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Ghost Division: Home Erwin Rommel & German Mobile Warfare in 1940 by Joseph Miranda

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Ghost Division: Home Erwin Rommel & German Mobile Warfare in 1940 by Joseph Miranda 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.
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