Composition of German Panzer Divisions

Rhetor

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Hi All,

There is one thing which I cannot understand. When one plays TOAW WWII western front scenarios, one usually finds US armored divisions neatly divided into Combat Commands, while German panzer divisions have two PzG regiments and a panzer regiment (over 100 tanks in one unit without any real infantry support).

As it is, the German player has to divide their precious armored regiments, thus losing 10% of the profficiency of the unit.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that it were the Germans who invented the concept of Kampfgruppe - to mix armor, mot infantry and artillery. Therefore the German armored divisions should be divided into Kampfgruppen from the very beginning of the game.

Comments welcome :-D
 

Telumar

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The germans put together Kampfgruppen as an operational need, when the situation called for it, they were quite flexible, a Kampfgruppe could range from battalion to brigade size, depending on situation etc. They put together so many Kampfgruppen at so many times that this is impossible to model with toaw if one wants historical correctness.
The US Combat Commands are an inherent part of the divisional composition afaik, i may be wrong, though.
A design solution could be to have two german Panzer Bns instead of one Regiment (so no need to divide and loss of proficiency) at a high cooperation level to simulate german flexibility.
 
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Heldenkaiser

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Telumar said:
The US Combat Commands are an inherent part of the divisional composition afaik, i may be wrong, though.
Being no specialist for the era, it always was my understanding that the combat commands in a U.S. armoured division were essentially HQs for ad hoc assignment of forces, even though it appeared that in practice it worked out so that they were permanently assigned 1/3 of the divisions infantry, armour and artillery each. So in theory not much difference from the German concept. But I may be wrong.
 

Ben Turner

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On the whole I don't see this as much of a problem. The Panzer divisions shouldn't really get spread out enough to need to worry about combined arms at the regiment level; rather they should be concentrated for attack or counterattack.

Of course depending on how the scenario is designed this may not work so well in TOAW.
 

Rhetor

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Heldenkaiser said:
Being no specialist for the era, it always was my understanding that the combat commands in a U.S. armoured division were essentially HQs for ad hoc assignment of forces, even though it appeared that in practice it worked out so that they were permanently assigned 1/3 of the divisions infantry, armour and artillery each. So in theory not much difference from the German concept. But I may be wrong.
General Maczek, commander of the 1st Polish Armoured Division, which fought with the 1st Canadian Army, used his two brigades (the division was organized by British standards) as HQ's for ad hoc assignment. As he wrote in his memories, it often happened that most units subordinated to the HQ of the armoured brigade came from the motorized brigade and the other way round. The composition and size of brigade combat groups varied. I don't see much difference between such combat groups and German "Kampfgruppen".
 

Ben Turner

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Rhetor said:
General Maczek, commander of the 1st Polish Armoured Division, which fought with the 1st Canadian Army, used his two brigades (the division was organized by British standards) as HQ's for ad hoc assignment. As he wrote in his memories, it often happened that most units subordinated to the HQ of the armoured brigade came from the motorized brigade and the other way round. The composition and size of brigade combat groups varied. I don't see much difference between such combat groups and German "Kampfgruppen".
German kampfgruppes were the exception rather than the norm. Ideally, the Germans would rather just use a whole panzer division.
 

Rhetor

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Ben Turner said:
German kampfgruppes were the exception rather than the norm. Ideally, the Germans would rather just use a whole panzer division.
Hans von Luck's memoirs tell a somewhat different story.
 

Ben Turner

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Rhetor said:
Hans von Luck's memoirs tell a somewhat different story.
Well, to be clear, the idea was that the Panzer division was already a perfectly satisfactory combined arms force and there was no need to subdivide it into small such forces.

Of course as things turned out, the Germans were often so battered that they had to patch several units together into a kampfgruppe in order to deal with a particular situation. von Luck had the misfortune in 1944 to find himself in 21st Panzer division, which was very badly mauled in the early fighting in Normandy. Note that for the previous five years, he had been part of panzer divisions which largely fought as formed bodies, and it was only for the last year of the war (which forms the most popular part of his memoirs) that he was shoved from kampfgruppe to kampfgruppe following the obliteration of 21st Panzer as a viable combined arms organisation.
 

