Hitler's military capabilities (3 Viewers)

[panda1gen]

I have always thought that military historians have been somewhat overly critical of Hitler's military decisions - particularly in the second half of the war. Even in the Russian endeavor it was perfectly reasonble for Hitler to assume that a quick victory was possible and even likely - particularly in light of the German experiences in the First World War. After the failure of his initial efforts in Russia, no military strategy could have led to a German victory. Hitler may have been among the first to recognize this. Rather, from about Dec. '41 onward his policy was simply to prolong the war for as long as possible by holding out to the last man in the East and contesting with the western allies in secondary theatres such as N. Africa and Italy. Most of the limited German offensives from 1942 onward were defensive in objective along these lines. In this, Hitler was quite successful in extending the war one or two years longer than perhaps it should have gone on given the allied superiority in material and manpower.

As with his pre-1933 political career, when faced with setbacks Hitler bided his time and hoped for something favorable to happen that he could exploit. His declaration of war on the US, for example, may have been a far sighted albeit risky gamble that recognized the potential tensions of an allied coalition that included the Americans and Russians. Most of the German generals, however, were overly optimistic until much later in the war based on their prior successes and failed to recognize that they could not reproduce such successes on a strategic level after 1941. Rommel is a good example of a general that achieved tactical successes, but only accelerated the demise of the Germans in N.A. due to his failure to recognize that no lasting success could be achieved due to allied superiority in supplies and that his duty was simply to prolong the fighting as long as possible. Kesselring did a much better job in Italy in this regard. I think there is an understandable need to castigate Hitler due to the German war crimes, however, many of the notions of Hitler contributing to the demise of the German army (particular by his own generals) have been somewhat exaggerated. Some of the otherwise more inexplicable decisions, such as diverting much needed Panzers to Hungary in '45 to protect oil reserves rather than Berlin, can only be viewed as consistent with his goal of extending the war at all costs. No oil - no capability to continue the fight. The loss of Berlin was of no strategic consequence -as even Eisenhower recognized.

This is the right room for an argument! I believe that the offensives in Russia in both 1942 and 1943 in the 'campaigning season' were designed to win the war and were not truly defensive. Defeat at Stalingrad meant they could not win the war in the east due to the losses, defeat at Kursk meant they would lose it. The real acheivement in all of that though was the increased capability of the Red Army during and after 1943 especially, which meant that frankly whatever Hitler decided was increasingly irrelevent. By the time it came, the western front shortened but didn't alter the outcome.

 

[Combat]

This is the right room for an argument! I believe that the offensives in Russia in both 1942 and 1943 in the 'campaigning season' were designed to win the war and were not truly defensive. Defeat at Stalingrad meant they could not win the war in the east due to the losses, defeat at Kursk meant they would lose it. The real acheivement in all of that though was the increased capability of the Red Army during and after 1943 especially, which meant that frankly whatever Hitler decided was increasingly irrelevent. By the time it came, the western front shortened but didn't alter the outcome.

Far and away the best book on the subject is Hitler by Joachim C. Fest. I strongly recommend it to anyone interested in this topic. The focus is primarily on the pre-war years, but the strategies developed in his political rise are strikingly similar to those used in his military undertakings.

 

[Combat]

I recently came across "Hitler and his Generals - Military Conferences 1942-1945" - a stenographic record of the German military conferences. A great book! A couple of passages from the intro that make points more thoughtfully than perhaps I did:

"one must grant that many of Hitler's military decisions until very near the end, were in the technical sense throughly reasonable -- more reasonable, in any case, than the usual version of events would lead one to believe. In the published transcripts that follow there are a number of examples of Hitler's decisions that are usually thought of as insane, overly confident, or based on blind emotion at best, but which were actually rooted in considerations that at least at the time seemed plausible, even when in hindsight they cannot be judged as completely objective. And as already mentioned, there were also decisions that were fundamentally correct -- even in hindsight -- and which were successful or averted disaster."

