Professional focus of German Officers

TiredOldSoldier,

Just one comment on the 2-Inch mortar, I've read that it was mostly used for firing smoke rounds vice high explosive but I've never seen anything definitive on this. There were a rather incredible amount of these small mortars authorized in a 1944 British infantry division (283), not sure what all those units were supposed to with them (allocation far exceeds the number of rifle platoons in the division).

Cheers

BW

 

T.A.,

Interesting comments. I concur with your comments about maneuver in Dupuy's model and rates of advance. Your comment about the rising Israeli proficiency during the war also rings true, although I suppose some of the Israeli units could have been rusty and shook out their issues after a battle -- but probably not enough to account for the rise in CEV that Dupuy proposed.

As I mentioned before, there are probably a few schools of thought about Dupuy besides the two obvious ones. I tend to fall somewhere in the middle, realizing that his model was far from perfect, but also believing his contribution was useful, and believing that on some concepts his approach was valid enough.

Cheers

BW

 

So the German infantry company would generally use their small arms and MGs to pin down and fix the enemy, and then call down mortar fire to increase damage, then rinse and repeat?

And the American and the British company would do the same, but they would not only have mortar fire, but also real artillery? Then rinse and repeat.

How long would it take to get mortar and artillery fire down on a position?

So I assume that the Soviets operated more on German lines, right?

*All this I assume is with the absence of armor

 

This page mentions

Speed in answering calls for fire remained an obsession. In Korea the British, Canadian and New Zealand regiments of the Commonwealth division typically responded to Uniform targets in about 70 seconds.

Probably on the high-speed-of-response end for getting field artillery support. A "Uniform" target was one the entire divisional artillery had plotted and could respond to.

Another thing affecting the speed of artillery response is whether the impact area was a pre-plotted target.

Cheers

BW

 

Thanks for the amazing link

 

I found a tidbit that said that German artillery responses were 10-12 minutes. So I assume that the british enjoyed 2 minutes?

 

The 70 seconds mentioned before had to be a "best response". I'd guess somewhere between 5 and 10 minutes was probably typical for U.S. and British artillery, depending on circumstances. Pre-plotted targets like the one mentioned before, though, were probably able to be hit faster. It would be nice to see a gunner comment on this. Any Redlegs out there ?

Cheers

BW

 

Yes, there is some great information there. Glad you enjoyed it.