The State of the Ostheer - May 1942

[Peter89]

What stands out the most is the appalling state of the German infantry: Army Group South had 50 percent of its original infantry strength; Army Groups Center and North each 35 percent. And this was despite having received 1.1 million replacements since June 22 1941.

I couldn't find specific casualty information in this book, but Glantz in When Titans Clashed lists German casualties as 522,833 by September 28, 1941. Stahel puts total German 1941 casualties at 830,903, of which 302,595 were killed. Stahel also lists 262,524 casualties for November 26, 1941, to February 28, 1942. Retreat from Moscow (p. 138).

Looking at the dreadful state of the German army in May 1942, with the United States entering the war, and the Soviets continuing to field a massive army, and the Eastern Front more or less stabilized, it seems the war was already lost for Germany. The OstHeer was too weak to do anything offensively in more than one sector, and that would never be enough to knock out the Soviet Union. Germany's severe manpower shortage meant that it couldn't replace casualties or ever hope to get back to its June 1941 strength, and German industrial output could never match that of the Allies.

With the benefit of hindsight, it also shows the folly of Operation Barbarossa. Throwing away over half of your entire country's infantry strength in the bottomless pit of Russia was never a good idea.

Just because it didn't work, it doesn't mean it couldn't have worked.

Also not being in a position to win, doesn't mean that you're in a position to lose...

It couldn't have worked. General Georg Thomas pointed this out to Hitler. To invade a country like the SU was a stupid idea. If the Soviets simply blew up everything, the whole plan couldn't work. And there was also the Red Army...

Saying that it was a stupid idea is ot a good argument : the only alternative for Barbarossa was unconditional surrender , and as this was out of the question ...
About Thomas : although his arguments were serious, they were also meaningless,as the problem was not on the German side ( manpower,etc ) but on the Soviet side .
The SU could not be defeated by military means .

There were plenty of alternatives for Barbarossa, we've been through this. I am not even sure that unconditional surrender was Britain's term for peace as early as May 1941.

Thomas' arguments were about the futility of the invasion of the SU. What he said was: if we invade the SU, we will have nothing. What you say is: if you invade the SU, you will lose everything. I agree with both

[ljadw]

About the Unconditional Surrender demand : on September 3 1939, Chamberlain said in the Commons that the war would last til the destruction of national socialism .
About Thomas :
1 He was exaggerating Germany's problems : he said that there was only sufficient fuel til October .We know that he was wrong .
2 In the short term (1941-1945 ) the occupation ,exploitation and colonisation of the European part of the SU would not help Germany, it would even hurt Germany .In the long term (after 1945 ) : Hitler speculated that in the far future (fifties or sixties ) there would be a war about world supremacy between Europe ( dominated by Germany ) and America ( dominated by the US ) and in such a war Germany would need the raw materials and food of the Eastern occupied territories .But in the far future also, the Eastern territories would not help,even not save Germany ,because Germany had not the means to occupy,colonize and exploit these territories . The truth is that the attempt to occupy them , colonize them and exploit them would ruin Germany and result in the collaps of the Third Reich before 1953 .
3 Does that mean that Barbarossa was stupid ? NO . Because the reason and even the aim of Barbarossa was NOT to occupy,colonize and exploit
these territories.
4 Whatever: without Barbarossa,Germany was doomed, if Barbarossa failed Germany was also doomed, if Barbarossa succeeded ,Germamy was also doomed .
5 Barbarossa was a desperate attempt to transform a desperate situation in a situation where Germany had still a chance to finish a victorious war .

[Sid Guttridge]

I would suggest that the problems started much earlier.

When Germany invaded the USSR, General Fromm of the Ersatzheer thought he had five months of replacements available for the Feldheer. This would have been OK if (1) the Red Army had not fought as hard as it did and (2) the war had been won by the end of the year.

However, casualties were much higher than anticipated and the five months of reserves were expended to replace casualties in just July and August 1941. And, of course, the men lost were of higher standard and longer experience than the replacements, so quality, as well as quantity, declined from the start.

The Eastern Campaign had to be effectively won in 1941 or not at all. After that, only monumental failures by the USSR could give Germany hope of a positive outcome. Stalin did his best to oblige with his "Not a Step Back" order in mid 1942, but the Red Army largely ignored him and successfully traded territory for time in the face of Army Group South's summer offensive.

Cheers,

Sid.

