The defining characteristic of what is commonly known as “Blitz” is a highly mobile form of mechanized warfare. This photo was taken during operations along the Terek River in 1942. The Terek River (Терек თერგი Tergi; Терек Terek, Chechen, Терк Terk) is a major River in the

Blitzkrieg (‘lightning war’ in German; listen (help·info)) is a popular name for an offensive operational-level military doctrine which involves an initial bombardment followed by the employment of motorized mobile forces attacking with speed and surprise to prevent an enemy from implementing a coherent defense. Military doctrine is the concise expression of how military forces contribute to campaigns major operations Battles and engagements It is a guide Defence The founding principles of these types of operations were developed in the 20th century by various nations, and adapted in the years after World War I, largely by the German Wehrmacht, to incorporate modern weapons and vehicles as a method to help avoid the stalemate of trench warfare and linear warfare in future conflicts. World War I (abbreviated WWI; also known as the First World War, the Great War, and the War to End All Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany ( ˈbʊndəsʁepuˌbliːk ˈdɔʏtʃlant is a Country in Central Europe. Wehrmacht (literally "defense force" was the name of the unified Armed forces of Germany from 1935 to 1945 Modern weapons is a subjective term used to describe the array of weapons available to a given society at any point in History that represents significant qualitative or increased Trench warfare is a form of warfare where both combatants have fortified positions and fighting lines are static A front line is a line of confrontation in an Armed conflict, most commonly a War. The first practical implementations of these concepts coupled with modern technology were instituted by the Wehrmacht in the opening theatres of World War II. World War II, or the Second World War, (often abbreviated WWII) was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including

The strategy was particularly effective to Germany in the invasions of Western Europe and initial operations in the Soviet Union. In World War II, the Battle of France, also known as the Fall of France, was the German invasion of France and the Low Countries Operation Barbarossa ( Unternehmen Barbarossa) was the Codename for Nazi Germany 's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II These operations were dependent on surprise penetrations, general enemy unpreparedness and an inability to react swiftly enough to German offensive operations.

Definition and methods

Video illustrating the principle of Blitzkrieg: http://static3.filefront.com/ffv6/player/vp_embed.swf?v=628609&autorun=true

The Junkers Ju 87 "Stuka" dive bomber provided close air support for advancing German ground forces during the invasions of Poland, France and the Soviet Union. The Junkers Ju 87 or Stuka (from Stu rz' ka' mpfflugzeug, " Dive bomber " was a two-seat (pilot and rear gunner In Military tactics, close air support ( CAS) is defined as air action by fixed or rotary winged aircraft against hostile targets that are in close proximity to

The generally accepted definition of blitzkrieg operations include the use of manoeuvre rather than attrition to defeat an opponent, and describe operations using combined arms, concentration of mobile assets at a focal point, armour closely supported by mobile infantry, artillery, and close air support assets. Maneuver warfare, also spelled manoeuvre warfare, is the term used by military theorists for a concept of Warfare that advocates attempting to This article is about the military strategy For the Israeli-Egyptian conflict see War of Attrition, for the game theoretical model see War of attrition (game Combined arms is an approach to Warfare which seeks to integrate different arms of a Military to achieve mutually complementary effects The Infantry is the oldest and most numerous of the Combat Arms in the Armed forces, and consists Artillery (from French artillerie) is a military Combat Arm which employs any apparātus machine In Military tactics, close air support ( CAS) is defined as air action by fixed or rotary winged aircraft against hostile targets that are in close proximity to These tactics required sheer speed, specialized support vehicles, new methods of communication, new tactics, and an effective decentralized command structure. Military tactics ( Greek: Taktikē, the art of organizing an army are the techniques for using weapons or military units in combination for engaging and defeating In a Military context the chain of command is the line of authority and responsibility along which orders are passed within a Military unit and between different Broadly speaking, blitzkrieg operations required the development of mechanized infantry, self-propelled artillery and engineering assets that could maintain the rate of advance of fast tanks. Mechanized infantry (or "mech infantry" are Infantry equipped with Armored personnel carriers (APCs or Infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs Self-propelled Artillery (also called mobile artillery or locomotive artillery) vehicles are a way of giving mobility to Artillery. German forces avoided direct combat in favor of interrupting an enemy's communications, decision-making, logistics and morale. Communication is the process of conveying information from a sender to a receiver with the use of a medium in which the communicated information is understood the same way Decision making can be regarded as an outcome of mental processes ( cognitive process) leading to the selection of a course of action among several alternatives Logistics is the management of the flow of Goods, Information and other resources including Energy and people between the point of origin and the point Morale, also known as esprit de corps when discussing the morale of a group is an intangible term used for the capacity of people to maintain Belief in In combat, blitzkrieg left little choice for the slower defending forces but to clump into defensive pockets that were encircled and then reduced by slower-moving German infantry reserves. Encirclement is a military term for the situation when a force or target is isolated and surrounded by enemy forces

Once the point of attack was identified, the schwerpunkt (‘focus point’, literally ‘heavy point’), tactical bombers, and motorised artillery units struck at enemy defences. This avoided the setup time and revealing nature of field artillery. These bombardments were then followed by probing attacks to reveal defensive detail and allow the most effective employment of the main armoured spearhead and combined arms groups. An armoured spearhead (US English armored spearhead) is a formation of Armoured fighting vehicles mostly Tanks that form the front of an offensive thrust Combined arms is an approach to Warfare which seeks to integrate different arms of a Military to achieve mutually complementary effects The goals were the deepest possible penetration and minimal engagement, while avoiding an enemy counterattack. A counterattack Once the main force broke through the designated strike area, motorized infantry would then fan out behind the armoured spearhead to capture or destroy any enemy forces encircled by panzer(tanks) and mechanised infantry units, and to prevent flanking attacks. A panzer, pronunced, is a German Tank, especially in the context of World War II. In Military tactics, a flanking maneuver, also called a flank attack, is an attack on the sides of an opposing force Less mobile infantry were designated for "mopping up" operations or to participate in the initial breakthrough.

Etymology and modern meaning

Blitzkrieg is a German compound literally meaning ‘lightning war’, but in context blitz(schnell) is a synonym for rush, quick or fast (in contrast to Stellungskrieg, ‘trench warfare’). The word did not enter official terminology of the Wehrmacht either before or during the war, even though it was already used in the military Journal Deutsche Wehr in 1935, in the context of an article on how states with insufficient food and raw materials supply can win a war. Another appearance is in 1938 in Militär-Wochenblatt, where Blitzkrieg is defined as a ‘strategic attack’, carried out by operational use of tanks, air force, and airborne troops. Karl-Heinz Frieser in his book Blitzkrieg-Legende, who researched the origin of the term and found the above examples, points out that the pre-war use of the term is rare and that it practically never entered official terminology throughout the war. ^[1]

It was first popularised in the English-speaking world by the American newsmagazine Time describing the 1939 German invasion of Poland. A newsmagazine, also spelled news magazine, is usually a weekly Magazine featuring articles or segments on current events Time (trademarked in capitals as TIME) is a weekly American Newsmagazine, similar to Newsweek and The Invasion of Poland (1939 precipitated World War II. It was carried out by Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, and a small German-allied Published on September 25, 1939, well into the campaign, the account reads:

Military historians have defined blitzkrieg as the employment of the concepts of maneuver and combined arms warfare developed in Germany during both the interwar period and the Second World War. Military history is a Humanities discipline within the scope of general historical recording of armed conflict in the history of humanity Strategically, the ideal was to swiftly effect an adversary's collapse through a short campaign fought by a small, professional army. Operationally, its goal was to use indirect means, such as mobility and shock, to render an adversary's plans irrelevant or impractical. To do this, self-propelled formations of tanks; motorized infantry, engineers, artillery; and ground-attack aircraft operated as a combined-arms team. A tank is a tracked, Armoured fighting vehicle designed for Front-line combat which combines Operational mobility and tactical Ground-attack aircraft are military aircraft designed to attack targets on the ground and are often deployed as Close air support for and in proximity to their own ground forces Combined arms is an approach to Warfare which seeks to integrate different arms of a Military to achieve mutually complementary effects Historians have termed it a period form of the longstanding German principle of Bewegungskrieg, ‘movement war’. Maneuver warfare, also spelled manoeuvre warfare, is the term used by military theorists for a concept of Warfare that advocates attempting to

