Quite apart from fortified lines, the Germans were also anxious to avoid counter-attacks by enemy reserve formations. The essence of ‘blitzkrieg’ was to break through the enemy’s defences before he had time to gather his reserves together. It should disrupt his counter-attacks before they had been formed. Only then would the apparently decisive advantages of the defensive be truly broken.
The early German blitzkriegs certainly succeeded in all this, and were able to brush aside the partial counter-attacks launched by armies which were still thinking in terms of pre-mechanised movement rates. Even so it was with considerable nervousness that the German high command ventured forth from its bridgehead at Sedan in 1940, and on several occasions it almost called off the whole operation for fear of the damage a counter-attack might inflict. When the British did manage to launch a local attack at Arras it caused disproportionate confusion in the German spearhead. In Russia, also, there was considerable disruption of the German plan when Marshal Timoshenko mounted a large counter-attack south of Smolensk in the second half of July 1941. In both these cases the counter-attack had the effect of forcing battle upon formations which were trying to avoid it by the use of mobility. More of the same might well have stopped the Germans in their tracks.
The secret of the ‘blitzkrieg’ lay in moving a mechanised all-arms force through an enemy’s front line before he had time to consolidate it, and then playing havoc in his rear areas before he could mount a counter-attack or build a fresh defensive line. This process did not rely particularly upon tanks – and in Norway it was effectively completed without their assistance. What it did require was rapid transport, surprise and an overawed or demoralised enemy.
An alerted enemy, on the other hand, could do several things to make such an attack stop and fight, for without the benefit of surprise a great deal of the power of the offensive melted away. Thus the drive into Russia was finally halted outside Moscow and Leningrad once the onrush of the German spearheads had been delayed sufficiently for defensive lines and counter-attack forces to be organised. The following year the same pattern was repeated at Stalingrad with more spectacular results, while at Kursk in 1943 the Russians were able to build defences in great depth which stopped the attack almost before it had begun.
The creation of effective mobile reserves was another important measure which could stop an armoured spearhead. In the First World War these had always been available in good time by the use of rail transport; but in the Second War the railways had become too vulnerable and inflexible for this role. The battle now moved faster and so mobile reserves now had to move on wheels and tracks, exactly like the break-in forces themselves. If adequate defensive reserves of this type could be provided, however, it was found that equilibrium could be restored to the battle line. The ‘blitzkrieg’s’ decisive break-through could be prevented, and the contest would revert to positional warfare.
After its first two years the Second World War continued to see some spectacular manoeuvring but it also saw a great deal of positional warfare and trench fighting. The tank by no means abolished this particular form of horror, as is often assumed, because it was found that the tank could be stopped. What happened, in effect, was that the development of tanks and anti-tank defences often cancelled each other out. The only really significant change was perhaps that the side which commanded the air could at last impose an important level of attrition upon the enemy lines of supply. At Alamein, Normandy and the Battle of the Bulge this was possibly the deciding factor in the outcome. Elsewhere it was important but less decisive. Heavy attrition still tended to take place in the front lines, just as it had during the First World War and in the Spanish Civil War.
Trench fighting in any war tends to be very like that in any other. Marshal V. I. Chuikov, for example, describes conditions in the Magnuszew bridgehead, August 1944, in terms very reminiscent of descriptions of the Western Front 1914–18:
As for what life in the trenches is really like, there is no need to say too much. Anyone who has no experience of it need only go down into a damp basement or cellar with a narrow slit of a window, and then imagine men staying in conditions like that for two or three weeks, or even several months on end, just waiting for their cellar-hole to be hit by a shell and themselves crushed under logs, boards, earth and mould. Added to which the soldier has to stand long hours of look-out duty, and has to sit in his listening post whether the rain pours or the sun blazes or the blizzard howls. And to crown all this comes that uninvited guest, the louse – who is the scourge of all under such conditions, and is no respecter of rank, title or honours. In Stalingrad they called the creatures ‘tommy-gunners’ on the Northern Donets they were ‘Vlasov’s men’ and on the Vistula they were ‘Faustniks’.22
In many of the Second World War battles the line became immobile for weeks and even months on end. In the Normandy fighting there was a fairly static front for almost two months; at Monte Cassino it lasted for six months; while at the siege of Leningrad it went on for two and a half years. In this war, as in previous conflicts, there were important ‘static’ phases as much as there were ‘mobile’ ones.23
In the First World War the fronts had been immobilised by machine-guns mixed in with the infantry positions. In the Second World War a sprinkling of anti-tank guns was added to the mixture to make it secure from armoured attacks as well as from infantry. The Germans were especially good at this, and led the way in making a flexible combination of all arms. Thus for them a ‘tank battle’ did not mean simply a duel between tanks meeting head-on, as it did for the British and other armies. Instead, it was to be a blend of tank manoeuvres, anti-tank gun fire and action by the other arms as well. It was to include both mobile and static elements as part of the whole. The Germans were particularly adept, for example, at using their tanks as bait to lure pursuing armour onto a screen of waiting anti-tank guns.