"Whatever one credits or does not credit Hitler with as a military leader, and whatever pieces of the mosaic are missing from this collectinon that would complete his portrait, one point should not be overlooked under any circumstances: the German Armed Forces were not defeated in WW II because Hitler led them poorly and continually handicapped his generals, nor because the clever instincts of the Fuhrer were diluted or sabotaged by this generals, who were at the very least narrow-minded if not downright evil. ...militarily the war could not have been won after 1941, and it wasn't won before 1941, despite dazzling battlefield victories."

 

[OzDigger]

I'll have to try and get that book Combat as I'm into factual accounts like that. I prefer books based on facts rather than those hollywood type of books for the masses that don't look past the propaganda. I have a few books written by ex German Generals and others that knew Hitler well. Most agree that Hitler was a quiet well mannered person with simple tastes. He had a good grasp of military tactics, and a better memory than most of his Generals.

Hitler appreciated the fact that boldness put the enemy on the backfoot and he often exploited this. Many people focus on battles lost, such as Germany's invasion of Russia. However the Germans had no choice as they had evidence the Russians intended to invade them. Hitler did not factor in the matter that Japan would get the US involved in the war and things may have been very different if the US remained neutral.

Imo it is dangerous to label people such as Hitler as 'madmen' because many of their actions at the time seemed reasonable to them and their followers. Therefore we should be just as wary of leaders that appear 'normal' and not follow them down the road to destruction. It's a bit like when news media interview neighbours that lived next door to some serial killer. They all say the same thing: "he seemed very nice, but sort of quiet". I've never heard anyone say: "yeah, he was a raving looney, and I'm not surprised he went around killing people". Mother was right, it's the quiet ones you have to watch out for

 

[Rob]

You guys know a lot more than i do about this but i have a point to put.If the mark of a great General is the decisions he makes in the heat of battle then there are some serious questions to be asked about Hitlers skill in this dept.

At the height of the Battle of Britain When they were gaining the upper hand he ordered Goering to attack London (in some act of child like rage)thus relieving the pressure and allowing the R.A.F(god bless everyone of them)to regroup and inflict a heavy defeat upon him.

Did he not also sacrafice a whole army at Stalingrad rather than lose face to the citys namesake?.An army who could have got out earlier and made a vital contribution to Germanys defence.

And how about the whole Battle of the Bulge?.A bold plan i agree but a huge drain in men and material that could never be replaced and did not achieve what it set out to.And his lack of supplys and support for Rommel had a huge effect on the outcome in North Africa.

As i say i am sure you all know a lot more than i do about this but it does seem to me along with his victories he had some cock ups on a monumental scale.

Rob

 

[Louis Badolato]

I have to go with Rob on this one. Nobody in Europe can ever hope to (1) win a war while fighting on multiple fronts or (2) successfully invade the Soviet Union. Hitler (1) wholly failed in finishing off the British both by (a) calling off the Panzers at Dunkirk at Goerings request and (b) changing the focus of the Battle of Britain from bombing airfields and radar installations to terror bombing of the cities, (2) got mixed up in North Africa, Greece and Yugoslavia in a misguided attempt to bail out Mussolini, and (3) launched an invasion of the Soviet Union late in the summer season, thereby hopelessly embroiling himself in a multifront war while simultaneously invading the Soviet Union. Further, his refusal to permit retreats from Stalingrad and from North Africa cost German hundreds of thousands of men. Whatever these transcripts show about other decisions, I don't think these disasterous decisions can be explained away. Quite simply, they cost Germany the war. Period.

 

[Combat]

Louis/Rob-
A lot of good points. Will leave it to others to address them individually if they like, but will simply reiterate my opinion that no decision made by Hitler or his generals in the West or Africa had any impact on the final outcome of the war. The Germans could have destroyed the British armies at Dunkirk and bomded England into the stone age, but still would have been unable to subdue England due to British naval superiority.

The war for Germany and England was decided in June-Dec. 1941 in Russia. It was a gigantic winner take all gamble by Hitler - the only one perhaps that could have led to a successful outcome for the Germans. Because of the German limitations in resources, however, it had to be successful in a few months or not at all. At that time everyone including Churchill and Roosevelt believed the Germans would be successful in Russia. Even Stalin thought he was going to be arrested based on the magnitude of the early German successes. These opinions were based in large part upon the experiences of the First World War in which Germany - while still fighting a multi-front war - was able to defeat Russia leading the Tsar's abdication. No one had any reason to believe that a country could survive the massive casualties and destruction imposed on the Russians - 30+ million - and continue to maintain an operational government and military force. Only the fact that Stalin proved more ruthless than his predecessor altered a repeat of WWI.