Blitzkrieg has since been extended to express multiple meanings in popular use. From its original military definition, blitzkrieg may be applied to any military operation emphasizing the surprise, speed, or concentration stressed in accounts of the Invasion of Poland. This article describes three distinct but related terms military operations Operations as military events and operational level of war During the war, the Luftwaffe terror bombings of London came to be known as the Blitz. ( German 'luftvafe is a generic German term for an Air force. Terror bombing is a strategy of deliberately bombing and/or Strafing civilian targets in order to break the Morale of the enemy make its civilian population panic London ( ˈlʌndən is the capital and largest urban area in the United Kingdom. The Blitz was the sustained bombing of Britain by Nazi Germany between 7 September 1940 and 10 May 1941 in World War II. Similarly, blitz has come to describe the rush tactic of American football, and the blitz form of chess in which players are allotted very little time. In American football or Canadian football, a blitz or red dog is a team defensive maneuver in which one or more Linebackers or Defensive American football, known in the United States and Canada simply as football, is a competitive Team sport known for mixing strategy with Fast chess, also known as blitz chess, lightning chess, bullet chess and rapid chess, is a type of Chess game in which each side is Blitz or blitzkrieg are used in many other non-military contexts.

Interwar years

Reichswehr

Blitzkrieg's immediate development began with Germany's defeat in the First World War. Shortly after the war, the new Reichswehr created committees, within the Truppenamt, of veteran officers to evaluate 57 issues of the war. The Reichswehr ( German for "National Defence" formed the military organisation of Germany from 1919 until 1935 when it was The Truppenamt or 'Troop Office' was the cover organisation for the German General Staff from 1919 through until 1933 when the General Staff was re-created The German General Staff ( Großer Generalstab literally Great General Staff) was an institution whose rise and development gave the German military a decided ^[3] The reports of these committees formed doctrinal and training publications which were the standards by the time of the Second World War. The Reichswehr was influenced by its analysis of pre-war German military thought, in particular its infiltration tactics of the war, and the maneuver warfare which dominated the Eastern Front. In Warfare infiltration tactics involve small lightly-equipped Infantry forces attacking enemy rear areas while bypassing enemy front-line strongpoints and isolating The Eastern Front was a theatre of war during World War I in Central and primarily Eastern Europe.

German military history had been influenced heavily by Carl von Clausewitz, Alfred von Schlieffen and von Moltke the Elder, who were proponents of maneuver, mass, and envelopment. Carl Philipp Gottlieb von Clausewitz (ˈklaʊzəvɪts ( July 1, 1780 – November 16, 1831) was a Prussian soldier military historian Helmuth Karl Bernhard Graf After the Franco-Prussian War Moltke superintended the preparation of its history which was published between 1874 and 1881 by the great general staff Their concepts were employed in the successful Franco-Prussian War and attempted “knock-out blow” of the Schlieffen Plan. The Franco-Prussian War or Franco-German War, often referred to in France as the 1870 War ( 19 July, 1870 — 10 May, 1871 For the French counter-plan see Plan XVII The Schlieffen Plan was the German General Staff 's early 20th century overall strategic Following the war, these concepts were modified by the Reichswehr in the light of WWI experience. Its Chief of Staff, Hans von Seeckt, moved doctrine away from what he argued was an excessive focus on encirclement towards one based on speed. Hans von Seeckt ( 22 April 1866 - 27 December 1936) was a German military officer noted for his organization of the German Army Encirclement is a military term for the situation when a force or target is isolated and surrounded by enemy forces Speed gives surprise, surprise allows exploitation if decisions can be reached quickly and mobility gives flexibility and speed.

Von Seeckt advocated effecting breakthroughs against the enemy's centre when it was more profitable than encirclement or where encirclement was not practical. Under his command a modern update of the doctrinal system called Bewegungskrieg and its associated leadership system called Auftragstaktik was developed which resulted in the popularly known blitzkrieg effect. Mission-type tactics ( German: Auftragstaktik, from Auftrag and Taktik" also known as Mission Command in the US have (arguably been a central He additionally rejected the notion of mass which von Schlieffen and von Moltke had advocated. While reserves had comprised up to four-tenths of German forces in pre-war campaigns, von Seeckt sought the creation of a small, professional (volunteer) military backed by a defense-oriented militia. The term militia is commonly used today to refer to a military force composed of ordinary Citizens to provide defense emergency law enforcement or Paramilitary service In modern warfare, he argued, such a force was more capable of offensive action, faster to ready, and less expensive to equip with more modern weapons. The Reichswehr was forced to adopt a small and professional army quite aside from any German plans, for the Treaty of Versailles limited it to 100,000 men. The Treaty of Versailles was one of the peace treaties at the end of World War I.

Bewegungskrieg required a new command hierarchy that allowed military decisions to be made closer to the unit level. This allowed units to react and make effective decisions faster, which is a critical advantage and a major reason for the success of blitzkrieg.

German leadership had also been criticized for failing to understand the technical advances of the First World War, having given tank production the lowest priority and having conducted no studies of the machine gun prior to that war. This article is about the history of the Tank. The prehistory of the tank The problem of advancing to attack while under fire is as old as For other uses of the phrase see Machine Gun (disambiguation. ^[4] In response, German officers attended technical schools during this period of rebuilding after the war. Technical school is a general term used for Two-year college which provide mostly Employment -preparation skills for trained labor, such as Welding

Infiltration tactics invented by the German Army during the First World War became the basis for later tactics. In Warfare infiltration tactics involve small lightly-equipped Infantry forces attacking enemy rear areas while bypassing enemy front-line strongpoints and isolating German infantry had advanced in small, decentralised groups which bypassed resistance in favour of advancing at weak points and attacking rear-area communications. This was aided by co-ordinated artillery and air bombardments, and followed by larger infantry forces with heavy guns, which destroyed centres of resistance. These concepts formed the basis of the Wehrmacht's tactics during the Second World War. Wehrmacht (literally "defense force" was the name of the unified Armed forces of Germany from 1935 to 1945

On Eastern Front of World War I, combat did not bog down into trench warfare. Trench warfare is a form of warfare where both combatants have fortified positions and fighting lines are static German and Russian armies fought a war of maneuver over thousands of miles, giving the German leadership unique experience which the trench-bound Western Allies did not have. ^[5] Studies of operations in the East led to the conclusion that small and coordinated forces possessed more combat worth than large, uncoordinated forces.