[HistoryGeek2019]

It couldn't have worked. General Georg Thomas pointed this out to Hitler. To invade a country like the SU was a stupid idea. If the Soviets simply blew up everything, the whole plan couldn't work. And there was also the Red Army...

I believe what General Thomas specifically said was that the Soviet Union did not produce enough of a grain surplus to feed both the people in the occupied part of the SU as well as those in the rest of German occupied Europe. Hitler said fine, we'll take the food and let the people in the SU starve.

[ljadw]

It couldn't have worked. General Georg Thomas pointed this out to Hitler. To invade a country like the SU was a stupid idea. If the Soviets simply blew up everything, the whole plan couldn't work. And there was also the Red Army...

I believe what General Thomas specifically said was that the Soviet Union did not produce enough of a grain surplus to feed both the people in the occupied part of the SU as well as those in the rest of German occupied Europe. Hitler said fine, we'll take the food and let the people in the SU starve.

But ,without the people in the SU, who would produce the food ?

[HistoryGeek2019]

It couldn't have worked. General Georg Thomas pointed this out to Hitler. To invade a country like the SU was a stupid idea. If the Soviets simply blew up everything, the whole plan couldn't work. And there was also the Red Army...

I believe what General Thomas specifically said was that the Soviet Union did not produce enough of a grain surplus to feed both the people in the occupied part of the SU as well as those in the rest of German occupied Europe. Hitler said fine, we'll take the food and let the people in the SU starve.

But ,without the people in the SU, who would produce the food ?

The starvation plan called for the Russian urban centers to be left to fend for themselves, while the Heer hoarded and stole food from the countryside.

[TheMarcksPlan]

When Germany invaded the USSR, General Fromm of the Ersatzheer thought he had five months of replacements available for the Feldheer. This would have been OK if (1) the Red Army had not fought as hard as it did and (2) the war had been won by the end of the year.

However, casualties were much higher than anticipated and the five months of reserves were expended to replace casualties in just July and August 1941. And, of course, the men lost were of higher standard and longer experience than the replacements, so quality, as well as quantity, declined from the start.

Casualties did not exceed planning margins during 1941. The Heer had 561,600 replacements available on June 22, 1941, the LW another 90,000. These were sufficient to cover permanent losses (KIA, wounded and not returned, MIA/PoW) through Novmember: Ostheer's KIA was ~170,000 by the end of November, permanently wounded were about the same, MIA was ~35K. See Askey, Operation Barbarossa v.IIB page 177.

If you just look at replacements versus ALL casualties (i.e. including temporarily sick/unfit and lightly wounded) then you can get the impression that the Heer ran out of replacements in August or so. That gives a wrong impression, however, as the Heer received 509,000 "recuperated replacements" - i.e. returning wounded/sick/unfit - during 1941.

Now it's true that not all available replacements reached the front during the relevant times, especially during Taifun. That was due to failure to plan railroad upgrades adequately, not due to lack of replacements.

Casualties significantly exceeded the replacement pool only during winter. There was an easy fix to that issue: call up the class of 1922 ("JG22"). OKW did not plan to call up that class until November 1941, however, meaning that virtually none of them had time to train and participate in Barbarossa.

The Eastern Campaign had to be effectively won in 1941 or not at all. After that, only monumental failures by the USSR could give Germany hope of a positive outcome. Stalin did his best to oblige with his "Not a Step Back" order in mid 1942, but the Red Army largely ignored him and successfully traded territory for time in the face of Army Group South's summer offensive.

The land lost to Germany during Blau nearly caused mass starvation in the SU. During 1943 the country saw widespread death from malnutrition-related diseases like TB and in the Urals the factories were required to release many workers to "re-feeding" facilities because, due to restricted food supply, they were literally working themselves to death. See Hunger and War. The Soviet economy reached its wartime nadir in 1942, producing about as much steel as did Japan in 43 (8mil tons vs. 7.8mil). Stalin's order was an appropriate communication of the economic stakes of losing land and labor in Southern Russia.

The Ostheer was about half a million men stronger in 1943 than in 42, with better equipment as well. Had Hitler/OKH planned for a two-year campaign in the East and fielded a stronger 42 Ostheer, Germany would have had a good shot at knocking out or crippling the SU during 1942.

The starvation plan called for the Russian urban centers to be left to fend for themselves, while the Heer hoarded and stole food from the countryside.

The Hunger Plan was mostly a pipe dream of a few ideologues and never saw systematic implementation. Throughout the war, the majority of rail traffic in the occupied SU was north-south traffic bringing food from the grain regions to sustain the population. This wasn't, of course, due to Nazi concern for Slavs/Balts. And of course food was never sufficient and millions did in fact die. But it was never practical to starve out the cities and that would have ruined Nazi economic plans and caused further resistance.

