Question About Western Contribution to the War

[ljadw]

The remainings of 19PzD were in june 1944 transferred to the south of the Netherlands,they did not go to Normandy because 19Pz was not operational : it would be useless in Normandy, in July, still not operational, it was going to Poland because of the collaps of AGC.

This is an example of the strong German reserve .

[Richard Anderson]

Kelvin said that the 60 divisions formed a reserve for the east : if they remained in the west, they would be useless .

Repeatedly posting lies does not make them truths. Kelvin's actually statement was "60 divisions in the western Europe was German 's strong reserves remained intact in 1944 and western offensive destroyed it and made it no longer had capacity to resist Soviet offensive."

That is exactly what OKH treated them as and it was exactly what Guderian expected and planned for. That it was complete pie-in-the-sky for them to imagine it would be successful is a completely different matter.

There were NO 31 divisions that could be used in the east, if they were transferred to the east , they would not last a week .

WHY? Dozens of divisions were transferred from west to east and vice versa from 1941 to 1945. Did they all not "last a week"? What magical formula caused them to dissipate within a week on the Ostfront? :roll:

A failed Neptune would not allow the Germans to complete their rebuilding, and if/ when they would be rebuilt, the Soviets would be at the gates of Berlin .

WHY? If NEPTUNE failed would the Germans suddenly lose the ability to rapidly reconstitute units they demonstrated from 1941 to 1944?
WHY would it suddenly take the Germans much longer to reconstitute and move units, so that they would not be able to redeploy the for ten montsh or so?

Even if Neptune failed, the Germans would still need 60 divisions in France . 60 divisions that can not be moved elsewhere do not constitute a strong reserve, they do not even constitute a reserve at all .

Except that is exactly opposite of what the Germans believed they would need in that event.

Only 4 PzD would be useful in the East : 12 SS, PzL, 2 Pz, 21 Pz and they would remain in France, because they were the last rescue for the Germans : without them ,nothing would stop the Allies, they would be east of the Rhine before September . If in June 1944 these divisions were not in France, it was over for Germany :your Schnelle Truppen could not contain the Allies .

WHY? The assumption remains that NEPTUNE fails, thus they ARE IN FRANCE in June...so how then do the Allies get "east of the Rhine before September"?

Meanwhile, why are 1. SS, 2. SS, 17. SS, 9. Panzer, 11. Panzer, and 116. Panzer useless in the East? Did they exceed their use by day?

[Richard Anderson]

The remainings of 19PzD were in june 1944 transferred to the south of the Netherlands,they did not go to Normandy because 19Pz was not operational : it would be useless in Normandy, in July, still not operational, it was going to Poland because of the collaps of AGC.

This is an example of the strong German reserve .

Sigh...the division began arriving in the vicinity of Breda on 24 May and departed on 16 July after being reconstituted, for the Arys training area in East Prussia. When it left Arys and was assigned to XXXXVI. Panzerkorps in August the division was fully operational and well-equipped. Its Panzer Regiment 27. included 81 PzIV, 89 PzV, and 8 FlakpzIV (37). Interestingly, I./Panzer Regiment 27. received its first 4 Panthers on 18 January 1944 at Mailly and a total of 79 by 13 April 1944, but then began turning them over to I./Panzer Regiment 15 on 20 June and drew new ones when it moved to join the division. It was issued 89 new Panther as replacements, the last 8 on 1 August at Arys.

[ljadw]

That is exactly what OKH treated them as and it was exactly what Guderian expected and planned for. That it was complete pie-in-the-sky for them to imagine it would be successful is a completely different matter.

There were NO 31 divisions that could be used in the east, if they were transferred to the east , they would not last a week .

WHY? Dozens of divisions were transferred from west to east and vice versa from 1941 to 1945. Did they all not "last a week"? What magical formula caused them to dissipate within a week on the Ostfront? :roll:



WHY? If NEPTUNE failed would the Germans suddenly lose the ability to rapidly reconstitute units they demonstrated from 1941 to 1944?
WHY would it suddenly take the Germans much longer to reconstitute and move units, so that they would not be able to redeploy the for ten montsh or so?



Except that is exactly opposite of what the Germans believed they would need in that event.

Only 4 PzD would be useful in the East : 12 SS, PzL, 2 Pz, 21 Pz and they would remain in France, because they were the last rescue for the Germans : without them ,nothing would stop the Allies, they would be east of the Rhine before September . If in June 1944 these divisions were not in France, it was over for Germany :your Schnelle Truppen could not contain the Allies .

WHY? The assumption remains that NEPTUNE fails, thus they ARE IN FRANCE in June...so how then do the Allies get "east of the Rhine before September"?

