The Logistics of Barbarossa (or lack of it)

[Aida1]

The evidence from the front was that the FHO had gotten it wrong and the red army was not yet near destruction.

The evidence from the front was that the FHO had gotten it RIGHT and the red army was not yet near destruction.

Whilst the evidence demonstrates the FHO pre-invasion briefings were broadly accurate, more overestimate than anything elsr, they fell into the same delusional fog affecting everybody else by early July. Then they were punting out briefings recording the identification of divisions and assuming they had been entirely wiped from the Red Army orbat. No attempt to reconcile this drawdown of divisions with an actual body count (dead and alive). Their drawdown of entire divisions being a significant (3-4 fold) overstatement of actual Red Army combat loss.

That is your pet theory which is wrong. Losses were not overestimated but the extent to which the red army could replace them was.
You are always evading the fact that FHO believed that the red army could not really mobilise the number of men it could theoretically mobilise for reasons already mentioned. Reason why the FHO stated in december 1941 that it was less surprised by the human reserves than by the amount of equipment and weapons.

[Aida1]

Something neither Pahl or Thompson consider is the FHO estimates on Russian reserves over time, from which the campaign was planned.
*Paulus study and "war games pre invasion made allowances for ~30 new Soviet divisions to be raised within the first three months of conflict, rising to ~140 divisions within six months of the commencement of operations". Campaign was planned to be won in 3 to 4 months so thats the number of formations Halder was expecting to have to deal with.

20 June 1941, FHO assessed the total Red Army strength at 179 rifle divisions, 33 cavalry divisions, 10 armoured divisions, by a month another 30, by 6 months another 140, for a total of 392 Divisons by Dec 41, 252 by August.

So the oft used Halder quote of 200 is the root problem, as thats a number from 1940 planning long replaced more more accurate numbers in June, and lets not forget that the FHO based it on the pre war 18800 TOE Division, so by August the 179/33/10 start has been joined by 21 more Rifle Divs and 9 others, so 200 Rifle Divs of 18800, but the SU has moved onto the 5/41 TOE of 14400, which is 261 Rifle Divs not 200. Had FHO knew the Rifle Divs had shrunk in size and more of them raised, then the number Halder should have thinking of, and writing in his diary, is not 200 but 313 around August. SO FHO had not fallen down as much as some have in their pet theory. Of course by December and 6 months, thats where FHO was really out of whack, being wrong by 100%.

*Walter Goerlitz, Paulus and Stalingrad (London, 1963), pp.99-100. Based on Paulus account kin 1946 recounting of detailed war games he ran in December of 1940 for the projected invasion of the Soviet Union.

I broadly concur with this.

Early in the thread l cast a fly to see if anybody knew where Halder got his "200" divisions from. The delusion denyers just ignored it. I wonder why. As Richard Anderson wrote, it could well be a simple approximation of what he was briefed the standing army size was. However, l suspect there is another answer.

The comprehensive survey that FHO produced in January 1941 contains an illustrative calculation of Red Army personnel numbers. They used the standard strategic planning tool 'notional division' for this calculation. A force of 200 notional divisions equated to approx. 5,6 million troops. Add in rear services to support them and you get to 6,2 million. This appears in Thomas despite poster Aida1's desperate attempts to pretend it doesn't exist.. The notional division is 28,000 strong - or 31,000 if you want to simplify the calculation and include the rear services too. To cross check, see the August 1941 briefing l posted earlier where FHO writes of the Red Army being 370 (notional) divisions: 370 x 31,000 = 11,47 million (written up in January 1941 as 11-12 million).

I suspect Halder's 200 comes from fixating on an illustrative calculation using the strategic planning tool 'notional division' and ignoring all of the estimates provided by FHO regarding actual tactical divisions in the field!!!!!

I'm also suspect of the assumptions regarding mobilization times and scales. Whilst it is clear that the OKH/Heer deluded itself about such things, the details you post from Paulus' notes are evidence of this, this delusion does not seem to have come from FHO. There is nothing in the briefings regarding timeframes from 1940 onwards, but some detail in their 1938 survey indicates a belief that things would happen a lot quicker than Paulus' assumptions.

You are misrepresenting here. On p 276 Thomas states: "Taking as the basis of computation approximately 200 rifle divisions and other units FHO assumes the following strength figures : field army 4 million , rear services ca 0,6 million ,internal troops 1,6 million. ."
You have added the 1,6 million internal troops to the field army to blow the numbers of the field army up. Dividing 5,6 million by 200 to get the strength of a socalled notional division is therefore nonsense . Notional divisions do not exist. Only real ones do. And a field army consists of more than divisions. There are levels above that. And we do see the 200 number here.

