“Blitzkrieg”: The Myth and Reality

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“Blitzkrieg”: A Word or Doctrine?


“Blitzkrieg.”  The very word conjures up the image of ‘lighting speed;’ combined arms attacks by ‘panzers’ (tanks) and screaming Stuka dive bombers that leaves  Armies in ruins. Doctrinally speaking, the Wehrmacht (German Armed Forces) had no term employed such as ‘blitzkrieg.’ What they did have was an operational focus on the offensive, combined with the maturity of technology by 1939, and initiative pushed down to the lowest level.

The military balance in 1940 was such that on paper, the French and British Expeditionary Force (BEF) actually outnumbered the Germans in both armor and aircraft. So what of the speedy German victory? For the French, “no effective, functioning, Allied command structure existed in 1939-40.”[1] In addition, the French and the BEF believed the defense should have concentration in the Low countries and Holland. The Germans, however, under Eric von Manstein’s plan, boldly struck out well south of the concentrated French and British forces, along a southerly axis via the Ardennes. “Shrewd and daring handling of the concentrated German armored formations, effectively supported at critical moments by the tactical employment of the German Air Force, gave the major impetus for victory”.[2]

The myth of the ‘blitzkrieg’ was a handy literal mechanism developed by the press and effectively employed by the Western military as the excuse for the collapse of France and the withdrawal of the British BEF. The truth lay more with the daring operational plan, the concentration of armor, and the excellent coordination between German ground and air units. The truth, in armor for example, was that in “May 1940 the 2,349 tanks of the Wehrmacht faced 4,204 Allied battle tanks.”[3] All along, the Germans would be outnumbered in just about every definable metric. Except the most important; the refined and offensive doctrine executed by a well-trained and professional force who clearly understood combined arms operations.



The doctrine of the Wehrmacht was historically associated with the ‘offense.’ From Von Moltke to von Schlieffen, the German Army had but always been focused on the offense. Prior to World War I, many German and Prussian strategists had, after determining that Germany was 1) always surrounded, and 2) almost always outmanned, to develop a strategy that would mitigate those disadvantages. Von Schlieffen, wrestled with the conditions of Germany and her neighbours and “set about creating a doctrine that would allow the outnumbered German army to outfight its opponents”.[4]

The results of von Schlieffen’s work presented speed, surprise, and manoeuvre as the key ingredients for a quick, sharp war. At all costs was a protracted conflict to be avoided. World War I would deny the Germans of victory and Schlieffen’s plan never came to be.

World War I, however, prevented Schlieffen’s strategy to be fully realized as technology, then in its infancy (eg motorized vehicles, communications sets) prevented mobility from fully supporting. Large troop formations could be transported by train but this hardly translated to the operational let alone the tactical.

Post-World War I, saw the German Army, although inhibited by the Treaty of Versailles, recalibrate her armed forces and incorporate lessons learned during the Great War. What soon developed, was the incorporation of the emerging technology that would allow the German Army to fully exploit the tenets of manoeuvre warfare; radio equipped tanks, close air-ground cooperation, and the idea of ‘Aufragstaktik’, or ‘mission orders.’

German operations typically concentrated forces, or mass, at the decisive point; the ‘schwerpunkt’. The decisive point being the center of gravity operationally, was also atypically where the enemy was weakest or along the flanks. As such, armor, as in tanks, was concentrated for breakthroughs and exploitation. In the attack, all armored formations received the full weight of the supporting ‘Luftflotte’, or Air Force air groups to deny the enemy any ability to either reinforce or counter attack.



The first real development of armored tactics were proposed not by the Germans but by the British! Major General J.F.C. Fuller and later, Sir Basil Liddell Hart, both exposed upon the ideas of ‘infiltration’, manoeuvre, and “the means proposed were a sudden eruption of squadrons of fast moving tanks.”[5]

But what of the European Armies on the eve of World War I? Analysis reveals several issues from the political, to the operational, and ultimately to the tactics employed and the quality of the equipment used. The British would hardly employ near enough forces on the continent in 1939. And as for the French, they exercised poor generalship coupled by the doctrine of utilizing armor in support of infantry. The extreme opposite of the German armored formations they would face. Further, both the British and French had politically settled on a ‘defensive’ approach to the problems posed by Germany. The Maginot Line had at least allowed the French to husband forces further afield but, the Germans had penetrated in areas weakly defended or least expected.

General Heinz Guderian is often thought of as the ‘father’ of the mature German Panzer formations that crashed in to Poland in 1939 and again through the Ardennes on in to France in 1940. Guderian had essentially built the Panzer arm and had fully comprehended the writings of Hart and Fuller. Guderian placed radios in ALL tanks for starters. In addition, he developed and matured the tactics that would deliver the operational breakthrough and penetration that higher command of the Wehrmacht desired.



Lastly, the German approach at the tactical (Platoon, Company, Battalion) level was markedly different and ultimately superior to all the other European formations combined. The ‘Truppenfuhrung’ was the fundamental field manual of the German Army published in 1933. It was the base document for unit level operations, joint operations, and service manual. This manual was indeed superior to anything the British or French had and was an “effective and realistic doctrine of employing combined arms maneuver warfare.”[6]

Economy of force operations, utilizing combined arms formations with massed armor and close air support, saw the German Army at its offensive best in 1939 and 1940. Striking at weak flanks, with a highly effective troop level doctrine, delivered the German Army a series of rapid and unbelievable successes and proved no match for the British and French Armies who were compromised from the start of the conflict with poor operational plans, dilution of combat power (specifically in the way they handled armor) and a political disposition that all but prevented any solid and cohesive defense.


As for the Allies, it would indeed be sometime before they could even remotely replicate the German Army’s organization or doctrine with respect to the armored combined arms fight. 1942 North Africa saw the British as qualitatively inferior and without air dominance, unable to match the Germans. The Russians in the ‘Eastern Front’ were also caught off guard and it would be some time before the German Army would be halted. The issue would be settled by the summer of 1943 after Kursk, and the Russians would then hold on to the initiative. The Americans would see the initial foray into North Africa as humbling; the Italian front frustrating; and ultimately, the long hard slog across Europe revealing when trying to replicate the German ‘art of war.’



RESOURCES

[1] Weinberg, Gerhard, A World At Arms A global History of World War II, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge: 1994 p. 127.

[2] Ibid. p.127.

[3] Freiser, Karl-Heinz, The Blitzkrieg Legend The 1940 Campaign in the West, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis: 2005 p.38.

[4] Foley, Robert T., “Blitzkrieg”, BBC History, London: March 2011, http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwtwo/blitzkrieg_01.shtml accessed on 1 October, 2018.

[5] Cooper, Matthew, The German Army 1939-1945, Scarborough House, London:1978 p.142.

[6] Condell, Bruce and Zabecki, David T, On the German Art of War Truppenfurung, Stackpole Books, 2009 p. X

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