Foreign influence

During this period, all the war's major combatants developed mechanized force theories. The official doctrines of the Western Allies differed substantially from those of the Reichswehr. British, French, and American doctrines broadly favored a more prepared set-piece battle, using mechanized forces to maintain the impetus and momentum of an offensive. There was less emphasis on combined arms, deep penetration or concentration. In short, their philosophy was not too different from that which they had at the outset of World War 1. Early Reichswehr periodicals contained many translated works, though they were often not adopted. Technical advances in foreign countries were, however, observed and used in-part by the Weapons Office. Foreign doctrines are widely considered to have had little serious influence. ^[6]

Col. Charles de Gaulle, in France, was a known advocate of concentration of armor and airplanes. Charles André Joseph Marie de Gaulle ( ( 22 November 1890 – 9 November 1970) was a French General and statesman who led the Free French This article is about the country For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic France topics. His opinions were expressed in his book, Vers l'Armée de Métier (Towards the Professional Army). Like von Seeckt, he concluded that France could no longer maintain the huge armies of conscripts and reservists with which World War I had been fought, and sought to use tanks, mechanised forces and aircraft to allow a smaller number of highly trained soldiers to have greater impact in battle. His views little endeared him to the French high command, but are claimed by some to have influenced Heinz Guderian. Heinz Wilhelm Guderian ( 17 June, 1888 – 14 May, 1954) was a military theorist and innovative General of the German [1]

British theorists J.F.C. Fuller and Captain B. H. Liddell Hart have often been associated with blitzkrieg's development, though this is a matter of controversy. Major-General John Frederick Charles Fuller, CB, CBE, DSO, commonly J Sir Basil Henry Liddell Hart ( 31 October 1895 &ndash 29 January 1970) usually known before his knighthood as

It is alleged that General Heinz Guderian, a critical figure in blitzkrieg's conception, drew some of his inspiration from Liddell Hart. Heinz Wilhelm Guderian ( 17 June, 1888 – 14 May, 1954) was a military theorist and innovative General of the German This is based on a paragraph in the English edition of Guderian's autobiography in which he credits Liddell Hart. It is argued, however, that Liddell Hart, as editor of the autobiography's English edition, wrote that paragraph himself or, more broadly, that his influence on Guderian was not as significant as held. This is further supported by the fact that the controversial paragraph is missing in other language versions.

During the war, Fuller developed plans for massive, independent tank operations and was subsequently studied by the German military. It is variously argued that Fuller's wartime plans and post-war writings were an inspiration, or that his readership was low and German experiences during the war received more attention. The fact that the Germans saw themselves latterly as losers may be linked to the root and branch review, learn and rewrite of all Army doctrine and training manuals by senior and experienced officers, the UK's response was much weaker. ^[7] (The British War Office did permit an Experimental Mechanized Force, formed on 1 May 1927, that was wholly motorized, including self propelled artillery and motorized engineers. Events 305 - Diocletian and Maximian retire from the office of Roman Emperor. The Birch Gun was the world's first really practical Self-propelled artillery gun built at the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich )

What is clear is the practical implementation of this doctrine in a wide and successful range of scenarios by Guderian and other Germans during the war. From early combined-arms river crossings and penetration exploitations during the advance in France in 1940 to massive sweeping advances in Russia in 1941, Guderian showed a mastery and innovation that inspired many others. This leadership was supported, fostered and institutionalised by his supporters in the Reichswehr General Staff system, which worked the Army to greater and greater levels of capability through massive and systematic Movement Warfare war games in the 1930s.

The Reichswehr and Red Army collaborated in war games and tests in Kazan and Lipetsk beginning in 1926. The Red Army ( Russian: Рабоче-Крестьянская Красная Армия R aboche- K rest'yanskaya K rasnaya A rmiya A military exercise (also called war game in American English) is the employment of military resources in training for Military operations either exploring Kazan (Каза́нь Казан tt Qazan) is the capital city of the Republic of Tatarstan, Russia, and one of Russia's largest cities Lipetsk (Ли́пецк is a city located in the Central Federal District of Russia. During this period, the Red Army was developing the theory of Deep operations, which would guide Red Army doctrine throughout World War II. Deep operations was a military doctrine developed by the Soviet Union for its armed forces during the 1920s and 1930s Set within the Soviet Union, these two centers were used to field test aircraft and armored vehicles up to the battalion level, as well as housing aerial and armored warfare schools through which officers were rotated. This was done in the Soviet Union, in secret, to evade the Treaty of Versailles's occupational agent, the Inter-Allied Commission. The term Military Inter-Allied Commission of Control was used in a series of various peace Treaties concluded after the First World War (1914&ndash1918 between ^[8]

Some precursors of blitzkrieg style were used in the First World War – most notably by General Alexei Brusilov in Russia's Brusilov Offensive of 1916 and Britain's General Allenby in the Battle of Megiddo in September 1918. Aleksei Alekseevich Brusilov (Алексе́й Алексе́евич Бруси́лов ( – March 17, 1926) was a Russian general most noted for the development The Brusilov Offensive (Брусиловский прорыв was the Russian Empire 's greatest feat of arms during World War I, and among the Most lethal Field Marshal Edmund Henry Hynman Allenby 1st Viscount Allenby GCB GCMG GCVO ( April 23 1861 - May 14 1936 The Battle of Megiddo of September 19 - 21, 1918, and its subsequent exploitation was the culminating victory in British General Both relied on achieving surprise; Brusilov by merely omitting the usual clumsy preparations, Allenby by laboriously painting a false intelligence picture for the enemy commanders. Brusilov pioneered the use of infiltration by small groups of specially-picked infantry to dislocate enemy artillery and headquarters; the Germans themselves used a variation of such tactics in their 1918 Spring Offensive. The 1918 Spring Offensive or Kaiserschlacht ( Kaiser's Battle) and also known as the Ludendorff Offensive was a series of German attacks along the Allenby used cavalry to seize railway and communication centres deep in the enemy rear, unhinging the entire defence, while aircraft disrupted enemy lines of communication and thwarted counter-moves.

A comparatively less-discussed development was the recognition by Allied industrial and political figures (rather than military leaders), that maintenance of momentum required new methods and equipment. Realising that armies based on horsed transport and relying on telephones for communications were not able to maintain an advance faster than the defenders could move reserves to a threatened sector and construct new defensive lines, the British Ministry of Munitions under Winston Churchill was seeking in 1918 to develop mechanical means of achieving this. Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, KG, OM, CH, TD, FRS, PC, PC (Can ( 30 November 1874 They planned to construct large numbers of vehicles with cross-country mobility, but the war ended before their efforts bore fruit. ^[9]

Guderian in the Wehrmacht

Following Germany's military reforms of the 1920s, Heinz Guderian emerged as a strong proponent of mechanized forces. Heinz Wilhelm Guderian ( 17 June, 1888 – 14 May, 1954) was a military theorist and innovative General of the German Within the Inspectorate of Transport Troops, Guderian and colleagues performed theoretical and field exercise work. There was opposition from many officers who gave primacy to the infantry or simply doubted the usefulness of the tank. Among them was Chief of the General Staff Ludwig Beck (1935–38), who was skeptical that armored forces could be decisive. Ludwig August Theodor Beck (29 June 1880 &ndash 21 July 1944 was a German General and the Chief of the General Staff of the Oberkommando des Heeres Nonetheless, the panzer divisions were established during his tenure.

General Guderian argued that the tank was the decisive weapon of war. "If the tanks succeed, then victory follows", he wrote. In an article addressed to critics of tank warfare, he wrote "until our critics can produce some new and better method of making a successful land attack other than self-massacre, we shall continue to maintain our beliefs that tanks—properly employed, needless to say—are today the best means available for land attack. " Addressing the faster rate at which defenders could reinforce an area than attackers could penetrate it during the First World War, Guderian wrote that "since reserve forces will now be motorized, the building up of new defensive fronts is easier than it used to be; the chances of an offensive based on the timetable of artillery and infantry co-operation are, as a result, even slighter today than they were in the last war. " He continued, "We believe that by attacking with tanks we can achieve a higher rate of movement than has been hitherto obtainable, and—what is perhaps even more important—that we can keep moving once a breakthrough has been made. "^[10] Guderian additionally required that tactical radios be widely used to facilitate co-ordination and command by having one installed in all tanks. Radio is the transmission of signals by Modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible Light.

