Why the Germans didn't use some intact AFVs?

[Christian Ankerstjerne]

On the subject of trucks: https://www.facebook.com/panzerworldweb ... =3&theater

[Stiltzkin]

On the subject of trucks: https://www.facebook.com/panzerworldweb ... =3&theater

I think this is overall better.

6-9 per men is the optimal level.

also:

Operation Barbarossa: the Complete Organisational and Statistical Analysis, and Military Simulation Volume I, IIB
https://books.google.de/books?id=UmwwBw ... e&q&f=true
However, this was not about trucks, the OP asked about the utilization of Beutepanzer. They were indeed implemented, many SPG battalions as mentioned before, french Char Flammenwerfer tanks were used on the EF (Panzer Beute Kompanien e.g. 223) some captured Soviet equipment, T-34s for example were used as tank hunters. All the tanks were modified to German standards. Tankettes and older tanks were assigned to rear services and AA field units. (Finland, Luftwaffen Feld units)

Units did utilize various Beutepanzer: Panzer Brigade 100 had 39, S 35, AOK 2 had 15 H 38, Pz Rgt 101 had 42.
There were various experiences with captured vehicles, training, spare parts and compatibilities were the primary issues for example from Beutepanzer 19-1, p-6, Jentz, despite a satisfactory implementation of (Skoda) tanks, this may be illuminating:

"The condition of all vehicles requires a long stay in home garrison because rapid and adequate vehicle repair is only possible in the garrison workshops and at the production firms. More than 4 weeks are needed to repair the panzers if the repair parts arrive."

Czech tanks proved to be quite reliable.

He also stated that the German Army was constantly in short supply of AFVs, this was not necessarily the case, as demonstrated, the per capita values of all armies were quite similar. By these standards all armies would have been in short supply of tanks. We are talking about all sorts of fighting vehicles, anything that can put fire on the enemy. The number of tanks did not need to surpass the required levels, so why would they waste more resources, they could also rely on captured vehicles.
Trucks were another story as the US held practically 86% of total world production. The number of vehicles in repair shops and ready fluctuated throughout the course of a few days, example: PzAOK 4 4.7.1943 (BA-MA RH 21-4/118). Leibstandarte 11-16 July, operational 77, 70, 78, 85, 96. This says something about their short but not necessarily about their long term capabilities.
If they had 2000 more tanks or King Tigers in 1941, this would have changed nothing, the overall outcome would have been the same.
This comes from a fundamental misunderstanding of warfare.

[Michael Kenny]

However, this was not about trucks, the OP asked about the utilization of Beutepanzer. They were indeed implemented, many.............

I know. Many, many many. A huge number that made up a significant part of the Army that invaded Russia. The reason being that Germany was short of tanks.
Over 200,000 trucks were captured in the 1940 campaign and again these captured vehicles were critical to the armies that invaded Russia.
The fact that you try and deny is simple. German industry could not make enough vehicles to equip her armies so as to match the Allies. You dismiss all contrary opinion by producing 'graphs' that mean nothing to the commander of 12th SS who in early July notes that his original 150 tanks have shrunk to 88 of which only 37 are runners. Only 17 tanks were sent as replacements to 12th SS in Normandy. That is a shortage. Call it a shortage of front line tanks/shortage of spares/shortage of replacements if you prefer but for sure a shortage.

[Christian Ankerstjerne]

On the subject of trucks: https://www.facebook.com/panzerworldweb ... =3&theater

I think this is overall better.

Those are the nominal strengths, not the actual ones.

If that's true, the losses must have been staggering, considering that the Heer truck production numbers listed an inventory of about 250 000 in January 1942.

[Stiltzkin]

That is a shortage. Call it a shortage of front line tanks/shortage of spares/shortage of replacements if you prefer but for sure a shortage.

Simply repeating a statement does not make it come true.

If the tank per capita number of all armies is more or less the same in relation to (army) tank unit size (also in relation to its personnel and the amount of vehicles the army demands from the industry), it certainly cannot mean that a force was "short" of tanks. You might as well argue against gravity. If this was the case, then all armies were short of tanks.
This includes speculating on the readiness number.