What he said was: if we invade the SU, we will have nothing.

Germany extracted most of its manganese ore from Ukraine and relied on Ukrainian iron ore at Nikopol and Krivoy Rog (thus the frantic efforts by AGS to hold those areas into early 1944). Manganese extraction exceeded Soviet deliveries under the Pact. For further details: viewtopic.php?f=55&t=243100.

In addition, the Ostheer largely fed itself from the occupied SU. Had the Ostheer won and redeployed/demobilized, those food resources would have been available to Germany.

One of the accounting errors of analyzing what Germany got from the SU is to look only at imports to the Reich (Tooze and many other historians make this mistake). Given that most of Germany's war effort was in the East, however, that doesn't make sense. Why import from the SU, only to export to Ostheer? Aside from food, my above link details production in Ukraine used by the Ostheer in Ukraine. Again, Ostheer victory would have freed those resources for redeployment.

Btw: Georg Thomas presided over a world-historically inefficient procurement system. I don't know anything about his generalship but his competence on economic matters is highly questionable. There's no reason to accept his analysis as authoritative.

[Yuri]

1922 were called to the RAD-Abteilungs and from 22.06.1941 were used in Russia, only in Army Group Center 22.06.1941 there were 30 RAD-Abteilungs and 6 OT-Abteilungs. In the winter of 1941, they were used as infantry. The RAD's and OT's losses were not counted in the losses of the Heeres.
Further, between the end of December 1941 and the end of March 1942, 150,000 policmen and SS-men (non-Waffen-SS) were transferred to Moscow from the Warsaw and Berlin regions alone, of which 15,000 policmens, including 709 the police officers, were killed.
This the police's and SS's losses were not counted in the losses of the Heeres.
When determining the size of the active army, the recovered wounded who returned to their unit after being cured were not taken into account. It was assumed that the number of returned wounded is equal to the number of patients (non-wounded) sent to a hospital in Germany.

[Yuri]

What is the number of troops in Army Group A / v.Kleist's Army Group/ in the Caucasus in 1942/43?
There is a bit of information about this group in the waiting for an answer. The first and last pages of the Protocol for interviewing a prisoner of war of the 2nd company of the 305th construction battalion from this Army Group.

42-10-20 305BauBatl.jpg

42-10-20 305BauBatl4.jpg

Below is my poor translation of the interrogation of what I think is an interesting Feldwebel.

[Yuri]

Questionnaire

German prisoner of war Feldwebel of the 2nd company of the 305th construction battalion Teich Friedrich, captured 15.10.42 in the village of Vladimirovka /up to 55 km South-East of Budennovsk/
Field mail 26110.
Arrived in the Intelligence Department of the Northern group headquarters on 17.10.1942.
Interviewed 18-20. 10. 42.

Personal data.
He was born in 1897 in Mulheim (Ruhr region), with higher medical education, a doctor for gastrointestinal diseases, but did not practice medicine, and led an exemplary agriculture, inherited from his father, up to 30 hectares. at this time, the farm employs 2-3 French prisoners of war and 2-3 German workers in the busy season. He served in the Kaiser's army during the first imperialist war and participated in the war on the Western and Balkan fronts. At the same time, he was promoted to Feldwebel. Under the Hitler regime, he was persecuted because of his brother, a lawyer who acted as a defender in trials against the Communists and who fled to Tetuan /Morocco/ in 1934 . He was drafted into the army in 1940 and sent to the 221st sapper battalion. Participated in the war against France and Belgium. Shortly before the war against the USSR, the 221st battalion was moved to the Przemysl region. On the Eastern front, the prisoner of war was held continuously until the moment of capture. While in the ranks of the Hitler's army, he was also persecuted. On 30.9.1941, he was sentenced to 6 months in prison, serving a sentence at the end of the war, for condemning cruel methods of treatment of the population of the occupied Soviet regions. After the trial, the prisoner of war was transferred to the 305th sapper battalion, where he commanded the 2nd company's baggage train and served as a paramedic. In view of the political distrust of the prisoner of war on the part of the Hitler's regime, he, as a doctor, was not promoted to the highest rank.