Rhetor

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Ben Turner said:
Well, to be clear, the idea was that the Panzer division was already a perfectly satisfactory combined arms force and there was no need to subdivide it into small such forces.
In 2,5 km/hex scale scenarios, such as Mr. McBride's "Plan Martin" and most of the Bulge scenarios, we see a tank regiment and two PzG regiments. Are you suggesting that the panzer regiment ever operated alone, without infantry support?

Ben Turner said:
Of course as things turned out, the Germans were often so battered that they had to patch several units together into a kampfgruppe in order to deal with a particular situation.
I'd rather say that the task determined the compositon of forces sent to deal with it, not the disorganization of the command structure.
Germans organized battle groups for specific tasks within divisional command structure as early as in the September campaign in 1939.
 

Ben Turner

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Rhetor said:
In 2,5 km/hex scale scenarios, such as Mr. McBride's "Plan Martin" and most of the Bulge scenarios, we see a tank regiment and two PzG regiments. Are you suggesting that the panzer regiment ever operated alone, without infantry support?
If the scale is regiments then it is to facilitate concentration. So just put the two units in the same hex.

I'd rather say that the task determined the compositon of forces sent to deal with it, not the disorganization of the command structure.
Germans organized battle groups for specific tasks within divisional command structure as early as in the September campaign in 1939.
Sure- but only very occasionally (for example 1st mountain division sending an ad-hoc motorised group on a dash to Lvov). Guderian's corps was transfered in its entireity from the Corridor to East Prussia. It operated as a formed unit on the drive to Brest. When German tanks first reached Warszawa it was as a division, not as a kampfgruppe. One ad-hoc mechanised unit was formed for the campaign- Panzerverband Kempf- but this too was basically just a special panzer division.

Forming combined armed groups at the regiment level rather misses the point; mechanised forces in general and armour in particular is to be massed and delivered at the crucial point. This is just as valid on the defensive as it is on the attack.
 
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Rhetor

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Ben Turner said:
If the scale is regiments then it is to facilitate concentration. So just put the two units in the same hex.
And I have a big red dot, heavy casualties, and I am throwing in 100+ tanks on a 2,5 kilometer wide stretch of land.
A US armoured division throws in a single combat command, which is a reasonable mixture of armor, infantry and artillery.

If you look once more into von Luck's memoirs, you will find that druring the training period after the Polish campaign Rommel insisted that units should always cooperate with the same units from the other regiments, and thus battle groups developed within the division, which proved to be very important in the future campaigns.

Von Luck does not command a battle group before 1944 for a simple reason - before that he commands a reconaissance battalion, which more often than not operates independently. However, from early June 1944 he is the commander of a battle group of combined arms, organized around his HQ (192nd PzG Rgt).
Peiper was the commander of the 1st SS Pz Rgt, yet from the very beginning of the December offensive a battle group of combined arms was organized under his command.
 

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Rhetor said:
And I have a big red dot, heavy casualties, and I am throwing in 100+ tanks on a 2,5 kilometer wide stretch of land.
A US armoured division throws in a single combat command, which is a reasonable mixture of armor, infantry and artillery.

If you look once more into von Luck's memoirs, you will find that druring the training period after the Polish campaign Rommel insisted that units should always cooperate with the same units from the other regiments, and thus battle groups developed within the division, which proved to be very important in the future campaigns.

Von Luck does not command a battle group before 1944 for a simple reason - before that he commands a reconaissance battalion, which more often than not operates independently. However, from early June 1944 he is the commander of a battle group of combined arms, organized around his HQ (192nd PzG Rgt).
Peiper was the commander of the 1st SS Pz Rgt, yet from the very beginning of the December offensive a battle group of combined arms was organized under his command.
So break down the two armoured units and throw in a broken down Inf unit?
Instant battle group, just add enemies. :laugh:
 

Telumar

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Veers said:
So break down the two armoured units and throw in a broken down Inf unit?
Instant battle group, just add enemies. :laugh:
Battle group, battle group...always battle group. It's Kampfgruppe! Kampfgruppe rocks, sounds evil nice, sinister, frightening and deathly.:clown:

But that was his point, that in this case proficiency and thus combat strength is lost while the US counterpart has combined arms units from the start.
 