[MarkN]

Losses were not overestimated but the extent to which the red army could replace them was.

On 7 July 1941 FHO briefed, based on reports from Heer combat formations, that they had so far encounteted 164 rifle divisions and 29 pantser divisions. Of those 42 rifle and 15 pantser divisions had been destroyed (vernichtet) and 47 rifle and 5 pantser divisions surrounded (abgeschlagen).

Once you add in all the non-divisional units that they are not bothering to count, that must be about 2 million or so that are now no longer on the orbat. What was the bodycount that the Heer was claiming up to 7 July?

It's this briefing that got Halder so excited and thus wrote in his diary:

The enemy is no longer in a position to organize a continuous front, not even behind strong terrain features. At the moment the apparent plan of the Red Army High Command is to check the German advance as far to the west as possible by draining our strength with incessant counter attacking with all available reserves. In pursuing this policy they evidently have grossly overestimated German losses.

It is not clear whether this is his opinion or what Kinzel briefed him.

Three days later he wrote:

Under those circumstances it is clear that the front, which also has no more reserves left, cannot hold much longer, despite the attempt to give that front apparently at least a 'backbone of energetic leadership "by introducing a number of new tactical HQs. These new HQs cannot make their presence felt and desperately radio .thru '!the whole ether to establish contact with their Divisions. I do net share the opinion that the enemy in front of AGp. Center is falling "back (this opinion evidently originates in the Armd-Gps-., not at AGp Hq.) He is making an effort to hold, but he is cracking in the attempt.

The Red Army bodycount was high enough to seduce the Heer into how well they were doing, but nowhere near as high as the scale of losses their writedown of Red Army formations suggested. The Heer's understand of how well they were doing, and how little the Red Army had left to offer, was based upon the writedown not the body count. Flawed and deluded. Or was it incompetence or stupidity?

[MarkN]

You are misrepresenting here. On p 276 Thomas states: "Taking as the basis of computation approximately 200 rifle divisions and other units FHO assumes the following strength figures : field army 4 million , rear services ca 0,6 million ,internal troops 1,6 million. ."
You have added the 1,6 million internal troops to the field army to blow the numbers of the field army up. Dividing 5,6 million by 200 to get the strength of a socalled notional division is therefore nonsense . Notional divisions do not exist. Only real ones do. And a field army consists of more than divisions. There are levels above that. And we do see the 200 number here.

Anybody taking the time to read the evidence and wanting to understand the numbers will recognise you posting complete drivvel.

Why are you so determined to deny historical reality?

[Aida1]

Losses were not overestimated but the extent to which the red army could replace them was.

On 7 July 1941 FHO briefed, based on reports from Heer combat formations, that they had so far encounteted 164 rifle divisions and 29 pantser divisions. Of those 42 rifle and 15 pantser divisions had been destroyed (vernichtet) and 47 rifle and 5 pantser divisions surrounded (abgeschlagen).

Once you add in all the non-divisional units that they are not bothering to count, that must be about 2 million or so that are now no longer on the orbat. What was the bodycount that the Heer was claiming up to 7 July?

It's this briefing that got Halder so excited and thus wrote in his diary:

The enemy is no longer in a position to organize a continuous front, not even behind strong terrain features. At the moment the apparent plan of the Red Army High Command is to check the German advance as far to the west as possible by draining our strength with incessant counter attacking with all available reserves. In pursuing this policy they evidently have grossly overestimated German losses.

It is not clear whether this is his opinion or what Kinzel briefed him.

Three days later he wrote:

Under those circumstances it is clear that the front, which also has no more reserves left, cannot hold much longer, despite the attempt to give that front apparently at least a 'backbone of energetic leadership "by introducing a number of new tactical HQs. These new HQs cannot make their presence felt and desperately radio .thru '!the whole ether to establish contact with their Divisions. I do net share the opinion that the enemy in front of AGp. Center is falling "back (this opinion evidently originates in the Armd-Gps-., not at AGp Hq.) He is making an effort to hold, but he is cracking in the attempt.

The Red Army bodycount was high enough to seduce the Heer into how well they were doing, but nowhere near as high as the scale of losses their writedown of Red Army formations suggested. The Heer's understand of how well they were doing, and how little the Red Army had left to offer, was based upon the writedown not the body count. Flawed and deluded. Or was it incompetence or stupidity?

You are overstating . The combat strength of a division is only part of it's total strength .So destroying a division does not imply killing, wounding or capturing every soldier in it. Your lack of practical insight in military operations is in evidence here again.