Lets look at Normandy 1944 (this even includes the number of holdings vs assigned):

US per capita AFV strength in July, approx. 1: 400, 1:310 and 1:250 men if you just go by the men committed to the continent (derived from the paper strengths, it is irrelevant where the units are).
British and Canadian forces approx. 1: 350. 240, if you just take the units on the continent.
German 1:390-420, if we go by the "accumulated" numbers (280 if committed troops are compared) and include all german personnel, as you can see the number is pretty much the same, you can give or take personnel and tanks, this will not drastically change the overall ratio, the german number even excludes french Beutepanzer.
Comparing the WAllies value for June 44 which yields approx. 1:260, with the german value of 300-400 this does not show a significant difference (considering that this is also in the defense), 1:900 on the EF if we look on Soviet operational forces on June 44 vs 1:1000 for the Ostheer (excluded, AFVs in rear services), which pretty much confirms my point.

qed.

Those are the nominal strengths, not the actual ones.

That makes it so good. I think people are exaggerating the "motorization impact".

If that's true, the losses must have been staggering, considering that the Heer truck production numbers listed an inventory of about 250 000 in January 1942.

Those are not just the Waffenamt registrations, Askey accumulates all the "potential" vehicles which are under each factions control, this is of course not that useful compared to the actual utilized vehicles, he simply established a comparison of all factions. I am more interested in the numbers per capita for each respective unit, this value fluctuated, but most armies during the 30s and 40s had similar amounts of motorization, the UK and the US were an exception but if the unit numbers are correct than their local "net" advantage never played that much of a role, at least to the extent that has been claimed in forums and literature. The total amount of vehicles for the US is of course dwarfing any other faction.

[Christian Ankerstjerne]

If the tank per capita number of all armies is more or less the same in relation to (army) tank unit size (also in relation to its personnel and the amount of vehicles the army demands from the industry), it certainly cannot mean that a force was "short" of tanks. You might as well argue against gravity. If this was the case, then all armies were short of tanks.
This includes speculating on the readiness number.

Sure you can. The number of tanks per soldier is not a meaningful metric for evaluating whether a country was unable to properly equip its units. This can be easily demonstrated:

Assume two armies, A and B, that each have 200 soldiers and two tanks, both of equal strength. Both armies have a ratio of one tank for every 100 soldiers.

Now assume that army B looses 100 soldiers and one tank. The ratio of both armies is still one tank for every 100 soldiers, but army B is certainly no longer as well-equipped as army A.

That makes it so good. I think people are exaggerating the "motorization impact".

Huh? Nominal strengths are by definition meaningless in terms of evaluating real-world strengths.


From an appendix to the war diary of the Artillery General Inspectorate on the mobility of artillery in the east, these numbers show the number of combat ready motorized vehicles in percent of the authorized strength:

Code: Select all

Army Group      A   South   Middle   North
Prime movers
  1943-09-01   65      77       75      57
  1943-12-01   52      46       59      64
Trucks
  1943-09-01   61      79       77      74
  1943-12-01   57      51       65      72
Cars
  1943-09-01   41      60       49      61
  1943-12-01   38      31       34      61
Motorcycles
  1943-09-01   54      61       64      76
  1943-12-01   42      32       45      70

[Stiltzkin]

Now assume that army B looses 100 soldiers and one tank. The ratio of both armies is still one tank for every 100 soldiers, but army B is certainly no longer as well-equipped as army A.

That is correct (but this is also only if you assume that combat power and losses are in favour of faction A).

What is of importance is not high production numbers, but rather the ability to keep the combat units well provided with tanks. Principally, this can be done in two ways, either by producing and delivering many tanks or by producing vehicles that survive combat. In reality, the combination of the two is what matters.

Kursk 1943, Statistical Analysis, Zetterling

This is not what I am argueing against, the notion here is that Germany was underequipped with the units it already possessed, before any combat started, that the German industry was incapable of providing a higher number of tanks than historically produced. People on the internet, also on the AHF (there are quite a lot of discussions in the economy section), have argued that producing more tanks, no matter for which faction, automatically results in a victory. They compare the total number of Soviet equipment and then put it up against other armies, stating that faction a outproduced faction b. This is not how it works. Quoting Qvist from the AHF once again, maybe then you will understand my point:

No, they did not pump out more armaments than the Germans, the overall volume of German armaments production was significantly larger, as was the overall size of the German economy. It was also a lot more diverse, which is why you get greatly superior Soviet output figures in the limited range of items they focussed on.

