Andrew: Then in some cases it becomes a matter of timing? That’s the problem that France had in the mid 1930s—it knew where the threat was coming from and roughly what capabilities the adversary would have, but it overspent on preparedness at the expense of investment in future capability and when the war arrived in 1939 rather than 1936 they were caught with out of date forces. Isn’t there a tension between future and present forces?
When France was invaded in 1940, did Germany have superior tanks? No. Superior aircraft? No. Superior ships? No. How can France be accused overspending on preparedness when...they were not prepared? France was defeated because of poor leadership from the very top; poor command and control and poor military preparedness in whole military communities. That is: the very basics from general-staff planning down to platoon leadership. They had enough hardware. They spent enough on the military. They were not capable of making it work to win. Germany took a lot of casualties in the invasion of France while having superior training, tactics, and general-staff work. If you swapped weapons systems, Germany still would have won.
Moving along on other things, Jim brings up the failed idea of Defence spend as a percent of GDP. The only value proposition is how much money is available in existing federal budgets to be given to Defence. Hello. This is an entitlement society.
More: the Defence 2030 is a kick-the-can-down-the-road fantasy. What we need is pure, skilled, military thinking which is not present in today's entrenched Defence bureaucracy. What we have today is: "If it is expensive and involves the maximum amount of rent-seeking, it must be good."
That and a failed DMO are: the enemy within.
15 comments:
For that matter, most of the effective German tanks in the invasion of France were of Czech manufacturer.
The Germans did have superior aircraft and superior artillery (including the self-propelled assault guns like the StuG) along with superior infantry (particularly small arms).
Combined air and artillery superiority generally ensures battlefield success. The main problem for France was that French industry was excruciating slow to ramp up after 1936.
In particular, high velocity AT and AA guns were in very short supply.
As you highlight, the Allied military leadership failed to digest or as far as I know even seriously investigate the German campaign in Poland despite the presence of many Polish officers in the Allied camp.
I think the notion that the Germans could have successfully undertaken the invasion of France with French weaponry (none of which was well suited for offensive operations) is quite risible.
What the Germans really had was combined arms knowledge. As for the artillery, again that speaks more toward combined arms knowledge and how it was used. Some of the German aircraft were better but they had again the ability to use that in a combined arms way. The French doctrine, leadership, general-staff work, command and control and so on was bad. And even with that, the Germans took a lot of casualties.
The multi-faceted battering that France took in WW1, which was largely fought on French territory, is somewhat overlooked in the Davies/Molan discussion. France suffered huge casualties and destruction with a very big economic impact so rebuilding the nation was necessary over the following 2 decades and the quality of their military was impacted in the aftermath of WW1.
It is worth considering the economic status of Britain in April 1939 when their Treasury warned: 'If we were under the impression that we were as well able as in 1914 to conduct a long war we were burying our heads in the sand.'
These snippets from the book 1940 - MYTH AND REALITY. 'British industry was incapable of producing the range and quality of armaments required to win the war. Even those items that could be manufactured locally were heavily dependent on imports of raw materials and products such as steel. Most of these imports came from the United States and had to be paid for either in gold or in dollars. Under American legislation, Britain was prohibited from raising loans in the US as it had done to pay for goods in WW1...Earlier estimates had suggested that the (gold and dollar) reserves might last until June 1941, but massive new arms orders had been placed earlier in the summer...(Kingsley) Wood now estimated that they (reserves) would last another 3 or 4 months at most. Britain would be unable to carry on the war by its own efforts'.
Britain was then virtually broke, as are multiple nations of the world in Year 2013.
Arguably, Australia is in pretty parlous economic situation and will inevitably be impacted by any foreseeable worldwide economic slump. Despite having overspent prodigiously, the Gillard Government is now whingeing that government revenue has declined; yet the Prime Minister very recently declared we are still spending about 8 percent of revenue on national security (she was apparently referring to defence). And by the way, the Howard Government sold off two thirds of Australia's gold reserves in 1997.
Jim Molan continually refuses to accept that the Force 2030 vision has weakened the ADF by too much funding being wasted on largely unproven futuristic capabilities rather than maintaining continual adequate and credible military capacity to cope with short-notice contingencies. Australia could have a quite capable ADF if defence spending was pegged at 7.5 percent of government revenue (not GDP) and capabilities planning was better managed.
Marauder, and others, suggest you read "Hitler's Panzers, The Lightning Attacks, Dennis Showater.
The facts are a little different.