Meanwhile, why are 1. SS, 2. SS, 17. SS, 9. Panzer, 11. Panzer, and 116. Panzer useless in the East? Did they exceed their use by day?

1) Guderian had nothing to decide in June 1944 : the 60 divisions were OKW divisions, even the PzD .

2) What happened before 1944 is irrelevant for the question if divisions could be transferred from France to the East if Neptunus failed

3 ) The 31 divisions that could go to Russia ,passing by the Brandenburger gate, would be useless in the east, where Germany needed strong mobile forces to stop a Soviet breakthrough and would be indespensible in the west : the Germans could not defend the west with 30 divisions in 1944 .


4) The assumption is that Neptune fails and that 50 % of the Westheer is going to the east .

5) 1 SS and 2 SS had fled the east to be rebuilt in the west : with the exception of 17 SS (which had no tanks) they were not operational on 6 june and if they could be in the east before 22 june (which they could not) they would not be operational on that day ,and would be useless in the east .

Even 17 SS was not ready on 6 june ; it was short of 40 % of its officers and NCO s;its shortage of trucks (only 245 were at hand,and there was a shortage of 1445),and of prime movers, resulted in an arrival of the whole unit on July 10 only in Normandy . (Source : Zetterling) .Such a division would not prevent the Bagration catastrophe .

With 3O divisions it was impossible to defend the West ;with such a small force(of which only a small part could be used ) it would be impossible to stop Dragoon /Anvil . 2Pz was the only mobile reserve for the aera between the Pas de Calais and the Dutch-German border . If it was going to the south of France or to the East, it would made a second Neptune inevitable; if it remained where it was, it would make Dragoon successful .

To divide the forces in the west would result in a catastrophe in the West and would not help the Ostheer .

Thus, the OP about the Westheer being a strong reserve that could stop the Soviets is not correct .

There is a strong analogy with what happened in the summer of 1941 to the Soviet Forces in the Far East : these also remained where they were, because they could not help the situation in the West and because it was too dangerous to strip the Far East of its forces : this would invite the Japanese to attack .

[ljadw]

The remainings of 19PzD were in june 1944 transferred to the south of the Netherlands,they did not go to Normandy because 19Pz was not operational : it would be useless in Normandy, in July, still not operational, it was going to Poland because of the collaps of AGC.

This is an example of the strong German reserve .

Sigh...the division began arriving in the vicinity of Breda on 24 May and departed on 16 July after being reconstituted, for the Arys training area in East Prussia. When it left Arys and was assigned to XXXXVI. Panzerkorps in August the division was fully operational and well-equipped. Its Panzer Regiment 27. included 81 PzIV, 89 PzV, and 8 FlakpzIV (37). Interestingly, I./Panzer Regiment 27. received its first 4 Panthers on 18 January 1944 at Mailly and a total of 79 by 13 April 1944, but then began turning them over to I./Panzer Regiment 15 on 20 June and drew new ones when it moved to join the division. It was issued 89 new Panther as replacements, the last 8 on 1 August at Arys.

Sigh : what happened in august is irrelevant for what would happen between 6 and 22 June : on 22 June the East collapsed and 19 Pz was not ready ;thus why would the Germans transfer 19 Pz to the East between 6 and 22 June ?

[jesk]

Your calculations are nothing more than gymnastics for the mind. Do not take into account, for example, the preparation and planning of Operation Bagration. Which mistakes were made and whether they could be avoided.

[jesk]

Hitler argues about Vitebsk



Only through the murder of Hitler did the Germans have a chance.

https://kehilalinks.jewishgen.org/vitsy ... story.html

By the summer of 1944 the Red Army became stronger. An attack against the central part of the German front line began on June 23 1944. About 900,000 soldiers from aviation, tank and artillery corps took participated. This was called the ‘Belarus operation’. Vitebsk was attacked by the 43rd Army commanded by General Beloborodov from the northeast, and by the 39th Army commanded by General Ludnikov from the southeast (287). Their plan was to encircle and destroy the 3rd German tank corps, which was situated in Vitebsk area. The German Commander General-Colonel Reinhgart realized that the this unit could be exterminated, and therefore on the morning of June 24, he asked Hitler for permission to surrender. Hitler ordered that Vitebsk must be held. The 206th infantry division was to hold Vitebsk and the 53rd infantry corps was to break out of the encirclement. The German troops weren’t able carry out the order or even leave Vitebsk. Fighting began in Vitebsk on June 25. Vitebsk was seized by the Soviet troops, after fierce street fights, by the following morning. The town was razed to the ground. Only 15 buildings survived. On the morning of liberation, the population of Vitebsk numbered 186 people.

