The following is an article I wrote about the plausibility of German military historian Rüdiger Overmans' figures in Deutsche Militärische Verluste im Zweiten Weltkrieg, following discussions on a Wikipedia talk page mentioned under https://www.quora.com/In-the-ground-war ... uehlenkamp Feedback would be welcome, especially such that allows me to replace the Wikipedia references in the article with references to works of military historiography (e.g. regarding the casualties of both sides in the battle for Brest, France, and the number of German dead and wounded in the Battle of the Scheldt).
As the article is quite long (15,941 words including footnotes), I'll post it in several installments over the next couple of days. What follows is the first installment.
---
Are Rüdiger Overmans’ figures of German military fatalities in World War II plausible?
1. Introduction
In a study about German military casualties in World War II by German military historian Rüdiger Overmans[1] , it is claimed that the total number of members of the German armed forces who lost their lives during World War II or in captivity after that war was about 5,318,000.
The above figure is the result of extrapolations from a statistical sample taken from German military personnel records located at the Deutsche Dienststelle (WASt), a German government agency based in Berlin which maintains records of members of the former German Wehrmacht who were killed in action, as well as official military records of all military personnel during the Second World War. It exceeds by about one million the number of dead and missing German military personnel recorded by that agency.[2] It also exceeds by about 900,000 the figure resulting from a demographic analysis published by the West German government in 1960.[3]
Overmans’ total is broken down by theater of operations/place of death as shown below.[4] It should always be borne in mind that, notwithstanding their last-digit precision suggesting otherwise, these figures are extrapolations from a statistical sample and therefore do not represent actually recorded deaths.
Africa_ 16,066
Balkans until October 1944_ 103,693
North, i.e. Scandinavia without Finland_ 30,165
Western Front until 31.12.1944_ 339,957*
Italy until the capitulation_ 150,660
Eastern Front until 31.12.1944_ 2,742,909
Final Battles in East and West after 1 January 1945_ 1,230,045**
Other Theaters (home front, deaths at sea, Polish campaign etc.)_ 245,561
Subtotal without deaths in captivity_ 4,859,056
American captivity_ 22,000
French captivity_ 34,033
British captivity_ 21,033
Yugoslavian captivity_ 11,000
Soviet captivity_ 363,343
Other captivity_ 8,066
Subtotal deaths in captivity_ 459,475
Total _ 5,318,531
* Thereof 244,891 deaths in 1944.[5]
** Thereof an estimated two-thirds (ca. 820,030) on the Eastern Front and an estimated one-third (ca. 410,015) on the Western Front.[6]
The purpose of this article is to examine the plausibility of the above figures.
2. Internal inconsistencies
Overmans’ study was generally well received at the time of its publication, namely by professional colleagues.[7] However, there were also critical voices, namely that of Swedish military historian Niklas Zetterling, who argued that Overmans’ sample may not be reliable, that some of his assumptions (especially the one that the absence of information about an individual’s fate in a sample file necessarily means that said individual died during the war) are unrealistic, and that his claims about the inaccuracy of the German casualty reporting system, at least before 1945, are untenable.[8]
Although Zetterling suspects that Overmans’ total figure of German military fatalities, and especially his figures for certain periods, may be too high, he doesn’t examine these figures in detail, and he also makes no statement about the reliability of Overmans’ death figures attributed to individual theaters of operation. Criticism in this sense was first expressed, as far as I know, in an anonymous review of Overmans’ book[9] , the arguments in this respect being the following (my translation and emphases):
The year 1945 has always been a problem. Now, for the "Final Battles" O[vermans] strangely no longer differentiates between theaters of operation. He determines exactly 1,230,045 deaths. More precisely: (1) killed, (2) missing, (3) otherwise deceased (without prisoners of war), as is differentiated on p. 272. However, many of the missing (O. calculates exactly 697,319) were first taken prisoner and died only in captivity. Nevertheless O. boldly claims that "300,000 soldiers per month" (p.275), "that is, 10,000 men per day" (p.279, cf. p.283, strikingly also stated in the introduction) actually lost their lives – a conclusion that contradicts the previous differentiation and is mistaken anyway. Thereafter O. estimates that of the 1,230,045 deaths (only Eastern and Western Front, without Italy, without deaths in captivity etc.) about two-thirds occurred on the Eastern Front (p.265). This would however mean that in 1945 about 400,000 soldiers were killed in the West alone – a glaringly high number not even remotely confirmed by any other source (for the Ardennes Offensive one must assume a maximum of 20,000, for the Ruhr Pocket 10,000 dead). In total the number of deaths on the Western Front in 1945 was probably less than 100,000.