Organization of a 1941 German panzer division. Panzerwaffe ( German for "Armoured Force" or "Armoured Arm"

After becoming head of state in 1934, Adolf Hitler ignored the Versailles Treaty provisions. Hi and welcome to Wikipedia! Please understand that this article is frequently vandalized and vandalism is reverted immediately A command for armored forces was created within the German Wehrmacht—the Panzertruppe, as it came to be known later. Wehrmacht (literally "defense force" was the name of the unified Armed forces of Germany from 1935 to 1945 Panzerwaffe ( German for "Armoured Force" or "Armoured Arm" The Luftwaffe, the German air force, was re-established, and development begun on ground-attack aircraft and doctrines. ( German 'luftvafe is a generic German term for an Air force. Hitler was a strong supporter of this new strategy. He read Guderian's book Achtung! Panzer! and upon observing armored field exercises at Kummersdorf he remarked “That is what I want—and that is what I will have. Kummersdorf is the name of an estate near Luckenwalde at, around 25km south of Berlin, in the Brandenburg region of Germany. ”^[11]

Guderian's blitzkrieg

Heinz Guderian probably was the first who fully developed and advocated the principle of blitzkrieg. Heinz Wilhelm Guderian ( 17 June, 1888 – 14 May, 1954) was a military theorist and innovative General of the German He summarized the tactics of blitzkrieg as the way to get the mobile and motorized armored divisions to work together and support each other in order to achieve decisive success. In his book, Panzer Leader, p 13, he said,

Guderian believed that certain development in technology must be developed in conjunction with blitzkrieg to support the entire theory; especially in communications with which the armored divisions, and tanks especially should be equipped (Wireless Communications). Guderian insisted in 1933 to the high command that every tank in the German armored force must be equipped with radio. Radio is the transmission of signals by Modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible Light. ^[12]

Spanish Civil War

German volunteers first used armor in live field conditions during the Spanish Civil War of 1936. The Spanish Civil War was a major conflict in Spain that started after an attempted Coup d'état committed by parts of the army against the government of Armor commitments consisted of Panzer Battalion 88, a force built around three companies of PzKpfw I tanks that functioned as a training cadre for Nationalists. The Panzer I is a Light tank which was produced in Germany in the 1930s The Luftwaffe deployed squadrons of fighters, dive-bombers, and transports as the Condor Legion. A fighter aircraft is a Military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat with other Aircraft, as opposed to a Bomber, which is designed A dive bomber is a Bomber aircraft that Dives directly at its targets in order to provide greater accuracy and limit the exposure to and effectiveness of The Condor Legion (Legion Condor was a unit composed of "volunteers" from the German Air Force ( Luftwaffe) which served with the Nationalist ^[13] Guderian called the tank deployment “on too small a scale to allow accurate assessments to be made. ”^[14] The true test of his “armored idea” would have to wait for the Second World War. However, the German Air Force also provided volunteers to Spain to test both tactics and aircraft in combat, including the first combat use of the Stuka. The Junkers Ju 87 or Stuka (from Stu rz' ka' mpfflugzeug, " Dive bomber " was a two-seat (pilot and rear gunner

Methods of operations

Schwerpunkt

Blitzkrieg sought decisive actions at all times. To this end, the theory of a schwerpunkt (focal point) developed; it was the point of maximum effort. Ground, mechanised and Luftwaffe forces were used only at this point of maximum effort whenever possible. ( German 'luftvafe is a generic German term for an Air force. By local success at the schwerpunkt, a small force achieved a breakthrough and gained advantages by fighting in the enemy's rear. It is summarized by Guderian as “Nicht kleckern, klotzen!” (Don't fiddle, smash!)

To achieve a breakout, armored forces would attack the enemy's defensive line directly, supported by their own infantry (Panzergrenadiers), artillery fire and aerial bombardment in order to create a breach in the enemy's line. Through this breach the tanks could break through without the traditional encumbrance of the slow logistics of a pure infantry regiment. The breaching force never lost time by “stabilising its flanks” or by regrouping; rather it continued the assault in towards the interior of the enemy's lines, sometimes diagonally across them. This point of breakout has been labeled a “hinge”, but only because a change in direction of the defender's lines is naturally weak and therefore a natural target for blitzkrieg assault.

In this, the opening phase of an operation, air forces sought to gain superiority over enemy air forces by attacking aircraft on the ground, bombing their airfields, and seeking to destroy them in air to air combat.

A final element was the use of airborne forces beyond the enemy lines in order to disrupt enemy activities and take important positions (such as Eben Emael). Eben-Emael was a Belgian fortress between Liège and Maastricht, near the Albert Canal, defending the Belgian-German border While the taking of the position does not constitute part of blitzkrieg, the disruptive effect this can cause in combination with earlier elements would fit well.

Paralysis

Having achieved a breakthrough into the enemy's rear areas, German forces attempted to paralyze the enemy's decision making and implementation process. Moving faster than enemy forces, mobile forces exploited weaknesses and acted before opposing forces could formulate a response. Guderian wrote that “Success must be exploited without respite and with every ounce of strength, even by night. The defeated enemy must be given no peace. ”

Central to this is the decision cycle. Decision cycle refers to the continual use of mental and physical processes by an entity to reach and implement Decisions Within the United States military a theory of Every decision made by German or opposing forces required time to gather information, make a decision, disseminate orders to subordinates, and then implement this decision through action. Through superior mobility and faster decision-making cycles, mobile forces could take action on a situation sooner than the forces opposing them.

Directive control was a fast and flexible method of command. Mission-type tactics ( German: Auftragstaktik, from Auftrag and Taktik" also known as Mission Command in the US have (arguably been a central Rather than receiving an explicit order, a commander would be told of his superior's intent and the role which his unit was to fill in this concept. The exact method of execution was then a matter for the low-level commander to determine as best fit the situation. Staff burden was reduced at the top and spread among commands more knowledgeable about their own situation. In addition, the encouragement of initiative at all levels aided implementation. As a result, significant decisions could be effected quickly and either verbally or with written orders a few pages in length.

Kesselschlacht

An operation's final phase, the Kesselschlacht (literally ‘kettle battle’), was a concentric attack on an encircled force. It was here that most losses were inflicted upon the enemy, primarily through the capture of prisoners and weapons. The term saw heavy use during the Russian campaign, where the Russian defenders drew together into isolated pockets of resistance while the German armies swept past them without engaging, in order to get to Moscow as soon as possible before the Russian winter set in. The Russian (or Soviet) Winter is a common excuse for military failures of invaders in Russia Later this proved to be their downfall, as the Russian pockets surrendered en masse, leading to an influx of POWs, and depleting German supplies.

Effect on civilians

Blitzkrieg tactics often affected civilians in a way perceived by some to be negative — sometimes intentionally, and sometimes not. Whereas more traditional conflict resulted in a well-defined, slow moving front line, giving civilians time to be evacuated, the new approach did not allow for this.

Operations in history

Poland, 1939

In Poland, fast moving armies encircled Polish forces (blue circles), but the blitzkrieg idea never really took hold – artillery and infantry forces acted in time-honoured fashion to crush these pockets.

Despite the term blitzkrieg being coined during the Invasion of Poland of 1939, historians generally hold that German operations during it were more consistent with more traditional methods. The Invasion of Poland (1939 precipitated World War II. It was carried out by Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, and a small German-allied The Wehrmacht's strategy was more inline with Vernichtungsgedanken, or a focus on envelopment to create pockets in broad-front annihilation. Vernichtungsgedanke, literally meaning "concept of annihilation" in German and generally taken to mean "the concept of fast annihilation of enemy forces" Panzer forces were deployed among the three German concentrations without strong emphasis on independent use, being used to create or destroy close pockets of Polish forces and seize operational-depth terrain in support of the largely un-motorized infantry which followed. Polish Land Forces (Wojska Lądowe RP is a branch of Poland 's Armed Forces. The Luftwaffe gained air superiority by a combination of superior technology and numbers.