[jesk]

They got it, but there happened an unauthorized capitulation in Italy. All this is difficult to understand, but accessible.

[Richard Anderson]

1) Guderian had nothing to decide in June 1944 : the 60 divisions were OKW divisions, even the PzD .

You didn't answer the question. The West was treated as a reserve holding ground, arguably until December 1943 when the expectation of invasion caused Hitler to begin reinforcing. If the invasion is defeated, then why wouldn't the Germans return to the previous policy, especially given that was Hitler's rational for the change?

So Guderian had no authority? Really? He wasn't Generalinspektur der Panzertruppen, so had no authority on the organization and re-equipping of the divisions? He wasn't reporting directly to Hitler under the Dienstanweisung fuer der Generalinspektur der Panzertruppen of 7 April 1943?

BTW, they were Hitler's divisions, not OKW divisions. He made that explicitly clear numerous times and specifically in Directive 51.

2) What happened before 1944 is irrelevant for the question if divisions could be transferred from France to the East if Neptunus failed

WHY? Failure of NEPTUNE sets up the preconditions implied by Hitler under Directive 51. The invasion is thrown back into the sea and then they can turn to the final destruction of Bolshevism.

3 ) The 31 divisions that could go to Russia ,passing by the Brandenburger gate, would be useless in the east, where Germany needed strong mobile forces to stop a Soviet breakthrough and would be indespensible in the west : the Germans could not defend the west with 30 divisions in 1944

So the 130-odd divisions in the East would not benefit from the addition of 30-odd divisions? Why would they be "useless"? Why can the Germans not expect to defend the west with 30-odd divisions after defeating an Allied invasion?

4) The assumption is that Neptune fails and that 50 % of the Westheer is going to the east .

Thank you for restating what I already said. Unfortunately, it does not answer my question. "WHY? The assumption remains that NEPTUNE fails, thus they ARE IN FRANCE in June...so how then do the Allies get "east of the Rhine before September"?"

5) 1 SS and 2 SS had fled the east to be rebuilt in the west : with the exception of 17 SS (which had no tanks) they were not operational on 6 june and if they could be in the east before 22 june (which they could not) they would not be operational on that day ,and would be useless in the east .

Even 17 SS was not ready on 6 june ; it was short of 40 % of its officers and NCO s;its shortage of trucks (only 245 were at hand,and there was a shortage of 1445),and of prime movers, resulted in an arrival of the whole unit on July 10 only in Normandy . (Source : Zetterling) .Such a division would not prevent the Bagration catastrophe .

Yet again, the assumption is that the invasion is defeated. Those divisions thus are free to rebuild and be transferred east, so there condition before the invasion is defeated is irrelevant...unless you are somehow assuming that in the aftermath of defeating an invasion the Germans somehow mysteriously lose their capability for rebuilding divisions?

Nor did anyone say anything about a defeated invasion "preventing" Bagration...could you please stop inventing red herrings?

With 3O divisions it was impossible to defend the West ;with such a small force(of which only a small part could be used ) it would be impossible to stop Dragoon /Anvil . 2Pz was the only mobile reserve for the aera between the Pas de Calais and the Dutch-German border . If it was going to the south of France or to the East, it would made a second Neptune inevitable; if it remained where it was, it would make Dragoon successful .

Sorry, but we just went over this a few days ago. ANVIL/DRAGOON required a successful NEPTUNE.

To divide the forces in the west would result in a catastrophe in the West and would not help the Ostheer .

WHY? NEPTUNE is defeated. There would be no ANVIL/DRAGOON. Why would the Germans anticipate a catastrophe in the West>

Thus, the OP about the Westheer being a strong reserve that could stop the Soviets is not correct .

Except the OP mentioned nothing about that reserve stopping the Soviets. Please stop rewriting Kelvin's original statement, which was, "60 divisions in the western Europe was German 's strong reserves remained intact in 1944 and western offensive destroyed it and made it no longer had capacity to resist Soviet offensive."

There is a strong analogy with what happened in the summer of 1941 to the Soviet Forces in the Far East : these also remained where they were, because they could not help the situation in the West and because it was too dangerous to strip the Far East of its forces : this would invite the Japanese to attack .

They "remained" there because of time and distance problems, chiefly the limitations of the Trans-Siberian railroad, which is not "analogous" to the German situation. Paris to Minsk is roughly 2,200 kilometers over a fairly dense rail system. Khabarovsk to Moscow is roughly 8,400 kilometers over a sparse rail system.

Meanwhile, 15 divisions from the Far East Front, and the Trans-Baikal and Central Asian MD's were transferred west from August to December 1941. Seven of those were from the 23-division Far East Front. So the "danger" of Japanese attack was apparently not seen to be too great.