In the Western Desert the British took a long time to understand what was happening in actions of this type, since they had at first no such close relationship between their own tanks and guns. Far too often the British would push forward their armour in unsupported masses against anti-tank ambushes. Predictably, they would then find that the limited visibility from each vehicle and the difficulty of firing on the move made it almost impossible to locate and destroy the German guns. The attacker’s losses tended to be high in these battles and sometimes had the effect of convincing British commanders that they were facing especially powerful enemy tanks, and not anti-tank guns at all.24
The Germans, by contrast, had quickly realised that a really heavy anti-tank weapon was essential. The redoubtable 8.8cm Flak gun turned out to be well suited to work of this kind, and was for some time much more powerful than anything the British were using in this role. Its long range meant that each piece could cover a wide area of front with its fire, thus allowing the principle of dispersion to be maintained without sacrificing mutual support. The open desert terrain lent itself to a defence by small, thinly-spread but powerful outposts built around this weapon.
We can here compare Rommel’s ideas of 1941 with his earlier views from 1937. Essentially the general pattern is the same in each case, although the weaponry had certainly improved over the four years between the two. By 1941 he envisaged an increased dispersion of the outposts, an even greater stress on anti-tank defences, and a substitution of mechanised forces for infantry storm troop counter-attack elements:
… The outpost positions, up to company strength, must perforce be fairly far apart; but the whole line must be planned in adequate depth towards the rear.
Every defended point must be a complete defensive system in itself. Every weapon must be sited so that it is able to fire in every direction. I visualise the ideal arrangement of such defensive points on these lines:
One 88-mm. ‘flak’ gun should be sunk into the ground as deeply as the field of fire permits. From here trenches should radiate in three directions to three points – one a machine gun position, the second a heav
y mortar position, and the third a light 22-mm. anti-aircraft gun, or a 50-mm. ‘pak’ [anti-tank] gun. Sufficient water, ammunition, and supplies for three weeks must always be available. And every man is to sleep prepared for action.
… In case of an enemy attack, the fire of our arms must completely cover the gap between the defended points. Should the enemy succeed in breaking through the gaps, owing say to bad visibility, every weapon must be in position to engage towards the rear. Let it be clear that there is no such thing as a ‘Direction, Front’, but only a ‘Direction, Enemy’.
… The final decision of any struggle if the enemy attacks will probably rest with the Panzer and motorized units behind the line. Where this decision is reached is immaterial. A battle is won when the enemy is destroyed. Remember one thing – every individual position must hold, regardless of what the general position appears to be. Our Panzers and motorized formations will not leave you in the lurch, even if you should not see them for weeks.25
All this represents a pretty close translation of First World War methods into Second World War terminology. It shows a great continuity of doctrine which argues against any supposed ‘watershed’ in tactical affairs around 1940. As if to reinforce this point, we also find that wherever Rommel set up a fortified line – as at Alamein – it elicited a distinctly ‘First World War’ style of attack from his opponents. Thus at Alamein we hear of Montgomery’s ‘thousand-gun bombardment’, his ‘creeping barrages’ and his infantry ‘break-in’ or ‘crumbling’ attacks. What else had Haig been trying to achieve at Passchendaele if not to ‘crumble’ the German positions in this way?
The Battle of Alamein also gives us a particularly vivid example of how a German tank attack could be stopped by infantry and anti-tank guns, once a suitably defensive mentality and guns of sufficient power had been deployed on the British side. This demonstration of the helplessness of armour came on 27 October 1942, just after the 2nd Battalion of the Rifle Brigade had occupied an advanced position near the point known as ‘Snipe’ on the western side of Kidney Ridge.26 Just before dawn the (much understrength) battalion had dug a position of all-round defence into the soft sand, supported by nineteen of the new six-pounder anti-tank guns, including some from the 239th Anti-Tank Battery, R.A. The position, on a gradual incline, measured 900 by 400 yards, and was overlooked from the south-west by a low rise called ‘Hill 37’ and in close proximity, as it turned out, to the night leaguers of two groups of enemy armour. To the north-west was a part of the 15th Panzer Division, and to the south-west lay the ‘Battlegroup Stiffelmayer’, with a strength of about thirty-five tanks and self-propelled guns.
While it was still dark a detachment from the Stiffelmayer group had blundered into the battalion’s position, and had been beaten off when two of their armoured vehicles were destroyed at very close range by the anti-tank guns. The Germans then took up covered positions about five or six hundred yards to the west and north. At dawn they broke cover to move away, but were engaged by the six-pounders and suffered no less than sixteen losses among vehicles which were presenting their vulnerable rear and side plates. There was a quick response by artillery fire upon the British position; but the scrub, the slight folds in the ground and the low silhouettes of the British guns combined to make accurate German observation impossible.
At this point the British received a rather hesitant reinforcement from 24th Armoured Brigade, which started badly by shelling the positions of its friends. As it came down from Kidney Ridge, moreover, the British armour attracted a lively fire from enemy tanks and anti-tank gun positions hull-down along the northern, western and southern horizons. The range was long for the British anti-tank guns to reply; but they succeeded in destroying three more enemy tanks. The intensity of the German fire, on the other hand, soon beat off the exposed British tanks, with the loss of seven of their number. They retired over the ridge to the east from whence they had come.
