this point I'm going to remain skeptical.

You have all the rights to be skeptical and nobody will take those rights away from you, buddy!

I take it that means you don't have anything to back up your claims then?

Do you?

Do I have sources to back up your claims? No.

[nuyt]

Bad day at the office corporal?