Apparently, the Tigers used during the Ramelle skirmish were actually mocked-up T-34s.
And did any of you guys notice the T-5, Upham's constant reprimanding by Mellish, a private? While Mellish was a "front-swine", does reprimanding one who outranks you even occur in the US military??
Don't forget, Platoon was more down-to-earth, more personal. Seeing as Oliver Stone did serve in Vietnam, you'd feel more at home seeing this.BAZ wrote:Yup, Platoon was a serious movie!!!
Don't forget that the Channel Coast was mostly held with ex-Soviet Ostbattailons, many of whom were fairly unwilling, of spurious competence. Merely meant to soak up an invasion, you must remember they were held on a 'non-priority' area, that is, one that's not seriously engaged. With the Waffen-SS, while orginally an elite in intention, don't forget by 1944, anything from conscripts from Volksdeutschen to whole units were transferred en masse, within each service even. So a unit even in the 'classic' SS-armoured divisions would be injected with transfers from the Luftwaffe, for example.Doppleganger wrote:The combat performance of German units in Normandy was in many cases poor as by 1944 the quality of manpower replacements received by even 'elite' units was very uneven. It is possible that an SS unit that had just received a particularly poor batch of replacements could have wandered into that village without laying down any supression fire ect ect. However, I still think that troops with even only 2 weeks training (as some German replacements were receiving), unless they were stupid or suicidal, would not have just sauntered into the village like they did in SPR.finnjaeger wrote:I still think that the combat performance of these germans is very poor. From most of the time they pack in herds, stand straight, don´t fire and when they should at the end finally charge to the bridge, then they finally lay down and start shooting (and none goes for the bridge).
best regards, TK
Of course troop quality by that stage was at best, dubious, with even Hitler's W-SS favourites, wavering in the field. Morale also played a part. The point is even newbies rushed through basic training would have the sense to aviod fire. The problem with facing the Americans is that they just have infinite resources to bear. While a landser would be forced to cower in in his foxhole and snap of one or two shots, his section in disarray, a GI could just sit back and shoot and shoot. The Americans could call on artillery and air support and expected the best of everything.
Of course Hollywood loves to show 'Nazi soldiers' being routed by the heroic GIs, with the former indulging in massacre, rape and pillage when they can. The GI appears to have the upper hand when he does in 10+ 'Nazis'.
Cheers.