[Richard Anderson]

Sigh : what happened in august is irrelevant for what would happen between 6 and 22 June : on 22 June the East collapsed and 19 Pz was not ready ;thus why would the Germans transfer 19 Pz to the East between 6 and 22 June ?

You do like to invent arguments that no one, other than yourself, has made. Don't you? :roll: :roll: :roll:

YOU brought up the 19. Panzer Division. I simply corrected your errors.

YOU incorrectly stated it was transferred in June. It was May.

YOU incorrectly stated it "did not go to Normandy because 19Pz was not operational". It did not go because it was never intended to go. It was part of those routine transfers from east to west and vice versa that you now appear to infer did not happen.

YOU incorrectly stated it was "still not operational" "in July" when it "was going to Poland". It was operational. It went to East Prussia where it completed its reconstitution in July. It did not go to Poland until August.

NO ONE argued that the division would be sent "East between 6 and 22 June" other than yourself.

Please CEASE the STRAWMEN, RED HERRINGS, and LIES!

[jesk]

3 ) The 31 divisions that could go to Russia ,passing by the Brandenburger gate, would be useless in the east, where Germany needed strong mobile forces to stop a Soviet breakthrough and would be indespensible in the west : the Germans could not defend the west with 30 divisions in 1944

It is such mix obviously with inserts from the article Frizer about the Soviet breakthrough, with mobile reserves. In general, only one problem - Hitler.

https://www.welt.de/geschichte/zweiter- ... nfig=print

Up to 600,000 casualties: The historian Karl-Heinz Frieser explains how it came to the worst defeat in German history, the smashing of Army Group Center in the summer of 1944.

Just three years after the German attack on the Soviet Union, the Red Army opened its biggest offensive to date. In the nearly ten weeks between June 22 and August 29, 1944, Soviet troops pushed more than 500 kilometers westwards to the eastern bank of the Vistula.

In this "Operation Bagration", named after a fallen 1812 Russian commander, the Army Group Center was largely smashed. The battles are considered the worst defeat of German military history, worse than Stalingrad or the lost battle for Moscow 1941/42.

Intensive like no other historian, the now retired Colonel Karl-Heinz Frieser, formerly head of department at the Military History Research Office, has researched the collapse of Army Group Center. The eighth volume of the standard work "The German Reich and the Second World War" published by him on the Eastern Front 1943/44 covers more than 1300 pages.

Die Welt: The Red Army began attacking Army Group Center on June 22, 1944, exactly three years after Operation Barbarossa. A coincidence or deliberately so set?

Karl-Heinz Frieser: That was intent. For the Red Army had the peculiarity to orient itself on the day of operations on commemoration days. So, just in time for Stalin's birthday - regardless of losses - an important city should be conquered. Operation Bagration had been prepared for weeks with effect from June 22.

Die Welt: Had not the Wehrmacht leadership foreseen this attack? What, for example, did the enemy reconnaissance department Fremde Heere Ost expect under Reinhard Gehlen?

Frieser: Gehlen feared that the Red Army would advance from the front projection at Kovel in the rear of the German front over Warsaw to the Baltic Sea and enclose the entire German north wing. However, the Soviet leadership shrank from a strategic decision-making offensive and instead attacked the Belarusian frontal balcony from the east frontally. She gave away the great opportunity to end the war prematurely. Hitler and his regime once again received a reprieve.

Die Welt: Did the German soldiers at the front and their senior officers in the front-facing bars know what was coming?

Frieser: When evaluating German booty files in Russian archives, I discovered that the front-line units had explained the Soviet offensive intentions surprisingly well. But the results were not adequately relayed by Army Group Center. Blame was their commander-in-chief, Field Marshal Ernst Busch. When he wanted to point out the threat, Hitler reacted with a tantrum. Busch broke in and banned "defeatist" messages. So the evil took its course.

Die Welt: What were the balance of power on the eve of "Operation Bagration"?

Frieser: Soviet superiority was 3.7 times that of the artillery, 9.4 times that of artillery, 23 times that of tanks, 3.6 times that of assault guns, and 10.5 times that of airplanes. In addition, 150,000 partisans lurked in the hinterland, which paralyzed the railway network by about 10,000 explosions two days before the operation.

Die Welt: In June 1944, Army Group Center still occupied most of Belarus. The front formed a kind of "balcony" here. The Wehrmacht had a lot of room behind it, to back off if necessary ...

