Combat effectiveness article

[ccmax]

http://www.militaryhistoryonline.com/wwii/...es/default.aspx

 

An interesting perspective regarding the books published during the 1990's about the performance of US Army divisions in WWII. Actually it's more of a short online book rather than an article.

 

Though you may not agree with everything, the author clearly knows the subject he is writing about.

[king802]

great link Cesar.

 

a very interesting read -some very good points raised about Marshals statistics and the effectiveness of the German Army.

 

Rich

[BEAST]

Taking a cursory glance through Nutter's writting, it appears to me that overall he does not want the quality of the German fighting force challenged. His belief seems to be that the four authors that he cites want some sort of glory given to the US Army for winning the Cold War, not that a reexamination of the US Army's performance during WWII was in order. While it appears to be an interesting read and I will read it in its entirety, I believe that Mr. Nutter is more interested in defending the myth of the Wehrmacht, namely that the only reason the they lost was due to lack of resources. Ask the 101st at Bastogne if an over abundance of resources allowed them to stop the German attack in their area. After D-Day, US logistics were still not up to full strength until early 1945. And by resources I am including trained/experienced soldiers and officers.

 

The myth of the superiority of the Wehrmact is shown from D-Day on. With a lack of combat experience and supplies, the US leadership and soldiers learned lessons quickly and immediately put the German Army on the defensive, pushing them back to their own borders by early 1945.

 

As a side note, when I was at IOBC in 1986, we constantly were being taught about the superiority fo the German Army and their tactics. At one point, I asked the instructor why we were learning about the losers, instead of studying what made us successful. His answer was that our forces in Europe would fighting under a similiar conditions as the German Army if the Soviets crossed the border.

[Cobrahistorian]

I just read the introduction. Basing an analysis of the US Army in WWII on its performance in Vietnam seems to be a flawed argument from the inception. And I quote:

"This work endeavors to explore the historiography surrounding a controversial and emotionally charged subject, namely the comparative combat performance of the United States and German armies in the European Theatre in World War II. While the subject has been of interest to soldiers and military historians for over fifty years, and hence would seem to be a likely candidate for reasoned debate, nevertheless it continues to incite strong interest among partisans on both sides. Indeed, in recent years the topic has generated some rather heated work, particularly from those who advocate the view that the United States Army was more than a match for the Wehrmacht in that elusive quality known as "fighting power". One reading the literature on the subject published within the last ten years or so is in fact struck by the aggressively adversarial tone adopted by the authors. One might reasonably inquire why such a stridently partisan tenor has asserted itself in this area of military history.

The answer to this question lies, it may be reasonably argued, not with the performance of the U.S. Army in World War II, but with its experience in the Vietnam War."

 

I'm really intrigued as to how he's going to prove that one. I wrote my undergraduate thesis on the downfall of the Luftwaffe and how the "world's most technically advanced air force" could have been beaten SO completely. Granted the Luftwaffe and Heer are two different animals, but it has been proven time and again that the Heer's major weakness was it's inflexibility and reliance on doctrine, especially in the face of losing experienced NCOs and Officers. The Luftwaffe was similar. They couldn't train and they couldn't replace veterans. We could. They simply didn't regroup well. Unit collective training was limited and while US units had opportunities to be pulled out of the line to retrain and train new replacements, a Heer soldat was in the line until he died or was wounded severely enough to be sent to a hospital. The Heer of 1939-40 wasn't even the invincible monster that it was made out to be. Look at the losses the Poles dealt to the Germans. They were overwhelmed by numbers and technical superiority, but they gave almost as good as they got for a short period there.

 

It seems that this article is more a defense of British academics Keegan, Hastings and Ellis (I don't know whether he's a Brit or not) whose assessments were underwhelming when examining the American efforts in Europe and an attempt to parry the attacks of author-soldiers like Colonels Mansoor and Doubler who have intimate working knowledge of the military and understand the workings of military units and the soldier's mindset. Their assessments of the American GI in WWII have blown apart S.L.A. Marshall's myth and set the record straight. Dr. John C. McManus' excellent work "The Deadly Brotherhood" belongs right up there with Doubler's "Closing with the Enemy" and Mansoor's "The GI Offensive in Europe". While it is impossible to maintain absolute objectivity, these authors set out to correct this idea of German superiority (gee, haven't we heard that one before Adolf?) and do so admirably.

 

I'm not minimizing the Wehrmacht's combat ability or their technical advancement (although that presents a whole slew of other problems, many of which we're facing in today's US military) but the insistence that the Wehrmacht (Heer, W-SS, etc) was superior to the US military is simply untrue and has been proven ad nauseum.

 

Funny, if you took S.L.A. Marshall and Nutter's histories as fact, only 2 of 10 riflemen fired their weapons in combat and the Wehrmacht was far superior to the US Army, it is a wonder I'm sitting here writing this.

 

Jon

[king802]

It seems that this article is more a defense of British academics Keegan, Hastings and Ellis (I don't know whether he's a Brit or not) whose assessments were underwhelming when examining the American efforts in Europe

 

If you read it all the way through you will see that Keegan and Hastings do praise the abilities of the US Army in WW2. They are also deeply critical of the German Army and it's reliance on horse power.

 

Let's face it the US Amy of WW2 was by far the best trained and equipped which was clearly shown by the end result. Without doubt the German army were good -fighting on two front's and with limited Air cover but they were not the Supermen that some claim and some of their units were really poor. They had already been beaten in the western Desert by the British 8th Army before America had troops on the ground.

 

I don't think this debate will ever come to a conclusion - too many factors to take into consideration.

 

Rich

[macvsog]

I have both of Marshall's books on the Korean and Vietnam Wars. Both are good reads and accurate from what I have been told by my Dad, My Uncle on my Wife's side. He was also on the cover of time magazine. He was looking into the sky when the picture was shot. He was a hero when he came back. My Dad also served in Korea. All of these family members thought the book on the Korean War by Marshall was accurate.

 

 

 

The one on Vietnam was rated to be pretty good as far as accuracy was confirmed by my cousin and by a friend. Also with my study of the Vietnam War and especially the "SpecOps" community back then was looked upon as a very good book on the subject.

 

The Korean War is the best however. Talks about most of the weapons we used in Korea and how they worked well or a FTF (Failure-To-fire). It also dabbled into how the Company sized units performed and smaller sized units.

 

Naturally the M-1 Garand was the choice of almost every soldier for combat. In the winter war part of the war the M-1 was regarded almost to affection in the Korean winter, and summer. The grenade was OK. The hand grenade in the winter had to be kept as close to the body as possible to defrost the fuze. Same went for any other grenades used. The "3.5" bazooka was well liked for its bunker blasting capabilities along with its ability to do a MK or a KK. This bazooka also was known to freeze up in the winter. The Carbine was either loved or hated. The round was anemic to a lot of soldiers because of its ability to not penetrate the NKA soldier because of his winter gear , thick "Mao" padded shirts, Jackets, and their combat gear they carried. This and the range in which was too long for the Carbine. Mortars, RR's, and .45cal Thompsons, and grease guns were all prone to freeze lock and therefore in operable and lock their firing mechanisms whereby in some occasions urinating on them helped to defrost the mechanisms. Mortar fixed firing Pins would freeze up and would break into two pieces. This also happened to the RR's with their firing pins too.

 

 

Hope this helps.

 

Mark

MACVSOG "Living Historian"