The understanding of operations in Poland has shifted considerably since the Second World War. Many early postwar histories incorrectly attribute German victory to “enormous development in military technique which occurred between 1918 and 1940”, incorrectly citing that “Germany, who translated (British inter-war) theories into action. . . called the result Blitzkrieg. ”^[15] More recent histories identify German operations in Poland as relatively cautious and traditional. Matthew Cooper wrote that

He went on to say that the use of tanks “left much to be desired. . . Fear of enemy action against the flanks of the advance, fear which was to prove so disastrous to German prospects in the west in 1940 and in the Soviet Union in 1941, was present from the beginning of the war. ”^[17] John Ellis further asserted that “. John Ellis may refer to Politics Sir John Ellis 1st Baronet (1829&ndash1912 British Member of Parliament for Mid Surrey 1884&ndash1885 Kingston . . there is considerable justice in Matthew Cooper's assertion that the panzer divisions were not given the kind of strategic mission that was to characterize authentic armored blitzkrieg, and were almost always closely subordinated to the various mass infantry armies. ”^[18]

In fact, “Whilst Western accounts of the September campaign have stressed the shock value of the panzers and Stuka attacks, they have tended to underestimate the punishing effect of German artillery on Polish units. Mobile and available in significant quantity, artillery shattered as many units as any other branch of the Wehrmacht. ”^[19]

France 1940

Main article: Battle of France

The German invasion of France, with subsidiary attacks on Belgium and the Netherlands, consisted of two phases, Operation Yellow (Fall Gelb) and Operation Red (Fall Rot). In World War II, the Battle of France, also known as the Fall of France, was the German invasion of France and the Low Countries The Kingdom of Belgium is a Country in northwest Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts its headquarters as well as those The Netherlands ( Dutch:, ˈnedərlɑnt is the European part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, which consists of the Netherlands the Netherlands In World War II, the Battle of France, also known as the Fall of France, was the German invasion of France and the Low Countries During World War II, Fall Rot ( Case Red in German was the second phase of the conquest of France by the German Army begun on 5 June, 1940 Yellow opened with a feint conducted against the Netherlands and Belgium by two armoured corps and paratroopers. Paratroopers are Soldiers trained in Parachuting and generally operate as part of an airborne force. The Germans had massed the bulk of their armoured force in Panzer Group von Kleist, which attacked through the comparatively unguarded sector of the Ardennes and achieved a breakthrough at Sedan with air support. For the political subdivision of France see Ardennes (department.

The group raced to the coast of the English Channel at Abbeville, thus isolating the British Expeditionary Force, Belgian Army, and some divisions of the French Army in northern France. The British Expeditionary Force ( BEF) was the British army sent to the Western Front in France and Belgium on the outbreak of The Land Component (French Composante Terre, Dutch Landcomponent) formerly the Belgian Army, is the land-based service of the Belgian The French Army, officially the Armée de Terre (Land Army is the land-based component of the French Armed Forces and its largest The armoured and motorized units under Guderian and Rommel initially advanced far beyond the following divisions, and indeed far in excess of that with which German high command was initially comfortable. When the German motorized forces were met with a counterattack at Arras, British tanks with heavy armour (Matilda I & IIs) created a brief panic in the German High Command. The Battle of Arras (1940 took place during the Battle of France, in the early stages of World War II. The armoured and motorized forces were halted, by Hitler, outside the port city of Dunkirk which was being used to evacuate the Allied forces. Dunkirk ( French: Dunkerque, dœ̃kɛʀk or; Dutch:; is a harbour city and a commune in the northernmost part of France, in the Hermann Göring had promised his Luftwaffe would complete the destruction of the encircled armies but aerial operations did not prevent the evacuation of the majority of Allied troops (which the British named Operation Dynamo); some 330,000 French and British were saved. The Dunkirk evacuation, codenamed Operation Dynamo by the British was the Evacuation of Allied soldiers from the beaches and harbour of Dunkirk

Overall, Yellow succeeded beyond almost anyone's wildest dreams, despite the claim that the Allies had 4,000 armoured vehicles and the Germans 2,200, and the Allied tanks were often superior in armour and calibre of cannon. ^[20] It left the French armies much reduced in strength (although not demoralised), and without much of their own armour and heavy equipment. Operation Red then began with a triple-pronged panzer attack. The XV Panzer Corps attacked towards Brest, XIV Panzer Corps attacked east of Paris, towards Lyon, and Guderian's XIX Panzer Corps completed the encirclement of the Maginot Line. Brest (bʁɛst in French, in Breton) is a city in the Finistère department in Bretagne in northwestern France. ||-||} Lyon, also known as Lyons in English is a city in east-central France. The Maginot Line (IPA, Ligne Maginot named after French Minister of Defense André Maginot, was a line of concrete Fortifications tank obstacles artillery The defending forces were hard pressed to organize any sort of counter-attack. The French forces were continually ordered to form new lines along rivers, often arriving to find the German forces had already passed them.

Ultimately, the French army and nation collapsed after barely two months of blitzkrieg operations, in contrast to the four years of trench warfare of the First World War.

North Africa, 1940–43

When Italy entered the war in 1940, a large Italian force faced the British Western Desert Force under Richard O'Connor on the frontier between Egypt and Libya. The Western Desert Force, during World War II, was a British Commonwealth army unit stationed in Egypt. General Sir Richard Nugent O'Connor KT, GCB, DSO & Bar, MC, ADC ( 21 August 1889 &ndash This article is about the country of Egypt For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Egypt topics. Libya ( ليبيا ar-Latn Lībiyā; Libyan vernacular: Lībya; Amazigh:) officially the Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab The British force included a substantial mechanised contingent, the Mobile Force (Egypt). Desert Rats redirects here For other meanings see Desert rat. The concepts of operations of the Mobile Force had been worked out by its former commander, Percy Hobart, a comparatively little-known theorist of armoured operations. The British Commander in Chief in the Middle East, General Archibald Wavell, had been a staff officer under Allenby in Palestine and had extensively analysed his operations. Field Marshal Archibald Percival Wavell 1st Earl Wavell GCB, GCSI, GCIE, CMG, MC, PC (5 May 1883 – 24 May

In Operation Compass, launched in December 1940, O'Connor's forces effectively destroyed the Italian armies in Libya. Operation Compass was the first major Allied military operation of the Western Desert Campaign during World War II. The British mobile force several times outflanked and isolated the Italian front line troops, and ultimately drove across the desert to intercept and capture the retreating Italians at Beda Fomm. Operation Compass was the first major Allied military operation of the Western Desert Campaign during World War II. At this point, British forces were diverted to campaigns in Greece and elsewhere, being replaced by comparatively inexperienced units, and German armoured forces under Erwin Rommel landed in Africa to reinforce the Italians. Erwin Johannes Eugen Rommel ( ( 15 November 1891 – 14 October 1944) (also known as the " Desert Fox " Wüstenfuchs Rommel launched a blitzkrieg offensive which destroyed many British armoured formations and drove the remaining forces back towards Egypt and the starting point of Operation Compass. The offensive was only halted when Rommel's forces were unable to capture fortress of Tobruk near the Egyptian border. The Siege of Tobruk was a lengthy confrontation between Axis and Allied forces in North Africa during the Western Desert Campaign of World War Tobruk possessed an excellent port that could have been used to drastically shorten Rommel's drawn out supply lines. Without Tobruk any further advance would have risked strategic collapse. Rommel's forces besieged Tobruk and he lost the momentum of his offensive.

From this point onwards, pure blitzkrieg operations played less part. The resulting battles in the open desert terrain have been compared to naval encounters, rather than land battles. The great distances involved imposed logistical limitations on movements, and made it difficult to seize any objective which would cripple the enemy ability to resist.