A basic problem of O.’s study is anyway the one that his individual figures are hardly ever compared with estimates from works of military history. And when in the summary (p. 321) O. sees his total of 5.3 million dead confirmed only by Soviet author Urlanis (Bilanz der Kriege, 1965), he overlooks that Urlanis’ figure of 5.5 million fallen on p. 181 expressly refers to "Germany and its former Allies", i.e. it includes Italy, Romania etc., whereas for Germany itself 4 to 4.5 million dead (pp. 185f.) are assumed throughout [Urlanis’ book].
The reviewer’s reading of Urlanis is correct. Urlanis’ estimate of over 4 million German military fatalities in World War II is mentioned in a 1966 German review of Urlanis’ book, which apparently considers this estimate to be too high.[10]
It is also correct that, on p. 272 of his book, Overmans subdivides his figure of 1,230,045 fatalities in the "Final Battles" of 1945 as follows: fallen, 401,660; died otherwise, 131,066[11]; missing, 697,319. The missing (i.e. the majority of the assumed deaths, about 56.7 %) would to a large extent be soldiers taken captive by the enemy, who may have died months or years after the end of the war.[12] This means that, if elsewhere in the book Overmans claims that 1,230,045 members of the German armed forces lost their lives on the Eastern and Western Fronts between January and May 1945 (about 300,000 per month or 10,000 per day, as he points out on pp. 275, 279 and 283), this claim is contradicted by Overmans’ own breakdown of the claimed "Final Battles" death toll.
Then there is Overmans’ split of the claimed "Final Battles" death toll between Eastern and Western Front, two-thirds (820,030) on the former and one-third (410,015) on the latter. This would mean a daily average of 6,406 deaths in the East and 3,203 deaths in the West. For the East this daily average is not implausible in light of Overmans’ monthly figures on p. 277, which add up to 882,900 deaths between June and December 1944 (4,126 per day on average), the bloodiest months being July and August 1944 with, respectively, 169,881 and 277,465 deaths (about 5,480 per day in July and 8,950 per day in August). But in the West, there were "only" 244,891 deaths in 1944, according to the Table 53 on p. 266 of Overmans’ book. Even if all these deaths had occurred after the commencement of the Allied invasion, i.e. between 6 June and 31 December 1944 (a period of 208 days), this would mean a daily average of 1,177 deaths in this period. So how can the average daily number of deaths in the West have jumped from 1,177 to 3,203, i.e. by a factor of about 2.7, between 1944 and 1945? Were the scale and intensity of the fighting on that front so much larger in 1945 than in 1944? There’s no evidence that this was so, the history of the Western Allies’ campaign in Europe rather suggesting that the fighting grew less intense towards the war’s end and the final months were an anticlimax, with resistance becoming ever more sporadic and an increasing number of German troops surrendering after token resistance or without a fight.[13]
Overmans’ two-thirds vs. one-third split also makes no sense for other reasons. Until the end of 1944, according to the table on p. 272 of Overmans’ book, there were a total of 339,957 deaths in the West (231,132 fallen, 58,000 died otherwise and 50,825 missing) versus 2,742,909 deaths in the East (1,401,462 fallen, 206,033 died otherwise, and 1,135,414 missing). So until the end of 1944 the Eastern Front accounted for 85.84% of the fallen, 78.03% of those who died otherwise and 95.72% of the missing. It seems highly implausible, not to say impossible, that this overwhelming predominance of the Eastern over the Western Front, especially as concerns the number of missing servicemen, should all of a sudden have changed into a two-thirds vs. one-third relation during the "Final Battles". Even if one assumed that all 244,891 deaths in the west in 1944 (p. 266) occurred between June and December 1944 and sets this against the 882,900 deaths on the Eastern Front in the same period, the relation would be 21.71% in the West versus 78.29% in the East. Applied to Overmans’ "Final Battles" figure of 1,230,045, this would mean 267,095 deaths in the West (about 2,087 per day) versus 962,950 in the East (about 7,523 per day). The eastern daily average would be lower than that of August 1944 (8,950) and thus not implausible in light of the 1944 figures. The western daily average, on the other hand, would still be an improbable 1.77 times higher than between June and December 1944.