[Aida1]

You are misrepresenting here. On p 276 Thomas states: "Taking as the basis of computation approximately 200 rifle divisions and other units FHO assumes the following strength figures : field army 4 million , rear services ca 0,6 million ,internal troops 1,6 million. ."
You have added the 1,6 million internal troops to the field army to blow the numbers of the field army up. Dividing 5,6 million by 200 to get the strength of a socalled notional division is therefore nonsense . Notional divisions do not exist. Only real ones do. And a field army consists of more than divisions. There are levels above that. And we do see the 200 number here.

Anybody taking the time to read the evidence and wanting to understand the numbers will recognise you posting complete drivvel.

Why are you so determined to deny historical reality?

You are the one that manipulates numbers to suit your theory. I clearly proved that. Coming up with the idea of notional divisions is the real drivel.

[MarkN]

You are misrepresenting here. On p 276 Thomas states: "Taking as the basis of computation approximately 200 rifle divisions and other units FHO assumes the following strength figures : field army 4 million , rear services ca 0,6 million ,internal troops 1,6 million. ."
You have added the 1,6 million internal troops to the field army to blow the numbers of the field army up. Dividing 5,6 million by 200 to get the strength of a socalled notional division is therefore nonsense . Notional divisions do not exist. Only real ones do. And a field army consists of more than divisions. There are levels above that. And we do see the 200 number here.

Anybody taking the time to read the evidence and wanting to understand the numbers will recognise you posting complete drivvel.

Why are you so determined to deny historical reality?

You are the one that manipulates numbers to suit your theory. I clearly proved that. Coming up with the idea of notional divisions is the real drivel.

You proved nothing. You posted whatever came into your head to deny the numbers of historical reality.

The FHO did exactly the same calculation using 'notional divisions' in another briefing. Instead of 200, they used 191. So, tell me, according to your "proof", what is the answer that comes out? Does the number for field army come down from 4 million, the number for internal troops come down from 1,6 million or the number for rear services come down from 0,6 million?

[MarkN]

You are overstating . The combat strength of a division is only part of it's total strength .So destroying a division does not imply killing, wounding or capturing every soldier in it. Your lack of practical insight in military operations is in evidence here again.

Ah!!! The old deniers fallacy approach.

I am not overstating. The Heer's assumptions overstate their combat success 3-4 fold.

The Heer's calculations assume that every soldier in the divisions has been removed from the orbat. There is no attempt to identify combat from non-combat body in their counts. They don't even bother to consider the body count at all. There is no attempt to make allowance for troops being available to rebuild or generate 'new' divisions.

Why was that? Was it it hubris and delusion or incompetence or stupidity?

[Hanny]

Something neither Pahl or Thompson consider is the FHO estimates on Russian reserves over time, from which the campaign was planned.
*Paulus study and "war games pre invasion made allowances for ~30 new Soviet divisions to be raised within the first three months of conflict, rising to ~140 divisions within six months of the commencement of operations". Campaign was planned to be won in 3 to 4 months so thats the number of formations Halder was expecting to have to deal with.

20 June 1941, FHO assessed the total Red Army strength at 179 rifle divisions, 33 cavalry divisions, 10 armoured divisions, by a month another 30, by 6 months another 140, for a total of 392 Divisons by Dec 41, 252 by August.

So the oft used Halder quote of 200 is the root problem, as thats a number from 1940 planning long replaced more more accurate numbers in June, and lets not forget that the FHO based it on the pre war 18800 TOE Division, so by August the 179/33/10 start has been joined by 21 more Rifle Divs and 9 others, so 200 Rifle Divs of 18800, but the SU has moved onto the 5/41 TOE of 14400, which is 261 Rifle Divs not 200. Had FHO knew the Rifle Divs had shrunk in size and more of them raised, then the number Halder should have thinking of, and writing in his diary, is not 200 but 313 around August. SO FHO had not fallen down as much as some have in their pet theory. Of course by December and 6 months, thats where FHO was really out of whack, being wrong by 100%.

*Walter Goerlitz, Paulus and Stalingrad (London, 1963), pp.99-100. Based on Paulus account kin 1946 recounting of detailed war games he ran in December of 1940 for the projected invasion of the Soviet Union.

I broadly concur with this.

Early in the thread l cast a fly to see if anybody knew where Halder got his "200" divisions from. The delusion denyers just ignored it. I wonder why. As Richard Anderson wrote, it could well be a simple approximation of what he was briefed the standing army size was. However, l suspect there is another answer.

