Großdeutschland 1942 (I)
Lessons Learned
Lessons Drawn from the Combats of Infantry Division Großdeutschland
(28 June to 25 December, 1942)Lieutenant Colonel (General Staff) Cord von Hobe
Part I
The following lessons form the combat notes of the author and thus represent his purely personal understanding. In general the lessons were well known or written down in manuals or orders. However, because the Infantry Divi- sion Großdeutschland represents a division equipped with all modern weapons and was (during the period covered by this report) sent into battle in almost all possible ways, many new ideas may result from the collection of these lessons.
1.) Reconnaissance and Messages.
The fondness of motorized troops for quickness and improvisation frequently leads to a neglect of reconnaissance (Aufklärung.) The time that seems to have been gained at first is quickly lost and costs blood. The troops don’t know how to observe enemy territory with a hunter’s eye [Jägerauge] in order to discover and report every movement and change. It must further be made certain that enemy territory be observed by persons who are well educated in tactics and not merely non-commissioned officers and junior officers. A particular result of this is difficulty combatting enemy heavy weapons.
In combat reconnaissance, making patrols [Spähtrupps] as strong as possible (up to about platoon strength and, if necessary, including pioneers for mine clearing) has proved itself effective. All available heavy weapons must hold themselves in readiness to provide covering fire for the patrol. This is particularly important at the time when the patrol starts moving away from the enemy. Small size must never be the reason for a combat reconnaissance patrol failing to move forward or remaining in close contact with the enemy.
Messages can never be composed in too exact a manner. Inaccurate messages interfere with the leadership’s ability to judge the situation. In two cases, the crossing of a patrol or a squad across a river was reported as the formation of a bridgehead. Of similar importance, particularly to a motorized unit, are reports about the condition of bridges. A bridge is only undamaged when it joins both banks and all planks are in good shape.
Because of a lack of translators, far too little use is made of the local population as a means of finding out about things, particularly directions.
2.) Aerial Photographs.
Aerial photographs have proven themselves especially useful in both summer and winter, but only when they have been distributed to using units in good time and, insofar as possible, down to the battalion level. This is especially true for localities where no accurate maps are available or where the appearance of terrain has changed (e.g. due to villages that have burned to the ground.) Above all in winter, leaders depend heavily on aerial photographs.
On the Don, the III. Panzer-Korps used a “Stork” [Storch light liaison aircraft] to deliver aerial photographs. From these aerial photographs one could clearly see the relationship between the roads on the south bank of the Don, so that the building of bridges and the employment of the division could quickly and effectively be ordered.
3.) The Reinforced Battalion.
The generous allotment of heavy weapons to the rifle battalions [Schützen- Bataillone] of the Grenadier and Füsilier regiments has proved itself effective when the battalion commander understood how to deploy and employ his weapons.1 This, however, due to incomplete training of units and leaders was not always the case. Where a leader was unused to them, the additional items of equipment proved ponderous and slowed down the momentum of the attack, while one waited for heavy weapons to be brought into action.
The combat strength of the rifle companies [Schützen-Kompanien] with over 200 men was excessive. This made itself known in heavy casualties. Cutting the squads by one third (with two-thirds of this number stationed with the field trains [Troß II] and one third with the division field replacement battalion) worked well.
As a rule, in motorized units the ratio between combat strength [Gefechtsstärke] and authorized strength [Iststarke] is poor, at most 60%. [That is to say, 60% combat troops and 40% non- combat troops.] A corps headquarters once ordered the division to raise its “tooth-to-tail” ratio to 80%, something that was often achieved or exceeded by stationary [Bodenstandig] divisions. This could only be achieved if all truck drivers were sent to the front and thus attained at the cost of the mobility of the division and the maintenance of the motorized vehicles.
Combat strength notwithstanding, the ratio between combat vehicles (trucks carrying squads, tanks etc.) to logistics and command vehicles seems numerically unsound. The large number of these vehicles lengthens march columns, makes leadership more difficult, and burdens resupply. Often the units come out of a month of fighting with far fewer [of these vehicles.] Considering the general equipment situation, an examination of which of these vehicles are essential seems appropriate.