Given these internal inconsistencies in Overmans’ study, the question arises if and to what extent Overmans’ figures are compatible with the numbers of German military fatalities in the respective theater that have been established by military historiography about the fighting in that theater.
This shall be examined, first of all, as concerns the Western Allies’ campaign in Western Europe from 6 June 1944 to 8 May 1945.
3. The Western Allies’ campaign in Western Europe from 6 June 1944 to 8 May 1945
According to Overmans’ estimates mentioned in the introduction, a total of about 655,000 members of the German armed forces (244,891 in 1944 and ca. 410,015 between 1 January and 8 May 1945) lost their lives on the Western Front in 1944/45. Of the 244,891 deaths in 1944, the overwhelming majority would have died between 6 June and 31 December of that year. Overmans provides no breakdown of the 1944 figure, but he claims 11,033, 12,000 and 11,000 dead for, respectively, the years 1941, 1942 and 1943.[14] Deducting half the 1942 figure for the first half of 1944, it can be assumed that 238,891 deaths would have occurred after the beginning of the Allied invasion. The sum total of German military fatalities in fighting the Western Allies between 6 June 1944 and the date of the German capitulation would thus be (238,891 + 410,015 =) 648,906. Not all these fatalities would be combat-related. As already mentioned, Overmans estimates that 58,000 of the 339,957 deaths in the West during the period up to 31 December 1944, or about 17.06 % of the total, were men who "died otherwise". As concerns the "Final Battles", he places 131,066 out of 1,230,045 deaths, or about 10.66 %, in the "died otherwise" category. As those who "died otherwise" include deaths from disease, accident, court martial execution and suicide besides men who succumbed later to battle wounds, and as it cannot be established what proportion corresponds to each cause, these fatalities shall for good measure be wholly deducted from the total number of fatalities to establish the deaths due to battle. Deducting the aforementioned percentages (17.06 % for June to December 1944, 10.66 % for January to May 1945) from the aforementioned 238,891 and 410,000 deaths for the periods June to December 1944 and January to May 1945 would yield 198,136 battle deaths in the former and 366,307 battle deaths in the latter period, for a total of 564,443 German battle deaths between 6 June 1944 and 9 May 1945. One could further think of deducting from the number of men listed as missing by Overmans a number who died after becoming prisoners of war, but first of all this number cannot be established and second Overmans’ numbers of deaths in captivity are far below those of the Maschke Commission[15] only as concerns the USSR and Yugoslavia, whereas regarding France, Great Britain and the US they exceed the Maschke Commission’s figures.[16] This means that, unlike in what concerns the Eastern Front, all missing on the Western Front can be considered battle deaths according to Overmans.
The plausibility of these figures shall in the following be examined on hand of the following records and estimates:
• US military estimates of total fatalities inflicted on the German armed forces;
• Allied and German casualties in the major engagements of the period.
3.1 US military estimates of total fatalities inflicted on the German armed forces
In General George C. Marshall’s Biennial Reports of the Chief of Staff of the United States Army to the Secretary of War for the period from 1 July 1939 to 30 June 1945, battle casualties of the US Army in the mentioned period were stated to have been 943,222, including 201,367 killed, 570,783 wounded, 114,205 prisoners and 56,867 missing. Marshall pointed out that US Army battle deaths in World War II were higher than the combined losses, Union and Confederate, in the American Civil War.[17]
These were casualties of the US Army including the Army Air Forces, not the total US battle casualties in World War II as the casualties of the US Navy, the US Marine Corps and the US Coast Guard were not included. It seems that a part of those reported missing by Marshall were later found to have been killed and/or a part of the wounded later succumbed to their wounds, for total US Army battle deaths were finally put at 234,874.[18] Battle deaths of the US Navy and US Marine Corps were respectively 36,950 and 19,733, for a total of 291,557 battle deaths of all US armed forces during World War II. In addition all services suffered 113,842 non-battle deaths due to diseases, accidents or other causes (thereof 83,400 in the Army, this figure is not included in Marshall’s report as that report refers to battle deaths only), for a total of 405,399 US servicemen who lost their lives during World War II.
