The Role of the Tank

[Zemke]

Well Lt Colonel John Fuller was the first person to propose that tanks shouldn't just be there to support the intantry and should be used basically as cavalry to punch a hole in the enemy and sweep into the rear areas, leaving the infanty to mop up. Although not totaly successful this plan was implimented at Cambrai, and again more successfully at Amiens, where both heavy and light tanks were used. The heavies to punch the hole and the light whippets to fan out into the rear areas and attack communications, HQ units and supply columns.

Basil Hart who rewrote the army's Infantry Training Manual in 1920 propsoed an 'expanding torrent' form of attack where resources should be used to exploit gains rather than fed into areas where difficulties were encountered. He wrote that success lay, "...partly in the tactical combination of tanks and aircraft, partly un the unexpectedness of the stroke in direction and time, but above all in the 'follow through' - the way that a breakthrough (the tactical penetration of the front) is exploited by a deep strategic penetration, carried out by armoured forces racing on ahead of the main army, and operating independantly."

These Germans used these tactics as the basis of Blitzkrieg, so I feel reasonably confident in saying that although they were indeed the first to use them on such a grand scale, they didn't come up with a 'unique' form of warfare, meremly 'borrowed' the ideas of others and refined them.

As for Market Garden, I wouldn't say that that was in anyway intended to be a Blitzkrieg. They couldn't bypass areas of resistance as they needed the whole length of the route secure. nor could the Armour range out in front of the infantry on it's own; and thirdly the intent wasn't to cut off or encircle units, nor to cause disruption behind the lines, but to achieve a specifc and limited tactical objective, i.e. to secure the crossings over the rivers.

All the above is true, except the "borrowed" idea part. During WW I both sides had been trying to solve the "Riddle of the Trenches". The Germans method was to create Stormtroopers, which were specially trained "Combined Arms Squads" (having flamethrowers, special hand grenades troops, and other trench clearing weapons). Their primary mission was to move as fast as possible deep into the enemy's trench network, bypassing centers of resistance, (sound familiar). Then follow on Infantry would eliminate the bypassed "pockets" of resistance, and continue to push forward. They did this through integration of Artillery and Infantry, and during the Offensive of 1918, use of close air support. They almost won WW I in 1918, but could not bring their artillery forward, nor get follow on Infantry forward fast enough. Also the forward troops could not be supported logistically over the shell shattered terrain and continue the "push". The Allies were able to shift forces to "shore up the breach", faster than the Germans could push more troops in, thus the Great 1918 Offensive failed.

Follow WW I the Chief of the German General Staff, Von Seeck instituted a systematic study of WW I, on every possible subject, by officers who had direct experience in each subject area. So lots of Captains, and not Generals, were solicited to write papers for the study. Following the studies, the Germans went about applying what was learned. Did other Officers of the Allies come to similar conclusions, yes, but their respective military institutions did not adopt those ideas. Fuller, Hart and De Gull were not taken seriously, or their respective military institutions were too rigid to accept the ideas of such relatively Junior officers. The great advantage the Germans had, was Von Seecks willingness to take the knowledge of the Officers who had fought in the trenches, and using a systematic study, apply that knowledge.

The term Blitzkrieg does not really explain what the Germans did in 1940. The term "Blitzkrieg" was coined by the English press. Although, according to the latest book on the subject, "The Blitzkrieg Legend, The 1940 Campaign in the West" by Karl-Heinz Frieser, 1995, the official German history of the 1940 campaign, the term was used in Official German doctrinal manuals, but only as a discription of what a Combined Arms Offensive would accomplish, which "Blitzkrieg" is nothing more than using combined arms with the mobility of tanks putting into practice what their infantry were doing in WW I, but on a larger scale. Larger only because the tanks allowed mobility, so depth was achieved, and that success could be supported logistically and with follow on forces. Last and most important, after the penetration, the mobility allowed the Germans to get inside the Allies decision cycle. The Allies (France and England) were making a decision based in information (A), while in reality was they should have been making decisions based upon information (D). So they were always reacting too late to the situation, and it got worse and worse, till the Allied Command and Control system totally failed, and there was no coordinated effort to stop the Germans.