Buy Now! Ghost Division: Home Erwin Rommel & German Mobile Warfare in 1940 By Joseph Miranda

This photo shows Gen. Hans von Seekt and his staff shortly after the founding of the Reichswehr in 1919. Von Seekt is the mustachioed offi cer standing in front just to the left of center with his hands behind his back. It was these men who developed the modern-day concept of mobile warfare.

Mobile Warfare

he origins of World War II offi cers, that another European war an advocate of armored and aerial German mobile warfare was inevitable. In it the German Army warfare, as tanks and planes seemed T go back to the “Black would need to employ advanced tech- to provide the answer to the trench Reichswehr,” the clandestine part of nologies and innovative tactics to win deadlock he’d experienced as an the armed forces created during the the decisive victory that had eluded it infantryman in World War I. The post-World War I Weimar Republic. The in 1914-18. The overall concept was the emphasis on advanced weap- victorious Allies had placed limitations army would be composed of two types onry, motorization and aircraft, also on the size of the German armed forc- of formations: a large mass of infantry appealed to the futurist orientation es, as well as banning the re-institution divisions providing a base for maneu- of National Socialist propaganda. of the general staff and the deployment ver and the ability to hold the front, The 1930s saw debates about the of tanks and military aircraft. That along with a smaller number of elite mission of tank forces in Germany, didn’t long deter the Germans. mobile divisions that would maneuver as well as in other major powers’ would break through the front and enemy anti-tank weapons), infantry (over 300) was only a fraction of the Gen. Hans von Seeckt, Reichswehr to set up and then win battles of armed forces. Traditional offi cers saw drive deep, maneuvering the enemy (to hold ground seized), anti-tank unit’s total motor vehicle allotment, commander from 1919 to 1926, encirclement and annihilation. tanks as useful for infantry support, out of position. That still wasn’t all: guns (to defend against enemy which also included a grand total of began a covert rearmament program. Von Seeckt had many followers. or in acting as mechanized cavalry the critical aspect was the operational armor counterattacking), engineers some 2,000 trucks, tractors and motor- Within it, he encouraged new ideas Heinz Guderian, a rising young offi cer, by scouting, screening and pursuing. level. There the panzers would move (for crossing rivers and clearing cycles. The 1939 organization had one and supported the rising generation advocated for a large force of tanks. Guderian and his group advocated cross-country to envelop entire obstacles), and motorized logistics panzer brigade of two tank regiments, of leaders. Among other things, he Those vehicles could provide both the tanks be concentrated into divisions opposing armies and destroy them (to maintain the pace of operations). a Schutzen (rifl e) brigade of one promoted combined arms warfare, maneuver capability and the fi repower that would fi ght as an elite strike force. in decisive battles of annihilation. By the late 1930s, then, German motorized infantry regiment and one a regimen of tough training, and needed to execute mobile doctrine. Tactically the tanks were to operate Field exercises soon showed panzer (armored) divisions had motorcycle battalion, an artillery regi- better offi cer-enlisted relations. When Hitler came to power in similar to the Stosstruppen (infantry tanks alone couldn’t gain that kind evolved to be organized as true com- ment, anti-tank, pioneer (combat engi- There was yet another dimension. 1933, he supported many of the shock troops) of World War I, albeit of decision. They needed to be bined arms formations. Indeed, the neer) and reconnaissance battalions, Von Seeckt believed, as did many other new military concepts. He became faster and with more fi repower. They supported by artillery (to suppress number of tanks in a panzer division plus motorized divisional services.