Having emphasized how huge the number of US army battle casualties in World War II had been, Marshall pointed out that enemy casualties had been much higher[19] :
As staggering as our casualties have been, the enemy forces opposing us suffered many times more heavily; 1,592,600 Germans, Italians, and Japanese troops were killed for the 201,367 American soldiers who died. It is estimated that permanently disabled enemy total 303,700. We captured and disarmed 8,150,447 enemy troops.
The break-down of German and Italian losses against American, British, and French forces in the war in Europe follows:
[Theater]_ Battle Dead_Permanently Disabled_Captured_Total
_Tunisia_19,600_19,000_130,000_168,000
_Sicily_5,000_2,000_7,100_14,100
_Italy_86,000_15,000_357,089_458,089
_Western Front_263,000_49,000_7,614,794 (1)_7,926,794
_Total _373,600_85,000_8,108,983(1)_8,567,583
(1) Includes 3,404,949 disarmed enemy forces.
As can be seen above, Marshall’s figure of enemy deaths on the Western Front is 263,000. It is not clear whether Marshall’s figures include members of the Luftwaffe killed in the air battles over Germany. Given that such figures would be reported by the US Army Air Forces and thus be available to Marshall, and that Marshall’s figures of American casualties obviously includes the Army Air Forces, it is possible that his figure of German deaths on the Western Front also include the air battles over Germany. But even if it only includes enemy losses on the ground or in the air related to the ground campaigns, it cannot escape notice that Marshall’s figure is much lower than the aforementioned figure of 564,443 based on Overmans, which exceeds Marshall’s figure by a factor of about 2.15, the difference between the two figures being 301,443 or about 114.62% of Marshall’s figure.
How likely is it that Marshall should have underestimated the number of fatalities inflicted on the enemy by a factor of about 2.15, and that his estimate should have missed 301,443 German military fatalities inflicted by US, British and French forces on the Western Front between June 1944 and May 1945?
Throughout history military commanders have tended to overestimate or deliberately overstate casualties inflicted on the enemy side, especially where such casualties could not be accurately counted (as is usually the case with enemy dead and wounded, whereas the number of prisoners of war taken can be more precisely assessed). Was Marshall a big exception to this rule, a military commander who underestimated enemy fatalities by a factor of about 2.15? There is no indication in this direction in his mention of German casualties throughout his reports, on the contrary. Regarding the outcome of the German Ardennes Offensive (16 December 1944 – 29 January 1945), Marshall wrote the following:[20]
The Germans gained an initial tactical success and imposed a delay of about six weeks on the main Allied offensive in the north, but failed to seize their primary objectives of Liege and Namur. They lost 220,000 men, including 110,000 prisoners, and more than 1,400 tanks and assault guns. The operation was carried out by the Fifth and Sixth Panzer Armies, supported by the Seventh Army, thus stripping the Reich of all strategic reserves and seriously depleting the resources required to meet the powerful Soviet offensive in January.
Marshall’s figure of 220,000 German casualties in the Ardennes Offensive, thereof 110,000 killed and wounded and 110,000 prisoners of war, has not been confirmed by military historiography. The lowest estimate comes from Dipl.-oec. Ralph W. Göhlert of the Militärhistorischer Arbeitskreis, RK Ratingen, who states that the losses of the three armies involved in the offensive were about 68,000 men, thereof 10,749 killed, 35,169 wounded and 22,388 missing, versus Allied casualties of about 77,000, thereof 8,607 killed, 47,138 wounded and 21,144 missing.[21] Antony Beevor writes the following:[22]
German and Allied casualties in the Ardennes fighting from 16 December 1944 to 29 January 1945 were fairly equal. Total German losses were around 80,000 dead, wounded and missing. The Americans suffered 75,482 casualties, with 8,407 killed. The British lost 1,408, of whom 200 were killed. The unfortunate 106th Infantry Division lost the most men, 8,568, but many of them were prisoners of war. The 101st Airborne suffered the highest death rate with 535 killed in action.
Roger Cirillo of the US Army Center of Military History provides the following information[23] :
No official German losses for the Ardennes have been computed but they have been estimated at between 81,000 and 103,000. A recently published German scholarly source gave the following German casualty totals: Ardennes-67,200; Alsace (not including Colmar Pocket)-22,932.
The above-quoted sources suggest that Marshall’s aforementioned figure of German casualties in the Ardennes Offensive is rather on the high side, which in turn suggests the same for his overall total of 263,000 deaths on the German side.