The large British armoured force which mounted Operation Crusader, the final attempt to relieve Tobruk in late 1941, had a vague mission which amounted to seeking out and destroying Rommel's armoured forces. Operation Crusader ( 18 November &ndash 30 December 1941) was the third the largest the longest and ultimately successful attempt to relieve the 1941 Rommel, having temporarily knocked out many British armoured formations, did launch an armoured raid into the British rear areas in an attempt to induce a strategic collapse among his opponents but this did not occur and he was forced to withdraw. Once again, British forces were diverted from the Middle East (on Japan's entry into the war), and once again the German Afrika Korps mounted a small-scale blitzkrieg counterattack which recovered most of the ground lost in Crusader. The German Afrikakorps ( German: Deutsches Afrikakorps DAK) was the original German blocking force (Sperrverband = Armored Blocking Force in Libya Rommel's subsequent attack against the British rear at the Battle of Gazala failed, and nearly left his forces stranded and isolated. The Battle of Gazala was an important battle of the World War II Western Desert Campaign, fought around the port of Tobruk in Libya from In the event, Rommel was able to restore his position, capture Tobruk and advance far into Egypt as a result of British failures at a tactical, rather than strategic level. Supply problems and stiff resistance at the El Alamein position, the last defensive line before Alexandria and the Nile, halted Rommel's forces. Rommel's last attempted blitzkrieg operation in Egypt, the Battle of Alam el Halfa, failed because the Allies had plenty of warning of his intentions through ULTRA decryption of German signals, and even “canalised” his advance into a head-on attack against dug-in British forces. The Battle of Alam el Halfa took place between August 30 and September 5, 1942 south of El Alamein during the Western Desert Campaign of ULTra ("Urban Light Transport" is a Personal rapid transit system from Advanced Transport Systems Ltd a company based in Cardiff, Wales.

Most of the subsequent Allied offensives were set-piece battles, with little attempt at pursuit. Rommel had one final opportunity to use blitzkrieg methods in Tunisia, when a spoiling attack launched at Kasserine resulted in the collapse of the American front. The Tunisia Campaign (also known as the Battle of Tunisia was a series of World War II battles that took place in Tunisia in the North African Campaign The Battle of Kasserine Pass took place in World War II during the Tunisia Campaign. Denied reinforcements to exploit the opening, the Germans rejected the option to advance deep into the Allied rear. The Americans were reinforced and were able to rally, and subsequent German attacks were indecisive. The North African campaign ended with a final Allied set-piece attack which broke through the lines in front of Tunis. Tunis ( Arabic: تونس Tūnis) is the Capital of the Tunisian Republic and also the Tunis

Soviet Union: the Eastern Front: 1941–42

After 1941–42, armoured formations were increasingly used as a mobile reserve against Allied breakthroughs. The black arrows depict armoured counter-attacks.

Use of armored forces was crucial for both sides on the Eastern Front. Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, involved a number of breakthroughs and encirclements by motorized forces. Operation Barbarossa ( Unternehmen Barbarossa) was the Codename for Nazi Germany 's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR was a constitutionally Socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991 Its stated goal was “to destroy the Russian forces deployed in the West and to prevent their escape into the wide-open spaces of Russia. ”^[21] This was generally achieved by four panzer armies which encircled surprised and disorganized Soviet forces, followed by marching infantry which completed the encirclement and defeated the trapped forces. The first year of the Eastern Front offensive can generally be considered to have had the last successful major blitzkrieg operations. The Eastern Front of World War II (die Ostfront 1941-1945, der Rußlandfeldzug 1941-1945 (Russian campaign or der Ostfeldzug 1941-1945 (Eastern Campaign

After Germany's failure to destroy the Soviets before the winter of 1941, the strategic failure above the German tactical superiority became apparent. Although the German invasion successfully conquered large areas of Soviet territory, the overall strategic effects were more limited. The Red Army was able to regroup far to the rear of the main battle line, and eventually defeat the German forces for the first time in the Battle of Moscow. The Red Army ( Russian: Рабоче-Крестьянская Красная Армия R aboche- K rest'yanskaya K rasnaya A rmiya The Battle of Moscow (Битва под Москвой Romanized: Bitva pod Moskvoy, Schlacht um Moskau is the name given by the Soviet historians to the two

In the summer of 1942, when Germany launched another offensive in the southern USSR against Stalingrad and the Caucasus, the Soviets again lost tremendous amounts of territory, only to counter-attack once more during winter. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR was a constitutionally Socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991 The Caucasus ( also referred to as North Caucasus) is a geopolitical region located between Europe Asia & Middle East German gains were ultimately limited by Hitler diverting forces from the attack on Stalingrad itself and seeking to pursue a drive to the Caucasus oilfields simultaneously as opposed to subsequently as the original plan had envisaged. Hi and welcome to Wikipedia! Please understand that this article is frequently vandalized and vandalism is reverted immediately

The Jagdtiger, one of the most formidable German tank destroyers. The Panzerjäger Tiger Ausf B Jagdtiger (Sd Kfz 186 was a German Tank destroyer (self-propelled anti tank A self-propelled anti-tank gun or tank destroyer, is a type of Armoured fighting vehicle designed specifically to engage enemy armor forces and not produced for an infantry These specialised vehicles traded mobility for firepower and protection, reflecting the defensive and non-blitzkrieg nature of German operations in the second half of the war.

Western Front, 1944–45

As the war progressed, Allied armies began using combined arms formations and deep penetration strategies that Germany had used in the opening years of the war. Many Allied operations in the Western Desert and on the Eastern Front relied on massive concentrations of firepower to establish breakthroughs by fast-moving armoured units. These artillery-based tactics were also decisive in Western Front operations after Operation Overlord and both the British Commonwealth and American armies developed flexible and powerful systems for utilizing artillery support. Operation Overlord was the code name for the invasion of northwest Europe during World War II by Allied forces What the Soviets lacked in flexibility, they made up for in number of multiple rocket launchers, cannon and mortar tubes. The Germans never achieved the kind of response times or fire concentrations their enemies were capable of by 1944.

After the Allied landings at Normandy, Germany made attempts to overwhelm the landing force with armored attacks, but these failed for lack of co-ordination and Allied air superiority. The most notable attempt to use deep penetration operations in Normandy was at Mortain, which exacerbated the German position in the already-forming Falaise Pocket and assisted in the ultimate destruction of German forces in Normandy. Operation Lüttich was a German counterattack during the Battle of Normandy, taking place around the American positions near Mortain from August 7&mdashAugust During August 1944 the Falaise pocket was the area between the four towns of Trun, Argentan, Vimoutiers and Chambois near Falaise The Mortain counter-attack was effectively destroyed by U. S. 12th Army Group with little effect on its own offensive operations.

The Allied offensive in central France, spearheaded by armored units from George S. Patton's Third Army, used breakthrough and penetration techniques that were essentially identical to Guderian's prewar “armoured idea. For the 19th century Scottish jurist/politician see George Patton Lord Glenalmond. ” Patton acknowledged that he had read both Guderian and Rommel before the war, and his tactics shared the traditional cavalry emphasis on speed and attack. Erwin Johannes Eugen Rommel ( ( 15 November 1891 – 14 October 1944) (also known as the " Desert Fox " Wüstenfuchs A phrase commonly used in his units was “haul ass and bypass. ”

Germany's last offensive on its Western front, Operation Wacht am Rhein, was an offensive launched towards the vital port of Antwerp in December 1944. The Ardennes Offensive (16 December 1944 – 25 January 1945 was a major German offensive launched towards the end of World War II through the forested Ardennes Mountains ||-||-||-||} Antwerp ( Dutch:, French: Anvers) is a City and Municipality in Belgium and the capital of the Launched in poor weather against a thinly-held Allied sector, it achieved surprise and initial success as Allied air power was stymied by cloud cover. However, stubborn pockets of defence in key locations throughout the Ardennes, the lack of serviceable roads, and poor German logisitics planning caused delays. For the political subdivision of France see Ardennes (department. Allied forces deployed to the flanks of the German penetration, and Allied aircraft were again able to attack motorized columns. However, the stubborn defense of US units and German weakness led to a defeat for the Germans.