6 WORLD at WAR 38 | OCT–NOV 2014 WORLD at WAR 38 | OCT–NOV 2014 7 Rommel & the Ghost Division

Erwin Rommel joined the German Army in 1910 and fought as an infantry offi cer in World War I with considerable distinction, being promoted to captain and decorated with Germany’s highest honors, notably for actions during the 1917 Caporetto offensive. He afterward wrote a book on tactics based on those experiences and titled Infanterie Greift An (Infantry Attacks). He emphasized up-front battlefi eld leadership, troop mobility and shock effect. The book gained him attention, including that of Hitler, resulting in his being made commander of the dictator’s headquarters detachment at the time of the Polish campaign, a prestigious assign- ment. For 1940 he requested command of a panzer division, and in that way he got 7th Panzer. The 7th Panzer Division had then only recently been created by being reorganized from the 2nd Light Division, and for the coming campaign it was assigned to Hoth’s XV Motorized Corps, part of von Kluge’s Fourth Army. As the The divisional insignia of 7th Panzer Division campaign opened, Rommel led 7th Panzer through the Ardennes and into France. in 1940. It has no heraldic signifi cance; rather He was usually up front, often taking personal command in tactical actions but it was merely a quickly identifi able icon to aid German military police and logistics never losing sight of the bigger objective—driving to the English Channel. offi cers in identifying units in the fi eld. Throughout the campaign Rommel emphasized speed and shock, defeating various Allied formations while still on the move as they appeared piecemeal to his front. The panzer divisions’ combined arms structure facilitated those tactics. A point Rommel made a high-velocity 37mm gun that was repeatedly in his account of the campaign was that concentration of fi repower, especially useful against enemy armor and could when supported by aerial attack, would often panic enemy troops and thus turn a seemingly also fi re high explosive rounds. The desperate situation into an opportunity for further exploitation by the tanks. He also viewed Panzer IV was intended for heavy as critical engineers for clearing obstacles, crossing rivers and overcoming fortifi ed positions. close-in support, and was therefore That didn’t mean the Allies were incapable of effective resistance. For instance, armed with a short barrel 75mm. The a crisis occurred at Arras on 21 May when a British armored force counterattacked Panzer I and Panzer II were by then 7th Panzer. Rommel reacted quickly, though, bringing up divisional artillery and essentially relegated to nothing more anti-aircraft guns that soon destroyed or disabled the attacking British tanks. The 7th than training vehicles, the former was then reinforced with tanks from 5th Panzer Division, and drove farther north. armed with machineguns and the On 29 May, Rommel received an order to prepare for a new latter with a 20mm automatic cannon. offensive to the south and west. In that operation he swept along the To fi ll out the inventory for the 1940 Channel coast, taking many prisoners and capturing Le Havre. campaign, the Germans used Czech Throughout all that, 7th Panzer became known as the “Ghost Division” because LT-35 and LT-38 (light) tanks that they’d its rapid movements made it diffi cult for the Allies, and sometimes the German taken over following the annexation high command, to fi gure out where it was and where it was going. ★ War of Czechoslovakia. Both models were serviceable vehicles, armed with an Typical Panzer Division Tank Inventories, May 1940 World War II in Europe broke out effi cient 37mm gun and capable of on 1 September 1939, when Hitler acting in the medium tank role, at least ordered the invasion of Poland. The in the opening two years of the war. Unit Panzer Is Panzer IIs Panzer IIIs Panzer IVs Panzer 38 Command ensuing campaign showed the panzer Nonetheless, the situation demonstrat- (Czech) tanks concept was essentially sound, but ed the overarching need for continued those units still needed shaking out. improvisation: German industry had 1st Panzer 52 98 58 40 - 8 The panzer divisions had too many yet to meet the panzer arm’s needs. Division tanks, making their sub-formations diffi cult to control in the fi eld. There Allied Strategy 5th Panzer 97 120 52 32 - 26 were also too many light tanks (Panzer Division Is and IIs) and not enough mediums The winter of 1939-40 was quiet and heavies (Panzer IIIs and IVs). on the western front, with the entire 7th Panzer 34 68 - 24 91 8 The number of tanks per regi- period being dubbed by newspaper- Division ment was cut back, with the surplus men and bored soldiers the “Phony reorganized to form more panzer War” and “Sitzkrieg,” the latter a play Note: In comparison, in the 1939 Polish campaign a panzer division typically divisions, usually by also reorganizing on blitzkrieg or “Lighting War,” the had 120 Panzer Is, 155 Panzer IIs, six Panzer IIIs, and 18 Panzer IVs. the (too) light divisions. The motorized popular term for German mobile infantry divisions proved too unwieldy, warfare. (The Germans themselves Rommel accepting the surrender of the British 51st Highland Division at St. Valery on 12 June. so they each lost an infantry regiment, didn’t originate the use of the term German victory in Poland. There, in The Polish campaign also showed which for the remainder of the war “blitzkrieg”; they used Bewegungskrieg, only a few weeks, the Wehrmacht the importance of airpower. With its The Wehrmacht (as the German had a tank battalion plus four motor- became the standard pattern for them. meaning “maneuver warfare.”) had overrun the entire country, control of the air, the Luftwaffe directly armed forces offi cially became known ized infantry battalions. Rounding out Within the panzer arm, the main While both sides spent their time demonstrating the effi cacy of their supported German forces and also in 1935) also organized several Leichte the mechanized force were motorized shortfall was an overall lack of tanks. training and preparing for the next mobile war concept. The debate over attacked Polish command centers, (light) divisions, intended to act as a infantry divisions, essentially standard The two modern types were the round of fi ghting, Allied planners the mission of tanks was in that way logistics and cities. The bombing of kind of mechanized cavalry. They each infantry divisions but moved by trucks. Panzer III and IV. The Panzer III had had to contend with the stunning resolved in favor of mobile war. Warsaw, which involved up to several

