Was the US army less effective than the German?

[Frederickvon]

Greetings, this is my first post!

My name is Frederick, and I'm American.

Certainly in 1942, there were deficiencies in the U.S. military. A certain lack of institutional knowledge and experience. Infact, prior to the mobilization in late 1940-early 1941, the U.S. army numbered around 125,000 if I recall correctly, and slowly grew to around half a million men. As the war broke out, training had to be expedited. The U.S. did not even have a proper armored force, and their first tanks, were rather mediocre M3 Lee's/grants with antiquated hull turret designs mostly exported to the UK.

The U.S. Also did not adequately take advantage of British experience in desert warfare before landing in North Africa in the operation torch campaign. Indeed, as they moved towards Tunisia, they were rightly smarted at the Kasserine pass.

General Fredendall took a good bit of imo fair blame for the failures there.

But the American army gained some good knowledge here as they moved into the Italian campaign with the invasion of sicily and southern Italy. The Germans there were impressed by U.S. firepower, particularly artillery. Indeed, the U.S. had advanced artillery support systems, far better than any other in the world. German veteran at Monte cassino noted that it was worse than any he experienced on the Eastern front.

But I often see anecdotes that note the U.S. troops as inexperienced and green. Not as good as their German counterparts. I speak of the infantry.

I'm curious to see what you all think about U.S. tactical efficiency on the ground. There was also an article I read on the web that has figures and statistics it dubiously claims show German superiority in this regard.



https://ww2-weapons.com/fighting-power- ... wehrmacht/

[South]

Good afternoon Frederick von;

Welcome to AHF. I'm confident you'll find this website super, if not superlative.

At the senior level, institutional knowledge was around and frequently enough being refined. General Stillwell provided a strong correspondence record to the War Dept and higher (He got fired). True, experience was lacking in the ranks of the expanding US military.

FDR's proclamation of a "limited" national emergency was 8 Sep 39. He only asked for 17,000 more troops. His worry - rightly so - was the negative public reaction. He had also tried to repeal the Neutrality Act but failed.

It was 16 May 40 when FDR appeared before Congress to ask for 50,000 (fifty thousand) aircraft. The fall of France changed the US public's mood.

You know the rest.

....

I defer to others to address tactical performance. Stillwell's "We got clobbered" just might not directly relate to tactical skills than to other factors. Again, others here at AHF are knowledgeable.

~ Bob
eastern Virginia

[genstab]

Hi all,
General Stilwell may have gotten fired from his command of Chiang Kai-shek's army, but he couldn't make them fight. Chiang was more worried about the Red Chinese. It was a really crummy job for a fighting general and Vinegar Joe wasn't the most diplomatic general. But competent? General Marshall thought so- he was given General Buckner's 10th Army as Buckner had gone and gotten himself killed on Okinawa- one of only two American Lieutenant Generals to be killed in the war.

I wanted to relate an amusing exchange between a German POW and an American soldier. The GI asked the German, a hard bitten vet smoking a cigar, why they lost the war. The German thought a moment and then replied "Well, it's like this. You would send a tank up the hill and we would blow it up. Finally we ran out of artillery shells. You didn't run out of tanks." Material superiority (in supply, not quality) had one hell of a lot to do with the victory, especially the incredible amount of weapons we sent the Red Army. They got to Berlin in American jeeps and trucks and marched on American made boots.

Best,
Bill