Asia 1942–1945

The terrain and logistical infrastructure in the areas of Asia in which Japanese forces were engaged presented far fewer opportunities for wide-ranging mechanised operations, but a few battles were noted for fast-moving attacks which resulted in the dislocation of the defences.

In the Battle of Malaya in early 1942, Japanese forces with air superiority and spearheaded by a tank regiment, rapidly drove British Commonwealth forces back down the length of the peninsula, aided by outflanking operations launched from the sea. The Battle of Malaya was a campaign fought by Allied and Japanese forces in Malaya, from December 8 1941 to January 31 The rapid Japanese offensive into Burma spearheaded by tanks and motorised forces in the same year also caused the Allied defence to collapse, although disunity of Allied command was also a factor. The Burma Campaign in the South-East Asian Theatre of World War II was fought primarily between British Commonwealth, Chinese and United

In the Battle of Central Burma in 1945, the British Fourteenth Army (enjoying air supremacy) launched an armoured and mechanised offensive which captured the major communication centre of Meiktila behind the Japanese lines by surprise. The concurrent Battle of Meiktila and Battle of Mandalay were decisive battles near the end of the Burma Campaign. The British Fourteenth Army was a multinational force comprising units from Commonwealth countries during World War II. Meiktila is a town in Mandalay Division, Myanmar; its population was 252305 in 1901 and it is located at 20°53'N 95°53' E There was no strategic collapse, but the attempted Japanese counter-attack was made at a strategic and tactical disadvantage. The Japanese were forced to break off the battle and withdraw from most of Burma.

In Operation August Storm, the Soviet invasion of Japanese-occupied Manchuria, the Russians made their major attack via a route the Japanese had thought impossible for armoured forces to traverse. The Russians very rapidly overran vast areas, and surrounded most Japanese forces in besieged towns. The Japanese were thinly stretched in static garrisons, and had very few resources with which to counter the Russian attacks.

Limitations and countermeasures

Environment

The concepts associated with the term blitzkrieg – deep penetrations by armour, large encirclements, and combined arms attacks – were largely dependent upon terrain and weather conditions. Where the ability for rapid movement across “tank country” was not possible, armoured penetrations were often avoided or resulted in failure. Terrain would ideally be flat, firm, unobstructed by natural barriers or fortifications, and interspersed with roads and railways. If it was instead hilly, wooded, marshy, or urban, armour would be vulnerable to infantry in close-quarters combat and unable to break out at full speed. Additionally, units could be halted by mud (thawing along the Eastern Front regularly slowed both sides) or extreme snow. Artillery observation and aerial support was also naturally dependent on weather. It should however be noted that the disadvantages of such terrain could be nullified if surprise was achieved over the enemy by an attack through such terrain. During the Battle of France, the German blitzkrieg-style attack on France went through the Ardennes. There is little doubt that the hilly, heavily-wooded Ardennes could have been relatively easily defended by the Allies, even against the bulk of the German armoured units. However, precisely because the French thought the Ardennes as unsuitable for massive troop movement, particularly for tanks, they were left with only light defences which were quickly overrun by the Wehrmacht. The Germans quickly advanced through the forest, knocking down the trees the French thought would impede this tactic.

Air superiority

Ilyushin Il-2, formidable Soviet ground attack aircraft that specialized in destroying German armor

Allied air superiority became a significant hindrance to German operations during the later years of the war. Ground-attack aircraft are military aircraft designed to attack targets on the ground and are often deployed as Close air support for and in proximity to their own ground forces Air superiority is the dominance in the Air power of one side's air forces over the other side's during a Military campaign. Early German successes enjoyed air superiority with unencumbered movement of ground forces, close air support, and aerial reconnaissance. However, the Western Allies' air-to-ground aircraft were so greatly feared out of proportion to their actual tactical success, that following the lead up to Operation Overlord German vehicle crews showed reluctance to move en masse during daylight. Operation Overlord was the code name for the invasion of northwest Europe during World War II by Allied forces Indeed, the final German blitzkrieg operation in the west, Operation Wacht am Rhein, was planned to take place during poor weather which grounded Allied aircraft. The Ardennes Offensive (16 December 1944 – 25 January 1945 was a major German offensive launched towards the end of World War II through the forested Ardennes Mountains Under these conditions, it was difficult for German commanders to employ the “armoured idea” to its envisioned potential.

Counter-tactics

General Stanisław Maczek, Polish general, one of the early developers of anti-blitzkrieg tactics

Blitzkrieg was very effective against static defense doctrines that most countries developed in the aftermath of the First World War. General Stanisław Maczek ( March 31, 1892 &ndash December 11, 1994) was the most Early attempts to defeat the blitzkrieg can be dated to the Invasion of Poland in 1939, where Polish general Stanisław Maczek, commander of 10th Motorized Cavalry Brigade, prepared a detailed report of blitzkrieg tactics, its usage, effectiveness and possible precautions for the French military from his experiences. The Invasion of Poland (1939 precipitated World War II. It was carried out by Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, and a small German-allied General Stanisław Maczek ( March 31, 1892 &ndash December 11, 1994) was the most However, the French staff disregarded this report (it was captured, unopened, by the German army). Later, Maczek would become one of the most successful Allied armoured forces commanders in the war.

During the Battle of France in 1940, De Gaulle's 4th Armour Division and elements of the British 1st Army Tank Brigade in the British Expeditionary Force both made probing attacks on the German flank, actually pushing into the rear of the advancing armored columns at times (see Battle of Arras ). In World War II, the Battle of France, also known as the Fall of France, was the German invasion of France and the Low Countries Charles André Joseph Marie de Gaulle ( ( 22 November 1890 – 9 November 1970) was a French General and statesman who led the Free French The Battle of Arras (1940 took place during the Battle of France, in the early stages of World War II. This may have been a reason for Hitler to call a halt to the German advance. Those attacks combined with Maxime Weygand's Hedgehog tactic would become the major basis for responding to blitzkrieg attacks in the future: deployment in depth, permitting enemy forces to bypass defensive concentrations, reliance on anti-tank guns, strong force employment on the flanks of the enemy attack, followed by counter-attacks at the base to destroy the enemy advance in detail. Maxime Weygand ( 21 January 1867 - 28 January 1965) (vɛgɑ̃ was a French military commander in World War I and World In Warfare the hedgehog defence is a military tactic for defending against a mobile armoured attack or Blitzkrieg. Holding the flanks or “shoulders” of a penetration was essential to channeling the enemy attack, and artillery, properly employed at the shoulders, could take a heavy toll of attackers. While Allied forces in 1940 lacked the experience to successfully develop these strategies, resulting in France's capitulation with heavy losses, they characterized later Allied operations. For example, at the Battle of Kursk the Red Army employed a combination of defense in great depth, extensive minefields, and tenacious defense of breakthrough shoulders. The Battle of Kursk (Курская битва refers to a series of German and Soviet operations on the Eastern Front of World War II The Red Army ( Russian: Рабоче-Крестьянская Красная Армия R aboche- K rest'yanskaya K rasnaya A rmiya In this way they depleted German combat power even as German forces advanced. In August 1944 at Mortain, stout defense and counterattacks by the US and Canadian armies closed the Falaise Gap. In the Ardennes, a combination of hedgehog defense at Bastogne, St Vith and other locations, and a counterattack by the US 3rd Army were employed.