4.) Cooperation between Motorcycle Riflemen and Tanks.2
Only in the southern sector did the Motorcycle Rifle [Kradschützen] Battalion receive missions [Aufträge] which were appropriate to its organization and armament. In the advance towards Voronesh the Motorcycle Rifle Battalion was placed under the operational control of the Tank Battalion. This severely constrained the forward movement of the Motorcycle Rifle Battalion. The motorcycle riflemen were able to cross a number of small streams whose bridges the tanks could not use. On each of these stream banks the motorcycle riflemen had to wait while the tanks looked for a ford or while the crossings were reinforced . Thus one must either provide armored engineers or renounce the use of tanks when the enemy and the terrain make these necessary.
5.) Cooperation among Infantry, Assault Guns, and Tanks.
Once the leaders learned how to do it, cooperation was generally good. When the [two infantry] regiments were deployed side by side, attaching the assault gun battalion to one and the tank battalion to the other proved itself effective.
In small-scale breakthroughs with a regimental combat team [Regiments-Gruppe], having the tanks pull the infantry while the assault guns pushed proved to the best method.
During the fighting in the area around Rshev things were entirely different. The value of using tanks “in front of the front” was greatly reduced by the restrictions placed on the use of tanks by the terrain as well as the strong enemy defenses. In nearly all attacks aimed at improving the German position, the tanks took losses without achieving success. At the same time, the value of the assault gun grew. Assault gun officers explained this by saying that the assault gun permitted better observation and therefore could therefore better avoid enemy fire. Once the first snows fell, the usefulness of the tank returned.
The following numbers are interesting. The assault gun battalion lost, through the middle of December [1942], four vehicles while destroying a hundred and fifty enemy tanks. The tank battalion, on the other hand, lost thirty vehicles while destroying one hundred enemy tanks.
After the beginning of winter, the following method proved itself effective. Some four to six kilometers behind the front, the tank and assault gun battalions organized strong points, in which tanks and assault guns could be maintained and the men rested. Three of the combat ready tanks and assault guns were, as a rule, either held as a counterattack reserve [Eingreifreserve] in the vicinity of the [infantry] regimental command posts or kept in an ambush position [Lauerstellung] within the main line of resistance. Reliefs took place, both day and night, every five to eight hours, (according to how cold it was.) Because of the snow, the nights were so clear that the tanks and assault guns could easily be driven.
There were also a patrol of three to five tanks or assault guns (or a mixture of both) which moved along or right behind the main line of resistance [Hauptkampflinie] and surveilled the terrain for enemy tanks. These not only provide a sure support for our own infantry, but also inhibited enemy tanks from breaking in to the main line of resistance.
In the Lutschessa Valley [near Rshev] the division used these methods to destroy over one hundred enemy tanks without losing a single friendly tank or assault gun! By way of contrast the tank companies assigned to other infantry divisions suffered heavy losses because of inappropriate employment. Time and again I was told that tanks were required to remain stationary in the main line of resistance for days at a time without relief. As long as the ground permitted, these tanks were dug in (as they were along the edge of the city of Rshev.) The habit of the infantry to “cling like a vine” to tanks and assault guns during attacks had to be resisted, lest their be losses from enemy fire. Tanks attract fire!
I propose that tanks be given the means, with a view towards their employment in position warfare behind the main line of resistance, to deliver indirect fire. The tank will therefore be able, naturally in exceptional cases, to take part in the fire fight, when the unarmored weapons are, as a result of heavy enemy fire, pinned down.
Source: This is a verbatim translation of an after action report submitted by the operations officer (Ia) of the Infantry Division Großdeutschland. A typescript of the original German report can be found in the records of the Tank Officer with the Chief General Staff of the Army [Panzer Offizier beim Chef General Stabs des Heeres.], U.S. National Archives, Microfilm Series T-78, Roll 620, Frames 923-945. Words in italic type were underlined in the original document.
The terms Grenadier and Füsilier had peculiar meanings within the Großdeutschland division of 1942. The Grenadier Regiment was the first of the two motorized infantry regiments of the formation and the Füsilier Regiment the second.
Marvelous to say, the Motorcycle Rifle Battalion possessed very few motorcycles. Instead, its men rode in half-tracked vehicles, trucks, Volkswagens, and armored cars.