 

[DMNamiot]

Hi Guys,

I have to say its really interesting that this question is still in play. I am glad that we are engaged in some very interesting discussion of the points that have been brought up. I dont however totally agree with the notion that Germany fighting on 2 fronts during WWI was able to bring the Russians to their knees and force them to lay down their arms. In a nutshell the Russians had had a series of strikes and worker related issues rising from the dissatisfation of the workers and being agitated by the Bolshevics they had two "revolutions" in March and again in October/November and a series of mutinies by troops in the field that forced not only the abdication of the Czar but brought the country to the Civil War that ultimately ended in the USSR. The Bolshevics also decided in November of 1917 to approach the Germans about an Armistice and because the Germans were needing troops for the planned offensive on the western front they rightly decided to negotiate with them. This was in fact a very smart thing for the Germans to do and when they sat down with the Russian delegation to hammer out the details of the Brest-Litovsk Treaty they had already begun transfering large formations of troops to the west and had left a smaller force in the front line trenches. There is also the fact that not all of the troops fighting on the Eastern Front were Germans, there were a lot of troops from the Austro Hungarian Empire in the mix as well as Turkish Troops and Bulgarians. (I will try and find the Order of Battle I have in my pile of paper to illustrate this.)

One other point that brought so much change to the world was that the Russians suffered over 4 million dead as a result of the fighting during WWI this was the most casulties suffered by any of the countries participating in this fight. To illustrate how bad they suffered the Russians lost 1 Million soldiers during the Campaign to seize Galicia by Gen Brusilov and were so depleted that they could not follow up on what was a major success on the battlefield which inturn allowed the Germans to transfer reserves to stop gap the offensive.

The other reason I think the Germans failed in Russia in WWII was because they diverted troops to the Balkens and delayed the planned offensive until much to late in the season for a successful campaign. If they had gone earlier we might have seen a different out come but because Hitler insisted on bailing out the Italians whenever they had issuses with small countries like the ones in the Balkens they lost an opportunity.

Dave

 

[Gideon]

Maybe you could clear this up for me:

Mussolini basically allied himself with Hitler to save Italy from invasion, right?

Why didn't Hitler march in there and take over? Seems he could have narrowed the fighting down a bit by doing that, but then again, what do I know?

 

[Combat]

Maybe you could clear this up for me:

Mussolini basically allied himself with Hitler to save Italy from invasion, right?

Why didn't Hitler march in there and take over? Seems he could have narrowed the fighting down a bit by doing that, but then again, what do I know?

Gid -
Mussolini allied himself with Hitler because he thought the Germans were going to win the war and he wanted to get in on the spoils. There was never a threat of invasion to Italy until after they entered the war. They could have stayed "neutral" like Franco's Spain. Not sure about the basis of your second question - except that Hitler would not have felt the need to waste troops occupying a friendly country that was outside the strategic scope of the war. He only aided the Italians when they got in trouble in Africa and Greece. He recognized that these were secondary fronts useful only in tying up American and British troops and maintaining the prestige of Mussolini. He did eventually occupy Italy when things fell apart. The British did him a huge favor by insisting that Italy be invaded in 1943. That was a pointless and bloody undertaking for the allied troops.

 

[OzDigger]

You guys know a lot more than i do about this but i have a point to put.If the mark of a great General is the decisions he makes in the heat of battle then there are some serious questions to be asked about Hitlers skill in this dept.

At the height of the Battle of Britain When they were gaining the upper hand he ordered Goering to attack London (in some act of child like rage)thus relieving the pressure and allowing the R.A.F(god bless everyone of them)to regroup and inflict a heavy defeat upon him.

Did he not also sacrafice a whole army at Stalingrad rather than lose face to the citys namesake?.An army who could have got out earlier and made a vital contribution to Germanys defence.

And how about the whole Battle of the Bulge?.A bold plan i agree but a huge drain in men and material that could never be replaced and did not achieve what it set out to.And his lack of supplys and support for Rommel had a huge effect on the outcome in North Africa.