The US doctrine of massing high-speed tank destroyers was not generally employed in combat since few massed German armor attacks occurred by 1944. A self-propelled anti-tank gun or tank destroyer, is a type of Armoured fighting vehicle designed specifically to engage enemy armor forces and not produced for an infantry

Furthermore blitzkrieg is very vulnerable to an enemy that puts a great emphasis on anti-tank warfare and on anti-aircraft weaponry, especially if the side employing blitzkrieg is unprepared. Anti-tank refers to any method of combating military Armored fighting vehicles notably Tanks The most common anti-tank systems An example being the beginning phase of Yom Kippur War; the Israeli tank were decimated by Egyptian infantry who were heavily equipped with RPGs and AT-3 Sagger missiles and Israeli Air Force suffered tremendous losses due to SA-6 Gainful missiles, against whom they had not proper countermeasures. The Yom Kippur War, Ramadan War or October War (מלחמת יום הכיפורים transliterated: Milkhemet Yom HaKipurim or מלחמת יום A tank is a tracked, Armoured fighting vehicle designed for Front-line combat which combines Operational mobility and tactical The 9K11 Malyutka ( Russian: Малютка little or tiny baby is the ( NATO reporting name: AT-3 Sagger is an MCLOS wire-guided The Israeli Air Force ( IAF; Hebrew: זרוע האויר והחלל Zroa HaAvir VeHahalal, "Air and Space Arm" commonly known as חיל Only with a radical doctrinal and tactical change (see Battle of the Chinese Farm) were the Israelis able to break through Egyptian lines and win the war. The Battle of the Chinese Farm was fought on October 15-16 1973 as part of the Yom Kippur War 's Operation Gazelle, the Israeli plan to strike the

Logistics

Although effective in quick campaigns against Poland and France, blitzkrieg could not be sustained by Germany in later years. Blitzkrieg strategy has the inherent danger of the attacking force overextending its supply lines, and the strategy as a whole can be defeated by a determined foe who is willing and able to sacrifice territory for time in which to regroup and rearm, as the Soviets did on the Eastern Front (as opposed to for example the Dutch who had no territory to sacrifice). Military supply chain management is a cross-functional approach to procuring, producing and delivering products and services The broad Tank and vehicle production was a constant problem for Germany; indeed, late in the war many panzer "divisions" had no more than a few dozen tanks. ^[22] As the end of the war approached, Germany also experienced critical shortages in fuel and ammunition stocks as a result of Anglo-American strategic bombing and blockade. Fuel is any material that is burned or altered in order to obtain energy Ammunition, often referred to as ammo, is a generic term derived from the French language la munition which Strategic bombing is a Military strategy used in a Total war with the goal of defeating an enemy nation-state by destroying its economic ability to wage war rather Although production of Luftwaffe fighter aircraft continued, they would be unable to fly for lack of fuel. What fuel there was went to panzer divisions, and even then they were not able to operate normally. Of those Tiger tanks lost against the United States Army, nearly half of them were abandoned for lack of fuel. Tiger I ( is the common name of a German heavy Tank of World War II. ^[23]

Influence

Blitzkrieg's widest influence was within the Western Allied leadership of the war, some of whom drew inspiration from the Wehrmacht's approach. In general allies are people groups or nations that have joined together in an association for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose United States General George S. Patton emphasized fast pursuit, the use of an armored spearhead to effect a breakthrough, and then cutting off and disrupting enemy forces prior to their flight. For the 19th century Scottish jurist/politician see George Patton Lord Glenalmond. In his comments of the time, he credited Guderian and Rommel's work, notably Infantry Attacks, for this insight. He also put into practice the idea attributed to cavalry leader Nathan Bedford Forrest, "git thar fustest with the mostest" (get there first, with the most forces). Nathan Bedford Forrest ( July 13, 1821 &ndash October 29, 1877) was a lieutenant general in the Confederate Army during

Blitzkrieg also has had some influence on subsequent militaries and doctrines. The Israel Defense Forces may have been influenced by blitzkrieg in creating a military of flexible armored spearheads and close air support. The Israel Defense Forces ( IDF) (צְבָא הַהֲגָנָה לְיִשְׂרָאֵל, lit In Military tactics, close air support ( CAS) is defined as air action by fixed or rotary winged aircraft against hostile targets that are in close proximity to ^[24] The Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 is also considered as a modern example of blitzkrieg-style assault by Indian forces that ended in a swift defeat of Pakistan, within a fortnight. The Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 was a major military conflict between India and Pakistan. ^[25] The 1990s United States theorists of "Shock and awe" claim blitzkrieg as a subset of strategies which they term "rapid dominance". Shock and awe, technically known as rapid dominance, is a military doctrine based on the use of overwhelming power dominant battlefield awareness dominant maneuvers and spectacular

It may also be argued that Napoleon Bonaparte used some form of blitzkrieg tactic when conquering Europe a century prior to the invasion of Poland by Adolf Hitler. Napoleon Bonaparte (15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821 was a French military and political leader who had a significant impact on the History of Europe.

Changing interpretation

Beginning in the 1970s, the interpretation of blitzkrieg, particularly with respect to the Second World War, has undergone a shift in the historical community. John Ellis described the shift:

Our perception of land operations in the Second World War has. John Ellis may refer to Politics Sir John Ellis 1st Baronet (1829&ndash1912 British Member of Parliament for Mid Surrey 1884&ndash1885 Kingston . . been distorted by an excessive emphasis upon the hardware employed. The main focus of attention has been the tank and the formations that employed it, most notably the (German) panzer divisions. Despite the fact that only 40 of the 520 German divisions that saw combat were panzer divisions (there were also an extra 24 motorised/panzergrenadier divisions), the history of German operations has consistently almost exclusively been written largely in terms of blitzkrieg and has concentrated almost exclusively upon the exploits of the mechanized formations. Even more misleadingly, this presentation of ground combat as a largely armored confrontation has been extended to cover Allied operations, so that in the popular imagination the exploits of the British and Commonwealth Armies, with only 11 armored divisions out of 73 (that saw combat), and of the Americans in Europe, with only 16 out of 59, are typified by tanks sweeping around the Western Desert or trying to keep up with Patton in the race through Sicily and across northern France. Of course, these armored forces did play a somewhat more important role in operations than the simple proportions might indicate, but it still has to be stressed that they in no way dominated the battlefield or precipitated the evolution of completely new modes of warfare. ^[26]

Ellis, as well as Zaloga in his study of the Polish Campaign in 1939, points to the effective use of other arms such as artillery and aerial firepower as equally important to the success of German (and later, Allied) operations. Panzer operations in Russia failed to provide decisive results; Leningrad never fell despite an entire Panzer Group being assigned to take it, nor did Moscow. In 1942, panzer formations overstretched at Stalingrad and in the Caucasus, and what successes did take place – such as Manstein at Kharkov or Krivoi Rog – were of local significance only.

See also

• AirLand Battle, blitzkrieg-like doctrine of US Army in 1980s
• Armored warfare
• Attrition warfare
• The Blitz, the Luftwaffe air raids on London
• Combined arms
• Deep Battle, the period Soviet concept of warfare
• Maneuver warfare, battle doctrine of speed and strategic movement
• Methodical Battle, the period French concept of warfare
• Rush (computer and video games), an RTS strategy influenced by blitzkrieg
• Shock and Awe, the 21st century American military doctrine
• Vernichtungsgedanken, or 'annihilation thoughts', one of blitzkrieg predecessors
• Mission-type tactics, tactical battle doctrine of delegation and initiative stimulation

References

Further reading

External links

• House, Jonathan M. (1985) Toward Combined Arms Warfare : A Survey of 20th-Century Tactics, Doctrine, and Organization. Fort Leavenworth/Washington: U. S. Army Command and General Staff College
• Sinesi, Michael Patrick (2001) Modern Bewegungskrieg: German Battle Doctrine, 1920-1940. Thesis submitted to The Faculty of Columbian School of Arts and Sciences of The George Washington University in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts; directed by Andrew Zimmerman, Assistant Professor of History. (Microsoft Word document).