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spearheads. Essentially, Plan D by advancing across the open terrain Schlieffen’s timetable to break down. called for a strategic offensive to be of the northern portion of that country Years of trench warfare followed. Home followed by a tactical defensive. and then going along the Channel For 1940 the OKW therefore initially Plan D wasn’t particularly inspired, coast to outfl ank the French armies decided on a less grandiose objective: but it suited the Allied perception of deployed farther south. The ultimate they would again push through the overall situation. Essentially, it objective was to fi ght a grand battle Belgium, but only far enough to seize narrowed the active front to a limited of annihilation somewhere in north- the industrial regions of northeastern sector where the French and British eastern France (exactly where remains France and then stop. The fi nal could maintain a local parity in tanks. a matter of historical debate) on operational objective was the Somme It also provided the benefi t of fi ghting terms favoring the Germans, thereby River. Britain would then be kept alongside the Belgians, adding their winning the war in one campaign. off-balance by a combined aero-naval divisions to the order of battle. Of course, the plan failed in siege based on the newly acquired Plan D left one opening, and that 1914. German logistics couldn’t forward bases along the Channel was in the Ardennes, the region of support so rapid an advance and coast. The war was expected to end in forests and hills in southern Belgium that, in combination with the friction some kind of negotiated settlement. and Luxembourg. The French high of Allied countermoves, caused command dismissed the area as continued on page 14 » impassible to tanks. In retrospect that seems an amazing underestimation of the potential threat on that front, but there was some justifi cation for that evaluation at the time. One reason for that went back to Belgium’s neutrality. The Belgian military refused to coordinate with the Allies for fear it would provoke Germany into belligerency. From the perspective of simple military effi cien- cy, then, once the Germans did bring Belgium into the war, the Anglo-French counter-move would have to be along the most effi cient axes of advance. They were in central and northern Belgium, where there was an extensive also the Netherlands, as that was road network as well as relatively open where the best tank country lay. terrain over which large numbers of While both of those countries were tanks could be deployed. Moving Allied neutral when the war opened, divisions in via the Ardennes could Germany had shown no hesitation in easily bog down and miss the expected The Panzer I: despite the fact it was already obsolescent, it was one of the two violating borders in 1914 and there main German drive in the north. mainstay tank models in the German armored divisions in 1940. was no reason to think Hitler would As it was, Belgium was supposed to respect neutrality in the new war. secure the Ardennes. Its army actually Even so, the situation held some had a dedicated force for that mission, promise for the Allies. If the Germans the Chasseurs Ardennes, trained to didn’t go through Belgium, they operate specifi cally along that front. would have to make their offensive into Alsace-Lorraine, west of the Manstein’s Plan Rhine. German attacks there could be shattered against the extensive lines of When France and Britain declared French fortifi cations. If the Germans war on Germany, the latter’s armed did break though, they would be met forces high command (OKW or by counterattacks from Allied mobile Oberkommando der Wehrmacht) had forces held in reserve and deploying to come up with a plan to fi ght in the considerable numbers of tanks. west. It was codenamed Fall Gelb The motorcycle reconnaissance unit quickly took the lead. If the Germans invaded Belgium, (Operation Yellow), and the original the French and British were prepared concept was indeed based unimagi- hundred planes in each raid, also offensive in the west. They expected to go into that country. Several natively on the 1914 Schlieffen Plan. appeared to vindicate the interwar them to use some variant of the 1914 operational plans were developed, That plan, which had been theories of airpower that held attacks Schlieffen Plan, but enhanced by and the one fi nally settled on was formulated by Field Marshal Alfred von on cities could destroy enemy morale. mobile divisions and airpower. Thus called “Plan D” for the Dyle River, a Schlieffen and refi ned by Field Marshal The question for French and British their main thrust was anticipated to small watercourse in central Belgium. Helmuth von Moltke (“the Younger”) planners, then, was centered on where be through northeastern Belgium Allied mobile forces would drive to in the years before World War I, called the Germans would concentrate their (as in World War I) and possibly that line and there await the German for an invasion of Belgium, primarily A scene from the start of the British counterattack at Arras.

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