According to the US Third Army’s After Action Report of May 1945, the Third Army inflicted 1,811,388 losses on the enemy forces facing it between 1 August 1944 and 13 May 1945, thereof 144,500 killed, 386,200 wounded and 1,280,688 POWs, against own losses of 16,596 killed, 96,241 wounded, and 26,809 missing in action for a total of 139,646 casualties.[24] However, Robert Fuller’s review of Third Army records, while confirming the aforementioned number of POWs, found that the number of enemy killed and wounded was somewhat lower than claimed in the May 1945 report, respectively 47,500 and 115,700. Fuller’s comparative assessment of German and Allied casualties is the following (emphasis added):[25]
Victory in the European Theater of Operations exacted its toll on the Allies. The total Allied casualties (killed, wounded, captured, missing) were 766,294 men. This included 586,628 Americans with 135,576 killed. The remainder of the Allied deaths reached about 60,000 men.
The German deaths on all fronts were about 3,000,000. German casualties on the Western Front probably equaled, or exceeded, Allied casualties. There were more than 2,000,000 Germans captured by the Allies in the West. German statistics have been less precise because of records destroyed and a progressively disintegrating German support staff at all unit levels that kept and maintained accurate figures.
The Third Army claimed by its records to have killed 47,500 and wounded 115,700 of the enemy between August 1, 1944 and May 9, 1945 at the time hostilities were to have ceased. There were 765,483 prisoners captured during the same time period. Between May 9 and May 13, there were 515,205 prisoners who were processed by various U.S. Army corps and division cages. This gave a total of 1,280,688 enemy prisoners captured. To include the killed and wounded, total enemy losses attributed to the Third Army were estimated at 1,443,888.
Between August 1, 1944 and May 9, 1945 (0001 B hours or one minute past midnight, double daylight saving time) the Third Army lost 27,104 killed and 86,267 wounded. There were 18,957 injuries of all kinds and 28,237 men listed as missing in action. To include 127 men captured by the enemy, brought total casualties of the Third Army to 160,692 in 281 continuous days of operations.
[…]
Taking German troop deaths to American deaths in the Third Army operating area would figure as a ratio of 1:1.75. That would have meant for every American death, 1.75 Germans were killed.
Fuller’s arithmetic in establishing the US Third Army’s "kill ratio" of 1:1.75 is questionable in that it only counts as killed the 27,104 Third Army servicemen listed as killed, but no part of the 28,137 men listed as missing, though it stands to reason that a part of the missing had also been killed while another part had been taken prisoner by the enemy. Fuller, who writes that German casualties on the Western Front "probably equaled, or exceeded" those of the Allies, mentions total Allied casualties (killed, wounded, captured, missing) of 766,294 men, thereof about 195,576 killed. The number killed amounts to about 25.52% of total casualties, suggesting that it includes a part of those originally reported as missing.[26]
Fuller’s figure of 766,294 Allied casualties seems to be based on MacDonald.[27] A higher total with a lower number of fatalities (780,860, thereof 164,590 killed or missing, 537,590 wounded and 78,680 captured) is given by Ellis.[28] The difference in the number of fatalities between MacDonald and Ellis may be due to the fact that wounded men who later succumbed to their wounds were counted by the former but not by the latter. According to a post-war US Army study, the army and army air forces of the United States suffered 586,628 battle casualties in Western Europe, including 116,991 killed in action and 381,350 wounded. 16,264 died of wounds and injuries, and 2,321 men (950 "captured and interned" and 1371 "missing in action") were later found to have died or declared dead, for a total of 135,576 "deaths among battle casualties".[29] Neither MacDonald’s nor Ellis’ total numbers of Allied casualties (respectively 766,294 and 780,860) seem to include (non-fatal) casualties due to non-battle causes (accidents, disease or exposure outside captivity). So the number of US Third Army fatalities corresponding to the relation between the total number of Allied fatalities (195,576) and the total number of casualties (766,294) according to MacDonald would be 25.52% of 141,735 battle casualties, or 36,174 fatalities (65.37% of the 27,104 + 28,237 = 55,341 servicemen either dead or missing). Set against this figure, the number of German fatalities according to Third Army records assessed by Fuller (47,500) would mean an Allied vs. German fatalities ratio of 1:1.31. This would be slightly less favorable to the Allies than the relation between Marshall’s estimate of 263,000 Germans fatalities and the 195,576 Allied fatalities in the entire campaign in Western Europe claimed by MacDonald and Fuller (1:1.34). If, as seems to be Fuller’s assumption in highlighting it, the US Third Army’s "kill ratio" was better than that of other Allied armies, this would be a further indication that Marshall’s estimate of 263,000 German fatalities is too high.