2.Route of the 221st and 305th construction battalions.
Since the beginning of the war against the USSR, the 221st battalion moved along the route: Lviv, Tarnopol, Kirovograd, Krivoy Rog, Dneprodzerzhinsk, Poltava, and Krasnograd. Here the prisoner of war was transferred as punishment to the 305th sapper battalion and with it moved back to Poltava-Staritskovka-Krasnograd-Lozovaya- Artemovsk. Here, 12 km from the city, the battalion spent the winter and in the spring was transferred to Konstantinovka, and from there to Mariupol, Kirpichev, where it built a road to Taganrog for about three months. In the summer of 1942, the 305th battalion was moved again by rail to Lozovaya, and from there on foot to Shakhty, Peschanokopskoe, Orlovka, Pravokumskoe, and Vladimirovka. In the area of Orlovka, the battalion was divided into separate units. Only the 2nd company arrived in Vladimirovka. Other companies of the battalion remained: the 1st company in Orlovka, and the 3rd company does not know where. 4th company in the Budennovsk area.

3.Combat mission and circumstances of capture.
The 2nd company was assigned the task of equipping positions in the Vladimirovka area for a bridgehead to provide a crossing of the Kuma river. The position was equipped for parts of the Afrika Korps, which were to arrive at Pravokumskoe by 14.10.1942. In Vladimirovka, the 2nd company of the 305th sapper battalion arrived on 10.10.1942 and worked for 5 days. The work was performed by company soldiers and 60 women who were forcibly mobilized from the population of Vladimirovka. There were no troops here.
The 2nd company was located in Pravokumskoye and came to Vladimirovka daily for work, and by the evening returned back to Pravokumskoye.
15.10.1942 about 6 o'clock in the morning, 55 people from the second company on 3 cars arrived in Vladimirovka and barely had time to unload, as they were fired at by machine-gun fire. A prisoner of war with 12 other German soldiers hid in one of the houses, where he was captured.

4. Location of units and subordination.
The prisoner of war knows that in the area of the road Budennovsk - Vladimirovka in all localities are located units of the division of the African corps, which came from Africa through Germany. The prisoner of war personally spoke with the quartermasters of one company of the specified division in Pravokumskoye. Quartermasters reported that one company of the new division and the battalion headquarters should arrive in Pravokumskoye on 15.10.1942. Only 270 people. 14.10.1942 the prisoner of war personally saw one young General who came to inspect the work done by the 2nd company of the sapper battalion. The prisoner of war believes that this General commands a newly arrived division, or is part of the headquarters of this division. Soldiers of the African corps wear khaki uniforms with a brown tinge and a mountain Rifleman's cap with a visor. Budennovsk was home to the 134th construction battalion and the 4th company of the 305th construction battalion. In addition, there were units of the signal troops. In levokumskoe there is a district agricultural Fuhrer appointed recently instead of the Fuhrer who was allegedly killed recently by the population. Several construction battalions are located in localities along the Peschanokopskoe - Mineralnye Vody - Budennovsk road.
The 305th construction battalion is subordinate to the 45th construction headquarters /45 oberbaustab/ 1st Tank army.

5.Plans and intentions of the German command.
From conversations in the company with various soldiers returning from Germany to the Eastern front, the prisoner of war knows that in the area between the don river and the Volga river, about 150 km from the Volga Bank, a chain of fortifications, Pillboxes, etc.is currently being built. For this purpose, many vehicles with cement, concrete mixers and other construction machines are being sent from Germany to this area. The German army, according to these conversations, will not advance further on the Volga river. In the North Caucasus, the German army also does not intend to move further until the spring of next year, but will consolidate its current positions and move to winter quarters. The prisoner of war knows that in all major settlements of the North Caucasus, winter apartments are being prepared for the German army. The 305th construction battalion planned to settle in winter quarters in the Budennovsk area, and the 2nd company of the battalion in the Pravokumskoye area.

6.Construction battalions in the North Caucasus.
In the North Caucasus, there are 6 construction battalions: the 305th, 221st, 134th, 521st, 551st and the number of the sixth battalion does not know, but believes that the 563rd. All these battalions are led by the 45th oberbaustab. The task of these battalions is to improve roads and build bridges. The prisoner of war believes that the 563rd battalion is building bridges. The personnel of these battalions are non-combatant soldiers of older ages from 40 to 45 years old and a small part of the youth recognized as unfit for combat operations. The 221st and 305th construction battalions include many Ukrainians recruited from the Red army pow camps and civilians. Each company of these battalions has at least 50 Ukrainian men. Recently, an order was allegedly issued that all participants in the 1st imperialist war should be demobilized. In exchange for these soldiers, the 221st and 305th construction battalions were to be replenished with Ukrainians of 150 men for each company. Other battalions were to receive reinforcements from the Germans.