Frieser: Since static defense was suicidal in the face of Soviet fire supremacy, the generals wanted to dodge behind the Beresina in a mobile defense. But Hitler demanded fanatically rigid holding and certain "fixed seats", which should be defended to "the last breath". His soldiers had to be included in it voluntarily.

Die Welt: Did not this massive "asymmetry of forces" be known in Fiihrer Headquarters?

Frieser: Hitler planned a two-pronged strategy. He first wanted to smash the Allied invasion on the Atlantic coast, at the same time keeping the eastern front static. After the "victory in the west" but 35 divisions should be moved to the east, to go back to the offensive. He wanted to compensate for the risk of a temporary weakening of the eastern front with his fixed idea of ​​"fixed seats", but this caused a disaster.

Die Welt: The strength of the Wehrmacht had always been their relatively high mobility and good technical equipment?

Frieser: Meanwhile, the Wehrmacht led the "war of the poor man". The 3rd Panzer Army had not a single main battle tank, but 60,000 horses. As incredible as it sounds, there was no operational reserve on the entire eastern front. This was instead 2300 kilometers away in France. Without their tanks, however, it was not possible to stop a Soviet breakthrough.

Die Welt: Could Army Group Center, despite its massive inferiority, have escaped the devastating defeat?

Frieser: The defeat was inevitable, but Hitler's fatal stop orders conjured up a catastrophe, because it whole armies were encircled.

Die Welt: How did you manage to stop the Red Army?

Frieser: Field Marshal Walter Model, the new Commander in Chief of Army Group, did the right thing: "Whoever is too weak to defend, must attack!" With newly brought up Panzerverbände he attacked the Soviet forays. At the beginning of August he forced the turnaround. In Warsaw, four German Panzer divisions suddenly attacked concentrically and lured a Soviet tank army into the trap. Thus, the front could be stabilized on the Vistula.

Die Welt: What influence did Hitler's decisions in late June 1944 have on military resistance? Its mastermind Henning von Tresckow experienced as Chief of the General Staff of the 2nd Army, the collapse of Army Group Center directly with ...

Frieser: In the summer of 1944, Hitler proved not only a scary military dilettante. Many were appalled by what contempt he sacrificed tens of thousands of soldiers for his delusions. On July 20, the despair and rage of several officers exploded in an explosion in the Wolfsschanze.

[Boby]

Typical storytelling from german historians. Hitler bla bla bla, Hitler bla, bla, bla.

[Sheldrake]

Typical storytelling from german historians. Hitler bla bla bla, Hitler bla, bla, bla.

Don't dismiss Freiser out of hand as as typical German - unless you mean thorough and rather good. He is a well regarded Bundeswehr historian, but a hero for his analysis of 1940 "The Blitzkrieg Legend." See how many times he is quoted on the Dunkirk and 1940 threads.

[jesk]

Up to 600,000 casualties: The historian Karl-Heinz Frieser explains how it came to the worst defeat in German history, the smashing of Army Group Center in the summer of 1944.

From June to November 1944, the "Center" group lost 330 thousand killed and missing.

https://web.archive.org/web/20151010060 ... dec44.html

Of these, 60 - 70 thousand in August-October, after the stabilization of the front. In the meantime, 494 thousand prisoners were held in France in August-September, 10 thousand were killed in the Falaise pocket and there may be another 20-30 thousand in other places.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_pr ... est_Europe

Cut off from the main forces garrisons on the Atlantic coast in an amount of 113 thousand people. Total irrecoverable losses of 650 thousand. Proceeding from the figures, probably the worst German defeat in history is Normandy. On the second place "Bagration".

Dünkirchen 10.000 Mann Vizeadmiral Friedrich Frisius 9. Mai 1945
Kanalinseln 198 km² 28.500 Mann Generalleutnant Rudolf Graf von Schmettow, später Vizeadmiral Friedrich Hüffmeier 9. Mai 1945
Lorient 24.500 Mann General der Artillerie Wilhelm Fahrmbacher 10. Mai 1945
Saint-Nazaire 1.500 km² 30.000 Mann Generalleutnant Hans Junck 11. Mai 1945
La Rochelle 400 km² 11.500 Mann Vizeadmiral Ernst Schirlitz 9. Mai 1945
Gironde Nord (Royan) 5.000 Mann Konteradmiral Hans Michahelles 17. April 1945
Gironde Süd (Le Verdon)170 km² 3.500 Mann Oberst Otto Prahl 20. April 1945

[jesk]

Typical storytelling from german historians. Hitler bla bla bla, Hitler bla, bla, bla.

Yes, I think the story needs to be rewritten. Instead of the encyclopedia of the Second World War, an encyclopaedia of Hitler's sabotage is needed. Thus, a distorted picture of history can be restored.