Veers

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Telumar said:
Battle group, battle group...always battle group. It's Kampfgruppe! Kampfgruppe rocks, sounds evil nice, sinister, frightening and deathly.:clown:

But that was his point, that in this case proficiency and thus combat strength is lost while the US counterpart has combined arms units from the start.
Oh right, I did read that, but it was after midnight when I posted that comment. My bad.
 

Rhetor

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Veers said:
Battle group, battle group...always battle group. It's Kampfgruppe! Kampfgruppe rocks, sounds evil nice, sinister, frightening and deathly.
Well, the Englishman who translated Oberst Hans von Luck's memoirs into English wrote that Rommel used a "jeep" instead of "Kuebelwagen"; the English-speaking world invariably says "King Tiger" instead of "Koenigstiger"... I merely tried to fit in :-D
 

Ben Turner

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Rhetor said:
And I have a big red dot, heavy casualties, and I am throwing in 100+ tanks on a 2,5 kilometer wide stretch of land.
If putting two regiments in a hex produces a red density light then obviously the unit scale in the scenario should not be regiments.

I should probably add here that I tend to stick to the official TO&E when I'm designing a scenario. So our intrepid Americans get armoured regiments and mechanised regiments. Not those bloody acronyms.
 
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Rhetor

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Ben Turner said:
I should probably add here that I tend to stick to the official TO&E when I'm designing a scenario. So our intrepid Americans get armoured regiments and mechanised regiments. Not those bloody acronyms.
Well, the official documents do not always match with what really happens in the field. Classic example - for the most of the Napoleonic era French infantry manuals did not mention such a trifle as voltigeurs, or skirmishers.


Back to the point - I have specifically written, that I "build my case" on existing western front scenarios, which are mostly Bulge scenarios. I do agree that maybe battalion scale, as in the Overlord scenarios, would be better (fewer red dots :-D). As it is now, we see in those scenarios that in 1944 only the Americans are using combined arms combat commands, and the Germans and the British have their tanks and mot infantry separated in different units. Hence it seems that the Americans are the only ones who have learned how to use their armour to the greatest effect.
 

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Rhetor said:
Back to the point - I have specifically written, that I "build my case" on existing western front scenarios, which are mostly Bulge scenarios.
Yeah. To a certain extent we're talking at cross-purposes. I'm mostly interested in the first two or two and a half years of the war.

I do agree that maybe battalion scale, as in the Overlord scenarios, would be better (fewer red dots :-D). As it is now, we see in those scenarios that in 1944 only the Americans are using combined arms combat commands, and the Germans and the British have their tanks and mot infantry separated in different units. Hence it seems that the Americans are the only ones who have learned how to use their armour to the greatest effect.
Of course ironically in TOAW pure armour units work great- especially on the defence.
 

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Rhetor said:
(...) Back to the point - I have specifically written, that I "build my case" on existing western front scenarios, which are mostly Bulge scenarios. I do agree that maybe battalion scale, as in the Overlord scenarios, would be better (fewer red dots :-D). As it is now, we see in those scenarios that in 1944 only the Americans are using combined arms combat commands, and the Germans and the British have their tanks and mot infantry separated in different units. Hence it seems that the Americans are the only ones who have learned how to use their armour to the greatest effect.
As Ben is been saying the problem isn't about TOAW. It concerns scenario design.

And it's understandable...
Everybody knows everything about 4th US armoured's CCB. Composition, commanders, campaigns, SOP, etc...

What about KG "Schneider"??? Not even "himself" remembers exactly what troops "he" had available on October 44 or February 45 or ...

Edit: Schneider...
 
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Panzer-War

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US Armored Divisions

Designers I think organize them into the combat commands because most of the Armored Divisions do not have official regiments towards the end of the war. Its either that or have 3 armor and 3 mech bns run around as independent bns in a regimental scale scenario. The 2nd and 3rd Arm Div maintained the heave organization of 3 regiments.
 
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