7.Organization, strength and armament of the 305th construction battalion.
The 305th construction battalion consists of 4 companies, a staff company, and a motor transport column consisting of 16 captured vehicles. In each company from 200 to 250 people, 50 of them are Ukrainian volunteers. In total, the battalion has 850 people. The company consists of 3 platoons and a wagon train. The wagon train company has 10-12 captured vehicles and 30 military wagons plus a kitchen, with a total of 64 horses. Weapons: all soldiers and non-commissioned officers have rifles. Each platoon has a captured light machine gun, which usually does not work, since the soldiers are poorly trained militarily. Many do not know how to shoot a rifle, yet each soldier has 60 rounds, but they carry only 15 rounds. The soldiers did not previously have German rifles, but were armed with captured Soviet rifles. Three months ago, the soldiers were given old German rifles, and captured ones were handed over, allegedly, for arming Ukrainian units formed by the German command. Ukrainian soldiers of the 305th construction battalion are not armed and wear a badge sewn on their sleeves (an ellipse is drawn divided by a vertical line - Yuri): blue on the left, yellow on the right. Their cap is without a cockade and without an eagle.

8. The political and moral condition.
Soldiers of the construction battalion are extremely burdened with military service.
Very frequent cases of violation of discipline, failure of the orders of unter-officers, unauthorized absences /tardiness to practice, violating the rules of guard duty /sleep on duty, negligent performance of duties sentinel, etc./.
In the 221st construction battalion, a soldier of the 2nd company Miller, went on vacation, did not return to the unit and went into hiding. In consequence, he was sentenced to 1.5 years in prison. Soldiers are unhappy that they don't get home leave. From the company go on vacation no more than 5 people a month. Food has deteriorated recently, but still the soldiers are not starving. Bread is given out 750 grams per day. Ukrainian soldiers receive the same food as the Germans, with the exception of a bar of chocolate once a month and sugar, which are issued only to the Germans. Ukrainian soldiers are sworn to be loyal to Hitler. In Peschanokopskoe, on the eve of the Ukrainian oath, one doctor and three Ukrainian soldiers escaped from the company. In Orlovka, two Ukrainian soldiers who took the oath got a civilian dress and tried to escape. They were detained by the rural civil police /from the Russians/, handed over to the battalion and sent to Budennovsk for trial at the 45th headquarters of the construction troops.
The mood of the German population in areas subject to British air raids is extremely depressed. The population considers Hitler to be the culprit of their misfortunes. Even the population of Bavaria is hostile to Hitler. The prisoner of war was on leave in Germany at the end of August and visited Nuremberg 1.9.42 after a British air RAID on 30.8.42. the prisoner of War saw great destruction in the city. Factories \Siemens /electric motor/, motor - building Nuremberg-Ausburg, post office buildings, railway station and many houses in the city center were severely damaged. There were several hundred victims. It was said that 20,000 people were left homeless. The prisoner of war heard from soldiers from Breslau and Konigsberg about the great destruction caused to these cities by Soviet air raids. No one believes that the war will end soon. The soldiers do not see a way out of the impasse in which Germany is located.

9.Officers.
Commander of the 2nd company of the 305th construction battalion, Oberleutnant Kleimais, Junior officer of the company Mulgens. Battalion commanded by captain Dr. Feierabend, his assistant captain Pressman.
The chief of the 45th staff of the construction forces, Lieutenant Colonel Hammitsch-Professor at the Dresden Institute of mechanical engineering-is Hitler's son-in-law, married to the Fuhrer's sister. Commander of the 221st construction battalion, major Razina, company commanders of that battalion:
1st company-captain Arngatz, 2nd company-captain Kling, 3rd company-captain Weber, 4th company-captain Dr. Bus.

10.Various
The prisoner of war knows that the German command is looting the occupied Soviet areas. So from the levokumskoye area 140 cars of grain were recently taken out.
Soldiers can send home parcels, in General, no more than 3 kilograms per month.
Soldiers send home sunflower oil and white flour.
There were several cases of typhus and malaria among the company's soldiers. In the 2nd company, 6 soldiers are ill with these diseases. In other companies, several people are also ill with malaria and typhoid.
One of the soldiers of the SS special team No.10 in Mariupol in the soldiers ' club at the table in the spring of 1942 told a group of German soldiers, including the prisoner of war, that all Jews were ordered to Mariupol under the pretext of sending them to the rear with the most valuable things. When they arrived with their children among several thousand people, they were robbed and shot to death, the SS team No.10 carried out the execution. The same teams are available in other occupied cities.
The commander of the 2nd company of the 305th construction battalion, Oberleutnant Kleimans, when sending the company to Vladimirovka, told the soldiers that they should not be afraid of partisans, since there are three regiments of Cossacks in front, formed by the German command, approximately 1000 people per regiment. The prisoner of war personally saw several Cossacks in Cossack uniforms in Pravokumskoe.