Number of tanks stands in relation to the size of the panzer arm and the losses it sustains. If faction A has 3x more men and the same (or even a higher focus on Tanks such as Russia today, or the USSR during the 30s and 40s, quality aspect aside), you will have a correlation between the number of tanks and army size/personnel employed.
In Normandy 1944: German Military Organization, Combat Power and Organizational Effectivenes, Zetterling showed that per capita values were similar. If you observe the production number and losses and the resource allocation for each faction you will find a correlation. The notion that you have a total undersupplied Wehrmacht vis overarmed Allies and Soviets can be easily dismissed (per capita).
If what you are saying is true, then whole Divisions would have not only shortages of AFVs but also Pistols, Rifles , Machineguns or Ammunition.
It is a consequnce of the enemies numerical superiority and prolonged combat.
Internet statements go like this :" Germany had less tanks than the US and UK in Normandy 1944, that is why they lost, they should have produced 50000 more tigers then they would have won". Conclusion: Germany must have been short of tanks and underequipped. Well if Germany had 5000 more Tigers it would have possessed significantly greater resources and also tremendously greater manpower reserves judging that tank crews and pilots represented less than 1% of total personnel.
Tanks represented less than a few percent of an Armys firepower, 80% came from Artillery alone. Tunnelvisioning never gives you the overall picture.
The German industry compensates for tank losses and never exceeds beyond necessary levels, but it suffers manpower shortages. Weapons always stand in relation to manpower. If the industry cannot come up with it, other sectors would be significantly underarmed too. If you are running out of men, there is no point in producing more vehicles. Choices. Resources. Manpower.

It is a good metric of evaluating how important tanks were overall for a particular faction, though.

Huh? Nominal strengths are by definition meaningless in terms of evaluating real-world strengths.

Never stated anything else. The distribution is not linear, but prioritized. Logistics and combat troop distributions, vehicle preservation and survivability rates are.

combat ready

These ones also inherit many ambiguities but this is not what I am talking about. Exclusive reliance on Beutepanzer, if they had 10000 more Beutepanzer they would have still lost. 900,000 further trucks, sure they would have helped, would not have decided the war, still.

[Michael Kenny]

What is of importance is not high production numbers, but rather the ability to keep the combat units well provided with tanks. Principally, this can be done in two ways, either by producing and delivering many tanks or by producing vehicles that survive combat. In reality, the combination of the two is what matters
Kursk 1943, Statistical Analysis, Zetterling

German was not able to do either in France 1944. The trick is to have enough tanks that allow for replacements of your combat losses. Having a Division that starts a campaign with 150 tanks is no help if within a month it is fielding only 50 tanks. The loss of front-line tanks is a direct result of not having enough of them in the first place. Lack of spare parts was another problem. Production was optimised for complete vehicles rather than spare parts and there is a passage in Repairing The Panzers that shows that the lack of a very small part (clips or something on a Tiger) meant that vehicles had to be abandoned and a new vehicle supplied as a replacement.

France 1944
sPz Abt 503, From 45 Tigers to 15 runners in 10 days.
sSS Pz Abt 101 45 Tigers to 20 runners in 25 days
sSS Pz Abt 102 45 Tigers to 30 runners in 21 days
12th SS 148 tanks to 79 runners in 30 days
Lehr 188 tanks to 79 runners in 23 days

[Michael Kenny]

Internet statements go like this :" Germany had less tanks than the US and UK in Normandy 1944, that is why they lost, they should have produced 50000 more tigers then they would have won". Conclusion: Germany must have been short of tanks and underequipped.

No you are making things up again. You seem to have morphed into the Ill-informed posters because you are using his exact same argument and that makes you just as ill informed.
The 'argument' is that Germany was short of tanks (and lots of other things )in that it did not have the numbers to either keep her existing Panzer Divisions up to full strength or to form new or reserve units. Germany could outfit her existing Panzer Division to a decent establishment every couple of months but in periods of extended combat they wasted away to nothing.