As i say i am sure you all know a lot more than i do about this but it does seem to me along with his victories he had some cock ups on a monumental scale.

Rob

Most of Hitler's military 'errors' were caused by political descisions rather than military. Don't forget that at the end of the day Hitler was a dictator that relied on his political cunning to win and hold power. He started bombing British cities after German cities were attacked and left the soldiers at Stalingrad because it would be bad politics to have German soldiers retreating.

In addition to politics, personality played a major part in Hitler's actions. Hitler was an emotional person that could only see the world in black and white, with no grey areas. He gained power because of his descisive actions when Germany was at it's lowest point following WWI. He viewed compromise as a sign of weakness, and perhaps this is the major reason for his mistakes. Self belief can often lead to success but it can also blind otherwise intelligent people to the bleeding obvious.

 

[Louis Badolato]

Oz,

I have to disagree with you about Operation Sealion. Were the Germans to have finished off the RAF, which according to British estimates they were about a week away from doing when they switched to terror bombing of cities, British naval superiority would have been useless. Remember Pearl Harbor, the Coral Sea, Midway? Remember what the Japanese did to the "Prince of Wales"? Naval vessels are absolutely helpless against air power. Once the RAF was done, Britain was as good as occupied. Had Hitler any understanding of this, Germany would have had an excellent chance to win the war.

Also, had Russia invade Germany, not visa versa, the Germans would have had the advantage of defense, and the Russians would have had to deal with the extremely long supply lines. Add all the troops wasted in Greece, the Balkans, and North Africa into the mix, and the Germans have an excellent chance of handing Stalin a very bloody nose.

I thank providence every day that Hitler, rather than someone with military knowledge, led the Nazis. His decisions absolutely lost Germany the war.

 

[OzDigger]

Louis, I actually didn't say anything about Operation Sealion

But now that you mentioned it. I would disagree that Britain would have been easy to defeat, even at that stage. Yes, the RAF was loosing aircraft, but not as many as the Luftwaffe. In anycase the Germans may indeed have landed on England. However I doubt that they would have gained much of a foothold because of the difficulty to supply troops across the English Channel. Remember that D-Day was touch and go for some time despite the vast superiority of the allied Navy and Airforce.

And you shouldn't discount completely the effectiveness of a ship to defend itself against air attack. Ships may be vulnerable to surprise attack but with sufficient warning they can hold off most aerial attacks, especially when they have their own air cover. The British have a reputation as being fair minded fighters but the gloves would have been off and they would have fought tooth and claw for their little island.

And rather than being Hitler's mistake, I believe the failure of Operation Sealion was mainly the fault of Goerring, as was the supposed resupply of Stalingrad by air.

 

[Louis Badolato]

Oz,

Again I must respectfully disagree.

First of all, before Hitler directed Goering to attack cities rather than airfields, the RAF was all but done. They simply could not produce pilots or planes to meet their losses. They were a week from total collapse. Once the RAF was done, Britain would have been done.

It is recognized modern naval doctrine that ships, absent their own air cover, cannot hope to defend themselves against airpower. One the RAF was wiped out, the British Navy would, quite simply, have ceased to exist under determined German air attack.

I know the British are brave and hearty people, as are the Welsh and the Scots, but once the Germans had command of the air, then the sea, there would have been no hope of their holding out. They had no generals, tanks or experienced troops who were any match for those German forces. Hitlers decision to try to terrorize the British into capitulation, at the cost of abandoning his nearly complete campaign against the RAF, sealed his, and Germany's doom.

Without defeating Britain, and while still bleeding troops and other resources in Greece, North Africa and the Balkans, launching Operation Barbarossa was also a disassterous decision. The Soviets, who absorbed some 75% to 80% of the German divisions, were the most important members of the Allied forces, far outstripping the British and American forces contribution. Bringing them into the war was also a fatal mistake.

I do agree that most of Hitlers decisions were political decisions, and that, ultimately, is why he doomed his country to defeat. Political and Ideological decisions (like attacking Russia because it was a communist state, something a fascist dictator felt obligated to oppose) are often contradictory to the appropriate military approach.

