Morning,
@paulrward: could you please stop naming "Mr. TheMarksPlan" every other paragraph? Thank you
Yes, it is obvious they were collected in sufficient number, but whether or not it was sufficient numbers of the correct sizes, with modifications, working engines, and so forth is a bit less obvious. Anyway, I thought your new date was 10 September rather than the end of the month?
"My" data is the 10th September (or a few days earlier, if possible). But, with the known 10-days-run-up the barges and stuff (at least for the 1st and 2nd Staffel in German diction) would have to sit in the harbours on the 1st September or a few days earlier.
The barges sitting in the harbours OTL End of September were already modified.
Why note it when it is incorrect? The Bodan-Werft PiLaBo Typ A, the prototype PiLaBo 39 (sometimes known as the PiLaBo 38), was completed by Roland-Werft and delivered on 16 July 1940. A total of four were delivered by Bodan-Werft in 1940, so I am unsure how a "shitload" could be available by the end of September.
Actually, you are talking about two different landing boats. The PLB 38 was built in 1938, and was sold to the civilian sector after testing. The PLB 39 was basically the same boat, only that it could be splitted lenghtwise for rail transport. THAT one was completed in July 1940.
So, the PLB 38 was ready for manufacturing in January/February 1940, when the pioneers asked for some. "Shitload" is maybe a bit overselling it, but around 50-100 would be possible till Early September in my opinion.
However, I'm NOT planning on having more than a handfull, so...
They were followed by the 1. Staffel, which was the main body of the initial landing force, sometimes split into two. They were the tugs towing a powered barge and an un-powered barge followed by various "pusher" motorboats.
Actually, no.
According to the GErman dicition, 1st Staffel was the whole thing not on the freighters, including Vorausabteilungen (Ist Gruppe) the main landing from the barges (2nd Gruppe) and some barges from the freighters (3rd Gruppe). The stuff on the freighters (and probably most of their barges) were the 2nd Staffel. Everything else from the initial Divisions left in France was the 3rd Staffel. The initial Divisions being the 1st Treffen.
In theory it would have been great if all the barges were powered, but in truth the power of the powered barges was pretty marginal, thus the provision of tugs and pusher boats. There probably wasn't much of an advantage at putting all the powered barges together and some downsides...at least the combination of tugs, motorboats, powered barges, and un-powered barges had some redundancy built in.
The provision for pusher boats was because of the unpowered barges. Later in the planning, pusher boats were eliminited completely, the powered barges having the task to help the unpowered land.
About 800 barges were motorized, About 733 were required for the 1, Staffel, so, yeah, in theory enough, but that left no powered barges for the 2. Staffel and later.
As I stated earlier, the loading plan is and was "concerning" to say the least. When I did my loading plan I arrived at around 400 Peniche and 140 Kampinen (exluding Abschitt E and not counting the barges brought in by the freighters), and with a bit of shifting around, there would probably be even less need. Unfortunately the newest version is in the office, at home I have only the older one.
If we assume there being around 800 powered barges, with around 130 of them without having a useable engine, that would leave 670 units.
As for the 3rd Staffel having no powered barges allocated at first... I think it is more important to get the 1st Staffel on land with as many fighting troops as possible from as many barges that can move on their own power.
So what "200 not-motorised ones with the aircraft engines" are those"? The B-Fähre were never considered suitable for cross-Channel operations, which leaves the c. 25-30 sS "Siebel" Fähre and the 22 Herbert Fähre were all available, but at the end of September and early October.
No, they were not the different Ferries, but normal unpowered barges with two BMW aircraft engines on deck. There were 200 modified this way (150 Peniche and 50 Kampinen) and were called Type AF. Theoretically they were able to move with 6-7 Kn.
(with the around 130 powered barges left over and the 200 Type AF you would have 330 powered barges for the 3rd Staffel and 2nd Treffen. Plus whatever comes back from the other side of the Chanel)
Well, 341 horse in the entire 1. Staffel, but that would mostly be from the offloading of the transports during the night of the first day. The bulk of the horses would land with the 2. Staffel,4,427 of them. That was the basic issue of the German Heer, it was horse-based and it wasn't a simple matter of just saying "here, take a truck and give us four horses". The limbers and carts for horse draft couldn't be motor drawn, so they would all have to be replaced as well. Then you need the trained drivers and mechanics.
Actually, No. 1st Staffel are the barges, not the transports - those being the 3rd Staffel.
For the 341 horses for the 1st Staffel, I'm assuming, you are referencing page 226 in Schenk (German version). Do note, however, that that list is for only one division, and next to the 341 horses there are also 300 "Karren" (for me it is not exactly clear if these are Infanteriekarren or the Feldwagen), 93 light cars, 34 trucks, 135 motorcycles and 46 MC-combinations. Please don enlighten me, why do you need so much transport for establishing, enlarging and securing of a not-so-deep bridgehead. And why do you need all these from the very first moment.
As for getting enough motor transport.
Each division had six supply columns (30t), from those half were mot and half horse-drawn. You don't have to do anything but relocate mot columns from the divisions that are not participating to the ones that do. One horse-drawn column had 46 wagons, one motorised 11 trucks.
As for the light (15t) columns for each regiment you could do two things:
a, get 33 light trucks for each division (297 units total) from somewhere - French booty, for example - and organise a driving camp for, say, 500 soldiers total.
b, get normal (30t) columns from divisions that are not participating, and attach half a column to each regiment.
More problematic would be the trains on Company and Battalion Level. Those had 4 wagons each, or two trucks. For a division (36 companies and 9 Btl = 45 in total) you would need 90 trucks, or 810 for all nine divisions (counting the two mountain divisions as "full" division). Assuming, InfDiv 1. Welle had only horses and wagons and no trucks at all. That point is a bit hazy.
Would it be possible to get around 800 further light trucks from somewhere and teach around the same number of soldiers how to drive in, say, two month?
Since the whole point of TMP was that is was possible to get enough trucks for 10 further fst divisions in less than a year...
Sure, but the actual assault plan was worse. They literally were placing entire divisions into what were essentially fire sacks with little means of getting off the beach, like at Cuckmere Haven or even worse at Newhaven
This is exactly what I'm talking about. Cuckmere Haven was an idiotic idea to begin with (Newhaven not so much), and there were other points too that I simply can not understand. For example, no landing at or near the only place that could be called a habrour (Folkstone), the deployment of the Vorausabteilung that violated every notion of Schwerpunkt, and so forth.
Possible, but the likelihood was that large numbers of those barges would be beached and would never be extricated, which makes getting the 2. Staffel and the follow-ups impossible to get ashore. There really wasn't a good solution for the simple fact that they were trying to run an incredibly complex and large amphibious operation off the cuff with jury-rigged vessels of widely varying quality.
That's the 3rd Staffel or the 2nd Treffen, but I know, what you mean.
HOWEVER.
Even if we assume the whole 1st, 2nd and 3rd Staffel is a total loss (a bit on the optimistic side for the UK) that would still leave around 1200 barges still sitting in French ports.