[Stiltzkin]

The trick is to have enough tanks that allow for replacements of your combat losses

https://books.google.de/books?id=lZb7AQ ... e&q&f=true
Statistical Analysis, again:

It is to be noted that the brigade had a mixture of light tanks (T-70) and medium tanks (T-34).
This did not work well in combat since the T-34 actually had superior mobility. The T-70s were often lagging behind during advances, while obviously the T-34 was also better protected and had greater firepower. But the Red Army had to resort to this mixture since the production of medium tanks was not sufficient to cope with demand.
...
For the Red Army the tank losses were worse than for the Germans. In fact, Soviet production did not suffice to keep up with losses. During the third quarter of 1943 production amounted to 5,761 tanks and assault guns.15 This can be compared with the fact that during six major operations alone, irretrievable losses amounted to 8,953 tanks and assault guns during the third quarter.16 During Zitadelle, the Orel and the Belgorod-Kharkov operations losses amounted to 6,064, according to Krivosheyev, thus during these 50 days of fighting around Kursk the Red Army lost 121 tanks,
including assault guns, per day as write-offs.17 This trend continued for the rest of 1943. On 1 July, the Red Army had a tank strength of 9,888 in the front armies and 2,688 in Stavka reserves.18 Six months later the Red army had less than half that number in their field units and Stavka reserves.19
During those six months 11,890 tanks and assault guns had been produced.20 It must be emphasized that when a force suffers such extensive losses as the Red Army armoured forces did during the second half of 1943, production of tanks will not suffice to replace losses. There will also be delays before the new tanks are issued to combat units owing to the need for training new crews.21

Seemed to have similar problems apparently, still won the war.

extended combat they wasted away to nothing.

Just for your information, any tankforce will, any army will if it is facing such odds. The Soviets sustained even higher losses, often could not replace their material losses for longer periods than the Ostheer, while being tied to one exclusive front.

Moscow strategic Offensiveoperation, 774 tanks

Speaking about victory.

Anyway, the thread was about captured tanks, I should stop polluting it.

[bertamingo]

Wow, so many responses in such short time, I'm amazed Thanks very much for everyone who contributes his ideas Much appreciated!

Regarding my initial question, there might be some confusion to it. Actually it was limited to certain types of captured vehicles, rather than the captured materials as a whole. For example, the captured French D1 tanks. The Germans captured 18 units, including some that were turned in by surrendered French units and thus completely operational and intact. The Czech tankettes are another example, which were acquired without a fight and thus fully intact. The Germans didn't use them to equip any units (except one captured--not surrendered-- D1 which was said to be used during French campaign) .

As some of you have already mentioned, captured tanks require spare parts, training, ammo etc. and were not very easy to utilise, unless it's worth the effort due to large numbers of captured machines, like French S35/H39/B1/R35 etc. or Russian T34/T26 etc. However, for vehicles captured completely intact and operational, wouldn't it be better to at least use them until they break down and then abandon/scrap them? In this, I am not suggesting to strategically shift the core of an army from infantry to armor or to increase armored units at all costs, but merely to make full use of "free" captured vehicles.

It's like, if I have a pure infantry unit, and I have 10 captured operational tanks and 20 captured inoperational tanks. I can choose to have the infantry unit remain purely infantry and dump these captured tanks because I don't want to restart the factory line to produce spare parts for them or train a professional panzer unit out of infantrymen. Or, I can let the infantry unit operate the operational tanks and use spare parts from inoperational tanks, with crews who are not professionally trained as tankmen but at lease know how to drive a tank and fire its gun, until the tanks all break down and then dispose them. In the latter scenario, at least I have my infantry unit partially "armoured" for some time, without putting significant resources to achieve this end.

[Sheldrake]

Regarding my initial question, there might be some confusion to it. Actually it was limited to certain types of captured vehicles, rather than the captured materials as a whole. For example, the captured French D1 tanks. The Germans captured 18 units, including some that were turned in by surrendered French units and thus completely operational and intact. The Czech tankettes are another example, which were acquired without a fight and thus fully intact. The Germans didn't use them to equip any units (except one captured--not surrendered-- D1 which was said to be used during French campaign) .

As some of you have already mentioned, captured tanks require spare parts, training, ammo etc. and were not very easy to utilise, unless it's worth the effort due to large numbers of captured machines, like French S35/H39/B1/R35 etc. or Russian T34/T26 etc. However, for vehicles captured completely intact and operational, wouldn't it be better to at least use them until they break down and then abandon/scrap them? In this, I am not suggesting to strategically shift the core of an army from infantry to armor or to increase armored units at all costs, but merely to make full use of "free" captured vehicles.