Finally, read Heinz Guderian's book, and you will see that Hitler didn't pay attention to warning after warning from his general staff, listening instead to useless toadies like Goering. Hitler repeatedly took Goering's word for the Luftwaffe's capabilities, and Goering, to inflate his own importance, inevitably promised far more than he could deliver. A good commander would not have fallen for this more than once.

 

[Njja]

If you do a bit of research on the Yamato it will quickly answer the comment

about warships ability to defend themselves against air attacks. This was the

most powerful warship the world had ever seen.......until it was sunk by

aircraft.

Njja

 

[Combat]

Even if the Germans had been successful in occupying England, Churchill and the govt would simply have moved to Canada. The war would have continued more or less as it did in Africa. I think the plight of the RAF has been vastly overstated. They were never close to defeat. Operational aircraft numbers were very close throughout the battle - any deficiency on the British side was made up by being on the defense. Their downed pilots were returned to battle, the Germans became POWs. Even accepting the notion that the Germans could have obtained air superiority and then translated that somehow into destroying the British navy the logistics of a cross channel invasion were beyond the wildest dreams of the Germans in 1940. They simply did not have the transports to get sufficient numbers of men and material into England and could not have done so for some time.

 

[OzDigger]

Louis, I guess we'll have to agree to disagree once again because I just can't see how Germany could have defeated Britain at that time as it was low on resources as well. The RAF may have been getting low on fighters but they still had plenty of medium and heavy bombers to attack an invading army. In addition, the Germans had virtually no landing craft in which to convey their tanks to England and would have required port facilities which the British would have been unlikely to leave intact in the worse scenario.

After some time I'm sure Hitler also regreted invading Russia, but at the time I guess it seemed a good gamble. The Soviet Union was even then a rather tenuous union of varied states that had issues with each other. Perhaps the Germans would have succeeded if they weren't so harsh on the people in the areas they occupied.

In the ship versus aircraft discussion I agree that the aircraft has the advantage in most cases. However it is wrong to think sinking a ship by air is easy or a one sided affair, even in modern times. The British navy would not have made themsleves easy targets defending their homeland, and would have beached their ships to repel an invasion if required. And as I said earlier the RAF still had plenty of bombers to attack the German navy and invasion force. As for the Yamato in the open sea with minimal screening support and no air support - it still required several waves of attack by 280 US aircraft to sink her. It should also be noted that very few Kamikaze aircraft got through US AA defence.

At least we agree about Hitler placing politics above military requirements on more than one occassion which played a significant part in Germany's defeat.

 

[Rob]

I agree with ozdigger (even though his country is probably going to win back the ashes in november!!!)I don't think the German invasion of Britain would have been a certain victory at all.Opinions have changed much over recent years and its to simplistic to say the Luftwaffe would have dealt with the Royal Navy.Its very easy to use terms such as total collapse within a week but i don't think thats the whole story.There is no doubt the Navy would have caused huge losses in German shipping,costing them vital losses in men and material.And believe me from the R.A.F veterans i have spoken to at the iwm they did not believe for one second that the germans would have placed a single foot on British soil.

There have also been several programmes on the History channel in recent years that suggest that Hitlers planned invasion of this country was a shambles.They suggest that they had very few landing craft fit for purpose and that the whole thing was not organised anywhere nearly as good as previous invasions. Again i bow to all your expertise on these things but am i right in saying the Germans did not have huge experience in seaborne invasions?.I also believe that in the seventies and perhaps again more recently (in another programme)A wargamme invasion of this country was played out.Using men who were on both sides at the time (including i think Adolf Galland)and on both occasions it was a failure.

No i for one do not think the invasion of this country was a foregone conclusion at all.

On one of these history progs about the invasion they spoke to some of the R.A.F. Veterans.One of them said:"who did they think they were,coming over here in their bloody little planes with their bloody little swatstikas on them,we wern't having it!"

I tell you guys for all the problems this country has,i sure am proud to be a Brit.

Rob

 

[OzDigger]

For US members: The 'ashes' represents a traditional cricket competition played between England and Australia which Australia sometimes lets the English win to stop them whinging - for a while

 

[Rob]

Sadly he's right again!!

Rob