Infantry Against Tanks 1941

[Bear]

I agree Bear. Just how good are your Russian units and leaders in 1941? Mine were never very good.

In fact, far from being good they we close to being the worst units and leaders of any army, at any time period in the entire war. Not the best of times to use the Molotov Cocktail. Of course that's when they were most prevalent.

CMBB gives them to the Russians all the way to 1945. That's a long stretch. If you are a scenario designer you can limit that use to better effect.

Good Hunting.

MR

I suggest reading Karl Schmidt aka Paul Carell, Hitler's War On Russia. U.S. Dept of the Army Pamphlet 20-269. German Defensive Doctrine on the Russian Front, U.S. Army Command and General Staff College. Manstein, Lost Victories and Guderian's, Panzer Leader. Geographia Atlas of the Second World War. i.e. 1.Moscow Motorized Division, equivalent to a Guards Division of hard core veterans stopped and bleed the 12.+17.Pz.Divisions (AGN + Center) for a week in July. Yeremenko had distributed over 10,000 Molotov Cocktails along the Borisov - Orsha front line units in July. Matter of fact, in rare form, Stalin PROMOTED the commander of 1.Moscow Motor, General Kreyser (yes, Prussian heritage). Guderian was taken aback after the German debacle at Shlobin on 6 July 1941 when German tanks advanced into Shlobin without recon or strong infantry support. And then there's Brest - Litovsk, the Soviet troops there fought from June to August 1941; someone forgot to tell then it was a lost cause? German field officers are unified in their view that the Russian infantry were the most dangerous troops they'd ever encountered. "They fought on even after their commanders had surrendered". Model, Manstein, Guderian all mentioned that by September 1941 the Russian soldier was holding the line, fighting behind German lines and even infiltrating, they agreed separately that Barbarossa was not going to succeed. This is before the winter and mud which is the often used scapegoat. All those scenarios with green and conscript OB do a disservice to our Soviet allies and historical truth in general. And it important remember that we're talking about a glass bottle holding gasoline with or without "improvements" and throwing it ten meters or less at a tank and sometimes under fire...a very ballsy thought, eh. "The more the merrier", I'd carry a Molotov from S'grad to Berlin, just in case.