It's like, if I have a pure infantry unit, and I have 10 captured operational tanks and 20 captured inoperational tanks. I can choose to have the infantry unit remain purely infantry and dump these captured tanks because I don't want to restart the factory line to produce spare parts for them or train a professional panzer unit out of infantrymen. Or, I can let the infantry unit operate the operational tanks and use spare parts from inoperational tanks, with crews who are not professionally trained as tankmen but at lease know how to drive a tank and fire its gun, until the tanks all break down and then dispose them. In the latter scenario, at least I have my infantry unit partially "armoured" for some time, without putting significant resources to achieve this end.

Let me try to answer your rephrased question = in emphasis above.

Military technology is useless without the procedures and training to use it.

In the example you mentioned suppose your infantry unit captures 10 operational tanks.Imagine the infantryman's experience.

Lets start with making the tank work.

Infantrymen climbs into the tank. The manual is written in a foreign language, as are all the markings in the vehicle.
How does the driver know how to start the tank and drive it? This isn't a modern car where instruments and controls are laid out with convenient conventions, but may be idiosyncratic. Starting the vehicle may require special settings procedures. Start a Tiger tank and move it and you break the transmission. The Gunner 's job is a bit easier , but might still be tricky. How does the gunner use the sights? What are the graduations on the markings on the sight? But what do the markings on the ammunition mean? Which is HE smoke or AP? Operating the wireless is going to be fun. The frequency range may be different to your own army and the markings are gibberish.

if and when we understand how to make this equipment work the crew need to train to carry out their functions competently,. at speed, but day and night over different types of ground. There are arts to changing gear with non sychromesh gear boxes, cross country, manoeuvring an AFV under the control of a commander, maintaining a valve radio on net.

(Don't forget, the men trying to make this work are not trained drivers, signalers and tank gunners, but infantrymen. These are likely to be in the infantry precisely because your army's personnel selection process has not identified them as having the potential to be trained in a skilled trade such as signaler or driver.)

None of the tanks will work for long without a maintenance and repair organisation full of trained AFV mechanics and access to spare parts. If you are an infantry unit you won't have these.

Once we have tanks working and the crew competent to use the vehicle we still need to learn to fight them as vehicles and as a company of ten vehicles. The training alone is in months. During WW2 the British converted several infantry battalions to become armour or artillery. It takes about six months.

If the equipment is any use you need some ammunition.

Giving 10 tanks to an infantry company will not add to their efficiency but remove 50 trained infantrymen from the order of battle. That is why armies did not make much use of captured tanks - except where a tank unit captures a running tank or if infantry use immobile tanks as pill boxes.

PS Armies did use captured equipment in some cases when they had captured enough material and had enough time to make it work. In North Africa the Tobruk garrison formed an improvised unit from Italian guns manned by Australian infantrymen under the command of the RSM of 1 RHA. The New Zealand Divisional artillery end ed the Tunisa campaign with an 88mm gun troop and the Germans used lots of captured artillery pieces - but they also had captured the factories.

[bertamingo]

Thanks for the very detailed response! Yeah that makes sense, it seems that even getting an intact tank back into the field is to be a major challenge, not to mention a damaged one as previously mentioned. Even with the lack of armour in the western front in 1943-1944, which prompted the 21 Panzer Division to convert French softskins into a variety of improvised amoured vehicles, the Germans still didn't use things like D1 and P16, so it must be really, really hard for them to get these machines back to work

[Michael Kenny]

The problem in the East was Units finding a runner (T34) and keeping it quiet and hanging on to it. There are a number of returns that show captured T34 on strength but I have read that many more were used just never got marked down on paper. Service life probably too short to make it worthwhile documenting it.

[bertamingo]

The problem in the East was Units finding a runner (T34) and keeping it quiet and hanging on to it. There are a number of returns that show captured T34 on strength but I have read that many more were used just never got marked down on paper. Service life probably too short to make it worthwhile documenting it.

Yeah I remember some sources mentioning that as well, many field commanders didnt report their captured machines to avoid the substantial paperwork involved. For example, if a captured tank was reported, then when it was lost due to either mechamic breakdown or enemy action etc., the commander would need to report again. Similarly, when the 150th Panzer Brigade was mustered, only 2 captured M4s were turned in, as most commanders didnt wanna reduce their troop strengths and add lots of paperwork to themselves.