Manstein becomes OKH Chief of Staff instead of Halder

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Aida1
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Re: Manstein becomes OKH Chief of Staff instead of Halder

#46

Post by Aida1 » 23 Oct 2019, 09:26

Cult Icon wrote:
23 Oct 2019, 00:48
Askey is not a student of 42-45..... Stitzen-type views are too statistically and theoretically based and not based on real world combat. (operational histories, unit histories, tactics, memoirs, statistics).

Art and I have done extensive analysis (highly statistical (from russian primary sources) and encompassing over a hundred secondary sources) about the EF 42-44 a few years ago. These threads can be found on armchairgeneral forums. We did not just study one operation (Kursk is a favorite) but a huge range and duration of fighting.

In conclusion the German combat formation Sept-43 onwards were simply not competitive vehicles for tactical superiority for a very good and obvious reason- they were ill equipped and undermanned, and suitable only for the immobile defense actions. When the average german infantry in Army Group South had the equivalent of 1-2 battalions of infantry, company sized support units and a few batteries of artillery....

Also, the achievements of heavily equipped 48.PzK in Oct-Nov pale compared to the Soviet tank armies.

What was notable about german forces was the skill of the veteran and surviving german officer and nco corps, who repeatedly made their opponents pay with stubborn defensive actions, hence the numbers you are focused on. They displayed this skill even with their replacement troops were poorly trained. That's about it.
You may have done analysis but you clearly drew the wrong conclusions .You contradicted yourself here by stating that the red army used inefficiënt mass attacks. Mass attacks is what you do when you are unable to apply superior tactics.That led to high casualties . Being tacticaly superior implies doing much better than mass attacks. High red army casualties lead to filling up formations with untrained men and that makes using superior tactics even more impossible. You also underrate German mobile formations who had to fight against heavy odds and were limited to local counterattacks.
Last edited by Aida1 on 23 Oct 2019, 10:16, edited 2 times in total.

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Re: Manstein becomes OKH Chief of Staff instead of Halder

#47

Post by Aida1 » 23 Oct 2019, 09:59

Cult Icon wrote:
21 Oct 2019, 15:57
also on tactics:

-the high soviet AFV loss rate was statistically most heavily connected with the heavy upgrading of german anti-tank weapons (pak40, long-barrelled Stug/PIV, Panther, Tiger, Nashorn, etc.) among german forces rather than operational art.

-There was a severe infantry shortage in AGS which was made even more epidemic by Hitler's orders to build up forces for the invasion front. HOWEVER, AGS was assigned the majority of rebuilt/new armored units. The Panzer divisions that arrived, such as 1.Pz, 1.SSLAH, 16.Pz, 24.Pz, 8.Pz etc. came with full strength infantry regiments. There were also periodic march battalions being allocated in a trickle. Some of these infantry units would be subsequently written down in a short amount of time (-eg in several days of heavy counter-attacking) and without much results.

-Let's say that German intelligence was much more effective in forecasting soviet moves, soviet tactics, and soviet forces than it was- then the AG commander could give a general order to preserve Panzer-grenadier regiments for the future medium-scale offensive operation and use Panzerkampfgruppe only (eg. PR plus recon and SPW battalions) and march battalions to rebuild PzDs only. This could be coincided with improved tactical procedures and organization to increase efficiency in the attack and defense among the depleted forces of the army group so the reserves would not have been used up.
You are not making much sense here. What Manstein wanted was pull back his right wing and give up the Crimea to free 17 Army and 1 PZ Army. That would allow creating a big reserve to do something major on the important left wing. That is what a real commander does who is good at operations.


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Re: Manstein becomes OKH Chief of Staff instead of Halder

#48

Post by Hoplophile » 23 Oct 2019, 14:58

Cult Icon wrote:
20 Oct 2019, 02:41
The decisive study on Manstein's leadership in 43-44 is yet to be written (a book/thesis on circa Dec 43- March 43 has already been published ). In Barrett's series "Zhitomir Berdichev", Manstein makes one appearance to supervise a German armored counter-operation.
Is this the thesis in question?