If, as suggested by the above evidence, Marshall’s figure of 263,000 German deaths is on the high side, this applies all the more to the aforementioned 564,443 German military battle deaths on the Western Front in 1944/45 that are suggested by Overmans’ calculations.
Even if Marshall’s figure is assumed to be realistic, the figure that Overmans’ study suggests must be dismissed as widely exaggerated in light of Marshall’s estimate.
Notes
[1] Rüdiger Overmans, Deutsche militärische Verluste im Zweiten Weltkrieg. Oldenbourg 2000. ISBN 3-486-56531-1
[2] About 4.3 million, thereof 3.1 million confirmed dead and 1.2 million missing (Willi Kammerer; Anja Kammerer- Narben bleiben die Arbeit der Suchdienste - 60 Jahre nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg, 2005, edited by the Deutsche Dienststelle and the Search Service of the German Red Cross inter alia, p. 17).
[3] About 4,440,000 according to Statistisches Jahrbuch für die Bundesrepublik Deutschland 1960, p. 78.
[4] Overmans, Verluste, pp. 174 and 336.
[5] Overmans, Verluste, p. 266.
[6] Overmans, Verluste, p. 265.
[7] See, for instance, the favorable review by Christian Hartmann in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung on 7.6.2000, online under http://www.faz.net/aktuell/feuilleton/p ... ageIndex_2, retrieved on 14.02.2017.
[8] Niklas Zetterling, ‘Comments on “Deutsche Militärische Verluste” by Rüdiger Overmans’, online under https://web.archive.org/web/20060219111 ... ermans.pdf
[9] ‘Vorsicht, Statistik’, written by “Hobbyhistorian” on 12 May 2011 on the page https://www.amazon.de/Deutsche-milit%C3 ... 3486200283, retrieved on 14.02.2017.
[10] ‘Kriegstote: Zu lange vermißt’, in: Der Spiegel, 21.11.1966, online under http://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/print/d-46415229.html, retrieved on 14.02.2017.
[11] This category (“auf sonstige Weise gestorben”) includes servicemen who died from wounds, disease or accident, were executed by courts martial or committed suicide, see Deutsche Militärische Verluste, pp. 175-176.
[12] The number of deaths in captivity calculated by Overmans is about 459,000, thereof 363,000 in Soviet captivity (Verluste, p. 286). Overmans’ figure of deaths in Soviet captivity is about 700,000 lower than the number (ca. 1,094,000) established between 1962 and 1974 by a German government commission, the Maschke Commission. Overmans (Verluste, pp. 288f.) considers it "plausible, though not provable" that these 700,000, which correspond to roughly half the about 1.5 missing on the Eastern Front that he calculated, perished in Soviet captivity.
[13] For a description of the fighting on the Western Front between February and May 1945, see Max Hastings, Armageddon: The Battle for Germany 1944-45, Pan Books 2004, pp. 389-437 and 481-514. There is nothing in Hastings’ account to suggest fighting on such scale and with such intensity as would be required for several hundred thousand deaths to occur on the German side.
[14] Deutsche Militärische Verluste, Table 53 on p. 266.
[15] See note 12.
[16] See Table 65 on p. 286. France: 34,000 according to Overmans vs. 25,000 according to Maschke; Great Britain, 21,000 vs. 1,300; US: 22,000 vs. 5,000; Yugoslavia: 11,000 vs. 80,000; other states: 8,000 vs. 13,000; USSR: 363,000 vs. 1,090,000.
[17] George C Marshall, Biennial reports of the Chief of Staff of the United States Army to the Secretary of War : 1 July 1939-30 June 1945, Washington, DC: Center of Military History, 1996, p. 201. Marshall’s reports are available for download in PDF format under http://www.history.army.mil/html/books/ ... index.html (retrieved 14.02.2017).
[18] Congressional Research Report – American War and Military Operations Casualties, Table I on p. 2 (online under https://fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/RL32492.pdf, retrieved on 14.02.2017).
[19] Biennial reports, p. 202.
[20] Biennial reports, p. 146.