The action at ‘Snipe’.
As the morning wore on the little garrison at ‘Snipe’ beat off an Italian infantry attack from the south, and then an attack by thirteen Italian M13 light tanks from the west. Immediately after this the British were able to engage the northern flank of a strong German armoured column moving east at a range of around 1,000 yards. Together with a cross-fire coming from 24th Armoured Brigade on Kidney Ridge, the anti-tank guns were able to destroy a further eight of these enemy tanks.
By this time many of the riflemen’s bren carriers had been destroyed, and only thirteen of the six-pounders remained in action. In the early afternoon the Italian tanks from Hill 37 were able to make a fresh attack which came into the field of fire of only one of the British guns. For some time the issue hung in the balance; but in the end all nine enemy vehicles were destroyed by the single gun – the last one at a range of under two hundred yards. After this the enemy returned to shelling the British for several hours without making an attack, in which endeavour they were for a time joined – accidentally again – by some British tanks on Kidney Ridge.
At 5 p.m., however, the German 21st Panzer Division arrived to the north-west of the riflemen’s position, and sent forward a group of forty tanks straight towards Kidney Ridge. They were apparently ignorant of the presence of the anti-tank guns a short distance from their exposed right flank, although they were soon to be disillusioned. The 239th battery found that it had four guns which could bear at ranges of between one and five hundred yards, and in a hectic duel they succeeded in destroying over twelve of the enemy Mark Ill’s and Mark IV’s. Perhaps more importantly, they persuaded the remainder of this imposing mass of armour to turn back and discontinue the attack.
The second wave of 21st Panzer Division next detached fifteen Mark III tanks to make a cautious frontal attack upon the British position. They made use of all the covered approaches they could, and came against a sector where they could be engaged by only three of the anti-tank guns. Fire was held by the defenders until the range had closed to a mere two hundred yards; but when it did come it quickly accounted for six of the enemy and beat the remainder back to a respectful distance.
After this, with an overall loss of well over fifty tanks, the Germans decided to call it a day. They had made casualties of about a third of the British garrison, had knocked out all but six of their guns, but had not defeated them. The gallant defenders were allowed to withdraw unmolested after nightfall, to spread the word that at last the Eighth Army had found an anti-tank gun which was actually capable of doing the job for which it was designed. As the historian of this action has said, ‘the immediate lesson that was read to the whole of the army was that, when equipped with their own 6-pounders, the infantry could themselves see off a tank attack and inflict severe losses upon the enemy’.27
It was unfortunate for the Eighth Army that the Germans reverted to a generally defensive posture just at the moment when the British finally deployed an effective anti-tank gun. It was soon after this, moreover, that the first of a new generation of German tanks appeared in action: the Tigers and the Panthers. Compared with these excellent models the American and British armour was for a long time seriously deficient in both protection and gun power. In important respects, therefore, the attacking side now lost much of the edge which the Germans had seemed to enjoy in their early blitzkriegs.
Against consolidated defensive positions the attacker found that he was almost as powerless as had been his predecessors in the 1914–18 war. Progress through a zone of enemy battle outposts seemed to be as slow as ever, provided that the enemy’s morale continued to hold out. Attacks were also liable, from time to time, to suffer the type of devastating check which the Germans had experienced at ‘Snipe’. Given good interlocking fields of fire with powerful tanks and anti-tank guns, there seemed to be little for a defender to fear from an armoured attack. Given adequate petrol, also, a defender could still concentrate his reserves behind a threatened point and deliver counter-blows to regain lost ground.
That the allied armies did
succeed in making slow but steady progress against the Germans says more for their material superiority, particularly in the air, than it does for any increased mobility which the tank may have brought to the battlefield. In the late summer battles of 1944, for example, British tank attacks in both Normandy and North Italy still seemed destined to meet bloody ruin against unsuppressed defences. Excessive faith in overwhelming numbers combined with insufficient co-ordination and control, and an unjustified demand for haste from the higher echelons, had all been depressing features of attacks in the First World War. In 1944 they appeared anew, now translated into the supposedly more ‘modern’ guise of tank warfare.
In the battle for the Gothic Line, for example, the 2nd Armoured Brigade was launched precipitously through the 46th Infantry Division on 4 September 1944, for what was intended to be the exploitation and pursuit of a beaten foe. This came after several changes of plan and two gruelling night marches which had deprived the tank crews of their rest. Some of the radios were inoperative because they had been netted onto the frequency of one of the BBC’s light music programmes; and the brigade staff found they had no time even to make a reconnaissance. They were thrown headlong into a battle which turned out to be far from won, with inadequate infantry support and with a false idea of where the forward edge of the fighting had actually reached. To cap it all, some of the tanks encountered severe traffic jams as they tried to make their way forward to their start-line through the winding roads of the hilly Italian terrain.
One squadron of the Bays fell instantly into trouble as it moved up a valley:
As the tanks moved into sight, the German anti-tank gunners on Gemmano to their left and at Croce in front of them began to make good practice. The tanks came under steady fire from armour-piercing shot …
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