David A. Shunk,Field Marshal von Manstein's Counteroffensive of Army Group South, February-March 1943:
The Last Operational Level Victory of the Panzer Forces on the Eastern Front
(Unpublished MMA Thesis, US Army Command and General Staff College, 1986)

https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a172534.pdf

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Re: Manstein becomes OKH Chief of Staff instead of Halder

#49

Post by Aida1 » 23 Oct 2019, 17:37

Hoplophile wrote:
23 Oct 2019, 14:58
Cult Icon wrote:
20 Oct 2019, 02:41
The decisive study on Manstein's leadership in 43-44 is yet to be written (a book/thesis on circa Dec 43- March 43 has already been published ). In Barrett's series "Zhitomir Berdichev", Manstein makes one appearance to supervise a German armored counter-operation.
Is this the thesis in question?

David A. Shunk,Field Marshal von Manstein's Counteroffensive of Army Group South, February-March 1943:
The Last Operational Level Victory of the Panzer Forces on the Eastern Front
(Unpublished MMA Thesis, US Army Command and General Staff College, 1986)

https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a172534.pdf
There are more books but Cult Icon ignores anything written in German as he probably does not speak German.

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Re: Manstein becomes OKH Chief of Staff instead of Halder

#50

Post by Cult Icon » 23 Oct 2019, 18:05

Hoplophile wrote:
23 Oct 2019, 14:58
Is this the thesis in question?

David A. Shunk,Field Marshal von Manstein's Counteroffensive of Army Group South, February-March 1943:
The Last Operational Level Victory of the Panzer Forces on the Eastern Front
(Unpublished MMA Thesis, US Army Command and General Staff College, 1986)

https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a172534.pdf
https://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Stalingra ... 646&sr=8-1

+Glantz has a lot of detailed books about the soviet winter counter-offensive 42-43.

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Re: Manstein becomes OKH Chief of Staff instead of Halder

#51

Post by Hoplophile » 23 Oct 2019, 20:24


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Re: Manstein becomes OKH Chief of Staff instead of Halder

#52

Post by TheMarcksPlan » 25 Oct 2019, 03:51

CultIcon wrote:Art and I have done extensive analysis (highly statistical (from russian primary sources) and encompassing over a hundred secondary sources) about the EF 42-44 a few years ago. These threads can be found on armchairgeneral forums. We did not just study one operation (Kursk is a favorite) but a huge range and duration of fighting.
Cite?
CultIcon wrote:Askey is not a student of 42-45.
Regardless of Askey, the model and data say what they say. The RKKA just wasn't very good (per man) at killing Germans later in the war, relative to earlier.
https://twitter.com/themarcksplan
https://www.reddit.com/r/AxisHistoryForum/
https://medium.com/counterfactualww2
"The whole question of whether we win or lose the war depends on the Russians." - FDR, June 1942

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Re: Manstein becomes OKH Chief of Staff instead of Halder

#53

Post by Cult Icon » 25 Oct 2019, 06:17

didn't read your link, doesn't make sense as the configurations on the battlefield were very different. I don't respect economics as much as you do.

Not important- the aim was not to "maximize" a video-game like kill ratio. The Soviets were achieving their objectives- routing Axis forces, fixing their forces, controlling the battlefield, advancing their forces and making German counterattacks costly- in their own <peculiar> way.

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Re: Manstein becomes OKH Chief of Staff instead of Halder

#54

Post by Aida1 » 25 Oct 2019, 06:32

Cult Icon wrote:
25 Oct 2019, 06:17
didn't read your link, doesn't make sense as the configurations on the battlefield were very different. I don't respect economics as much as you do.

Not important- the aim was not to "maximize" a video-game like kill ratio. The Soviets were achieving their objectives- routing Axis forces, fixing their forces, controlling the battlefield, advancing their forces and making German counterattacks costly- in their own <peculiar> way.
But the losses the red army sustained we're not consistent with being tacticaly superior. That is where you are wrong.

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