[21] ‘Die letzte deutsche Offensive sollte eine Wende bringen’, text posted under http://forumarchiv.balsi.de/verlauf_wel ... 20924.html (retrieved 14.02.2017).
[22] Anthony Beevor, Ardennes 1944: Hitler's Last Gamble, Penguin Books 2016, p. 367.
[23] Cirillo, Roger (2003), Ardennes-Alsace, Office of the Chief of Military History Department of the Army, p. 52.
[24] U.S. Third Army After Action Report, May 1945, Headquarters, Third U.S. Army, 1 August 1944 – 9 May 1945 VOL. I (Operations) [unclassified]
[25] Fuller, Robert P. (2004), Last Shots for Patton's Third Army, Portland, ME: NETR Press, ISBN 097405190X, p. 254.
[26] According to sources cited on the Wikipedia page about Operation Overlord (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation ... 14.02.2017), Allied land forces suffered the following casualties between June and August 1944: American armies, 124,394 casualties, of which 20,668 were killed (16.42% of total casualties); First Canadian and Second British Armies, 83,045: 15,995 killed (16.42% of total casualties), 57,996 wounded, and 9,054 missing. The differences between these percentages and the proportion of men killed out of total casualties throughout the whole campaign (195,576 out of 766,294, or 25.52%) suggests that a part of the missing must be counted as killed to establish the total number of fatalities among the Allied ground forces between June and December 1944. Applied to the total of Allied casualties on the ground between June and August 1944 (207,439, according to the sources cited on this page), 25.52 % would mean 52,943 fatalities, versus (20,668 + 15,995 =) 36,663 listed as killed without including the missing.
[27] Charles B. MacDonald, The European Theater of Operations: The Last Offensive, Center of Military History, United States Army, Washington D.C., 1993, page 478: "Allied casualties from D-day to V–E Day totaled 766,294. American losses were 586,628, including 135,576 dead. The British, Canadians, French, and other allies in the west lost approximately 60,000 dead. How many of the three million Germans that were killed during the entire war died on the Western Front is impossible to determine, but exclusive of prisoners of war, all German casualties in the west from D-day to V–E Day probably equaled or slightly exceeded Allied losses. More than two million Germans were captured in the west." (Emphasis added.) Not all figures in this book can be considered credible. On p. 324 MacDonald states that the Dresden bombing from 13 to 15 February 1945 "may have caused as many as 135,000 civilian deaths", citing David Irving, whose claims in this respect have been discredited (see Judgment of Mr. Justice Charles Gray at the Irving-Lipstadt trial, sections XI and XIII, online under https://www.hdot.org/judge_toc/, retrieved on 14.02.2017). The accepted estimate, confirmed by a historian’s commission appointed by the Dresden city council, is that up to 25,000 civilians were killed in these bombings (Neutzner, Matthias, et al. (2010). "Abschlussbericht der Historikerkommission zu den Luftangriffen auf Dresden zwischen dem 13. und 15. Februar 1945", p. 67. The report is available online under http://www.dresden.de/media/pdf/infobla ... V1_14a.pdf and was retrieved on 14.02.2017.) In this context it should be taken into account that MacDonald’s book was published in 1993, long before the Irving-Lipstadt trial and even longer before the findings of the aforementioned commission. MacDonald’s having accepted as possible Irving’s widely exaggerated figure of Dresden civilian deaths is therefore not deemed to have any bearing on MacDonald’s credibility as concerns casualty figures of military engagements.
[28] John Ellis, The World War II Databook: The Essential Facts and Figures for all the combatants. Aurum Press Ltd (1993). P. 256.
[29]Army Battle Casualties and Non-Battle Deaths in World War II. Final Report, 7 December 1941 – 31 December 1946. Available online under http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USA/ref ... ies-1.html (retrieved on 14.02.2017). The breakdown of total battle casualties is the following:
Killed in action: 116,991
Died of wounds and injuries: 16,264
Captured and interned killed in action: 224
Captured and interned died of wounds and injuries: 194
Captured and interned died from other causes (non-battle): 532
Missing in action declared dead: 1,361
Missing in action died from other causes (non-battle): 10
Subtotal fatalities: 135,576
Non-fatally wounded: 365,086
Captured and interned returned to military control: 72,809
Missing in action returned to duty: 13,157
Total battle casualties: 586,628
---
[To be continued]