Re casualties,the Germans lost 50,000 killed.
The majority of tanks were German made and totally outclassed by the French tanks technically.
@ELP
Germany had a clear offensive doctrine and CONOPS ("schwerpunkt") that dictated certain types (artillery with good mobility and high rate of fire) and quality of weapons all of which they had been building and refining since 1933.
If your point is that good German leadership produced good doctrine and German industry was able to produce the types and qualities of weapons required to suport that doctrine then yes, I fully agree.
France had a good defensive doctrine but did not have the leadership (and possibly industrial wherewithal) needed to support that doctrine in terms of equipment.
Had war started in 1941, French industry might have had enough time to properly equip French forces. Oh the "might of beens" of WWII...
Which goes back to Andrews claim that France spent a lot on preparedness. No such thing happened as there was no credible military leadership and doctrine model to support such a claim. France was unprepared to defend their country.
Very perceptive point Bushranger, final paragraph. Well said.
"Australia could have a quite capable ADF if defence spending was pegged at 7.5 percent of government revenue (not GDP) and capabilities planning was better managed."
Indeed, that's sufficient investment to continually and adequately maintain and procure a 'good enough' modern fighting machine to cover multiple contingencies and deterrence capabilities, from just about everything except a martian assault landing.
Yes, it's about how Defence leadership spends and manages said generous annual cash funding. And yes, that 7.5pct Defence budget would still be able to procure a potent 'next-gen' Tactical fighter replacement for the legacy Hornet. On schedule.
With respect to Australia's vulnerability to any future external economic shock... if it was truly on a global scale of economic shock, then even China would be suffering heavily. So all would be in the same boat so to speak.
I would assert that German air power in 1939 was vastly superior to that of the French in quality, experience, and sheer numbers (the latter is a guess as the actual figures are not coming directly to mind). The 109 overmatched anything the French had to counter it. Even their best fighter D520 was it?) was inferior and available in very small numbers.
Should have said 1940, not 1939, I think. Sorry.
@anonymous
I've read the Showalter book but I don't see how it contradicts my analysis.
The German's suffered about a 5% casualty rate (KIA, WIA, MIA) and a 30%+ loss rate in material.
What the French tanks lacked was good mobility which is rather essential if your are trying to contain armored breakthroughs.
The Germans quickly established artillery superiority which enabled them to effectively suppress French AT defenses and break up French counter-attacks.
The Battle of France in 1940 parallels the Battle of France in 1944; in both cases, artillery and air superiority enabled a highly mobile armored force (largely made up of tanks with inferior armor and guns) to outflank, surround and annihilate a heavier armor force.
But ELP's point remains and one with which I agree; a lack of a coherent doctrine and quality leadership committed to seeing that doctrine realized contributed directly to France's defeat in WWII.
@alert1;
don't trust feelings. The numbers are out there, the standard work on this is Frieser's book:
http://books.google.de/books/about/The_Blitzkrieg_Legend.html?id=7Y0MxdP-ws4C&redir_esc=y
The French and British had general parity and were superior in many regards.
The difference in the air war was that the Luftwaffe's effort was focused on supporting the army's operation while the Allies held huge reserves and were not focused on anything.
Germany's position regarding tanks was one of inferiority in regard to raw characteristics, while having a better concept of their use, better training, quicker leadership and more radios.
German artillery wasn't substantially superior, albeit the French still had lots of less efficient 75 mm flight field guns.
It's true that the Germans used Czech tanks "in large numbers" in the 1940 campaign in France. However, my understanding is that the Czech chassis, (which apparently was very good, and very reliable, much moreso than most of the German tanks of that time), was mostly used to mount anti tank guns or as SP artillery, and both these were used to great effect, attached to highly mobile infantry units (aptly named 'storm troopers', a term borrowed from WW1).
The French did spend huge amounts on defence in the between wars period, but much if not most was spent on the infrastructure of Maginot Line defences, which proved to be almost useless.
Many think the French cut and run in 1940, but they were involved in some major fighting, inflicting quite heavy casualties on the Germans.
A little-known fact - they took 1000 Luftwaffe aircrew as prisoners in the May 1940 campaign, all of whom were released after the ceasefire and who returned to duty against the British later that same year in the BoB.
Edited to add: 1000 aircrew prisoners. When you consider that at least some must have died as well, that represents an awful lot of downed aeroplanes.
Marauder,you would have to have mobilty if all your tanks were under 10 tons in weight.
The casulties were horrendous.
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