The comprehensive survey that FHO produced in January 1941 contains an illustrative calculation of Red Army personnel numbers. They used the standard strategic planning tool 'notional division' for this calculation. A force of 200 notional divisions equated to approx. 5,6 million troops. Add in rear services to support them and you get to 6,2 million. This appears in Thomas despite poster Aida1's desperate attempts to pretend it doesn't exist.. The notional division is 28,000 strong - or 31,000 if you want to simplify the calculation and include the rear services too. To cross check, see the August 1941 briefing l posted earlier where FHO writes of the Red Army being 370 (notional) divisions: 370 x 31,000 = 11,47 million (written up in January 1941 as 11-12 million).

I suspect Halder's 200 comes from fixating on an illustrative calculation using the strategic planning tool 'notional division' and ignoring all of the estimates provided by FHO regarding actual tactical divisions in the field!!!!!

I'm also suspect of the assumptions regarding mobilization times and scales. Whilst it is clear that the OKH/Heer deluded itself about such things, the details you post from Paulus' notes are evidence of this, this delusion does not seem to have come from FHO. There is nothing in the briefings regarding timeframes from 1940 onwards, but some detail in their 1938 survey indicates a belief that things would happen a lot quicker than Paulus' assumptions.

Divisional slice, each author does is a little differently) is, when you work through the links i posted (https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=fNV ... ey&f=false and* https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/de28/8 ... f23f6e.pdf

*The term division slice referred to the total number of men in a theater divided by the number of divisions. The slice included all the troops needed to maintain a division in combat. The American division slice in January 1945 in Europe was 43,400 men. 2 The U.S. slice included a large service element; less than a third of the troops were in the division. The German division slice dropped from 34,873 in 1939 to 21,895 in
-77-

1944, while the infantry division decreased from 16,626 to 9,985. 3 About half the troops were in the divisions.
In June 1941, the Russian field armies on the border had a division slice of 16,600 men with about 8,000 to 9,000 men in the division. 4 The slice varied from about 13,400 in 1942 to 12,300 in 1945 (including rifle divisions and tank and mechanized corps). The Soviet rifle division strength dropped from about 10,500 in 1942 to 5,000 or less in 1945, while supporting arms increased. The rifle division made up 50% of the division slice in 1941 and had risen to 75% in 1942, but by 1945 the rifle division made up only 40% or less of the division slice. 5 The Russian division slice had only half as many men as the German, but had almost as much firepower provided by the many supporting artillery and tank units.

[Hanny]

Depends, formations were raised from a region, travial distance from that region, or training centre, to where the formation was stationed on the border, could mean a lengthy train trip on a military train. one example would be the 28 Rifle Divisions tasked 13th May to move from the interior to the frontier, and complete the move by 10 July.

See also here for time to travail after mobolisation, which in this case is greater than then time called up for, https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/39979677.pdf

I'm trying to analyse numbers. To compare the FHO estimates to actual Red Army numbers: when, where, how etc. Your answer refers to my attempt to identify whether all the March 500,000 call up was with their units or not, to build an estimate of how many were with border units and non-border units, and whether another call up had been made. All part of the up to 8,000 or from 8,000 to 12,000 query.

If poster Art's suggestion that the 500,000 March call ups were principally for 45 days and no more, they'll have already returned home by the end of May. Not so?

Its when you called up and for what purpose, ie in 1940 to invade the Baltics in an offensive war, after which your demobilised.
In April-May to conform to the Mobilisation plan 41 that calls for 8 million men in x number of division, see

Depends, formations were raised from a region, travial distance from that region, or training centre, to where the formation was stationed on the border, could mean a lengthy train trip on a military train. one example would be the 28 Rifle Divisions tasked 13th May to move from the interior to the frontier, and complete the move by 10 July.

See also here for time to travail after mobolisation, which in this case is greater than then time called up for, https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/39979677.pdf

I'm trying to analyse numbers. To compare the FHO estimates to actual Red Army numbers: when, where, how etc. Your answer refers to my attempt to identify whether all the March 500,000 call up was with their units or not, to build an estimate of how many were with border units and non-border units, and whether another call up had been made. All part of the up to 8,000 or from 8,000 to 12,000 query.

If poster Art's suggestion that the 500,000 March call ups were principally for 45 days and no more, they'll have already returned home by the end of May. Not so?

Its when you called up and for what purpose, ie in 1940 to invade the Baltics in an offensive war, after which your demobilised.
In April-May to conform to the Mobilisation plan 41 that calls for 8 million men in x number of division, to defend the nation from agression, see http://zhistory.org.ua/probus41.htm which Art failled to quote the relavent portion of they are expected to stay till August 41*.

*On May 23, 1941, Directive No. mob / 540 sent the General Staff to the headquarters of PribOVO the conditions and procedure for conducting fees.