The survey was conducted by: Intendant of the 2nd rank Skomorovsky's signature-Yuri /Skomorovsky/

Head of the 3rd division of the intelligence Department of the headquarters of the Northern group of the Transcaucasian front
Major Barsukov’s signature -Yuri /Barsukov/

23.10.1942.

[TheMarcksPlan]

1922 were called to the RAD-Abteilungs and from 22.06.1941 were used in Russia, only in Army Group Center 22.06.1941 there were 30 RAD-Abteilungs

There were many other sources of labor available to the Reich (foreigners, civilian workers) who could have done RAD's menial labor without denying troops to the Heer.

Besides, 60 or so RAD battalions is a small portion of JG22's ~500k men (I don't recall the exact figure).

[Yuri]

This is only those RAD-Germans, those who operated in the zone of Army corps and divisions, in fact, they performed the tasks of sapper units, and then infantry.
You should take into account the Luftwaffe's RAD-Abteilungs.
In addition, since 22.06.1941, the OKH's "Red Ball Express" operated in the East, only ten times more than the American one in terms of the number of cars and the shoulder size of 500-700 kilometers.
In addition, the national socialist automobile corps, that is, the same RAD, was involved here.
This is all in the number of the so-called "Ostheer" was not taken into account.
The number of pepsonnel on RAD-Abteilungs is very very different: from 800 to 3500 people.

[TheMarcksPlan]

The number of pepsonnel on RAD-Abteilungs is very very different: from 800 to 3500 people.

Taking the mean of your figure, 60 battalions would be ~120k men. Still only a quarter of JG22's size of 565,000 fit for service (it was a large class, presumably reflecting deferral of childbirth during the war and tough times immediately following).

Even if they were involved in fighting, they can't have been very effective.

And they can be replaced by foreign labor, which Germany was not fully exploiting at this time, as I have detailed elsewhere.

[ljadw]

The number of pepsonnel on RAD-Abteilungs is very very different: from 800 to 3500 people.

Taking the mean of your figure, 60 battalions would be ~120k men. Still only a quarter of JG22's size of 565,000 fit for service (it was a large class, presumably reflecting deferral of childbirth during the war and tough times immediately following).

Even if they were involved in fighting, they can't have been very effective.

And they can be replaced by foreign labor, which Germany was not fully exploiting at this time, as I have detailed elsewhere.

It is not so that because/if Germany was not fully exploiting foreign labour at this time,that more foreign labour would be available and if it was so that this foreign labour could be used by the Germans .

[Richard Anderson]

This is only those RAD-Germans, those who operated in the zone of Army corps and divisions, in fact, they performed the tasks of sapper units, and then infantry.
You should take into account the Luftwaffe's RAD-Abteilungs.
In addition, since 22.06.1941, the OKH's "Red Ball Express" operated in the East, only ten times more than the American one in terms of the number of cars and the shoulder size of 500-700 kilometers.
In addition, the national socialist automobile corps, that is, the same RAD, was involved here.
This is all in the number of the so-called "Ostheer" was not taken into account.
The number of pepsonnel on RAD-Abteilungs is very very different: from 800 to 3500 people.

If you are talking about the personnel of JG-22 that were already doing RAD service as of 4 June 1941 it was 170,125 of the 565,060 found fit for service. Of the remainder, 117,565 already volunteered for service and were in the Wehrmacht and 72,435 were service-deferred as UK-gestellte.

In terms of the NSKK, which was not actually part of the RAD, it was a NSDAP organization. Information on the exact number of NSKK personnel at the front is difficult to find...on 20 December 1941, 11. AOK reported 40 and the same number of 10 January, 10 February,10 March, 10 April, and 10 May 1942 and the dates intervening. By 31 December 1944 a total of 743 NSKK personnel were recorded as dead due to enemy action. So it seems unlikely there were significant numbers at the front or suffering losses...their important service was training hundreds of thousands of others as drivers.