In line with the directive of General Staff No. mob / 540, the Headquarters of PribOVO issued an order on June 12, which states the following:

"... On the basis of the cipher telegram of the General Staff of the Red Army of May 23 this year, No. mob / 540

The district commander ordered:

1. To conduct 45-day training camps of the assigned composition of the reserve in parts and quantity, according to the attached calculation (Appendix No. 1).

The collection period is from June 24 to August 7, 1941.

2. Division commanders:

a) ensure a timely meeting in parts of the enlisted personnel arriving at the training camp, taking into account that all teams will arrive at the address of the division commander;

Lastly iirc its J house who wrote a book dealing with where reserves were in transit in June, ill have to look that up for you.

[Boby]

Kampfwert is a precise military term.

60-65 rifle/motorized plus 10 panzer equivalent means the total strength of the front at full manpower divisions. FHO calculated 260 rifle and motorized, 50 panzer and 20 cavalry, thus

60-65 * 270 = 22-24% average strength
10 * 50 = 20%

[Art]

If poster Art's suggestion that the 500,000 March call ups were principally for 45 days and no more, they'll have already returned home by the end of May. Not so?

First, it's literal meaning of relevant documents not my suggestion. Second, there was no"March call". On 8 March 1941 the Politburo approved the plan of reservists call-up during the year, which was to start later, principally beginning from the second half of May and on. Only several weeks after that the Red Army's General Staff sent relevant directives to military districts which detailed the schedule of reservists' call-up (units, starting day, duration). This schedule was revised later, according the the revised schedule in most divisions call of reservists was to begin in late May - early June.

[Aida1]

You are misrepresenting here. On p 276 Thomas states: "Taking as the basis of computation approximately 200 rifle divisions and other units FHO assumes the following strength figures : field army 4 million , rear services ca 0,6 million ,internal troops 1,6 million. ."
You have added the 1,6 million internal troops to the field army to blow the numbers of the field army up. Dividing 5,6 million by 200 to get the strength of a socalled notional division is therefore nonsense . Notional divisions do not exist. Only real ones do. And a field army consists of more than divisions. There are levels above that. And we do see the 200 number here.

Anybody taking the time to read the evidence and wanting to understand the numbers will recognise you posting complete drivvel.

Why are you so determined to deny historical reality?

You are the one that manipulates numbers to suit your theory. I clearly proved that. Coming up with the idea of notional divisions is the real drivel.

You proved nothing. You posted whatever came into your head to deny the numbers of historical reality.

The FHO did exactly the same calculation using 'notional divisions' in another briefing. Instead of 200, they used 191. So, tell me, according to your "proof", what is the answer that comes out? Does the number for field army come down from 4 million, the number for internal troops come down from 1,6 million or the number for rear services come down from 0,6 million?

The 4 million is not only the combat divisions; it is also includes the levels above it and what depends from that, . So the 4 million is not only the strength of the 200 divisions as such. In addition , you added up the 1,6 million internal troops to the 4 million to make the field army look bigger.

[Aida1]

You are overstating . The combat strength of a division is only part of it's total strength .So destroying a division does not imply killing, wounding or capturing every soldier in it. Your lack of practical insight in military operations is in evidence here again.

Ah!!! The old deniers fallacy approach.

I am not overstating. The Heer's assumptions overstate their combat success 3-4 fold.

The Heer's calculations assume that every soldier in the divisions has been removed from the orbat. There is no attempt to identify combat from non-combat body in their counts. They don't even bother to consider the body count at all. There is no attempt to make allowance for troops being available to rebuild or generate 'new' divisions.

Why was that? Was it it hubris and delusion or incompetence or stupidity?

You have no clue. If you affected estimated losses on the total strength of the enemy, you would end up overstating what is left as most of the losses are sustained by the combat element, particularly by the infantry. So you do not need to inflict 100 % losses on a unit to render it combat ineffective. It will rarely happen you will destroy 100% of the total strength of a division .Even in encirclements part of the support units could have escaped. And you can mostly reconstitute them .Even 6 th Army was reconstituted after Stalingrad.
What was mostly underestimated was the ability of the red army to refit existing divisions and set up new ones and underestimating war production was an important aspect in that as FHO admitted itself. That the USSR had large human reserves was not unknown but you need to be able equip them.

[Aida1]

Kampfwert is a precise military term.

60-65 rifle/motorized plus 10 panzer equivalent means the total strength of the front at full manpower divisions. FHO calculated 260 rifle and motorized, 50 panzer and 20 cavalry, thus

60-65 * 270 = 22-24% average strength
10 * 50 = 20%

So the combat element would have lost 80% of its strength but the non combat part of the divisions would be at a higher strength as losses are mostly sustained by the combat element.